Apology and Polemic in the New Testament: The Bohlen Lectures, 1915 (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from Apology and Polemic in the New Testament: The Bohlen Lectures, 1915 The large element of controversy in the New Testament Writ ings has suggested the following studies of the progress of Christi anity amid the earliest attacks upon it, or the attempted perver sions of it, and of the methods of its original defense and of the establishment of believers in the faith of the Gospel. An examina tion of the New Testament from this special historical standpoint promises to contribute not only to a distincter understanding of the development of some of the movements of the Apostolic Age, but also to the exposition of several of its Books or of passages in them, in the light of their polemic occasions and of their direct interest in establishing their readers against specific intruding errors. In some cases it may also contribute to a more precise understanding of the occasion and formulation of important theological themes. Such a study will have the additional interest of recognizing the abiding principles and constant lines of defense, and the bases of the full assurance of faith to which the New Testament writers confidently appeal. We already possess numerous important studies of separate lines of New Testament apologetic arguments and their validity, and of the external persecutions; exhaustive investigations of the Judaistic controversy, and monographs on the errorists alluded to in several Books of the New Testament, frequently with an interest in their bearings upon critical theories. In the studies here submitted, portions of which were presented in the public lectures, an attempt has been made to gain a connected view of these various separate features and movements by employing as the unifying principle the dominating religious interest of the writers in the genesis of faith by the method of witness and apology, and in its continued establishment against attacks from without and within. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.