Journal: Westminster Theological Journal
Volume: WTJ 01:1 (Nov 1938)
Article: Jesus In The Hands Of A Barthian Rudolf Bultmann’s Jesus In The Perspective Of A Century Of Criticism
Author: Ned B. Stonehouse

WTJ 1:1 (Nov 1938) p. 1

Jesus In The Hands Of A Barthian
Rudolf Bultmann’s Jesus In The Perspective Of A Century Of Criticisma

N. B. Stonehouse

MR. PRESIDENT and Gentlemen of the Board of Trustees:

I wish to take this opportunity to express my gratitude for the honor which you have conferred upon me in elevating me to the Professorship of New Testament. Let me assure you that I am vividly aware of the unique privileges which this position affords, and that I am entering upon its labors with no small measure of enthusiasm. Nevertheless, as I reflect upon the demands which it places upon me, I confess a deep sense of inadequacy.

One factor in the situation that gives me considerable pause is the memory of the one whom I am called to succeed in this great work. Although fifteen months have passed since Dr. Machen found rest from his labors as minister and teacher of the New Testament, the sense of loss, like the sorrow at his departure, has not diminished. I am deeply conscious of the distinction which his presence here gave to the department of New Testament, as to the Seminary as a whole, both through his scholarly attainments and his illustrious success as a teacher. I can follow him only from afar. Nevertheless, my mind does not linger long with these thoughts before I am reminded that our sovereign God, who bestows diversity of gifts, both of kind and of measure, does not hold us responsible according to the standard of another’s endowments.

WTJ 1:1 (Nov 1938) p. 2

The final reason why my enthusiasm is tempered with trembling is found in the character of the responsibility that has fallen upon me. For the responsibility is to God Himself, and demands first of all faithfulness in the handling of His Word! Today, through the reading of the pledge required of professors in this institution, I dare say that you too have been impressed with the solemn character of this undertaking. Accordingly, that which occupies my mind today is less the exacting demands of true scholarship, however insistent they are, than the call for faithfulness to the Word of God. Not long ago a Calvinistic theologian in the Netherlands spoke aptly of the isolation in which the Reformed man finds himself today as he takes his stand upon the Bible as the Word of God, surrounded as he is by the mediating theology of experience on the one hand, and by the Barthian theology on the other.1 In this country too we have become conscious of our isolation, but, in humble submission to the authority of God speaking in His Word, and in reliance upon the power of His Spirit, we can go forward in quiet confidence to seek to fulfill our God-appointed task.

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