Reader's Guide — 11th Edition

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Chapter XXIVFor Ministers

The Great Preachers

The minister or candidate for the ministry will find a valuable course of reading laid out for him in this Guide under the heading Bible Study, and it might be said with little exaggeration that any systematic course of reading in the Encyclopaedia Britannica should add to the efficiency and power of one who would be an ideal pastor. If the schools of the Middle Ages could truly call all the arts and sciences hand-maids and helpers to Theology, much more truly, in the present age, should the minister, in order that he may minister truly, know not merely the history of the Bible and of the Church, the results of modern criticism, and of comparative religion and folk-lore, but, almost as fully, general history, literature, philosophy, psychology, education, something of the fine arts, much of law and political science, and still more of social science and economics. In a period of specialization he cannot afford to be a specialist—or, it might be nearer the truth to say that, like every other true specialist, he must make all knowledge, all the circle of the sciences, tributary to his specialty, which is the knowledge and the improvement of the human soul. The suggestions that follow must necessarily be fragmentary, and should be considered as including merely a few topics not covered in the chapter on Bible Study nor in the other courses which, as has just been suggested, a minister might profitably pursue.

The article Sermon (Vol. 24, p. 673) is by Edmund Gosse, librarian of the House of Lords, biographer of John Donne, Jeremy Taylor and Dr. Thomas Browne. The writer is especially conversant with the English literature of the 17th century, in the middle of which, to quote his article, “the sermon became one of the most highly-cultivated forms of intellectual entertainment in Great Britain, and when the theatres were closed at the Commonwealth it grew to be the only public form of eloquence.”

Each name on the following list of great preachers is accompanied by volume and page reference to the biographical sketch in the Britannica, containing criticism of the preacher and a bibliography of his works and of works about him, so that the articles supply the basis for a study of the world’s great preachers.

These lists could easily be made longer and fuller, but the articles mentioned give such a view of the great preachers of the world as cannot fail to stimulate any minister. Supplementing what has been said above about the necessity of the minister’s being a well-rounded man, it may be worth while to notice that Donne and Keble and, in a less degree, Doane and Muhlenberg, were poets as well as preachers; that Cudworth was known as the founder of the Cambridge Platonists, and Jowett as the translator of Plato, Barrow as a mathematician, second, in his day, only to Isaac Newton, Edward Everett Hale as an essayist and writer of short stories, and McCook as a great naturalist.

The minister will find the Britannica an excellent encyclopaedia of comparative religion and of church history, with the newest and most authoritative information on any subject in this field. For a brief outline course in these topics let him read:

The article Religion (Vol. 23, p. 61; equivalent to 50 pages of this Guide), by Dr. Joseph Estlin Carpenter, principal of Manchester College, Oxford, and Robert R. Marett, fellow and tutor of Exeter College, Oxford, author of the Threshold of Religion and contributor to the Britannica of articles on Prayer, Ritual, etc. This article is made up of: a general introduction sketching the history of the study of religions, especially in the last century, and concluding that “the origin of religion can never be determined archaeologically or historically; it must be sought conjecturally through psychology”; a section on primitive religion, which is a remarkable summary of all that is known of this subject; and a section on the higher religions which discusses developments of animism, transition to polytheism, polytheism, the order of nature (a half-way stage to monotheism), monotheism, classification of religions, revelation, ethics and eschatology and bibliography.

Another class of articles comprises Ancestor Worship, Animal Worship, Animism, Fetishism, Folklore, Magic, Mythology, Prayer, Ritual, Sacrifice, Serpent-Worship, Totemism and Tree-Worship, written by such authorities as N. W. Thomas, author of Kinship and Marriage in Australia, etc., Andrew Lang, Stanley Arthur Cooke and R. R. Marett.

Certain primitive religions are separately treated, as in the article Indians, North American (Vol. 14, especially pages 471–473), by A. F. Chamberlain, assistant professor of anthropology, Clark University, Worcester; in the article Australia (Vol. 2, especially p. 957); in the article Hawaii (Vol. 13, pages 87, 88).

