successive order of the books will be in the revised as it is in the received version. The revision takes the old English version and makes it a more faithful rendering of the original, but does not attempt a rearrangement of the order. It has to do almost exclusively with textual criticism, and does not touch the higher criticism except as better renderings may contribute to it incidentally.

The German plan for revising the Bible may seem to be better than the English. A revision has been given to the people for their criticism, and it is intended that a final revision shall embody the best results of the popular judgment. It is therefore called the Probe-Bibel, the trial Bible. It has often been said of the New Testament revision that if popular criticisms as to style and diction could have been known, some of the most objectionable features would have been absent. It may be, however, that revisers would take less pains with a translation which is avowedly tentative. It would be decided to let many passages go in a form not strongly approved, in order to learn what might be said of them. Translators must have felt more responsibility and have exercised more care with a final than with an experimental revision. At all events, the revisers had the benefit of popular criticism on their New Testament work, and we shall soon know whether or not that criticism has aided them concerning the literary quality of their Old Testament work.

It is not easy to determine how generally the revision will come into use. As a commentary it will be indispensable to every careful reader of the Bible, for a correct translation is the best commentary possible. In the Episcopal churches it will not find a place at present. Besides, they have never used the received (or King James' version) of the psalms. It may be predicted that in other churches it will come into use more generally than the revised New Testament has succeeded in doing, for the reason that it will do much to make the Old Testament Scriptures intelligible. The growing custom, which cannot be too highly commended, of reading Scripture lessons both from the Old and New Testament in every public service, will create a demand for a revision which aids in the understanding of portions of the Bible that have hitherto been somewhat obscured.

Every translation of the Bible for popular use constitutes a religious epoch. The great advances of the church have synchronized with new translations. This revision will have a silent but mighty influence. When scholarly knowledge becomes common property, there are not only more intelligent, but also more spiritual views of revealed truth. The letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life. A translation which has been in use two hundred years comes to be held in superstitious as well as in affectionate regard, so that the bondage of the letter waxes strong. But truth in new expression is almost new truth. In fresh and modern garments the Word of God gains new freedom and power. Whatever contributes to clearer understanding of God's revelation is certain to

promote its spiritual power over the faith and life of men, and to quicken recognition of its divine origin.

"And even things without life giving a voice, whether pipe or harp, if they give not a distinction in the sounds, how shall it be known what is piped or harped? For if the trumpet give an uncertain voice, who shall prepare himself for war? So also ye, unless ye utter by the tongue speech easy to be understood, how shall it be known what is spoken? for ye will be speaking into the air."

THEOLOGICAL AND RELIGIOUS INTELLIGENCE.

THE PREDESTINATION CONTROVERSY IN THE LUTHERAN CHURCH.

THE appearance, early in 1880, of a new semi-monthly entitled "Altes und Neues" at Madison, Wisconsin, under the editorial management of Professor F. A. Schmidt, of the Norwegian Theological Seminary, first announced to the theological world that there would be a controversy on the subject of predestination in the Lutheran Church of North America. A number of circumstances conspire to make the present a favorable time for a summary of the development of this contest in the past five years and of the status contr wersic at present. This is all the less a work of supererogation as the debate has been carried on chiefly in the German and the Norwegian languages, and in periodicals to which the general reader can find access only with some difficulty. The controversy will naturally have a special interest for those who are acquainted with the ins and outs of the New England controversy on a similar subject some decades back, for most of the leading questions which then brought the great theological contestants into the arena have here been discussed again, although, of course, from a different stand-point and for a different purpose.

The controversy originated within the bounds of the Synodical Conference, the youngest, but the largest, most active, and most conservative of the four general synodical bodies in the Lutheran Church of this country. It consisted entirely of German and Norwegian Synods in the West, and numbered about two fifths of all the Lutherans in the United States. The leading member of this organization was the Missouri Synod, which alone constituted about two thirds of the Conference. The other members were the Ohio, the Norwegian, the Wisconsin, and the Minnesota Synods, the last two but small bodies. The leadership in the Conference naturally fell to the Missouri Synod, and here again to that man who stood out prominently from among them as a theologian, teacher, and preacher, namely, Dr. C. F. W. Walther, of St. Louis, who is acknowledged by friend and foe to be a dogmatician without peer in the Lutheran Church of America. He is a remarkable man with a remarkable career. It is no exaggeration to say that he more than any other man has given the Lutheran Church of this country that impetus to conservatism and confessionalism which is now being felt in her every fibre throughout the length and breadth of the land. Some thirty years ago he with a few Saxon

