THE BIBLICAL REVIEW, AND CONGREGATIONAL MAGAZINE. VOL. III. JANUARY TO JUNE, 1847. LONDON: JACKSON AND WALFORD, ST. PAUL'S CHURCHYARD, THE BIBLICAL REVIEW, AND CONGREGATIONAL MAGAZINE. JANUARY, 1847. I. GIESELER'S ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY.* THE Christian Church, viewed as an historical community, is that visible society which was originated by Christ and by the ministry of his apostles, which acknowledges his authority, and is bound together by a common faith in him. By the History of this Church we understand a faithful representation of the successive steps by which it has reached its present state, and of the way in which each of these successive steps was connected with, and arose out of, those which had preceded it. "The object of ecclesiastical history,' according to Gieseler, 'is to present, in historical development, the entire course through which the Christian church has passed, and the influences which it has exerted on other human relations, and to lay the foundation for a true estimate of it in all respects. As time consists of moments, so is history made up of circumstances connected together as cause and effect. Tholuck, looking at the subject in a loftier theological point of view, 'defines ecclesiastical history to be, in the popular acceptation of the term, the narrative of the changes through which the church of Christ has passed on earth. But every scientific narrative must have one leading idea which imparts a unity to the whole. The idea of the kingdom of God is the leading thought in the history of the church. This kingdom of God is an ideal communion of the redeemed in a state of perfection. In this state, every man is so far pervaded with the spirit of * Gieseler's Compendium of Ecclesiastical History. Vol. I. Translated by S. Davidson, LL.D., Professor of Bib. Literature and Eccl. History in the Lancashire Independent College. Clarke's Foreign Theological Library. Vol. IV. 1846. |