CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY GIFT OF Alfred C, Barnes Cornell University Library ■K35 neoiooy of the Epistles. olin 3 1924 029 292 624 The original of tliis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924029292624 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES STUDIES IN THEOLOGY Christianity and Etiiics. By Archibald B. D. Alexander, M.A., D.D. Tlie Environment of Early Cliristianity. By S. Angus, M.A., Ph.D. Eistoiy of the Study of Theology. Vol. I. " " " Vol.n. By Dr. C. A. Briggs. The Christian Hope. By W. Adams Brown, Ph.D., D.D. Christianity and Social Questions. By William Cunningham, F.B.A., D.D., D.Sc The Justification of God. By Rev. P. T. Forsyth. Christian Apologetics. By Rev. A. E. Garvie. A Critical Introduction to the Old Testament. By George Buchanan Gray, D.D., D.Litt. Gospel Origins. ■ By William West Holdsworth, M.A. Faith and Its Psychology. By William R. Inge, D.D. Cfaristiamty and Sin. By Robert Mackintosh, D.D. Protestant Thought Before Eant. By A. C. McGiFFERT, Ph.D., D.D. The Theology of the Gospels. By James Moffatt, D.D., D.Litt. The Theology of the Epistles. By H. A. A. Kennedy, D.D., D.Sc. Histoiy of Christian Thought Since Eant. By Edward Caldwell Moore, D.D. The Doctrine of the Atonement By J. K. Mozley, M.A. Revelation and Inspiration. By James Orr, D.D. A Critical Introduction to the Kew Testament. By Arthur Samuel Peake, D.D. Philosophy and Religion. By Hastings Rashdall, D.Litt. (Oxon.), D.C.L. (Durham), F.B.A. The Holy Spmt. By T. Rees, M.A. (Lond.), B.A. (Oxon.). The Religions Ideas of the Old Testament. By H. Wheeler Robinson, M.A. The Text and Canon of the New Testament By Alexander Souter, D.Litt. Christian Thought to the Reformation. By Herbert B. Workman, D.Litt. THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES BY H. A. A. KENNEDY, D.D., D.Sc. PROFESSOR OF KEW TESTAMENT EXEGESIS AND THEOLOGY NEW COLLEGE, EDINBURGH NEW YORK' ^' CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 1920 All rights reserved AFFECTIONATE BEMEIIBBANOE OF DR. JAMES DENNEY PREFACE This volume scarcely requires a preface, as the method which has been followed in discussing the subject is fully described in the Introduction. One matter alone calls for remark. I have deUberately refrained from dealing with the thought of the Johannine Epistles, because that could not be adequately treated apart from the Fourth Gospel. All students of theology are aware that any such discussion must extend far beyond the limits of a handbook like the present. I have tried to limit the references to literature. But I trust I have not missed any contribution of first-class importance. It is once more a pleasure to acknowledge the large debt I owe to my friend and colleague, Professor H. R. Mackintosh, D.D., D.Phil., who, besides helping me to correct the proofs, has, by his fine sensitiveness of ear and mind, enabled me to improve both the thought and its expression. H. A. A. KENNEDY. New Coixeob, EDiNBUsaH, Mcai 24, 1919. CONTENTS INTEODUCTION Method . , , Scope .... St. Paul's Letters . Catholic Epistles . Scheme op Treatment : — 1. St. Paul 2. Post-Pauliae Christianity PA OB 1 2 4 5 6 9 PART I Paulinism CHAPTER I St. Paul's Bnyirokmbnt : Judaism . ^■fflELLENISM 13 22 CHAPTER II St. Paul's Experience under the Religion of the Law : — Presuppositions . Sense of Failure Power of Silf in the Flesh . Human Nature . Origin of Sin . Significance of the Law His Relation to the Nazarenes 28 29 33 35 39 41 47 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES CHAPTER III St. Paul's Conversion : — Revklation of Jesus as Risen Call to Sbrticb His Election BEARiNa of Vocation on Theology 50 66 60 62 CHAPTER IV Normative Influence of St. Paul's Conversion on HIS Religious Thought : — Jbsus the Conqueror op Death Significance of the Cross The Messiah (Son of God) The Lord The Spirit The New Attitude to God 68 72 75 82 86 91 CHAPTER V St. Paul and the Christian Tradition : — The Historical Jesus . , . eschatoloqical conceptions . , The Era of the Spirit . The Death of Christ . • 97 108 111 114 CHAPTER VI The Fundamental Positions of Paulinism :— In Christ The Crucified Redeemer . The New Relation to God The Activities of the Christian The Body and Members of Christ The Cosmic Relations of Christ 119 125 133 142 147 152 CONTENTS PAKT II Phases op Early Christian Thought in the Main Independent of Paulinism CHAPTER I PAOK The First Epistle of Peter: — The Situation . . .... 161 Practical Character op the Theology . . 165 Appinities with St. Paul .... 166 Atmosphere op Common Church-Consciousness . 170 Conceptions Characteristic op the Epistle : — 1. Old Testament Prophecy. . . . 174 2. The Death of Christ , . . .176 3. The Descent to Hades . . , .179 CHAPTER II The Epistle to the Hebrews. A. Prolegomena : — Special Character of the Epistle , . 182 Perils op the Community . . . 185 Relation of Author to Paulinism . . 187 Relation to Alexandrian Judaism . . 190 B. Fundamental Conceptions op the Epistle : — The New Covenant : — 1. The New Covenant and the Old . . 195 2. Superiority of Christ, the Mediator of the New Covenant .... 202 Consummation op the New Covenant : — 1. Christ's Priesthood a Link between Temporal and Eternal Worlds . . .215 2. Faith, the Attitude of Members of the New Covenant. . . . .218 xu THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES PART III Thk Theoloqt of the Dbvklopinq Church Shaping Forces Moralistic Tbmdenct in Belioion Thinnino of Rbdbmptivb Ideas Prouinence op the Church-Consciousnesi Conception of God . Law of Liberty Eschatological Outlook Influbnck of Heretical Movements Hellenistic Colouring Bibliography .... Index ..... 225 228 234 238 241 244 248 256 259 M. or (M.) denotes Professor Moffatt's Tramlation of the New Tatament, THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES INTRODUCTION (a) Method There can be little question that the ideal method of reaching the significance of the Theology of the Epistles is to deal with it as an integral section of the history of early Christianity. The fundamental matter in that history is the rehgion of the first disciples of Jesus, and of those who were won for His allegiance by their missionary labours. The vital thought of the Epistles is the pre- cipitate of the religious faith inspired by Jesus, and deriving its support from Him. But the task of relating this thought to the complex play of events and infiuences which gave it shape in the apostolic age is one of extra- ordinary difficulty. The data at our disposal are meagre. Most of them are supphed by the Epistles themselves. The brief outline of history in Acts supplements them here and there, but its view of the circumstances often creates new problems. A connected survey of the apostoUo age is impossible of achievement. We have only to compare Paul's passing references in Gal. i. to the events which followed his conversion, with the vague account of the situation given in Acts ix., to reahse the many gaps which confront our investigation. DeUcate questions such as the precise relation of Jewish-Christian thought in the Diaspora to that of Palestine and the mother Church, and the influence of each of these factors on Paul's early Christian career, elude our instruments of investigation. 2 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES Nor can we with any certainty determine the various forms assumed by Christianity on heathen soil.^ Further, for a complete estimate of primitive Christian thought, it would be necessary to trace the aflSnities which it presents with those faiths from which it gained the majority of its adherents, notably Judaism and Hellenism, as well as the syncretistic influences which surrounded it in an age when the civiUsed peoples of the Roman Empire were rapidly becoming unified. Here, it may be admitted, the materials for arriving at a judgment are accumulating in bewildering variety. Hasty conclusions are attractive, and usually erroneous. In no field of inquiry is it more needful to resist large generalisations, until the evidence has been adequately sifted, and its bearings carefully weighed. (6) Scope A final problem is concerned with the scope of the investigation. In the opening centuries of our era, the Church was led to construct a Canon or authoritative selection of sacred writings. Certain documents received universal recognition within the Christian community at a very early date. But as late as the beginning of the third century several of the CathoKc Epistles, e.g., were regarded with hesitation, if not rejected, by some sections of the Christian Church.* On the other hand, in the same period, the writings of the so-called Apostolic Fathers were occasionally cited as Scripture. Thus Irenaeus assigns Scriptural authority to a quotation from the ' Shepherd ' of Hennas, which he groups with passages from Genesis, Matthew, and Ephesians. The facts remind us that the boundary between ' canonical ' and secondary Christian writings was still fluctuating. But this condition of things is reflected in the contents as well as the history of various documents. It is practically impossible to draw a sharp distinction between the apostolic and the sub-apostolic age. Hence, such writings as 1 Clement and the Epistles of > See Wrede, Aujgdbe u. Methode, p. 69. ' E.g. the Syrian Church. INTEODUCTION 3 Ignatius have, in many respects, as good a claim to a place in the history of early Christian religion as, say, 2 Peter and Jude. And recent writers on New Testament Theology have extended their survey to the sub-apostohc period. Apart, however, from the inherent difficulty of approxi- mating to the ideal treatment of our subject which has been sketched above, the Umits prescribed for a handbook like the present make it impossible to attempt a systematic association of the religious thought of the Epistles with the history of the Christian Church out of which it has arisen. To essay the task would mean the covering of a bare skeleton of facts with a thin tissue of ideas. Our aim is wholly different. Our starting-point is the clear recognition that the Theology of the Epistles is not an exercise in system-building, but the transcript of a Uving Christian experience. K we make the experience the regulative factor in the interpretation of the thought, we shall to that extent guard against the danger of placing the ideas in a false proportion. We shall be able to dis- tinguish those that are normative from those which emerge incidentally in a given situation. Ultimately, the interpretation of the ideas will prove the surest clue to the essential history of early Christian faith. For they will themselves, in large measure, supply their own context. The inner processes of thought and feeling will give life to the meagre historical outline which we are able provision- ally to reconstruct from our various sources. In any case, we shall be compelled at every step to fill in as much of the background as is needful to explain the origin and character of those phases of Christian experience which the writers of the Epistles set in the forefront. Thus we shall at least avoid dealing with the material for our study as a Jiortus siccus, in which lifeless specimens are arranged in artificial order. There is, no doubt, a place for the history of New Testament conceptions in the various stages of their development. But that must be supplementary to New Testament Theology in the strict sense, and not its main content. 4 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES (c) Paul's ' Letters ' The formulation of Christian thought in the Epistles must be estimated in the light of the nature and genesis of the documents in which it is embodied. Much recent dis- cussion has turned on the distinction between the Epistle and the Letter.^ And for our inquiry there is point in recognising that the Epistle constitutes a definite type of literature, intended for publication, while the Letter is a private interchange of thoughts and sentiments, the ex- pression of a well-marked mood. Obviously the writings of St. Paid — even so elaborate a production as the Epistle to the Romans — must be classified as genuine Letters. Yet their unliterary character must not be exaggerated.^ The truth is that Paul cannot be placed under any of the ordinary categories. ' This style of letter,' says one of the most eminent Uving authorities on Greek Literature, ' is Paul, nobody but Paul. It is not a private letter and yet not Uterature, something between which cannot be imitated.' * And he declares that Paul's uniquely in- dividual Greek, depending on no school or model, but welling up from a heart full of joyous vitahty, makes him ' a classic of Hellenism.' That is justly said. These documents contain an animated monologue abounding in personal feeling, reflecting the subtlest shades of the speaker's mood. Yet it is not ordinary conversation. For the apostolic note is there, a tone of authority not anxiously claimed, but assumed as by the ambassador of CJhrist. So we reach a criterion for estimating Paul's conceptions. He addresses himself in his Letters to certain definite situations, and these determine the emphasis laid on particular ideas. But he never hesitates to apply eternal principles to the passing circumstances of his correspondents, and he arrives at his principles not by reference to any external authority, but as he has discovered their operation • See especially Deissmann, Bibelntudien, pp. 189-262. • As by DeiBsmann, e.g. Licht vom Oaten, p. 167 f. • Von WUarDowitz-MoeUendorfiE, Die griechiache Literatur d. AUertuma (in Die Kultur d. Oegenwart'), p. 332. INTRODUCTION 6 in his own experience, an operation of the very life and energy of God Himself. Hence we have to keep in view, on the one hand, the artless and occasional character of Paul's Letters, and, on the other, their claim, bom of a personal assurance of contact with the Divine, to be the medium of a Gospel, a redeeming message, which has a right to challenge attention and obedience. If we give each of these aspects its due place, we shall be able to avoid two easy misconceptions : we shall not demand a rigid logic in the apostle's pastoral counsels and instruction, nor painfully labour to harmonise apparent inconsistencies in order to reach completely rounded ideas ; and we shall remember that he does not write as a contributor to the sum of human knowledge, even the knowledge of God, but as a man redeemed by Christ, who is convinced that he holds the Divine secret of peace of conscience and life eternal for all the burdened children of men. {d) Catholic ' Epistles ' The Catholic Epistles ^ reveal numerous affinities with those of Paul. Their authors share with him the stock of ideas which are the common property of the Church. Hence, in attempting to interpret their thought, we must guard against hasty conclusions as to their dependence upon Paulinism, although that, of course, is an element which has to be reckoned with. A notable characteristic of these Epistles is their impersonahty. The reader of James or Jude, or even of 1 Peter, receives no clear-cut impression of their authors. ' It is not so much an im- portant man who speaks, as an important subject.' ^ They might therefore be properly classified as ' Epistles ' in the strict sense. And yet a point must be stretched if we are to regard them as primarily literary compositions. They are certainly intended to reach a widespread > The Johannine Epistles do not fall within our survey, as esplaioed in the Preface. ' Deisemann, Bibelatudien, p. 2i6, 6 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES audience. But they are more than general treatises. They presuppose special situations in the communities which they address. These situations, which seem to be common to many locaUties, are sufficiently important to call for definite treatment. This treatment is invariably practical. And the reUgious ideas emphasised in the documents serve mainly to provide motive power for urging home their exhortations. Accordingly the argument from silence is in this case pecuHarly hazardous. We are often compelled to form a judgment of the standpoints of the writers rather from the general atmosphere of their thought than from any detailed doctrines. (e) Scheme of Treatment The real background of the Theology of the Epistles is the faith of the primitive Christian community, having its direct basis in the impression created by the historical Jesus, and confirmed by the conviction that He had con- quered sin and death. But, as has already been indicated, our direct evidence for the earliest type of Christianity is scanty in the extreme. ' We are restricted to some information in Acts and the Pauhne Epistles, to inferences from the Gospels and Paul, and to that which may be gathered from the nature of the historical situation.' * We must attempt to fill in this dim backgroimd as the opportunity offers. Meanwhile, we are confronted with a mass of unchallengeable and illuminating data when we approach the Letters of St. Paul. 1. Paul. No figure in early Christianity stands out before us in such glowing clearness as its greatest missionary. The frankness of his self-revelation, the overmastering sway of his personality, the sheer force and sweep of his Christian faith, the enthusiasm of his devotion to Christ, all combine to focus our interest on this master-builder of the early Church. Consider the range of his influence. It was Paul who Uberated Christianity from the trammels of > Wrede, op. cit., p. 65. INTRODUCTION 7 Judaism, and thus opened up for it a world-wide mission. There were tendencies, no doubt, in the Christian con- sciousness of Jewish believers throughout the Diaspora, which helped to prepare the way for his achievement. Jewish Christians, e.g., had inaugurated a mission to Greeks at Antioch.i But a penetrating insight into the mind of Christ and a dauntless energy of purpose were needful in order to carry through a movement which to many devout souls must have appeared treachery to the revealed will of God. But not only was Paul responsible for the real creation of heathen-Christianity. Although we have no immediate evidence, the subsequent history of the Church is sufficient proof that his influence reacted on the Jewish- Christian section of the community. He may have re- mained more or less suspect in the eyes of Palestinian believers,^ but for Christian Jews throughout the Empire his positions must have acquired, at least up to a certain epoch, an increasing validity. It was only in some heretical Jewish-Christian sects that the tradition of hatred towards Paul remained influential. The secret of his constructive power hes primarily in his own Christian experience. For that experience, from its very nature, led Mm. beyond the realm of his personal interests. It meide him first of all an ardent missionary. But his mission-work involved the interpretation not merely of that epoch-making contact with Christ which gave him his Grospel, but also of the facts and processes which lay behind it. He was compelled to formulate a Christian apologetic, wide in scope and admitting of varied applications. For the very sum and substance of his message was ' to Jews a stumbling-block, to Greeks foUy ' (I Cor. i. 23). Hence, a vital element in his missionary enterprise was the elaboration of Christian ideas on the basis of actual experience, and the relating of these, on the one side, to minds steeped in the religion of the Old Testa- ment, on the other, to a mixed multitude of cultivated and ignorant Greeks and Orientals. But his task did not end * Acta zi. 20. ■ Acts zxL 21. 8 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES with the presentation and defence of Christianity. The training of converts would be almost as pressing an obliga- tion. So to Paul fell the duty of disclosing the ethical bearing of the central Christian truths, and the process shed back new Ught on the fundamental conceptions of the faith. But the man who showed such concern as to the life and conduct of those whom he had won for Christ must have been careful to give directions for the regulation of their existence as communities. It is certain that during his lifetime there was much elasticity in the matter of organisation, for we can gather from various passages that the guidance of the Church was associated with special 'gifts' rather than fixed oflaces.^ Still we may infer from the answers given to the questions referred to Paul by the Christians in Corinth, that his practical wisdom largely determined the hnes along which a definite organisa- tion gradually took shape. We are justified, then, in making the religious thought of St. Paul the starting-point of our investigation. The considerations already emphasised determine the method to be followed. When Paul became a Christian, he was an ardent Pharisee, who had made full use of his training in the Rabbinic schools of Jerusalem. But by birth he was a Jew of the Diaspora, and most of his Christian career was spent in a Hellenistic milieu. We must therefore attempt to estimate the significance of his education and environment for his work as an interpreter of Christianity. But no influence in his history can compare with his con- version. To form any intelligible idea of this crisis, we must examine his experience in Judaism, laying special stress upon those elements to which he himself makes constant reference in describing human helplessness and need. Thus we shall be able to judge what his conversion meant, more especially as a summons to new life and service. In the light of his new vocation as a missionary of Christ, we shall try to discover the normative influence of his conversion for his rehgious thought. But it is ' E.g. Rom. xii. 3-8 ; 1 Cor. xii. INTRODUCTION 9 necessary to recognise that when Paul entered the Christian Church, he found there the beginnings of a theology. Those elements in it which were predominantly Jewish were familiar to him already. The new thing was the tradition of the life and teaching of Jesus, and the Church's endeavour to reach an adequate interpretation of it. This situation must have affected at various points the con- clusions at which he had arrived as the result of his con- version. In these conclusions, as to some extent modified by the current Christian tradition, we shall look for the fundamental positions of Paulinism.^ 2. Post-Pauline Christianity. The Christian experience of Paul must not be regarded as normal in early Chris- tianity. His was a unique individuality. And he had to pass through a singular crisis. Hence we need not be surprised to find that, while his influence in the Church of the first century was epoch-making, some of his pro- founder conceptions were not grasped by average Christian thought. Moreover, as time went on, reactionary influ- ences asserted themselves. Even in Paul's day many of the converts from heathenism had been prepared for the step they took by their connection with the worship and doctrine of Jewish synagogues. Jews in large numbers had entered the Christian community. Thus, when the burning controversy as to the necessity of the Law for salvation had died away, the fundamental ideas of Jewish monotheism were bound to exercise their sway. The second generation of Christians would be specially con- cerned with problems of conduct in a heathen environment. Now much of the best Hellenistic thought was at this ' The Epistles to the Thessalonians, Galatians, Komans, Corinthians, Colossians, Ephesians, and Pfailippians will be used as soiirees in this investigation. These, with the exception of Ephesians, are accepted by most modem scholars as Pauline. Space does not admit of a detailed argument in favour of the present writer's firm conviction that Ephesians is a typically Pauline document. Readers may consult Professor Peake'a careful discussion in his Critical Introduction to the N, T., pp. 53<57. There they will also find a well-balanced statement of the reasons which prevent us from citing the Pastoral Epistles as evidence for Paul'v roUgious thought (pp. 60-71). 10 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES period occupied with similar questions. So the demand for definite guidance in the details of practical life brought in a new legalism, whose influence was to grow with the develop- ment of the Catholic Church. Besides, as the first enthu- siasm of the early days began to fade, a formal Christian tradition would gradually take shape, which, because of its lower level of conviction, would be less exclusive of influ- ences from outside. This attitude is reflected in varying degrees in the literature which may be described as embody- ing the Theology of the Developing Church. But before we discuss that phase of early Christian thought, we must examine the religious ideas of two documents, one of which seems to reflect the best type of Christianity current in the Church contemporary with Paul, while the other represents a markedly individual outlook, revealing points of afBnity with Paulinism, but still more the Alexandrian interpretation of Judaism, baptized into Christianity. a. First Peter. The First Epistle of Peter consists largely of exhortations to various communities of heathen- Christians in Asia Minor, who were exposed to persecutions of a private and perhaps also of a pubUc character. The religious convictions of the author are introduced, not for their own sake as instruction in Christian truth, but as the driving power behind his exhortations. To a marked degree, therefore, the ideas emphasised are determined by the situation of the readers. But they give an interesting glimpse of the ground taken by an authoritative Church- leader, who has learned something from Paul's view of Christianity, and yet is far from being a mere echo of the great apostle. The Letter bears the name of Peter, and, if we follow so eminent a scholar as Mommsen in beUevlng that the persecutions which constitute the one clear datum of the Epistle may reasonably be placed as early as the reign of Nero, there is no need to doubt a claim which has un- usually good external evidence.^ There is little force in ' For the details, see the admirable discussion in Mofiatt's Introduction, pp. 319-342. INTRODUCTION 11 the objection that the Epistle ignores the life and teaching of Jesus, which Peter knew at first hand, and concentrates attention on His sufferings, death, and resurrection.^ The selection of material is determined by the purpose in hand, and, in any case, these crucial events must have held a commanding place in the hearts and minds of all the early disciples. Nor is there any real difficulty in the affinities with Paul. That which the two apostles had in common, as belonging to the authoritative Christian tradi- tion, must have far surpassed their differences. Moreover, it is not unlikely that an impressionable nature such as Peter's would at various points reveal the influence of the dominating intellect of his brother -missionary. But even if the Petrine authorship be disallowed, the Epistle presents an impressive picture of the solicitude of an earnest pastor who has at his command a rich store of weighty Christian arguments resting on convictions which were central for the Christian community of his time. /S. Hebrews. So much of the Pauline spirit was felt to pervade the Epistle to the Hebrews that for a long period it was included by many sections of the Church among the writings of Paul. More careful research has shown that the book is unique in New Testament literature. Its affinities with crucial conceptions of Paulinism are obvious. But it especially represents the blending of a distinct type of culture with Christian belief, and serves to remind us of the varieties of thought which found a home in the Christian Bociety. The comparison of the Old Covenant with the New, which forms the kernel of the Epistle, is elaborated with all the skill of Alexandrian theological equipment. Yet here, too, the end in view is chiefly the practical one of sustaining a faith which falters under trials. 7. The Theology of the Developing Church. The Pastoral Epistles, while incorporating genuine PauUne fragments and traditions, we are unable to regard in their present form as compositions of the apostle Paul. Therefore we group • Heinrici notes the comparatively frequent points of contact in 1 Peter with the Sermon on the Mount. 12 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES them with Jude, James, and 2 Peter as monuments of the general rehgious thought of the developing Church. They are characteristic products of that post-Pauline evolution which has been sketched in the introductory paragraph of this section. They are ' Cathohc ' Epistles in the strict sense, having in view a wide circle of Christian communities and dealing principally with the perils which beset Christian life and doctrine between, say, 90 and 150 a.d. We have no space for the treatment of detailed questions as to authorship, readers, etc. For these reference must be made to such works as Professor Peake's Critical Intro- duction (cited above) and Professor Moffatt's Introduction to the Literature of the New Testament, with whose fundamental positions regarding the Epistles in question the present writer is in agreement. We shall attempt to show that these documents reveal the same general rehgious atmosphere, that they presuppose the same type of pro- blems, and that, while each writer maintains his own individuaUty, he is exposed to the pressure of similar influences, Hellenistic and Jewish, which mark a definite stage in the development of early Christianity. This development appears in such sub-apostoUc writings as 1 Clement, the Epistle of Barnabas, and the ' Shepherd ' of Hermas. PART I PAULINISM CHAPTER I ST. PAUL'S ENVIRONMENT It is a common modern fallacy to suppose that a pheno- menon may be adequately explained, if only its origin can be accounted for. The risk of error is most serious when we are dealing with individualities. The man is larger than his heredity and more potent than his environment. And his superiority to training and circumstances increases in the ratio of his creative power. The apostle Paul is, of all men, the least likely to satisfy mechanical tests. His was one of those spontaneous, ardent, conquering natures, whose vitality and daring were subject only to the mind and will of Christ. Yet we should fail to understand the real significance of his religious experience and the forms in which it finds expression, did we not attempt a brief review of the influences amid which he grew to maturity, and the spiritual forces which were bound to leave their mark upon him. (a) Judaism There is a ring of natural pride in Paul's enumeration of his ancestral and acquired privileges : ' If any one pre- sumes to have confidence in outward prerogatives, I more : circumcised the eighth day ' (as contrasted with proselytes), ' of the race of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin ' (which had remained loyal to the Davidic house), ' a Hebrew bom of 14 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [rr. i Hebrew parents, as regards the Law a Pharisee, according to the legal standard of righteousness blameless.' ^ And his bewilderment at the refusal of his nation to recognise the fulfilment of the Divine purpose for them in Christ is intensified, as he recognises the gifts bestowed upon them in the providence of God : ' To whom belong the son- ship and the manifestation of the Divine glory, and the covenants, and the Divine legislation and the worship and the promises, from whom, as regards natural descent, the Messiah has sprung.' ^ Although as a Christian missionary, describing his methods, he can take up so detached a position as to say : ' I became to the Jews as a Jew, that I might win Jews,' ' he had never lost his absorbing interest in the race which gave him birth. No more con- vincing evidence could be found than the argument by which, in face of invincible difficulties, he wrestles to explain the rejection of the Christian revelation by the elect nation as a temporary aberration which is being overruled for good.* No hasty conclusions must be drawn from the fact that Paul was bom in Tarsus, a city of CUicia, which formed part of one of the provinces of the Roman Empire. It is true that a more Uberal attitude to non-Jewish society prevailed among Jews of the Diaspora.® But a treatise Uke the 'Aboda Zara, intended to regulate the relations be- tween Jews and the heathen peoples among whom they sojourned, puts us on our guard against the impression that anything Uke laxity was permitted. ^ No doubb there were Jews who proved disloyal to their obUgations.' But Paul's description of himself as having surpassed his con- temporaries in his burning devotion to the ancestral traditions of Judaism * is sufficient evidence that he came » PhU. iii. 4-6. « Rom. ix. 4, 6. ' 1 Cor. ix. 20. « Rom. ix.-xi. • See Bertholet, Die Stdhmg d. Israeliten u. d. Jvden zu den Fremden, p. 317 f., for requirements for converts from heathenism. Philo's attitude, as disclosed in his works, is pecnliarly instructive. " See, e.g., 'Aboda Zara (ed. Ehnslie), i. i. p. 4. ' An inscription of Miletus apparently marks the place allotted to Jewa in the city theatre ; see Deissmann, Lickt vom Osten, p. 326 t. » Gal. i. 14. OH. I.] ST. PAUL'S ENVIRONMENT 16 of a family which kept to orthodox paths. Jerome hands down an interesting report that Paul's parents had come to Tarsus from Gischala, a town in Galilee. The story need not be an invention. Many Jews were taken captive in Boman expeditions, and removed to various parts of the Empire, and some at least of these received the privilege of Roman citizenship. ^ The youth was trained at Jerusalem in the school of one of the most celebrated rabbis in all Jewish history, GamaUel i., of whom it was said : ' Smce Rabban Gamahel the elder died, there has been no more reverence for the Law.' * The chief element in his education would be the art of interpreting the Old Testament according to the approved Rabbinic methods. These methods were pre- eminently allegorical or typological. Good examples in Paul's letters are Gal. iv. 21-31, where he uses the Genesis- story of the quarrel between Sarah and Hagar as an allegory of the struggle between the servile religion of legalism and the freedom which belongs to the religion of Christ ; and 1 Cor. x. 6-11, where the temptations which overcame the Israelites in the wilderness are regarded as a direct warning written down for the sake of Christian readers in after ages. Occasionally he follows the Rabbinic custom of taking an Old Testament passage entirely out of its connection, when he can make apt use of it as an argument ; so, e.g., 1 Cor. xiv. 21, where he introduces a sentence from Isa. xxviii. 11, 'by men of alien tongues and by the Ups of aliens shall I speak to this people,' into a discussion on ' speaking with tongues ' in the primitive- Christian sense. He also has a predilection like the Rabbis for constructing centos of quotations from various parts of the Old Testament to support some thesis : e.g. Rom. iii. 10-18, in which is demonstrated the universality of sin. No better instance of deftness in constructing an argument in the very language of Scripture could be cited than Gal. iii. 7-18, which seeks to establish the position that the > See Zahn, SM. in d. N. T., i. p. 48 f., note 16- « Sota, ii. 16, quoted by Schiirer, H. J. P. (E. tr.), n. i. p. 364. 16 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [ft. i. true heirs of the promises made to Abraham are the members of the Christian community. But this scholastic technique, important as it was reckoned, by no. means furnished the most vital part of Paul's education. That lay in his acquaintance with the sacred book itself. The Law came first : then the Prophets and the ' Writings,' more especially the Psalms. No doubt for an ardent Pharisee like Paul the Law stood supreme. But righteousness at this period included more than ceremonial. The Law abounded in moral demands, and from beginning to end of the Epistles we are conscious of the moral discipline which formed the background of his religious life. He was also completely at home in the Prophets and Psalms . It is true that these held a secondary place in Jewish estimation as compared with the Law.* But they were read in the pubUc services of the synagogue, and the use which Paul makes of them as a Christian missionary is sufficient evidence of the impression they must have left upon his mind at an early period. Yet there can be little question that he rediscovered their significance in the light of his Christian experience. A superficial glance may see in Paul's debt to the reUgious heritage of his nation little more than frequent survivals of that later Judaism in which he was reared. But those who look deeper will find that he has grasped the religious content of the Old Testament in its fundamental aspects. Only, it has been so closely woven into the very texture of his ideas that these must be analysed in order to disclose their basis. It goes without saying that this applies to the Messianic bearing of many sections of the Old Testa- ment. By an amazing spiritual intuition Paul catches sight of the organic unity of the Divine self -manifestation. Often in such instances he makes no quotations. Yet one cannot study, e.g., his view of the value and significance of the Death of Christ without perceiving that the Suffering Servant of Deutero-Isaiah stands in the background. So also his great conceptions of the ' knowledge ' of God, » Of. Holtzmann, N. T. Theologie ', i. p. 51. CH. I.] ST. PAUL'S ENVIRONMENT 17 the ' Spirit ' of God, the ' righteousness ' of God, and many- more presuppose the positions taken by prophets and psahnists. But just as the teaching of Jesus has been so fully assimilated by him that direct references are only necessary when detailed problems arise, so we may expect to find the foundation-truths of the prophetic religion as imphcit rather than exphcit factors in his theological construction. It is always, at least, wise to exhaust the possibilities in this direction, before we venture to postulate the influence of Hellenistic ideas. At no point does Paul stand more directly in the lineage of Jesus than in his maintenance of the prophetic tradition. The recognition of these facts ought not, however, to blind us to the influence upon Paul of the Jewish Theology which had developed in the Rabbinic schools. When we use the term ' theology ' in this connection, we must not think of any elaborate system. That was aUen to the mind of pre-Christian Judaism. But a vast number of elucidations and appHcations of the sacred text had accumulated which were at a later date to be codified in the Mischna. These were due to the wisdom of many teachers, of whom the most famous were the so-caUed Tannaites.^ This exegetical tradition of the schools had attained a virtual equality of authority with the Law itself. It is exceedingly difficult to determine the chrono- logy of the various strata in the material. Hence it must be used with caution in any attempt to reconstruct the Judaistic background of Paul. We are on surer ground in the endeavour to determine those reUgious ideas of Judaism with which Paul must have been familiar, when we turn to the apocalyptic Uterature which was so influential in the first century before and the first century after Christ. This Uterature was, in the main, a product of Pharisaism, but, while it may be going too far to say that it was a dehberate reaction against the more formal piety of Scribism,^ it certainly seems to represent a > See Bacber's invaluable compilation, Die Agada der Tannaiten, * So> in efiect, Baldensperger, Die Messianisoh-Apokalyptiachen Hoff- nungen d. Judeniunu ', e.g, p. 83 f. B 18 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [pt. i. wider outlook and a deeper reKgious need. At many points its ruling conceptions can scarcely be distinguished from those to be found in the later prophets, as, e.g., Joel. Like these, apocalyptic literature looks forward to a cata- strophic intervention of God in history, an intervention in which His chosen people shall be vindicated, a new order of salvation established, and the enemies of the Most High, who are also the enemies of the elect nation, visited with merited punishment. The content of the apoca- lypses is therefore largely eschatological, and the events of the end are closely associated with those Messianic ex- pectations which had for centuries agitated their minds. Certain features in the apocalyptic picture were of special importance. The entire course of things was divided into two ' ages.' The present was evil, an age of sin and suffering under the sway of malicious powers. But the coming age was to be the inauguration of perfect felicity under the rule of God Himself. The conceptions of this bhssful future show much divergence. In some apocalypses it is delineated as Ufe on a transfigured earth. In others it belongs to a transcendental order, akin to our own conception of ' Heaven,' in which material well- being is exchanged for spiritual. In any case, it means the final estabhshment of the dominion of God and the vanquishing of all those forces which oppose Him. This new epoch was frequently, although by no means invariably, associated with the figure of the Messiah, who was regarded as the vicegerent of God. Here, again, there are noteworthy variations in the picture. Some vmters describe the Messiah as a monarch of the house of David, supematurally equipped for his unique functions. For others he is a dim transcendental figure, perhaps of angelic rank, who is revealed from heaven for purposes of judgment and the wielding of Divine authority. It would be precarious to determine what precise conception of a personal Messiah prevailed in the environment to which Paul belonged. And it must not be forgotten that often all Messianic oflBces were ascribed to God alone. Whichever of these CH, I.] ST. PAUL'S ENVIRONMENT 19 views might be dominant, the new epoch was introduced by resurrection and judgment. The pictures are often inconsistent, and cannot be harmonised. The resurrection, in the view of some apocalyptic writers, only embraces the righteous. For others, it is universal. The judgment includes aU within its sweep, although the representations of it are confusing. Retribution has come to take a funda- mental place in Jewish piety, and now, owing to the growth of individualism in reUgion, men are not judged in the mass, as in earUer Hebrew thought, but each separat* person receives his verdict from God. In the one case that will be deliverance from His wrath, salvation, eternal lite. In the other it is death, or destruction. At a later stage we shall see how definitely the apocalyptic forecast, briefly sketched above, has left its mark on the thought of Paul. Meanwhile, let us review certain aspects of Jewish theology, attested both by apocalyptic and rabbinic literature, which must have formed integral elements in the apostle's early religious position. Paul brought with him into the Christian Church his convinced monotheism. And even his high Christology never detracted from that. But his idea of God assumed a new colour in the hght of the revelation of Christ, and so it will be serviceable to have before us a brief sketch of the view of Grod which dominated that Judaism in which he was brought up. It is needless to observe that for a Pharisee the supreme revelation of God was to be found in the written Law, which was regarded as His revealed will. Now the larger part of the ritual which the written Law codified was concerned with the regulation of the approach of impure men to an aU-holy Deity. The conception of God's holiness, therefore, partly physical, partly possessing a real moral grandeur, dwarfed for the average worshipper the other qualities which men yearn for in God. Hence it was inevitable that a great chasm should be felt to lie between the all-holy One and His frail, sin-burdened votaries. We do not wish for a moment to minimise the thought of God's grace and loving-kindness which is 20 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [fi. i. certainly visible.^ But it is overshadowed by the fear of transgressing wittingly or unwittingly the code of precepts which represents God's mind for His people. And so the priest comes in, to begin with, as man's representative before God ; and later, the rabbi or scribe as the inter- preter of the sacred documents, whose judgment may be followed in situations which are difficult of decision. But even ' the very conception that God had spoken once for all in the Law removed Him further off from the ordi- nary worshipper, and in combination with other inlSuences yielded the post-exilic idea of the transcendent God, who deals with His world only through the agency of innumer- able intermediate beings.' * This necessity for mediating powers bet^v^een God and the world accounts, no doubt, for the remarkable develop- ment in angelology which appears in Judaism after the Exile. Traces of it are to be found in Daniel, where the archangel Michael is the champion of Israel.* But in some apocalypses, as, c.gf., 1 and 2 Enoch, it takes the form of vast hierarchies of angelic beings subordinate to God, often identified with the forces of nature, and sometimes, as in the Book of Jubilees, associated with the giving of the Law. Many scholars connect these orders of angels with Persian (and ultimately, Babylonian) influence. Whether this be their origin or no, it is probable that they occupied an even more prominent place in popular belief than they did in theology.* It is sometimes difficult to distinguish between forces of evil and forces of good in these ' powers and authorities,' as Paul calls them,^ but Judaism certainly conceived of a spiritual reahn of wickedness, whose head was Satan or Belial. Probably in the lower strata of popular ideas the behef in evil spirits had always been present, but in the Old Testament they have no important rdle. In Paul they cannot be said to take a prominent ' See, e.g., the Psalms, paseim. ' H. W. Robinson, Eeligious Ideas of Old Testament, p. 126. ■ Dan. X. 13 ; xii. 1. * See Bousset. Religion d. Judentums *. p. 379. « E.g. Col. ii. IS. CH. I.] ST. PAUL'S ENVIRONMENT 21 place, although obviously he reckons them among the deadliest foes of the Christian life.^ In the famous product of Hellenistic Judaism known as the Wisdom of Solomon, which Paul appears to have read,^ it is said that ' God created man for immortality and made him m the likeness of his own proper being, but by the envy of the devil, death entered iato the world ' (ji. 23, 24). As death is for Judaism the wages of sin, this statement would connect sin's origia with the devil. But other explanations are more common. In some Jewish documents sin is attributed to the ' evil impulse ' (Yetzer hara) in the heart of man.' The Pall of Adam is also a frequent subject of speculation. It is constantly described as having brought misery upon his descendants,* and yet there is no clear doctrine of inherited sin. Death has come upon his posterity through Adam's transgression, but apparently each individual is regarded as responsible for his own sin.