Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 89:354 (Apr 1932)
Article: Old Testament Chronology-Difficulties
Author: Melvin Grove Kyle

BSac 89:354 (April 1932) p. 193

Old Testament Chronology-Difficulties

M. G. Kyle

Four clergymen were dining together at Winona Lake, many years ago; they were all attending a Bible Conference and naturally Biblical problems came under discussion. I was one of the four and was carrying my javelin as usual; I asked of one of the gentlemen, “Why does not your Church give Professor — an opportunity to do something for the literature of Biblical subjects? He is one of the foremost scholars of the world, but he is so tied down with classroom work that he cannot publish much.” “Yes,” replied that Doctor of Divinity, “and who knows what he would be finding?” A haunted house is a spooky affair, we may jeer at the idea, but no one of us would like to live in a haunted house, yet that preacher was living habitually in a haunted house; there were closets in that house which he was afraid to look into, and afraid to have anybody else look into them.

There are a great many such people, afraid of their own intellectual weaknesses and afraid for anybody to pry into those dark corners. “Difficulties” of chronology, or any difficulties that may be mentioned concerning the Bible give them shivers. They cannot conceive of there being any “difficulties,” unless there is something wrong with the Bible. It never seems to occur to them that the “difficulty” may be in their mistaken understanding of the Bible. There is no phase of Biblical investigation in which difficulties are encountered more frequently or are the source of more controversy and doubts on the one hand and jeers on the other than in consideration of Old Testament chronology. Now in this article on the subject of chronology we are going to look into all closets. No doubt but that some will be fearful and will imagine they see ghosts, dreadful hobgoblins that menace their faith, all of which will be but delusion of fear; there are many difficulties in Old Testament chronology, but none which menace the trustworthiness of Scripture Those who have the steadfastness to look difficulties in the face and then patience enough to

BSac 89:354 (April 1932) p. 194

await a subsequent study of the real characteristics of Old Testament chronology, will discover that what seemed to them fearful specters were only very simple well-known facts found in a place where they were not expected. I awoke one night with cold shivers to see by the light of the moon a white haired man standing near the foot of my bed! Closer examination, when I got courage, discovered that it was a dressing-gown draped on the standard of a mirror with a white cap hanging on top of it. The ghosts we are going to find in the closet look no more like realities than that phantom man in my bedroom, and they are no more real than he.

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