The Social Teaching of the Bible. Edited by Samuel E.
Keeble. (Robert Culley. 2s. net.)—The plan of this book is that various writers, thirteen in number, all members, we are told, of the Wesleyan Methodist Social Union, have taken portions of the Bible, and set forth their significance in relation to human life on its social aide. The conclusions at which they arrive fall into two divisions, historical and didactic. Of course we do not mean to draw a sharp line of division between the two. When a writer has explained what the Pentateuch, to take one instance, teaches us as to the social life of the period or periods to which it belongs, we may learn from what he says much that has a present-day application. But this present-day application is sometimes direct, and, we feel bound to say, not always judicious. Dr. 3. H. Moulton tells us that "killing is murder, even when flags are waved round it, and national honour is is-apposed to be secured by it." This seems to us very foolish talk Mr. I. Ernest Rattenbury, again, has a very eloquent exposition of the subject in con- nexion with the Apocalypse; but surely he is talking wildly when he declares that the "modern social order cries, 'Long live King Mammon" That there is much mammon-worship who would deny? But he must know very little about history who thinks that the "modern social order" is worse in this respect than the ancient. Compare the Britain of to-day, with its altruistic energies, public and private, with what we know of Carthage. On the other hand, we find chapters of the greatest value in Mr. Bedele's "Social History of the Hebrew People," Mr. Lofthouse's "Social Teaching of the Hebrew Law," and in what Dr. Findlay has to say about St. Paul from the same point of view. Dr. H. M. Hughes deals with a subject too much neglected in "The Social Teaching of the Hebrew Apocrypha." Altogether, the volume abounds with valuable matter. The practical energy of the Wesleyan body is well known ; here we see a most satisfactory proof of its excellent intellectual equipment.
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