* The bearing of this idea upon Paul's specu- lations must be noted immediately. It is plain that Jewish thought took a dark view of human frailty and imperfection, although it is an exaggera- tion to call it ' ethical pessimism.' * Over against this vitiated human nature stood the claims of the Divine Law. Before reUgious individualism had asserted itself, it was not so difficult to conceive a right relation between the community and their God. But 4 Ezra feels as poignantly as Paul the burden for the individual of facing the Law's requirements. Yet the way of obedience is the only path on which righteousness can be won. For righteousness before God, acquittal in the day of reckoning, is the reward of service. The righteous man is declared to be righteous, i.e. is ' justified.' The unrighteous is con- demned. So inadequate was the obedience of the average man that the need was felt of supplementing it, and there ' E.^. Eph. vi. 11, 12. ' See Grafe, in Abhandlungen C. v. Weizaacker gewidmet, pp. 253-286. » E.g. Siraoh, xxi. II ; Kidduschin, 306; Pirke Aboth, iv. 2. * E.g. 4 Kzra vii. 11 f. ' See esp. Apoc. Banich liv. 19. ' So Bousset, op. cii., p. 462. 22 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [pt. i. are traces of the idea that the surplus merit of notably pious individuals might be reckoned to those who- could feel no confidence about their own. Holtzmann lays stress on the conception that the suffering of another as well as his special merit could atone for transgression.^ Unquestionably the idea finds remarkable expression in the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah. But it would be pre- carious to argue from this unique passage to any general Jewish doctrine, and the bulk of the evidehce, as Holtzmann himself admits, is decidedly late. The general outlook, however, serves to remind us of the positions from which Paul started as a Pharisee. (6) Hellenism It is probable that there was far less fundamental differ- ence between Hellenistic and Palestinian Judaism than is usually assumed. Wendland has most instructively shown, e.g., the intimate contact between Palestinian and Hellen- istic exegesis.^ And this relationship no doubt held good over a large area. So that we dare not start with the notion that because Paul was a Jew of the Diaspora he must have stood in a wholly different relation to Hellenism from that of the average Jew of Palestine. And yet we must no less clearly recognise the full significance of the fact that Paul grew to maturity in a typically Hellenistic city, and that his most memorable work was carried on among a Hellenistic population. Attempts have been recently made to show that Paul had the advantage of a training in a rhetorical school, which formed a regular element in a good average education,' a training which might be received imder Jewish auspices. The evidence for this is found in his acquaintance with certain terms current in popular Stoicism, the use of rhetorical art in the construction of paragraphs, the play ' Op. dt., i. pp. 79-82. • Die hellenietiach-rSmische Kultur ', p. 201. • E.g. J. Weiss, Dtu VnhTUUntum, pp. 133. 134 ; Boblig, Die Geiatu- kultuT von Tartos, p. 161. CH. I.] ST. PAUL'S ENVIRONMENT 23 upon words, the elaboration of antitheses, and especially the points of contact which appear between his style and that of the Cynic-Stoic Diatribe, that form of popiilar dis- course which was a chief instrument in philosophical propaganda. There can be no question that he used words belonging to the vocabulary of Stoic moral teaching, and Bultmann has carefully traced various links of connection between Paul and the Diatribe. But he admits that Paul puts a stamp of his own on these popular types of expres- sion, and refuses to venture on a conjecture as to how he became master of them.^ Much irrelevant theorising has been expended on the rhetorical technique of Paul's com- position. A few traces of current practice may be dis- cernible.* But it is noteworthy that in the masterpieces of his spiritual genius, such as 1 Cor. xiii. and Rom. viii. 31 S., he approaches far closer to the forms of Hebrew poetry than to the approved ' figures ' of Hellenistic art. In attempting a brief survey of Paul's relationship to his Hellenistic environment, it is of vital importance first of all to remember that his Bible was the LXX. But the LXX, with all its literalness of rendering, was, Hke every translation, to some extent an interpretation. Of course Paul was well acquainted with Hebrew. But his religious thought is expressed in terms of the LXX, and language necessarily affects ideas. Now it is no doubt true that this translation, in a sense, simplified the conceptions of the original and so far adapted them to their new Hellen- istic milieu. The fact, for example, that the Hebrew Jahweh was rendered by Kvptot, ' lord,' a term already laden with religious significance for the Oriental and Hellenistic world, suggests how the thought of the apostle might be almost unconsciously adapted to the audiences whom he had to address.' This criterion might be appUed to words like iri'tf/ia, ' spirit,' 4''"XV> ' soul,' a-dfi^, ' flesh,' ' Der Stil d. pauUnUchen Predigt, p. 108. » See Wendland'a very careful estimate. Die urchristUchen Literalur- formen, pp. 354, 3S5. ' See Deissmann, Die Hetlenieierung d, aemiUschen Monotheistmu, pp. 13-16. 24 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. crftj/ia, ' body,' and others, which are, of course, direct renderings of Old Testament terms, and yet may carry with them a Hellenistic shade of meaning. But it is surely an exaggeration to say that ' the historic pre- supposition of Paul's piety is the religious content of the Old Testament in Greek.' ^ This is to postulate an in- fluence of terminology on thought which is inconceivable in the case of one who must have been an expert in the Hebrew original. There are good grounds, if not absolutely conclusive, for believing that Paul was acquainted with the Alexandrian Wisdom of Solomon. This work reveals the influence of Greek ideas throughout. The ' formless matter ' of Plato, the ' world-soul ' of the Stoics, the conception of immor- tality and of the body as the prison of the spirit, all find a place.* Such notions may have determined the emphasis at various points in the apostle's thinking, but we have only to compare him with a contemporary Jew of the Diaspora, Philo, to recognise the vast difference which has to be allowed for between temperaments exposed to the same general atmosphere, but shaped to diverging issues in virtue of their individual experiences.' At the same time we must not ignore Paul's dehberate statement that to ' those outside the Law ' he had become as ' one outside the Law,' in order to win them for Christ.* How much does this mean ? Recent investigation has shown that in the Hellenistic area in which Paul laboured, genuine religious aspirations sought satisfaction, roughly speaking, in two chief directions : in a supernatural redemption from the uncertainties and calamities of hfe through some sort of communion with the Divine, or in a patient self-discipline, based on the idea of a rational world-order, whose outcome must be a moral hfe. The one tendency found a home in the numerous reUgious ' Deissmann, Pauhte, p. 70. • E.g. xi. 17 ; viii. 1 ; ix. 15, etc. For Paul's relation to Wisdom, of. Wisd. xiii. with Rom. i. 18-32. • See an admirable paragraph in Wernle, Einjuhrung (ed. i.), p. 185. • 1 Cor. ix. 21. CH. I.] ST. PAUL'S ENVIRONMENT S5 associations which were grouped round Mystery-cults. The other followed the guidance of that quickened Stoicism which sought to rouse men to self-knowledge, and offered rules for ethical practice. There were movements also in which both these tendencies had a place.^ It is impossible to say whether Paul was, in any definite sense, ahve to these movements as a youth at Tarsus.^ In any case, as an active Christian missionary who was bound to seek for common ground with his Hellenistic audiences, he must have become acquainted, to some extent, with the currents of thought and feeling which were moving in the minds of men. like the Mystery-reUgions, he proclaimed a great * redemption.' Like them he could speak of possession by the Divine. lake them he could point to a ' knowledge ' of God which meant not intellectual apprehension but practical fellowship. Like them he could think of ai trans- formation into the Divine likeness which was the very goal of being. This paralleUsm would be all to his advan- tage as a preacher, and an educator of those whom his preaching had won. But his presuppositions were different. Redemption from sin was primary with him, not redemp- tion from fate. The Spirit in whose might he could do all things was the Holy Spirit which cleansed the heart. The ' knowledge ' of God, in his view of it, was not reached through any esoteric ritual but by faith in Jesus Christ, whose self-sacrificing death was the supreme revelation of the Divine love to sinful men. Thus there is complete justification for Wendland's wise caution : ' Even when separate statements and doctrines look alike, the ultimate motives and fundamental positions which have prompted them may be quite different.' * It may be admitted without discussion that Paul adopted a variety of terms and ideas from popular Stoicism. Thus ' Perhaps we may so describe the influence of Fosidonius, when looked at in its broader aspects. ' Bohljg; finds some interesting parallels between Paul and Athenodorus, the famous Stoic of Tarsus, as also between Paul and the popular philo- sophical teacher, Dion of Prusa, well known in Tarsus. But the evideng* is very slight: see op. cit., pp. 107-128. » Op. cit., p. 228. 26 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [pt. i. he speaks of ' conscience,' * nature,' and ' the unfitting.' ^ In demonstrating that all men alike, both Jews and heathen, are without excuse for their sins, he attributes to the heathen the possession of an unwritten moral law Implanted by nature in their hearts,^ a fundamental tenet of Stoic ethics.' In his terrible indictment of heathenism he makes use of the argument that a knowledge of God may be gained from His created works, and this we know was a regular Stoic position.* Possibly he was impressed by the idea from its presentation in the Wisdom of Solomon, ch. xiii. And the fact suggests that he came into contact with current conceptions of the popular philosophy through what may be called the Jewish apologetic literature of the Diaspora. In any case, no mistake must be made as to his normal attitude towards the ' wisdom ' which is ' of this world.' That, he declares, ' is folly in the sight of Crod.' For him, the true wisdom is embodied in Christ, and it consists of * righteousness and sanctification and redemp- tion.' ® These things are not the attainment of unaided human effort. The Stoic doctrine of self-sufficiency counted for little with Paul. He certainly puts a high value on every virtue which may be manifested in human character.* But his exhortation to his converts to work out their own salvation, which from the very nature of the case involves a life of moral effort,' is based on the conviction of the living presence with them of the living God Himself.* Yet Paul was no bigot. The common life of the great cities which had claimed his labours is reflected in the illustrations he employs and the metaphors which give vividness to his utterances. Nay, we may go further and * E.g. 1 Cor. viii. 7 ; xi. 14 ; Bom. i. 28. The idea of conscience, how- ever, is much more prominent in Philo than in Stoicism. * Bom. ii. 14 f. ' Cf. Cic, de Legibua, i. 6, 18 : lex est ratio aumma, inaita in natura, quae jubet ea quae facienda sunt prohibetgue contraria. ' See the valuable evidence in Lietzmann's note on Bom. i. 20, and J. Weiss, op. cit., p. 179, note 2. For a further important example of hit contact with Hellenistic ideas, see chap. vi. (/), infra, ' 1 Cor. iii. 19 ; i. 30. ' E.g. Phil. iv. 8. ' Note the sequence of thought in Bom. zii » Phil. u. 12, 13. CH. 1.J ST. PAUL'S ENVIRONMENT 27 say that the political organisation of the Roman dominion made its mark on his whole programme of service ; and his lofty conception of the unity of men in Christ Jesus, essentially spiritual as it was, must have gained in direct- ness and power from his consciousness of citizenship in an Empire which had unified the known world. 38 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [ra. i. CHAPTER II ST. PAUL'S EXPERIENCE UNDER THE RELIGION OF THE LAW (a) Presuppositions The experience which is bom of the reaction of the indi- vidual nature upon its environment is a far more potent force in shaping a man's view of the world than the influence of the environment in itself. Hence, while Paul's Jewish nurture and his contact with Hellenistic civilisation must have counted for much in the evolution of his spiritual life and thought, his inward religious history remained the decisive factor. We know from his own testimony that the epoch-making event of that history was his conversion. But if we are to form a true estimate of the significance of an event which gives the clue to his theology, we must endeavour to understand something of the spiritual pro- cesses which culminated in that extraordinary experience. The only available evidence is contained in Paul's own Letters, although it can be supplemented here and there from brief notices in Acts. Now some authorities consider that it is futile to attempt to reconstruct any part of Paul's pre-Christian religious experience from the extant data. They hold that his conversion wrought so complete a revolution in his life that his subsequent descriptions of his spiritual past can in no sense be taken as accurate. To the man who has come forth into a marvellous light, the twiUght in which he has hved before appears total darkness. Such a view is only partially true. There is, no doubt, always the tendency to heighten the contrast between the past in which the soul was tempest-tossed and the present in which it has reached the haven of peace. But surely the CH. n.] THE RELIGION OF THE LAW 29 scars of such a struggle are ineffaceable. And throughout the ages minds less sensitive than Paul's have been able to record the phases of unrest through which they journeyed before reaching the goal of their striving. Yet one or two cautions are quite relevant. We have to recognise first of aU that Paul invariably interprets his spiritual past in the light of his Christian consciousness. How could it be otherwise ? The growth of reUgious life cannot be divided up into completely isolated sections, like those which compose a machine. Commenting on the most famous of aU Paul's autobiographical delineations, Rom. vii. 7-25, Dr. Denney aptly says : ' No one could have written the passage but a Christian : it is the experience of the un- regenerate, we may say, but seen through regenerate eyes, interpreted ia a regenerate mind. It is the apostle's spiritual history, but universalised : a history in which one stage is not extinguished by the next, but which is present as a whole to his consciousness, each stage all the time determining and determined by the rest.' ^ Further, although Paid often seems to universaUse his own experi- ence, we must remember that on many sides it was unique. It was the expression of a nature which had no room for half-hearted, compromising attitudes in the life of the soul. Most men Hve by easy compromises with their ideal. They are content with the second-best. Paul's passionate thirst for God chafed at the commonplace. There must have been many even of the devout Jews of his time who were at least provisionally satisfied with the possession of a legal standard of righteousness, and the attempt to conform to it, however inadequate. What we know of Paul's pre- Christian days suggests that even then his principle was that of his later yeacs : ' This one thing ... I press towards the goal.' ^ (6) Sense of Failure In Paul's enumeration of his Jewish prerogatives he describes himself as ' blameless according to the legal ' Expos. O. T., a. p. 639. « PJiU. iii. 13, 14. 30 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. standard of righteousness.' ^ Probably this is not to be taken as a studied confession of his Pharisaic attainments, but rather as a large general statement such as he is fond of making, intended to emphasise the contrast between past and present. Yet so far from clashing with such selt- revelations as those of Romans vii., as some scholars assert, it brings them into clearer Ught. It reveals the difference between Paul's own ideal and that current among many of his contemporaries in Judaism. The risk which attends every legalistic scheme of religion is the exaltation of the trivial at the expense of the weightier obligations. It is easier to fast twice in the week, or to pay tithes on mint, anise, and cummin, than to do justice and to love mercy. The nature which finds satisfaction in this view of man's relation to God, whether in ancient or modem days, is that which dehghts in the possession of rules, authoritatively laid down, which cover an immense variety of possible situations. To beheve that one is pleasing God by offering a definite number of prescribed sacrifices, or repeating a special group of petitions at certain fixed hours by day or night, reUeves the conscience of much of the dissatisfaction due to failure in more serious moral responsibiUties. Unquestionably a large expendi- ture of time and energy is necessary to attain a high level even in this type of obedience. But once the habit is formed, such obedience can be rendered almost mechani- cally. And there are temperaments which feel a glow of satisfaction in following a routine. Now the Jewish Law, as formulated in the Pentateuch, embodied a vast number of ritual prescriptions. The regulations regarding physical purity form a noteworthy instance. The tendency to emphasise external minutiae had increased under the influence of the Pharisees, more especially in connection with the Sabbath law.^ But the authoritative code of Judaism had a much wider scope. The contents of Deuteronomy reflect at many points the moral ideal of the great prophets. The so-called Book of the Covenant > Phil. iii. 6. * See Schuier, H. J. P., n. ii. p. 96 f. Cfl. n.] THE RELIGION OP THE LAW 31 (Ex. XX. 22, xxiii. 19), which is probably earlier than Deuteronomy,! and the ' Ten Commandments,' bear witness to the high place occupied by ethical demands. Here we touch the crux of Paul's problem. His fulfil- ment of the required observances reached, no doubt, a very high level. He had in this respect left his contem- poraries in the shade.^ But obedience of such a character left his spiritual nature starved. It brought no inward freedom, no sense of harmony with God. What of the ethical claims of the Law ? Must not real satisfaction be reached in this direction ? At this point the apostle lets us see into the depth of his experience. ' I should not have known what sin was except by the law : that is to say, I should not have experienced evil desire unless the law had said : Thou shalt not covet. Thus sin, finding its starting-point in the commandment, produced in me all manner of evil desire.' ' The words reveal one fundamental element in the situation, the constant conflict between self-will and the claim of a higher order identified by Paul with the will of God, wh'ch succeeded the period of childish innocence. To that higher order his better nature assented, but the power of sin was ever present, thwarting his aspirations.* Plainly the incessant struggle in his effort to reach his ideal had haunted his soul Uke a night- mare. And his case was not exceptional. The failure of his fellow-countrymen was equally conspicuous. Nothing could be more instructive than his deliberate indictment of Jews who boast of their privileges as possessing in the Law ' the embodiment of knowledge and truth,' and yet lamentably fail to fulfil its requirements.* This reminds us of the wide significance of the situation for Paul. He was too earnest a Pharisee not to feel that the impossibifity of keeping the Law had far more than a personal bearing. It was indissolubly bound up with the dearest hopes of the nation. For it had become a fixed dogma of Judaism that the Divine inauguration of the new Messianic epoch > See Bobinson, op. eit., p. 66. ' Oal. i. 14. • Rom. vii. 7, 8. * Rom. vii. 22, 23. • Rom. ii. 17-26, 32 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [ft. i. depended on the faithfulness of the people to their obliga- tions. So that failure in obedience involved the gravest consequences. The purpose of Grod was being hindered. How could the nation enjoy His favour ? To so penetrating a mind the case must have seemed almost hopeless. For Paul was fully aUve to the principles of legalism. This comes out again and again. Quoting from Deut. xxvii. 26 he declares : ' It stands written, cursed is every one who does not abide by all that is written in the book of the law, to do it ' ; ^ and, later in the same Epistle, ' I testify again to every man who submits to circumcision that he places himself under obhgation to perform the whole law.' ^ That this is no mere personal dictum is evident from such passages as James ii. 10, and parallel Rabbinic sayings.^ Here is revealed the serious- ness of the position. As we have seen, multitudes could be satisfied with compromises. But Paul and others like- minded refused to be contented with anything short of complete conformity. The words of Leviticus xviii. 5 had sounded like a knell of doom in his ears : ' The man who performs it ' (i.e. the righteousness demanded by the Law) ' shall Uve by it.' * No less exacting criterion would be apphed to the sum-total of his conduct by a holy and righteous Grod, who was entitled to demand flawless obedience. And the penalty for disobeying was death. Li the hght of these considerations it is easy to under- stand Paul's persecuting zeal when some of Jesus' more outspoken followers, like Stephen, began to reveal their detachment from legal obhgations,* and to proclaim their Master as the promised Messiah. The situation was true to human nature. The earnest Pharisee, with his settled beUef in the high destiny of his nation, was tortured by doubts which were sapping his rehgious position. These doubts he was striving with all the force of reason and. feel- ing to overcome. And now, although he would refuse to » Gal. iii. 10. " Gal. v. 3. ' See Mayor on James ii. 10. ' Bom. X. 5. Cf. the lament In 4 Ezra over man's powerlessness iu presence of the requirements of God, esp. vii. 45-74. » Acts vi. 11-14. OB. n.] THE RELIGION OP THE LAW 33 acknowledge the truth to himself, they were reinforced by this movement whose centre was a crucified impostor. In sheer self-defence he was compelled to lead the assault on the Nazarenes, scarcely reahsing that in thus coming to close quarters with them he was in truth being led with growing insight to discern the instability of his own reUgious attitude. (c) Power of Sin in the Flesh Before we attempt to estimate the impression made upon Paul's mind by the disciples of Jesus, we must pause to examine his own explanation of the failure of legal religion, as that is fundamental for his entire reUgious out- look. Now, although it may be impossible to bring all his utterances on the Law into a consistent scheme, we receive a quite definite answer to the question : Why has the religion of the Law failed to bring men into a completely satisfying relation to God ? Because of the power of sin in the ' flesh.' Paul speaks of ' the powerlessness of the law, that wherein it had no might through the flesh.' ^ And again, taking his own case obviously as representative of universal experience, he declares, ' Left to myself, with my mind I serve the law of God, but with my flesh the law of sin.' ^ What does he mean by this law of sin in the ' flesh ' ? It is important to note that Paul usually speaks of sin not as individual transgression nor as abstract tendency to wrong-doing, but as a quasi-personal power which takes possession of human nature and leads it astray. We emphasise the fact in order to make it clear that he holds no theory of the inherent evil of matter. Man as created was not evil, but now, as a truth of experience, his nature has proved to be tainted with sin. Paul uses the term ' the flesh ' to describe this evil nature. The term has its roots in the Old Testament. There ' flesh ' is often used to designate human nature in its weakness and in- • Bom. viii, 3. * Bom. vii. 25. 34 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. adequacy, as contrasted with God, who is ' Spirit.' ^ There is a closely allied use of the very term {a-dp^), which Paul employs in Plato and the later Platonic schools with refer- ence to the body as the lower element in man in contrast to the soul.2 But the Hellenic idea rests on a different basis. Matter is evil as phenomenal, as belonging to the reahn of Becoming and not of Being. Paul, like the Old Testament, is not concerned with metaphysical distractions.' He does not speculate on the lines of a cosmic dualism. What absorbs his interest is the reUgious significance of human nature, its actual attitude towards God. That attitude is perverted. ' In me, I mean in my flesh, good does not dwell.' * Paul's view of human life is constantly described as ' pessimistic' That is surely a misconception. It is true that he invariably emphasises the moral disaster which is the consequence of sin, but no man was ever more alive to the high possibihties of human nature when restored to that condition which was God's eternal purpose for man- kind.^ In all that he says of sin he speaks from the standpoint of the sincere Christian missionary who under- stands the needs of others because he has first grasped his own. For Paul, then, the ' flesh,' that is human nature apart from God, gives sin its material to work upon, so that the Law, even in its highest aspect as the revealed will of God, is made of no e£fect. In narrating his own inward conflict, which he has undoubtedly generaUsed, he lays stress on one feature of the situation, which, perhaps, stands out before him in clearer rehef just because he has subsequently passed into a condition of spiritual freedom. That a man under the sway of sin should be confronted with a regime of moral prohibitions means resentment * E.g. lea. xxxi. 3 ; Fs. Ivi. 4, etc. S6e the scholarly discussion in Robinson's Christian Doctrine of Man, pp. 20-25. ' See esp. Capelle's article, ' Body (Greek and Roman),' B. B. E. ' Philo anticipates Paul in using ffdp^i * flesh,* to denote the lower side of human nature as realised and felt in ordinary experience. But there is an important difference ; cgf., in Qig. 40, Philo sets ffdp^ and ^I'X^ in sharp antithesis, a usage never found in Paul. But in the same treatise l§ 29) his usage is extraordinarily akin to Paul's regular contrast between (rdp^ and TTvev/j-a, * Rom. vii. 18. ' Cf. JUlicher, Paulua u. Jesua, p. 61. cfi, n.] THE RELlGlOlSf O'S' THE LAW SS against such an order. ^ For sin is essentially self-will, or, in the words of 1 John iii. 4, ' lawlessness.' Paul develops the account of his experience in the famous passage which may be summed up in the words : ' Not the good which I desire do I achieve, but the evil which I do not desire, this I do.' ^ The idea has found abundant expression in ancient literature. The words of Ovid are familiar : ' I see the higher course and approve it : the lower I follow ' {Metam. vii. 20).* The ground which the apostle here takes up reveals the nature of the course he had endeavoured to follow. Making all due allowance for the Christian standpoint from which he writes, it seems plain that he had approached God mainly as the supreme Judge of human action, and had been driven to recognise that he possessed no real merit on which he could count when face to face with the Divine Presence. Sin was too subtle and too strong for him. The very order which reminded him of God acted as an instigation to transgress. This was his personal experience and the experience, no doubt, of many. That it was by no means universal is evident from such outpourings of thankfulness for the Law as have been preserved in Psalm cxix. Now the bitterness of his position was enhanced for Paul by the consciousness of those higher desires which protest against sin. ' I assent,' he says, ' to the law of God according to my inward man, but I see another law in my members opposing the law of my mind.' * Here we get a gUmpse of Paul's idea of the constitution of human nature, which it is worth while examining in view of its bearing upon his whole conception of the Christian life. (d) Human Nature As has been already indicated, the basis of Paul's inter- ' Bom. vii. 7-11. ' Rom. vii. 19. ' An extraordinarily apt parallel to Paul's language occurs in Epictetus, ii. 26. 1 : irSv afidpnjfia fJidxvv irepi^x^^- ^^^^ J^P ° dfia prdvui^ ov d^Xti aftaprdyeiv, dXXA KaToptfuJtrai, drjXov tin & fihf d^Xet ov iroiet. See further parallek in Wetstein's N. T., ii. p. 57. It is doubtful whether such parallels justify the statement that Paul is here using Stoic expressions. ' Bom. vii. 22, 23. 36 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [rr. l pretation of human nature lies in the Old Testament. There the primary aspects of the human personahty are described by the terms 'flesh' (basar), 'soul' {nephesh), ' spirit ' (rimch), and ' heart ' (leb). The most notable feature about the Old Testament use of the term ' flesh ' for our discussion is that it often occurs with a psychical and not mere physical meaning. That becomes almost ethical in the group of passages quoted above, which form the background of Paul's usage. But how far the Old Testament is removed from the notion of the ' flesh ' as inherently evil is plain from such passages as Job iv. 17-19 ; XXV. 5, 6, in which ' physical frailty is used to explain or to exculpate ethical imperfection.' ^ ' Heart ' has an extraordinarily wide range of application, not only pos- sessing its physical sense, but associated with the activities of feeling, intellect, and will. The same comprehensive use of it (xapSio) is found ia the New Testament, and is as common in the Gtospels as in Paul. As we shall see, how- ever, the term ' mind ' (vovs), which occurs several times in the LXX as the rendering of leb, encroaches upon the sphere of the ' heart ' in the thought of Paul. ' Soul ' seems usually in the Old Testament to denote the prin- ciple of life in the individual, but is often extended to embrace the emotional activities in particular, and some- times, as might be expected, is almost a substitute for the personal pronoun. Paul rarely uses i'vx'^ except in this latter sense, following the LXX. Three or four times, also in accord with the LXX, he employs it in the popular sense of ' heart ' or ' mind.' But in 1 Cor. xv. 45, where he quotes the LXX rendering of Gen. ii. 7, eis v^ux^v ( ^Pi? ) fujcrav, he deliberately contrasts i^vxtj with irvtviia, and it becomes clear that in his view i'vx'j, ' soul ' stands for the life of man as untouched by the spirit of God (TrieC/ia), which he regards as God's special gift to the Christian behever. While the noun is comparatively rare in Paul's Letters, the adjective formed from it, meaning hterally ' soulish ' (iZ-nxiKos), and translated ' natural ' in the ' Robinson, op, cit.i p. 26, CH. a.] THE RELIGION OF THE LAW 37 Authorised Version, takes an important place. Some scholars hold that Paul was influenced in his use of this term by contemporary Hellenistic religion. The evidence is altogether inadequate. But it is worthy of observa- tion that the adjective is used by the Jewish author of 4 Maccabees, who is certainly steeped in the current popular philosophy, not in Paul's sense of the ' unspiritual ' as opposed to the ' spiritual,' but in that of ' belonging to the soul ' as opposed to ' belonging to the body ' (4 Maccab. i. 32 : T<3v Si kiridvixiiav ai fiiv eicriv xj/vxiK't't, ai S( crio/iaTiKai). Philo, in accordance with his uses of ^f^x^' employs the adjective in all sorts of connections. In a few cases it applies to the ordinary inner life of man, whether viewed as physical or as the sphere of feeling and other forms of consciousness. More often it occurs in the higher sense of ' spiritual,' which is totally aUen to Paul. Like nephesh, ruach meant in certain phases of its development the ' breath-soul,' but in its earhest usage it signified {a) the wind, (6) the stormier energies of human life, (c) the influence from God which brought about abnormal or " demonic ' conditions in men. Probably owing to this latter use, it came to connote a higher side of the inner life than nephesh, closely associated with the ruach of God Himself. Hence Paul uses ' spirit ' (irveC/io.), the word by which it is commonly rendered in the LXX, for the Divine life kindled in man as well as for the Divine Spirit which has kindled it, phenomena which must be discussed at length in a later section. Occasionally, how- ever, following what we have seen to be an Old Testament usage, he employs ' spirit ' to denote the inner hfe without special reference to its relation to God.^ But the passage which formed the starting-point of our present discussion discloses further elements in his conception of the con- stitution of human nature. There ^ he uses the expressions ' the inner man ' and the ' mind ' (vovs) to describe that part of the human consciousness, primarily his own, which ' See esp. Robinson, op. cit., pp. 18 f., 26 f. ' Rom. vii. 22, 23. Cf. the use of vovs in the same sense in verse 2S. 38 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [pi. i. has an affinity with the will of God, which affords a point of contact, so to speak, with Divine influences. This confirms what was said above as to the error of calling Paul a pessimist in regard to human nature. It is of interest to note that Plato uses a phrase almost identical with that of Paul, ' the man within,' * in distinguishing the power of the rational consciousness from the lower capacities of the soul, and the conception passed into Neoplatonism. But here, as in the case of the cognate term in Paul, the ' mind ' (I'ovs), we must be careful not to read into them the content which they hold in Greek philosophy. At the same time, it is quite possible that in selecting these words to describe the power of rational (and moral) discernment belonging to human nature, a carefully defined aspect of the inner activity of man, Paul was more or less directly influenced by the popular thought of his day.^ This is certainly true as regards his use of the term 'conscience' (a-w«t8j; See esp. Rom. i. 1-5; Gal. i. 16. * E.g. 1 Cor. ix. I. » 1 Cor. iv. 1. * Rom. xv. 15, 16 (M.). » 1 Cor. iii. 10. ' 2 Cor. iii. 6. ' 2 Cor. V. 20. ' Eph. iii. 2-9; Col. i. S6-27. » 2 Cor. iv. 7 (partly M.). '" 2 Cor. xi. 1 (M.). 60 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. Was there ever penned a more amazing document than 2 Cor. x.-xiii. ? For the spiritual health of this community he feels compelled to defend his position against unscrupulous men who were working hard to undermine their confidence in him. It hurts his sensitive feeling to assert his claims upon their respect. ' I am mad to talk like this,' he inter- jects, in the course of his statement.^ But the climax of this marvellous self -revelation, in which every thought and emotion can be tracked as they pass over his soul, brings out the genuine attitude of the devoted, self-forgetful pastor and teacher : ' I am glad to be weak if you are strong.' ^ Hence all charges of arrogance and presumption are simply due to a misunderstanding of the ground which the apostle occupies. From first to last he is conscious of being the ' spokesman of Christ.' * (c) His Election This ' apostolic consciousness ' of Paul means, as we have indicated, his conviction that God has chosen him for a high vocation. But if we think at all of choice in con- nection with Grod, it cannot be conceived as something casual, but as belonging to His eternal vision of things. So we are confronted with Paul's idea of Election, the main significance of which has constantly been misconceived owing to the emphasis being placed on the wrong element in it. We know how, in the Old Testament, the people of Israel, from their remarkable experience of the goodness of God, concluded that He had specially chosen them for His favour from among the nations. And the great prophets Hke Amos find in that position not a reason for self- satisfaction or slackness of effort, but for a deeper sense of responsibihty.* Paul also starts from personal experi- ence. The wonder of God's grace to him in Christ has over- powered him. What does it mean ? As we have seen, bis destination for a special function in the all-wise plan of • 2 Cor. xi. 23 (M.). ^ 2 Cor. xiii. 9 (M.). • 2 Cor. xiii. 3 (M.). • ^mos iji. 2. CH. m.] ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 61 God. But that forms part of the profound experience which he calls his salvation. Such an experience cannot be a mere accident. It must go back to God's eternal purpose. It is involved in God's thought for the world. That thought must sooner or later be realised. And so when Paul feels the inadequacy of his service and shrinks from presenting so faltering an obedience to the all-holy Father, his soul is cheered by the assurance that the Gtod who has taken such pains with his life wiU not allow that life to fail. Human weakness does much to hamper the progress of the Divine operation. But Paul is convinced that what God has begun He wiU carry out to the end.^ ' Faithful is he who calls you : he wiU also perfonn it.' ^ The loving effort which God lavishes on winning a life for His service, Paul describes as His ' caU.' Those who respond to it thereby prove themselves to be the objects of His choice. And they are able to reahse that while they work out their own salvation with fear and trembling, God Himself is behind and in the process, by His gracious disposition towards them enabling them to achieve their desire without failure. What of the other side of the picture ? Has God dehberately and in His eternal purpose excluded some from His salvation in Jesus Christ ? The apostle was too whole-hearted a missionary to act at any time on that assumption. As JiiUoher admirably puts it : ' He never said to any one : You have been made hard of heart, you have been destined to unbelief and destruction : there is no use wasting my energy in trying to win you over : there is no use wasting love on you. . . . For Paul's practical piety both propositions alike stand firm : I myself am responsible for all my sins : all that is good in me is the gift of Grod's grace.' * The misconception referred to is due to the prominence given to the theoretical discussion of Rom. ix.-xi. There the apostle is face to face with the serious problem of the rejection of Christ by the Jewish people. It fills him with perplexity. What can it mean ? Has the purpose of God for Israel been defeated ? To 1 phU. i. 6. 'J Thess. v, 24. ' Pauhta u. Jetua, p. 45. C2 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [ft. i, begin with, he endeavours to show from what actually happened in the history of the nation that, far back in the past, reUgious distinctions revealed themselves between various families, Isaac and Ishmael, Esau and Jacob. And he ends by pointing out to his Gentile readers that, as it is, a remnant of the chosen people have entered the promised blessedness, and by disclosing his conviction that one day ' all Israel will be saved.' But in the course of his argument he tries to account for the actual circum- stances of the case by the Pharisaic theory that God has mercy on whom He pleases and makes stubborn whom He pleases. This is plainly to ignore the moral conditions of the Divine activity. For, as Dr. Denney has tersely put it in his comment on Rom. ix. 20, which compares God's relation to man with that of the potter to the clay, ' A man is not a thing, and if the whole explanation of his destiny is to be sought in the bare will of God, he loill say. Why didst Thou make me thus ? And not even the authority of Paul will silence him.' * (d) The Bearing of his Vocation on his Theology As Paul's consciousness of a direct call from God gave stabiUty to his faith, so the purpose of that call absorbed his practical interest. In attempting to estimate his reUgious thought, it is needful to bear in mind that it took shape on the mission-field, and that its most important features were to a large extent determined by missionary experience. However meagre our knowledge of Paul's earlier Christian career, it is plain that from the first he became a preacher of the Gospel. So there was probably no period in his Christian life in which he was not testing the validity of those truths which appeared to him funda- mental. It was pointed out in an earlier paragraph that he would naturally alrtach supreme value to the convictions which had sprung out of the crisis of his conversion. He would be constrained to believe that the particular revela- > Expos. Oreek Tut., ii. p. 663. ca. m.] ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 63 tion of God in Christ which had brought peace and joy to his own soul must be equally effective in the Uvea of others. Jesus Christ would always be the centre of his message. But obviously he had, as a Christian missionary, to deal with divergent types of men. Although he regarded the heathen communities of the Empire as his pecuUar sphere, his heart yearned for his brethren in Judaism, and especially for Jews of the Dispersion like himself. Now, in this case, he had a wide basis of common belief from which to start. There was the one Hving and true God to whom they and he alike did reverence. There was the conviction of a future Judgment in which men should be recompensed according to the actual issue of their earthly lite. There was the hope of a new order of things, associated with the manifestation of the Messiah, in which those declared righteous by Grod should enter upon a condition of eternal blessedness And he could count on an acknowledgment from his Jewish audiences of a moral standard which placed them on a far higher level than that of heathenism. But Paul had to enlarge the conception of a righteous and holy God by emphasising that grace and love which through Christ had come to be for him the truest expression of the Divine character. He had to turn the hearts of his fellow- countrymen from the attitude of trembling imcertainty in which they stood towards the decision of God upon their conduct, and to persuade them that in union with Christ, the union reached through faith, they could even now become assured of God's forgiveness for Christ's sake. He had to urge that their painful efforts to win merit in God's sight were rendered needless by the wondrous exhibition of the very meaning of God in the cross of His Son. So that his central doctrine of Justification by faith is not a scholastic abstraction, formulated to round off an artificial theory. It is, as Luther discovered later, an attempt to express in Hmited human terms what is most vital in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It was impossible for him, however, to show the real value of this new attitude to God without revealing the inadequacy of the old. Hence &4 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [rt. t. his constant criticism of Pharisaic legalism, the religioua attitude which had kept his own soul in a state of unrest. This criticism comes into the forefront of his Epistles, because Jews and Judaiang Christians regarded Paul's independence of the Law both as treachery to the Divine revelation and as a serious peril for morahty. In the case of the former, of course, it was only one of several formid- able barriers between them and the new faith. But as regards the latter, Paul felt that their Christian position was vitiated in its very foundation by their failure to recognise that it meant the exchange of codes of regulations for the free and joyful inspiration of the Spirit of Grod. When they endeavoured to force their view upon con- verts from heathenism, he did not hesitate to charge them with falsifying the Gospel of Christ. The Messianic Hope was a burning question in Judaism when Paul became a follower of Jesus. Nothing produced upon him a more profound impression than the discovery that in Jesus all the promises of God were fulfilled. He retained much of the Jewish eschatology associated with the consummation of the Kingdom of God, but even this was powerfully affected by the recognition that in a real sense the new epoch had already broken in, that Christians were living among the powers of the world to come. The pledge of this was their actual experience of the Spirit. He did not require to inculcate morality in the ordinary sense upon his Jewish brethren. But he had to make plain to them that the presence in their lives of the Divine Spirit, which was God's answer to their faith, was a much more stable basis of worthy conduct than any formal attempts to comply with a legal standard. Probably Paul's method of approach as a Christian missionary to Jewish audiences would to a large extent appeal to those ' God-fearers,' ^ who formed groups of earnest inquirers in many Jewish synagogues, and who were already influenced by the idea of one righteous God, ■ Regularly described as o! (repi/ievoL rbv Qeiv in Acts. MofEatt trans- lates ' devout proselytes.' CH. III.] ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 65 a moral life, and a future day of retribution. When, however, he came to deal with Gentiles, he could not as a rule take these fundamental positions for granted. First and foremost in that ancient Hellenistic world stood the need of Redemption. It is true that this took the form of a yearning to be Uberated from the crushing tjnranny of Fate or of those elemental spirits whose malice was every- where feared. Men were burdened with a sense of helpless- ness rather than of sin. They beUeved in supernatural powers, but merely to be suspicious of them. Paul proclaimed to them the cross of Christ as a demonstration of that ineffable Divine love which was incarnate in the Saviour, as an exposure of human sin at its darkest in rejecting the gracious appeal of God, and as an exhibition of the Divine righteousness in virtue of which all contact with sin means suffering. The cross of Christ is his central theme. For he knows by experience that it constitutes the most powerful summons to repentance. God is there in His love and holiness, condemning sin, and offering deliverance in Christ to the sinner. But this fundamental Gospel of the apostle bore directly on the heathen attitude of fear towards the mighty powers that towered above them. God was no longer blind force or inscrutable cunning. He was presented in gracious guise as the loving Father, the Father of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. He was brought near to them in His dear Son, the Redeemer. And their contact with Him meant inspiration with new life and power. They were not abandoned to the passiag effects of magical ceremonies and mystic initiations. They were equipped with the very quahties which gave them the victory over sin and temptation. The whole armour of God was placed at their disposal in virtue of their surrender to Christ. Now this power imparted to them through the Divine Spirit was to find expression, not in fitful out- bursts of enthusiasm like the frenzy of heathen orgies but in the channels of daily behaviour. Love, joy, kind- ness, purity, lowliness, trustworthiness, self-control— these were the genuine fruits of the Spirit. It is plain from B fib THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES L^t. i. the evidence of the Epistles that Paul spared no pains in the ethical training of his converts. And perhaps nothing proved more effective in morally immature communities than his announcement of a day in which God should judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ. This day was coincident with the return of Christ and the complete inauguration of that age in which God's rule should be supreme. The thought of its approach, the conviction that the dark night was already receding before the dawn, formed a powerful incentive to sobriety of life and watch- ful self-control. Idolatry, sensuality, strife, untruthfulness, fraud — how could a soul soiled by such stains appear in presence of the spotless purity of Christ ? So that Paul's emphasis on the Parousia is not a piece of mere eschatolo- gical scenery, but a powerful appeal for Christian living. We have already seen that the constantly recurring discussions of legalism in the Epistles had a much wider application than to Jewish or Jewish -Christian com- munities. They were thoroughly relevant to the tradi- tional subjection of heathen peoples to innumerable rites and customs, which usually had Uttle ethical signifi- cance. Therefore the proclamation of an inward freedom of the s^pirit as the very kernel of reUgion, while possessing its own dangers, as Paul well knew, meant a welcome Uberation from a routine which was irksome in proportion to its lack of value for spiritual needs. The unerring moral perception revealed in Paul's selec- tion of truth to be set forth is attested on every mission- field. The aspects of Christian faith and morality which he never wearies of commending are precisely those which the modem missionary finds most effective.^ This must be borne in mind at a time when so much stress is laid on the chasm which separates Paul's religious ideas from ours. Unquestionably his theology has primarily in view those who, through the crisis of conversion, have come over from heathenism to Christianity, and it was shaped at the outset in the throes of a parallel experience of his own. Such a > See eap. Wameck, op. cit., pp. 81-122, 287-339. OH, m.] ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 67 course cannot be postulated as normal. But we must beware of forgetting that the elemental things in religion are strangely persistent. And there is rich significance in Hamack's observation that all the great movements of spiritual renewal in the history of the Church may be traced to a fresh discovery of the meaning of the Gospel of Paul. 68 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES L^. i. CHAPTER IV THE NORMATIVB INFLTJENCB OF ST. PATTL'S CONVBBSIOW OH HIS EELIGIOITS THOUGHT (fls) Jesus the Cmiqueror of Death Enough has been said to make it perfectly clear that Paul's entire conversion-experience circled round the person of Jesus. Henceforth he was persuaded that his function in the world was to bring his fellow-men into touch with those supreme benefits which, through Jesus Christ, had transformed existence for him. This epoch-making change affected every feature of his religious outlook. His view of God, his Messianic expectation, his eschatology, his relation to the Law, his moral ideal — all were directly modified in the light of the decisive revelation which had come to him. Truly old things had passed away ; new things had come to be.^ It is plain, therefore, that his religious thought will be, primarily, the result of reflection upon these new things. So that we ought to be able to discover the main drift of his theology by examining the convictions which were borne in upon his mind by his conversion. Paul, as we have noted, must have been familiar with the common faith of those Christians whom he harassed. For them everything turned on the assurance that Jesus, who had been crucified, was risen. There was no behef comparable to this in the history of Jewish religion, and its sheer daring must have impressed a mind hke Paul's, more especially as it was associated with one who had died a death of shame. The crucifixion of Jesus by itself put » 2 Cor. V. 17. cii. IV.] INFLUENCE OF ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 69 an end for ever to all Messianic claims and hopes. But if He could not be holden of death, no dignity could be too honourable for Him. The suggestion was monstrous. And Paul must often have fallen back on its incredibility, when his opposition to the Nazarenes required reinforce- ment. But it was this Jesus who laid hold of him, who claimed his liio, who made him a new creature. Astounding readjustments of religious ideas were needful in every direction, as soon as he had opportunity to make them. These readjustments form the subject of our investigation. But the presupposition of them all is Jesus as the conqueror of death. The central place of this conviction in Paul's mind is evident from the stress which he lays upon it in crucial passages of his Letters. Thus in the opening words of the Epistle to the Galatians, a document intended to lay bare the essence of his Gospel, when Unking together the name of Jesus Christ with that of God the Father, he attaches to the latter the description, ' who raised him from the dead.' ^ That is to say, in his new discovery of the mind and purpose of God, the most amazing element was the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The idea is elaborated in his famous statement regarding Jesus Christ in the introduction to Romans : ' Born of the seed of David by natural descent, and installed as Son of God with power in virtue of the Spirit of hohness as the result of resurrection from the dead.' ^ Here is a compendium of Paul's Christology, and it illuminates what he conceives to be the bearing of the resurrection on the person of Christ. The resurrection has put the seal upon His supreme dignity as Son of God, with all that that involves for His relation to men. He is now exalted to the highest place that heaven affords. It is no arbitrary process, for it is the operation of that Spirit of hohness which was the controUing principle of His nature, and which death could not quench. But for Paul, the practical consequence of this crowning event in the experience of his Lord and Master is paramount. In ' Gal. i. 1. ' Rom. i. 3, 4 (partly M.). 70 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [ft. i. one of the most intimate of all his self-revelations, he declares how he has spumed all that he once had valued in order to know Christ ' in the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings.' ^ The basis of a genuine heart-to-heart knowledge of Christ is His risen life. The later development in the Johannine hterature is the elaboration of Paul's position : ' He who possesses the Son possesses hfe.' ^ These passages suggest the main significance of Paul's conviction that Jesus has conquered death. (1) The re- surrection is God's vindication of all that Christ has been and has done. His career is shot through with a Divine purpose. What seems tragic failure can be estimated in its genuine meaning, when viewed in the Ught of its consummation. Christ's earthly life, Christ's death of shame, cannot be understood apart from His resurrection which involves His exaltation. It is very noteworthy that when Paul thinks of His human experience, it is as an element in His humiliation (e.gr. Phil. ii. 7 ; 2 Cor. viii. 9), that humiliation whose cUmax is the cross (Phil ii. 8). All this leads up to His supreme dignity as Son of God with power. That is the complement of His voluntary self- renimciation : ' Wherefore also God highly exalted him and gave him the name which is above every name ' (Phil. ii. 9). (2) All that has been said impUes that for Paul the resurrection forms an integral part of Grod's redeeming operation. Not only may such an impression be drawn from the association of ideas in Phil. iii. 10 and from Gal. i. 1-4, where the resurrection is plainly connected with Christ's redemption of men, but the fact is emphasised in the highly compressed statement of Rom. iv. 25 : ' Jesus who was " delivered up for our trespasses " * and raised that we might be justified.' This is one of those character- istically Pauline passages in which the death and resur- rection of Jesus Christ are regarded as inseparable co- efficients of the same mighty achievement. The words " Phil. iu. 10 (M.). « 1 John v. 12 (M.). • Quoted probably from Isa. liii. 12 (LXX). CH. IV.] INFLUENCE OF ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 71 must not be parsed, but interpreted in their broad signific- ance. They do not suggest that the cross meant one thing and the resurrection another. For Paul the cross is un- intelligible apart from the resurrection, and the real im- port of the resurrection becomes clear only in the light of the cross. The words mean, to quote Dr. Denney's apt comment, ' that we beheve in a hving Saviour, and that it is faith in Him which justifies. But then it is faith in Him as One who not only lives, but was delivered up to death to atone for our offences. He both died and was raised for our justification : the work is one and its end one.' * Here Paul interprets the death of C3irist from his experience of the risen Lord. (3) But the revelation of Jesus as the conqueror of death meant for Paul immediate contact with the forces of that higher order which was destined to replace ' this present evil age.' He felt that the coming era of blessedness, so long and wistfully yearned for, was at the door. He speaks of himself and his fellow- Christians as those ' whose lot has been cast in the closing hours of the world.' ^ The reign of Messiah has begim with the exaltation of Jesus. New powers are being liberated from the unseen, of which Paul is intensely conscious. The risen Lord dwells in the souls of His faithful disciples.' The love of God has been poured forth in their hearts through the Holy Spirit given to them.* This confidence in the dawn of the new epoch of Grod's dominion must inevitably kindle high hopes and enthusiasms. Already the apostle can say : ' Our commonwealth is in heaven, from whence we eagerly look for the Saviour.' * The corollary of such high confidence is to be found in the injunction : ' Seek the things where Christ is seated at the right hand of God . . . for you died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.' ® (4) We know how sorely hampered Paul felt himself to be by the burden of physical life. What he calls his ' earthly tent ' ' he makes responsible for much of the failure of his spiritual life. And he therefore sighs after that existence in ' E. 6. T., n. p. 632. ' 1 Cor. x. 11 (M.). » Gal. ii. 20. « Rom. v. C. ' Phil. iii. 20. ' Col. iii. 1, 3. '2 Cor. v. 1. 72 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. which his mortal element shall be swallowed up by life.^ The risen Christ is for him the pledge of perfected being. ' K the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised from the dead Christ Jesus shall also make alive your mortal body through his Spirit dwelling in you.' '^ Christ is the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep.' His victory over the grave is the demon- stration that a triumphant life awaits all who have entered His fellowship. {&) The. Significance of the Gross For Paul, as we have observed, the significance of the cross was bound up with the conviction that Jesus Christ had conquered death and was aUve for evermore. The fact of a crucified Messiah was placed in a new perspective by His exaltation. Crucifixion in this case did not involve the curse of God. Jesus had been revealed as the Chosen of the Divine love. Now the early chapters of Acts reflect the emphasis which was laid by the primitive Christian community on the human mahce which brought about the cruel death of Jesus.* But if we are to appeal to them as evidence for such a conception, we must also recognise that they trace the event to the deliberate purpose of God ; * and associate it with the forecasts of the prophets.® The description of Jesus in these chapters as the ' Servant ' of God ' at once suggests the famous ' Songs of the Servant ' in Deutero-Isaiah. There an Old Testament basis is found for the doctrine of A suffering Messiah. We cannot be sure at how early a date this Old Testament foreshadowing was used to interpret the Passion of Jesus. Considering the authoritative place which the Scriptures held in the con- sciousness of Jewish Christians, a place all the more unique now that they were being persecuted by the Pharisees and so would be detached from the oral. tradition, we are obliged to suppose that almost from the beginning they must have " 2 Cor. V. i. ' Rom. viii. 11. > 1 Cor. xv. 20. ' H.g. iii. 13, 14 j v. 30, etc. • E.g. ii. 23 j iv. 28, etc. ' iii. 18. ' 6 TTois, iii. 13, 26 ; iv. 27, 30. CH. IV.] INFLUENCE OF ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 73 eagerly studied the Old Testament for light upon the new circumstances in which they found themselves. Whether Paul, before his conversion, had ever been led to examine the data, must be a matter of mere conjecture. But as soon as he had entered into fellowship with the risen Christ, the cross, although no longer a scandal, must have appeared an enigma. As a loyal monotheist, he was compelled to assign it a place in the Divine order. But innumerable questions would present themselves. The event was a startUng reversal of Jewish ideas. The Messiah was the very symbol of triumph, and this had been degradation. Yet Jesus was sinless. Why should the Holy One of God undergo so appalling an experience ? To estimate the full significance of such a problem for Paul, we have to remind ourselves that for a Jew death was the emblem of separation from God. It marked the disastrous issue of that taint of evil which had poisoned human nature from the first. The wages of sia was death. What could this mean for God's Vicegerent ? It is far from sufficient to say that it was the necessary transition to a state of glory and exalta- tion.^ Paul's strenuous mind would demand some pro- founder answer than that. And the answer must be more than the device of a skilful apologetic. We may readily admit that Paul had to interpret the significance of the death of the Messiah to other minds than his own. But surely Julicher's view of the situation is superficial when he declares that ' Paul . . . was obliged ... to transform the " folly " [of the cross] into wisdom.' * Paul felt, Uke every tmprejudiced thinker who has faced the facts, that there was something stupendous in the experience of Calvary, something that unveiled a realm of spiritual reahties which almost blinded the mental vision of men with excess of fight. And we know how he exhausted the resources of metaphor and analogy in trying to express that intuition of the Divine nature which had flashed upon his soul from the cross of Jesus Christ. > So, e.g., Weizsacker, Apoalol. Zdtalter, p. 111. ' Paulus u. Jeaua, p. 6S. 1i THE THEOLOGY Of THE EPISTlES [pt. l. We cannot help thinking that the clue to his many- sided conception of the death of Christ is to be found primarily in his conversion-experience. Whatever else in it subdued his nature, first and foremost was his impres- sion of unspeakable grace. That was the atmosphere into which he had been transferred by his wonderful contact with the risen Jesus. The bitter persecutor had been laid hold of from sheer compassion. A love too deep to com- prehend had come to his aid in the midst of bewildering struggle. The whole relation of God to men was encircled with mercy. Need we be surprised that this liberated soul attained to the spiritual height of the Old Testament prophet's estimate of God ? ' In all their affliction he was afflicted, and the angel of his presence saved them : in his love and pity himself redeemed them : and he bare them and carried them all the days of old.' * It was surely his fresh impression of the meaning of God as discovered in the living Christ which prompted him to look for the secret of the cross in the depths of the Divine love. We misconceive Paul's standpoint entirely if we try to account for his interpretation of the death of Christ as the effort to resolve by an ingenious process of dialectic a problem which re- fused to square with ordinary facts. And it is easy to ascribe too much importance to the influence of information concerning Jesus which had reached him in his Pharisaic days, or to the counsel of Christian believers who assisted this strange convert in the first moments of his new life. We would by no means undervalue such factors in the situation.^ Nothing prevents us from supposing that Paul had heard of Jesus' wonderful way with outcasts and sinners. And unquestionably real Hght would be shed upon the mystery when he learned from his Christian brethren the pathetic story of the Last Supper, and was told of Jesus' remarkable words concerning a ' new covenant,' a new relation of men with God, to be inaugurated by His death. Paul was already conscious of this new relation. It had ' Isa. Iziii. 9. * See J. Weisa, op. cit., pp. 34S, 346. CH. iv.J INFLUENCE OF ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 75 brought joy and peace to his soul. Its foundation could be nothing else than the boundless love of God. (c) The Messiah {Son of God) Paul's conviction that Jesus was risen carried with it the acknowledgment that He was the Messiah of God. Jesus' hfe and teaching had involved this high claim, and from the outset His followers had placed it in the forefront. We have seen the serious issue which confronted an ardent Pharisee like Paul when he faced the situation. Jesus had shown an attitude of laxity towards such vital elements of the Jewish system as the Sabbath laws and the regula- tions concerning purification. But the fulfilment of the Messianic Hope of Israel depended on strict loyalty to the authoritative standard. This teacher of heresy had only met his deserts when he was condemned to the most degrading penalty that could be inflicted, that of death by crucifixion. We can only grasp Paul's estimate of the Cliristian movement if we try to reahse that for him, as for all devout Jews, every ideal worth living for was summed up in the Messianic Age. In his rehgious earnestness he had yearned and prayed for the advent of that era. His bold imagination had often pictured the bhss of the final dehver- ance. He had studied the forecasts of prophets and psalmists. In thought he had beheld the foreign domina- tion broken, and the chosen people fulfilling their function as a fight to the nations. Iniquity was purged and righteousness was triumphant. As he looked on the prosaic reafity of Jewish refigion, this glorious vista must have seemed remote enough. But a worse thing had happened. The Nazarene and Ms followers were bringing the national Hope into contempt. Their assertions were horrid blas- phemy. It is against the background of his earHer position that the full significance of his new conviction becomes evident. The glory of Messiahship in no way fades when the office is assigned to Jesus. Paul never loses sight of the fact 76 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. that the revelation of Messiah means the chmax of God's wonderful dealings with His people. He is true to his former expectations when he says of Jesus Christ : ' In him is the " Yes " that affirms all the promises of God.' ^ He cannot conceive any manifestation of the Divine purpose which will surpass that which he has received in the risen Jesus. But it is plain that his Messianic expecta- tions were profoundly modified by the actual experience through which he passed. Johannes Weiss has sugges- tively pointed out that there are only a few places in Paul's writings where the constantly recurring term ' Christos ' can be translated ' Messiah.' ^ The expression ' Jesus the Christ ' is never found. These phenomena indicate that the reality of the personal Jesus has absorbed the Messianic functions. It is the living Person who has impressed the soul of Paul — we may almost say, the personal Saviour. The Messiah qvA Messiah was to the Jewish mind a pubUc functionary. His office was conceived in terms of kingship. He was set apart for judgment. Hence kingly attributes were usually ascribed to him : righteousness, justice, wisdom, power.' For Paul and the early Church the centre of gravity is shifted. They have not to deal with an august, remote Being, whose character is composed of abstract ideals. ' Christ ' has for them become the name of a historical Person. And this historical Person is the embodiment of grace and lowliness and love. For those who had companied with Jesus in the days of His earthly ministry that impression had transcended all others. Paul had caught many glimpses of it while still a persecutor. But now, as the result of his amazing experience of the risen Jesus, it was imprinted for ever on his soul. In the Ught of it, the Messianic redemption is for him transfigured. It is transferred to a new level. No longer can it mean the deUverance of the nation from an aUen yoke, as a reward of faithfulness to their covenant with God. Salva- > 2 Cor. L 20 (M.). * E.g. Rom. ix. S : perhaps also in the phrase, * the Qospel of Christ ' ; possibly in Boni. x. 6, 7 ; 2 Cor. v. 10. See J. Weiss, op. cit., p. 3S0. • E.g. Isa. xi. 1-5. CH. IV.] INFLUENCE OF ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 77 tion is once for all released from national categories. The very significance of Paul's contact with Christ gives it a universal bearing. He has found in the risen Lord the source of spiritual power, of victory over sin and failure. Hence redemption belongs essentially to the spiritual Ufe. It has no concern with material conditions, except in so far as these are evil. The Messiah is He who can rescue from sin, who can deUver from that Divine ' wrath ' which is the reaction of God's holiness against all that is vile.^ But the transformation of the Messianic Hope goes deeper. As has been hinted, the notion of reward falls into the background. Paul had honestly faced the facts as a Pharisee, and had been compelled to acknowledge in the secret place of his heart that if God were to reckon with His people on the groimd of merit, the promised redemp- tion must stiU remain a dream. The crisis in his own Ufe flashed upon him an extraordinary discovery. God had not waited for him to win salvation. He was not left to purchase the boon of inward peace with the price of a laborious obedience. God in His infinite grace had anticipated his action. lake the father in the Parable of the Lost Son, He had gone to meet him while still far off. He had phed him with love and mercy ; He had offered him the gift of new life. He had shown Himself on the side of fraU human nature, appeaUng to men to enter His fellowship through Jesus Christ. Here is a complete revolution in eschatology. We shall have to examine its implications in the case of many of Paul's fundamental ideas. Meanwhile let us note its general bearings. It is easy to show how much of the eschatological apparatus of Judaism Paul retained as a Christian apostle. In his earhest Letters he portrays the Second Advent of Christ in typically Jewish colours. Its accompaniments are the shouts of archangels and the sounding of trumpets. It is the signal of doom for those who refuse to listen to the Gospel of the Lord Jesus. Those who have fallen asleep in Christ shall rise from their graves ■ 1 Thess. i. 10. 78 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. :. to meet Him.* In later documents he employs the same type of imagery. In depicting the consummation of the Kingdom of God, he sketches, though with great restraint, the sequence of events at the Parousia. After the resur- rection of His followers, Christ abolishes all opposing forces, and among these Paul includes the vast hierarchy of evil powers who enslave human destiny and contest the supremacy of God over men. Death itself is annihilated, and finally the Son delivers up the Kingdom to the Pather, ' that God may be all in all.' In the resurrection flesh and blood shall have no part. Both Uving and dead will be clothed with an incorruptible spiritual organism, 'in a moment, in the twinkUng of an eye, at the last trumpet- call.' * In a passage of extraordinary intimacy, Paul reveals his eagerness to exchange ' this earthly tent ' for his ' heavenly habitation,' and his dread of being ' naked ' at the hour of death.^ The language and imagery which he uses have numerous parallels both in the prophets and the apocalypses, as well as in the apocalyptic discourses of Jesus. We have already noted what strong emphasis he lays upon the future Judgment, and how he urges the nearness of the Parousia as a motive for self-disciphne and watchfulness of life. Apart altogether from traditional pictures of the Last Things, which are strangely persistent in all reUgions even after the behefs which they originally embodied have begun to fade, there remains a genuinely eschatological strain in Paul's religious outlook. He yearns for the consummation of God's dominion over men and the universe. He yearns for the extirpation of all the forces of evil, which he conceives as an army of spirits mustered under ' the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit which is at present working in the sons of disobedience.' * He longs for the spiritual attainment which will be the outcome of liberation from the trammels of a body of flesh. For him the future means perfect conformity to the image ' 1 Theas. iv. 15-17; 2 These, i. 7-10. > I Cor. XV. 22-28, 30-53. » 2 Cor. v. 1-4. « Eph. u. 2 ; cf. Col. i. 13, Eph. vi. 12. CH. IV.] INFLUENCE OF ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 79 of Christ : participation in that ' glory ' which constitutes the Divine essence. And so when he deals with Justification he invariably keeps in view the final stage, when his salva- tion will be completed. Indeed, no more typical statement of the Pauline position could be cited than that of Gal. v. 5 : ' We by the Spirit as the result of faith eagerly expect the righteousness we hope for.' But while all this is true, we must assign its proper place to the complementary aspect of Paul's religious thought. The future has, in a very real sense, become present. Fundamentally, that which it has to ofiEer is given already in Christ to the trustful heart. In principle the Christian has begun to participate in his glorious heritage. Already he possesses the love of God which is in Christ Jesus his Lord, and nothing shall ever be able to rob him of his priceless possession.^ This conscious- ness that he had virtually entered upon the coming Age of apocalyptic expectation meant an entire readjustment of the older Hope, and marked off Paul's outlook from that of Jewish Messianism. In a real sense, the Messianic rule was present, attested by signs and wonders and all the gifts of the Spirit. The new condition could not be com- pared to the old. The resurrection and exaltation of Jesus were the proof that the ' rulers of this world had been vanquished.' Believers might still appear a feeble folk in the midst of ' a crooked and perverse generation,' but their light was visible in the surrounding darkness.^ The whole creation was eagerly waiting for the complete revelation of the sons of God. When Christ, who was their life, should appear, they also would appear with Him in glory.' Perhaps enough has been said to bring out the unique character of Paul's conception of Jesus as Messiah. And it certainly refuses to tally with some theories much in vogue at the present time. Prominent scholars like Wrede, J. Weiss, and others have argued that the foimdation of Paul's Christology is to be found in his pre-Christian view of Messiah. Taking their stand mainly upon the apocalyptic • Rom. Tiii. 35-39. " Phil. "• IS- ' Col. iii. 4. 80 THE Theology of the epistles [ft. i. pictures in 1 Enoch ^ and 4 Ezra,^ they hold that the heavenly being there portrayed, to "whom was committed the function of judgment, may be regarded as representing the current Messianic doctrine of Judaism.* But the evidence is highly conflicting. In the Psalms of Solomon, a Jewish work of the first century B.C., and also a product of the Pharisaic party, there is no trace of such a con- ception. It adheres to the common view that the Messiah should be a prince of the house of David.* There is no proof that the other notion was widely diffused. Mr. G. H. Box refers it to some ' probably small apocalyptic circles,' while ' the orthodox Rabbinic view . . . accepts an earthly national Messiah, the son of David, and sometimes aflSirms^ for him an earthly pre-existence {e.g. that he has already been bom but is in concealment, awaiting the time of his manifestation).' * Paul's actual language seems to coincide, as we might expect, with the usual Rabbinic position, for in Rom. i. 3 ff ., when describing the Son of God, who is the subject of his Gospel, he emphasises His Davidic descent, omittiag aU mention of heavenly origin, and pointing to His exaltation as the decisive moment in His Messianic career. There are, of course, important passages which refer to His pre-existence. But it is not necessary to find the origin of the idea in that strain of Jewish apocalyptic tradition which may plausibly be referred back to the early myth of the ' archetypal Man.' Pre-existence, in some sense, must belong to One who is placed on the side of Deity. The artificial nature of the attempted analysis of Paul's Christology appears from the fact that the keenest advocates of this view declare the whole period from the Incarnation to the Parousia to be a mere episode for Paul's mind.' Such a hypothesis, even in the hght of the facts already examined, is scarcely worthy of refutation. But while Paul has not constructed his Christology on " Esp. chapters xlvi., xlviii., Ixii. ' Chap. xiii. * B.g. Wrede, Paulut, p. 86 f. ; BrQokner, Die Entatehung d. paulin. ChriatoUigie, passim ; J. Weiss, Chrislua, p. 18 £. * See Psa. of Solomon, xvii., xviii. * The Ezra Apocalypse, p. 284. ' This does not apply to J. Weiss. CH. IV.] INFLUENCE OF ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 81 these mechanical lines, its super-human imphcations appear in his frequent use of the designation, Son of God. We might naturally be disposed to look for the root of the idea in the Old Testament. And we know the central place occupied in early Christian thought by Ps. ii. 7 (LXX): ' The Lord said to me, Thou art my son, I have to-day begotten thee.' When it is observed that the succeeding sentence of the passage runs : ' Ask of me, and I will give the heathen as thine inheritance,' we can easily realise the force of its appeal to Paul. This description of Messiah does not stand alone. In Ps. Ixxsdx. 28 (LXX) God declares : ' I will also make him my first-bom, exalted in presence of the kings of the earth.' And Ps. ex. 3 (LXX), where again the ' begetting ' of the chosen king is a feature, was very famihar to the primitive Church. The title ' Son ' appears also in several apocalypses as appUed to the Messiah of God. This usage has obviously an official character. To be the chosen of God is to stand towards Him in a special relation. It may be legitimate to refer for a parallel to the ancient Oriental designation of kings as ' sons ' of God.^ But the comparison does not shed much hght on Paul's conception. A remarkable affinity is dis- cernible between the Old Testament Messianic application of the title and such statements of Paul as Rom. i. 3,4: ' His son, bom of the seed of David by natural descent, and installed as Son of God with power in virtue of the Spirit of holiness as the result of resurrection from the dead.' Here the installation as Son of God with power is directly equivalent to the ' supreme exaltation ' of which Paul speaks in Phil. ii. 9 as bestowed upon Christ by God as the result of His humiUation. There is an enhancing of His position in the universe. He is henceforth ' Lord,' with a right to universal dominion and universal adoration. Of special value for the comprehension of Paul's idea is his description of Christ as ' the image of the invisible God, the first-bom of the whole creation.' ^ Here, unquestion- ably, he has in view what must be called a ' metaphysical ' ' See J. Weiss, Chrimtua pp. in-21. * Col. i. 15 j cf. Heb. i. 3. F 82 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [w. i. relationship. It represents something more than perfect mutual understanding, completely reciprocated love. But even in the incidental references found in the Synoptic Gos- pels to the unique relation between Jesus and His Father, while we may be content with formulating it in ethical terms, we are all the time conscious that reflection carmot stop there, although it has no instrument adequate to interpret the phenomena. As a matter of fact, Paul does not speculate in this mysterious realm. To trace his use of the title ' Son of God ' to a mythological tradition which had come down from polytheistic religions, but had been gradually purged of its mythological character by monotheistic influence and philosophical abstraction, is altogether gratuitous.^ It does not, indeed, seem enough to say, with Weinel, that our phrase, ' Son,' following a common Semitic usage, merely denotes ' belonging to.' ^ We beheve that here, as else- where, Paul's religious experience Ues in the background. The wonderful Person who had laid hold of him so graciously and transfigured his whole being must belong to a sphere above humanity. The Christian tradition had probably already associated the term ' Son ' with Jesus' self -conscious- ness. Its use accorded with the apostle's strict mono- theism. He never called Jesus God. ' Son of God ' assigns Him to His proper sphere of being. Without speculative attempts at definition, it suggests His oneness with the Father.' (rf) The Lord Johannes Weiss remarks with truth that ' early -Christian religion is contained in germ in the formula, our Lord Jesus Christ.' * We cannot precisely determine how the title ' Lord ' came into currency. Li Acts ii. 36 Peter is • See J. Weisa, Christus, pp. 36, 37. ' Paialus, p. 2S1. He compares Matt. xii. 27, viii. 12, xiii. 38, etc. ' Bousset is inclined to think that the phrase was a creation of Paul's own, the product of religious reflection rather than of the worship of the Church {Kyrioa Christoa, pp. 181, 182). The evidence of the Synoptioa even when estimated critioally, seems to f^vowr the view in the text. * Christus, p. 24. CH. IV.] INFLUENCE OF ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 83 reported as saying, ' Let all the house of Israel know that Grod made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified.' Plainly the title is here connected with His exaltation, and that idea seems always to he in the back- ground of its use. The writer of Acts links it with a famous Messianic passage, Ps. ex. 1 : ' The Lord said to my Lord, Sit on my right hand, until I make thine enemies a footstool for thy feet.' And there can be little doubt that this passage was a most important factor in the formation of the usage. But for Paul at least it is far more than a synonym for Messiah. Possibly the same thing is true for the early Church as a whole. It is certainly significant that the translators of the LXX, in all likelihood Egyptian Jews, rendered the Old Testament ' Jahweh ' by Kijpios, ' Lord.' No doubt in so doing they were influenced by the fact that in the Hebrew text of the Old Testament the Tetragrammaton was pronounced as Adonai, a Semitic title of deity which was a more or less accurate equivalent of Ki'jotos. In any case, their action gave the claims of the God of Israel a world-wide bearing.' For the peoples of the Hellenistic epoch were famihar with the Divine significance of Kipioi. It was a typically Oriental title. It was constantly used of characteristically Oriental deities, such as the Egyptian Isis, Osiris, and Serapis.^ In the first century it was quickly taking its place as the designation of the deified Emperor, and thus becoming the central term of the Imperial cult.^ Its appUcation to Christ was all the more significant from its Hellenistic at- mosphere, and especially from its intimate association with the cult of the Csesars. The impression which it made upon heathen-Christians is strikingly brought out by a passage in the Acts of the Scillitan Martyrs (1-2),* where Speratus contrasts Christ as im/perator noster (' our Em- peror') with the dominus noster imperator ('our Lord » See Deissmann, Die Helleniaierung d. aemifiachen Monotheismua, p. 14. • See Bousset, op. cit., p. 118. _ ■ « . . ^ ' See the examples anb voce K6pios in Dittenberger s Onenhs Oraecae IntcHptionea Selectae. ' Quoted by Lietzmann on Rom. x, 9. 84 THE THEOLOGT OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. the Emperor ') of the Roman proconsul, and another (6) in which he declares : ' I refuse to acknowledge the Empire of this world ... I acknowledge my Lord who is Emperor of the kings of all nations.' Possibly Hellenistic practice as well as the usage of the LXX had some iniluence in the regular ascription of the term ' Lord ' to the exalted Christ. Yet the appearance of the Aramaic formula Maran atha, ' Lord come ' (1 Cor. xvi. 22), forbids us to distinguish between Palestinian and Hellenistic Christianity in regard to the use of Ki5pios.* The same consideration prevents us from accepting Bousset's hypothesis that Kvpioi, as applied to Jesus, means prim- arily ' the Lord who presides over the community-life of Christians, as that life is unfolded in the pubUc worship of the Church, i.e. in the cult.' ^ Perhaps this conception may have formed an element in the situation. Full force must be assigned to such important phrases as ' caUing upon the name of the Lord,' ^ which may be taken as a brief description of Christians, and referred to the attitude of the community assembled for worship. But the personal relationship involved in the designation must be placed in the forefront by any careful student of Paul. Here the influence of the Old Testament becomes apparent. Passages hke Ps. cxvi. 17 (LXX), ' Lord (Kvpios), I am thy bond servant (8oi5A,os),' give a partial clue to Paul's standpoint. Corresponding to the position of Jeeus as Lord is his own as devoted slave. Again and again he calls himself by this name.* It is no conventional description, but suggests how large and profound is the relationship between his Lord and himself. It implies surrender, obedience, rever- ence, trust, grateful love. Accordingly, whether Paul was indebted to the Christian community for this conception or not, he has, at least, made it completely his own. He uses it as the vehicle for expressing what he feels about * Boiuset's attempt to restrict the formula to Antiochene Christianity {op. cit., p. 103, note 3) is quite unconvincing. ' Op. cit., p. 105. * E.g. 1 Cor. i. 2 ; Ro'n. x. 12 ; Acta ix. 14, 21. * E.g. Rom. i. 1 ; Gal, i. 10. CH. IV.] INTLUENCE OP ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 83 Christ. And the feeUng is the direct transcript of his conversion-experience. Christ is for the apostle pre- eminently ' my Lord.' ^ So that with equal right we may derive its cult-association from its personal significance. This is evident from statements found in Paul's Letters. Thus, in 1 Cor. xii. 3, he declares : ' No one can say Jesus is Lord but by the Holy Spirit.' Here is a process of transition from the personal to the public confession. Yet, however fundamental the ascription of lordship to Jesus may be for the life of the community, it must have its roots in the inward discovery of the soul. Li Paul's case, that has as its issue union with the living and exalted Lord. But the idea of exaltation in Paul's use of the title must be specially emphasised. It was as the exalted One that Christ revealed Himself to the Pharisee. And that note may always be heard when Paul speaks of Him as Lord. The most important material for the elucidation of this conception is found in Phil. ii. 9, 10 : ' Wherefore {i.e. as the issue of His lowly self-renunciation) God highly exalted him and gave him the name which is above every name, that in the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven and things on earth and things under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.' Plainly, in this passage, the ' name above every name ' is that of ' Jjord.' What this meant for a devout Hellenistic Jew may be inferred from such Old Testament declarations as Isa. xlii. 8 (LXX) : ' I am the Lord {Kvpws <> Qi6^), this is my name.' And the background of Paul's thought in the passage quoted appears in Isa. xlv. 23 (LXX) : ' I swear by myself . . . my words shall not be turned away, that to me every knee shall bow, and every tongue shall swear (some good authorities read ' confess ') by God' (an excellent authority reads 'the Lord'). As in the case of the designation ' Son of God,' Paul, in this affirmation of His lordship, deliberately assigns Jesus to ' Phil. iii. 8. 86 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. the sphere of the Divine. Apart from the judgment of the Christian community which he has entered, he makes this ascription as the result of his personal experience. It is scarcely needful to point out that for ancient thought the giving of a name carried with it the imparting of all the name stood for. The Old Testament use of ' Lord ' implies the right to universal worship and dominion: that which is due to Jahweh. With all these considerations before his mind, Paul does not hesitate to call Christ the Lord. But it is instructive to notice that the final goal of the lordship of Christ is ' the glory of God the Father.' Paul never deserts his monotheistic position. And perhaps J. Weiss is justified in suggesting * that he welcomed the possibihty of using the term ' Lord,' which for him ex- presses Christ's position of equality with God in the eyes of men and His right to universal adoration, while, at the same time, the name of ' God ' is reserved for the Fathei to whom even Christ shall one day deliver up His dominion, ' that God may be all in all.' ^ (c) The Spirit In the most explicit account of his conversion which Paul gives in his Epistles, he speaks of the gracious purpose of God to reveal His Son ' in me.' ^ Whatever may have been the objective circumstances of the revelation, the permanent gain for the apostle is something spiritual, the fellowship of his spirit with the Divine life in Jesus Christ. Hence he can describe Him as ' life-creating spirit.' * And the gift of new life or power is for him the supreme token of God's operation in his personal experience. So from this time forward the decisive criterion for the Christian life is the reception of the Spirit. When he desires to bring his erring Galatian converts to the touchstone of funda- mental realities, he asks them : ' This is the only thing I wish to find out from you : Did you receive the Spirit aa ' ChrieUu, p. 28. « 1 Cor. xv. 28. ' Gal. i. 16. • 1 Cor. zv. tS. OH. IV.] INFLUENCE OF ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 87 the result of observing the Law, or was it because of the hearing which your faith gave to the Gospel ? ' * The one vindication of his preaching which he submits to the in- tellectually restless Corinthians is the ' demonstration of the Spirit and of power.' * How are we to estimate this standpoint of tu»j apostle ? It is noteworthy that in the earlier narratives of the Old Testament, phenomena of an abnormal or ' demonic ' nature were usually referred to the ' spirit ' or ' breath ' of God. Probably this explanation represents an advance on some primitive animistic theory. Thus, Samson's extraordinary physical strength (Judges xiv. 6) and the technical skill of Bezaleel the artificer of the Tabernacle (Exod. XXXV. 30, 31) are ascribed to the Spirit of God. As migiit be expected, a similar origin is presupposed for the ecstatic experiences of both earUer and later prophecy. The former were apparently more physical than spiritual in character (see, e.g., 1 Sam. x. 10). This, possibly, was the reason why famous prophets like Isaiah and Jeremiah did not associate their prophetic utterances with the ' Spirit ' of God. The idea may still have borne traces of its more primitive unethical features. In the case of Ezekiel, however, whose career gives evidence of a marked pathological element, the conception of the Spirit of God comes into prominence {e.g. ch. xi. 1, 5, 24), although he also more frequently speaks of the ' hand ' of the Lord, In a few places, endowment with the Spirit is associated with special service in God's Kingdom {e.g. Isa. xi. 2), and occasionally its value is emphasised for the needs of the reUgious life {e.g. Ps. h. II ; cxliii. 10). In the Wisdom- literature of Israel, its place is taken by the semi- personahsed conception of Wisdom, represented as God's instrument in creation and the channel of Divine energy to the universe. The relation of the two allied conceptions will meet us again when we examine Paul's view of the cosmic significance of Christ. In Rabbinic theology, the ' Spirit of holiness ' is the equipment of specially gifted ' GaJ. Hi. 2. ■ 1 Oor. u. i. 88 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. teachers. Of more importance for our purpose is the eschatological expectation that the Messianic Age should be marked by an extraordinary visitation of the Spirit (e.g. Joel ii. 28, 29). It is plain from the early chapters of Acts that this expectation took a pre-eminent place in primitive Christian thought. We are unable to determine to what extent it was due to the teaching of Jesus. The evidence of the Sjoioptic Gospels does not suggest that Jesus emphasised the idea of the Spirit. In one or two places the term appears to have been substituted in the tradition for a more general expression. The statements of the Fourth Gospel presuppose Paul as well as the very unique interpretation of Jesus which is there embodied. In any case, the extraordinary ferment of spiritual power and enthusiasm which prevailed among the Christians of the early ApostoUc Age was associated with that outpouring of the Spirit which was beUeved to usher in the Messianic Era. We must consider in the next chapter in what measure Paul was affected by the conception current in the Church. The most important feature of his own conception of the Spirit is its relation to Christ. The risen Lord who appeared to him was essentially ' Spirit.' The result of this revela- tion was for him, above all else, a new consciousness of spiritual power — power able to achieve undreamed-of moral effects. In the primitive community the fresh quickening of spiritual life was vaguely associated with the Spirit. In Paul's case the idea was far more concrete and personal. The Spirit as experienced by him was the Spirit of Christ. This was central for Paul's Christianity ' If any one have not the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to him.' * Yet we must not narrow his conception, for in the preceding clause of the passage quoted he has spoken of the ' Spirit of God ' as ' dwelling in you.' A few sentences later he describes the new life of the Christians as due to ' the Spirit of him that raised Jesus from the dead.' * Nor is this all. Interchangeable with the idea of the ' Rom. viii. 9b. • Bom. viii. 1 1, CH. IV.] INFLUENCE OF ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 89 Spirit of Christ or the Spirit dwelling in the behever is that of the believer as being ' in Christ ' or ' in the Spirit.' ^ The usages we have examined prepare us for Paul's remarkable identification of Christ with the Spirit : ' Now the Lord is the Spirit.'