By Dr. William Evans Associate Dean of the Bible Institute of Los Angeles
from the Christian faith, and Christianity still remain intact? POSITION OF OPPONENTS The opponents to the doctrine reply in the affirmative. They maintain that the foun dations o f our faith are not shaken by a refusal to believe in the supernatural birth o f Christ; that there were conversions in the Acts o f the Apostles and in the early Church, when the doctrine o f the Virgin Birth was unknown; that men believed in the sinlessness o f Christ and His redemptive work even though they knew nothing o f His supernatural birth. The attitude o f the opponents to this doctrine is expressed by the following quotation: Soltau, in his book, “ The Birth o f Jesus Christ,” says: “Whoever makes further demands that an evangelical Christian shall believe in the words ‘Conceived by the Holy Ghost, born o f the Virgin Mary,’ unwittingly constitutes himself a sharer in the sin against the Holy Spirit o f the true gospel as transmitted to us by the apostles and their school in the apostolic age.” Soltau, then, makes belief in the Virgin Birth a sin against the Holy Ghost. Reginald T. Campbell, in “ The New Theology,” says:
INTRODUCTION. The mod ern critical spirit with its antagonism to the supernat ural, its evolutionary teach ings concerning biology and
the processes o f life, its attempt to bring the supernatural into the realm o f the nat ural, so; that much which heretofore has been attributed to unique divine action, is now purported to have taken place through ordinary natural means—these things com'- pel the Christian to .consider anew and afresh, in order to be able to give a reason for the hope that is within him, touching 'the Virgin Birth. The reasons for the discussion o f the doc trine o f the Virgin Birth are therefore more than personal or individual. Something much larger is involved. The faith o f the Church is at stake. Is the doctrine o f the Virgin Birth a necessary article o f the Christian’s creed? Shall this doctrine, which for all these centuries has been con sidered a fundamental plank in the plat form o f the Christian faith, remain there? Is it necessary any longer to believe in this account o f the entrance o f our Lord into the world? Is it incumbent upon the Chris tian to so believe and confess'his faith? Can belief in the Virgin Birth be expunged
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