^' "% PRINCETON. N. J. /«, •S-A % Presented by~Y^Tl2.^\C\ey'<^\^^CAW or^ liiTi.uon 1880 jEdDXfi® ////rt'af fiom^: WHO WAS JESOS ? BY EEY. CHAELES F. DEEMS, D.D., LL.D., PASTOU OF THE CiaRCH OF THE STRANGERS, NEW YORK. AUXnOR OF THE HOME ALTAR," "WEIGHTS AND WINGS," ETC. NEW YORK : J. HOWARD BROWN, 21 Park Place. London: R. D. DICKINSON. Copyright, 1880, by C. F. Deems. PREFACE TO THE NEW EDITION. Test years ago a publishing house in New York issued a book with the simple title, "Jesus." It was a volume prepared expressly at the publisher's request. I had spent three years in the writing of the book, and had done the work conscientiously. No hope of gain held my heart one minute in the whole course of its preparation. It was not expected nor desired that it should make "a sensation." It was designed by its author to be as near the truth in all points as he was able to make it, and, he will candidly confess that he expected the book to live. In this expectation he has not been disappointed. Very slowly, but very surely it has gained its way without any special effort upon the part of the author or the publisher to push it. It has been republished in England under the title, "Who Was Jesus V " This title is now assumed for the American edition. It has gained the approval of a large number of the most learned and competent critics, the verdict of any one of whom is more satisfactory than any ephemeral applause that arises from uned- ucated minds excited by some picturesqueness of style. It has been a gratification to learn that the book has had its influence on pulpits in England and America, and on some writings concerning its great (Sub- ject, since it was published. But now the work appears to be attracting increased attention— so much so that its present publisher informs me that he is about to put a large edition to press, and desires a new preface. I have nothing to say which can modify the statements made in the original preface ; but it was my good fortune last year to visit almost every point mentioned in the history of Jesus. So careful had been my study in the preparation of the book that I found little in Palestine to compel me to make corrections in the text as originally published. Some slight changes I have introduced, especially into what had been written in regard to the illustrations in the volume. There is, however, one point upon which I would speak in this new preface : it is in regard to the site of Golgotha. (ill) 17 PREFACE. "Whilp I was in Jorusalcm nothing interested me so much asthisqnes- tion. I liail given it very careful study from l>ooks, but was quite ready to have my couchisions overtlirown and re-write that portiuii of tlie vol- ume if a new edition were ever demanded. The second day after my arrival at the Holy City I supposed that I should have this to do. As soon as I was able to walk, after a tempo- rary lameness, not stopping to consult authorities and remind myself of the changes of names, I went down the Via Dolorosa and out at tlie St. Stephen's gate. When I looked around me I felt lost and, I must say, most sadly disappointed. The modern St. Stephen's gate is in the east wall and looks over the valley of Jehoshaphat, up tlie slopes of Olivet. Continuing my walk around the north-east angle of the wall, the moment I turned it 1 s;iw what seemed to me to be the place which should be Calvary. It grew upon me so that I spent several hours examining tlic spot and re-entered tlie city by the Damascus gate. Upon consulting a copy of my book, now in possession of the Right Rev. the Anglican liisliop of Jerusalem, I found that this spot which I liad discovered in the morning was precisely the spot which I had described in my volume ten years ago. The gates have changed their names. The old St. Ste- l)iien's gate is now the Damascus gate, and the new St. Stephen's gate is .sometimes also called the Gate of Lions. There was no day of my stay in Jerusalem of which I did not give a portion to the study of localities connected with this question. If tliere be anything which, it seems to me, approaches certainty in topography, it is this : that the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, so called, is not on the site of Golgotha. The locality fixed in this book may not be correct, b»it every argument that can be brought against it does, a fortiori, dis- credit the claim of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre; whereas, the theory which selects the hill over the Grotto of Jeremiah, whatever dilli- ctdties it has, does more than any otlier to meet all the requirements in the case. If no one had ever read the passage in the New Testament describing it, and were to come up suddenly round the north-east angle of the wall, it seems to me he would be struck with the resemblance of the iiill to the shaiM» of a huge skull. The Evangelist says it was a place called ''skull." The north wall of the city here is very high; but this Iiill is not more than a foot lower than the top of the wall, which is hero built upon natural r«iek, which rises higlier than at any other place between St. Stephen's gate and the Dama.scus gate. The top of the hill over the Grotto of Jeremiah can be seiii from all the houses In the north- west i>ortion of the city, and perhaps from the whole city, as the walla PREFACE. were in the clays of Christ. From the top of my hotel, which was near the Pool of Hezekiah, the entire hill was visible. The roads from the north and east pass it, and must have passed it in the days of Christ to reach any gate known to history. It looks down on the eminences that look down on the Clinrch of the Holy Sepulchre. An execution at the latter place probably would not have been very public, but from the hill over the so-called Grotto of Jeremiah it could have been seen from all quarters. The surroundings of this spot contain remains such as we should expect to find in the neighborhood of the spot mentioned by the Evangelists ; and this is not an insignificant fact. I confess to a gtatification in having a reasonable conviction that the place where Jesus died is not covered by the Church of the Holy Sepul- chre, now a most degraded spot, in which foolish rites are performed by filthy monks, whose fanaticism is restrained from deeds of open violence by the presence of INIohammedan soldiers, who are much more respecta- ble persons than the wretched Greek and Latin representatives of 'the name and teachings of Jesus. CHARLES F. DEEMS. " Church of the Strangers," New York, February 12, 1881. A PREFACE IMPORTANT TO BE READ BEFORE GOING FORWARD. The author of this book has not been deterred from his "work by the flippant remarks occasionally made in regard to writing a Life of Jesus, as if it were a senii-profane attempt to improve upon the Evangelists. Those who make such suggestions ought neither to preach sermons nor wi'ite pastoral letters, lest they be suspected of an ambition to " improve " upon the Sermon on the Mount or the Epistles of Paul. The law which an author sets to himself in the composition of a book must be known before proper criticism can begin. If this volume, or any portion of it, be jiidged as if I had attempted a Life of Christy the most gi'ievous misapprehension of the volume and its author may be made. It is no more such a book than it is a volume of sermons or of poems. It carefidly abstains from being a Life of Christ. A Life of Christ necessarily starts with the assumption that Jesus was Christ. It must be dogmatic, and can be useful mainly to Christians. I have assumed no sucli thing. Nor have I assumed in this book that the original biographers, the four Evangelists and Paul, were inspired. I simply assume that their books are as trustworthy as those of Herodo- tus and Xenophon, of Tacitiis and Caesar. They write about the man Jesus, who was the son of IVIary. They preserve Meviorahilia of his acts and words. I deal with these evangelic biographers as I would with those classic authors. I strive to make a harmonious narrative from their records, and to ascertain what was the consciousness of Jesus as he performed each act and spoke each word, according to the laws of thought so far as they are known to me. This book must not be judged from any theologic stand-point. If my views of theology are of any importance, they must be sought in my Sermons, not here. vii Vm PREFACE. There will be foxmd in this book a new translation of the sayings of Jesus. The ordinary rule in such cases is, not to make a literal render- ing of each word by its synonym in the tongue into which it is trans ferred, but, to represent the idioms of one language by those of another. I have departed from that canon, because all who read this book will have in their hands the Common Version, wliich, generally, does that work for them. The translations here furnished differ from those in tlie Common Version, in beiiig usually almost strictly literal, and they have been purposely made so, that such of my readers as ai-e unacquainted with the original may liave an opportunity to comi>are a literal with an idiomatic version. My renderings from the Greek must be judged by scholars in the light of this statement. The language emjiloyed by Jesus was what is called the Palestinian Aramaic, which is also called Hebrew by early ecclesiastical writers, ac- cording to Pajtias, Ireuajus, Origen, Eusebius, and Jerome. Matthew's Gosjiel was written in that language. Matthew may have written also the Greek version of his own Gospel. The books of Mark, and Luke, and John were wiitten in Greek, a language which it is prob- able Jesus sometimes employed. The autographs of these four books ore supposed to have perished, and so probably have all the copies made in the first throe centuries. In addition to the usual causes for the di.sai)pearance of books, we may mention in this case the tho- rough manner in which were executed the decrees of Diocletian in the beginning of the fourth century (February, a.d. 303) for the destruction of all the sacred books of the Christians, for the purpose of extii'imting " the superstition," as he called it. Notwithstanding the severe penal- ties which impelled every magistrate to execute those decrees, some cofyes escaped the flames. The Diocletian pei-secution closed a.d. 313. Constantine, the first Chri.stian Emperor, ascended the throne a.d. 324. In a.d. 328 he re- called Eusebius, who liad been banished, and, in a lettci* which Eusebius quotes in his Life of Constantine, the Emperor directed him to cause ** fifty copies of the Sacred Scriptures to be written on prepared parch- ment, in a legible manner, and in a commodious and poi-table form, by transcribers thoroughly jtractised in the art." The completion of this work Constantine acknowledged in a subsequent letter to Eusebius. PREFACE. IX One of those copies, or perliaps the oklest copy of one of them, is tho property of the Emperor of Russia. It is called the Codex Simdticiis, because foujid in a convent on Mount Sinai, by Tischendovf, a leaiiud German. That copy, being the oldest extant, is tho basis of my tiuubla- tion. "Whenever, therefore, the reader finds any of the -words of Jt-svin in this book different from those in the common version, he will uudci- stand that he is carried nearer to the fountain-head of the Jesus-literatiux-. The difference in the characteristics of the four authors, coimuonly called The Evangelists, is worthy of note. Matthew was a practical man of business ; Mark was an aesthetic obsei'ver ; Luke had a scieutiiio bias, and Jghn was devoutly metaphysical. We are permitted to sue Jesus as he presented himself to four such students of liis acts and char- acter. Our skill is to be exercised in combining their imjn-essions. 1 1 is a gi-eat advantage to have a subject placed in so many different lights Jesus was the Founder of a Faith. He Kved centuries ago. The most diverse claims have been made for his person and his teachings. Almost every saying of his has become the basis of a dogma. It will not be wonderful, then, that historians couie upon actions and utterances af his which involve difficulties. Some of these are still difficulties to me. In such cases I have frankly said, " I do not understand this." So would it be, I think, -with any other honest student and fail- writer. By tliis candor I cannot lose the esteem of tliose whose esteem is worth having. But, I have not avoided the hard places. Tinnd readeis may wish I had. AVherever there seemed to me to be an explanation, I havu given it. It may satisfy some. It may lead others to discover what is more satisfactory to themselves. In no case, I believe, will unlearned readex'S of good sense be perjjlexed, and in no case, I trust, will scliulars be scandalized. There has been no ambition to appear learned. To those who are not acquainted mth the languages in which the Evangelists wrote, or the languages in which learned men have conuuented on these works, I li;i\e endeavored to make the way plain by all needed heli)S. Nor luus theie been an ambition of originality. AMieiuver I have used the labors of others I have given credit, so far as 1 rt-cullect. If any fdlure on tliis point has occurred, it has been througli inadvertence. To re])aii- that, and to send students to the sources of my own stream of information, X PREFACJE. I have supi)lied a list of the books used iii the preparation of this vol- ume. I have read up in the literature of the subject as well as I could* All writers on this subject have difficulty with the chronology. In til is book the terminal points of birth and death, I think, are trustwor- tliy, especially the latter ; but many of the incidents in the life have been arranged in an order which I have seen reason to change several times. The result of my investigation is the conviction that it is not now in the jiower of human skill to arrange a harmony of the facts in tliia biogi-aphy, which should be positively asserted to be the precise order in which tliey occurred. Here and there are some that we know preceded one the other. There can be no doubt as to the order of the Baptism, the Temjitation, the Sermon on the Mount, the Transfiguration, etc., but minor incidents puzzle every chronologer. The gi-oupings in this book, as it goes to the ])rinter, are the last result of my most careful study, and have been adopted in no instance simply for picturesque effect. In the preparation of these pages I am sure that there has been no am- bition of novelty ; but I have not been afraid of new things, nor has any opinion commended itself to me because it was old. On the other hand, novelty has been no recommendation and antiquity no disparagement. I have sought to know the truth. When I believed I had found it, I \\Tote it, and now jiublish it without stopping to inquire whether these honest opinions will please or displease, or whether they put Jesus at an advantage or a disadvantage. In this I have sought to imitate the spirit Rnd style of the Evangelists. A man would be sadly stupid who should spend some years on a subject which, more than any other, has engi'ossed the study of thoughtful men, without improving the opinions he formed in earlier lifi; on Kss invt-stigation. The jivepanition of this book haa l»o. — Family of Herod, 5fi. — His will, 5S. — His funeral. .5S. — Ai-ehclans. 58. — Troubles in settling the succession, .58. — Snbiinis, ail. — Varus, (10. — An helans confirmed, (ill. — Tlu- p.-^'udo-Alexander, (>1. — Cyreniiis, (12. — The revolt under Judas, (12. — Menahem. (i;i. — Ciipniiins. ('>.'i. — The Samaritans pollute the Temple, I'^i. — I'ontins Pilate outrages the Jews, (1-1. — Tacitus and Joscphus speak of Jesus, (iS. Galilkk. Herod Antii)a.s G^. — In love with Ilerodias, GO. — QnaiTcls with Pilate, (Mi. — Herodias, U(i — Character of Herod Antipas, 07. The Chuuch. The High-priesthood, (i7. — Caiaphas and Annas, (i7. — The Sanhedrim, 08. The Sects. The Pharisees, 71. — The Sailducees, 71. — The Es.senes, 72. — The lleroilians, 72. PART II. INTRODUCTION OF JBSUS TO HIS PUBLIC MINISTRY. IFrojn A.I). 20 Co A. I). 27. About one year.'] CHAl'TER I. JOHN'S PREACHING AND MINISTRY. "The Baptist" opens the wny for Jesns, 73. — Elijah. 73. — John's consecration, 74. — His ministrj-, Ta. — Sul)-;tance of his discourses: Repentjince, 77. — Against formalism and scepticism, 78. — An- nciiiiii-es a coming kingdnm, 7'.1. — Announces the presence of the ruler, 80. — His bapti-sm, 80. — Hiu ministry not peruuineutly effective, 82. CHAPTER II. JESUS DESIGNATED AT HIS BAPTISM BY JOHN. Jesus co"~es to be baptized by John, S4. — Why Jes\is was baptized, S-1. — Cert.iin mistakes 8-1. — John's previous anpiaintani-e with Jesus 80. — .lohn deoric«, 91 — S<>nso of liJK hnmnnity in Jesus, '.15. — ExciU-nicnt of Jcsnn at bin buplisiii, Utj. — The collapse, 'M, — H;k immitivi: ^'ivi-ri hiimniily, '.«. Batan, 1)8. — liU-ii of .Sntnn iiol pn-poiitrnntu, !>S. — Rational probaWlities of the existence of Patan, Ofl, lOtl.— SiitiiM of JifiUH not JfwiKh. 100.— The Jewish iiU-a not IVrsiiin. lOO.— The Satiin of Joh, 101. — <»f Diiviil. ml.— Of the ChronicleR, 101.— Of Zechariah, lUl.— What Jesus believed about th« tenipt;ition. lUi. Firnt tenipiiition, "the Inst of the flesh," 10.3. — Second temptation, "the lurt of the eye," 10-'5. — Third U'inptiitioM, "the pride uf life." 104. — Assault on the SlesKiah side of Jesus, 105. — Satan's admis- sion, U'5. Ministry of onceK lOf?. — Anpels the hiphest creatures, IOC. — Their power, 107. — Their activity, 107. —Their inlellipi-nce, 107.— Their holinexs, lll«.— Their numbers, lOS Agents of Goil, 109.— "The Angel of Jehovah," 109. — The angcU miuibter to Jesus HI. CnAPTER IV. THE FinST DISCIPLEa Committee from the Sanhedrim, 112.— John's testimony to Jesus, 112,— "The Lamb of God," 11.3, — rirst two disj-iplcs, ll-'{. — Andrew and John, 111.— Simon (IVter). 11-1. — Philip, 115,— Nathanael, 115.— "The Sou of Man," IIS,— Thesou of David, 1 1'.l.- Bartholomew, 119, CUAPTER V. n« CANA AND CAPEnXArM. Cana of Onlllce, 120.— The flrrt miracle, 120.— The most memorable weddinfr, 121.— The mother of Jexua, 122. — The watcr-potn, 12.3. — The niirucle, 121. — The lesstm, 125. — A vinil to Capernaum, 12Sw TART III. FnOM THE FIRST TO THE SECOND PASSOVER IN TIIE PUBLIC LIFE OF JE8XJ3. [One year: pr«b. 27, to April, A D. 28.] CHAPTER L CLEANSING THE TE>rPLl?. The broVers cTpelled by Jp«ns, 127. — His authority demanded, 127. — Reply of Jesus, 128. — The Tenv pie, 12j^. — I'liiurnl national rciMlleetious, 129. — Retort of the Jews, l.'iO. — The nation shocked, 130. — The resurrecllontliouiiliL, 1-31. — An Appeal, 1.31. — Jc-sus had no "policy," 132. CHAPTER IL KIcodemus, 13.3.— His address. 131.— Its caution, i:i5.— Reply of Josns, 13.^.— M l.'Jfi. — "The Kingdom of tioiL" i:;*i. — Nieo ond "wind," 1-1(1.— Surpri-^- of Nic<)7 —Return of the disci- Jite«, 157. — ArrivuU from the city, 158. — Satiinritain ide^is of the Messiah, 158. CHAPTER IV, FROM BAMARIA TO OALILEE. lams begins to preach, KiO. — Hi-als the nobleman's son. Ifil.— In Na7j\reth, 1f!2. — The synneoffiie, ir.2. — Its inllui'Mi-e, ll'k3. — Its oftlcers, ICh').— lis service, H'hl.— Jesus reiuls from Isaiuh, lt(5. — He shirks their )irejndic«T«, IPki. — He is dnven from Nazareth, It'iCi. — Make.4Ca|>cmauin his headipi.-ir- tt:nt, l'''7.--I)ei«ns, 174.— The oiipoxinu tbuory, wiUi Ita n«M)Ds, 170. — Most proboUlu Uu^tirv, 179. — A demonUu: cureil in the syiiaKORue, 179 CONTENTS. 3CV CHAPTEE VI. THE FIllST TOUR OF GALILEE. Jesus heals Siiimn's mother-in-law, ISl.— Exhausuvo I'llucts on Jesus, 1^2.— Jesus travels in G^ee, 1S.J — The leprosy, IS."!.— Supposed to be incurable. 1S5.— Jesus heals a leper. ISO.— Ihe sufferei and the healer, 1S7.- Jesus withdraws from the publie, 1S'.».— Heals u paral.nio. 1^;9.— Importance of a word, 190.— An awful claim, 190.— Call of Matthew. 191.— .\ratthew-s feast, 192.— John s di* ciplea object, 193.— The Old and the New, 191.— lUustrations, 19,i.— Jesus the dividing line of his- tory, lUtJ. PAPwT IV. FEOM THE SECOND UNTIL THE THIRD l'ASSO\Ti:E IN THE PUBLIC MINISTRX OF JESUS. [From A.D. 28 to A.D. 29. One year.] CUAPTEU I. THE SABBATH QUESTION. The House of Outpom-ii>e. 198.— The impotent man. 2UU.— Ciured on the Sabbath, 200.— The Sabbath before Moses, 201.— The Sabbath in the Decaiojrue, 202.— IW les.sons. 20-3. —Pharisaic exactions, 204.— Jesus never broke the Sabbath \nw, 20.5.— His reply to accusations, 206. — Itemarkable dis- course, 200. — Jesus no egotist, 209. — The battle begun, 210. CHAPTER IL THE SABBATH QUESTION AGAIN. The disciples In the erain-ficld. 211.— The example of David, 211.— Example of the priests 212.— Key to the Sabbath-idea, 212.— The battle continued, 21-J. — Question of healing on the Sabbath, 213. — A counter-question, 2M. — An ad liomiiiem (piestion, 215. — The cure of the withered haiul, 215. — The Herodiaus, 21ti.— Crowds foUow Jusus, 210. — A movable pulpit, 217. CHAPTER IIL THE TWELVE. A crisi.s, 218.— Selection of the twelve, 219.— Simon I., or Peter, 219.— Andrew. 221.— James I., 222.-- John, 223.— Philij), 22.5.— Nathan.ael, 22(1.- Levi, or Matthew, 227.— Thomas, 227.— James II., 228.— Judas I., 2.!0.— Simon II., 231.— Judas II. (Iscariot), 2;«.— "The Twelve," 2:i5.— Why thiii number, 235. — Their order, 230. — Types, 237. — Nothing of the "church" ideo 239. CILU'TER IV. THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT. Place of delivcrj', 241.— Reports by JIatthew and Luke, 242.— The time, 245.— The Text: Character, 245. — Thk By.vTlTUDEs: fJlenients uf Uifty rliaiaclur, 248. — The poor in s))int, 24.\ — Those who mourn, 251. ^The meek, 252. — Those who hunger and thirst for rightcousnes.s 254. — The merci- ful, 255.— The pure in heart, 256.— The iiirace-makers, 258 — The persecuted, 2.59.— The reviled, 260. — Value of a lofty character, 261. — Jesus the completer of the law, 263. — IIkfutation op Phauis.mc errous. 266. — Of murder, 266 —Of adultery, 271.— Of divorce, 272.— Of perjurv, 27:5. — Of revenge. 274. — Love and hatred, 277. — Diueotions FOR THK discharoe of duty. 28ll. —Alms-giving. 2.S1.— Prayer, 2S2.— "The Lord's Prayer," 284.— Forgiveness, 292.— I'asting. 29:i.— Warnincis: Against covetiuisuess, 294. — Against double-mindednes.s 294. — Against e.xcessivo anxiety, 295. — .\gainst harsh judgments, 299. — Against doubting God, 301. — Against the broad way, 301.— Against hypocrisy, 303. — Conclusion: 'llie s(ife foatulaUon of cliuracUr, 304. — The manner of Jesus, 305. CHAPTER V. IN CAPERNAUM AND NAIN. The centurion's servant, .307. — The centinion's humility. 308. — Jesus namireshim, 308. — The ?ervant healed, 309.— In Nain, 309.— Jesus raises the dead. 310.— John hears of the works of Jesus, ."iVi.— His mes.sage to Jesus and reply, 312. — Defence of John by Jesus, 313. — Relative estimate of Jotin, 814. — Both John and Jesus rejected, 315. — Jesus dines with a Pharisee and is anointed by a woman, 317. — The delicacy of Jesus, 318. CHAPTER VI. THE SECOND TOtTK OP GALILEE AND RETURN TO CAPERNAUM. A-Ocompanied by women, 820. — Magdala, 320. — Mary Magdalene, 321. — Her devotion to Jesu.'!, 322.— The mo.st beautiful of loves, 323. — Caiiernaum, 324. — The blind and dutub demoniac. 324. — Phari- saic conspirators 325. — The charge that Jesus has a ilemon. 325. — The reply of Jesus 326. — He is more powerful than Satan. 326. — Blasphemy against the Ifoly Ghost, .327. — The sign of Jon.ih, 8.31. — A woman's complimetit, 3;i3. — Mary and her w)ns«333. — Je.sus eats with a Pharisee and denounces Pharisaism, 334. — A "lawyer," '^i5. — Wari.ing against hypocrisy, 337. — Parable of tbfl rich fool, 337. — One of Pilate's outrages, 341. — Parable of the lijj-ti'ce, 343, XVI CONTENTS. CHAPTEn VI L A CBAPTEB or PAJIABLES. Parablp o( the Bowor. 3-15. — Of the tnrois ."Mti. — Of the |>aticnt farmor, ZAFt. — Of the mu^JtarflRcctl, i-JQ — Of tho li^^ivcii, '-'A'. — Explicati m of the piinil'k- of tlif s»)\vir, 3^9. — Of thi- jMitii-nl fiiniior, ."iSS — Of iho nmiilaril-KocJ, a50.— l)f tho Itaiveii. %7. — Siuulitudea, 367. — Tho Lrcu»un.' iu the field, 857.— Tho peail-buycr, 36ti.— Tho drutf ulL, ib'J. CILA.ITEU VIII. A CUAPTEIl OF MiUACLES. JcsuB hnd no iwlitlca, 861.— A political followi-r. .•iCl.- A hanl miying. :;fi2.— Its dimailty, lfi:i.— IU k-won, ?.Cili. — .\iiothcr lesson. .'ilM. — Stonii on the lako, '■H\4. — Jisus stills the storm, •'.tki. — Oudnra, 3. — Jeiiai> cures u dumb do- monioc, 376. — In Kazarcth, 377. — Aguin rejected by Uin uwu people, 377. CHAI'TKU IX. TBS THIBD TOtm OF OjLlAl£K AND nETmN TO CAPEnNAim. In Galilee, .779. — A mixsionary movement, 379. — Aildrosa of Josnn, ."280. — The ronte of the twelve, SSI. — The huincaltar, 3ti2. — A warninj.', Stfi. — A cunsoliition. liNl — The kukih?! to bi- ii diMTimumtiou, ■"^4. — A fritrhtful fl^'ure, :y>5. — A >.Teut step fonvimi. •'iN'>. — John Baptist l)thoiu|p<|, ;i"S.'>. — Herod heiirs of Jesus, :iNi. — Ueturn of the twelve, .'JNi. — MinKulotis fiMHlin^ of live ihuu.siiiiil. Ii)*.— Klonn on the lake, 3ilU. — Jisus wulkinj; on the waters, 3111. — rrofrreKsiveiiess of Jesus, 3'.hJ. — In- tense excitement, 393. — The brend-s«vkcr«, 3!M. — Thi-y demand a sipn, 3U5. — Jesua iiguiu offeuda tbo rbariiicvtt, 396. — Their puzzle, 3*J7. — Jesus sifts his followers, 398. PART V. PROM TUE THinO rA.SSO%n-,n to the ensuing FEAST OF TABEIIXACLE8. [From April to October, A.D. 29. Hix moiU/ia.] ClIAI'TEIl L tJNSETTLED. Tmditlon, S99. — Jowm rcbnke« the rharisoos, -IllO.- What defiles a man, 401.— In rhnenicin, 402.— The Syro-1'h'rnician woman, -lIKi. — Jesus upim-ciiites holy wit, 4(lfi. — The IXn-npolis, 4(i(;. — Cure of the deaf stnmmenT, 4')1S.— Heidi ni,'. 4U!t. — Keediiin of four thousand, 4U'.I.— Daliuanuthn, 410. — A siini dcmaiMled, 411. — Addressed to weuther prophets, 412. — The leuven of tho rharlsoes, 413. — Bethsuido, 413. CHAPTEn IL THE OnEAT CONFKgSION. Ctaaarcn rhillppl, 41.'5.— Another crlsin, 415.- Not Rtnirk n>ot, 41fi.— Peter's wilomn oonfofwion, 417.— Jesus n'ceivcH M<-'»ianie hoiuu^'e, 417. — Aildn-ss of Ji-susto I'eter, 41f<.— The wunl '•ihurcli." 420. — HU "c«>n»rreuntloii," 420.— The |Miwer of the keys. 421.— Jesnis ixmtrols history, 42.3.— He pn.'- dlctii his nanirrecUou, 42-1.— Itebukus I'eUT, 424.— .Viidress to his disciples, 426.— lu meuiiiug, 425. CHAPTEn III. THE TnANSriOtTRATION. Account by the Evancelisti«, 427.— Why Klijiih must tlrsi come, 428.— Site of the tmnsfitniratlon, 428. — PetiT's ci.nji-clure, 42'.t. — The voi.-i^. 42'.).— liiilni-ny, 4.'ia.— Jej.us hcul« him, 433. CHAl'TEll IV. LAflT DAYS IN GALILEE. Tliroiurh Northern Oullleo, ♦"A— The Temple tnx, l-!*!.— A mirarle of knowloe«, 4.'4.*'.— The nile of preoi-.leei<-e, 4;!.S.— Joliir» frank confcMion. 4-"i'J.— S«-hisn\, 440.— •' If two mnvf," 441.— Ideii of II tnie ehun-h, 442.— I'arable of tho unuiurciful servant, 442. — Tho missioa of the Suvuuty, 444. — Inhunjiltiiblo Suiiuu-itun vilhiKe, 44(i. PART \\. PnOM THE FEAST OP TAnEllNACLKS UNTIL THE LAST PASSOVEH ^VEBK. [n-om CKtober. A.IK 29, to April, A.IK 30. A'te MoiUli*.] CH.MTEn I. AT TIIE rEAKT OT TAnEnNACLKS. rhe Fi-nst of TnlK-rnnoW 447. — Evenlnif wr\iiT, 44S.— Rnpplpmentnl festival, 449.— Jcwmnt the fmrt, 44'J. — His defensive i-jK-uch, 430. — Uu attitclw l.U uneinleis 4M.— Aaicns his buaveiily urit;iu, 46S. CONTENTS. Xvii — An alarming speech, 453. — The great day of the feast, 454. — Tho fountain of Siloam, 454. — They cannot arrest Jesus, 455. — In the treasury, 4.56. — The woman taken in adulter}-, 450. — • Caught in tlieir own trap, 457. — Conflict of Jesus with his enemies, 457. — Josus more deeply in- censes his enemies, 460. — Jesus charged with having a demon, 461. — His reply, 403. — Jesus before Abraham, 462. CHAPTER II. THE FEAST OF DKDICATION. Hear Jcncho, 40;?. — Parable of the Good Samarit;in, 404.— From .Teni«alom to Jorcho, 4K). — Tiethany : JIury and Martha, 406. — Keply nf Jesus to ;Miirtlia, 407. — The hlinit man, 4li'.l. — iOxistence of evil, 40!l. — The ancient pagan idea, 470. — The Helirew idra, 4711, — " Wtio did sin ? " 471. — What JesiL'J thought of it, 472. — Manner of the healing, 47.'!. — JlCiikd im the Sabbath, 47^1 — The patient and his parents examined, 474. — Jesus meets him. 477. — Discouriie of the shepherd and the sheep, 478. — Division among his enemies, 47'.l. — A challenge, 4ti0. — E.xalted claims, 4i50. CHAPTER III. IN PEKEA. Bethany, east of Jordan, 4S2. — Jesus visits the place of his baptism, 482. — The dropsical man, 484.— I'arable of the Great Supper. Iiv5. — Terms of discipleship, 4S8. — Jesus claims to be The Resurrection, 500. — Mary and Jesus. ,501. — The grief of Jesus, 502. — At the grave, 50.'5. — I.azanis rai.sed from the dead, 504. — The Sanhedrim, 5U5. — .\ckiiowledge his miracles, 505. — Reject him as Messiah, 506. — Caiaphas, 506. — His prophecy, 5117.- Ephron, 507.— Ten lepers healed, 50!).— The Parouxia of the Son of Man, 511.— Parable of the Unjust Judge, 512. — Its lesson, 51.3. — Despondency of .Jesii.s, 514. — Parable of the Pharisee iind I'ublican, 514. — Final departure fiom Galilee, 510. — Divorce, 516. — Mosaic law of divorce, 517. — True law of divorce, 520. CHAPTER V. GOING TO JERUSALEM. Jesus blesses little children. .52.'5. — The rich ruler, .52 1. — " ^V^lo can be saved ? " 527. — The Palingeiiexia, 52M. — Parable of the laljorers, 528. — The lesson, 5-30. — A third warning, 530. — The ambitious bj-i>thers, 5'-ii. — The blind men. 533. — Blind Bartimieus healed, 5:i5.— Jericho, 530. — Zaccha.'us, 537. -His conver.sion. 5oS. — Parable of the pounds, 539. — Bethany: House of Lazarus, 541. — Crowds fiock to see Jesus, 542. — Uis last Sabbath, 542. PART YII. THE LAST AVEEK. [From April 2 to April 8, A.D. 30.] CHAPTER L THE FinST DAT. Palm-Sunday, .543. — Jesus riding, ,544. — Great excitement, 545. — "The church"' frightened, .540.—. In sight of Jerusalem, 517. — Jesus ajiostrophizes Jerusalem. 548. — Entering the city and the Temple, 548. — Greeks seek him, 549. — The liatk-ICol, 550. — What was if. 551. — Jesus knew it, 552. CHAPTER XL THE SECOND DAT. The barren fig-tree cursed, 554. — Trouble in the- narrative. 5.55. — A great lesnon. .550. — A prnnd truth, 557. — The second clean&ing of the Temple, 557. — fine discriminations, 558. — An act of mercy, 558. CHAPTER IIL THE THinD DAT. " ly what authority?" ,501. — A countcr-dUemma, 502. — Puzzled priests. 503. — Parable of the Two Sour, 504. — I'arable of the Wicked Husbandmen, .504. — Parable of the Marriage of the King's Son, 565. — Without the wedding-garment, 5(!7. — Conspiracy. 508. — .-Vftempt to ensnare Jesus 56!). — An adroit question. 670. — The net torn, 571. — .V profound lesson, .571. — Question by theSad.lucee*, 573. — Reply of Jesus. 574. — Jesus against Pantheism, 574. — The gri'at commandment, .576. — The reply of .Jesus, .57f>. — David"s.s,*i and David's Lord, .578. — The valedictory to the Jews, 57!). — Con- trasted with the "Sermon on the Mount," 581. — Final woe, 587. — L.a.st times, .587. — The he.irt of Jesus melts, .588. — The widow's mite, 5S!). — Last utterance of Jesus in tho Temple. 5S9. — Piuable of the Ten Virgin.s, b'.K^. — A prophecy, 51)4.— Jcru.s,ilem to be destroyed, 5!)5. — Pseiidc)-Chriot,s, 5!)6, — General judgment of mankind , 596. — Jesus the representative of himianity, 698. — Absence ot doKmatism, 590. CONTENTS. CHAPTER IV. THE FOiniTH DAT. DiMippolntMl hn|>cR, WXI. — Tenxt in Pinion's house, CiOO. — Mary nnoints Jcstis, fiOO. — Jiidoji ob](>ctn, fiOl. — Reply of .IfhUN tii>initons IK)'.'.— Tlicra)itiirr ix)8tiHJUud, 602, — JiiduDOODiul Ui them, (jua.— The ciue uf Juduii, (XXi.— Fruib cxuiainution, UU4-till. CHAPTER V. THE FIFTH DAT. The flmt day of nnlcnvcncd bread, filS!.— Preparations for the Paschal Supper, C14. — At whose hoime 014. — Between the cveuinipi, C15. CHAPTER VI. THE SIXTH DAT. Buc. 1. The StTPFn. Jcsub'h opening upecch, (ilG. — Washes their feet, 017. — Peter's refiiRal. 617. — The lesHoi), GlS.—Siul preilictioii. lilS). — Sulf-inRiio<-tion. til'.t. — Judas leaves, 62(). — Peter puzzled, 020. — CoDiiolinK words •'""• — Philip's muterialisui, (12:1.— Thaddeus iwrplexc*!, (124. Bee. a. The VALKDirxnnT AND Last PuAYtn. The Hallel, (124. — An out diK)r di.^course, 625. — A luiuse, 62(1. — l)inciple.s e.vpress lx4ief, (127.— The last prayer with the disciples, 627. Bee. 3. GETM8KMANK. The Ki-clron valley, ri2«.— In the pnrdeii, (l-'id. — Soliuirj- prayer. (ViO.— A horror, (i-'MI.— The sweat C)f blood, Ci-'tl. — The Is-trayal, CkSl. — Jewish criminal law, (>.'i2. — l'rejud(,anent, 633 — Irn-K^ilarities, (l.'i*l.— The sijcual, (>.'14.— The arrest, (UM.— Peters zeal (l-'W.— Forwikon, i>^. Bee. 4. The TuiaU (>-'1(1. Fresh outrage, ((.Sd.— Annas, (>:56.— Caiaphas, (>J7.— Reply of Jesus, (>Jt<.— I'eter, filjS.- llis denials, (kJT-CstU.— Dayhivak, Csll.— False witnesses, 6-11. — Jct>usputon oath, 649 — The judifo in a rat;e, ('(:). — Intense exeiteuieiit, 614. Bee 5. I'lLATE. The Procurator, 644.— The jim f/tmlil. (sl4.— To PilBt«\ 6-15.— Play of pa-ysions 645 ^A halt, (hlO.— Change of tTound, (H7. — In the prajtorium, 6-IS. — Jesus replies to I'ilate, 64'J. — A contras-t, (15(). Boo. 6. llFnoii. Herod and Jcaiim, (SO.— Herod aud Pilate, 651.— Jesus sent to Herod, 651. — Jctma SIKKH-hll-SS, 652. Bee 7. Back to Pilate. I'ilatcand the Sanhedrim, 652.— The jMMiple aeainst Jesus 65.3. — Burabhas, 6>5J.— I'datt-'s wife's drtam, CM. — The unstable |>eople, 655.— Pilate washes his hands, (156.- Jesui sconn,'"! and mocked, (l-'id.- I'ilato in trouble, (i57.— " Kcce Homo 1 " 657. — Pilate seeks to release Jesus, (15S.— "Ciesnr's Friend," 65!t.— A dyiuR luitionality, (iCO.— The sentence, (160. Bee. 8. The last of Judas. His hopes and fears, tiCiU.— The pround gives way. 661. — He returns to the priests, 661. — They regard him n fool, 662. — He Mings the money away. 6(i'2. — Potter's Field. 66:i. Bee. Jl. Goiso TO Calvaiiv. Beanng the cross, (Kki. — The Cyrenian, Wh'i. — Form of the'cros-s 664. — Daughters of Jenisalem, (KhI. — Jesus prophesies, (i65. — (lolgothiu 6(15. — The sour wine, 666. Bee. 10. FiioM Nine o'clock till Noon. Jesus prays for his tormentors, 667. — The scanUess pir- mint, (i7U.—What wivs his agony ♦ 6b3.— Joseph ODil NieoJeiuus, 6W.— ^Secret disciples, 6S4.— In a garden, 6t)5.— Love's last vigil, 685. PAET VI ir. BESURRECTION OF JESUS AND SUBSEQUENT E\'ENTS. [Forty iHti/i. Fii>mAprU\>lo MuyVXA.D.ZU.] L The Sabliath after cniciftxion, e.'ifl.— The sepulchre (niarded. 687. — Preimnitions for embalming, (W7.— A vision in the sepulchre, 6.V1.— A message to Peter. 6!S8. — John ami PeU-r, CWt.— Mary of Magilala »<•«•* Je»iis «!I0.— Her obedience. 6!I0.— The other women, 601.— The watch. 6'.ll.—i'lic Sanhedrim, OOl.^The conKpiraey, tl'.fj. — On the way to Emmaus 6'.l'i. — Jesus ivvi-als himself, (i05. }{,. apiM'ars to Peter, 61(6. — First aswmbly of the dis<'lples. 6'.I7. — Jesus in their tnidst, 607. — The Holy Spirit, (i!W.— Absolution. 60H. Thomas incredulous. (i'.C.I.- The second •"semblage. 700. II. The .\|K«tlc«» in Galilee, 7U0. — Jeaus by the lake, 701. — Peter's ordeal, 702. — A pivdiclion, 703. — J..lin. 7(tt. III. Talsir. 701.— "Five hundn-d \>rethren at once," 704. — Jesus reappears. 70.5. — The commission, 7(1.').— The last nt-'irdnl wi.ril. 70.'>.— Ji-suk's ctmeept of God. 706. — All n-strictions removed, 706. A unlvers4il nOiiron. 7o7. — A cUimi uud a prediction, 707. — The fullllmcut, 707. I V. The Asceiuuon. 7uU. ili'»', Til.— Mary of Magdala, 712.— A translation e.xplainiMl. 712. — I>is<-lpline, 71'A The wonuu) taken in adidterha])S it might be, mother of the great E.\])ected King. Barrenness, therefore, was a reproach. "\V"hile Elizabeth was quietly awaiting hei- time in the hill coun- try of Judea, another wonder occurred in the obscure little city of Nazareth, in the heart of Galilee of the Gen- tiles, far fi-om the sjilendid temjjle where Zacha- rias had beheld his vision. In that remote place dwelt a 8imi)le Hebrew maiden, Mh(»se name was Maky. She was poor. Ilei society was that of the common work-people. She wjis betrothed to a kinsman, a cai-penter,"' named Joseimi. But royal blood ran Mary. * The word translated "carpenter" means any worker in wood, builder of houBes or of ships, or maker of wooden furniture. We know that Joseph was not a ship-buildcr. It ia not probable that he was a house-builder, because of the scarcity of wood and the custom of building stone houses. lie was probably a maker or mender of furniture. It hau been suggested that he was an architect. PKELIMINARY EVENTS. 17 through her veins, and the gifted King Da\ id was her ancestor. So great, however, had been the decHne of lier people, that even the race of Jewish kings liad failed to keep so accurate an account of tlieir genealogy as to save historians from great perplexity. T^vo tables of genealogy have been preserved — one in the bio- graphical sketch by Matthew, and another in that by Luke. It is noticed that both trace the descent of Joseph rather than of Mary, for whom it is specially ji^^°^''^°^ ""^ necessary to make a descent from David, seeino- that her wonderful Son is reputed to have had no earthly fathei-. But if Mary was the daughter of Jacob, as has been supposed, she was the first cousin of Joseph, so that a table of his genealogy is in fact, if not in form, a table of Mary's. These two tables present very gra\-e difficulties, but not per- haps insurmountable. Matthew says that Joseph was the son of Jacob ; Luke says that he was the son of Ileli. The former pre- serves the genealogy of Joseph as legal successor to the throne of David, the latter his private genealogy, sh(3^ving his real birth as a descendant of David. Jacob and Ileli might both have been sons of Matthan, who was thus gi-andfathei- to both Joseph and Mary. "J 1 Jacob^inight have been Mary's father, as was generally supposed.. . / and ILeTi Joseph's father. Or, Mary might ha\c been Matthan's •granddaughter by her mother, whose name has not been pre- served. This latter is asserted to have been the fact by Ilippo- lytus of Thebes, in the 10th century; but his statement probably rested upon ti-adition, the value of which we cannot now ascertain. But if it were true, then Jacob might really have had no son, and Matthew gave his name as Matthan's eldest son, because Matthew was making a list of successive heirs to the throne, not of succes- sive progenitors, the latter being the work of Luke. If we compare Luke's personal table with Matthew's official table of genealogy, M-e find that the lineal descent was broken in Jechonias (Matt. i. 12), who could not have been literally the father of Salathiel, as he is declared childless in Jeremiah xxii. 30. It is clear from this that Matthew could have been giving only the names of the heirs to the throne. And this simple e.v planation, if applied to Matthew's table, according to the Jewish law in lumbers xxvii. 8-11, may go far towards clearing up diffi- culties. Even if, with Dean Alford, we take the ground that the difficulties created by the two tables cannot be soh-ed without 2 18 THE BIKTII AND CUn.DHOOD OF JESUS. kno-\vlc(lge which wc do not j)()?ticss, it would not be positive proof a<'ainst the general conchision which the tables undertake to reach, namely, that Jesus was a descendant of David, because the writers may ha\e had kn ip B Rl'i pS BmTlI OF JESUS : ITS DATE. 25 (1.) The imhhc ministiy of Jcsns must, at the lowest calcula- tion, have covered between two and three years, as not less than three, and probably /ot^r, Passovers occurred. (See John ii. 13 ; vi. 4 ; xii. 1 ; v. 1.) It may have occupied more than three. Let us say two, of which we are certain. (2.) That public ministry closed, as all admit, during the con- sulsliip of the two Gemini, and that is fixed, as all agree, in the fifteenth year after the death of Augustus. Then Jesus could not have be(/un his ministry in the fifteenth year of the sole reign of Tiberius, and it must have been in the fifteenth year of some other reign, that is, of his associate reign. "VYlien did that associate reio-n beo:in ? Comparing Suetonius with Dio Cassius, it appears that Tiberius returned to Rome, triumphed, and dedicated temples in the consul- ship of M.Emilius Lepidus and T. Statilius Taurus,* in the month of January. It would seem that this is the time of his probable accession to joint power with Augustus. Indeed Suetonius says : "JVot long after (the dedication of the temples) a law being pro- posed by the senate that he (Tiberius) should administer the government of the provinces in common with Augustus, he departed into Illyricum." It must have been, at longest, only a few weeks after January of this year. Let us say February. Xow tlie consulship of M. Emilius Lepidus and T. Statilius Taurus M-as in the third year hefore the death of Augustus. When did Augustus die? On the 19th of August, in the year in which Sextus Appu- ^^^^^'^t^ ^^ ^"&^s- leius and Sextus Pompeius were consuls. AVliat A.D. was that ? From some ascertained coincidence of an event in some con- sulship with a certain year in our era modern chronologers have reckoned back and arranged the consular tables so that we have : A.D. IGl \ •^^- ^^^^'' ^G^'^is Anton. Cges., called the Philosox>her. \ L. yElius Aur. Yerus Caes., called " OominodusP In copying and otherwise it seems that some confusion has come * ConsulsMps are very important in these investigations. The Romans kept their dates by consulships as we do by the "Year of our Lord." The preser- vation of the fiiiccessitm of consuls was the English dated everything by the year of their reigning sovereign, and the Americans by the year of their Presi- dent. The Fa.sti among the Roman.s were marbles in which were carved this cif the utmo.st importance in their chro- | succession of consuls. Fragments of nology. It is as if we had no .\.d., and I these marbles still exist. A.D. 160 A.D. IGl i 2C TITE BLRTn AKD CniLDIlOOn OF JICSUS. in at this point of the chronological calculation, and two sets ol consuls have been shrunk into one year. The authority of three lists (those of Cassiodorus, Victorius, and the Paschal Chronicle) makes two years, while that of one list (Idatius) makes one year. It is safer to follow the stronger authority, and by correcting the mistakes of copyists, the consular list at this particular period ia restored thus : ' T. El. Aur. Antoninus " Pius," Emperor (who died this year), and M. El. Aurelius Anton., the Philosopher (who sue ceeded him), j" M. El. Aurelius Anton., the Philosopher, and L. Aur. Ant. Yerus, called " Commodus," It will be perceived that tliis pushes back all the other consul- ships one year, so that those for IGO must be i)laced in a.d. 159, and so all the way back through the list. The consulship of Sextus Ap})ulcius and Sextus Pompeius, usually entered a.d. 14 (Julian Period -1727), must be one year earlier. The result is that Augustus died on the lOtli of August, a.d. 13:* the associate reign of Tiberius began three years before this, namely, a.d. 10, in February : in the fifteenth year of that reign — between February, a.d. 24, and Februar}-, a.d. 25 — Jesus reached his thirtieth year. This is marked, because it Avas the legal time of entering upon the Jewish priesthood, and was the age at wliicli Jesus actually began his public ministry. From that date deduct thirty years, and the conclusion is reached that Jesus was boin between the Februaries of the yeai"S G and 7 before the beginning of the Vulgar Era. Secinir that this event has l)een by different writei-s assigned to every month in the year, can we ascertain the very day? If not, let us see how nearly it can be approximated. The Latin Churcli luis kept the 25th of Decemljcr; the Greek Church originally observed the Cth of January, but subsequently came over to the Latin calendar. Neither date has any conclusive authority. According to Josephus, Jerusalem was taken in the second year of the reign of Vcsi)asian, on the 8th day of Sep- Exnmination of ^^.,,^1,^ ^^ yq, which was in the year of the month and uuy. . , . ^_ „ ' , , , , City (a,u.) 823, and the temple was destroyed on * Be careful to notice that this is I the actual birth of Jesus, the Vulgar Era, not on era dated from I BIRTH OF JESUS : FfS DATE. 27 tlie 4th of August. According to the Jewish ]\[is]iiiii— compiled in Palestine toward the close of the second centnrj — on that day the first sacerdotal class of the twenty-four which officiated in rotation, each a week (1 Chron. xxiv., and Xeheniiah xii.), entered upon their duties. Computing the number of sacerdotal cycles between a.d. 70 and b.c. 8, we ascertain * that on the 4th day of August, B.C. 8, there were nine weeks and five days needed to complete the cycle. Add these to 4th of August and we reach October 11 as the recommencement of the cycle. The eio-hth class that to which, according to Luke i. 5, Zacharias belonged, woidd enter upon duty on the forty-ninth day after October 11 ; that is, Ko\eniber 29 (n.c. 8). A simple arithmetical calculation shows that Zachai'ias must have been serving on the followino- days : B.C. 9.. August 12 j B.C. 8.. July 14 I b.c. 7.. May IG B.C. 8. .Jauuary 27 [ B.C. 8. .November 29 I B.C. 7. .October 31 Add to these dates fourteen months and twenty-two days, by which allowance is made of seven days for Zacharias's ministry, five months and fifteen days for EKzabeth's time before the Annim- ciation, and the usual period of nine months for Mary's time, from the Annunciation to the bh-th of Jesus, and you have the follow ing table : B.C. 8. .November 3 I b.c. 7. .October B.C. 7 . . April 1 8 1 B.C. 6 . . February 6 I B.C. 6. .August 7 20 I B.C. 5. .January 22 These six dates are all that seem possible on the calculation by the courses of the priests. It is not necessary to point out objec- tions to any single date, as our previous calculations have shown that it must have been b.c. 6. Was it February 20 or August 7"? To decide between these dates we are helped by the statement in Luke ii. 8, that at the Nativity "there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the fields, keeping watch over their fiocks by night." Would this have been in the month of February ? In lluhle's Economical Calendar of Palestine (it may be found as the 454th of the fragments in the 4to edition of Calmet), which contains a very satisfactory account of the weather for each month, it is shown that February is rainy and snows are frequent * In this -way : The interval between the dates is 77 years, being 28,12-1 days, being 4,017 weeks and 5 days, which, divided by 24, gives 166 cycles, with 9 weeks and 5 days over. 28 THE BIKTH AND CHILDHOOD OF JESUS. in the soutlierii part. It was not a month for shepherds to be v/atching their flocks at night in the open air. Nor is it probable that tlie enrolment which was had at the imperial order would have been assigned to so distressing a portion of the year, nor that ^lary, in her condition, could have taken this journey in FebruaiT. T/ie 1th day of August, b.c. 6 (a.tj.c. 747), is the nearest approach we can make to the date of the bikth of Jesus. Within a fy Herod's clcvatioTi to the throne. 3. It is objected that the Eoman niode of taking the census was according to actual residence. But, even if that was bo, and , „ even if the census of Augustus did not ncces- >ot the Roman . " i tt i i • njojle. sarily embrace Judea, we know that licrod at tins time had state reasons for desiring to propitiate the (Miijicroi-, and might on that account have ordered a census ; which, as he did it as of his o\\n motion, lie might prefer to tyke in tlie Jewish way, that is, in the place whence the family sprung, lather than in the Uoman manner, that is, in the jilaceof actual residence. Or even if Ilerod had simply proclaimed a census, it is quite easy to see that the Jews wcnild prefer to go to the place of nativity, as tliatliad been tiii-ir custom. 4. Again, it is ol)jected that the state of Mary's health would BIETH OF JESUS : ITS DATE. 33 have precluded such a journey. It is answered, tliat if the enrol ment was made by tribes, a Jew of the house and jjj^—.g health, lineage of David would make great exertions and sacrifices to present himself in liis proper place and secure the recognition of his position. This motive would operate equally upor. Joseph and Mary, as both were of the family of David. Quiet women have enormous reservoirs of determination. "When one of them sets her heart on any course it is only an insur- mountable obstacle that can divert her. 5. Another objection is that Luke seems to say that this census did not take place until at least ten years later. (Luke ii. 2.) This brings us to the real difhculty in the passage. It is an ob- jection urged by Dr. Strauss, but not by him fairly put. {Leben JesUf i. iv. 32.) Let us examine this. Luke makes two statements : (1.) That Augustus decreed a taxing. (2.) That this taxing was made when Cyrenius Avas gov- ernor of Syria. Let the distinction between the statements be noticed. The first has been estab- ments seem con- lished above, as I thi*k, conclusively. The his- tradictory. torian Luhe asserts it, and there is nothing in history, so far as we now know, to cast the slightest discredit on it. The difficulty is to reconcile the second statement of Luke with his first, or to clear away somehow the difficulties of the passage. Cyrenius was governor twelve years after the date of the Nativity assigned above, and this passage seems to make the birth of Jesus to have occurred during his governorship. The following explanations are tendered : (a.) Ilerod undertook the census after the Jewish form, accord- ing to the imperial decree, but died before it was finished. The Evangelist knew that as soon as a census was 1 , . . 1 T • 1 1 . . How explained, mentioned persons conversant with Jewish history would think at once of the census which Avas had about twelve )"ears later, after the banishment of Archelaus, which was notori- ously a Homan census, and caused an insurrection (Josephus, ^l;//. xviii! 1, § 1), and therefore he added the second verse, which is equivalent to this : " Xo census was actually completed then : and I knew that the first Roman census was had after the banishment of Archelaus; but the decree went out much earlier, namely, in the time of Ilerod." This is the explanation of Dr. Thorason, Archbishop of York. 3 34 TTTE BTKTir AXD CniLPIIOOD OF JESUS. (1).) CyroTiiiiP, it is said, may liave l)ccn twice governor. Prof, A, "\V. Zninpt, of Berlin, has pnhlished a work entitled Comr weniatlo (Je Syria TtomnnorMin provincta a CcBsare Augusta ad T. Ve.; maybe translated "before," and then the passage would mean, "this enrolment took place "before (that better known enn^lment, when) Qxiirinus was gover- nor of Syria^ (See Alford's Greek Testament, ««. loco) For similar examples in Greek literature De Pressensu refers to Tho- luck {GhnilnoiirdigJi'eit, p. 181), and confines himself to citing a specimen of the same construction in (John i. 15) the words of John the Baptist, -^p'To's/xov^r, "lie was before me." If this be received it ends all difficulties. Let it be remembered that this is not ^ jprorcd inaccuracy \w Luke, it is oidy a difliculty, an ol)scurity. Ko man has shown that Augustus Civsar could not have ordered this n y an o )scu- (.Q,,g„j, jj,„. |],.^|- (^y,.(,,,i,^P jl],c;,)]„|^(,]y (^.(-,,j]J j^,^^ Jj^^^yg been governor wlien it was in process of execution. "We know that. he was fjovernor years after the Nativitv, and with M«^ gubernatorial term we have been striving to recmicile Luke's statements. The whole difficulty arises from our igno- rance, not from Luke's proved inaccuracy. All honest historical iiiquirei'S should admit that LulETni.iini:M-Ei'nuATAJL Its first PLACE OF THE BIRTH '. THE CmCTIMCIBION. 37 fame came to it from its being tlic birtliplace of David, wlio, however, did nothing to advance it, even after his elevation to the thi-one. His ancestor Boaz had possessions here, and in some of tlie meadows in sight of the town Riitli gleaned. Bnt it ne\er rose to the dignity uf a ca])itah The birth of Jesns has made it to be known to the wlude workL Since that event tradition lias never lost sight of Ijcthlehem. Justin Martyr visited it in the second century ; Origen in the third ; afterwards Eusebius, Jerome, the Bordeaux Pilgrim, and thousands of others. The Emperor Hadrian planted a grove of Adonis on the spot, to desecrate it. This grove kept up the identification. It remained from 135 to 315 A.D. About A.D. 330, Constantino or the Empress Helena erected a church which remains to this day. In the twelfth cen- tury it was elevated into an episcopal see. There is shown a cave in which Jesus is said to have been born ; but the precise spot can- not now be known, and it seems absurd to suppose that cattle were kept twenty feet under ground. But we know the town.* * The birth of Jesus in Bethlehem be- ing coincident with the prophecies of the birthphvce of the Messiah, the destnic- tive critics attack it as being a false statement ; but it is observable that no one has proved its incorrectness, nor even presented anything worth calling an argument. For instance, Dr. Strauss (Book i. 31) says: "But the opposite hypothesis as to the original dwelling- place of his parents, from which these Evangelists start in the accounts they give, shows that they are not following any historical authority, but simply a dogmatic conclusion, drawn from the passage in the prophet Micah, v. 1. " Can such modes mislead thinking men ? A historian says that two people, husband and wife, live in New York, but finding it important to go to London in person on or before a given day, to attend to mat- ters of great importance, the wife is theie delivered of a son, the distinguished Bubject of the historian's biography, and who afterwards spends a great part of his life in New York. Some subsequent critic says: "Nay, but he was bom in New York, for does not the historian ' start ' with that as ' the original dwell- ing-place of his parents ? ' " Such a critic would equal Dr. Strauss. But then Dr. Strauss proceeds on the theoiy that he was a native of Nazareth. Why not say he was bom at Damascus ? On what authority do these writere assume that he was bom in Nazareth ? On the au- thority of the Evangelists. Dr. Strauss makes fifteen references to the four Evangelists, which, if the reader will consult, will be found to contain no state- ment whatever as to his birthplace, but simply speak of Jesus as a Nazarene or a Galilean. Two (Matt. x.wi. 69, 71) are the accusations made against Peter by women, that he was an associate of " Je- sus of Galilee," or " Jesus of Nazareth." A third is the speech of the unclean spirit (Mark i. 24), '* A\Tiat have we to do \vith thee, thou Jesus of Nazareth ? " A fourth is IMark's account of what 'Mat- thew gives in chapter xxvi. A fifth is Luke xviii. 37, where the blind man in- quires the meaning of the noise, a ad the multitude tell him that ' ' Jesus oi Naza- reth passes by." This is the amount oi Dr. Strauss' s argument. 38 THE BIRTH AND CHTLDHOOD OF JESUS. It lies on the eastern and northeastern brow of a ridge, run ning east and M'est, from the t^p of which there is an exten- The utter want of fairness is seen in three wajs : 1. In the case supposed above, of an American bom of American parents in London, his subsequently re- turning and being called ' ' Mr. Blank, of New York," or '' Mr. Blank, the Ameri- can," would certainly not prove that he was born in Xew York, and most certainly not prove that he was not born in Lon- don. 2 Take his reference to Luke. To prove that Jesus was ior;i in Nazareth he produces the reply of a miscelhmeous crowd to a beggar. They called him a "Nazarene." But if that passage in Luke be good authority we must take the whole, what the beggar said as well as what the multitude said. The beggar cried out, "Jesus, son of DaNid, have mercy on me." Then Jesus was gener- ally reputed to be the son of David. But this Dr. Strauss denies, and because he is following " simply a dogmatic conclu- sion drawn from " his theory of mytha, he is anxious to show that Jesus was not bom in Bethlehem, the city of David, and was not the son of David at all, and wag not believed to be the son of David. {Lcben Jchu, chap, ii.) But his own au- thority confutes him. 3. He cites Luke xxiv. 19 to prove that Jissus was bom in Nazareth. Does Luke, in that i)assage or any where else, say so? Not at all. But this same Luke, Dr. Strauss's wit- ness, does say, distinctly, ii. G, 7, that Jet*uH was born in Bdhkhem. In all this there is nothing supernatu- ral, so that Dr. Strau.ss might not answer that we ha;.sagc. And this is cited to prove that Jesus was bom in Ndznreth! ! iVI. Renan's lost authority is John L 45, 4(), where it is said thai I'liilip found Nathanael and said: "We have found PLACE OF THE BIRTH : THE CrRCUMOISION". 39 Bive view toward the east and south, in the direction of Jericho, the Dead Sea, and the mountains of Moab. In the time of the captivity there was an inn, or caravanserai, close to Bethlehem, which appears to have been a point of departure for Egypt. (Jeremiah xli. 17.) Perhaps this was the very inn wliere Jesus was born. The prophet Micah (v. 2) had said of this city of David : " Thou Bethleheni-Ephratah ! though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, out of thee shall he come unto me to be the Kuler of Israel ; whose goings forth have been from old, from the days of eternity ! " It is said that the inn or caravanserai in Bethlehem was so cr(Avded that Joseph and Mary were obliged to Hud lodging in the stable. There Jesus was born, the first child of Mary.* It would seem that his birth occurred in the nio-lit. There him of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets did write, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph. ' ' Would any man in a court of law bring such testimony for- ward to establish the birthplace of an individual ? It might prove that Jesus resided at Nazareth when he was about thirty years of age, but it has no bearing whatever upon the question of the place of his nativity. A man having resided in New York a few years, called to make affidavit, might describe himself gener- ally as "of New York," unless the doc- uments were known by him to be about to be used on the question of the place of his nativity or citizenship. The fact that John says that Philip spoke of Jesus at thirty as being "of Nazareth," is nothing to the i^oint ; but two historians, one having had personal intercourse for years with the subject of his biographj', pay distinctly that he was born in Beth- lehon, and that settles the question until better evidence can be produced showing that he was born elsewhere. Of a piece with this is M. Kenan's Btafcement in Life of Jcsun, chap. xv. : " The famOy of David had become, it would seem, long since extinct," when M. Renan, as one of his notes shows, knew that the doctors Hillel and Gama- liel were reputed of the race of David, and Dr. Strauss' s reference to Luko xviii. brings up a passage in which a blind beggar by the way -side salutes Je- sus as the " son of David," no one of the multitude present objecting, show- ing that Jesus was publicly and notori- ously recognized as of that race and lineage. It is to be noticed how unreliable are the quotations and references of those who attack the Evangelists. A great par- ade is made in foot notes and parentheses. They look like authority. The shrewd writers knew that not one in a thousand of their readers will consult the passages referred to. Take this instance: M. Renan positively names the place of the birth of Jesus, and then in a foot-note quotes three distinct ancient authors, and gives chajater and verse. That looks like settling the question. But an exam- ination shows that not one of these au- thors alludes in the.se X'laces to the sub- ject, and one of them, who knew Jesus personally, positively affirms that he was bom ill, another plctce ! • Mary appears to have been the mother of several children, sons and daughters, younger than Jesus. Four sons are named, and daughters are al- luded to in Matthew xiii. 55, and Mark vi. 3. 40 THE niRTII AST) CHILDHOOD OF JESUS. were slieplierdswatduni^ their flocks in one of tlie pasture grounds, winch may still be seen near Bethlehem.* To them appeared a vision, and they believed that God told them not to fear, that there was born that day, in the city of David, cp ti i, see jgg^^g ^y|jy ^y^ ^Ij^j Anointed Lord, the Messiah. angels. ' _ ^ ' That they nii<;-ht be assured, it was told them that they should find him in swaddling-clothes and lying in a manger, one of those exterior stalls usually attached to caravanserais. Im- mediately there bui-st upon the ears of the shephei'ds a chorus sung by nniltitudes of voices, saying, " Glory to God in the highest, on earth peace, good will to men." If it be iiKjuired how this statement came into histoi-y, tlie answer is, that it is probable that Luke, when he came to writing the biogi-aphy of liis Master, nui le diligent search for all he could find of the early life of Jesus, aiid in that search received from the lips of one of the shepherds his simple account of the transaction. This sounds like the narrative of an eye-witness. It may not have literal accuracy, but it has been noticed how re- mai-kably free it is from all materialism, liow very pure and ele- vated is the statement of the transaction. It occurred as any well- balanced mind might resisonably suppose it would, if the Great Father ever inr.de any such comnnmication to men. The shepherds went to Bethlehem and found the ])lace, the mother and the babe. Then they made known what tliey liad heard in the plain, and returned rejoicing. • About a milo cast of B«:tlilehem | lage of the Shepherda. there is a little viUage called the Vil- PLACE OF TUE BIRTH : THE CIECUMCISION. 41 Luke asserts that Mary's child was circumcised, according to the Levitical law, on the eighth day, and received ii „ £ T Circumcision o£ the name ot Jesus. Jesus. The Mosaic law required the presentation to the liOrd of every first-born male, but allowed children to be redeemed from exclusive devotion to religious pursuits by the loayment of five shekels, which is about thirty . ^^^^ presen e ^•^ 111 OT -K '^^ ^'^® temple. American gold dollars. See Levit. xii, 24 ; Num- bers xviii. 15, 16. At the same time the parents were to offer a sacrifice of a pair of turtle-doves or young pigeons. (Leviticus xii. 8.) In this service consisted the legal purification of the mother. The rich offered a lamb ; the poor gave pigeons. Mary had only doves to bring. If tliis history had been written by an impostor he would have given a different turn to th(j story. These sacrifices imply sin. If Jesus be that Holy One fiom the birth, why were these offer- ings made ? The straightfoi-wardness of the story gives a gen- eral air of truthfulness to the wliole narrative. There is no myth here. Mythical narratives elevate. This depresses. It places Jesus in the race of sinners. A writer of myths, as Neander suggests, would have brought in an angel to hinder Mary from submitting her child to a ceremony so unworthy his dignity. But here there appears strikingl}'' that mingling of humiliation and glory which marks all the main passages of the life of Jesus. Amid the general spiritual declension of the T iU ' i. ^ Ti.i.1 1, 1 i 1- Simeon and Amia. .lews there existed a little band, not perhaps con- Bociated so as to be called a society, but well known to one another, of those who made careful culture of the spiritual life, and who were waiting for some special revelation of mercy from Almighty God. Among these were two aged people, named Simeon and Anna, who looked earnestly for the coming of the Consoler of Israel. Simeon had received what he believed a divine intimation that he should not die before he had seen Je- liovah's Anointed. Moved by special spiritual impulse he came into the temple the very day of Mary's purification, which was foity days after the circumcision of the child. There was something in the babe which responded to the ciy of the soul of Simeon. In him he recognized the long-looked- for Eedeemer, and taking the child in his arms he broke into that rapture m hich the Chris- tian Church has preserved under the name of the JSPiciic Dimittis : 42 THE BIRTH Am) CniLDnOOD OF JESUS. " Lord, now lettest Tliou Tliy servant depart in peace, according to Tliy word : for mine eyes have seen Thy salvation, which Thou hast prei)ared l^ef ore the face of all the peoples; a light to enlighten the nations, and the glory ol Thy people Israel." (Luke ii. 29-32.) Although Jesus never recognized Joseph as liis father, Luke speaks of Joseph and Mary together as the parents of Jesus, as they naturally would genei-ally be taken to be, and says that this display of rapture, u})on the part of Simeon, caused Joseph and Mary to marvel. Although Mary knew of Jesus's miraculous birth, each new wonder would impress her with fresh awe. Per- ceiving this, Simeon said to Mary, " Behold, this is set for the fall and risiug again of many in Israel ; and for a sign to bo spoken against ; and a swoi-d shall pierce through thine own soul also, that out of many hearts evil thoughts may be revealed." In the words of Simeon we discover a feeling very much in advance of the general state of the Jewish nn'nd. They dis]>lay a softness, a hopefulness, and a liberality to which the hard Jew- ish heart of his day was generally a stranger. It contains the idea of development through struggle, a spread beyond the limits of Judaism, and a final trium])h, which, while it should break up the exclusiveness of that ancient faith, should bestow upon it a greater glory than any of its anterior traditions. Tliei-e was also one Amia, " a i)ro])lietess," daughter of Plia nuel, of the tribe of Asher. In early womanhood she had mar ried. After Seven years her husband died. She had been more than fifty years a widow, and had devoted herself to the tem- ple-service, not departing from the house of God, whom she Bers'cd night and day with fasting and prayei-s. Coming in at this moment she joined Simeon's tlianksgiving, and ropoi-tcd the case "to all that looked for redemj)tion in Joj'usalem." * * Schleiermacher's conjecture that the i minutely described than Simeon, while narrative came indirectly from Anna Simeon's words are reported and her's seems ]>laujjible, seeing that she is more | are not. CHAPTER IV. HIS FIKST YEAK8. In the course of the year following the birth of Jesus, there arrived in Jerusalem a company of men described as the " Wise men from the East." (Matt. ii. 1.) Who were they? Matthew calls them /idyoi. By this name Magi the Greeks denoted the priests of Persia, just as we now speak of the Brah- mins of India. The Magi may have been a tribe, as Herodotus says thev were. To them amono; , ,,^ * "'' ^^ _ _, . 1 " T • , -r '^ of the Magi, the Persians, as to the Levites among tlie Jews,- Avere intrusted all the public matters of religion. Their chiefs educated the prince ; they were royal counsellors and judges; they kept sacred traditions, and were thought to be able in various ways to divine the future, especially by watching the stars and by in- terpreting dreams. In the Poman Empire their name was generally assumed by magiciayis. The bad character of this class is clear from a decree of the Senate, which banished them from Pome in the year 16. Matthew used the term in its original, in its national and honor- able sense. This is certain from Herod's honorable treatment of these ]\Iagi. For in the whole -world there were only two classes of men who would have been at all safe in coming to the capital of so jealous and bloody a tyrant with the question, " Where is ho that is born King of the Jews?" even though, as was the case with these Magi, they were understood to be seeking not for a spiritual, but for a temporal lord ; these two classes were citizens of Porno and subjects of the Parthian kings, and it would have been well that even such should have had more than a connnon claim to the protection of their governments. The Parthians, a small but warlike tribe, had gotten the upper hand in Persia. They were haughty and fierce, and so wielded the military power of that country as to make it dreaded even by 44 THE BIETII A>'D CHILDHOOD OF JESUS. (he Iwomans. Herod's kinf^dom was exposed to their sudden inroads, and in his youth he had fled before them from Jerusalem. Against their anger his dependence even on the Koman power was no sufficient protection. In Babylonia, which was then a province of the Parthian Empire, was the city of Ctesiphon, on tlie river Tigris, one of several of the Parthian capitals. If these pil^iims came from Ctesiphon under a safe-conduct from the Parthian king, or were Magi of his court, Ilerod would not have dared to touch a hair of their heads, and M'ould have been driven tci some such policy as that to wliich he did resort. His treat- ment of them, especially his calling together the Sanhedrim, a body of men who in their sacerdotal and learned character much resembled them, proves that these Magi were men of very liigh rank, though they were not kings, as they were commonly held to be in the Middle Ages. This tradition seems to have grown very naturally out of their reception at Herod's court ; and it was probably right in making them thi-ee in number, for this seems to be indicated by their presents to the infant Jesus. These ]\ragi are described in our version as from " tlie East," and it is said they were in the East when they saw the Star. In the original the Greek word is the same in both places, but with such a difference in its form as would make the difference made in iMiglish by prefixing to the former the word fa}\ which thus means the Far East. In some of the later Books of Hebrew Scripture Babylonia is called the East, and Persia lies next beyond it and in the same line. History, geography, and Hebrew usage leave no reasonable doubt that these strangers were Persians, and saw the Star in Babylonia, then a Persian province. Zoroaster, the famous Persian teacher of religion, who may have lived as far back as 1500 years betore Christ, or not far from the time of Moses, was ncj idolater, and in the Bible the Persians are not classed with the heathen. Cyi-us, the founder of the Pei-sian Empire, was predicted by Isaiah (xliv. 24; xlv. 1-6) ; by him the Temple of God in Jerusalem, which had been burned by the king of Babylon, was ordered to be rebuilt ; and in his proclamation to that clTect (Neh. i. 1-2) he acknowledges the (iod of the Pei-sians and of the Hebrews to be the same Ix)rd God of Heaven. Daniel \vas high in lionor with this king; and the Magi had an idea of a Sosiosh, or Redeemer, to come, that in certain respects was strik- ingly like his. From the time of Cyrus there were ever many HIS FIRST TEARS. 45 Jews in (he Persian or Parthian country, and many thln-s per tannng to the Hebrew religion must have been well known to some of the Ma^ri. Eut how did they come hj their idea of the Star? It was the universal belief of their times that the stars controlled the fates of men. The science that professed to look into their influences was called Astrology, and the Magi were astrologers. An ancient prophet, who was of the East, and who was not a Jew, had foretold a Jewish Messiah in the remarkable prediction, " There shall come a Star out of Jacob, and a Sceptre shall rise out of Israel " (Numb. XXIV. 17), words then understood as foretelling that a new star would shine at his birth. In all Syria there was in their time an expectation that this personage would soon appear, which must have been common also to the Jews in the East and in the Ear East. Within that very century, this belief, as Suetonius and lacitus* state, had much to do with the uprisino- of Uie Jews against the Eomans, in which Jerusalem periSied Ihat which IS further required to explain why they were so sure they saw the Star of the King of the Jews is furnished by a discovery of Kepler. He traced back the orbits of the planets, and found that near the time of the birth of Jesus cer- tain of the planets were in positions of great import in astrolo^ry • Jupiter and Saturn were in conjunction; that is, were very cltse to each other, and were in such a place in the zodiac that the like happens but once in 800 years; and there were other astroloo-ieal signs, all giving the idea that some great event was to conTe to pass in Jud.nea, as Kepler says, " according to the rules of Chaldean art as existmg even till his own time." The new star therefore seemed to them the Star of the King of the Jews; and it seems providential that Ivepler enables us to see how the Magi came scientifically to this opinion, for the silence of the Bible as to anv- thing supernatural in this proves it was not revealed to them " The conjunctions of Jupiter and Saturn occurred twice, in the spring and in the autumn of the same year, and some have thou-ht the Magi saw the earlier one when they were in the East, the later 3ne when they left Jerusalem, and that it was in the direction of * Suetonius says : " Percrebuerat Ori- ente toto vctvs st constans opinio, esse in fatis, ut eo tempore Judasa profecti rerumpotirentur." Tu cit us says : "Plu- ribus persuasio inerat, antiquis sacer- dotum liberis, contineri, eo ipso tempore fore ut valesceret Oriens, profectiqua Judaja rerum potirentur." 4:6 THE BIKTU A>T) CIIUJ)IIOOD OF JESUS. I>ctlileliem, and bo acted as a guide to them. But it is neither manly nor lioncst tlius to evade the astronomical difliculties ot their guidance l)y the star. It does not suit the words of Mat- thew, who says it was a star, and that it went hcfore them ; and the latest astronomical researches, while they prove the accuracy of Kepler's discovery, prove that this conjunction was not in such a direction from Jerusalem that it could in any way have been a guide to Bethlehem.* Upon arriving in Jerusalem the Magi seem to have gone at once to the king's palace. At any rate, Ilerod learned that they were present in the city, and ascei-tained the object of Ilerod and the ^j^^j^. coming. With his usual craftiness he called ° toirether the Sanhedrim to learn where, accordincj to the sacred books of the Hebrews, the Messiah should be born. They recited to him the well-known prophecy in Micah (v. 2) ]K)intin2: to Bethlehem. Calliuir the Mai;i to him, Ilerod care- fully inquired the time at which the remarkable "star'* had made its ajipearance. Then he directed them to go forthwith to Beth- lehem and ascertain exactly all the facts in the case and report to him, pretending that he was equally desirous to pay due deference to the royal infant. Tlie Mairi resumed their iournev, still bcholdinn; the luminous appearance in the heaveu ^1.1 u 1 v. exceedinjjly anorrv, and sent and slew all the male Bethlehem babes. » •' n ^ ? children in Bethlehem " from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the Wise Men." This creat crime is consistent with the character of the man He had ascended the throne through blood ; in blood he liad sus- tained himself; he had murdered his wife and thi-ee sons through the suspicion of jealousy ; and he had arranged that the principal men of the Jewish nation should be slaughtered at his death, that the people might have some occasion to mourn, as he foreknew what a joy of relief they would feel at the death of their tyrant. He was suffering the pain of a horrible and incur- able disease, loving life yet looking for speedy death. He was just in the condition to commit this outrage. That Josephus does not mention this circumstance is nothing to the puiix)se. Josephus did not know eveiytliing. Josephus did not tell all he knew. So many and great were the outrageous crimes committed by Herod that, even if this came to the knowl- edge of Josephus, it might not have occurred to him to mention it. It did not specially bear on anything he had in hand, and he had told enough of Herod's history to depict the character of the wretch of whom the Emperor Augustus is i-e})()rtcd to liave said, '"''IlerodU tnalUm 2>orcus esse q^iamjilius: '' " I would rather be Herod's hog than Herod's son." There is every probability in the histoiy, and notliing against it.* And Matthew is as good histoi-ical author- ity as any otlier ancient writer, and better than Josephus. f He has a reason for mentioning this circumstance, and he states what * Unless you say that it is too horri- ble to be believed : but why ? Ilerod murdered his wife Mariamne, and his three sons. Alexander, Aristobulus, and Antipater, the latter just before his own death — perhaps about the time of the Bethlehem massacre. If he killed his of the hatod inhabitants of an obscure Jewish village ? f LKhtenftcin sngpcsts that Josephus would purposely avoid everything that drew attention to the Mps.sianic hopea of his people : Lnrdner that ho could not have mentioned this caac without own family, would he feel any com- i giving the Christian cause a great ad panction at killing some of the children ! vantage. HIS FIRST YEARS. 49 consists with the well-known character of the man of whom it is related. How many children fell we cannot now know. Yoltaiie, who was always read}' to adopt any calculations which wonld tend to throw discredit on the history in the New Testament, supposes, according to an old Gentile tradition, that the number would he 14,000! nearly three times as many as the largest assigned popula- tion of Bethlehem. Sepp supposed the number of inhabitants tc have been about 5,000, and this would make the number of cliil- dren of the specified age to be about ninety. Townscnd makes the number of inhabitants at 2,000 ; the number of slain cliildrcn would then be about fifty. Some have said fifteen. Ko oue knows. Upon the death of Herod Joseph had another dream, in which he saw an angel who told him to return to his native land Avith Mary and the child, as his enemies were now dead. Joseph obeyed immediately. lie seems to have naturally supposed that David's city was the place where David's son shoul'd be reared, and so prepared to return to Bethlehem. But upon reaching the confines of Juda3a, he learned that Archelaus had succeeded to the throne of his father Herod. He knew that this prince had inherited his father's cruelty and contempt of holy things, and so he was afraid to return to Bethlehem, which M'as within the ter- ritories of Archelaus. Joseph having again been warned in a dream to go to Galilee, which was under the dominion of the mild Antipas, seems to have made a detour, travelling east of the Jordan, within the territory of Herod Philip, until he came to be opposite Galilee, which he entered, and, proceeding to Nazai-eth, settled his family in that city. Jesus thus became confounded with the despised ISTazarenes."'^ In this toAvn the first twelve yeare of the life of Jesus were spent. Ilistor}'- gives us little insight into this period of his exist- ence. Luke says that he "grew and waxed strong in spirit, filled Return and set- tlement in Naza- reth. * Matthew says, " that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets. He shall be called a Nazarene." So far as I can discover, the Old Testa- ment does not contain any text in which the word Nazarene is applied to the Messiah. The explanation may be that prophets had described the IMessiah as a despised person, as the Nazareues were. See John i. 4(5, where Nathanael quotes the proverb, " Can any good thing come out of Nazareth ? " In Isaiah liii. we have a specimen of the general prophecy. 50 THE BIKTII AND CIIILDnOOD OF JESUS. with Avisdom ; and tlic grace of God was upon liim." He liad. for liis playmates liis younger liaif-brothers, children horn to Mary after Jesus, together with his cousins, the cliildren of Cleopas. At liis mother's knee he learned language and the elements of religious thought. He was prol)ably engaged in assisting in the ordinary affaii-s of the household as he grew older, and perhaps assisted his reputed father Joseph in his business as a carpenter. The silence of history is filled with the babblings of tradition, which seems to delight to crowd these twelve years with wonder- ful fantasies. AVe may rely only upon what is certainly afiii'med, and yet it is reasonable to suppose that the wonderful child car- ried with him the unconscious air of an innocent soul that has uncommon depths of spiritual introspection, and is being fitted for a marvellous destiny. So <;rcat is the influence of the surroundinc^s of the younc: that the situation and the scenery of Nazareth. must hereafter forever be a study of profound interest to evei-y student of the growth of character. There is none more glowing than the following, with which M. Henan closes the second chapiter of his "Life of Jesus" : "Nazareth was a little towii, situated in a fold of land broadly open at the summit of the group of mountains which closes on the north the plain of Esdraelon. The population is now from three to four thousand, and it can- not have varied nuich. It is quite cold in wntor, and the climate is very healthy. The t()^\^^, like all the Jewish villages of the time, was a mass of dwellings Iniilt without pretensions to style, and must have presented tliat poor and uninteresting appearance which is offered by villages in Semitic countries. The houses, from all that a})pears, did not differ much from those cul)cs of stone, without interior or exterior elegance, which now cover the richest portion of Lebanon, and which, in the midst of vines and fig-trees, are nevertheless very pleasant. Tlic environs, moreover, are charming, and no place in the world was so well adapted to dreams of absolute happiness. "Even in our days Nazareth is a delightful sojourn, the only i)lace perhaps in Palestine where the soul feels a little relieved of the burden which weighs upon it in the midst of tliis unequalled desolation. The people are friendly and good-natured; tlie gardens are fiesli and green. Antcmius TSIarlyr, at the end of the sixth century, draws an enelianting i)icture of the fertility of the en^nrons, which he compares to paradise. Some valleys on the western side fully justify his description. Tlic fountain, about which the life and gayety of the little town centred, has been destroyed; its broken channels now give but a turl>id water. Ikit the beauty of the women who gather there at night — this beauty which was already remarked in the sixth centur}', and in which was seen the gift of the Virgin Mary, has been 8uri)risingly weU HIS FIRST years: 51 presei-ved. It is the Syrian type, in all its languishing grace. There is no doubt that Mary was tliere nearly every day, and took her place, -with her urn upon her shoulder, in the same line with her unremembered countrywomen. Antonius Martyr remarks that the Jewish women, elsewhere disdainful to Christians, are here full of affability. Even at tliis day religious animosities are less intense at Nazareth than elsewhere. " The horizon of the town is limited ; but if we ascend a little to the pla- teau, swept l)y a perpetual Ijrecze, which commands tlie higliest houses, the [jrospect is splendid. To the west are unfolded tlie beautiful lines of Cannel, terminating in an abrupt point, which seems to plunge into the sea. Then stretch away the double summit which looks down upon Megiddo, the moun- tains of the country of Shechem, with their holy places of the patriarchal age, the mountauis of Gilboa, the picturesque little group mth which are associated the graceful and terrible memories of Solam and Endor, and Thabor, -with its finely rounded form, which antiquity comiiared to a breast. Thiough a depression between the mountains of Solam and Thabor are seen the valley of the Jordan and the high plains of Parjca, which fonn a contin- uous line in the east. To the north, the mountains of Safed, sloping towards the sea, hide St. Jean d'Acre, but disclose the gulf of Khaifa. Such was the horizon of Jesus. " This enchanted cii-cle, the cradle of the kingdom of God, represented the world to liim for years. His life even went little beyond the limits familiar to liis childhood. For beyond, to the north, you almost see upon the slope of Hennon, Cesarea Philippi, his most advanced point into the Gentile world, and to the south, you feel behind these already less clieerful mountains of Samaria, sad Judaea, withered as by a burning blast of abstraction and of death." Joseph and Mary were accustomed to go up annually to Jerusa- lem to attend the Passover Festival. When Jesus reached the age of twelve he was carried to the Temple, to be initiated into the regulai- study of the law, and /^^^"^ ^™°°2 to begin tlie observance of the festivals and fasts of the Jewish church. The Jews believed the age of twelve to be the line dividing childhood from youth. At that period one was called "son of the law," and first incurred legal responsi- bility.* This incident is the only passage in the early life of Jesus of which we have any reliable historical account. But it is full of interest. He was a remarkable child, born under remarkable circum- Btances, which had undoubtedly been narrated to him, and which * Josephus states that when he was 1 city met with him to put qaestions tc fourteen years of age the priests of the J him about the law 52 THE BIETn ANT) CniLDIIOOD OF JEStJS. lie had pondered as he read the law and the prophets, or heard them read. lie liad never been in the Temple since he was an infant. Now the siglit of the solemn fane and the holy rites, amid the excitement of the great crowds who were present, must have stirred the depths of this profound young soul. A solemn sense of his spiritual capabilities, and perhaps an awful presenti- ment of his tremendous destiny must have come upon him, lie began to be revealed to himself. He did not put himself forward as a teacher amonjr those wliite-haired rabbis. His hour^luul not yet come. But he was neitlier a stupid nor a frivolous l)oy. His rarq fine spirit had been developing itself amid the quiet scenes of nature, and he had been looking into the faces of the most profound and puzzling questions. Many a bright day from the heights near Nazareth he had gazed upon the grand scenery about him, turning over what he had heard of the historic associations of such famous places as were in sight, feeling his blood tingle with the touches of autumnal breezes or ghjwing in the ric^i warmth of the first spring ; and Life and Man, the Seen and the Unseen, Nature and Supernature, held their problems up to his soul. And he dared to study them. At twelve he was read}'' to ask questions even of rabbis. The custom of the Jewish schools was for the scholai*s to ask questions of the teachers, and much of rabbinical literature consists of answers to such intei"i"ogato- lies. The questions a man asks are as indicative of his character as the positive sayings that go out of his mouth. If hist(My had preserved these questions which he asked in the Tcmpk^, we should be helped in our study of Jesus. It records sinq)ly tlie general fact that his learned hearers were astonished at his under- standing. When the Paschal ceremonies M-ere ended, Joseph and Mary started to return to Nazareth. They did not at fii-st perceive that Jesus M'as not of the company. They had been M'Bsed by Jo- ^^ accustomed to his obedience as to rclv upon his sepn and Mary. n • '. . promptness. Eastern travellers m ancient tinn > ordinarily made a short jotn-nc}' on the first day. Poi-haps J»)sc|>li- and Mary did not start until some time in the afternoon, and! then in company with many others. When they pitched tlicii- tents that night they discovered his absence. They returned to Jerusalem. Luke says that "after three days they found him." This probably includes their fii-st day out, the second day, in which HIS FIKST YEARS. 53 they returned and inquired, and the third day, when they found him. lie was in the Temple, among the rabbis, astounding them by asking questions, startling by reason of their artless depth and amazing significance.* Mary — not Joseph — spoke to him. She and Joseph knew their relations to the boy. And Mary said, "Son, why have you dealt so Avith us? Behold, your father and I have sought you sorrow- ing." Up to that time he seems to have regarded Josej^h as his father, and to have behaved towards him in that relation. But in his public teachings he never acknowledged Joseph as his father. If Mary had said " we," the remarkable answer in which Jesus ex- presses his sense of his own intimate relationship with God could not ha\e been given. But "your father and I" brings it. AVith tender reproachf ulness Jesus replied : " How is it that you sought me? Did you not know that I must be about my Father's busi- ness?" As if he would remind his mother that she ought to know from- his extraordhiary introduction to the world that his was to be an extraordinary life. As if he would remind her of the fact that at the Annunciation she had been told by the angel that her child was to be the " Son of the Most High." All this she knew ; but now it comes home to her with power, when that simple, ingenuous, noble child stands up in the house of God and claims his Divine Paternity. Of this only authenticated saying of Jesus in his childhood, Stier beautifully says: "Solitary floweret out of the wonderful inclosed garden of thirty 3'ears, plucked precisely there where the swollen bud, at a distinctive crisis^ bursts into flower. To mark that is assuredly the design and the meaning of this record. The child Jesus sought to know himself, and his whole life of childhood was this seeking." All these things Mary laid up in her heart, and most probably after the death of Jesus told them to Luke. This sounds like a mother's narrative repeated by a historian. That Jesus had accumulated a vast number of questions tou(th- ing God and man, life and death, the seen and the invisible, it is most natural to suppose. One also naturall}^ thinks that those questions must have been based largely upon the Hebrew sacred *"To answer children is indeed an sxamen rigororum, " saj's Hamann. And again, " He who will stop the mouths of scribes and sophists must know how to put questions." (Edition of Tloth, ii, 424.) 54 THE BIRTU AJfD CUILDUOOD OF JESUS. books, and that when he should find an opportnnity of going to ecclesiastical headqnarters and visiting the apix)inted cxponndera of tlie law and i)\e ofhcial cxi)lainer3 of the prophets, he would propound such questions, and tliat his interrogatories would not be captious or critical or superficial, about tithes and such trifies, l)ut such as the solcnni tone and the special deep phrases of the Hebrew oracles would suggest to a child of such exquisite genius and such extraordinary spirituality. "Would they not naturally run along the lofty lijie of Messianic hope and promise which his gifted ancestor David had drawn ? Would they not push against the doors to spiritual freedom and the emancipation of humanity which Isaiah seems to have set ajar? When this marvellous child came amid the rabbis and began to ask these questions, no wonder they were amazed. But ho must have been disappointed. Blindness was on the eyes of the teachers in Jerusalem. The more he pressed his simple questions the more he must have felt that sense of his own souship, of that intimate nearness to the Father of spirits which has singled l»im from among the company of the sons of God as the elder brotJier of humanity. They could not instruct him as to Jehovah's An- nointed. Years after, on his last visit to Jerusalem, in the last week of his public ministry, in this same Temple, Jesus pro- pounded to this same school of teaching the questions, "What think ye of Christ? Wliose son is he ? " (Matt. xxii. 42.) Did not his fii*st questions have the same bearing? Two things seem to have come strongly to him from this visit; his own Peculiarity and the Worthlessness of the religious teach- ing of his nation. To what extent the former we do not know. If it was a wide view and a profound conviction, he kept it hum- bly folded in his soul and bided his time. Then he went down with Mary and Joseph to Nazareth, and abode with them, and was subject to them. For another space, coverinj' ci":hteen yeai-s, we have an unbroken Eighteen yeara ., ° ^^^ t-. ' , ,, in Nazareth silencC as to Jesus. Ilistoi*y does not utter a sylla- ble. But during all that season he was ripening; and the times were ripening. He lived a life of some activity, probably "working with his reputed father at the bench of the car- penter, lie led also probably a social life, making and receiving visits, as his presence at the marriage in Cana would seem to im- ply that he was in friendly, cheerful intercoui-se with the people HIS FIKST TEAKS. 55 of his neighborhood. Beyond this we cannot penetrate. "Wg only know that when a man achieves in a few ycai-s a great ^v(n•k the influence of which lasts, he must somcliow through his pre- vious life have been accumulating assets of ])owci' to meet the drafts of his crisis. Jesus was no exception. lie was thirty years growing in the preparation to do the ^\•ork of three. That preparation could hardly have embraced wliat we call " learning," in any sense beyond a study of the ancient Hebrew Scripture. Hellenism, which embraces what we generally con- ceive to be the culture of the Greeks, had not penetrated to the obscure town in which Jesus spent his early life. Indeed it was discouraged by the Jews throughout Judea. In the Talnmd of Jerusalem (Peah. i. 1) a story is told of a learned rabbi, who, when asked at what time it was proper to teach a child the wis- dom of the Greeks, replied : " At the hour when it is neither day nor night, for it is written of the laio, ' Thou shalt study it day and night.' " He must also have been preserved from what M. Renan happily calls the " grotesque scholasticism " at that time taught in Jerusalem, and which shortly after was embodied in the Talmud. He had no regular theological training. CnAPTER V. PUBLIC AFFAIKS DURING THE CIIILDIIOOD AlO) YOUTH OF JE8US. JUD^A. "When Jesus was born Ilerod was near his end, perishing of an incurable disease. Ilis reign had been one of oppression and „ , terror to the Jews, but so skilful a iiolitician was Herod. / . ^ he that no combination had been able to break Ilis influence at Rome. lie continued his crimes up to the very day of Ills death. lie had slain his wife on suspicion, that Mariamnc Mhom he so loved that after her death he would go howling for licr through his palace. lie had slain his two sons, Alexander and Aristobulus, and just before he died he slew a third son, Antipater. lie had outraged the religious sentiments of the Jews. He had built a theatre in the Holy City. lie had introduced Roman games, in which gladiatoi^s and wild beasts fought. lie had put lip the Golden Eagle over the gate of the temple, probably about the time he had inscril)ed the name of Agrippa over the gate. The Jews regarded this as a breach of the Second Cumnuind- ment. It was intolerable to them. It was " an abomination of desolation." At the instigation of two rabbis there was an up- rising, and on a false repoit of the death of Ilerod the young men of the city tore down the hated thing in open daylight. Ilerod caused the rabbis to be burnt alive, the high-priest Mat- thias to be deposed, and Joazar to take his place. This, in brief, was the state of affairs in Jerusalem when Ile- ralace at Jerusalem he hung U]) certain gilt shields without images, but bearing the names of heathen deities.* The people had not forgotten the clandestine inti'oduction of the standai-ds, and this new act greatly inilamed them. They appealed to the lOmperor Tiberius, who ordered their removal. This must have weakened Pilate's influence at Pome. The Co?'lafi\ among the Jews was any oblation, but especially • Philo, Ad Caiuin, § 38, iL 580. | f ^''^^ -OiJ. Arch., v. §§ 302 3'JL PUBLIC AFFAIKS DUKING THE CIIILDIIOUD OF JESUS. G5 in the f ulfilineiit of a tow, which w.as dedicated to the Temple, It might be money, cattle, lands and houses, and it became the property of the Temple, only that the land might be redeemed in the year of Jubilee. (Lev. xxvii. 1-24.) It was, of course, held as very sacred. But this treasure was diverted by Pilate to the building of an aqueduct to bring water into Jerusalem. This so incensed the Jews that, in the language of Josephus, "many ten thousands of the people got together and made a clamor against him. Pilate dressed a num- ber of his soldiers like the Jews, and had daggers concealed on their persons. AVhen the Jews would not forbear, he gave the Boldiers the signal agreed on beforehand, and they fell upon the unarmed and surprised populace, striking the innocent as well as the guilty, so that many were slain and others wounded." * This was the kind of man uiider whose procuratorship Jesus spent his whole public life and exercised his public ministiy, under whom he suffered and died, as the Evangelists and other historians relate. Tacitus says: "Christus, Tiberio Imperate, per procuratorura Pontium Pilatum supplicio adfectus erat."t The following is the only mention of Jesus which occurs in the writings of Josephus : ^ " Now there was about tliis time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call him a man, for he was a doer of wonderful works, a teacher of such men as receive the truth witli pleasure. lie drew over to him both many of the Jews and many of the Gentiles. He was (the) Christ. And when Pilate, at tlie suggestion of the principal men amongst us, had condemned him to the cross, those that loved him at the fii-st did not forsake him, for he appeared to them alive again the third day, as tlie divine prophets had foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concei-ning him. And the tribe of Chris- tians, so named from liim, are not extinct at this day." GALILEE. We turn now from Juda3a to Galilee. By the first will of Herod, Antipas was to be his successor; but a change of the will gave precedence to Archclaus : and Augustus Ca3sar confirmed IIerod Antipas as Tetrarch of Galilee, ^^'^^'^ Antipaa, according to the altered will of his father; and trarch"^" hence he is mentioned by Matthew and Luke as * Josephus, Ant, book xviii. ch. iii I J Josephus, Ant., bookxviii. ch. iiL §3. f Ann. XV. 44. ' 5 66 THE niKTIl AND CIIILDIIOCD 01 JESUS. IIekod the TKTiiAucit. The name of "kiiii:;," given liini by Mark, (vi. 14) must be regarded as a title of courtesy. His fii-st wife was the daughter of Ai-etas, king of Arabia Petrjea. "Wliile liv- ing with her he fell in love with iTei-odias, the daughter of Aris- tobulus, mIio was his own half-brother. She was then the wife of Ilerod Philip I. (another half-brother of Ilerod Antipas), and by him had had one daughter, Salome. He was living in retire- ment in Rome, llerodias disliked this obscurity and forsook him and accepted the offer of Ilerod Antipas to live with him. This outraged Aretas, the father of his first wife, whom he had divorced to please llerodias. Aretas made war upon him and destroyed his army, and was restrained only by a movement of the Emperor Tiberius, who ordered Vitellius to march against Aretas, which command failed of fulfilment because of the death of Tiberius. But the Jews regarded this disaster to Ilerod Antipas as the ven- geance of heaven for the murder of John the 13aj)tist, who had rebuked Ilerod Anti}>as and llerodias for the sinful lives they were leading. This Ilerod had qnarrelled with Pilate the procurator in Juda?a, it is supposed because of those " Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices," a circumstance Quarrels with .. ,. j, , ... ^ ... , ,,,, „., ^ mentioned ni Luke (xiii. 1, xxiii. I'J). i liere Pilate. ' seems t(j be no mention made elsewhere of this; but the Galileans were foremost in the frays which occurred at the festivals, and these difUculties were so frequent that it is not to be wondered that one of them escaped the notice of Josephus. Ilerod would natui-ally resent ]*ilatc's ])unishing his subjects, whatever might liave been their guilt; not to mention the fact that he assumed the role of pati-on of the Jews. The court he paid the Jews is shown by his attendance upon the Passover in Jeru.salem. That visit gave Pilate an oj^portunity to pr()])itiate him by acknowledging his jurisdiction over Galileans; so that when he learned that Jesus was a Galilean he sent him to Ilerod Antipas, liy llerodias he was instigated to a movement which ended in his luin. His nei)hew, Ileiod Agrippa I. (under whom, yeara alter, came all the territory which had been crcKiaB. ruled over by his grandfather, Ilerod the Great), «ras a favorite with Caligula, having been imprisoned for cxj)ressing a wish for Caligula's early succession to the imperial throne. PUBLIC AFFAIES DUKmG THE CIIILDUOOD OF JESUS. 67 Upon him Caligula showered favors. "What specially moved Ilerod Antipas and Ilerodias was that Ilerod Agrippa had at- tained to a royal estate. So they determined to go to jRome, osten- sibly to petition for the royal title, but really to intrigue against Agrippa, who, on his side, brought accusation against his uncle Antipas, whom the Emperor Caligula banished to Gaul, where he died. Ilerodias showed at least this good trait, that she shared his exile. Josephus puts a very pretty speech into her mouth, making her say to Caius : "Thou indeed, O Emperor! actest after a magnificent manner, and as becomes tliyself in what thou offerest me; but the kindness which I have for my husband hinders me from partaking of the favor of thy gift; for it is not just that I, who liave been made a partner in his prosperity, sliould for- sake him in his misfortunes." (Josephus, Ant, book xviii. chap, viii.) The character of this prince can be easily gathered from the record. He was not so great a t}Tant as his father Herod. But he was unscrupulous. He shut up John in prison for no crime nor violation of the peace, but ^^^^^<=*«/^ o^ because that faithful teacher reproved him for ^^^^' his adultery with Ilerodias, and for his general wickedness of life. He was cunning. Jesus, generally so mild and careful in his speech, calls him a " fox." (Luke xiii. 32.) He was weak and superstitious. For a time he heard John gladly (Mark vi. 20), and wished to see Jesus, that he might witness some miracle. (Luke xxiii. 8.) Because of a foolish oath, uttered in wine, ho slew John, and was afterward filled with remorse ; and although a Sadducee, not believing in spirits and the resurrection, he was frightened when he heard of Jesus, fearing it might be John come back from the dead. (Mark vi. 14.) He was Avilling to have Jesus destroyed, but contrived to roll the responsibility upon Pilate. He was unscrupulous, capricious, sensual, superstitious, and weak. THE CHURCH. The office of the High-Priest, had felt the general unsettling effect of these turbulent times, so that there seems to be some confusion at the date of the openiuir J^^ High-Pnest- „ . . r o hood. Caiaphas ot the pubhc mmistry of Jesus. Luke say^ and Annas, (iii. 2) that Annas and Caiaphas were high-priests. An investigation of all available records gives us the follow- ing result: The real and acting High-Priest was Josepli, 68 THE RTKTII AXT) CHILDriOOD OF JESUS. Bunifimed Cuiaplias ; and liis Vicar, or Deputy, was his father-in law, called Annas by Luke, Ananus by Josephus, but probably called in liis own time and place Ilananiali. Caiaphas was ai> pointed to the oilice by the jirocnrator, Valerius Grains, abont A.D. 25, and held it throni:;!! all the procnratoi-ship of Puntius Pi- late, and was conseqnently Iligh-Priest throngh the whole ])iiblic ministry of John and of Jesns. lie married the daughter of a former Iligh-Priest, Annas, who still possessed great inlinence, several of his family having held the highest sacerdotal position. The mention of these two jointly by Luke has made some per- plexity, which has given rise to various explanations, of which it is necessary to state only that which seems satisfactory, namely, that of Wieseler, who, in his Chronology^ and more recently in an article in Ilerzog's Jieal-q/dopddie, maintains that the two, Annas and Caiai)has, were jointly at the head of the Jewish people, the latter being the actual Iligh-Priest, and Annas being president of the Sanhedrim. In this latter position he might have acted as vicar to his son-in-law, in an oflice called in the Hebrew 130, Sagan, and mentioned by the Talmudists. This is the opinion of Kninr)!. It is suggested that such position would not be unworthy of one who had held the ofiice of Iligh-Priest, since the dignity of the Sagaii was very gi-eat. Lightfoot shows, for in- stance, that he might on urgent occasions enter the Holiest of Holies. {Ilor. Ifch. Luc.^ iii. 2.) It is not strange that having been actually a High-Priest, and being now president of the Sanhedrim, ho should still be called by the name of the lofty oflice he had filled. "We shall meet Caiaphas as the history shall progress. It may merely be mentioned here that he was a Sadducee, and used his influence o])prcssively, the Sudducees usually being more intolerant than the Pharisees: and frequently it has been remarked that no people are more illiberal than those who {^^\\\\jpar exceUence^^xQ' name of Liberals, and that no sectaries have been more intoler- ant tha)j those who have had no creed. The M'ord SAxiiEnnrM — or more accurately Sanhedrin, coming from the Greek awt^tov^ no Hebrew ctvmol(\gy The Sanhedrim. i • i r i-r -i. j • ^ *i t: liavmg been found \ox it — designates thebupremo Council of the Jewish jieople as it existed in the times of Jesus and long before. In the Talmud it is called " The Great SanhetJrhn f in the ^lishna, " The Houae of Judgment.'''' The ^Mishna traces the origiii of this assembly to the times of PUBLIC AFFAIRS DUKINQ TUE CULLDHOOD OF JESUS. GO Moses, who was directed (Num. xi. IG, 17) to associate with him seventy elders in the government. But Vorstius {De Si/iihedrlis, § 25-40) seems to show that the *'"^* identity of this Comicil of Moses and the Sanhedrim of later days was a mere conjecture of the rahhins, as we find no trace of the continuance of the Council of Moses in Deut. xvii. 8, 10, wheie it surely would have been mentioned if then existing, nor in the age of Joshua and the judges, nor in the times of the kings ; so that that council seems to have been temporary. The Greek etymology of the word points to a time subsequent to Alexan- der's supremacy in JudiBa.* It has been conjectured that the yiuovoia liSv '/oidai'ow of 2 Macc. i. 10; iv. 44; xi. 27, designates the Sanhedrim. If so, it is the earliest historical trace of the institu- tion. Many learned men agree in believing that it arose after the return of the Jews from Babylon, and in the time of the Seleu- cidae or of the Ilasmonean princes. The fact stated by Jose- phus,t that Herod, when procurator of Galilee, e.g. 47, was called before the Sanhedrim on the charge that he had usurped the func- tions of that body in putting men to d(3ath, shows how great its power was at that day, and the probability that it was notthen of recent origin. For the constitution of the Sanhedrim we ai-e compelled to rely upon the im;idontal notices in the New Tcritament, namely, Matt. XX vi. 57, 5!) ; Mark xv. 1 ; Luke xxii. GO ; , „,_! A i. 01 T^ .1 •, 1 , , Its constitution. and Acts v. 21. 1 rom these it probably appears that the body consisted of the Iligh-rriests (and those who had been nigh-Priests) and 'u^/mosU^ chief-priests, that is to say, the heads of the twenty -four classes into which the priests were divided; 7rofff.?tT«(;o(, elders, men of age and experience; and yQcijifirtiHc^ scribes, men learned in the law. The number was probably eeventy-one. There was nearly perfect uuaniuiity of o\m\\on among the Jews, and that was expressed in the Mishna, which says {Sanedr. i. 61) that there were seventv- oue judges. Tlie reason assigned for this number is not sound, namely, that in Num. xi. 6, Moses is required to gather seventy elders, who with himself would ^^ "^®' make seventy-one, as we have shown it probable that no connec- * Livy expressly states (xiv. 32) : " Prouunciatum quod at statum Mace- doniaa pertinebat senatores, quos syne- droa vocant, legendos esse, quorum oon* silio respublica administraretur. " t^««.,xiv. 9, §4. 70 THE BIETH AJTD CHILDHOOD OF JESUS. tion existed between the Council of Moses and the Sanhedrim Our reception of this number is to be based upon the tradition of the Jews, which has its probability increased by the su*;- gostion that the modern Council would, as far as possible, have I)cen formed upon the model of that of Moses. The Presid-ent was styled " Nasi," and was chosen on account of his eminent worth and wisdom, and was supposed to occupy Ita President the place of Moscs. Sometimes the Iligh-Priest liad this honor. At the condemnation of Jesus the Iligh-Pricst was presiding, as we leani from Matt. xxvi. 62. The Vice-President was called " Ab-Beth-Din," and sat at the right hand of the President. The Babylonian Geraara states that there were two scribes, one to record the votes of acquittal and one those of condemnation. The lictors, or attendants of the Sanhedrim, are called vnr^Qiiat^ in Matt. xxvi. 58, and in Mark xiv. 54. While in session the Sanhedrim sat in form of a semicircle in the front of tlie President. The j)lace of the meeting of the Sanhedrim, it is suj^posed, was in a building near the Temple ; but that it might be assembled elsewhere we learn from ]\Iatt. xxvi, 3. when meetmjr ^^ seems to have met in the residence of the Iligh-Pricst. The Jurisdiction of this body M'as mainly over questions of religion, as the trial of a tribe for idolatrv, the trial of false -^ . ... ^. i)roi)het5, and of the Ilijrh-Pricst,* and other Ita jurisdiction. ^ , . '^ ' pricsts.f Jesus was arraigned as a false prophet,:}; and Peter, John, Stephen, and Paul, as teachers of pestilential erroi-s. Its jurisdiction seems to have extended beyond Palestine. The power of cajiital punishment was taken from this body forty years before the destruction of Jerusalem. § It was for this rea- son the Jews answered Pilate : " It 'S not lawful for us to put any man to death." (John xix. 31.) The Sanhedrim arrested, tried, convicted, and then handed the condemned over to the secular [X)wer, represented by the Roman procurator. There a])i>oai-s an exception (in Acts vii. 56, etc.) in the case of Stei)hcn : but that was " a tumultuous proceeding or an illegal assumj)tion of * Mishna, SanJiedr. L § That is, according to the Jerusa f Midil'dhy V. Jem Qcmara, quoted by Scldcn, book X John li. 47. ii., chap. 5, 11. PUBLIO AFFAIKS DURING THE CHILDHOOD OF JKSUS. 71 power," as the execution of James in tlie absence of tlic procura- tor is declared by Josephus* to have been. The religious sects of the day were tlie Pliarisecs, the Sadducces, and the Essenes. We shall soon see tliat tlie ministry of Jesus was antagonistic to all these, and in studying tliat antagonism we shall more clearly understand the distinctive tenets and tempers of these several religionists. It is sufficient in this place to ren- der a mere synopsis. The Pharisees (se])aratists, as their name implies) were the Puri- tans of the time, claiming superior sanctity. Tliey taught that tradition was as binding as the written law ; that p, . God must have communicated much religious truth to Moses orally, as the people generally held, and had from time immemorial held, certain doctrines to be as well settled as the law, althougli they are not mentioned in the Pentateuch, of which prayer and the resurrection of the dead are notable in- stances, and that this oral law ^yas as binding as the written law. The classical passage in theMishnaf on this subject is the follow- ing: "Moses received the (oral) law from Sinai, and delivered it to Joshua, and Joshua to the elders, and the elders to the pro- phets, and the prophets to the men of the Great Synagogue." They held themselves to be in the succession and to have the right to interjDret and apply the law. They had become the most ex- treme ritualists. They were formalists. They had smothered spiritual religion to death under ceremonials. They laid on the conscience " burdens too heavy for men to bear." The Saddacees were a sect owing their existence to a reaction against Pharisaic teaching. The Sadducecs held that the oral law was not at all bindinf;:;, that nothins: was bindino: „ 1 1 °' o c> Saclducees. except the written law. To them it was a logical consequence to deny a future state of rewards and punislnneuts. As in the written law, in all the pleadings of the great lawgiver for good living, and in all his threatenings against evil-doing, Moses had never called to his aid the consolation of the doctrine of future rewards nor the terror of future punishments, it seemed to them inconceivable that he should have believed in any such doctrine. They proceeded to deny the immortality of tlie sonl, and then the existence of the soul itself. They believed in neither angel nor spirit. * Antiq. , xx. 9, § 1. | f Quoted in Smith's Dictionary. 72 TIIK BIUTIl AXD CHILDHOOD OF JESL'S. The Essenes represented rather a tendency than a sect But they grew into a coiumunity. They separated themselves from _ the distraction of business. Thev were Pliarisees £6sene& T i i i i in doctrine, in general terms; but they held to- wards tlie Pharisees very much the relation which the Pharisees maintained toward the mass of the common people. They were the Quakei-s of the day of Jesus. They opposed wai and slavery and commerce. They were monks, ascetics, mystics. They ex- erted little influence on Christianity, and Jesus made no special allusion to them. His life and doctrine did not accord with their views and practices. The Ilerodians were a politico-religions sect or party. Herod the Great was of foreign descent, but was a Jew in his religious professions. There were many Jews who saw no ero lana ^^^^ ^^ sustain the national independence, in face of the Ronnm power, except in the continuance of the reign of Herod ; and, as they believed that the preservation of their nation- ality was necessary to the glory of their destiny, they would sup- port Herod, in whom they saw a protection against direct heathen rule. Othei-s were quite willing to have a compromise between the old Hebrew faith and the culture of the Pagans, such as Herod seemed to bo making. The political wing of the Ilero- dians would side with the I'harisees, and the religious wing with the Sadducees. But the Ilerodians seem never to have attempted to harmonize the doctrines of the two sects. It is, perhaps, more nearly proper to call tlie Ilerodians a coalition than a party or a sect. PART 11. INTEODUCTION OF JESUS TO HIS PUBLIC MINISTEY. FEOM A.D. 26 TO A.D. 27— ABOUT ONE YEAH. CHAPTER 1. John's rREAcirmo and ministky. John, called " the Baptist," performed a ministry in Judaea which certainly opened the way for the public work of Jesus, and hence he is spoken of as the Harbinger. Of the wonderful circumstances attendinir the . ,. , .".'. ^ L ; Luke ui. birth of this vei-y extraordinary man we have already spoken. In his case, as in that of his cousin Jesus, a BJleuce covers the years of his youth. Ilis marvelh)us birth, and the manner in which he obtained his name, must have had a great effect upon the character of the child, making his ver}' boyhood and youth sacred and solenm. lie grew up in the study of the law, grieved at the spiritual deadness of his times, and the hard conventionalities wlii(;li had enervated the heart of the nation. Upon his spirit must have fallen, also, the influence of the gen- eral expectation of a Mighty One, a Messiah, a Deliverer. His nation had 'pondered the strange intimations of the prophets, and the uprising of Elijah in tlieir midst would not have been to them a surprising event. If Moses be excepted, there was no figure among all the mighty men of tlieir earlier history who filled so large space in the Hebrew mind, and filled it so solemnly, as Elijah. To their imagination he was colossal. To the modern mind he is " the grandest and most romantic charac- 74 IKTKODUCTION OF JESUS TO HIS rUTJLIC MINISTRY. ter that Israel ever produced." * Ilis history fascinates us. " Hie rare, sudden, and brief appearances, — his undaunted courage and fiery zeal, — the brilliancy of his ti-iumphs, — the pathos of his des- ixjiidency, — and the glory of his de})arture, — threw such a halo of brightness around him as is equalled by none of his compeei-s in the sacred story." f He has been well called ^^ Prodi fjiosus Thes-- lites'''' X — the j)rodigious Tishbite. It is noticeable that the very last sentence wiiieh fell from the lips of Prophecy, before they were sealed into silence, contained the prediction of the reap- pearance of Elijah (Malachi iv. 5, G) ; and whenever any man of extraordinary power appeared, it seemed to the Jews, in their political troubles and degradation, that Elijah had come. Such was their expectation when this holy Xazarite, John, fol- lowing the example of many good men who were discom^aged by the degeneracy of the times, retired to the desert John's conse- -i iaiti i ^ • iCi re<;ion bevond tlie Jordan and gave himselr to cration. ° ' . , ,. . the self-discipline of meditation and prayer. After years of stern ti-aining the hour of his manifestation came, and he broke upon the world with i)reaching that roused the nation. His appearance was not comely. - His physique had none of tho plumpness, his complexion none of the richness, which comes from generous diet. His food was locusts § and wild honey. His dress was removed as far as possible from the elegance of fashion and the pomp of office ; it was a vestment of camel's hair, j bound about his waist by a leathern girdle. His address was blunt and brusque. He held no office and had no official sanction. Ho was not a priest, nor a rabbi. As De Pressense well says : " It was not priests or doctoi-s that were wanting; the very spirit of • Stanley, S. and P., 328. f Smith's Diet., Art. Elijah. X Acta Sanctor. % The axptty permitted to be eaten fLevit xi. 22), was used as food by the lower orders in Judoea, and mentioned Bajitista jirobat." Shaw found locusta eaten by the floors in liarbary. ( Travels, p. 1G4.) See 1 Sam. xiv. 25. Here again there is no need to suppose anything else meant but honey made by wild bees. I The garment of camel's hair was by Strabo and Pliny as eaten by the not the camel's skin with the hair on, Ethiopians, and by many other authors i which would be too heavy to wear, but OS articles of food. Jerome, adv. Jo- i raiment woven of earners hair, such as vinian, 2, C, says: " Apud Orientales ct Josephus speaks of (B. J. i. 24, 3). Libya) populos quia per dcsertam et « From Zcch. xiii. 4, it seems that such a calidam eremi vastitatem locustarem I dress was known as the prophetic garb: nubcs reperiuntur, locustis vesci moris i " Neither shall they (the prophets) weiU est : hoc verum esse Joannes quoque ' a rough garment to deceive." John's pkeacuing and ministrt. 75 Judaism was stifled under rites and traditions. It was this spirit that had to be reanimated and freed from all that oppressed it." For this work John needed, as he took, a fi-ee, broad si)ace. His ministry is remarkable for the absence of two thinij^s, namel}^ miracles and an organizaticjn. He pretended to no juiracle ; he formed no school. Of the multitudes , ^ 1 • • 1 • 1 • '11 John's ministry, who came to mm, some remamed m his neiglibor- hood and gained what benefit they could from his society and his teaching. But he did not add another sect to the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Essenes. lie was simply a preacher, a herald. As to his st//le, two things are to be noticed : 1. His earnestness. lie believed that he had a great message to his generation. lie could not forbear. lie had no specially favorable position for its deliver}', but it was in him and it grew, and it became too large and is s y e. strong for him to hold, and there was room in the wilderness and he went there " crying." One can fancy that he cried and cried until a stray traveller across the wilderness heard him, listened, went and reported the sound ; and another came and heard, and rejiorted the strange voice crying in the wilderness; and they that went alone hung timidly on the outskirts of the desert, and held their hands behind their ears to catch the flying sounds, and trembled as they heard the cry, " Kepent ! Kepent ! " then drew near in groups and beheld the strange wild man who, when he saw them, opened his great eyes wide upon them, and cried, " He- pent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." Frightened, they fled. But there is a fascination in earnestness. The tones of the prophet's voice rang in their ears whether they waked or slept, and they could not stay away. And when they went again he cried, "Bring forth fruits meet for repentance." -lie was in full earnest. He believed that before he came Isaiah heard him with his own prophetic ears, and exclaimed, " Hark ! a voice is crying in the wilderness ! " 2. The message was indiscriminate. The crowds of common people drew the great and learned to this powerful preacher. He had no compliments for the rabbis, no gallant speeches for the ladies, no politic utterances for the powerful. He saw before him men and women, full of sin, concealed from them- selves by their conventionalities, and he thundered the truth at them indisci-iminately. They had Abraham to their father 76 INTRODUCTION OF JESUS TO mS PUBLIC MINISTRT. and needed no special moral illumination, certainly no spiritual regeneration — so they thought of themselves. But he helievcd that they did need spiritual regeneration, and helieved that that regeneration was the most important thing in all the world. The matter of his preaching we gather from the few notices in the Evangelists. \. '^ ° ^ Matthew reports him as saving, " Repent ye : preaching. ^ ^ > r^? ... for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. (iii. 2.) " But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to his baptism, he said unto them, ' O generation of " vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wi-ath to come? Bring forth therefore fruits meet for rciientance : and think not to say within youi-selves. We have Abraham to our father: for I say unto you, that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham. And now also the axe is laid unto the root of the trees: therefore every tree which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance : but he that cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear : he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire : whose fan is in his hand, and he will thoroughly puige his floor, and gather his wheat into the garner; but he will burn up the chaif with unquenchable Are.' " (iii. 7-13.) Mark says that he preached, saying, "There cometh one mightier than I after me, the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to stoop down and unloose. I indeed ■ have baptized you with water : but he shall bap- tize you with the Holy Ghost." (i. 7, 8.) Lnl'e reports that he said to the multitude that came forth to be baptized of him, " ' O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee frtnn the wrath to come % Biing forth u-esrepo thercfoi-e fruits worthy of reiicntan(;e, and begin not to say within yourselves, AVe ha\e Abraham to (>?^/' father : for 1 say unto you, That God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham. And now also the axe is laid unto the root (»f the trees : every tree thei-eforo which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.' And the ])eople asked him, saying, 'What shall we do then?' lie answered and said unto theui, ' lie that hath two coats, let him imjtart tc him that hath none ; and he that hath meat, let him do likewise.' John's peeaciiing and otnistrt. 77 Tlien came also publicans to be baptized, and said unto him, 'Master, what shall we do?' And he said unto them, 'Exact no more than that which is appointed you.' And the soldiers likewise demanded of him, saying, ' And what shall we do ? ' And he said unto them, ' Do violence to no man, neither accuse any falsely ; and be content with your wages.' And as the people were in expectation, and all men mused in their hearts of John, whether he Avere the Christ, or not ; John answered, sayin^y unto them all, ' I indeed baptize you with water ; but one migh- tier than I Cometh, the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to unloose : he shall baptize you with tlie Holy Ghost and witli fire : whose fan is in his hand, and he will thoroughly purge his floor, and will gather the wheat into his garner ; but the chaff he will burn with fire unquenchable.' " (iii. 7-17.) John the Evangelist, speaking of John the Baptist, says :— - " And this is the record of John when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, ' AVlio art thou ? ' And he confessed, and denied not ; but *^°^° *''^ ^^'^°' confessed, ' I am not the Christ.' And they ^^ ^^ ^ ^^''°^ ' asked him, MYliat then? Art thou Elias?' And he saith, ' 1 am not.' ' Art thou that Prophet ? ' And he answered, ' Xo.' Then said they unto him, 'Who art thou? that we may give an answer to them that sent us. What sayest thou of thyself?' He said, ' I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord, as said the prophet Esaias.' — And they which were sent were of the Pharisees. And tlicv ask-ed him, and said unto him, ' Why baptizest thou then, if thoii I.c not that Christ, nor Elias, neither that Prophet?' Jolm aiiswcred them, saying, 'I baptize with water: but there standcth one among you, whom ye know not : he it is, who coming afrei- me is pi-ef erred before me, whose shoe's latchet I am not woi-fhv to unloose.' " (i. 19-27.) It will be seen that this startling preacher not only tiaini.ltMl under foot all prejudices as to appearance and style, but als.. rliat he S])ared no prejudice of national pride or eccle- siastical precedent or ancient creed or modern Substance of his rationalism. Let us analyze these very brief re- ports of his discoui-ses and see what the substance was. 1. His most impressive discoui-ses seemed to be of repentance. This ho pressed upon the people of all classes vehemently. It was 78 INTRODUCTION OF JESUS TO HIS PUEIJC illNISTRT. not to be a mere outward reformation, an abandonment C)f noto rions sin — nor simply the observance of strid rules of life, mere external purification. lie knew iiotliiMi^ of the dogma t)f sin resident in the flesh, and of the thciiry of purifying the life by lacerating the body, or by reduc- ing it by ascetic observaiutes. He had a mission to othere, not a liuiiiiliating work to perform on himself, like the Jewish masses that were around him in the desert. lie tore conventionalities and ci-eeds and orthodoxies to shreds, and flung them to the winds, lie went at once into tlie inmost man, and insisted that his hear- ci"s should make a total change of their minds in every dejiart- ment — in intellections, in emotions, in volitions. lie knew that if this intenuU rectification could be secured everything necessary in the outward life would follow, " fruits meet for repentance." So when the peo})le asked for more distinct instruction he gave it with«nit vagueness. lie had the art of discovering just where the fester was in the sore, and the great surgical talent of bold yet skilful probing. Even the publicans — that most hated class — were drawn to him. lie told them plainly that they should exact no more than they were authorized to require. Thie was their besetting sin, greatly nourished by their position, which gave them so much op])ortunity to enrich themselves by op]u-ca- sing othci-8 without being called to account. — There were soldiere in the neighborhood. And they flocked to hear this strange preacher, and asked for instruction. He warned them against their well-known vices, charging them to assault no one ; nor accuse any of the people to their superior on frivolous pre- tences ; nor be discontented with their wages. It is to be observed that John, radical as he was, and reformer, made no assault ujxin the existing institutions of society. He was a radical not in the sense of tearing everj'thiug up by the roots, but of imjiroving all growing things by purifying the roots. In this ])articular we shall see that Jesus resembled him. 2. lie preached against the formalism and the scepticism of tlie times, the phariseeism and sadduceeism that divided the ruling miiuls of his nation. This led hiin to deal roughly Against formal- ^^.|jjj ^^^^ cherished traditional religion of his peo- Ism and Bcepti- , it i i ^^^L^ • ,.• r n • i pie. Jle had as little appreciation lor this as he . had for sacerdotal succession. Men are not to bo drilled and marched in platoons. The business of life is individ- John's rEEACHiNO and ministry. 79 ual culture in holiness. No man does a great tiling in any proces- sion or succession. He must step out. lie is not to fancy, because it is a fact that he is descended from Abraham, that he is all that he should be. The stern preacher looked at the shingle of pebbles and stones at his feet, and laughed their traditional claims to scorn by exclaiming, " Children of Abraham are you? God can of these stones raise up children to Abraham." It is difficult to conceive at this distance and with our culture how shocking such a statement must have sounded in Jewish ears. As members of the theocracy they held that they had a prescriptive right to a place in the kingdom of the coming Messiah when he should arrive. And they believed that that kingdom would be restricted to their nation. There was a broad dash of liberalism in John's discourses. It hit the formal Pharisee and the nnspiritnal Sad- ducee equally hard to be told that God could, by his Spirit, out of stones raise up children to Abraham ; as if he had said, " God is able to transform the most uncultivated portions of the human race into a people of highest spiritual character and prospects." 3. He announced an approaching kingdom, and called it " the kino-dom of the heavens." If the kino'dom were to be such as they and their fathers had expected, there had then been no need of "change of mind," repent- cot^gr^gdon^ ance. They longed for a kingdom of earth, whose mighty Ruler should be to them a deliverer from every foreign yoke. lie was to be revealed from heaven with great wonders, resuscitate the race of Abraham, subjugate the Roman power to the Jewish theocracy, carry a war of triumph against all the Gentiles — all nations tliat were not Jews — and then establish a personal reigr. of a thousand years, in which the Jewish people were to rcacjL a condition of nnimaginable splendor. John plainly told them that that was all nonsense. That, so far from that being the case, the axe was already laid to the root of the tree of their nation and religion, and that in a little while, if no sign of an inward life appeared, tluit whole tree, deep as its roots had struck, and wide as its branches had waved, would be cut down. It Avaa inward spiritual life which God required in every man. The kingdom was to be a spiritual kingdom, in which the will of each man was to be conformable to the will of God, a kingdom which was to cover earth with lieaven and obliterate the distinction of eacri^d and profane. 80 INTRODrCnON OF JESUS TO IIIS PUBLIC MINISTRY. 4. He declared the nearness of tliat kingdom, and made the Btartling announcement to his hearei-s that the liuler in that kingdom was then actually standing, unknown, Announces the • /i • • i ^ i tt -n ^ .^ ^ t^ ^ _ , ., in their very midst I lie mai^nmed that Iluler, presence of the '' _ f^ ' itiiier. and spoke of himself in contrast as quite the most humble of pei-sons. He was not worthy to antic and carry the shoes* of that Potentate. That Ruler was mightier than he. He l)a})tized only with water; the Coming One should ba])tize with fire. He was no one, — not Christ, — not Elias, — nothing — but a V. " i • i around what they suppose to be a diniculty, M'hich they really make into a difficulty for other minds, but Mhich they do not remove. The simple statement of John himself ought to throw much light on the subject. lie says, ^^tAat he skouhl he made knovni to Israel; therefore am I come baptizing with •water." That seems quite exi)licit. The hope of a Messiah was intensifying its element of expectation when John's ministry opened. lie felt the depths of his great nature stirred with a call to arouse his people to a preparation of heart for the great Advent. lie did not entertain those thoroughly spiritualistic views of the Messiah's kingdom which have since-obtained. lie believed in his pci"sonal reign, a great sjiiritual imi»rovement, a discrimination, a dividing, a burning up the chaff of his own nation, a cleansing of the Jewish peojjle for the establislnnent of a purified theocracy to be administered by The Christ in i)roper person. It was not simply the kingdom he was to announce, but the king. Something in this man's soul told him that in the course of his ministry of heralding the kingdom the Certain mistakes. , . , , , , i i ^ ""i • i ' / i i i kmg shoula bo revealed to lum, and he slionid point out that being to his 2^^<>2^^e, and that there his ministry wjw virtually to cease. lJp(jn the inauguration of Jesus, John was JESUS DESIGNATED AT ITIS BAPTISM BY JOHN. 85 functus officio. Jesus did not come to John for instruction, surely E\ery reader of the history, who reads it even in the most com- mon Iiuinan way, must see that as a teacher the man Jesus wag superior to the man John. lie did not come to liim to be bap- tized with a baptism of repentance, change of mind, for he liad held these views of the spiritual theocracy as long as John had. lie was at least John's fellow-prophet of the coming kingdom. lie had thrown no obstacles in the way. lie was not a priest, a con\entionalist, a ritualist, a fossilized conservative of decent hcterodoxes. It was not a sacrament that John was to administer to him. It was not an induction into a priestly office. The bap tism administered by John to Jesus had no precedent and was iKjt a precedent. It was a singular act and fact in human his- tory. The Man who was to be the Ruler of the human mind in the aires to come, and was to ascend to the hii-'hest throne in tho kingdom of thought; the Man who was to be the Ruler of the human heart in the ages to come, so that no one was to be so deeply, highly, tenderly, reverently loved as He, — this man was the Son of Mary. He had been ordained to this place in tho harmonious arrangement of the universe, and hence is called the CiiKiSTUS. The time for his inauguration had come. lie was to be revealed to the world through the ministry of John. One needs to be very tender and thoughtful as one studies this great passage; great not only in the history of Jesus, but in the history of the world; for the history of all humanity was from this time forth to be changed by liim. Whatever there is of fact should be studied with historical discrimination, and whatever there is of })oetr3', wonder, aAve, and beauty, should, if possible, be studied with poetic appreciation. It has been well said that — "It is of manifest importance that what we see we should see clearly. We are not indeed to require, as an absolute condition of faith, that wc should be able to see, or even to image distinctly to the mind, the i\\\\\X in wliich we are to believe. Because there are thincfs ^'T""'. \ " ' '"'**"'' ■^ '^ mcntAl picture. which, from tlieir very nature, do not admit of being pic- tured even to the imagination, such as God or one's own soul. (See Edlnhunjh Rev., vol. xlvi., p. 339, Eng. ed.) But when the matter proposed is confessedly an object of sense, a scene that addresses the eye, clear vision is supremely desirable. TVc may not ask to see those things which eye hath never seen and can never see. But of that wliich professes visibility, let us have tlie distiuct- est sight Accordingly, it is necessary to a due faith in tlie Baptism of Jesua, 86 nrrEODucnoN of jesus to nis pctjlic ministet. with its attendant circumstances as a fact, that it should be distinctly repre scnted to tljc mind. With this understanding, and a single desire to a|>})ro hend the actual state of the cjise, what it was tliat occurred on tliis occasior*, let us cxaiuinc the above account." — Je*ua and his Biogi-aphert, by Furucss, p. 147. Jesus came voluntarily to John's baptism uninvited. TTad John seen liini before? Possibly several times: they were kins- men. Probably seldom: they lived apart in a John's previous ., i • i • i acquaintance. country not very easily traversed in their day. Possibly never. There is no history. John says (John i. 31), " I knew him not." This may mean one of two things : either that he had no knowledge of the person of Jesus, BO that he should recoccnize him on si^ht, or that he did not know tliat this was the wonderful Being whose arrival his great life- work was to announce ; did not know that he was the ''^Krhome- noSy^ the Coming Man, until certain wonderful phenomena made the whole ])lain to his mind. The submission of Jesus to the baptism of John was another blow at churchisin, pricstism, and all that form of thouglit which attempts to run the streams of God's gra- A blow at church- . ,, , i • ,• i i . t' . ciousness through ecclesiastical aqueducts. Jesus was a layman. So was John. Jesus Avas about to begin the Ministry of Grace, to assume the kinglincss of the Power of Purity, lie did not order the conduct of the ])()inp of the inauguration at lm])eri:d Home, nor at Saceixlotal Jerusa- lem. Not in palace, not in temple ! He went out into the t'j>cu air, under the open sky, beside the running stream. He would not have lictoi-s and chamberlains and priests about him. A rough, unlearned layman, exhorting the people to be ready for him, that was a sufficient herald. lie was going to lay the world open to goodness and to God. lie was going to rend the veil of the temple and of all tenij)les. lie wjis going to abolish heredi- tary religions and tear away whatever stood between God and man, whether it were temple veil or erroneous thought, a chauci'l rail or a dogma, or a rubric or a canon, — M'hatever stood between the Father and the Child he was to destroy. He was never to use tlie phi-ase " The Church " in all his ministry. His kingdom was to be inclusive, not exclusive. His people were to be every man a king and every man a priest, a royal priesthood, a holy genenition that should know no distinction between " clergyman " and " layman." JESUS DESIGNATED AT HIS BAPTISM BY JOHN. S7 Wlien Jesus approaclied John for baptism, the latter hesitated. If he had never seen him before, or not since early childhood there was something in the appearance of Jesus which arrested his attention. lie was not like «. , ^- t to baptize Jesus. the people who nsually flocked to his niinistj-y. There must have been a remarkable absence of traces of world- liness, — world-care, world-sorrow, world-pasoion, — on the brow of this rare young man, who had groAvn up under influences so pure from a birth so marvellous, lie must have looked like one who had always been in " the kingdom of the heavens," the coming of which John was preaching. Why should he be baptized ? With all his vehemence and power, the great-hearted John was modest. When he looked at Jesus he declined to baptize him, and said, " I have need to be baptized of you : and do you come to me ? " The repl}' of Jesus was simple and decisive: "Suffer it now: for thus it becomes us to fulfil all righteousness." As though he had said, "AVhatever you perceive which yon .„ , , _ . . . . Reply or Jesus, tlimk IS against your baptizing me^ proceed Avith the rite, and you shall then know something beyond. If you are divinely moved to believe that in the regular discharge of your ministry of preparation the Anointed One is to be revealed to you, your obvious duty is to go forward baptizing every comer until HE come. If there be anything in me, in all my previoiis groAvth, in all the development of my soul, that predicts for me and to myself a great and solemn destiny, I must not refuse ji baptism of heralding the kingdom of the heavens. If your M'ork be of God, O humble layman, and I have come from God, I must make no divergence, and no opposition, but go through ■with it, and then it shall come to pass that I shall be revealed to you, and shall be certified in my o^\^l soul of that calling of which from earliest childhood I have had growing intimations." IIow nnich of this Jesus said, or whether he said merely whul is recorded in the text, and looked the rest, we cannot know. But John knew the history of his birth and the marvels thereon at- tending. And he baptized him. It was a momentous crisis for both parties. John was to have a sign of the Messiah when the ]\Iessiah should appear. Jesus was to come to the fulness of the Momentous perception of his place in the world and the world's history. Others went doA\Ti to the water confessing, and 88 nO'RODUCTrON of JKSUS to his public JnXISTRT. came up ehoutiiig. lie descended in solemn silence, and as cended from the river with face npturncd in woi-ship. Then occurred a phenomenon mentioned by all the historians. Something like a dove de-i Jesus. That much is „, , ,. patent, what else we may discover hv rereadin«» The descending \ ' ... '; , , , , jQyg the i)assai!;cs. We must either accept tliese books as histories or reject them. I acce})t. They must then be dealt Avith as other histories, and what is marvellous must no more be explained away than what is connnonplace. "WHiat was this that appeared "like a dove?" All the four historians use that same phrase, whatever may be their variations elsewhere. I believe it was actually a dove. If I were to read four accounts of the coronation of a kinpr, in all which there was represented that sometiiing " like a dove " descended upon him, I should say " It was a dove." I say so here. Kow, let us brini^ the scene and the persoiui<^es clearly before us. We are standing beside Jordan. Here is a powerful, masterly _ , , T man proclaimiuf; a cominic kino-dom. And here John and Jesus. * ^^ o d is a man who is to take the lead of all the world's men, upon wlioni as never upon any other there had come gifts of insight, purity, and elevation of character. John does not know this of Jesus, as later men shall know it. lie knows him a child miraculously born, in whose early history there had been passages not common in human biography. He is looking daily for the Christ of- God, the Anointed of Jehovali. lie feels that Jesus is his superior. On sight he acknowledges that superi- ority. "NVliat must have been the face of that man whose ]>res- cnce hushes the outspoken John, that John whom mobs of sol- diers and peasants, and crowds of rabbis, and connnittccs (^f Sanhedrims only roused into intenser flame of hatred against sin ! lie that is higher than John is on the i)innacle of all that is hu- man. The man that overawes John has the mastery of humanity. AVith what intense excitement must John have gazed uix^n Jesus! Aiul when .Tesus came up from the water, praying, ti-ans- flgured with his own intense intellectual and ?i>ir- Johnthediscov- .^'^.^ excitement, it was a moment of rapt awe erer of Jesus. , , . , . , i i i to both. At that instant a dove descended on Jesns. Whence, no one saw. It seemed to come from heaven. John had had the assuraiu-e that a sign should be given him w1um\ tlic Messiah rose to his vision. lie was advancing along the lino JESUS DKSKiNATED AT HIS BATTISM BY JOHN. 89 of his ministry when this remarkable state of affairs was come upon, namely ; a man of -wondrons sanctity of appearance comes to his baptism ; John feels that this is his superior, and is' com- pelled to acknowledge it ; the candidate makes no confession ; he comes from the water in a state of great spiritual exaltation ; a dove from parts unseen descends upon him. It was to John the Holy Spirit of the great Jehovah designating the expected and Anointed Deliverer, according to previous intimations. Now, if the presence of Jesus could have produced such an uprising of the mind of John, there must have been something divinely pow- erful in Jesus. It was John Avho was selected to discover the Messiah and to declare him to his generation. There was not only the appearance of a dove out of the opening heavens, but the sound of a voice. The voice was not a mere ruir.ble, as of thunder. There could have been no thunder-storm. It was clear in a rare degree, for the " heavens " were "opened." The sound was articulate. It was the vouchsafed sign. John heard it : " This is my lelovcd * Son, in whom I am well lileasedP Jesus heard it: " Thou art vxy leloved So7i, in whom I am well jpleasedP Any theory may be set forth, but here are the facts. It may be said that it was an intense state of mental excitement which made these men hear what they supposed to be a voice. Suppose that. If God speak to you ar- , ticulately, just as a human being does, or prefer so to cpiicken your inward being that you receive thereon precise- ly such impressions as come to you ordinarily and normally through your senses, it is to you precisely the same. There is no difference in the result. All great souls that have dedicated themselves to great deeds of self-abnegation and heroism have felt, seen, heard powerful communications from the Gi-eat Cre- ator. Impressions are frequently made directly upon the mind without intervention of the organs of sense; and they seem just Buch as men are accustomed to receive through those organs ; and then they are spoken of as visions or voices, as the case may be. It is not a cpiestion of such vast concern in which way came this con- firmation to John. He was not a cold, hard materialist. He was a man of high-wrought spirituality. And Jesus was the finest piece of human organism of which any history gives ns any ac- count. These men met in a circle of circumstances described by 90 DfTRODUCTION OF JESUS TO HIS PUBLIC MIXISTKY. one of tlicin. Jcjlinsays: '-^ I saw ^ and hare record that this is the So}i of GodP If he was satisfied, surely we (>ii«rlit to be. It is as iinpliildpopliic to be incredulous as to be superstitious. Men have no reward when they exert their intellects to reason thcni- Bclves out of their faith. Faith of what can be believed is aa ini])ortant as science of what can be known. Jesus thus inaugurated his public ministry. CHAPTER IlL THE TEilPTATION. Immediately after tlic exciting scene of his baptism, Jesns en- tered upon a fearful season of spiritual trial and depression. It is usually known as The Temptation. The history is given by Matthew and Luke, a brief statement being made by Mark also. Mattheio' H \\'ii\\-A.\A\Q. vs, this: "Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wildei-ness to be tempted of the devil. And M'hen lie had fasted forty days and forty nights, after- ward he liuni>:ered. And when the tempter came " ^ count. to him, he said, ' If thou art the Son of God, com- mand that these stones be made bread.' But he answered and said, ' It is written, Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word proceeding through the mouth of God.' Then the de\il taketh him up into the holj^ city, and setteth him on the battlement of the temple, and saith to him, ' If thou art the Son of God, cast thyself down: for it is written, lie shall give his angels charge concerning thee : and upon their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone.' Jesus said unto him, 'It is written again. Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.' Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and showeth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them ; and said to him, ' All these things M'ill I give thee, if falling down thou wilt do me homage.' Then saith Jesus unto him, ' Go away, Satan : for it is written. Thou shalt do hom- age to the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou worship.' Then the devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and ministered unto him." (Matt. iv. 1-11.) All that Mark records is in ch, i. vv. 12, 13 : " And immedi- ately the Spirit driveth him into the wilderness. And he was there in the wilderness forty days J^V ^^^'^ ' •' •' and LuKO BL tempted of Satan ; and was with the wild beasts ; and the angels ministered unto him." 92 INTRODUCTION OF JESUS TO HIS TUBLIC MINISTRY. aS'^. Lulxie (iv. 1-13) gives an account of this transaction ■which is substantially the same as that of Matthew. It cannot now be known in what i)lace this passage in the his- tory of Jesus occurred. Tradition assigns it to one of the moun- tains opposite Jericho, called now Quarantania, Place of the f ,.(j„i the forty days of fasting, a name probably given it 111 the tunes of the Crusades. jLhonisun {Land and JBook^ vol. ii. p. 450) thus describes it: — "Directly west, at a distance of a mile and a half, is the high and piTcii)i- tous mountain called Quarantania, from a tradition that our Sa\nour liere fixsted forty days and nights, and also that this is the 'liigh mountain' from whose top the tempter exhiljited ' all the kingdoms of this world, and tho glory of them.' Tiie side facing the plain is as perpendicular and apparently as higli as the rock of Gibiultar, and ui)on the very summit are still vibible the ruins of an ancient ct)nvent. ^Midway l)elow arc caverns hewn in the i)er- pcndicular rock, where hermits formerly retired to fast and pray, in imitation of the 'forty days,' and it is said that even at the present time there is to be found au occasional Copt or Abyssiiiiou languislmig out his Quaraiiiania in this doleful place." The general reader would be amazed to see the immense amount of literature there is upon the subject of the Temptation of Jesus. Through milch of it we have })ainfully waded, to come back to the conclusion that the simjilest way is to read the history in the light of common sense, and derive what lessons our present scien- tilic culture may enable us to educe. It is obvious that the narrative is substantially made by Jesus. The historians could have gathered it from no other source. Un- less they made gi-eat blundei-s in understanding T e narrative j^j^ statements, or ill recordiii'' them, we have the male. The myth theory. * If the reader recalls John \\. 70, he most be reminded that JeRun calls Judas Sia^uAoT, which is the generic substan- tive, "a devil," in the sense of "devil- ish." I do not recollect any ca.sc of a mon being called A 8iaj3oAo5, (he devil. Alford {Gr. Test, in loca) says that nc such case can be adduced. TnE TEMPTATION. 95 Among the Greeks and Romans the tlieologic m^-tlis wliich tlieir early ancestors liad originated were fast losing all respect among the nntfnUivated masses and the lower orders, as thev had long before ceased to be regarded by the learned and the tasteful as ■worth more tlian merely the poetical element that was in them Tlie Jcwisli nation never were much given to that form of thought Pei'haps the infancy of no commnnity known to history was fi'cer from myths than the early life of the Hebrew people. How im- practicable, then, must it have been to generate a mytli under llerod and Pontius Pilate, in Judaia, just before or soon after the destruction of Jerusalem, by people who had been bred Jews and were scattered over the Poman Empire! These general remarks, applying to the biography of Jesus in the mass, are equally forceful as to any particular passage in his histoiy. "We must give up the myths. Those M-ho earnestly held to them a few years ago are forced by the advancing spirit of critical investigation to abandon them. As for the theories Avhich involve visions and " significant morn- ing dreams," perhaps nothing shorter or l)cttcr can be said than Lann-e's sentence: ^''Decisive ethical conflicts do The "dream not take place in the form of dreams ; " a state- ^^^^ ment which will probably be confirmed by the consciousness of many a reader. Let all dogmas be laid aside and the record of these historians be examined to see what they teach any fair-minded reader. In general they give us the knowledge of what Jesus thought of a supreme passage in his own mental and spiritual history. As no man who existed before his time, or has risen since, has so influenced the intellectual and moral condition of the world, this piece of autobiography becomes to ns a history of unspeakable im- portance. We wish to ascertain his views of the subjects involved, and compare them with what we believe to be ascertained laws of psychology. It is first to be noticed that this important and testing occur- rence enters his history just at the moment we should naturally look for it. He was a man. Marvellous and won- . , . , --,.,., - , , „ Sense of hishu- deiTul, m birth and growth, he was a man. Irom canity in Jesus perhaps an earlier period than even the beginning of conscious self-inspection there had been a sense of spiritual idiosyncras}^ present ^^dth him. It may have been at first the 96 INTRODUCnON OF JESUS TO HIS I'LHIJC -AflMSTRr. prliinincr, then tlie dawn, tlicn tlie growing Uglit. It consisted witli a perfect Inunan consciousness. The sense of manness, of hunianncss, never left liini. It was as present to him as it ever was to any other human being. His Avhole history sliows tliat ; and from a review of liis whole life we must recall that fact in tlie study of his preparation for his life-work. lie had an increas- ing conviction that he was set in the universe for some uni(pie work. He had a growing ability for that work. " He grew in wisdom." As he approached the hour in the world's history and his own when his mission was to be ostensibly and operatively bejrun, he felt within himself the keen and masterini]' desire to enter upon and accomplish his work. The baptism was a crisis. John was to have therein a sign of the Messiah, the Sent One, the real Man of Destiny, the Anointed Deliverer. If he were that One, — and his belief Excitement of ,yj^^g^ J^ave grown with his growth, — what should Jesus at his bap- , "", xii- ip.ti u j^jjj occur when he presented lumselr to Jolm would settle the question definitely. It would also be his own voluntary dedication to the loftiest and the largest work ever enterprised by man. The phenomena at the baptism con- spired with his own sentiments to produce in him the most in tensely exciting and exalting state of feeling consistent with the continuance of life. Through that state he had just passed. It was his Itul)icon. It was his voluntary devotion to what he never could afterward abandon without spiritual shipwreck and self- ruin. Every other great soul has passed through precisely in kind that crisis of the mind and spirit proportioned to each man's soul and work. Jesus is admitted by all healthy minds to have been the greatest sonl in all our human brotherluKxl, and the work he was about to undertake, whether he should succeed in accomplishing it or not, to be the greatest of all the enterprise? known in the record of holy daring. He was making for himself an investiture of himself with the oflice and dignity of i-oyal i-ule over all humanity. The excitement had been indescribably be- cause inconceivabl}' intense. Then followed in his what has followed in ever}' other known human history-, — a collapse, a depression, an awful desolation, a .^ „ * plmiire from the altitudes of human sensations, The collapse. ' '^ . , . . , ... i i i j)erceptions, and spiritual conditions to the depths 'hat lie separated by thin ani weak Uooring from the bottonilcse TIIE TEMPTATION. 97 pit of despair. Every man that has gone upon a huge work has had these alternations, — transitions from the high excitement of emprise to the depths of doubts and misgivings, — that dread in- terval of chill between commitment to a cause and the fii"st blow, — the season, brief by the clock but long by the heart, which the soldier passes through between the formation of the line of battle and the roar of the first artillery discharge which announces the befrinninn: of the action which must then be fought throusjh to the result of victory or defeat. Such seems to have been the passage of the temptation. Full of the Holy Ghost, Jesus returned from Jordan, where he had been baptized, and was led by God's Spirit into a •11 1 1 ii \li i'l Peccability of Wilderness, where he was to endure another trial ^ ' Jesus. and have shown whether he could as well preserve his unsinningness in depression as in exaltation, when hell ftiocked him as well as when heaven eulogized him. This was absolutely necessary for him. It was possible for Jesus to sin : '- quite as possible as for Adam, or Moses, or you, or me, or any other man. Any other view reduces this portion of his history to such a fable or parable as avouUI be more ridiculous than any farce we ever read ; for even in the fable Jesus would be represented as liable to a spiritual lapse, which is inconsistent with any dogma of his impeccability. He might have attempted an indulgence of him- self in what M-as attractive but sinful. It would have ruined him. But if he could not, then he was no man in any reasonal)le sense of that word ; then he had no freedom of will, and could not have been CTen virtuous ; then his history is of no kind of moral sig- nificance or spiritual import to any man whatever; then he was a monster, being not God, not angel, not demon, not man, an ano- malous drift, floating lawlessly and disorderly among the things of God, an entity having no reference to God whatever. This is not to be supposed. Jesus was tempted just as any other man, and tells- the story of his tem]:)tation just as any other intelligent person would narrate the fearful passage of his supreme spiritual trial. His narrative * The old distinction is of the non ' to Adam and to Jesus. Neither had any posse pcccarc and the posse non peccnre ; the former, the inherent inability to sin, belongs to God alone ; the latter, the inherent ability to keep from sinning, 7 traditional bad blood. That is their chief human distinction from other men. This is th.e schoLastic view. 9fi INTRODUCTION OF j::SrS TO HIS rUDLIC >nNISTKT. follows known psyclidldiric l:iws. " Tniniediatcly," lie tells nfl, the S[)irit wliii-h luiJ led him to John, to the i)aii;- His narrative jj Joicjan, to the oj)C]nng heaven, to the deseend- (riven humanly. . , .1 t • i ^' .• i 1 • mg dove, to the divme benediction, compels linn, '•drives" him into the wilderness " to be tempted of the devil," Just so any ant()biogra})lier would state it. It was the actual con- flict of Jesus with the Power of Evil. The excitement of the Jordan scene was followed by a fast of forty days and forty nights. "We are not i)repared to say that this was literallv a period of forty times tweiity- ^Jast of forty j^^^^^. j^^^^^^.^ ,, y^^^,^^. ^.^^.^ „ j^ ^ licbraism for an indefinitely long time. We have no record, out- side tlie Bible, so far as I know, (»f any fast having been continued this long and life retained. And if Jesus was miraculously sus- tained, it takes much from the power of moral instruction which this passage otherwise contains. As in the cases of Moses (Exod. xxxiv. 28) and Elias (1 Kings xix. 8), this period was tilled with a spiritual ecstasy and a trial of his powers which susjiendcd the ordinary wants of the l)(»dy. AVlien at last hunger broke through upon him, and exhaustion ensued, Satan is represented as having come to him presenting the tests of his virtue which seai-ched him through all those open- ings of the human I)cing as yet discovered on the side of (h.'^irc, namely, the desire of pleasure, the desire of jiraise, and the desire of ])ower, — an approach through the body, through the intellect, and through the soul, to the inner man, the si)irit, the real T, — or, as the writer of the First Ejjistle General of John (ii. IG) classifies them, " the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life." The tem]>tation through /vv^/* was reserved. In the history of Jesus we shall come upon some other teaching ill regard to Satan. Here, for the fii-st time in that Satan. i-^ xi- • • li ii* lii.()ntaneous so far as he knows — acting upon his will, making such a pressure upon that will as amounts to a temp- tation ; or, that such excitation of the emotions and such pres- sure upon the M'ill is from something without. In the latter case it is some perception of some object which he sees, or of some sound A\liich he hears, or some report of some of the senses, unde- signed^ coming incidentally upon him, or designed, brought to bear upon him by some intelligent being. Among the undesigned se- ductions to evil, or what may at least be called evil influences, are those attractions or repulsions created in the individual man by the " spirit of the age," a general air and temperature generated by all the intellectual and spiritual motions about him, and coming upon his soul not from any individual's design to be specially hurtful to him, but just as deleterious air destroys where no man is attempting to poison another. But we are conscious of sinister and wicked designs upon us coneocted and openited by wicked men. Some men are adroit, some skilful, some surpassingly influential for evil. Some of these are really so acute in their ° . sure, perceptions, so rapid in their motions, and so per- sistent in their efforts, that to speak of them as compassing sea and land seems hardly an exaggeration. Aitists of the pen sometimes paint these far-sighted, near-sighted, telescopic, microscopic, almost ubiquitous weavers of the webs of deceit and treachery, and paint thoui with a power that appals us.* The body is at once a help and encumbrance to these spirits. We easily reach the proba- bility that there are spirits without the clog of flesh who operate upon one another, and upon the spirits of men, having learned the [ip[)roachcs to the soul through the flesh, some of them having probably been in the flesh. As among men there are those who gain the mastery, and "get the stai-t," and take the lead in the * Perhaps Sue's Le Juif Errant might be cited as famishing an example. 100 ENTKODUCnON OF JESUS TO HIS PUBLIC SDNISTKY. march "of tliis majestic worl(]," so amon*^ tliein it is iK^t difficult to believe there may be spirits ambitious of chieftainship and capable of lifting themselves over the masses to a throne of power, and of establishing jnincipalities in spii-itual places. ^Vlioso could reach the czai-ship in this rule, or secure and keep skill to ht^ld the generaFs post in this Proimgajida, would be 77ie Devil, Satanas, Satan. These are merely the probabilities reached by reas<^)iiings on the facts of human nature and S(x;iety ; but are not proofs of the existence of a Pei-sonal Spirit of Evil. That is Rational proba- r ,i , • . \ • \ i , .,. . . ,, one or those subiects upon wluch men can have bihties of the ex- . . istence of Satan. ''<^ positive knowledge beyond what the Father of all spirits should choose to reveal. But if' there l»e such a being, the ])robability is that some revelation of his existence wouUl be made, if God ever reveals anything to man. The statement that Jesus employed the superstition of liis coun- trymen to advance his own go(^d aiid i)raisew()rthy design of ac- quiring inlluence over them ivr their benelit — a Satan of New ^.^j.^ iiii^vyi.tljy course for any ffreat man to pur- Testament not *' . • ,, . • . . .1 1 <• , . . sue — IS cftj)eciaily mapiM'opriate to the case beiore us. His narrative of his temptation, together with liis other teachings, actually made a revelation to the Jewish mind. They had no conce}>tion of such a being as the Satan of the New Testament. The statement that the Jews obtained their idea of Satan from the East during the " Cajjtivity," is wholly nnsustained by any- thing known of their literature. Their conce|> Jewish idea of ,. r ^ . in i-i xi t> • • i ,. ^ . w • 1 tioi» oi oatan was whollv uiiuUe the 1 oi-sum idea Satan not obtained • In the Captivity. "f "^*^ 1 rmce of bin. Ihat old JManicha^an doc- trine traced the existence of evil to one creator, as it did the existence of good to anotlier, and these creatoi-s were equally })<)werfiil ; their Satan was always as grand and inthion- tial a ]terson as their (iod. No man can read Jewish sacred lite- rature without seeing how totally ab.scnt is this idea. It seems never to have had a })lace among them. Among the writei"s of the Old TcstaiiHMit the //^//;/t' seldom o(r(;ui"S, and the?^v>/v/iiot very fn;- quently. AV^hcrc tlu; name is used the person so designated has no attribute of grandeur or tciribleness or extensive ]M>w('r. lie is always at the control oCh-hovah. This is <|uite dilTerent from tlio doctrine of Ahriinan and Oriuuzd, tlie I'ersian co-ordinate deities THE TEMTTATION. 101 The name f)ccurs first in the hook " Joh" (i*. G ; ii. 1-7), in paa- sages so familiar that they need not he quoted. But it is worth wliile to remind the reader tliat in this powerful (li-amatie sketch Satan is not represented with any characteristic of splendor or terror. lie is a mischievous vagabond, who is allowed by Almighty God to exeit his influence for evil upon the body and the estate of Job, but not upon his soul. He is cliained, and the chain is not long. It is to l>e recollected that this book was most probably written before the Captivity. In the next place, we find the following in Ps. cix. G: "Set thou a wicked man over him: and let Satan stand at his right hand." This, fairly translated, seems to be only a statement of God's law of retribution, in which Q^r^A the word Satan may be translated " adversary," * so that it simply says that when one has behaved wickedly towards his friend, " A wicked man shall be set over /dm, and an adver- eaiy shall stand at his right hand." But if the word be taken as the name of the Chief of Evil, to which there seems to be no ob- jection, here is marked inferiority. Satan is limited and subordi- nate, a being totally different from the Ahriman of the East and the Satan of the New Testament. The third citation is in 1 Clu'on. xxi. 1 : "And Satan stood up against Isi-ael, and provoked David to numl)er Israel." Supposing this to be the personal Devil, the remark in the last sentence of the preceding paragraph equally ,, ^, . ., applies. The onl}' other passage, so far as I know, in which tlie word is translated " Satan " in our version, is in Zechariah iii. 1 : "And he showed me Joshua the high-priest standing before the auircl of the Lord, and Satan standinc: at his „ , . , right hand to resist him. This is a dream or vision. As such I admit it may safely be taken as the writer's idea of Satan, as even embodying the popular idea. It was written after the Cap tivity. Can any man find in this, and in the text from Chronicles, the slightest trace of Persian origin ? And this is all, except a few passages such as 2 Samuel xix. 22, and 1 Kings v. 4, in which the word satan is admittedly properly translated "adversary." * I believe the Septuagint generally, I " adversary." p^rhaos invaiiably, translates the word I 102 IXTEODUCnON OF JESCS TO HIS rUDLIC SnXISTKT. Tlie Jews, tlicn, did not find their conception of Satan in the Captivity. They never adopted tlie Oriental mytli<)lo<;y. Nor did Jesus adopt their notions. Tlie Satan of his teueliin^ is a revelation, as Ave shall see as we make progress with this hi&r.ory. We shall find that Satan is a pei*son six>ken of as thoroughly individualized in the mind of Jesus, and subsequently of liis fol- lowers, and his existence repeatedly referred to, " asserted or im- plied as a familiar and important truth." Jesus helieved himself to have been assailed by Satan, and as we know n(jthing to the c(jntrary, we believe so t(H). 13ut he no- where states, and we have no right to affirm, <••■••- ,. , tainlv no riMit to consider it an article of faith, lieveu. " f ' that Satan appeared to him in bodily form as a man, a " member of the Sanhedrim," or a " Scribe." "When a cunning evil man discovers a pure and gi'cat spirit about to en- gage in a great work, he offers resistance and presents obstacles. Tlie attractions of the universe bring them face to face, as a neg- atively electrified body is drawn towards one that is positively electrified. Satan found Jesus as he finds you and me, and he instantly opened an attack on his virtue. Whether Jesus saw Satan or not, and held this colloquy in ar- ticulate words, or had the suggestion presented to liim, and from his inmost s})irit made the response, we cannot WTiich theory , -k-^ • -^ • i. i. rri • -.. i i • , , ,.,„ , know. JNor IS it im])ortant. I lie s))iiitual Jns- has less uitncul- ^ n • i i jjgg tory of Jesus comes forward as well on either the- ory ; and on either we have all the lessons neces- sary for our instruction. The latter is free, however, fi-om the embarrassments of the former, a^ before mentioned, such as the bodily visible tempter taking the person of Jesus to the battle- ments of the Temple and the top of the mountain. I>ut if Al- mighty God gave Satan temporary power to do these things, as he is represented in the l>(K)k '' Jol) " to have done, it need give trouble only to such historians as strive to read the history of God's world with G(k1 totally ignored. The writer of these pages believes as much in the existence of God as he does in the exis- tence of man. Tlie fii-st temptation of Jesus was thnmgh the body, by " the lust of the ficsh." The TcmpttM- said: "If y<>n be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bicad." It was well jnit. Jesus had just received at J(»rdan a marvellous confirmation oj THE TEMPTATION. 103 his opinion of himself as the Son of God. If lie was the Son of God he was the Messiah. If the Messiah, he could work miracles. Here was a case where a '^^^ ^^^^ temp- miracle seemed needed. But it was a temptation ^^ the i\esh " to place himself out of the harmony of the mii- versal oidei*, and to do so for a selfish ])ui-pose. lie replied in tha langnao;e of the holy books : " It is written, Man shall not live hy bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the niouth of God." It was a human and a manly response. Wliatever may have been his inmost tlioughts of himself, whatexer profound and inscrutable self-consciousness, he always knew hiuiself to be a man. lie meets the tem])ter on the i)latform of common hu- manity, and there fights out the Imttle of virtue. The passage he quotes in reply is froui Deuteronomy viii. 3, and occurs in the his- tory of the Tomptation of the people of Israel, in which tempta- tion they fell, even as Adam fell when he was tempted. It im- plies, not that men are to put aside the ordinary fo(xl of the body, but that when a man is in the discharge of duty he may depend upon God's providential arrangements. " Word " does not occur in' the original. It is "eveiy — [thing] — that proceedeth from God's mouth," every expression of His will. Even \Ahen men eat " bread," the}' do not live by bread alone. There is a vitality maintained by the Father of spirits in men which nuikes the bread productive of growth or reparative of decay. Jesus might have yielded to the temptation. Then had he parted with his Messiahship, his ordination to the leadership of those sti"iving to be bravely good. lie would no longer have been a Deliverer. lie would himself have been a captive of his lusts. The second temptation* addressed the spirit of Jesus through the intellect, "the lust of the eye." Jesus was present bodily or by vivid mental representation, it matters not which, in Jerusalem, and " on the pinnacle of Second tempta- , , „ rpi • i. • £ i. t^'on: '"the lust of the temple ihe precise spot is oi course not .^ „ ascertainable, but a probable suggestion f is that Jesus was placed on the lofty porch which overhung the -valley .')f the Kedroii, where the steep side of the valley was added tc the height of the temple-wall, as described by Josephus,:|: and * It will be perceived that I follow I f Smith's X. T. Jlist. the order of Luke rather than of Mat- % Ant., xv. 1, § 5. thew, as being more logicaL j 104 DrrRODucTiox of jesus to his Pur.Lic imasxRY. made a depth down \vliich it was terrific to gaze. Then the fcmpter said, " Gust tliyself down." lie followed np tlie sug- gestion by an ahbreviatcd but verbatim quotation from the sacred book, namely the 91st Psahn : "It is written, lie shall give His angels charge over thee, to keep thee ; and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone." An assurance jj^iven to the children of the Almiichtv God in general must a fortiori apply to the Son of God, one who had been i)ro- iiounced so by a voice out of the heavens. " Now, then," said the tempter, " perform a brilliant miracle. Fling thyself from this height, and when thou touchest the ground the people will flock to thee, and without question hail thee as the Messiah." It addressed itself principally to the inuigination of Jesus. It was one form of miracle which the Messiah, such as the Jews looked for, was traditionally expected to perform. Jesus replied, " It is written again, * Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God." f To obey the seductive suggestion would have been so grateful to a selfish vanity. But he repels it. The Divine Providence must never be invoked for selfish ends. The third form of temptation assailed Jesus through the pas- Bions, — " the pride of life," ambition, "the last infirmity of noble minds," Satan made to pass before the mind of Third tempta- j^.gi,g ^ panorama of the kingdoms of the world, tion: "the pride ,. ii-i tt e ii of life " their power and their glory, ile proiessed to be owner and master of these. lie tendered them to Jesus on the solitary condition that Jesus should pay him homage. As if he had said : You came to be the Messiali. You can a(-complisli your message better by a partnership with me. You can at once go to the head of the world. You are the Son of God : join me : acknowledge my world-sovereignty, and then I will remove all obstructions from your path to supreme power and gloi-y ! It was a proposition to use physical force for the accomplishment of moral results — to turn from the path of suffer- ing and labor and martyrdom for the truth. It was the State proposing an alliance with the Cliurch, for the accomplishment of a good end by sinister means. But it involved homage to Evil, tribute t > the Chief of Evil. "Whatever may be said of tlie other temptatit^ns, this must be * The word nahv, translated "again," I rather " in another place." ioes not signify " ou the contrarj-," but I f Dcut. vi. 10. XnE TEMPTATION. 105 admitted to have been internal. The pliysical conditions of the planet are such that there cannot possibly ho an elevation from which all the kingdoms of the world could be seen, and there is no conceivable position in which their "power" and "glory" could have been visible. It is to be observed that this temptation assailed Jesus on the Messiah side of his natui'e and expectations. lie now, if never before, believed himself to be the Messiah. lie was about to exhibit himself as such to his nation. Assault on the The people of the Jews, as he knew, held that j„g,^ the Messiah upon his arrival should first break the Roman yoke, and then, by a series of conquests, military and moral, reduce all the nations to the rule of the Jews and to the religion of Judaism. Why should not Jesus satisfy this natural expectation? Why not abandon the method of leavening the world by the sure but very slow process of the operation of truth, and transmute it at once by a single stroke of divine power, such as he could have exercised if he were the Son of God ? The very attempt would have been homage to Satan, a bending of the knee to Evil. lie was willing for this wonderfully endowed young man to exercise all the authority and enjoy all the gloiy of the most splendid viceroyalty of the world, while he retained supreme dominion. The reph' of Jesus is : " Get thee hence, Satan, for it is writ- ten, Thou shalt do homage to the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou worship." The answer shows that Jesus now certainly recognized the instigator of his evil thoughts. The suggestion of idolatry of a very foul kind, the worship of the Spirit of Evil, unveils the Satanic character of the tempter, and Jesus repels him. There is an expression in Luke (iv. 6) worth notice. Satan says : " All this power will I give thee, and the glory of them ; for that is delivered to me, and to whomsoever I •n T • -i- ?J rpi i. i. 1-1 • 1 i-i. i.' Satan's admission. Will i give it. lliat to which special attention is called is the acknowledgment of his inferiority by the Chief of Evil Spirits, amid intense braggadocio. lie had not this dominion of personal natural right, but had been peiTuitted to enter upon it. The whole statement is a falsehood, when asserted by the Evil One ; but the subservience and limit which he admits IB a characteristic of the Satan of whom Jesus speaks, which dis* 106 INTEODUCTIOX OF JESUS TO HIS rUBLIC ^n:>^STIlT. tinguishcs him from tlic Alirimaii of tlie l^ra^i^iau mytholo^, from which Jesus and the Jews are said to have derived their notion of Satan, and is very important in this l>cginning of our examination of wliat Jesus teaches as to the Cliief of Evil. Anotlier <::eneral lemark nmst be made. It is o])servahle that Jesus never attempts to rebut temptation witli logic, lie has no argument with Satan. lie confronts liim with Jesus repels with j|^^ ^y^^^.^^ ^^^ (,^,j_ ^^ quotes tlie sacred b.>oks of Scripture. rm • ^ • ^ 1 /M 1 HI ins people, ihis homage \ydia to tlie (>)la iesta- ment Scriptures by a mind endowed naturally with greater gifts than that of Moses, oi- David, or any of the prophets, or any other human being, gives those books an exalted and endui-ing impor- tance. The history tells ns that when the tempter departed angels "came and ministered" to Jesus. AVe have seen the statement of the announcement of his birth by angels, both IS ry o an- ^^^^^^.^ ^^^^ after it Occurred. Their innnediate gels. attendance upon Jesus brings them nearer to this biography, and as this portion is taken to be autobiogra})hic, it is the first mention made by Jesus of these superior beings. It is the proper place to institute an incpiiry into the positi(jn which they held in Jewish literature and thought before the birth of Jesus, as preparatory to what he himself teaches upon the subject. It is to be noticed how little is given in the Old Testament writin have immediate and great concern there is nnich stated. The heavenly world, the residence of good s])ii-its, is fre- quently spoken of, and many things told of its inhabitants, not && doctrines of religion but as facts. They are jegarded as the highest order of created intelligences, all other creatures being below them in dignity and station. The projjhet Isaiah says: "In the year that king nges e ig - ^ • | |j^.j j saw also Jehovah sittiiii!; upon a est of creatures. . . throne, high and lifted up, and his tiain iilled the Tem}tlc. Ahove it stood the seraphim: each one had six wings. And one cried to another, and said, II<»ly, holy, holy, is Jehovah of hosts ! the whole earth is full of liis glory ! '' This nearness to the central throne of the universe is set forth also in Ezekicl, ami Daniel. The former says (x. 1): " Then I U)oked, and, behuldj THE TEMTTATION. 107 in the firmament that was above the head of the chernbhn, there appeared over them as it were a sapphire-stone, as the appearance of the likeness of a throne." Also (in xxviii. 14) : " Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth ; and I have set thee so: thou Avast npon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up anurpose, but simply to show what views were held among learned and unlearned Jews when Jesus aj)peared, we pro- pose to present a condensed history of this word, for which Ave shall be largely indebted to Ilengstenberg's Chrlstologi/. In Genesis xvi. 7-13, the Angel of Jehovah is said to have found Ilagar, and a prei-ogative of the Supreme Creator is as- cribed to him, namely, the vast increase of her posterity. Ilagai 110 nsTnoDccnoN of jesus to nis ruELic MnasTKT. recoginzL'd liim as God, and expressed surprise that slie liad seen God and lived. In the account aheady Instances in Gen- j.(.fej.j.(.(2 to, in (iencsis xviii., one of Abraham's three guests, distinu^uished by the dignity of liis person, announces himself as the Angel of Jehovah. In (Jenesis xxii, Abraham receives a command from God {Elohim is the word here) to offer np his son. In the act of obedience he is stojii)ed by ^Malak Jehovah, the Angel of Jehovah, who says : "Xow 1 know that thou fearestGod,since thou ha.st not withheld thy son, thine only son from rneP Abraham called the jilufe JrJiovah-jlreh, " Jehovah Mill provide," which shows that he belie vcd that he had seen Jehovah. In Exodus iii. the An(jd of Jehovah appears to ^Moses in the flamiii"- bush, and ascribes to himself all the attributes of the true God. Moses covers his face, being afraid to Instances in Ex- ,, /-»7tt'i ••a1\ ir l(K)k upon God. In Lxping the golden calf, lie aft(;rwards relents. Ill Judges ii. the Angel of Jehovah appeal's to the Israelites in a place which is afterwards called Jiochim, and makes himself , ^ , known as their deliverer from Ef'vi>t. In chap- In Judges. X r' • 1 A- -HI ter VI. he appeal's to Gideon, and in verse 14 he is called nnrpiulifiedly Jehovah, In verse 22 Gideon expresses a fear lest he might die, having seen the Angel of Jehovah. IJe- iiig pacified by the august 13eing, ho erects an altar wliidi ho calls " Jehovah-shaloin," JchoraJi\s Peace. In chapter xiii. is the interesting story of Manoah, When the wonder-working vis- itor disajtpeared in the flame, " then Manoali was convinced that he was the Angel of Jehovah;''"' and in ver. 22 he says to his wife : '* We shall surely die, because we have seen 6W." In 2 ]\ingR xix. tlic Angel of Jehovah destroyed the Assy- , „. rian liost, which threatened destruction to the In Kings. ' theoiM'acy. In Isaiah Ixiii. 0, the Angel of Jehovah is called "the angel of , ^ . , His iiresence," that is, the aiifjel of His face. In iHOiah. ' , In Zcchariah " Malak Yehovah" is very fre- quently menti<»ned. The projthet receives all his revelations from , „ , . , this wonderful IJeing. In chapter ii. (12-15) lio In Zechanah. . . , , r t i i r i t i / is distinguishe'els, ministering to him what he needed, , ^ ^^ minis er ^ ° r> 1 1 to Jesus. — whatever was necessary to refresh him in body and in soul — food, and tenderness, and sympathy. * It must be noticed that in all the passAges cited above the oriyiual is re- ferred to, and not the English version, which, however, is ordinarily quite close enough for all practical puri)oses. f Ilengstenborg uses the facts in this case to show that this angel of Jeho- vah wa.s Christ, a Ileing equal in dignity and glory with the great God. A remarkable little book by Prof. MacWhorter, of Yale College, is enti- tled " Yahvfih Christ; or. The Bleniorial Name." It holds (1), That the name is not Jehovah, signifying I AM, but Yah- veh, Thk Onk to Ct).ME. equivalent to the Greek 6 Epxiatvos, IIo Erkonieuos, TilK Onk Co.mi.no, the difference being in the vowels, the Jewish prejudice mak- ing the former reading, while the latter is storrect. (.2), That the right reading is. " The Angel Jeho\ah," not " The Angel of Jehovah," the latter word being appo- sitional ; and that this Memorial Name is complete in Christ. Ileadei"s who wish to examine this subject more thoroughly are referred to C/irtJitohffp of 01(1 Testament, by Ilengsteuberg, vol. i, chapter 3, in which he will find a very able and learned treati.se on the Jfetratron. with an interesting comparison of Jewish and Persian teaching on these questions ; also. Prof. MacWhorter's book ju^t mentioned ; and Uililidthccn S*icra, vol. for 18r)!). p. 80,"). an article on "The ./Vngel of Jehovah ; " also, Blh. Sar. , Jan., 18.")7, p 08. These we have used only so far as they bore upon the object we have in view in this biography of Jesus. CnAPTER lY. THE FIRST DISCIPLES. In the mean time the Sanhedrim at Jernsalcm hearing of John's proceedings sent a dej)iitation of priests and Levites to catechise liim as to the office which lie supposed liimself to om the Sanhedrim. be iilling. The first question, as history stands in the lii-st cliapter of John, was general, " W\\o are you ? " But he knew the ^lessianic expectancy, and promptly and frankly said, " I am not the Messiah, the Christ, the oi'dained One." They held the tradition that the Messiah was to be pre- ceded by a powerful prophet, endowed as Elijah was — ]>crhaps by Elijah himself. This was the usual interpretation of Malachi iv. 5. So they asked John if he was Elijah. He asserted that he was not Elijah, nor the prophet whose coming had been pre- dicted by Moses in Deuteronomy xviii. 15, a prediction which the Jews intei-preted to signify the resurrection of Jeremiah, or some other ancient prophet, who was not the Messiah, as appears from Matt. xvi. 14. Tlie wliole passage from John i. 10-28, has already been given at p. 77. The interview with the committee of the Sanhedrim appeai-s to have taken place as the terrible trial of John's testimony x • xi -i i i • '^ i ^ . T u • Jesus m the wilderness was reacluuf; its conclu- to Jesus. John i. ^ _ ® sion. "NYe learn from John i. 29, that " the next day John saw Jesus coming unto him, and said, ' Behold the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the world ! This is he of whom I said, After me coraeth a man which is preferred before me; for he was before me. And I knew him not: but .hat he should be made manifest to Israel, therefore am I come baptiziug with water.' And John bare record, saying, '1 saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it abode upon him. And I knew him not: but he that sent me to l)aptize with water, the same siiid unto me, Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending, and I'cnuiining on him, the same is he which TnE FIRST DISCIPLES. 