Appendix I—Professor Alan Richardson on 'Fundamentalism'
APPENDIX I
PROFESSOR ALAN RICHARDSON ON 'FUNDAMENTALISM'
THE short article on 'Fundamentalism' in the 1950 edition of Chambers' Encyclopœdia is extraordinarily misleading. Dr. D. Johnson remarked on its inaccuracy in his article, 'The Word "Fundamentalist" ', in the Christian Graduate for March 1955 (p. 22), but it still stands unchanged in the 1957 edition. It is worth examining in some detail, partly because it is typical of much present-day misconception, and partly because, appearing where it does, it is likely to be used as an authority for more.
Dr. Richardson, as we saw,1 defines 'Fundamentalism' as a theory of the mode of biblical inspiration 'which regards the written words of the Bible as divinely dictated'. As Dr. Johnson pointed out, a definition that refers only to the 'fundamentalist' view of Scripture is too narrow to fit the historical facts; in any case, the view stated by Dr. Richardson was never the 'fundamentalist' view of Scripture at all, as we shall now see.
This theory, we are told, 'was developed by way of reaction' to nineteenth-century biblical criticism; it 'represents a hardening of the traditional pre-critical view . . . that the Spirit of God had miraculously communicated the truths of revelation to the biblical writers, though the manner of this communication had never been precisely defined by the Church'. What evidence is there for this 'hardening' ? None at all. The fact is that Protestant defenders of the divine origin of the Bible during the past century have uniformly been at pains to disclaim any mechanical doctrine of the mode of inspiration, to stress that the biblical authors wrote spontaneously and freely, and to insist that the product of their writing is as truly and fully human as it is divine. See, for example, W. Lee, The Inspiration of the Holy Scriptures (2nd ed., 1857), pp. 21 ff.; C. Wordsworth, The Inspiration of the Bible (1861), p. 5; L. Gaussen, Theopneustia, Eng. tr. by David Scott (1863), III. i. 3, 23–26, pp. 107, 125 f.; C. Hodge, Systematic Theology (1873), I, 156 f.; W. Cunningham. Theological Lectures (1878), pp. 349 ff.; W. B. Pope, Compendium of Christian Theology (2nd ed., 1879), I. 171, 183; A. A. Hodge, Outlines of Theology (2nd ed., 1883), Chapter IV; C. H. Waller, Authoritative Inspiration (1887), pp. 200 f.; J. C. Ryle, Old Paths (4th ed., 1895), pp. 17 f.; H. C. G. Moule, Veni Creator (1890), pp.53 f.; A. H. Strong, Systematic Theology (12th ed., 1949), pp. 208 ff.; J. Orr, Revelation and Inspiration (1909), p. 210; B. B. Warfield, The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible (re-issued 1951), pp. 153 ff. Of these, only Cunningham and Gaussen use the metaphor of 'dictation' at all, and they qualify it with great care. Lee and Orr prefer to speak of 'plenary', and Strong of 'dynamical', inspiration rather than use the term 'verbal', which they fear is too closely linked with mechanical ideas. The mechanical view of inspiration is explicitly disclaimed in The Fundamentals1; Hebert notes that T. C. Hammond disowns it,2 and rightly affirms that the theory is 'repudiated by all the conservative evangelical leaders'.3 So it always has been. The 'dictation-theory' is a theological mare's-nest; it never existed at any time during the past century save in certain people's imagination. In 1893 B. B. Warfield wrote : 'It ought to be unnecessary to protest again against the habit of representing the advocates of "verbal inspiration" as teaching that the mode of inspiration was by dictation.'4 Still less ought it to be necessary in 1958—but hoary error dies hard.
Dr. Richardson goes on to quote, as a 'classical statement' of 'Fundamentalism', part of the peroration of a sermon preached by J. W. Burgon at Oxford in 1860 (not 1861, as Richardson says)—some sixty years, we observe, before the term 'Fundamentalism' was coined. We subjoin the complete passage.1 'The Bible is none other than the voice of Him that sitteth upon the Throne! Every book of it, every chapter of it, every verse of it, every word of it, every syllable of it (where are we to stop ?), every letter of it, is the direct utterance of the Most High! Pasa graphē theopneustos.2 "Well spake the Holy Ghost, by the mouth of" the many blessed men who wrote it. The Bible is none other than the Word of God; not some part of it, more, some part of it, less; but all alike, the utterance of Him that sitteth upon the Throne; absolute, faultless, unerring, supreme.' This is nothing more than a rhetorical affirmation of the divine origin of all Scripture. Burgon is affirming the fact of inspiration; he is not discussing the mode of it, and the passage contains not a word to suggest that dictation was the method whereby Scripture was given. Indeed, a few pages further on Burgon explicitly repudiates the construction which Dr. Richardson puts on his words. ('Let me not be told… that this is to advocate a mechanical theory . . . I should as soon think of holding a theory of Providence and Free-will, as of holding a theory of Inspiration . . . Inspiration,—the analysis of which is so favourite a problem with this inquisitive age,—is far, far, above us. . . . The method of Inspiration is . . . one of the many things I cannot fully understand, much less pretend to explain.'3) So much for the 'classical statement' of 'Fundamentalism'!
Dr. Richardson continues : 'Such views are now abandoned in the theological faculties of British Universities.' If this means the views attributed to Burgon, we must insist that they were never held, in British Universities or any other. If, however, the statement had been intended to imply that no theological teachers in British Universities today maintain the historic Christian view of inspiration which Burgon in fact held, it would be simply false.
Dr. Richardson concludes by saying that 'Fundamentalism' flourished chiefly in America. This in the context of the article suggests that American Fundamentalists contended for the 'dictation-theory'. But this was not so; what they stood for was the fact of inspiration, not any theory as to the method of it; and, as we have shown, they stood for much more besides, which Dr. Richardson nowhere mentions.
It seems a pity that such a misleading account of this matter should find a place in a standard work of reference.