Wisdom from Charles Spurgeon on Critics & the Bible

 “Believe in the inspiration of Scripture, and believe it in the most intense sense…. If you adopt theories which pare off a portion here, and deny authority to a passage there, you will at last have no inspiration left, worthy of the name.

“If this book be not infallible, where shall we find infallibility? We have given up the Pope, for he has blundered often and terribly; but we shall not set up instead of him a horde of little popelings fresh from college. Are these correctors of Scripture infallible? Is it certain that our Bibles are not right, but that the critics must be so? The old silver is to be depreciated; but the German silver, which is put in its place, is to be taken at the value of gold. Striplings fresh from reading the last new novel correct the notions of their fathers, who were men of weight and character. Doctrines which produced the godliest generation that ever lived on the face of the earth are scouted as sheer folly.

 “But where shall infallibility be found? "The depth saith, it is not in me"; yet those who have no depth at all would have us imagine that it is in them; or else by perpetual change they hope to hit upon it. Are we now to believe that infallibility is with learned men? Now, Farmer Smith, when you have read your Bible, and have enjoyed its precious promises, you will have, to-morrow morning, to go down the street to ask the scholarly man at the parsonage whether this portion of the Scripture belongs to the inspired part of the Word, or whether it is of dubious authority. It will be well for you to know whether it was written by the Isaiah, or whether it was by the second of the "two Obadiahs." All possibility of certainty is transferred from the spiritual man to a class of persons whose scholarship is pretentious, but who do not even pretend to spirituality. We shall gradually be so bedoubted and becriticized, that only a few of the most profound will know what is Bible, and what is not, and they will dictate to all the rest of us. I have no more faith in their mercy than in their accuracy: they will rob us of all that we hold most dear, and glory in the cruel deed.

 “This same reign of terror we shall not endure, for we still believe that God revealeth himself rather to babes than to the wise and prudent, and we are fully assured that our own old English version of the Scriptures is sufficient for plain men for all purposes of life, salvation, and godliness. We do not despise learning, but we will never say of culture or criticism: "These be thy gods, O Israel!"

Source: Charles H. Spurgeon, “The Greatest Fight in the World,” taken from the Spurgeon Archive online at spurgeon.org

Comments

[JWarton]

This quote is great, but it is not about textual criticism. Spurgeon is denouncing higher criticism.

Dear JWarton,
To a large extent we agree with you, although we think it is debatable whether the higher critics and lower critics necessarily remain in their separate camps. Too often, one seems to invade the other. All that to say, we have modified the title. Instead of "Textual Criticism," we have now changed it to "Critics & the Bible," which we believe is more accurate. Thanks for your comment. NOTR