080. II. The Probationary Law.
II. The Probationary Law.
1. A Matter of Divine Determination.—The assignment of duty to primitive man in the form of precept or commandment was purely the prerogative of God. Adam could not determine his own duties, for he knew not sufficiently either himself or the claims of his Creator. Some duties, such as the love and worship of God, might stand in a clear light, and be seen as by intuition; but what in the way of restraint might be requisite to his best moral and religious development could not thus be known. These things could be known only to God; and the whole right of commandment was his. He might impose any duty or any restraint consistent with his own wisdom. When we say consistent with his own wisdom we mean that the perfections of God are a law unto himself, so that he could impose nothing contrary to his own wisdom. This fact, however, does not bring down the ways of God to the measure of our own minds. We cannot judge him as we judge men, for we stand on the same plane with them, while God is in the infinite heights above us. There is here a place for our trust in God, and an infinite warrant for it, even when the light of his wisdom is hidden from our view. Such trust is far wiser in us than any unfriendly criticism of the law whereby he tested the fidelity of primitive man.
2. The Law as Divinely Instituted.—This law is plainly given in the sacred narrative: “But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die” (Genesis 2:17). Respecting the knowledge of good and evil, the sense is not that the fruit of this tree could by any virtue of its own give the knowledge of good and evil, but rather that man, as obedient or disobedient to its divine interdiction, should prove himself good or evil, or come to know in his own experience the good or the evil. Such a sense best accords with the testing function of the law.
We can hardly think that this one commandment constituted the sum of duty for primitive man. There are moral laws which must exist for all moral beings. From the beginning it must have been the duty of Adam to love and worship God. Such a religious life requires habits of thought and disposition which in themselves fulfill religious duties. Nor is there in the words of that one commandment any exclusion of other duties. There was this specific commandment, and the first sin was in its violation. So far the sacred narrative is clear. There were other duties; but whether of a proper testing character, or whether in case of fidelity under this first trial other tests might have been instituted—on all such questions that narrative is silent. With the obligation of other duties, the fidelity of Abraham was yet specially tried by a positive command. Such was the manner of trial in the primitive probation; and, so far as the Scriptures give us any clear light, such was the law of that probation.
3. A Proper Test of Obedience.—This law of the primitive probation was a positive law in distinction from a moral law. The obligation of a moral law is intrinsic and absolute: the obligation of a positive law arises from a divine commandment. Such a ground of obligation is in no contradiction to the reality of fundamental principles of ethics. Nor is such obligation grounded purely in authority. A divine command always means to the enlightened religious consciousness a sufficient reason for the duty imposed, however hidden that reason may be. There is thus a place for faith as the practical power of obedience. The case of Abraham is an illustration. No reason was given for the command to offer up his son. His faith, found the reason for obedience, not in an absolute arbitrary authority of God, but in the wisdom and goodness of his providence. Such is the real ground of obligation in a positive command. For the religious consciousness such obligation is absolute. A positive command of God is not the dictum of an arbitrary will, but the expression of his wisdom and love. Nor is obedience to a positive command any abject submission to an arbitrary absolute will. No such submission could constitute a true obedience. At most it could be only a conformity of outward action to the positive mandate. Such conformity is not in itself obedience, because without the motives of piety. Such was the case under this probationary law. True obedience to its mandate required the motives of religious reverence and love; and disobedience could arise only with an irreligious revolt of the soul from God. It thus appears that a positive command of God is no arbitrary mandate of an absolute will, indifferent to morality and piety, and which the most servile outward observance will satisfy, but the expression and requirement of his infinite wisdom and goodness as our moral Ruler, and which can be fulfilled only with the truest obedience of a devout mind and a loving heart. So closely one in obligation and fulfillment is a positive law of God with a moral law. With the inexperience of primitive man as he entered the sphere of probation, a positive law may have best suited the purpose of a moral trial. There were sufficient reasons to the divine Mind for its institution, and, as we shall point out, it was most favorable to obedience. After a long experience of Abraham and the practical development of his moral and religious life, God found reason to test his obedience through a positive command. Clearly, then, there might be sufficient reason for such a trial of primitive man, whose conception of moral principles was as yet without any development through experience.[462] Such a command was given him—a command which addressed itself to the deepest moral and religious consciousness, and required for its proper observance the truest motives of a good life. Further, it embodied the great religious lessons, that the will of God is the supreme law of duty, and that the highest good of man must be found in his loving favor, not in any pleasures of sense. Such facts constituted this law of the primitive probation a proper test of obedience.
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