^ Yet the clause which. follows puts us on our guard against a too literal interpretation, for it runs : ' and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is Uberty.' Paul, in other words, leaves a fluctuating margin between his conception of Christ and the Spirit. He was convinced that in the crisis on the road to Damascus he had come into touch with a hving Person, but that Person belonged to the sphere of the Spirit. His essential being was Divine Spirit. The result of Paul's contact was experience of transforming power. When he thinks especially of this power, he speaks of the Spirit. When he dwells on the source of his new energy, he speaks of Christ. But always that fellowship with Christ which presupposes a hving faith is the condition of the Spirit's indwelling. The Spirit is, indeed, the Divine response to the faith of the Christian. We do not stay to deal with Bousset's theory that it is not the Christ who appeared to Paul at his conversion whom he identifies with the Spirit, but the ' Lord ' (Kuptos), worshipped in the services of the Christian com- munity.* If there is anything which distinguishes Paul's conception it is its personal character. The Divine power which has laid hold of him and now operates through him is no vague world-soul, but is definitely individualised. Of course, in deahng with so impalpable a reality as spirit, his language is bound to fluctuate. Thus, when he attempts to determine the relation of the Divine energy to the human personahty which it quickens, it is neces- sarily impossible to divide the ground between the Divine and the human. But in the great majority of instances in which he uses * spirit ' (irvtvixa), he thinks of the Spirit of God (or of Christ) as dwelling in the Christian, or of the ' E.g. 2 Cor. v. 17 ; Rom. viii. 9. « 2 Cor. hi. 17. ' Op. cit, p. 145. 90 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [rt. i. inner life of the Christian as recreated by the Spirit. It is true that there are about a dozen cases in which Paul applies this term to the inner life apart from the influence of the Divine Spirit. In this usage he follows that of the Old Testament. For in some post-exilic passages ' spirit ' is used as a synonym for ' soul.' ^ But that does not alter the fact that when Paul speaks of the Spirit, he has in view either the energy of God (or of Christ), acting upon human nature, or human nature as renewed by such Divine action. The extraordinary significance for Paul of his contact with Christ as spirit lies in the conviction that he was now moving among the forces of the coming age, the age of final redemption. His hope of the consummation of God's saving purpose, his assurance that God would complete what he had begun, was powerfully confirmed by this experience of vital power. The great promises of the Messianic epoch were actually beginning to take shape. The Spirit was God's pledge of coming blessedness.* It was the first-fruits of the splendid harvest which awaited behevers.* By its agency the love of God was shed abroad in men's hearts, as Paul's own experience could testify. Its presence, as known and felt, was the evidence that its possessors were ' children ' of God.* For the Spirit dis- closed to the receptive nature a new view of God. It taught men to cry ' Abba, Father.' * In this experience Paul found a wonderful corroboration of his conviction of Christ as working through the Spirit. For it was the Spirit of God's Son which had been sent forth into their hearts.* In a later section we must investigate the relation of the Spirit to the moral life of the Christian. Meanwhile it ought to be noted that Paul's personal experience exercised an epoch-making infiuence upon the conception of the Spirit in the early Church. We can easily gather, not only from Acts, but from Paul's own Epistles, that ' See p. 37, supra. = 2 Cor. i. 22. " Bom. viii. 23. * Rom. viii. 16 ' Bom. viii. 16. • Gal. iv. 6. CH. IV.] INFLUENCE OP ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 91 the consciousness of the Spirit was associated with abnormal manifestations, such as ' speaking with tongues,' ' prophe- sying,' etc. There was grave danger lest the spiritual enthusiasm of the Christian community should evaporate in mere fitful and unprofitable emotion. Paul recognised the peril. With a firm grasp of the true value of equip- ment with the Spirit, he saw the necessity of self-control and discipline in giving play to this wonderful energy. From him the immature communities learnt once for all that the genuine action of the Spirit is not spasmodic or eccentric : that it is a power for worthy living. For those who assimilated the apostle's teaching, the Spirit became the normal principle of Christian life and conduct. if) The New Attitude to God A recent investigator of Paulinism has justly said that for Paul God was first and chiefly the Father of Jesus Christ. The statement reveals at a glance the revolution accomplished in his religious thought and experience. The significance of that revolution may be expressed by a suggestive modem phrase, ' the Christhkeness of God.' From the day of his conversion onwards, Paul interpreted the nature and purpose of God not from the traditional beliefs of Judaism, but exclusively in the light of the revelation of Christ to his soul. His contact with Christ was not an accident, nor was it the fulfilment of a domi- nating resolution. It was Divine from beginning to end. God was behind it : Grod was in the heart of it. It was intended to alter the entire basis of his religious life. The first thing which impressed him was that he had been made the object of an amazing and whoUy undeserved compassion. As he hurried on in a career whose raison d'itre turned out to be a senseless defiance of the Divine purpose, the unspeakable mercy of God had singled him out, had checked his folly, and illumined his soul with a heavenly light. This unmerited Divine tenderness is always before his mind, and becomes one of his watch- 92 THE THEOLOGY OJ THE EPISTLES [pt. i. words in the term ' grace,' a term which gets its colour from the crisis of his conversion It is not mere pity : that seems too casual an idea to the apostle. Grace is something positive, basal, essential to the very character of God. It is Christ who has shown what it means. Often, indeed, the grace of God implies primarily for Paul the gift of His Son Jesus Christ, and since this supreme gift, in certain most important aspects, cannot be separated from that of the Spirit, grace frequently suggests that special working of the Divine energy. But, in the first instance, Paul from the nature of the case was profoundly influenced by the concrete form, if we may so say, in which the grace of God was expressed. Christ was the Revealer of this con- tent of the Divine nature. As the result of the revelation, Paul never ceases to wonder at the incomparable Divine generosity. Thus the very circumstances of his conversion brought into bold relief the fatherly character of God. Now we need not suppose that Paul realised within a few days all that was involved in this transformation of his re- ligious lite. And yet the completeness of the transformation must have led a mind Uke his almost at once to seek for an adjustment between the new experiences which flooded his soul. Hence, the conception of Jesus, incarnate and crucified, as God's unspeakable gift for the sake of sinners, must have soon taken a regulative place in his efforts to understand his wonderful new attitude to God. The very revelation of Christ to him as the Chosen of God, with all the light he could shed upon it from what he had already learnt of Christ's life and activity and gospel, would in itself almost immediately lay the foundation of his new relation- ship to God. Almost immediately he would become aware that the old suspicion and fear of God as task-master and judge had vanished, and an amazing vision of His heart, which seemed too good to be true, had begun to flash upon his soul. And then as he meditated upon the cross and all that led up to it, he reached the profound conclusion that ' God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself.' ^ ' 2 Cor. V. 1 9. CH. IT,] INFLUENCE OF ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 93 The fact that the issue of the crisis was a sense of obliga- tion to proclaim the message of Jesus to the heathen is itself a comment on the meaning of the experience for Paul. It was a surprise to discover the God whom Jesus revealed. For instead of being struck down with terror by the entrance into his life of a power which he felt to be distinct from himself, his soul was filled with love and joy and hope. He had found that it was the good pleasure of God to act on different lines from those which he had all along taken for granted. He had striven to establish a good record in the eyes of the All-holy, striven with painful eagerness although with no permanent satisfaction. And now, in the life which burst upon him, he reaUsed that he had misunderstood the God he was yearning to please. God's favour was not to be purchased by straining efforts. Christ, crucified and risen, crucified for sheer love to men, risen because that love was Divine love, the very index of the heart of God — the Clhrist who had become manifest to him, was the demon- stration that God's joy was to give rather than to receive. And the giving was infinitely lavish. All that he had learnt of Christ convinced him that God did not wait for men to approach Him, but that He anticipated them in the wonder of His grace. This had been Paul's own experience. God had followed him with the subtle influences of Hia mercy, had in Christ laid hold of him and mastered him. All that was necessary on his part was to surrender to that loving grasp. To the trusting soul which took God as He revealed Himself, laying aside its prejudices however deep- rooted and long-standing, to the surrendered life God made over the wealth of His priceless gifts. This fundamental aspect of the new attitude to Grod is what Paul calls Faith. It lies at the heart of his conversion. In that hour ho showed himself willing to be taken captive by the Divine hand. His receptivity to the influences which radiated from the risen Lord became for him, as he was well aware, the channel of new life. Li the history of Old Testament reUgion, faith had meant the belief that God would fulfil His promises to His people. 94 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [ft. i. That, of course, was an important factor in religious life, and had achieved valuable results. Later, and especially in Hellenistic Judaism, it denoted firm conviction as to the actual existence of invisible things, above all of God Himself. Both these meanings are to be found in the Pauline Epistles, but they are completely overshadowed by the profound expansion of significance which the idea of faith undergoes in Paul's hands. For him it is primarily the complete response of the soul to the good news of God embodied in Christ. That no doubt includes the great acts in which Christ has accomplished the Father's purpose, His incarnation. His redeeming death. His resurrection and exaltation as Saviour. But even in these instances it does not merely signify assent to the truth that such events have happened. It involves sympathy with their redemptive value and acceptance of the purpose of God as disclosed by them. But for Paul it chiefly describes a relation between one person and another, the grateful and reverent sub- mission of the entire inner nature to the Divine heart whose love appeals to men in Jesus Christ. This relation constitutes the basis of all those descriptions of the dealings of Grod with the soul which lead to the new attitude on which Paul has so joyously entered. We are sometimes repelled by the technical ring of such terms as justification, adoption, righteousness. When we try to analyse their precise meaning, we discover certain formal elements in them, due primarily to Paul's environment. But, as a matter of fact, they are all attempts from difEering angles of vision to set forth the wonderful approach to God of which Paul has become conscious. He knows himself to be on a wholly new footing with the Almighty. Probably the description of widest range which he can give of it is Sonship. He does not use this word. He calls the new status Adoption. The atmosphere of the term comes from his own experience. Men who have wandered far from God, and have been guilty of all manner of sin and disobedience, have utterly forfeited their right to any place in His family, that family for which they were destined in en. IV.] INFLUENCE OF ST. PAUL'S CONVERSION 95 creation. But God, in that infinite grace of His which has become manifest in Jesus Christ, deliberately iavites them to become His children. He adopts them, makes them Has children out of sheer goodness, deals with them as children, lavishes on them all the love that a father can bestow. This is not theory. Paul is sure that it has happened in his own experience. That unspeakable Divine love of which Christ is the pledge has made him heartily ashamed of his sin. He has given himself to a new bondage, the bondage of Jesus Christ, and that means peace with God. The old uncertainty and fear have become impossible. He has grasped the full significance of the father's answer in the Parable of the Lost Son : ' Son, thou art always with me, and all that I have is thine.' That is the focus of the message of Jesus Christ. It is also the clue to Paul's new attitude towards God. Quite plainly such a standpoint involves the doom of Legalism. There is no idea of bargain in such a relation- ship. There is no suggestion of a quid pro quo. Paul has simply taken the gift held out to him in Jesus Christ, the gift of salvation. Hence the thought of earning some reward from God loses all relevance. There is no compari- son between man's obedience and God's unspeakable gift. Thus the apostle can say from the depth of his heart : ' Christ is the end of the law to every one who beHeves.' By this new attitude to God we are warned against the notion that the centre of gravity in Paul's religion was eschatology. We must give all due emphasis to the stress he lays on the consummation of the Kingdom of God. We must estimate at its full value the importance he attached to that life in a perfected spiritual organism which was to begin with the Second Advent. We must recognise the place he assigned to a final verdict of God at the Judgment, the last word on the destiny of individuals. We must endeavour to appreciate his yearning to get rid of the hampering influence of existence in the flesh. But while, in one or two instances, Paul's sensitive conscience seems to tremble before the final issues of hfe, the very core 96 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [ft. l of his religious position is the certainty that he has already been received into the reahn of God's grace. He is akeady an heir of God. He possesses the Spirit, which is the pledge and foretaste of the heritage of blessedness awaiting him. And, after all, this is the most important fact of his religion. He can say with unwavering conviction : ' We know that all things work together for good to them that love God, who are the called according to his purpose. . . . We are more than conquerors through him that loved U8.'V ■ Som. viii. 28, 37. CH. v.] ST. PAUL AND THE CHRISTIAN TRADITION 97 CHAPTER V ST. PAUL AND THE CHEISTIAN TRADITION (a) The Historical Jesus In the famous passage in which he speaks of his conversion Paul firmly emphasises the independence of his Gospel and his apostoUc vocation. The shaping of his Christian convictions he ascribes directly to the influence of the risen Christ with whom he had been brought in contact. ^ It is impossible to regard any vital element in his Christian consciousness as coming to him at second-hand. And we have tried to show in the preceding section that his experi- ence on the Damascus road was decisive for the regulative features of his new position. But we must not exaggerate Paul's assertions in Gal. i. For these are made in a con- troversy which is for the apostle a matter of life or death. So he does not pause to qualify them. It has already been pointed out that Paul the persecutor and champion of the Pharisaic ideal must have formed certain definite impressions of the sect he was seeking to extirpate, and that he cannot have ignored the significance of Jesus. The extent of his knowledge must remain a matter of conjecture, but the fact that he identified the Uving Person who appeared to him with Jesus of Nazareth is sufficient proof of the influence exerted on his mind by the information he had received regarding the alleged Messiah. But it is of much greater moment to remember that immediately after the supreme crisis Paul associated himself with the Christian community. There is no reason to doubt the report in Acts that he became intimate in : Gal. i. 1, 11. 12. a 98 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. Damascus with a Christian disciple named Ananias,^ and he must speedily hfive got into touch with the other believers in Christ who were to be found in that region. His own evidence that he was a marked man in Damascus * corroborates the vague information of Acts as to his bold proclamation of the Gospel,' and warns us against taking too literally the bare statements of Galatians referred to above. Even from Gal. ii. 1 it is obvious that Paul had been for a considerable time a fellow-worker with Barna- bas, and the passage in Acts which mentions their early intimacy * has often been insufficiently appreciated. Paul himself describes a journey to Jerusalem from Damascus, which he dates apparently three years after his conversion, ' to interview Peter.' *• An unprejudiced reader can have little doubt that this visit is identical with the sojourn at Jerusalem narrated in Acts ix. 28, 29 : only that Luke wishes to put as favourable a construction as possible on the relations of the new convert to the Christians of the Mother- Church, and leaves the impression that the visit was con- siderably longer than Paul's own statement permits us to beheve, and of a much more pubUc character. Paul singles out Peter and James as the apostles whom he met. In view of later events that is suggestive. At every stage in his career, Paul was in immediate contact with those who had known Jesus and their friends or converts. Hence it was inevitable that from the outset of his Christian course he should be familiar with all that was essential in the tradition of the Church. This being so, his fundamental positions as a Christian would be profoundly affected by the information which came to him regarding the hfe and teaching of the Lord, and the attitude towards that life and teaching which he found in the primitive community. Various misconcep- tions have arisen at this point. It is true that soon after Paul's mission-work among Gentiles began to assume large proportions, he was brought into sharp conflict with the > Acts ix. ] fl. « 2 Cor. xi. 32 f. > Acts ix. 22-25. • ix. 27. • Gal. i. 18. CH. v.] ST. PAUL AND THE CHRISTIAN TRADITION 99 older sections of the Church as to the obligation on Gentile converts to keep the Mosaic Law. From the emotion revealed by the broken sentences which open Gal. ii., it is clear that he was anidous, at least for a time, about the decision of the Jerusalem apostles. And even after they had shown their genuine Christian insight by refusing to lay down a rigid rule of compUance, and by giving Paul a free hand for his own special sphere, representatives of the Mother-Church continued to dog his steps and to urge on his converts that he was preaching a mutilated Gospel. But this special aspect of the situation in no way justifies the idea that Paul occupied a different Christian position from that of the primitive Church. As we have seen, there is no suggestion that they were at variance on the supreme question of Christology.^ Jiilicher has cogently pointed out the all-important matters of agreement between Paul and so unassailable a witness to the standpoint of primitive Christianity as the Gospel of Matthew.^ They were at one as to Christ's resurrection and exaltation. His universal Lordship, His relation as Son to the Father. Both aUke acknowledged His Messianic dignity and His sinlessness. Lideed Paul himself makes direct reference to his indebted- ness to those who were in Christ before him, when he declares to the Corinthians : ' I handed on to you first of all that which I myself received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.' ' But further, the notion of Paul's isolated position is deduced from his alleged indifference to the earthly career of Jesus. The paucity of references to Jesus' teaching and activity is insisted on as a proof that Paul was not interested in the historical person : that his attention was absorbed by the exalted Lord. Now it is plain that he could never completely adopt the attitude of those who ' See, e.g., Wemle, Einfuhrung, p. 177. ' Paubta u. Jema, p. 30. 1 Cor. xy. 3-S. 100 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [ft. i. had companied with Jesus. He did not feel the necessity of such a course, for he was deeply conscious of his own special vocation, and believed that, in the Divine wisdom and grace, he had been prepared for his task by the most fitting type of discipUne. Moreover, the nature of his individuality did not lend itself to be the external reflection even of so solitary and incomparable an ideal as that embodied iu the life of Jesus. What he assimilated of His precepts and example would inevitably be woven into the very texture of his Christian character and be manifested through the mirror of his marked personality. But apart from such psychological considerations, the aim of Paul's correspondence must be kept in view if we are to avoid hasty inferences regarding the place which it gives to the life and teaching of Jesus. These letters were never intended to be missionary addresses. In every instance the apostle writes to men and women who were already beUevers in Christ, and who had received at least some training within the Christian community. His purpose almost invariably is to warn against perils to which he knows his readers are exposed, to encourage in circum- stances of trial and temptation, or to give practical guidance on problems of Church life which had been referred to him by the community in question. It is surely obvious that he will take for granted a more or less accurate acquaintance on their part with the sahent features of Jesus' character and history. No more reckless assertion could be made than that His life on earth was for Paul an unimportant episode. As Johannes Weiss sugges- tively puts it, 'the fundamental presupposition of Paul's Gospel is that Christ accompUshed his work of redemption in the flesh.' ^ It is scarcely necessary to quote passages. In Paul's view the cross is the crowning-point of that humiliation which was involved in the earthly life of Jesus.* An outstanding element in his description of the Son of God is ' that he was bom of David's seed by natural descent.' When he explains the redemption which brings > Dot Vichnntentum, p. 167. • Phil. u. 7, 8. CH. v.] ST. PAUL AND THE CHRISTIAN TRADITION 101 sonship, he emphasises the fact that the Redeemer was bom of a woman, born under the Law.* At a later point we shall have occasion to examine the material in some detail. Meanwhile a further misconception which bears on our present subject must not be overlooked. It has been frequently asserted in :ecent theological hterature that between Paul and Jesut there is a chasm which cannot be bridged. Jesus is solely concerned with the claims of the moral imperative which He identifies with the will of the Father in heaven. Paul assigns central importance to a scheme of redemptive facts or events which must be accepted with a view to salvation. From the course of the preceding discussion it is suffi- ciently clear that this is an altogether misleading de- scription of Paul's position. But it does take account of a truth which is vital for any comparison between Paul and Jesus. The comparison, to put it in a sentence, cannot be made on equal terms. We are ignoring the real character of the situation when we say : ' Such and such was the teaching of Jesus : but this is the teaching of Paul.' We forget that the supreme factor in Paul's reUgious experience was the Person of Jesus Himself in every stage through which He passed from His entrance into the world to His final exaltation. Therefore it is irrelevant to compare their points of view. Jesus, as all His followers and Paul himself were convinced, stood in a relation to God which no one else could share. His contact with His Father knew no barrier. Paul as a Christian found Grod in Jesus Christ. He was never conscious that the medium distorted his vision. Its inestimable worth was bound up with the love of Him who humbled Himself and became obedient even unto death. We must carefully examine his view of the mediation. But let us remember that apart from it Paiil would not have come to understand Grod at all. Accordingly it would be erroneous to estimate Paul's relation to the historical Jesus from a comparison of the jorm of their teaching. But it is not difficult to show that » Gal. Iv. 4. 102 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. at every turn Paul, like the primitive Church, presupposes the life and doctrine and influence of Jesus. How, it may be asked, would such a background be likely to appear in occasional writings hke the PauHne Epistles ? We should expect no more than incidental references. And the more spontaneously these appear, the more evidently do they presuppose a close and accurate acquaintance of Paul with the tradition of Jesus. The readiness with which he can use his material appears throughout his writings. When the Corinthians, in their perplexity about the resurrection, put definite questions to him on the matter, he takes his stand on the resurrection of Christ Himself, and, without constraint, enumerates various appearances of His to individual disciples and to groups of beUevers.^ In dealing with abuses connected with the observance of the Lord's Supper at Corinth, of which news had reached him, he gives an account of Jesus' farewell meal with His disciples, so vivid and so graphic as to show his thorough acquaintance with the details.^ In reply to the difficulties raised about marriage by persons of ascetic tendencies in the Corinthian Church, he directly appeals to the Master's teaching : ' For married people these are my instructions (and they are the Lord's, not mine). A wife is not to separate from her husband — ^if she has separated, she must either remain single or be reconciled to him — and a husband must not put away his wife.' And then he proceeds : ' To other people I would say (not the Lord) : if any brother has a wife who is not a believer, and if she consents to hve with him, he must not put her away ; and if any wife has a husband who is not a beUever, and if he consents to live with her, she must not put her husband away.' ' This instance is extraordinarily instructive for our purpose. Where the disciples have preserved a ruling of Jesus on any point of perplexity, that ruling is necessarily decisive. In the present instance Paul can cite the opinion of Jesus on divorce, which has been handed down to us in the Synoptic » 1 Cor. XV. 3-8. • I Cor. xi. 23 fi. • 1 Cor. vU. 10-13 (M.). CH. v.] ST. PAUL AND THE CHRISTIAN TRADITION 103 tradition.^ But the question of mixed marriages, which was bound to create difficulties in a heathen-Christian community like that at Corinth, had never been before Jesus. So the apostle deals with it on his own responsibihty, taking care to make plain that he has not the Master's authority for his advice. The passage clearly indicates Paul's attitude towards and dependence on the teaching of Jesus. A further interesting example occurs in a section of 1 Corinthians in which the apostle, who has been urging the stronger-minded Christians to respect the scruples of the weak and to deny themselves, seeks to show that he himself has never asserted his ' rights ' in his dealings with the Corinthian community. One example of his self- renunciation is afforded by his refusal to accept support from them. ' Do you not know that as men who perform temple-rites get their food from the temple, and as attend- ants at the altar get their share of the sacrifices, so the Lord's instructions were that those who proclaim the gospel are to get their hving by the gospel ? ' ^ Here, as a matter of course, he points out Jesus' counsel on the subject, which he accepts, and expects his readers to accept, as authoritative. It will be observed that all the illus- trations we have given are taken from the First Epistle to the Corinthians. The fact is suggestive, for this happens to be the only letter in which a number of practical ques- tions affecting the life and organisation of the Church were dealt with by Paul at the request of his converts. If more of such inquiries had been preserved in documents (for the situation must have been common), it is almost certain that we should have found numerous additional references to definite instructions of Jesus. We do not propose to collect evidence for Paul's know- ledge of details in the career of Jesus. A meagre amount is available in the existing sources, and if any samples of the apostle's instruction of converts had been handed • Mark x. 1-12, with parallels. It is, of course, impossible to say whether Paul was here dependent on written documents or oral tradition. ' 1 Cor. ix. 13, U (M.). 104 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. down, more would undoubtedly have been forthcoming. But in this connection it may be frankly admitted that in Paul's mind aU else in Jesus' earthly experience was over- shadowed by His entrance into humanity, His seM-sacrific- ing death on the cross, and His resurrection to glory and triumph. Whatever emphasis he may have laid on the proof of Jesus' love and compassion afEorded by deeds of which he was informed, nothing could be compared with the knowledge that ' while we were yet sinners, Christ died for the ungodly.' However often he may have alluded to the Divine power energising iu Jesus, its supreme ex- pression was His victory over death and the grave. But before we examine more carefully the influence of Jesus' teaching, with which he became acquainted in the Christian community, upon the reUgious thought of Paul, it is worth while to note the impression left on his mind by what he learnt of the Master's character. Here again, as might be expected, we have to do with incidental allusions and not with elaborate references. But the very fact that they are introduced so artlessly reveals Paul's intimacy with the historical tradition. When pleading for a fair judgment of his own conduct, which had been mahgned by opponents within the Christian Church, ,he appeals to the Corinthians ' by the gentleness and reason- ableness of Christ.' ^ In writing to his much-loved con- verts at Philippi, he caUs God to witness that he yearns for them all ' with the affection of Christ Jesus himself.' ^ When exhorting the strong to bear the burdens of the weak, he reminds them that ' Christ never pleased himself, but, as it is written, the reproaches of those who denounced thee fell upon me,' the Old Testament quotation showing that he had in mind the scorn and abuse which the Master had to bear in accomplishing His mission.* It in quite probable that when, in setting before the Corinthian Christians the duty of a liberal contribution to the col- lection organised for the poorer brethren in Jerusalem, he speaks of ' the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, who, ' 2 Cor. X. 1. " Phil. i. 8 (M.). » Rom. xv. 3. CH. v.] ST. PAUL AND THE CHRISTIAN TRADITION 105 though he was rich, yet for your sakes became poor,' ^ he is thinking of Jesus' actual poverty in His earthly exist- ence. Of special interest are the indications that Paul portrayed the character of Jesus to his converts as the ideal for imitation. In the passages in question he often associates himself with his Lord, as supplying the standard of ethical life. This is simply an example of his pastoral skiU and insight. For it is the unanimous testimony of missionaries that their own Uves have to serve in the first instance as a pattern for immature heathen converts. In his earliest letters he gives thanks that his readers ' began to copy us and the Lord.' ^ In 1 Corinthians, which we have so often cited, he entreats them : ' Copy me, as I copied Christ.' ^ And when he warns Christians in Asia against yielding to pagan vices, he declares : ' That is not how you have understood the meaning of Christ, for it is Christ whom you have been taught, it is in Christ that you have been instructed, the real Christ who is in Jesus.' * References of such a kind plainly imply that the man who made them not only had an intimate knowledge of the character and conduct of the historical Jesus, but laid the profoimdest emphasis upon them in the discharge of his work as a missionary. But we must further observe that the fundamental note of Jesus' teaching, the revelation of the Fatherhood of God, dominates Paul's religious conceptions from beginning to end. This can be made clear in a variety of directions. We may be surprised that the apostle has not given a larger place to the idea of the Kingdom of God, on which Jesus laid so much emphasis. There are, of course, various instances of its occurrence in his Epistles, and these reveal the same shades of meaning as those which appear in the Synoptic Grospels. In some passages, as, e.g., 1 Thess. ii. 12, 1 Cor. XV. 24, etc., the term ' kingdom ' is essentially eschatological. Others, as, e.g., 1 Cor. iv. 20, Col. i. 13, as plainly presuppose that the Kingdom has already been > 2 Cor. viii. 9. » 1 Thess. 1. 6. • 1 Cot. xi. 1 (M,). * Eph. iv. 20, 21 (M.). 106 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [ft. i. inaugurated, and exists as a power in the world. But the very fact that the Kingdom-idea has fallen into the back- ground in Paul's mind only shows the more conclusively that he has penetrated behind the form to the irmer substance of Jesus' thought. For we are not unduly pressing the data when we assert that for Paul the con- ception of the Family of God, as estabhshed and knit together in Christ, takes the place of the Kingdom.^ To make good this position, evidence might be adduced from the whole range of Paul's writings. A few tj^ical instances will suffice. No statement more powerfully sums up Paul's notion of the Christian life than that which forms the cUmax of one of his greatest arguments in Galatians : ' You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.' ^ The rich significance of these words is disclosed in a later sentence of the paragraph : ' When the fulness of the time came, God sent forth his Son, bom of a woman, bom under the law, to redeem those under the law, that we might receive our adoption. Now because you are sons, God sent forth the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father. So that you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son then also an heir through God.' ' Practically everything of moment in Paul's experience of religion is here expressed — the Incarnation, the Redemption in Christ, the gift of the Spirit, the crucial relation to God of sonship, the right to the completed inheritance. And it is plain that the terms in which he formulates his experience go back to the teach- ing of Jesus. It was He who, out of the depth of His own unique consciousness, disclosed the high truth that men are called to be sons of God, not in abstract name, but in the reaUty of a personal relationship. His consciousness of Sonship, although solitary, sets the norm for those whom He is not ashamed to call His brethren. Thus, His redemp- tion of men from their false relation to God, the relation of > We do not here refer to the parallel conception of the Body of Christ, which will be examined in the next chapter. « Gal. iii. 26. • Gal. Iv. 4-7. CH. v.] ST. PAUL AND THE CHRISTIAN TRADITION 107 guilty fear, and the bestowal of that Spirit which is His own life-principle, introduce them into what Paul calls ' the liberty of the glory of the children of God.' In Christ Jesus they are constituted God's sons. The intimate affinity of Paul with Jesus is equally manifest in what he teaches concerning the Family -spirit. When Jesus was asked, ' Which is the supreme of all the commandments ? ' He replied : ' The chief is : Hear, Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord, and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and all thy soul and all thy mind and all thy might : the second is this : Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.' ^ It is needless to recall Paul's wonderful eulogy of love in 1 Cor. xiii., a passage in which the matchless grace of the thought is almost equalled by the rhythmical beauty of the language. His estimate, as there unfolded, may well have been derived, as some eminent scholars have suggested, from the life and character of Jesus Himself. However this may be, Paul makes plain by the language which he employs that he stands in the direct succession of Jesus. In Bom. xiii. 8 ff., when formulating various Christian duties, he makes this most suggestive statement : ' Be in debt to no man apart from the debt of love one to another. He who loves his fellow-man has fulfilled the law. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not covet — ^these and any other commands are summed up in the single word. Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. Love never wrongs a neighbour : therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.' ^ That this is no isolated reference becomes plain from Gal. v. 14 : ' The whole law is fulfilled in one command, namely. Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.' The keynote of Paul's ethical thought, which cannot be dissociated from the outcome of his religious faith, he has caught once for all from the teaching of Jesus. > Mark zii. 29-31. • CSiiefly M. 108 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [ft. i. (6) Eachatological Conceptions A careful reader of the Pauline Epistles must be im- pressed by the prominence given by the apostle to the element of Hope. We have already exempUfied this in the section on the Messiah in the preceding chapter. The very existence of a Messianic ideal involved such a feature. And it belonged, of course, to the essence of Paul's pre- Christian consciousness. Now we have seen how com- pletely his conception of Messiah was altered by his experi- ence of the risen Jesus. In the strict sense, the ardent expectation of those who waited for the Kingdom of God was already in process of being reahsed. Phenomena were visible which testified to the power of the unseen world. Unique gifts and graces in the Christian community were the evidence of a new order. Fellowship with the living Christ lifted the soul out of the present. Even now Christians were in possession of redemption.^ This redemption was different from the earlier hope of national deUverance. It was embodied in the forgiveness of sins, and had no political bearings at aU. In one aspect of it, nothing more satisfying could be conceived. Yet, as has been noted, Paul was keenly alive to the hampering con- ditions inseparable from bodily life and the evils imposed by the existing constitution of the world. Redemption wiU only be complete when the present organism of flesh and blood shall be exchanged for the spiritual organism, which will be a perfectly adequate expression of the renewed hfe of the Christian : when this age, which is cursed with futility and death, shall give place to that which is to come, the epoch of ' glory,' in which men shall be transformed into the very image of God. It is evident that Paul has devekped these ideas from a deep-rooted personal instinct. But he has also preserved a large amount of the esohatological material of Judaism. Here again we may explain the fact by saying that he remained true to his Jewish inheritance. But how are we to reconcile that with his altered coo- ' Pol. I l|, CH. v.] ST. PAUL AND THE CHRISTIAN TRADITION 109 oeption of Messiah ? How are we to account for the extra- ordinary prominence he assigns to the Parousia, the Second Advent of Christ, with all its eschatological accompani- ments ? Has he here elaborated on apocalyptic lines the contents of his Damascus experience ? Or is he attempting to combine two incongruous ideas, the traditional machinery of Jewish eschatology with the spirituaUsed Messianic doc- trine involved in his own Christian view of Messiah ? The clue to his procedure is at least partly to be found in the attitude of the early Church. The New Testament writings, almost without exception, reveal an eager longing for the consummation of God's redeeming purpose, which will coincide with the return of Christ. It is plain, there- fore, that primitive Christianity was possessed by an overpowering eschatological enthusiasm. The Apocalypse, which is a typical product of its age, closes with the words : ' He who bears this testimony says. Even so : I am coming very soon. Amen, Lord Jesus, come ! ' (M.). The ejaculation corresponds to the final salutation of so completely different a document as Paul's first letter to the Corinthians : ' If any one has no love for the Lord, God's curse be upon him. Maran atha ! ' (' Lord come ! ') In what is probably the latest book of the New Testament, the writer is chiefly concerned with meeting the scoffing reproach hurled at Christians : ' Where is his promised advent ? Since the day our fathers fell asleep, things remata exactly as they were from the beginning of creation.' * The return of Christ introduces the resur- rection and the judgment. Sometimes the final con- summation is preceded by a limited rule of Christ on earth, during which all opposing forces are subdued. The Synoptic Gospels indicate that we must allow for something more than the traditions of Jewish Messianism m attempting to account for this constant strain in the religion of the primitive Church. It is extremely difficult to determine with any accuracy the eschatological teaching of Jesus. A comparison of parallel passages shows the » g Pet. iii. 4 (M.). 110 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. effect of varying traditions. Not only so. In an atmo- sphere of such eager expectation of the Parousia as that in which the report of Jesus' words was handed down, His sayings were exposed to modifications hkely to stamp them with eschatological features.^ But after due allow- ance has been made for such influences, there remains a residuum of evidence which cannot be explained away. Here we can only touch the subject. Various utterances of Jesus appear to imply that He expected the Kingdom of Grod to be consummated within a comparatively short period. More than once He associates this consummation with His own return in glory. When, however, we consider that the Gospel which He brought laid supreme emphasis on the immediate recognition of the love of the Father and its present enjoyment by His children, it is obvious that questions of chronology cannot be of primary importance for Jesus' conception of the Kingdom. So that His predic- tion of its immediacy as an eschatological magnitude may simply express the prophetic certainty that the cause of God mttst be victorious. Whatever be the precise explana- tion of this aspect of His teaching, it was natural that its literal form should above all else appeal to men and women who had been taught to look forward to a definite moment in history at which God should intervene, either directly, or through His Vicegerent, the Messiah. Paul found this expectation dominant in the Christian community when he entered it. He was profoundly impressed by it, as we can gather from such passages as 1 Thess. iv. 13 — -v. 11 ; 1 Cor. XV. 20-28; Rom. xiii. 11-13. He can describe the change through which his heathen converts have passed as a turn- ing to God from idols, ' to serve a living and true God, and to wait for the coming of his Son from heaven — the Son whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who rescued us from the wrath to come.' ^ And he uses the expectation in his letters as a powerful motive to self -discipline and watchful- ' See on the whole subject the admirable disoussion in Mofiatt's Theoloy^ o/ the OoapeUi, pp. 41-84. " I Thess. i. 9, 10 (chiefly M.). CH. v.] ST. PAUL AND THE CHRISTIAN TRADITION Hi ness of life. It is of interest to note that in his eschato- logical teaching he constantly reflects not only the thought but also the language of Jesus. (c) The Era of the Spirit No conception, as we have discovered, was more central for Paul than that of the Spirit. This we endeavoured to trace, primarily, to his conversion-experience. The supreme crisis of his life was always identified by the apostle with a new consciousness of spiritual power. That power he could only ascribe to the risen Lord who had revealed HimseK. Thenceforward, possession of this high endowment was regarded by Paul as the main criterion of the Christian life. A remarkable example of his position is found in 1 Cor. xii. 3, where, in distinguishing between genuine and spurious spiritual manifestations, he declares : ' No man can say, Jesus is Lord, except by the Holy Spirit.' He admits, as this passage shows, the existence of spiri- tual phenomena which are worthless and perilous. These were visible in heathen communities, and, so far as their external form was concerned, might easily be confounded with those of the Christian society. The crucial difference lay in the fact that the Holy Spirit was directly associated with Christ. He is described as ' the Spirit of God's Son,' or ' the Spirit of Christ.' ' Where the Spirit of the Lord is,' Paul asserts, ' there is freedom.' ^ Obviously then, in his judgment, the Spirit is above all else the witness to the power and presence of the living Christ and all that that involves. We cannot tell how early in his Christian career Paul came to formulate his conception of the Spirit along the lines which are discernible in the Epistles. But we know that when he entered the Christian Church he was con- fronted with experiences similar to his own, which were grouped together under the category of the Spirit. The opening chapters of Acts are of priceless value as > 2 Cor. iii. 17. 