BISHOP COLENSO AND THE PENTATEUCH.
LTO THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."]
SIR,—Though so appreciative to one side of the character of the late Bishop Colenso, I cannot think that your late notice does full justice to that aspect under which his name became most widely known. His book on the Pentateuch, you say, "excited much more interest than it deserved, and really only proved what all genuine scholars knew,—that the historical part of the Pentateuch is a human composition, by no means exempt from error." Undoubtedly, it proved only what all genuine scholars knew,—what, indeed, you might have said all unpre- judiced and attentive readers knew; it merely pointed out what all human beings might have discovered for themselves who read the ancient records of the Hebrew race with the same impartial, disinterested attention as any other. But did they do this ? Was Dr. Colenso assailing an obsolete superstition, when, twenty years ago, hepointed out that the Bible contained un- questionable error ? Was it a statement which required no courage ? Was he denounced, in requital, by fanatics and bigots alone ? Surely these questions answer themselves.
I can hardly think you mean that Dr. Colenso had not, as a fact, a great effect on popular opinion. It does not seem to me open to question that there has been a difference in the tone of all reference to Scripture since he wrote, but perhaps you mean That the difference is not a valuable one. He was blamed at tie time for writing a book designed neither "to instruct the
educated" nor "to edify the uneducated," but simply to spread the truth, as far as he discerned it. I should say that the whole merit of the book was that it discarded this distinction of the educated who were to be instructed and the uneducated who were to be edified, and took it for granted that error was bad for all. When he wrote, ordinary, common-place people were either irreligious, or they believed that. every word in a book from which you might derive a sanction for almost every crime was dictated by the Holy Spirit, and some of the best of men sanctioned a delusion they could not have shared. Since that pretence has been discarded (of course, I do not mean that this has been the result of what Dr. Colenso wrote, or, indeed, of any single influence), it has been possible for ordinary • people who were not scho]ars and critics to recognise that the Bible is the history of a Divine revelation. We discern that which is divine, when we discern that which is not divine, and for practical result it matters little whether you say that every word in a book is of supreme value, or that every word is worthless. The Bible is a sealed book, to those who dare not discern error in it ; our love for it should show itself in gratitude to those who, in pointing out its mis- takes, bring that wonderful history into the light of day.—I am,
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