113 baptizeth with the Holy Ghost. And I saw, and bare record that this is the Son of God.' " This is substantially the testimony of John the Baptist: "Yon- der is the Man who is ' Ho Erkomenos,' the ' Coining One,' of whom 1, spoke yesterday. I did not myself at first recognize him, but lie who. commissioned me to baptize gave me a token whereby I should be able to recognize Jehovah's Anointed, and I do declare that those signs were displayed at his baptism, and I now discharge the other function of my ofhce by announcing him the very Messiah ! " Why Jesus afforded John the opportunity to bear this testimony we cannot tell. If the temptation took place on the Quarantania, according to tradition, then Jesus must have gone a little out of his way to have another interview with the Baptist. If the mountains of Moab were the scene, then, on his homeward journey, Jesus would pass near the place where John was baptizing. But John's speech, whatever may have been its general effect upon the minds of his scholars, does not seem to have penetrated any one in a special manner. The next dav Je- -^ . '■ T ^1 Ti • 1 ^ ^ ■" i? "The Lamb of sus agam was seen, and tlien John saul to two ot q ^ ,, his disciples who were standing near, " Behold the Lain!) of God ! " Something in the manner of their teacher arrested their attention. They certainly could not have formed any very distinct theologic or metaphysical idea from this descrip- tion. It may be doubted whether the Baptist himself knew what his words meant. They were an utterance of the heart, in an ecstatic moment, springing past the intellect into speech. John probably did not attach to them the idea of vicarious suffering, which is a Christian thought; and John probably had only Judaic ideas. But whatever may have been their meaning, the two disci- ples who heard John's words followed Jesus as he walked. He turned and saw them, and spoke graciously to them. " "Wliat do you seek? " As if he had said, ^° ^^^'^ ^^' "Do you wish to ask anything of me?" They called him "Babbi," giving him the Hebrew designation of teacher, ac- knowledging him to be their superior. They inquired his place of lodging, doubtless that they might have a private interview, which, if satisfactory, would lead them to attach themselves to him permanently. Jesus invited them to accompany him, which 8 114 INTRODUCTION OF JESUS TO HIS TUBIJC MINISTRY. thcj did, and spent the remainder of the day with him, it Lein^' ahoiit four o'clock in tlie afternoon wlien tlicy began the conver- sation. (See Jolin i. 39.) These two men were Andrew of Bethsaida and John the Evan- gelist. The latter is not positively named in the narrative, bnt a Andrew and John, f-omparison of statements in John's gcspel makes it quite ]>lain who is meant.* Of the former wc do not know very much, except that he always seemed to have a high place amoiii; the apostles of Jesus. Ills Ijrother Simon was a more mai-ked character, as Ave shall sec. There are various traditions concerning Andrew. Eusebius says that he preached in Scythia ; Jerome and Thcodoret, that his ministry was in Achaia; Kicc])horus, that it was in Asia Minor and Thrace. lie is said to have been cruel (iod in Patrae, in Achaia, on a cross decus- sate (X), lience called St. Andrew's Cross. An apocry])hal book called "Acts of Andrew" is mentioned by some ancient writers. Andrew and John sitting with Jesus make a group worth paus- ing to contemplate. Whatever may have been the design of this marvellously endowed young teacher, this is the beginm'ng of a ministry which is to spiritualize the philoso})hies of the world. This was a society com])ORed of earnest seekers after the true and the holy, with a true and holy teacher. From this hut (m the Jf)rdan went forth a conquering power beside whose achieve- ments the deeds of the Alexandei-s and Caesars and Napoleons grow ])alc and insignificant. A third disciple was almost immediately added to this company, namely, Simon, Audi-cw's brother. When Andrew left Jesus he found his brother, and so powerfully had the iiri- Rimon, after- . ' i J i wards called Pe- ^'^^^ discoui-se of Jcsus impressed him that he ter. did not hesitate to declare to him, " AVe have found the Messiah!" Simon was not naturally disposed to bo a sceptic. His temperament was ardent. lie had ]>robably l»een a disciple of John, and was one of the devout Jews who were earnestly looking for the Lord's Christ, the Anointed * Alford's rensons are (a), Tliat tlie j and (c), That the other disciple certainly Evanjjclist never names himself in his j would have been named if the writ^^r gospel ; (b). That this account is so mi- had not has to com- municate the gCK)d news to liis friend. His allusion to Moses was |)rol)al)ly made M'ith the passage in Deuteronomy xviii. 18 in his mind. His calling Jesus the son of Joseph proves oidy that Jo- seph -was commonly i-cputed to be his father, as we naturally sup- pose would be the case, even amid the circumstances which these historians say surrounded his birth. It does not prove that Jo seph was his father. To the enthusiastic announcement by Philip, Xathanacl re- ])lied: ''Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth?" Nathanael was a Galihean: it cannot be supposed that he intended to throw reproach upon his own ])rovince in general, nor upon Nazareth in particular. His question means simply what it seems lo mean, namely, that Nazareth was so insignificant a place that it was not reasonable to exjiect the Messiah to spring therefrom. It is a remai-kable fact that neither in the books of the Old Tes- tament n(»r in Josephus is any mention made of Nazareth ; of so little histoi-ical importance Avas this place. Pliilip's reply is, like most simple utterances of guileless souls, wonderfully j)hilosophical : "Come and see." Si)ii-itnal discov- eries, as all thinkers know, arc exceedingly difficult to report. Each one must for himself pass through the i)rocesses of thought and emotion Mhicli are necessary for spiritual growth. No man can, upon the representation of aiujther, believe in the adapted ness of any sinrit to his own spirit. He must try it for himself. In nothing do we need to be more practical and to exercise more connnon sense than in the ailaii-s of relijrion. Nathanael readily went. As he a])proached, Jesus said to tlie bystanders, " I'diold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile ! " These are jdain woids that need no explanation. Nathanael * Reference is made to Ps. ii. C-9 ; I these pamagea critically may differ in Isa. ix. 6; xi. l-T), 10; Ijii. 2-12; Jer. their estimates of their Messianic val- xxiii. o, 0; xxxiii. l.T ; Ezekiel xxxiv. ue, but can hardly fail to find in thcra 2'.i ; Dan. ix. 25 ; Mic. v. 2 ; Ila^. ii. 7 ; snflicient basis for the expectations of Zechariah iii. 8; ix. 9; xiii. 7; Mai. ' the.se men and the Jcwi.sh people pen- iii. 1 ; ir. 2. Readers who examine . erally. TIIK FIRST DISCU'LES. 117 Bccins to liave ovcrhciird this speech, and, Avithout presiinihig to nppropriate to himself the line quality mentioned, saw that the remark naturally intimated a i)revious knowledi^e. lie frankly asked Jesus: "Whence did you know me T' And Jesus replied : " Before Thilip saw you, when you were under the fig-tree, I saw YOU." Kathanael exclaimed : " Rabbi, you are the Sou of (rod ! You are the King of Israel ! " This sudden admission on Nathauael's part, of the claim of Messiahship made for Jesus by Philip, seems a little strange. A\^hat Jesus said—ii we have it all recorded here— amounts to very little, lie might easily have seen him sitting in meditation under his fig-tree. There nmst have been something more implied in look or tone, or both, that went directly to Nathanael's heart, lie was somehow searched. There came into his soul a feeling of the presence of a superior spirit. By word or deed Jesus made him feel that he knew what was in Nathanael's mind when he sat under the fig-tree. The sight of his person was no proof of divine or even extraordinary power. The reply of Jesus is remarkable : " Because I said unto you that 1 saw you under the fig-tree, do you believe ? You shall Bee greater things than these." And to the company present he added : " Yerily, verily,* I say unto you, hereafter ye shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man." So far as we know, this was never liter- ally fulfilled to those to whom it was spoken. It has been sug- gested that the disciples frequently saw around Jesus, as he talked, or prayed, or wrought, or slept, appearances of angelic creatures. But this is mere conjecture. They never said so. It is poetry and not history. The words, then, nmst have been synd)olic: if literal, the fulfihnent would most surely have been recorded. They do symbolize that series of wonderful deeds wherewith afterwards his life became adorned and made the most marvellous of human histories; and that spiritualizing of human modes of thought by Jesus, in which heaven has been opened ; and that more active fiux and reflux of celestial powers which have marked the Christian era But now for the first time Jesus applies to himself that name which seems to have been his favorite mode of self-designation, " The Son of Man." Others spoke of him usually by the name ♦This afti'jv, anr'iv, translated " vcr- I similar asseverations the other biogra- ily, verily," ia peculiar to John. In I phers use a/ar-I']nosh, M'hich repi-esents humanity in its greatest frailty and humility. Ezekiel is repeatedly called Son of Man, but never calls himself so. It may have been to keep him from undue exaltation on account of his many great and glorious visions. But he is not called the Son of Man. The Old Testament writers may be said to have used the phrase to designate, generally, humanity in its highest ideal. It was certainly not a cust(^mary designation of the Messiah, else some false Messiah would have used it. More- over, the people would sometimes at least have applied it to Jesus, as they frequently did the name " Son of David," which latter name Jesus accepted, and ui>on which he was accustomed to base an ai-gument for the superior dignity of the Messiah. (See Matt. ix. l>7 ; xii. 23 ; xv. 22 ; xx. 30, 31 ; xxi. I), 15 ; xxii. 42, 4.5.) It was as the " Son of David " that the people implored his • In. John's "Gospel," however, Josus ' of (lying Stephen. Sec also Rev. i. is frequently represented aseallinghim- 13. Belf the " Sou of God," with a pregnant % I now discover only one pa.ss.Tgt; in meaning. which it is omitted, namely, John v. 27, \ In Acts vii. 50 it occurs, and has i)erhaps for a reason we may present Bjiecial reference to the bodily appear- i when we reach the disoushiou of tb« auce of Jesus, as it SL-emed to the eyes | passage. THE FIRST DISCIPLES. 119 help, and as the " Son of David " he did help them. The prophets had foretold that the Messiah was to come of David's line, and freqnently nscd the name of j. . , „ David to imply the Messiah. The Jews cher- ished the name and fame of David as their most glorious mon- arch, the king who hud done most to extend their dominions. And so they natnrally came to associate ideas of secular splendor and conquest with the thought of the Messiah. Perhaps it was on this account that Jesus, when he wished to connect his person with the Messianic idea, preferred to call him- self "The Son of Man." It lifted him from the sphere of secu- lar to that of spiritual and everlasting life; it enlarged him from the representative of one family — a royal family — to the repre- sentati\e of all humanity. It realised Messiah, it idealized man. And the missicm of Jesus was to break bands — bands of church- ism, bands of monarchy, bands of caste, prejudice, conventional- ities. In his work he was to bring himself down to all the weaknesses, wants, and sympathies of man : in the results of that work he was to lift man up to himself. In regard to Wathanael, it may be further stated that he is believed by many to be the same, as Bartholomew. The reason assigued is, that in the first three gospels Nathan- ael is not mentioned, while Philip and Bartholo- tneno are constantly named together ; whereas in John, Philip and Nathanael are constantly coupled, but Bartholomew is never mentioned. We may consider his real name as Nathanael, Avhile Bartholomew, which signifies " Son of Tolmai," is his surname. AYe learn from John xxi. 2, that he was a native of Cana, in Galilee. Bernard and Abbot Rupert were of 0])inion that he was the bridegroom at the marriage in Cana. lie is reported among the witnesses of the resurrection and of the ascension of Jesus, and as returning to Jerusalem with the other A])ostles. (See John xxi. 2, and Acts iv. 12, 13.) The apocryphal statements are, that he was subsequently an Apostle to the Indians, M'hoever they may have been, the ancient writers using the word indefinitely. The place of his death is not well ascertained. Albanoj^olis, in Armenia Minor, and Urbanopolis, in Cilicia, are mentioned. lie is said by one author to have died in Lycaonia. They all agree that he was crucified with his head downward. A spurious '• gospel " bears his name. CHAPTER V. IN CAN A AND CAPERNAUM. KSN.V LL JLLIL. Cana of Galilee. Having accoinplihlicd his in-oposcd journey, we next find Jesus in Cana of Galilee. This vilhi<;e is not named in the Old Testa- itient. Aecording to Josephns ( Vita, c. 10), it lay half a day's journey from the sea of Gennesaret, and about two days from the Jordan, where Jesus had had his in- t('r\ ic'W u-ith Natlianael, who probably accompanied him to Cana. In his lu'i^raiH'hcs (iii. 2(U), Dr. Robinson establishes it as Kana- cl-Jelel, 3.^ lu)urs X. ^ E. from Nazareth. Hero Jesus ])orfor|ned his first miracle, which is thus r(']>ort('d in John ii. 1-10: "And the third day there was a marriaj^e in Cana of Galilee; and the mother of Jesus was tliere: and both Jesus was called [invited], and his disciples, to the marriage. And when Tlie first miracle. John ii. IN CANA AND CAPERNAUM. 121 they wanted wine, the mother of Jesus saith unto him, ' They have no wine.' Jesus saith unto her, 'Woman, what have I to do with thee? mine hour is not yet come.' His mother saith unto the ser- vants, 'Whatsoever he saith unto you, do it.' And there were set there six water-pots of stone, after the manner of the purifyiui^ of the Jews, containing two or three firkins apiece. Jesus saith unto them, ' Fill the water-pots with water.' And they filled them up to the brim. And he saith unto them, ' Draw out now, and bear unto the governor of the feast.' And they bare it. When the ruler of the feast had tasted the water that was made wine, and knew not whence it was (but the servants which drew the water knew), the governor of the feast called the bridegroom, and saith unto him, 'Every man at the beginning doth set fotth good wine ; and when men have well drunk, then that which is worse: but thou hast kept the good wine until now.' " The particularity with M'liich minutiae are mentioned renders it probable that the historian John was one of the party; that he, and Andrew, and Peter, and Philip went forward with their new Pabbi, detachiuir themselves from John , , ,,. ' => orable weadmg. and attaching themselves to Jesus, From Betha- bara on the Jordan, where the last incident is mentioned, to Cana in Galilee, there would be parts of three days consumed in the journey. Jesus would pass through IS'^azareth by the most natural route. Perhaps there he would be told that his mother had gone to Cana, to the wedding of some familiar friend of the family, and that an invitation had been left for him, and any friend wIkj might be with him, to follow her as speedily as convenient. His friends continue with him, and they go in a body to Cana. There «i event in the life of Jesus occm'S which makes this the most memorable wedding upon record. The marriage of no imperial parties has been so frequently mentioned as this of these unknown peasants of Galilee. No wedding has invoked from genius so many poems and so many passages of eloquence, AV^ho the bride and bridegroom were we have no means of knowing. They were simple people, of the rank of Mary, and probably poor, as we learn tliat the wine fell short. Jesus had heretofore performed no miracle. That we ai-e ex- pressly told by the historian John (ii, 11), who thus sets aside all those grotesque and monstrous things which are related of Jesug in the Apocryphal books. But Mary laiew his miraculous con- 122 INTRODUCTIOX OF JESUS TO HIS rCBLTC MIXISTRY. ception and the marvels atteudinf^ liis birth. She had watched his growth in wisdom and power, and althonirh The mother of i , , ., , • i i i i i ' ^ she had never witnessed a mn-acle, she Jiad alwavs Jesus. _ _ ... fonnd liini a wise adviser in times of domestic emerfrencics. How far he had connnunicated to lier his views of his mission we cannot know. They must have liad hnig conver- sations and deep comimmings about liimself ; and if lie had nevei given her any hints about his Messiahship, tlie Jewish woman had Jewish hopes in her licart, and she connected them witli the sacred secrets of his birth and brooded over them with her maternal love. There is a great probability that the disciples who were with Jesus told her how they liad come to form that brotlierhood, on tlie ground of the Baptist Jolm's liaving jiroclaimed him as the ^Mes- siah. The Baptist was the liighest authority then. So now Mary received him, after his absence, in tlie double cliaracter of son and Messiah. And she knew that the Messiah was to work mii-acles. The liour seemed ta have arrived; tlie wine failed. She spoke to Jesus, very delicately, merely informing him of the fact. It Mas very natural. The reply of Jesus seems un- rep y o ii;^turally harsli. That somehow it was a reproof Jesus. . . •' '■ is obvious. That some rel)uff should come, wo might, upon reflection, expect. Our knowledge of Jesus after all MG have read makes it natural. lie would do nothing at the mere ]u-ompting of pride or vanity. And if Mary believed or suspected liim to be tlie Messiah, she should wait until his own spirit prompt- ed the extraordinary act. And 3'et the woi-ds are not as harsh as they seem in our English version, i'lrwj, "Woman," is an Oriental method of salutation to women of the highest rank, and Jesus used it upon the cross, in the season of his extreme suffering, and when he was exhibiting the most tender and unselfish regard for his mother. (See John xix. 26).* Substitute "Lady," and see how different is the sound. But tlie fact that he chose to say ^^My Lady," instead of "^fy Mother," is significant. He had entered his work. This was his fii-st meet- ing with Mary after his l)a])tism, and he seems to have made her then feel the barrier which must ever thereafter be between them. Mary was to learn what many a woman has learned, how a great life-work interferes with the aft'ections. She is to be "woman " * Bee also John xx. 15. IN CAl^A AND CAPERNAUM, 123 to him, — a very dear mother, ever to be honored, hut woman. ITcr husband had not been his father.* lie knew himself now ag tlie son of the God. His Avhole treatment hereafter, as we sliall see, is on this platform. "What have I to do witli thee?" is the translation of a difficult phrase. It seems to imply that they had different positions from which to see the demands of this occasion. She , 1 -111 1 ^ ^ c ^• TT 1 1 Difficult phrase. had a neighbor s and a motlier s leelmgs. lie luid the sentiments becomiiiii; the ]\Iessiah, the Sent of God, and was to do what was necessary to nudce himself known in this work, and no more. It was not an ugly, rough, unfilial speech; but it did i-eprove Mary, and stands forever against all that superstition which elevates her into a goddess who has power to command her son. We shall find that nowhere does Jesus encourage supersti- tion. The mother still felt that her great son would do something great. Perhaps he had intimated as much, and all that he checks in Mary is her too great forwardness. She tells the servants to be on the alert, although he had said what she could hardly have understood, what perhaps we do not nnderstand — "My hour has not yet come." Gregory of Xysseu gives a turn to this which may be the solution of difhculties. lie regards it as a question : "Has not my hour come?" He used it afterward on another memorable occasion. lie will hasten nothing, he will delay noth- ing. But does not her speech to the servants show that Mary had had some intimation of what Jesus was going to do? The ceremonial punctuality of the Jewish religion was ob- served by this poor family. They had six water-pots, each hold' ing from two to three " firkins." This word signifies a measure of S gallons and 7.4 pints. If we assign tM'o firkins and a half {fieTprjrr}^ is the original) as the average, then they held 133 gallons. They were water-pots, not wijie-jars. They were filled with water at the command of Je- sus, lie directed the servants to draw and carry to the " gover- nor of the feast," a person called in the original a?-cMtric/nnus\ who held something like the place of the si/mj)osiarch, the master of ceremonies, the rex convivii, probably a guest who had kindly by request undertaken the oflice for the occasion. The servants * As Augustine says, " That in me which works miracles was not born of thee '■ 124 INTRODUCriOX OF JESUS 10 HIS PUBLIC MINISTRY. dipped and bore it to tlio ruler of tlie feast, mIio, wlicu lie liad tasted it, not knowing whence it was, called his friend the bride- «;rooni, and i)leasantly reminded him that it was customary to ])r(> duce tlie best wine at first, and when men had rather cloyed their j)alates by freqnent potations, then to produce the inferior wine. " But," said he, "yon have kept the good wine nntil now," until the ver}' last. The historian pronounces this a miracle. It certainly is, or it is a contemptible farce played out by cnnm'ng collusion, or the whole history is false. We liave no more right to suspect this history than most of Caisar's Com- mentaries on the ^Yar in Gaid., or the Annals of Tacitus. AVe must accept this, or reject almost every line of these histories. Accepted, the narrative shows that John, who seems to have been present, believed, so far from this being a trick, that it was really a miracle. There is nothing gained by any explanations of the palliative class, such as Neander's idea that Jesus " intensified (so to speak) the powers of water into those of wine." * Nor Palliative erpla- ,. .•■'•ii.ii. i •!• i ^ *^ by Auirustme s idea tliat sucli a miracle is wrouijht nations. ' . . in our vineyards yearly, and Jesus simply has- tened the processes of nature by which water becomes wine.f This view is indorsed by Trench {On Miracles, p. 91), when that usually judicious writer (compares this to "the unnoticed miracle of every-day nature," and si)eaks of the difference lying in " the power and will by which all the intervening steps of these tardier processes were overleaped and the result obtained at once." There is no comparison. There is in this act of Jesus in Cana no such basis as soil and germ, vine and grape, through which to j)rf)pel the wine. It was a clear and sheer miracle, the simple basis being loater and the result being ? are : " lUud autem non miramur quia ijiringa, in which, by natural processes, onini anno fit ; assiduitatc ainicit ad- new powers are given to water; and I miratiouem." the ancient accounts of springs which I m CANA AND CAPEENAUM. 125 Trouble is given some commentators bj the abundance of wino which Jesus made. It looks like " putting temptation in men's way," it is said. But does not the All-Fatlier do that perpetually and plentifully ? There is notli- /^^ abundance ^ . , . 1 . , , , . , or the wine, mg about us whicli is not open to that objection. AVhy does God allow grapes to grow? ^Yliy did God give men appetites? All life is a submitting of the human spirit to thd disci})line of trial. The lesson to the disciples and to the woi-ld is wholesome. They had been in the ascetic school of John. In the very open- ing of his public career Jesus teaches them that all the courtesies of life are to be respected ; that The lesson, no man is to be so great as not to give a portion of his time to the demands of society; that indulgence in innocent pleasures should have the sanction of the loftiest and grandest natures ; that marriage is not to be discouraged because the work of some men in the world forbids them— as his forbade him— to partake the blessed sweetnesses of married love ; and that he came not to destroy but rectify, not to sadden but to transfigure all life by heightening the spiritual part of man and connecting his ordinary drudgery with the highest hopes; by turning the water of ordinary existence into the wine of a generous, rich, and exhilarating life. "And his discij^les believed on him." (John ii. 11.) After this Jesus, Avith Mary and her other sons, the half-broth- ers of Jesus, accompanied by the disciples, went down tcj Caper- naum, which lay on the western side of the Sea of Galilee, a place where we shall find him doing ^''^'^ ^"^ ^^P^""" many of his mighty works, and which, according °^"'"" to his prediction, has been lost from human geography so thor- oughly that no ecclesiastical tradition ventures to fix its site. Dr. Robinson exposes the views of all previous travellers in their at- tempts to identify the locality. (See BM Ih'searehes, iii. 2SS- 294.) The " not many days " seems to signify his eagerness to be about liis work, rather than to indicate any chronological space. PART III. FEOM THE FIRST TO THE SECOND TASSOYER IN THE PUBLIC LIFE OF JESUS. ONE YEAR— PROBABLY FROM APRIL OF A.D. 27 TO APRIL OF A.D. 23. CHAPTER L CLEAXSING TIIK TKMl'LK. A Passover apiiroaelicd. Tliis frreat festival drew Jews to the Temple not only fi-oiii all jmrts of Palestine, but from distant lands. Jesus went nj) to Jerusalem. On enter- ing the Temple he found iu the Court of the Gentiles persons sellini; oxen, sheep, and doves, fur sacrifices, and near them sat brokei's makiui^ exchange of money for those who wished to purchase offeiiugs. Perhaps these brokei*s also changed the foi'eign money of Jews from a distance into the sacred half- Bhekel, which alone was allowed to be paid in for the Temjde capitation-ta.x, levied annually on every Jew of twenty years old and nj)wards. (Compare iMatt. xvii. 24: with Exod. xx.x. 13 ; 2 Kings xii. 4 ; 2 Chron. xxiv. G, 0.) * Jesus had witnessed this dese- * According to ling, "the ancient ! nion business, trade, wages, sale, etc., imposts which were introduced before the Roman dominion were valued ac- cording to tho Greek coinage, e.f/., the taxes of tho Tenijile. Matt. xvii. 24; Joseph., 11. I., vii. 0, C. The offerings were paid in these. Mark xii. 42 ; Luke xxi. 2. A payment which i)ro- ceedod from the Temple treasui->' was made according to the ancient national payment by weight. Matt. xxvi. 15. jTbifl ia very doubtful.] Cut in com- the as-si/i and dcnnrhis and Roman coin were usual. Matt. x. 29 ; Luke xiL 6 ; Matt. XX. 2 ; Mark xiv. 5 ; John xii. 5 ; vi. 7. The more modem state taxes are likewise paid in the coin of the nation which exercises at the time tho greatest authority. Matt. xxii. 19; Mark xiL ir, ; Luke XX. 24."— Vol. L p. 14. After all, however, seme of the.8e words may be troufilations. CLEANSING THE TEMTLE. 127 oration o£ God's house eveiy year from his early boyhood. Ho had seen that the secularized and demoralized priesthood allowed it. To him it had become intolerable. lie had entered upon his mission. Probably rumors of him increased the crowd at this festival. Eighteen years before, in that very spot, he had said that he must be about his Father's business, and he certainly meant the work of God. This was the house of God. lie would not endure the sight of its desecration longer. The cattle may have stood by in pairs, and rope — such rope as they were accus- tomed to use in leading beasts to the slaughter — lay near. The spirit of the old prophets was npon him. lie did not speak. He acted. Seizing the rope he made a scoui-ge, and drove these dese- crators out of the Temple. AVhether he actually applied the lash to their backs we do not know. Ilis presence, his act, so like that of one of their old prophets, may have exerted such a moral force upon their guilty consciences that they lied before the blow, lie ordered the animals away, overturned the tables of the money- changers, and cleared the Temple. Lights and shadows ! 'NYe have seen him all sweetness at a wedding, beneficently turning away the shame of a poor but lov- ing bridegroom by a miraculous supply of wine. We now behrdd him terrible to evil-doers. Among the holy poor he is all gentle- ness; in the presence of merchants and rulers and multitudes he is the stern rebuker of the great wrong. The effect of this act upon the disciples was to dec})en the impression of his Messiah- ship. Perhaps they recalled the words of John, " whose fan is in his hands." They certainly did recollect what David had sung in his soi'rowf ul exile : " The zeal of thy house has eaten me np." (Ps. Ixix. 9.) The Jews demanded his authority for this amazing act. The demand is to be regarded as coming from two classes. The more devout among the people must have long regarded this proximity of the mart to the Temple a nui- , ^^ , ^" °^^ ^ '^ . ^ deraandecl. sance which should be abated. When this extra- ordinary young man, of whom they had heard vagne but interest- ing statements, performed the act so boldly, it must have been agreeable to them, and probably increased their expectations of what he should do hereafter. They h6ped he would by greater deeds of national importance furni.sh authority for believing that he did this as a Messianic act. The worldly and secular hated 128 FIKST AXD SECOND. PASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. liim foi it. but could not resent, as he placed it npon a religions ground and had some g(X)d i)eople near who approved. All tlie traders conld do was to make sullen demand for his anthority, which they had a right to do, as only the Sanhedrim or a ])rophet could correct abuses in the Tcmple-woi-ship, and the latter was always expected to demonstrate his prophetic authority by a mir- acle. His reply to that demand was enigmatical. It was : "Destroy this tem])le, and in throe days I will raise it np.'* In order to appreciate the effect of this speech upon his hearers there are several things to be done. In the fii-st place, we must remember that the disciples themselves did not undei-stand the meaning of the saying until after the death of Jesus, and that neither they nor the Jews were furnished with the interpretation of this dark speech, which John gives in ii. 21, 22. Then we must, as far as practicable, re])roduce the state of feelings in the hearts of the Jews against which Jesus seems to have hurled this speech as a courageous reply to their defiance. Towards him pei"sonally they had no kind feelings. He had been associated with the denunciator}'' John the Baptist. lie had made no overtures to ecclesiastical power or popular favor. His lii*st public act seemed the deed of a zealot. I3ut their Temple had become their idol. lie himself intimated as much in a rebuke contained in one of his speeches. The Temple was the central figure among their national ideals. It had stood, in one form or another, on the same spot tln-ough the centuries, collecting around itself all the tcnder- est and sublimest associations of devotion and patriotism. It was the visil)lc residence of the invisible Jehovah. It imparted a solemn sanctification to the whole land. It was the heart through which all the national blood flowed. It held tliose who were resident, and attracted Jews from every clime. Their co-religionists, dispersed among the nations, having no more ])lace of Inisiness in Jerusalem, no more houic there, no living associates of their youth there, nothing but sad memories in the city of the sei)idchres of their fathers, saw, iu the vision of the uight, Tmk Temple rise and stretch its arms like a great Mother, and heard a voice as from the Holiest of Holies call them back, in sounds more solemn than the thunder aiul more thrilling than a lo\c- whisper — and they rose, and at whatever sacrifice of business or CLEANSING THE TEMPLE. 129 pleasure they turned their faces towards Jerusalem and stood with awful joy in the courts of the house of Jehovah. The people that heard Jesus speak this fearful enigma recol- lected that the Temple had been defiled. They recalled the days of Antiochus Epiphanes, who had forbidden the observance of the law, and had set up the " abom- , ^"^..^ °^ ^°^' ' . . ^ ^^ recollections, iuation of desolation " by making a sacrifice to Olympian Jove on the altar of Jehovah ; * and they never forgot liis loathsome end, when terror and remorse lashed him into an ignominious grave. " He came to his end, and there was none to help him." They recollected that Crassus, governor of Syria, on his way from Rome to fight the Parthians, plundered their Tem- ple,t and went forward to terrible defeat and captivity, and to a fearful death amid the desert sands. They had not ceased to feel that it was retribution from God, for his Temple's sake, which had sent Pompey's head to Caesar, and left his dishonored trunk on the shore of Egypt.:}: Their love for their Temple was stronger than patriotism, or love of home, or the instinct of self-presei-vation. It was a pas- sion and a fanaticism. As truly as beautifully does Milman say, " The fall of the Temple was like the bursting of the heart of the nation." In such a state of mind the Jews heard this young tea(3her de- clare : " Destroy this Temple, and I Avill rebuild it in three days." Any careless speech in regard to the Temple was unpardonable ; but to talk lightly of its destrucrtion was an intolerable outrage. And that is just what they and his disciples understood him to say, and he knew that they did so understand. The suggestion that he pointed to his bod}', indicating that he referred to his * Compare Diod. Sic, Eclog. xxxiv. 1; Daniel xi 31; xii. 11; 1 Mace. i. 57; Josephus, Ant., xiL 5. 4. "The abomination of desolation " was proba- bly a small idolatrous shrine which was set up in the Temple on the loth of the month Kisleu : just ten days after which the first victim was ofifered to Jupiter. The circumstances of the death of Antiochus Epiph. are narrated in Poly bins (xxi. 2), and in Josephus (Ant., xii. ,\,et scq.). \ I find no other authority for this 9 than the paragraph iii Josephus ( Wars, L 8. § 8) ; but the mention by him shows how any even reported disrespect to the Temple fired the Jewish heart. X Pompey's fate is well known to all readers of history. Josephus says that Pompey's virtue kept him from carry- ing off the sacred treasure, but rerords the fact that he desecrated the Temple by entering the Holiest of Holies (Ant., xiv. iv. 4), and examining those things which it was lawful for the priests only to behold. 130 FIRST AND SECOND TASSOVKK IN TOE LITE OF .TESU8. death and resurrection, is wholly inadmissible. If he had done BO it must have been in sight of the Jews, or of his disciples only, lie could scarcely have made the gesture significant to his disci- ples without also making it apparent to the Jews, and it is not consistent with the general purity and simplicity and elevation of his character to fancy him winking to his disciples and concealing a gesture from the crowd. They believed that he meant the ma- terial Temjde in which they were standing. Their re]»ly shows that: "Forty and six ycai-s was this Temple in building, and wilt thou rear it up in three days?" This must refer to the completion of some main jwrtion or jg^g principal wing of the Temple. Ilerod the Great liad a taste for building, and had expended, and ■was still expending, vast sums and much time on this groat work, in which he was assisted by the piety, the wealth, and the patri- otic pride of the Jews. From the time he had commenced this work to the time this reply was made to Jesus it was just forty-six yeai"S. Josephus (Ant., xvi. 11. 1) says that he began in the eighteenth year of his reign ; but in his Wdrs of the Jews (i. 21. 1) he says in the liftecnth, the dates being founded respectively npon the death of Antigonus and Herod's appointment by the Homans. If the latter date be taken, it will give twenty yeai-s to the birth of Jesus, and thirty yeai-s to this passover, making fifty from which if we take four yeai-s to correct our era, the epoch of which is just that much too late, we have forty-six years.* It was to Jewish ears a preposterous and a blasphemous thing in Jesus to intimate that the Temple should be destroyed, and to assert that he could rebuild it in three davs. They Thenation _ ,. ttiii ^^i Bbockecl never jorgave him. He had hurt them m every sensibility. And Jesus knew it. And he made no reply and no ex])lanation. In his first public acts he had ex- hibited a zeal that seemed headstrong; ho liad certainly per- formed a most impolitic act. But it cannot be charged as an in- discretion or inadvertence, such as occur in every ]ud)lic man's life and give him great rci^rets. Jesus never regretted it. He * Alford (on John ii. 20) notices that the Temple was not completed till a.d. 04, under Herod Agrippa II. and the procurator AlbinuB; so that "was in building" must have referred to the greater part of the work then com- pleted. CLEANSING THE TE^ilPLE. 131 must have known that he had vii-tually signed his owl. death- Mari-ant. He awaited the result. AVe shall see how this one sentence of his rankled in the heart of the natiou, was made the strength of the indictment on which he was executed, and con- fionted him in the shape of gibe amid the horrors of his cru- cifixion. lie meant his own body. He thought of his death by violence, and his belief that he had power to take up his life again. lie knew the unity of his OAvn meaning and compre- hended the multiplicity of its relations. It might , , refer to the desecration of the Temple by the men around him, or to its destruction by the Itomans ; it might refer to the abolition of the Jewish form of religion and the recon- struction of faith on the basis of his resurrection. Uere as throughout his whole public life (compare Matt. xii. iO) this thought of his resurrection was ever present to his mind. Subsequently he seems to have told John and the other disciples that his allu- sion, in the offending speech, was to " the temple of his body." But even then they could not comprehend, they seemed scarcely able to apprehend, the idea of the resurrection of the body. The whole meaning came upon them only after they believed that they had seen him alive after death.* An appeal may now be made to the candor of mankind against the disingenuousness of some modern criticis. If any public man, say Pericles, or Caesar, or Cromwell, or AVasliing- ton, or Napoleon, had plunged into public life as Jesus did, would it be fair to charge that his intent was to pan- der to the public taste, to study the tides of fortune, to adapt him- self to the desires of the masses, and thus to popularize himself? Suppose the act of cleansing the Temple would be agreeable to a few unsecularized devout old Jews; it would be disagreeable to the large majority of ruling, influential people, and hugely dis- gusting to the traffickers themselves; while the speech of the Temple would give point to the rancor of those whom the act had offended, and shield their resentment from the allegation of being based upon personal grounds, while it would be poignantly afflic- tive to the sensibilities of the pious few who would, but for the Bpeech, have favored the act. * Read with care John ii. 21, 23. 132 rmsT A^T) 6eco>t) rAssovEE m the lite of jestts. On grounds of policy the act and the accompanying speech are wholly indefensible. If Jesus undertook the enterprise which ia cliarged upon him by the critics, then he was sim- .. }ily a fool, whose folly it would be difficult to match from all the recorded mistakes of men. But whatever else be charged, he is not accused of folly. Then, he did not seek to draw men to his fellowsliip l)y going to their opinions. Then, he was an independent thinker and actor. Then, he was not politic. If, since his death, it be ascertained that he has exerted a vast influence over human thought and action, — if now he reigns king in the hearts of multitudes of men, — then it ia possible to live a great life and die a great death without a policy. If devout men see in the life of Jesus something supeniaturally beautiful, we shall find, in an nndogmatic study of his career, the thing of all things most beautiful, pure naturalness. It would seem from the history that during his attendance upon the Passover Jesus did many wonderful things, even perfonned miracles, which convinced many that he was tlie s mimy won- ^^j^gggj^^jj^ They seemed more willing to trust him derful works. -^ ... than he was to trust them. His intimate friend and biographer says that it was because "he knew what was in man." lie knew that in the fervor of recent conviction they might soon form a mob of excited adherents, whose fidelity could not endure the test which such teaching and discipline as he would enforce would bring upon them. lie was in no haste. He came to plant princii)les and demonstrate truths, not to crente factions and secure partisans. CHAPTER II. NIC0DEMU8. Jestjs was a light that could not be hid. The more thoushtfiil &' had begun to study the phenomena of his character and career. Even members of the Sanliedrim began to take Nicodemus. John &- interest in his teachings, — most with feelings of aversion, a few witli solicitude, and one at least with kindly inclination. That one was Nicodemus. There must have been others whose observation had led them to desire to know more of Jesus. Sucli was Joseph of Arimathea, who be- came a disciple, " but secretly for fear of the Jews." (See John xix. 38.) How man\' more men of mark were in tliis circle we have no means of knowing. John says (xii. -12) that "among the chief rulers many believed on him." Of these we take Nicode- mus as at once the leading spirit and the representative man. He was a Pharisee as to faith, and a member of the Sanhedrim as to position. He had all the traditionary intiuence of his sect and his office to bind him to propriety and conservatism. He was not young. Tlic Talmud * speaks of a rich Sanhedrist, called Nicodemus Bonai, who, at a great age, was alive at the destruc- tion of Jerusalem. There are no means of identifying this man with the Nicodemus spoken of by John, but there is no reason, so far as I know, why he may not have been the same. This Nicodemus came to Jesus by night. The interview is re- ported condensedly by John, but is exceedingly interesting, as showing how ready Jesns was to set forth the most profound doc- trines to any willing mind, even when that mind is still held in the bondage of old prejudices. Timid, afraid of the ban of his * The Nicodemus of the Talmudists Is called " son of Gorion," is represented as one of the three richest men in Jeru- Balem, living at the time of the destruc- tion of Jerusalem, being then among ! the disciples of Jesus. Olshausen re- fers to Sanhedr. , ' f ol. xliiL 1 ; Aboth Rab. Nathan, cap. 6 ; Tract. Gittin, foL Ivi 1, etc. 134 FIRST AJfD SECOND PASSOVEE IN TIIE LIFE OF JESUS. caste, holding tenaciously to liis prejudices by force of liahit, yd candid, loving truth, seeking a sure footing cautiously, lie idt himself bound, as all honest minds are bound, to give a fair lieaiinu to every new word and an impartial examination to all new cluims. Jesus had not yet classed — as he did afterward — the hypociiir with the infidel, the Pharisee with the Sadducee. He had not re peated with emphasis the denunciations of Jol.ii Jesus regarded ^j^^ Baptist. But his style was not such as wu„M with misti-ust. , . 1 -ni • 11 1-1 be pleasmg to the i harisees, and they did n<>t know how far he was to advance his claims. They regarded him, therefore, with mistrust. Kicodemus saw more in him than nmst of the other Pharisees ])erceived. Just such was the ])ostme <»f his mind when he determined for truth's sake to ha\e an inter- view with Jesus, but for the sake of i)rudence to have it at night. Let us now examine the narrative in John in the true historic spirit, laying aside the dogmatic prejudices of educatiresenting others as well as himself, what a very few othei-s, like Joseph of Arimathaia, were ready to adniit, and what Nicodemus thought the whole Sanhedrim, at that time, in their hearts, believed. Here is a discovery of the impression already made by Jesus upon the most elevated and thoughtlul min«ls of his nation. "We know this much, that thou hast eome from God — that thou hast a divine mission to the jK'ojile — as a teaeher." Only that, no more, is adm'itted. They are not carried away hy any enthusiasm in his behalf, but they are stimulatcni to leani M'hat he can teaeli them. He must nt»t be elated by this admis- sion, f(^r it is qualiiied by a logical reason: "for no man can do the wonderful things thou doest, if God be not Nvith him.'' *It is noticed that the phrase "we know" is the current characteristic formula of the j)roud Pharisees, who held the key of knowledge for them- selves and withheld it from the common I)vopIc. We shall meot it frequcuUjr oa we proceed. NIC0DE3IUS. 135 To what does all this amount? Not very much. It imjilies that while the chiefs had made no high estimate of John, l)e- cause John had performed no miracle, Jesus had 1 r J • • i-i 1 . Caution of made a profound impression upon tlie rulers: „. , , , ^ ^ , , . , . . Nicoaemus s ad- one is sent, or comes, to examine his claims pri- ^ggg^ \ately and dispassionately. lie says " we," very generally perhaps, as Stier thinks, to shelter himself from express- ing his own convictions, and so as to be able to draw back if necessary: "thou hast come" is in Greek a pointer to ep;)^oyu-€i^o9, the " Coming One," and if Jsicodeinus used a precisely parallel woi-d in Hebrew or Aramaic — in one of which dialects the con- versation must have been maintained — he might have seemed to involve a recognition of the Messianic mission of Jesus ; which recognition, however, is immediately withdrawn in the word " teacher," — the Messiah expected by the Jews being not teacher but Jdiig. He further proceeds to thin out his address by the phrase, " if God be not with him." A great fall from the almost promise of recognizing the Mes- siah ! He is so afraid of making that acknowledgment of the Messiahship of Jesus that he stops short and fails to ask a question as to the coming kingdom of God. lie had long felt that the heavenly kingdom should come, and must be near, in spiritual power. His whole people were ardently longing for it. From that lofty expectation he drops down to the idea of a mere science^ learning, a school, the founder being a mere tecMher ! The idea was not Jewish. Those who had come from God were prophets, foretelling and denouncing, or announcing, not teaching. This scientific Sanliedrist begins to blunder as socm as he mingles the spiritual and the material. A teacher working miracles indeed I And yet a sincere desire to know the truth must have been at the bottom of this man's heart. The mysterious young Rabbi recognized this, as his whole treatment shows. As soon as Nicodemus had " laboriously achieved his introductory speech," as Stier describes it, or, as I think, paused from mei'e confusion, having given no good reason for his visit, Jesus made a reply, which is the first and perhaps the most dogmatic of his utterances. He lets down upon the mind of Nicodemus the weight of the central truth of his system, veiled in figurative language. Looking down into the eyes and heart of the learned Pharisee, he says solemnly : " Verily ^ verily, 1 say to 136 FIRST AND SECOND PASSOVER IN TITE LIFE OF JESUS. you, if any man l>e not horn anew, he camiot enjoy the kingdom of Godr Jesus knew the general expectation of the approaching king- dom, Kicoderans shared it. lie had approached Jesus to ascer- tain, it would seem, what connection existed between his miracles and his doctrine. The miracles seemed phenomena whicli de- clared the nearness of the kingdom of the Messiah which Daniel (vii. 14) had taught him and his nation to expect. As a Jew, a Pharisee, a ruler, he had jn-escriptive right to a place in this kingdom; but it was quite pnjbable that this young teacher could give him instruction as to the best way to enter, to see, to enjoy the Messianic kingdom. The general drift of this sudden speech seems to be this: You have come to me as if J earning (io\A(i do everything; but it is not by new learning, but by new life, that one is to eaningo is Q,,fgj. God's kinijdom ; and a new life comes bv a reply. . new Irirth. Luther paraphrases it thus : " My teaching is not of doin^ and leaving undone, but of a change in the mun: it is not ne^o works done, but a new man to do them ; not another mode of living f»nly, but a new birth." lie takes Nicodemus down from the lofty platform of his official rank and Pharisaic self-sufticiency, and throws him out among the multi- tude of men by telling him that not rank and learning will save, but any man, whoever he may be, who has not had the experience which Jesus indi(rates by the phrase 'yevvr^d?) avwdev, "be born afresh," such a man cannot understand by exjierienc'ing and enjoy- ing (for such the word i8ety means) the kingdom of God. Nicodemus wf»uld have received no shock from the idea of the new birth if it had been spoken of the proselytes from the heathen, who stood at the door of Judaism applying for admission. When Buch a one was baptized he was, in the Ilabbinical view, "sicut parvulus jam natus," as a new-born babe. Put the shock lay in the sweeping statement M'hich turned all tlie Jews — rulers, Phari- sees, Scribes — out-dooi*6, to seek admittance afresh. The w<»rd dvtoOev in this conversation has been a puzzle to critics. And it is the important word, on our undei-standing of which will depend our comj>rchension of this p 0 en 1C8. pj^pp^.jj ^j£ Jesus. It is to be recollected that Jesus spoke in the Aramaic tongue most probably, and John records in Greek the conversation which Jesus had reported tc NIC0DEMU8. 131 him, Now, for the Greek word is there a corresponding word in the Aramaic, with a double laeaningf If so, then the more remote n\eaning miglit throw light upon the word, showing tliat it meant of God, as the kingdom of God is mentioited, or that it bore the meaning which the Apostolical nsage subsequently closely connected with the being born again, namely, from heaven, e'/c Tov oupavou, so that dvcodev might be synonymed with ovpavodev. But Grotius has shown that there is no such word in the Aramaic. We must, therefore, give the closest possible translation of avwdev, and that must mean " anew," or " afresh," or " entirely anew," or " from the beginning." Nicodemus makes a reply which shows that he so understood it, namely, as a totally new birth experi- enced by one at his maturity. This is not conclusive, as Nico- demus might have misunderstood Jesus, but it is corroborative, as it gets exactly the most natural meaning of the word. In all these studies of Jesus we are not concerned to learn what the official expounders, commentators, and preachers have agreed is to be the conventional interpretation of the words of Jesus, but to discover by calm and patient research into the original documents what this remarkable Teacher really did mean. "We are not, however, to despise the opinions of others, especially when they seem formed upon impartial examination. In this spirit we are to encounter another phrase, namely, ''^ the kingdom of GodP It may be noticed here that it is not usual with John. Indeed' it does not occur in his gospel outside this conversation. This is inci- dental evidence of the fidelity with which John reports the conversa- tion, not changing any phrase, however it differ from his own modes of thought and expression, as any critic nnist see that this does. "We know that the Jews looked for a temporal kingdom of material splendor, in which Jehovah's Messiah should reign, and which should have sanctity from the Divine Presence and won- derful spiritual manifestations, as it should have paramount authority from its political predominance. Now, just as a Jew- was gross and materialistic in his tendencies, this kingdom fig- ured itself to him on its earthly and material side ; and just as he was devout and spiritual in his tendencies, this kingdom presented itself to him as of the soul and spirit of a man, with heavenly characteristics. Nicodemus seems to have had very niixed ideas of the kingdom. 138 rmsT and second passotek in tite life of jesus. "The kingdom of God" must reasonably mean as much aa this : a government in which God is king, whicli, being an ab- straction, we can concretely think of, so far aa The kingdom of , . 11*^^1 ^ £ _ , each man is concerned, onlv as the surrender or God. ' that man to the rule of God, the total removal of rebellion out of his heart, the destruction of the princii>le and spirit of rebellion from his sou], so that freely and aftectioiuitely is he loyal to God, — a siiiiitual change so great that it is quite equivalent to a new creation, a new birth into a new life ; and then, as two or more come to be in that state, we have a com- munity bound to God by the allegiance of love, and to one another by the loving temyjcr which comes into the heart when it yields its will to the will of (iod. Now, if we have really found not only a reasonable but a probable meaning of this phrase, as Jestis used if, it Avill follow that all his convei*sation with Nicodeums and all his subsequent discoui"ses will consist with this theory, and that he directed the labors of his life to the forming upon earth just such a body of loving subjects to the law of love and to the Lord of love. If this shall fail to appear as we evolve the biography of Jesus, then have we failed of reaching his meaning. Let us see. The rei>ly of Xicodemus was, " How is a man able to be bom, being old ? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?" If this be taken as proof that eaningo ^ ico- j^i^jodd^^jg iindei*stood Jesus as meaning fleshlv demus s reply. r i 1 • 1 birth, it would snnply prove Inm a fool, and with such an idiot Jesus could have had no convei-sation. It is sur- prising how generally this has been supposed to be the meaning of jS'icodemus. But let the reader reflect that this was no child, but a man advanced in years, holding a high oflice, having a trained mind, being skilful in detettting the meaning of speech, learned in the Scrii»tures of his religion, which must have made his mind familiar with the couching of deepest spiritual significa- tion in figurative language. lie knew that Jesus meant a rebuke and an instruction. The rel)uke was this: You, Nicodemus, have come to me as to a mere teacher to be told something new about the kingdom of God; I tell you this, that you cannot be instriK-led into that kingdom, schooled into it, educated into it. Vou cannot sec the kingdom of God from afar. You cannot see t with your natural senses. You must be spiritually re-created, NICODEMUS. 139 must have not exactly a palingenesis, being born again, but a totally new, fresh birth into a life no emotions of which you have ever felt, and no function of which you have ever discharged. The reply of Nicodeinus is in the disputatious temper of the learned. It ran somehow thus : Is that your view of " the king- dom of God " ? If so, it throws all our mere Scriptural learning, ecclesiastical position, and supposed prescripti\e rights to the winds. But, young man, you are undertaking a most fruitless mission. Such spiritual fresh-generation is wholly impracticable. It is easier to effect physical changes than spiritual. It is easier to create a body than a soul. But you know that no old man can j-e})eat the })rocess of his physical birth : it will be more clearly impracticable for him to have a new S})iritual birth. It was not that Nicodemus failed so much to understaivl Jesus as to heliere him. He saw the meaning, but attempted to confute the proposition of Jesus by a kind of reductio Lack of belief ad ahmirdum. Nicodemus answered as many a learned man answers when some new ])hase of truth is presented which he cannot fail to see, but which he cannot embrace because he has nut the moral strength— indeed, who has? — to throw down all the prejudices of his education. The resi)()nse of Jesus is : "I most assuredly declare unto you, if one be not born of water and the spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of God. Wliat is born of the flesh is flesh ; what is born of the spirit is spirit." The baptism of proselytes was considered a new crea- tion, so that old relationships were so totally broken as to permit a convert to marry his o^vn sister without crime. Nicodei/ms knew what baptism was — that of the Jewish i-itual and that of John. He and the other Pharisees had despised the luptism of John because it was a baptism of rei)entance. Jesus must have known that the mind of Nicodemus would YQSQi'i tc^tuptism at once. The language must, then, have some reasonable inter- l)retation consistent with that fact. Baptism was known bj Nico- demus and by Jesus to be a mere external rite, a clean? ing of the outward man, but as intended to symbolize an interna) ])uri- fication, else it were a senseless ceremony. The religions of the world had aimed at the reformation of the external man. Juda- ism especially did so, more especially Phariseeism. It was water Spirit was needed. There must come a spiritual new creation. 140 FIRST AND SECOND PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. Then, ill reply to Nicodemus's reductio ad ahsurdum, Je^nfi makes statement of a well-known principle in physioloory and psychology, that that which begets imparts its nature to that which is begotten. If a man could go into his mothers womb and be horn again he would be horji the 8a?ne, and nothing would ^come of this. If the Spirit of the Almighty God make the new spiritual creation there is no longer any difficulty to be objected. Did he mean the highest spiritual activity in the universe, namely, the Spirit of God f In the original the word vvevfia is used where we have "spirit" and where we Spirit and wind. , n • ^ i^ • .-i t-' t i have " wind in the common Lnglish version, which is quite accurate in both cases, notwithstandiiig the iincnti- cal suggestion that the word should be translated by "spirit" or " wind " throughout the passage. We know that the word means both spirit and wind, and, if there be nothing to the contrary, should be translated by one word or the other in any passage, unless a grammatical reason appeal's to the contrary. Such rea- son does occur liei-e in the word ourw^i, translated "so" — "so is every one," etc. This means comparison, and comparison involves at least two ideas. If Nicodemus had had time to reflect he might have recol- lected that water cannot produce water ; dead flesh, a body with- out a soul, has no power to procreate ; spirit, life, must be in man or woman before fatherhood and motherhood — so all gen- eration, or all creation, strictly i»pcaking, comes from the Spirit of God, that Sj)irit being the real primal creator. That seems the reason why water, having been alluded to, is not mentioned again nor pressed ; as if he had said, " You may have a body, you may have a soul, you may have conformed outwardly and mended your external life, as baptism or water indicates; all very well, but there inu.st he a fresh creation of the soul." In the report of tliis conversation, Alford * has called attention to the use of tiic neuter in the original to yeyevvrj/xevov (that which is begotten or b(»i'n) as denoting the universal ai»plication of this truth, aiul IJengel f to the same grammatical fact, as denoting the very flrst stamina or groundwork of new life, before Bex can be prec physical world in the case of tl>e wmd-most natmal because in the language which Jesus spoke, as .^^,^,^gJestea well as in that in which Jofm reported, tlie same ^^^ ^^^ word means wind and y>iHt. In Eccles.astes (xi. 5) it is used as an image of the inexphcable and n Xeno- phon * as a symbol of the Deity, whose essence is invisible and who is to be traced only by his operations.f The points of r - Temblance are striking. The ,notion of the spirit o* a m n more nearly resistless than his body, and the spirit of God must Te wholly resistless when it moves. The results of the operation of the spirit of man are perceptible, and so are those of Gods spirit. The mode of operation, in each case, is totally mcompre- hensible. In these three particulars the resemblance is striking. The whence, the w/^re, the whither, itf each case, are unknown. ■ We can examine only results. All this speech of Jesus should have shown N-odernus that Jesus taught that for entrance into, and enjoyment of, tlie king- domof God, a man needs something, the production of which cannot be traced, as in the case of culture or education of any W and is as necessary as natural birth, in winch spn.t comes S flesh, and is as incomprehensible. No n.an understands his birth ; every man knows that he was born, and is consc.ou that he is alive. No man understands the coming of the Spirit of God into his spirit, but he must know that it l^as^come Nieodemus replied, " How can these things be ! it i» not a question for information. It is the exclamation ^^^^^^ ^^ ^^.^ of surprise. He has been carried into mysteries ^^^^ of the soul. Jesus answered, " Ai-t thou a teacher ^ ^ of Israel, and hast thou had no experience of these great spiritual chancres?" This is a humiliating rebuke to his arrogant excla- mation. He ought to have known such scriptures as 1 salm h 12 ; Ezek. xviii. 31 ; xxxvi. 24-28 ; Jeremiah xxxi. 33 ; Zechanah xiii.l; and he ought to have had spiritual experiences of his 142 FITvST AND SECOND PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESL'8. ovn\. Then Jesus l)egan to teach him. " I solemnly declare untc you that wc * speak what we know, and testify what we have seen, and yet ye receive not our testimony." The plural form has no special significance, unless Jesus in- tended to give a large and solemn dignity to the utterance, or to set his " we know " against Nicodemus's " we know." The aflir- mation is of positive personal knowledge on the side of Jesus, and the allegation is of an unbelieving rejection upon the part of Nicodcmiis and the Jews. Jesus adds: "If I have shown you things of the earth, and you believe not, how can you believe if ] show you things of heaven? Xo one has ascended into heaven but he tl at came down from heaven, namely, the Son of Man, whose residence is in heaven." Here Jesus makes claims for himself of the most extraordinary character. lie affirms himself to be a personal witness of tlio things which are invisible to men, all the heaven- ly tilings. lie asserts his o^^Tl pre-existence. lie asserts his coming into the world on a mission. He asserts that his real residence is in heaven; that where he is is heaven. There is no evading this meaning. He intended Nico- demus to understand him so. "We have a phrase in English to this effect — " the words were calculated to make a certain impres- sion,"— meaning that such would be a hearer's natural interpreta- tion, although such meaning might have been totally absent from the mind of the speaker. I3ut here we go further than that, and say that Jesus meant to convey what the words are calculated to convey. lie was too wise, Nicodemus was too important a lis- tener, the conversation was on too solemn a theme to allow the slightest carelessness of diction. He must have given it with pre- cision to his biographer John, and John must have been most careful in the report, for this is altogether the most im])ortant oc- casion of speech which Jesus ever had. The point in his life and the character of his listener made it the occasion to render llic most careful version of his doctrine. Whether his doctrine was Jesas claims pre-existence. * It may entertain the reader to see how much learned difference there has been about this simple use of the plural form. Euthymius, a Byzantine commentator of the twelfth centurj-, Bays that it means Ilimarlf and hi« FaUier ; Bengcl, Ilimself and the Jldy Spii-it ; Beza and Tholuck, Uiiimilf n nd the Prophets ; Luther andKnapp, Him- 8f1f and John the liiiptixt ; Meyer, ///wi- sftf and Teachers like llim ; Lan^'c and Wesley, AH irho are born of the Sja'rit / while Do Wctte and Liicke regard it oa only a rhetorical plural. NICODEMUS. 143 true or not, it is not our purpose now to decide ; we are simply striving to ascertain wliat he said and what he meant. It must be remarked that Jesus claims another thing: that what he says must be heUeved, not known or understood, because he savs it. He liings away the title of teacher, which Nicodemus bestowed. He is the Heavenly j.^^ Assertor of heavenly things and speaks with par- amount authority. And Jesus made this solemn statement to N^icodemus : "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, it is absolutely necessary that thus the Son of Man be lifted, that every man trusting in him should have perpetual life. For God loved the world so, that he gave His son, the only begotten, that every one who trusts in him may obtain perpetual life and not perish. For God sent not His Son into the world that he should damn (or condemn) the world, but that the world might be saved through him. He who trusts in him is not damned (or condemned) ; but he who trusts not is damned already, because he has not confided in the name of the only begotten Son of God. But this is the danuiation (condemnation), that light has entered the world, and men have preferred the darkness to the light because their deeds were evil ; for every one who does vilely hates the light, and shuns it, lest his deeds should be detected and convicted. But he that does the truth comes to the light, that his works may be mani- fested that they are done in God." Here is an open statement by Jesus that he hnoios — he is con- sciously positiN'e — that he is the " only begotten " Son of God, whatever that may mean. John must have receiv- ed the word from Jesus himself, and it can only , . ° ^^ ° ^ ' '' claim, mean a more intense nearness to God than it is pos- sible for language to convey. The word tells us something which we can understand, and, as is often the case with profoundest think- ers, intimates more. "We see the ocean out to the horizon, but the Boul feels that the ocean stretches far be^'ond. Xot simply as Ewjene but as Monofjene Jesus was known in the spiritual world. He says still further, that Moses lifted up the serpent on the pole in the wilderness, as related in Numbers xxi., as a symbol of himself, whether Moses so , . ^^*^ °^^^ °°* triHGS. understood it or not. He claims this act as typical. So he was to be crucified. It was a necessity. He, as 144 rmsT A^^) second passovee in tue life of jesus. harmless as the Xechustan to which Moses directed the eyes of the people who had been bitten by the harmful fiery serjients, — he miLst be lifted up and crucified. And that accomplished, every man who put his trust in that crucified Only Begotten would have a life that is endless. Here are the two main doc- trines of Jesus clearly set forth: 1, That his religion was not to consist in any intellectual assent to any statement of any moral proposition, but in a personal attachment to his pei-son and a per- fect t'nist in him ; and, 2, That no caste, prescriptive right, rank, learning, or nationality, or form of creed, gave title to place in the kingdom of God, nor did any or all of these exclude any man. It thus threw down the barriers of Jewish prejudice and bigotry, and let the nations, the Gentiles, into the kingdom of God. The Jews believed that when the Messiah came he * r. ^:^?^^ ° ^^' ^ would " damn " the Gentiles, and make them of God 6 love. ^ ' " perish." Jesus told Nicodemus that it should not be so ; that God loved the world in sublime catholicity of affec- tion, in intensest depth of devotion, — so loved it as to give his peculiar one, his Monogene, that the world might hold to him as he held to God, that thus they might be drawn from perdition and lifted into the light ; that salvation, not damnation, was the intent of his coming, and that salvation lay not in knowledge but in faith ; not in processes of intellection and ratiocination but in the culture of the human heart planted in the divine heart, so that a man's deeds should be done " in God." He asserted salvation and everlasting life to be by trust in himself when crucified. Whether that be true or false, Jesiis taught it. Whether Kicodemus believed him or not, we shall see that Jesus never changed the essence of his dogmatic statement, never developed in himself thereafter, but told all out at the beginning, and demonstrated not only his belief in the truth of what he said, but the very truth of liia sayings, as far as it is conceivable that any liuman being could roiidcr such demonstration, by any possi- ble life and any possible death. CHAPTER III. FKOM JUDiEA TO SAMARIA. Some time after the Passover at which he had performed mir- acles, and had had the conference witli Nicodemus, Jesus went with his disciples into the rural districts of Judaja, probably along the western side of the Jordan, _ Matt, iv.; Mark opposite East Bethany, Precisely how long after ^2. '' the Passover, there is no means of ascertaining. Nor do we know how he was engaged in that interval. That he was constantly preparing the way for that " kingdom of God" ol which he spoke to Nicodemus there can be no doubt. Upon leav- ing the metropolis he seems to have been engaged in active min^ istry, teaching and preaching, while his disciples baptized. The question naturally arises, why Jesus should have baptized I Perhaps this is an answer. John came with the baptism of repent- ance, that the people might turn from their sins, Why Jesus al- and make ready to receive the Messiah. Such he jo^ed his disciples recognized Jesus to be, and changed his style of to baptize. preaching, his place of baptizing, and perhaps his very formula. It was all now employed in concentrating the atten- tion of the people on Jesus as the Messiah. Ilis first baptism had respect to the Coming One ; his second, to the One Come. Jesus in the beginning of his ministry may have had a baptism unto repent- ance administered by his disciples, because the question now had come to be whether the nation would accept him as the Messiah, and certainly none but those who were penitent could. If they liad submitted to this baptism Jesus would have instructed thein further in the doctrines of the kingdom of God. At this time John was baptizing in iEnon, near to Salim. It is not possible to fix this site with ])recision positively. John (iii. 23) assigns as a reason for the selection of this spot that there were many springs there. The expression in John iii. 26 fixes it as on the west side of the Jordan. It could scarcely have been iinme- 10 14G FraST AND SECOND TASPOVKR IX TFIK LIFE OF JESUS. diately on the river, else the statement of its ahiindanee of water wonhl be superfluous. Eusebius and Jerome ])lace Salim cii^ht lioman miles south of Scythopolis. Dr. Tlunnson, who visited Scythopolis, now called Beisan, represents the valley as abound- injr in water, and as b'einij one of tlie most fertile in Palestine. The tradition in this case is most probably correct, ^fr Van de Velde reports findiiii; a Mussulman oratory, called Sheykh Salim, near a heap of ruins about six English miles south of Scythopolis aTid two west of Joi-dan. ^non would seem to be the name of the district, and Salim of the town. Both the cousins weie now baptizing, Jesus at the Jordan and John in Samaria. It would seem that some Jewish proselyte to Jesus had had a discussion with some of John's John and Jesus jjsciples, in which hc spokc sliglitinglv of the baptizing'. '^ ^ . - . !->.->. reformatory baptism of their master, and magni- fied the discipleship of Jesus, as if the latter had rendered the fonner superfluous. This kindled their sectarian and partisan zeal. Heated with this discussion, they immediately repaired to John, as if they were about to connnunicate some alarming intel- ligence. "Ral)bi, he who was with you beyond Jordan, to whom you bore witness, behold the same is baptizing, and all come to him." They seem to have regarded the act of Jesus as a usurpa- tion of the place and the functions of John. The very ]>hrase, " to whom you bore witness," shows that the disciples felt that John was superior to Jesus, and that the latter derived his chief consideration from tJie eulogy pronounced on him by Jolm. This appeal bi-ings forth from John a testimony for Jesus, re- markable not only as indoi"sing the new teacher in the most em- phatic })ossible way, but as presenting the char- John's self-con- ^^,^^^ ^,f j^^jjj^ jj^ ^fjg j^Qgj. s„|)iijnc possible light. Quests There is nothing grander in all history or fiction. No human being ever more thorouglily conrpicrcd his own spirit or governed liis whole nature by a sense of right than did .John the Ba])tist. lie had felt stirring in him his wonderful genius for religion. Under what he believed to be divine impulses he attacked the sins and follies of the day in a style so vigorous as to attract atten- tion to himself. He had been the most pojnilar public speaker of his generation. ITe had swayed the masses and made even roy- alty quail beneath his power. He had been the great prophet, FROM JTTDiEA TO SAMARIA. 147 and ]iad enjoyed all the consideration which that position gives to an}' man. Now he sees another, one who had come to him for baptism, rising into public notice, attracting the attention of the highest ecclesiastics, and, as his o^vn disciples inform him, with drawing the masses from himself. There is not a particle of en\} oi- anger or jealousy. The news which saddens his weak disciples gladdens their grand and glorious master. lie had had a mission from heaven. He had fulfilled that mission. Ilis work was done. There was nothing lacking but some movement on the part of the Di\'ine Provitlence which should as clearly point out the way of his exit as it liad designated his mode of entry, or should forcefully withdraw him from public life. He had not entered of his own accord ; he would not leave. He saw and felt that he was declining. He held himself ready to be extinguished. Grand man ! There never was any other human being more Borely tempted ; there was never a man more triumphant over temptation. Beside one such noble act as this how all the achieve- ments of the Nimrods and Alexanders, the Caesars and the Napo- leons dwindle ! " He that ruleth his own spirit is greater than ha that taketh a city!" His final testimony to Jesus is worth considering. I shall attempt a faithful paraphrase. He first lays down a general principle, and then applies it to Jesus and himself : — A man can assume nothing which heaven does not give: Each man has his mission : To take anything else, assume any other character, is wholly useless : It would have been folly in me to attempt to play the part of the Messiah: The mask would have fallen at last : But I have done no such thing; for I knew my mission : That mission is at the beginning of its end : Yon yourselves must bear me witness that I said that I was not the Anointed of Jehovah, but only his harbinger: Our ancient Scriptures have represented Humanity as the Bride, and the Coming Christ as the Bridegroom, the desire of the nations: I am only the paranymph, the Bridegroom's Friend:* I rejoice in the occasion which gives Humanity to the arms of her Lover and r)ridcgroom : The sound of the voice of the Bridegroom is to me the assurance that my mission, so far from being a failure, John's last testi- mony for Jesua. * The ly solicited to sanction this nuirriagc. But Herod had mis- taken the man. Jolin denounced it, and boldly told the wicked prince, "It is not lawful for you to have her." Herod and Ilerodias were enraged at tliis interdict, and John was thrown into prison, and would have been killed at once if . Herod ias had had her wa v. But Herod was iiol- Ilerod imprisons . . i " . , jojin^ itic, and knew that such violence would make an out1)reak among the people, the very thing ho dreaded. "Ulien Herod finally slew John ho gave out as the rea- son that he feared lest the great influence whic^h Jt»hn liad over the people should give him the power and inclination to raise a rebellion, as the j^eople seemed ready to do anything which John commanded. This we learn from Josephus.* This was the state reason publicly assigned ; but the real and private reason, as the Evangelical historians give it,t was the hatred which llen>d and Hci'odias felt because he would not sanction their wickedness. Jesus learned the fact of John's imprisonment, and that the Pharii^.ees knew that through his disciples (for /le never ba])tizcd; he was baptizing more than John ; he left his place on the Jordan • JosephuB, Ant., b. xviiL, chap. v. | f ]\I;itt. iv. ; Jlark xvi ; Luke iiL JOHN'S PBI80N FKOM JUD.EA TO SAMAKIA. 149 and proceeded to Galilee, being at that time under very great spiritual iufliieucc, or, as Luke says, " in the power of the Spirit." (Luke iv. 14 ; compare Matt, iv., ^^ Galilee j^fai'k i., and John iv.) Ilis way of usefulness hciug closed in one direction, he turned himself to other fields. His shortest way lay through Samaria, in which is the city oi Shechem. This place is famous on many accounts. It is the most beautiful spot ui all Syria. Modern travellers, as well as ancient writers, lavish extravagant epithets upon it. Mohammed said: "The land of Syria is beloved by Allah beyond all lands, and the part of Syria which he lovetb Shechem. m^ BHECHEK. most is the district of Jerusalem, and the place which he loveth most in the district of Jerusalem is the mountain of Nablus." This is the modern name of Shechem, being a corru|)tion oi Ifeajjolis, a lumie given to the city by the Emperor Vespasian On this spot Abraham pitched his tent and built an altar, on his first migration to the Land of Promise. (See Gen, xii. G.) After his sojourn in Mesopotamia, Jacob selected this place for a resi denee, and there he dug a well, which remains to this day. (See 150 mtST AND SECOND PA6S0VEE IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. Gen. xxxiii. IS.) The city lies between the two mountains ol Ebal and Gerizim, and acquired fresh importance from the fact that from the former were read the curses and from the hitter the blessings, upon the renewed promulgation of the law, when the peoi)le bowed their heads and acknowledged Jehovah as their law- ful king. (Deut. xxii. 11.) The hatred between the Jews and the Samaritans came to pass on this wise. Shalmanezer (b.c. 721) had carried Israel away ^ . . . , into Assyria, into cai)tivity. This left their cities Ongin of the , , . , . , . Samaritans. wa?te, and tlicy remained m this condition until '' the king of Assyria brought men from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Ilamath, and from Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel ; and they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in the cities thereof." (2 Kings xvii. 24.) There is some doubt as to who the king was that put this new unjewish population in the land. The Samaritans themselves attributed their colonization to '' Esarhaddon, king of Assur," or to " the great and noble Asnappcr." (Ezra iv. 2, 10.) Perhaps the latter was a general who executed an order issued by Esarhaddon, who, on his inva- sion of Judah in the reign of Manasseh (about B.C. C77), saw what a fine tract of country was lying waste on the frontiers of his em- pire and determined to repopulate it. These new Samaritans ■were not descendants of Jacob, but foreigners and idolatei-s. Nor did they all woi-ship the same gods ; their idolatry was divei-se. The land had been left desolate until wild beasts had taken pos- session, and annoyed the new Samaritans to such an extent that they attributed it to the vengeance of the god of the land, and sent an explanation of their miserable condition to the king. Upon which he despatched a captive priest to them, who taught them. The mingling of the true and false in their religion is de- scribed (in 2 Kings xvii. 41) thus : " So these nations feand Je- hovah, and served their graven images, both their children and their children's children." It is plain then that the new Samaritans were not of Jewish ex- traction, and their boast that Jacob was their father was not true Of some who may have returned after the captivity this might bo aflirmed, but the commiii^rlinix of the families would in that casu be loss of caste. After Judah had retunied from the captivity these new Sama FKOM JXTDMX TO SAIIAKIA. 151 ritans desired to assist in the rebuilding of the Temple at Jerusa- lem. But the Jews knew that their conversion to ^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^ the true faith was at most but partial, and so they j^^^g ^^^ gj^^nar- declined their help. Upon this the Samaritans tans, threw off every attempt to disguise and becanio open enemies, and harassed the Jews until silenced l)y Dariue Hystaspes (b.c. 519). The animosities tlir.s begun grew from vear to year, and deepened from generation to generation, until, more tlian a hundred years after the original rupture (b.c. 409), Manasseh, a man of the sacerdotal order, having contracted an unlawful marriage with the daughter of Sanballat, the Persian satrap of Samaria, was expelled therefor from Jerusalem by Nehemiah, upon which he obtained permission from Darius IS"©- thus, the king of Persia, to erect a temple on Mount Gerizim for the Samaritans, who had afforded him an asylum. This w^as all that had been lacking to make the hatred between the races intense. The schismatic, heretical Samaritans did all in their power to harass the Jews, who repaid their ill-treatment with in- describable hate. Josephus says that the Samaritans would way- lay the Jews on their journey to the Temple, so that many from the northern portion of the land were compelled to make a long detour east of the Jordan for fear of their enemies. It was so intolerable at one time as to lead to an armed conflict.* Jose- phus also tells a horrible story of Samaritans stealthily entering the Temple after midnight and scattering dead men's bones in the cloisters.f We are told that the Jews were accustomed to communicate to their brethren in Babylon the exact time of the rising of the paschal moon, by beacon-fires begun on Mount Oli- vet, and "flashing from hill to hill until they were mirrored in the Euphrates.":}: The Samaritans frequently deceived and disap- pointed those whose lamps were hanging on the willows over the waters of Babylon, by perplexing the watchers on the moun- tains bv a rival flame.§ Josephus loses no occasion to tell us of Samaritan meanness and outrage, and there is no reason to disbe- * See a full accoimt of this in Jose- phus, Ant, XX. 6, § 1. f Ant., xviii. 2, § 2. X Smith's Diet., in loco. § Smith quotes Dr. Trench, who says : "This fact is mentioned by Makrizi (see De Sacy's direst. Arahe, n. 159), who affirms that it was this which put the Jews on making' accurate calcula- tions to determine the moment of th« new moon's appearance (comp. Schoett- gen's n&r.Ucb.,l 344.)" 152 FIRST .VXD SKCOXn PASSOVKU IX TIIK LIFl-; OF JESUS. lieve any of his statements ; and if we had a Samaritan historian we slionld nndoul)tedly hoar quite as luucli tliat was quite as true on the other side. AVe know that the Samaritan was pul)licly cursed in the s^niagogues of the Jews, tliat lie could not appear as a M'itnc^s in a Je^vish court, that what he touched was considei-cd as swine's llesh, and tliat no i»enitencc or profession of faith upon liis part would admit him through any door of proselytism, the Jew striving thus to cut him off from the hope of eternal salva- tion. " Thou art a Samaritan and hast a devil," was the ordinary Jewish form for expressing utter contempt of any one. The vio- lence of this hatred was thus expressed : " Tie who receives a Samaritan into his house, and entertains him, deserves to have his own children driven into exile." "We must recollect that this feeling of mutual contempt and hate had liecn deepening through centuries, — a combined political and religious feud, transmitted and intensified. It is necessary to recall this to he prepared for certain passages in the history and teaching of Jesus. On his return to Galilee he passed near Shechem, -which the Jews of his day vulgarly called Sychar, Drunkard-town.* He paused to rest on a tract of land which Jacob had bequeathed to his favorite son, Joseph, and where there was a well which Jacob had digged. This 'well is still in existence, is nine feet in diameter and one hundred and five feet deep. It nsually now has five feet of water, but when Maundrellf visited it in the month of March it had fifteen. At this well Jesus rested. lie allowed his disciples to go, or sent them, to the town to procure food. "Wliile he sat, Mcary, there came, perhaps directly fiom the city, a woman who belonged to the city. IJetween Jesus and this woman there occurred a con- versation remarkable in itself and for its effects. His interlocu- tor was not now, as in the case of Nicodemus, a learned doctor, of high moral character, but a sinqJe woman, of bad moral charac- ter, unsophisticated by the schools, but held in bonds of preju- dice and weakened by sinful indulgence. Our curiosity is aroused t<) learn how this remarkable teacher deals with such a case as this. In the lii-st i)lace he arrests her attention by the polite request, •Permit me to drink." The woman looked at him, and liis gen- • John iv. G ; but tho grave historian I tempt oould not have used the name in con- I f Quoted by Tholuck, in loco. FROM JITD^EA TO SA^tAHIA. 153 era! appearance confinned" the suspicion, created by his intona- tions, that he was a Jew. lie had touched her ^^^ q.^,^^^,,^ liuman sympatliics in some measure. A request ^^^omanatUieweil- imphes some superiority in the pei-son addressed. She could give liim relief. He had transgressed tlie line marked JACOB'S WELL, BHECHEM. out by his people as dividing them from the Samaritans. Food might be purchased, but a Jew might not drink from the water- pot" of a Samaritan. The woman was at once good-natured and satiricjal, and j.erhaps felt somewhat elated by the request. She bantered the traveller with the question, "IIow is jt that you, being a Jew, ask water of me, a Samaritan woman?" This gave Jesus tlie opportunity to deepen her interest by a profoundly spiritual rcnuirk: "If you had known the bounty of God, and who it is that says, ' Permit me to drink,' ^^^^^ ^^^, you would certainly have requested him and he ^^sation. would have given you living water." So intent was he upon his mission that he had forgotten his thirst; but so 154 FIKST AND SECOND PASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. Bkilfiil is he that he connects his highest moral lessons with the most transient circnmstances. The saying seems to mean that water is one of the freest and fullest of Gt)d's gifts to man, and nothing but most extreme meaimess would allow a man to deny his fellow a drink of water ; but God's bounties in the spiritual world are as full and free as in the physical world, and men can as readily obtain water of s})iritual life as water of material life ; and Jesus professed to be able to impart this great gift to the soul of the Samaritan woman. This was the second revelation to her. She hud met a Jew wIkj was no ordinary Jew, but one who had the gift of life. He probably used the phrase "living water" in its double sense. lie was dealing with one who M'as to l)e led. The woman's mind would seize the material suggestion, and thus be led to the spiritual truth. Her reply shows that this is what ehe did. "Kunning water" was in her mind. As Stier finely says, '" Her words are incomparably picturesque in their echo of his." She says, still banteringly, " Sir, thou hast no bucket, and the well is deep : pray whence then have you this live water of which you speak? Surely you do not pretend to be greater than our father Jacob, who gave us this well, and drank of it himself, with his children, and his cattle." Here spoke out her national pride and prejudice. She claimed Jacob as her ancestor, proba- bly with no right or title to such a descent. She thinks that any man may be content with what Jacob used, and no Jew could be greater than the patriarch. Jesus waives the comparison, but presses home the great spirit- ual truth he had in hand, exciting her desire by a strange prom- ise. He says : " This water satisfies only the space : no water f i-om any earthly spring or well can slake the thirst of the inner man : but I can open such a fountain in the soul of nuin that no life, no immortality, shall bo long enough to exhaust it." "Give me this water, sir, that I thirst no more, nor come to this well to draw," is lier sudden ex- clamation. We must enter into this wc^man's character and his- tory to comprehend the strange mingling of naive simplicity with gross canuility. She might have seen that Jesus had in his words a moral that covered her life. At many broken cisterns of lust she had endeavored to find happinesE. She begins partly to dis- cern that something great and noble is offered her by tliis stran- FROM JUDJSA TO SAMA.RIA. 155 ger, and expresses a half willingness to accept, but mingles a little jocularity with this expression that she may not too scrit)usly coin mit herself. " Sir, give me this water, tliat I never thirst again, nor come to this well to draw." And now Jesus thoroughly rouses her by probing her licart, and showing tliat he knew all her history, altliough they had never met before. The delicacy and gentleness with wliich Jesus touched the wound in this woman's soul is marvellonsly beautiful. " Go, call your husband, and return." It flashed her whole bad life before her eyes in an instant. " I have no hus- band," is her half -true, half-false, and very mournful reply. Je- sus did not uj)bi"aid her for her licentiousness and falsehood, but putting the very best face on her answer, replied with perfect politeness, " Well spoken ! You have had five husbands. You have a lover now, but he is not your hushand : that word is true." She saw that this was a man who searched hearts. She knew that by death or divorce, probably for her own faults, she had been separated from the five men to whom successively she had been married, and now was openly or secretly licentious. Her sense of guilt was roused by even this most delicate handling of her case. Astounded by the disclosure, she acknowledged to Jesus that she believed him to be a prophet. But she did what is usually done under similar circumstances. She endeavored to engage Jesus in a theological discussion, and thus, by womanly tact, divert the conversation p -, , ,,..... TiT She tries to ri'ora an unpleasant personal disqmsition. instead of ingenuously acknowledging her case and seek- versy. ing instruction and help fi'oni this wise and gentle teacher, she turns from the practically useful question of how to pray, to the speculative and comparatively useless where. It was simply and swiftly done. " Sir, our fathers worsliipped in this mountain: you Jews insist upon Jerusalem as the place where men ought to worship." Gerizim was in full view. Abra- ham and Jacob had lived and woi"shipped here. Here had been the temple built by Manasseh, and here the altar remained after John Ilyrcanus had destroyed the schismatical temple. Sur- rounded by these sacred associations, she covertly propounds the question to Jesus whether she is to abandon her ancestral faith or reject his. It was the old " vexed question" which had kept bad blood between the Jews and the Samaritans for ages. It is the 15 G FIEST AND SECOND PASSOVER IN TILE LITE OF JESUS. poor old question of " To what denomination do you belong ? *• Tlic discussion of this would cover her retreat. The leply of Jesus shows how a wise and healthful mind [n-e- serves a judicious adjustment of the forces of liberality and clear conviction. lie at once widens the h(^rizon of her vision and pours white light on the objects already in view. lie bears his testimony distinctly for the right that lay on the Jewish side of the question. The promises of God and the oracles of God were with the Jews. The Samari- tans were in the wrong, and held the truth in much corrupt false- hood. That is not liberal religion which confounds or abandons the distinction between right and wrong. In this question, which had gendered so much bigotry, lay a great essential point : the Jews founded their religion npon the whole word of God, and were therein right ; the Samaritans on only apart of GocVsivord, such as suited them, and were therein wrong. Both had come to regard the outward form as more imjwrtant than the inner spirit, and therein both were wrong. It was, therefore, not a trivia^ question, nor was it of only temporary importance. Uut Jesus brought in a new view, a gi-cat, wide, glorious view of the re- lationship between God and Man, and of the nature of the M'or- pliip which must be rendered to God. He says with great solem- nity, " Woman, believe me, tlie hour is coming when ye shall Avorsliip the Father, but not only in tliis mountain and not only in Jerusalem. Tlie hour approaches, and is now present, when the real worshippers shall adore the Father inwardly and sincerely : for the Father seeks such to adore him." Between these two sen- tences he encloses the statement, " Ye worship ye know iiot what: we worship what we know : because salvation is of the Jews." The Samaritans had distinctly set aside a portion of God's word, the prophetical writings, because they pointed to a Saviour who was to spring from the Jews. The latter, of coui-se, accepted them theoretically, and were that far right; but practically i-ejccted them, and in this were as w^rong as tbe Samaritans. But the Jews knew whom they worshi])ped. Their religion was based upon something quite sure, namely, God's promise of a Deliv- eier. Ileie is the basis of the religion which Jesus promulgated God is Spirit, not a spirit. He is essential Spirit. lie is t/ia i-'ather. He not only allows but seeks worehip. The woi-ship FKOM JXTDMA. TO SAMAKIA. 157 must be in the inmost spirit. Outward forms are nothing unless they be phenomena produced by the motions of ^^^^^^^.^^ the noumenon, the expression of spirit through matter. God is without material form. The spiiit that is in man is that which is most like God, and that which touches God. The worship God seeks is down below all organism that makes utter- ances and gestures. The worship offered him muni, also be per- fectly sincere. It can only escape totally all the siimlcr influence of mixed motives when offered directly from the c^tl to God. Every discussion of ceremonials and topographies lies v.utside all true religion. The outward modes and the visible plcKkw t\ve inwg- nificant. Eitualism is thoroughly worthless. The I^a'icst of Holies is in the soul of man. There the man is to find uwd wor- ship God. Then each continent and island is a Holy Lr.ud, and each soul the Temple of Jehovah. Such was the teaching of Jesus. The woman replied, " These matters I do not quite comprehend, but 1 know that Jehovah's Anointed is coming, and upon his arrival he ^^^^^ ^^^,^^^^ will expound all these things." Jesus said, " I am ^^.^^^^j^ ^^^ ^^^^, He, now speaking to you." Here is a direct and siah. unequivocal declaration of his Messiahship. He had not declared it in Jerusalem, but in Samaria ; not to the learned Nicodemus, nor to his own disciples, but to an ignorant stranger ; not to any man, but to a woman ; not to a pure and cultivated lady, but to a prostitute ! It seems marvellous, and, as a policy, wholly inexplicable. Hereupon his disciples arrived with the provisions they had gone to purchase, and were amazed to st>e him talking familiarly with a woman, yet did not venture to question ^^^^^ ^^ ^^^ him. In the mean time the woman had left her ^^g^^jpieg. water-pot, forgetting her errand, and had re- turned to the town and roused her neighbors, exciting them by the statement that out by Jacob's Well was sitting a man who liad told her all her life. AVas not this the Messiah, the Christ ? Her earnestness brought forth a crowd. In the mean time the disciples requested him to cat. P.ut he had become so rapt by lofty thought, and so engaged in his ear- nest effort to plant the principles of his religion in one soul that al] physical appetite failed him. " I have meat to eat that ye know not of. My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me." Look 158 FIRST AND SECOXD PASSOVER IN TIIE LIFE OF JESUS. Hii,' uj), lie saw tlie field in the beautiful valley, just sown with the seed it would require four montlis to ripen, and he saw at the same time the ]>e(»i)lc pouring out, perhaps from their mid-day meal, at the invitation of a woman wIkjiu they knew to have been uiclnt John seems to have meant that Jesus went into Gal- ilee to avoid notoriety, lecause a prophet has little ado made over him l)y his own people. He had moved from his place on the Jordan fortius vei-y reason, and he had refused to stay among the Samaritans, where he Mas creating a great sensation. lie went among his own ])eoi)le feeling perfectly certain that the divine power which resided in his teaching would cause it to grow, and he preferred to sow the seed M'liere there was no storm of popular applause, or even excitement. It was not the utterance of dlsa])pointed pride, so far as we can discern, but a wise action based on a well-knoMTi principle. If popularity was what he Bouirht, whv did he leave Samaria ? But many of the Galil;paus hud witnessed his works at the feast in Jerusalem, and learned that he had a metropolitan fame. They now received him as a miracle-workei", not as a proi)het. Then Jesus began to jjreach. (^latt. iv. 17; Mark i. 14, 15.) lie declared that the time for the fulfilling of the ancient ])ro])he- cics had arrived, that the reign of the ^lessiah, Jcsns begins to , , . , p ry ^ \ i i ' i i preach. *''^ Kingdom ot God, liad begun, and that it was pr(>j)er that they should prei)are to enjoy that kingdom by an abandonment of their sins. He repeated these FKUM SAMARL\. TO GALILEE. 161 sayings, presenting them privately in his interconrse with the peo- ple, and urging them publicly in the Jewish chapels of that re- gion. Jt>hn and Jesus equally urged repentance, the former by threatenings of wrath and the latter by the attractive persuasive- ness of promise. The manner of Jesus won the admiration of the people, and his fame grew. (Luke iv. 15.) In his circuit of preaching he went to Cana, where he had made the water wine, reviving by his presence the remembrance of that first and very remarkable miracle. AVliile in Cana he received a visit from a nobleman, who was a functionai'V in the court of Ilcrod Antipas, tetrarch of Galilee. or a liii^h military officer. This pei-son was a Jew , , . ", , . -TT , , Heals the noble- by birth or by convereion. He may have been ^^.^ ^^^ j^^ Chiiza, Herod's steward (Luke viii. 3), but of this iv. 40-54. we can have no certain knowledge, llis resi- dence was at Capernaum, on the lake shore, twenty-five miles dis- tant from Cana. Learning that the great teacher had returned to Galilee, he came to Jesus with the request that he would heal his sick son, who was at the point of death. The very name of Cana probably reminded him of the wonderful power which Jesus had exerted in that town before his departure for Jerusalem. To his request Jesus said : " Except ye see signs and miracles ye will not believe." The words seem merely to indicate a contrast between the read- iness with which the Samaritans believed because of his words, and recei\ed him as a prophet, and the obstinacy of the Jews in refusing to believe without a mira(;le, and not always yielding even to such evidence. He may have also alluded to the fact that this nobleman had been brought to him not by any necessities of his S})iritual nature, but because of the sickness of his son. Jesus neither made parade of his power to work miracles, nor un- dervalued their weight as credentials to his character as a great religious reformer. As in other cases (Matt. xv. 27), he may have been testing the sincerity of the applicant ; not for any knowl- edge he might gain, for no other person ever read character as Jesus did, but that the nobleman might discover what was in his own heart. The distressed parent implores him: " Sir, do co.ne down be- fore inv boy die." His faith was sound as far as it went, but it was narrow. He never had dreamed of anv man having power 11 I(t2 FIKST AND SECOXD PASSOVEE IN TTIE LITE OF JESUS. to raise tlie dead. lie even supposed that the presence (»f tlie Great Worker was necessary. iiut Jesus said : , " Go, vour son lives." He believed. Quictlv and plea. . . . * leisurely he went his way. lie could easily ha\e reached home at sundown, for it was just one o'clock in the after- noon wlien Jesus spoke tliosc words. He felt so sure that his child was safe that he did not return to liis residence until next day. Then on the way he met his faithful servants, who had C(jiue out to sock him and to relieve his solicitude. His (juestion to them shows that all he had hoped of Jesus was to save his child from death and commence a convalescence which shoidd l)e gradual. "When did the child hei^in to amend?" asked he. *' He did not begin at all," said they, " but yesterday at one o'clock in the afternoon he suddenly recovered; the fever totally left him." The unexpected completeness of this recovery and the pre- cise correspondence between the languapje of Jesus and that of the servants, and the identity of the hour of the word of Jesus and the recovei-y of the boy, added this nobleman and his whole family to the discii)loship of Jesus. They not onl}' believed that a great miracle had been wrought, but that Jesus was theMessiali. If this nobleman was Chusca, Herod's steward, his wife Joanna afterward became an ardent supporter of Jesus. (Luke viii. 3.) In a missionary cii'cuit which Jesus undci'took he came to the to^^^l of Nazareth, where he had been brought up. His fame as a I N z. r th pi'PJit-her had preceded him. AVhen the Sabbath Luke iv. IG-UO. day came he went, as his religious custom had been, into the svnairojxue. The time had come when he was to announce himself in his own toM'u and to his own people. !Many a time; had he taken his jjlace of humble silence to listen to the reading and exposition of the law and the i)ro- j)hets. Now the day of his revelation luid come. The synagogue was a i-einarkable chai-acteristic of later Juda- ism. The Hebrew name, l)eth-ha-Cenneseth, meaning House of the Congi'cgation, has its e(piivalent in the (ireck The synagogue. „ ,',.,. i • xi o ^ • ,. bunagoge, wliu-li is used in the beptuagmt as a translation of two Hebrew words, each of which implies a (/ath- eriiifj. A very great anti(piity lias been claimed for the synagogue by Jewish writei-s, but not on good gi\)unds. There does not Bcem to have been anything in earlier Judaism providing for the spiritual edification of the people in public congregations outside FKOM SAMARIA TO GALILEE. 16.3 tlie Temple service, wliicli, however, was suspended during the exile. Then the devout Jews who were cut off from the hol^y city and from the Temple of Jehovah held frequent and, it would seem, regular meetings for religious instruction. (Ezek. viii. 1 ; xiv. 1 ; XX. 1 ; xxxiii. 31.) " The whole history of Ezra presupposes a habit of solemn, probably of periodic meetings."* (Ezra viii, 15 ; Kch. viii. 2 ; ix. 1 ; Zech. vii. 5.) In his time the synagogue either had its origin, or such distinct revival and organization, that we ma}^ date tiie establishment of the synagogue service from his period — about e.g. 500. Its inliuence was prodigious. It was church, school-house, lec- ture-room, and weekly newspaper. Regular periodical assembling for any purpose exerts a silent but powerful influ- ence. In this case it embedded the law in the n^inds of the Jews, and bound them together with a band whose strength was made manifest in holding them, after the Maccabean struggle, to the faith of their fathers, and from the degradation of idolatry. It lacked the pomp and splendor of the Temple, but it was favorable to simple and hearty devotion. Its very freedom from magnilicent ceremonial gave scope to the exercise of thought and of speech. Its unperceived but certain effect was to destroy the power and influence of the hereditary hierarchy, and prepare for the bringing in of what Jesus gave, freedom to teach, for any one who has the intellectual and moral qualifications. In towns where the population allowed a full organization, there was a college of " elders " (Luke vii. 3), whose president was called the Ai'chisynagogus, Ruler of the Synaij;oo;ue. These elders manao'ed tlie secular affairs of the synagogue, and had the power of pronouncing excommunication. There was also an ofiicer called Sheliach, or Legate, who represented the people, leading them in their prayers, etc. He was required to be an adult, active, the father of a family, not engaged in secular business, not ricli, having a good voice, and aptness to teach. There was also an ofticer named the Chazzan (called " the minister" in Luke iv. 20), whose duties seemed to be those of a sub-deacon or sexton. He to(jk care of the building and prepared it for service, and had charge of the sacred furniture. It is believed that during the * See Smith's Dict.^ on " Synagogue," for full account of the institution. 1G4 riEST AiTD SECOND PASSOVEE IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. week he acted as the village schoohnaster. Moreover, there "were ten men, Batlanhn, meaning men of leisure, without whom no synagogue was complete. It is difficult to say precisely what duties specially devolved upon these. The most probable conjec- ture seems to be that as ten was the minimum muuber for a con- gregation, without which number no public serWce could go for- ward, these men were to be always on hand, so that there should be no delay, and no single woi-ship})er should be disappointed. Perhaps these ten held the several offices of the church. Light- foot says that they consisted of the Chazzan, or Minister, whom he makes the same as the Sheliach, or Legate, three Judges, three Parnasim (whom he compares with the deacons of the early church, whose business was to attend to the alms), the Targumist or Interpreter, the Schoolmaster and his Assistant. This classili- cation, however, seems purely conjectural. , The service of the synagogue was much less stately than that of the Temple, but there was a regularly appointed series of les- sons out of the law and the prophets, and there The service of , -^ i i • i • • n i j ♦Vo »„^„ « - ^^'^s also a ritual which was rij^idly observed. Ine synaijogTie. f^ » The ritualistic controversy raged at times in the Jewish Church, and continued after the days of Jesus. AVe leani that one Eliezer of Lydda, about the close of the fii-st century, set forth that the Lcgatus of the svnagogue should discard the fixed prayers, doxologies, and benedictions, and i)ray as his heart prom})tcd him. This suggestion was a sin greater than an ordi- nary immorality. He was never forgiven, but died in Cesarea an excommunicated man. The Jews of that day, it appeal's, hud no more sense or piety than some baptized Christians of our own times. The first lesson was from the law and the second from the prophets, and then followed a discoui-se, expository or hor- tatory, somewhat like our modern sermon. It is called by the writer of the Acts (xiii. 15) the " word of exhortation." It ai>i>cars that whoever had a word to say took that occasiort to utter it. And so from synagogue to church the form of p«)pular address has been transferred, and by Christianity been rendered a ]>o\ver in civilization in propagating opiiiiiti'S and sentiinents. AVhen a member of the synagogue wished to speak, he stoi»d up to signify that desire. For the iirst time tlu'ii, ujK)n coming back to his own town, when the Sabbath arrived, Jesus entered the familiar place of FROM SAMARIA TO GALILEE. 165 woisliip, and stood up to read. The President caused the roll of the Prophets to be handed him, and he turned perhaps to the appointed lesson for the day, per- , ?*^ ^^ °"" haps to what came under liis eye as the roll unfurled. It was what in our version is Isaiah Ixi. 1, 2. lie read : " The Spirit of Jehovah is on me : hecause Jehovah has anointed me. To hring good tidings to the humble has he sent m-e / to hind up the hroken-hearted^ to proclaim to the captives freedom^ and to the hounden perfect liberty : to proclaim the year of favor with Jehovah^ * He sat down. All eyes must have been riveted on him. lie opened his exposition with the deliberate and solemn announcement of himself as the expected Messiah, in the words, " This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears." They all knew that the passage stood in the middle of the third great division of the book of Isaiah, that which they always considered as predicting the person, the ofiices, and the triuraplis of the Messiah. That made the announcement all the more impressive. In words of hearty and moving eloquence Jesus proceeded to expound Isaiah, " Gracious words," says the historian, " proceeded out of his mouth." As he pressed his doctrine of universal charity upon them, a kingdom not restrained by Jewish limits and bearing no vengeance against other peoples, their old traditional preju- dices began to be excited. They recollected his ^^"!.'' ^ ^" • • mi prejudices. obscure origm. They said among themselves, " Is not this the son of Joseph ? " As if they had said, Is not this a most pretentious thing in so young and unknown a man ? Jesus perceived their captiousiiess and said, "You will by all means scornfully apply to me the proverb. Physician^ heal thyself, de- manding me to do in my own country what you have heard that I have done in Capernaum. I reply with another proverb, iV^ prophet is accepted in his own country. In coming among vou * This gives the words as they stand in the original, in a translation as near- ly literal as practicable. The historian Luke varies the passage a little. Pro- bably he quoted from memory from the Septuagint. and so gives " recovering of sight to the blind " as a translation for •' the opening of the prison to them that are bound," and inserts after it, ' ' to set at liberty them that are bound," appar- ently taken from the Septuagint version of "let the oppressed go free," in Isa. IviiL G, as if to complete the sense (See note, Strong's Harmony.) The phrase, " and to the bound en perfect liberty," ia still more strictly literally " open open- ing," which may mean of eyes or o£ prison -doors. (See Alexander, in loco.) 1G6 rmST AND SECONT) PASSOVER IN TITE LIFE OF JESUS. I knew that I slionld encounter the ordinary prejudice against every great moral teacher which exists in the minds of his own peo]>le, who have known him in childliood and amid ordinary secular employinents. I refuse to perform miracles at your dicta- tion. I recall for your instruction some passages in the history of tlie two greatest of the earlier prophets, showing that God's grace lias gone over to strangers who had not the advantage of intimacy with the oracles of God such as you possess, and that God distributes his favors freely and will not have them extorted. In the days of Elijah, when the heavens dropped no rain for the Bpace of three ycai*s and six months, when a great famine was throughout the land, the prophet was sent to none of the many suffering widows of Israel, but to a Gentile widow in Zarcphath, a town of the Phoenicians. Afrain, when Elislia was discharirinir the functions of a prophet there were many lepers in Israel, but he cured none but Naaman, a foreigner, a Syrian general. And thus the history of the i)rophets shows that God causes miracles according to His sovereign will and wisdom, and bestows such blessings where they will be appreciated," This whole speech was construed by his hearers into a reproach for their unworthiness. They had always suffered under the stigma which rested upon their toA\Ti. It had passed into an adage that " No good comes out of Xazareth." He might redeem them. But now he seems unpatriotically to prefer Gentiles to his o^vn people. They became enraged, and thus proved their unworthiness of him. Their frenzy grew to such a pitch that they took this elo- quent preacher, who had gone about the country finding welcome in all the synagogues, and led him to a precipitous place on the raufje of liills on which Nazareth stands, intending: to cast him headlong down.* But Jesus, how we do not know, passed through the midst of them and went away. There seems to have been no miracle here, no rcnderiiigof himself invisible, no striking liis j)er- He 13 driven from Nazareth. • " Most readera probably imaffine a town built on the suminit of a niouiitain, from which summit the intended pre- cipitation wna to take place. This is not the situation of Nazareth. Yet its position is still in accordance with the narrative. It is built ' upon,' that is, on the side of 'a mountain/ but the brow is not beneath but over the town, and such a clifl as is here implied is to bo found, a-s all modem travellers de- scribe, in the abrupt face of lime.stone rock, about thirty or forty feet high, overhanging the Maronito convent at the south-west comer of the town.' Stanley, Sinai and Palestine, p. 339. FROM SAaiAHIA TO GALILEE. 107 seciitors blind, nor any " slipping away," taking advantai^e of narrow streets or tortuous ways. There was something in him wliicli seemed to overawe or overpower them. lie " passed through the midst of them," is the historian's statement. Perhaps, as Stier suggests, there came such an appearance* of majesty upon him, that the crowd began to dispart and give way right and left, as he moved along. Pfeninger graphically says: "They stood — stopped — inquired — were ashamed — separated — fled ! " Upon quitting Kazaretli after the bad treatment he liad received from his townsmen, Jesus went to Capernaum, and thereafter made that place his head-quarters. mi r< • •£ J' i. Makes Caper- ilie name Capernaum siiiniiies, accordmg to ,. . ^ ^ ^ '■ ° ^ naum his nead- some authorities, " the V illage of Is ahum," accord- quarters. ing to others, " tlie Village of Consolation." As we follow the history of Jesus we shall discover that many of liis mighty works were wrought, and many of his most impressive words were spoken in Capernaum. The infidelity of the inhabi- tants, after all the discourses and wonderful works wliich he had done among them, brought out the saying of Jesus, " And tliou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven shalt be cast down to hell." (Matt. xi. 23.) So thoroughly has this prediction been fulfilled that no trace of the city remains, and the very site which it occupied is now a matter of conjecture, there being even no ecclesiastical tradition of the locality. At the present day two spots liave claims which are urged, each with such arguments of probability as to make the whole question the most difficult in sacred topography. Those who desire to examine the relative claims may consult the references given in the note below.* We shall probably never be able to know the exact fact. Jesus damn- ed it to oblivion, and there it lies. We shall content ourselves with the New Testament notices as bearing on the work of Jesus. We learn that it was somewhere on the borders of Zebulun and Naphtali, on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee. (Compare Matt. iv. 13, with John vi. 24.) It was near or • f^,i 1 1 r /^ .11 / nr,, • Description of in " the land of Cxcnnesaret (compare Matt. xiv. napgi-naum 34, with John vi. 17, 21, 24), a plain about three miles long and one mile wide, which we learn from Josephus waa * See Robinson's Bibl. Bescnrches, iii. 288-294 ; new edition, iii. 348 ; Bonar, p. 437-41 ; Thomson, Land and Book, i. 542 ; Wilson, Lands of tJie Bible, it 139-149 ; Biblioth. Sacra, AprU, 1855, p 162. 1G8 FIUST AND SECOND I'ASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. one of the most prosperous and crowded districts of Palestine. It was probably on the great road leading from Damascus to the south, "by the way of the sea." (Matt. iv. 15.) There was great wisdom in selecting this as a place to open a great public ministr}-. It was full of a busy population. The exceeding richness of the TUX HUM BTTnra. wonderful plain of Gennesaret supported the mass of inhabi- tants it attracted. Josei"»hus {/?. J.^ iii. x, 3) gives a glowing de- scription of this land. He says tliat the soil was so fruitful that all sorts of trees could grow upon it ; tliat the air was so mixed as to nouiish the walnut, wliich requires the cold, as well as thepalm- ti'ce, Avhich demands the heat. "One may call this place the ambition of nature," because it forces those trees to grow together which are natural enemies. It afforded, to his fancy, a happy contention of the seasons, as if each claimed the land for its own. He gives a luscious picture of the fruitage, and tlie natural foun- tains. He says tliat the ])ooplc thought the fountain Caphar- iiaum to be a vein of the Kile, "because it produced fishes like a Corbe bred in a lake near Alexandria." In modern times Professor Stanley, of the University of Oxford, gives quite as FEOM SAMABIA TO GALILEE. 169 glowing a description of tliis plain. (See Sinai and Palestine, p. 365, et seq.) Such was the region in which was located Jesus's new centre of activity. From Capernaum, by land, he could command large portions of Galilee ; by boats he could cross from west to east, from north to south, from the juris- diction of one prince to that of another. lie was where the fisheries made life on the lake and the shore ; where pleasure pa- laces brought the gay and the rich ; where warm springs attracted opulent invalids; where the great thoroughfare from Babylon and Damascus brought companies of travelling merchants into Pales- tine ; where royalty attracted officials and dignitaries ; where gar- risons established to give dignity to sovereignty, or to suppress the neighboring turbulent Galilsean peasantry, brought military com- manders and troops of common soldiers ; where trade and traffic on a frontier established custom-houses, and where a land of exu- berant fertility made agricultural products abundant and stimu- lated the activities of tlie people. So many foreigners, for busi- ness or for pleasure, had fixed their residence in this vicinity that it acquired the name of " Galilee of the GentllesP The lake of Galilee was the Como of Syria ; for the Ilerodian family, famous for love of magnificent architecture, had made a portion of its shore splendid Avith the palaces which mingled with the synagogues of all the line of cities and villages which overlooked the sea. There were work, pleasure, life, and energy, all around the new teacher. Here he found congregations and helpers, friends and disciples, and the people, who, moving all about, with almost the restlessness which characterizes modern times, were ready to pro- pagate his fame and attract other hearers to his teaching. He went into the very thick of life. His seasons of long solitude were over. His time had arrived to exert all the moral force he had been accumulating in study and prayer. He went among the people who were working and toiling with their hands, know- ing that they were ordinarily the people whose brains were active. He had a powerful friend in the nobleman whose son he had healed, a man who was probably of Herod's household. So there, where sea and mount and desert met, Jesus broke upon Galilee, a light whose rays were to reach every nook and corner of the globe, and illuminate the pathway of thought and sentiment down all the succeeding centuries. 170 FIRST AKD SFXOND PASSOVER IX THE LITE OF JIISUS. Soon after his arrival at Capernaum, one day as Jesus walked beside tlie Lake of Gciincsaret, perluips a little south of the t<>\ni, he cunic upon Siuiou, called Peter, and liia csus preac ea |^j.,,^]j^,j. Amliew. Simon, as we have already from a boat. r ^ learned, iiad met Jesus on the banks of the Jordan. As Jesus walked out of tlie town the people began to gather about him and accompany him, to hear other gracious words from his lips, and to witness other great works from his liands. There were two iishing-boats at the shore. The lishermeu had cone to wash their nets. But the owner of one of them was Simon Peter, who, at the request of Jesus, pushed it from the shore a distance sufficient to preserve the attractive preacher from the pressure of the crowd, and yet not so far as to make it incon- venient for the people to hear. And from this floating pulpit Jesus delivered a discourse on the doctrines of the religion he had come to propagate. At the conclusion of the discourse he directed Simcjn to launch out to a deeper place in tlie lake and let down his net for fish, for Jesus would not use any man's time or The wonderful ^^^^^^ .vithout rewarding him. Simon told him draught of fishes. " niii that all night they liad toiled and no nsh had been caught. Put there was something so commanding and inspiring in the Mords of Jesus that Simon immediately added, " Nevertlieless, at thy W(;nl, I will let down the net." So he called his brother Andrew, and the net was lowered ; and so great was the number of the fish enclosed that the net began to break : and they called for their partners, James and John, the two sons of Zebe- dee, to come and help them ; and so great was the haul that botli ships came near sinking with the weight. Wiien Simon (Peter) saw this wonder he fell at the feet of Jesus with mingled adoration and supplication. The rapidity of discernment and dei)th of feeling which we shall The effect on ^^^^^^ ^^^ ^^^ charac^teristic of this energetic man Simon. . , . rm come out m this passage. Ihere was some power in this new teacher which was not human: Peter believed it to be divine. He was a rough, profane man, but he had that sense of contrast between ])urity and sinfulness whii-h is not the mark of a degraded mind, but rather of a spirit that lias not last ita moral sensitiveness. "My Lord, be ])leased to leave my ship, for I am not eaintlv enough to endure thine august presence of lK)ly FKOM SAMAEIA TO GALILEE. 171 power ! " That seemed to be the tenor of his address. " Be not afraid," said Jesus ; " for from this time thou shalt catch men." A call to discipleship had been already made, after which Peter had gone home to his work. Now, Jesus gives him a deepei intimation of his intention to attach him strongly to his service^ and gi\-es an increase to his faith by the great wonder he beheld, and exliilarates him by a figure taken from his own pursuits. If to bring so great a haul of fish to land be joy, what rapture nnibt it not be to " catch men ! " Hereafter emperors and kings and queens and philosophers and scholars and poets and merchant- princes shall be in the net which these simple Galiliiean fishermen were to let down into the deep waters'of the lake of human life. So they brought their fish to land, drew up their boats upon the shore, and abandoned boats and nets that they might follow this wonderful Being. Going along the shore they found their partners, James and John, the . „ , •^ ■'■ ; _ ' follow Jesus. sons of Zebedee, who, while this profound con- versation was going on between Jesus and Simon and Andrew, had betaken themselves to repairing their own nets. It would seem that when called by Simon and Andrew to render help, they had put their own net under the overburdened net of their partners, to prevent the escape of the fish and the increase of the rent, and that thus their own net had become damaged. The invi- tation he had given Simon and Andrew, Jesus extended to James and John, and they left the implements of their business with their father and the servants, and obeyed the call to a higher work. CHAPTER V. DEMONIACS. On the Sahhatli following liis return to Capeniaura Jesus went ^•itli his disciples to the seAice of the synagogue, and, according to his custom, expounded the Holy Scriptures. Matt vu.; Mark fijc-g geenis to have been great siniplicitv in hia . • Luke iv. i .- mode of treating all subjects, but it is remarked on this occasion that there was an element in his method which not only interested but astonished his audience. lie spoke on the most ])rof()und and imj)ortant subjects, not as one discussing them, showing what can be said on both sides, nor as one striving merely to stimulate the intellects of his hearere, nor as a learned man, rejiorting the results of the researches of the best minds, but de- ci&i\ely, with authority, as declaring truths which were not to be questioned, with an authority from which there was no appeal, and with a si)irit full of power. The contnist which this afforded with the ])edantry, the pretence, the sophistry, and tlie quibbling of the scribes, made Jesus notable. On this ])articular Sabbath there came into the synagogue a pei-son described by Mark (i. 23) as "a man with an unclean spirit," by Luke (iv. 33) as "a man which had a The man with • -i. r ^ j -i ») n i • • ii . ., si)int or an unctlean devil." Uombimuir the nar- an unclean spirit. ' . ... i i r i ratives of these two historians, we have the fol- lowing account: The man cried out, "Ah! what to us and to thee, Jesus the Xa/carene? Ilast thou come to destroy us? I know thee who thou art, the Holy of God." Jesus spoke sharply to him and said : " Be silent and leave him." Then the "devil," or "unclean spirit," threw him down, tore him, howled, and left him. And the ])eople were astonished, and questioned among themselves and said, "What thing is this? what new doctrine is this? for with authority and power he commands even the unclean sjiirits, and they obey liim." This occurrence greatly and rapidly increased DEMONIACS. 173 the fame of Jesns throngli all Galilee, for then, as now, a crazy man was an object of general notice. It brings ns at once to the consideration of the perplexing qiies tion of what is ordinarily called demoniacal possession. In examining this subject we have the disadvantage of not liav ing in onr own times anything that quite corresponds with this remarkable class of phenomena, or which is recognized as falling into this category of maladies. We are remitted to the ancient writers, and must learn what we can gather from the notices in the classical authors and New-Testament historians. So far as the latter are concerned, it is to be noticed that the word used by them in reference to all these cases is one which does not mean the Devil, Satan, but demons. The classical writers, except when they indicate by a special epithet the contrary, used the word as describing good-natured, or at least not malevolent beings ; but the New-Testament writers, on the supposition that they meant beings distinct from the afflicted individuals, invariably repre- sent them as sinister or positively malevolent. The classical writers sometimes loosely employed the word to mean any spiritual existences out of man, from the spirits of the departed up to the Supreme Being, the Father of the gods ; but when they pretended to be precise tliey described them as intermediate beino;s between man and the irods. Plato says: ^^ Every demon is a middle being between God and mor- tal." He further says, that " Demons are reportei-s and carriers from men to the gc^ds, and again from the .U to men, of the supi)li- cations and prayere of the one and of . - injunctions and rewards of devotion from the other." * There were two kinds of demons. The souls of good men after their departure were called heroes, and raised to the dignity of demons ; f and there were also sup- posed to be demons who had never inhabited a mortal body.:]: Philo§ says that the ancients held souls, demons, and angels as the same. The demons who had once been in human bodies became objects of worship among the heathen, and Jehovah is so often called "the livinor God" to distintruish llim from these.II The classical authorities. * Plato, Si/mpos. , pp. 202, 203. f Plutarch, Be Defect. Orac, and Plato, Urntifliis. X Plato, 2V/n., and Apuleius, De Deo Socratis. § Philo, De Gignntibus. J Deut. xxvi. 14 ; Ps. cvi 28 ; Isaiah viii. 19; Deut. v. 26. 174 rmsT and second passovee in the life of jesus. Josephus* incidentally gives iis his opinion, and ^e sii] nose tlic opinion commonly entertained by his countryme.., of demons, --^J^ mIio, he says, " are the spirits of wicked men that Th^»\vish ^j^^^j. jjj^Q ^jj^ bodifcs of the livino: and kill them opinions. ^ . ,. , , J^^ 1 11 if they do not c4^p|b^ielp. The New-Testament historians seeiTi to give the impression that they believed in the existence of separate spirits, for they call them 7rv6v/iaTa,\ who were intelligent,:}: powcr- The New-Testa- f^^i^g ^^.-^^ ^^^^j unclean.rD TASSOVKR IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. the niirades of Jesus to suppose that he only licalcd diseases, tlic casting out of devils being supposed a greater display of divine power. The opposing theory is that in reality there never was such a fact as a demon or evil spirit, whether formerly in human llesh or always a separate existence, taking possession The opposing . ' i i • \ 4.11- ^ or a man antl having such control over him as to be able to torment and destroy him ; that all the recorded eases are of persons miserably diseased in mind or body, or both, and that because the phenomena were inexplicable the popular mind assigned them to the influence of demons ; and that Jesus, in order to be understood by his contemporaries, adopted the usual forms of expression as most readily indicating this special class of diseases. It is further contended that whereas all parties agree that, so far as appeai-s in the records, whatever the possessed did cannot be distinguished from the acts of the demon, the in- quiry is reduced to the simple question. Can these phenomena be accounted for without recourse to the supernatural ? No devout scholar hesitates to acccjit the theory of the sujiernatural Mhen necessar}'; but equally does he never resoii to it to exj^lain what is readily explicable by well-known physical or psychoLjgical laws ; and all the phenomena correspond with what we know of hypochondria, cpilc]>sy, and insanity ; that the New-Testament historians give as plain intimations as we could demand that they were employing popular iiliraseology, and not in these cases giv- ing utterance to doctrines or asserting facts ; and that the doc- trine of the agency of departed spirits upon the bodies of men is contrary to other doctrines expressly taught by Jesus. Those who lu)ld this theory, in reply to the arguments cited above by the advocates of real demoniac possession, say : 1. These insane people helieved themselves p(>ssessed. They had been brought up in a community holding that doctiine, iind in their ravinSU8. 7. TIic snppopcd addrespos of Jesus to the demrms may he easily undei"st<)od to he, fii-st, an aecoinniodatioii to the fancy of the de- ranged persons, and, secondly, to the understanding of spectators. His hidding the demon depart, and no more enter the man, is of a ]>icce with his l)idding the fever leave a patient, which he did in the case of Peters mother-in-law, 8. In regard to the mention of Satan hy Jesus, in connection with demons, it is urged that the saying, " I beheld Satan as light- ning fall from the heavens" (Luke x. 18), camutt he taken liter- ally except as referring to his original ex])ulsion from heaven. In that case it would be wholly irrelevant. The choice is then left among the various figurative interju-etations. Satan is a name given to anything inimical to what is good. Jesus meant, it is said, that he had foreseen tlie glorious trinni})hs of his disci- ]tles over the most formidable obstacles. And as to his ai'gmnent with his enemies, he simjily took them upon their own grounds, ainl, not affirming those grouiids solid, showed that, even presum- ing them so, there was no place for their objection to him : so that nothing can be inferred fiom tliat. 0. In the case of the man who took to himself seven other s])irits, it is a mere illustration, taken as public siJeakei^s frequently do take such, fi-om the popular l)eliefs, as one might illustrates principle by reference to a well-known fairy story, without in- dorsing it. 10. That no dotra(;tion is made from the dignity of Jesus; for those who hold this view, quite equally with tiieir o]iponents, be- lieve in the divine poAver Of Jesus, and that it was quite as great a miracle to restore an insane man instantanef)usly to reason, and rectify the shocks his mind had received, as it would have been to cast out from the body of a man the wicked spirit of some dead man who had come to torment and destroy him. Perhajis the strongest thing that can be said on the other side is this : That while a perfectly truthful jicrson may accommodate himself to ])opidar fancies and ]»hrases muler cir- StronparCTiment i • , i /. i /• i for first tlicorv eumstauccs which do not connrm liurtrul error, nor niisre]iresent his own beliefs, — as a scientific man of to-day may speak of the rising and the setting of the sim, and call deranged mcu hinaticfi, although he does not believe that the sun moves round the earth nor that mental ailments are caused by the moon, — yet no truthful nuxn would always speak as if he DEMONIACS. 179 adopted a theoiy wluch he really believed to 1)C false, and knew to be injurious, which is the case with this theory of demcjniacal pos- session. If nntrue, it was a very hurtful superstition, and a great and good teacher would not have countenanced it. I think that a critical examination of all that is said in the ISTe^v Testament on this subject will probably lead most candid readers to the conclusion that a distinction is made be- tween those who suffered merely fi'om phj'sical ^ijeoj^, ailments and those who are represented as demo- niacs. In the latter case the patients seem to have psychical ail- ments which came from physical disorders. They are troubled by a sense of double consciousness, and distracted l)y what seems a double will. If' paralytics or those who suffer neuralgias have their pains from physical causes, and lunatics theirs from mental disorders, it is merely in accordance with analog}' tliat we sup- pose there are those whose miseries arise from psychical derange- ments, soul-disorders. If the atmosphere act on the body, and one mind on another,' why should not one spirit on another spirit ? And this seenis' to liave been the case with demoniacs.* We ]-cturn now to the demoniac in the synagogue of Caper- naum. His symptoms are such as we now see in persons who are known to be insane. His insanity was by his coun- , , , !> 1 A ,1 Demoniac cured trvnnen traced to the ao;encv ot a demon. As the . ,, „ „ •J n ^ in the synagogue. insane are often strangely moved by the })resence, the voice, and the words of certain persons, so was this man moved by the intonations and language of Jesns. Believing him- self possessed of many devils, he suddenly lost his self-control and gave vent to such a shriek of rage and fear as such beings would be supposed to ntter under the circumstances, crying out at first inarticulatel}', and then making an appeal to Jesus, and then call- ing him "the Holy One of God." On the theory of demons, they recognized the holiness of Jesus and his powerful influence, and thus in a paroxysm of rage gave their testimony to liim. lie de- clined it, but said : " Hold thy peace and come out of him." We see in onr lunatic asylums men who are terribl}' afflicted with moral insanity, as we call it, showing all these symptoms. In the * If the reader wish to investigate this Bubject further, he is referred to Trench on Mirades, the chapter on " The De- moniacs in the Country of the Gada- renes ; " to Farmer's Essat/ on the Be- mo?i'tic.efore the setting of the sun, probably accounts of these wonders had been rendered in every house in the city, and * And we learn from 1 Cor. ix. 5, that his married state continued through his apostolic ministry. He was much more fortunate than PauL f It is not certain that Luke intended to make the distinction between the dif- ferent kinds of fever, as Alford inti- mates that he does. If he had so in- tended would the article have been omitted in Luke iv. 38, where it is sim- ply vvptTC> jiiyiyci ? It being a violent fever is sufficient to make this a remark- able miracle. |: It is to be noticed that Jesus treated disease as a hostile potencj', to be " re- buked" and to be resisted, as though sickness were somehow akin to sin. Early commentators, among them CyiiJ of Alexandria, noticed the peculiar ex- pression in the origuial Greek as some- how conveying this idea. 182 FIRST AND SECOND PASSOVER ES" THE LIFE OF JESUS. the hearts of the people were thrilling with the thought that BO marvellous a personage was residing in their Crowds of sick jjjj^i^^^ j^ ^^..^^ ^j^^ Sal.i>ath. The strictness of people. T • 1 1 r 1 1 • 1 T 1 Jewish observance f)! that day is known. It has been illustrated by divers incidents in the history of the jK'ople, but by none perhaps so strikingly as the fact that in the Macca- bean revolt aijainst Antiochus the insnrjicents, who had been sur- prised on the Sabbath, tamely submitted to butchery rather than violate the sanctity of the day by defensive warfare.* But the Sabbath ended with the sunset. Admiration broiifjht crowds to Peter's house, and many who were diseased came or were brought by their friends. The lame hobbled towards the Healer, and the blind came groping, and the palsied came trembling, and the epi- leptic brought his mysterious malady, and even " the possessed " were pi-eseut. The streets about the house were so crowded that Peter felt that " all the city was gathered together at the door." (Mark i. 33.) And none went away unblessed, lie laid his hands on all. The palsy-stricken, the man with the epilepsy, the suf- ferei-s from chronic neuralgias, felt instant ease, refreshment, and health infused into all parts of their bodies ; the deaf instantly heard the exclamations of the demoniacs amidst the shouts of the healed, the praises of the disciples, and tlie murmur of the popu- lace; and through them all, like music through a storm, swept the voice of Jesus, with all authority and sweetness, silencing demo- niacs and i-el)uking disease, while eyes that had been long blind looked for the iirst time upon the faces of their friends, U})on the multitude, and upon Jesus, as he stood in the foreground of a soft Syrian sunset. Virtue went out (»f him as it entered all these. lie became ex- hausted and nervous and faint. (Mark i. 35.) And when the time fitr bed had arrived, after this wonderful Exhausting ef- j^.^i.i..^,! J^^^^,^ ^.,,„ij „„t ^]^,^.., u^ j-ose j^ the fects ou Jesus. • i i • i • night and went out into a solitary place that he might ])ray. "When the day had come, Peter and they that were with him sought Jesus, and tt)ld him what an e.xcitement his deeds had created among the i)eoj)le, and urged him to stay in the city and go amongst those who so earnestly sought him. His reply was, " I>ct us go into the next towns, that I may i)rea«h the king- • See Milman's UhrUtianity, i. 211. THE FIEST TOUR OF GALILEE. 183 dom of God there also ; for therefore came I forth." Then com- menced his first circuit of missionary preaching. The earnest teacher " went about all Galilee," as Matthew says, meaning probably Upper Galilee, which formed the most northern part of Palestine, embracing a tract of country about fifty miles long and twenty-five broad. ^^**^- ^^- ^^^ It was bounded on the west by Phoeuicia and the • '^^ , ^" ' ^^ Mediterranean Sea, on the east by the Jordan and the Lake of Tiberias, on the north by Cojle -Syria, and on the south by Samaria. It was a fertile country, full of romantic valleys, and containing, it is said, two hundred t(jwns and villages ; and Josephus says {Wars, iii. 3, § 3) that the smallest contained moi'c than fifteen thousand inhabitants. The people were earnest, intelligeut, and remarkable for their bravery, but despised by the inhalntants of Jud<\3a, because their dialect was uncouth and the land filled with " Gentiles," who had been attracted tliither by the delightfulness of the country. Through this region Jesus made a tour. lie went into the syn- agogues and dischaiged the functions of a rabbi. In his thne the rabbi was not a regularly graduated teacher of the law, as somewhat later^ but was still re- -^^^""^ ^'^^''^^^ ^° garded by the people as the successor of the ancient prophet. Jesus preached his doctrine of "the kingdom," and exerted his marvellous power of healing, so much that by his words and deeds he created a fame of himself that went through- out all Syria, through Palestine and Phoenicia, carried i)r(A)ably by the caravans that went from Damascus by the Sea of Galilee to the Mediterranean. Great multitudes followed him from all parts of Galilee, and from the "Decapolis" (a region so called from its ten cities, which were inhabited inainly by Gentiles, and is said by Eitter to have been founded by the vetei-ans of the army of Alexander), and from the neighborhood and the city of Jerusa- lem, and from Perea, beyond Jordan. On this journey occurred, in some town not named, the healing of a leper. The leprosy is the most horrible of diseases, and all the details of its symptoms and effects strike our imaginations most painfully. Although not strictly exclusively confined to the Orient, it is the special scourge of the East, ^he leprosy. Wlien it first made its appearance wo shall probably never be able 184 FIRST AND SECOND PASSOVEU IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. to learn. Pc'r]iaj)5 the earliest recorded mention of this jtla^ue is in the ber held place at court and connuanded the forces of the Syrian king ; and also the case of Gehazi (2 Kings viii.), who, while he was an incui-able lei)er, held familiar c(»nver- sation with the king of Israel. The le})er's exclusion these learned authors assign to the fact that he was cereinoniaUy unclean. Modern travellei's and wi-iters tell us that in Palestine it is still an o])cn (juestion whether mere contact will communicate the disease; but all the i)olicc regulations about Jerusalem and Damascus, and even among the Avabp, sliow that there is a di-ead of touching lepers. They are excluded fiom the camp and city, are sepaiated fr<»m their kinspeople and ac(puiintance8, and live in a c(»nmiu- nity <»f wretchedness, having no comj)anionship but thatof sufVercrs alllicted like themsehes. Jhit it is " hei-editary, with an awfully infallible certainty."' * The child of leprous parents may exhibit • Dr. Thom.son'H Tht htnd and (he tancously, without hereditary or nuy Jiook, vol. ii. p. TjIO. This author 8ny.s other iH)SHible connection with those also, that " fresh cases appear from time previously diseased." to time, in which it $cein« to arise spou- THE rmST TOUR OF GALILEE. 185 all the usual sweetness of infancy and be briglit and beautiful ; but just as certainly as it li\cs it will begin to show the terrify- ing rignsof the horrible disease, and will finally perish of a malady wliicii medical science has discovered no skill to cure and almost none to mitigate. The symptoms and the effects of this disease are very loath- some. There comes a white swelling or scab, with a change of the color X)f the hair on the part from its natui-al _ , ^ i- ^ bymptoraa. hue to yellow; then the appearance of a taint going deeper than the skin, or raw flesh appearing in the swell- ing. Then it spreads and attacks the cartilaginous portions of the body. Tlie nails loosen and drop off, the gums are absorbed, and the teeth decay and fall out ; the breath is a stench, the nose decays ; fingers, hands, feet, may be lost, or the eyes eaten out. The human beauty has gone into corruption, and the patient feelf that he is being eaten as by a fiend, who consumes him slowly in a long remorseless meal that will not end until he be destroyed, lie is shut out from his fellows. As they ai)proach he must cry, "Unclean! unclean!" that all humanity may be warned from his jtrecincts. He must \l)aiidon wife and child. He must go to live with other lepers, in disheartening view of miseries similar to his own. lie must dwell in dismantled houses or in the tombs. He is, as Trench says, a dreadful })arable of death. By the laws of Moses (Lev. xiii. 45 ; Xuin. vi. 9 ; Ezek. xxiv. IT) he was com- pelled, as if he were mourning for his own decease, to bear about him the emblems of death, the rent garments; he was to kee}) his head bare and his lip covered, as was the custom with those who were in communion with the dead. When the Crusaders brought the leprosy from the East, it M'as usual to clothe the leper in a shroud, and to say for him the masses for the dead.* In all ages this indescribably horrible malady has been con sidered incurable. The Jews believed that it was inflicted by Jehovah directly, as a punishment for some extra- ordinary perversity or some transcendent act of sinfulness, aiid that only God could heal it. AVhen Naannin was cured, and his flesh came back like that of a little child, he said, "Now I know that there is no God in alltlie earth but in Isiacl." (2 Kings V. l-i, 15.) It was to be, the test of the Messiah, the * Trench on Miracles, p. 176. 186 rmsT A^'D shcom) passovek lx the life of jesus. Deliverer sent out from Jehovah, that he should be able to cure the leprosy. Cyril of Alexandria calls it Trado^ ovk laaifiov, the in- curable disease. The report of it struck horror into the minds of peoples afar. The Greek poet -tEsehylus * has a few powerful lines in which he describes the symptoms, and dwells, as Moses (.lid, upon the fact of the si)readini^ energy of the evil, and makes that an argument for the theory that the leprosy was the special scourge of God. Tacitus f describes the Jews as " a race detested by the gods," saying that when they were in Egypt they all had the lepros}', and that when the king inquired of Jupiter Annuon how the kingdom could be fi-eed from this great calamity, he was told that it could be effected only by driving this wretched race from the country. Such is the leprosy, and such were lepers in the days of Je- sus. Other sufferers luid sympathy and help. Tlie leper was regarded as stricken of God, smitten of llim, and afflicted by Ilim.:}: No one sat by his couch of pain ; no hand touched his brow with cooling moisture ; no kiss of lo\'e ever distilled itself on his lips. A poor wretch corroded with leprosy had heard of the power and goodness of Jesus, whose reputation had gone down among , , the outcasts in the tombs, lie came near the Jesus heals a irii i-r leper. Matt viii. "^vondcr-wcjrker, and kneeled, and fell on his face, 1-4; Mark i. 40- and worshii>i)ed, and said with extraordinary faith 4o; Luke v. 12- .^,,,| pathos, '' Thou canst make me clean, if thou 14 wilt." The historians of the New Testament tell this story with a calmness which seems itself miraculo^is. Wo ordinaiy historians ai'c moved l)y the toucliing postures, and acts, and fancied accents of these two men. Laying all dognuis aside, here is a historic gnuij) of ]>niionnd and powerful poetic interest. Standing there is a youn'^j teacher, who has aroused the dull ears of plodding, stupid, ritualistic religionists of his day, and attracted the attention of the fashionable, the gay, the heathen rulei-s of his people, and of the busy mei-chants intent on trade. A ]>opulous regi(^n begins to be full of his i)raises. lie is stirring his people and his age by religious views the most i)ractical, full of common • ^8ch., Cfi&J-r^i., 271-274. f Tacitus, Ann., lib. v. X In quoting from Isaiah the phrases osuolly understood to bo prophetic of "the Christ," I am reminded of a strange old Jewish tradition that the Messiah was to be a leper. THE ITKST TOUR OF GALILEE. 187 sense, adapted to human wants, yet lofty and spiritual, and uttered in a tone of paramount authority. His life is bhuiu^lessly pure. The innocency of infancy, the tenderness of Avonianliood, the strength of manhood, the gravity of a sage, the endurance of a martyr, and the daring of a hero must have been the mingled elements of his aspect and his maimers. Seieue and l<»fty and sweet, Jesus stands, while at his feet a lejjcr lies, disgusting, loatlisome, rotten. He has been burning with fever for many years^ for he is " full of leprosy." It is in his blood and iiesh, a fret and a torment, lie lias no hope from medicine or nursing. He can look forward only to a death-in-hf e existence, whose nights shall be filled with dreams that scare and visions that terrify (Job vii.), and whose mornings shall be an awakening to face an approaching and inevitable doom. This is his only, his last chance. He has heard of the mighty deeds of Jesus. His faith in the 2^^'^*^^ of Jesus is unfaltering. The Messiah will be a leper-curcr. This is the Messiali. He can. Will he ? That is the question. 7/' the goodness of this wonderful Kabbi be equal to his power the le])ei' ^vill be sa^■ed. But perhaps the leprosy ia the one evil God has determined not yet to remedy, and this, after all, may not be the Messiah. It is not inqjrobable that all these thoughts passed through the mind of the sufferer. He saw in fancy his home, his wife, his babes, and all that makes the home circle powerful in its attrac- tions. H the Great Teacher should cure him he should go back to all those dear delights. If he refused, then the tombs and wretched companionship and despair ! Will he % Let us look up from the suppliant to that face of lofty lovingness. Jesus is moved — moved with compassion. Ko one else had ever felt so for the leper. All others had been moved, but it had been with diso-ust or ., , , ' _ p the nealer. horror. The brow of Jesus lifts itself. The eyes of the teacher soften and brighten. His hands stir slightly. His lips quiver with emotion. His frame is, perhaps, agitated. All-health, unbroken AVholesomeness, untainted Physical Purity, stands face to face with Disease and Corru]i)tion. It is a moment of critical conflict. He is about to speak a word which is to bo decisive of his power or his feebleness. There can be no half- success. It will be complete, and surpass in its effects all other words that ever passed human lips, or be instantly followed by a 188 FIRST AND SECOND PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. BuiTender oi moral power, lie dares to utter that word, and does it with elevated calmness, fearless of ceremonial impurity or infectious disease. Step})ing forward, he breaks thronrosy, the se})aration had to be made. Seat- ed leprosy was considered incurable, and, until the days of Jesus, no cure is recorded except of those who were miraculously healed in the times of the pmphets. Generally Jesus enjoined silence u])on those Avhoni he restored, and the reasons are appar- ent. The importance of his ministry, as is always the case with great men, lay in his spiritual inllueiu-,e rather than in the mere words and acts which conveyed it. His miracles were only acces- sories. For the si)ii'itual as well as ])hysical good of the restored lie commanded quiet. Nor did he desire to have his deeds so bi'uitcd abroad Jis that his ministry should be obstmu^ted by great cr«.»wds, nor such enthusiasm generated as should lead to mobs or i)olitical conqilications. These were general i)rudential reasons. In one i)}>osite direction. Ihit in each case, in addition to the general, there wae TIIE FIRST TOUR OF GALILEE. 189 a special reason. The priest liad pronounced him a leper: if the priest, unmoved by the knowledi^e that Jesus had cleansed him, should pronounce him healed, the " testimony' to them " would be complete that Jesus had really performed this wonderful deed and had thus estal)lished his claims to the Messiahship. l]ut the glad and grateful man could not be restrained. lie blazed the matter abroad so much that crowds n 1 • . T i.-i 1 11 1 i Jesus withdraws came il()ckin2: to Jesus, until he was compelled to , ,, ... p _ ' _ '■ from the pubuc. withdraw himself into a solitary place. And there for some days he refreshed his soul by devotional exercises. It was needful, for trouble was brewing for the great teacher. A Messiah that removed himself from the public was not the Messiah for the Jews. lie returned to his chosen home in Capernaum. His fame had o-rown in his ,, ' '.. '/..->' ^ «= . Mark u. 4-13; absence. People flocked to the liouse he occupied, i.u.'ke v. 17-28. "Wlietherit was a residence he had hired, or one that belonged to some disciple, we cannot learn. But it was known to the inhabitants of Capernaum, and to the strangers therein. lie commenced teaching. Among his hearers were certain Phari- sees and doctors of the law, who had come down from Jerusalem. It is not quite easy to determine the motives of these listeners. They may ha\e been drawn by the fame of Jesus, or they may have been emissaries come to collect testimony against the young rabbi who had made such a commotion on his visit to Jerusalem. Both classes probably were represented in this assembly, for Luke intimates that he healed some,* while some were severely critical upon his mode of expression in a miracle which he performed in their midst. The miracle was on this wise : Four men brought upon a pallet their friend, who was a paraly- tic. The entrance to Oriental houses is ordinarily by the one front door. This was blocked by the excessive crowd, so that it was impracticable to press througrh: ^^'^^ e s a r 1 .1 1 Vi Pfiralytic. bnt the desire of these men, mcreased probably by the urgency of the patient, was so great that they ascended the roof, probably through the adjoining house, and, crossing the parapet, either removed the hatchway, if Jesus was sitting in the * The construction here is a little | these Pharisees and doctors, as on it-a difficult. The avrovs in the original has , face it seems to do, for there was noth- no grammatical antecedent. It is rather , ing in their cases to make them recep unnatural to interpret it as meaning i tive of his curative power. 190 FIRST AXD SECONT) PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. upper chamber or rei.ioved tlie awninp;, if Jesus was sitting in the court-yai-d. In rcadini^ tlie statement of the evangelical histo- rians we must recollect the construction of eastern houses. What might he impossible as Eui-opean and American houses are built in our cities was not an insuperal)lc difKculty in the East. Jhit it was a difficulty; and when Jesus saw the earnestness of all ]>arties he said to the paralytic, "Son, be of good cheer; thy sins are forgiven thee.'" How much depends upon a little word! This speech by Jesus was the turning-point in his history. If he had said, "May thy sins be foi-givcn," he would simply have uttered Importance of a ^^^ as])irati(>n of pietv. But undertaking to de- clare upon his own individual authority the for- giveness of the man's sins, in other \v(n\U,for(/ii'in(/ him, he vol- untarily took a vast step forward, ascended to a higher and more conspicuous platform of claim, and aroused against himself all the philosophic;, religious, and traditionary prejudi(;es of his peo- ple. It was the commission of a most, if not the most, grievous crime known to the Jews. It was hlasphemy. It was a claim to exercise the prerogative of God. It was making himself equal with God. It was making himself God. And there was no re- treat for Jesus. lie had said it. The learned visitors sat reason- ing with themselves, " Who can forgive sins but God only ? " Jesus read their thoughts, and manifested his penetration by tell- ing them just what was passing in their minds. He proceeded to establish this awful claim. Any fool or crazy man may claim anything which is not susceptible of proof or dis- proof. What evidence is furnished that heaven An awful claim. ^.^^-^^^^^ ^|j^. assertion of any human being that the sins of another human being are forgiven? It is a pertinent question. The claim maybe at once futile and. sinful. Jesus asked them this question : "Which is easier — to say ' Thy sins are forgiven,' or to say ' Tvise, take thy bod and walk? ' " To forgive sins is not less difficult than to heal disease, to one who can do both ; but it is less'easy of proof, as the latter is open to the senses. But neither can be done without the will of God, and God Avill not indorse blasphemy l)y a miracle, and therefore Jesus said to them, "That you may know that I have power to forgive sins, listen and behold." And turning to the sick man he said, "Rise, take up your bed, and go to your own house." There was no Btniggle. no slow stretching of himself, no painful effort to drag THE FIRST TOUR OF GALILEE. 191 himself and his pallet through the crowd. Immediately he stood up before them, he gathered up that on wliicli he had been lyino- and started for his home. The crowd disparted. Tliey made way for this new wonder. The man went home shouting. Amaze- ment, fear, and gladness took hold of the people. Tlie great power of God had come do-svn among men. It is to be noticed how Jesus, in the methods of this miracle, sets forth the close connection between an nnwholesome spiritual con- dition and the physical maladies of mankind. lie treats a disease somehow as if it were a sin. ° y ^ ^^ . " Your sins are forgiven, rise up, go home." In this case, as per- haps invariably in cases of paralysis, some sin, some excessive self-indulgence, lies at the root of this bodily disablement. Jesus is compassionate to tlie snffei-er, but honest with the sinner. He addresses him tenderly but faithfully. He calls him "' son," but gives him to understand that his sympathy with suffering does not for a moment blind him to the badness of the sin from which it sprang So indescribal)ly sublime was the self-possession of Jesus that no crisis threw him from his balance, and yet so ob\nou8 is it that he never thinks of self-possession and mental equipoise, [lis greatness inheres. Shortly after the healing of the paralytic Jesus was found at the sea-side, teaching nmltitudes who gathered about him. Making a short excursion from Capernaum along the Lake of Gennesaret, discoursing on religious subjects, he came to the road from Damascus, which, crossing the Jordan by "Jacob's Bridge," went along the lake coast to ^l^ttbew's call, the neighboring cities. On this road, near Caper- f "".^Ml^j-^i ^"^^ naum or some other town, it is quite probable there would be a toll-house. Such a station somewhere Jesus came upon, and there found Matthew, called also Levi, who M-as discharging the duties of a Uoman poHito?% or tax-gatherer, com- moidy called " publican " in our version. It was the most degrad- ing employment in which a Jew could be found. It was nuikiug himself, for gain, a servant of the oppressor of his people. Jesus seems to have known him. He simply said to him, " Follow me," and Matthew immediately obeyed. Ilere was another shock given to Jewish prejudice. It was intolerable that he should select his circle of nearest friends and disciples fi*om men whose reputation was so ruinously bad. 192 FIRST AND SECOND TASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JEStJS. Matthew's feast. But sometliiiig more was done, probably on tliat very day, to in- tensify tlie groNviiif^ opposition. The newly called disciple made a great feast at his house. iVll his old compflnions were welcome to his table. On this day he nnist have consulted Jesus, who did not object to dining with publicans and those technically called sinners by the scientifically religious Pharisees. And so there was a great crowd of bad men, and Jesus and his djsciples eating with them. This seemed the crowning outrage. lie had pronounced a man forgiven who had not gone throuirh the ritual, thus bursting: the bands of sacerdotal succes- sion and ecclesiastical exclusiveness. lie then broke down the pales of social life, which were also themselves of ecclesiastical construction. The Pharisees remonstrated with liis disciples. But when Jesus heard it he said to them, with sj^lcndid irony, '' They that are mIioIc need not a physician, but they that are sick. Go learn what God meant when he spake by his prophet, ' I will have mercy and not sacrifice.' (Ilosea vi. G.) And I am not come to call the righteous, but sinnei-s, to repentance." His rej^ly was silencing to the Pharisees, and should be instruc- tive to people of all ages. It first quotes the pi-overb, " The physi- cian is not for the whole, but for the sick," which ^ .u^«i° • ^''^ ^vas known to Jews and Gentiles, and is of uni- te the rhansees. _ - , verbal use.* It was em]>loyed ironically against these Pharisees. They were as unsomid as the sinners that sat at meat with him, the difference being that the latter knew them- selves sin-sick and the former did not. Seriously, the place for the physician is in the wards of the hospital, and not in the cnnvd of hearty, healthy laborers. The man whose purity and exaltation of character are not siu-h as will di"aw the low to his higher plat- form, and not be degraded to theirs, is not the man to be even a Moral Reformer, not to say a Great Regenerator. Men cannot from great distances do good to their fellow-men. It is amid the amenities of social life that much is done for good morals. And then he quoted from their sacred books: "I will have mercy and not sacrifice," says God. "When afilictions come in Ilis providence they may have a chastening effect ; but lacerations of oui*selve8 or others, of our bodies or our souls, are not acccpt- * It is found in the Talmud ( Tul Babyl., tit. Bara Kama, fol. 40, col. 2). Used by Antisthcnes in Laertiu8, Dio- genes in Stoba:u8, Pausanias in Plutarch, Ovid in " De Ponto." Ml,! ■i.'i,iiiijj||;i « THE FIRST TO UK OF GALILFE. 193 able to God, who prefers a life of love to all self-tornieuting. Jesus seems to teach that whatever sacrifice a man may make fcj* God, if there be no charity, it all counts for nothing ; that charity must animate all toils to make them beautiful in the sight of God. As if he had said, " You Pharisees offer great sacrifices, and yet are unmerciful to your poor brethren who make no religious pro- fession. You are merciless ; how can you cxpec^t mercy ? " From the proverb and the scripture he ascends to an authorita- tive declaration concerning himself : " I am come to call sinners to repentance, not the righteous." In this there seems some irony, but the proposition involves a profound truth. In every age, from every teacher, t)nly those rccciN'e benefit who are conscious of needing help. The Pharisees of every age are those whose ex- terior decei\'es them as to their inward condition, and they are the very people who receive the least good from the beneficial agencies abroad in the world. Sinners, who being sinners, know themselves to be sinners, are those to whom salvation comes. It is not the lack of power in the spiritual agencies that keeps men from being good, but generally the lack of a sense of their own need, and a willingness to throw themselves open to the sweet in- fluences of the spiritual world. And thus he answei-ed the Pharisees. Tlicy had talked to his disciples ; then the disciples of John talked to him, and said, "We and the Pharisees fast often : why do not your disciples fast?" Let us make all „ r> 1 •, p .1 mi • John's disciplea allowance or charity tor these men. ihen-s was , • . a pitiable condition. Their master was in prison, and they could not bear to see Jesus in the midst of festivities. Their school had wellnigh broken up. Many of John's disciples had attached themselves to Jesus. There were probably a few of the stanchest and most obstinate followei-s of the Baptist, who were ready to acknowledge what was good in Jesus, but clung closely to the modes and teachings of John, and in their obstinacy classed themselves with the Pharisees. After such numberless demonstrations of the folly of siich a course, it is amazing how men persist in clinging to the dawn, and in suffering as it broad- ens into the fulness of the day. Jesus answered them by almost echoing the words of their great master. John had spoken of the pleasure which the friend of the bridegroom enjoyed as he heard the voice of the bridegroom. Jesus re])lies to these querulous dis- 13 194 riKST AND SI-X'OND PASSOVER IX THE LIFE OF JESL'S. ciplcs of Joliii, " Can tlic sons of tlie hridechamhcr monrr, ns lon^ as the bfidcii^rooni is with thein ? but the days will conie, when the bridegroom shall be taken from them, and then shall ••hey fast. Xo man putteth a ])atcli of new cloth unto an old i-j garment ; for tliat wliich is pnt in to fill it np taketli from tlie garment, and tlie rent is made worre. Neither do men pour new wine into old skins: else SKIN iioTTLF.s. ^]^q skiiis bi'eak, and the wine rnnnetli ont, and the skins perish : but they put new wine into ncAV skins, and both are preserved." He thus does several things in one reply. He reminds them of the light in whi(;h their mastei- had received him, namely, as ful- filling the prophetnes by coming to espouse the Reply of Jesus. ^ ■ ^' /t • ^• k -l/^ \ ' t- 1 . , 1 r .' oride. (Isai. liv. 5-10.) It ought to be a icstive season. The gladdest day of a man's life should be the day of his nuptials. The discijiles were represented as the intimate fi'iends of the bi-ide^rroom, those wlio were a(;customed to irit of proijress. Humanity M'ent forward, but Jesus, the divid- . r ^ • » ,• , . . , ing line of history. ^^ ^^'C"t forward m a rut. After lum it began to spread itself in all directions. But still men en- deavored to hand it down from generation to generation in old skins that would bui-st and spill the wine. Hence the delay of Christianity in taking the world. The intention of Jesus was to establish a religion which should have no binding forms, no pre- scribed temple-service, no priei^thood, nothing of the old, but bo new, and in spirit, and reside in the hearts of men ; and this we find frerpiently set forth in his teachings. It was the Hinging away of the old bottles MJiich has made mctdern times so progres- sive. It is the powerful intluence of Jesus which helps men to do broad, great, good things, even if it be ol)jected that they are not old tilings. It was such conduct as this, and such teaching, that brought against him the wrath of scribe and Pharisee, of priest and Levite. Old Bottles or If he had been content to i)ut /-gate, there was a Jerusalem. Hoa»eK)f- P'^o^ ^^^^cd in tlic Syro-CluiUlee, which was the Outpouring. John v. vemacular of Jesus, Baith-Hisdaw, or Bethcsda, 1-47 . . I . tliat ]i=>, Ilouse-r)f-Oufj)ouriiif/,t]\Q\n'ocisc locatua) of which it is probably now impossible to indicate. For a loug time Bethesda was suitposed to be identical with a large excava- tio»cd iu the Fourth Coniraoiidmcut. THK SAIJIJATII QUESTION. 203 and ■vvIiGU slaves wont free. The ori- that man has no proprietorship in anything earthly; *^^'^'^- that he is holding it for God, and ol)tains its best uses oidy as he uses it f(^r God: this is the great lesson of the Sabbath. Time belongs to God, which man ^vas to acknowledge by the tribute of the seventh day. Land belongs to God, which is recognized i'l the Sal)batic year. All things npon which a man may lay any "claim of ownership, as uj3on the moneys due him from his credit- ors, as in the case of his servants, bought or inherited, belong at last to God, and to him must be remitted, as the Jubilee sots forth. Socially men Avere to be profited by the Sabbath, It was to be a festive day. The rich gave feasts. The poor saved their best for the seventh day enjoyment; men walked abroad and visited, as M'ell as met amid, joyful celebrations of God's ])raiso in taber- nacle, Temple, or synagogue. Labor was suspended. The body must rest; it rested on the Sabbath. No journeys, no business, no servile labor could be performed. It was a democratic insti- tution. Master and servant equally susj^ended toil and took re- fi'cshment. In other parts of the law there were given constructions of the prohibition of labor in the Decaloo;ne. It was forbidden to liirht a fire. (Exodus xxxv. 3.) For gathering sticks 1 o 1 1 1 1 /-v-r rrohibitions. on the babbatn a man was stoned. (JN um. xv. 32.) Isaiah uttered solemn warnings against the violation of the Sabbath, and promises of blessings to those who should scru])u- lously observe it. (Isa. Iviii. 13.) Jeremiah denounced the gen eral violation of the Sabbath in his day, when men wrought as much and carried burdens in their traffic as much as on other days. (Jerem. xvii. 21-27.) And in the days of Ezekiel there was such a general falling off that the secularization of the Sab- bath is ranked foremost among the national sins of the Jews 204 SECOND AND THIKD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUB. (Ezekiel xx. 12-24.) Nehemiah (xiii. 15-22, and viii. 9-12) at- tnl)uted their severe initioiiiil calamity to the specially heinoua oiYenceof neirlectinrr the Sahharli ; and he crives an account of his measures for restoring the day to its proper obsen'ance, among which was the representation to the ])e(jple that the Sabhath was a festival. " This day is holy unto the Lord your God : mourn not, nor weep. Go your way, eat the fat, and drink the sweet, and send portions unto tl»ein for whom nothing is pre})ared ; for this day is wholly unto our Lord : neither be ye sorry ; for the joy of the Lord is your strength." " "With many such words he cheered the people, and they went their way to eat and to drink, and to send portions, and to make a great mirth, because they had under- stood the words that were declared unto them."* It will be seen that this method of observing the Sabbath is very different from that prescribed by subsequent Jewish and modern Puritans, who have made the Sabbath a burden, a darkness, and a cui-se, whereas God meant it for a blessing, and considers "holy day" the equiv- alent of holiday. The Pharisees and the rabbins, following up the Avork of Ne- hemiah, committed the error of carrying tlieir exactions too far, and thus absolutely abrogating the spirit by their super-exact adherence to the letter of the law. Because Moses had forbidden the Israelites to go out of the camp to gather manna against God's command, a sect was established whose prime ai-ticle of faith and practice was the maintaining throughout the day the posture in which they should happen to be when they first awoke; a terrible way of resting. This of course exceeded even the usual rigor of Sal)bath observance. Because Jeremiah had denounced the bearing of the burdens of traflic, men were forbidtU-n to lift any article. It was against the law to hunt on the Sabbath, therefore the Pharisaic and rab- Pbarisaic exactions. * As showing that the Sabbath waa not tle\ion to this short statenient. ]>ut their belief that he did mean this, he himself proceeded to justify by the remark- able discourse which John has preserved, and which we give entire : "Verily, I say to you, Tlic Son can do notliini^ from hinisi-lf. Imt what ho seeth the Fatlitr doin;;: for wliat tilings Ik- doitli, these also tloeth the Son likewise. For the Father loveth the Son, and showeth him all things that lie Himself doeth: and lie will show him greater works than these, that ye may marvel. For as the Father raiseth the dead, and giveth life, even so the Son giveth life to whom /(/; will. For the Fatlicr jiidgcth no one, hut hath com- mitted all judgment to tlie Son: that all should know the Son, even as they know the Father. He that honoreth not the Son honoreth not the Father who hath sent him. Verily, verily, I say to you, lie that heareth my word, and believetli on Ilini that sent me, hath i)eri)etual life, and doth not come into condenmation for judgment), hut hath passed from death unto life. Verily, verily, 1 say to you, An liour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they who hear shall live. For as tip- Father hath life in Himself, so also hath he given to the Son to have life in himself; and hath given liim authority to execute judgment also, because he is the Son of man. Marvel not at this, for an hour is coming in which all that are in the graves .«hall hear his voice, and shall come forth; they wlm liave done good, unto the resurrection of life; and tliey that have done evil, unto the resurre(;tion of judgment. "I can of nunc own self do notliing: as I hear I judge; and my judgm. nt is ju.st ; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of ITnu who sent ni.\ If I Ijcar witness of myself, my witness is not true. There is another tli.it bcareth witness of mc; and ye know tliat the testimony which he tesfilietli o( me is true. Ye sent unto Jolm, and he bare witness unto the truth. Hut I receive not testimony from man: but tliesc things I say that ye may In- .sivcd TIIE SABBATH QUESTION. 207 He was the burning and shining lamp : ye were wiling for a season to rejoice in his light. "But I have a greater witness than that of John : for the works which tlie Father hath given me to finish, the same works that I do, l^ear witness of me, that the Father hath sent me. And the Father Himself, wliich hath scut me, hath borne witness of me. Ye have ncitlici" heard His voice at anj^ time, nor seen his shape. And ye have not His word ahidiiig in you: for whom He hath sent, him ye l)elieve not. " Ye search the Scrijitures ; for in thorn ye think to have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me. And ye will not come to me tliat ye ma} ha';e life. I receive not glory from men. But I know you, that ye have not the glory of God among j'^ourselves. I have come in my Fatlier's name, and ye receive me not : if another shall come in his o"uti name, him ye will receive. How can ye believe, receiving glory one of another, and seek uot tlie glory that Cometh from the only God ? Do not think tliat I will accuse you to tlie Father: there is one that accuseth you, even Moses, in whom ye have hoped. For had ye believed ]\Ioses ye would have believed me : for he wrote concern- ing me. But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words ? " It would seem that lio one can rCad this speech without being impressed with tlie thorougli sincerity of the speaker. lie be- lieved all he said.* lie made assertions of himself, wliich, if true, are not only profound, and tou(;hing all the awful mysteries of life and eternity, but separate him from all other known human beings. lie first assumes the fatlierhood of the Deity. God is father. It is of His essence. He does not become a father by creating, but creates because lie is a fatlier. The human ^^v, ^ ,x, ^, ^ , The Fatnernooa oi relationship between the begetter and the begotten coa and the sonhood furnishes ics witli the idea, but it lias always sub- sisted in God. Unbeginuing fatherhood implies unbeginuiug sonhood. In point of fact, i.? there such a son? Jesus not only declares that there now is, and consequently always has eternally been, but that he himself is that very son, not a son, as any other man may claim to be, but t/ie Son of God. If the unbegun son, the always-existent son, then he does make himself equal with the * It must be remarked here, as else- where in the speeches of Jesus, that our comments are not made in order to form a system of theologj'. This is iutcndod to be purely a history — a history of the deeds and speeches and consciousness of Jesua We are concerned merely to dis- cover what he meant to say, and, havuig found that meaning, not to defend or to condemn, but to show the effect of the holding and the propagating of such thoughts upon the life of the man Je- sus, and perhaps upon the subsequent history of the world. 208 SECOXD AND TITTRT> TAPPOVER TN TTIE I.TFR OF JESUS. Father, as there cannot be two Gods. The long-inculcated mono- theism of the Hebrews made it impossible for them to conceive two persons in one God, and it is probably a meta[)hysical im- practicability for any mind in which the idea of God is that of an infinite or even of a supreme Existence, to conceive two God>. If, then, Jesus claims to be the Onlv Bcijotten, being: one witli the Father, the Father and the Son not having had precedent and subsequent existence, then he stands before all the laws of human thought the equal of God, the very God. Right or wrong, such eternity of sonship and such divine equality Jesus believed lie held, and he acted and spoke always as we should a prioj'i expect a person with such a belief to sjieak and act. lie confirms the impression u])on tlie minds of his enemies by statements made with the formula he always employed when he designed to make his asseverations spccnally solemn, " Verily, verily ;" "Amen, amen." If they regarded him, the man Jesus, visil)le to them, as the sole and egoistic |)erformer of such mira- cles as that wliicli had been wrouirht at the House of Mercv, thev were mistaken. He does them as the Son of God, and does wliat the Fatlier shows him. He asserts that the sul)si.stcnce of the existence of Father and Son is love. They are one in their love. Xothing is done by the Father which is not known to the Son. These things they had seen are but a small ]>art of a stupendous "whole. God is j)erpetually vivifying and revivifying, wherefore the Son must also be constantly discharging the quickening f unc tion of the life-])ow('rtliat is in him as the Son of God. Not only does all life proceed from liiin, but he is the judge of the living and the dead ; so that no liouoi- is to go to God which does not come, to Jesus as the Son. He asserts, fui-thermore, that those who hear his teachings, and thus believe in God by believing in him, have already everlast- ini; life, — do not wait for death to introduce them PtTpctanl life. i • • i i i • •, n-ii tncremto, indeed hare no judgment to pass, llie hearinjj of the voice of the Son of God irivcs passaije into a life that is perpetual, and that is wholly unafTected by the mere inci- dent of physical dissolution. But as touching the judgment of men, he asserts tliat that is j)laced in his hands, because he is the Son of ^lan. !Man judges man. He that has had the trials, weaknesses, human emergencies, fearful despondencies, a]i]>etites and passions of a man, and tliereforc hath all human sympathy, is THE SAnBATII QUlCS'l'IOX. 209 to pass judgment on the character and acts of men. He is God's eqnal in divine purity and man's equal in humaneness. The proof of the truth of what he says lie rests upon several grounds. In the first place, he was not bearino; egotistical testi- mony to himself. All that he said and did '' /~t y -r^ ^ - Jcsiis no egotist. brought glory to the great God, the Lvcrlastiiig Father, and in this he was to be distinguished from the pseudo- Messiahs. In the next place, they had sent to John, who was a resplendent light, and had from him received testimony to the Messiahship of Jesus, M-ho, nevertheless, makes little of all human testimony to himself, even of John's ; and says that he was willing for them to hear John, that they might have all helps to their faith they could find, because he desired that they might be saved. But the really reliable external proof is the works he did, and the really reliable internal proof each man should have would be the voice of God, bearing witness in his soul that this Jesus had come out from God. But the Jews had silenced that voice. Without this subjective evidence men will not believe on him, no matter what quality and quantity of evidence may be adduced. For instance, thev had the Scriptures of the Old " Til Subjective c\'idence. Testament in their midst, and studied them. They believed that the way to life lay mapped out therein. But those Scriptures, Jesus held, pointed clearly to him. He fulfilled them. And yet he does not glorify himself therefor, but he docs glorify the Father. And yet they will not believe him. Let another come * glorifying himself, and although he fulfil no scripture, he will be received by these hard-minded men who desire to kill Jesus — not so much for blas})heiny, nor for the vio- lation of the real Sabbath law, as for disregarding a legcd Sab- bath, It is a deformity of the will. They had put a gloss on the Scripture. They had narrowed it to their national hopes. They looked for national deliverance and splendor, and for a Messiah wiu) should bring grandeur to Judaism, and thus glory to God ; and they could not undei-stand how God could be glorified and the Jewish nation not aojorrandized. The verv ground on M'hich they reject him is the very ground of his proof that he had conic out from God, * This assertion was verified by the I who were manifest impostors. Coin- crowds that subsequently followed those | pare Acts v. 3C, 37, 14 210 SECOND AND TTTTKD TAi^SOVER IN THE EFFE OF .TESU8. And now he retorts upon tliem. They accuse him of violat- ing 07ie law of Moses. lie accuses them of rejecting the writings of Moses bodily. He asserts that ^Moses wrote Jesus retortii. . — «., ... . . 11*1 of Jesus, i hey did nt)t understand and did not believe Moses. So Jesus may hardly expect them to believe him. If they extinguish their light tliey cannot see. If they truly believed in Moses it woiild be impossible to avoid believing in Jesus, if, as he asserts, the writings of Moses are full of Jesus. So, then, the greatest human authority to the Jews, — that under which their Icadei-s are arraigning and endeavoring to try and convict Jesus that they may destroy him, — that very authority is aressive discourse, his persecu- toi-8 were compelled to let him go. They could not gainsay the words he had uttered. Ihit the battle had been begun. The assault was on the strong- hold of Phaiisaism, namely, such rigorous observance of the Sab bath as should nuike it a burden to the people The battle bognn. , . . . p . ^ • ^i 1 i r xi and an instrument of torture m the liaiuls or tlie priesthood. Jesus had attacked that, and they determined to destroy him. He never sought and never declined a conflict for princi})le, but went steadily on his way, avoiding giving any "•round of justification to the charge that he recklessly rushed against even men's foolish and hurtful j)rejudices, but never avoiding doing what was right: because the popular prejudice was ajrainst it. CHAPTER II. THE SABBATH QUESTION AGAIN. IIe departed for Galileo. It seems to have been the Sabbatli after tliat on which he had healed the man at the Bethesda Pool, when, passinut they were blameless. It was necessary for the maintenance of ])ublic worship. The Temple was greater than the Sabbath. lie then made the re- markable assertion : " A {/reciter t/timj than the Temple is here^ It would seem to be a reference to himself, and the meaning to bo that these discii)les weie in the discharge of religious duties in following him, and in a much higher sphere than the priests in the Temple, so that if these wei-e not in fault, much more those were not to be blamed. Again he repeats to them the woixls of the pr()])het Ilosea : f " I will have mercy and not sacrifice," teaching them that all God's laws are laid ujion the basis of mercy and not pain-giving; and that no amount of sacrifice in any shape, whether in offering victims upon the altar or in the alliicting of one's self, is at all acceptable to God unless the heart be full of love and mercy. And thus out of their law, and out of their most cherished his- tory, and out of their prophets, he confutes them. But he does not rest on that; he lays down the memorable pro- position whicth is tlie key of the whole Sabbatic idea and arrange- Kcy to the Sabbath uieut I " The Sahbath was made for man, afid thought. j,^,f in an for the Sabbath.''^ AVhatcvcr regidatiun for the observance of the Sabbath may be set up by human au- • Compare 1 Sam. xxi. ; also xxii. 20-23; 2 Sam. viii. 17; 1 Chron. xv. 11. In the first of these references Ahimelech is uienticmcd as the priest who gave the bread ; but in Mark ii. 2(i the occurrence is stated as in the days of Abiathar. Both are historically true. Ahimelech was the father, Abiathar the son. The latter became distintpiished in the reign of David, and seems, from the Old Testament narratives, to have been j)re.Hent when the shewbread was given by his father to David. f See Ilosca vi. G, with which com- pare the beautiful wonLi in 1 Samuel XV. 22. THE SABBATH QUESTION AGAIN. 