112 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [pt. i. revealing the tone and feeling of early Christianity. ' Day after day,' we are told, ' they resorted with one accord to the teinple and broke bread together in their own homes : they ate with a glad and simple heart, praising God and looked on with favour by all the people.' ^ The truth- fulness of the picture is corroborated throughout the New Testament. Alike in Paul and other writers we overhear the same note of exhilaration and joy.^ More than once the temper of these primitive believers is described by the term Trapp-qa-ia, glad, courageous self-expression. This excites the amazement of the Jewish authorities in the case of Peter and John.^ The writer of Acts definitely associates it with the Spirit : ' When they had prayed, the place where they were met was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak the word of Grod with glad fearlessness.' * The connection of this attitude with the Spirit belongs, no doubt, to the primitive thought of the Church. For the early traditions, incorporated in Acts, are saturated with the conception of the Spirit. The chief emphasis, indeed, is laid upon abnormal phenomena. Again and again in Acts, speaking with ' tongues ' is singled out as typical of the Spirit's operation in the hfe of behevers.* Paul's discussion of spiritual gifts, in reply to the question addressed to him on that subject by the Qiristians at Corinth, shows the firmly established place this endowment held in the esteem of the community.* Most scholars are now disposed to identify this ' glossolaUa ' with a phenomenon which belongs to all outbursts of spiritual enthusiasm. In such times of nervous tension, the emotional life bursts through its ordinary barriers, and men and women break forth into ejaculations of praise and prayer, often quite unintelligible to their neighbours, but serving as an outlet for their pent-up feeling. Paul clearly indicates the restraints which ought to be placed upon such manifestations. And, as we have seen, his profound ' Acts ii. 46 (M.). Cf. iv. 33, v. 41. « Cf. Pha. iv. 4 ; 1 Pet. ii. 9 ; Jas. i. 2. » Acts iv. 13. « Acts iv. 31. » Acts ii. 4, X. 46, xix. 6. • 1 Cor. xiv. CH. v.] ST. PAUL AND THE CHRISTIAN TRADITION 113 influence probably did more than anything else to keep them under control, and to turn this exuberance of emotional vitality into the channels of moral action. But already in the early Church the more wholesome con- ception of the significance of the Spirit had begun to assert itself. Indeed from the beginning fearless pro- clamation of the Gospel was traced to the power of the Spirit, just as definitely as gifts of healing or interpretations of truth or glossolaUa.^ But naturally what was extra- ordinary attracted special attention. Behind all lay the conviction that the Messianic Age had begun to dawn. Now already in the Old Testament the new era, so ardently longed for, was connected with a unique out- pouring of Divine influences. In Isa. xi. 2, it is said of the Messianic King that ' the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord.' Jeremiah speaks of the wonderful days to come in which Grod will put His law in the inward parts of His people, and write it in their hearts.^ Ezekiel has the same idea of the ' new spirit ' which is God's Spirit.* First Enoch describes the Messiah very much in terms of Isa. xi. 2,* and later, the Psalms of Solomon speak of the wisdom, righteousness, and might of God's Anointed as wrought by the Spirit.' In Isa. xxxii. 15 the epoch of bliss is ushered in by the outpouring of the Spirit from on high. The early Christians, quoting the apocalyptic words of Joel,® are convinced that all these forecasts have found their realisation through the exalted Jesus. The pro- nouncement of Peter in Acts ii. 32 f. gives the clue to the general behef : ' This Jesus God raised up, as we can all bear witness. Exalted then by God's right hand, and receiving from the Father the long-promised holy Spirit, he has poured on us what you now see and hear.' ' This indissoluble association of the Spirit with Jesus had already ' See Acts iv. 31 as above. ' Jer. xxxi. 33. » Ezek. xxxvi. 26, 27. * 1 Enoch xlix. 3. » Pas. of Sol. xviii. 8. ' Joel ii. 28 fi. Cf. Acta ii. 16 fl. ' Chiefly M. 114 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [ft. i. before Paul's time ensured that the conception should not degenerate into a mere external superstition. Enough probably has been said to indicate that Paul must have been under real obhgations to the Christian community which he entered, in formulating both for his own mind and for his audiences in the mission-field a fruitful conception of the Spirit.^ Yet it is none the less clear that he worked out to its proper consummation the idea, which was apt to be lost in the midst of startling phenomena, that the Spirit, as the gift and pledge of Christ, was not an endowment for special occasions or special activities, but rather the life-principle of every trustful and loyal disciple. (d) The Death of Christ From the very dawn of his Christian career Paul was obhged to reflect upon the significance of the death of Jesus, the Messiah. In the next chapter we must carefully examine his interpretation of the facts. But, with a view to that investigation, it is of moment to ask : From what point of view was this crucial event regarded in the circle of primitive beUevers ? The pre-eminent position given to the story of the Passion in the Synoptic tradition bears witness to the absorbing interest which it created in the early Church. And in their work among their own fellow- countrymen the first preachers of the Gospel must neces- sarily have endeavoured to explain the meaning of the cross to those who considered it as discrediting the claims of Jesus. When we turn to the early chapters of Acts, we find some illumination as to the direction which was being taken by Christian thought on the subject. It accords with what ' We have not discussed the question of Jesus' teaching on the Spirit. The data in the Synoptics are quite inadequate for the purpose^ Those in the Fourth Gospel are an interpretation which presupposes Paulinism. And yet the place given by the writer to the conception of the Spirit is more intelligible if some traditions of Jesus' teaching on the subject wore current in the Church. Cf. I^uke zziv. 4S, 49 ; Acts i. i t. CH. v.] ST. PAUL AND THE CHRISTIAN TRADITION 11 o we might expect in the opening stages of reflection. The simplest point of view is that which regards the death of Jesus as a crime committed by the Jews, in ignorance of its full and awful import. ' I know, brethren,' says Peter, ' that you acted in ignorance, as did also your rulers.' * Stephen compares the murder of 'the Righteous y One' with the persecution and slaying of the prophets in earlier generations.^ But from the beginning their action is regarded as no mere accident, due to an outburst of human malice. It belongs to a deliberate and predetermined purpose of God. The Jews were only instruments to carry out His will, ' to do what thy hand and thy counsel had decreed to happen.' ^ Indeed, even when blaming their ignorance, Peter describes it as the means which God took to carry out that which He had announced long before by the mouth of the prophets.* The Second Psalm is quoted as declaring that ' the kings of the earth rose up and the rulers gathered together against the Lord and against his Christ.' * Again and again in the earher section of Acts the for- giveness of sins is more or less vaguely associated with the person of Jesus as crucified. Thus, immediately after he has pointed to the fulfilment of prophecy in the suffering of Christ, Peter urges upon his hearers repentance ' with a view to the blotting out of your sins.' * Having described Christ as ' the stone rejected by you builders ' (Psa. cxviii. 22), he asserts that ' in no other is there salvation.' ' No better example of the position could be given than Acts v. 30, 31 (M.) : ' The God of our fathers raised Jesus whom you murdered by hanging him on a gibbet. Grod lifted him up to his right hand as our pioneer and saviour, in order to grant repentance and remission of sins to Israel.' In all these passages — and they are only a selection — there is no attempt to explain the relation of forgiveness to the death of Jesus. Yet the words in our last quotation which » Acts iii. 17. ' Acts vii. 52. • Acts iv. ?7, 28 ; ii. 28. ' Acta iii. 18. « Acts iv. 26. ' Acts iii. 19. • Acta iv. 12. 116 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [m. i. speak of ' hanging him on a gibbet,' and which are them- selves cited from Deut. xxi. 22, midoubtedly suggest a particular drift of reflection. And it may be noted that the reference is found not only here, but also in Acts x. 39, Gal. iii. 13, and (probably) 1 Pet. ii. 24. The original passage describes the man who is ' hanged on a gibbet ' as ' accursed by God.' What can be the meaning of a curse lying upon One who was perfectly righteous ? We have seen that the idea of a suffering Messiah was read into the prophets by the early Christians. The suffering, the curse, must somehow be related to human sin. Now already in Judaism there were traces of the beUef that the merit of an iimocent man could atone for a guilty.* This position at least was reached in the primitive Church, for Paul can say : ' First and foremost, I passed on to you what I had myself received, namely that Christ died for our sins, as the Scriptures had said.' ^ It is instructive to notice that on this crucial matter Paul appeals not to any saying of the Master but to the Old Testament as inter- preted in the Church. If we ask what Scriptures were so expounded, Isaiah hii. wiU inevitably suggest itself. As soon as the earhest Christians began to explore the Old Testament for light on the stumbling-block of the cross, they were bound to be impressed by the extraordinary delineation of the Servant of Jahweh in that chapter. There they read of one who was ' despised and rejected of men,' who ' was wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities,' who ' was brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth.' But of peculiar significance would be the declaration of ver. 10 : ' If he should make his soul an offering for sin, he should see his seed, he should prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord should prosper in his hand.' The idea of the sin-offering would illuminate the mystery of Deut. xxi. 22 f. The cross would receive a profound meaning in the hght of the prophetic word : ' The Lord laid on him the iniquity of us > 1 Macoab. zvii. 22. ■ 1 Oor. zv. 3 (M.). CH. v.] ST. PAUL ANB THE CHRISTIAN TRADITION 117 all ' (Isa. liii. 6). It might be precarious to infer a definite doctrine of the death of Christ in the early Church from the fragmentary data at our disposal. The evidence suggests that it was interpreted now from one standpoint, now from another. But enough material has survived to reveal the germ of Paul's conception of Christ as the propitiation and sin-bearer. Indeed, a careful examination of Isa. liii. in the LXX discloses at various points the essential back- ground of Paul's doctrinal construction. The Servant 'bears our sins' (ras afiapriai fifiCiv (jiepei). He 'shall have many for his inheritance and shall share the spoil of the strong, because his life ("/-ix^) ^^s dehvered up (Tra/ieSi-^r/) 1 unto death, and he was reckoned among the transgressors (avd/xois) and he bore (avijveyKci/) the sins of many, and was delivered up because of their transgressions . ' We have observed that in recording the traditions which he had received in the Church regarding the death of Christ, Paul appeals to the authority of the Old Testament. Yet the Church had preserved sayings of the Lord which could at least find some place in the scheme of thought under review. In an incidental statement of the purpose of His mission, Jesus declared that He had come ' not to be served (gtuKoi'Tjffiji'ai) but to serve, and to give his life ('pvxv^) a ransom {kinpoi) for many.' ^ It is difficult not to discern here the influence upon His rehgious thought of the Servant-passages. The same thing is true of His remark- able utterance at the Last Supper : ' This is my blood of the covenant (or, ' the new covenant in my blood,' so Luke and Paul) poured out for many.' * For in Isa. xhx. 8, 9 the Servant is described as ' given for a covenant of the people . . . that thou mayest say to the prisoners. Go forth : to them that are ia darkness, Show yourselves.' * These, and other passages which might be quoted from the * Used bv Paul in his central statements regarding the death of Christ : e.g. Rom. iv. 25, viii. 32 ; Gal. ii. 20 ; Eph. v. 2, 25. ' Mark x. 45 and parallels. ' Mark xiv. 24. * The best MSS. of the LXX have the " covenant ' in verse 6 as well. lis THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. Gospels, indicate that Jesus' thoughts on the profoundesfc aspects of His own mission were moving among Old Testa- ment forecasts and symbols, and there can be no doubt that the wonderful figure of the ' Servant ' exercised a unique influence upon His Messianic consciousness.^ ' See a series of articles by the present writer on ' The Self -conscibusnea^ of Jesus and the Servant of the Ijord,' in the Expository Times for 1008. CH. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POblTIONS OF PAULINISM 119 CHAPTER Yl THE FXmDAMENTAI, POSITIONS OF PATTLINISM (a) In Christ In the preceding chapters an attempt hat been made on the basis of the data furnished by the Epistles to set forth, first, the features characteristic of Paul's pre-Christian rehgious experience, secondly, those conceptions which were brought into the forefront by the transformation of that experience due to his conversion, and finally, the influences already dominant in the early Church which seem to have affected the apostle's religious thought. All these elements must have had normative value in the shaping of his fundamental positions. No man can shake off his past hke a worn-out garment. His ancestral heritage of ideas wiU assert itself, even when in principle he has discarded it. The symbohsm in which the mind takes refuge has a strange fashion of surviving, after the things signified have been seen in a new fight. It is needless, in view of Chapter iv., to lay further emphasis on Paul's spiritual crisis. In each section of our present discussion its central significance becomes more and more clear. But we must not minimise the fact that Paul entered a society in which a theology had begun to take shape. When we recognise that that society was guided by original disciples of Jesus, it is plain that he could not afford to ignore interpretations of facts and experiences which were regarded by the large majority of Christians as authoritative. Keeping all these factors before us in their right proportions, we ought to be able to outline the fundamental positions of Paufinism. 120 THE THEOLOGY OE THE EPISTLES [pt. l In taking as our starting-point Paul's famous descrip- tion of his Christian status, we would endeavour to adhere to the genetic method which was vindicated in the opening chapter. We are least likely to err if we begin with that stratum in his reUgion in which Paul himself always finds his surest standing-ground, the immediate and unassailable reality of his personal relation to Christ. What, then, is the content of the phrase, ' in Christ,' which Paul loves to use when he desires to represent the profoUndest aspect of his rehgious life ? We must not lay too much stress on the form of the expression, and yet we must not attempt to explain it away. The impression made upon Paul by the revelation of the living Lord was an impression of boundless love and grace. It is probable that in his pre-Christian days he had heard of Jesus' self-sacrificing devotion to the needy and the outcasts. But his personal experience was decisive. And when he found the clue to Christ's char- acter and mission in the voluntary humihation of the cross, the sense of a love inestimable by human standards over- powered him. H6 was swept away in its current. This infinite love claimed him. And he yielded himself up to Christ as His AviUing slave. Henceforward his connection with Christ was the primary element in his rehgious life : ' What things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ : indeed I count anything as loss compared to the supreme value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have lost everything (I count it all the veriest refuse) in order to gain Christ.' ^ The consequence of ' gaining ' or ' knowing ' Christ he describes as being ' in Christ.' As the result of a searching investigation of the phrase, Deissmann ^ reaches the following conclusion : ' The formula iv Xptcrrcji constructed ... by Paul char- acterises the relation of the Christian to Jesus Christ as an existence in the pneumatic Christ to be conceived locally. This thought, for which there is no analogy in any relation of man to man, we may clarify by means of the > Phil. iii. 7-8 (chiefly M.). * Die neutestamentliche Formel ' in Chriato Jemi^ pp. 97, 98. CH. VI.1 FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 121 analogy of the notion underlying the phrases tV Trftvij xtl and Iv Tu! 0€ Gal. ii. 20. 122 THE THEOLOGY 01 THE EPISTLES [pt. i above : ' I have been crucified with Christ, so it is no longer I that live, but Christ hves in me : and the life which I now Hve in the flesh, I live by faith, faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.' ^ The same intimacy of relationship is expressed, almost incidentally, in 1 Cor. vi. 17 : 'He who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit [with him].' In Rom. vi. 5 he asserts that ' if we have grown into him [Christ] by a death Uke his, we shall grow into him by a resurrection like his.' ^ How much does this involve ? Does it mean that the fundamental element in Paul was a mystic absorption in Christ ? It has become fashionable to emphasise the mysticism of Paul. And if by ' mysticism ' we mean that contact between the human and the Divine which forms the core of the deepest religious experience, but which can only be felt as an immediate intuition of the highest reality and cannot be described in the language of psychology, the emphasis is thoroughly justified.^ Over and over again Paul bears witness to this unfathomable intimacy between himself and the exalted Christ and all that it means for his personal life, although he nowhere rttempts to analyse its significance. Thus, in Phil. iv. 13 he makes the triumphant confession : ' I can do all things in him that strengthens me.' And the same type of experience hes behind the uplifting assurance that came to him from Christ : ' My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is perfected in weakness.' * Even more. We may frankly admit that some of those visions to which he refers might be called mystical in a strict sense, notably his ' rapture ' to the third heaven, narrated with such emotion in 2 Cor. xii. But, as J. Weiss pointedly remarks, the fact that he mentions them in detail shows that they cannot have been frequent occurrences.* Indeed there is no trace of the characteristically mystical idea of absorption in God or in Christ. Even in the famous passage quoted above, in which his language suggests that his own individu- > Gal. ii. 20. » M. ' ' Up to a certain point all Christiana are mystics ' (Bigg, Epp. of St, Pettsr and St. Jude, p. viii). * 2 Cor. xii. 3. Dan Vrchrisientum, p. 397. CH. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 123 ality has been replaced by that of Christ, he guards against any interpretation which might be termed mystical in the technical sense by proceeding to describe his life as strictly personal, a life of faith in the Son of God. Here we touch the very foundation of Paul's reHgious experience. The appeal of the love and grace of Christ, of which he became conscious at his conversion, penetrated to his inmost being. It set in motion all the activities of his soul. And this response, which carried his whole nature with it, he calls Faith. We have already seen how much faith includes for Paul : how it takes into account the historical basis of the Gospel in the incarnation, death, and resurrection of Jesus : how it interprets these in the Hght of the revelation made to him as an individual : how it is woven of love and adoration and trust and obedience. The relationship of faith does not imply for Paul the dis- solving of the separate personalities involved, and the blending of them in one. Although he can speak of being ' in Christ,' yet he looks forward to being ' with Christ.' * Faith remains throughout the link which binds the 'bond-servant' ('^oPAos) to his 'Lord' (Kupto ). The union is one of dependence, not absorption. But that does not derogate from its reaUty and power. Rather does it prevent the relation from becoming mere contemplative ecstasy. It is the channel by which Divine resources are imparted. And the supreme Divine gift which is bestowed on faith is that of the Spirit.^ But in this connection the Spirit is scarcely distin- guishable from Christ Himself. Paul's statement in Rom. viii. 9, 10 reveals his point of view : ' You are not in the flesh but in the Spirit if the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if any one have not the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to him. But if Cbrist be in you, the body indeed is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteous- ness.' Here Christ and the Spirit are virtually synonymous. Probably we should be most true to Paul's standpoint in saying that he regards Christ as operating in the inner life 1 PhiJ. i. 23. ' E.g. Gal. iii. ?. 124 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [pt. 1. of the Christian through the Spirit .^ From this activity of the exalted Lord are derived all the highest blessings of the Christian life. These we must examine in a later paragraph. Meanwhile it ought to be noted that this supremely intimate relation of union with Christ con- stitutes for Paul the pre-supposition of everything that counts in salvation. Without anticipating our subsequent discussion of such central Pauline ideas as justification, death to sin, and the final redemption, we must briefly notice the bearing upon them of the present conception. While in his more theoretical and controversial statements Paul follows an ' order of salvation ' which imphes successive stages, as a matter of practical experience their common basis is found in union with Christ. That is the apostle's religious starting-point. His doctrinal constructions are interpretations of it. When he speaks of God justifying a man because of his faith, receiving him into a new relation, the relation of a chUd to his Father, his language seems at times unduly to objectify the process, to keep it apart from the experience of the individual. But for Paul the very existence of faith means that the subject of it is ' in Christ.' Hence, all God's dealings with the individual stand on that footing. To quote the apostle himself, God's grace is ' bestowed on us in the Beloved.' ^ That is to say, God comes into touch with men in virtue of their relation to Christ, So too with the nature of the new Ufe. Paul has formulated, as we shall discover in the next section, something of a theory regarding the ' death ' of ' J. Weiss {op. cit., p. 356, note 3) saggestively illustrates Paul's usage from Philo's doctrine of the ' powers * of God which penetrate into the world and uian. He quotes from Zeller's exposition {Phil. d. Oriechen iii. 2, p. 3BS) : ' In his doctrine of the Powers, two ideas cross, the religious conception of personal mediating beings, and the philosophical of iihper- Bonal : he unites both, without observing their contradiction : indeed he cannot possibly observe it, because otherwise the r61e of mediators, the double nature of the Divine Powers, would at once be lost, by means of which on the one hand they must be identical with God, so that it might be possible for a finite being by means of them to partake of Deity, while on the other they must be separate from Him, in order that Deity, in spite of this participation, should remain apart from any contact with the world.' > Epb. i. 6 (M.). CH. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 125 the believer to sin. That theory is implicated in his con- ceptions of the Flesh and the Law. But when you get behind his logic, you reach the crucial fact that the man who is in intimate connection with Christ, from the nature of the case feels the utter incongruity of sin, and must break with it if that connection is to endure. In union with Christ he takes Christ's attitude towards sin and Christ's attitude towards holiness. Contact with Christ can mean nothing else than new Ufe. ' If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature : the old things have passed away : new things have come into being.' ^ Plainly, this relation to Christ is also the guarantee of a completed salvation. To have a part in it is to share in His whole experience : to die with Him, to rise with Him, to be changed into His likeness as exalted, that condition which Paul calls ' glory.' ' You died, and your life has been hid with Christ in God : when Christ, our life, shall be revealed, then you also shall be revealed with him in glory.' ^ The pledge of final redemption, that redemption of the whole personaUty on which Paul laid so much emphasis, is often identified with the gift of the Spirit.' But this only con- firms the fact already indicated, that Paul regards this vital union of the believer with Christ as mediated by the Spirit, through whom God meets faith. (&) The Crucified Redeemer It may be truly said that when Paul speaks of the death of Christ, the resurrection stands in the background of his mind. He invariably interprets the cross in the light of the resurrection. This follows the order of his rehgious experience. It was the risen Christ he came to know in the spiritual crisis of his career. And this knowledge, which is far deeper and larger than a mere intellectual process, remains the foundation of his victorious Christian Ufe. It is the condition of that central relationship which is 1 2 Cor. V. 17. = Col. iii. 3, 4. » E.g. 2 Cor. v. 5, i. 22 ; Eph. i. 13, 14. 126 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. expressed by the phrase, ' union with Christ.' But the living Lord to whom he cUngs with all the might of his unfaltering faith has passed through death, the degrading death of the cross. There can be httle doubt that Paul recalls a personal impression when he describes Christ crucified as a ' cause of stumbling ' (a-KavSakov) to the Jews.^ Even when the accounts of Jesus which reached him in his persecuting zeal disclosed features so rare as to prompt to caution in his project, the conception of a crucified Messiah closed his mind, and hardened his resolve to extirpate such blasphemy. And now he had discovered in this degraded impostor ' life-giving Spirit.' The Christ whom he knew as the source of inward power, the Christ who had convinced him of the boundless love of God, had met and conquered death. His crowning vision of Christ was a vision of love. Love was the clue to His words and deeds. Such was the tradition of those who had companied with Him. But Paul had no need of evidence at second- hand. The love of Christ had been demonstrated to him immediately. Tradition merely confirmed his experience. Must not Christ's death also be illumined by love ? Must it not serve some generous purpose ? When questions like these emerged, it is plain that the death of Christ would become the subject of Paul's profoundest reflection. He was compelled to start with certain assumptions, assumptions about which he never argued. Christ was the sinless Son of Grod. Paul shared that position with the whole early Church. Yet Christ had suffered death. Now, for Paul as a Jewish thinker death was the penalty of sin. ' The wages of sin,' he declares, ' is death ' : ^ ' through sin came death.' * Here he stood in line with the great prophetic tradition : ' the soul that sinneth it shall die.' * The tradition was handed on in the Rabbinic schools. ' Satan and Yezer (the Evil Impulse) and the Angel of Death,' said R. Simon b. Lakish, ' are one.' * ' See, my » 1 Cor. i. 23; cf. Gal. v. 11. • Rom. vi. 23. » Rom. v. 12. * Ezek. xvlii. i. ' Baba Bathra, 16a (qu. by Schechter, Some AapecU of Rabbinic Theology, p. Hi). CH. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OP PAULINISM 121 children,' said R. Chaninah b. Dosa to his disciples, ' it is sin that kills.' ^ There is little doubt that when Paul speaks of death, he regards it synthetically, not distin- guishing, as we are wont to do, between its physical and spiritual aspects, but ^dewing the experience in its entirety as involving primarily separation from God. That Jesus Christ, being what He was, should die, was to his mind a perplexing problem. But the perplexity was intensified as he reflected on the nature of Christ's death. It was death by crucifixion. The degradation of such a doom was uhiversally acknowledged. ' May the very name of a cross be far removed not only from the bodies of Roman citizens, but even from their thoughts, their sight, their hearing.' ^ In the Pentateuch it was singled out for special execration : ' Cursed by God is every one who is hanged on a tree.' ' Paul leaves out the words ' by God ' when he associates the passage with the death of Christ, but his quotation of it in Gal. iii. 13 shows its importance for his thought. This particular death Ues imder the curse of the Law. And Paul caimot tear his mind away from the significance of such a ban. ' He humbled himself, becoming obedient as far as death, and that the death of the cross.' * What could this unspeakable shame mean for the Messiah of God, the ' Lord of glory ' ? Christ could not lie under any DiAdne curse. The thought was blasphemy. And yet, as Paul was convinced, Christ had given Himself willingly to the cross. We have already tried to estimate the interpretations of the death of Christ which Paul must have found in the Christian community when he entered it. Although the data are meagre, it is plain that two main traditions were being emphasised. On the one hand, the crucifixion was no mere accident, but an integral part of the Divine pur- pose. On the other, it was felt that the whole experience was illuminated by the mysterious hints and suggestions • Berachoth, 33a (qu. by Schechter, op. cit., p. 247). ' Cic. pro C. Babirio, v. 10. » Deut. sxi. 23 (LXX). ♦ Phil. ii. & J28 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [rr. I. of such Old Testament passages as Isaiah hii. There, unquestionably, the ' Servant of Jahweh ' was represented as bearing the burden of sins not His own, as giving Himself for a sin-offering. Hence the idea of propitiation, which in post-exihc Judaism received an extraordinary promin- ence in the sacrificial system, was sure to attach itself to reflection on the death of Christ. It is also noteworthy that in 4 Maccabees (xvii. 22, vi. 29), a Jewish document which probably belongs to the first half of the first century A.D., the conception that righteous men atone for sinners is clearly set forth. We have seen that the language which Paul often uses in connection with the death of Christ reflects the terminology of Isaiah lui. And the fact that Jesus' own mind, when He spoke of the significance of His mission, reveals the influence of these Old Testament ideas, must have powerfully affected the drift of Paul's thought. It is probably accurate to say that Paul has no fully elaborated theory of the significance of the death of Christ, but we can discern the outlines of certain attempted constructions. These have their starting-point in prin- ciples belonging to the religious heritage of his race, modified by his personal experience and interpreted in the light of his communion with the risen Lord. We might expect that one who had found his sorest bondage in the tyranny of the Law and who regarded its claims, which he could not satisfy, as aggravating sin and provoking resentment against GfOd, would bring the death of Christ into some connection with his dehverance. This he does from two divergent but related standpoints. First of all, he regards men as confronted by the Law as an imperious, almost personified power, which issues its commands and punishes disobedience. Now men were unable to render a complete obedience, they were unable to achieve righteous- ness. But for the Law it was all or nothing. Those who failed came under its curse.* Here is one ray of light for him on the mystery of the cross. Here is an explanation of the curse which Christ voluntarily bore. ' Christ « Gal. iu. 10. CH. v^.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 129 redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become accursed on our behalf.' ^ He had never been guilty of disobedience. But in accordance with the will of the Father He suffered for men the penalty of the broken Law : it exhausted its claim in the vicarious Redeemer. For it was a recognised principle that ' he who has died is absolved from sin.' ^ Those, therefore, who are united to Him by faith are for ever released from its obUgations. They have no longer to torment themselves with a fruitless struggle. Christ is ' the end of the law with a view to righteousness to every believer.' ^ ' Him who knew not siu he (God) made sin on our behalf (i.e. dealt with as a sinner: appoiated for him the cross) that we might become the righteousness of Grod in him.' * They are accepted in Christ.^ In Him a right relation to Gfod becomes once for all possible. More or less closely linked with this is another inter- pretation on which he lays emphasis. In Rom. viii. 3 he refers the ineffectiveness of the Law in procuring right- eousness to the resistance of the flesh. The ' flesh,' as we have seen, is Paul's description of human nature as it is known in actual experience, i.e. as defiled by sin. Sin, like the Law, is represented almost as a personal Power. It wars against the higher aspirations of the soul and pre- vents obedience to the righteous wiU of God. Therefore, if sin is to be vanquished, the flesh must somehow be robbed of its vitality. Now Christ, in becoming incarnate, entered itito the common life of humanity, conceived by Paid as the living organism of ' sinful flesh,' * in order to redeem it. His death was a judgment upon the flesh, i.e. upon siaful human nature with which He had identified Himself, and which He represented as the Second Adam.'' Those who become one with Him through faith are included in that judgment. But in the. death which was sin's condemnation He passed out of all relation to sin.* The resurrection was the triumphant proof that He had got ' Gal. iii. 13. ' Rom. vi. 7. ' Rom. X. 4. * 2 Cor. v. 21. • Eph. i. 6. ' Rom. viii. 3. ' 1 Cor. XV. 22, 45; Rom. v. 12-19. » Rom. vi. 10. I 130 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. beyond the reach of its dominion. So all who have been united with Him are sharers in His crucifixion and His resurrection.^ Their old nature was crucified along with Him. They now five in Him to God.^ This new life into which they have passed is the life of the Spirit.' These closely related interpretations of the death of Christ are perhaps the nearest approach on Paul's part to a theoretical construction. It is easy to see how the ideas of atonement and sacrifice may be found in them, although they are not definitely expressed. In the first instance, Christ is represented as giving Himself up willingly to endure that which men merited because of their dis- obedience. He atones for their sins. ' As through the disobedience of the one man [Adam] the many were constituted sinners, so also through the obedience of the one the many shall be constituted righteous.' * Through Him they receive reconciliation with Grod. In the second there are similar implications. Christ's voluntary death means the doom of sin, that sin which hindered men from entering upon the right relation to God. So He removes all barriers and enables them to come into fellowship with the Father through Himself. It is obvious, however, that there is no attempt to equate the sacrifice with any special rite of Jewish ceremonial. Even when in 1 Cor. v. 7 (M.) he says, ' Christ, our paschal lamb, was sacrificed,' the context shows that he is only using a metaphor. A similar general statement in Rom. ui. 24 f. suggests that we are not to ask in detail what constitutes the propitiation : ' Justified for nothing by his grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth in propitiatory power ^ by his blood {i.e. by his death) to be received by faith.' ' The clause which follows, ' in order to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, that he might be righteous himself, and accept as righteous him who believes in Jesus,' simply points out that the cross makes plain that ' Rom. vi. 6 ; Gal. ii. 19. " Rom. vi. 11. » Rom. viii. 10. ' Rom. v. 19. « 2 Cor. v. 18. • So Denney. ' Rom. iii. 24, 25. cii. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 131 God cannot trifle with sin, for there Christ submits to its doom, and that all who, in union with Him, assent to this judgment of God upon sia, are accepted in His sight as righteous. Paul makes no attempt to explain the precise bearing of the propitiation on God. Plainly, his treatment of the theme is many-sided. He seems to be feeling out for analogies (necessarily imperfect) by which he can express the discovery which has flashed upon his inmost soul, that the Divine heart suffers in and with and for the sin of the world. As Wemle has well said,^ ' Paul interpreted the atoning death from above, instead of from beneath.' In his view, God is the inspiring Power in it from beginning to end. Nothing is so true to his profoundest conception as the statement that ' God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself.' ^ For Paul's deepest experience there was no sense of a transaction between the Father and the Son. The Divine attitude of grace towards the sinful is paramount. It may be well at this point to illustrate in a few sentences the richness and breadth of Paul's interpretation of the death of Christ, gathering up part of the material which has already been used, (a) Often he simply emphasises the fact of Christ's love in dying : e.g. Gal. ii. 20, ' The Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me ' ; 2 Cor. V. 14, ' The love of Christ constrains us who have reached this conviction, one died for all.' (b) He also regards the cross as an overpowering exhibition of the love of God : e.g. Rom. v. 8, ' God proves his own love towards us, because while we were still sinners, Christ died for us ' ; viii. 32, ' He who spared not his own Son, but gave him up for us all, shall he not with him give us all else besides ? ' (c) The death of Christ is the great instrument of God's own reconciUation between men and Himself : e.g. Rom. V. 10, ' If, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son ' ; 2 Cor. v. 19 (quoted above). (d) On the cross Christ made atonement for sin : e.g. Rom. V. 6, ' While we were still weak, Christ died in due ' Anjange. p. 146. ' 2 Cor. v. 19. 132 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [pt. i. time for the ungodly ' ; Rom. iii. 24-26 (quoted above) (e) Christ's death is a redemption from evil : e.g. Gal. iii. 13, ' Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become accursed for us ' ; Eph. i. 7, 'In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our sins.' (/) Christ's death makes possible the destruction of the principle of sin in human nature : e.g. Rom. vi. 6, ' Know- ing this that our old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, so that we should no longer be in bondage to sin ' ; Rom. viti. 3, ' God, sending his own Son in the hkeness of sinful death and for sin, con- demned sin in the flesh.' (g) Christ's death is a willing sacrifice on His part : e.g. Eph. v. 2, ' As Christ also loved us, and gave himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God ' ; 1 Cor. v. 7, ' Christ, our paschal lamb, was sacrificed.' This classification is by no means exhaustive, yet it is sufficient to reveal the depths and heights which Paul had discovered in the Cross of Christ. It suggests that the apostle could never be content to confine the interpretation of so unfathomable an aspect of the self-manifestation of God to men within the frame-work of any single formula. Indeed, his discussion of what he calls the ' foUy ' of the cross (1 Cor. i. I8-ii. 5) as contrasted with the more intel- lectual or rationalising presentation of the Gospel which found favour at Corinth, and which he designates ' wisdom,' implies that he trusted to the direct appeal of Christ crucified to the restless, sin-burdened conscience. In any case, the ultimate clue to the meaning of the cross for Paul's mind is to be found in his own experience. When he exclaims, ' I have been crucified with Christ,' or when he declares, ' We were buried with him through our baptism into his death, that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we also should walk in newness of life,' ^ we do not require to look for an explanation of his figures in the mystery-cults of Attis or Osiris. He is using the great events of the Passion to set ' Bom. vi. 4. CH. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 133 forth the transformation of his own life which has been brought about through his union with Christ by faith. As Christ, in dying, realised to the full the Divine judgment on sin and never flinched from His loyalty to righteousness, so the Christian, identifying himself with Christ's attitude to sin, through the power of Christ in his soul vanquishes the evil bias of his nature. As Christ could not be holden of death, but, in virtue of the Spirit of holiness which was His life-principle, rose to glory, so the Christian, clinging to the risen Lord, is raised into the new atmosphere of glad obedience to the Divine will.^ Accordingly, Paul's large conception of the death of Christ is an endeavour, by means of inherited as well as freshly minted ideas, to expound the significance of his contact with a gracious, forgiving God in Jesus Christ. However theoretical certaia elements in it may appear, the heart of it is a profound and soul -satisfying vision of God. And so the word of the cross becomes on his Ups a call to repentance, faith, love, and obedience. (c) The New Relation to Ood — its Beginning, Development, and Issues For Paul, religion denoted fundamentally the right atti- tude to God. In his pre-Christian days he had taken for granted that the wiU of God for men was embodied in the legal code of Judaism. Hence men's sole obligation was to obey. But as they found that to be impossible, their religious outlook was hopeless. There was nothing more to be done. The supreme wonder of Paul's conver- sion-crisis was that there God took the initiative. That was his unassailable conviction. The God who met him in ' Paul regards the ritual of Baptism tis an impressive picture of the Christian's crucial experience. As, in Christ's name, he is plunged into the baptismal water, he passes out of contact with his old environment, he dies to his past. As he emerges out of the water, he enters into a new environment, which is the realm of the Spirit, or ' the kingdom of the Son of God's love ' (Col. i. 13). To associate magical notions with Paul's view of Baptism is to misconceive the whole manner of his approach to Christ. Wo shall discuss the topic in a later section. 134 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. Jesus Christ transferred him into a reahn of forgiveness and peace and hope. Of course he was conscious of this gracious transformation long before he attempted to analyse its significance. In any case it must be noted that the various descriptions he gives of it are regulated by the circumstances in which they are given and the purposes for which they are intended. We do not for a moment minimise the central importance which he assigns to the conception of Justification by Faith. But in this case, too, environment counts. It is not accidental that Justification is most prominent in those Epistles which directly reflect the burning controversy with Judaism regarding the validity of the Law into which Paul had to plunge for the defence of his missionary Gospel. And the very emergence of this controversy intensified the emphasis which he laid on the idea. J. Weiss may be right in asserting that the most com- prehensive description of salvation in Paul is Recon- ciUation.^ Both here and in Justification the crucial feature consists, as we have suggested above, in the initiative of God. That is a practical certainty for Paul, whatever be the terms in which he formulates it. And he exults in it as the antithesis of his old Pharisaic belief. Let us observe what this means. For Pharisaic Judaism the centre of gravity lay in the doctrine of Retribution at God's great day of reckoning. The history of apocalyptic thought shows how, along with the growth of individuahsm in rehgion, a growth plainly visible in Ezekiel, who has not unfairly been called ' the father of apocalyptic,' the idea of retribution became more and more prominent, until at length it might be regarded, in Bousset's phrase, as ' the shibboleth of the pious.' * Now originally this conception marked a deeper vmderstanding of the moral order. It was a reaction against the simple and super- ficial view current in Israel, that righteousness of conduct was rewarded by material prosperity, while ungodliness was visited with outward affliction and loss. But when Op. eit., p. 384. « Die Religion d. Judentuma,' p. 222. CH. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 135 in a time of sore calamity men could only appeal to the justice of Grod, the doctrine was apt to overshadow other elements in the Divine action which could not be ignored with impunity. For sensitive consciences the conception had a double edge. Soon it began to react on the idea of God with serious consequnnces. Judgment became the supreme function of the Almighty. And when the standard of judgment was a« elaborate code of precepts, it was no wonder that those who faced the facts shuddered with foreboding at the thought of the final verdict. For Paul, Reconciliation took the place of Retribution. On the basis of unassailable personal experience, he can describe his Gospel as ' the ministry of reconciliation.' * He can say of himself : ' I am an ambassador on Christ's behalf, God appealing by me, as it were, I entreat you, on Christ's behaK, to be reconciled to God.' * Through his contact with the risen Christ, his whole conception of the Divine attitude to men has been revolutionised. Gfod's disposition towards them is not cold, not even impartial. He yearns for men's love. Christ's sacrifice, which is God's sacrifice, is the convincing demonstration of it. So Paul's Gospel, which is really the formulation of his own discovery of God in Christ, pleads with men to accept the gift which He offers in His Son, to allow the Father to restore His erring children to His fellowship. The initial step in this wonderful redeeming process Paul calls ' being justified.' Its most startling expression is found in the phrase : ' He that justifies the ungodly.' ' It need scarcely be said that the idea of Justification has its background in the Old Testament. Typical instances are Isa. v. 23 : ' Woe unto them . . . which justify the wicked for a bribe ' ; * and Exod. xxiii. 