pastors and immigrants, who would not live under the corrupt church government in their fatherland, settled near St. Louis, to set up there the sign of Lutheran confessionalism at a time when these Confessions were scarcely known by name even to the majority of Lutheran clergymen. The little leaven has leavened the whole lump, and the little Missouri organization, combined with a number of favorable circumstances, has managed to give to the Lutheran Church of America the direction of faith and life that now pervades it. It is necessary to mention these facts, as they alone explain the almost unbounded influence which Dr. Walther exercises within the bounds of his own and allied Synods, and the great veneration which other bodies of this religious communion entertain for him; which facts have been very potent in the present controversy. Dr. Walther's name has always stood synonymous for the strictest orthodoxy in the Lutheran Church. He it was who again brought back to recognition and respect the official Confessions of the church as laid down in the Book of Concord, and who made the systematic study of the great dogmaticians of the sixteenth and seventeenth century, Chemnitz, Hollaz, Gerhard, and others, find favor throughout the church. When, then, just he was accused by men of his own Synod and by Professor Schmidt of the Norwegians, certainly the second scholar in the Conference, it is no more than natural that such a charge gave rise to most intense excitement in the circles directly affected, and every one was on the qui vive to see how matters would turn out.

The basis for the accusation was the debate of the Western District of the Missouri Synod in 1877 and 1879. The matter was brought up rather incidentally and accidentally. The topic for the regular discussion in 1877 had been the thesis that the Lutheran Church in her theological system gives all the glory to God. This brought up the point whether such was the case also in the doctrine of predestination, where the dogmaticians of the church, and the Confessions, too, as these had been generally understood, teach that election takes place, not absolutely, but in view of faith (intuitu fidei). Here, it was thought, the teachings of the church assigned a part of the glory to man. Dr. Walther had prepared the theses and led in the debate; in fact, the expositions in the Minutes of these two synodical meetings are acknowledged on all sides to be his work and views. Already in the first of these two pamphlets it had been maintained that the doctrine of an eternal election and predestination in view of faith was neither Scriptural nor in accordance with the Confessions. The true view was represented to be that God elected irrespective of any conditions on the part of man; that for some reason to us unknown he chose certain ones who were eternally to be saved, while he did not select the rest, and thus suffered them to be lost on account of their sins. The selection of the elect, however, was represented to be not merely the mere fact of selection, but it was repeatedly and emphatically added that this includes also the determination of God to call, enlighten, give faith to, and preserve in the faith until the end, those whom he had chosen for eternal life. Predestination, then, according to the views of the Missouri Lutherans, comprehends the selection of the few for salvation, but on the way which the Biblically revealed plan of salvation teaches, namely, through faith in Christ, which faith God by the very act of predestinating determines also to give to the elected persons. Predestination, then, is not in view of faith, but is unto faith.

In this connection several matters were further emphasized. Missouri wishes it to be distinctly understood that it teaches only a predestination unto life, not one unto death. It further maintains that of the reasons why God selects just these persons and not others no man can know anything, as these reasons have not been revealed to us. That is the great mystery in the election of God, and upon the fact of this mystery great stress is laid. Then they claim that they cannot be made responsible for any conclusions which by logical process may be deduced from their premises, as God has revealed the latter but not the former.