213 tlioritj, wliicli fails to make it a doliglit, a profit, a culture in happy goodness, is wholly invalid and is to be rejected. Man is not to be the slave of the Sabbath ; the Sabbath is to be the ser- vant of man. Man is greater than the Sabbath. lie rules it. And then Jesus added those other words, which he connects with the former by Logical process : " Wlierefore the So7i of Man is Lord of the Sabbath-day?'' He who is the Consummate Man, who is Essential Manhood, who is to exist in the minds of the coming ages as the Representative Man, he, in virtue of this Manness, is the Ruler of the Sabbath-day, and has a right to say what may be done and what may not be done on the Sabbath. It will be seen from this that he made no intimation of the abrogation of the Sabbath ; no man abrogates a kingdom by declaring himself king. lie reaffirms it. He re-estal)lishes it by removing it from the wretched circumstances of tradition and placing it where God originally intended it, on the rational basis of being the sup- ply for a demand widely created in man. liow, it commends itself to the reason of men. IS^ow, we can take the ideas of Jesus and by their light survey the Sabbath as an institution of divine beneficence. If it be not that, it is a curse. The battle on the Sabbath question continued to be urged by the Pharisees and bravely fought by Jesus. He shrank from none of its issues. lie was retiring into Galilee. „ ,, .. „ , . O JIatt. xu. : Jfark iv. ; On the very next Sabbath after the scene in the Luke vi. The battle barley-field he* entei-ed into a synagogue. It is *'°"'^""'' • not certain in what town this particular synagogue was located. Some infer from Mark iii. 1 that it was Capernaum, but there is no authority for this, and the absence of the article in the original slightly favors the opinion that it was some other syn- agogue. As his custom was, he began to teach the peoj)le when occasion for exhortation was given. The intense hatred of the Pharisaic party, and their conspiracy to crush him, reappear in a still more significant manner. It seetns to have been arranged that there should be present a man who had an arm that had been withered by a M'ouud or by disease, that they nn'ght see whether Jesus would heal on the Sabbath. That they might direct the attention of Jesus to this afl^licted man, the Scribes and Pharisees asked him : " Is Question of hcniing It lawful to heal on the Sabbath-days I " Accord- ^" ^**'= sabbath. ing to the strictest teacliiiiir of tlieir school it was not. Sham- 214 SECOND ANT) THIRD PASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. inai, the preceptor of the Great Ilillel,* and one of the earliest founders of their sect, had distinctly laid down the law : " Let nc one console the e,n•^\ nor visit the mourning on the Sabbath-day." They might therefore accuse Jesus if he healed on tlie sacred day. Heading their intents, Jcsiis said to the man witli the with- ered liand : " llise and stand fortli in the midst." And tlie man f arose and tc»ok a conspicuous position. It is to be lU'ticed that when a man has a real malady, and there appeal's any prospect of relief, how indiffci'cnt he becomes to all the ])hilosophical theories of the modes of treatment, and how absoi-bcd in the practical matter of fact in which his pereonal comfort is most deeply con- cerned. This was a fine sti'oke upon the part of Jesus. It held up the sufferer to the gaze of the assembly. It ajipealed tathe humanity of the i)ersecutors, and invited the sympathy of A counter-question. . , , . the Spectators. Jesus then turned upon ins pur suers M-ith this movement. They liad narrowed the question to the doiiuj OY i\\(i not doing on the Sabbath. l>y a counter-cpies- tion he lifted the whole subject to a loftier light : " Is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath-days, or to do evil? to save or destroy ? " The question was double-edged: on one side it cut the knot of their question ; on the other side it smote them. They were filled with hatred. They were ])ui-suing him on the Sabbath-day, trying to kill him. lie was about works of goodness, giving life, and more life, — nuikiug life joyful that had been almt)st intolerable. ''Now, who Mill be to be blamed, you who are full of murderous intent, or I, if 1 heal this sufferer? " They were silenced. Ihit he pushed the (juestioii home to them: "Suppose one of you owned a single slieej), and on the Sabbath it shotdd fall into a cistern; would he not lav hold 11)1011 him and pull him out? * Hillel was held in the very highest esteem as the most loanicd in the laws of the Jews. He was more lil)cral than his master Shammai, and the differ- ences of their teaching led their disci- ples to blows, which resulted in the death of several iwrsoiis. Hillol is re- ported by some as tl.f grandfather of that Ganialii'l who was preceptor to Saul of Tarsus. \ St. Jerome, who tran.sluted the '' Gospel according to the Hebrews " (an npocryi>hal book, .seemingly an adul- terated version of St. 3Iatthew, and much in use among the Nazarenes and Ebionites), says that this man was a stone-mason, and told his occupation to Jesus, adding that he was comjielled to obtain his food by the labor of his hands, and jirayed Jesus to heal hira, that he might no longer basely beg hia bread. THE SABBATH QUESTION AGAIN. 2l!) A man is mucli better than a sheep. Wlierefore to do good on the Sabbath is lawful." It appears from An «. w... this, that in the days of Jesus, this pulling of nuestion. a sheep out of the pit on the Sabbath was a thing allowed amongst them ; else this ad Tiominem appeal had had no force. Subsequently it was, in express terms, forbidden in the Gemara ; and only permitted to ky planks for the animal to come out ! Stier suggests that this explicit regulation was made because of the words of Jesus. But the puritanic instinct would dominate, holding on to the property while appearing very sanctimonious about the moral law. His enemies were still silent. Their hardness towards the suf- ferer, their hatred towards himself, their spiritual blindness in not seeing the merciful intent of all moral law, aroused mingled feelings in Jesus. He was angry ^^« ™'"<^°f thewith- and was sorry. He exhibited in the most sur- '""''"'^ passing manner that which appears in all noble- souls, a tender- ness for the sinful man, while the sin is hated. But, turnin<>- toward the waiting patient, he said, " Stretch forth thy hand." The man ol)eyed. He lifted it. It was as M-hole as the other arm. The cure was instantaneous and complete. It was a dis- play of mighty power and goodness. He flung himself into the hands of his foes to save this unknown sufferer. No selfishness lield him. He saw his peril, but he chose to face his fate rather than turn from a work of beneficence standing before him to be done. The Pharisees were filled with rage at this ncM-, bold, defiant disregard of their traditions. If their Sabbath laws could be set aside thus, then was their authority at an end. The blasphemy of two weeks ago they might o^•erlook; the apparent violation of the Sabbath by his disciples they might forgive, as it had not been done by him in person ; but this distinct avowal that their tra- dition was of no force was intolerable: they hated him But what could they do with him? He had not mixed medicines to give the sick. He had made no journeys to hunt up and console sutterers, in the simple way of ordinary Jewish dutv. He had gone into the synagogue, and simply said to a man, "Stretch forth thy hand." It seemed im])racticable to make a judicial case on such ground. They were as much puzzled as they were enraged; and so they went out and took counsel with the Hero- 21 C BECOND A^TD TiriKB PASSOVER IN THE LIEE OF JESUS. diaiis, how tlicy might compass the destruction of him wliose crime was tl;e lieuling of a fellow-man on the S:il)bath-day. "The Ilcrodians " are mentioned several times by the Kew- Testament historians. They were those who were the open and avowed political adherents to the family of the Tlic Herodians. -i t i • i • i ' i llcrods, m whose interest they were i-eady to make any combination, and use any of the ecclesiastical parties and theological sects that might be in existence from time to time. They were Jews more iniliicnced by political than by religious considerations. The independent nationality of the Jews was the first and last consideration with them. They believed that the Ilerodian family had the talent and the ambition to make liead against the Roman power, and so were willing to submit to them, although they ■were of foreign origin, and not sti'ict observers of the Mosaic ritual. If they were lending their intluence to a do- mestic tyi-anny, they were thus at least saved from a direct heathen domination. On this ground some of the Pharisees would be of their party. Then there were those who might l>e called liberal Jews, who had become quite lax in their belief in the dogmas of Judaism and in the observance of its stringent ceremo- nials. They favored the Ilerods as being the most promising airents in briuixini; about a combination of the Hebrew faith with the heathen civilization. On this ground some of the Sadducces would be of their })arty. Thus the leading sects would be found at different times co-operating with the Ilerodians, and the Ilero- dians using either of these sects, as the occasion might seem to indicate it could be used, for increase of political power. In this particular case the poj)ularity of Jesus was so great that the Pharisees could not openly attack him. The Ilerodians nn'ght be indiu-cd to employ their influence with Herod to have Jcsiis put out of the way on political gromids. Discovering the formation of this powerful cons])i racy against him, Jesus retired with his disciples to the shore of the Lake of (Jcnuesarct. Vast crowds followed him, not mere- Crowds follow jo«„«. ]v fr-.m the neiirhburing district of Galilee, but Mnrklii.; MntlliLWxii. • -^ '^ also from Jiuhea generally, as well as Irom the city of Jerusalem, and even from Llmiuva on the south, and from Perea beyond the Jordan, and from the coasts of Tyre and Sidon on the north-west. It was the fame of his miracles that drew them. Among the orientals, to this day, the name and fame of a THE SAr.RATII QUESTION AGAIN. 217 prophet or a miracle-workei* will agitate large sections of country, and people will abandon their ordinary employments to follow him. Jesus healed their diseased people and restored their insane. All had the benefit of his marvellous power and surpassing good- ness. "Wlien those who had "unclean spirits" cried out to him, " Thou art the Son of God," addressing him in language that ac- knowledged him as the3Icssiah, he rebuked them, and very strictly charged all who received his favor to abstain from proclaiming him. It would seem to have been his intent to do all the good lie could, scattering his l)lessings with royal bounty, but to do this unobtrusively, so as not to appear to provoke a controversy with his ecclesiastical and political enemies. Whenever they provoked it he never shrank, but met them promptly, skilfully, and with blows aimed so adroitly and delivered so powerfully that the pop- ulace rejoiced in the discomfiture of the rulers. In all other par- ticulars he so carefully avoided publicity and general popularity that to C)ne of his biographers at least (Mark iii. 17) were recalled the striking words of Isaiah (xlii. 1-4): " Behold my servant whom I uphold; my chosen, in whom my soul delighteth : I have put my spirit upon him ; he shall bring foi-th judgment to the nations. lie shall not cry, nor lift up, nor cause his \-oice to be heard in the street. A bruised reed shall he not break, and the smoking flax shall he not quench." To us at a distance this reticence, with this power, seems to be marvellous. To those who were in daily and full sight of both it must have produced a wonderful impression. So great was the crowd that his friends procured for him a small boat, which could be used as a kind of movable pulpit, so that from it he could preach to the peo])le on the ..,,,,,, .A movable pulpit beach at a distance wJiicli should not render his voice inaudible, while it should save him from the pressure of the crowd. There might also have been the additional reason of being able to go quickly from one side of the lake to the other, and thus elude the machinations of his enemies. CHAPTER III. THE TWELVE. It was a crisis with Jesus. He liad attained imnieiise popular- ity with the masses, and had aroused the deadly hatred of power- A crisia Matthew ful ecclesiastics and politicians. The posture of X. ; Markiii.; LukevL j^jg affairs was sucli that it became him to move with great caution, and to act with great despatch. "We have learned what his opinions of himself were, and have seen some- thing of his character by his words and acts in the emergencies into which his career brought him. lie must have had the sa- gacity to see now that there was only one of two courses before him : to go forward in what he believed to be the establishing of the kingdom of God, or to retreat, give up the mission, and retire into the utmost privacy and draw out an insignificant life, and leave the world merely a torso of a memory. To do the former was certain death ; to do the latter was an abandonment of the Mcssiahship. Out of Capernaum he went to a neighboring mountain alone, and spent the night, we must suppose, in looking the dread near A night is a moun- futurc in tlie face. He must have canvassed all **^ the probabilities on both sides. It must have been a night of torture to him. But he saw his way clear, and came forth in the morning prei)ared to walk it at all hazards. He must not take measures to avoid the su])reme fate, if death were necessary to achieve the great result he had set before himself as the mission of his life. But he must not both die and fail. He must manajre himself and his affairs in such a manner that before his enemies could kill him he should have so implanted the germ of his doctrines in the world that it would grow after his dcpar- tui-e. He must so instruct others in the kingdom of God that they might be able to place the torch of light in tlie upturned hands of the coming generations. He must so breatlie his spirit into other souls that even when dead ho could through thein cause his religion to live and grow in the hearts of men. THE TWELVE. 219 Wlien the morning came lie called together all those who, from whatever motive, had followed him, or shown attachment to hi.s person, or interest in his movements. And from ,11.,., , , Selection of the Twulvo. tJiem he set apart twelve men, who were to be ifear his person, to be carefully instructed in his doctrine, to re- ceive of his power to cure physical and mental maladies, ami to be representatives to the woi-ld of the princii)le? lie had taught. It will be interesting to make a study of the chai-acter of each of the men wliom Jesus would put in this extraordinary position, the men whom his choice has made inunortal. We shall take them in the order in which they are named in the sixth chapter of Luke, calling attention to the fact that they are there catalogued in pairs, as we are informed in the sixth chapter of Mark they were sent out " by two and two." It will also be noticed that the first seven had recei\ed some kind of call from Jesus before this definite setting apart to the Apostleship. 1. At the head of the list stands the name of Simon I., whonj Jesus named Peter. Simon, rrTiaJ, signifies " hearer." Kr}cf)a<;, Ce- phas, or JTeVpo'?, Peter, signifies "rock." It will be recollected that Mhen Jesus first saw him this name was gi\ en the Apostle. (Matt. xvi. 18.) Ills father's name was Jonas ; his mother's name, according to traditicm, was Johanna. He resided originally at Bethsaida, and afterward in his own house, or the house of his motlier-in-law, in Capernaum. (Luke xiv. 38.) He was brought nj) to his father's occupation ; he was a fisherman on the lake of Tiberias. This was not a vei-y exalted employment, nor was it degrading. It developed his courage, his watchfulness, his fortitude, in the self-denying labors on the sea, the night-watches, the frecpient and trying postponements which men who make their livelihood by fishing often encounter. He became a rough, ready, impetuous, hard man. He had the vices of his class. He was not always truthful, and he was profane. "We judge these to have been the vices of his youth, as we generally find that when a fierce temptation assails a man in advanced life it bi-ings out jn's earliest vices. When Peter's crisis came, in the hour of his Master's trial, he used both falsehot)d and profanity for his own safety. (John xviii. 15, 17, 25-27.) He was not a wholly unedu- cated man.* He must have enjoyed the benefit of the public' * Smith well remarks that the state- I perceived that they (Peter and John) ment in Acts iv. 13, tha^ "the council I were unlearned and ijpiorant men," ia 220 6EC0XD AND TIIIIU) PASSOVKK IN THE LIFK OF JESUS. Fcliools maintained by the commnnity in which lie lived, Avliieh the young were compelled to attend, according to a law enacted l)y Simon Ben-Slielach, one of the great leadei-s of the Pharisaic party under the Apmonean dynasty. The Holy Scriptures and the history of his country he probably knew from his eai-Iiest child- hood. The regular attendance upon the synagogue service would have been a species of education. And these remarks a}>i)ly to all the disciples. Moreover, in the case of Peter there was the culture which came from trade and intercourse with cultivated foreigners. He seems to have picked up some rudimental knowl- edge of the Greek tongue, and to have profited generally by mingling with his fellow-men of diverse education. He was not a very poor man. His father, Jonas, was a pei*son in good circumstances. Fishing was lucrative. The great pf)pn- lation of the district, the influx of ])C()ple from among the culti- vated heathen, and the pleasure-seekers whom the beauty of the lake attracted, must have afforded a good market. He may have also acfpiired money by his marriage, as the house to which he invited Jesus and his fellow-disciples would "seem to have been roomy, and to have been his property, or that of liis mother-in- law. He makes mention of the sacrifices which he had incurred to follow his Master, and Jesus does not deny that they were great.* Peter seems to have married in early life, and to have been a devoted and affectionate husband. CMement of Alexan- dria, whose testimony is made more valual)le by the fact that he was connected with the church founded by St. Mark, tells us from very ancient traditions, as other historians do, that the name of Peter's wife was Pcrpetua, by whom he had a daugliter, and per- ha]is other childivn, and that she suffered martyrdom. Paul informs us that Peter was accustomed to be accompanied by his wife on his apostolic journeys. The quality Peter most lacked is precisely that which seems to be indicated by his name, finruiess. In no way docs the word " rock " recall Peter, except as it reminds us of his hardneax. aot at all incompatible with the state- ynent made above, and tlio translation of this pa«.sago in the autlioriznd version is rather ex!4Jgoratod. the wonl ren- dered "unlearned" beinjf rather equiv- alent to " laymen "—men of ordinaiy education, not Bpccially trained in the schools of the rabbis— so that the tenn miffht have been api)lied to a man thor- oughly conversant with the ScriptureH. ♦ Mutt. xix. 27. THE TWELVE. 221 He was hard and unstable. He asked Jesus to invite him to come to him on tlie water, and when bidden lie started off boldly, soon lost courage, and began to sink.* At the last supper which Jesus had with his apostles, the Master offered to wash the feet of his disciples as a symbol. Peter vehemently refused, but at a word from Jesus iinpetuotisly thrust forward his hands aud his head.f When his Master was betrayed he frantically undertook, single-handed, to fight the whole body of Koman soldiers; but when Jesus ordered him to put up his sword he fled, and left his Master in the hands of his foes.:}: With another disciple he fol- lowed Jesus into the palace of the high-priest, and when the crisis came he denied all knowledge of his Master, and did this with oaths and vehement protestations.§ After the Christian society began to take form, he was in the front of the inovement to baptize conveited Gentiles ; but when opposition came from the Judaizing element in the Christian community, he inglorious- ly abandoned his position.]! And yet there was something so daring and dashing, so eagle swift, so unthoughtful of consequences, so sympathetic and elas- tic in this nuin, as to nuike him most receptive of such spiritual influences as the character of Jesus would produce upon the human heart, and most capable of being the ardent pioneer preacher of a new faith, lie led the band of Apostles as a bold chieftain would his chui. 2. The next Apostle in the catalogue is Andrkw, whose name is Greek, 'AuSp€ainting out Jesus as " the Lamb of God.*' " His earliest act as a follower of Jesus was his bringing his brother Peter to the newly found Mas- ter. He is mentioned with thi-ee other disciples as being in a confidential interview with Jesus, making inquiries concerning tlie destruction of the holy city.f lie also appears in connec- tion with the history of the feeding of the five thousand.:}: Be- yond this there appears no reference to Andrew. 3. The third Apostle is James, whom we designate as James I., to distinguish him fi-om James the son of Alphaius. There were perhai»s eight of this name mentioned in the New ""*^ Testament Scriptures. As held by the Apostles it was " Jacob," and it has been noticed that in them it reai)i)ears for tlie fii-st time since it was borne by the Patriarch himself. The Greeks called it 'Ia/ca/8o?, accenting the fii-st sylhible, and the Latins Jacobus, probably accented as the (Jreek name, since the Italian is Giacomo, or lacomo. In Sj^anish it took two fcjrms, lago and Xaymc, or Jayme, pronounced Ilayme, with strong ini- tial guttui-al. In French it became Jaccpies and Jame, from which the transition is easy to our James. It exists in Wycliffe's Bible, i381.§ In the East, St. James is still St. Jacob, 2lar Yakoob. This James was the son of Zebedee, a well-to-do fisherman on the Lake, of Galilee. lie was the brother of that John who, according to his own account, became such a favorite with his Master. The year before his appointment to the Apostolic col- lege he had been called to be a disciple of Jesus.l As we trace the history of Jesus we shall find James admitted to the raising of Jairus's daughter,! and also nuide one of the three witnesses to the Transfiguration.** His furious temper is shown in his de- sire to call down lire from heaven to destroy a Samaritan village.t+ The ambition of himself and his brother John is shown in their re(piest, thron^h their nK.tlier, to be ])romoted to the joint premiei- ship in the new kingdom which they believed Jesus as the Messiah ♦ John i. 30. f M.irk xiii. 3. X Jolm XV. 9. t^ For thiH Bf-e a full note by Mr. Grove, in Smith's Dictionary. I Mark i. 20. i Mark v. 37 ; Luke viii. 51. *» Matt. xvii. 1 ; Luke ix. 28L f f Luke ix. 54. THE TWELVE. 223 was about to inaugurate.* He was present at the agony in tho garden of Gethseniane,t and is mentioned in connection with the Ascension.:}: In the year 44, as it is supposed, about the time of tlie Passover, lie was put to death by Herod Agrippa, a bigoted Pliai'isee, who slew James with the sword,§ according to the Jewish law, that if seducers to a strange worship were few, they should be stoned ; if many, they should be beheaded. It has been noticed that earlier in the history John is mentioned as the brother of James, showing the superior age or position of the latter ; but in the later history the place of honor is assio-ned to John by calling James his brother. James was the first of the Ajwstles to suffer martyrdom. 4. John, son of Zebedee by Salome, being brother to James, is or. linarily mentioned with him, as Andrew is with Peter. These fo ir were the leading spirits of the body of the dirciples. To James and J(^hn Jesus gave the ^°^' name ^ayr.?, Boan' erget' s, the Gaiila^an pronunciation of the Syro-Chaldee words i':-] ^33, Benai Rhjaz, " Sons of Commotion," or " Sons of Thunder," probably given because of their impetuous temper. The name John has its equivalent in Theodore meanino- " the gift of God." " In the Kew-Testament memoirs he is represented as the inti- mate friend and almost constant companion of Simon Peter, and as the most single-minded and devoted of all the men who loved and followed Jesus. He had been brought up to a life of labor, but does not seem to have come from the very poorest class. His father, Zebedee, and mother, Salome, were above many of their fellow-citizens. AVe hear that the father employed " hired ser- vants " on his fisheries CMark i. 20) ; that probably after his death the mother had some substance (T.uke viii. 3), and that John him- self had '< his own house." (John xix. 2.7.) He had had the usual instruction of Jewish lads, had gained what a quick boy would gather from his regular religious visits to the Temple, and had probably sympathized with the occasional political movements that contemplated the throwing off the Eoman yoke from the Hebrew neck. His name was one which began to be given to children born in the sacerdotal circles, and was probably rendered * Mark x. 35. j J Acts i. 13. t Matt. xxvi. 37. j g Acts xiL 1. 224 SECOND AND THIRD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. all the more popular by the circumstances of marvel which had attended the birth of John the Bajitist, and by the general hope tliat" God's i^ift," Jehovah's special gift of grace, the Messiali, was aljout to be bestowed upon the world. John nnist have been quite young when called to the Aposto- late, as we learn that he was still alive in the days of the Emperor Trajan, The appearance of John the Baptist at Jordan roused the religious fervor of the young man, who became a disciple of his namesake. lie was an earnest seeker after truth, and this led him to follow Jesus on Jolm's saying that he was the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world, and this predominant characteristic, notwithstanding his faults of temj)er, won him the love of Jesus. AVith Peter and James we find him in the cham- ber where the dead daughter of Jairus was brought to life, amid tlie dazzling si)lendoi*s of the Transfiguration, at the solenm an- nouncement of tlie impending destruction of the holy city, in the garden of Gctlisemano, at the fearful agony, and near the cross as Jesus expiiod. lie had nothing of that soft effeminate manner which is so ut^ually assigned to him. lie never married, lie was very passionate, narrow-minded, ambitious, and vain, as is shown in his hatred of the Samaritans, liis desii-e to consume a village with iii'e, his attempt to extort a pledge from Jesus to share the highest honors of the new dynasty between himself and his brother, and the way he alludes to him- self in his writings. But he loved the ti-uth, and he loved Jesu3 with a supreme passion, which subsequently ripened and mellowed his character into exce(;ding sweetness and beauty. And Jesus loved him. lie leaned on the bosom of the Master at the Last Supper, and received from him the tender consignment of his mother when the Master died. To him and Peter, Mary of Mag- dala brought the news of the resurrection of Jesus. Although Peter had denied the Lord, the old friendshij) survived, and the penitent friend was received again with warmth. John grew out of his narrowness so much as to lose all his ])rejudices against the Samaritans, and to become willing to re(H3ive them into the Chris- tian society, in which his 8ubse<]uent position wsis one of honor and usefulness, or<>:anizinut these men were all laymen, and had neither political influence nor intellectual culture; they had no standing even among their own people, and certainly no influence ■with their conquerors and civil rulers. Peter and Andrew were brothei-8. So were James I. and John, the friends of Peter and Andrew. So were James II. and Judas I. Four of them had been disciples of the ascetic John the Baptist. All of them, except Judas Iscariot, were of the most uncouth part of the Jewish popula tion ; they were Galileans, and several of them fishermen. They spoke their vernacular brokenly. It is as if a man should select a dozen negroes, of average character, from the plantations of the Southern States of America, and set them on the work of revolu lionizing the ])hilosophy of all schools, and the elements of all civilization, and the systems of all religi(»n. It is to be noticed that they did not choose liim : he chose them. This he tells them. (John xv. IG.) This is true of their They did not choo«, p"blic Work. They had gathered about him and ^^ clung together through pereonal love of him, but thcv liad not settled it in their minds precisely what he was, and THE TWELVE. 239 their re^^ard for him was largely mingled with an expectation of future secular good and glorj, if their general expectation should prove correct. " Wliat shall we have, therefore ? " was the ques- tion of Peter, who, with all liis faults, was certainly not the most selfish among the disciples. (Matt. xix. 27.) It is to be specially noticed that there is nothing of the modern Church idea in anything done by Jesus on this or any other occa- sion.* These men were not inducted into any Nothing of the priestly office, or given any pre-eminence over "Chiirch"idea. their brethren. They were distinguished, discriminated, set apart for a special work, but not clothed with corporate powers. There was no baptism or any other rite indicative of an entrance upon church membership. Jesus did not baptize. Ilis disciples had done so, but they had taken the idea from John the Baptist, wha baptized those who were already in the church, and whose ba|> tism was to indicate the Messiah. If an outward formal sign did no good, it did no hurt, and Jesus had allowed it. But he had established no sacrament. These men hod no creed. There was no creed. They loved Jesus. They h^ped great things from Jesus. lie loved them, and intended to instruct them, and leave with them " the gospel of tlie kingdom," What he seems to have seen in them, and what was the basis of their call, was the reli- giousness of their general character. Whatever culture they lacked, and whatever faults they had, they had devoutness, devo- tedness, the capability of giving themselves finally and fully up to an idea: they had some certain noticeable genius for religion. Them he selected to instruct ; but he gave them no eaoteric cul- ture ; told them nothing about himself which he did not tell the multitude ; imparted nothing which should in any manner give them any title to rule others who believed on him. Luke (vi. 13) says that he " named them Apostles," and Mark (iii. 14, 15) says that " he ordained twelve, that they should he with him, and that he might send them forth to preach, and to have power to heal sick- ness and to cast out devils." To be wholly given to the work of teaching the truth, and doing good to the bodies and souls of men, was the work of these men sejit of Jesus, and therefore called * The word translated "church" occurs only twice in the histories of Jesus, namely, in Matt. x\\. 18, and Matt, xriii. 17, in neither of which, it seems to me, can impartial criticism find anything like the modem " close corporation " idea. They will be exam* iued in their places. 240 SECOND AXD THIKD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESITS. Apostles. Some organization naturally took place, after the death of Jesus, keeping together those who loved him. But that they were to be considered a close corporation, keeping all of Christianity, all the beautiful and precious legacy of Jesus, tc themselves, with powers to transmit to future generations of suc- cessors by mesne descent, never seems to have entered the mind of Jesus, or any of The Twelve. AXCISMT lAKF-BTUriX CHAPTER IV. THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT. Having set apart liis cliosen ambassadors, it remained that Jesus should set forth the principles of his religion, give some such evidence of liis divine right to teach as Koar capemaum. should be able to move the generation around ^''"- "■'■' ^''•' '"- him, and impart his spirit to those who were to infuse it into the world. He proceeded at once to this work. The first movement was the delivery of a discourse, wliich has been known generally as the ^'Sermon on the Mount ^^ reports of which are furnished us by Matthew and Luke. It would require a much larger volume than this to give the lit- erature which has grown around the questions of tlie time and place of delivery of this " sermon," and whether Matthew and Luke report the same or different discourses. And the literature of the sermon itself would make a library quite respectable in point of size. It is clear that much must be condensed. The place was a mountain. It could not have been very far from the lake. The earliest tradition of the spot is as late as the middle of the thirteenth century. That makes it TT p TT • M 1 riacc of delivery. what is now called the " Horns of Hattin, be- tween Tiberias and Mt. Tabor, seven miles from Capernaum, in a south-westerly direction. Dr. Robinson {Researches, ii. p. 307) gives the following description of this spot : " The road passes down to Hattin on the west of the Tell ; as we approached, wo turned off from the path toward the right, in order to ascend tho Eastern Horn. As seen on this side, the Tell, or mountain, isi merely a low ridge, some thirty or forty feet in height, and not ten. minutes in length from east to west. At its eastern end is an elevated point or horn, perha])S sixty feet above the ])lain ; and at the western end another, not so high ; these give to the ridge, at a distance, the appearance of a saddle, and are called Ivuruii Hattin, ' Horns of Hattin.'' But the singularity of the ridge is, 10 242 SECOND A^'D TllIUD I'ASSOA'EK IN TflK I.IFE OF JESUS. that, on reacliiiig the top, you fintl tliut it lies along the very bor- der of llie great sontliern plain, where this latter sinks off at once, by a precipitous offset, to the lower j)lain of Hattin, from M-hich the northern side of Tell rises very stee})ly not nineh less than four hunilred feet. . . . 21ic suiiiniit of tJie luifnterii llorn ?.s- a little circular plain., and the top of tlui lower ridge hetween llf two Jiorns is also fattened to a plain. The whole mountain is of limestone." Dr. Stanley (Staidey's iSinai and Palestine, p. ?,(\0) gives the following: " The ti'adition [of the Latin Church, w liich selects this si>ot as the 'Mount of ]*>eatitudes '] cannot lay claim to any early date ; it was in all i)robability suggested lirst to the Crusaders by its remarkable situation. Cut that situation so strikingly coincides with the intimations of Gospel narrative, as almost to force the inference that in this instance the eye of those who selected the spat was for once rightly guided. It is the onl}' lieight seen in this direction from the shores of the Lake Clcnne- saret. The plain on which it stands is easily accessible from the lake, and from that plain to the summit is but a few minutes' walk. The platform at the top is evidently suitable for the collection of a nudtitude, and corresponds precisely t(; the ' level place' (tottou Trehcvov), (mistranslated 'plain' in Luke vi. 17) to which he 'would come down' as from one of its higher horns to addi'ess the ])eople. Its situation is central both to the peasants of the Galihean hills and the lishermen of the Galiloian lake, between •u-hich it stands, and would, therefore, be a natural resort both to 'Jesus and his disciples ' (Matt. iv. 25, and v. 1), when they retired for solitude fi-om the shores of the sea, and also to the crowds who assembled 'from Galilee, fiom Decapolis, from Jerusalem, from Juda'a, and from beyond Jordan,' None of the other mountains in the neighborhood could answer equally well to this description, inasnmch as they are merged into the uniform l)ariier of hills iMund the lake ; whereas this stands separate, — ^ the momi- tain,' which alone could lay claim to a distinct r.ame, with the ex- ception of the one height of Tabor, which is too distant to an- swer the rert« by Mnithcw identical is (piite peri>lexiug, Jis there seem to be andLuko. gravc objectious to both supjKjsitious. That they are identical is believed by most readci-s upon a superiicial in THE SEKMON ON TTIE MOUNT. 243 Bpcction, find is inaintained generally by most German commen- tatoi's. And then efforts must be made to explain the diiferencea •which occur in the two. In Luke we have only about one-third the matter given by Matthew, four of the beatitudes being " bal- anced by four woes," as Dean Alford notices; and some intro ductory sayings are recorded M'hich do not appear in Matthew. That tliey are two different discourses is held by a number of writers, and among them Greswell {Dissert, xxvi.). Against this it is ui-ged as improbable that he should have delivered two distinct discourses so nearly alike, and both so near the begin- ning of his public ministiy. The beginnings and the conclu- pions in both discourses agi'ec. They seem to be the same, and different. Matthew tells us that the sermon was delivered on a mount ; Luke, that it was on a })lain. If both histories be read carefully and without prejudice, I think the following will occur to the reader as the probable state of the case : AVHiat we find re])ortcd l)y both Matthew and Luke must have been delivered during the same journey through Galilee, and at the close of that journey. AVliat Luke reports, if it be not the same, must have been delivered immediately after the discourse Matthew gives ; but his report is so connected as to compel the abandonment of the theor}' that it is a number of the apoph- thegms, delivered at different times, recollected by Matthew and strung together. The people had gathered in great crowds about Jesus. lie went up into the mountain. His disciples came to him. Others must have accompanied his disciples. lie deliv- ered the discourse which is begun in ]\Iatt. v. 3. When that was completed he commenced to descend the mountain. On the plateau below he found gi-eater multitudes. He repeated some things he had just spoken, and added others, making together the ppeech which begins in Luke vi. 20. It is not right to speak of tlic former as esoteric and the latter as exotey^c. There was nothing of that style in Jesus, All is outspoken truth — such truth as individual men in every stage of culture need. But it is to be admitted, to his more select and friendly audience he should have spoken more freely of the Scribes and Pharisees than to a promiscuous assemblage. This statement of the case is, at least, a natural one, as all who liave preached to crowds in rural districts must know, and consists with all the major and minor incidents related by both historiani 244 8EC0.VT) A>.'D TUIKD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JF^US. It ao;reos, too, ■with tlie pliysical conditions of tlic Mount of Beatitudes, if that Bolected by tradition be the mount, as tlie do Bcriptions given above exhibit, especially the i)assage from Dr. Ro]>inson uhich is italicized. It agrees with such iucidents as this: Matthew says that he sat, Luke that he stood ; and the former he naturally woidd do on rising ground, the latter on a plain. Matthew represents his audience as coining to him after he had taken his scat, Luke as being about him when he began ; and this is just what would have taken place if the case be as is suj)posed above. It is to be noticed, also, that the case of the centuiion in Capernaum ft>ll()ws close upon Matthew's account, and innuedi- ately npon Luke's, thus drawing these two discoui-ses together in the history. CIKCITMSTANCES. Before entering nix)n a consideration of the teachings of this extraordinary sermon, let ns endeavor to place ourselves amid the circnmstances of its delivery. The si)ot was one of the most beautiful in all Palestine. "While on other occasions Jesus " preferred the unostentatious and obscure. he seems to have selected the most enchanting spot in nature as the tem)»lc in which to o}>en his ministry. Travellei-s ai-e wont to liken the mountain scenery of (ialilee to the iinest in their na- tive lands, — the Swede, llasselquist, to E;\st Gothland, and Clarke, the Englishman, to the romantic dales of Kent and Surrey. The environs of the Galilajan Sea have been compared with the border of the lake of Geneva."* The blooming landscape lay before the speaker, the neighboring hills enriched with vineyards, while to the west stood wooded Carmel,and snowy Ilermon to the north, and down before him, seeming almost at his feet, the bright Lake of Galilee, glittering and ripi)ling in its frame of forest. The vault of that cathedral was the oriental sky, seen through an atmosphere BO transi)arent that one who had spent a tpiarter of a century in tlic Holy Land says of it : " One seems to look quite to the bot- tom of heavc^n's i)rofoundcst azure, where the everlasting stai-3 abide;" and, standing in licirut, he says, " Ilow sharply defined 18 every rock and ia\inc, and tree and house, on h)fty Lebanon! That vir«'in snow on its sunnnit is thirty miles off, and yet you ♦ Tholuck, Edinb. Bib. Cab., No. vi. p. 73. THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT. 245 could almost read your o\vii uame there, if "written with a bold liand on its calm cold brow." "■ It was in the sprini^ or early sunnner, when Xature was in hei most luscious richness. It was in the early morning, when the fresh est sweetness of the day's smile fell on land and sea. m . *" ' . . The tiiuc. The birds had not fallen from the height of their morning songs to the drowse of the heated hours. The crowds were collecting from every part, dra^'n b\' curiosity, wonder, love, or by the strange power with which all crowds of people have to swell themselves. The Messianic expectations had become more vehe- mently excited, and it was supposed that Jesus would soon declare himself, and let the people know what he intended to do, and what to teach. As it was the iirst, so it was the grandest specimen of field-preaching. The journeyings of Jesus, and his works and words, had drawn great multitudes from the thickly settled Galilee, from Decapolis, from Jerusalem, and the neighboring disti'icts of Judiea ; from the east of the Jordan, and from as far west as the coasts of Tyre or Sidon. (Mat. iv. 25, and Luke vi. 17.) It was an occasion of transcendent religious intci-est and iuijtortance. The congregation was great, the exj>ectation was great, the Teacher was great. No discourse ever delivered is so worthy of study and analysis as this. It is worth the while to endeavor to dis- cover what there is in it which has produced such an impression upon men and done so much for the moral elevation of the world. THE TEXT. If it may be permitted to suggest the text of this sermon as it lay in the mind of the great and influential Speaker, I should say that it is " Character:' AVith the suddeimess of lightning and with the sharpness of a Burgeon's seal pel he penetrates to the core of all life in the very fii-st Fcntence. lie has no exordium, no pompously announced plar, no rhetorical rests and starts and other tricks. Without prefa- tory, introductory, or apologetic remarks, he plunges right into his subject. His first announcements tear away all the shams of Pharisaism, all the millinery of churchism, and all the pretensions of perfunctory and transmitted religion. To him succession is • Thomson, Land and Book, voL L p. 17. ^46 SECOND AND TTimD PASSOTER IN THE LITE 07 JESUS. rotliing; nothing to be of Abraham's seed or Aaron's lineage. Each man stands out before him, the subject of Iiis study, tlio object of liis description ; and each man stands in the loneness of his individual responsibility, with no claim upon attention but his character, and no fountain of happiness but his character. Cir- cun^iStances count for nothijig. Hiches, rank, and honors do not make the supreme distinction among men. Being i)i the chuj-ch or outside does not discriminate men as touching their chief dif- ference. I>y waters of baptism, by imposition of hands, by priestly garments, by bishop's mitre, by high-priest's breastplate, a man docs not attain to the jx>sition for which he was designed and for which he longs. Nor do even outward acts, however consonant with prevailing ideas of morality, however conservative of the commonwealth, however consistent with all the best men's views of what should be a good man's life. All these things may be- long to a man, and yet he may not be what he should be — ILvrry. The great distinction among men lies in this : the being hai>py and blessed, or otherwise. Kot in being free from care, bereave- ment, the saddening facts of human history which fall into every man's life at some time, but in having such a character that the outward shall neither weaken nor contaminate the imifcr,so that the man shall not depend upon fountains outside, but be secure in the possession of springs inside. A man is like a walled city. If the supply of its water be from lakes or rivei-s outside, that are brought down by acpieducts into reservoii-s, from which, by leading-pii)es, it is distributed through the city, then when the enemy destroys the aqueducts the city nuist capitulate or the inhabitants perish. So with a man's soul. If he is compelled to hrlng in joys his condi- tion is most precarious, and he is not happy ; it is most undignilied, and he is not Idesscd. But if he sends out joys his condition is in his own liands, and he is happy; he is im[)arting to others and he is blessed. It must be recollected that the company whom Jesus was addressing was surrounded on the ecclesiastical side by chui-chism, by teachci-s who insisted upon everything consisting in being Abraham's children; anprcssion of an empire that had no sympathy with their religion, and no care for their temporal ])rospei'ity, beyond the point at which they could be plundered to enrich their heatlien eonijueroi-s. They were longing for a !^^essi:lll, a n)essenger from Jeho\nh, who ehould be their Deliverer. Ihithe would not hasten hiscomin;r, and THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT. 247 their souls M^erc faint -with expectation. Naturally these people needed rest and ]iaj)piucss. This i^reat Teacher taught them the lessons men need in all ages, a religion which makes the man the nuister of circumstances by breaking the tyranny of his surround- ings and setting up an inward kingdom, making the Inner the ruler of the Outward. It was a reversal of all their Rabbis had taught them, and all their conquerors had im})rcssed iip(jn them. The former had given them a religion which consisted wholly in fijrms and cero- monies and rituals; the latter had flaunted their riches and paraded their power in the presence of those who had been the W(n-ld's aris- tocracy, but who were then impoverished, degraded, and disheart- ened. David's glory and Solomon's s})lendor had paled before the magnificence of a heathen imperialism. Very far away seemed all the grand history of tlie march of their ancestoi-s through the deseit, when Jehovah cared for their commissariat and went before them in the solemn pillar of fire and cloud. In ghostly thinness walked before their fancies the forms of their Judges, who in olden time were men of such might of brain and brawn. The Urim and Thummim were oracular no longer, and the voices of their prophets were as the songs of childhood's li(5pc- fulness repeated to the cars of j^aralyzed and depressed and despaiiing old age. And they were looking for a temporal Deliverer, one who should ' break the Homan yoke. If that could be done, if Ciesar's power could be thi-own off, if a king should sit on David's throne with whom Caisar would be compelled to treat as with a superior, if all nations should acknowledge the Hebrew suprenuu-y, then the land should flow ^\■ith milk and honey, and all the trees of the field should clap their hands, and under every vine and every fig- tree should be seated a contented and happy Jew, and the days of the riglit hand of the Most High should visit and rejoice his chosen. Alas! poor people, they could not rid themselves of the connnon hallucination that a man is made happy by his surround- ings. They could not see that the Koman, who had might and glor}', M'as not a happy man. Jesus saw this great increasing multitude of people hungry for Bomething. He knew tlie sad mistake of their souls. He had BhoM-n himself in all his life a pei-son of exquisite and pi-ofound Bympathy. On this occasion he seemed full of an interest which 24S 6ECOM) AND THinD PASSOVKU IX THK I.lFi: OF .nSSUS. was i^roM-iiig ill liiiii, aiitl wlicn tlic time came and tliey were look ini; that he should dechire himself, that he should deliue his posi- tiou, that he should give some intimation of his desii^ns, and pcr- liaps of his i)lans, that he should at once openly unfurl the ban ner of the Messianic campaiy or blessed man. And these we must carefully exam- ine that we may find the jihilosophy of this Teacher, and learn if ])ossible the method of this discourse. It will be seen that they all describe cJiaracter, and that there is noi)lace for rank or wealth or any of the outward distinctions of human life. "The poor in spirit" is the first characteristic. As this is a kind of key-note, it is not to be wondered that there has been much diversity of oj)inion as to the meaning of Jesus. When we come to see how sjtiritual is the whole tone of this discourse, we are forced to feel that mere poverty, lack of material wealth, which is the ni(jst literal bare sense of the word " poor," cannot have been meant. It has been suggested * that the words are to be collocated BO as to read, "Happy in spirit are the poor." IJut there is nc authority for this arrangement of the words, and the oldest MS.f * By Biich writora or Olcariiu, Wet- I f The Sinaitie Codex. ■teux, Micbaclis, and Paulua. I TITE SERMON ON TITE JIOHNT. 249 extant gives the order MaKapioi, oi ittw^oi t({> irveVfj^arL^ and if tlio arrangement wei'C as suggested above, it would l)reak tlie synuno- trj of the beatitudes, and, finally, it would be notoriously false. The people that listened to Jesus were poor enough and nnhappy enouijh. It Avould have been to them neither instruction nor com- fort to tell them in rhetorical flourish that the poor are happy. "When the Emperor Julian, in the fouilh centnr}^, said that his only object in confiscating the property of Christians M'as that their poverty might confer on them a title to the hingdc^n of heaven, instead of a bitter scoff it would have been a benevolent thing in the Apostate, if Jesus meant mere literal poverty. And then it should follow that if one would benefit one's fellow, the vei-y best method is to take his property, burn his houses, strip him, and turn him naked and empty on the world. There can be no interpretation put upon the words of a man of common Bcnse which shocks common sense. Moreover, Jesus was a man who was extraordinarily spiritual, and as far as possible from being gross in his modes of thought. lie was surpassingly sagacnous, and as far as possible from being stupid, and therefore could have had no meaning contradicted by the whole hist(M-y of the race. The phrase has been translated to signify voluntary poverty, poverty from a spirit of being poor, "qui propter Spiritum Sanc- tum Yoluntate sunt pauperes," as Jerome says. But that agrees neither with the genius of the language nor with the analogy of the discourse. Precisely the sainu graunnatical construction re- curs in verse 8, and the reader will see how violent a similar ren- dering would be in that passage. There are two interpretations which may be accepted as being more natural under the circumstances, and more in accordance with the whole drift of the discourse. One is by Clement of Alexandria, who thinks that when Jesus pronounced the j)^')^ blessed, he meant all those who, whether as to worldly goods rich or poor, do inwardly sit loose from their property, and conse- quently in that way are poor, — a view similar to that of Paul in i. Cor. vii. 29 : " they that have as though they have not." That may be a truth included in what Jesus taught on this occasion, but is that the teaching ? Let us see if we cannot find a still more natural interpretation. Let us recollect the state of mind of those Avhom he was ad- dressing. "What specially made them unhappy was their sense of 250 SKCOXD AXD THIRD TASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. their woi-ldly poverty as imlividiials and as a nation. In any age of the worhl, to any people, that is most galling. The emharrass- ments and dogi-adation of such a condition go far towards break- ing the spirit of a man. In striving to reacOi the meaning of Jesus, all a ci-itical historian can do, and perhaps all that any one ought to do, is first to know, if practicable, what wei-e the precise words employed, and then to ascertain how those identi- cal words would be nndci-stood generally by the avoi'age minds of those who composed the very audiences he addi'csscd. If the Bpeakcr be not a fool or a charlatan he will sti-i\e to find for his ideas just those words wliich when nttered to the ears of another will put in the mind of tlic hearer the idea that is in the mind of the speaker. Jesus had lived with the people he addiessed. Their vernacular was his mother-tongue. He knew their hopes and fears, their opinions and prejudices, their modes of thought and methods of sjieech. He was of the people. lie v.as not a dema- gogue, in the sense of one who vilely leads the people astray by playing upon their weaknesses for his own advantage. lie was a DemaiTorjus in the loftv sense of one who exerts his suiieiior abil- ity to lead tlie thoughtless and passionate multitude into sound thinking and right acting. He will speak Avords that shall be comprehensible by them in their fii-st intent and present mean- ing, even if he include therein a profound meaning which shall develop itself with the developing ages. "Wlien, therefore, wo come, as now we nmst come, to consider the meaning of Jesus, we must endeavor to ascertain M'hat his words woidd mean to the average mind in all thar. Galilajan and Judiean and Iduuiiuan crowd that stood about him ; men and women who were living before the early Christian fathers, and the decisions of councils, and o]»inions of those commentatoi-s who run the golden woi-ds of the Teaclivr into the moulds of their own theories ; men and wo- men who lived aires bef»jrc Augustine, and Arminius, and Luther, and Calvin, and Wesley, and Paulus, and Tholuck, and Strauss. To sJU'h a ci-owd these words most probably meant that they were mihaiijiy who suffered themselves to be afllicted by a sense of their want of mateiial i»rosperity, but they were happy Avho felt the want in their spirits, their s})iritual neediness and poverty ; who would be mdia]>i>y if sitting on Caesar's throne with empty Bouls, but happy amid starvation if spirit\ially rich. In general It was a statement of the superiority of the s^iiritual to the corpo- THE SERMON ON TITE MOUNT. 251 real. His hearers "were in Avrctched I'cstlessness Lccaupc tlic ISFcs- Biali did not liasten to coiuc and l)rcak the Roman yoke. They felt their poverty as to the Jlcah^ but not their povei'ty as to thb spirit^ and they were unliappy. The first words of Jesns in this disconrse Avere snch as shocked their hopes of secnlar deliverance, [t is as if he had said : My conntrynien, yon desire nie to leae conifoi-totl. seen the heathen in great power and apparent happiness. They had seen the magnificent towns and villas which * Luke, in vi. 20, calls it " the king- dom of God." The most natural trans- lation of the phrase in Matthew is "the kingdom of the universe;" but both mean finally the same thing, aa God reigns throughout the universe. 252 SECOXD AND TIIIKD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. had been erected along the shores of tlieir lake hy their political lords, and had witnessed all the pleasnres which they seemed to enjoy in their mansions, with goodly fnrnittn-e and manifold ap- pliances of Inxnry. Those happy Romans did not mourn. They had not seen trailing in the dust the standards which their an- cestors had made irlorions. They did not feel roval hlood tiu'diiiir in them as llioy bowed their necks to a foi-eign yoke. To the conqueriMl Jew they Avcre at once objects of hate and of envy. And now to those Jews Jesus says that they wlio mourn are haj)- py ! l>ut we must read his words in the light afftnilcd by the text as well as with the aids furnished by the cii'cumstances. lie is teaching that everything depends upon character, the inner man. He is drawing them away from externals as a basis of hai>piness. The man who bewails not his tem[)oi-al and physical wants, but his si)iritual needs, is not a man to be so nnich compas- sionated, lie shall be comforted. He who whines and wails over his worldly condition may go on whining and wailing. lie has no assurance that he shall have his condition improved. ]Jut the man, rich or })oor, king or peasant, who feels that to be poverty- stricken in his soul is the greatest misfortune, and one by all means to be remedied, — who, when he detects himself lacking truth, courage, self-control, mourns over that more than over the absence of meats and wines and conches, and whatever money buys, — such a man is a blessed man ; for he shall be com- forted. The Jews had lost Judaea. A conquered people who remain in the land arc jrreater suffei-ers than those who are banished or cro Happy the mo,.k. for Voluntarily into exile. The Jews remained on thpy Rhuu inherit the sufferancc, Tlicy were put under the yoke, sub- jugated, saw others rule what once had belonged to them, and had been under their contiol in fee. Having been mastei-s, they were now slaves. They were far from being " meek." They wei'c very far from submitting to the inevitable, but" kicked against the jtricks," and rubbed against the yoke, and aggi-avatcd their suiTcrings by their hatred of the compieror, and by foolish, vain, unfoundccl hopes. Once more Jesus turned them from tiie outside to the imier man, and pointed to the hap})iness of those who were gentle in spirit, who soothed themselves and those al)Out them by the (juiet self-possession of their own soids. Again he disap])ointed their political hopes by giving a spiritual inter])reta- THE SEEMON ON THE MOUNT. 253 tion to a pln-asc witli which they were familiar." Their huid was holy laud, hecaiiso ^promised land, given by Jehoiali to Abraham and his seed to possess it. It was to them the type and the per- petual prophecy of that better land beyond death. Tliere never has existed a i)eople who had a nK^re desperate and fanatical at- tachment to the soil upon which they were born than the Jews. Their patriotism M'as their reliirion, and their religion their pa- triotism. The land of Abraham was heaven on eai-th. To be in Abraham's bcjsom was to consununate the hopes of earth by what- ever bliss might be in heaven. The Eomans held the land of Abraham. The Jews, ^vllo wei-e plotting revolts and stirring up insurrections, Avere losing every- thing. They were missing all domestic enjoyment ; thoy were failing to improve their lands and their houses, and to promote the growth of true religion among their children ; so that while they "dwelt in the land " it was as prisoners. All they loved was going^ to decay before their eyes. They wei-c afilictcd with a mania which has not died out from among men, Ijut e\-ery now and then in modei-n times breaks forth, a feverish feeling that everything depends upon the political condition of a people. Proud, violent men inflame the people with this idea. Proud, violent men believe that happiness is in high i)ositi()n and fame' in being in a condition to lord it over their fellows. It is all a mistake. A man who has a quiet good soul can be just as good and great, can live as ha])pily and die as nubly in Puissia as in France, in France as in England, in England as in America. Emperor, king, president, it makes so little difference that it is not worth one human life to change it. An ambitious, selfish, ill-tempered, weak man will be unhai)iiy anywhere. A meek man is not a weak man, but one who has the strength to hold liimself in, as one by a strong bridle holds a stroiig and fiery horse. He will be happy anywhere. He will inherit the earth. He M-ill be in the enjoyable possession of the earth, fur that is the meaning of the Avords. This is a general truth. Conqueroi-s over- run a land, but they do not enjoy it. The king is often overbur- * Compare Deut. xix. 14; Psalm xx v. 13 ; xxxvii. 9, for variatious of this phrase. "The laud " is spokeu of re- peatedly through Deuteronomy as be- longing to the Jewish people. All are familiar w-ith the words in the Fifth Commimdment. Jesus iu this passage uses the precise phrase which occurs in I's. XXX vii. 11. 2j4 6EC0XD AND TIIIKD PASSOVEK IX THE LIFE OF JESUS. dcncd witli tlic load of statcship, and lidcs in magnificent wcari- nops over inniicnse domains from Avliicli he can draw no increase of delight ; while down those valleys and on those hill-slopes, in a thctusand cottages, arc multitndes of men and women and little cliildi-en who really " inherit," by enjoying all the earth can yield of physical delight, and in those cloisters arc many stndents who "iidicrit" by enjoying all the intellectual delights wliich a study of the earth can give. If these people whom Jesus addressed were expecting that in the reign of the Messiah they should have material riches, worldly pleasures, and the indulgence of the ])ride of power, and if they supposed Jesus to be the Messiah, they M-cre to be disappointed. He was no i-evolutionist. He Avas no political preacher. lie had a dee] )er, loftier nn'ssion. lie had not come to "fire the Jewish heait," but to purify the spiritual life of the world. So through- out this discourse he describes all excellence as consisting in character, and all real happiness as having its fountains in the soul. There is not a single beatitude which has its basis in exter- nal things. Jesus thus j)laiidy instructs them in the beginning that they are not to regard him as being about to add himself to the number of those conquerors who di\ide the acquired territory among their followers. They may have been expecting that he should subdue the world and give it to the Jewish people. lie had no su(th intent. Those that hxjked for such things need not be followei's of Jesus. There was no happiness in all this worldly, exorliitant, insatiable heat. The kingdom he should set up would bo in the hearts of men. And so, Avhenever occasion served, Jesus restored to their spiri- tual meaning phrases and passages of the Holy Scri])tures which the Jews had lowered to a most secular significa- gcr im.i thirst aficr tion. Aud thcTi lic intensified and still more [Im^iru-'iTcT '"' '^^^ ^'i^l'ly sjuritualized those passages. Almost every l)hrasc he uses must have recalled some well- known expression in the Prophets, the Psalms, or the Law. , Thns he des(;ribes the hapi)y man as one who " luingei-s and thii-sts after righteousness." In the East thirst implied the most intense desire, and was the most vivid i-epresentation of lodging to a people who dwelt in lands where there was a scarcity of ■\vatci-. Thia unspeakable desire to be upright, right towards God \n(l man, light inwardly, whether the life should be able to be THE SERMON OX THE MOUNT. 255 brought to the high standard or not, tin's marks a true man. .Hunger seeks to eat, and thirst to drink. It nmst be an inward satisfaction. The man may be up to his h'ps in -water and in food, and all things ontward fail to satisfy him. The words of Jesua nuist have reminded his hearers of David's simile of the hart panting after the water-brooks (Ps. xlii. 1), and the outcry of in- vitation in Isaiah (Iv. 1): "IIo! everyone that thirstcth, come ye to the watei-s." Perhaps it recalled also that remarkable passage in the Psalms, "I shall appear in righteousness before thy face I shall be saiUjltjd when thy glor}^ appcai-s."* It is to be observed that the promise made is of the inward and not of the outward. Longings for i-ighteousness are to be satisfied by rigliteonsness. The reward of loving is the increased power to love. The reward of longing to be righteous is the increased power of being right- eous. All such people shall be filled. Having given these blows to secular ho]>es by stating three of the characteristics of those who are really happy and blessed, such as he should desire to have for his subjects if he is to be king of men in any sense, he innnediately states three other characteristics ; and it is to be noticed that the first three are such as a man will be conscious of in his own soul while they may be wholly unknown to others, M-hile at least two of the next three open into the visible life. The hidden growth of grace now bcghis to bring forth fruit. The man who has felt and mourned his poverty of s})irit, who has l)ecome self -continent and meek, whose heart has „ ,. ., , ' n:iiii)y the merciful, been athirst for righteousness, is not selfish, but fw they shaii obtain goes out in love and pity to his fcllow-fnen. The ''""^''^" subjects of a spiritual kingdom, which is to consist in the para- mount influen(;e of love, are to be merciful. Conquering warriors were not ordinarily merciful, but had what the heathen thought to be the sweets of hating. Tlie conquered were not merciful, but had the sweets of revenge. And neither were hap])y. The hai)py man is he Avho seeks to make othei-s happy, whether they be good and grateful or bad and thankless. The next characteristic of the happy is that they arc ]>ure in heart, heartily pure, loving purity, and seeking to have it inwardly. * This translution I give from the I Ps. xvL 15. In our common English Septuagiut version, where it occurs in I version it is xvii. 15. 256 SECOND AND TIIIKD PASSOVER EN THE LIFE OF JESUS. The logical connection between this "beatitude" and that which Happy the pure In hnniediatclv precedes and follows is not quite so ncnrt, for they 8hau«.c appaicut. Lidecd it is to be doubted whether in the mind of Jesus there was anything of tliat Strict scholastic arraugeiuent of ideas which so many connnentatoi-s endeavor to construct for this discoui-se. Kevei-theless tlicre must have been in the mind of this great teacher some thread of dis- com-se, some nexus of tliought or feeling which i)rumpted the succession of ideas. Pei'haps it is found in the meaning assigned by Jesus, which may not have been the modern sense of purity. Perhaps he did nt)t mean those who are free from violation of the seventh comnumdment, but rather those who from the heart observe the ninth; not so nnich those who are not carnal as those who are not cunning. lla})py the sharp, cunning man, is the general verdict. Sueh men are sui)posed to be a1)le to secure the riches, the honoi's, the glories of the woild. Thev are the irrand speculators, the successful diplomatists. But Jesus declares that the innocent, the innocuous, those whose souls are honest, whoso intents are guileless, whose s})irits are surrounded by a moral atmosphere of perfect transparency, — that these are the blessed, happy men. And he assigns tliis remarkable reason for such blessedness — " they shall see God." Kow, as all the happiness nnist in some sort correspond with the condition of character stated, we can be assisted by an miderstanding of one to the compi-ehension of the other. What is this vision of God, and when shall it take place? Some have held that vvdo heatljiva wsis real bodily sight, othei*s that it was purely mental, others that it was both physical and spiritual ; some that it is now, others that it will be in the state of existence which the soul shall maintain beyond the grave, (jthers that it is both here and hereafter. That .Jesus simply used these words in a spiritual sense I have no doubt, nor do I doubt that tliey signify a blessedness which is not conlined to either life,but is as true of the here as of the hei'C- after. It is familiar to the students of the IJible that these writ- ei-s use "see " and " know " almost intei-changeably. The Great Teacher ju-obably intended to con\ey the idea that in order to know Ciod, to undeistand His natui-e and 1 1 is ways, simple-heart- edness, clear. less of the atmosphere about tlic mind anassions are not allowed to make such a fume about his soul that the very sun of truth is hidden, — a man whose moral atmosphere is ti-anslucent, sees God, knows God, and shall see and know Ilim forever. The jrlass to be used in the 17 258 SECOND A'SB THIRD PASSOVER IN TIIE LIFE OF JESUS. telescope lifted to gaze into tlic greatest depths which vision can peiiotratc must be flawless and colorless, otherwise all observations will be inaccurate and all calculations thereupon be false and misleading. The lesson of the Teacher is against double-minded- iiess, guile, and all kinds of mental as well as moral impurities, as interfering with the highest privileges and pleasures of the soul. And then follows the last of the characteristics of the IlArpy. It would seem most luitural that if any body of men can be found who are distinmiished by the predominance of Happy the peace- . Y ^ x mukei-K, for they shall tlic characteristics we have been studying, they be called sous of God. ^^.jj| ^^ j^^^.^^ ^.J^^ g|^^|| :^^ eUgagcd hi tllC blcSSCd work of pacification, and shall be making peace among men skil- fully and on a proper basis, as distinguished from those who increase difficulties by their bungling interference, and thereby compromising the right in making settlements. Touched by a sense of their own spiritual wants, mourning over their own frail- ties of temper and character, meek, merciful, and guileless, see- ing things in clear light, humane, but hating all wrongs, they Avill be the very people who shall bring together those who have been sei)ai'ated. And here is the final blow to the secularity of their Messianic hopes. They had dreamed of going forth conquering and to conquer. How hai)py should they be, pouring out of all the gates of Jerusalem, and from all the hamlets of Judira, following their divine Leader to Home, hurling Ciusar from his throne, gathering all the crowns and sceptres of the world into their arms, and trampling the heathen and the Gentile under their feet ! There is no such happiness in store for them. The climax of the description whic-h Jesus gives of his followers, of the ])eo- ple he desires to collect ab-« were a strange echo to his repeated " Happy hap- """'■"^• py, happy!" But they are happy. " nLppy they that ha^•e been persecuted on account of righteousness." Persecution is rep-sented in the orighial text by a word taken from the chase and from war, the stronger frightening, pursuing, canshig to run, those who are the weaker. The good are not dways hi j>ower and when the evil have rule the good are made to sutler. But if a nian has come into that affliction because, when the question of r.ght and wrong was thrust upon him, he stood up for the ri-ht he IS not to be compassionated. The tyrant is to be pitied, not 'the victim. Brief pain and everlasting glory is the martyr's reward, f he was a martyr because he preferred dving to sinnin.^ Brie triumph and everlasting shame belong to him who was the nuili-- nant destroyer. Generations of even bad men who suc-ceed ^'^i tymnt condemn him, while they praise his victim. It is cAu, actc'r not circu7nstaiice, that makes the happiness ..T'^A i' r^ ^''''^'' '^ ^f '"• ^ ^"^" '' '^«^' ^^Wy because he has siiftercd, but because he has suffered for the sake of bein<. rio-ht It IS the cause and not the pain that makes a martyr. Ami nmv' when Jesus looked upon the noble army of martyrs who had 260 RECONT) AND TIIIRD TASSC VEU IN TITE LIFE OF JESTT8. chosen to koe}) an unbroken manhood in suffering ratlier tlian purchase pleasure by surrender of their souls, he exclaiim il, " IIa])py those who have suffered on account of riy;hteousiicss : the kingdom of the heavens is theirs: they stood awliile in the nar- row pi lu-e of torture, dungeon, or rack ; tlicy arc now free in all the width of the dominion of the universe. If they had suitcu- dei'cd the right to avoid the i)ainful, they would have so belittled their spirits as to ha\c bccu miserable: but now they possess what- ever delights the iniivei'sc can pour in on souls that are truly great." It was natui-al that Jesus should then turn with a special ten- derness towards those who were liidi-csented paity is regarded as the danuiged. Is he ? Is it not the slanderer who is hurt? At the close of the day, mIio ought to shout in his closet: the slandeiei", who has succeeded in making his lies tempoi-arily believed, and thus done vast injury to his own character; or the meek man, mIio has not allowed the falsehood of his ]>oi-secutor to damage Jiis character by arousing unholy resentments? The heavens arc very wide. There is room in the univci-sc. Tlic growth of the character will he the gnod man's eveilastiug TIIE SEEMOX ON THE MOUNT, 261 joy. The prophets were not destroyed : hut what of their persecu- tors ? Did you ever hear of Magor-missahib ? No? lie was the t-aine as Pashur. "And who was Pasluir?" The inuocent igno- raiK'O implied in that question tells the wliole story of the relation of [)ersecntors and the persecuted. Pashur, named Magor-missabih, was a great man in his day. lie was the sou of Immer the priest, " who was also chief governor in the house of Jehovah." There was an earnest brave man in his day named Jeremiah, and this man spoke words of great truth very courageously, but they were bitter words to an evil people and priesthood. And so Pashur threshed him and put him in the stocks in a most public place near the Tem|)le, and left him there all night. (Jeremiah XX.) But Pashur was carried to Babylon a slave, and died obscurely there. There would be no memory of his name on earth at this day, but for the fact that Jeremiah has pilloried him in a book which the world will never let die, hundreds of thou- sands of which are printed every year, although twenty-four cen- turies have elapsed, and Jeremiah is among the innuortals. Of all the kings of Da\id's family who sat on David's throne, there was no one who reigned %o long as Manpsseh, the twelfth king of Judali. And yet of no one is so little known. ' The historians avoid as much as may be all mention of his reign. If the tradi- tions of his people are to be relied on, he caused Isaiah to be sawn asunder. Ko words of the king are remembered. No actions of liib are regarded as memorial and exemplar3\ But Isaiah's words have inspired the preachers and prophets of all succeeding times, and to-day are preserved among the most precious treasures of all luunan literature. And so it has been, is, and will be, until right aud wrong shall cease to oppose each other. Great is their reward in all the heavens who suffer, being in the right. VALUE OF A LOFTY CHARACTER. What Jesus says of the position of his disciples, those who are distinguished by the characteristics he has mentioned, is so plain as to need little exposition. He braces them against the storm which is to beat upon them, by reminding them of the transcen- dent importance and dignity of the functions which they are to discharge towards the world. They are the world's conservatorg and illuminators, its salt and its light. Without them the world would rot in utter darkness. That is to be true in all ajres. Take 262 SECOND AND THIRD PASSOVEE IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. men. Ye are the light of the world. A city set oil a hill cannot be hid. Neither do they light a lamp and put it nnder a corn-measure, but upon a lamp-stand : and it gives light to all in the house. Thus let your light shine before men, that they may see instantly out of tlie world all the men described in the opening of the Sermon on the Mount, and the evil that is in it would run the world i-ai^idly to a state of total putrefaction. i e are the salt of the ^n earth : but if the salt Talcc thcm awaj and all hope would be gone — becoiiie insipid, with ^jj briditness, bloom, and beauty. what shall it be sea- o ;> ? j soned? F" nothing is Morc thaii auioiig tlio modci'ns, salt was held in it useful any longer j^j i^ admiration among the ancients. Their except to be cast out ./ n O and trodden do^vn by pocts gave it tlic most uoblc and bcautif 111 epi- thets, and their pliilosoi)hers bestowed great praise upon it. It was used in religious services, sym- bolical of what is very fine, vei*y refining, very powerful, and very preservative.* The words of Jesus, in which he likens his disciples at once to salt and light, are remarkably reproduced by Pliny {Hist. jVat., xxxi. 9) in his words, " Nil sole your good work-s, and et salc utilius," JVotkmg is more useful than the ous thoughts of your ^'^''^ ^^^^ ^^^^- -A-ud bccausc of tlicir value to the Father who is in the world, Jcsus urgcs them to be careful to preserve heavens. - ' ^ • -i ^ the saltness, and avoid what would cover the light ; in other words, preserve in their characters those very elements which give them these powers. Much useless labor has been spent on the scdt and citf/ ques- tions. "Whether real salt can lose its saltness, is not a pertinent question. The question of Jesus is hypothetical : if the saline quality be lost out of salt, how can it be restored? By chemical action Ave know that salt can " lose its savor." But because the example should liave suggested something that was familiar, and it is not a familiar fact that salt does utterly lose its saltness, many have perplexed themselves with striving to find what the ro aXa? is, if it be not salt. A Dutch writer, Von der Ilardt, suggested that it was asphaltus from the Dead Sea ! And then "the trodden down of men" has given the commentators great perplexity. A German author brings forward authorities from the Rabbins to prove that salt, which b}^ exposure had so far lost its chlorine that it could not preserve, was sometimes scattered upon * Homer calls salt Oeiov, divine, and Plato 8eo(pi\es (Tufta, a substance dear to the gods. There was a Latin proverb, Purior salillo, pure)' than salt. Both Greeks and Latins used it as a trope for wit, on account of its pungency. Hence we hear of Attic salt. In incense and in relinious sacrifices salt was used. See Ovid, Fasti, i. 337. THE SEEMON ON THE MOUNT. 263 slippery places to prevent falling, as by the priests iti the Templo when sacrificing animals. Bnt his citations feebly sustain his po- sition, and if they did they would not disprove the words of Jesus, who says that it is worthless, and this being " trodden down of men " expresses only the utter contempt men have for its woi thlessness. So of the city. There is no reason to suppose that some special city was referred to. Any city on a hill-top must be conspicuous, especially when lighted at night. lie was simply ctiarging his disci- pies not to hide their light nor to lose the vigor of a good character. ''Let your light shine." If you have light it wdll do its own shining, and give light to others, if you do not cover it. Only lot it shine. ° You need not go flaunting it about as a wild boy does a flambeau at night ; but let it be like the sun's light, naturally il- luminating ; but do not obscure it. There are just two important things to care for, namely, that a man have in him the illumi- nating property, and then that he see to it that that light be not obscured. The Law : and Jesus the Completer thereof. Whenever any man has the fortune to see truth in a new light, and the commission to make it known to the \vorld, there are those who adroitly endeavor to break his power Think not that i by giving out that he is a revolutionist ; that he is — - -- -/- unstable ; that he is discontented with the estab- came not to reuix, but lished order of things. Such a rumor does two ^i°*;„y°^u": wrono-s. It drives from him those who hold to tu the heaven and the the truth that has been already gained, and sends thJfthrsm.auLuettei- about the new teacher those who really hope that nor the smallest stroke , 11.1' i of a letter, shall pass the allegation is true and that old tlnngs are to ^^^^ ^^^ ,^,,. „„tii au be abroo-ated. Their apprc^ach to the teacher be accomplished, who- O ... 1 soever, therefore, shall confirms the prejudicial rumor, and so soon as leiax one of the least they discover their mistake they fall away, and "^ ^^^^^ commands. J 1.1 *°*^ shall teach men so, this flux and reflux of apparent popularity weak- ^e shaii be caiied least ens the hold of the teacher on the public confi- "^^^^^IZ deuce. Jesus suifered in that way, as in modern of the universe); but times have Luther and Wesley, who sustained :;::;7-:;r::re:; towards the Roman and Anglican churches, res- great in the kinsdom pectively, a position similar to that of Jesus to- of the heavens, wards the Jewish church. In this discourse of his doctrine, Jesus is at pains to define 264 SECOND AND TIIIKD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESTJ8. his relation to the system of morals taiight in the saci*ed booka of the Jews. If, as he tauglit, his followers were to endure i great persecution "for righteousness' sake," and "on account of Jesus," it was natural to infer that it ^vould be on account of the kind of righteousness which they should learn from him ; aud if that were sucli as to raise persecution, it must be because it wa^ opposed to the righteousness taught in their law and in their' pi'o- pliets. Jesus takes occasion to correct this by showing that ho held to the law ; that it was the Pharisees who had a new right- eousness, and that it was this fact (that he should teach a I'iglit- eonsness which, while it opposed that of the Pharisees, accorded with that of the law, and really accomplished and fulfilled it by giving it a spirit, and by vitalizing it) that slK)uld bring him trouble fi'om a generation that had gone far astray from Moses and the Prophets. "The Law " and "the Pro})hets" constituted the great l^asis of Jewish morals and religious institutions. The law, as Tholuck says, kept alive in the people a sense of their need of salvation ; the prophets perpetually sustained them l)y the liope that want would one day be satisfied. Jesus nmst have meant something more than merel}^ presenting in the facts of his history the coun- tei-part of what the prophets set forth, or in the moi-ality of his life an example of perfect observance of the moral law. lie meant to say that all those who looked upon the work of the Mes- siah as that of mere abolition, mere loosing, mere doing away, had made a total misapprehension. His work was not negative but positive. So far from doing away the law, he came to show the world that even the moral law, written on Sinai stone or liv- ing human hearts, is im]>erfect, in the sense of incomplete. He came to supjjlement, to fill up. The Law was one thing, the Ih-o- phets another ; and with them both, without something else, hu- manity was poor indeed. He was that something else, that j)le- roma, that Fulness ; so that hereafter, for all purposes of living and dying, the world might have all it needed : the Zaw, the Pkopuets, the JESUS. Without the law the world is a moral chaos. With the Law, and without the Prophets, the world is a company of condemned malefactors. With the Law and Pro- phets the condenmed world is hoping with a hope deferred that makes the heart sick. With the Law, the Prophets, and Jesus, mankind have tlieir hopes fulfilled, and such an element of power TTTE SEKAtON ON THE MOUIfT. 265 from love, and sucli an element of love newly developed in the Law, that life becomes tlic sublhne occnpation of preparing the sold, by obedience, ft)r still greater obedience to a moral rnle ■which keeps the nniverse in rhythm. " I am come," said he, " not a Relaxer but a Completer," This great Jesus must have been conscious of vast spiritual resources, a fulness of soul that was to stream out into the nations and down through the ages. He felt that he had enough soul for himself and a whole race of men. It is not necessary to go into the minute details of the theological anatomists. They have said nothing finer than Augus- tine, "Because he came to give love, and love is the fuliilling of the law, he has rightly said that he had not come to dissolve, but to complete." * The moral law is to stand while earth and heaven endure, a proverbial form of expression, like, as Strong says, our less ele- gant one of " While grass grows or water runs." AVliile there is any universe of moral beings there will be moral law. Not a particle is superfluous. Not a particle, therefore, shall ever be swept away ; not a "' (yode), the smallest of the Hebrew letters ; not a Kepata, the smallest stroke of the pen used to distinguish ietters.f But a grace that is in neither letters nor laws shall be given the world, and nuinkind shall see how beautiful and unsel- fish and free a thing a life of obedience may be ; of obedience to God's laws, — not man's moral police enactments, perhaps, but God's laws. lie that regards reverently the slightest indication of what the will and purpose of God is, shall be recognized great in the dominion of the universe, the kingdom and rule wliich is BO wide as to embrace not merely this present scheme of our world, but all the changes of all worlds, and all the sweep of the universe, — not merely the ages which mark the history of man, but the cycles on which eternity rests. Thus Jesus taught that he did not come, as some feared and * "Quia venib dare cliaritatem, et charitas preficit legeinn merito dixit, non venisse solvere, sed implere." Au- gustine, Serin. 12({, on John v. f That this may be understood, let the reader who does not know Hebrew compare with his eye the Hebrew let- ters T, raish, and t, dauleth. He will see in print that the only difference is a slight pi-olongation to the right of the upper part of the letter. In writing them for the printer I have made a rainh in both instances, and in the lat- ter merely added a little stroke in tho right place, a stroke much smaller than the Hebrew letter yode of the same type. 266 SECOND AND TIUKD PASSOVER IN THE LITE OF JESUS. others hoped, an adversary to tlie God-ordained moral govern- ment of the world. lie came to explain, exemplify, fulfil. Ilis life, his deeds, his words, all were part of the Koa/jio<;, the orderly nniverse. He wished no one to become his follower under the false idea that he can thereby indulge a dissolute life with im- punity. He has no liip;hcr law than the law of God, but he sets that in the highest possible light. KEFUTATION OF rUARISAIC ERRORS. Because Jesus had not kept the law according to their methods of interpi'ctation, tlie Pharisees persecuted him as a dissolver of For I say unto you, tlic law. lie tums upou tlicm. IIo denouuccs That if your righteous- j^g gj^^^jj ^^^^ l^^^y |1jq rigliteousncss iu M'liich they ness do not frreatly ex- ^ V i i i • ' • ceedthatof the Scribes SO mucli cxultcd, and declared to his disciples, in and the rharisecs ye ^yords wliich lic iutroduccs witli the utmost so- shall not enter into the kingdom of the heav- Icmuity, that to luive tfhc freed(^m^ of the domin- ion of the universe they must have a wider and hio-her ri2:hteousness, a rii2;liteousness founded not on a micro- scopic view of ritualism, but on a comprehension of the spirit of the laws which spread wide as all M'orlds and endure long as eternity. The Pharisees taught that their righteousness could, and in many cases did, exceed the requirements of God's moral law ; but Jesus taught that that law was so wondei'f ully deep, and bi'oad, and high, that it is not in the compass of human capacities to ex- ceed its requirements. Of Murder. Jesus does not leave so important a matter, to the impression which a general statement might make upon a promiscuous assem- bly. Ho intends to make his feud with Pharisaism deadly. He will now cut it up in detail. The plain peo])le shall know what he means. He tells them that the law which was given anciently to their ancestors has been read in Temple and syna- gogue by the Pharisees, who held the position of official ex- pounders, and who so wove their glosses into the original text that the common people had lost all discrimination, so that the general belief was that Pharisaism and Mosaicism was the same. He intends to tear away all the wretched sophisms and dangerous as well as foolish " various readings " of the Pharisees, and show them what the moral law means. He does not impugn the Mosaic THE SEKaiON ON THE MOUNT. 267 law: he simply does two things, namely, 1. lie clears away the ruhbisli that lias been piled on the law ; and, 2. Wlien it is seen as it is, he explains what its real meaning is, a yc have heard that it meaning not to be confined to the ancients, but ^assai^uo the ancients , 1 11 -i IP f 1 1 • Thou Shalt not kill ; for sucli as snail be good lor any part oi the doniam whosoever shau kiu of tlie universe. ^^"■^ ^"^ ^'^^'^ *«• ^^° The errors into which the ancients fell, and unto you, Any one an- which were hugely exaggerated in the Pharisees, ^J,,^''^ '"' '"■"'^"'^* . . "'^^'^ ^° liable to tha grew out of a literal interpretation, which natu- judgment; and whoso rally came to be erroneous and injurious. A lit- "'^"" ^~" ■ ' eralist, an advocate, or pettifogger, takes up a statute and says, " What do these passage in a shall say to his brother, AViXo, shall be liable to the Sanhedrim ; and whoso shall say, 3foreh, shall be liable to tho words mean ? " Of course he soon comes to con- cchcnna of fire, if, siderwhat tliey may mean. A great jurist, rS'toTe a'S especially if he have judicial responsibility, takes ant^ there rememberest up the same passage and says, "What did the leg- Zt^S^S" islature mean when it enacted this statute and leave there thy pi ft be- p 1 ii • • 1 n n mi !• 1 foi"e the altar, and first framed this sjiecial passage ? " The former needs The go, become reconciled to thy brother, and then coming offer thy gift. Agi-ee with thy adversary quickly, whilst thou art with only to have tlie very words before him. latter must know the character and general in- tentions of the legislature, the occasion of the pas- ,. , ,,.,•, 1 . . 1 , , whilst thou art with sage ot the statute, the objections urged by the him on the road, lest minority and how answered by the maiority, the *^in° adversary douver , , • PIT -I ' J J ^ thee to the judge, and wliole animus of tlie law-makers as touching this the judge to the shcriii, special matter. This is just what Jesus did. And ""'^ *°" "" "*'* '"*" ... "' prison. Verily I say to it is important now, for a fair understanding of thee, Thou shait not all his own words, in this sermon and elsewhere, harpa'd'thl'TaV?^! that we bring to their elucidation and interpre- t^i"s- tation the same spirit and method of criticism which he applied to the decalogue. We must know what Jesus said, and find the mean- ing of any doubtful or perplexing phrase or sentence by what he plainly teaches elsewhere, and by the whole temper of his intellect and soul. Whoever fails to do this becomes toM-ards the teachings of Jesus just what the Pharisees became towards the moral law. We shall almost immediately have occasion to show the impor- tance of this principle. * In the common version the phrase " without a cause " occurs, but it is gen- erally conceded that this is an interpo- lation which has crept in from some marginal note written by some very con- servative reader or editor. It is not in the SinaiUc Codex, and is also omitted by other ancient MSS. 2G8 SECOND A^WD THIRD PASSOVER m THE LDTE OF JESUS. And now comes the first example. Moses said: "Kill not." The Pharisees said : " If a man commit actnal homicide he shaL be liable to go before the Court of the Seven." Jesus said : " Angei M'itli one's l)rother is a violation of the moral law in this particu- lar." It will be seen how these differ, and a little fulness hero may save space hereafter. The Pharisees taught such a morality that if a man who had liad the most inhuman or the most deadly feelings towards his brother had so managed the circumstances of the homicide, or so suppressed or arranged evidence, as to be able to secure a verdict of acquittal from the Court of Seven, he felt himself altogether absolved. Put Jesus showed that the law was not a mere police regulation. It was that, but vastly more. It touched the kingdom of the heavens. It rendered human life sacred, but it was also a development, out into the sphere of hu- manity, of that measui-elessly profound law of love which per- vades the Dominion of the Universe, a law which was violated if one had hatred of his brother, or contempt, or scorn. Nay, one must not even so much as fail of loving. It is not suthcient not to hate. Jesus teaches positive regard for our fellow-men. lie was the great Humanitarian on the broadest and deepest founda- tion of principle, not merely by the impidse of sentiment. Jesus taught in popular style, and presented his doctrine so concretely that his words would stick in the memory of his hear- ers. In illustration, he quotes words in connnon use as expres- sions of a malign condition of the heart, not that they "have any danniing power in themselves," as Alford says, " but to represent states of anger and hostility." If one should call his brother lial-a, he should bo regarded by God as one is regai'ded by men when the Sanhedrim has condemned him. If one should call his brother Moreh, he should be in the sight of God as, in the sight of men, is he who having been stoned to death is cast into the Valley of Ilinnom.* liaha is a Chaldee word expressive of the * There is a deep ravine to the south and west of Jerusalem, which took its name, as Stanley conjectures, from some ancient hero who had encamped there, " the son of Hinnom." In this ravine heathenish rites were observed in the worship of Moloch, and in its south-eastern corner, Tophet, infants M-ore sacrificed to the fire gods. King Josiah caused the place to be polluted by strewing it with human bones and other things, making it ceremonially unclean, so as to put an end to these abominations. See 2 Kings xxiii. 10, 13, 14 ; 2 Chron. xxxiv. 4, 5. There- after it was the common cesspool of the city, into which all filth was cast, and it is believed that the bodies of crim- THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT. 26D greatest contempt, "Worthless fellow!" "Empty hciad!" Moreh is a harsher expression, and signifies a hopeless fool, an impious wretch, a rebel, especially a rebel against God, and hence an atheist, a word so bitter that for using it Menses and Aaron were not permitted to enter the promised land. (Numbers xx. 10.) Now, here are the gradations : First, concealed but cherished anger, then sudden ejaculation of wrath, and then foul and abusive language. And all these Jesns says are nniixlcr in several forms. lie holds us to his text that character is everythlnrj. Men consider the outward act as the horrible thing in crime ; and they can do no better, because they cannot read the heart. But each man knows his own heart, and God knows all. His law covei-s the whole man, inside as well as outside ; Jesus gi\es its proper intensity to the "Thou" of the law, penetrating the inmost soul, and its proper extension covering the whole life. " Thou," as Luther well puts it, in his vehement and popular style, is not ad- dressed to a man's fist alone but to his whole person. Indeed, if the fist were addressed it would be an address to the whole per- son, for the hand could not deal the blow unless the whole person co-operated. The whole act comes of the character, and it is not so important to be striving to make our actions right as to keep our souls pure. The words and the deeds of a man are impor- tant as showing the character. We may not interpret Jesus literally in this and his other speeches. It is not the- use of RaJca and Moreh that is con- demned, for they were sometimes used playfully, there being evidence that the latter, which is so harsh in its real meaning, was employed as a gentle nickname in the days of Jcsus,'^^' — l>ut it is the murderous spirit which precedes their use. Jesus himself was angry,t and used the very epithet Moreh,X which is here so condemned; but it is very obvious from the history that the emotions he had and the words he uttered, in the connection, give no indication of a murderous spirit. Nor, strictly, could he have inals who had been stoned to death were flung into this place. In Joshua xviii. 16, the Septuagint has Taievva. Afterwards it was rendered Tetwa, Ge- henna. • Tholuck, vol. i., p. 238. Edin. edit. f As Mark expressly asserts (iii. 5), and Matthew (xxiii. 13) and John (ii. M) clearly imply. X In Matthew xxiii. 17, 19, it is the identical word, and in Luke xxiv. 25, it is the equivalent, in the original ; and consequently in both cf ses ia properly translated " fools " m our version. 270 SECOND Airo TnmD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. meant that the secular government would decide upon these cases, and inflict these punishments ; and most probably by alluding to the visible tribunals and penalties simply gave objectiveness to the Bpiritual fact of responsibility for character, so far as voluntarily formed, and taught gradations of punishment proportioned to the pinfulness. And now, that he may set the duty of loving and the sin of hating in the strongest possible light, he insists upon the necessity of reconciling differences, and this ho does in language which must ha\e been very impressive to his Jewish hearers. lie taught that if a man had gone up to the Temple to offer sacrifice for his sins, had even brought the victim into that court where the priest was to receive it, and in the most solemn moment of approach to Jehovah the worshipper should recollect that his brother had aught against him, no matter how he felt toward that brother, he should lea\e his gift there in the Temple, and postpone homage to God until he had made love with man. Perhaps the worshipper would recollect that he had given offence to his brother by calling him ugly names, as Raka and Moreh, ''Empty Head" and "Eebel." His brother may have had occasion to have something against him. In that case until the bad feeling, which was mother to the bad words, be utterly flung from his heart, his worship would be an abomination to God. Hecatombs of slaughtered beasts would not please the eye of the Holy Gne of Israel if he saw malignity in the heart of the offerer. If the bad feeling has been cast out, then he must go and tell his brother; nmst let him know how changed his feelings are. But if he has never knowingly given offence, and finds that his brother is embittered against him, let him go and do all that love should prompt to have that bitterness removed, to effect a reconciliation. Let us always guard against literalism, and see what the spirit of the words is. That he should literally go from the Temple in Jerusalem, the journey of many Aveary days, to a distant part of Palestine, to make up a quarrel, cannot be meant, any more than the postponement of reccMiciliation until the moment when the sacrifice is about to be laid upon the altar.* But in his heart the * Instances of Pharisaic literalness occur to this day iu the Christian church. Perhaps there arc few pastors who have not kno\vn communicants begin to feel uneasy about their animosities as the time for the Lord's Supper apjiroached, postponing reconciliation to the very latest moment before the sacrament, — THE SEKMON ON TIIE MOUNT. 271 T.ork cf love must be done, A man mnst not do that wiiicli ex- poses him to the judgment of the local conrt, to the sentence of the Sanhedrim, to destruction ; nor must lie allow his brother tc do it, if in his ix)wer to prevent. If that brotlier has anytliino a;^ainst him, it may lead to sin on the brother's jiart. If he has been called " Empty-head," he may retoit by calling his brother "Eebel." And if the sacrifice is for forgiveness of sin already committed, let thei-e be no new sin connnitted. Jehovah will wait for the sacrifice if he know that the offerer has gone to do the holy work of love. Do it instantly : that is the lesson. Nothing is so important: not even worship. A man may die while offering his beasts in sacrifice, and woe to him if he die with hands on the altar and hate in his heart. That such a fate mi'dit overtake one, and should be a\-oided, are taught in the iuipressive words which immediately follow. If a man is haled to the jud^-- ment-seats of civil governuujuts, it is pi-udent to do everything pi-acticable to be reconciled to his advei-sary. For if once the advei-sary should lodge complaint, and the ease go agaiust the accused, he nuiy be cast into prison ; and the inexorable judge, standing by his own decision, will not allow him to go free until he has paid the wlujle debt, or met the whole claim in disjMite. AYliat is so important as regards the management of worldly mat- ters is infinitely more important as regards character. The culti- vation of love, the prompt discharge of the duties of love, lest death come in and a man be cut off therefrom, and thei-e be sui-- vi\-ors who shall be injured in their character, — these are the lessons. Having gone so fully into the spirit of this first example, it will not be necessai-y to be so elaborate upon the others. Of Adultery. The second exam^tle is the Ijlw of Adultery. It must be observed that in his statements Jesus kee})s constantly in view as if that were obedieuce to Jesus. He taught that the very niouient you recol- lect that your brother has aught against you, even if that recollection should flash upon you at the Lord's Table, be reconciled, be sure that you are in a tight luiud about it, no matter how he feels. It does not suppose that one will come to the sacrament knowing that he hates his brother, or that, if his brother hate him, he has failed to strive to be reconciled. Some people's Chrijstiauity is so uidike that of Jesus. 272 SECOISTD AKD TIIIED PASSOVER IN THE LITE OF JESUS. that he is inculcating the culture of character, outward things bein^ important only as they spi'ing from charactei-. The mere indul- „^ ^ . jrenceof anaturalapi^etite isasmall thinw; butthe Yo have heard that it " _ ^ ' , . was said, Thou xhaii bciug SO degraded, SO lost to the claims of our fel- .oicovimuu.mier,: ly^y.^en and of society, as to elieri^h the desire to \iiit Isayuntoyoii,That «' ' every one who looks iuvadc the uiost sacrcd riglits, that is horrible, pliniroT'ncIeLing ^hat is thc tiling to be dreaded. And it is further his longing, has already to bc obscrved that lic scts tlio law ill tlic right coinniittcd adultery ,. , , -r-n . . , 1 1 i • ^ with her in his heart. I'glit- Fharisaism perpetually regards it as a And if thy right eye burdciisome rcstrictiou, which must be as much cause thee to sin, tear , , -i i T> T ^ i it out and Hin;,' it from evadccl as possiole. liut J csus tcachcs that our thee; for it is better fur f^-^yj^ persoiuxl iutcrest lics ill kecpiug the law thee that one of thy \ t • i n i ti • ' /> members perish, and sacrcdlv. " it IS bcttcr /fr tlice^ OX it IS prout- not thy whole body be ^\^\^, f^^^ ^A^^t?," is a plirasc showiug that the indi- cast into Gehenna. "^ \ ^ ^ • vidual who is to keep the law is to have the profit of the keeping. You must not avoid adultery because it is going to be injurious to your neighbor, but because even to intend any such wrong is so damaging to yourself. And this is the pure and fine strain of all the teaching of Jesus. ^Yliat is done in the heart hurts. And so he enjoins such self-denial as shall lead to the renunciation of whatever is loveliest in our eyes and the nearest to ns ; the most beautiful and the most useful friends we have, if, holding them near us, they lead us to commit such offence against ourselves. Of course the words of Jesus are not to be taken literall}', for in tlrat case the member of the body would be considered the sinner, and not the soul that is in the body. It is not the eye nor hand that sins, but the inner man. Moreovei-, if taken literally, the whole Avorld would probably be speedily depopulated. This strong hyperbolic expression of Jesus seems to find its rational interpretation as we have given it. Of Divorce. And this naturally brings up the third example, the Law of Divorce^ as held by the Pharisees. Here, again, the Pharisees had perverted the law. Acct)rding to the law, so sacred M'as the tie of marriage that only infidelity upon the jiart of the wife could justify a man in putting the wile away. Moses had made this exception not to weaken but to strengthen the marriage bond, not to make divorce easy but ditH- ciilt. Put the Pharisees had made it quite easy, the school THE SEEMON ON THE MOUNT. 273 of Ilillel even going so far as to allow a man to put away his wife when he found any one whom he liked better. But Jesus insisted upon the sacredness of the relation. By 7 . -, . , It has been saul, If his teachings any divorced man is disgraced, any man divorce his Either he had committed some sin or his wife, wife, let him give her a AT 1 • writing of divorce. But who thus disgraces hiin. And a woman who is i say unto you. That divorced from her husband, except for his sin, is ^^^"^° divorces wb ' 1 •! 1 wife, except for the rea- not at liberty to marry. If she marry while he eon of uncioanness, lives she is an adulteress, and the man who mar- '^'^""'^^ ^'^'^ '" '^"""'"* ' _ adultery ; and whoso ries her is an adulterer ; and if her husband marry shau many a divorced he is an adulterer. This is quite as plain as Greek ^;^;'''^ """^"^''^ ■"''"'■ and English can make it, and no legislature on earth can make right by its enactments what is morally wrong. Wlien a man and a woman have married, and neither has bi'oken the bond by infidelity, neither can put himself or herself in the posi- tion of being parent of a child by another party while the other is living in pin-ity. The offspring would be illegitimate. It was this laxity of divorce that had so corrupted the morals of Jewish society. Of PeTJury. The fourth example of Pharisaic perversion is in the Law of Oaths, ■ Their gloss was, that if the name of Jehovah was omitted the oath was not binding. And so they swore And yc have heard by their heads, by Jerusalem, by the Temple, by that it has been said to ■^ 1 T 1 -"^ ' "^ the ancients, Thou heaven, and by earth. Jesus taught that both shait not swear faiseiy, perjury and blasphemy were to be avoided, and i^'i'shait perform thine i^ J •! I J 7 ojiths to the Lord : but that the latter could not be evaded by the em- i say unto you, swear ployment of petty oaths, and the former was not ""' '-"^ ""' "fj^^^l-y i- ecial your enem es and pray .. «,,. „' ^ ,,." ^ ^ for them that persecute recipients 01 diviiie iavors/6»r their own sake^ yon, that ye may bo the alone,\>\\t that thcv miMit 1)0 eminently fitted to sons of your Father in , , , . i i • i the heavens; for Ho SUbscrvC llOt OUly tllCir OWll llltcrests but tllC lugll- makes his sun to rise gg^ jnterests of all the peoiilc of all the world and on the bad and good, p , -r . ■ and rains on the just of all time. It was their stupendous mistake to and the unjust. Forif j.g .^| themsclves as the end of all divine legisla- ye love your lovers, _ ^ ~ what reward have ye? tioii, aud tlicy lost tliclr powor of Universal be- . von the tax-gatherers yvq,'^{^q,\\(:q, ill a lai'o-e measurc by this narrow view do that same. And if O ./ ye sahito your brethren of tlic casc. Tlic Pliarisecs luid Carried the Jew- Thing '^^'y^r'nTrot ^^^^ higotry to its last lengths when they added the even the Gentiles that corollary, " Tliou slialt liatc tliiue enemy." The law are to~~bc perfect Is ^^^^ iudced eujoined on the Jew love for the " chil- yonr Father in the hcav- drcu of liis peoplc," biit tluit was au educatioiial preparation for loving and serving all mankind. Jesus set forth the wide charity of his philosoi)hy in the distinct precept, " Love your enemies." lie has been protesting against all vindictiveness ; he now blooms out into richest precepts of uni- versal fraternity and affection. He is determined not to be mis- understood, lie embraces public as well as private, national as well as personal enemies, the Samaritan and the Roman, the ecclesiastical and the political foe. Not simply is a man to regai-d without animosity the foi-eigner and the alien, he is even to have charity for the enemy who stands over him and curses him ; for hatred he is to return good, for contempt and ]')ersecution he is to return benedictions. If the Jews had only understood and acted upon this, they might have carried their rule of love to the end of the M'orld. The Messiah is to carry his rule to the end of the world. Jesus makes good his claim by insisting upon leading his people forth to this conquest of love ; and thus, and not as the secular Jew expected, became in a high sense the Sa\'iour of the world. This broad law of benevolence is enforced by an appeal to tlie loftiest example in the universe. God is our Father. His chil- dren should resemble Ilim. He causes his sun to rise on men TTTT? SEEMON ON THE MOtTNT. 279 witliont moral distinctions, and so he sends liis rain." If ^ye would be his children, our love must have that same characteris- tic of impartiality. Perhaps by this splendid appeal to God's deaUngs in nature, the Great Teacher meant to imply that the same principles prevailed in the moral government, and that as sunlight and rain fell on the fields of all, so the grace of God was not confined to the Jew but fcnt equally to the Gentile. It cer- tainly does help one to come to a rational view of this lofty teaching, when it is recollected that this impartiality in nature is not the loss on the part of God of the distinctions of right and wrong, nor insensibility to charms of character. It is the law of active benevolence which is set forth, the desire to do good to another whether he deserve it or not. The love I bear a mean and wicked man, who is calumniating and persecuting me, is not to be the love I bear my beautiful, true, and good friend, on whom my soul safely rests ; for the love God shows men who rebel against His holy law is not the same which He feels towards the devoted child whose life is spent in learning and doing Ilis will. Attracting his hearers by the great example of the heavenly Father, he endeavors to break them from their narrowness and illiberality by the example of those whom they specially hated and despised. The Jew who allowed himself to be a tax-gather- er was an unprincipled and mercenary fellow. The Roman gov- ernment of the Jewish people was not particularly harsh. It was the galling of their pride more than anything else that was offen- sive, and that came out specially in the presence of the Eomau Boldiery, and more especially in the oppressive taxation. " Publi- can" thence came to designate the most disagreeable kind of a " sinner." But, Jesus urges, even publicans love their kith and kin, their " nearest," if it be insisted that that is the meaning of "neighbor." The Gentiles, whom you hate, will salute their brethren. Are the Jews the elect of the Father God ? And do they in moral character rise no higher than the plane of those nations who are not favored by God and are hated by Jews ? If the Jews have surpassingly helping privileges, should they not have surpassingly elevated characters? ^ maria." "If thou wilt imitate the gods, bestow benefits en even the un- grateful : for on even criuiinals the suu rises, to even pirates the seas lie open." * Meyer quotes the following sen- tence from Seneca, which is remarkably like these words of Jesus : "Si deos imitaris, da et ingi-atis beneficia: nam et sceleratis sol oritur, et piratis patent 280 SECOND AND THIKD PASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. Thus lla^'ing exhibited the wrong that is in the Pharisaic nar ■ rowness and selfishness, showing that in practice it was a mere copy of the example of the worst men, while in theory it was an injurious perversion of the law, he turned to his disciples and said. " You are not to be so. You are to have perfect principles. The principles which govern your Father wlio is in the heavens, are those which are to govern yon." Keachiiig this transition point in the Discourse, I think it may be well to notice that the simple, plain intellects of his congre- gation, understanding the words of Jesus in their simplest, plain- est meaning, did not see in them the difficulties which all the glosses and comments have made for ns moderns. It is really some task to our intellects to throw out the influence of the per- verting interpretations to which we have been accustomed in order to place ourselves where the audience of Jesus stood. How far I am doing so as I write, I know not ; but I am striving ear- nestly to find just what Jesus meant his hearers to understand. And an examination so conducted shows that he was not laying down maxims of conduct but tests of charxicter. The great trouble many good people, and even many scholarly men, have found in the Sermon on the Mount has come from not observing this distinction. For example, take the last precept above, " Ye are to be perfect, even as your Father in the heavens is perfect." The physical and mental limitations of humanity make that ut- terly impracticable as a rule of action, but quite practicable as an attainment of principle. It is by considering his statements, without their limitations, as a directory of conduct, and seeing how utterly men fail to reach that standard, that the teachings of Jesus come to be regarded as merely a refining ideal, not to be realized totally in this life. DIEECTIONS FOR TUE DISCIIAKGE OF DUTY. We have now reached another division of this discourse, in which Jesus shows the corrupting influence of Pharisaism upon even the practice of the virtues, and teaches his disciples to purge the very spring of their actions. Here is the key to this part of the discourse. A man's right- eousness works itself out into his public life, and he must often do good in the presence of his fellow-men, and there are sf)me duties which cannot be discharged in total privacy. " Righteous- THE SEEMON ON THE MOUNT. 2S1 Cut take hoed not to work ynur rijihteous- ness * before iikmi, to be seen of them ; if otherwise, you have no .reward from jour ness" is exemplified in this discourse by alms-giving, by pi-ayei- and by fasting, or more generally by onr duties to our bi'cthrcn to our heavenly Father, and to ourselves. These duties are to be discharged with reference to God, and not man. When our righteousness is wrouglit in the presence of our fellow-beings, we are to be very careful that it is not for the purpose of Father who is in the being seen by them, to elicit their applause. ^'=''^">^- The verb in the original is very striking, ^eadrjvai, from which comes our word " theatre." We are not to theatricize, phiy a part, think the thing well done if they applaud, and ill if they give signs of dissatisfaction. It is, moreover, to be observed that Jesus does not inculcate duties : he merely tells his disciples how they are to be performed, lie does not say that they shall give alms, and pray, and fast. Lib- erality towards our fellows, piety towards our God, and self-con- trol, are among the well-known duties of religion everywhere, in every form. But the methods of doing these right things may be injuriously wrong, and, among the Pharisees, obviously were ; so Jesus sets himself to showing his disciples how they ought to do what they already felt it their duty to do. The First Examjtle is Alms-giving. The word hypocrite is in analogy with the theatricizing just spoken of in general terms. A hj'pocrite strictly Therefore when thou is one who n/aintains a part in a dramatic perfor- :rrfortLTt": mance, speaking his words usually from behind a hypocrites do in the mask, and hence readily transferred to one who is ;3f;:;::;hermS not really what he seems. The blowing of the have giory of men. trumpet may be derived from what is aftirmed to ^^^';,,l"ill; ^^Zt have been the custom of ostentatious alms-givers, their rewm-a. But when , 1,1 ii i.li1 thou doest alms, lot not who sunnnoned the poor by a trumpet, and thus ^,^y ,^f^ ,^_^^,, ^^^^^ made known their gifts. But it is better to take it what thy right hand „ . T . .p . T 1 A doeth, that thine alms figuratively, as signifymg unnecessary display. A ^^^^^ .^ ,^,,,t^ ^„d man's goodness to a fellow-man may be known thy Father who seeth in , _ . , . . 1,1. i 1 •, J- secret shall reward thee. and bring him praise, but he is never to do it for the purpose of having that praise. If lie do, he will not fail, he * Not " alms," as in the common ver- Bion. The authentic text is undoubted- ly 5iicaio(ruyTji', righteousness, and not iKcnfio(T6i'-nv, alms, the latter being a jrell-intentioned but mistaken gloss. The Vatican andBezaMSS., and, what is still more important, the Codex Sinni- ticus give the former. This restored reading aids the symmetry of the dis* course. 282 SECOND AND TrTTRD PASSOVEK IN TITE LITE OF JESUS. will be piTviscd. lie will have his reward, and his wliole rewai'd, in that praise. He will thus exliaust his rewai-d. But when he gives alms because it is right, and for the good the alms may do another, and docs it so secretly that, to nse a proverbial phrase, his left hand does not know what his right hand does, such a man has reward from the Father, who does His greatest works in secret. Let the deed be done as to Ilim and not to man. The Second Exam/pie is Prayer. Let it be remembered that it is hypocrisy which Jesns attacks, not any special outward modes or acts. lie does not condemn usinw And when thou pray- syuagogucs and strccts as prayer places ; he does not est, be not as the hypo- coudcmn Standing as a posture.* A man ma}' pray crites; for they love to ^^^ ,,^.],g,.e ^^^^ gj^Q^^ij . everywhere. But no pray staiuling in the J ' 1 J ./ »- ^^ synaftogues and in tiie matter whcrc lic prays, nor how, nor when, — if his prayers be made in order to attract the attention and elicit the applause of men, he is a hypocrite. He pretends to be speaking to God, when, in real- ity, he is speaking to men. A modern clergyman, kneeling in the church, may be playing off rlietori- ed thy door, pray to cal fircworks f Or tlic entertainment of liis audience,f thy Father wlio is in , , , . . , ... , . rather tJian be assisting them in tlieir supphca- tions for the mere}' of the Almighty Father. Ho is warned by this incisive speech of Jesus. Jesus does not prohibit much praying, but much comers of the broad- ways, that they may bo Keen of men. Verily, I Bay unto yon, They ex- haust their reward. But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and having lock- secret; and thy Father •who secth in secret will reward thee. But when yc pray use not sense- less repetitions, as do the heathen ; for they , nre of opinion that talking ; if not repetitions, but vaiii^ empty repe- they shall be heard for ^jj-j^ji^g^ jgg^^g passed wliole niglits ill pravor, and their much speaking. ^ -^ , . . ■Do not, then, resemble lu tlic agouy of Gctlisemaue lic iiiadc repetition them; for God your ^f |^jg ^^.j^g ^^ ^j^^ heaveiilv Father. It was the Father knows what ^ -^ things ye need before heatheuisli ciistom,§ wliicli had also crcpt in ycaskhun. amoug the Jews, of sometimes unthinkingly re- * Indeed, where the general custom is to stand, as it was among the Jews, it would be ostentatious to kneel ; and if Jesus had intended to make a special hit at the posture, he would have said kneeling. No posture must be taken which so attracts attention as to nourish one's vanity. \ As would seem to have been the case with that clergj'man of whom a modem new.=;paper said, "He delivered the finest prayer ever addressed to a Boston audience." X This distinction is made by Augus- tine: " Absit ab oratione multa locutio; sed non desit vinlta precatio, si fervent perseverat intentio." Ep. 130, 10. § A specimen of heathenish vain re • petitions is given in the Old Testament^ in 1 Kings xviii. 26. THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT. 283 peatinp^ sound, good words, and at other times filling np the sca- Bon of prayer with the nnnicaning repetition of irrelevant and senseleps things. AVlien a clergyman in church, or a layman in a meeting for prayer, sets before Almighty God a tabular statement of statistics, or a running commentary on the shortcomings of the neighborhood, or a resume of the political movements of the times, telling the Great Ruler how wickedly such a senator is going to vote if God do not kill him, he is acting heathcnishly, and Jesus rebukes him in these precepts. Again, we guard ourselves against the temptation to the Phari- saic vice of literalism in interpreting Jesus. lie did not proscribe public worsliip in his precepts, and he was strictly oliservant of it in his conduct. But he does teach that culture of character is iimcli more important than that of the outward behavior. AYliile all display should be avoided in public service, there is a still surer mode of spiritual culture, namelj', communion with God the Father in tlie profoundest secret, in that place which no one but God knows to be used as an oratory, at that time when no one but God knows that the suppliant is praying. Such praying recognizes the individual personal responsibility of the suppliant, for therein he must use the singular personal pronoun when refer- ring to himself. lie is away from the crowd. lie cannot mingle his deeds and life Avith theirs, and thus divide, even in idea, the responsibility of his actions. He is alone with God. lie acknow- ledges the spirituality of true religion. There is no ceremonial, even the very simplest, to help him. It is the spirit of the man peeking strength from the spirit of the God. He acknowledges the spirituality and omnipresence of God. Ko distance separates and no darkness hides from the Almighty. While one is praying here in this closet, another is in that closet, thousands of miles away ; and both are heard. It seems to me difficult to overestimate the importance of this urgent teaching by Jesus of the internalism of true religion as antagonizing all the externalism of cultivated Paganism and ecclesiasticized Judaism. It is what a man is, not what he does, that distinguishes him in God's eyes. Being right will produce doing right. Internal piety will certainly produce proper external worship, but proper external worship does very little towards \^vo- ducing true internal piety. The external is easily assumed. TiiQ internal is produced with difficulty. Therefore a ceremonial reli- 284: SECOND AKD THIRD TASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. gion is easily popularized. Men are attracted by the sliowiness, and gratified by the pomp. It requires no painstaking of soul culture. But it does not endure. It cannot be carried beyond the niouient of death. What is not inwrought falls off. Charao- ter is everything. It is surprising that the modern church has gone so far from the teaching of Jesus as to lay almost the whole stress upon forms and ceremonies; that a "denomination" may be erected on a mere form, and a wliole church be convulsed with a controversy about mere ceremonials ; that one branch of the church, as is the case with the Lutherans in Germany, should have worship disturbed, and discord and separations occasioned, on the question whether the Loi-d's Prayer, as it is called, which we shall next consider, should be begun Vater unser or TJnser Vater, " Our Father " or " Father, Ours ! " * If externalism could be banished from all religion, nine-tenths of all prejudices, animosities, and persecu- tions would cease. "TUE LOKD S PRATEK. And then Jesus furnished a form of prayer, which should be a model, and show Avliat the spirit and general method of praying should be. To a critical student of the mind and Thus therefore pray , ,. t • ^ • l-r ye: Our Father, the soul 01 J csus there cau DC no passagcs lu liis lite One in the heavens, ^^^^,^ important thau thosc which set forth his hallowed bo Thy Name, ■>■ i ■ j Thy kiiiKiiom come, praycrs. A man's prayers are the mam and most Thy will be done, as in j.^ii^i^ig indiccs of lils real character. The posture neavcn so on earth. _ Bread necessary for hc deliberately assuuics before his God is the 7^7^ t:Z "^'^^cs*^ ^"^^ the most graceful possible to him. our debts, like as wo Iljg uttd'cd praycrs rcvcal him more than his didactic ctcliverances. The prayers he sets forth to be used by others are his own highest represen- tation of himself. They show wliat he believes God to be, what he belic\'es man to be, and what he believes to be also have fortriven our ciel)t()rs. And lead us not into trial, but res- cue us from evil. * This is stated by my learned friend Dr. Schaff in a note to Lange. In Greek it is HctTfu rif.i.wi>^ Pater haymone ; and in the Latin, Pater nostcr. The German Lutherans follow that form in V((ter vnser, but the German Reformed insist apon Unser Vater. People who write quarrelsome books and articles on that distinction have no need for either form. It does not much matter at all how they pray. It would not seem that they should care anything for the teaching of Jesus who are so utterly uidike him in spirit. THE SEKMON ON THE MOLT^T. 285 the relation between them. The theological system of Jesns mnst therefore be fomicl chiefly in his prayei-s. The theology he wished to popularize mnst be what he embodied in the prayer which ho set forth for all his followers, in all ages of the wojld. Tlie " ye " is emphatic, as the form in the Greek shows and implies that between the praying of the heathen, the " ethnic battology," as lie calls it, and the j)i'aying of those who belonged to his spiritual family, there was to be a marked difference. Brief as this prayer is, it is so pregnant that one scarcely sees how in a few paragraphs to set forth its wonderful teachings. First of all, in every sense, is the presentation of G(xl tlie Almighty, not as the Creator of the "World nor the King of tlie Universe, bnt as standing to human suppliants in the relation of Father. We are not to ask God for anything because he made ' us, or because he rules ns, but because we are his children and lie is our Father. So many myriads of tongues have addressed liiin in this way since the days of Jesns, that we fail to realize what a revelation this was. God is never addressed as " Father " in the Old Testament.* The relation is alluded to as the ground of re- proach for the bad behavior of the people, as in the lirst chapter of Isaiah and the lirst chapter of Malachi, where God is repre- sented, in the flrst passage, as saying that He had nourished children who were rebels, and in the other demanding the ser\ice due from child to father ; or, as Alford says, " as the last resource of an .orphan and desolate creature," as in the passage in the sixty-third chapter of Isaiah, where, nevertheless, no address is made or peti- tion presented on the ground of the fatherhood of God. But now Jesns lays it at the foundation of all religion, because the basis of all prayer. It is the starting-point of both his theology and his philanthropy. The appeal is to be made to the father-heart in God. And this shows what all praying really must be. It is not the appeal of a slave at the feet of his master, nor a subject at the feet of his king. It is not to be an attemi)t to wring from reluctant power a favor which he who prays earnestly desires. It is to be such communion with God as sons do have with fathers. This abolishes at once that fearful element of most forms of reli- gion, in which it is assumed that the interests of God are one thing, and those of the supi)liant another, and the sti-uggle * The learned Bengel well remarks 1 adduced are either dissimilar or mod- fiiat the examples which Lightfoot has I em. 2SG SECOND AND THIRD PASSOVER IN THE LITE OF JESUS. between man and liis Maker is as to the obtaining and the with- holding. Every child's interest is identical with that of the father, as the father's is with that of the son. So now, when a man wlio receives the teaching of Jesns goes to his prayers, he begins by feeling that he ought to desire sinipl}^ what God wills, and that God wills exactly the thing which is best for his child. That makes the comnnniion at once tender and confidential. The brief doxological addition to the sublimely simple title, "Our Father," is "The One in the heavens." The employment of this phrase does two things; it prevents undue familiarity with even the Father, who is represented as infinite and glorious, I'esi- dent in all the heavens that are, being wherever anything heavenly is, and perhaps intimating that his presence makes Avhat is lieav- enly ; and it declares his personality, thus separating Jesus fi-om all the teachers of pantheism. Pi-ayer is not to be a A'ague address to any indefinite phantasy, but to a " him," to a " one," to a pei'son having place and personality, the infinite Progenitor of a countless number of sons and daughters, each of whom so derives his or her pei'sonality from the Great Father, that if he were not a Personal Being neither could they be. There is another thought suggested by this form of address to God. It is to be a perpetual assertion and reassertion of the brotherhood of man. It is " our," not " niy." I am to acknowl- edge that He is as much the Father of every other human being who utters this prayer as He is my Father. I am to offer a pi'ayer for every other human being when I pray for myself, and if I em- ploy this prayer -which Jesus sets before me I shall do that very thing. Selfishness in 2)rayer is proscribed forever. A man may not ask after blessings on his body and on his soul for his own jier- Bonal comfort and own personal salvation alone. "When he com munes with the Father it must be for the good of the whole fam- ily. It lifts the lowly and humbles the proud. An unspotted queen on her throne feels that while her royal lips say " Our Father," the hunger-parched mouth of the frail and abandoned woman, who crouches beside the doorsteps in the dark night, is Baying the same words to the same Being, with the same truth ;ind meaning in them ; and the two women, if they are really praying, are praying each for the other. This is the basis and method of philanthropy set forth by Jesus. After the address the prayer has six petitions, which, it is to b© THE SEEMON ON THE MOUNT. 2S7 observed, arc not doxologics, but real pi-ayers, and as such are to Bi^'iiify what are the things which above all others we feel that we need, and having which we shall be satishcd that other things may come and go as they will. It shonld interest any student of human history to know wdiat arc the six things which such a per- son as Jesus believed ought to be paramount in the desires of all mankind. It will be noticed tliat three of them relate to God and three to man. The pi-ayers in the first part are, tliat the Name of the heav- enly Father should be ludlcnved, that his kingdom should come, and that his will should be done. There is this phrase added to the last of these petitions, "as in heaven so on earth." The hear- ers of Jesus nnist have understood hy the Avord " heaven " the special abode of Jehovah, of all holy intelligent spirits that have not fallen, and of all the human spirits that have been purified and saved. From his making this a model of prayer they nmst lia\e gathei'cd that the state of affairs in that world is the normal^ and the state of affairs in this world is the aljiiornial condition of the uni\erse, and that to have this M'orld brought to the condi- tion of that world should be the highest desire and the most irre- pressible longing of every true heart. It is the first outburst of the soul. The phrase "as in heaven so on earth" is not therefore to be confined'to the last of these three petitions, but is to cover them all.* "As in heaven so on earth be thy name hallowed;" " as in heaven so in earth thy kingdom come ; " " as in heaven so on earth thy will be done." The foundation of all true religion in the heart of man must be found in its pure ideas of God. Men cannot add to His holi- ness, but their own conceptions of His character may become very exalted. Errors in religion arise from false ideas of God, in re- garding Ilim as vengeful, or weakly lenient, or indifferent, or in some way other than what He really is. In heaven the souls of the holy have only holy, that is, true thoughts and conceptions of Ilim. Each soul is like a perfect mirror. The souls of men are * This is the view of the Council of Trent, as set forth in the Catechism. I am aware that the Codices which omit the petition, '' Thy will be done," in the corresponding passage in Luke xi. 2, omit also these words, " as in heaven so in earth;" nevertheless the spirit of the prayer, and its peculiar construction, by which so much condensation is obtained, seem to me to justify the iutcri)retation given in the Roman Catholic Catechism. 288 SECOND AND TnmD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. full of flaws. God's name means God's character, tliat by which lie should be called or described. As in heaven the purest, truest thoughts of God are held, so ought it to be desired that upon earth all men shall " sanctify the Lord their God in their hearts." And the acknowledgment of his kingdom by all men, and their total submission to his benehcent reign, so that there should be no rebellion against the benign sovereignty of the Father-King, ig to be the aspiration and desire of all who pray. There is a sense in which that kingdom does always as much prevail on earth as in heaven, nainelj^, in the actual rule of God over all things ; but in heaven all intelligences comprehend this, accept it, and rejoice in it ; on earth men do not submit, do not willingly and gladly ac- cept it, but are striving to rcacli their happiness in their own ways, and not by being Milling subjects of their Father, who is their Lord. Each man that prays should desire that that kingdom be set up wholly in his own soul, and* that he should always be free from all other paramount rulers.* The third petition prays that on earth the will of God may be done as it is in heaven. It is to be observed how the personality of God is preserved throughout, and humanity as distinct from God. So that prayer is not the mere human addressing itself or voiding its deepest feelings on the unfeeling universe. Man is as autocratic in his sphere as God is in his. God m*ay do the will of man, or man may do the will of God, or their wills may bo made to clash. If the last do not take place one of the former must. AYliich does the good governance of the universe in gen- eral, and the good of both parties in particular, demand? Shall the Lifinite be obedient to the finite, the power of the Omnipo- tent Lnmaculate be made subservient to the caprices of the will of sinful Feebleness? If the latter were the case, then, for a moment, we might have peace. But the submission of Onmipo- tence to a mind that may at any moment make a mistake, and to passions that every moment are rushing on blindly, would be a ruinous anomaly. There is no wa}' in which peace and ])rogrcss and happiness can be secured but by the direct bending of all the enei-gies of man to the will of God. And thus is man to 1)0 ennobled. lie loses no freedom of his will, he is not ahaorhed in God, he is not doing compulsory work, but he is freely choosing * So Augustine says: "Ut in nobis I optamus." Seitn. 50. veniat, optamus ; ut in illo inveniamur, I THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT. 289 to direct all his great energies to the accomplishmeiit of the good designs of the tenderest and lovingest Father in all the univei'se. In the case of man it would be many fitful wills attemptins: to rule ; in the case of God, it is One will, the will of the infinitely wise and good Father. And thus, by a natural and logical transition, from petitions touching the estate of God the suppliant is taught to jDass to peti- tions touching his own estate. The first prayer is for subsistence : " bread proper for our suste- nance give ns to-day." The epithet which precedes " bread " occm'S in the New Testament only in this passage and in Luke xi. 3. It is one of the most disputed words in all these writings. In Greek it is eiriovaiav. In the common English version it is trans- lated " daily." The Vulgate has " panem nostrum superstantia- lem," which is followed by the Ehenish version, " our superstan- tial bread." In the Arabic and Ethiopian versions it is " to- morrow's bread," * which does not accord with the desire that it may be given to-day. I have endeavored in the ti'anslation given above to render what seemed to me to embrace all tlie possible and practicable meanings of the word as used by Jesus. f The prayer is for the preservation of the whole man. AVhat is need- ful for his body is bread, and therefore aprov is used. And that symbolizes what is necessary for his intellect and for his soul. "Wliat is noio necessary to sustain us as men is to be prayed for, and nothing more. No anxious care for the morrow is allowed, for if our prayer be answered to-day the same prayer will be an- swered to-morrow. No luxuries are to be ci-aved. Life, in which to do the Father's will, this is all the child is to seek. What I may use now fot physical, mental, and spiritual sustenance and strength, I may ask of God. But bread, real bread for the body, is the thing set forth in this petition explicitlj', and all other needed things implicitly. The second thing to be asked \% forgiveness. Sin is represented imder the figure of debt. To be in debt oppresses a sensitive mind as with a load of guilt. There can be no security, no peace, no happy action of the powers while a man lives in the * And in the ' ' Gospel according to the Hebrews," Jerome says that he found for imovffiay the word -in>:, that is, " to- morrow's." 19 f Those who desire to see all the mean- ings assigned may consult Alford's G^reek Tciftnment^ Lange's Comment.^ and Ben* gel's Gnomon yi)i Iook 290 SECOND AND TllIKD PASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. consciousness of having committed sins wliicli are not forgiven him. Every true man longs for that. Whatever pleasure he may have found in sinning, the moment the heat of lust or passion subsides the sense of the offence against his heavenly Father overpowers him. lie can do no more, he can enjoy no more, until the sin he forgiven. It has become the extreme necessity of his life. The pain of guilt is the one intolerable agony. And here the communion element of the Prayer is made to ap- pear again distinctly. The petitioner prays that all sins, his owir and those of others, may be forgi\en. And that there may be a general amnesty, he first forgives all who have sinned against him, all who have gotten in debt to him by their failure to do for him what they were bound as human brothers to do. Then he goes to the heavenly Father and prays that the same may be done for him. " Forgive us our debts like as we also have forgiven our debtors." It does not place the ])lea of foi-giveness on the ground that we have forgiven our debtors, those who have sinned against us ; nor does it make the forgiveness we grant to others the meas- ure of the Father's forgiveness of us : " Forgive us as much as we have forgiven othere ;" but rather means that what we have done to-wards them He should do towards us, referring to the nature of the act of forgiveness rather than to the degrees of its exercise. The last prayer is for 7'edempfion. Trials of faith, tests of character, discipline that strengthens, these are what no man has need of dreading. But that the providences of the heavenly Father ma}^ not lead us into such positions as shall make the solicitation to evil on the part of others specially influential over our lives and conduct, we may request. Being forgiven, we ha^•c a horror of the same circumstances as those in which we fell. This petition seeks to put the suppliant under the special provi- dence of the Father in all coming life. And then, as a climax, it exhibits the consummation of the Christian life. " Rescue us from evil ! " When that prayer is answered, there is nothing more to pray for: it is the completeness of redemption from all physical, intellectual, and spiritual evil, — from disease, from error, and from sin. It indulges the vision of perfection, and ai-dently longs that in the suppliant it may have complete reali^ca- tion. And what he asks for himself he solicits for all others who pray. It is a prayer for the destruction of all evil. Every fresh analysis of this Pkaykk lets us more and more into TUE SERMON ON THE MOimT. 291 the mlrd of Jesus. It is to be noticed that each petitioner is in- structed by his Yciy prayer to regard the glory of God as the fii-st thing, and the supply of his own wants as quite secondary. A man who rushes to his heavenly Father with requests for his own deliverance and enlargement, not feeling more concerned that God may be adored than that he may be helped, is a selfish and undevont worshipper. The rule is : AVorship first and help after- ward. Again, there seems to be this connection implied, that the petitioner desires sustenance, forgiveness, and deliverance from evil, that he may be able to contribute towards rendering the name of the Father holy in the hearts of all men, and bringing all men to submit to his kingship and devote themselves to carry- ing out his w^ill. Xor must the practical effect of the sincere offering of this prayer upon the character of the petitioner escape our attention. A man should pray only for wdiat he really, truly, and earnestly desires. If he do not desire what he asks, he adds to deceit a dreadful mockery of the omnipotent and loving Father. This prayer indicates whal he should desire, the proper adoi-ation of God, the complete acknowledgment as well as continuance of his rule in the universe, and the beautiful harmony and beneficent progress which shall follow the adjust- ment of man's moral energies to the decisions of the will of God : and ill order that these things may be accomplished, for himself the petitioner desires only sustenance, foi-giveuess, and safety. What then must life be ? Simply the devotion of man's powers to gain these things. A life so ordered would necessarily become not only satisfactory but sublime. The petitioner would no longer be seeking the things that were degrading or even unnecessary, lie would never idle. He would strive to obtain proper food for his body, proper culture of his intellect, proper growth of his Boul, that he might be able to do more to carry forward God's irreat desiirn of makino- the universe the domain of a rule which too o should develop it into a boundless estate of inconceivable glor3\ Petty cares would lose their hold upon such a man ; but nothing would be neo-lected. In the most trivial matters he would be just and faithful. For every possible emergency he would be ready. The poets have not dreamed of a man surpassing him who should labor to have this prayer fulfilled in all equipoise of passions and intellect, in all completeness of self-government and energy of action. He would come into a grandeur and a beauty 292 SECOND AND THIED TASSOVEK IN TIIE LIFE OF JESUS. which would justify humanity in its claim of being offspring ol Deity. Can the parallel of this Piajer be found elsewhere in literature ? FOEGIVENESS. Tlie Teacher steps back a moment to enforce the duty of for- giveness as a necessary precedent of prayer. The word is changed Fcxr if ye forgive men from that wliicli Signifies a debt to that which their blunders, your gij^nifies a sUp, a fall, a defeat, a blunder. In the heavenly Father will . also forgive you ; but if translation I liavc chosen the last, as perhaps com- ye forgive not men, pj-igin^ j^ somc sciise all the others. The lesson neither ■will your Fa- -* ~ ther forgive your biun- plainly is, that wliatcver other preparation a man may have for prayer, if he ha\e not forgiven others his petitions will be inefficient. It is utterly useless to go to God for forsjiveness if I have not forgiven all othei's, considerins: their sins against me as defeats in a conflict which I must charita- bly suppose they waged with the temptations to do wrong ; for that is the view which God charitably takes of my wrong actions. I owe him service. It is a debt. I fail to pay. Praying for for- giveness shows that I acknowledge the debt and have tried to pay, but failed, and was defeated. This blundering life He forgives, but not until I have forgiven those who thus stand related to me. The English version of Matthew has a doxology at the close of the petitions, a veiy simple and very noble doxology. But as in a history of Jesus we can consider only his well-ascertained words, this addition must be rejected. Its absence from the Sinaitic, the Vatican, and the Beza Codices ought to settle the question that, however excellent it may be, it was not a part of the prayer Avliich Jesus delivered to his disciples for their use, and to be the model of all prayer used by his followers in all times. To the absence from the oldest Greek manuscript versions must be added the fact that the earliest Christian authors failed to comment on it. If we found in dissertations upon what is called Oratio Dominica, " The Lord's Prayer," the doxology expounded as part of the prayer, that fact would create a violent assumption that it existed in manuscripts older than any which have survived, older than the Codex Sinaitic\is, which dates back to the fourth century. Or, if we had relied upon the Codex Vaticanus, which up to the discovery of the Codex Sinaiticus was our oldest, and then upon the discovery of this latter had found that it contained the doxology, THE SERMON ON THE ilOUNT. 293 it vrould have strengthened the conviction tliat it existed iu the very first records made of the words of Jesns. But when none of these versions have it, and all the Latin Fathers fail to make mention of it, when expressly explaining the prayer, sound criti- cism compels us to reject it. The question natumlly occurs to a thoughtful reader. How, then, did it appear in the text of Matthew ? It is manifestly liturgical. Wlien liturgies spmng up in the Church it was added,* and then, when copies of the Gosjiels M^ere made, it was easily transferred from the liturgy by the memory and habit of the copyist into the margin or directly into the text. Ambrose,f who was born in the middle of the fourth century, implies that the doxology was re- cited by the priest alone, after the people had recited " The Lord's Prayer." It is quite easy to see how this Epiphonema, as Ambrose calls it, should have come into the text. But the proof thus far is all against its being part of the original pmyer. The Third Exam])lc is FASTING. The teaching here is qnite plain, II}^ocrites — men playing a part for the purpose of securing the applanse of men — make all of the part they caii, look sad and worn, that men ^„^ ^^.^^„ ^^ ^^^^ ^ may praise their saintliness. And men do. They come not as the hj-p- have their reward, and they exhaust it. They TTZfZ^^T'^^ have none of that inner culture which comes of f^oe^ *^hat they may bo , iPi-if*i.- p i-\ 1 iiacn of men to be fast- real selr-denuil, or abstinence from tlie usual en- i„g_ ^^ ^griiy i say •joymcnts of life because the soul is afflicted with unto you, They exhaust • 1 £ -^ 1 ,. £. n J T-C ^"^^^ reward. But a pam by reason or its departures rrom (jrod. it a thou, fasting, anoint man choose such a culture and its great reward, he ^"^^ "^"^^ ''"'^ ^^^^ *^y , face, that thou be not must not put on the appearance of saintliness. seen by mm to be fast- Let him fast, if he find spiritual profit therein, in?, but to thy Father '- ^ \ _ who is in secret, and but let him fast inwardly, making his usual toilet, thy rather who is in permitting no negligence to creep into his dress, ^^^t wiu reward the*, giving no sign to the world of that inward spiritual discipline which he is enduring. The modern Christian who makes all about him aware that it is Friday by his glumness or sanctimony is a Pharisee. The cultivation of character, not the flaunting of • It appears in its first form in Con*t. Apos., viL 24, 6ti arou iariv i) fiatriXfia tis aiiiva.!' Ay.T}K ' ' For thine is the king- dom through the aeons. Amen," f Be Sacrament., vi. 5. 294 SECOND AND TniRD PASSOVEK IN TIIE LIFE OF JESUS. the insignia of religious ceremonial, is the great work Jesus set before bis disciples. WARNINGS AGAINST COVETOUSNESS. Whenever the connection in this discourse seems to he broken, the clue is easily found by recollecting that the text is CliaracteT. The Teacher is insisting upon a man's being right TrcaRTire not up for ^ .?,;,. -, , , yourselves treasures up- aud stroug aud bcautiiul lu his soul \ that a man s on earth, where moth m-eatucss docs uot cousist in liis circumstauccs and rust disfigure, and " where thieves break but iu liis internal cliaractcr : that a man may through and steal. But -^^^^ ^^^ ^^^ imperishable and inalienable treasure up for your- •' •■• eeives treasure in hca- trcasurc, iiamcly, liimsclf — liis charactcr. Other ven where neither things go. Tliis stays. Otlicr thiugs are earthly J moth nor rust disfigure, O o J o ./ 7 and where thieves do this is hcavenly. "ITt^^^Z Moreover, a connection appears in this, that Je- treasure there is also gug was Setting a transparent character in con- ^ ^ ' trast with h}']30crisy. The Pharisees were worldly- minded to the core, while all their external appearance was reli- gious. They were blowing trumpets before their alms, in the graphic description of Jesus, were making long prayers in market- places while devoui-ing the substance of widows, and fasting osten- tatiously while heaping up treasures on earth. Having set forth the manner in which the prominent duties of religion ought to be discharged, the Teacher inculcates the entire consecration of the life, in the heart and soul of a man. It is to be marked how he adheres to one theme. It is not because all earthly possessions are liable to destruction from the wear and tear of time, or the force or fraud of men, nor for the safety of the jMSsessions, that Jesus insists that all things shall be contrived into an investment in spiritual and eternal things, but for the effect upon the charac- ter, for the heart's sake ; for " where is thy treasure there is also thy heart ; " and for everlasting dignity and happiness the imper- ishable affections must be fixed on imperishable things. AGAINST DOUBLE-IIINDEDNESS. That his discii>les might learn the importance of preserving clear-sightedness in spiritual things, he brings an illustration f i-om fi bodily member, and this he does not scientifically, but, as always in such cases, popnlarl}', as the people understood it. Sight is simple. A healthy eye is needed. An eye that sees THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT. 295 double is an evil e^'e, and utterly confusing. So, when the soul'a eye begins to fliclcer, becoming nncontroHable, seeing double, commingling and confusing objects, it is a bad tuc lamp of the body time for the man who depends upon it. His light is darkness — the greatest darkness — worse than is the eye : if thine eye be clear, thy whole body shall .be bright : but if thine eye be bad, thy whole body shall be total bhndness, to which a man may adapt him self. It is uncertain, unreliable, yet inducing the dark, if then the , • , 1 -L i. 1 • l,i liptht that is in thee man to rely upon it because it seems to be right. ^^ ,i.^,kncss, how great If the light be darkness, how great the darkness ! the darkness i Jesus continues to dissuade his disciples from the double-mind- edness of the Pharisees by a second illustration, taken from social life. The word emi)loyed in Greek can be trans- 1 ./ No man can be slave lated oiil}' by " slave," one who belongs to an- to two masters; for other. A hired servant may in some sense serve ^^^ ^ ^^^ ^ two men ecpially Avell, but a slave is a member of he win cung to the a family. As a son cannot be son of two parents '^^^^^ "^^ at once, so a servant that belongs to a master is be slave* to God and devoted to his master utterly. His oidy comfort is in undivided affection and service. So as to the claims of God and Mammon. You cannot serve both at the same time. The Pharisees have tried it and failed. They are kept from the full enjoyment of their gains by their religious pretences ; they lose the pleasure of undivided religious service by their base worldli- ness. A man must be single-hearted to be good, and gi-eat, and happy. Mammon seems merely to be a Chaldee word for " riches." There is no evidence that the Syrians, as has been as- serted, ever worshipped a god of that name. AGAINST EXCESSIVE ANXIETY. In this passage the Teacher enlarges the idea of single-mind- edness in a direction which excludes distiacting care. He has been speaking of clear-sightedness : he now speaks of directness of living. A man's full powers are needed for each day's living. * In the common version it stands, " either he will hate the cue and love the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other," the latter clause being merely a repetition of the former. But this certainly is not the meaning'. Meyer expresses it; "He will either hate A and love B, or cling to A and de- spise B," which is certainly the sense, and such I have given it hy using "former" and "latter" so that in both members of the sense the 6 cm shall refer to one person, and 6 erepoi shall refer to another. Dean Alford sanctions this translation. 296 BECOND AND TUIKD TASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. lie cannot afford to have his forces scattered. Double-minded iiess does this. Loving God and hating Mammon, hating God On this account I say and loving Mammon, in perpetual alternation, id nnto you, lie not cxces- ,■■ • ^ n i i. oi t Biveiy anxious for your ^^^ ^'^^^^^ <^>^ cliaractcr. bo Jio procccds vei'j ear- inner man,* what ye nestlj aud cloqueutly to strip his disciples of the are to eat, nor for your , ji ^^ iii i i ont<;r man, whatye are encumbraDce OI all worldlj carcs, that tliej may to wear. Is not the cr[yQ tliemSclveS tO tllC lofticst SClf-Culture. soul more than food t-> i i i • r t and the body than i cHiaps ahuost uo teaching of Jesus has been clothing? Look upon gQ variouslv undcrstood and so Avretchedly misin- the birds of the air, * , , •'^ _ for they sow not, nor terprctcd as tliis jjarticular passage. It is quite reap nor gather into ngcessaiT that WO do it the lusticc to apply a lit- Btorehousos, and your '' , _ •' x i ./ heavenly Father feed- tlc comuion scnsc to its interpretation. oth them. Do yon not jj. certainly docs not teach idleness, sloth, list- differ from them, and •' ' ' is not the difference Icssucss, ucglect of Ordinary affairs, or any volan- much in joiur fivor?t ^ imi)overishment. It does not teach starvation But who of you by be- "^ i ing excessively anxious aiid luikediiess. It docs uot cucourage the fanati- to Ms'iirone^Iingie ^^^ui of sitting dowu aud " letting the Lord take cubit ?t And about carc of " a man. It teaches precisely the opposite over^lnxiousf Consid! ^f all tlicsc tliiugs. It tcaclies that a man is to er the lilies of the field euiploy all liis facultics aiid time in doing what neither toil nor spin : his i)lace ill tlic kiiigdoiii of God plainly demands and 1 say unto you That ^^f him aiid Satisfying wliatcver righteous claim not even Solomon in all i • /• \ • • i his glory was arrayed aiiy 0110 lias upoii him. Oil piuuciple, aiid as the like one of these, pj-ineipal thiiiG;, tlic kino;doni of God is to be Wherefore, if God thus '■ '- ^' « , . clothe the grass of the SOUght, tllO rulc of tllC laW of God ill tllO life. * The word may be translated ' ' life " or "soul." The soul's continuance in the body does depend upon food, and yet it seems somewhat harsh to translate the word by '' soul " in this case, and bring it so abruptly close to food. As the outer man is in the connection named (tw^o, so the inner man is named \ This is a circumlocution, and yet I have not learned how to convey the sense of the original in closer English. The Greek is obx v/xus ,uaWov Sta „ f • i v ^ ■ '! Do not judge harsh- pare conduct and character with his own great ly, t^'it yon bo not standard of morality. There are few more im- I;.itri,,arj,rl!,„e°J proving exercises than this, for the quickening of >■« i'"!-''' ye ^'i^'ii ^^ T ,,.-,., 1,1 • 1 t> jiulgct], and witli what our own moral sensibility and tlie guidance oi nica.sareyeineasiirc«,yo our own lives. The Great Teacher condemns the si.aii be measured. And , 1 .,,.,,., , . , why dost thou observe unlovely spirit with which many are wont to criti- the splinter that is in cise the conduct of their fellows, to make the "'^ brother's eye, and „ ii'T cni' • ''"*''• ""^ perceive the most uiiiavorable judgments oi all their actions, beam that is in thine and to assio;n to bad motives actions that may iust °"'" ''^'"'^ ^'^ '""^ ^ '^ •* tlust thou say to thy as well be supposed to have s})rung from motives bn;thcr, "Brother, let that are pure and noble. To "iudge" here "''' """ ^^"^ '"""*" / . p . . from thme eye," and means neither the passing of just or of unjust heboid a beam is m judgment, but the spirit with which this is done. "\i"«°^^"7«? "i-P"- ii 3 ' -^ cntc, first cast the Men ought to be careful not to form judgments beam from thine own unnecessarily, nor carelessly, nor hastily. When ^I^Tc^lrTyTcast'th! duty and observance of the requirements of jus- splinter from thy broth- tice demand, then M'e may pass judgment. But "^''^®' even then not hastily and not harshly. The reason assigned is that we shall be judged with the judgment which we apply to others. God is judge. To judge one's fellow-men is to assume his prerogative. Our judgments will be reviewed by the Searcher of all hearts. The Great Teacher does not mean that if we are lenient to the faults of others God M'ill tlierefore be lenient to us — that if we lose the distinction of ri;'"'« °"«"«d •■ ~ »' to you. I or every one down as a universal proposition, that every true who .wks receives, ana .^ „ • 1 -XTTi J "'h*> seeks fiiuls, and to prayer is answered. When any man comes to !,;,„ ,^.^^, ,,„„,.^ j^ God and sincerely prays that his sins may be ^hau be opened, ot ji ' t 11,1 . • 1 what man is there ol forgiven, he may go away absolutely certain and you. whom his son ask- Bure that his prayer has been answered, and that "'^ ^°^ ^""'■-^'^^ ^^ ■«■"' I . . ... AT 1 1 ^°^ B'v f"'"* '^ stone I Jiis Sins are lorgi veil. And so wliatever the pe- or even asks for a fish? titioncr needs God gives in answer to his praver. i^o wui not gwe him a /-, 15 .p T 1 • 1 1 . ." serpent! if you, being (jrod s gilts are good, and suited to the recipient, evii, know to give good If a human father adapts his gifts to his child, gifts to your children, ~,. . 11111 1 1 ^y ^"^^ nmch mora not olreriiig a stone when he should present bread, shaii your Father in the much more the o:ood Father in the heavens, lifted ii^'"^'^'"« s^yo good 1 11 1 ..... .11 . 11 TT- *'^'""^ ^ ^^^"^ *^** above all liunian miirmities, will give to all liis ask him i ah things, children, if not what they ask, certainly what they ^^'^••'^^f"'-''' 'hat you •^ ' *' •' wisli men to do to you, need. His gifts would not be good if not adapted the same aiso do ye to to his children. ^^''"'- ^°' '^'" ^' '^^ law and the prophets. There seems also this connection with what im- mediately precedes. You know what you would have your heav- enly Father do to your fellow-men. Do so to them, not judging harshly, not giving inapproju-iately. What you would have God do to you, that do to your neighbor ; for manifestly that is Avhat you desire your neighbor to do to you. Our petitions to God are the expressions of our highest and best self-love. Thus this Teacher has shown that he taught nothing which was to invalidate the law and the prophets, but much that Avas to ful- fil them, and that the demands of the moral law are iK)t met by a rigorous C)bservance of the outward letter, but by the building up of a character in accordance with the spirit of the law. AGAINST THE BROAD WAY. As compared with an earnest culture of the charactei', the mere Pharisaic observance of outward Pharisaic rites is quite an easy thing. It is the broad road. The other is the narrow. It is not 302 SECOXD AXD TIIIED PASSOVER m THE LITE OF JESUS. rjiirow p:itc' ; for 'jrciad and Rpucious is the ruiui loiifiing away into destruction, and many arc those entorinj^ through «,', because nar- row is the Kate and re- stricted * tlie road tliat leads away into life, and few are they wlio find it. of itself so difficult a thing that men may abandon the attempt to enter it. Tlie fewness of those who do enter is not due so much Enter thron-h the to its difficulty, Avlilch is admitted, as to the fact that so many are drawn away into the broader road. But that the narrow way rather than the spacious road should be souglit, is ui-ged, and a powerful reason suggested l)y the very verb that is used, '' leads hwiuj^'' one to destruction and the other to life, intimating tliat both roads are very long, and carry the ti-avellers thereon into scenes far removed from this present state of affairs, and therefore the clioice of roads should be made with great care. Tlie difficulties of cultivating character are enhanced by teach- ers of falsehood, wlio assume such manners of sanctity that they Beware of false pro- "^^J tlcccive. " From witliiu " sucli mcu are ra- phets, who come to pacious, and use even the office of teaching morals you in sheep's clothing, £ ^ x i i t but from within they loi' ^asc purposcs. Jcsus shows liow coustautly nre ravening wolves. \^q hcciis liis great tlicme ill vicw bv his very Front their fruits ye ■\ <• -i •^ • c- i . shall know them. Do uiodc ot dcscnbing falsc tcaclicrs, not by saying persons gather grapes ^^|^j^(. ^j^^^ ^^ j^^^j. |^ dcscribing wliat thcy aro. from thorns, or figs -^ J o J ^ from thistles? Thua Their actious Spring from an inmost nature Avhich duces b!^!!tifurf..l't^ is wolfish and selfish. ^ And the same thing is set and every rotten tree fortli lu liis illustratiou drawu from trccs and produces evil fruits. ■• • p .. rm i • , n i • It is not possible that tlieir iruit. Ihemauwlio is not really good is a good tree should pro- \>\^q. a trcc wliicli iiiay be laden with artificial duce evil fruits, nor /.. i>i''ii'i i» • that a rotten tree ii'uit, wliile it IS absolutcly uuproductive Or is ca- Bhouid produce beauti- pablc of producing only e\-il fruits. A man need ful fruits. Every tree , ti p ,p. ci'tpi that docs not produce havc littlc carc lor the fruitage of Ins lite, but beautiful fruit is he^vn j^ust be luost carcf ul for thc sap of his soul. The down and cast into the , ^ _ ^ '^ . _ fire. So then, from sap bsiug right tlic fruit will be right. Jesus their fruits ye shau teaclics that tlic laws of tliG intellectual and spi- know them. •■■ ritual world are as settled and as regularly oper- ative as those of the physical world. Where there is a really good and beautiful life there must be a really good and beauti- ful soul ; and where a man's character is really bad, no repressive carefulness can keep back the bitter fruits of bad acts. In either case, for a season, intervening circumstances may prevent the ob- * The original is not fairly met by our English word " narrow," the Greek word being a passive participle, strictly meaning "squeezed," as Dr. J, A, Alex- ander notices. THE SEEMON ON THE MOUNT. 303 server from seeing tlie connection, but it will someliow finally assert itself, lleuce the necessity of being more careful to culti vate the character than to protect the reputation. AGAINST HYPOCKISY. And now lie turns to those who wei-e gathering about him, and instructs thcni tluit mere profession of attachment to his person, that even zeal for the orj-eat work which he had „ . * ,, fc) Not * every one who undertaken, that even the possession of power to wys to me, "Lord, ^11.1, . 1 .1, ,1 Lord," shall enter into rm deeds that are miraculous, will not be the kingdom of the hea. suflicient to insure them a place in the kingdom ■»'e"s: but he that does 1 . 1 r;ii 11 ,1 1 .^ . 11 the things willed by my which nils all the heavens, — the great m()rai and Father in the heavens. . spiritual kingdom which he is now preaching, — but ^'''"y ^'^"■^^ ''"y ^ ^° ,..,.- 1T1 ^^ that day, "Lord, that it IS absolutely necessary to establish a pro- ^ord, have we not in found and lofty moral character, and that this can ^*^y "'^"^'^ p>-eached, be done only by an inward conrormity to the will ,,eiied many demons, and in thy name per- formed many works of power ? " And then will I profess + to them, " I never knew you." Separate yourselves from me, yo who aio working lawlessness. of his heavenly Father. That not only are professions comparatively valueless, but that even the possession of singular gifts, such as excite the admiration of the world, M'ill avail nothing in the absence of a true and high character, he teaches in a brief dramatic passage of almost fearful jiower. It is as if he had said : All time is not now. Days are coining after this day. To all In^po- crites and self-deceivers some day of exposure will come. They may plead againist it. They may appeal to the eloquent sermons they have delivered in explanation or defence or enforcement of my doctrines ; they may appeal to the force that lay in them, which was sufficient to cast out the demons who had taken possession of men ; they may appeal to apparent miracles which they have per- formed in my name, and these appeals may be founded on facts which I will not deny. But this I will do, I will make such ex- posure of them as shall be the same as if in speech. I will tell them that I had never known them as being of my people and subjects * The Greek ov -na^ 6 AeycDi' . . . sio-f- XtviTtrat does not signify that every one who calls Jesus ' ' Lord " shall be excluded from the kingdom which he was preach- ing ; but that calling him so does not of itself secure such admission. f The word in the Greek is striking. It means, as Alford points out, a state- ment of the simple tnith of facts as op • posed to the false coloring and self-de- ceit of the hypocrites. 304 SECOND AND TIIIED TASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. of tlie heavenly kingdom ; tliat I always knew that they were not doing my Father's will. Then, after that startling announcement, which was all the more terrible because the day was not designated, Jesus turned upon the crowd about him, and in substance said : " Seeing that this is the case, I charge every man whose life is a series of works done lawlessly, without i-cgard to the law of the I'ight, which is the will of my heavenly Father, to separate himself from me and my community. Whatever power to perform miracles he may Geem to possess, I acknowledge no gifts and no professions. Char- acter is everything. Law is eternal. God is the law-maker. Those who obey Ilim follow me ; let others separate themselves." It must not be unnoticed that Jesus asserts that it is possible for one who does not conform to God's moral law to cast out demons and perform works of power and wonder, that is to say, miracles, or seem to do so. The performance of miracles, therefore, accord- ing to this teaching of Jesus, is no proof that the teacher who does them is true, or that his teachings are in accordance with truth. It follows that he did not lay his claim to the attention of the world upon the miracles which he performed. lie claimed, as we shall see, through all his course, to be something higher than a miracle-worker, namely, to be a teacher of truth, and to be king over all other teachers and over all other men in that he taught the truth authoritatively. lie claimed to have the right to say what the truth is, and declare it, not as a discovery made by his intellect, not as an inspiration from some spiritual force outside of himself, but as originally knowing it and authoritatively declar- ing it. lie certainly conformed his subsequent teachings to these announcements in the Mount Sermon, in which we learn that a truth is greater than a miracle, and to obey God is better than to do marvellous works. conclusion: the safe foundation of CnAKACTEK. This wonderful discourse terminates with a striking parable. As Jesus had begun M'ith an enumeration of characteristics, he closes with a description of the trials of character, in which he contrasts the stability of one with the downfall of another. All goodness and safety lie in placing the life upon the truth and remaining there. Knowledge of truth is in no way helpful to a man if he do not obey the truth ; it rather makes his destruction THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT. 305 more appalling. The same kind of trial comes to those who are mere hearers of truth and to those whose lives are conformed to it. To all outward appearance the characters •*■ •*■ Every one, then, who of the two men were the same, except as to foun- hears these wotjs of dation. Both built. Both built residences, not ^aii'be"'^iikr'C'cVtlJ"a mere sheds. The houses were the same. If both wise man, wu.bmithia house upon tie rock: had been built upon the rock, both would have and down came the* i 1 Ti 2. J.^ i • 1 2.1^ t^'i.„ shower, and the floods stood, it was not the materials or the architec- ^^^^^ \^^ ^j^^, ^i,^^,^ ture that was at fault. It was the foundation. If I'lew, and feu on that house, and it fell not; the winds, the rains, and the freshets could have for it had been founded swept away the foundation of the first, liis house e^inewhfheat'fheL* would have fallen and its downfall have been words of mine, and does . them not, shall be liken- great. ii the sandy foundation of the second man cd to a fooiish man, had been able to resist the winds, the rains, and ^^° ^'^^*' ^'' ^°'''^ upon the sand : and the freshets, his house was good and strong enough down came the shower, to have stood. But the stronger the timbers, and "^ *^^ ^°°^^ ^'''"^' " _ ' and the winds blew. the more thoronghly knitted and nailed together, and gmote that house, the more prodio-ious the wreck and ruin when the "°'^**^«"' ^""^ ^^ ^'^ ^ c5 was great. foundation subsided and the lofty and strong edifice collapsed. Men who pa}^ no attention to the upbuilding of their characters may fall and attract little attention. Men who are most careful to build up their characters, and yet secure no foundation, have no security, whatever be the materials or the painstaking. This is the important and generally neglected thought to which Jesus calls attention. It is the collapse of character which is the most appalling catastrophe possible in the universe. This Discourse has been dwelt upon at length, because as Jesus came a Teacher of Truth his words are most important, and this is the lono-est report of his speeches made in any . -^ . ^ '' The manner of Jesus. biographical memoir extant, it must be supposed to embrace the essence and spirit of the gospel he came to pro- mulgate. We have the recorded statements, the propositions ver- bally rendered, but there was something in the manner of Jesus that was extraordinary. There was a tone which made his hear- ers feel that this was a man altogether superior to any other * The articles as used in the original show that all those things were familiar to the hearer ; that from personal obser- vations they knew the rock, the sand, the Bhower, the sndden swelling of riv- 2C ers into freshets, and the fierce winds. The word translated floods means rivers, but in this case it obviously means rivers swollen into floods. 306 SECOND AND THIKD PASSOVEK EST THE LIFE OF JESUS. " greatest man," because the latter was compelled to enforce his teaching either by an argument or by authoiity, by showing that what he said was true or by invoking the authority of the ancients. Jesus did no such thing. He announced the truth as a monarch announces an imperial edict : " I say unto you." The people were struck with astonishment. They had heard learned men. They had heard enthusiasts. They had heard the Scribes and John the Baptist. In the case of Jesus it was not learning. It was not eloquence. It was authority. He T/iade tliem feel his Toyal jpre- Togative. No other man had ever done so before. No man in modern times is known to have made anything like a respectable imitation of this marvellous impression. We can see how dicta- torially the discourse is constructed. "We must fancy the manner of him who spoke under the conviction that he had the right to declare what the truth is, and that of the finality of his announce- ments there was to be no discussion, and from his supreme deci- sions there could be no appeal. CHAPTER V. IN CAPERNAUM AND NAIN. Matt. vilL &-1.3 ; Luke viL 1-10. Jesiia heals the centurion's slave. Upon liis rctuni to Capernaum an incident occurred in the Iiistoiy of Jesus of very great importance. A Koman company of soldiery held the post in the town. The cen- turion in command was a person remarkable for his faith, his humility, and his large charity. Having had Eonian and perhaps Greek culture, he had so much respect for the Jewish religion that he had actu- ally erected a synagogue for the use of the Jewish residents. Such considerate liberality had won the regard of even the Jew- ish elders, who became interested in whatever concerned this centurion. His case presented a violent contrast with the relation usually existing between the hating, subjugated Jew and the scornful, ruling Iloman. This oflicer had a slave between whom and himself existed a strong attachment, as is not unusual in countries where slavery has existed;* a sentiment of tenderness which is wholly incomprehensible to those whose servants have always been hirelings. He loved his servant, and his servant was ill of some paralytic disease which gave him excruciating torture. The centurion had probably studied the character of Jesus, and the history of the great works he had already performed, and had the utmost confidence in his healing power. The Jewish elders, whatever may have been their prejudices against Jesus, entertained so high a regard for the centurion that they waited on Jesus and * In the original Greek the word is TTatj, hoy. The ancient Hebrew had, and the modern French has, the same idiom. In the Southern States of North America, before the abolition of slavery, the servant was often called "boy," although an adult and perhaps advanced in years. It was a euphemism, a soft- ening: term. If the slave were a mar- ried man, he was usually called " un- cle." Domestic servants were generally tenderly treated, and the whole family thrown into mourning when they died. Even under the rougher form of Roman slavery, Cicero expresses the great grief he suffered on the occasion of a death of a favorite servant. 308 SECOND AND THIRD TASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. urged the exercise of his marvellous therapeutic faculty in behalf of the Roman slave. Jesus readily consented to accompany them. Wlien the cen- turion learned that he was approaching the official residence, he sent his friends to Jesus with a message most mmty '^'"''^'"''^ ^"' Roman, most military, and yet most full of a beautiful humility and faith, containing the lof- tiest and the widest view of the character and power of Jesus which had as yet ever been uttered. He sent an expression of wor- shipful regard, and most humbly told Jesus that he did not feel himself worthy to have so illustrious a personage come under his roof, even as he had not felt himself wt spectatoi's. There was no incantation. Tbeie was no prayer. There was no invocation of the help of another. Out of himself, and by virtue of his own ])ower and authority, Jesus said to a dead man, " J say, Arise." There was no gradual recovery. The dead was alive, sat up, and began to talk. It was the collision of life-force with the inertness of Jesus raiees the dead. IN CAPEKNAUM AND NAIN. 311 death, and the former prevailed. All such collisions are awful, but here was the additional element of extraordinariness. Usually death conquered. Here life was the victor. Great fear fell upon the people. Jesus had at fii-st been a teacher, then a physician ; now he is a great prophet. Xever since the days of Elisha had such a miracle been performed. For nine centuries the power of resurrection had been in abeyance. Now it had come back among men. In tones of awe they said one to another, " God has visited His people," and the fame of Jesus spread through all the regions round about.* "While Jesus was thus increasing in popular attractiveness, and enlarging his field of operations, his friend John lay pining in the castle of Machserus,f into which he had been thrown^ by Herod Antipas, because of his bold mrj^r^^Trf^n! denunciation of that tetrarch's crimes and public ^"^« ^- 1*-^^; iratt* scandals. John had hailed Jesus as the " Comino- One," the Anointed, the Deliverer. Sixteen months had passed since the inauguration of Jesus, and as yet John had not heard that he had begun to perform such Messianic acts as the Jews looked for in the Deliverer. From a national blaze of reputation John had suddenly gone down into the gloom of a dungeon. The lion had been caged. This grand spirit that had walked the wilderness and the shores of Jordan, and had drawn vast crowds to hear his roaring eloquence, lay cankering in the silent solitude of a prison. Day and night, througli months of winter and of spring he lay. ISTow and then notices of the doings of Jesus had * But the contrast between the pray- erful efforts of the prophets and the sublime authoritative call of Jesus must always be noticed. It is set forth in a passage in Massillon's sermon, Sur la Dinnite de Jesus- C/inst, which is worth quotation for its great eloquence, finer in the original than I can give in a trans- lation : " Elias raised the dead, it is true, but he was obliged to throw him- self often on the corpse of the child he would resuscitate : he breathed hard, he drew himself together, he threw himself about ; it is plain that he is in- v».>king a power outside himself (un puissance etrangere), that he is recall- ing from the empire of death a soul that is not submissive to his voice, and that he is not himself the master of death and of life. Jesus Christ raises the dead as he does the most common actions ; he speaks as a master to those who are slumbering in the eternal sleep ; it is quite apparent that he is the God of the dead as well as of the living, but always the most serene when he is per- forming the grandest deeds. " f Next to Jerusalem, the best forti' fied place in the Holy Land. It waa near the summer residence of Herod in Per». 312 SECOND AND THIKD PASSOVEE IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. reached him. All that these seemed to show was the free and easy manner in which the new Teacher mingled \\'ith peoples oi all kinds, rising apparently above all ecclesiastical and national prejudices, and setting himself and his disciples free from the ei'emitical restrictions which characterized the lives of John and liis disciples. John's soul M-as growing weak with waiting. lie was bemnnino^ tb doubt. Had he made a mistake ? If Jesus were the Deliverer, why did he delay the deliverance ? It was probably at this j uncture that Joliu heard of some of the mighty works of Jesus. This increased rather than diminished John hears of works his pcrplcxity. It sccmcd unaccountablc to John "* ''^^^^ that more than a year before he should have pro- phetically seen signs of Messiahship in Jesus which appeared most nnqnestionable, and that now Jesus had begun to perform miracles that surpassed the deeds of even Elijah, and that still he declined to assert his Messiahship. He determined to seek a solution of the difficulty. Accordingly he sent two of his chosen disciples to Jesus. They foimd him surrounded by the populace. They ad- dressed to him publicly, in John's name, the question, " Art thou the Coming One, or do we look for another ? " No more unfortunate question, as coming from John, could have been propounded to Jesus at this moment, and under these cir- john's message to cumstauces. It Said to tlic pcople that the man Jesus, and his reply, whoui they had regarded as one of the greatest of the prophets, who had introduced Jesus to pulJic life in a season of great excitement, now that he had time for cool reflection, had begun to doubt the mission of Jesus. It was a blow on the heart of Jesus from the hand of his best friend. It showed him what a melancholy effect was being produced upon the mind of John by his long and cruel imprisomnent. The acts and words of Jesus on this occasion passed up into the si)liere of the sublime. John must be saved. That was the first thing. In the presence of the embassy from John, Jesus relieved iiuiiiy of the infirmities of the people, opened the eyes of tlie blind, and cured demoniacs. Turning to the messengers he said in sub- stance, " Go to John, and tell him what you yourseU^es have seen and have heard from reliable witnesses. The blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf liear, the dead are i-aised, and the men of humble souls have a jubilee, for they are hearing glad tidings. And happy is he who is not offended in me." IN CAPERNAtTM AND NAIN. 313 Tliat was the whole message to John. It implied more than it said. Jesus did not wish to womid tlie imprisoned propliet as that friend had Avonnded him. He was grander than even tlie grand John. Instead of saying, " Woe to liim who is offended in me," lie puts it in the softer way, " Blessed he who is not offended." John knew what the prophets had indicated as true Messianic signs. lie remembered the words of Isaiah in Ixi. 1, 2, and xxxv 5, 6, and other prophetic utterances. If these met in Jesus, then Jesus was the Messiah, and, for any who believed that, it Avas a happy thing to wait his motions and not be striving to precipitate his announcements. But there were the peoi)le hearing all these things. The repu- tation of his incarcerated friend was dear to Jesus, lie saw at once that the people might begin to turn against Defence of joun by John, and charge him with weakness in thus so •''^'"*- Btrangely modifying his own endorsement of Jesus. As soon therefore as John's disciples had departed— for he would not even seem to flatter his gi-eat friend— he recalled to the minds of his heai-ers the picture of John in the glory of his sti-ength, in the height of his popularity, when he was crowding the Jordan with auditors and disciples. If they susi)ected John of being a vacil- lating weakling, it was doing him great injustice. He was no reed shaken in a wind. He was himself rather a storm that shook others. Xor was he a courter of public applause, a flatterer, or a sycophant. If he had been such he would have been found amono- the sumptuously dressed attendants on the court of Ilerod Antipas, instead of a prisoner waiting away in a dungeon because of his bold out-spokenness against the wrong. He was neither a reed shaken in the wind nor a delicate self-seeker. He was acknow- ledged as a prophet by those Avho heard his tremendous hai-angues at the Jordan. And Jesus asserted that John was more than an ordinary prophet, that he was as great as the greatest prophet, and that no greater man had ever been raised up by Providence for any Avork so great as that of John. AVith this generous eulogy he at once defended the reputation of his afflicted friend, and made his hearers to remember that the greatest men have their hours of Aveakness and distrust. But having so done justice to the character of John, he pro- ceeded to say, "Notwithstanding, he that is less in the kingdom of the heavens is greater than John." Here manifestly the speaker 314 SECOMD AND THIRD PASSOVER IK THE LIFE OF JESUS. draws a distinction between the world which, closed with John and the world which opened with liimself. John had not become Relative estimate of a citizen of the kingdom of the heavens. Jesus •^"^'^ is proclaiming that kingdom. John had not .been set free. lie was still held by formalisms, and still made much of baptisms and mortifications. lie had not 3'et risen to regard the kingdom of God as a kingdom of the heavens, covering all parts of the universe and running through all the ages, of which our planet and the time of our generation make a ^■ery, very small part. Jesus came speaking the breadth of God's love and God's law. He came to preach those principles which rituals, and canons, and human foi-ms of creeds and hierarchies cannot bind ; principles which survive all human institutions, all consecutive literatures and civilizations, and which vitalize them all. lie that is less in position, or office, or native endowments than John, less in relation to this kingdom than Jolm to the old theocracy, is, nevertheless, greater than John. He Jias gone into the temple on whose porch died all these greatest men who knew things only in their outwards. It is to be carefully noted that Jesus does not say that the crowds who M'aited upon his ministiy are so superior; that those who after liim were to pervert the name of Cln-istian and preach Churchism were so superior. Very far from that. That was pre- cisely the defect in the Jews generally, and in John specially. A modern churchman, of any sect, is precisely in tlie condition of the Israelite M'ho depended upon liis having Abraham to his fatlier. He is a citizen of perha])s a snug little kingdom of the earth, but he is not a citizen of the bi'oad kingdom of the heavens. He is depending upon what must perish if the M'orld shall pass awa}^, and not upon what will survi\-e the measureless cycles of eternity. He that builds on churchism, builds on tlie sand : he that builds on the woi-ds of Jesus erects his edifice upon the rock. He that even measurably recognizes the kingdom of the heavens, and strives to live according to its wide, deep, ceaseless laws, is a greater man than the man who is greatest in a kingdom of cir- cumcisions, baptisms, and general decent ritualisms. That seems to be what Jesus taught. The law and the prophets, he proceeded to teach, did their work np to John's completion of his public ministry. Now, although that last and greatest of the prophets had retired from his actual IN CAPERNAUM AND NAIN. 315 labors, the spirit of liis work lived. He had been a hei aid. He had aroused the people. He had announced a coining King anc" a coming kingdom. There was power in the ainiouncement and in the rushing influences which had. begun to break down ecclesi- astical barriers, and bring the world under the influence of this kingdom. John could not retract. He had excited a furore which should increase. From his days the kingdom of the heav- ens suffers violence ; people violently press into it; multitudes are eager to break the shell and reach the kernel ; multitudes are zeal- oush' striving to rise into the higher life. John had come in the spirit and power of Elias to prepare the way of the Lord of the kingdom. All this explanation and defence was made to a fickle genera- tion. Jcsns knew their waywardness. He reflected upon the treatment received by John and by himself. To Both John ana Jesu8 John's ba]>tism the common people and the pub- «jectea. licans had come; but the Pharisees and Doctoi-s of tlie Sacred Law had i-ejected him, and the same leaders had rejected Jesus : and the two rejections were for opposite reasons. He seemed for a moment at a loss how to describe this capriciousness, and then selected an illustration from the petulance of whimsical chil- dren so often exhibited in their sports. He described a party of boys at play in a town square. One party endeavors to draw the others into their amusements. First there is a mock wedding, and a portion would not join in that ; then the leaders get up a mock funeral, but the same companions refuse to take part in that; whereupon the leaders break foi-th into vociferous reproaches : " "VVliat kind of fellows are you ? We have tried to amuse you every Ava}'. We have fluted, and you would not dance : we have played funei-al, and j'ou would not beat your breasts. Wliat will please you?" So John came, an ascetic, withdrawing himself from the ordinary conventionalities of life. He was most abste- mious, confining himself to a diet of locusts and wild honey. The Pharisees and the Doctors denoimced him as one possessed of a demon. lie mourned; they did not lament. Jesus came, — the Son of Man, as he calls himself in this passage, thus claiming the Messiahship,* — came eating and drinking as other men did, * The reader is again referred to Dan. vii. 13, where the phrase the " Son of Man " is used confessedly as a designa- tion of the Messiah. By applying it to himself Jesus obviously intended to claim Messianic functions and honors. 