7 : 'I will not justify the wicked.' * These passages reveal the forensic meaning of the term, ' to give a decision in favour of.' » 2 Cor. V. 18. » 2 Cor. v. 20. • Rom. iv. 5. • In the LXX (which Paul eeems always to use) : oial . . . ol Sixai- ovvTei rbv Aae^ij ^pexev Sdjptav. • The LXX here varies from the Massoretio text : oi SiKaulxreis Tin iaepij ^veKiP iiipiav. F omits Svckcv SJipav. 136 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [ft. i. That of course implies : ' to pronounce them not guilty.' When the final verdict of God upon individual lives was placed in the forefront of Jewish religious thought, the supreme problem for anxious souls came to be : ' Shall I be acquitted or condemned, declared righteous {SiKaimOrjvai) or ungodly, in the great day of reckoning ? ' The question had been a burning one for Paul, as for all earnest Pharisees. And now the man who had despaired of obtaining a favour- able verdict on the ground of achieving obedience to the law, who had concluded that sin was too strong for him, joyfully recognises that a new order has been unveiled. To quote his own words : ' Now we have a righteousness of God disclosed apart from law altogether : it is attested by the law and the prophets, but it is a righteousness of God which comes by beheving in Jesus Christ. And it is meant for all who have faith. No distinctions are drawn. All have sinned, all come short of the glory of God, but they are justified for nothing by his grace through the ransom provided by Christ Jesus.' ^ In this connection the . new attitude or relation to God is called ' righteousness.' That was the attainment aimed at in legal obedience. Now it comes or is brought about, not by laborious efforts, but by beheving in Jesus Christ. It is the gift of God to faith. We have seen what faith means for Paul : not the assent to certain truths, although that is included : not even primarily the beHef that God is and that He is the rewarder of those that dUigently seek Him,^ although that is for him a presupposition : but the trustful surrender of his whole being to Christ, as crucified and risen, and the complete identification of himself Adth Christ's attitude to God and to sin. Hence God's gracious judgment on a life grounded, as Paul represents it to be, on faith, is not arbitrary or unreal. It presupposes a very definite relation to Christ. And when the apostle speaks of ' justifying the ungodly,' he means that the sinner has, in dependence on Christ, turned his face in a new direction, and that Gtod in ' Rom. iii. 21-24 (M.). ' Heb. xi. 6. CH. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 137 His mercy deals with him as with one who has made a fresh start. Paul is too practical not to recognise that the progress of the new life may in many cases be slow. That accomits for his frequent exhortations to members of the Cihristian community to be on their guard against evil, e.g. Rom. vi. 13 : ' You must not let sin have your members for the service of vice, you must dedicate yourselves to God as men who have been brought from death to life.' ^ But he has such complete confidence in the faithfulness of God, whose purpose of love lies behind every changed career, that he cannot believe that a life in which the Divine Spirit has begun to work will ever be lost.* Justification, which can scarcely be distinguished from forgiveness, except that it emphasises the positive element in God's act of grace, places men on a new footing in relation to God. Peace and joy take possession of their souls. The love of God is shed abroad within them by the Holy Spirit.* This relationship, from which fear and shrinking are banished, Paul calls Adoption. The term sounds technical, but when its significance is examined we discover the very heart of Paul's religion. It is needless to look for its origin in the usage of mystery -cults. It is, as we have already seen, a transcript of his own experience. There is only a formal distinction between it and the ' birth from above ' of the Fourth Gospel. In the one case, emphasis is laid on admission into the family of God, in the other on the operation of the life of God. In both instances the result is the relation of a son or child to the Father. Here, obviously, Paul comes into direct line with the central teaching of Jesus. For Jesus the child is the emblem of simpHcity and artlessness. He loves and reverences and depends upon his Father. He trusts Him completely, and is sure that He will always do the best for him. These human ties are but dim reflections of those which link the soul to God. But Jesus' use of them indicates that in the child relationship He discerns the most life-like picture of > M. • B.g. Phil. i. 6. * Rom. V. 1, 6. 1^8 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [rr. i. that fellowship with God which is the true end for human personaUty. We have noticed La an earlier section how close is the affinity between Paul's position and that of Jesus in His classical exposition of Sonship, the Parable of the Lost Son. The profound utterance of the father may be recalled : ' Child, thou art always with me, and all that I have is thine.' ^ It might almost be felt that Paul's mind had been dweUing on these words, when he exclaims : ' All things are yours.' ^ Here is revealed an element which brings a sense of exultation to the spirit of the apostle, what he elsewhere calls ' the glorious liberty of the children of God.' This was the direct antithesis of his former rehgious con- dition. For that he could find no name but ' slavery.' It was all compact of fear and uncertainty and distrust and foreboding. In Christ he is master of circumstances — the world, life, death," things present and things to come. For now he is an heir of God.* This victorious condition Paul always associates with the gift of the Spirit. It gives their content to the prayers of the Christian. Sonship and freedom constitute the atmosphere which the Spirit creates. ' The sons of God are those who are guided by the Spirit of God. You have received no slavish spirit that would make you relapse into fear : you have received the spirit of sonship. And when we cry, Abba, Father, it is this Spirit testifying along with our own spirit that we are children of God.' * The keynote of this lite of sonship is heard in the term * glorying ' which Paul delights to use.® Its occurrence in Rom. ii. 17, 23 suggests that in the vocabulary of Judaism it expressed the satisfaction of the man who had made good his claim upon God by fulfiUing his legal obligations.* If that be so, its significance is all the richer in its new application. For Paul it has been stripped of every hint ' Liike XV. 31. 2 1 Cor. ui. 22. ' Bom. viii. 17. * Rom. viii. 14-16 (M.); of. Gal. iv. 6. ' KavxairOm : e.g. Rom. v. 2, 3, 1 1 ; Phil. iii. 3, ■ See J. Weisa on 1 Cor. i. 29. CH. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 139 of self-confidence. Rather does it now connote the most complete self-abnegation : ' God forbid that I should glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world.' ^ Everything that counts, everything that has enduring worth, is bound up with Christ. He is the sole standard of values. He kindles the heart with an exultation which the sharpest tribulations are powerless to quench.* Now this exultant mood of Paul's is constantly related to the future. Typical of his attitude is Rom. v. 2 : ' We exult in hope of the glory of God.' And so we are reminded that for him both Justification and Adoption are in a very real sense daring anticipations of God's final purpose. An illustration of his complete view of Justifica- tion is to be found in Gal. v. 5 : ' We by the Spirit, as the result of faith, eagerly expect the righteousness we hope for.' The statement is extraordinarily comprehensive. Christians possess the gift of the Spirit, which is the Divine response to faith. But this possession is not an end in itself. It is the basis of a splendid hope, that hope whose content is righteousness. And righteousness here means the perfected relationship to God which can never be annulled. That relationship is made final at the con- summation of the Kingdom when Christ shall appear. Adoption is viewed by Paul in the same perspective. It is of course a reality here and now. But it has by no means reached its final stage. This comes out clearly in Rom. viii. 23 : ' Even we ourselves who have the Spirit as a foretaste of the future, even we sigh to ourselves as we wait for the redemption of the body that means our full sonship.' ' Paul seldom refers to the stages by which beUevers are prepared for the consummation. Occasionally he reveals a sense of incompleteness which spurs him on to higher endeavour : ' Not that I have already attained this or am already perfect . . . my one thought is . . . to , press on tp the goal for the prize of God's high call in Christ » Gal. vi. 14. ' Bom. v. 3. " M. 140 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. Jesus.' 1 Once or twice he speaks of the actual process : ' Though my outward man decay, my inner man is renewed day by day ' ; ^ and more concretely : ' We all with un- veiled face (as contrasted with the veiled face of Moses in Old Testament story), reflecting the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same likeness from one glory to another — for this comes of the Lord the Spirit.' ' When it is remembered that glory in Paul's usage means the revealed nature of God, the Divine life as manifested, we can reaUse the grandeur of his conception of the existence which awaits the redeemed soul. We have seen how inevitable it was that Paul, steeped as he must have been in the eschatological tradition of Judaism, and participating in those ardent expiectations»of the coming aeon which the early Church associated with the teaching of Jesus, should keep his gaze fixed on the Parousia of Christ which is to usher in the final Messianic salvation. Li his earliest letter, he describes the Christian life of his converts at Thessalonica as ' serving a Hving and true God and waiting for the coming of his Son from heaven.' * In one written nearer the middle of his career he speaks of ' these days of waiting till our Lord Jesus Christ is revealed.' ^ And in that which marks the close of his activity he characterises his readers and himself as those who ' eagerly wait for the Saviour from heaven, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform the body of our humiliation (i.e. the earthly hfe) into the likeness of the body of his glory.' ^ It is, however, scarcely possible to trace in his writings any consistent scheme of eschatology. Thus, for example, he never discusses such questions as the fate of those who reject the Gospel of Christ,' or a possible intermediate state. And although the idea of the final Judgment appears frequently, it is difficult to determine his view of its precise relation to the other events of the End. Besides the Parousia, to which reference has » Phil. iii. 12-14 (M.). » 2 Cor. iv. 16. • 2 Cor. iii. 18 (partly M.). • 1 Thesa. 1. 10. ' 1 Cor. i. 7 (M.). • Phil. iii. 20. ' These he rtesignates ' the perishing ' : e.g. 2 Cor. iv. 3 ; 1 Cor. 1. 18. CH. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 141 been made, Paul lays special emphasis on the resurrection, and this becomes more prominent as his expectation of surviving untU the Parousia grows more uncertain. Naturally the picture which he has formed owes much to his conception of the resurrection of Christ. It will mean a transformation of being with a view to entrance into a new order, as it meant for Christ.^ Such a transformation he also anticipates for those who are still ahve when Christ returns.^ He gives various hints of the process for which he so eagerly longs. It is an exchanging of that earthly body of flesh which he feels so burdensome and which ' cannot inherit the kingdom of God,' * for a spiritual ' organism,' prepared by the Divine power, and destined to be a fit instrument for the perfected spirit.* He can describe it as ' the image of the heavenly,' which is equivalent to the likeness of the exalted Christ. This he names in the passage already quoted from Philippians, ' the body (or organism) of his glory.' That is to say, be- lievers are to share in the exalted life of the Lord Himself. Thus we are brought back to the significance for Paul of the Parousia. Now in so far as he is true to the escha- tological tradition of Judaism, this represents to him the complete triumph of God, the consummation of the Divine kingdom. And occasionally that aspect is placed in the forefront.* But in contrast with the usual tendency of Jewish apocalyptic he is as a rule far more concerned with the destiny of individual behevers than with the reahsed victory of God as such. In the great epoch of Christ's appearing, death is to be swallowed up by life,* and this will be the victory of those who are united to him. Hence the condition of blessedness which the Parousia inaugurates is specially designated ' life ' or ' eternal life.' ' It is the disclosure of a high potentiaHty already present. ' You died,' he says, ' and your hfe has been hid with 1 PhU. iii. 20. ' 1 Oor. xv. 61-53. » 2 Cor. V. 1, 2, 4 ; 1 Cor. xv. 60. * 2 Cor. V. 1 ; 1 Cor. sv. 44-46. ' See especially 1 Cor. xv. 24-28. • 1 Cor. XV. 54, 55. ' Occasionally ' salvation.' 142 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. Christ in God. When Christ shall be manifested, who is our life, then you also will be manifested with him in glory.' 1 ' Glory ' constitutes the loftiest description of the perfected existence, the final issue of the new attitude to God. (d) The Activities of the Christian There could scarcely be a greater misconception than to suppose that Paul's mind was so completely engrossed in contemplating and interpreting the mysteries of the faith as to ignore the practical sphere of ethical obligation. The sequence of Rom. vi. on Rom. v. is true to his essential standpoint. If God's gracious response to men's faith is the establishing of a new relationship of love and freedom, that relationship must express itself in an obedience to Him which is moral. Such utterances as Rom. xii. 1 show clearly his general position : ' I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, consecrated and well pleasing to God.' This use of all one's powers in the Divine service is the highest privilege of the new life. Those who are sons of God are no longer at the mercy of the ' flesh,' i.e. the lawless desires and self-will which characterise human nature apart from the Divine influence. They are led by the Spirit. But the Spirit is not now regarded merely as the source of abnormal manifestations, as in the earliest days of the Christian community. We have seen in a former section how Paul corrected that prevalent view, restraining the spiritual energy which found its chief outlet in such phenomena as ' speaking with tongues,' and urging upon his converts that real spiritual power should take effect in ethical activity. ' The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness of heart, faithfulness, meekness, self-control.' ^ An atmosphere of inward har- mony is established which prompts to generous service. It is noteworthy that love stands first in the series of ' Col. iii. 3, 4. ' Gal. v. 22. CH. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OP PAULINISM 143 spiritual qualities enumerated by Paul in Galatians. That this is no accident may be inferred from various impor- tant passages, of which the most remarkable is 1 Cor. xiii. There, after a delicate and penetrating analysis of love, he sums up in the famous words : ' As it is, there abide faith, hope, love, these three : but the greatest of these is love.' When we remember that for Paul faith is the foundation of his fellowship with Christ, and that the hope of final redemp- tion at the Parousia is to him the very breath of life, we can scarcely over-estimate the significance of the primacy which he assigns to love. The cardinal importance of love arises for him out of the depths of his religious experi- ence. It has already been pointed out that Paul's con- version-crisis meant the discovery of a love at the heart of things which almost exceeded comprehension. He calls it ' the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.' And his immediate answer to it was a whole-hearted loyalty and devotion. But he realised at once that this affection could be no mere inward rapture. It must go out to others as the love of Christ had gone out to him. And the more closely he became acquainted with the tradition of the life and teaching of Jesus, the more clearly did he discover that boundless love had been the keynote of all His earthly activities. In this, pre-eminently, those who had seen Him had seen the Father. Accordingly we recognise that for Paul, as for his Master, there is no severance between reUgious and moral values. The activity of love, like all the ethical activities, is the iudex of a definite relation to God. The great statement of 1 John iv. 19 is strictly true to Paul's conviction : ' We love because he first loved us.' Here is a new and enduring basis of moral action. As Weinel has aptly described the situation, ' " Thou shalt " no longer rules the individual, but " I will." ' * The quaUty of conduct is fundamentally altered. From the purified motive in which selfish ends are forgotten springs a spontaneity of action which enhances and ennobles life. It need scarcely be observed that this is the direct converse ' Paulua, p. 105. 144 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. of legalism. No one had been better acquainted than Paul with the tormenting challenge of innumerable ordinances. His pre-Christian view of obligation had never got beyond these. But now, in Christ, all separate maxims — and the apostle has still to urge these on his converts — are absorbed in the high ideal which Jesus has promulgated. The new spirit is the decisive factor. That spirit is to determine the kind of activity for which every separate situation calls. The more completely the Christian suffers the Divine power to possess him, the more certainly will he be dehvered from morbid scruples regarding each separate moral decision he has to make. His enlightened judgment wiU enable him to strike the balance between freedom and self -limitation. Paul's discussion of this pro- cess in Rom. xiv.^ is a classical example of 'spiritual and ethical tact. And no better instance of his normative position could be found than Gal. v. 14 : ' The whole law is fulfilled in one sentence, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.' It is surely not a mere coincidence that this was the obligation which Jesus placed next to that of complete devotion to God. This recognition of Paul's supreme motive at once suggests that, like all healthy moral energy, his ethic will be largely social. And the range of the term ' social ' will be regulated by his circumstances and environment. Not that this latter influence must be exaggerated. For when Paul urges the members of the Christian community at Rome, ' Bless those that persecute you, bless and do not curse them,' ^ it is plain that he looks far beyond the circle of his brethren in Christ. And when he follows up such injunctions by bidding them to ' be in debt to no man except to love one another,' * we cannot doubt that his conception of ' neighbourship ' was derived from that of his Master and equally wide in its scope.* But due importance ought to be assigned to the situation in which he found himself. As an ardent missionary, he was absorbed in the ' Of. 1 Cor. viii. and ix. ' Rom. xii. 14. ' Rom. xiii. 8. • Luke x. 30-37. CH. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 145 work of spreading the Gospel over the Graeco -Roman world. No part of his labour was more pressing than that of guiding his converts into a lite worthy of the name they bore. Hence there is nothing abstract or theoretical in his moral teaching. It reaches down to the most elementary duties, the avoidance of theft, drunkenness, lying : and it ascends to the moral heights from which Jesus had beckoned, self-denial, love of enemies, forgiveness. Above all, the Christian community affords the best training in ethical discipline. Plainly the types of moral action with which Paul deals will depend upon the actual pro- blems that confront the immature Christian communi- ties. A primary question will be that of their relation to their pagan environment. Paul handles it with masterly sagacity. It came before him definitely in a request for advice from Corinth regarding sacrificial meat. Some members of the Church, taking full advantage of the Christian position that an idol is ' nothing,' ^ are able to treat the situation with indifference. It matters nothing to them that the meat they eat has been consecrated in a temple. ' The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof.' For others the old associations are decisive. It is a violation of conscience to partake of such food.^ Which attitude is to be regulative ? ' All things are allowed,' says the apostle, ' but not all things are expedient. All things are allowed, but not all things edify.' ^ Hence, ' it is a good thing neither to eat flesh nor to drink wine, nor anything that your brother feels to be a stumbling- block.' For Paul the criterion of love among the brethren is normative.* A further point of discussion was the relation of the sexes. Naturally Paul used no uncertain language re- garding all breaches of personal purity, a subject on which gross laxness prevailed in heathen society. Nor does he shrink from taking the highest ground : ' Do you not know that your bodies are members (Uterally, limbs) of Christ ? • 1 Cor. viii. i. 'I Cor. viii. 7. » 1 Cor, X. 23, * Bom. xiv. 21. 146 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them the members of a harlot ? God forbid.' * It is from the same lofty platform that he estimates the position of woman. In this matter he has been seriously misunderstood. His injunction that women should keep silence in the pubhc services of the Church ^ has been seized upon as an indica- tion of his contempt for the sex. In reality the advice is given lest Christian women should incur the suspicion of a forwardness which offended the sensibility of the ancient world.' Paul's position is clearly discernible in Gal. iii. 28 : ' There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or freeman, there is no longer male or female : you are aU one in Christ Jesus.' This passage also goes to the root of the apostle's attitude towards slavery. But there happens to be extant an application to a particular case of the principle here laid down. Onesimus, the slave of Philemon, a Christian belonging to the community at Colossae, had run away from his master. He drifted to Rome, and there under PauPs influence became a convert to Christianity.* The apostle had the delicate duty of sending him back to his master : and in the singularly beautiful note which he gives him to hand to Philemon he reveals his own standpoint. 'Perhaps this was why you and he were parted for a while, that you might get him back for good, no longer a mere slave, but something more than a slave, a beloved brother : especially dear to me, but how much more to you as a man and as a Christian.'* If a slave can be treated as ' a beloved brother,' his social position has lost its bitterness. If Paul's principle of the oneness of Christians in Christ be adopted, slavery as an institution is doomed. He made, indeed, no attempt to interfere in any formal way with the existing social order. He goes so far as to advise slaves not to be troubled by their condition. ' Of course, if you do find it possible to get ' 1 Cor. vi. 16. ' 1 Cor. xiv. 34. • Some scholars regard verses 33&-3S as a later interpolation. Verses 34-35 are placed by most Western authorities after verse 40. Certainly the words seem to contradict 1 Cor. xi. 5. See J. Weiss ad. loc. * Philem. 10. ' Philem. 15, 16 (M.). HI. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 147 free, you had better avail yourself of the opportunity. But a slave who is called to be in the Lord is a freedman of the Lord.' ^ As the context of this passage shows, the consideration which weighs with him is the imminence of the Parousia.^ When Paul deals with the relation of the Christian to the State, it is from the standpoint of the practical missionary. He lived in the epoch of the Pax Romana. Nowhere was the boon of a carefuUy organised yet non- despotic government more highly prized than in the ProTdnces which were the scene of Paul's evangelistic work. It is not, therefore, surprising that he preserves an attitude of respect towards the Imperial rule. Here, as in his whole estimate of society, he is guided by the principle which he lays down in Horn. xii. 18 : ' If it be possible, so far as that rests with you, hve peaceably with all men.' But he directly enjoins submission to the State, on the ground that it has been divinely ordained to rule righteously and put down evil.* Christians are to dis- charge their duties to the State as genuinely moral obUgations. It has often been observed that at various points of his ethical outlook Paul reveals affinities with the popularised philosophy of his time. But from beginning to end it is plain how that outlook was determined by religious motives. (c) The Body and the Members of Christ We have found that Paul's ethical teaching is pre- dominantly social. From the nature of the case the society which chiefly absorbs his attention is the Church, the community of Christians. His conception of the Church is most clearly reaUsed by means of his favourite metaphor, the Body of Christ.* The previous course of discussion has shown that for Paul the fundamental aspect ' 1 Cor. vii. 21, 22 (M.). • Ibid., veraes 26, 29, 31. ' Rom. xiii. 1-7. ' See especially 1 Cor. xii. ; Eph. iv. 1-16. 148 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. of Christianity is the union of the beUever to Christ. That union is constituted by the Spirit, who mediates the life of Christ in response to the faith of the individual. An obvious inference from this process is the communion of Christians in Christ through the same Spirit. The one Spirit, as the real life-principle of the society, suggests the correlative idea of the one Body, the living organism which gives expression to the life of the Spirit. This is ideally the embodiment of the mind and will of Christ. Hence the Christian community is designated by Paul the Body of Christ, and those who belong to it His members. A typical expression of his view is found in Rom. xii. 4, 5 : ' As we have many members in one body, and all the members have not the same function, so we, though many, are one body in Christ, and severally members one of another.' ^ Let us examine the essential features of Paul's idea of the Church, as set forth in this most suggestive figure. (1) There is a singular lack of reference in the Epistles to external organisation. This certainly does not mean that Paul was negligent of order in the life of the Christian society. We have direct evidence of the emphasis which he laid upon it.^ But his was the period of charismatic functions in the Church.^ It is highly significant that when he ranks the offices in the Church, he places first apostles, secondly prophets, thirdly teachers.* Probably none of these represent permanent officials. They are all persons endowed with a special ' gift ' {xapLo-fia), which they readily place at the service of the Christian society. They are to be found where their work is most required. It may be that the terms ' helps ' and ' administrations,' which occur later in the same context, stand for the more concrete ' deacons ' (Uterally, ' servants ' : cf . Mark x. 45, which perhaps helped to estabUsh the usage) and ' over- seers ' (tTTio-KOffot), titles only found in Philippians,^ which is probably the latest of Paul's Epistles. The ' Cf. 1 Cor. xii. 12. » E.g. 1 Cor. xiv. 40. ' E.g. 1 Cor. xi;. 4-11. • 1 Cor. xii. 28. » Pliil. i, 1. CH. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULIXISM 149 existing data suggest that during the period of Paul's activity the organisation of the CJhurch was in a flexible condition. What primarily concerns the apostle is the spiritual vigour of the Body. (2) The health of the Body depends on the unity of the Spirit which pervades it. Paul constantly dwells on this idea ; e.g. Eph. iv. 3-6 : ' Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body, and one spirit, as you were called in one hope of your calling ; one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through aU, and in all.' The important point to be noted in all his utterances on this theme is the inwardness of the conception. It seems highly probable, as has been hinted, that there was as yet no such thing as uniformity of organisation. Paul's general view of the situation, in so far as it can be reconstructed from the available evidence, would lead us to suppose that he was prepared for large divergence in the methods of Christian service. For he delights to dwell on the mani- foldness of the gifts bestowed by the Spirit for the up- building of the Christian society. But he constantly keeps in the forefront the obhgation to unity of mind and heart in the separate Christian communities. ' I beseech you, brethren,' he writes to the Corinthians,^ ' by the name of the Lord Jesus Christ that you aU speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you ; but that you be perfectly knit together in the same mind and the same judgment.' This is simply the appHcation to a particular case of his great general principle : ' God has tempered the body together, with a special dignity for the inferior parts, so that there may be no disunion in the body, but that the various members should have a common concern for one another.' ^ That is to say, the supreme object of membership in the Body of Christ is mutual service and helpfulness. (3) But Paul's conception of the Body of Christ impUes that the Church is the special representative of her living ' 1 Cor. i, 10. « 1 Cor. xii. 24, 2S (M.). 150 THE THEOLOGY OE THE EPISTLES [vt. i. Lord upon earth. Christ is frequently described as the ' Head ' of the Body,^ and of course that is always pre- supposed. The head requires the body. The brain controls the limbs. The will demands an instrument to carry out its purposes. Here is outHned the daring idea that the Church is the direct manifestation of the life of Christ to hiunanity, the supreme witness to the Divine intention for the universe. On the other hand, contact with the Head ensures that the Body shall attain its full development, growing up completely into Him.* A special aspect of the Divine purpose for mankind, which Hes close to the apostle's heart, is that on which he may be said to have staked all his activity — ^the fellow- ship of Gfentiles with Jews in the common salvation of Jesus Christ. The proclamation of this great discovery he regards as his peculiar function : ' The Divine secret was disclosed to me by a revelation . . . namely, that in Christ Jesus the Gentiles are co-heirs, companions, and co- partners in the promise.' ^ In this union of those who had been aliens with the members of the historic community of Israel ' in one body through the cross,' Paul recognises the disclosure of ' the full sweep of the Divine wisdom.' * The unity of the members of the Body of Christ in Him their Head receives solemn expression in the sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper. It is absurd to say that ' Paul created the sacramental conception.' * He found these rites in the Christian community when he entered it. And there is no evidence to show that he enhanced their importance. It is significant that in so careful and syste- matic a delineation of his religious behefs as the Epistle to the Romans there is no reference to the Lord's Supper.' ' £.?. Col. i. 18, ii. 19 ; Eph. i. 22. « Col. ii. 19 ; Eph. iv. 12-16. ' Eph. iii. 3, 6 (M.) ; similarly Col. i. 25-27. « Eph. iii. 10 (M.). ' So Wemle, Anfange, p. 166. • There is no force in the position taken by Professor Lake in his Earlier Epiatlea of St. Paul, p. 384, and elsewhere, that Paul did not need to refer to beliefs which were * common ground to him and all other Christians.* As a matter of fact he does invariably recur to such beliefs, as, t,g,, that in the Holy Spirit. CH. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 151 And in 1 Cor. i. 17 he distinctly subordinates Baptism to the preaching of the Gospel. Still, like his fellow-Christians throughout the Church, he regarded these rites as of real value for the quickening of faith. No statement in the Epistles suggests that he looked on Baptism as the originat- ing cause of faith. Indeed the baptismal formula, ' into the name of Christ,' takes for granted that the candidate had come already into a definite relation with Christ — that he had formed a definite estimate of the ' name ' by which he was called.^ Even the utterance of Gal. iii. 27 : ' All of you who had yourselves baptized into Christ have put on Christ,' in no way conflicts with the clear teaching of the entire Epistle that faith is primary. For the whole context shows that in this passage faith is the presupposition of Baptism.^ Baptism marks the definite entrance of the convert into the Christian community. As such it was an event of epoch-making importance in his history. It was of course a symbol, and as such Paul uses it to set forth his profound conception of dying and being buried with Christ in relation to the old sinful life, and rising with him to the new life of righteousness.' But Baptism is more than a symbol. As ia this impressive rite the convert takes the decisive step of turning his back on his old spiritual environment, and making himself over to the lordship and obedience of Christ, his faith is powerfully intensified : he receives a fresh inspiration : the solemn ritual becomes to him a real pledge of the unfailing grace of God. It is not otherwise with the Lord's Supper. Paul nowhere imphes that fellowship with Christ is inaugurated by the Eucharist. He dehberately states his view of its signific- ance in I Cor. xi. 26 : ' As often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you represent (KarayyeXAcTc) the Lord's death till he come.' To quote a statement which the • See Sokolowski, Oeiat u. Leben bei Pauius, p. 270. • See verses 23, 24, 25, 26 ; so also in Col. it. 12. • Bom. vi. 3, i. It is worth noting that in the most remarkable descrip- tion of this experience (Gal. ii. 19, 20) there is no mention of Baptism. It is, therefore, quite irrelevant to say that for Paul the experience ii ooiitlitioned by Baptism. 152 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [ft. i. present writer has made elsewhere,^ ' the bread and wine represent not the flesh and blood of Christ as such, but His human person as slain on the cross. Therefore com- munion with the body and blood of Christ means com- munion with the Lord as crucified, and aU that this involves. Hence we never find the apostle speaking of " eating the flesh " or " drinking the blood " of Christ. He is careful to associate the solemn actions only with the bread and the cup. It is thus apparent that the Lord's Supper sets forth visibly, for Paul, the supreme spiritual experience which he has described in Gal. ii. 19 : "I have been crucified with Christ." And as the apostle can never dissociate the Crucifixion from the Resurrection, the appropriation of the benefits of the death of Christ which is quickened by the sacred celebration will carry with it a like appropriation of the resources of the risen Lord.' Here, as in Baptism, to the beHeving consciousness the symbol becomes a sacrament, a convincing pledge of the mercy of God in Christ the crucified. But Paul does not, any more than in Baptism, ascribe to the actions a magical effect. The spiritual benefit is the Divine response which is never denied to adoring faith. It may be noted, finally, that the common meal is the most impressive exhibition of the unity of the Body of Christ. Paul is keenly alive to this when he declares : ' Many as we are, we are one bread, one body, since we all partake of the one bread.' * (/) The Cosmic Relations of Christ Starting from his own experience, Paul was convinced that the most momentous event in the history of the in- dividual was his redemption from sin and from the sway of that hierarchy of evil forces to which he regarded the present world-order as subject. Only by this means could humanity attain the destiny appointed for it in the wisdom and loving-kindness of God. Now the sole medium of the > St. Paul and the Mystery-Religions, p. 270. • 1 Cor. x. 17 (M.). CH. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 153 redemptive process is Christ. He is the Last Adam, the Second Man,^ who, as life-giving Spirit, counteracts the principle of sin and death which had attained miiversal sway through the transgression of the First.* As such, He becomes the Founder of a new humanity.' Hence His incarnation, death, and resurrection are not mere incidents of a personal history. Their bearing is universal. For the establishing of right relations between the God who is over all and the creatures whom He has made for likeness to Himself is central in the world of being, which Paul of course conceives as a moral and spiritual order. It is an easy and natural step from this position to find in Christ the focus of the cosmic system, the constitutive principle of universal life. Paul's statements are remark- able. Already in 1 Cor. viii. 6 (M.) he speaks of ' one God, the Father, from whom all comes, and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom all exists and by whom we exist.' But the formulation of the idea is most clearly seen in the Captivity-Epistles, written from his Roman prison towards the close of his career. By this time his great controversies with Judaizers on behalf of the liberty of the Gospel have lost their intensity. Circum- stances have thwarted the extension of his own missionary labours. And although he is still in constant communica- tion with all parts of his mission-field, he has some leisure to reflect on the unfathomable significance of that Lord who is the end and aim of his activity, ' in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.' It is true that in the Epistle to the Colossians, in which especially these meditations find expression, he was confronting a definite situation in the Churches of the Lycus-vaUey, a challenge by the adherents of an obscure theosophy to the supremacy of Christ. But the whole tone of Colossians and Ephesians, not to speak of the unique passage on the incarnation in so thoroughly practical a letter asPhilippians, indicates clearly enough the regions in which his thought was moving. • 1 Cor. XV. 45, 47. » Rom. v. 12. » 1 Cor. xv. 22. 1^ THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [ft. t. The most important statement for our purpose is Col. i. 15-20, and it is worth noting that Paul links it on to a reminder of the redemption which his readers have attained though God's ' beloved Son,' because that is the real basis in his experience of the cosmic functions of Christ on which he proceeds to enlarge. ' He is the likeness of the unseen God,' says the apostle, ' bom first before all the creation — ^for it was by (better, ' in ') him that all things were created both in heaven and on earth, both the seen and the unseen, including thrones, angelic lords, celestial powers and rulers ; aU things have been created by him and for him ; he is prior to all, and all coheres in him.' Then after emphasising Christ's headship of His Body, the Church, in virtue of the pre-eminence He has reached as ' the first to be born from the dead,' Paul continues : ' It was in him that the Divine Puhiess willed to settle without, limit, and by him it willed to reconcile in his o'bti person aU on earth and in heaven ahke, in a peace made by the blood of his cross.' ^ Thus the paragraph ends as it began in the atmosphere of redemption. It is perhaps true to say that the far-reaching inferences which Paul has here made are already involved in his conception of Christ as the Son of God. But even if this be so, it does not alter the conclusion at which we have already hinted, that in Christ crucified, the Redeemer of men from an evil order of things and its conqueror,^ Paul is assured that he has come into touch with Ultimate Reality. Hence he feels justified in elaborating the im- plications which such a Reality involves : pre-existence, mediation of the Divine activity in creation, the sustaining principle of the universe, the goal of all being. All these things are imphed in the passage quoted above. But the fact that, after using an aorist tense to state the creation of all things by Christ, ' he lapses into perfects and presents, is a suggestive hint that he contemplates' Christ's pre- existence, ' through the medium, so to speak, of the ' (M.). Cf. Eph. i. 10, 22, 23. ^ Col. ii. 15. vn. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 155 exalted life . . . His function as Creator is proleptically conditioned by his achievement as Saviour.' ^ The description of Christ's cosmic significance reveals intimate affinities with tendencies of thought current in contemporary Hellenistic speculation. Even the language Paul uses in defining the relations of the created universe to Christ, more especially the prepositional phrases, ' by him,' ' through him,' ' for him,' ' in him,' find remarkable parallels alike in the hterature of Stoicism, and (through Stoic influence) in the regular vocabulary of the popularised philosophy of the day.^ It is natural, as an induction from the facts, to conclude that the apostle has here an apolo- getic aim in view : that of set purpose he desires to exhibit Christ as satisfying the presuppositions of a type of philo- sophy of religion which had become influential throughout the Roman Empire. For on every side speculation was busy with the conception of mediating influences between God and the world. The prominence of the Logos- hypostasis in the Stoics and in Philo, who mirrors the movements of his time, indicates the drift of Hellenistic metaphysics. And Paul's statement that ' all coheres in ' Christ reminds us of the common Stoic position that life and order in the universe depend on the world-soul, which is the constitutive principle in the system of created things. This world-soul received the names of Logos and Pneuma in Stoicism. The very term Paul employs in Col. i. 17 for 'coheres' (o-vi/eaTrjKtv) appears in precisely the same connection in contemporary Hterature : e.g. in the anony- mous Ilcpi Kocr/iov, 6 (which has many traces of Stoic influence) : ' All things are of God (ck eeoC), and through Grod (Sta GeoC) cohere (o-vrto-TijKtv) for us.' ' Of course the special occasion which prompted this remarkable formulation of Paul's inferences as to the cosmic functions of Christ was, as has been noted, the emergence in the Churches of the Lycus-valley of a hybrid ' H. R. Mackintosh, The Person of Jesus Christ, p. 70. • See E. Norden, Agnosias Theos, pp. 240-250. * Quoted by Norden, op. eit., p. 250. Other instances in J. Weiss, Das Urchristentum, p. 370, n. 1. 166 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [ft. i. blend of doctrines in which the worship of angek, ecstatic visions, and ascetic ordinances held an important place. In Paul's eyes the pecuhar peril was the attempt to reach Grod by another path than Christ. The propagandists were evidently emphasising the existence of a chain of mediating beings Unking the material to the spiritual. Through purifying mystery -ritual the soul could come into touch with these, and thus attain the Divine. Paul attacks the error by exalting Christ as the sole channel of • hfe and power between God and the universe, and in the process discloses the large horizons of his thought regarding the ontological significance of Him whom he had come to know as Redeemer and Lord. It is by no means improbable that here Paul, as at other points, touched Hellenistic speculations through a Jewish medium. In the Wisdom-literature of Judaism the con- ception of Wisdom had received a remarkable personi- fication, as, e.g., in Prov. viii. 22, 23, 29, 30 : ' The Lord possessed me in the beginning of his way before his works of old. I was set up from everlasting . . . When he appointed the foundations of the earth, then I was by him as a master-worker ' ; and Wisd. of Sol. ix. 2 : 'By means of thy wisdom thou didst create man.' It is difficult to draw any sharp distinction between this personification and the Spirit of God. ' She is a breath of the power of God,' says the author of Wisd. of Sol. (vii. 25 ff.), ' and a clear effluence of the glory of the Almighty . . . She is an effulgence (aTravy aufia) from everlasting light, and an unspotted mirror of the working of God, and an image (tlKiLv) of his goodness. And she, being one, hath power to do all things, and remaining in herself reneweth all things : and from generation to generation passing into holy souls she maketh men friends of God and prophets ' Paul would be familiar with this realm of thought, for it was influential in the Rabbinic schools. It is noteworthy that he designates Christ the 'image' (iiKw) of God, using the very term appUed to Wisdom in the passage just cited, Philo gives the same description CH. VI.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OF PAULINISM 157 of the Logos, an hypostasis with which Paul was probably acquainted. But Paul had also identified the exalted Lord with the Spirit.* Hence, when he endeavours to set forth the universal bearing of Christ, who had been for him not a metaphysical abstraction but a living, redeem- ing personaHty, it was natural that he should express his ideas by means of thought-forms and a terminoloigy which had already provided a meeting-point for Hellenistic and Jewish speculation. It may be observed incidentally that it was easy for a thinker of that age to pass from personified concepts to personality. The evidence of 1 Cor. viii. 6 suggests that, apart from the definite situation presupposed in Colossians, Paul's mind was occupied with the ultimate consequences of his profound conception of Christ. There are no clear data to estabhsh the position, often hastily affirmed by some modem scholars, that these consequences were involved in the apocalyptic idea of Messiah. We are on far surer ground in regarding them as inferences from what he had discovered Christ to be in his own experience and ia that of the Church, inferences which he clothed in language which would appeal to his readers, both Jewish and Gentile. Only it seems hazardous to attempt a detailed analysis of his statements. J. Weiss, e.g., commenting on the phrase ' in him were created all things ' (Col. i. 16), asserts that these words must be taken in their most Uteral sense. ' With his creation all was created : he contains the All in himself . . . This can only be understood if Christ is here identified with the Logos. Li Philo the Logos as compendium of all God's creative " ideas " con- tains the whole world " in idea," the " kosmos noetos." It is doubtful . . . whether Paul had recourse to this conception . . . Presumably he conceived of the process more materially : the pre-mundane Son of God, as " life- creating Spirit " contained the energies and elements of all beiag realiter in himself : thus he was in a certain sense the world itse'f.' ^ We may admit the close kinship be- » E.g. 2 Cor. iii. 17 ; cf. 1 Cor. xv. 45. » ChrUtae, pp. 46, 47. 