It is difficult to exhaust the significance of this great passage from the Epistle to the Hebrews ; but a word must just be said about that other phra«e, *In many modes.' It might be taken as
including the different classes of persons through whom_ God spoke ; not only prophets, but also psalmists and wise men. These classes too shared in a genuine inspiration, though they did not exactly use the special formula 'Thus saith the Lord.' The whole nation, as the Chosen People, was reaUy a medium of Divine communication, though as a rule such communication was conveyed through individuals who were specially inspired.
Then there is the further question of the manner of the communication. There is a large body of evidence which goes to show that, under the New Dispensation as well as under the Old, the Holy Spirit made use of vision and trance and dream. Some of the examples — as, for instance, those from the ' we-passages ' of the Acts — are very well attested indeed. Another strong example would be the vision of the Apocalypse, though that is probably the case of a book based upon a vision , r at her t han co-extensive with the actual vision. The book itself would seem to have been constructed upon literary methods. That would be another instance of the 'many modes.' _ The Gospels are really a new and special form of literature. The Epistles are of more than one kind. Some are what we should call genuine letters, others are rather treatises ia the form of letters. 'VMien once the epistolary type was fixed it would be natural to employ it in different waj^s.
Before we leave the passage from Hebrews, we must go back to the main point : the distinction between revelation 'by' or 'in' the prophets, and revelation 'by' or 'in' the Son. The distinction is sufficiently explained by the words that are used. The prophets were 'spokesmen' of God; the Son was the Son — none other and none less. His inspiration came to Him as the Son. It was the product of His direct and constant filial com- munion with the Father. The nature of this inspiration ia explained in that other famous verse: 'AU things have been delivered vmto me of my Father ; and no one knoweth the Son, save the Father ; neither doth any know the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son wiUeth to reveal him' (Mt 11", Lk IO22).
For a further exposition we may turn to the pro- logue of St. John's Gospel, where the correct read- ing perhaps is : ' No man hath seen God at any time ; God only begotten, who is in the bosom of the Father, hehath declared him' (Jn l^^). The phrase 'who is in the bosom of the Father' denotes exactly that close and uninterrupted communion between the Son and the Father of which we have been speaking. The Son is admitted to the inner- most counsels of the Father ; and therefore it is that He is able to communicate them to men.
6. The historical setting. — \\'hen we were quot- ing above from the First Epistle to the Corinthians, we were really extracting a page or two from the autobiography of St. Paul ; but the Apostle gives us plainly to understand that his experience was shared bymany other Christians. That groupof phenomena which we call inspiration was part of the movement described in general as the outpouring of the Holy Spirit; and St. Paul, with his natural bent for analysis, classifies and labels the different forms of manifestation which the gift of the Spirit assumed (1 Co r2''""). Some of these concern us, and some do not; but the 'word of wisdom,' the 'word of knowledge,' ' prophecy and the discerning of spirits ' are all directly in point. In these various ways the men of that day might have been seen to be carried out of and beyond their natural selves ; and we possess a permanent written expression of the movement in the books of the NT. The gift of 'speaking with tongues' was a by-product of the same movement.
Like all other spiritual forces, these too needed to be regulated ; they needed the controlling hand
INSPIRATION AND RE^^:LATION
INSPIRATION AND RE\TLATION 617
to fit them in orderly fashion into their place in the organized Hfe of the society. Left to them- selves, the exuberant outgi'owths of spiritual ex- •altation were apt to run riot and cross and interfere with one another. It is such a state of things that St. Paul deals with in 1 Co 14. From a chapter Uke that we may form a good idea as to what the primitive assemblies for worship were Hke in a community that was, perhaps rather more than the average, subject to religious excitement. The Apostle lays down rules which, if observed, would keep this excitement within due bounds.
Great movements such as this which we have seen to be characteristic of the Apostolic Age do not come to an abrupt end, but shade off gradually into the more placid conditions of ordinary times. Hence, though it was natural and justifiable to regard the sphere of this special inspiration as co- extensive with the hterature which claims to be apostolic, the extension of the inspiration to the whole of that literature and the denial of its presence in any writing that falls outside those hmits, must not be assumed as an exact and scientific fact. The Epistles, e.g., of Ignatius of Antioch are not inferior to those which pass under the names of 2 Peter and Jude. There are two places in the Epistles of Clement of Rome to the Corinthians (lix. 1 and Ixiii. 2) which appear to make what we should call a definite claim to in- spiration ; and Ignatius reminds the Philadelphians (vii. 1) how, when he was present in their assembly he had suddenly exclaimed, under an impulse which he could not master, 'with a loud voice, with the voice of God: "Give heed to the bishop, to the presbytery, and to the deacons." ' He clearly re- garded this utterance as prompted by the Holy Spirit. He certainly did so in complete good faith ; and there is no reason for disputing his claim, any more than there would be in our own day in the case of one who spoke under strong conviction, with deep emotion, and with a profound sense of direct responsibility to God. It would not follow, even so, that the claim, standing alone, was in- fallible— it would, like aU such claims, be subject to ' the discerning of spirits' — but it would at least have a -prima facie right to a hearing.