310 SECOND AND THIRD PASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. havinof notliino- siiiffular in liis habits. The Pharisees and the Doctors denonnced him as a erhitton and a wine-bibber, an associ- ate of tax-gatherers and vagabonds. lie made music for them ; they did not dance. Jesns closed this vivid invective by the irony of the saying, "And such is the justice which Wisdom receives at the hands of her professedly devoted children ! " Tlecalling the treatment which he had received from several towns in his beneficent mission, he -breaks forth in words which show the depth of his grief and anger. " "Woe to thee, Chorazin ! woe to thee, Bethsaida ! For if hi Tyre and Sidon had been done the things of might which have been done in you, in old times, sitting down in bag-cloth and in ashes, they would have changed their minds and repented. But I say unto you. That it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of separation than for you. And thou, Capei-naum, why hast thou been exalted to heaven ? Thou shalt descend even to Hades!" None of the three places thus denounced had any distinction beyond what they derived from the presence and works of Jesus, and they have all so passed away that the site of them is no longer definitely known. The Tyre and Sidon must be sn].- posed to refer to the old Phoenician cities against which the prophets had hurled their predictions, and on the ruins of which IN CAPERNAUM AND NAIN. 317 stood modern towns of the same name. Capemanni had been selected as liis residence when Jesns had been driven from Na/a- retli. The lesson seems to be that the ne2;lect of superior privi leges brings the greater destruction. Jesus employed phrases from the pagan rn^'thology to convey this idea, " heaven " as contrasted with " hades " signifying a contrast between great height of privi- lege and great depth of doom. A few days afterwards a Pharisee invited Jesus to an enter- tainment at his house, probably in Capernaum,* thus paying with a small civility the healing of some small ailmentf by the kindness and power of Jesus. The recep- Dine" w^th'a Pharisee, tion of the great Teacher does not seem to have ^^'^ " anointed by a been eminently cordial. Simon felt compelled to invite him, and was probably glad to have the interview short. lie showed few civilities to his distinguished guest. Nevertheless Jesus found sufficient reason for accepting the invitation. "While rechning, with his unsandalled feet stretched from the rear of the couch, after the manner of the ancients, a woman of the city, who was a notorious sinner, came behind him with a vase of perfumed ointment, weeping, and unostentatiously wetting his feet with her tears, and with most exquisite reverence wiping them with her beautiful hair. Her adoring tenderness made her feel that when that delicious ointment had touched the holy feet of Jesus it was sweeter than ever before, and she instinctively caught it back into her tresses. The Pharisee at length noticed this, and reasoned thus : " This man has a certain sti-ange power with him ; but if he were a true prophet he would know what kind of woman j,^,, ,,^^3 ^ ^^^.^ this is who pollutes him by touching him, would tiioughts. know that she is a prostitute." Jesus read his thoughts. This Teacher seems to have been the first of pure men who had for- giveness and pity for that sin which, in a woman, no one forgives. Turning to his host, he said : " Simon, I have something to say to you." And Simon replied, " Teacher, say it." "A money-lender had two debtors. One owed him five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. And when neither could pay he freely forgave them * Robinson and Meyer believe that it was Capernaum. •^ If Jesus had not conferred some favor upon him there had been no point in his comparison of those who love much, as the woman did, and those who love little, as the Pharisee did. 318 SECOND AND THIKD PASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. both. Now, wluch of tliera will love liim most ? " Simon, not Beeing as yet the bearing of the question, replied, " I suppose he to whom he foi'gave most." " Quite right," said Jesus ; and turn- ing upon his elbow as he reclined, so that he could see the woman, he said, " Simon, look at her : I entered your house a bidden guest, yet you failed of the ordinary courtesy of furnishing water for my feet,* while this woman has washed my feet with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head. You gave me no warm salutation : she has caressed my feet with kisses. You poured not even ordinary oil upon my head : she has expended her precious ointment on my feet." This was most delicately pungent. The woman had entered the apartment in the crowd accompanying the Teacher. Simon did not take offence at this, because he knew that The delicacy of Jesus. tihi-i p ^ • ^ ' Jesus had all kinds oi characters m his tram. But when he saw what he considered the polluting touch, he won- dered and was scandalized. Jesus most delicately gave him to understand that this unbidden guest was now in a better moral condition than the giver of the entertainment. Her great sins had been forgiven her, or else she never would have been so grateful. Jesus had done more for her, whatever it was, than he had done for Simon, and therefore she loved much more. It was no longer a prostitute who bent over his feet, but a penitent. She lingered. She had been a great sinner. It required distinct as- surance to confirm her faith. Jesus said to her : " Your sins are forgiven you." Then those who were reclining at the dinner- table began to whisper among themselves in protest against his assimiption of power to forgive sins. It was greater to forgive a sin than perform a miracle. But Jesus repeated it, " Your faith has saved you ; go in peace." Who this woman was is not known. There is not the slightest intimation. By a most unhappy mistake Mary of Magdala, called This woman not Mary in our common versiou Mary Magdalene, has been of Magdala, coufouuded with this woman.f This mistake has been perpetuated in painting and in sculpture, and is counte- nanced by the caption to the chapter of St. Luke in the English * TNTiich was necessary in a country where men walked over dusty roads witliout shoes. f The anointing took place in Nain or Capernaum, of one of which cities this penitent sinner probably was a na- tive or an inhabitant ; but Mary was o1 Magdala. m CAPERNAUM AND NAIN. 319 version. But there is nothing whatever on record in the history to give the slightest coloring to this supposition. It is doing as much injustice to the tnith of history as to suppose that the Vir- gin Mary was this sinner. The name of this penitent sinner is strictly withheld. There is nothing in the history of Mary of Magdala to justify this aspersion of her fair fame ; on the con- trary, we shall see how she came into greatest intimacy with the purest followers of Jesus, devoted herself to him, and came to be controlled by a powerful yet pure passion for Jesus, — the Virgin Mary and the Magdalan Mary being his most devoted friends, and this latter Mary loving him quite as warmly as the Blessed Virgin, but with an ardor which certainly was not mother-love. ■ii.^=^'^^i~ '"i XaiNS AT TELL HUM. CAFEBNAUM. CHAPTEE VI. THE SECOND TOUE OF GALILEE AND KETUEN TO CAPEia^^AUM. Immediately after this, Jesus began another circuit of preach- ing and miracle-working, going from village to village and from Luke viii. 1-3. Ac- citj to citj, prcacliing the happy news of God's companied by women, tiug^jom. On this tour hc was accoiupanied by his twelve chosen Apostles, aad by many women whom he had cured of evil spirits and other infirmities. This companionship with Jesus was not out of the usual order of things, since it was customary for women of means, especially for widows, to con- tribute of their substance to the support of rabbis whom they reverenced.* Three are mentioned as being in this company, namely, Mary called Magdalene, and Joanna, and Susanna. The first of these so devoted herself to Jesus that she became his chief friend among women, and it may be worth while to make a sum- mary of what we can learn concerning her. In the first place, it should be repeated that there does not ap- pear the slightest reason for belie\'ing that she had been an extra- ordinary bad woman, particularly that she was a prostitute, but quite the contrary. Here is one of those unhappy cases in his- toiy in which some misapprehension has occurred which has suc- ceeded in branding a name with an undeserved infamy and perpetuating it through generations. Let us see what is said about her. El-Mejdel is the name of a "miserable little Muslim village," as Kobinson calls it, which is most probably the representative of the town on the western shore of the lake of MagdaJa. Gennesaret, known as Magadan in the days of Jesus, and so called in the chief MSS., although in the author- ized English version, and in the usually received Greek text of Matthew (xv. 30) it is written Magdala.f It was one of the many * See Jerome on 1 Cor. ix. 5. I embrace every point worth notice. f Prof. Stanley's description seems to | "Of all the numerous towns and vil- THE SECOND TOUK OF GALILEE. 321 Mary llagdiilcne. Migdols {watch-towr.rs) whicli existed in Palestine. The nnfortu- nute identification of the saintly and loving friend of Jesus Mitli the sinner who bathed the feet of Jesus with her tears, has made Magdala, this Mary's birthplace, familiar to all modern huio'ua<:;es. !She comes before us first in this passage in St. Luke, associated with women of great respectability. These ladies were Joanna and Susanna. The former M'as the wife of Chuza, the steward of Herod Antipas, the tetrarch of Galilee. It is not to be supposed that this lady of the court would associate herself with a " woman of the city," a street- walker, a prostitute, or ]>rubably even with one who had had that reputation. Moreover, the fact that Mary was engaged with these ladies in ministering to the jx'i-sonal wants of Jesus, shows that she, as well as each of the otliers, had means at her own dis])osal. She was not a woman of the lower ranks, in point either of prop erty or of reputation. In this passage, and in Mtirk xvi. 0, the fact is stated that out of her Jesus had cast seven devils. Modern thought has been accustomed to associate demoniac possession with ^ . Her "seven devils.'* the idea or bad moral character ni the pos- sessed, which, however, is a -sery great error. Children, women of good repute, people in any class of societ}', had been liable to this terrible disease. It is a very proper remark, therefore, that we miist think of her " as having had, in their most aggravated forms, some of the phenomena of mental and spiritual disease A\hich we meet with in other demoniacs, the wretchedness of de- spair, the divided consciousness, the preternatural phren&y, tlie long-continued fits of silence." Her case had been so marked and painful that the contrast it afforded with the serenity of her condition after the great Healer had restored her, made such an impression upon those "wlio were familiar with the circle of Jesus, lages in what must have been the most tliickly peopled district of Palestine, one only remains. A collection of a few hovels stands at the south-east cor- ner of the plain of Gennesaret, its name hardly altered from the ancient Magdala or Migdol, so called probably from a watch-tower, of which ruins ap- pear to remain, that guarded the en- 21 trance to the plain. A larg^e solitaiy thora-tree stands beside it. The situa- tion, otherwise unmarked, is dignified by the high limestone rock which over- hangs it on the south-west, perforated with caves, recalling, by a curious though doubtless unintentional coinci- dence, the scene of Correggio'a cele- brated pictui'e." 322 SECo^^) AKD TnmD passovee in the life of jesus. and "u-lio afterwards chronicled tlieir movements, that repeated mention is made of the fact. It seems probable from the whole history that other women came and went, and did for Jesus all their love prompted and their means allowed, but Marx Mao'dalene* never Her devotion to Jesus. i i . t r~i forsook hnn. Joanna and Susanna were not with him in his last moments. Mary Ma^-dalene was. She was then accompanied by the wife of Alplu«us and the wife of Zebcdee. She remained even after Mary, the mother of Jesus, had left the sight of horror.* Her love never faltei'ed. The other women stood afar off. She stood close to the ci-oss, where she heard all his last words and groans. She endured the sight of the death of him whom her heart adored. She was present, perhaps ten- derly aiding, Avhen the body was taken down and when it was wiapped in fine linen, and probably assisted in depositing it in the se])ulchre, and then, with her friend Mary the mother of Joses, she sat down o\'er against the sepulchre. All her attentions were such as the daintiest love gives to the most honorable and dearly beloved. She had regarded him as a man ; l)ut as the holiest, most gifted, most charming of all the sons of men. She saw him buried, and had no hope, nor even thought, of ]iis re- sun-ection. She wrapped her heart up with her lord in the linen cloth they wound about the precious limbs. The next day wis a sorrowful Sabbath, and on the morning following she went to the sepulchre and found it empty. She saw angels there : but one Jesus was to her worth more than a thousand ano^els. She ilew with anguish to Peter and John, and ran back with them to the sepulchre, crying, " They have talcen away my lord, and I know not where they have laid him." And then she sank down almost to the verge of that horrible pit of mental disease from which she had * From reading all the accounts in the four historians, it would seem that there was a crowd of women sorrow fully present at the execution, but all " standinfj afar off." Some sign from Jesus, or the promptings of nature, sent his mother Mary, aud his aunt, and his fi-iend Mary Magdalene, aud his disciple John up near the cross. When Jesus Lad committed his mother to this disci- ple, the latter drew her away to the city. The aunt seems to have accom- panied the mother, so that only Mary Magdalene was present. Mary the mother of Jesus joined her, probably coming up from the crowd which stood at a distance, and sat down with her be- side the sepulchre. But the whole stoi*y l)uts Mary JIagdalene forward. This much of the history we have been com- pelled to anticipate to make clear the case of ]\rary of Magdala, the sweet and suffering saint. THE SECOJn? TOUR OF GALILEE. 323 been lifted. "When Jesns came slie did not perceive that it was lie. ITc spoke. lie said "Maiy." Probably it was the one tone in which he had always spoken to her. It thrilled her back to widest conscionsiiess, and she rushed forward to clasp his feet. Calf there be anything more beantif id than this ? Every great man — great in pnrity as well as power — has some special, honored fi'iciid among women, which friend is not his kins- The relation of jesus woman. Such Jesus had, and that nearest and *''^'''"- dearest friend was Manj called Magdalene. It was not fitting that he should marry. His mission was too awful. lie was to stand in snbliine solitariness. He had no eartldy father; he was never to have bodily descendant. But he had a human heart, and must have had craving for human love. He was the incarnation of goodness, and had no fierce words of denunciation for fallen women, whom he raised as well as forgave ; but his whole record is so spotless that it shocks ns to think that such a being could have found his best beloved friend in a former prostitute, and that she who had been so morally degiaded could have had more than any other woman the fineness of sonl to have been able to appre- ciate Jesus and to attach herself to such a man with such adherent love. She was a beautiful character. She had been a great suf- ferer. Jesus had healed her. She was all the finer for what she had endured. She was the watchful attendant of his footsteps. Hers were probal)ly the last human eyes into which the dying eyes of Jesus looked, and hers the first human eyes he is repre- Bcnted to have shown himself nnto when he came back from the crave. This is all that is told. It is most exquisite. The ntmost delicacy is here. It is the sweetness, not the words of the narrative, which betrays the holy love. And after that last interview in which Jesns The most beautiful showed her how her mortal affection mnst be lifted °^ ^"^"^ into religions Avorship, there is nothing more said of Mary. And then history takes this beautifullest love of all the world and mars it, and blotches her name, and associates her with all the fallen of lier sex. It is to ns one of the most awful problems of human biography. lid's was a bitterly beautiful lot. She had suffered. She liad recovered. She loved her healer. She never could be asked to cross a certain line. But there she was met, more than any other woman, by the confidence and affection of the most ex- ceptional of all marrellously fine characters. lie died looking at to 324 SECOND AND THIRD PASSOVEE m THE LIFE OF JESUS. her. He rose and showed himself first to her. If slie lived to be a century old, she had such a memory as never has been vouch- safed to any other woman. In her real life she was lifted to a heaven of love ; in history she has been cast down to a hell ol infamy. Let her be restored. . The truth does restore her* Th& Frieiid of Jesus was a blessed saint. When Jesus and his party returned to Capernaum, so great waa his fame that crowds assembled about the dwelliiig and pressed ,, , them so much that they could not even eat bread. Capenianra. Mark '' iiL i!>-35; Matt. xii. Ilis motlier and brothers, learning how he Avas ex- """ ' " ^ ■ erting himself, and how the crowds were pressing him, said, " He is beside himself," and went to restrain him from such excessive labors. Although they did not believe in his doc- trines, they loved his person and had tender care of him. But the multitude blocked the entrance. Meanwhile there had been brought him one possessed of a demon,* and at once blind and dumb. It was certainly the most The blind and dumb cxactiug demand upoii powcr to heal this com- demoniac. plicatiou of mental and physical disease. If the objective theory of demoniacal possession be lield, then some evil spirit had found in this human soul an organ it could use, and in malignity had deprived the victim of sight and speech. On the subjective theory, the psychical ailment had struck out and had bedumbed and blinded the patient. In either view Lango has graphically described the case, in his Leben Jesu, when he says : " Shut up in this most shocking manner did this being come before Jesus, like a dark riddle of hellish restraint and human despair." The sim])le statement of the historian is, "And he healed him, insomuch that the blind and the dumb both spake and saw." This was a culminating marvel. It was a manifold miracle. It showed the power of Jesus over nature and super- nature. It threw the populace into an ecstasy. They hailed Jesus with Messianic salutations. They cried out, " Is not this the Son of David?" At this time there had come down from Jerusalem to Caper- naum delegations from the Scribes and Pharisees, engaged in the * It cannot be necessary to go into the question of demoniacal possession every time an incident of this species of ail- ment appears. The reader is referred to the ample discussion given this sul>« ject on p. 173. •mE SECOND TOUR OF GALILEB. 325 Trork of Inyiiig snares for Jcsns tluat they might vnth impunity put him out of the way. Affairs had now reached a climax. He had raised the son of the widow of Xain ; he 1 J 1 . • , 1 1 y, T . 1 . • Pharisaic conspirators. liaa made a cn-cuit tlu-ougli CTahlee, increasing his train and his fame ; and he had returned to find the people re- garding him with greater reverence and wonder than before ; and he had cured the " possessed " man, opening his eyes and ears and restoring him to mental sanity. He had thus aroused the popu- lar enthusiasm to a degree that they were ready to civiwn him king and accept him as the Messiah. As he would not rank himself with the ruling class, but had set his influence directly against their authority, the hour had come Avhen something must be said. The unfortunate expression which the other sons of Mary had used in kindly meaning toward Jesus, namel}^, "He is beside him- self," was probably suggested, if not it was seized, xhey charge that by the hierarchic party and emploj-ed against him. J'^s"' '^=1'' a ?^';^; quer All must take sides. There is no neutrality. The hght is over the surface of the universe. Satan is to be destroyed, or Jesus. All who are not for Jesus are for Satan. And thus he swiftly retorts the charge, and shows them to be m league with Satan by opposing him? There is no passivity possible to a rational being. "Whoever does not collect * m aid of me, scatters " He that does not help the work of Jesus brea.vs down and scatters the work of God. Opposition to Jesus is allegiance to Satan, ^ • „, Jesus then uttered one of the most profound and mysteriou. sentences which ever fell from his lips. Few people Iuinc been able to read it witliout shuddering. It is so im- Bia.ph.n.y a,ain,st portant that I shall present a careful translation, -eH.yo.o.. L<,pin^ to be helped thereby to a better understanding of tlie words! The passage in Matthew is, "Because this is the case, I savto you Every \ki.id of, or form of) sin and blasphemy shall be f org ven to men. But the blasphemy of the Spirit shall not be foro-iven. If one speak a word against the S,>n of Man, it slia be forgiven him ; but if one speak against the H^ly Spirit, it sha not be'forgiven him, in this age nor in the coming. In Mai k it " Assiii-edly (amen) I say to yon. That all sins shall be o. .Ivcn to the sons of men, and the blasphemies, whatever they ^hall have blasphemed. But whoso shall blaspheme m reference to the lloly Spirit has not forgiveness for an age (during the tym) ,.t is held iound by a perpetual loss." ^^ark says hat he uttered these words because the Pharisees had said " H^/-;^ ^ thy spirit." ThepassagcmJLi^^ -T^^^:^Z^;;i^^^^l^mean coming I street, but ra^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ ^i together, ub a crowd coUects upon the I gathering a harvest. 32S SECOND AND TITIRD TASSOVEE IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. "We may be helped to tlie meaning of this utterance by recol- lecting that it is a warning, and that the Pharisees had not yet committed this fatal offence ; and also, that whatever this destruc- tive sin may be, it is a sin of words, of speech rather tlian of action or of thought. The perpetrator of this hopeless sin imist have said it ! It is hlasjphemy against the Holy Spirit, not a sin against the Holy Spirit. It seems to be an open, outspoken vituperation of the Holy Spirit of God, deliberately uttered by a man when he knows what he says to be false, and says it for the distinct pur- pose of committing spiritual suicide. The enemies of Jesus had not yet done this. They had said that Jesus had an unclean spirit ; but this they had uttered in the heat of passion. Never- theless, that speech liad come out of bad hearts, and he kindly warns them to beware lest they come to such a state as to be able to commit this fatal crime. They were blaspheming the Son of Man in their anger, and, because the Holy Spirit of God was in him, as he claimed, they might by persistent wicked intent against him come to some such state as to be able to do what would be endlessly destructive to their souls. The sense in which Jesus uses the word "reon," age, it is im- portant to know. In the lexicons it has different meanings, as has the corresponding adjective, "ceonial," which seems to signify " continuous duration throughout the period referred to," and that period, tlie duration indicated by " jieon," must be understood by the context.* One of the most The word " seou." * Thus the phrase as tdv atatva, which I have translated by the two phrases for an age, or, durinrj the cfon, is precise- ly the phrase which occurs in 1 Cor. viii. 13, where Paul says that if meat make his brother to offend, he will eat no more meat sis tou aiwva, for an age, during the teon, but in the common version, "while the world standeth," which seems to me a good translation ; but a better rendering would be, " as long as I live," as Paul simply meant to make a strong assertion in regard to his total abstinence from meat, not in eternity but in his lifetime. We find in Eph. iii. 9, and in Col. i. 2G, the plirase, &nh twv altiyuy, and in Romans xvi. 25, xp'"""^ olwiidis. The common version renders the first passage "from the beginning of the world ;" the second, " from ages;" and the third, " since the world began ; " but the i^hrase in the first two instances is the same in the original, and strictly translated means, " from the ages," and the third signifies '' through age-long times." These ci- tations are made that the reader may see that the signification of the word is limited by its cormections. The Hebrew word which the Septuagint translates by these Greek words, is one applied to many things which have passed away, such as the Jewish priesthood, the time for which a person whose ears had been THE SECOND TOUR OF GALILEE. 829 Btrikins^ chai-acteri sties of the teaching of Jesns is the absence of all metapliysical terms. Thus he has no word for eternity, or eternal, nor apparently any phrase to convey the idea of never- beginningness and never-endingness. Whatever he speaks of is mentioned as if its duration were connected with an aeon, or the aeons, an age, or the ages. So here, " in this ?eon, or age," may mean the age before the establishment of the Messianic king- dom, and the " ceon, or age to come" may mean the Messianic age ; or the former may mean the duration of the human race, or any part of them, on the earth, and tlie latter the duration of the human race, or any part of them, elsewhere and hei-eafter. Or the whole phrase may be taken hyperbolically, to give the utmost strength to the expression ; or it may be taken literally. If liter- ally, whatever may be the interpretation given to the special phrases, the statement must have meant, to any intelligent and attentive hearer, that it was possible to commit a sin, from the direful and spiritually ruinous results of which there could never be any escape. But if taken literally, and " the age to come "be understood to mean the state of luiman existence beyond the grave, then the words also imply that thei'e are sins and l)lasphe- mies that may be forgiven after death ; nay, that every kind may be forgiven except blasphemy against the Holy Ghost. Ko less a person than Augustine* does actually make that inference, and the Roman Catholic Church teaches it for a dogma. "Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or else make the tree rotten and its fruit rotten : for the tree is known by its fruits." This was the proposition with which ^ 111 Ti- • -T ' 1 T^° '-''•"' '*°'^ ''-^ fniits. Jesus closed the reply to his enemies, it is the announcement of a well-known fact in nature, that the outer is a representative of the inner. Good fruits come only from good bored might be held in slavery, the in the resurrection of the dead there doors of the temple, landmarks, waste places, etc. The Aramaic word which Jesus used in bis discourses was doubt- less the best possible representative of the Hebrew and Greek words employed in the Hebrew Bible, and in the Greek translation of the Evangelists, and there- fore subject to the same interpretations as those words. * He says, in a passage of which the following is a literal translation, ' ' As will be some who, after the pimi.shment which the spirits of the dead suffer, wUl receive mercy, so that they will not be cast into everlasting fire. For it could not with tnith be said of some that their sins would not be forgiven in this world, or in that which is to come, un- less there were others who would be forgiven in the world to come, though not in this world." I think the phrase is not to be talcen literally. 330 SECOND AND TUIED PASSOVER Ci THE LIFE OF JESUS. trees, and bad fruits from bad trees. He probably designed this statement to tell both ways. As if be had said, So far as I am concerned, take all my life that men can see. Does that look as though it were the product of a bad soul ? So far as you are con- cerned, the fact that you speak such vile things should alarm you as to your real character. And then he broke upon them with language of great severity. " Offspring of vijjers, how can you, being evil, speak good things? For the mouth utters the overilo\vino;s of the Severe words. •-' heart. A good man throws good things out of the good treasure, and an evil man throws evil things out of the evil treasury. But I say unto jon, That every idle word men speak they shall render an account thereof in the day of separation. For from thy words thou shalt be declared right, and fi-om (thy) words thou shalt be condemned." This is a broad and deep say- ing for one whose whole teaching seems to dwell upon character and its proper cultivation. Commentators have generally endeav- ored to explain it away. But the truth lies open on the plain surface of the statement, if it be only considered that a man's words {nvariahl// show \n& real character; not a word here and there, detached speeches, but the whole body of all his utterances, all his words spoken through all his life. Speech is the overflow of the heai't. A man's heart is full of that kind of thing wliich drops fi'om his tongue and pen. It is utterly impracticaljle for any man to misrepresent himself i)i the whole hodij of Ids sj)cech. It is the forgetfulness of this which allowed one of the most sagacious of connncntators* to say that such a ci'itei-ion " would be absurd, and put it in the power of any man to settle his own destiny by sheer talking or profession." l^ot at all. Suppose a bad man, intending thus to settle his destiny, should utter, from day to day even, Avords which in themselves are good, but with the intent to deceive his fellow-men as to his real character. Those words are then bad. Men might be deceived ; but the Judge knows his heart, and kn-owing that he uttered hypocritical words, from those very words he shall be condenmed as a hypo- crite. Even idle words, Avords that carry no meaning and go on no mission, come out of a meaningless and empty soul and con- demn the man as woi-thlcss. Or, if the word be one of wanton thoughtless calumny the utterer shall not escape condemnation. * Dr. Joseph Addison Alexander. THE SECOND TOUR OF GALILEE. 331 Jesus had commenced to act so vigorously on the offensive that the hici-archic clique felt compelled to make some movement which should divert the force of his vigorous ^ ^j„^ ^^^„^^^,,,,. blows. The crowd was increasing and growing excited. It was known that the wonder-loving nniltitude looked for displays of miracles on the part of the Messiah when he should come. So their leader said, " Teacher, we wish to sec a sign from you." That is, a sign showing yourself the Messiah, lie replied, " A wicked and iduhxtrous * generation seeks a sign! Ko sign shall be given it but the sign of Jonah the proi)hct : for as Jonah was three days and three nights f in tlic belly of the great fish,:}: thus shall the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights." lie charged them that they had gone into heathenism ; that they were worshippers of signs and wonders. This ^^^ ^.^ ^^ ^^^^^ evil disposition should not be nurtured by anything he should do. The Messianic signs sli(ndd come in their seasons, * The word here used signifies " adul- terous" when applied as usual, but when employed to signify things spirit- ual it means "idolatrous." There would have been no point in the application of the former epithet to the Jews. But they were familiar with the idea of the Lord God being the husband of His people, and with the application of the words " adultery " and " whoredom " to idolatry, which was represented as com- ing from an unclean love. This proper translation of the word has the advan- tage of affording a key to the connec- tion of this discourse. Jesus charged them with being idolaters, heathen, because they worshipped visible things, such as signs. This suggested his two illustrations drawn from heathen na- tions, Jsine%-ites and Arabians (or per- haps Abyssinians). f That is, by the Jewish reckoning. In the Talm. Ilieros. it is written : " Day and night malce together a space of time, and a j)art of it is as the icltole." That "space of time" is called in He- brew nz'V, which literally means an . evening -morning. The Septuagint trans- lation gives yvxdviJ-foov as the equivalent. See Daniel viii. 14, and the same word used by Paul in 2 Cor. xi. 35, and trans- lated in the common version " a night and a day." From Monday afternoon to Wednesday morning would be repre- sented as three of these spaces of tune, thiec vvx6rifj.epa, three eveniug-momings, three nights and days. Olshauscn makes the following fine remark: " The accu- racy of Scripture never degenerates into minute and anxious precision. Like nature, it combines regularity with free- dom ; and hence it affords scope to lib- erty, and states and fulfils all prophecies in such a manner that they mny either be believed or contradicted. The Holy Scriptures would altogether miss their aim if, by mathematical precision and strictness, they should compd belief." X In the Mediterranean Sea there is found to this day a shark, the sff'irtlus carcharias, called also lamia, sometimes as long as sixty feet. Lauge says that Hubner relates the instance of a sailoi who was swallowed by a shark and yet preserved. 332 SECOND AISHD THIKD I'ASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. but sliDiild not be advanced to gratify a mere curiosity. Jonah was a type of the Messiah. His w'ondei'ful adventure shall be paralleled in the history of the Son of Man. What he meant must have been wholly unintelligible to all his hearers, learned and illiterate. Xot one of his disciples understood it to intimate a resurrection from the dead. It was a perplexing answer. The mention of their idolatrous tendency, and of Nineveh, led him to say that Ninevite men, heathens, who were despised by The NinevitoR unci tlic supcrcilious Jcws, sliould I'lsc in judgmciit the Queen of the South. ^^^^. separation) against the men of the generation of Jesus, and condemn them ; that whenever any moral discrim- inations should be made, the men among the heathen vvdio repented when such a man as Jonah warned them shall be considered bet- ter than the Jewish churchmen who heard Jesus, a greater than Jonah, and rejected him. He added another illustration. A Queen came from the South * to hear the wisdom of Solomon. She was " from the ends of the earth," from the people who were most removed from the true religion. Without invitation, against friirhtful risks, a woman was so moved with a desire to be in- Btructed in religion t that she made the long, painful, and ])eril- ous journey from barbaric regions to Jerusalem. Whenever a discrimination or judgment is made on moral grounds, she shall be declared better than the people of the Jewish church, who, pro- fessing to desire to know the truth, reject a teacher who had per- formed greater deeds and spoken greater words than Solomon ever did, and whom following generations would pronounce a man superior to great David's splendid son. He closed his addi-ess with a description of tlie condition of the Jewish nation, contained in a parable founded upon their notions in regard to demoniacal possession. This peroration cannot probably be rendered better than in the paraphrase by Professor Strong : " According to your The peroration. * From the southern portion of the Arabian peninsula, or from the Cushite kingdom of Seba in Ethiopia. Jose- phus {Ant., viii. 5, 5) says the latter. The Ethiopian (or Abyssian) church has a tradition to the same eflfect. It is not at all material to the argument of Jesus. He was contrasting the conduct of heathens with that of the churchmen of his day, to the disparagement of the lat- ter. f It is merely fair to attribute this motive to her, since the history which records her visit says, " When the Queen of Sheba heard of the fame of Solomon, concerning the name of Jeluycah, she came," etc. 1 Kings x. 1. THE SECOND TOUE OF GALILEE. 333 owT belief, a foul fiend, upon his expulsion from the possessed, ranges disconsolate through some barren region, in quest of relief from the anguish of guilt that torments him, by a shelter in some human tenement ; and to save your credit, upon the relapse of a demoniac whom you profess to have rendered sane, you say of the exorcised demon in such a case that, being unsuccessful in tlio scarcli, he resolves to return to his late victim, and take up his quarters there. Be that as it may, such a fiend, if at his return he find that former abode untenanted by any better occupant, but swept clean and put in order as if for his reception ; he will then assuredly go forth to the general rendezvous of his comrades, and associate witli him perhaps seven other demons, woi'se, it may be, than himself, for the secure possession of such an inviting resi- dence, and these all repairing thither will enter and permanently occupy that mansion. In the state of him whose mind is the theatre of such an occupancy, ' the latter evil is greater than the former.' Precisely such will become the condition of the aban- doned race who now hear me ; the incipient conviction forced upon them by my previous preaching and miracles, by being re- sisted, Avill but increase their guilty obduracy, which not even the required miracle would remove." As he spolce these words a M'oman in the crowd, an enthusias- tic admirer of the young Eabbi, broke out into the exclamation, " Blessed is the w^omb that bare thee, and the breasts which thou hast sucked ! " lie answered nicut.^"™""* '^^^ ' this womanly but commonplace compliment by correcting her low ideas. " Rather are they blessed who hear and keep the word of God." As if he had said, "Even Mary's blessedness does not lie in the historic fact that I became son of her flesh, but that she was so humble and faithful a keeper of tlie word of God as to be selected to be my mother." Biographical circumstances are so little when compared with real loftiness of character ! All this while the mother and brothers of Jesus were outside the door, and could not reach him for the press, but sent word in to him. They had heard, and perhaps partly be- "^ ' '^ r [^ J Mary and her sons. lieved, the slanders of the Pharisees. Even Mary's moment of weakness was upon her. She feared. She did not know into what the effect of his excessive labors may have be- trayed him. But he was her son. ^Yhen the message came to 334 SECOND AND TniKD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. liiin tlirongli tlie crowd, lie said : " Who is my motlier 1 Wlio are iny brethren ? " And then, looking upon the multitude about him, and more particularly upon the disciples who were clinging more and more closely to him, and striving more and more to comprehend him, he said : " Behold my mother and my brothers ! For whosoever shall do the will of God, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother ! " The first sentence seems a sharp rebuke to the weakness of Mary and the infidelity of her other sons in regard to this her greatest siritual relationship with him. The whole sets forth a great advance in the teaching of Jesus. It is to be noticed that he chiims moi-o and more. lie is looking M'idely through human- ity aiul into the future. lie is caring less for lleshly ties. His love is founded on a principle. AVhocver lovingly obeys God is a Mary that hath borne Jesus in the heart. Whoever lovingly obeys God is his brotlicr: the same spirit animates both. If his mother do not obey God, Jesus is ready to disown the relationship. If the poorest woman in the world — such as the poor barbarian woman in Africa who gave water to Mungo Park, and sang lulla- bies to him in his sickness and solitude— shall only lovingly obey God, Jesus is ready to i-ecognizc her as sister or mother. It is a sublimely wide and deep saying! While Jesus was making these speeches, one of the Pharisaic party, seeing the defeat they were suffering, invited Jesus to a „ , .,, ™ . luncheon at his house, aiMjai-ently that he im'ght Eats with ii Phanseo, 5 11 J & and (loiiounoes Thari- brcalv Up tliis public discussloH aiid talvC from Jcsus **"''"■ the support of the po]uilar presence and approval, and surround him in private by his deadly enemies. Jesus accepted the invitation. Doubtless the Pharisee«thought that this was done in rustic simplicity by an unsophisticated man. But Jesus saw the whole manoeuvre. lie went into the house and sat down at the table, omitting the ceremonial washing of hands. He M'as surrounded by Pharisees, who were Separatists, Purists, Puritans, as their name implies. These well-washed gentlemen, with nicely pared finger-nails, in all things fastidiously neat, exchanged glances of wonder that he did not wash his hands. He saw it. lie knew what it meant. He had been invited into a net. He was going to break its meshes. Just then a servant may have* ■wiped the plates and cups with a clean napkin, to remove any THE SECOND TOUK OF GALILEE. 335 little dnst that may Iiavo settled on the dishes. Jesns took the occasion to reply in words to the accusations tliey were making bv i>-lanccs. " You Pharisees are now as faultless in your out- M-aixl behavior as these dishes are clean of every kind of dirt ; but your hearts are full of extortion and wickedness. Thought- less nieu, he that makes clean that which is without, does not necessai-ily clean that which is within also? l>ut y(^u give alms, and then say. All things are clean ! * But woe to you, Pharisees ! you are so careful in your tithes that you give a tenth of even yoin- mint and rue and ever}^ herb,t and omit righteonsness and the love of God : these are absolutely necessary, while your seni- pulousness in other things should not be omitted. Woe to you, Pharisees ! for ye love the uppermost seats in the synagogues, and the frreetino-s in the markets. Woe to you ! for ve are as hidden irraves wliicli men do not see, and so walk over tliem and are ceremonially defiled." Amongst those present was a "lawyer." When that name is mentioned we are not to suppose that the person occupied the same position in society as our modern lawyers. The lawyer in this case was rather a professor or doctor of divinity. lie was an authority in sacred law. This person, ])erha[)S feeling pinched by the statement about the punc- tilious tithing of the smallest products of the garden, a question the decision of which came before the lawyers, pertly addressed Jesus with the remark, " Teacher, saying these things thou insult- est us also." Then Jesus broke npon him: "And to yon, professors of the moral law, woe ! for ye lade men with burdens grievous to be A "lawyer." * This seems to me to be the mean- ing of Jesus, au iuterpretation held by Erasiiius, Lightfoot, Kuinoel, Schleier- macher, the devout Stier, and others ; but opposed by Dean Alford, who has five reasons agauist the correctness of this rendering, one of which is a strong reason for the iuterpretation here given, three are gi'ammatical, one of which is not pertinent when we regard tliis as a dramatic sketch, and another begs the question. This fifth reason is, that this makes Jesus cast a slur upon almsgiving, which is a mistake j perhaps he slurs such almsgiving as the Pharisees made, but he is not speaking of the giving of alms, but of substituting outward and ceremonial for inward and moral clean- liness. The intei-]5retation given in the text has this advantage, it makes sense; which the usual reading does not, unless it be the sense that he that gives alms is therefore inwardly pure — the very doctrine of the Pharisees which Jesxia was vehemently denouncing. f Perhaps, by a rigid rendering of the passage of the law in Levit. xxvii. 30, the Pharisees made this precept. 336 SECOJTD AND THIRD PASSOVER m THE LIFE OF JESUS. Lawyers denounced. borne, and you yourselves touch not the burdens with one of youi little fingers. Woe to you ! for ye build the tombs of the prophets, and your fathers killed them. Truly ye ai'e wit- nesses tliat you approve the deeds of your fathers : for they killed the prophets, and over them you erect monuments of your own heavy ordinances. On this account the wisdom of God has said : ' I will send them prophets and apostles, and some of them they wull slay and persecute, that the blood of all the prophets, shed from the foundation of the world, may be required of this "-eneration, from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zacharias,* who perished between the altar and the temple : ' veri- ly, I say unto you. It shall be required of this generation. Woe to you, professors of the moral law ! for ye have taken away the key of knowledge ; ye entered not in yourselves, and those that were entering in ye hindered," This broke up the meal. Ilis enemies and he rose to their feet. The Pharisees were furious. They might have despatched him there, but between the pauses of his awful speech they heard the surging of the great crowd M-hich blocked the street outside, among whom were hundreds who had been wrought into an enthusiasm for the Teacher, and were anxious to have him make his appearance. He passed out from the circle of his deadly foes into the midst of the nniltitude. The meal broken up. * This is not so mucli a quotation of Scripture as an amplification of a say- ing of Scripture. The alhision seems to be to the account of the slaughter of Zacharias, the son of Jehoiada (as re- corded in 2 Chron. xxiv. 18-22), who was stoned in the court of the house of the Lord, because he had faith- fully borne witness against the sins of the people. As he was dying he said, '' The Lord look upon it, andrequire it." Jesus amplifies this expression, and makes the assertion that God will "re- quire " of the Jews of his generation the blood of all the holy martyrs who had died for confessing the truth, from Abel the first prophet-martyr to Zacharias the last martyr-prophet. He predicts that such obstinate and wicked rejec- tion of the truth by his people should bring upon them a destruction which should justify all the assertions of good men in regard. to the ruinous nature ol sin, and as complete as if they had real- ly heard and rejected each confessor of the truth in every age. Matthew calls this Zacharias " the son of Barachias," thus creating a difficulty to which two solutions have been offered : (1), That of Olshausen, who says, " There is nothing offensive in the supposition that Mat- thew might have confused the name of the murdered man's father with the father of the Zacharias whose book we have in the canon of Scripture ; " or (2), Perhaps still better, that of Ebrard, who suggests that Zacharias might have been the grandson of Jehoiada, and that Barachias stood between. THE SECOND TOUE OF GALILEE. 337 He commenced to ^varn them against hypocrisy, against accept- ing hypocritical invitations to feasts, but was interrupted by a voice from the crowd inojiportunely saying, waming against hy- " Teacher, speak to my brother, that he divide P<^™y- the inheritance with me." This man was not a disciple, nor apparently about to become one, but seeing the great and grow- ing influence of this rabbi, he supposed that he had come to set all things right, and so put in his selfish appeal. Jesus turned upon him with tlie speech : " Man, who made me a judge or a divider over you ? " He remitted him to the laws of the land. But it gave him occasion to deliver another warning against covet- ousness. " See and g\iard yourselves against covetousness. Not because a man has abundance does tliis life consist in his goods." The life comes from God. It may be sustained by a portion of worldly goods, but all that is over and above what a man can use is really useless to him. It adds nothing valuable to his life. This admonition is enforced by the parable of the Rich Fool, told A'ery dramatically : " The large field of a rich man produced plentifully. And he thought within himself, rarawo of the ELch ' What shall I do ? Because I have not where to ^'"'^ store my fruits.' And he said, ' This will I do : I will pull down my barns and build larger : and there will I gather all my pro^ duce. And I will say to my life, ' Life, thou hast many good things laid up for many years: take thine ease, eat, drink, be merry!' But God said: 'Thoughtless man! this night they* require of thee thy life, and to whom will belong the things which thou hast prepared ? ' So is he who layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God." It would be exceedingly difficult to find another passage in the discourses of Jesus fuller of lessons in as few words. A man had become rich. He owned a great field. He • 1 1 All 11 Expositiou. was growing richer every day. At last he reached a point of perplexity. His business had gi-own into a very large * It was a common belief among the Jews that the angels had to do with dying men, a belief alluded to again by Jesus in the parable of Dives and Lazanis, Luke xvi. 22. Evil men had their souls required of them, dragged out of them ; but the souls of the righteous were drawn from their 22 mouths gently with a kiss by the angel Gabriel. To something of this kind Trench thinks allusion is made in the fonnula by whi:h the early church so frequently described the departure of a good man. " In osculo Domini obdormi- vit," he hath gone to sleep in the kins of the Lard, 33S SECOND AND THIKD TASSOVEK IN TUE LIFE OF JESUS. affair. IIo had reached a point when some plan for life, which should arrange for the disposal of all these riches, must be adopted. The Teacher shows us the inmost mind of the man, and puts his thoughts into words, and then renders the vei'dict of God upon his character and conduct. God pronounced him "a fool." It is proper to learn who, in the judgment of God, is a fool. It is quite apparent that the man was not engaged in an ille- gitimate business, not even in one that was at all cpiestionable. He was not a thief nor e-ambler, nor was he a Business legitimate. , .1. speculative operator in stocks. He was neither banker nor merchant. If money has pollution in its touch, he avoided it. He was not exposed to the trials which beset those men whose business compels them to buy in the cheapest and sell in the dearest market. He lived in the rural districts, away from the metropolis ; and he was an agriculturist. If any man can lead a spotless life, surel}^ a farmer can. But spotless lives are not more frequently led in agriculture than in other pursuits. Farmers are as good as others, and no better. There are farmers who have grumbled at the extortion of merchants, but who eagerly snatched at the advantage given them by a droii^ht or a blockade to lock up their corn and wait for still greater advance in the prices. But the employment of farming is one in which a man is subjected to the fewest temptations. If he do wrong, it is because it is in him. Tliis man was a farmer, and — a fool. But he was not intellectually or spiritually a fool, because he was rich. It is not true that " any fool can make money." It Riches no proof of rcquircs braius, and thouglit, and energy, and folly or Bin. pcrsc vcraucc, — all these in such amount and pro- portion as would make the man great in any department. Nor does it follow that he was a sinner because he was rich. Ordinarily, if a man be veri/ rich, it is because he or some ances- tor has done some wrong. But it is not so always. Some men are so wise and good that wnth increasing liberality they grow rich. Job was that perfect man who won even the admiration of God, and he was the richest man of his region, if not of his age. Abraham was the "friend of God," and he was a millionaire. In every age some of the saintliest have been among the most prosperous. Men ought not to despise or hate the ricli, but pity them ; for with great difficulty, as Jesus says, do they enter the TIIE SECOND TOUK OF GAilLEE. 339 kingdom of heaven. And he that sets the poor agahist the rich, inciting the many against the few, appealing to tlie passions of those who have not against those who have, turning servants against masters, employes against employers, labor against capi- tal, wresting men's houses and lands and servants from them by preaching the crusades of agrarianism is, to speak after the man- ner of (iod, a " fool." This man in the parable was a farmer, was shrewd enough to become rich, — but he was a fool. This severe verdict was pronounced on. his character because. Firstly^ lie could not comprehend the state of affairs which he himself had created. lie had labored for an in- i. He axa not com- crease, and when the increase came he was not v^^^^^^ his affairs, prepared to invest it permanently for perpetual use. When a man reaches a point that he begins to destroy what he has made, it is clear that he is not long-sighted. This man had invited Success to be his guest. Success came, and he did not know how to entertain. Secofidlf/, Because he misunderstood his relation to the exter- nal world. lie speaks like a proprietor, "/have no room where to bestow mi/ goods." "/will pull down my 2. Korhis relation to barns, and build greater, and there will I bestow the external world, all my goods and viy fruits." Jesus represents him as a man who did not know how to adapt himself to the facts of God and the laws of the uni\erse. A wise man acknowledges God as the proprietor, and himself as the agent whose business it is to im- prove and beautify God's world. lie sees that in order to have his world beautified God has made this law, that the very moment a man begins to draw the world into himself he begins to be crushed out of sight. The very moment he begins to pour him- self out u]3on the world he begins to grow, and the world to brighten. This " fool " did not know the meaning of the words he was employing. IS^othing is "fruit" that is not enjoyable. Nothing that brings troubles and pei-plexities should be called "goods." And this man had burdened himself with what he could not enjoy. T/drdlt/, lie did not know the difference between his body and his soul. " The life (or soul) is more than meat." He thought he could feed his soul on corn ! And so he put all he had of capital and brain into the production of com. " All my goods," 340 SECOND AKD TIIIKD PASSOVEK EN THE LIFE OF JESUS. he says, "Wlien a man lias i]i vested liis " all " in perishable ob- 3. Didno kr^owthe jet^^^' and tlicj ftrc swept away, he is totally fliffcreiice between iK>ui jioverty-striclvcn. Tlils iiian acknowledged that ° ^' he had taken snch a fearful risk. I'ourthly, lie had postponed his enjoyments. There is a sense in which the old Epicurean precept, " Carpe diem," holds good. 4. Postponed his en- If there be any i-eal happiness to be had 7ioiVy joyments. ^j^^ sliould not Ict it slip by postponing it to the uncertainties of the future. What pleasure we have ever had we still have, in the knowledge and memory of it. What we have not we may never have. The past and the future lie equally be- yond our control. Narrow as is the Now, it is the field for our action and the season for our enjoyment. It must be packed full and close, — pressed down with heaity effort and hearty delight. Many a man is like this fool in the parable. Many a man says, " AYlien I have accumulated a fortune, and built a house, and established my family, I will settle down and have a good time." Wliy not have a good time now, while one is accumulating one's fortune and building one's house ? Why wait ? Fifthly, He relied upon a known nncertainty. All that he pro- jected required time, and was environed with insecurity. As tho 5. Keiied on a known timbcrs of the old bams wcro coming down, or uncertainty. tlioso of tlic ncw Avorc going up, they might fall on him or strike him, and thus kill him or leave him a mangled cripple, wretched for all life, quite beyond the anodynes that wealth can bring to pain. "J/wcA goods — laid ii^ — for many years." Here is a triple uncertainty. And yet on this nncertainty he was going to settle down at his ease, and eat and di-ink and be merry, forgetting that in eating and in drinking men sometimes choke or go into manifold diseases that dampen all merriment. Sixthly, lie omitted preparations for a future certainty. He could not tell when he should die, but he certainly knew that _, whatever wealth men may accumulate they 7nust 6. Made no provl- ^ '' r ^ ' n eion for a known cer- die. IIc had made uo arrangement for his fortune *'""*^* when ho should be dead. To whom should belong the things which' he had prepared? In this day it is sometimes announced that a man has died and " left a fortune of many mil- lions of dollars." He " left " it, did he ? Why not stay with it 1 What a palace, what parks, what equipages, what delicious food, what sumptuous furniture of books and statues and pictures and THE SECO>"D TOUR OF GALILEE. 341 articles of vlrtto would not those millions bny ! Alas! he could not stay with it. The gate of the grave is so narrow that slender ghosts do barely struggle through, and houses and lands, and cof- fins and shrouds and bodies are all torn off, and the soul stands naked on the other side. And a man cannot tell to whom he shall leave his riches. Take what precaution he maj', his will may be broken, after much of the estate is squandered in litigation. If it go to the designated heir, he may squander it on swindlers and harlots, or the heir may die and leave it to his fathers dead- liest foe. It is folly to be all one's lifetime laboring to acquire a fortune one must leave to one knows not whom. "So is he that layetli up treasure for himself, and is not rich to^vard God." This is transcendent folly. The man has so buried himself in the perishable that when that goes he -fx 1 i,i' 1^' 1 •! Not rich toward Grod. IS gone, lie has lost liimselr in the material. Abstracted his inmost, highmost nature, and emptied it, as one should spill upon the sands of the desert his only bottle of water, when he knows that thence it can never be gathered u}) again, and that there is not another drop within reach. lie passes int(j eter- nit}' with nothing, as if one should go into a foreign land, a land of strangers, with none of their current money, and with nothing that could be converted into currenc3\ On this side rich, on that poor. Here the papers are full of accounts of his immense estate, where it lies, and how it goes, while he stands a jxxle and shivering spirit on the inside of the gate of death, with nothing. He is not rich toward God, nor rich in God. He hath not used the means at his control to please the owner thereof, and now he comes to the judgment a defaulter. He luid not learned the blessed alche- my by which Love and Faith do change the baser metals of this world to gold which endures foi-ever.* Such seem to be the lessons of this striking parable. Jesus fol- lowed it with a repetition and enlargement of much that he had spoken against covetousness and excessive carefulness in the Ser- mon on the Mount. In the crowd of hearers were some who took occasion to speak to him of certain Galilteans whom Pilate had one of Piiatc's ont- elaiu while the}^ were engaged in worship, min- "^^ gling their blood with their sacrifices. We cannot now ascertain •In this exposition I have ^rsxra \ ^^ A Prophylactic of Cov€iau»/ic^." largely on my published sermon entitled I 342 SECOND AND THIKD TASSOVER m TUE LIFE OF JESUS. what was the particular atrocity to which they alluded. The Gali Iseans, according to Josephus,* were prone to insurrection. Tliey were ignorant, rude, and tumultuous, and made frequent distiirl> ances in Jerusalem on the occasions of the feasts. And Pilato not infrequently was grossly violent in the government of his peo- ple.f Why these informants should have brought this subjecit to the attention of Jesus at this particular time it is difficult to decide. Perhaps it was a challenge to him, as he was putting forth claims to the Messiahship, to stretch forth his arm against the Roman governor who had violated the Temple by the introduction of soldiers and by mingling human blood with tlie blood of sacri- fices. Perhaps it was a slur on Jesus as a Galilsean. Perhaps it intimated that he was creating trouble for the people, as tliese GaHlseans had met their death as his partisans. They may have done so. Going up to Jerusalem to present their sacrifices, they may have found a test presented to them, involving the rejection of Jesus, or may have heard him violently denounced by the priests ; and although they themselves were not good, they had an enthusiasm for the young Pabbi, and resented the insults of the priests, who may have called in the aid of the governor and the unscrupulous Poman soldiery ; or, most probably, to divert the searching address of Jesus from themselves, they spoke of this great catastrophe in reprehension of the Galilaeans who had been slain. Jesus takes occasion to rebuke the spirit which was rife among the Jews, and which can be found in this day, leading men to adjudge the unfortunate as wicked, and to regard singular catastrophes as proofs of singular crim-. inality. " Suppose you that these Galilaeans were sinners above all the Galilceans, because they have suffered such things ? I tell you, No ; but except you repent, you shall all perisli in like man- ner.:}: Or those eighteen, upon whom the tower of Siloam § fell A false judgment. * VU., 17, and Antiq., 17, 9, 3 ; 10, 2. •f See Josephus, Antiq. ^ 18, 3, 1; De Bell. Jud. ,2,9,2; also Winer, the arti- cle Pilate. X " Likewise " does not translate the word. It means that their punishment should be of the same kind as that of those who had been spoken of. § History has preserved no record of the incident here mentioned. Winer refers to Josephus, Bell. Jud., G, 7, 2, from which passage it would seem that the lower town extended as far aa this district of Siloam, which Josephus distinguishes from a well of the same name, and that the district was enclosed by the city walls. THE SECOND TOCK OF GALILISE. 3*3 and killed them, think ye that thoy were snuiers ahove all men who dwelt iu Je u.alem ? I tell you, No ; but excop you repen ™"sWl all (Galiteans and J„da.ans) perish m l.ke n^anner. I^tau . It tha these unfortunates who fell l,v P.lato's hand were not W«-^ to he aecounted worse tha,> their countryn.en ; nor he Galtan, in gene.al to be disparaged on this account or .n Jud^a ay, iu Jerusalem itself, a tower had fallen upon cghteen JS^'who'were not Galih.ans, and they perished ; but they were not aerefore to be aecounled worse than other Judsans. He 1 1 gave his discourse a turn which his heare,, htt e ev peeted Ii: led them from thinking of othe.. to thmk of them- selves. Eepeutance and not judgment wa. the „.,»« ... Droner occupation of their lives. Unless the ' Se peopli of the Jews repented, the nation should be slan, I^d crLid out. God's hand flings down Siloam-towe.. and u - sheathes I'ilate-swords, and these are but ^y^^^J^^^^^ do to the whole nation, if they do not repent. Tins wa.. a p.ea c Uon which was literally fulfilled at the destruction of Jer,^^^^^^ when multitudes of the inhabitants were crushed 1 eneatli the n^'s of the Temple and the city, and multitudes, wlnle engaged in offeriu- their sacrifices, were slain by the Eoman army. "Xhe fm-bearance .and the justice of ^^-xi U>.^^^^ nation are then set forth iu a warnmg payable. A ceUam had afi"-trec planted in his vineyard, and he came j,^^„„,n,pig.tt^ Beekino.°fn.itonit,anddidnotfindit. Then he saMtohisvine-drLser,' See, three years*! conre -kmg frmt on th^s fig^ree^amUdono^^ gustine understands them to mean the law of nature and the written law and the law of grace ! Theophylact in- terprets them to signify IMoses and the prophets and Christ ; and also, when ap- pUed to the individual under moral cul- ture, childhood and manhood and old age. Olshausen, the three years of the ministry of Jesus, ^^^lereas the plain meaning is simply the space required for mon. f The whole force of the most impor- tant word in the sentence is lost in the common version. ' ' In addition to occu- pying space, it exhausts the ground." AMiy°should it ? That is the real mean- in'T of the text, which, in our transla- tion above, is sought to be brought out suggestively by the world "also." 3U SECOND AND TIIIKD PASSOVKK IN THE I-IFE OF JESUS. injure tlic ground ? ' But tlic vinc-dressor replied, ' Master, let il alone this year also, until I sliall dig and cast manure about it ; and then, if it produce fruit, — but if not, then thou shalt cut it down." * It was a plain and pungent lesson. The fig-tree was the Jew- ish people, who had received all kinds of protection and culture from God, who had been expected to bear fruit for the good of the world, who had had time granted for that purpose, but who liad not only been barren, but had kept the world back in the growth of improvement. It was like a tree drawing from the ground the nourishment which, if other trees had, they would l)roduce fruit. It must be cut down. But a merciful space is left. If it begin to be productive, it shall be spared ; if not, it shall be cut out from among all the trees of the nations which God has planted in the field of the world. His hearers certainly must have understood this to be a prediction of the destruction of their hierarchy and nationality. The construction of the par- able, and the connection in which it is uttered, showed them that this was the meaning of Jesus. And he meant nothinjr else. * The following receipt for curing- a fig-tree of ban'enness is quoted from Rosenmuller (AUe vrul Neuc Morgcn- Ifuid, V. 5, p. 187) : " Thou must take a hatchet and go to the tree with a friend, unto whom thou sayest, I will cut down this tree, for it is unfruitful. He answers, Do not so, this year it will certainly bear fruit. But the other eays, It must needs be, it must be hewn down, and gives the stem of the tree three blows with the back of the hatchet. But the other restrains him, crying, Nay, do it not; thou wilt certainly have fruit from it thLs year ; only have patience with it, and be not over-hasty in cutting it down ; if it still refuses to bear fruit, then cut it down. Then will the tree that year be certainly fiiiitful and bear abundantly." CnAPTEE VII. A CHAPTER OF TARABLES. In tlio course of the afternoon of the same day Jesus left hig residence in Capernaum and went to the shore of the hike of Gennesaret. His appearance in public Avould Lake ocnnesarct, now inunedlately summon a conc-rerration. To "''•■^'•capprnaum. Matt *' r? o xiu. ; Mark iv. ; Luke the multitudes that had assembled fi-om all the vul neighboring towns and cities, he presented liis doctrines in the form of parables, delivered while he sat in a boat near the shore. It is to be noticed that Jesus was more libei-al of this kind of teaching at this period of his ministry than ever befoi-e. In the next chapter we shall have occasion to consider the motive. We are following the order of the original historians as far as practicable. The iirst in order and in importance is the Parable of the Sower. Jesus considered it the fundamental parable. "When his disciiiles questioned him privately as to its siplication. The word lies on their souls as seed does on a paved and much-trodden road. It is t/icre : but it has not entered. It has not been received. The hungi-y mouth of the ploughed furrow is not * Of which a specunen is Lange's in- terpretation of the parable of the sower, when he says that the stony groiand is exhibited in "corrupted Judaism; the ground where the good seed is choked by thorns of worldly lust is the Blohani- medan world ; the good ground is Chris- tendom!" (Life of Jesus, \ol. ii., p. 194. ) Really the common justice which allows an intelligent man to know what he meant to say, ought to be accorded to Jesus. After he has given his own inteipretation of one of his own para- bles, surely it is most unfair to repre- sent him as meaning something else thereby. 350 SECOND AND TnntD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. tlierc to take it in, nor is the harrow readj to pnt it under. It is obvious to the c^'es of the birds, who see it and take it off. The Evil One does that for the M-ay-side hearers of the truths of "the kingdcni" which Jesus was pi-cacliing. The grammatical con- struction of the sentence shows tliat this loss of the word occurs "almost dvu'ing the act of hearing." (2.) " But what was sown among the stones, this is he who heareth the word, and immediately with joy receiveth it ; yet hath he no root in himself, but is for a time, temporary ; and when tribula- lation or pursuit ariseth because of the M'ord, immediately he is caused to stumble." Here is a different class of hearers. They not only listen to the word, and receive it into their ears, but they have joyful emotions. They receive it enthusiastically. But so soon as a severe trial of their faith comes, they fall away from the gospel. They have not root. They have not taken it into their souls and made it part of their lives. They love the truth only so long as the truth is to them an occasion of pleasurable emotions. In other words, they love pleasure more than they love truth, and when pressure or pursuit, tribulation or pei'secu- tion, presents to them for immediate decision the choice between pleasure and truth, their decision shows how little root the truth had been able to strike in their souls. (3.) " And what was sown among the thorns, this is he who heareth the word, and the anxious care of the world and the de- ceitfulness of wealth choke the word, and it becometh unfruit- ful." Here is another mixture of the sign and the thing signified, making " the word " mean in the same breath both seed and soil ; but the sense is very open. While in the second case the rootless- ness of the man, or the rootlessness of the word in the man, is demonstrated by what comes to him, here the same thing is de- monstrated by what the man himself pursues. In the" former ease, if no tribulation or pei-secution had come, the man would have gone on quite happy, but here his course of daily life shows how little the truth has dominion over his soul. Anxious care, an elevation of the present over the future, a preference for tem- porary visible things rather than for permanent, eternal, invisible things, and then the deceitfulness of wealth, luring men to ita pursuit by promises of enjoyments it never affords — these spring up about the word, and the truth fails to have the happy effect upon the character of the hearer which it would other^vise have. A CIIArXER OF PARABLES. 351 (4.) " Bat what was sown on the good irronnd, this is he who hearerh and iniderstandeth the word, wlio indeed beareth fruit, some a hundred, some sixty, some thirty." That which " was sown on good grt)und," so says the original The way-side, the stony places, the thorny places, are all bad for the seed. " Ground," wlt/t nothing else, is " good." A soul without prepossessions and anxious cares, lying ready for the truth, is the soil in which this seed will grow. That is the reason why childlikeness and sim- plicity of spirit, with desire for the truth, are so nmcli connnended by Jesus, and have in all ages been favorable to the cultivation of the character and the acquisition of true Avisdom. In such a man plant the truth, and it will certainly be fruitful. But as in evil hearei-s there are three classes, so the Teacher instructs ns that there will be varieties of good bearers, but that this variety will 1)0 rather in degree than in kind. Some will be more fruit- ful than others, but all will bear frnit, not perhaps in exact arith- metically expressed ratios, but certainly in a proportional diversity. Then followed his own exposition of the Parable of the Tares. " He Avho soweth the good seed is the Son of Man. The field is the world. The good seed, these are the sons of" the kingdom. The tares are the sons of the Evil One. TJ^e enemy that sowed them is the Devil. The harvest is the end of the age. The reapers are the angels. As therefore the tares are assorted and burned in the fire, so shall it be at the end of this age ; the Son of Man shall send angels, and they shall gather ont of his kingdom all who arc snares,* and those who make lawlessness, and shall cast them into a fur- nace of fire : there shall be wailing and grinding of teeth. Then the righteous shall shine out as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He that has ears to hear, let him hear ! " It would seem impossible to make anything clearer than this, and yet it is a remarkable fact in the histoiy of human thought that there is only one other speech of Jesus which has caused so much perplexity to the church as this.f A volume as large as Explication of the Tares. * The word translated " all things that offend," means that portion of a trap where the bait is suspended, which, being touched, causes the snare to spring and tighten on the unfortunate animal. As the word in the original, although neuter, manifestly refers to persons, the translation I have given above seems to be not only literal, but exactly expres- sive of the idea intended. f I refer to his words at the Supper : " This is ray body ; " ' • this is my blood." 352 SECOND AND TIIIED PASSOVER IN THE LITE OF JESUS. this might be filled with a history of controversies fought aronad this parable and its explanation by Jesns. The most perverse and foolish and rninous interpi'etations have been given, mainly grow> ing ont of the interpretation of the phrase " the world," which men insist to this day in making to mean " the clmrcli." They will not let Jesns know what he meant when he spake. Will the reader be good enough to refer to the parable, and immediately after reading it read the exposition of Jesus, and then follow with the next paragraph ? In that we shall present what seems to us would be the understanding of an intelligent man who had com- pared the sayings of Jesus with one another, without any prepos- session of interjiretation. Jesus says : " The seed is the word of God." (Luke viii. 11.) lie represents himself as being the Sower, by which he would seem to mean that in some way, excelling all others, he should apply the word of God to the minds and hearts of mankind. He describes himself by his favorite name, " Son of Man." "The field is the worlcl^'' not the church. The field is the whole commu- nity of human beings occupying this planet, in successive genera- tions, with their various pursuits and developments. " The king- dom of the heavens is like unto a man who sowed good seed in his field." " The field is the worlds " The good sped are the sons of the kingdom " of the heavens. " The tares are the chil- dren of the Devil," whose personality and activity Jesus taught not in parable, but in most strictly didactic and expository dis- courses to his disciples in private, and in explication of a parable. The " Devil," the accuser, the slanderer, is the enemy of the Son of Man. He has sown evil in the world, not specially in the church. Because the church must be part of the world, it will have the characteristics of the world in the particular of a mixed population. " The harvest is the end of the age." In our common vei-sion of Matthew xili. Ave have in the thirty- eighth verse, " The field is theworld^'' and in the thirty-ninth verse, " The harvest is the end of theworld.^^ The words in the original are totally different. In the former passage it means this orderly universe of God, and the human race occupying this planet. In the latter it means cao'i^ age, fera. The whole phrase* means the * The phrase here is avrjTe\iia rov aituvos. In Hebrews ix. 20, Paul uses the phi'aso, avynXeia tuv atdiyuy, the ]*uncture of the agea, the moment of passage from one tera to another. Trench thinks "the phrase equivalent A CIIAPTEE OF I'ARABLES. 353 coming together of asras, tlie joining of tlicir ends, the conclud- ing end of one and the opening end of the other. In this phrase there is nothing wliatever which iniphes or in- sinuates the destruction or end of either this phinet or its inhah- itants. There is very phainlj indicated a great transition epoch, when one cycle ends and another begins, and this juncture of tlie aeras is marked by an epoch of vast changes in tlie constitu- tion of things. It will be the harvest-home of the kingdom of tlie heavens. Until that time no man, and no set of men, must undertake the weeding process to cast the evil out. It cannot be done. " Lest gathering together the tares ye root out the wheat with them." Obviously Jesus believed that the world was not so much hurt by the existence of evil men as it was benefited by the existence of the good. It is better to permit an evil man to reside in a comnmnity, a church, a society-, a town, than by mis- take to destroy a good man. The faith of Jesus in the goodness of goodness is both beautiful and sublime. It rested upon an- other thought. The evil is to be destroyed at the end of this seon and the beginning of the next, whenever that shall be. The destiny of the evil is to be destroyed. The destiny of the good is to be preserved. At the conjunction of the ages the Son of Man will send his reapers forth officially, and he will direct them Avhat to do. Here Jesus assumes to himself the final supervision, and accomplish- ment by the agency of angels, of the destiny of the evil and the good. He will direct what shall be done with them. The evil are to be dealt with first. TMierever in any part of his kingdom,—" the kingdom of the heavens,"— there are any who are baits to othei-s, enticing them to evil, or any Avho make lawlessness, teach or practise disregard of the laws of tlie king- dom of the heavens, they are to be separated from all the good. That is the first process. Then these evils and these evil people will be assorted. All shall not be destroyed alike. Every man is to be judged and punished " according to his works." There are "few stripes" and "many stripes." There is discrimina- tion and assortment. " Bind them in hundles for their burning." Augustine sees this, and teaches that sinners shall be punished together. " Hoc est, rapaces cum rapacibus, adulteros cum adul- to the T€\rj Twf aidivwv of 1 Cor. x. 11, the I the one and the commencement of the extremities of the two aeras. the end of I other." 23 354 SECOND AND THIRD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. teris, homicidses cum liomocidis, fares cum furibus, derisorea cum derisoribus, similes cam similibus ; " that is, robbers with robbers, adulterers with adulterers, murderers with murderers, thieves with thieves, scorners Avith scorners, like with like.* Then these bundles are to be thrown into a furnace of fire. The weak Bliall burst into wailing, and the fierce wicked ones shall gnash their teeth in rage ; but they shall be destroyed. This intimates the most fearful anguish in the process of destruction. Then, when whatsoever and whosoever offends, or causes to offend, shall have been destroyed, — shall have been rolled away like a dark cloud, — the righteous shall blaze forth gloriously in the kingdom of their Father. Until which time let no man undertake the work of excision and destruction. It is the prerogative of the Son of Man, and shall be accomplished at the juncture of the seras, when " this age " shall end and " the age to come " begin. And yet, with such plain teaching set before the world by Jesus, and in face of the corroboration, by the history of the whole world, of the utter impracticability of infallible judgment as to the character of men, some called Christians have insisted upon persecution for opinion's sake, making a man an offender for a word, until at some period of the church's history ecclesiastics have become morl)id hei-esy-hunters. For instance, Aquinas, who in the thirteenth century won the name of the Angelic Doctor , taaglit that the prohibition is binding only when there is danger of plucking up the wheat while extirpating the tares, as if Jesus had not expressly taught that that danger is always and will be, M'hile this a^ra lasts. John Maldonatus, a Spanish Jesuit of the sixteenth century, taught that the householder was to determine whether such danger existed, and he added, that as the Pope is the representative of that householder, he must be asked whether or not the tares shall be removed. Upon which he addresses to all Catholic princes an exhortation to imitate these slaves of the householder, so that instead of having to be urged to the work of rooting out heresies and heretics, they will rather need to ha\'e * Dante, "the dark Italian hiero- phant," represents that among other Bpectacles in hell he saw one moving flame, divided at the top, and was told that it contained Diomed and Ulysses, • " who speed together now to their own misery, as formerly they used to do to that of others." The Old Testament Scriptures give this intimation repeat- edly. " That man perished not alona in his iniquity." ' ' The deceiver and the deceived are His." Job xii 16. A CKAPTER OF PAKABLES. 355 tlieir :.eal restrained ! So totally has what is called " The Church" misrepresented the teaching of Jesus. Having now the invaluable help of the Great Teacher's method of explaining his own parables, let ns apply it to all that follows. The next is the Parable of the Seed growing in secret. In that the commentators have found great difficulties. They say that if the man who sows the seed is Jesus, then the par- Kxpu«ation of the able seems to disparage him, — " something is at- Patient Husbandman. tributed to him which seems unworthy of him, less than to him rightly appertains, — while if, on the other hand, we take him to mean those that in subordination to himself are bearers of his word, then something more, a higher prerogative, as it would seem, is attributed than can be admitted to belong rightly to any save only to him." * Another f says that this parable "is another and imperfect version of that of the tares, only with the circum- stance of the tares left out ! " As to the fii-st, the question is set- tled. Jesus says that he is the Sower. If that distinct declara- tion of his cannot be made to consort with his pictorial represen- tations of truth, it cannot be helped by even an archbishop. He was not careful to preserve the unities, and a German doctor must bear it. He spoke with the fi-eedom of a soul too lai-ge for mere rhetorical rules. Why should commentators be so careful for the reputation of Jesus ? As to the second, the slightest ex- amination would have shown the learned author that this is an- other version of the parable of the tares, as Othello is another version of Hamlet, when, of coursp, " the circumstance " of Ham- let is " left out." That of the tares teaches one thing, this an- other. This parable sets forth that the seed of the kingdom, the word of God, the germ of truth, is under the great system of law per- vading the universe. The truth grows of itself. All a man can do is to plant it. He need have no worry, no excessive anxiety. It will grow. The Son of Man, Jesus, has cast seed into the ground, and whatever he may know of all the secret processes of nature beyond Mhat men know, the seed he plants can grow no otherwise than, and will certainly grow just as, the seed of the most unlearned farmer grows. That is to say, it is part of the universal plan, and obeys the universal law. Jesus does not pro- * Trench, in his treatise on the Para- I f Strauss, Leben Josv, voL i. , p. blea I 6G4. 356 SECOND Am) third PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. fess to give his vrords an unnatural element. He will wait. The seed of God will surely grow day and night. Every part of its development is beautiful in its season, the blade, the ear, and the full corn at last. It is an impressive lesson of faith and patience. Then we have the Parable of the Mustard-seed. We need no fanciful interpretation of this parable. It plainly means the ex- Expiication of the tcusivc growth of tlio principles of the kingdom Mustard-seed. ^j^ ^^iQ licavens from the small beginnings of the obscure life of Jesus. He professed to plant that little seed in the field of the world. The planting took place in one of the most obscure corners of the field. It consisted of some spoken, not written, words, uttered to a few ordinary people, and coming out of a life of moderate length, only one-eleventh of which was spent in ])ublic. lie had such faith in the power of his own words that he predicted the time when they should be eo exten- sive in their influence that the utterances of no other man should be as potential. And that prediction is this day fulfilled. The parable and its fnlfihnent shows what prodigious results God ac- complishes with what apparently slender resources. From setting forth the extensive growth of the kingdom of the heavens by the propagation of truth, Jesus proceeds to conclude this series of parables by teaching the intensive Lea^vS!'^""'' °' '''' growth of truth. This kingdom is like hidden leaven. It is a small body when compared with the three measures of meal, but it is more than a match for the mass of inert substance in which it is hidden. Tlie meal has no effect on the leaven. The leaven instantly attacks tlie meal. It is a vivid, restless, transforming agency. It seizes the particles of meal next to it and changes them to leaven. It converts the use- less into an ally. There is now more leaven and less unleavened meal. This process goes forward until the whole mass is leavened. It'is a noiseless process. No one sees it, no one hears it ; but just as certainly as if the work were performed in the sight of all men, and ^vith blare of trumpets, the great change goes steadily forward. Placed in contact with humanity, the truths of the kingdom will go forward changijig that humanity by a potency peculiar to itself. It will cover humanity and take the whole world, not by over- powering, or conquering, or subjugation, but by transforming the world, and converting the mass of inert hmnanity into a vigorous agency. A CHAPTER OF PAKABLES. 357 Thus did Jesus set forth his ideas of the nature of the kino-dom of the heavens when addressing multitudes, and thus did he ex plain his teaching to his disciples in private when thej sought an explication of his dark sayings. ™ u <». And teaching his immediate followers he adds these other para- bles, or " similitudes," as Origen says they should be called. (1) " The kingdom of the heavens is like to a treasure hidden in the field, which a man having found he hid, and from the joy of it goeth and selleth all that he hath and buyeth that field." (2) " Again the kingdom of the heavens is like to a merchant scekino- good pearls, and having found one pearl of great value, he went and S( )ld all that he had and bought it." (3) " Again the kino-- dom of the heavens is like to a drag-net, cast into the sea, and gathering of every kind, which when it was full they drew upon the shore, and having sat down, they gathered the good into ves- sels, but cast the bad away. So shall it be in the end of the age : the angels shall come forth and separate the bad from the midst of the righteous, and shall cast tliem into the furnance of fire. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." After the method of Jesus in explaining his parables, it would Beem that these similitudes should contain no difficulties. And they do not, to simple minds. There is not a particle of difficulty except to such as have the old barren idea of churchism, to whicli all things must bend. Jesus is talking about something much higher and deeper than church ; he is talking about the kingdom of all ages and all heavens. He presents it again in tlu-ee wa^'s. 1. In the Parable of the Treasure, it is as if a man walking over the field, which may seem to him barren and worthless, ail at once comes miexpectedly upon a treasure, which so enhances the value of the field that everything else in compai-ison witli it seems worthless. "The field is the world." The kingdom of the heavens is the treasure. It is this which makes the world so valuable. It is in the world. Men do not see it. They are like unlettered rustics who walk over a field and perceive nothing. The chemist, the botanist, the geologist, the mining engineer, come into the same field, and they see a thousand beautiful and valuable thino-s ; and the jxeoloo-ist and engineer perceive traces of coal or copper, or silver or gold, exliibitions or jiromises of riches sucli as Australia and California never presented. How rapidly the field appreciates ! Just so ia The Treasure in ths Field. So 8 SECOND AND THIKD PASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS- it often witli men who, not expecting it, have sucli a sudden rev- elation of the glory of the reign of God in the world. Then the world becomes vastly precious to them. The basis of this parable was a fact common to society in the East, not only in the days of Jesus, but in this da}^ Curious ex- plorers of oriental ruins have obstructions in their work created by the belief of the natives that they come to cari-y away vast treasures from the country, the existence of which had somehow become known to these travellers. In ancient times, when there were rapid changes of dynasties, men adopted methods of invest- ment unknown to modern times. It is said that they divided their estates into three parts, one of which was put into commerce for current use ; another converted into costly aiiicles, which were easily portable and salable in all countries, so that, if obliged to fly, these would be their means of support ; and the third they buried, so that if they returned to their own land they might find their riches again. As in the changes of this mortal life many a man did not return, there were frequent occasions when treasure would be found. Idling peasants often sighed for the discovery of great riches, and so many romantic incidents would necessarily be connected with the burying and the finding of these treasures, that they occupy no inconsiderable space in oriental literatui-e. Jesus meant to teach, (1) That the reign of changeless principles occupying God's universe and pervading God's eternity is incom- parably valuable. (2) That its existence is what gives value to the woild, which would otherwise be woithless. (3) That men sometimes have these great truths revealed to them as by an inspiration, and all true men are excited with gladness thereat. 2. But there are men who are seeking the ^■aluable, the most precious, and they find it in this kingdom. This truth is set fortli in the Parable of the Pearl-buyer. It is necessary The Pearl-buyer. • i . i i • to recollect the great esteem ni which the ancients held the pearl, and the great sums often given for a single perfect pearl. The two pearls which Cleopatra proposed to dissohe in acid, in honor of Mark Anthony, were valued at 10,000,000 ses- terces, or about $390,000 in gold. But tlie value depended upon several things, such as size, form, color, and purity of lustre. It was rare to find a pearl that united all the good qualities, and when found if was of great price, of so great price as to stimulate elaborate counterfeitino-. It was worth while sometimes to invest A CHAPTEK OF PAKABLES. 359 all one possessed in a single pearl. There was less fluctuation in its value than in that of other commodities in the world's markets. So Jesus likens the earnest truth-seeker to the pearl-merchant. lie finds the most costly truth in the kingdom which Jesus was preaching. As men come to see and know the vahie of these truths, all other things will become comparati\"ely valueless. They will seek this. They will give up evei-ything else for this. The possession of this truth is the gaining of an everlasting fortune. 3. Again, this kingdom is likened unto a drag-net. Such a net is loaded with lead at the bottom, to sink it into the sea, and fur- nished with cork at the to]), which floats it, and then carried far out, as on the English coast some- times lialf a mile, and brought round with a sweep that takes all in and pulls all to the shore. Such a drag-net is the kingdom of the heavens, not the church. It sweeps the sea of life. It gathers in all the good fish and all the bad. It inight be likened to the sea itself, but that Jesus desired to convey again a very deep, important lesson of this kingdom, namely, that at the end of the current age, at the period when this cycle shall come to its conclusion, at the moment when another cycle shall be at its be- ginning, then there is a discrimination, judgment, separation crisis, and that this separation shall be followed by the destruction of the wicked. Fishermen sit on the shore and throw away upon the sand all fish that cannot be sold in the mai-ket. And the fish die, rot, disappear. Now it is to be remarked that Jesus teaches the doctrine of the final destruction of the wicked at the end of this aeon, but connects with it the idea of suffering, teaching us that the wicked shall not rot away out of the universe painlessly, but shall be as if a man were cast into a furnace, when there should be pain in the process of destruction, pain which should vent its expres- sion, according to the character of the sufferer, in weak wailing or in terrific grinding of teeth. When Jesus had said these things he asked his disciifles if they understood them, and when they said " yes," he added, " On this account every scribe disciplined for the kingdom of the heavens, is like to a man, a housemaster, who throM-s forth from his treasury new things and old." That is to say, that all who are to be ex- pounders of the truth must be themselves trained to it, and tlien must be, like householders, bringing forth whatever those who are the taught need, old things and new things. The truths of the 360 SECOND AND THIED PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. kingdom will perpetually expand to the soul's vision as they are studied. The truth is no worse for being old ; but if a man sup- poses that there will never be new revelations of truth he is sadly mistaken. It has always been a part of the injury which the race has suffered from churchism, that it has been taught that the limit of the knowledge of truth can be definitely fixed by one set of men for all men, and by one generation for all succeeding generations, so that a church may say in a council that such and such a thing is semper et ubique, always and everywhere the truth, and whosoever does not see it and acknowledge it to be trutli, " let him be accursed." Every man disciplined for the kingdom pours out, to those whom he is in turn disciplining, all things 7iew and old , old truths in new developments of science and human experience ; and thus the truth, to the teacher's mind, is as old as the hills and as fresh as the flowers that grow thereon. And thus the word "ortho- doxy " comes to be the contempt of the wise and the horror of the good, for it no longer means " right thought," but the edict of an overbearing and dogmatic and narrow self-conceit. The ortho- doxy of to-day may be the heterodoxy of to-morrow. Thinking which is right on the plane of the discoveries of to-day may be most wrong on the plane of the discoveries of to-morrow. A wise man holds on to all valuable truth bequeathed' him by the ages, and seeks to gather something new to add thereto for the benefit of those who shall succeed him. Research into the laws of the whole expanse of the kingdom of the heavens is as much taught as research into that small section we call the animal kingdort), the vegetable kingdom, or the mineral kingdom. Xew things are useful ; and so are old things. CHAPTER YIII. A CUAPTER OF ilTRACLES. About this time occurred one of those seasons of excitement ir, which the populace showed a disposition to make Jesus king, and hasten his revehition of his Messianic powers, ^att viu -Markiv.: These popular paroxysms were always so man- Luke viii., ix. jesua aged by Jesus that they should create no outbreak, ^^ *^° ^° ^^^' Rud thus comiect his name and mission with the ephemeral poli- tics of his nation. No man can be a great moral teacher and a politician. Politics are for a da}^ ; morality for eternity. It seems utterly impracticable to make a-ny satisfactory conjecture as to the political opinions of Jesus, whether he was Ilerodian or anti-Ilerodian, He would have absolutely nothing to do wi'th these questions. So, when another burst of excitement came, he directed his disciples to accompany him to the other side of the lake.* A certain scribe, an official expounder of the moral law, came to him and said, " Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go," He may have amplitied this short speech into a '^ , , . , . A political follower, statement of his views of the position and pi'os- pects of Jesus, or there may have been something in his mannei which showed that he had ulterior designs, or else Jesus read his character at a glance. The reply shows that the Teacher under- stood precisely tlie spirit in which the statement was made by this new disciple. " The foxes have lairs, and the birds of the heaven have places of shelter ; but the Son of Man hath not where he may lay his head." It is supposed that Jesus adopted the name The Son of Man with reference to the prophetic vision of Daniel (vii. 13), and because all other titles of the Messiah had been perverted to fos- *Into Perea. The eastern side of the lake of Gennesaret and of the river Jordan was called "beyond." Hence its Greek name "Perea," which means "beyond." 862 SECOND AND THIRD PASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. ter the worldlj expectations of the Jewish people, and because it comported at once with the humility of his position and the dig- nity of his character. The scribe was willing to endure for a few days, or even a few months, the roving life which Jesus had adopted, expecting that the great Leader would soon ascend the throne of David, and then those who had shared his poverty w^ould share his glorious fortunes, lie was as cunning as a fox, and doubtless felicitated himself on his sharpness of calculation and superior skill in reading the signs of the times. The reply of Jesus is graphic and touching, and perhaps by its figures had reference to the cunning and the " fugitive character " of the scribe's enthusiasm. He did not mean to Jesus discourages him. ic^ r nr t ^ i • say strictly that the Son oi Man had no sleepmg- place, for he had at this very time some friends who devoted themselves to looking after his pei-sonal comfort, and, so far as we know, he was never without a night's lodging, except when he voluntarily set apart a night to devotional vigils. He simply meant that he had no fixed place of residence, a comfort enjoyed by even the lower ordei* of animals. It was a solemn warning to the scribe, that if he joined his fortunes to those of Jesus he would become a homeless wanderer, as the Son of Man had given himself to a life of perpetual voluntary poverty. Whether the scribe became a "disciple," in the stricter sense, we have no means of knowins;. Lange suffffests that this was Judas Iscariot. But it is a mere hypothesis, suggested by the characteristics of Judas displayed by this scribe. Another of the f ollowei's of Jesus, called quite generally " dis- ciples," said to him, " Sir, permit me first to go and bury my father." Jesus rei^lied, " Follow me, and leave A hard saying. ' the dead to bury their own dead : but go thou and preach the kingdom of God." It is not said who this person was. A church tradition, which can be traced to Clement of Alexan- dria, in the third century, says it was Philip, which cannot be cor- rect, as he had already been called. Lange suggests Thomas, but this is only conjectural. It is not important. But the lesson of Jesus is. What did he mean ? The request of the follower seems natural, and even dutiful. The Jews buried their dead.* Great etress was laid on this. The interment was conducted with mi- * The Greeks burned the corpses of I Pliny (vii. 55 ) say that burial was the their friends. Cicero {Legg. , ii. 22) and I ancient mode of disposing of the dead. A CHAPTER OF MIRACLES. 363 nuteness of ceremonial. It was considered one of the most sacred duties of a son to "bury bis parents when they deceased.* The disciple in this case seemed to desire to follow Jesus. lie did not make an excuse that he might go seeking his own pleasure or liis own gain. It was to perform what all his nation regarded as a son's imperative duty. Celsus, early in the third century, brought the reply of Jesus as objection to him, because he demanded what was opposed to duty to parents. This saying of Jesus does present grave difficulties. "We must interpret the word " dead " in both places in the sentence as mean- ing the same or difPerent thino-s. If the same, 1 1 • • o mi 1 • • 11 Its difficulty. tlien what is its Ihe plain sense is usually ac- cepted, namely, naturally dead. But this seems nnintelligible, because corpses cannot inter corpses. If difPerent, then we may attach to the former the sense of spiritually dead — those described by Paul as dead in trespasses and in sins — and to the latter the natural meaning ; and then the passage would signify, " Let the work of interment be committed to sinners." But that is a most harsh interj^retation, and not consistent with the temper of Jesus and the general spirit of his teachings. If the whole expression be taken as hyperbolical and paradoxi- cal, it will give ns this sense : Jesus thus teaches in the most strik- ing and impressive manner the lesson that the interests of the kingdom of the heavens, which he was preaching, are paramount, so that if there seem to be even a natural duty, the performance of which will di-aw a disciple of the Messiah from obeying some express command of his, then that apparent duty, even if it be that of burying a parent, is in reality not a duty. Let the dead go unburied rather than Jesus be dis- obeyed. It certainly is a claim on the part of Jesns to supremacy over the hearts and lives of his disciples. It is a claim to be more than teacher. It is a peremptory demand for the total surrender of the whole man to Jesus and the interests of his kingdom. It is the voice of a spiritual autocrat. Jesus must have felt that he had a right to all this, or he must have been conscious that he was l)uttiiig forward a claim which he had no right to make. His consci(.)usness at the moment this speech was made was either that Df the Supreme Spiritual Ruler of the world or that of the most * Honorable mention is made of those I Gen. xxv. 9 ; xxxv. 29, etc. ; Tobit iv. who discharged this filial duty. See I 3. 364 SECOND AND THIED PASSOVEE IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. daring impostor. But lie speaks unwaveringly, and died witli tliij claim upon his lips, having never for a moment abated a jot there- of. There never was a teacher or leader, before the time of Jesus or after, who went so far as this. lie stands alone in this claim. In immediate connection with this circumstance there occurred a similar occasion for a similar lesson. Another of his mere fol- lowers said, " Lord, I will follow thee, but let me Another lesson. i . i p ^^ ^ • i i? -r> go to bid lareweil to those in my house. JJut Jesus said to him, " No man putting his hand to the plough, and looking at the things behind, is rightly disposed for the kingdom of God." Here again is brought out the paramoimt importance of the kingdom of the heavens. The mind must have no inde- cision. A man who wavers so is as unfit for the great work of teachino; the doctrine of the universal kiiii^dom as one is iiniit for agriculture who holds the handle of a plough and gazes back at the furrow. Upon dismissing the multitude who had waited upon his min- istry, Jesus went down to the shore of the lake and entered into a ship with his disciples. Accompanied by other storm on the lake. -, ■,, i , ^ ,- , i and smaller vessels, they started for the other Bide. Worn with the fatigue of teaching, Jesus fell asleep on a pillow in the hinder part of the ship. It was probably evening. There fell upon the lake one of those storms to which the pecu- liar position of the Sea of Galilee exposes it. Thompson (ii. 32) was for several days in one of those storms, which he thus do- scribes : — " To understand the causes of these sudden and violent tempests, we must remember that the lake lies low, six hundred feet lower than the ocean ; that the vast and naked plateaus of the Jordan rise to a great height, spreading backward to the wilds of the Hauran and upward to snowy Hernion ; tliat the water-courses have cut out profound ravines and wild gorges, converging to the head of the lake, and that tliese act like gigantic funnels to draw d()-\\ai the cold winds from the mountains. And, moreover, these winds are not only violent, but they come down suddenly, and often when the sky is perfectly clear. I once went in to swim near the liot-baths, and before I was aware a wind came rushhig over the cliffs witli such force that it was with great diffi- culty I could regain the shore." Of another storm, when on the eastern side, he says : — "The sun had scarcely set when the wind began to rush down toward the lake, and it continued all night long mth constantly increasing violence, so A CnAPTER OF MIRACXES. 365 that •when we reached the shore next morning the face of the lake was like a huge boiling caldron." ..." We had to doul)lc-i)in all tlie tent-ropes, and frequently were obliged to hang with our whole weight upon tlieni to keep the quivering tabernacle from being carried off bodily in the air." It was such a storm as this that was rocking the sliip which held Jesus and the Apostles. The Teacher was in the quiet of slumber. The disciples perceived their cjreat . -^, ... Jesus stills the storm. jeopardy, ihey ran to him in terror, some cry- ing, "Master, Master, we are perishing!" while others cried, " Master, carest thou not that we perish ? " Their solicitude did not seem to be wholly selfish. Undoubtedly some of them in- cluded Jesus in that " we," as the most precious of all existences. It must have agitated them greatly to see a person who had ex- hibited such power and wisdom now lying in utmost carelessness asleep amid such imminent peril. Jesus arose and spoke unto the wild Avhirl and storm-fury, and said to the winds and the raging of the sea, " Peace ! be still ! " and the wind ceased at once and there was a great calm. The stars shone in the quiet sky above the quiet lake. And he quietly said to the men in the ship, " Why are ye so fearful ? AVhere is your faith ? " The simple exercise of such prodigious power over the forces of nature when in stormy motion, produced in their minds a sudden sentiment of awe. They were surprised and amazed, and filled with exceeding fear, and said to one another, " Who is this, that even the winds and the sea obey him ? " It was morning when Jesus and his disciples readied the south- eastern margin of the lake, in a region into which it was the intent of Jesus to carry his beneficent ministry, south-eastern shore This landino; was signalized by a very remarkable °^ ^^° '"''® oennesa- , 11 -1 J- 1 • 1 1 • . . *■'=*' ""•■''' Gadara. miracle, the details 01 which make it interesting Matt, viii., ix. ; Mark to fix the locality, if possible. A difiiculty meets ''•' ^'^'^'''^ us in the names employed by the historians. Matthew calls it the country of the Gasaroies, Mark of the Gerasenes, and Luke of the Gergesenes.^ Three places are mentioned in the ancient writers, Gadara, Gerasa, and Gergesa. The first was ten miles inland, and the approach to it was by a toilsome way, which would require several hours to make it on foot. It is represented by Josephus as the capital of Perea, and by Polybius as a very * The reading of Codex Sinaiticus is followed, and not the common English version. 366 SECOND AND THIRD PASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. strongly fortified cit}^ The ruins to this day give evidence of great former magnificence. This can hardly be accepted as the place where the miracle was performed, as we find among its cir- cumstances the fact that a herd of swine ran down a steep place into the sea. In order to do so from Gadara, they must have run down a mountain in the neighborhood of the town, have forded a stream quite as formidable as the Jordan, and then crossed a plain of several miles before reaching the sea. For similar rea- sons we must reject Gerasa, a city also mentioned by Josephus as situated among the mountains of Gilead, twenty miles east of the Jordan. The highest probability is in favor of a spot suggested by Dr. Thomson.* On the eastern shore of the lake he has found ' a pile of ruins still called by the natives Gersa, very nearly pro nounced Gergesa, the name in Luke, and that which Origen gi\es as the supposed site of the miracle. Thomson represents that an " immense mountain " stands above these ruins ; so high and so declivitous that a herd of swine rushing frantically down would be carried by the momentum of the descent over the narrow ledgo of beach into the sea. Mr. Tristam (in his Land of Israel) in- * Land and Book, vol. ii. 35. A CHAPTER OF MIRACLES. 367 The demoniac dorses tliis -view of the question. It is to be noticed that the his- torians do not mention any particular town, .but call the site of the miracle " the country of the " Gadarenes or Gergesenes, so that whatever town be selected, the miracle must have occurred near the sea, and somewhere near the site of the ancient city of the Girgashites. All that region abounds in rock excavated for purpores of sepulture, and to this day a whole community in that region make their dwellings in the tombs. The testim(iny of Origen, the ancient traditions, and the opinion of so well-informed a traveller as Thomson, concur to fix the place at the site of the ancient Gergesa. It was at this spot, then, that Jesus landed early in the morning which followed the night in w^hich he had calmed the storm on the lake. Here a sight met him more appalling than a tempest on a lake — the fury of a man lashed by the tortures of insanity. Mark and Luke speak of one demoniac, while Matthew mentions two. It is probable that there were two, but one was so much fiercer than the other, and his cure so much more striking, and his after-life so much better known to these historians, that they speak of him alone in a special man- ner.* He exhibited all the most shocking phases of that terrible phj^sical, intellectual, and spiritual insanity which manifested itself so frightf ull}^ in the days of Jesus. He was so ungovern- ably frantic that he had abandoned the abodes of men and made his dwelling among the dead. He tore his clothes from his per- son. He was a terror to travellers, so that men might not pass by that way. He had acquired that wonderful strength which some- times seems to come to maniacs. Men could not keep him bound. Often they had chained him, but he burst the bonds asunder. Night and day this unhappy man, with fierce cries that made the rocks and seashore ring wath the expression of his agony, roved through the wilderness or rushed along the beach of the lake. On this eventful morning he saw Jesus from afar. Whatever * Robinson, in his Harmony, proposes the following illustration : "In the year ■ 1824 Lafayette ^dsited the United States and was everj'where welcomed with honors and pageants. Historians will describe these a» a noble incident in his life. Other writers will relate the same visit as made, and the same honors as en- joyed by two persons, namely, Lafayette and his son. Will there be any contra- diction between these two classes of writers ? Will not both record tho truth?" See jKm, 195. 368 SECOND AND THIRD TASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. may have been the cause, there was somethiiio; in the appearance of Jesus that arrested him. He paused. He gazed. lie ap- proached, lie fell at the feet of Jesus. He cried, His appeal to Jesus. '■ _ ^ r /^ i " vVliat to thee and me, J esus, bon or (rod most high ? " Here is an exhibition of that flux and reflux of passion frequently noticed in maniacs. He was alternately attracted and repelled bj^ the spiritual magnetism of the pure Jesus. Jesus connnanded the unclean spirit to leave the unhappy man, who then cried out, " Comest thou here to torment us before the time ? " As if to steady the man's mind for a moment, and re- call him to a sense of his personality and identity, Jesus asked him his name. Still believing himself to be in possession of the departed spirits of wicked men, and recollecting how his whole intellectual and moral constitution had been laid waste, as when troops dismantle a town, and probably recalling the appearance of a battalion of Roman soldiers, the wretched sufferer said, with the confusion of ideas so natural to his condition, " My name is Legion, for we are many." And he besought Jesus that he would not send them away into " the abyss," whatever that might mean. On the adjoining mountain \vas a herd of about two tliousand hoga feeding:. The demons besoueople all the truth — for Her faith confiiined. what cause she had touched him, and how she had been immediately healed. This was all that Jesus desired. He had tenderly abstained from extracting this confession until the poor woman was healed. She might not have been able to make it in advance. Now, although a trial, she was able to endure it. Jesus said : " Daughter, your faith hath saved you. Go in peace, and be well of yonr plague." He caused her and those who were about him to know that no miracle of good would ever be wrought for men who did not trust his beneticence ; and that in every case there must be desire and faith on the part of the subject, and volition upon the part of Jesus, to make the happy operation complete. This single incident lifts Jesus forever out of the mass of tricksters and magicians. AVhile he was engaged in this work of mercy, messengers ar- rived from the house of Jairus informing him that his daughter Death of jairus's was ccrtaiidy dead. He had accompanied Jesus daughter. uucouiplainingly, but doubtlessly extremely rest- lessly, and now it appeared that the delay had blasted his hopes. He seems scarcely to have trusted that Jesus could raise her from the dead, while he believed that there was such power in him A CHAPTER OF MIRACLES. 373 that he could pluck her back from death even when she was almost in the last gasp. The messenger who announced the fatal news added: " Why troublcst thou the Teacher further?" as though Jesus could now be of no avail. But his quick car cauglit the word, and before Jairus could sink away into dc.ul>t>- Jesus said to him: "Be not afraid ; only believe ; and she shalJ be saved." Jesus by this Avord seemed to pledge himself to save her, even if she were really dead. And so he proceeded towards the house of Jairus. And when he arrived he found that they had already brought in the profes- sional mourners, who, after the vicious fashion jesus brings her bac. of the JcAvs, were making loud lamentations, *°^«- howling dirges amid the din of musical instruments, and beating themselves in token of grief. Jesus said to them : "' Give place*^ why make ye this ado? The child is not dead, but is sleeping." They took these words in their literal sense, and laughed Je'^us to scorn. They hiew that she was dead. She was, undoubtedly.* But Jesus taught the resurrection of the dead. On another occa- sion he called himself "The Eesurrection." Since he has taught the world, those who believe his teachings do not sorrow for the dead as those who have no hope. Death is not destruction, nor annihilation— it is sleep. Sleep implies waking. So to the thought of Jesus, and of all who believe in his teaching, sleep is the most appropriate possible representation of death. AYhen men die we see them fall asleep. We do not see them awake. But Jesus, this wise Teacher, assures us that they do, and here he exerted his power to give men a \-isible and tangible example of * The attempt to put away all mira- cle out of this transaction, by taking the words of Jesus literally, " She is not dead, but sleeping-," cannot succeed. For suppose we grant that this was a mere case of syit.coj)e, and that the girl was still alive, there will yet remain these miraculous facts : 1. That before Jesus reached the house or saw the girl, he knew that she was not totally dead, although he had not seen her, and her father had represented her as dying, if not dead, and messengers direct from the house had proclaimed her dead; »nd, 2. When, having not hurried, but stopped to cure the woman with the hemorrhage, he reached the house, the mourners and assembled friends still saying she was dead, and laughing to scorn his literal or figurative saying, " She is not dead, but sleeping," he i)ro- ceeded to her chamber, accompanied by her parents and three other persons, and by two words and a single touch he brought her imtantlj/ to her feet, and to perfect health, after all the effoits which the skill of the ph^'sicians could devise had utterly failed. We must put the whole of Jesus out of history oi accept the mirac^ous. 374 SECOND AND THIRD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. this great awakening. He entered the chamber of the dead, ac- companied by the father and mother, and bj the tln-ee disciples, Peter, and James, and Jolm, whom now for the first time we see elected from among the elect friends of Jesus, that they might be special witnesses of his greatest and most sacred doings. He approached the bed, took the girl by the hand, and said to her in the Aramaic tongue, " Talitha-cumi," which is simply, "Maiden, arise." It was no magical formula, no incantation, but a simple authoritative command. Her spirit came to her, and she arose straightway. In the confusion of the rapid and great transitions through which she had been passing, the girl walked about the room. The astonishment of the parents was so great that tliey forgot the necessities of the child ; but the ever calm Jesus simply told them to give her something to eat. She was necessarily weak. She was no ghost, although if a ghost had come it could scarcely have produced a different effect upon the spectators. So self-sus- tained was Jesus that these wonderful displays of his power seemed to him as the ordinary work of his hands. "VYliat man ever did such things and made no ado, exhibited no sense of his importance, took no pains to give the transaction all possible eclat ? Jesus told them not to spread it. But they did. The fame of this miracle went abroad into all that land. As Jesus went from the house of Jairus, occasion presented itself for the performance of other strikingly wonderful works. On the road two blind men followed him, and Matt. ii. , , . ' solicited the exercise of his gi-eat healing power In the history of Jesus he is often confronted with bhndness. We shall not wonder at this when we recollect how common that disease is in the East. In Cairo alone it has been estimated that there are four thousand blind persons, and one traveller supposes that one in every five is partially or totally blind. This arises from the bi-ightness of the sun, the intense reflection of the light, the dust so impalpable or so constantly abroad in the air, and the custom of sleeping in the open air at night, exposing the eyes to noxious dews which produce iniiammations that are usually neg- lected until they end in incurable blindness. Two such patients, perhaps by the way -side begging, learning that Jesus was passing, followed him, led by the crowd, it may be, and cried after him, " O Son of David, have pity on us." " Son A CHATTER OF MIRACLES. 374 of David:" this was the recognized title of the Messiah. To accept it was to claim Messiahship. The blind men continued to repeat it. Jesus apparently paid no attention two bUnd men r«- to it or to them, but passed on and entered his '^''"''^^ lodgings. The blind men somehow found their way to his pres- ence. Jesus said to them, "Do you believe that I am able to do this for you ? " They answered, " Yes, Lord." Then he touched their eyes and said, "According to your faith be it unto you." Their sight was instantly restored. Then Jesus, who made this response to their faith, charged them sternly— he really seems to have threatened them— that they should not make proclamation of their belief in his Messiahship. He could not have charged tliem to conceal tlieir restoration to sight. There could be no reason why this should not be known. But there was a good and sufficient reason for restraining the public announcement of his claim to the Messiahship. The people were already begin- ning to believe it. They were in a state of intense excitement, and being always ready for a revolt against the Roman government, and their enthusiasm for Jesus growing at each display of his power and wisdom and goodness, a single word of incitement would have been, like a spark to a keg of gunpowder, the occasion of a terrific explosion. With extraordinary wisdom Jesus saw that his time had not yet arrived. Nevertheless, the blind men, in the exuberance of their grati- tude, proclaimed that the Messiah had healed them. The prac- tical effect of this disobedience, which can only be charitably excused on the ground of their uncontrollable delight at their recovery, had no good effect on the minds of the enemies of Jesus. Those men had scarcely left the house when the people brought to Jesus another of those bewildering cases of fearful disease, a demoniac. The patient in this case was one jcsus cures a dumb whose psychical disorder had the physical exhi- demoniac, bition of dumbness. His diseased soul locked up his tongue. His insanity took on the form of speechlessness, through pro- foundest melancholy or most obdurate stubbornness. As soon as the evil of his soul was cured his speech returned. The multi- tude marvelled still more, and said, " It was never so seen in Israel," or, as it may be translated, " He has never been so seen in Israel." Either rendering makes the speech of the populace an ascription to Jesus of glory greater than that of any of the 376 SECOND AND THIKD TASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF ?ESUS. prophets. It lifted liim above Moses and Elijah. It declared him to be, in their opinion, the most splendid display of God's glorious goodness and power ever made to Jeho\ah's chosen peo- l^le. It was the most magnificent compliment which people living under a theocracy could pay to any man. Of course the tendency of this w^as to inflame the Pharisaic j)arty against him. They made the old objection, " He casteth r.1, A fi, K • out demons by the ruler of the demons." It is Charged with being >/ a confederate of the HOW no lougcr a wliispcr, slyl}'^ circulated, but an open accusation, made to bi'cak his influence over the popular mind. Infernal passions manifestly swayed these Pharisees, so that naturally it 'was not difhcult i'or them to believe that any one so strong as Jesus had his strengtli from bad spirits. There has always been in human nature an unfortunate pro- pensity to imagine the chief evil spii-it of the universe to be mightier than he is. Men are prone to deify the devil. Even many Christians have to pause and think before they disabuse their minds of the pi-ejudice that Satan is just less than Almighty God. Creative power is often assigned him, and the power of inspiring great thoughts and stimulating human genius. When printing was invented, the honor was assigned to " the devil and Dr. Faustus." It is a po])ular opinion in parts of Germany to this day, that tlie famous cathedral of Cologne owes its magnifi- cence to the co-operation of the devil : it is too splendid a struc- ture to have been erected without his aid ! On the road over the St. Gothard Pass, in Switzerland, is a wonderful bridge across the river Reuss, joining the wild scenery of two mountains by a span of seventy-five feet. Of course it is the " Devil's Bridge ! " The Pharisees would have gladly obtained power from the ruler of the demons if they had only known how: it was quite eas}', then, for them to fancy that Jesus had discovered the secret. That the Father of Men should confer so beneficent a power upon any of his sons was an idea too broad for the narrow minds of the Pharisees. And so they persecuted Jesus, not because of the sin of being in league with the devil, but out of sheer envy that he had made better terms with Satan than they and their children had been able to do. In Matthew xii. 27, does not Jesus intimate as much ? Jesus now withdrew himself and went with his disciples to his own country. This avoidance of the spite of liis enemies seems to A CnATTEB OF MIRACLES. 377 evince only a prndential regard to the success of his work, and ill no way to indicate cowardice, as lie was always ready to meet them in argument ; and when he shifted tlie range of his operations, he never for a day ceased to ^^^^^ ' '^ '^"'" nrgc forward his work. lie was not yet read}' to give himself np. His disciples Avere not yet ready to be left. Jesus was no wild fanatic, no fnrious enthusiast rushing on fate. He had the great faculty of being able to wait : but he was a ceaseless worker. He foresaw his time coming. He would not hurry it. It was coming fast enough. Once more he entered Nazareth, a town to be made immortal by being attached to his name. On the Sabbath he entered the synagogue and began to teach. He taught astonishingly. His knowledge, his goodness, his power, and, perhaps above all, his authority came out in his speech. The Nazarenes could not com- prehend it. It seemed to them only a few months, and it had not been long since he had lived in their midst among their humblest fellow-citizens. They knew the dwelling of Mary. They knew her other children. None of Mary's other children made any pre- tension to either special sanctity or special authority. Nay, they did not believe in the pretensions of their brother Jesus. He had failed to inspire them with confidence. He came to them with a crowd at his back, and bringing home a reputation as a prophet the like of which had not been known in their day. He had per- formed mira(tles, had even raised the dead, not far from Nazareth. But it seemed like yesterday since they had seen him in his shop with the implements of the mechanic, making or mending plain furniture, or had seen him carrying his tools to neighboring houses to do repairs. There was nothing specially attractive in his ap- pearance. When he sat in the synagogue no halo hung ovpr his brow. But now this plain man came back and assumed great authority, and really did teach in a style surpassing anything they had ever heard before. And so they talked among themselves and said, "Whence hallj this one this wisdom and mighty powei-s ? Is he not a carpenter 'i Is he not a carpenter's son ? Is not his mother the woman called Mary ? Is he not the brother^^^.^'^^"^''^'^'*'*^ ^^ ''* of James and Joses, and Judas and Simon ? Are not his sisters all here with us? Whence hath this man all these things?" They showed him no violent opposition, but merely 378 SECOND AND THIRD PASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. regarded him with contempt. His return for this treatment wat* the simple announcement of a well-known fact in human nature: " A prophet is not without honor except in his own country, and among his own kin, and in liis own house." lie did nothing note- worthy in Nazareth, except tliat he laid his healing hands on a few sick people. He left Nazareth, marvelling at the unbelief of its inhabitants. MAP or CEXTBAi, AND aOUIH GALILEE. CnAPTER IX. THE THIRD TOUK OF GAilLEE, AND KETUKN TO CAPEKNAUM. Fkom Nazareth Jesus entered upon his tliird circnit in Galilee, the extent of which tour cannot he defined. Matthew says that he " went about all the cities and villages." Mark, that "he went round about the villages." All i" caiiiee. Matt. u., o X., XI.; Mark VI., iz.« concur that lie was teaching and preaching his Luke is., x. peculiar doctrines, and displaying his great power of healing. The multitudes continued to throng him. They had had the formal instruction of tbe Established Church, but the mass of the people wore destitute of moral and religious culture. They appeared to the eye of Jesus as sheep that had no shepherd, torn to pieces by hierarchic wolves. And yet the people seemed desirous of spiritual training. At sight of this Jesus said to his disciples, " The harvest indeed is great, but the laborers are few: pray therefore the Lord of the harvest that he will send forth laborers into his harvest." It was the suggestion of the mission- ary idea and the kindling of the missionary spirit. It was a hint as to what his intentions were for immediate missionary opera- tion. In pm-suance of this design he called his twelve chosen disci- ples together, and commissioned and instructed them for this new institution of propagandism. He intended to disseminate his doctrines more rapidly and ^^^^'>^'^ ^°^^ more widely. These men had been with him long enough to be weaned from other pursuits, to be attached to his person and his plans, and to have acquired such facility in co- operation that they could work together. Jesus instituted seven itinerant centres of influence. Not stopping in his own work, he sent the twelve in pairs. Their work may be better gathered from their commission in the words of Jesus than from any para- phrase. He addressed them thus : — 3S0 SECOND AND THIRD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. " Go not into the "svay of the Gentiles, and enter not into a city of the Samaritans. But go ratlier to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And going, preach, saying. The kingdom of the heavens ia at hand. Ileal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lep- ers, cast out demons : freely ye have received, freely give. Provide neither gold, nor silver, nor copper in your girdles, nor a wallet for your journey, noi two coats, nor shoes, nor a staff. And into whatever city or village ye may enter, inquire who in it is worthy, and tliere abide tiU. ye depart: go not from house i*to house : and into whatsoever city ye enter, and they receive you, eat such tilings as are set before you ; for the laborer is worthy of his food. But as ye enter into the house, salute it, saying, 'Peace be to tliis house.' And if indeed the house be worthy, your peace shall come upon it : but if it be not worthy, your peace shall return to you. And whoever will not receive you, nor hear your words, on going out of that house, or city, or village, shake off the dust from your feet for a testimony against them : notwithstanding, be ye sure of this, that the kingdom of God is come nigh unto them. Verily I say to you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and the land of Gomorrah, in the day of judgment, than for that city. "Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves. Begin ye therefore to become wise as the serpent, and simple as the doves. But beware of men : for tli^y will deliver yoi; up to councils, and will scourge you in the synagogues : and ye shall be broug'nt before governors and kings for my sake, for a testimony to them and to the Gentiles. And wlien they deliver you up, be not over-anxious how or what ye sliall speak : for it shall Ije given to you in that hour what ye shall speak. For ye are not the speakers, but the Spirit of your Father sp'jaking in you. And a brother shall deliver up a brother to death, and a father a child ; and cliildren shall rise up against parents, and shall put them to death. And ye sliall be hated by all on account of my name ; but the one liaving endured to the end shall be saved. But when they persecute you in this city, flee into another: for verily I say to you. Ye shall not finish the cities of Israel until the Son of Man come. "A disciple is not above his teacher, nor the servant above his lord. SuflS- cient for the disciple that he be as his teacher, and the servant as his lord. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how much more those of the household ? Fear them not, therefore, for there is nothing covered that shall not be revealed, and hidden that shall not be kuo^vn. What I say to you in the darkness, speak in the light : and what ye hear in the ear, preach upon the housetops. And fear not those who kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul : but rather fear the one able to destroy both soul and body in Gehen- na. Are not two sparrows sold for an assarion ? * and not one of them shall * This indicates a coin of small value, perhaps more than an American cent and less than an English penny. Here is a picture of a bronze specimen of this coin. On one side is an anchor, and the Greek MITE OP HEKOD. Icttcrs fox IleTocl Bttcl (Herod King), and on the obverse two cornucopiiB and a pomegranate. THE THIRD TOUR OF GALILEE. 3S1 fall on the ground without your Father. But even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear ye not then ; ye are of more value than many sparrows. Eveiy one, therefore, who will confess me l^efore men, I also ^\^ll confess hira before my Father in heaven. " Think not that I came to cast peace on the earth : I came not to cast peace, but a sword. For I came to set a man against his f atlier, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And the enemies of a man are those of his own household. He who loveth fatlier or mother above me, is not worthy of me : and he wlio loveth son or daughter above me, is not worthy of me. And he who taketli not his cross, and fol- loweth after me, is not worthy of me. He who lindetli his life shall lose it : and he who loseth his life for my sake shall find it. He who rccciveth you rcceiveth me, and he who receiveth me receiveth him who sent me. He who receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet, shall receive the reward of a prophet; and he who receiveth a righteous man in tlie name of a righteous man, shall receive the reward of a righteous man. And whoever may give to diink to one of these little ones only a cup of cold water in the name of a dL. They were to cure and cleanse men spiritually, and in confirmation of their mission cure and cleanse them physically. The religion of Jesus is not a tem- ple religion. It does not consist in periodical visits to the altar- spot, ceremonial offering of specified sacrifices, nor anything else churchly and ritual. It was to be the religion for the home. It was to draw all men near to the Father of all men. It was to make the earthly home a type of the heavenly, a terrestrial school of preparation for the celestial "life to come." It was to be a religion of principle. Some families would receive them, others would reject. They are told how to conduct themselves in either event. But he warns them that it is not to be always easy work. They were not always to be immediate and radiant victors. The oppo- , . sition they should meet would be powerful and for- midable. The Jews would oppose them. Some- times, instead of carrying captive the congregation in the syna- gogue, the poor Apostle would be enduring a scourging. The Gentile governors and kings would set them at naught. What seemed so true to them would seem so false to others; what seemed THE TITLED TOUR OF GALILEE. 383 BO beautiful to tliem would be so ugly and hateful to others. They should be called to answer suddenly at the highest pagan tribunals. But they were not to be anxious. The right word would come at the right hour. They are to keep themselves in the love of the truth and be not specially careful for their oratory. He particular!}^ tears away all self-conceit from them by sa\ing " Ye are not the speakers, but the Spirit of your Father." This lifts them above all selfish anxiety. It is not their work, but another's. If they be persecuted in one city they must flee to another. They have no further work in the one, artd they have something to do in another. Providence sometimes leads and sometimes drives. But he gives them this consolation — that they shall not have finished visiting the cities of Israel " vmtil the Son of Man come." It is not quite easy to determine satisfactorily •■■ •' "^ A consolation. what this phrase means. It may mean that he should join them in person before long, and thus be present to aid and direct them. To this it is to be objected that the portion of tlws solemn charge which begins with " Behold, I send you forth as sheep," really seems not to have had application to them in their temporary missionary excursions, but to their much longer apostolic career after the death of Jesus. Certainly the events which he foretold did not take place until then. The interpreta- tion suggested by Stier is that it applies to the apostolic labors in Judaia, which were to be closed by the coming of the Son of Man in the destruction of Jerusalem, and, by extension, that it applies to the operations of his messengers in the towns of the spiritual Israel. But all this seems mystical. These men were going on a practical mission, which Jesus tells them was so full of peril that their lives should be in constant jeopardy. It was no time to talk romantic theology to them, Jesus meant something practical which they could understand. Just what it was I do not know, but its general significance seems to be that, no matter how industriously they worked, and however rapid their move- ments, they could not visit all the towns before their mission should be accomplished. And this was probably the sense, whether their temporary tour be considered or their tra\el3 and laboi-s after the death of their Teacher. He still further confirms and strengthens them by reminding them of his own case. Thev rcadilv acknowledged him as theii 384 SECOND AND THIKD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. Master and Lord ; but he had all kinds of opprobrium heaped upon him. He had not had a serene and brilliant public life His was not the work of o-radually winnino- men Hi3 own case. . •(■•ii •! to the truth ; it was a terrmc battle with error and evil. The disciple is not above his master, the servant is nol above his lord. They were to push the battle forward. He had spoken to them privately; they were to declare his doctrines openly. What they had heard in the closet they must proclaim upon the house-top. But there was to be no timidity and pusil- lanimity. A special providence would be vouchsafed them. To sparrows, one of which is worth scarcely a penny, God's guar- dianship extends, so that one of them does not fall without his notice. The arrow of the archer cannot reach him unless God so wills. That same heavenly Father counts every hair of every head. How much more precious is tlie head than the hair, the man than the sparrow! And a man set to the promulgation of great truths, how precious is he ! He shall not l)e destroyed care- lessly. On the other hand, he warns tliem by tlieir fear of God as well as by their coniidtMice in his love. The pei-secutor lives his day; the martyr lias eternity. Men may destroy the body. They reach their limit there. God can destroy both soul and body in eternity. He seems to teach that the linal punishment of the incorrigibly wicked shall be the final destruction of both soul and body. He gives his Apostles to understand that the propagation of his gospel would be a process of discrimination, and an occasion, not The gospel to be a ^ causc, of widc-sprcad and bitter antagonisms, discrimination. jjg amiounces liis iuteiition of claiming and striv- ing to win the best love of every man. Every earthly affection in the disciple is to become subordinate to his devotion to his Master. Father, mother, son, daughtei-, — every other relationship and love must sit down at his feet. He intends to make himself king by obtaining monarchic sway over the hearts of men. Life itself is to be laid on the altar of this love. If a man shrink from the service of Jesus in order to preserve his life, he Mill surely lose it. He who yields himself, in the wise abandonment of a reasonable devotion, to Jesus, shall find all the good and sweet there is in life. Jesus will know, remember, and reward every least act of help to his kingdom or to those who are engaged in upbuilding it — even to the giving of a cup of cold water to a THE THIRD TOUR OF GALTLKF:. 385 disciple. lie intends to invest all his followers with a portion of his own dignity. Whosoever receives a minister of the gospel is to be regarded as one who has received Jesus into his liouse, as Jesus is to be king of hearts ! It must have been appalling to the Apostles wdien Jesus spoke of " taking up the cross " and following him. lie had not been crncified ; there was no prospect that he would , 111- 1 . . . - A frightful figure. be : he had given them no intimation or any suspicion on his part that his career would have so disastrous a termination. But the cross as an instrument of ignominious tor- ture was well known to them ; and they most probably interpreted this phrase figurativel}'', as it was intended, to mean great pain and shame to be brought upon them by becoming preachers of the gospel. The whole address is a great step forward. It commissions Apostles to open the way before him. His hour was coming. lie was advancing his claims. lie was prudently but unhesitatingly going forward on the line of his aission. He mio;ht have retreated hitherto ; now he must 2:0 for- ward to any fate that might lie in the path he had chosen. The disciples went on their way. Jesus continued to work. They were all engaged in preaching repentance as preparatory to the receiving of the Messiah. We are not now able to learn how large was the missionary circuit of the Apostles, but it is very ap- parent that it excited a great popular interest in the person and work of Jesus. At the instigation of Herodias, Herod had, as we have seen, seized and imprisoned John the Baptist, because the bold preacher had rebuked him for living in adultery w'itli Ile- j. , 1 • • 1. • 1 ii •£ r -^>^ •^• John the Baptist cx- rodias, who was his sister-in-law, the wire 01 rhihp. ecuted. Matt. xiv. 1- He may also liave feared lest the ffrowins: in- i^; Mark vi. 21-29; n " r T 1 1 1 -11 Luke ix. 7-9. iluence or J ohn upon the populace miglit become so great as to give him political power, if he chose to exert it. For entire safety he had confined the Baptist in the castle of Machserus. Herodias never forgave John his denunciation of this adulterous connection, but continued to plot against his life, and at last succeeded Herod's birthday arrived. He made a supper for his lords, high captains, and chief-estates. At a warm stacjc of the revel the daughter of Herodias entered and danced before the assembly, danced so seductively that Herod, in 25 386 SECOND AND THIRD PASSOVEE IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. Herod hears of Jesus. his liot admiration, promised to give her whatever she should awk, to the half of his kingdom. To convince her, he backed up this foolish promise by an oath. She conferred with her vindictive mother, who instructed her to demand the head of John the Bap- tist. To this demand Herod was extremely reluctant to comply. Nevertheless, as the historian says, "for his oath's sake, and for their sakes who sat at meat, he would not reject her." An execu- tioner went forthwith and bi'ought the horrible gift in a charger, which the hardened daughter carried to her callous, mother. John's disciples heard that he had been executed, and went and buried his headless corpse. It was at this juncture that the fame of Jesus readied the court of Herod. That potentate was superstitious as well as lustful and cruel. When he heard the marvellous things which Jesus was doing he was perplexed, and said to his friends that it was John risen from the dead. They endeavored to allay his terror by saying that it was Elias, or the spirit of some other of the older proi3liets reappearing in Jesus. But Herod's alarms were not so easily dissipated. He retained and affirmed the conviction that his victim had I'isen from the dead. He determined, if possible, to see Jesus, who was mani- festly becoming as important, in a political point of view, as Herod had supposed John to be.» "When Jesus heard that Herod had begun to manifest an interest in his movements, and saw that the people were reaching a pitch of excitement which might easily transport them into violence, he judged it best to withdraw himself from a position in which he was liable to have his great work interrupted by the arousing of a tyi*ant's terrors by popular demonstration in his behalf. In the mean time the disciples had returned and reported the results of their missionary tour. Perhaps the news of the death of John hastened their return.* Mark mentions another reason: the Apostles iiad returned from their tour, by the labors and circumstances of which they were excited, and they needed refreshment for coming conflicts. Jesus Ectum of the twelve. * It does not appear how long they Were absent on this preaching tour. Wieseler and Tiachendorf make it only a flay ; Ellicott, two days ; Greswell, that hey left in February and returned in March, one or two months ; and Krafft extends it to several months. We can hardly suppose that it was lees than several weeks. THE THIKD TOUR OF GALILEE. 387 withdrew them from their public ministry, and went with them into a desert place. If he had not done so, now that he was becoming so popular, and the people so much excited by his min- istry, and the slaughter of John having undoubtedly produced a very profound impression, it is probable that a sedition would have occurred, and Ilerod would have charged it to his ministry. And this sedition was all the more probable as the people did not recognize him as a divine person, but only as a very great prophet. There was every prudential reason for retiring, lie took a boat with his disciples and went over to a portion of uninhabited shore, probably near the town of Bethsaida, in Perea. He was not flying from Ilerod so much as from the people. But he could not be hid. The excited populace, seeing the movement and conjectur- ing the destination, ran around the head of the lake and reached the spot before the landing of Jesus, who, when he came out, saw that privacy was impracticable. lie looked on that great multi- tude, anxious and panting from the exertion they had made to gain the spot.* He had compassion upon them. Their spiritual pastors had abandoned them. They were as sheep without a shep- herd. The tender-hearted Jesus could not forbear. So, eoino; to an elevation, he sat down, and for hours gave them instruction in the things pertaining to the kingdom of God. And when the day was far spent his disciples reminded him that it was a desert place and that the people had long been with- out food, and urged him to send them away to find food and * The distance was from six to eight miles, and could be passed over as quickly by those who hastened on foot as by those who crossed the lake in a boat. Bethsaida probably lay on both Bides the Jordan, just where it entered into the lake. On the east is the level plain of Buthiah, in the shape of a tri- angle, made by the eastern mountains, the lake shore, and the river side. Dr. Thomson concludes, and I think shows, that the site of the feeding of the five thousand was in the south-eastern angle of this jjlain, where the hills come close to the shore. He says (vol. ii. p. 29), " From the four narratives of this stu- pendous miracle, we gather, 1st, That the place belonged to Bethsaida; 2d That it was a desert place ; 3d, That it was near the shore of the lake, for they came to it by boats ; 4th, That there was a mountain close at hand ; 5th, That it was a smooth grassy spot, capable of seating many thousand people. Now all these requisites are found in this exact locality, and nowhere else, so far as I can discover. This Butaiha be- longed to Bethsaida. At this extreme south-east comer of it the mountain shuts do\vn upon the lake, bleak and bar- ren. It was, doubtless, desert then as now, for it is not capable of cultivation. In this little cove the ships (boats) were anchored. On this beautiful sward, at the base of the rocky hiU, the people were seated." 388 SECOND AXD THIRD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESTIS. lodging in the surrounding country. To this he replied, " Tliey need not depart ; give ye them to eat." Previous to this, probably Mb-acuions feeding of earlj iu tlio aftcmoon, Jesus had questioned Philip five thousand. j^g ^q ]^q^ i\yQj ghould manage to feed so great a congregation of people. There may have been two reasons for ])utting this question to Philip, namely, that he was a man very slow of spiritual apprehension, and was a citizen of the neighbor- ing town of Bethsaida. John says that Jesus tlius questioned Philip to prove him, Philip's reply shows his spiritual obtuse- ness. Jesus was putting forth his claim to Messiahship more and more distinctly. But Philip could not discover it. lie replied, " Two hundred denarii wortli of loaves is not sufficient for them, that everyone should receive a little." This intimation of the impossibility of making so heavy a purchase shows the scantiness of the exchequer of tlie circle of Jesus. "Thirty dollars would not feed them ! and where have we tliat sum ? " Jesus seems to have left the perplexing question with Philip until late in the afternoon, when liis disciples suggested the difficulty to him, to which he replied as above, and added, "How many loaves have you ? " Andrew answered that they had found in the multitude a lad who had live bai-ley loaves and two small lislies. lie ordered them to be brought to him, and then commanded the multitude to be seated on the green grass, in plots or squares, so that there were alleys betM^een, and the whole slope looked like a garden whose parterres were filled with human beings. He thou locjked up to heaven and blessed and brake the loaves, and handed them to the disciples to set before the multitude. There were about five thou- sand men, beside women and children. The orderly arrangement secured anq)le opportunity to each to eat as much as he would, as long as the food lasted. They did all eat and were filled. AVlien they could eat no more Jesus directed the fragments to be gath- ered, that nothing be lost, and the disciples gathered twelve bas kets* full of the fragments and of the fishes that remained over after all had eaten. * This is the translation in the com- mon version, and is correct, that bemg the ordinary meaning of the word. But does it not mean that the twelve Apos- tles filled each his wallet with the frag- ments ? Whence did they have so many empty baskets f But the very word which is here translated "baskets" does mean "wallet," and was applied to the travelling-bag which every Jew carried. To this Juvenal alludes, using the veiy word employed in this passage, " Judjeis, quorum cophitivs faenumqua supellex." (iii. 14.) THE TniRD TOUR OF GALILEE. 389 How tliis was performed we have no means of knowing. The historians recite the facts and offer no theory. There was no 6upi)ly called forth from the mnltitude, and the ^ ^ "^ . ' No theory. disciples had none in reserve. The astonishment and enthusiasm of all parties show this. It could have been no feat of legerdemain. It has had no parallel, and no attempt has been made, so far as is known to us, to imitate it. It was no has- tening of the process of nature, for it was baked bread that was multiplied. If a handful of uninjured wheat had been made to grow in an hour into the bulk of a harvest, the process would have been measurably intelligible, and might have been described as an astoundingly rapid pushing forward of natural processes. But here were five baked loaves, and two small fishes already cooked. More than five thousand persons, after a long fast, ate of these and nothing else, ate to repletion, and then the fragments were hugely more than the original bulk. It was an astounding fact, a stu- pendous act, and was so regarded by those who were of that lai'ge party. AVhether the food grew in the hands of Jesus, or in the liands of the disciples, or in the hands or in the mouths of the eaters, there seems no possibility of knowing. The historians, who were eye-witnesses, do not adventure an oj)inion, Nor can we. It is a fact in the history' of Jesus, and as such we must simply record it and honestly study it. IIow this wonderful performance was regarded by the multi- tude is manifest from the fact that their false Messianic views were so highly excited thereby that they were Matt. xiv. ; Mark vi. ; ready to rise in rebellion against the Roman J^i^i^vi. power, and crown Jesus as their king, and insist that he should lead them forth to a victorious revolt. Perceiving that they ^vould make him king by f(n-ce, and thus push him into a false j^osition, Jesus showed wonderful force of character and sagacity by first sending away his disciples, that they might not catch this political fever and complicate the difficulties of the situation by joining the people in their mad attempt. In the absence of his innnedi- diate friends and followers it would be more easy to manage the mob, for such the multitude seems to have become. And he did succeed in dispersing them. At this point occurs a difference in the directions given by Jesus to the disciples as recorded by two of the historians. John say a the disciples went ovci' the sea toward Capernaum, and Mark 390 SECOND AOT) THIKD PASSOVER IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. says that Jesus constrained them to get into the sliip and to gc to the other side before hhn unto Bethsaida. Dr. Thomson, whose intimate personal knowledofe of the Holy A difficulty explained. , ~ *' Land makes him the very highest authority, says " Looking back from this point at tlie south-eastern extremity of the Bu- taiha, I see no difficulty in these statements. As the evening was coming on, Jesus commanded the disciples to return home to Capernaum, while he sent the people away. They were reluctant to go and leave him alone in that des- ert place ; probably remonstrated against his exposing himself to the coming storm and the cold night air, and reminded liim that he would have many miles to walk round the head of the lake, and must cross the Jordan at Beth- saida before he could reach home. To quiet their minds, lie may have told them to go on before toward Bethsaida, while he dismissed tlie crowd, prom- ising to join them in the night, which he intended to do, and actually did, though in a manner very different from what they expected. Still, they were reluctant to leave him, and had to be constrained to set sail. In tliis state of anxiety they endeavored to keep near the shore between this and Bethsaida, hoping, no doubt, to take in their beloved Master at some point along the coast. But a violent wind beat off the boat, so that they were not able to make Bethsaida, nor even Capernaum, but were driven past both.'' "When the disciples had started, and the multitude had been dis- persed, Jesus went into a mountain apart to pray, and so remained until the fourth watch of the night : that is, be- Storm on the lake. i • i n i ■ i • x tween three and six o clock m the morning, in the mean time there came upon the lake one of those furious storms which sometimes sweep down through the valleys and plough the lake furiously. Dr. Thomson's description (ii. 32) is a vivid help to our imaginations in endeavoring to realize the scene : " My experience in this region enables me to spnpathize with the disciples in their long night's contest with the wind. I spent a night in that Wady Shukaiyif, some three miles up it, to the left of us. The sun had scarcely set when the wind began to rush down toward the lake, and it continued all night long witli constantly increasing violence, so that when we reached the shore next morning the face of the lake was a huge boiling caldi'on. The wind liowled down every wady from the north-east and east with such fury tliat no efforts of rowers could have brought a boat to shore at any point along that coast. In a wind like that, the disciples must have been driven quite across to Gennesaret, as we know they were. To understand the causes of these sudden and violent tempests, we must remember that the lake lies low — six hundred feet lower than the ocean; that the vast and naked plateaus of the Jaulan rise to a gi-eat height, spreading Ijackward to the wilds of the Hauran, and upward to snowy Hermon ; and the water-courses have cut out profound ravines and wild gorges, converging to the head of this lake, and that these act likff THE THIRD TOUR OF GALILEE. 391 gigajitic funnels to draw down the cold winds from the mountains. On the occasion refeiTcd to we subsequently pitched our tents at the sliore, and re- mained for three days and nights exposed to this tremendous wind. We had to double-pin all our tent-ropes, and frequently were obliged to hang with out whole weights upon them to keep the quiveiing tabernacle from being carried tip bodily into the air. No wonder the disciples toiled and rowed hard all that niglit; and how natural their amazement and terror at the sight of Jesua walking on the waves! The wliole lake, as we had it, was lashed into fury; the waves repeatedly i-oUed up to our tent-door, tumbling over the ropes with such violence as to carry away the tent-pins." Ill such a storm as this the disciples toiled about eight hours, making a little over three .miles, and therefore only about half their voyage. It was still dark, and the heavy jesus waiting on the tempest lay on them. Suddenly they saw what ^'*'^^'■• they supposed was a ghost — the appearance of a man walking the waves as though he would pass them — and they cried out with fear. Jesus spoke to them and said, " Cheer up, it is I ; be not afraid ! " It tvas he. lie had come down from the mountain and gone over the sea, and was walking near their vessel. When the excitable Peter heard his voice he said, " Lord, if it be thou, command me to come to thee upon the waters." Jesus did not command, but he permitted the attempt. Peter tried it. Going toward Jesus, the prodigious storm so unnerved him and shook his faith that Peter began to sink, and cried for help to Jesus, who stretched out his hand and seized him, and lifted him up with the kind rebuke, '' O thou of little faith ; wherefore didst thou doubt?" In their act of entering the ship the wind suddenly ceased and straightway the vessel was at the .landing. Tlien the disciples, the crew, and the passengei's fell at his feet and worshipped him, and said, " Of a truth thou art the Son of God." Here is a plain statement of a miracle. In a howling storm Jesus walked the waters of a lalce that had been lashed by the scourges of a powerful hurricane through the 1 1 • 1 T . T '^^ 1 . Theories. whole niglit. it was not a pliantasm or him. There was no optical delusion. Peter touched his hand. He went on board the vessel. He remained with a number of men, who had ample opportunity to examine his person. How he did it is not the part of a historian to say. There are latent forces iu our humanity which now and then flash forth. There are ordi- nary phenomena wliich lie in the line of this narrative, one of which, namely, that a man is lighter when awake than when 392 SECOND AND THIED PASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. asleep, was noticed as early as the times of Pliny. Trench'a tlieoiy for tliis is that the human consciousness as an inner centre works an opposing force to the centripetal force of gravity, how- ever unable now to overbear it. But here is something stupen- dous. In a great storm a man walks about on the waters, for the original word indicates something of a quiet promenade. AiKjther man attempts to walk towards him, and succeeds so long as he trusts him, but sinks as soon as his faith begins to fail. Jesus teaches that, so far as Peter was concerned, the walking was due to his faith alone ; that there was in him a capability to achieve this dominion over nature, but that he had failed because his faith had failed. So far as Jesus was conceited, there was no force exerted on liim from without, nor was tlicre any suspension of the physical law of gravity : it was manifestly the power of his own will dominating what seem to us to be natural laws. If there had been any very philosophic man among his fol- lowers he must ha\e seen, even at the disadvantage of too great Profrreesiveness of ueamess, wliat sccms sufficiently plain to even •'**"^ superficial study of Jesus at this remove from his presence, namely, that there M^as a progressiveness in his whole inner and outer history — a growth of the inner man— to which there was a corresponding development of the outer life. Through thirty years his spiritual force seems to hav^e been accunmlating in private. We can hardly imagine that he was totally devoid of all consciousness of this progress of his soul ; nay, the whole his- tory shows that he knew himself, and that one of the sQvy gi-eatest difficulties of liis position was to make others comprehend his psychical condition. At the ripening moment he entei'ed upon liis public career, through all of which there wci-e repeated out- llasliings of the gr(.)wing inner glory. These three years show how he became more and moi-e luminous. At this point of his history he opposes the forces of his inner man to famine, to a mob, to a storm at sea. lie stretches the assertion of his kingly rule further and further into the world of matter and the world of mind. The development of his spiritual history is rhythmic. These phenomena are described by men who did not perceive, and could not comprehend, the profound logical and poetical noume- non which produced them. If these things did not occur, then we have a more troublesome perplexity to deal with, namely, the miracle of the existence of a narrative so superhumanly true to THE TiriRD TOUR OF GALILEE. 393 philosophy and the lu'i^hest poetry — siipcrhuiiiaiily, that is to say, if the historians were not i-ehitiiii^ facts. It would be easier for any man to walk the Atlantic through a raging storm, from New York to Liverpool, than to produce a book which should set forth a character and a history so wonderful as this of Jesus, -30 symmetrical, so accordant with our intuitions of truth, and yet not modelled after this of Jesus, whose historians produced it without type, suggestion, or original, if just such, a man did not live and perform just the things Avhicli they represent. There is no wonder, then, that the mariners and passengers, as well as the disciples, now, if never before, acknowledged him as the Son of God ; that is, granted what he had claimed, the posi- tion of Messiah, although they held their own gross views of what the Messiah's functions were. They now believed that he was the One Anointed to deliver them from the bondage of the EomaTis. It would seem as if there now came upon them the conviction which had been forced upon the multitude by the feeding of thousands with a few loaves. The party landed on the plain of Gennesaret. As soon as the inhabitants found that he had arrived they sent messengers through the whole country and had tlie sick brought in lit- .. AT 1 1111 1 Intense excitcD\ent. ters to hnn. As he passed around the lake to his home in Capernaum there was an intense excitement everywhere. In all the towns and villages they brought their sick and laid them before him on his passage through their streets, and invalids begged the privilege of touching if only the hem of his garment. All were healed. It was a wonderful procession of beneficence. In the mean time some of the most fanatical of tlie people who had been fed on the previous day seemed to have lingered in the hope of seeing him again. They knew nothing of the extrar»r- dinary night-scene on the lake. They supposed that he may liave retired for private devotion, but would make his appearance during the day. But not finding him, and knowing that there had been but one vessel on the lake yesterday, and that in the fearful Btorm the disciples could not have returned and taken him, tliey fell back on the only natural conjecture, namely, that he had walked around the edge of the lake by Bethsaida to Capernaunu When, therefore, vessels from Tiberias passed near, they hailed them and took shipping for Capernaum, seeking Jesus and more bread. 394 SECOND AND THIRD PASSOVEK IN THE LIFE OF JESUS. That these people were not the best of the multitude who had been fed in the wilderness, a2:)pears from their persecuting Jesus with their presence when he would fain have been rid of them, because they did not follow him for religious instruction, but for material considerations. They hoped that he was to be their Bread-king, the Messiah, to reign audi feed his people. Their hearts and consciences had all gone to stomach. They lived in a dream, in which many a lazy soul to this day laps itself, that there is "a good time coming" when men shall have plenty to eat and nothing to do. They were the Millerites or Adventists of old. We must remember tliis, to make the address of Jesus at all comprehensible. He speaks what they could not understand, while he utters profound truths which all receptive spirits will find instructive. The company of bread-seekers pushed into the synagogue where Jesus was teaching, and sought to relieve their curiosity by the abrupt inquiry, "Rabbi, when did you come The bread-seekers. i j. ./ / •' ./ hither?" Jesus deigned no reply to this imperti- nence. He regarded himself as the embodiment of Truth, and Truth never reveals itself to crude curiosity and pruriency. He answers reprovingly, and then makes an utterance very deep, but not wholly incomprehensible even to them. "Verily, verily, I say to you. Ye seek me not because ye saw signs, but because ye did eat of the loaves and were filled. Exert yourselves, not for food which -perishes, but for that which remains to the enduring life which the Son of Man gives to you, for him has God the Father sealed." They seemed to understand something of this, so far at least as that he meant to say that if they got material bread from him it would be a very incidental thing ; that he was a moral teacher, and that they must seek him for what their souls would gain of spiri- tual sustenance, which he boldly announces that he is able to give them; that he is the one whom God the Father has stamped as genuine, and that he could give them that which nourishes the life which endures. Therefore they said, "What shall we do that we may work the works of God ? " Jesus answered them, " This ii the work of God, that ye believe on him whom He hath sent." Their reply was, " What sign doest thou, that we may see and believe thee ? what dost thou work ? Our fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, as it is written, ' He gave them bread from hea- THE THIKD TOUK OF GALILEE. 395 ven to eat.' " These gross people, having been fed miraculously had forgotten the feeding and undervalued the miracle, it would seem, because it was a mere multiplication of . . They demand a sign. bread, whereas in the desert, durmg then* wander- ings, their fathers had a daily shower of bread from heaven. This repl}^ shows how material and sensuous were all their ideas. Jesus answered : " Moses did not give you the bi-ead, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For tlie bread of God is that which cometli down from heaven and giveth life to the world." It was not Moses who gave the manna, but it was God. And that manna was but temporary, for if it remained over it decayed and was useless. But God sends Jesus, in whom the world is to have life. He evidently believed and manifestly tauglit tliat the life of the world was derived from himself, and tvholly dependent on himself. It was the highest possible claim. There seemed to be some upspringing of faith in the hearts of his hearers. They said unto him, " Sir, evermore give us this bread." Jesns, knowina; that the faith which • 1 11 Somefelth. depended upon mn-aclcs was a stream made by showers, and not flowing from a fountain, deepened his discoui*so and became more offensive to them. " I am the bread of life : he tliat comes to me shall never hunger, and he that believes on me shall never thirst. But I said unto you that ye have even seen and failed to believe. The whole that the Father gives me will come to me, and him that comes to me I will not cast out. For I came down from heaven not to do mine own will, but the will of Him who sent me, which is, that of the whole which He has given me I should not lose from, but should raise it up in the final day. For this is the will of the Father, that every one who sees the Son and believes on him may have lasting life, and that I should raise him up in the final day." This profound speech seems to imply that as bread is the nutri- ment of the outward and physical life, so Jesus is the nutriment of the spiritual life ; that as the body which does not receive food into itself, and assimilate that food with itself, will perish, so the soul which fails to receive and assimilate Jesus, which must mean the spirit and teachings of Jesus, will also perish ; that there is no lasting life for those who do not derive it from Jesus. The assertion that he came down from heaven, by which ho claimed a relation to the spiritual world quite distinct from and 396 SECOKD AXD TirmD PASSOVER m THE LITE OF JESUS. • superior to that of otlier men, was an offence to the Pharisaic leaders, who started the murmur among the people : " Is not this Jesus again offends Jesus, the SOU of Joseph, wlioso father also we the pharLsees. liavo kuowu ? IIow then savs he, ' I came down from heaven ? ' " They had been familiar with Joseph and with Jesus as plain mechanics working in a humble shop, or going about doing the usual work of carpenters. That such a man should claim knowledge of a previous existence in heaven, and a voluntary coming from heaven to earth, all which Jesus certainly did claim, was to them a stumbling-block. The reply of Jesus was, " Murmur not among yourselves. 'No man can come to me except the Father who has sent me draw him ; and I will raise him up in the last day. It His reply to them. . . . , /*ii inm-i is written m the prophets, ' And they shall all be taught of God.' * Every one who has heard and has learned of the Father comes unto me. Not that any one hath seen the Father, except he who is from the Father: he has seen God. Verily, verily, I say unto you. He that believes has lasting life. 1 am the bread of life. Your fathers did eat the manna in the wilderness and have died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, that any one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread which came down fi'om heaven ; if any one eat of my bread he shall live forever. The bread which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh." Here Jesus explicitly teaches that God co-operates with him in his mission, so that every one who has any right thoughts and feelings from God has the moral preparation necessary to receive Jesus. Not that any one has seen God except Jesus himself, but he implicitly says that he has seen God. God gave perishable bread in the desert for the temporary Bustentation of the temporary lives of their fathers, but now God gives living bread from heaven, even Jesus. This language is evidently highly symbolical of a deeply pro- found conviction of Jesus. lie connected the welfare of man- kind with himself, and M'ith himself after death. Flesh cannot be eaten until the animal is dead ; but then that flesh, having lost its life, is on the way to decay: but Jesus says his flesh is alive when eaten. The words in the original are so arranged as to ex- press this weightily. Then there can be no doubt as to his con- * In 3uch passages as the remarkable i pare Isa. liv. 13, and Jerem. xxxi. 33, one in Joel il 2G, 29, with which com- | 34. THE THIED TOTIR OF GALILEE. 397 viction that he should die ; that after deatli he should be alive ajrain : and that then faith in him should be the life of men, and that only by faith in him could men have lasting life, and that souls that did not receive him should perish, just as bodies perish that do not receive material food into themselves. Then the Jews strove among themselves and said, " How can this man give us his flesh to eat?" Perhaps some had glimpses of a profound spiritual meaning. Jesus confirms Their puzzie their idea of "eating" by a positive averment. "Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood, ye have not lasting life in you. He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has lasting life, and I will raise him up at the final day. For my flesh is truly food, and my blood is truly drink. lie who eats my flesh and drinks my blood dwells in me and I in him. As the living Father has sent me, and I live on account of the Father, so he who eats me, ho also shall live on account of me. Such is the bread wdiich camo down from heaven : not as the fathers did eat, and Iiave died : he who eats this bread shall live forever." This is very spiritual or very gross, and to each hearer it must have seemed, as now to each reader it docs seem, either one or the other, according to his moral state of receptivity.' To Jesus, from all we now know of his character, it could have been only an ex- pression in human language of his most delicate perceptions of most spiritual and sublime and important truths. Xo one could truthfully utter these words without believing that the existence of all souls depended upon himself, and that his life was depend- ent upon the continued existence of God and upon nothing else, so that he is vii-tually the God of humanity. The soul that does not somehow paitake of him is as sui-ely going to destruction as the bodv that does not somehow ])ai-take of food and drink is go- ing to destruction. He makes tliis statcniont so strong that while the Jews are discussing the jtosdbilitf/ ho cuts them short with an empliatic statement of the necesdtij. That which is eaten is taken into the absorbing and circulating organs of the body and assimi- lated. That seems to be the reigning idea throughout this si^eech, not the grossness of mastication, but the fineness of assimilation. All this discourse took place in the synagogue in Capernaum. It was not only offensive to the Jews, but also to many of the hangers-on of his disciples, those who followed him from generaj 398 SECOND AND THIRD PASSOVER EST THE LITE OF JESUS. motives or for sinister pui-poses. They said, " This is a hard say- ing; who can listen to it?" Jesus knew how they felt, perhaps heard what they said. He replied, " Docs this offend yon ? Wliat if ye shall see the Son of Man ascend to wlicrc he was before ? It is the spirit that gives life; the Hcsli profits nothing: the words that I have spoken to yon are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe." It seemed to them some- thing like impiety which he was uttering in saying that he came down from heaven. He startles tliem with the intimation that it is possible they may yet have ocular proof of In's ascending. He declares again his pre-existence. In speaking to his disciples he gives a spiritual turn to the words he had uttered, and broad- ens the spiritual significance of that speech by declaring that his physical man, his body, could not be profitable, but that it is the spirit which gives life, the spirit animates the body, and spirit- ual recoo-nitions alone are valuable. John declares that Jesus had insight into the spiritual con- dition of the men about him, and knew M'ho did and who did not Jesus Bifts his fouow- bclievc liis words, and who it was that should ers. betray him. He saw that he weaned from him the utter materialists and traditionalists and secularists. Many of his followers turned away from him forever. Jesus said to his twelve chosen friends, whom he had selected to propagate his principles, " Do you also wish to go away ? " Simon Peter, gen- erally spokesman, answered, "Sir, to whom shall we go? You have the words of lasting life, and Ave belie\e and have found out that you are the Holy One of God." There was a great faith based on a great spiritual intelligence. lie saw that ivoi'ds were more powerful than acts. Deeds die. AVords live. The feeding of five thousand people was a small thing as compared with the utterance of a great truth on which the soul could feed and grow. Jesus said, "Have not I chosen you twelve? and one of you is a traitor." 'John says, after the fact, that Jesns spoke of Judus Iscariot, son of Simon of Kerioth. Jesus may have told John that he did mean this Judas, or John may have simply afterward recollected when Jesus was betrayed that this speech had been made and must have referred to Judas. This is the closing passage in the history of the second year of the ministry of Jesus. He had aroused the Pharisees, had sifted his followers, and had given training to his tried Apostles. PART V. FROM THE THIRD PASSOYER TO THE ENSUING FEAST OF TABERNACLES. PROM APRIL TO OCTOBER, A.D. 29— ABOUT SIX MONTHS. CHAPTER I. UNSETTLED. It does not appear that Jesus went up to Jerusalem to the Pass- over of this year, but it is supposed that his disciples did. There must have been multitudes at the great national celebration who had seen or heard of the f eedino; . ^^"^ remains „ _ "in Capernaum. of the five thousand, and who knew the intense desire of the people to make Jesus king. Such things would be much talked of and most eagerly listened to. The intense inter- est excited by these reports probably hastened the determination of the hierarchic party to destroy Jesus. Jesus knew it, and ceased to travel in Judisa proper, confining himself to Galilee. Soon after the Passover a deputation from the Pharisees and Scribes, being charged to ascertain some ground of accusation against Jesus, were dogging his steps and watch- , , ^^ .„ , ing his movements; and spies of that character vii. The d'eputa- never fail to find in the most spotless life some- tion from th^ thing to which they can take exception. Phaiisees. In addition to the Scriptures, which contained the moral law in writing, the Pharisees endeavored to bind upon the consciences of the people certain unwritten traditions of the elders, oral precepts, which they attributed to the assistants of Moses. After the time of Jesus these were collected 4:00 THE THIKD PASSOVER TO THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. into a book, consisting of two parts : the Mishiia, tlie text of the supposed original precepts of the elders, and the Gemara, the comments on the text by the chief rabbies — tlie whole being called The Talmud. Among the requirements of these traditions were many which obliged the Jews to wash often, and to wash many things, and to wash in peculiar ways. Mark has a note to that effect, inserted parenthetically in his history : " For the Pharisees and all Jews, except they wash their hands often, eat not, holding the tradition of the elders, and on coming from the market, if they sprinkle not, they eat not. And many other things there are which they have received to hold, as baptisms of cups and of pots and of vessels of brass." On coming from any public assembly it was in accordance with this ceremonial law tliat the whole body be washed, because it could not be known what defilement may have been contracted by contact with the common people. When this deputation of spies saw that Jesus and his disciples paid no regard to these requirements they catechized him, saying, " Why do your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashed hands ? " The plain intimation is, that the Master was held responsible for at least the known and unrebuked acts of his disciples.- The stern reply of Jesus was, " Well has Isaiah prophesied of you hypocrites when he said (representing Jehovah as speaking), ' This people honor me with their lips, but their Jesus rebukes j^^^^.^ -^ ^.^j. f^.^^^^ ^^^^ -j^ ^.^^j^^ ^^ ^j^^ worship tlie Pharisees. . me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.' For you, leaving the commandment of God, hold the tra- dition of men. Well do you reject the connnandment of God that ye may keep your own tradition. For Moses said, ' Honor thy father and thy mother, and he who resisteth father or mother let him end by death.' But you say that if a man shall say to his father or mother, ' Corhan (which means a gift), by whatever thou mightest be profited by me,' ye suffer him no longer to do anything fur his father or his mother, making the word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered. And many such like thhigs ye do." This was a severe rebuke, and struck at the sorest spot of Pha- risaism. The hold of the hierarchic clique upon the people lay in continuing in them a superstitious regard for the " traditions." CXSETTLED. 402 So long as the people wei-e traditionists and ritualists, and the Pharisees held in their hands the interpretation of the tradition and the arrangement of the ritual, thej could lord it over the con- sciences of the populace. And we see in this rehuke of Jesus tliat churchism is the same in all ages of the world. The spies from Jerusalem indirectly rebuked Jesus, not because he did not regard personal cleanliness, but because he did not conform to the minute directions of tlie ceremonial laws which had been built up by the doctors of the law. In this they were hypocrites. They had made canons which were contrary to God's express command- ments. They had been described by Isaiah, and a telling passage was quoted against them. Jesus cites a case in which the terrible injury of churchism is seen. According to the law of God, a man was to honor his parents. But these " churchmen " taught that if a man said " Corban " over any property, it was thenceforth de- voted to "the church," and no matter how much the parents might be in need, this property was interdicted and ahenated to "the church." Jesus regarded this as simply horrible. Notliing taken from a needy father or mother could be made acceptable to God by being devoted to wliat are called sacred purposes. Then calling to the crowd that was near, Jesus said, "Hear and understand: There is nothing from without the man which enter- ing into him can defile him ; but the things which come out of him, those are wliat defile the man." ^^''^ ^^^^^^ ° The comparison of this address to the multitude with the speech to the Pharisees shows to us, that Jesus would not be understood as undervaluing purity in any sense, as not abol- ishing any law which God had given, but that purity was not to be attained and maintained by outward washings, and by observ- ance of what meats a man should eat, but rather by keeping the soul, the source of life, all clean. But this is expressed in a°par- able. ^ His disciples told him that he had ofPended the Pharisees by his speech to them. He answered, " Eveiy plant which my heavenly Father hath not planted shall be rooted up. Let them alone; they are blind leaders. And if a blind man lead a blind man' both shall fall into the ditch." W]udi reply seems to mean that whatever might come to him from so doing, he should not hesitate to root up such noxious weeds as these false teachers, but seems also to imply that no special violence would be requisite. Do you 402 THE THIRD PASSOVER TO THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. see a blind man leading a blind man ? There is a pit in their path. AVliy should one push them forward ? They are going to destruction of themselves. So of these false teachers, and, alas! of their followers. But when they reached the house, Peter, who still had tradi- tionary ideas, and regarded the manner of eating as not an indif- ferent subject, asked his Master to explain to the hissIT^''^^''^' disciples this parable about the food. And he said, "Arc you yet also without understanding':!" They had been so near him, had so long heard his expressions of thought that they should have been able at once to know what he meant, and not compel him to go into a detailed explanation, which, however, he does not withhold. " Do you not undei-stand that whatsoever enters the mouth goes into the stomach, and is evacuated into the draught? But the things coming out of the mouth come from the heart, and they profane the man. For out of the heart come forth evil purposes, murders, adulteries, forni- cations, thefts, false testimonies, blasphemies: these are the things that profane a man, but to eat with unwashed hands does not." This is consistent with all his teachings, that a man's pui'ity must be that of the character interfused through the whole life. It was quite apparent now that the Jewish ecclesiastical au- tliorities meditated extreme measures. The labors of Jesus and Ills Apostles had been exhaustive. There was a Matt. XV.; Mark fgjjj.f^^^ ordeal in advance of them: Jesus mani- vii. In Phojiiicia. „ , , i i ■ ^ .