Wescott and Hort or Chapter 8 of UHotB reading

Oddly enough, neither man believed that the Bible should be treated any differently than the writings of the lost histor-ians and philosophers!

We must consider these things for a moment. How can God use men who do not believe that His Book is any different than Shakespeare, Plato, or Dickens? It is a fundamental belief that the Bible is different from all other writings. Why did these men not believe so?

They have both become famous for being able to deny scriptural truth and still be upheld by fundamental Christianity as biblical authorities! Both Westcott and Hort failed to accept the basic Bible doctrines which we hold so dear and vital to our fundamental faith.

hort writes in 1858, "... I did 'recognize' 'Providente' in biblical writings. Most strongly I recognize it; but I am not prepared to say that it necessarily involves absolute infallibility. So I still await judgment." " {yikes!!!}

Though unimpressed with the evangelicals of his day, Hort had great admiration for Charles Darwin!

Hort also shrunk from the belief in a literal, eternal "hell."

Although the idea of a literal devil and a literal hell found no place in Hort's educated mind, he was a very real believer in the fictious Roman Catholic doctrine of "purgatory."

hort wrote in 1854 - (2) that the power of repentance is not limited to this life; {this is scary because my own MIL also believes or at least hopes this is true...she had a husband and he wanted nothing to do with Yeshua and she hoped/believed that he would have to spend time in "hell" (she said away from God) and then he would be asked again if he'd like to repent...or so she hoped/believed and she grew up in Germany}

There was also his rejection of Christ's atoning death for the sins of all mankind. In fact, Hort considered the teachings of Christ's atonement as heresy! {doesn't the Word say these truths will be hidden from the so-called learned? after all, it's too "easy" right....those with so much "knowledge" just can't accept its completeness and fullness and simplicity...why shouldn't the Creator of all be able to say ok this is all it's gonna take...why not, HE is in charge...it's HIS story...stop looking at it from your point of view and look at it from HIS}

In fact, Hort's heretical view of baptism probably cost his own son his eternal soul, as we find Hort assuring his eldest son, Arthur, that his infant baptism was his salvation:
"You were not only born into the world of men. You were also born of Christian parents in a Christian land. While yet an infant you were claimed for God by being made in Baptism an unconscious member of His Church, the great Divine Society which has lived on unceasingly from the Apostles' time till now. You have been surrounded by Christian influences; taught to lift up your eyes to the Father in heaven as your own Father; to feel yourself in a wonderful sense a member or part of Christ, united to Him by strange invisible bonds; to know that you have as your birthright a share in the kingdom of heaven."

Then again, it is possible that the learned doctor was influenced by more than mere philosophy, as we see in his description of a hotel in the Alps where he often vacationed:
"Pontresina, Hotel Krone; homely, but very clean and comfortable; ... beer excellent." It is not an amazing thing that any one man could hold to so many unscriptural and ungodly beliefs. It is amazing that such a man could be exalted by Bible believing preachers and professors to a point of authority higher than the King James Bible!

Dr. Hort was a truly great Greek scholar, yet a great intellect does not make one an authority over the Bible when they themselves do not even claim to believe it! Albert Einstein was a man of great intellect, but he rejected Scripture, and so where he speaks on the subject of Scripture he is not to be accepted as authoritative. Possessing a great mind or great ability does not guarantee being a great spiritual leader. Dr. Hort was a scholar, but his scholarship alone is no reason to accept his theories concerning Bible truth.

If fundamental pastors of today enlisted the services of an evangelist and found that this evangelist had beliefs paralleling those of Fenton John Anthony Hort, I believe that the pastor would cancel the meeting. Strangely through, when a pastor discovers such to be true about Dr. Hort, he excuses him as "a great Greek scholar" and presents his Authorized Version to him to be maliciously dissected and then discarded as Dr. Hort sets himself down in the seat of authority which the Bible once held. Here again I must assert that most often this is done with childlike faith on the part of the pastor, due to the education he received while in seminary. The seminary is not really guilty either, for they have simply and unsuspectingly accepted the authority of two men raised under the influence of a campaign by the Jesuits to re-Romanize England. Wilkenson reports that Hort had been influenced by these Roman Catholic forces: "Dr. Hort tell us that the writings of Simon had a large share in the movement to discredit the Textus Receptus class of MSS and Bibles."

Westcott believed that the second coming of Jesus Christ was not a physical coming but a spiritual coming:
Bishop Westcott, for he believed Heaven to be a state and not a literal place.
Place Mr. Westcott next to any present fundamental preacher or educator, and he would be judged a modernist, liberal and heretic.
In spite of his outstanding ability in Greek, a man of his convictions would not be welcome on the campus of any truly Christian college in America.