igo LECTURES AND ESSAYS [1868- 



historian is often tempted to shade off the boundaries of 

 history with a deepening haze, losing himself in vague 

 generalities about the relation of the Divine and human 

 spirit, couched in terms that might easily be taken to 

 imply that the mere natural development of man s faculties 

 brings with it all that gift of fellowship with God which is 

 the end of history. Thus Ewald himself has been claimed 

 as a champion of the opinion that there was no specific 

 difference between Hebrew and heathen prophecy. In 

 spite of some expressions that might seem to support it, 

 we do not hesitate to deny the justice of the allegation. 

 Ewald holds, indeed, with all Protestants, that man, as 

 created, has the capacity for fellowship with God. But 

 this capacity is but a germ which lies dead till a Divine 

 agency calls it into life. All through history this quicken 

 ing agency works, calling men into a new life of fellowship 

 with God. Thus there lies in every man the possibility 

 of becoming a prophet as, indeed, the prophets them 

 selves look forward to a time when all men shall see as 

 fully into the mind of Jahveh as the greatest prophet of 

 an imperfect dispensation. But the realization of this 

 possibility is limited to a few. Ewald does not hesitate 

 to speak of the spiritual religion of Israel as standing in 

 direct antithesis to heathenism as the true religion. In 

 the very striking declaration of his faith which stands at 

 the head of the second edition of the Propheten, he speaks 

 of the Bible, and the Bible alone, as the mirror in which 

 we can read all the conditions and stages of the perfect, 

 true religion, which is necessary for all future generations 

 of men. 1 He has the keenest perception of the historical 

 significance of Judaism and of Christianity. But the one 

 question which is not historical wherein namely the 

 specific agency of God lies, which so singles out individual 

 men and an individual nation to do so special a work in 

 the world he never seems to have set before him. The 

 question, of course, is a theological one. On the answer 



1 Propheten, iii. 14. 