^ ^i festly saw that, whether it was apparent to the others or not. His Held of operations was daily more and nioi-c circumscribed by his enemies. He could not " walk " in Judiea nor in Galilee without being beset by his ecclesiastical foes. Capernaum could no longer be a retreat to him. It would seem that in view of these things Jesus meditated a season of retire- ment, and so withdrew his discijJes up towards the confines of Phoinicia, designated in Matthew and Mark by the names of the two principal cities, Tyre and Sidon. It has been a question whether Jesus ever crossed the boundary of his native country during his public ministry. It is not neces- sarily implied in the words of Matthew and Mark, " into the coasts," "into the borders of Tyre and Sidon." The word may be as well translated " towards," or " unto," as " into." That he had declared his ministry to be confined to the Jewish people ■UNSETTLED. 403 does not toncli the question, because he was seeking a place where ' he nnght for a season have recuperative repose, which he could better find in a heathen country in which he did not intend to preach. But now the question has been settled by the recently discovered Codex Sinaiticus, the text of which, in Mark vii. 31 is, " And again going from the coasts of Tyre he went tliroiigh Sidon to the Sea of Galilee, through the midst of the coasts of Decapolis," Of a woman of this country one of the most touching of all the stories in the New Testament history is narrated, Jesna sought retirement. He went into a house and took measures to prevent persons from seekino- '^^^ Syro-Phoe- him. But he could not be hid. Some report o'f ''''''''' "^'''""'''^ his power had crossed the frontier and reached the ears of a wo- man in those coasts. She now heard that Jesus, a descendant of that great Jewish king who was the wonderful Solomon's father, a worker of many cures, the most beneficent of prophets, was in the neighborhood. Her daughter was strangely and fearfully ifiiicted, and her countrymen, in common with the Jews, believed in demoniacal possession. She had nothing but this o-reat afflic- tion to commend her to the attention of Jesus. Everything was against her. Her nationality was an offshoot of that base Canaan- itish stock that God had aforetime doomed to utter destruction, but which had been spared by the weakness of the ancestors of the people to -whom Jesus belonged. She was a Syro-Pha^nician. Then, in her creed, she was a pagan— a Greek. So she had in her veins the blood of three hated races— Gi-eek, Syrian, and Phoenician : and her religion was against her in her appeal to the Jewish prophet. But her grief and love for her daughter transcended all such considerations. She sought Jesus and found him, and fell at his feet, and besought him, saying : " O sir, David's Son, pity me ! for my daughter is grievously de- ^"^ ^^^^"^ ^^^^' monized ! " For the first time in his career Jesus seemed un- touched by the plea of suffering. He paid no attention to the suppliant at his feet. He answered her not a word. But she followed him, prosecuting her pleadings. At length tlie disciples put in a word in her behalf. " Dismiss her : for she cries after lis." That this word was in her favor is manifest from the reply of Jesus, but it seems to have come rather from a desire to 404 THE THIRD PASSOVER TO THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. be rid of lier importunity than from any special regard for tho poor petitioner. The reply was another discouragement to the agonized mother : " I was not sent except to the lost sheep of the house of Israel." This reminded them of the limit of their own commission, and perhaps recalled to them the fact that Jesus had made no cures of any heathen. It did not positively say that he would not grant their request and hearken to her prayer, but that if he did so it would transcend the limits of his mission and theirs. To the woman it must have sounded like a fresh repulse. She had, however, made her daughter's case her own, with such motherly sympathy that when she opened her petitions to Jesus it was in the pathetic appeal, " Pity me ! " as if she were the sufferer. Such love is unconquerable. She could not go back to her daughter with no relief. The picture of the paroxysms of the wretched patient goaded her maternal heart to utmost effort. Again she worshipped him. Again she cried : " O sir, help me ! " As if she had said : " I cannot go wholly milielped : if my daughter cannot be utterly cured, do something for me ! I leave it to your wisdom and goodness to decide what." Jesus again re- pulsed her by a speech embodying a picture from domestic life. His first word to her was : " It is not a fair thing to take the bread of the children and throw it away (waste it) on the little dogs." All the history of Jesus shows the fineness of his organization. It is a remembrance of this which must help us here. With wOiat tone and look did Jesus utter this speech ? Jesus tries her rp^ fancy that he meant tliat this anxious mother at his feet was a dog, would be a wretclied f orget- fulness of the whole spirit of Jesus thus far manifested in his words and works, especially in his treatment of women. He did not mean that. The woman knew, and the disciples knew, that the Jews were accustomed to apply the unhandsome epithet of " dog " to all heathens. He never could have called any woman a " whelp." None but the grossest of all gross men ever apply this word to any woman, and then they conceive her to be the basest of all base women. There is nothing here to justify this interpretation. He was simply reminding them of what the Pharisees and Scribes would say if he should help this w(;man, and also presenting to them in concrete words the abstract but vigorous prejudices of their own hearts against all peoples whc UNSETTLED. 405 were not of their nation, as if he had said : " Ton know that the Jews are Jehovah's peculiar children, and that this ■v\'()inan is a dog of a Canaanite ; would you liave your Master outrage all decenc}' and orthodoxy by helping her? " The coldest of most unpoetic historians might fancy that a faint smile of })ity for their narrowness passed over his now benignant features as he uttered these gently satirical words. There was something in that look whicli stimulated the poor pleader's fainting hope. In the light of the smile which fell on her eyes, her heart — a woman's and a mother's — seemed to detect a warmth from tlie inmost soul of Jesus which escaped the eyes of the disciples, and which could not possibly be transferred to a written nan-ative. Quick-witted, persistent, faithful, she caught at the very word " little-doo;s." In the original it is onlv one word. He did not employ the harshest name for those worth- less, vicious, vagabond canine prowlers through oriental villages. It is the only passage, so far as I can recollect, in the Bible his- tories, in which occurs any allusion to dogs which is not much against that animal. The word here is a diminutive, softening the meaning, not intensifying the contemptuousness. And it Is a home scene. The little 'dogs are in the house; they are men- tioned in close connnection with " the children." It was a hint to her faith. She caught it, and replied with admirable spirit and celerity. She did not deny what Jesus affirmed, but gave it a most sudden turn in her own favor. She did not degrade her- self. She did not allow herself to be worthless as a dog. It was the love for her dauo;hter which c-ave her strength to hold herself up while her self-respect was thus apparently tortured by another and held down by herself. She loved another better than she loved herself. She said : " True, sir ; but even the dogs eat of the crumbs falling from the table of their masters." She assented to the truth of the general proposition of Jesus, but argued that so far from being a reason for her rejection it contained a reason for her acceptance. She does not make a demand for even tho crumbs, but she pleads that she may not be driven from even them. Simon Peter must have resembled Martin Luther in many of his characteristics. When Luther read this passage he burst out so that you can almost hear the clapping of his hands in hia written syllables : " Was not that a master-stroke ? She snares 4:06 THE THIRD rASSOVER TO THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. Jesus appreci- ates holy wit. Jesus in his own words ! " "Witli what clelii^ht the fo. lowers of Jesus must have regarded tlie swift beauty of this most finely delicate repartee. How could Peter contain him- self ? riow he must have glanced from the face of the Pagan at her prayer to the sad face of the \vearied but good Jesus, who was gazing down into her eyes, to Ree the effect of his speech. And when the reply came, the most spiritual don mot on record, if the exuberant Peter did not flow over with gesticulations of delight, Jesus broke into applause at the wit of the speech and the humility and faith of the utterer. " O woman ! great your faith ! Be it unto you even as you de- sire ! " The prophet that at first refused to listen to her, and then repelled her, and then seemed to insult her, now that her faith has triumphed, gives her all. " Your utmost wish in its very form is granted." She rose, withdrew, and found on her return that her daughter had recovered while she lay pleading at the sad and holy Prophet's wearied and dusty feet. There was no more rest for Jesus, He could not be quiet in Judsea, nor in Galilee, nor in a heathen country. He was not disposed to hasten any crisis ; but if he must work it must be in his own coimtry. He resolved to return. From Tyre he went northward " through Sidon," * probably going by a circuit through the mountainous countrj' which lies between Tyre and Lebanon, where he might have opportunity for solemn retirement and deep dis- course with his disciples. But Ave have no itinerary of this jour- ney. He may have crossed from the Phoenician boundaries di- rectly to Hennon, and down by the east bank of the Jordan towards the lake, and thus have gone through the midst of Decapolis. N^or do we know exactly what part of Decapolis was thus visited. This name, which means " Ten Cities," and describes a region, was east of the Jordan, excej^t a little territory near the western bank, at the southern end of the lake, and called Scythopolis. Upon the conquest of Syiia by the Romans (b.c. 65) these ten cities were rebuilt, colonized, and allowed certain peculiar munici- pal privileges, making an assemblage of little principalities some- A\'hat after the manner of the Hanse Towns of Germany. Various The Decapolis. Blatt. XV. ; Mark srii. , viii. * Aio SiSdjios is the text in the Codex Sinuit.^ and is now the accepted readmg, beiiig well authenticated, Tischendorf, Alford, Tragelles, Meyer, Lachmann, and others following it. ■IDON. 8A1DK. uNSE'rrr.ED. 407 lists of names are given. Perhaps tlie larger number of antliori- ties agree un tlie following: namely, Damascus, no\v the oldest city in the world ; Scythopolis, whose site is well known ; Gadara; Pella ; Fliiladelphia, which was the ancient Rabbotli Annnon ; Gerasa, " whose ruins are the most magnificent in Palestine;" Canatha or Kenetli ; Paphana ; Hippos ; and Dion. * These cities were inhabited mainly by a pagan population, and in the days of Jesus the whole region was populous and prosperous. It was not long before the people began to bring their sick to * '• Cellarius thinks that Caesarea, Philippi, and Gergasa should be substi- tuted for Damascus and Raphana in this list, which is taken from Pliny {Nat. Hist., V. IG). It is true that Pliny is the only wTiter who extends Decapolis so far north as to include Damascus, which city would seem to be excluded by Josephus (who, however, does not furnish a list), since he calls Scythopo- lis 'the largest of them.' ''—McClintoc/e & Strong's CycJ<>padia. 408 THE raiED PASSOVER TO TUE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. the great Healer. Matthew describes the rapid and frequent ciires by such words as these : " And great multitudes came untc him, having with them lame, blind, maimed, dumb, . ' „ „ and many others, and cast them down at his feet : Btu aimerer. j ' ^ ? and he healed them." Mark singles out a case which he describes in his peculiarly graphic style. Among the invalids was one who was deaf and a stammerer, and they brought liim that Jesus might lay hands on him. But iu this particular case he did not choose to exert his healing power in that way. He took the patient privately from the multitude, and put his fingers into the man's ears, and having spitten, he touched his tongue, and sighed, as in prayer, and said, "Ephphatha," an Aramaic word, which Mark translates "Be opened." And his ears were opened, and the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spake plainly. Jesus charged him and his friends that they should not publish this transaction. But they disobeyed him, and in proportion to the earnestness of his charge was the zeal with which they made the cure known. Each reader of this passage must have his own opinion of the motives of the great Worker. This much we have already learned, that Jesus had no selfish motives, was not fanatic nor timid, was neither a magician nor a charlatan. Whatever else be denied, the purely sincere deepness of his nature must have become ap- parent, lie had no tricks and no evasions. We must always recollect the circumstances under Avhich an act was performed, and the character of the actor. Jesus was now in a region in- habited principally by pagans, among whom, however, were manj? Jews. And then the ruling passion with Jesus was an intense desire to do good to their souls through the bodies of men. Isow, unless we could have the spiritual penetration oi this great Teacher, and see each j^articular case as it rose, we could not fairly criticize the valuations which he made in the style of his mighty deeds ; iu that sometimes he merely spoke, sometimes he touched, sometimes he sent the patient off to wash in a certain pool, sometimes he healed in the heart of the crowd, sometimes, as in this case, took the sufferer into privacy. Although we can- not perceive the reason in the patient, Ave may, as in this case, perceive some reason in the circumstances. It would have been contrary to his plans and the spirit of his life to excite a furor in this pagan population ; it would ha\e been every way TINSETTLED. 409 injurious to Jew and Gentile, to allow to be created for himself the reputation of magician. lie took the man into privacy, lie prayed, he tonched him, he commanded ; it was done on an instant. The Jews said, " lie hath done all things well ; " the pagans glo rified the God of Israel. For three days Jesus was with this mixed multitude, healing and teaching, the crowd probably constantly growing as the report of the miracles spread. At the close of the third day Jesus called his disciples and said, '• I have compassion on the midtitude, because already they have continued with me three da3^s and have noth- , , , T -IT. i. 1 n Feeding of four ing to eat : and i am unwilling to send them ^j^o^sj^^ away fasting lest they fall in the way." They could not readily cross the lake, nor ^'isit the towns, but would be compelled to return to their mountain homes by way of the passes through which they had followed Jesus. The disciples seemed to have forgotten his great miracle in feeding the five thousand, or they may have thought that he would not repeat so signal a creative act, or they may have chosen to let him indicate how the wants of all these people should be relieved. Their reply was, " AVhence should we have so many loaves in the desert as to fill so great a multitude ? " Jesus said, " How many have you ? " They answered, " Seven, and a few little JlshesJ^ Jesus commanded the multitude to be seated, and takins: the food he gave thanks, and divided it, and gave it to his disciples, and the disciples to the multitude. They all ate and were satis- fied. And they took up of the fragments seven baskets full. And the number of eaters was about four thousand men, besides children and women. The narrative here is very similar to that of the ]:»revious won- derful feeding of five thousand people. Perliaps, in some par- ticulars, they grew alike before they were written ; but there are points of difference. The assembly here was largely heathen, the need was more pressing, the number of eaters was smaller, the number of loaves was larger, and the number of baskets of broken meat gathered after the meal was smaller than in the former instance. It is also to be observed that the word trans- lated "basket" is not the same as in the former instance. There, as the note on p. 388 shows, it meant the wallet which a Jew ordinarily carried on his journeys. Here it means a fish basket 410 THE THIKD TASSOVEE TO THE FEAST OF TABERNACI.ES. That these two words mean different things is apparent from the fact that they are not confounded in the two narratives, and fi'om the other fact, that when Jesus afterward called the memory of his aisciples to the two instances he discriminates in the use of the words, keeping the former to the first and the latter to the second instance. One cannot help pausing to say that, if these narratives had been fabrications, the author would have put this for the first and the other for the second miracle ; for obviously it is a more splen- did thing to feed five thousand on five loaves, and take up twelve baskets of fragments, than to feed/ci^r thousand on seven loaves, and save only seven baskets of fragments. Certainly it is not the manner of romancers and impostors to relate the greater exploits first, and then parade tlie smaller deeds of their heroes. If a writer of fiction had had this case in hand he would certainly have represented at least ten thousand eaters, and have reduced the number of loaves to two, if not to one. We may not comprehend all the physical and spiritual phenomena in this history, but it certainly sounds as if reported by an honest eye-witness. Jesus dismissed the multitude and took ship, perhaps a ship which the disciples kept in readiness for his accommodation, and went to the western side of the lake, to the coasts Dalmanutha. of Magadan or Magdala as Matthew reports, to Matt. XV., xvi.; X)almanutha as the more exact Mark records. Mark viii. ; Luke ^^^^ probability is that Dalmanutlia was a village near Magdala, the latter being generally identified with El Mejdel, a poor hamlet near the lake on the south side of the plain of Gennesaret. AVhether he remained here a short time and encountered the Pharisaic party, or returned to Capernaum and there had this de- cisive interview with them, has been a question. A new trial. ^ \^^^.\^^^q to believe that this fresh trial took place m Capernaum. It was obviously premeditated and planned. Dalmanutha was so obscure a place that we cannot think they would have expected him there. Wherever they did meet, it was where the Pharisees and Sadducees lay in wait for him, and this would most naturally be at his home in Capernaum. This is not a matter of great importance. It was on the western shore of the lake. It was in Galilee. It is noticed that now for the first time the Sadducees, the " rationalists " and infidels of their day, had UNSETTLED. 411 united themselves with the Pluirisecs, the rnritaiis of that day, tc put Jesus to a new triaL Here was a great combination of pow- erful influences. The Sadducees were tlie coni-t ])arty. Herod was a Sadducee. They were the refined and "liberah" The })rut Peter ac- knowledged his Messiah as directly begotten of God. In his sol- emn phrase he did not use the word "living" to distinguish God, the true God, from dead idols, but to intensify the idea that was in the word " Son." It was not the question who God was, but the question who Jesus was, that Peter was answering. Jesus accepted the homage. Let us remind ourselves that we are making historical studies and not dogmatic theological asser- tions. The question now is, not ^vhether Jesus was rio-ht or wrong, but what he thou-dit and said , '^^'''^'' receives and did. It is most obvious that at this period of his career he believed liimself to be the Son of God in a sense separate and distinct from any other with which the phrase could be ap}»lied to other men. He was the Messiah, the Christ, the Sent, the Anointed. Ilis people wei-c looking for a temporal * It is to be noticed that Peter re- j pies, nor "I think that you are," etc., ports the opinions of others, but when Jesus asked the opinion of the disci- ples Peter fails to give it. We do not know from him what it was. For him- self he answers, not saying "We think," ou behalf of his fellow-disci- 27 on his own behalf, but addressing- him with the worshipping assertion, "You are the Chri.st." The state of mind in which this was uttered is to be consid- ered. 418 THE TniKD PASSOVER TO THE FEAST OF T.VBERNACLES. ieliverer ; he was the only dehverer they should have, and he vvas a spiritual deliverer. With such sentiments he made his solemn reply to Peter: "Blessed art tliou, Simon Bar-jona, for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father in the heavens. And I also say to thee, Thou art Peter, and on thia rock I will build my congregation, and the gates of Death [Hades] shall not prevail against it. 1 will give thee the keys of tlie king- dom of the heavens, and what thou shalt bind upon earth shall be bound in the heavens, and what thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in the heavens." Jesus had been in some measure and by certain terms acknowl- edged as Messiah in early parts of his history, but no confession had yet recognized him as at once divine and HisMessiahship j^^^^^n. Such he held himself to be. And, more- a revelation. , i i t i • r ^ - ^ i over, he held that that view or his nature could not be reached by any process of human reasoning or any leap of human imagination. It was a direct revelation from heaven. The lit- eral words of Jesus are : " Flesh and blood have not apocalypsed it to thee, but my Father." From such a mystery no human hand could have raised the veil and made the apocalypse, — no hand but God's. It is manifest that Jesus believed his own character and person such a miracle that no intellectual analysis of his words and acts could enable any man to reach the apprehension of them. lie was a blessed man to whom the Eternal Father vouchsafed Buch a revelation. It must have been the deepest conviction that drew such utterances from Jesus. He was joyous in his solemnity. He calls Simon by his other name, Kepliau, Cephas, Peter, Pock. " Kephau " was probably the word he used, speaking in the Ara- maic tongue, and this word Grecized was Ke^a9, and translated into Greek was Uerpo'i, of which our English is " Rock." He ascends from Bar-jona to Peter. This whole speech of Jesus to Peter, which must be acknowl- edged as one of the most impoi-tant — if not the most important — of all his sayings, has been a source of great per- Address of Jesus i^j-j^ ^j^^, trouble with many commentators is to Peter r %/ •/ their hardened ecclesiasticism. Wlien Churchism hangs like a veil over the faces of men, they do not see the face of Jesus, and they hear his words as men hear the mumbling of a priest through the baize curtain at the church-door. A succeed- ing commentator may be afraid to differ from his predecessor£,lest THE GREAT CONFESSION. 419 !ie be charged with heresy, or at least irregularity. Many of the Protestant writers are as papal as the Roman writers. Roman Catholicism is the concentration of papacy on one pope ; secta- rian Protestantism is the division of the papacy among many popes. Many men seem afraid to know what Jesus really meant. They hear him through the ear-trumpet of " the church;" they see him through the stained glass of " the church." To reconcile these sayings of Jesus Avith truth, and the known facts of history, will be a perpetual tax on tlie ingenuity of those who at the same time hold to Churchism. If a man can only dare to look the truth full in the face, and accept the truth and its logical connections, he will have less difficulty with the questions of the Rock and the Keys. Let us venture to utter the truth, even at the peril of being cast out of the synagogue. Jesus never intended to establish " a church," in the modern sense of the term, namely, a close corporation, inside which should be all that are to be saved, while all outside should be damned. lie never intended to institute any ^ ^'^ ' body in which should exist the distinction of clergy and laity, which should, as a whole, dictate to its members and to the world what their faith should be. lie abrogated priesthood as a corpo- ration by making every man a priest. The churches now on earth are mere human economical arrangements, with no spiritual authority to declare that any man is a saint or a sinner. As com- munities and associations for propagating the principles of Jesus they may be useful ; as hierarchies they are hurtful. They may turn a man out of their body, but that in no way affects his rela- tions to Jesus or to God. Jesus was full of Anti-Churchism. He seemed to have a mission to destroy Churchism, which was so incrusting human hearts that they could not grow into beauty and ripen into maturity in the sunlight of God's love and smile. He was a Secedcr, a Dissenter, a Come-outer, an Independent, any- thing you please to call him but Churchman. If he were living in our midst now he would endure to be called "glutton," "wine- bibber," "friend of publicans and sinners," and make no more resentment than he did when he was on earth ; but he would not allow himself for a moment to be shrunk into the contemptible insignificance of a mere " churchman." Living or dying, to the multitudes, to his disciples, in parable or plain speech, he never used the woixi " church," so far as the records show. 420 THE THIRD PASSOVER TO THE FEAST OF TABER?TACLES. Twice in Matthew — and it never occurs in the other three evan- gelists— a word in the original is translated " church." * If it were granted, which it is not, that the word means , . f .. ^ what is now ordinarily understood by church, it ' church. J ^ .1 •< would be a most lemarkable thing that this Teacher, who was a great talker in eveiy sense, shonld have only twice alluded to the subject of church. 33ut when we come to examine these two passages we find no " church " in them. One of them is this, which records the confession of Peter. "On this rock will I build iny chtircJi,^^ are the words of the common Eng- lish version. The Greek word translated " church " is eKKXjaia, eoclesia, which does not mean an organization of any kind, but simply a congregation. An assembly brought together by the common crier in Athens was called ecclesia. In all the English versions before the days of Queen Elizabeth (except Wicklif's) the word was translated "congregation." The word "church" was substituted in the Bishops' Bible for the word " congrega- tion," and by express order of King James was so substituted in the authorized version of 1611, in ever}' place where it occurs in the Xew Testament. In the German versions the Koman Catho- lic translators and commentators employ the term kirche, church, while the Protestants use gemeinde,, congregation. The German Bible published in 1557, by Com-ad Badius, has "congregation." As Jesus performed no " ecclesiastical " act, as he made no or- ganization of any kind, as he gave no directions to his disciples to make any kind of close cc^i-poration, as he nowhere speaks any- thing which involves the idea of churchness, in any measure or sense, and as he broke in witli many ruptures upon the ecclpsias- ticism which existed among his own countrymen, teaching that character was everything and mere position an incidental, we have a right to believe that ho was no churchman. Wliat, then, did he mean? Simply this. His congregation, that is, all who heard liis call and came to it, should be built upon the foundation of the hearty belief that he was a His con^ega- (^ij^.|jjg personao-e, tlie Son of the living God, and tion. 1 o ^ c7 ' sent and set apart to be the Deliverer. Whether he had any right to make such a claim is a question for tlie de- ]>artmcnt of theology. All that we concern ourselves to know ia this — what did he mean ? He certainly meant that much, and * The other passage is in Matt, xviii. 17, and will be considered in its place. THE GKIiAT COXFESSION. 421 chat is more than churchism. lie meant that whoever took Jesna for his deliverer, that soul was of his congregation, whether bap- tized or not, whether enrolled in any society or church, oi not All other things had fluxions, but this belief in hiin was to l^e the one invariable element of life ; it was to be the firmest foundation on which character could be built. lie e\idently believed also, and taught, that in all ages thei-e would be men who, like Peter, would plant and stake their all upon a hearty belief in Jesus as the divine Deliverer of human souls, so that, whether there should l)e visible churches or not, his congregation should exist forever. The " gates of the grave," the under- world, death, — for the word translated " hell " in the com- mon version means this, and not a place of punishment, — " the gates of death shall not prevail against it ;" — which simply means that men may be born and may die, but there would always be those who believed in him as divine, and trusted in him as their Saviour: and tliese should constitute his " couirreiration." Quite natm-ally cau the words which follow be interpreted, if one's mind be turned away from the fixed idea of churchism. All the controversy on the meaning of the powers of the keys has arisen from supposing that Jesus "^^^ powers of was talking "church," to which subject he was ^ ^^^' making no allusion in any way whatever. The " kingdom of the heavens" does not mean a "church" or the " church." The very breadth of the expression ought to have led men to see that it means something much larger. The "kingdom of the heavens" can no more be contained in the church than the whole physical heavens can be folded up and laid away in a stone cathedral. He that is only a churchman shall have only the keys of the church. Whatsoever he binds shall be bound in the church, whatsoever he looses shall be loosened in the church. But that is his limit. He cannot go outside this human organization called the church. But whosoever receives Jesus as divine, and trusts him as his Saviour, shall have the keys of all heavens, the range of the univei-se, and all home-rights in the Father's house of many man- sions. How much gi-ander and more reasonable is this teaching of Jesus than the dogmas of some scholastic theologians ! Take any of their theories, and how little and immaterial they are ! They narrow heaven, and belittle God, and degrade Jesus. They pledge 422 THE THIRD PASSOVEK TO THE FEAST OF TABEKNACLES. tlie Infinite One to sanction any decisions of a very frail man, whom Jesus, in almost the next breath after this commendation, was compelled to rebuke and call Satan, or else they yield into the hands of a corporate body of men, comprising wise and fool- ish, learned and ignorant, strong and weak, good and wicked, the monopoly of deciding all moral questions and all human desti- nies. If that is what Jesus meant in this interview, he therein contradicted all that he had taught elsewhere, which was that character is everything and office nothing as concerns a man's per- sonal salvation. It drops him immeasurably. If that was his meaning, he is no more than a priest and a Levite. He ceases to be the cosmopolitan soul, the multitudinous man, the loftiest Son of Man, and the only-begotten Sou of God. If there be any consistency in his doctrines, Jesus intended to apply to all men who made Peter's confession this proposition which he uttered concerning Peter. It would be most uncritical to take this solitary passage and interpret it into a signification which contradicts all his other teachings. To say that the power of the keys signifies " the pre- rogative of the Apostles either to admit into the kingdom of heaven or to exclude from it," is to say that Almighty God abdi- cated in favor of an impetuous though generous man, who was always blundering, if Peter's primacy is to be maintained ; or that the sceptre of the " King eternal " was transferred to a body of men whom their teacher, to the very last, chid for their stupidity and want of faith. Contrast with this the real meaning of Jesus. Wlioever accepts him as the Divine Deliverer, and lives sincerely in that faith, shall be perpetually binding on himself certain things or casting fi-om himself certain things, but all his decisions he shall afterwards find were sanctioned by the heavenly Father. The power of the keys is given to every believer, and it is a power to be exercised over himself alone and not over another. Sincere faith in Jesus is the only safe guide through earth and heaven, and it is a perfectly safe guide. No forms nor ceremonies give entrance into this kingdom, nothing but the heart's unwavering belief that he is "the Anointed Deliverer, the Son of the living God." One may enter " the church," man's organization, by bap- tism and other rites, with oral or written profession of creeds, but one can enter the " kingdom of the heavens " only as he takes Jesus fur his guide. He may be in both the church and the king- THE GKEAT CONFESSION. 423 dom ; but being in one is no evidence whatever that he is in the other. Men shall come from the east and the west and sit down in " the kingdom," while " churchmen " may be cast into outer darkness. It was an immense assertion, "VVliether he had any right tc make it or not, Jesus certainly did put forward the claim to be the only medium of entrance into the freedom and enjoyment of the kingdom of the heavens. It seems to have satisfied Jesus that he had secured not simply a foothold in human affection, but a real root in humanity. lie charged his disciples not to go out and announce him as the Messiah. It was sufficient that they believed in him. The mul- titudes were looking for a sensuous millennium, and a secular Messiah to reign therein. It was too late to revolutionize them. He had not succeeded. His disciples would not succeed. The time for the i)erception of the beauty and grandeur of a spiritual Messialiship had not arrived. It would come, lie was content to await its coming, so that only the "seed of the kingdom" were meanwhile kept in the earth. In the history of Jesus appears what we do not detect in other men. He had a control over history. He allowed nothing to he antedated in fact, while he anticipated everything Jesus controls history. in thought. The shadow of the cross on his path lay as distinct as that which Gustave Dore, in his terriljle pictures, throws everywhere on the M-ay of the "Wan- dering Jew." He saw it. He talked of his death, before it oc- curred, with as much definiteness as he did of that of John tlie Baptist after it had occurred. His disciples could not see the outline of the shadow on tlie path until Jesus pointed it out to them, Now he begins to tell them " plainly," says tlie rccoi-d in Mark viii., that he must go up to Jerusalem, He had absented himself from the late Passover; now he "musi go to Jerusalem." He should suffer many things. The consjjiracy formed aii:;n'nst him by the elders and chief priests and scribes should culminate in bis death. He should certainly be killed. But, — on the third day he should rise again ! He plainly pre- dicted that. The prediction of the resurrection seems to have made no im- pression upon them, VVliether it was because he talked so much in parables with them that their exegesis was often sorely puz- 4:24 THE THIRD PASSOVER TO THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. zled, SO that they know uot when to interpret his words literally and wlien figuratively,* — or whether the startling and astound- ing announcement that he was to be killed came e pre ic s ^^^ suddenly after his ioy at the recoocnition of resuiTection. i . -»j- • i i • i r n his Messnihship,- — the tact comes out afterward.- that they totally forgot the prediction of the resurrection. The sratemcnt that he, the newly acknowledged Messiah, was to l»'e killed, was more than Peter could bear. lie seized him by hand, or dress, or perhaps in embrace, and exclaimed," " God save thee,t lord ; not to thee shall this be ! " He actually undertook to rebuke him, as Matthew and Mark agree in recording. Jesus turned his back on Peter, saying, " Go behind me, Satan: thou art my stumbling-stone ; for thou i-egardest not the things of R buk P t Grod, but the things of men." A moment ago the Pock on wliich the church was to be built ! if we accept the interpretation of churchism : then it is fair to hold churchism to what Jesus says now, and this same Peter is the veiT devil and a stumbling-stone ! But the words no more applj- to Peter here than there, in the sense of a closely restricted personal application. They contain a general truth. He who cannot accept the self-abnegation of Jesus, and endure the humiliation of a violent and ignominious death, but is so carnal and secular as to desire a reign of visible temporal glor}^ is a stumbling-block to the work of Jesus in the world. When they met face to face, as Jesus and Peter did, it was a pei-sonal rebuke. Satan is the Hebrew name for the chief of evil spirits, in whose existence as a personality Jesus certainly believed. The general meaning of the word is Tempter^ or, more correctly. Adversary^ one who sets himself in opposition to goodness and duty and j'ight. It may have been used in this general sense to Peter, but certainly very pointedl}', and with a distinct recognition of the personal existence of Satan. * The reader may consult John iv. 33; Matthew xvi. 7; and John xi. 12, for passages in which Jesus manifestly epoke figuratively, and which his dis- ciples interpreted literally. At other times he spoke literally and they under- Sftood him figuratively : see Matthew XV. 15, 17; John xi. 11, 17; and John vi. 70 f The phrase in the Greek is an ab- breviation, and literally is, " Propitious to thee," or " Gracious to thee," mean- ing that the goodness of God should save the person from the evil spoken ; a sudden ejaculatory prayer for the safety of the person addressed. The very form shows the great excitement of Peter. THE GREAT CONFESSION. 425 This resistance of Peter to the aniiomicement by Jesus of his comino; death is proof tliat, iiotwithstandiiiir his noble and loft^^ ackno\vled^ii:inent of the spiritual Messiahsliij) of Jesus, thei-e still clung worldly notions to tlie mind of Peter, and to the disciples and followers generally. He therefore called his disciples and the people near to himself, and delivei-ed a discourse to them, the substance of which is preserved by Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and which was as follows : — "If any one wishes to come after me, let him deny himself, and take up liis cross and follow me. For whosoever may wisli to save liis life shall lose it- and whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gos- pel's, shall find it. For what shall a man be profited if lie Addresses his (liscipies. should gain the whole world and lose his own life, or l)e cast away ? or what shall a man give in excliange for his life ? "Whosoever shall confess me before men, him will I confess also Ijcfore my Father Avhich is in heaven, and before the angels of God ; but whosoever shall deny me and be ashamed of me and of my words before men in this sinful and adulterous generation, him will I also deny before my Father which is in the heavens: for the Son of Man shall come in his own glory, and in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works. Verily I say unto you, That there be some standing liere wliich shall not taste of death till they see the Son of Man coming in liis kingdom mth power." Which seems to mean this : His Messiahship had been acknow- ledged, but it was to be a bitter disappointment, even to many M-ho acknowledged it, because he was going to be ,.,,,,,. , in, V r. Its meaning'. killed. It any man thought of becoming Ins dis- ciple, he must make up his mind to abandon all hopes of ])ecu- niary advantage and personal ease and indulgence. He must go further. He must deny himself, "\7hat flesh and blood call for, he must often refuse even to himself. He must submit to igno- miny and torture. Nothing was so disgraceful and painful as death by crucifixion, in which the condemned was compelled to carry the cross, which was to be the instrument of his torture, to the place of execution. So his disciples must learn perfect sub- mission to extreme sufferings. But there was a compensation even here. A man who gives his life up for the sake of Jesus and those doctrines of philanthropy which he preached, should indeed lose luxuries, comforts, home delights, and many a sensu- ous pleasure, but after all should find the truest and sweetest uses of life : whereas the selfish hoarder of his vital powers should find them shrinking within him. In general, vitality is maintained 426 THE THIRD PA880VER TO THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. and strengthened by living largely, putting out the energies widely, life being not income but outgo. In that case why should a man lose his life ? If he kill himself in the effort to grasp the whole world, even if that effort should be imagined to prove successful, nothing would come of it. He would be gone, lost, a castaway, out of existence ; then where would there be any use of ])leasures if he did not exist to enjoy them ? The basis of eveiything is life. The universe is nothing without life. A man must therefore do all he can to increase his physical, intellectual, and spiritual vitality. The world will be so much world to him, and the man will be so much man to himself in proportion as he has life. And life is got by giving. The more a man gives himself to his generation the more he gets out of it. Jesus taught that to follow him was the way to gain life by giving it. Men nnist tlierefore confess him l)y following him. He was going through a dark i)assage. lie would ^ , not conceal that from them. Jhit tlieir hope of Messianic glory was not all a dream. It was a mistake in so far as it was secular, but it was a truth in so far as it recognized him as the conquering Deliverer. He was to come in glory, in his own glory and God's, which he spoke of as being iden- tical, with a holy familiarity, in such style as no man before his time or since has ever dared to employ. The rewards of mankind he represented as being in his hands, — a prodigious claim ! He knew the works of every man, and in exact accordance with those works he should give each man his reward, and there should be no mistake. He closed his address with the statement that there were those present who should not die until they saw the Son of Man coming in his kingdom with power. I do not know what AQincomprehen- j^^ ,^^^^,^^^ j)-^ j^j^ disciples? Did any event ever occur in their life-time which corresponds with this statement ? If so, where is it recorded ? I know what theories have been propounded in explanation, have read the commentators, am familiar with the views of theologians, and have perhaps a theory of my own ; but the plain question, to be honestly answered, would amount to this : As each man in that company died, if he had been asked in his last moments whether he had seen any event which was to him a fulfilment of these words of Jesus, could he have designated any such event ? If he could, we have no means of ascertaining the fact. CHAPTER III. THE TRANSFIGURA.TION. It was about a week after tlie confession made by Peter that an event of great interest, as a fresh revelation, occurred in the history of Jesus. The narrative, as col- lected from all the New Testament historians, Probably Mount Hermon. Matt. IS this : ^ ^ JJ.YU . Mark ix. ; Jesus took Peter, James, and John nito a high Luke ix. mountain apart. As he prayed he was trans- figured before them. The fashion of his countenance was altered, and his face shone like the sun, and his raiment became shining and white as the snow, white as the light, whiter than any earthly fuller could make them. Moses ^. ® ^^^^ ^" in- 'IT ration, and Elijah were present and talknig with Jesus, who had a glorious appearance, and they spoke of his death at Jerusalem, "which he should accomplish." The three disciples were hea\'y with sleep, but this vision kept them awake by its splendor. As Moses and Elijah departed, Peter said unto Jesus, " Sir, it is good for us to be here ! If thou wilt, I will make here three tents; one for thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elijah." He spoke at random, for he was greatly scared. While he was speaking, the awe of the disciples was increased by the over- spreading of a bright cloud, out of which came the words, " This is my Son, the Beloved, in whom I am well pleased : hear him." This splendor and these words overpowered them, and they fell on their faces greatly afraid. And when the voice was past, Jesus came and touched them, and said, "Arise, and be not afraid." And when they lifted up their eyes they saw no man but Jesus. As they came down from the mountain his disciples asked him why the Scribes taught that Elijah must first come. His answer was, "Elijah truly shall come, and restore all things: but I say unto you, That Elijah is come already, and they knew him not, 428 TUE TUIKD PASSOVER TO THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. but have done to him whatever they wished. Thus also is the Sou of Man about to suffer by them." The disciples understood him to mean John the Baptist in this last speech. Why Elijah must ^^^^ ^^ ^. descended from the mountain, Jesus first come. "^ . , m n i charged them, saying, " lell the vision to no man until tlie Son of Man be risen from the dead." Luke and Mai-]< say that the injunction was obeyed. The disciples did nut tell any tiling of the vision outside their own circle, but inside they held discussion of the meaning of the perplexing phrase, " risen again from the dead." It would appear that the intimation of his sufferings and death had had a depressing effect upon the mind of his dis- ciples. Under this cloud they struggled and questioned their own hearts for the space of a week, when the event of the trans- figuration gave new form to their thoughts and hopes. It is not known precisely what mountain was the site of this transfiguration. In the fourth century, from a passing remark by Cyril of Jerusalem, tradition fixed on Mount 1 e o ^ e "jjj^jijQj. jjj Galilee, famous for the beauty of its Transfiguration. ^ ^ form and for the wide view oi Central Palestine beheld from its summit. In the sixth century three churclies were built on its top, suggested by Peter's idea of three booths. Subsequently a monastery was founded. But later criticism has displaced the claims of Tabor. It was possible for Jesus, by a very forced march, of which we have no account, to reach Tabor within the period specified. But why should he return to Galilee, where his enemies were seeking him to destroy him? Mark (ix. 30) informs us that he did not go into Galilee until after this event. Moreover, Tabor was occupied, to its summits, by settlements, and had been, probably, from the time of Joshua. Jesus was in the highlands of Gaulonitis, in the region of CsBsarea Philippi. Whoever in this place looks up for a "high mountain," immediately sees the sublime heights of Ilermon, and the almost common consent of travellers and critics is now given to the theory that the transfiguration took place somewhere on Hermon. Jesus had with him the three representative and trusted dis ciples, Peter and James and John. It was his custom to go into the mountains for evening prayer., and sometimes to continue his devotions through the entire night. He seems to have done so ia THE TRANSFIGURATION. 429 this instance. lie prayed while his futigued disciples slept. At some period of the night a strange awe suffused their slumbers. They woke to see their Master in a state of glori- fication. His face shone like the sun, and his very gai-nients were glistening, snowy white, and luminous. Mark was struck with that fact, which must have been narrated to him by one of the spectators, and his sim])le remark is that they wei'e white "as no fuller on earth can white them." This was tlio first stage of the marvel. Then two unknown men stood with him. They entered into solemn discoui-se with Jesus. The disciples learned from the lofty conversation that these were Moses and Elias, the founder and the defender of the theocracy Tliey spoke to Jesus about his death, wliich was shortly to occur. It was an awful time to the disciples. It seemed to flasli upon Peter's mind that Jesus was now about to declare oi)enly that Messiahship of his which Petei» had so recently confessed : that on this mount he was about to fix Peter's conjec- ture, the seat of his empire, with Moses and Elijah as his prime ministers. It was the prevalent belief of the Jews that Elijah was to precede and herald the Messiah, bViiig back the pot of manna and Aaron's rod, settle the contro\ersie3 between the Jewish schools, purify the people by some lustration, and hand the nation over to King Messiah. He seemed now about to begin this grand inauguration. But then, on the in- stant, he and Moses retire. Peter, in his general confusion and fright, blunders out a request to Jesus to be permitted to erect there such booths as the Jews Avere accustomed to pnt up in a temporary style for their Feasts of Tabernacles, so that Moses and Elijah might remain with Jesus and carry forward the great work. Before Jesus made any response a bright cloud en<'ircled them, and the disciples were sore ama/.cd and frightened as they en- tered the cloud. A new marvel broke on them. A voice sounded from the brightness, saying, " This is my Son, the Beloved, in whom I am well ])lcased : hear him." The disciples fell on their faces, and remained so until Jesus came and touched them and encouraged them to arise, when they found that they were alone with Jesus. Whatever theory may be adopted as to this history, the effects 430 THE TUIED PASSOVER TO THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. upon tlie minds of the disciples is the important consideration : whether it was a vision which all three saw consentaneously, in all its parts, in a dream, or whether, being awake, discf™°°^^^ they were in such a physical, intellectual, and spiritual state as, all together, to have witnessed these phenomena, it is certain that there were impressions made upon them which had great influence subsequently upon theii character and conduct. The surpassing glory of Jesus, his con- sistency with the law and the prophets, the subjection of Moses and Elijah to Jesus, his suffering of death not vitiating his claims to the Messiahship, were certainly represented with great power to the minds of these three representative and influential disci- ples, and by them brought to bear npon the whole body of the neai-est followers of Jesus. 13ut still there were two perplexities created by this vision and by the words of their Master. One was the " being raised again from the dead," as applied to Jesus. If he were the Messias, how could he die ? How could death have power over a being so glorious that the effulgence of his person rendered his very garments glistening ? They never did find a satisfactory solution of that problem through the whole life-time of their Master. That he was in some mysterious man- ner to accomplish at Jerusalem something which might be repre- sented as a death, they had gathered from the conversation of Moses and Elijah ; but that he should really depart this life by dying, being virtually murdered, and that his spirit should come back to that same mangled body and lift it from the grave, and go about in it as if he had never died, is a series of thoughts which seems never to have entered their minds. Their second trouble was to reconcile the fact that they had seen Elijah leave Jesus, apparently not to return, with the predic- tion of Malachi (iv. 5, 6) that Elijah must fii-st plexit° ^^ ^^^' ^^^"^' which, as their religious instructoi-s had taught them to believe, meant that the personal appearance of the prophet Elijah was to precede that of the Mes- sias. Here he had shown himself to only three of the disci- ples, and not to the body of the people ; and instead of preceding Jesus, had really appeared to. no one until this late period in the ministiy of Jesus. Their Master gave them to understand that John the Baptist had fulfilled all predictions of a forerunner ; THE TKANSFIGURATION. 431 that lie had preceded Jesus with the power of Elijah, and had been slaughtered, and that the fate of the Baptist prefigured the sufferings which he himself was to endure. His own approach- ing death by violence seemed as plain before his eyes as that of John, which had already been accomplished. After these wonderful revelations Jesus enjoined silence on the three witnesses. We can readily conjecture good reasons for tliis. They had become so affected by this interview that they could carry the moral influence into the whole body of the disciples without the description of phenomena which might give rise to perplexing and inharmonious discussions. Everything was to be done which should suppress the sensuous Messianic expectations of his followers. The very criticism made on this transaction by such men as Paulus and Yenturini and Strauss in modern days, shows just the spirit with W'hicli the narrative of such lofty scenes and experiences would have been met by the multitude and by the learned men of that time, who were generally coarse, skepti- cal, and profane. "When no good can possibly come of speaking, and much evil may, it is wisdom to keep silence. Immediately upon the descent from the mountain occurred a scene which stands in contrast witli tlie lofty splendor of the Transfiguration. Jesus came to the nine disci- ples whom he had left behind, and found them in -r,, ... T ^ , ' sarea Pmlippi. great trouble and perplexity, and the ]u»stile Mark ix. ; Matt. Scribes vexing them with questions, and the ^^i- > ^^^ i^ multitude about them in a tmnult. But there must have been something in the natural dignity of the person of Jesus, and perhaps on this occasion some reminiscence of the glory wherewith he had shone on the eyes of his three disciples in tlie Mount ; for the people were amazed at his appearance, and ran towards him and saluted him. He asked them, " "NVliy do ye question among yourselves? " The disciples gave no answer, nor the Scribes. The former were ashamed of their weakness in the absence of their Master, and the latter feared his power now that he was present. The question, however, was soon an- swered by a man from the crowd, who came forward and kneeled down before Jesus, and said : " Teacher, I have brouirht to thee my son, mine only child, who has a dumb spirit ; and where it seizes him it tears him, and he suddenly cries out and foams, and gnashes with his teeth, and pines away, and the spirit with diffi- 432 THE THIRD passover to the feast of tabernacles. cultj departs from him ; for he is a hmatic and sore vexed. And I spoke to thy disci])les that they should cast him out ; and they could not." Here was the whole case, with all its difficulties, revealed. Here was a spectacle of mental and physical wretchedness, an ei)ile])tic and lunatic youth, whom the disciples The demoniac j^.^j ^^^^ ^^^^^^,^^. ^^ j^^^l . ^^^^ because tliey failed when tliey tried, the party antagonistic to Jesus had stirred up the nniltitude to profane skepticism, and perhaps to taunts, rejecting the Master in the perso'is of the disciples, who, under these jeers, on account of their weakness, grew still more impotent. The conti-ast with the Mount of Transfiguration was violent. Hafaelle's great picture in the Vatican presents to the eye the idea of the contrast, but fails to express it all. The Mount Avas bright and warm, and full of celestial health and har- monies, but ]ici-e in the pUiin were physical disease and mental disoi-dcr, and daikness, and clang of discordant voices and pas- sions. It smote fiom the sensitiveness of Jesus the expression : "O faitliless generation, iiow long sliall I be with you? How long shall I suflci- yon ?" Wluit long pent up agony suspii'ed in that groan ! lie had Ii\ed to teach them that faith in God was everything as a basis of character and as an energy of life ; and it all seemed to come to nothing. He knew the power and good- ness of God so well that want of trust in II im on the part of others gave Jesus the greatest suffering. He could not endure it. It was not the sins into which their passions betrayed them that M'as most gj-ievous, but the la(;k of faith which allowed their pas sions such power over tlieir lives. " Bring him to me," he said. And as they brought him the boy had another fit, and he fell and wallowed foaming. And Jesus asked the father : " How long since this Brought to Jesus. , i i. i • o » a i i i u -t' ha])i)ened to Inm ? And lie answered : " 1' rom a child : — and often it has cast him into the fire and into the wa- ters, that it might destroy him ; but if thou art able, have com- passion on us and help us." Jesus replied : " If thou art able !— all things are possible to him Avho believes." There may be a doubt as to the ])rccise shade of meaning which Jesus attached to these words. The emphasis makes great difference. " Jf thou art able ! " would be quoting the man's words and rebuking him for the implication of inability on the part of Jesus. Repeating THE TKAXSFIGUKATION. 433 the mail's words without any emphasizing would be to say: "It is not a question of abihty, physical or intellectual, but purely of faith ; if I have faith enough I can do this ; if my disciples had had faith eiiougli they might have done it." Both these mean- ings may be in the speech of Jesus, but I think that over them predominates the sense given by the words when emphasized as above : " K thou — the fatlier of the child — art able." No faith on the part of Jesus would have a's'ailed if the man remained un- believing: and, — faith is strength. " If thou art able" to believe — is the reply to " If thou art able " to cure. It is only the repetition of tlie teaching of Jesus that the greatest power of humanity lies in its trust in the Father God, that this gives a man control over all the possibilities of the universe, and that things become possible to men in proportion to their faith ; that as a man extends the radius of his faith he enlarges the circle of his possi- bilities. Faith and Love, in the system of Jesus, are tlie two great wings which bear a man upward through tlie universe to the liighest attainments and enjoyments. The father must have felt that there was some rebulce in the reply of Jesus. He burst into tears and said: " Sir, I believe; do thou help mine unbelief." This is at once so natural, so simple, and so profound, that every ® at er a , J' 1 1 1 • • . emotions. reader must reel that he is j^erusmg a narrative of actual events. The father believed that his unbelief was in the way of the healing of his child ; he. believed that Jesus could do something to destroy that unbelief ; lie prayed him to do it, BO that at once his infidelity and his child's malady might be cui'ed. - If it was not the 'S'oice, it was at least the echo of faith. It was enough. By this time the people had begun to run together. He made no prayer, but said authoritatively, " Dumb and deaf spirit, I charge thee come out of him, and enter no more '",,,,.,,. 1 . 11' ,1 Jesus heals the into hnn. And shrieking, and having greatly ^ convulsed him, it left ; and the boy la}' as if he were dead, so much so that some of the spectators prououiuicd him dead. But Jesus took his hand and raised liim ; and he stood up. When they entered the house, bis disciples privately asked him the cause of their failure. He plainly traced it to their lack of faith. They then pi-ayed, " Lord, increase our faith." Ilis reply 28 i34 THE TnmD passover to the feast of tabernacles. was, " If you have faith as a grain of mustard, ye might say to this sycamine tree, ' Be rooted up and planted in the sea,' and it would have obeyed you ; or to this mountain, ' Ke- ^ , ,® ^°^' move hence yonder,' and it should obey you. And pies could not. *^ . . "^ "^ nothing should be impossible to you." He also eaid to them, " This kind can come forth by nothing except by prayer." It was a strong expression of the value attached to faitli by Jesus. Stier seldom said a more sensible thing than his com- ment on this passage. " Faith cannot make it its concern, in a literal sense, to be removing mountains of the earth. But if it could be, and ought to be its concern, then faith would be able really [literally] to remove mountains." All the possibilities are within the reach of faith. But if a man have not faith, even the possibilities become impossibilities. The removing of matei-ial mountains is a matter of small moment. It would be curious to stand on a peak of the Alps, and see a spur of the mountain lifted by a word and set down quietly in a Swiss lake ; but it would be nothing more. Nothing useful, or beautiful, or profitable would be in it. A man who takes from his fellow-men a mountain of doubt, of intellectual and spiritual difficulty, is greater, does a grander, wiser, better, lovelier thing. Yery currently in the school of the Rabbins was a remover of such difficulties finely called " An Uprooter of mountains." CHAPTER lY. LAST DAYS IN GALILEE. 7^0 such a pitch had risen the opposition to Jesus that he no longer dart-d to show himself openly along the high-roads, lest his life and his ministry should be brought to a sudden termination by violence. He could not go Throiigh North- down to the lake. So, crossinc; the Jordan near . nr xi. ' •• ' ° IX. ; Matt. xvii. ; its source, by field-paths and through byways Luke ix. he went with his disciples through Upper Galilee. In Gaulonitis he had declared to his nearest and most trusted disciples that his end was approaching, and that it was to be one of great shame and pain. But there were scattered throughout Galilee quite a body of people who in such measure believed on him that they might be called disciples. To these, "of whom a nucleus of more than five hundred brethren survived the trial of the cross," he now made the same announcement in plain lan- guage, saying, " The Son of Man is being delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill him ; and when he is killed, after three days he shall arise." Here was an open prediction of a violent death, and of a resurrection after a certain specified time. And yet they could not understand it. They could see no necessity for it. It was so contrary to all their expectations, to his great power and niighty works, that his death was utterly incompre- hensible. The resurrection was totally unintelligible. And they were afraid to ask him what this saying meant ; but it was a sad- ness and a sorrow to them. We do not know how long this journey was, nor what spots of Northern Galilee he visited. It was manifestly not intended to be a circuit of preaching, but a season to be spent in instructing his disciples, especially in the matter of his great trial, which he saw approaching. After some time he brought his disciples to Capernaum. On their arrival, Peter, who Avas the most demonstrative, and there- 436 THE TiriKD PASSOVEK TO THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. fore the most conspicuous of the little band, was applied to by tho collectors of the didrachms. This didrachra (or donble-drachm) was of about the value of thirty American cents tr ^i. ^'" " ^' ill ffold, and was the half-shekel tribute to the Tem- tax. Matt. xvu. . • -r^ pie mentioned in Exodus xxx. 13. Every Jew acknowledged it. Even during the Babylonish captivity it was conscientiously and punctually paid. It was not, then, a tax to the Roman govenmicnt, for it had been collected long anterior to the Roman rule. Jesus had been absent from his home, and now, upon his return to Caperiuxum, being in arrears, as this money had been due since the previous March, it was expected that he would attend to it. And yet there was something so excep- tional in his character and history that the collectors hardly dared to aj^proach Jesus on the subject, but preferred to speak to his disciples. After he had passed into the house, they said to Peter, " Does not your Teacher })ay the didrachm ? " As all paid it, Peter supposed of course that Jesus would, and, genei'ally blun- dering, often through his gushing earnestness and generosity, he said, "" Yes." Perhaps he felt that his Teacher's honor was at stake, and, forgetting what he had a short time ago confessed, that Jesus was the Son of the living God, and thus, as Jesus declared of himself, greater than the Temple, he had placed his Master in the difficulty of confessing himself to be liable to Tem- ple-tribute, or of taking a position in which oifence would be gi\en where no good could be done. When Peter entered the house, Jesus said to him, " Wliat think- est thou, Simon ? From whom do the kings of the earth i-eceive tariff or poll-tax, of their own sons or of others ? " , ,, , ., Peter answered, " Of others." Of course a prince should not pay it. ' ^ '■ of blood royal would not pay a capitation-tax ! "Thei-efore the sons are free," responded Jesus. Peter must have licard in the words and tone a very deep meaning. Jesus chiimed to he a son of Jehovah in a sense in which no other Jew, and thc'i-efore no other human being, could utter the claim. lie A\as a son, free in his Father's house. Other men might pay Temple-tax, Ijut surely not he. The admission of Peter, the logi- cal connection of which that disciple did not perceive, took back his former confession and reduced Jesus to the level of an itiner- ant teacher. From this predicament his Master relieved him, saying, " But, LAST DATS m GALILEE. 437 LTSntACHUS, tliat we may not offend tlieni, go to tlie lake and cast a hook, and take the first fish that conies np ; upon opening its mouth thou shalt find a stater; take that, and give it to tlieni for nie and thee." It is to be presumed tliat Peter did ^ so, else the narrative would have found no place in the history. The stater was a coin equal to the Hebrew shekel, about sixty American cents gold, and was therefore two double didraehms : it paid for two. But it is to be noticed that while Jesus put himself into brotherhood and sympathy with his disciples, there is always a dignified reserve. He does not say, " Give it for us ; " but " for me and for thee:' This was a mii-acle or nothing. It was at least a miracle of knowledge, being out of the usual methods in which knowledge is gained. It was not a creation. There was no need of that. And Jesus never created before ^ miracle of the eyes of men. He did not make the money in ^^^'^^'^se. the fish. The fish had swallowed it. He knew it, and knew that it would come to Peter's hook. And it came. Tlie tax was paid. It is quite easy to say that this was a selfish act, that it was ex- erted for his personal benefit, and that it was undignified and un- necessary. It occurred. There is nothing else undignified, and unnecessary, and selfish in this man's life. To have paid' this special tax would have been to surrender what he had claimed, and to let his disciples down from the high place to which he had been so long engaged in lifting theuL As the Son of God, in a sense higher than any which can be claimed by any other, whic^i is manifestly what he thought and taught himself to be, he should not pay the Temple-tax. Kings do not tax ])rinces of the blood royal. As God's Only Begotten he was free in his Father's house. Kevertheless, as it would have been most impi-udent to plant himself on that claim at this juncture of his history, and as Peter had pledged the payment of this tax, he perfoi-med this mn-acle, which at once meets the case and declares his superiority to other men. Several circumstances now combined to increase in the disci- ples the rigor of their anticipations of a sensuous Messianic reign. 438 THE THIKD PASSOVEK TO THE FEAST OF TABEBNACLES. Jesus had told them that the end approached. The intimatione of the darkness and sorrow that awaited him, with which ha accompanied this prediction, seem to have mada Messianic hopes; little impression upon them. The Messiah waa Mark ix.- Matt. ^^ ^.^j ^^j sorrows wouJd be like the morn- xvm • Lukexvii., . ,1,^ t • • mim /> 2^^ ing cloud beiore the rising sun. Ihe Iransligura- tion, the miracle of the stater in the fish's mouth, combined with the ground he took as to his non-liability to be taxed, made them feel that the kingdom had in some sense been set up, and that the time of the distribution of honors must be api^roaching. Certain things had excited their vanity. Peter had received special commendation for his confession. Peter and James and John had been taken to witness the splendors of the Transfiguration. A miracle had been performed by which money had been procured to pay Peter's Temple-tax. Poor human nature could not endure all this, and so they fell into a dis- pute in regard to the Primacy. Wlien they reached the pres- ence of Jesus they were flushed with the excitement of the discussion. Matthew says that they came and submitted the question to Jesus. Mark says that Jesus perceived the thought of their hearts. Their very visages plainly told of the alter- cation they had had. lie questioned them as to wluit had been the subject of dispute. They were silent with shame. But he pushed them to a reply, and they said that they had been dis- puting on the question, " AVho is the greater in the kingdom of heaven?" Here was the spirit of churchism cropping out, with its oflicial distinctions and struggles for ofiice, which have been the curse of religionists in all ages. It was a fitting time to The rule of pre- gj^^^^. ^low that kinc^dom of the heavens which he preached, the limitless field and perpetual dura- tion of principles of right, was set against everything that sa- \ored of churchism. There were to be no distinctions in that kingdom, no ofticers, no primacies. He called the twelve out, and laid down to tliem this principle : " If any man desire to be first, the same shall be last of all, and servant of all ; " as much as to say, profoundest humility and most extensive usefulness con- stitute the only ground of distinction in the kingdom of the heavens. The distinctions there are of character and not of office. LAST DAYS IN GALILEE. 439 A little child. John's frank confession. To impress this he took a little child * and set him in the midst of them, and when he had taken the boy in his arms he said to his disciples, " Uidess you shall be changed, and become as little children, you shall not enter into the kingdom of the heavens. AVhosoevei-, tlierefore, shall humble himself as this child, he is the greatest in the kingdom of the heavens. AYhosocver shall receive one of these children in my name receiveth me, and whos«je\ ei' shall receive me, receiveth not me, but him that sent me." This reminded John of something. The wideness of this catholic speech condcnmed a little act of sectarian meanness into which the disciples had been betrayed. It was frank in John to say, " Teacher, we saw one cast- ing out demons in thy name, and we forbade him, because he fcjlloweth not us." It was a most naive confession. It was an exhibition of denominationalism, sectarianism, churchism, in its very essence, but in its best manner. It gave Jesus an op- portunity to make a speech that ought to make any man blush to acknowledge himself a churchman, and in the same breath claim to be a Christian. Jesus said : " Forbid him not ; for there is no one who shall do a mighty work in my name and be able lightly to speak e\-il of me. For he that is not against us is for us. And whosoe\er shall offend one of these little ones believing in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hung upon his neck and that he were sunk in the depth of the sea. Woe unto the world from causes of offence ! For it must needs be that offences come ; but woe to the man by whom the offence comes. For every one shall be salted with fire. Salt is good ; but if the salt have become saltless, with what will you season it ? Have salt in your- selves, and have peace one with another. See that ye despise not one of these little ones ; for I say unto you. Their angels in the heavens always behold the face of my Father in the heavens." The connection seems to be this : Forbid no one. The doino' of any good thing is sufficient authority for the doing. Do not dis- courasje that follower of mine who follows me even at the jrreatest * There is a church tradition that this child was Ignatius, who afterward be- came a martyr. But there seems to be really no proof of this. The lack of Buch personal distinctions as minister to individual vanity is very striking in the absence of the names of many parties mentioned in the Scripture histories. Where there is no high moral reason fox it, no name is ever mentioned. 4:4:0 TIIE TIIERD PASSOVEK TO THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. distance and Avith the least faitli. Schism is a great evil, and schismatics greatly to be condemned. But who are schismatics 1 Those who are driven from a church because they will not yield the truth ? No, but those who drive them forth. The doom of a destroyer of faith is terrible. Incen- tives to defection will naturally occur, but w^oe to the man who makes them. Those who follow me will be subjected to severe trial. As every sacrifice before being presented to God is sprin- kled with salt, so each of my disciples is to be salted with fiery trials. Salt is a symbol of spiritual preservation. Have this spiritual life in you. If it be gone you are worthless. Have a keen, sharp, active spiritual life in yourselves as individuals, and be at peace auiong yourselves. Have life. J.et others have life. Strive not at all for ])re-eminence, but very much for inner life. And see that you do not despise one of these little ones. The angels in heaven are like them. God sees in the angels the counter23art of His humblest, simplest children. And, perhaps, he also meant that to those angels He connnits the keeping of little children and of child-like men. In this connection Jesus continued to teach them, and said : " Moreover, take heed to yourselves ; if your brother shall tres- pass, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone ; if he shall hear you, you have gained your brother. But if he will not hear you, take with yourself one or two, that by the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established. And if he neglect to hear them, tell it to the congregation ; * but if he neglect to hear the congregation, let him be to 3'ou as a heathen f and a tax-gatherer. Verily I say to you, Whatsoever ye shall bind upon the earth, shall be bound in the heavens ; and whatso- ever ye shall loose upon the earth, shall be loosed in lieaven. Again I say unto you. That if two of you shall agree upon earth about asking anything, it shall be done for them by my Father in the heavens ; for where two or three are gathered together in my name, there I am in the midst of them." In this teaching of the method of mending breaches of fra- teruid fidelity Jesus utters some ver}' profound HeaUng breaches. ^ ,, rn ,1 , • j: x- i truths, iwo men belong to a congregation or lol- lowers of Jesus. One is offended by his brother. Let him not, in * See what was said on the transla- I f WTiich means one of another na- tion of this word, page 420. I tion, a Gentile. LAST DAYS IN GALILEE. 441 turn, be an offender, but let him bring personal kindness to bear upon the offender for his restoration. It may prevail, and greater love come than existed before. But the offender may be incor- rigible. Let the offended take two witnesses, other brethren, so that this scandal may be kept from spreading, if possible, and so that if one continue to be offensi\e while the other is peaceable, it may be known which is the offender. If he shall continue un- appeasable, take the case to the congregation. If the voice of the brotherhood be disregarded, then the offender may be to the of- fended as if he were an " outsider," a Gentile, and a tax-gatherer, that is to say, no longer an object of fraternal confidence, but a subject for missir)nary zeal ; certainly not a person to be hated, for the whole teaching of Jesus and his whole conduct taught a different lesson. He received tax-gatherers and sinners, and ate with them. IS'ow, whatever profound principle may underlie the declaration of what is bound upon earth being bound in heaven, that princi- ple Jesus applies to every believer, to all the dis- ciples, to his congregation, and not to the Apostles ^^° agree, alone. That the whole essence of modern churchism and of an- cient Jiierarchism are totally absent ; tluxt the " power of the keys," as it is called, belongs not to any officials as such, but to all Clnis- tians as such, appears from the statement of Jesus, " If two of vou shall agree upon earth about asking anything, it sliall be done for them by my Father in the heavens ; " and from the reason which he assigns for this, namely, " For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them." These seem to be among the profoundest utterances and the loftiest claims of Jesus. AYlierever two souls exist, to both of whom some- thing is equally necessary, and necessary above everything else, so that they go to the heavenly Father with this united and para mount petition, it will be granted. It cannot be a trifling, earthly, temporary, egotistic thing ; it must be something that takes hofd of eternity. If such a thing be asked it will be granted, because nothing contrary to God's will can, under such circumstances, be requested. The only permanent platform of union for any two souls lies high up among the loftiest things of eternitv. Ilis idea of a true church now comes out. It is not a hierarchy. It does not rest on officials. Any two souls together, united in the name of Jesus, make a church, M-ith all powers and functions; 442 THE THIRD PASSOVER TO THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. for there is with them always a third, and that person is Jesus. There may be a true church Avitlioiit bishops, elders, and deacons. The fountain of spiritual power and authority is His idea of a always present ^vhere two souls are spiritually con- true cnurcrL »/ a a «/ joined. "Whetlier Jesus makes good these claims is a question for individual si)iiitual experiences; but thathedid make the claims is simply what we must record as history ; and this fact tears from the teacliing of Jesus all that men have in- serted therein whereon to build ecclesiasticism, denominationalism, sectarianism, and whate\'er would give to any one believer in Jesus what does not belong to every other. His was to be a holy catholic church, and a holy catholic church is one in w^hich are no persons wlio are not holy, and in which is no one who has what is not catholic, common to all. I Peter, the noble-hearted blundei-er, apparently having failed to ,isten cai'cfully to the discourse of Jesus, but pondering what had been said about offences, broke in with the ques- How frequently ^- "Lord, liow often shall my brother trespass lUSt I forgive ? .' i t r- • i- o rn-n • o« agamst me and 1 forgive mm ? iill seven times ? That seemed a large measure of placability to Peter.* But fancy the look which the laro^e-hearted Teacher g-ave him when over against Peter's close arithmetical calculation of foro;iveness he set a statement of boundless compassion. "Until seven times? I say not that, but until se\'euty times seven ! " That this compassioiiateness <»f Christian chai'acter might be impressed upon them lie related the following parable : " There- Parable of tlie fore shall the kingdom of the heavens be likened nnmerciful ser- uuto a human f king who wished to compare an ^^^*- account M-itli his slaves. And, beginning to com- pare, there was brought one to him, a debtor of many :j: talents. And he not having wherewitli to pay, the lord commanded him to be must! * It greatly exceeded the rabbinical rule of three times, which they based ou Amos i. 3 ; ii. G ; Job xxxiii. 29, 30. f lu the common version it is "a cer- tain king," in the original it is avepanra) PafftXet, a man, a king ; but it seems to me that the translation above gives the true sense, making avOpwrrw emphatic. So Meyer says, " da das IIimmeKREICII mit einem Menschlichen Konige ver- gUchen wird." I In the common version it is " ten thousand talents. " So a number of the MSS. have /xvpiaiv raXavToiv, but the old reading, as in the Codex Sin. , is irnWoiv, many. If the former reading be adopt- ed, it means an infinite, if the latter, an indefinite debt. One talent, Attic, was equal to G,000 denam. If the read- ing be 10,000 talents, then the one owed his lord 000,000 times as much as hia fellow-servant owed him. LAST DATS IN GALILEE, 443 sold, and the wife, and the little children, and all that he had, and payment to be made. Then the slave falling down woi-shipped him saying, ' Lord have patience with me and I will pay you all' Then the lord of that shive, moved with compassion, released him and forgave him the debt. But that slave going out found one of his fellow-slaves who owed him a iiundred denarii,* and, having seized him, he throttled him, saying ' Pay if you owe.' f Then hi's fellow-slave falling down besought him, saying, ' Have patience with me, and I will pay you.' And he would not ; but going out he cast him into prison until he should pay the debt. Then his fellow-slaves seeing what was done were very sorry, and came and told their own lord all that had been done. Tlien, having called him, his lord says to him, ' O wicked slave, I forgave you°all that debt because you did entreat me: did it not behoove you also to pity your fellow-slave as I also pitied you ? ' And his lord, being indignant, delivered him to the tormentors until he should pay all that was(>^ving to him. Thus also shall my heavenly Father do to you, if you fi-oni your hearts forgive not every one his brc/ther." ^ The moral of this beautiful parable is so apparent that it needs little ex])lication. It teaches the Christian doctrine of Forgive- ness. A man must be wide-hearted who is a sub- ject of the kingdom of the heavens. The parable ^*^ ™'"''^ is in accordance to what Jesus taught as a proper prayer, " Forgive as our trespasses, as we have forgiven those who trespass against us." When the slave who owed to the master vastly more* than his fellow-slave owed him, appealed for mercy to his lord, he pro- fessed by that very petition to believe that mercy was a grace which every man should show his fellow-man. AVhen he would not forgive his fellow-slave he showed that that profession was a lie. So when a man asks God to forgive him, he announces to God that he has forgiven his fellows their wrongs against him. If he has not, he is lying in his prayers. It is nJt simply an im- perative rule of government, it is a fundamental principle in Iniman nature. No man can solicit Avhat he does not believe to exist. If a man do not feel mercy in himself he cannot believe in mercy in another. * Say !|15 American gold. f And yet it is certain he did owe. So the meaning- must be, "Seeing that thou owest, pay me," which signifies that there is nothing to be done but to pay when anything is owing ; no room for mercy and forgiveness. 4:4:4: TTlll TIIIKD PASSOVER TO TUE FEAST OF TABEENACLES. About this time Jesus made auotlier missionary demonstration. lie organized thirty -live companies, each consisting of two disci- ]»les other than the twelve he had ah-eady selected, theseveutv Luke ^^ ^^ souicwhat difficult to keep the harmony of X. 1-8, IG ; Matt, the narrative at this point, and modern criticism vii. 6 ; X 2;}-25 ; has attacked the whole account of the Mission of Luke vi. 40 ; John ^]^g Seventy, as given by Luke, on the gi-ound that there is no trace of them in the subsequent history of Jesus or his early followers. It would seem that even a super- ficial view of the work assigned these seventy should be an answer to that. Jesus was shortly to go from Galilee to Jerusalem. lie sent these messengei's before his face. His time was shortening. Seventy men could rapidly spread themselves and make procla- mation of the gospel. It was not intended to institute a perpetual order. Indeed it seems to have been a temporary arrangement, and that Jesus probalily remained in Capernaum, from which, we believe, he sent foi-th these bands, initil their return, and then began his journey. It was to be a brief, quick movement, pre- j)aratory to his tra\"els towards Jerusalem. We are not compelled to understand by the words " into every city and place whither he v^^ould come," that Jesus would go to every town they visited, but that he would not enter any town where none of the Seventy had been. The ground occupied by these swift missionaries we cannot positively describe, but it is probable that it included a part of Samaria, and nuich of Perea and Judtea, wdiere he spent the last six months of his life. The commission was this : " Go : behold I send you as lambs in the midst of wolves ; be ye therefore wise as the serpent and harmless as the doves. Give not the holy to the dogs, neither cast your pearls before the swine, lest they ti-am- ple them with their feet, and turning might rend you. But ^vhen they persecute you in this city, flee into another ; for verily I say unto you, You shall not finish the cities of Israel until the Son of Man come. A disciple is not above his teacher, nor the slave above his lord ; it is enough for the disciple that is perfect that he be as his teacher, and the slave as his lord. If they have called the house-owner Beelzebul, how much more those of his house- hold I Fear them not, therefore." They were simply to proclaim his coming and his gospel. But the country was excited against him. It behooved these disciples ■•'ilill T|i: 'ii:;i„ii,iiT.iiiim'i"'''!ti" LAST DAYS m GALILEE. 445 to unite the innocency of doves with the supposed watclifuliiess of the serpent. In declaring the truths wliich it Avas the mission of his life to cstal)lish and propagate, they were to irse discrimination. It were folly to ^ive the '' c coming. consecrated flesh of sacrifices to dogs. It were folly to present jewels to swine, who, finding that these did not satisfy hunger, would crush them into the mire and turn in their voracity upon tlie givers. Yet, when they had conducted tliem- selves as well as possihle, no circnmspection conld keep them fi-om being assailed with malignity. "Wlien one town rejected tliem they must escape to another, and thus give the whole land an op- portunity of knowing what it was that Jesns tanght. lie assm-ed them that they should not have visited all the towns till the Mis- sion of the Son of Man be accomplished by the establishment of his claims as Messiah, if that be the meaning of the saying, " Ye shall not finish the cities of Israel nntil the Son of Man come." If that be not the meaning — and I am far from being sure, and give it as the most plausible conjecture — then I do not know what Jesus meant. He was going up to Jerusalem. There were two things to be secured, namely, an increased attention to himself and his words, and a snfiicient interest npon the part of the popu- lace to give him protection against tlie growing malignity of the church party — the priests, the scribes, the Pharisees. All this might in some measure be produced by the ministry of the Seventy. The Jewish Feast of Tal)erna(;le3 was now at hand. It Avas, as Josephus says, the holiest and greatest of their festivals. The peo- ple would be assembled in great crowds. It would be an occasion for a powerful proi)liet to make an Gahlee ana Sa- ,.,,,, , , T . maria. John vii. , impression which should move tlie whole nation. ••■ t i „ • + VIU. J ojUKC IX, J The younger sons of Mary, whom we should call xvii. the half-brothers of Jesus, did not believe he was a prophet, yet perhaps hoped that he might put hiuisclf forward as a Messiah, such a Messiah as they, in common with their nation, hoped lor — a splendid deliverer, and conqueror, and king. Tliev urged him to go into Judiea, as liis })opularity seemed waning in Galilee ; and moreover, all that he had accomplished was to attach a few fishermen to his cause. He had not won a person of any social or ecclesiastical distinction. To this politic advice, which would have been sound if Jesus had intended to claim and maintain such a Messiahship as they supposed, he returned this reply :— diG THE TniKD PASSOVER TO THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. " My time is not at present, but your time is always ready. Tlie world cannot hate you ; but it hatetli me, because I testify that its works are evil. Go you up unto this feast. I go not up to thia feast; for my time is not yet fulfilled." They wished hiui to join theu* caravan, and go up publicly and conspicuously. His thne had not arrived. He would not be pre- cipitated. He would aA'oid as far as possible giving any occasion to liis enemies. He would not be of the party of his brethren. But after they had left for Jerusalem, he arranged his plans and went up to the metropolis in a secret manner. He sent messen- gers before his face, who made the necessary preparations, so that in the evening he could enter lodgings, rest, and next day proceed on his journey. They were going along the borders of Galilee and of Samaria. At one of the Samaritan villages n ospi a e a- ^ partv wcre refused lodgings because they were mantan village. *• l J & o ./ ^ going to attend the feast in Jerusalem, thus wit- nessino; against Mount Gerizim. Sectarian rancor conquered ori- ental hospitality. James and John, the latter generally conceived, I think, to be a sweetish kind of characterless young man, were BO enraged that they desired permission from their Master to call down fire from heaven to consume the town. They were not con- tent that Jesus should do it. They desired the personal gratifi- cation of vengeance on these people. Jesus rebuked them. They then went to the next village on the route. TALENT. — STATER OP TEYPHON. PAKT VI. FEOM THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL TILE LAST WEEK. FROM OCTOBER, A.D. 29, TO APRIL, A.D. 30— SIX MONTHS. CHAPTER I. AT THE FEAST OF TAEERNACLES. Lsr tlie mean time his brothers, with many other friends, and all the Jewish people who could travel, had gone up to the Feast of Tabernacles. This festival is spoken of in the Talmud as the Feast par excellence, and by Jo- ,^^ *l. , ^ ^^.'. ii-i-.li 1 11-. nacles. John vu. Bcplius and by rlutarch as the most holy and glorious of all the Jewish Holidays. It was celebrated in the au- tumn, when the heats were abated and the rains had not begun. The harvest had been gathered, and the Day of Atonement had just passed. In the fulness of their garners, and in the sense of f i-ee- dom from the guilt of their sins, the whole people rejoiced together. Moreover, it was a joyful celebration of a sad passage in the early liistory of their nation, when their fathers had dwelt in booths in the wilderness, and even Jehovah's sanctuary was in a tent. From all parts of the land, and even from many foreign parts, the devout poured into the Holy City. No good Jew allo'svcd himself to sleep in a house. Boughs full of green leaves were brought from the country, and temporary booths constructed on house-tops, and along thoroughfares, and in all the environs of the city, until Jerusalem was covered with a temporary forest. Glad ness reigned, and public and private rejoicing prevailed. The Temple service partook of the festal air of the occasion. 44:8 FROM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. Immediately after the regular morning sacrifices, every day, a priest went with a golden vessel to tlie fomitain of Siloali, on the _ , . side of the hill on M'hich the Temple stood, and Temple service. , ^ ' drew water, which he brought through the water- gate, accompanied by a gay procession and the sound of trumpets, and having mixed it with wine, poured it on the sacrifice upon the altar, amid the hallelujah shouts of the people. This probably reminded them of the supplies of water Jehovah had given to their fathers in the emergencies of the wilderness. The joyful- ness of this ceremonial was so great that it passed into a common proverb : " lie that never saw the rejoicing of drawing water never saw rejoicing in all his life." * As a complement of the morning service, and retaining another reminiscence of the wilderness life of their ancestors, namely, the -, . . guidance by the i)illar of fire throuo-h the ni^ht, Evening service. '^ . o ' there were set up, in the Court of the Women, two great golden lamp-stands, and when these were kindled they threw their light over the whole city. Then all the Temple music played, and the members of the Sanhedrim, the elders, the rulers of the synagogues, the doctors of the law, and all those who were distinguished by age, piety, and learning, danced wildly and recklessly, in the sight of the women who crowded the balconies, and the men who thronged the court ; he that made himself the most ridiculous achieving the greatest success. Perhaps this ad- dition to the ceremonials was taken from the dance of David before the Ark. There was another peculiarity of this festi\'al. In addition to the usual daily sacrifices, on the first day thirteen young bullocks, two rams, and fourteen laml)s of the first year, were sacrificed ; the next day, twelve bullocks ; the third day, eleven ; and so decreasing until on the seventh day, on which seven bullocks were offered, making seventy in all. This number, the Jewish doctors taught, represented the languages of the seventy nations of the world, and the process of diminution represented the gra- dual reduction of those nations until all things should come under the reign of the Messiah. f The legal limit of the "Feast of Tabernacles" was seven days. * Jennings in his Jeicish Aiitirpiities quotes this from the Mishna^ tit. Sweah, cap. v., sect. 1. f R. Solomon on Numb, xix., cited hy Lig-htfoot in his Temple Service^ chap, xvi., sect. 1. AT TnE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. 449 but.it was followed on the eighth day by a supplemental festival of rejoicing, especially over the ingathered crops, their corn and their wine. This was a day of special jollity, from which Jennino-s* suijcciests that the heathen bor- , ^."^.^ ™ ^ => ^^ festival. rowed their Saturnalia. Plutarch even made the mistake of sui)posing that it was kept in honor of Bacchus, for lie says {Symposia, lib. iv. prob. 5) : " In the time of the vintage tlie Jews spread tables, f ui-nished with all manner of fruits, and lived in booths, specially of palm and ivy wreathed togethei-, and they call it the ' Feast of Booths ; ' and then a few days after [alluding pi'obably to the last day of the feast] they kept another festivity, which openly shows it was dedicated to Bacchus ; for they carried boughs of palms, etc., in their hands, with which they went into the temple, the Levites (who, he fancies, were so called for Ewo?, one of tlie names of Bacchus) going before with instruments of music," etc. It was to this gayest of all festivities that the men of the nation were gathering. But over all there was a shadow. The wonder- ful words and works of Jesus had spread themselves through the land. The mission of the Seventy had freshly excited public attention. Every man had something to tell or to hear of what Jesus had been saying or doing. Misrepresentations and exag ■ gerations were, of course, rife. Opinions differed. Parties were beginning to crystallize. Some were for him, some g,gainst. The latter were more and stronger than the former, whose favorable opinion of Jesus we find much modified by the pressure of public sentiment. They said, " lie is a good man," Avhile the others said, "Nay, but he deceives tlie people." His friends did not dare to render a frank expression of their views of his character and his operations. Suddenly, in the midst of the feast, Jesus appeared in the Temple and began to teach. It was like an apparition. What course he had come they knew not. He was not at the beginning of the feast. His absence had occasioned nmch anxious speculation upon the part of friends and foes. ^ . , , ^ rrii 1 -1 1 1 1 . 1 Jesus at the feast. ihe days were gf)mg by, and lie did not come. But perhaps on Wednesday, the fourth day of the feast, when expectation of his coming had begun to flag, he calmly walked * Jevnsh Ant., book iii sea 6. 29 450 FEOM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UTSTTIL THE LAST WEEK. into the Temple, took his position, and began to unfold his doctrine as if nothing unusual had occurred, as if his friends were not intensely anxious for his safety, and as if his foes had not been forming plots to compass his destruction. lie went amply witli wide knowledge, and powerf idly with great authority, into his discourses. The Jews listened and were amazed, and started the inquii-y, " How does this man know letters, never having learned ? " They intended to disparage him by calling the attention of the people to the fact that he had not received Rabbinical instruction. Tlie intention was to create pojjular prejudice against him, as if he were an in- terloper, not being a graduate of the schools, not His defensive i • • .i • p j.-i • . tt- i , bemp" m the succession oi tJie priests, liis re])iy speech. ° . ^ . ^ _ ^ -^ was, " My teaching is not mine, but His who sent me." lie did not mean his doctrines simply, but also his mode of teaching and the spirit with wJiich he taught. They charged that he usurped the office of teacher. This he denied. God was with him. In proof of tliis he says, " If any one will do His will lie shall know of the teaching, whether it bo of God or I speak from myself." This is a plain way of practically putting the teachings of any teacher to the test. If a man be living in perfect purity of heart, in strict study and obedience of the pliysical, intellectual, and spiritual laws and ordinances of God, he will render himself a test of the truth of any other man's teaching. To this test Jesus submitted himself. As if he had said: All of the nation who are acknow- ledged to be living pure lives confess my teaching divine : try it yourselves : in proportion as you do what you already know that God has taught to be the duty of man, in that proportion will you open your hearts to me. And then, in disproof of the allegation that he was an in- truder into the teacher's office, he submits the following plain assertion : " lie who speaks from himself seeks his own glory ; and he Avho seeks the glory of II im that sent him, the game is true, and unrighteousness is not in him." The former is moved by a narrow and low vanity ; the latter by a high devout spirit. No ordination, no anointing, no induction into priesthood, no consecration can make the former a teacher of morality. His selfish vanity breaks his claim. Jesus appealed to them whether such characteristic had ever appeared in him. He did not take his position from self-promptings ; he did not teach for morality what was merely the suggestion of liis persona] AT THE FEAST OF TABEENACLES. 451 fancy ; lie did not seek to glorify himself, being willing for that purpose to warp the truth in unrighteousness. He was so con- scious of his rectitude in this particular that he rested his appeal on the opinion of all the people. That was his defensive speech: he then made an attack upon his enemies. They could not comprehend and obey him, because they had not sought to comprehend and obey those who had preceded him, whom they acknowledired ®.^ ^^'^ 1 T • 1 1 • 1 1 mi enemies, to be divniely authorized teachers. Ihere was Moses, the founder of their theocracy, the acknowledged law- giver. They had the Decalogue. They were living in violation of it. The Jewish priesthood of his day were notoriously licen- tious. Their rabbis and elders were so impure that when they brought to Jesus a woman taken in adultery, his speech, which meant, "Let him that is no adulterer tlirow the first stone," so condemned the entire assembly that not a man of them could remain in his presence. And now they stood around Jesus, a band of conspirators and murderers. He showed them that this was not a mere question of biblical scholarship, but of that essen- tial relio-ion which consists in doins: the will of God, Wliat is the capability of elucidating a point of scholastic pei*plexity compared with a consecration to doing the will of the Most High God ? And then he charged the rulers that they were at that moment seekins: to kill him. The multitude rec-arded this asser- tion as an exaggeration of his fancy, and said, " You have a demon ! who seeks to kill you ? " — meaning that he -was dis- ordered through melancholy. They did not know what secret machinations were then at work among the rulers. Jesus gave them a reminiscence. Some time ago, in that same city, he had marvellously restored an impotent man to strength; and beneficent as was this great act of power, it wrought in the hierarchy no sympathy for him, no disposition to co-operate with him for the welfare of the people ; but because it infringed some of their oppressive regulations for observing the Sabbath-day, they had plotted against him, and had never ceased to endeavor to com- pass his death. He defended that past act. He put the case to them thus: "Moses gave to you circumcision (not that it is of Moses but of the fathers), and ye circumcise a man on the Sab- bath. If a man receive circumcision on the Sabbath, that 452 FEOM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. the law of Moses should not be broken, are ye angry with me because I have healed a man on the Sabbath? Jndge not according to appearance, but judge righteous He defends his ^.^^j ,,ent." That is to say— Circuuicision was Sabbath act J » •' earlier than Moses, who merely confirmed in legal euactment what the fatliers had always practised as a part of Monotheism. The male child was to be circumcised on the eighth day, even if it fell on the Sabbath, because circumcision was an important sanitary regulation. But the Jewish hiei-archy had sought to destroy Jesus because he had made a man eveiy whit whole on the Sabbath, — such poor judges were they, so utterly incapacitated by reason of their adherence to the external letter, utterly unmindful of the internal spirit. This ai'gument began to prevail with the people, and incline them favorably towards Jesus. So, very shortly after, some of tliem of Jeru- salem said, " Is not this he whom they seek to kill ? And lo ! he speaketh boldly, and they say nothing to him. Do tlie rulers know whether of a truth that this is the Christ? But this one, we know wlience he is: when the Christ cometh no one knowetli whence he is." This shows how the multitude fluctuated. The courage of Jesus struck them as admirable. They had be^ come convinced that the rulers ^vere seeking to destroy Jesus. Perhaps they had 'been paralyzed by finding in this man some indications of his being the Messiah, which had frightened them. But then they swung away from that feeling by the reflection that Jesus was a Nazarene. They knew him to be a citizen, if not a native, of a mean town in the provinces. The opinion was that the Messias should arise among men by sudden incarna tion, without earthly parentage. But this man's parentage they supposed to be known to them, which is sufficient to their minds to set aside all supposition that he was the Messias. Then cried Jesus in the Temple, teaching and saying, "Yo both know me and know whence I am: and I am not come of myself, but He who sent me is true, whom ye Asserts his hea- j^^^^^^ ^^^^^ j,^^^ j j,^^^^^ jjj^^ f^^. j ^^^ f^.^^^^ VGnly oTKHTi. Ilim, and lie hath sent me." They thought to humiliate him by their reference to his humble extraction. With a loud voice, openly in the Temple, he acknowledged his low earthly relationships. As Langc says, " He even treated with a certain cheerfid ii-ony the supposition that therewitli t]iey kne^v AT THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. Ano his real essential origin." Bnt when he speaks so freely of his ave,Uy descent they desired to arrest him: b„t tl41ld . o . There vas somethnij; in Imn whic]> repelled tlieir rudeness John says that >t was God's overrnling protidence, " because ,^' .onr was not yet come." There wereriideed, among rrpeole hose who behoved in him becanse he was a mi.Lcle vvoZ Ms z itr-'T f' T ^°-^^ '-'' '^ '" "- trtt:;; .s one does? Such sentiments among the people rendered thernlors uneasy. While these things were gotog fonva d tte beTwf";; "? " """'V" "'" ^''™P'^' "'" '^« SoneXtb^: between the forejourt of the Gentiles and the inner court " aa flux and ,efl„x of pnbhc opinion. The Sanhedrim sent officers With orders to arrest him, the!!^" vlf '^r!;','' 1'^ " *°"' ''^''"^ '''""' '° )>«« di^^'-'ned sen" me V! in " "" ^ "'* ^•°"' »'» ^ S° ^ Him that sent me. le shall seek nie, and shall not find me; and whei-e I am ye cannot come." This ^ alarming most probably meant simply that for the present ^'"'°''' tl.ey could not touch bin,, but that in a short time he would have a more con.plete separation from then,. liut the saying alarmel ml him < Is he about to go to the dispersion amono- the Gen tiles, and teach the Gentiles '! " ° ophiZs ''"tI "'"1 ^?'f 'f ™"' contradictory emotions and and talk of nothing else. Jesus was the topic of public and pri- vate discourse. lie was tlie nation's mystery-a riddle to the ™1- fterror'; r" 'V" "tT^"'*''' ^ '"'"^'^y '° «- -'"'-'e, and col 1 ofl MM "'^ '""'' " '™°'"y ^''°"' I'"" «'"' they con d not lay violent hands upon him. But he exposed to each dioadful. To keep him was to bo perpetually tormented. To drive him from the country was to send him out to preach a doc- tone winch should embrace all mankind, and thus break ,'p the T'to do h ''•","■'"' "" '"'-' ^"PP"^^" "-"-'-^ to po! ^s To do h„n violence was perilous, because there was such a poound interest ,n the man and such a division of popular sen! tunent. Thej were terribly perplexed. 454 FKOM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL, THE LAST WEEK. The " Feast of tlie Tabernacles," strictly speaking, closed at the end of the seventh day ; but on the eighth day was a supple- mentary festival which concluded the whole, and The great day ^^^^.^^^ ^^^^^ ,, ^j^^ .^^^ . ^^ ^^^^ ^^^^^„ q^^ ^j^^ of the feast. ^ . *' other days the priests, as we have seen, went to the fount of Siloam and drew water, which was brought with great rejoicing into the Temple. This ceremonial was omitted on the eighth day. The seven represented the wandering, the eighth the entrance into the land of rest, the nation's home. The water came to represent in sjnnbol the Holy Spirit of God. It had been always a fact to notice that there was no fountain in the Temple limits on Mount Moriah. This was interpreted to signify that the refreshing spirit was lacking in their dry ecclesiasticism, and the gift of that spirit, like the opening of a fountain, was among tlie most precious promises of prophecy. Joel (iii. 18) foretold that it should come forth from the House of the Lord, and Ezekiel (xlvii.) descril3es its breaking forth from under the thi'eshold of the Tem- ple. It was the great expectation of the spiritually minded Jews, and most probably was constantly associated in their minds with other unspeakable benedictions which should come with t]ie Messiah. It was on this day, the great day of the feast, when the failure to draw water from the fountain of the Siloam reminded the peo- ple of the absence of all fountains in the Temple, , ' and tlie predictions which many undoubtedlv in- loam. J- _ '' ^ " terpreted literally, and to which a few assigned a high spiritual significance, Jesus, who was accustomed to sit as he taught, rose up, and lifting his voice, cried out to the multitude, " If any one thirst, let him come and drink. He who believes on ine, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living waters, as the Scrip- ture has said." He made allusion, probably, to such passages as Isa. xliv. 3, Iv. 1, Iviii. 11. The meaning seems to be, that in that man's inmost nature shall be sources of refreshment for him- self, which shall yield streams of refreshment for others. This appeal touched the hearts of some, who said, " Of a truth this is the Prophet." Others grew more emphatic, and said, " This is the Christ, the Messiah." Othei's said, " No ; for doth the Christ come out of Galilee ? Has not the Scripture said that the Christ comes of the seed of David, and from the town of Bethlehem, where David was ? " The l^arty feeling grew strong. Some of the multitude THE POOL OF 8IIX>AM, AT THE JUNCTIOS OF THE TAU.ET OF KIDBON WllB THE TTBOPiBOR. AT THE FEAST OF TAEEKNA(3LES. 453 called out to arrest him, but no one bad tbe courage to lay bands on bim. Tbe officers sent by tbe Sanliedrim returned witliout bhn, and to tbe indignant question, "Wby liave ye not brongbt bim?" tbev answered, ''Xever did man They cannot , 1 • " 1 „ rm T-x arrest mm. speak as tins man speaks." Tbe em-aged Pbari- sees taunted tbeni : " Are ye also deceived ? Have any of tlia rulers or of tbe Pbarisees believed on bim ? But tbis ciii-scd mob THE ASSEMBLY OF THE SANHEDRIM. (From an ancient description.) do not know tbe law." Here Nicodemus, a member of tbe San- bedrim, tlie person wlio bad bad an inter\'iew witb Jesus by nigbt, interposed witb tbe question, " Does our law condemn a man, except it bear jfirst and Imow wbat be does ? " It seemed to be a plain and bonest question, but so excited were tins assembly of judges tbat tbey began to deal in invective, saying, "Art tbou 456 FKOil FEAST OF TABEKNACLE8 UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. also of Galilee ? Search and look, for out of Galilee arises no prophet." They were ready to qnote Moses for their purposes, but would not listen when it made a<:^ainst them and their prac- tices ; and it was not true that no prophet came from Galilee, as Jonah and Amos, and perhaps others, were of that country. So the assembly was broken up in disorder, and every man went to his house, while Jesus went to the Mount of Olives, and there spent the night. Again he caine back to the city. The Feast of the Tabernacles had ended. The lights were dead in the great candelabra that had shone upon the city, a reminiscence of the Jerusalem; the pjn^j. f^f jj^Q which had led tlieii' fathers through empe e rea- ^j-^g ^^.Q^jg^.j^ggg^ It was the painful darkness fol- Bury. John viii. •■ lowing a great light, the silence of a deserted ban- quet hall, which now lay upon Jerusalem, Jesus entered the Temple to teach the people. Every day a teacher could find hearers there. Now he might still find many who had come up from the provinces and were still lingering in the city. As soon as he was seated and prepared to teach, a very great concourse gathered about him. In the mean time the Scribes and Pharisees had concocted a plan to entrap him, and to raise against him the dislike of the people. They brought to him a woman taken in ^ , . ■, ,, adultery, and sat her in the midst of the crowd, and taken in adultery. -^ ^ _ ' said to Jesus, " Teacher, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act. Now, Moses in the law commanded us that such should be stoned ; but what do you say ? " The refer ence was to Deuteronomy xxii. 21. The woman must have been umnarried, but betrothed, as stoning was prescribed by the law only for such persons. She was therefore probably young and not hardened. This must have been a most painful ordeal. In nothing does the superior beauty of spiritual goodness over hard and technical morality appear more than in this scene. Jesus was spotlessly pare. He did not assert his purity by bursting into invectives against the "horrid creature." lie modestly bent his head, and wrote on the ground with his finger. He had no pruri- ent curiosity. The subject was distasteful. But the Scribes and Pharisees seemed carried away with their zeal for purity. They had dragged the poor guilty thing before the public gaze. They were then connnitting a sin greater than hers, as malicious AT TIIE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. 457 li)1)0crisy is Avorse than incontinence. Bnt every man engaged in this exposure had himself committed adultery. Jesus did not wish to touch the question. But they ni-ged it They thought it Avould embarrass him. If he should say, " Stoiio her ! " he would be advising a breach of Koman law, which tixik such power out of Jewish hands. If he considered the case mildly, the populace would be excited against him, as one who was dis- posed to relax the law of Moses. These bad men were animated by many forms of vile passions. So they urged the question. Jesus, blushing, lifted himself np. lie looked tln-ough each man's eyes to the bottom of his soul. lie said : '* Let him among you who has never sinned first cast a stone at her." (See Dent. xvii. 7.) Again he blushed. Caught in their 111 rni 1 ""^^ trap. and stooped, and wrote. The word smote thein. It aroused their consciences. The oldest Pharisee among them was an adulterer ; so was the youngest Scribe ; so was each man. Some of the crowd probably knew the licentionsness of these hypocrites, and, if so, gave them such significant looks as must have been most embarrassinc:. The oldest Pharisee amono- them sneaked off ; so did the youngest Scribe ; so did each man. When Jesus again rose from his stooping posture they had all departed. The woman had not moved. He said : " Where are those your accusers ? Has no ]nan condemned you ? " She answered : " No, sir." — " Neither do I," said Jesus ; " go, and sin no more." She had sinned. He had no license to give to sin. Whether the popular opinion, or even his indulgence, should withhold condem- nation, her only safety was in abstaining from sin. Nothing could have won her from the downward course on which she had en- tered so much as this exqnisite tenderness of Jesus. Perhaps, pointing to the huge lamps now kindled, he ex- claimed : " I am the light of the world : he that follows me shall not walk in darkness but has the ligjit of life." On the spot his adversaries endeavored to coun- Conflict of Jesua , , . f . ,. with his enemies. teract the force of his teaching by saying to him : "You bear testimony concerning yourself; your testimony is not true." As if they would quote him against hiinselt", and, urcre that self-2:lorification was his aim. Jesus answered : " Even if I bear testimony concerning myself, my testimony is true ; for I know whence I came, and whither I go ; but ye know not whence I come, and whither I go. Ye judge according to the 4:58 FEOM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. flesh ; I judge not any man. And even if I do judge, my judg- ment is true ; for I am not alone, but I and He who sent me. 13 ut it is also written in your owu law that the testimony of two is true. I am a witness concerning myself, and my Father who sent me witnesses for me." Here is a claim to a mysterious origin and high position in the universe. The nature of the case was such that he was com^iellcd to bear witness concerning himself. Kay, more, his very nature Avas such that he Avas compelled to testify of himself, as light, which shows the existence of other things, makes its own existence known. Moreover, they wei'e so fleshly that they could not of themselves' discern spiritual things, so that he was obliged to show them. They took a sinful plea- sure in discerning in man what they might condemn. He took nc such pleasure. He was not ready to judge and condemn men If they had been as free from this evil disposition as he, they w^ould not seize every word he spoke as matter for condemna- tion. But when he spoke of his Father as being a witness for him, his enemies asked : " AVhere is your Father ? " His reply Avas : " Ye neither knoAv me nor m}^ Father : if ye had v th %^ ^ ^ knoAvn me ye Avould have knoAvn my Father also." They must have understood him to mean that he felt a consciousness of being one Avith God. That cer- tainly was the claim Avhich Jesus set forth. Whether he Avas mis- taken or not, Avhcther he told the truth or a falsehood, — these are tAvo other questions ; but Avhether he made this claim is a ques- tion readily answered. He most manifestly did. And no one could find such a claim made by any man, otherwise very good and exemplary, Avithout feeling that hoAvever mistaken he might be, he is unquestionably sincere in his belief. The Avliole ques- tion of the divinity of Jesus is narroAved to the inquiring Avhether his judgment Avas hurt by a false consciousness. If that ques- tion be determined in the affirmative, then Ave have these difficul- ties on our hands, namely, to account for a man so immaculate, so surpassingly good, so profound, so rapid and searching a reader of the hujnan heart, that the like of him has never risen among the sons of men, — a being Avith such self-control, such vast poAvers of mind and Avonderf ul endoAvments of physique, living the most resplendent of human lives, and dying a sublimest death of mar- tyrdom, and influencing the ages by his life and death, Avhile he AT THE FEAST OF T^UJEKNACLES. 459 himself was inwardly crazed by believinp^ himself to be one person while he was in reality another, — livinp; and dying in the belief that he was God,, while in point of fact he was really inferior to even any man who knows who he is. It was truth or blasphemy which he was speaking. From the Btanding-point of the Jews they must have deemed it the latter, and yet they had not the courage to lay hands on the man who had committed in their hearing the greatest cn-ime possible under the theocracy. His good greatness seemed to paralj'zc them. Then said Jesus again to them : " I go awa}-, and you shall seek mo, and in your sins you shall die : for where I go you have not the ability to come." The Jews said: "Will he kill himself ? " lie replied : " You are of those lieneath • I am of those above ; you are of the world ; I am not of the world. I said to you that you shall die in your sins ; for if you do not believe that I am, you shall die in your sins," They asked him, sarcastically : "Who are you ? " He replied : " What say I to you from the first ? I have many things to say and to judge concerning you, but the Father who sent me is here ; and I speak to the world those things which I have heard from Illm." John inserts the explana- tory sentence — " They understood not that he spoke to them of the Father, God." So utterly obtuse and fleshly were they that even these mystical utterances of Jesus were incomprehensible. Then he said to them : " When you have lifted up the Son of Man then shall you know that I am, and from myself I do nothing, but as the Father has taught me, so I speak. And He who sent me has not left me alone. lie is with me, for I do always those things that please Him." Upon this many of the people believed on him. There was something in the words or in the manner, or in both, which touclied them and awoke them into faith. But it was not very great or very intelligent faith, as ^°^ ^ ®^® '^^ appears from what immediately follows. He said to such : "If ye continue in my \vord, then are ye my disci- ples indeed ; and ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall emaiv cipate you." He saw that they were regarding him in a sensuous light, as a political deliverer from the Koman yoke, and therefore spoke this word to set them right. He had exliibited such cour- age in peril, and spoken so frankly of his consciousness of being one with God that they had begun to think that they might have 460 FKOM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. been misled by his antecedents and his manner, and tbat this, after all, was the Clirist, the Anointed, the Messias, — still connect- in"- him, however, with their hopes of freedom from the Roman yoke. ■ This speech, which claimed that all his triumphs were to be spiritual, opened their eyes to their misapprehension. More- over, it touched them on the sorest spot of their hearts, as their reply shows. They indignantly answered him : " Seed of Abra- liam are we, and to no man have we been slaves at any time : how do you say then, ' Ye shall be emancipated ? '" So blind were they as to forget that their fathers had been slaves in Egypt and Babylon for generations, and that they were virtually at that very moment the slaves of the Roman Empire. Jesus replied : " I most solemnly assure you that whoever is do- ing sin is the slave of sin. And the slave abides not in the house continually. If, therefore, the Son shall emancipate you, you shall be indeed f i-eed. I know that you are Abraham's seed ; but you seek to kill me because my word has no place in you. I speak what I have seen with my Father, and you then do what you have seen with your father." These last words seem addressed to the crowd promiscuously. It excited their anger greatly. If they had believed on him before, they dropped him now, and with vehemence replied, "Abra- ham is our father." Jesiis said unto them, "If you were Abraham's children you would do the works of Abraham ; but now you seek to kill me, a man who has told you the truth, which I have Jesusmostdeep- ^^^^^^^ f^.^,,^^ (.^^^_ rpj^j^ ^^^^ ^^^^ Abraham. You 13; incenses them. i p p ^i ?> rri • i.-n do the works of your lather." Ihis still more m- censed them, and they retorted, " We are not born of fornication. One father have we, God." — " If God were your father," replied Jesus, "you would have held me dear ; for I proceeded forth and liave come fi'om God; neither came I of myself, but He sent me. Why do you not understand my speech ? Because you cannot liear my discourse." Ye are of your father Diabolus (the Calum- niator), and the desii-es of your father you are minded to do. He was a manslayer from tlie beginning, and in the truth he has not an abiding-place, for the truth is not in him ; when he speaks a f It is important to notice the dis- ] late utterance of the latter, -which tinction between XaXia and A070J, the j means a reasonable connected line of foniier signifying the outward aiticu- I thought. AT TUE FEAST OF TAI3EKNACLES. 461 lie he speaks of liis own, for he is a liar and the liar's father. But heoause 1 speak the truth j'ou do not believe nie. AVlio of you convicts me of wrong ? * ^^^y tlo you not believe nie if I speak the truth? lie who is of God hears the M'ords of God: on this account you hear not, because you are not from God." Upon their claiming to be Abraham's children Jesus showed them that they had none of the characteristics of the spiritual descendants of Abraham. That was tantamount to a charge of spiritnal bastard v, which thev re- Children of Abra- ^ ^ " . " ham. pelled by claiming God as their father. But Jesns shows them that they have not the characteristics of spirit- nal children of God, because they hate the One who has come out from God. If they were God's spiritual children the truth would be their vernacular ; but they cannot receive the truth ; it is as un- intelligible to them as an unknown language. lie then pours tho awful statement into their ears that they are the children of tho Devil, who was at once a liar and a murderer, who in the begin- ning sought to destroy the race, and endeavored to accomplish his nefarious designs by a lie. The Jews showed this disposition towards Jesus — the lying, homicidal s})irit — in that they sought to kill him, not for any error of thought or wrong of life, for ho appeals to them if they have ever been convinced on evidence that he had done a wrong or made a mistake. It was a great claim. lie challenges any flaw to be shown in his doctrines or life. And yet they hate him murderously. If they were of God they would hear the words of God; but their failure to hoar the words of God, which Jesus professed to speak, is proof that they are not of God. Then, they are of the Devil. Jesus rested his reproof on actual facts of which they were cognizant, such as their known desire to slay him. To his lofty rebuke they reply with coarse invective: "Is it not polite in us to say that thou art a Samaritan, and hast a demon ? " They were going to throw at him the two hardest words known in Jewish quar- relling, just because they knew no harder; but they sought to in- tensify them by saying — It is really a stretch of politeness to call Jesus charged ynfh having a de- mon. * The word means "error" as well as " fault," mistake of judgment as weU a-s sinfulness of life. So the word which I liave translated "convicts" signifies to prove the fallacy in one's logic as well as to fasten uj^on one tlifl charge of wrong-doing. 462 mOM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. you a Samaritan: are we not doing a "handsome" thing to restrain ourselves and go no further than to say "you have a demon? " Jesus calmly replied, " 1 have not a demon. I honor my Father and you dishonor me. And I seek not my glory. There is one who seeks it and judges." The mention of God's His reply. . , , , . . , , judgment arouses his compassions, and he says to them, " I solemnly assure you that if any one shall keep my word he shall not see death through the ages." The Jews replied, " Now we know that you have a demon. Abraham is dead, and the prophets, and you say, ' If a man keep my word he shall not taste of death through the ages.' Are you greater than our father Abraham, who is dead ? And the prophets are dead. Whom do you make yourself? " This was pressing him to declare his exact position toward God and toward Abraham, — -to reveal himself wholly in all his claims. He simply answers that if he glorified himself his glory would be nothing ; that liis Fatlier would bring all his glory to light, and that that Father was the God whom they professed to adore. He thus claimed to be the Son of God in an exclusive sense. He adds, " And you have not known Him [although you call Him your God], but 1 know Him, and if I should say I know Him not, I should be a liar like to you ; but I know Him, and I keep His word." He presents this as if he felt that they were urging him to deny his own consciousness, to de- clare that he was not what he felt himself to be, one with God ; to assume a lower position M'ould be to violate his own nature, to ' falsify his convictions, and to deny the truth of God. In regard to Abraham, however, he said, " Abraham, your father [as yon claim], exulted that he saw my day, and he saw it and was glad.' This was an astounding assertion. They said with sarcasm, " You have not fifty years yet, and has Abraham seen you ? " Jesus replied most loftily, as if from some far-off eternity, " I most solemnly declare to you that before Abraham was born 1 AM." If this be not the senseless assertion which ., ^ the Jews took it to be, it is a declaration of the Abraham. . ' consciousness which Jesus felt of his being in ex- istence before time began, before measurements of duration had been discovered, in eternity, eternally coexisting with the Being whom he calls his Father, and whom we all su[>pose to be God. The Jews took up stones to cast at him, but he somehow hid himself from the frantic multitude and went out of the Temple. CHAPTER II. THE FEAST OF DEDICATION, Where Jesus went, and how long lie stayed in any place, are questions the answers to which escape our closest investigations. He travelled and taught. This is nearly all we can learn. Tliere are certain incidents recorded Perhaps some- , 1 , , . 1 , . , . where near .len- by his biograpliers which seem to associate them- ^-^^ Luke x. selves with this portion of his history, and, even if we have missed their precise chronology, may as well be intro- duced here. They seem to show that Jesus was oi route towards Jerusalem to attend for the third time the Feast of tlie Dedica- tion, a festival which celebrated the renewal of the Temple ser- vice under the Maccabees. On one occasion a lawyer stood np, with the intent, if possible, to entrap Jesus in his sayings. He put this question to Jesus : " Teacher, by doing what shall I inherit perpetual life?" To this Jesus returns two questions, im- '^^ lawyer's . 1 . . question, portaiit m themselves, and mcreasmg their impor- tance by their relation to each other. Probably pointing to the phylactery of his questioner's robe, on which, as a lawyer, he bore the inscription of that passage of Scripture (Deut. vi. 5) which the Jews were accustomed to repeat daily, he said, "AVliat is written in the law \ " His next question was, " How readest thou ? " He calls his attention to the fact that a man must first know the words of the record, and that then the mood iu which he exam- ines them will have influence on his judgment. So, before mak- ing answer, Jesus asked the lawyer what response he had been al)le to get for himself out of the law. His reply was, " Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind, and thy neighbor as thyself." Jesus said, " You have answered rightly. Do this and you shall live." Perhaps tkis touched him as an intimation that his life had 464 FROM FEAST OF TABEKNACLES UNTIL THE LAST "WEEK. been in fault, and therefore he could not understand the profound B])iritual sul)jects which he had brought forward for discourse. lie may have felt piqued, and to make return gave Jesus what ])ei-haps he intended to be a quiet touch of sarcasm by the ques- tion, " And who is my neighbor? " As if he had said that he liad kept the law, unless Jesus gave to the term neighbor perhaps a meaning not altogether accepted among his people, thus covertly seeking to rebuke him for his too great laxity in mingling with the hated Samaritan race. Jesus replied in the beautiful parable of the Good Samaritan. "A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves, who both stripped and wounded Parable of the ^^ ^^^^ departed, leaving him half dead. By a Good Samantan. '. ^- '. .'^^ . ; contmgency a certam priest was gomg down that way ; and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. And likewise a Levitc, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and, see- ing him, was moved with com- passion, and coming to him he bound up his w^ounds, pouring in oil and wine, and set him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him. And on the morrow lie took out two denarii,* and gave them to the innkeeper, and said, ' Tak(^ care of him, and whatsoever thou spendest more, when I come again I will repay thee.' " Then Jesus submitted to the lawyer the question, "Wliich of these three seems to thee to have been neighbor to him that fell among the thieves ? " And he replied, " lie who showed mercy on him." Jesus said, " Go, and do thou likewise." The road from Jerusalem to Jericho was proverbially perilous * To English readers of this parable the generosity of the Samaritan in leav- ing two pennies with the landlord seems to be a small thing. But let us recollect that each denarius represented a day's labor. It would surely not be considered a small thing if a New York laboring man should humanely take up a poor fellow who had been maimed, and leave ten dollars to meet his expenses. Per- haps ten dollars now in New York would be a fair representative of two denarii in Palestine in the days of Jesu.s. It was a liberal provision. THE FEAST OI' DEDICATION. 465 by rcapon of being the resort of higliwaymen. Of this Josephus (B. J., iv. 8, 3) informs us. The priests and Levites who lived in Jericho and officiated in Jerusalem were accus- „ , , 111 IP 11 p From Jerusalem tomed to take the longer and safer road by way or ^^ jericho Bethlehem, but on this occasion they had chosen the shorter route. Their guilt is increased by the fact that the} examined the condition of the wounded man and found it to be so very desperate, and yet their selfish lo-ve of safety di-owned the voice of conscience and humanity in their hearts. If the lawyer thought it was not the correct and regular thing for a Jew to show mercy to a Samaritan, Jesus showed him the beautiful picture of a Samaritan putting his own life in peril to save a man whom he considered a heretic, and whom lie knew to be his na- tional enemy. If the wounded man, however, was not a Jew, — and Jesus does not say he was, — then the Samaritan is represented as having the widest possible humanity. He had met a man , , TT T 1 , 1 .1 A lesson of wide who was a stranger, lie did not have even the j^ujQanity pleasure which comes from helping an enemy, which is always an intense personal gratification of one's own nobleness. The person before him presented only two claims to his attention and his kindness, namely, he was a man. and in trouble. Here was the very widest humanity. But we know that the helper was a Samaritan, and by introducing this feature into the picture Jesus taught that it is possible to have humanity with heterodoxy, and to have orthodoxy without humanity ; and he also teaches that if a man's orthodoxy do not beget humanity it is barrenly worthless ; that humanity is superior to orthodoxy, and inhumanity is worse than heterodoxy. The beauty of this parable in an sesthetical view, its grapliic- ness, its fulness, its wideness and completeness of action, its genuine humaneness, are all heightened by the fact that this great Teacher, who selected the Samaritan to be the model of neighborly behavior, had himself been recently insulted and rejected by the Samaritans. It would seem to have been on this journey to the Feast of Dedi- cation that Jesus and his followers went to the little neighbc ring village of Bethany, to meet a household consisting of three per- sons, two sisters and a younger brother, of whom we shall have nore to say hereafter. This family seems to have attracted and 30 '466 FKOM FEAST OF TABEKWACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. held the friendship of Jesns. The sisters were named Martha and Mary, the former probably being the elder and the keeper of the house. Their brother was named Lazarus. Bethany. Mary "\y]ieji, or liOAV often previously, or whether ever before, Jesus had been in this house, we have no means of knoAving positively ; but it would seem f i-om the air of the narrative that Jesus had had some previous intercourse with this interesting domestic circle. Jesus had come into the house tired with travel and preaching. Ilis reception by the sisters shows the difference in their tempera- ments. Mary sat at his feet, listening lovingly to his words. Mary was receptive. But Martha went bustling about the house, preparing many things, intent upon giving Jesus something of a festal reception as he came from his tiresome journey. At last her industry passed over into worry. She became cumbered about much serving. And then she became a little fretful. And she went from the kitchen to the sitting-room and broke in upon the ^artv with the half-playfid, half-petulant speech addressed to Maiy tn^uugu desus, "Dost thou not care that my sister has left mo to serve alone ? Bid her therefore that she help me ! " It did not occur to Mary that much preparation would be needed. ^^^'^ she loved Jesus so that she went straight into the sittmg room and THE FEAST OF DEDICATION. 467 took a stool at liis feet, in the confidence of innocence. Martha loved him just as much, and. knew that he must have something to eat, and water to wash with, and a comfortable bed. Mary thouo-ht of what she needed of Jesus. Martha thouirht of what Jesus needed of her. She was so anxious to get back to Jesu? that she felt keenly how her work was depriving her of the pleas- ure and profit of the company of her illustrious friend and guest. Mary was having all the good of it. Martha was not envious oi her sister, but she desired to have some of the happiness of that society, and if no one helped her she would lose it all. The reply of Jesus has generally been regarded as a rather severe rebuke to Martha, and a boundless compliment to Mary. I venture to say that it was neither the one nor the other. He did most probably convey in his . ji^j^° tone, as is intimated in the repetition of her name, some dissatisfaction with Martha's course. It was, however, only the dissatisfaction of love, not of anger. lie desired to have her there where Mary was. lie loved the sisters equally. He was not satisfied that Martha sliould be worrying in the kitchen, and he should l)e losing her society. lie did not undervalue care for his personal comfort. No man, sinner or saint, ever does. It was a token of her love substantially given. He must have ut- tered the words tenderly, with the tone of love, reproving love for putting itself to trouble. lie did need food and a resting-place, but he also needed her company. And so, with a loving smile and a kind look that pleaded his love against his words, he ut- tered this sentence that had in it more of warning than of re- proof. She ivas in peril. She was undertaking too much for her means. That was making her over-careful. Slie was becoming distracted and worried, anxious and troubled. SJie was losing her self-con- trol. She was in danger of losing her whole enjoyment of those for whom she was working. Kow, no true man can see his friend, especially if that friend be a woman, making over-exertion for his comfort, and be unconcerned. Unless he be entirely selfish he will interfere. So Jesus did as soon as she opened the door and looked in. Nor did tlie reply of Jesus imply that only one dish was neces- sary. That is an absurd interpretation of his words. Nor did it mean that religion was that one thing. This is a mystical inter- 468 FKOM FEAST OF TABERNACLES tTNTIL THE LAST WEEK, pretation. The plain, common-sense meaning of this part of the reply is, tliat he required only one thing in his reception, namely, love of him. Martha had that. All then that was necessary was simple attention to his simple wants. What he says of Mary is not so much complimentary as defen- sive. We must recollect that. It was not a volunteered statement. Martha knew that she loved Jesus, and believed that Mary did too; but thought that her sister had a very indifferent way of showing it ; and Martha intimated as much. Jesus simply meant to defend Mary. lie said, " Martha, you shall not take away Mary's share in this loving reception of me. She has chosen the part of goodness as well as you." The fact is, that the reply of Jesus was a sweet speech to both the women, and both felt pleased and improved by it. There is no record of what followed ; but I have no doubt that when Martha shut the door behind her, Jesus intimated somehow to Mary that she should go to the help of her sister, for he saw that Mary's peril was in the direction of quietism, as Martha's was in the direction of worry.* From Bethany Jesus went up to the metropolis. While passing he saw there a man who had been blind from his birth.f This * I ventvire to refer the reader to two published sermons of mine, entitled, Mary; or, Religion in Beauty, and Martha ; or, Religion in Service. f I can unite with Dean Milman, who, in a note to the text of his Hist. Christianity, in loco, says : "I hesitate at the arrangement of no passage in the whole narrative more than this his- tory of the blind man." The Harmo- nists have two opinions, one placing it at the time when Jesus escaped from the wrath of his enemies in the Tem- ple, and the other in the time I have given it in my text above. In favor of the former it may be urged that the narrative seems so closely connected that we can hardly imagine an interval. Moreover, we know that that conflict in the Temple was on the Sabbath, and that this healing took place on the Sabbath. (ix. 14.) The objection to that view is that Jesus evidently departed alone from the Temple, while at the healing of the blind man his disciples were with him. Archbishop Trench replies that it is easy to suppose that they could have extricated themselves as Jesus did him- self; but the ArchbishoiJ must have overlooked the fact that they were not present at that violent interview. The argument from the Sabbath is not con- clusive, because the conflict took place on a festal Sabbath, and this healing on a regular weekly Sabbath. Both might have fallen on the same day, but it is not known that they did. I have been inclined to place it where it stands in the text, because the connection of the conclusion of the narrative seems to me quite as close as that which is urged for the beginning, and the conclusion (John X. 22) connects itself with the Feast of Dedication, at which his disci- ples were with him, as they were not on the former occasion. Moreover, a THE FEAST OF DEDICATION. 4C9 Jerusalem. The blind man, John was the first time that the disciples were in Jerusalem with Jesus. As they were passing a certain place they saw a man who hud been blind from liis birth. It occurred to the disciples to extract from their Teacher some light on a dark difliculty, as old as the history of human thought. Ti-aces of ihe profound study given l)y men to such questions as the existence of evil in the universe of the good God • the transmission, if not of meiital and moral traits, at least of penalties ; the connection between sin ^^«<*°«« ^^ eviL and suffering ; and kindred problems, are almost everywhere iu the stream of re(;orded thought, as far up towards the fountain- head as the literature of the world enables us to ascend. It is probably impossible to say when men first began to have these conceptions in shapely manner in their minds. But this much is certain, that very early iu the history of human society we discover that the doctrine of retribution was not held merely looselv as hypothesis, but was imbedded in the human mind, and sprinc^- ing up in all forms of human literature and art. The heathen classics are full of it. The students of the old Greek dramatists can ne\er foi-get with what power it comes out in the writino-s of ^schylus, the father of classic tragedy ; how he shakes his read- ers with the grand horrors of the Prometheus, the Agamemnon, the Eumenides; how in them and his other tragedies which have survived we are thrilled by the perpetual reproduction of ances- tral guilt, the punishment of successive generations of sinners who are pressed into the commission of atrocities by the doom which lay mountain hea%7 on their race. Nor will they fail to great difficulty lies against the other date, namely, that Jesus would scarcely have left the Temple in a secret man- ner, and then immediately perform a miracle which would attract all eyes to him at the moment of a popular tu- mult, nor would there have been space during the remainder of the day for the events to have occuiTed which are con- tained in the narrative. It is a beauti- ful thought that it exhibits his godlike calmness to be able thus in his own peril to stand still and work this beneficent miracle. If I were wiiting a poem in- stead of a history, I should take the other date, in favor of which are Lange, Olshauseii, Meyer, Stier, Trench, and Milman ; against whom, and in favor of the view I adopt, stand Lucke, Tho- luck, De Wette, Alford, and Rev. Mor- ris Dods, who translated and editel Lauge's >' Life of the Lord Jesus Christ." Macknight places the healing on tho day of the escape from the Temple ; the recognition and subsequent proceed- ings during the visit at the Dedication, The reader must examine and decide foi himself. 470 FROM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. remember how the greatest of Greek dramatic authors, in his wonderful (Edijpus^ seems to attempt an imitation of the intrica^ cies of Divine Providence, and the inevitability of the blow of retribution from the opening of the plot to the tremendous catas- trophe; nor with what splendid diction and terrible beauty thi! same doctrines are set forth by Euripides in his wonderful Vhua- dra and overwhelming Medea. Indeed, the whole ancient chissic tragedy surges with the heaving billows of sinful j)assion under the beating tempests of tremendous retribution. The ancient idea of penalty was personified. Nemesis, daugli- tei" of Darkness and kinswoman of Shame, was the agent of the gods in the punishment of the violation of law, e ancien pa- ^^^^ ^^^^^ ^j^^ sijccial aveufrer of family crimes, gtin idea. . ^ . . " "^ . AVith the scent, the swiftness, and the certainty of a sleuth-hound, she followed guilt through all the windings of societ}'' and all the doublings of blood, until she smote it with tho scourge that infuriated or the sword that destroyed. The skill of even Phidias was employed to embody in marble the popular con- cej^tion of this personation of penalty. This same idea of the inevitable following of pain upon trans- gression, at whatever intervals and through whatever prosperi- „, „ ties, — f]-om which was always made the illogical The Hebrew idea. ', . , cc • ^ i -i conchision that no suiienng takes place with- out sin, — lay dark and heavy on the Hebrew mind. In that sim- plest, grandest, and most solemn of all the ti-agedies, the book Joh^ we see a very powerful representation of this. A man serv- ing God with such consecration and such constancy that even the Almighty spoke of him as Ilis perfect servant, suddenly topples from the pinnacle of luunan prosperity to the dunghill of the lowest debasement ; from surroundings of comfort, which made liim seem like a secure god, into privations and pains which ranked him among the most pitiful of the feeble. AVlien his friends drew near to condole with liim, they knew him not. They beheld a blackened ruin lie where there had stood a palace of delights. The sight was so appalling that Eliphaz the Teman- ite, and Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite, lifted up their voices and we])t, and rent their mantles and crowned them- selves with dust, and sat down with the sufferer seven days and seven m'ghts, and never a man of them essayed to break with syllables the awful silence of that transcendent grief. And wheii THE FEAST OF DEDICATION. 471 tliey did, wlien they had taken a week to contemplate the situa- tion and study the case of Job, these three great men, whom Job had thought worthy to be his friends, embodied their philosophy iu such words as these : Eliphaz said : " Who ever perished, being innocent ? or where were the righteous cut off? Even as I have seen, they that ploufjK uii/juity, aiid sow wickedness, reaj? the same.^^ Bildad said : " Can the rush grow up without mire? Can the flag grow without water? "Wliilst it is yet in its greenness, and not cut down, it withereth before any other herb. So are the paths of all that forget God / and the hypocrite's hope shall perishP Zophar boldly said : " Know that God exacteth of tJiee less than thine iniquity deservethP And amidst all this intimation or assertion of secret sin, Job was without fault. But it was impracticable for these men to conceive it possible that there could be so much suffering and no sin. We hnow that Job was in the midst of prodigious pains which were in no way a punishment for either his own sins or the sins of any other. So when we come down t<; the days of Jesus and the passage of our text, we find the great Teacher confronted with a case of special privation, and his disciples phimply put . . . . . " WTio did sin 9 " the direct question to him : " Who did sin, this man or his parents, that he was born blind ? " Here is a sad case, a man who had never beheld God's great expanse of the heavens or fruitful field of the earth — a man who had never seen the love- light in the eye of mother or wife or child — a man to whom the angel rays of holy light had never come flooding in from all the forms of nature and of art, full of I'eports of beauty. It was a dire privation. It never occurred to the disciples to ask the pre- vious question : " Why came he thus ? " They never question tlieir prejudices and tlieir old ideas which they had received fi-om their fathers. If they had ever I'ead the book of Job they had forgotten its moral. They presumed sin. Here is suffering, where is the sin ? Suffering has oidy one parent. Sin. All they seemed curious to know Avas, Who was the sinner ? It broke upon them like a new day on what they supposed the noon of their intelli- gence when the Master said, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents. It was an utterance which smote the mouth of Poetry with the hand of Silence, and emptied the garnered treas* ures of Philosophy into the sea. 472 FROM FEAST OF TABEENACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. It is not at all necessary to suppose that the disciples believed in the doctrines of pre-existence and metempsychosis,* or had even heard them. There is no sufficient proof that these Platonic ideas had spread genei-ally among the Hebrew people, or that they pre- vailed to any extent even in the schools of the Rabbis. Here is the ray of light which Jesus let in on one case, and which maybe applicable to millions: "Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents ; but that the works of God What Jesus ^i^^^^i^ j^^ made manifest in him." Not that the man had never committed sin of any kind, not that his parents were faultless, but that this blindness was neither punitive nor the result of sin. It was the grand rev- elation to the world that suffering may exist without sin, and as part of the working of a beneficent law whose sweep describes a circumference too large for human vision, but enclosing a vast field of God's benign operations ; of this circle, the segment, if visible to us, is too small, too fine a point, for us to find the cen- tre, measure the radius, and calculate the area, with all the aids of all the geometry known to man. Jesus says that a man may Buffer for God's sake, and by the cure of the blind man and the results of that cure he demonstrated this blessed fact. Jesus added the saying, " Wliile it is day we must work the works of him who sent us. Night comes, when no man can work. As long as I am in the world I am the light of the world." The proverbial expression " Niglit comes, when no man can work," simply meant that he who did not his work in the day cannot do it in the night ; that when a man neglects an opportunity to do what he should do, he cannot recover it : and Jesus applies this general principle to himself and his disciples. As he was the light of the world, what fitter thing than that he should open the eyes of the blind ? So, he spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and anointed the blind man's eyes therewith, and said _to him, " Go, wash in the pool of Siloam," Anciently a virtue was supposed to be in saliva for disorders of • The doctrine of metempsychosis was widely leceived among the Jews of the Middle Ages, especially among the Cctbulists, who explicitly taught that blindness from the birth was to be ac- counted for by this doctrine ; but we cannot learn that it was taught in the times of Jesus. Lightfoot quotes the Rabbins as teaching that the embryo might sin in the womb, and as quoting for proof the struggle betweer Jacob and Esau. (Gen. xxv. 22.) Tholuck believes that this was merely the pri- vate opinion of particular individuals. • THE FEAST OF DEDICATION. 473 the eyes, as M-e learn from Livy {Ilist. Nat., xxviii. 7). Suetoniua ( Vei., vii.) and Tacitus {Hist., iv. 8) give accounts of the restoring of a blind man by the Emperor Vespasian, and botli speak of the use of saliNa, the latter repre- , ^^^^""^'^ of the 1 1 1 . 1 healing', seutiiig the blind man as beggmg the Emperor to anoint his eyes with spittle.* Jesus himself in a similar case em- ployed it in the healing of a blind man (Mark viii. 23), and also in the case of one suffering from a defect in the organs of speech and hearing. He did not always, however, use outward applica- tions, as we see in the case of the blind man near Jeiiclio (Mat- thew XX. 34). Why he did so in this case we do not positively know. Trend I's suggestion seems good: " Probably the reasons M-hich induced him to use tliese means were ethical ; it was per- liaps a help for the weak faith of the man to find that something external was done." It may also have been a test of his faith, as faith was the psychological basis on which Jesus wrought his miracles. It could hardly have been to wash off the clay which would have obstructed the nse of the eyes after the miracle had been wrought, as this would not have been a sufficiently import- ant thing to mention, nuich less to command. The short history is, that " he went and washed, and came seeing." The recovery of his sight made so great a change in the appear- ance of the man that some of his neighbors doubted his identity, although they still saw a great resemblance to the blind beggar. When he affirmed that he was the very man, they asked him, " How were your eyes opened ? " He answered, " The man who \s called Jesus made clay, and anointed mine eyes, and said to me, * Go to the Siloara and wash : ' then I went and washed, and received sight."—" Where is he ? " said they. " I do not know," said he. The people noticed that the man had been healed on the Sab- bath. It was expressly forbidden by some of the Ilubbins, accord- ing to Liglitfoot, to put saliva on the eyelids on the Sabbath : in case of inflammation of the eyes, ^''''^'''^ ""^ *^® however, some did allow this to be done. There being some difference of opinion among their religious teachera and rulers, the man's neighbors brought him to the Pharisees. The wish has often been expressed that some miracle of Jesus had * Trench says that abundant quota- I in Wetstein, in loco. Mods to the same effect are to be found j 474 FROM FEAST OF TAEEENACLES imTIL THE LAST WEEK. been submitted to judicial investigation. I^ow here is precisely such a case. Jesus had given sight to a man blind from his birth. The man was no fof)l, but rather a quick-witted, genial person. The best intellects of the nation employed themselves in investi gating the phenomena and circumstances of the case. These in- tellects were not credulous, but exceedingly skeptical ; not spiritu- alistic, but exceedingly materialistic; not friendly to Jesus, but ex- ceedingly hostile. If it be possible to disprove the alleged work- ing of a miracle we have now an opportunity. Let us study the investigation and i-esults. The Pharisees asked him how he had received his sight. That presumed blindness and a cure. The man admitted botli, and to the point of their question, namely, the rnaniier catechised. '^"^ ^f the healing, he replied, " He put clay on my eyes, and I washed, and I see." There must have been some peculiar quality in the clay, and if so it arose from the saliva of Jesus, for the same dust from which to make the clay, and the same water of Siloam, had been open to tho use of millions of men, and yet no other blind man had been healed. This was so manifest to all his inquisitors that a schism waa immediately produced. No one doubted that a very Avonderful thing had been done, if there were no fraud or collusion in the case. Their hostility .to Jesus came out in the saying, " This man is not from God, because he does not keep the Sabbath." But some re])lied, " IIow can a man that is a sinner work such signs?" Here was a dilemma. The miracle could not be denied, if there wei-e no fraud, and they could not give up their ideas of Sabbath- keeping so far as to accept a good man, although he had sustained his claims by a miracle. They turned again to the healed man and said, " What do yon say of him, seeing he has opened your eyes?" This question in- volves the admission on their part that Jesus had given the man sight in some wonderful way, if his story be true, or else the ad- mission of that upon the man's part, or b(jth. That //e believed it was a miracle is nuinifest from his reply, " He is a prophet." But the inquisitors were not williuix to be imiwsed His parents ex- rm . . , . . . amined, upon. Iney had no interest m admittmg a mira- cle, but the contrary. They called his jiai-enta and asked them three questions : " Is this your son ? " " Was ho TnE FEAST OF DEDICATION. 475 born Lliiid ? " " How does he now see?" To wliicli liis parcutg replied : 1. " "We know that this is our son ; " 2. " We laww tliat he Avas horn Hind i " 3. " We know not how he now sees, nor do we kncAv iclio has opened his eyes : he is of full age, he sliall speak for himself," The Pharisees in Sanhedrim had already agreed that if any man should aeknowledge Jesus to be the Christ, the Messiah, he should be put out of the synagogue, that is, endui-e the sentence of the thirty days' excommunication.* Of course such a decree did not pi-omote in any way the interests of truth or the interests of Jesus. The fear of it made the parents dodge the question. But we are not to conceive of them as heartlessly selfish, for they knew, as they said, that their son was a man, and they knew that he was very shrewd and ready. They were willing to trust him to take care of himself. lie was recalled and put on his oath. " Give glory to God : wo know that this man is a sinnei-." This address certainly does not mean that he was to asciibe all the glory of his ,-,,,. *" -r The patient put cure to God, and give no reverence to Jesus, as ^n oath Hammond and Jeremy Taylor teach. It was a form of adjuration, similar to that which Joshua put to Achan, (see Joshua vii. 19).t They pretended in his absence to have found the existence of fraud, and so they desire him to purge himself bv takinij: an oath and tellinn- the whole truth and nothinaj but the truth. AVhile the man is not to be overcome by their au- * " There appear to have been two, or some say three kinds of excommuni- cation among the Jews, greatly differ- ing iu degrees and intensity, and our Lord often alhides to them, not as though they were a sHght matter, but as among the sharpest trials which his servants would have to endure for hir name's sake. The mildest was an ex- clusion for thirty days from the syna- gogue, to which period, in case the ex- communicated showed no sign of re- pentance, a similar or a longer period, according to the will of those that im- posed the sentence, was added : in other ways too it was made keener ; it was accompanied with a curse ; none might hold communion with him, no, not even his family, except in cases of absolute necessity. Did he show himself obsti- nate still, he was in the end absolutely separated from the fellowship of the people of God, cut ofE from the congre- gation,— a sentence answering, as many suppose, to the delivering to Satan in the apostolic church. 1 Cor. v. 5 ; 1 Tim. i. 20. Our Lord is thought to allude to all these three degrees of separation, Luke vi. 22, expressing the lightest by the a0iipi(,\ii', the severer by the oj'i5i{,%(r, and the severest of all by the fK^aKXav. Yet, after all, it is doubtful whether these different grades of excomm.unica- tion were so accurately distinguished in our Lord's time." — Trench. t Compare 1 Samuel vi. 5, and Ezra X. 11. 476 FEOM FEAST OF TA3JEKNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. His slirewdness. tliority and influence of position, lie is nevertheless a little more reserved. lie quietly but firmly answei-ed, " If he be a sinner I do not know it : but I do know one thimj^ that being blind I now see." On theories he would not convict hhnself ; but he planted himself on facts. They could not shake him away from those, lie was no fool and no coward, hut he was cai-eful. They then endeavored to cross-question the man, probably hop- ing that he would contradict himself or else say something which they could nse to the damage of Jesus, They said, " What did he to thee ? How opened he thine eyes ? " This persistence began to arouse the resentments of the man, and he o-ives them a sarcastic answer. " I have told yon already, and ye did not hear : why do you wish to hear again ? AVill even you wish to become his disciples ? " Or perha|)s the grateful man, intending to add himself to the number of the dis- ciples of Jesus, ventured to intimate as much to these persecutors of his benefactor and himself. This enraged them, and they re- viled him and said, " You are his disciple ; but we are the disci- ples of Moses. We know that God spake to Moses ; but this one — we know not whence he is." The man then Ijegan in turn to question and press them. They were the acknowledged teachers of morals and religion. They ought to be able to meet so plain a case as this. lie said, " In this is the wonderful thing, that you [great divines] know not whence he is, and yet he has opened mine eyes. We know that God does not hear sinners ; but if any one be a worshipper of God, and does His will, him He heareth. From the jieon [the beginning of time] it has not been heard that any one opened the eyes of one born blind. He could do nothing if he were not from God." * This enraged them. The man they had endeavored to detect in a fraud became their teacher of morality and theology. He was cool while they were heated. Again they Enrages the m- -i i - i • tit- i i i i *"" i quisitors railed at hnn. vVith clmrchly arrogance they ex- claimed, " You were altogether born in sins, and do you then teach us?" They chai'ge that his blindness was God's mark upon him for his sin, showing him to be both physi cally and spiritually defective. They forgot, in their blind rage, * According to Grotius, opening the eyes of the blind was an ackno\vledged sign of the Messiah. Midrash in Ps. cxlvi. 8 ; Isa. xlii. 7. It was a miracle never known to be wrought by Mosea or any other prophet. THE FEAST OF DEDICATION. 477 that they now admit tliat ho had heen born blind, wliile they liave spent tlicir strength to show that it was all a fraud, which he had colluded Avith Jesus to perpetrate. Their verdict escaped in their wrath. Whatever else the investigation de\eloped, it proved that Jesus had opened the eyes of, one born l)lind, by anointing his eyes with a clay made of common street dust and spittle. Never- theless they cast him out of the synagogue and excommunicated him. From their days to this the churchmen, who are their suc- cessors, have sought to drive away and excommunicate those ^■hose eyes Jesus has opened. Jesus heard that the man was excommunicated, and, having found him, said to him, "Dost thou believe on the Son of Man?" He knew that that meant the Messiah, but he did ^ 1 T , -HI- . 1 TT 1 xi J. Jesus meets bim. not know who the Messiah was. lie knew tiiat the. person speaking to him was Jesus, whom, however, he had learned to regard thus far only as a miracle- worker and a prophet. His confidence in Jesus was great : he said, " Lord, who is he, that I may believe in him ? " As if he had said, "I will receive any one as Messiah who shall be set forth as such by you." Jesus answered, " You have both seen him, and he it is that is talking with you." The man said, "Lord, I believe," and worshipped him. We cannot know the height of that worship until we know the idea which the name " Messiah " conveyed to that man. How much of God was in the Son of Man, the Christ, the Messiah, accoi'ding to this man's measure of thought, so much of God he worshipped in Jesus. No man ever does more. Jesus said, " For judgment am I come into this world, that they who see not might see, and that they who see may become blind." Did he not speak this in a soliloquy? The tone indicates it. Reflecting upon the unsuccessful effoft he had made to enlighten those of his people who were considered the enlightened class, but perversely preferred darkness to light, and contrasting this with the physical, intellectual, and spiritual illumination he had shed upon this blind beggar, it was natural that this reflection should occur to him. The blind through him found light, and those who thoug-ht themselves enlightened were demonstrated to be blind. Some Pharisees near by, who had probably been watching him as he talked with the excommunicated man, now approached, with the question, "Are we blind also?" His reply was, "H you 478 FROM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. were blind you would have no sin ; but now tliat you say, ' We see, your sin remains " He varies the words a little Pharisees engage ^^ ^^^-^^ ^^^j^. condemnation more pointed. The Jesus in conversa- _ , , i.ii i ■> t ^ -, J.-QJJ lact that they elanned to be ah-eady enlightened, and yet resisted the truth, fastened their guilt upon them. Then followed a discourse which our modern professors of rhetoric would pronounce an outrageous mixture of metaphors, but which has perhaps never confused any learned Discourse of the ^j. i^i^igarned reader by its shifting of figures, as shepherd and the , . • i -i i t sheep when at one time a person is described as a door who had at another been represented as a shep- herd, and again another person is represented at one time as a sheep and at another time as a shepherd. His relation to all true people as the true Shejyherd of the sheej), and the relation of all false people to him as enemies of him and of the flock of God, is what Jesus sets forth ; and this is a severe reproof of the religious leaders of his time. The Jews were descendants of shepherds, and still fed many flocks, so that they were familiar with the allusions to shepherd life with which their whole sacred literature abounded, and which abound in this discourse of Jesus. In the translation of this dis- course I have put many explanatory words in brackets to fill out the pictures to our eyes ; for the speech opens with a picture of a fold by night, with the night-watch on guard, and the thieves occasionally climbing over the low walls. " I most solemnly assure you," said Jesus, " that he who [as a pastor of the flock of God] enters not through the [appointed] door into the sheepfold, but climbs np some other Avay, is a thief and a robber ; but he M'ho '[frankly] enters in through the door is a [true and genuine] shepherd of the sheep. To him the door- keeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name, and leads them out. When he puts forth his own sheep he goes before them [into the pasture], and his sheep" fol- low him ; for they know his voice. And a stranger will they not follow, but will flee from him ; for they know not the voice of strangers." Having uttered these sayings, he looked upon them and saw that they had failed to appreciate the intent and meaning of his words. lie was determined that they should feel some of ita THE FEAST OF DEDICATION. 479 force, so he ex"]3Hcitly said : " I most solemnly fissure you that 1 am the door of the sheep. All who ever came [professing to be- the Shepherd of Men and were not, such as your Pharisaic pastors] are thieves and robbers : but the . ^^ e^^icit say- sheep did not hear them. I am the door: through me if any one enter he shall be saved [from false spiritual pas- tors], and shall go in and out and find pasture. The thief comes not, except that he might steal and kill and destroy. I am come that they might have perpetual life, and have it abundantly. I am the Good Shepherd. The good shepherd gives his life for the sheep. But the hireling [such as you], who also is not a shep- herd, whose own the sheep are not, sees the wolf coming, and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf catches and scatters them, because he is [merely] a hireling and cares not for the sheep. I am the Good Shepherd, and know mine, and mine know me. As the Father knows me, I also know the Father, and I give my life for the sheep. And other sheep I have which are not of this fold ; those also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice, and there shall be one flock, one shepherd. On this account my Father loves me, because I lay down my life, that I may take it again. No one took it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have autlun-- ity to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This injunction have I received of my Father." It seems quite plain from all this that Jesus felt that he held a relation to all the good (piite diffei-ent fi-om that held by any other man, and quite superior ; that such intimacy ex- isted between God and himself that he only, I^elation of Je- together with those who came in his s])irit, could ^^^ '^ ^ ^°°'' ' bring men together, from Jewish and from Gentile folds, and bring all to God. He made another intimation of his approach- ing death, but claimed to have power over life and death, so that his sacrifice of himself was not the sullen, despairing abandon- ment of a defeated revolutionist to his fate, but was a voluntary endurance of death for a high object. It was this which made his Father love him, this high, heroic dutifulness. This profound speech, containing a sharp i-eproof of the un- faithfulness of these venal shepherds, made a great division among his hearei-s. Some said, A division « He has a demon, and is mad." That is the im- ^"''^'* '^""^ pression, or something similar, made on all weak and shallow men 480 FKOM FEAST OF TABERNACLES mSTTn. TIIE LAST WEEK. by the discourses of those who are of very profound and loft;y nature. Jesus caught them up so suddenly to su(;h a lofty height that their heads grew dizzy. Others, not yet understanding him, but having strength of mind to maintain their self-possession in some measure, replied : " These are not the woixls of a de- moniac. Can a demon open the eyes of the blind?" Tliey ap- peal to tlie well-known miracle of the cure of the blind man, which the investigation had established, and in which the peoph; retained their confidence, although the man had been excom- municated. It was the Feast of the Dedication, kept in honor of the cleans- ing of the Temple and the restoration of the Temple service . , „ u])on the deliverance of the nation by the Mac- AchaUenge. ' . n ^i c • cabees irom the oppression or the bynans, a.c. 1C4. (See 1 Mace. iv. 52-59.) It was winter. Jesus was M'alk- ing in the Temple, in Solomon's portico. The Jews encircled him and said to him, " IIow long do you agitate us ? If you be the Christ [the Messiah] tell us plainly." It is a fact to notice tliat Jesus never, in so many words, declared his Messiahship to them. He does not now. His reply is: "I told you, and you beh'eved not. The works that I do in the name of my Father, they bear witness of me. But you believe not, because you are not of my sheep. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they folloAv me, and I give them perpetual life ; and they shall never perish, and no one shall pluck them out of my hand. The Father who gave to me is greater than all, and no one is able to pluck them out of the Father's hands. I and my Father ai-e One." The claims here made by Jesus are of the most exalted kind. The lives of all the good are in his hands. He gives them a per- E aJt d 1" petuation of their lives. Nothing can destroy them because he guards. This claims power over all the forces of the universe. God is above all, and Jesus and God are one. Siu;h were his claims, right or wrong. He did not choose to declare himself to them as Messiah; for reasons which we can conjecture, but he does not hesitate to declare himself to be God. The infuriated Jews so understood him. Again they took up stones to stone him. He said to tliem, " Many good works have I showed you from the Father ; for which work of these do you stone me ? " Their reply was : " We do not stone you for a TIEE FEAST OF DEDICATION. 481 good work, but for blasplieinj ; because, being a man, you make yourself a god." If what Jesus had said was not tlie truth, then it certainly was blasphemy, and the Jews were not prepared to acknowledge the truth, and Jesus did not witlidraw the claim ; but he did answer them by a quotation from Psalm Ixxxii, C. lie said, " Is it not written in the law, ' I said, You are gods? ' If he called them gcjds to whom the word of God came, and the Sci-ip- ture cannot be broken, do you say to him whom the Father has sanctified and sent into the world, ' TIk^u blas})hemcst,' because I said, ' I am a Son of God?' If I do not the works (;f my Fa'lier, believe me not ; but if I do, although you believe not me, be! eve the works, that you may know and believe that the Father is in me and I in the Father." This speech of Jesus is an ai'gument from the use of language. The phrase " Son of God " it was not blasphemous to ajjply to a man, for the Scripture did it repeatedly. But Jesus must also have meant much more than Supposed blas- ,,, ,, , ,. p ,.,.,,. phemous assump- that, or else be desccndmg irom Ins iiigli claims ; ^.^^^^ that the latter was not the case appears from the conduct of his enemies innnediately upon the conclusion of the speech. It nmst be noticed that, in cinnmenting on the passage of Sci'ipture he had quoted, he nuide an argument involving this: If those to whom the word of the Father came were called " gods," it is not blasphemy for him who is the very revelation of the Father to call himself "god." But thai he had not done in this mild and usual form ; he had explicitly declared himself one with the everlasting Father, and it M*as their inference — a fair and loo-ical inference — that he claimed to be a ijod and to be the God. lie now appeals to his works. If they cannot receive his testi- mony M'ithout such aids to their undei-standing as appeal to their senses, here are his works. They are the works of God. You ouffht to believe that he who does those thini>:s is in God, and God in him. So the Jews understood him ; so he undoubtedly meant, if we have his very words in this record. Jesus believed himself to be in God, and God to be in him, and himself and God to be One. When he announced this the Jews sought to capture him, but he escaped out of their hands. 31 CHAPTEE III. « m PEEEA. Jesus must have felt that the end of his career was approach- ing . lie left the dense atmosphere of hostilit}'^, and passed across the Jordan into Perca, the territory of * T A^ T^ Ilerod Antipas. The name Perea included all of Jordan. John _ ^ X. that territory lying along the east of the Jordan, extending from the foot of Ilauran to the desert on the sonth of the Dead Sea. The river rendered tlie land fer- tile, so that it was a district of vineyards, and the proximity of the mountains of Gilead and Moab preserved the salubrity of the climate. Jesus came back to the place where John had had a revelation of the Messiah in the son of Mar3\ To the spot where he was baptized, but which he had never since revisited. Visits the place -r , , .f, • ■, ^ • ^ f c t • .,. , ,. Jesus returned, as it to reo-ird hnnselt lor his of his baptism. _ _ ' ... coming conflict. It was a region inhabited by a mixed population, and its distance from the capital removed it from the fierce religious contentions of the day. He might have a little rest from those conflicts. Moreover, the testimony which John had borne in his behalf was still remembered by the people. When he performed works whi<:;h far surpassed even John's pro- phecies of him, the people resorted to him in multitudes, saying, " John indeed wrought no sign ; but all things that John said of this man were true." And many believed on him there. How long he stayed we do not know, but his sojourn was probably several weeks. The time was occupied by journeys and teachings. It is pro- Are there few hable that it was at this period that one said to that be saved ? him, " Lord, are they few that are being saved ? " Luke xiii. His answer was : •' Strive to enter in througli the narrow door ; for many, I say unto you, will Beck to enter in, and shall not be able. From the time when the master of tha m PEKEA. 483 K.'Use has risen and has shut the door, and you begin to stand without and to knock at the door, saying, 'Lord, open to us,' answering he shall say to you, ' I know you not whence you are.' Then you shall begin to say, ' We hav eaten and drunk in thy presence, and thou hast taught in our streets.' And he shall say to you, ' I know you not whence you are ; depart from me, all workers of iniquity.' There sliall be weeping and gnasliing of teeth when you shall see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, and you thrown out. And they shall come from the east and the west, and from the north and the south, and shall recline in the kingdom of God. And see, they are last who shall be first, and they arc first who shall be List." The question was proposed by some frivolous person in the crowds about him, some person not yet enough attached to him to be called a disciple: AVlio shall be of the kingdom of the Messiah ? Now there comes forward in the reply of Jesus what we shall find repeatedly presented liereafter, the idea of the last becoming first, and the first falHng beliind. Many would like to be of the kingdom of God, but are not able to enter in, simply because they do not take the legitimate measures. They '• are not able " to break into the kingdom nor to sneak into it, and these are the only ways they try. lie represented their final for- lornness by the picture of a head of a household whose family had been wandering about beyond the hour for retiring, and his resolute determination that if they would not keep his regulations they should stay outside. No matter what the privileges of any man, if he do not come in God's ways he cannot come at all ; and no matter whence a man may come, if he come ariglit he shall have admittance. The same day certain of the Pharisees came and said to him, "Depart hence, for Ilcrod desires to kill you." They invented the story to induce Jesus to leave, or they had reason to know that Herod had animosity towards the Teacher. This latter is quite compatible witli his desire to see Jesus. Katures like Herod's are fitful. Jesus seems to have received the statement as a message from Herod, since he made this reply: " Go and tell that fox, Behold, I cast out demons and I do cures to-day and to- morrow, and the third day bring them to an end. Nevertlieless, I must walk to-day, and to-morrow, and the following : for it can- not be that a prophet perish out of Jerusalem ! " This was not the language of precision, but of irony and melancholy. John had perished by the liands of Herod, but as a general rule the 484: FEOII FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. hatred wliicli produced martyrdom had its seat at the Bation'a ecclesiastical headquarters, Jerusalem, It was while enc in want. And he went and joined himself to one of the citizens of that country; and he sent him into his fields to feed swine. And he would fain have been filled with the pods that the swine did eat : and no one gave to him. And coming to himself, he said, 'How many hired servants of my father have bread enough and to spare, and I am perislnng liere with hunger ! I will arise and go to my father, and will say to him, Fatlier, I have sinned against heaven and before you ; I am no moi-e wortliy to be called your son : make me as one of your hired servants.' And he ai-ose and came to his father. But when he was yet a great way off liis fatlier saw liim, and Avas moved with compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him. And the son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight. I am no more worthy to 1)C called your son ; make me as one of your hired servants.' But the father said to liis slaves, ' Bring forth quickly tlie best robe, and put it on him ; and put a ring on his hand, and san- dals on his feet. And bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it ; and let us eat and be merry. For this my son was dead and is alive again ; he was lost arid is found.' They Ijegan to l)e merry. Now his elder son was in a field : and as he came and drew nigh to the liouse, lie heard music and dancing. And having called one of the servants, he asked what these things meant. And he said to him, ' Your l)rother is come : and your father has killed the fatted calf, because he lias received him safe and sound.' And he was angry, and would not go in; but his father coming out entreated liim. And he, answering, said to his fatlier, ' Lo, these many years do I serve you, and never did I transgress your command ; and you never gave me a kid that I might make merry with my friends. But when this your son has come, who has devoured your means ol living with harlots, you have killed for him the fatted calf.' And he said to him, ' Cliild, you are always with me, and all that I have is yours. But it was needful to make merry and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive ; he was lost, and is found.' " • The connection and the climax in this series of parables must be noticed. They indicate a regular discourse rather than a col- lection of sayings. Ownership, in some sense, is the connecting thought. A lifeless coin, a living domestic animal, a son ; this is the climax. If the order which Luke gives was observed in the address, then it would logically seem thus : The recovery of a lost animal is a cause of rejoicing, — nay, even the recovery of a coin, — how much more the reco\ery of a son. Men are i-epresented as; the sons of God, and all sinful. Sinners are of two classes, — }>i'( d- igal sinners and puritan sinners, — those who gravitate towaid the condition of outlaws and those who gravitate towards the condi- tion of sneaks. In some particntlars the prodigal is worse than the elder brother, in many others the elder brother is worse than the prodigal. The yearning love of the fatlier draws the wan- m PEEEA. 4S9 derer home ; the goodness of the father hears with the son who is a hypocrite. In any case, when a human being is h>st, God is the loner. This puts the appeal to every liuman heart on a hif>-her plane tluui mere selfish taking care of one's self.* Then followed this parable : — , " Tliere was a certain rich man that had a steward ; and he was accused to him of wasting his property. And calling him, he said to him, 'What is this which I hear of you? Render an account of your steward-sliip ; for j^ou can be no longer a steward.' And raiabie of the Unjust tiie steward said witln-n liimself, 'What shall I do, because ^"''""'^' ^"''"-^''''^ my lord takes the stewardship away from me? I am not strong enough to dig; I am asliamed to l)eg. I know what I will do, that when I am put out of the stewardship they may receive me into their houses.' And calling each one of liis lord's debtors, he said to tlie fiist, 'IIow much do you owe ny lord?' And he said, 'A hundred baths (806 gallons) of oil.' ^And he said to him, ' Take your bill, and sit down quickly, and Amte Jifty.' Then he said to another, ' And how much do you owe ? ' And he said, ' A hundred cors (1109 bushels) of wheat' And he said to liim, 'Take your bill and wi-ite eighty.' And the lord praised the unjust steward, because he did pru- dently ;t fortliG children of this Ufe are more prudent for their generation than the children of light. "And I tell you, IMake for yourselves friends of the riches of injustice, that wlK-n it fails they may receive you into the enduring tabernacles He that IS faitl.ful in the least is faithful also in mucli. If, therefore, you have not been faithful in the unjust riches, who will commit to you the true ? And if you have not been faithful in another's, wlio will give you youi-s ? No domestic can serve two masters; for he will either hate the first and love the other, or he will adiiere to the lirst and despise the other. You cannot serve God and Mammon.'' Perhaps we shall simplify the difhculties which manv have found in this parable by learnhig to whom it was addi-essed and what it was intended to teach. It was not ad- dressed to the Scribes and Pharisees, but as Luke Meaning of the expressly says, «to his disciples.'' It' was in- ^''''''^''• tended to teach prudence in the management of a man's spiritual affairs. The ordinaiy lack of this prudence he makes the more conspicuous by contrasting it with the prudence of men who are * See these ideas enlarged in my pub- lished sermons, entitled llie Puritan Sinner and Lost. t This seems the verj- best translation of the original word. It was used in Wiclif s translation, but unfortunately was changed in the common version. There may be prudence without wis- dom, for piudenc3 is often a rascally Tirtue, 490 FKOM FEAST OF TAUEKNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. absorbed in worldly matters. Here was a steward to whom waa committed the affairs of his rich employer. The bonds made by that steward, who seems to have had a power of attorney, would bind the master. He, -moreover, lent the money of the master, and took obligations therefor. He became wasteful. Upon learning this the employer expostulated with him indignantly, and ordered him to settle up his affairs. This gave him time to think. But he did not delay. He went from bad to worse, lie now resolved to rob his master. Calling the debtors together, he made a swift arrangement with them. Tlicy were not poor ten- ants, but rich neighbors in large business themselves, or else they could not have been trusted with sucli amounts of such costly ar- ticles as oil and wheat. He handed back their Ixmds, and received in return bonds for a nuich less sum. They wei-e thus laid under great pecuniary obligation to this steward. They did not know that he was about to lose his place ; but he did. So when he waa discharged he had ground of an appeal to them. AVhen his em- ployer discovered what had been done, he complimented the shrewdness of a man who had been most dishonest towai'ds him. It M'as only the forecast, not the dishonesty, that was praised. Jesus used the parable to teach his disciples prudence in regard to the future oi their souls. A great difficulty exists in the say- ing of Jesus : " Make for yourselves friends of Friends of the ^^le mammon of injustice, that when it fails they Mammon of un- , . , i • , , i ',i ^,-„v,».