142 QUAKER ASPECTS OF TRUTH 



are absolutely out of harmony with all the rest of His 

 teaching* I know of no instance more flagrant or more 

 deplorable of an isolated text of Scripture being constantly 

 used to prove what is obviously untrue* 



** But/^ some will say, ** how about the wars of the 

 Jews ? Surely they were directly ordained by God ? ** 

 Well ! We live in the twentieth century, when the 

 higher criticism and the theory of evolution have alike 

 become orthodox* And in such an age I think that this 

 argument should scarcely need refutation* Surely it 

 is obvious that in the Old Testament we have the teach- 

 ing of Jesus in process of evolution* The Apostle Paul 

 clearly recognises this fact when he says : ** The law 

 was our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ.** I well 

 remember, when I was at school, we used to be taught 

 that the word here translated schoolmaster, is the Greek 

 word, ** paidagogos/* and that the paidagogos was not 

 really the schoolmaster, but the Greek slave whose duty 

 it was to take the child to school* And if this be true, 

 then, obviously, the thought in the apostle *s mind was 

 that Christ Himself was the schoolmaster, and that it 

 was the glorious function of the hw to lead the Children 

 of Israel to Him* But however this may be, it is obvious 

 that the Apostle Paul clearly recognises the fact that the 

 teaching of Jesus does not stand alone, but forms the 

 consummation of an evolution of religious thought* 

 Indeed, Christ Himself recognises this when He says : 

 ** I came not to destroy the law and the prophets, but 

 to fulfil them** ; to fill them full* And, this being so, 

 then to go back for our ethical precedents to the Old 

 Testament is much as though a modern chemist were to 

 hark back upon the authority of the alchemists upon a 

 question of organic chemistry* The thing is absurd on 

 the face of it, and by so doing we do not only justify war ; 

 we justify the most appalling massacres ; we justify 

 slavery : we justify bigamy ; we justify polygamy ; we 