158 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [n. i. tween Paul's idea of the pre-incamate Christ and the contemporary notion of the Logos. But it is altogether arbitrary to read into the apostle's statements meta- physical conceptions for which there is no evidence in his writings. His thought was, in all hkeUhood, no more metaphysical than that of the Wisdom-literature of his nation, his afl^ties with which we have noted above.^ We must be content with the same vagueness in esti- mating Paul's description of the final goal for the universe, the ' summing-up of all things in Christ, the things in heaven and the things on earth ' (Eph. i. 10). To force on the words an abstract, pantheistic construction would be to fall into contradiction with various statements of the apostle as to the real individuaUty of beUevers in the future glorified existence. It has already been observed that for Paul the birth, death, and resurrection of Christ are more than events in a personal history. They belong to God's redemptive purpose. They are normative for the development of the world-order, and yet the apostle is so completely dominated by the impression of the historical Person which has been wrought in him through his experience of the living Lord and the tradition current in the community, that only once does he treat of the pre-mundane existence of Christ, which he is compelled to postulate in view of the central rehgious significance he has discovered in Him. The passage occurs incidentally in an exhortation to lowliness, and its primary purpose is to emphasise the humility of Christ. It con- tains much that is undefined, and it scarcely lends itself to dogmatic construction, but it none the less indicates that Paul's mind had dwelt earnestly on what may be called the presuppositions of the Incarnation. ' Though he was divine by nature,' he writes to the PhiUppians, ' he did not snatch at equality with Grod, but emptied himself by taking the nature of a servant : bom in human Windisoh greatly exaggerates the influence of the Jewish conception of the Divine Wisdom on Paul's Christology in his essay in Neutestament- liche Sfudien fur O. Heinrici. pp. 220-2:!4. CH. IV.] FUNDAMENTAL POSITIONS OP PAULINISM 159 guise and appearing in human form, he humbly stooped in his obedience even to die, and to die upon the cross. Therefore God highly exalted him, and gave him the name which is above every name, that in the name of Jesus every knee should bow . . . and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.' ^ Here we have Paul's clearest utterance as to the pre-existence of Christ, a pre-existence which he regards as in some sense individual. The most difficult phrase in the paragraph is that which speaks of an ' equaHty with God ' at which Christ did not snatch. Plainly the apostle views the pre- incamate attitude of Christ from the standpoint of his post-resmrection existence. He had come into contact with him as the glorified Lord to whom was due the universal worship of men. His possession of this name (Kv/itos), as we have seen, placed Him side by side with God in the eyes of humanity. That is what Paul means by ' equality.' But He had reached that glory by a path of lowly obedience which led through the scorn and rejection of His earthly life, and the shame and agony of the cross. This was the cost of redemption, although Paul does not here explicitly refer to that. The incarnation was a great act of self-renunciation for the sake of mankind, a great act of obedience in which the Son made Himself one with His Father's wiU that He might bring sinful men to God. Possibly the noteworthy expression, ' did not snatch at equality with God,' contains a reminiscence of the First Adam, who, in disobedience to the Almighty, yielded to the temptation to ' be as God ' (Gen. iii. 5). It is remark- able that even here Paul does not dwell on the metaphysical implications of his statement. He hastens to the act of humble self-denial, revealing the true focus of his interest. We are not, therefore, justified in attempting to analyse what he means here by the Divine Nature (/iop<^ij) of the pre-incamate Christ. Nor is it legitimate to use the passage as evidence for the conception of Christ as the ' Heavenly Man,' which some scholars have attributed to ' PhU. U. 6 ft. (partly M.). 160 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. i. the apostle. There is no trace of such a conception here, nor, in our judgment, anywhere in his writings.* Paul leaves in obscurity -that of which the pre-existent One ' emptied ' Himself.^ He is content to view the incarnation,^ even when placed in its cosmic setting, as a wonderful disclosure of the grace of Christ,* that grace which Lies behind the salvation He has accomphshed for humanity. And thus once more an utterance which touches realms of specu- lation in which human thought grows dizzy is found to have its real basis in the conviction that self-sacrifice belongs to the very nature of God. • See an article by the present writer in Expositor, 1914, pp. 97-110. ' J. Weiss quite arbitrarily says, of ' the body of bis glory ' (Phil, iil, 21). ' He never uses any term like this. • Cf . 2 Cor. viu. 9. PART II PHASES OF EARLY CHRISTIAN THOUGHT IN THE MAIN INDEPENDENT OP PAULINISM CHAPTER I THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER (a) The Situation In the Introduction a brief sketch has been given of the historical background of the Epistle, so far as it can be reconstructed from the very fragmentary data which are available. One or two features of the evidence ought to be emphasised. (1) The most striking fact as regards the external attestation of the document is the place of authority assigned to it by Polyparp,^ who writes shortly after the first decade of the second century.^ In making his quotations from the Epistle, he does not mention Peter's name, but his pupil Irenaeus regularly assigns it to the apostle. (2) On the other hand, most modem scholars agree that, in view of its more or less correct Greek style, the actual composition of the Epistle cannot be the work of Peter. The problem is elucidated by the words of chap. V. 12 (M.) : ' By the hand of (Sia) Silvanus, a faithful brother (in my opinion), I have written you these few lines of encouragement.' A remarkable parallel is found in the description given by Dionysius of Corinth {Euseb. H. E., iv. 23, 11) of Clement's Epistle to the Corinthians, in which the same preposition (Sia) emphasises Clement's function as mouthpiece of the Roman Church. Silvanus, already a person of authority in the Christian community and one of Paul's trusted fellow-missionaries (1 Thess. i. 1, » See Chase, H. D. B., iii. p. 781. * See Lightfoot, Apostolic Fathers, Part H., voL i. p. 128. L 162 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. u. 2 Thess. i. 1, 2 Cor. i. 19, Acts xv. 32, 40, etc.), is more than the bearer of this Epistle. He has had the responsibihty of shaping the apostle's exhortation, and it may well be that some of the marked affinities with Paul are due to the fact that Silvanus, as coadjutor of the great Gen- tile missionary, ' acquired a sympathy or famiUarity with his characteristic modes of thought and expression.' * (3) The language of chap. iv. 3 is sufficient proof that the Epistle is addressed to C!hristians who had been converted from Paganism. Since, however, by the second half of the first century the Christian community regarded itself as the true heir of the chosen people, the distinction between its Jewish and Gentile elements had ceased to be of primary importance. It has been suggested that the order in which the various provinces are mentioned, ' Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia,' ' reflects the road followed by the bearer of the letter.' * No reason can be given for the selection of these particular localities, but Peter's name and authority would be familiar to them all. (4) It is almost impossible to doubt that ' Babylon,' which is obviously the place of writing (v. 13), is a cryptic name for Rome as the sjrmbol of arrogance, secular power, and ungodliness. It is used frequently in this sense in the Apocalypse {e.g. xiv. 8, xviii. 2, 10, 21).' A tradition of the Church which goes as far back as Papias gives this interpretation,* and there is no vaUd testimony which associates the apostle with the real Babylon. Now, as early as a.d. 96, we have the witness of Clement {ad Cor. v. 1-4) as to Peter's martyrdom, and the context of the statement certainly seems to imply that he suffered at Rome.® A combination of the facts would suggest that when the Epistle was written the Christian community of the metropolis had already I Mofiatt, Introduction, p. 332. See also Zahn, Einleitung, ii. pp. 10, 11. • MoSatt, op. cit., p. 327. » Hart {E. O. T., v. p. 19) points out that the Jewish author of Book V. of the Sibylline Oracles (dated by Geffcken shortly after 70 A.D.) usei Babylon for Kome. * See Zahn, op. cit., ii. pp. 19, 20. » See Zahn, op. cit., i. pp. 445-448 ; ii. 22-27. CH. I.] The nRSi EPISTLE OE* PETER 163 experienced the skilfully planned outbreak of Nero's rage and cruelty, an outbreak which finally led to more or less organised persecution of the Church. The actual character of the persecittions referred to in the Epistle is the most important question of all for the reconstruction of its environment. Rash inferences have been drawn by many scholars from the somewhat incidental and unstudied allusions found in the document. When these are examined without prejudice, they are seen to reflect a situation which must have been common, as soon as the Christian movement became a force to be reckoned with. The chief strain in the exhortations of the Epistle, which bear upon the sufferings of its readers, is the appeal to live down the slanders of ignorant pagan critics by their blameless conduct.^ We know from the Uterature of the early Church that insinuations were made against the Christians as to Bhameful orgies and imnatural crimes. This was the penalty of their quiet gatherings for worship and their fraternal love. Nero had taken advantage of the situation to make the Christians at Borne the scapegoats of his own crime. But, further, it is interesting to observe that just as Paul, after urging his readers at Rome to overcome evil with good, proceeds to enjoin submission to existing authority,^ so Peter in a precisely similar context exhorts Christian slaves to obey their masters, even when they make unreasonable demands and treat them cruelly. Here we get a hint of special hardships which have to be borne for Christ's sake by men and women who were at the mercy of those who had the power over them of life and death. The innumerable occasions on which heathen rites mingled with the details of family life would afford opportunities for such harsh tyranny. Various scholars have held that iv. 15 (' Let no man suffer as a murderer or a thief or an evil-doer or an officious meddler,' but if as a Christian, let him not be ' E.g. ii. 12, 15 ; iii. 16. ° Eom. xii. 19 — xiii. 6. ' It is probably best to explain the ha/pdx legomenont ^WoTpLoeTriaKoiro^, as Zeller doeSj from contemporary philosophical usage, which shows that the charge of meddlesonienos? was brought against ardent Cynic propa- 164 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [pt. a. ashamed, but let him glorify God because of this name ') presupposes the process mentioned by Pliny in his famous letter to Trajan, in which the Christians were condemned, not because of any alleged crime, but ' on account of the Name alone ' (propter nomen ipsum). That would of course point to a period of organised persecution by the Imperial authorities, such as appeared in the reigns of Domitian and Trajan. But, as Bigg aptly observes, this Epistle shows that they were regarded as evil-doers.^ And, in any case, the statement of iv. 14, ' If you are re- proached in the name of Christ, you are blessed,' words which are probably an echo of Matt. v. 11, suggests some- thing much less formal than a legal indictment for bearing the name ' Christian.' Followers of Christ would inevitably look upon the sufferings involved in their loyalty to their Lord as endured for His name. This interpretation tallies with what we have seen to be the general character of the allusions throughout the Epistle.^ Nor is it at all under- mined either by iv. 12 (' Do not be surprised at the ordeal which has come to test you '), or by v. 8 (' Your enemy the devil prowls like a roaring Hon looking out for some one to devour').^ In every region where Christianity got a foothold, there would necessarily come a time when the attention of their neighbours would be directed to the members of the new sect. This time had arrived in the Asiatic provinces for which the Epistle is intended. If it was written after Nero's savage attack upon the Christians at Rome, we might naturally suppose that the eddies of that disturbance had spread to the more distant parts of the Empire. Perhaps this very fact is indicated by v. 9 : ' Knowing how to pay the same tax of suffering as your brethren throughout the world ' (M.). The reference to the machinations of the devil is not more emphatic than Paul's gandists. 'A Christmn might give great ofience by ill-timed protests against common social customs, such as the use of garlands, or of meat ouered to idols at dinner parties * (Bigg, ad loc), ' Commentary on St. Peter and St. Jude, p. 30. * For a discussion of details, marked by great historical insight, sea Bigg, op. cit., pp. 24-33 » M. CH. I.] THE FIRST EPISTLE OP PETER 165 warning in Eph. vi. 11 £E., that Christians are confronted by Satanic wiles, and have to struggle not against mere human adversaries but against spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly sphere. It seems appropriate, therefore, to assign the Epistle to a date not long after Nero's persecution, anywhere between 64 and 66 or 67 a.d.^ (6) Essentially Practical Character of the Theology The clue to the contents of the Epistle is given in v. 12, which describes the purpose of the writer as being to testify ' that this is what the true grace of God means ' (M.). When the Epistle is examined ia the hght of that statement, we find that ' the true grace of God ' embraces the splendid hope which has been disclosed in the resurrection of Christ, and aU the kindness which God the Father has shown to men. But this Divine grace, in the generosity of its scope, is emphasised for a definite reason. The communities addressed are called to pass through severe trials. These are a sharp test of faith and conduct. There is the danger of feeling disappointed at such an issue of their new career. Might they not have expected peace rather than conflict ? Is it worth while to continue in so difficult a course ? Such disillusionment will be reinforced by the temptation to compromise with the lower moral standard which con- fronts them on every side. It will be natural to fall back into heathen ways and so escape suffering. But the Lord whose name they bear, for whom they have to face shame and pain, was Himself a sufferer, and He had done no wrong. It was through suffering that He achieved the redemption of man, and He bore all with lowliness and calmness. They are called to share in His experiences, to follow in His steps. And they are not left to meet their trials alone. They belong to God. They invoke Him as Father. They have been bom again of immortal seed. God's power is at their disposal : the Spirit of Him who has ' For an excellent discussion of the date, see Mofiatt, op. cil., pp. 338-342. 166 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES tet. li. called them to His eternal glory in Christ Jesus. Only, they have a great moral duty both to God and to men. They must live worthily of the Holy One who has redeemed them at such a cost. They must spend their days as pilgrims, in the midst of an impure environment, so con- trolling all evil lusts and tempers that their pagan neigh- bours will be impressed by their conduct, and led to glorify God because of them. This will remove all vahd causes of slander and maltreatment. If they have to suffer, it will be suffering for righteousness' sake, as Christ's was. And at the end the unfading crown of glory awaits them. Obviously, the Epistle, from its raison d'itre, is essentially practical. The arrangement of thought is homiletical and not logical.^ It is the pastoral address of an earnest and affectionate Christian missionary to communities of whose circumstances he is aware. If it be said that Hope is the central idea of the Letter, we must note that its prominence is due to the depressed conditions of the readers. It is quite illegitimate on this account to call Peter the Apostle of Hope. When occasion demands, Paul gives it equal importance. Here it has no theological, but entirely a religious significance. It is when the author speaks of the Christian life that he shows originahty.^ Those ideas which may be justly described as theological are introduced not for their own sake, but in order to confirm and enhance the practical considerations which the apostle uses to cheer and encourage his readers. Hence we must be on our guard throughout against reading into his reflective utter- ances more than he intended them to contain (c) Affinities with Paid The most delicate problem raised by an investigation of the thought of our Epistle is that of its relation to the religious standpoint of Paul. Sweeping statements have been made for which there is no justification. ' Is not » See Gvinkel, Die Schriften d. N. T., ii. p. 530. • Sea W. Bauer, Die kaHtuUachen Brief e, p.- 31. CH. I.] THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 167 everything,' asks Wemle, ' in 1 Peter from the first line to the last Pauline language and Pauline thought ? ' ^ The fallacy which lies behind such a view is the assumption that there was no attempt to shape reh'gious ideas in the early Church except that made by Paul. It may be granted that his was by far the most powerful intellect brought to bear upon the data of Christian experience, and that probably no other leader in the Apostolic Age had the same natural bias to systematise the material which lay before him. But we have already adduced evidence to show that when Paul entered the Christian community he found reflection busy with the work of interpreting such facts as the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the gift of the Spirit, and the Second Advent. And there can be Uttle doubt, as we have seen, that he largely accepted the funda- mental positions which had already been taken up.^ As it happens, we have important testimony that Peter was in agreement with his brother apostle on the basal value of faith. Paul can appeal to him on this common ground : ' Knowing that a man cannot be justified by the works of the law, but only through faith in Christ Jesus, we also (t.e. we Jews) put our trust in Christ Jesus.' ' Accordingly, it is quite illegitimate to say that the central place given to faith or to the atoning death and resurrection of Christ in this Epistle is due to the influence of PauL He un- questionably elaborated ideas which he found only in germ, and in various instances moulded them into forms which dominated later generations, but often the leas articulate conceptions of the earUer epoch were more easUy assimilated. Hence much of the fundamental agreement between this Epistle and the essentials of Pauhnism must be referred to the common heritage of the apostoUc Church. That rich store of ideas we shall examine in the following section. There we shall find the paramount influence of the Old Testament, and especially of the prophets, on Peter's religious thought, as well as * Einfiihntng, p. 137. So also Holtzmann, op. Hi., ii. p. 360 f. » See esp. 1 Cor. xv. 3 ft. » Gal. ii. 16. 168 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [pr. n. many reminiscences of the teaching of Jesus. Throughout ■we are conscious of a simple, earnest, affectionate nature, whose keen sympathies make him receptive rather than originative : who would therefore readily respond to the impress of a stronger mind, and yet by the force of his spirituality impart something of his own tone to the con- victions on which he places value. A comparison of 1 Peter with the Pauline. Epistles undoubtedly suggests that the author was acquainted with some of them, notably that to the Romans. Thus, in iii. 9, Peter urges his readers not to return evil for evil {jiij diroSiSovTci KaKov di/Tt KaKov), Using the very phrase which Paul has in Rom. xii. 17. What is specially significant is that in both contexts it is introduced between admonitions to lowliness and advice to preserve peace with all men. His knowledge of Rom. sdi. is further attested by his use within the same paragraph (ii. 2, ii. 5) of the same rare adjective (Xoyi/cos) for ' spiritual ' as Paul employs (xii. 1), and the same conception of Christians as offering spiritual sacrifices well-pleasing to God (xii. 1). Equally remarkable is the employment by Peter (ii. 6, 8) of the same quotations from Isa. xxviii. 16, viii. 14 as appear in Rom. ix. 33, and, a few sentences later (ii. 10), of the same passage from Hosea (ii. 23) as Paul cites in Rom. ix. 25. There are some interesting parallel expressions in Rom. xiii. 1-7 and 1 Pet. ii. 13-17, but here Peter's thought follows quite independent lines. We must confess that we find it as difficult as Dr. Bigg does to discover those subtle affinities between 1 Peter and Ephesians which appeal so strongly to Hort and others.* There are a few vague parallels, but no close inter-relation of ideas is at all prominent. It is of course impossible to get beyond conjecture in accounting for Peter's knowledge of the Epistle to the Romans or any other of Paul's Letters. But the fact that he wrote from Rome reminds us of his intimate connection with that particular Christian community, which must have ■ See Hort, The First Epistle oj St, Peter, p. 5, and Zahn'a list of alleged parallels, op. cit., ii, p. 36. CH. I.] THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 169 reckoned Paul's Epistle among its most treasured posses- sions. H, as has been suggested, SUvanus, a friend and fellow-labourer of Paul, was directly concerned in the shaping of Peter's Epistle, it is not surprising that echoes of the great missionary's words, as well as of his thoughts, should here and there be overheard. When we examine the normative ideas of the Epistle in the light of the fundamental positions accepted through- out the Church, we are not impressed by their alleged reproduction of Paulinism. It is not surprising, e.g., to find a function of the highest import assigned to faith in this Epistle. But its colour is different from that of Paul's watchword. In Paul, as we have observed, faith is the supreme channel of spiritual life and power. It is the nexus of the most intimate fellowship between the soul and Christ. For Peter, as for all Christians of the Apostohc Age, salvation is impossible without faith. But the special nvunce of his conception may be discerned in i. 20, 21, where he speaks of Christ as revealed ' at the end of the ages on your account, who, through him, believe in God that raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope is in Grod.' ^ This attitude reminds us rather of the Synoptics than of Paul. In view of it, we can understand why Paul's central idea of justification does not occur in 1 Peter. Nor is it legitimate to quote the important passage on Christ's atoning death (ii. 21-24) as a proof of the Paulinism of the author. The profound delineation of the Servant of the Lord in Isa. liii. has a much more inward relation to it, and we know how much emphasis was laid on that delineation in the early Church, in its endeavours to interpret the scandal of the cross. At the same time we are reminded every here and there that Paul's powerful exposition of the Gospel has left its permanent mark on the general Christian position. In the passage just referred to, the writer states as the purpose of > This rendering seems preferable to that favoured by Mofiatt and others : ' so that your faith is also hope in God.' See Hort's strong arguments ad loc. 170 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [rx. u. Christ's atoning death, ' that we having died ( ^''' "■^'i'^'' ivpo^ipevaav (OuOintt oj N, T. Chrialology, p. 79). « Quoted by Granbery, op. dt., p. SO. 176 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [pt. n. 2. The Death of Christ It is perhaps scarcely accurate to describe Peter's view of the death of Christ as a conception peculiar to his Epistle. Indeed he presents no rounded-off interpre- tation of the event any more than his brother-apostle Paul. But the combination of aspects in which he regards it, while revealing many aflSnities with Paulinism, is, in the New Testament, pecuhar to himself. And it is specially instructive as an example of the manner in which ideas explanatory of so central a fact must often have been grouped in the apostolic Church. His utterances on the death of Christ have been prompted by the practical necessities of the communities to which he writes. We must not therefore press them imduly, or credit the apostle with inferences from them which to us appear inevitable. On the other hand, the spontaneity and artlessness with which they occur suggest their dominance in Peter's thought, and the brevity of expression must not be allowed to conceal the wide reaches of reflection which lie behind it. Before we attempt a connected survey of the various statements, it may be of value, first, to note their intensely practical bearing, and secondly, to give a brief analysis of their background. In i. 18, 19, the cost of redemption, ' the precious blood of Christ,' is made the ground of appeal for a serious and reverent life. In ii. 21-24, the patient suffering of Christ for righteousness' sake, in order to be the medium of healing to sin -sick souls, is exhibited as an example to Christian slaves, who have to endure punish- ment for doing right. Precisely the same ground is taken in iii. 18, where the apostle points to Him who died for sins, ' a righteous man for unrighteous, that he might bring us to Grod.' The typically Pauline conception that Christ's suffering in the flesh broke the power of sin, serves in iv. 1 f . as an incentive for His followers to Hve in complete loyalty to the wiU of God. The only other significant reference is that which, in tie address of the Epistle (i. 2), describes CH. L] THE FIRST EPISTLE OP PETER 177 the readers as ' chosen ' by God, ' for obedience (i.e. to Him) ,* and for being sprinkled with the blood of Jesus Christ.' The association of the daily behaviour of his Gentile- Christian readers with so solemn a theme reminds us that the writer could take for granted their true appreciation of it. When we examine the crucial passages in order to trace their background, we are at first confused by the variety oi the conceptions represented. This variety accounts for the impression made upon some scholars that Peter's ' ideas about Christ's work of redemption are not unified and stable.' ^ They are not unified in the sense of forming a systematic doctrine, but there is no real discrepancy between them. As in the case of Paul, they disclose the many-sidedness of aspect which the death of Christ exhibited to the Christian consciousness of the Apostolic Age, and they exemplify the richness of the material supphed by the Old Testament to form the media of its interpretation. For it is in the Old Testament that his interpretations have their basis. Reference has been already made to the author's constant dependence on the prophets, more especially on Isaiah. His chief utter- ance on the meaning of the cross, ii. 21-25, is not only steeped in the thought but uses the actual language of Isa. liii. (esp. w. 9, 12, 6), with a probable reminiscence of Deut . xxi . 23 in its mention of the ' tree.' The same passage seems to colour his ideas when he speaks of ' the righteous ' dying for ' the unrighteous ' (ui. 18). The metaphor is changed in i. 18 from ' the bearing of sins ' to that of ' ransom.' Here, too, the language seems to echo Isa. hi. 3 (LXX).3 Yet it may be legitimate to trace back his thought to the great deKverance of the chosen people which had been wrought by blood (Exod. xii. 13, etc.). Indeed this is made almost certain by his description of Christ as ' an unblemished and spotless lamb.' A lamb without > Not to ' Jesus Christ,' a,3 Dr. Mofiatt translates. The significanoe of the text will appear immediately. • E.g. Feine, op. cit., p. 670. • 06 /ACTot ipyvpiov \vTpvd7itrea6e. H 178 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. n. blemish was appointed for the passover-sacrifice. No doubt the comparison was frequent in the early Church, for Paul also speaks of Christ as ' our paschal lamb ' which ' has been sacrificed.' ' With this he may quite well have combined the recollection of the lamb in Isa. liii. 7, the symbol of meek endurance, a symbol which was probably suggested to the prophet by the sacrificial ritual. There remain the remarkable words in which the Christians to whom the Epistle is sent are designated as ' chosen . . . for obedience and for being sprinkled with the blood of Jesus Christ ' (i. 2). Plainly they presuppose Ezod. xxiv. 7 f . : ' [Moses] took the book of the covenant (tijs Siafl^K»;s), and read in the audience of the people : and they said. All that the Lord hath spoken will we do, and be obedieM. And Moses took the blood and sprinkled it on the people, and said. Behold the blood of the covenant, which the Lord hath made with you upon all these conditions.' This is the passage which colours the thought of Jesus at the institution of the Holy Supper, and its influence appears repeatedly in the New Testament, notably in Heb. ix. 18-20. These Old Testament references suggest the lines on which Peter's view of Christ's death must be interpreted, and they warn us against the error of drawing the sharp distinctions between the component elements of that view, into which some expositors have fallen.^ Three elements are clearly discernible. Christ is regarded as (1) ' bearing the sins of men,' that is, taking upon Himself their conse- quences; (2) 'ransoming men from their sins'; (3) cleansing or covering the sins of men that they might enter into covenant with God. In all three aspects Christ's voluntary death is central. In all three His action is concerned with the removal of sin, as the supreme barrier between the human soul and God. In each case the idea of sacrifice is implicit if not explicit. No doubt the conception of sacrifice carries with it the suggestion of atonement. And * 1 Cor. V. 7. Cf. Heb. ix. 14 : 8s . . . iavrdv irpoff'^eyKev Afiufioy Ty • E.g. B. Weiss, Der petriniscke Lehrbegri^, p. 264. cu. I.] THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 17i; from these we cannot separate the thought of substitution, which is the very nerve of the two leading passages, ii. 24 and iii. 18. Probably the attempts made by the apostle to plumb the unfathomable depths of the Divine self- sacrifice represent quite faithfully the directions followed by the spiritual instinct of the early Church when con- fronted by the wonder of redemption. Even a hurried glance reveals the a£Snities with Paul. A more penetrating study, in the hght of such cognate passages as Heb. ix. 18 S., discloses the influence on Peter of the covenant-idea, that idea which the Master Himself had, in a moment of peculiar solemnity, used as the most fitting s3anbol in which to enshrine His act of redeeming love. We are inclined to think that this conception gained its prominence just because it had been, so to speak, consecrated by Jesus. It may be noted that the apostle does not discuss the question : How did the redeeming act of Christ mediate salvation to men ? But, as Dr. Denney aptly observes, ' to say substitution is to say something which involves an immeasurable obUgation to Christ, and has therefore in it an incalculable motive power.' ^ Peter, however, lays marked emphasis on the purpose of redemption. In ii. 24 its result for those who welcome it is ' dying to sin and living to righteousness,' a moral transformation. In iii. 18 its aim is described as ' to bring us to God.' Here we again find ourselves in the realm of covenant-conceptions. In Hebrews, which is based on the covenant-idea, 'drawing near to God,' which is only a different way of stating the same fact of experience, is shown to be the supreme ideal of religion. There is therefore no real distinction between the two affirmations of our Epistle, for in Christianity reUgion and moraUty have been fused in an indissoluble unity. 3. The Descent to Hades In speaking of Christ as having died, the righteous for the unrighteous, Peter adds the noteworthy statement that • Death of Christ, p. 100. 180 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [pt. n. although Christ was put to death as regards His flesh, He was made aUve as regards His spirit, and to this he Unks the strange paragraph concerning Christ's preaching to the souls confined in Sheol.^ These he describes as the contemporaries of Noah, who had on account of their disobedience been swept away by the Flood. ^ With this passage we must connect iv. 6, which speaks of the Gospel as having been preached to the dead as well as the living, in order that while they must be judged in human fashion as regards the flesh (i.e. their earthly life), they might ' nevertheless be enabled to live after the pattern of Grod ' * as regards the spirit. It is quite unnecessary to trace Peter's speculation to those heathen myths which tell of the visits of famous heroes to Hades.* It was probably due to two lines of reflection which would exercise many minds in the early Church. On the one hand, their thoughts must have turned to the multitude who had died in their sins, without having the opportunity of being brought face to face with the salvation offered by Christ. A specially notorious group of sinners were those belonging to the generation of the Flood.^ On the other hand, the interval between Christ's death and resurrection would naturally suggest to Jews a sojourn in the World of the dead. The two ideas would easily be brought into con- nection. Here was an outlet for the compassion of the Saviour. He preached His Gospel to these captives in their prison-house. For Sheol was no longer regarded as the abode of pithless shades. It was partly a place of punishment, and partly an iutermediate state. Possibly also such passages as Isa. Ixi. 1 f., xUi. 7 lay in the back- ground of the apostle's thought,® passages which, on the authority of Christ Himself, were apphed to His function ' iii. 19, 20. It is difficult to take seriously Dr. Rendel Harris' emenda- tion : ' in which also [iv i} koX] Enoch [Bkc^x] went and preached,' where he assumes that the name has slipped out because an early scribe dropped some repeated letters. The emended passage interrupts the context, and vould have to be regarded as an interpolation. » Gen. vi. 12, 13. » So Chase H. D. B., iii. p. 793. ' So W. Bauer, op. cit., p. 29. ' See Windisch's excursus. Die katholischen Briefe (Lietzmann's Hand- btich), p. 69. ■ So Chase, op. oit., p. 79S. cii. 1.1 THE FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER 181 of liberating those in captivity.^ That the idea embodied in the paragraph had taken hold of Peter's mind is clear from the mder statement of iv. 6, quoted above. There the scope is enlarged to embrace more than the one genera- tion, and the emphasis is laid, not on the Preacher, but on the chance given to those whom the judgment of men had already condemned, to enter on the higher divine life. The theologumenon is a natural product of reflection. It was probably widely current, as many traces of it are found in second century literature, which do not seem to have any immediate connection with 1 Peter.^ ' E.g. Luke iv. 18-21. > See especially the remarkable passage in Odea of Solomon, zlii. 19-26. 182 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. a. CHAPTER II THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBEEWS A. Prolegomena (a) Special Character of the Ejnsfle If we are to grasp the significance of this important post- Pauline document, it will be necessary to give a very brief sketch of the situation which it presupposes.^ The first impression which it makes is rather that of an elaborate discourse than of a letter. Each section of its careful argument culmiaates in a direct appeal to its readers,^ and the author describes his communication to them as a 'word of exhortation' (xiii. 22). There is something to be said for the hypothesis that actual homiUes of the writer have been incorporated in it.^ But numerous indications point to his intimate acquaintance with the community to which he writes, and suggest that some special circumstances in their history prompted the letter. Hence its impersonaUty hes only on the surface. From ii. 3 we can gather that the Gospel had been preached to the readers by personal followers of Jesus : from v. 12 that they had reached the stage when maturity might be expected. From his knowledge of them, the author is still able to be hopeful (vi. 9). He can point to an earlier time of struggle from which they had come forth as victors ' For an adequate dUonssion, see Professor Feake's Critical Introduction to the N. T. « E.g. ii. 1-4, vi. 1-2, x. 19-25, etc. • Clemen so explains chaps, iii.-iv., Bruce, chap. xi. The theory of F. Dibelius that Hebrews was an actual sermon, transforuied info a letter by slight modiflcQtions and the addition of chap, xiii,, is an oxaggei'ation. CH. n.] THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS 183 (x. 32, 33). They must brace themselves for a sharper conflict, remembering that discipline is salutary (xii. 4-11). The obscure allusions of chap. sdii. show that the writer was aware of dangerous symptoms of error which were appearing among them, and he urges them to recall the noble example set before them by leaders of their com- mtmity now passed away.^ In the same context hints occur which throw some light on the nature of the Church addressed. It was plainly a community within a community, for the letter is not sent to the chief authority, and it presupposes a wider circle of Christians to be found in the same locaUty as the recipients. The latter observation is corroborated by a reference to their special gatherings for worship.^ When it is borne in mind that most Christian communities in large cities must, owing to considerations of space, have been made up of various house-churches,* meeting in Uttle groups, while under the supervision of a central authority, the background of the Epistle becomes sufficiently clear.* Further, the greeting sent by the writer from ' those belonging to Italy ' (xiii. 24) certainly suggests that the community is some- where in Italy, and no centre is so likely as Rome. A keen controversy has in recent years been waged around the question : Were the readers Jewish or Gentile Christians ? The title of the Epistle, ' To the Hebrews,' which, of course, does not form part of the original document, but goes back to an early date, reveals the impression made by its contents. We cannot here enter into the details of the discussion. But one or two considerations may be adduced which seem to us decisive. The most important proof that the Epistle is written to Jemsh Christians is suppUed by the entire character of the author's apologetic. Every point he makes has a definite bearing on the Old Testament. It may, no doubt, be said that by this time the Old Testa- » xiii. 4, 9 f. ; xiil. 7. ' xiii. 24, X. 26. * Cf. Bom. xvi. 5 ; 1 Cor. xvi. 19. * Professor Naime's hypothesis of ' » group of scholarly men,' an ' exclusive circle of Hellenistic thinkers ' {The Epiatte of Pritsthood, p. 10), finds no adequate basis in the Epistle. 184 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. n. ment had become the Bible of Gentile Christians as well as of Jewish. But for Gentile converts it had become authoritative through the medium of the Christian Church. Now, as Prof. Peake forcibly says, ' the writer never dreams that his readers wiU reject an appeal to the Old Testament, though he fears that they may reject Christ.' * Indeed, his whole argument presupposes a most minute knowledge of and sympathy with the Jewish ritual, as embodied in the Pentateuch, and the habit of using the Old Testament as the criterion of religious obhgations. In any case, it would be an extraordinary method of demonstrating the finality of the Christian faith to Gentile converts, to prove in almost wearisome detail that the cultus of Judaism has at every point been superseded by Christianity. It is scarcely too much to say, with Reuss : * ' For this writer there are no Gentiles.' The problem of authorship has never been solved. The names of Barnabas, Apollos, Aquila (and Priscilla), and others have been suggested. Origen, the greatest Biblical scholar of the early Church, frankly admits : ' As to who wrote the Epistle, God knows the truth.' ' The question does not seriously affect the interpretation of its theology. The author was evidently a cultivated Jewish- Christian of Hellenistic origin, educated, as we shall see, in the Alexandrian school of Judaism, and possessing also a rhetorical training. He seems much less indebted to Paul than to the common Christianity of the Church, and he must have occupied an influential position as a Christian teacher in the Diaspora. It is difficult to fix the approximate date of the Epistle. It was certainly used by Clement of Rome (last< decade of first century). Some scholars have found in x. 32 ff. a reference to the Neronic persecution. But this is doubtful, although by no means impossible. One thing seems fairly plain. The Epistle was written at a time when the con- • Hebrews (Century Bible), p. 16. • Quoted by Dods, E. O. T., iv. p. 231. » In Euseb., H. E., vi. 86. CH. n.] THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS 185 troversy as to the Law was no longer a burning question as between Jewish and Gentile Christians. That suggests a date later than a.d. 64, and as the references to ritual by no means necessarily presuppose that the Temple was still standing, it may be placed as late as 81 or 85, in the period when persecution arose under the rule of Domitian. (6) The Perils of the Community There is general agreement as to the spiritual condition of this community, which has called forth the writer's admonitions. Their grasp of the Christian hope was slackening (iii. 6). Their faith was wavering (iii. 12, iv. I, 11). They were In danger of falling away from Christ in listlessness and apathy (vi. 6, 12). What they need is to have ' an assured faith ' (x. 22), and to hold out patiently even in the midst of trials (x. 35, 36). They must keep their eyes fixed on Jesus, their great Leader in the life of faith, ' who, for the joy set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame ', (xii. 2). It is an awful thing to ' trample under foot the Son of God,' to ' count the blood of the covenant a common thing,' to ' insult the spirit of grace ' (x. 29). Hence, the whole exhortation may be summed up in the words of It. 14 : ' Let us hold fast our (Christian) confession.' If, as we have endeavoured to show, the readers were converts from Judaism, it is easy to recognise the kind of pressure which was loosening their hold of Christianity. The Epistle itself contains definite references to trials which had assailed them in the past, and fresh trials belongiug to the present.* And the same fact is indirectly suggested by the constant stress which the author lays on the sufiferings and consequent sympathy of Jesus aivofi(v See Lev. xvi. 11-19. 212 THE THEOLOGY OJT THE EPISTLES [pt. u. God.^ The writer brings into close connection with the ritual of the Day of Atonement that belonging to the inauguration of the covenant as described in Exod. xxiv. (ix. 18-20). Indeed his reference to the sprinkling of holy places and vessels is introduced as if related to the latter. But throughout he draws no clear distinction between the inauguration of the covenant and its maintenance, as is plain from ix. 15, where, in describing the death of Christ as the initiation of the New Covenant, he goes on to declare that that death had as its aim the forgiveness of the sins committed under the earUer covenant. That is to say, the same event is regarded both as an inaugural and an atoning sacrifice. As a matter of fact, the basal idea in his mind is expressed in ix. 22 : ' Apart from shedding of blood, there is no remission of sins.' Both these types of sacrifice have as their purpose the forgiveness of sins, which are the violation of the covenant. Probably the dictum laid down is an axiom for the writer, as it was for the Hebrew mind in general. He does not theorise on its significance. Blood, regarded as the seat of hfe, atones. But his description of the Levitical ritual, as it culminated in that of the Day of Atonement, emphasises its inadeqttacy. The same ceremonial was repeated year after year. The Holy of HoUes where Gk*d was to be met remained closed save for one day annually. The sacrifices themselves were bound up with a system of ' meats and drinks and various purifications.' They consisted of the blood of bulls and goats.^ As regards these, the writer bluntly declares that ' it is impossible that they should remove sin ' : that ' they have no power to perfect (TtXtiQcrat) the worshipper in his conscience,' i.e. to remove his sense of guilt so that he may have the assurance of real fellowship with God. The very fact of this repetition pointed to the abiding consciousness of guilt.