List of Contributors to Volume V. REV. JOSEPH AGAR BEET, D.D. E. N. BENNETT, M.A. REV. PROF. W. H. BENNETT, M.A. REV. A. A. Burd, M.A. RICHT. REV. G. A. CHADWICK, D.D., Lord Bishop of Derry and Raphoe. REV. PROF. T. K. CHEYNE, D.D. F. C. CONYBEARE, M.A. THE LATE REV. R. W. DALE, D.D., LL.D. REV. PROF. MARCUS DODS, D.D. REV. A. M. FAIRBAIRN, D.D., LL.D. REV. PROF. R. A. FALCONER, D.D. REV. PROF. G. G. FINDLAY, M.A. PROF. J. RENDEL HARRIS, M.A. W. R. INGE, M.A. REV. PROF. E. KÖNIG, D.D. REV. G. MARGOLIOUTH, M.A. REV. G. MATHESON, M.A, D.D., F.R.S.E. REV. J. B. MAYOR, M.A. REV. PROF. TH. NÖLDEKE, D.D. REV. PROF. JAMES ORR, D.D. PROF. W. M. RAMSAY, D.C.L., LL.D. REV. PROF. A. ROBERTS, D.D. REV. PROF. J. A. ROBINSON, D.D. REV. D. M. Ross, M.A. REV. JAMES STALKER, D.D. REV. H. CLAY TRUMBULL, D.D. REV. J. H. WILKINSON, M.A. THE EXPOSITOR. EDITED BY THE REV. W. ROBERTSON NICOLL, M.A., LL.D. FIFTH SERIES. Volume V. London: HODDER AND STOUGHTON, 27, PATERNOSTER ROW. MDCCCXCVII. "THE MIND OF THE MASTER." THIS is a superficially attractive and a deeply disappointing book. It has such gift of phrase that one thinks it might easily have been a work of art, but it is not. And it has such flashes of insight that one looks to it for fresh and real teaching, but gets nothing of the sort. Let us linger for a moment with the style, meaning thereby the expression of thought, and not such slips as that by which in the first sentence of chapter viii. a verb is left without a nominative. There is an unpleasant flavour of Renan, in his most sugary mood, in the expression which tells us about Jesus "in a moment of fine inspiration" (p. 117). Of course, if this expresses Dr. Watson's settled opinion, it is not with the style that we must quarrel. But if he believes (as we gladly think he does) that the Spirit in His organic completeness abode upon "abode upon" Jesus, that the words which He spake were not His own, but as He heard He spoke; that as long as He was in the world He was the light of the world; that He whom God sent spoke the words of God because God gave not the Spirit unto Him by measure; that He was one with His discourse (Σὺ τίς εἶ; . . . Τὴν ἀρχὴν Ő, TI Kai λaλŵ iuîv, John viii. 25), being Himself the Word, the Truth, and the true Light,-in that case, to speak of "moments of fine inspiration," as if inspiration ebbed and flowed in the breast of Jesus, is not only nonsense, but very mischievous nonsense indeed. What is in question is not the Kévwois, but the efficient equipment of the Logos. It is our hope that such expressions (and we shall find many such) do not indicate erroneous doctrine, but only defective grasp on doctrine; that they are the utterance of a man of TOL. V. 1 I 253707 |