The Eschatological Question in the Gospels: And Other Studies in Recent New Testament Criticism

"What is worth printing, is worth printing twice," seems to be the judgment of many of our writers today, and especially of those who write along the lines of New Testament Criticism. Almost all the chapters of this book have appeared elsewhere as magazine articles. Several of them have no relation in any way each to the other, except that they have to do with some phase of New Testament Criticism. They are all of real value nevertheless, and few readers are likely to have found all of them heretofore in the various periodicals in which they first appeared. The "Other Studies" of the title include the following essays: "Galatians, the earliest of the Pauline Epistles," a strong argument in favor of the early date of the letter to the Galatians, a theory which is growing in favor and which found one of its strongest and most enthusiastic supporters in Douglas Round and his little book on the subject, published some five years ago. "The Problem of the Apocalypses, and its bearing on the conception of inspirations," is another of the essays. "Should the Magnificat be ascribed to Elizabeth?'' is a third. In a fourth he reviews carefully what Professor Harnack has to say in his "Spruche und Reden Jesu," about the "Second Source '' of the First and Third Gospels. That source is known as "Q," from the German "Quelle," and names that common source of both Matthew and Luke which, it is generally agreed, must in some form and in some sense, lie behind the matter that is common to these Gospels alone. The author, Mr. Emmett, is a very careful reader and a very fair critic, and he has a way of putting very clearly the gist of what he has read and his criticism of it. The busy man needs, often times, to have much of his reading done for him. He can draw his own conclusions provided the reading has been well done. It is such work that Mr. Emmett has done for the readers of this volume, and it is characteristic of the first half of the book even more than of the latter half. And it is the first half of the book that gives it its main title, "The Eschatological Question in the Gospels." He has read most carefully the work of two men, Albert Schweitzer, a "Privatdozent '' at Strasburg, and M. Loisy, who was excommunicated a few years ago because of his "The Synoptic Gospels," and his connection with the Modernist Controversy as a whole. He makes very plain the position of both writers, and gives a very careful and fair estimate of their conclusions. Generally speaking every recent book which touches on New Testament Criticism has some reference or other to "The Eschatological Question." The eschatologist, as the word is used in critical discussions, at present, is one who holds that most of the New Testament writers, and our Lord Himself, believed that the end of the world was to come in the lifetime of those then living, and that this belief is the best key to the understanding of "The Synoptic Gospels." To the development and proof of this theory Schweitzer has given the best that is in him. It leads to some very radical conclusions. It makes Jesus not so much a teacher as a herald. The end of the world was imminent. A kingdom was to be established supernaturally in place of the existing world-order. There was no room nor time for a "Church," or for Missionary effort. Only those pre-destined to it, should have part in this kingdom. The New Testament student is just now steeped in eschatology, it is said. He certainly is if he reads even a part of that which is written on the subject. And no pastor and preacher, who desires for his own sake and for his people's sake, to keep in touch with the discussions that occupy the thought of our New Testament scholars, can afford not to be familiar with this Eschatological Question in the Gospels.... -Auburn Seminary Record, Volume 7 [1912]