Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 77:305 (Jan 1920)
Article: The Evidence Of Fulfilled Prophecy (I.)
Author: J. T. Lias

BSac 77:305 (Jan 1920) p. 23

The Evidence Of Fulfilled Prophecy (I.)

Chancellor J. J. Lias

The present age, on my side of the Atlantic, has seen the painful sight of cheap and slight “Oxford Text Books,” which contrast strangely with the learned treatises by men of mark — not written yesterday I may say — which candidates for Holy Orders used to be required to do their best to master. From these achievements of the twentieth century we learn that the Old Testament miracles have entirely disappeared, while the New Testament miracles are somewhat summarily dismissed. As to prophecy, it expires under the knife of the German operator. Isaiah is sliced up into a congeries of authors of various dates and no names (with the exception of a few fragments assigned to the prophet) on the hypothesis (which, by the way, no attempt is made to establish by argument) that there is, and can be, no such thing as prophecy. That this hypothesis is absolutely unsound can easily be demonstrated by an appeal to facts, even though the German critic tries to bolster it up by attempts to assign some of the Minor Prophets to any period in which it may suit him to place them.

Prophecy, however, is a characteristic of the Old Testament from Moses to Malachi. Prophecies are also recorded in the New Testament; and one book, the last, is a prophecy of things to come. Some reasons have of late been given for doubting the soundness of the German criticism of Gen. 1–3. The evidence from prophecy will be found to strengthen that doubt. The first prophecy in the Bible is one which clearly dates from a very early epoch. The very vagueness of its form, which differs very largely, for instance, from the form of God’s Promise to Abraham, gives evidence of its antiquity. Immediately after the Fall (which consisted, let us not forget, of the resolution of mankind to test God’s laws by disobeying them) comes

BSac 77:305 (Jan 1920) p. 24

a remarkable but indefinite intimation given by God to His creatures that the seed of the woman1 should achieve a victory over the votaries of the Serpent, though not, however, without cost to the Victor. Pass by innumerable centuries and what do you find? A vast and increasing Society, the Founder of which — miraculously born — gave His life for mankind, and thereby purchased to Himself an Universal Church of the Living God by His Own Most Precious Blood. Read your Bible — not as manipulated by the German critic, but as it stands — and you find the early prophecy growing clearer and clearer through the ages, until He is revealed Who by His Death, and even more by His Life (Rom. 5:8–11), has fulfilled t...