The words of Jesus regarding death, judgment. His second coming, and the life to come, can be interpreted with rigorous precision, even although they clothe spiritual conceptions with a material garb. They are not mere metaphors, for a meta- phor is rarely, if ever, the exact counterpart of the idea it illustrates. Jesus is dwelling in eternity and conteiiiplating the processes of the spiritual world, and He conveys to the receptive soul by the only medium at His command the impression He Hiinsi'lt iiTiivi- troin His direct ATsion of the tiutli Hi' i- iM\ i- i-iiiu. The medium is of value only in -o lai a- II ~.iM-- its purpo.se. To the irre- M>oii>ivc soul it ha> no meaning or value at all. To the soul tliat has the factilty of ■vision the words are luminous, and reveal God's secrets. There is no question here of metaphor except in so far as nine- tenths of spoken words are metaphorical. There is nothing overstrained or untrue.
The bearing of this on the doctrine of Revelation cannot here be overlooked. Revelation is insight in its intensest form. The ie\-elatioii irianted to the prophets in OT times ^^ iv thiii iii-ij;ht into the meaning of God's way-, tie ii \i-ion of the spiritual proce-sses through « hirh ilie liiulier life of humanity is evolved. The revelation granted to the A|iostle> was their response to the brilliancy of tlie liulit that streamed from the Eternal Word during the lirief jieriod of His Incamation. Jesus reveals because He is the Light of the world. He never argues. He knows nothing of the dialectic process in pressing home the higher truths to the soul. He sees and He would have others to see,
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and only in so far as they see is He capable of blessing tliem (Jn 12"- ■"*). It follows that all revelation is personal, and incommunicable from one man to another. Only the Triune God is the Revealer of the s))iritual mystery. A written revelation is thus, in the strict meaning of the words, a contradiction in terms. The Bible is not a revelation, but a record of a series of revelations that were given to men of insight, men who pos- sessed the faculty of vision. Its purpose is not to reveal, but to put the soul in an attitude of expect- ancy by telling what other men have seen. It is the Holy Spirit that quickens the soul and conveys the gift of vision to which alone Divine Truth can be revealed. This is eveiywhere the doctrine of Scripture, and has never been more clearly or beautifully stated than in the Westminster Confes- sion of Faith (ch. i. par. 5).
Jesus invariably attaches a knowledge of the Divine mysteries to a certain spiritual attitude apart from wliich nothing can be kno^vn. It is the pure in heart who see God (Mt 5'). It is the doer of God's will who alone can judge of the truth of His doctrine (Jn 7"^- "). The sin of the Pharisees is that they are blind while thev think they see (Q'"). No matter with what bri'lliiim-y the light may shine, so long as the spiritual orli is darkened it can reveal nothing of the wonders of the spirit- land {V-]. And St. Paul says that no man knoweth the things of God ; it is the Spirit of God alone who knoweth them ; and only in so far as the spirit of man is illumined by the Spirit of God can they be revealed to him (1 Co 2"). Only when the Divine in man meets and mingles with the Divine that is without and around him can there result that spiritual certainty which is revelation.
Insight, then, in the spiritual sense of the term (which is the sense in which it is generally used), links itself on to the doctrine of tlie Holy Spirit (wh. see). It is the Light that lighteth every man coming into the world ; for we must assume that the capacity, in germ at least, is universal as humanity, otherwise there would be some to whom religion is impossible. But it is given in vary- ing degrees, and is conditioned by varying environ- ments. The visions it sees are not always of reality, for the medium through which it looks is often obscured by earthly passions and prejudices. But when it does see right into the heart of things, it enunciates truths to which the soul clings as essential to its very life.
Jlectums 0/ Goethe William Blake ; P. W. Sfewman, The Soul ; Hibbert Lectures on Basis of Religions Beliefs by C. B. Upton ; James, Varieties of Religiom Experience ; Ewald, Revelation, its Nature and its Record ; Oman, Vision and Authority ; Vf. P. du Bose, The Ecumenical Councils ; Herrmann, Verkehr des Christen mit Gott ; Meister Eckhart, Schriftm und Prcdtgten, lieipzig, 1903.
A. Miller. INSPIRATION.— The term employed to denote the action of the Divine Spirit upon the writers of Scri|>ture. Literally signifying a breathing into, it has the secondary meaning of breathing a cer- tain spirit into the mind or soul, and is therefore naturally employed to express the influence of God upon the sacred writers. ' Inspiration in general is the influence of one jierson upon another ; Divine inspiration is the influence of the Divine Person upon the human ' (Wood, A Tcnnhlc Theory of In.ip. p. 10). In Scripture itself we lind the idea in Hos 9' (LXX) expressed by the word irpev/jiaToipdpos — though in this case the inspiration was not Divine. In the NT (2P l=i) similarly iml, 7r«iiMaros ayiov (t>ep6/j.etioL. In non-Christian literature inspired men are spoken of as SeoSlSaKToi., 6e6(j>opoi, deoipopovixevoi., 6e65oxoi, BebirvewTOi, hdeoi, iirlirvoot., ^aKxi^vd/jLenoi., fiaivofiei'OL, divino numine a-fflati, inspirati,furcntes. The use of the word ' inspiration ' to express the