Article October 7, 1911 Issue

Christian Scientists are in no way offended with our...

Charles W. J. Tennant

Eskdale and Liddesdale (Scot.) Advertiser

Christian Scientists are in no way offended with our critic when he says "doctors of all kinds—surgical and medical—are coworkers with God." What concerns them infinitely more are the questions, "Was Jesus a coworker with God? and if so, did his method of healing differ from materia medica?" "Did he heal by material or spiritual means?" The answers to these questions can be found in the Bible. In John v, 19, we read, "The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise." From this we gather that Jesus healed the sick by a method which confirmed to the will of God. Again, in John xiv, 12, we read, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do." Is it unreasonable to think that the Master expected these works to be done by the same method he employed? According to Gibbon in his "History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," the early Christians healed the sick and raised the dead by spiritual means alone, for some two hundred and twenty-five years after Jesus left this earth.

In the Old Testament we have records of Elijah and Elisha multiplying meal and oil and raising the dead. Does our reverend critic not see the same divine Principle underlying these works as underlay the works of Jesus, his disciples, and the early Christians? The Bible teaches that God is "the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever." His power, therefore, can heal the sick in any age, and is available to man just in proportion to his possession of that Mind in him "which was also in Christ Jesus." Our critic says, "Christian Scientists err in two ways in setting up their theory and practice. They represent matter as an illusion, evil as an illusion, and pain as an illusion. That is a caricature of idealism. It is comedy to the schools, but tragedy in the sick-room." Now let us go back to the scene of a sick-room in Palestine, which terminated in the death of a certain ruler's daughter, as related in Matthew ix, 23-25: "And when Jesus came into the ruler's house, and saw the minstrels and the people making a noise, he said unto them, Give place: for the maid is not dead, but sleepeth. And they laughed him to scorn. But when the people were put forth, he went in, and took her by the hand, and the maid arose." Now I ask which was the tragedy in the sick-room, the material thought of the people which laughed Jesus to scorn, or the spiritual understanding of Jesus which raised the dead?

Let our critic study and practise the idealism of Jesus as revealed in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" by Mrs. Eddy, and it will give him a clearer understanding of how to "love God supremely," and his neighbor as himself.

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