Encyclopedia of sacred theology - pagina 387

Chap.

II]

AND OUR CONSCIOUSNESS

THIS PRINCIPIUM

and that not merely

363

content but also itsfonn sprang from

its

the principium speeiale,

i.e.

from that special action which

has gone out from God to our sinful race, in order to The distinction of course discover Himself to the sinner. between these two actions of the Holy Spirit must ever

even more sharply than our fathers were For by their summary exposition accustomed to do this. they gave some occasion for the idea, that it were almost indifferent whether in earlier ages a real revelation had ever taken place, so long as w^e but had the Scripture. With a too high estimate of the chart which was drawn of the country, the country itself at times seemed a superfluity. In this way spiritual intellectualism was fed, and oftentimes

be kept in view

;

the reality of history was sacrificed to a barren abstraction. The representation of a Bible dictated word for word did

not originate from it, but was materially advanced by it an error which of course cannot be overcome, except first the :

inspiration that operated in the revelation itself be separately considered,

and then

a proper representation be given

of the inspiration that operated in and with the compilation But however strongly of the canon of the Holy Scripture.

we emphasize

the

that

real

inspiration of

the Scripture

must be carefully distinguished from the inspiration revelation as

entirely

dissimilar,

yet this

may

of the

never be

taken as though the one action of the Spirit stood in no Both, indeed, are expressions organic relation to the other. of the one will of God, to grant to our race, lost in sin, a central Revelation, and to bring this central Revelation within the reach of

all

ages and people.

For the simple believer

it is,

therefore,

by no means neces-

sary to consider this distinction, provided he makes no dogma of his own thoughtless representation, and with this dogma,

formulated on his own authority, resists the accurate repreITow tlie central Revelation has come, concerns sentation. the believer only in so far as it must be to him the fruit of the

of

—

of God, and of that God in His grace. enough if the Holy Scripture is but the Word The HeidelGod's grace, by which he may live and die. (/race

of Grod

It is quite

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