AoC-0.3-Introduction

Introduction

EVERY reader probably knows who are meant when we speak of "the Apostles of Christ." The names of some of them - as Peter, John, and Paul - rise to the lips at once, and the fact is recalled that Christ chose a company of men whom he called and commissioned to be His Apostles. It is well-known that, from the very beginning of Christianity, great authority has been ascribed to these men - "the Twelve" and "Paul.". Their teaching has been accepted as inspired, and their commands treated as possessing the same authority as those of Christ Himself. In using the New Testament to discover the mind and will of the Master, no distinction as to authority has been made between instruction from Christ’s lips and that from the lips or pens of His apostles. Accordingly Christianity has been regarded as the Teaching of Christ and His Apostles as found in the New Testament.

Even in churches where apostasy from the teaching of the New Testament is undeniable, the same place of authority has continued to be granted to the Apostles. In Ecclesiastical buildings we meet, in sculpture, or in painting, with "the Apostles of Christ." The Church of England liturgy gives a first place to "the goodly company of the Apostles," and even the claim of Rome to "Apostolic succession" is a recognition of the great place in Christianity given by its Divine Author to His Apostles. Of late years, however, many religious leaders have begun to make a decided difference between the Master and His School - meaning by "School" the Apostles and the other New Testament writers. Arising apparently from a distaste for the teachings of the Apostles - of Paul especially - regarding the Deity and Atonement of Christ, the attempt now is to get behind the Apostles to Christ Himself; and the investigators find - so they say - that He taught differently from them. For such teachers and those they lead, "Back to Christ" has come to mean the regarding of the Apostles’ teaching, such as that on the great subjects just named, and that on "the Church," as lacking Christ’s authority and as expressing no part of Christ’s Mind. If this, or anything approaching this, is true, everyone can see that all parts of Christianity are rendered loose and indefinite, and a great deal of the contents of the New Testament becomes of no authority whatever. We purpose to return to the revolutionary and destructive character of this theory, to the impossibility, if it be true, of our having any certainty as to the teaching of Christ Himself; but for the present pass on to review the contents of the New Testament, which, in any case, is the basis on which our decision as to the authority of the Apostles must rest. As far as space permits we shall consider the following points, devoting a Chapter to each:-

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