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Immediately upon the publication of the Minutes of 1877 opposition to the views there expressed was heard, but no publicity was given to it. Private conferences were held, and it seemed not impossible that the difficulty could be amicably settled. In 1879 the Western District again discussed the problem, and again had Dr. Walther prepared the theses. When these appeared in print it was seen that, instead of modifying the views that had given so much offense, the position taken two years before was only reiterated and emphasized. Thereupon Professor F. A. Schmidt, who wields a facile pen in English, German, and Norwegian, began the publication of his "Altes und Neues." He with others maintained that the predestinarian views of Missouri were, if not outspoken Calvinism, yet thoroughly Calvinistic in their character, and if consistently carried out would result in Calvinism. Dr. Walther and his friends answered these charges in their periodical, the Lehre und Wehre" of St. Louis. The direction thus given to the argument from the very outset was a confessional and not a Biblical one; although the latter was later also discussed in the various periodicals, and still more at a number of general and special conferences. Each party claimed to represent the traditional views of the church as laid down in the Confessions. The Book of Concord treats of this doctrine only in one place, namely, in Article Eleven of the "Formula of Concord," the latest and longest of the different Lutheran Confessions. But this article contained the shibboleth of neither party, and its wording is such that both claimed it for their views. The Missouri party maintained that the word "predestination" was here used in a narrow sense, and embraced only the selection of the persons, while the anti-Missouri party claimed that the eight points included in that article under predestination embraced the whole process of salvation, and that the word was thus used in a wider sense. On this point" Altes und Neues" carried out the historical argument with an exhaustive fullness seldom witnessed in theological or other debate. As the words of the Confessions seemed not to lead to a conclusion of the matter, Professor Schmidt ransacked the great tomes of the authors of the "Formula of Concord" and their contemporaries to see how, in the day and date of the Confession, this point of doctrine was understood. He showed beyond a doubt that as far as this was concerned historical evidence stood entirely and unanimously on his side. The authors and signers of the "Formula of Concord," as well as also the theologians of the church of that period, teach a predestination in view of faith. In fact the Missouri party now admits this fact, and only claims that either these fathers erred in their interpretation of doctrine, or that those now teaching this doctrine understand it in a different sense from that in which it was then understood.

This latter point now made a change in the line of argumentation, and transferred it to the anthropological field. Missouri claimed that its

opponents were synergistic in their teachings, as they admitted the coöperation of man in the work of salvation in him. This was especially claimed to be the case because the anti-Missourians maintained that the willful resistance of man (muthwilliges Widerstreben) could be overcome through his own exertion. They were very particular ever to emphasize the fact that they did not ascribe any merit to faith as such; that this faith was in no wise a work of man, but purely a gift of God; that in the matter of predestination it was not even a causa minus principalis, as some dogmaticians admit; but that it was the faith given by God through the means of grace, and that it is a faith which grasps the merits of Christ as its sole anchor of hope.

In connection with this line of development many other important and fundamental theological problems were discussed. Especially was it maintained by the opponents of Missouri that according to its views God would necessarily have two wills: one, open and revealed, according to which he wishes the salvation of all; another, secret and hidden, according to which he desires the deliverance of the elect alone. It was also pointed out how a predestination unto faith undermines the doctrine of justification by faith and the efficacy of the sacraments. The totally un-Lutheran character of the views was further shown to be indicated by the fact that Missouri's statements agreed almost verbatim with the utterances of Calvinistic Confessions, especially with that of the Synod of Dort, which teaches an election "non ex prævisa fide, sed ad fidem." Missouri met these charges by denying that they were legitimately drawn from their doctrine, and repeats the charge of synergism and even Pelagianism against its opponents. Outside of the Synodical Conference the Missourian views are everywhere declared a new doctrine and un-Lutheran. No other Lutheran synod nor any Lutheran of prominence in this country or in Germany is friendly to these views. Most seem to agree with the late Dr. Krauth, of Philadelphia, who declared the Missourians to be "inconsistent Calvinists." There can be no doubt whatever that their views are new in the Lutheran theology and church.

With this "inner Gang" the outward development went hand in hand. A number of periodicals were started with the outspoken purpose of combating the Missouri views. Among these are the " Columbus Theological Magazine" and the "Columbus Zeitblaetter," which became the chief mediums for more elaborate articles in English and German, while the "Lutheran Standard" brought the matter before the English Lutheran people of the West, and the "Lutheresk Vodnesbyrd" before the Norwegians. The Ohio Synod, the second in size in the Conference, already in 1881 confessed its adherence to the traditional doctrine of the Lutheran Church and withdrew from the Conference. In the Norwegian Synod the pastors, who have ever had a strong attachment for Missouri, adhere, in a considerable majority, to Dr. Walther's views, while the congregations are firm in their old faith, as they have learned it from the popular exposition of Pontoppidan, whose explanations have for a century and more been the handbook of Christian instruction in the Scandinavian churches. The Norwegian Synod has indeed withdrawn from the Conference, but has not yet attained to peace at the synodical hearthstone. The controversy in the matter seems to be undermining its very existThe Missouri Synod soon chose to stand and fall with its able leader. Dr. Walther's influence was so mighty that he succeeded in get

ence.