# Hugh Martin, S. T. Coleridge, and biblical inspiration



## Reformed Covenanter (Nov 9, 2019)

Hugh Martin made a comment that alerts us to the impact that Romanticism had upon the doctrine of biblical inspiration:

The fact is that against the representation [of biblical inspiration] given by the [Free Church] College Committee, [Samuel Taylor] Coleridge would have been under no provocation to write his "Confessions of an inquiring spirit." Against the Westminster doctrine (no doubt under a misapprehension of it connected with the ridiculous idea of "dictation,") he poured out, in that well known little volume, one of the fiercest tirades in the history of theological literature.

Hugh Martin, _The Westminster Doctrine of the Inspiration of Scripture (With a Prefatory Note on the Free Church College Committee’s Report, and with Remarks on Dr Marcus Dods’s Recent Sermon)_ (1877; 4th edn, London: J. Nisbet, 1890), p. 2.

There are some questions that spring to mind upon reading this extract. For the time being, I will restrict myself to one: What exactly did Martin mean by dictation? Some have tried to argue against "dictation" by claiming that the scriptures are fully human and fully divine (did not B. B. Warfield use that argument?), but I tend to think that argument is mistaken. I presume that Martin may have been arguing against a notion that saw the biblical writers as mere typewriters.


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