<.^„o,,^oo iiiay receive you mto the endurmg tabernacJes. righteousness. j j & Money is represented under the name Mannnon, and it has been said that this was the name of the Syrian god of wealth, as Plutus was in the Greek mythology. But no proof has been discovered of such a fact. It is called "Unjust Mammon," or "the Mammon of Injustice," as riches are ordinarily, not always, acquired in a sinful way, or used for purposes of injus- tice, or are in themselves delusive. The dealing with large wealth usually leads to some wrong-doing ; and, as Meyer says, " the ethical character of its use is represented as cleaving to itself " in this phrase in the parable. But riches can l)e used so as to secure permanent spiritual blessings. The disciple of Jesus who does not so use it is not as prudent as the unjust steward. Gen- erally his disciples do not ; and therefore Jesus says that " the children of this life are more prudent for their generation than the children of light " are for the world beyond. IN PEKEA. 491 Tlie Pharisees, who were covetoiis, heard all these things and derided him. To them he addressed the following parable : " There was a certain rich man, and he was clothed in purple and fine linen, and feasted sumptuously every day. And a certain poor man by tlie name oi Lazarus was laid at his gate, afflicted with ulcers, and de- siring to be fed with the crumljs which fell from the rich l-"^" ^'- ^''^"■^^^ , , , T n' T 1 1 1 • 1 o^ t^" liii^li Miin and man s table ; yet even the dogs came and licked liis ulcers. Lazarus. And the poor man died, and was carried away by the angels to Abraham's bosom. And the rich man also died, and was buried ; and in the under-world he lifted up his eyes, being in torments, and saw Aljraham from afar, and Lazarus in his bosom. And he called and said, ' Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip the tip of hia finger in water and cool my tongue ; for I am in pain in this flame.' "But Abraham said, ' Son, remember that you received your good things in your life, and Lazarus in like manner evil things; but now he is comforted here, and you are in pain. And ])csidcs all this, there is a great chasm fixed between us and you, so that those wishing to pass hence to you cannot, neither can they i)ass thence to us.' And he said, ' I l>eseecli you, tlien, fatlier, send him to my fathei-'s house, for I have five brothers, to testify fully to them, that they may not also come to this place of torment.' But Al)ruham said, 'They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.' But he said, ' No, father Abraham, but if one went to tliem from the dead they would change their minds.' But he said to him, ' If they hear not jMoses and the prophets, they would not be persuaded if one rose from the dead.' " This parable is not intended to be a revelation of the ontward condition of individual souls in the spiritual world. Jesus takes the imagery of Jewish and Gentile mj'thologj as the mere drapery for the teaching of most impor- "^^ ^^^ ^ ® taut moral lessons. " Abraham's bosom " is a metaphor for a place of permanent rest in communion with the good. The whole parable is a short and striking drama, convey- ing most solemn and impressive lessons. The main lesson is the ruinonsness of nnbelicf in a spiritual World, an nnbelief which renders men selfish in this world, and engrossed witli this world, so that they may be covetous as tlie Pharisees were, or self- indulgent as the rich man in the parable was; The Pharisees, so far from being clothed in purple and fine linen, were remai'kably abstemious in diet and modest in dress. Bnt penuriousness and prodigality are opi)Osite sins, growing from the trunk of worldli- ness, tliat is, overestimate of the value of what addresses tlie senses, the one finding its pleasure in hoarding and the other in 4:92 FEOM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. squandering, — and tlms worldliness grows from the root of unbe- lief in a spiritual world. In the story two persons are represented as being in extremely opposite conditions. One was rich, the other a beggar. One was clothed in byssus, a linen which was sold in the vs-omenin is |.jjjjg ^f Jesns for its wei<>;ht in jrold, and in o-ar- world. . o !■!! 5 t? ments colored with the most costly dyes. The other did not have clothes enough to cover his sores. The one had a mansion with a gate ; the other was homeless, and laid about at people's doors, probably by those who desired to be rid of him. In comparison with" the splendid condition of the one who fared sumptuously " every day," was the fact that the other waited to catch tlie crumbs which the servants of the former would throw to the beggars and the dogs. These latter, such wretched dogs as prowl in Oriental cities, added to the humiliation of the beggar by being his only attendants, licking his sores, and thus making a contrast with the unfeeling human brother. The beggar was named Lazarus in the story. Perhaps it Avas suggested by the name of the friend of Jesus, ^vllom he was soon to raise from the dead. That men may know that condition is nothing and character everything, Jesus transfei'S the scene to the under-world. Lazarus dies. lie has no funeral. But after death he is happy. Angels escort him to the society of the good and blessed. The rich man dies. Ilis funeral is a pomp. But he is wretched . The same men jn the under-world. lie sees Abraham and Lazarns. — ^g He cries to them for help. lie had found his pleasure in physical delights. His misery is the want of them. He does not deplore his unbelief, but wants his tongue cool. He is a churchman even in the under-world. He claims Abraham as his father. Abraham acknowledges the rela- tionship, calling him " son," but showing him that that is of no avail to a Jew whose character is ruined by unbelief. The rich man's ideas of caste do not desert him in the under-world. He does not presume to ask "Father Abraham" to bring him a drink, but he requests him to send that beggar Lazarus to wait on him. The whole story teaches that in this world, or any other, a man is himself; that death does not destro}' his identity. The same prejudices and passions a man has here he has hero- after. IN PEREA. 493 Prayers to departed saints do not seem helpful. Al^raliam could not help the rich man. There is as great a gulf in the spir- itual world as in this. Men cannot cross and re- ,11. ,1 T 1 1 i. 1 1 Prayers to saints, cross the nne at pleasure. Lazarus could not help tlie ri('h man if he would. The rich man had not been specially vicious, may have done many things which he ought to have done, and for that he had received his "good things " in this life. Lazarus was not perfect, and had done many things which he ought not to have done, and he had received his "evil things" in this life. r>ut the great distinction between them M'as that Laza- rus had built his character on a sure faith in the surpassing im- portance of the spiritual woi'ld, and the rich man had erected his on faith in the surpassing importance of the material world. And this dift'erence is immense. The forloni wretch would seem to have been anxious to prolong the conversation. lie rememl)ered his brothers ; but the M-ay ho speaks of them leaves us at a loss Avhether he was more concerned for them or more disj)Oscd U) arraign God's providence. He desires the dead Lazarus to be sent on an" errand for hiin, and to warn his brothers by telling them that there was a spiritual world. This means that if God had given him sufficient warning he would not have gone into that torment. The reply of Alu-ahani is stern, and by it Jesus gives a powei-ful lesson for all time. God knows what kind and amount of evidence is necessary to convince those who will be convinced, and he has given it. He knows that no amount of ai^' kind of evidence Avill convince those who do not choose to know the truth. The appearance of one from the dead would not be more convincing than the Holy Scriptures. And it must be noticed that almost innnediately after this he raised Laz- arus from the grave. A man who had been four days dead came back, and had no more influence upon the md)elieving Jews than Jesus had, or the writings of Moses. There may have been, many suppose there was, in this parable a lesson for nations — the rich man representing the Jews and Laz- arus the Gentiles. The sjiiritual conti-ast, as to pi-ivilegcs, is as great in one case as in another. The Gentiles shall become the children of Abraham by faith, while the Jews shall be cast out. Perhaps he did mean that also, but it is not quite ajiparent, and we have given above what we think the clear-sighted iiearers of Jesus must have felt to be the meaning of the speaker. 494: FROM FEAST OF TABEENACLEfl UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. It was probably in this connection that he made the following address to his disciples : — "It is impossible for causes of offence not to come ; but woe to him through whom they come ! It were better for him that a millstone were hung round Luke xvii. On of- his ueck, and lie cast iuto the sca, than that he should cause fences, forgiveness, and one of these little ones to offcnd. Take heed to your- ^^^^' selves: If your brother trespass, admonish him; and if he change his mind, forgive him. And if he tresj^ass against thee seven times in a day, and seven times turn again to thee, saying, I change my mind; thou shalt forgive him." Tlien the apostles said to the Lord, "Increase our faith." And the Lord said — " If ye have faith as a grain of mustard, ye might say to this sycamine- tree, Be rooted up, and be jAanted in the sea ; and it would have ol)eyed you. But who of you, having a slave ploughing or tending flocks, will Bay to him, when he is come from the field, ' Go immediately and recline to eat ? ' And will not rather say to him, ' Make ready wherewith I may sup, and gird tliyself, and serve me, until I eat and drink ; and afterwards thou Bhalt eat and drink ? ' Doth he thank the slave because he did the things com- manded him ? So likewise ye, when ye shall liave done the things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable slaves; Ave have done what was our duty to do." This address teaches the behavior j^roper among brothers. Through the frailty of human character men will offend, and, what is woi-sc, will cause others to offend. It is a thing to be dreaded. But if one's brother commits an offencejie must go to him kindly and admonish, and upon repentance must forgive him, and must do so just as often as the brother offends and repents. As this recpiires faith, the twelve who were near him united in a prayer for increase of faith, and it has been noticed that this is the only petition in which the whole twelve ever did unite. The reply of Jesus shows something more than the gross marvel which a literal rendering of words would indicate. It shows that Jesus believed there was a loftier circle of existence, in which faith represents what muscular Btrength stands for in this lower physical world, and, moreover, that in that sphere things are possible which are impossible in this The disciples were always ready to go into pride, and such a picture of spiritual power Jesus tempered by calling their atten- tion to the fact that they were servants, and that as they expected IN PEKEA. 495 their slaves to do their duty without feeh'ng that they had laid any one under obligation, so when the disciples of Jesus had per- formed their greatest and best works they were to consider in humility that they had merely done their duty. The Betliany in Perea is about thirty miles from the Olivet Betliany, which is less than two miles from Jerusalem ; fifteen stadia says Luke. AYliile Jesus was carrying for- ward his woi-k on the east of the Jordan, Lazarus Sickness and sickened. Lazarus was the cherished friend of f^^^l ^^''''"'• Jesus. Iiuleed, nowhere else in his history do we find Jesus enjoying the amenities of society in repose, and away from the glare of publi(nty which notable men of aifairs must always endure, except in this household, which consisted of a busy, bustling elder sister, a gentle, thoughtful younger sister, and a quiet brothei-, probably the youngest of the three. Bethany M-as so near to Jerusalem that it presented Jesus a place of easy retreat, and it was so small and unimportant a villao-e, lying nes- tled (piietly on the mountain side, containing no residence of offi- cial pei-sonage, whether civil or ecclesiastical, that it afforded a safe and happy escape from the bickerings and contentions of the excitable metropolis. Jesus had put hiuiself upon the footing of most respectful familiarity with this family, insomuch that Martha came to him with her petty household- cares and the gentle Mary became his companion. These people were not desperately poor, but rather iu moderately comfortable circumstances, seeing that they entertained company and were ownei-s of a family buriab place. When Lazarus sickened the sisters despatched a messenger to Jesus, saying simply, " Lord, behold he whom you love is sick." It was a i-equest delicately embedded in an expression of trustful- ness. AVhen Jesus heard it he said, "This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified thereby." This was a declaration which showed that Jesus believed he could see the conclusion of this whole matter, and the results proved how correct it was. It was not merely an opinion of a case of sickness, expressed after hearing tlie symp, toms from the messenger, but it was of the nature of a prediction. It gave the messenger comfort to carry to the sistei-s. After receiving the message Jesus remained in Perea two dava before he again alluded to the subject or made any change in his 406 FKOM FEAST OF T.VUERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. movements. He then said to his discijiles, "Let ns go into Judsea." Tlicy recalled the painful scenes throiij^h ^yhich thej had so lately passed with him in Jerusalem, scenes Jesus stm re- ^y\^\^.]^ iini)ressed them deeply with the feeling mains in Perea. , , . , . f . i ^^ . , that tlie intentions or the ruling party were most malignant. They replied, "Rabbi, the Jews of late sought to stone you, and do you go there again?" His answer was, "Are there not twelve hours in the day? If any one walk in the day he does not stumble, l)ecause he sees the light of this world. But if any one walk in the night he stumbles, because there is no light in him," There is in these words not only a lofty truth as to the special mission of the extraordinary man who uttered them, but an im- portant principle touching all human life. The disciples desired to prolong his life by keeping him from his enemies. lie did not desire to lose his life in any sense, either by having his career cut short by his foes, or l)y his own departure from the line of his rio-htful work. He held that if he should protract the years of his natural life by kecjung out of the line of his woilv, because the peril of death lay therein, his life would be lost in a worse manner than if he were killed in doing his work at the right time and place. He should have outlived himself, and thus have lost his life. The only safety. and happiness lie in doing the assigned work, discharging the obvious duty. That is walking in the light. There is just so much of light and life, say "twelve hours." If a man lill those hours with the right work, ho has gained life. If he omit, and then endeavor to go out in the night to work, he stum- bles. To apply it to himself: if his duty call him to Bethany, thither he must go, even if the Jews kill him ; for staying away is stepping out of the light of duty into the night of selfishness. If Jesus do so, he cau no longer accomplish any good in Perea, or Galilee, or elsewhere. He must walk in the day. He then said to them, " Lazarus, our friend, is sleeping ; but I go that I may awake him." He knew that Lazarus was dead. Whether by the prophetic spirit that was in him He announces ^^. | j^jg j,i(]nrincnt iipon whatever dcsci'iption of the death of Laz- . , "- , . • . • . the case tlie -messenii-cr may nave given, it is not arus. i^ . . T important to decide ; but the fact is that Jesus in Perea knew that Lazarus was dead in the Bethany near Jerusa- lem. He desired to prepare the minds of his disciples for the IN PEKEA. 497 dangerous journey, and so began to let tlicm know the exact state of the ease. Tliey took his statement literally, and said, " Lord, if he sleep he shall recover." But Jesus spoke of his death. In all languages sleep is represented as the image of death ; but it comes with extraordinary beauty and force from the lips of him who is going to arouse the sleeper. Then Jesus said to them l»lainly, " Lazarus is dead, and I am glad on your account that I was not there, that ye may believe ; but let us go to him." The history here inserts a little incident which is very beauti- ful, and which sheds light on a certain cast of character. Thomas, called Didymus, turned to his fellow-disciples and said very pathetically, " Let us also go, that we ^^° ^^^ ° may die with him." Thomas was a natural skep- tic, a constitutional doubter, a desponding soul. lie required the most grossly palpable proofs to win his belief. But he was true- hearted and brave when he did believe. And of just such stuff do we find a certain class of doubters and melancholy men in all ages, Lazarus was dead. Jesus was going to die. The circle was breaking. " Let us all go together," said this sad, brave man. His faith could not reach to the heights of his Master's predictions, but his fidelity made him ready to follow that Master unto the death. Wliy Jesus should have delayed two days in Perea after receiv- ing the message of Martha and Mary we can only conjecture, and scarcely any theory yet presented seems entirely satisfactory. He did not idle. He was not en- ^^^ •^^'"' ^^' 1 • 1 •! • T T-» , laved. deavonng to while away time. In i erea he found plenty of work to do, and he chose to finish what had been BO auspiciously begun. It is true that he might have left some disciples behind him and have returned. But he did not intend to return. His career was coming to its close. He read his cir- cumstances correctly. Moreover, he was never hurried. He had that self-possession which, when conjoined with high intellectual and moral qualities, is the measure of true greatness. He knew what he could do, and what he would do. And then he had re- spect to those, his dearest friends, whose spiritual iinpi-ovement was a ruling consideration in this matter. He was working for the good of men and for the glory of God. He neither loitered nor hurried. 32 CHAPTER ly. JESUS ON HIS LAST CIRCUIT. "When Jesus readied Bethany lie found that Lazarus had been alread}' "four days in the tomb." It would seem that when the messenger was despatched by the sisters, Lazarus In Bethany near ^vas still living. Such their message implied. It was therefore satisfactory and consolatory to the messenger to hear Jesus say that that sickness was not unto death. He must have been greatly surprised when he returned and found Lazarus buried, and if he delivered the message to the sisters they must have been sorely puzzled, for Lazarus had died in the mean time. This message must have seemed to them to show that Jesus had lost his way. He had said that this sickness was not unto death at the very moment when Lazarus was in his grave, for the Jews made haste to bury their dead out of their sight, and a prompt interment was intended to be an honor to the deceased.* Wlien this message came to Martha and Mary it must have been a double blow. They had had such love for Lazarus and such confidence in the power of Jesus ; and now Lazarus was dead and Jesus was mistaken, or, if not mistaken, he did not regard them enough to come and explain his dark sayings. So it seemed to them. Lazarus must have died the day the messenger left for Perea, and been buried before sundown. That journey occupied a day. Jesus spent two other days in Perea, and the fourth was given to the journey to Bethau}^, so that when he arrived it was the fourth day that the corpse of Lazarus had been in the grave. * For proof that it was custoraaiy to bury the dead on the day of their death, eee Acts v. 6, 10, and Jahn's Arcliceology ^ i. 2. In hot countries it is necessary to bury promptly bfecaiise of the rapid de- composition ; and the Jews had the ad- ditional reason of being fearful of deiile- ment by reason of contact with a corpse. Even now, in Jerusalem, the burial, as a general rule, is not defeiTed more than three or four hours ; and if the death occur so late in the evening that the burial cannot take place that night, it is performed at the eaiiiest break of day. JESUS ON niS LAST CrRCUIT. 499 The sorrow of this stricken family liad called to them their neii^hboring friends, and also many Jews from Jerusalem, some undoubtedly sincerel}' sympathizing with these afflicted young women, others simply going through the ceremonies of condolence in a perfunctory manner, and others perhaps desirous of bringing back into the fold of orthodoxy these excellent women, who had been tnrned aside by the fascination and friendship of the young heresiarch of Nazareth. There was a crowd in the house. Martha, always busy and bustling, was in a position to hear of the approach of Jesus, and she hastened to meet him. Mary was sitting quiet in the house. The tiaits of character in each came out undei' the new and exciting circumstance of the arrival of Jesus. Martha met him first, and the words that burst from her lips indicate what had been the thoughts, and probably the sayings, of the sisters in his absence. " Lord, if you had been here iny brother had not died ! " This speech is a study. Martha had had ample opportunity to investigate the character of Jesus. She had seen him both fatigued and rested ; had noticed him gazing in J. . . . 1 . T ,1 , . Martha's speech, revery far mto tiie air, or down the mountani slope, as he sat before the door of her house ; had heard him when he was engaged in conversation M'itli Lazarus or some of the dis- ciples ; had watched his inteix-ourse with Mary; noticed, as only woman's quick eye can notice, all his movements about the house, his dress and address, his dispositions of himself, his off-guard moods, his temper under provocation, and all those things which have been said to make a man cease to be a hei-o to his valet. The whole impression made upon her mind was that he was so holy as to have most intimate communion with God, such intimacy as gave him most extraordinary power, such power as would have enabled him even to push back death and keep her brother alive. But she did not know, it would seem, of the miracles he had wrought in restoring other persons to life, and did not imagine Buch a possibility as the resurrection of her brother. To Martha Jesus was a divine personage, but not Deity. To the saving, "' II you had been here my brother had not died," she added, proba- bly after a pause and a sob, " Even now I know that whatever you will ask of God, God will give to you." AVliat she expected him to ask of God is not apparent. She was in the tunudt of a fresh and great bereavement, swayed by hopes and fears and griefs. The spiritual elevation of every person who came within the 500 FROM FEAST OF TABERNACLES TmTIL THE LAST WEEK. circle of his influence was manifestly the design of all that Jesiia did and said. To give back her brother simply, was merely to indulge Martha's natural desires for a season, leav- High aims of -^^^ |^^j. g^-|| ^^^ great distress because her l)rother might be snatched from her again at any mo- nieut. Her suffering, in that case, would have been such as Wordsworth, in his fine poem of Laodamia, lias described to have been that of liis lieroine when the shade of Protesilaus was re- stored to lier for a l)rief time and then withdrawn. As Olshausen lias well said, it was needful that Martlia should so recover her brother that it would be impossible ever to lose him again, and thus become rooted M'ith him in the element of the imperishable. Jesus proceeded not simply to restore her brother, but to f urnisli her with a remedy against all forms in which death could possibly assault humanity, bodily or spiritually. Jesus said to her, " Your brother shall rise again ! " Martha replied, " I know that he shall rise again at the resnr- rection — at the last day." It is to be noticed that she speaks of the resuri-ection as a doctrine currently received, and as including the restoration to life of all dead men, simply in virtue of their beino; men and beinjj dead : and also that this was to be accom- plished for all the race at the last day. As if she had said : " Of course, as he has shared the fate of all men in dying, he shall share the fate of all men in rising." But Jesus taught her another doctrine and advanced a most prodigious claim for himself. He said : " I am the Resurrection and the Life. He who believes on me, even if he .Tesus claims to ^.^^.^ ^^. ^j^^lj j.^.^ ^^^^| ^ ^^^^ ^^,^^^ Ij^.^g j^j^jj and believes in me shall not ultimately die." He removes from the plane of natural causes both life and the resurrection, and declares that the power of both re- sides in him ; that he is the dynamical force of life ; that without him no one who is dead could possibly be restored ; and that those who are alive and have connection with him cannot finally per- ish. He represents himself as the fountain of soul-life and of the animal life that is in man. He is the life. He is Lifeness itself. H he bring himself to bear upon the dead they live. If he bring himself to bear upon the living, so long, through the ages, as this remains, they are not able to die. He is the Resur- rection for Lazarus, and he is the Life for Martha. JESUS ON HIS LAST CIRCriT. 501 Upon tliis he appealed to her : " Do you believe this?" Mai-tha did not unequivocally express her faith in this startling and immeuse claim, but she did reply, "■ I have reached the be- lief that you are the Christ — the Anointed One — „ , , •^ , 1155 Martha s caution. the Son of God that was to come into the world. It was a noble thing in her not to give hasty assent to what she could neither understand nor believe. Jesus had uttered some- thing too deep for her, and then startled her by the sudden cpies- tion, " Do you believe all this ? " She could not say whether she did or not, because she was not sure that she quite apprehended the meaning ; but she did believe that he was the Messiah, and was quite ready to say that much. If that meant what Jesus meant, then " Yes, Lord ; " if not, then " Nay, Lord ; not yet that much ; but I have believed and do believe that you are the Mes Biah." Having said this she went her way and privately sought Mary not choosing to let the Jews from Jerusalem know that Jesus was BO near, for she must have known the intensity of the malignant hatred of the Jews towards Jesus. She said to Mary : " The Master is here, and calls for you." AVhen Mary heard this she arose quickly and came to him. Jesus had not come to the house, nor indeed into the village, but was near, perhaps between the house and the burial-place. When the Jews who were in the house, and had been endeavoring to comfort her, saw Mary rise up hastily and go out, they followed her, thinking that she was going to the tomb to weep there. When Maiy reached Jesus she fell at his feet — an act of homage which Martha had not paid, an expression of adoring love, perhaps brought sud- denly from her by the recollection that she had been sitting in the house M'hile her dear friend was so near. She exclaimed, " Lord, if you had been here my brother had not died." In the identity of this speech with that of Martha, both coming out in the great emotion of the first meeting, we sec what had been the tenor of their conversation in the absence of the dear friend. It was the unfortunate absence which occasioned all their trouble. The coniidence in Jesus of these two women, who were so dif- ferent in temperament, is really aifectingly beautiful. The outburst of Mary stirred the hearts of the Jews who had come to mourn with her, and they wept. When Jesus saw thia deep emotion he was vehemently agitated. The language of the 502 FEOM FEAST OF TAJ3EKNACLES UNl'IL THE LAST WEEK. original history (Jolm xi. 33) intimates a complex mental condi tion, a combination of grief and anger, " he grew wroth in liia spirit and disturbed himself ! " Ilis sympathies The grief of the ^^.^^.^ intense. He loved Maiy. He could not en- dure to see her suffer so keenly. These were rea- sons for tears ; but why should he be angry ? That is not so easy to answer. Neither Mary nor the Jews had done anything on this occasion to arouse his indignation. It is absurd to suppose that the mere death of Lazarus had produced this state of feeling, or that he had -any regrets for his own absence when Lazarus died ; because he believed that he was about to raise him from the dead, and he had said to his disciples that he was glad he was not present at the death, because he knew that it was for the glory of God. AVe cannot very clearly discern good reason for his anger, but he was angry. It may be that an intense perception of all the wrong that sin was working in the race came upon him, and the discords and jangles of the world broke on his sensitive soul with a force that excited him violently. If this be not the explanation, we do not know what is; but it is quite clear that the historian de- scribes him as angered. Lie said, " Where have you laid him ? " They replied, " Lord, come and see." Jesus wept. On the way to the sepulchre the company noticed that manly tears were silently flowing down the checks of Jesus, like a shower of soft rain after a thunder-clap. Something Jeli^^ ^^®^ °^ had angei-ed him. Now he was weeping. Some of the Jews said to others, " See how he loved him." And then, recollecting the case of the blind man in Jeru- salem, Avhom Jesus had restored to sight, they said, "Could not this man, who opened the eyes of the blind, have caused even that this man should not have died ? " It must be noticed that this remark shows that the restoration of the blind man had been settled as a fact in the popular opinion of Jerusalem. The spec- tators saw in Jesiis unmistakable signs of affection for Lazarus. Ho had shown gi-eat power in the case of the blind man ; did hig ability to save stop at that limit ? In that case he had been criti- cised for doing too nmch ; here, for doing too little. The anger of Jesus rose again, and exploded in a groan rather than in a ver- bal reply to their foolish gainsaying. JEStfS ON HIS LAST CrRCUTT. 503 They came to the tomb. It was a cave. A stone lay against it. Jesus said to them, " Take the stone away." Martha shrank from the exposure and expostuhated : " Lord, al- ready he" — she said with instinctive shuddering e grave, and painful reluctance — "stinketh; for he. has l)cen buried four days." Here was a conflict between her faith in the friendly power of Jesus and her natural desponding disposition. She did not know that putrefaction had begun ; the word " for " shows that she had merely inferred it from the length of time her brother had been in the tomb. Jesus reassured her. "Did I not say to you that if you would believe you should see the glory of God." Then they removed the stone. Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, "Father, I thank Thee that Thou hast heard me. And I know that Thou hearest me always ; but because of the mul- titude which stand around I said this that they may believe that Thou hast sent me." This remarkable speech seems to be the utterance of a sentiment of internal spiritual communion, and not a prayer in the form of petition, although Jesus did make such prayers. This was no "show-prayer." It was a Eucharist, a thankssivinir, such as was in his heart, and he chose to utter it that the people hearing it might believe that he was the Sent of God, the Christ, the Messiah, or at least perceive that he believed himself to be such. The raising of the dead was the experiinentum crucis, the final and indisputable test and proof of Messiahship. . He accepted it as such. He had raised the dead at least twice before, in the cases of the daughter of the nobleman and the son of the Nain widow, but never under cir- cumstances like these, in which the deceased was an adult, had been dead and buried now the fourth day, and spectators from Jerusalem, the seat of ecclesiastical authority and of enmity to Jesus, were present in a crowd sufficient to examine all the phenomena of the miracle, and to detect collusions and tricks. They were certain that Lazarus was dead. It could not have been an arrangement upon the part of these young women and Jesus. His whole character M'as such that not only would he not have entered into any such arrangement, but if they had desired to glorify the great Teacher by getting up a pseudo-miracle, he would never for the sake of friendship have yielded himself unwillingly to be part of such a scheme. Moreover, the grief of 604 FROM FEAST OF TABEKNACLES UNTIL -niE LAST WEEK. Martha and Mary, as well as that of Jesus, was not feigned. If it had been, the Jews, who liad three days for observation, would have detected it. They were so thoroughly convinced of the death of Lazarus that they themselves wept with Mary and ad- mired the tenderness of the friendship of Jesus. It was the crisis of Jesus. He stood before the opened toin]>, and, with a loud voice, cried, " Lazarus, come forth." Then he who had been dead came forth, in just such e raises aza- p|jg]j{. j^g corpses were customarily laid away in the grave, namely, with narrow strips of linen wrapped about each limb, so that while motion was obstructed it was not impracticable, and with a handkerchief tied about liis head. So thoi'ough was the restoration that he needed no aid to obey the command of Jesus, but w^alked forth into the pre- sence of the assembly. Jesus simply said, " Loose him, and let him go." That is, take away whatever encumbers him and let liim go home. One cannot fail to notice the absence of all parade and mura- blincj and incantation, as if this were the work of a magician. The history is beautiful on the side of the human passions, and sublime on the side of the simple exercise of power in doing "udiat only God has always been supposed to be capable of per- forming. There is no indulgence of curiosity, no telling of tales brought back from the prison-house of the sepulchre, no marvels, no self-gratulation upon the part of Jesus, no sense of exhaustion, as if he had poured vital force from himself into his dead friend. The veil is dropped over any conversation Jesus might have had with his dear friend, and the most delicate silence preserved as to tlie display of feeling upon the part of Lazarus and liis sisters at his restoration, and any loving thanks they may have heaped upon tlieii- benefacto]-. Even tradition does not venture upon repeating to us anything Lazarus may have been represented as saying of his sensations in dying, his experience of being dead, and his emotion upon the return of the soul to its seat in the body, and the reattachment of the cords of life which had been snapped. Tradition only tells us that Lazarus asked Jesus if he should die again, and when informed that there still lay before him the inevitable fate of humanity, he never smiled a2:ain. But there is no foundation for that. It is the unnatural fancy of some gloomy mind. JESCS ON HIS LAST CIRCUIT. 505 History tells us nothing more of Lazarns, In the beginning of the second century many of those Avhom Jesus had both healed and raised from the dead were still alive, according to Quadiatus in Eusebius (//. E.^ iv. 3). From this great miracle the village of Bethany took the name of Lazarus, and to this day is called El-Azariyeh or Lazariyeh. Of the Jews who witnessed tlie miracle there were two classes, those Avhom this proof of Messiahship won to Jesus, and those who, overwhelmed for a season by this display of power, which seemed to be omnipotence, nevertheless ° ^* had no intellectual or spiritual good from the spectacle, but went home chatting about it, or went to the priestly party repeating it, and asking them what they thought about it. Whether in mere gossip or through hostility, these people told the Pharisees what Jesns had done. The Sanhedrim was forthwith assembled to consider the state of affairs. Early in his public career the Jews of Jerusalem had sought to kill Jesus as a Sabbath-breaker (John V. IG, IS). Subsequently, in Galilee, the ^J^^^btd^^^'^ Pharisees had conspired with the Ilerodians to destroy him (Mark iii. 6). The Sanhedrim had gone so far as to decree exconnnunication of any one who should confess Jesus as the Messiah (John ix. 22). Officers had once been sent to arrest him (John vii. 25), and the people generally believed that the party in power M'ould never rest until Jesus should be put out of the way. Is^evertheless the Sanhedrim had never formally decreed his death. But this raisins; of Lazarus brouo-ht matters to a head. When the council assembled, the first thing apparent to them all was their ntter helplessness, so feeble is political power when opposed to moi-al force. The nnarmed Jesus, having no authority— civil, military, or ecclesias- "^^^^ acknow- ,., .. 1T11 -1 •, ledge his miracles. tical — was gammg such hold upon the populace that they could put no arguments, no authority, no intlueiico before the people to counteract him. They acknowlerhjod hl^ miracles. The greatest learning and the greatest authority in the law, quite as capable of detecting a trick, and quite as Milling to expose a fraud as modern minds, admitted that Jesus did "many miracles." They did not deny what such nndtitudes declared tliey had witnessed, namely, his raising of the dead. Their uttei 506 EKOM FEAST OF TABEENACLES UNTIL THE LAST "WEEK spiritual stupidity is seen in that they felt tliemselves bound to kill Jesus rather than believe on him. The latter should have been the rational conclnsion, but " state reasons " prevailed. They should have said: He has done these great things as re- ported, or he has not; it is so important a matter that we may well afford to put out our utmost resources to settle that ques- tion. If he has done these things, then he is the Messiah, and we must hail him as such : if he has not, we must take all possi- ble pains to demonstrate to the poj^ular mind that all this is noth- ing, and then truth will prevail. Instead of which they admitted that Jesus did perform many miracles, and therefore resolved to kill him ! As if that were the way to meet an acknowledged miracle ! They said among themselves, "If we let him thus alone all will believe on him: and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation." This was the utter rejec- They reject him ^-^^^^ ^^ j^^^^^ ^^ ^j^^j^. ^gggi^h. In their opinion he did not have the force to push himself against the Roman power and overthrow it. He was not to be a conqueror ; and if not a conqueror he must not be allowed to go so far forward as to make himself a party, and excite the Roman power to take such measures as should lead to a popular uprising, which might be a suthcient excuse for the total extinction of the Hebrew nationality'. That was their great state reason. They did not see that if Jesus had the power to work these great miracles their simple acknowledgment of the fact could do no harm ; and then, in any event, he that could raise the dead could repel the Romans ; and that if the whole affair were a delusion it would shortly die out, and need not be kept alive by the notice of the Sanhedrim. One of the members of this Council was Josephiis Caiaphas. In John xi. 40, he is called " high-priest of that year." The (office of high-priest had fallen so low that it had lost aiap as. i^g^rly all that respect and almost awe which it had formerly inspired. Josephus tells us {Antiq., xviii. 2, 2) that Valerius Gratus, the fifth governor of Juda?a, took the high-priest- hood from Ananus, also called Annas, and transferred it to Ishraael, whom he soon removed, substituting Eliezar, a son of Ananus ; that the next year he made another change, conferring the office on Simon, who held it only a year, when it was given JESUS ON HIS LAST CIKCUTT. 507 to Joseplins, siiriiamed Caiaplias (not Josepluis the liistorian), who held It throiicrh the public ministiy of Jesns. It M-ill be readily perceived liow the Pontificate fell into disrepute, and that the description, "of that year," was the mode of expressing the popu- lar contempt for the incumbents of that office. At the time of this history the more con- sei-vative and orthodox still held to Ananus as the law- ful high-priest, although Ca- iaplias enjoyed the office by political favor. In tlii:-; meeting of the Sanhedrim, this Caiaphas said. " You ,^. , His prophecy, know noth- ing, nor consider that it is ex- pedient that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not." •John says that he did not speak that of himself ; but that holding, however un- Hioe-r«iEST. righteously, this high and holy office, the spirit of prophecy still lingering about the breastplate which contained the C/nm and Thummhn—WxQ Lights and Rights of God— spoke through Caia- phas, prophesying that " Jesus was about to die for the nation, and not for that nation only, but also that he should gather to' gether in one the children of God who were scattered abroad." The voice of Caiaphas, according to John, spoke what the mind of Caiaphas did not comprehend. His saying settled the question. The death of Jesus was decreed. It M-as only needful to deter- mine how to compass his destruction. Jesus was aware of the deadly intent of the ruling party, and so retired to a place called Ephraim in the commoirversion', but spelt Ephrem in the Codex Sinaiticus, and, I think, there can now be little doubt, identical with Ephron. It lay in the wild uncultivated region, hill-country N. E. of Jerusalem, lying between the central t-^wna and the Jordan valley. We are indebted to the late Dr. Eobin- son for the recovery of this place, and its identification with the Ei^hrorL Joba 508 FKOM TEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. modern village of Taiyibeh. It is nearly twenty miles north of Jerusalem, and stands on a conical hill, upon the top of which is an ancient tower, affording a wide prospect of the wilderness along the valley of the Jordan, of the Dead Sea, and of the mountains beyond. To this place Jesus retired for a few weeks. It gave him a retreat from the multitudes, a respite from his angry perse- cutors, aud an opportunity to instruct his disciples more thorough- ly in the principles of his religion. There may have been another, reason. All his words and actions show that he knew that his end was apiu-oaching, and that his death would be violent. Be- tween this moment of retreat and that last fatal conflict he might adopt some method to indulge the Messianic wishes of the friendly portion of the people, yielding himself in some way publicly to their natural desire to honor him. For all this he must have a season of quiet, in which he could nndergird his soul for its last struggle, and in which he could bo train his disciples that when he should be seized and executed they should not sully his dignity aud embitter his last nionieuts by any fanatical and useless out- break. Just such a rctieat did Ephrem afford. Here he could not have remained longer than a few weeks, as he nmst have entered Ephrem late in February or early in Marcli, and the Passover occurred on the 7th of April. It is not probable that he went into neighboring villages, as he knew that the au- thorities were taking measures to arrest him. His dis(;iples were with him, and this last opportunity to be together apart from the people would be filled with profitable intercourse. He was quite JESUS ON niS LAST CIRCUIT. 509 soon enough to emerge into a splendid publicity wliich should precede a terrible death. It Avas now the intention of Jesus to enter Jerusalem in the most conspicuous manner. Being near the line of Samaria he seems to have crossed and gone through Galilee to the valley of Jordan. Samaria and A „ 1 . , , Galilee. Luke xvii. As lie was passing along the border-line of these two countries, and was entering a certain village, there met him ten men who were lepers. This common misery had made a bond of union. It must have been an affecting sight to see ten men driven from good society, j^^^^^ ^^"^ ^"^^^^ excluded from their own houses, standing in a body, forlorn and stricken, as if banned by man and branded by God. They lifted up their feeble and hoarse voices and cried to him, because the law would not allow them to approach the un- tainted nearer than four ells. (Levit. xiii. 46, and Nuinl). v. 2.) 'i'heir cry was, " Jesus, Euler, compassionate us." It was not the word translated in the common version as Master, meaning Teacher, nor that other word translated Lord. The views of these men were not clear, nor, so far as they went, '-'orthodox." One was a Samaritan. They simply knew that this was the man who had exercised great power beneficently, and that they were the men who greatly needed his help. They called him " commander" or "chief." He looked at them across the distance, and simply said " Go, show yourselves to the priests." According to the law (Levit. xiii. 2) the priest was to declare when a man had recovered from the leprosy, but the priest could not heal the leper. So, when Jesus gave this direction to the lepers it implied that in their going the healing would come to them. They seemed to feel the authority of that tone. Like a platoon of soldiers, at the word of their commander, they wheeled and marched. As they went they were cleansed. One of them, on perceiving that he was healed, ran back rejoicing and glorify- ing God, and fell at the feet of Jesus and thanked him. ^ "And he was a Samaritan," adds the honest historian. He was a heretic 111 his religious views, but fall of thankfulness for the great favor bestowed on him. His " orthodox " fellow-sufferers, avIio had re- ceived the same gift of health, coolly went awav, and never came back with thanks. It moved Jesus deeply. lie said, evidently with strong emotion, « Were not the ten cleansed ? Cut where 510 FROM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. are the nine? "Were there none found- returning to give glory tc God except this stranger ? " lie said to him, " Arise, go your way : your faith has saved you." It is to be noticed that the faith of these ten men was the psychical basis of the operation of Jesus, and that Jesus always looked for a spiritual improvement to follow a bodily healing ; but it seems to have done so in the case of one of the men. When that man openly acknowledged the benefit, it was confirmed to him with an enlaro-ement of the advantag-e. It is also to be noticed how greatly the popularity of Jesus had decayed. Not long ago the cleansing of one leper would raise the whole country side into a fervid excitement, now the sudden healing of ten men in a body creates no enthusiasm. It was a dark day in the public life of Jesus. Somewhere on this journey, we know not exactly where, some Pharisees asked Jesus when the kingdom of God should come. This seems to have been a taunt. His fortune? Luke xvii. , , ... . -r-, seemed rather wannig than improving. lor months, indeed for years, John the Baptist and Jesus had been predicting the coming of the kingdom of God, and, so far as these observers could see, there was no change in the aspect of affairs, ecclesiastically or civilly. His reply was, " The kingdom of God does not come with observation : neither shall they say ' Lo here ! or. There ! ' for behold the kingdom of God is (already) among you." This question and reply show how entirely unable to the very last the countrymen of Jesus were to comprehend his chai-- acter and mission, and to divest themselves of sensuous ideas of the Messianic appearance and rule. Jesus taught them that that kingdom was not a matter of external display and brilliancy ; nevertheless, as he said to his disciples immediately after, when it came men should not inquire whether it had come and where, because it should be as apparent as the lightning ; but it should . be in the souls of men. Turning then to his disciples he said : " Days wall come when ye shall desu-e to see one of the days of the Son of Man, and yet shall not see it. And they shall say to you, ' See here,' or, ' See there : ' do not go away nor follow them. For as the lightning lightens out of one part under heaven, shines to the other under heaven, so shall the Son of Man be in his day : but first, he must suffer many things, and be rejected by this generation. And as it waa JESUS ON HIS LAST CmcUIT. 51J bu,kl,ug: but tUe day that Lot went out of MomTrlccU^f . V ^ ..one fou, l,c,,vca and destroyed them all. e2 ,"sTl , • e , ",'"■ ivlien tlio Sou of Mau is revealed In tl,„ ,1 ■ ''" ''"-' ->« .pod. in .i.e „„„,, u:r,i;.t c::eit : t ';';r "::::r"::;;' r' Tlieso revelations of troubles seem to have shocked the disci- ples TJiej ask 111 surprise, « Whei-e, Lord ? " IIis answer is a proverb. " AVherever the body, there also will the eao-Ies be gathered together." booh th-?r^' V ^"^' ''^^f preconceptions and read sincerely any torv how fl„. ,1 w ""«'''gs- It IS a curiosity ,ii mental his- bci al t. I T "' "^/f"^"''-'"' «"■ l-" supposed t„ I.avo huma , f "■"■' "* ''"'"'■ ^"y ^"-"''l" catastrophe i„ iiunian liistorv can lu^t na -n-oii i.^^ ^ ^ , ^ mind of Jesns. ^ ^" '"''''""'^^ '" '"'^•<-' '«'^" "' "'e Let us pnt onrselves in their plaees, knowing nothino- of Catho 1.C and Protestant, and mediaeval-scholastic, a'ul rnod'em er 'S comments and theories, and listen to Jesns. The disciples had heard the Pharisees when they The Parousia of taunted him with the question of the establish """^°"">"'™- l;u;.=^,ini of thXU^ ?- =:;rir ™"^,J: outbutsts of human passion. Wl.eu we recall that the Goetae, 512 FROM FEAST OF TABERNACLES "UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. Bliort]y before the destruction of Jerusalem, by means of false promises of miracles, led many away into the wilderness to perish, M e can see reason for this warning.* lie told them of his own suffering and rejection, and then predicted a Kevelation of himself at some time, a Parousia of the Son of Man, whatever that might mean. But there is a mystic air to this whole speech. In general it seems to teach that coming events do not cast their shadows before, that when any stupendous crisis in the world's affairs oc- curs there is little, if any, outward previous manifestation. It is like a dry rot in a house, which reveals itself only when it has so eaten away the substantial supports that the M'hole edifice comes to its fall. The flood was such a crisis. The destruction of Sodom was such. Up to the uioment of the first plash of rain, up to the moment of the first hurtling of sparks in the hot atmosphere, in the one case and in the other, men and women went about their usual pleasures and businesses as if nothing extraordinary were on the eve of occurring. So shall it be at the Parousia of the Son of Man, M'hatever and whenever and wherever that may be. And men need not speculate on that. They can never know It. It has no harbingers. It is not in the field of such events which can be prognosticated. Men should simply be always at their posts, always doing their duty, and always right at heart. The Revelation of the Son of Man is a crisis, in the sense of a judgment and discrimination. It shall separate death from life, the dead from the living. Life is preservative. The birds of prey do not attack the living but the dead. Therefore keep alive. It seems that Jesus had in his mind the idea of some display of himself M'hich should be of universal interest. But who can tell all he meant? Because of the troubles that were coming upon the woi-ld he spake this parable to his disciples, to teach them not so much the duty as the necessity of prayer, and that men should not be faint- hearted, lie said : "There was a certain judge in a certain city, who feared not God neither regarded man. And there was a widow in that city, and she came to liim saying, 'Avenge me of my adversary.' And lie would not ara eo e n]us f^,,. ^ time : but afterward he said within himself, ' Though Judge. _ ^ ^ I fear not God nor regard man, yet, because this widow troubles me I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she toiment me.' * See Josephus, Ant. xx. 8, 6. Com- I and Acts v. 3G, 37. pare Josephus, De Bell. Jud., ii. 13, 14, | JESUS ON niS LAST CIRCDTr. 513 Hear wliat the unjust judge says. And shall not God avenge His chosen, who cry day and night to Him, even though He delay long with them? I tell you that He will avenge them speedily." To interpret a parable it is ne(;essary to know what is the pivot of instruction on whicli it revolves. And then it is not necessary to find a doctrine in all the lisjhts and shades of the picture, in all the folds of the drapery of the statue, of a parable. It has exercised sorely the ingenuity of some commentators that the good God should be likened to an unjust judge. Xo such thing is done. The parable is intended to teach not the duty, not the beauty, not the profit, but the ab- solute necessit}' of prayer ; and not the prayer which consists merely of expressions of formal petitions, but the prayer which is the real and constant desire of the soul. That only is true prayer. It may be " always." It may sometimes break forth into words of devotion and even agonies of spiritual wrestling ; but men must alioays pray, and that constant spiritual pressure brings help. The illustration is from an unjust judge, whose injustice the connnentators desire to modify, thus destroying the whole force of the parable. Tlie stronger the judge and the more un- just, the poorer and the weaker the suppliant, the more impressive is tlie lesson of Jesus ; for God is not compared to this judge, but set in contrast with him. The badness of the judge is shown in that he was impious and inhuman — he feared not God, he had no regard for man. Not that he even said this to himself, much less admitted it to other men, but the soliloquy represents his prevail- ing strain of feeling. Ilis petitioner is represented in the utmost helplessness. AVe have all learned the destitution of Oriental widowhood. This suppliant was a woman, a widow, poor and persecuted. The judge had no disposition to help her, and no reason in the world to do so, except that by the continuance of her prayer she should be a torment to him. In the exaggeration of selfishness he uses a word which signifies tO' make one black and bine about the eyes. She will overcome him by her impor- tunity. He grants her request, not because it is just, not because he pities her, but because of his selfislmcss, to save himself from annoyance. The argument of Jesus is this : If constant prayer can prevail against the selfishness of an unjust human being, how certainly it will find answer in the heart of the good God and Father. 33 514 FEOM FEAST OF TABEENACLES UNTIL THE LAST "WEEK. Immediately upon delivering this parahle Jesus added, "But when the Son of Man comes, will he iind the faith npon earth?" It is an e\|)ression of despondency. It seems to n xpression o jj^^iimate that wheu- the Parousia of which he wa? speaking shall take place, when the S(,tn of JMan shall reveal himself, he may find faith in his coming so rare that the world shall not be prepared for it. The history of t-he race shows that humanity is never expectant the moment before the fall of some great influence npon its history. lie spoke another paraljle, that of the Pharisee and Publican, which Luke reports in this immediate connection, and which the Harmonists generally assign to this time in the cai-eer of Jesus. Whenever spoken, I can see a reason why Luke should ]"eport the two parables together, as they ai-e didactically connected, theii- teachings being of the same subject. This particular parable must be assigned to this general period of the life of Jesus, as it would naturally be suggested by the thousands of pilgrims now going up to the temple for worship. But it does seem that it would be more appropriate where there were Pharisees to hear it, than to be told to his disciples alone ; while, on the other hand, it is true that he had seen in his own family of disciples certain dis- plays of dispositions of which this parable is a corrective. Because I cannot satisfy mj'self of any better place for the insertion of the parable, I give it here. It was intended to teach humility in prayei', as the j^ai-able of the Unjust Judge was to id'Af^'Ai 2)ersistence. The parable is this : — " Two men -went up into the Temple to Jjray, tlie one a Pliarisee and the other a tax-gatherer. The Pliarisee, standing, i)rayed these [words] : ' God, I . thank Thee that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, Parable of the Phan- ■ee and the Publican, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax-gatherer. I fast twice in the week. I give tithes of all that I get.' — And tlie tax-gatherer, standing afar off, would not even lift up eyes to heaven, Init smote on his breast, saying, 'Be merciful to me, the sinful one.' I tell yon this man went down to his house justified l)eyond that one : for every ont who cxalteth himself shall be humbled ; and he who humbleth himself shall be exalted." Luke says that this ])arable M'as levelled against those who trusted in themselves that they were i-ighteous, and despised others. It is a graphic lesson. The Pharisee went into the Tem- ple. He stood to pray. That was \}o evidence of pride. Thf JESUS ON HIS LAST CIRCUIT. 515 Jews generally stood when they prayed, and the exceptions were ■when they became excitedly devout, so that to kneel would have beeu rather a display of ostentation. The tax-gatherer also stood. In sc\eral Greek editions occur words which in the common English version are translated " with himself," which some have connected with the standing as indicative of the "Separatists," "he stood hij himself r St. Bernard alludes to this apparently proud isolation in prayer. But the words do not occur in the oldest texts, and are doubtless an interpolation. There was no intention to ridicule the man nor to exaggerate Pharisaism, but to contrast it with the simplicity of faith, and teach what Jesus from the beginning nntil this the closing period of his ministry constantly insisted upon, the superiority of simple faithfulness to one's con- victions over all devotion to mere forms of worship, — so that men might feel how much better it is to be the Penitent than the Puritan. This self-complacent worshipper addressed God in terms of thank- fulness which soon show themselves to be the thin veil covering his pride. lie separated himself from all man- 1 • 1 Tr 1 II ii 1 -1 The Pharisee's Kind. He was one class, all otlier i)coplc another; prciyer. and he was better than all others, whom he pro- ceeds to classify as extortioners, unjust, and unclean, — and then as his 030 fell upon the tax-gatherer, wliose business he regarded as the "sum of all villanics," he added — "or even as this tax-gatherer?" And having purged himself of all charges that might bo brought against his moral character, he proceeds to glorify himself to God in vaunting his discharge of religious duties, and even the per- formance of works of supererogation. " I fast twice in the week." Moses had appointed only an aimual fast, the great day of atone- ment (Levit. xvi. 20-31 ; Numb. xxix. 7). But this man superadded two private weekly fasts. " I give tithes of my whole income." The law tithed only the products of the earth and the offsjM-ing of the cattle (Nund). xviii. 21; Dent. xiv. 22; Levit. xxvii. 30) But he was determined to exceed even the requirements of the law, so he tithed all that came to liim in his business. lie dwells fondly on these things, showing that he was doing them not for the glory of God, but for his own pleasure. He had no sins to confess. lie had no worship to offer God. He had contempt for bis fellow-men, even for his fellow-woi-shippers. But the tax-gatherer stood afar off. lie had as much rijrht tc 516 FKOM FEAST OF TABEKNACLE8 UNTIL THE 1.AST WEEK. tlie Temple as the Pharisee, for he was neither lieatheii ncr prose Ivte. llis reverence for God's liolincss and holy places was such that it was enough for him to stand even in the The publican'8 ^^^^.^^ ^f ^he holy Temple. Pei-haps he saw prayer. ^ ,. . , , the Pharisee stanan)g m a reserved but conspicu- ous place, and almost envied his fellow-worshipper the holiness which made him worthy of such a position, siud felt that he him- self was not fit to breathe the same air with that man of God. All sights about him and all thoughts of himself conspired to humili- ate him. lie would not so much as lift up his eyes to heaven. llo called himself "tue sinner," by a word which means hardened in sill. Jesus did not depreciate the Pharisee. lie gave him his full dues. But God is represented to have sent such a comfort into the breast of the publican, that, being forgiven, he left the Temple a happier man than the Pharisee, whose only comfort was in his self-complacency. It is supposed that now Jesus left Galilee, crossing the Jordan into Perea. His plan seems to have been to join himself to the great caravans of pilgrims thronging the Jordan Final departure valley ill their progress to the Holy City from all thew xix • Mark *^^^ towns about the Sea of Galilee. If we may X. I'ely upon Josephus, the multitudes that attended this feast were enormous. He tells that at one Passover, by actual count, 256,500 paschal lambs were slain. The smallest number of worshippers which the law allowed to each lamb was ten, which would make the number of participants in this feast to have been at least 2,505,000. It seems incredible ; but if allowance be made for exaggeration, still the number must have been immense ; and the roads that led to Jerusalem must have been thronged for several days before the feast and after. It was on this tour that the subject of divorce was brought to the attention of Jesus. He found the Pharisees everyvvhei-e his Divorce. enemies, and everywhere ready to enti-ap him. This makes this interview deeply interesting, since the case of Herod Antipas, who had put away his wife and taken a married woman to his bed during the life of her husband, made it politically dangerous for any teachci- to discuss the law of marriage in the days and under the government of Herod. If Jesus should utter stringent sentiments and lay down strict rules of morality on the subject of marriage and di\orce, he should JESUS ON IirS LAST CIRCUIT. 517 probably meet a fate similar to that of Jolm Baptist ; but if his utterances should indicate laxity of sentiment he should lose the confidence of the more moral and pious class of the commu- nity. In the reply of Jesus the attention of the reader is called to the fact that he does not answer as a judge or a legislator. He Avill not take up personal cases for decision. He will not lay down a canon for ecclesiastical discipline. He speaks as a moral teacher, and only as such. The importance of the utterances on this occasion, and the moral ]x>wer of Jesus over mankind, is seen in the fact that we have a bare statement of his views spoken authori- tatively as a moral teacher should speak, who has ^^ jesus the i-ight to speak, and yet those few words have exerted a greater power over the whole course of human history and destiny, over literature, over political and social and domestic progress, than all the words of any other one man since the world Jjegan ! Is not that a sober historical statement ? Let any man reflect upon monogamy, the sacredness of marriage, the purity of the domestic circle, and this lifting of the family to a position which it never held in Greek or Latin or Hebrew civiliz:ation, from which it has had such power over the destinies of the State and the progress of religion, — and then let there be allowed to Jesus only such influence as he is plainly entitled to have acknowl- edged,— and who has, by so few words, sent his influence so widely and so deeply down into the heart of man, and down into the centuries ? Certain Pharisees of the school of Ilillel came to Jesus with the question, " Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause ? " Let us l(X)k at what the Mosaic law of divorce really was. It is recorded in Deuteronomy xxiv. 1-4. "\yhcii a man liatli taken a wife, and married lier, and it come to pass tliut Bhe find no favor in his eyes, l^ecause lie has found some uncleauness in her. then let him write her a bill of divorcement, and give it in her hand, and send her out of his house. And when '^^'^ ^^°''^^'' '''"' "' Qivorco. ehe is departed out of his house, she may go and be another man's wife. And if the latter husband hate l»er, and write her a bill of di vorcemeut, and give it in her hand, and send her out of his liouse ; or if the latter husband die, which took her to be his wife ; her former husband, which went her away, may not take her again to be Ids wife, after that she is defiled.'' 518 FKOM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. It is to be noticed that provision is made for the hnsband to put away the wife, but not for the wife to put aAvay the hiisl)and. Slie liad no relief, unless her husband committed adultery with anotlier married woman, and then elsewhere the law of Moses provided that he should be put to death. Again, there is great uncertainty as to the meaning of the phrase " some nncleanness." This Avas a notorious sul)ject of controversy between the schools of Shannnai and Ilillel in the days of Jesus. The former, it is generally thought, taught that it meant an act of lewdness on the part of the wife ; but this could hai'dly be, as that was punishable with death, "Winer,* however, asserts that the Gemara represents the view of Shammai as less strict: "Even pul)lic violations of decorum might furnish ground for divorce a(;cording to his doc- trine." Josephus represents the views of Ilillel. lie says {Antiq.j iv. 8, 23), " lie who wishes to be separated from his wife for any reason whatever — and many such arc occiuTing among men — ■ nmst affirm in Avritins; his intention of no lone^cr cohabitinf>- with her." Knobel, in his Commentarij on Deuteronomy^ says, ^''ErvatJi dabar [in tlie common version translated 'some nncleanness'] is used of human excrement in Deut. xxiii. 13, and is properly a shame or disgrace (Is. xx. 4) from anything ; that is, anything which awakens the feeling of shame and repulsion, inspires aver- sion and disgust, and nauseates in contact — for instance, a bad breath, a running sore," etc. He adds, "In the time of Christ [Jesus] the expression was in controversy. The school of Sham- mai took it as being the same with Dabar ervath [a thing of nn- cleanness or disgust], and understood it of unchaste demeanor and shameless lewd behavior. The school of Ilillel, which the Eab- bins follow, explained it as something disgusting, or any other caused This was, of course, giving the largest license.f To the question from the Pharisees, whether a man might put away his wife for any cause whatever that seemed to him sufficient, Jesus makes the following reply: "Have you not read that he * Quoted in President Woolsey's very valuable Essay on Div&ixe. f In the Tract. Gittin, fol. 90, it is ex- pressly said, " Even if she had only over- Balted his soup ; " nay, with shameless license, ' ' even if he should find a fairer one, in whom he has more pleasure." The repeated rule in the Talmud runs : IlUlel loosens what Shammai binds, Josephus shows the laxity of the times by coolly telling us that his first wife left him ; and that he put away the second, al- though the mother of three children by him, that he might take the third — Stie3: JESUS ON mS LAST cmcuiT. 519 who made them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ' On this account shall a man leave father and mother, and sliall cleave to his wife, and they two shall be „, . . , , The onginal law. one llcsh 5 bo that they are no more two, i)ut one flesh. What, therefore, God hath joined t])le could endure. iliere are certam fixed „ ,^ ' . . . , . , . . the Mosaic hiw. principles, certain high ideals in Monotheism, to which Moses did not reach. Put lie did the best that could ba done for them with that people. Jesus ascends above Moses. He goes up to the origin of the race. He announces what God did 520 FROil FEAST OF TAIJEKXACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. and wliat God intended. The Fatlicr of all made man to be M'edded. The oldest history of creation says : " God created man in his own hnage, in the imaf^e of God created lie him, male and female created lie them," (Gen. i. '27.) It is observable that it does not say that God created them a man and a woman, but " masculine and feminine," after the image of the God, who is at once both masculine and feminine. It i-equires the unic^n of the masculine and feminine to make oneness in humanity as it does in divinity. God would be only a half-God, therefoi-c no God, if lie were either masculine only or feminine only. There is no completeness in any man or wouum. The two are required to make one. The tie between husband and wife is closer than that between parent and child. In the beginning there was a single pair. The devotion of the one to the other, the absolute necessity of each to the other for personal relief and comfort, and for the propagation of the race, and the indissolubleness of tlie union thus contracted, was demonstrated by their very posi- tion in the universe. They could never part. Whichever did any- thing that made any separation between them .committed a wrong. That represents the normal condition of the estate of wedlock. When men and women multiplied, and there arose a multipli- cation of possibilities of violating the original law, the most that Moses seemed to do was to put in form certain ar- rangements for regulating, as far as possible, the irregularities which had sprung up in society. Hard-hearted men would put their wives away. Moses intei'posed in behalf of the woman. Jesus goes back to first principles, and thence deduces the law of divorce. 1. The married pair are one in fiesh and heart and life ; and neither should do anything which shall weaken or soil this blessed union. 2. No man shall divorce his wife unless he know her to have first violated the law of chastity, otherwise he wrongs her and drives her to do wrong. 3. If to that unlawful putting away he superadd the marrying of another M'oman, he commits adultery with that second woman."" The true law of divorce. * The statement in Mark, who is as remarkable for his attention to details as he is for his lack of attention to chronological order, is : " Whosoever shall put away his wife, and marry an- other, committeth adultery against 7ier." The original Greek is ctt' avrr/v^ and this, I believe, refers to the second wife ; and the classical use of this pre- position with the accusative, I think, justifies my interpretation. Of course, at the same time, he is an adultorei quoad his former wife. JESUS ON niS LAST CIRCUIT. 521 4. The woman wlio is separated fi-om lier husband for her own fault is an aduUercSs afresh, if she niai'ry a2:;ain. A form of mar- riage oaunot annul the wron^ of the traii.-^action. 5. If the hus- band be innocent and the wife iijuilty, a divorce may ensue, the husband may marry, but the wife may not. A second marriage would be but a continuance of her sin. These live particulars seem to reside in the orij^-inal law of marriaii-e, as stated bv Jesus. Dr. Woolsey {Essay on Divorce, p. 59) sums up this teaching very clearly in the following sentence : " The general principle, servins: as the m-oundwork of all these declarations, is, that leijal divorce does not, in the view of God, and according to the correct rule of morals, authorize either husband or wife thus separated to marry again, with the single exception that when the divorce oc- curs on account of a sexual crime, the innocent party may, without guilt, contract a second marriage." Whether these views of Jesus were fundamentally right, we are not now to discuss. This is what he taught. Tliis teaching has through ages controlled the opinions of the best minds, and thor- oughly changed domestic life from what we know it to have been in Greece, and Home, and Palestine, in the times of Jesus, to what we know it is in the best parts of America and Eui-ope to-day. It is noticeable that wherever these views have prevailed there has been a better state of societ}' in every other particular, and that departure from these principles has marked social decay, all legis- lation not conformed to these principles having the effect of rap- idly damaging the moral tone of society. No society is so good as that in which a divorced man, unless he be parted froin his wife for reasons not implying immorality on his part, is held as an acknowledged adulterer ; and in which a divoi-ced woman, unless she be parted from her husband by reason of his inconti- nence, is treated as an unfortunate woman. What Jesus said to his disciples on the objection which they started and the inference which they made that marriage was un- profitaljle, it must be admitted is a passage of difficultv. Marriage is the normal condition of , Objections by • '^ T • 1 ^""^ disciples. man. ihat we know, it is always honorable. No celibacy is equal to chastity in marriage. But there may be celibates. Jesus speaks of three kinds, those who arc such by nature, by compulsion, and by choice. 1. Some have congenital 522 FKOM FEAST OF TABERNACLT"^ UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. disqualifications ; tlicv arc horn with physical defects which make it iihpi-acticablc for tliciu to inany. 2. Thei-e ai-e those who liavc been inutilated by men ; and this M'as a lai-o-o class in the days of Jesiis. In our day tlie servants who guard the liarems in the East are eunuchs, and tlie Roman Church, it is said, makes eunuchs for the benefit of sac^red art, those who sing the Miserere at the Sistiue Cliapel at Rouie i-etaining the peculiar characteristics of tlieir voices at the ex])ense of their manhood. In the class of forced celibates also luay be I'eckoned those whom "society," the artificial rules of couvcutional life, exclude from such a union as nature demands aud God sanctions. 3. Those who decline mar- riage for the sake of the kingdom of the heavens, a phi-ase by which Jesus always seems to set forth his woi'k in the ^vorld, be- cause he believed that his work Avas founded on the principles which maintain the luxrmonies of the universe, and that his work promulgated and expanded those principles. For the sake of promoting this great work, if he can reuuiin chaste, in some ex- ceptional circumstances, a man may remain in celil)acy. Other- wise marriage is ])etter. No man dare be a celibate for his own ease and convenience. Tlie rule is that it is better to marry. It must be a mournftd excejition which justifies a man to abstain. Such an exception occurred, perhaps, in the case of Paul. Such a celibate was Jesus. But, of course, in this case Jesus spoke figuratively. History gives us a horrible instance of these words having l)een taken h't- erally. Origen, in the mistaken excess of his ardent youthful zeal for the cause of Jesus, so nmtilatcd himself that lie was dis- qualified for marriage. This act was ])ropci'ly condenmed by the ancient church, and for it he was cxcomnumicated from the dnn-ch of Alexandria.* The li1)eral rule of Jesus comes out at the close of the inter- view. You are not to ado])t celibacy as a rule. You are not to teach it as a docti'ine. You are not to enforce it on otliers. *' Let hinr receive it who is alJe to i-eceive it." But let him bo sure he is able. You cannot l)e sure in respect of another, there- fore yon must not lay so grievous and nmiatural a burden on another. * On the whole subject of marriage i compare Schaff's History of Vie Apo»- and celibaey in the New Testament, | toUc C/ntrch, % 112, pp. 448-454. CnAPTER Y. GOING TO JEIiUSALEM. It was about tliis time that the blessing of little chikli-eii must have taken place. As tlie Passover approached the people knew that tlic time of his departure for Jerusalem \vas jgsus blesses lit- drawing near. It reveals to us much of the char- tie children, acter and behavior of Jesus during this trying Matt, xix., xx. ; and depressing period of his life, ^> learn that ^^--^yl^ ^- ^^^ .1 xviii the mothei-s of the country were so impressed with his sanctity and benignity that they brought their young chib dreu, even their babes, to him, that he might merely put his hands upon them and pray over them. Put the disciples were becoming rigorists. It is painful to see how rapidly men — who at first take advanced ground, become pioneei'S hi moral progress, and make themselves the differentia of their age — do begin to lapse into blindest conservatism so soon as they consolidate their oj-ganiza- tion ; do begin to have certain ideas of dignity ; do suppose that they are improving their state and position by as great a remove as possible from naturalness. In this case the disciples probably felt a fresh accession of dignity, as their Master was manifestly about to make a public display of himself, and their hopes of a Messianic inauguration probably begau to be augmented. The disciples offered to forl)id these mothers as obtrusive. It was below the dignity of their Master. They had nothing to say when the Pharisees were holding him to the discussion of such profound and important questions as the divorce law. They felt that that was employment worth}' his noble chai'acter and mission ; but that he should be asked to waste his time on babes seemed to them past endurance. So they rebuked these revering mothers. Put Jesus, in turn, rebuked the disci})les. He had other views and another temper. lie was much displeased at the conduct of his friends. It was cutting him off from that portion of the com- munity least offensive to his simple and pure nature. It showed 524 FROM FEAST OF TABERXACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. npon their part such stubborn acUicrence to their prejudices ir favor of a sensuous, civil, political Messiahship, such wrong viewa of the kingdom of the heavens, as though its insignia should be the trappings of worldly pomp, that Jesus was much displeased, and said to them, " Suffer the little children to come to me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of the heavens. I most assuredly say to you, "Wliosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he shall not enter into it." And, having taken them in his arms, he blessed them, placing his hands upon them. The whole picture is simple, natural, beautiful, and sublime. The discourse on marriage crimes stands as a dark background to this brilliant tableau of a great Teacher lifting A beautiful scene. • r- - • ^ i • *" • ^i i? up miants nito his arms, coming near the roun- tains of humanity, airing his soul in the free atmosphere of unso- phisticated childhood. It was an occasion seized to make a lesson for his disciples. They were thinking of a throne, a court, them- selves as Hebrew princes in the regenerated theocracy, and that princes and their king should not be interrupted in their converse by the prattle of babes. Jesus taught them that he knew noth- ing of any such kingdom ; that the kingdom of the heavens, which he preached, and which was also the kingdom of God, was made nj) of such people, not of children merely, not that the kingdom was theirs exclusively, but that no one could enter and enjoy that kingdom, which is as wide as all the heavens, covering the uni- verse, who did not have childlikeness of disposition ; that so far from children having to grow into manhood in order to enter the fruition of God's kingdom it was absolutely essential that men Bhould shed the hard-shell of their rigid manhood and come back to the unsuspicious, open-eyed, natural sensitiveness of childhood ; and thus have the utmost enjoyment of all that God has made. About this time, as he was on his journey out of the country, a certain ruler came running and kneeled to him, and said, " Good Teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may The neh ruler. jjijiQ^it perpetual life ? " He seems suddenlv to Matt. xix. ; Mark , r- i^ xi -^ Ji • • ^i • i. I- T , ... have lelt the necessity or receivmo; the instruction X. ; Luke xvui. J _ o of Jesus before he left the neighborhood. Jesus replied, " Why do you call me good ? No one is good but one, that is God. You know the commandments : Do not kill ; do not commit adultery ; do not steal ; do not bear false witness ; defraud GOING TO JERUSALEM. 525 not; honor your father and your mothci", and you sliall love your neighbor as yourself." lie answered, "Teacher, all these tilings have I observed from my youth up." Jesus looked on him and loved him, and then spoke the words that tested him, "One thing is yet wanting to you : if you will be perfect, go sell M'hatever you have and ^ve to the poor, and you shall have treasure in heaven ; and come, follow me." lie was very rich, and the saying sent him away very sorrowful. This is a peculiarly interesting case, as exhibiting a phase of human nature worth studying, and as giving fresh insight into the character of Jesus. This person, who seems to have been a ruler of the synagogue, had led a life of scrupulous external morality, but failed to have quiet of spirit and satisfaction of soul. lie had probably watched the course and studied the character of Jesus. lie had occasional deep longings and high aspirations, but he did not have most thorough earnestness in the pursuit of tho highest good, — nay, had a kind of self-conceit and Hippantness in talking of the most sacred things, both which came out in his ad dress to Jesus, " Good Teacher, what nnist 1 do to inherit perpet ual life ? " To which Jesus's reply seems to be a check ; as if he had said : You seem to talk of goodness very lightly. Goodness is the loftiest tiling. Xo one is absolutely good but God. Do you recognize God's goodness in me, or do }ou address me with an empty compliment? "Ashe would not have himself called Mes- siah in the wrong, or at least easily misinterpreted, sense in which the word was then often used, so neither [would he have himself in a mistaken way called] Good Master." (Lange.) lie gives the young man, however, no space for reply, but proceeds to answer the question by directing him to the commandments of the Moral Law. The young man avowed that he had strictly kept all the commandments all his life. This he may have said with an accent of pride, but there was a painful tone in the question, " What yet do I lack?" which moved the compassion of Jesus. The young man may have unduly plumed himself u])on his legal righteous- ness, but he was certainly candid. It was in kindness, then, not in severity, that Jesus, whose spir- itual insight into men even his enem'3s must acknowledge, showed the young man the depth of his own heart and his lack of total earnestness. lie was rich. Jesus submitted him to a violent test, namely, the selling of all his pro})erty, its distribution to the poor 526 FROM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST AVEEK. and his following a Teacher who had no world]y gain or glory to offer. Jesus did not here enact a law for all his followers. lie never enacted laws. lie simply tauglit the great fundamental principles of morality, from which each mail must make a I'ule for himself. lie saw that the tempei-ament of the young man made it quite easj'for him to render his life exemplary of all out- ward morality, while a latent spirit of self-indulgence weakened his whole character. The sorrow the young nuxn felt demon- sti'ated the correctness of the estinuxte Jesus had formed of him. "Wlien he found just what he lacked he was not willing to })ay the price of perfection. IJeing troubled at that saying he went away grieved, for he had great possessions, Jesus nuxde a lesson for his disciples. lie turned to them and Baid, "AYith what difficulty shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of God." This saying astonished Difficulty of the j^j^ tliscii)les, and Jesus saw the impression which his words had nuide. They recollected that riches were a part of the blessings pnniounced undej- the old dispensa- tion, and their Jewish ideas exaggerated the temporal prosperity which ought to visit the children of the kingdom under the new, the Messianic, dispensation, which they wei'e fondly hoping was about to be inaugurated. Jesus said, " Children, how difficult it is to enter the kingdom of God.* It is easier for a camel to enter through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God." Here he speaks of the natural difficulty all men encounter in coming out of a gross worldly life into a spir- itual and lofty mode of existence, a difficulty intensified in the case of the rich, because their hearts grow large and their bur dens are packed bulkily upon them, so that, to use a proverbial expression, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for such a person to divest himself of his love for these material possessions, to cease to be gross and sensuous so as to become fine and spiritual, to enjoy a kingdom whose greatnesses and glories and happinesses are wholly spiritual. At this saying the disciples wei-e astonished out of measure and said, "Who then can be saved ? " If it be this temper which * lu the common version (Mark x. 24) the reading is, "Children, how hard it is [for them that trust in riches] to enter into the kingdom of God." The words included in brackets do not occur in the original in the oldest MSS. The trans- lation I have made in the text is of tha Sinait. Cod. in loco. GOING TO JERUSALEM. 527 destro3's a rnaii tlie rich will be lost ; and all men, poor as Avell as rich, will bo found to be eny Matthew (Mark speaks only of one), as he was leaving tlie city. [Kitto, Augustine, Morrison.] Some [O.siandcr] make four to have been healed. — 2. Tliat the cases of healing were two, and distinct; one being on his entry into the city, the other on his departure. [Lightfoot, Ebrard, Krafft, Tischendorf, Wiesler, Greswell, Buclier, Lex, Neander.] According to this solution, Matthew combines the two in one, and deeming the exact time and place unimportant, represents them as botli occur- ring at the departure of Jesus from tlie city. — 3. That two were healed, and both at his entry; Ijut one being better known than the other, he only is men- tioned by j\Iark and Luke. [Doddridge, Newcome, Lichenstein, Friedlieb.] — 4. That one of the blind men sought to be healed as Jesus approached the city, but was not; that the next morning, joining himself to another, they waited for him by the gate, as he was leaving the city, and were both healed together, Luke, hi order to preserve the unity of his narrative, relates the healing of the former, as if it had taken place on the afternoon of the entry. [Bengel, Stier, Trench, Ellicott. See modifications of this view in McKnight and Crosljy, and another m Lange on Matt. xx. 30.] — 5. That only one Avas healed, and he when Jesus left the city. Matthew, according to his custom, uses tlie plui'al where the other Evangelists use the singular. [Oosterzee on Luke ; Da Costa.] — 6. Tliat Luke's variance -with Matthew and Mark, in regard to place, may be removed by intei-j)reting (xviii. 35) ' as He was come nigh to Jencho,' ev tw eyyi^eiv civrnv as ''Iipixco, in the general sense of being near to Jericho, but without defining whether he was approacliing to it or departing from it. Its meaning here is determined by Matthew and Mark: he was leaving tlie city, but still near to it. Luke, like Mark, mentions only the more prominent person healed. [Grotius on Matt. xx. 30; Clericus, Diss., ii., Canon G; Pilkuigton, cited in Townsend v. 33; Robinson, Jarvis, Owen.]" Newcome {liar., 275) holds that Jesus spent several days in Jericho, and that his departure, mentioned by Matthew and Mark, was for a temporary puipose, the blind man being healed as he was returning. ]\IcKniglit's theory is (Uar., ii. 93) that there were two Jerichos; that ns he left one he cured one blind man, and as he left the other lie cured the second blind man. Paulus (iii. 44) holds that the procession was so great that the front ranks were leaving the city as that portion in which Jesus was was entering it." The reader has before him the original record and the various theories, and nni^^t choose what seems most satisfactory to him. I believe that two were healed, but that one, for some reason, was more consjncuous than the other, or afterward came to be well known to the apostles, and therefore the account of his cure alone is preserved by ]Mark and Luke. His story is simply this. He was sitting l)y the road-side, plying his business as a beggar, when he heard that in the vast procession of }>ilgrims, which waa sweeping ])ast him with its bustling noise, was the famous Teachei GOING TO JERUSALEM. 535 and Ilealer, Jesus of Nazareth. lie began at once to cry out, " Jesus, Son of David, have niercv on me ! " It will now be jier- ccived how at eveiy step the Messianic spirit rises aniongthe people. AVe should naturally expect ^^"^^ ^'''''''^^^■ this when we recollect that the church had set a price upon the head of Jesus, aud yet he was publicly, deliberately, and with d'g"itj5 going up to the head-quarters of his enemies after he had performed such miracles as made liis friends feel that no enemies could crush him. ^Yhen Bartimaeus made his cry, which was an acknowledgment of the Messianic dignity of Jesus, those nearest bade him keep his peace and make no disturbance. This injunction was not made, as so many seem to think, to repress his acknowledgment of Jesus as the Messiah. The populace had not yet turned against Jesus. They rather sided with liiiu as against the ecclesiastical party • but as there seemed to be in the confluence of events a current of festivity, they did not choose to have the lofty gayeties of the occasion depressed by the unmannerly cries of a beggar. But they could not repress Bartimaius. The more they tried to silence him, the more he cried, " Son of David, have mercy on me." His voice reached the ear of Jesus, who stood still and said, "Call hnn." There is a touch of naturalness in the narrative. As soon as Jesus spoke complacently, those very men became very kind to the beggar they had just now rebuked, and said, " Be of good courage ; rise ; he calls you." How success begets success ! Tliis little history is constantly reproduced in society. Men of such force of character as disturb the public are suppressed if possible. If they be persistent enough to begin to succeed, that same public takes great delight in assisting. As soon as Bartimasus knew that Jesns called him, he arose, flung aside his loose and probably ragged garment, and leaping up came to Jesus. Jesus said to him, " AVliat will you that I should do to you?" He answered, ^^'''' ^^"'^^ ^™- "Babboni [My Master] that I might receive my sight ! " The contrast between the ambitious and foolish prayer of James and John and the humble and wise prayer of this beggar is striking. He knew his greatest necessity. He was humble^he was believ- ing, he asked the most needful thing. Jesus neither questioned nor criticized him, but simply said, " Go your way : your faith has healed you." It was a mere breath, a few words, and with- 536 FKOM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. out touch, the siglit came instantly back to Bartiniffiiis. It ^\'aa enough. lie left all and joined the procession going into Jericho. This permitting himself to be publicly hailed as the Messiah , ., T , being followed with a sti-ikiiiiT and sudden miracle Jericho. Luke Y /• i i r • . . . xix. • Matt. XXV. ^pcul}'^ periornied before an immense multitude, excited the people to a great pitch, and they shouted praises to God on their way into Jericho. The city of Jericho, the site of which is now occupied by a miserable village of huts, was a place of considerable historical -Tl m and commercial importance. It was iimnediately opposite the spot in the Jordan which was crossed by the Israelites when they took possession of the promised land. Ilei'e they found much spoil. It was situated in a beautiful i)lain. Its name, which sig- nifies "Fragrance," indicates that it was in the midst of a growth of finest plants. In fact, there bloomed the palm-tree and the balsam " in the midst of a luxuriant and fragrant vegetable king- dom." It afterwaids became the favorite residence of priests, who loved its shades for contemplation, and of Roman ofhcers, whose presence was rerpiired by the richness of the neighborhood, and by its being on the road of travel and of trade from the East. GOING TO JERr SALEM. 537 Zaccliseus. Pilgrims from the Perea side of the Jordan came through Jericho on their way to Jerusalem, Among the residents of Jericho, at the time of the visit of Jesns, was Zacchaeus. lie was a Jew. His Hebrew name, notwith- standing its Greek termination, shows that.* He was an officer of the Roman Empire, whether an actnal farmer of the revenue, a. puhlicamis, or only a comptroller, who received what was collected by the jportitore>< and then paid it over to the farmer-general, we cannot tell. The Koman law provided that such farmer-general should be a Eoman knight, but Josephus says that sometimes Jews obtained the office, as was tlierefore possible in the case of Zaccliseus. At any rate he had a lucrative ]ilace in the customs, and Jericho was an important ])ost by the general reason of its situation, and the particular rea- son of there being then a heavy tax on dates and balsam. This man desired to see Jesus. It is remarkable that as Jesug had achieved what his countrymen regarded as the bad reputation of being the "Friend of Publicans," Zacchaius, one of the very chief, had never beheld his person, although he had repeatedly been in the neighborhood of Jericho. Moved by curiosity, and perhaps by still higher motives, as the subsequent history would justify us in supposing, he determined to put himself in a position to see the distinguished traveller as he passed. Zacchasus was so short that he could not see because of the great crowd. His desire to behold Jesus conquered his sense of dignity. So he ran ahead of the crowd and climbed up into a svcamore-tree. It is to be remembered that tliis is not like the tall, close, slender tree of our American river-bottoms. In Palestine it is a great tree, with large trunk and far-spreading arms, and planted near roads and in the open places where several paths meet. The arms grow across the road, giving excellent opportunity for seeing any one passing beneath. Hammocks are sometimes swung in them, and a score of girls and boys may be seen playing among the limbs of this ample tree.f As Jesus passed and looked np he saw Zacchaeus, and somehow knew his name, and surprised him with the sudden address, "Zac- chaeus, make haste and come down ; for to-day I must stay at your * The name is found in its Hebrew form in Ezra ii. 9 ; Nehemiah vii 14 ; and 3 Mace. x. 19. f For a description and a picture of this tree, see Thomson's Land and Book, u. 23. 538 FKOM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WTSEK. liousc." The freedom, the kindness, the cordiality of Jesus won Zacchreiis instantaneously. lie almost fell from the tree, and with demonstrations of joy received Jesus as his guest. On the way to the house thei-e were some disaffected Jews who criticised this conduct. Uninvited, he had invited himself to be- come the iruest of a sinner. Every man connected His conversion. • i i 1 1 • i- i " i pi witJi the collection oi the revenues was hateful in the eyes of the Jews, and if one of their own nation accepted such a post he was regarded as specially despicable. It was said by some one in the crowd, "He has gone to be guest with a man that is a sinner." Zacciifeus heard it, and knew that he was a sinner, and confessed. He stood in face of the crowd and said to Jesus, " See, Lord, the half of my possessions I give to the poor ; and if I have taken anything from any man by extortion I wnll restore him fourfold." There was something most honest, deliberate, and ready in this outspoken confession. According to the law (Numbers v. 0) a man who had wronged another and confessed it, was to restoi-e the stolen property and add twenty per cent, of its value. This man knew that he had wronged others, but his quick calculation told him that he could give half his property to the poor, restore all his ill-gotten gains, and pay the injured party thi-ee hundred per cent., and yet have all he now cared to retain, since he had now the transcendent h(^nor of entertaining Jesus as a guest in his house. Speaking both to Zacclmeus and of him, Jesus said, " This day has salvation come to this house, inasmuch as he also is a Son of Abraham. For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save what was lost." It was a most noble and free act on the part of Jesus. He rose above caste and prejudice and political partisanship. His quick eye saw the good in Zacchseus, a germ of sweet richness kept from its growth by the difhculties of his position and the prejudice of his people. Jesus suddeid}^ so warmed it that it sprung at once into vigorous growth. Wide-hearted Jesus ! We know nothing more of Zacchsieus positively. There is a tradition that he became a disciple of Peter, and subsequently Bishop of Csesarea. But there is no historical proof of this, so far as I am aware. It may have been in the house of Zacichseus, or just as they started, or soon after, that Jesus uttered the Parable of the Pounds, in order to correct the perversely wrong \iews of his friends in GOING TO JERUSALEM. 539 the inultituclo, ^vho, saelurr thej were approaching the Holy City, looked now for tlie immediate inani!;nration of Iiis ]\Iusi>ianic reii^ni. This expectation of worldly dis])hiy may have l)een kindled hy the phrase, " The Son of Man is come to seek and save that which M-as lost." They believed a contiiet would come between Jesus and the Church, and that Jesus Avould ti-iumph and would set np " the kingdom of God " at once. This is the parable : " A certain nol)leman went into a far country, to receive fcn-liiniself a kini,'- doni, and retmn. And having called ten of his own slaves, he gave them ten mime, and said, ' Trade till I come." But his citizens hated liini, and sent a message after him, saying, ' We will not Parable of the roun.is. have this man to reign over us.' And it was so on his return, ha\ing received the kingdom, tliat he commanded those slaves to whom he had given the money to be called to him, that he might know what they had gained by trading. Tiien came the first and said, 'Lord, your mina has gained ten minas.' And he said to him. ' "Well ! good slave ! because you have been faith- ful in a very little, have authority over ten cities.' And the second came and said, ' Lord, your mina luis gained tive niin.ne.' And he said to this man, ' Be you also over live cities.' And the other came and said, 'Lord, behold your mina, which I have kept laid up in a napkin ; for I feared you, Ijecause you are an austere man. You take up what you did not lay down, and reap what you did not sow.' lie said to him, ' Out of your own mouth vdll I condenni you, wicked slave. You knew that I am an austere man, taking up what I laid not down, and reaping what I did not sow. Wherefoi-e tiien did you not give my money into the bank, that at my coming I might have required it with intere.«t?' And he said to those Avho stood by, 'Take from him the mina, and give to him that has ten minfe.' And they said to him, 'Lord, he has ten min;c.' ' I say that to every one who hath shall be given, and from him \vho hath not, even what he has shall be taken away. But mine enemies, those who would not that I should reign over them, bring hitlier, and slay them before me.' " This parable is very far from being identical with that of the talents, as we shall see when we come to study the latter. That a writer professing to discharge the functions of criticism shonld see in this an awkward amalgamation of two other parables, namely, of the Talents and of the Unfaithful Husbandmen, is a conspicuous display of the power of a preconceived theory over critical acmnen. {Sh'a.n&s,'s Zffe of J<'sus, I 351.) The parables have a few things in common, but the points of instruction are totally different. Here Jesus is surrounded by two classes of per- sons, one a multitude representing the Jewish ]ieople, and the other his little band of disciples. This paralde of the pounds ia 540 FROM FEAST OF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. intended to teach a lesson to both, as both were more or less look- ing for the setting np of a kingdom which should overthrow Rome. The formal portion of the parable is taken from the then well- known circumstances in the career of Archelaus, the son of Ilerod the Gi-eat. (See the note, page 59.) Jesus dis- ' . , , tiiiiruishes between the servants of the kina: and case or Archelaus. => _ , _ o the rel^ellious subjects of the kingdom, and has a lesson for each. The latter will reject their king. The Jews will reject Jesus for their s])iritual as they had rejected Archelaus for their civil sovereign. The result will be their destruction and the establishment of Jesus in his kingdom, lie meant to tell them that so far from the setting np of a kingdom of temporal power, he was to Ije rejected by them ; but that this rejection would not harm him, but would destroy the Jewish nation, which very soon subsequently proved to be true in history. lie intimated, also, that his was to be a reign of spiritual in- fluence, and therefore, instead of putting arms into the hands of his servants he gave them small proi)erties, which Adapted to the ^^ \vere to uso, Calmly working, negotiating, condition of the , ,. ., ' t -, , if o i and tradmg until the Lord should come, bucn conduct on their part would be the best possible protest against the rebellious subjects, because it would show that these servants had such perfect faith in the return of their master and king that they quietly persisted in trade, so as to have ac- complished all that was possible before his return. lie taught his disciples that Ihey who had the faith, the industiy, and the endurance to do this should receive a reward proportionate to their success, but out of all proportion to the small sum put in their hands to trade with. If we understand even the Attic mi}ia as the money here designated, the sum did not exceed $15 gold, equal in its purchasing capabilities in that age to many times §15 this day, but still being only one-sixtieth of a talent. lie that made it tenfold M'as created ruler over ten cities, and he that made it fivefold, over five cities. As Von Gerlach well says, " Ten minai would scarcely purchase a home ; and the superabun- dant recompense of grace is ten cities." This interpretation is consistent with the whole narrative, and with the circumstances under which it was uttered, and the state of mind of those to whom it was addressed. As far as practi- disciples. GOING TO JERUSALEM. 541 cable it corrected all their misappreliensions before their arrival iu Jerusalem. The Passover was approaching. Many had gone up fi-om the country to Jerusalem to make ceremonial purification filgriins pushing towards the Holy City. It would seem that he probablj 542 FROM FEAST CF TABERNACLES UNTIL THE LAST WEEK. reached Jericho in the evening of Thursday, 7 ISTisan (30th March), remained all night with Zacch?eus, made the whole jour- ney to Bethany the next day, reaching the place that evening before the beginning of the Sabbath. He knew that it was to be a week of conflict and anguish, and he would naturally desire to be with his friends of Bethany, refreshing himself in their quiet home. It was soon reported in Jerusalem that Jesus was at the house of Lazarus, Great crowds began to stream out to the little vil- lage, which was less than a Sabbath-day's jour- Crowds flock to j^e frojnthe city. There was a double induce- 66C Iiini ment : they might see Jesus, and at the same time gaze upon Lazarus, who had had the strange experience of being raised from the dead. This combined attractiveness of Jesus and his friend Lazarus incensed the church, and an ecclesiastical council was held to compass the death of both, because Lazarus was living proof that Jesus possessed the strange power of raising the dead, and those who saw them both together believed on Jesus. It was decided to destroy both men after the Passover. They had not then calculated upon the assistance of Judas, whose co-operation hastened the consummation of their plans. The Sabbath — Saturday, April 1 — was spent in Last Sabbath of ^^^^ ^^j^^ ^^ ^j^^ j^^^^^^ ^^ Lazarus. It was the Jgsus last Saljbath in the career of Jesus, and it was appropriate to spend it with the beloved family of Bethany. PART VII. THE LAST WEEK. FEOM APRIL 1 TO APRIL 8, A.D. 30. CHAPTER I. THE FTEST DAY — FEOM SATURDAY EVENING TO SUNDAY EVENINO. Sunday morning came. The Sabbath had ended. Jesus and his followers took up their journey to Jerusalem. It was a gay time in the national calendar. The crowds of pils^rims going up to the great feast received ac- between Beth- cessions every hour. When the party or Jesus ^^^ Paim-Sun- reached a village called Bethphage, which means day, April 2. Matt. House of Figs^ the site of which it seems not ^^i- ; ^^^^'^ ^i- > possible now to identify, but which lay some- -^"^^ ^^''■'' '^°^ where on the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent forth two of his disciples, saying, " Go into the village over against you, and immediately you shall find an ass tied, and with her a foal whereon never man sat ; having loosed them, bring them unto me. And if any one say anything to you, you shall say, ' The Lord has need of tliem,' and immediately he will send them." The disciples went on their errand and found a colt tied outside a door at a cross-roads. AVlien they connncncod to untie it tlie owners said, "AVliat are you doing, loosing tliat colt?" AVlien tlio disciples repeated the words of Jesus, the-objcctors said no more, but let them take it away. It would seem that the dam followed tLe foal. It was natural that they should keep togethel-. Tlic presence of the ass kept the colt quiet. On the latter the disciples of Jesus spread their garments, and he sat on them, and thus rode forward down the Mount, in the midst of the cavalcade. Tho 544 THE LAST WEEK. historian Matthew says that in the doing of this was f ulfined what was spoken through the prophet, " Tell tlie daughter of Zion, see your King comes to yon, meek, and sitting upon an ass, even upon a foal, an offspring of a beast of burden." * AVliy Jesus should have done this is a question which naturally arrests us at this point. It is manifest, from the whole tenor of the history, that he felt that his hour was now about Jesus riding. ^^ ^^^^^^ jj^ expected to stand no more by the Sea of Galilee, or walk the streets of Capernaum, Bethsaida, and the other places which had been his haunts. He addressed him- self as to a last conflict with his foes. They had laid a price upon his head. He did not intend to evade their vigilance, but he in- tended not to throw himself recklessly into their hands. There- fore he alwavs left the city in the evening, spending the night in a neighboring village, and returning to the Temple-service in the niorntng. But he would avoid no responsibility of his position. He rod"^ into Jerusalem. There should be no pomp, and there- fore no blooded steed with rich caparisons and insignia of royalty should carry him. An ass's colt should testify at once his poverty and his dignity. He went in so lifted up that all the people might Bee him, and " the church" should perceive that he was not afraid of his fate. , * Strauss (.Life of Jesus, ii. 291) holds ' that the "Evangelical narratives" of this advance of Jesus to Jerusalem " are formed not so much upon a given fact as upon Old Testament passages and dogmatic ideas." In proof of which he cites Matthew's account of the two disciples bringing two animals, and spreading the garments upon both, and setting Jesus upon both. He accounts for this by Matthew's want of sense and misapprehension of the passage in Zech- ariah (ix. 9). Matthew "paralyzes" "the understanding" of Dr. Strauss when he seems to represent Jesus as riding both animals at once! and the Doctor recovers himself only when he examines Zechariah, where it is written in Hebrew parallelism — " Lowly— and riding upon an ass. And upon a colt, the foal of an ass." Matthew had read that, and supposed that the fulfilment of the prophecy ne- ces.'^itated the riding of two animals at once, and so he made the history con- form to his dogmatic ideas ! But no one would charge Dr. Strauss with being so poor a Hebrew scholar as not to be quite familiar with the Hebrew poetic forms. As soon as he turned to the text in Zech- ariah he knew that the second line was a mere parallelism, being equivalent to and expounding the idea in the first line, the ass in the one being identical with the foal in the other, the second simply amplifying the first. Matthew certain- ly was as good a Hebrew scholar as Dr. Strauss, and the writings of the for- mer, examined critically, show quite a.s much common sense as the latter. This ' ' paralyzing of the understanding " is an affectation unworthy one who sets up for critic on the most influential of aU the productions of literature. THE FIRST DAT. 545 As the cavalcade descended tlie sides of the Mount of Olives they met a crowd composed of the friends of Jesus, of those who had admiration of him, of those whom curiosity and the excitement of the occasion had drawn to- ^^^ ^^°^ ' g-ether, coming out to meet Jesus, who was reported to be approach- ing the city. With the former Lazarus was undoubtedly present, and with the latter the emissaries of the church party. The meet- ing of these tides of people heightened the excitement. They cut branches from the trees and strewed them on the road. They took their very garments from their shoulders and spread them before the colt that bore Jesus. Their hopes of the setting up of the Messianic kingdom waxed warm. They shouted, " Ilosanna to the Son of David ! Be praised the King of Israel, coming in the name of the Lord ! Peace in lieaven ! Hosanna in the high- est!" Tin's Messianic shout of joy was taken from the Psalm cxviii, 25. The series of Psalms from cxiii. to cxviii., inclusive, called the Great Ilallel, was usually chanted by the priests, the whole multitude of worshippers waving branches of willow and palm, and at certain intervals shouting the response, " O Lord, I beseech thee, send now prosperity." This was the Hallelujah or Ilosanna. The children who were old enough to w^ave the branches and re- peat the words joined in the responses. The willow wands them- selves came to be called Ilosannas. And so wlienever there wei-e occasions of happy excitem^t and joyous anticipation,, this pas- sage from the Psalm became its form of utterance. There were true hearts out of which this cry of joy went up in utmost sincerity ; but the mass of the people were carried away with a wild kind of excitement which had no sub- ,,•11 . £ n •.■I rni r- , ' i Great excitement* stantial basis or raith. I hey were a festival pop- ulation, the people of the city and the vicinity, whose bread was in the maintenance of the sacred metropolitan character of Jeru- salem. x\s the mass of the citizens of Kome at this day, artists and artisans, depend for their livelihood upon Pome's being kept the centre of ecclesiastical attraction, and mio-ht therefore regret any movement which should take the Papal throne from tlie city or break up a system which by repeated festivals and processions and spectacular exhibitions of surpassing ecclesiastical splendor draws thousands of visitors and tens of thousands of dollars an- nually to Kome, but might favor any candidate for the Papacy 35 646 THE LAST WEEK. •who slioiild promise a vast increase of these attractions, so these Jerusalemites did this Sunday shout " Hosanna " to the young Teacher, after whom they cried, " Crucify him, crucify him," on the following Friday. Jesus knew the hollowness of this parade and of this eulogistic uproar. lie allowed himself to be addressed as Messiah. If any sinister political interpretation were given it, he gr a para . ^^^jj appeal to his whole course heretofore. He would try his nation. _ lie meant to be their spiritual leader, and set them free by making them fit to be free, if they would accept such leadership as that. They meant to make him king of the nation civilly, the royal successor of the royal David, the Messiah who should break the Roman yoke, and bring the nations to be tributaries of the Holy People, planting the banners of the Hebrew faith and polity on every high place of the earth, and making Jerusalem the World-Metropolis, He could not induce them to accept him as such a king as he meant to be, and he would not be such a king as they desired. They could not induce him to fulfil their wishes, and they would not comply with his requirements. This Palm-Sunday they tried their experiment, hoping to betray him in a moment of excitement into the assumption of a position from which he could not retreat until he had carried out their de- signs. He spent the week in one last long effort to lift them to his plane of vision. They failed. He failed. The same multi- tude, when they found they had failed, wheeled into line with the forces of the cnuKcn, and increased the weight that was flung on the lofty and lovely young Dissenter and Heretic to crush him out of the world. The emissaries of the church failed to understand the temper of this festive mob, and felt as if their case was about to be lost. They said to one another, each blaming his neigh- The church |^^^, ^^^, incfficienc}^, as men in such circumstances ^ ' are wont to do, " Do you not perceive how ye pre- vail nothing ? Behold the world is gone after him ! " It really seemed as if the world had gone after him. As they looked upon the mountain side it was covered with an immense multitude, and when these waved their branches and shouted their song the clear air was filled with the multitudinous music ; and the enemies of Jesus, clad in robes of priestly authority, sitting in the high places of churchly power, plotting the murder of Jesus, heard that shout, THE FIRST DAY. 547 and shook in. their timorous pride as Jesus neared the city, sitting simple and quiet on tlie ass's colt, a pure personage without pre- tence, a good man to be flung up against the rock of the church by the billows of the popular enthusiasm, and left there to perish when that tide ebbed, but who now seemed to priest and Pharisee a bitter riddle of destiny, whose presence shook them with an as: Lie of fear and inflamed them with a fever of hatred. Some of that party being with the multitude, and offended by this open acknowledgment of his Messiahship, said to Jesus, " Teacher, rebuke your disciples : " which far from doing, Jesua answered, " I tell you that if these should be silent the stones will cry out ; " signifying by this proverbial ex])rcssion, " Do you ex- pect my disciples to be harder than stones ? They have followed me through my years of ministry, they have seen me open the eyes of the blind and unstop the ears of the deaf, and cleanse the skin of the leper, and raise the very dead, and now they see the general people acknowledge me : are they stones that tliey should show no emotion ? " Then they came in sight of the city. From the summit of Mount Olives the view of Jerusalem on the opposite heights is very imposing. The Crusaders broke into jubilation when they first beheld it. But now Jesus looked ^ *^ ° ^* c rusalem. With profound sadness at its walls and temples, and dwellings and towers, with its thousands of historical associa- tions, of kings and prophets and holy men, of splendid worship and bitter bigotry and deeds of violence, in the days of its gloi-y and the days of its gloom, the city of the Great King now held as an outpost of a heathen empire. It M'as his Father's House on earth. It was the repository of the oracles of God. But now it was about to reject, to betray, and to murder him. TVliat a city it might speedily become if it would but be the first to accept the form of civilization he could give, and the spiritualized forms of faith he could impart ! Its doom rose up before his mind. This great city was hastening to a direful catastrophe and knew it not. The very spirit which led the reigning party in Jerusalem to reject Jesus would precipitate the city into SHch acts as should bring down upon it the crushing arm of the Roman Empire. He foresaw all that. He was " a man that could certainly divine." He beheld the Eoman cohorts encamped with their engines of war laying siege to the city of David. He saw the fagot and the sword 548 ■ THE LAST WEEK. carrying destruction to buildings, and deatli to men, and worse tlian death to women. He saw the Roman eagle flaunting in the liolj place, and the priests murdered as they attempted to flee, and ferocity and lust penetrating everywhere, and soiling and tram- pling and ruining everything sacred in man, or woman, or temple. It swept over the city of the House of God. His was a great, en- during, tender nature. This outburst was no relieving shower of sentiment overflowing his eyelids ; it was the genuine expression of manliest noblest sorrow for a fall from an eminence so august to an al)yss so base, that never in the ages would Jerusalem climb back to the splendid exaltation from which she was about to be toj^pled. Amid his sobs his disciples heard him apostrophizing the city in these tear-wet words. " If thou hadst known — in this day — even thou — the things for peace! But now — they are Jesus apostro- , . i ,. ,i . ^ i -n i ^ •^^ , . , 1 hid from thme eyes ! — i^or days sliall come upon phizes Jerusalem. . '' ^ -^ ^ thee when thine enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round, and keep thee in on every side, — and shall level thee with the ground, and thy children in thee : and they shall not leave in thee stone upon stone, because thou know- est not the day of thy visitation ! " Down the slopes of the Olive Mount, past the Gethsemane Gar- den, over the Kedron Creek, went the Palm-Sunday procession. Serene and sad sat Jesus on the colt as the singing and Temple cavalcade, ascending to the white walls, passed through the gates into the streets of Jerusalem, rnaking the city to ring with the gladness of their exuberant song. From the lowliest, Jesus had ascended to the highest place in the nation. This festal procession was becoming something like a royal cortege. All the city was moved. Out of the windows peered priest and Pharisee, and said, "Who is this?" And the peo]^le answered, " This is the prophet Jesus, from Nazareth of Galilee." Perhaps those who answered were Galileans themselves, and, becoming ])roud of the prophet that had sprung from their country, they made a response which was the very answer, whether so intended or not, to anger the hierarchic party. But the tone in which the popular party answered the priestly party sounds to me like an abatement of enthusiasm. They do not cry out, " This is the King of Israel coming in the name of the Lord ! Come down, ye priests and Pharisees, and render him homage." Jesus doubt less felt all this abatement of popular zeal. THE rmST DAY. 549 Jesus went forthwitli to the Temple, and made an iuspociion of all things in the holy place. There were certain Greeks, probably Jewish proselytes, who had come np to the feast, and, with all that intellectual inquisiti\e- ness which marked the Hellenistic character, they X TT j> 1 1 Greeks seek him. were eager to see Jesus. He was a iresh phe- nomenon of humanity. They seem to have been people of cul- ture. They ^vere at least polite, and did not intrude on the Great Teacher, but communicated their desires to Philip of Bethsaida. Perhaps Philip had Greek blood in him, as his name indicates. He certainly had modesty. Although these Greeks represented the most polished forms of civilization, they were, by Hebrew narrowness, regarded as the lowest class of worshipj^ers in the great Temple. He consulted his brother disciple Andrew, and upon agreement they both told Jesus. So far from meeting a repulse these disciples found that the very message filled Jesus with a strange joy. He welcomed the Greeks, and said to them and to his disciples, "The hour is come that the Sou of Man should be glorified. I most assuredl}' say to you. That except a grain of wheat falling into the ground die, it abides alone; but if it die, it bears much fruit. He wlio loves his life loses it, and he who hates his life in this world shall keep it unto perpet ual life. If an}^ one serve me, let him follow me ; and where 1 am, there also shall my servant be. 1£ any man serve me, the Father will honor him." The shouts of the people did not exhilarate Jesus, did not for a moment throw him from his mental equipoise. Indeed Jesus seems grand in his solitary sadness amid this po- pular gladness. But the coming of the Greeks tiiere\^th ^^^ seems a great delight to him. He is thereby glorified. To say so was disloyalty and heresy. It was enough tliat as proselytes they were bai-ely admitted within holy precincts. Loyalty to Hebrew traditions demanded contempt of pagans, and loyalty to the church party demanded contempt for all the world that did not live as the Pharisees directed and worship as the priests taught. But tlie soul of Jesus was so tall as to look over the palo of man's church; indeed to perceive that that rotten structure was to be by himself felled to the ground, that the whole world might be let into one. That was his glorification. It required martyrdom to accomplish it, and he was going to endure that martyrdom and 650 THE LAST WEEK. accomplish that glorious bringing of all peoples into one. The births of life are through the husks and corruption of death, a truth which finds forceful and beautiful illustration in veo^etable reproduction. The man wlio, like the foolish farmer^ will not sow his wheat because he desires to save his wheat, will surely lose it all. " To hate " one's life is a Hebraism signifying to " value less." He who values this present form of life less than the life which is perpetual shall keep both this and that. Jesus intended to yield this petty Palm-Sunday triumph, and even the apparently more substantial royalty of supreme civil rule, so that he might live in the lives of the world and be king over the hearts of the ages. He desired his disciples to follow his example, and promised that all who did, whatever earthly distinctions they might miss, should have honor from God. Then a great shudder j)assed through him, and he said, " Now is my soul troubled : and what shall I say ? " He paused. He had not been misled for an instant. He knew where all this would end. The horror of death came upon him. He cried out, " Father, save me from this hour." It was a natural cr3^ It was the instinctive love of life. H he had yielded and pressed that ques- tion, it would have been that loving of life which loses it. He rallied. No ; he will not sacrifice the perpetual to the temporary. He said, " But on this account came I to this hour. Father, glo- rify thy name." We do not know what Jesus meant by " on this account." There was something in his mind which did not, per- haps could not, come out in words. It was a great soul in a frightful spiritual storm. In his agitation the anguisli compelled the utterance of the first prayer. He was strong enough to reverse it, and to change it instantly from " my deliverance " to " thy glory." A notable thing then occurred. A sound was heard. It seemed to be a voice from heaven. Three interpretations were given to it. Some said it thundered. Some said, " An angel has spoken to him." Some said there were these words spoken : " And I have glorified, and I will glorify." It is plain that all heard a sound. The three interpretations are to be explained on two grounds, the difi^crenco in relative position and the difference in psychical condition. Thus on the more dis- tant it may have produced only the impression of an inarticulate heavy noise like thunder ; on those nearer, the impression of arti- culate yet confused utterances, articulate in themselves but not dis- THE FIRST DAT. 551 tinct to the hearers ; on the nearest, the very syllables which are repeated in the histoiy. Or Jesus himself may have heard these words, and have given a subsequent explanation of them to hia disciples. Again, on the supposition that these very words wero spoken, there were but few who were so receptive as to hear them, while to others they sounded like a voice in the aii', and to others like thunder. This latter view of the case seems to me the more reasonable. That God has spoken to man, all believe who are not atheists or the most dreary materialists. Instances in which men of good understanding have believed that they heard voices are not to be put aside by our grossl}^ material philosophy as the hallucinations of a diseased mind. The Jewish writers speak of the Bath-Kol, ^"pTia , the daughter of the voice, as a kind of second voice, an internal articulation, addressed to the inner sense by the good God, and second in authority only to the inspiration enjoyed by the Old Testament prophets. The Targum and Midrash represent it as the actual medium of divine connnunication with Abraham, Moses, David, Nebuchadnezzar, etc. In the history of the early Christians we have accounts of a " voice or voices," as in the conversion of Saul and the vision of Peter. (Acts ix. 7, x. 13, 15.) Josephus tells of a " voice," supposed by some to be the Bath-Kol, which informed IIjTcanus that his sons had conquered Antiochus. {Ant., xiii. 10, 3.) The same historian relates that, just before the fall of Jerusalem, one night as the priests were going into the Temple to perform their sacred ministrations, they heard a multitudinous voice saying, " Let us go hence." ( War, vi. 53.) Similar instances might be adduced from the records of all succeedino; ao-es like the " tolle, lege," take, read, which Augustine heard when he was converted. Perhaps any finely organized reader of this page will bring from his memory something similar in his own experience. It is scarcely philosophical to call these fancies. Our modern science instructs us that the phenomena which are able to affect objectively do exist subjectively in every man's constitution. Thus there is something existing subjectively in every man -which responds to the objective impingement of the atmosi^heric waves on the tympanum. Now, unless one be an atheist, or, believing in the existence of God, believe that He never desires to com- municate with man, or desiring to communicatej has not left open 552 THE LAST WEEK. to Himself every avenue of approach which is free to a man's fellow-men, I can see no difficulty in receiving the theory that this God can form in a man, immediately^ the very sensations and perceptions which are produced mediately by his fellow-men who form sounds in the brain of the hearer, through the audi tory nerves, by waves of air which the speaker sets in motion. Even then each man's impression would be measured by his ca|)abi- lities of reception, as in an audience of a thousand there are a thousand different results produced by the same speech ; as on the exhibition of a picture to a thousand persons, a thousand dif- ferent impressions have been made. To any human or divine fountain, whosoever conies carries away just so much water as his vessel holds. Jesus recognized the voice. lie was no fanatic. Through his whole history nothing is more apparent than the absence of all fanaticism. He is no trickster. Nothing seems Jesus knew it. ,, , . , ,. ,.« tt- ^ ^ ^ - more open than his pubhc lire, liis whole his- tory is like a structure which is all windows. From any side ono sees all through. He said, " This voice came not on my account, but for you. Now is the judgment of this world. Now shall the prince of this world be cast out. And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all things unto myself." John says that he said this signifying what maimer of death he should die. He felt sure that he was to be crucified. He felt sure that that which his enemies supposed would be a wall between him and the world, keeping all men away from him, namely, his death of ignominy, would be a position of elevation from -which he should exert the attractive influence of his great character on the whole world. Then a voice, representing the skepticism of the multitude, said, " We have heard out of the law that the Christ abides through the ages, and how do you say that it is necessary Christ abides that the Son of Man be lifted up? AVlio is this ior6Y6r. Son of Man ? " It seems clear from this that the name " Son of Man," to the apprehension of the common people, was identical with the Messiah, the Christ, the Anointed Saviour of Israel. Of him the people had a belief, gathered from their sacred writings, that he should abide forever, and this they intei- preted in a sensuous manner. If the reader will take the pains to consult the passages in Isaiah ix. 7, and Daniel vii. 14, he will THE FIRST DAT. 553 eee liow easy it was for minds not given to the study of spiritual things, but filled with violent national prejudices, to make an in- terpretation like that these people placed on the words. It is also clear that in some jjart of his sayings that day Jesus had calleil himself the Son of Man. Especially were they unprepared now to give up so suddenly the hopes which the Palm procession had so greatly kindled. He, Jesus, was to be the Messiah, to remain on the throne of David forever, to administer a government which should have no end, to subdue all peoples to the Hebrew theo- cracy ; and now he speaks as if he were the Son of Man, on whom is laid the necessity of being crucified. They never suspect the soundness of their own orthodoxy nor the correctness of their own logic, hy which, from a perpetual reign, they had inferred a per- petual personal presence of the Messiah. Jesus does not resolve this question directly. He says simply, " "Walk whilst you have the light, that the darkness may not over- take you : for he who walks in darkness knows not where he goes. As you have the light, believe in the light, that you may be sons of the light." As if he had said : You need not perplex your- selves with questions whose solution one way or another would have no benefit on your moral character. Do what your present duty enjoins. Go forward. Children are obedient to their parents. " Children of the light " is a Hebraism for those who are obedi- ent to the light. Thus ended Sunday the 2d of April. Jesus went out of the city as the evening approached, and over the darkening hills took his way to Bethany, where he lodged that night. STATEE — ANTIOCHUS EPIPHANES, CHAPTEE II. THE SECOND DAY — FROM SUNDAY EVENING TO MONDAY EVENING. The second day of the week found Jesus early on the roadj accompanied by his disciples, going up to Jerusalem. The record ^ , T, xu is that he was hungrry. Why the early morn should Between Beth- __ . * "^ "^ ^ r any and Jerusa- ^^1*1 ^^i^^^ ^o, when he might have broken fast with lein. Monday, 3d his fricuds iu Bethany, is not so very clear. He April. Matt, xxi.; -^^^^y have spent the night in devotion, and, being ^^ ^' joined by his disciples before sum-ise, proceeded at once to the city, kno\\'iiig that his time was short, and it be- hooved him to do promptly all that he would do before the final catastrophe. As they were going towards the city he saw a solitary fig-tree on the roadside, at some distance in advance, and was attracted by its display of leafage. He approached it, if The banren fig- .. j^^ ^-^^^ ^^^ something on it. There was no fruit ; there was nothing but leaves. He said to it, "May no one, to the end of this age, eat fruit of you!" We shall see that the next morning the disciples noticed that it was utterly withered. Few passages in the life of Jesus Jiave been so perplexing to hia friends, and such an a]ipai-ent vantage-ground to tliDse who either dislike Jesus or disbelieve his history as this. Tlie destructive critics, such as Dr. Strauss, call it "a vindictive miracle." This author calls attention to the fact that " it is the only one of its kind in the Evangelical history." The friends of both the his- torian and Jesus have felt that it is a passage specially pressed with difilculties. It is a flaw in the crystal, a muddy place in the clear stream, an ugly cloud on the pure sky. And so the com- mentators have endeavored to explain away what seems to obscure the character of Jesus in this act. But after all attempts there stands the fact that Jesus cursed a tree, and it withered. It waa a miracle. Was it vindictive ? If Jesus was angry, had he just THE SECOND DAT. 555 cause to be angry ? He had his passions. There is no more sin in anger than in hunger, in the abstract. But was he at all angry ? Tlie trouble in the narrative is that it is believed to tell the f ol ■ lowing story, namely : Jesus saw a fig-tree in full leaf; he waa huii«--i-y, and went to it, hoping to be able to gather ,. ^^' ,. ..if 11 Trouble in the hgs; he was disappomted ; he was angered; lie j^^^jj^^.i^,g cursed the tree: under that curse it withered. Tliis is not a pleasant picture of a great and good man. The dif- ficulty is increased by the statement of Mark, " for it was not the season of figs." Then the tree could not reasonably have been expected to have figs. It is treated as a free moral agent, being only a vegetable, and is then destroyed for not doing what it could not do. This seems a hard fate for the tree, and unhandsome con- duct in Jesus. To abate the embarrassment, one commentator* proposes a change in the reading of the Greek, so that it shall read, " whero he was it was the season of figs." This has two difticulties, 1. There is no codex that justifies this reading ; and, 2. It was not a fact. He was in the rocky regions of Judcea, and it was early in April. Josephus tells us that in the neighborhood of the Sea of Galilee figs grew ten months in the year ; but this was not true of the vicinity of Jerusalem. Equally futile is the suggestion of another, to read the passage as a question : " For was it not the season of figs?" Of course it was not. Moreover, that style does not appear in Mark. While he is a graphic word-painter, he has no emotional rhetoric. The same may be said of another f sug- gestion : " it was not a good season for figs." There is no author- ity for the reading, and it was quite too early in the year to de- clare whether it was to be a good season or not. Another explan- ation is that the "fig harvest" had not yet arrived; that is, Jesus came expecting fruit, because the time in which the figs were gathered had not yet come, so that there could not be the explan- ation that there had been a good crop, and that it had been gath- ered. This is more nearly reasonable than the others. But still there is the fact, in the natural history of the fig, that it does not ordinarily ripen in Palestine until June. We are told there is an early kind which has been gathered as far up as Lebanon as early * nemsius, Exercit. Sac, ed. 1639, p. | f Hammond, Annot. ad S. Marc 116. 556 THE LAST WEEK. as May, yet tlie general time of ripening is June. There are otliei interpretations', but these will suffice as samples. It is to be observed that none of these explanations toucli the root of tlie matter — tlie destruction of an inanimate object because it was not in the condition in which it was expected to be foutid. Friends and foes seem to agree on one point, M'hich Dr. Strauss states thus : " Mark adds these words in order to explain, — what in the case of a particular tree may be easily ex- A great mistake. -, . ^ • n ,• it " r ^ ^ plained, even m ng-time, by disease or from local causes, — why Jesus found no fruit upon itP It seems to me that Mark did no such thing. It was not the absence of fruit but the presence of leaves which Mark sought to explain. It appears that in the case of the fig the fruit often appears before, and generally with, the leaves ; the early fruit comes before the leaves, whicli do not appear until late in the season.* Indeed, the appearance of fig-leaves is one of the signs of approaching summer, as Jesus said (Matthew xxiv. 32), "'When its branch . . . puts forth leaves you know that the summer is nigh." If the '^ap in the original be translated " although " instead of " for," it seems to me that great help will be afforded to the proper comprehension of the passage. No man was expecting figs ; but as they went towards Jerusalem, in these first days of April, they saw a fig- tree in foliage, " although it w^as not the season of figs." If leaves, then there should have been fruit, for the fruit comes first. Jesus was not angry, but, as was usual with Oriental teachers, when he found occasion to teach a lesson symbolically, he seized the occa- sion. He blighted the tree not because it did not have fruit, but be- cause being fruitless it did have leaves. The tree stood a symbol of the Jewish people, leafy and fruitless ; in ^ " advance of all the nations of the earth in religious pretensions, while being at the same time quite as destitute of real fruit as the Greeks and Romans and others, whom they re- garded as barbarians and pagans. In a special manner that par- ticular sect of the Jews called the Pharisees leafed out into mani- fold baptisms, and minute tithings, and excessive fastings, and broadened phylacteries, while the fruits of piety and hu-manity were nowhere to be found in their lives. The act of Jesus Avas not vindictive, but didactic ; he did no harm to the tree, while he * Hackett's Illus. of Scriftures^ p. 141. THE SECOND DAT. 557 A grand truth. impressed a profound lesson upon liis disciples by what may be considered an acted Parable and Prophecy. But there is still another consideration which seems to me more important than all others. Possessing power to smite and tc destroy, and being about to yield himself volun- tarily to death, a death from which he might easily extricate himself by destroying all his enemies, it was im- portant that the world should know that he had this power ; otherwise the grandeur of liis self-sacrifice would be unknown to the race. There were only two ways in which he could exhibit it, by smiting things animate or things inanimate. It was in pur- est mercy that he chose the latter. We now kno.w what he could have done M-hen bound, and buffeted, and insulted, and led out to be crucified. He could have made Caiaphas, or Pilate, or Herod, or the Poman centurion the blasted result of the exercise of his power. To know tliat he had this power, and did not exert it on men^ under the circumstances, is the grandest display of mercy possible to man, and, let it be said devoutly, possible to God. It is worth more than all the trees that ever grew. Plant this stricken tree of Tuesday beside the cross of Friday, and you have a suggestion worth the study of man through all ages of time and of eternity. We have seen that very early in his ministry Jesus had entered the Temple and rebuked its secularization by driving the profaning money-changers from the sacred precincts. (See p. 126.) It does not seem to have made a per- ^^ ^j^^ Temple ^ manent cure of the evil. The Temple-market as it was called, taberiice, where animals for sacrifice, and oil, and wine, and salt, and incense, were sold to worshippers, and the uncurrent and profane coin of those who came fi-om distant coun- tries was exchanged, had been set up again in the Court of the Gentiles. Again Jesus overturned the tables of the money- changers and the seats of the dove-sellers, and drove these mer- chants from the House of God, and forbade the carrying of uten- sils through the Holy House, as if it were a common edifice." * It is supposed that operatives and mechanics on their way to work stepped in for worship, bringing their tools with them and setting them down while they prayed, thus making the Temple a com- mon-place. Perhaps also, rather than take a longer way around, those who were engaged about the Temple carried utensils through the holy places. It was the general secularization of holy things which Jesus rebuked and endeav- ored to reform. 558 THE LAST WEEK. It is to be noticed that the first cleansing of the Temple, at the beginning of his ministry, was performed by Jesus as an act of zeal on his part as a prophet. The learned Selden * and others maintain the existence of a zealot-right, which justified one who was moved by sudden uncontrollable prophetic impulse to attack existing irregularities in the national worship. In some such spirit Jesus seems to have performed the first cleansing. This second purification appears to be made in character of Messiah. The people were giving him such a recognition. lie could not, in such a position, allow this profanation of the Temple of God. It is to be noticed that the first purification excelled in violence of act, and the second in severity of word. In both cases there was a majesty and moral force in the very presence of Jesus, which accomplished the cleaning of the courts by the quick disappear- ance of the merchants. Freely combining and using two jtassages from the prophetic writings, Isaiah Ivi. 7, and Jer. vii. 11, he says: " Is it not written that My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations ? But you are making it a den of robbers." The charge is that The CnuEcn' had become at once narrow and pro- fane. God's religion has the spirit of universality ; it is a religion for all the nations ; theirs excluded the nations, and where Ilaman- ity should have been represented there was a body of thieves. These fine discriminations are characteristic of Jesus — discri- minations which escape ordinary observation, but which, when once made by him, summon the history of the Fine discrimina- i i , , i • i . . • i world to their demonstration. In every age we tions. ^ ... can now see, since Jesus has indicated it, that ' there is an exceedingly slight difference between a bigot and a thief. He who is unwilling to allow to his fellow-man the spiritual rights he has in virtue of being a man, will not long hesitate to take from him his material properties. And he who will cheat a saint will not long hesitate, when he has an oppor- tunity, to defraud a sinner. This severity was followed by acts of mercy. Blind and lame people came to him, and he healed them publicly in the Temple. The children caught the general enthusiasm. The remembrance of Palm-Sunday jubilations and the sight of the discomfited merchants, and of the healed patients, I * DeJure Nat. et Oent., iv. 6. The I Phinehas, Numb. xxv. 11. supposition is suggested by the act of I THE SECOND DAT. 559 jwhose sight and activity had been restored, kindled the ardor of the young, and they sang around the powerful Teacher, " Ilosanna to the Son of David." It gave sore displeasure to the churchinoii to see a man who was not in the succession, not of the tribe of Aaron, doing things more wonderful than miracles, and receiving these Messianic salutations. To the latter they called his atten- tion, pointing to the children, and saying : " Do you hear what these say ? " His reply was prompt and emphatic : '* Yes ! IIa\e yot(, never read, ' Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings Thou hast perfected praise ? ' " (Psalm viii. 2.) They did not believe that he was the Messiah in any sense. The children employed words from the sacred writings which, -whatever sense their ten- der minds may have seen in them, no man could accept who did not believe himself to be the Messiah in some sense. Jesus did accept them. More and more the malignity of the church deepened against him. The scribes and cliief priests sought how they might destroy him ; for they feared him because the people were astonished at his teaching. During the day he taught in the Temple. When the evening came he retired to rest in Bethany. CHAPTEE III. THE THIRD DAT — FKOM MONDAY EVENING TO TUESDAY EVENING. turning to Jerusalem Bethany and Je- rusalem. Tuesday, 3d April, ISth Ni- san, A. u. 783. Matt, xxi., xxii., xxiii. , xxiv. , xxv. , xxvi. ; Mark xi. , xii,, xiii., xiv. ; Luke XX., xxi. The morning of the third day found Jesus and his disciples re- It would seem to have been dark when they crossed the Mount of Olives the evening be- fore, so dark that they had not noticed the condi- tion of tlie fig-tree which they had visited the morn- ing previous. But now its appearance arrested their attention. The blight which Jesus shed upon it seems to have begun to take effect at once, and in twenty-four hours such a change had been wrought tliat now it was dried up from the rocts. Peter, calling the yesterday to remembrance, said to Jesus : " Rabbi, see ; the fig-tree which you cursed is withered away." The solemn reply of Jesus was : " If you have faith in God, I assuredly say to you, whosoever shall say to this mountain, ' Be removed and cast into the sea,' and shall not be divided in his heart, but shall believe that what he says is coming, it shall be to him. On this account I say to you, All things whatever you pray and ask, believe that you have received, and they shall be to you. And when you stand praying forgive, if you have anything against any one, that your Father in the heavens may also forgive you your trespasses." * It is noticeable that, frequent and wonderful as has been the exhibition of the powers of Jesus, each fresh display strikes his disciples with astonishment. They had seen the dead raised, and now they are astonished at the withering of a fig-tree. Jesus turns them from astonishment at the phenomena to con- 6ider the necessary internal condition of a powerful soul to be that of faith in God. A literal interpretation of his words about * In tlie common version, Mark xi. 26, there is added, "But if ye do not forgive, neither vrill your Father which is in heaven forgive your trespasses." But these words do not appear in the original in the oldest MSS. THE THIRD DAT. 561 removing mountains may be quite puzzling, and perhaps we can hardly satisfy ourselves with the suggestion that he pointed to the oj^pctsite mountain, on whicli the Tem])le stood, as meanini!; that. 1)V faith, his disciples mio-ht . . g moun- ' _ n ./ ? 1 » tains. be sustained in such a course as should lift the mountain of Judaism, and fling it out of tlie Avay of the progress of true religion. But it is quite natural to suppose that he taught that faith is supei-ior to bodily strength, and that generally the spiritual forces of the universe ai-e superior to the physical. And this is consistent with the spirit of the whole l)ody of his teaching. As for the remainder of his speech, it is a repetition of what we have had in the Sermon on the Mount. The people assembled at an early hour in the Temple. Thei-e never had been so exciting a Feast in the knowledge of the oldest worshi})per, and the occurrences of the previous dav had increased the excitement. Soon after ., ./^ ity .'' the arrival of Jesus, the representatives of the church party, the Iligh-Priest,* accompanied by the sci-ibes and the elders, came to him with that same old foolish chui-chlv question, " l>y what authority are ^-ou doing these things? and * In the Evangelists it is "chief priests." Lauge says: "The plural is explained by the then existing relations of the high-priesthood. The high-priest was supposed legally to enjoy his func- tion during life {see Winer, art. Uohe- prieister) ; and before the exUe we read of oulj' one deposition (1 Kings ii. 27). But since the time of the Syrian domi- nation the office had often changed hands under foreign influence; it was often a foot-ball of religious and politi- cal parties, and sometimes even of the mob. This change was especiallj^ fre- quent under the Roman government. Th\is Amias (Ananus) became high- priest seven years after the birth of Christ {JEra Dion.) ; seven years later Ishmael, at the command of the Roman procurator (Joseph., Atitiq., xviii. 2, 2) ; afterward Eleazer, son of Aimas ; a year later, one Simon; and after another year, Joseph Caiaphas, a son-in-law of Annas. Thus Caiaphas was now the 36 official high-priest ; but, in consistency with Jewish feelings, we may assume that Annas was honored in connection with him as the properly legvUmnte high- priest. This estimation might be fur- ther disguised by the fact of his being at the same time the |3D, or vicar of the high -priest (Lightfoot) ; or, if he was, the S't"J , president of the Sanhe-; drim (Wieseler). Compare, however, Winer, sub Synedrium. That, ia fact, high respect was paid to him, is proved by the circumstance that Jesus was taken to him fii-st for a private examin- ation (John xviii. 13). And thus he here appears to have come forward with the rest, in his relation of colleague to the official High-priest. Moreover, the heads of the tweuty-four classes of the priests might be included under this name. Probably the whole was the re- sult of a very formal and solemn ordi- nance of the Council, at whose heada stood the high-priests. "^ 5^2 THE LAST WEEK. who gave you this authority to do these things ? " It ought not 60 much to surprise us that the bigots of the old narrow Judaism should ask these questions as that the nonsense of propounding them should have been perpetuated through eighteen centuries, and be in as full force in London and New York to-day, not to say in Home, as it was in Jerusalem in the daj^s of Jesus. As if in all ages of the world the knowing of any truth does not gi\e to liim that knows the authority to proclaim it. As if in all ages, the possession of any moral power to do good does not give the possessor the right to exert that power. As if the luminousness of the intellect of Jesus, and the manifest control he held over the physical world, did not lift him out of the circle to which these stupid and powerless churchmen could with any propriety address such a question. But tliey had just that dulness of spir- itual perception which ordinarily accompanies narrow cunning. This latter trait appears in them. They hope to give him trouble by a dilenuna. He might put forth some claim which would con- flict with the acknowledged canons of " the church ; " any claim he could make they supposed would do that ; or, if he could show no credentials, he would lose his hold upon the people. It is to be noticed that when the zeal of Jesus led him in the first instance, and in the beginning of his ministry, to purify the Temple, the church party demanded a "sign." Now, for the Bpace of three years, he had been filling his ministry with marvels, and signs, and wonders, and miracles. It would make them ridiculous to demand a sign so near the very spot where Lazarus was raised from the dead. Tiiey now, perversely, demand his " authority." In their own nets were their feet entangled. Jesus submitted a counter-dilemma. They claimed to be the body set to judge the right of teachers and prophets to fulfil their coun er - ^^^j^^j^j^ Jesus determined that, as they had lemma. iti publicly challenged hmi, they should as publicly demonstrate their capability of sitting in judgment on such cases. With that view he submitted to them a case well known to them, to him, and to the multitude wlio were listening — the case of John Baptist. Jesus said, " I also will ask of you one question, and answer me, and I will tell you by what authority I do these things. The baptism of John — was it from heaven, or from men ? Answer me ! " All the people knew John ; so did tlie Sanhedrim. THE TmKD DAT. 563 It was a sudden question in the field of theocratic investigation. They saw the dilemma, and held a short private consultation.'^ Jesus silently awaited their answer. The multi- tude were too deeply interested to disperse. The Sanhedrim had only two courses from which to elect, to retire and leave the field to Jesus, or siiape some reply. It was a question which demanded a categorical answer. Should it be " from hea- ven," they knew Jesus would reply, " Why then did you not be- lie\ c him ? " and they recollected that John had borne the most emphatic testimony to Jesus. They would thus acknowledge John, whom they had rejected ; but if they did so, it would deprive them of all prestige and influence in judging Jesus. " The Chnrch " weighed consequences, not truth; that is the fashion of " The Church " in every land, in all ages. But if they should say " of men," deciding that John had no authority from heaven, that his was a self-assumed ofiice, in which he was sustained by his partisans, who also were without divine authority, then they feared that the people would stone them, for the multitude held Jolni to be a prophet. There was no escape. They saw it, and returned to Jesus with the statement, " We do not know." And Jesus said to them, *' Neither do I tell you by what authority I do these things." If tliey were not able to determine from the whole ministry of John, which Avas now completed, whether he had God's favor or not, Btill less wei'c they able to judge Jesus in the midst of this excite- ment. Their discomfiture was complete. They acknowledged their inability to exercise the functions of the highest ofiice in a theocracy, which office they were ostentatiously parading, and the dignity, the authority, and the power of which they had brought foi-th to crush Jesus. He appealed from the highest church tri- bunal to the private judgment of mankind, and is sustained wher- ever there are candid judges. IIo, then poured in upon these pretentious churchmen a raking broadside of parables. In further reply he said, " But what think ye ? A man had two children : and he came to the first and said, ' Child, go work to- * For the report of this consultation we are probably indebted to Xicodemus, who was a member of the Sandedrim, and a private friend to the disciples of I Jesus, to whom he probably communi- cated what had passed in thia consulta- tion. 564 THE LAST WEEK. day in the vineyard.' And he answering, said, ' I will not.' Afterwards, having repented, he went. And he came to the other, and said likewise. And he answering, said, ' 1 go, Parable of the ^-^ . „ ^^^^ ^^^^^^ ^^^_ ^Yh{ch. of the two did the T«^o Sons. ^.^^ ^^ ^^.^ ^^^^^^^ ^ „ ^^^^ answered, " The hrst." Jesus said to them, " The tax-gatherei-s and the harlots go into the kingdom of God before yon. For John came to yon in tlie way of righteousness, and you believed him not ; but the tax- gatherei-s and the harlots believed him ; but you, when you had Been, repented not afterward, that you might believe him." This was exceedingly severe. These churchmen had expressed a wilHngness to serve God, as had been shown in their high moi-al professions and pretensio]is of legal righteousness. John came an earnest preacher of that very kind of righteousness, urging that it be done from the heart toward God. The scribes and Pharisees showed their insincerity by rejecting just such a preacher as it is evident they would have hailed M'ith joy, if they had not been hypocrites. And when God set the seal of His sanction by the conversion of the worst class of men and w^omen in the commu- nity, even then the church authorities rejected him who bore the credentials of the heavenly Father's approval of his ministry. So perverse was their hypocrisy, that when the most convincing proofs of their error came, tliey refused to repent of the original rejection of John. In general two classes of sinners are here represented, as in the parable of the Prodigal Son, the one at first outbreaking, yet afterward repentant and obedient, the other pretending to obedi- ence, going tlie full length of obedience in speech, while disobe- dient at heart and in action. Publicans and harlots are the former, hypocrites and churchmen are the latter. Jesus continues his pungent appeal to the consciences of his adve]-saries. lie said : " Hear another parable : A man, a house- holder, planted a vineyard, and made a hedge Parable of the ^ij^^^^. u ^^^^j dii»:£::ed a wine-trough, and built a Wicked Husband- -, , . ,. ^ j_ ^ i ^^^ tower, and let it out to farmers, ana went abroad. And at the season of fruit he sent a slave to the farmei-s, that he might receive from the farmers [his share] of the fruits of the vineyard. And [the farmers] having caught him, beat and sent liim away with nothing. And again he sent to them another: and him they wounded in the head and dishou- THE THIRD DAT. 505 ored. And again he sent another, and that one they killed ; and many others, beating some and killing some. lie had yet one be- loved son. He sent him at last to them, saying, ' They will rever ence my son.' But these farmei-s said among themselves, ' This is the heir ; come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.' And they took and killed him, and cast him out of the vineyard." Then Jesus put the question : " When, then, the lord of the vine- yard shall come what shall he do to tliese farmers ? " From some one burst forth the reply : " He will miserably destroy those wicked men and let out the vineyard to other farmers, who shall render him the fruits in their season." Some one present ex- claimed : " Be it not so ! " or, as the passage stands in our com- mon version, " God forbid." Quoting Psalm cxviii. 22, Jesus said : " Have you not read this Scripture : ' A stone which the builders rejected the same became a head of a corner ; from the Lord tliis came, and is wonderful to our eyes ? ' " The chief priests and Pharisees felt the keenness of the speech against their principles and practices. They were not able to an- swer him, and therefore sought to silence by killing him, a thing they had already decreed to do. They were deterred only by a fear of the people, whose enthusiasm for Jesus was still easily ex- cited. Jesus went forward with his parables, so searching and so in- structive. He said to them : " Tlie kingdom of the heavens is likened to a man, a kinij;, who made weddincr- ^feasts for his son, and sent forth his slaves to call Parable: Mar- those who had been invited to the weddinsr-feast : ^^^^ ^ "^* c) 5 boa. and they did not wish to come. Again he sent other slaves, saying : ' Tell those who have been invited, Behold I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fatlings are killed, and all things are ready : come to the feast.' But they, making light of it, went away, one to his farm, another to his merchan- dise. And the rest, having seized his servants, insulted and slew them. And the king was enraged, and having sent his armies lie destroyed those murderers and burned their city. Then says }ie to his slaves : ' The wedding-feast is ready, but they wlio were in- vited were not worthy. Go you, therefore, to the outlets [the roads leading out into the country], and as many as you find call to the wedding-feast.' So, going out into the roads, those slaves « t>ee THK LAST WEEK. gathered all whom they found, both bad and good, and the bride- chamber was full J furnished with guests. And the king, coming in to view the guests, saw there a man who had not on a wedding garment; and he says to him: 'Friend, how did you come in here, not having a wedding-garment ? ' And he was speeeliless. Then the king said to his servants : ' Having bound his feet and hands, cast him into the darkness which is without ; there shall be the weeping and gnashing of teeth : for many are called, but few chosen. " This seems to be an enlarged repetition of a parable uttered earlier in his ministry in the house of the Pharisee. (See p. 485.) That such a Teacher as Jesus often repeated his teachings is what may reasonably be supposed. He represents the heavenly kingdom in the light of a festivity, combining the two images under which the prophets were fond of painting the reign of the Messiah, namely, a Wngdom. feast and a wedding.* Here it is a feast given by a king on a special high occasion,t the mar- riage of his son. Invitations are issued to great numbers of per- sons. In accordance with Oriental custom, at the time specified the second invitation is issued. An instance of this appeai-s in the invitation of Esther to Haman to come to a banquet on the morrow, and the sending a chamberlain at the appointed hour to bring him to the feast. (Compare Esther v. 8, with vi. 14.) The subjects of this king had been entertaining feelings of rebellion against him, and now that they were able to insult him through his messengei-s, they did not let the occasion pass. Some treated the invitation with contempt, going, one to his estate, which he had already acquired, and another to the business which he hoped would enrich him, showing how they preferred their private inter- ests to the will and pleasure of their sovereign. Others, wrought up to rebellion, went so far as to kill the messengei's of their king. The Pharisees saw in all this that Jesus meant to present a pic- toiial history of the rebellious Jews, and felt that he was seveie on them. But then he began to speak prophetically by describing the burning of the city by the enraged king. Could he be so audacious as to mean Jerusalem, holy Jerusalem, that that top- * Compare Isaiah xxv. C, Ixv. 13 ; Cant. V. 1, with Isaiah Ixi. 10, Ixii. 5, ftnd Hosea ii. 19. f HocJvzeit, high-time, in Germany^ still means a marriage-feast. THB THIRD DAT. 567 most of cities should be so destro^-ed ? It really seemed so. And if this festival was the good time of the Messianic reign, did he mean that the Jews were to be destroj^ed and the Gentiles brought in ? It really seemed so. After the destruction of the city the servants were ordered to go into the " outlets," where the streets ran into the country,* and bring in the outsiders. Jesus thus added fuel to the flame of the wrath of his enemies. But another lesson is made from this narrative. When the house became crowded the king went in to survey the guests, and found a man without the wedding-garment. He addressed him in language at once gentle and ^\- °" * searching. He called him " friend :" but in the ^^^^^ Greek the " iiot having " is put in a word whicli suggests not simply the absence of the wedding-dress, but some defect in the behavior of the guest in allowing himself to be present without such a dress.f Tlie speechlessness of the guest indicates that he had not even a specious apology to offer. The narrative assumes that garments were at the guest's command, and therefore that the king himself had provided them. There seems to be no trace of such a custom exactly in this form, but we do know that splendid garments were reckoned among the ti-easures of Eastern chieftains and kings ; that some of them pos- sessed inunense numbers of robes ; that the gift of costly i-aiment was a mark of honor ; and that a mantle presented by a king was to be worn in his presence, and that a failure to appear therein was considered offensive.:}: In addition to what we read in the Old Testament, Horace § tells us that LucuUus found in his wardrobe not less than five thousand mantles. The fashions did not change as with us, and a man of wealth might accumulate and preserve * Trench guards his readers against being misled by the English word •' highwaj-s." as if this referred to the country, whereas the whole scene is represented as lying in a city. But this usually accurate and learned writ- er seems to have forgotten that the ing attention to the fact '* that it is the auhjcctice and not the objective particle of negation, which is here used." Ou ex'^*' signifies not hncing. without being con- scious of the absence of anything, or the necessity of its being present; fit) fX<»^ signifies intentional, not luiving city is represented to have been burned what one knows one should have. before those servants go out into the highways. The original Greek word means owiways as well as throxtgh- ways. f We are indebted to Trench for call- X In illustration of these, points read Judges xiv. 12 ; .Tobxx^'ii. 1(5 ; Gen. xIt. 22 ; 2 Kmgs v. 5 ; 2 Chron. ix. 24 ; Matt, vi. 19; Acts xx. 33 ; James v. 1, 2. § EpiM., L G, 40. ^68 THE LAST WEEK. an immense wardrobe. The customs of the East are so change- less, that we find the same state of affairs to-day. A modern writer, Chardin, acknowledged to be unusnallj well-informed and uccni-ate, sajs of the King of Persia: " The number of dresses he gives away is infinite." * The same writer tells of a vizier who lost his life from failing to wear a garment which had been sent ]iim by the king. He tells us that the ofiicer through whose haiicU tlie robe from the king was to be sent, out of spite forwarded h- ])l!iiu dress instead. The vizier thought that if he appeared in tliat it would announce that he was in disgrace at court, and so made his public entry in a robe presented by the late king. His enemies represented to the monarch that his minister had refused to wear his gift, which so incensed him that he ordered the vizier to be executed. t The whole })icture in the parable is in accord with Oriental cus- toms, and represents tlie punishment of wilful unworthiness. The guest was willing to have the good of the feast, Wilful unwor- -r i -, -, •*" -j. • i • ^ i i • 11 Jie could einoy it m nis own way and on his thiness. ;; *' -^ own terms, which were derogatory to the honor of the king and injurious to the pleasure of the other guests. He was a bold, perhaps a desperate, intruder. He Avho could dare enter the banqueting saloon of his king in such a shameful style might offer resistance, as the Jews showed when they were about to be ejected from a position wliich they were not worthy to main- tain. But resistance would be ineffectual. He was to be bound, and forced out, and left in the dark. H weak, he would wail; if strongly passionate, he would gnash his teeth. The Marriage Feast is a sifting process. So God sifts and sifts. Only those who are willing to partake of the joys of the universe, and will- ing to take them in the way of God's appointing, a way intended to heighten the individual and the general joy, — only such shall remain in the high feasts of the kingdom of the heavens. Then the Pharisees went and took counsel how they might en- tangle Jesus in his talk. And they watched him, and sent to him a company of spies made up of their own sect Conspiracy. ^^^ ^j ^j^^ Herodiaus. The latter represented a political party, whose highest hope was in the continuance of the * Voyage en Perse, vol. iii. , p. 230. nis words are : " Le nombre dea hab- f For the manner in which the rejec- tion of a monarch's gift was resented, its qu'il donne est infini. " see Herodotus, i. 9, c. 3. THE TUIRD DAY. 569 rule, of the Herodian family. Thej were the special adlierenta ot Herod Antipas, and perhaps personal attendants upon that tetrarch, who, we learn from Luke xxiii. 7, happened to be pres- ent at this Passover. That dynasty was a compromise between total national independence, of which this party of the Jews were in despaii-, and direct Roman rule, which was to the minds of tlie Jews the extreme of political degradation. The Ilerodians did not represent a theological or ecclesiastical sect, but a political party. The Sadducees, although they were nnorthodox material- ists, desired to maintain the ancient faith against pagan forms of civilization ; and the Pharisees, who were the orthodox religionists, preferred the domestic tj^ranny of the family of Herod the Great, who were nominally orthodox Jews, to the presence and rule of some heathen appointee of the Roman emperor. It thus hap- pened that sometimes the Pharisees, and at other times the Sad- ducees, are found in close fellowship with the Ilerodians ; but the basis of the fellowship was political and not religious. It is to be observed that all tliese parties had the most intense bitterness of hatred towards Rome, and that makes their conduct on this occasion the more vile, because, since Jesus cannot be forced to take the role of a political Messiah, they determine, if possible, to involve him in the fate which would have come upon any man who attempted that perilous part and failed. Or per- haps the intention was to drive him into taking the headship of a rebellion against Rome, and thus realize their political hopes, or crush him out of their way as the social rulers of the people. When priests and ])oliticians combine there is the culmination of human villany. With these malicious feelings they sent a body of, probably, young men of both parties, who should now go to him as private persons, as orthodox Jews, as devoted to the the- ocracy, as scrupulous men, who were to propound J^^ ° ^'^' T . . .p.. snare Jesus, to Jesus an ensnarmg question, as if it were sim- ply one which was troubling their consciences. The historian says (Luke XX,), "who should feign themselves to be just men, that they might take hold of his conversation, so that they might deliver him to the power and autlioi-ity of the governor." The manner of the approach was gracious, the style of the ad- dress was complimentary. They said, " Teacher, we know that jou are true, and that you teach the way of God in truth, neither 570 THE LAST WEEK. do you care for any one, for you do not look to the face of men." Guileful as were liis enemies, they were compelled to give this faithful description of the character and teaching of Jesus. He was truthful because he was independent. He had demon- strated in his ministry of three years that he could not be moved by any appeal men could make to his hopes or to his fears. He was independent because he was righteous. All this was truth to which the people could bear witness ; but it was not uttered in the spirit of truth, and, while essentially and profoundly true in it- self, it was a lie on the lips of these tempters. The intent of this manner of address is quite obvious. It was an attempt to cozen Jesus. It was a movement to excite him into such a feeling of superiority that he should dare utter what would bear a treasonable interpretation, which the llerodians would re- port, and to which the Pharisees, as impartial and unpolitical per- sons, would bear testimony. The question was one of marvellous adroitness. It seemed to demand a categorical answer, " yes " or " no," or enforced silence. It was this: "Tell us, then, what you think : is it An adroit ques- ^^^^.^^^^ ^^.^ ^j^.^ ^^..^^^^^^ ^^ q^^^,, „j. j,,,^? » If he said, '' Yes, it^is lawful," he would shock the Jew- ish prejudices of the populace. He would be charged with in- culcating a humiliating submission to a heathen conqueror. He would disparage his claims to the Messiahship. It would be out- rao-eous that the theoci-atic king of the Jews should teach submis- sion to a heathen oppressor of his own people. An affirmative answer would thus destroy his present popularity and his prospects of future advancement. If he said, " No, it is not lawful," there would be ground on which to rest an accusation of rebellion. It might be a speech to pass without notice if uttered by some bigoted rustic in a Jewish village, but spoken by a very popular Teacher at the high festival, in the metropolis, and in the Tem- ple of his nation, it becomes altogether another thing. Rome would not pass lightly by such a speech of such a man under such circumstances. These conspirators supposed that he must sa,y " yes " or " no," and perhaps it occurred to them that if for any reason Jesus should see fit to decline an answer, this would put him just where he had placed them by his dilemma in regard to John the Baptist, and that thus they should recover the ground they had lost in that conflict. THE TIIIKD DAT. 571 AUGUSTUS C«8AB. The net torn. But Jcsns neither kept silence nor gave a categorical reply. He read them through and throngh. He upbraided theui foi their dissimulation. " Why do you tempt me, you hypocrites ? " And then he turned upon them with a most unexpected movement. " Show me the coin of the tribute," he said, and they brought him a denarius, the common silver coin of the Empire then in circulation in Palestine, being the ordinary pay for a day's labor. lie held the piece of money in his hand and asked — not that he did not kuow, but manifestly that their own lips should speak it — " Whose is this image and superscri})tion ? " They answei'ed, " Caisar's." His reply was like a flash of inspiration, " Kender therefore Cajsar's tilings to Cjesar, and God's things to God ! " Was there ever anything fairer? The net was torn to pieces. All morality, all piety, and all the companionship of the numer- ous duties were put into eleven Greek words, which require only the same number of English words to translate them. All personal devotion to G( )d, all j ustice towards man, all equipoise of character were set forth in a sentence which can be pronounced in a breath. They had accepted money from CiBsar's mint, thus acknowledging the dominion of the Emperor ; thus they had settled against themselves in practical e\ery-day life, the question which one of their schools had determined in the rabbinical rule, "The coin of the country shows the master."* Jesus thus gave a summary of his teaching in an answer the most profound, because it states what underlies all life and all the duties thereof ; the most lofty, because it crowns the highest hopes of man for this present life, and his grandest for the life to come ; the most beauti- ful, because in it law and freedom kiss each other; the most power- ful, because it holds despotism and anarchy apart, and holds religion and progressive free life together. Ko other one sentence uttered among men has done so much for the progress of human Bociety. It was not a divorcing of religion from govermnent, and a putting of God out of the affairs of the nations, as if human A profound les- son. * Ellicott quotes Maimonides in Ge- gdao,^^ chap v. : " Ubicunque numisma re^ alicujus obtinet, illic incolse regem istum pro domino agnoscunt. " See also Lightfoot, Hoi: Ueb., in Matt. xxii. 20. 572 THE LAST WEEK. government and divine rule stood at neutrality or in antagonism. JS^or was it a sanction of Jewish ideas of unity, as if service to an earthly monarch were treason to God, as under their theocracy they had grown to believe, since God was king. Caesar exists by appointment of God. Government does not exist by the will of the governed, nor by the will of the governor, but by the ordi- nance of God. Men dare not be without government ; nor is it practicable if men should attempt it. Duty to the government is best discharged by devotion to Go4 ; and duty to God involves the discharge of obligations to the government. These hypocrites and liars who were tempting Jesus were like all the disciples of the "higher law" school in every age, making their pretended piety an excuse for a violation of civil obligations. They were willing to serve neither God nor Ccesar, pleading one against the other that they might be free from both. But Jesus, instead of admitting the alternative of Caesar or God, assumes and impresses the con- nection of Caesar and God. Perhaps the idea that Jesus intended to convey a lesson by the allusion to the image on the coin is not without foundation. It has obtained in all Christian ages. Man bears God's image in his soul from the birth, and is a man because he does bear that image, as a piece of silver is a coin because it bears the image of the reigning prince. Kender your inner spiritual life to God and devote your outer worldly life to your country, might seem to be the lesson for each individual. In any case there is no collision of duties. When the Pharisees and Ilerodians heard the saying of Jesus they marvelled at the wisdom of his reply, and seeing that they could not take hold of his words before the people, they held their peace and left him, and went their way. But their pursuit of Jesus was not to be thus abandoned. If he cannot be caught by an adroit question regarding political princi- ples, perhaps he can be betrayed into saying some- The pursuit not ^j^jj^g which shall rouse against him the adherents of one of the sects among the people. To that end the Sadducees approached him ; and they had a question so shaped that any answer they could conceive would either commit him against the law of Moses or drive him into the helplessness of Bilence. Jesus had endorsed the law of Moses, and had also explicitly taught the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead. THE THIRD DAY. 573 The Saddiicees -vrero materialistic pantheists. They did not believe in any spirit, whether of man, angel, or God. They did not belie\e in the resurrection of the body, and therefore, as the body was all there was of man, the continued existence of con- scious personal identity was not received by them. They ran their principles to the logical ends of atheism or pantheism. In out- ward life they were decent, and considered themselves a part of the " church," and, so far as we can see, were not del^ari-ed by their philosophical tenets from being members of the Sanhedrim. For political reasons they were ready to join the Pharisees and the Herodians — indeed some of the sect may have been Ilerodians — in putting aside a man whose course threatened to bring the Jews into collision with the Homans without the prospect of making a successful revolt against the dominant empire. The Sadducees plant themselves on Moses and qtu)te the law of the Levirate marriage, thus : " Teacher, Moses said. If any one die, having no children, his brother shall marry liis wife and raise ui) seed to his brother. But there , Qf ^^o^ by the were with us se\en brothei-s ; and the first, having married, died, and not having seed he left his wife to his brother. Likewise the second also, and the third, until the seventh. And last of all the woman died. Now in the resurrection of which of the seven shall she be wife?" From their standing-point this seems like a difficulty from which Jesus cannot extricate himself. lie must admit that their statement of the law, being a free render- ing of Deuteronomy xxv. 5, is quite correct. Then they state a case. AYliether it occurred in real life or is imagined in order to test the principle, is not important. It nn'ght occur. It would have been sufficient to take the very case which Moses supposed, namely, of two brothei-s ; but the greater the number the greater the perplexity, and therefore they state seven. It is clear that they suppose that Moses did not believe in the resurrection, and the question which they state involves, as they think, in any reply, which Jesus can make, a surrender of the truth of the doctrine of the resurrection, or of the binding force of the law of Mose" It is quite clear that they did not propound the question that they might be enlightened. It was to entangle Jesus. The reply of Jesus was lofty in its spii-it and demolishing in i*.i stroke. He did not deign a reply to a sneer at a great doctririr, nor a solution specially ai)plicable to a case sensually conceirc.^ 674 THE LAST WEEK. and coarsely stated. He showed their folly and stated the great principle involved in the case, and demonstrated by a single qnota- tion from the writings of Moses that the great law- giver was neither pantheist nor Sadducee. Ilia reply is, " Yon are wandering, knoM'ing neither the Scriptures nor the power of God. For in the resurrection they neither many nor are given in marriage, but as the angels of God in heaven are they. But concerning the resurrection of the dead, have you not known precisely that spoken to you by God, saying, ' I am the God of Abraham, and God of Isaac, and God of Jacob ? ' lie is not the God of the dead, but the God of the living." lie rejects their pantheistic notions, asserts the personality of God, teaches that those of whom Jehovah is God cannot be dead, but alive. God is y Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob esus agains ^^.^ These men are dead, so far as the world is pantheism. . ' able to perceive; but they are as certainly alive as God is. lie answers their quotation from Moses of the provision for Levirate marriages, by showing them, by another quotation from Moses (Exod. iii. 6), how the belief in the continued exist- ence of men after death underlay the highest teachings of the great lawgiver. He gives them to understand that their question, which was propounded in the spirit of libertinism, involved a gross error, which came of their ignoi-ance of both the meaning of Scripture and the power of God. It does not seem that Jesus charged the Sadducees with being ignorant of the omnipotence of God, but that they did not discern the pOMcr of God in holy Scripture ; that to them a writing was a writing, and nothing more ; in short, that they did not know that the fact of the power of God being in the Scripture was a proof that God is a spirit. The marriage relation is one of the natural and not of the spir- itual body. This forced Levirate marriage was most unnatural. „ . Wliether any love existed between the widow and, Mamage natu- , , , . , , . i i i ^ her brother-m-law, whether or not she loved an- other man better, or he had already a wife whom he loved, his brother's widow must be taken to his arms. The 'whole arrangement was made for the preservation of the family. There should be no need for any such regulation in the world which men enter at death. There the men do not marry, and women are not married. If sex remain, there is nothing which demands such unions as we have on earth ; so then the case which THE THIRD DAT. 575 the Sadducees cited as conclusive really had no hearing whatever on the question under discussion. The Sadducees did not see far enough to perceive that human beings may exist in two states successively, without losing their identity ; while we, who are in one of those states, do not see how arrangements of the other can at all correspond with this. A priori^ it would be reasonable to Buj)p()se that we could not see this connexion, and that any diffi- culty proposed would amount simply to an acknowledgment of our ignorance, and no proof of any other proposition whatever. That is what Jesus implies. You are in error ; your error is the result of your ignorance ; but your ignorance can have no effect upon the facts of God and of eternity. The reply of Jesus silenced the Sadducees and excited the admiration of the multitude, and even some of the better-minded Pharisees, according to Luke, exclaimed: "Well said!" so de- lighted were they with the reply. One of them, a lawyer, came forward with a question to Jesus. The term " lawyei-," i/o/zt/co?, so frequent in the Evangelists, must be understood to mean one who devoted himself to the study and exposition of the Mosaic law, a "^^f lawyer's biblical scholar, a Doctor of Divinity, rather than one practising in the courts of civil and criminal law. We are not quite sure as to the spirit which prompted this question. The Pharisees were undoubtedly elated that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees. They might have felt that now was the time to show their superiority by proposing a good question, implying they wei'e not concerned in things so gross as those which occupied the Sadducees. Or this lawyer may have personally desired to know what was the opinion of this Teacher upon a question which was one of great interest in the schools of the Pharisees. Or tho Pharisaic party may have wished to make him repeat the com- mand which asserted the great doctrine of monotheism, from which they argued, as Mohammed has subsequently, that God could have no son, and to reflect it up(jn the claim which Jesus had made of being the Son of God in an exceptional sense. These suppositions are suggested by the question itself, by the answer of Jesus, and by the counter-question which followed. The lawyer asked, " Of what nature is the first commandment of all ? " This is sti'ictly the meaning of the question, and not, aa in the common version of Mark, " ^Y^^,^ch is the first \ " and of 576 THE LAST WEEK. Matthew, " Which is the great commandment ? " The legal spirit had taken such possession of the Jews that they enumer- ated, says Braune, 365 prohibitions, according to The grreat com- ^^^^ ^ ^^ ^j^^ year, and 228 commandments, mandment. / \ m -ni • according to the parts of tlie body. The Pharisees distinguished between light and heav}', great and small laws. They regarded them quantitively. Each command in the deca- logue had its adherents. There was no danger in any selection Jesus might make. But the point of peril lay here : if he said, as was most probable from his character and teaching, that tlie first commandment, " Tliou shalt have no otlier God before me," contained the principle of supreme love Vo God, his answer would make the basis for a charge of blasphemy. In the original it is TTota, " what kind of a law," what is the spirit and ^>r^/ic^^Z« of the chief law. AVe shall see that the two counts against Jesus at last were political aspiration and blasphemy, into both which his adversaries had endeavored to force him ; and having failed of the first they are still trying the second. Jesus answered, " The first is, Hear, Israel ; the Lord our God is one Lord ; and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and all your soul, and all your intel- The reply of ^ ^^^^ ^y^ ^^^^^ strength. This is the first and Jesus. 