n his
master before him. In his turn he became professor; and that was a dark
day for Germany and Protestantism when he read his first lecture to his
auditory. He studied the Scriptures while laboring under the conviction
that people worship the Bible instead of the universal Father; and he
seemed to say within himself: "I will destroy this vain idolatry, if it
take bread from my wife and children: if life be lost in the effort." So
he set himself to work with a will. He was in a difficulty concerning
the want of understanding as to the number of sacred books. He consulted
the Jews of Palestine, and they replied "twenty-four;" he went to the
Alexandrians, and they answered "a greater number than that;" and to the
Samaritans, who stoutly held "that only the five books of Moses have a
just claim to divine authority." With such difference of opinion among
those who ought to know all about the Holy Scriptures, Semler,
confounded and defiant, esteemed himself a judge on his individual
responsibility. He consequently began to examine the merits of each
part. And first of all, he must determine what is the proof of the
inspiration of a book. This he decided to be the inward conviction of
our mind that what it conveys to us is truth. Certainly, reason cannot
be sunk so low as to discard its functions of judgment. And did not
Christ use his natural faculties? Letting reason, therefore, be umpire,
he concluded that the books of Chronicles, Ruth, Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther,
and the Song of Solomon must be rejected; that Joshua, Judges, the books
of Samuel, Kings, and Daniel, are doubtful at best; that the Proverbs of
Solomon may be _his_ or the joint production of a number of tolerably
gifted men; and that the Pentateuch, and especially Genesis, is a mere
collection of legendary fragments. The New Testament has some good
qualities, which are wanting in the Old; but there are parts of it
positively injurious to the church. The Apocalypse of John, for example,
can only be held by every calm critic as the work of a wild fanatic. As
to the gospels, their authenticity and integrity are very doubtful, and
that of John is the only one in any wise adapted to the present state of
the world; since he alone is free from the Jewish spirit. The general
epistles were written solely for the unification of the struggling
parties into which the early church had unfortunately split.

We now come to the famous _Accommodation-Theory_. Christ and his
apos