Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 64:254 (Apr 1907)
Article: The Education Of A Minister
Author: A. A. Berle

BSac 64:254 (April 1907) p. 283

The Education Of A Minister

Reverend A. A. Berle

The probable or prospective removal of Andover Theological Seminary from its ancient seat on Andover Hill to Cambridge or Boston, and the discussion of the probable gain or otherwise to that institution by such removal, has opened anew the question of the relation of seminary instruction to the effective work of the Christian ministry. It certainly is a very superficial view both of the ministry and also of theological training, to suppose that mere locus has anything vital to do with the preparation of a man for the service of the Christian church in the practical work of the pastorate. It seems like a puerile view of the case to imagine that mere relation to urban or institutional work can give or necessarily provide the elements which will secure to the churches the kind of ministry which the church wants on the one hand, or which the times seem to require on the other. And it is a rather curious fact, too, that, in the discussion of the removal of an institution with the history and aims and power which Andover has exhibited in times past, the ideal elements should be so utterly left out of the consideration of the question, and that the whole discussion should lie apparently in the realm of material expediency, if the securing of candidates for the ministry can be so termed.

At all events, the primary element in the discussion seems to be the lack of students and the desire to get them. Nobody

BSac 64:254 (April 1907) p. 284

pretends, so far as the present writer knows, that, if Andover had the students at this moment, there would be any desire to move. The presence of a large number of students would be evidence par excellence that the Seminary was fulfilling its function, and that the present location was both suitable and satisfactory. What becomes, or might become, of the students, is left out of the question. How effective they might or might not be is not discussed. To get students, the location must be changed. This seems to be the whole of the problem in the minds of those who wish to remove. What, if, when the Seminary is moved, it still does not get students? Will it be moved again? What, if, after ten years’ experience at Cambridge or in Boston, there still remains a great dearth of men for the Christian ministry? Will each succeeding board feel it needful to look around for a new location? If it is sound as a principle to change the location as a device to get students, then it is sound to change the Seminary’s location as often as the opinion as to the most desirable spot changes, which of course reduces the matter to an absurdity.

And yet nobody has, at least not audibly, impeached either the character of the instruction offered at ...