'JO great command. The second is like it, this : You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is not any other commandment greater than these ; on these two commandments depend the law and the prophets." It will be perceived that as he had foiled their efforts to make him compromise himself politically, so now, fi-om any involvement in blasphemy, which would have been caused by a surrender of the claims he had al- ready made,, especially if accompanied by an assertion of the debt of supreme love to God alone, Jesus saves himself, by adding imme- diately after the first command the second, and saying that it was like the first, and then conjoining them and declaring that on thQ two was suspended all that the law and the prophets contained. It was bringing together what God had joined and man had sepa- rated, namely, God and man, heaven and eai-th. It was a decla- ration that all the morality of the law, and the religious faith and fervor of the projihets, lay in loving God up to the full measure of human capability, and loving one's fellow -man up to the full measure of a healthy and natural self-love which has not run THE THIRD DAY. 577 to selfishness. The reply was simple, comj rehensive, and sub- lime. The scribe felt it. lie exclaimed, " Well, Teacher, you have spoken the trutli. One lie is : and there is not another besides Ilim. And to love Ilim Avitli all your heart, and all your under- standing, and all your strength, and to love your neighbor as your- self, is more than all the whole burnt-offerings and sacrifices." This gushing expression of belief seemed to please Jesus, who said to him, " You are not far from the kingdom of God." This is an important sentence. It lets us into the knowledge of the meaning of Jesus when he speaks of " the kingdom of God," which he makes synonymous with " the kingdom of the heavens." An apprehension of the spiritual meaning of the hnvs of God, of the abstract essence which is independent of the concrete forms of right, and on which those concrete forms themselves depend, is the beginning of the comprehension of a kingdom whose existence does not rest upon matter as a foundation, nor grow out of matter as a root, a kingdom which is itself the substance of all visible thino-s. The thino-s that are seen are to be known thor- oughly only as understood in their connection with the things that are not seen. The former es and Pharisees, hypocrites ! for you go about sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he l^ecomcs so you make him tenfold more a son of Gehenna than youreelves. Woe unto you, the blind guides, who say, 'Whosoever shall swear by the Temple, it is nothing ; but whosoever shall swear by tlie gold of tlte Temple, he is a del>tor ! ' Fools and blind ! for which is greater, the gold, or the Temple which makes the gold holy ? And, 'If one shall sw^ear by the altar, it is nothing ; biit if any one swear by the gift tliat is on it, he is a debtor I ' Blind ! for which is the greater, the gift, or the altar which niakes tl)e gift lioly ? He, therefore, who swears by the altar, swears by it and by all things on it ; and he Avho swears by tlie Tem- ple, swears by it and by Ilim who dwells in it; and lie who swears by lieaven, swears l)y the throne of God,, and by Him who sits upon it. " Woe to you. scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites ! for you tithe mint and anise and cummin, and have omitted the weigliticr matters of the law, judg- ment, mercy, and faith. Tliese it was right to do, and not to leave the others undone. Blind guides ! straining out a gnat, swallowing a camel. "Woe to you, scril)es and Pliarisecs, hypocrites! for you cleanse the out- side of the cup and of the dish, l^iit within tliey.are full of rapacity and in- justice. Blind Pharisees ! cleanse first t)ie inside of the cup and of the dish, that the outside of them may be clean also. "Woe to you, scribes and Plwrisees, hypocrites! for you are like to whited sepulchres, which outwardly indeed appear beautiful, but are within full of the bones of the dead and of all filth. Tims you also outwardly in- deed appear righteous to men, but within you are full of hypocrisy and law- lessness 1 "Woe to you, sciibes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because you build the tombs of the propliets and ornament the monuments of the just, and say, Jf- we had been in the days of our fathers ice would not have been imrtalers with them in the blood of the2)roj)hets. So that you testify to yourselves that you are the sons of the muiderera of the prophets, and you have filled up the THE THIRD DAY. 581 inoasnro of your fathers. Seipcuts, breed of vipers, how can you escape the jadginent of Gehenna ? " On this account, see, I send to you prophets and wise men and scrilies, some of Avlioiu you shall kill and crucify, and some of them you shall scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed upon tl>e earth, from the Idood of rigliteous Abel to tlie blood of Zacliarias, whom ye slew between the Temple and tlie altar. I assuredly say to you. All these things sliall come \i\ion this generation. " O Jerusalem, Jerusalem ! killing the prophets and stoning them that are sent to you, how often would I have gathered your children together, even as a hen gathers her chickens under her wings ; and you were not willing 1 See ! your house is left to you desolate ! For, I say to you, You shall not see nm from this time, till you shall say. Praised he lie coming in the Lord's name! " This is a terrible speech. One is remanded to the Sermon on the Mount hj varioHs points of similarity and contrast. The main resemblance lies in this, that l)otli are discourses on Character. One M-as delivered in the beo-inninjr, and the ^ Compared with „ . . 11 Sermon on the other at the end or his mmistry, yet both set jjount forth the ruling doctrine of his life, namely, that office is nothing, that profession is nothing, that internal spiritual character is everything. It will be perceived also that parts of the Sermon of the Mount, as well as parts of tliis Denunciatory Valedictory, were repeated at sevei-al stages of his ministry, so as to c;ive a certain class of critics some irround for sayini>- that both are collections, made b}" the art and insight of the Evangelist (Matthew), who grouped his teachings into something like ora- tions. But there is a terrible Ijcauty of unity in this last fiery discourse, M'hicli, more than any argument of criticism, it seems to me, will make every reader feel that it was all delivered at once. Passages may have been, and doul)tless were, uttered as occasion called them forth ; but here, in his Farewell to Juda- ism and Jerusalem, Jesus poure his soul in a full tide of grnnd and pure passion down the channel of a final discourse. Moreover, one jxirceives that the Sermon on the Mount is constructed u}X)n the principle of describing, first, the essentials of a good diameter, and then the results in the open life; while the Denunciatory Valedictory first describes a wrong outward life, and then ti-aces these fruits to the sap of hypocrisy. It has also been noticed that the number of the woes in this case is equal to the number of benedictions in that, and some have made 582 THE liAST WEEK. a strict correspondence. Wliile we may not be able to perceive that as closely as others, the analysis of this discourse will never- theless suggest it. The speech opens with some instriTctions to his disciples in the presence of the multitude. He advises them to do as the scribes , ^ ^. and tlie Pharisees said, not as thev did. These Instruction. , ^ . p i . t ", . men had the seat or doctrmal authority. Bur- densome as were some of the regulations which they imposed on the people, in their public teachings they inculcated sound mo- rality. If the disciples of Jesus had set themselves in a revo- lutionary manner against these teachers of the law there would have been public disorder, a woi-se thing than allowing these men to retain the seat they had taken, representing Moses in the teaching of the law. But their conduct was so wicked that no authority which they seemed to derive from their position was to give them such an influence over the disciples of Jesus, and the multitudes who heard him, as to lead them into imitating the example of these hypocrites, who covered the viciousness of their lives by laying heavy burdens on the shoulders of other men. Their whole life was a sham. They never did right because it was right and because it would be pleasing to God, but simply that they might enjoy the applause of men. Their life was a perpetual lie. Tliat they might have the reputation of sanctity they made broad their phylacteries and fringes. In literal application of the figurative expressions of Exodus xiii. 9, 16, and Deuteronomy vi. 8, 9, that the law should be bound as frontlets between the eyes, the Phari- sees made what is called " the tejpliilla on the head," and in the text and elsewhere called phylactery. These were strips of parchment on which, with an ink prepared for the purpose, were written four passages of Scripture, namely. Exodus xiii. 2-10,- 11-17; Deuteronomy vi. 4-9, and 13-22. These strips were rolled up in a case of black calf-skin, which was attached to a stiffer piece of leather, having thongs, covered with Hebrew letters, which thongs being passed round the head and made into a knot in the shape of i, were passed over tlie breasts. Instead of Avriting the law of God on their memoi-ies and affections, as the Scriptures had taught them, these Phari- sees contented themselves with making a parade of their pliy- lacteries. THE TIURD DAT. 583 In Numbei*s xv. 38, Jehovah commands the Israelites to "make them fringes [in Hebrew ti-'-s.^ tsitsitli] in the borders of their garments," and " that they put upon the fringe m • i, of the borders a ribbon of blue." The blue was the symbolical color of heaven and of God's faithfulness. It was much used in sacred things. The Iligh-Priest's ephod, the loops of the curtains of the Tabernacle, the ribbons for the breastplate, and the ribbons for the plate of the mitre, were blue. Setting up these tsitsithim they were to remind themselves of their being children of the covenant, and that they were faithfully to keep the commandments of a God who on Ilis part would be faithful to all His promises. Losing all memory of the spiritual meaning of the regulations, tliese hypocrites had learned to satisfy them- selves with an enlargement of the fringe on the garment in place of a deepening sentiment of humble piety in the soul. These men loved the chief place at feasts. Among the Greeks the seat of honor was the highest place on tlie divan, among the Persians and the Pomans it was the middle place. The Pharisees loved also the highest places in the synagogues, and it gratified their vanity to be called Teacher, Doctor, Pabbi. Against these Jesus warned his disciples. They were not to love to be called Pabbi, a title which occurs in three forms, Hah^ Teacher, Doctor ; Rabbi, My Doctor or Teacher ; Rahhoni, My great Doctor. Nor were they to call any man " Father," in the sense of granting liim any infallibility of judgment or power over their consciences. All the disciples of Jesus are of equal authority, all are brethren. " Papa," as the simple Moravii\ns call their great man, Count Zin- zendorf ; " Founder," as Methodists denominate good Jolm Wesley ; "Holy Father in God," as bishops are sometimes called; " Pope," which is the same as "Papa;" "Doctor of Divinity," the Chris- tian equivalent of the Jewish " Rabbi," are all dangerous titles.* "Rabbi." * It is contemptible in any minister of the Gospel to seek the title of Doctor of Divinity. The solicitation of its be- stowal ou himself proves the applicant unworthy. It is foolish and Pharisaic to reject it. No man can possibly prove to any other man that his rejection was not prompted by vanity. Probably no man yet has rejected it who was not knovm to his acquaintances to be, on other grounds, a very vain man. It ia as Pharisaic to reject it as to seek it. No man for such a cause can plead thia teaching of Jesus in justification, be- cause the public rejection violates the spirit of this very precept. It says to the world, ' ' See : I am greater than these Doctors of Divinity ; I can ailord 584 THE LAST WEEK, But it is not the employment of a name wliicli Jesus de- nounces, it is the spirit of vanity which animated the Phari- sees, and the servile spirit which the employment of titles is apt to engender. Paul and Peter spoke of themselves as spiri- tual fathers.* Jesus teaches that positions in the societies of his followers, such as should afterward be formed, were not to he regarded as dignities, hut rather as services ; that no man should seek them for tlie lionor the}' might confer, but for the field of usefulness they might afford ; and that no man should lead off a sect, there being but one leader ; and that the whole body of believers are brethren, of whom God is the Father. Then he turned upon the Pharisees and exposed and de- nounced them. 1. Opposed to that "povei'ty of spirit" which is the subject of the first benediction in the Sermon on the Mount, is a de- nunciation of that lie which pervaded the long First contrast /• i • i i i • • with the Ser o pi'^ycrs oi charity made by tJiese sanctnnomous Pharisees, Mdiile they were privately devouring the houses of defenceless widows. Even in their prayers they lied. The}' were not able to be honest at their devotions. And tliis is mentioned first, because it seems to be a key to the whole. If when a man approaches God in prayer he is a hypocrite, how can he Ije otherwise with his fellow-men ? To obtain the property of the helpless unrighteously is bad enough, but to commit this villany under the garb of piety is absolutely damnal)le. 2. In the " Sermon," he had blessed mourners, encouraging all who are penitent, making their heartfelt grief a source of com- foi-t to them. But the Pharisees, being unchari- table and hypocritical at once, not only did not repent and prepare themselves for the kingdom of the heavens, but actually kept others from entering. They sat in the seat of Second contrast. to dispense with the title." The only decent course is silence. But Christian colleges ought to be careful in the be- stowal of a title which so tests the Christianity of the recipient. Jesus teaches us that we ought not to love to be called by any names which seem to elevate us above our brethren. Mr., Master, might just as well be rejected as Dr., Teacher, for originally it meanl the same; and it is much worse to allow one's self to be called " Rever- end " than to allow the title of Doctor. It is not courtesy which Jesus cond'^mns, but vanity. * See 1 Cor. iv. 15 ; 1 Tim. L 2 ; Ti- tus i. 4 : 1 Peter v. 13. THE THIRD DAY. 585 Moses. They should have been tlie teachers of a true spiritual religion. Eiit, instead, when men showed any signs ol a spir- itual awakening they repressed them, as they were trying to sup- press him who tauglit the highest spiritual truths. Their sitting at the door of knowledge as janitors was a lie, over which Jesus pronounced a " woe." 3. Their position, however, demanded that they should do Bomething. They spent their strength on proselyting. It was not to save souls ; it was not even to convert liea- ^, • - T TIT • i. 1 Third contrast. tliens into Jews, nor even bad Jews into good Jews, but it was to add to the number of their sect. It was that same spirit which sometimes now seizes the sects of Christendom, makmg them proud of the growth of the " denomination," the "connection," "the church," or whatever else the sect maybe called. It is opposed to that "meekness " which is the subject of the thii'd benediction in " the Sermon." They were fierce and hot, like the Gehenna, the burning valley of Iliinioni, and when they made a pervert he was doubly as bad as themselves, as per- verts, the world through, usually are. 4. Jesus denounces their morality, which was a base ca?'.iistiy, the very opposite of that "hungering and thirsting after right- eousness " which he had blessed in " the Ser- mon." They had gone blind on the simplest and plainest questions of morality. He gives a case. The oath by the Temple — " by this Dwelling " — was fi-equent. Sometimes it was by the Temple-treasure. The Pharisees distinguished be- tween the binding obligation of these oaths. The violation of the former was a trivial offence ; of the latter was a heinous crime. It was the foolish casuistry of those who set more store by the church than by the chapel or meeting-house, who forget the value of that which sanctifies, and think only of that which may be sanctified, as if building, ornaments, vestments, ceremonials, con- stitute the kingdom of the heavens. So of their other case : an oath by the gift on the altar is more binding than an oath by the altar itself. This folly would seem to be transparent to any men, if Ave did not know that learned " doctors " of the later ages had not taught in the spirit which makes the rubric of a ritual more important than an enactment of the Decalogue. Their whole t^ystem of ethics was rotten, and Jesus cursed it. 5. And then he pronounced a woe over their hypocrisy in what 586 THE LAST WEEK. they would have considered tlieir devotion to religion. The law of tithes, as set forth in Levit. xxvii. 30 ; Numb, xviii. 21 ; Deut. •o-e^-u X J. xii. 6 : and xiv. 22-28, embraced only the ffrain that Fifth contrast, '. , , ' . ^ grew in their iields and the fruits that grew in their orchards. But the schools had applied the rule to the smallest product of the garden. With scrupulous exactness the Pharisees paid these. Jesus does not intimate that they defi-auded the Tem- ple treasury; but their sin lay in devoting themselves to outward goodness of behavior and neglecting justice, mercy, and fidelity. It is common for men who never suspect themselves of Ijeing Phari- sees, to fancy themselves just in character because they are scru- pulous upon some one right point of practice. It is the sjnrit of justice that is required, that justice which dwells with fidelity and mercy, that mercy on which he had pronounced the fifth benedic- tion in the " Sermon." Of what avail their tithes, tlieir outward strict legality, if their souls were "lawless," tliat is, if they did not submit heartily to the law of God? lie d(K3s not disparage attention to the minutest regulation, nor the most punctilious ob- servance of all regulations ; what he denounces is the being con- tent with these while the weightier matters are neglected. 6. It was not wrong to cleanse the outside of the cup, but if either was to be neglected let it not be the inside. If their scru- pulousness led them to strain their wine through a filter, so that they might not swallow an unclean insect, how absurd would such rigid observance of the law be when contrasted with the swallowing of so huge an unclean beast as a camel ! Jesus uses this proverbial expression to exhibit their enormous hypocrisy. 7. This is set forth in the horrible figure of a grave, the tomb over which was whitened, not to beautif}'- it but to warn all passers-by that they were in peril of becoming legally un clean.* But that very signal of filth made the graveyard picturesque, while it failed to sweeten the grave that was full of the corruption of putrefying corpses. Such were these Purists — pure and white as lime outside, but inwardly filthy as which was defilement (Numb. xix. 10), mig-hfc be more easily seen and avoided. (See the Rabbinical passag-es in Light- foot, Schottgen, and Wetstein.) Thus they always had a pleasant outward ap- pearance."— Meyer. Sixth contrast. Seventh contrast. * " The graves were, every year, on the 15th Adar, whitened with a kind of chalk {kovm), a practice derived by the Rabbins from Ezekiel xxxix. 15 ; not merely for the sake of appearance but also that these places, the touch of THE THIKD DAT. 587 Final woe. lotting flesh. What a contrast with the pure in heai-t M'ho re- ceive the sixth benediction of the sermon on the Mount ! 8. The eighth "woe" sums up the whole by denouncing their hatred of tlie true spiritual life. As a benediction was pro- nounced in the " Sermon on the Mount " on those who were persecuted for righteousness' sake, so in this valedictory is a woe uttered against those who are murder- ers of the propliets and those who inherit the spirit of the j^erse- cutors. The fathers of those Pharisees had killed the prophets, and those Pharisees themselves had adorned their graves, glad that the prophets who harassed their wicked fathers Avere not alive to torment their more wicked children. Men praise those of a former generation who did the very thing for which they denounce those of their own. Stier (vol. iii. 232) rpiotes; "Ask in Moses's times, Who are the good people ? they will bo Abraham and Isaac and Jacob ; but not Moses — he should be stoned. Ask in Samuel's times, Who are ihe good jjeople? they will be Moses and Joshua; but not Samuel. Ask in the times of Christ, and they will be all the former prophets, with Samuel ; but not Christ and his Apostles." {Berlenh. Bihel.) They were in the last times. The opposition to spiritual views of God's government of the universe, which has prevailed in the Jewish heart and was growing intenser with each succeeding generation, culminated in the men of the time of Jesus. lie was about to close the list of martyrs. Of those who had preceded him he speaks strangely. lie S})ea]cs as from the consciousness of Almighty God ; as if he, in fact, were Almighty God. lie (Jesus) had been sending prophets and wise men to persuade them away from their materialism to a spiritual religion. It had been a failure. They had grown worse and worse. They were now reaching the very worst. Tlie l)lood of the martyrs was about to be demanded at their hands, from the blood of Abel, who represented the religion of spirituality, and was killed by Cain, who represented material, outward, churchly religion, to the blood of Zachariah, who, by the order of King Joash, was stoned in the Court of the Temple, and who died say- ing, " The Lord looks on this and requires it." * The goodness Last times. * See 2 Chron. xxiv. 20. The cri- tics and , commentators have had much hard work with Matt, xxiii. 3G, where Zacharias is called "the son of Bara- chias." Relief came with Tischendorfa discovery of the Codex &naiiicus, froa 588 THE LAST WEEK. The heart of Jesus melts. of this man and of his father Jehoiada, and the atrocity of his mur- der, kept his memory vividly in the minds of the Jews. Jesus told the Jews that the measure was fuU. They were making the last martyrdoms, and then would come their judgment and their destruction. lie seemed to hear the wings of the Koman eagle sounding in the air. Dear Jei-usalem was the friglitcned hrood of chickens. lie had denounced with the utmost vehemence the sins which he had ])ictui-ed with tlie most poignant invective. I3ut the sinners were his own people. That which was about to be the prey oi the l)ird of power and plunder was his own Jerusalem, metropolis of his nation, seat of the throne of his ancestors, site of the TcjnjJe of his Father. His heart melted. After the Hash of the light- ning-stroke of his terribly eloquent denunciation of their sins came the shower of the rain of his pity and compassion. The omnipotence of God is not able to reduce the obstinacy of man. Even this Jesus, who had opened the eyes of the blind, and the ears of the deaf, who had stilled the stormy sea, who had cleansed the leper, and raised the dead, even this Jesus had not power to break the rebellion of his proud countrj'men. Even Orrmipotence is not a sufficient servant for Love. He sets the feebleness of his tears over against the power of his miracles, and to this day his sob in the pathos of his " O Jerusalem, Jerusalem," wins more hearts to ways of goodness and love than his eightfold "woe, woe," repels from the paths of badness and hate. And thus ended his Valedictory to Judaism. It is no longer his. Jerusalem is no longer the House of his Father. He speaks of it to the Jews as " Your House." It represents no longer Heligion but Churchism. It has ceased to l>e God's, and becomes Man's. He sat down in the Court of the Women, opposite the Treasur)% where the chest for alms is placed. He saw the rich ostenta- tiously throw in their heavy coin, whose ring arrested the atten- which it appears that those words were not originally in Matthew, but crept in from some copyist's note. Zacharias is known to have been the son of Je- hoiada. After all, it may have been Zecharias, the son of Barachias. In Ezra, V. 1, we have " Zechariah, the son of Iddo," and in the book of Zecha- riah, i. 1, 7, we have Zecharias, the son of Barachias, the eon of Iddo. The Old Testament does not ment'on hia murder, but Whitby quotes the Targum assaying that he was killed "in the daj of propitiation." TIIE TUtED DAT. 5S9 don of spectators. Among the donors came a woman, a poor wIcLiw, and she threw in two lepta, which make a qnadrans. A lepton was a bronze coin, the smallest in valne of all in circulation at that time. Two lepta .^^® ^dow's made a Iloman qnadrans, which was equal to about one-iifth of an Ameiican cent, so that one lepton roallv i-ej)rescnted the imaginary mill of American currency. AVliun Jesus saw all this, there stood before him again the two types, the religi ■ Temple, its roof covered with golden spikes, that flashed and glittered in the setting sun, was specially conspicuous. It was a grand sight. Perhaps also faintly through the evening stillness came snatches of psalms and hymns from singers in the Temple, as up through the quiet air curled slowly the smoke from the evening sacrifice. Then Peter, James, John, and Andrew came to him with the complex question, " Tell us, when shall these things be ? and what shall be the sign of your coming and of the end of the present order of things ? " They acknowledged his Messiah- phip. They connected the fall of the Temple vsdth the destruc- tion of the existing order of things. They could not conceive for a moment that the downfall of the world should not immediately follow the overthrow of the Temple. Jesus replied : " Take care lest any one should deceive you, for many shall come in my name, saying, * I am the Clirist,' and shall deceive many. The time draws near. Go not after them. And you shall be about to [you ehall in the future] hear of wars and rumors of wars: see to it, be not troubled; TIIE THIRD DAY. 591 for it is necessary that this come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation Bhall rise a^niinst nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there shall he .hocks and famines in places; and ^^^^.^ fearful things and great signs shall there be from heaven, ^^,^^^ ^^^^ ^^ ^,^^ ^^^ but all these are only the beginning of the pangs of virgins. childlnrth. " But beware of men, for before all these things they shall lay their hands on you and persecute you, they will deliver you up to the councils, and into the i)risons, and shall scourge you in the synagogues; and you shall be brought before governoi-s and kings for my sake, and it shall turn to you for a testimony to them and to the nations. But when they shall deliver you up be not over-anxious beforehand how or what ye shall speak, nor premeditate what you shall answer, but whatever shall be given you in that hour, that speak. I will give you a mouth and wisdom Avhich your adversanes shall not be able to resist nor gainsay ; for you are not the speaker, Ijut the Spirit of your Father speaking in you. " Tliink not that I came to cast peace on the earth ; I came not to cast peace but a sword ratlier, and divisions. I came to cast fire upon the earth ; and what will I ? If it were already kindled ! For I came to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And the enemies of a man are those of his own house- hold : for from henceforth there shall be five in one house divided, tlu-ee against two, and two against tlu-ee. " And they shall deliver you up to affliction. And a brother shall betray a brother to death, and a father a child, and children shall rise up against their parents and shall put them to death. They shall kill some of you, and you shall be detested of all nations on account of my name. And afterwards many shall be caused to fall and betray their associates for affliction. " I say to you, my friends. Be not afraid of those who kill the body and after that have not anything more to do. I will show ye whom ye should serve: Ilim, who after He has killed has power to cast into Gehenna. Fear Ilim; And' many false prophets shall be raised up and deceive many. And because lawlessness shall abound, the love of many will become cold. But he who en- dures to the end, the same shall be preserved. By your patience gain your lives. Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you tlie king. dom. And preached shall be this glad tidings of the kingdom through the whole inhabited world, for a testimony to all nations, and then shall come the end. "When, then, you shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies, and tte abomination of desolation, spoken of through the prophet Daniel, stationed in the sacred place, where it should not be— [he who reads, let him understand] —then know that her desolation is at hand; then let those who are in Judica flee to the mountains; and let those who are in the midst of her depart out, and let not those who arc in the country places enter into her, and let not him who is on the roof come do^Nni to take anything out of his house ; nor let hira that is in the field tuni back to take his garment. Remember Lot's wife. For these are days of punishment, that all things wliich arc written may ba fulfiUed. 592 TIIE LAST WEEK. " And "woe unto them that are with child, and to them that snckle m those days! But i)ray that your flight be not in winter nor on the Sabbath-days ; for there shall l^e in those days great distress on the hand, and wrath on this people, such as has not been seen from the beginning of the world until now, nor ever shall l)e. And thoy shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into all nations ; and Jerusalem shall ])e trodden do-\\ai ])y the nations, until the times of the nations shall be fulfilled. And except those days were shortened tliere should no flesh be saved: but on account of the cliosen those days shall be shortened. " Days will come when ye shall desire to see one of the days of the Son of Man, .and you shall not see it. Then if any one shall say unto you, ' Lo ! here is Christ,' or ' there,' believe not. For there shall arise false Clirists and false prophets, and shall show signs and wonders, so as to deceive, if jjossible, even the chosen. But I have told you l^cfore. If tliey shall say to you, ' Behold he is in the desert ! ' go not forth ; ' Behold he is in the secret chambers ! ' believe not. For as the lightning comes out of the east and shines to the west, so shall be the coming of tlie Sou of Man, in his day." His hearers broke in "U'ith tlie iiiterrnpting question, " "Wlierc, Lord?" lie replied, "AVliere the carcass is, there are gathered the cables." lie resumed : — o "Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the poAvers of the heavens shall be shaken ; and on the earth distress of nations, men in perplexity at the roaring of the sea and waves, men fainting for fear and expectation of the things coming on the inhabited world. And then shall appear the sign of the Son of jMan ; and all tlie tril>es of the earth shall mourn, and they shall see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels with a •great trumpet, and he shall gather his chosen from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption di-aws uigh. " Now learn the parable from the fig-tree and all the trees. When already its l)ranch has become tender and puts fortli leaves, you know that summer is nigh. Thus also when you shall see all these things, know that the kinguom of God is near, at the doors. I assuredly say to you. This race shall not pass iiway until all these things be done. But concerning that day and hour knows no one, not the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but tlie Father only. But as the Days of Noe, so shall be tlic coming of the Son of Man. For as they were in the days which were before the flood, eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, and did not know until the flood came and took all away ; likewise as it was in the days of Lot; they were eating, they were drinking, they were Iniying, they were selling, tliey were planting, they were building; but on the day Lot went out from Sodom, it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them THE THIRD DAT. 593 ah ; thus shall be also in the day when the Son of ]\Ian shall be revealed. I tell you that in tliat night there shall be tAvo in one bed, one shall be taken and the other left : then there sliall be two in the field, one shall be taken and one left : two grinding at the mill, one shall be taken and one left. " Look to yourselves lest at any time your hearts be oppressed with surfeit- ing and drunkenness and anxious cares of this life, and so that day may come on you unawares ; for as a snare shall it come on all those who dwell on the face of all the earth. Watch, then, and at every season pray that you may be considered worthy to escape all the things about to come to pass, and to stand before the Son of :Man : for you know not when the time is. But know this, tliat if the householder had knomi in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken into : on this account do you be ready also, for in an hour when you do not think it, the Son of Man comes." Peter broke in with, " Lord, do yon speak this parable to us, or even to all 'i " Jesus repl ied : — " Wliat I say to you I say to all, "Watch. It is as a man taking a far journey, who, leaving his house, gave authority to his slaves, and to each man his work, and commanded the gatekeeper to watch. Who, then, is the faithful and wise slave Vv'hom the Lord will make ruler over his household, to give them tlie food in season ? Hapjiy slave that, whom his lord coming shall find doing so ! I assuredly say to you that he shall make him ruler over all his possessions. But if the l)ad slave shall say in his heart, ' My lord delays,' and shall begin to strike his fellow-slaves, and to cat and drink with the drunken, the lord of that slave shall come on a day which he expects not, and in an hour that he knows not, and shall cut him in two, and give him his part with the hypocrites ; there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth. " Now that slave who knew his Lord's will and prepared not, neither did according to his will, shall be beaten much ; but he who knew not and did commit things worthy of stripes, shall he beaten -SAnth few. To whom much is given, of him much sliall be required; and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more. Watch, therefore, for you know not what day your Lord comes — whether at even, or at midnight, or at the cock- crowing, or in the morning — lest, coming suddenly, he find you sleeping. " Then the kingdom of the heavens shall be likened to ten virgins, who, having taken their lam])s, went forth to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish, five prudent. For the foolish, having taken lamps, took no oil with them ; but the prudent took oil in the vessels with their lam})s. But, the bridegroom delaying, they all slumbered and slept. And at midnight a cry was made, ' Behold ! the bridegroom 1 go out to meet him.' Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps ; and the foolish said to the prudent, ' Give us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out.' But the pi-udent answered, saying: ' Lest there l)e not enough for us and you, go rather to those who sell, and buy for yourselves.' And while they went to buy, the l)ridegroom came, and they Avho were ready went in witli him to the wedding-feast ; ai d the 38 504 THE LAST AVEEK. door was shut. Afterwards come also the otlier virgins, saying: ' Sir, sir, open to us; ' Ijut he answering, said, 'I assuredly say to you, I do not know you.' "Let your loins be girded about, and your lamps burning, and yourselves like men waiting for their lord, when he will return from the wedding, thai when he comes and knocks they may op^'n to him immediately. Hapi)y slaves they whom the lord coming shall find watching. I assuredly say to you, that he shall gird himself and make them recline, and will come near and serve them. And if he shall come in the second Avatcli, or in the third watch, and uud them thus, happy are they ! AVatch, therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour. " And when the Son of Man shall come in his glory, and all the angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory, and before him shall be gathered all the natiwns ; and he shall scpai-ate them from one another, as the shepherd separates the sheeii from the goats ; and he will place the sheep on the right hand, but the goats on his left. Then shall the King say to those on his right hand, ' Come, you who are praised of my Father, inherit the king- dom prepared for you from the foundation of the world : for I hungered and you gave me to cat, I thiisted and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you made me a companion, naked and you clothed me : I was sick, and you visited me ; I was in prison, and you came to me.' Then shall the right- eous answer him, saying : ' Lord, when did we see you hungry, and fed you ? or thirsty, and gave you drink ? and when did we see you a stranger, and en- tertained you ; or naked, and clothed you ? and when did we see you sick, or in prison, and came to you ? ' And the King, answering, shall say t(j them : * I assuredly say to you, inasmuch as you did it unto one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me.' Then shall he say also to those on the left hand, ' Dei)art from me, you accursed, to the perpetual fire prepared for the devil and his angels ; for I hungered and you did not give me to eat, I thu-sted and you did not give me to drink, I was a stranger and you did not enter- tain me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.' Then they shall answer, saying, ' Lord, when did we see you hungering, or thirsting, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister to you ? ' Tlien he shall answer them, saying, ' I assuredly say to you, inasmuch as ye did it not to one of these least ones, ye did it not to me.' And these shall go away into perpetual punishment, but the righteous into perpetual life." This extraordinary discourse contains statements of what was then future, which cannot be regarded as the mere results of extraordinary sagacity, as some political men prop ecy. foretold the French Revolution years before it broke upon Europe. The character of the average Jewish mind and the state of feeling among the Jewish people might have led any observant person to perceive tliat tlie fanaticism of the people was becoming frantic, and that the wild excitement which led tliem to persecute Jesus to the deatli, because he would not be a TirE THIRD DAY. 595 political leader against Home, would finally dasli Judaism with such violence against the Ruler of the nations as to produce such results as came forty years afterwards, in the taking of the city by Titus and the dispersion of the Jewish people by Hadrian. But hei-c some of the details are such as one would utter who had the veil of the future lifted, and beheld coming events with the intense spiritual insight of an inspired Seer. And yet there are none of the particularities which distinguish the predictions of the believers in^ a millennium, none of their chiliastic sensuous ideas. He takes the complexity of the question of his friends as the foundation of a description of the future, which embraced both tlie destruction of the Jewish theocracy and the final ground of judgment of men and nations. AYhat he had said in the Temple naturally led his disciples to ask for further information. He had dislocated their ideas of the government of the Avorld. They had not dreamed that the Tem- ple would be destroyed. There would come days of darlvucss, but the arrival of the Messiah would cover Mount Zion witli splendor and flood the world with theoci-atic glory. Kow he says that Judaism, with its Temple, is to be swept away. AVliat then should be their relation to the world and to God ? They had rea- son to seek to be taught on these points. He first warns them to beware of interpreting the pangs of child-birth into the agonies preceding death. The nations would be astir. Vast physical and national upheavals 111 1 / 1 1^1 • • The nations would take place, but the end or the existmg or- gti^-j.^^ der of tilings is not yet. AVliat men call endings are really beginnings. Deaths are births. His people, those who adojrited his principles, would suffer many bitternesses. Christians should suffer especially at the hands of churchmen. The truth, for which he was about to suffer death, would always be an occa- sion of contention. There would always be the double trouble of opposing ecclesiastical influence and those distracting pretenders the false prophets. Eut endurance, prudence, and vigilance would bring his followers through all troubles. Jerusalem should certainly be destroyed. A desolating abomi- nation should stand in the holy place, when the eagles of the Eoman standard, which were wor- Jerusalem de- 1.1 .11 .,,... I. Btroyed. shipped as idols, as representing the divinity or power, should be planted in the precincts of the Temple of Jcho 596 THE LAST WEEK. vah. He gave directions to his followers what to do then. They should flee to the mountains, probably those of Perea, any place Avliich should take them from these horrors. That the gospel of Matthew was written before the destruction of Jerusalem, ap- pears from the fact that he calls attention to this prediction and these directions by the parenthesis, " Let the reader understand." The Christians subsequently obeyed these directions. When the Roman armies encamped against Jerusalem, they fled to Pella, and thus escaped that terrible slaughter in which 1,500,000 Jews are said to have fallen. If the whole Jewish populace had given up their idea of a political Messiah, and yielded to the spiritual teachings of Jesus, and felt that the Messiah's kingdom was inward and not outward, and abandoned all thought of attempting by the sword what was in that way wholly impracticable, they would have avoided that terrific catastrophe, which filled the world with shuddcrings, and to this day stands up as the bloodiest horror of the past. But amid all commotions, when pseudo-Christs arose, the dis- ciples of Jesus were not to be drawn hither and thither in vain expectation of the revelation of the Son of Man. When that really occurred, men should not have to look after it. It would force itself on the attention of all men like a lightning-flash. It would fall like a thunderbolt. The disciples said, " Where, Lord ? " His reply was a proverbial form of expression containing a general principle. Wherever there is a dead carcass, there the vultures do come. To keep from being eaten by birds of prey, you must keep alive. God has his scaven- gers everywhere. If a man die, or a nation, or a church, there are forces provided to consume the dead body and transmute it into live tissue. Judaism is dead. The wings of the vultures are abroad in the sky, and these devouring birds will scent the prey, and come and take it away. From the fatal downfall of Jerusalem the Teacher ascends to tlic general judgment of mankind. Here there is nothing to gratify vain curiosity. There is a 2:raphic repre- General jucl"-- ^ -^ -^ t> r i ment of mankind, mentation of prodigious events in nature and in human society, as ushering in what Jesus calls the Parousia of the Son of Man, that is, his coming, his appearing, his revelation of himself. It may be delayed, but it will come. God works gradually forward to great results ; but they ofteD TUE THIKD DAY. 597 break upon the world at last like thunder-claps. The flood iu the days of Noah and the rain of fire in the days of Lot are examples. The people on whom this ruin fell were years in ripening for their doom ; but it fell at last like the downcoming of an enor- mous trip-hammer. It will be so as often as God shall visit the world with summary judgment. One cataclysm may succeed an- other, but the woi-ld does not take Avarning. The Deluge was no lesson to Sodom and Gomorrah, nor the destruction of those cities a .warning to the Jews in the days of Jesus, nor the downfall of Jerusalem and Judaism any preventive of the French Revolution. So whatever this " Parousia" of the Son of Man may mean, it will come suddenly, and all tlie development of the causes will not make men ready for the results. The race of mankind, Jesus taught, should not disa])pear from the earth before all the things he liad predicted should come to pass. The certainty should strengthen the faith, while the suddenness should keep all who beheve that Jesus is a true Teacher on the spiritual alert. The words of warning, he distinctly asserts, were not confined to his immediate friends, but to all men, for they are founded on gen- eral and perpetual principles. The necessity of vigilance is illustrated further by the case of servants whose master is absent. Of the time of his return they have no certain knowledge, but they know he w^ill return, and they must keep in a perpetual state of readiness. This is further illustrated by the parable of ten virgins, who, according to Oriental custom, were waiting until the bridegroom should appear, bringing his wife to his home. They were to add to the splendor of the procession by their torches. As is often the case in these in- stances, a delay keeps the bridegroom until midnight. The vii'>- gins all sleep, so that the foolish do not perceive that their lamps are dying out, nor are the wise virgins wakeful enough to warn their sisters of their danger ; and so the call comes upon all sud- denly. The wise have oil enough for themselves, and they proper- ly conclude that it is better to have five torches burning brilliantly through the whole time of the procession than that the party should enter with ten, all of which should soon be extinguished.* * Trench quotes Ward (Vieic of the \ He says: "After waiting two or three Hindoos, vol. 2, p. 29), who describes ; hours, at length, near midnight, it waa the parts of a marriage ceremony in I announced, as in the very words of Scrip- India of which he was an eje-witness. ! ture, ' Behold, the bridegroom comes 593 THE LAST WEEK. Jesus the presentative humanity. re- of He tlius teaches personal responsibility and the necessity of cease- less vigilance. Jesus sets forth himself as the representative of hnn-anity. Hmnanity shall be judged by him in both senses. His moral sense is the standard of judgment. Whatever injury is done to any human being, however feeble, friendless, nninfluential, apparently worthless, is to bring to the injurer just what that act would bring if done to Jesus. He is the Son of Humanity. Hurt humanity and you hurt him. Do good to humanity at any point, and you do good to him. Water to any thirsty man, bread to any hungry woman, clothing to any naked child, kind attention to any unknown stranger, visit to any prisoner, criminal or innocent, is set down as done to the Son of Man. He refuses to have any- thing which the giver is not willing to bestow upon humanity. He takes the lowliest human being, whoever he or she may be, and says, "Inasmuch as you did it not to this least one you did it not to me." Any failure of duty to a7\y human being Jesus takes as a personal neglect of himself, while he acknowledges as a per- sonal favor the slightest kindness done to the most nearly insigni- ficant human being. This is the most sublime and tender Humaneness. It is to be remarked how, in the setting forth of the doctrine of future rewards and punishments, the goodness of the heavenly Father is presented by Jesus. From the foundation of the world a state of exaltation had been prepared for all the good. God does not make devils, and bad people, and hells. Angels may make themselves devils, the sons of God may make themselves bad people, wickedness may make hells ; but God makes only kingdoms of glory, and angels, and sons of God. He does all he can to keep angels from becoming devils, and men from becoming bad, and high celestial places from becoming infernal pits. He uses all possible attractions to keep men from going away from liim. He does not curse them, but they are accursed. He does not dri\-e them away, but they do depart. To be a man, one must have a free will. To be a son of God, and made in the likeness go ye out to meet him.' All the per- sons employed now lighted their lamps and ran wdth them in their hands to fill up their stations in the procession — some of tlwn liad lost their lights and were unprepared, hvt it icccs then too late to seek them ; and the cavalcade moved forward." THE TniED DAY. 599 of God, one must be as free as God. Does not every man wlio re- flects and examines his consciousness feel sure that he is? 'NVlien a man chooses to pnt himself in such position that the attraction of hell becomes i^reater than the attraction of heaven, he gravitates naturally toward hell. And yet there is nothing dogmatic in all this wonderful dis- course. There is no qnestion of curiosity settled, no question the answer to which could have no bearing on the , . Absence of dog* moral character of men. JNo subscription to jQatism. formal creeds secures the final benediction, but only such belief as is the necessary root of the moral tree which bears the fruits of humanity, is saving. God's discriminations liere are all made in regard to character ; and so will be the dis- criminations of the other world. Jesus sets himself forward as the representative of humanity, while he is the judge of mankind. Such belief in him, as that representative, as shall lead to such love for him as shall produce on all possible occasions all possible kiudiicss to all kinds of men, it is that belief which keeps a man in the circle of the humane, and the humane are those who are drawn closely t(^ Jesus, " the Son of J/«;i," and thus to one an- other. As humanity dies out of man devilislmess sets in. Jesus recognized the existence of a personal devil. Men, in every act, become more and more like one or the other — like Jesus or tlie devil. There are judgments from time to time on earth: there ai-e to be judgments in the future, the details of which are not fur- nished, but in g'^neral terms of appalling grandeur those judg- ments are described. One of these temporal judgments of men ehould be had at the destruction of Jerusalem, the horrors of Avliich should typify another, a spiritual, a grander judgment on a broader e{;ale. That stupendous event should have no effect upon the character of those whose sentence it should pronounce, but that character should determine the sentence. They shall go away, the righteous — that is the humane — into continuous life; the wicked — ■ that is the inhumane — into continuous punishment. He does not tell us how long that punishment and that life shall be. He uses a word (atcoi/to?) which specially conceals any definite conclusion. It may be endless, it may have an end, it may be immediate and to continue through tlie existing state of things ; it is pain and pleasure set over against one another, with no limit of time. Time, jneasureless or limited, is very little, but character is everything. CIIAPTEH lY. THE FOrRTU DAY FKOM TUESDAY EVENDfG TO WEDNESDAY EVENING. At tlio conclusion of this speech, most prohaljly on the same evening, Tuesday, which was the beginning of the fourth clay of ^. the week, according to Jewish reckoning, and Disappointed i ., i • i -r-> i V j, g while they were going towards Jjethany, Jesus said to his friends, " You know that after two days is the Feast of the Passover, and the Son of Man is be- trayed to be crucified." There could be nothing plainer than tliat. lie should not carry out the Jewish Messianic idea. lie should disappoint all the worldly hopes of his personal friends. They must give up forever their expectations that he would prove a temporal Deliverer and regard him hereafter as a spiritual Messiah. Wlien Jesus and his disciples reached Bethany they found that an entei-tainment had been provided for them in the house of Simon " the leper." AV^ho he was we do not Feast in Simon's know. It is probable that he had had the leprosy ouse. ues ay ^^^^ j^^^ been healed by Jesus, and that he £;ave evenin"", April 4 . , . ^ jj 3Q ' this supper in token of his gratitude. Perhaps he was a relative of Lazarus ; if not, the two families were intimate, as Lazarus, and Martha, and Mary were present, " and Martha served." After the meal had begun, while Jesus reclined at the table, Mary came in quietly and opened a flask, and noiselessly poured the ointment on the head of her friend. She had Mary anoints Je- .ii.ii. .^ fi- i g^g watched witli loving eyes the agony of his soul, his harassed look as he returned from his daily conflicts in Jerusalem. She naturally desired to make some marked and significant display of her love. On that aching head sliu poured the nard. There, stretched from the couch, were the irollen, throbbing feet that had been standing iu the Temple THK FOURTH DAT. 601 during the day, and bringing him across Olivet in the evening She recollected that they had stood beside lier brother's gi-ave. Now, there sat that brother, alive, well, and eating. Her heart went ont in all lovingness. She spent the remainder of the oint- ment on his feet, then threw the flask away, and wrapped the dear limbs in her hair. So silently and nnobtrnsively had she done this, that it was only when the honse was filled with the odor of the ointment that the disciples perceived what had been done, although Jesus from the first knew that it was Mary, and what she Avas doing. There was one dark spirit at the feast, who was about to do the deed of treason wliicli was to danm his fame forever. It was Ju das Iscariot. He ventured the first sinister criti- u -iTTi l.^ ' i £ ii • , , Judas objects. cism. >Vhy was this waste or the onitment made ? Why was it not sold and given to the jioor ? " The other disciples concurred in this view, after it had been suggested by treasurer Judas under the s])ecious guise of consideration for the poor. The criticism grew into a luurmur i-ouiid the table. The reply of Jesus is most striking. " Let her alone," said he ; " why do you trouble her ? Slie has wrought a beautiful work on me. You have the poor with you always, and when YOU will you may do them ijood ; l)Ut me erepjo e- you have not always. She has done what she could: she came beforehand to anoint my body for the burial. Verily 1 say to you. Wherever the gosj)el shall be preached in the whole world, what she has done shall also be spoken of as a me- morial of her." This is a remarkable speech e\ery way. Jesus was caught m the toils of his enemies. He always knew that there was to be no temporal kingdom, with ofllces, and honors, and emoluments, and that now death lay near before him. Beyond that death he saw that his cause was to rise and conquer, that the whole woi-ld was to hear the glad tidings of Jesus, and that whenever and wher- ever that gospel was preached, Mary's graceful tribute should be recited as a memorial of her. It is noticeable as showing the care of Jesus for the graceful when it has no special utilitv. Jesus took care of the beautiful ; he knew that the useful would take care of itself. He showed how much more jirecious in his Bight is the seryice of the heart than the service of the liead; the worship of loye than the labor of thought. 602 THE LAST WEEK. A meeting of conspirators. "While Jesns Tras predicting the downfall of Jerusalem, as he sat on a projection of Mount Olivet, the churchmen inside the city were plotting his destruction. lie had that day hnnil)led them in the sight of the people. lie had every day increased their rage more and more, and had constantly escaped, always going out of the city at nightfall. They felt that they must do something promptly and decisively to suppress Jesus. With that view a lai'ge, and perhaps confidential, assemblage of chief priests and scribes and elders met together " in the palace of the high-priest," says Matthew. They did not go to the usual place, the council-chamber called Gazitli, which, according to the Talmud, joined the south side of the Temple ; they went to the hall or court of Caiaphas, son-in- law of Annas, a man who had degraded the pontificate by giv- ing it political connections. It is not certain where this " palace," or hall, or court was. An ancient tradition makes it the conntry- house of Caiaphas, the ruins of which are still shown on the sum- mit of the Hill of Evil Counsel* The intent of the meeting was to devise some scheme of subtll- ity by M-hich they could quickly move him out of the way. They did not dare to attempt to take him openly. He e cap ure ^^^ adherents and warm partisans. The iwpu- postponed. ^ . ^ ^ . lace were excited in his behalf. His recent mir- acles and his manifest triumph over the church party in the most public manner had brought the people to his side. The shouts of the Palm-Sunday Messianic salutations had scarce yet died out of the air. If they arrested him publicly there might be a public attempt at rescue, and then there would have been a collision. The Roman guard, who never studied Jewish ecclesiastical ques- tions, and who, from the tower of Antonia, looked down upon the Tenq:)le court and kept the often tumultuous crowd of worship- pers under surveillance, would have rushed upon them with the sword and consigned both parties to indiscriminate slaughter. By craft, therefore, must he be taken. After a long consultation this was the result of their deliberations : that the Passover should be * " Tradition makes the bargain with Judas to have been entered into at the conntry-house of Caiaphas, the ruins of which are still shown upon the sum- mit of the Hill of Evil Counsel. The tradition is not ancient ; but it is men- tioned as a singular fact that the mon- ument of Annas, who may have had a country-seat near his son-in-law, is found in this neighborhood." Williams, U. C, ii. 49G, quoted by Andrews. THE FOUKTH DAY. 603 allowed to go by, that tlie crowds of visitors to the metropolis on this festal occasion shonld be permitted to depart, and that then the Sanhedrim should contrive to do away with Jesus, Avithout noise, without calling attention to him. It never seemed to have entered their minds that this end might be gained by the treason of some member of the circle of Jesus. What they were resolv- ing should be after the Passover, Jesus was predicting should take place on that very day. AYe can fancy the surprise and dial)olical delight of the San- hedrim when suddenly one of the Twelve, one of the most inti- mate friends of Jesus, found access to them and ^ , - • 1 1 Judas comes to offered to betray hnn to them, so that tiiey nnglit ^-^^^^ avoid the difficulties of his apprehension in pub- lic. This was Judas of Kcrioth. The reply of Jesus to his criti- cism of Mary's waste of the ointment seemed to convin(;e Judas that things were not going forward on the path he had marked out in his own mind, and BO he took the resolve to precipitate the work by a bold movement. lie went back from Simon's house to Jerusalem and sought the ecclesiastical authori- shekel. ties. They were glad, and covenanted with him "for thirty pieces of silver." These pieces are supposed to be the silver shekels, each of which was worth a little over two English shil lings, or fifty American cents, so that the whole sum offered Ju- das was a little more than £3 English, or $15 American. A re- ference to Exodus xxi. 32, shows that this had more anciently been the price of a slave.* It has been suggested by Lange that when the Sanhedrim made this offer to Judas it was with cunning irony. Judas accepted. The case of Judas is a study. We may as well enter upon it here, anticipating so much of the remainder of his history as the New Testament writers record. No historical _, i 1 -1 IIP ■!-< •£ ii The case of Ju- character has liad so hard a rate. Even it the ^^^ ingenuity of those who jileasc themselves in mak- ing theories which shall expose the falseness of long-received conclusions, or the pleas of those whose amiability is in excess, * Compare the remarkable passage in Zechariah xi. 13. 604 THE LAST WEEK. shall do something for poor Judas, there will still remain the fadt that for more than eighteen centuries his name has been a horror in all lands where it has been known, his fame the blackest among men, his portrait in the gallery of historical person ages the most deeply dra]ied, and his whole character considered the most infer- nal of all that have been mortal. Poets, painters, and preachers have united to damn him from generation to generation.* He has been the one culprit wlio for long ages had not a single hu- man brother to say one word in his behalf. This itself has been a terrible doom. Of late years examination of his character, his motives, and his conduct has gone far to mitigate the verdict of the past. Every examination of the career of Jesus involves an ex- amination of the case of Judas, and the very unanimity of opinion in past ages has so aroused the suspicion of modern criticism, that some writers who have not concerned themselves with Jesus have found a fascinati believed in the Godhood of Jesus that he felt that no power could kill him, and if he could put his Master in just such relation to humtui power that ho would be compelled to let his Godhead break through his humanity, then should be brouglit to pass, what they all desired, the immediate inauguration of the Messianic kingdom. It might be a personal disaster to Judas to do it, but none of the other dis- ciples had the faith in Jesus and the daring to make tlie venture. Judas had. But when he saw his dire mistake, and that Jesus did not burst out into undeniable Messianic splendor and power, Judas was so delicately constituted that his heart broke. This is the argument of Mr. Story's poem. Let us see how much of all this has ground in history and reason. Jesus originally selected Judas from a company of at least sixty of his followers to be of the number of tlie Twelve who should be on his "staff" and should be chai-ged with tiie special duty of propagating his doctrines. Judas, then, was no worse and no better than the rest of them. He was an average man, 606 TIIE LAST WEEK. of average moral and intellectual endowments. But lio was dra^\•n to Jesus, and by Jesus selected to the Apostolate. He was religious above the average. Through his whole Judas compared connection with Jesus, up to this point, he does with the other ,. , i-i-ii o Apostles notlnng and sajs nf)thnig ^vhlcll draws a reprool from Jesus. lie behaves better than the rest. He never had said or done anything to make Jesus say to him as he had to Peter, " Get behind me, Satan." He was a better-tem- pered man than John, who is the admiration of painters and romancers, for never, like John, had he desired to call down fire from heaven to consume his fellow-men. He never was such a profane liar as Peter proved to be, nor so ambitious as John and his brother James, who desired to share the Messianic kingdom with Jesus, and sit one on his right hand and the other on his left, ruling over their brethren. The only occasion when even acuteness can discover anything that can be tortured into a reproof is the supper in the house of Simon the Leper, when Judas suggested that the „ ^ money which had been spent on the ointment by Mary might have been better expended on the poor. If any candid reader will foi-get that it was Judas who made this remark, and notice that what Jesus said was not in opposition to the remark of Judas, a remark which Judas himself had learned from the very teaching of Jesus, — if the reader will only fancy that John might have said the same thing, and Jesus might have made to him the same re]dy, then all sign of reproof will disappear. It is to be recollected by those who will be criti- cal that when we read the account of that supper in John's twelfth chapter, we are prejudiced by the statement that it was Judas Iscariot who made the suggestion of economy in the matter of the ointment, and that John takes pains to inform us that it was he "-which should betray him," and then he adds the damaging parenthesis : " This he said, not that he cared for the poor, but because he was a thief, and had the bag, and bore what was put therein." If we had only the narratives of Matthew and Mark we could never liave had any suspicion that Jesus was reproving the suggestion of giving the money to the poor, but was rather, with his usual lofty yet tender courtesj^, protecting the woman who loved him and was anointing him. It is to be consideredj then, that John's saying "he was a thief " THE FOURTH DAT. 607 docs not prove tliat Judas had ever coniniitted an act of theft or showed any signs of a proclivity towards peculation. He certainly had not been a thief up to the time of his elec- „ , . 1 . TT r Jolm's allega- tion for the Apostohite. He was a man or exeeu- ^.^^ tive ahility sur])assing them all, and supposed to be a man of honesty equal to them all, else he had not been made their treasurer. That they had an insignificant exchequer is not proof that they would therefore be careless as to the person who should manage it : qulle the contrary. Poorpeojile who invest their sav- ings a dime at a time, need to be more careful than men who would not be embarrassed for an hour by the breaking of a bank in which they have deposited ten thousand dollars. These disciples W'cre scrupulous and careful. There must have been frequent auditing of the accounts of Judas, not from any suspicion of foul dealing on his part, but to know how far their little fund would meet their pressing wants. A widow whose toil brings such weekly Avagcs as that the most rigid economy nuist be exer- cised to keep her oiitgo from exceeding her income, counts over lier little store more frequently and carefully than the Koths- childs count their ample assets. The disciples would have de- tected the leakage if Judas had purloined. Jesus would have found some method of reproof, or at least of warning. But nothing of this kind ever occurred. No suspicion against Judas arose among the disciples until after the betrayal of Jesus. John wrote this verdict after Judas had betrayed Jesus. The other disci i)les nnist have been unspeakably outraged. It was natural. They would not have deserved to be the friends of Jesus if they had not felt the utmost horror at the betrayal. That would naturally lead them to believe any evil thing of the be- trayer, and as Judas certainly did receive money for his services in this transaction, it was most natural to su|)])ose that he was so avaricious that he would have stolen, that he who would " sell his Master," for so they regarded it, for thirty shekels, the price of a Blave, would not hesitate to steal, being at heai-t a thief ; and that he who had not tenderness enough for such a j\[aster as Jesus as to make the cai'th, even if it were a solid chi-ysolitc, no tempta- tion as a bribe for betrayal, ccndd not have had any care for the poor. This is all that the words of John do really prove, namely, that his fellow- Apostles regarded the act of Judas as so horrible as to put him beyond the pale of Christian charity ; in which 608 THE LAST WEEK. they might have been as much mistaken as Jolm was M'hen he wanted lire from heaven to burn up the Samaritan village. Judas had the "worldly" part of the work of the Apostles to attend to. He made the little purchases, and thus, as De Quincey suggests, came in contact Avith the " petty shop • keepers," or, as I should say, mingled with that class from whom he gathered the popular opinion of men and measnres. lie was not confined to the spiritual influence of the inner circle of the friends of Jesus. He went, out frequently into "the world," and coming back Judas believed, as they all did, that Jesus was going to establish a temporal kingdom. The difference between the eleven and Judas, as it seems to me, was simply this, that thelr's was a vague belief and expectation, influ- encing them more as a dream than as a vital power shaping their lives. Judas was no fanatic and no poet. I think Mr. Story not quite right when he speaks of him as a man " who took his dreams for firm realities." He studied all the phenomena of the case as a man of affairs, as an astute politician. He had more knowledge of the world and more practical sense than the other Apostles. He believed in the desirableness of throwing off the Roman yoke. He believed the time had come to do it. The people had grown into an impatience that was passionate. If a proper leader could be found and a proper time to strike, tlie work could be accomplished. He found that leader in Jesus. It would seem probable that more than the other Apostles he believed in the Messiahship of Jesus, and in a loftier and at the same time more practical way. Let us suppose that he brooded over this thouglit for three years, not as a dreamer, but as a prac- tical working man. He would naturally come to see it in a light in which the other Apostles could not study it. The capacities of Jesus for such a leadership would be a question of profound in- terest. He saw in him prodigious power, power to work mira- cles, to escape through the heart of a mob as if he bore a charmed life. He was capable of overawing men. A crowd of merchants had rushed out of the Temple before his eyes of rebuke. There was a majestic augustness about him which made Judas feel that this was a King of Men. Devils bowed before him, while children were attracted to his side and were petted when they came, and women absolutely adoi-ed him to the very kissiiig of his feet. Ho THE FOURTH DAT. 609 could raise the dead with a word ; could he not slay the wicked with a look ? Jesus had all the personal dignities and graces for a king of kings ; but there w^as one defect : he had no policy and no " push." So it must have seemed to Judas. , , , ^ /. 1 . 1 Judas s opinion Jesus never took advantage oi his personal pop- of jgsus. ularity to consolidate a party. lie fed thousands of people and got nothing back. He confounded the ecclesiasti- cal leaders, and yet would not found a church, and now, when his affairs seemed to be reaching a crisis, he was making no move- ments ecclesiastical or political. This behavior, in the eyes of a politician, was simply absurd. Judas, no more than the other Apostles, recognized the interiomess and throiujliness of the kingdom which Jesus was preaching and trying to make them understand, how that it was like that ether which pervades the atmosphere, and glass, and all transparent substances, and is w^here there is neither air nor glass, — a kingdom which did not need to displace any existing kingdom or church, — a kingdom which could as well subsist in political anarchies as in empires, in re- publics as in despotisms, a kingdom which had no need of any outward and visible State, or any outward and visible Church, but could and would subsist in all forms of States and all forms of Church, and without all States and all Churches, a kingdom which did not exists but S2ibsist and jpersist^ that did not stand out but fill through, that was not 2i phenomenon but a noximenon. Rooted and grounded in the belief that a temporal, sensuous, visible, Hebrew kingdom was to cover the earth and subdue the nations, nothing else would satisfy Judas, And he must have believed that Jesus expected such a ^^ ^""^"^^ ^'"'^ "^ ,., - ,1, . ., , temporal king- kmgdom, and expected to reign over it, but that ^^^ he had not the promptness at the right moment to make the stroke, the requisite coup cVetat. In De Quincey's language, he seemed to Judas to be " sublimely over-gifted for purposes of speculation, but not commensurately endowed for the business of action and the sudden emerut I have chosen you, and appointed you, that you shall go and bear fruit, and that your fruit shall remain ; that whatever you shall ask of the Father in my name He may give it to you. " These things I command you, that you love one another. If* the world hate you, you know that it hated me fii-st. If you were of the world, the world would love its own ; but because you are not of the world, but I have cliosen you out of the world, on tliis account the world hates you. Remc'iii- ber the word which I have spoken to you, Tlie slave is not greater than liis lord. If they persecuted me tliey mil also persecute you. If they liave kejjt my word they will keep yours also. But all these things they will do to you, on account of my name, because they do not know Him who sent me. "If I had not come and spoken to them they would not liave sin ; but now they have no excuse for their sin. He who hates me hates my Father also. If I had not done among them works which no other man has done, they would 40 626 THE LAST W^EEK. not have sin. But now have they both seen and hated both me and my Father. But tliat it might be fulfilled, tlio word which in their law is written of them, 'They hated me causelessly.'* But when the Advocate is come, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of Truth which proceeds from the Father, he shall testify concerning me. And you also shall bear wit- ness, because you have been with me fi-om tlie beginning. " These things have I spoken to you that you sliould not lie offended. For they shall make you excommunicated ; more, the hour is coming that who- ever kills you will think that he offers a service to God, And these things will they do to you, because they have not kno^\^l the Father nor me. But these things have I told you that when the hour shall come you may remem- ber that I spoke of them; and these things I did not say to you at the begin- ning, because I was with you. " But now I am going away to Ilim who sent me, and none of you asks me ' Whither are you going? ' But because I have said those things to you, sor- row has filled your heart. Nevertheless, I tell you the truth. It is protitable to you that I go away. For if I go not away the Advocate will not come. But if I depart I will send him to you. And when he is come he will convict the world of sin, and of rigliteousness, and of judgment: of sin, because they do not believe in me ; of righteousness, because 1 go to my Father, and you see me no more ; and of judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged. " Many things yet have I to say to you, but you cannot l)car them ; but wlien he the Spirit of Ti'utii is come lie will guide you in the crutli, for lie shall not speak from out of liimself , but whatever he "hears he shall speak ; and he will tell you things to come. He shall glorify me, for he shall receive of mine and announce to you. All things that the Father has are mine. There- fore I said that he takes of mine and shall announce to you. " A little while and you shall not see me ; and again a little while and you shall sec me." Then said some of his disciples among themselves : " What is this that he is saying to us, ^A little while and ye shall see me no more, and again a little while and ye shall see ine : and, Because I go to the Father? ' what is this ' little while ? ' AVe do not understand what he is saying." Jesus knew that they were about to ask him, and anticipated them by resuming : — "Do you inquire among yourselves because I said, A little while and you shall not see me, and again a little while and you shall see me ? I most assuredly say to you. That you shall weep and lament, but The discourse resumed. i i , 11 • • ir 1 n 1 j> 1 1 * the world shall rejoice. You shall be sorrowful, but your Borrow shall De turned into joy. A woman when she is about to bring forth hath sorrow, because her hour is come ; but when she has given birth to the * See Psalm xxxv. 19, and Ixix. 4. THE SIXTH DAT. 027 cliUJ she remembers the anguish no more, for joy that a man is bom into the world. And ye, tliercfore, now indeed }iave sorrow, but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no one takes fiom you. "And in tliat day you shall ask me nothing. I most assuredly say to you, Whatever you shall ask the Father in my name, lie sliall give it to you. Hithei'to you have asked nothing in my name. Ask and you shall receive, that your joy may be made full. These things have I spoken to you in pro- verbs : the hour is coming when I shall no longer speak to you in j)roverbs, but I shall tell you plainly concerning the Father. In that day you shall ask in my name ; and I do not say to you that I will pray tlie Father for you, for the Father liimself loves you, because you have loved me, and have believed that I came from God. I came forth from the Fatlier, and have come into the world: again I leave the world and go to the Father." Some one of his disciples said to him : " Now you arc speaking in frankness, and not speaking a proverb. Now wc know that you know all things, and have no need that any one sliould ask y(jn. By this we believe that you u k * came fortli from God." Jesus answered : " Do you now believe ? IJehold, the hour is coming, and tlie hour has cotne, that you shall be scattered, every one to his own, and shall leave me alone. And I am not alone, because the Father is with me. These tilings ha\e I spoken co you, that in me you might have peace. In the world you have anguish ; but be courageous, I have contjuered tlie world ! " Then Jesus lifted up his eyes and prayed audibly, while the dis- ciples must have listened in perplexity and awe. And this is the prayer as John records it : — " O Fatlier, the hour has come. Glorify Thy Son that Tliy Son may glorify Tliee. As Thou hast given him power over all tlush, that lie should give per- petual life to every one whom Tliou hast given him. And tliis is the iierpetual life, that they might know Tliee tlie The Prayer of Jesus. only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent. I have glorified Thee on the earth. I have finished the work which Thou gavest me to do. " And mnv glorify Thou me, O Father, -with Thyself by the glory which I had with TliL'e before the world was. I have shown Thy name to the men whom Thou gavest me out of the world. They were Thine, and Thou gavest them to me. And they have kept Thy word. Now they know that all things, what- ever Thou hast given me, are from Thee, for I have given them the words Thou gavest me, and they have received them, and have kno^vii surely that I came out from Thee ; and they have believed that Thou didst send me. I pray for them. For the world I pray not, but for those whom Thou hast given me ; for they are thine. And Thou hast given them to me, and I am glorified in 628 THE LAST WEEK. tliem. And I am no longer in the world, and these are in the world, and I am coming to Thee. " O Holy Fatlier, keep them in Thy name, whom Thou liast given me, that they may be one as we. When I was with them I kept tliem in Thy name and guarded them, and not one of them is lost, except the son of ])erditi()n, that the Scripture miglit l^e fulfilled. And iiow I am coming to Thee, and these things I am speaking in the world, that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves. I have given them Thy word, and the world has hated tliem because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. I do not pray that Thou wouldst take them out of the world, but that Thou wouldst keep them from evil. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Make them holy in the truth: Thy word is truth. As Tliou hast sent me into tlie world, I also have sent tliem into tlie world, and for their sakes I make myself holy that they also may be made holy in the truth. " But not for these alone do I pray, but for those also who believe on me through their word, that they all may be one, even as Thou art in me and I in Thee, that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that Thou has sent me. And the glory wlii.cli Thou hast given me I have given them, that they may be one, even as we : I in them, and Thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one ; and that the world may know that Thou didst send me, and hast loved them, as Thou hast loved me. " O Father, that which Thou hast given me I will that where I am they also may be -with me, that they may behold my glory, which Thou hast given me; for Thou lovcdst me before the foundation of the world. " O righteous Father, the world also has not knoAAm Thee, but I have known Thee, and these lifive known tliat Thou didst send me. Thy name I both have made known to them, and will make it known, that the love wherewith Thou hast loved them may be in them, and I in them ! " Section 3. — Gethsemane. Perhaps at the close of this prayer they sang another portion of the Great IlalleL Then they went to the Mount of Olives, cross- ing the brook Kedron, the name signifying " Mud- . dy Brook." It was probably through what is called St. Stephen's Gate that Jesus and his band passed down and crossed the Kedron, which runs about 200 feet from the city walls. On the slope of the Mount of Olives, which rises hei'efrom, and near the road leading on to Bethany, was the Garden of Gethsemane, meaning an " oil-press," — tlie garden having derived its name most probably from an oil-press which belonged to the estate. Whether we now know the precise spot where Jesus was in agony, and where he was betrayed, is THE SIXTH DAY. 629 somewhat uncertain ; but it is quite certain that it could not have been far from the plot which tlie Latin Cliurch has recently l>()U£>;ht and enclosed. We cannot say that the eig-ht venerable trees, which are so impressive to all travellers, were standing in the days of Jesus. It is probable tliat they were not, as Josephus informs us that Titus cut down all the trees round about Jerusa- lem {B. J., vi. 1, 1), and that the Tenth Legion Avere posted about KIDRON VALLEY. FROM AKELDAMA. the Mount of Olives (v. 2, 3, and vi. 2, 8). But these trees must have been planted very early by the hands of those who, cherish- ing the memory of Jesus, desired to mark the traditionary spot. Dr. Thomson is inclined to place the garden in the secluded vahj several hundred yards to the north-east of the present Gethsemane. In any case it was near the city, and Judas and the other disci- ples knew that Jesus was accustomed to frequent it for private de- votion. 630 THE LAST WEEK. Ilavino" entered Getlisemane a c;reat heaviness fell on him, and he said to his disciples : " Sit down and pray that you do not en- ter into temptation, wliile I go and pray yonder." e gar en. j^^ ^^^^^^ ^vitli him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, James and John. They walked farther into the garden. lie began to be sorrowful, and terrified, and depressed. They must have perceived it, l)iit lie opened his heart to these friends and said : " My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even nnto death ; remain here and watch with me." It seemed to be a sense of abandonment coming upon him. "Nameless conti-arieties of sensation overwhelmed him, and choked and straitened his heart, as if they would have stifled and killed him." Ilis appeal to his tjiree friends is very pathetic. He went a little faither from the three disciples, about a stone's throw. He had prt>bal)ly, as Dean Alford conjectnres, gone with his three friends into a portion of the garden from Avhich the moonlight would be excluded by the rocks and l)uildings on the opposite side of the gorge. It was the vernal eqninox, and this must have l)een 7icar midnight, so the moon, being two days from its full, would be able to cast shadows thns. As his anguish deepened he went into the deepest gloom of the garden. He kneeled down, he fell upon his face, he prayed. His prayer was : " O my Father, if it ho possible, let this cup pass from me ; yet, not as I will, but as Thou wilt." How long Solitarj' prayer. ' . -r> i he thus agonized we cannot know. Jiut he must have had some comfort from his prayer, for after some time he returned to the three disciples and found them all asleep. The travel and excitement of the day had proved too much for them. They certainly did not comprehend the crisis which had come in the afPairs of Jesus. He addressed Peter with the intensely pathetic appeal, "AVhat, could you not watch with mo one hour? Pise, watch and pray, that you do not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak." He left his poor, heavy- eyed, and exhausted friends, and went back and ])rayed, saying: " O my Father, if this may not pass away except I drink it. Thy will be done." He came the second time to his disciples and found them all . , asleei). Down on his soul fell a great horror of A. jiorTor desertion. It was past the midnight. Over the hill in Bethany, Lazarus and Martha and Mary, and perhaps his THE SIXTH DAT. 631 own mother, for slie was at the feast, were sleeping. In fi'ont lay Jerusalem, the moon sailing on above and beyond the city, whose walls on this side grew darker from top to bottom ; and within those walls they were plotting to destroy him withont fair trial. Judas had left him on an errand that was to be disastrous. Here lay Peter, James, and John, asleep, near his scene of un- speakable anguish. There lay the other eight, asleep also. His country was under the Roman, whose garrison filled yonder tower of Antonia. The church was arrayed against him. His mother was awaj-, and Mary Magdalen, his true friend. He was alone. He staggered back and fell upon the ground, and the third time he ])rayed this prayer of exquisite pain and perfect submis- sion. The horror of his position lay heavy on -r 1 . 1 1 1 The sweat of hnn. in his agony he prayed more earnestly ; ^^i^^^ and his sweat was as it were clots of blood falling dovra to the ground. His friends afterward believed that an angel appeared to him and gave him succoi'. That he was strengthened, and his serenity in some measure restored, appears from the tone of his address to his disciples, and by his whole bearing in what immediately followed. He said : " Do you sleep on now and rest." Then he suddenly said: "It is enough. Be- hold, the hour is here, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise ; let us go. See, he that betrays me is here ! " And while he was speaking these words, Judas, who knew the place, and knew that it was a resort of Jesus and his disciples, probably havinsj souo-ht him in vain in the cham- r ii-iii?i. 1 The Betrayal. ber where he had left hnn, came upon the party. He was accompanied by a band of men whom he had received from the chief priests and Pharisees. They were not all Roman soldiers, but some Avere servants of the priests and some were members of the Sanhedrim. They had no official authority to do as they did. They were the minions of the church party. This brings us to an examination of what a learned Jewish physician, M. Salvador, of Paris, pronounces " the most memo- rable trial in all history." This writer produced a work, entitled The Institutio7is of Moses and the Hebrew People. At his OAvn request, M. Dupin the elder, a French lawyer of distinction, reviewed the chapter on the " Trial and Condemnation of Jesus." 632 THE LAST WEEK. We shall be indebted to both works, and we make this general ac knowledgment to save specific references. Candor ought to com- [)el any Christian writer to admit that it was not a question of " deicide," a name invented to represent an imj^ossible sin, as the church party did not believe that Jesus was a God in any sense. The simple question is. Did he receive justice as a Hebrew citizen uiRlcr Hebrew law ? The Mosaic law provided three securities for justice in a crim- inal proceeding, namely, publicity of the trial, entire liberty of ^ . , defence for the accused, and safeojuards ai>;ainst Jewish crmiiiial .. , , . -n i i i , l^^ false testnnony. i! or the latter there must be at least two witnesses. According to the Hebrew text, " One witness is no witness." Testimony was rendered un- der oath. If a witness against the accused perjured himself, he was compelled to undergo the punishment which would have be- fallen the accused if he had been convicted. If the accused were convicted, the witnesses by whose evidence he perished dealt the first blow, in proof of the truth of their testimony. A woman could not be a witness, because she might not have the courage to deal such a blow, Xo man could testify against himself. The testimony was required to be exceedingly specific. The very hour, as well as day, place, and circumstances nnist be mentioned. There were twenty-three judges. Those who believed the accused to be innocent s]^oke first, those who believed him guilty spoke afterwards, '■' and -with the greatest moderation." Th'e most pro- found attention was given to the accused when he wished to speak. Of the twcnty-thi-ce votes eleven M'ould acquit, while it I'oquired thirteen to condenm. If acquitted, the accused M'as dis- chai'gcd instantly ; if condemned, the sentence was not pro- uoiniced until the third day. On the third day any judge who had been in favor of condemning might change his vote, so as to acquit, but one who had once voted for acquittal could not change his vote so as to condeimi. If, then, at least thirteen judiz'es voted for condeuniation, the prisoner was led forth slowly. The judges remained on the bench. An ofticer was stationed at the door with a flag, while another, on horseback, accompanied the prisoner, looking back constantly, as he would be recalled by the waving of the flag if any testimony in favor had been brought before the judges. On his own declaration that he recalled some reasons which had escaped him, the prisoner could be brought THE SIXTH DAY, 633 back to the judges as often as five times. As the procession ad- vanced slowly, a herald with a loud voice proclaimed, " This man [stating his name and surname] is led to punishment for [here the crime was named]. The witnesses who have sworn against him are [here their names were recited]. If any one has evi- denc^e in his favor let him come forth and give it quickly." This is an epitome of M. Salvador's representation of the ad- ministration of criminal law among the Hebrews. "We shall now see whether Jesus had a fair trial. We may recall that, before tampering with Judas, the church party had determined that Jesus should die, thus pronoimcing sentence upon him before any beginning of even a show of trial. Then they had appointed emis- saries, employing evil men, for none but wicked men, feigning themselves to be good, could be engaged in such work, to dog the Bteps of Jesus and entangle liim in his talk. There was nothing done by Jesus which any one was willing to lay voluntarily be- fore the authorities and denounce as a crime against God or social order. So far from this, they arrested him before any allegation was made, and they did this ci-aftily and stealthily, so that " the people" might not know. They desired to postpone the arrest until the termination of the Passover should ha\c emptied the city of the multitudes from all parts of the conntiy.who had heard and seen Jesus, not one of whom had accused him of any crime, and many of whom might have given testimony in his favor. When circumstances hurried up the operations of Judas they seized Jesus, rushed him through a mock trial, and crucified him in the space of less than ten hours. We shall examine each point in the progress of this affair in the light of the Hebrew law as stated by M. Salvador, a learned defender of his ancestors and their action in the case of Jesus. In the first place it was unjust to begin to prosecute, not to say persecute, him before any charges had been laid before the Grand Council. In the next place it was a gross irregu- larity to attempt to take him privately, and not " give him the benefit of all the publicity of a most open trial in clear daylight, and not in tlie night. This was enhanced by employing a spy, and bribing him to assist in their unlawful proce- dure. They go about to take him without any regular and legal Roman or Jewish order for his arrest. The Sauhedi'im had had 634 THE LAST WEEK. a conclave, but not a regular sitting, and did not proceed as a court of law, but rather as a band of conspirators. They took counsel how they might slay him, as John says (xi. 53), not how they might administer justice in his case. And I think we lOiall see how the whole procedure was the execution of a foregone conclusion, and was the condemnation of a man before trial. The signal of Judas was a kiss. He was not to lay liands on his Master, nor join this mob in their attack. lie was simply to designate Jesus, and this was the preconcerted sign, the selection of which perlia])s intimates that Jesus was accustomed to receive this affectionate mode of salutation from his apostles, wlien they had been separated for a season. Judas approached him and said, so as to be heard by the band, "Ilail, Kabbi," and kissed him. The reply of Jesus was most mild, and to Judas must have been painfully cutting. Matthew repeats it as, " Friend, for what are you here ? " Luke says that Jesus said, "Do you betray the Son of Man with a kiss ? " — and his manner of narrating it might im])ly that Jesus prevented the kiss by tlie question ; but Mattliew and Mark distinctly affirm that Judas actually kissed Jesus ; all the historians showing that Jesus knew the intent of this salu- tation. Upon this Jesus stepped forward to the crowd and said, " "VVliom do you seek ? " They replied, " Jesus the Nazarene." lie answered, " I am he." ^Yliat there was of majesty, innocence, and spiritual power in his presence and reply we may conjecture ivom the fact that though they were all armed, and were many, coming out against a man whose friends were few and unprepared for conflict, they stag- gered backwards and fell to the ground. Here was a man capable of inspiring such awe, and yet never voluntarily, so far as we can perceive, putting forth any influences to serve or save himself. lie stood alone in that gai'den, in the bi'oad light of the full paschal moon, and the band of conspirators and ruffians who had come to take him lay prone on the ground. He recalls them by asking a second time, " ^Yliom seek ye ? " And they made the same reply as before, " Jesus the Nazai-ene." He said to them, " I have told you that I am he ; if, therefore, you seek me, let these go away," so that his disciples might not Buffer with him. THE SIXTH DAT. G35 Tliey then advanced to seize him, and liis disciples, perceiving what would follow, said, "Lord, shall we smite with the sword?" The impetuous Peter did not wait for a reply, hut immediately made a blow at the nearest man, who happened to be one Malchus, a ser\ant of the high-priest, and cut off his right ear. M. Dupin argues that the fact that Peter was not arrested, cither at this moment or afterwards, when he was recog-nized bv a relative of Malchus at the house of the high-priest, is proof that this was an illegal seizure, otherwise Peter's resistance would have been " an act of rebellion by an armed force against a judicial order." Jesus healed the priest's ser\ant with a touch. lie also restrained his disciples, who, under the awe which the presence of Jesus inspired in his per- secutors, might have perhaps delivered him. He said to Peter, " Petui-n your sword into its place ; for all who take the sword shall perish hy tlie sword. Do you think that I am not able to pray unto my Father, and He shall foi-thwith give me more than twelve legions of angels? But how then should the Scrip- tui'e be fulfilled, that thus it must be? The cup which my Father has given me, shall I not drink it?" He did not, however, forbear to let the multitude understand that he knew the illegality of what they were doing. "Have you come out as against a thief, with swords and clubs, to take me? I sat daily teaching in the Temple, and ye laid no hold upon me. But this is the houi-, and the power of darkness. All this has come to pass that the writings of the prophets might be fulfilled." It was a dis- tinct intimation to the mob that he was suffering voluntarily, and quite as distinct an intimation to his disciples that he was going to suffer certainly. So they understood it, and forsook him and fled. b;i6 THE LAST WEEK. Section 4. — The Trial. Tlien the band and the captain and oflicers of the Jews \a,6 "snds on Jesus, and bound him and led him away. This wmp another outra^'e. He was alone and unarmoo. IJe olfered no resistance to his captors, but jiaa come forward and surrendered liimselt voiui- tarilv, and yet they treated him as a conaemuuij malefactcjr or resisting culprit. tnaav mom- 'UK!. A iresn out MAP OF JERUSALEM. They took Jesus to I'he house of Annas. Annas had lieen high-priest. He was lirst appointed to that olhce about a.d. 7, by Qulrinius, Proconsul of Syria, but was de- posed by Valerius Gratus, Procurator of Judaea, aDout seven years later, who gave the office to Isuiuel, and THE SIXTH DAT. G37 then to Ellezer, the son of Annas, who held it only a year, wag succeeded by Simon, who held it another year, and then it fel? into the hands of Caiaphas, the son-in-law of Annas. Annas had not been high-priest for nearly twenty years ; but as father-in-law of the actual liigh-priest, and his sagan or substitute, and having held the \\vA\ office himself, he exerted great influence. Kever- theless the carrying of Jesus to Annas was a vexations and irre- gular procedure, contrary to the spirit of the Hebrew law, as subjecting a ma'^, before any trial or condemnation, to an insult- ing inspection. Annas had no right to question Jesus. He was fiot the proper person to deal with the case. He had no jurisdiction. If he had had, it was not lawful to put a man in a position to condemn himself : indeed, accoi'ding to Jewish ... law, his own words could not be used against liim- self. So that any catechising of Jesus in i*egard to his disciples and his doctrines was unlawful. It was a compliment to Amias, but an insult to Jesus, as a citizen, to be carried forward to gratify the curiosity of this bad old man, who was one of the conspirators against the life of the prisonei*. There was an opportunity now to do Jesus simple justice. If Annas hud been right-minded he would have taken Jesus into his house, and, even if under guard, have kept him until the daylight. His great personal influence, his relations with the high-priest (who had married his daughter) and with the Sanhedrim, would have justified Annas herein. Instead of which he aided and abetted those lawless men in their persecution of Jesus. He sent him bound, in the night, to tlie palace of Caiaphas. This palace must have been near the chamber in which the Sanhedrim held its sessions. The night was wearing away. It was growing so cold that while the Sanhedrim was being unlawfully assembled, for it could ^^^^ not meet at night or on the Sabbath, they made a fire. Until the council could be gathered, Caiaphas seems to have taken upon himself the catechising of Jesus, which he had no ]-iglit to do personally, but only in his place as President of the San- hedrim. He asked him of his doctrines and his disciples, witli evident malice of intent to criminate the prisoner and inculpate his friends. His dignified reply was, "I spoke openly to the world. I 638 THE LAST WEEK. at all times taught in the synagogue and in the Temple, where all the Jews resort, and I have said nothing in secret. Why do you question mef Question those who heard me what I said unto them: behold, they know what I said." Here he th]-ew himself nj)on the great reserved Hebrew rights, freedom of speech and being confronted by one's accusers. Caiaphas must have felt that his proceeding was at least irregular. If he had been conducting a trial he should have called for witnesses. The reply of Jesus was just what any Hebrew would naturally give under the circumstances, provided he had intelligence _, enough to know and courao;e enouo-h to assert The reply of , . *? , ^ r- i i • • , «. jgg^g_ his rights. Jjut one oi the ecclesiastical omcers who stood by struck Jesus with the palm of his hand and said, " Do you answer the high-priest so ? " The reply of Jesus is full of indescribable dignity and forbearance; "H I have spoken evil, bear witness of the evil : but if well, why do you smite me ? " Here is another speech which shows that Jesus knew his rights and was aware that they were invaded. The man who struck him might have borne testimony against him, if they were both together in a court having jurisdiction; but if he did net appear as a witness ho had no right to insult hi»n by striking him when he was bound. This was an additional out- rage which the high-priest permitted to be perpetrated. It accumulates the proof that Jesus never had a fair trial as a citizen. When another high-priest commanded those who stood by Paul, when he was up for a hearing, to smite him on the mouth, the intrepid Apostle answered, " God shall smite you, you whited wall ; for do you sit to judge me after the laws and command me to be smitten contrary to law ? " (Acts xxiii. 3.) All this persecution of Jesus, it is to be noticed, took place in the night, contrary to law, which demanded daylight and utmost publicity. In the mean time Peter began to recover his self-possession. He desired to learn what was happening to his Master, and so went to the palace of Caiaphas and lingered outside. He was joined by " another disciple " (John xviii. 15) whose name is not given. It has been assumed to be John. There seems little ground for the presumption. "\7e can only speculate. The probabilities are that it was Judas. THE SIXTH DAT. 639 Wlioever that other disciple was, he was "known to the high- priest." There is no reason to believe that John was ; while M'e know that that very week Judas had been with this digni- tary making arrangements for the betrayal of Jesus. This will also account for the freedom with which he entered the palace of tlie high-priest, and the interest he could make for the admission of Peter. John would have been in almost as much danger as Peter, as he was generally as prominent in the group al)0ut tlie Teacher. On the supposition that this other disciple was Judas the whole histor}^ becomes easy. Peter might have been ad- mitted on the supposition that he was an accomplice with Judas in the delivery of Jesus. On any of the theories which have been advanced on his character and motives it was natural that Judas in his excitement should follow Jesus into the palace of the higJi-priest to see the result, and would be relieved by the presence of another disciple. However that may have been, Peter entered. In the court of the palace the slaves and officers had made a fire, and stood warming themselves. Peter went up to the fire and warmed himself with them. It may be that the maid who kept the door began to fear that she was admitting strangers too freely, or she may have seen the look of concern on the face of Peter. She went up to him and said, "And are you not one of this man's disciples?" He denied it before them all, saying, " I am not ; I do not know him, nor do I understand what }ou are saying." This peremptory challenge disconcerted Peter, and he walked out into the court. Perhaps he put on the air of a man insulted before a company. But an excitement had been 1 I 1 • A i.1 -1 i His second de- begun by his presence. Another maid-servant, probably passing him in the court and coming up to the fire, stated her belief that the uneasy man out there was a disciple of Jesus. AVliile Peter Avas out in the court-yard the cock crew. But it does not seem to have recalled the prediction of Jesus. Upon his return to the fire the wliisper went round : " This fellow was also with Jesus the Nazarene," until one boldly blurted out the charge, and still another directly put the question to him : " Are you not one of his disciples ? " He made a second distinct denial, backing it up with some profane expression, and assertinof that he did " not know the man." 640 THE LAST WEEK. These denials seem to have occurred while the high-priest was examining Jesus. There was an interval of an hour, which was spent in assembling the Sanhedrim and in indnfeing men to be- come witnesses. It was cold. Jesus was in the hall inside, which opened probably on the court wliere Peter and the servants and officers were. The embarrassing examinations to which Peter had been subjected began to be painful. He must have re- collected the pi'ominent jiart he had taken in the affair of Getli- semane. lie endeavored to throw suspicion from himself by engaging in free conversation with the others, as being no more personally interested in what was going forward than they were. But it did not succeed. His xcry garrulousness aroused suspi- cion. One said, " Of a truth tliis man was with him ; for he is a Galilgean : his speech betrays liiui." Jesus was of Galilee. The Galilseans were a turbulent race. Most of the disciples of Jesus were known to be GaliLieans. Their dialect was not that of cul- tivated Jews, nor of even the uncultivated inhabitants of the me- tropolis. So they made his accentuation a proof against him. This called special and unfriendly attention to him. A slave of the high-priest and brother of that Malchus whose ear Peter had hacked with his sword, regarding him carefully, brought the charge home upon him, saying, " Did I not see you in the garden with liim ? " This was too much for Peter. lie could not retreat from his former denials. He was at the point to be discovered. His im- petuous sword-thrust in the garden was about to His third denial. , , ■, , . tt ' • ^ i -i j 1)0 turned upon hnn. He was m mortal peril and in mortal fear. There was nothing to be done but to plunge for- ward. He broke into cursing and swearing, and, amid dreadful imprecations, denied that he ever had any knowledge of "this man " of whom they were speaking. Amid his ungrateful denials and horrid blasphemies the cock crew a secoud time. And Jesus, whose smiting Peter had witnessed, turned and looked upon him. It was the last look Peter received from the eyes of his Master before his death. The look and the crowing of the cock came together, and Peter saw liow truly had come to ])ass what Jesus had so pathetically predicted, that before the cock should crow twice he should deny his Master thrice. Covering his head with his mantle he flung himself out of the company and went off weeping bitterly. THE SIXTH DAT. 641 "We now return to the examination of Jesus, The night had been spent in a frnitless search for witnesses willing to render such testimony as the persecutors of Jesus sup- posed sufficient to 'convict him. Only two were necessary, but these could not be obtained. The bribes they were able to offer, of security and gain, could not move Judas and another to testify against him. The day began to break over Olivet, The Sanhedi'im was assembled. " The priests, the elders, and the scribes" were there, three classes of men having special enmity against Jesus. They led the prisoner, perhaps in solemn procession, from the palace of the high-priest into the council-chamber on the Temple mount. In the examination which followed there finally came forward two witnesses. The testimony of the first was : " lie said ' I will destroy this temple made with hands, and in three days I will build another made without hands.' " The testimony of the second was : " This man said, ' I am able to destroy the temple of God, and to build it in three days.' " The friends and biographers of Jesus asserted that both statements were false, both in form and in intention. The nearest that the words of Jesus approached any formula that could have been even wrested into either of these statements is when he said, " De- stroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up," pointing probably to his body, at least his friends say that he signified that (John ii. 19), and that he spoke in this evasive way as being a proper reply to his enemies under the circumstances. But the first of these witnesses made the impression that he had threat- ened to destroy the Temple, and the second that he merely asserted his power to do so. Their testimony did not agree, and " one witness is no witness." Then the high-priest rose up and said to Jesus, " Do you answer nothing to what these witness against you ? " But Jesus held his peace. The testimony refuted itself. Then they asked him, " If you are the Christ, tell us." He replied, " If I tell you, you will not believe ; and if I shall question, you Avill not answer." It will be perceived that his persecutors desired to obtain e\i- dence against him on two counts, — first, blasphemy ; secondly, sedition : on the first they could condemn him to death as lords spiritual, and on the second the Bo- man power could execute him. If they could prove only the 642 THE LAST WEEK. former, as it was a mere question of religion, tlie secular arm would not destroy him, and the right to inflict capital punishment had been taken away from the Jews. If they proved only the latter, they would leave to him all his moral influence over tlie people, in whose eyes any rebellion against Rome was a high vir- tue. If both together could be made out, the prisoner would perish. They could have found ample proof that Jesus had vio- lated the Sabbath, according to their law of observance ; but the testimony would have showii that he had always therewith con- nected the performance of a miracle. They could have proved that he had denounced the clergy and the church, and set the traditions and ceremonials of Pharisaism at naught ; but that would have excited in his behalf the friendly feeling of the Sadducees, who, as well, despised churchism. There was a narrow path to tread, and they persistently kept in it. They could not prove the necessary allegations, and they attempted illegally to extort con- fessions from the prisoner which they might use to his damage. Then Caiaphas solenmly said to him, "I adjure you by the liv- ing God, that you tell us if you are the Christ [the Messiah] the Son of God." He calls upon tlie prisoner on oatr""^ ^""^^ *''' oath to testify in regard to himself while he is on trial on a criminal and capital charge, " a gross infraction of that rule of morals and jurisprudence," says Dupin " which forbids our placing an accused person between the dan ger of pei-jury and the fear of inculpating himself, and thus mak- ing his situation more hazardous." But when the high-priest per- sisted, Jesus replied, "You have said it; moreover I say to you, From this time you shall see the Son of Man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming on the clouds of heaven." Among the ancients the deity was represented, hieroglyphically, as being in the clouds, to signify his celestial habitation. Traces of the reduction of that picture to language are •'The clouds." fo^-ind through the sacred books of the Jews. " Jehovah rideth upon a swift cloud," Isa. xix. 1 ; " The clouds are the dust of His feet," Xahura i. 3 ; "I saw in the night vi- sions, and behold, one like the Son of Man came with the clouds of heaven," Daniel vii. 13. It is very probable that Jesus had special reference to this vision of Daniel, as well as general refer- ence to the idea contained in this pictorial representation, which, reduced to our language, would mean a claim upon the part of THE SIXTH DAT. 643 Jesus to have a divine relation to the world and to be about to be acknowledged as a divine person. It is not for a moment to bo supposed that he intended his words to be taken literally, or that the Sanhedrim so took them. Literally they amount to nothing, unless one should take them as the harmless exaggeration of a weak head. But Jesus was no such man, and the hour was too soleimi for anything of the kind. He was on trial for his life ; he obviously believed that his hour had come ; and he was speak- ing from the depths of his nature. lie did not mean that he was coming on the clouds of heaven literally. It were a ridiculous thing ; and thus far we have found nothing ridiculous, surely, in the character and words of Jesus, how many soever inexplicable things we may have discovered. The high-priest did not so un- derstand him, else he w^ould have burst into laughter instead of exhi])iting horror. Jesus meant to claim divinity. So Caiaphas understood him, and so the Sanhedrim. Therein was the blas- phem3\ If this be not the meaning of Jesus, this part of his his- tory seems to me wholly unintelligible. AVlien the high-priest heard the reply of Jesus he " rent hi? clothes." The sacerdotal robe was worn only «in the Temple. It was his Simla, or upper garment, which Caia^^has tore. This exijression of pain and fijrief and hor- ^ r &> rage, ror would at first burst forth naturally, afterward it came to be enacted theatrically, as we frequently see grief " performed," at some of our modern funerals. It became so ex- cessive that it was moderated by ecclesiastical law, among the regulations of which was one (Levit. xxi. 10) forbidding the high- priest to rend his clothes. We learn, however, from 1 Macca- bees xi. 71, and from Josephus, B.J., ii. 15, § 2, 4, that this rending was allowable to the high-priest in cases of blasphemy. To this violent gesture Caiaphas added the exclamation, " See ! he has uttered blasphemy ! "VYliat further need have we of witnesses ? See, now, you have heard the blasphemy ! AYhat is your opin- ion?" Here is one who is at once accuser and judge, and he presents the disgraceful spectacle of a judge in a rage. He de- mands a verdict of condemnation based upon the words of the prisoner, as those words are interpreted by himself. All this was contrary to well-established Hebrew law. The whole council caught the temper of this violent man. The judges excitedly asked him again, "Are you then the Son of G44- THE LAST WEEK, God ? " — " I am," said Jesus. They cried out, " He deserves to die." The oflicers, the slaves, the bystanders generally broke into furious revilings, taunts, and insults. Wliilo . still on his trial, before condemnation, the high l^riest and the council gave him over to the bru- talities of the unofficial people. They spat in his face, slave? slapped him with the palms of their hands, they blindfolded him, and said, " Prophesy to us,0 Messiah, who is he that struck you." And the judge and the jury allowed all this. Indeed these men probably did it that they might obtain the favor of their masters. And yet it is maintained by such learned and liberal modern Jews as M. Salvador that as a Hebrew citizen Jesus was fairly tried. While sufferino; these thino-s Jesus heard Peter cursinc: and Bwearing, and avowing that he never knew him. From his infuri- ,ated judges he turned and looked upon his faithless disciple. Jesus was most completely abandoned. Section 5. — Pilate. It is to be remembered that Palestine was a conquered pro- vince, regularly governed by the concpierors. Six years after tho bii'th of Jesus, Archelaus, son of Herod, had been deposed, and Judiiea and Samaria annexed to the province of Syria, the Prceses or governor of which was the highest representative of Roman imperialism. Nevertheless a special procurator was appointed for Judaia, and the office at this time was held by Pontius Pilate. The procurator ordinarily resided at Csesarea, by the seaside, but usually came up Avith troops to attend the great festivals, partly for the enjoyment he might have amid the excitements, and partly because it was his duty to keep the Roman authority before- the eyes of the Jews, and to be ready to repress any popular outbreak which would be likely to occur when so many people were assembled at the me- trojjolis. During the six years in which he had held the office Pilate had incensed the Jews by his violence and oppression. The Sanhedrim had no right to inflict capital punishment. Wherever Rome extended its dominion the jiii^ gladll, the riglit of the sword, the power over life and death, was ejii^ga u. ^q]^qii fyQi^-i ^\^q conquered. In the case of the Jews all minor matters were left in the hands of their council, THE SIXTH DAT. 645 especfally tlie settlement of all religious questions, but civil cases were tried by the procurator, and capital cases by the Praeses. In this case it seems to have been deputed to the procurator. lie ^vas present in the city. It was the beginning of Friday. The PassoNcr was to commence on the evening of that day. They had only that morning to secure the condemnation and execution of Jesus. If delayed until the festival had passed, the whole coun- try might be aroused and a great reaction in his favor might set in. It was, therefore, determined to keep hira bound and guarded, and to assemble at daybreak and push their plans to a consummation. All the night long was Jesus buffeted, tortured, insulted. They would have killed him if they had dared; but Pome looked down on them from the tower of Antonia and kept even churchly rage in check. Day began to dawn. The light was breaking over Olivet. The earliest movements must be made. The procurator must be seen as early as practicable. There was a reassembling To Pilate of the Sanhedrim. In the niglit session they had * condemned him : but beyond tiiat they were powerless ; they could not execute him, and they coukl not see Pilate at that hour. Tlie object of the morning meeting was to concoct plans to have him put to death, according to their verdict. This could be done only through Pilate. They pre-arranged their methods. They took Jesus bound, making as imposing a procession as possible ; thus, as far as in them lay, prejudicing his case. The palace of Pilate had been desecrated in their eyes by having been the residence of a Gentile. These scrupulous officials, intent on a Clime, compassing the destruction of a man against whom they could prove nothing, although he had led a public life by the space of three years, M-ere so cautious that they would not defile themselves by entering a Gentile's house, because the Passover was at hand. They forgot that the memljcrs of the Sanhedrim were bound to spend the day fasting in which they had con- demned a man to death. Churchisni is the same in all ages. They sent in to Pilate, and he came out, as his custom was. Then commenced a play of passions on both sides, which consti- tutes a profoundly interesting study. He saw , , , . 1 , ■". , Play of passions. the crowd, the (iouncil, the prisoner. It was an unusual hour. It must be an unusual case. His quick ejQ interpreted the general meaning of the scene. Turning to Caia- 646 THE LAST WEEK. plias and the Sanhedrim, he said, " Wliat accusation do you bring against this man ? " It is not poetry, it is criticism, to strive to know what looks and gestures accompanied any speech of any historical character. It is well known how greatly these vary the sense of the mere words. If we could know i^recisely the motions of the person, the play of the lips, the glance of the eye of Jesus, how much more intelligible would his words be, and how our interpretation of them might be changed. And still more how we should bo helped by a knowledge of the precise tone and emphasis he em- ployed. The same is true of others, and here of Pilate. He may have looked at Jesus and seen him pale and worn, yet calm as the morning in whose light he stood. He may have contrasted the face of the prisoner, so free from passion, witli the heated and fierce glare in the countenances of Caiaphas and the Sanhedrim, whose excitement and anger through the night must have left their traces ; and Pilate may have uttered unfeigned surprise by the exclgftnatory question, " What accusation do you bring against him ? " as if intimating that if either party should be plaintiff it was Jesus. But, read with any emphasis, the question gave the churchmen plainly to understand that in this case Pilate did not intend to pronounce a confirmation of any sentence they may have passed, ordering its execution without examination and perfunctoril3^ Unfortunately for liim lie had in haste done such things before, and thus emboldened these men to venture in this case a ^presumption upon his judicial carelessness. He gave them to understand that he intended to take cognizance of this case. His question assumed, what the Sanhedrim knew to be true, that he had the right of original jurisdiction, as repre- sentative of the Koman Emperor. This took them aback. They had not expected from Pilate such assertion of his rights. They expected of him simply the secular sanction to their ecclesiastical verdict. They expected to be acknowledged as judges. But Pi- late took the bench, and put them on the stand of the witnesses. This touched their pride to the quick, while it seemed to inti- mate a miscarriage of their whole plan. Their ride^ ^ ^^^°^ arrogant reply was, " If he were not a malefactor we would not have delivered him up to you." As if they resented the insult which was implied in his words, THE SIXTH DAY. 647 that tliey could have condemned an innocent man. But Pilate ■jvas as proud as Caiaphas. In reply to their claim to be judges, he said, " Take him, and judge him according to your law." As if he had ironically said, " Oh, that is it ! You do not vouchsafe to inform me even of the accusation against tliis man. You claim to be judges. Y^ou know your liuiit. I am sure that I am will- ing that you should try him according to your law, and condemn him, and punish him as far as the hiw will permit. If you be judges, take the case away, and do not trouble me with it." This irony was stinging ; but the Roman might become obstinate, and insist that the case remain with them, and they could not put Jesus to death ; and so the whole scheme was like to miscarry. This brought them to terms. They were obliged to submit the indictment. If they had had all power in their hands tliey would have stoned him for blasphemy. It is noticeable I X 11 T 111- 11 Change of that Jesus iiad predicted that his career would _j.q^q^ end in crucifixion, the Koman — rather than in stoning, the Hebrew — mode of execution. The probabilities had all been in favor of the latter. It was this sudden and unex- pected obstinacy of Pilate which changed the current of affairs. For a moment they were in perplexity. To tell Pilate that Jesus had committed blasphemy, by claiming to be the Son of God, would go for nothing. He had no interest hi their religious questions : he was utterly a pagan. Tliey changed their ground, and said, "We found this one perverting our nation, and forbid- ding to give tribute to Caisar, saying that he himself is Christ, a King." There are three counts in this allegation ; the first two being to the nation notoriously false, and the third being to Pilate merely ridiculous. Jesus had explicitly taught the people to " render unto Cnssar the things that are Caesar^s ; " but the bare fact that such a question should have been brought to him is an in- dication of the unsettled state of the public mind, and how ready the people were to listen to any suggestions of rebellion. Caia- phas and his fellow-conspirators knew that, in the sense in which Pilate must have understood it, the third count was false. Jesus had aspired to no temporal rule, and had done nothing to make himself a rival of CiEsar, but had simply claimed to bo the Mes- siah, a claim in which the representative of the Roman Emperor could have no official, and scarcely any personal, interest. When Pilate, from the portico of his palace, looked down upon 648 THE LAST WEEK. the meek face of tlie pro^^hct from Galilee and saw his liaiida bound, and the spittle of the slaves on his beard, chaiffe ^^^^ ^^^ general friendlessness, and how tho'- oughly he was in the hands of his enemies, it must have seemed the most aljsurd thing to him that Caia])haH should bring such a man, under such circumstances, and charge him with the loftiest political ambition and the most immense political enterprise. And then a suspicion must have come to him that there was something l:)eliind all this ; that if Jesus really had entertained ideas of re\olt, these priests were the very first men to foster any opposition and trouble to Rome, and the very last men to oppose or even eml)arrass the movements of any real rebel. But as the allegation had been made, the investigation must be had. Pilate went into the praitorium, so as to take his official position. The Roman trial was public. Any could enter. Jesus had no scruples, and when he was called went in at once. There werb the representatives of the scrupulous churchmen present. If they could not go in, they could send in those who should watch and in some measure influence proceedings. Friends of Jesua might also enter and report to those outside. Pilate said to Jesus, " Are 3'ou the King of the Jews ? " AVhether Pilate intended it or not, there was a trap in the cpiestion. It could not have a categorical answer. If Jesus In the praeto- . , ,. ^^ ,, -r^., r' n ^ i ■ ^•„^ said "les, to Pilate s manner or thoumit it mio-ht seem an acknowlcflirment of the charge of sedition they were making against him. If he said " No." it would seem an abandonment of the Messianic claims he had al- ready advanced. His reply to Pilate was a question, " Do you Bay this of yourself, or did others tell it you of ine?" To a man of the world like Pilate it should have showed that the person be- fore him was not a crazy adventurer from the rural districts, whose claim to be Tiberias himself, if he had made it, would have been as harmless as any other utterance of wild insanity. It meant, " Do you put that question to me in the Roman or the Jewish, in the political or the ecclesiastical sense ? " — " Am I a Jew?" Pilate replied rather petulantly. " Your own nation and the high-priest have delivered you to me ! AVhat have you done ? " Jesus had done nothing. His abstinence from all politics was remarkable. Ilis enemies could bring nothing against him. The THE SIXTH DAY. 649 charge of sedition -was an nnfounded calumny, and they liad not been able to find a solitary man in the crowded city to bear wit- ness thereto. But now he can approach an answer to Pilate which shall 1)0 consistent at once with his innocence and his claims. lie said : " My kingdom is not of this world. If my king- dom were of this world, then would my servants p^j^^^g fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews. My kingdom is not from hence." Here w^as a statement which implied that there was a kingdom whose defenders were not the Koman eagles. To an imperial official there seemed no kingdom that was not Roman. Or, if any other kingdom, it wonld draw Bword but in vain, for it should soon succumb to Roman power. But the kingdom of Jesus was totally disengaged from secular governments, reigning under and over and through them, and would survive them, and did not need the defence of the sword. But a kingdom implied a king, and yet such a kingdom as Jesus had been describing seemed a mere vague idea ; so Pilate asked, " Are you not a king then ? " Now Jesus had placed his judge in such a posture that the an- swer about to be given should not be deceptive : " Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this pui-pose came I into the world, that I should bear witness concerning the truth. Every one who is of the truth hears my voice." It was the kingdom of truth, and not of physical power, in which he claimed to be supreme. Such a claim threatened no danger to the Emperor : w^hy, then, should Pilate care for it? He had heard such things l)efore. There were Greek and Roman philosophers who taught that those who lived by the truth were kings among men. And it seemed to Pilate that it was the same proposition he had heard often, now pronounced by a Jew. He did not believe that men could reach the ultimate and absolute truth. It was a pretty fancy for poetic dreamers, a fine theory for recluses and philosophers, but there was nothing practical in it, nor useful to a man of affairs. It may have been witlvsome bitterness of regret that such a search should be, as he believed, fruitless, that Pilate exclaimed with a sigh, " "VVTiat is truth ? " as he passed out to the portico to announce the acquittal of Jesus to the priests, w^hich he did by saying, " I find no fault in him." 650 THE LAST WEEK. Then the vehemeiit Sanhedrim repeated their accusations. Jesua said not a word. The contrast between the raging churchmen and the meek heretic struck Pilate so forcibly that he appealed to him : " Do you answef nothing ? See how many things they witness against you." Jesus kept his silence. In the ecclesiastical and in the civil courts Jesus paid no attention to anything that did not touch his claims to Messiahship. When that was invohed he was perfectly ex- plicit, giving his persecutors and his judges ample ground. On all else he was silent. He seemed determined, when put to death, to perish in his claim to be the Son of God in a sense signifying that he was God's equal. This self-control seemed marvellous to Pilate, who reiterated his judgment, saying, "I find no fault in this man." But the crowd about the portico was fierce. How- ever innocent Jesus might be, he had manifestly rendered himself odious to the ecclesiastical rulers. It placed Pilate in a trying position. For all that appeared, he should have set Jesus free : but to do so peremptorily, before he had allayed the passionate excitement of the church party, would be to peril all parties. His parley with the priests was in the interests of Jesus and justice. But the rabid mob shouted, " He stirs up the multitude through- out all Judffia, even beginning from Galilee to this place." Here was a distinct charo-e of sedition : but the namins^ of Galilee was an outlet for the perplexed Pilate. They mentioned it as a sinister circumstance that this man's ministry had begun among the turbulent Galilseans, in a country belonging to his political adversary. The shrewd Pilate saw in it a solution of his difti- culty. Section 6. — Herod. The part which Ilerod Antipas had taken in the murder of John the Baptist has been narrated. This king, Roman in office, Hebrew in faith, licentious in life, had been Herod and Jesus. , , , , ,.,. , . .^ haunted by superstitious terror ever since the assassination of John in prison. AVIien he heard that another prophet was travelling through the country, preaching with a skill the effects of which surpassed those of the vehement eloquence of John, and to such preaching adding the wonder of miracles, until the whole land was full of his fame, and when it was whispered THE SIXTH DAT. 651 that this new preacher was Elias, or one of tlie old prophets, or perhaps John the Baptist, the guilt}- soul of Ilerod adopted the last of these suppositions and said, " It is John." At iirst he en deavored to induce Jesus to leave the country by conveying to him the warning that if he remained in the territory of Ilcrod that prince would kill him. But as time wore away, and his conscience hardened, and his feelings of terror were allayed, he conceived a curiosity to see the great things which Jesus did. There had come a cloud between Ilerod and Pilate. Some of the turbulent subjects of the former had visited Jerusalem on a fes- tival occasion, and created an insurrection which „ ^ , „. .... , , Herod and Pi- Pilate had suppressed by mdiscrimniate slaughter, ^^^^^ not stopping to send them for trial to the courts in tlie dominion of Ilerod. This had made an estrangement between the rulers. Now the Galilean king had come up to Jerusalem to celebiate the Passover. It would be a graceful recognition of Herod's jurisdiction, and a compliment, to send this distinguished prisoner to liim for trial, and it would free Pilate from further proceedings. Therefore he sent him to Ilerod. It did heal the quarrel ; but it did not relieve Pilate of the case. When the frivolous Ilerod saw Jesus he was glad. There was not manliness enough in him to see that this was a most perplex- ino- affair, in which the empire, his own tetrarchy, ° ,„,-r,,v ii- Jesus sent to the weal or tlie Jewish people, and the niterests ggj-o^ of his ancestral, religion, as well as the fate of a great and good man might be involved. It was an opportunity to have an exhibition of legerdemain or necromancy, and this in- cestuous assassin had no such weight on his seared conscience that he could not enjoy any species of entertainment. He catechised Jesus in many ways, endeavoring to draw him at least into con- versation. Jesus looked at him with that broad look which inno- cent manliness gives to crime. He could have spoken wliat would have riven Ilerod, but he was silent. The church party stood near, and were vehement and violent in their accusations ; but not a word could be extorted from Jesus. He had never be- fore met any man or woman or child to whom he would not speak. There never was so great a sinner that, with any expres- sion of contrition, could not have a word from Jesus. But Ilerod lived and died, probably the only man who, having seen Jesus, never heard the tones of his voice nor a syllable from his lips. 652 THE LAST WEEK. There was no point of contact between Jesus and Herod. II he had addressed Jesus with any projDcr desire to know any proper thini^, Herod would doubtless have had a Jesus speechless. ,« ^, ,mi -n-i, word irom the great ieacher. rilate was a time- serving coward, and Caiaphas a hypocritical bigot, but Jesus talked with them. Herod's frivolous licentiousness had eaten his whole manhood out. Fretted by the profound, the majestic, the awful silence of Jesus, Herod and his military guard set him at naught, and mocked him, and arrayed him in a gorgeous robe, and sent him back to Pilate. If we were writing a poem instead of a history, we might indulge in descriptions of the probable reflec- tions of Herod after the speechless prophet of Galilee had gone out of his presence. Although Herod was so mean that he could allow an uncondemned man, who had been tortured all night, to remain bound and be insulted in his presence, even that bad prince did not have the heart to say that there was in him any- thing worthy of death. Section 7. — ^ack to Pilate. Back to Pilate is Jesus now sent. We do not know whether Pilate was in the tower of Antonia, and Herod occupying the palace of his father, which is said to have exceeded the Temple in splendor, but in any case the distance was not great. The troubled procurator discovered that he had appeased Herod, but had not shifted the responsibility of this most perplexing case. When he saw Jesus brought back, wearing a robe of mockery, it plainly confirmed his suspicion that the accused M'as innocent. The greater part of his pul^lic life had been passed in the territory of Herod, who nnist have known the fact if Jesus had been a sedi- tious person. His treatment of the prisoner plainly said that Herod regarded his kingly pretension as a harmless vagary, not fit to be treated seriously by any ruler. Then Pilate called the Sanhedrim to him and addressed thein thus : " You have brought this man to me as one who perverts the people, a revolutionary demagogue. And see, 1 Pilate and the j^^^^.g examined him in your presence, and have Sanhednin. „ ^ „,.,. ,. , ^, . found no fault ni this man touching those things whereof you accuse him. Neither did Herod, for he sent him to us ; and see, nothing deserving of death has been done by him. I will THE SIXTH DAr. 653 scciiirge and release liim." It is quite evident that Pilate had no feolings of malignity against Jesus. He was really desirous of releasing him, while desirous at the same time of pleasing the Sanhedrim as far as practicable. He appeals to the fact that he had taken cognizance of the case ; had heard the indictment ; had openly conducted the trial in tlieir presence, so that they could put in any proofs they thought likely to convict, and he had been willing to convict, and had shown his willingness by sending the prisoner to Herod, a native prince and a co-religionist of theirs, as the ruler in whose jurisdiction the most of the life of Jesus had been spent, and where, as they had alleged, Jesus had stirred up the peoj)le. No proof of seditious behavior had appeared. This man might be a wild enthusiast, but he was not a dangerous revolution- ist. He should therefore scourge him and release him. This was a great error, and most un-Roman. The man wag innocent or guilty. If innocent, his release was imperative ; if ffuilty, the iudo-e should not have been endeavor- ° "^ , . -r-K -r-v.i 1 11- ^^,• ^ A grave error. ing to protect hnn. But Pilate had his pohtical difficulties, and office was sweet to him. Moreover, he may have hoped to satisfy the rancor of the churchmen by the scourging of this young heretic, and thus spare the young man's life. In the mean time the ecclesiastical party were busy with the multitude, inciting them to violent demonstration. They had been telling the people that Jesus had blasphemed before the Sanhe- drim, the high council of the nation, claiming to be Jehovah. It is always to be remembered that the people expected the Messiah to be a man, and not a God, not even an angel, certainly not Jehovah. Blasphemy was the supreme crime in their code of ethics. It was because Jesus was a good man, such a very good man, and exer- cised such great moral power, that they regarded him as about to be their Messiah. If, however, he had blasphemed in the presence of the elders of his people, he could be nothing to them but a de- ceiver. The passions of the mob were adroitly plied by these M-ily and bitter ecclesiastics, and they were prepared to show an outbreak of passionate reactionary feeling against Jesus. Pilate docs not seem to have calculated on this state of affairs when he resolved to appeal from the clergy to the laity, from the priests to the people. He must have ^^^^^ jl^^^^ known something of the personal popularity of the young prophet, and hoped to be able to array the people 654 THE LAST WEEK. against their rulers. For tliat purpose, apparently, lie gathered them together, and when they were assembled they reminded him of the custom which had added to the festivity of the Passover by the release of some prisoner. How long tliis had been a custom we know not, nor can we now determine whether it was of purely Jewish of purely Homan origin. The Romans were accustomed to propitiate conquered peoples by acts of political grace. A parallel between a malefactor and the goat slain on atonement- day may have inclined the Israelites to execute great criminals on festivals, and their disposition to release a prisoner at the feast might be referred to the goat which was let go free into the desert. At any rate the custom existed, and when Pilate came before the mob they broke into a demand tliat he should comply with the custom, which gave them any prisoner they might demand, no matter what his crime. It seems to have flashed upon Pilate as a bright idea. He could now turn this demand to the account of Jesus. He agreed that it was the custom, and that he was prepared to observe it, and then, that they might come to his aid against the priests, he fell upon another expedient. There lay in the prison at that moment a man named Barabbas, whose general notoriety as a robber liad cidminated in an act of sedition in the very metropolis, in Avhich outbreak it was well known that he had committed murder. As the ringleader of the insurrectionists, who also lay bound with him, it ^\•as generally supposed that on this day he would be crucified. lie had been tried and convicted for the very crime which had been charged on Jesus, namely, sedition. No one doubted the guilt of Barabbas, while no one could bring a particle of proof to fasten the char^re on Jesus. The conti-ast was strikino;. Ao;reeino: to observe the custom, he narrows the choice to a selection betw^een Jesus and Barabbas, not having apparently the shadcnv of a doubt that the popular voice would at once release Jesiis from his peiil and Pilate from his perplexity. To his utter astonishment the people preferred Barabbas. ' His trouble was increased at this moment by another circum- stance. It had formerly been forbidden the governors of con- quered provinces to carry their M'ives with them t(j , the provincial capitals. This rule had been modi- dream. , fied so as to allow the ladies to accompany their lords, the governors being held responsible for any intrigues or THE SIXTH DAT. 655 derelictions of their spouses. Pilate's Avife, — M'hose name as Clau- dia Procla, and whose fame as a woman of devout habits, leaning kindly to the religion of the people whom her husband ruled, tra dition has preserved, — moved by a morning dream, sent a messengej to her husband beseechina^ him to have nothino; to do ao-aiust Jesus, who, she was persuaded, was a good man. The message came to Pilate while he was on the judgment-seat, and while he was endeavoring to solve the problem of saving Jesus and ])lacating the church party, bent on his ruin. Worldly man as he was, there was doubtless a tinge of superstition in his heart. lie may have had no clear theological opinioTis, no fixed religious convictions, but all the peoples among whom he had travelled believed in gods, and there was something in this prisoner which strangely influ- enced him ; perliapsAe was a god, and perhaps the gods gave warn ing in dreams. It may have occurred to his recollection what had been rife in Pome, that the night before the great Ciiesar was assas- sinated, his wife Calphurnia dreamed that her husband's bloody body fell across her knees. Thus his perplexity w^as increased. He could scarcely persuade himself that the people had made this choice. He was not much of a democrat. He could not have believed that most monstrous falsehood, Yoxjpopu- h vox Dei est. But a few days before, the multi- '^® unstable tude had come trooping into Jerusalem, shout- ing preans to this extraordinarily popular prophet. They certainly could not now prefer Barabbas to him, for Barabbas had made the highway dangerous and had been a common villain. Moi-e- over, he had been condemned for that of which their leaders had accused Jesus. It is this which had made Pilate all along sus- picious of the churchmen : they preferred a political charge against Jesus, while he knew that in their hearts they did not love the Poman yoke. But Pilate was giving way. He had already agreed to scourge an innocent man. They pushed him. Tliey cried out " all at once." It was the roar of what Burke calls tlie Bellua PojpuliLS, that wild beast the People. It was becoming fi-ightf ul. " Xot this man ! " " Away witli this fellow ! " " Pelcase Barabbas to us ! " AVliat is the governor to do in this case ? Jesus is charged with sedition, and the Jews are proving their loyalty to Pome by urging liis destruction; but they are proving tlieir disloyalty by demanding the release of a man convicted of leading a seditious insurrection. 656 THE LAST WEEK. Standing on his judgment-seat, before the tessellated pavement, Pilate demanded : " AVliat shall I do, then, with Jesus, who is called Christ, whom ye call King of the Jews ? " j(. " Crucify liim, crucify him," they exclaimed. A third time the governor interposed : " "What evil has he done ? Prove a caj^ital crime. I have found no cause of death in him. I will release him, after having scourged him." But that proposition did not pacify them. They cried out the more exceedingly, saying, with loud voices, "Let him be cru- cified ! " When the populace united with the priests Pilate gave way. lie had shown a weakness of which the priests, who hated him, took advantage. Perhaps he reasoned thus : Things have reached such a pass that quiet can no more be restored without bloodshed. To release Jesus will not save him from this furious mob, who will tear him in pieces. An insurrection will be raised. I shall be compelled to call out the troops. Then several will perish. I shall have to give him up ! The weak ruler sent for a ewer of water, and standing in his place he washed his hands before them all, and again declared the innocence of Jesus, but by this symbolic act his hards endeavored to throw all responsibility from him- self, saying to the mob, " I am innocent of the blood of this just person ! But see you to it ! " The infuriated multitude answered : " His blood be on us and on our children ! " Then, deceiving himself and drugging his conscience, Pilate con- sented to their demand, and released Barabbas to tliem. Then Pilate caused Jesus to be scourged. The Poman scourg- ing surpassed the Hebrew in all the particulars of severity. In the latter only the shoulders were bared ; in tho " ' former the whole person : in the latter tlie stripes were limited to forty, save one ; in the former there was no limit. It was the punishment given to a slave. The stripes of the hisli were loaded with bones or metallic frjigments. The scourging of those who were to be crucified was so frightful that tlie con- demned frequently escaped the cross by dying under the thongs. Then the soldiers of Pilate took Jesus aAvay into the common hall, called the Praetorium, probably in the castle of Antonia, and gathered the whole company of the guard, which usually numbered about 400 men. They stripped him again, and on his torn and bleeding shoulders put a EOCE HOMO ABCH. THE SIXTH DAT. 657 scarlet robe, probably some old military coat from the wardrobe of tlie guard-room. Then they plaited a crown from the twig3 of some thorny groM'th. It may have been the Syrian acacia, the thorns of which are as long as an ordinary finger. But we can- not know what particular kind of thorns were used. It is cnouo-h that they intended to mock him, and that they were not wanting in cruelty. The more painful as well as humiliating the instru- ment of their mockery, the more acceptable it would be. Then they put a reed in his hand as a mock sceptre. Then they knelt before him and ridiculed him and his nation, saying : " Hail ! King of the Jews." And they spat on liim. He was bound. The reed ^^-as laid in his hands, but he did not hold it. He was perfectly passive. It fell. Some of the guard seized it, and with it drove the tliorn-cro\v^n down upon his head. They smote and mocked him, ^-arying their indignities. Pilate looked on this wild scene. We can conjcctnre Ws thoughts from his actions. He must have regarded this whole affair with mingled feelings of perplexity, a\ve, and apprehension. He had never seen such a P^^^^^^ in trouble, sufferer. Most majestic amid ridicule, most serene amid tor- tures, here was a man fit to be king anywhere. Yet he had not sought to use his marvellous person^.! influence for personal ad- vancement, Tliere was Barabbas, coarse and brutal, bein^ the vilest kind of person and doing the very things which the priests had chai-gcd upon Jesus. If being seditious Avas such a heinous crime in their eyes, why should they not desire tlie destruction of Barabbas, who had been convicted of repeated acts under cir- cumstances of great aggravation, and why should they desire the destruction of Jesus, who was charged with sedition, but against whom there was proved no single seditious word or act ? It was a great ]>uzzle. Some other basis than loyalty to Rome lay under this extraordinary zeal of the priests. Pihite determined to make one more effort to save the life of this wonderful sufferer. Taking Jesus, thorn-crowned, covered about with the old robe that burlesqued royalty, faint, worn, haggard, as he must have been after the niglit and morning of agony and torture, he placed the prisoner once more before ''^^^ Homo." the people, reasserting his conviction of the innocence of Jesus. He pointed to this weak and apparently helpless man. Ho showed how lonely and friendless and powerless he seemed. 42 658 THE LAST WEEK. Jerusalem should be too luagnauiinous, and Rome too lofty, to crush out this poor peasant-prophet for fear lie should become too strong for Church and State. lie said to them : " Ecce Homo ! Behold the man." As if he had said : " Can that be a dangerous person?" It was a pathetic appeal. Even Pilate's voice may have been unsteady in making this utterance. But the church hate was not to be touched. Jesus was to be de- stroyed. " Crucify him ! Crucify him ! Give him the extreme punishment of a slave," they cried. Pilate said : " Take you him and crucify him ; for I find no fault in him." The crafty priests, determined, if possible, to make Pilate a tool in their hands by inducing him to acknowledge their verdict, making him thus not a judge in a court of ori- Pi a e grows ^j^^^j jurisdiction, but a mere recorder of their authoritative decisions, said to Pilate : "We have a law, and according to the law he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God." AVliat definite idea this last phrase conveyed to the mind of pagan Pilate m'C cannot tell, but the whole statement made his soul afraid. He was growing weaker and more superstitious. He went back into the judgment-hall and sent for Jesus and said to him : " AVhence are you % " The wonderful prisoner, who had uttered no complaint, and showed no nervousness, and seemed to take less interest in the whole tragedy than any spectator, held his peace. "What!" said Pi- late, " do you not s|»eak t(j me ? Do you not know that I have power to crucify you, and power to release you?" Jesus an- SAvered : "You could have no power against me, unless it were given you from above ; on this account he who has delivered me to you has the greater sin." In the judgment of Jesus, Caiaphas is worse than Pilate. All this increased in Pilate a desire to release Jesus. The pris- oner was guilty of no crime, was apparently capable of no dis- turbance, had no marks of wickedness in his Je!i^^*°"^^^'^ history or his manners, had been very popular with the masses in the rural districts, had dis- played the most extraordinary composure during a period of extraordinary peril, had the reputation of a miracle-worker, had excited the dreams of Claudia Procla, had called himself the Son of God, and was manifestly the object of intense hatred on the part of the priesthood. Again Pilate sought to release Jesus THE SIXTH DAT. 659 J Jut the churclimen had kejt their strongest form of argument for their last. They return to the political aspect of the affair, and ])ut it before Pilate thus : " If you release this man you are not Cae- gar's friend : whoever makes himself a king speaks against Csesar." The phi-ase " Csesar's friend," Amicus Ccesaris, had not only the ordinary signification of the words, but was a title of honor which the Emperors were accustomed to bestow ,, . , ,. T 1 • - J Caesar's friend, upon their representatives ruhng over subjugated peoples. It was a most ingenious way of putting the case. It struck Pilate on liis weakest side. He was a lover of place, an office-seeker, who considered the loss of his political position the gi-eatest misfortune, as is shown in the fact that when that did befall him he retired to Gaul and committed suicide. The priests knew their man, and Pilate knew how insecurely already he held his seat, and that such an accusation, if pressed with show of evi- dence, would be his ruin at Pome. Tiberius was suspicious. Pilate had been closeted with Jesus. The trial had been infor- mal. They now had much to show. If he had only taken the strong and dignified position which became an Imperial Procura- tor, and released Jesus as soon as he was convinced that he waa innocent, and began to feel perhaps that he "vvas divine, Pilate would have saved himself ; but he had vacillated so long and grown so weak that this last push toppled him from all his intel- lectual and moral proprieties. He fell. Jesus was brought forth and placed in the judgment-seat, in what was called the Pavement, from the tessellated jjavement in front of the iudo-e, and in Hebrew Gabbatha, the ot,.™oIog,oLr,iehisnot,„itceW. TheW J"- — mal ceremonials of a trial were now resumed. Pilate was going to condemn Jesus ; but, enraged at the defeat of his efforts to release him, he called the attention of the Jewish leaders to the pale and poor prisoner at the bar, and said in de- rision, " Behold your king ! " But they called out, " Away, away, crucify him ! " Still taunting them, knowing that by pro- nouncing the sentence he should be secure at Rome, and venting I lis rage on them he said, " Shall I crucify your king ? " They answered, " We have no king but Caesar ! " It was the shriek of a dying nationality. Their earliest ances- tors had lived under a theocracy whose king had held court in a pillar of flame and or. the top of rocking Sinai. They had had 660 THE LAST WEEK. no king but Jehovah. Their descendants had had snch kings as the great David and the super-splendid Solomon. This very gen- eration of men, who were howling around a pagan i-x^^"^ "*' court-house to secure tlie condemnation of Jesus, tionality. . . had had hopes of a theocratic Messiah. But tlieir thirst for innocent blood was uncontrollable. They throw up all hopes of the future as they did all traditions of the past. They lifted the casket that contained the treasure of their nation- ality and flung it into the maelstrom of the Roman dominion. " "We have no king but Caesar." The nationality of Abraham and David and Solomon and the Maccabees was surrendered in spirit, as it had been captured in form, to an imperialism whose repre- sentative was the dark, suspicious, cruel, and debased Tiberius. " We have no king but Caesar ! " Judaism's " loyalty " was Ju- daism's doom. So perishes every church and people and man that will " have no king but Caesar." Then Pilate sealed their fate and his own by delivering Jesus to be crucified. What the precise form of sen- tence was in this case we cannot now know. The usual formula was, "Ibis ad crucem," " Go "to the cross." Section 8. — The Last of Judas. I think it is most probable that tliis is the point at which Judas reappears. The condemnation by the Sanhedrim would not have aroused him, on any theory of his motives. If His hopes and i .jt j.ti t. . he expected Jesus to display superhuman power and deliver himself it was not reasonable to sup- pose that this would occur until he was placed in extremis^ aftei his condemnation by the Roman authorities. The verdict of the ecclesiastical council could have little terror for any disciple of Jesus, and every Jew knew that it could not issue in capital pun- ishment without the sanction of the procurator. But Judas, who seems to have been with Peter in the palace of tlie high-priest, most probably watched every movement of all the parties, and as Pilate or the priest had seemed to have the better of the argument the hopes or fears of Judas had risen or fallen. But now, when he plainly saw that Jesus had received the con- demnation of the church, and the sentence had been ratified by the State, and that " the Master " did not pass out of their midst, but had submitted to scourging and mockery and insult, and waa THE SIXTH DAT. ggj apparently not going to put forth any effort for his own rescue Judas felt the whole ground give way under him. Tlie one huo-e dark fact fell on his whole superstructure of rea- sonings and it fell. He was smitten with re- .T^e&^^ound morse. He had expected no such issue of his ^'^^^ ^''"'^' conduct. As by a flash of lightning in a tempestuous midnight a precipice is discovered by the ti-aveller to be at his very feet, so JiKlas now suddenly saw the abysses of horrible meanings wliich were in the words that Jesus had spoken at the Sui)per concern- ing his betrayer. The whole of the beautiful, beneficent life of Jesus rose up before him. He reviewed all the personal kindness and forbearance he had received from the Galihiian prophet. There was nothing in the whole character or life of Jesus which Judas could recollect as being any mitigation of the offence of betraying him. If Jesus had ever done a wrong, or spoken a word which could warrant the suspicion that he might in some way be injurious to the people, Judas would have employed it as an argument to justify himself to himself. But the life of Jesus was faultless, even Judas being judge. He probably felt that this death was to be a martyrdom so conspicuous that it would be seen by far-off generations, and that his o^vn name would be taught to the children of men from age to age as the synonym of treachery. It WHS too much for him. He had had two days and nights of intensest anxiety. He gave way under it all. He rushed into the midst of the cruel churchmen, now ready to despise their base instrument, seeing that they ^® returns to had gained their end. They were probably ar- *^^ ^'''^^*'' ranging for the crucifixion in the same chamber in which he had first met them, when the plan for designating and an-esting Jesus was concocted. How gladly they received a recreant discTple of Jesus in the time of their political perplexity, and how courteous they were to him so long as they hoped to get anything out of him, and how glumly they met him when he came back corroded with remorse! He acknowledged his guilt, hoping somehow vaguely that it would cover the case and avert the fate of Jesus. He shrieked in their hearing, "I have simied, in that I have be- trayed innocent blood ! " He seemed to think that his confession might convince them that the whole proceeding was wrong, and that they would probably take measures to secure a re^'ersal of 662 THE LAST WEEK. the sentence, wliicli lie perceived Pilate would be most ready to grant. But he did not understand the men in whose service he had enlisted. Their cold reply was, " What is that to us ? Do you see to it." It was ccruched in curter words than the English can well put it : " What to us ? You see ! " They were not seeking justice and judgment : he was a fool if he thought so. They wanted to kill a man who - J was in their way ; that was all : his being iimoceut or guilty was nothing. They had needed Judas as a tool ; that was all : they had used him, and now flung him away. His guilty solitude was thus manifested to Judas. God and man. Church and State, seemed turning against him. He went into the Temple, which was now deserted. The priests were away, and the worshippers. The fate of the Galilsean prophet kept all Jerusalem intent and absorbed. His dread loneliness came down on the betrayer like a crushing despair. He walked into tlie holy place, where none but the priests should go. He was alone with the great God, but lost to all distinctions between sacred and profane. He was desolate, darkened, and doomed. The bag with the thirty pieces of silver was in his hand. He flung it down in the sanctuary ; flung away the remembrancer of his guilty error ; flung down, for the priests to ™ gaze upon, the proof of the utter uno-odliness of money away. ... proscriptive churchism. Then he rushed out to some desert j^lace, and, all shattered, the wretched man met a clouded fate, the record of which by the biographers of Jesus only serves to confound our speculations as to the precise mode of his death. His life went out in a tumultuous, nameless anguish and horror. In the gallery of the Apostolic portraits a rumpled black cloth falls down over the face of Judas. When the ecclesiastics learned that the money was in the Tem- ple, the scrupulous murderers were sorely perplexed. The killing of Jesus was not so much matter for their consciences ; but here was a question for careful ritualists to study. Here was money which it would not be correct to waste, and which by i;crtain interpretations of the law could not be put directly to tlie pur- poses of the sanctuary. They devised a method. There was a piece of ground — of little importance, having been spoiled for THE SIXTH DAT. 663 cultivation by the potteries— adjoining the Ilill of Evil C mnsel, on which Caiaphas liad a country-seat, in which it is said that the death of Jesus had been resolved upon. This pother's Fieli. they bought with the money Judas returned, and named it Aceldama, and dedicated it to the interment of strangers, that is, of such pagans as became proselytes to Judaism, for they were too scrupuk)us to mingle tlie dust of believers who were only converts with that of the sons of Abraham. Section 9. — Going to CaUary. After other mockings they took the robe from Jesus, and re- placed his own garments, and led him away to crucify him. It was a part of the i)unishment that the convicted . i 1 Beaxing the cross, person should bear his own cross. Jesus was no exception. The cross was not that huge combination of timber usually imagined and put into pictures. A man of ordinary strength would have little difficulty in carrying it; but Jesus had passed through so mucli anguish of mind and torture of body that his strength failed him. He does not appear to have been a person of prodigious powers of endurance, but rather a man of delicate organization. When he fell under the cross the proces- sion met a man coming from the country. It was odd that he should be moving in a contrary way wlien all the people had been profoundly interested in this tragic affair, and were pouring along the streets to see what might be its issue, lie happened at the juncture needed. Eoman and Jew equally were too proud to do this menial and degrading service. This man, whose name was Simon, came frt)m Cyrene, in xVfri- can Libya, where many Jews resided, who supported a synagogue in Jerusalem. Whether he had come to Jerusa- • 1 1 1 The Cyrenian. lem to the festival, or had lately resided there, we camutt tell. It is not probable that he was a disciple of Jesus ; but it is not improbable that, coming suddenly upon this procession, and seeing three men bearing their own crosses, and one — paler and more delicate than the others— lying prone beneath a load he had not strength to carry, Simon should have uttered some excla- mation of natural pity. It was eiKjugh to suggest and warrant a military impressment. They made him bear the cross of Jesus. The artists have generally misled us as to the appearance of one 664 THE LAST WEEK. crucified, and tlic structure of the cross. It is not known how early the mode of capital punishment by crucifixion was adopt- ed. Traces of the cross have been found among j,^.Qgg the Scythians, Persians, Egyptians, Carthagini- ans, Greeks, and Komaus. It was not a Hebrew mode. The corpse of a criminal who had been executed might be hung upon a tree, but even then it was not permitted to re- main all night (Deut. xxi, 22, 23). Jesus suffered the extreme })unishment dealt by Romans to slaves Avho had been convicted of a capital offence. There were three kinds of crosses : the ct'ux decussaia, X ; the crux commissa, T ; and the crux immissa, -j". The cross on which Jesus died is represented by tradition to have been the crux imonissa. The upi-ight piece was made just long enough to hold the body a few inches from tlie ground, and to be sufficiently in the ground to suj^port itself and its burden. There was no support for the feet, as the painters now make in the pic- tures, but on the upright part was a projection, or seat, on which the weight of the body rested. It would have torn the hands and feet fearfully if the whole weight of the body had depended, as Jeremy Taylor says, '*' on four great wounds." After Jesus had been relieved of the burden of the cross by Simon the Cyrenian, the procession moved forward. It was the custom for the heralds to carry the accusation of each convict before him, written on a tablet whitened with gypsum. Some such epigraph, we suppose, was carried before Jesus, as it was afterwards nailed to the cross. The procession grew as it pro- ceeded. People came forth of tlieir houses. A great company of persons had gathered, and there were many women among them, drawn together by the strange curiosity „ T 1 ° which is felt to see those who are about to die. 01 Jerusalem. These women, without special sympathy Avith Jesus as a religious teacher, but having their womanly compas- sions stirred by seeing the sufferings of a man whose appearance contrasted with that of the robbers, who were also carrying their crosses to the place of crucifixion, broke out into bewailing lamentations. It was a touch of nature. The men were all against him. The temper of the mob was opposed to any pity for him. These women did not love him as tenderly as Mary of Bethany, as passionately as Mary of ^Rlagdala ; but they were women, and women instinctively know the true man ; and they THE SLSTn DAT. 665 wept. It moved Jesus. It was the only incident on the way to the crucilixion wliich seems to liave arrested his attention. lie said nothing when he fell beneath the cross. He said nothing when they lifted it from his shoulder and gave it to Simon. But who can bear a- woman's tears? Jesus turned and said. to them, •' Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep for your- selves, and for your children ; for see ! the days are coming in which they shall sa}', 'Happy are the barren, and the wombs that bare not, and the breasts that suckled not.' Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, ' Fall on us ; ' and to the hills, ' Cover us.' For if they do these things in the green tree, what shall be done in the dry ? " The spirit of prophecy came upon him. He seemed to see what would occur on that spot forty years afterwards. Touched by the womanlv tribute of tears, he did n(:»t rciect _ , . •' " J J Jesus prophesies. tlie proffered sympathy, but seemed to feel that he was gazing into the eyes of now happy young mothers whose old age should be crushed by a catastrophe of the most over- whelming character. lie forgot his grief in theirs. Beyond his cross and sepulchre he saw the Koman investment of the holy city, the siege, the suffering, the horrors, starving mothers snatch- ing food out of the mouths of their own children, and other starv- ing mothers killing and roasting and eating their own offspring ; while men and women and children went creeping through sub- terranean passages and foulest sewers; and others, fleeing, hid themsehes in crevices of mountain rocks from the storm which was sweeping Jerusalem. This address to the women was the last utterance of patriotism which came from the mouth of Jesus. He was then brought to a place which was called Golgotha in the Hebrew tongue, meaning " Skull." '''^ The site of the true Calvary has of late years been a subject of pro- found interest to topographers. That the present Church of the Holy Sepulchre is over the i)lace where Jesus died, as it is professed, cannot be believed by those who examine the Golgotha. * " Golgotha means Skull, and the place is not called Kpayiuy roiros, i. q^\w the Sabbath— the specially sacred Sabbath of the Passover festival. There remained only two or three hours. Ac- cording to Hebrew law, if one had been stoned / f "^li«ti« «i^- to death tor blasphemy, and his corpse hung upon a tree, it nnist be remcned before night (Deuteronomy xxi. 23), and this regulation would be scrupulously observed on the eve of Ihe Paschal Sabbath. The leaders of the ecclesiastical party, who had not shrunk from conspiracy, and lying, and blasphemy, :md the murder of the innocent, these ritualistic Puritans could not endure that their feast should be defiled by the sight of three crosses hanging near Jerusalem on the high Sabbath of their church. Moreover, they did not know what effect the sight uf the body of the innocent Jesus might have upon the fickle pop- ulace. They might still rescue him. The Pharisees did not now know that he was dead. They had a political reason, and it 678 THE LAST WEEK. always was tlie manner of the hypocrite to cover a politic design with a religious profession. So they went to Pilate to ask that the death of the three crucified men might be hastened by the break- ing of their legs, and that the bodies might be buried. Pilate had no care now as to what might happen. lie consented. The rude executioners did not hesitate with the two thieves. They were soon dispatched. But when the soldiers saw Jesua they were convinced that he was thoroughly j^gjj dead. It were a wanton act to crush his limbs. lie had been so good and gentle tln-ough it all ! There may have been something in his very looks which inspired a sense of delicacy. The phenomenon attending his death may have awed them. They forbore. John had returned from attending Mary, the mother of Jesus, to a place of retreat in the city. lie was witness to an incident which he recorded, probably, to meet a certain suggestion of his day, but which throws light on a question important in our own. One of the soldiers, more daring and hardened than the others, in order to make assurance doubly sure, thrust a spear into the side of Jesus, and forthwith there issued water and blood. The remarkable events of the past few hours, and the certainty of the death of the condemned, had probably removed all restraint, and any one might approach the cross. It was so low, — not lifting the body many feet above the ground, as the painters have it, — that John could distinctly see what was going forward. When his account was written, it had not yet been suggested that Jesus had not died but had passed into a swoon from which he subsequently revived ; but the Gnostics afterwards maintained that it was not flesh and blood that hung upon the cross, nor the real Jesus, but a resem- blance of Jesus. This statement of facts John connects with two passages from the sacred Hebrew books, namely, those which provided that not a bone of the paschal "lamb should be broken (as Exodus xii. 4G, and Numbers ix. 12), and the passage in Zechariah (xii. 10) in which John undoubtedly understood the prophet as predicting that the people should pierce Jehovah in the person of the Mes- siah, and should have great grief therefor. But the phenomenon of the outflowing blood and water brings us to the question of the physical causes of the death of Jesus. THE SIXTH DAY. 679 They manifestly were not the causes ordinarily found in cruci- fixion. Jesus died in six lioui-s after he was lifted to the cross ; no other person is known to have died so soon. „ , . 1 . 1 11 Physical cause* bonie pulpit oi-ators are accustoinecl to aweil on ^^ death of Jesus tlie horrors of crucifixion. Whatever they were, tliey we]-e such as were common to all persons who were cruci- fied, and may be as pathetically assigned to the thieves as to Jesus. Crucifixiou Avas not an extremely painful or rapid mode of execution. Sharp spikes were driven through poi-tions of the body where no injury was done to any vital part. There was not a great effusion of blood ; sometimes almost none. There was not a very great pressure on the wounded jjortions, almost none on the feet. Death was not caused by the wounds inflicted, nor were tlicy extremely painful, as man}' persons have received them ^^'ithout a murmur, and survived on the cross for very many hours, e\en for dajs. Some ha,\e been taken from the cross after hours of suspension and been healed. The convict was to expire by sheer exhaustion of nature and the nervous irritation produced by the fretting of the flesh where the nails were inserted. The thieves had as yet begun to show no signs of even faint- ing. Jesus was as able to endure as they, lie was a young man, a little i)ast thirty. He had been reared care- ^. TTig i3ii vsicftl fully. He was perfectly virtuous. Ko excesses ^^^ had told upon his constitution to make him pre- maturely old. He had lived temperately, yet not abstemiously, allowing himself a generous diet, while living within all the bounds of the laws of health. He had passed mucli of his life in the open air. He had received no special brutality at the hands of his executioners. And yet the man who might have survived six days, who, on all known bases of calculation, should have been able at least to survive the Paschal Sabbath on the cross, died in six hours. What were tlie physical causes of his death ? They were not the processes of crucifixion. The clearest, most scientific, and most satisfactory answer to the question is in a treatise upon the subject by William Stroud, M.D., firet published about a quarter of a centnry _ ^ ' ,,' , ... , ''Dr. Stroud'8 ago. All subsequent nnestigations have con- ^.j^g^jy spired to confirm it. It shall be stated here ;is succinctly as possible. Dr. Stroud says : " It was agony of mtxd, PEODucixo Klttuee OF THE ILc.uiT." That suggests the call for 6 so TTTE LAST WEEK. pr<)of that the lieart of Jesus was litei-all_v mpl'ired. If in hia case, most pi'obably it would occur in other cases, which modern science would discover. For the satisfaction of persons not familiar with anatomy, Dr. Stroud furnishes the following de- sci-iption of the heart : — "It is a donl)]e muscuLar bag, of a conical form, lined witliin and without by a dense membrane, and loosely inclosed in a receptacle of similar mateiial, called the ijericardium. It consists of two princii^al sacs, Thehenrt. , • n II' the nglit and the left, whicli lie side by side, and adhere firmly together, so as to form a strong middle wall, but have no internal com- munication. Each of these is subdivided into two connected pouches, or chambers, termed auricle and ventricle, whereof the auricle is round and thin, the ventricle long and fleshy ; the two former constituting tlic base, and the two latter the body of tlie organ. Placed in the centre of the vascular sys- tem, the heart promotes and regulates the circulation of the Ijlood, received on each side from two or more large veins of a soft and compressible texture, and discharged through a single artery which, being firm and elastic, is kept constantly pervious. Returning from all parts of the body except the lungs, blood of nearly a lilack color, and become unfit for tlie jMirjioses of life, is poured ]»y two princij)al veins, called venve cavfe, into the right auricle, whence, after a momentary delay, it is transferred to the corresponding ven- tricle, its reflux Ijeing prevented Ijy a meml)ranoUii valve interposed between them. By the powerful contraction of the ventricle it is transmitted through the pulmonary artery to the lungs, v/here, by minute subdivision and con- tact with atmospheric air inhaled through tlio windpipe, it is j)urified, and acquires a l)right crimson color. Returning from the lungs by the four pul- monary veins, tlie renovated blood next passes into the left auricle, and from thence, in a similar manner, and at the same time as on the right side, into the left ventricle, by the contraction of which it is distributed with great force through the aorta to the remaining parts of the body, whence it was origin- ally derived." It is a familiar fact that the sanguiferous system does sustain sudden and great changes from the influence of the passions. The o-listenino; eye and Mowinir face are external indi- The effect of the ^ ^. , -i ,, " cc , i .p i . .... cations, while the iiersoti artected, it his attention passions. 'a ' be called to his own condition, becomes conscious of coldness in his extremities, a sense of distention of the heart, difficulty of respiration, and other distressing s}mptoms. The effect may be so great as to supei-induce death, and may be pro- duced by any of the passions. History has many examples of death from joy. Pliny informs ns of a LacedjEinonian who died of joy at heai'ing that his son had gained a prize in the Olympio TTTE SIXTH DAT. 681 games. Sophocles died of joy at gaining a decision in liis favoi in a contest of lioiior. Livy mentions an aged matron, wlio be- lieving lier son to have been slain in l)attle, died in his arms in excess of joy on his safe return. Leo X. died of a fever produced by joy at the news of the capture of Milan. Dr. Sti-ond qnotes many other cases of sudden death from exciting passions, in all which we cannot donl)t that tlie decease was caused b/rni^tnre of the heart, althougli, for want of examination, that cannot be affirmed. The following is Dr. Stroud's description of the modus : " The immediate cause is a sudden and violent contraction of one of the ventricles, usually the left, on the column of blood thrown into it by a simi- lar contraction of the corresponding auricle. Prevented from returning liackwards hy tlie intervening valve, and ^'"' '"'"'"■''■ not finding a sufficient ontk't forwards in the connected artery, the blood reacts against tlie ventricle itself, which is consequently torn open at the point of greatest distention, or least resistance, l)y the influence of its own reflected force. A quantity of l)lood is hereby discharged into the pericar- dium, and having no means of escape from that capsule, stops tlie circula- tion by compressing the heart from without, and induces almost instanta- neous death. In young and vigorous suljjects, the blood thus collected in the pericardium soon divides into its constituent parts, namelv, a pale watery liquid called serum, and a soft clotted substance of a deep-red color termed crassamentum ; but, except under similar circumstances of extravasation, this distinct separation of the blood is seldom witnessed in the dead body. When, however, the action of the ventricle is less violent, instead of burstin- under the continued injection from the auricle, it merely dilates; but, as in conse- quence of this over-dlstcntion its power of contraction is speedily destroyed, death takes place with equal certainty, althougli jierhaps with less rapidity,' and in this case as Avell as in the former one, the blood remaining within the heart has been divided into serum and crassamentum." Let ns now revert to Gethsemane. There the sweat of Jesns was as it were great drops of blood. Some passion of prodigions force M-as producing a serions disturbance of his circulation. Many cases of like phenomena at- ^""^^^ °^ ^^°°*^y tending like states of mind are recorded in the ^'^^^^' books. Ilervey tells of a .man who, under the long-continued working of an indignation he was compelled to restrai^i, fell into a hemorrhagic state, attended with extreme oppression in the chest, owing to an iunnense eidargement of the heart and princi- pal arteries, exhibiting a slight oozing of blood from the cutane- ous vessels. The eminent French historian, De Thou, mentions the case of an Italian officer who commanded at Monte-Maro, a 682 THE LAST WEEK. fortress of Piedmont, in the warfare between Cliarles Y. and Heiuy II. of France, in the middle of the sixteentli century. " This officer, having been treacherously seized by order of the hostile general, and threatened with public execution unless he surrendered the place, was so agitated at the prospect of an igno- minious death, that he sweated blood from ever}' part of his body." A young Florentine, unjustly put to death by Pope Six- tus Y., upon being led to execution, discharged blood instead of sweat from his whole body. In the German Ephemerides many cases are given of bloody tears and bloody sweat. Maldonatus refers to " a robust and healthy man at Paris who, on hearing sen- ten-ce of death passed on him, was covered with bloody sweat." Schenck tells of a nun who fell into the hands of soldiers, and, seeing herself encompassed with daggers and swoi'ds, threatening instant death, was so terrified that " she discharged blood from every part of her body, and died of hemori-hage in the sight of her assailants." So far as I know, no one has yet called attention to the fact that, while sudden death may be occasioned by joy as well as by c-rief or terror, this phenomenon of bloody sweat The Gethsemane . . . . g^gj^^. has ne\er been noticed except in connection with great mental agony. Jesus had this mental agony in Gethsemane. It seemed to be in a measure assuaged. It was renewed when he was on the cross. Did it not terminate in rup- ture of the heart ? Many such have occurred and been examined, in which no part of the body exhibited morbid symptoms, but the heart was ruptured and the pericardium was filled with serum and crassamentum, which popularly are called M'ater and blood. In- deed, the crassamentum, or red and clotted portions, contains " all the more essential ingredients of the blood," while the serum, a mere yellowish liquid, " consists chiefly of water." Dr. Aber- crombie, of Edinburgh, gives a case of the sudden death of a man aged seventy-seven years, owing to a rupture of the heart. In his case " the cavities of the pleura contained about tltree jpoiinds of Jlidd, but the lungs were sound." Dr. Elliotson relates the case of a woman who died suddenly. " On opening the body the peri cardium was found distended with clear serum, and a very large coagulum of blood, which had escaped through a spontaneous rup- ture of the aorta near its origin, without any other morbid appear- ance." Many cases might be cited, but these suffice. THE SIXTH DAY. G83 The narrative of the last hours of Jesus, as wc have already given it from the Evangelists, shows just such a state of mind aa has produced the phenomenon of the bloody sweat , , , , 1 1 1 1 1 • 1 State of mind ir m Other persons ; and the water and blood which -^^^ ^^^j. ^^^^^ John noticed as following the soldier's spear, are such an exhibition as attends rupture of the heart, although it was more than a thousand years after the record was made befoi-e science connected the two. Every expression of Jesus in Geth- scmane is such as any man would make in describing sensations produced by the effect of mental agony on the physical constitu- tion. On that cold night liis was not ordinary perspiration. It was the hemorrhage which agony produces. He did not die of crucifixion. He died of a broken heart while they were crucify- ing hira. lie did not swoon. He was in full possession of his powers, as his direction to Mary and John showed. He was in full physical strength, as his cry — his loud cry — showed. At three o'clock, if he had endui'edonly the ordinary pains of the crucified, he might have been taken down and saved, as the Pharisees show that they perceived, by desiring to have his legs broken. Pilate marvelled wlien he heard that Jesus was already dead. The agony of Gethsemane had a mortal tendency. The agony on the cross was a mortal blow. It was agony ^ — not grief, — not fear. If one sweats under grief or fear, it is a scant cold sweat. In the conflict of agony the action of tlie heart is violent, and sweat is abunflant and warm, and in extreme cases bloody. Fear or grief paralyzes ; agony supplies extraordinary strength. In full Btrength, Jesus died suddenly. Tlie water and blood whicli flowed from his punctured pericardium showed that his heart had been ruptured. ^Y}lat was that agony? He was not afraid to die. He could have avoided death. He could raise others from the dead. He was not afraid of men. He was not afraid of God. He professed a con- [. ■ 1 /->, 1 -n -1 "WTiat was his sciousness oi oneness witli God. He was irood. « t5 agony ( Others have loved him so that they have shouted on the cross and at the stake, and died, of exhaustion or of fire, happier than conquering kings. But he, so good, so humble, so free from all earthly ambitions, so unselfish, — he died of a men- tal agony. He had no anger, no bad passions, no sudden dis- appointment. He had always expected to die on the cross. He 684 TnE LAST WEEK. had told his intnnates that unless he died on the cross his life woTdd he a failure. He did not avoid crucifixion, and 3'et, al- though he expii-cd on a cross, he did not die of crucifixion. rie had a great spiritual conflict ; in the agony thereof his heart was ru])tured. ^SUl.at was that agony f It is not a question for history. It is a question for each reader's heart. It could not have heen an a^onv on account of himself : it must have heen for others. For whom ? That ques- tion also steps heyond the limits of history. With Jesus hefore liis death the work of the historian here closes. There are circumstances recorded of the hurial of Jesus which are to be noticed as important parts of his history. There are two men who seem to have tahen a profound in- terest in the career of Jesns— one was Joseph. Of him we learn that he was of Arimathaia: that he was an honor- Joseph and Ni- , , . , ^ ^ • codemus counsellor, a rich, a good, and a just man; that he was " waiting for the kingdom of God ; " that he had not consented to the action of the Sanhedrim in the case of Jesus, and, in fact, was a disciple of Jesus, hut secretly, ft)r feai- of the Jews. The crucified Jesus drew from him a con- fession of attachment which the living Teacher had never been able to elicit. The other was Nicodemus, the ruler who had gone to Jesus by night, eai-ly in the career of the great Teacher, and who seems never to have lost his interest in the young prophet now come to an untimely and ignominious end. These two men took charge of the interment. "Wliile Joseph went boldly unto Pilate to crave the body of Jesus, Nicodemus went into the city to procure myrrh and aloes for his embalm- ment. The interest they took in Jesus shows how deeply he had impressed them. Neither had dared profess their faith in him. Perhaps that faith was not well defined. But Secret disciples. , ^ ^• i ^ • i 1 1 i i they believed him to l)e both great and good. They had absented themselves from the Sanhedrim which had been called together that mornine: bv the hig-h-priest. Thcv knew the question to be put to them. Each was probably Ignorant of the feelings of the other. But they could not vote to execute Jesus, and they had not the courage to defend him. Now they discover each the other's long regard for Jesus, and tbey a TITE SIXTH DAT. 685 unite in showins^ delicate attentions to tlio remains of the crnci- fiod prophet. Pilate granted the body. Joseph hrohght a linen shroud, and Nicodemns brought the spiccry. There is a pensive beauty in John's siin])le statement: "In the place where he was crucified there was a garden ; and in the gai'den a new sepnl(;hre, wlierein was never nmn yet laid," Matthew says that tins sepulchre was ^ a gar en. Joseph's '^own new tomb, which he had hewn out in the rock." The place was near, and these good men, with pious haiuls, boi-e Jesus to it, and thus saved him from beinc; fiunir into a com- mon ditch with the malefactors who were crucified with him. They seem to have had no helpers. The friends of Jesns had fled. His enemies had returned to the city. Alone and solitary, these honorable counsellors lifted and wrapped and carried and interred the body of Jesus of Nazareth. Joseph rolled up a great stone to the door of tlie tomb. It was " the Jews' i)i'epara- tion-day." He and Nicodemus left the garden to jucpare for the Passover. Two women had watched these great men in tlieir humane and godly work. Joseph and Nicodemus had not consociated with Love's last vi«nl. J^''^"^ ^"^ ^"S friends, but they were probably knovrn as men of wealth and distinction. It must have been a wonder to these women wliat interest two members of the senate wliich had condemned Jesus should have in the proper pre])aration and entombment of his body. Thev M-ere too shy to address them, and probably the counsellors did not notice the women; l)ut -\vlien the great men went away two humble women were left to keep love's vigil at tlie gate of death, Mary of Magdala and her friend Mary the mother of Joses. And even they were so thoroughly Je\v, that shortly tliey re- turned to the city, and having "prepared further spices and ointments, they rested the Sabbath-day, according to the com- mandment." That Sabbath-day, April 8, a.d. 30, Jesus spent in Joseph's sepulclue. PAKT VIII. TIIE IlESTJEEECTION OF JESUS AKD SUBSEQUENT EVENTS. FORTY DAYS— FROM APRIL 9 TO MAY 19, A.D. 30. I. It was a remarkable Sabbath. The crucified men had been removed, Jesus had been buried, the Temple worship had been re- sumed, going forward as it had gone for several -. ^„ ^ centuries, and the church party would fain have after crucifixion. ' i ./ had everything move on as if nothing had hap- pened. But a great storm had swept the popular mind. Pilate must have been moody and disturbed. The disciples of Jesus could have had little heart for the Temple services. They loved the buried Jesus, and although all their hopes of him and much of their faith in his sagacity must have disappeared, their hearts were buried in the new sepulchre of Joseph of Arimathsea. The priests had two things to trouble them. There was the rent veil of the Temple. In the dying agony of Jesus had come a con- vulsion which had torn that veil from top to bottom and laid the Holiest of Holies open. That must have been an appalling sight. His body might be removed from the sepulchre, and thus faith in his resurrection be encouraged. That was an anxiety. More- over, these politicians recollected what his disciples had forgot- ien — his own prophecy of his resurrection. Their recollections of his prophecies were accurate, and they supposed his disciples were as cunning as themselves, and they knew what they would do under similar circumstances. That was the second trouble. "When the Sabbath was past, the chief priests and Pharisees THE KESUKRECTION OF JESUS. C87 went to Pilate and said, " Sir, we remember that that deceiver said, while he was yet alive, 'After three days I will rise again.' Command, therefoi'e, that the sepnlchre be made secure until the third day, lest his disciples come ® , ^^^^ ^ ^^ 1 •! 