THE writer has not the pleasure of Mr. Philip Mauro's acquaintance. He remembers vividly how the Christian world was delighted when his early writings appeared, such as "The Number of Man," and that delightful classic, "Life in the Word," whose circulation has run to 300,000 copies, and been translated into many languages. We wondered then what star of the first magnitude had swung into the theological heavens, and were prepared to welcome warmly any further writings he might produce.
Alas, our hopes have been grievously disappointed! Mr. Mauro has reversed his original teaching as to dispensational truth to a greater extent than one has ever known in any similar instance. He was dogmatic in his early teaching. He is equally dogmatic in his later teaching. He condemns his early views. He presses his later views upon our acceptance.
This has brought about confusion amongst God's dear children, and caused division in some of their assemblies. The writer has been asked to review in a general way Mr. Mauro's recent teaching with a view to the help of the Lord's people. It is with the desire that the truth may prevail that the writer puts pen to paper, seeking the grace and help of God's Holy Spirit. Though Mr. Mauro's name is necessarily prominent, it is only in the desire to elucidate the truth, and nothing of a personal nature, that makes this necessary.
It is evident that an exhaustive review of Mr. Mauro's later teaching is not possible within the limits of a small pamphlet, but we will endeavor to put sufficient before the reader to enable him to form a judgment. We limit, in the main, our brief examination of Mr. Mauro's Dispensational Views to what he puts forth in two volumes, (1) The Gospel of the Kingdom (258 pages), and (2) The Patmos Visions (576 pages).
Mr. Mauro is a trained lawyer, and must know a good deal of the method that lawyers adopt in examining witnesses. A calm, dispassionate witness will carry great weight. A witness, who evidently has prejudices that color his evidence, will weaken his testimony accordingly.
Alas, Mr. Mauro weakens his whole position by the virulence of his attack on the well-known Scofield Bible. In his introduction to his volume, "The Gospel of the Kingdom," he writes: "Through an incident of recent occurrence I was made aware of the extent-far greater than I had imagined-to which the modern system of dispensationalism has found acceptance among orthodox christians; and also of the extent-correspondingly great-to which the recently published 'Scofield' Bible (which is the main vehicle of the new system of doctrine referred to) has usurped the place of authority that belongs to God's Bible alone" (p. 5). Now this seems to us to be a really bitter and virulent attack. We are not able to subscribe to every note in the Scofield Bible, but we are bound to admit that Dr. Scofield has got together a large number of very helpful notes, explanatory of the text of Scripture, and remarkable in their combination of clarity, conciseness and general correctness.
In this note Mr. Mauro charges Dr. Scofield with usurping the place of authority which belongs to God's Word alone. Can he substantiate this charge? Does not Dr. Scofield print in the Bible which bears his name, the authorized text from Genesis to Revelation without the alteration of a single word? Dr. Scofield's notes are distinct from the text. They are explanatory and helpful. They do not claim to be inspired.
His notes are on a par with a servant of the Lord who stands up, reads a portion of Scripture, and then seeks to expound it to his hearers to the best of his ability. The one does it by word of mouth; Dr. Scofield does it by writing. How unjust it would be to denounce every servant of the Lord who stands up to give an exegetical address, as usurping the place that belongs to God's Bible alone! The so-called Scofield Bible is GOD'S Bible, whatever Mr. Mauro may say. It is within his province to express his opinion as to the wisdom of the explanatory notes or otherwise, but he has clearly gone beyond the bounds of fair criticism in this case.
Mr. Mauro returns to the attack: "It is a matter of grief to me that a book should exist wherein the corrupt words of mortal man are printed on the same page with the holy Words of the living God; this mixture of the precious and the vile being made an article of sale, entitled a 'Bible,' and distinguished by a man's name" (The Gospel of the Kingdom, p. 6). To write off the notes in the Scofield Bible in this sweeping fashion as "corrupt" and "vile" is going far too far. One's moral sense is shocked by such utterly unfair treatment.
It is true that Mr. Mauro makes a frank acknowledgment of a very unchristian state of mind that marked him when he held the views he now attacks. He says: "It is mortifying to remember that I not only held and taught these novelties myself, but that I even enjoyed a complacent sense of superiority because thereof, and regarded with feelings of pity and contempt those who had not received the 'new light,' and were unacquainted with this up-to-date method of 'rightly dividing the word of truth.'... Yet I was among those who eagerly embraced it (upon human authority solely for there is none other), and who earnestly pressed it upon my fellow-Christians" (The Gospel of the Kingdom, p. 6.).
All honor to Mr. Mauro for this frank acknowledgment. It would have been out of good taste to have referred to it in this pamphlet, if it had not been that he is committing the same fault in the book we are reviewing. Proverbs tells us, "Whoso confesseth and forsaketh his sins shall have mercy." We may well ask in the light of the extracts we have just given, Has Mr. Mauro forsaken, as well as confessed, the wrong attitude he took towards those he differed from? It does not look like it. The virulence of his attack on the Scofield Bible, the recklessness of his accusations, are surprising in a lawyer, and above all in a Christian teacher. We wonder if he does not even now view with "pity" and "contempt" those who hold the views he once held and pressed, but which he has now renounced.
Here is a statement, referring to the Scofield Bible, that far exceeds the bounds of common fairness: "There is no doubt whatever that it is mainly to this cleverly executed work that dispensationalism owes its present vogue. For without that aid it doubtless would be clearly seen by all who give close attention to this doctrine, that it is a humanly contrived system that has been imposed upon the Bible, and not a scheme of doctrine derived from it" (The Gospel of the Kingdom, p. 21).
Mr. Mauro cannot complain of these extracts being reproduced, seeing he has written them himself, and wishes for their widest circulation. It is only just and right to take account of the way he treats the notes in the Scofield Bible and its Editor. Dr. Scofield's editorship refers solely to the notes and comments on the Bible that bears his name, and not to the Bible itself.