* And he boldly appeals to Ps. xl. 6-8 as scriptural evidence that God had no pleasure in ' In is. 9 reXemaai, ' to perfect,' is used in the same sense. See Feine, np. fiit.f p. 559. ' ix. 25, ix. 7-9, ix. 10, ix. 12. ' i. i, ix. 9, x. 2. CH. n.] THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS 213 sacrifices, but that His delight was in the obedient will (x. 5-9). Hence we may take as his general principle the statement made with reference to the priesthood : ' The earlier commandment is cancelled on account of its feebleness and futility, for the law brought nothing to its goal' (vii. 18 f.). The question naturally arises : Did the writer hold that the older ritual had been simply labour lost ? That would be a most precarious inference. It was an integral part of the rehgious system of Israel, and although ' the law brought nothing to its goal,' it contained nevertheless ' a shadow of the blessings to come,' and its ministrants served 'a copy of the heavenly realities' (x. 1, viii. 5). But while the ' shadow ' is very different from ' the fac-simile ' which is presented in the Christian faith, it is better than nothing. It provided a ritual cleansing for the community (ix. 13), a cleansing which, for devout minds that could penetrate beneath the letter to the spirit, must have often meant a sense of restoration to the Divine communion. But at best the machinery was cumbrous : at best the pathway into God's presence was dimly Ughted. No wonder that a man who had in his own experience grasped the significance of Christ could affirm that the old sacrifices ' were of a kind which could never remove sin ' (x. 11) : no wonder that he exulted in ' the new and living (i.e. effective) way ' into the sanctuary of God's presence, inaugurated by the sacrifice of Christ.^ Christ, in contrast to the Aaronic priests, is ' a minister of the genuine taber- nacle,' which is the heavenly world, the real abode of God's presence. As exalted above all that is material and imperfect. He represents His people in the Holy of HoUes ' not made with hands.' He too has made an offering, but not on His own behalf, an atoning sacrifice in virtue of which He could enter the Divine presence, tb give His worshipping people the assurance that their sins were purged away. This He did once, and once for all. The offering was Himself, in His spotless purity. It was made » X. 19, 20, 214 THE THEOLOGY OP THE EPISTLES [pt. n. ' through eternal spirit.' ^ This differentiates it from the animal sacrifices. It had the whole power of His deathless personahty in it : it was an embodiment of all that He was. So its worth can never fade. Its moral significance is that it realises the Divine will. It is an act of perfect obedience Its effect corresponds to its character. It does completely what the earlier ritual had never achieved : it cleanses the conscience from dead works to serve the living God.^ The description is very remarkable. The living God is God manifested as He truly is, in Jesus Christ, ' all active in putting Himself forth to men, and all responsive to their putting of themselves forth to Him.' ' As soon as the conscience is unburdened of its sin, it passes out of the sphere of death into that of life, which is the sphere of God. For the first time the human spirit finds its real home. This new condition the writer describes by the old ritual term, ' sanctify ' (dytafeiv). The word retains its associa- tion with the covenant-idea. But it imphes a covenant ' which has been enacted on the basis of better promises.' * This, then, is the assurance brought to the believing heart by the sacrifice of Christ. The writer sets forth, as usual, in the language of cvltus, the transformation which had been wrought in his own life and that of his fellow- Christians by coming into relation with Christ and His redeeming activity. It is for him concentrated in His death and (as we shall see) His exalted life of intercession. ' Having been perfected,* he became the cause of eternal salvation to all who obey him ' (v. 9). But what He has done carries with it the total impression of His career as Saviour. To each element aUke we may apply what Prof, Bruce has said of Christ's sacrifice, that it ' acts on the conscience through the mind interpreting its significance, and in proportion as it is thought on.' * Such inter- pretation and reflection would necessarily be coloured by ' viu. 2, vii. 26, ix. 11, vii. 27, ix. 12, r. 12, ix. 14. • X. 9, 10 ; ix. 14. • Davidson on Heb. iii. 12. • X. 10, 14, 29; viii. B. ' His TfXe^uiris was eSeoted b^ iufierine and death ; it was realised in Ei3 exaltation. * Epistle to the Bebrewa, p. 3S0, CH. n.] THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS 215 the author's presuppositions. When these presuppositions are modified in the course of a long development of reh- gious experience the interpretation inevitably receives an enlargement of range and an enriching of content. (6) Consummation of the New Covenant in the World to Come 1. Christ's High Priesthood a Link between the Present and the World to come The ultimate issue of our author's conception of the high-priesthood of Christ finds expression in viii. 1 : ' We have a high priest of such a character that he sat down at the right hand of the throne of majesty in the heavens.' CSbrist's exaltation completely overshadows His resurrection in this Epistle, while of course presupposing it. And it is invariably linked to the atoning sacrifice of Himself which He offered as High Priest for His people : ' Having offered one sacrifice for sin of eternal value, he sat down at the right hand of God ' (x. 12). The latter phrase which he uses so often has come from his favourite Psahn, the 110th. But he always interprets it from the point of view of Christ's high-priesthood. By the pathway of His sacrificial death, which, as we have seen, was at once the inauguration of a new relationship to God and the pledge that such a relationship should never be broken, He passed into the Divine presence and abides there for ever. There can therefore be no interruption to the ap- proach of those ' who come unto God by him, seeing he ever lives to make intercession for them ' (vii. 25). A barren controversy has been waged around the question : When did Christ become high priest ? Was it at His death or when He entered heaven ? The author draws no such distinction. According to the symboUsm used. He must have been high priest when He offered the sacrifice, but the sacrifice is not complete until it is presented before God. But Christ never leaves the heavenly sanctuary, therefore He is an eternal high priest. His people can 210 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [ri. n. always count on His interest in their needs. They may always be sure that He ' can bring to bear all the resources of the Almighty for the complete and final salvation of his brethren.' ^ A remarkable turn is given to the idea of Christ's high- priesthood, which reveals a further range of the writer's thought. It is introduced almost as if incidentally, but it belongs to a fundamental element in his scheme of con- ceptions. In describing the hope of the Christian as an anchor cast within the heavenly world, that world which is at present veiled from his eyes as the Holy of Holies was curtained off from the gaze of the worshippers in the ancient tabernacle, he reminds his readers that Jesus has penetrated behind the veU as their High Priest, but also as their Forerunner (irpoSpofio's).' Here is a vital trans- formation of the picture. The Aaronic high priest was permitted once a year to pass within the Holy of HoUes, but no worshipper could ever expect to follow him. At best their fellowship with God was mediated. Christ has entered the true sanctuary in the heavenly world, not to spend a brief moment there but to abide for ever. But in so doing He has prepared the way by which His people are destined to follow Him. The veil has been withdrawn. Their perfecting will be on the same lines as His (v. 9). It will mean entrance into the real sanctuary, complete and immediate communion with God. That will be the consummation of the New Covenant, Now a most important feature in our author's outlook is the conviction that already Christians have entered upon this consummation, have begun to live in the world to come, the invisible heavenly order. At an early stage in our discussion we found how central for the Epistle was the contrast between the present, as the world of shadows, embodied for religion in the ritual of Judaism, and the world to come as the realm of realities, which have their true copy in the Christian dispensation. The author ventures to go further than this, and to declare that, in a » Bruce, op. cit., p. 280. ■ vi. 20. CH. n.] THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS 217 sense, the world to come, the Messianic age of ardent Jews, has already broken in, has already projected itself into the closing epoch of this present age. That is the real meaning of the New Covenant. It is not merely a hope : it is already fruition. Here he touches the thought of Paul. Paul too has the belief that Christians are even now ' delivered from this age which is evil.' Their common- wealth is already in heaven. Their lot has been cast in ' the closing hours of the world.' ^ This phrase has a marked resemblance to that of Heb. i. 2 : ' the close of these days,' an epoch signahsed by the manifestation of Jesus Christ.^ His appearance, or at least His high-priestly service on behalf of His people, has virtually inaugurated the coming era. Their present access to God through Him is a genuine anticipation of the future. They know that they possess a better than any earthly heritage, one that endures. They have already ' tasted the heavenly gift . . . and the powers of the world to come ' {/xiWovTo^ almvos).^ In Jesus Christ their representative High Priest and Forerunner, who has carried with Him into the heavenly order the life and experience in which He became one with His brethren, they are now ' partakers of a heavenly calling.' They have come ' to Mount Sion, the city of the Hving God, the heavenly Jerusalem, to myriads of angels in festal gathering, to the assembly of the first- born enrolled in heaven.' * The Christian is thus Hving a two-fold Ufe. ' Actually he still lives within the lower order. But ideally he has already transcended it, and he confidently looks forward to the time when the actual shall be one with the ideal.' ^ Even now, in wondrous fashion, the ideal is translated into the real through faith. ' Gal. i. 4 ; PhU. ui. 20 ; 1 Cor. x. 11 (M.). ' Cf. ix. 26 : M Cf. the constant use of the phrase, ' trustworthy is the saying,' in the Pastoral Epistles. • So Titius, op. eit., p. 205 f. ni.l THEOLOGY OF THE DEVELOPING CHURCH 237 in our period, religion is regularly viewed, the aspect of piety (tuo-£/8eia). The term has a peculiarly Greek flavour, and it is worth noting that noun, verb, and adjective are rare in the LXX, except in Sirach, which has many non- Jewish affinities, and that they occur above all in 4 Macca- bees, which is the most typically Hellenistic work in the Pseudepigrapha preserved by the LXX. Out of fifteen instances of the noun in the New Testament, only one falls outside our documents, and it occurs in Acts, which has many points of connection with these. It perhaps retains something of that external tone which belongs to the public religion of Greece. Its content very markedly exemplifies the tendencies of the period. On the one hand, piety has the most intimate association with sound doctrine, the truth which has been attested by the apostles. Thus the Epistle to Titus speaks of ' the knowledge of the truth that accords with piety ' (i. I), and in I Tim. iv. 6 ff., Timothy, after being reminded of his careful instruction in the right doctiine, is urged to train himself for piety. In vi. 3, the ' dpctrine that accords with piety ' is contrasted with the teaching which departs from the wholesome standard of the Church. On the other hand, piety must express itself in good works (1 Tim. ii. 10).' Hence those members of the Christian community whose conduct is a scandal have merely the form of piety, and have renounced its power (2 Tim. iii. 5). Piety is the regulating force for action. To live righteously and piously in the present age is the result of the discipline brought to men by the saving grace of God (Tit. ii. 12). It is the sxpress aim of that spiritual endowment which has been bestowed on men by the Divine power through the knowledge of Jesus Christ (2 Pet. i. 3). But piety looks beyond th^e present. It also receives the pledge of that eternal life which will be fully realised in the future (1 Tim. iv. 8). Hence it may be said to sum up Christianity as an actual torce in human experi- ence, having its genesis in that unadulterated teaching ' See the previous section. The term uaed here ia Seorifieia, which is equivalent to e6(rdpeta. 238 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. which goes back to Christ and has been handed down by His Apostles, and authenticating itself in a course of ethical activity. (e) Conception of God Its conception of God must be normative for Bveiy phase of religious thought, and some valuable light from this direction is thrown upon the period with which we are dealing. Here, as in many other sections of our inquiry, we need not expect to find the outlines of the idea so clearly marked as to reveal at a glance the features in which they differ, say, from the Pauline conception. We must be content rather with hints and impressions. It is true that in our documents there are one or two important descriptions of the nature of God,* but the value of these for our purpose is slightly discounted by the fact that they evidently belong to liturgical formulae which had taken shape in the Church. Still, they express beUefs widely current, and it may be possible at times to recognise the forces which have produced them. To begin with, the view of Grod exhibited in this post- PauUne literature is to a real extent determined by the missionary aim of the Church. In contrast with the religious ideas of its heathen environment, it sets in bold relief, as Paul has also done, and as was customary with the propaganda of Hellenistic Judaism, the thought of God as the One, the Living, and the Creator of all things.^ In His supreme majesty He is immortal, dwelKng in light unapproachable, the Father of the heavenly lights who knows no change of rising and setting, invisible to mortal eyes, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. ^ AflSnities may be found for certain of these predicates in the Old Testament,* and perhaps they are derived from Judaism. ' 1 Tim. i. 17, vi 15, 16, possibly Tit. iii. 4, 6. ' 1 Tim. i. 17, ii. 5, vi. 15 ; Jas. iv. 12 ; Jude 25 ; 1 Tim. iii. 15, iv. 10, vi. 16 : 1 Tim. vi. 13, iv. 3, 4 ; Jas. i. 17, IS ; 2 Pet. iii. 5. » 1 Tim. i. 17, vi. 16o; 1 Tim. vi. 166; Jas. i. 17 (M.); 1 Tim. i. 17, vi. 16; 1 Tim. vi. 15. * Feine (op. ait., p. 541) compares Deut. x. 17 (LXX), Pa. cxxxvl. 3 (LXX) with 1 Tim. vi. 16 and Ps. oiv. 2 'LXX) with vi. 16. ui.] THEOLOGY OF THE DEVELOPING CHURCH 239 But there is some ground for supposing that they are emphasised in view of those Gnostic tendencies which had now begun to disturb the Church. The prominence as- signed to Christ as sole Mediator between God and men (1 Tim. ii. 5) gives colour to the significance of this back- ground. It is quite possible that the interesting reference to the light which encircles God has regard to Gnostic speculations on dark and malevolent powers. God casts no shadow, and is the source of those heavenly bodies (Jas. i. 17) to whose influence so high a place was ascribed in the reUgious syncretism of the time. To a similar reason may be due the importance attached to the creative activity of God. We know that in Gnostic theories a distinction was drawn between the supreme God, the Father of Jesus Christ, and the Creator, who is an inferior deity as responsible for the evil world of matter. ' Every- thing created by God is good,' says 1 Tim. iv. 4. Only good gifts come down from above (Jas. i. 17). Hence the remarkable description of God in the Pastorals and Jude as Saviour {aari^p).^ The God of creation is also the God of redemption. With the exception of Luke i. 47, which echoes Old Testament hymns of praise, and the documents before us, the title ' Saviour ' is invariably given in the New Testament to Christ. But the LXX frequently employs this term to translate two Hebrew words for salvation, when used (especially in the Psalms) as de- scriptions of God. We must not therefore ignore this Old Testament usage, while, at the same time, recognising that ' Saviour ' had become a prominent term in Hellenistic religion, more particularly in those phases of it which strove to meet the prevalent yearning for redemption. The important point in the present connection is that God, who is Himself the blessed (1 Tim. vi. 15),^ is the source of all blessedness, the ultimate author of salvation. Not » X Tim. i. 1, ii. 3, iv. 10 ; Tit. i. 3, ii. 10, iii. 4 ; Jude 25. * Holtzmaiui {op. cit., ii. p. 299) calls this the Christian application of the Greelj phrase, fidKapes deoi, ' the I ile'ised gods.' 240 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES only is this highest of all the Divine functions expressed by the title Saviour, but mention is made of ' the grace of God fraught with salvation,' of ' the graciousness and kind- ness of God,' of His ' pity,' of His desire for the salvation of all men.^ In this crucial matter the theology of the developing Church maintains inviolate the position of the earher days. AU the more noteworthy is the somewhat colourless use made of the profound conception of the Fatherhood of God. At no point has Paul more completely grasped the thought of Jesus than at this, and from beginning to end his Epistles thrill with wonder and adoration as he sets forth the glory of Christian sonship. Very rarely is God designated ' Father ' in our documents,^ and the name is more or less formal, as ia the stereotjrped epistolary address (1 Tim. i. 2 ; 2 Tim. i. 2 ; Tit. i. 4). As constantly in the Apostolic Fathers, it is found in 2 Pet. i. 17 in corre- spondence with a statement regarding the Son. The usage of James is also instructive as revealing the intimate con- nection of thought between this stratum of Christian literature and the contemporary non-canonical books. In i. 27 and iii. 9, the title ' Father ' appended to the Divine name seems little more than an element in the traditional designation current in the Church. But when (i. 17) he calls God ' the Father of the heavenly lights,' he shows that already the idea of Fatherhood was being identified with that of Creation. This identification appears con- tinually in Philo, and notably in 1 Clement, who speaks of 'the Creator and Father of the ages' (xxxv. 3), and of the ' Father and framer of the entire universe ' (xix. 2). These phenomena indicate that the iatimacy of that view of God which Paul had learned from Jesus was, in spite of the recognition of the Divine grace in salvation, giving place to a more detached conception, which, in the sub- apostoKc epoch, finds characteristic expression in the • Tit. ii. 11, iii. i ; 1 Tim. i. 2 j 2 Tim. i. 2 ; Tit. iii. 5 ; Jude 2 ; 1 Tim. ii. 4, iv. 10 ; 2 Pet. iii. 9. * Once in each of the Pastorale, 2 Peter, and Jude, and thrice in James. m.] THEOLOGY OP THE DEVELOPING CHURCH 241 term ' ruler ' (Seo-iroTjjs),^ Clement's favourite designation of God. (/) The Law of Liberty We have observed that in the period under review ' good works ' may almost be called the badge of a Christian career. But the iateresting question emerges : How is a Christian convert to know what will satisfy the require- ments ? What precisely is to constitute the standard of his new activity ? It has already become clear that a certain body of teaching, authenticated by the leaders of the Church, was recognised as the test of an adequate Christianity, of that piety which embraced both doctrine and conduct. But it was easier, probably, to agree upon a general confession, of faith than to give authoritative directions for the complex situation which must confront immature members of the Christian society in their daily duties. In the earlier days, the enthusiasm of the new life in Christ would overcome many difficulties by means of its inherent vigour. As the Church settled down iato the forms of an organised institution, a more stereotyped condition of things must inevitably arise. The originality of a decisive Christian experience would frequently be lacking. The sense of a need of definite training in morahty would be enhanced. But those who had entered the Church from Judaism, in the Diaspora as well as in Palestine, brought with them the tradition of such a training, and so did the many proselytes from heathenism who came to Christianity by way of the synagogue. They were all imbued with the idea of a rule of life embodied ia that moral Law which was the revelation of the will of God. On the other hand, the ethical revival which was operating in the Hellenistic-Roman world had as its chief watchword, ' conformity to law, whether the law of nature or the law of God.' 2 Now, in proportion as the profound ideas of the Gospel shaped by the rich and unique experience of ' In these post-Pauline writings it is not applied to God, but, what is more remarkable, in two passages (Jude 4, 2 Pet. ii. 1) to Christ. 2 M'GiSert, ChrisHanity in the Apostolic Age, p. 450. 242 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. Paul were less securely grasped in the Christian com- munity, and the founding of faith in Uving fellowship with Christ and the outworking of its energies as the product of an inner Divine life in the soul became obscured to the average mind, the conception of a definite code of precepts was bound to assert its influence. The claims of the ritual side of the Law were no longer dominant. Its moral injunctions alone were in question, but forces had been operative even in the eariiest phase of the Christian society which might easily raise these in- junctions to a controlhng place in its later development. To minds disciplined by a legal system, the fresh and, in many aspects, revolutionary interpretation of it given by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount might weU appear the promulgation of a new Law for the Messianic community. There can be little doubt that this was the actual position taken in the Mother-Church at Jerusalem. Ordinances which Jesus had not dealt with retained their vaUdity, even although these were in real conflict with the prin- ciples He ha;d enunciated. It required Paul's marvellous spiritual intuition to discern the perilous issues which such an attitude involved. He it was who rescued the Christian mission from the bondage of Jewish legalism. But he himself recognised the necessity of a moral standard. And we have an instructive example of his teaching on the subject in Gal. v. 14 : ' The whole law is fulfilled in one saying, namely this : Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.' Here, as always, he identifies himself with the teaching of Jesus in Mark xii. 28-31. It may therefore be taken for granted that Jesus' restatement of the earlier ethical code continued to have absolute authority in the expanding Church. Now as the memory of Paul's burning controversy with his Jewish -Christian brethren faded, the prejudice roused against the Jewish Law in many heathen-Christian communities would disappear. In typi- cally Jewish sections it had never existed. Hence, not only the tradition of Jesus' ethical principles but the moral code of Judaism must soon have asserted its claims. m.] THEOLOGY OF THE DEVELOPING CHURCH 2-13 Appeal could be made to Paul himself in such statements as Rom. vii. 12 : ' The law is holy, and the commandment holy and righteous and good.' Yet a very interesting instance of the position adopted in our period, which occurs in 1 Tim. i. 5 S., shows that the acknowledgment of the Law meant something different from that of the earUer time. ' The aim of the Christian discipline is the love that springs from a pure heart, from a good conscience, and from a sincere faith. Certain individuals have failed here by turning to empty argument : doctors of the Law is what they want to be. . . . Now I am quite aware that " the Law is admirable " provided that one makes a lawful use of it : he must keep in view that no law is ever made for honest people, but for the lawless and the insubordinate, for the impious and the sinful.' * This is essentially Paul's view, and can in no real sense be called legalism. Perhaps the standpoint of the Epistle of James indicates a somewhat closer approximation to the Judaistic position. James virtually describes the content of the Christian message as ' the perfect law, the law of freedom ' (i. 25), and the context shows that the claim of compassion is chiefly before his thoughts. The injunction, ' Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself,' he describes as the ' royal {i.e. supreme) law.' * After emphasising the danger of an inadequate standard of conduct, he reminds his readers that they are to be judged by ' the law of freedom ' (ii. 12), and as an example of what he means, he refers to the obUgation of kindness : ' The judgment will have no mercy on the man who showed none, whereas the merciful spirit will triumph in the face of judgment ' (ii. 13, partly M.). And then he proceeds to challenge a conception of faith which fails in deeds of loving service. Primarily these passages show that his mind is saturated with Jesus' teaching on love.^ While he describes the obUgation of • So Dr. Moflatt admirably translates the passage. ' ii. 8 : plainly, like Paul in Gal. v. 14. he has in view the teaching of Jesus in Mark xii. 31, llntt. xxii, 40. * Ci. IV. 11, 12, where the Law is associated with tie very same ciroie of ideas. 244 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. love as a ' law,' he deliberately sets in the forefront the spirit of freedom and spontaneity with which it is fulfilled, taking for granted that the Christian has inwardly iden- tified himself with its principles, so that, as the Epistle of Barnabas strikingly expresses it, ' the new law of our Lord Jesus Christ is freed from the yoke of compulsion ' (ii. 6). Nevertheless in such an atmosphere as that of the close of the apostohc and the beginning of the sub-apostohc age, when the Church was confronted by a definitely antinomian movement, larger conceptions of the La^w like that of James and Barnabas were bound to give place to something more formal and restricted. It is interesting, indeed, to notice that the writers with whom we are con- cerned prefer, as a rule, to speak of ' commandment,' ' perhaps to avoid confusion with the Mosaic Law. But as soon as the idea of keeping commandments begins to overshadow the spontaneity of a spiritual life which receives its ethical impulses from its relation to Christ, the way is prepared for that new legahsm of which we have so significant an example in the first ten chapters of the Didache. (gf) Eschatological Outlook It would be an exaggeration to say that in the reUgious thought of the developing Church salvation is regarded as the reward of obedience to the Divine commandments. We have seen that it continues to be viewed under its Pauline aspect as a gift of God's loving-kindness. Yet the tendency to such a position appears here and there, e.g. 2 Pet. i. 10, 11 : ^ 'If you exercise these quahties, you cannot stumble : rather will you be richly furnished with the right of entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.' The words remind us that the gaze of these Christians was eagerly turned towards the future, in which eternal life and blessedness awaited them. No wonder that their leaders urged them to make sure of the high vocation to which they had been called. » E.g. 1 Tim. vi. 14 ; 2 Pet. ii. 21. » Cf. 1 Tim. vi. 14. m.] THEOLOGY OF THE DEVELOPING CHIJRCH 245 Their predominant conception of salvation may be described as Eternal Life. The idea is familiar from the letters of Paul. There it appears with a rich variety of content, always closely associated with the possession of the Spirit or the indwelling of Christ in the soul. For Paul too the conception has a strongly eschatological character, which accords with the entire trend of his reUgious thought. But his personal history has re-shaped the idea, which was already current in Jewish escha- tology, in the direction of laying marked emphasis upon it as a present experience known and enjoyed, whose consummation belongs to the final estabhshment of the Kingdom of God. An examination of the usage in our documents shows that for them the eschatological aspect of Eternal life is paramount. Sometimes it is described as a hope and a promise. Sometimes the picture is that of a prize awarded to the victor in a hard contest. Again, it is the goal of faith and patience. And once, as synony- mous with immortaUty, it is declared to be the content of that good news which has been brought by Christ, the conqueror of death. ^ The more closely these Epistles are investigated, the more deeply embedded in their sub- stance does this conviction appear to be. Here we have the embodiment of the central faith of the universal Church. Perhaps its most prominent element is now that of immor- tahty. This feature is emphasised, even where there is no specific mention of eternal Ufe, as, e.g., when 2 Peter speaks of God's ' exceeding great and precious promises ' by which men ' may become partakers of the Divine nature, escaping the destruction created in the world by lust ' (i. 4) And its atmosphere is ' eternal glory ' (2 Tim. ii. 10). The kinship with Paul's thought is evident. Only, the con- ception is presented in a more superficial form, and lacks that profound sense of contrast with the old, sin-burdened nature which has been vanquished in the power of the Uving and life-giving Lord. > Tit. i. 2, iii. 7 ; 2 Tim. i. 1, 1 Tim. iv. 8 ; Jas. i. 12, 1 Tim. vi. 12; 1 Tim. i. 16, Jude 21 ; 2 Tim. i. 10. 246 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [M. In discussing the theology of Paul, we found that the expectation of the return of Christ formed a permanent part of his eschatological picture. It was based, as was then pointed out, ^jartly on the tradition of the Master's teaching, partly on the prophetic and apocalyptic forecasts of the coming of Messiah. In the earlier Pauline Epistles it stands in the forefront. Later, while always recognised, it remains side by side with convictions as to the experience of the Christian soul after death which are reallyindependent of it. That is to say, the Parousia, the resurrection, and the judgment continue to be grouped together as the great crisis of the end, but the deeper currents of Paul's spiritual life seem to demand a more immediate relation of the soul to Christ, to be realised as soon as the hampering conditions of the body are removed.* A similar variation of emphasis appears in the thought of the developing Church. Every- where the Messianic eschatology survives. An incidental evidence is, perhaps, the constant use of the term ' arrival ' (vapova-ia) to denote the return of Christ.^ Here attention is called, not so much to the second advent of the historical Jesus, as to the advent in glory and power of the Messiah,^ an expectation which is, of course, pledged by the redemp- tive career of Jesus. Hence no forecast of the End can dispense with the conception of the Parousia. Further, the conviction is general that Christians are living in ' the last days.' * But the relation of the close of the age to the return of Christ is variously conceived. There can be little question that the pressure of trial and temptation intensifies expectancy. Thus James can urge his brethren to be patient and to strengthen their hearts, ' for the arrival of the Lord is near' (v. 8). In the Pastorals the outlook is less definite. Krst Timothy speaks of ' the appearance of our Lord Jesus Christ which that blessed » See especially Phil. i. 23 ; 2 Cor. v. 8. » Jas. V. 7, 8 ; 2 Pet. i. 16, iii. 4, 12. The Pastoral Epistles prefer the typically Hellenistic term, iTi(f>dv€Lay ' manifestation,* * appearance,' which is really identical in meaning. ' James speaks of 'our Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Glory' (ii. 1). See on this whole question, Titius, op. cit., p. 31. « 2 Tim. iii. 1 ; Jus. v. 3 ; 2 Pet. iii. 3 ; Jude IS. m.] THEOLOGY OF THE DEVELOPING CHURCH 247 and only Sovereign will disclose at his own time ' (vi. 14, 15}. Here, without any speculation or feverish eagerness, the future is left in God's hands, while the Church is encouraged to go on with its work of consohdation. A similar impres- sion of unhasting quietness of mind is made by the description of Christians as Uving ' a life of self-control, righteousness, and piety in this present world, awaiting the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of the great God and of our Saviour Jesus Christ ' (Tit. ii. 12, 13). But a problem inevitably presented itself. As the days went on, devout souls, troubled by the apparent triumph of evil, must have been perplexed by the delay in the fulfil- ment of their expectation. No doubt the delay was used by vigorous natures as an incentive to watchfulness. But the question, which in 2 Pet. iii. 4 is put into the mouth of scoffers, ' Where is the promise of his advent ? ' must have found an echo in many a beheving heart. And the answer given by the writer indicates how such hearts were com- forted. He never falters as to the certainty of the crisis, which rests on the evidence of apostles (i. 16, 17, iii. 2) and has long since been predicted by the prophets (i. 19 ff.), yet he refrains from specific chronological forecasts. The day of the Lord will come suddenly, and it will bring destruction by fire upon the existing universe, even as of old the world of that day was destroyed by the deluge (iii. 6, 7). Here the author follows a tradition of the two- fold destruction of the world current in Judaism. * But the explanation of the delay is to be found in the nature of God. Men measure His processes by their limited ideas of time. ' With the Lord a thousand years are as one day ' (Ps. xc. 4, used, as in Jubilees iv. 30, by 2 Pet. iii. 8). It is nothing but His long-suffering. His desire that all * Windisch quotes interesting passages from the Vita Adae et Evae, 49, and Joseph. Ant. i. 2, 3, and refers to Sibylline Oraclea, iv. I72-1S2, v. IJiS- 161, 274 f., 612-631. Perhaps Isa. Ixvi. ISfi. should be added. The notion of a world-conflagration is widely diUused, being found not only ip Jewish sources, but in Persian eschatology, and in the Stoic doctrine of i(cviipii)(ni. Many scholars trace its origin to Babylon. See excursoa on 2 Pet. iii. 10 in Windisch, op. eit., p. 100. 248 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [ft. should repent before it is too late, which prompts Him to suspend the final crisis. (h) Influence of Heretical Movements It has been suggested in the course of the previous discussion that various phenomena in the theology of the developing Church were due to reaction against the influ- ence of heretical teachers. Reference was made to the emphasis on morality and the claims of a definite ethical standard as a protest against tendencies to moral laxity involved in their doctrines. These doctrines themselves must have helped to crystaUise the idea of a body of sound teaching, representing the authoritative Christian tradition handed down by the followers of Jesus and incorporated in confessions of faith which were required of candidates for admission to the Church. Piety, we saw, consisted in adherence to the well-attested apostoUc deposit of truth, and the Uving of a Hfe of worthy activity in accordance with the Gospel. Further, in our investigation of the current conception of God, it seemed possible to explain certain aspects of that conception as at least thrown into prominence by way of antithesis to positions which were being adopted by disloyal members of the Christian com- munity. Perhaps we may add that the departure from some of Paul's bolder and more original rehgious stand- points and the acceptance of a more eommonplace out- look may have had a real connection with dangerous exaggerations of such ideas as spiritual freedom and the boundless generosity of the Divine grace. And if, as there is reason for supposing. Gnostic influences are to be in- cluded among the perils of the Church of our period, it cannot be accidental that so large a place is assigned to the value of a true knowledge of Christ and the revelation of God which He has made. When we come, however, to examine the material presented by our Epistles for estimating the precise features of these heretica.1 movements, we pass into a m.i THEOLOGY OF THE DEVELOPING CHURCH 249 region of obscure hints and shadowy outlines. The chief reason is that the authors are concerned not with describing but with denouncing the false teachers. Their vague allusions would be quite clear to their readers. The terminology which is so opaque to us shone for them against a background which we cannot fully reconstruct. Still, a provisional attempt may be of value, and in making it let us start with the data whose interpretation cannot be doubted. First of all, it may be observed that the more important of the perils confronted appear throughout our literature. It is far more likely that this bears witness to a wide- spread group of tendencies than that it merely represents hterary dependence. Indeed we find traces of a similar movement in Paul's letter to the Church at Colossae. And we should probably be justified in supposing that the entire area of Hellenistic Christianity was exposed to its inroads. The most prominent phase of this aberration from the Gospel may be called Libertinism. Its adherents are ' impious persons who distort the grace of our God into immorality.' They are people ' seared in conscience,' who ' fall in with the polluting appetites of the flesh,' who ■ profess to know God, but by their deeds deny him.' * Here is a distortion of the meaning of salvation. Paul had taught that through the boundless grace of God men were raised above all the hampering restrictions of a reUgion of mere routine and endowed with a spiritual freedom responsible to God alone. But the apostle himself had to warn against a degeneration of that splendid hberty into licence. His warnings were being disregarded with fatal results. These false teachers promised freedom to their disciples, while they themselves were the slaves of corrup- tion (2 Pet. ii. 19). Now Irenseus, in describing those who claimed to have perfect knowledge, and were therefore called Gnostics {yviaa-nKoi), tells how they, as ' spiritual ' {TTvtvfjiaTiKOL) men, ' affirm that good conduct is necessary for us (i.e. Christians belonging to the Church, whom they • Jude i ; 1 Tim. iv. 2 ; 2 Pet. ii. 10 (M.) ; Tit. i. 16. 250 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [pt. called ' psychical,' or unspiritual) : otherwise it is im- possible to be saved. But they hold the doctrine that they themselves will be saved in any case, not because of their conduct, but because they are by nature spiritual. . . . And so, without fear, the most " perfect " among them perform all the forbidden things, regarding which Scripture declares that " those who do such things shall not inherit the Kingdom of God." ' ^ Surely this is precisely the standpoint which Jude has in view when he speaks fver. 19) of ' the people who draw sharp distinctions {i.e. Detween themselves and others), unspiritual {^fyvxiKoi), not pos- sessing the Spirit.' Just because they deUberately indulge their lusts,* they give the lie to the title of ' spirit-possessed ' which they arrogantly claim, and earn the name of ' un- spiritual ' which, in contempt, they assign to others. The Pastoral Epistles contain hints of this exclusive standpoint. Thus 1 Timothy speaks of ' the God who desires all men to be saved,' and of ' the living Grod, the Saviour of all men.' ^ The emphasis is noteworthy. Moreover, Timothy is warned against ' the profane jargon ... of what is falsely called knowledge ' (vi. 20, M.). Throughout our documents vague allusions are found to the contents of this profane jargon. It is connected with the study of ' myths and interminable genealogies.' * No more apt description could be given of the material used in Gnostic speculation. It has constructed a genuine mythology of cosmological principles, many of them literally derived from earUer mythological systems." It might be rash to explain the genealogies as referring to the Gnostic doctrine of emanations. But apart from that, there is evidence of their eagerness in tracing the descent of those half-personified principles which are central in their scheme of the imiverse. Confusion has been brought into the discussion of this > Contra Omn. Haer. i. vi. 2, 3 (ed. Stieren). ' ' With their immoral practice a definite theory went hand in baud * (Hollmaun, Die Sckriften d. N. T.,' ii. p. 571). ' ii. 4, iv. 10. * 1 Tim. i. 4 (M.) ; 2 Tim. iv. 4 ; Tit. I. 14, iii. 9 ; 2 Pet. i. 16. • See, e.g., Bousset, Hauptproblente d. Gnosis, pp. 9-21, 83 S., 160.176, 223-237, 320-322. m.] THEOLOGY OF THE DEVELOPING CHURCH 251 subject by the attempt to explain it completely from a Jewish point of view.^ Recent research has shown how Gnostic movements assimilated elements from every type of Oriental reUgion, and not least from the Jewish.^ Strange hybrid sects were the characteristic phenomenon of this age of religious syncretism. Some of these had their roots in Judaism.^ Now the obverse side of the Libertinism mentioned above appears from our Epistles to have been a rigid asceticism. This of course accords with one of the fundamental tenets of Gnosticism, the dualistic theory that matter is incurably evil. On that assumption the body and its passions may be ignored as matters of indiffer- ence : hence the indulgence of fleshly lusts as lying wholly apart from the realm of spirit. Or on the other hand, all that is material may be subjected to the severest discipline. Thus the seared in conscience of 1 Tim. iv. 2 are also men ' who prohibit marriage and insist on abstinence from foods which God created for believing men ' (iv. 3, M.). ' For the pure all things are pure, but nothing is pure for the polluted and unbelieving' (Tit. i. 15). It is plain that a theory of asceticism could be powerfully buttressed by the Jewish Law. And our documents supply evidence that the false teachers aimed at interpreting the Law, that it entered into the controversies which they had stirred up.* Furthermore, we hear of ' insubordinate creatures who impose on people with their empty arguments, particularly those who have come over from Judaism ' (Tit. i. 10, M.). So that there is reason for regarding the heretical movement assailed in these Epistles as being a widely diffused phase of incipient Jewish-Christian Gnosticism, revealing, on its ascetic side, traces of kinship with the similar movement attacked by Paul in his letter to the Colossians.^ ' So, e.g., Hort, Judadstic GhrinUamty, pp. 132-146. " See, e.g., Bousset, op. cit., pp. 194-202, 324-328. ' See Curaont, Les Religiuna Orientalea,^ pp. xx, 94, 182, 367 (n. 69). * 1 Tim. i. 7 ; Tit. iii. 9. * The curious medley of elements in these speculations is brought out by the fact that, while in the Colossian heresy angel-worship is prominent (Col. ii. 18), one of the features of this later phase is a contempt for angelic powers (Jude 8-10; 2 Pet. ii. 10-12) 252 THE THEOLOGY OF THE EPISTLES [PT. (») Hellenistic Colouring Attention has been called at isolated points to the impact of Hellenistic thought and feehng on the theology of the developing Church. It lies beyond our scope to deal with the large and complex problem of the range and ultimate issues of such impact. To attempt any estimate we should require to cover a wide area of early Christian hterature. But the material which directly concerns us brings into view the atmosphere in which nascent Christianity was obliged to construct its religious thought. That it does so by unconscious hints makes it all the more valuable for our purpose. A pecuUarity of the vocabulary of our Epistles is the occurrence of various typically Hellenistic terms which either do not appear at all, or ivith extreme rarity, in the rest of the New Testament. The regular word used in the Pastorals for the ' appearing ' of the exalted Christ in glory {iiridvfiav) of the great God and of our Saviour {a-oiT^pos) Christ Jesus,' an inscription of Ephesus ^ which celebrates Julius Csesar while still alive as ' the god . . . who has appeared {(TTKftavr]) , the universal saviour (cnoTTjpa) of the life of men.' The combination with ' Saviour ' is noteworthy, and reminds us of the significant fact that this word, so prominent in Hellenistic religious usage, occurs no less than sixteen times within the short compass of our docu- ' See Dittenberger, Orientis Oraecae InscripHones Selectae, i. 90, n. 19. ' Dittenberger, Sylloge,' 347, 6. m.] THEOLOGY OF THE DEVELOPING CHURCH 253 ments, while Paul has only two instances of it. In this connection we may mention another typical term of the Hellenistic milieu, which in Tit. iii. 4 is associated with the ' appearing ' of the Saviour, namely, the Divine ' kindness ' The opening paragraph of 2 Peter reflects the Hellenistic atmosphere of the author's thoughts in every sentence. In setting forth the ethical requirements of the Christian's rehgious life, he heaps up characteristic quahties of the highest contemporary ideal, ' virtue ' {dpertj), ' knowledge " (yvcuo-is), 'self-control' (lyKjodreta), 'piety' (ev(re/3eia). It has already been pointed out that piety may almost be called the watchword of the Pastoral Epistles. No less remarkable is the Hellenistic strain in the Epistle of James. This appears not merely in arresting expressions like ' the wheel of existence ' (iii. 6), which is common to our author with late Greek philosophical commentators such as SimpHcius and Proclus, and the metaphors used in iii. 3, 4, but in a large number of striking parallels to PMlo and the Alexandrian Wisdom of Solomon, in cases where these are indebted to the Hellenistic culture of their time.^ And here it may be observed that Alexandrian Judaism has evidently been an important medium of Greek influence for our group of documents.' Even more suggestive than the use of special Hellenistic terms is the appearance of typical ideas. Thus in 2 Pet. i. 4 the bestowal of the priceless promises of God has for its aim the participation of those who receive them in the Divine nature {Oeias Koivmvol <^v'ov^(reo)s). Philo, who quotes these words verbatim (De Fv^a et Invent. 63), is engrossed with the idea, and follows his master in such a passage as De Migrat. Abrah. 9 : ' Depart then from the earthly element that encompasses you, and flee with all your might and main from that accursed prison, the body, and its pleasures and desires which may be called your jailors.' He speaks also of souls ' rooted to the earthly body which, when purified, are able to soar on high, exchanging earth for heaven and destruction ((l>9opdv) for immortaUty.' * Here is the atmosphere of our passage, apart from its Christian adaptation, and the emphasis which our author lays on knowledge * as the pathway to blessedness finds a direct parallel in Philo's doctrine that immortaUty is attained by knowledge of the Divine essence.* > Windisch gives this and other instances in his admirable note on 2 Pet i. 4. « Quis Rer. Div. Her., 239. • E.g. i. 2, 3, 8, ii. 20, iii. 18. * See Windisch, Die Frommigkeit Philoa, pp. 4-8. ni.] THEOLOGY OP THE DEVELOPING CHURCH 255 Finally, the ethical ideal of high-minded natures in con- temporary Hellenism is mirrored in the description given by Tit. ii. 12 of the aim which God's redeeming love sets before men, ' to renounce impiety and worldly lasts and to hve in self-control (o-ux^/jdvws), and righteousness (StKaiws), and piety (tv