1 II' 1 1 guarded, by night and steal him away, and say unto the people that he is risen from the dead, and so the last deceit be worse than the iirst." Pilate could have been in no sweet mood, but there was no reason why he should not grant their request lie had been forced by them to consent to the death of the young teacher: he might as well yield this also. He cared nothing for the result, and could have taken no interest in the predictions of a man whom he regarded as a harmless and unfortunate fanatic, lie was cross. Yes, they shall have a guard, these mad priests who are frightened by a dead peasant ! If it gratifies them to make fools of themselves they may do so : he will not hinder ! lie said to them, " Ye shall have a watch : go your way, make it as sure as you can." So they went and made the tomb secure, roll- ing up a stone to its mouth, and sealing it. The Poinan guard took possession of the sepulchre. In the mean time Mary of Magdala and other women, knowing that the burial of Jesus by Joseph and Nicodemus had been hur- ried, although decent, had gone out on Saturday evenino, the Sabbath being past, and had pro- P'-eparations f or i" ^ ' ° "■ ..' . - ^ „ embalming. cured SM'cct spices, and were waiting anxiously tor the morning which should follow the Sabbath, that they might go and anoint the precious body, performing love's last offices before Jesus should be left, as they supposed, to lie forever in that grave. They knew nothing of the government seal on the tomb, and nothing of the Poman guard. They knew that there was a great stone at the mouth of the se])nlchre. As, at earliest dawn, they approached the garden they cpiestioned how they should remove the stone so as to proceed with the embalming. Then they felt a preternatural shaking of the ground beneath their feet. Then, as they looked towards the sepulchre, there was a preternatural light. There had been an earthquake. The stone had been thro^v•n down. An apparition as of an angel sat on the stone. His appearance had so frightened the Poman guard that they had fallen like dead men. Jesus had disappeared from the tomb. The guard had not Been him. The great stone had not detained him. His earliest biographers give no intimation of the hour of the resurrection. 688 THE RESUEEECTION OF JESUS lie was abroad at dayliglit. They represent Iiim as having liad frequent intercourse with them for forty days, in which he gives them no intimation of the hour of his resurrection. It was be- tween Friday's sunset and Sunday's sunrise. Wlien he K>6e he did not show himself to the guard : the fii-st fright they had was from tlie angel. lie did not show himself to any one until after the women had visited the sepulclire. There is almost no twilight in Palestine. It is dark ; a glim- mer comes in the eastern skies; then the sun bounds forth. It M'as 3'et dai-k as the women came near enough to the sepulchre to see that the stone was o-one from women. ^ ^ _ ^ _ " its mouth. A terrible suspicion flashed on the mind of the devoted Mavy of Magdala, that the beloved body had been stolen b}' the nuilignant enemies of Jesus, and she could not conjecture what outi-ages might have been committed on it. In her grief and indignation she rushed back to communicate the horrible news to John, with whom Peter then happened to be. The other women — Mary, Salome, and Joanna — entered. They do not seem to have noticed the angel until they had ascertained the absence of Jesus. They were sorely per- , , plexed. Perhaps they had ccone into an inner sepulchre. ■"■ i j » chamber of the tomb, and returned, after finding that the corpse was missing, when the angel i-evealed himself to them. Luke says there were two angels, or rathei-, " tAvo men in long shining garments." The women were afraid. They bowed their heads. The angel said, " Do not be afi-aid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was c]-ucified. Why do you seek the living among the dead ? lie is not here. lie is risen, as he said. Come and see the ])lace where they laid him." lie showed them the spot, and the grave-clothes lying in order, and then said, " Pemember how he spoke to you when he was yet in Galilee, saying that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinfnl men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again." The women then dis- tinctly recalled that })rediction. The angol added, " Go your way quickly, and tell his disciples, even Peter, that he is risen from the dead, and goes before you into Galilee. There you shall see him, as he said p " " to 3'ou." The women started off towards the city, full of mingled fear and joy. They seem to have missed another party now approaching the sepulchre. AND SUBSEQUENT EVENTS. - 6S9 Wlien Mary of Magdala had reached the city slie flew to ^he house of John, with whom Peter was, and rusliing in breathlessly exclaimed, " Tliey have taken away the Lord out ,. , , 1 , , , 1 j^i John and Peter, uL the sepulchre, and we know not where they have laid him." This was startling news. Both the men rose and went out to tJie sepulchre. Peter had not yet learned that a special message had been sent to him. lie had behaved so Ijasely that he did uot feel as if he were of the number of the disciples. But he had repented, and he loved the brotherhood of the disciples, and he loved his dead blaster, and he would gladly nuike amends for his denials by devotion to the corpse of Jesus. Still the burden of the bad memory was on him. lie did not go as fleetly as John. Both ran ; but John reached the sepulchre tirst. There a reverent awe checked him. lie kneeled down and looked at the grave- clothes. Peter followed, and went right in. There lay the shroud wrapped nj), and the napkin, which ])erhaps Mary of Magdala had wound about his juangled head. Everything was orderly. IIo had been taken away by neither friends nor foes. The former would have had no care for the clothes, or have uot removed them ; the latter wcKild have torn them away carelessly. It looked as if Jesus had risen and carefully fi)lded and laid away the garments of the grave, wherewith the hands of respect and love had wrapped him. Peter induced John to follow him, Peter was puzzled. In John tliere began to spring up some faith. " lie saw and be- lieved ; " for as yet, according to John's own testimony, " they did not know the scripture, that he must rise again from the dead." Then they left the sepulchre and went home. But Mary of Magdala stood without at the sepulchre, wee})ing. The men might go, but she lingered about the spot whei-e she hud last seen the body of him whom she loved with all her heart and soul. She was alone. Hers . ' ■ <=> was an absorbing love and an absorbing grief. She gazed through her tears down into the sepulchre where the dear Jesus had been laid. She was flooded with sorrow. She saw the two. angels in white, but she had no attention to give to even angels, Nothing in heaven or earth could interest her but Jesus. They said to her, '•' Woman, -why are you weeping ? " She could not be astonished or frightened even by so brilliant an apparition as two angels ; but she was ready to burst forth when the subject of her love was 44 690 THE KESUERECTION OF JESUS tonched. She sobbed out, " Because they have taken a"way my Lord, and I know not where they have Laid him ! " What marvellous beauty of lovmg is here ! " My Lord ! " It was the emphasis of appropriating affection. lie was hers more than he was any other's. She loved him more than any other woman or any man loved him. And he had done everything for her. She did not ask the angels for any consolation ; she was inconsolable. She turned to go, and through her tears she saw a man standing in the garden. She scarcely looked at him. One man filled her heart and brain and eyes, and he was dead, and his dear body was stolen. When the stranger asked her, " Why do you weep i^ whom do you seek ? " she thought it was the gardener, and that he mnst know all about it. Her reply Avas, " Sir, if you have borne him hence, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away ! " "Wliat marvellous beauty of loving is here ! " Ilim " — as if every- body must know Mary's " him ! " If it were not considered meet for his corpse to be in that garden because he had e sees esus. ^.^^^ ^^ ^ malefactor — although she felt that that body, if laid down on God's throne, would sweeten all heaven — • she would take it away to' some place Avliere, withont interruption, he might sleep the sleep of death, and she might weep the tears of the dying. She had not turned to gaze full on the speaker. It was Jesus, and she did not know it. He said to her, " Mary ! " h\ his lifetime it is probable that he had never called the other Marys with the tone in which he was accustomed to pronounce her name, the poor dear friend whom he had brought out of the darkness of insanity with the marvellous liglit of his love. The syllables in the familiar tone thrilled her. She turned. She saw him. She knew it was Jesus. She sprang towards him saying, " Rabboni." It seems that she would have embraced him, but Jesus checked her. He said, " Touch me not, for I am not yet ascended to my Father : but go to my brethren and say unto them that I ascend unto my Father and your Father, to my God and your God." Mary left him. Her love was obedient. The brilliant moment was past. She might not see him again, but he was alive. He was to meet the brethren in Galilee. He was not Her obedience. ^,^^ Comforter ; he had not yet come in that cha- racter, as he had promised his disciples, becanse he had not yet Aim SUBSEQUENT EVENTS. C91 as2ended to the Father. So Mary of ]\Iagdala, lovingest of women, out of whom Jesus had cast seven devils, and into whom seven angels had come, sad Mary, glad Maiy, left her Lord and went about the errand on which he sent her. The interview was exceedingly brief. Before the other women could j-each the city, Jesus was with them. lie mot them. lie saluted them with "All hail!" Combining the accounts given by Mark and Matthew, a very natii- '^^^ '^^^^'^ ^^ ral history seems to me to be this : The women had entered the sepulchre and seen where Jesus lay ; then they had the vision of the angels ; then they went out " quickly " and fled from the sepulchre, for they trembled and were amazed, " and departed with fear and great joy." Leaving the sepulchre in great agitation, they may have wandered off from the city quite as naturally as towards it ; but recalling the message of the angel to the disciples, their joy pi'edominated ; their mental equipoise began to return. To make up the lost time, they began to run, and thus they met Jesus. They knew him at once. As soon as he saluted them they fell at his feet, clasping them and rendering him hom- age, lie permitted in them what he had forbidden in Mary of Magdala. Their worship and their feelings were quite different from those of the loving Mary. Jesus soothed them, saying, " Bo not afraid ; go tell the brethren that I go into Galilee, and there shall they see me." As the M'omen went to bear this message to the disciples, some of the watch went to report to the Pharisees, and to consult for their own safety. The Sanhedrim assembled. The The watch soldiers probably told the facts as they occurred. The council was driven to desperation. They had hoped that the money given Judas should end the matter. Now there must be more bribery. They gave the soldiers " uirge money," as our common version has it ; " sufficient silver pieces " it is in the ori- ginal. They instructed them what to say ; it was this : " His dis- ciples came by night and stole him away while we slept." They a.so pledged themselves to stand between them and Pilate, if a report of the affair should reach the governor's ears. We can readily account for the mental and moral temper of the majoi-it}' of the Sanhedrim. A course of crime . had blunted their sensibilities. It was natural that they should offer money to the soldiers. It was natural thai 692 THE KESUKRECTION OF JESUS tlie soldiers should accept it. Their case was this : having dis- charged their duty faithfully, they M'ere in such circumstancea that if tried by a military court they would he executed. Csesar would take no " angel " for an excuse. They had suffered the government seal to be violated. They had committed a military crime. If brought to trial their doom was sealed. They would better make all out of their circumstances that could be made. They took the money, and took the pledge of the priests, and went off and awaited events. But there is no evidence that these soldiers ever told to a mili- tary tribunal what the Sanhedrim put into their mouths. They could not be worse men than the priests, and not such fools as to tell a lie that would convict them. It is quite probable that they repeated the stupid falsehood to some of the populace, in the presence of some of the priests, to mcike good their bargain. The priests would use it among the vulgar people, and thus the report would gain currenc}^ among the Jews. But the soldiers would not have said so if arrested. " AVe slept : " that was a crime for which death would be inflicted, according to imperial law. " They stole : " how could men tell what was done, or who did it, while they were asleep ? But it is quite easy to see why the soldiers did as they were taught : there was in that direc tion some possibility of escape, but none in any other. That the body of Jesus could not have been stolen by any one, a very slight inspection of the facts must show. If stolen, it was by friends or by foes, by the Jewish authorities or by The Body not . ■,••-, mi _c ^^ .i . i •/ . J tlie disciples, Ihe former could not have taken it ; for if they had, they would have made an exhibi- tion of the corpse after three days, and thus secured a complete demolition of the claims of Jesus. The disciples could not have done so. The presence of the dead body would be a perpetual reminder of the death of their hopes. There would be no stimu- lus in that. They had no conceivable reason for stealing the body. If they had, they could not have accomplished it. They were too few to overpower the guard. If they had made the attack some would have been at least wounded, and perhaps killed, and the uproar would have aroused the city. But this is not charged. It is unreasonable to suppose that all the guard were asleep at once, and that at that juncture the disciples stole the body. That would have involved the breaking of the government seal on a niglit AND SUBSEQUENT EVENTS. 693 \vlie:i the moon was at its full, and the citj was crowded, and the popnlace was excited. If that had occurred the discii>les would have been prosecuted. But tliey never were prosecuted. The testimony of the soldiers would then have been called into court, and that would have acquitted the disciples and covered tlie San- hedrim with shame. There were in the Sanhedrim a few who believed in Jesus, and to them — to such men as Joseph and Nicodemus, for instance — the early historians must have been indebted for a narrative of what had passed in the Sanhedrim, including their infamous and stupid proposition to the soldiers. When the women returned and made their report the disciples did not believe ; but what the women said seemed to them like " crazy talk." That afternoon two disciples left Jerusalem to walk to Em- mans, a village seven miles distant. The name of one is preserved. It was Cleoiias ; but we know not who he was. mi 1 1111 IIP 1 0^ t^^ '^^y ^ lliey started probably about halt-past three -Emmaus o'clock, after the evening sacrifice. They had iieard the reports which seemed to have been circulated among the friends of Jesus, that the sepulchre was empty. As tliey walked they conversed npon the subject nearest to all their hopes and fears and interests, the dead Jesus, and what had happened in the three eventful days. They were perplexed. They "reasoned.'' They were probably striving to reconcile the apparentl}' conflicting facts, the claims of Jesus and his manifest power, with the igno- minious death which he had suffered. Jesus drew near and walked with them ; but they were so absorbed that they did not notice him. He spoke to them respectfully in such a way as not to be offen- sive even in a stranger. " What are these words that ye exchange one with another as ye walk ? " Lnke saj^s that ,, , 1.1 PI 11 mi The interesting " tliey stood with sorrowful countenances. fhey gfj-an^-er looked at Jesus, but did not recognize him. The same historian says, " their eyes were holden that they should not know him." Mark says that Jesus "appeared in another form unto them." It is to be noticed that some change must have passed in the appearance of his person. Xone of his friends recognized him immediately on first sight ; but none failed to recognize him afterwards. Who can tell what that chano^e was ? It was hia 694 THE EESURKECTION OF JESUS o^vn body. They all saw, and some touclied him. Was the gross- ness of the material body disappearing, and the fineness of tlie spiritual body coming forth ? But we are to record only what are the facts in the case. When Jesus asked his question the two disciples looked at him. There was nothing in the appearance of this stranger to make him seem a suspicious person, to be avoided, and tlie Grief of the dis-, , r- i • .r^'• . , tone and manner oi his respectful inquiry com- mended him to the confidence which these simple- hearted men gave him. Cleopas replied : " Are you the only so- journer in Jerusalem w^ho has not known these things that have come to pass there in these days ? " It was a polite reflection on his apparent ignorance. " What things ? " asked the stranger, to draw him out. One of them answered, " Concerning Jesus the ISTazarene, who was a man, a prophet mighty in act and speech before God and all the people ; and how the chief priests and our rulers delivered him to be condemned to death and have crucified him." And then,, running out into confidential lamentations to the attentive and sympathizing stranger, the speaker continued : " But w^e hoped that it had been he who was about to redeem Israel ; yet, for all these hopes, this is the third day since these things were done. Besides, certain women of our company astounded us, who were early at the tomb, and not having found his body they returned, saying that they had seen a vision of angels, who say that he is living. And certain of those with u?. went to the tomb and found it thus, according also as the women had said : but him they saw not ! " The stranger had completely won their confidence and tested the genuineness of their grief, their faith, their love, and their fears. Tliey had even confessed themselves disciples of the pro- phet who had seemed to have failed, whose ignominious execution had blasted their hopes but not their affection. Tliey even ad- mitted him to a knowledge of what was passing in the inner circle of the friends of the crucified Jesus. These simple-hearted pea- sants were the first confessors. Then Jesus replied, " O thoughtless and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken ! Ought not ., , ,. . , The Christ to have suffered these thino^s and to the two disciples. o enter his glory ? " They supposed their Master to be The Christ of God : if so, the books held to be sacred writings AND SUBSEQUENT EVENTS. G95 by the Jewish people pointed to just such a course of affairs as had happened to Jesus. Then he began with Moses, and running through liis writings and those of their prophets, he exphiincd to these simple men that those very things which had shaken their confidence should be confirmatory of the faith of all those who understood and believed the Holy Scriptures. AVe can never know what special passages Jesus quoted and expounded in this conversation ; but it is not difficult now to see how the whole sys- tem of worship instituted under Moses can be made liighly typical of what happened to Jesus, to the minds of tliose who believe in him. It was new light to these simple but thouglitful men, and they received it gladly. Upon reaching the house where they were to abide, Jesus was about to take his leave and pass on. But he had been so cliarm- ino; a talker, his frlowino; eloquence had so M'on o 1 Jesus reveula the hearts of his two ingenuous listeners, that they jjj^gelf urged him to stay with them. lie consented. When the meal was spread Jesus assumed the host's place. As they reclined at the table he took bread and uttered the usual thanksgiving, which, according to the Jewish ritual, Avas obliga- tory where three ate together. There was something in the tone, or there was some change come over Jesus, which caused them to recognize their dear dead friend, or, perhaps, as he broke the bread they saw his wounded hands. " Their eyes were opened," says Luke. At that instant Jesus became invisible to them. This can scarcely be regarded as the history of a subjective process on their part. That both should see the same man, and hear the same words throuo-h a Ions: discourse, and see him as they prepared the meal, and behold and hear him while uttering the thanksgiving, and both lose sight of him at once, and the whole be a mere subjective fancy of both minds, is not at all in accordance with the well-known laws of our intellectual constitu- tion. His disappearance is not explained. Then they said to eacli other, " Did not our hearts burn M'ithin us as he talked to us by the way, and opened the Scriptures to us ? " They were so excited at what had happened ,,,,, ,, They return to tliat they arose and returned to Jerusalem. It ,^ ., must have been night; but enough was happening to draw the little circle closer together. When Clcopas and his 3ompanion reached the city they found the eleven Apostles to- 696 THE EESURRKCTION OF .TESVS getlier and others of the disciples. As soon as they entered some one said to them, " The Lord is risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon." And perhaps all the strange occurrences of the day, so far as they knew them, were rehited by the company to the two who liad just come from Enmiaus. We do not know when this appearance to Peter occnrred. It was some time since morning, of conrse ; but wdiether it was liefore or after the revelation of himself to the Emmaus Jesus appears ,. . , , r ... -r, ^ ,, ^ disciples, we have no means or ascertammiy. it to Peter. ^ - _ *=> mio-lit have been after. There was time enouij-h. The company were evidently greatly excited by the appearance to Peter. In an earlier part of tlie day he may have gone to the sepulchre, or he may have been wandering about the suburbs or through the sti'cets, very disconsolate and uiiha])py. Xone of the disciples liad as mnch cause for sorrow as he. lie had denied his Lord and broken into profanity. The last look which Jesus gave liim must have haunted him. Even if his Master had risen from the dead, would he appear to him ? lie had forfeited his place. Perhaps none of his brother Apostles knew how basely he had acted: but Jesus did. Would he allow poor Simon to fall peni- tently at his feet?- ^Nothing can be more beautiful or appropriate than these first appearances of Jesus. lie first shows himself to the grief of love in Mary of ]\Iagdala. lie next shows liimself to the grief of per- plexity in the two Emmaus disciples. lie then shows himself to the grief of penitence in Peter. It was all in beautiful consis- tency with the charactei- he had displayed thi-ough his whole career. After the assembly had informed Clcopas and his companion of what was known in Jerusalem, they, in turn, gave an account of their interview with Jesus in Emmaus and on the way thither, and especially told of how Jesus was made known to them in the breaking of bread. There was great incredulity in the company, and much perplexity. They all believed that he was no longer in the sepulchre; but his appearance to Mary and the other women, and Simon, who professed to have seen him, seemed to tliem like hallucination. The story told by the Emmaus disciples increased the perplexity of the company. Jesus was seen so often, in such difierent places, so near the same time, and vanishing so strangely. It began to be frightful. It suggested spiritual appearances They were mournfully disturbed. AND SUBSEQUENT EVENTS. 697 It was probably the fii*st time they liad been gathered together since the sup]ier with Jesus on Thursday night. They were afraid of the church authorities, and so the doors were shut. Just when tliey were in most peri^lexity by - Jf^ ,.^^.^^™ '^ i 1 -^ -^ of the disciples. all these narratives of preternatural tilings, Jesus suddenly appeared in their midst. AVhether he opened the door, or was admitted by the doorkeeper, who might have seen that it was Jesus, or whether it was accomplished in some way still " unknown to our philosophy," we cannot say. Here is the simple historical statement. It shows that he was no lonijer in the irrave, but was in bodily intercourse with the disciples. As he entered he said : " Peace to you ! " It was his usual salutation. But they w^ere terrified and affrighted. They thought they saw a spirit, a phantasm, a ghost, something produced preternaturally. Their nerves were unstrung by the events of the day. They were so agitated that they did not notice his salutation. Tie said to them: "Why are you troubled? And why do rea- sonings arise in your hearts ? " He saw that they regarded him as some strange " ai)pearance " merely. He re- j , 1 r i 1 T • . 1 1 Jesus in their proved them tor not believing the men and women ^ , . who had seen him and had reported his resurrec- tion, thus preparing them for his coming into their midst. He exhibited the wounds which they knew he had received in cruci- fixion. " Behold my feet and my hands, that it is I myself : handle me, and see : for a spirit has not flesh and bones as you see me have." Whether they touched him or not we do not knoAv ; they might have done so. But they were overjoyed; they were too glad to believe ; they were full of wonder. The sight of Jesus was first terrible, and then glorious. They were in a state of great mental agitation, described very naturally by these intelligent historians. They behaved just as people would behave who were not playing a part or posturing for effect. Jesus said very simply, " Have you anything to eat here ? " They gave him some broiled fish and some honey-comb. He took them and ate, the whole company beholding him. And while eating, he said to them : " These are ^^ ^^*^ ^'^^ the words which I spoke to you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled which are written in the law of Moses, and in the Prophets, and in the Psalms, eon- 698 THE KESUEKECTION OF JESUS cerning me." These are the parts into which thej ■were accus- tomed to classify the canonical Scriptures, He showed that they all pointed to his death and resurrection. lie assisted them, opening their understanding, that they might know what the Scriptures meant in passages which had been sealed to them. He concluded by adding, " Thus it is "written that Tlie Christ should suffer, and rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance for tlie remission of sins should be proclaimed in his name among all the nations, bco;innini]i: at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things : and, behold, I send the promise of the Father upon you : but tarry in the city until you be endued witli power from on high." He cleared up for them a point whicli was greatly dark to the Jewish mind, namely, that Tlie Christ, the Messiah of God, should be a sufferer. They had so thoroughly misread the Scrij^tures. AVe need not be surprised at that, when we see how traditional readings of the New Testament come to have such influence on men, that when one gives a natural and consistent interpretation it often seems a shocking innovation. His com- mand to remain in Jerusalem must be understood as making that their centre and headquarters, as we soon see them ordered to Galilee for a season. John records that Jesus again said, " Peace unto you ! As my Father has sent me, I also will send you." And then he breathed on them, and said: " Receive the Holy Spiiit. If you remit the sins of any, they shall be remitted to them ; and if you retain the sins of any, they are retained." The act of breathing seems s^^mbolical. These men wei-e from that time very different from the men they had been before. They were wiser, better, deeper, more holy men. The last words are not to be interpreted as conferring upon any corpoi-ate body of officials the authority to bind upon their fellow-men the sins of whicli they have been guilty, and to forgive authoritatively all whom tli'ey choose to forgive. The meaning of these words, which are here repeated, having been used before, we have discussed their significance on pp. 421, 422. In addition we may add, (1) That the company addressed were not the twelve Apostles, because there were other persons present to whom the Holy Spirit was given, if given to so u ion. ^^^^^^ ^^^ J ^^^j^^ received this authority quite as much as the Apostles, of whom there were only ten present, the place of AND SUBSEQUENT EVENTS. 699 Judas II. not having been filled, and Thomas Dldymns being ab- sent. (2) Moreover, there is not the slightest historical evidence that any of this company, whether disciples or Apostles, ever, separately or conjointly, attempted to exercise ^vhat came long afterward, in churchly corruptions, to be called " Absolution." This pretence of priestcraft rests itself altogether on a misrepre- sentation of this passage. AVe do not know why Thomas Avas absent. There is no special blame to be attached to him. He loved Jesus. He was so de- voted to him that when Jesus proposed to return ^^^^^^ j^^^^^. into Judsea, to visit the bereaved family of Laza- ^^^ rus, Thomas proposed to accompany him and die with him (see p. 497). The very love and distress which brought the others together may have kept Thomas apart. He was thor- oughly stunned by the blow. There seemed nothing left to him. He was of that temperament which has its grief aggravated by seeing the grief of others. AVhen the disciples had been lifted into a great joy by seeing their Master, they f(Kmd Thomas and told him all. They had refused to believe the women ; but they had accepted the testimony of Peter and the two disciples from Ennnaus, before Jesus appeared to them. Thomas declined the combined testimony of the whole body of women and men that professed to have seen Jesus. We may assign many and very diverse reasons for this incredu- lity, without supposing Thomas extraordinarily skeptical. It may have been partly wounded love, or love that felt that the news was too good to be true. His associates were compelled to ac- knowledge that Jesus had come to them very much after the manner of an apparition, and that his appearance was changed. They may have confessed that they had not touched their Mas- ter. They could not convince Thomas throughout all that week. To their repeated representations Thomas at last gave his decided answer : " Unless I shall see in his hands the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe.-' He was all the week in this unhappy state of mind. If his friends were mis- taken, they were at least happy. Another Sabbath passed, and another Sunday. On Sunday evening the friends of Jesus were collected again. Thomas was now with them. Jesus suddenly stood in their midst, as he had done eight nights before. He repeated the usual salutation, 700 THE EESUERECTION OF JESUS " Peace unto you ! " Then turning at once to Thomas, he said, " Reach hither thy finger, and see ray hands ; and reach hitlier thj hand, and thrust it into my side, and be not faith- _ V. 1 „ less, but believing." Thomas had ffazed at liim through all this speech. It was not a ghost. It was not a phantasm. It was The Master. However changed, it was undoubtedly he. Thomas knew the voice. The Master had not met nuj of the disciples during the intervening week, else they would have told Thomas, Now Jesus knew his very thoughts, and repeated his very words, and offered himself to the very test which Thomas had proposed. Thomas believed of Jesus three things at once — that he retained his personality ; tluat he could be where he w^ould at any moment ; and that he knew all things. The whole infidelity of Thomas broke down at once. He ac- knowledged all. The resurrection of Jesus was an accomplished fact. Here were the pierced hands, and ankles, and side. He was omnipresent. He was omniscient. All their preconceptions of their Master were below the fact. He was very God. Thomas worshipped him, calling him " My God." Jesus recog- nized the faith of Thomas in his Godhead as correct, and while receiving the homage due only to God, he administered a mild rebuke for the slowness of the faith of Thomas : " Thomas, you have believed because you have seen me : blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed." II. All these six appearances of Jesus had occurred in or near Je- nisalem. It bound the disciples into a company of believers. But as yet they had no plan. The eleven Apos- Gaiii^ ^°^ ^^"^ ties left the metropolis for Galilee (Matt, xxviii. 16), whether at the immediate direction of Jesus or at the promptings of prudence we have no means of knowing. But at the last supper he had said to them w^ords which were then incomprehensible : " After I am risen again I will go before yon onto Galilee " (Mark xiv. 28). And the angel at the sepulchre had reminded the women of that promise, and directed them to " tell his disciples, and Peter, that he goeth before you unto Galilee." (See p. 689.) They would prudently remain in Jerusalem until the close of the Passover. They would then follow the directiou AUTD SUB&ilQUENT EVENTS. 701 of Jesus, and go back to their old homes in Galilee. Beyond that they had no direction, except the knowledge of the fact that they Avcre to come hack to Jernsalem and await the gift of the Holy Spirit, They did not know when that should occur ; in point of fact it did not occur until about two months afterward. AVhile waiting for the reappearance of their Lord, and further direi;- tions, they naturally resumed their old employment on which their livelihood depended. One evening, on the shoi-e of the Sea of Tiberias, Simon Peter said he should go a lishing. Thomas Didymus, ajid Kathanael of Cana, and James and John, and two other Apostles, who are not named, were of the company. These seven were all experienced fishermen, but they toiled all night and caught nothing. At break of day Jesus was standing on the shore ; but they did not recognize him. It is related of each appearance of Jesus after his resurrection that he M'as not recognized at lirst . , , , . , . . ,. . 1 mi Jesus by the Sight by Jus most mtnnate inends. Uiey saw . ^ the stranger, standing on the shore, as an early purchaser of iish might be who stood where he saw the men fish- ing and awaited an opportunity to buy. At last he said, "Chil- dren, have you any meat ? " The form of the question would not arouse the suspicion that it was Jesus. They answered, " jN'o." lie said totliem, ''Cast the net on the right side of the ship and you shall find." Even this did not reveal Jesus. Any man acquaint- ed with the lake might have detected from the sh(jre some sign of fish which had eluded their weary eyes. It was an easy thing to do ; so they followed the stranger's direction, and they were not able to draw the net for the nniltitude of the fishes. John's quick eye fii'st recognized Jesus. lie said to Peter, " It is the Lord." Since the crucifixion these two men, so much un- like, each having what the other lacked, had been drawn into a very close companionship. They we)'e in a boat together. Peter, always impulsive, ])ullcd on his fisher's coat to go to Jesus. The vessel was about three hundred feet from the shoi-c. The other disciples came up to the help of J ihn, and they dragged the net and the fishes up near enough to the shore to secuj-e them. Upon landing they saw a fire of coals, and fish thereon, and bread. Jesus directed them to bring of the fish they liad just taught; and Simon Peter, perhaps now recollecting how he had abandoned John, promptly obeyed the command, and landed the t02 THE RESUEKECTION OF JESUS unbroken net witli its contents of one liundred and fifty-three great fishes. Jesus then said, '^ Come and dine." Jesus divided the bread and the fish. It was a silent meal. A tender awe was on the company. The disciples knew it was " the Lord," as they had now learned to call him, but they asked him no questions. "When all had eaten, Peter, who since his denial of liis Master must have felt that he had largely lost the confidence of his asso- ciates, and must have felt very uncomfortable as to the opinion which Jesus had of him, was called to endure a painful ordeal, which resulted, however, in the re-es- tablishment of his confidence in Jesus and of the confidence of his brethren in him. Jesus said to him, " Simon, son of Jonas, do you love me more than these?" This must have recalled to him his boastful professions compared with their reserve, and his cowardl}' desertion compared with their fidelity. His reply was, " Yes, Lord ; you know that I love you." lie does not now re^t the proof of his devotion on bragging professions of what he woi Id do, but upon the consciousness of his Master, who must havi believed, notwithstanding the dark passage of his momen- tary weakness, that Peter loved; or, if he did not, nothing the disci pie could now say would convince him. Jesus replied, " Feed my . ambs." Perhaps a brief silence ensued. Jesus then varied the cuestion, and, looking down into Peter's eyes, said, "Simon, son o'^ Jonas, do you love mef^ Poor Peter had only the same reply to make : " Yes, Lord ; you know that I love you." Jesus said, ' Feed my sheep." After another silence Jesus repeated his questj )n : " Simon, son of Jonas, do you love me ? " All this was passing in the presence of his associate Apostles. Jesus was most tender, but this probing was most painful. But Peter could not complain. Thrice had he denied his Master. The others had not done so. It was not unfair that he should be called upon publicly to make a triple reversal of his triple denial. But it pierced Peter to the heart. This third time he thi-ew his case on the knowledge of his Master. " Lord, you know all things ; you know that I love you." The " all things " involved Peter's denials; but the subject was so distressing to him that he could not speak more specifically of what was so shameful in his his- tory. Then Jesus replied, " Feed my sheep." It was the com- plete restoration of Peter. lie was to be a pastor, an under-shep- herd of the flock of God. AND SUBSEQUENT EVENTS. Y03 Tlien in tenderness, but to lay on the over-ardent temperament ol Peter what should be a balance-Aveight to his character, Jesus intimated to him that he should die a violent death. Jesus had never made a prophecy to gratify curiosity. lie would never be classed with fortune- tellers and mag-icians. But he said to Peter, as indicating his alfection for him and his confidence in him, " Yerily, verily, I say to you, AVlien you were young you girded yourself, and walked whither you would; but when you become old you shall stretch forth 3-our hands, and another shall gird you, and cai-ry you whither you would not go." John, who was present, and who records this saying, adds, "This he spake signifying by what death he (Peter) should glorify God." John understood it, and, of course, Peter did. Perhaps Jesus added some tone or ges- ture or word not recorded, which made his speech perfectly intelligible to the parties concerned. Peter had once said that he would follow Jesus anywhere. Jesus had been crucified. It ^^hould be the fate of Peter to follow his Master even to crucifix- ion, and thus have his Avords verified in a sense he had not meant. Perhaps it was a melancholy comfort to Peter to know that, in any sense, what he had said would come true. Then Jesus rose and said to Peter, " Follow me." Peter looked at his friend John, Avho had risen and followed with him, drawn by his devotion to Jesus and his friendship for Peter. At the last supper John had asked a question of the Master at the suggestion of Peter. Xow Peter asked a (piestion for John : "Lord, and what this man?" It was a question of mere affectionate curiosity. Jesus replied, " If I will that he tari-y till I come, what is it to you ? Do you follow me ! " It recalled Petei* to a sense of his propriety and of his personal responsibility. It told him nothing about the fate of his friend, but the report was circulated among " the brethren " that John should not die. He did live to a great age. lie is the historian of this interview, and adds, "Yet Jesus did not say. He shall not die ; but, // / will that he tarry till I C07ne, ivhat is that to you f " As John's life prolonged itself, that saying of Jesus nnist have come to his recollection very often with veiy great force ; but never perhaps so impressively as when, forty yeai-3 after, he survived the destruction of Jerusalem, a frightful event; Avhich Jesus in his discourses was accustomed to associate with his 704 THE KESUREECTION OF JESUS " coming," We cannot fail to notice the claims which Jesus here makes to a complete control over the periods of men's lives. " I will," as applied to iixing the limits of human life, is the lan- guage of the Almiglity God, and is blasphemy in the mouth of any one who is not God. III. It appears from Matthew's account (xxviii. IC) that Jesus had api^ointed a time and a place in Galilee to meet his followers. _ We know of the time only that it was within Tabor. . foi-ty daj's after the resurrection. The place was a mountain. It would seem that Mount Tabor would be the most convenient place for such an assemblage. The fact that it was inhabited is against the theory of those who would make it the scene of the Transfiguration, but is rather in favor of its se- lection for this meeting, as the inhabitants were Galilaeans, and would be at least not unfriendly to the followers of Jesus. Tabor is six miles east of Nazareth. " Northward it overlooks all tho confronting highlands of Galilee ; southward it extends far down into the plain of Jezreel " (Lange). On the top is a table about a mile and a half in circumference. This is the only occasion mentioned by any Evangelist which can correspond with a fact mentioned by Paul in his first letter to tlie Corinthians (xv. 6). ''' lie was seen of Five hundred , f-iiiii «x ii brethren at once ^"^ove live hundred brethren at once. It would seeiti that the Apostles had been at pains to make this appointment known to all who might be supposed to be, in any sense, disciples of Jesus. It ^vas a large gathering. Afterwards, in Jerusalem, this company mustered only one hun- dred and twenty. While in Galilee, and before this meeting, the Apostles had doubtlessly been industriously repeating the narra- tive of all the strange occurrences of the resurrection and the j-epeated appearances of Jesus. Thomas had most probably been giving an account of his mental processes by which he had gone over from despondent unbelief to exultant faith in Jesus as God, and had told how he had worshipped Jesus, and how the Master had received the homage due only to God. Jesus appeared in their midst. No account has been preserved of his manner of approach. ^V^hen they saw him the body of the Bion. AND SUBSEQUENT EVENTS. 705 disciples worshipped him. But some hesitated. In the common version it is said some " doubted " (Matt, xxviii. 17). But this is not the meaning of the word. None doubted jeeua reappears. tJiat this M'as Jesus. They all knew him, and had nil met at this time, on this mountain, at his appointment. But it is most reasonable to suppose that among five hundred persons there should be several who had the temperament of Thomas, and were slow to worship. The historian, who was present, does not say that all worshipped, but he does frankly state that " some hesitated." Jesns met these doubts as to his divinity with a vast claim. He approached the doubters and said, " All power is given to me in heaven and on earth." He claimed to be al- .1 mi 1 11 .^ ' 1 The commifl- nnghty. These words could mean nothing else to the listeners. They must believe that, or thc}^ could never undertake the great work he was about to place in their hands. This was the commission: "Go, make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit : Teaching them to ob- sei-ve all things, whatever I have connnanded you: And lo, I am with you every day till the consumnuition of the present seon." Of this commission se\eral things are to be noticed. 1. It was the last word of Jesus recorded by his biographers. It was the commitment of his cause into the hands of his friends. It is his last protest ao-ainst churchli- , , The last record • ness. There were the Seventy, who had had a ^^ ^^^^ special work to do, and had done it. There were the Twel\e, who were still to continue in that work of an itine- rant proclamation of the gospel of the kingdom of Jesus. But neither to the Seventy nor to the Twelve does Jesus grant any corporate powers. A\1iut the Seventy had done, and what tho Twelve had to do, all his discijtles were authorized to do, wher- ever their sphere and whatever their condition in life. All these live hundred might make disciples and baptize them, and all these, when made disciples, might in their turn perform the same offices for others. No word or act of Jesus, before or after liis resurrection, can be fairly employed to sustain the modern arti- ficial distinction between "clergymen" and "laymen." 2. Jesus gives the name of God in the synonym of "The 45 706 THE KESUKKECTION OF JESUS Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit." He believed that there is one God. He called himself the Son. He claimed to be God in his oneness with " The Father," in his omnipotence, His concep o -^^ j^j^ Qjjmipj-esence, and in his eternal existence. He allowed his disciples to present to him the worship proper to be rendered to Jehovah. His concept of God was of a-triunitj. This is quite manifest. The mode of the existence of this oneness and this threcness together he never dis- cusses. God is the Father, God is the Son, God is the Holy S})irit : The Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God. But he does not say that there are three persons, or three several forms of the exhibition of one person. He makes no dog- matic statement. As this is not a theological treatise, but rather a psychological essay, we have nothing to do with theological sci- entific explanations. But the historical statement is that, in point of fact, in the mind of Jesus the concept of God was that of a triunity. As the Jews were "baptized unto Moses," and so incorporated with that system of religion which is represented under the He- brew theocracy, the kingliness of the One Jehovah, so now the disciples of Jesus are to be ba[)tized unto "The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit," and incorporated into that system of religion which is represented by the triple concept of God as being Father and Son and Spirit, the living lovingness of the One Jehovah. 3. Jesus removed all restrictions to the labors of his disciples, such as are recorded in Matthew x. 5. His gospel is to be preached to all nations. He has so succeeded in this that All restrictions ^^.^ ^^,^ unable to appreciate, even by an effort of removed. , . n i . i i . i • the nitellect, what a stupendous undertakmg it was. All other systems are suited to nationalities. They there- fore intensified all the narrowness of race, and that narrowness helped to perpetuate them. Kone did so more than the Jewish church. To put Samaritans and Romans and Greeks and distant barbarians on the same footing of spiritual privilege as the elect Jewish race was an idea so wide that it had never before entered the Jewish mind. Jesus believed that his system was as well adapt- ed to one climate as another, and to one nation as another : to the polytheistical Gentiles as to the monotheistic Jews ; to the power- ful Romans as to the weak Gauls ; to the cultivated Greeks as to the rough savages in the forests of Germany. AlTD SUBSEQUENT EVENTS. 707 It was an idea wholly original with Jesus. lie had no prece- dent, lie had no human authority for it. lie predicted that it should be done. If he had simply delivered a discourse, in which he had tau«jht the desirable- ,. . "^^^^'^^ ^^' lionnn, ness of this univei*sal religion, and that discourse had been preserved, it M'ould have rendered his fame immortal, and have placed him far in advance of all the wisest and most profound of human thinkers. Coming from an unlettered me- chanic, raised in one of the meanest villages of the most narrow and bigoted people on earth, the announcement would have been a mar\el of grandest thought. The more remarkable fact is, that each succeeding century has brought his words nearer to a ful- filment, and that none since his death has contributed so much to their accomplislmient as the present, a century full of hottest political excitements, of vastest enterprises, of most material pro- gress, and laro-est liberality of thouoi-ht. 4. His latest words were a claim and a prediction. They were a claim of perpetuity, of personal presence, and personal influence. lie should exist. He sliould be present with each discii)lc in every part of the world, every day, ,.^^^^^ ^"^ * ., , PI. 1 11 1 prediction, untu the pi-esent system of things shall meet the cataclysm which shall inaugurate another a!on, another system of things. All our new science demonstrates that the Great Creator divides His biography into parts and into chapters. The whole universe, so far as we have been able to read it, is falling forward. Nothing in the past gives us much help towards ascertaining the probable length of the present a3on ; but everything we learn in- creases the probability that some vast change shall come. Everything that Jesus predicted has come to pass, except this, and this is coming to pass. The present age promises that when the last day of the system, of which thoughtful mortals form a part, shall arrive, tliei^e will be ^, ^^^^ '■ . . . filment. disciples of Jesus engaged in his work, according to this prediction. They are now more busy than ever. It is an imi)ortant series of facts that the books which contain the origuial history of Jesus, the record of his acts and words, and the predic- tions wliich he made, constitute the first volume Avliich was set in t^'pe and published at the invention of printing;* that at this * It was issued at Mentz, in Germany, I Revived, says of this book : " Though a in 1450. McOlure, in his Translators I first attempt, it is beautifully printed on 708 THE KESUKKECTIOX OF JE8F8 time there are several presses engaged on each of the continents in printing nothing hut that vohnne ; that it is printed and circulated in more languages and dialects than any other book o" books considered by any criticism as sacred or profane ; * that so soon as a savage tribe is discovered its language is reduced to a grammar, that there shall be translated into it the volume, the central figure of which is Jesus ; that his name occurs more fre- quently in song than that of any other man who e\er lived, and that the eighteenth century after that in which he lived has pro- duced more books investigating his character aiid claims than all the preceding centuries. very fine paper, and with superior ink. At least eighteen copies of this famous edition are known to be in existence at the present time. Twenty-five years ago, one of them, printed on vellum, was sold for five hundred and four pounds sterling ! " * The whole number of languages and dialects into which the Holy Scriptures have been translated is two hundred and fifty-two. Of these, two hundred and five are versions prepared since the ori- gin of Bible Societies, at which time the Scriptures had been translated into only forty-seven different languages. Bagster, in his Blhle of Every Land^ gives specimens of the Scriptures iu various languages and dialects, to the number of about three hundred, includ- ing those which have been printed in different native characters. It is supposed that within three years after the publication of the Great Bible, in 153S, no less thun twenty-one thou- sand copies were printed. Between 1524 and IGll, two hundred and sev- enty-eight editions of Bibles or Testa- ments in English were printed. In 1011, 1612, and 1613, five editions of King James's version were published, besides separate editions of the New Testa- ment ; and we have some slight clue to the size of the editions in the fact, that one person in England has recently col- lated no less than seventy copies of the issues of 1611 ; yet, after all, this wa« the day of small things. Since the beginning of the present, century, the British and Foreign Biblo Society has issued over sixty-three mil- lions of Bibles and Testaments ; tho American Bible Society has issued more than twenty-seven millions of volumes; other Bible Societies, not far from twenty millions ; while private publish- ers in Great Britain, the United States, and elsewhere, have increased these is- sues by scores of millions besides. In speaking on this subject, Anderson, in his Annals of the EiigUnh Dible^ says : ' ' The volumes of the Scriptures which have already been printed cannot be numbered. Hitherto we have num- bered the editions only ; but this is now impossible. No one can say exactly how many editions even of the English Biblo have been published, much less inform us how many copies." The volumes of Holy Writ circulated within the present century are gi'eater in number than all that were in the world from Moses to Martin Luther, and are more than double the entire production of the press, from the print- ing of the first Bible in 1450 to the era of Bible Societies in 1804. (See Man- ual of the Amei-ican Bible Society.) AlfD SUBSEQUENT EVENTS. 709 The Ascension. lY. There 16 but one other thing to record. They all returned to Jerusalem. On the fortieth day after his resurrection, Jesus led them out to the neighborhocxi of Bethany. There, on some part of the Mount of Olives, they saw him for the last time. He blessed them, and while in the act of pro- nouncing his final benediction, he was ])arted from them. lie ascended in their siglit. lie passed into a cloud. The rapt disci|)les stood gazing up into that part of the heavens where they had last beheld their Lord, Suddenl}' two men in white apparel stood beside the silent group, and one said, "Ye men of Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, which is taken from you into heaven, sliall so come iu like man- ner as you have seen him taken into heaven," The disci] )les returned to Jerusalem with great joy. They believed that Jesus, who had departed, was still present, and their sorrow was gojie ; and they who, forty daj's before, were in the darkness of despair, now continually praised God, and waited for the fui-ther direction of Jesus. He had become to tliem tlie glory of heaven and of eartli. * KBDAL roUHO A.T CKFA, BCBIA. 710 THE EEStTRKECnON OF JE8TJ8. Y. Who is this Jesus ? I have told his story as simply and as conscientiously as possi- ble, and have honestly endeavored to apprehend and to repre- sent the consciousness of Jesus at each moment of his career. The work of the historian is completed. Each reader has now the responsibility of saying who he is. All agree that he was man. The finest intellects of eighteen centuries have believed that he was the greatest and best man that ever lived. All who have so believed have become better men therefor. We have seen that he never performed an act or spoke a word which would have been unbecoming in the Creator of the Universe, if the Creator should ever clothe Himself with human flesh. Millions of men — kings, and poets, and historians, and philosophers, and busy merchants, and rude mechanics, and purest women, and simple children — ^liave believed that he is God. And all who have devoutly believed this, and lived by this as a truth, have become exemplary for all that is beautiful in holiness. What is he who can so live and so die as to produce such intel- lectual and moral results ? Header, you must answer APPEIN'DIOES. Chronology of the Bikth of Jesus. — Pp. 26-37. By an inadvertence which I seek to correct in this Appendix, a noto was omitted in the proper place, giving full credit for my obligation tc A ISfew Harmony and Expodtion of the Gox^Jels, by James Strong, LL.D. (published by Carlton & Lanahan, New York), for much aid which I received from that valuable volume in my discussion of the date of the birth of Jesus. Capernaum. — P. 1G7. It should have been stated in the text that the proper name " Na- hum" means " consolation." The reader would naturally infer that if it had any signification it was something else than " consolation." The place may have been named for Nahum, or it may not : if not, then its name simply signified " Village of Consolation." I did not detect this inadvertence until after the page had been stereotyped. Addition to Note on P. 189. Perhaps the avrovg, " them," in Luke v. 17, may refer to o^Xoi •tt'oXXoi, " great multitudes," in verse 15. But what I have written, both in the text and in the no+e, is unnecessary if the reading of the S'maitic Codex be adopted. That omits the ai/Tous, and reads " the power of the Lord wrought in him so that he healed." With the omission of the word " them " at the end of the sentence the difficulty disappears. Slaves at Jubilee. — P. 203. Tlie statement in the second pai-agraph, in regard to the freeing of slaves at the Jubilee, is to be understood with the limitation stated in Leviticus xxv., from which it would appear that slaves which were " of tlie heatlien round about" them, " of the children of the strangers that 712 AT'PENDICKS. sojourned among" them, did not enjoy this provision of the jubilee. The statement in the text is correct, but this is added for accuracy. Mary of Magdala.— Pp. 321-323. That part of this book which treats of Mary of Magdala was in the hands of the i)rinter before I read Dr. Ilanna's view of the case, as he gives it in the Forty Days, etc., chap. ii. I am gratified to have the support of this eloquent preacher so far as that this Mary is not to be confounded with the " sinner " who anointed Jesus,— and that she was not a woman of base character or low condition, — and that the havinif had seven devils is no proof that she was of depraved and dissolute habits. He well says : " Satanic possession carried then no more evidence along -wdth it of previous immorality than insanity woixld do now among ourselves." A Translation Explained. — P. 325. In the last paragraph is this translation of the words of Jesus as re- ported by Matthew: "And every city or house divided against itself shall not stand," These words are a literal but not a logical trans- lation of the original, because, when the original is rendered into our language the English words imply that some such city or house may stand. If, however, the word " not " be considered as attached to the predicate and not to the copula, this translation will be a logical as well as a literal rendering. It then means, " Every such city shall fall." [See Whately's Elements of Logic, book ii., cha}). ii., § 4.] This explanation aj)plies as well to the translation on p. 143, " that every one who trusts in him may not perish," etc. Discipline.— Pp. 353, 354. Tliis paragraph may be suggested by over-caution, but it may be that my explication of the parable of the Tares may be imderstood by some readers to be a protest against all church discipline. I would not be so understood. I do not believe that Jesus taught that there was to be no discipline in the church. His lesson is against that excessive rigor which is destructive and not disciplinary, and a caution against undue confidence in our power of discrimination. One sentence on jiage 353 I should reAvi-ite : " It is better by mistake to permit an evil man to reside in a community, a church, a society, a town, than by mistake to destroy a good man." APPENDICES. 713 The Woman taken in Adultery. — P. 456. The story of the woman taken in adultery is fonnd only in John's Gos2)el. The critical editors of the Greek Testament mark this whole passage in the eighth chapter as doubtful or spui-ious. It does not ap- pear in the ISinaitic Codex. In the first writing of this book 1 omitted this narrative. Ui^on a review of the authorities my opinion agrees with that expressed by Dr. Schaff: "The prevailing critical evidence, though mostly negative, is agahist the passage, the moral evidence for it ; in other words, it seems to be no original {)art of John's written Gos- pel, but the record of an actual event which probably happened about the time indicated by its position in the eighth chapter. The story could not have been invented, the less so as it riins contrary to the ascetic and legalistic tendency of the ancient church, which coidd not appreciate it." Those who desire to see the authorities on both sides may consult Lange's Commenlary on the chapter, with Dr. Schaft"'s valuable addi- tions in his translation. It is so consistent with the character of .lesua that I think we may accept it as a real event in his life, inserted by some unknown author in the narrative given hy John. Betiiany=Bethabara. — P. 482. According to the received text, Bethabara is the name of the place where John was baptizing, apparently at the time when Jesus came to him for baptism. (See John i.) But the oldest manuscri})ts have " Bethany," a reading which Origen states was found in most of the copies of his day. The Tkanslation of Matthew xix. 10. — P. 519. I found it difficult to render the oi-iginal of the passage which in our common version is translated, " If the case of a man be so with his wife." I am not yet satisfied with this translation, and yet am not pre- pared to suggest a better. The woi'd translated "case" means cause, but specially the cause of something bad. It is a sinister woi-d. My translation appears very awkward, now that I see it in print. The disciples seemed to mean that if their Master's view of the niarriaf'e relation was correct, then the relation of a married man to his "wifo was injurious to him, and it were better one should not marry. Physical Cause op the Death of Jesus. — P. 679. Attention has been called to Dr. Stroud's book on the Physical Cause of the death of Jesus. It has been republished in tliis country since this portion of the book -vraa "written. 714 APPENDICES. After writing my paragi-aph on the subject, I saw Dr. Ilanna' volume on llie Last Day of the Passion of our Lord, In the Appendix he has a letter from Dr. Begbie, late President of the Royal College of Physicians in Edinburgh, in which that learned gentleman accepts Dr. Stroud's theory. He calls attention to the fact that rup- ture of the heart is comparatively a rare affection, and, so far as he knows, limited to persons advanced in life or laboring under some degeneration of the structure of the organ. Jesus, however, was youn<» and healthy, so far as we can discover. How great miist have been his anguish to produce this rupture ! Dr. Hanna also quotes a letter from Dr. Simpsofi, Professor in the University of Edinburgh, who also accepts Dr. Stroud's theory. He asserts that so far as we can now understand the physical condition of Jesus, such a sudden termination of his sufferings in death could be produced only by fatal fainting or by a rupture of the walls of the heart or of larger blood-vessels issuing from it. But the symp- toms, such as the loud cry, show that it was not mortal syncope. He says : " On the other hand, these symptoms were such as liave been seen in cases of rupture of the walls of the heart. Thus, in the latest book published in the English language on Diseases of the Heart, tlie eminent author. Dr. Walshe, Professor of Medicine in University College, Lon- don, when treating of the symptoms indicating death by rujiture of the heart, observes : " The hand is suddenly carried to the front of the chest, a piercing shriek uttered," etc., etc. The rapidity of the i-esulting death is regulated by the size and shape of the ruptiired opening. But usually death very speedily ensues in consequence of the blood escaping from the interior of the heart into the cavity of the large surrounding heart, sac, or pericardium ; which sac has, in cases of rujiture of the heart, been found on dissection to contain sometimes two, three, four, or more pounds of blood accumulated within it, and separated into red clot and limjjid serum, or * blood and water,' as is seen in blood when collected out of the body in a cup or basin in the operation of common blood-letting." Dr. Josiah C. Nott of this city, a gentleman of well-known high scien- tific attainments, has favored me with a copy oilus post-mortem examina- tion of the Rev. Mr. Maffitt, made with the assistance of Dr. E. P. Gaines, in Mobile, in 1850. Mr. Maffitt was known all over the United States as a man of no ordinary pulpit ability. He was what is called a " re- vivalist," and spent the last years of his life in gi'eat excitement. Ha got into trouble, was arraigned before the courts of his church in New York, and subsequently went South, where he was preaching with great success, and apparently in high health, when evil reports pursued him^ ATPENDICES. 715 and damaging articles from the Ne^w York papers were republished in ISIo- bile. Parties were arrayed for and against him. He was greatly excited. He was taken suddenly ill, about eight o'clock p.m., on the 27th of June, and died in seven hours When the physician arrived he found him " in great pain, which he referred to the inferior sternal region." He had had pain in the heart on several previous occasions. " Auscultation de- tected no abnormal sound, no palpitation, but the heart beat regularly and slowly." " He was perfectly cold all over, and bathed in cold sweat." After anodynes and carminatives had been administered, he said, " Doctor, I feel better now, everywhere else, but that pain still remains. It is a persistent and abiding pain, that seems to press through me against my spine." " All this time his pxilse was regular, full, strong, but rather slow ; his stx-ength was good, for he got out of bed several times without help." At one o'clock morphine and calomel were adminis- tered. At two o'clock the pain had left his breast and gone to his heart, but still retained its severity. There was no palpitation. He com- plained of being weaker, and his pulse, although regular, seemed slower and weaker. In fifteen minutes his heart had stopped beating. The post-mortem showed his lungs sound throughout : " pericardium fully distended with fluid, and when opened was found to contain blood and serum." Dr. Nott says : " This being carefully removed by a sponge, I introduced my hand into the sac beneath the heart, and on gi-asping this organ the contained blood was seen to spirt from a small perforation in the anterior wall of the left ventricle, disclosing at once the imme- diate cause of his death." Dr. Nott pronounced the death " from fatty degeneration, ulceration, and rttpture of the heart,^ confiiniing Dr. Begbie's general view of such cases in his letter to Dr. Hanna. If Mr. Maffitt's heart had not been diseased, he would probably have survived his grief. Jesus was younger by a quarter of a century, and was appa- rently sound. Dr. Nott believed that Mr. Mafiitt had a malady which " marches steadily onward," but adds that " it is highly probable that iti termination was hastened by moral causes^ I cite it as a well-authen- ticated case, the most modern known to me, of rupture of the heart. INDEX OF MATTER NOT EASILY FOUND IN THE TABLE OF CONTENTS. Ab-Beth-Din, the, 70. Abercrombie, Dr., quoted, 083. Abia, course of, 15. Abbot, Rupert, quoted, 119. Aceldama, Potter s Field, 063. Acta Philippi, 115. Acta Sanctorum, quoted, 74. Adonis, grove of, 37. .^non, 145. ^on, 21, 338, 476. JEra, Vulgar, 24. .^^schylus. quoted, 119. Alford, Dcau, quoted, 31, 34, 47, 94, 114, 130, 140, 181, 184, 195, 225,289, 295, 303, 335, 400, 030. Alexander, J. A., quoted, 165, 302, 330, 345. Ambivius, procurator, 63. Ambrose, quoted, 293. Amen, 117. "AmiciiH Cajsaris," 659. Anderson's "'Annals of English Bible," quoted. 7()S. Andrew, the Apcstle, 114, 221. Andrews, S. J , quoted, 541, 602, 613. Angaros, Pi/rsian, 27(i. Angel of Jehovah, 109. Angels, ajipear to shepherds, 40 ; minia- ter^to Jesus, 100; Scriptural repre- sentations of, 100-111. Anna, the prophetes.s, 42. Annas, the high-priest, 67, 506, 036. Annius Rufus, procurator, 63. Annunciation, of John's birth, 15 ; of birth of Jesus, 20. Anthony, IMark, 29, 358. Antigonus, 29. Antiocthus Epiphanes, 129, 551. Autistheues, quoted, 192. Antonia, tower of, 6C2, 652, 656. Apostolic Constitutions, 293. Aquinas, Thomas, the Angelic Doctor, 354. Archelaus, his troubles, 58 ; in Rome, 59 ; as Ethnarch, 00 ; his income, 00 ; marries Glaphyra, 00 ; dies in Vienne, 61 J suggests a parable, 540. Archisynagogus, 163. Aretas, father-in-law to Herod Antiptu^ 00. Asnapper, colonizes Samaria. 150. Assarion, a coin, 380. Astronomical calculations, 30. Augustine, quoted, 31, 34, 47, 205, 282, 288, 329, 343, 340, 347, 534. Ava, land of, 150. B. Babjdon, colonists from, to Samaria, 150. Badius, Conrad, 420. Ruhr, quoted, 150. Bagster's "Bible in Every Land," quot* ed. 708. Baptism, John's, 80 ; of Jesus, 84—89. Barabbas, 054 ; prefened to Jesus, 657. Barachias, 588. Bartholomew, the Apostle, 119, 226. Bartimteus, 53;!. Bath-Kol, the, 551. Beelzebul, 325, 444. Benedictus, the, 21. Bengel, quoted, 93, 140, 143, 225, 285, 289, 534. Bernard, quoted, 119. Bertholdt, quoted, 159. Bethabara, 482. Bethany, 405, 495, 498. Bethany, east, 145, 495. Bethesda, 198. Bethlehem, 30 ; children slain, 33. Bethsaida, denounced, 316, 387. Betbsaida-Julias, 413. Bethphage, 543. Beza, quoted, 142. Bibliotheca Sacra, quoted. 111, 167. Biehle's Economic Calendar, 27. Bloody sweat, cases of, 0S3. Boanerges, 223, 532. Bonar, quoted, 107. Bordeau.x. Pilgrim, 37. Bucher, quoted, 534. Burials among the Jews, 498. Byssus, 492. 718 INDEX. Cassar, Augustus, death of, 11 ; decree for taxing, 10. Caesar, Tiberius, 10. Cassarea Philippi, 415, 431. Caiaphas, high-priest, 57, 07, 637, 643. Caligula, Emperor, favors Herod Agrip- pa, 07. Calvary, true site of, 665. Camel'-s hair, 74. Cana of Galilee, 120. Canatha, 407. Capernaum, 107; denounced, 316. Caravan.serai, 40. Cassiodorus, quoted. 36. Cellarius, quoted, 407. Celsus, quoted, 303. Census, ordered by Augustus, 30 ; Ro- man and Jewish methods, 32. Chardin, quoted, 508. Chazzan, The, 103. Chief priests, 09. Chorazin, denounced, 84. Christmas, Latin, 23 ; Greek, 26. Chronology of birth of Jesus, 23. " Church," 420. 440. Chrysostom, quoted, 235, 340, 578. Chuza, 101. Cicero, quoted, 307, 302. Clement of Alexandria, quoted, 115, 249, 302. Cleopas, 50 ; name of an Emmaus disci- ple, 095. Cleop.atra and her pearls, 358. Cleiicus, quoted, 534. Coins, 120. '* Congregation," 420, 440. Constantino, Emperor, 37. Consulships, 25. Coponius. procurator. 62, 63. Corbau, The, 05, 400. Croisus, 129. Criminal laws of the Jews, 033. Crosby, Dr., quoted, 199, 534, 613. Cross, form and construction of, 004. Cuthah, colonizing Samaria, 150. Cyprian, quoted, 93. Cyreuius (Quirinus), 31, 33, 34, 62. Cyril, of Alexandria, quoted, 181. Cyril, of Jerusalem, quoted, 428. Da Costa, quoted, 534. Dalniauutha, 410. Damascus, 407. Dante, quoted, 354. Darius, Hystapes, 151. Darius, Nothus, 151. Death from joy, cases of, 680, 681. Decapolis, 182, 406. Demetrius, 276. Denarius, 404. De Pressense, quoted, 36. De Quincey's theory of Judas, 605, 608, 609. De Sacy, quoted, 151. Devil, The, popular superstitions, 376. De Wette, quoted, 93, 409. Diabolus, 400. Dickinson's Version, 300. Didrachm, 430. Didymus (Thomas), 227. Dio Cassius, quoted, 25, 31. Dion, city of Decapolis, 407. Dionysius, Exiguus, 24. Doctor of Divinity, 583, Doddridge, quoted, 534. Dods, Rev. Morris, quoted, 469. Domitian, Emperor, 18. Dora, 415. Dove, at baptism of Jesus, 88. Drachma, coin, 487. Dupin, M. , on trial of Jesus, 631-635. Dwight, Dr., quoted, 107. E. East, The, 43. Ebal, Mount, 150. Ebrard, quoted, 534. Edinburgh Review, quoted, 85. Egypt, Jesus in, 47. Eichhom, (juoted, 93. El-Azariyeh, 505. Eldei-s, 09. Eleazcr, high -priest, 63. Eliezer, of Lydda, 104. Elijah, 73, 410 ; with Jesus, 415, 428, 430, 075. Elizabeth, 15, 10, 20, 21. Ellicott, Rishop, quoted, 82, 386, 534, 571. EUiotson, Dr., quoted, 082. El-Mejdel, 410. Emmaus, 093; the walk thither, 693-695. " Ephphatha," 408. Ephratah, 30. Ephrem, 507. Erasmus, quoted, 335. Esarhaddon, 150. Essenes, sketch of, 73. Eunuchs, 521. Euripides, his " Phajdra and Medjea," 470. Eusebius, quoted, 39, 114, 115, 146, 330, 571. Euthymius, quoted, 143. Excommunication, 475. P. Fairbaim, quoted, 236. INDEX. 719 Farmer, quoted, 93. Fasti, The, 25. Figs, 555. Fountain of the Virgin, 199. Friedlieb, quoted, Hoi. Furness, quoted, 85. G. Gabriel, and Zacharias, 15, and Mary, 21. Gadara, 3(55, 407. Gains, Institutes of, 31. Galilee, "of the Gentiles," 1G9 ; "no prophet arises out of," 456. Gaulonitis, 428. Gehenna, 585. Gemara, The, 400, 518. Gemini, consulship of the, 25. Genealogical tables of Matthew and Luke, 17. Genuesaret, Plain of, 168. Gerasa, 407. Gerizim, Mount, 150, 446. Gethseinane. 628, 02!), 681. Glaphyra, wife of Archelaus, 60. Golgotha, Calvary, 605. "Gospel according to the Hebrews," 214. Graves, whitened, 58^. Gresswell, quoted, 225, 235, 243, 386, 5;}4, 5U, (il:5, 621. Grotius, (jnoted, 137, 202, 476, 534. Grotto of Jeremiah, 666. Gustave Doro, 423. H. Hackett, quoted, 556. Hades, 418. Hadrian, Emperor, 37. Hallel, the Great, 545, 624. Hamann, quoted, 53. Hamath, 150. Hammond, quoted, 475, 555. Heart, description of the, 680. Hebron, 16. Hegesippus, 229. Heinsius, quoted, 555. Helena, E:upress, 39, 666. Heliopolis. 47, 48. Hengstenberg, quoted, 109, 111, 578. Hermon. 40l>, 427. Herod, the Great, 15 ; interview with ■wise men. 29; date of death, 28; becomes king, 29 ; kills the Bethle- hem babes. 32, 46 ; connection \\'ith the census, 33 ; Augustus's opinion of him. 4S; his outrages, 48, 50; his family, 57 ; his will, 58 ; his funeral, 58; completes the Temple, 131. Herod, Antipas, Tetrarch, 65 ; seducea Herodias, 6(5 ; quarrels with Pilate, 66 ; his fall and death, 67 ; his char- acter, 67 ; and John Baptist, 1 48 ; kills John Baptist, 386 ; seeks Jesus, 483 ; at trial of Je.sus, 650 ; quarrel with Pilate healed, 651. Herod, Agrippa I. , 57. Herod, PhUip I., husband of Herodias, 55. Herodias, forsakes Philip for Antipas, iiij ; whom she instigates to his ruin, 66 ; adheres to him, 67, 148; causes death of John Baptist, 385. Herodians, sketch of, 72. 216, 568. Herodotus, quoted, 195, 276, 568. Herzog, quoted, 68. High-priest, 507. High-priesthood, 67, 506, 561. Hill of Evil Counsel, 663. Hillel, 214, 517. Hippolytus. of Thebes, 17. Hippos, of Decapolis, 409. Homer, quoted, 195, 262. Horace, quoted, 567. Horns of Hattin, 241. Howe, Fisher, quoted, 668. Hiibner, quoted, 93, 331. Hyrcanus, 551. Ideler's calculation,. 30. lugraham's "Prince of the House of David," quoted, (504. Ignatius, Martyr, 439. Jacob's Bridge, 191. Jacob's well, 152. Jahn, quoted, 64, 498. Jarvis, quoted, 534. James I., Apostle, 170, 222, 590, 630. James II. , Apo.stle, 228. Jennings, quoted, 448, 449. Jericho, 465. Jerome, quoted, 37, 74, 114, 146, 249 289, 320. Jerusalem, date of destruction, 26. Joazer, High-Priest, 56. Job, 470. John, Apostle, 114, 170, 223, 439, 590; his allegation against Judas, 607, 619; in Gethsemane, 630, 671; at the cross, 673, 678 ; at the sepulchre, 689, 701. John, the Baptist, birth onnoiinced, 17* 720 ESTDEX. his birth and circumcision, 21 ; early life, 22 ; ministry, 73 ; baptizes Jesus, 84-8!) ; discoverer of the Messiah, 90 ; in prison, 311 ; message to Jesus, 312; Jesus's estimate of him, 314; his execution, 385. Joppa, 415. Joseph, betrothed to Mary, IG ; his dream, 23 ; in Bethlehem, 39 ; in the Temple, 42 ; takes Marj- and Jesus to Egypt, 47 ; settles in Naza- reth, 49 ; with Jesus at a passover, 51. Joseph, of Arimathea, 684. Josephus, quoted, 24, 29, 33, 51, 58, 00, Gl. 02, 05, 08, 09, 71, 103, 120, 120, 129, 130, 148, 151, 108, 174, 183, 221, 231, 270, 320, 332, 342, 347, 407, 449, 405, 500, 512, 518, 551, 501, 015, 029, 043. Josp;pnL!s CATAPn.\s, 500. Judas, of Galilee, heads a revolt, G2. Judas I. , Apostle, 230, (J24. Judas II. (Iscariot), Apostle, 231, 398, 001; his case studied, 003, 019; m high-priest's palace, 039; the last of him, 000. Julian, Emperor, 249. Justin, Martyr, 37, 578. Juttah, 10. Juvenal, quoted, 388. Kedron, the creek, 025, 638. Keueth, of Uecapolis, 407. Kepler, his calculations, 30, 46. Keraia, The, 205. King James, orders "church" inserted in the translation, 420. Kitto, quoted, 534. Knapp, quoted, 142. Krabbe, quoted, 9 5. Krafft, quoted, 531. Kunul, quoted, 08, 335. L. Lachinaim, quote 1, 406. Lauge. quoted, 142, 237, 289, 311. 849, 302, 45:.', 4()9, 525, 534. 501. Lardiier, quoted, 34, 48. Lawyer, i'o,j.ikos, 575. Lazariyeh, 505. Lebanon, 40(i. Lebbens. 230. Legis Actioiies, 31. Leprosy, the, 183-186, Lepton. coin, 589, Lex, quoted, 534. Lichtenstein, quoted, 48, 534. Lightfoot, quoted, 08, 285, 335, 371 417, 448, 472. 534, 501, 571, 580, 60() Livy, quoted, 473. Locke, quoted, 17G. Locusts, 74. Lucke, quoted. 142, 469. Luthardt. quoted, 541. Luther, quoted, 142, 405. M. Maccabees, the, 182, 463. McClintock and Strong's Cyclopaedia, quoted, 108, 407. McClure, quoted, 707. Machasrus, Castle of, 148, 311, McKnight, quoted, 4()9, 534. MacAVhorter, quoted. 111. Magadan, 410. Magdala, 320, 410. Magi, the, and Herod, 43-40, Magnificat, The. 22. Magor-missabib, 201. Maimonides, quoted, 194, 571, 624. Malchus, higli-])riest's servant, 040. Maldonatus, S[)anish Jesuit, 354. Mammon, 490. Manasseh. 150, 151, 201. Manual, Bible Society, quoted, 708. Mariamne, 57, 00. Mark, his style, 520. Mary, the mother of Jesus, betrothal, l(i ; genealogy, 17; in Nazareth, 20; the Annunciation, 19 ; visits Eliza- beth, 20 ; pronounces the Magnilicat, 20 ; returns to Nazareth. 21 ; hei several sons, 39 ; in Bethlehem, 40 ; in the Tem]ile, 41 ; her relations with Jesus, 072 ; at the cross, 072, 078. Mary Magdalene, 321, GG7, 671, 685, 087, ()88, 090. ]\Iary, wife of Cleopas, 071. Massillou, quoted, 311. Matthew (Levi), Apostle, 191, 226. Mar.udrell, quot-d, 152. Menahem. heads a revolt, 63. Messiah, The, to be a leper, 186. Metariyeh, 47. Metempsychosis, among the Jews, 472, Meyer, quoted, 93, 142, 279, 317, 406, 442, 409, 5H(i. 075. Michaelis. quoted, 248, 578. Midrash, The, 551. INlibnan, Dean, quoted, 63, 81, 151, 183, 4()8, 409. Milton, quoted, 108. Mhia, its value, 540. Mishna, The, 27 ; quoted, 08, 69, 400. Mouey, coins, 120. INDEX. 721 Moreh, an epithet of contempt, 268. Morrison, quoted, 534. Moriah, Mount, 454. Moses, with Jesus, 437. Myth theory, The, 94. N. Nablfts, 149. Nain, o09. Nasi, of the synagogue, 70. Nathanael, 115, 226. Nazareth, 19 ; Jesus settles there, 49 ; Kenan's description of it, 50, 54 ; Je- sus revisits, 102. Neander, quoted, 31, 93, 124, 534, 610. Neapolis, 149. Nehemiah, 151. Nemesis, 470. Newcome, quoted, 534. Nicodemus, his interview with Jesus, , 133 ; in the Sanhedrim, 563; secret disciple, G84. Nicophanes, quoted, 114. Nineveh, 333. Nunc Dimittis, The, 42. 0. Olearius, quoted, 248. Olshausen, quoted, 93, 133, 343, 347, 469, 500, 631. Oosterzee, quoted, 534. Origen, quoted, 87, 93. Osiander, quoted, 534. Ovid, quoted, 192, 263. Owen, quoted, 534. Palingenesia, The, 527. Palm-Sunday, 546. Paranymph, 147. Paschal Chronicle, 26. Pashur, 261. Passover, crowds at, 516 ; Jesus's last, 616 ; Great Sabbath of, 677, Paulus, quoted, 93. Peccability of Jesus, 97. Pella, of Decapolis, 407 ; Christians find refuge, 590. Perea, 361, 482. Peter (Simon), 114, 170, 181, 219, 398, 402, 405, 417, 436, 537, 590, 593, 617, 619, 630, 630, 638, 639, 671, 688, 689, 696, 701-703. Pfeninger, quoted, 167. Pharisees, sketch of, 71. Phidias, his statue of Nemesis, 470. 46 Philadelphia, of Decapolis, 407. Philip, the Apostle, 115, 225, 362. 388, 549, 633. Philip, the Tetrarch, 415. Philo, quoted, 64, 173. Phoenicia, 403. Phylactery, 463. Pilate, Pontius, procurator, 63 ; outrages the Jews, 64, 343 ; at trial of Jesus, 644 ; his wife's dream, 655. Pilkington, quoted, 534. Plato, quoted, 173, 303. Plutarch, quoted, 173. Polybius, quoted, 139, 365. Ponipey, 139. Porter's Hand-Book, quoted, 666. Potter's Field, 603. Priests, courses of, 15, 29. Procurators, 03. Pseudo- Alexander, 61. Publicans, portitores, 227. Quadrans, coin, 589. Quarantania, Mount of Temptation, 92^ Queen of the South, 333. Quirinius (Cyrenius), 16. R. Rab, Rabbi, Rabboni, 113, 583. Rabboth-Ammon, of Decapolis, 407. Raka, a term of reproach, 308. Raphana, of Decapolis, 407. Renan, quoted, 20, 40 ; his description of Nazareth, 50, 55. Robinson, quoted, 130, 125, 167, 198, 200, 241, 317, 367, 507, 534, 541. Rosenmiiller, quoted, 344. Routh, quoted, 230. s. Sabinus, procurator, provokes a revolt, 59. Sadducees, sketch of, 71. Sagan, of the Synagogue, 68. Salim, 145. Salome, 531, 671. Salvador, Dr., on "the Trial of Jesus," 631. Samaritans, their origin, 150 ; defile the Temple, 151. Sanballat, 151. Sanhedrim, its origin, 68 ; its constitu- tion, size. President, place of meeting, and jurisdiction, 69, 453, 691. Satan = the Devil, 93, 98 ; Jewish ideas 722 INDEX. of, 100 ; Manicliasan idea of, 100 ; idea in Job, 101 ; in David, 101 ; in Zechariah, lOl ; Jesus's idea, 102 ; 178 ; 424. Saton, a Greek measure, 347. Schaflf, Dr., quoted, 284, 522. Schleicrmacher, quoted, 42, 93, 335. Schoettgen, quoted. 151, 58G. Scythopolis, now Beisan, 14G, 407. Selden, quoted, 70, 558. Seneca, quoted, 279. Sepharvaim, colonizes Samaria, 150. Sepp, quoted, 49. Shalmanezer, carries Israelites into cap- tivity, 150. Shammai, head of a Jewish school, 214- Shaw, quoted, 74. Shechem, capital of Samaria, 149. Shekel, value of, 00. Sheliach, officer of the synaj^ogne, 163. Shepherds, see angels, 39 ; village of, 40. " Shoe's latchet," 68. Sicarii, 63. Sidon, denounced, 816 ; visited, 402, 405. Siloam, 454, 472. Simeon, at the circumcision of Jesus, 41. Simla, high-priest's garment, 043. Simon I., Apostle, see " Peter." Simon II., Apostle, 231, Sinaou of Cyrene, 603. Simon, Zelotes, 231. Smith, Sir J. E., quoted, 298. Smith, Dr. Wm., "Dictionary of the Bible." quoted, 29, 71, 74, 151, 103, 219, 222, 613. Smith, Dr. Wm., " N. T. History," quoted, 57, 103. " Son of David," 18, 119, 403. " Son of God," 118. " Son of the Law," 51. " Son of Man," first use, 117; 361; 599. Sophocles, his "CEdipus," 470. Spartian, his " Life of Hadrian," 31. Stanley, quoted, 74, 166, 1G8, 242, 320. Stater, coin for Temple-tax, 437. Stier, quoted, 53, 335, 347, 383, 469, 518, 534. Story, W. W., his theory of Judas, 605. Strabo, quoted, 74. Strong, his "Harmony," quoted, 165, 265, 332, 541. Stroud, Dr. Wm., quoted, 679. Sue, his " Wandering Jew," 99. Suetonius, quoted, 25, 31, 45. Sycamore tree, 537. Sychar = Shechem, 152. Synagogue, fuU account of, 162-164. Tabor, Mount, 428, 704. Tacitus, quoted, 31; "breviamm of Augustus," 32 ; prevailing expectation of the Coming One, 45 ; speaks of Jesus, 65, 186, 473. Talent, value of, 442. Talmud, quoted, 55, 80, 192, 331, 400 666. Targum, The, 551. Taxing, The, under Cyrenius, 31. Taylor, Jeremy, qitoted, 475, 664. TeJl Hum. ruins of, 168. Temple, The, 128; tax, 126, 436; tabemte, 557 ; veil rent, 676. Temptation of Jesus, 91. Tephilla = Phylactery, 582. Tertullian, quoted, 578. Thaddeus, 230. Theodoret, quoted, 114. Theodorus of Mop.suestia, quoted, 93 347. Theophylact, quoted, 343. Tholuck, quoted, 141, 152, 244, 269 453, 469. Thomas, Apostle, 227, 362, 497, 699. Thomson, Abii. , quoted, 33. Thomson, his " Land and Book," quot ed, 92, 146, 167, 184, 245, 298, 346, 360, 387, 390, 537, 629. Tiberius, Emperor, 17, 24, 26, 66. Tischeudorf, quoted, 386, 406, 534. ToMTisend, quoted, 49. Tragelles, quoted, 406 Trajan, Emperor, 224. Trench, Abp., quoted, 124, 151, 184, 185 353, 355, 469, 473, 475, 534, 567 597. Trent, Council of, its Catechism, 287. Tristam, quoted, 366. Tsitsith, The, 583. "Twelve, The," 235. Tyre, 402, 405. IT. Upham, Dr. F. W., his "The Wisa Men," 46. Urim and Thummim, The, 507. Valerius Gratus, procurator, 68, 506. Van de Velde, quoted, 140. Varus, Prefect of Sj-ria, 60. Vespasian, Emperor, 12, 149. Victorius, qvioted, 26. Vitcllius, 06. Voice, at baptism of Jesus, 77. Voltaire, on number slain at Bethla* hem, 47. Von der Hardt, quoted, 263. INDEX. 723 Von Gerlach, quoted, 540. Vorstius, quoted, 69. VuJyar iEra, The, 26. W. Ward, " View of the Hindoos," 597. Weisse, quoted, 93. Wesley, quoted, 167. Wetsteiu. quoted, 2-48, 473, 578, 586. Wiclif's translation, 489. Wioseler, quoted, 29, 31, 68, 386, 534, o(;i Williams, " Holy City," quoted, 602. Wilson, " Lands of the Bible," quoted, 167. Winer, quoted, 342, 518, 561. " Wise Men," The, 28, 30, 43. Xenophon, quoted, 141, 376. Xerxes, 276. Zacharias, sees apparition, 15 ; become« dumb, 16 ; names his son John, 21 ; pronounces the " Benedictus," 21; his sacerdotal class, 27. Zealots, The, 63. Zealot-right, The. 558. Zelotes, Simon, 231. Zoroaster, 44. Zinzendorf, Count, 583. Zumpt, quoted, 36. PASSAGES OF THE OLD AND THE NEW TESTAMENT AND APOCRYPHA, Alluded to, or Quoted ; other than tlie Four Evangelists. Oene,w i. 201; i. 27, 520; ii. 201 ; iv. 3, 201 ; vii. 4, 10, 203 ; \'iii. 10, 12, 202; xii. 6, 149; xiv. 22, 507; xvi. 7-13, 109 ; xviii. 6, 347 ; xviii. 8, 108; xviii. 109; xviii. 110; xix. 3. 108; xxii. 110 ; xxxiii. 18, 150 ; xxv. 9, 363; XXV. 22, 472 ; xxiv. 7, 40, 109 ; xxviii. 12, 108; xx\aii. 12, 109; xxix. 25-30, 202; xxxii. 2, 108; xixv. 19, 47; XXXV. 29, 363. Exodus iii. 110; iii. 6, 574; xii. 46, 678; xiii. 2-10, 11-17,583; xiii. 9, 16,582; xvi. 203 ; xx. 202 ; xx. 26, 276 ; xxi. 24, 274 ; xxi. 32, 603 ; xxx. 13, 126 ; XXX. 13, 436; xxxii. 110; xxxiv. 28, 98 ; XXIV. 3, 203. Levit. xii. 24, 41 ; xii. 8, 41 ; xiii. 45, 185; xvi. 20-31, 515; xviii. 2, 509; xviii. 46, 509; xix. 18, 277; xxi. 10, 643 ; xxiii. 27-29. 203 ; xxiii. 5, 541 ; xxiv. 20, 274; xxvii. 30, 335; xxvii. 30, 515; xxvii. 30, 586. mimbers v. 2, 509; v. 6, 538; vi. 1-21, 16; vi. 9, 185; ix. 12, 678; xv. 32, 203; XV. 37-40, 371; xv. 38, 583; xviii. 15, 16, 43; xviii. 21, 515; xviu. 21, 586; xix. 448; xix. 10, 586; XX. 10, 269 ; xri 143 ; xxiv. 17, 45; xxiv. 17, 158; xxv. 11,558; xxvii. 8-11, 10; xsrviii 9,313; xxix. 7, 515. Det(t. V. 26, 173; vi. 16, 104; vi. 5, 463; Ti. 4-9, 13-23, 582; A-iu. 3, 103; xii. 6, 586; xiv. 23, 515; xiv. 23-28, 586; xvii. 7, 457; xviii. 15, 112; xviii. 18, 116; x\'iii. 15, 158; xix. 14, 253; xix. 21, 274; xxi. 23, 23, 664; xxi. 23, 677; xxii. 11, 150; xxii. 12, 371 ; xxii. 21, 456; xxiii. 25, 211 ; xxiii. 13, 518; xxv. 5, 573; xxvi. 14, 173. Joshi/a x^-iii. 16, 260. Judges ii. 110 ; vi. 22, 109 ; vi. 110 ; vi. 14, 110 ; vi. 22, 110 ; vi. 19, 347 ; xiii. 15, 16. 108 ; xiii. 110 ; xiii. 23, 110; xiv. 12, 567. 1 Sa7n. i. 24, 347 ; vi. 5, 475 ; xiv. 25, 74; XV. 22, 212 ; xxi 212 ; xxii. 20-23, 212. 2 Sfim. viii. 17, 213 ; xix." 22, 101 ; xix, 27, 107 ; xxiv. 107. 1 Kings ii. 27, 561 ; v. 4, 101 ; x. 1, 333 ; xviii. 26, 282 ; xix. 8, 98 ; xxii. 19, 108. 2 Kings v. 27, 177 ; v. 184 ; v. 14, 15, 185 ; V. 5, 567 ; xii. 4, 126 ; xvii. 24, 150 ; xvii. 41, 150 ; xix. 15, 107 ; xix. 107; xxiii. 10, 13, 14,368. 724 INDEX. 1 Clirm. xii. 22, 108; xv. 11, 312; xxi. 1, 101 ; xxi. 20, 109 ; xxi. 30, 109 ; xxiv. 10, 15 ; xxiv. 27 ; xlix. 10, 158, 2 Chrmi. iv. 24, 5G7; xviii. 18, 107; xxiv. 6, 9, 126; xxiv. 18-22, 336; xxiv. 20, 587 ; xxx. 21-26, 204 ; xxxiv. 4, 5, 268. Ezra ii. 9, 537 ; iv. 2, 10, 150 ; viii. 15, 163; X. 11,475. Nehcmiah vii. 14, 537 ; viii. 2, 163 ; viii. 9-12, 204; ix. 1, 163; xii. 29; xiii. 15-22, 204. Esther v, 8, 566 ; vi. 14, 566. Job i. 6, 101 ; ii. 1-7, 101 ; iv. 18, 108 ; xxvii. 16, 567 ; xxxiii. 29, 30, 442. Psalms ii. 6-9, 116 ; viii. 2, 559 ; x\di. 15, 255; xxii. 16, 18, 667; xxv. 13, 253; xxxiv. 7, 111; xxxv. 5, 111; XXXV. 19, 626 ; xxxvii. 9, 253 ; xxxvii. 11, 253; xxxix. 5, 296; xii. 9, 618; xlii. 1, 255 ; Ii. 12, 141 ; Ixviii. 108; Ixix. 4, 626; Ixix. 9, 127; Ixxxii. 6, 481 ; xci. 104 ; xcii. 204 ; civ. 4, 107 ; cvi. 28, 173; cix. 6, 101 ; ex. 578; cxiii. 545 ; cxv. 624 ; cxvi. 624 ; cxvii. 624 ; cxviii. 545 ; cxviii. 624 ; cxviii. 22, 565 ; cxlvi. 8, 476. Isaiah vi. 1-3, 108; viii. 19, 173; ix. 6, 116 ; ix. 7, 552; xi. 1-5, 10, 116 ; xix. 1, 642 ; xx. 4, 518 ; xxv. 656, 6 ; xxx. 29, 204 ; xl. 2, 7, 476 ; xlii. 1-4, 217; xlix. 24, 327; liii. 49; liii. 2-12, 116 ; liii. 12, 327; Uii. 12, 621 ; liii. 12, 667 ; liv. 13, 396 ; Iv. 1, 255 ; Ivi. 7, 558 ; Iviii. 6, 165 ; Iviii. 13, 203 ; Ix. 3, 45 ; Ixi. 1, 2, 165 ; Ixi. 10, 566 ; Ixii. 5, 566; Ixiii. 9, 110; Ixv. 13, 506. Jeremiah vii. 11, 558 ; xvii. 21, 203 ; xx. 261 ; xxi. 12-14, 204 ; xxii. 30, 19 ; xxiii. 5, 6, 116 ; xxxi. 15, 47; xxxi. 33, 141 ; xxxi. 33, 34, 396 ; xxxiii. 15, 116; xii. 17, 39. Ezekiel viii. 1, 163; x. 1, 106; xiv. 1, 163; xviii. 31, 141 ; xx. 1, 163; xx. 12-24, 204; xxiv. 17, 185; xxviii. 14, 107; xxxiii. 31, 163 ; xxxiv. 23, 116; xxxvi. 24-28, 141 ; xlvii. 454. Danid iv. 13, 23, 107 ; vii. 9, 10, 108 ; vii. 13, 118; 315; 361; 411; 642; vu. 14, 552 ; 13G ; viii 14, 831 ; viii. 13, 107; ix. 21-23, 16; ix. 34, 45 ix. 25, 116; X. 13, 107; x. 7, 109 X. 8, 15, 17, 109. Rosea ii. 6, 204 ; ii. 9, 566 ; vi. 6, 193 vi. 6, 212; xi. 1, 47. Joel ii. 26, 29, 396 ; iii. 18, 454. Amosi. 3, 442; ii. 6, 442. Micah V. 2, 36 ; v. 1, 37 ; v. 2, 46 V. 2, 116. Nahtim i. 3, 642. Haggai ii. 7, 116. Zech. ii. 12-15, 110; iii. 1, 101; iii. 8. 116; vi. 15, 111; vii. 5, 163; ix. 9' 116; ix. 9, 544; xi. 12, 603; xii. 8; 111 ; xii. 60, 678; xiii. 4, 74; xiii. 7, 116 ; xiii. 1,141 ; xiii. 7, 621. Malachi iii. 1, 116; iv. 5, 6, 74; iv. 5, 112 ; iv. 2, 116; iv. 5, 6,430. ToUt iv. 3, 363 ; xii. 19, 108. Song ii. 1, 2, 16, 298. Cant. V. 1, 566. 1 Mace. iv. 52, 59, 480; xi. 71, 643. 2 Mace. i. 10, 69; iv. 44; 69; xi. 27, 69 ; X. 9, 537. Acts i. 3, 115; i. 13, 223; i. 13, 226 i. 13, 228 ; i. 13, 231 ; i. 13, 230 i. 16, 611; iv. 12, 13, 119; iv. 13 219; V. 36, 37, 209; v. 36, 37 512 ; vi. 6, 10, 498 ; vii. 56, 70 vii. 55, 118; ix. 7, 551; x. 47, 48 221 ; X. 13, 15, 551 ; xii. 1, 223 xii. 17, 229; xiii. 15, 164; xv. 13 19, 229 ; xix. 13, 326 ; xx. 33, 567 xxi. 18, 229; xxiii. 3, 638; xxvii. 3, 611. Ramans xvi. 25, 328. 1 Car. i. 21, 257; iv. 15, 584; vii. 29, 249 ; viii. 13, 328 ; ix. 5, 181 ; xii. 613 ; XV. 6, 704. 2 Cor. xi. 25, 331. Qal. ii. 9, 229. Eph. iii. 9, 328. Col. i. 20, 328. 1 Timothy i. 2, 584. 2 Timothy ii. 8, 20. Titus i. 4, 584. HehreiDS xiii. 12, 666. James v. 1, 2, 567, 1 Peter v. 13, 584. 1 John ii. 16, 98. Jude, ver. 17, 231. Beo. i. 13, 118. S0UKCE8. 725 SOURCES. [The following books have been consulted, and, so far as known, credited for what use has been made of them. The list may be serviceable to those who de- sire to verify my quotations or to prosecute studies in this department.] Abbott, Rev. Lyman : Jesus of Nazareth. 1 vol. AiNSLEE, Rev. RoBEKT : Translation of Tischendorf's Greek New Testament. 1vol. Adams, Nehemiah, D.D. : Friends of Christ in the New Testament. 1 vol Alexander, Joseph A., D.D. : Blatthew Explained. 1 vol. " " Mark Explained. 1 vol. Alford, Henry, D.D. : New Testament Revised. 1vol. '' " Our Lord and His Twelve Disciples. 1 vol. " " Greek Testament, with Notes (on Evangelists). 1 voL Alger, W. R. : History of the Doctrine of a Future Life. 1 vol. Andrews, S. J. : Life of our Lord upon Earth. 1 vol Anonymous. "Ecce Agnus Dei." 1 vol " "EcceDeus." 1vol. " "Ecce Homo." 1vol. " Jesus of History. 1 vol. Augustine r Homilies on the Gospel of St. John. 2 vols. ** Sermons. 1 vol. Bagster : Polyglott Bible. 2 vols. Balfour, W. P. : Lessons from Jesus 1 vol. Balfour, W. : Import of Sheol, Hades. 1 vol. Barclay, J. T. : City of the Great King. 1 voL Baum, E. p. : Companion to the Bible. 1 vol. Bengel, J. A. : Gnomon of the New Testament. 2 vols. Bibliotheca Sacra. 30 vols. Bloomfield, Bishop : Greek Testament, with Notes. 2 vols. Blunt, Rev. J. H. : Dictionary of Devotional and Historical Theology. 1 voL Bourdillon, Rev. Francis : Parables of Our Lord. 1 voL Briepot, Abbe : La Vie de N. S. Jesus-Christ. 3 vols. Brown, James : Bible Truths with Shakesperian Parallels. 1 vol. " Rev. John : Discourses and Sayings of our Lord Jesus Chrl«t. 2 vols, BuNSEN, E. : Hidden Wisdom of Christ. 1 vol. Burt, N. C. : Hours among the Gospels. 1 vol. Calmet, a. : Dictionary of the Bible. 4 vols. Christian Examiner for 1854. 1 vol. Clark, Rev. G. W. : New Harmony of the Four Gospels. 1 voL Clayton, G. : Angelology. 1 vol. CoBBE, F. P. : Studies, Old and New. 1 vol. Cox, Robert : Literature of the Sabbath Question. 2 vols. Crosby, Dr. Howard : Jesus and His Works. 1 vol, Cust, E. : Horffi Dominicae. 1 vol. 726 60UKCES. De Pressens^, E. : Jesus Christ. 1 vol. De QumcEY, Thomas : Theological Essays. 1 vol. " " Historical Essays. 1 vol. Dickinson, R. : Corrected Version of the New Testament. 1 voL Ellicott, Bishop : Historical Lectures on Jesus Christ. 1 vol. EUSEEIUS : Ecclesiastical History and Life of Constantine — ed. 1C38, folio. 3 vol. EWALD, H. : The Life of Jesus Christ. 1 vol. Fairbairn, Dr. Patrick : Typology of Scripture. 2 vols. Farmer, Hugh : Demoniacs of the New Testament. 1 voL PoVFLER, Wm., LL.B. : Miracles. 1 vol. PuRNESS, W. H. : Jesus and His Biographers. 1 vol. " " Jesus. 1 vol. GiLMORE, J. R. : Life of Christ. 1 voL Gresswell, Edward : Dissertations on the Harmony of the Four Gospels. 6 •vols. Hackett, H. B. : Illustrations of Scripture. 1 vol. Hale, W. H. : History of the Jews. 1 vol. Hammond' s Parajshrase and Annotations on New Testament. 3 vols. Hanna : The Life of Chi-ist. 6 vols. Hardwick, C. : Christ and other Masters. 2 vols. Hemans, Charles J. : Ancient Christianity and Sacred Art. 1 vol. Hengstenberg, E. W. : Christology. 3 vols. Herodotus : Translated by Rawhnson. 4 vols. Hill, Genl. D. H. : Sermon on the Mount. 1 vol. Howe, Fisher : True Site of Calvary. 1 vol. Jamieson, Mrs. A. : History of our Lord, as exemplified in Works of Art. 2 vols. Jarvis, -S. F. : Chronological Introduction to History of the Church. 1 vol. Jennings, D. : Jewish Antiquities. 1 vol. Jones, Joel, LL.D. : Notes on the Scripture. 1 voL Joseph us : Translated by Whiston. 6 vols. . Justin Martyr : Writings of. 1 vol. Lange :. Life of the Lord Jesus. 5 vols. Leathes, S. : Witness of Old Testament to Christ. 1 vol. " '' Paul to Christ. 1 vol. LoWTH, Bishop : Isaiah. 1 vol. McClintock and Strong : Cyclopaedia. 3 vols. Mackay, R. W. : Rise and Progress of Christianity. 1 vol. McWuorter, a. : Yahveh Christ. 1 vol. MICHAELIS, J. D. : Introduction to N. T. 6 vols. , Miles, H. A. ; Traces of Picture Writing in the Bible. 1 vol. Milman, Dean : History of the Jews. 3 vols. Moore, T. V. : The Last Days of Jesus. 1 vol. Mountford, William : Miracles, Past and Present. 1 vol. Murray : Hand-book of Syria and Palestine. 1 vol. Neander, a. : Life of Christ. 1 vol. Noyes : New Testament, Translated from Greek Text of Tischendorf. 1 voL Olshausek, Dr. H. : Commentary, etc. G vols. Parker, Joseph : Hoiniletic Analysis of New Testament. 1 vol. PlilNY : Natural History, Edition Bohn's Library. G vols. B0UK0E8. 727 PLtJMTRE, Prof. : Christ and Christendom. 1 vol. Pbime, W. C. : Tent Life in the Holy Land. 1 vol. Priestley, Joseph : Early Opinions Concerning Christ. 1 voL RAMMonuN Roy ; Precepts of Jesus. 1 vol. Penan, Ernst : Life of Jesus. 1 vol. Reville, Dr. Albert : The Devil. 1 vol. Robinson, Dr. E. : Biblical Researches, etc. 2 vols. Ryle, Rev. J. C. : Thoughts on the Gospel of St. John. 1 ToL SCHAFF, Dr. P. : History of the Christian Church. 3 vols. " " Person of Christ. 1 vol. SciiENKEL : Sketch of the Character of Jesus. 3 vols. S.MALLBUOOK, Bishop : on Miracles. 2 vols. Smitu, Dr. Wm. : Chronological Tables. 1 vol. '' " Dictionary of the Bible. 4 vols. ' " " New Testament History. 1 vol. S\rAT T Boni-s • i ^^^^^ o^ Man. before the Promulgation of Christianity. 1 vol. / Greek Philosophy from the Age of Socrates to Christ. 1 vol, Stackhouse, T. : History of Holy Bible. G vols. Stanley, Prof. A. P. : Sinai and Palestine. 1 vol. Stephen, Sir George : Life of Christ. 1 vol. Stier, R. : The Words of the Lord Jesus. G vols. Story, W. W. : A Roman Lawyer in Jerusalem. 1 vol. Strauss, D. F. : New Life of Jesus. 2 vols. Stroud, Dr. W. : Physical Causes of the Death of Christ. 1 vol, Tacitus : Annals. 1 vol. Taylor, Bp. Jeremy: History of Life and Death of Jesus Christ. 1 vol. Taylor, Charles : The Gospel in the Law. 1 vol. Tertullian : Works. 3 vols. TisCHENDORF, C. : Nov. Test. Grasce, ex Sinaitico Cod. 1 vol. " Origin of the Four Gospels. 1 vol. TnoLUCK, Aug. : The Sermon on the Mount. 1 vol. " The Gospel of John. 1 vol. Thomson, W. M. : The Land and the Book. 2 vols. Thbupp, J. F, Ancient Jerusalem. 1 vol. Thucydides : Goeller's Edition. 2 vols. TowNSEND, G. : New Testament arranged in Chronological Order. 1 voL Trench : Studies in the Gospel. 1 vol. " On the Miracles. 1 vol. " On the Parables. 1 vol. TURPIE, D. M. : The Old Testament in the New. 1 vol. Uhlhorn, Dr. G. : Modern Representations of the Life of Jesus. 1 voL Van Dyke, Rev. Dr. H. T. : The Lord's Prayer. 1 vol Veith, J. E. : Life Pictures of Passion of Christ. 1 vol. West, Dr. N. : Complete Analysis of the Bible. 1 vol. Whately, Archbishop : The ICingdom of Christ. 1 vol. " " Scripture Revelation of a Future State. 1 ToL YOXJKQ, John, LL.D. : The Christ of History. 1 vol. LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS, DESIGNED BY ALBEKT LEIGHTON EAWSON. ENGRAVED B1 LINTON, FLLMER, AND OTHERS. Ideal Head op Jesus (opposite the title-page), after the celebrated painting by Guercino called " Ecce Homo," engraved in aquatint by W. G. Jackman, New York. All of the so-called heads of Jesus are ideals of the artists, made to supply the demands of certain believers in the several ages, and they are of every possible variety of character and expression, as they were designed to represent the teach- ing, laboring, healing, suffering, or triumphant Christ. The most ancient of these that have been preserved, that are worthy of the name of fine-art works, are engraved on precious stones, and must be assigned to quite SL recent age, when the Italian revival of art found it necessary to supply the multitude of worshipers with some visible image of the divine man. The best of these is called, " The Emerald of the Vatican," and is a copy of the head of Jesus in RafaeUe's cartoon of the Miraculous Draught of Fishes. The heads engraved by Albert Diirer are very artistic ideals of the notion that the Messiah must have been repulsive and unlovely in appearance. The Italians (Leonardo da Vinci, Rafaelle, Guido, Guercino, Titian, etc.) made their ideals weak and womanish, without intellectual force or manly vigor, and have in nearly every instance lowered their hero beneath the average appearance of men in active life. The recent attempts of Europeans and Americans have served only to show that the artist is incapable of painting any ideal above or beyond his own char- acter; and if that falls below the pure and lofty ideal which is universally given to the conception of the character of Jesus, then the work must reflect upon the subject to its disadvantage. The all-healing Messiah could only be represented faithfully as the merciful phj'sician and restorer to spii^itual and physical health by an artist who was qualified, first, by having the almost divine attribute of a soul that is willing, for the sake of relieving a suffering brother, to 730 LIST OF ILLUSTEATI0N8. take his disease upon himself, or his criminal shame as his own ; and, second, the ability to reproduce the expression of countenance which will convey that will- ingness to self-sacrifice. The artist who would not so sacrifice himself is lesa than the ideal of Jesus which every believer holds sacred, and is, therefore, inca- pable of conceiving the proper character of the divine physician. And this ia also true of any other aspect of the many-sided character of the Great Teacher. That such an artist lives we cannot determine ; but that any such picture has been produced we are certain, and can only wait. It seems to many persons that this subject in all its aspects, whether representing Jesus as teacher, healer, or the divine man, is abovQ and beyond the possible achievement of art. The early fathers were influenced by the Jewish habits of thought, which regarded every representation of the human form, and more especially any at- tempts at imaging the divine, with hon-or, and therefore the only devices used were such as the dove, the fish, the lyre, the anchor, the ship under saU, etc. The very earliest date that can be assigned to any head of Jesus engraved on a gem (and there are hundreds known) is to the age when the emperors sustained a school of engraving as an appendage to the court, as is mentioned in a law of the Emperor Leo, A. D. 886-911. The most popular pictures representing Jesus are those of the passion, includ- ing the trial, incidents on the way to Calvary, the crucifixion ; and in this work of Guercino the incident of the crowning mth thorns is presented in a masterly maimer. This painting has long been valued by some critics, who think they see in it more of the real character of a Jew of Syria, in raiddle age, than appears in any other Italian work. It is almost impossible to convey even a fair impression of the excellence of the original painting, which is justly classed among the chief works of the greatest masters in art. This engraving gives as clear and satisfac- tory an idea of the original, which is in colors and very carefully finished, as ia possible to be done in black and white, and the style of engraving (aquatint) seems to be peculiarly adapted for such a subject. It should be borne in mind that the orientals were not in the habit of stripping even condemned criminals nude, and therefore the nudity of the Italian artists is local, and has no reference to the customs of Palestine. If we must have pictures of Jesus, it seems a pity that they cannot be the work of artists who are as free as possible from the monkish traditions of the Komish Church, and of the effete whims concerning Greek art, and who will take the time and do the work of informing themselves on the manners and customs of the Syrians, and especially of the Jews in the first century A. D. , and who would endeavor to present the man Jesus, the native of Palestine, in such a character that we should find it natural to respect and love him as a powerful and good person. So far every attempt to represent the person or character of Jesus has been a vote for Rome, the head, the drapery, and often the ascessories, carrying the mind of the beholder to Home instead of to Jerusalem. ]\Iap op Palestine in the Time op Christ (p. 15). — This map gives only the most important places, the hundreds of small villages having been omit- ted to avoid crowding. LIST OF ILLUSTKATIONS. 731 SiTEPnERDs' Field, BExnLEnEM (p. 23). — The side hill and fields east of the convent and village of Bethlehem bear the name of The Shepherds' Field, and have been used as a pasture, as they are now, from the most ancient time. The soil is kept from washing down the steep by stone walls, forming terraces, on which there are a few trees, the remains of orchards of olives and figs. The shepherds watch their flocks day and night, very few having a fold, sleeping near them under a tent of coarse cloth, or of leaves and grass. It was in one of these fields, east from the terraced hillside, that the beauti- ful idyl of Ruth, Boaz, and Naomi occurred, forever sanctifying the toils of common life, and shedding a glory over the harvest-fiejd. The scene is also associated with David, first as the shepherd boy, tending his father's flocks, then as the brave leader and chief, contending with his enemies, and singing the praises of the great Leader who assists all who contend against evil ; and after that as the- king t^vice crowned as ruler over the Jews. A well is pointed out there as the one whose waters David thirsted for \vith a resistless longing, which was suddenly changed into regret when he learned that its water had been brought to him at the risk of good men's lives. The village on the hiU is not very ancient, although it may be on the site of the original town. It is not again mentioned in Scripture after the birth of Jesus, which occurred not in the village, but, as Justin Martyr says (A.D. 150), "in a certain cave very close to the village." The village is built on a low hill, which is west of, and se^Darated a little by a shallow depression, from the convent ; it is triangular, walled in-, and contains three thousand people, who are nearly all makers of beads, crucifixes, boxes, models of the holy i^laces, &c. , for sale to pilgrims. The manufacture of relics is also carried on to an extent which is alarming to the true antiquarian, although very profitable to those concerned. The imitations can always be detected by a little care and scrutiny. Husks (p. 22). — The Carob tree, a species of locust, bears the long, sweet- ish pods (ten inches), somewhat like the Lima bean pods, which are called husks in Lulce xv. 16, and St. John's bread by pilgrims. The tree grows everywhere in Palestine, and the Levant as far south as Hebron, and is a large and hand- some object, with its deep green dense foliage of round glossy leaves, more especially in the dry season, for it is an evergreen. The Greeks caU it keratia (horn), from the horn shape of the pods. The pods (just before they are ripe) are steeped in water, forming a pleasant acid drink. They are also sold in aU Oriental bazaars for food, more commonly for pigs, cattle, and horses, but they are only eaten by the verj- poorest of the people. They furnish, by boiling, a poor quality of molasses (dibs). Nazareth (p. 24) is first mentioned in Matthew ii. 23, or if taken in the order of time, in Luke i. 2G, as the scene of the annunciation to Mary of the birth and character of Jesus. This place was unknown, or unmentioned in his- tory, before the birth of Jesus, but since that event its name has become a 732 LIST OF ILLUSTKATIONS. houseliold word throughout the Christian world. The city is now built on a Bide hill, overlooking a plain, and probably not far from the ancient site, a little lower on the same hill, and has about 5,000 inhabitants. It is very well built, nearly every house being of stone, flat roofed, and of two stories or more. The Maronite convent is built close under the steep place which is shown as the one down which the people were determined to cast Jesus. There are many other ob- jects and localities pointed out to visitors as remnants of antiquity, but which have little claim to such honor, because the stone of the district is a soft white marl, easily crumbled and soon falling to pieces ; and therefore it is not probable that any house there is more than one or two hundred years old. The fountain, the valley, and the fourteen hills around the city have not changed, and must pre- sent the same general appearance as when the son of the carpenter grew up there. The valley runs nearly east and west, and is about a mile long by a quarter wide. The hiUs are from 500 to 100 feet high above the vaUey ; the highest, called Naby Ismail, being 1,800 feet above the ocean, and 500 above the valley. The soil is rich, and sustains a great variety of trees, flowers, vines, and produces fruit, vegetables, and grain in abundance. The view from the summit of Naby Ismail, behind Nazareth, to the north- west, is most extensive, and includes many well-known and interesting Scripture sites, some of which are noted also in later history. South-east the long brown crest of Carmel juts out below the Bay of Acre, with the blue sea beyond ; on its east end there are memories of Elijah and Baal's priests, Ahab, the "fifties," and on its western end, near the sea, is a convent dating from the Crusades, and the plain of Esdraelon, level and green at its base ; the hills of Scmaria, inclosing the city of Samaria, and the mountain Ebal (and Gerizim behind it) by Shechem, Gilboa, Little Hermon, and its speck of the village of Nain, and Shunem not far off ; the Kishon river, the village of Jezreel : Mount Tabor, with memories of Deborah and Barak, and later of Napoleon ; Gilead, purple and tremulous in the east, rising into the high plateau of Jaulan, over which, to the north-east, the shining crest of Hermon above the clouds, lifting up so many ruined pagan temples on its sides and summits. The Mount of Beatitudes (Hattin) just hides Capernaum at the north end of the Sea of Galilee ; the heights of Safed, Jebel Jermuk, and the hill on which Hazor once stood, are to the north, and over them appears, like a stUl blue cloud, the range of Lebanon. Jebel Kaukab marks the site of Cana, lying at its foot ; and there is the sea over Acre again ; St. John of Acre, fuU of mediaeval history, fuU of dust and rains, of Crusading times and later ages of war. Nazareth (p. 35). See page 731. Bethlehem (p. 36). See Shepherd's Field, page 23, Hebron (p. 36). — There has been a "city" on or near the site of the present place, which is called KhuUl, The Friend (of God), meaning Abraham, ever since the time of the earliest records in history. The whole district is favor- able to an agricultural life, and is noted for its good soil and the great variety of its products, especially the vine, figs, olives, and is as well watered as any part of the 733 LIST OF ILLITSTRATIONS. and vegetables giving place to melons and cucumbers. „ r ";^Trs^«::^r!. :rn:ri"'sr:; built oL ^ -::Hr.eii:t::ieb^.i^e«^ is possible tbat some part o£ ^^ ~- ^ . ^^^ „^^ ^„,^, ,^^^ tbis sup- ::i=:tr:;ero;'::x^^ -*-^^"°''^'?:T;::J':/:r -slice tbc time of tbe Bomans. r:o";r:.:r :; t^r,: tbe nara^ is » rClc o, sevcra. ages, put into nre^ccrrrr^airr^^^^^^^^ clitircli of Constantine was built near this tree, a lew still to be seen, some large ones measuring fourteen ^eet^" -f ■ ^^^ ,.^, Kin<. David lived there seven years and a half, as kin„ ^u , 7Z « "e so poor as to be ^able to get an, better jewelr, tban tbrs cheap glass. i™, on K=«. (p. 40).-The only publicbonse offered by the Orientals^ is Ly to Le camels for baggage besides for riding, and so every part, of half a Zn forms a little caravan of ten to fifteen camels, or camels, borses, and don '^^Tbeinnof Chimbam is tbe first mentioned in tbe ^^'^r'^l^ Bethlebem, on tbe road to Egypt, as alluded to by Jercm.ab (Jr. 17 ami .t !: improbable that it was tbe same publie-bonse in -^;^^'^^^;'JZ\rll site is now occupied by a convent, wbicb dates from the C--^-.^^^-; ' the time of tbe Empress Helena, mother of Constantme and « tbe oMest Cbus tian church in the world. It wa. repaired by K-ng Edward IV of En>nd , Mdwi^, the famous Crusader and king of Jerusalem, was ero.vned m t '^e bunding is venerable and maiestic, and i^-^^; ^;,- ^ ^e^ toiy. Its root is made of tbe cedar of Lebanon, and ...s m»rb.e co.um-. 734 LIST OF ILLTJSTEATIONS. g'athered from many countries, the gifts of princes and devout persons. Some of the Byzantine pillars are painted with curious devices, -which are almost obliterated, being very much time-worn and weather-stained. The history and tradition of the " Cave of the Nativity," which is under the church, being' reached by a number of steps cut down in the solid rock, and in which it-is asserted that Jesus was bom, extends back almost to the death of John the Evangelist and Revelator. Caves and recesses in the rock are now used, and probably always have been, as a refuge for cattle, and also for people, as is often noticed in the Scriptures. But still there is veiy little to be said in favor of the cave having been a part of the original inn. Jerome translated the Bible in a grotto at Bethlehem, which may have been in this same cave (where a grotto is shown as his studio), although it has been very miTch enlarged in later times, and is now a very sho%vy, if not actually a splendid room, filled with gilt ornaments of religious interest, the gifts of the pious pilgrims of many ages. Marble pavement, marble columns, panels, silver, brass, and copper lamps, with gold ornaments, and massive metal candlesticks, highly enriched with engraving and gilding, and inscriptions sculptured and gilded ; and more showy, and ap- parently more valuable, than all the rest, a radiated star around the inscription recording the birth of the Saviour, made of colored glass, in imitation of precious stones, and placed over the grotto which is pointed out as the very spot on which Jesus was bom. There was f armerly a star composed of real gold and precious stones, including many valuable diamonds, emeralds, &c., which was removed by some avaricious and unworthy custodian, and the present cheap imitation substituted. The walls, and in many places the roof also, are covered with richly dyed silk hangings. SmAT (p. 48).- — The Sinai of tradition and of many modem investigators is shown in the view, which was taken from the plain Er Rahah, a little west of the convent. The whole group of peaks is named Jebel Musa, Mount Moses, and the peak nearest to the convent is called Has Sufsafa, Head of the Willow, fronti a single willow tree which grows on it. The summit is about 3,000 feet above the plain, and has on it a chapel and the ruins of a mosque, which may be reached by a few minutes of hard climb- ing. The whole mountain stands out against the sky like a huge altar, being separated by valleys on all sides from the mountains around. The plain of Er Rahah is two miles long, half a mile wide, and slopes gently towards the mountain, forming a natural amphitheatre on which many thou- sands could camp and distinctly view the mountain from its base to its summit. SuccOTn (THE Booths) (p. 84).— It is still called by its ancient name, pro- nounced by the Arabs Sakut, and is believed to mark the place where Jacob crossed the Jordan river, a few miles below Bethshan. The booths must have been on the east side of the river, but the name has been transferred across, for Sakut is now on the west side. Other names have passed over Jordan ia th» LIST OF ILLrSTRATIOlSrS. 735 game maimer, as " Jebel Miisa," near Jericho, Moses' Mountain, meaning the one from which he viewed the promised land, which was on the east side. The vessels for Solomon's Temple were cast in the clay ground on the Jordan banks, between Succoth and Zartan, and there are very fine and deep clay beds there now, the clay from which is hard, almost slaty, easily softened and moulded, and the best known for casting metals in to this day. The whole vicinity of Succoth abounds in springs and brooks, and there is " much water" now, as there was in the time of John's ministry (John iii. 22). The " ford" (so called, for there is no passable place as a ford there) opposite Jericho, near the Jews' castle, is one of the '• localities" of the monks. Ford op the Jordan (p. 58). The view is of a place near Ximrim (the Panthers), where there is a rather difficult ford in the season of low water, but none at .all in the winter. There are several fords, in the summer time, which are used by travelers and the natives, as opposite Bethshan, near Succoth, just north of Wady Yabes (Jabesh), which is supposed to be the same as the Betha- bara (Beth- bara) of Judges \'ii. 24. There are several others north of the mouth of the Jabbok. Ten miles south of that river there is a good one on the road from Nablus (Shecliem) to Es Salt (Ramoth in Gilead), and there are ruins of a Roman bridge there also. There are also fords both above and below the Pilgrim's Bathing Place (Latin), opposite Jericho; the upper one is supposed to be the one crossed by Joshua. The river below the ' ' bathing place " is swift and deep, and cannot be forded. Caioiel (p. 90). — The mountain is 1,800 feet at the east, and 500 feet high at the west end, and is nearly eighteen miles long from the site of the sacrifice of Baal's i^rophets to the convent overlooking the sea. It is the most picturesque region in Palestine, in variety of hill-sides, mountain slopes, covered with the most luxuriant vegetation, and carpeted ^\•ith countless flowers. The forests abound in wild game, such as partridge, quaU, woodcock, hare, jAckal, wolf, hyena, boar, and bear. The mountain has been fanious from remote antiquity as a holy place, having had among the visitors to its shrines the ancient philosopher Pythagoras and the Emperor Vespasian. The present budding, standing on the west end near the sea, was erected in 1830, over the ancient ruins of the convent originally standing there, which wag founded by St. Louis of France, who named the order '" The Barefoot Carmelite Friars." Capeknatjai (p. 112), which had been so utterly destroyed as to leave scarcely any trace of its site, has been restored to history, beyond a doubt, by the researches and discoveries of \V. M. Thomson {Land and Book), and tho Palestine Exploration {Jerusalem Recovered). The ruins lie scattered over a hill called Tell Hum, which rises from the water edge of the Sea of Galilee, and which is an excellent site for a city, being high, commanding a wide prospect across the sea south, over the plains and hills east, the plain of Gennesaret and 736 LIST OF ILLTrSTEATIONS. the hills of Galilee west, and the mountains around Safed, while snow-capped Harmon is in view north-east. There is a ruin of the synagogue, which may have been built or improved by the centurion mentioned in Matthew, who was in command of Roman troops stationed there. The building was made of lime- stone, brought from a distance, and there are a few pieces of sculptured orna- ments, columns, cornices, lintels left, which indicate that the structure was mag- nificent in size and workmanship. One of the lintels had sculptured on it a pot of manna, as an ornament, among scrolls and other figures, which proves that the building was a religious edifice built by Jews. There was also a cemetery, with graves and regular tombs cut in the rock or buUt above the surface. The ruins cover a space nearly as large as the town of Tiberias, and the place may have contained, in its greatest prosperity, fifty thou- sand inhabitants. The materials may have been carried away during the last thousand years, to reappear in other cities, or have been burnt into lime, as has been done at other places. The other claimants to the site of Capernaum do not present ruins which answer the demand of the text, and Tell Hum does. The Evangelists did not give topographical indications directly, for they were not writing a geography ; while Josephus, as a soldier and engineer, was careful to notice localities, and his description of Capernaum and other places is very complete. The miracle of the feeding five thousand persons with food created for the purpose, was considered by all the Evangelists of very great importance, and aa they have all mentioned Capernaum and Bethsaida in connection with the ac- count, geograiDhers have been so perplexed as to attempt to invent a second Beth- saida at the head of the lake, west of Capernaum. The preaching by the sea may be located somewhere along the 6oast between Tell Hum and Tabigah, where there are several creeks and inlets in which the boat (ship in the Gospel) could ride in safety only a few feet from the shore, and where the multitude could be seated on the dry shore, where there are many boulders of basalt, smooth and convenient for seats. The first four of the Apostles were fishermen, and there are no more favorable places for carrying on their business than this very shore, where their boats could be kept in safety, and their nets mended on the hard shell-paved beach. (See TeU Hum.) Cana (p. 120). — There is a division of opinion among scholars on the question of th^ site of the ancient Cana, one party holding that Kefr Kenna, a \'illage three miles north-west of Nazareth, is the true site, and another that what is now called Kana-el-Jelil (Cana of Galilee), is the site of the village in which the marriage -feast was held, at which it is said that the wine was created from water. Kana-el-JelU was selected as the more beautiful of the two in a pictorial sense, and besides the evidence seems to be greatly in its favor. It lies on the end of a ridge, at the foot of Jebel Kaukab, just at the border of the plain of Buttauf (plain of Issachar), eight miles north of Nazareth. The site is very favorable for fine views, overlooking the plain, and including distant glimpses of LIST OF ILLUSTKATIONS. 737 Bfcveral mountains well known in Bible narrative, as Hermon, Tabor, Gilboa, Carmel, and Lebanon, The ancient writers (Antoninus Martyr, A.D. 590; St. Willibald, A.D. 780; Ssewulf, A.D. 1103; Maurice Sanutus, a.d. 1321; Breydenbach. A.D. 1483; Anselm, A.D. 1507; Adrichomis, A.D. 1575) unite in describing the site, as be- lieved to have been correctly located in their day, at the foot of a high round mountain on the north, a plain, broad and fertile on the south, and wath Sep- phoris between it and Nazareth, all of which particulars are found at Kana-el- Jelil. These writers also described six water-pots and a triclinium where the feast was held, the whole being in a cavern or grotto, underground, like that of the Nativity at Bethlehem, and also of the Annunciation at Nazareth. The water-pots shown there are not reliable as antiquities, because they are a common article of domestic use, and are made when wanted, in every age, in every year, and a few broken jars can always be had to lend their appearance in aid of a popvdar tradition. It is therefore not surprising that water-pots are shown at both sites of Cana, and both claimed as veritable antiquities. The general truth of the event, the Galilean village, the custom of the peoplo keeping water and wine in jars of pottery, can be proven beyond question ; but the house in which the feast was held, and the jars that held the water made wine, have passed away into their original dust. John's Prison, Mach^ertjs (p. 148).— Herod the Great built a palace and s» prison, and probably bath-houses also, at the hot springs of Callirrhoe, on the liver Main, about eight miles from the Dead Sea. Josephus describes it i. Wars, vi., 0. 1) as "a veiy rocky hUl, elevated to a great height, ditched about vdth valleys on all sides to such a depth that the eye cannot reach their bottoms, that on the west reaching to the Lake Asphaltitis ; and on that same side the castle had the tallest top of its hill." The cliffs are 200 feet high, about 150 apart, and the stream from the hot springs is six to ten inches deep, 50 to 100 feet wide, and runs four or five mUes an hour. The ruins of the castle or palace, and per- haps other houses, are scattered over several acres of the ridge, nearly half a mile from the ravine. The finest view is had by moonlight, when the almost daylight of the fuU moon gives a wild and strange character to the scene. There has as yet been no exploration on the east of the Dead Sea, except at a few points, and it is believed that the richest results would follow from the examina- tion of certain well-known ruins, such as these at Macha;rus, and at Heshbon, Rabbath-Ammon, by scientific men, properly provided with instruments and assistants. Shechem (p. 149).— The village lies between two hills, Ebal and Geriziin, which are on the great dividing ridge between the Jordan and the Mediten-auean Sea. It is now called Nablus, a corruption of Neapolis, the Greek name given to it by Vespasian. John speaks of it as Sychar, and Pliny called it IMabortha. The valley is about 1,500 feet wide, between the two mountains, and its general level is 1,800 above the sea. The valley is full of springs of good wate., fche people counting as many as eighty. Some of these springs send the waters 47 738 LIST OF ILLTJSTKATIONS. into the Jordan, and others into the Mediterranean. The soil is rich, and -very productive in orchards, gardens, and fields, and is not equalled in Palestine for ita glory of fruit and verdure, running brooks, and singing birds. Abraham pitched his tent under the oak of Moreh, and there first set up the worship of the living God, near to Shechem. In this vicinity was also most probably the residence of Melchizedek, the King of Salem, in or near that little modern village of Salim. The Samaritans also claim that the Moriah on which Abraham laid out Isaac ready for the sacrifice was Mount Gerizim. Shechem also was the residence of the grandson of Abraham, Jacob, who bought a field and dug a well. (See Jacob's Well.) It is probably on account of these well-known facts in the history of the place that Moses regarded it as the most sacred spot in Canaan, and the only one con- secrated to the worship of the living God, and that accordingly he ordered the great assembly of the people there. The experiment has been made of two readers stationed on opposite sides of the valley, on Ebal and Gerizim, who read the blessings and the curses in a loud voice, and were distinctly heard by each other. The bones of Joseph were also brought from Egypt by the children of Israel, and buried, as tradition says, in the level spot close under the foot of Mount Ebal. Jacob's Well (p. 153). — The remarkable work called Jacob's Well is ia the plain of Mukna, a mile and a half from the village of Nablus (Shechem). Joseph's Tomb is in plain view, nearer Mount Ebal. There are none who dispute the identity of this well as having been the work of Jacob and his servants. The most surprising thing about it is that a well should have been dug at all in a place which abounds in natural springs of bright, sweet water, and sufficient in quantity to supply several brooks. The visitor now first descends into a chamber about ten feet, in the floor of which is the mouth of the well, only large enough to admit the body of a man. This opening is broken through an arch which has been not very long ago built over the well. The shaft is seven feet six inches in diameter, and seventy-five feet deep down to the rubbish, which is supposed to be fifty to seventy-five feet deeper. It is lined with rough masonry, having been dug through alluvial sod. There are ruins of the church, which once stood over the well, scattered about, but nO signs of any curb or inclosing wall of any kind around the mouth (John iv. 1). This is one of the few places in Palestine that is not "honored" by some edifice or monument ' ' locating " the Bible narrative ; but it is said that the Greeks (Russians) have lately bought the place, with the intention of building a church over the well. The valley of Mukna, the ancient Moreh, is one of the richest in the produc- tion of grain, fruit, and vegetables in aU the land ; — vines, figs, oranges, lemons, pomegranates, in short, every fruitful tree, and all growing beside never-failing streams of pure water. The valley extends for about seven miles, and is the fairest expanse of cultivated soil in all the land. LIST OF ILLUSTEATIONS. 739 Samaritan pkiest (p. 159). The Assyrians carried away to the Euphrates the Jews of Samaria, and sent their own people to occupy the cities and the land. From these emigrants the modem Samaritans are descended. They have kept a copy of the law as it was on their day, 500 B. c. , and still celebrate the ancient form of worship, although there are only about one hundred of them left. The dress of the priest may be, and probably is, a correct following of the ancient style, and its description answers the requirements of the text in Exodus very closely. The enmity between the Jews and Samaritans began when they were refused to have a share in rebuilding the Temple at Jerusalem, after the return from the captivity in Babylon, when they built a temple for themselves on Mount Gerizim, at She- chem, in the time of Alexander. This was destroyed by John Hyrcanus, B.C. 129. In the fifth century A.D. there was a Christian Church on Gerizim, butonly a few stones of the foundation are left. Tell Hum {p. 1G8). — In determining the antiquity of a name which ig found attached to a certain locality, it is sometimes needful to follow it through several changes it may have undergone in passing from one language to another. In this archaiological skill Dr. Robinson was especially noted and successful, hav- ing recovered hundreds of Bible names from the modern Arabic titles to placea noted in the Scriptures. W. M. Thomson was the first to discover the name of Capernaum in the Arabic Tell Hum. He says : " Hum. is the last syllable of Kefr-na-hum, as it was anciently spelled, and it is a very common mode of cur- tailing old names to retain only the final syllable. Thus we have Zib for Ach- zib, and Fik for Aphcah, etc. In this instance Kefr has been changed to Tell- why ? A deserted site is generally named Tell, but not Krfr (which is applied to a village) ; and when Capernaum became a heap of rubbish it would be quite natural for the Arabs to drop the Kefr, and call it simply Tell Hum." (See Capernaum. ) Scribes and books (p. ISO). Cedars (p. 181).— There are few remains of the ancient forests on the moun- tains of Syria, and the cedars are the most noble specimens now standing. On the slopes of the Lebanon range there are several groves of the ancient cedars, one of which is near the Beirut-Damascus carriage road, and is quite easy of access to travelers, who have brought away thousands of the cones, which are nearly three inches long by two inches diameter, and one especially, Robert Mor- ris, LL.D., in 1808, distributed several thousands among Sunday-school scholars as incentives to a study of the natural history of Palestine. The largest cedars are found near the highest summit of Lebanon (Dhor el Khodib), close to the limit of perpetual snow. Bottles (p. 194).— There are several kinds of bottles used in the East, made of skins, earth, glass, and of metal. The skins are of various sizes, as they are taken from rabbits, kids, sheep, cows, holding from one gallon to thirty or forty. These are usually prepared with the hair turned inside, and so are likely to give the water or wine a peculiar flavor. These skin-bottles are the kind alluded to in the Scriptures, where new bottles are recommended for strength ; and they are also used in Spain now as well as in Palestine and other eastern countries. 740 LIST OF nXrSTEATIOIfS. The bottles of glass do not differ from ours, except that they are it very sin gular forms. Those found in tombs and in ancient ruins are, ■without doubt^ veritable antiquities, and have the well-known appearance of old, time-worn, decayed glass. Earthen bottles, or jars and pitchers, axe always finely formed, and often elegantly ornamented with figures and colors. They are in constant use, as pails are \\-ith us, and are seen in the hands or on the heads of the women, morning and evening, at the wells, or on the way to and from. Metals, especially copper and bronze, were used for bottles and cups, and most of the smaller vessels, such as are made of tin or tinned iron with us, in the East are made of copper or brass. The ancients did not make brass, but bronze. The ancient pieces of money are bronze, as also many articles, such as knives, swords, handles, dishes, bowls, etc., and this compound was of copper and tin, the union of copper and zinc forming brass being a modem invention. Ancient Bottles (p. 197). Pool of IlEZEKL^n (p. 199). — This pool is cut in the solid rock, and is of great antiquity, and is the work of Hezekiah, King of Judah, who "made a pool, and a conduit, and brought water into the city ; " and also " stopped the upper watercourse of Gihon, and brought it straight down to the west side of the city of David." Jerusalem is chiefly dependent on the rains for its supply of water, and every house has under it one or more cisterns. The Hezekiah pool is 2~)0 feet long, 150 wide, and capable of holding millions of gallons of water, which is used to supply several bath-houses. The pool is inclosed by houses on every side, one of which is a large hotel, kept by Europeans. The question of where the pool of Bethesda was, and which ruin or present pool is the true site, if any now remains, is one of the unsettled problems in the map of Jerusalem. Among the sites offered is the great pool or reservoir north of the Temple site, and now called the Pool of Bethesda, ne;ix the St Stephen Gate, and which has been lined with masonry and cemented for holding water, although it is now dry ; 360 feet long, 130 wide, 75 deep. Another, called by Eusebius and the Bordeaux PUgrim the twin pools, which has been lately foimd at the north-west angle of the Temple area, a large reser- voir. 1G5 feet long by 48 wide (with a dividing wall running lengthwise, and both sides arched over, and now bmlt over). The water is used by the Convent of the Sisters of Sion. The Arch of Ecce Homo is near the place. Mr. Williams (TMy City, p. 484) thinks the Bethesda pool was near the St. A"Ti Church, and now almost completely destroyed. Chancellor Crosby selects the A'irgin Fotmtain, which is now outside of the city walls, as the true Bethesda. Our text offers the Hezekiah pool, which answers many, if not all, of the requirements of the case. Sea op Galilee (p. 218).— The sea is pear-shapei. the large end at the north, six and three-quarters mile wide, and twelve and a quarter long. The, LIST OF ILLUSTEATIOXS. 741' purface is between 600 and 700 feet below the ocean level. The shores are on all sides quite regular in outline, but the hills are indented into many little baya or hollows, some of which are small plains, filled with vegetation, and very beautiful. The hills are almost always gently sloping, and might be cultivated from bottom to top. The soil is rich, being formed on limestone. Basalt has flowed over t"he tops of the hUls from three sources, Kurun Hattin, El- Jish, beyond Saf ed, and in the Jaulan. The beach is paved with minute white broken shells, and skirted in many places %vith oleanders and other flowering shrubs. The hills have a general tint of purpUsh brown, broken in some places by gray rocks, or lines of foliage. The east shore is 2,000 feet high, quite uniform in height along the summit of the ridge, but cut down by several deep ravines, with very few scattering trees, and no forests. On the west the banks ai-e about the same height, but the uniform level is relieved by the outlines of Tabor and Hattin, which rise into the sky in the distance. Northward the outline is still more varied by the heights of Safed, the plain of Gennesaret, and the snow-capped Hermon. Towards the south the view is lost in the dim hazy heat of the Ghor, with Mount GUboa and Little Hermon on the west side of the Jordan, and Gilead on the east. The locality of the Dead Sea can be made out by the level haze in the distant horizon, in the morning or near sunset. The Jordan river enters near the w-estern shore of the north end, and colors the water for nearly a mile with its muddy current, and passes out at the south end, a pure bright stream. The water of the sea is in some places 250 feet deep, and is clear, bright, and Bweet to the taste, except near salt springs. The climate is almost troj^ical, ice or frost never appearing. Palms and all kinds of trees and vegetables grow in luxuriance, and indigo is cultivated. The summer heat is high, but the cool breezes of the morning and evening relieve its oppressiveness. The waters are well stocked with many kinds of fish, some of which are much prized for their flavor. Several wann springs pour their waters into the sea, which were increased in volume and temperature by the earthquake of 1837. The most noted of the hot springs are those near Tiberias, where there are bath-houses of stone, quite well built Josephus speaks of this place as Emmaus, near Tiberias. It was an ancient and fortified town of Naphtali, as mentioned in the book of Joshua (xix. 35). In the time of Jesus there were nine cities, or cities and villages, around the shores of this lake, only one or two of which now remain — Tiberias and Magdala. All the others are in ruins, and even so far destroyed as to be almost entirely lost. The sea has had several names, as Galilee, from the district in the Roman period ; Chinnereth, from a city which stood at or near the present Tiberias ; Tiberias, from the city which was named in honor of Tiberius, Emperor ol Rome ; and Gennesaret, from the plain of that name on its north-west border. 742 LIST OF ILLTJSTEATIONS. Lamp-stand (p. 240). — The recent exploration in Palestine has found many articles of domestic use, such as bottles, jugs, lamps of pottery, and some articles of copper, as ring-s and ornaments, daggers, heads of gods and serpents, and this lamp-stand, which was found in a chamber south of the Haram Area. Some of these articles were finely wrought, beautifully enamelled, or deHcately inlaid. There were also a few articles of shell, ivory, and wood carvings, such as boxea and cases for the toilet, and objects of luxury. MotTNT OF Beatitudes, Kukun Hattin (p. 242). — Almost unanimous con- sent locates the Sermon on the Mount on this mountain, which rises high above the plain of Buttauf (Issachar), a little more than half way between Nazareth and the Sea of Galilee. Its Arabic name, Kurun Hattin, Horns of Hattin, de- scribes its appearance from a distance, for it is marked by sharp peaks at each end, especially as seen from the south. The view given in the engraving is from the opposite side of the plain, on the north, where the horns, or peaks, are not so apparent. The Hebrew word for horn, keren, is almost identical. It is the most prominent height on the west of the Sea of Galilee, and the plain at its northern foot is very easily reached from the coast towns, while from the plain to the summit it is but a few minutes' walk. There is a level place on the top, as described in the text, and also a higher standing-place on the horns. It is distinctly "the mountain" of the whole region, no other being comparable to it in prominence. The last great battle between the Crusaders and the Saracens took place on and around this mountain. On the 5th July, 1187, the noble army of Knights Templars, numbering 2,000, with 8,000 squires, men-at-arms, &c., formed their line of battle against the army of Saladin. The contest was carried on through several days, until the remnant of the Knights and their followers, then led by King Guy of Lusignan, Raynald of ChatiUon, the Grand Master, the Bishop of Lydda, bearing the relic of the true cross, and Humphrey of Turon, were either killed or made prisoners. There has been no Christian power or ruler in Pales- tine from that day to this. Nain AST) Little Hermon (p. 310). — The vUlage of Nain is poorly built, of about twenty huts, on a rocky ridge, a spur from Little Hermon (ILll Moreh), and near the water-shed between the Jordan and the ]\Iediterranean. The ruins of an ancient city he around the village, and there are cave sepulchres in the steep side hill east of the site, and also on the west. The expedition of Gideon and his 300 men, with lamps in pitchers, and trumpets, is associated with this vicinity, for the plain in front of Nain is that on which the Midianites were camped. Tyre (p. 316) was built both on an island and on the mainland opposite, the island being very strongly fortified. Alexander found it necessary to build a causeway out to the island during his siege of the city, and the work still re- mains, joining the island to the shore. The population in the time of Christ waa LIST OF ILLrSTEATIONS. 743 nearly equal to that of Jerusalem. Cassius, a Christian bishop of Tyre, was at the Council of Caesarea. " William of Tyre " was archbishop in the time of the Crusades (A.D. 1124), and wrote, in his history, an account of the wealth, strength, and manufactures of the city, among which glass and sugar are men- tioned as articles of great value in trade. The Christian army abandoned the place on the eve of June 17, ll'Jl:, the Saracens took possession the next morn- ing, and have held it ever since. The ancient strength and wealth have disap- peared, and its present condition of silence and desolation, as comjiared to its former activity and magnificence, is a most complete fulfilment of prophecy. One stone alone of its great sea wall is left in its original ijosition, near the north end of the island city. It measures (il feet thicli by 17 feet long. The ruins have been used as a quarry, furnishing columns, capitals, panels, and wrought stones for buildings in Joppa, Acre, and BeirCit, besides many fine works carried to Rome and Constantinople. The ruins of the Christian cathedral, in the south- eastern quarter of the modem \'illage, are still imposing, and are visited by every passing pilgrim. It was about 250 by 150 feet in extent. Some of its main .-^olumns were red syenite, and now lie where they fell. The most interesting objects next to the cathedral ruin are the immense fountain and the remains of the aqueduct for supplying the city with water. A few days' work would repair the fountain as good as new. The water is bright and clear, and flows in a large stream, which is only used to turn some smaU mills buUt against the ancient walls. The largest pool or cistern is 80 feet across, octagonal, and 20 feet deep. Another is 53 by 47, and 12 deep ; and the third is 52 by 36, and 16 deep. Tell Hum (p. 319).— See TeU Hum, p. 168. Gkrs.\. (p. 366). — The ruins of this place are on the east side of the Sea of Galilee, on the left bank of Wady Semakh, just at the foot of the hUls, having a little plain half a mile to three-quarters of a mUe in width between the site and the water. The city was enclosed with a wall about three feet thick. The largest ruin is of a rectangular building, which was built east and west, but which cannot now be identified either as a temple, synagogue, or church. Near the water there are a few ruined foundations and walls, which were the port of the ancient city. There is a hot spring in the hUls a mile south of the site, where the hills come close to the sea, leaving only a roadway and a little beach, and forming a steep, even slope, which raay have been the " steep place" mentioned in Matthew viii. 28. There are no rock-hewn tombs (as far as has been examined), and the two demoniacs must have lived in one that was built above ground, similar to those described at Capernaum. Herod's Mite (p. 380). — The farthing was the smallest coin of Herod, unless perhaps the mite or lepton was still smaller. There are mites extant of Herod 744 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. (p. 589) of brass or bronze or copper. There is also a well-known mite of Tibe rius and Julius Caesar. The best idea of the value of the money that was in use in Palestine in the time of Jesus wUl be had from tables of Greek Coins. Lepton (mite) 2 mills. Drachma 16 cts. Didrachm 33 " Stater 64 " Mina (poimd) 16 dolls. Talent 960 " Hebrew — Copper or Bronze. Weight. Gerah (/„-) ... 20 grains. 2 mills. One-sixth.... 88 " 3 " Zuzah (i) . . .133 " 4 " Bekah (i)...2G4 " 8 " Shekel 528 " 1 ct. 6 " Talent (1,500 shekels) 25 dolls. Roman Coins. As (farthing) 15 mUls. Quadrans SJ cts. Denarius (penny) 15 '* Aureus (stater) .' , . . 3 dolla Talent 961 " Ilebrew — Silver. Gerah (bean) 25 mUls. Bekah (divided) 25 cts. Shekel (weight) 50 " Maneh (talent) 25 dolls. Kikkar (round) 1,500 " Talent (p. 446). — The Attic talent of Antiochus III. was valued about sixty- four cents, being equal to four drachms (tetradrachm). Stateu (p. 437). — Tribute-money. The stater was equal to the shekel in the New Testament time, and therefore one stater was the sum required for the tribute for two persons. The image on it was of some Greek king or emperor, and an emblematical figure with an inscription teUing whose money it was — as money of Alexander. Judas Money (p. 414).— The shekel coined by Simon or Eleazar. Map op Galilee (Central and South) (p. 378). — The numerous villages and cities, and the many unnamed rviins of ancient towns, give some idea of the dense population that inhabited Palestine in its prosperous days. Many of these sites are without names, and there are quite a number of Scrip- tural names not yet identified with their sites. There are not many roads now, and probably never were more than a few great lines, connected with the smaller towns by bridle-paths, as is the case now, the traveller needing a guide for a jour- ney of a few miles. Tyre (p. 402).— See page 316. SiDON (p. 406). — The Great Zidon of Phoenicia was built on the northern 6lo^:e of a promontory which iuts north-west into the Mediterranean Sea, and is LIST OF ILLUSTKATIONS. 745 the most ancient of the country. Homer says the large silver bowl given as tha prize to the swiftest runner by Achilles was made at Sidon {Iliad, xxiii. 743). In the Odyssey (iv. 614) there is also an account of " a divine work," a bowl of silver with a gold rim, the work of Hephaestus, and a gift from King Pheedimus of Sidon. He mentions the beautifully embroidered robes that were brought from there for Andromache ; and it is also noticed in the Book of Kings (1 Ki. V. 6) that skilled workmen and not traders were their special pride. While under the Persian rule the city rose to great wealth and importance, and to live carelessly, after the manner of the Sidonians, became a proverb (Judges xviii. 7). The prize in a boat-race, witnessed by Xerxes at Abydos, was won by Sidonians ; and in reviewing his fleet he sat under a golden canopy in a Sidonian galley, and, at the grand assembly of his officers, the King of Sidon sat in the first seat. Strabo said there was the best opportunity for acquiring a knowledge of the sciences of arithmetic and astronomy, and of all other branches of philosophy. It is now called Saide. The vicinity is one great garden, filled with every kind of fruit-bearing trees, nourished by streams from Lebanon. Its chief ex- ports are silk, cotton, and nutgalls. A mission station of Americans are working among 5,000 people. There are many sepulchres in the rocks at the base of the mountain east of Sidon, and also in the plain. One of the most beautiful and interesting Phceni- cian monuments in existence was discovered in a cave in 1855. It is a sarco- phagus of black syenite, with a lid carved in human form, bandaged like a mummy, the face being bare. There is an inscription in the Phoenician lan- guage on the body, and another on the head. In them the king of the Sidonians is mentioned, and it is said that his mother's name was Ashtoreth. The date of the inscription is assigned to the 11th century B.C. Gadaka (p. 407). — This was a Greek city, celebrated for the hot baths near it, and for its temples and theatres, the ruins of which may still be traced. It is five miles south of the Sea of Galilee, and nearly three from the river Hiero- max, which some think was called the Jabbok. Some of the ruined tombs have rooms ten to twenty feet square, and even larger, with many small recesses in their side walls for receiving bodies. The doors are of stone, turning on stone hinges, and some still in use by the people, who occupy the tombs as dwellings. There was a straight street from end to end of the city, nearly two miles long, with a colonnade on each side. Not a house or a column of the whole city is standing except the western theatre. The hot springs are in a natural basin near the river, a beautiful spot, and average 110' F., smelling strongly of sulphur, and they are now used by quite a number of invalids who believe in their curative properties. The ruins of baths and houses are so many and important as to indicate that there must have been at some time a population of at least a thousand invalids and attendants at the baths. The eastern theatre is still quite perfect in its c^roimd plan, although the seata are covered with rubbish and loose stones. 746 LIST OF HvLUSTKATIONS. The western theatre was much larger, and was only about a thousand feel from the eastern, and is in quite a good state of preservation, having been verj strongly built. The seats are of stone, well designed, finely finished, and scarcely show the effect of so many centuries of neglect. The entrance was by a grand stairway leading from the main street, having Corinthian columns on each side. The basalt pavement of the streets shows here and there the marks of wagon wheels, which had worn quite deep ruts in the hard stone. The Jordan valley. Sea of GalUee, and the mountains beyond, are in plain view from the brow of the hill near the city. Bethsaida (p. 414). — This interesting place was on the Jordan, just above its entrance into the Sea of GalUee, and there was no second Bethsaida, as has been supposed, west of Capernaum. The arguments for and against are given with much detail by W. M. Thomson {Land and Book), and by the Palestine Explo- ration {Jerusalem Recovered). A misunderstanding of the text made it seem necessary to find a second place of the name on the shore of the sea. The re- cent discovery of the Sinaitic copy of the gospels, which gives a more correct version of the passage, has settled the question in favor of one city of the name located on the Jordan river It may have been on both sides of the river, and BO have been one part "in Galilee" and the other "beyond Jordan." The ruins, although they are found on both sides of the river, do not appear equal to the requirements of the text of Josephus, in which it is described as an impor- tant city, raised to the first rank, and named Julias, in honor of Julia, tht- daughter of the Emperor Titus. Herod Philip, the Tetrarch, was buried there in a magnificent tomb, which has not yet been found. The place where the five thousand were fed has been located in the Plain of Butiha by some, and at Ain Ba- rideh, near Tiberias, by others. If the coi*rection * of the reading derived from the Sinaitic MS. is the more ancient and reliable, then Ain Barideh, or more cor- rectly, Ain el Fuliyeh (Warm Springs), was the place. CiESAREA PniLiPPi (p. 416). — The ancient Paneas (Pan's city) was named in honor of Tiberius Caesar by Herod Philip, who added his own name to that of the emperor. It was a place of idolatrous worship from the most ancient times, and there are shrines near the Jordan source now. This fountain is one of the largest in Syria. The ruins of the town are on a hill a little east of the fountain. The ruins of the castle are on the hill above the fountain, and among them are some bevelled stones which indicate a Phcenician origin. "Mount Hermon" (p. 428), said Dr. Vandyke, of Beirut, Syria, "is a beautiful sight from every side, wherever visible, near or afar off." Its summit is crowned with perpetual snow, and its lower slopes are clothed with forests. The summer sun melts the snow from the crests of the ridges, leaving it in the * The corrected text reads : " When therefore the boats came from Tiberias (which was), nigh nnto where they did also eat bread." The most ancient writers record tlie tradition that the locality was at Aiii Baridch, (John vi. 23. , LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 747 deep ravines, where it appears like long white lines at a distance, and has been compared to the white locks of an old man. The name Jebel-esh-Shekh means the chief mountain, a title which eveiy traveller gives it spontaneously. It may be seen from the hUls a few miles north of Jerusalem, and from any part of the country north of that, and also from the heights of Moab. Its height is a little less than ten thousand feet ; but as it stands alone and separated by several miles from any other high range, it appears even more majestic and lofty than Leb- anon itself, which is higher. Whether this mountain or its slope near Paneas (Caesarea Philippi) was the scene of the Transfiguration of Jesus, has not been determined ; but the common consent of many writers on the subject has con- nected its name with that event, and the only other locality (Mount Tabor) which at one time was thought to have been the scene is now almost entirely rejected, partly because Josephus gives an account of a Roman fort on its summit, the foundations of which are still traceable. JoppA (p. 444). — This was the only port of Judea, and from the earliest times has been subject to danger, having been taken by armies, sacked, burnt, and rebuilt many times. Nearly every ancient nation of Europe and Asia Minor, Mesopotamia, and Egypt, has had a hand in making the history of Joppa. The present city is but little more than 12.3 years old — some of the residents remem- bering the time when there were not more than a dozen houses in the town — and the present number of people is about 1G,000. Soap is the leading manufac- ture. Fruit and silk are exported in large quantities. The lauding of shipping is made very dangerous by rocks, especially in windy weather, and even steamers are often compelled to go on to Haiffa, nearly sixty miles away to the north. The rocks which lie just outside of the inner harbor are famous in the works of the ancient historians and poets as the monster which devoured Andromeda and was killed by Perseus. They still devour many boats, and even large ships, with all their cargoes, and sometimes also their passen- gers. The gardens around Joppa are famous for most excellent fruits, probably be- cause the whole plain is percolated by the waters from the hills, which may be drawn up in every garden from a few feet deep. The followers of tradition show a "grave" of Dorcas and a "house" of Simon the Tanner, The tanneries are a little south of the city, where they pro- bably have been from the earliest, and were in Peter's time. The route for a raih-oad from Joppa to Jerusalem has been surveyed, following very closely the ancient summer road of Solomon's time. It will seem almost a sacrilege to ask for "tickets for Jerusalem," and "through tickets for Bethle- hem," after the ages of weary cUmbing of pilgrims, mostly on foot, over the Btaep rocky hills. SlLOAM (p, 454). — This pool is one of the very few locahties in and around Jerusalem that is not disputed, and its Arabic name, Silwan, is almost identical with the Hebrew SniLOACU, or Siloah. It is near the junction of the Tyro- 748 LIST OF ILLUSTKATIONS. poeon valley with the Kidron. The reservoir is fifty-three feet long by eighteen wide, and nineteen deep. The water flows from the Virgin Fountain (and did formerly' from other city pools), underground, to Siloam, w^ith an ebb and flow de- pendent on the supply of water, being more freqent in the rainy season. There is another pool a short distance below this, which is nearly five times the size of Siloam, and is called the Birket el Hamra, and may be the Solomon's Pool of Joscphus, and the King's Pool of Nehemiah (ii. 14) Jewish tradition makes Gihon and Siloam one and the same pool. The village of Siloam, seen hi the view of the Kidron valley, page G29, is apparently a number of tomb dwellings. Saniiedrin (p. 455). — The supreme council of the Jews, composed of seven- ty-one members, who represented the twelve tribes, consisting of chief priests (the heads of the twenty-four classes of priests), the elders (men of age, experi- ence, and honor), the scribes, and the doctors (an order of men learned in the sacred law). The president (Nasi, chief) was generally the high-priest, although chosen by vote (lot), and sat in the centre of the semicircle on an elevated divan, v^rith the vice-president at his right hand. Two scribes acted as secre- taries. The room in which they met was called Gazzith, and was at one time in the south-east comer of the group of buildings around the Temple. It also met, according to Matthew (x.xvi. 3), in the residence of the high-priest. They sat every day, from the morning sacrifice to the evening sacrifice, except Sabbath, when they instructed the people by lectures. The Sanhedrin, after the destruc- tion of Jerusalem (a.d. G8 to SO), met at Jabne (Jamneel), under the rabbi Zak- kai ; and after being transferred back and forth two or three times between Jabne and Usha, was finally located at Tiberias (A.D. 193), where it retained its name until about the year A.D. 300, when it lost its peculiar hold on the Jewish mind and became a consistory only, and in a.d. 425 finally closed its sittings. The SEVENTY appointed by Jesus took the place in the new church of the San- hedrin in the old economy, as the twelve apostles answered to the twelve tribes of Israel (Matt. xix. 28; Luke xxii. 30). If Closes w^as the real founder of the Sanhedrin, it had a continuous history for nineteen centuries. The only legal modes of punishing by death allowed to the Sanhedrin by the law of Moses were by stoning, burning, beheading, and strangling. The Romans took away this privilege, and no one could be put to death without their sanc- tion. The Small Sanhedrin was a judicial court appointed by the Great Sanhe- drin, and had twenty-three members and a president (excellency). Their time of meeting was on Monday and Thursday, which were stated market-days. A smaUet court of three judges tried petty offences against the person or property. Den.\rius (p. 464). — The value of the denarius (penny) was fifteen cents, which, being the price of a day's labor, and also of a Roman soldier, would vary \n value from time to time. When first coined in Rome, B.C. 209, it was wortlj fifteen cents, but it was reduced by Nero to twelve cents. T.IST OF ILLDSTKAllOXS. 749 Wat to Jertcho (p. 466). — About eight miles from Bethany, on the road tc Jericho, which passes through what was probably the ancient valley of the brook Cherith, now Wady Kelt, there are ruins of a monastery or inn, on the right-hand side of the road, now called the Khan of the Good Samaritan, and on the oppo- site side of the brook, or Wady, there are other ruins not named. From the road, a few rods east of the ruins, there is a glimpse of the Jordan valley, the course of the river, the Dead Sea, and the Moab mountains. The place has alwaj's been noted as very unsafe to travellers, and is so now, and it ia likely that on this account it was selected as the locality of the parable of the Good Samaritan. The region is called desert or wilderness, and is without dwellings, except the huts or tents of the shepherds who watch the flocks and herds, which find excellent pasture on the rocky hills and in the winding ravines a great part of the year. There are very few trees, many small shrubs, and in the winter an abundance of flowers. The road from Jerusalem to Jericho is very steep, descending nearly 4,000 feet in fifteen miles, and abounds in smooth rock and loose stones, both unsafe to the foot both of man and beast. Sometimes, as in the way below the ruin, the gorge is narrow, and walled in on both sides by almost perpendicular rocks 500 feet high, in the bottom of which the stream flows, or rather rushes in a continuous cascade or foaming rapids for miles together. The holes or caves of the hermits of the Middle Ages begin a few miles above Jericho, and are now occupied by birds only. Some of them have been examined and found to contain dust and bones ankle deep. No books or inscriptions of any kind, except a few names and extracts from the Scriptures, have been noticed. Here and there, as the way approaches the plain of Jericho, there are ruins of chapels on the heights, where the monks met for public services. The plain of Jericho appears from the road very level, and dotted in many places by green clumps of vegetation marking springs, and lines of trees also following the brooks, the broadest being along the course of the Jordan. Bethany (p. 4GG) is on the Mount of Olives, a mile and a half from Jerusalem east, and is now called El Lazariyeh (Lazaiais' village). It is in a hollow, and the few tumble-down hii,ts are on a slope, around and below an old tower, which is called after Lazarus, of course. There is also a tomb of Lazarus, into which you descend by twentj'-six steps. The orchards near the village grow olives, almonds, pomegranates, figs, and carobs, while there are a few oaks. The people who live there are busy -with their orchards or flocks, and also in the manufacture of articles of curiosity and slight u.se, including a number of anti- quities which they sell to travellers. FotTNTAlN IN PERiEA (p. 480). — The east side of Jordan is almost unknown, scarcely one place in ten that were known in Bible times being now identified. There are few inhabited villages, but many tribes of Bedawins, living in black tents, whose numbers must be very great, yet far below the multitudes who filled the cities in the time of the Greeks and the Romans. The book on the ' 'Giant Cities 750 LIST or nXUSTRATIONS. of Bashan" gives a glimpse of the many wonderful ruins which are found in every part of the land, from the Jordan to the desert. Captain Burton (of the Mecca pilgrimage fame) lately visited the Leja, the Trachon of the Romans, where he found many ruined cities, in which were many fine houses cut in the solid rock, and he gives a description of an extensive cave, one of those men- tioned by Josephus. The fountain drawn here is near the ancient Heshbon. DuACHMA (p. 487). — The value of the drachm varied from fourteen to seven- teen cents, with the kind of talent of which it was a division, and there were three varieties of talent : Attic, Phoenician, Ptolemaic. Hion-PRIEST (p. 507). — The dress of the Jewish high-priest, and the breast- plate, have been the subject of much inquiry, critical examination of the Hebrew text, and investigation into the manners, customs, and costume of the ancients, but without as yet determining beyond a doubt any one particular. The breast- plate was symbolical of the twelve tribes, and the ijlacing of the twelve engraved gems in their several positions was a sign of the presence of the twelve tribes before Jehovah. Josephus gives a detailed description of the garments and their sym- bolical meanings in Ant. iii. 7, § 7. The " holy garments " were peculiar to and worn only by the high-priest, and certain pieces were put on only on the great day of atonement, when he went into the Holy of Holies to appear before the presence of Jehovah for the people. Epitraim (p. 508), now called Et Taiyibeh. The village is built on a conical hill, and completely walled in, about twelve miles north-east of Jerusalem. There are some ruins of antiquity, and the site is very favorable for fine pros- pects, and it is mentioned in both the Old and New Testaments (Joshua xviii. 23; Judges vi. 11 ; Micah i. 10; John xi. 54). Arch of Wilson, at Jerusalem (p. 538).— This is an arch on the west of the temple area wall, opposite the Double Gate of the Chain. It is an arched room which has been lined with cement or plaster, and used as a cistern, in some age later than that of its first construction. Exjiloration shows that the stones of the walls of this room, which were traced to a depth of forty-four feet below the spring of the arch, are of stones similar to those in the upper part of the wall of the Harem at the "Jews' wailing-place." The chamber is now filled up with stones and rubbish nearly forty feet, on the top of which the cement is laid. There are seyeral other smaller arched chambers in the same vicinity, which were used in their day for stores or for water. jERicno (p. 530). — There are three distinct localities at Jericho which claim our attention as the sites referred to in ancient history. The village of Er Riha is of least interest among the three, and can scarcely date before the Crusades, unless it may be one of the places mentioned in the book of Joshua, perhaps Gil- gal. Jericho of Joshua's time would then have been at the Elisha Fountain, LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 751 now called Ain es Sultan ; and the Jericlio of the New Testament lime at the foot of the hills where the brook Cherith, now Wady Kelt, enters the plain. The name in the Hebrew means a fragrant place, and the abundance of flowering shrubs in the rainy season even now gives some color to the title. Josephus de- scribes it as surrounded by gardens, orchards, and palm-groves in his day, and says that it is not easy to light on any climate equal to it. The Romans held it as an important town, and Herod fortified it, naming the fort Cyprus, after his mother, and a town after his brother Phascelus. He is also said to have buUt a new town a little north, in the same plain, which was also named Phasajlis. Vespasian made it the head of a toparchy. It was destroyed during the siege of Jenisalem. The ruins are mostly foundations and heaps of rubbish, which have been quite extensively examined lately without yielding any valuable antiquity. Six miles across the plain, on the west bank of the Jordan, are the ruins of what is now called " The Jews' Castle," an old monastery of the time of the Cru- sades. It was once a grand pile of well-built cloisters and chapel, and is now quite an interesting ruin. The vaults are large and roomy, and would make ex- cellent store-houses, if there was anything there to store. A\Tiat little grain that is raised in the plain is carried away by the farmers, who live among the hills, where the climate is cooler, as soon as it is harvested. Jekusai-em (p. 544). — The view of the city from Olivet looking over the " Garden of Gethsemane" is the finest, showing the city to its best advantage. At that distance it is a beautiful sight, with its domes, towers, walls, well- built convents, and English church. A nearer inspection reveals the utter neglect of streets and of the walls of houses fronting on the streets. The only pleasant places in the city are in the court-yards of houses, or in the square be- fore the English consulate and church, and in the Temple area. The streets are all narrow, and in many places arched over or shaded with awnings or mats, and are very badly paved or not paved at aU. The rain makes a torrent in the mid- dle of the way, and no one takes the trouble to clean the street, street-sweeping being unheard of. The city is small, measuAng a mUe and a half by three-quarters, but there is scarcely a pface in the world which has given scholars and investigators so much severe labor with so little result. It is almost completely an enigma, after so many years of the most careful exploration. The descriptions of the Old Testa- ment writers were not very minute, but those of Josephus were very exact and particular, while of many points there are accounts by other writers of anti(iuity, so that it seems almost marvellous that there should have been anj' difficulty, until we are reminded that during the Crusades, as well as in the earlier agea succeeding the destruction of the city by Titus, Jenisalem was regarded as a peculiarly sacred city, and the Christian residents desired to have every event that is mentioned in the Bible, as having happened in or near it. located and hon- ored with some appropriate memorial of tomb, chapel, or church, and therefore, when the exact location had been lost another was adopted and consecrated, and 752 LIST OF rLLUSTEATIONS. among the miiltitude of "sacred localities" it is just a little surprising' to find not only every trifling as well as important event preserved, but also the Inci- dents and personages of parables embodied, and provided with a habitation and history, such as the rich man and his house. Stater (p. 553). Augustus Com (p. 571). — The imperial coin of the first Roman emperoi (Caisar) who assumed the title of Augustus, which means tJie venerable. This title was adopted by all the Cfesars untQ near the downfall of Rome. Jerusalem (p. 582). See page 544. — The beautiful location of the city is given in this view, which shows the depression of the valley of Kidron (Jehosha- phat) and the height of Zion, with the very conspicuous site of the temple, so placed as to be visible from every direction. The dome of the work now standing over the famous Rock (said to have been Araunah's threshing-floor) can be seen from Kerak, beyond the Dead Sea, by good eyes without a glass, a distance of forty miles in a straight line. It is also visible from the summit of Gibeah, north- east of the city. Beautiful for situation the temple on Zion certainly was, as sung by the ' ' sweet singer of Israel. " Farthing (p. 589.) — See Herod's Mite, page 380. Robinson's Arch (p. 59G). — Edward Robinson, D.D. , of New York, has done more to revive a study of the Bible in our day than any other man. His researches in Palestine are the most important work during the last century, if not since the Crusades, since they have been the direct means of restoring to our knowledge several hundred sites of cities named in the Bible, which had been lost for centu- ries. He also minutely examined many ruins, and rarely failed to bring out some point of historical interest. This "Arch " is the one destroyed by Titus in the destruction of Jerusalem, and the only remains visible above ground are the few jutting fragments in the wall to the right, as shown in the picture. The stones which formed the arch are lying on the rock or soU, more than forty feet below the present surface, the valley having been filled up, in some age since a.d. 70, to its present level. Half Shekel. — The shekel (p. 603) was first coined by Simon the Macca bee, under the authority of Antiochus VII. , 139 b. c. , and the inscription recorded this and other privileges that the Jews had received from their rulers, dating from the first year of Simon's rule : "In the first year of Simon the Benefactor of the Jews, High-Priest." The shekel was struck in silver and in bronze. There are a number of specimens still existing in the museums or in private collections of the coins of the Jews in nearly every age, from the first of Simon fc-k the last of Barkokab, A.D. 130. The half shekel (p. 612) was the regular yearly Temple dues from each adult Jew. Those who lived in foreign lands, Greece, Egypt, etc., changed their money into Jewish coin before paying, because sacred money only could be received into the treasury. The devices on Hebrew coins had reference to the productions of the country. LIST OF ILLUSTKATIONS. 753 and also to tlicix religious history. The bunch of grapes, palm-tree, palm branch, with leaves braided and called lulab, ears of wheat, cup of manna vase or jar of oU, baskets of fruit, horns of plenty, the throne or chair of State the State umbrella, anchor, wreath of oKve leaves, Temple portico, are all well klo^w on coins now in existence. Table (p. G15).-The oriental table is what we should call a tea-trav is generally circular, five or six feet across, and is used on stool about sixteen inches high. The party sits on the divan on one side, and on cushions laid on the floor on the other sides, all around it. The servants (or the host's ^Wfe or daughter) 8ex-ve the dishes, usually one at a time. There is a large copper table (or^ray) at Salahiyeh, near Damascus, which has on it the revenue stamp of several Roman emperors, and ha.s been an heir-loom in the same tribe, or it may be the same family, for nearly two thousand years. xXearly every traveller who goes there pays an extra price for a dinner served on this antique table. GExnsEMAKE (p. G28).-The so-called Garden of Gethsemane is a "locality " of the Christian monks of Jerusalem, which is placed more for convenience near the city than for any desire to meet the demands of the text and of his- toric accuracy. The old olive-trees are its chief attraction, and are certamly great curiosities, being, without doubt, many centuries old, and, it may be the descendants of some planted in the time of the Crusades Titus de- stroyed all trees around Jerusalem during his siege, so that not one that was then gi-o^ving, even if it could have lived so long, is now standing. The 'garden," or " olive-press," as some read the original, was probably in some more retired part of OHvet, away from the public road, and, it may be nearer Bethany. The most ancient Christian writers (Eusebius, Adamnanus) mention some such locality as "a place of prayer for the faithful" (Jerome) havin<. a church built in it. The Empress Helena may have selected this spot, as she did many others, as convenient and appropriate for her special honors and named it Gethsemane in memory of the place mentioned in the Gospel nar- rative The eight old trees inside of the stone wall are supposed to have an addi- tional proof of antiquity in the fact that the Turkish government have alwaya levied upon them, as they did on aU fmit-trees which were standing at the time of their conquest, a tax of one medina ; those planted after that time being rated differently. This would date them before a.d. G34, when Omar took the city, or, if the Turkish conquest is meant, before a.d. 1087. The " garden " is filled with flowers of many kinds, which are carefuUy tended by the monks and are pressed on Uttle pieces of paper and sold to pilgrims. The walls of the city near the Stephen Gate are in plain view, only 850 feet distant. A little farther up the Kidron valley there are some "gardens" or shady places under olive-trees, where many resort for cool shade and quiet, away from the bustle of the city and distant from the public roads. Kidron Valley, from Akeldama (p. 629).-The vaUey of the brook Kid- ron below Jemsalem is fuU of gardens, which are suppUed with water from Si. 754: IJST OF IIJXSTRATIONS. loam, and in the rainy season it is really a beantiful spot ; but in tlie hot, djy, and dusty summer it is almost a desert. In the view the Mount of Olives rises to the right, and the village of Siloam is at its foot, bordering the edge of the Kidron. Scopus is seen in the distance, and the comer of the Temple wall rises high over Ophel, which falls steep down on the west side of the Kidron. Both of these slopes are covered with tombstones, every one of which indicates a dozen graves below, or it may be a hundred bodies to each, for this has been a vast cemetery for aU devout persons, both Christian and Mohammedan, and especially Jew, for many ages, and never in greater request than now. It is thought by some that Solomon's idol shrines were built on the site of Siloam, or on the summit behind it to tht . ^ t, while others think the pagan high place was more probably on the summit of Olivet. There were also shrines to Moloch in the valley of Tophet or Hinnom, where children were offered to the god in burnt sacrifice. This valley, with its horrid associations, has become the poetic type of hell. The Alisa mosque Coriginally the chapel built by the Knights Templars) is in plain view on the Temple site, and Zion rises high to the east, with its long slope terraced, dotted with orchards and scattering trees, and crowned with the ancient church and mosque called the Tomb of David. Everywhere the surface is carpeted with a bright green in the rainy season. The Tyropoeon Valley joins the Kidron at Siloam Pool, and the Hinnom valley at En Rogcl, when the three become the Wady en Nar (Valley of Fire), and llow by the old convent of Santa Saba to the Dead Sea. (See page G02.) Map of Jerusalem fp. G30).— The various sites named, except Golgotha, are located accordijig to tradition, or the selection of the monks at Jerusalem. ECCE Homo Ancn (p. G.j7), over the Via Dolorosa, Jerusalem. This is called the Ecce Homo Arch because of the legend that Pilate exposed Jesus to the multitude at the middle window in the wall over the arch, and said, " Be- hold the man." Pilate's palace may have been near, but there is no proof, either of ruin or record, as to where it actually was. Nor is there any reason to believe that the street called Via Dolorosa, "Way of Grief," is even on the line of the street through which Jesus was led "out" to Golgotha, and it certainly ia not, if the true site of Golgotha hiis been found at the Jeremiah Grotto, north- west of the Damascus gate. The streets o'f the holy city are almost always fre- quented by pilgrims from every Christian country, habited in an endless variety of costume. The narrow way is often jjerilous from the rush of eager, hurry- ing, loaded men and animals, and is very unsafe after dark from the loose jjave- ment, steep, crooked ways, and the numbers of half wild dogs, whose ' ' tooth " is against every eatable thing. Very few of the streete are named, although the Christians are beginning to apply names to some of the principal ways, for their own convenience of description. (See Jerusalem.) Calvauy (p. Of).")). — The question as to the true site of the crucifixion haa very much depended on the theories respecting the location of the two more LIST OF II.LrSTPwVTtOXS. 7o5 ancient wall-; oS Jcrusaloni. Xo one can l>e iiuite sure as to the precise location of those walls, and no recent discovery of what are su}>i>osed to be those remains can he used to strengthen the claim of the Chiireli of tlie Holy Sepuldne to he located on the site of Calvary. It may argue tinit the Mary ciunch built by Helena was on the same site, i)ut cannot determine that the site seieoted by Helena was not adopted for convenience rather than fixed by actual knowledge of the ground. It would seem to be a very strange thing that the site of the crucifixion of tlieir Master and His burial place should not have been carefully kept known to man- kind by his followers. We can scarcely imagine Americans of any generation losing knowledge of the grave of Washington. Rut we must recollect that the followers of Jesus were not superstitious, and that the departure of Jesus from the world was followed by the destruction of Jerusalem, that the Christians as well as the Jews were dispersed, and that succeeding centuries so changed the ajiiu-arance of Jerusa- lem tiiat now not a spot there is visible which was visible to the eyes of Jesus and his followers. If we take the Evangelists as guides, we must be sure that it was not the Church of Sepulchre, but probab/;/ was the hill of the Grotto of Jeremiah. The points in favor of our site as the true (.iolgotha (Hebrew for skull, as Kraniou is Greek for skull, and Calvaiy is from tlie Latin for skull), are — 1. The place was out of the city, as this must have been then, and is now. 3. It was also " nigh unto the city," as this is about five hundred feet from the nearest part of the city wall. 3. The hill is shaped like the upper part of a skull. 4. The place was near a main road to and from the city, as this is. 5. The spot was very conspicuous, and this is also. 6. There were gardens and sepulchres near, and now- (and proV>ably also there were anciently) there are rock tombs of great extent and magnificence of design Mid finish, which give an idea of the wealth and splendor of the ancient Jews. 7. ^\nd, finally, there is no other spot that claims equal attention or respect. CAPERNAmi (p. 703). See page 1G8.— The nxin at Toll Hum, which stands near the water edge, is evidently a building of a later age than the synagogue, whose ruins are on the hill higher up. The view from near this spot is very fine. There are a great many thorns and thistles here, which make it almost impossible to move about, where once there were streets full of a busy, proud population. Restored view op Jerus.vi-em (p. 704). UitFA Coin (p. 709). — This bronze coin, or medal, was found at Urfa, Syria, and may possibly date as early as the fourth or fifth century A.D. The inscrip- tion indicates a Christian origin, " Jesus Christ, king of kings." The spccinuMi here engraved was loaned to the designer by Rev. G. B. Nutting, missionaiy of the A. B. C. F. M. at Urfa. Olivet (p. 710). — The moxintain on the east of Jerusalem is between two and three hundred feet higher than the city, is more than a mile long from north to Bouth, and is divided into four summits, which are named, beginning at tha 750 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. norLh, 1. Mount of the Men of Galilee (Viri Galilei); 2. Ascension 3Iount; 3. Mount of the Prophets ; 4. Mount of Offence. During the middle ages the mount was dotted all over with chapels or monu- ments of some kind, marking the localities selected as the sites of interesting events recorded in Scripture, and these are now still in use, or their fonner lo- cation is known and pointed out. The "ascension" is commemorated by a chapel on the summit, nearly opposite to the Temple site ; but this is merely a monkish tradition, and the true site of the ascension cannot be detennined beyond the one imjiortant allusion iu the text, which says that it was ' ' as far as to Bethany" (Luke xxiv. 50), and therefore must have been somewhere on the eastern slope of Olivet. The view includes all that can be seen of the mountain from a point near the road to Mar Saba, north-east of the Arab village Beit Sa- hur. The south-east corner of the Temjjle site just appears in the left side of the picture, to mark the position of the city of Jerusalem, and the site of Beth- any is but a short distance to the right of the large tree, hidden behind a ridge.