On higher religions there are the following separate articles (among many):

Babylonian and Assyrian Religion, by Morris Jastrow of the University of Pennsylvania; and the articles Anai, Ishtar, Ea, Marduk, Assur and Gilgamesh,—all by the same author and all of particular value as throwing sidelights on Hebrew Religion.

Egypt (Vol. 9, pp. 48–56), by Allan H. Gardiner, editor of the New (Berlin) Hieroglyphic Dictionary.

Hebrew Religion (Vol. 13, p. 176; equivalent to 40 pages of this Guide), by Dr. Owen Charles Whitehouse, professor of Hebrew, Cheshunt College, Cambridge; and the articles Hebrew Literature, Jews, etc.

Brahmanism (Vol. 4, p. 381) and Hinduism (Vol. 13, p. 501), by Julius Eggeling, Professor of Sanskrit, Edinburgh.

Buddhism, Buddha and Lamaism, by T. W. Rhys Davids, author of Buddhist India, etc.

Confucius, by James Legge, author of The Religions of China.

Sikhism, by Max Macauliffe, whose book The Sikh Religion is accepted by the Sikhs as authoritative.

Zoroaster, by Karl Geldner, professor at Marburg, and the article Parsees.

Mahommedan Religion (Vol. 17, p. 417; equivalent to 45 pages in this Guide), by G. W. Thatcher, warden of Camden College, Sydney.

Mahomet, by D. S. Margoliouth, Laudian professor of Arabic, Oxford; Mahommedan Institutions and Mahommedan Laws, by D. S. Macdonald, professor of Semitic languages, Hartford Theological Seminary.

Bábiism, by E. G. Browne, professor of Arabic, Cambridge, and author of History of the Báb.

Greek Religion (Vol. 12, p. 527), by L. R. Farnell, fellow of Exeter College, Oxford, author of Cults of the Greek States; and such articles as Demeter, Hecate, Hera, Hermes, Hestia, Nike, Phoebus, Themis and Zeus.

Roman Religion (Vol. 23, p. 577), by Cyril Bailey, fellow of Balliol College, Oxford, and author of The Religion of Ancient Rome; and such articles as Anna Perenna, Arval Brothers, Bona Dea, Concordia, Fama, Faunus, Juno and Jupiter; and the valuable articles on Eastern cults in Rome, Great Mother of the Gods, Attis, Mithras, etc., by Professor Grant Showerman of the University of Wisconsin.

Christianity (Vol. 6, p. 280; equivalent to 35 pages of this Guide), by G. W. Knox, professor of philosophy and history of religion, Union Theological Seminary, New York; Jesus Christ (Vol. 15, p. 348; equivalent to 35 pages of this Guide), by the Very Rev. Joseph Armitage Robinson, Dean of Westminster; Gospel (Vol. 12, p. 265), by Rev. V. H. Stanton, Ely professor of divinity, Cambridge; articles on the separate gospels; Paul the Apostle (Vol. 20, p. 938), by the Rev. James Vernon Bartlett, professor of church history, Mansfield College, Oxford.

On Church History there is an excellent key article in volume 6 (p. 331; equivalent to 45 pages of this Guide). It begins with an outline of the work of the great church historians and divides the subject into three parts: first, up to 590 B.C.,—this part and the general introduction are by A. C. McGiffert, professor of church history in Union Theological Seminary, New York City; second, the Church in the Middle Ages, by Albert Hauck, professor of church history at Leipzig; and The Modern Church, by W. Alison Phillips, author of Modern Europe. This sketch may be filled in by reference to the following articles (among many):

A brief course in theology and dogma is contained in the following articles:

Theology (Vol. 26, p. 772; equivalent to 45 pages in this Guide), by the Rev. Dr. Robert Mackintosh of Lancashire Independent College, Manchester.

On Religious Orders:

and see also the names of different orders and hundreds of biographical articles on saints and heretics, preachers and theologians.

The following alphabetical list includes only a part of the articles in the Britannica on religious topics; but it will serve to show the value of the book to a clergyman in his own field: