/.; •^Vst^it^i oi ttvt 11w«>%ia| ^ . '^% PRINCETON, N. J. % 5/J-?^.. Division . SeitioH ... N'limher. ,d,..K.7.3 '"^"'ks: THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES TRINTRD nV SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE LONDON THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES A STUDY IN MODERN CRITICISM BY THE REV. R. J. KNOWLING, M.A. VICE-FRINCIPAI. OF KINGS COLLEGE, LONDON LONDON LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. AND NEW YORK : 15 EAST i6'i' STREET 1892 All rights reserveii PREFACE Some years ago a remarkable series of articles by Dr. Matheson appeared in the ' Expositor,' entitled ' The His- torical Christ of St. Paul.' These articles drew out with great force and skill the argument from the four Epistles of St. Paul, Galatians, Romans, i and 2 Corinthians, as an historical basis for the facts of the life of Jesus. But although this argument was not entirely new to English Apologists, and although it has since been frequently employed and popularised, it may be of some fresh interest and value to consider the subject more generally, taking into particular account the manner in which it has been treated by various foreign theologians. Careful attention has also been given, both in the text and in the notes, to Sabatier's ' L'Apotre Paul,' and to the treatises of Paret, Thenius, and Huraut, all of whom are specially mentioned by Reuss in the last edition of his * Geschichte der heiligen Schriften des N. T.' as literary authorities for Paul's acquaintance with the historical life and teaching of our Lord (see Chapter II. pp. 84-86), and refer- ences will frequently be found to modern Apologetic literature in England. The value of Paret's work will be best seen by the list of modern critics who refer to or quote him (Chap. p. II. 86), and his statements have often been introduced at length, but never without some acknowledgment. The whole of Cha[)tcM- III. is devoted to recent attacks vi THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES upon the same four Epistles of St. Paul — the Hauptbriefe, as the Germans call them — for two reasons. First, because it is not fair to assert that there is a school of theologians in Germany by which these Epistles are rejected, without a due consideration of the critical authority which accepts them ; and secondly, because while many English writers {e.g. Mr. Gore in his ' Bampton Lectures ' ) have justly spoken of the ' utterly untenable and perverse arguments ' of Loman and Steck, yet it seemed more satisfactory to examine objections at length, even at the cost of some apparent interruption in the argument, and so to clear the way for the chapters which follow. In Chapter II. and Chapter V. I am greatly indebted to the recent articles of Dr. Sanday in the ' Expositor ' for introducing me to the writings of P. Ewald, Resch, and Bousset ; and in the endeavour to traverse a very wide field of inquiry I am deeply sensible that I must ask much of the indulgence of my readers. R. J. KNOWLING. King's College, London : Easter 1892. CONTENTS CHAPTER I THE MEANING AND IMPORTANCE OF THE WITNESS St. Paul a contemporary witness to the facts of the life of Jesus, pp. I, 2— the early date of his conversion, attested by Keim, Hausrath, Volkmar, and the recent remarks of Renan, 3 — whilst his four great Epistles insure him the title of a contemporary witness, the testimony which adds to them i Thess. , the earliest of the Pauline writings, 4— importance of the admission of Rom. XV. and xvi. by Hilgenfeld and others, as showing that St. Paul was in close communication with those whose sources of information were earlier than his own, 4-6 — modern criticism justifies us in adding i Thess., Philippians, Philemon, and, in part, Colossians, to the four great Epistles, 6 — the views of H. Ewald, Reuss, Schenkel, Sabatier, H. Holtzmann, Renan, Hilgenfeld, Weizsacker, and others, 6-I1 — importance of the admission of I Thess. and Philippians, 11— negative criticism in England admits these two documents in addition to the four great Epistles, 11 — contrast in this respect between Baur and modern German scholarship, 11 — the testimony of B. Weiss, 12 — these Epistles presuppose the story of the Gospels, 12 — their position in the foreground of Christian Evidences, 13— further justification of this position, 14, 15— the historical argument from the Pauline Epistles valid against the 'mythical' and 'legendary' theories, 16— the rightful use and meaning of these terms, 16, 17— references to Hettinger, Weiss, Nosgen, and others, 17, 18— Baur's influence upon Strauss in relation to the mythical theory, 18— the valuable criticism of C. Ullmann upon the position of Strauss, and his testi- mony to the importance of the witness of St. Paul's Epistles, 19-21 — the un- Jewish elements in the Gospels, and in the Epistles, a further objection to the mythical theory, 22, 23 CHAPTER n AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT References to English writers upon St. Paul's Epistles as an historical basis for the life and teaching of Jesus, pp. 24, 25 — important to show how continental theologians have treated the same subject, 25— Karl Hase, 25-27— Baur, 27- 29— Schwegler, 29-34— Ritschl, 33— H. Ewald, 34-36— Neander, 36-38 — Holsten, 38-40— Hilgenfeld, 40-43— Schenkel, 43, 44— Keim, 44-51 — Hausrath, 51-54- Wittichcn, 54-62— Weizsacker, 62, 63— Pfleiderer, 64-66 —Holtzmann, 66-71 — Reuss, 71— Renan, 71-73-Dc Prcssense, 73-77— VUl THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES B. Weiss, 77-84-Paret, 84— Sabatier, 86 — Huraut, 86— Thenius, 87— he anticipates the position of Pfleiderer and of Volkniar, 87-92 — how Pfleiderer's position may be utilised in the argument, 93 — Beyschlag, 93-100 — Wendt, 100-105 — Resch, 105, 106 — P. Ewald's criticism of his Agrapha, 106-114 — Resch's Agrapha further examined, 114-129 — Bousset's criticism of Resch, 129-131 — the strictures of Nosgen, 131 — value of Resch's work for the present argument, 132 — Harnack, in relation to the subject of this chapter, 131 note — conclusion from the foregoing, 132 CHAPTER III RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' HAUPTBRIEFE ' Steck and Volter really reproduce many of the arguments of Bruno Bauer, p. 133 — important criticism of Zahn upon these attacks, 134-139 — Bruno Bauer, 139 — Pierson and Naber, 140-144 — Loman, 144-149 — criticism of Kuenen and Scholten upon Loman's theory, 149-154 — Loman's reply, and how received, 155 — Steck's attack upon the Hatiptbriefe, 155, 156 — the historical difficulties raised by him, and the replies of Gloel, Lindemann, B. Weiss, 156-164 — • Steck's theory of the order of the Hatipthriefe, and the strictures of Gloel and Lindemann, 164-175 — further criticism of Steck's attack upon the historical character and language of the Galatian Epistle, 1 75-179— examina- tion of the external evidence in favour of the historical position assumed in the Galatian Epistle, 179-188 — points of likeness between Steck and Volter. 189 — examination of Steck's theory that the Hauptbiiefe are dependent upon our Gospels, 189-196 — Steck's method of dealing with the account of the Lord's Supper in i Cor., 196-200— and with the Resurrection appearances in I Cor. XV., 200-208 — Steck's account of St. Paul's lofty Christology, 208- 211 — his attempted proof of the dependence of the Hauptbriefe upon extra- canonical writings, 211-213 — upon Philo and Seneca, 213-215 — Gloel's important criticism, 215 — the more recent attack of Volter, 216 — his recon- struction of the Epistle to the Romans, and his rejection of all but the 'original' letter, 217-224 — the same method applied to the Epistle to the Galatians, 225 — Volter's argument that Galatians is really dependent upon the other Haupibi-iefe, 225, 226 — his attack upon the historical notices in the Galatians, and his preference, similar to that of Steck, for the Acts, 225-230 — contrast in this respect between Steck and Volter and the position occupied by Baur, 230 — further examination of Volter's alleged discrepancies between Galatians and the Acts, and the arbitrary and subjective nature of his criticism, 230-237 — his attack upon the historical position assumed in the Galatians met by Gloel's reply (warmly endorsed by Hilgenfeld) to the similar attack of Steck, 237, 238 — protest of Lipsius, Hilgenfeld, Holsten, and others, against these attacks of Steck and his followers upon the Hauptbriefe, 239, 240— Godet's admirable criticism of Steck's theory, and his proof that the three ideas which dominate Paul's teaching in the Romans are essentially Jewish, and therefore not derived, as Steck maintains, from a Grseco-Roman school of the second century, 240-242— further counter-criticism of Steck's theory by recent writers, 242 — Weizsacker's description of i and 2 Cor. may fairly be extended to the four Hauptbriefe, 243 » CONTENTS IX CHAPTER IV ST. Paul's christology and thf': incarnation Cannot be dismissed as mere ' secondary questions ' with Baur, p. 244—' tlie Pauline Gospel of the Infancy,' Gal. iv. 4, 244 ff.— ' made under the law ' : what this implies, 245, 246, and notes — testimony of Steinmeycr, Schenkel, Wittichen, Nosgen, &c., 245, 246 — force of the expression 'God sent forth i/' His Son,' and how interpreted by Lightfoot, Weiss, Lechler, Hilgenfeld, Steck, Pfleiderer, Martineau, 245-249— question whether Paul's conception ;of Christ as the sinless Head of humanity does not demand a miraculous V conception : testimony of Neander, Lechler, Huraut, Weiss, Schmid, 250 and notes— references in the Pauline Epistles at least in harmony with those of the Gospels: no right to expect more from epistolary writings, 251— in this connection, importance of Paul's reference to the descent of Christ from David, 252, 253 (and also 293)— Gal. iv. 4 does not stand alone : comp. Rom. viii. 3 and 32, 253, 254 — force of these passages, and reference to Baur, Lechler, Sabatier, Schmid, Reuss, P. Ewald, Roos, 254, 255— signifi- cance of the fact that these expressions are found in one of Paul's generally accepted Epistles, 256— St. Paul's 'advanced' Christology in Ephes. and Col. justified, 256-259— references in this connection to Schenkel, Reuss, Hase, Renan, ibid. — parallel between Col. i. 16 and i Cor. viii. 6, 260— the latter passage not to be restricted to the redemptive work of Christ, or to a moral creation, 260 — Phil. ii. 6 : criticism of Reuss, Sabatier, Lipsius, against Baur's interpretation : the real force of the passage, 260, 261 —significance of the word Kupios as applied to Jesus, 261 — testimony of Ritschl, 262 — Schmid, 263— Gess, 264— Lechler, 264— Gloel, 264— Weiss, 265 — Sabatier, Schanz, Pfleiderer, Carpenter, 266— early use of the word in i Thess. against Martineau's theory of the later growth of such expressions, 267, 268— exami- nation of I Cor. XV. 47, 268— criticism of the views held by Sabatier and A Beyschlag, 269, 270 — Christ's pre-existence not merely ideal or impersonal, 270 — interpretation in this connection of i Cor. x. 4, 2 Cor. viii. 9, Phil. ii. 5, 6, 270, 271 — contrast between i Cor. xv. 45-47 and Jewish systems, 272, 273 — refusal to admit that Paul taught the doctrine of the Incarnation substitutes one difficulty for another, 274 — thus, Keim denies Paul's knowledge of a divine nativity, but finds nothing more suitable to express his own con- ceptions of the Personality of Jesus than the language of Paul's earliest Epistles, 274, 275 — further admits that the creative act of God in the Person of Jesus was unique, 275 — Godet's criticism on Keim's position, 275^(see also p. 250) —Keim's endeavour to avoid the difficulty, 276 — doctrine of ^the X Incarnation could not have arisen on Jewish^ soil, 277, 278 — testimony of Neander, Steinmeyer, Weiss, Edersheim, Didon, Nosgen, ibid. — nor from \ Gentile sources, 278 — valuable criticism of Steinhart as to the origin of the story of Plato's miraculous birth, 278 — no implicit confidence to be placed in the statements of Diogenes Laertius, 279, 280 — early Christian Apologists and their view of pagan myths, 281 — how St. Paul's language reminds us that we are again on the lines of the Gospels, 281, 282— his expression ' the second Adam ' in harmony with that of ' the Son of Man,' 282 ff,— references to Paret, Gess, Dorner, Sabatier, on this point, 282, 283 — ' the second Adam ' identified by Paul with the historical Christ, 284 - his conception not X THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES derived from Philo or Plato, ibid. — valuable testimony of Rilschl, 285 — the title ' Son of Man ' both human and divine, 285 — Ncander, Kcim, Schanz, on this title, 285, 286 — why it is not found in the Epistles, 287 —remarks of Gess and Keim, and of English writers, upon this omission, 287 — further objection to the assertion that the ' legend ' of the Incarnation was post- \ Apostolic, and, above all, post-Pauline, 287 — Keim again fails to take sufficient account of the facts of the case, 287 — contrast between the Apocryphal and Canonical Gospels, 288 — similarity of the views of W. H. Mill and Weiss as to the silence of Epistles with regard to the Incarnation, 289 note — Bey^chlag on the Incarnation, 289, 290 CHAPTER V OUR lord's life and teaching The expression ' mode of life ' as used in this connection, p. 291 — statements in the Epistles in agreement with the facts and spirit of the Gospel narratives, 291 — the poverty of Jesus, 291, 292 — the human surroundings of Jesus, 293 — His life of meekness and gentleness, 294 — His life of service, 294 — the historical pattern of Love, 295 — the sufferings of Jesus, ibid. — His life our example, 296, 297 — tempted as we are, 297 — His sinlessness, 298 — objections raised to it, 299-301— the miraculous power of Jesus, how connected with Paul's conception of an Apostle, and with his Epistles, 301 ff. — Paret's remarks, and those of Schmid, in this connection, 304, 305 — the character of the Apostle in its bearing upon this subject, 306 — importance of the repre- sentation of Jesus as the Christ, 307 — how much this common feature of the Apostles' preaching involved, 308, 309— proclamation of the Kingdom in the Epistles and Gospels alike, 309 — its laws and characteristics, 310-314 — positive evidence of Paul's knowledge of Christ's sayings and commands, 315 — the Lord's Supper, 315, 316 — Paul's frequent references to Baptism, 316, 317 — his words of consolation to the Thessalonians, 318— significance of the Apostle's teaching on such subjects, 318 — Paul's practical exhortation to the Corinthians in i Cor. vii. 10, 12, 25, 319, 320— plain distinction between his own opinion and the command of Christ, 319, 320 — i Cor. ix. 14 and Matt. X. 10, Luke x. 7, 320-323 — Paul's use of our Lord's imagery, 323 — Holtzmann on • the sayings of the Lord,' 323, 324 — some further instances, 324, 325— connection between St. Luke and St. Paul, 325 — Holtzmann's parallels between Luke's Gospel and the Pauline Epistles, 326— criticism of Holtzmann's view of the dependence of the former upon the latter, 326-328 ■ — Luke's ' universalism ' and ' Paulinism,' how related to the teaching of Jesus, 328 — connection between St. John and St. Paul, 329 — maintained by Dr. Matheson, 329 — references to other writers on the same side, 330 — P. Ewald's maintenance of a Johannine tradition, 331, 332 — examination in detail of his parallels between the fourth Gospel and the Pauline Epistles, 333-347 — conclusions, 347, 348 CHAPTER VI OUR lord's death and burial Importance attached in Epistles and Gospels alike to the last hours of Jesus, pp. 349) 350 — details in the Epistles, in accordance with those of the Gospels, , CONTENTS xi 350> 35l> ^^^ notes— institution of the Lord's Supper, 351-353- importance of the word StaO-qKri, 353 — the words of institution, 353~the sit^nificancc of the words in relation to the death of Jesus, 354— acknowledged by Kcim, by Strauss, and by Ilarnack, 353, 354— references to other writers, 355— our Lord's claim to supersede the old Mosaic covenant, 355~importance of this claim in the eyes of Jews, 355— and therefore of Paul, i/nd.—Wcndt on the significance of the Lord's Supper, 356 — reference of the words and acts of Jesus to Exodus, xxiv. 8, 356— possible references to the scenes of the Tassion, 358-360— Paul's representation of the death of Jesus in entire harmony with that of the Evangelists, 359- the Christian Church founded ])y a Crucified Jew : what this presupposes, 359-362 — the Crucifixion issued in death, 362— the reality of the death of Jesus, 362, 363 — Paul at one with the Gospels in his testimony to the burial of Jesus, 363— the fact of the burial emphasised by Weiss, Beyschlag, Nosgen, Keim, &c. , 363, 364 CHAPTER VII THE RESURRECTION The Creeds and l Cor. xv. 4, p. 365— ' according to the Scriptures,' ih'd.—ihc Resurrection, as it took place, foreign to Jewish ideas, 366, 367 — ' the third day,' 367, 368 — the appearances enumerated by St. Paul, 369— a summaiy of facts already communicated, 369 — the appearances to Peter and James, 370- 372— the appearances to the Twelve, to all the Apostles, to the five hundred, 372. 373— Hohzmann on Luke and Paul in this connection, 374 — Paul's principle of selection, 375, 376 — how the account in i Cor. xv. confirms the Gospels, 377— the appearance to Paul himself, ihid. — Paret's examination of Paul's own statements, 378 ff.— criticism of Beyschlag as against Baur, il>iJ. notes— on the force of fKTpwfxa, 381 — Paul's 'reserve,' j'h'd. — on 2 Cor. xii. 9, 383 —Paul able to distinguish between visions and realities, zdt'i/. — i Cor. ix. and I Cor. XV. to be distinguished from 2 Cor. xii. 9, 384 ff. — on the importance of the expression Mast of all,' 385, 386 — the death, the burial, the resurrec- tion of Jesus, how viewed by St. Paul, 386, 387 —not merely a spiritual Init a bodily resurrection, 388— results in past ages of the Church of the separation between the historical and the ideal, 388, 389— Paul's mental state at the time of his conversion, 389, 390 — attempts to analyse it, 390-392— called upon to account not only for his conversion, but also for his apostlesliip, 392 — Keim on the vision-theory, 392, 393— Ilase on the same, 394— Gospel narratives of the Resurrection not to be summarily dismissed, 394 the Ttibingen school unable to explain either the resurrection of Jesus or Paul's conversion, 395— but these two facts, the turning-points, as Lichtenberger calls them, of the Ajiostolic Age, 396 CHAPTER VIII THE ASCENSION AND THE RETURN The Ascension the complement of the Resurrection, p. 397— Keim on the unanimous assertion of the New Testament writers, ihid. — the Pauline P^iistles and the Ascension, 398— no detailed account of the event given by Paul, and xii THE WITNESS OK THE EPISTLES why, 39S-400-the Ascension not derived from Old Testament sources or existing Messianic conceptions, 400, 401 — nor from pagan sources, 401 — \ Paul's references to Christ as the future Judge, 402, 403 — significance of the attribution of this office to Jesus, 403— most frequent references to the coming of Christ in i and 2 Thess., 404 — reason for this, ibid. — connection between the Epistles and the discourse of Jesus on the Mount of Olives, 404-407 — difficulties presented by I Thess. iv. 15- 18, 407 — Paret's view of the passage, 407-410 — probable reason for its introduction, practical, 410, 411 — connection with sayings of Jesus in the Gospels, 411, 412- caution in dealing with Paul's language and conceptions as to the Saviour's return, 412, 413— no parallel between the return of a hero, or some hero king, and Christ's coming again from heaven, 413, 414 CHAPTER IX ST. PAUL AS AN ' EVANGELIST ' Important questions raised by the previous chapters, p. 415— unlikelihood that Paul should have absolutely ignored the facts of the Saviour's life, 415 — examination in this connection of the statement that Jesus was the Christ, 415, 416 — cannot infer a scanty knowledge of the sayings of Jesus from Paul's frequent use of the Old Testament, 416, 417 — Paul's position before his conversion unintelligible without some information as to the teaching of Jesus, 418— his position after his conversion equally so, 419, 420— further reason why he should refrain from multiplying quotations even from the teaching of Jesus, 420 — Paul able to refer practically and decisively to the words and acts of Jesus, 421 — sources of the Apostle's knowledge twofold, tradition, oral or written, and revelation, 421 — cannot assign positively the part due to each, 422 — his strength lies in the union of the two, 423— Paul's position, in this respect, and that of the first disciples, 423, 424 — difficulty of distinguishing between these two sources (tradition, revelation) discussed in connection with I Cor. xi. 23, 424-426 — Paul's knowledge of the historical Christ no mere recital of • dead facts,' 427 — must take into account the spiritual element in his character, ibid, —this necessity recognised by Weiz- sacker, ibid. — significance of the expression ' to reveal His Son in me,^ 428 — the first instance of the mystical use of the preposition kv, as in St. John's language, 428 — this union between Paul and his Lord only to be expressed by our word religion, 429— and yet the Apostle's faith rested in the historical Christ, ibid. — but no mere intellectual acceptance of His Messiahship, 430 — cannot account for Paul's change of life and character by his reflecting upon Old Testament prophecy, or by his Jewish theology, 431 — equally unable to account for them by Hellenistic influences, 432 — face to face with a life-giving Personality, which neither Hellenism nor Judaism can explain, and with a new relationship between God and man, realised in a mystical union with Jesus by faith, 433 — Christianity contained a new principle, the preaching and the power of the Cross, 434 — choice of Saul the Pharisee to illustrate this power, 434 — how his whole Christian life depended, in a very true sense, on the death and resurrection of Christ, 434-436. Index oi~ Authorities quoted 437 Errata Page 19, note', line 3, for Rusultate 7-ead Resultate 132, note', line 10, read \o\. i, p. 113 164, line 10, ;-^a(/ contacty^r contrast 274, note", line i^for thirty years r^a^/ twenty years 355, last line, read a coDUiia after (he first him 405, note", line 23, /;?;• 'pQnJ rm/^nnZ! xii THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES why, 39S 400 tlie Ascension not durived from Old Testament sources or existing Messianic conceptions, 400, 401 — nor from pagan sources, 401 — \. Paul's references to Christ as the future Judge, 402, 403 — significance of the attribution of this office to Jesus, 403— most frequent references to the coming of Christ in i and 2 Thess., 404 — reason for this, ibid. — connection between the Epistles and the discourse of Jesus on the Mount of Olives, 404-407 — difficulties presented by i Thess. iv. 15- 18, 407 — Paret's view of the passage, 407-410 — probable reason for its introduction, practical, 410, 411 — connection with sayings of Jesus in the Gospels, 411, 412- caution in dealing with Paul's language and conceptions as to the Saviour's return, 412, 413— no parallel between the return of a hero, or some hero king, and Christ's coming again from heaven, 413, 414 CHAPTER IX ST. PAUL AS AN ' EVANGELIST ' viiji-ii^r^cu 111 "" connection with I Cor. xi. 23, 424-426 — Paul's knowledge of the historical Christ no mere recital of • dead facts,' 427 — must take into account the spiritual element in his character, ibid, —this necessity recognised by Weiz- sacker, ibid. — significance of the expression ' to reveal His Son in w^,' 428 — the first instance of the mystical use of the preposition iv, as in St. John's language, 428 — this union between Paul and his Lord only to be expressed by our word religion, 429— and yet the Apostle's faith rested in the historical Christ, ibid. — but no mere intellectual acceptance of His Messiahship, 430 — cannot account for Paul's change of life and character by his reflecting upon Old Testament prophecy, or by his Jewish theology, 431 — equally unable to account for them by Hellenistic influences, 432 — face to face with a life-giving Personality, which neither Hellenism nor Judaism can explain, and with a new relationship between God and man, realised in a mystical union with Jesus by faith, 433 — Christianity contained a new principle, the preaching and the power of the Cross, 434— choice of Saul the Pharisee to illustrate this power, 434 — how his whole Christian life depended, in a very true sense, on the death and resurrection of Christ, 434-436. Index ok Authorities quoted 437 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES CHAPTER I THE MEANING AND IMPORTANCE OF THIS WITNESS The readers of Mr. Darwin's ' Life and Letters ' will recall his pathetic description of his loss of faith, and rejection of the Christian Creed ; how he tells us of his unwillingness to give up his belief; how he felt quite sure of this, for he could remember often and often inventing day-dreams of old letters between distinguished Romans, and MSS. discovered at Pompeii or elsewhere, which should confirm, in the most striking manner, all that was written in our Gospels.^ But, as a matter of fact, we are in possession of letters — old letters — which go far, very far, to confirm the statements recorded in the Gospels, and which constitute historical evidence of the highest value, for no evidence is more valuable than the letters of a writer contemporary with the events which he professes to describe ; and a further exercise of the patience for which Mr. Darwin's name has become so justly proverbial might perhaps have shown him that this is no unreasonable assertion. Even if the term cojiteiiiporaiy he not admitted with regard to the testimon\' of the four Evangelists, and if it must remain an open question whether St. Paul ever saw our Lord in the flesh, and listened to His teaching,- yet no one can ' Vol. i. |5. loS. - See Keim, Gcschichte Jesn, i. 35, 36, and note, on different authorities for and against ; and for the views of some more recent writers, see below, chap. ii. B 2 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES fairly refuse the word to the Apostle's testimony to the facts of the life of Jesus. For, in the first place, it is not unim- portant to observe that the date of St. Paul's conversion is Comp. alsoParet, ' Paulas und Jesus,' va Jalirbilcher fiir deutsche Theologie, 1858, p. 64, note. Neander, Geschichte der Pflaiizung, i. 127, 5. Aufl. 1862 (neuer Abdruck, 1890) ; Sabatier, VApotre Paul, p. 52 ; Godet, UEpitre aux Remains {Introd. ), i. 13, 2nd edit. ; Weizsacker, Das apostolische.Zeitalter, p. 122 ; Weiss, Einhitimg in das N. T. p. 115, 2. Aufl. 1889 ; Holtzmann in Hand-Commentar zitin N. T. i. 16, 1889, and Schmiedel, ibid. ii. ; erste Abtheilung, p. 206, 1891. Beyschlag {StiidieJt tind Kritiken, p. 248, note, 1864, and ibid. p. 22, 1870) argues that the expression in 2 Cor. v. 16, of which so much has been made in this connection, cannot refer, as Baur and Holsten maintained, to a contrast between Paul's earlier and existing idea of the Messiah. The words iyvcDKevai Kara adpKa, in Beyschlag's view, can only refer to an external know- ledge of Jesus, a knowledge face to face, a knowledge, i.e., without any inward believing relation to Him. Thus the Judaisers in Corinth ' who gloried in appear- ance and not in heart,' eV ■npoaiincf) Kavxc^/J-^yoi Kal oh KapSia (2 Cor. v. 12), boasted that they not only knew the disciples and brethren of Christ, but that they had known even Christ Himself during His earthly life, while they were unbelievers, much better than Paul. The Apostle makes answer that so, too, in like manner, had he known Him, whilst he had been a scholar in the school of the Pharisees in Jerusalem, but that since he had been i/i Christ (ev Xpi(TTat the words refer to the pretensions o( those who boasted of their personal relations with the Lord, or equally well to the carnal character of the prevailing Messianic hope amongst the Jews, and as in no other expression can it be maintained that Paul alludes to seeing Jesus during His earthly life, he concludes with Kenan and Mangold that the Apostle must have been absent from Jerusalem (see, however, Keim, ubi sttpra). Sabatier, although he does not by any means exclude Paul's knowledge of the earthly Jesus, regards 2 Cor. v. 16 as containing a reference to the Jewish national THE MEANING AND IMPORTANCE OF THIS WITNESS 3 fixed b)' hostile and ncgatixe critics both in France and Germany considerably earlier than it has often been by Christian apologists. We have, for example, in M. Renan's recent' Histoire du Pcuple d'Israel,' two important statements, one in the Introduction: 'Jesus is known to us by at least one contemporary piece of evidence, that of St. Paul ; ' ' and the other in a comparison drawn between Moses and Christ : ' Moses is completely buried by the legends which have grown up over him ; and though he very probably existed, it is im- possible to speak of him as we do of other deified or trans- formed men. Moses, from the historic point of view, cannot be at all compared with Jesus. St. Paul admits Jesus to have been a person who in reality existed. Now St. Paul was a con- temporary of Jesus ; he was converted to the sect four or five years after the death of Jesus (see Epistle to the Galatians)."'^ If we turn to Germany, Hausrath, according to his chronology, places Paul's conversion in the year following the Crucifixion ; Keim within two years (possibly within one) of the same event, and Volkmar at a similar distance. ■* It becomes more needful to lay stress upon the statements of such critics on this point, in face of the last attempt of the author of ' Supernatural Religion ' to disparage Paul's personal testimony to the Resurrection by basing it upon a vision ' seen many years ' after the alleged miracle.^ But if St. Paul's conversion could be assigned to the latest possible date, his Messiah, triumphing in a carnal sense, whom Paul had known before his con- version (comp. Schmiedel, ubi supra), but who now, after the rising from the dead, had become a new Christ, a Christ /caro irj/eCyua (conip. Weizsacker, ubi supra, who finds a further explanation of 2 Cor. v. i6 in Rom. i. 4). ' Histoire du Piuple d^Israi'l, i. Introd. p. xviii, 2nd edit. 1887. - ' La legende a entierement recouvert Moise, et, quoique son existence soit tres probable, il est impossible deparler de lui commeonparle des autres homines i supra, p. 326). - For a similar hypothesis, cf. Renan's Saint Paul, Introd., pp. 68 ff. Cf. also Sabatier, L'Aputre Paul, pp. 183, 184, where, after remarking that nothing in these two chapters authorises the doubts which Baur raised against their authenti- city, he adopts Renan's view as the most satisfactory — viz. that they formed a kind of circular letter, part of which was sj^ecially addressed to Ephesus. See also Ewald, Die Sendschreibcn des Apostels Paulus, pp. 13 and 428-30. 6 THE WITNESS 01" THE EPISTLES allusions which they contain, and speaks of Andronicus and Junia as examplesof the fact that Jews who had belonged to the primitive Church, and had not been disciples of Paul, were yet united with him in a common work, and served a common gospel.' Every student of Apologetic Theology in England is aware how much stress has been recently laid upon what is called ' the argument from the Pauline Epistles ' for the historical basis of the life of Jesus. This argument has been confined, for the most part, to those four Epistles which are regarded as practically undisputed,- but the course of modern criticism increasingly justifies us in adding to the number at least three others, i Thessalonians, Philippians, and Philemon, and, in part, the Epistle to the Colossians. At a time, indeed, when the names of certain continental critics are persistentl}' put forward as names wherewith to conjure, and when it is persistently assumed that the result of their efforts has been to destroy the belief in the traditional ' Weizsiicker, Das apostolisihe Zeitaltcr, pp. 190, 332, 335, 438. A full history of the criticism relating to this part of the Romans will be found in Holtzmann's Lehrhiich der historiscJi-kritischen Einleiiuug in das N. T. pp. 269- 274. He points out that, amongst others, not only Hilgenfekl and Pfleiderer, but Schenkel [Bib. Lex. v. 113) and Reuss (Die Geschichte der heiligen Schriften des N. T. pp. 103-5, 6. Aufl. 1887) have defended the two chapters as Pauline. (Comp. Mangold, in Bleek's Einleituug in das N. T. p. 547 ; and, for a sum- mary of views, Godet, UEptii-e atix Eoiitains, i. 153-7, 2nd edit.), although in most cases the final doxology is given up. Cf. also 1!. Weiss, Lelninich der Einleitung in das N. T. pp. 247-9, 2. Autl. It will be noticed that Dr. Weiss, whilst he regards Romans xvi. 1-20 as a separate letter of recommendation to Phoebe for Ephesus which found its way into the Roman Epistle, because on her way to Ephesus she herself passed through Rome and brought it thither, refuses to accept the view of Ewald and others that this recommendatory letter begins at xvi. 3, and dates from the time of the Roman captivity, a view which seems to deprive us of every natural explanation as to how such a letter gained a place in our Roman Epistle ; that he accepts the final doxology as genuine ; and that in his second edition he lays stress upon the fact that Reuss is at one with him in this conclusion. For a still more recent exposition of the views of Dr. Weiss, see Meyer's Rivuerbricf, pp. 35-8, 8. Aufl. (edited by Weiss) 1891. To the above authorities, we may add R. A. Lipsius, who is prepared to accept almost the entire chap. x\-. as genuine, and to regard chap. xvi. 1-20 as part of a letter to the church at Ephesus ; vv. 21-4 he considers to have formed the original conclu- sion of the Roman Epistle, and the final doxology, vv. 25-7, to be a later addition {Hand-Coniiiientar zuin N.T. pp. 74, 75, Freiburg, 1891). - A review of recent objections to these Epistles will be found in chap. iii. THE MEANING AND IMPORTANCE OF THIS WITNESS / authorship of the books of the New Testament, it is well to remember that, at least with regard to the Pauline I'^pistles, such appeals are one-sided, and such assumptions unwarrant- able. There is, for example, one name which still stands in the front rank amongst the man}' distinguished Biblical critics and historians of Germany — the name of the late Heinrich Ewald. Here at least is a writer, it might be thought, whose dictum would carr}' weight even with rationalists. But whether because of his uncompromising defence of the Fourth Gospel, or because he does not hesitate to tell us that nothing is more historical than the appearance of the Risen Lord to His disciples,' no stress whatever is laid upon his name in recent popular controversies. What, let us ask, is the judgment of Ewald upon the Epistles which bear the name of St. Paul } If we refer to his ' Sendschreiben des Apostels Paulus,' we find that he admits not only the four Epistles, Galatians, i and 2 Corin- thians, Romans, but also both Epistles to the Thessalonians (although he transposes their order), Philippians, Philemon, and even with regard to the Colossians he concludes that it was written, if not b}- Paul himself, by some amanuensis like Timothy, just as he supposes that i Peter was transcribed by Silvanus.''^' But we turn to another name — the name of a great theo- logian also recently passed away, who may be said to have represented both French and German criticism, and whose works have played a prominent part in at least one recent controversy in England — Eldouard Reuss of Strasburg. ' Die drei ersten EvangcUcit, i. 444, 445. - It is, of course, fair to state that Ewald rejected the Ephesians and the Pastoral Epistles. Cf. his Siebeii Sendschreiben des Nenen Bundes. ^ Ewald, Die Sendschreiben des Apostels Paulus, pp. 1-I2, 17, 18, ^^it 34i 56, IOI-7, 223-33, 314-20, 428-30, 431, 432, 460-2, 466-9. For the Epistle to the Colossians, cf. especially pp. 11-13, and pp. 467-9. After discussing the question of authorship, he adds: ' Ahernoch bleibt die.Vnnahme, dass Paulus die Abfassung des Schreibens se'.bst, nachdeni durch vorliiufige liesprechung sein Inhalt festgestellt war, dem Tiniotheos Uberlassen habe, wolcher ja als Mitver- fasser in der Zuschrift i. I genannt wird. Und in der That liisl ciiese .Vnnahuie jtlle obigen Rathsel, und erwcist sich nach alien Seiten hin als die richtige. ' 8 THE \VITNi:SS OF THE EPISTLES In addition to the four 'practically non-disputed ' Epistles, Reuss accepts botJi the Epistles to the Thessalonians, and the Epistle to the Philippians ; ' no one has more stoutly defended the Colossians and Ephesians, with the exquisite letter to Philemon, against the attacks of the Tubingen school ; ^ and although in his Commentary (' Les Epitres Pauliniennes,' 1878, ii. 243, 307) he rejects i Timothy and Titus, he still admits 2 Timothy, which he had previously described, as of all the Pauline Epistles assailed b)' criticism the one which bears most plainly the stamp of genuineness, with the single exception of the letter to Philemon,^ ' It is quite refreshing to read the pages in which Reuss dismisses the doubts raised against 2Thess. , the rejection of which by negative critics has become a kind of dogma, equally with their acceptance of i Thess. ; and in his defence of the Philippians there is a wholesome reproof in the remark that criticism fails of its end in a special degree when it bases a verdict of rejection against the whole Epistle upon a single dogmatic digression, which it cannot understand, or which it does not like. (^Die Geschichie der heiligen Schrifien des N. T., pp. 76-79, and 128, 6. Aufl. 1887.) - Geschichte dcr H.S. des N.T. pp. 110-I19, 6. Aufl. Amongst recent de- fenders of the Epistle to the Colossians we may now rank H. v. Soden, an important addition. In the Haiid-Comnienta)- zuin N.T. (of which he is joint- editor) he examines the usual objections raised against the Epistle, and concludes that neither its language nor its dogmatic expressions afford sufficient ground to reject the Pauline authorship ; he places the date of the Epistle in the Apostle's first Roman imprisonment. {^Hand-Commeniar, iii. pp. 14, 17, 1891.) ■■' Reuss, nbi supra, § 123. The fate experienced by the little Epistle to Philemon affords us a curious glimpse into the workings and exigencies of the negative criticism, and we may well say with Reuss (p. 120) that the verj' fact that criticism has presumed to question the genuineness of these harmless lines only shows us that itself is not the genuine thing. No one has spoken more warmly in praise of this practical note to Philemon, and its charming Christian spirit, than Baur {Paiiliis, ii. 82), and when, in spite of this eulog)', he proceeds to assert that we have here the germ of a Christian romance, which was after- wards elaborated into the recognition and reunion scenes of tlie pseudo- Clementine Homilies, he fails to convince even his own followers. The real truth is that the Epistle to Philemon is indissolubly connected with the Epistles to the Colossians and Ephesians, and carries with it the acceptance of at least the former of these two Epistles (cf. Sabatier, UApotre Paul, p. 203, and Renan, Si. Paul, Inlrod. p. xi). ' If the Epistle [to the Colossians] is apocryphal, the note \i.e. to Philemon] is apocryphal also . . . yet Paul alone, as it appears to us, could write the little masterpiece.' The close connection between the three Epistles is well expressed by Sabatier in his chapter upon them, VApotre Paul, pp. 201-210. ' Ces trois lettres forment un groupe distinct dans Tensemble des epitres de la captivite, et ne doivent point etre separees. Ecrites en meme temps, tres-vraisemblablement de la prison de Till-: MEANING AND IMPORTANCK OF THIS WITNESS 9 The testimoii)' of M. Rcnan with rct^ard to tlic Pauhnc Epistles is perhaps better known in Enghmd than that of any other continental critic, and it is therefore only necessary to remind ourselves that of thirteen Pauline Epistles he positively rejects only three — the Pastoral Epistles — whilst he classes the Ephesians as probably spurious, and Colossians and Philemon as probably authentic, although doubtful. The three Plpistles which he places in the second class, viz. i and 2 Thes- Cesaree, portees en Asie Mincuie par les memes messagers, elles gardent dcs traces frappantes de cette parente d'origine {Phikiii. 10 ; cf. Col. iv. 9 ; P/tile»i. 23, 24 ; cf. Col. iv. 10, 12, 14 ; Phikiii. 2 ; cf. Col. iv. 17 ; Col. iv. 7 ; cf. Eph. vi. 21). Ces epitres, en effet, se supposent Tune I'autre, et il devient bientot evident qu'elles ont eu un seul et meme auteur.' After a humorous exposition (p. 203) of Baur's attitude towards the letter to Philemon, in which, beneath its air of innocence and candour, he claims to have discovered a mysterious design, and the working of an ambitious dogmatic idea, Sabatier expresses the importance of the letter in question in the words which conclude the same page : ' Attachee, des I'origine, aux deux autres epitres {Colossiens, Ephesiens), elle est, pour elles, comme la signature meme de Paul qui les accompagne a travers les siecles pour les garantir.' Sabatier points out with much force, that the way in which Baur insisted upon a recognition of one and the same author of both Ephesians and Colossians, almost annihilated the objections of De Wette to the former Epistle, and his conclusion that it was the work of a forger who tried to imitate the earlier Pauline Epistle, viz. in the Colossians. For De Wette's criticism on the Ephesians cf. Lehrbttch der historischen-kridschen Eiitkituiig in die kanonischen Bikher des N. T. pp. 309-321. De Wette accepted the Colossians, p. 307. The ingenious theory of Holtzmann that a part of the Colossians is a genuine letter of St. Paul (a remarkable concession from such a negative critic), that a forger worked this up into the Ephesians, and that then, pleased with his per- formance, he produced our present Colossian Epistle by interpolations from his own forgery (Holtzmann, Einkitiiiig, 1886, pp. 290-297) had been answered in Germany by B. Weiss in iYie Jakrh. fiir deutscke TIteol. 1872, 4, in reply to Holtzmann's first announcement of his views in his Kritik der Epkeser iind Colosser Briefe, Leipsic, 1872. For the course of German criticism on this theory see Weiss, Einleititng, pp. 259, 260, 2. Aufl., and Dr. Salmon's liitroductioii to Ike N.T. pp. 479-81 ; and for its untenableness, in addition to the above, see Quarterly Revieiv, October 1886, on Historical Criticism of tkc N. T. p. 478 &c. Cf. also Sabatier, ubi supra, p. 210 : ' On a essaye de decouvrir un noyau authentique dans I'epitre aux Colossiens, a I'aide duquel un ecrivain posterieur aurait d'abord redige I'epitre aux Ephesiens, et, pour mieux cacher son jeu, ce meme ecrivain serait ensuite revenu a la lettre de Paul et I'aurait amplifiee librement pour la rendre mieux conforme a sa propre oeuvre. L'histoire et encore plus une exegese sans prejuges condamnent cette etrange solution dont le moindre embarras est d'etre irrealisable. ' On the relative priority of the two Epistles cf. Reuss's Gesckicktc, p. iii, Sabatier, ubi supra, p. 208, and B. Weiss, Einkittivg, pp. 267, 268. 10 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES saloniaiis and Philippians, he admits as authentic in his own judgment, although, as a critic, he points out that certain difficulties have been raised against them.' But it will be noted that what Renan mentions as the chief difficulty, viz. the theory of the Antichrist in 2 Thessa- lonians ii. — a difficulty which he himself regards as by no means insuperable — also admits of solution in the judgment of Schenkel in his discussion of the two Thessalonian Epistles,-' and it is important to bear in mind that Schenkel not only admits i and 2 Thessalonians and Philippians, but also that he is prepared to accept the Epistles to the Colossians and Ephesians.' ' Renun, Saint Pan/, I2th edit. iSSS. The Epistles are arranged in five classes : ' i. Epitres incontestables et incontestees ; ce sont I'epltre aux Galates, les deux epitres aux Corinthiens, I'epitre aux Remains ; 2. Epitres certaines, quoiqu'on y ait fait quelques objections ; ce sont les deux epitres aux Thessaloniens et I'epitre aux Philippiens ; 3. Epitres d'une authenticite probable, quoiqu'on y ait fait de graves objections ; c'est I'epitre aux Colossiens, qui a poar annexe le billet a Philemon ; 4. Epitre douteux ; c'est I'epitre dite aux Ephesiens ; 5. Epitres fausses ; ce sont les deux epitres a Timothee et I'epitre a Tite ' (p. 6). With regard to the 2nd class, 1 and 2 Thess. and Philippians, Renan remarks : ' A peine in- sisterons-nous meme sur les epitres de la deuxieme classe. I.es difficultes que certains raodernes ont soulevees centre elles sont de ces soup^ons legers que le devoir de la critique est d'exprimer librement, mais sans s'y arreter, quand de plus fortes raisons I'entrainent. Or, ces trois epitres ont un caractere d'authen- ticite qui I'emporte sur toute autre consideration ' (p. 6). And after discussing the objections against Colossians, he adds : ' Rien de tout cela cependant n'est decisif. Si I'epitre aux Colossiens (comme nous le croyons) est I'ouvrage de Paul, elle fut ecrite dans les derniers temps de la vie de I'apotre, a una date oi; sa biographie est bien obscure ' (p. 9). -' Das Christusbild der Apostel, pp. 68, 69. ^ In mentioning the doubts which have been raised against the three Epistles, Colossians, Ephesians, and Philemon, Schenkel points out that Colossians cannot be separated from Philemon, an Epistle which bears upon its face the stamp of authenticity (p. 84). He considers (pp. 85, 86) that the altered circumstances of the Apostle go far to account for the difference in tone between these Epistles of the captivity and St. Paul's earlier writings, and he adds two important notes in connection with the theory of Holtzmann which has been already mentioned. In the first note he points out the fact that the Pauline character of the Colossian Epistle is not denied even by those who oppose its authenticity or integrity, and after mentioning Holtzmann's ingenious attempt to restore the original Epistle, he refers to the admissions made by Pfleiderer of much that is really Pauline both in the beginning and in the second half of the Epistle (Panlint.wniis, p. 370). On the Philippians he writes (p. 91) : ' Auch die eingehenden und lehrreichen Untersuchungen Holsten's . . . haben meine Ueberzeugung von der Echtheit dieses Briefes nicht zu erschiittern vermocht.' See also on the three Epistles, pp. 298-301. Tin: MEANING AND IMPORTANCE OF THIS WITNESS U l'2\"cii if \\c put the last two Epistles out of the ques- tion, we find that both Hil^enfeld and Weizsiicker acce[)t se\en of the Pauline Epistles, viz. i Thessalonians, Philemon, and Philippians, in addition to the four placed by Renan in the first class.' The importance of the admission of twoof these documents, the First Epistle to the Thessalonians and the Epistle to the Philippians, will be shown, it is hoped, in the following pages, and we may notice in passing that in England even the most negative criticism is compelled to accept them. ■^ But if so, it is no longer fair in examining St. Paul's testimony to argue from the standpoint of Baur, and the early Tubingen school,'' as if modern German scholarship had never got beyond it, espe- ' Hilgenfeld, Einkittuig, \)\i. 239, 246), 'In dem ganzen Briefe (i Thess. ) erkennt man die Sprache des Paulus. Es ist kein Giund vorhanden, denselben dem Paulus abzuspiechen ' (246). After speaking of the scruples which prevented Holtzmann from entirely rejecting Philemon he adils (331): ' Der ganze Brief tragt das Geprage der einfachen Wahrheit an sich una verriith auch in den Wortspielen, v. 11, 20, die Schreibart des Paulus'; and after criticising the Philippians he concludes (347) : ' Die Aechtheit des Philipperbriefs ist also nicht wirklich widerlegt worden. In diesem Briefe haben wir den Schwanengesang des Paulus.' Cf. also his emphatic remarks in Z6'/to///-///y}/r7(:'/w^«. Theol. p. 199, 1871. Weizsacker, after admitting that it is not so easy to reject the Colossians as the Ephesians, and after entirely dismissing the Pastoral Epistles, maintains most decisively the authenticity of i Thess. and Philippians. ' Von den librigen Briefen nuissen wir nur noch den zweiten nach Thessalonike bei Seite lassen, der zu offenbar das Geprage einer Nachahmung hat . . . nach iiberwiegenden Griinden stammen von ihm auch der erste Brief nach Thessalonike, und der nach Philippi.' Das apostolische Zeiialter,\>. 190. For the doubts raised by Weizsacker against 2 Thess. on the ground that it is an imitation of i Thess., see his Apost. Zeitaltcr, pp. 258-261, and cf. B. Weiss's criticism of this view in his Einleituiig, 2. Aufl. pp. 176, 177. Cf. also Sabatier, itbi supra, pp. 86-88 ; Roos, Die Briefe des Apostels Patthts ujid die Reden des Herrn Jesii, pp. 38, 39. In addition to the testimonies given above in favour of Phil, the Epistle is emphatically defended and accepted by Mangold, in his edition of Bleek's Einleitiing in das N.T. pp. 568, 569, 1886 ; by Holtzmann, Einkitung in das N.T. \>\>. 302-304, 2. Aufl. 1886 ; Wittichen, Lehen Jesu,\>. 14 note ; Pfleiderer, Das Urc/iristendin/ii, pp. 153, 1887. For the most recent examination of the attacks made upon the Epistle, and for their refutation, see Hand-Comtnentar ztiiii N.T. ii. B., 2. Abtheilung, pp. 195-197 (edited by R. A. Lipsius), Freiburg, 1891. - Martineau, Scat of Aiithoriiy in Religion, p. iSo : ' Of the New Testament writings, six letters of Paul, viz. I Thess., Gal., Rom., i and 2 Cor., and Phil., must have the full benefit of the presumption which accepts a book on its own word.' * Sabatier, L^ A pot re Raul, Inlrod. pp. ix, x. 12 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES cially when we remember that one of the foremost of German critical theologians of the present day is prepared to accept the whole of the Pauline Epistles, not even excepting those three Pastoral Epistles against which modern doubts have been raised most frequently.^ And yet his ' honoured ' name is dismissed in a recent popular review of the results of German criticism with a single passing remark ! But even if we should confine our attention to the four Epistles which Renan places in his first class (the Hanptbriefe^ as the Germans call them), they present to more than one very common objection a solid block of historical evidence. Thus, in spite of the remarkable concessions of German rationalistic criticism,- it is still constantly asserted that we know nothing of our Gospels until the middle of the second century. But the Epistles of St. Paul, even if we restrict our I attention to ' the four chief Epistles,' presuppose the story ot the Gospels^they are justly cited by Christian apologists as a substantial proof that the story was known in all its main features within some twenty-eight years, at the latest, of our \ Lord's death — known, too, in Churches so widely apart as Rome, Corinth, and Galatia ; they carry us back, moreover, to a much earlier date still, for there is no reason whatever to sup- pose that St. Paul is preaching the great facts of the life and ' See B. Weiss, Eiuleititng in das N. T. p. 122, 2. Aiifl. 1889, for the conclu- sion of his examination of the. Pastoral Epistles. - We may refer, e.g., to the remarks of Weiss in his Leben Jesu, i. 160, 161, where, after speaking of the late date assigned by the Tubingen school to the Gospels, he adds that on this point a healthy reaction has recently begun. The origin of our Gospels is by no means so obscure, and their dates so uncertain, that in accordance with the necessity of the judgment which has been formed as to the unhistorical character of their contents, a place can be assigned to them at pleasure in the second century. Even Volkmar places the Gospel of St. Matthew, which he considered the latest of our three older Gospels, more than twenty years earlier than the head of the school, although the latter considered it as the oldest ; Volkmar places ' the first great doctrinal fiction ' concerning Jesus Christ, the Son of God, our Gospel of Mark, three years after the destruction of Jerusalem, A. D. 73 ; see also Weiss, Einkitimg in das N. T. pp. 482, 499, 2 . Aufl. 1 889. For Volkmar's own statement see/es/ts Nazareniis, pp. 18, 19. We have only to consider the dates assigned to the Gospels by Baur, and the dates now adopted by Hoitzmann, to see a further justification of Weiss's remark as to the reaction. Cf. 'Historical Criticism of the New Testament,' p. 479 in Quarterly Review, October 1886. THE MKANIN(i AND IMPORTANCE OF THIS WITNESS 15 death and resurrection of Christ to those wlio had never heard them before (see below, Oiaj^tcrV.) ; if so, he would not have been in a position to draw so many practical lessons from them, and to take for t^ranted their universal acceptance. There is thus abundant justification for the emi^hatic de- claration of Dr. Salmon : — ' If I were lecturing on Christian Evidences, I should com- mence my examination of the books of the New Testament with the Epistles of St. Paul. There are some of these which are owned to be genuine by the most sceptical critics, and these universall}^ admitted Epistles are rich in autobiographical details, and set Paul vividly before us as a real, living, working character. . . . Bring down the date of the Gospels as low as the most courageous of our adversaries can venture to bring them, and though we thus lose the proof of the greater part of the wonderful works of the Saviour's life, the great miracle of the Resurrection remains untouched. Take St. Paul's abridged account of the gospel he had received, as given in an unquestioned Papistic, and though it is so much shorter than any of the four, it contains quite as much stumbling- block for an anti-supernaturalist.' ' It has, indeed, been said, that although Christian apolo- gists have latel}' made it a favourite argument to appeal to the four undisputed P^pistles of St. Paul, they do not always meet the certain objection that the Epistles show only what were the convictions of St. Paul, and that he was in opposi- tion to believers of older standing.- This objection has by no means been forgotten in the succeeding chapters. But we may remark in passing, that if we consider the testimony of these four Epistles with refer- ence to our Eord's life and teaching, it is evident throughout ' IntroJ. to the N. T. pp. 30, 31, 5th edit. 1S91. With Dr. Salmon's remark that with Paul's testimony in i Cor. xv. 5-7, ' Christianity thus could survive the loss of the Gospels,' we may compare Schmid, Bil>lisihc Tlieoloi^ie dcs N. 7\ pp. 12, 24, 5. Aufl. 1886 (edited byC. Weizsacker) ; Weiss, Lcbenjesit, i. p. 15 ; C. Ullmann, Ilistorisch oder Mythisch ? (see below). English readers will recall Dr. Sanday's remarks in the Keadit};:; Clmrch Congress Report, pp. 94, 95, and more recently, Mr. Chore's Bainpton Lectures, p. 58, ff. - Stanton, Jewish and Christian Messiah, p. 155. Put sec Gore, Ba;>ipton I.eelnres, p. 61. 14 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES that St. Paul is at one with the first Apostles in the leading facts of the Gospel which he preached ; that the primitive Church of Jerusalem never ceases to command his respect ; and that the other Apostles are not regarded by him in the light of mere personal opponents, but always as the Apostles of the Lord.^ And if we turn for a moment to their Christology, it is ' See Hilgenfeld, Eiulcitttng, p. 225 ; and esp. Weizsacker, Apost. Zeitalier, p. 366. Comp. Hilgenfeld's opening remarks in Zeitschrift fur luissen. Tkeologje, p. 358, 1890. One of the most important epochs in the controversy with the Tiibingen school was marked by the publication of Albrecht Ritschl's second edition of his Die Entstehungder altkatholischen Kirche,\%<)'] , in which he declared his total antagonism to the fundamental principles of Baur and Schwegler ; his re- marks, e.g., on p. 51 (comp. also p. 48) are of the utmost importance in showing how utterly he disclaimed the maintenance of any fundamental opposition between Paul and the primitive Apostles : ' Nach Maassgabe dieser Andeutungen sind wir weit davon entfernt, einen fundamentalen Gegensatz zwischen Paulus und den Uraposteln vorauszusetzen. In diesem Fallehatten sie die gemeinsame Geschichte nicht haben konnen, welche sie nach den von Niemand bezweifelten Dokumenten gehabt haben. Einen praktischen Gegensatz zwischen Beiden werden wir freilich anerkennen miissen, aber das Feld desselben wird eineso enge Abgrenzungfinden, dass die wesentliche Uebereinstimmung in den von Christus aufgestellten leitenden Ideen nur um so deutlicher einleuchten wird.' So, too, Sabatier {UApotre Fatil, p. 7), in discussing the agreement of St. Paul with the disciples of older standing, reminds us that the Apostle speaks of the first Christian community as 'the Church of God,' and once, simply as 'the Church' (Gal. i. 13, i Cor. xv. 6, Phil. iii. 6) ; that he calls the first Christians ' the brethren' and ' the saints' (i Cor. xv. 6, i Cor. xvi. i, Rom. xv. 31), and sets them before the members of the Church of Thessalonica as worthy models for imitation, ' For ye, brethren, became followers of the c/iiarhcs of God which in Judcea are in Christ Jesus' (i Thess. ii. 12-14). On such passages as i Cor. iii. 22 and i Cor. xv. 1 1 and their testimony to the fundamental agreement between St. Paul and the Twelve, see Lechler, Das apostolische Zeitalter, pp. 486-8. 3 Aufl. The same passages are examined by Sabatier, uhi supra, pp. 9, 10. In this connection we may refer to some of the closing remarks of Huraut (see chap, ii.) in his Paid, a-t-il contiu le Christ historiqiie ? p. 46 : 'La foi qu'il [Saint Paul] a prechee, c'est elle qu'il renversait autrefois (Gal. i. 23), comprenant bien qu'elle ruinait les traditions de ses peres, et montrant par la qu'il comprenait mieux que nos critiques modernes toute la partie du Christianisme ante-paulinien ; c'est celle qui Pa fait regarder comme un frere par les Apotres memes auxquels on I'oppose, et qui lui ont donne la main d'association, reconnaissant ques'ils etaient, lui et eux, separes sur des points de detail sans importance, ils etaient unis, fonda- mentalement unis, sur ce qui fait I'essence meme du Christianisme. Et de meme que Saint Paul pouvait dire aux Corinthiens Soit done ?)ioi, soil eux, nous prec hens ainsi et vous avez cru ainsi, les Apotres auraient pu dire : .Soit done nous, soit lui, nous prichons ainsi et vous avez cru ainsi. ' THE MI:ANING AM) IMPORTANCE OF THIS WITNESS I 5 manifest that St. Paul is at one, not only with tlic Church of Jerusalem, but with those who chsputcd his aiithorit}-, in re- garding Jesus as tJie Lord. Take, e.g., his remark in Gal. i. 19, ' But other of the Apostles saw I none, save James the . Lonrs brotlicr' \ here St. Paul cvitlcntl)' uses a title already familiar to the Church of Jerusalem, and which carries us back to a much earlier date than the Epistle ; or if we refer to I Cor. ix. I, ' Have I not seen Jesus Christ our Lord} ' is it not evident that such an appeal presupposes that his oppo- nents held the same opinion as his own with regard to Christ's Person ? ' Certainly if the early Tubingen criticism is correct, the rise of a higher Christology is to be referred to St. Paul : the other Apostles must have had rather Ebionite views of the Person of Jesus, but the less Paul knew of the historical Christ, the more dogmatic the position which he could take up with regard to Him. It is very difficult to understand how men can entertain this opinion and yet ascribe the Apocalypse to the Apostle John, since in no writing of the New Testament is a higher Christology exhibited than in the Apocalypse. "•^ But even one such passage as Galatians i. 19, shows us that St. Paul w^as by no means unacquainted with, or indifferent to, the facts of the human life of Jesus ; and whilst he does not hesitate to speak of Him as t/ie Lord (on the significance of this term see Chapter IV.) he also associates Him with human surroundings, and describes Him as a brother among brethren (cf. r Cor. ix. 5).^ ' Cf. Lechler, uki supra, p. 521. St. Paul, even in his keenest attack upon the Judaisers (see Galatians), nowhere implies that they erred in their conception of the Person of Christ, though they did not truly understand the significance of the work of Christ. Stanton, yifr^vV// and Christian i\fessiah, p. 156. - Paret, inyir/i;-. y! Deutsche T/iecL, 1858; Paitliis iimi Jesits, i. p. 7. (For Paret, see chap. ii. ) ' Paret, iibisupra, p. 1 1 and 19. ' Ausserdem begegncn wir IJriidern des Herrn, welche, gleich den Aposteln, verheirathet waren, unci niit ihren Weibern als an Jesuni, den Herrn, gljiubige umherzogen (I Cor. ix. 5). Einerderselben, Jakobus, wird Gal. i. 19 mit Namen genannt. Paulus muss also Jesum. in dieser rein menschlichen Umgebung seinen Gemeinden vorgefiihrt haben ; denn alle diesc Erwahnungen kommen nur gclegentlich vor und setzen voraus, dass den Lescrn dieses Alles schon wohl bckannt sei. Und dock bei all dein hat er ihn als dt:n Herrn in jcnein hohcn .Stnne (in welchem er eben bci Pan Ins i/nmer so <^enannt -^'ird) festghaltcny und seinen Hijrern gcschildert.' J l6 . THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES But it may also be maintained that this same Hne of argu- ment from the Pauline Epistles is valid against the ' mythi- cal ' and ' legendary ' theories, which still seem to be relied on to a great extent by writers who are compelled to place the Gospels at a far earlier date than that assumed by Strauss or Baur.^ Certainly it would seem that there is often some con- fusion in the use of these terms ' mythical ' and ' legendary,' and the question has been fairly raised whether the word ' myth ' can strictly be employed in this connection at all.'' ' See, for example, the opening pages of Holtzmann's recent Die Synoptikcr, 1889, pp. 20, 53, 54. Ha7id-Co)nmentar zum N. T. i. ^ The myth, as Weiss points out {Leben Jesu, i. 146), has, strictly speaking, no application at all to the Gospel history, since this turns upon the historical person of Jesus, while it is of the essence of a myth to be a pure ideal conception. And he reminds us with truth that, if this is the case, we must first, with Bruno Bauer, call in question the historical existence of the person of Jesus, and see in Him simply the embodiment of the form of the Messiah as it was shaped by the religious consciousness of the Church, to be able to explain as pure myth the nar- rative concerning Him. It is just this naivete of the myth-forming consciousness which, in Dr. Weiss's judgment, is entirely lost sight of when a distinction is drawn between the religious or philosophic myth and the historical myth (pp. 146, 149). The former might be taken into serious account, if, in approaching the story of the Gospels, we had to deal with an age and a people like that which meets us in the formation of son:ie heathen mytholog)-. But the reverse is the case, and we have to face an historical period— a period, as has been said, as historic as any that the ancient world presents to view. (See Dr. W. H. Mill on The Mythical Interpretation of the Gospels, pp. 97, 98.) The same argument is expressed by Hettinger in his Lehrlnich der Fiindaiiiental- Theologie Oder Apologetik, 1879, pp. 291, 292: 'Die Mythenbildung gehort der vorhistorischen Zeit an, die weder Schrift, noch Geschichte, noch Chronologic hat. Die Evangelien dagegen erscheinen in einer Zeit des regsten historischen Bewusst- seins, als Griechenland seinen Thukydides, Rom seinen Livius und bald darauf Tacitus besass, iiber Palastina Flavius Josephus, iiber Aegypten Manetho, iiber Phonicien Dios und Menander, iiber Herodes Ptolemaus der Mendisier geschrieben batten.' Such words recall the familiar remark, 'The idea of men writing mythic histories between the time of Livy and Tacitus, and St. Paul mistaking such for realities !' (Arnold, Life, ii. 58). With Hettinger, we may compare the similar line of thought more fully expressed by C. Ullmann in his Historisch oder Mythisch ? pp. 52-5, from which it will be of interest to quote a few sentences, since it was the book which influ- enced Strauss himself to make considerable concessions (Pfleiderer, Development of Theology, p. 220) : ' Vorerst sollte der Aitsdriick Mythus hier lieber ganz vermieden werden. Er fiihrt fast unausbleiblich eine Vermischung verschieden- artiger Gebiete mit sich. Wir sind nun einmal gewohnt vorzugsweise die heidinischen Religionsdarstellungen Mythen zu nennen . . . wir befinden uns dabei entschieden auf dem vorhisto)'ischen Gebiete und ganz im Kreise einer durch THE MEANING AND IMTORTANCE OF THIS WITNESS 1 7 Indeed, in one of the most recent and powerful of the many Lives of Jesus which German theology has given us, it is recognised that the question is not between ' mythical ' and * legendary,' but whether, when either theory is applied to the Gospels, some other word ought not to be used — whether, in reality, it is not a moral question, a question affecting the moral character of Christ, or at least of His immediate followers.' Certain!}' after the rise of the Tubingen school, with their description of the Gospels as ' tendency ' writings, the early position of Strauss was no longer tenable, since conscious invention, invention creating freely, and with deliberate pur- pose, had taken the place of the unconscious products of the imagination, and of that naive interchange of idea and actuality which considers that what is necessarily thought, must have necessarily happened.^ Strauss himself unhesitatingly refers to Baur's influence geschichtsform anschaulich gemachten, gleichsam personificirten Physik und Naturreligion. Mit dcin Christenthuiiie dagegen betreten 7uir eiii voUkoniinen andcres Gebiet ; hier herrscht nicht ein physikalisches, sondern ein durch und durch ethisches Interesse, hier befinden wir uns nicht mehr in dem kindlichen Alter der freien, unbefangenen religicisen Dichtung, sondern in einon vorgesiJn-it- tenen, schriftstcllei-ischen, gebildcten, ja theihveisc iiberbildetcii, iiberhaupt aber in einem historischen Zeitalter.'' On the distinction between ntytli and legend, and the fallac)' of Strauss's position in not fully recognising the distinction between them, s^e Dr. A. S. Farrar's Critical History of Free Thonght, pp. 328, 379, 380 ; and for a recent exposition of the fact that myths properly so called must be restricted in their rise to the earliest and most uncivilised ages, we may refer to Mr. Andrew Lang's Myth, Religion, atid Ritual, \. 3, 21, 29, 33, 37, 51. 'From all these efforts of civilised and pious believers to explain away the stories about their own gods, we may infer one fact— the most important to the student of mythology — the fact that myths were not evolved in times of clear civilised thought' (p. 3). ' \\c\s.%, Lebenjesn,\. 158, 159, and 148, 149. 'A fiction, which consciously attributes to freely-constructed details the significance of actual facts, is no longer a fiction but a lying invention. This hypothesis, therefore, ends of necessity with discrediting the moral character of the Evangelists.' ' Eine Erdichtung aber, welchemit Bewusstsein frei geschaffenen Ziigen die Bedeutung thatsachlicher beilegt, ist keine Dichtung mehr, sondern eine liigenhafte Erfindung. .So endet . ' be an argument of decisive weight in favour of the credibilit}^ of the Biblical history, could it indeed be shown that it wa.s^^ written by eye-witnesses, or even by persons nearly contempo- raneous zuith the events narrated.'^ 'For though errors and' false representations may glide into the narratives even of an eye-witness, there is far less probability of unintentional mis- takes {intentional deception may easily be detected) tJian ivliere- ' \}\\m2xm, Htstorischoder Mythisch? '^^. 56, 57, 144, 145: ' Setzen wir aber auch fur den Augenblick, class Strauss die Quellenkritik zum Ziele gebracht, unci haltbare Rusultate geliefert hiilte, so bkiht dock ein Fcis liegen, den er nicht luohi' hitiu'ej^ 7vahen kann — dei- Aposlel Paithis imd die paulinischen Schriften. Die meisten und vvichtigsten paulinischen IJriefe sind ihrer Aechtheit und Urspriing- lichkeit nach iiber jcden Zweifel erhaben, und auch Strauss kann dies nicht in Abrede stellen ' (p. 56). Cf. also, Keim, Geschichlc Jesu fiir weitere A'ret'se, pp, 20, 21, 1875; Beyschlag, Leben Jesu, i. 68, i887 ; Ncisgen, Geschichte Jesu Christi, p. 81, 1891. Compare Herzog's Real-EncycL Art. ' Mydius. ' The conclusion of the article deals with the importance of the Pauline Epistles in their bearing upon the mythical theory. - Strauss, in his Leben Jesu fiir das deutsche Volk, still does his best to minimise the value of Paul's testimony to the facts of the Gospels, as well as to the great miracle of the Resurrection. Cf. e.g. i. 66, and .379-85. ^ Strauss, Life of Jesus, 4th edit. E. T., p. 55. c 2 20 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES the nan^ator is sepanxted by a long interval from the facts lie records! The words italicised in these paragraphs reveal the assumption which underlies the whole theory of Strauss, an assumption which the existence of the Pauline Epistles entirely refutes, but which Strauss felt to be the mainstay of his position, since he devotes so long a space to the attempt to prove the late date of our Gospels.' How this same difficulty pressed upon Dr. Loman will be seen in Chapter III., and to what straits he was driven to get rid of the testimony of these Pauline Epistles to the Apostle, who became a psychological puzzle, if he was only removed from Jesus by such a brief interval of time.- Yet, even in describing what he must have regarded as the chief factor in his work, the pure myths in which the Messianic ideas and superstitions of the Jewish people irresistibly embodied themselves in narrative form, Strauss is obliged to presuppose that the greater part of these myths already existed in the Old Testament, and that a compara- tively small portion of them was entirely new — they had ' ' Die ganze Ansicht von Strauss ist iiur durchzufiihren unter Voraussetzung des kritischen Gewaltstreiches, dass alle vier Evangelien unacht, nichtapostolisch, von spateren unbekannten Mannern verfasst seyen. Dies ist aber von Strauss bei weitem nicht zureichend bewiesen ' (UUmann, ubi sitpi-a, p. 55). Dr. Weiss remarks that Strauss well knew what he was about, when, in his latest Lebenjesit, he held fast to the views that all our Gospels arose at a tin'e in which, while the memory of a considerable portion of the sayings of Jesus still remained, only the most shadowy outlines of the history of His life were known (Weiss, Lebenjesit, i. p. 160). The importance of time for the growth of a »iy/h is also fully pointed out by W. H. Mill, Mythical Interpretation, p. 95, and by Hettinger, ///'/«//;-«, p. 292, comp. Schanz, Gott iind die Offenbarnng, p. 198, 18S8, Nosgen, ubi supra, p. 80. With these remarks we may compare Dr. Fairbairn's criticism of the mythical theory in Cqutemp. Rev., May 1876 : ' The application of the mythical theory to the Gospels was without warrant until justified by the most searching historical and documentary criticism. Precisely here, at the most crucial point, Strauss failed. His criticism of the evangelical histories was not based on a criticism of the evangelical narratives. The questions as to their origin and authenticity are dismissed in a few sentences. The time necessary for the mythical creation is assumed, not proved, to be there. And this vitiating deficiency involves others. Strauss has no glimpse as to the value of PauPs testimony — does not see' that thjvugh him we can get too near the sources to leave the mythical faculty room for action. ' 2 See W. C. van Manen's examination of Loman's hypothesis in /ah rb/tcher fiir prolestantische Theologie, 1883, p. 595. THE MEAXIXC; AM) LMPORTANCE OK THIS WITMISS 2f then mercl}- to be transferred to Jesus, and accommodated to His character and doctrines.' But not only does he thus find the Old Testament totally insufficient without the addition of myths derived from ver}- different sources ; '•^ not only is he obliged to fall back upon the overwhelming impression made by the Personality of Christmas a factor with which it is impossible to dispense ; not only may it be very scriousl)- questioned whether such a definite picture of the Messiah, as he assumes throughout, ever existed at the period of time when Jesus was born,^ but there is one other objection to which, in the present stage of the controversy as to the sources of the Gospel narratives, special importance is rightly attached. It is laid down, amongst the positive proofs by which a myth may be recognised, that if the contents of a narrative strikingly accord with certain ideas existing and prevailing within the circle from which the narrative proceeded, which ideas themselves seem to be the product of preconceived opinions rather than of practical experience, it is more or less probable, according to circumstances, that such a narrative is of mythical origin.'' But what if it can be shown that the Gospel narratives of the Incarnation, the Temptation, the Transfiguration, the Resurrection of our Lord, so far from being ' in striking harmony with some Messianic idea of the Jews of that age/ are in direct opposition to it,'' and if the same criticism can ' Strauss, while he is evidently conscious of this weakness in his theory, still maintains the same position in his Leben Jesu fiir das deutschc Volk, 5. Aufl., pp. 194, 195. - See, for example, pp. 38, 39, tibi supra, in his treatment of the Incarnation, and compare Weiss, l.eben Jesii, i. 154; Stanton, ytTi'/.f// and Christian Messiali, p. 377, and below, chap. iii. * The immense importance attaching to the Personality of our Lord, and the utter weakness of excluding it in any attempt to account for the rise of the Christian Church, are most fully expressed by Ullmann in the treatise already men- tioned /a.fj//«— a treatise which induced Strauss himself to modify the conclusion of his Leben Jesu. See the late Canon Cook's essay on Ideology and Subscrip- tion, and Pfleiderer's recent account of the book in his Development of Theology^ p. 221, 1890. * Weiss, Leben Jesu, i. 152. * .Strauss, U/e of Jesus, p. 94, 4th edit. E.T. " 'Der Charackter der mythischen und evangelischcn Erziihlung schlicsseu 22 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES be applied to the one great historical fact upon which even critics who refuse to St. Paul any definite acquaintance with the life of Jesus allow that he laid the greatest stress — the fact, not merely of a suffering, but of a crucified Messiah ? ' Take, as a single instance, the incident which Strauss himself chooses as an illustration of the pure niytJi — the Transfiguration of our Lord. The account of it, we are told, is derived * almost exclusively ' from Messianic ideas and expectations existing in the Jewish mind before Jesus, and independently of Him ; there was a predisposition to create the whole occurrence by virtue of the current idea of the relation of the Messiah to Moses and Elijah.- But, granting this part of the case, how are we to account for the introduction of the two prophets talking with Jesus as to His ' decease,' which He should shortly accomplish at Jerusalem, the context plainly showing what the decease in- volved ? It would be difficult to conceive any incident more directly opposed to Jewish feeling — indeed, Strauss seemed to have been conscious of the difficulty, for he fixes upon this particular incident as the only amplification taken from the other source of the pure myth — viz. the particular impression which was left by the fate of Jesus, and which served to modify the Messianic idea in the mind of the people. But a witness whose impartiality will scarcely be ques- tioned has reminded us that even in the second century after einander voUstandig aiis. Die Mythe ist das Product des Volksgeistes, dariim jiationa/ gefdrbt ; die Lehre des Evangeliums ist von allgemein nienschlichem Interesse, vielfach im IVidersprnche init dem Glauhen des Volkes, in dessen Mitte /:s ersfanden ist.'' Hettinger, ubi sup7-a, i. 292. ' V^€v&txQx, Hibbert Lectures,'^. 53. For Jewish ideas and the Incarnation see chap, iv., and for Jewish ideas and the Resurrection see chap. iv. On the con- trariety between these ideas and the Gospel narratives of the Temptation see Edersheim, Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, i. 292, 293 ; and for the same contrariety with regard to the Transfiguration, ii. 100, loi. For a remarkable testimony to the ' scientific value ' of Dr. Edersheim's work see Pfleiderer, Development of Theology, p. 393. - Strauss, IJfe of Jesus, i. 85, 94, 4th edit. E.T. and his Leben fesu fiir das deuische Volk, 5. Aufl. ii. 251-255, 256, 257, and especially 255, for the way in which Strauss speaks of the death of Jesus as the chief stumbling-ljlock to Jewish modes of thought, and supposes that the Evangelists introduced Moses and Elias to counteract this prejudice, and to show that His death was in accordance with the counsels of God. THE MEANING AND IMl'ORTANCE OF THIS WITNESS 27, Christ, Tr}'pho, the Jewish opponent of Justin Martyr although admitting the idea of a suffering Messiah, decided 1}' rejects the idea of a Crncificd One {Dial. c. TiypJt. c. 90). And he sums up his examination of the question of the ' suffering Messiah ' by affirming that, on the whole, it was one quite foreign to Judaism in general, and b}' citing as an abundant proof of its repugnance to Jewish feeling the con- duct of both the disciples and the opponents of Jesus ' (Matt. xvi. 22 ; Luke xviii. 34, xxiv. 21 ; John xii. 34). But if we are met, as seems to be the case, with this strange un-Jewish element in dealing with this and other great facts of our Lord's life, it is surely not too much to conclude that in many respects the Messiah of Judaism is, as Dr. Edersheim expressed it, the Anti-Christ of the Gospels, and, inasmuch as St. Paul preached ' Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling-block,' the Anti-Christ also of his Epistles. "-^ ' Further mention is made of this circumstance in chri|i. v., and references will be found there to other authorities. Schiirer's words, to which reference is made above, are as follows : ' Dcr Icideiide Messias. Aber so sehr sich von diesen Pramissen aus die Idee eines leidenden Messias auf dem Boden des Judenthums begreifen lasst, so wenig ist sie doch die herrschende Anschauung des Judenthums geworden. Das sozusagen officielle Targum Jonathan lasst zwar die Beziehung von Jes. 53 auf den Messias im Ganzen stehen, deutet aber gerade diejenigen Verse, wclche vom Leiden des Knetches Gottes handeln, nicht auf den Messias. In keiner der zahlreichen von uns besprochenen Schriften fanden wir auch nur die leiseste Andeutung voneineni siihnenden Leiden des Messias. Wie fern diese Idee dem Judenthum lag, beweist auch das ^'erhalten der Jiinger wie der Gegner Jesu zu geniige (Matt. xvi. 22 ; Luc. xviii. 34, xxiv. 21 ; Job. xii. 34.) Man wird nach alledem wohl sagen diirfen, dasssiedem Judenthum im ganzen und grossenfremd gevvesen ist ' {Geschichte des jiidisc/ten Volkes im Zeita/lcr Jcsu Christi, ii. pp. 464-466). Cf. also Weiz- sacker, Das apost. Zeitalier, pp. iii, 138. We may add to Schiirer's remarks, as to the state of feeling of the disciples and the friends of Jesus, those of Dr. Dalman, and the passages in the New Testament quoted by him, in his important work Der kzdeiide ttiid dei- stcrbcnde Messias, '^^. 30, 85, 86. 1888. - See also Fairbairn, Studies in the Life of Christ, pp. 313 ff. , and his criticism of Pfleiderer's account of Paul's position. 24 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES CHAPTER II AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT Part I Ix the previous chapter an endeavour has been made to point out some common objections which the argument from the Pauline Epistles, as an historical basis for the life and teaching of our Lord, is calculated to meet. But while many English writers have justly laid great stress upon this testimony of St. Paul, and while it has been increasingly felt that such evidence, derived from writings admitted to be genuine even by the most advanced critics^ cuts at the very root of the famous mythical theory, it may not be without interest to show how various continental theologians have treated the same subject. It may be said that in England the force of this connection between the Pauline Epistles and the Gospels has been more and more appreciated since the days of Dean Stanley's essay entitled ' The Epistles to the Corinthians in Relation to the Gospel History.' In this essay, which traces, chiefly from the two Epistles to the Corinthians, the resemblance between ' the Christ ' of the Pauline Epistles and ' the Christ ' of the Gospels, we see how such a resemblance constitutes ' a fifth Gospel,' and how correctly we may say of the Apostle who preached it that ' he becomes to us truly an " Evangelist." ' It has, indeed, been thought that Dean Stanley somewhat undervalued the force of his own views ; at all events, sub- sequent writers have pursued the same line of argument further, and its value may be increased by the extension of the same method to other Epistles. In other well-known evidential works there are occasional ' Stanley's Corinthians, p. 588. AN IIISTOkUAL KKTROSrECT 25 chapters devoted to the same subject, and in books written with a much wider purpose no more could be expected ; ' but they have no doubt powerfully contributed to keep before men's minds the importance of this line of argument, and references will accordingl}' be made to them in the following pages. But when we turn from England to Germany, we shall no doubt be told, at the outset, that many German writers of note maintain that St. Paul hardly ever alludes to the human life and teaching of Jesus, and that they are hopelessly divided as to whether he ever saw Him. We could not refer, as a starting-point, to a more interesting name than that of Karl Hase, whose death in 1890 deprived Germany of probably her most venerable and her most learned Church historian, and whose ' Leben Jesu,' published in 1829, six years before that of Strauss, had the distinction of being the first work of the kind. Hase is classed as a rationalist, but no one has pointed out more forcibly how unreasonable it is to ignore the Personality of the Founder of the Christian Church in any attempt to account for its origin ; no one has more scornfully put aside the preposterous theories which would question, with a Bruno Bauer, the very existence of Jesus of Nazareth, or which fail, with Strauss and his followers, '■ Dr. Leathes, Religion of the Christ (Bampton Lectures, 1874), pp. 267- 310 ; V^ov>', Jesus of the Evangelists, pp. 251 ff. , 4th edit., and Christian Evidences in relation to Modern Thought, pp. 330-357 (Bampton Lectures, 1877) ; Westcott, Study of the Gospels, pp. 177 ff. ; Stanton, Jewish and Christian Messiah, pp. 155-160; Kennedy, Self-Kcvelaticn of Jesus Christ, pp. 247 ff. ; Plumptre in Commentary on the N. T. (Ellicott) i. pp. xxix, ff. Amongst recent writings ex- pressly bearing upon this subject we may mention Fragmentary Records of Jesus of Nazareth, from the Letters of a Contemporary (Wynne [Hodder and Stoughton], 1887) ; and two of the valuable Present Day Tracts, one by Dean Howson, on Evidential Conclusions from the Four greater Epistles of St. Paul, and the other by the Genevan I'rofessor F. Godet, on The Authenticity of the Four priiuipal Epistles of St. Paul. Godet refers to the decisions of two or three advanced German critics in favour of the authenticity of the Epistles in question, whilst I'rofessor Wynne quotes Kenan's judgment, which (joflet also introduces, as justifying an extension of the argimient Ijeyond these four Epistles. But it is much to be regretted that the very interesting and exhaustive papers, so far as the four chief Epistles are concerned, by Dr. Matheson, entitled The Historical C//;-^/^.^/. /"aw/, have never appeared in a separate form, {"^qq Expositor, vols. i. and ii. 2nd series, and comp. Footman's Reasonable Apprehensions, &c. pp. 85. ff. ). 26 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES to recognise His unique creative power in a religion which has transformed the world. If we only possessed, as Hase reminds us, the earliest records of Christianity (recognised as such by the Tubingen school), viz. the Apocalypse and the four great Pauline Epistles, * the authenticity of which has never been doubted by one earnest man,' ' and if we add to these the information given us by Tacitus of the Christian persecution under Nero, we are in possession of at least three historical facts, quite apart fi^ovi tJie four Gospels: viz. that a Jew, Jesus of Nazareth, was cruci- fied under Pontius Pilate in the days of Tiberius Caesar ; that he was called the Christ ; and that he became the founder of a religious community, from which have proceeded a new principle of life, and a transformation of the history of the world. ^ But when he passes from these broad general statements, it must be confessed that Hase finds little in the New Testa- ment to complete our representation of Jesus, if we look for information beyond our Gospels. Paul, who is our oldest and safe witness, although not an eye-witness, or, at any rate, not one upon his own testimony ; who became an Apostle, in Hase's view, in the short interval of three or four years after the Crucifixion ; who had interviews with Apostles, and who stayed with Peter in Jerusalem ; whose letters are the authentic ' Hase, Gestkichte Jesii, pp. 8, 9, 1876, and Lcheii Jcsit, p. i, 4. Aufl. 1854. " ' Ein Jude, Jesus von Nasaret, genannt der Messias, der schmachvoU untergegangen ist, hat eine religiose Gemeinschaft gegriindet, von der ein neues Lebensprincip und eine Umgestaltung der Weltgeschichte ausgegangen ist . . . Dieses also steht fest : die machtige religiose Personlichkeit des Griinders der Christenheit, sein tragischer Untergang und irgend ein Ereigniss der siegreichen Erhebung seiner vSache aus diesem Untergange ' {CesihiLkie Jesti, p. 9). Hase entirely repudiates any attempt to put Paul into the place of Jesus ; from her earliest days the Christian Church had shown a moral religious energy, hitherto unheard of; when to all appearance she was only a poor conventicle, she had boldly proclaimed her belief that .she was destined to become a universal religion, and she has become so ; but all this energy, and this triumphant belief, was derived, with one consent, from her Founder, Jesus of Nazareth. To deny His existence, or, if that is really too absurd, to deny His creative genius, His moral grandeur, and His religious might, is to refer the whole transforming power of Christianity to chance causes, and one might as well affirm that Strasburg Cathedral had been constructed in a night, or in the course of a centurj-, by the confluence of the dust of the streets (see pp. 8 and 9}. AX HISTORICAL KKTROSPECT 2J representation of the imnieasureable impression which Jesus made upon all classes of His contemporaries, seems purposely to ignore all matters of detail in His earthly life (2 Cor. v. 16). Certainly, once in a way, the Apostle mentions His descent from David, the fact that He was ' made under the law,' and his decision with rcgartl to the indissolubility of the marriage tie ; on the occasion of the abuses which had gained ground in the Church at Corinth, he describes the institution of the holy Supper, but his pious memory moves only around the simple facts of the Crucifixion, the Resurrection, and the heavenly glorification of Christ' ' And so,' concludes Hase, ' we can only appropriate in a limited way the favourite modern paradox, " The Epistles are also Gospels." ' For the history of Jesus, the Epistles are of more value than the Gospels as authentic vouchers, but of much less as sources of our know- ledge of details. - But it will be noticed that, even with these limitations, Hase recognises in the four great Pauline Epistles 'sources of the first rank ' for the life of Jesus, and an irrefutable testimony to the grandeur of His Personality, and to the earliest belief of the Christian Church. In this respect Hase occupies a very different standpoint from that of Strauss, who seems to have had no idea of the value of Paul's testimony, which, as Keim clearly saw, was fatal to the mythical theory as an adequate account of the Gospel narratives.'' It was, moreover, to the interest of Baur and the Tubingen ' Hase, Geschichle Jesii, pp. 9, 10. - ' Daher wir uns die neuerlich beliebte Paradoxie : " auch die Epistein sind Evangelien," nur in beschrankter Weise aneignen kiinnen. An urkundlicher Sicherheit bedeuten die paulinischen Briefe fiir die Cleschichte Jesu noch mehr als die Evangelien, an indivicUicllem Inhalt viel weniger' (p. 10). Comp. Hase's Leben Jesu, p, 1,4. Aufl. ' QucUen ersten Ranges . . . Daher sind unniiUelbare Quellen die vier Evangelien ; mittelbare Quellen die paulinischen Briefe, weniger durch Ilindeutungenauf Ausspriicheund Schicksalejesu, als durchdie urkundliche Darstellung des ersten Eindrucks, den sein Leben gemacht hat.' ^ In Ilase's Kiirhettgcsdtichtc (Vorlesungen), erstcr Theil, p. 140, 18S5, after referring to Baur's acceptance of only four of Paul's Epistles, he adds that he himself accepts as equally certain i .Thess. and Philemon ; Colossians and Philippians are contested, he thinks, chiefly owing to the prejudice that Paul did not ascribe a superhuman nature to Christ, but, as he adds, only an artificial inter- pretation can extinguish the high Christology in the Corinthian Epistles. 28 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES school to minimise, for more reasons than one, St. Paul's knowledge of the Jiistorical Christ. Their object was to em- phasise to the utmost the supposed opposition between Paul and the Twelve, upon which supposition their whole theory de- pended, and they therefore represented Paul as if he disdained all knowledge of the historical Christ as a knowledge according to the flesh, and they described his Gospel as a pure idealism.' The less Paul knew of the historical Jesus the more dogmatic (as Paret points out) the position which he could take up with regard to Him. The space which in the case of the other Apostles was filled up by memory, be- getting as it were second-sight, was in the case of Paul quite empty, or at least half-empty. Upon this tabula rasa he could express his Christological ideas. In this space, the more empty it was, the more easily could theo- logical dogmas, as, e.g., that of the pre-existence of Christ, and all that was connected with it, settle — dogmas which were neither begotten from intuition, nor communicated by its means but which took an independent flight into the air at random.^ But although Baur himself represents St. Paul as viewing Christ's whole human life only in the light of His death, that death upon the cross being the great turning-point where for the Apostle, and for all who were truly ' in Christ,' all things became new, and although the original Apostles could thus no longer claim precedence on the ground of their direct intercourse with their Master,-^ yet it ought not to be forgotten that Baur by no means affirms that Paul was ignorant of the facts of the Gospels ; we learn not only incidentally, but from the plainest statements, that he recognises St. Paul's acquaint- ance with the chief contents of the Gospel history.^ No sooner did it please God to reveal His Son in him, that he ' Sabaiicr, VApolre Paul, p. 53. On this opposition and recent criticism see further in chap. iii. -' Paret, uhi supra, Pan /us 11 n J Jesus, p. 7. ■' Baur, Paulus, i. 304, 305. Paret points out (p. 24) that Baur is no doubt quite correct in maintaining that St. Paul regards the earthly life of Jesus entirely in the light of His death, but that the same view is expressed in each of the first three (jospels in words uttered Ijy Jesus Himself. ^ vSee Paret, Paulus und Jesus, p. 19. AN HISTORICAL RKTROSrKCT 29 might preach Him among the heathen, than a new world opened to the Apostle's consciousness ; but whilst his own strong indi\iduality preserved him from ever becoming a de- pendent upon others, and whilst he based his whole work and Apostleship upon the direct call of God, he certainl)' did not cease from making inquiries into the historical life of Jesus, and a man who could speak so positively, and in such detail, as the Apostle does in i Cor. xi. 23, and xv, 8, of the facts of the Gospel history could not have been unacquainted with the chief contents of the same.' In the hands of Baur's immediate follower, A. Schwegler, his views, as Pfleiderer candidl}- admits,- were exaggerated into a caricature: before Paul, Christianity was simply a narrow ascetic form of Judaism, and the only question with which it had any concern was whether Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah. With this narrow Jewish Christianity traces of Ebionitish views were united at a much earlier date than is usuall)' supposed to have been the case, as we see from the manner in which Hegesippus represents ' James, the brother of the Lord,' a description in which Schwegler places un- hesitating confidence. Opposed to this Jewish Christianity stands Pauline Christianity, with its two leading ideas of the abrogation of the Mosaic law, and the universality of the Christian religion, or, in other words, justification by faith instead of the right- eousness of the law, and the reception of the Gentiles without circumcision.'^ This opposition it is usual to regard as the ' Baur, Patihts, i. 103. ' Wer von Thatsachen der evangelischen Geschichte so bestimmt unci so speciell reden kann, wie der Apostel thut (i Cor. ii. 23 f., 15, 8 f.) kann auch mit dem ubrigen Ilauptinhalt derselben nicht unbekannt gewesen sein.' We may compare with the alcove, J'aii/iis, ii. pp. 196, 197, and also p. 267, where Baur interprets 2 Cor. 8, 9 of earthly poverty, thus intimating that St. Paul was acquainted with the facts of the Saviour's humble life. It is to be noted that Strauss not only ignores the testimony of the I'auline Epistles, but that he seems less disposed than Baur to admit the likelihood of Paul's acquaintance with the facts of the life of Jesus {Leben Jcsii fiir das deiitsche Vol/:, i. pji. 66. 368 5th edit.) - Development of Theolo'^y, p. 233, 1S90. ^ Das iiachapostolische Zcilallei- in den Hauflpunkte)t seiner Enlwickelun;', i- 23-25. 30 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES inspiring motive of Church development during the ApostoHc age, and as overcome by Paul himself. But in Schwegler's opinion there is not a single fact which testifies to the accu- racy of this belief in the victory of Pauline Christianity during the Apostolic age ; both the Acts of the Apostles and the Pauline Epistles testify to the opposite. The truth, as Schwegler maintains, is that the same conflict which prevailed in early days marked also the succeeding period, and the task of the historian is to follow the struggle step by step until ecclesiastical Christianity, i.e. a Christianity of a more or less Ebionitic Jewish type, developed into Catholicism. Prior to this stage it cannot be said that Pauline Christianity, or the principles of the Pauline teaching, had gained any real ascendency.' But theories are not facts, and ' it seems,' writes Pfleiderer, ' as if Schwegler, hypnotised as it were with the one idea of early Christian " Ebionitism," was completely blind to all the varied thoughts and interests which moved that age and also influenced the life and belief of the Chris- tian Churches.' ' The dangerous tendency,' he adds, ' to be seen, it must be confessed, in Baur, of insisting too exclusively on a new point of view as the only true one, was carried in Schwegler to the most extreme lengths.' - What, we naturally ask, were the sources from which Schwegler derived his views ? The earlier the date, he argues, the rarer becomes our acquaintance with written authorities, and the more exclusive our dependence on oral tradition. If even amongst the learned classes of the Jews literary activity was so slight, much more was this the case amongst the primitive Apostles and the early Christians. In Schwegler's opinion, as in that of his master, F, C. Baur, only five written documents remain to us which can with certainty be ascribed to the Apostolic age, viz. Gal., Rom., i. and 2 Cor. and the Apocalypse ; the Acts is a mere ' tendency ' writing, which must be left quite out of the question.'^ Primitive Christianity was the belief in the Messiahship of Jesus, that Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ : the Synoptic Gospels and the Acts ' Ubi supra, pp. 33-29, and ff. - Ul>i stipra, p. 233. =• //'/(/. pp. 89, 90. AN HISTORICAL RETROSrECT 3 1 arc at one in this, that the announcement of the Christ who had been crucified and raised again, formed the whole con- tents of the ApostoHc message.' Thus Christianit}- was in its origin only a question internal to Judaism, and a step in the development of it : in its earliest days its followers were reckoned as a mere Jewish sect (Acts xxiv. 5, xxviii. 22), and its teaching as a continua- tion of Old Testament Judaism, and the final stage of it : Christ Himself was placed on a level with the Old Testament prophets, and the Christology of the earliest days of the Church did not consist in elaborating His divine nature — the Jewish Messiahship was the measure of His dignity.- Primi- tive Christianity, therefore, knows nothing of a metaphysical conception of Christ's Person ; on the contrar}-, it was Ebionitish ; ^ and that was the conception which prevailed until ecclesiastical Christianity separated from it, and Irenaeus classed the Ebionites as heretics. Up to that date ecclesias- tical Christianity was, to repeat Schwegler's favourite mode of expression, more or less Ebionitish, i.e. Jewish, and although the sharp Judaism which Paul had to face in the Galatian Epistle did not prevail for any length of time after the Apos- tolic age, yet throughout the whole subsequent period Judaism only declined step by step, and Catholicism only gradually took its place.^ If, then, Christianity had been represented by the primitive Apostles alone, its followers would have re- mained a mere Jewish sect, which in the course of time would have been absorbed again by the ancient Jewish religion, or it would have gained the upper hand of Judaism, but only to the extent that the Messiahship of Jesus would have been acknowledged as a Jewish dogma. But it would never have overrun the world and gained recognition as the universal religion. To whom did Christianity owe this freedom from Judaism, and its independence alike in essence and principle } Schwegler answers : To the Apostle Paul.^ At the head of the Pauline system stands the idea upon which its historical significance reall)- rests, viz. the idea of the newness and in- ' Ul'i supra, p. 91, '■' //'/./. [ip. 99-101. ^ //>i(/. 102, 103. ^ li'hl. p. 107. •■ //-/,/. p. 148. 32 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES dependence of Christianity, it was a Katvr] KTiais, a new creation, a principle new and distinct from Judaism : to this principle Paul's two fundamental practical thoughts were directly united, viz. the abrogation of the Mosaic law, and the universality of the Messianic salvation — the former a con- sequence of the new life of Christianity in its relation to the Jew, the latter in relation to the Gentile.' Closely connected with these thoughts was Paul's teaching as to the universal sinfulness of the human race, on account of which both Jew and Gentile alike lay under a curse. In Christianity, there- fore, Paul saw a redemptive power, and the principle of a new birth : the teaching and example of Christ retire into the background when set against His atoning death, and as the Christian himself is no longer a mere Jew, but a kulvj] ktIctls, so Christ is no longer regarded as the last of the prophets, but as ' the second Adam.' ^ But if we inquire as to Paul's relation to historical Christianity,^ we find that in Schwegler's opinion the Apostle is absolutely silent as to the Gospel his- tory : as an historical personage Christ does not occupy the prominent position w^hich one would expect ; no mention is made of His deeds and miracles ; these all disappear before the miracle of His resurrection ; no facts or incidents of His life are introduced with the exception of His death and the institution of the Last Supper ; there is no mention of Christ's teaching, and passages such as i Cor. vii. lo, 12, 25, admit of another reference.^ Paul, according to him, positively disdains any obligation to the tradition of the life and history of Jesus ; he received his gospel not by means of others or by human instruction, and plainly for him historical Christianity consisted in nothing else but the simple facts of the appear- ance of the Messiah, of His death, of His resurrection. But though Schwegler fails to see how much is involved in the proposition Jesus is the Christ,^ which he himself emphasises as the sum and substance of the Apostolic ' Ubi supra, p. 152. -' Ibid. pp. 152-154. ^ //;/(/. pp. 154, 155. * This is all Schwegler has to say of such passages in the hrief note contained on p. 155. ■' See below, chap. v. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT ^^ preaching ; though he fails to do justice to the historical notices scattered throughout the Pauline and other Epistles of the New Testament, which later writers, like Kcim and Hausrath, have so fully recognised,' yet in a remarkable note he admits that the spiritualisation and transfiguration of the Jewish Messianic conception must in any case be referred back to Christ Himself, although it maybe almost impossible to make a full and accurate representation of His Personality.' Thus, Schwegler, like others before and after him, is constrained to recognise in the Personality of Jesus a character and a power which he cannot dismiss from his account of Christianity in its relation to Judaism, and the real answer to the question which he asks above, is, not Paul, but Jesus. No one has pointed out the weakness in Schwegler's position more strik- ingly than Albrecht Ritschl (' Die Entstehung der Altkatho- lischen Kirche,' 1857, p. 19), and he truly remarks that Schwegler leaves to his readers the unpleasant task of deciding which was the real Christ — Paul or Jesus. Although Ritschl is not concerned to discuss the precise knowledge of the historical Jesus which Paul might or might not have pos- sessed, since he is chiefly occupied with the consideration of the results of the death and resurrection of Christ upon the believer (pp. 79, 81, 84, 89 ff), it is evident that in his view (in contrast with that of Schwegler) the Apostle must have had considerable acquaintance with the sayings and discourses of Jesus (pp. 49, 58, 102, comp. 330), and that he could not have been without some definite information as to the marvel- lous impression which the human life of the Saviour must have produced ; how otherwise could he have insisted so pointedly upon the sinlessncss of Jesus (p. 85) ? Indeed, this information would seem naturally to be presupposed in the stress which Ritschl (while careful to guard Paul's originality [p. 52]) lays upon the fact that both Paul and the other Apostles had access to a common history, and that there was no fundamental opposition between them, but rather an agree- ment which extended even to the dogmatic conception of Christ's Person, and to a recognition of the absoluteness ' See further in this chapter, pp. 44 H". - U/>i .it/m, pp. 148, note. J) 34 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES of the revelation made in Him (pp. 23, 48, 51, 88, 120, 121). It is worth noting that Schwegler helps us to realise what a tremendous shock the death of Jesus as a malefactor was to the early Christians. He lays great stress upon the manner in which the Epistles of the New Testament, and Justin Martyr's ' Dialogue with Trypho,' reveal what a stumbling-block the cross must have been, and continued to be.^ He argues, indeed, that the Christians of Apostolic days, finding themselves robbed of their Jewish Messianic hopes, of the advent of Jesus in the clouds of heaven to restore the kingdom to Israel, had no resource but to transfer to the future what the present denied them, and to postpone their Messianic hopes to a second advent of the Christ for their completion : hence the expectation of the Parousia so prominent in the Synoptic Gospels and in the Epistles alike.- But the more Schwegler emphasises ' the offence of the cross ' the more difficult is it to understand how the hopes which died with Jesus on Calvary could have been revived, unless another fact is presupposed — the Resurrection of the crucified Messiah. Amongst the foremost opponents of the Tubingen school stood Heinrich Ewald, to whom reference has already been made in Chapter I. In Ewald's opinion the oldest written Gospel, a Gospel with which the Apostle Paul was acquainted, may with more probability be attributed to Philip the Evan- gelist, the first person who meets us in Church history as definitely called by that name (Acts xxi. 8), and who stands next in the list to Stephen in Acts vi. 5, amongst the seven men of honest report. No one, as Ewald thinks, would have been more likely, or more fitted, as an Hellenist, to compose this first written Gospel.^ Ewald of course admits that his view must remain a conjecture, but he maintains that ' See above, chap. i. p. 23, and further in chap. vi. -' Ubi supra t^. 108-I10. ^ Die drei ej-sieii Evangelien, i. 48, 63, 2. Aufl. 1871. Comp., however, Weiss, Einleitting in das N. T. p. 483, and Holtzmann, Die synoptischen Evangelien ^ p. 396. On Ewald's view of the relation of the Spruchsammlungen or Collection of the Sayings of Jesus, which he also recognises, see Weiss, ul>i supra, and Ewald, Die drei ersten Evangelien, i. 63-71. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 35 it is not without foundation, and that nothin<^- forbids its acceptance, and his remarks may still be read witjj interest on the work of the Evangelists, and their relation to Luke's statement in the Prologue of his Gospel.' At the same time Ewald distinctly recognises the part played by oral tradition. Such passages as i Cor. vii. 6, lo, II, 25, 40, ix. 14, xi. 23, XV. 3; I Thess. ii. 6, iv. 15, only prove that appeal was not made to a written document in questions relating to the words and acts of Christ, because a man like Paul still stood sufficiently near to the original source of the reminiscences of the Saviour's life and teaching, and because what had been perhaps already written down comprised only a small part of the whole of the traditions ; but all this by no means proves that there was no written Gospel in existence at that early date,- and Ewald has no doubt that the manner in which Paul expresses himself in i Thess. v. i. points to the fact that his readers had before them a written report of Christ's words. •'^ ' The notion that when Paul refers to something which has come down from Christ, he refers only to his own visions is so absolutely groundless and unjust that I have never con- sidered it worthy of a refutation. On the contrary, it may be seen that he had often before him a Gospel in cases where he- does not appeal to a tradition from Christ (see SendscJireiben^ p. 48, and elsewhere).'"* This oldest written Gospel always remained at the Apostle's command : it is the use of it b}- Luke and Paul alike which accounts for their close relation- ship in the important words at the Last Supper (Luke xxii. 19, I Cor. xi. 23-25).-5 Ewald, moreover, recognises the fact that Paul after his ' Some interesting remarks upon the work of the Catechists and their method of teaching, and the value attached by St. Paul to their labours, and the high rank assigned to them in the early Church will be found in Mr. Wright's Compo- sition of the Four Gospels, 1890 (Macmillan). ^ Ewald, ibid. pp. 62, 63 ; comp. also History of Israel, vii. 289, E. T. s Ewald, Die Semischreiben des Apostels Paiiltis, p. 48, 1857. See below, chap. viii. ^ Ewald, History of Israel, vii. 290, note, E.T. ' Ewald, Die drei ersten Evatigelien, i. 63, 427. Comp. , however, I lollzniann, Die synoptischen Evangclieu, p. 396. D 2 o 6 THE WITNESS OE THE EPISTLES •conversion would naturally take care to inform himself of the incidents connected with the earthly life of Jesus, for, although he holds that the Apostle had probably seen Christ in the flesh, yet he could not, like the other Apostles who had actually lived with Christ, recall to mind with equal vividness the Saviour's words and deeds, or appeal to them with equal decisiveness as precedents and models ; the instructions ot Ananias before or after his baptism, his intercourse with other Christians in Damascus and its neighbourhood, would have supplied this defect to some extent, but more especially Paul's visit to Jerusalem three years after his conversion, in which Ewald sees the Apostle's purpose to gain information from Peter as to the historical events of the life of Jesus. But whilst Ewald thus fully admits Paul's knowledge of the Gospel history and teaching, he considers it as a mark of the Apostle's great simplicity and sincerity that he left it to others better qualified, to a Peter or a John, to point in detail to the example of the historical Christ, and he holds that for the same reason the Apostle intentionally avoids all reference to that example in his own Epistles.^ The name of another of BaUr's opponents is more popu- larly known in England than that of Ewald, the name of the great historian and theologian, Augustus Neander — the man who counselled calm and patient reasoning when the whole continent of Europe was thrown into alarm by Strauss's ' Leben Jesu,' and when the Prussian Government was eager for the suppression of the book.-^ Neander, like Ewald, held that Paul had access to a written Gospel, or rather Gospels, whilst he fully recognises the inde- pendence of Paul's character, and accepts unhesitatingly the ' Ewald, Hislory of Israel, vii. 278, 279, 283, 288, 289, 294, E. T. On p. 294, note, Ewald expresses his opinion that it is not accidental that such references to Christ's earthly life as in i Pet. ii. 21 ff., iii. 18 ft'., i John i. i, never occur in Paul's Epistles. ' We perceive also from this that such Epistles as those of John and ,the first of Peter, although other indications show that they must be traced to the Apostles themselves, must all the more certainly be regarded as proceeding from them.' References to Ewald's Scndschreiben des Aposteis Paiilus will be found in other chapters. - Dr. A. S. Farrar's Critical History of Free Tlioiight, p. 3S3. AX HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 37 Apostle's statement that he had received his Gospel, not from man, but onl\' b\- the Spirit of Christ. But he also holds that this b)- no means involves the belief that the Apostle received his information as to the life and discourses of Jesus b)^ supernatural communication. It is quite unnatural, he thinks, to suppose that Christ must have communicated to the Apostle by means of special visions all that He had said and done on earth ; ^ and where Paul himself introduces words or ordinances of Christ, he speaks in such a manner as to cause us to think of no other source of information than that of ordinary human tradition : thus, e.g., in i Cor. xi. 23, he uses uTTo, not irapd, to signify that what he had ' received ' was not immediately but mediately from the Lord : had Paul been speaking of a special revelation by which this information had been communicated to him, he would not, Neander thinks. have employed the expression irapsXajSov but rather airzKa- \v(f>67].'- Nor can we suppose, that Paul, as he felt himself compelled to examine independently the depths of the truth proclaimed by Christ, would have satisfied himself with isolated expressions of the Saviour casually derived from oral inter- course with the Apostles, with whom he came into contact so seldom and so briefly ; we are led to the supposition that he procured written memoirs of the life of Christ, or at least a written collection of the sayings of Christ, if any such existed, or that he compiled one for himself.^ It is very probable, in Neander's opinion, that such a written collection, or several such were in existence, and also written memoirs of Christ's ministry, for we must not forget that we are speaking of an age in which literary activity prevailed, however highly we may value the power of the living word in these days of the Church's youth. That which moved men's hearts so deeply and occupied them so fully would surely have been soon committed to written memoirs, although not until after an interval might anyone resolve to write a Life of Christ as a whole. In confirmation of his view, Neander refers to the ' Geschichte dcr PJiaiizung, &c. , i. 154, 5. Aufl. ; see also Life of Christy p. 7, E.T. - Geschichle Jer Pflanzung, Sec, p. 155, 5. Aufl. See chap. ix. ^ Geschichte der Pflanzuug, pp. 155, 156. 38 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES many reminiscences of Christ's expressions which meet us in the Pauline Epistles, besides the Apostle's direct quotations of Christ's words, all of which point to the existence of some collection of the sayings of Jesus, of which Paul availed him- self Nor is it without significance that in the fourth edition of his work, which contains the additions and corrections of the author, Xeander further expresses his conviction that when Paul in his Epistles speaks of the imitation of Christ he speaks in a manner which presupposes that a definite his- torical image of the Saviour was known throughout the whole Church, and taking everything together, we are justified in the supposition that Paul employed some original historical record of Christ's ministry as a point of connection for his instruction, and that this shorter record fell into oblivion when our fuller Gospels had incorporated its contents and attained to more general acceptance."^ In the following chapters many references to Neander's works will be found, and although in the recent (1890) reprint of the fifth edition (1862) of the ' Geschichte der Pflanzung' in the ' Bibliothek theologischer Klassiker ' the polemical remarks directed against the Tubingen school are for the most part omitted, yet Neander's weighty examination of Paul's character and of the incidents of his conversion,^ as well as of the many points of connection between his teaching and that of Christ, is by no means to be dismissed as out of date. Both Neander and Ewald furnish us with a protest, the force of which cannot be ignored, against the views which would reduce the Apostle Paul to the level of a mere enthusiast and fanatic, evolving out of his own brain the picture of a Christ whom he had not onh- never seen, but of whose life and teaching he possessed no accurate information whatever. If we turn to a writer who has been described as the most acute and learned of Baur's followers, Carl Holsten, we find that he gives us a modified view of the relationship ' Geschichte der Pflanzitng, pp. 156, 157. ^ Ibid. p. 157. The words are retained in the fifth edit. 'Keandets Additions and Corrections are also given in the English trans, of the fourth edit. oii\it History of the Planting and Training of the Christian Chnrchby the Apostles,\\. pp. 58-I90. ^ Geschichte der Pflanzung, pp. I18 ff. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPKCT 39 between Paul and the Twelve, inasmuch as he grants that both the Petrine and the Pauline gospels were based upon the preaching and life of Jesus, and that the bitter opposition of Peter against Paul did not develop itself until after the conflict at Antioch.' But he still insists that Paul's gaze is directed only towards the Saviour's death and resurrection, although he admits that in these two facts is included a knowledge of their attendant circumstances, such, t'.^., as is revealed in the Apostle's acquaintance with the words of Jesus at the Last Supper.'- All that Paul may have learnt from Peter during his fourteen days visit to Jerusalem-' occupies only the background in his religious consciousness and therefore in the oral tradition which he delivered to the Churches which he founded : the only source of informa- tion for the historical life of Jesus flowed, not in the Pauline tradition, but in that derived from the primitive Apostles.'* But in the gospel of a Peter, the gospel of the Circum- cision, there was no assertion, as in the Pauline gospel? of a new principle of life in Jesus, of a perfect freedom from the righteousness of the law, no recognition that the death of Jesus on the cross was the death of Judaism itself-^ Holsten, however, quite admits that while the gospel of Peter differed from that of Paul, in that the former, cramped and confined by a Jewish legalism, was destitute of the living power of the latter, yet the spirit of Jesus lived in each ;*' and it may well have been that Paul in his intercourse with Peter received a picture of the personality and preaching of Jesus which convinced him that the gospel to the heathen, revealed to him in the solitudes of Arabia, was in entire agreement with the spirit and doctrine of the Christ whom the primitive Apostles had known in the flesh, although such a picture was ' Weiss, Einlcilitv.gindas N. T. pp. 14 and 141, 2. AuM; Moisten, Das Evan- geliuin des Paitliis, pp. 8-1 1, 84 ff. ; flolsten, Die syiioptischen Evati^elicn nach der I-onii Hires luhaltes, pp. 2, 3, 1885. For Beyschlag's criticism on Holsten's Vision-Hypothesis see below, chap, vii, -' Die syiioptischen Evangclien, p, 159. ' Ibid. pp. 159, 172. ' Ibid. pp. 159, 160. '" Ibid. pp. 162, 164 ; Das Evaiigeliiun des Pauhts, p. 312. " Ubi supra, p. 164. 40 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES afterwards marred and spoilt by the wickedness of the Judaisers and their passionate disHke of Paul.^ Adolph Hilgenfcld would probably be named as the most prominent and assiduous of Baurs living disciples. As one of the most zealous defenders of the Hauptbriefe against Steck and Volter, frequent allusions will be found in Chap. III. to his recent articles in his ' Zeitschrift fiir wissenschaftliche Theologie,' - and reference has already been made in Chap. I. to his acceptance of Philippians, i Thessalonians, and Romans xv. xvi. By accepting these writings and the tradition respecting the end of Peter as genuine, as also by moderating the contrast between Paulinism and primitive Apostolic Jewish Christianity, Hilgenfeld, as B. Weiss puts it, sought to cut away the most prominent excrescences of the Tubingen criticism.'^ \\'ith regard to Paul's knowledge of the earthly life of Jesus, Hilgenfeld declines to draw any conclusion in favour of it from 2 Cor. v. 16. ' To know Christ after the flesh ' is a knowledge which belongs only to the Apostle's Jewish opponents : there had been a time, before his conversion, when Paul himself had been open to a like imputation, when, i.e., he had seen in the ignominious death of the cross a divine condemnation, and in that belief had persecuted the Christ ' Ubi sitpra pp. 165 ff. ; Das Evatigelinm des Paiilus, pp. 7, 8. Holsten'sview of the relation between Paul and the first three canonical Gospels depends entirely upon what he calls the development of the dogmatic-religious consciousness by which the contradictor)- elements of Judaism and heathenism were gradually reconciled. Under this law of development our Gospels were written : Matthew, the Petrine Gospel ; Mark, that of Paul, to show that the spirit and teaching of the historical Jesus lived in the spirit and teaching of Paul ; Luke, the work of a unionist Pauline, the blending together and, at the same time, a remodelling of the two earlier Gospels. But not only is the order of the Gospels which Holsten advocates verj' different from that demanded by more recent criticism (see the remarks of Pfleiderer in Development of Theology, p. 240), but his view of their relationship to Paul is dominated by his desire to bring the life of the early Chris- tian Church into submission to the law of an inward necessary development quite as arbitrary' as that demanded by Baur or Schwegler. (Holsten, Die syiioptischen Evangelien, pp. 160, 170 ff. ; comp. Weiss, Eiiileitiing in das N. T. p. 482, 2. Aufl.) - Zeitsclu-ift fii}- wissen. Theol. pp. 485 ff. 1889, and ibid. pp. 357-6 1, 1890. ^ Weiss, Einleitung in das N. T. p. 14, 2. Aufl. 1889. AN TIISTORICAI. RKTKOsrECT 4I who had so falsifictl the Jewish ideas of a Messiah.' But all this was changed when God had revealed His Son in the Apostle (Ga\. i. 16), and when Paul recognised the higher spiritual being of Jesus (Rom. i. 4). The aim of this revela- tion to Paul was essentially this : that he might preach the Son of God among the Gentiles, and that as the Apostle of the Gentiles he might avoid from the outset anj- dependence upon the primitive Apostles.- But whilst Paul thus stood distinguished from the Twelve as the Apostle of the Gentiles, Hilgenfeld emphasises the fact that even before Paul passed over to the Christian ranks the Christian communities had taken the important step of recognising Jesus as the Messiah in spite of His shameful death (a fact which still remained a cause of offence to the Jews : Gal. i. 1 1 ; i Cor, i. 23), and that to that belief they had adhered : the full consequences of the death of Jesus Paul was the first to perceive, but we must not overlook the connection between the earliest Christianity and that of Paul, which the recognition of that fact, viz. the death on the cross, most certainly involved.' Indeed, Paul's fundamental topic of Jesus as the Crucified, in which his whole preaching was comprehended, and his teaching as to the Saviour's atoning death, by which the righteous- ness which is by faith takes the place of the righteousness of the law, has its roots — as Hilgenfeld carefully reminds us — in the simple teaching of Jesus. If Paul, e.g:, regarded the death of Christ as the end of the law (Rom. x. 4), the Christ of Matthew had already declared his conviction (Matt. xi. 13) that with John the Baptist the prophecy of the law had ended and the time of fulfilment had commenced : if Jesus had con- nected the entrance into the kingdom of heaven with a return to the innocence of childhood (Matt, xviii. 3, xix. 14), and had represented greatness in that kingdom as a childlike humility, and the new relationship to God as that of a child ' lli\gen(ck], £ifi/e7/un!^'- tn das JV. 7] p. 219; Zcitsclirift fiir luisseii. Theol. p. 184 ff. 1864. ^ Zeitschfifl fiir ivissen. Theol. pp. 106, 223, i860. Hilgenfeld, like the earlier members of the Tubingen school, insists upon the superiority of Galatians to the Acts [ibid. pp. Ill ff. ; comp. ibid. pp. i ff. 1888). ' Zeitschn/f fiir 7uissen. Theol. pp. 108, 109, i860. 42 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES to its heavenly Father, we have already that lowly submission and trust which meets us in Paul as the faith which justifies, which contains in itself a consciousness of the divine favour, and constitutes the very opposite of the righteousness of the Jew resting on the works of the law.' But, whilst Hilgenfeld denies that the word laToprjaai in Gal. i. 1 8 means to inquire of Peter, instead of simply to make his acquaintance,^ and whilst, like the Tubingen school in general, he makes Paul's belief and preaching centre around the two great facts of the death and resurrection of Jesus, he allows that Paul was quite sure of his fundamental agreement with the primitive Apostles as to the main facts of the Chris- tian Creed (in proof of which he refers to the verse so often quoted by Christian apologists as to the harmony existing between Paul and the Twelve, i Cor. xv. ii), and that his information as to the appearances of the Risen Christ was received, not indeed from Peter, but from the current Christian tradition (i Cor. xv. 3, irapiXajSov)? If, however, Hilgenfeld thus acknowledges Paul's debt to his fellow-Christians for this information, is it not a very difficult matter to determine how much more the Apostle may not have received from similar sources ; especially when Hilgenfeld, in a recent article, certainly appears to endorse Weizsacker's view, that Paul, in his visit to Peter (Gal. i. 18), received communications from him both as to the life and as to the teaching of Jesus ? ^ But, whilst we cannot cite Hilgenfeld as bearing witness in detail to the fulness of Paul's knowledge of the historical Christ,-"' we are able to attach special importance to his weighty defence of the Hauptbriefe, and to the uncompro- mising attitude which he assumes towards Steck and similar ' Ubi supra, pp. 109-11. - Ibid. p. 96, 1864. See below, chap. vii. ^ Ibid. pp. 96, 97. Hilgenfeld, it will be noted, dwells upon the expression, the third day (i Cor. xv. 4), as being derived from the oldest testimony, and also upon the remarkable agreement between i Cor. xv. 7 and the Gospel according to the Hebre'vs. ■• Ibid. pp. 9, 10, 1888; comp. Weizsacker, Dasapost. Zeitalter, p. 83. * Hilgenfeld, it is worthy of notice, admits that such passages as Gal. iv. 4, I Cor. X. 4, and 2 Cor. viii. 9 prove that Paul ascribes to Christ a personal pre- existence, although he denies that there was anything special in Christ's birth to mark Him out from other men (Zeitschrift fiir wissen. Theol. pp. 188-90, 1871). AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 43 opponents of the four great Pauline Epistles, expressing, as it does, the judgment of the foremost living representative of Baur's followers. But if we pass from those who arc followers of Baur, in the stricter sense, to the representatives of the modern critical school, we shall find that while for the most part they limit St. Paul's preaching to the simple announcement of the Crucified and Risen Christ, they often recognise in a remark- able manner his acquaintance with the human life of Jesus, the fulness of this acquaintance being sometimes rather implied than illustrated in detail. Thus Schenkel states, as an undoubted fact, that Paul during his first visit to Jerusalem must have learnt many incidents of the life and work of Jesus more especially from a most trustworthy eye-witness, St. Peter (Gal. i. i8),' although these communications were not regarded by the Apostle as the essential contents of his message of salvation, for that was summed up in the brief statement that in Jesus of Nazareth the Christ had certainly appeared, and that Jesus as the Christ had suffered on the cross for the sins of men, and had risen from the dead to awaken them to a new life. Schenkel quotes, amongst matters of detail, St. Paul's references to the descent and birth of Jesus ; he is of opinion that the appearances of the Risen Christ to Peter,"the Twelve Apostles, the five hundred brethren, James, the whole body of Apostles (in the wider meaning of the word) could only have been communicated to St. Paul by eye-witnesses or their friends ; that St. Paul undoubtedly learnt from an Apostle's mouth the teaching of Jesus concerning divorce.- The exact description which St. Paul gives of the institution of the Lord's Supper is the result of information which he had received, not indeed from written sources, but from the com- munication of one who had actually shared in the first cele- bration. To these statements, moreover, we must add such incidental allusions to the Gospel history as Schenkel finds ' Das Christiisbihl der Apostel, p. 59 : ' Ohne Zweifel hat Paulus aus dem Lebcn unci Wirken Jesu damals manche Einzelheiten, zumal von Petrus als deni zuverlassigsten Augenzeugen, crfahrcn.' - //-/&& Hibbert Lectures, pp. 141, 142. Comp. Das UrchristentliwH, p. 178. ^ Hibbert Lectures, pp. 10, 11. It is to be noted that Pfleiderer's view of the Pauline Christology leads him to some remarkable statements. Thus he writes, ' He is called also " the Lord ' absolutely, the name which is in the Old Testament given to God only. By such conceptions Christ is brought so near to God that we need feel no surprise when Paul at length calls Him without reserve " God who is over all," in order thereby to indicate His pre-eminent dignity and dominion.' Hibbert Lectures, p. 55; but comp. p. 56, and Das Urclu-isteiithum, p. 240. ^ The expression of Holtzmann's views is taken from his Einleitung in das N. T. and the Hand-Commentar zum N. T. i. ' Die Synoptiker.' AN HISTORICAL KETROSriXT 6^ made up of a hundred little pictures, composed of various incidents in the hfe of Jesus, of characteristic traits, and oft- repeated sa\'ings. All these were the result of the tradition preserved in the first place by the Church at Jerusalem, and then gradually spreading beyond the limits of Palestine. The importance attached to this tradition -is plainly stated in the earliest no less than in the latest writings of the New Testament (i Cor. xi. 23, xv. i, 3, John xiv. 26); it is this tradition which is an indispensable means and a necessary pre-condition of religious belief, and then, afterwards, its care- fully-guarded sanctuary. But if once such a form of instruc- tion was a condition of the life of the Church, it might be supposed, as Holtzmann remarks, that some official means of promoting it would have been employed, and he refers to the belief sometimes maintained that in the ' Evangelists ' (Acts xxi. 8; Ephes. iv. 11 ; 2 Tim. iv. 5) we have the representatives of a special office, upon whom the duty devolved of communicating to others the history and the words of Jesus. This, in his opinion, cannot be proved, although in each Church the tradition plays an important part, and it may have been included in the teacJmig {^iZaa-KoXla) which Paul classes with prophesying, revelation, speaking with tongues, interpretation, as one of the regular means ot edif)-ing the Church (i Cor. xiv. 6, 26 ; Rom. xii. 7). And so, as is usually the case, we find first oral, and then written tradition, when we examine into the earliest Christian sources. The matter of chief importance is the transition from oral tradition to the fixed written form. And here Holtzmann warns us against arguing from the conditions of our own day, when writing comes first, and whoever has anything new to publish takes up his pen. But Christ, unlike many other religious founders, wrote nothing, and whilst He was zealous for the permanence of the Old Testament Scriptures, He was unconcerned for the fate of His own preaching of the Kingdom. The ' word ' was to do everything, as a word which, accor- ding to the appropriate expression of the fourth Gospel, was spoken ' in die Welt ' (John viii. 26). And the continuance 68 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES of the original impression thus made depended entirely, as Holtzmann admits, upon the uniqueness, transcending the limits of common and ordinary humanity, which appertained both to the woi'd and to the speaker himself ; it depended uj^on the eternal youth of this luord, as it retained its own unique originality even amidst oral tradition, and as it prevailed through a whole century over the world of human thought, l^ut this unique word (ko'yos) consisted of a whole series of words (Xoyoi), which formed the special treasures of the primitive Church. A full reference will be found to the high value which Holtzmann attaches to these sayings in a later chapter ; but we may notice here that, in the way in which he introduces them, Holtzmann's remarks remind us of the im- portance which Weizsacker also attributes to these ' words of the Lord ; ' they are for both these writers the oldest and fundamental law which the Church possesses, its highest autho- rity, an oral Canon, as it were, by the side of the written Old Testament, and Holtzmann points out how Paul emphatically raises his voice, and twice underlines, as it were, what he had written, whenever he makes a communication which was not so much his own individual opinion, but rather one con- nected with a traditional announcement of Christ Himself. (I Th. iv. 15 ; I Cor. vii. 10, 12, 25 ; i Cor. ix. 14, xi. 24, 25.) ^ Indeed, Holtzmann admits that the possibility of a written record, as early as the date of the first Epistle to the Corin- thians, of the most important words of Jesus, and of His commands relating to His Kingdom, is by no means excluded ; and although he does not allow that Matthew could possibly have composed such a work as the Canonical Gospel which bears his name, yet he thinks it quite possible that he might have secured against the corruption of continuous oral tradi- tions many of the parables, prophecies, and discourses of Jesus. With the view which he thus intimates, Holtzmann connects the old tradition which affirmed that Matthew com- ' Holtzmann, Ei7ileituug, p. lOO, and Die Synoptiker, 1889, p. 15. YnHand- Conwientar, ' Das alteste Grundgesetz gleichsam den mtindlichen Kanon neben dem geschriebenen des A. T. besassen die Gemeinden sonach in den \6yoi Kvpiov. ' AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 69 posed Xoyia KvpiaKu in the Hebrew language.' (Euseb. Eccles. Hist. iii. 39, 16.) But when wc pass from the words to the deeds of Jesus and the historical details of His life, we find that Holtzmann takes his stand upon the. fact that the Gospels are not only- sources of information as to what Jesus was in Himself, but as to what He was for the Church as the Messiah. If so, there was room, in Holtzmann's opinion, for the widest play of an idealising motive and for dogmatic interests. These centred around the death of Jesus, and to this fact was trans- ferred the picture of the righteous Sufferer of the Psalms, and of the atoning servant of Jehovah in Isaiah — and hence the representation of Jesus as the ideal good man, whoselife was the perfect realisation of righteousness in a sinful world. But if the death of Jesus was once conceived of as sacrificial, and interpreted as taking place ' according to the Scriptures ' (i Cor. XV. 3), then an impulse was given to the endeavour to bring the whole preceding life of Jesus, in accordance with Old Testament guidance, under a similar ideal point of view, and to make it the subject of dogmatic religious reflexion, until the process was applied to event after event, and, finally to His birth and generation. This belief that Jesus was the Christ developed into the simple Creed, which was embodied in such phrases as * died for us,' ' raised by the Father,' ' coming again in glory.' And this belief, as Holtzmann proceeds to point out, finds its oldest and simplest expression in the Epistles of St. Paul. There is a dark side to the picture which the Apostle draws, the darkness of death ; but there is a corresponding bright side, the light of the Easter morn. One can read through the Epistles of St. Paul from the beginning to the end, without finding much else mentioned in the history of Jesus than ever and again these two poles around which for the Apostle the whole significance of the life of the Messiah is gathered : on the one side towers the Cross as the lofty symbol of a great divine act of reconciliation, emerging out of the gloom of the past which has spread over the lowlands — on the other side, • \\o\\zm7ccin, Emleitung in das N. T. p. 100. 70 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES the Resurrection sheds its resplendent light upon the Cross. But in vain will one seek for an answer to such questions as these ; when, where, how, of whom was He born, how long did He live, where did He preach ? and so forth. Single events, as Holtzmann admits, were unquestionably known to the Apostle in numbers ; ' but with the exception of the in- cidentally mentioned account of the Last Supper, in which he attached most importance to the words of Jesus, no detail occupied such a prominent place in the foreground of his con- sciousness that it was of any consequence by the side of those great turning-points to which belief was referred, or that it was even touched upon by the course of ideas which filled the Apostle's letters : ' Though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet henceforth know we him so no more ' (2 Cor. V. 16). The dogmatic element is therefore, in Holtzmann's opinion, the most weighty in the Apostolic preaching, al- though this necessarily led back to certain historical con- siderations, concerned before all else with the death and resurrection of Jesus. It was from the Passion history - first of all that, according to Holtzmann, the gradually increasing historic interest took its starting-point, an interest which, in his opinion, was by no means purely historic, since it existed always in the service of devotion and dogma : one need only read, he maintains, the numerous references to fulfilled prophecies in the history of the Passion to observe the predominance of this dogmatic aim. But Holtzmann notices that no part of the life of Jesus is proportionately so fully recorded as the ' Holtzmann, Die Synoptikcr, p. 16, and comp. Einleitung in das N. T. p. 100. ■■^ ' Kein Theil des Lebens Jesu ist verhaltnismassig so ausfuhrlich berichtet wie die Leidensgeschichte. Wahrend es auf alien andern Stationen dieser Lebensbahn noch chaotisch fluthet, und die einzelnen Auftritte, die man sich zu erzahlen weiss, nur in einem durchaus losen Verhaltnisse unter einander stehen, konnen wir hier schon fast Tag auf Tag verfblgen, sehen wir die todbringende Wette sich bilden, heranw'alzen und iiberschlagen. Eine mehrere Momente zu einem grosseren Zusammenhang verkniipfende Erz'ahlung von den letztenStunden Jesu setzt daher schon Paulus voraus, wenn er seinen Bericht iiber die Abendmahlsstiftung einleitet mitden Worten : " UnserHerr Jesus, in der Nacht da er verrathen ward " (l Kor. xi. 23).' — Holtzmann, Die Synoptiker, p. 17. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 7 1 history of the Passion, and that whilst around all other stations in the life of Jesus there is a confused and irregular flow, and the several scenes which are narrated only stand in a loose connection with each other, we can here follow almost day by day, we see plainly the fatal wave form, roll on, and overlap. Paul presupposes a narrative of the last hours of Jesus uniting a quantity of incidents in one greater whole, when he introduces his account of the institution of the Supper with the words ' Our Lord Jesus in the night in which he was betrayed ' (i Cor. xi. 23). But if a writer admits that St. Paul could thus write of the Passion at sttcJi an eai'ly date, and could express himself in a way which shows that his readers were already familiar with the facts to which he alludes ; and if the Apostle, at such an early date, could make a clear and decisive distinction between his own opinions and the words of the historical Christ, it is a fair inference that he had more information at his command, if occasion demanded ; and it seems absolutely impossible, in face of this knowledge of concrete facts, to speak of his Gospel as a mere idealism, and to refuse to recognise that he paints something more than an ideal picture.^ But we are reminded by other writers besides Holtzmann, that the significance of the Passion history, and the importance attached to it in the earliest days of the Church, cannot be denied.^ M. Renan has repeatedly insisted on the fact that St. Paul had never seen Jesus nor heard His voice ; that it is easy to understand how much more easily in his case the human figure of the Saviour was transformed into a metaphysical type than in the case of Peter, and of the others who had talked with Jesus ; that Paul was ignorant, or pretended to be ignorant of the historical Jesus ; the divine \6 formed the daily spiritual food of the Churches. 72 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES to him is a phantom of his own imagination ; he listens to himself, and thinks that he hears Jesus.' But with regard to the words of Jesus, it is difficult to believe that Paul was so very ignorant of them, even on Renan's own statements. He allows, e.g., by long quotations from I and 2 Thess., that twenty years after the death of Jesus only a single essential feature had been added to the picture of the da}- of the Lord as Jesus had painted it, viz. the character of an Anti-Christ ; ^ he admits that Paul had passed at all events some few days in the centre of the Apostolic traditions, and in converse with the Apostles at Jerusalem — Jerusalem, where the image of Jesus, as portrayed in the Gospels, was known in all essential particulars ; he refers elsewhere to the remarkable manner in which at least one of those Apostles whom Paul met — James, the Lord's brother — had kept in memory the words of Jesus : those maxims which were incessantly repeated, and those moral sentences which were the food of the Church.^ But it is the histor}- of the Passion and its details, which Renan admits were stereotyped and known by heart in the earliest oral tradition of the Church ; and it is a part of this tradition, perhaps most of it, which was known to St, Paul, although, beyond doubt, he had no written words of Jesus in his hands,^ When, however, M. Renan asserts that Paul's quotations of the words of Jesus are doubtful, and do not correspond with the discourses which the Synoptists put into His mouth (' L'Antechrist,' p. 6o~', we ma\- fairh^ reply that such a state- 1 Renan's Saint Paul, 1 2th edit. l888, pp. 308, 563 ; LAntcchrist, 3rd edit., 1873, pp. 60, 84 ; Les Evangiles, p. 269. * Saint Paul, pp. 250-252. * Les Evangiles, pp. 77-87. UAntechrist, pp. 54, 62. * Les Evangiles, p. 78, and note. L'Antechrist, p. 117, and comp. pp. 60, 61. Renan's description of the closeness with which Christian tradition followed the scenes of the Passion often reminds us of the expressions used by Hokzmann, in reference to the same subject. But although Renan, like Holtzmann, lays stress upon the way in which the early Christians idealised these and other scenes, he not only admits that many of the incidents may be historical, but that the essential features in the picture of the suffering Jesus were very early fixed in the tfiemory of the faithful. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 73 mcnt, in so far as it implies ignorance of the words of Jesus, is at variance with the stress laid by such critics as W'eiz- sacker and Holtzmann, to say nothing of others, upon the significant line of demarcation which the Apostle draws between his own dicta and the sa}'ings of the Lord ; that even if the quotations are doubtful, they are exactly what wc might expect if, as Renan positively affirms, Paul had no writing before him, and must therefore have been quoting from memory, or from the form of oral tradition which he had received. ^Moreover, it is extremely difficult to believe that St. Paul was so scantily acquainted with the words and acts of Jesus, when we find that within the limits of our Epistles he is able to refer to His commands with regard to marriage, and to the incidents of the last hours of His life, in order to settle questions which happened at the time of his writing to disturb and divide the Church at Corinth. But one of the best answers to M. Kenan's attitude with regard to St. Paul's testimony was given by one of his own countrymen, the learned historian and theologian. Dr. E. de Pressense. He points out that amongst the Pauline letters there are some before which the boldest criticism is silent, and in his view this judgment includes, not only the letters to the Romans and the Corinthians, but also the first Epistle to the Thessalonians. These Epistles, which may certainly be assigned to some time between the years 50 and 60 A.D., confirm, he says, at a glance all the principal facts of the life of Jesus as these are recorded in the Gospels. His divine origin, His humi- liation, His miracles. His death on the cross. His resurrection. His reign in heaven — all these great facts of Gospel history are the subject of exhortations, of burning appeals, of the mys- terious raptures of the Apostle. But this testimony becomes all the more striking, continues De Pressense, because the Apostle does not enter into any continuous narrative, but makes perpetual allusions to the histor}^, as if nothing was more familiar to his readers. It is evident that he draws from the common source of primitive tradition, and that this tradi- tion was so well established twenty )-ears after Christ, that 74 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES it could be alluded to in a general nuanner without explana- tion or discussion. Upon this tradition the Church rests as on a solid foundation, and thus we touch the rock below the shifting sands of legend. It is not possible, he adds, that in this short inters^al a tradition so clear and positive could have been fortuitously born of a capricious mythology. Nor does De Pressense omit to mention that St. Paul met at Jerusalem Peter, James, and John ; that he frequently returned to the metropolis of the primitive Church, and had oppor- tunity on the very theatre of the Gospel history to interrogate its first witnesses. He lived in the midst of those five hundred Christians who saw the Risen Redeemer (i Cor. XV. 6). We are thus carried back, he maintains, to the very time of Christ, and those thirty years which are demanded for the growth of the Christian mythology are altogether wanting, and we may therefore assert that, apart from our canonical writings, the principal events in the life of Jesus are guaran- teed by the unanimous testimony of the primitive Church. The more complete narratives (the Gospels) are not isolated ; they are so linked with all the tradition of the first century that, even if they failed us. Christian truth would stand in its en- tirety, on the sole basis of documents which have obtained universal assent. These documents could not, indeed, replace our Gospels, as conveying a knowledge of the life of Jesus ; for if they preserve its essential facts, they yet give only an imperfect idea of them, for the very reason that they pre- suppose the basis of tradition on which they were built.' In a later part of his book De Pressense reminds us that at first ' the Gospel ' did not bear the signification of a writing, a book ; it stood always for the divine realities of salvation, the work of Christ, His death and His resurrection : it was the proclamation of the good news of pardon, and this use of the word evidently results from its frequent use in the Synoptics by Jesus Himself: 'To the poor the gospel is preached ' (Luke vii. 22) ; it is in this sense that Paul speaks of his Gospel at a time when there may not have been one line ^ Jhus-Christ, pp. l8l, 1S2, 7th edit. 1884. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 75 written of our canonical narratives (Gal. i. 8). All the expressions emplo}'cd in the New Testament to designate the proclamation of the new truth are independent of the notion of written documents (Xoyos, Jas. i. 23 ; Xoyos aKorjs, Heb. iv. 2 ; K)jpvyfj.a, Tit. i. 3). The Gospel had been spoken long before it was written, and the Apostolic Church, especially in its first period, might be called the Church of oral testimony.' But such a view, as De Pressense is careful to state, by no means implies that this testimony was uncertain or fluctuating ; on the contrary, it was fixed in its essential features at a very early stage. It appears that, from the first, the testimony which was to be the rule and check was that of the Apostles themselves (Acts i. 21, 22), and their preaching thus formed, as it were, the nucleus of evangelical tradition. The discourses of St. Peter (if we may credit the Acts of the Apostles) set forth the great facts of the life of Jesus with a manly simplicity, which engraves them readily on the memory. That which he delivered in the house of the centurion Cornelius, and of which we ha\e only a summary, presents a sort of epitomised Gospel, which reminds us of St. Mark's narratives. We have in the Acts only the Apostle's apologetic discourses, those commands in which he confines himself to the most general facts, but in the inner circle of the Church, as we learn from St. Paul's account of the institution of the Lord's Supper in I Cor., the Apostolic testimony expanded into far greater richness of detail. We see from i Cor. xi. that before per- haps the composition of a single one of our Gospels, the account of the Lord's Supper was fixed in the remembrance of the Church. Clearly St Paul and St. Luke draw from the same source.- Nor is there any difficulty in the evangelical tradition thus assuming a more exact and definite form. Is not, asks De Pressense, the Jewish nation pre-eminently the nation of traditions ? The teaching of their synagogue was preserved orally for nearly two centuries before being embodied in the ' Jisus-Chi-ist, pp. 199, 200. - Ibid. pp. 200 -202. 76 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES Talmud. The Rabbis kept for nearly seven hundred years a purely grammatical tradition. Assuredly, as he says, the Gospel history would not be too heavy a weight on the memory of men to whom it was the one concern, and who fed upon it as their daily bread. Moreover, the Epistles bear witness that, quite apart from the great features of the Gospel history, the teaching of the Master was retained in a very exact form. There are allusions to the words of Jesus which are almost verbal quotations. Without dwelling on the in- cident mentioned above of the institution of the Lord's Supper, which, he thinks, points beyond doubt to the fact that St. Paul and St. Luke drew from the same source, De Pressense gives other instances to support his argument. We find St. Paul adducing a saying of Christ's which is found word for word in the third Gospel (i Tim. v. 17, i8 ; Luke x. 7 ; see also i Cor. ix. 14 ; Luke x. 7, 8). .In i Cor. the same Apostle pronounces that the Christian may eat whatsoever is set before him. Here, too, we have a lesson of the Master's preserved by St. Luke (i Cor. x. 27 ; Luke x. 8) ; and again, in I Cor. vii. St. Paul appeals on the question of marriage to the very words of Jesus which we find in our Gospels (i Cor. vii. 10; Mark x. 7-9).' It follows, in De Pressense's view, from these significant passages, that before the composition of our canonical narratives, Apostolic tradition was in part fixed, especially as regards the words of the Master. The lesser writings referred to by St. Luke in his Preface had, he thinks, no doubt an important share in this result, and he sees no difficulty in admitting that at this early period a nucleus of common tradition was formed, which remained as a solid basis underlying the diversity of relations, and which circulated from Church to Church.^ But it must never be forgotten that if Paul's preaching, ' Ubi supra, pp. 203-6. — De Pressense seems to include words in this reference to the command of Christ which are not always connected so closely with the verses in I Cor. vii. ' When Paul says,' he writes, ' that the Lord commands, " Let not the wife depart from her husband " (i Cor. vii. 10), he carries us back to Mark x. 7-9, "What God hath joined together, let no man put asunder." On the question of divorce, the Apostle refers to Luke xvi. 18.' 2 Ibid. p. 206. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 7/ and the earliest Christian tradition, centred around the great facts of the death and resurrection of Jesus, nothing was more natural to men into whose hearts the Gospel had shone as a revelation of the face of God in Jesus Christ — of God in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself — to whom it had come as a deliverance from the kingdom of darkness, and from the power of Satan unto God, as a message of freedom from the bands of sin and death, as the redemption of the world, and as the hope of glory. ' I have no other holy annals,' said an unknown Christian, ' but Jesus Christ, His Cross, His Death and Resurrection.' Such words are the very motto, as De Pressense describes them, of the Church of the second century, rising in a body to be the irrefragable witness of the events of the first ; such words show us how the souls of the early Christians fed on the great facts of the Gospel history, and how this Gospel was written in their deepest hearts.* The recollection of all this may help to explain to us what at first sight seems puzzling in a writer like Dr. B. Weiss, and his disposition to admit such scanty references in the Pauline Epistles to the life of Jesus. Not by any means that he is concerned to maintain St. Paul's ignorance of the facts, but bethinks that in most recent delineations of the life of Jesus one thing in particular has been overlooked, viz. - that at the foundation of the collective Apostolic preaching there lies the presupposition that the work of Christ was not completed during His earthly life — that this was rather the pre-condition and the beginning of a work which will be carried on by the Risen Christ with means entirely new, with all-embracing success, a work which will only be completed in the future. In the same way also this preaching from the first involved the presupposition, that Christ, through His heavenly exaltation, had become something quite different from what He was in His earthly life ; and the more the knowledge was matured of the eternal divine being of Christ, ' Uln supra p. 177. i)xo\ Se apx"^^"- (O'tiv 'It]itovs Xpimos (Ignat. ^d Philadelph. c. viii. The words have at all events, in Pressense's words, ' the stamp of high antiquity.' - Weiss, Lchcnjesit, i. 1 1 and 24. 78 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES SO much the more did it become self-evident that His earthly human life was a state of self-emptying and abasement upon which He had entered for the accomplishment of His work, and from which He returned to His full divine glory only after His exaltation. It is therefore a self-evident result that the very thing which constitutes for the Apostolic preaching the unique importance of His Person and work cannot receive full expression in His earthly human life ; and only thus can it in truth be explained why this preaching refers so very seldom to the earthly life of Jesus and its details. Accordingly, in the view of Dr. Weiss, salvation and faith in the salvation made manifest in Christ, are by no means dependent upon the historical knowledge of the earthly life of Jesus ; and in a remarkable passage he affirms that the Chris- tian faith would have remained exactly what it is, and would have lost no part of its deepest foundation, if it had pleased God to leave us only the Apostolic preaching, as it lies before us in the Epistles of the New Testament, and together with the Gospels to deprive us of all sources out of which we could design for ourselves a detailed picture of the earthly life ofjcsus.^ But he at once adds that of course any man who has attained to faith in Christ's Person and work by reason of the Apostolic preaching as both are there represented, will certainly not at the outset assume that the picture of His historical life which the Apostles conceived, and which Paul formed of the same, can have been one thoroughly mistaken, dimmed by subjective presuppositions, or that the Gospels retained by us as the sole sources for our information of that life have preserved what is only a falsified picture, whether this be the fault of that earliest tradition, or a consequence of their distance from it.^ But if we would fairly realise the point of view of the Apostolic preaching, this can only be done, according to Dr. Weiss, by remembering that the narratives which it introduces are not meant to gratify curiosity, or to serve the purposes of historical investigation ; they were meant to strengthen and quicken faith, to edify in the widest possible ' Weiss, Leben/esu, i. 15. ^ Jbid. AN HISTORICAL RETROSrECT 79 sense, and thc}- were, therefore, confined to the pubh'c h'fe of Jesus, of which the disciples had been witnesses, and in which He had gained His significance for the people. But if this was their purpose, then Dr. Weiss thinks that in such preaching, and in the ApostoHc letters, inquiries into the history of the Saviour's childhood or youth were plainly excluded, and we can understand how it is that no reference is made to His miraculous birth.' It is, however, important to notice that no one has emphasised the fact more strongly than Dr. Weiss himself, that although the Apostolic letters, which aimed at the formation of the religious and moral life of the Church, scarcely enter upon the details of the life of Jesus, it is by no means to be taken for granted — although the conclusion has been strangely drawn — that the eye-witnesses of that life had no motive or occasion to testify of what they had seen and heard in the society of their Master. In the different assemblies of Messianic believers there would be continual reference to the recollections of the life of Jesus, in whose name men had associated themselves together as a distinct society within the great community of their nation, and here most naturally would the words of Jesus be recalled for teaching and warning, for strength and consolation.^ But confining our attention to St. Paul, we find that Dr. Weiss is careful to point out that during the Apostle's visit to Peter in Jerusalem, he no doubt asked and was told many things respecting the Lord's life on earth, and that he is able to appeal repeatedly to the words of the Lord for his statements and directions, although this appeal is made, not to written Gospels, but to oral tradition (i Cor. xv. 3, &c.).'' Elsewhere we gain much fuller information of the extent of the Apostle's knowledge, as it is revealed to us in his Epistles, It might appear at first sight as if this information ' Lehen Jesii, i. 13 and 16. ' Lebeit Jesu, i. 15, 16. See below, chap, v, for the application of this argu- ment to the position of St. Paul, as well as to that of the first disciples, and for a proof of how much was involved in the statement that Jesus was the Christ. ' Weiss, Einkitung in das N. T. pp. 119 and 22-4. 8o THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES amounted to very little, even when it is given in detail. Paul only mentions, it would seem, those points in the historical life of Christ which were doctrinally significant, viz. His lineage, the institution of the Lord's Supper, His death and resurrection. He did not look up, like the first Apostles^ from the picture of the earthly life of Jesus which they had themselves seen, to the divine glory of the Ascended Lord, but he looked back, from the splendour in which Christ had appeared to Him, upon His earthly life ; whatever he may have seen or heard of this latter, his representation of the Christ was at any rate not conditioned by it. There is no trace in his Epistles of any details which are not closely connected wdth the teaching and work of Christ. That He was descended from Abraham and the fathers (Gal. iii. i6 ; Rom, ix. 5), and, specifically, that He was of the seed of David (Rom. i. 3, cf Acts xiii. 23) — these were facts of which the Apostle possessed historical information ; but he only uses them to justify the references of both prophetical and patriarchal prophecies of the Messiah to the Christ whom he preached.* Passing to the other two facts, the death and resurrection, which formed the foundation of the Apostle's preaching, it would certainly seem that he must have been in possession of a considerable amount of information relating to them, even if we accept the limits of that information which Dr. Weiss proposes. He knew, e.g., that Jesus was slain upon the cross at the time of the Passover ( i Cor. v. 7 ; Gal. ii. 20 ; i Cor. i. 13 ; Rom. vi. 6), by the Jewish and heathen rulers (i Cor. ii. 8) — all this may be allowed — although we cannot conclude from Gal. iii. i, that the Apostle had related to his Churches every detail of the death of Christ. He speaks of the sufferings of Christ (2 Cor. i. 5,7, cf Phil. iii. 19, Col. i. 24) ; but because he illustrates them for his readers by a reference to Psalm Ixix. 10, it is evident how few of the details of these sufferings were vividly before his eyes.'^ That he knows how Christ had instituted the Lord's Supper on the night in which He was ' Weiss, Bibl. Theol. des N. T. p. 289, 5. Aufl. 1888. -' Weiss, ibid. pp. 2S9, 290. AN HISTORICAL KKTKOSrECT 8 1 bctra)-cd into the hands of His enemies, only shows, Dr. Weiss thinks, that he had had explained to him the origin of a custom which he had found in the Christian Church ; more- over, the historical details are subordinated to the Apostle's teaching as to the meaning of the Supper, and he himself refers this teaching to a higher source (i Cor. xi. 23-25).' With regard to the Resurrection, Paul appeals to the same facts as the first Apostles, and to the particular appearances of Christ vouchsafed to them and the oldest disciples (i Cor. XV. 3, 4, and v. il). And we may notice that Dr. Weiss points out how the Apostle repeatedly emphasises the burial of Christ (i Cor. xv. 4; Rom. vi. 4, cf Acts xiii. 29; Col. ii. 12) as a guarantee of the reality of His death and of His resurrection, and therefore alike important in its relation to both these great facts of salvation.- If we turn to the manner in which Paul represents the sinless purity of Jesus and the example which He left for imitation, we see a further distinction between his teaching and that of the first Apostles : the latter was evidently based upon the direct impression of the life and sufferings of the historical Christ. With Paul it is otherwise : only once is the sinless- ness of Jesus expressed, and that in quite a dogmatic manner (2 Cor. V. 21); but Dr. Weiss suggests a reason for this inasmuch as Paul had no necessity to prove historically the sinlcssness which was self-evident in the case of the Messiah exalted to heaven, who by His death had redeemed the world from sin.' But if we put together the few references which Dr. Weiss admits, it is by no means evident that Paul was unacquainted with the leading traits in the character of Jesus. Thus the Apostle mentions His meekness and gentleness : in his own self- forgetful striving after the salvation of others, he is an imitator of Christ, and points to the proof of love which He had given in His death ; so that he bids the Thessalonians to be imitators of the joy which the Lord had shown in His sufferings (i Thess. i. 6).^ ' Ubi supra, p. 290. " Ibid. p. 290, note. ' Ibid. p. 290. * Ibid. p. 290. In the 5lh edit, of his Bibl. Theol. (in contrast with earlier G 82 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES Certainly it seems strange to Dr. Weiss that the Apostle instead of making manifest that unselfish surrender of Christ by some special feature of His life, appeals to the verse of a Psalm ; and he thinks it is still more significant that the Apostle looks back from Christ's earthly life to His pre-exis- tcnt being, in order to set forth His self-sacrificing love as an example for imitation (2 Cor. viii. 9 ; cf Phil. ii. 5).' But in the first place, nothing was more natural than that St. Paul should fix upon the death of Christ as the great act of His life in which all His self-sacrifice reached its highest and culminating point, and, in the next place, it must always be remembered that the two last passages (2 Cor. viii. 9 and Phil. ii. 5) by no means exclude all reference to the condition of the earthly life of Jesus. But this sinless purity of Jesus, and its acknowledgment b}' St. Paul, must also be regarded from another point of view. In an important passage Dr. Weiss maintains that we cannot discover whether Paul really considered how this sin- lessness of Christ in His earthly life agreed with his teaching as to the reign of sin over all mankind through the trans- gression of Adam. Does not such teaching demand in the case of the one sinless man a direct act of divine creation .•* Whether Paul drew what Dr. W^eiss calls this almost indis- pensable consequence for his system we do not, in Dr. Weiss's opinion, know, since we have to set on the other side the facts that in Gal. iv. 4 the Apostle speaks of Christ being born of a woman without intimating that there was anything unusual in His birth ; that in Rom. i. 3, he plainly stamps Him to be of the seed of David ; and that we cannot pre- suppose that he was ever acquainted with the tradition in our Gospels of the miraculous conception of Jesus.- But at the same time we are warned that it is going too far to affirm on the strength of such passages that the Apostle denied the supernatural birth, since even the Evangelists who narrate the miracle of Christ's supernatural conception do not editions) Dr. Weiss seems inclined to limit the reference to the meekness and gentleness of Christ to the Passion. ' Ubi supra, p. 290. - Ibid. pp. 290, 29 1. AX HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 83 regard it as a reason for cxcludini; His ^genealogical descent from the fathers.' In the face of such frequent qualifications, it is almost sur- prising to find how much Dr. Weiss implies as to St. Paul's knowledge of the Christ of the Gospels. In his opinion, although the Apostle did not enjo}' personal intercourse with Christ, it is possible that he may have seen Him at Jerusalem, little as this can be proved from 2 Cor. v. 16 ; it is possible, too, that the attack of Jesus upon the Pharisees prepossessed him from the very beginning against the Nazarene ; and that he anticipated his companions in his conviction of the danger which threatened the law of the fathers.'- Whilst, however, it cannot be maintained that Jesus during His earthly lifetime exercised any important influence upon Paul, the future Apostle would naturally have heard in his disputations with the followers of the Crucified how His death and resurrection were ' according to the Scriptures ' (i Cor. XV. 3, 4), and in the same way he may have gained a knowledge of many incidents of His earthly life. But all attempts to derive the source of Paul's Gospel from the thoughts which may thus have been stirred in his breast are, Dr. Weiss maintains, in direct contradiction to the Apostle's own testimony in Gal. i., where his aim is to show that his whole attitude towards the religion of Jesus before the event at Damascus (verse 13) excluded all possibility of human influence in the formation of his Gospel (verses 11, 12) ; and the Apostle's gaze was fixed first of all, not upon the Jewish Messiah, but upon the Mediator of divine grace for sinners aroused to a consciousness of their sins.'* But whilst Dr. Weiss thus attaches the greatest importance to Paul's own statement in Gal. i., he none the less condemns the opinion which supposes that from the commencement Paul was freed from the primitive traditional teaching of the Church. It is true that the Apostle rarely quotes the decision of Je-sus (i Cor. vii. 10, i i, ix. 14 ; cf i Thess. iv. 15), but, as Weiss expressly admits, the frequent reminiscences of them in his writings show that many other words of Jesus were ' Ubi supra, pp. 290, 291, note 3. - //'/./. p. 199, note. ' Ibid. p. 199. G 2 84 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES known to him. If, moreover, he did not at first come into contact with the Apostles, he was not from the commencement of his career so isolated from intercourse with the Christian community that the current ideas and teachings should not have been known to him, nor does it follow from Gal. i. 1 1, 12 that the Apostle did not adhere in many respects in his preaching to the views and doctrines within the primitive Christian circle with which without reserve he considered himself in union. The very fact that the Church praised God because St. Paul now preached the faith which once he destroyed shows how fully and entirely they regarded him as one of themselves.' No doubt when Paul's special mission directed him more and more exclusively to the heathen, there must have been peculiar features in his doctrinal teaching wherein it differed from that which existed in circles of Jewish Christians.- But when we thus consider at length the view which Dr. Weiss entertains of St. Paul's relation to the historical Christ, we may see in it a justification of his own remark that a knowledge which the Apostle had gained according to revela- tion (Gal. i. 1 6) in no way excludes a knowledge according to tradition.^ In the note in which Dr. Weiss thus expresses himself he mentions another writer who has rightly drawn attention to this twofold source of St. Paul's knowledge — Paret by name — although he thinks that this writer has over-estimated the extent of the details of the life of Jesus which Paul an- nounced in his fundamental preaching. The name of Heinrich Paret is but little known in Eng- land in comparison with the names of the representative writers to whom reference has already been made, but he has examined more fully than any of them the relation of St. Paul to the historical Christ. In his treatment of the subject Paret ' Ubi supra, p. 200. - Ibid. ^ ' Mit Recht hat Paret {Jahrbiicher fiir dcutsche Theologie, 1858) darauf auf- merksam gemacht, class der oft'enbarungsmassige Ursprung seiner Vorstellung von Christo, dessen sich Paulus bevvusst war (Gal. i. 16), keineswegseine iiberlieferungs- massige Kunde von Christo ausschliesst ; aber den Umfang dessen, was Paulus von Details aus dem Leben Jesu in seiner grundlegendcn Predigt verkiindigte, hat Paret sicher Uberschatzt ' (Weiss, Lehrbuch der B. 1'. p. 289, note i). AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 85 not onl\" shows that St. Paul's acquaintance with the carthl}- life of oiu' Lord is much fuller than has often been supposed, but he also tries to meet difficulties which must present them- selves in connection with the Pauline testimony : viz. (i)Why does the Apostle quote so seldom from our Lord's words and apparently refer to so few of His deeds? and (2) From what sources did the Apostle derive the amount of informa- tion which he possessed. Parct's contributions first appeared in the ' Jahrbiicher fiir deutsche Theologie,' 1858, 1859, but references are made to them by Dr. Weiss in his recent ' Litroduction,' and although, as we have seen, he expresses his opinion elsewhere that Paret has made too much of some of his details, he refers to the earlier article of 1 858 as an authority for the sources of St. Paul's information (' Einleitung,' p. 1 19), and to the later article of 1859, with which his own view is in substantial agreement, as an authority upon the nature of the appearance of the Risen Lord which was vouchsafed to the Apostle (' Einleitung,' pp. 115, 116). But an acknowledgment of Paret's work is by no means confined to one distinguished writer. ' Paul,' writes Keim, ' is correctly estimated in the excellent treatise of Paret, " Paulus und Jesus " (1858).' ^ And the context makes it evi- dent that Keim is referring, not merely to the way in which the Apostle is represented as dealing with historical facts, but to Paret's enumeration of the facts. If Paret's life had been spared, there is every reason to believe that he would have found a place in the front rank of German theologians. In proof of this we need only to refer to the warm eulogy passed upon him by Weizsacker, and to the extract which he gives from one of Paret's letters, written in the near approach of death, and from which we gain some idea of the beauty and simplicity of a life cut short in the prime of manhood. - When we find that such well-known writers as Hase, Keim, W. Grimm, Meyer, Ilagenbach, Reuss, Weizsacker, ' Geschichte Jesti, i. 36, note. - Jahrbiicher fiir deutsche Theologie, 1S59, pp. 252-4. In these pages we see how highly Weizsacker ranks Paret's studies on Joscpluis, to which reference is also made by Keim [Gesechicht Jesti, i. 10, 12, 14). 86 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES Mangold, B. Weiss, and more recently Resch and P. Ewald, all refer to Paret's treatise on the relation of St. Paul to the historical Jesus, there seems to be ample justification for directing attention to it so frequently in the following pages.' It is also evident that Paret's work has been appreciated in France, as we can easily .see by a close comparison of it with many passages in Sabatier's ' L' Apotre Paul ' — indeed, Sabaticr distinctly refers to it in estimating Paul's acquaintance with the historical Jesus.^ Another French writer to whom attention is called by Reuss, J. H. Huraut, has also evidently made acquaintance with Paret's articles, and has enriched the subject with many criticisms of weight and value in his own treatise (' Paul, a-t-il connu le Christ historique .-' ' ^ But fifteen years before Paret wrote, a letter of much interest was addressed by Otto Thenius to Bruno Bauer (1843). Its title is suggestive, 'The Gospel u^ithout the Gospels,'"* and the writer's argument is very similar to that contained in many modern apologetic works of English ' Hase, Kirchengeschichte, p. 31, 10. Aufl. ; W. Grimm, Lexicon in Libros N. T. p. 336, 2. Aufl. ; Meyer, Korinthcrbriefe, i. 419 (reference to Paret's second treatise) ; Hagenbach, Encykloptidie der theologischen IVissenschaften, p. 221, 10. Aufl. ; Reuss, Geschidite der heiligen Schriften des N. T. pp. 55, 56 (to Paret's second treatise), and again p. 163, 6. Aufl. ; Mangold, in 4th edit, of Bleek's Einleitiing, p. 477, note ; B. Weiss, Bihl. Theol. des N. T. p. 289, 5. Aufl. ; Einleitung in das N. T. p. 1 15 (to second treatise), and p. 1 19, 2. Aufl. ; Resch, Agrapha, p. 17 1, 1889 ; P. Ewald, HaupiproblcDi der Evange- licnfrage, p. 75, 1890. -' Frequent references (see Index) will be found to Sabatier's work, esjjecially in connection with Paul's extensive knowledge of the life and teaching of Jesus (chap, v., comp. V Apotre Patil, pp. 57-64). ^ This treatise, published in 1S60, to which references are frequently made in these pages, was kindly lent to the writer by the author, M. le pasteur Huraut, of the University of Montauban. He is mentioned by Reuss in his Geschichte der heiligen Schriften des N. T. in earlier editions, and also in the latest (cf 6. Aufl. p. 55), in combination with two other writers, Paret and Thenius. '' Das Evangeliiim ohne die Evangelieti, Thenius is also known by his work on St. John's Gospel which he called Das Evangeliuni der Evangelien (1865), ' The Gospel of Gospels.' Weiss, Eiftteitttng, p. 618. A copy of his letter to Bruno Bauer can be studied at the British Museum. See also an interesting re- ference made to him by Sir William Dawson, F. R.S., in Modern Science in Bible Lands, p. 517. For other recent references to Thenius and his work mentioned in the text, see Beyschlag, Leben Jesii, i. p. 70, 1887, and Nosgen, Geschichte /esu Christi, p. 22, 1891. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 87 writers. His aim is to furnish a representation of the hfc of Jesus out of the Epistles of the New Testament as if the Gospels did not exist ; and he claims to be the first to have given such a complete list of the points of contact between the Epistles and the Gospels (pp. 53, JJ, 78). And this list, he reminds us, is taken from the Epistles which are admitted to be genuine, while all other quotations from disputed writings of the New Testament are enclosed in brackets. But the letter of Thenius is of further interest, because it anticipates to some extent' and refutes the position taken up by more recent German critics, notably Pfleiderer, as to the mutual relations of the Gospels and the Epistles. If their judgment is correct, the Epistles are not merely prior to the Gospels, but they contain the groundwork of the narra- tives afterwarcis elaborated in the Gospels, which, otherwise, would not have been w^ritten at all. To take one or two examples. In St. Paul's words in Romans i. 4, where he speaks of Jesus Christ as ' declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness,' we are said to have the kernel of St. Luke's story of the Annunciation and miraculous conception : ' And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee : therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God ' (Luke i. 35).'^ So, too, in the Apostle's statement in the previous verse that Jesus Christ ' was made of the seed of David according to the flesh ' (Rom. i. 3), we have the germ of the story in Luke ii. which describes the journey of the mother of Jesus, before the birth of her child, to Bethlehem the city of David. '' In the same way the Evangelist issupposed to illustrate other expressions of St. Paul. The Apostle, for instance, writes to the Galatians that ' when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law ' (Gal. iv. 4, 5). Here we have a series of statements, each one of which is repro- ' See especially Thenius, Das Evaiv^eliiiin ohiic die Evangelien, p. 52. - Pfleiderer, Urchrhtcnlhum^ pp. 419-21. * IbiJ. pp. 42I-3. 88 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES duced in the narrative of St. Luke. The fulness of the time is intimated in the close connection which the Evangelist seeks to establish between the birth of the Saviour of the world and the political events of the Roman empire, and reference has already been made to the way in which God's- sending forth His Son, born of a woman, is represented in Luke's story of the Incarnation. But the Evangelist has still to show that the Incarnate Son of God was really ' made under the law,' and that from the beginning the pious in Israel had known by revelation His divine destiny as the Redeemer of heathen and Jew alike, together with the opposi- tion which He would provoke, and the suffering which awaited Him. And this task he has accomplished in the narratives- of the Circumcision of Jesus, of His Presentation in the Temple, and in the oracular sayings and blessings placed in the mouth of a Simeon and an Anna (Luke ii. 21-38).' In a similar manner Pfleiderer deals with other events of our Lord's life. Thus, according to him, nothing can be plainer than that the story of the Transfiguration is based upon such passages as 2 Cor. iii. and iv. 6 (although for many of its details it depends upon Old Testament legend), and the .disappearance of Moses and Elias, leaving Jesus alone with His disciples, is meant to show how the highest glory of the old covenant is but transient, and vanishes before the abiding glory of the Lord who is the Spirit."- But Pfleiderer's position, which makes Luke the chief agent in translating Paul's brief statements into the stories which surround the birth and early years of Jesus, had been already anticipated by Gustav Volkmar. The results arrived at by Volkmar are remarkable, because whilst he occupies the position of the early Tubingen school in* accepting the four great Pauline Epistles, and the early date of the Apo- calypse, and in some respects surpasses even Baur in daring, he places the Gospel of St. Mark three years after the destruc- tion of Jerusalem, A.D. 73.-^ ' Urchristenthitm, pp. 423, 424, 481. " Ibid. pp. 388, 389, and Hibbert Lectures, pp. 175-7. ' \oWvc\2lX, Jesits Nazaroius, pp. 18, 19(1882). AN HISTORICAL KETROSPKCT 8c> But, according" to X'olkmar, the Gospel of St. Luke must be placed much later, at the beginning of the second century and that of St. Matthew later still' The belief in the miraculous birth of Jesus, current in the opening years of this century, naturall}- turned men's thoughts to the contemplation of His earl}' life. Here was the opportunit}' for the poetic genius of the Pauline Luke. Paul had already published his own history of the early years of Jesus, but it was contained in one brief statement, Gal. iv. 4. But, for Luke this passage does not stand alone. The Apostle had spoken to the Corinthians of the grace of the Lord Jesus, ' who, though he was rich, yet for our sakes became poor ' (2 Cor. viii. 9). And so in Luke's narrative of the Licarnation, we see how the Son of God passes from the riches of His divine being into the poverty of time; how all the circumstances of a human life of poverty are known to Him, its need, its want, its lowliness ; how Christianity is cradled in the manger of the poor shepherds. - And the Son of God, who thus comes, comes ' under the law ' : (a) as the destined Messiah of Israel He is born of the family, and in Bethlehem, the town, of David (Luke ii. 1-7) ; (d) under the law of circumcision (Luke ii. 21) ; (c) under the law of offerings, when ' according to the law of Moses,' He is presented in the Temple (Luke ii. 22-40) ; (d) under the law, in his visit to the Temple at the age of twelve, in fulfilment of the obligation binding upon every Jewish boy (Luke ii. 41- $2).^ But if so much is involved in the simple statement ' made under the law,' we are surely justified in believing that St. Paul's use of the phrase carries with it no slight acquaintance with the incidents of the early life of Jesus, and Volkmar helps us to understand how much may underlie the brief words of the Apostle."* ' Ubi supra, pp. 20, 21. - Ibid. pp. 46-8. ' //'/(/. p. 48. * Compare Matheson's argument in connection with the very same phrase in The Historical Christ of Si. Paul. Just as the Pauline Luke is said to graft his stories upon such a passage as Gal. iv. 4, so \'olkmar argues that the Jewish Christian ' Matthew ' found the basis of the second chapter of his Gospel in the statements contained in the Apocalypse, ch. xii. 1-5, and xxi. 23, 24, combined with familiar Old Testament prophecies. But in \'olkmar's view the whole account of the flight into Egypt and the visit of the Magi is not fact, but poetry, the author's way of expressing in figurative ■90 THE witnp:ss of the epistles But the curious connection between the Epistles and the Gospels, which is thus advocated by Pfleiderer and Volkmar, is by no means confined to the events of our Lord's life ; it is extended to His words narrated by the Evangelists, the origin of which may often be traced to the Epistles. There are passages in each of the first three Gospels to which Pfleiderer refers in support of his theory, and it will be sufficient to give one or two instances from each of these Gospels. We read in ^lark viii. 34, that Jesus demands of His disciples that the}' should take up their cross and follow Him. Such a demand, according to Pfleiderer, could only have been placed in the mouth of Jesus after His death upon the cross had really happened, and its source is to be found in the specifically Pauline thought that believers shared in the death of the crucified Jesus (Gal. ii. 19, vi. 14). In the words which follow, relating to the losing and saving of the soul, we may have an original utterance of Jesus, but here, too, in Pfleiderer's opinion, there is a reminiscence of such expressions as those contained in Gal. ii. 20. But in the following verses he finds unmistakable reminiscences of the Epistles to the Romans and Philippians. To gain the world, and to lose one's own soul, is the same contrast which is expressed in the very same words, although in a somewhat different connection (K£p8r]aai, ^T)fj,io)dr]vai), in Phil. iii. 7, 8. The thought of a price paid for the soul (Mark viii. ^/) forms a fundamental conception in the language the early history of Christianity, its dangers and its triumphs {Jesus Nazareniis, pp. 49-52). But may we not rather argue that the twelfth chapter of the Apocalypse manifestly borrows its colouring from the birth of Jesus and Herod's seeking the young Child's life ? If so, such incidents must have been already well known when the Apocalypse was written, and Volkmar is one of those who assign it to the early date 68-9 a.d. (cf. Leading Ideas of the Gospels, p. 21, Bishop of Derry). It is surely more antecedently probable that the imagery of Rev. xii. is a reminiscence of the events described in Matt. iii. than that the circumstantial narrative of the Evangelist was derived from such imager)'. Pfleiderer seeks to explain in a similar manner the same narratives in the Gospel according to Matthew out of the Apocalypse, Luke, and the Old Testament. Chap. xii. and chap. xxi. 24 of the Apocalypse are similarly introduced as the basis of the narratives of the visit of the Magi and the flight into Egypt, whilst the in- cident of Herod's wrath in slaying the children of Bethlehem is founded upon chap, xii. 17 {Urchristenthtitn, pp. 481-5). Pfleiderer agrees with Volkmar in placing Luke at the commencement of the second century, and Matthew later still (p. 542). AN HISTORICAL KETROSrECT 9 1 Pauline doctrine of redemption, according to which we are ransomed and bought with a price (Gal. iii. 13 ; i Cor. vi. 20). The being ashamed of Christ and His words in this adulterous and sinful generation (Mark viii. 38) is a reminiscence of Rom. i. 16, and probably the designation ' this adulterous generation ' is best explained by believing that the writer had in mind the detailed representation of the sins of impurity which Paul gives us in the same portion of his Epistle to the Romans.' We pass to an instance in St. Luke, where Pfleiderer finds a similarly close connection, and even verbal agreement. After the return of the seventy — an incident in which Pfleiderer only sees a typical representation of the Pauline mission to the heathen - — Christ is represented as giving thanks that the Father had hidden these things from the wise and prudent, and revealed them unto babes (Luke x. 21). Here Pfleiderer has no doubt that the Evangelist directly refers to i Cor. i. 19-25, and ii. 7-16, and he endeavours to prove, not merely a similarity of thought, but a close verbal agreement. In the same manner Luke x. 22 is unmistakably derived from I Cor. ii. 7, 2 Cor. iii. 5, cf. i Cor. xv. 27.^ And if we seek an instance from St. Matthew of the same line of argument, we may take as a sample the confession of Peter in xvi. 17. In the words 'flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven,' there is a reference to Gal. i. 1 2 and 16, where Paul declares that he conferred not with flesh and blood, when it pleased God to reveal His Son in him.' ' Urchristenthiitii , ]i. 384. ■■* Urdu-istenthiim, pp. 442, 444. Pfleiderer of course argues that the expressions in Luke x. 7, 8, are direct quotations from i Cor. ix. 14 and x. 27, and presuppose the conditions of heathen-Christian Hfe (p. 444). Urchristenthiim, p. 445, note. ' Die Berlihrung unserer Stellc mit den Gedanken und Worien von i Cor. i. 19-iii. i ist so auffallend (vgl. aocpol, (TweTo), fxupol, viiiTioi, aotpiav iv ^vtrrripiu) a.TT0KfKpvfXfj.4vnv, airfKoiKvypiv, iiiSoKrifffv, ovk tyvtt), oi-Sels iyuoiKiv), dass ich an direkter Beziehung des Evangelisten auf jcne .Stclle nicht zweifeln kann.' So, too, in relation to v, 22: 'Bei der wahrscheinlich iilteren Lesart i-yvu ist die Beziehung auf das niehrfache ovk tyvw, oiSels tyvuiKev, Ti'j iyvx, il ifvuKTav, in I Cor. i. 21, ii. 8, ii. 16 noch augenfalligcr.' * Urchristenthiim, p. 518. According to Pfleiderer, the expression in Matt. V. 19, 'the least in the kingdom of heaven' (f'Aox'O'Toy), undoubtedly refers to Paul, who had called himself ' the least of the Apostles ' (eAcJx"'"''''^). I Cor. XV. 9 {Urchristenthiim, p. 495, and Ilibbert Lectures, pp. 178, 179). 92 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES But if Pfleiderer's statements are correct, we are carried far beyond the position of those who credit St. Paul with the creation of Christian dogmas out of the simple facts of the Gospel history — here, St. Paul not only creates the dogmas,, but the facts, or at least the basis of them. Moreover, if this theory is correct, then it is plain that the authors of the Gospels are more wonderful than the events- they narrate. They not only more than justify the opinion which Pfleiderer and Volkmar enforce as to their poetic genius, but they are unrivalled in their art, and they possess,, in addition, the marvellous power of inventing some of those sayings of Jesus which (Keim being witness) are marked, ia every sentence, with such a peculiar mental stamp that no successor, no Evangelist, Jew or Gentile, not even Paul himself, could have invented them.^ In Kenan's opinion the Gospel of Luke is the most beautiful book which was ever written, and the first two chapters call forth his special praise. But if the theory which we are examining is correct^ a very considerable portion of St. Luke's opening narrative must have been composed from a few scattered hints in the Epistles of St. Paul."^ ' ' Die Reden Je.su insbesondere tragen neben den Zeitspuren aller Zeichen einer hohen geschlossenen Originalitat, einer grossmachtigen Natur, einer gottlichen Weihe und Kraft, so sehr, dass selbst da.s einzelne Wort, voll alterthtimlicher, in der Kirche bald verlorener Gewandung, den Stempel eines Geistes tragt, den keia Epigone, kein Evangelist, Jude oder Ileide, und auch kein Paul zu erfinden wusste ' (Keim, Geschichte Jesu von Nazai-a, i. 64; cf. Holtzmann, in Hatid- Comnientar zum N. T. i. 15). We may compare with these words of Keim the well-known judgment of J. S. Mill, T/n-ee Essays oti Religiott, pp. 253, 254. The following extract from a review of Pfleiderer's book in the Spectator ot January 12, 1889, will be of interest. ' What wonderful people these Evangelists must have been, to take a doctrinal statement or an Old Testament prophecy and weave it into a lifelike story which shall be taken by many generations for historical truth ! If this were possible, then the greatest poets are not Homer nor Shakespeare, but the Evangelists. Seriously, however, is not this kind of work the rediictio ad absurdum of the theory ? Where did Paul get his facts, or his beliefs, about the life of Christ ? Is it not simpler, more historical, more likely, that the resemblance between the facts of the Gospels and the ideas of Paul is ta be explained by the priority of the former— that Paul's conceptions were ruled by the facts, not vice versa ? ' - Renan, Les Evangiles, p. 278. Cf. also Ullmann, Historisch odet Mythisch ? p. 58. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 93 But one thing may at all events be noted, that whethcr thc Evangelists are indebted to St. Paul or not, it is evident, on rfleiderer's own showing, that a very close similarity exists between the Gospels and the Epistles ; and the more frequently Pfleiderer and others insist upon this similarity, the more clearly are we enabled to see that ' the Epistles are also Gospels.' Indeed, Pfleidcrer's book might not unfairly be used as a heli) to the argument of Chapters iv.-viii. below ; and whilst we cannot always endorse the references which, in his eagerness to support his own theory, he is for ever finding in the Gospels to the Epistles, yet such points of contact may help to strengthen our belief that throughout these Epistles we are breathing the atmosphere, if not of the very words, yet at least of the thoughts and the mind of the Jesus of the Gospels.' Part II In the same year in which Pfleiderer delivered the Hibbert Lectures, another German writer, W. Beyschlag, published the first edition of his ' Leben Jesu ' (2nd edit. 1887). Beyschlag's name is one full of interest in connection with our present inquiry, not only on account of his views as to our Lord's pre-existcnce, Incarnation, and Ascension, and his well-known articles in the ' Studien und Kritiken ' in defence of Paul against the visionary theories of Baur and Holsten, but also on account of his valuable references in his ' Leben Jesu ' to Paul's knowledge of the historical Christ. It is, moreover, important to remember that P. Ewald in his work to which the most recent criticism on the Synoptic Question has drawn our attention in England, ' Das Hauptproblem der Evangelienfrage,' makes special reference to Beyschlag's ' Leben Jesu ' in support of his assertion that Paul was doubt- less acquainted with the material of the Gospel history, and ' Comp. P. Ewald's criticism on Iloltzmann's theory of the dependence of the fourth Gospel upon the Pauline Epistles, Das Ilauptpi-obkm dct Evangcliett- rage, pp. 89, 91, 93. 94 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES especially with the discourses of Jesus.' Beyschlag, in dis- cussing the extra-evangelical witnesses to the facts of the life of Jesus, points out that not a few of the New Testament writings are older than our Gospels, and are partly so undisputed in the circumstances of their origin that what they declare or permit us to know of the facts concerning Jesus can claim the highest value of historical testimony. At first sight, he admits that one who would look at these Epistles would be overcome by a feeling of disappointment, that they do not contain more frequent references to the life of Jesus, and especially, more frequent quotations of His words. But if so, as Beyschlag reminds us, we should thus overlook the fact that all these Epistles, together with the Apocalypse, are directed to Churches which had already received at their institution firmly established notices of Jesus, as a foundation of their belief, and are therefore only from time to time reminded of them upon special occasions : in the same way that the whole Apostolic preaching tended to take for its text, not so much particular incidents of the teaching and life of Jesus, but rather that life viewed as a whole, and especially the last act of it. If we regard it from this point of view, Beyschlag holds that the witness concerning Jesus contained in the con- temporary writings of the New Testament, quite apart from the Gospels, is full and weighty. After speaking of the valu- able testimony derived from the Epistles of James and i Peter, both of which Beyschlag accepts as genuine, and assigns to a very early date, he passes to the consideration of the writings of the Apostle Paul. From these, and especially from the Apostle's great Epistles, which he speaks of as raised above all critical opposition, Beyschlag points out that we obtain the richest number of references to the earthly life of Jesus- How profoundly, he observes, has this Paul, one of the most powerfully intellectual of men who have ever lived, this Apostle of the Gentiles, standing in the clearest light of history, bowed before Jesus ! how does this Contemporary, belonging to the same people, appear to him in the light of eternity ! ' Das Hauptprobkm der Evangelienfrage, p. 75, 1890. See Beyschlag, Leben [esii, i. pp. 61 ff. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 95 Jesus is for him ' the second Adam,' the spiritual and heavenly man, who, just as all owed their material life to the first Adam, has become for all men the source of a higher and divine life, the higher and completing regeneration of humanit)-, who restores it to its divine idea and eternal destination (Rom. v. 12 ; i Cor. xv. 22, 45-49). Moreover, in these conceptions Paul includes the idea of an intervention in the creation of the world : this prototype of humanity is also the image of the invisible God, the essential divine idea, upon which the whole creation of the world is based (i Cor. viii. 6 ; 2 Cor. iv. 4; Col. i. 15). It is impossible, Beyschlag argues that all this lofty Christology could have been derived chiefly from the appearance of Christ at Damascus, which caused the Apostle's conversion, without an}' impression from the hi.storical life of Jesus co-operating with it ; as if that appear- ance which had only assured Paul of the Messiahship of Jesus, of His life in glory, and of His pity in seeking for him, could possibly have produced the fulness of the Apostle's Christological ideas without the historical revelation of God in Christ ! The central point of the salvation which had appeared in Christ is not fixed for Paul in His exaltation, of which the Apostle had been certified in the appearance vouchsafed to him before Damascus, but in His voluntary self- humiliation even to the cross, and this conclusion of the historico-earthly life of the Saviour presupposes, with regard to the significance of His salvation, the entire religious and moral contents and character of that earthly life, and at the same time Paul's full appreciation of it (as also Keim acknowledges, vol. i. pp. 35-44). To obtain this, as Beyschlag proceeds to point out, histori- cal means of help were by no means wanting to Paul, although he had not belonged to the personal disciples of Jesus. Whether the years of his life which Paul spent in Jerusalem at the feet of Gamaliel coincided with the critical days of the life of Jesus, or followed immediately upon them, at any rate the learned circles of the capital were full at that time of the events by which Jesus had stirred the people to the inmost depths of their souls ; and the hostile and persecuting attitude ■g6 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES which the young Saul assumed above all his companions cannot possibly be conceived of, unless, with thoroughness and set purpose, he had acquired information about the man whose appearance had aroused such a violent contest. The miracle of his conversion only placed the historical know- ledge already possessed by Paul in a new light, a light which only disclosed to him the inward knowledge of that which he had already known well in outward appearance (2 Cor. v. 16) ; and in so far as the external knowledge was still in need of completion, it was supplemented from the most reliable sources by Paul's familiar intercourse with an Ananias and a Barnabas, and in a further degree by his intercourse with Peter, and James the brother of the Lord (comp. Acts ix ; Gal. i. 18, 19, ii. i, 6). Accordingly Paul, when he had newly founded a Church, painted Christ before their eyes, as if He Avere crucified in their very midst, and before all other means he laid ' the one foundation ' by the aid of rich historical communications (i Cor. xi. 23, xv, i). If, therefore, in the Epistles written to already existing Churches, he only refers in an exceptional manner to those historical founda- tions, he nevertheless shows by this very circumstance from what a rich supply he derives them. Thus, he knows that Jesus ' is descended from the seed of David according to the flesh ' (Rom. i. 3) ; that He ' became poor for our sakes, that we through his poverty might be made rich ' (2 Cor. viii. 9) ; that He did not live to please Himself, but allowed the reproaches of the enemies of God to fall upon Himself (Rom. xv. 3) ; that He ' knew no sin,' and out of love for us voluntarily went to His death, the accursed death of the cross (2 Cor. V. 21 ; Rom. v. 6 ; Gal. ii. 20, iii. 13). Although he rarely quoted sayings of Jesus, yet he knows, e.^:, what Jesus had expressed with regard to marriage and what not (i Cor. vii. 10 and 25), so that he thus possessed at all events a fair general view of the sayings of the Lord. He has also referred (i Cor. ix. 14) to the saying that ' the labourer [in the gospel] is worthy of his meat' (i.e. of his livelihood) (Matt. x. 10) ; and so too, as it appears, in i Thess. 14, 15, to words of Jesus concerning the resurrection of the dead, and in Acts xx. 35, AN HISTORICAL RETROSri'.CT 97 in one of the most undoubtedly authentic portions of the Acts, he introduces a saying- of Jesus, which not even our EvangeHsts have retained, while it certainly bears the stamp of genuineness : It is ))iore blessed to give than to receive. The miracles of Jesus he does not expressly mention ; but if he repeatedly mentions the gifts of miracles and healing present in his Churches (i Cor. xii. 28 ; Gal. iii. 5) ; if he appeals to the ' signs, mighty works, and miracles ' which he had himself performed as to the ' signs of an Apostle ' (Rom. xv. 18, 19 ; 2 Cor. xii. 12), and is confident every moment that ' in the name of Jesus Christ' he has power to perform even miracles of punishment (i Cor. v. 4, 5 ; 2 Cor. xii. 21-xiii. 10) — from whence could he have derived this confidence in his own • miraculous working, or in that abundant gift of miracles possessed by the early Church, except from the miraculous prototype of Jesus .' But Beyschlag has not yet mentioned what he terms the two most importanttommunications concerning the life of Jesus which Paul gives us, and which we find in the Apostle's most undisputed letters, viz. the institution of the Lord's Supper, and the history of the Resurrection. In i Cor. xi. certain disorders at the Corinthian Love Feasts lead him to mention the institution of the Lord's Supper, and he gives a report of it, says Beyschlag, in express correspondence with that of the Evangelists, attests ' the night of the betrayal,' corroborates the connection of the last supper of Jesus with the custom of the Passover meal by the mention of the ' breaking of the bread ' and in the designation of the cup as ' a cup of blessing,' intro- duces the words "of institution more fully than any of the Evan- gelists and transfers us by means of them ' into the soul of Jesus ' during the last crisis of Mis life. In the same manner, continues Beyschlag, in i Cor. xv. a doubt which had entered into the Church with regard to the resurrection of the dead leads the Apostle to speak of the resurrection of Jesus, and to show himself more fully instructed concerning it than our first three Evangelists. He recounts in a series the appearances of the Risen One to those who became the chief witnesses of the gospel, a series which materiall)' supplements the reports II 98 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES contained in the Gospels, and he confirms therein the most important particulars of the great fact of the Resurrec- tion, he connects the appearances of the Risen Jesus with His grave, and dates their commencement from the third day. The information with regard to our subject which we have thus already gained, quite apart from the Gospels, Beyschlag describes as embracing a small compass, but yet very im- portant in its contents. If, he continues, the aberration of a self-destructive criticism has gone so far as even to deny the historical existence of Jesus, and to relegate the whole tradi- tion concerning Him to the misty Jewish Messianic idea shaped into sham history, or to refer its origin to the picture of the ideal wise and righteous man drawn by the Stoics (comp., e.g., Marius, ' The Personality of Jesus Christ ' ') it suffices in refutation of this learned folly to remember that the family of Jesus existed in Palestinian Christianity until the time of Domitian (Eusebius, ' C. H.' iii. 19, 20), that a brother of Jesus according to the flesh presided through the succeeding generation over the primitive Church (Gal. ii. 5-12 ; Acts xv. 13 ; xxi. 18), and that Paul knew the brethren of Jesus and his first personal disciples (Gal. i. 18, 19; ii. I f 12 f ; I Cor. ix. 5). But much more than the mere fact that Jesus lived is guaranteed to us by the witnesses of the first generation : we have a complete sketch of His life. His Davidic descent. His family relations. His fore- runner John, the mention of twelve as the number of His disciples (i Cor. xv. 5), His preaching of the kingdom of heaven and His miracles of healing (Acts x. 36-42 ; Heb. ii. 3, 4), His claim to be the Messiah, as it appears from the name of ' the Christ ' bestowed upon Him by his friends, and frequently used even by those who did not believe in Him, His contest with His own people, especially with the rulers and learned men (i Cor. ii. 8), His betrayal at night by ' Comp. also a curious pamphlet, Die Weihnachts unci Osterfeier erkldrt aiis dem Sonneuailfus cier Orientaien, by F. Nork (1838), for the lengths to which men will go in dealing with the Gospel narratives. The author entitles his work, which was recently re-advertised in Germany, Etwasfiir die Besitzer der Strauss- 'schen Schrift : ' Das Lebe>t Jesu.' AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 99 one of His disciples (i Cor. xi. 23 ; Acts 1. 16), the institu- tion of the Lord's Supper, the crucifixion at the Paschal feast (i Cor. V. 7), the resurrection on the third day. But still more important for us than this external sketch of His life is the fact, adds Be\'schlag, that its unique inward character is already made manifest. The Christological views of these first witnesses to the faith are indeed, he notes, not directly historical, but dogmatic expressions, yet an historical fact of the first magnitude is reflected in them — the impression which Jesus made upon His receptive contemporaries and fellow- countrymen, upon men, some of whom were possessed of lofty endowments and conspicuous culture, and all of whom were marked by a deep moral-religious earnestness, who proved their thoughtfulness and love of truth throughout a life rich in con- test and sacrifice, full of work and blessing. How, asks Bey- schlag, could this impression be otherwise explained than by an overpowering and inward majesty which was more than human, especially in the case of One who in His outward lot differed in no respect from His fellow-nationalists, except in the ignominious fate of a terrible and degrading death ? But in addition to this testimony to the impression made by Jesus, there is also, as Beyschlag points out in a concluding and important passage, a direct insight into His inmost heart, furnished to us by the report of the same witnesses whom we have hitherto examined — an insight which in fact already places beyond doubt all upon which belief depends. That Man, he says, who in the night before His death, when He went knowingly and freely to meet His fate, has instituted with such words the holy memorial feast for His followers. He — let one take any position one likes — was beyond doubt conscious that He was presenting in sacrifice a spotless life on behalf of the sinful children of men : He has stood firm in the confidence that He would not be separated from His own by death, but that rather in virtue of His death, He would henceforth be to His followers the meat and drink of their inner life : it is this entirely marvellous and unique self-con- sciousness of Jesus, His self-consciousness, in one word, that He was the Saviour, which is reflected in the institution of H 2 lOO THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES the Lord's Supper, that most certain fact of all facts which we know of Him, It is not surprising after this full and striking examination of the witness of the New Testament Epistles to the histori- cal Christ, to find Beyschlag adding that in fact there was ample justification for speaking of a ' Gospel without the Gospels,' when men combined all the testimonies which lie outside the Gospels. Not that Beyschlag depreciates the value of the Gospels ; on the contrary, he reminds us that in spite of the value of the witness of the Epistles, the question of the greatest importance must still be that of the origin and trustworthiness of the Gospels, and he cannot endorse the remarks of Dr. B. Weiss to the effect that the Christian faith would remain exactly the same if it had pleased God to leave to us only the Apostolic preaching as it is presented to us in the Epistles of the New Testament ; in his view, if we had no authentic Gospels we might perhaps be able to form a general idea of Jesus, but we should have no real living pic- ture of Him, and we should thus be denied the adequate historical means for accounting for the personal impression made by the Saviour.^ Amongst still more recent German critics the name of Dr. H. H. Wendt, Professor of Theology in Heidelberg \vi\\ be already familiar to many English readers by Dr. Sanday's special reference to his ' Lehre Jesu.' - This book, which was published in i88i,was followed in 1890 by Dr. Wendt's ' Der Inhalt der Lehre Jesu.' It is interesting to notice the place which Wendt assigns to the Pauline Epistles as sources of information for his sub- ject, and his remarks on pages 10-12 of his later work should be supplemented by the short appendix to the ' Lehre Jesu ' on the traditionary sayings of Jesus outside the Gospels. ' See, however, for Beyschlag's view of the Gospel narratives of the Incarna- tion, chap. iv. note, and comp. in answer Nosgen, Geschichte Jesu Christi, pp. 109 ff. 1 89 1. Frequent references to this recent work of Nosgen are given in the notes. '^Expositor, 1891, Feb. -April : 'A Survey of the Synoptic Question.' See also Sept. 1891, for an article on Wendt's later work, by Dr. Iverach. AX HISTORICAL RETROSPECT lOI The sources, he sa}-s, for our knowledge of the historical im- port of the teaching of Jesus do not lie in the reports of the ("lospels alone, but also in the literature of the Apostolic age, more especiall}' in the letters of Paul.' We have here not onl\- to think of the several quotations of the sa}'ings of Jesus outside the Gospels, but rather of the general fact, that the whole Christian teaching contained in the preaching of the Apostles affords an indirect testimony to the teaching of Jesus. The teaching of the Apostles, and that also of Paul, alth(nigh he did not belong to the disciples during the life- time of Jesus, is a product of the powerful influence of His earthly activity. Even if it is certain, as we are now able to recognise, that in the case of the Apostles other factors co-operated in order to produce this result, and, in- deed, in the case of Paul in producing it in a form different from that of the original Apostles, }'et the Apostles them- selves, and more especially Paul, undoubtedly intended not to alter but to continue the gospel of Jesus which they re- garded as a revelation. Even their announcement of Jesus as the Messiah was not in their consciousness a new teaching, but only a continuance and completion of the Messianic claim which Jesus Himself had raised. We should thus, even if no direct reports like those of the Gospels had been handed down to us, still possess in this Apostolic literature a valid testimony for the historical existence and the epoch-making significance of the work of Jesus as a teacher. If, therefore, in the criticism of the Gospels one seeks a primary basis for an estimation of their historical trustworthiness, Wendt allows that there is ample justification for taking as such a basis the Pauline Epistles, which constitute the oldest and most solid part of the Apostolic literature, and for attempting in the first place to argue back from these Epistles alone to the actual contents of the conceptions and teaching of Jesus which they presuppose, in order to test by the result the contents of the information afforded us in the Gospels. But at the same time Wendt points out that it w^ould not be correct to employ this method, valid as it is, for a critical ' See Der Inhalt der Lehrc Jesu, pp. lo ff. 102 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES inquiry, if it is a question of giving a connected representa- tion of the teaching of Jesus founded upon critically tested sources of information. For the knowledge of the contents of the teaching of Jesus which we are indirectly able to gain from the Pauline Epistles is yet, in comparison with the rich, detailed, and direct communications of the Gospel sources of information, much too general to afford a fitting point of connection for the arrangement and treatment of the whole material communicated to us through the Gospels. Wendt, therefore, determines, for the purpose of his work, only to con- sider these indirect sources for the teaching of Jesus in this way, viz. to estimate the teaching contained in the Apostoli- cal preaching as the historical result of the teaching of Jesus, and to endeavour to learn the proper significance of that teaching, which his pages present to us on the basis of the Gospel sources of information, from the traces of its powerful influence upon the teaching of the Apostles. In the Appendix to the ' Lehre Jesu' • Wendt remarks at the outset that only very few sayings of Jesus outside the Gospels are handed down to us in such a manner as to justify us in reckoning them as authentic. We have in the first place some words of Jesus vouched for by Paul. In i Cor. vii. lo, he introduces the commandment of the Lord, which he expressly discriminates from his own Christian judgment. A saying of Jesus of a similar meaning is handed down to us in the Logia of Matthew, and also in the Gospel of Mark (Matt. V. 32 ; Mark x. 5 ; Luke xvi. 18). Paul further remarks (i Cor. ix. 14) : 'the Lord ordained that those who preach the Gospel should live of the Gospel.' A similar utterance of Jesus has been preserved for us in the charge of Jesus to His disciples starting on their mission, as that charge is given in the Logia of Matthew (Matt. x. 10; Luke x. 7). Paul again reports the institution of the Lord's Supper by Jesus and quotes the words of institution. The founding of the same institution is handed down to us by Mark (xiv. 22). Wendt places Mark xiv. 22-24 3-"^ i Cor. xi. 23-25 in parallel columns and compares the two passages. Besides the minor deviations ' Pp. 343 ff- AN HISTORICAL RETROSrECT I03 he draws attention to the fact that Mark only designates the blood as having been shed for the benefit of others {lit. of the many), whilst Paul makes the analogous statement already when mentioning the body, and that the designation of the cup as the ' blood offering of the covenant ' is mentioned in a different way. There is also, he proceeds, the more important deviation, that in place of the invitation to the actual partici- pation (verse 22, ' Take, eat,' &c.) by which Mark introduces the peculiar significance of the offered food, Paul appends to those words which explain the significance of the food a double invitation to the subsequent repetition of this meal as a meal of remembrance {i.e. what is given by Mark as a single invitation in the introduction, is given by Paul as a double invitation by wa)' of an addendum, or, what occurs in Mark first, occurs in Paul last). A special emphasis is laid by Paul upon this invitation of Jesus, because he is anxious to explain the significance of the repeated feast of the Supper. We are therefore, in Wendt's opinion, justified in assuming that Paul was fully convinced of the authenticity of this invi- tation given by Jesus, and so the report of Paul may be con- sidered as an important supplement to that of Mark.' Wendt points out that it is interesting to find parallels in the Gospel reports for all those sayings of Jesus which Paul quotes in i Cor. There is no occasion whatever, he continues, to consider that we have here a relation of literary dependence of the Gospel reports upon Paul or vice versa ; but we also must not suppose that only one fixed form of oral tradition handed down from the first Apostles was the common source for Paul and the Gospel reports ; we can simply say that such characteristic sayings of Jesus could be preserved and noted down independently from several quarters. In Wendt's judgment the passage i Thess. iv. 15, where Paul speaks ' by the word of the Lord,' also contains a reference to the historical teaching of Jesus. Wendt maintains that in Paul's assertion that those who have fallen asleep will not remain behind at the coming of the Lord, the Apostle gives an outward representation of the fact that death in this ' See also Der Inhalt der Lehre Jesu, p. SiS. 104 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES world will not by any means be prejudicial to their gain of heavenly salvation. This same thought, he further main- tains, is expressed in the saying of Jesus testified to by all the chief Gospel sources, that he who seeks to save his life shall lose it, and he who loses it shall save it (Mark viii. 25 ; Log. § 17 b ; Matt. x. 39; Luke xvii. 33 ; John xii. 25) ; bodily death must be judged by the disciples of Jesus, not as an actual loss of life, but rather as a means to gain the true and healthful life. The parallel which Wendt thus draws between this passage in the Gospels and i Thess. iv. 15, will certainly not commend itself to everyone, and it will be noticed that Wendt himself adds that he does not actually mean that Paul had in mind that precise saying of Jesus, but rather that he gave expres- sion to the conception of Jesus which was the basis of the saying, to which Jesus had Himself given expression in a veiy different form (comp. John xi. 25 etc.) : the introductory formula, tovto v/juv Xsyo/Msv sv Xoyco Kuplov, appears to Wendt to agree best with this conception.^ The one other quotation of a saying of Jesus in the New Testament outside the Gospels which Wendt discusses is Acts XX. 35. If we assume that the address of Paul at Miletus belongs to the so-called ' we ' source of the Acts, which the author has employed in the second portion of his work, and that this same source again rests upon eye and ear testimony, then we shall decide that that saying of Jesus has been in- directly handed down to us by Paul ; and no doubt the Apostle himself received it from a good source. But even if one does not acknowledge that the address at Miletus has been handed down to us in an authentic form, yet, adds Wendt, one has no ground for doubting the genuineness of the tradition of the saying of Jesus, which agrees admirably with the point of view attributed to Him elsewhere (e.£: Mark x. 42 ff ). Wendt concludes his Appendix with some important remarks upon the traditionary sayings of Jesus outside the ' For the connection between St. Paul's conception of the Kingdom of Heaven and the conception in our Gospels, cf. Wendt's Der luhalt der Lehre JesHy p. 326, and see below, chap. v. pp. 310 ff. AN HISTORICAL RLTROSPIX T I05 New Testament. Of these he says that he can make but Httle use. He admits the possibihty that in the oral tra- dition of the post-ApostoHc age many genuine sayings of Jesus not contained in our Gospel may have been retained for a long period, but we cannot in his opinion derive any favourable conclusions from this possibility with regard to the sayings handed down to us as genuine words of Jesus. Partly these sa)'ings— ^.^. those which are derived from the Gospel according to the Hebrews — are of such apocryphal origin and of such strange import that the}' are at once convicted of spuriousness ; partly they only recommend themselves to us as authentic because they contain reminiscences of the words of Jesus derived from the Gospels ; partly again they have been handed down to us quite unconnected with any context, so that we cannot recognise their original meanings and on this account we cannot judge of their value. Amongst these last we may class, in Wendt's opinion, the best and most widely attested of these sayings : ^ivsade rpaTTS^rai Boki/jloi. The conjecture that this saying belonged to a connection of thought like that preserved in Luke xvi. 1-12, and that thus it may be explained to mean that a man ought to consider his earthly goods as a means towards winning the goods of the kingdom of God — that he ought to give up the one to receive in exchange the other — is one, he admits, of very great interest, but not of sufficient certainty to allow us to regard and employ the saying in question as a contribution towards fixing more accurately our knowledge of the historical teaching of Jesus.' These strictures of Wendt with regard to the alleged traditional sayings of Jesus will be read with interest by those who have studied Dr. Resch's learned discussion of these sayings under the title ' Agrapha,' a work which forms the fifth volume of Gebhardt and Harnack's ' Texte und Unter- suchungen zur Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur.' The importance of the contribution thus made by Dr. Resch to our knowledge of the sources and relative value of these ' Comp. also the strictures of Ndsgen upon this traditional saying, Geschichte Jesu Christi, p. 19, 1891. I06 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES sayings has been described at length by Dr. Sanda}% in his recent articles in the ' Expositor,' ' and attention has also been drawn to it by Dr. Salmon in the last edition of his ' Introduc- tion.' ^ Quite apart from its bearing upon Paul's knowledge of the traditional sayings of our Lord, Resch's researches have acquired an additional value for English students in connection with Professor Marshall's interesting articles on ' The Aramaic Gospel': 'We both believe,' writes Professor Marshall, 'in a primitive Semitic document, written by the Apostle Matthew, that this document was used by the three Synoptists, and that its contents can now be recovered only by internal criticism ; but Dr. Resell maintains that this primitive Gospel was written in Hebrew, not Aramaic' ^ But confining ourselves •of necessity to that part of Dr. Resch's treatise which is concerned with the Pauline Epistles, it is important to notice that, in a note on page 93 of the ' Agrapha,' Resch finds fault with ' the historical school ' of critics, because, moving in a wrong track, they have regarded the four great " Pauline Epistles as the oldest primary Christian source, and have not rather interpreted the relationship between the two combined writings, between, i.e., the canonical doctrinal writings and the synoptical Gospels, by means of the common pre-canonical source, z>. the original document (the UrscJiriff) of Christianity. This UrscJwift Resch considers to have been the Login of the Apostle Matthew, originally written in Hebrew, and to sayings contained in this document, or in different versions of it, he finds as many as thirty-eight parallels or allusions in the Pauline Epi.stles alone (' Agrapha,' special index, pp. x, xi, and pp. 102-129, 298-300). Most critics will probably agree with Dr. Sanday that this list stands in need of revision. In Germany, Paul Ewald has criticised it severely. Certainly Ewald's determination not to accept a synoptical tradition apart from a Johannine would naturally disincline him to accept Resch's assertion that there are no Johannine agrapha,^ but, quite apart from this, some ' Expositor, 4th series, Feb. -May, 1891. ^ P. 184; comp. also Nosgen, tibi supra. ^ Expositor, May 1891, p. 375. ^ Resch, Agrapha, p. 25. Comp. Ewald, Das Haupfproblein, p. 160. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 10/ of his slricturcs upon Resch's extensive list demand very careful attention. Ewald's object is to show that there was no fixed tradition, cral or zvritten, of the words of Jesus ; in proof of this he points to the phenomena presented by the Apostolic dis- courses and writint;s ; they very rarely contain any express appeal to the words of Jesus, or any verbal quotation of a ^ Logion ' of Jesus, often as we might have expected it, and often as our eyes wander involuntarily from the words of these discourses and writings to corresponding words of Jesus in the reports of the Evangelists. It must not be inferred from this that Ewald depreciates Paul's acquaintance with the thoughts and views of Jesus, and indeed with the very words of the Lord ; his point is that if there had been a fixed canon of the words of Jesus, either oral or written, actual quotations from it would be found in greater numbers, and of pre-eminent importance in their contents.' In his own judgment the number of the quotations, their contexts, and especially the mode of their employment, are all opposed to the supposi- tion of any such canon. And it is here that Ewald comes to close quarters with Dr. Resch. With regard, first of all, to the number of quotations, he points out that Resch adduces more than twenty passages from the Pauline Epistles alone which contain more or less distinct formulas of quotation, and, in addition to these, other passages from the rest of the New Testament writings. But if, adds Ewald, one looks into the matter only a little more attentively, nearly all these for- mulcTE of quotation resolve themselves into nothing.- Ewald takes first of all those instances adduced by Resch which point directly to the authority of a written word, as, e.g., I Cor. ii. 9, ' but as it is written ' {aWa Kctdtos 'yiypairraC) ; I Cor. ix. 10, ' for our sakcs it was written ' (St' r^^ias iypdffir}) ; I Tim. v. 8, ' for the Scripture saith ' (\ejel yap 77 'ypacf)rj) ; James iv. 5, ' the Scripture saith ' (/; 'ypa(f)r] \sysi), &c. Even if there prevails ' for the most part the most profound obscurity ' as to the origin of the sayings referred to in these ' Ewald, ubi supra, p. I48 note, 143, and comp. 75. * Ewald, ubi supra, p. 143. I08 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES passages, yet Ewald maintains that there is no ground for the supposition that the Scripture alluded to is a written report of the life and teaching of Jesus composed in the earliest days of the Church, since it is diametrically opposed to the primitive Christian conception of the ' Scripture ' as 'the written word' kut s^o'xjqv. If that primitive Gospel which Resch assumes was once granted, it would be easier, in Ewald's judgment, to believe that its author had by mistake referred some of its sayings to the Old Testament Scripture, than that he would have thus placed that primitive Gospel on a level with the Old Testament, and even embraced the two in a unity : a formula of quotation of such a kind Ewald confidently regards as proving less than nothing. Incidentally he draws attention to the fact that the supposed or actual quotations, just as those of the sub-canonical time, appear for the most part, not as words of the Lord, but as words of Scripture, as Resch himself describes them in the ' Agrapha.' ' Amongst other formulae upon which Resch relies Ewald dismisses Rom. ii. i6, 'according to my gospel' (kutu to svayysXiov fiov) ; whether we think, with some of the Fathers, of the Gospel of Luke, or, with Resch, of the fundamental source of INIatthew, the one is as impossible as the other. In the same manner he deals with the formulae used in the Pastoral Epistles and the Apocalypse : ' faithful is the word,' TTLcnos 6 Xojos ( I Tim. i. 1 5, iii. i , iv. 9 ; 2 Tim. ii. 11 ; Tit. iii. 8), or ' these words are faithful and true ' (ovtol ol Xojol irLaTol Kal a\r)6ivoi elcnv) (Apoc. xxi. 5). Ewald cannot believe that any impartial reader will here undoubtedly receive the im- pression of a quotation from a written source (as Resch maintains will be the case, ' Agrapha,' p. 262), still less of a quotation of a Logion of Jesus. For such a result Ewald thinks that we might rather refer here to the introductory formula specially peculiar to the Romans and i Cor., ' do ye not know ? ' {ovk otBars ; 1 Cor. vi. 3 : i) ovk ol'Sars ; I Cor. vi. 2 : 7) a'yvosLTs; Rom. vi. 3 ; 'Agrapha,' p. 312 & 153). But not only does uncertainty prevail in each of these cases also, but ' Ewald, itbi supra, p. 143. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 109 there is no question of an actual appeal to a canon of the Lord's words. It is only, in Ewald's view, the mark of an entirely arbitrary exegesis to employ as Resch does in favour of his hypothesis such expressions as those which occur in Col. iii. 18, ' as it is fit in the Lord' (ods dpfjKsv sv Kvpm), or in 2 Thess. iii. 12, 'we command and exhort in the Lord' (TrapayysWofMsv koI TrapaKaXoufxsv sv KvpUp k.t.X.), or probably also such a passage as i Cor. xiv. T,y. As a result Ewald maintains that of the quotations which may in some degree be regarded as certain Resch has not proved a greater number than was already recognised before he wrote.' These quotations he reckons as six : (i) i Cor. vii 10 f, ' But unto the married I give charge, jrr? not I, but the Lord, " That the wife depart not from her husband " (roh 8s ^sya/xrjKoa-ii' TrapayysWco, ovk syu) dWa 6 Kvpios, yvvaiica diro dvhpos p,rj ')(copLa6rjvat K.r.X.). (2) I Cor. ix. 14 : ' Even so •did the Lord ordain that they who preach the Gospel should live of the Gospel ' (ourcos koI 6 Kupios Sisra^sv roly to svayysXiov KarayyiWovaiv sk toO svayysXiov ^f]v). (3)1 Cor. xi. 23 ff : ' For I received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you ' (iyoy yap irapsXa^ov (itto tov Kvptov, o koX irapsScoKu vfitv, ort /c.t.X.). (4) I Thess. iv. 1 5 ff. : ' For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we that are alive that are left . . . shall in nowise precede,' &c. (rovroyap vpZv Xsyofisp £v \6y(i) Kvpiov ort rj/xsls 01 ^mvtes oi TrspiXsiTro/nsvoi . . ou /XT] (f)Ouacofi£v K.T.X.). (5) Acts XX. 35 : ' And to remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he himself said, " It is more blessed to give than to receive " ' {(MvqixovsvsLv rt rwv Xoyiov TOV Kvpiov^lrjaov otl uvtos^ sIttsv MaKapiov scttlv fxaXXov hihovuL rj Xafi^dvsiv). (6) Acts xi. 16 : ' And I remembered the word of the Lord, how that he said, John indeed baptised with water ; but ye shall be baptised with the Holy Ghost ' (ifiV7]adr]p Ss tov pi^jiaTos tov Kvplov ws sXsysv. ^Icodwrjs fisv ifSdiTTLasv vSuTi^ vfjbsis 8s ^airTLa-drjo-ecrds svirvevfiaTLayioi). This number furnishes a full authoritative testimony, in Ewald's opinion, against the idea of a fixed doctrinal authority, either oral or written, which is said to consist of ' Das Hatiptprobliin, p. 144. no THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES the words of the Lord, even if the supporter of a complete primitive Gospel {Urevangelium) was to add 2 Peter i. 17 fif. : there are more frequent appeals, Ewald asserts, not only to the canonical Scriptures of the Old Testament, but also to apocryphal books, and even to secular authors, to proverbs and such like, than to words of Jesus. He also reminds us that even the limited list of quotations which he has given might be further diminished if in accordance with the opinion of many interpreters we refer the first, third, and especially the fourth passage out of the six to special revelations, and if we lay stress upon the fact that the sixth passage in the above form is not found in the Gospels at all, but in the Acts (i. 5). Ewald, however, is prepared to admit all six as quotations, but what, he asks, are they amongst so many appeals to the Old Testament, &c. ? ' When he passes to the consideration of the contexts of the six passages Ewald is equally at a loss for any proof of a fixed tradition. The last two passages, 5 and 6, are simply reminiscences of particular sayings of Jesus, which could not be wanting whether the tradition was fixed or not, and they are in them- selves of no interest for the theory which Ewald is discus- sing. In the former passage, viz. 5, one involuntarily recalls, he thinks, the well-known independent apocryphal Logion, •ylvsada rpaTrs^rai Sokl/xoi, ! and similar words. The passage marked 3 is certainly, says Ewald, a salient reminiscence, which one might look for within a limited circle of tradition, but it is, he thinks, equally possible that it was handed down independently — ie. without being joined with any homogeneous tradition — on account of the unique char- acter of the event of which it treats. The passages marked i and 4 he describes as s/>ea'a/ia, which accordingly cannot be regarded as if they formed integral portions of a fundamental doctrinal document. There is indeed only one passage, viz. 2, which Ewald con- siders to harmonise fully with the idea of derivation from any such document, yet without in the least requiring such a supposition ; and he bids us see in conclusion from this ' Das Hauptprohhmf p. 145. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT I I l review of the six passages that he had not expressed himself too boldly in saying that there arc few traces of what might be expected on the theory of the existence of a fixed tradition.' When he compares these same six quotations with the Synoptical tradition, to the foundation of which they are said fundamentally to belong, he points out that not one of them is in verbal agreement with the sayings contained in the first three Gospels. Even in the passage numbered 3, where an exact agreement might certainly have been expected, if anywhere an endeavour after any kind of final tradition had shown itself, there are striking variations. The same is the case with i Cor. vii. 10, where at any rate the first half of verse 1 1 is very independently expressed ; and with i Cor. ix. 10, where the word of the Lord alluded to is only characterised according to its contexts (Matt. x. 10; Luke x. 7). Two indeed of the six passages in question have no Synoptical parallels, viz. Acts xx. 35, and i Thess. iv. 15 ; for in these cases one cannot do more than establish a harmony with expressions in the Synoptists. Ewald sees nothing which militates against his position in such passages as i Cor. xi. 2 ; 2 Thess. ii. 15, iii. 6 ; where mention is made of a tradition or traditions (TrapdBoais, irapahoasts) which Paul has communicated to his readers (compare also 2 Pet. ii. 21) ; or again in Rom. xvi. 25, where ' the preaching of Jesus Christ ' {K-qpvyiia 'It^ctoi) Xpia-rov) is mentioned by the side of the gospel of Paul, or again in I Tim. vi. 3, where ' sound words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ ' (vyLaivovrsf \6yot, oi rov Kvpiov tj/xmv 'Irjaou Xptarov) are plainly emphasised ; or, finally, in i Cor. vii. 25, where a distinction is expressly drawn between that with regard to which Paul had a command of the Lord (iTriray/j) and that with regard to which no such command was at his disposal."^ In discussing these passages Ewald observes that so far as the irapaSocrsts are concerned there is no justification whatever for confining them to any collection of the words of the Lord ' Das Hauptprohlem, p. 146. * Ibid. p. 147. 112 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES specially corresponding to the Synoptical type, since the context in these passages appears much rather to refer to what lies beyond the material embodied in the Synoptists. In truth, however, it remains on the whole not only undecided * whether Paul has received or freely arranged the ordinances thus handed down by tradition,' but it appears tolerably clear, in Ewald's judgment, that the Apostle is not concerned with the further promulgation of what had been already received, but with independent ordinances corresponding as a matter of course with the spirit and will of Jesus : this view Ewald thinks is plainly confirmed by the second passage, in which these TrapaSoasts can be communicated ' either by word or by our letter ' {strs Sia Xoyov sits St sTrcaroXrjs rjfjLMv). We must, he adds, put a very forced construction upon I Thess. iv. 1 5 &c. if we wish to create the belief that in that passage Paul had in mind a reported communication of the sayings of Jesus. The same explanation of 2 Peter ii. 21 is, in Ewald's judgment, a very natural one, where we have the expression ' from the holy commandment delivered unto them ' (i/c Tr]s 7rapaSo0SLcri]s avrols aytas svroXrjs) ; whilst he thinks that if Rom. xvi. 24 is not altogether put on one side by inter- preting with Weiss and others the expression ' the preaching of Jesus Christ ' (K7]pvy/jLa ^Irjaov l^ptarov) as though it con- tained an objective genitive, yet at the most it affirms that Paul was conscious of the agreement of his gospel with the preaching of salvation proclaimed by Jesus Christ. There remain the two passages i Tim. vi. 3 and i Cor. vii. 25. With regard to the first, Ewald considers it correct to hold that this passage presupposes that the words of Christ were accessible not only to Timothy, but to Christians in general, although he cannot suppose that these words were limited to the Synoptical tradition only, or that this passage presupposes a canon of the Lord's words as Paul's authority ; it is even doubtful, he adds, if the verse in question does refer to actual sayings of Jesus, and not rather to thoughts in harmony with His mind. With regard to the second, Ewald considers it correct to say that the Apostle draws a distinction between that for AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT II3 which he can make good a command of the I.ord, and that for which he is referred to his own judgment ; but here again he cannot accept the view that Paul employs those words of the Lord according to any fixed traditional form, and he is of opinion that the purely subjective expression ' / Jiave 710 coiuniajidinciit of the Lord' {ovk ex&>) rather suggests the opposite.' But we should entirely mistake Ewald's meaning if from the above conditions we concluded him to be of opinion that Paul was not well acquainted with the words and thoughts of Jesus. In the important note to which reference has been already made,^ he remarks that it will no doubt be maintained that I Cor. vii. 25 makes it at any rate clear, that Paul re- garded the words of the Lord as a high authority. But this, adds Ewald, we also in no way deny ; only we cannot, in his judgment, conclude that the Apostle regularly availed himself of these words, or that they lay before him in any fixed traditional form, as is supposed to have been the case. There are exceptional cases, as Ewald terms them, in which the Apostle has recourse to these words — it may be because his own experience and Apostolic consciousness were not in question, as in i Thess. iv. 15 &c. and i Cor. xi. 23 &c., or because they were insufficient, as in the question of the married life, i Cor. vii. i &c., or because he would avoid even the appearance of giving mere subjective decisions, as in I Cor. ix. 14 (comp. also Acts xx. 35). In general the Apostle is conscious that he is in constant agreement with the thoughts and views of Jesus, whilst he gives utterance to his Apostolic opinion as such. But Ewald also argues for Paul's acquaintance with a rich j tradition which extended beyond the material contained either in the first three Gospels, or in the fourth. -* In support of this he not only allows such passages as Acts xx. 35 and I Thess. iv. 15, which are without parallels in our Gospels, but the very important enumeration, in view of the event ' Das Hauptproblem, p. 14S. ' Ibid. p. 148, note. • For Ewald's enumeration of the points of contact between St. John's Gospel and the Pauline Epistles, see below, chap. v. pp. 329 ff. I 114 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES with which it is connected, of the appearances of the risen Christ in i Cor. xv. 5. This enumeration Ewald describes as a crux to the harmonists (since it is only partly in agreement with our Gospels), but as a striking argument for his own theory that there was no fixed oral or written tradition, because facts of such exceeding interest as those narrated in I Cor. XV. could not have been passed over in such a tradition if it had existed. But if, we may remark in passing, Paul was thus, according to Ewald, in possession of this most important testimony to the cardinal facts of the resurrection of Jesus, which he could confidently place by the side of the traditional material already known to him ; if he was able in exceptional cases to refer to the words of Jesus ; if he could draw a distinction between his own opinion and a command of the Lord ; if he could guard himself against a subjective decision by quoting from a discourse of Jesus, and if his letters are full of instances of the employment of Johannine phraseology and Johannine figures of speech, we are justified in inferring (i) that the Apostle must have felt very sure of his ground ; (2) that the knowledge which he could bring to bear in exceptional cases could have been extended to other cases had occasion required ; (3) that the Jesus of the Pauline Epistles is in word and deed no other than the Jesus of the four Evangelists. But it is of interest and importance to consider, however imperfectly, the particular Logia which Resch so closely associates with the Pauline Epistles. Other Logia to which he finds allusions in James, i Peter, and the Apocalypse, are enumerated by him in later pages of his book (' Agrapha,' pp. 244-293 ; 301-310). The first Logion (i 3)to which Resch would trace a reference in St. Paul need not detain us long. The words which Resch quotes from the 'Clem. Hom.'xii. 29, as spoken by 'the prophet of the truth' — an expression which we may readily allow refers to Jesus (comp. Logion 11) — are also familiar to English readers in Bishop Westcott's list of the Apocryphal traditions of the Lord's words — ' good must needs come (ra dyada sXdslv Bst), but blessed is he through whom it comes ' ; but a response AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT II 5 to this saying of Jesus in Rom. iii. 8 is certainly not very obvious, especially when Resch would have us believe that the Apostle's opponents combined it with another saying of Jesus, ' it must needs be that offences come ' (Matt, xviii. 7 and Luke xvii. i), with which we find it associated in the 'Clementine Homilies,' and then perverted the two sayings into an attack upon the morality of Paul's teaching." As Logion 14, Resch quotes three passages from the ' Apostolic Constitutions ' to support his view that Jesus con- nected with the baptismal formula the command to baptise into His death, and to this latter command he believes that reference is made by Paul in Rom. vi. 3. Paul may himself have received such a command from oral tradition and from the teaching of the primitive Apostles, and to this it is quite possible, as Paret points out,- and as P. Ewald also considers possible,^ that reference may be made in the formula in Rom. vi. 3, 1) dyvoslrs. That the passages in the ' Apostolic Con- stitutions ' may easily have been derived from Paul's teaching is seen by the way in which one of them (vii. 43) expressly speaks of Christ's death on the cross as that ov rvirov sScoks TO ^aTrrca-fia, which reminds us of Paul's words in Rom. vi. 5 (comp. also Rom. v. 14, for the Apostle's employment of the same word tvttos). When we remember the free manner in which the words of the Lord were combined by early Christian writers, and how even on occasion the authority of the Apostles was put on a par with them,^ it is not difficult to understand that Paul's words would be regarded as refer- ring to a command of Christ Himself Is it not possible that the expression used by Paul may be referred to our Lord's own words with reference to His own baptism of suffering and death, in St. Mark x. 39 ; Luke xii. 50? Logion 1 5 is formed by the words ' the weak shall be saved by the strong ' to acrdavss hca tov la-'y^upov croiOjjcrsTai, which Resch quotes from the ' Duae Via^, vel Judicium Petri ' ' Nicholson, in his Gospel according to the Hebrews, p. 1 52, places it amongst the possible quotations from that lost Gospel. * Paret, Paulus und Jesus, p. 16. ' Das Ilauptproblern, p. 144. * Weiss, Ehtiettitttg in das N. T. 2. Aufl. pp. 26, 27, 34, 1889. I 2 Il6 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES [ = K.au6vs9 SKKXrjaiaa-TiKol rwv ayCwv airocrroXaiv^ cap. 26, and to which he believes that Paul refers in i Cor. i. 25. But in the first place, it would seem more probable from the pre- ceding verses that Paul had in mind passages of the Old Testament like Isaiah xxix. 14 ; and it is to be remembered that when Resch adduces another Logion, which he admits is a parallel in meaning to the one under discussion, ' For those that are sick I was sick, and for those that hunger I suffered hunger, and for those that thirst I suffered thirst ' (Ata rovs aa-QevovvTas t)(T6svovv k.t.\., Logion 47), it is quite probable that both Logia were only adaptations of the same passage in St. Matthew xxv. 35, 36.^ There is nothing strange in finding the words of the Lord transmitted thus freely and orally, but still transmitted in their essence.^ Logion 16 might be fairly described as one of those instances to which Ewald's criticism is applicable with respect to the use of the formula ' as it is written,' or ' as saith the Scripture.' And in this criticism Ewald is supported by the recent remarks of Schmiedel.'^ In Schmiedel's view it is very improbable that in this Logion i Cor. ii. 9 Paul is quot- ing, as Resch maintains, from a Hebrew Urevangelium, and ' See the remarks of Keim, Gestkic/Ue Jesu, i. 27, 32. These references are of interest because they give us Keim's opinion as to the alleged sayings of Jesus outside the Gospels. He is not inclined to value them very highly, and many of them he regards as distinguished by no strongly marked peculiarity from those we already possess ; they may have been actually uttered by Jesus, or afterwards elaborated in the Church out of older material. Thus the Logion mentioned above (15) recalls, in Keim's judgment. Matt. xxv. 35 ; comp. Westcott, Study of the Gospels, p. 460, for the same parallel. '^ Weiss, Einleitting in das N. T. p. 27. " Ha.nd-Co»i»ientar zum N. T. ii. p. 79, erste Abtheilung, I. Halfte, 1890. The introduction of the passage in i Cor. ii. 9, by Clement of Rome in his I Cor. 34, one of the passages cited by Resch, may be added to the other and undoubted proofs that he was acquainted with Paul's Epistle, although he is closer to the LXX of Isaiah Ixiv. 4, in the words Toh virofj.4vouaiv av-rov. The fact that he introduces this passage with his usual formula of Scripture quotation, \4yeL yap, shows that he regarded it as canonical. Meyer, tn loco, p. 63. See Expositor for June 1891, where (pp. 408, 409) the passage in question is referred to the Old Testament, and evidence is given in support of the view that in the Greek Liturgy of St. James the words of i Cor. ii. 9 are quoted from St. Paul, as against Dr. Littledale's view that the Apostle was quoting from the Liturgy (see Translation of the Primitive Liturgies, p. 51, note). AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT II7 improbable that the author of the ' Apocalypse of Elijah,' as Resch also supposes, is quoting from a similar work. Schmiedel holds that Paul is himself quoting from the lost apocryphal ' Apocalypse of Elijah,' since Apocalyptic works, without belonging to the Old Testament, were frequently reckoned as inspired, and so classed as ' Scripture ' (ypacfir]). He bases this view of the quotation in i Cor. ii. 9 (Kadcos 'ys'^pairrai) upon the authority of Origcn. Or Paul himself, he thinks, may have believed that he was quoting an Old Testa- ment passage. There are three passages in Isaiah the words of which may have been in the Apostle's mind, Ixiv. 4, Ixv. 16, and lii. 1 5, and it is quite possible that he combined and freely adapted these passages in their bearing upon his purpose. It seems somewhat fanciful on the part of Dr. Resch to argue that I Cor. ii. 9 was derived from what he considers to have been the original conclusion of the parable in Matt. xxv. 34-46, a conclusion which he believes is retained for us in its com- pleteness in the passage which he quotes (p. 164) from the ' Apost. Const.' vii. 32. He thinks that the view which he here advocates is rendered more probable from the fact that Paul so often refers to this parable in Matt, xxv., and he gives several instances in proof of this (pp. 164, 165): e.g: Rom. ix. 22, 23, and Matt. xxv. 34 ; 2 Cor. v. 10, and Matt. xxv. 31-33. But all that the passage in the ' Apost. Const.' shows is that we have in it another instance of that same frequent combination and intermingling of the words of the Lord with Old Testament writings which so often meets us in the literature of the early Church,' and the phraseology adopted by Paul, whilst it may point to the fact that he was acquainted with the parable in Matt, xxv., cannot be said to justify Resch's inference (' Agrapha,' p. 165). Logion 17 is quoted by Bishop Westcott in an interesting note, in which he points out that the saying occurs substan- tially in the LXX of I.saiah xxiv. 16. (Comp. Resch, ' Agrapha,' p. 165.) Dr. Westcott quotes it in two forms : ' Weiss, EinleitiDig in das N. T. p. 28 ; Westcott, Study of the Gospels, p. 458, where he points out that the words ((uoled in Barn. Ep. c. 6, tiov iroiijcriii TO lo-^aTa ws TdwpiJTo, seem to be a mixture of Ezek. xxxvi. 1 1, and Matt. xix. 30. Il8 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES ' Wc remember our Lord and Master, how he said to us,. Keep the mystei'ies for me and for the so?is of my house ' (Ta fivcrrripLa ifiol kol rols viols tov oIkov \xov (f)v\d^aT£, ' Clem. Hom.' xix. 20); and * It was not through unwilHngness to im- part His blessings that the Lord announced in some Gospel or other, My mystery is for me and for the sons of my house (^^\.va-n']piov s^ov ifiol KUi toIs viols rod oI'kov jjlov, Clem. Alex. ' Strom.' v. 10, 64). The words in Isaiah are these:— To fi,vaT7]piov fjLov ifjiol, to fMvcrTi]pi6v fjiov ifxoi Koi rols i/iols. But whilst it will be noted that this saying is only described as found ' in some Gospel or other ' (eV tivi svayyeXio) : see Westcott, ubi supra^, and whilst we must also take into account what Dr. Sanday describes as ' the tendency to give a specifi- cally Christian interpretation to all parts alike of the Old Testament,' yet the Logion finds a striking parallel in Mark iv. II, and contains the same thought, as Resell points out which Paul expresses in i Cor. iv. i, 2 (' Agrapha,' p. 169). In Logion 18, if the formula 'ysypaTrrai yap forbids us to refer the words KoWaads rols dyiots ore 01 KoWdy/xsvoi avrols uyiaa6}](7ovrai (Clem. Rom. I Cor. 46) to i Cor. vii. 14 (comp. vi. 17), it is of interest in passing to note the connec- tion to which Resch refers between Paul's use of the word ayioi and the familiar language of John xvii. 17 (' Agrapha,' p. 170). Logion 20 requires more attention, because it is closely con- nected with the passage which is so frequently acknowledged as an allusion by Paul to a saying in our Gospels (i Cor. ix. 14). Here, in this Logion, i Cor. ix. 10, we have a similar expres- sion to some of those already discussed and referred to by P. Ewald — ' for our sakes it was zvritten ' {hC 1)110,5 sypd(f>r]). Resch, in discussing this passage, refers to Paret's ' Paulus und Jesus,' ^ where it is maintained that in i Cor. ix. 10 we have a word of the Lord known to Paul by oral tradition, but which by a slip of memory the Apostle referred to the Old Testament. But Resch believes that if we accept the view that Paul took the words in question out of the written Hebrew Urevangelium all ' The remarks of Paret (to which Resch refers) will be found in his Faulus und/esus, p. 45. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT II9 becomes plain, and he refers to the fact that a definite quota- tion of the Lord's words is given in i Cor. ix. 14, and also that in i Tim. v. 18 the quotation is placed on a level as 'the Scripture ' (?/ ypacf>^) with the Old Testament passage Deut. XXV. 4 cited in i Cor. ix. 9. But, in the first place, it must be remembered that a very large number of critics accept i Cor. i.K. 14 as a quotation of the words of Christ who are not prepared to regard i Cor. ix. 10 in the same light ; and, in the next place, it is very doubtful whether, if we take into account Paul's general usage, the term ■>) jpa(j)i] in i Tim. v. 18 can be referred to both parts of the verse, and not rather to the Old Testament passage onl}'. But Resch does not affirm that Paul introduces the words of Jesus verbally in i Cor. ix. 10 or 14, and he is content to point out that as the fundamental thought in verse 10, 'in hope' (ett' sXttlSi,), is not contained in Deut. XXV. 4, the Old Testament passage quoted in verse 9, a new source of quotation is demanded in verse 10. The St rj/xds iypd^T} of verse 10 may, however, be amply explained by regard- ing it as explicative, and not as implying a fresh quotation.' Logion 21, 'For He said, Many shall come in my name, clad without in sheepskins, but within they are ravening wolves ; and, There shall be divisions and heresies ' (scrovrat o-)^l(TixaTa Kol aipsasLs), is discussed by Dr. Sanday, and he thinks it proved that the saying was current as a saying of Christ, and also that it was referred to by St. Paul in the passage i Cor. xi. 18, 19, in which Resch traces an allusion to it. But a very different view is taken by Dr. Weiss : - he speaks of the mode of quotation adopted by Justin Martyr, from whom ('Dial. c. Tryph.' c. 35) the Logion in its above form is taken, how he intermixes the words of the Lord with Old Tes- tament citations (' Apol.' i. 48), and how in the midst of a series of the Lord's words a sentence is inserted which can only arise out of a reminiscence of i Cor. xi. 18 (saovrai a-^^iafxara koI aipsasis). But at any rate Resch seems to go too far in fixing the exact position of this Logion in the Urevangelium ' Agrapha,' p. 177), and in supposing that in the expression ' Meyer, Korinlherbriefc, in loc. ; Weiss, Bibl. Tlieol. des N. 7*. [>. 271, note. ^ Einleitung in das N. T. 2. Aufl. pp. 28 and 48, 1889. IJO THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES 'for there must be (Set) also heresies among you ' -alpsaiis : comp. axla-fiara in the previous verse ; i Cor. xi. iS, 19) the first readers of the Epistle, who already knew of the Logion, would see a direct reference to it Why should not the alleged Logion, as Dr. Westcott says, ' have been formed from the sense of our Lord's words and the form of i Cor. xi. iS, 19 ' ? But when Resch proceeds to maintain that without this Logion the Lord's prophetic words would be incomplete, if He had not foreseen and foretold the divisions and heresies which would come upon His Church ('Agrapha,' p. 175^, there are surely many words of Christ which indicate that such results would follow, and Paul, we ma}- readily admit, testifies b}- his Eii how fully he knew the sayings and the mind of Christ.' In Logion 22 Resch maintains that Paul is quoting from the same written source which he so frequently uses ; the introductory- formula ' for I received from the Lord ' (s fO) yap "rrapsXa/Bov airo rov Kupiou) is to be considered as marking a quotation from this written source, and the special relationship bet%\-een the Pauline and Lucan accounts of the Lord's Supper depends upon the common use of an identical version — z'.e. a recension of the original Hebraic source — as distinguished from the version followed by Matthew and Mark. But in addition to these conclusions Resch also believes that i Cor. xi. 26 contains, not the words of Paul, but the words of Jesus. In support of this view he quotes among other passages * Apost ConsL' viiL 12, the Liturg>- of St. Mark, and the Latin translation of the Liturg}- of St. James, in all of which the words ' until he come ' a^^pis ov av s\0r}, 1 Cor. xi. 26) are changed into the first person, and closely preceded by the expression ' ye proclaim wj' death ' 'rov ddvarov rov ifibv Kara'^/^/eWsTe : mortem meam annuntiabitis). But as no evidence has yet been produced to prove that any written Liturgies were in existence in the first centurj', it is far less ' Mr. Nicholson in discussing this Logion points out that the form in which it is fonnd in the C/em. Horn. xvL 21 is quite consistent with the theory that only the zensi of -various prophecies of Jesus is being given, although he thinks it probable from the double coincidence of Justin that in some Gospel or other the word 'heresies' was put into the mouth of Jesus. — Gospel according to the Hibre-j.:. p. 156. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 121 difficult to suppose that their compilers, writing at a later date, embodied the words of St Paul in the form above quoted than to assume that the Apostle's words in i Cor. xi. are a quotation from a written Urevangeliuvi^ the 'existence of which is purely hypothetical. In the Logion numbered 34- it is not surprising that Resch should have incurred P. Ewald's condemnation, ai "/vvaXKes vTTorda'crecrOe T0I9 Iciois avcpaxnv, as it seems nothing less than arbitrary to find in passages like CoL iiL 18, in the expression 6>s aj/^xev kv fcvpio}, and r Cor. xiv. ^/, references to a written Urei-angelium. The same may be said of i Cor. vii. 10 (* Agrapha,' p. 185), although Resch does not appear altogether to exclude the possibility of oral tradition in his examination of the passages in question (' Agrapha,' p. 186). At the same time these passages afford us another proof of the manner in which Paul's teaching was in perfect harmon\- with that of Jesus. But the Old Testament would be quite sufficient for the command of both Peter and Paul that the women should be in subjection to their husbands, without referring such a command to a definite saying of Jesus. Resch admits the connection between the command given in Ephes. v. 22, 24; CoL iiL 18; i Peter iii. I, 5, vS:c. and Gen. iiL 16, and Peter might naturally recall this last passage in speaking of the holy women of the Patriarchal days. Logion 26, avj]p aZoKifios airsipaa^os reminds us of James i. 12 as much as, if not more than, of 2 Cor. xiii. 5-7, and if the verse in James is really some sa>-ing of our Lord, as there is reason to believe, St Paul's use of the word aSoKifios and the stress he lays upon it may indicate that he, no less than St. James, was acquainted with this saying of Christ ' See Expositor for June 1891, ' Is the Apostolic Lituigy quoted by St. Pan! ? ' p. 408. On the introdaction of these words of Paul into the Apoit. Ccnst. as if they were the words of Christ, see Meyer, Korimtherhriefe, L 520, 321 ; and cm the misonderstaliding of the passage by which they found a place in the ancient Liturgies in the same form, see Schmiedel in Hand-CcmnutUar sum ^V. T. u. 131, ersle Abtheilung, ii. Halfie, 1891. Renan's remarks on I Cor. xL 23 fil are also of interest in coonectioD with the above : see Les EvixngiUs, p. 78, note I. - Ubi supra, p. 144. 122 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES Logion 27, which Resch quotes from the narrative of the man working on the Sabbath in Codex D, and which, he argues, formed a part of the oldest Gospel source, could be better supported, as P. Ewald points out (p. 160, nbi supra),. by referring to the original Judaic-Christian character of the Codex — which would scarcely have been favourable to the introduction of such a saying of Christ as this part of it contains if it had not been genuine — rather than to the verbal coincidences with Paul and James. It certainly does seem rather fanciful when Resch finds an argument in support of his theory in the fact that Paul and James use the expression Trapa^drris vofxov, which occurs in the narrative in Codex D, or that because Luke (xii. 14) and Paul (Rom. ii. i) use the same form of address, avOpwirs — w avOpwrrs, they had recourse to some older Gospel source employed by both of them, containing the narrative in Codex D, in which the same form of expression occurs.' With regard to Logion 28, sStKatcoOj] ra sOvrj vTrsp v/xas, we must remember that Resch himself points out that it is quoted in ' Apost. Const. ' ii. 60, in immediate connection with Logion 58. In this latter Logion, iSiKatoodT] %6Soixa sk aov, it seems that we have one of those combinations of parallel passages in the Gospels so frequent in early Church writers (comp. Resch, ' Agrapha,' p. 259), e.£: Matt. xi. 20, 24, 19, Luke vii. 35, x. 12, and the former (Logion 28) may merely contain an inference from the latter (Logion 58), or it maybe a reminiscence of the thought expressed by Paul in Gal. iii. 8. In Logia 30-37 Resch finds allusions to one Epistle, viz. the Ephesians, and it must be remembered that in arguing from it to St. Paul's acquaintance with the words and thoughts of Jesus, we are dealing with one of those Epistles which negative critics regard as very doubtful. In this Epistle Resch believes that there are more allusions to the written Hebrew Urevangelium than in any other (' Agrapha,' p. 195)- Logion 30 comprises the strange saying, ' When the two ' Keim, ubi supra, in discussing this extra-canonical saying of Jesus, classes it amongst those which would directly contradict our knowledge of the character of His teaching derived from other sources. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 1 23 shall be one, and that which is without as that which is within, and the male with the female neither male nor female' (Clem. Rom. ' Ep. ' ii. 12), prefaced by the words 'The Lord Himself having been asked by some one when His Kingdom will come, said ' (sTrepcorrjdsls yap avros 6 Kvpios VTTO TIV09, TTOTS i]^sc uvTOv T] ^aaCksla, sIttsv • orav scrraL ra Bvo h', Kal TO £^(o 009 TO saco, kol to apasv fxsTa tt}? OrfKsLas, ovTs apasv ovts OfjXv). Bishop Westcott compares this with Gal. iii. 28 ' (see also Resch, ' Agrapha,' pp. 201, 202), and speaks of it as a mystical saying very different in form from the character of our Lord's words - (comp, 7{di supra, p. 460). Resch takes each of its four parts and examines them at considerable length. With regard to the first part, orai/ saTut ra Bvo sv, he finds interesting parallels in Ephes. ii. 14-16, 18^ but it appears somewhat fanciful to suppose that it must have been before Paul's mind in Gal. iii. 20, or to find any point of connection with the second part kuI to s^co cos- to saco in 2 Cor. iv. 10. At the same time, when we consider the mystical and fanciful manner of treating the Lord's words, it does not seem altogether improbable that we have here a free combination of such passages in the Gospels as John x. 12-16; Matt, xxiii. 26; Mark vii. 18; Luke xvii. 20; and possibly Matt, xxvii. 30 ; Mark xii. 25 ; Luke xx. 35 (comp. ' Agrapha,' p. 202). In Logion 31, alluded to in Ephes. ii. 17, v/ntv toIs fxaKpai/ Kal Tols iyyvs, it is difficult to suppose that anything more than an Old Testament parallel, Isaiah Ivii. 19, is in the writer's mind, and in ' Apost. Const. ' ii. 54 (' Agrapha,' p. 109), the phrase KaOois ysypaiTTai which introduces this Logion does not demand anything more ; the same remark may apply to the words associated with the Logion under ' The good instance of the mixture of a mystic explanation with a simple text from the IIio-tis 2o(/)ta to which Westcott refers in this connection, as quoted by Tischendorf on Matt. xxiv. 22, is as follows : 4Ko\6^ui(ra rols Kaipoiis Sia rovs iK\fKrovs fxov • el yUTj, oiiK &j/ iratro ij/ux^ iffcLQf). iKo\6fiw(Ta S« rui/s Kaipovs Kal tovs y^pSfOvs Sio rhv a.pi.dfxhv rbv riKeiov twv \pvxiin' cu KrjrpovTat rh fivaT-qpiov • avrai elffiv oi eK\(KToi ■ Kal el firj eKoXufiaxra tovs xP'^^ovs, ovk h.v iracra (^"X^ iiKiKij iffwdr]. Tischendorf, A^. T. Grace, edit. 7, 1859. -■ Comp. also the strictures of Keim, ubi supra, p. 32. 124 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES the same formula Kadcos 'ys'^painaL in ' Apost. Const. ' ii. 54, ovs syvQ) Kvpios ovras ainov, and also to 2 Tim. ii. 19 (comp. Num. xvi. 5), although it is quite possible that Paul had in mind the manner in which the Lord Jesus uses the word I71/&), Matt. vii. 23 ; Luke xiii. 27 ; and the way in which He speaks in these passages certainly contains an interesting parallel with Paul's words in 2 Tim. ii. 19 (' Agrapha/p. 207). Logion 32 may present a parallel with Matt, xxiii. 9, but because in Ephes. iii. 1 5 Paul uses the verb ovo/xd^srai, which is not found in the passages quoted by Resch from extra- canonical writings, we cannot argue that the verb in question is an addition made by Paul to the original Logion to show that he was making a quotation, and that it was afterwards omitted by later writers (' Agrapha,' p. 207). There is no proof that the words are not, in each of the extra-canonical passages, a reminiscence of the words of Paul in Ephes. iii. 15. The familiar words in Logion 33, 'Let not the sun go down upon your wrath,' need not contain a saying of Christ. The words in all probability are a reminiscence of Deut. xxiv. 15, just as the first part of the verse may be referred to Psalm iv. 5. In Polycarp ' Ad Phil.' xii. i, it is noteworthy that we have the two passages of the Old Testament similarly combined, and it is difficult to believe that we have not in this case a reminiscence of Ephes. iv. 26 (comp. Salmon ' Introduction to the N. T. ' p. 389, and Holtzmann ' Einleitung in das N. T. ' p. 290). On the other hand, Weiss, who admits the reference to the Old Testament, cannot believe that Polycarp quotes directly from the Ephesians ('Einleitung in das N. T. ' p. 33), whilst Meyer apparently favours the view that in the expression Kadods iv rats ypa(f)aLs sipTjrai with which the passage is introduced, Polycarp refers to the Old Testament, although he admits a possible reference to Ephesians {Der Brief an die Epheser, ' Einleitung,' p. 28). In the ' Vita S. Syncleticae,' from which Resch also quotes, we seem to have another of those combina- tions to which Weiss refers, and which might easily arise in a quotation from memory. The other passages quoted by Resch may probably be explained by referring them to the AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 1 25 Old Testament, or, at all events, to the preaching of the Apostles, and none of them can be said to afford a proof that the Logion in question was an actual utterance of Christ, or that it must be referred to a written Gospel source. The command, yu./; Sore 7rp6(f)a(Tiv tco Trovrjpw, which Resch regards as a Logion (34), cannot be said to be supported by an}- strong patristic testimony. The only passage to which Resch refers is one in the ' Clem. Horn. ' xix. 2, and here the words may be a reminiscence of Ephes. iv. 2y, or they inay be one of the traditionary sayings of Christ (comp., however, Meyer in loco, and Westcott, p. 460, ubi supra). Logion 56, which Resch regards as closely akin to the one in question, di/T£o-T7;TH rw Sia^oXa, does not require us to believe that it found a place in an original Hebrew document from which James, Peter, and Paul all derived it (' Agrapha,' p. 258). There is good reason to believe that the Epistle of James was used by Peter in his first Epistle, and possibly the Ephesians also, and the quotation in Hermas (' Mand. ' xii. 2, 4), dvriaTTjTS rco Sia^oXo) koL (psv^srac a^' vfXMv, is evidently a quotation from James iv. 7, an Epistle upon which the wTiter frequently depends (Weiss, ' Einleitung in das N. T. ' p. T,y). In Logion 35 it is probable that we have one of the aypa(j)a Soy/jbara or unrecorded sayings of Christ, but it can hardly be said that its connection with Ephes. iv. 28 is very obvious. But if the ' Didache ' (i. 6), in which this Logion occurs, ' Let thine alms sweat into thy hands, so long as thou knowest to whom thou givest ' (iSpcoadro) rj hXeTjfioavvr) crov et'y rds ■x^slpds crov, /xs-^pis dv yvmsrivi, 8ms) was 'an intensely Jewish document,' the words may have been taken from some Jewish manual reckoned as a sacred authority, as the command is prefaced by the formula sipijTac. Logion ^6 a is said to be quoted in a work to which Resch in this connection attaches much importance, the ' De Aleatoribus ' of the Pseudo-Cyprian, which may be, in Harnack's judgment, the oldest Latin Christian writing. Harnack himself ascribes it to Victor of Rome, and places it at the close of the second century — an early date which Dr. Salmon, with other critics, is altogether unable to accept. 126 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES The Logion, according to Harnack, runs as follows : 'Monet Dominus et dicit : tiolite contristare Spirituni Sanctum, qui in vobis est, et nolite exstinguere lunten, quod in vobis effulsit ; and he believes that we have here two separate quotations. Resch argues that the whole passage forms only one Logion, and that the two parts afford an instance of Hebrew parallelism, and therefore a proof of its original Hebrew form. In Greek he points out that the Logion would run thus : TrapaKoXwv <})r)alv 6 Kvpios' Mr; XvTrslrs to irvsvfia to ayiov to sv vfxlv KaTOiKovv, Koi fMT] ajBivvvTS TO (f)(os TO sv vfiiv sirnrsc^a'yKos. And to this Logion he finds a reference not only in Ephes. iv. 30, but also in i Thess. v. 19, for when Paul says ' Quench not the Spirit,' to irvsvfxa firj a-^ivvvTS, he presupposes that the Spirit is a light. But we have what certainly may be a much earlier reference to the first part of this Logion in Hermas, * Mand.' x. 2, 5, where words are used which seem to be a reminiscence of Ephes. iv. 30 combined with James iv. 5, two Epistles with both of which there is reason to believe that Hermas was familiar.^ Resch himself admits that there is an evident relationship between various passages in Hermas' ' Mand.' and Ephes. iv. 25, 29, 31 (' Agrapha,' p. 218, 219). But he thinks it possible that as words of the Lord are contained in Ephes. iv. 26, 27, 28, 30, 32 (see p. 219 and Logia ZZ-Z^^)^ so also verses 25, 29, 3 1, in the same chapter, may be referred to words of the Lord, which Hermas derived from a pre-canonical Gospel source. He therefore argues for the possibility that the whole section Ephes. iv, 25-v, i, carries us back to words of the Lord derived from this same source. But it is plain that such a line of argument must be very conjectural. We may notice in passing that Dr. Resch, in support of his posi- tion that Logion 36 a is derived from this pre-canonical Gospel source, points to the striking relationship between the words of the Logion and passages in our canonical Gospels, e.g. Matt. vi. 33, Luke xi. 35. But as i Thess. v. 19 and Ephes. iv. 30 are also closely connected by Resch with this Logion, ' Weiss, Einleittiug in das N. T. p. 37 ; Holtzmann, Einleitungin das N. T. p. 290 ; Salmon, Introduction, p. 389. AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 12/ a further rclationsliip is thus established between these pas- sages in the Epistles, and the language of the Gospels (comp. also Ephes. v. 8, and Luke xvi. 8, ' Agrapha,' p. 217). Logion 36 b is of interest because whilst Resch does not give any definite Pauline parallel to it (* Agrapha,' p. xi) he finds a connection between the first part of the Logion and the phraseology, not only of Paul, but of John. Thus the expression ' ita me in vobis videte ' finds a parallel in John xiv. 20, ' You in me, and I in you ' (v/xsis iv i/j-ol KuyoD iv vfilv), John xiv. 20, and Gal. ii. 20, ' But Christ liveth in me ' {^jj Bs iv ifiol Xpia-ros), (' Agrapha,' p. 222). Logion Tfj gives us one of those New Testament pas- sages (Ephes. v. 14) which have sometimes been referred to some well-known Christian hymn, sometimes to various pas- sages of the Old Testament, sometimes to an unknown apocryphal writing (' Agrapha,' p. 226 ; Meyer, z'u loco). By Epiphanius it is distinctly ascribed to the apocryphal ' Apocalypse of Elijah,' and Resch thinks that possibly both Origen and Hippolytus refer it to the same writing (pp. 223, 224). But Resch seems undecided for his own part as to whether it can be referred to a word of the Lord. The parallels which he quotes show that the saying may be easily connected with sayings of Christ in the Gospels employed both in a literal and in a metaphorical sense ; comp. e.g. Matt. ix. 5, Luke v. 24, Matt. ix. 5, Luke vii. 14, Mark v. 39, Mark v. 41, Luke viii. 52, Matt. ix. 24; comp. also Luke ix. 60, XV. 24, 32 &c. (' Agrapha, p. 225). Logion 39 contains one of those sayings to which Resch allows that parallels may be found in the Old Testament, and he quotes two from Ezckiel (LXX) xviii. 30, xxxiii. 30,' (p. 227), in which the word Kpivw is emphasised just as ' Westcott also parallels the saying with Ezek. xxxiii. 20, xxiv. 14. Keim compares it with Matt. xxiv. 40, xxv. i (see Geschuhte Jesti, i. 29). Dr. Sanday thinks that the authorship of Ezekiel, to whom this saying is referred in the Vita S. Antonii (at the end of the fourth century), probably applies to some apocry- phal work bearing the prophet's name, and that Justin refers it to Christ by a slip of memory, aided by the tendency already in force to give a specifically Christian interpretation to all parts alike of the Old Testament [Expositor, June 1891, p. 419). But Resch also admits the existence of this apocryphal book, and that it was known to Josephus {Agrapha, p. 290). 128 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES in the Logion. The words of the latter are these, as they are found in Justin Martyr (' Dial. c. Tryph.' 47) : In zvJiatsoever I may find you, i?t this zvzll I a/so Judge you ('Ei/ ols av vyuas KaToKajBco, sv rovrois Koi Kpcvu)), and the Words are introduced by Justin thus : ' Our Lord Jesus Christ said ' (o rj/jLSTspo9 KvpLos 'Itjaovs Xptarbs sIttsv). But Resch maintains that both Justin and Paul had the original Logion before them, and that they adopted the same rendering of the Hebrew verb which admits of the three variations all found in the different versions of the Logion quoted by Resch, KaroKafi- ^dvevv — supia-KStv — aiphiv (pp. 227-229). But it is certainly somewhat fanciful to find a reference to the Logion in i Thess. V. 4, and still more fanciful to find another in Phil. iii. 12, to account for such allusions by referring them to the Apostolic way of playing upon the words of Christ, and to see in these Pauline allusions, which only consist in the employment of the same verb KaraXafi^avscv, a guarantee of the Christian origin of the Logion. With regard to Logion 43, in the discussion of which Resch, as Dr. Sanday says, ' surpasses himself ' in the numbers of allusions which he finds, is the connection between it and I Thess. V. 21 so certain as it is generally assumed to be ? The most recent German criticism seems to doubt it. Resch refers to the use by Hesychius of the words sl8os voixiapiaTos to prove that slhos, the word used by Paul in i Thess. v. 21, meant ' a kind of coin,' and that therefore this verse may be fitly connected with the Logion ' Show yourselves approved money-changers' (yivsaOs TpaTrsl^lrac Soki/xol), in which the idea is hot that of banking, but of money -changing, ' the taking of coin as bad or good.' But slSos vofiLcr/xaros, as Schmiedel points out,^ is one thing, slSoy by itself may be quite another ; and he remarks that it is unnecessary to interpret the word in I Thess. v. 21, of the changing of coin because the Church Fathers have connected with this verse the aypacpov of Jesus. There seems to be no valid proof that the Logion in question and I Thess. v. 2 1 were originally part of one saying. Weiss sees no difficulty in believing that the saying was probably ' Hand-Co7!unenta7- zum N. T. ii. 25, erste Abtheilung, i. Halfte, 1890. AN HISTORTCAI. RETROSrECT 1 29 known b\' oral tradition in spite of the fact that Clement ot Alexandria (' Strom.' i. 28) quotes it as jpacf))],^ but a strong case may be made out for its derivation from the Gospd according to the Hebrews} A final judgment on Resch's laborious work is yet to be passed : but even the criticism which fully appreciates the interest of his remarks admits that there are many difficulties in the way of accepting his conclusions. The German writer Hcrr Bousset, e.g., whom Dr. Sanday describes as ' an inde- pendent follower of Resch,' points out these difficulties very frankl^^ and allows that there is much to be said for them.-' Resch's method, Bousset maintains, is too hasty, and his conclusions too bold. His opinion that the Urevangeliui/i, which he claims to have discovered, was quoted by Paul as ypa(f))] is entirely rejected. In his attempt to prove that many sayings which appear originally to have belonged to Paul, are quoted in patristic literature as words of the Lord, he has not sufficiently weighed the possibility of a confusion of memory, by which words of the Lord might be ascribed to Paul. The second leading proof which Resch adduces on behalf of his supposed Gospel is in Bousset's judgment no more valid than the former. The manner in which Resch refers each variation in the text to a Hebrew written Ur- evangelium is somewhat injudicious : he has not sufficient!}' considered the possibility that through oral tradition many textual variations could perpetuate themselves, and that many extra-canonical sayings of the Lord could be handed down b}' oral tradition, and he has regarded the patristic quotations and the variations in the manuscripts as too liter- ally true. Finally, his supposition that that extra-canonical material, which he has collected so copiously, is to be referred back to a pre-canonical Gospel is nothing but an h}'pothesis. Even supposing that Resch has right on his side, how is it ' Einkititng in das N. T. p, 52. - Salmon, IntroJitition, p. 162, 5th edit. Nicholson, Gospel according to the Hebrews, p. 157. Kcim compares tlie saying to Matt. xxv. 27, or considers that it may be an aftergrowth from it. ' Die Evangeliencitate Just ins Mdrtyrcrs in ihrein IVcrt fiir die Evangelien- krilik, pp. 9, 10, II, 42, 43. 1S91. K I30 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES conceivable, asks Bousset, that such a Gospel as Resch assumes to have existed, which must not only have been a collection of the sayings of the Lord, but a true Urevangeliuni, which Paul quoted as a ypa^rj, which was used by almost all the New Testament writers, and which most of the older Church Fathers must have known — how is it conceivable that such a document should have vanished without leaving a trace be- hind ? But whilst he grants that there is force in most of these objections, Bousset adds that in face of the numerous materials which Resch has collected, it must be admitted that problems still exist in this field of inquiry. The fact at any rate cannot be denied that even writers of a later period, of the third, fourth, and even fifth century, had be- fore them words of the Lord in a fixed written fortii, some of which are not found in our canonical Gospels at all, and others only in a very different shape. Whether this fact can be explained on the supposition of manuscript variations or entire written Gospels, or whether it points to one or more lost Gospels, remains for the present undecided. At all events, Bousset concludes that the attempt must fail to explain from oral tradition all the materials which Resch has collected, and their wide diffusion. On the same page, however, he admits that oral tradition can be employed as the explanation of a series of such isolated Logia as those collected by Resch, although he thinks it inconceivable that any rich and com- prehensive tradition of the Lord's words could have been maintained through a long period by oral tradition alone. But before we are justified in arguing back from the passages collected with such diligent care by Resch, or from the Pauline Epistles in combination with them, to a written Hebrew Urevangeliuni, the work of the Apostle St. Matthew, usually known as the ' Logia,' we must have more positive grounds for believing that the variations which occur in the passages quoted by Resch, and in their Pauline parallels, are due to different translations of some Hebrew word in the original Hebrew Gospel. Even if Resch's theory was admitted with regard to later quotations, it cannot be proved that in the case of St. Paul the variations may not have been in an oj'a/y AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT 13I and not in a written, Hebrew tradition. We must also take care to bear in mind the strictures of Ur. Sanday, (i) that ' the critic must be on the watch for variants which have arisen, not from any fundamental Hebrew, but simply in the course of transmission of the Greek text' ; (2) 'the influence which one writer exercised upon another, and the extent to which some particular form of quotation may have been simp}}' passed on from hand to hand.' ' These considerations, together with the strictures of Wendt and Bousset, to which may now be added those of Ncisgen,^ must be carefully weighed, and it will be found help- ful to consult on the general method of the patristic quotations the sections by Dr. Weiss entitled The Canon of the Lord's Words and The Oldest Traces of the Neiv Testament Epistles in his ' Introduction to the New Testament.' ^ But quite apart from these aspects of the question, there is a further value attaching to the * Agrapha ' of Dr. Resch. It may help to some extent to strengthen the view, maintained ' In his review of Resch's Agrapha in the Expositor, June 189 1. * Nosgen allows that as the New Testament writings do not claim to give us a complete account of the facts of revelation, so it is possible that our knowledge may be increased by extra-canonical sources, and that many unwritten words of Jesus and His Apostles may have been preserved to us. But he points out that even if we should admit all that Dr. Resch has lately adduced, the New Testa- ment would gain no important enrichment, for we should have only what is already contained in our Gospels in another form, or what is entirely new (see also p. 104, above), Geschichte Jesu Christi, pp. 18, 19, 1891.I ' Einlcitung in das N. T. pp. 21-32 ff. 18S9, 2. Aufl. See also Dr. Salmon's remarks on patristic quotations in his Introduction to the N. T. pp. 52, 62, 96, 97, 5th edit. Reuss {Geschichte der heiligen Schriften des N. T. 1887, 6. Aufl. p. 164) also reminds us of the importance of memory and oral tradition in retaining the sayings of Jesus : the form in which many of these sayings appear in the patristic writings may just as well be referred to memory as to written documents unknown to us (comp. also p. 323). In this edition Reuss, whilst admitting that it cannot be precisely determined whether Paul obtained his knowledge of the history of Jesus from written sources or not, thinks that on the whole the probaliilities are against it, and that access to any such written sources cannot be proved from I Cor. xi. 23, and still less from i Cor. xv. Mr. Nicholson would refer many of the important Agrapha enumerated by Resch with more or less probability to the Gospel according to the Ifc/>re7us {see his work mentioned above, pp. 148-162). Amongst others we may enumerate : « Keep the mysteries for Me and for the sons of My house ' ; ' Good must needs come, but blessed is he through whom it comes ' ; ' For in such as I find you in such will I also judge you ' ; ' Show yourselves tried bankers ' ; &c. , &c. K 2 132 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES in the following chapters, that St. Paul was closely acquainted with the mind of Jesus, and that although his Epistles afford few verbal parallels with our Gospels, yet they are pervaded by the same spirit, and presuppose the life and teaching of the same Divine Saviour.' We have travelled a long way from the days of Strauss's first * Leben Jesu.' It is now fifty-three years ago that C. Ullmann so strongly condemned the attempt to write a ' Life of Jesus ' without taking into account the Pauline Epistles,^ with their fatal bearing upon Strauss's statement of the mythical theory ; and we have lived to see a writer of a very different school, Theodor Keim, reject with equal scorn the same attempt, and precisely upon the same grounds} Keim, it is true, never freed himself from the influence of the mythical theory, but we hope that this chapter has sufficiently shown that both he and many of his fellow-countrymen, representing widely different schools of thought, have recog- nised in these Pauline Epistles a firm historical basis for the life and teaching of Jesus of Nazareth, even where they have not fully acknowledged the import of His mission, or the truth of His Divine nature. ' Resch's Agrapha forms, as we have mentioned, vol. v. in Harnack's Texte imd Untersiichungen, and although Harnack's own work, to which reference has been made, belongs more especially to Church History, it has many points of contact with the subject of this chapter. Harnack's position, in this relation, sometimes reminds us of that of Weizsacker, to whom he expresses his warmest thanks in the second edition of his Dogmengeschichte. Although Harnack, as might be expected, considers that the death and resurrection of Christ form the central points of Paul's preaching, and although he maintains that it must remain an open question how far the most weighty Christian conceptions were derived from Paul, or were already found in existence by him (ubi supra, p. 1 1 3, and especially Proleg. to the Didache, p. 64), he admits that the Apostle must have possessed an accurate acquaintance with the preaching of the historical Jesus, that in his own preaching to his Churches he could not have ignored the facts of the life of Jesus, and that he referred for rules of life to the words and example of Jesus {ubi supra, pp. "jt^, 82, 86, 130). Pfleiderer, however, in his recent criticism of Harnack, speaks of the ' surprising indifference ' with which he hurries over the Pauline and Johannine theology, and declares that nowhere does Harnack give us a clear answer as to what constitutes ' uncorrupted Christianity ' {Development of Theology, p. 299). * See chap. i. p. 19. •'' See chap. ii. p. 54. ^n CHAPTER III RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' HAUPTRRIEFE Part I Before we pass on to consider in detail the facts and sayings of the Gospels to which the I^pistles bear witness, it must not be forgotten that modern criticism has refused to spare even the four chief Pauline Epistles. Until a few )'ears ago it was an easy matter to appeal triumphantly to these four Epistles as writings admitted to be authentic even by the most remorseless critics,' but this is no longer possible, and we must not shut our eyes to the fact. English readers are already familiar with the name of the Dutch theologian Dr. Loman. But since the publication of Loman's attack, others of his countrymen have entered the lists against the Epistles ; and more recently still, R. Steck, Professor in the University of Bern, and another Amsterdam Professor, Daniel Volter, have attacked them at length.- ' With the one notable exception of Bruno Bauer, Kritik dcr paiilitiischoi Briefe, p. 1852. It is of interest and importance to bear in mind that whilst recent critics like Steck and Volter unhesitatingly condemn Bauer's eccentricities they do not hesitate to reproduce many of his arguments. Comp. e.g., Steck, Dcr Galaterbrief, pp. 62, 63, and Bauer, tibi supra, p. 45 ; Steck, Der Galaterbrief, pp. 57, 60, and Bauer, tibi supra, pp. 40, 4 1 ; Volter, Die Komp. der pauliniscken Haiiptbriefe, pp. 8 flf. , and Bauer, ubi supra, pp. 47 ff. ; Steck, Der Galater- brief, pp. 70, 71, and Bauer, p. 56 ; Steck, Der Galaterbrief, pp. 73, 136, 153, 154, and Bauer, ubi supra, pp. 67, 73; Volter, iibi supra, p. 167, and Bauer, p. 74 ; Steck, Der Galaterbrief, pp. 268 ff. and Bauer, ubi supra, p. 43 (zweite Abtheilung) : Steck, Der Galaterbrief, p. 211, and Bauer, ubi supra, p. 47; Steck, Der Galaterbrief, p. 206, and Bauer, ubi supra, pp. 61, 62 ; Steck, Der Galaterbrief, p. 182, and Bauer, ubi supra, pp. 70, 71. ' Der Galaterbrief nach seiner Eehtheit untersucht, by R. Steck, Berlin, 1888 ; Die Komposition der pauliniscken Haiiptbriefe, by D. Volter, Tiibingen, 1890. P'or an admirable skit upon these attacks of Steck and Volter, see Romans Dissected, p. 93, by E. D. McRcalsham (T. and T. Clark, 1S91). See Arch- 134 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES In an interesting article entitled 'The Epistles of Paul for the last fifty years in the fire of criticism,' ' Theodor Zahn of Erlangen, whose name is so widely known in connection with the history of the Canon, after speaking of the early acceptance of the Pauline letters by the Church, points out that sixteen centuries had passed since Marcion's time before the authenticity of any one of the thirteen Pauline Epistles was seriously disputed. It is more than half a century ago (1888) that Michaelis published the last edition of his ' Introduction ' ; but his work (and that of Semler which had already appeared in Germany) was chiefly directed, Zahn reminds us, against the dogmatic obligation of the Scriptures, and against theories which regarded the Canon as a faultless production of Divine providence ; it knew little or nothing, he adds, of the criticism of to-day. The next fifty years were not marked by any general critical movement in relation to the Pauline Epistles, although one or other of the writings bearing Paul's name was made the subject of inquiry or attack. But matters changed when F. C. Baur turned his attention to these documents. Ten years before his great work on St. Paul, Baur had in 1835 expressed his doubts as to the Pastoral Epistles (' Die deacon Watkins' Bampton Liciiires, p. 175, for the attack of the Englishman Evanson (1792) upon the Epistle to the Romans, and Holtzmann, Einleihmg in das N. 7\, p. 230). Volter's attack is examined at some length below, pp. 216 ff. Amongst the most recent German criticism we may mention another attack upon the Epistle to the Galatians by J. Friedrich (Maehliss, 1891) entitled Die Unechtheit des Galaterbriefes : ein Beitrag zu einer ki-itisclie^i Geschichte des Ur- christenthnms. The writer mentions that a considerable portion of his pamphlet was composed before he saw Steck's work (p. 39), but as a matter of fact he retails nearly all the same objections which Steck had raised, and all his later pages are simply a summary of Steck's arguments. He makes a great deal of the argument (p. 8) that no years lie between the supposed date of Galatians, 60, and the first testimony to its existence, which he places at 170. But, to say nothing of the fact that the latter date is quite out of the question, the writer entirely forgets that even if the interval was no years it would not be anything like as long as that which separates us from the first attestation of many classical writings which we unhesi- tatingly accept. See, e.g., The Antiijuity and Genuitieness of t/ie Gospels {AWsn), and Archdeacon Watkins' note in his Bampton Lectures, p. 138, 139. ' ' Die Briefe des Paalus seit fiinfzig Jahren im Feuer der Kritik,' in Zeitschrift fiir kirchliche Wissenschaft 7iud k irchliches Leben, p. 452-466, Heft ix. 1889. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUPTBRIEFE ' 135 sogen. Pastoralbricfc,' Stuttg. u. Tlib., 1835) ; in his ' raiilus,' as Zahn points out, he took up the position which he main- tained to the end, and only admitted the four chief Epistles as belonging to Paul, and the Apocalypse as the work of the Apostle John : All the other writings of the New Testament were pseud epigraphic products of an historical development, which extended into the latter half of the second century, and the aim of which was to mediate between the legal Christianity of the primitive Apostles and the free Gospel preached by Paul. The development of Christianity and of Christian literature in the Apostolic and sub-Apostolic age must be forced to obey the Hegelian formula of thesis, antithesis, and higher unity : whatever accords with the history thus intei-preted is (continues Zahn) in Baur's view to be accepted ; otherwise, however great its claim to be con- sidered historical, it must be rejected, even though a more fitting place for it cannot be discovered. That this criticism should have made a great impression in Germany is not, Zahn says, to be wondered at, when we remember how powerful the Hegelian philosophy still was ; but it is a remarkable proof, he holds, of Baur's influence that men who are widely at variance with his conclusions should adopt a phraseology which implies that his distinction between the real and false Pauline letters corresponded with an actual historical development. Thus, B. Weiss in his ' Biblical Theology' treats separately of those writings of St. Paul which he calls ' the four great doctrinal and polemical Epistles,' viz. the four accepted by Baur. But can it be said, as Zahn puts it, that the eschatology of i Corinthians is more closely rel atcd to that of the Romans and Galatians than to that of the Thessalonian Epistles ? or, is not the Epistle to the Ephesians quite as much a 'great' Epistle as the Galatians, and has it not a better claim than 2 Corinthians to the description of ' a doctrinal letter ' .' After pointing out other serious objections to Baur's criticism, Zahn claims that Baur should be prepared to show why the critical grounds upon which he rejects nine Epistles may not equally be maintained against the four which he 136 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES receives. As far as external testimony is concerned — to say nothing of the fact that Baur and others like him always despise it — much less can be adduced for Galatians and 2 Corinthians than for Philippians and Ephesians. And if we turn to the grounds of internal testimon}', Zahn points out that strange results would follow if we advocated upon similar grounds the rejection of the four accepted Epistles. In this connection Zahn reminds us of a former attempt of his own in which, starting from Baur's standpoint, he busied himself to prove that i Corinthians was not written by Paul. The real Paul— so Zahn supposes the argument to run- says in Gal. v. 6 (cf vi. 15), ' In Christ Jesus neither circum- cision availeth anything nor uncircumcision, but faith which worketh by love.' How, then, can the same Paul have written i Corinthians, where we read (vii. 19), ' Circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing, but the keeping the commandments of God ' ? is not this the plain old Catholic legality, the degenerate Paulinism of the post-Apostolic age, which appropriated Pauline turns of speech, but denied their spirit ? The Paul of the Galatians boasts that he had not re- ceived his gospel from men (Gal. i. 12) ; the Paul of i Cor. xv. 1-3, and xi. 23, has received his gospel, just as he has him- self delivered it to the Corinthians, by human means and instruction. He does not appeal to the revelation of the Son of God made personally to him, but to the traditional words and commands of Jesus, and when this latter authority fails him, he is uncertain of his ground. And who can recognise the Paul of the Galatians who so boldly withstands Peter to his face, charges him with hypocrisy, and speaks only with irony of the very chiefest Apostles, in i Corinthians, the author of which places himself so far beneath the older Apostles, declares himself unworthy of the name of an Apostle, and shows himself entirely indifferent to the dis- tinction between a Pauline and a Petrine gospel (i Cor. xv. 9-1 1)? It is not the Paul of the Galatians, but the Paul of the Acts, who claims it as a merit that to the Jews he became as a Jew, and to them that are without law, as RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUl'TBRIEEE ' 137 without hiw (I Cor. ix. 20, 21). If the same Paul only rebukes the partisans of Peter, who opposed Paul at Corinth, just as he rebukes those who formed the Paul-party in the same city, on account of their part)' spirit ; if, indeed, he attacks the latter still more sharply and directly, since he exemplifies the folly of partisanship in connection with the name of Paul (i Cor. i. 13) — who does not recognise in all this the same conciliatory tendency, levelling all the oppo- sitions of the Apostolic age, which renders the Acts an untrustworth}' book ? Is not this the attitude of a man of Catholic spirit, utterly indifferent to all parties, such as that which characterises the pseudo-Paul of Phil. i. 18 — ' If only Christ is preached, whether in pretence or in truth, I do rejoice thereof? It is true — so we may suppose this argu- ment to run — that the pseudo-Paul is cautious enough to avoid in both passages the word ' catholic,' which confessedly first sprang into existence about the middle of the second century. But much more plainly even than in the exhorta- tions to unity, and in the ever-recurring Travres of the Philippian Epistle, is the idea of the ' Catholic ' Church expressed in i Corinthians. Already Holsten (' Evangelium des Paulus,' i. 1,453) has correctly recognised that the correct text and meaning of i Cor. i. 2, against which he in vain contends, is thoroughly 'catholic' The one collective Church, standing above the particular Churches as the highest earthly authority, which the pseudo-Paul of the Philippians preaches, the critic finds in such passages as I Cor. X. 32, xii. 28 ; he finds it again where this pseudo- Paul demands the submission of the individual judgment to the uniform custom of all the Churches (i Cor. iv. 17, vii. 17, xi. 16, xiv. 33). In short, so long as the Epistle to the Galatians is made the Archimedean point from which the traditional view of Apostolic Christianity is to be turned upside down, so long must each impartial judgment acknowledge that I Corinthians is only a link in the chain of pseudonymous literature, which forms the passage over the storm-tossed period of the Apostolic age to the peace of the Catholic Church. Such is the ingenious way in which Zahn shows that Baur's 138. THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES line of attack might be extended much farther than he himself desired, and it will be seen that similar arguments to those which Zahn imagines have been actually reproduced in the recent opposition to the four great Epistles by Steck and Volter. As Zahn reminds us, a reaction followed against Baur's views even in the ranks of his own followers. Not only, as we have seen, does Hilgenfeld accept more than one of the Epistles which Baur rejected, but a still more signal opposi- tion was offered by one of the most famous of recent theo- logians, Albrecht Ritschl. His definite and fundamental breaking away from Baur's theory of the history of the Apostolic age (cf Ritschl's ' Entstehung der alt-katholischen Kirche,' 2. Aufl. Bonn, 1857) ' may fairly be called the most important event in the history of the contest with the Tubingen school. There is no need to delay over ' the hypothesis of inter- polations,' - as it may be called, with which the names of C. H. Weisse and F. Hitzig are associated. Such hypotheses are ' Weiss, Einhitiing in das N. T. p. 13, 2. Aufl. 1889. For an appreciative notice of the importance of Ritschl's work see Archdeacon Watkins' Bainpfon Lectures, pp. 235, 242, 364, 1890. Pfieiderer seems quite unable to do justice to Ritschl {Development of Theology, pp. 235-237, 1890), whilst no one would suppose in reading the passing allusion to him in the * New Reformation ' {Nineteenth Century, p. 472, March 1889) that his ' scientitic opposition' to the Tubingen school had been any opposition at all. - ' Die Interpolationshypothese,' R. Steck, Der Galatej-brief,-^. 8, Berlin, 1888. See also Weiss, Einleitiing, p. 159, 2. Aufl. ' Weisse hat seine Ansicht an den meisten der paulinischen Briefe durchgeflihrt und war iiberzeugt, das Richtige gefunden zu haben. Aber viel Anerkennung hat er damit nicht gefunden, sondern fast lediglich Widerspruch freilich letzteren auch mehr nur in der summarischen Weise, wie man die Ansichten Bruno Bauer's abgethan hatte. Seine Methode erschien gerade als die subjectivste von alien und man urtheilte liber sie von den verschiedensten Seiten abfallig (vgl. z. B. Meyer-Sieffert im Cominentar zum Galaterbriefe, 7. Aufl. p. 26 : "Die zahlreichen Interpolationen, welche nach Weisse der apostolische Text erfahren haben soil, beruhen lediglich auf subjectiver Stylkritik mit volliger Hinwegsetzung liber die kritischen Zeugen ; " und Hilgen- feld, Einleitiing, p. 192 : " Ueber die Paulus-Briefe hat er seltsame, den Text zerreissende und zerstorende Ansichten hinterlassen in den Beitriigen zur Kritik der paulinischen Briefe," &c. ) In der That gewinnt der Leser keine rechte Ueberzeugung davon, dass die von Weisse zurechtgestellten paulinischen Briefe nun urspriinglicher seien als die, welche wir jetzt lesen, und so blieb die ganze Absicht auf den engen Kreis seiner besonderen Schiiler beschrankt ' (R. Steck, Der Galaterhrief, pp. 9, 10). RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUTTBRIEFE ' 1 39 SO entirely subjective that Weissc has been condemned by- critics of very opposite tendencies, and Hitzig's chief distinc- tion seems to be that he anticipated Holtzmann's theory of the mutual relations of the Colossian and Ephesian Epistles.' Even critics like Daniel Volter who have done their best to revive similar hypotheses are obliged to acknowledge the abeyance and discredit into which such views have fallen. - With this interpolation-hypothesis Zahn connects the "* Verisimilia,' the joint work of two Dutch theologians, A. Ficrson and S. A. Naber (1886).^ It was the same year, as Zahn reminds us, which witnessed the ingenious attempt of a young Swiss theologian, Eberhard Vischer, to prove that the Johannine Apocalypse was a Jewish book, interpolated from Christian sources,'* and so, adds Zahn with pardonable irony, one might be superstitious, and believe in a Time-Spirit to account for the remarkable coincidence that similar ideas should thus be evolved unconsciously and simultaneous!}', since Pierson and Nabcr take up the position that the Pauline Epistles also were compiled to a great extent out of Jewish writings. In thus passing to a brief consideration of the ' Verisimilia,' the extraordinary attempt of Bruno Bauer in 1850-52, and again in 1876, to disprove, not only the whole of the Pauline Epistles, but the historical reality of Jesus Christ, has by no means been forgotten, but it seems naturally to connect itself Avith the similar radical attempt of Loman in 1882 (which will be considered in due course), just as we associate the ' After alluding to Weisse's theory, Zahn adds : ' Ueberraschte namentlich die Hypothese, dass ein echter Brief des Paulus an die Kolosser von eineni und ^'^^ is, indeed, one of the features in his character most conspicuous in the Gospels. A little 7>iore attention to this would have saved many doctrinaii-e objections to the narrative of the Acts, where the inconsistency, which is really one of character, is treated as if it stood in the way of the objective truth of the events.' 2 Q\oB, Die Jtingste Kriiik des Galaterbriefes, 1890, pp. 16-18; Hilgenfeld, Zeitschrift fiir ivissen. Theologie, pp. 358, 359, 1890. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' HAUPTBRIEFE ' l6l quite apart from those which are concerned with the characters of Peter and Paul, would have been solved had he only given due allowance to the simple fact that the Epistle to the Galatians is an Epistle and not a history? His con- tention is that the author of the Galatians purposed to correct in every detail the account of the Acts as to Paul's life and work. But the historical information is evidently subservient to a definite didactic aim. The author is con- cerned to show by a reference to historical facts, that Paul's gospel was the result of a direct revelation from God ; that the heads of the Church at Jerusalem had added nothing to it, and that Paul had advocated his gospel even in face of the error of Peter. But if it was the author's purpose to furnish this apologetic proof, then we have no right to expect that the historical facts which are concerned with the question shall be related with entire fulness of view. And so when Steck says of the negotiation related in Gal. ii. that it was the most senseless (p. io6) which could have been transacted, he leaves the fact entirely out of con- sideration, that it did not concern the Epistle to give informa- tion of the whole transaction which had been conducted in Jerusalem. The Galatian Epistle by no means excludes these transactions, of which the Acts gives us an historical report ; but there was no occasion to represent them fully, any more than there was to communicate the Apostolic decree. The only question at issue was to show that the gospel preached by Paul had also found unreserved recog- nition in Jerusalem.' Upon some of the other historical difficulties raised by Steck it is scarcely necessary to dw^ell at length. When, e.£:, In the following pages constant reference will be made to the treatise of Gloel, and many of his arguments have been rendered into the text. Dr. Sanday, it will be remembered, has described this work of Gloel's as perhaps the most decisive reply to Steck's attack upon the Hattptbriefe. Gloel's early death in the June of last year called forth an appreciative notice of his life and labours in the Evatigelisch-Littherische Kirchenzeitung {]n\y 24), pp. 723-6. (Dr. Salmon also refers to Gloel's treatise, Inlrod. p. 356, 5th edit. See, too, Nosgen in his Geschichte Jesu Christi, p. 20, 1S91.) ' Gloel, ubi supra, pp. 51, 52 ; Sabaiier, UAp5tre Paul, p. 6. M l62 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES he insists that the Galatians is at variance with the Acts with reference to Paul's conversion and the circumstances attendant upon it, it is plain that in each the conversion is regarded as an act of God, and that Paul's commission to preach his gospel is in each derived from a divine and not a human source (cf Gal. i. 15, 16 with Acts xxii. 21, and Gal. ii. 7, 8).' The part assigned to Ananias in the Acts, which Stack seems willing to admit as probably historical- does not exclude the Apostle's statement in Gal. i. 1 2, that he had not received his Gospel from men ; ^ the journey to Arabia is also not excluded by the narrative of the Acts, nor does it follow from the Galatians that Paul avoided all intercourse with the Christians at Damascus, and disdained all human sources of information.^ The fact that the Apostle remained so long absent from Jerusalem after his conversion may be easily explained, if we bear in mind that as he was converted by the exalted Christ, so for him the Messiahship of Jesus depended not upon what He was or had done and taught in His earthly life, nor upon the information which could be obtained from the primitive Apostles, but upon what Jesus had become through His death and resurrection;' or if we remember that it is almost impossible to suppose that ' Lindemann, Die Echtheit der paulinischeti Hauptbriefe, p. 39. ' Ganz ubereinstimmend mit Act. ist dem Paulus sein Evangelium an die Heiden ausdriicklick nicht durcli menschlichen, sondern gottlichen Auftrag uberbunden worden, Act. xxii. 1 7. Wer sollte uberhaupt Paulus iiber Heidenmission instruirt oder ein Colleg gelesen habe (Gal. i. 12), da er doch der erste war, der dieses Werk mit Erfolg betrieb ? Vgl. Gal. ii. 7 u. 8, wo das " mir vertraut " ein Gott gegeben Meisterschaft und Bewahrung andeutet.' - Steck, ubi supra, p. 92. ^ Cf. Lindemann, ubi supra. ^ See especially Lindemann's answer to Steck's objections on each of these points, ubi supra, p. 40. Compare also Lightfoot, Galatians, p. 89, and Conybeare and Howson, Life and Epistles of St. Paul, p. 82. ' This is the answer of B. Weiss to Steck's objections : ' Die Bedenken, die neuerdings R. Steck {^Der Galaterln-ief, Berlin, 1888) gegen dies Fernbleiben erhoben hat, erledigen sich einfach dadurch, dass dem Apostel in Folge seiner Bekehrung durch den erhohten Christus die messianische Bedeutung Jesu eben nicht in dem lag, was derselbe inseinem irdischen Leben gewesen war oder gethan und belehrt hatte, und was er darum von den Uraposteln erkunden konnte, sondern in dem, was er durch seinen Tod und seine Auferstehung geworden war ' {Ei7ileittm,s:, p. 1 17, 2. Aufl.). RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUl'TBRIEFE ' 163 Paul, before his short \isit to Peter in Jerusalem, was ie^norant of all the circumstances of the earthly life of Jesus.' But no one can mistake the bias of a writer who lays stress upon definite notes of time, as evidence of accurate information, in the narrative of the Acts, and dismisses them as altogether untrustworthy in his estimate of the Epistle to the Galatians ; - who sees in the former book the representation of some mediating follower of the Apostle, and in the latter ' the Pauline legend ' at work, full of improbabilities and incon- sistencies, having for its object the exaltation of Paul, as the hero of freedom, who owed nothing to Peter or James.'"' An impartial reader will rather find in these definite notes of ' See further on this point, chap. viii. Lindemann points out that Paul, as a persecutor of the Christians, must have made acquaintance with their teaching ; or, as he asks, are we to suppose that men persecute that of which they know nothing ? According to Acts vi. Paul had contended with one of the ablest Christian teachers, as a member of the Cilician synagogue ; while Steck proceeds throughout upon the one-sided pre- supposition that Paul's mind at the time of his conversion must have been a tabu/a rasa. Lindemann, it is to be noticed, insists no less than a conservative writer like Dr. Gloel that the Apostle's ' Gospel ' was based upon the deepest religious experiences of a life, and was not merely the result of instruction from without, or of a gradual mental process, although he sees no difficulty in supposing that intercourse with his fellow-Christians aided the inward illumination of the Apostle. See especially Lindemann, ubi supra, pp. 9, 40, and comp. Gloel, Die jihigste Kritik dcs Galatcrbriefes, pp. 48-51. Lindemann remarks (p. 40) : ' Paulus hat sich jedenfalh von den Christen nicht abgesondert, davon ist im Gal. gar keine Rede ; aber als tief religiose Natur kann er dcch liber seinen frliheren Wandel nicht so leicht hinweggehen wie Leute der Gegenwart, die ungenirt von einem Lager und extrem ins andere iibergehen und sich in ihrem Leben dfters hauten.' - Steck puts down the ' fourteen years' mentioned in Gal. ii. i as a mere artificial number, in which the author of the Epistle expresses his protest against the way in which the Acts represents Paul as in continuous intercourse with Jerusalem (Steck, ubi supra, p. iii) ; but, as Gloel asks, where is there any proof of such protest in Gal. ii. i ? and why is the precise number fourteen chosen ? are we to suppose that the reason lies in the fact that fourteen is exactly double the symbolic number seven ? and is a secret symbolism also to be found in the number of years mentioned in Gal. i. 18 ? Is it at all probable that any writer of the second century, such as Steck supposes, would have dared to introduce such fictitious notes of lime in opposition to prevailing tradition ? (Gloel, tibi supra, p. 52). So, too, Lipsius, as against Steck's contention that fourteen is an ' artificial number ' {Ilaud-Commeutar zum N. T. ii. zweite Abtheilung, p. 18). ' Steck, ubi sup7a, pp. 119, 120. l64 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES time the proof of a truthful recollection, and in the decisive and pointed communications of the Epistle the clear echo of the personal reminiscences of the author.' But the Galatians is subjected to criticism not only on the ground of its supposed incompatibility with historical circum- stances ; its language, according to Steck, proves that so far from being the oldest of the Hauptbriefe, as it has generally been regarded, it is in reality the youngest, and the order ought to be Romans, i and 2 Corinthians, Galatians. No doubt there are many points of contrast between Romans and Galatians ; but there is nothing strange in this circumstance, and it at once becomes intelligible if in the two Epistles the same author is handling kindred questions.^ If, ^.^.,as Gloel points out, we find in the so-called ' dogmatic ' chief section of the Galatians (iii. i-iv. 7) a shorter representa- tion of the teaching of salvation than that which is more full}' drawn out in the Romans, we are not, as Steck maintains,'^ reduced to the dilemma that either the shorter passage is the outline and the longer the completion, or that the shorter is an abstract of the longer ; there remains the further possi- bility that the same man is drawing on each occasion from the riches of his mental store without of necessity referring in the one case to his exposition in the other. Only upon one supposition would these points of contact appear strange, viz. if we had in one Epistle mechanical repetitions of the expres- sions and turns contained in the other. This is not the case, and there is no single passage, says Gloel, in the Galatians which exactly corresponds with a passage in the Romans, unless it be a quotation from the Old Testament which is em- ployed in each Epistle ; there is no single detailed expression in the Galatians of such a kind that we are compelled to view it as borrowed from the Romans.^ And this decisive refusal to ' Gloel, tdn supra, p. 52. " 'Ich erinnere nur an die unzahligen gegenseitigen Beriihrungen unci Wieder- holungendie sich in Luther's Schriften finden' (Gloel, nbi supra, p. 29). ^ Steck, tdn supra, p. 51 ; cf. Lindemann, tdn supra, pp. 34-8. ^ ' Nirgend begegnet uns im Galaterbrief ein Satz, der vollstandig einem Satze des Romerbriefes gleich ware, es sei denn ein in beiden Briefen verwendetes alttestamentliches Citat. Nirgend ist der Ausdruck im Einzelnen so geartet, dass RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUPTBRIEFE ' 165 regard the Galatians as dependent upon the Romans is by no means confined to conservative critics ; it is equally- emphasised, as Glocl well reminds us, by Lindemann,' and especially b}^ Karl Moisten, who, after a thorough analysis of the Galatian Epistle, shows that the \iewof its literary depen- dence upon the Romans is entirely excluded, and that just as little can a fundamental difference be af^rmed in the attitude of the two Epistles towards the law and Judaism. A comparison of their contents must convince us that the same powerful mind is at work in both Epistles, and whatever differences exist between them are explained by the fact that the same author is writing under changed conditions.- If we examine, under Gloel's guidance, some of the pas- sages to which Steck appeals in support of his theory, his method of procedure is seen to be sufficiently arbitrary. Some of the figures and examples used in the Galatians must have been familiar enough to all readers of the Old Testa- ment, and would naturally be introduced for illustration without our being compelled to adopt the view that they were borrowed from the previously written Epistle to the Romans.^ And if, again, the writer of the Galatians quickly passes from one figure to another — as, e.£:, in Steck's view of Gal. iv. 1-7, where the figure of the heir and his tutors (verses I and 2) is exchanged for one borrowed from a state of slavery and not of sonship (verse 5) — such a transition by no means demands a literary dependence upon Rom. viii. 14-17, as Steck maintains (' Der Galaterbrief,' p. 64), but is quite in harmony with the style of the other Pauline Epistles, where the writer introduces one figure after another, or does not er zu der Annahme einer Enlstehung aus deni Rijmerbrief zwange ' (Gloel, u/>i supra, p. 30). ' Lindemann, uhi supra, pp. 5-8 and 34-8, 41, 55. - ' Kritische Briefe iiber die neueste paulinische Ilypothese,' von Karl Holsten, in der Prot. Kirchenzeittwg, 1889, Nr. 15, 16, 17, 20, 22, 26; referred to by Gloel, nbi supra, p. 13. 3 What, e.g., could be more natural than the appeal lo the faith of Abraham in Gal. iii. 5 and 6, when the Apostle is addressing those who boasted themselves upon their descent from Abraham, and dependel upon that for salvation? Cf. Gloel, uhi supra, pp. 31, 33, 34, and Lindemann, p. 36. 1 66 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES trouble himself to work out his comparison in all its details.^ Nor is it easy to see how a writer, unless he had a theory to serve, could seriously maintain that Gal. iii. 13 is to be ex- plained by referring to Rom. iii. 25. Even if the assertion that ' Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us ' (Gal. iii. 1 3), contains another form of the thought ' whom God hath set forth to be a pro- pitiation through faith in his blood to declare his righteous- ness' (Rom. iii. 25), there is surely no valid reason to allege that we have here an instance of borrowing.'^ Nor, again, are we called upon to believe that the phrase ' to put on Christ ' (Gal. iii. 27) is a combination of Rom. vi. 3 and xiii. 14 ; not only is the expression differently applied in the Galatian Epistle, but the connection of the verses 26-28 is so close and natural, that it is quite arbitrary to suppose the introduction of thoughts borrowed from else- where.'^ And even if, as Steck maintains, there are expressions in Galatians upon which considerable light is thrown by pas- sages in Romans, it is just this mutual supplementary re- lationship of the two Epistles which speaks, as Gloel argues, for the identity of authorship, while it excludes a literary dependence consisting in a mere mechanical transference of words and phrases from one Epistle to another.'* But if we turn to the passage before which, in Steck's opinion, all doubt vanishes, and the dependence of Galatians upon Romans is decisively proved, it would seem, says Gloel, that the clearness of thought which Steck promises as a result of his theory is only rendered hopelessly obscure. According to him, Gal. v. 13-18 can only be explained by reminiscences of Rom. vii., and he supposes that the latter chapter is known to the readers of the Galatian Epistle. No doubt the struggle represented in Gal. v. reminds us of Rom. vii. ; here, as there^ ' Cf. e.g. 2 Cor. iii. 2, 3, with w. 12-18 of the same chapter ; or, again, the figure in Rom. vii. 2, &c. Gloel, p. 33. - Steck, uhi supra, pp. 57, 58. ' Steck, iibi supra, p. ^t,. * Steck, ubi supra, pp. S7-6o. Compare Gloel, p. 32. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' HAUPTBRIEFK ' 167 we arc concerned with the struggle against the flesh and its sinful lust. But, as Gloel shows, it is quite a different struggle against the flesh which is spoken of in the two passages. In Rom. vii. the author is speaking of the unavail- ing struggle which the law, with the consent of the inner man, carries on against sin in the flesh. In Gal. v. the Divine Spirit is represented as an adversary to the flesh which is superior to it. Steck acknowledges that in Gal. v. 16 the Spirit signifies the spirit of the new life; but he thinks that in the next verse (verse 17), it signifies ' the inward man ' spoken of in Rom. vii. No doubt such an interpretation would strengthen the view that the section of Galatians in question is an abridg- ment of the fuller teaching of the Romans ; but is there any- ground for adopting it ? Is it not rather evident that imme- diately we connect 'the Spirit ' inverse 17 with the same word in verse 16, and understand it of the spirit of the new life — z.i\ the Spirit of God — without any reference to Rom. vii. (where, as Steck himself admits, the word ' spirit ' is not used '), we have a continuous sequence of thought which is only con- fused by the introduction into the text of expressions taken from a passage of a totally different meaning? The whole section, verses 16-18, stands in close connection, says Gloel, with the verses which precede and follow, and there is no occasion to maintain with Steck that verse 18 is a reminiscence of Rom. vi. 14, viii. 14, and is quite inconsistent with the context in which we here find it.'- Such a mode of expression could not be altogether foreign to a writer who had already discussed at length the position of the Galatians with reference to the law (Gal. iii. i-iv. 7) ; but Gloel shows us that it has in verse 18 its own fitting significance. In opposition to the Judaisers, the Apostle de- clares that the victory over the desires of the flesh can be obtained by a higher might than the law. The office of the law was to oppose the lust of the flesh, and he who lived after the flesh stood in need of the discipline of the law. But he who lived after the Spirit subdued the lust of the flesh by a divine power, and stood no longer under the law. To him ' Steck, t//>i supra, p. 72. -' Steck, iibi supra, p. 73. 1 68 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES the law with its prohibition has nothing to say (cf. also Gal. V. 23) ; in the power of the Spirit, and with inward freedom, he lives in the practice of the love which the law demands, and therefore he no longer needs the external compulsion of the law (cf V. 22 with v. 13-15).' But if Steck's theory fails of proof when tested by parti- cular passages, does it gain any support from the alleged difference in the general point of view of the two Epistles ? This difference, in Steck's judgment, is shown by the compara- tive depreciation of the law in Galatians, and by the manner in which Jew and Gentile are placed on an equal footing in the face of Christianity, so widely removed from the value attached to Judaism in Romans (especially ix. 1-5) ; it is therefore im- possible to suppose that Galatians preceded Romans, when we see how much further it is removed from the Jewish point of view ; it occupies rather a middle place between the Paulinism of the Roman Epistle and the Paulinism of Marcion.^ But the differences upon which Steck insists are capable, as Gloel proceeds to show, of a perfectly fair explanation. No doubt the opposition to the Judaisers in Galatians is more acute than in the Romans, and, as a natural result, the transitory significance of the law is more pointedly emphasised. The Galatians were far more likely to become a prey to Judaism than the readers of the Roman Epistle, and it was therefore necessary to draw the line of demarcation between their state under the law and their state under grace with the utmost clearness. But the position assigned to the law is not materially changed. In Galatians, as well as in Romans, divine authority attaches to the Scriptures, of which the law is a constitutive part (iii. 8, 10, 13, iv. 27, 30), and not only so but the law itself is represented as a means of acquiring a ' Gloel, iibi supra, p. 36. ' So zeigt es sich, class in V. i5-i8 ein geschlos- sener Gedankengang herrscht, sobald man nur diesen Abschnitty/V'r j-?V// selbst und in seinem Ziisammenhang mit den vorangehenden und nachfolgenden Ausfiihrungen unseres Briefes betrachtet. Sobald man aber die andersgearteten Aussagen aus Rom. vii. in unseren Text hineintragt, bringt man ihn in heillose Verwirrung. Sollte das nicht ein deutlicher Bevveis dafiir sein, dass man sich der von Steck geiibten " Erklarung " aus dem Romerbriefe zu entschlagen hat ?' (Gloel, p. 37). ^ Steck, tibi supra, pp. 75-7. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUPTBRIEFE ' 169 knowledge of the demands of the divine will (v. 14, cf. iv. 21). Certainly the law is spoken of as ordained by angels in distinction to the promise given directly by God (iii. 19). But such a conception is diametrically opposed to that of Marcion, according to whom the law is not to be attributed to the good God at all ; and yet, in Steck's judgment, the Galatians is onl}' a step removed from the position of Marcion ! ' But to take this step, says Glocl, one must break entirely with the value attached in Galatians to the Old Testament, and with the belief which breathes throughout the Epistle, not only of the essential unity of all divine revela- tion, but also of the unity of the God thus revealing Himself : the connection between the salvation offered in Christ and the old covenant, which is so expressly emphasised by Paul in this Epistle, must be destroyed, in order to arrive at the conception of the law entertained by Marcion. The Galatian Epistle, therefore, cannot, he adds, be regarded as a means of transition from the l\iulinism of Romans to that of Marcion, since it stands upon the same ground as the former, while Marcion occupies an entirely different position. The same result follows if we take account of the relation between heathenism and Judaism. Certainly in Romans the origin of the former is traced back to a falling- away from the God who had manifested Himself to man, while the favoured position of Israel is emphasised (cf. Rom. i. 18 with ix, 1-5, iv. i) : in Galatians both heathenism and Judaism are equally re- garded as states of immaturity and childhood. It might therefore appear as if in the two Epistles the points of view from which Gentile and Jew are regarded are quite distinct. But in Galatians, where Judaism and heathenism are comprehen- sively viewed together, there is also a marked contrast between the two — ' we who are Jews by nature, and not sinners of the Gentiles ' (ii. 15); and so it is plain that Gal. iv. does not entirely cancel the distinction. The true account of the matter, in Gloel's judgment, is that from one point of view the two pre-Christian forms of religion might be placed under the same category, whilst from another they might be con- ' .Steck, uhi supra, p. 75, ' nur noch ein .Schrilt.' I/O THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES trasted. If we regard them from the point of view of the salvation revealed in Christ, both heathenism and Judaism are insufficient and inferior, but yet, in the preparation for that salvation, Judaism differed widely from heathenism. But why, he asks, should it appear strange that the man who could write the Epistle to the Romans should be able to treat of Judaism from two different points of view ? Might we not rather expect that such a rich and powerful mind would throw fresh light from time to time upon the same subjects, and that the Apostle would endeavour to gain by new paths a fuller and wider recognition of the message of the one salvation which possessed him heart and soul ? ' The relation of i Corinthians to Romans, and the priority of the latter, is supported by similar arguments. Thus, e.g., the key to the meaning of i Cor. xv. 56 is to be found in Rom. vii. 8-13, because it is there made clear that death is the result of sin : "^ Rom. vii. 1-2 precedes i Cor. vii. 39, because the ex- ' For a full criticism of Stack's position see Gloel, itln supra, pp. 5, 6, 41-5. Gloel pertinently asks those who refuse to regard the Pauline Epistles under dis- cussion as composed by the same author, whether they are prepared to deny that the first and second part of Faust are the work of the same poet. If not, they have no right to dispute the possibility of an identity of authorship in the case of the Haiiptbriefe : ' Ich bin vielmehr liberzeugt, dass diese Briefe ihrem gesamten Inhalt nach einander viel naher stehen, als dies hinsichtlich jener beiden Seite der Goethe'schen P'austdichtung der Fall ist ' (p. 44). In the same way, as Gloel reminds us, it would follow that we must refuse to recognise accredited sayings and writings of Luther's if we applied to them the standards of criticism which Steck applies to St. Paul. We are not surprised if we find in Luther expressions which are often almost exact repetitions of what he has said before ; and we are also not surprised if he uses expressions at brief intervals which appear to differ widely from each other ; if, e.g., he complains to-day of the tyranny of the Roman Antichrist, the destroyer of souls, and if to-morrow he addresses himself in prayer to the 'Holy Father' to lay-to his hand and to put a bridle upon the hypocritical enemies of peace ; if to-day he composes a polemic in which the struggle is carried to the bitterest extreme, and if to-morrow, in the midst of the fiercest contest, he bears witness to the glorious freedom and blessed peace of a Christian man, without sounding a note of strife. Cf. Gloel, iibi supra, PP- 44, 45- - ' Die Stelle i Cor. xv. 56 scheint Steck nicht verstehen zu konnen. Diese schone Stelle wird durch Beiziehung des Gedankens, der Tod sei Folge der Slinde, unverstandlich. Des Todes Dolch, oder schmerzbereitendes Werkzeug, ist die Stinde ; die Wucht, die den Dolch fiihrende Muskelkraft ist das Gesetz. Die Kenntniss des Gesetzes vermehrt den Ernst und die Bitterkeit des Todes. Dies Bild hat mit dem Gedanken der Tod sei Folge der Siinde nichts zu tun' (Linde- mann, ubi supra, p. 49). RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUTTBRIEFE ' I/I prcssioii ' so long as lie lives ' oecurs in both places, and the imagery is worked out more fully in Romans ; Rom. xv. 2-3 appears to be a fuller expression of the shorter exhortation in I Cor. xi. i : ' Be ye followers of me as I also am of Christ ; further parallels may be found in i Cor. x. 1 1 and Rom. xv. 4 : I Cor. xiv. 33 and Rom. xv. S3, ' the God of peace : ' i Cor. xvi. I and Rom. xv. 26, where the mention of ' the saints ' in the first-named passage is explained by ' the saints who are at Jerusalem ' in the second : Rom. xii. 4-8 reads like an epitome of I Cor. xii. 4-1 1, but we are not called upon to suppose that this is the case, although Steck had previously laid it down as a fundamental axiom that in a comparison of two passages the shorter and epitomised form is derived from the more lengthy and detailed ; so, too, with the familiar imagery of the body and its members; although in Romans it is summarised, there is no occasion to suppose that the much more expanded form in i Corinthians precedes it.' But Steck can only refer to these instances as probabilities, and even in the cases which he quotes of verbal agreement between the two Epistles, he is obliged to allow that a definite decision as to priority is by no means easy. Thus, he insti- tutes a comparison between the passages in i Cor. viii. and Rom. xiv. concerning the weak in faith (cf i Cor. viii. 8, 11, 13 with Rom. xiv. 13, 15, 21), and he asks which passage precedes the other, admitting that there is much to be said on either side. But the scale is turned in favour of Rom. xiv. because whilst ' the weak in faith ' is mentioned in the first verse of that chapter, in i Cor. viii. ' the weak ' is mentioned somewhat abruptly in verse 9, although, as Steck himself points out, a ' weak conscience ' had been spoken of in verse 7.- In the midst of this uncertainty he confesses that he would welcome a point of connection between the two Epistles which would clinch his argument, such as he claims to have discovered in Gal. v. 21 and i Cor. vi. 9. And this he believes that he has found in i Cor. iv. 6 and Rom. xii. 3. ' Steck, ul>i supra, p. 156; cf. Lindomann, pp. 13, 14, 50. - Steck, p. 157. 172 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES In the former place we read, ' And these things, brethren, I have in a figure transferred to myself and to Apollos for your sakes ; that ye might learn in us not to think of men above that zvhicJi is written, that no one of you be puffed up for one against another.' But in this warning, according to Steck, the writer can only be referring to Rom. xii. 3, ' For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think.' ' Whilst, however, we may agree with Steck in refusing to admit any allusion to Christ's exhortations to humility, and may recognise the difficulty of supposing that any of His sayings could be quoted at such an early date in a written form, it is not so easy to see why Steck should put out of court the explanation adopted by Meyer and other commentators, viz. that the author of i Corinthians is re- ferring in general terms to passages in the Old Testament, especially as Steck himself allows that as a rule a reference to the Old Testament Scriptures is introduced by a very similar, if not by the very same, formula.^ But Steck has to maintain his theory of the relative priority of the four great Pauline Epistles, and he arbitrarily rejects all that cannot be made to harmonise with it. A proof of this may be seen in his usual way of interpreting the expressions ' as I have written,' ' it is written,' and so forth. In this same i Corinthians he reads (v. 9), ' I have written to you in a letter not to company with fornicators,' and he describes this as a similar passage to the one which he has just discussed (iv. 6). He is obliged to admit that he does not know to what letter the writer alludes, but he finds no difficulty in rejecting what he allows is the general explana- tion, viz. that reference is made to an earlier and lost Epistle to the Corinthians, because such an expedient appeals to the unknown, and has the least probability according to his special view of the origin of the four Hauptbriefe? But it is from a comparison of the tw^o passages (to which Steck refers in his attempt to establish the priority of Romans to I Corinthians) Gal. v. 19-21 and i Cor, vi. 9, lO, that ' Steck, p. 158. 2 Steck, pp. 158-60. ^ Steck, pp. 160, 161. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUTTBRIEFE ' 173 'the great light ' is thrown upon the order of the sequence of the Pauh'nc Epistles. In Gal. v. 19, 20, the works of the flesh are named, and in verse 21 it is said with reference to these : ' of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.' But in i Cor. vi. 9, we read : ' Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kitigdoni of God} ' and after an enumeration of the various kinds of unrighteous- ness, the same judgment follows, viz. that they sliall not i^therit the kingdom of God. Steck lays special stress upon the verbal agreement in the expression, ^aaCkziav dsou ov K\7ipoi>ofjLi]crov- aiv.^ But, as Gloel well asks, is anything so remarkable ex- pressed in this sentence that we can only be allowed to meet with it once in the same author } The expression KXripovofxelv (Baaiksiav Osov was probably a form of speech quite as familiar as KXrjpovo/xslv ^cotjv alcovtov (cf i Cor. xv. 50,. ATatt. xix. 29 ; Matt. xxv. 34 ; Mark x. 17 ; Luke x. 25,. xviii. 18), and it already had its roots in the language of the Old Testament. But if we are to insist upon verbal agree- ments in the two passages, we must not overlook the verbal differences ; and it is not only to be noted that whilst in I Corinthians the different kinds of evil-doers are enumerated, in Galatians we have a list of the different kinds of vice (TTopvoi, elSoiXoXaTpat k.t.X. in I Corinthians, but iropvsia, ciKaOapaia k.t.X. in Galatians), but it is further observable that whilst in i Corinthians we have ten kinds of evil-doers, in Galatians we have fifteen forms of vice, and that in the two lists of enormities only three exactly correspond with one another ; iropvoi, slScoXoXarpai, fisdvcroi in i Corinthians and TTopvsia, elScoXoXaTpia, /xsOac in Galatians. But, as Gloel reminds us, it is just these three — fornication, idolatry, drunk- enness — which as a matter of fact had to be specially com- bated in the early Christian Churches gathered out of the surrounding heathen world ; and there is surely nothing re- markable in the circumstance that the same man in writing to Galatian and Corinthian converts should warn them that the immoralities practised among the Gentiles would exclude bap- ' Steck, p. 153. 174 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES tised Christians from any inheritance in the kingdom of God. But there is another expression used in Gal. v. 21, which, if rightly understood, is sufficient proof for Steck that the Gala- tian Epistle presupposes i Corinthians — &>$• irposlirov must refer to the words previously used in i Cor. vi. 9, 10. When^ however, we recall the fact that Paul had twice exercised his missionary activity amongst the Galatians, and that the whole Galatian Epistle presupposes a personal acquaintance between the waiter and his readers, what was more natural than that he should remind them of his earlier oral teaching in the word Trpoetirov ? and what more natural than that he should repeat to the fickle Galatians a warning obviously needed in such a community .'' Steck condemns this view as a mere conjecture and an empty pretext ; but if his own theory is correct, then, as Zahn puts it, the canon of criticism must in future run thus : the writer of an Epistle can only appeal to written, not to oral, expressions which he had previously used, and in Epistles ' to say ' means ' to write.' ' But it is in his treatment of 2 Corinthians that Steck's theory makes the most extraordinary demands upon him. His object, we must remind ourselves, is to show that the right order of the Haiiptbriefe is, Romans, i and 2 Cor- inthians, Galatians. He readily admits that i Corinthians precedes 2 Corinthians, but how can he show that the latter Epistle is really the third in the order which he supposes } In 2 Corinthians Paul speaks of his ensuing visit to the Corinthian Church as a third coming to Corinth (2 Cor. xii. 14, 20, xiii. i). No doubt in their form of expression these announcements relate to proposed journeys of the Apostle, and to his personal coming — all this Steck is bound to admit, but, he adds, as a matter of fact they relate rather to his spiritual coming, i.e. through letters. It is treated as of no consequence (as Zahn points out), that Paul had spoken quite unequivocally in the same connection of ' the third coming ' as of a future fact, and that he opposes this act of writing in his absence to his proposed personal visit (cf. 2 Cor. xiii. 2, 10). But after the announcement of his third coming, the ' Gloel, ubi supra, pp. 37-4° 5 Zahn, p. 463 ; Steck, p. 153. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUPTBRIEFE ' 175 writer adds sirl a-rofiaTOs 8vo fxaprvpwv koX rpiiou araO/jasraL irav pPjfia (2 Cor. xiii. i): here is a great sui)port for Steck's tlieor}', and in this veiled manner we have an intimation that our 2 Corinthians is the third in the order of the Pauhne writings, and the three witnesses would therefore be the three Epistles, Romans, i and 2 Corinthians. It is surely no wonder that Lindcmann can say ' Such arbitrariness needs no refu- tation ' ' (p. 50), and that even Steck himself seems doubtful as to the validity of his own arguments {c(. pp. 160, 161). It is thus that Steck seeks to explain what he names the correct order of the four Epistles, and he contends that a gradual advance in vehemence of tone and in opposition to the Judaic section of the Church characterises the sequence. In Romans there is a calm and measured style, only marked here and there by polemical outbursts. In i and 2 Corinthians the Paulinism becomes more and more decided in tone, and increases in its vehemence as the close of the second Epistle is reached. But the most vehement of all is the Galatians, in which the entire independence of the Apostle is repre- sented, and the severance of a liberal and cultured Gentile- Christianity from a legal and slavish Judaism.-^ No doubt some of the expressions upon which Steck (as Pierson and Naber before him) relies are not free from obscurity, and it is easy to magnify the different views of the date and place of the composition of the Galatian Epistle, and of the localities occupied by its readers, into serious diffi- culties and objections ; but may it not, asks Zahn, be fairly maintained that whatever obscurities exist can be made to tell rather for than against the Epistle ? Steck, ^.^., argues that, when Paul writes (Gal. iv. 13), oIlSuts 8s on ht aaOivsLav rfjs aapKos £ur]j TrapsXa^ov utto tov Kvplov koI TrapsScoKa vfitv, ' For I re- ceived of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you ; ' in what way, asks Steck, did Paul receive his communication from Christ ? Oral information from the living Jesus is of ' Steck, ubi supra, pp. 172-80. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' HAUPTBRIEFE ' I97 course excluded ; heavenly teaching from the exalted Christ, although supported by analo(;y from the Apostle's own ex- perience, in that Paul sometimes makes a boast of such revela- tions (Gal. i. 12, ii. 2 ; 2 Cor. xii. i.), cannot be said to be in harmon}^ with the contents of the Apostle's communication ; it is difficult to suppose that a heavenly revelation would have consisted of an account so temperate and so historical. The word irapsXa^op points to human means, and the preposition ajTo is also in favour of this view, since in distinction from Trapd it signifies an indirect receiving. But if it means ' I re- ceived directly from the Lord,' the manner of the reception is conditioned by the manner and method of the delivery ; the Apostle, we know, delivered to the Church the information which he had received through tradition, and there is nothing to hinder the view that this tradition was exactly similar to that which our Evangelists received and transmitted to wider circles. In i Cor. xv. 3, the information concerning the resurrection of Christ is introduced by the same expression, TrapsScoKa vfiiv o koI irapsXa^ov, and in that place there can be no doubt that reference is made to the tradition of the oldest Churches. Consequently, in the case before us, the account is derived from the same source, and it is therefore just as likely that it was based upon the fixed written tradition already contained in the Gospels as upon an oral tradition still in circulation. If thus the possibility be still granted that the Pauline account may rest upon oral tradition, yet nothing in the main is opposed to the view that it may be derived from Luke's Gospel, provided that its form can be explained from such a source. Steck, as we have already seen, regards I Cor. xi. 23-26 as a shorter and simpler account than that of the Synoptists, and he now proceeds to mention a further ground for supposing that the information which it contains is derived from Luke. If this possibility results from an in- quiry into the opening of the passage it is rendered far more probable from a consideration of its conclusion. That the monition in verse 26, oauKis 'yap av sadirjTS top aprov tovtov Kal TO TroTi']piov irLvrjTS, rov ddvarov tov Kvplov KarayyeXXsTc d')(pi ov s\9r}, is to be regarded as a word of Paul, and not as 198 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES an utterance of Jesus, should be plain, and this is recognised by most commentators. The modes of expression top Odvarov rov Kvplov and a%/3t ov eXOrj favours this view, as also do the ' Apostolic Constitutions,' where these words are placed in the mouth of Jesus, with an adaptation exactly corresponding to the form employed in i Corinthians, top Odvarov rov s/xov and a^pc^ av sXOco. But if verse 26 is added by Paul, and yet is to be retained as belonging to the account of the institution of the Supper, this supposition, in Steck's opinion, throws a light upon the whole formation of the account. For verse 26 manifestly establishes the conclusion of verse 25, eh rr)v ifxrjv dvafivrjaiv, since obedience to the exhortation to frequent celebration of the Supper will be the means of keeping the Lord's memory steadfast. The repetition, there- fore, of the expression sis rrjv i/xrjv avd/mPTjaLv at the distribu- tion of the cup is connected with the Pauline addition (verse 26), and this repetition is itself an addition to the text of Luke, where the words sh- rrjv sixrjv dvdfMvrja-cv only occur at the distribution of the bread. The text of Luke, Steck maintains, has from the com- mencement been regarded in an unfavourable light on ac- count of its remarkable deviation from Matthew and Mark in its mention of two cups, and although an attempt has been made to account for this difference on the supposition that we have in Luke's Gospel an unskilful revision of two sources, Steck proceeds to show that this cannot be regarded as a satisfactory explanation. The first cup in Luke (xxii. 17) stands in the very closest connection with the first eating (verse 1 5), when Jesus says, ' With desire I have desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer : for I say unto you, I will not any more eat thereof until it is fulfilled in the king- dom of God.' With this corresponds exactly the offering of a first cup with the words, * Take this, and divide it among yourselves ; for I say unto you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine, until the kingdom of God shall come.' These two incidents are thus connected — they form in Luke a first act of the Last Supper, with the significance of a parting meal, and with a reference to a fulfilment in the kingdom of God : then RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' HAUPTBRIEFE ' I99 follows a second act, again consisting of eating and drinking, but now with the meaning of a memorial feast in memory of Jesus for the time between His death and His return. But we are thus able to find an explanation of the second cup : it is introduced by Luke to enrich the meaning of the action, and he was so far justified inasmuch as at the actual Jewish Paschal meal, which Jesus, according to all the Synoptists celebrated, it was customary to offer, and to drink from, not only one cup, but several — generally four — and to accompany the action with solemn words. But the account in i Corin- thians, while it stands in connection with Luke in the rest, omits again this first act, because, after all, it did not belong properly to the matter, and Matthew and Mark do not mention it. We see, however, that i Corinthians was acquainted with it from the concluding admonition, oadKis jap k.t.\. Here we have, only in another form, the reference to the future coming of the Lord, which in the first act of Luke's account is contained in the twice repeated words : scos orov irXripwdfj £v TTj ^aacX.£ia rov Oeov . . . f'o)? orov )) /BaaiXsia rod Osov sXOrj (verses 16, 18). Whilst the account in i Corinthians omits the rest of this first act as a mere anticipation of the words of institution, it preserves in its conclusion this definite reference to the words in verses 16, 18. We thus have, in Steck's view, in i Corinthians not merely the simplest, but rather a simplified account of the Lord's Supper based upon Luke, and retaining his description essentially, although in smaller details abbreviated, so that a short and simple representation is the result, which could be used to a certain extent as a standing formula for communication to the Churches. But in this conclusion Steck does not seem to be so very far removed from that advocated by Godet and Dr. Salmon,^ viz. that Luke gives us the words which he had heard Paul use in celebrating the Holy Communion — words which might naturally be described as 'a standing formula for communica- tion to the Churches.' It should also be remembered that, in ' See below, chap. vi. p. 352 ff. , for further comment on the words of institution. 200 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES Holtzmann's view, the words in Luke bear the stamp of genuineness, and he thinks that they may be easily explained by regarding them as a combination of the Pauline and Synoptical narrative ; for the Pauline account he holds that Luke was dependent simply upon ' the preaching of Paul ' {Kr)pv^fxa YlavXov) in which the report of the Last Supper had received a fixed form.' This view that Luke's account may be fairly described as a combination of preceding traditions — e.g. those received from Mark and Paul — is strongly supported by Gloel,^ and it has also recommended itself to Weiss, in his ' Leben Jesu.' ^ At least it may be said that, whatever may have been the precise source from which Luke received the words, we are by no means shut up to the conclusion demanded by Steck. But the account of the Resurrection appearances in i Cor. XV. is discussed by Steck at still greater length."* He points out, first of all, the importance which this account in i Cor. XV. i-ii has assumed in the modern vision-theory (p. i8o); he regards it as the lever by which modern criticism has undertaken to do away with the realistic accounts of the Resurrection contained in the Gospels, and he considers that the confidence with which the holders of the vision-theory maintain their view is based upon the fact that i Corinthians precedes the Gospel narratives. But all this, he says, must be rendered uncertain immediately the Pauline composition of this account in i Corinthians is disputed, and thus an unsuspected danger threatens criticism on one of its most important points. Steck acknowledges that, as a matter of fact, the account in question is sufficiently remarkable and peculiar to awaken a favourable predisposition in favour of its antiquity ; it gives, after some introductory remarks, a formal list of six appear- ances, of which only a minority could possibly be identified ' Die synoptischen Evangelien, pp. 395, 396 ; see below, chap. vi. p. 352 . ' Gloel, nbi supra, p. 51, where he points out that 'the plain reader,' so far from feeling himself compelled to adopt Steck's conclusions, will much rather be inclined to the view mentioned in the text as he reads Mark xiv. 24 (cf. Matt. xxvi. 28), I Cor. xi. 25, compared with Luke xxii. 20. ' See chap. vi. p. 352. * Steck, uhi supra, pp. 180-91. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUPTBRIEFE ' 201 Avith those of the Gospels, while the majority are quite peculiar to this passage.' But although it is thus evident at the very outset that it .would be a futile attempt to derive it from our Go.spcls, specially from Luke, yet, he says, we must not omit to inquire how far some elements of this remarkable account may be connected with the account in our Gospels, especially with that given b}' Luke.- The first point of coincidence is to be found in the opening statement that Christ died for our sins accord- ing to the Scripture. This statement corresponds with the teaching of the Risen One to His disciples on the way to Emmaus (Luke xxiv. 26, 27), and the Scripture proof for the death of Jesus on the cross, although everywhere presupposed, is nowhere so expressly alluded to as in this passage of the third Evangelist. The second point of agreement is one to which Steck refers in company with many commentators who would widely dissent from many of his conclusions. The appearance to Cephas, which Paul mentions first (i Cor. xv. 5), is not referred to by Matthew or Mark ; but, on the other hand, Luke (xxiv. 34) tells us how the two disciples return from Emmaus to Jerusalem and are received by the others with the joyful cry, ' The Lord is risen indeed, and hath appeared unto Simon,' where, indeed, the expression ' hath appeared unto Simon ' strikingly reminds us of i Cor. xv. 5 {co^drj Kr](})a). A third point of agreement which can be detected bet\\een the two accounts consists in the mention by Luke of an appearance to the Apostles after the return of the travellers from Emmaus, and the mention of an appearance to ' the twelve ' in i Cor. xv. 5. But here Steck considers it necessary to point out that the agreement is not quite exact, since in Luke the appearance is vouchsafed, not only to the Twelve or to the Eleven, but to others assembled with them (Luke xxiv. 9), and of the Emmaus disciples, who were certainly amongst those thus assembled, one, at any rate, did not belong ' See chap. vii. for a further discussion of these appearances. ' See below, chap. vii. p. 375, where Holtzmann reverses the relationship between Luke and Paul, and points out the many instances of agreement between their two accounts of the Resurrection appearances. 202 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES to the Twelve. Of the other appearances recorded in I Corinthians, those to the five hundred, to James, to the assembled Apostles, are entirely unknown to Luke ' and the two other Synoptists, for it is by no means satisfactory to identify the appearance to the five hundred with the farewell scene at Christ's Ascension, or with the events of the first Christian Pentecost.^ We must therefore decide that i Corinth- ians appears to be independent of Luke, at any rate in the form in which we now have it ; but we cannot therefore hastily jump to the conclusion that we have before us a report of incomparably greater historical value, which goes back to the earliest days of the Church, and which may even possibly be based upon a communication of the original Apostles- Steck accordingly proceeds to enumerate the different weak points in this passage (i Cor. xv.). It is certainly difficult to believe that a serious argument can be based upon some of them, but we will take them in the order given by Steck him- self. In the first place, he takes objection to the way in which the account is introduced, and repeats the objection raised by Bruno Bauer (' Kritik der paulin. Briefe,' 2. Abth. p. 70) — viz. that we do not ' make known ' again what has once been preached to the members of a Church, but ' remind ' them of it, if there is reason to believe that they have forgotten it. Steck, therefore, considers it probable that fresh information is here represented as already known to the Church, because it is not to be supposed that Paul had said nothing of it on an earlier occasion. The second point of objection is to be found in the fact that Paul narrates the appearance to himself as that which he also 'received,' as if it belonged to the elements of the Apostolic testimony to the Resurrection. No doubt, says Steck, Paul placed the appearance vouchsafed to himself on a level with the older appearance of the Risen Saviour, but it is doubtful whether it so presented itself to the primitive Church. According, however, to the account in i Corinthians, this cycle ' See, however, the passage in Holtzmann's Die synoptischen Evatigelien^ ta which reference has just been made. ^ See below, chap. vii. p. 373. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' HAUPTBRIEFE ' 203 of appearances was acknowledged and defended by both Apostolic circles, the Jerusalem and the Pauline (i Cor. XV. II). But it is quite unlikely, in Stcck's judgment, that the primitive Apostles included the appearance to Paul amongst the main facts of their preaching, or that he so included those appearai'Hzes vouchsafed to them, especially when we consider that, while Paul based his Apostleship upon the appearance granted to him, his opponents violently con- tested his claim to have seen the Lord, and upbraided him with his familiarity with 'visions and revelations' (2 Cor. xi. 19, xii. I, 5, 13, and i Cor. ix. i, 2).' The report is therefore artificially and purposely constructed to show that no differ- ence existed in the appearances vouchsafed to Paul and the Twelve. The third point which demands attention is that in this Pauline account the burial of Jesus is expressly testified just as in our Gospels. The supporters of the vision-theory regard the report of the burial of Jesus in the Gospels as a proof that the accounts of His resurrection had already re- ceived a widespread material interpretation, but the krd<^7] of I Corinthians shows that, at least as far as the grave of Jesus is concerned, the Pauline account stands on a level with that of the Gospels ; how, then, Steck would have us ask ourselves, can it be so much older? In the fourth place Steck notes the absence from the Pauline account of the announcement common to the Gospel narratives of the Resurrection through the women who found the grave empty. Whether this last detail, he says, is held to be important or not, the role which the women played in the rise of the belief in the Resurrection is, at all events, not to be undervalued, and it forms an integral part of the whole history."^ Paul, therefore, it is generally assumed, would not deny this active share of the women, but he consciously ' See chap. vii. p. 383 fif. * With regard to these last two points, as Gloel well puts it, Steck surely deserves that we should agree with him when he lays stress upon the fact that the Pauline (rav iiA itivruiv Qioi to Christ in Rom. ix. 5 on exegctical grounds, although he evidently regards ch. ix.-xi. as one of the later of those sections out of which he holds that the Hauptbriefe were composed. P 2IO THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES Apostle became a follower of Christ by a sudden bound, on the supposition that his Christian consciousness was formed quite apart from the historical Jesus and His disciples, and by his reflection upon the fundamental facts of the Crucifixion and Resurrection : on these grounds a higher dogmatic develop- ment in the Apostle's thought would no doubt be conceivable. But, against all this, Steck points to his own examination of the Galatian Epistle, to the consciously designed contrast between this Epistle and the Acts, and to its intention of making the Pauline Gospel quite independent of human in- fluences. The historical Paul could not, he thinks, have thus developed his thoughts, and his dependence upon the Apostolic circle was too natural, and too much a matter of course, to be ignored. But when Steck speaks of the ' historical Paul,' it is not easy, on his own showing, to see upon what data he could speak with any certainty of a person whose existence he has reduced to little more than a shadow, and when he denies that this ' historical' Paul could have composed the Christology of the Hauptbriefc, it is perhaps pardonable to apply Steck's own criticism to himself : ' Such a conception of the development of Paul's thought is like that of a philosophical system con- structed by a German philosopher in his study, but it has no place in the living current of history ' (p. 283). The passage 2 Cor. V. 16 is best understood, according to Steck, as contain- ing a reference to the early external conception of the Messiah according to his earthly being, into the place of which, for advanced Christians, the Christ has stepped who is tlie Lord, the Spirit (2 Cor. iii. 17) ; the first conception was that of the historical Paul, which he shared with the men of his time. This historical Paul had very probably, if he had grown up in Jerusalem (Acts xx. 3), been present at the Crucifixion, and had, at any rate, received some passing impression of the historical Jesus, for it is quite arbitrary, says Steck, to banish him from Jerusalem, only with the view of removing him as far as possible from all personal contact with Jesus. But the Paul of the Hatiptbriefe who avoids all that is historical in the Person of Jesus, according to Steck, is a pure dogmatist, RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' HAUPTBRIEFE ' 211 and therefore not the Apostle. But again we are compelled to demur to Stcck's conclusions, since, in the first place, \vc must repeat the doubt as to how he could have any definite knowledge of the historical Paul, and of the extent of his information about Jesus the Messiah : if he refers us to the Acts, this is not only a strange change of front with regard to the trustworthiness of that book, but it is also evident that the Paul of the Acts was not contented with the Messianic conceptions of the men of his time, since the Jews are repre- sented as his most constant and bitter opponents ; and, in the next place, it is nothing but an arbitrary assumption that the Paul of the Hauptbriefe avoids all that is historical in the Person of Jesus. It can scarcely be maintained that Steck's argument is advanced by his attempted proof of the dependence of the Hauptbriefe upon extra-canonical writings. He specially mentions two, the * Assumptio Mosis ' and 4 Esdras. The passage upon which Steck chiefly relies is Romans ii. 15, but its connection with the 'Assumptio Mosis,' i. 12, 13 (which Steck places at a much later date than that assigned to it by Schlirer) is far too general to allow us to build a theory of dependence upon it. Loman, it will be remembered, had anticipated Steck's argument from this passage, but even Scholten was unable to recognise any validity in his reasonings. Indeed, Steck can only speak of Rom. ii. 15 as pointing to a probable acquaintance of the writer of the Epistle with the ^ Assumptio Mosis,' and he admits that the passage is itself surrounded with so much doubt as to make it hazardous to build too much upon this one trace of acquaintance. The only other proof which Steck attempts — viz. a connection between Gal. iii. 19, 20, and the 'Assumptio Mosis' in the use of the term ' mediator ' {yuzairrjs) of Moses — fails entirely to convince even Loman, and therefore it need not detain us. It is no wonder that Steck speaks of ' a truly modest result ' which follows from the examination of these two pas- sages to which his proof is limited.' He endeavours, however, to supply the lack of positive proof by arguing that, as we ' Steck, ubi supra, pp. 226, 227. P 2 212 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES only possess the first part of the ' xAssumptio Mosis,' and even that in an unsatisfactory condition, the lost half may contain passages used in the Haupthriefe ; and this, he maintains, is no mere empty opinion, but one supported by ancient testi- mony. When we examine this testimony, we find that it consists of two references to two Byzantine authors of the ninth century — Syncellus and Photius. The passage in the Epistles chiefly relied upon is Gal. vi. 15. Steck himself seems puzzled to know how such a statement, although abrogating the value of circumcision, could have found a place in an entirely Jewish Apocalypse. But the two authors to whom Steck refers are themselves dependent upon the information of Euthalius (fifth century), a circumstance which appears to have escaped Steck's attention. Moreover, it will be noticed that Syncellus uses an expression which makes it doubtful whether he means the ' Assumptio Mosis' at all, since he speaks of anroKoXv^is, and not avakrj-^c^ ; and the indefinite expression of Euthalius, Mcocrscos airoKpvyfns, may at all events comprehend several other post-Christian Apocrypha, akin to the 'Assumptio,' which bore the name of Moses. But even if Euthalius had thought of the ' Assumptio Mosis,' the form in which the writing lay before him must have been one which had been enriched by many Christian additions from the New Testament.^ But Steck lays great stress upon Hilgenfeld's view that the 'Assumptio Mosis' presupposes 4 Esdras, and there- fore is itself of later date. In further support of his case Steck is thus obliged to examine the last-mentioned Apo- cryphal work, and Hilgenfeld's testimony is again referred to at length. But it is most important for us to bear in mind that Hilgenfeld regards 4 Esdras as a pre-Christian docu- ment. No doubt, if we accept the opinion which places the date of this book during the reign of Domitian, and if, on the supposition of such a late date, the dependence of the Pauline Epistles upon it could be proved, then Steck would have > Gloel, u5i supra, pp. 57, 58. For a recent summary of views as to the date and contents of the Assumptio Mosis see Deane's Pseudepi%rapha (T. and T. Clark, 1891), pp. 9S-130. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE * HAUPTBRIEFE ' 213 brought forward a strong argument in proof of his position. But when we come to examine the passages which, according to Hilgenfeld, afford instances of a connection between the Pauline Epistles and 4 Esdras, we find that, with one excep- tion, Steck himself regards them as easily explainable on other grounds than the dependence of the former upon the latter. Even this exception Steck can only describe as making the dependence very probable (p. 234). The parallel is between Rom. X. 6, 7 and 4 Esdras 4, 8. But why should not Paul be here referring to Deut. xxx. 1 1-14, the connection with which is admitted by Steck ? Rom. x. 8 contains an exact quotation from this passage in Deuteronomy, and if mention is made in Deuteronomy of a going up into heaven and a journey over the sea, it was easy to replace the latter expression by the going down into the deep of Rom. x. 7, which fitted well with the context, and was an expression naturally derived from the Old Testament, where it is used as the opposite of heaven.^ Let us next inquire whether Steck is more successful in his attempt to prove the dependence of Paul upon Philo and Seneca. It should of course be remembered at the outset that even if the influence of Philo's writings and his modes of expression and phraseology were plainly seen in Paul's Epistles, it would be no argument against their authenticity. At the same time it may safely be asserted that none of the instances alleged by Steck are sufficient to prove any such influence. Not one single case can be made out of an actual borrowing from Philo, although there are numerous cases in which the same imagery is employed, and expressions of the same general kind. But these points of contact do not involve a literary dependence, and they may easily be ac- counted for when we remember that the writers in question are two men, both at home in the Old Testament and in the Judaism of their day, and both acquainted with Hellenistic Greek.^ Is it, e.g.^ strange that at a time when the games of the arena played such an important part, both Paul and ' Gloel, ubi supra, pp. 56, 57. * Ibid. p. 59. 214 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES Philo — each, however, in his own special way — should trans- fer to the spiritual province the imagery of the combatant in the games striving for the mastery ? Is it necessary to suppose in such a case that the writer of i Corinthians borrowed from Philo ? ' But Steck claims to have discovered a particularly striking instance, in which the writer of Romans ix.-xi. has borrowed from Philo, and he would have us regard the imagery of the olive-tree in those chapters as identical with that which we find in Philo, ' with slight variations.' But, to say nothing of the fact that such a figure might easily be derived from the Old Testament, it is very evident on closer examination that Paul and Philo are not employing the same but two different kinds of imagery. Paul is describing how the Jews as old branches have broken away from the olive-tree, and the heathen are grafted in as new branches. Philo is describing how new shoots spring forth from branches which have been cut off, if the roots have not been destroyed, out of which the old trees again acquire prosperity ; and, so, too, if some few seed-corns of virtue remain in the soul, even if others go to ruin, yet nevertheless out of the few all that is best and noblest amongst men grows up. It would surely be strange to affirm that we have here a decisive proof of literary de- pendence. The hypothesis of a dependence of the Pauline writings upon Seneca had been already maintained by Bruno Bauer, and it is revived by Steck.- Points of connection, he remarks, between Seneca and Christian, especially Pauline, views, had long ago been discovered, and hence arose the legend of a correspondence, and even of a meeting, between the Roman and the Christian philosopher. Undoubtedly, as Steck is himself obliged to admit (p. 248), the opinion has again been recently maintained that Seneca borrowed from the Pauline Epistles. But the points of connection between the two writers are far too general in their character to allow us to believe that one was influenced by the other. We cannot, e.g., seriously argue, with Steck, that the exhortation in Rom. xiii. Gloel, ul>i supra, p. 59. - Steck, ibiJ. pp. 249-265. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' HAUPTBRIEFE ' 215 14, svSvcraaOe tov Kvptov '\ijaovv ^piarov, is a mere echo of Seneca's exhortation ' indue magni viri animum ' (' Epist.' 6^) ; the figure employed is certainly not so strange that two authors could not independently have lighted upon it. Is it not far more probable that the Pauline expression was derived from the Old Testament? (comp. e.g. Isaiah lix. 17, see also 1 Thess. V. 8, and Ephcs. vi. 14, where the reference to Isaiah lix. 17 [LXX] is evident). And yet this is among the most noteworthy parallels which Steck adduces.' One other instance, which Stock mentions, serves to mark most clearly the distinction between the confidence of the Christian and the apathy of the Stoic. According to Stock (p. 2 56), the likeness between Rom. viii. 35 and a word of Seneca (* Epist.' 85) can scarcely be accidental. And yet, it is not too much to say that the joyful certainty of triumph in which a believing heart is comforted in every trial by the never- failins: love of God is as far removed as heaven from earth from the apathy with which the Stoic denies that evil is really evil ! ^ But it is strange, as Glool points out, that, whilst Steck himself recognises the essential differences between the writings of the philosophers and the New Testament, he yet does not hesitate to explain the points of contrast between Paul and Seneca on the ground of the acquaintance of the author of the Pauline Epistles with the writings of the Roman philosopher. How can we reconcile these judgments except on the supposition that Steck is actuated by the wish to gain in every possible way proofs to support his hypothesis ? ' Indeed, as the same critic, Glocil, acutely observes, whilst writers like Steck are hasty enough in drawing conclusions as to literary points of contact between single books of the New Testament and other writings, such haste is frequently not in accord with the cool reserve with which the literary in- fluence of the New Testament writings upon the literature of the Apostolic Fathers and others is estimated. In Steck's case there is a manifest inclination to maintain to the utmost the literary dependence of the Pauline Epistles upon other writ- ' Gloel, itbi supra, pp. 61, 62. '* Ibid. p. 62. ' Ibid. p. 63. 2l6 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES ings, and, on the other hand, to weaken as far as possible the testimony in support of the influence of these Epistles upon Patristic literature.' Part III But Steck's references to Philo and Seneca are also of interest in connection with the more recent attack upon the Hauptbricfe by Daniel Volter.''^ In many of his arguments Volter follows closely in the steps of Steck, but it is of im- portance to notice that he is much more inclined to admit that many of Steck's alleged instances of the dependence of the Pauline Epistles upon Philo and Seneca may be explained by the common use of Old Testament language, or by the philosophic atmosphere of the period. In a short introduction to his work ^ Volter refers to what he considers as the most remarkable phenomenon in New Testament criticism — the increasing attacks upon the Haupt- hriefe. Volter makes allusion, like Steck, to previous labourers in the same field ; but it will be observed that he confesses that he was not only dissatisfied with Loman's arguments, which seemed to exclude creative religious per- sonalities altogether, and with those of Pierson and Naber, which degenerated into a mere subjective fantasy, but also at first with those of Steck. Nevertheless, the position main- tained by the last-mentioned writer seems to have gradually forced upon him the conviction that the question as to the genuineness of the Hauptbriefe could no longer be dismissed with a shrug of the shoulders or a few cheap generalities, and he now claims to institute an entirely new and unpreju- diced inquiry into the subject. But when we examine the grounds upon which Volter decides to reject the Epistle to the Romans, it will be seen ' Gloel, iibi supra, p. 67. ^ Die Koviposition dei- paulinischen Hauptbriefe, i, ' Der Romer- und Galater- brief,' 1890. ' Ubi supra, pp. I-7. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUPTBRIEFE ' 21/ that thc}' arc arbitral'}' in the extreme. It must be carefully remembered that, after all is said and done, Voltcr is himself obliged to recognise a brief original Papistic as the actual work of the historical Paul.' But he commences his attack upon the Epistle as we have it by finding fault with its length. This seems to him far more fitting for a scientific treatise than for a letter addressed to a Church which Paul had not founded, and with which he was not personally acquainted. It is therefore a question whether the epistolary form is not fictitious, or whether longer or shorter passages have not been interpolated in the original letter. The Epistle, too, is open to further suspicion on account of the different views which have been entertained as to its readers and as to its aim. But Volter thinks that all difficulties are removed if we reconstruct the Epistle according to his arguments.''^ By recovering what he terms the original letter we get rid of the strange length of the Epistle, and we gaift a clear idea of the character of its readers. They are evidently heathen Chris- tians with a minority of Jewish Christians, a view which agrees with the conclusion of the Acts. The aim of the letter is also plain. The Roman Church is a Gentile Christian community which had arisen without Paul's direct action, but which in its nature falls within his province of work : he has always hoped to visit it, and anticipates that he will soon be able to do so. With such a Church Paul would of necessity sympathise, and would contribute something to its Christian belief and Christian life, in order to show himself the father of Gentile Christians in this Church as in others ; he would naturally enter into personal relations with its members, and prepare them beforehand for his coming. With all this Volter argues that the original Roman Epistle exactly cor- responds. This original letter consists of ch. i. i*; i. 7 ; i. 5, 6 ; i. 8-17 ; ch. v. and vi. (except v. 13, 14 ; v. 20 and vi. 14, 15) ; ch. xii. xiii. ; xv. 14-32 ; xvi. 21-23.^ The conception of Christianity which the author of this * original ' letter puts forward is as follows : the Gospel of Jesus Christ is a power of God for all believers, for the Jew ' Volter, u6i supra, pp. 45-50. '^ Ihid. p. 44. ' Ibid. 2l8 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES first and also for the Gentile. In Christ alone is salvation^ for the whole of humanity is under the dominion of sin and death, which entered into the world with the fall of Adam. The judgment of God upon the fall and disobedience of Adam is a condemnatory judgment upon the whole human race, by which all men are reckoned as sinners deserving the penalty of death. But a great turning-point in the history of humanity commences with Christ. By the obedience of the one man Jesus Christ many are made righteous ; for the verdict upon the obedience of this one man is the justification of the whole of humanity — a justification unto life. The man Jesus stands out from the whole sinful race of humanity (which is connected with Adam by bodily descent and inherits the taint of his nature) as alone obedient unto God — obedient even unto death. Here is the proof that this man was the Christ, the Son of God, chosen to carry out His will in the work of salvation, and who had with this object faithfully surrendered Himself even unto death. But that God should thus give up this righteous One unto death can only be under- stood as His loving purpose to reconcile us to Himself whilst we were yet enemies, and to justify us through the blood of Christ. The Messiahship and Sonship of Jesus, as also the saving significance of His death, are confirmed by His Resurrection ; the Risen Jesus lives unto God, as a willing instrument to further His purposes. The grace of God offered to mankind in Christ is appropriated by faith, and the believer is conscious of peace with God, being justified by faith, and is filled with hope of the future glory of God, which hope is only confirmed by tribulations, and has its sure guarantee in the love of God, of which the Holy Spirit given to believers is a living and abiding witness. But for a man thus justified, a mode of life is fitting which corresponds to that state of grace in which he is placed. He who believes that Christ has died for his sins must recognise that his old man is crucified with Christ that the body of sin might be destroyed. This dying with Christ is symbolised for the Christian in baptism : but he who is thus dead with Christ must advance further to the belief that he stands in relation RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUPTBRIEI' E ' 219 to the Christ raised from the dead, and that he must live in fellowship with Him. This service of righteousness, this sanctification, is the spiritual service of God whereby the body is presented as a sacrifice holy, acceptable to God, and the Spirit proves what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God, For a knowledge of this will of God the law with its moral claims must ever be the highest and best source, the law which is fulfilled through love : and this whole new life of the justified is a life in the Holy Spirit, which is not only the constant source of our consciousness of justification and reconciliation of our consciousness of the love of God, but also a power of sanctification, of brotherly love, a power in word and deed, in signs and wonders wrought in the service of the gospel. This ' original ' Epistle thus carries with it, in Volter's judgment, all the marks of ' originality.' ' How simple it is — how far from all speculative construction is its conception of the Person of Christ ! Here there is no pre-existence, na thought of two natures in Christ. The starting-point is the man Jesus : upon Him a judgment of faith is passed which, without transgressing the bounds of moral-religious contemplation, is founded upon the impression which His life, His death, His resurrection had made, which leaves Him a place amongst mankind and yet assigns Him His deserved rank as the bearer and accomplisher of the divine plan of salvation, the turning-point in the world's history, the Christ, the Son of God. So, too, the doctrine with regard to the Holy Spirit in this ' original ' letter is in Volter's opinion another proof of ' originality,' since it is so entirely removed from all systematic usage.'^ Voltcr would account for the teaching of chapters v. and vi., which, with the exception of a few verses, are included in the original letter, by deriving it from a combination of Old Testament and Grecian ideas ! ^ But, in the first place, it is difficult to see how any passage in the Old Testament could so plainly lead to a judgment of God justifying all men by the sufferings of the righteous One, and the atoning efficacy ' Volter, ubi supra, p. 48. ' Ibid. ^ Ibid. p. 49. 220 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES of such sufferings. He proceeds to remark that the repre- sentation in chapter vi. of the mystical union of the Christian with Christ is an idea which had a home in the mystical religion of the Greeks, where the believer shares by con- secration in the life of the gods, in their sufferings and resurrection ; but it is not easy to believe that any idea de- rived from the heathen mysteries, the sink of all impurity, would commend itself to the early Christians, amongst whom, on Volter's own showing, we must rank the historical Paul, the author of this part of the Epistle. But Volter attaches special significance to the fact that there is no sign in this * original ' letter of the sharp anti- nomian attitude which characterises some portions of our Epistle to the Romans.^ According to him, it is historically impossible that Paul should have adopted a position towards the law which regarded it as entirely cancelled, and yet that he should have maintained the relations with the primi- tive Apostles which are described in the Acts. If he held the views regarding the law which are ascribed to him in the interpolated portions of the Epistle to the Romans, then the difference between Paul and the Twelve would have been irreconcilable : to declare the law entirely cancelled for Gentile and Jewish Christians alike was quite a different thing from recognising its moral and lasting value, and from allowing it to stand, so far as it was ceremonial and ritual, for Jewish Christians, and even as a Jewish Christian to join in its observance. The author of the interpolated portions of the Epistle to the Romans occupies the former standpoint ; the historical Paul apparently the latter. That even thus this historical Paul should be exposed to the hostility of the Judaizing zealots was very conceivable (Rom. xv. 31). But if the Apostle was exposed, on Volter's own showing (since ch. xv, 14-32 is included in the ' original ' letter) to the attacks of an extreme section, nothing can be more arbitrary than to lay down exactly what he must have said, or ought to have said, in the face of such opposition and with the apprehen- sion of its consequences, and to regard all else as interpolated. ' Volter, tibi supra, pp. 51 ff. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE * HAUPTBRIEFE ' 22 1 When, moreover, \'6ltcr speaks of the ' historical ' Paul, \vc are compelled to ask, as in the case of Steck, from whence does he derive this historical personage? If from the Acts, as seems to be the case to a great extent, then we have another instance of the curious manner in which the most recent negative criticism eagerly appeals to a document which the older Tubingen school had ruled out of court. Into this original letter Volter considers that a later writer has inserted ch. i. i8-iii. 20 and viii. 13-32 (and in the former section he regards ii. 14, 15 as another interpolation).' These sections, he maintains, are nothing else than a development of the statement of the original letter (i. 16), that the gospel is a power of God for everyone that believeth, for the Jew first, and also for the Greek, but their Christology is different, as also their teaching concerning redemption. Christ is here regarded as the pre-existent essential Son of God, and is therefore spoken of in viii. 32 as ' God's own Son.' His essential being is the divine Spirit (irvevfia) ; He has only taken this sinful flesh by God's command for the purpose of redemption, to judge sin in the flesh and to break its dominion Here, Volter maintains, redemption is based, not only upon the death and resurrection of Christ (as in the ' original ' letter), but upon His coming in the flesh, just as in the fourth Gospel, of which this passage may be regarded as the imme- diate introductory step. It is a somewhat wearisome task to attempt to follow Volter step by step through the series of differences which he discovers between his ' original ' letter and the additions introduced by the ' first interpolator,' and it will probably be sufficient to point out that he is inclined to attribute to the hand of this writer the short passage which he reckons as an interpolation in the introduction of the Epistle, viz. ch. i. verses i''-4.- But could anything be more arbitrary than thus to exclude from the original letter a passage so important in its Christological bearing, and to do so upon the ground that it agrees essentially with the Christology of viii. 3, 4, 32, i.e. with the conceptions of the first interpolator? ' Volter, u/ii suj>ra, p. 56. ' /Hd. p. 61. 222 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES But a further scries of interpolations is discovered by Volter, thus making a third group, viz. ch. iii. 21-iv. 25, V. 13, 14, v. 20, vi. 14, 15, vii. 1-6, and ch. ix. and x.' The author of this third series has in view the whole Christendom composed of Gentile and Jewish believers, but he specially addresses himself to the Jewish Christians. His purpose is to show them that the service of the law and the difference between Jew and Gentile is cancelled, and that the fact that the Jew remained behind, while the Gentiles crowded to salvation, ought not to be made a matter of reproach to the Gentile Apostle Paul. Nor was such a fact in contradiction to the divine choice of Israel, but, as he proceeds to argue, it was rather based upon this, viz. that the people chosen by God is not Israel after the flesh, but the Israel whom God had selected of His own free and merciful choice out of Gentiles and a remnant of the Jews, while the majority of the Jewish nation belonged to the vessels of wrath, having brought their rejection upon themselves by their own fault, and having no cause to complain of arbitrariness on the part of God. The author of these sections, according to Volter,^ is more closely allied to the writer of the original letter, and he in- stances, in proof of this, his teaching concerning the work of Christ and justification, although even here differences in detail are to be found. Thus, e.g., this second interpolator regards the death of Jesus as a representative and atoning death, but the obedience of Jesus plays no part in this con- sideration : in the original letter the source of faith is the impression which the death of Jesus makes as a manifest act of obedience on His part towards God, while the Resurrection of Jesus can only serve as a confirmation of the faith thus awakened : accordingly, whilst in the original letter the death of Jesus is the immediate object of faith, in the second interpolator the starting-point is the Resurrection. The Resurrection thus awakens faith, and is the first and proper object of justifying faith, for it is faith in the almighty power of God declaring itself in the Resurrection of Jesus which is reckoned for righteousness (just as Abraham's faith in God's ' Volter, ubi supra, pp. 73 ft. " Ibid. pp. 776". RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE * IIAUPTBRIEFE ' 223 almighty power was so reckoned), in so far as in consequence of this faith the death of Jesus gains its atoning significance for the beHever. The death of Christ, therefore, is not con- ceived of by this first interpolator so much from the point of view of the love of God, but rather from that of the righteousness of God. The second interpolator appropriates from the original letter the thought of the believer dying with Jesus, but, again, with a characteristic turn of thou"-ht. According to the original letter, the actual body of sin is killed with the body of Christ, so that the believer is dead unto sin ; according to the second interpolator, the believer, while his flesh is slain with the body of Christ, is become dead to the law, since the law is only appointed for the fleshly man, to awaken the sinful passions dormant in the flesh. We thus arrive at the important difference which exists, as Volter maintains, between the writer of the original letter and the second interpolator with regard to the law. The former reckons the law more from a Christian standpoint as the highest and best source for the knowledge of the divine will which the Christian has to fulfil : the second interpolator, on the contrary, recognises in the law only the purpose of stirrino- up the motions of sin in the flesh, of making sin to abound, and so of awakening the conscience to a sense of the divine wrath ; thus it negatively prepares the true way of salvation, of which it also positively testifies, but after this true way of salvation has appeared, the law is^'cancelled for those who have entered upon it. Volter's next step is an attempt to show that our second interpolator is considerably opposed to the first interpolator.' With regard to the work of Christ and justification, this opposition manifests itself just in proportion as our second interpolator is in agreement with the ' original ' letter : with regard to the attitude towards the law, the difference which Volter claims to have established between the ' original ' letter and the second interpolator manifests itself still more sharply between the first and second interpolator.- The former, e.^-.^ recognises in the law the expression of the divine will, according ' Voller, ubi suj>ra, pp. 79 A- ■' I/'id, p. 99. 224 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES to which mankind and their works will be judged at the judg- ment. In his view, all depends upon this : that man whom the law, on account of the sinfulness of the flesh, can only aid to a knowledge of sin and not to justification, is armed by the redemption in Christ with a power which enables him to free himself from the power of the flesh and sin, and to- fulfil the law. The second interpolator, on the contrary, conceives of the redeemed as dead to the flesh and to the law, and so the law in the case of the redeemed is cancelled. In the course of his criticism upon this second interpola- tion, Volter thinks that ch. ix. and x., which are a part of it^ enable us to form some idea of the date of its composition, But when he proceeds to place this after the catastrophe of A.D. 70 because in ch. ix. the author speaks of the majority of Israel as belonging to the vessels of wrath which God has appointed to destruction, we may fairly point, not only to the strong protest of Godet,' but also to the still more recent and remarkable one raised by R. Lipsius,^ against any attempt to separate ch. ix.-xi. from the authorship of the rest of the Epistle. Lipsius shows us by a careful analysis how these three chapters (ix.-xi.) form a complete and natural section of Paul's argument, whilst Volter, not content with regarding ch. ix. and x. as one interpolation, asks us to consider ch. xi. as another, the work again of some later hand. But Vdlter's ingenuity is by no means exhausted, and perhaps nowhere is it carried to a greater length than in his separation of ch. vii. 7-25 and viii. 2 from the rest of the Epistle : these verses, he asks us to believe, belong neither to the ' original ' letter nor to the first or second interpolation : they are the work of another and a later hand seeking to bridge over the chasm which divides ch. vii. 1-6 from viii. i, 3 ! But without entering further into the arbitrary method adopted by Volter in dealing with the Epistle to the Romans a method condemned by R. Lipsius no less than by Godet and Gloel — it is even more surprising to find that he applies 1 Godet, VEpitre aux Romains, p. 644, 2nd edit. 1890. 2 Hand-Covimentar zuin N. T. ii. zweite Abtheilung, p. 70. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUPTRRIEFE ' 225 the same method to the Epistle to the Galatians. Here it is obvious that there is Httle ground to complain of the length of the Epistle, and yet in the half-dozen chapters which it contains Volter claims to have discovered a whole scries of interpolations and instances of dependence upon the Epistle to the Romans ! But even after these interpolations are marked out, that which remains is not the work of Paul, and Volter here agrees with Steck in regarding the whole Epistle as spurious.' He rejects it, first of all, upon two grounds closely connected together — (i) its theology ; (2) its relation to the other Pauline Epistles, especially the Romans. Many of the objections which Volter raises in this part of his attack have been already anticipated by Steck, and met fairly and suc- cessfully by Gloel, and again, still more recently, in a very concise form, by Lipsius, Volter's attack, however, is more complicated than that of Steck, owing to the manner in which he had previously broken up the Epistle to the Romans. Thus, he commences by pointing out that both Romans and Galatians have the same groundwork — the universality of sin ; that in both Epistles the law is brought into a close relation- ship to sin ; but he argues that, in some particulars of this relationship the author of Galatians borrows from the first interpolator of the Romans, whilst in other respects he follows the antinomian second interpolator. It is evident how entirely subjective such speculations must be. But w^hen Volter pretends to found an argument for the dependence of the Galatians upon the Romans from the passage in the former ch. iii. 21-iv, 25, we are reminded that the same line of argument had been previously adopted by Steck, and that the same answer may be given to it, viz. that there is nothing strange in the fact that a writer like Paul, himself an Israelite, should derive his teaching both here and in Rom. iv. from familiar incidents and characters of the Old Testament. Volter, however, is not content with supposing a depend- ence of the Galatians upon one other Epistle ; according to ' Volter, ubi supra, pp. 89-105. Q 226 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES him, it also contains instances of dependence upon the two Epistles to the Corinthians. Some of these alleged instances of dependence have been already anticipated by Steck — e.g. Gal. iv. I2-20 in relation to i Cor. iv. 14, 15 : Gal. v. 19-21 in relation to i Cor. vi. 9 — and, it is not too much to add, have been already refuted by Gloel. Most, if not all, of them are easily accounted for, unless we are prepared to lay down a canon to the effect that a writer must never reproduce the same thoughts, or clothe them in somewhat similar words, even when he is addressing different hearers. Let us now turn to Volter's examination of the historical notices in the Epistle to the Galatians.' Here he starts with an assumption, viz. that the first two chapters are meant to serve an apologetic purpose, and to support the proof that Paul's gospel was derived directly and exclusively from a divine revelation, that it had kept itself free from all human influence, and in the face of human assaults had asserted and proved its independence and its truth. He is careful to point out that this apologetic aim is not in itself any ground for regarding the notices contained in this part of the Epistle as unhistorical, but it is at once evident that the assumption with which he starts leads him to the most fanciful judgments. Thus, e.g., the expression in Gal. i. 1 5> in which Paul speaks of himself as ' separated from his mother's womb ' (acfiopLaas), reminds Volter of the expression in Rom. i. i, 'separated unto the Gospel of God ' (d(f)(opL(r/xsvos). But whilst in the latter case Paul only states in a general way that he was separated from human surroundings to preach the Gospel, in the latter the word ' separated ' is strikingly determined by the addition ' from my mother's womb ' (sk KoiKlas /x^jrpos). This addition to the expression ' separated ' (di su/ra, pp. 120 ff. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' HAUPTBRIEFE ' 22/ by a combination of the word ' separated ' (dcfxopicrfjbhos) in Rom. i. I, and of the words 'as to one born out of due time' (cDo-TTEpsl Tft) sKTpcofxaTi) in I Cor. XV. 8. This latter expres- sion he beh'evcs that the author of the Galatian Epistle has taken literally ; he thought that Paul here points himself out ' as one untimcl}^ born,' and he saw in this expression Paul's peculiar destin)- already intimated. Thus, then, Volter would have us conclude that Gal. i. 15 presupposes Rom. i. i and I Cor. XV. 8 ; that it wrongly defines the~ first passage and gives a wrong explanation to the second, and that herein lies a proof that the author of the Galatian Epistle could not have been Paul himself ! But a further examination of Gal, i. arouses Volter's suspicions still more. In comparing Gal. i. 12, 15, 16 with the narratives of Paul's conversion in the Acts, and with I Cor. ix. I, XV. 8, he lays it down that in Galatians no re- ference is made to an external appearance, but only to an inward process in the Apostle's mind. He admits that one might be inclined to attach little weight to the difference be- tween Galatians on the one hand and the Acts and i Cor- inthians on the other, and to combine the two descriptions, since at least in two passages of the Acts (xxii. 6-9 and xxvi. 13, 14) the voice must be conceived of as an inward process in Paul's mind, connected with the external appearance vouchsafed to him, and Paul in Gal. i. might easily be supposed to speak of this inward process alone, since it was for him the chief fact. But he proceeds to argue that this difference is seen on closer consideration to be connected with another and a weighty discrepancy between Galatians and the Acts. In the latter, all three narratives of Paul's conversion presup- pose that Paul had already learnt, or was to learn, the details of the life, teaching, death, and resurrection of Christ in- directl}' or directly from those who were witnesses of them, and according to i Corinthians this was without doubt the case (comp. i Cor. vii. 10, 12, 25, xv. 3, xi. 23). The Epistle to the Galatians, on the contrary, derives from the event before Damascus, not merely the conversion of Paul and his call to be the Apostle of the Gentiles, but also his Q 2 228 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES whole preparation for that office. Paul's whole gospel has its source in that event before Damascus, so that he assures us that nothing had been received from men, nor taught him by- man (Gal. i. II, 12), and so the event is represented as a re- velation of Jesus Christ — as a revelation of His Son which God had wrought in Paul, with an imitation which can scarcely be mistaken of Matt. xvi. 17 in Gal. i. 16. In Volter's opinion it is simply impossible to suppose that Paul's gospel was thus received, apart from all human communication and instruction. That gospel has an historical foundation : historical events, the life and teaching, death and resurrection of an historical Person form its contents, and the Apostle could only have gained his knowledge from men to whom these events were known. If the author of the Galatian Epistle contradicts this, then we can only see in such a contradiction a proof that we are dealing with a writer who in the pursuit of his ten- dency entirely loses sight of the limits between what is possible and what is impossible, the historical and the unhistorical. But if this is so, Volter holds that he is justified in regarding the incidents which the author of the Galatians associates with Paul's conversion as also devoid of all historical credibility. The narratives of the Acts which represent the Apostle as entering into fellowship with the Christians at Damascus, and with the Apostles at Jerusalem (ix. 8 ff., xxii. 10 ff.) are far more simple and natural, far less exposed to the suspicion of tendency, and far more probable, than the account in Gal. i. 16 ff., according to which Paul confers not with flesh and blood, but immediately leaves Damascus for the deserts of Arabia. In this narrative the author of the Epistle, in Volter's view, wished to enter his protest against the immediate intercourse of Paul after his conversion with the Christians at Damascus, especially with Ananias, and this protest he would endorse by making Paul undertake a journey to Arabia, where, withdrawn from all human influences, he could medi- tate upon the revelation which he had received, and prepare his gospel. Just as Peter after his confession of Christ as the Son of God was deemed worthy by Jesus of the acknowledg- ment that flesh and blood had not revealed it unto him. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUPTBRIEFE ' 229 SO, thinks \''6ltcr, it was necessary for the author of the Galatians to represent Paul as deriving his knowledge of Jesus Christ through divine revelation alone, in which flesh and blood shared just as little as in the case of Peter. The same tendency of the writer to assert the divine origin of Paul's gospel is further witnessed in the notice that Paul's visit to the primitive Apostles at Jerusalem does not take place after a short stay in Damascus, but only after his sojourn in Arabia, and after a three years' interval from the date of his conversion (Gal. i. 18).' At the same time it is evident, according to Volter, that the account in the Galatian Epistle presupposes some such representation of Paul's conver- sion as in the Acts to be known to the author, since, although he omits to tell us where the revelation of which he speaks took place, he shows through the words ' I returned again to Damascus ' (jruXiv uirsarpeylra sis AafxaaKov), that he looks upon the neighbourhood of Damascus as the acknowledged scene of that revelation (Gal. i. 17). It is this same tendency to represent Paul's gospel as independent from the first, which Volter discovers in the account given in Gal, i. of the Apostle's first visit to Jerusalem. According to Gal. i. 18, 19, Paul sees only Peter and James when he goes up to Jerusalem, and Volter at once jumps to the conclusion that such a statement is entirely at variance with Acts ix. 26, 27, where Paul essays to join himself to the disciples at Jerusalem, but they are all afraid until Barnabas takes him and brings him unto the Apostles, But if, argues Volter, Paul had open intercourse with the whole Church at Jerusalem, as we gather from Acts ix. 26-9, those explana- tions must at once have been entered into with regard to the teaching of the Pauline gospel, which the author of the Galatian Epistle reserves for the Apostolic Council. The first visit of Paul to Jerusalem is therefore, according to the Galatians, resolved into a purely personal meeting between the Apostle and Peter and James, while the additional effect ' On the alleged discrepancies of time between Gal. i. 18 and Acts ix, 20-26, see Lightfoot, Galatians, p. 89; Lindemann, Die Echthcit dcr paulijiischen Hauptbriefe, p, 40. 230 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES is produced that, at this his first visit to Jerusalem, Paul stands by the side of the two leaders of the primitive Church as their equal. Again, therefore, Volter would have us accept the narra- tive in the Acts as the more trustworthy, inasmuch as it con- trasts so favourably with the Galatians in its freedom from tendency : and again we are struck with the readiness with which Volter, like Steck before him, accepts the trustworthi- ness of a book which Baur and his followers rejected in favour of the (to them) undoubted historical document, the Epistle to the Galatians. Many of the objections raised by Volter against the his- toric character of the Galatians are exactly similar to those raised by Steck, and the same answers are equally valid. It is, however, important to bear in mind that here again, not only Gloel, but Lindemann ' and Lipsius see no reason to doubt the historical accuracy of the notice in Galatians i. i8 of Paul's sojourn in Jerusalem for fifteen days with Peter. With regard to some of the points of detail upon which Volter lays stress in his attack upon this notice, it may be safely asserted that no contradiction can be proved between Acts ix. 27 ff. and Gal. i. 18, 19,^ since the other Apostles, with the exception of Peter and James, might either have been absent from Jerusalem at the time, or Paul might not have attended any public meeting of the Church. Nor, again, does it seem very reasonable to suppose that, even if Paul's visit to Peter and James was a purely private and personal one, no explanations of his peculiar ' gospel ' could have been included in the intercourse of fifteen days, especially if Paul was from the very first so anxious to assert the independence of his teaching. After all this, it is not surprising to find that the famous passage Gal, ii. i-io affords Volter still further scope for ' Lindemann, Die Echtheit der patiliiiischen Haiiptbriefe, pp. 40, 41 ; Lipsius, Hand-Comme7itar invi N. T. ii. zweite Abtheilung, p. 16. - Lightfoot, Galatians, pp. 91, 92; Nosgen, Aposielgeschichte, p. 206; Plumptre (EUicott's Cotnmentary on the N. T.) ii. 62; and see also Weiss, Einkitiing in das N. T., as to this, and the supposed 'tendency' of the Acts p. 564, 2. Aufl. 1889. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUPTBRIEFE ' 231 extravagant ingciuiity and arbitrary criticism. It seems impossible for him to approach any book of the New Testa- ment without applying to it the same method of disintegration which he applied to the Apocalypse. Thus he is not content with a comparison of Gal. ii. and Acts xv. unless the latter chapter is broken up into sections : Acts xv. 5-2 1 does not belong to the original source, but to a later addition, and therefore we must compare Gal. ii. i-io, not only with this portion of the chapter, but also with Acts xv. 1-4 and 22-33. In addition to a comparison with these two portions of Acts XV., Volter also requires us to compare Gal. ii. i-io with Acts xi. 27-30. In this latter passage mention is made of a second visit of Paul accompanied by Barnabas to Jeru- salem, for the purpose of bringing charitable alms to the saints in that city, and in Acts xv. we have a third visit of Paul, again accompanied by Barnabas, to the Jewish capital. But Volter asks us to regard these two visits mentioned in Acts xi. and xv. as one and the same : they are, he maintains, two different accounts of the same journey, which the author had obtained from different sources, and which, owing to their distinctive details, he had referred to two journeys instead of to one.^ But when he compares these two accounts with Gal. ii. I-IO, although he acknowledges some points of agreement, he soon discovers the old 'tendency' at work in the narrative of the Galatian Epistle. In Gal. ii. 2 Paul goes up to Jeru- salem ' by revelation ' [kutci aircKuXv^iv), but of this, says Volter, neither Acts xi. 27-30 nor xv. 1-4, 22-33 know any- thing.- Here, then, we again encounter the purpose of the ' On the visits of St. Paul to Jerusalem and the notices in Acts and Galatians, see Godet, VEpitre aux Romains, pp. 30-33 (Introd.) ; Lightfoot, Galatians, pp. 91, 92, no, 123 ff. ; Nosgen, Apostelgeschichte, p. 236; Weiss, uln supra, p. 564, note. ■■' See, however, on the expression /caro aicoKd\v\pLu Lightfoot's note, Galatians, p. 125, where he points out that there is no contradiction between this statement and the fact that in the Acts Paul is represented as sent to Jerusalem by the Christians at Antioch : ' The historian naturally records the external impulse which led to the mission ; the Apostle himself states his inward motive. . . . The very stress which he lays on this resolution seems to show that other circum- stances were at work.' 232 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES author of the Galatian Epistle to assert the entire freedom of the Apostle from any dependence upon man, and this purpose becomes still more evident when we consider that the m.otive of the journey given in Gal. ii. 4 makes the introduction of the Kara airoKuXvy^iv of verse 2 quite unnecessary. Even if it be contended that Gal. ii. 4 shows that the author of the Galatian Epistle was acquainted with the same motive of the journey as that mentioned in the Acts, yet this, argues Volter, is nothing in its favour, and indeed it rather awakens a sus- picion against the Pauline authorship of the Epistle, since the brief intimation of Gal. ii. 4 appears to presuppose the more exact and complete narrative of the Acts ! A narrative such as we find in Acts xv. 1-4 simply gives the occasion of the journey, without having recourse to any revelation as the motive, and makes upon us the impression of unvarnished historical truth ! The same preference for the narrative of the Acts shows itself when Volter compares the compact arrived at between Paul and the Pillar Apostles in Gal. ii. i-io with the results of the Apostolic Council in Acts xv. In his view Acts xv. 1-4, 22-33 gives us a record clear, free from contradictions, raised above any suspicion of a tendency, and containing all the elements of historical probability. But all this praise, we must remember, is again bestowed at the expense of Gal. ii. I- 10, in which we are asked to believe that the historical elements are either relegated to the background, or are dis- figured and displaced, by the additions and perversions of a writer whose object is always to exalt Paul and his gospel. But not only have conservative critics like Lechler ' and Godet, and scientific critics like B. Weiss and Reuss,- refused to regard the alleged differences between Acts xv. and Gal. ii. as irreconcilable, but more recently still, we find Lipsius not only admitting that the narrative in Gal. ii. i-io refers to the same event as Acts xv., but defending its historic truth against ' Lechler, Das apost. Zeiialier, pp. 163-209. " Weiss, Einleitung in das N. T. pp. 132, 133, 2. Aufl. ; Godet, L'Epitre aux Remains, i. 49 (Introd.) ; Reuss, Geschichteder heiligen Schriften des N. T. pp. 60, 63, 6. Aufl. 1887. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' HAUPTBRIEFE ' 233 Steck.' He sees no difficulty in the division of missionary work (not in a geographical, but in an ethnographical sense) between Paul and the Pillar Apostles, such as is described in Gal. ii., a division which does not destroy the recognition of a brotherly relation of fellowship, and he regards the conduct of the Apostles as a bright example of that genuine senti- ment of union which in the living consciousness of a common foundation of Christian belief stretches out a brotherly hand even across deeply-felt theological oppositions. That this division of labour was soon found to be impracticable in Churches composed of Jews and Gentiles is not, Lipsius maintains, any argument for rejecting the historical cha- racter of this representation : the compact at Jerusalem, he adds, was of course soon superseded by the sequence of events. Volter commences by remarking- that what chiefly differentiates Acts xv. 5-21 is the fact that here a separate assembly of the Apostles and elders is presupposed, which Pharisaically-minded Christians who had arisen in the Church assembly at Jerusalem had occasioned by demanding that Gentile Christians should be circumcised and obey the law. This interpolation of verses 5-21 was prompted, Volter asks us to believe, by the Epistle to the Galatians. The ex- pression in Gal. ii. 2, 'but privately to those of reputation' {kut^ IBiav Bs Tois hoKovcTLv), would easily be understood as if Paul was speaking of a separate negotiation with the Apostles, which took place close upon the assembly of the Church, and since the Galatian Epistle first mentions ' false brethren brought in unawares ' (irapsiaaKTot -ylrsvBdSsXcfioc) on the occasion of the negotiations at Jerusalem, while previously it had only spoken of the revelation {verse 2) as the motive of Paul's journey, it was easy to understand Gal. ii. 4 as if Paul there spoke of false brethren who had arisen in the Church assembly at Jerusalem. Volter therefore believes that the author, or the reviser, of the Acts had the Epistle to the Galatians before him, and from an entire misunder- ' Lipsius, Hand-Coiumenlar zum N. T. ii. zweite Abtheilung, p. 22, 1891. * Volter, ubi supra, p. 148. 234 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES standing of Gal, ii. i-io, particularly of verses 2 and 4, has supplemented Acts xv. 1-4, 22-33 by the verses 5-21. If he speaks of some of the sect of the Pharisees who believed (verse 5), this for the author of the third Gospel is an obvious explanation of the phrase in Gal. ii. 4, ' false brethren brought in unawares.' Could any exegesis, we may well ask, be more extravagant or arbitrary than this .? Another instance of Volter's arbitrary criticism meets us in the manner in which he compares the remaining part of Gal. ii. with the Acts.^ He commences by refusing to recog- nise the historical character of Paul's words in Gal. ii. 11 -21, because the Apostle adopts an attitude towards the law which must be regarded as unhistorical when we compare it with the account of the Apostolic Council in the Acts — an attitude which is inconsistent with the ' original ' Epistle to the Romans, and due to the influence of the ' first ' and * second ' ' revisers ' of that Epistle. It is difficult to see how a critic can form a fair judgment as to the historical nature of a narrative when he approaches it with such pre- suppositions. But Volter's mode of dealing with the infor- mation in Gal. ii. and the Acts as to the conflict at Antioch between Peter and Paul is even more surprising. The Acts, as he remarks, relates nothing directly of the coming of Peter to Antioch, and of the quarrel with Paul : but may it not say something of this incident indirectly .? Let us only read, says Volter, Acts x. i-ii, 18. If we do so, and contrast this passage with Gal. ii. 1 1 ff., do we not receive the impression that Acts x. i-ii, 18, is a. pendant to Gal. ii. 11 ff — 3. pendant in which, in contrast with Gal. ii. 11, Peter is to be repre- sented as he who first broke through, upon an undoubtedly divine incitement, the barrier between circumcised and un- circumcised, not merely with regard to community of belief, but also in regard to fellowship at table ? But in this case Volter considers it beyond a doubt that the ' tendency ' is on the side of the Acts : - the passage (Acts x. i-ii, 18) must be regarded as unhistorical, for if we accept it, the passage in xv. 1-4, 22-33, becomes quite unintelligible, since there ' Volter, ubi sitp)-a, pp. 149 ff. ^ Ibid, p, 150. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUrTBKIEl'K ' 235 we find that the question of the position of Gentiles with reference to the law must first be brought before the primitive Church, and the freedom of Gentile Christians from circum- cision mustl^bc first acknowledged by it. But the diff.culty is easily explained by Volter, for we have only to suppose that the author of the Acts added the section xv. 5-21 to the rest of the narrative in the chapter, and thus made a meagre attempt to bring ch. xv. into relation with ch. x. i-i i, 18, and to balance them one with the other. But Volter believes it possible to show that the author of the Acts was acquainted with a narrative similar to that of the Galatian Epistle, but had passed it over.' We have seen> he says, that the narrative in Acts xv. 1-4, 22-33, ought to be placed before ch. xiii. and xiv., and runs parallel with Acts xi. 27-30. At the conclusion of the section Acts xv. 1-4,22-33, it is related that Judas and Silas again returned to Jerusalem from Antioch, but in Acts xv. 35 ff. the presence of Silas at Antioch is presupposed without anything being told us of his coming thither : so, too, with regard to John Mark, his pre- sence at Antioch is also presupposed without any notice being given of his coming thither. Now if, argues Volter, it had only been a question of the return of Silas and Mark to Antioch, the author of the Acts would probably have spoken of it : that he passes it over in silence can only be ac- counted for on some pressing ground, and the reason, in Volter's opinion, is to be found in the belief that Silas and Mark returned to Antioch in company with Peter ; but the author of the Acts probably omits to mention this arrival of Peter with Silas and Mark at Antioch, because it was con- nected with the conflict which took place in that city between Peter and Paul. In one of his most characteristic and ingenious arguments^ Volter would prove to us that this is no mere baseless conjec- ture. He takes the narrative related in Acts xii. This nar- rative is placed after the narrative in Acts xi. 27-30, with which Acts xv. 1-4, 22-33 is, as Volter has already main- tained, parallel. After the incidents recorded in Acts xii. ' Volter, ubi supra, p, 151. 236 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES 1-23, we certainly find verses 24 and 25, which belong to Acts xi. 27-30. But, says Volter, these verses 24 and 25 are evidently only placed after xii. 1-23, in order to be able to join to them the narrative in xiii. I, and thus to bring them into connection with Acts xi. 19-30. And so the narrative in Acts xii. 1-23 really belongs, according to the author of the Acts, after the incident of the journey of Paul and Bar- nabas to Jerusalem (Acts xi. 27-30 and xii. 24, 25). But in Acts xii. 1-23 we find the notice that Peter was obliged to leave Jerusalem and betake himself ' to another place' (verse 17). Therefore the Acts thus fix a departure of Peter from Jerusalem subsequent to the Apostolic Council (since, accord- ing to Volter, Acts xi. 27-30 and Acts xv. refer to the same visit of Paul and Barnabas to Jerusalem), and we are at liberty to suppose that by the expression ' to another place,' allusion is made to Antioch. After elaborating an argument of this ver}^ subjective kind, Volter expresses his conviction that the Acts sufficiently indicate the substantial correctness of the narrative in Gal. ii. 1 1 ff., at any rate so far as the coming of Peter to Antioch, his conflict with Paul and the occasion of it, are concerned.' In his view the position of things at Antioch was somewhat as follows : — Paul and Barnabas and the other Jewish Christians at Antioch partook with the Gentile Christians of the love-feasts, at which regard was had to the Jewish scruples as to food, although not in the ordinary fellowship at table. Peter acts similarly when he comes to Antioch. But when emissaries arrived from James, Peter and the other Jewish Christians, and even Barnabas, withdrew from the common meals : Paul alone remained firm, and we may assume, thinks Volter, that Paul regarded Peter's con- duct and that of the other Jewish Christians as a disgraceful and cowardly yielding against their own better conviction, at which he was the more indignant, since the question for the Jewish Christians was one of a small formal concession, but of great importance for the fellowship in Christian belief To this effect Volter is willing to admit that Paul ex- pressed himself But that the Apostle could have adopted ' Volter, ubi supra, p. 152. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUPTBRIEFE ' 237 the position towards the Jewish law which the Epistle to the Galatians represents, and that he could have used the words which that Epistle places in his mouth— this Volter considers an impossibility, and he cannot accept it as historical ; the point of view of the author of the Galatians, in common with that of his favourite ' second reviser ' of the Epistle to the Romans, whom Volter again introduces, is that of an ad- vanced Paulinism, and of a Gentile Christianity which had entirely freed itself from any connection with, or any regard for, a Jewish Christianity. In the pages which follow, Volter renews the attacks, with which Steck has already made us familiar, upon the character of the Galatian Epistle, and upon its alleged want of harmony with historical conditions. But after Gloel's admirable de- fence of the living and powerful personality which speaks to us in the pages of Galatians,' it is needless to follow Volter in his description of it as an abstract document, which contains but a slight reminiscence of actual experiences. Volter makes a great deal of the question as to whom the Epistle was addressed, whether to the inhabitants of the district called Galatia, or to the inhabitants of the Roman province of Galatia.'^ But here again it will be noticed that Lipsius, with all the difficulties before him relating to this point, unhesi- tatingly declines to accept them, even if unsolved, as any argument against the genuineness of the Epistle.^ Volter finally elaborates an argument to show that Gala- tians points to a later time than 2 Corinthians, and there- fore to a later period than the Apostolic age/ At first sight we might, he thinks, be tempted to suppose that in Galatians reference is made to the Jewish emissaries with whom one undoubtedly has to deal in 2 Corinthians. But this, in Volter's view, is by no means the case. The notice in Gal. vi. 13, 14, in which the agitators are more closely characterised, points, according to him, to what he calls a ' Gloel, Diejiingste Kritik des Galaterbriefes, pp. 90-93. * Volter, ubi supra, p. 154. ' Lipsius, Hand-Commentar zum N. T. ii. zweite Ablheilung, p. 8, 1891. * Volter, ubi supra, pp. 167 ff. 238 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES spontaneous Judaising movennent within the Churches. At a time, when a Christian as such was an object of enmity, circumcision, so offensive at other times, appeared to many a specious means of preservation against persecution : Christians of repute who had pubHc interests received circumcision, without accepting the whole Jewish law, in order to secure their social position ; naturally, they strenuously endeavoured to persuade their fellow-citizens to a similar course, so that they might represent the whole Church to their Jewish perse- cutors (for of such we have probably to take account in the first instance) as a Church of the circumcised, distinct from the mother Christian Church, and as such possessing a claim to toleration. But this, Volter adds, is quite another kind of movement from that with which we have to deal in Corinth, and points plainly to a later period than the Apostolic age. To counteract this movement Volter supposes that the author of the Galatians (who was some later Pauline) clothed his Epistle with the authority and name of Paul. But the Paul, whom this unknown Pauline presents to us, has lost all the features of the historical Paul of the Acts, all Paul's just regard for the Jews and Jewish Christians ; the picture is drawn after the model of the sharp antinomian Paul which ' the second reviser ' of the Epistle to the Romans had rendered familiar : and whilst this unknown author represents the relations of the Apostle with the Galatians after the fashion of i and 2 Corinthians, he impresses upon the Judaising agitators the type of the Judaists of his own day. Here we find ourselves again face to face with some of the most characteristic of Volter's criticism : ' the historical Paul of the Acts ' as contrasted with the Paul of the Epistles ; * the second interpolator ' of the Epistle to the Romans, a needless personage in the eyes of advanced critics like Lipsius, who consider that the difference of tone between the Roman and Galatian Epistles is amply accounted for by the position of things in the two different Churches addressed ; ^ a fanciful picture of the historical conditions at the time of the Galatian Epistle — conditions which, as Gloel has shown so ' Hand-Commcntar zum N. T. ii. zweite Abtheilung, p. 8. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUPTBRIEFE ' 239 fully (a proof warmly endorsed by Hilgenfeld), are in entire accordance with the received date of composition, and with no other.' But not only has Volter's attempt thus to break up and invalidate the two Epistles, Romans and Galatians, been classed by Lipsius under the head of merely subjective and conjectural criticism,- but it has called forth the extreme regret of Hilgenfeld,^ who, after remarking that Steck's attack on the Galatians would only afford joy to the opponents of all critical inquiry into primitive Christianity, adds that this * critical influenza ' has extended still further, and embraced amongst others Daniel Volter, and W. C. van Manen the last-named clearly showing whither ' this critical epidemic ' leads, since he regards Steck as foo conservative in retainino- his belief in Paul as a great historical reality. Attention has before been drawn to Hilgenfeld's firm rejection of the Steck and Volter hypothesis, and this fact is in itself sufficient to prove that the present foremost representative of the Tiibino-en school is little inclined to change his attitude with regard to the authenticity of the Hauptbriefe ; and in this decided protest against Steck and his followers he by no means stands alone, since he is joined by numerous other advanced critics — e.g. C. Holsten, Lindemann, and Volkmar.'* When Gloel wTote his answer to Steck, Hilgenfeld had not yet expressed an opinion upon the newest phase of New Testament criticism, but in a note Gloel quotes with pleasure the fulfilment of his expectations in Hilo-enfeld's disavowal of Steck's hypothesis.'* In his criticism of Steck and Volter, contained in his review of Gloel and Lindemann ' Hilgenfeld, Zeitscln-ifi fiir wissen. Theologie, p. 361, 1S90. * Lipsius, ubi supra, pp. 9 and 75. So, too, Weiss, ' Der Romerbrief,' p. 33 in Meyer's Commentar, 1891. ^ Hilgenfeld, vbi supra, p. 358. * It is only fair to note that Lipsius [ubi sjipra, p. 9), although by no means endorsing his opinions, recognises the earnestness of Steck's work, and the fact that he has called attention to many unsolved difficulties. Harnack, while ad- mitting that the strength of such attacks as those of Loman lies in the difficullies which surround the early history of the Church, declares that the rejection of such a primary source as i Corinthians presents to him an insuperable argument against these new hypotheses {Dogniotgeschichtc, i. p. 49, 2. Aufl.). * Gloel, ubi supra, p. 14. 240 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES Hilgenfeld expresses his entire agreement, not only with Gloel's defence of the received date of the Haiiptbriefe^ but also with other details in his argument. Thus he considers that Gloel has conclusively shown that the Galatian Epistle is not dependent on the Romans or i and 2 Corinthians ; he agrees with him also in the view that a dependence of Paul upon Philo and Seneca is quite unprovable, and he approves of his rejection of Steck's attempt to set aside or weaken the attestation to the Pauline Epistles contained in the writings of the Apostolic Fathers and the oldest Fathers of the Church.^ There is, moreover, another point of view from which this criticism by Hilgenfeld becomes full of fresh interest and importance. It is evident that if, as Hilgenfeld admits, the dependence of the Hauptbriefe upon Philo and Seneca cannot be proved, a further blow has been struck at Steck's theory, and at what Godet calls ' la clef de voute du systeme.' ^ According to Steck, when the news of the appearance of Jesus reached Rome it produced there two different Chris- tianities, the one Judaic preached by the Apostles and Paul, the other Hellenic, the product of the Grecian colony estab- lished at Rome. Up to the close of the first century these two tendencies — the Judaic and the Hellenic — ran in parallel lines ; but a part of the Roman Hellenists rebelled against any attempt at fusion, and embodied their protest in the four great Epistles bearing the name of Paul, 120-140 A.D. These Epistles, therefore, were not in reality the work of the historical Paul, but of the extreme Greek-spiritualistic school which existed within the Christian Church at Rome. But not only is it impossible to prove the least de- pendence upon the teaching of Philo or Seneca in these four Epistles, but we may proceed further and advance a positive argument to the effect that the three chief notions which dominate the Epistle to the Romans are essentially ' Hilgenfeld, ubi supra. With these remarks we may comp. those of Lipsius and Schmiedel in condemnation of Steck. See Haiid-Commentar zum N. T. ii. zweite Abtheilung, pp. 8, 9, and ii. erste Abtheilung, i. Halfte, pp. 34 ff. (Introd. to i and 2 Cor.). * Godet, VEpttre mix Romains, ii. 642, 2nd edit. 1890. RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUPTBRIEFE ' 24I Judaic. This has been admirably worked out by Godet in his criticism of Steck's theory.' There are, Godet reminds us, three ideas which dominate the teaching of Paul in the Epistle to the Romans, the very Epistle upon which Steck would rely as affording the best support to the theory of what he terms an Hellcnico-Roman origin of the HaKptbricfe. These three ideas are justification by faith, sanctification by the Holy Spirit, and the relation between Jew and Gentile in a common salvation. The first of these ideas is essentially Judaic. If Hellenism possesses up to a certain point the notions of sin, of expiation, of absolution, the idea of a positive imputation of justice ac- corded to faith on the part of God is absolutely strange to it, since we must presuppose the idea of a holy and merciful God, which belongs to the revelation vouchsafed to Israel. We can trace the idea from Genesis (xv, 3) through the Psalmists and Prophets, and we can see how familiar it had become to the Jewish mind in the books of the Maccabees (Ps. cxliii. 2 ; Isaiah 1. 8 ; i Mace. ii. 52, 61). And if this is so, w^e can also readily understand how this fundamental notion of Paulinism emanates purely and simply from the circle of Old Testament ideas, and not from that of any Grseco- Roman school. So, too, the same argument may be applied to the second essential notion of Paulinism — the sanctifying work of the divine Spirit in the heart of the justified believer. The more closely this idea is shown to be related to the Old Testament (comp., e.g., Ps. li. 12-14; Jcr. xxxi. 33, 34; Ezek. xxxvi. 25-27) the further is it removed from Greek philosophy, and especially from that form of it which prevailed in Rome amongst the best thinkers of the second century — that of Stoicism. Without entirely disavowing the need of com- munion with God, Stoicism made human nature rely upon its own self-sufficiency, and believed man capable of realising for himself the moral ideal ; whilst the Pauline teaching was ' Lipsius {uhi supra) expresses himself as entirely opposed to the theory of Steck that the Pauline Epistles bear a thorough Hellenistic character without any acquaintance with Old Testament views. R 242 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES based upon two facts — the powerlessness of man for good, and the necessity for a work of God Himself in the heart of the believer. With regard to the third idea — viz. that of the relation between Jew and Gentile in the possession of the salvation offered by the gospel — if such a question had ever presented itself to the Greek mind, it would not in any case have excited the poignant interest with which Paul treats of it in Rom. ix.-xi. ; one feels that it stirs his Jewish patriotism to the very depths of his heart. To attribute such accents of personal emotion and of such unequalled pathos to a Grseco- Roman school of the second century is to offend against common sense, and is like trying to make water leap forth from a rock, as Moses did.^ We have thus dwelt at length upon the recent criticism directed against the Hauptbriefe, not only because it is unfair altogether to ignore it, but because to examine it in detail, and not merely to mention its existence, is one of the best and surest ways to justify the appeal which is made to these epistles in the following chapters. When all is said for this criticism which can be said, and when we have fully recog- nised with Lipsius the earnestness of Steck's endeavour, it is scarcely likely to obtain a following in face of the counter- criticism of writers like Scholten in Holland, of the most advanced representatives of French and German thought,^ and, we may add, of the extreme negative criticism in England. What value a learned writer like B. Weiss attaches to these attacks may best be learnt from the fact that in the eighth edition of ' Meyer's Commentary on the Epistles to the Romans,' he dismisses Steck in the Introduction with a brief remark in a bracket,^ and from the short and summary 1 Compare with Godet's remarks those of Gloel, Die jiingste Kritik des Galaterbriefes, pp. 77 and 78 and note. 2 See chaps, i. and iii. above. ' P. 33. Amongst still more recent writers, Mr. Gore speaks of the utterly per- verse and untenable arguments of Loman and Steck {Bampton Lectures, p. 258), whilst in Germany Nosgen has remarked upon the extreme arbitrariness of such attacks as those of Steck upon the Haiiptbriefe {Geschichte Jesu Christi, p. 20, 1891). RECENT ATTACKS UPON THE ' IIAUPTBRIEFE ' 243 manner in which he deals with the interpolation theory of Weisse it is easy to see how he would regard the very similar theory maintained by Volter, of whom he makes no mention whatever. The description which Weizsiicker gives of the two Epistles to the Corinthians may not unfairly be extended to the four great Epistles of St. Paul : ' they arc, he says, in an eminent sense historical, they deal with a whole series of facts and circumstances in such a way as to compensate for an historical description ; for many things they are the only, and for others at any rate the best, source ; and if we possessed nothing else than these Epistles, they would be sufficient to afford us a representation of the oldest form in which the Christian religion developed itself on Graeco-Roman ground. ' Das apost. Zeitalter, p. 265. Compare the remarks of Holtzmann, EinleitiDig in das N. T., pp. 98, 192, 193, 230, 2. Aufl. 1886. In the face of many recent objections Baur's own remarks may well be recalled [Paulus, i. 276) : * Gegen diese vier Briefe ist nicht nur nie auch nur der geringste Verdacht der Unachtheit erhoben worden, sondern sie tragen auch den Charakter paulinischcr Originalitat so unwidersprechlich an sich, dass sich gar nicht denken lasst, welches Recht je der kritische Zweifel gegen sie geltend machen konnte.' 244 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES CHAPTER IV ST. PAUL'S CHRISTOLOGY AND THE INCARNATION In the previous chapter an endeavour has been made to show- that no recent criticism deprives us of the right to appeal to the Hauptbriefe as the genuine writings of St. Paul. We can now proceed to examine the testimony of these Epistles to the great facts of the Gospels, as these facts are embodied for us in the Apostles' Creed and to the life and teaching of Jesus. References will also be made from time to time to the testimony of other Pauline writings, but chiefly to those which the most advanced critics accept as the genuine "work of the Apostle (see above Chapter I.). What, then, may we gather from the Pauline Epistles as to the great fact of the Incarnation ? We cannot dismiss the treatment of such a subject as one of a series of ' secondary questions,' as if it was not essentially bound up with a right understanding of Paul's conception of the Person and work of Christ.^ Although no doubt it is possible to build too much upon what has been so well called ' The Pauline Gospel of the Infancy ' (Gal, iv. 4 : ' God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law '), yet we may fairly say that St. Paul here mentions the birth of Jesus Christ in a way ' Even this is classed by Baur amongst the Nehenfragen [Paiihts, ii. 262 ff.). After speaking of Baur's exposition of Paulinism, Sabatier adds : ' On peut cependant et Ton doit lui reprocher d'avoir meconnu et neglige les principes metaphysiques du paulinisme. II les a rapidement touches dans un court chapitre intitule : Questions Secondaires {Nebenfrage^i). Or, est-il permis d'appeler ici choses secondaires les notions pauliniennes de Dieu, de la personne du Christ, de la predestination, de la revelation ? Ne sont-ce pas la au contraire autant de clefs de voiite essentielles, qui maintiennent I'harmonie et la solidite de la construction entiere. Si I'exposition d'Usteri nous a paru sans base nous pouvons dire que celle de Baur reste sans couronnement ' (Sabatier, UApotj-e Paul, p. 252). ST. PAUL'S CIIRISTOLOGY AND THE INCARNATION 245 which at least suggests an acquaintance with the opening chapters of St. Luke's Gospel.' The phrase 'made under the law ' certainly carries with it such facts as these : that the child Jesus was circumcised on the eighth day ; ^ that after forty days He was ' presented ' in the Temple ; that at the age of twelve He became more directly responsible for His obedience to the law, as was the custom with Jewish children ; that at that age, or shortly after, personal attend- ance on the feasts at Jerusalem was required of Him;^ it ' See Dean Plumptre's Introduction in Ellicott's Comnieutary on the N. T., i. 30 ; and comp. chap. ii. p. 89, above, on Pfleiderer and Volkmar's treatment of the phrase, as a proof of how much it carried with it. We may also compare Steinmeyer, Geschichte der Gelmrt des Herrn, p. 128 {1873), written of course from a different point of view ; in speaking of Luke he writes : ' Was er von der Beschneidung des Knaben, von seiner Darstelhmg im Tempel und von der Darbringung der gesetzlichen Opfer erzahlt ; das erinnert zu lebhaft an das paulinische yiv6ij.ivos e'/c ywaiKhs, yevS/xevos virh v6jxov, 'Iva rovs virh v6fiov i^ayopafftj (Gal. iv. 4, 5), als dass wir in diesen Berichten tonlose Notizen erkennen konnten.' The Greek word, moreover, which is used in Gal. iv. 4, must not be forgotten — e'|o7r6(rT€iA.€j' d d^hs rhv vibv avrov : the expression means, ' He sent forth from Himself (Lightfoot, Galalians, in loco, p. 168), the word thus assuming the pre- €xistence of the Son, although, as Bishop Lightfoot adds, it must not be pressed to imply also the unity with the Father, as the same word is commonly used in later Greek in speaking of any mission. Comp. Lechler, iibi supra, pp. 315, 316. (For an appreciative notice of Lechler, to whom frequent reference will be made, see E. T. of Lichtenberger's History of German Theology, esp. p. 415.) Amongst recent German Commentaries, we may also comp. the Kurzgefasster Cominentar ztim N. T. (Strack andZockler), iii. 72, 1887, and to the same effect Lipsius in Hand-Corn mentar zum N. T, ii. zweite Abtheilung, p. 42, 1891, where, although denying that Gal. iv. 4 points to a birth without a human father, he remarks : ' i^air((TTei\e sandte von sich aus (namlich, in die Welt), setzt die Praexistenz des Sohnes voraus. ' B. Weiss, while accepting the passage as affirming Christ's pre-existence, remarks of the compound i^airecmiKev : ' das doch nur klinstlich auf ein Sich- trennen des Vaters vom Sohne bezogen wird ' {Bibl. Theol. des N. T. p. 295, 5. Aufl. 1888). - Schenkel, Das Christiisbild der Apostel, p. 285, on Col. ii. 11, 'putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ ; ' Wittichen, Leben /esu,Y>- 14, on Gal. iv. 4. So, too, Nosgen, Geschichte Jesu Christi, p. 123, 1891. Comp. Westcott, Study of the Gospels, p. 181 ; and Row's Bampton Lectures, pp. 316, 333, 339 ; so, too, Kurzgefasster Commentar (Strack and Zockler) zum N. T. ii. dritte Abtheilung, p. 72, 1887. ^ ' In strict law personal observance of the ordinances, and hence attendance on the feasts at Jerusalem, devolved on a youth only when he was of age — that is, at thirteen years. Then he became what was called " a son of the Ccmmandment," or "of the Torah." But, as a matter of fact, the legal age was in this respect 246 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES even suggests the probability that the Messiah waited till His thirtieth year before entering on His earthly ministry, for we know that to have been the age at which the Levites assumed their official duties.' But can we say that the words * God sent forth his Son, made of a woman ' imply that St. Paul was acquainted with St. Luke's account of the miraculous conception and birth of Jesus .-• The expression ' made of a woman ' is sufficiently striking to have caused even Hilgenfeld to note that it is in excellent accordance with the generation of Jesus without a human father, without expressly attesting the fact.^ But one of the most remarkable testimonies to the force of the ex- pression comes to us from Steck's review of St. Paul's Christology, although it may of course be said that Steck is only arguing to support his own theory of the late date and advanced Christology of the Pauline Epistles, and that it is therefore to his interest to magnify a simple expression beyond its ordinary meaning. After pointing out that Paul nowhere expressly states whether Jesus was conceived by the aid of a human father, or by the Holy Ghost, he mentions two passages which may be referred to in this connection, but from which, he adds, we arrive at no certain result.'^ The one is anticipated by two years, or at least by one. It was in accordance with this custom that, on the first Pascha after Jesus had passed His twelfth year, His parents took. Him with them in the "company" to Jerusalem. The common statement that Jesus went to the Temple because He was ' a son of the Com- mandment ' is obviously erroneous. All the more remarkable, on the other hand, is St. Luke's accurate knowledge of Jewish customs, and all the more antithetic to the mythical theory the circumstance that he places this remarkable event in the twelfth year of Jesus' life, and not when he became " a Son of the Law "' (Edersheim's Life and Times of Jesiis the Messiah, i. 235, 236). See also the remarks of Schiirer, Geschichte des jiidischen Volkes im Zeitalter J. C. ii. 355, on Luke ii. 42. ' Matheson's ' Historical Christ of St. Paul,' Expositor, 2nd series, vol. ii. p. 296. See, however, Keim, Geschichte Jesii, Bd. i. 468, 470, who thinks that not even Gal. iv. 4, gives a firm basis of inference for the age of Jesus. ^ ' Mit der Geburt aus dem Mutterschooss eines Weibes will der Apostel die wahre und vollkommene Menschheit Jesu als eine Selbstverniedrigung seinerseits bekennen, hat aber einen Ausdruck gewahlt, welcher (wie selbst Hilgenfeld, Galaterbrief, 174, bemerkt) zu der vaterlosen Erzeugung Jesu trefflich stimmt, ohne sie ausdrticklich zu bezeugen ' (Lechler, Das apostolische Zeitalter, 3. Aufl. PP- 333> 334). * Der Galaterbrief, pp. 280-282. ST. PAUL'S ClIRISTOLOGV AND THE INCARNATION 247 Rom. i. 3, 4, which is not incompatible with the miraculous conception ; the other is Gal. iv. 4. The expression ' born of a woman ' is no doubt, as Steck reminds us, a mode of speech common both to the Old and to the New Testament (Job xiv. I ; Matt. xi. 1 1 '), and it may be quite compatible with the birth of Jesus from a human father and mother ; but it cannot be denied, continues Steck, that it can just as well be connected with the thought of a miraculous conception, and this, not because only the mother, and not the father, is spoken of, but because the two following expressions are correlative to the two which precede : Iva rovs viro v6[xov i^ayopday forms a contrast to ysvo/xsvov viro vo/jlop, and in the same way Iva rrjv vLoOscTiav (iTToXu^cofisv to ysvofxsvov sK 'yvvaiKos : the divine exaltation in the appointment to the Sonship is contrasted with the human lowliness in the birth from a woman : Christ is born of a woman, that we may become the sons of God, and therefore He from whom this result proceeds is Himself the Son of God ; and this is the other side to His human birth. In Steck's view this passage accordingly leads to the same result as Rom. i. 3, 4, and it must remain undecided as to whether the appearance of Christ amongst men, coupled with the natural factor of His birth from a woman, does not include in addition the supernatural factor of a conception by the Holy Ghost. But the latter, adds Steck, is more probable, if we take into consideration the passage in John i. 12, 13, 'But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God . . . which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.' Here the sonship of believers is manifestly described, just as we may conceive of the Sonship of Jesus, as a birth from God, not through human instrumentality. But Steck believes that the expressions ovhs sk OsXrjfiaros crapKos ovhs sk dsXijfxaros dvhpos evidently allude to the pre- vious histories of the Synoptists, and that one can connect their assertions of the miraculous conception of Jesus with this Johannine comprehension of it. According to him the ' Lightfoot (p. 168) />o/// the same passages decides lluil there is no reference in Gal. iv. 4 to the miraculous Incarnation. 248 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES balance of probabilities, therefore, decidedly favours the view that John, although he did not teach it, silently presupposes the miraculous birth of Jesus : and so it is with Paul. Both Paul and John, indeed, ascribe to Christ in their speculative explanation of the divine side of His Person infinitely more than could be ascribed to Him by the mere fact of His miraculous birth alone. We can thus understand, in Steck's judgment, how the representation of the latter fact falls into the background, and becomes more and more handed over to the popular consciousness of the Church, while the progress of dogma enters upon another road. But Stock forbids us to suppose that Paul was not yet acquainted with the whole representation, when we consider the similarity of his expres- sions to those of John : for in the case of John no one would affirm that the date of his writing forbade his acquaintance with any of the facts of the case. To understand fully this language of Steck we must remember that he had previously spoken of the Hauptbriefe as containing beyond doubt the doctrine of Christ's pre-ex- istence, and that although he does not discuss the meaning of the phrase ' God sent forth Ins Son ' in his criticism of Gal. iv. 4, he had already referred to it as pre-supposing Christ's heavenly pre-existence, and had previously main- tained that if by His Resurrection Christ was first plainly declared to be the Son of God (Rom. i. 4), yet this was what He really had been before His appearance upon earth,' We are able, indeed, to derive another testimony from an unexpected quarter to the impression made by the whole verse Gal. iv. 4, and to its direct bearing upon Christ's pre- existence. There is a passage in Dr. Martineau's ' Seat of Authority in Religion ' which reads for the most part as if it was a declaration of the most orthodox Christian belief After speaking of the heavenly Christ, he goes on to say that His pre-existence is undoubtedly implied throughout even the Pauline letters which find no occasion to give it direct expres- ' We may add that Steck's criticism is of additional importance because it shows us that, so far as language is concerned, the silence of St. John as to the miraculous birth of Jesus is by no means conclusive of his ignorance of the fact. ST. PAUL'S CIIRISTOLOGY AND THE INCARNATION 249 sion : ' Could the birthday of a human being be announced, for instance, in these terms : " When the fulness of the time Avas come ; " or, again : "God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh ? " &c. &c. One who is " sent " is pre- sumed to be there in readiness for the mission ; and the predicates enumerated, His being made of flesh, and having a mother, and being under the law, might be taken for granted of a Palestinian Jew, and could not be specified except of One to whose nature they did not properly or necessarily be- long. Such language is applicable only to a spiritual being passing into the conditions of an incarnate life. If more unmistakable statements are required, they are supplied by passages in which the appearance of Jesus on earth, instead of being referred to the grace of God, is described as His own voluntary act' ' So, too, Pfleiderer, although he thinks it much more probable that in this passage, taken in connection with Rom. i. 3 and ix, 5, there is nothing to show that Paul knew of a miraculous conception, does not hesitate to lay stress upon its testimony to the Apostle's belief in the pre-existence of Christ, and to point out that the fact of that belief prevents us from supposing that Paul regarded Christ as an ordinary man, whether miraculously conceived or not.- ' Seat of Aitihon'ty in Religioii, pp. 392, 393. - Pfleiderer, Das Urchn'sient/nuu, pp. 217, 222. After asserting tliat Paul refrains from any positive statement as to whether Christ was conceived naturally or supernaturally, but that the probabilities are overwhelming in favour of the Apostle holding the former view (see below for Pfleiderer's reason), Pfleiderer adds : ' Der Einwand, dass unter dieser Voraus- setzung Paulas Christum nur fur einen gewohnlichen Menschen, nicht aber fiir den sundlosen Gottessohn hatte halten konnen, trifift darum nicht zu, weil ja die Cottessohnschaft, wie wir oben sahen, eine Wesensbestimmung ist, welche schon dem praexistenten Christus vermoge seines Heiligkeitsgeistes zukam, welche also ganzlich unabh'angig ist von der Entstehungsweise seines Fleischesleibs bei der Inkarnation ' (pp. 221, 222). It is specially to be noted that Dr. Martineau {idn supra, p. 394) (in view of his interpretation of such passages as i Cor. x. 4, 2 Cor. viii. 9) pointedly describes the pre-existent Christ as a personal being ; on this view, in contrast with those who maintain that the pre-existent Christ was only an ideal being, or a life- giving principle, see below, pp. 269 ff. We may compare with Dr. Martineau's view, and with Pfleiderer's ascription to the pre-existent Christ of acts which could only be those of a personal being (of. Panlinismtis, pp. 138 ?ie time he taught the propagation of sinfulness from Adam down, it is likely that the supernattiral generation of Jestis was so firmly established in the co7inectio7tof his own thozights, that he felt the less itecessity to give it individual prominence. We shall have occasion to make a similar remark hereafter in regard to the omission of the account of Christ's Ascension as an individual event.' Cf. also Huraut, Paul a-t-il connu le Christ historique? p. 15, for a similar argument. Speaking of Gal. iv. 4, he remarks : ' Cette derniere expression nous semble contenir une allusion a la naissance miraculeuse du Sauveur. D'ailleurs, la doctrine de saint Paul de la transmission du peche d'Adam a tous ses descendants, prouve qu'il a connu ce fait. Si par le peche d'un seul tous sont rendus pecheurs, et si, d'un autre cote, Christ n'a point connu le peche, il s'ensuit qu'il ne doit point descendre d'Adam au meme titre que les autres hommes. Sa naissance ne saurait etre une naissance ordinaire. Si saint Paul avait ignore la naissance miraculeuse du Sauveur, sa doctrine ne lui eiit pas permis d'exempter Jesus-Christ de la tache originelle, puisque, selon lui, nous sommes tous par nature des enfants de colere.' ST. PAUL'S CIIRISTOLOGY AND THE INCARNATION 253 date of its alleged composition allows time for the growth of any number of miraculous stories, the only point in connection with the birth of Jesus which it emphasises is that to which St. Paul directly refers in Rom. i, i — viz. His descent from David.' The temptation to put into the mouths of the earliest preachers of Christianity some further reference to the events surrounding the birth of Jesus must, one would think, have been well-nigh irresistible. And yet the same reserve is maintained, whether we are listening to the Peter and the Paul of the Epistles, or to the Peter and the Paul of the Acts. But it must also not be forgotten that the expression used by St. Paul in Gal. iv. 4 does not stand alone. When writing ' Cf. Schmid, iihi supra, p. 401, and see Acts ii. 30 and xiii. 23. In 2 Tim. ii. 8 there is a statement which is closely parallel with that in Rom. i, 3 (cf. also ix. 5). 'Remember,' writes St. Paul, 'that Jesus Christ of the seed of David was raised from the dead according to my gospel.' It has been thought that these words may have formed part of a recognised profession of faith (comp. Mill, Mythical Interpretation, &c. p. 208, and especially Weiss, Bibl. Theol. des N. T. p. 461, and note, 5. Aufl. 1888). On this descent of Christ from David Neander well remarks {Life of Christ, p. 20, note, E. T. ) that the fact must have been admitted from the beginning, and that the Evangelists took it for granted as indisputable : ' Could the Apostles have embraced a notion which the Saviour Himself had denounced as an invention of the scribes ? There was nothing in Paul's turn of feeling or thought to incline him towards it, had it not been established on other grounds ; on the contrary, the doctrine that Christ was not the Son of David, but the Son of God and the Lord of David, would have afforded him an excellent point of attack against Judaism.' (Compare also the remarks which follow, and those of 'PrQS,sQr\?,6, Jt'sus-Christ, p. 272, 7th edit., as against the strictures of Hase, Geschichte Jesu, p. 206, on this statement in 2 Tim. ii. 8). With this we may compare Weiss, Leben Jesu, i. 205 : 'Paul in accordance with his whole conception of Christ and His work, had not the slightest occasion to establish Christ's claim to the throne of Israel, for the re- establishment of which he no longer hoped, and yet he has no doubt of the fact that Christ was descended from the seed of David according to the flesh.' On the significance of the title ' Son of David,' Dr. Edersheim's Warbiirtonian Lectures, p. 17, may be consulted. On the genuineness of 2 Tim. see esp. Reuss, Die Geschichte tier heiligen Schriften des N. T. pp. 122 ff. 6. Aufl. 1887 (although he rejects i Tim. and Titus); Salmon, Introd. to N. T. pp. 408-413, 5th edit. 1891, and with his remarks as to the concessions made by Hausrath, Pfleiderer, and Ewald with regard to 2 Tim. compare the attention directed to them by Gloel in Die jUugste Kritik des Galaterbriefes, p. 91, 1870 ; for a recent defence of the three Epistles and a summary of the arguments against them, the reader may be referred to Die Briefe des Apostels Pan lit s iind die Redcn des Her>n Jesu, pp. 156-202, 1887, by Fr, Rocs, whose name is not unknown in England in connection with recent Old Testament criticism. 254 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES to the Romans, the Apostle tells them ' what the law could not do, in , that it was weak through the flesh, God sending Jus oivn Son, in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, con- demned sin in the flesh ' (Rom. viii. 3), o Osos rov savrov vlov TTS/xyfras sv o/xotco/xari crapKos afMaprlas : and in verse 32 he uses a still stronger expression : os wcov, the real humanity of Jesus is not questioned, since bfjioico^ia relates, not to the aapl alone, but to the (xapl afxaprias. So, too, in Phil. ii. 7, the Apostle does not say oixo'iai/xa avdpuntov, an expression which would approach nearer to Docetism than the words used in this passage, Rom. viii. 3, but a.vdpwi:oou, the ST. PAUL'S CIIRISTOLOGV AND THE INCARNATION 255 Jesus Christ, then, of whom the Apostle is speaking, is God's ozvn Son — not merely 'a son of God ' as any Hebrew might claim the title, not merely ' a son of God ' as the Roman centurion might describe a national hero, or the patient Sufferer ' dying so lordly ' upon the Cross, but in a far higher and unique sense.^ It is the same expression which St. John uses when he tells us that ' the Jews sought the more to kill Jesus, because he not only broke the Sabbath, but called God His oivn Father (^Ihios), making himself equal with God.' '^ But St. Paul, a Hebrew of the Hebrews, who, like his countrymen, would shrink back with horror, as from blasphemy, at the thought of a man claiming equality with God, does not hesitate, in one of his generally accepted Epistles, to use the same term thios of Him who had been born of a woman, made under the law, and who had suffered death upon the cross some five-and-twenty or eight-and-tvventy years before the /\postle penned his words.^ plural evidently signifying that Christ came in the likeness of ordinary men, Ullmann, Die Siindlosigkeit Jesii, p. 144, note, 7. Aufl. 1S83. For a lengthy examination of Holsten's view that Jesus by an innate propensity was subject to sin, although he remained pure from actual sin [Ztiin Evangeluim des Paiilus zind des Petrus, pp. 436 ff. ), see Sabatier, ubi supra, pp. 306-308. Comp. also Reuss, Geschichte der heiligeti Schrifteit des N. T., in opposition to any idea of Docetism in such words as ofj-oiufia or /j.op£ais (only found once in each of these Epistles) ; but is it to be ' Reuss, Gcschichte der heilii;cn Schriften des N. T. pp. 116, 117, 6. Aufl. Comp. also Schmid, Bibl. Tlieol. des N. T. pp. 495, 508, 5. Aufl.; Sabatier, VApotre Paul, pp. 1 93- 1 99. '^ .Sabatier, VApolre Paul, p. 199. * Das Christusbild des Apostels Pan /us, p. 91. S 258 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES supposed, asks Reuss, that the ^rcnuine Paul has never spoken elsewhere of the forgiveness of sins ? ' No doubt there are philosophical terms, expressions kindred to Gnostic ideas ; but not only are many of these terms found in the oldest and most undoubted writings of the New Testament, not only are those which undeniably contain a Gnostic element old enough and Jewish enough to have been well known to Paul,^ but the more the Gnostic element is insisted upon, the more inconceivable does it become that a forger, writing with a ' tendency,' as the Tubingen school would say — i.e. with the object of reconciling the parties of Peter and Paul — should have imagined that the best way of effecting such a reconcili- ation was to introduce the language of heretics equally ob- noxious to Petrine and Pauline alike/^ Nor must it be for- gotten that the borrowing may have been often on the other side, and that Renan has candidly admitted that, instead of rejecting the Epistle to the Colossians because in certain pas- sages it contains traces of Gnosticism, we should sometimes reason inversely, and seek in these passages the origin of the Gnostic ideas which prevailed in the second century.^ But it must not be forgotten that, so far as the Apostle's Christology is concerned, similar expressions are found in earlier and generally accepted Epistles (cf. especially i Cor. viii. 6, 2 Cor. iv. 4) \^ and Reuss reminds us also that this con- ception of Christ in Col. i. i 5 ff , which is often described as ' Reuss, Gescliichlc der heiligen Schriften des N. T. p. 115. - Reuss, jd>i supra, pp. 1 18, 1 19. ^ I/>id. * Saint Paid, Introd. x, xi, 12th edit. ; Reuss, tdu supra, p. 119; Sabatier, LApotre Paul, p. 212. ^ Renan, Samt Paul, Introduction, p. x, 12th edit. : ' Nous montrerons meme que les plus energiques expressions de Tepitre aux Colossiens ne font qu'encherir un peu sur celles des epitres anterieures :' 7iote, ' Voir surtout, Rom. ix. 5, I Cor. viii. 6, 2 Cor. v. 19.' Again, on p. 275, he writes : ' Les formules les plus avancees que nous trouverons dans I'Epitre aux Colossiens existent deja en germe dans les epitres plus anciennes, i Cor. viir. 6.' In his UAntechrist, Renan is again obliged to admit that at least the germ of St. Paul's later Christolog}' is con- tained in his earlier and undoubted Epistles (pp. 77, Z^) ; but it is difficult to understand how he allows that the Epistle to the Colossians was written by St. Paul, 'a Hebrew of the Hebrews,' and yet asks us to believe that Christian mythology and metaphysics were born in Paul's Churches amongst men who found the idea of a God made man quite simple, whilst, in Renan's own words, ST. PAULS CIIRISTOLOGY AND TIllC INCARNATIOX 259 Gnostic, or later than the PauUnc tlicology, is to be found in the Apocalypse (iii. 14).' But why should a Christian Jew, writin<^, as so many modern critics would have us believe, in 68 A.D.,- be able to use such an expression as /; apxv '^'l^ KTi(T£(os Tov dsov (tlic significance of which we can only fully estimate if we compare it with the familiar Apocalyptic formula apxh '^^'^ tsXos),^ whilst the phraseology of the Epistle to the Colossians (cf i. 15-18) is to be referred only to the time of Christ's redemptive work, and not to His pre- cxistencc ; or to be dismissed as borrowed from the Book of Enoch or as characteristic of the second century ? ' If it be urged that in Col. i. 18 Christ is described as 09 ecTTLv iipxh TrpcoTOTOKos SK TMv vsKpSiv, and that this latter expression limits the force of apx^h it is to be remembered that in the Apocalypse our Lord is also irpcoToroKos tcov vsKp'7n> (i. 5), and that St. Paul has just called Him irproTo- TOKOS Trdarjs ktictscos.'' for the Jews the incarnation of the Divinity was a tiling blasphemous and revolting ! (pp. 85-90). On the force of the expressions used in Paul's earlier Epistles, conip. also Reuss, u/>i supra, pp. 116, 119. Lechler, Das apostolische Zeit alter, pp. 315, 320, 3. Aufl. ; Hase, Kirchengeschichte (Vorlesungen), erster Theil, p. 140. ' Reuss, ubi supra, pp. 11 7- 119, 149; Weiss, BibL Theol. des N. T. p. 559, 5. Aufl. - It will be noticed that Dr. .Salmon in the last edition of his Iittroditction, pp. 243, 244, expresses himself as disposed to accept the testimony of Irenjeus, and to place the Apocalypse, not in the reign of Nero, but in the early years of that of Domitian. For the recent literature upon the Apocalypse, it may be sufficient to refer to Holtzmann's review of it in the Hand-Co»imentar ziim N. T. iv. 257, and to refer to the replies to the disintegrating theories of Volter and Vischer made by Reuss in his Geschichte der heiligcn Schriften des N. T. p. 147, 1887, 6. Aufl., and by Ililgenfeld in Zeitschrift fiir ivissen. Theologie, p. 396 f. 1882 ; 374-378, 1888 ; 385-468, 1890 ; Beyschlag, Studien zind Kritiken, pp. 102 138, 1888. Comp. also Weiss, Einleitung in das N. T. pp. 375, 376, note, 1889, 2. Aufl. ' Lechler, Das apost. Zeitalter, pp. 448, 449, 3. Aufl. * See esp. ^ow , Jesus of the Evan-^elists, pp. 142 ff. 4th edit. * On the force of this last expression see esp. Schmid, Bt/>/. Thcol. des N. T. pp. 508, 509, 5. Aufl. Comp. also Weiss, Bild. Theol. p. 426, note, 5. Aufl. ; drimm. A'. T. Lexicon ^ p. 386, on the strictures of Baur. Cremer's IVorterbuch, pp. 559, 560. Kdcrshcim points out that while Pliilo uses the word ■nptini'yovos, St. Paul says ttpqitStokos (Article ' Philo,' Smith and Wace's Diet.). Comp. Lightfoot, Colossians, in loco, pp. 212, 213, where he S 2 26o THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES But this passage in the Epistle to the Colossians has a parallel in i Cor. viii. 6, where essentially the same idea is expressed as in Col. i. i6. At the same time, in neither pas- sage is there the least justification for the view which would restrict the Apostle's meaning to the redemptive work of Christ, or to a moral creation, as Baur and Schenkel main- tained,' and a much truer judgment affirms how fully in such expressions St. Paul, no less than St. John, taught the doctrine of the Logos.^ But if it can be fairly argued that no small proof of the correctness of this interpretation is to be found in the violent attempts to explain it away, the same may certainly be said of another great Christological passage, to which we are now justified in referring, even if the Epistles to the Colossians and Ephesians are denied us. The extraordinary interpretation put upon Phil, ii, 6, 7 by Baur has justly merited the emphatic condemnation of Reuss, and one may well ask whether it is really any longer necessary to refute it.^ remarks that irpaiTdTOKos is preferred by St. Paul to irpooTdyovos, a favourite term, as we may infer from Philo, ^^ith the Alexandrians, while ■Kp/. Theol. des N. T. p. 297, and note, 5. Aufl., and also Sabatier's criticism in his UApotre Paul, p. 218, and that of Pfleiderer in UrchristentJmm, esp. p. 214. Comp. also Keim, as against Baur, ubi supra, i. 42 and 345. To these criticisms we may add the valuable remarks of Lechler, Das apost. Zeitalter, pp. 318, 319, and note, and those of Schmid, Bibl. Theol. des N. T. pp. 495, 496, as against the strictures of Dr. Martineau on I Cor. viii. 6, Seat of Authority, p. 393 (comp. Schenkel, Das Christusbild, p. 282). It may be added that Steck in his examination of Paul's Christology regards the passage as speaking of Christ as the instrument in the creation of the world, and points out the difficulty of rejecting such an interpretation {^Der Galaterbrief, pp. 276, 279). '■^ Comp. Chap. v. p. 330 ; Salmon, Introduction to the N. T. p. 201, 5th edit. ' Reuss points out that the much debated expression apiray/j.hi' Tjyria-aTO can, according to its context, have no other than the natural meaning : ' Although in the possession of a divine essence he would not retain this equality with God by force : ' apirayixhs is used because the decree of God demanded the /ceVcxrts (an idea which everywhere lies at the foundation of the Apostle's representation of the sufferings and obedience of the Son of God, 2 Cor. xiii. 4 ; Gal. iv. 4 ; Rom. viii. 32, although the word is elsewhere wanting), and therefore the refusal to submit to this /ceVcotris must have expressed itself in forcibly grasping something which ought temporarily to have been surrendered. But, adds Reuss, to express this thought no one needed to have read into the passage the history (as Baur sup- ST. PAULS CTIKISTOLOCV AND TIIK INCARXATION 261 Nor can it be said that Schcnkcl's endeavour to explain the expression iv iJ.op(^fj deov by a reference to Gen. i. 27 and by supposing that the Apostle is merely instituting a moral comparison between the first and second Adam has been any more successful.' It is impossible to ignore the force of the whole phrase virdp-^ajv iv /xopcpfj Osov: such words express an essential relationship with God, and although I'aul speaks of man in his present state of being as the image and glory of God (i Cor. xi. 7), he would never, as Sabatier reminds us, have said of us, as of Christ, iu fiopcpfj Osov inrap^^^ovTss. As for the charge of Docetism which Baur and others have brought against this passage, not only is such an interpreta- tion directly opposed to the express intention of the Apostle — since the exaltation of Christ could not have been the result of a humiliation and obedience and death which were only apparent and unreal — but, as both Reuss and Sabatier insist, no idea of Docetism is to be found in the word /xopcpij, since it is emplo\-ed also of the divine substance, nor in 6/xoiw/j.a (cf Rom. viii. 3, i. 23), nor in such terms as (7^Pj/j.a and svps- Orjvai, which always indicate an objective reality (i Cor. vii. 31:1 Cor. iv. 2 ; Gal. ii. 17).'- But without attempting any further examination of these great Christological passages, it is necessary to remind our- selves of one very significant word, common to the earliest and the latest Epistles of St. Paul — the word KvpLos applied to Jesus. In the very first words of his earliest Epistle the Apostle speaks of the Church of the Thessalonians, which is 'in God the Eather, and the Lord ]qs\xs Christ' (i Thess. i. i) poses) of an aeon which unduly longed for the TT\r)pwfj.a and, as a result, fell into the Kevetifxa {Geschichte der heiligcii Schrifteii des N. T. p. 129, 6. Aufl. ; so, also, Sabatier, VApolre Paul, p. 233, and R. Lipsius in Hand-Co»i»ientar zum N. T. ii. (2), p. 196, 1891) ; and see Ur. Liddon's Divinily of our Lord, Lect. vi. for this and other Christological passages referred to in the text. ' Das Christushild dcr Apostel, p. 296. - Sabatier, L'Apo/re Paul, p. 235 and 233 ; Reuss, ubi supra, p. 129 ; Pfleiderer, Uichristenthuiii, p. 218; Schanz, Golt uiid dn- Offenbaruiig, ]i. 412. For the force of the verb uirdpx*"'> ■'^ee Lightfoot, Pliilippiaiis, p. no, where we are also reminded of the connection between Paul's phraseology, rh thai l(ra 6ea> (ii. 6), and St. John v. 18. On the bearing of the passage upon the human life of Christ, see below, chap. v. 262 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES -- indeed, the term ' Lord,' or ' our Lord,' occurs some five- and-twenty times in this Epistle alone ; for the Church at Corinth the Apostles' Creed is summed up in the warning : ' No man can say that Jesus is the Lord but by the Holy Ghost ' (i Cor xii. 3), whilst the Philippians are reminded that every tongue shall confess that ' Jesus Christ is Lord' (Phil. ii. II). The word is so familiar to us in St. Paul that we are liable to forget the full force and significance of the expres- sion,' and it may be useful to recall the fact that no less a critic than Albert Ritschl, after reminding us that Paul di- rectly applies the name of God to the Risen Christ (Rom. ix. 5, Tit. ii. 13), adds that, although this is not more fre- quently the case, yet we have in the word Kupios- the name which is above every name, and which signifies nothing less than the name of God, and that he refers as proof passages to I Cor. xii. 3 ; Rom. x. 9 ; comp. Apoc. xix. 16 ; James ii. i.- ' Paret, Paulus nnd Jesjis, p. il. '■^ Die Entstclnti2g der altkatliolischen A'irchc, pp. 79, Sc, and conip. p. 121, 2. Aufl. 1857. Ritschl's words are these : ' Es unterliegt keinem Zweifel, dass Paulus dem Christus, der durch seine Auferstehung zu gijtllicher Macht erhoben ist (Rom. viii. 34), unumwunden den Gottesnamen gieljt (Rom. ix. 5; Tit. i^-lS) ' (p. 79). With regard to this much disputed passage in Rom. ix. 5, it must be remembered that Steck has recently admitted that on exegetical grounds there is every reason for referring 6 S)v iirl i^avTocv deos to Christ {Der Galate7i)rief, pp. 285-287). For a similar reference of the words to Christ, see also Lechler, Das apost. Zeitalter, pp. 331, 332; Schmid, Bibh Theol. des N. T. p. 511, 5. Aufl. ; Schanz, Golt und die Offenbarting, p. 412 ; Weiss, Bibl. Theol. des N. T. p. 282 ; Pfleiderer, Hihbei-t Lectures, p. 55, and note (but comp. his Urchristenthum, p. 240, 1887). On the significance of such a passage as 2 Cor. xiii. 14, in the Pauline Christology, see Dr. Matheson's ' Historical Christ of St. Paul ' in Expositor, vol. ii. 2nd series, p. 153, and Dr. Wace's Boyle Lectures, Lect. vii. 284, and Lect. V. 241. Of the profound reverence with which this monotheism inspires every Jew, we may find some evidence in Coleridge's Aids to Reflection, Aphor. Ixvi. : ' The Jews would not willingly tread upon the smallest piece of paper in their way, but took it up; for possibly, said they, the name of God maybe on it.' For a remarkable passage upon the monotheism of the Jewish disciples of Jesus, and of the scruples which on this account they would have to overcome in ascribing to Him the language which they undoubtedly used, see Gess, Das Dogma von Christi Person ttnd Werk, p. 305, 1887. At the conclusion of this passage Gess strikingly asks : 'Was wird aber vollends aus dem frommen Monotheisten Jesus selbst wenn er eben nur Josephs Sohn war, dem Golt sich ofi'enbarte, dass ST. I'Ari.'S fllRISTOLOGV AND Till". INCARNATION 263 Students of thcoloi^y in luii;iancl arc no doubt familiar Avith the Bishop of Derry's Introduction to i I'hcss. in tlic 'Speaker's Commentary,' in which he dwells upon the im- portance of the fact that the New Testament writers should thus adopt the term b\' which the LXX render the most solemn of all the names of God in the Old Testament — the Ineffable Name— Jehovah. It is as 'those who call upon the name of the Lord ' that the early Christians are habitually known, and there can be no doubt that, not only do they honour Christ with worship in their use of such a phrase, but that the}' associate Him with the Jehovah of the Old Testa- ment prophets.' Nor can it be said that such an interpretation is merely put upon the words by orthodox English divines ; it may be confirmed by the emphatic testimony of various and recent writers. Dr. Schmid, e.g:, in discussing the Person of Jesus Christ, expresses himself thus : ' Christ is indeed to such an extent the object of religious invocation that it belongs to the idea of a Christian that he should call on the name of Jesus Christ (i Cor. i. 2 ; Rom. x. 12) ; and Paul himself ])ra}-s to Christ.' * Indeed,' he adds, ' the very name Kvpios, so constantly employed as a characteristic designation of Jesus Christ, the one Lord, by whom are all things, is here of great weight ; for in heathen usage " lord and king " was a designation of the er Gott seinen Brudern oftenbaren konnte, und dennoch solche Zeugnisse iiber sich aussprach kraft deren seine Junger ihn angebetet haben ? Je tiefer Jesu Ehrfurcht vor Gott war, desto gewisser hat cr goltgleiches Wirken, welches kein Prophet sich zuschrieb, nur dann sich zuerkannt, wcnn er das klare Bewusstsein iibermenschlicher Wesenheit in sich trug.' On St. Paul's monotheism, and yet recognition of the Trinity in the Godhead, see Lechler, Z)as aposl. Zeitaller, p. 333, in connection with 2 Cor. xiii. 14. Comp. also in Gore's Batiipton Lectures, j)p. 58, 59, 98, and 24S for a summary of the Pauline passages bearing upon Christ's Pre-existence and Incarnation. Sabatier lays stress upon the fact that we do not find in St. Paul the metaphysics of later days, or the Niccne formula, l)ut if he is prepared to admit — as apparently he is — that such passages as 2 Cor. xiii. 14, cf. i Cor. xii. 4-I1 are ' the point of departure ' for these later expressions of belief, this is all we can expect {VApolre Paul, pp. 315, 316), and the real question is whether the Nicene Creed is not the only satisfactory explanation of the Apostle's words. See Dr. Wace's article in Good Words for 1878, pp. 651 ff., and Dr. Bright's Lessons from Three Great Fathers. ' Speakci's Commeiitaiy, vol. iii. pp. 689 ff. ; and p. 186 on Rom. x. 12. 264 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES ' highest God ; in the Old Testament nini is translated by Kvpio9.' ' Elsewhere he reminds us that in the midst of His humiliation, when He was crucified, He was Kvpios tT-js ho^r^s, the Lord of glory (i Cor, ii. 8) i^ and in an earlier passage he sums up the total impression made upon the Apostles' minds in their intercourse with Jesus, as being precisely that in virtue of which they worshipped Him as the Lord, bowed the knee before Him, and called upon His name (Rom. x. 13, cf 12 and 9).'' So, too, Lechler points out that not only does the description of Christians in i Cor. i. 2, as ' those who call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,' imply that divine worship is offered, and actual prayer addressed, to Him, just as worship and prayer are implied in the Old Testament phrase ' to call upon the name of the Lord ; ' but he adds that still more expressive from this point of view is the way in which, in Rom. x. 13, the words of Joel iii. 5 are directly transferred to Jesus, so that the prayer of believers is addressed to Him in the same sense, and with the same promise, as in the Old Testament to Jehovah.^ So, too, the testimony of W. F. Gess may be quoted to the same effect, not only as to the frequent application of the term Y^vpios to Christ, but also as to its significance in the passages emphasised by Schmid and Lechler. Thus, in com- menting on the First Epistle to the Corinthians, he remarks that in this Epistle mention is made of the Lord almost seventy times. In the Old Testament quotations iii. 20 and xiv. 21, God Himself is meant ; in iii. 5 (cf 6 and 7), iv. 19, viii. 17, X. 26, God rather than Christ; in i. 31, ii. 16, xi. 32, xiv. 37, xvi. 17, the reference is doubtful ; but in all other cases the term is without doubt to be referred to Christ. In i. 2, 3, and vi. 13, just as in viii. 6, the Father is specifically God, and Christ specifically Lord. ' But,' adds Gess, ' what conclusions follow from the fact that the same name which ' Bibl. Thcol. des N. T. p. 510, 5. Aufl. ^ Ibid. p. 500. On the force of the same expression in James ii. \,ihid. p. 354. ' Ibid. p. 142. •" Lechler, Das apost. Zeitalter, p. 330 ; comp. Gloel, Die jiiiigste Kritik des Ga^aterbriefes, p. 80, note. ST. PAUL'S CIIRISTOLOCV AND TIIK INCARNATION 265 the Creator of the world, the God of Israel, bears in the Old Testament, is the spechc title assigned to Christ ! Add to this that in i. 2, the Christians are characterised as those who call upon the name of the Lord. Comp. Joel iii. 5, in the LXX.' ' With these remarks we may connect the decisive way in which he refers to Christ the Old Testament prophecy in Romans X, 13, which speaks of Jehovah, and of saving prayer to Him^ and expres.ses his conviction that for the Israelite Paul, for whom the First Commandment had become part and parcel of his very life, such a reference would have been an impossi- bilit}', if he had presupposed that Christ was only human.'^ In his ' Biblical Theology ' we find that B. Weiss is equally emphatic in his judgment as to the significance of this term. After pointing out that for St. Paul the peculiar dignity of Christ is comprehended and comprised in the word Kvpios, and that the confession of the Church is summed up in the acknowledgment that Jesus is the Lord (i Cor. xii. 3, Rom. X. 9, Phil. ii. 11, Col. ii. 6), he adds that Paul refers Old Testament passages which relate to the Kupioy-Jehovah directly to Christ (i Cor. 16, x. 22, Rom. x. 13), and does not hesitate to draw the full consequences of the bestowal of this name of honour upon Him. The exalted Messiah appears at his return with full divine omniscience, as only He who knows the hearts possesses it (i Cor. iv. 5) ; He is prayed to as the Lord (2 Cor. xii. 8), or His name Kupios is called upon (i Cor. i. 2, cf. Phil. ii. 10) ; and Rom. x. 12, 13, where the passage in Joel iii. 5 is referred to Him, plainly shows that this is to be understood in the sense of divine worship.'* In commenting on the earlier Epistle, i Thessalonians, ' Christi Person iiud IVcrk nach Christi Sell'stzeugiiiss und den Zeiignissen der Apostcl, zweite Abtheilung, i. Halftc, pp. 128, 129, 2. Aufl. 1887. '•^ Ibid. p. 214, and comp. 2. Hiilfte, p. 411. ' Weiss, Bibl. Theol. des N. T. pp. 281, 282, 5. Aufl. ' Auch I'aulus folgt cleni Sprachgebrauch der LXX, in welchcm Kvpios die UebersetzungdesA.T.lichenCiottesnamensist.sowohlinseineneigentlichenCitatcn als auch wo er sich A.T.liche Worte aneignet (i Kor. i. 31, iii. 20, x. 26, xiv. 21 ;. 2 Kor. vi. 17 f., X. 17 ; Rom. iv. 8, ix. 28 f., x. 16, xi. 3, 34, xii. 19, xiv. 11, XV. 11), und in demselben Sinne gebraucht er Kvpios von Gott (i Kor. iii. 5, iv. 19, vii. 17, X. 9, wo rhv Kvpiov zu lesen ; xvi. 7 ; Rom. xiv. 4).' Note, p. 282, and see also p. 211 for the force of tlie word nvpios as it is employed by I'aul in I Thess. 266 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES Weiss attaches special significance to the manner in which an Old Testament expression like ' the day of the Lord ' (i Thcss. V. 2, cf. 2, ii. 2), in which the day of the Lord Jehovah is meant, is transferred without hesitation to Christ,' and it will be noticed that whether he is examining the theology of the Acts, or of the first Epistle of Peter, or of the Epistle of James, Weiss reminds his readers of the im- portant bearing of the fact that the Old Testament name of Jehovah, the Kvpcos of the LXX, is repeatedly and indubi- tably referred to Jesus.'-^ If we turn to Sabatier, his testimony as to the force of the word Kvpios is most emphatic. He reminds us how this word, which in the Septuagint is specially used of Jehovah, has become in the Epistles of the New Testament, the peculiar title of Christ (i Cor. viii. 6); how it implies an absolute sovereignty over the conscience, the Church, and over the world in its historical development ; how the fact of its transference to Jesus is in itself sufficient proof that He has become for the Christian conscience that which Jehovah was for the conscience of the Old Testament prophets. Thus *the day of Jehovah ' has become the day of the Lord Jesus (i Thess. V. 2, 2 Thess. ii. 2).^ It would be easy to multiply testimony, but when we find two writers so widely differing in general as Dr. Paul Schanz, Professor in Tubingen, one of the most prominent apologists of the Christian Faith amongst the Roman Catholics, and Dr. Pfleiderer in his ' Hibbert Lectures,' both laying stress upon the manner in which the Old Testament name for God, viz. Kvpios, is given to Christ by St. Paul,"* it is difficult to suppose that the word is only equivalent to * Master ' or ' Sir,' as any disciples might address their teacher.-^ No doubt the ' Weiss B/7>/. Theol. des N. T. p. 212, note. -' Ibid. pp. 130, 170, 181, note. ' Sabatier, U Apotre Paul, p. 83 ; comp. I'aret, Paulus und Jesus, p. 74- •* Schanz, Gott und die Offenbaruug,^. 414, and Pfleiderer, Hibbert Lecliires, P- 55- ' It is to be noticed that Professor Estlin Carpenter admits that the term, as it is employed in our Gospels, cannot be thus restricted, and he remarks with reference to I Cor. viii. 5, 6, that ' the language of the Apostle Paul seems clearly to approach the antique sense of Hebrew Scriptures ' ( The First Tliree Gospels, pp. 1 24-127, 2nd edit.). ST. PAUL'S CHRISTOLOGV AND THK INCARNATION 267 word is sometimes used in this lower sense in the narratives of the Evangelists, but it is to be observed that in St. Luke's Gospel there are frequent passages in which the term ' the Lord ' is used absolutely of Jesus, and that his frequent use of the term in this absolute sense is in striking contrast with its rarer employment by St. Matthew and St. Mark. If, however, St. Luke came into the field later than St. Matthew or St. Mark, and derived, as is probable, much of his informa- tion from those who had learnt to speak of Jesus with the highest reverence, this recurrence of the word in his Gospel is easily explained.' Nor must it be forgotten that we have not merely to consider the number of times which a writer like St. Paul uses the word Kvptos in reference to Jesus, but the fact that he and his fellow Apostles associate with its use the honour which, in the Old Testament, belonged to God only.- But the habitual reference by St. Paul of the term under discussion to Jesus of Nazareth is of interest also from another point of view. It has lately been argued that in the interval between the date o{ Jesus' living voice and the period, from forty to seventy years later, during which, it is alleged, our Synoptic Gospels were compiled, the first disciples and their Palestinian converts threw back, as it were, upon the life of Jesus, the Messianic representations in the Book of Daniel, and other Apocalyptic books, and converted a title like * the Son of Man,' expressive of lowly and equal sympathy among the brotherhood of mankind, into a Jewish Messiah sending forth his angels and coming with his saints to judg- ment : hence the Lvangelists themselves were tempted to patch the discourses of Jesus with shreds of some Jewish Apocalypse ; hence the exposition of the ' last things ' in our Synoptical Gospels. ' Must we not own,' inquires Dr. Mar- tineau, 'that purely in his character of Messiah coming shortly with his saints to reign, was he called /,^rc/ ; or only as presiding at the great Assize which was to open his reign ' Comp. Dean Plumptre, in Ellicott's Commciilary, vol. i. p. 277, and Fariar, Messages of the Books, p. 73, note. ''■ Comp. Westcotl's Epistle to the Hebrews, pp. 89 91 and Gore's Bampton Lectures, uhi supra. 268 THE WITNESS OE THE EPISTLES was he called Judge ; and because in that hour his verdict would reserve from the sentence which swept the rest away all those who knew him and bore his name, he was called their Saviour ? ' • But we have only to look at St. Paul's earliest Epistle,. I Thessalonians, to see that each of these terms is employed by the Apostle in writing at that early date to the Church at Thessalonica ; and it would therefore seem that the trans- formation which Dr. Martineau demands must have taken place in a much shorter period than he is willing to allow,. to say nothing of the fact that Paul would hardly have written in a brief letter in such terms to his converts, unless they had possessed some previous knowledge of the Person with regard to whom he asserts these tremendous claims. This Epistle, then, which Dr. Martineau himself admits, would seem to carry us back to a date earlier than itself,, when the Christian Church conceived of Jesus as their Lord, their Saviour, and their Judge. Certainly such expressions as ' the Lord of glory,' ' the second man,' ' the Lord from heaven,' have been subjected to various interpretations.'- When, eg., St. Paul says ' the second man is the Lord from heaven,' or, as in R. V. ' the second man is of heaven,' is he speaking of Christ's pre- existence at all ? Or, if he refers to His pre-existence, does he not mean that He is pre-existent only as a principle ? or, as the ideal, the archetypal man .^ But if we omit the words 6 Ki/ptoy in I Cor. xv. 47, it does not follow that there is no reference to our Lord's pre-existence,'^ and it is somewhat strange that such a view should have commended itself to the mind of Sabatier, who in his anxiety to emphasise the im- ' Seat of Authority, p. 356. - Baur, Paulus, ii. 268 fF. ' ' An dieser Stelle nun heisst es ausdrlicklich, dass der zweite Mensch e| oupavov war (das 6 Kvpios, v. 47, ist zu streichen) ; dieser Hinweis aber auf seinen himmlischen Ursprung kann nur den Gedanken involviren, dass der, welcher der Menschheit eine ihrer himmlischen Vollendung entsprechende Leiblichkeit vermittelt hat, selbst seinem urspriinglichen Wesen nach ein Himmelsbewohner gewesen sein muss.' ' Allerdings hat er dieselbe nicht etwa vom Himmel mitgebracht, sondern sie selbst erst bei seiner Erhbhung zum Himmel nach der Auferstehung empfangen ' (Weiss, Bihlische Theologie, p. 294). ST. PAUL'S CIIRISTOLOC'.V AM) Till; INCARNATION 269 mcnsc difference which utuloubtcdl}' divides the Apostle's thought from that of Philo, denies that i Cor. xv. 47 has any reference to the pre-existent, but only to the risen Christ.' But this essential difference of nature is marked by the words i^ ovpavov, placed in antithesis to ek ti/s yP/s ; and although it may be maintained that in the Pauline view, Christ received more after His exaltation than He had possessed before He became man, }'et, both here and elsewhere, Paul conceives of Him as in His origin more than man.'^ But it is much more surprising to find that Sabatier allows that in Paul's view Christ was pre-existent as the Son of God, and yet that he seems in doubt as to whether the Apostle conceives of this pre-existence as ideal or personal,^ and that he falls back upon his favourite position that Christ was in the essence of His being t/ie Spirit (not simply irvsv^ia ^coottoiovv, but, as in 2 Cor. iii. 17, 8s Kvpios to Trvsvfidiariv), the divine Spirit, under the form of a human individuality.' The Apostle, according to Sabatier, confounds the pre-historic activity of the Christ with that of this divine Trvsv/xa, which appeared as a human person in Christ, but to which it becomes difficult, ' Sabatier, VApotre Paul, pp. 310, 311, 312 : ' Les mots o Ziv-npos &udpwiros «| ovpavov (v. 47), n'impliquent nullement la preexistence, et Ton se trompe gravement quand on en conclut que, aux yeux de I'apotre, la preexistence du Christ etait celle de Vhonime ideal, de Yhoviiiie type.' This last idea, Sabatier adds, belongs to the system of I'hilo, and between that and the system of Paul the difference is radical. ' Philon se place toujours au point de vue de la pure speculation; Paul reste fidele au point de vue historique. L'un diraque I'homme ideal est le premier, et que I'homme psychique, reproduction imparfaite du type divin, vient le second ; I'autre, au contraire, aftirme expressement que I'homme psychique apparait d'abord, et I'homme spiriluel ensuite.' But having thus drawn a distinction between Philo and the Apostle, Sabatier at once limits the term 6 Sfvrtpos dfOpunros e{ oiipavoV to the Risen Christ, and refers in proof to the context. - Weiss, Bidl. Theol. N. T. pp. 294, 295. Comp. also pp. 295, 296, where after discussing Rom. i. 4, he concludes : ' Der Sohn Gottes aber, der in der Theilnahme an der gottlichen Wiirde und Weltherrschaft seine Vollendung gefunden hatte, konnte von Anbeginn an kein menschlich-geschopfliches Wesen, sondern musste von Ewigkeil her der Gegen- stand der gottlichen Liebe gewesen sein.' Lechler, Das apost. Zeilalter, pp. 314, 315 ; Schmid, Bidl. Theol. p. 504 ; on the same passage. ^ UApotre Paul, pp. 31 1, 312: ' Etait-ce une existence personnclle, ou simplement ideale ? L'Apotre ne s'explique pas sufifisamment sur ce point.' * See p. 311, and the whole passage. 2/0 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES if not impossible, to attribute a separate personal pre-exist- ence.' So, too, Bcyschlag attempted to show that Paul ascribes to Christ only an ideal, and an impersonal pre-existence, and that He pre-existed, not as an actual personality, but only as the principle of one (' Die Christologie des N. T.' p. 243). But, in the first place, it may be noted that Steck, in review- ing modern criticism with regard to this point, not only describes Beyschlag's interpretation of such a passage as Phil. ii. 5, in which the latter finds no reference to the pre-existence of Christ, as a mere piece of fancy,^ but that he also considers it more intelligible to understand i Cor. x. 4, not merely as referring to the pre-existence of a redemptive principle in the Old Covenant, but to a persotiaL pre-existent Christ, actively engaged in the deliverance of Israel.^ But we are by no means dependent upon such a disputed text as i Cor. x. 4, although it may be doubted whether it is sufficiently con- sidered how many writers regard the words, not as figurative, but as indicating the actual pre-existence of Christ : ^ there are other passages in which St. Paul attributes to Christ the actions, not of a pre-existent principle, but of a pre-existent person. A mere pre-existent principle could not be repre- sented as a moral example, as capable of a self-renunciation, of a self-emptying, such as that described in 2 Cor. viii. 9, or ' With this compare the criticism of Weiss : ' Auch Sabatier halt die Frage fiir unlosbar, ob PauUis die Praexistenz Christi als eine ideale oder personliche gedacht habe, und behauptet falschlich, die vorgeschichtliche Wirksamkeit Christi zerfliesse dem Apostel in die des gottlichen Geistes ' {B. T. p. 297, note 7). 2 Steck, Dej' Galaterbrief, pp. 276, 277. Comp. his criticism of De Wette on 2 Cor. viii. 9. s Ibid. p. 279. * Comp. ^.^. Weizsacker, Z?a.r «/i>5/. Zeitalter, p. 125; Keim, Geschichle Jesii, i. 42. So Weiss, Bibl. Thcol. p. 298, and note, in answer to Baurand Schenkel, who interpret i Cor. x. 4 as typical (Schenkel, Das C/u-Jstusb/hi, p. 259, and Baur, Patilns, ii. 267) ; Schanz, Gott und die Offenbaru7jg, p. 414 ; Lechler, Das apost. Zeitalter, p. 318; Schmid, Bibl. Theol. p. 505 ; Paret, Pattlus und Jesus, p. 28 ; Gess, ttbi supra, p. 124 ; Kiihl on i Pet. i. 1 1 in Meyer's KoDitnentar, p. 94, 5. Aufl. So also Pfleiderer, U rchri stent Jnitu, p. 215 ; Steck, ubi supra, and von Soden in Jahrbiicher fiir p7-otesta7itische Theologie, p. 490, 1883 ; Martineau, Seat of Authority, p. 393 ; Gore, ubi supra, p. 59. ST. PAUL'S CIIRISTOLOGV AND TJIK INCARNATION 2"] \ in the closely parallel passage Thil. ii. 5, 6.' In both cases it ma)' be fairly maintained that the force of the Greek, and the context point not only to the pre-existence of Christ, but to an act of free will on His part, to a moral act of self- denial, which could only be attributed to a personal bcing.- It is impossible to evade the force of the aorist hixrio^zvaz in the former passage, which implies not only a state of poverty, but a definite time when Christ ' became poor,' '^ and it is easy to understand how the exhortation to charity in the one case (2 Cor. viii. 9), and to humility in the other (Phil. ii. 6), would be emphasised by the contrast between Christ's earthly poverty and humiliation and His pre-existent heavenly riches and glory. Nor must we forget, in this connection, the strong critical testimony which, as we have seen, interprets i Cor. viii. 6 in such a manner as to assign to Christ a divine and personac agency in the creation of the world,^ although, strangely enough, at least one recent authority, while adopting the strained interpretation of this passage, to which reference has already been made, can yet find, not only in Phil. ii. 6, 7, but even in i Cor. x. 4, proofs of Christ's personal and pre- existent agency.'* ' See Lechler, Das afosf. Zcitalter, pp. 316-320, 321;, 327, 328; Weiss B. T. pp. 297 and 426. .See also Pfleiderer, Urchrisfentlntiu, p. 217. ^ It is to be noticed that although Sabatier in the passage above quoted does not regard iirTccx^vcre as equivalent to iKevwafv eavrof with Lechler, he yet sees in the latter expression a moral act by which Christ renounces His pre-existent Divine nature, and gives up His personal will to the will of the Father {tthi supra, p. 237). He also sees in Phil. ii. 5, 6, a natural development of the idea indicated in the former Epistle, 2 Cor. viii. 9. See p. 235. ^ This is pointed out not only by Lechler [uln sttpra, p. 317), but admitted in the plainest terms by Sabatier (234) : ' On a souvent meconnu I'exacte portee de ce dernier texte. Sans doute, le mot errrcixewo'ei' n'est pas I'equivalent de iKtvuiaiv ka.vr6v. Le verbe Trrcoxe"^*'" signifie bien vivre pauvre, paupertateni gerere ; mais raoriste indique ici tres certainement le moment oii cet etat a commence, oil Christ est devenu pauvre.' * See p. 260, and comp. also for authorities Lechler, uhi supra, p. 310, note 2, and .Schmid, B. T. especially pp. 511, 512, in which he shows that .St. Paul represents Christ not only as a truly divine principle, but also as a pre- existent principle, which is in itself a personal one. * Thus Dr. Martineau, after remarking that some words are found in Si. Paul's writings which seem to assign Christ even an instrumentality in the 2/2 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES But if St. Paul thus speaks of Christ as a pre-existent and personal being, there is nb reason to suppose that such pas- sages as I Cor. XV. 45-47 exhaust the Apostle's conception of this personality. This passage in i Corinthians is fixed upon by many critics as if it was the central point of the Pauline theology/ and the expressions ' the heavenly man,' ' the spiritual man,' ' the archetypal man,' are employed as if St. Paul had never given any intimation that Christ was to be described by any higher name, and as if nothing was easier than to refer the Apostle's use of such terms to Jewish or Hellenistic influences. But the points of contact with Jewish or other systems are more than counterbalanced by the points creation of the world (I Cor. viii. 6), would refer the * all things' in this passage, not to the objects constituting the universe, but to the current Providential courses of human affairs, a view which he considers is amply justified by the con- text (Seat of Authority in Religion, p. 393. See against this and similar views Schmid, B. T. especially pp. 495, 496, and comp. Lechler, tibi supra, as against Holsten, and Weiss, B. T. 297, note, as against Schenkel ; comp. also Steck, Der Galaterbrief, p. 278 : ' Dass Christus dann in seiner vormenschlichen Existenz weiter hinaufreicht also Dasein der Welt, und dass er das Organ der Weltschopfung war, wird man aus dem oben angefiihrten Worte des ersten Korintherbriefes 5t' ol to Travra auch nur schwer hinwegdeuten.') ' It would not have been in character,' continues Dr. ISIartineau (p. 394), 'for the Apostle as a " Hebrew of the Hebrews " to trench upon the undivided prerogative of Him who alone stretched out the heavens (Job ix. 8) '—a very two-edged argument, since Paul's antecedents make it all the more strange that he should so often seem to do so — ' but,' he adds, ' the subordinate agency attributed to the pre-existent Christ in the national history and in the voluntary descent into the humiliations of mortal life, can belong only to a being conceived as personal, and therefore forbids us to interpret that personality as due to the incarnation and limited to the contents of the human nature.' On the intense revulsion of the Jews from idolatry see some important remarks in Dr. Kennedy's Self-Revelation of Jesus Christ, pp. 302 ff., who draws a very different argument from this fact from that maintained by Dr. Martineau. ' ' Auf diese .Stelle griindet sich die Annahme, in welcher man neuerdings vielfach den eigentlichen Schliissel zu der paulinischen Christologie gefunden zu haben glaubt ' (Weiss, B. T. p. 295). So, too, Lechler points out how Holsten [Das Ev. des Paulus, i. 431 and 435), Pfleiderer {Paulinismus, 131 ; cf. Urchri stent hum, p. 213), and others, imitating the example of Baur (Paulus, ii. 208), have ascribed to Paul the strange Gnostic and Docetic representation that Christ, in His prehistoric being, was the archetypal man existing in a spiritual body of light, a view which is based by these critics upon i Cor. xv. 47. Lechler, ubi supra, pp. 335, 336, and comp. Pfleiderer's Hibbert Lectures, pp. 56-59 ; Keim's Geschichte Jesu, Bd. iii. pp. 624, 625 ; Hausrath's Neutest. Zeit. Bd. iii. pp. 91, 92. ST. PAUL'S CIIRISTOLOGV AND THE INCARNATION 2/3 of contrast.' If, <\^'-., wc examine the doctrine of the Adam Oadmon, or First Man, of the Jewish Tahinid and Kabbalah, we see that it is not only very far removed from the doctrine of the Incarnation, but that in some of its forms it would be repulsive to the whole character of Christianity ; - and if we turn to the * heavenly ' man of Philo we see that, although he interprets Gen. i. 27 of the creation of this ' heavenly ' man in contrast to Gen. ii. 8, which he refers to the 'earthly' man, we arc not onl\' still very far from the doctrine of the Incarna- tion, but that this archetype is not an individual at all, but a species, and, like the Adam Qadmon, neither male nor female.^ ' Thus Schanz {Apologie des ChristenlJni»is), while admitting the Jewish ideas and representations may have influenced Paul's conception of ' the heavenly man ' : ' Es mag sein, dass Paulus zu dieser Auffassung des himmlischen Christus durch die Erscheinung des verkliirten Christus vor Daniaskus veranlasst wurde, ja dass er auch von der weit verbreiteten jiidischen \'orstelIung von der himmlischen Welt, in welcher der Messias und die Glite des messianischen Reiches voraus- geschaffen sind und nur der vEnthiillung harren, beeinflusst war ; aber einerseits ist es unbestreitbar, dass auch im Allen Testamente eine vorweltliche Zeugung angedeutet und namentlich in den LXX hervorgehoben ist, andererseits geniigt eine Vergleichung mit Philo urn den himmelweiten Unterschied kennen zu lernen. Nicht der Vorbereitung des Messias und Erlosers, nicht der Logos-Messias, nein, die Ueberfiihrung des Logos in einen andern .Stand, die Menschwerdung ist das wesentliche Unterscheidungsmerkmal ' {Gott und die Offenbarung, pp. 414, 415 ; see also esp. pp. 178, 194). Comp. Sabatier, L\4p6ire Paul, esp. p. 310, and an interesting resume of a paper read by M. Henri Bois of Montauban, before the ' Conferences Evangeliques du Midi,' on ' La Preexistence de Jesus-Christ,' contained in Le Christianisvie ait XIX'' Siecle, 5 decenibre, 1889. ■■^ Dorner, Person Christi, i. (' Einleitung'), 59, 60. ' See an admirable review of the views held by Holsten, and by the earlier Tiiliingen school, as to this passage in Godet's Connl/iians in loco, vol. ii. E. T. pp. 418, 421, and article ' P'nilo ' in Smith anti Wace's Dictionary of Christian Biography, vol. iv. pp. 376, 381. See, too, Weiss's important criticism: ' Paulus soil auf Grund der Deutung, welche Philo dem doppelten Bericht iiber die Menschenschopfung in der (jenesis giebt, in Christo den himmlischen Urmenschen oderdas Urbild der Menschheit aus Gen. i. gesehen haben, wahrend hier ausdritcklich Christus der letzte Adam und dor zweite Mensch heisst (i Cor. XV. 45, 47),' /?. T. p. 295, 5. Aufl. Still more difficult is it in his view to connect I'aul's statements with the Logos of Philo, for he immediately adds : ' Noch fcrner aber liegt dem paulinischen Vorstellungskreise der Gedanke an den philonischen Logos, den Aeltere in dem paulinischen Christus erschiencn sein liessen (vgl. Usteri, Dahne). Yi\x die aprioristische Annahme eines solchen Mittelwesens lindet sich in ihm auch nicht der geringste Ankntipfungspunkt.' 274 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES But if the Tauline l^^pistles thus express the highest Christology on the one hand, whilst on the other they insist no less plainly than the Gospels upon the lowly life and true humanity of Jesus, we may refuse to admit that St. Paul taught the doctrine of the Incarnation, but in so doing we only substitute one difficulty for another.' No one has examined more fully than Keim the narra- tives of the birth of Jesus aiid the evidence upon which the words of the Apostles' Creed are based, ' conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary"^ — he dismisses without hesitation the accounts of the Incarnation in St. Matthew and St. Luke as late additions to the primitive Jewish Gospel ; ^ he declares that the silence of St. John and St. Paul proves con- clusively that they knew nothing of a divine nativity,* a story which he derives from the imagination which surrounds the entrance of great men into the world with poetry and legend,'^ whilst at times he falls back upon the Old Testament stories of the miraculous birth of an Isaac or a Samson ;'' he affirms that St. Paul's conception of Jesus as the heavenly man which the Apostle undoubtedly entertained some twenty years after the Crucifixion, was based, not upon any historical tradition, but only upon the Apostle's personal and dogmatic consciousness.^ And yet, when he has to express his own ' See this point brought out with reference to Keim, and also Sabatier, by Godet, ubi supra, p. 491. Cf. also Didon, Jesus-Christ, i. 74, 75, on the strictures of Reuss, Histoire Evangelique, and of Sabatier, Encyclop. des Sciences Religkuses,a.xi. 'Jesus-Christ.' ■^ Keim, Geschichte Jesti, Bd. ii. pp. 336-412. ' Ibid. i. 342, 343. * Ibid. I. 342, 346. On the silence of the Fourth Gospel sec Salmon, Introd. to the N. T. pp. 276 ff. 5th edit. ' Geschichte Jesu, i. 336, 337. "- Ibid. i. 354. ' Keim twice lays stress upon this short interval of thirty years ; cf. Geschichte Jesu, i. 345 and 347 : ' Allerdings reicht die Ansicht des Apostels Paulus bis auf das Jahr 20 nach Jesu Hingang zurtick ; aber sie ist lediglich das Resultat seines dogmatischen Denkens, keineswegs einer vorgefundenen Ueberlieferung. Wenn er von geschichtlichen Traditionen der jerusalemischen Gemeinde redet, so hat er gewiss immer nur Tod und Auferstehung, niemals die Vorzeitlichkeit Jesu auf diesem Weg bewiesen. Wir haben auch keine Spur, dass in den Kreisen der ersten Apostel, Petrus, Jakobus, Johannes, dem Paulus diese Tradition prasentirt warden konnte ' (pp. 347, 348). It is further to be noticed that Keim carries back this belief in the heavenly ST. PAUL'S CIIRISTOLOGV AND THE INCARNATION 2/5 conception of the personality of Jesus he can find nothin-es, p. 58. * Cf. e.g. Schmid, ubi supra, p. 509, and a remarkable passage in W. F. Gess, Das Dogma von Christi Peison und Werk, pp. 304, 305, 1887, upon the deeply rooted Monotheism of the first disciples, and its relation to their Christology. See above, p. 262. ST. PAUL'S CIIRISTOLOf.V AND TIIK INCARNATION 277 Keim himself points out that it did arise — viz. upon Jewish- Christian soil.' ' Gt'Sihiih/e Jesii, i. 342. 'The Hindoo mind,' says Ncandcr, himself a Jewish convert, ' niiglil have originated a fable of this character, though in a difterent form from that in which the account of the Evangelists is given ; but the Jewish had totally differeni tendencies. Such a fable as the birth of the Messiah from a viri^in could have arisen anywhere else easier than among the Jews ; their doctrine of the Divine Unity, which placed an impassable gulf between CiOI) and the world ; their high regard for the marriage relation, which led them to abhor unwedded life ; and, above all, their full persuasion that the Messiah was to be an ordinary man, undistinguished by anything supernatural, and not to be endued with Divine power before the time of his solemn consecration, all conspired to render such an invention impossible among them.' And he adds : ' It was on this very account, viz. because the miraculous conception was foreign to the prevailing Jewish modes of thought, that one sect of the Ebionites, who could not free themselves from their old prejudices, refused to admit the doctrine ; and the section which con- tains the account is excluded from the Ebionitish recension of the Gospel to the Hebrews, which arose from the same source as our Matthew ' {Life of Christ, E. T. pp. 17, 18). Comp. with Neander's remarks Weiss, Lebeit Jesti, i. 220, who also emphasises the argument that against every attempt to derive the idea of the supernatural generation of Jesus from Jewish Christian views we must jilace the fact that it was just in such circles that the only opposition to it is found, viz. in its rejection by the Ebionites. So, too, Y}\A<.m, J,'siis-Chriit , i. 71, and comp. Ncisgen, Geschichte Jesii Chrisli, p. 114, 1891. It is further to be noticed that Keim allows that there is no trace of a miraculous birth of the Messiah in the older writings of the Jew's, nor even in Jewish expectations at the time of Jesus ; even as late as the time of Justin Martyr, the Messiah is for the Jews at/Qptairos e| avOpwiruf ( Tryph. 49 ; Gescliichte /esH, i. 355). If it is alleged that the belief in the miraculous conception, and the Gospel story of the Incarnation, were derived from Old Testament prophecies, it is to be remembered that Keim admits that Isaiah vii. 14 is open to several different interpretations {ul>i supra, pp. 354, 355). Weiss, in his Lehen Jesii, i. 219, points out that there is no proof that this passage was ever supposed in the pre-Christian period to refer to the Messiah, or that the Jews regarded it as pointing to a virgin mother, as the Hebrew expression by no means exclusively indicated an unmarried person (cf. Schmid, tibi supra, p. 34) ; and if the prophecy of Micah v. 2, is relied upon as proving beyond a doubt that the Old Testament pointed to Bethlehem as the birthplace of the Messiah (Keim, ubi supra, p. 355 ; Edersheim, Jesus the Messiah, i. 181), yet even then we are very far from accounting for the circumstances narrated in the Gospels— a census, e.g., and that census taken at the bidding of a heathen emperor, and executed by a Herod, would represent, as Edersheim expresses it, the >ie plus ultra of all that was most repugnant to Jewish feeling. Speaking of the prophecy in Isaiah vii. 14, Steinmeycr, in his important work Geschichte tier Geburt des Ilerru, writes (p. 95) : ' Die Beziehung derseloen auf den Messias datirt nemlich erst von dem Matlhaus. Sie hat sich von da ab allerdings durch alle Jahrhunderte, bis tief in das achzehnte herab, einer unbestrittenen Geltung erfreut ; aber sie hat el^en ausschliesslich auf der Autoritiit des Evangclibten beruht, und es fehlt an jedwcder Spur, dass sich frtiher die 278 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES In support of his statement, Keim refers to St. Paul's de- preciatory views of marriage, as one of the sources of the belief in the birth from a Virgin Mother, although he hesitates to affirm that any such views can be found in the teaching of Jesus.' We are, moreover, asked to believe that this lovely and attractive legend formed itself ' naturally ' and ' irresis- tibly ' around the birth of Jesus. In times and among minds where science is not a power, the pureness and elevation of a great teacher, it is said, powerfully strike the popular ima- gination, and the natural, simple, reverential explanation of His superiority is at once that He was born of a virgin. Such a legend is the people's genuine translation for the fact of His unique pureness,^ But it ought surely to be remembered that we have not to deal with some later ascetic age of the Chris- tian Church, to which the idea of the superiority of the virgin condition had become familiar ; but with the Jewish nation — a nation amongst whom marriage was held in the highest possible honour, exalted almost to the dignity of a Christian sacrament, and actually considered to carry with it the for- Hoffnung Israels niit diesem prophetischen Ausspruch geeinigt hatte. Aber wie kann sich dann, so miissen wir fragen, die angebliche Sage aus einer Stelle herausgebildet haben, welche von Niemanden in solch' einem Sinne verstanden worden war ? ' But if the story of the Incarnation could not have arisen on Jewish grounds, / • it must have had its origin in Gentile sources. And if so, we must face the difficulty as to how anything from such a quarter could find such ready accept- ance in Christian circles; if it is alleged, e.g., that the mythological conception of sons of the gods and of heroes gave rise to the belief in the divine conception of Jesus, it is surely not too much to say that the primitive Christian consciousness would have felt the deepest abhorrence of the shameless glorifying of sensual desire in these pagan myths, and the application of any such idea to Jesus must have appeared nothing less than the most shocking profanation. See, e.g., Weiss, Lebenjesn, i. 220, and Neander, Life of Chi-ist, E. T. pp. 15, 16, and note, and, more recently, Nosgen, Geschichte Jesu Christi, p. xio, 1891. The newly dis- covered Apology of Aristides, whilst it asserts most plainly the birth of the Son of God 'from a Hebrew virgin,' emphasises the horror with which the Christians regarded the legends of the pagan gods and goddesses. See e.g., pp. 30, 83, 93, ff., in the recent account of the Apology by Mrs. Rendel Harris. No one has pointed out more forcibly than Keim the great difference between Philo's theories of the Eternal Divine Word, and the Christian conception of the Incarnation (z/(^«\f?(/r«, p. 356). ' Geschichte Jesu, Bd. i. 354. - See, e.g., Mr. Matthew Arnold's 'A Comment on Christmas,' reprinted in his Paul and rroteslantisin. ST. PAUL'S CIIRISTOLOGV AND THE INCARNATION 2/9 givcnessof sins.' \\'h\', then, if the}- wanted to find ' a s)-mbol of purity,' should Jewish Christians either ' naturally ' or ' irre- sistibh' ' seek it in the story of the birth from a Virgin Mother ? It is therefore nothing to the point to refer such a story to Grecian or Roman sources for its origin, or to insist dogmati- cally upon the fact that a similar story of a miraculous birth gathered around the name of Plato.- It is quite imjiossible, in the opinion of the German writer Karl Steinhart, that any such story was known in the days of Speusippus, Plato's nephew : Diogenes Laertius, who refers it to him, never dis- tinguishes between truth and fiction in his account of the life of Plato, and evidently there is some confusion in his state- ment that the stor)^ was known to Speusippus.-^ Steinhart ' Weiss, after referring to the supposition that the thought of the miraculous conception had its origin in the idea of impurity attaching even to the sexual relationship in marriage, or to the idea of the higher purity of the virgin condition, adds : ' These views, however, of later ascetic tendencies, although they certainly gained currency in Christendom, are yet, in an acknowledged degree, far removed from the view of Judaism, which considered marriage as a divine institution, and the fruit of the body as a blessing from God ' [Lebcn Jesu, i. 219, 220). Yox Jewish views as to the dignity of marriage, see Edersheim, Jesus the Messiah, i. 352, 353. It may not be out of place to compare with the remarks of Weiss and Neander (ul>i supra) the opinion of Dean Milman in his History of Christianity, i. 99 : 'I am inclined to think that the Jews, though partially orientalised in their opinions, were the people among whom such a notion was least likely to originate of itself [viz. the birth from a virgin]. Marriage, by the mass of the people, was considered in a holy light ; and there are traces that the hopes of becoming the mother of the Messiah was one of the blessings which, in their opinion, belonged to marriage.' See also, in this connection, the criticism of Didon to the same effect : ' Rien qui rappelle les fables paiennes de intervention suspecte des dieux et des deesses dans I'avenement des heros ou des grands hommes ; rieti qui denote le genie Juif, si pen oitvert a Pideal de la virginite. I^e recit de I'origine virginale de Jesus ne s'explique que par la realite meme ; ce n'est pas ainsi que I'imagination reve et invente ' {Jesus-Christ, i. 72) ; and Dean Plumptre, Christ and Christendom (Boyle Lectures), pp. 363-365, new edit. 1886. ^ See, for example, amongst recent English writers, Mr. Matthew Arnold, ubi supra, and Professor Estlin Carpenter, The Synoptic Gospels, p. 153. It is by no means certain that Diogenes Laertius is worthy of such implicit confidence as Professor Carpenter asserts ; see below, reference to Steinhart's JVaton's Leben (Leipzig, 1873). » Steinhart's opinion of Diogenes' Life of Plato may be gained by consulting the following paragraph : ' Sein Leben Platons fiihrt uns durch ein Fold voll wiist durcheinander liegendcr Triimmer von Triimmern. Ueberall stellt er mit grosser 28o THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES points out that had the story entirely depended upon Olym piodorus, who tried to revive Neo-Platonism in the sixth century, it might have been that the story of Christ's wonder- ful birth had been transferred by him to Plato, but since this theory would not apply to Apuleius or Plutarch, or to the statement of Diogenes Laertius with reference to pre-Christian times, we must seek for the origin of the story in the eager- ness with which in the Grecian world hero-worship gathered around great names, and in the myths associated with the birth of Alexander the Great.' Naivetiit die echle und die gefalschte Daistellung, Mythos und Geschichte, Ueberlieferung und willkurliche Erdichtung, Lob und Tadel, Vergotterung und Verleumdung des Philosophen, fast ohne eigenes Urtheil dicht neheneinander, und obgleich er fur beides Quellen anfiihrt, die er indessen haufig gar nicht gelesen, sondern seinen Vorgangern nachcitirt zu haben scheint, so unterlasst er doch vielfach gerade bei den wichtigsten Angaben die Bezeichnung seiner Quellen ' {Plafonds Leben, p. 26 ; cf. p. 262). Steinhart's positive conclusion as to the improbability that the fable of Plato's birth was known to Speusippus is given on p. 36 of his Plalon's Leben : ' Dass indessen schon Speusippos dieser Fabel als einer zu seiner Zeit umlaufenden gedacht habe, wie Diogenes angibt, ist unglaublich und kann, wie wir bereits erwahnten, nur auf einem Misverstandniss beruhen.' See for Steinhart's account of this niisiinderstanding pp. 7, 8, and 260 of his Platofi's Leben. ' Steinhart, nbi supra, p. 36, and comp. p. 282, note 30. ' Immerhin ist es bemerkenswerth, dass tiber die grossen Staatsmanner Themistokles, Aristeides, Perikles nichts der Art gefabelt wurde, sondern erst mit dem phantastischen Alexander, der sich den homerischen Heroen zuzugesellen iiebte, die alten Heroensagen wieder auftauchen ; da ist es immerhin moglich, dass man in Athens schon bald nach Alexander's Tode, getuiss aber lange nach Speusippos, den Platon durch jene Fabel als Geistesheros dem vergotterten Weltiiberwinder ebenburtig zur Seite stellen wollte. ' Steinmeyer, nbi supra, p. 96, remarks that the attempt of Strauss to explain j the story of the Incarnation from heathen sources is not a whit more fortunate than the attempt to derive it from Jewish prophecy : ' Ganz abgesehen von den Riicksichten der Pietat erschien es denn doch allzu gewaltsam, so heterogene Dinge in Parallele mit einander zu stellen. Den Erfolg, der ihm auf diesem Wege erreichbar war, hat sich Strauss tibrigens dadurch selbst abgeschnitten, dass er von dem eigentlich mythologischen Gebiete Abstand nimmt, und statt dessen auf der Thatsache beruft, dass Manner wie Plato, Alexander, Augustus von ihren Verehren als GiJttersohne betrachtet worden seyen. Dass die "Sage" von der Menschwerdung des Sohnes Gottes in der Analogie derartiger Apotheosen entstanden sey, das wird er selbst dem Schwachsinn nicht einreden konnen.' In a note Steinmeyer points out that in a later work, Der alte und der neue Glaube, Strauss again appears to fall back simply upon mythology : ' Wir wittern mythologische Luft ; nur dass uns die griechischen Gotterzeugungen besser erfunden diinken als diese christliche ' (Strauss, Der alte und der neue Glaube, p. 25). ST. PAUL'S CIIRISTOLOGY AND TIIK INCARNATION 28 1 No doubt the early Christian .Apologists saw in these pagan myths of supernatural births prototypes and anticipa- tions of the Incarnation, and it must always be remembered that they started with presupposing that event, but this is a very different thing from explaining the origin of the idea of it' But whilst, in the passages we have examined, Christ is represented as a pre-existent and divine being, joint agent with God in the creation of the world, so that even if St. Paul •does not directly call Ilim God,^ he approaches so closely to the conception of the Logos that only the word used by St. John seems wanting ; ^ and whilst, by His Incarnation, He takes upon Him the form of a servant, a conception strictly in accordance with the Gospel narratives of His lowly birth ' Comp. Weiss, Leben Jcsit, i. 220, 221, and the fuller remarks of Neander, Life of Christ, E. T. p. 16, note. It really seems almost needless to answer the criticism which finds an argument against the historic truth of the Christian Incarnation in the Birth Stories of the Buddha (Prof. Estlin Carpenter, uhi supra, p. 155). The best answer to such attacks may be found in the weighty statements of Schanz, Gott uiid die Offcn- l>anai!^, pp. 33, 34, to say nothing of Dr. Kellogg's chapter entitled 'The Comparative Value of the Buddhist and the Christian Scriptures ' in his Lig/il of Asia, &c. pp. 19-55, ^""^l Dr. Kennedy's Self-Kevelation of Jesus Christ, PP- 313. 314- The remarks of Didonare alsoof interest, though from a very different point of view, in his Jesus-Christ, i. 74. It is not wise, in defending the Incar- nation, to attach too much importance to instances of what is called parthcito- genesis in the natural world (see Sir W. Dawson's remarks in his Modern Ideas of Evolution, p. 39). - Steck emphatically defends the reference of Rom. ix. 5 to Christ, and his full discussion of the passage is important, as it is a further proof that there is nothing grammatical in the way of such an interpretation, although no doubt Steck is influenced by his desire to place the Hauptbriefe as late as possible [zibi supra, pp. 284-287). Comp. also in favour of a like reference to' Christ the critical remarks of Schanz, Gott uiid die Offcnbarung, p. 413, and Godet's review of the various interpretations of the passage, V Epitre aux Roinains, pp. 250 f. 2nd edit. ; Lechler, Das apost. Zeitalter, pp. 331, 332 ; also Schmid, ubi supra, p. 513; Weiss, Bibl. Theol. p. 282, and note, 5. Aufl. ; VPiCider*^^ ,IIil>i>erl Lectures, p. 55, and note ; but comp. Urehristenthum, p. 240, note Ritschl undoubtedly refers the words to Christ {Die Entstehung der a/tkatholischen Kirche, p. 79, 2. Aufl.) But see on the other side, Baur, Pau/us, ii. 260, 264, and amongst recent commentators, Lipsius in Hand-Commcutar zuni N'. T. ii. zwcite Abtheilung, P- 145- ' Sabalier, J.\4p6tre Paul, esp. pp. 217, 238 ; Hausrath, Ncutesiamentliche Zeitgeschichte, iii. 95. 282 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES and life, the expression of the Apostle ' the second Adam "" may remind us that we are again on the lines of the Synop- tist Gospels. It is not only that St. Luke in his genealogy (ch, iii.) virtually represents our Lord as ' the second Adam ' (in contrast with St. Matthew, who represents Him as the heir of Abraham), a conception entirely in accordance with St. Paul's declaration of universal redemption and brother- hood in Christ ; ' but it is not too much to add that St. Paul's description of the work of ' the second Adam ' is strikingly in harmony with that of ' the Son of Man in the Gospel records.^ Thus in Matt. xx. 28 Christ Himself speaks of the life of the Son of Man as a life of service, and of His death as a work of redemption, in this way uniting, as it were, in one breath the two conceptions of the life and death of Jesus which are found side by side in the Epistles (cf Phil. ii. 4-8 ; ' Comp. e.g. Schmid, 7ibi supra, pp. 35, 553. ^ Hausrath lays stress upon the fact that Jesus never called Himself 'the second Adam,' and that all such representations of Him had their origin, not in the teaching of Jesus, but in the anthropology of Paul {Netitestanientliche Zeitgf.schichte, iii. 72). But whilst it is true that our Lord never spoke of Himself as ' the second Adam,' it may be fairly said that such a conception is contained in His teaching about Himself. ' Kann man den Gedanken von Jesu Bezeichnung seiner selbst als des Sohnes des Menschen geistvoUer auslegen als es Paulus in seiner zweimaligen Gegen- iiberstellung des zweiten und des ersten Adam thut?' (Gess, lUn supra. Das apostolische Zetigniss, p. 368). In this same connection we may refer to the important note of Paret, ubi supra, p. 80 : ' Dass erst in der paulinischen Christologie (nomentlich I Cor. XV. 45 ff. 21 ; Rom. v. ; Phil. ii. 7, 8) der hohere Begriff, welchen Jesus unstreitig mit dem Ausdruck Menschensohn verbaut, zur Entfaltung kommt, kann nicht zweifelhaft seyn, obwohl das Wort selbst bei Paulus nicht gebraucht wird. Dejr Hellenist Stephanos, sein Vorlaufer, hatte den Ausdruck selbst noch gebraucht ' {Apostelgeschichte, p. 56). So, too, Dorner in discussing the title ' Son of Man ' speaks of it as giving us the Christian version of the doctrine of the Adam Kadmon, which is specially unfolded in the Pauline doctrine of the second Adam, who completes the creation of the first, i Cor. xv. 45-47 ; Rom. v. 14 [^ubi supra, p. 83). With these statements we may also compare Dr. Liddon's remark in The Inspiration of Selection, Sermon preached at Oxford on Whitsunday, 1890: 'A phrase of Jesus becomes in the hands of an Apostle the warrant of a doctrine, which is thus seen to have been always latent in it. The title " Son of Man," for instance, reappears in St. Paul as " the second Adam," the ideal Representative of mankind, whose work is placed in vivid contrast with that of the first father of our race ; ' see also Dr. Kennedy's Self - Revelation of Jesus Christ, pp. 148- 1 54 ; and Dr. Fair- bairn's Studies in the Life of Christ, p. 193, 5th edit. ST. PAUL'S CIIRISTOLOOV AND THE INCARNATION 283 Rom. V. 19; 2 Cor. viii. 9; Matt. viii. 20), using words to describe His own ministry of service and His own redeeming death which seem to have passed into habitual use in the language of the Apostles (cf Luke xxii. 27 ; Rom. xv. 8 ; 2 Cor. xi. 23, iii. 6 ; Phil. i. i, &c. ; and cf also i Tim. ii. 6 ; I Cor. vi. 20 ; i Pet. i. 19), so that St. Paul in viewing the death of Jesus as the crowning point of His life and the consummation of His obedience was not expressing his own subjective fancies, but in reality the mind of Christ (Matt. XX. 28 ; Luke xxii. 27 ; Mark x. 38 ; John xii. 27).' It is also to be noted that whilst, in St. Paul's conception, Jesus is the representative of humanity (Rom. v. 1 5 ; i Cor. XV. 22), so also does his work extend to each individual man who comes under his consideration, not as Jew or Gentile, but simply as a human being and a sinner, who can appro- priate the Person and the work of Jesus as if they existed for himself alone (Gal. ii. 20; Rom. xiv. 15, &c.). We may ' ' Er war unter den Menschen wie ein Uiener, wie deiin Christusselbst (Luk. xxii. 27), diess von sich sagt, und (Watt. xx. 28) sein ganzes Leben als eine Diakonie beschreibt, auch — wir konnten mit Verkehrung der Sachordnung sagen acht paulinisch — als den Gipfei diescr Diakonie, als das, worin der Gehalt und der Charaktcr seines Lebens am klarsten zu Tage icomnie, sein Selbsthingabe in den Tod bezeichnet. Obwohl dieser Tod ein Losegeld fur die Vielen sein solite (Matt. XX. 28, xxvi. 28, und die auffallend ahnliche Stelle Rom. v. 19), so war doch die personliche Wirksamkeit Jesu wahrend seines Lebens nur auf das israelitische Volk beschrankt ; er war ein Dicner der Beschneidung (Riim. xv. 8, Matt. XV. 24).' Paret, ubi supra, p. 24. With this passage in Paret we may connect Sabatier, ubi stip7-a, p. 63 : 'Jesus a borne son ministere au peuple d'lsrael, il est reste, jusqu'au bout, ie serviieur de la ctrconcision (Rom. xv. 8). UApotre Paul park de Jhtis, comme Jesus lui-mime park du fils de Phomrne ; il a ete pauvre, meconnu, humble, obeissant ; il n'est pas venu pour etre servi, mais pour servir ; il a pris le rang et la forme d'un serviteur ; servir et obeir a ete toute sa vie (Sjojcovta, v-n-aKori). And then he adds a criticism of Baur with which Paret's note above quoted (cf. p. 24, note l) is closely in agreement: 'II est parfaitement exact, comme I'a fait remarquer Baur, que Paul considere toute la vie du Sauveur a la lumiere de sa mort, et voit dans cette mort le couronnement de son ministere et la consom- mation de son obeissance. Mais n'est-ce pas de ce meme point de vue que Jesus considerait sa vie et son oeuvre (Matt. xx. 28 ; Luc xxii. 27 ; Marc x. 38 ; Jean xii. 27) ? ' ' Im .Sprachgebrauch des Apostels Paulus und der Evangelien haben die Worte SiaKovf^v, SiaKovia, SidKovos eine sehr weite Bcdeutung. .Sie werden angewendet auf den Beruf Jesus, Rom. xv. 8 (Gal. ii. 17), Matt. xx. 28.' Weizsacker, Das apost. Zeitalter, p. 634. Comp. also Schmid, ubi supra, p. 216, and also Dean Plumptre in Commentary on I/iq N. 7'. (Ellicott), i. 126. 284 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES of course regard this conception of the Christ idea as the natural result of the revelation made to the Apostle by the Risen One, appearing no longer as a Jew, but as the glorified Son of Man, and Son of God ; but may we not also regard it, asks Paret, as proceeding from the historical Christ, who, although He has indeed limited His temporal circuit of work almost entirely to the people of Israel (cf. also Rom. xv. 8), yet, within the same, as Son of Man regarded men as such, as sinners in need of redemption, and while He gave to Himself and His work a meaning for all people (Matt. xxv. 32, xxviii. 19), yet equally comprehended the most insignificant individu- ality (Matt. xxv. 40, &c.), a,nd especially those who no longer found a place, or at least no good one, in the Jewish national Church? If this be so, we see how Paul, in this fundamental point of his Christology, goes back to the historical Christ, and gives us a conception of Him identical with that which is furnished us by the Synoptists.' Xo doubt it may be maintained that Philo's conception of the heavenly man, the ideal man, is based upon the Platonic world of ideas, and it is very easy to attribute to St. Paul ' unconscious Platonism ' - ; but the second Adam, the heavenly man of St. Paul, is identified with the historical Christ, and is neither a sexless being, like the ideal man of Philo, nor a being who has his dwelling in the world of pure forms, like the ideal man of Plato. Such a passage, e.g., as Gal. iii. 28, indicates plainly enough how closely the Apostle approached to the thought of Christ as the representative head of humanity, a thought which expresses at least one meaning of the title ' Son of Man,' by which Jesus of Nazareth loved to express his relationship to the whole race of man- kind : ^ and we are justified in maintaining that the Pauline ' Paret, ttbi siip7-a, pp. So, 8i. - For an elaborate exposition of the view that the Pauline conceptions were based upon those of Philo and Platonism, see Ilausrath, Neittestaineiitliche Zeitgeschichle, Bd. iii. 88-95, the section entitled ' Der Messias alszweiter Adam,' ■esp. pp. 92, 93- ■" For Hausrath's interpretation of this passage in conformity with his own views, see ubi supra, p. 93, and comp. also Weiss, Bibl. Theol. des N. T. p. 55, 5. Aufl. ST. PAUL'S CHRISTOLOGV AND TIIK INCARNATION 285 terms ' the second Adam,' ' the heavenly man,' are derived directly from the special designation of Jesus, ' the Son of Man who came down from heaven,' and that there is no need to refer them to any other source.' It must not of course be forgotten that the title ' Son of Man ' has two sides, a human and a divine, and that it speaks even more for the heavenly than for the earthly man. Whether or not we interpret it, with Neander and others, of Jesus as the representative of humanity, it is plainly based upon Daniel vii. 13, an origin to which the words of Jesus before the high-priest refer us, and it is therefore a title which points to a heavenly Son of Man, who had come from heaven, where he had his pre-existent life.'' ' ' Die ebionitische Idee des Adam-Christus ist, in ihrer formellen Berlihrung niit der Christologie des Paulus, derselben geradezu entgegengesetzt. Obgleich Paulus ebtnfalls Christus als Adam bezeichnet (Rom. v. 14 ; i Cor. xv. 45, 47) xmd seine Ausdriicke (k -yrjs xo"'^^ und livOpouiros t| ovpavov den philonischen nahe stehen, so identificirt er beide doch nicht wieder, sondern stcllt den Anfanger der Siinde und den Anfanger der Gerechtigkeit und des Lebens in Gegensatz. Und nur die Ignorirung der Siinde niacht jenes juden-christliche Theologumenon moglich, welches die bcabsichtigte Identit'at des Judenthiinis und Chrislenthums charakteristisch bezeichnet. Ferner ist die paulinische Terminologie nicht abhangig von der essenischen Ausbeutung der Stellen in der Genesis, sondern von der Jesu selbst eigenthtimlichen Bezeichnung des v'ihs rov avOpwirov 6 e/c tov ovpavov Karafias ' (A. Ritschl, Die E)itstehitng der altkathclischen Kirr/ie, note, p. 216, 2. Aufl. 1S57). Comp. also p. 81, where Ritschl also refers the Pauline titles of Christ, ' the heavenly man,' ' the image of God,' to the peculiar expression of Jesus in calling Himself 'the Son of Man.' Comp. also Hase, Geschuhte Jesii, p. 412, who also, it is to be noticed, uses the same expression as Ritschl, ' der Menschensohn, der vom Himmel gekommen ist' (John iii. 13), 'the Son of Man who came from Heaven,' and attaches to it, in the mouth of Jesus, an ideal significance. '■' See Hase, Geschichte Jesti, pp. 410-414. (It is impossible to read these pages without noting the wide difference between Hase's interpretation of Jesus* announcement of His Messiahship, and the extraordinary assertion of Dr. Martineau that Jesus never claimed to be the Messiah. In the same connection we may well compare Hase's remarks, p. 414, with Dr. Martineau's refusal to allow that Jesus ever uttered the words ' Come unto me, all ye that are weary and hea\'y laden, and I will refresh you,' Matt. xi. 28. See also Ilarnack's emphatic rejection of the view entertained by Dr. Martineau and other critics, {Dogmengeschhh.'e, i. 57.) Comp. especially Schanz in his Apologie des Christenthiiins : Gott tind die Offenbarung, p. 408, 1888: ' Aber Jesus nennt sich selbst Menschensohn. Dieses Wort ist indess so weit entfernt fiir die pure menschliche Person als Argument zu dienen, dass es vielmehr entschieden dartiber hinausweist. Der einzige Umstand, dass es auch dem Johannes sehr wohl bekannt ist, dtirfte schon 286 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES At the same time it is remarkable that it forms a point of contact between the Christology of the first three Gospels and that of St. John, and there were other titles which the latter Evangelist might have chosen had he designed, as is so often asserted, to place the human nature of Jesus in the back- ground.' It is no doubt worthy of observation that the expression ' Son of Man ' is not found in any of the Epistles, but this is fairly accounted for by the fact that the early Christians loved to think of Jesus as the glorified and ascended Lord: zur Vorsicht mahnen. Der Titel spricht mehr fiir den himmlischen als fiir den irdischen Menschen. Er ist ein Bindeglied zwischen der Christologie der Synoptiker und der des Johannes. Denn ob man denselben von der Bedeutung Jesu fiir die Menschheit, ftir die menschliche Natur oder anders erklare, jeder Erklarung ist Dan. vii. 13 zu Grunde zu legen, worauf Jesus vor dem Hohen- priester selbst hinweist. Der Titel geht also vom himmlischen Menschensohne aus, der vom Himmel gekommen ist, dort gelebt, praexistirt hat.' The remarks of Neander, Life of Jesus, E. T. pp. 98, 99, may be compared with this passage (see also note 2). And on the following page Neander adds : ' We cannot find in Christ's use of the title any trace of the Alexandrian Theologoumenon of the archetype of humanity in the Logos, of Philo^s distinc- tion between the idea of humanity and its manifestation (or the Kabbalistic Adufn- Kadmon) ; notwithstanding it was not by accident that so many ideal elements, formed from a commingling of Judaism and Hellenism, were given as points of departure to the realism of Christianity ; although this last was grounded on the highest fact in history. ' ' Comp. Schanz, ubi supra, p. 408 ; Neander, tthi supra, p. 99, note. Keim, in his lengthy discussion of the meaning of the title ' Son of Man ' {Gesehichtejesu, ii. 64-76), points out how frequently this conception of the ' Son of Man ' as the perfection, the ideal of humanity, the second Adam, has been entertained by modern writers (pp. 75, 76). Keim himself unhesitatingly refers the origin of the title to the Book of Daniel, although he thinks that Jesus was also influenced in His choice of the name by Psalm viii., a Psalm to which Keim finds frequent references in the Gospels as well as in the Epistles of the N. T. (p. 72 and note i, for points of immediate contact with Dan. vii.). The title, as Keim insists, had two sides : a higher, in that one cannot dismiss it as a mere title of humility or of fellowship with the human race (as Dr. Martineau suggests), for in many passages far higher conceptions are undoubtedly connected with it (pp. 70, 71, and notes) ; and a lower side, a side which was manifested in lowli- ness and service (pp. 74, 75). In a remarkable passage (p. 76) Keim attempts to combine the two sides, the human and the divine ; but it is to be noted that although he sees in Christ's choice of this title a claim to be the Messiah in a deep moral and spiritual sense, rather than in accordance with the gross Jewish ideal of lordship and dominion, and although he adds ' Seine Herrschaft lag in Wahrheit in seiner Dienstbarkeit,' he does not deny that such passages as Matt. XXV., which speak of the Son of Man as the future Judge on His throne, contain a claim which Jesus actually made (ii. 74, iii. 652). ST. PAUL'S CIIKISTOLOCY AND THE INCARNATION 287 indeed, the very absence of tlic term in question from the Epistles is an argument in favour of the primitive cliaracter ■of the narratives of the Gospels, inasmuch as they thus strikingly represent an carHcr tone of feehng.' It may further be observed that Keim insists upon the fact that whatever may be the precise date of the legends of the Incarnation, they must have been post-Apostolic, and above all, post-Pauline.^ But if this is the case, it would seem, in the first place, that the theory which alleges that the belief in the sinlessness of Jesus gave birth in the primi- tive Christian consciousness to the story of His miraculous conception can no longer be maintained, since Paul, who distinctly affirms the former, never even refers, in Keim's opinion, to the latter.'' In the next place, Keim fails to take sufficient account of the fact, that the story of the Incarnation, in our Canonical Gospels, even if unknown to St. Paul, is very different from the description in the Apocryphal Gospels and in the products of the age to which Keim refers them.^ ' ' Dieses Verhiilltsein der iibermenschlichen Majestat Jesu durch die Niedrigkeit irdischen Menschenwesens isl der Grund vvarum der Auferstandene sich nicht mehr diesen Namen gibt (auch Lukas xxiv. 7 erinnert nur an ein friiheres Wort) ; jetzt war die Majestat unverhtillt. Ferner warum die Apostel ihn nicht mehr den Menschensohn nennen : an die Niedrigkeit seiner Erscheinung •durch den Namen zu erinnern widerstritt ihrem Gefuhl ' (W. F. Gess, Christi Person tind Werk, erste Abtheihmg, p. 187, 2. Aufl. , and of. zweite Ahtheiking, p. 368). For the same argument see also Stanton, y^ww/; and Christian Messiah, p. 244, and an interesting note by Dean Plumptre in Ellicott's Commentary on the N. T. ii. 45, and Farrar's Alessages of the Books, p. 31. Keim, in commenting upon the fact that the title is so seldom found outside the Gospels, and never in the writings of St. Paul, adds: 'ein merkwlirdiges Anzeichen gleichsosehr von der Selbststandigkeit der Entwicklungen apostolischer Zeit wie von der Unabhiingigkeit der evangelischen Tradition gegentiber der nachfolgenden geschichtlichen Stromung ' (ubi supra, p. 66 ; see also note 4 on same page). '^ Geschichte Jesu, i. 342. ' Comp. Weiss, Lehenjesu, i. 221. * For a detailed examination of the marvellous contrast between the canonical «nd Apocryphal Gospels, see Ullmann's Historisch oder Afythisch? pp. 162-212. Keim seems himself conscious of the difference between the two sets of narratives ; cf. e.g. Geschichte Jesu, i. 362, and p. 343, where he speaks of the ' chaste reserve ' of Matthew. See also Didon, in his chapter upon the historicity of the miraculous accounts of the birth and infancy of Jesus {ubi supra, pp. 71, 72). 288 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES This remarkable contrast between the Apocryphal and Canonical Gospels is not only emphasised by orthodox theologians who might be considered to exaggerate it ; both Hase and Reuss insist upon it no less decidedly.' But many of these Apocr}^phal Gospels, with their insipid tales and fantastic miracles, date, according to the Tubingen theory, from the same period as our Canonical Gospels ; how, then, are we to account for the contrast between them ? "^ It is remarkable that these Apocr}'phal Gospels are most exuberant in their fancy during that period of our Lord's earthly life which preceded His public ministr}- — that is to say, just when our Canonical Gospels are silent : ■'' these silly tales of our Lord's childhood and youth show us what to expect whenever we leave firm historical ground, and the fact that these Gospels have so embellished the period left almost void by our Evangelists goes far to prove that their writers must have been aware of the ground thus left open to them — in other words, that our Gospels must have been already in existence.^ No wonder that Dr. Weiss remarks that there is no more striking apology for the Canonical Gospels than the contrast afforded by the Apocryphal, and that he should consider it a matter of congratulation that we in these latter still possess monuments of what free invention was able to produce when set loose from all tradition of eye-witnesses.^ Here, then, is a fact which everyone may test for himself, an instance in early Church history of a remarkable survival of the fittest. Is this fact to be ascribed to chance — to the literary instinct of men who were, so we are assured, super- stitious and ignorant to a degree ? or is it another proof that ' Hase, Geschichle Jesu, p. iS6 ; Reuss, Geschichte der heiligen Schriften ties N. T. pp. 298, 299, 1887, 6. Aufl. 2 Weiss, Lebeiijesu, Bd. i. p. 162. » Ibid. < Ibid. i. pp. 162-165. * ' Es giebt keine augenfalligere Apologie ftir die Geschichtlichkeit unserer kanonischen Evangelien, als das Gegenbild dieser apokrj'phischen ' {ubi supra, p. 164). ' ^Vir sind in der gliicklichen Lage, noch Denkmaler zu besitzen, aus welchen wir ersehen konnen, was die von aller Ueberlieferung der Augenzeugen losgeloste frcie Dichtung hervorzubringen vermochte, in den sogenannten apokry- phischen Evangelien' {ubi sttpra, p. 162). ST. PAUL'S CHRISTOLOGV AND THE INCARNATION 289 the gift of Pentecost enabled the Church of God ' to have a right judgment in all things ' ? ' ' It is of interest to note that the reasons given by Dr. W. 11. Mill {Mythical Interpretatiou of the Gospels, 1S61) for the silence of the New Testament writers as to the details of the miraculous birth of our Lord, are substantially the same as those which commend themselves to the judgment of B. Weiss in his Leben Jesu. Comp. e.g. Mill, pp. 213, 214, 218, with Weiss, i. 217, 223, 224. Both writers point out that there is no reason whatever to assume that the miraculous conception of Jesus, if a fact, must have been generally acknowledged during His lifetime. On the contrary, there was a high and holy interest in guarding this secret of the house, to preclude not only all irreverent curiosity, but also calumnious falsehood, 'a falsehood which,' as Dr. Mill remarks, 'when that mystery became generally notorious as Christian doctrine, and not before, burst forth with the utmost virulence from the enemies of the Son of Mary.' On the origin of these stories see Mill, p. 200, note, and Weiss, i. 217, 224. See also D'xdon, Jc'sus-Christ, p. 71, and Keim, Geschichte Jesu^ i. 368-370. The subject is so important that one or two arguments from Dr. Weiss, which afford a fitting parallel to the arguments of W. H. Mill, are given at length. After remarking upon the extraordinary nature of the demand that Jesus should point out His miraculous birth to the masses of the people, who, in spite of His daily miracles, did not believe on Him ; and after adding that the unbelief of the brethren of Jesus, in spite of what they had heard of the divine revelations and miracles at His birth, is quite intelligible in view of the offensive contrast which the whole appearance of Jesus presented to their highly-wrought expectations, he proceeds to show how silence with regard to this secret, on the part of those who knew of it, was justified by the event : ' Wenn im Volke nirgends ein Zvveifel daran aufgetaucht ist, dass Jesus der leibliche Sohn des Mannes war, in dessen Hause er aufgewachsen, wenn der Vorwurf unehelicher Geburt erst in viel spaterer Zeit vnd offcnhar aiif Griind unserer evangelischen Berichte im Aliinde der Feinde Jesu erscheint, so ist das nur ein Beweis, dass man die Ehre dieses Hauses nicht preisgab, indem man jedem Unglaubigen einen Vorwand bot, Jesum als einen in Siinden und Schanden geborenenzu bezeichnen ' (p. 217) ; and he adds : ' Daher erklart es sich von selbst, dass erst so spat, vielleicht erst nach dem Tode der Maria, in der Gemeinde sich die Kunde von den wunderbaren Unistanden der Geburt Jesu verbreitet.' It cannot be said that Beyschlag's remarks in his recent Leben Jesu (i. 163 fT.) with regard to the Incarnation are very satisfactory. He argues that such passages as Rom. i. 3 distinctly imply the birth of Jesus from a human father (pp. 166, 170), and that the lineage of Joseph and not of Mary is referred to David. But there is good reason to suppose that both Joseph and the Virgin Mother were of the house and lineage of David (see Weiss, Leben Jesu, i. 211 ; Pressense, y^wj-CZ/rii/, p. 272; Y.d.^x'^tvcn, Jesus the Messiah, \. 149; Neander, Life of Christ, p. 20, E. T. ), and it is quite arbitrary to affirm that such expressions as those contained in Acts ii. 30 or Rom. i. 3 exclude the Virgin birth, or that the latter fact was unknown to St. Peter and St. Paul. Moreover, it will be noticed that Beyschlag himself strongly refuses to believe (p. 167) that the story of the Incarnation can possibly be derived from any heathen source, even if that source was alleged to be the birth of a Plato ffom Apollo, and he therefore seeks for the origin of the story on Jewish-Christian grounds. He takes such expres- U 290 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES sions as those which we find in Gal. iv. 29, Rom. ix. 8, ' He that was born after the Spirit,' fieTo. TTVfv/jLa yevvTjdei^. From such expressions he maintains that it was but a small step to assume the generation without a human father of Him who, more than Isaac, was ' the child of the promise,' and that this step would be accelerated by such a passage as Isaiah vii. 14. But the Hebrew rendering of this last verse could not help Beyschlag much, and the Septuagint rendering of it is quite insufficient to explain the rise of the belief in the Incarnation on Jeiuish- Christiaft grounds (Weiss, Leben Jesii, i. 219, 220), since, as Weiss points out with great force, there is one circumstance which can always be adduced against any attempt to derive the idea from Jewish-Christian views, viz. the fact that opposition to it was specially presented in such circles, in the subsequent rejection by the Ebionites of the supernatural conception of Jesus ; moreover, it makes too great a demand upon our credulity to ask us to believe that this one prophecy, to which St. Luke never refers, combined with such expressions as those contained in Gal. iv. 29, Rom. ix. 8, could possibly have given rise to the circumstantial narratives of St. Matthew and St. Luke, to a story of such exquisite beauty — a beauty which has appealed to human hearts for eighteen centuries^as that of the third Evangelist (see Fairbairn, Studies hi the Life of Christ, p. 31). Beyschlag devotes a long note to the refutation of the defence put forward by Weiss on behalf of these Gospel narratives of the Incarnation, but it cannot be said that it meets the argument upon which Weiss insists as to the impossibility of ex- plaining the rise of these stories on Jewish-Christian grounds, and Beyschlag has himself declared against their origin in heathen sources. On p. 170 he remarks that he had formerly defended the narratives, the historical character of which he now rejects, and he takes refuge in the belief that these narratives are, after all, but the outer clothing, the symbolical form, of what is a great and essential truth, viz. the fact that Christ was in very truth the Divine Child, the Founder of a new humanity, of whose personality the Holy Spirit must be indeed the generating principle, and the holy root from which that divine life unfolded itself : in support of all this he quotes Paul's description of Christ as the spiritual and heavenly man, but there is no ground for asserting that such expressions militate against St. Paul's knowledge of the Incarnation, and it may more justly be argued that Paul's conception of Christ as the sinless Head of humanity demands a recog- nition of a supernatural birth (see above pp. 250-252). One may be pardoned for thinking that Beyschlag might have done well to consider a little more fully the remark of Haupt's which he quotes with approval (p. 164) : ' As to the fashion in which it pleased God to call into existence the miraculous Person of Jesus there is no definite statement of belief. WTiether for this purpose He availed Himself of the Virgin bjr.h, or of an absolute new creation, or of what other means, the Christian consciousness cannot of itself decide.' For a recent criticism of Beyschlag, see Nosgen, Geschichte Jesii, pp. 109 ff. 291 CHAPTER V OUR lord's life and teaching We have next to consider what testimony may be derived from the Pauline Epistles as to the mode of life which Jesus lived.' In using the expression 'mode of life' it is of course to be remembered that we have no right to expect in the Epistles such details as we find in the Gospels.'- But there are undoubtedly statements which agree perfectly both with the facts and with the spirit of the Gospel narratives. Take, e.g., such a passage as 2 Cor. viii. 9 : ' For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor.' Here no doubt it may be said that the mind of the Apostle is dwelling upon the ' richness ' of Christ in the glory which He had with the Father before the world was, the glory which He laid aside, when He took upon Him our nature in great humility. But the word which ithe Apostle uses is a remarkable one, which elsewhere carries with it the idea of temporal poverty, one might almost say of beggary.^ So, too, in the passage Phil. ii. 5-8, which is so ' ' One phrase which dropped out of the [Nicene] Creed in its passage through the Council must have had a touching sound as it was repeated amongst the hills and valleys of the Holy Land, "Who for our salvation was incarnate, and lived amongst tnett." Eusebius declares that such words formed a part of the Creed of the Church of Palestine— what he had himself been taught in his own native city of Ccesarea in the plains of Sharon.' — Stanley's Eastern Church, p. 135, 2nd edit. See also Maclear's Introduction to the Creeds, p. 27, on the force of this phrase, Kol eV afOpcinots iro\iTfV(Tdfj.evov. - Thenius argues that the scantiness of the details is easily accounted for by the aim of the Epistles, but that such references as we find are all the more weighty inasmuch as the writers of the Epistles did not start to write a life of Jesus (Das Evangeliiim ohne die Evangelien, pp. 77, 78). ^ Thus, Dean Plumptre, while he holds that the chief thought expressed is the renunciation by our Lord of His divine riches in the Incarnation, thinks that u 2 292 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES often compared with that in 2 Corinthians, it may no doubt be maintained that when the Apostle speaks of Christ as 'emptying Himself,' and taking upon Him 'the form of a servant' the words refer, as in 2 Cor. viii. 9, to His pre- existent glory, and His assumption of the nature of man. But just as in the earlier passage the context shows that ' poverty ' in its natural sense was also in the Apostle's mind, so here the extreme lowliness of life which marked our Lord's earthly career emphasises the Apostle's exhortation, and he again draws from it a most practical lesson as to the bearing of men towards their fellows." But without pressing this argument from the context, may we not fairly say that such passages enable us to realise, quite apart from the Gospels, that our Lord did not make the im- pression of being a ruler of this world, or a man of wealth, but that He lived in the form of a servant, and in outward poverty, to which His inward lordship and His divine riches formed a startling contrast (2 Cor. 8, 9 ; Phil. 2 ; Matt. 8, 20) ? - Cer- tainly it is quite arbitrary on Pfleiderer's part to maintain that Paul never refers to the earthly example of Jesus, even when there was the most direct and urgent occasion for him to do so, and to quote in support of this assertion the two passages we can scarcely doubt that the words refer also to the outward aspect of our,. Lord's life. He chose the lot of the poor, almost of the beggar (the Greek word TTTwxos is so translated, and rightly, in Luke xvi. 20-22), and as regards the out- ward mendicant aspect of our Lord's life, and that of His disciples, he refers to Matt. X. 10, Luke viii. 1-3, John xii. 6 {Commetitary oji the N. T. [Ellicott], ii. 391). ' Stanley's Corinthiajts, Essay referred to in chap. ii. - ' Naraentlich macht er nicht den Eindruck eines weltlichen Herren oder Reichen, sondern lebte in Knechtgestalt (Phil. ii. ) und in ausserer Armuth, gegen welche freilich seine innerliche Herrlichkeit ( i Cor. ii. 8) und sein gottlichen Reichthum einen wunderbaren Gegensatz bildete (2 Cor. viii. 9, Phil, ii., Matt, viii. 20).' Paret, ubi supra ^ p. 24. Comp. also Sabatier, ubi supra, 63; Keim, Geschkktejesti, Bd. i. p. 39; Thenius, ubi supra, p. 65 ; Hausrath, ubi supra, Bd. iii. p. 69, where he refers, not 2 Cor. viii. 9, but Phil. ii. 4-8, to the life of poverty lived by Jesus ('dasarme Leben Jesu'). Schenkel refers the 'poverty' to the Cross and to Christ's voluntary and lowly suffering [Das Christusbild, p. 249). Baur {Panlus, ii. 267) and De Wette {Exeget. Handbuch, 3. Aufl. 369) both explain 2 Cor. viii. 9, of the historical life of Jesus, and His Hfe of human poverty, but in doing this they both deny that the passage implies His pre- existence. OUR lord's life and teaching 293 2 Cor. viii. 9, Phil. ii. 5, 6, in which he asserts that the Apostle does not allude to the extremely relevant instances of humility and willing self-sacrifice afforded by the earthly life of Jesus, but to the Incarnation, and therefore to con- siderations taken, not from history, but from dogmatic specu- lation.' But we are surely at liberty to accept the dogmatic bearing of these passages without rejecting the plain natural sense of such words as inw)(^6s and SovXos.' Outwardly, indeed, there was nothing to distinguish Jesus from other men. He was a Jew (Rom. ix. 5), of the seed of David (Rom. i. 3), of the Jewish people and the Jews' religion, and in this relation obedient to the conditions of their law (Gal. iv. 4) ; He is represented as living amidst purely human surroundings, a brother amongst brethren, one of whom is mentioned by name (Gal. i. 19). And these allusions, like many others, are so purely incidental that they imply at least some previous knowledge on the part of the Christian community which the Apostle is address- ing : on any other supposition they present a series of inex- plicable puzzles.^ ' Hihbert Lectures, p. 52. Pfleiderer bases his whole argument upon the very doubtful interpretation of 2 Cor. v. 16. ■■^ Thenius, ubi supra, p. 65. ' Paret, uhi supra, pp. 19, 23. ' Paulus muss also Jesum in dieser rein nienschlichen Umgebung seinen Gemeinden vorgefiihrt haben ; denn alle diese Erwahnungen kommen nur gelegentlich vor und setzen voraus, dass den Lesern dieses Alles schon wohl bekannt sey. Utid dock bei all dent hat er ihn als den Herrn injenem hohen Sinnefestgehalten und seinen Horern geschildert !' (p. 19). Thenius, ubi supra, p. 55 ; and also Weiss, Bibl. Theol. pp. 289, 291 ; Beyschlag, Leben Jesu, pp. 68, 69 ; Wittichen, Leben Jesti, p. 18 ; Thenius, ubi supra, p. 55. Comp. too, Sabatier, itbi supra, p. 62 : ' Paul ne raconte pas plus les evenements de la vie de Jesus qu'il ne cite ses discours ; mais il les suppose connus de ses lecteurs. A des gens qui n'auraient point entendu les principaux recits evange- liques, ses epitres offriraient, a chaque ligne, d'indechiffrables enigmes. Je n'en veux d'autre preuve que la maniere dont I'apotre des gentils parle des Douze, des fr^res de Jesus et de ses rapports avec eux.' So, too, Huraut, in speaking of Paul's incidental reference to the brothers of the Lord, adds : ' Mais comment Saint Paul est-il venu i parler d'eux dans ses Eglises, sinon en racontant I'histoire du .Sauveur, et le representant au milieu de ses disciples et de ses freres ? ' (ubi supra, p. 16). On these incidental notices of Paul and their relation to the narratives of the Gospels, Paret's words are of interest : ' Bis auf die Stammbaume Jesu hinaus— wenigstens was deren allgemeine Tendenz anlangt — erhalt somit die synoptische 294 TI^E WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES Moreover, this human life of poverty is described by St. Paul as a life of meekness and gentleness, as a life of service and self-denial. The whole tenor and spirit of His earthly life was that of unswerving obedience towards God, even unto death (Phil. ii. 8), and of self-forgetful, lowly, self-sacri- ficing love towards man — the exact opposite of the spirit of pride and self-pleasing (Rom. xv. 3 ; Phil. ii. 4).' It would certainly seem that when the Apostle beseeches his converts ' by the meekness and gentleness of Christ ' (2 Cor. x. i), he is recalling ' definite traits of a living human person, exem- plified to the full in the life of Him to whom he ascribes them ' ; and we pass at once from such words to our Lord's own declaration concerning Himself: 'Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly of heart' (Matt. xi. 29).2 Historically this life of service was limited to Israel, and the Apostle speaks of Christ as ' a minister of the circumci- sion ' (Rom. XV. 8) ; ^ but it must not be overlooked that in the Gospels no less than in the Epistles both Gentiles and Jews are alike regarded as receptive of salvation (Matt, xxviii. 19 ; Luke xxiv. 47 ; Col. i. 23 ; Gal. ii. 7-9 ; Rom. xi. 13 ; Ephes. iii. i), and that Jesus Himself not only recognises this, but also announces the future participation of the Gentiles as a great fact (Matt. viii. 10 ; see also John x. \6y St. Paul, Geschichte Jesu durch Paulus ihre mittelbare oder unmittelbare Bestatigung, und muss als ein integiirender Theil seiner evangelischen Verktindigung gedacht warden' {ubi supra, p. 19 and note). On the force of Paul's testimony to the Davidic descent of Jesus, Rom. i. 3, see Wendt, Der Inhalt der Lehre Jeszi, p. 438. • Paret, tibi supra, p. 24 ; H. Ewald, Sendschreiben des Apostels Paulus, P- 445- 2 See also PUmiplre's Commentary on 2 Corinthians {i supra, p. 26. OUR lord's life and teaching 297 IS of Christ (i Cor. xi. i). It is exactly the self- forgetting, sacrificing love which subordinates all outward considerations to its own peculiar law — a love learned from Christ — which it behoves these Corinthians to learn from him (i Cor. x. t,;^). So, too, the expression ' to walk worthily of the Lord ' (Col. i. 10) may be fairly held to contain a reference to the histori- cal life of Jesus in accordance with which Christians ought to walk as their rule and guide (cf also iii. 12) ; and with these passages we may compare such expressions as those used in Phil. i. 20, iii. 10, and the close parallel exhortations in I Thess. iv. 1,2.' But the life of Jesus was not merely an ideal of moral excellence, it was the life of One of whom it could be said that He was tempted in all points like as we are, yet without si;/.^ It is not unreasonable to ask, how Paul could speak as he does in Rom. viii. 1-3, and feel himself freed from the dominion of sin (of which every Jew in presence of a holy God ' Paret, ul>i supra, and Thenius, tibi supra, p. 58. It is to be noted that the word used by St. Paul in i Cor. xi. i, and also in I Thess. i. 6, is /ui/iTjTT^s, an ' imitator ' ; the A. V. ' follower ' does not at all indicate what is meant The R. V. renders the word in these passages, ' imi- tators ' ; cf. also I Cor. iv. 16, Vulg. iviitatores. With the remarks in the text we may compare Sabatier, itbi supra, p. 63 : * Ce n'est done pas un Christ absolument ideal et subjectif qui vit dans la conscience nouvelle de I'apotre. Ce Christ interieur reste bien en meme temps un type exterieur, que Paul contemple dans son souvenir, qu'il apprend chaque jour a mieux connaitre et a mieux imiter. On sail que I'imitation du Christ en cffet est un des principes essentiels de la morale paulinienne ; ce principe ne suppose-t-il pas de toute necessite, un modele exterieur, historique, que tous les croyants ont devant les yeux (i Cor. xi. i ; Phil. ii. 5)? Jesus est done tout ensemble et le principe immanent de la sanctification en I'homme, et I'ideal de la saintete realise devant ses yeux.' So, too, Huraut, ubi supra, p. 14 : ' Ce qui prouve encore que saint Paul a connu le Chiist historique, c'est la maniere dont il envisage la vie Chretienne ; Col. i. 10 ; Phil. iii. 10. . . . Ce n'est que parce qu'il est lui-meme imitateur i sie/ra, p. 66 ; for references toother writers see below. See esp. T/te Religion of the Christ, pp. 24 ff. (Dr. Stanley Leathes' Banipton Lectures, 1874). Conip. Wendt, Der Inhalt der Lehre Jesu, p. Ii, 1890. But no one has insisted upon this more strongly than Schwcgler ; cf. Das nachapostolische Zeitalter, i. 91. - Paret, ubi supra, p. 9. The same line of argument is adopted by Sabatier, who, after remarking, with Paret; that modern criticism with all its subtleness sometimes ignores the most obvious facts, reminds us how it has forgotten that Paul was a missionary before he was a theologian, and that he preached the Gospel in places where men had never heard any mention of Jesus or Messiah. Must he not then, of necessity, have made known this subject— Jesus — and explained this attribute — Messiah ? Must he not have given in the synagogues of Asia such an idea and such an impression of Jesus, Mis life, His miracles, His death, His resurrection, that receptive souls would naturally have been brought to say, ' This Jesus was the Christ ' ? How can we conceive apart from all this the 308 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES out of the c;rcat number of Jews who were called Jesus,' Paul pointed out prominently one Jew of this name, predicated of Him all the high attributes which are contained in the Pauline conception of the Christ, viz. that He was the Son of God, the Lord in the highest sense of that expression — which, so far from disclaiming it, actually included a claim to worship — the Redeemer and Judge of the world ; the Lord of the living and the dead ; the Second Man, who divided the whole history of mankind into two halves ; the initiator and future perfecter of an entirely new epoch of the life of the human race ; the head of humanit}% just as Adam was its original first representative.^ But unless this affirmation that Jesus was the Christ was to become void of all reality ; unless this faith was to degenerate into a brainless superstition, and its proclamation into nothing' but a mere make-believe, then, as Paret forcibly argues, the Apostle was bound to show how he came to assign such lofty attributes to that particular Jew who bore the name of Jesus^ to define the subject of his proposition more accurately, or, in other words, he was bound to endeavour to produce such an impression of the Person and the history of this Jesus as should influence thinking and receptive minds to identify him with the Christ, and to hold this opinion with as much firmness as Paul himself, who can exchange one name with the other, and use the title Christ as if it was a proper-name {e.g. i Cor. xv. 3) : the same man who, in his letters to the Corinthians, used his great dialectical skill to establish the proposition ' Paul is an Apostle,' and appealed for this purpose to his inner and out- missionar}^ preaching of the Apostle ? {LApotre Pan/, p. 57). So, too, Huraut. in connection with a similar argument, points out the improbability that Paul who^ had as his companion a Saint Luke, could have ignored in his preaching all the details of the Gospel narrative : ' Lui, qui avail pour compagnon Saint Luc, dont I'Evangile est si riche de details, comment aurait-il ignore ces details ? II y a plus, comment aurait-il pu evangeliser, s'il ne les eut point connus ? Saint Paul, en effet, allait annoncer Jesus-Christ dans les contrees oil ce noni n'avait point encore ete prononce. Or, ce Jesus qu'il proclaniait comme le moyen seul de salut, comment aurait-il pu faire naitre la foi en lui, s'il ne se fut appuye sur les faits ? Comment des paiens se seraient-ils rendus au nouveau Dieu qu'on leur prechait, si des faits incontestables a leurs yeux n'etaient venus forcer leur assentiment, et desarmer leur resistance?' Paul a-t-il comui le Christ historique? (p. 10). Comp. also Nosgen, Geschichte Jesii Christi, p. 22, 1891. ' Paret, ubi supra, pp. 9, 10, note. - Paret, ubi supra, p. 10. OUR lord's LIFF. AXU TKACHIN(; 309 ■ward experiences, td his deeds and sufferinLis, lias surely taken not less but greater pains to establish the more weighty proposition, 'Jesus is the Christ,' the Son of God, ' the Lord ' in that high sense of the word in which He was always so called by Paul.' Certainly we do not possess a fundamental analysis of these terms in the Pauline letters, nor, indeed, as Paret points out, could we expect to find them there, since in all of these letters the Apostle is writing to those who were .already believers. The great mass of his historical information concerning Jesus belonged to the period when, in accordance ■with his own figurative expression, he had begotten a Church, cared for it as a foster-mother, and nourished it with milk (i Cor. iv. 15 ; I Thess. ii. 7 ; i Cor. iii. 2).- P)Ut, according to the Gospels, Jesus not only proclaimed Himself to His disciples as the Christ, He proclaimed also the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of God. Even before His Sermon on the Mount He had repeated the Baptist's message, ' Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand ; ' He had taught in the synagogues of Galilee, and preached the Gospel of the kingdom. Once, and once only, in the Gospels, did He speak of Himself as the founder of a Church, and even on that occasion the Church is clearly inseparable from the kingdom of heaven (Matt. xvi. 18, 19).-^ Rut if we turn to the Epistles, do they not evidently presuppose the kingdom of God as Christ proclaimed it, and the Church of God which ' Paret, iihi supra, p. 11. To the same efiect Sabatier, uhi supra, p. 57. ''■ Huraut (p. ii), in company with I'aret (p. 27), lays stress upon the peculiar composition of the Pauline Churches, and reminds us that the touching narratives of the Gospels would appeal with special force to the poor and unlearned, to pious and faithful women ; this affectionate and historical element of the Apostle's gospel, which only comes into prominence from time to time, but which forms a peaceful hidden foundation, is easily overlooked whilst we conceive of Him as disputing with party emissaries, and opposing impure sectaries ; l)ut if at the out- set the Apostle had employed such dialectical aiguments as we find in the Epistles to the Romans and Galatians, the personal composition of his Churches must have been widely different from what was actually the case ; cf. lieyschlag, Leben Jesu, pp. 62, 67. * Stanton, _/(f7C7j'/i and Christian MessiaJi, p. 221, and see alscj pp. 2;6, 227 ; and comp. Farrar, Messai^es of t lie Boo/cs, p. 31. What could be more unsatis- factory than the way in which Harnack relegates Matt. xvi. 18 and ,\viii. 17, to the second century, and supposes that the title iKKKriaia may have been derived from Paul {Do^mengeschichte, i. 69J ? 310 THE WITNESS OV THE EPISTLES Christ had founded ? ' It is to be noted, in the first place, that St. Paul refers three times to the Church of God — the Church, that is, which he had once persecuted ; and this repeated use of the term with reference to the period of his persecuting- fury shows us that it was a term which he had found already in existence, and not one which he had himself set up for the Christian community (see Gal. i. 13 ; i Cor. xv. 9 ; Phil. iii. 6). WeizsacKer,in a remarkable passage, draws special attention to this point,- and from the same passage it will be seen that* in his view, the idea of the kingdom of heaven precedes the figurative conception of the body of Christ and an all- embracing Church. Certainly we find very clear indications that the laws of the kingdom, its characteristics, the methods of its working, are set forth by St. Paul in entire harmony with the teaching and conceptions of the Gospels.^ It is when ' the time is fulfilled ' (Mark i. 14, 15) that our Lord comes, preaching the Gospel of the kingdom, declaring the kingdom of God to be at hand ; it is ' when the fulness of the time was come ' (Gal. iv. 4) * that the Advent of the Saviour redeemed those that were under the law, so that, led by the Spirit, they are no longer servants, but sons and heirs of the kingdom of God (Gal. iv. 6, and v. 18, 21). And as with our Lord, so also with St. Paul, it is the same word, ' the Gospel,' which strikes the keynote of his teaching (Mark i. 14, and Rom. i. 2) — a word which the Apostle had already found in the Christian * Wendt, Der Inhalt der Lehre Jesii, pp. 326-328, 1 890 ; Gess, Christ i Person und Werk, zweite Abtheilung, pp. 358, 359, I. Halfte,' 1887 ; see also Keim, Geschjchte Jesti, i. 37 and 39. ^ Weizsacker, Das apost. Zeitalter, p. 620. ^ Lipsius on Rom. xiv. 17, asserts that with Paul 'the kingdom of God' always refers to the future jNIessianic kingdom {Hand-Commentar zum N. T. ii. [2nd half] p. 176), but Wendt and Gess, ubi supra, both point out that as in the discourses of Jesus Himself, so also in the Epistles of Paul ' the kingdom ' is sometimes spoken of as future, sometimes as actually present. Comp. for the former Gal. v. 21 ; I Cor. vi. 9, xv. 50 ; i Thess. ii. 12 ; and for the latter con- ception Rom. XIV. 19; I Cor. iv. 20; Col. i. 13. See the significance of Paul's teaching with regard to the kingdom of God, and its connection with the discourses of Jesus, well drawn out by Fr. Roos, tihi supra, pp. 44, 45. •* Pfleiderer, Hibbert Lectures, p. 171 ; Holtzmann, Einleiiung in das N. T. p. 395 ; Y oWima-T , Jesus Nazarenus, p. 182. OUR LORDS LIFE AND TEACHING 311 Church, consecrated b}' llic use of Christ Himself, the best description of that message of freedom and salvation which the Lord and His followers after Him were to proclaim (Rom. i. 2, 15, 16, X. 15 ; Gal. i. 6, ii. 14; i Cor. i. 17 and ix. 14 ; 2 Cor. ii. 12, iv. 3).' If, advancing a step further, we do not find in the Pauline Epistles such frequent allusions to our Lord's Sermon on the Mount as we find, c.^if., in the lipistlc of St. Jaines, yet the Apostle repeatedly expresses himself, to Thessalonians^ Romans, and Corinthians alike, in the spirit, if not in the letter, of Christ's teaching, and with a constant reference to the laws of His kingdom. Thus he can tell the Corinthians that in doing wrong and defrauding their brethren they were excluding themselves from the kingdom of God (i. Cor. vi. 7). ' VVh}- do }-e not,' he asks, ' rather take wrong, and be defrauded ? ' an appeal in which we trace a reminiscence of the words of Jesus Himself (Matt. v. 39, 40).^ Again, later on in the same chapter, we see how the Apostle represents Christian freedom in a manner quite in harmony with our Lord's own decision as to things indifferent (comp. i Cor. vi. 12 with Matt, xvii.' 26, 27). A similar spirit pervades the passage Rom. xiv. 13-15, whilst the interv^ening verse (Rom. xiv. 14), where the Apostle exclaims ' I know, and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus, that nothing is unclean of itself vividly reminds us of Matt. xv. 11-20 (comp. also i Cor. x. 7 with Matt. XV. 11, and with what was probably our Lord's own custom: Matt. ix. 11, xi. 19. Comp. also i Cor. vi. 13 with Matt. XV. I7).'' ' Volkmar, Jesus Nazarenus, pp. 60, 62, 63. - ^Veizsacker, Das apost. Zeitaller, p. 683 ; Thenius, ubi supra, p. 45. Comp. the Apostle's own practice, i Cor. iv. 12, and the teaching of Christ, Matt. V. 44 ; Hausrath, ubi supra, p. 70 ; Xeander, Life of Christ, p. 253, E. T. Matheson compares verses 2 and 3 of lliis same chapter with our Lord's own saying, Matt. xix. 28. So, too, Ewald, Seiidschreiben des Apostels Paulus, p. 154. But more probably Dan. vii. 22 was in the Apostle's mind, although the reference to Matt, might be included. Schiirer, Geschichte des jiidischen Volkes int Zeit. J. C. \. 255, compares i Cor. vi. 2, with IVisdoin iii. 18. ' Paret, ubi supra, pp. 39, 40 ; Ilausralh, ubi supra, p. 70. So, too, Huraut, ubi supra, pp. 31, 32. Both Paret and Huraut attach importance to the Apostle's expression, Rom. 312 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES The standard of truthfulness which he recognises as binding upon the same Church of Corinth, and upon his own conduct, is that prescribed by Jesus (2 Cor. i. 17 ; Matt. V. 37),' and the practical advice which forms the concluding part of his Epistle to the Church at Rome often strikingly reminds us of the Sermon on the Mount.- Indeed, it is not too much to add that the Apostle's description of the kingdom of God (Rom. xiv. 17) reads like a brief summary of its description in the same Sermon on the Mount : the righteousness, peace, and joy, which form the contents of the kingdom in the Apostle's conception are found side by side in the Saviour's Beatitudes ; '' nor can we fail to notice how both St. Matthew and St. Luke contrast the anxious care for meat and drink with seeking in the first place for the kingdom of God and His righteousness. Nor must it be forgotten that Paul's fundamental idea of ' righteousness ' may be said to be rooted in the teaching of Jesus, inasmuch as it is opposed to the prevailing idea of a merely external xiv. 14, ' I am persuaded in the Lord Jesus ' {TreTret(r/j.a.t iv Kvpiw 'iTjrroD), as also do those writers who cannot conchide with them that the expression involves a retro- spective knowledge of the historical Christ, or a reference to some saying of the Saviour ; yet when we compare the whole passage with Matt. xv. 11-20, we can at least agree with the above-mentioned in regarding this close comparison as a proof that the Apostle had apprehended the general spirit and mind of Christ. ' Paret, uln sufra, p. 40 ; Plausrath, Jibi supra, p. 70 ; Huraut, ttbi supra, p. 31 ; Meyer's Comiiieniar on the Koriiitherl'n'efe, in loco, and also on James v. 12, p. 226, 5. Aufl. ; Steck, Der Galaterbrief, p. 171 ; Roos, ubi supra, p. 64 ; of. Plumptre, in loco (Ellicott's Conuiientary, ii. 366). - Sabatier, ubi supra, p. 62 ; Thenius, ubi supra, p. 45 ; Huraut, ubi supra, p. 31. Comp. , e.g., Rom. xii. 14, 17, 20, i Thess. v. 15, with Matt. v. 39, 44, and the whole section Rom. xiv. 16-21. Comp. also Rom. xiv. 4, and ii. i, with the condemnation of uncharitable judgments in Matt. vii. i, and Phil. iv. 6 with Matt. vi. 25, 34. See Ktihl, in 5th edition of Meyer's Coiniiientar on /. Bi-ief des Petrus, p. 187. Paret remarks that if we possessed a full collection of the sayings of Jesus on the one hand, and of all the Epistles of Paul on the other, we should probably find an extraordinary number of references in the latter to the former, but that, as it is, points of contact are not wanting, and he instances the close connection between the moral exhortations in the passages of the Epistle to the Romans just cited and the teaching of the Sermon on the Mount. Paret, ubi supra, p. 39. ^ Paret, ubi supra, p. 40, who parallels Rom. xiv. 17, ' Beschreibung des Reiches Gottes,' with Matt. v. 3 ff., ' Eingang der Bergpredigt.' Hausrath, ubi supra, p. 70. OUR lord's life and tkaciiixg 313 righteousness, to a self-righteousness such as that of the scribes and Pharisees (Matt. vi. Sj^"^'- -0> ^^ Luke xvi. 15, xviii. 9, 14).' As this kingdom is the kingdom of the FatJier — the Father whom Jesus came to reveal, speaking b}' the revela- tion of Fatherhood, not only to one chosen nation, but to the innermost life of each individual man- — so the word Abba, that word of the heart and mouth of Jesus (as Volkmar calls it), which carries with it the distinctive mark and token, the s}-mbolism of His whole revelation, passes into the Christian Church ; and not only in Rome and Galatia, but everywhere where men prayed without wrath and doubting, they do so in the spirit of sonship, in the spirit of a little child/* Thus, whilst both in the Gospels and in the Epistles, l the Ten Commandments remain the fundamental law of life ' and godliness, there is also in Gospels and Epistles alike ' Schmid, ubi supra, p. 457 ; Beyschlag in jNIeyer's Conimeii/ar : ' Der Brief des Jacobus,' p. 38, 5. Aufl. ; and Roos, Die Brief e des Apostels Pauhis und die Reden des Herrn Jesii, pp. 88, 89. Comp. also his remarks on the conception of the kingdom of God in i Cor. iv. 20, and Paul's strong reproof of the sins mentioned in ch. v. and vi. with Matt. v. 27 ft'., 38 ff. , and xii. 28, xviii. 15, p. 60. - Paret, ithi supra, p. 80. ^ Volkmar, Jesus Na%arenus, pp. 59, 60. Comp. Gal. iv. 4-7 ; Rom. viii. '^})-'^l ; Mark X. 15-16, xiv. 36; and see Weizsacker, Das apost. Zeitalter, pp. 577, 602, who remarks that the word Abba in Gal. iv. 6, Rom. viii. 15, pre- supposes an existing formula of prayer, and probably refers to the Lord's Prayer. See Roos, ubi supra, p. 100, and comp. also Klihl's remark on i Pet. i. 17, koX el irarepa eTriKaKelaOe : ' vielleicht mit Recht meint Huther nach Weiss (p. 1 72), dass Petrus hier auf das Vaterunseranspielt ' (Meyer's Coiitineutar, in loco, 5. Aufl. p. 108). With the remarks of Weizsacker we may compare those of Wendt {^Der Inhaltder Lelire Jesu, p. 159) : ' In dem Gebelsrufe, welchen Paulus als die Aeusserung des den Christen zu Theil gewordenen " Geistes der Kindschaft " hinstellt, " Ablja, Vater ! " (Gal. iv. 6; Rom. viii. 15), horen wir noch den lautlichen Nachhall der Anrede, mit welcher Jesus selbst sich in seinen Gebeten an Gott gewandt und welche er ebenso seine Junger in ihren Gebeten zu gebrauchen gelehrt hatte.' Comp, further on the word Abba and its significance in Rom. and Gal. Plumptre in Ellicott's Coiumeutary, i. 228 ; and Bishop of Derry's Leadius^ Ideas of the Gospels, pp. 20, 21. Roos, ubi supra, p. 199, is inclined to find a further reference to the Lord's Prayer in 2 Tim. iv. 18, but see Prebendary Gibson's article on ' Sources of St. Paul's Teaching' {Expositor, vol. iv. 129, 130, 2nd series), where he refers this and the preceding verse to Psalm xxii. 21, 22, as their probable source. 314 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES something far higher than the negative duty of refraining from injury to our neighbour ' — there is, in both ahke, the fulfilling of the law of love, the bearing of one another's burdens, which is the law of Christ - — there is, in both alike,, the recognition of the Saviour's Presence in the least of His brethren, against whom if any man sinned, he sinned against Christ.^ Nothing in that kingdom of the Father was to be accomplished by external violence, but by rendering to all their dues, by perseverance, patience, endurance : faith in God, a faith rooted in His righteousness, would alone give the victory, a victory which every Christian must prepare to gain b)' suffering.^''' ' Volkmar, tibi supra, pp. 64, 65. Conip. I Cor. vi. 9, Rom. ii. 21, 22, xxii. 9, with Mark x. 19, vii. 21, 22 (and with Matt, xxii, 39, 40 ; Paret, tibi stipra, p. 40; Huraut, ?//^/ supra, p. 31): 'Die heiligen zehn Gebote Gottes bleiben das Grundgesetz fiir das Gottesvolk in Ewigkeit (Mc. x. 19, vii. 21, 22 ; 2 Cor. vi. 9 ; Rom. ii. 21, 22, xiii. 9 ; Off. Joh. xii. 17, xxii. 15) : aber das blosse Vermeiden des Unrechts gegen den Nachsten gentigt nicht. Die Erfiilhing muss geschehen durch die voile Liebe des Nachsten als des Bruders ' (Volkmar, p. 65) " Comp. Gal. v. 14, Rom. xiii. 8, xii. 17-21, I Cor. xiii. 4-6, with Mark x. 17, xi. 25, 26, xii. 31. Volkmar, pp. 64, 65 ; Weizsacker, Das apost. Zeitalter, pp. 618, 619, and esp. 668 ; Gal. vi. 2 ; Weiss, Bibl. Theol. des N. T. p. 348^ and Einleitung in das N. T. p. 24. •' Comp. I Cor. viii. 12, with Matt. xxv. 40, Paret, ubistipra, pp. 40, 80; Keim, Geschichte Jesii, iii. 217, 218. So, too, Matheson, 'Historical Christ of St. Paul,*^ in the Expositor, i. (2nd series), p. 371 ; ^oy; , Jesus of the Evangelists, p. 261. ■' Paret, tdri supra, p. 33. Comp. Rom. xiii. I-7 with Matt. xxii. 21. See also Volkmar, ttbi supra, p. 66, who compares 2 Cor. vi. 4, xii. 12, with Mark xiii. 13 (uTTo/xouTj ; so also 2 Thess. iii. 5) ; 2 Cor. v. 7 with Mark ix. 23, xi. 22 ;. H. Evvald, Sendschreiben des Apostels Paulus, p. 417. That Christians as such were appointed to suffering is plainly declared I Thess. ii. 3 (cf. Acts xiv. 22), and this conception of the Christian lot belonged to the fundamental characteristics which the Lord Himself had ascribed to it in a host of sayings (Paret, ubi supra, p. 39). PrebendaryGibson, in his articles on 'Sources of St. Paul's Teaching' (Expositor, vol. iv. p. 38, 2nd series), points out that i Tim. vi. 1-3, seems to imply that Paul's teaching on slavery was founded on the express words of the Lord Jesus, and he believes that this passage refers either to some traditional saying, or to such incidents as Luke xii. 14, xx. 25, where Christ directly refused to interfere with existing social arrangements^ the verj' position of Christianity with regard to. slavery. ^ It is very important to notice that Pfleiderer, no less than Volkmar, sees various special points of connection between Mark and Paul. We have long been accustomed to hear of instances of connection between Luke and Paul, but the line of argument adopted by Pfleiderer and Volkmar goes far to corroborate the New Testament records of the companionship, not only of Luke and Paul,, OUR lord's life and teaching 315 Certain !)• the fact that St. I'aul docs not more frequently make direct appeals to tlie words and teaching of Jesus has often occasioned surprise, and provoked discussion. But whilst more than one reasonable explanation may be given of this circumstance/ it is well to adduce first of all the positive evidence of the Apostle's knowledge of our Lord's sayings and commands. At the outset, 'the words of the Lord Jesus,' to which St. Paul so touchingl}^ referred as he bade farewell to the elders of Ephesus, and upon which he claimed to have modelled his own life, will naturally recur to our thoughts.- But just as the Apostle introduces this saying for a special purpose, to meet the requirements of the occasion, and to enforce a practical duty, so also it must not be forgotten that the same reasons were at work in his introduction of the account of the Lord's Supper, and in his obvious references to our Lord's eschatological discourses. If, as Paret reminds us, we only possessed the infor- mation that 'the Lord's Supper' was celebrated in the Pauline Churches as in others, this fact in itself would justif}' the conclusion that the retrospective element of the Pauline Christianity cannot have been so very much over- l)ut of Mark and Paul. Thus Pfleiderer writes that ' there is no reason for doubting that Mark was found in the immediate society of Paul during his imprisonment in Rome. There is in fact very much to be said in favour of ascribing our second Gospel to this disciple of Paul ; for it exhibits plainly various traces of Pauline influences and reminiscences' {Hibbert Lectures, 1885, pp. 171 and ff. ). See also the remarks of Prof. Estlin Carpenter on the traces of relation- ship between Mark and Paul, First Three Gospels, pp. 292, 294, 2nd edit. ; and comp. also Holtzmann, Einleitmig in das N. T. pp. 395, 396. The passages in the Epistles referred to by Pfleiderer in maintaining the social intercourse between Mark and Paul are : Philemon 24 ; Col. iv. 10, 11 ; 2 Tim. iv. 11. ' See below, chap. ix. - Acts XX. 35 : 'In all things / giwc yon an exatnple, how that so labouring ye ought to help the weak, and to remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he /limsci/ said " It is more blessed to give than to receive " ' (R. V.) ; Paret, ubi supra, p. 48, and Sabatier, ubi supra, p. 62 ; H. Ewald, Die drei ersten Evangelien, i. 160. See also the remarks of Wendt in favour of the authenticity of this saying, Die Lehre Jesu, pp. 345, 346. Amongst English writers Dean Plumplre. /// loco (Ellicott's Commentary, vol. ii. p. 143), Dr. Salmon, Intro- duction to the N. T. p. 95, 5th edit, should be consulted. Comp. also Stanley's Cori}tthians, p. 588. 3l6 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES grown, and pressed into the background, by the spiritual, •dogmatic, and apocalyptic aspects of it, but that a broad basis of historical evangelical preaching must be presup- posed to account for the more didactic explanations of the Apostle in his received Epistles. But the disorders in the Corinthian Church at the festival of the Lord's Supper gave occasion to the Apostle to introduce the history of its institution (i Cor. xi.) : and it is important to remark that he had already done this on an earlier occasion, and that he now repeats what he had formerly said. We have here a proof, not only that his gospel was for the most part an historical narrative and based upon historical events, but that what he -SO often terms ' my gospel ' cannot really be separated in its historical conditions from that of the other Apostles, since the narrative in i Cor. xi. is in essential harmony with the first two Gospels, and agrees almost verbally with the third.' But if we bear in mind the fact that this full account of the institution of the Lord's Supper finds a place in I Corinthians only because of the abuses which had become connected with it in the Corinthiai Church, we may see a reason for the Apostle's frequent references to the sacrament of Baptism without relating the history of its institution. Such an omission may reasonably be attributed to the high estimation which the rite enjoyed amongst the Corinthians, and to the circumstance that no disorders had crept into its celebration, as had been the case with the Lord's Supper, which had its analogy in Grecian Syssitia and Symposia, and was liable to be corrupted by them.- But if Baptism had not been originally an institution of the Lord Jesus, and if Paul had regarded it as of less primitive origin, then we may fairly suppose that he would have relegated it to ' the weak elements of the world ' (dadsvfj arocx^sla rov Koa-fjuov), he would never have introduced it into his own Churches, nor would he himself upon occasion have baptised: neither would he have discovered types of it, and in a certain sense even ' Paret, tcbi supra, pp. 15, 16; see further, chap. vi. 352. ^ Paret, ubi supra, p. 17. OUR LORDS LIFE AND TEACHING 317 baptism itself, in the Old Testament Scriptures, he would not so reverently have allegorised about it, nor attached to it such deep symbolical and mystical meanings — Rom. vi. 3, 4; i Cor. xii. 13; Gal. iii. 27; see also i Cor. i. 17, x. 3 (Ephes. iv. 5) — and baptism would not have been so highly regarded in his Churches. It maj' be that the relation of baptism to the death of Jesus is a peculiarly Pauline thought, but of this we cannot be sure, and the expression ' or are ye ignorant (rj dyvosiTs) that all we who were baptised into Christ Jesus were baptised into His death .^ ' (Rom. vi. 3) has been held to point in all probability to some generally received Apostolic teaching.' It must not of course be hastily assumed that these argu- ments of Paret amount to positive proof that Paul was acquainted with the historical institution of Baptism by Jesus, but we are at all events justified in asserting that the Pauline Epistles no less than the Gospels bear witness to the fact that a Church was founded by Christ in which the Lord's Supper was celebrated and to which entrance was ministered by Baptism. - Again, if we turn back to the Apostle's earliest Epistle, ' Paret, u/>t supra, p. 16. See also Thenius, p. 66; Hausrath, jtln sitpi-a^ p. 69, and Huraut, p. 22, who after adopting Paret's arguments, and pointing out that although the actual commands of Christ are not quoted, we cannot suppose that baptism would have been introduced into the Pauline Churches unless it had been instituted by Jesus ; that its importance is obvious from i Cor. xv. 29 ; that otherwise Paul would not have searched for types of it in the Old Testament, or written as he has in Rom. vi. 3, 4, and in i Cor. xii. 13, adds : ' Si institution du V:)apteme n'a point ete rappelee dans les epitres, c'est que saint Paul n'a point eu I'occasion, cette cercmonie ayant sans doute toujours ete entouree de respect.' See also Matheson, Historical Clirist of St. Paul, vol. ii. (2nd series) pp. 46, 47, on I Cor. XV. 29, and i Cor. i. 13 ; and the recent remarks of Nosgen in his Geschichte Jesu Cliristi, pp. 679, 680. So also C. Uhlhorn, ubi supra, p. 114. Keini, in his Geschichte Jesji, iii. 609, 610, although he throws doubts upon Matt, xxviii. 19, admits that Paul by his estimate of baptism, and by assigning to it the .same rank as to the other sign, the Lord's Supper, makes its institution by Jesus very plausible. Keim thinks it prol)able that Jesus gave the command- ment to His disciples to baptise amongst his final commissions on the last evening of His life, and he lays stress upon the fact that Paul reckons baptism amongst the ordinances and means of grace, placing it by the side of the Lord's Supper the undoubted institution of Jesus, as lending support to this view (i Cor. x. 2 ff xii. 13). (See Geschichte Jesu [1875], pp. 304, 305.) ^ In defence of the historical character of Malt, xxviii. 19, and a comparison of it with the formula of baptism given in the Acts, see Schmid, Bibl. Theol. dcs 3l8 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES to the Church at Thessalonica, it is evident that the dis- orderly conduct of some of the members of the Christian com- munity, the restless and morbid excitement, and the anxious questions which arose in prospect of the speedy return of Christ, enable us to understand more clearly the attitude of the Apostle, and his words of special warning and comfort' But if the Apostle could thus take his stand upon the historical acts and sayings of Jesus in relation to subjects of such vital importance as the atoning death and the future advent of the Lord ; and if he could thus bring them to bear without hesitation upon the immediate circumstances and the passing necessities of this Church or of that, it is surely not an unfair inference that it was in his power to have re- course to the same stores of knowledge had other similar occasions demanded. In support of this we proceed to examine two passages which find a place in the practical exhortations of the Apostle to the same Church at Corinth — passages which are not so familiar as those previously men- tioned, but in which a direct reference to the Gospel sayings of our Lord is admitted even by those who are inclined to minimise the acquaintance of St. Paul with the historical Christ.2 In I Cor. vii. the Apostle gives his injunctions concern- ing marriage : and, although we differ so widely from Volk- N. 7\ pp. 1 68, 169, 5. Aufl. ; Plumptre, m loco (Ellicott's Comiiiefilary, vol. i, p. 183), as against Harnack, tihi supra, i. p. 68, where he asserts, not only that it cannot be proved that Baptism was instituted by Jesus, but, in the most positive manner, that Matt, xxviii. 19 was never spoken by Him. The remarks also of Neander, Life of Christ, p. 483, note, may be consulted with advantage. See also Weiss, Bibl. Theol. des N. T. pp. loi, 102, and note, 5. Aufl., although he does not consider that the baptismal formula in Matt, xxviii. 19, belonged to the oldest tradition. It is important to remember that in the Didache, ch. vii., which treats of Baptism, the candidate is to be baptised in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. ' Sabatier, UApotre Paul, pp. 158, 159. Weiss, Einleitung in das N. T. p. 24, and see further, chap. viii. - Weiss, in Bibl. Theol. des N. T. , p. 200, admits that in these two passages, and in these two only (i Cor. vii. 10, ix. 14), Paul appeals expressly to a word of the Lord ; and see the important note of P. Ewald in Das Hauptprobletn der Evangelienfrage, p. 148. This note and P. Ewald's position and criticism of Dr. Resch, have been already discussed in chap. iii. OUR LORDS LIFE AND TEACHING 319 mar's general conclusions, it is a beautiful thought of his which connects the command of St. Paul (i Cor. vii. 10) with our Lord's saying (Mark x. 2-12). As the word Ablnx, Father, strikes the keynote of the new revelation, so in harmony with that ' first word ' which tells of God's Father- hood, 'the second word,' as Volkmar calls it, speaks to us of the sacredness of family life, and of the blessedness of the little children whom Jesus drew to His heart ' (Mark x. 13, 14). But nowhere is the distinction so plainly and decisively drawn between what the Apostle determines on his own autho- rity, and what has been already decided by a definite saying of the Lord — between his own opinion (jpco/j,-!]) and the command of Christ (sTTiTay/])- — as we here find in i Cor. vii. 10, 12, 25. In verses 10, 11, the Apostle appeals to the forbidding of divorce as Christ had spoken in Matt. v. 32, only that what there is forbidden to the man is here extended to the woman also. If we had only the wording of this judgment given us by Matthew and Luke we should certainly be obliged to suppose that as this wider application of it b\' Paul is so distinctly referred to a saying of Jesus, the Apostle based his deduction upon some fuller form of the tradition in which mention was also made of divorce on the part of the woman ; and in Mark x. 12, we find this fuller form actually given. But in the later verse (i Cor. vii. 25) the Apostle's remark that he had no command concerning virgins is of importance, because it shows us, as Paret forcibly reminds us, how thoroughly he was conscious of dependence upon the historical ' Volkmar, yesus JViazarem/s, pp. 64, 75. - This clear distinction made by Paul between a command of the Lord and his own opinion cannot be dismissed as a distinction which only existed in his own consciousness (Baur, Paulus, ii. 302). Amongst those who have emphasised the distinction here drawn between the Apostle's own opinion and the command of Christ, we may refer to Thenius, tibi supra^ p. 58; H. Ewald, Sciidschrciben des Apostels Pauliis, p. 160 ; Paret Patihis und Jesus, p. 37 ; Weizsacker, Das apost. Zcitalter, p. 613 ; Sabatier, UApolre Paul, pp. 61, 62 ; Weiss, Eitileitttng in das N. T. p. 24; Hausrath, Neutest. 7.eitgeschichte, iii. 70; \<\\.'C\ch^x\, Lehoi Jesu, p. 16; Wendt, Die Lehre Jesu, p. 343 ; Beyschlag, Lehen Jcsu, i. 67 ; Schmid, Biol. Tlieol. des N. T. p. 24 ; Iloltzmann, Haiid-Commentar zuni N. 7' p. 15 ; cf. P. Ewald, ubi supra' Matheson's ' Historical Christ,' &c. , Expositor, i. (2nd series) pp. 367 f. 320 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES sayings of Jesus : where the Lord had left a matter undecided, where questions, e.g., of discipHne were involved, which could not have been determined by Jesus in His earthly life, since they had only become prominent in the course of time, there we find the Apostle placing certain instructions which he gives on his own authority upon a level with those of the Lord ( i Cor. xiv. 37); but where the Lord had already spoken, there the Apostle, as i Cor. vii. shows, lays his hand upon his mouth, and only repeats, as an ambassador, the words of his Master,' At first sight, indeed, the command which Paul proceeds to give in the subsequent verses (i Cor. vii. 12-17) is so entirely in accordance with the mind of the historical Christ, the mind of love and peace, it is based upon such reasonable grounds^ and is so reasonably applied by Paul, that Paret fails to understand why it also has not been introduced as ' a com- mandment of the Lord ' {sirira'yr^ r. Kvp.). One w^ould have expected that it should have been so introduced, and the only conceivable explanation why this is not the case results from the view that E-KiTa'yr) signifies the historical words of Jesus which the Apostle had learnt by tradition, and that the historical Christ had said nothing concerning the questions discussed in i Cor. vii. 12 and 25. But (as Paret argues) nothing had become known to Paul, because as a matter of fact Jesus in His lifetime had said nothing, about such matters ; nor, indeed, had He any occasion to do so, for mixed marriages at any rate were a phenomenon which arose at a later period, and one specially connected with the Pauline Churches.- In a later chapter of the same Epistle (i Cor. ix. 14) we meet with a passage from a consideration of which the infer- ence seems almost irresistible that we have another citation from the words of the historical Christ. Not only do Weiss and Keim admit the reference, but Hausrath, after speaking of the many indirect references compared with the direct, to the words of the Lord, remarks in a note, ' A real quotation is in I Cor. ix. 14,' and he adds i Thess. ii. 6, 'which are founded upon Luke x. 7.' So, too, Schlirer is of opinion that ' Paret, tibi supra, pp. 37, 38, 56 ; Thenius, ubi supra, p. 58. 2 Paret, p. 51. OUR lord's life and teaching 321 in I Cor. ix. 14, St. Paul is exprcssi)' referring to Matt. x. 10 and Luke .x. 7.' Upon this passage, which he regards as the clearest reference by Paul to a word once uttered by the Lord, Paret has a long dissertation, which is briefly summarised by Sabatier (' L'Apotre Paul,' p. 62). The Apostle wishes to establish the right of those who preach the gospel to live of the gos- pel ; he iirst lays down a ' rational ' argument, drawn from the nature of things ; then, an illustrative argument, drawn from a word of the law, ' Thou shalt not muzzle the ox which treadeth out the corn ' : ' finally, he completes his proof by citing a positive command of the Lord, ' The Lord com- manded,' 6 Kvpios Stsra^Ev (Matt. x. lo ; Luke x. 7) : where clearly the word of Jesus forms the last stage in the argu- ment, as being the decisive and supreme authority (comp. Paret, ' Paulus und Jesus,' pp. j6, 44, 45 ; i Cor. ix. verses 4-6, 7, 11-12, 13; 9, 10; 14). If we look closely at the wording of this remarkable pas- sage, it would seem as if the saying of Christ was present to Paul's mind even to the letter ; not only does the word 'gospel,' suayyeXiov, cany us back to the rich treasury of speech which we owe to Jesus, but the expression ' ordained,' Scsra^s, is also to be noted : twice previously the Apostle had only spoken of his right, his power, i^ouala (verses 4, 12), but now (verse 14) he uses a word {Sisra^s, comp. sTrirayij, I Cor. vii. 25), which is exactly in harmony with the form in which both Matthew and Luke have preserved this injunction of Christ to his first disciples and to the Sevent)- (Matt. x. 10, Luke x. 7).'^ ' Weiss, Bi/>/. Theol. des N. T. p. 348, and Einleitttug in das N. T. p. 27 ; Keim, Geschichte Jesu, i. 37, 39 ; Ilausralh, Neiitcst. Zeitgeschichte, iii. 70 ; Schiirer, Geschichle des jiidischen Volkes iiii Zeitaller Jcsu Cliristi, ii. 259 ; see also H. Ewald, Sendschrcibeti des Aposiels Paulus, p. 172 ; Wittichen, Leben Jesu, p- 16 ; Weizsacker, Das apost. Zeitalier, p. 386 ; Wendt, Die Lehre Jesu, p. 343, and Der Inhalt der Lehre Jesu, p. 635 ; Nosgen, Geschichte Jesu Christ, p. 22. See also P. Ewald in his criticism of Resch, Das Hauptpi-oblem der Evangelienfrage, p. 148, note, also p. 146, where he lays special stress upon this point of contact in i Cor. ix. 14, with the Synoptical tradition. For Resch's discussion of the passage, see Agrapha, pp. 171, 185 (see above, chap. iii.). - Paret, ubi supra, pp. 36, 37 ; comp. Volkmar, ubi supra, pp. 62, 63, for the word (vayyfKiov. The tense which Paul uses, 5i«'Ta|€, also seems to point back to a definite Y 322 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES The parallel, too, which Paul draws in the preceding verse (i Cor. ix. 13) between the service of the Apostles and the service of the Temple (comp. Rom. xv. 16) brings back to our minds the comparison used by our Lord Himself (Matt. xii. 3-6) between the ministry of the Apostles and that of the priests in the Temple.' Nor must it be forgotten that an expression in the next chapter of the Epistle, i Cor. x. 27, may to some extent strengthen the conviction that St. Paul must have been closely acquainted with the whole discourse addressed to the Seventy (comp. i Cor. x. 27 with Luke x. 8) : ^ and if, indeed, as we have seen reason to believe, the Apostle knew the particular direction given by the Lord to His disciples, as we find it in Matt. x. 10, it is surely not an unfair inference to suppose that he was not ignorant of the other directions en- joined upon them on the same occasion.'^ occasion when the ordinance was prescribed, as we find to have been actually the case from the narratives of the Evangelists. Huraut's remarks on p. 39, ubistipra, embody Paret's arguments quoted in the text. ' ' Endlich, ix. 13, stellt er den Dienst der Apostel in Parallele mit dem Tempeldienst (vgl. Rom. xv. 16), was ein auffallende, von keinem Ausleger bemerkte Aehnlichkeit mit Matth. xiii. 3-6 darbietet, wo Jesus selbst den Dienst der Apostel mit dem der Priester im Tempel vergleicht ' (Paret, p. 37). Comp. Huraut, p. 32 : ' Saint Paul (i Cor. ix. 13) met le ministere des Apotres en parallele avec celui du temple ; voyez aussi Rom. xv. 16, ce qui offre une ressemblance assez grande avec Matt. xii. 3-6, ou Jesus rapproche le ministere des apotres de celui des pretres.' ''■ Paret, tiln supra, p. 40 ; Hausrath, uhi supra, p. 70 ; comp. Leading Ideas of the Gospels, p. 23. This passage, i Cor. x. 27, is one upon which Steck chiefly relies in support of his position that the writer of the Epistle was dependent on Luke [Der Galalerbiief, pp. 203-208). But, as Gloel observes, the expression ' Eat what is set before you ' is not so peculiar as to prevent two authors using it independently, especially when we remember that the words in the Epistle and the Gospel are not verbally the same, and that they occur in two different con- nections. Dr. Salmon, in commenting on the connection between i Cor. x. 27 and Luke x. 8, remarks : ' If the coincidence is more than accidental, I should ascribe it to the adoption as his own, by St. Paul, of well-known words of our Lord' {Introd. p. 329). But, as Dr. Salmon points out, this passage is no proof that Luke, when he wrote, had seen the Epistles to the Corinthians, as Holtz- mann argues, Einkitiuig in das N. T. p. 401, 2. Aufl. 1886. For a further consideration of the connection between St. Luke and St. Paul, see below, p. 325 ff- ' Paret, uhi supra, p. 36. On Paret's view that i Cor. ix. 10 also contains a word of Jesus, see ubi supra, p. 45, and Resch, Agrapha, p. 171. ' Kannte Paulus diese einzelne den Aposteln fur ihre kiinftige Amtsfuhrung OUR LORD'S LIFE AND TKACIIING 323 lUit fuithcr : such a passage as i Cor. ix, 14, ma}' show us how St. Paul, in dcscribiiiij;- his labour in the Gospel, repro- duced the \-er}' imagery which his Lord had used : to plant a vineyard, to feed a flock, to sow, to reap, to plough, all these figures of speech which St. Paul employs in describing the work of the ministry (i Cor. ix. 1-4) are familiar to us in the words and sayings of the Jesus of the Evangelists (comp., (•.£■., I Cor. ix./, 10, and Luke xvii. 7 ; i Cor. ix. 10, and Luke ix. 62),' and as we review these frequent instances of similarity between St. Paul's language and the Gospels, we may well be reminded of the remarks of Holtzmann, that the Church had in the carefully preserved ' sayings of the Lord ' a kind of fundamental law (comp. Paul's expres- sion ' this I say unto you as a word of the Lord,' i Thess. iv. 15, I Cor. vii. 10, 12, 25, ix. 14, xi. 24, 25), and in the sayings of Jesus, with their effective expressiveness and their homely clearness — words, which once heard would linger in the memory for ever : ' Blessed are the pure in heart ' : ' Ye are the salt of the earth ' ; ' Let your conversation be Yea, >'ea ' — words which in the Sermon on the Mount are strung together like pearls.'- To such sayings we may add those parables of transparent crystal clearness, as Holtzmann calls von Jesu gegebene Anweisung, so waren ihm die ubrigen, wie wir sie etwa Malth. X. 10 lesen, gewiss auch nicht unbekannt ' (Paret, i{/>i supra, p. 36). ' Si saint Paul a connu cette indication si particuliere donnee, Matt. x. 10, par Jesus aux Apotres pour leur vocation future, est-il probable qu'il ait ignore les autres recommandations qui leur sont encore faites dans le menie chapitre ? Tout le contenu ne doit-il pas hii en avoir ete parfaitement connu ? ' (Iluraut, ///'/ supra, P- .^S.) ' 'On remarquera, en outre, dans tout ce passage (i Cor. ix. I-14), les images sous lesquelles Paul designe le labeur evangelique ; ce sont les memes dont Jesus aimait a se servir : (pxniv^iv a.jj.treKiiii'a, Trui/j.a.ivfiv iroifj.vrjv, a-rreipftv, Ofpi^eiv, aporptav' (Sabatier, nhi supra, p. 62). After comparing i Cor. ix. 13 with Matt. xii. 3-6, Paret adds: ' Diese eigenthiimliche Auffassung des apostolischen Berufes, sowie ohne Zweifel das vorangehende aporpiav (i Cor. ix. 10 ; vgl. mit Luk. ix. 62, xvii. 7), scheinen auf urspriingliche Gedanken und Worte Jesu selbst zuriickzudeuten ; ebenso erinnert das Bild von iroifjiaiveiv, i Cor. ix. 7, an Luk. xvii. 7 ' (p. 37), To the same effect also Iluraut, ul>i supra, p. 32 ; Hausrath, uht supra, p. 70; Roos, ul>i supra, pp. 59, 60 ; and for similar instances Wittichen also, Lebenjesu, p. 50. ^ Holtzmann, Hand-Commentar zujh N. T. i. 15, 18S9. Y 2 324 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES them, so abundantly found in our Gospels, inexhaustible sources of the purest consciousness of God and of the world ; parables of such an inimitable simplicity, of such an artless sublimity of conception, of such an inspiring colouring, as to assure them to all eternity a place at the head of all written remains which point out to an inquiring humanity the way to its divine goal.' But is it not possible (while reserving the consideration of the obvious references in the Epistles to the words of the Lord in His last discourses) to add to the list of those say- ings of Jesus ' which once heard would linger in the memory for ever ' ? It may be readily admitted that such references are not so direct in the Epistles of St. Paul as in the Epistle of St. James or in the Apocalypse, but if they are considered on the whole,^ they may help to strengthen the belief that the Apostle was more widely acquainted with our Lord's teaching than might appear at first sight to have been the case. Take, e.g., the two familiar images which immediately succeed each other in the Sermon on the Mount (and to one of which Holtzmann refers in the above passage), ' Ye are the salt of the earth ' ; * Ye are the light of the world' : Ewald reminds us ^ how they are both reproduced by St. Paul, one in the Epistle to the Philippians (ii. 15), the other in the Epistle to the Colossians (iv. 6). It is also worthy of remark that in the same exhorta- tion to the Philippians the Apostle bids them to be 'harmless' (aKspaioi), and in so doing he reproduces, as Neander ob- serves,^ the very word used by our Lord in His charge to the disciples (Matt. x. 16) — a word only found in one other passage in the Nev/ Testament, which also plainly reminds us of our Lord's command, and which we again owe to St. Paul (Rom, xvi. 19). Certainly such a characteristic as that which is attributed to faith in i Cor. xiii. 2, ' and if I have all faith so ' Holtzmann, iibi supra, i. 15. ^ Reuss, •///'/ supra, p. 227, admits, and quotes, similar reminiscences in i Peter. Comp. also Weiss, Einleilutig, p. 433. " Ewald, Sendschreiben des Aposteh Patilns, pp. 446, 492 ; comp. also Thenius, ubi supra, p. 45. * Neander, Life of Christ, E. T. p. 299. OUR LORDS LIFK AND TI'.ACIIING 325 as to remove i)iou}itai)is^ may be accounted ior by saying that St. Paul is merely reproducing an ordinary Jewish proverb. Paret in discussing the connection of this expression with our Lord's sayings, admits this (' Paulus und Jesus,' p. 40), but, on the other hand, it may be noted that Ewald, Hausrath, Thenius, Sabatier, Huraut, all connect this verse with our Lord's own familiar illustration of the power of faith (Matt xvii. 20; xxi. 21).' Hausrath also points out how the imagery of the blind leading the blind in Matt. xv. 14 (which again may be derived from some familiar proverb) is exactly reproduced in Rom. ii. 19,'- and the imagery in 2 Cor. xi. 2 appears to him to be connected, not only with Matt. ix. 15, but also with our Lord's parable in Matt. xxv\ 1-12.^ We are also frequently reminded of a special connection between the Pauline Epistles and the Gospel of St. Luke — a connection which we might fairly expect, and which is naturally accounted for, if Paul and Luke, as there is every reason to believe, were companions and fellow-labourers. If indeed we looked no further than the two accounts of the institution of the Eucharist given us in i Cor. and Luke xxii., we must remember that whatever difficulties they may pre- sent in detail, and although the agreement between them does not extend to every word, yet many writers have risen from their examination with the conviction that these two accounts are alone sufficient to establish the connection between Paul and the third Evangelist.' ' Ewald, Sendschreibcn, p. 198; Thenius, uhi supra, p. 45; Sabatier, VApotre Paid, p. 62 ; Huraut, uhi supra, p. 31. ■■* Hausrath, uln supra, lii. So too Paret, p. 40 ; Huraut, p. 31. ' Hausrath, th'd. ; but comp. Plumptre, in loco (Ellicott's Commentary on the N. T. ii. 401). * See below, chap. vi. p. 352. On the different views which may be taken of the literar)' connection between St. Paul and St. Luke, comp. Salmon, Introd. p. 320 ; Godct, Conimeutaire sur rEvanqite de St. Luc, pp. 31-36 ; Holtzmann, Einleitung in das N. T. p. 399, 2. Aufl. 1886 ; Bleek's Einleitung in das N. T., edited by Mangold, 1S86, pp. 147, 163 ; Keim, Geschichte Jesti, i. 77-83. Dean Stanley, in his essay, referred to in chap, ii., remarks of the references in I and 2 Cor. to the Gospel History, that they almost all, so far as they refer to one Gospel narrative rather than another, agree with that of St. Luke 326 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES In the literature of this subject two of Holtzmann's learned works occupy a very prominent place. Holtzmann has drawn up a very lengthy and exhaustive list of parallels between the Lucan Gospel and the Pauline Epistles, from which he would derive an argument for the dependence of the former upon the latter.' On the other hand, it has been .... even words and phrases have a relation to Luke's Gospel so intimate as to require some explanation ; and there is no reason, he adds, why we should not adopt the account anciently received, that the author or compiler of that Gospel was the companion of St. Paul. For similarly striking instances of the relationship between Paul and Luke, see Plumptre, Conuiientary on the N. T. (Cassell) vol. i. Introd- pp. 29, 30. Amongst other instances Dean Plumptre notes Paul's use of the adverb airipiairaaTois, which is taken from St. Luke's account of Martha as ' cumbered ' [irepuffiraro) about much serving ( i Cor. vii. 35 ; Luke X. 40 ; comp. the stress laid by Dean Stanley, and by the Bishop of Derry, Leading Ideas of the Gospels, p. 21, upon this same parallel) ; comp. also Godet's remarks upon Paul's adoption of the remarkable word aQeril, ' rejecteth,' although the Apostle was not himself of the number of the Twelve, a word not found else- where in the first three Gospels (i Thess. iv. 8 ; Luke x. 16). Godet, UEpitre aux Remains, ii. 652 ; Paret, Panlus und Jesus, p. 40 ; Thenius, Das Evan gelium ohne die Evangelien, p. 45. We may also refer to Prebendary Gibson's articles on ' Sources of St. Paul's Teaching ' {^Expositor, vol. iv. 2nd series, pp. 38, 40, 42, 43, 44), where he finds special points of connection between Paul and Luke's Gospel: e.g. i Tim. vi. 13 and Luke xii. 14, xx. 25 ; i Thess. v. 1-8 and Luke xxi. 34-36 ; Rom. xii. 13 and Luke vi. 27 ; Rom. xiii. 7 and Luke xx. 35, xxiii. 2 ; I Tim. v. 18 and Luke x. 7 ; 2 Tim. ii. 24-26 and Luke v. 10. ' See Die synoptischen Evangelien, pp. 322-324, and Einleitung in das N. T. p. 401. The list of parallels given by Holtzmann in the former work is as follows: Luke iv. 22 — Col. iv. 6. Luke iv. 32— I Cor. ii. 4. Luke vi. 36 — 2 Cor. i. 3 ; Rom. xii. i. Luke vi. 37 — Rom. ii. I ; cf. xiv. 4. Luke vi. 39 — Rom. ii. 19. Luke vi. 48 — i Cor. iii. 10. Luke viii. 15 — Col. i. 10, 11. Luke ix. 56—2 Cor. x. 8. Luke x. 8— i Cor. x. 27. Luke x. 20 - Phil. iv. 3. Luke x. 21 — I Cor. i. 19. Luke xi. 22— Col. ii. 15. Luke xi. 36 — Ephes. v. 13. Luke xi. 41 -Tit. i. 15. Luke xi. 49—1 Thess. ii. 15. Luke xii. 2, 3 — I Cor. iv. 5. Luke xii. 35— Ephes. vi. 14. Luke xii. 42—1 Cor. iv. i, 2 ; the word oIkovcixos only occurring in Paul and Luke (cf. xvi. i) with the sole exception of I Pet. iv. 10. Luke xiii. 36 — l Cor. viii. 8. Luke xviii. 1 — 2 Thess. i. II. Col. iv. 12 ; cf. I Thess. v. 17 ; Rom. i. 10. Luke xx. 16 — Rom. ix. 14, xi. II ; Gal. iii. 21. Luke xx. 17, 18 — Rom. ix. 33. Luke xx. 38— Rom. xiv. 7, 8 ; • cf. 2 Cor. V. 15. Luke xxi. 19 — Rom. ii. 7 ; cf. 2 Cor. i. 6, vi. 4. Luke xxi. 24 — Rom. xi. 25. Luke xxi. 34 — i Thess. v. 3-8 ; cf. Rom. xiii. 11-14. Luke xxi. 36 — Ephes. vi. 18, 2 Cor. v. 10 ; cf. i Thess. ii. 19. Amongst English writers a long list of words and phrases common to St. Paul and St. Luke is given by Dr. Davidson in his hitrod. to ilie N. T. ii. 12-19, and a selection of them will be found in Dr. Farrar's Messages of the Books, p. 76. With regard to Holtzmann's theory of the dependence of Luke upon the Pauline Epistles, Dr. Salmon considers it probable that when the Evangelist wrote he had not seen the Epistles to the Corinthians. The strongest token, as he calls OUR LORDS LIFE AND TKACIIING 327 strongly urged that these parallels b}' no means pro\-c the use and knowledge of Pauline Epistles. Thus H. Weiss remarks, with special reference to Holtzmann, that all which has been said in favour of such use, even that which is to some extent probable (Luke x. 8, comp. with i Cor. x. 27 ; xii. 35 with Ephes. vi. 14 ; xviii. i with 2 Thess. i. 1 1 ; xxi. 34 with I Thess. V. 3), amounts simply to this, that Luke's mode of expression shows a certain relationship with the Pauline, which surely cannot be strange in the case of a companion of Paul ; even the agreement between Luke xxiv. 34 and I Cor. XV. 5, which Weiss admits to be striking, does not prove, in his opinion, that Paul himself supplied Luke wdth his historical material.' But Weiss readily admits the Pauline character of Luke's Gospel, and speaks of Luke's account of the Last Supper as blending the Pauline account with that of Mark.- If, however, the comparisons between Luke's Gospel and I Corinthians were so very obvious and numerous as Holtzmann maintains, it is strange that Steck does not make more of his argument for the dependence of i Corinthians upon St. Luke, especially when he had every interest to do so. Certainly Steck does not take account of i Thessa- lonians, which presents us with such a close and striking parallel between Paul's words and our Lord's great eschato- logical discourse (comp. i Thess. v. and Luke xxi.). But even if we do not adopt the view that a common document was used by Luke and Paul, is it very unreasonable to believe that such a discourse would be widely known by oral tradi- tion, especially when we remember that the j^rimitixc Church naturally had its gaze fixed upon the return of the Lord and the signs of His coming.^ And if, as Holtzmann himself it, that has been found of indebtedness on Luke's part to Pauline Epistles, viz, in the close resemblance between the words of Institution in i Cor. and Luke's Gospel, Dr. Salmon is inclined to explain by the liturgical use of the words : with reference to the similar phrase in i Cor. x. 27 and Luke x. 8, Dr. Salmon ascribes the coincidence, if it is more than accidental, to the adoption as his own, by St. Paul, of well-known words of our Lord {Inlrod. to the N. T. pp. 319, 320, 5th edit. 1891. ' Ebileitungin das N. T. p. 555, 2. Aufl. 1SS9. - ////(/. pp. 554, 555. 328 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES maintains, there is no necessity to suppose that Luke em- ployed I Corinthians in his account of the Last Supper, but simply depended upon ' the preaching of Paul ' (Krjpvjfia UavXov), in which the account of that Supper had received a fixed form,^ why should not a dependence upon the same source explain the Evangelist's acquaintance with the great discourse on the Mount of Olives ? No doubt what is called Luke's ' universalism ' which shows itself in such sayings as Luke xiii. 30, xiv. 22, xxiv. 47, in the parables of xv. and xviii. 1-14, in such incidents as those narrated in xix. i-io, xxiii. 43, confirms the Pauline doctrines of free grace and universal redemption," but here again what more likely than that Luke the companion and friend of Paul should have selected from the materials which lay before him those portions of the life and teaching of Jesus which would best recommend the two great Pauline prin- ciples ? •* But when we use the expression Luke's ' Paulinism ' let us remember that there is a sense in which it may be truly said that the Paulinism of the third Evangelist is neither more nor less than that of Jesus Himself: it has its roots, not in the teaching of Paul, but in that of Jesus. In the teaching and work of the Saviour both the so-called Judaic and Pauline elements found a place, and Paul in developing the two prin- ciples of a free and universal salvation only extended, says Godet, the sides of an angle already drawn by Jesus Himself^ In this third Gospel, e.g:, which is said to possess an anti-Judaic tendency, and to have been directed against the Twelve, we see not only Jesus represented as the son of David (xviii. 38, XX. 41), the theocratic king (xix. 38), but salvation des- ' Die synoptischen Evangelien, p. 396. - Weiss, Einleitung in das N. T. p. 551, 2. Aufl. 1889. ^ Godet, Coiiuneiitaire siir PEvangik de SL Luc, p. 32. On the manner in which Paul's teaching had its germ in the sayings and parables of Jesus, see the interesting remarks of Neander in his Life of Christ, E. T. pp. 89, 93, 95, 108, 217, 312, 386, and especially in connection with St. Luke's Gospel see pp. 199, 233- ■* Godet, ubi supra, pp. 35, 36. Comp. also Wendt, Der Inhalt der Lehrejesu, p. 401. OUR lord's life and teaching 329 tilled in the first place for Israel (xiii. 16, xix. 9), and the Twelve Apostles appointed for the twelve tribes of Israel (xxii. 30).' But there still remains one most important question for our consideration. Is it possible to establish any points of connection between the teaching of the Pauline Epistles and the Gospel of St. John ? A fresh interest and importance has been given to this question by the recent work of Paul Ewald.'- But it is fair to remember that 'the subject had not altogether escaped the attention of other critics. It is not only that in Paret "' and Sabatier we find a distinct recog- nition of the mystical element common to St. John and the first three Gospels, but P. Ewald's argument has been already to some extent anticipated by Dr. Matheson in his ' Historical Christ of St. Paul.'' All students who arc interested in ' Weiss, ubi supra, pp. 551, 552, note. Against the view that St. Luke's Gospel was written with a ' tendency ' to degrade the Twelve, see Weiss, ibid. P- 553> Godet, ubi supra, pp. 22, 32, 39, and the theory rejected by Hollzmann, Einleitung in das N. T. pp. 400, 401, 2. Aufl. 1886. - Das Hauptproblem der Evangel ienf rage, 1 890. ' Paret, Paulus und Jesus, p. 73 ; conip. Sabatier, U A pot re Paul, pp. 5r, and 259, 260. ■* Comp. e.g. ' The Historical Christ of St. Paul ' in Expositor, vol. i. (2nd series) pp. 193-199, and vol. ii. pp. 137-143. We may select from these striking pages Dr. Matheson's comments on Rom. vii. 4, with which he compares our Lord's own use of the figure of the bridegroom in the Synoptists (comp. also Paret's remarks, ubi supra, on the same figure and its connection with St. John's phraseolog}-) : ' It becomes more and more impossible that St. Paul could have uttered these words if the atmosphere called Johannine were not already around him, if the conception of the fourth Gospel had not been involved in the earliest vision of Christianity. Nor does it seem to us a likely supposition that he would have ventured on a metaphor so bold, if there had not been ringing in his ears an echo from the words of the Master which seemed to warrant it. If he knew as an historical fact that the Master had called Himself " the Bridegroom," or if he was familiar with such parabolic references as we meet with in the Syno])tic Gospels, we can well understand his language ; if he was the inventor of that language he must have transcended in a remarkable degree all traces of his Judaic birth and education. The whole passage sounds like Johannine thought expressed in .Synoptic symbolism. It singularly unites the elements of two generations. It breathes the atmosphere of profound mysticism, and as such it anticipates the spirit of the fourth Evangelist ; it employs the metaphor of familiar daily life, and as such it re-echoes the spirit of an earlier day. On the very lowest computation, it may with confidence be affirmed that, if there were an historical Christ who united in His own person the characteristics of the first three 330 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES New Testament criticism may well be thankful to Dr. Sanday for directing attention to Ewald's book, and more especially that portion of it which deals with the Johannean question.' The bold position taken up by Ewald in main- taining that there was not only a Synoptic but a Johannean tradition in the early Church is supported by arguments of singular force and interest.^ It might perhaps be argued with some plausibility that if the historical tradition peculiar to the fourth Gospel was of so much value and importance, it is strange that few distinct notices of it are found in the Epistles. But Ewald maintains that so far as the historical tradition is Gospels with the spirit of the fourth, the natural outcome of such a union would be the passage before us' (vol. i. tibi supra, pp. 198, 199). A valuable exposition of the points of connection in the teaching of St. John and St. Paul will be found in Scientific Bases of Faith, by Mr. J. J. Murphy, and a summary of them is given by Dr. Salmon, Inti'od. p. 202. See also the following pages in Mr. Murphy's work, 391-395, 418, and Row, Jesus of the Evangelists, pp. 252, 257, 261, 264, 265, 273, 275, 4th edit. Comp. Lechler, Das apost. Zeitalter, pp. 516-524, 3. Aufl. 1885 ; and see P. Ewald, Das Haupt- problem, p. 89, as against Holtzmann, Einleitiing in das iV. T. pp. 452 ft". 2. Aufl. ' Expositor, March 1891, pp. 182 ff. * See, e.g., P. Ewald, Das Hauptproblein, pp. 11, 12, 13, iS, 22, 23, 24, 35, 36, and 150, 151, and many other passages. In a note on p. 58 Ewald refers to the Ijook of Fr. Roos, entitled Der Apostel Patilus und die Reden des Berrn Jesii, 1 887, which, as he admits, is the only place in which he has found a real treatment of the points of connection between the Johannine tradition and the New Testament Epistles, inasmuch as other treatises have been so confined to the consideration of the Synoptic material only. Ewald, however, at the same time reminds us that Roos is writing with a different object from himself, and he speaks of the sifting necessary in Roos' uncritical accumulation of material. But it is to be remembered that in Ewald's own pages we frequently find stress laid upon the same passages as in the treatise of Roos : comp. e.g. Roos, pp. 40, 41 — Ewald, p. 85 ; Roos, p. 46 — Ewald, p. 91 ; Roos, p. 64 — Ewald, p. 88 ; Roos, pp. 97, 98 — Ewald, p. 81 ; and although, no doubt, some points of connection between Paul and John which Roos emphasise may appear fanciful, his pages are full of suggestiveness and interest, and of apologetic value in their summaries of the arguments for the authenticity of the various New Testament Epistles ; his work is recently referred to by Nosgen in his Geschichte Jesu Christi, p. 22. In addition to the few instances given above, the following pages of Roos' work may be consulted in their bearing upon Pauline and Johannine phraseology: pp. 45, 58, 59, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93, 98, loi, 102, 138, 151, 152, 153, 154, 155, 222, 240, &c. See also Thenius, Das Evangeliuin ohne die Evangelien, p. 45. OUR lord's life and teaching 331 concerned the Pauline Epistles introduce a certain number of facts common to both types of tradition — the S)'noptic and the Johannean — and the real result is, not that Paul shows as good as nothing of the Johannean tradition and very much of the Synoptical, but that he recognises material which ma}' be described as material equally common to all four Gospels.' To illustrate this statement Ewald refers to such facts as the betrayal (i Cor. xi. 23), the revilings (Rom. XV. 3), the wood of the cross (Gal. vi. 14), the nailing to the cross (Col. ii. 14), the burial (i Cor. xv. 4) with special features. In addition to these facts common to both traditions we have the institution of the Lord's Supper peculiar to the Synoptists, and possibl}- a few special incidents peculiar to St. John : even if it is asserted that Paul shows a special acquaintance with man}- facts which belong to the material contained in the S}Mioptists, y'et this would not exclude an acquaintance with, and the use of, the subject-matter of the fourth Gospel. And if we admit St. Paul's knowledge of many of the facts certified b}' the Synoptists, such facts, e.g., as those referred to by Paret or Keim or Wittichen, in- cluding the descent, the birth, and circumcision of Jesus, or the naming of the Twelve, or the high value set upon baptism, Ewald reminds us that some of these facts are just as much founded upon the Johannean tradition as upon the Synoptical, and are assumed to be generally understood (comp., e.g., John ii. 5, -q ixi]Trip avTov, John iv. 9 ff av 'lovSalos mv — j) a-(OTT)pia SK T(ov 'lovBaioiv). But whilst Ewald frankly concludes that the facts which may be derived from the Johannean tradition are very few in number,"- he maintains that what is wanting to his argu- ' Das Haiiptproblem, pp. 77, 78, and note. ' So far as the historical facts of the life of Jesus are concerned, Ewald points out that there are only three in all the rich literature of the Pauline Epistles which can be described as specifically Johannine, viz. i Tim. vi. 13 ; i Cor. v. 7 ; I Cor. xv. 7, and even with regard to these, the first two might be regarded as contained in the Synoptic tradition, while the third is ba.sed upon Reach's assumed identification of James and Thomas in John xx. 24 ff. (^Das Hauptprohlem^ P- 77). 332 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES ment in this respect may be supplemented if we can find in Paul's Epistles, as in- the case of the Epistles of James and Peter, a series of references to positive words and discourses of Jesus which the fourth Gospel presents to us — words and discourses which, in some cases at least, cannot possibly be separated from their accompanying incidents.' It must of course be remembered that Ewald's position is not that such coincidences prove the existence of a written fourth Gospel, but of a Johannean tradition ; and just as Dr. B. Weiss has shown that the 'Didache'^ is replete with Johannean ideas and expressions, so Ewald's argument goes to show that the same kind of Johannean thoughts and phraseology must have been at a very early date current in the Church. N^o criticisDi can expect to pi'ove more iJiau this : and to be able to prove as mucJi as this is to take an important step tozvards refuting the tJieory that the teaching of the Christ of the fourth Gospel is an after-grozvth of the second century. Ewald commences with the Epistles of St. James and I Peter, from each of which he is able to adduce many passages in support of his position.'' He is quite prepared to accept each of these Epistles as genuine, and to regard the former ' with an ever-increasing number of inquirers ' as the oldest document in the New Testament. /\t the same time he expressly says that he does not feel called upon to defend these two Epistles at any length, because with regard to the Epistle of St. James it is evident that in any case, even upon the supposition of its entire spuriousness, it must be regarded as older than the fourth Gospel and independent of it.^ So, too, with regard to i Peter, whilst he rejects the early date demanded by B. Weiss and Kiihl, he holds that nothing vital depends upon the acceptance or rejection of their position, since a knowledge of the fourth Gospel on the part of the writer of i Peter is in any case ex- cluded.'' ' Das Hanptp7-oblem, p. 78. " Weiss, Einkitung in das N. T. p. 32, 2. Aufl. 1S89. See vol. i. E. T. pp. 42, 43. 8 Pp. 58-67 and 68-75. ^ Das Hauptproblem, p. 58 and note. * Ibid. p. 68 and note. OUR lord's life and TKACIIING 333 In the same way Kwald considers himself entitled to appeal, not only to the recognised Hmipthricfe, but to the other Pauline Epistles, because, in the first place, he is of opinion that more satisfactory arguments should be forthcoming to justify their rejection, and in the next place, and chiefly, because even if we assume that they arc not genuine, the result of his discussions woulci not be subjected to any essen- tial modification. As in the case of the Epistles of James and I Peter, so here, too, there is no room for the supposition that a considerable portion of the Pauline literature was post-Johannine and composed under the influence of the Gospel of John : such a position has seldom been seriously maintained even with regard to the Pastoral Epistles. The only difference in the present argument would be that a fraction of the proof passages must be referred, not to Paul himself, but to some representative of the Pauline school, and the passages in question would still remain as independent witnesses of the historic character of the Johanninc account' As considerable ground has to be covered in tracing the references in the Pauline Epistles to Johannean sayings and discourses, Ewald thinks it best to start from the Gospel and to take the chapters in order.- Until we reach the third chapter, Ewald admits that it must remain undecided whether there can be found Pauline parallels which are more than parallels, and which prove any application by Paul of what is related in the fourth Gospel. We might, e.g., argue that the expression ' the Lamb of God ' in the mouth of the Baptist reminded us of i Cor. v. 7, and that in the Pauline universalism we have an echo of ' the taking away of the sin of the world,' but since it is not proved that the pa.ssage in the fourth Gospel is to be under- stood of the Paschal Lamb, we cannot maintain that i Cor. V. 7 contains any reference to the fourth Gospel. But we are able, Ewald thinks, to find in the Pauline Epistles a whole series of reminiscences of ch. iii. To do ju.stice to Ewald's argument, we must remember that he has already dwelt upon the close connection between the opening ' Das Hauplprohkm, p. 76 and note. * //'/(/. pp. 79-95. 334 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES verses of John iii. and James i. 17, 18, and that he claims to have estabHshed the acquaintance of James with Christ's conversation with Xicodemus. But in the Pauhne Epistles he further claims to have discovered reminiscences of the same conversation and of the same familiar phraseology. The first passage which naturally occurs to us is Titus iii. 4, and here, he thinks, we have not only the general conception of ' regeneration ' as a point of connection with John iii. i, &c.^ but when we consider the whole context, is it not as if we could read between the lines, and see Nicodemus enter into the presence of the new teacher sent from God who had appeared before his eyes, with the tacit inquiry ' What works of righteousness did the Lord expect from him } ' as if one heard how Jesus referred him to the birth from above, which truly could not be effected by any human means, but which must proceed from the Holy Ghost, and through which, so to say, flesh is renewed to spirit. All this will doubtless seem to many minds somewhat fanciful, and Ewald's next point will probably carry more weight when he reminds us how the expression in Titus iii. 5, ' the washing of regeneration ' contains both the factors men- tioned in John iii. 3. In Ephes. v. 26 we have 'the washing,' but not the birth ; in i Peter and James we have the birth, but not the washing : but the two are united in Titus iii. 5, a union only found elsewhere in John iii. 3, ' to be born of water' {lycwr^Orjvai s^ vSaros). In Titus iii. 5 the mention of the Spirit and its renewing power reminds us of John iii. 4, for in Ewald's opinion the word avwdsv (John iii. 3), though rightly translated ' from above,' implies a thorough renewal, a radical change of life, and, carrying on his points of con- nection, Ewald further notices that the result of the washing and renewing in Titus afford a close parallel with the result of the new birth in the Gospel (comp. Titus iii. 7 and John iii. 5 and 16). From these details Ewald prefers to draw an argument, not for the literarj' dependence of the author of this Epistle upon the fourth Gospel, but for the existence of a living Johannean tradition to which the author of the Epistle referred ; OUR lord's life and teaching 335 and this conclusion he supports by reminding us that there is good reason for beHeving that the tradition of the narrative contained in John iii. was ah-eady well known : comp. James i. 1 8 and l Peter i. 23. But the points of connection need b\- no means be con- fined to the first group of conceptions in chapter iii. In verse 6 we have two other conceptions by the side of that of the new birth, viz. ' the flesh' and 'the spirit.' It maybe said that these words are not here used in the full meaning of the Pauline terminology, but at any rate we find ourselves on the way to the Pauline statements, and it becomes at the outset probable that the words of Jesus concerning the birth of the flesh and of the spirit were known to Paul, and that they influenced his terminology. This probability, Ewald believes, becomes a ccrtaint}^ when wc compare Rom. viii. 7 and 8 with John iii. 5, 6. Here, again, it must be admitted that the points of connection are of a very general kind, and it is not so certain, as Ewald thinks, that the Pauline ex- pression ' they that are in the flesh cannot please God ' at once brings to the mind the word of Jesus that he that is born of the flesh ' cannot enter into the kingdom of God.' But further : in the same chapter (Rom. viii.), and in the same connection of thought, Paul speaks of the confident belief of the Christian : he appeals to the fact that God has not spared His own Son (JStos vios), but delivered him up (7raps8(OK£v) for us all (verse 32), and he sees here a proof of the love of God (verse 39 : dyaTrr] rod 6sov) : it follows that in the case of believers there is no one who accuses them, no one who condemns them. Here, again, Ewald maintains that we can hear Jesus saying in the same conversation with Xicodemus : ' God so loved {rjydTnjasp) the world that He gave His only-begotten Son (fiovoysvi]) ' — we can hear Him ex- plaining that he who believes on Him is not judged (ov KpivsTai) : so, too, we may compare Rom. viii. 3 with John iii. 17, and from these various points of connection we need no further proof that Paul when he wrote Rom. viii. lived in the thoughts of the conversation of Jesus with Nicodcmus. But, quite apart from this manifest dependence upon a 336 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES particular narrative, Ewald finds in the same chapter of the Romans still further proofs of Paul's acquaintance with the Johannean discourses of Christ. In verse i the expression 'those that are /;/ Christ Jesus' {slvat sv XpiarcZ 'lijaov) reminds us of John xv. 4 ff ; in verse 10 the expression 'Christ in you' (XptaTos iv ifilv) of John xvii. 23 &c. : again in verse 2 ' hath freed me ' {rjXevOspwasv /xs) re- minds us of John viii. 31, &c., and with Paul's whole view of the indwelling and working of the Spirit, the Spirit of Christ in man, verse 9 ff., verse 26 ff, we may compare, amongst many passages, John xiv. 26, xv. 26, xvi. 13, vii. 31. One more point of connection between Paul and this third chapter of the fourth Gospel Ewald thinks may possibly be found in the striking expression 'whom he hath set fortJi' ?>. exhibited openly (^ov TrposOsTo : Rom. iii. 25), which carries us back to the thought of the Son of Man who must be lifted up {v-^w6rjvai Bsi) John iii. 14, just as the serpent in the wilderness was lifted up before the whole camp : this con- nection Ewald supports by the fact that in each passage faith is spoken of as the means of appropriating the Saviour ; comp. Rom. iii. 25 with John iii. 16 (Sta Tricrrsfo^ — iva ttcis 6 ina- Tsvwv). But here again the connection seems somewhat forced, and it may be questioned whether the middle voice irposOsro conveys the meaning which Ewald attaches to it.' In John iv. Ewald believes that we may read another special reminiscence of Paul. In verse 21 of this chapter we have the one passage in which lie nearly all the elements of the Pauline Universalism. ' Salvation ' indeed ' is of the Jews' (verse 19 comp. with Rom. iii. i ff ix. 4 ff). But 'the hour Cometh when ye shall neither in Gerizim nor yet at Jerusalem worship the Father '(verse 21), with which we may compare St. Paul's language, * there is neither Jew nor Greek ' (Gal. iii 28; Col. iii. ii). ' And this hour now is' (verse 23) — so Paul can say that in CJirist Jesus thei-e is no longer Jew nor Greek, through him the partition wall is removed {ibid. and Ephes. ii. 14). Moreover, this hour is characterised by the dispensation of the Spirit : men ' worship in spirit and in ' Comp. Humphry, Commentary on the K. V. p. 269. OUR lord's life and teaching 337 truth' (John), comp. 2 Cor. iii. 6. Ewald grants that it might be possible to explain these points of agreement without supposing the litcrar)' dependence of Paul upon the Evange- list — for this, the expression is too independent — but by what might be called an accidental agreement of view on the part of two writers, whose theological tendencies were, in general, concordant. Ewald himself is evidently not pre- pared to accept the latter explanation, but he insists that in any case one must recognise that Paul's words absolutely presuppose an acquaintance with explanations of Jesus similar to those which he offers to the woman of Samaria in John iv. : how otherwise in the question as to the validity of his ' uni- versalism ' could Paul have been so confident, as he doubtless was, of his agreement with the will of Christ ? At the very least Paul's words furnish us with an indirect confirmation of the narrative in John iv. 19 ff. John V. contains, in Ewald's opinion, many sayings of Jesus which produce upon us a very distinct impression that we have in them the source from which the Pauline Chris- tology received its normal direction, but he does not offer any actual proof in support of this view. In John vi. Ewald dwells at length upon a remarkable parallel between verse 26 and a conception which meets us twice in the two Epistles which are probably the earliest of those which bear Paul's name, i Thess. i. 3, 2 Thess. i. 11, the work of fait Ji {sp'yov rrjs tticttsws). This Pauline concep- tion is a very striking one, because it is evidently regarded, not in the sense of an activity proceeding from belief, but in the sense of an activit}- consisting in belief itself From whence did Paul derive it ? Not, Ewald thinks, from his own consciousness : he employed it because he had received it, but later he discontinued its use when he saw that it was misunderstood. But if this is so, then Ewald maintains that the source of the conception could be no other than the answer contained in John vi. 29, an answer easily retainable bv ' -Jition : the Jews ask what they must do to work the f God, and Jesus replies, ' This is the work of God, that you . eve on him whom he hath sent ' (toOto icmv to spyop z 338 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES Tov Osov, tva TTLcrTSvrjTS els ov airicrrsiXsv sksIvos). Ewald considers that the reference here is quite clear, and that however insignificant, it is yet full of significance, since the expression is so decidedly foreign to Paul's general usage. Passing on to ch. viii., Ewald notices first of all the evident parallel between verse 34 and Rom. vi. 16. ' He that committeth sin is the servant of sin,' says Jesus (Tray 6 iroLMV TTjv d/juapTiav BovXos sariv rrjs ajMaprlas) : ' To whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey, whether of sin unto death/ says Paul. But further : Paul gives thanks that his readers have left behind them the season of slavery unto sin and have become obedient from the heart — not first to righteousness — but to that form of teaching to which they were delivered (verse 17). It is a striking coincidence to Ewald's mind, that here also we have a point of contact with that same conversation between Jesus and the believing Jews. There, too, the con- dition of becoming free is that one enters into a relation of obedience to a teaching, that one abides in the word of Jesus, and thus learns to know the truth. So, too, Paul's expression ' from the heart ' {sk Kaphlas) ' corresponds to the terms ' to abide ' {/xsusiv) and ' truly ' (a\rj6(os) in John ; so, too, we may note in addition Paul's expression ' and the end everlasting life' (to 8s tsXos 1^0)7] alwvios) (verses 23 and 24), to which the words in the fourth Gospel correspond, ' the Son abideth for ever ' (6 vlos fxsvst sh tov aloiva). Certainly in Paul the thought receives quite a peculiar turn, inasmuch as he speaks of ' a being enslaved to righteous- ness ' (SovKcodfjvai rfi htKaioavvrj), but Ewald does not main- tain that Paul must have followed the exact words of the Lord, and it is, he thinks, after all possible that the original form of the conversation narrated in the Gospel might have had a secondary reference, tending in the direction of the phraseology adopted by Paul. But the most important con- sideration of all lies in the fact that this passage in the ' Comp. also James I. 25 ; Das Hauptprobhm, p. 87. For points of connection between this chapter and St. John's Gospel, see also Ewald, Sendschreiben des Apostels Paiilus, pp. 388, 389, 393. OUR lord's life and teaching 339 Romans is not the only one which renders clear the acquain- tance of Paul with the conversation in John v. In Gal. v. we may instance verse i and verse 7. In verse i we read, * the freedom wherewith Christ hath made us free ' (tt; iXsvdspia y/Mcis ^piaros rfKsvOspwcrsv), with which we may compare John viii. 36 : 'If therefore the Son hath made you free, ye shall be free indeed ' {sav ovv 6 vlos v/xas rfksvdipwasv, ovTcosf sKsvdspoL sasads) : in verse 7 we read ' Who did hinder you that you should not obey the truth ? ' (Ti9 vfids ivsKoyjrsv aXrjdsla /xr} irelOscrdai;), with which we may compare John viii. 31 : ' If ye abide in my word ... ye shall know the truth' {sav jxelv-qTS sv rm \6ycp tw ifxco . . . 'yvcoasaOs Trjp a\i]6siav). In 2 Cor. iv. 3 we have another passage which Ewald thinks may be fairly claimed as indicating a knowledge on Paul's part of this same conversation in John viii. Paul is there speaking of the manner in which ' the god of this world hath blinded the minds of those that believe not ' {aTTiaToi). Here Ewald traces a connection with the words of John viii. 43-45, where Jesus tells the unbelieving Jews (ov irio-TEvers fiot) that they do not understand His speech, because they cannot hear His word : ' ye are of your father the devil ' (v/xsts sk tov irarpos tov Bia^oXov ears). So, too, Ewald would compare Paul's conception (in 2 Cor. iv. 4) of Christ as ' the image of God ' with the words which Jesus spoke of Himself in John viii. 19, 42, and Paul's reference in the same verse (2 Cor. iv. 4) to 'the god of this world' (6 6eos TOV alwvos rovrov) with the Johannine expression * the prince of this world ' (0 cip-^wv tov Koa/xou rovrov) ' (John xii. 31, xiv. 30, xvi. 11, comp. also Ephes. ii. 2): these passages in the fourth Gospel are more fitted to explain Paul's expression than the supposition that it is derived from the later Rabbinic notion of ' the other God ' and the like. Ewald concludes his parallel in ch. viii. by com- paring the words of Jesus in verse 51 : 'If any man keep my saying, he shall never see death ' {edv ris rov Xoyov rov ifxov r7]p7]a-p, ddvarov ov fxij Oecopyjar] sU rov alwva) with Paul's conception of Christ in 2 Tim. i. 10, 'who hath destroyed ' Comp. Westcott, Gospel of St. John, in loco. z 2 340 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES death, and brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel ' (Karapy^cravTos fisv rov OdvuTOV, cpcorlaavros Bs ^corjv Koi acpdapcrlav Sia rov svayysXlov). In his examination of John x. Ewald commences by drawing attention to the parallels which Holtzmann cites (' Introduction,' p. 452) and from which he endeavours to prove that the writer of the fourth Gospel was dependent upon Paul : thus he compares John x. 14, 15, 27 with Gal. iv. 9 ; i Cor. viii. 2, 3, xiii. 12.' These parallels, in Ewald's judgment, are worthy of consideration, but for an opposite reason to that maintained by Holtzmann : they are proofs of the dependence of Paul upon the words of the Lord contained in the Johannean tradition.- But Ewald proceeds to discuss a further significant word in this same chapter (x. 16), 'and other sheep I have which are not of this fold : them also I must bring . . . and there shall be one flock and one shepherd ' (/cat aXXa irpo^uTa e%&>, a ovK scrriv sk rrjs avXrjs Tavrrjs • KUKSiva Set /xs dyayslv . . . Kal ysvijcrsrat fiia iroifivr], sh TroifMrp). Here, also, Holtzmann has not failed to notice the parallel presented by Ephes. ii. 13-15, 'But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh ... he is our peace who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition ... to make in himself of twain one new man ' (vvvl Bs iv Xpio-Tw 'Irjaou vfjisis oi irors ovtss fiuKpdv iysvijdijrs syyi/s . . . ainos r] slpijvrf ' Holtzmann {EinleitU7ig in das N, T. pp. 452, 453) compares also John i. 12— Gal. iii. 26. John i. 17 — Rom. vi. 14. John iv. 36-38 — i Cor. iii. 6, viii. 14. John V. 25, 28 — I Cor. xv. 22. John vi. 51 — i Cor. x. 3, 4. John vi. 63 — 2 Cor. iii. 6. John vii. 19 — Rom. ii. 17-19. John viii. 34-44 — Rom. iv. 11 ; I Cor. viii. 2, 3, xiii. 12. John xii. 24 — i Cor. xv. 36, 37. John xiv. 9—2 Cor, iv. 4, 6. * Das Hanptproble7n^ p. 89 and note. In the note Ewald points out that as the verses 14, 15, 27, in John x., upon which Holtzmann depends, evidently refer back to the earlier verses 3, 4, we must therefore suppose that the whole chapter, and the whole allegory of the Shepherd and the sheep, is built upon the Pauline passages which Holtzmann quotes : this, as he continues, becomes additionally improbable when we remember that i Peter (pp. 70-72) affords a guarantee that the words of Jesus respecting the relationship between the Good Shepherd and his sheep are historical. Must we suppose, then, asks Ewald, that we have only the Evangelist's use of the word yii/wo-Keip to point us to Paul ? Even if we had not such passages as Numb. xvi. 25 (comp. 2 Tim. ii. 19), this would be an improbable assertion. OUR lord's life and teaching 341 r/ficov, 6 7rou](Tas to. a/xcfiOTspa ^v, koI to fMS(76Toi)(^ov tou sis sva Kaivov avOpwirov k.t.\.)} But here again, as Ewald argues, Holtz- mann's recognition of the parallel may be turned into an additional proof for the dependence of Paul upon the Johannean tradition. The decision as to the side on which the dependence lies is to be found, Ewald thinks, in the much-discussed expression koI to [xsaoToi-^ov tov cfjpayfiov Xvcras : here, and here only, the Apostle passes from the imagery of the commonwealth to that of the enclosed flock ' having broken down the hedge or fence (fisaoToi^op) ' which confined the flock. It must, however, be remembered that here Ewald is evidently following Luther's version, and it is doubtful how far the word /xsaroTocxov can bear the meaning attached to it and justify Ewald's reference of it to the imagery used in John x. A third parallel Ewald derives from x. 17, with which he compares Phil. ii. 5 fif. But it will probably appear to many minds that his exegesis is somewhat forced and fanciful. According to him, the word of Jesus, ' Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life that I may take it again,' is exactly the same thought which is presented to us by Paul in Phil. ii. 5. In John x. 16 the thought is that the Father loves Him because He did not retain His life with care and anxiety, but readily surrendered it that He might take it again : in Phil. ii. 5 the thought is that Christ Jesus did not think that His equality with God consisted in grasping it — z.e. He did not believe that He must retain it anxiously, but He emptied Himself, and became obedient unto death, wherefore also God hath exalted Him. This parallel Ewald supports by comparing the expression * obedient' (vttt] koos) in Phil. ii. 8 with the expression 'this commandment I have received ' (tuutiju ttjv svtoXtjv sXa^ov) in John x. 18, and the ' wherefore' (8to) of Phil. ii. 9 with the 'therefore' {Zlcl tovto, otl) of John x. 17; so, too, the exaltation in Phil. ii. 9 which follows upon the voluntary ' Comp. also Resch, Agrapha, p. 198. 342 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES surrender of Jesus corresponds to the love of the Father which is the result of His self-surrender in John x. ly. In Ewald's judgment all this similarity and sequence of thought proves that Paul was acquainted with the words of Jesus in John x. 17, 18. But it must be remembered that Ewald himself admits that Paul has transferred the words from the simple, almost enigmatical, form, in which he pro- bably received them, into the more speculative form of his Christological teaching. Of ch. xii. verses 35 ff. Ewald believes that we have reminiscences in i Thess. v. 5 and also in Ephes. v. 8. In both these passages we have the express contrast of ' light ' and ' darkness ' (^ws and aKoros) just as we also find it in John iii. 19, whilst in Luke xvi. 8 we see viol rov (fxoros placed in juxtaposition to viol rov alcovos rovrov. In considering these parallels Ewald points out in a lengthy note ' that Holtzmann also introduces them as strong evidence in support of his view of the dependence of the writer of the fourth Gospel upon the Pauline Epistles. He compares John xii. 35, iii. 20, 21 with Ephes. v. 8, 11, 13. As the parallels are very striking in expression, and besides, as the verses in Ephesians, which are there placed in the same context, occur in two separate places in the Gospel, it is evident, thinks Holtzmann, that the dependence lies on the side of the latter. But why, Ewald asks, should it be thought improbable that Paul, on his part, should combine a traditional word of the Lord which invites men to walk as children of light with another which speaks of evil as avoiding or deserving the reproof which the light brings with it ? Surely nothing would be more natural (comp. esp. John iii. 20 and Ephes. v. 13). With regard to the chapters which follow, Ewald points out that our Lord's last discourses, which these chapters contain, probably were not so well suited for connected tradition, because they contain no points upon which the memory could fasten : all the more valuable, therefore, is it if we can find in Paul (as in Peter) thoughts and expressions ' Das HauptprobUm, p. 91. OUR lord's life and teaching 343 akin to them. Thus, with John xv. 12 we may compare Ephes. V. 2 (also Gal. ii. 20). Passing to ch. xvi., verse 1 1 may be compared with i Cor. ii. 10. In this parallel, not only does Paul's assertion of the revealing activity of the divine Spirit form a point of contact with Jesus' promise of the instructing and guiding activity of the Paraclete, but the reason given by the Apostle corresponds exactly with the interpretation of the work of the Spirit given by Jesus (comp. I Cor. ii. 10 with John xvi. 13-15) : and just as Jesus tells His disciples that after they have received the Spirit they shall be guided by It into all truth (comp. verse 23), so Paul dares boldly to assert of ' the spiritual man ' that ' he judgeth all things' (i Cor. ii. 15). Ewald also finds two other parallels between this same chapter in the fourth Gospel and the opening chapters of i Corinthians. In ch. iii. i Paul writes : ' And I xcas not able to speak unto you as unto spiritual, &c. I have fed you with milk and not with meat : for not yet were ye able' (^Ku'yoi ovk rjhvvqOrjv Xa\i)aaL vfuv 00s 'jrvsv/xartKols k.t.X. r), see Paret, Paithis imd Jesus, p. 13 ; Sabatier, UApotre Paul, p. 58 ; Lipsius, Hand-Comnieniar zwn N. T. ii. zweite Abtheilung, p. 30, 1891. Row, Jesus of the Evatigelists, p. 270 ; Plumptre, Christ and Chn'steitdom, new edit. 1886, p. 38 and note. See, however, Westcott, Study of the Gospels, pp. 177, 181 ; and Lightfoot, Galatians, in loco, p, 134. Weiss, Bibl. Theol. des N. T. p. 290, denies that any inference can be drawn from Gal. iii. i as to Paul's acquaintance with the details of the Passion, but at the same time he admits the Apostle's knowledge of the leading facts (see notes below). - Paret, ibid. Comp. Ilarnack, DogmengescJiichte, i. 72 note. 3 so THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES maintained to have been composed under preponderating Pauline influences — viz. those of Matthew and Mark — present only a slight sketch, a mere outline, a pencil-like drawing of the life of Jesus ; but the nearer they approach the history of the Passion, the more do they narrate their story in detail. Whilst, as Paret observes, they pass over almost in silence the whole course of years which preceded the public ministry of Jesus, and whilst they often only group together in a cur- sory manner the events of His public teaching, we are bidden under their guidance — as the Galatians at the bidding of Paul — to accompany Jesus step by step during His few last days of suffering,' as if they also wished ' to know nothing else but Jesus and Him Crucified ' (i Cor. ii. 2). In this connection Paret reminds us that the particular details of the history of the Passion which, as occasion arises, find mention in the Epistles of Paul, are quite in accordance with the notices of the Gospels. Thus, the accusation and condemnation of Jesus proceed primarily, not from the mass of the common people, but from the rulers of this world (i Cor. ii. 8 and Matt. xxvi. 3 ; comp. i Thess. ii. 14) : ^ treachery also was at work by means of which He fell into the hands of His enemies, and this treachery was ' Paret, ibid. ; see also Holtzmann, 'Die Synoptiker,' in Hand-Commeyitar zum N. T. i. 17, 1889, and see above, p. 72, for Renan on the Passion. ■■^ Paret, uhi supra, p. 13; Huraut, nbi supra, p. 19; Hausrath, Jibi supra, p. 70; Thenius, nbi supra, p. 66; Sabatier, ubi supra, p. 58 (Paret compares the expression used by Josephus, Arch. xiii. 3, 3, eVSeilet tSsv ivpdrwv av^pwv Trap' rj/xiv) ; Keim, nbi supra, i. 41 ; Weiss, Bibi. Theol. p. 289, 5. Aufl. ; Beyschlag, Leben Jesu, i. 69 ; Wittichen, Lebenjesu, p. 15. On the historical character of the narrative of the betrayal, see Weiss, Leben Jesu, ii. 504, 505, and Fairbairn, tibi supra, p. 254. In I Thess. ii. 14, 15, the persecution and violent death of the Lord Jesus are here placed between two similar events, the persecution of the Jewish prophets and the actual sufferings of the Christian Apostles, as equally historical and equally notorious ; and in the same connection we naturally recall the expression which occurs quite incidentally in i Cor. ii. 8. Birks, Horce Apostoliaz, p. 356. Comp., too, Dean Howson upon the significance of Paul's expression in i Cor. ii. 8 {Evidential Conclusions from the Four Greater Epistles of St. Paul, p. 8). If we are justified in ascribing i Timothy to St. Paul, we have an expression in ch. vi. 13, in the solemn charge to Timothy, which is very closely connected — ■more closely, indeed, than at first sight appears — with the Article of the Creed, 'Suffered under Pontius Pilate.' 'I give thee charge in the sight of God, who ■quickeneth all things, and before Christ Jesus, who befo7-e Pontius Pilate wit- OUR LORDS DEATH AND BURIAL 35 1 carried out upon an appointed night (i Cor. xi. 23, and Matt. xxvi. 31):' moreover, the comparison which the Apostle draws between Christ's death and the sacrifice of the Paschal Iamb seems to indicate a knowledge of the exact time of the year at which the Saviour suffered. "■^ l^ut the earlier hours of this night of betrayal were marked by a solemn scene, the Institution of the Lord's Supper, with the details of which St. Paul claims to have been intimately acquainted. At the commencement of his recital the Apostle speaks of ' the Lord Jesus, in the night in which He was betrayed' (i Cor. xi. 23), a title sufficiently startling, when we remember its significance to the Jewish mind (see above, chapter iv.) and that it is here attributed, as nessed a good confession ' (see Reuss, Geschichte der heiligen Schrifien dcs N, T. p. 163, 6. Aufl. ). Here we have not only a direct reference to our Lord's trial, but there is also high authority for taking the word eVi as siuiply^marking the date, just like the word ' under ' in the Creed. This is the view of Dr. Westcott, but it is of interest to notice his remark that if we adopt the common translation, the reference in that case must be rather to St. John's Gospel, ch. xviii. 36, than to St. Matthew's, ch. xxvii. 11 {Study of the Gospels, p. 180). So, too, Dean Stanley in commenting upon the same passage, adds that it is the more remarkable because, although it may be sufficiently explained by the answer in St. Matthew, yet it points much more naturally to the long and solemn interview peculiar to St. John. For a similar view see also Row, Jesus of the Evangelists, p. 275. Comp. also Thenius, ubi supi-a, pp. 55, 69, and the recent work of P. Ewald, Das Hanptproblem der Evangelienf rage, pp. 77, 78, 1 5 1. ' In addition to the authorities cited at the commencement of the previous note, it may be sufficient to refer to Holtzmann, Hand-Co>n)nentar zum N, T. i. 16, 17 ; Reuss, ubi supra, p. 163, and the summary of the views of the various writers mentioned in chap. ii. Comp. also Weiss, Leben Jesii, ii. 504, 505, note ; Keim, Geschichte Jesu, iii. 243. - Weiss, who denies that any inference can be drawn from Gal. iii. I as to Paul's acquaintance with the details of the Passion, yet admits the force of I Cor. ii. 8 and i Cor. v. 7, as showing the Apostle's knowledge of the instru- ments and the season of the Saviour's death : ' Er wusste dass Jesus am Passah- feste (i Cor. v. 7) von den judischen und heidnischen Machlhabern (i Cor. ii. 8) ans Kreuz geschlagen war ; aber dass er den Tod Christi mit alien Details seinen Gemeinden erzahlt hatte, lasst sich keineswegs aus Gal. iii. i schliessen ' {B. 71 5. Aufl. pp. 289, 290). Comp. on I Cor. v. 7 as a note of time, Paret, ubi supra, p. 14 ; Thenius, ubi supra, p. 69 ; Sabatier, ubi supra, p. 58 ; Huraut, ubi supra, p. 20 ; comp. also Meyer's note, in loco ; Birks, Hora Apostoliciv, p. 360 ; Westcott, Study of the Gospels, p. 180. 352 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES a title already accepted and well known, to ' an outcast of the people ' who, some five-and-twenty years previously,, had been put to death upon a cross of shame. But such a title is in reality the best justification of the words and deeds which follow in Paul's recital, a recital in which we enter into the presence and listen to the voice of a more than human teacher. It is easy no doubt to point to the verbal differences between St. Paul's account and that of the first three Gospels. But the agreement which exists between St. Paul and St. Luke is confessedly so close that the differences in detail are of no significance in comparison with it.^ And if we are asked to believe that the earliest form of the words actually spoken by Jesus is to be found in St. Mark,'^ it does not appear that the Evangelist himself was aware of any serious discrepancy between his own and the Pauline narrative. For we must remember that St. Mark, no less than St. Luke, was during part of his career a companion of St. Paul : he was associated with him in his early missionary life, and later on he had laboured with him in Rome ; is it reasonable to suppose that he was unacquainted with whatever words of Institution St. Paul adopted at the celebration of the Lord's Supper ? ^ And yet Mark's account of the words spoken in ' See the emphatic remarks of Renan, Les Evangihs, pp. 269, 270, 284 ; comp. also Holtzmann, Die syuoptischen Evangelien, pp. 237, 238, and 395, 396 ; and Keim, Geschichte Jesii, i. 77. ^ For Steck's preference for tlie Matthew-Mark account, which he regards as earlier than that of the Lucan-Pauline, and Gloel's criticism of Steck's view, see chap. iii. 196-200 (see also for Resch's distinction between the two accounts, and his conclusions from it, chap. ii. p. 120). Comp., however, Wendt, Die Lehrejesu, pp. 343, 344, and also Der hihalt der Lehre Jesu, p. 518 (chap. ii. p. 102) ; also Weiss, Leben Jesii, ii. 513, 514, note, where he points out that we are dependent upon Mark's account or Paul's, since he holds that Luke combines- these two, while the first Evangelist simply repeats Mark's description. At the same time it will be noticed that Weiss believes that Paul's account is older than Mark's, and he terms it ' the really official one,' for Paul would not have in- troduced this usage into his Churches without assuring himself of its historical foundation. Comp. Bousset, Die Evangeliencitate Justins des Mdriyrers, pp. 112, 113, 1 89 1, for the view that the original words of Institution may be traced back to Paul and Mark. ' The readers of Dr. Salmon's Introduction to the N. T. will remember that he speaks of the close resemblance between the words of Institution in I Cor. OUR lord's death and burial 353 the upper chamber was written within a few years of Paul's death — if we may not say, in his Hfetime. If, moreover, as Schenkel affirms, Mark's account was derived from Peter,' it would appear that both Peter and Paul must have been in substantial and recognised agreement, so that of the Lord's Supper, as of other facts, Paul might well exclaim with reference to the first disciples, ' Whether it was I or they, so we preach, and so ye believed ' ( i Cor. xv. 1 1 ).^ But there is one most important word which we are justified in retaining in all four accounts, the word which the Revisers carefully translate ' covenant ' {hiaOi^K'q), although it will no doubt be said that in St. Matthew and St. Mark we have no right to read ' the netv covenant,' but simply ' the covenant.^ It will be noticed, however, that Weizsacker in quoting the four accounts of the words of Institution, whilst he divides them into what he calls two families, Matthew and Mark forming one, and Luke and Paul the other, fails to see any opposition between them, but rather a proof of the freedom which characterised Apostolic explanations of the ordinance : and if, as in his judgment, the formula of Mark was certainly derived from the primitive Church, he can see no reason why Paul's version should not be referred to a similar source.^ But let us allow that the word ' new ' (/cati/77) was originally wanting in Matthew and Mark : even then we still have a declaration of the mighty importance which Jesus attached to His own death. Keim acknowledged this in more than and in Luke's Gospel as the strongest token that has been found of indebtedness on Luke's part to Pauline Epistles : ' I am myself inclined,' he adds, ' to explain that resemblance by the liturgical use of the words. Luke would probably have often heard Paul, when conducting divine service, recite the words of Institution, and so they would come into his Gospel in the same form ' (p. 320). The same theory with regard to the liturgical use of the words is adopted by Godet, Com- menlaire stir PEvattgile de St. Lite, p. 29. ' So also Weiss, Leben Jesti, ii. 513 ; the same view would be quite in harmony with what is now called ' the two document ' hypothesis ; comp. e.g. Wendt, Die Lehrejesu, pp. 37-44, 172, 173, 205. '■' Paret, uhi supra, p. 15. ' Keim, Geschichte Jesii, iii. 275, 276, see also his article, ' Das Nachtmahl ini Sinne des Stifters,' m Jahrhiicher fiir detitsche Theo/ogie, p. 83, 1859. * Das apost. Zeitalter, p. 597. Comp. Rcnaii, Les £vangiks, p. 78. A A 354 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES one remarkable passage. Paul, he thinks, no doubt inter- preted the death of Jesus from the circumstances of his own time, but this interpretation did not contradict the facts of the Saviour's earthly life : there must have been something in the historical Jesus more comprehensive than Judaism and its law, which justified Paul in seeing in His death a purpose which transcended all national limitations, and in going so far as to speak of a ' new covenant ' — an expression which he quotes from the mouth of Jesus ; a ' new covenant ' which Jesus expressly declared to be founded upon His death, after the pattern of the old ; and of the design of Jesus to deliver men by that death from the law, and to reconcile not only the Jews, but even the heathen world also to God.^ So too, in a later part of his work, in describing the details of the scene of the Last Supper, Keim again insists upon the fact that even if Jesus did not use the word ' new,' and its intro- duction is to be ascribed to Paul, yet He truly perfected the new, the real, the true covenant, which crowned the begin- nings, the prophecies, the prototypes of Mosaic times, without threatening thereby the validity and the truth of the Law and the Prophets.^ But Strauss, no less than Keim, acknowledges the signi- ficance of the terms in which Jesus spoke of His own death as He instituted the Last Supper. Strauss thinks that the scene depicted by the first three Evangelists is quite conceivable owing to the forebodings which naturally pressed upon Jesus as He recognised His real position, and saw Himself surrounded, on the one side, by fanatic and desperate enemies who were capable of daring the utmost, and, on the other, by intimate friends who only imperfectly understood Him. When then, as master of the household, Jesus broke the bread for distribution, and poured out the red wme, ' Keim, Geschichte Jesu, i. 40. Comp. Y{z.rn2ick, Dogmengesc It khte, i. pp. 59, 60 note, where he admits that however difficult it may be to explain precisely the words of Jesus in delivering the bread and the wine to the disciples at the Last Supper, yet one thing is certain, that He connected the forgiveness of sins with His death (comp. p. 55). ^ Keim, ibid, iii. 276. OUR lord's death and burial 355 Strauss thinks that there may have been involuntarily present to His mind the thought of His body destined perchance for a similar fate at the hands of His cruel foes, and the thought of His blood, which perchance would shortly be poured forth, and that full of forebodings He may have assured His disciples that such would be His fate. Thus absorbed in the thought of His near death, He may have regarded it as having a sacrificial aspect, and His blood as the consecration of a nezv covenant between God and man. ' But our Lord was speaking to Jews : that is, to men who knew all that the word ' covenant ' involved, who must have been reminded, as they heard it, of the most solemn fact in their own national history, and in their own individual lives ; to Jews : that is, to men who would naturally shrink even from the symbolical drinking of blood in face of the stern and re- peated enactments of their own Law. And yet he virtually claims to supersede that old Mosaic Covenant, and to ratify a new one by His own blood (see Keim's note, ' Geschichte Jesu,' Bd. i. p. 40, where he admits that Matt. xxvi. 28 is essentially the same as i Cor. xi. 25 ^), the shedding of which was to ensure forgiveness of sins, a prerogative which, as every Jew was eager to maintain, belonged to God, and to God alone ! But, from this point of view, such a claim must have had the same significance to Paul as to the Twelve ; to him also pertained the Covenant and the giving of the Law, but to him, no less than to them, it was a matter of historical fact that Jesus of Nazareth, on the night in which He was betrayed, had spoken of His death in a manner which implied an intolerable arrogance or a divine claim, for what man could redeem his brother, or make agreement unto God for him to him, no less than to every member of the Church ' .Strauss, Lehen Jesu fiir das deutsche Volk, i. 358 ; comp. Luthardt, ' Die modernen Darstellungen des Lebens Jesu ' {Gesantme/te Vortrdge, p. 100), and Beyschlag, Lehen Jesu, i. 393, 394, for a criticism of this passage in .Strauss. See also Dr. .Salmon's Reign of Law, and other Sermons, pp. 37-53, to which attention is drawn by Dr. Maclcar in his Preface to 77^1? Evidential Value of the Holy Eucharist. 2 < Neuer Bund i Cor. xi. 25, im Wesentlichen auch Mt. xxvi. 28.' A A 2 356 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES of Christ, the bread broken and the wine outpoured had become the Supper of the Lord. ' But are there any indications that St Paul was able in thought to follow our Lord, as He passed out into the night across the brook Kedron to the Garden of Gethsemane ? When we remember how plainly Holtzmann declares that the way in which Paul introduces his account of the institu- tion of the Lord's Supper presupposes a narrative in detail of the last hours of Jesus,^ it does not seem unreasonable to suppose that the Apostle must have been acquainted with the scene in Gethsemane. But it cannot be said that we have any direct reference in the writings of St. Paul to the Agony in the Garden,'^ although the passage which is so often associated with this part of the Passion occurs in an Epistle which we are justified in referring to the Apostle's school, and to the Apostolic age,^ In the passage in question (Heb. v. 7), ' On the significance of the Institution of the Lord's Supper, and its influence upon the early Christian Church, see the remarkable passage in Wendt, Der hihalt der Lehre Jesu, pp. 594, 595, 1890, where he speaks of the action of Jesus in thus founding this rite as a masterpiece of wisdom, especially in relation to the men with whom, as His disciples, he had to deal ; and comp. the important remarks of Beyschlag (see chap. ii. p, 99) in connection with the bearing of the words of Institution upon the sinless consciousness of Jesus. It will be noticed that the reference of the words and acts of Jesus to such passages as Exodus xxiv. 8 is not only found in Christian Apologetic writers in England (comp. e.g. Maclear's Evidential Value of the Holy Eucharist ;. Matheson's ' Historical Christ,' in Expositor, i. [2nd series], 431-443), but also in Wendt, 2t//i supra, pp. 584, 586 ; Schmid, Bibl. Theol. des N. T. pp. 216, 217; Weiss, Leben Jesu, ii. 516, 517; Strauss, ubi supra', Holtzmann, 'Die Synoptiker ' {Hand-Coinnientar ztim N. T.), p. 278. On the historical character of the Lord's Supper, see Weiss, Lehen Jesu, ii. 513 ; and for further remarks on the sources of St. Paul's information, see below, chap. ix. Dean Plumptre has some valuable comments upon the tendency to lose sight of the evidential value of the Eucharist (Ellicott's Commentary, i. 163). ^ 'Die S)moptiker ' (Hand-Cotnmentar zu7n N. T.), p. 17, 1889. ^ This is, however, maintained by Dr. Matheson with regard to 2 Cor. xii. 8, 9, in his Spiritual Develop7nent of St. Paul, pp. 79, 188. So, too, Roos, Die Briefs des A post els Paulus zind die Reden des Herrn Jesu , p. 66. * De Wette assigned the Epistle to a time shortly before the outbreak of the Roman-Jewish War, 65-67 A. D. Einleitung in die kanotiischen Biicher des N. T. p. 357, 6. Aufl. 1880 ; Ewald, to the same period, Das Sendschreiben an die Hebrder, pp. 3, 5, 1870 ; Hilgenfeld, to 64-66 A. D., Ei7tleittmg in das N. T. p. 388, 1875 ; Beyschlag, to a date preceding the destruction of Jerusalem, ^o A.D., Leben Jesu, i. 64, 1887 ; Renan regards 66 A.D. as the probable date. Saint Paul, Introd. p. 61, 1888, 12th edit. (comp. L'Antechrist, Introd. p. 13, OUR lord's death and burial 357 * Who in the daj-s of his flesh, when he had offered up prajxrs and supplications with strong cr}-ing and tears unto him tliat was able to save him from death,' even Strauss could find a reminiscence of the scene in Gethsemane.' And if Keim is right in supposing that this passage is more naturally referred to the strong cry upon the cross "■^ (Matt, xxvii. 46, 50 ; Luke xxiii. 46), we may at least conclude that the writer of the Epistle was acquainted with the details of the Crucifixion. But is there any reason why the words should not contain a twofold reference: (i) to the Agony; (2) to the loud cry upon the Cross ? ^ In this connection we naturally recall another passage of the same Epistle, Heb. xiii. 12, 13 : 'Jesus . . . suffered without the gate; let us go forth therefore unto him with- out the camp, bearing his reproach ' — words which suggest a reference to Jesus led forth to die outside the city, and to Simon of Cyrene compelled to bear the Cross.^ No doubt 1873, 3rd edit.); B. Weiss considers that it was probably written during the threatening symptoms of the breaking out of the Jewish War, Einleitung in das N. T. pp. 345, 347, 1889, 2. Aufl. ; Salmon places it at 66, or 67 at the latest, Introd. to N, T. p. 431, 5th edit. ; and Westcott, between 64-67 [Epistle to the Hebrews, p. xlii. [Introd.]). Bleek assigned 68-69 as the probable date, and in the fourth edition of his Einleitung ill das N. T., revised by Mangold, a review of the dates maintained by various critics is given in a lengthy note, pp. 690, 691 (4. Aufl. 1886). Mangold rejects the date 116-118 A.D. to which Volkmar (together with Keim and Hausrath) referred the Epistle, as too late, but he regards Holtzmann's view, which plac s it at the end of the first century on the ground of supposed traces of Domitian's persecution (cf. also von Soden, Hand-Coininentar zio/i N. T. iii. 14, zweite Abtheilung, 1890) as lying within the sphere of possibility (but see Weiss, iibi supra, p. 345) ; beyond this period he thinks we cannot proceed. For the manner in which it may be said that this Epistle touches on each of the great features in our Lord's life, see Westcott, Study of the Gospels, p. 181 (comp. Beyschlag, Lebenjesu, i. 65, but see also, on the other hand, the remarks of von Soden, tihi supra, p, 3). ' Comp. also Weiss, Lehen Jesu, ii. 536, note ; Beyschlag, Leben Jesu, i. 65 ; Steinmeyer, Die Geschichte der Passion des Herrn, p. 41, 2. Aufl. 1882 ; West- cott, Study of the Gospels, p. 181 ; and see references to Keim in note 2, for the passage in .Strauss. * Keim, Geschichte Jesu, iii. 306, note, 427, 429. ' Kurzgefasster Ko/nmentar (Strack and Zockler) zuvt N. T., vierte Abthei- lung, p. 170. * Comp. Steinmeyer and Beyschlag, ubi supra, and Keim, ubi supra, p. 400 ; von Soden admits the allusion to the place of execution in xiii. 12 and to the death- 358 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES the attempt to establish a connection between the latter incident and Rom. xvi. 13, where reference is made to a certain Rufus as a well-known member of the Christian Church at Rome (comp. Mark xv. 21, where Simon is de- scribed as the father of Alexander and Rufus)' may seem to many minds somewhat vague and fanciful, but it is most important to remember that Volkmar emphasises the con- nection between the two passages, and thinks it quite possible that Mark whilst with Paul at Rome had become acquainted with Rufus ; hence the mention in the Gospel which bears the name of Mark, not only of Simon, but also of his two sons. But if, in accordance with Volkmar's own admissions, Mark himself was probably the young man who fled naked from Gethsemane (Mark xiv. 51, 52), and if the details of the Crucifixion in the Gospel which bears the name of Mark were derived, as Volkmar also admits, from a witness dwelling in Jerusalem, and were published as early as 73 A.D.,^ it is not unreasonable to suppose that the incidents in the last hours of the Saviour's life were previously widely known, and that Paul must have had easy access to such knowledge, a sup- position materially strengthened if Mark was by his side in Rome. As we pass to the next Article of the Creed, ' Was struggle (not to Gethsemane) in v. 7, although he finds very little reference in Hebrews to the human life of Jesus {Haud-Comiiientar ziini N. T. iii. 3, zweite Abtheilung, 1890. ' Godet, Co?7imentaire sur UEpitre atix Romains, ii. 596, 2nd edit. 1890 ; Plumptre (EUicott's Commentary), i. 231 ; Bishop of Derry, Leading Ideas of the Gospels, p. 58 ; see, however, Lipsius in Hand-Covimejitar ztim N. T. Bd. ii. zweite Abtheilung, p. 188, 1891. Comp. Carpenter, /^zVj^ Three Gospels^ p. 287, on the connection between Mark xv. 21 and Rom. xvi. 13. Professor Jowett, in Epistles to the Thess, &c. ii. 425, compares St. Paul's expression in ch. xvi. 13, ' and his mother attd mine,^ with Christ's words upon the Cross, as He commended His mother to the care of St. John, ' Woman, behold thy son r . . . ' Behold thy mother ! ' (John xix. 26,27). It has recently been suggested that we have a sweet and solemn reminiscence of the last Word from the Cross, not only in I Pet. iv. 19 (as is so often admitted), but also in 2 Tim. i. 12, irapad-fiKTiv /xov ; comp. Luke xxiii. 46, and see EUicott's Comme?2tary on the N. T. iii. 222, on the m.eaning of the word irapaOiiKri (Bishop of Derry, Ferbiem Crucis, p. 106). "^ Jesus Nazarenus, pp. 18, 19, 122, 135, 304. OUR LORD'S DEATH AND BURIAL 359 crucified, dead, and buried,' we naturally associate with the words the opening verses of i Cor. xv., those verses in which St. Paul insists upon the historical facts of Christ's death for our sins, His burial, His resurrection, in what has been well termed * the first Creed of Christendom.' The references which the Apostle makes to the death of Jesus are in entire harmony with the narratives of the Evangelists. The Passion of Jesus was the time of His weakness. His defencelessness, and powerlessness (2 Cor. xiii. 4) : He suffered death upon a cross of wood (Gal. iii. 13), to which He was nailed (Col. ii. 14), and on which He shed His blood (Col. i. 20) : ' during the hours of His Passion He was exposed to revilings which He endured without a murmur (Rom. xv. 3):^ if we look at it from the side of the Sufferer, this death upon the Cross was an act of obedience towards God (Phil. ii. 8 ; Rom. v. 19 : comp. Matt. xxvi. 39 f ), and also the surrender of self in love to man (Gal. ii. 20 ; Matt. xx. 28), whose sins were thus taken away and atoned for (comp. the account of the Last Supper in St. Paul and the Synoptists) : at the same time, all this was done that the Scriptures might be fulfilled (Matt. xxvi. 54, and i Cor. xv. 6), a point of view which is in entire agreement with the unanimous voice of the Evangelists.'' But if the Pauline Epistles only corroborated the two historical facts, which we can prove quite apart from any Christian documents, viz. the Crucifixion of Christ, and the rise of the Christian Church, we are apt to forget how much these two facts presuppose. That a Jeiv should have been the Founder of the Christian Church is a fact which arrests attention, if we bear in mind, on the one hand, the national ' Paret, Patdits imd Jesus, p. 14; Sabatier, L'Apoire Paul, p. 58; Weiss, Bibl. Theol. des N. T. p. 289 ; Hausrath, ubi supra, p. 70 ; P. Ewald, Das Haiiptprohleni der Evangelienfrage, p. 78, note ; Ellicott's Co»inie7itary on the N. T. iii. 108. * See Paret, Sabatier, Hausrath, as in previous note ; comp. also Keim, Geschichte Jesu, iii. 431. Weiss, however, is of opinion that the fact that Paul illustrates this trait of Christ in Rom. xv. 3, by a reference to Psalm Ixix. 10, shows how little he realbed the details of the sufferings {Bibl. Theol. des N. T. p. 290; but comp. Paret, ubi supra, p. 14. ' Paret, ubi supra, p. 14, 360 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES pride and culture of the Roman and the Greek, and, on the other hand, the exclusive narrowness of Judaism. But a Crucified J CIV \^ it is difficult for us to realise the extreme shame and degradation which attached even to the name of the cross in the heathen world, and no one has emphasised this more fully and graphically than Keim, whilst the detestation with which crucifixion was regarded by the Jews must have been intensified in the case of Jesus of Nazareth by the fact that the heathen Romans were the instruments of His punishment.''^ That St. Paul, both a Roman citizen and a Hebrew of the Hebrews, was keenly alive to the depth of the humiliation which the cross involved is evident from the manner in which he speaks of the Saviour becoming obedient, so obedient as to die, yea, to die the death of the cross (Phil. ii. 8): and even if we could conceive the teaching of Jesus winning its way in individual cases among the Greeks, who sought after wisdom, and who were accustomed to associate the thought of a wise man like their own Socrates with the poison cup, how could the Jews accept a crucified fellow- countryman as their Messiah ? To the Greeks Christ crucified was only foolishness ; to the Jews He was a stumbling-block. There is no proof that at the time of Jesus' earthly life any general expectation prevailed of a S74ffering Messiah ; and it is plain that even in the second century, when the Christian interpretation of prophecy may well have made some impres- sion, the offence of the Cross had not ceased : ^ it was one ' Comp. Ullmann, IVas setzt die Stiftiing der christlichen Kirche ditrch einen Gekretizigteii voratis? pp. 13, 18, 21, 22, 26, 27, 30. - Keim, Geschichte Jestt, iii. 409 ff. ; Ullmann, tihi supi-a, pp. 7, 8. It is noteworthy that in this connection (p. 413) Keim not only speaks of the way in which the Christian teachers from the first to the last, with Paul at their head (i Cor. i. 23), dwell upon the shame of the servile punishment of the cross, but he adds : ' " If the Messiah can suffer," cries the Jew Trypho to Justin Martyr, "yet he cannot be crucified; he cannot die such a shameful, dishonourable death ! " ' (Justin, Trypho, 90 and 32). See also p. 605. Comp. Edersheim, testis the Messiah, ii. 100. ^ See chap. i. p. 23 : the whole Appendix on the ' Suffering Messiah ' in Schiirer should be consulted, and esp. Dalman's Der hidende iind der sterbende Messias. Dr. Dalman (p. 30) argues from passages in the Gospels, the Acts, and the Epistles (i Cor. i. 23 ; Gal. v. 11) that the suffering of the Messiah was evi- OUR lord's death and burial 361 thing to admit that the Scriptures pointed to a Christ Hable to suffering, but quite another thing to admit that such suffer- ing could find expression in the ignominy of a crucifixion, a death cursed by the Law. But the same passage in the Roman historian Tacitus ^vhich witnesses to the fact of the Crucifixion, also bears witness to the fact that Judaea was the source from which the religion of the Christ proceeded.' And yet how could dently regarded as something strange and repulsive to the Jewish people in the time of Jesus. For the oldest interpretations of Isaiah liii. see also Dalman, uhi supra, p. 27-35, where he maintains that the doctrine of a Suffering Messiah was not pre- Christian, but that the possibility of it which he admits was present (p. 34) was not realised in Rabbinical theology until a much later date (p. 21-23, ^9i 9i)- Comp. •esp. 'i^X.z.n'^ovi, Jeivish and Christian Messiah, ^^\). 122-125. We may add to these former references the emphatic statement of Wendt to the same effect, Der Inhalt der Lehre Jesic, p. 541, 1890 : ' Wenn auch das spatere Judenthum sich mit der Vorstellung vondem leidenden Messias beschaftigt hat, so giltdoch nichtnur, dass ■diese Vorstellung bios eine theologische Theorie vereinzelter Rabbinen geblieben ist Jind ziir Zeit Jesii dein religiosen Volksbewiisstsein der Juden ganz fern lag, sondern namentlich auch dass die von den Juden als moglich angenommenen Wehen des Messias, welche er an der Spitze seines Volkes in der Zeit des Kampfes gegen die Weltmachte um die Herstellung des messianischen Reiches durchmachen muss und durch welche er zum Sieg und zur Herrlichkeit hindurch- ■dringt, ihrer Art nach ganz verschieden sind von den Leiden, welche Jesus gerade durch die Haupter des Volkes Israel erfahrt und welchen er, jiusserlich betrachtet, im Tode erliegt. ' It is evident how keenly sensible Schwegler was of the difficulty presented by I Cor. i. 23, and similar verses, and also by the famous passage in Justin's Dialogue with Trypho (see above, chap. i. p. 34), but as the death on the Cross could not be denied, he supposes that the Christians created the belief in Christ's future coming in glory in order to compensate for the ignominy of the fact of the Crucifixion, and for what the present denied to them [Das nachapostolische Zeitalter, i. no). See also Westcott, Study of the Gospels, pp. 145, 149, 150, •6th edit. Fairbairn, Studies in the Life of Christ, pp. 308, ff. ; J. Drummond, The Jewish Messiah, esp. pp. 356, 357, 1877 ; Row, Jesus of the Evangelists, 4th edit. pp. 140 ff. and 213 ff. ; Pseudepigrapha (W. J. Deane : T. and T. Clark, 1891), pp. 82, 127, 153, 157, 189; Gore, Bampton Lectures, p. 192, for the incompatibility of a suffering Messiah with Jewish ideas and expectations. Comp. Matheson, Spiritual Developvietit of St. Paul, pp. 30, 31, 109. ' Ernest Naville, Le Christ, p. 2CX3, who emphasises this fact in quoting the famous passage, Tacitus, Ann. xv. 44. Upon the historical character of the facts relating to the Crucifixion, see Steinmeyer, Die Geschichte der Passion des Herrn, p. 100, where he points out that just as the Evangelia Infanticc are one of the strongest proofs of the historical character of the Gospel records of the Nativity, so the same may be said of the Acta Pilatiz.% compared with the Gospel narratives of the Passion ; for some account of the Acta Pilati see Keim, Geschichte Jesu, i. 33. 34, and iii. 569, 570. An interesting passage in Matheson's ' Historical Christ of St. Paul ' 362 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES the preaching of a Crucified Christ have taken root upon such an unpromising soil ? How could it have been planted and watered by pious Jews — a St. Peter or a St. John or a St. Paul — unless it had been endowed with a more than human vitality ? If, indeed, it had its true source in no holy ground of this world, in no city made with hands — if, as the seer beheld the New Jerusalem, it had descended out of heaven from God ; if its Founder, though crucified through weakness, was the Living One who became dead, and who was living for evermore, then and then only is it intelligible how Christ Crucified could become to the Jew ' the power of God,' to the Greek ' the wisdom of God ' (i Cor. ii. 24, 25). But of the Christ thus crucified through weakness, the Creed tells us that He was ' dead and buried ' : and evidently in the belief of St. Paul, no less than in that of the Evange- lists, the crucifixion of the Saviour issued in death ; ' of the brief Creed which Paul delivered to the Corinthians, and which he states that he had himself received, the first Article expresses this belief ( I Cor, xv. 3), and critics who minimise St. Paul's acquaintance with the details of the earthly life of Jesus eagerly maintain that the Apostle's teaching was centred around the two great facts of His death and resurrection.^ It is not too much to affirm that the reality of the death upon the Cross would never have been disputed, in the face of the unanimous testimony of all our sources, had it not occurred to rationalism to transform the miracle of the resurrection into the reawakening of one who was only apparently dead.* No one recognises more plainly than Strauss that a half-dead Christ creeping out of his tomb could never have impressed the disciples with the belief that he was the con- queror of death and the grave, the Prince of Life ; such a revivification would only weaken the previous impression {Expositor, i. 356, 2nd series) shows us how easily, if we had no reference to the Crucifixion outside our Gospels, the doctrine of a Crucified Messiah might have been fitted into the mythical system of Strauss, and grafted upon the famous passage in which Plato describes the sufferings of the Perfect Man, his scourging^ his crucifixion (Plato, Republic, ii. 361). ' Paret, ubi supra, pp. 14, 20 ; Sabatier, UApotre Paul, p. 59. * See above, chap. ii. ' Weiss, Leben Jesu, ii. 590. OUR lord's death and burial 363 which Jesus had made upon his disciples, and it could not possibly have transformed their sorrow into enthusiasm, or have raised their reverence to adoration." In the same manner Keim dwells upon the impossibility of believing that the poor, weak, sick Jesus, scarcely able to support himself upon his feet, hiding and disguised, finally succumbing to death, could have been an object of the faith, of the exalted emotion, of the triumph of his followers, a risen conqueror and Son of God ! Such a theory is too paltry and absurd to hold its ground, since it makes the Apostles either miser- ably deceived, or associates them with Jesus as themselves deceivers.'- But St. Paul in ' the first Creed of Christendom ' insists upon the burial no less than upon the death of Jesus, and it may well be described as arbitrary in the face of Paul's repeated testimony (comp. e.g. i Cor. xv. 4 ; Rom. vi. 4 ; Col. ii. 12) to question the fact of that burial.^ Even Strauss admits that there is nothing historical to be alleged against the Christian tradition known to Paul, viz. that Jesus was buried after He had been taken down from the Cross ; ^ whilst Keim not only maintains that the burial in itself is beyond doubt, but also protests as strongly as Steinmeyer against the arbitrary assumption that Isaiah liii. 9 is sufficient to ' Lelienjesufiir das deutsche Volk,\. 378. - Keim, Geschichte Jesit, iii. 576, and notes, and comp. the remarks of Schanz in Gott und die Offenbarung, p. 401, Nosgen, Geschichte Jesu Christ i, p. 640, on the theory that the death of Jesus was not a reality. See also Fair- baim, Studies in the Life of Christ, p. 339. ' So Keim, Geschichte Jesu, iii. 526. Comp. Beyschlag, Leben Jesu, i. 441, as against Strauss, and esp. 448 ; also in Studien iind Kritiken, p. 228, 1870, and Paret, ubi stifra, pp. 14, 20, for Paul's agreement with the Gospels. The comment of Dr. Weiss on the repeated emphasis laid by Paul upon the burial of Jesus, is important : ' Dass er das Begrabniss Christi wiederholt betont (i Cor, XV. 4, Rom. vi. 4 ; vgl. Act. xiii. 29, Col. ii. 1 2) hangt damit zusammen, dass dieses ebenso die Wirklichkeit seines Todes wie seiner Auferstehunggarantirt und darum gleich bedeutsam ist fiir die beiden grossen Heilsthatsachen seines Systems ' {Bibl. TheoL des. N. T. p. 290, note, 5. Aufl.). On the force of the repetition of Srt before iTaid Jesus, p. 20. ^ Steinmeyer, Die Auferstehungsi;cschichte des Henn, pp. 16, 17 ; and Ewald, Die Sendschreiben des Apostels Pauliis, p. 208. * So Strauss, Leben [esu, i. 400, 401, 5. Aufl. ; Keim, Geschichte Jesu, Bd. iii. pp. 533, 534 : Weizsacker, Das apostolische Zeitalter, p. 15. But compare Gess, Das Dogma von Christi Person und iVerk, pp. 12-18 (Vorwort) ; and see also Hase, Geschichte Jesii, p. 594. 368 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES not only does violence to the unanimous tradition of the Evangelists, it breaks down under the weight of fresh im- possibilities, and fails to commend itself to Hilgenfeld and Holsten, who maintain that the first appearances took place, not in Galilee, but in Jerusalem. • But in this connection there is one historical fact which demands an explanation, viz. the institution of the Christian Sunday, ' The first day of the week ' is an expression used not by one but by each of the Evangelists, as also by St. Paul in I Cor. xvi. 2 (cf Acts xx. 7). Whatever date we assign to the Gospels, it is evident that this day — ' the first day of the week ' — must have had some meaning for Christians when St. Paul wrote his letter just quoted to the Church at Corinth ; he had already, it seems, prescribed the same day for the Churches of Galatia (see xvi. i), and he does not consider it necessary to give any reason for its selection. But if on the third day, i.e. the first day of the week, Jesus Christ rose again according to the Scriptures,, then we can understand how men like St. Paul and St. John^ with all their Jewish instincts and Jewish training, could centre the thoughts of Christians, not upon the Jewish Sabbath, but upon the first day of the week, as the day of holy communion with their Risen Lord, and of holy and loving intercourse with one another.^ ' ' Da die dem Jakobus geschehene Erscheinung nur in Jerusalem zu denken ist, so wird auch die vorhergehende und unmittelbar sich anschliessende in Jerusalem gedacht sein ; sonst hatte Paulus hier, wo alles auf das thatsachliche ankam, gewiss die Ortsveranderung angegeben. ' Holsten, Das Evangeliiim des Paulus, p. 412, 1880; Hilgenfeld, Zeitschrift fib- 'Lvisscnsch. Theol. i868, p. 73. Comp. also Beyschlag, Lel>e7ijesu, i. 421-423. 2 Sabatier, VApotre Paul, p. 59 : ' Cette resurrection a eu lieu le troisieme jour. Que nous ayons ici une indication historique, et non I'application d'un mot prophetique c'est ce que prouve le fait de la substitution dans les eglises pauliniennes du jour du dimanche au jour du sabbat. ' Paret, Paulus und Jesus, p. 20 : ' Schon die genaue Zeitbestimmung fehlt nicht : am dritten Tage nach seinem Tode ist, ganz iibereinstimmend mit den Evangelien, nach dieser Stelle (I Cor. XV. 4) Christus wiederbelebt worden. Demgemass wurde auch in den paulinischen Gemeinden der erste Wochentag als der heilige Tag der Christen gefeiert (i Cor. xvi. 2), und wir haben so neben der christlichen Beschneidung (Col. ii. II) dem christlichen Passah (i Cor, v. 7), auch in den paulinischen Gemeinden schon den christlichen Sabbat. ' To the same effect Thenius in Das Evangeliuvi ohiie die Evangelien, p. 70 ; THE RKSURKECTIOX 369 When wc turn to the Christophanies enumerated by St. Paul in the few succeeding verses, a number of questions at once demand an answer. How fully, e.^., does this series of appearances harmonise with those of the Gospels ? or, what was St. Paul's object in making his selection ? is the last mentioned appearance, to himself, to be placed on a level with those vouchsafed to the earlier Apostles ? Now, in the first place, it is needful to remind ourselves again that St. Paul is writing a letter — a letter which pre- supposes an acquaintance with the gospel which he had preached, and which would not therefore be likely to contain more than a summary of facts already communicated to the Corinthian Church.' Thus, while Keim attaches even more weight to the Pauline testimony to our Lord's resurrec- tion than many Christian Apologists, he has surely forgotten this consideration when he positively states that Paul has with set purpose excluded from his account of the Resur- rection appearances the speaking of Jesus, His sitting and walking with His disciples, His eating with them, His permission to them to handle Him, and every represen- tation of His previous corporeity, and of His fellowship with His disciples. All this is done designedly by St. Paul, in Keim's view, in order to show that he regards the appearance of Jesus to His disciples as exactly similar to the appearance vouchsafed to him, viz. a dazzling and momentary revelation of the Son of God in Heaven in His and Huraut, Pan/ a-t-il connti le Christ Jiistoriqne ? p, 20 ; see also ^^'eiss, Lehen Jesii, Bd. ii, pp. 602, 603, Beyschlag, Lehen Jesn, i. 441, Nosgen, Geschichte Jesti Christ i, p. 644. Amongst English writers see especially Milligan, Lectures on the liesurrection, pp. 67-69, and Maclear, The Evidential Value of the Obse)~vance of the Lord's Day (' Present Day Tracts'), 54. If the statement in Acts xx. 7, is dismissed as unhistorical, the expression used in Rev. i. 7 cannot be disregarded by critics who are prepared to accept the Johannine authorship of this latter book (see Weiss, iii>i supra), nor can there be any reasonable doubt that as early as the time of Ignatius ' the Lord's Day' was identical with ' the first day of the week ' {Diet, of Christian Antiq. ii. 1042). ' I'aret, ' Das Zeugniss des Apostels Paulus iiber die ihm gewordene Christus- Y^rschtirwing,' in Jahrbiicher fiir deutsche Theologie, 1859, p. 245; Weiss, Lehen Jesu, Bd. ii. p. 626; Beyschlag, Studien tind Kritiken, p. 218, 1864; and Matheson, ' Historical Christ of St. Paul,' in Expositor^ ii. 38 (2nd series). B B 370 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES glorified body. The proof of this determined exclusion of the Gospel narratives by St. Paul is based by Keim upon what he calls the measured, reserved, and scanty expression ' was seen ' (axpSi])} Certainly in the statement ' and that he was seen of Cephas' (i Cor. xv. 5), it is not only evident that the mention of such an interview is in perfect harmony with the narrative of St. Luke (xxiv. 34),'^ but it is also significant that both Luke and Paul alike content themselves with a brief reference to this incident. It has recently been pointed out with much force what room there was here for mythical embellishment in the place of two brief intimations,'* and we are able to see, not only in the work on the Resurrection ascribed to Justin Martyr, but more plainly still in the ' Acta Pilati ' how far men's fancies could carry them.^ But it is difficult to believe that this mention of the appearance to Peter would have been so meagre if indeed he had played the leading part in the Resurrection history which is assigned to him by recent criticism.'^ According to Weizsacker, e.g:, it is no longer an hysterical woman, as Renan suggested, but Peter who first believes that he has seen the Risen Lord, and who communicates this assurance to his fellow-disciples. But we have been well reminded that the selection of St. Peter to bear this burden of contagious belief is by no means judicious.*^ It is not only that the ' Keim, Geschichte Jesu, Bd. iii. p. 540. Comp. Beyschlag's criticism in Leben/esu, i. 430, and his remarks in Stiidien iind Ki-itikeii, pp. 221-223, 1864 ; Paret, ubi supra, pp. 20, 21. On this word &<^Qf\ and its employment in the New Testament, see note, p. 265, in Dr. Milligan's Restcrrection of our Lord. ^ Holtzmann, Die synoptischen Evangelien, p. 396. ^ Maclear, Evidential Value of the Holy Eucharist, pp. 297-300 ; cf. the remarks of Steinmeyer, Die Auferstehungsgeschichte des Herrn, pp. 166, 167. * See the instances given by Keim, Geschichte Jesu, Bd. iii. pp. 568-570. * W. F. Gess, Das Dogma vofi Christi Person und Werk entivickelt aus Christi Selbstzeugniss und den Zeugnissen der Apostel, p. 15 (Vorwort), 1887. " Gess points out with much force {uhi supra, pp. 16, 17), that according to Weizsacker the Fourth Gospel was composed by a disciple of St. John soon after his Master's death ; but if, as Weizsacker would have us believe, the appearances of the Risen Lord took place in Galilee, and only as visions, how is it that a Gospel written by a disciple of St. John should introduce some woman, then Peter and the beloved disciple, as finding the grave empty, and that a series of appearances, comprising one occasion on which Jesus offered Himself as an object to be handled, should be represented as taking place in Jerusalem ? THE RESURRECTION 37 1 difficulty of accounting for this confident conviction on the part of St. Peter presses heavily upon those who deny that our Lord ever definitely predicted His Resurrection,' it is not only that St. Paul's silence as to the earlier appearances in Jerusalem is interpreted to mean his total ignorance of the empty grave and of the events of the first Easter day, and thus to make room for a vision to St. Peter in Galilee ; '^ but the theory seems to contradict all our ordinary experiences of human nature. What the apparent degradation of the death of Jesus upon the Cross must have been to His disciples ; how utterly it must have extinguished all their courage and all their hopes ; how difficult it is to rekindle the flame of a dead enthusiasm, and the more difficult in proportion to the greatness of its former life and power — all this is forgotten in the attempt to make Simon Peter the founder of the Christian Church. But how unlikely that men so crushed and disappointed should have recovered from their despon- dency by the mere fantasies of a comrade who in the very hour of trial had least approved himself ! ^ Contrast with this unlikely supposition the actual narrative of the Gospels. There St. Peter does not hasten to place himself at the head of his fellow-disciples in unseemly eagerness, and with no assurance of forgiveness for his past failure and denial. We see him passing from the high-priest's palace into the night, not like Judas into the night of darkness and despair, but in bitter tears of repentance to meet the coming dawn. That the Saviour should appear to him first of all His disciples was surely no strange action on the part of Him who came, not to break the bruised reed, but to impart an unfailing strength : that such a meeting and its message of forgiveness should be treasured by Peter in the inmost sanctuary of his heart, in the deep silence of humility and gratitude ; that he should wait until the Lord again restored him in public to his authority in the Apostolic College : all this, we may ' See an article by Deck upon i Cor. xv. 3-8, in connection with Weizsacker's theory in Theologische Sludien aus Wiirttemberg, x. Jahrgang, 1889, i. Heft, pp. 44, 46. ' Gess, tihi supra, pp. 12, 1 3. ' Theologische Stitdien, ubi supra, pp. 49, 54. B B 2 372 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES reverently' say, is in accordance with the mind of Christ, and with the divine fitness of things.^ But if we can thus see a reason why our Lord vouchsafed a special appearance to St. Peter, we can also see, from another point of view, why St. Paul should refer to it. It is not very fanciful to suppose that this appearance of the Risen Lord was an earnest theme of conversation during- Paul's visit to Jerusalem recorded in Gal. i. i8, especially when we remember that this was his first meeting with any member of the Twelve, and that his reference to it seems to indicate the purpose of careful and searching inquiry.- But the same Epistle to the Galatians records a meeting at Jerusalem, not only between Paul and Peter, but also between Paul and James (Gal. i. 19) ; and if Paul afterwards mentions plainly two appearances vouchsafed by the Risen Christ to Peter and James, this mention is in striking agreement with the fact that Paul had himself conferred personally with these two Apostles when he first visited Jerusalem after his con- version.^ ' Theologische Studien, ubi supra, pp. 55, 56, and comp. the remarks of Gess on the appearance to Peter, p. 18, ttbi supra : ' Die Vermuthung liegt nahe, dass diese Erscheinung fur Petrus dem tief gefallenen, tief zerknirschten gegolten habe, durch eine besondere Huld ihn aufrichten. Kam ihr diese sehr personliche Bedeutung zu, so ist das Zurticktreten in der Gemeindeliberlieferung leicht zu verstehen. ' ■ Weiss, Einkitutig in das N. T. p. 119, 2. Aufl., where he refers to Paret's first treatise, Paidus und Jesus. Comp. also Weiss, Bibl. Theol. p. 2CX), 5. Aufl. ; Schenkel, Das Ckristusbild, p. 59 ; Godet, UEpitre aux Romains, i. 30, 2nd edit. ; Sabatier, L'Apotre Paul, p. 60; Keim, Geschichte Jesu, iii. 532; Beyschlag, Leben Jesu, i. 429 ; Hase, Geschichte Jesu, p. 592 ; and amongst recent English writers, IMatheson, Spiritual Developtnent of St. Paul, pp. 114-II7, 121, 131- 133 ; for the great importance of this visit in its bearing upon Paul's information as to the facts of the life of Jesus. Lipsius, although he limits the result of the visit to Paul's making the acquaintance of Peter, yet maintains its historical truthfulness as against Steck, Hand-Comtnentar zum N. T. ii. zweite Abtheilung, p. 16, 1891. On the force of the word Iffropriaai, see Sabatier, ubi supra, p. 60, and Edersheim,/^«-i stent hu7>ts, p. 39). No wonder that Beyschlag speaks of this as ' ein Dahingestelltseinlassen, bei dem freilich weder Freund noch Feind sich beruhigen konnte.' - For section marked i, see Paret, ubi supra, pp. 242, 243. , TIIK RKSURRKCTION 379 but by Jesus Christ and God the Father,' so that whilst in verse i6 Christ appears only as an object of the divine activit}', in this opening declaration He appears as the im- mediate agent to whom St. Paul owes his calling as an Apostle, and indeed the name of Christ is introduced even before the name of God. Again in verse 12 of this first chapter, Jesus Christ is not only the object of the divine revelation as in verse 16, but its author; otherwise, we can- not preserve the antithesis upon which the Apostle is evidently insisting. But in the attempt to isolate the expression air k. k.t.X. we not only lose the force of preceding verses, but also the force of the immediate context.' In the next verse (17) there is one most significant word, which throws a flood of light upon the whole passage, the word ' again ' (ttoXiv) : ' neither went I up to Jerusalem to them which were Apostles before me ; but I went into Arabia, and returned again unto Damascus.' How can the word irdXtv be explained, except upon the supposition that even as he spoke of God revealing His Son in him (verse 16) there flashed before the gaze of the Apostle one definite particular act in the past, and the birthplace of his new life — the road to Damascus ? But if the event of his conversion had been purely internal, the recollection of the locality where it happened would scarcely have forced itself so much into the foreground so many years after, so that even when describing in general terms the in- ward nature of his change Paul thought perforce at the same moment of Damascus. - ' Beyschlag remarks upon Baur's omission to take any notice of the preceding words, Kai KaKiffas 5io ttjs ;tapiTos avrov, ' and called me by his grace,' Gal. i. 15 ; and if Paul, under the idea of a KKriais, 'a calling,' always understands an act of divine influence upon men proceeding from without, and if Paul speaks of himself as ' called to be an Apostle ' not by man, but by Jesus Christ, and so not by any human agent, does not this very passage, so far from containing a denial of any external incident in Paul's conversion, in reality demand some outward and immediate call from heaven like that in the narrative of the Acts, ' Saul, Saul, why persecutes! thou me ? ' {Studien unci Kritiken, p. 220, 1864) ? - With these arguments of Paret Sabatier's remarks are in entire agreement, VApdtre Paul, pp. 40, 41. So, too, Professor Massie in his article ' Conversion 38o THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES 2.' But even if in Gal. i. 15, 16, the Apostle lays the chief stress upon what may be called the internal side of his conversion, he insists not less exclusively upon its external and objective side in two passages in i Corinthians. Of these two passages the first, ch. ix. i., is sometimes explained as if it referred to a seeing of Jesus during the Saviour's earthly life, or to some appearance vouchsafed to the Apostle during his Christian course : and this latter explanation has been given even to the second passage, ch. xv. 8. But here, again, serious misunderstanding arises from a forgetfulness of the immediate context : ' Am I not an Apostle ? have I not seen Jesus Christ our Lord ? ' It is evident that the two facts, the fact of having seen the Lord Jesus Christ, and the fact of having been an Apostle, are mentioned, as it were, in the same breath, and that the one is an essential counterpart of the other. The commencement of an Apostleship implies one ' sending,' and if Paul could only have appealed to His inner calling and conversion, and not in equal measure to an external fact, his recognition as an Apostle would have been endangered every moment. In those days many were converted to Christianity without claiming the name of Apostles, and from the beginning the fundamental conception of an Apostle was that of one who had received an immediate personal commission from the Lord. The ' having seen Jesus,' then, to which Paul here refers is plainly such a seeing as coincided with his becoming an Apostle.- In the opening verses of i Cor. xv. St. Paul's thoughts again dwell upon the close connection between the of St. Paul,' in Expositor, No. 58, 3rd series. Comp. the criticism of Steck, Der Galaterbrief, p. 82, and Volter, Die Composition der paulinischen Haiiptbi-iefe, p. 125. ' For sections 2, 3, and 4, see Paret, ubi supra. * Beyschlag draws attention to the fact that Paul evidently ranked the ofifice of an Apostle above that of a Prophet (i Cor. xii. 28) ; but if the special •characteristic of the latter both in the Old and New Testaments was to have seen visions of the Lord, it would seem that Paul must have based the higher office of an Apostle upon something more than a mere Spa/^a, upon a mere visionary * seeing ' the Lord : this emphatic precedence which Paul assigns to the Apostle- ship points to the fact that while a Prophet was granted an inward and spiritual revelation, an Apostle had also been witness of the actual bodily appearance of the Lord {^Studien und Kritiken, pp. 223, 224, 1864). See further his remarks in Studien und Kritiken, p. 208, 1890, and Lehen Jesii, i. 435. Till': RKSURRECTION 381 Apostolic office and the appearance of the Risen Lord. And in this connection he introduces a remarkable ex- pression : ' and last of all He appeared to me also as to one born out of due time ' (waTrspsl rm sKTpcofiart — verse 8). No word could remind us more forcibly of a violent sudden change, of the miraculous might of the revelation of Jesus Christ, and Paul himself thus paints for us in one graphic word his sudden arrest on his way to Damascus.' 3. It is sometimes objected that Paul nowhere defines clearly the mode and manner of the appearance of Jesus, and that he is far more reserved in his allusion to it in his Epistles than one would suppose in view of his detailed descriptions of his conversion in the Acts. But does not the Apostle's 'reserve' suggest that he had spoken freely and fully ? ' - In the opening ' On the force of the words wcrirepel t^ eKTpio/xan, Sabatier writes : ' Ces derniers mots doivent etre releves. Una seule interpretation est possible ; c'est celle qu'en donnait deja Grotius et que Baur a acceptee. Un e/crpco^a ne peut etre qu'un foetus arrache violemment avant terme au sein maternel ; ce que Grotius exprime tres heureusement dans ces mots : /loc ideo dicii, quia tion lono-a instihitione ad Christianisnmm perdtutiis fuit, quo esset vehtt iiatiii-alis partus, sed vi sulnla, quo inodo imviattiri partus ejici solent.' ' Pourrait-on,' adds Sabatier, ' mieux indiquer le caractere objectif de la violence exercee sur Fame de Paul au moment de sa conversion ? ' {ubi sup7-a, pp. 41, 42). Baur's remarks will be found in his Paiilus, ii. 296, where he quotes with approval the explanation of Grotius, and comments as follows upon the expression fKTpujxa : ' Ein Ausdruck, welcher nicht von einer Spiitgeburt, sondern nur von einer Fehlgeburt zu verstehen ist, aber auch von einer Fehlgeburt nicht so, wie wenn er damit seine Unwlirdigkeit und Unfahigkeit zum Apostelamt bezeichnen wollte, dass er so wenig verdient habe, Apostel zu werden, als eine Fehlgeburt zu leben verdiene, sondern was er mit diesem Ausdruck sagen will, ist vielmehr, dass er auf eine gewaltsame Weise, wie eine Fehlgeburt, als Christ zur Welt geboren worden sei. ' Steinmeyer's lengthy note on the word e/crpoi^a is also of interest and importance, both for his own explanation and for that of others {Auferste/iuitgs- geschichte des Herrn, pp. 139, 140). For a further exegesis of the passage, and for the force of the article before fKTpwfia, see also Kurzgefasster Commentar N. T. pp. 199, 201, dritte Abthei- lung, 1887. Two articles on 'The Sense in which St. Paul calls himself an Ectroma,' in the Expositor, iii. (2nd series), pp. 268, 364, and Matheson's Spiritual Development 0/ St. Paul, pp. 69 ff. , may also be consulted with interest. - See Beyschlag, Studien und Kritiken, p. 218, 1864. With regard to what is called the ' reserve ' of Paul in speaking of his conversion, Beyschlag finds references to the event in i Cor. ix. i, xv. 8; 2 Cor. iv. 6; Gal. i. i, ii_i6; Phil. iii. 4-12, to say nothing of less positive allusions, and he adds that he does not know what more a critic could demand, especially a critic who accepts only four of the Pauline Epistles. 382 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES verses of i Cor. xv. he evidently points back to an earlier recital which he himself had made, and if his ' seeing ' Jesus was so intimately bound up with his claim to be an Apostle, it would have been strange if he had omitted iv Trpcorois (l Cor. XV. 3) all account of the facts upon which that claim was based, and had never mentioned them with something of the precision and detail which marks the narratives of the Acts. 4. But, it is argued, even if it be granted ' that Paul, equally with the other Apostles of Jesus, believed himself to have seen the dead Christ restored to life, and to have seen Him in an objective manner, and if it be granted that this outward seeing of Jesus was for Paul a fact of equal importance with that inward revelation from which he distinguishes it, how can it be proved that it was really the Person of Jesus which he saw, and that his seeing was really an objective seeing ? ^ Never, at any point, so it is maintained, do we pass beyond the self-consciousness and testimony of the Apostle, which no doubt he gives dona fide : ' we believe that he believed him- self to have seen Jesus ' : this formula we may allow to stand, but we cannot know to what extent his perception was of an objective kind, and whether his deeply agitated religious self- consciousness did not at the same moment help to beget and form the vision of the glorified Jesus. One of our own class, continues the objector, say a critic of imperturbable coolness and calmness, would perhaps de- serve credence if he affirmed that he had seen before him a dead man alive, and in a bodily form, although even in such a case it would be necessary to make inquiries as to whether at that moment at which he claimed to have witnessed the appearance he was still a critic of the above character, or whether he had not rather dropped out of his part, and under- gone a momentary destruction of his reasoning functions.^ ' Paret, tibi stipra^ p. 246. ^ See Mangold's note, tibi supra, and for his argument that i Cor. xv. 6 points plainly to an objective seeing, and that therefore the Christophany to Paul, which he places on an equal footing with that in verse 6, should also be regarded in the same light. ' Paret's description irresistibly reminds us of the conditions dem nded for THE RESURRECTION 383 But an Apostle Paul wlio, it is admitted, not seldom falls into trances, received revelations, spoke with tongues, and in moments of the highest spiritual excitement no longer knew whether he was in the body or not, who once at any rate thought himself to ha\-e been snatched up into the third heaven and into Paradise, is not the man whose avowed per- ■ception can vouch to us for the objective truth of a fact so entirely incredible in itself, and so contradictory to all other existing experiences. Now the only ' point d'appui,' as Sabatier reminds us, for all this, is found in the passage, 2 Cor. xii. 1-9, in which Paul undoubtedly speaks of heavenly visions and revelations vouch- safed to him from time to time.' But the Apostle's statement the scientific inquirer into the reality of miracles by Renan in the introduction to his Vie de Jesus. With Paret's criticisms we may compare the closely parallel passage in Sabatier, U Apotre Paul, p. 43. ' Beyschlag's articles in the Studien tend Kritiken remind us how much both Baur and Holsten depend upon this passage to establish their argument as to the incompetency of Paul to distinguish between visions and realities. But by a series of illustrations Beyschlag proves that both the Old and New Testament writers made a marked distinction between them ; and this distinction, as he proceeds to show, may be very plainly seen in the Acts of the Apostles. In ch. xii. 9, e.g., it is said of Peter, after his release from prison, that he knew not that it was true what was done by the angel, but thought that he saw a vision (v. 9) Whether we regard the narrative as historical or not, it is evident that the writer understood how to distinguish between an actual fact and a vision ; moreover, the same book describes visions such as that of Peter in ch. x. 10, and of Paul in the Temple in ch. xxii. 17, as ecstacies, and whilst it designates the later appearances of Christ to the Apostle, and also that vouchsafed to Ananias at the time of Paul's conversion, as visions, ecstacies, hpa^aTo., ^Ka-raans (ch, xviii. 9, xxii. 17, ix. 10), it thrice describes that first appearance, from which Paul's conversion resulted, not as visionary, or estatic, but as an actual fact. How then, asks Beyschlag, can Holsten assert as something self-evident that we have no ground for regarding ' that first vision of the Messiah ' as anything different from the manifold ' visions and revelations of the Lord ' of which Paul informs us in 2 Cor. xii. I ? It is quite true, as Beyschlag himself admits, that once, in Acts xxvi. 19, Paul himself speaks of the appearance of Christ vouchsafed to him before Damascus as a vision, oTrraa-iot, but the word on-Tairia, as Beyschlag shows, is not confined to appearances which the narrators regard as visions (comp. Luke i. 22, xxiv. 23), and its meaning must here be explained from the entire ' objectivity ' with which Paul invests the narrative of his conversion ; to say with Holsten that Luke has translated ' objectively ' the ' subjective ' appear- ance of a light and the ' subjective ' sound of a voice is merely a petit io principii. Studien und Kritiken, pp. 203 fi". 1864 ; and also Studien und Kritiken, pp. 192-206, 1870. See further, Beyschlag, Leben Jesu, i. 446, 447, and on the manner in which 384 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES in this chapter, so far from relegating his ' seeing ' Jesus to the inner world of his own consciousness, helps us to establish a directly opposite view. It is not only that the chronological notice ' fourteen years ago ' (verse 2) cannot, without the most violent exegesis, be referred to the moment of the Apostle's conversion. Paul would hardly have spoken of himself at the time of the event as ' a man in Christ ' ; but the Apostle's whole tone and attitude with respect to the visions and revelations of 2 Cor. xii. is in striking contrast with the manner in which he speaks of seeing the Lord in i Cor. ix. and XV. The opening words of this chapter, 2 Cor. xii., show us the Apostle speaking with evident reluctance and reserve. We are made aware of his intention to communicate a series of visions and revelations (since he speaks of them in the plural, and commences so far back in point of time), and not merely the particular incident recorded in verses 2, 3, 4. But as he proceeds, his reluctance becomes a positive aver- sion (verse 5) ; not even the insolence of his adversaries shall tear away the veil which hides the depths of his spiritual life ; he will no longer boast or parade himself, lest in doing so he should destroy his relation of equality with his readers (verse 6) ; he will only put forward the aspect of his life most characterised by weakness, and express his regret that he had already said so much (verse 11). But if it was a prin- ciple of the Apostle's mode of action to conceal from the public gaze all that belonged to the life of the spirit hidden in God : if when he glories in a vision such as that narrated in 2 Cor. xii., or makes any mention of it, he becomes 'foolish' (verses 6, 11): then he must have made an incon- ceivable exception in relation to the seeing Jesus of which he speaks in i Cor. ix. and xv., if that also could be referred only to this spiritual province. If it had differed in no respect from ' the visions and revelations ' of 2 Cor. xii. i Paul expressly separates the ' seeing ' Christ, upon which his Apostleship was based, from any visionary appearances, Sttidien und Kritike7i, p. 208, 1870, where Beyschlag follows the line of argument in the text. See also Mangold's note, iibi supra. Till': RKSURRECTION 385 there remains a strange paradox in the faet tliat St. Paul should ha\e made it his loudest boast, that he should have demanded for it a public recognition, and placed it in the forefront of his preaching of the gospel.' Or if, again, it was of the same nature and kind as the spiritual and apocal)-ptic appearances of Christ, which con- tinued during the Apostolic age (Rev. i. 10, 12), then it is not too much to affirm that the expression ' last of air (i Cor. XV. 8) has no intelligible force or meaning. The only justification for its introduction is to be found in the belief that the Apostle drew a hard and fast line between those appearances of which the series was closed (verse 8), and all subsequent visions and revelations, such, e.g., as that described in 2 Cor. xii. 9 : and if we ask the reason of this distinction, it is difficult to .say upon what else it de- pended except upon the Apostle's belief that the appearances of the Risen Saviour had a character of objective reality which could not be assigned to such visions and revelations as those referred to in 2 Cor. xii.- ' For the preceding argument, see Paret, tibi supra, pp. 248, 249, and also Paret, Pauhis nnd Jesus, pp. 21, 22. Weiss is in the closest agreement with Paret (to whose article he refers) in drawing out this same argument : Lebenjesji, Bd. ii. pp. 626, 627, and Eiiileitting, pp. 114,116, 2. Aufl. To the same effect, Sabatier, UApotre Paul, pp. 44, 45 ; and Godet in the Introduction to his Commentary on the Romans, p. 18 (' La Conversion de Saul'), 2nd edit. -' See Paret, ' Das Zeugniss des Apostels Paulus,' &c., in Jahtb. fiir deutsche Theol. 1859, pp. 249, 250, with which compare the remarks of Sabatier, ubi supra, pp. 45, 46. After speaking of the form of the expression ' last of all ' in I Cor. XV. 8 as pointing to the line of demarcation which the Apostle drew between the series of appearances thus closed and the ecstacies and visions of the Apostolic age, he adds : ' D'oii vient cette distinction tres-nette, sinon du sentiment que les apparitions du Ressuscite avaient un caractere de realite objective que n'avaient plus les visions spirituelles de I'extase ? ' (p. 46). So, too, Weiss, after pointing out the way in which Paul differentiates i Cor. XV. 8 from 2 Cor. xii., and from the visions described in the Book of the Reve- lation, inasmuch as the appearance in i Cor. xv. 8 marks the last of a series, concludes : ' Dieselbe muss also durchaus etwas Eigenartiges, sie von sonstigen Christusvisionen Unterscheidendes gehabt haben, und das wird man, wenn man ihre Zusammenstellung mit den Christuserscheinungen der Urapostel in Rechnung zieht, immer am naturlichsten darauf zurtickfiihren, das hier irgend ein sinnen- fialliges Erlebniss damit verbunden gewesen ist ' (Leben Jesu, Bd. ii. p. 627). To the same effect Godet, ubi supra, p. 17 ; Gess, Das Dogtna von Chi-isii Person und IVerk (Vorwort), pp. 18, 19 ; Nosgen, Geschichte Jesu Christi, p. 648. cc 386 Tin: WITNESS of the epistles It has, indeed, been contended that in usincj the words tayjxTov TrduTMv, St. Paul only meant to express that the appearance of the Risen Lord vouchsafed to him was ' last ' in its relation to the appearances vouchsafed to the first Apostles, and that such an expression does not mark it off from other later visions of Christ, but this contention over- looks the fact that the Apostle does not write so-x^drw sfiol 'to me as the last' but sa-'^^aTov sfiol, i.e. 'for the last time (when it occurred at all) to me,' whereby he excludes the re- currence of further appearances of a similar kind.' But if the assumption of a mere vision, as Weiss puts it, is inadequate to explain St. Paul's language in i Cor. xv. 8, it is unfair to make a similar assumption with reference to the manifestations of the Risen Lord to the other Apostles, all of which are described by the same word m^Otj, or to interpret such a word to mean a mere visionary appearance, or a mere subjective process in the Apostles' own minds. '^ The death, the burial, the resurrection of Jesus are in St. Paul's view three facts which stand upon an equal footing as facts appealing to the senses. There is not the smallest ground for supposing that Paul's Corinthian opponents had ever thrown doubts upon the reality of the bodily resurrection of Jesus Himself On the contrary, we find that Paul argues from it, as from a fact which the Corinthians themselves admitted, and the denial of which, even from their own point of view, could be shown to be an impossibility and an absurdity.'' And yet, as Paret argues, the more Paul adores and spiritualises Christ (so that he prays to Him, as to one who was every- ' Beyschlag, Lebeii Jesu, Bd. i. p. 435, note. - See Beyschlag's articles previously mentioned, and Dr. Milligan's note on the word wcpdr] in his Lectiu-es on the Resurrection of our Lord, p. 265. For more recent remarks of Beyschlag in which he expresses himself as still holding the same views against the vision-hypothesis, see his Leben Jesu, i. 434 ff. 2. Aufl. 1887. How much Schmiedel is puzzled by the word &<^Qy\ we can gather from his recent remarks in the Hand-ConiDientar zuin N. T. ii. erste Abtheilung, ii. Hiilfte, pp. 157, 158, 1891. ^ Paret, Das Zeugniss des Apostels Paulus, uln supra, p. 251 ; and Paret, Paulus und Jesus, uhi supra, p. 21 ; Sabatier, VApotre Paul, p. 59 ; Godet, ubi stcpra, pp. 17, 18, 19 ; Thenius, Das EvajigcUuin oJiue die Evangclieu, pp. 73- 76; Beyschlag, Studien und Kriti/cett, p. 226, 1864. THE RESURRECTION 387 where present, and ealls Him by name 'the Spirit') the more remarkable does it become that he keeps such a decisive hold upon the human personality and the actual corporeity of the exalted Saviour. If the question in debate is the resurrection, the Apostle has before his e)'cs the body of Jesus, a body endowed with incorruption, glory, and power. If we ask what was the exact nature of this spiritual and heavenl)' body we cannot say, but at least we may suppose that the Apostle would have given some explanation of it to the curious and disputatious Greeks, and the hints which he affords us (i Cor. xv. 49 ; Phil. iii. 21) are not to be dis- missed as based upon his own mere imagination, but upon the bodily appearance of the Risen Jesus vouchsafed to him and to the other Apostles.' Now a popular mode of thought in our own day entirely overlooks the fact that St. Paul places what we call a mira- culous event, such as the Resurrection of our Lord, side by side with His crucifixion : the Resurrection, that is, is treated historically and not ideally.- It is contended, e.g., that the ' Paret, Das Zeugn/ss des Aposteh Paiihis, p. 251, and Paulus und Jesus, ubi supra, p. 21, with which compare especially Weiss, Lebeii Jesii,\\. 623 ; Lechler, Das apost, Zeitalter, pp. 359, 360 ; Meyer, Co7-intherbriefe, i. 419, where reference is made to Paret's article on Paul's testimony ; see further, Steinmeyer, ubi supra, pp. 109 ff. ^ No one could have expressed himself more decidedly against this view than Sabatier in his VApotre Paul, p. 59. After pointing out that Paul has described the Passion and Resurrection of Jesus not as two abstract notions, as if he were merely treating of an ideal Christ, but as two historical concrete facts, he continues : ' C'est bien ici la croix a laquelle a ete attache, il y a quelques annees a peine, Jesus de Nazareth ; c'est bien le tombeau oil son corps a ete enseveli et d'ou il est sorti triomphant. Fvit-il impossible de montrer que Paul n'a pas connu autre chose de la vie historicjue de Jesus, la manicre dont il a recueilli et considere ces deux grands faits suffirait pour rattacher la conscience de Paul au Christ historique, et empecher de reduire sa theologie a un pur idealisme.' Compare Westcott, Gospel of the Resurrection, pp. 108, 109 : ' The fact itself (the Resurrection of Christ) was treated historically and not ideally. It was not regarded as the embodiment of a great hope, or as a consequence of some preconceived notion of the Person of Christ. On the contrary, the hope was expressly rested on the fact ; and the apostolic view of the nature of Christ is deduced from I lis rising again.' After quoting i Cor. xv. I-8, 11, as an outline given by Paul uf ' ihe Gospel' by which men 'were saved,' he continues: 'Nothing can be more simply historic. What we call the miraculous facts are placed beside the others without any difference. The Resurrection of the Lord, and Ilis appearances after the Resurrection, are taught as events of the same kind essentially, and to c c 2 388 THE WITNKSS OF THE EPISTLES m}'th of the Incarnation was the expression of the idea of purity, and that to regard Christmas as embodying that idea is to treat it in a way exactly similar to St. Paul's treatment of Easter. The Resurrection of Christ expressed the idea of ' a death unto sin and a life unto righteousness,' and only through a legend could this idea find its way into the hearts of men. But, in the first place, we may readily admit that the words ' birth ' and ' death ' and ' resurrection ' are often used in the New Testament in a spiritual and figurative sense^ although there are surely many passages where such an in- terpretation of them is forced and arbitrary. And, in the next place, we do well to remember that this ' spiritual ' interpretation of the historical facts of the Christian creed is no new danger, and certainly no new discovery. There were men belonging to the various sects of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries who retained more or less the dogmas of the Church, but who, under the pretence of spiritualising them, transformed them into mere symbols of universal religious ideas, and treated the historical element as a mere covering of the reality. But, as Hagenbach has pointed out,^ in all this there lay an element of truth : the mere historical revelation does not effect our salvation unless the historical events are repeated in us, unless Christ again assumes life and form in mankind, unless the Incarnation accomplished in Him is accomplished again in us, unless we are crucified with Him, unless we rise with Him to newness of life, and have with Him our conversation in heaven : but such was the teaching of the orthodox Church, when it was not stiffened into the dead letter. The result, however, of the complete separation between the historical and the ideal, which won be received in the same way as His Death and Burial. Together they formed '« the Gospel," and in this respect, whether it was " the Three," or St. Paul who preached, the substance of their preaching was the same.' It is necessary to remark that, with regard to Sabatier, one cannot claim that his views remain what they were in i88i. See an article, ' Die " Umbildung "^ der Dogmen,' in the Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirchenzeitiing, Nov. 28, 1890, on Sabatier's pronouncement on Christian Dogmas before the University of Paris, Nov. 4, 1889 ; and comp. on Sabatier's position, Godet, HEpitre aux Romains^ ii. 653, 1890. ' Hagenbach, Kiixhengeschichte, ii. 472. THE RESURRKCTION 389 favour amont^st some of these medi;iival sects, was certainly not encouraging : in some cases it issued in Pantheisin, in others in lawlessness, in others in neglect of the Sacraments,' and even the teaching of a holy m\-stic like Johann Tauler was not free from expressions which the multitude might easily make a pretext for putting aside both grace and virtue.'- It is surely not unreasonable to maintain that however high and pure may be the motives of men who are tempted to weaken the historical facts of the Christian creed, such a weakening is liable in the hands of less noble spirits to those same gross perversions which characterised former ages, and which Hagenbach has so vividly portrayed. But in addition to the difficulties arising from an examina- tion of St. Paul's own language, the advocates of the vision- theory are chargeable with the same inconsistency in the case of St. Paul as in the case of St. Peter, viz. that the faith which the vision, in accordance with the theor}', ought to create, is all along presupposed. This is pointed out no less forcibly b)- Dr. Weiss than b)' Dr. Milligan,'' and it is a fatal flaw in the highly-coloured efforts of Renan, Hausrath and Pfleiderer, or in the somewhat similar attempt of Strau.ss to anal}'se the psychological conditions which resulted in Paul's conversion.' Certainly it has been alleged that Paul's earlier life was marked by gradual preparations for a sudden change. He had been struggling, it is said, against the unsatisfactoriness of the Pharisaic standpoint. He had been pricked to the heart by ' Hagenbach, JCirchengcsckuIitc, ii. 472-474. - /i>/i/. ii. 500, 501. ' ' Damit fallt jede Moglichkeit unci jede geschichtliclie Berechligung einer Erkljirung seines Christusglaubens aus einer auf rein psychologischen Wege vermittelten Christusvision, luelche iiniiier schon iri^eiidwie den Glaiiben voraussetzt, wek/ien ste erzeugl haben solP (Weiss, Lehen Jesu, Bd. ii. p. 624). Compare also Ullmann, Historisch odcr Mythisch ? p. 30, and especially .Sabatier, UApctre Paul, p. 46, where reference is made to the excellent articles of Beyschlag in the Stiidicn mui Kritiken, 1864, 1 870. With these articles we may compare Beyschlag's remarks in his Leben Jesii, Bd. i. pp. 436-438. ' For a good criticism of Renan's rationale of raiiTs conversion (to which reference is made by Hausrath in his own highly-coloured Neutcslainentliihe Zeitgeschiihte, Bd. iii. pp. 63, 64), see Godet, iibi supra, pp. 18, 19. 390 Tin: witnp:ss of the epistles the murder of Stephen ; he saw in the Nazarencs a joy and a peace in the presence of a cruel death, which he could not dismiss from his thoughts ; his excited imagination made him believe that he beheld the image of Jesus and heard His voice — but what he beheld was only the image of his own fancy ; what he heard was only the echo of his own con- science.' Such a picture of the Apostle's mental state is drawn in direct opposition to his own statements. Paul knows nothing of a gradual conversion to the Gospel. In Gal. i. 12-16, if his language has any meaning, it certainly shows that he was quite inaccessible to human influences in this matter: all through his life his conversion is regarded as an event which surprised him in the midst of his fanatical zeal : he represents it as being appreJiended by Christ (Phil. iii. 12), he has been conquered by main force ; if he preaches the Gospel he does so of necessity ; he describes himself by a term which pointedly indicates the sudden change wrought upon him (i Cor. xv. 8).- If it be argued that Paul for a long time previous to his conversion had been resisting better convic- tions, and drowning the voice of conscience by more violent persecutions, it can only be said that the essential test by which all such theories must be tried, viz. the Apostle's own language, points in quite an opposite direction. More than once he speaks in words of intense self-accusation (i Cor. XV. 9 ; Gal. i. 13), but there is no acknowledgment that in his zeal against the Christians he was violating his conscience, ' Thus Dr. Pfleiderer in his Hihhert Lectures (1885), in explaining Paul's conversion, speaks of 'a soul which had been violently agitated, and torn by the most terrible doubts ' (p. 43) ; Strauss, Leben Jesii fiir das detitsche Volk, pp. 384, 385 ; and see Weiss, Leheii Jesu, ii. 624, for a graphic description of these fanciful pictures. Steinmeyer justly criticises the manner in which Strauss gets over the subject of Paul's conversion : ' So ergab sich fiir den Paulus eine Ekstase, in welcher ihm Christus in aller seiner Herrlichkeit erschien, ihn auf das Verkehrte und Verderb- liche seines Treibens aufmerksam machte und ihn ziini Uebertritt in seineii Dienst berief^ (Z. J. p. 304), ' and siininioned hi/n to pass over into his service ' : ' that is all, absolutely all,' adds Steinmeyer, ' which Strauss says to remove the difficulty ! ' {J)ie Aiifersiehiingsgeschichte des Herrn, p. 147). 2 See especially Sabatier, tibi supra, p. 39; and Weiss, Einleitung, p. 116. 2. Aufl. ; Godet, ///'/ supra, p. 16 ; Lechler, Das apost. Zeitaltci , p. 265, 3. Aufi. ; Beyschlag, Stiidien iind Kritikett, p. 243, 1864. THE RESURRKCTION 39 r or acting; Axilfull}- ai^ainst his better judgment, and if \vc accept I Tim. i. 13 he has himself anticipated and refuted all such imputations.' If, indeed, the Apostle had been filled with a consuming desire to sec Jesus after His Resurrection (as Holstcn imagines, and as he is obliged to imagine for the creation of the vision of the Risen One in the Apostle's mind), if, indeed, he lived under a sense of painful anxiety that he might be fighting against God, then it was his first and bounden duty to advance no further upon a path in which each step might perchance prove to be a further act of impiety. A man so eminently conscientious as Paul, who could declare that an act innocent in itself was of sin if done in doubt instead of in faith (Rom. xiv. 23), would rather have laid aside his com- mission from the Sanhedrin, and would have decided that inward mental struggle, not by fresh deeds of violence, but in quiet and retirement. - Nor is Holsten any more successful in his attempt to reduce the Apostle to a mere weak epileptic with shattered nerves. To say nothing of the fact that the almost incredible catalogue of the Apostle's labours in itself refutes such a supposition (2 Cor. xi.), whilst it helps us at the same time to understand more fully the constant references to his bodily ' Weiss, Leboi Jesu, Bd. iii. p. 624, and especially Einkitung, p. 116, 2. Aufl. ; Beyschlag, Studien inid Kritiken, p. 49, 1870. It is not fair to build a contrary theot}' on the ambiguous proverb contained in Acts xxvi. 14 (see Professor Massie's article, ubi supra ; Beyschlag, Studien uiut Kritiken, pp. 259, 260, 1864), especially when such a theory is put forward by critics who insist upon the differences in detail of the narratives of Paul's conversion in the Acts, and who deal with that book in such an arbitrary manner (see, e.g., Hase's method of treating the words in question, Kircheiigiscliiclile, p. 143, 1885). On the other hand we do not, of course, regard the mind of Paul as being at the time of his conversion a kind of tabula rasa (see especially Schmid, Bibl^ Theol. des N. T. p. 312, 5. Aufl. ; and Sabatier, UApotre Paul, p. 49). If we believe, e.g., that as Saul of Tarsus he found that the legal righteousness of the Pharisees gave him no rest for his soul, and if he was, so to speak, before his conversion inwardly ready for Christ, it is no more reasonable to conclude that the whole process of his conversion may be accounted for naturally than to affirm that pressing hunger or thirst naturally produce of themselves the food or drink by which they are appeased and satisfied (Beyschlag, Studien und Kiitiken, pp. 249-260, 1864; and //'/(/. p. 45, 1S70). ■^ Studien trnd A'ritiken, p. 49, 1 870. 392 THE WITxNESS OF THE EPISTLES weakness, it would indeed be strange that if the ' thorn in the flesh ' (2 Cor. xii. 9), by which Holsten would understand a kind of epilepsy, was a condition of receiving the abund- ance of the revelations, the Apostle should thrice beseech the Lord that it might be taken from him ! ' But supposing that the graphic picture is true, and that Paul on the way to Damascus was already almost a Christian ? If so, the vision which followed has to account not onl}' for his conversion, but for his ApostlesJiip. The two are essentially related in Paul's thought and language, as we have already seen ; there was one requisite which raised the office of an Apostle above every other, the requisite expressed by Paul himself in the well-known words ' not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised Him from the dead.' Put it is one of the essential mental conditions upon which the visionary theory rests, that visions can only render objective images already formed. We are therefore obliged to suppose that Paul was on the point of becoming not only a Christian but an Apostle, and that he had conceived the thought within himself of filling the Apostolic office amongst the servants of the Crucified,' and ' Studien wid Kritikeii, pp. 237, 238, 1864. See also Dr. Fairbairn's remarks on Paul's character, iibi supra, pp. 347, 348. - Steinmeyer, tibi supra, p. 144, where he well reminds us in a note, the fact which astonished the early Church was not merely that the persecutor had become a convert, but z. preacher of the Gospel which once he had destroyed (Gal. i. 23, Acts ix. 20, 21). Comp. also Luthardt, Die Erscheimtngen des Atiferstaudeven im Kreise seiner /linger {Gesaiinnelte Vortrdge, 1876), pp. 71, 72 ; and esp. Steinmeyer, jdn sup7-a, pp. 143-I47. .So, too, Luthardt, in an essay entitled Der Apostel Paii/us contained in the same volume, has pointed out that none of the so-called natural explanations, none of the influences which are supposed to have been at work in the Apostle's mind, are sufficient in themselves to explain the entire transformation of his inner man : ' Durch solche Mittel kommt keine Bekehrung zu .Stande. Und wollte 7uan duck seine Bekehrung so erkldren — aber too bleibt der Apostel ? Pauhis ist atif diesein IVege nicht /doss ein Christ, er ist ein Apostel Jesu Christ gcworden ' (P- 148). .So, too, Godet in maintaining the objectivity of the appearance of the Risen Christ to Paul, adds {tdn supra, p. 17) : ' Paul lui-meme etait si fermement convaincu a cet egard, qu'il en appelle sans hesiter, i Cor. ix. i, pour prouver la realite de son apostolat, au fait qu'il a vu le Seigneur, ce qui ne peut s'appliquer dans sa pensee a une simple vision ; car on n^ a jamais imagine quhine vision siifflra pour conferer P apostolat. ' TIIK RKSURRF.CTION 393 the imagination which prompted liim tobeh'evcin this call and mission. Weizsackcr, indeed, thinks that Paul had no need of a special call to the Apostlcship.' As he had already been a kind of Apostle among the Jews, there is no difficulty in supposing that he should have felt himself called to fill a similar office in the Church of Jesus Christ. But Weizsacker's theory, however he may elaborate it, really obliges us to believe that Paul made himself an Apostle, and, more ■especially, an Apostle to the heathen. Yet we cannot justly suppose that there was anything in Paul's past life to account for his taking upon himself the office of a Christian Apostle. - After stating the vision theory and all that can possibly be said in its favour, Keim adds that, notwithstanding all these arguments, it is by no means his intention to adopt it,'' and he confesses that for him the Resurrection belongs essentially to faith ; ^ he afterwards speaks of it as the secure faith-fortress of the Resurrection."' But he admits that the belief that Jesus lived as Messiah in the bosom of God would never have been generated by feverish Oriental visions : the greatest of men would have passed away and left no trace ; in Galilee his memory would have lingered for a time, but we should ha\e had no religious exaltation, and no St. Paul : the evidence which was wanted was that Jesus was alive, and this evidence was therefore given.'' But this influence of the glorified Christ from a higher world upon his followers — this telegram from heaven, as Keim calls it ^ — exerted in a special manner and at a special time, is it not in the highest degree supernatural .•* And what end is gained by substituting one miracle for another, by maintaining, c.if., that the manifestation of the Risen Lord was ;r^/, while repudiating the term objective } ' Das apost. Zeitalier, p. 78. - See Deck in Theologisihe Stitdien aus IViiriteiiiherg, pp. 36 ff. , x. Jahrgang, 1889, I. Heft ; and conip. the important remarks of Reuss, Geschichte der heiligen Schriften des N. T. p. 56, 6. Aufl. ■' Keim, Geschichte Jcsii, Bd. ill. y. 594. * Ibid. p. 601. * Ihid. p. 606. • Ibid. p. 605. For the high value which Keim attaches to Paul's character and testimony on the .'.ubject of the Resurrection of Jesus, see his Geschiclite /esu, iii. 532, and chap. ii. above. • ' Keim, ibid. p. 605. 394 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES Even the corporeal appearance of Jesus, says Keim, may be granted to those who are afraid of losing everything without it.' Certainly, it may still be maintained that these conces- sions by no means guarantee the details of the Resurrection appearances to the first disciples recorded in the Gospel narratives. But if such narratives cannot fairly be derived from Jewish or heathen ideas,- why should they be summarily dismissed, because they purport to describe in detail events to which Paul had only occasion to make a brief reference, inasmuch as an earlier account of them is evidently pre- supposed ? -^ At all events it will remain a notable fact in the history of recent German criticism that Karl Hase, no less than Keim, was impressed at first with the arguments for the vision-theor}-, but recognised on reflection its utter inadequacy to account for the facts of the case. Hase criticises some of the instances recorded in poetry and legend of the appearances of the dead, of a Thomas a Becket, of a Savonarola, but in a few striking words he differentiates all such cases from those recorded in the Gospels : (i) because they consisted only of spiritual appearances, there being no thought of a resur- rection, and (2) because after merely affording a pleasing ' Keim, Geschichie Jesti, iii. p. 603. - For the impossibility of deriving the New Testament accounts of the Resurrection from previous Jewish ideas, see above, pp. 366, 367 ; for the equal impossibility of deriving them from heathen sources, see especially Westcott, Gospel of the Resurrection, pp. 115-I17. It is strange that a writer with Professor Huxley's acuteness cannot see the fundamental difference between the belief in the Resurrection of Christ and the belief in the return of a Nero. And yet he seriously compares the one belief with the other {Nitieteeuth Century, April 1889) : it was credited, he tells us, not only by heathens, but by Christians also, that Nero was not dead, but was hidden away somewhere in the East, and that he would speedily come again at the head of a large army to be revenged upon his enemies. That such a belief existed no one disputes ; but in the one case, the belief was built upon a denial that death had ever taken place (see Renan's UAntechrist, pp. 317-319, and his account of the origin of the belief in the return of Nero) ; in the other case, the belief was built upon a death which was witnessed to and gloried in as an historical and imdoubted fact. ^ After speaking of the appearances of the Risen Christ in the Gospels, Weiss adds that it is perfectly arbitrarj- to say that such appearances belong to the later embellishments of legend because Paul does not relate any details of them (Weiss, Leben/esii, Bd. iii. p. 605 ; and comp. also p. 617). TlIK RKSURRKCTION 395 gratification they passed away without result, whilst the Risen One from Golgotha has transformed the world.' In concluding this chapter, it is well to remind ourselves that this inabilit)' of German criticism to render any satis- factor}- account of our Lord's Resurrection — Hase can only conclude that one thing is certain, \-iz. the firm belief of the disciples and the Church that Jesus had risen (' Geschichtc Jesu,' p. 599 : so, too, Strauss himself, ' Leben Jesu,' p. 289)- — may be said to apply also to that other great fact of which we have been treating, the conversion of the Apostle Paul. We cannot too often call to mind that it was no inferior critic, but Baur himself, who in the evening of his life, and to the vexation of his followers, gave up all natural explanations of Paul's conversion, and confessed that he could only see in it a miracle the inner secret of which no logical or psycho- logical analysis could discover.'' ' Hase, Geschichte Jesu, pp. 595-597. See also the remarks of Mr. Gore in his Bamptoit Lectures, p. 76. - How much more satisfactory is the decision of Weiss, who, after pointing out that the greatest critic of our century, whilst granting the firm belief of the disciples in the Resurrection of Jesus, and that that belief had for them all the reality of an historical fact, gives up all hope of explaining the phenomena, adds : ' historical inquiry cannot remain stationary at such a point ; the history of Christianity cannot begin with an insoluble puzzle ' {Leben Jesu, Bd. ii. p. 596). Comp. the similar remarks of Beyschlag on Baur's position, Leben Jesu, i. 452, 453, and see also Fairbairn, ubi supra, pp. 337, 338. Harnack wishes to dis- tinguish between the historical question and the question of belief. But in his treatment of what he calls the firm historical points he seems to fall back with Baur upon Gal. i. 15, to the exclusion of Paul's other references to the appearance of the Risen Christ vouchsafed to him, and he dismisses as of a legendary character the mention of the empty grave. That the grave was found empty on the third day, Harnack holds to be excluded by Paul's account in i Cor. xv., and he ap- parently endorses WeizsJicker's theory already mentioned of Peter's share in creating the belief in the Resurrection {Dogmcngescliiclite, i. p. 74). ^ Baur's words are these : ' Wir konncn in der Bekehrung des Apostels Paulus nur ein Wunder sehen, und keine weder dialektische noch psychologische Analyse kaijm das innere Geheimniss des Actes erforschen ' {Kirchengeschichte der ersten drei Jahrhunderte, p. 45). For a criticism of the views put forward by Renan and Keim to explain the conversion of Paul, see Godet, ubi supra, pp. 18, 19. With Renan's conclusion that if the Apostle's conversion was not a miracle in the old traditional meaning of the word, it remains a psychological problem for ever insoluble by us of to-day {Les Epilres Pauliniennes, i. Ii) comp. the remarks of Reuss, Gescliichte der heiligen Schriflen des N. T. pp. 55, 56, 6. Aufl. 1887. 39^ THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES It is a common thing to be told that however Baur's opinions may have been modified by subsequent critics, we owe him a great debt of gratitude, because he has given us such wide and rich views of early Church History.' But, however this may be, the truth remains that there are two facts, the Resurrection of Jesus and the conversion of St. Paul, of which neither Baur nor any of his followers have been able to give any satisfying explanation, and yet, these are the two facts upon which the whole history of the Apostolic Age turns.'^ ' See, e.^. , 'The New Reformaiion,^ in ihe JViiiefeeii^A Ceittuiy iox March, 1889. '^ This is well put by Lichtenberger in his Histoire des Idees Keligieuses en Allemagne, iii. iii, 2nd edit. (E. T. p. 390) 1888 : ' La resurrection de Jesus et la conversion de Saint Paul sont les deux points que ni Baur ni ses disciples ne sont parvenus a expliquer d'une maniere satisfaisante. Et c'est sur eux pourtant que pivote toute I'histoire du siecle apostolique. Chose etrange mais signifi- cative ! ' THE ASCENSION AND THE RETURN 397 CHAPTER VIII THE ASCENSION AND THE RETURN St. Paul not only insists upon the great cardinal fact of the Resurrection of Jesus, but he also bears witness to another fact, which is, at least for every Christian, its fitting and necessary complement : * He ascended into heaven.' To deny the Ascension, and at the same time to affirm the Resurrec- tion, as Schleiermacher proposed, is an inconsistency which no one has emphasised more pointedly than Strauss,' and Keim candidly admits that the reception of Christ into heaven is the unanimous assertion of the New Testament writers.- Certainly it may be said that in many of his refer- ences Paul assumes, and that he never describes, the Ascension of the Lord (although in the Epistle to the Ephesians the fact is so prominent, and the allusions to it are so distinct, that this Epistle has been called ' the Epistle of the Ascension '). ' See the remarks of Steinnieyer, Die Ajifcrste]umgsi:;eschichte des Herni, p. 232 ; and also Strauss's criticism in Der Christus des Glmibens, pp. 201-208. On the close connection between the Resurrection and Ascension, and on the Incarnation as completed by the Ascension, see Dr. Milligan, Ascension of our Lord, p. 27, and for references to the latter in the Pauline Epistles, see Schmid, Bibl. Tkeol. d-es N. T. p. 92, 5. Aufl. ; and Weiss, Leben Jesu, Bd. ii. pp. 622, 623. - Keim, GescUichte Jesii, Bd. iii. pp. 606, 607. Among the passages enumerated by Keim, we find i Thess. iv. 16 ; Rom. viii. 34, x. 6 ; Rev. iii. 21, xxii. 3 ; Heb. i. 3, 13, iv. 14, vi. 20, ix. 11, x. 12; John iii. 13, 31, vi. 62; Acts i. II, ii. 33, vii. 56; Ephes. i. 20, ii. 6, iv. 8-10 ; i Tim. iii. 16; i Pet. iii. 22, &c. Nbsgen, iibi supra, pp. 685, 686, maintains that if Ephesians is denied to us, Rom. x. 6 contains an evident allusion to the Ascension, and he refers to i Tim. iii. 16 as a proof that Paul was always mindful of the fact, and to I Peter iii. 22, that it was known and recognised in the Apostolic age. See also Milligan, ubi supra, pp. II-13. It is often maintained that in such pas- sages as I Tim. iii. 16 we have a fragment of some early Christian hymn : on the force of the ' faithful sayings ' in the Pastoral Epistles, as, e.g., in i Tim. i. 15, see Humphry, ubi supra, in loco, and also p. 253 above. 398 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES It is evident that the fact is present to St. Paul's mind, and that it is assumed even in his earliest Epistle in the New Testament (i Thcss. i. lo) : there is undoubtedly one reference to it in the Epistle to the Romans (viii. 34), and probably another, although of a more incidental character, in ch. X. 6 ; • and if it is said that even in the later Epistles which are attributed to Paul the fact is still only assumed (cf. e.g. Col. iii. i ; Ephes. i. 20), there is a very distinct allusion to it in Ephes. iv. 8-10, and again in the phrase contained in i Tim. iii. \6} The circumstance that Paul only assumes or alludes to the fact of the Resurrection may help us to understand the attitude of a writer like Paret, who declines to accept the Epistle to the Ephesians or the Pastoral Epistles. After insisting so earnestly, as we have seen, upon the objective fact of the Resurrection, he is of opinion that it must remain undecided whether Paul taught and narrated a visible Ascension of Christ to heaven. The Apostle knows, indeed, that Christ is at the right hand of God (Rom. viii. 34), and he awaits His return from heaven (i Thess. i. 10, iv. 16 ; Phil. iii. 20) : evidently, therefore, according to Paul, the passage of Christ into heaven must lie between His Resurrec- tion and His later existence in heaven : but Jiotv the Apostle represented this we do not know.'^ But it is to be observed that after making these qualifications, Paret draws particular attention to the fact that it must always remain a matter worthy of consideration that the Pauline Luke relates most graphically a visible Ascension.^ We may remark in ' On the application of this passage to the Ascension, rather than to the Incarnation, as is sometimes maintained, see Godet, U Epitrc aiix Roiiiains, ii. 336-338 ; and comp. Keim's references in previous note. ■-^ For the significance of these allusions, see Schmid, Bibl. Theol. des N. T. p. 93, 5. Aufl. , and Milligan, iihi snp7-a, pp. 7-10. ^ Paret, Paulus utid Jesus, p. 22 ; so also Huraut, ubi supra, p. 22. ■* Paret, ibid. He also points out in this connection that the Epistle to the Hebrews, which was certainly a writing of the Pauline School, not only works out the idea of the Ascension as dogmatically as Paul does that of the Resurrec- tion, but almost appears to presuppose that event as visible to the eyes and liappening in space, ch. iv. 14, and other similar passages. See the strictures of Steinmeyer, Die Atifersteliiingsgeschichte des Herrn, p. 223, note, on the view THE ASCENSION AND THE RETURN 399 passing that if the fuhicss with which the Pauline Luke narrates the Ascension (cf. Acts i.) is a proof that the details of that event could not have been unknown to St. Paul, the same line of argument tends to show that the Apostle could not have been ignorant of the details of the Incarnation, when we remember the fulness with which St. Luke describes that event. But further : if St. Paul gives us no detailed account of the Ascension in his Epistles, it is most important to bear in mind that he is writing to Christians Avho may fairly be presumed to have been already acquainted with it,' 'and that his fuller treatment of the Resurrection history was demanded by practical difficulties which were not imme- diately connected, so far as we know, with the Saviour's Ascen- put forward even by Meyer, that while the actual fact of the Ascension is immovably established in the New Testament, a visible occurrence meeting the senses belongs to a later tradition. On some of the difficulties raised in detail by Strauss and .Schenkel, see Milligan, iibi supra, p. 15. Ilarnack, with an inge- nuity worthy of Pfleiderer (see above, p. 87 ft". ), evidently sees in such passages as Rom. X. 6, Ephes. iv. 9, i Pet. iii. 22, the source of the representation of Christ's Ascension {DogmengescJiichte, i. pp. 172, 173). ' See Steinmeyer, ui>i supra, pp. 224-226, for an interesting account of the ' strange ' silence of the two Evangelists, who were also disciples, Matthew and John, as to the Ascension of the Lord, and Keim's references to New Testament jiassages in Bd. iii. p. 606, ul>i supra. See Nosgen, ubi supra, p. 685. ' We make the same remark upon the Ascension of Christ as we before made upon His miraculous conception. In regard to neither is prominence given to the special and actual fact in the Apostolic writings ; in regard to both such a fact is presupposed in the general conviction of the Apostles, and in the conver- sion of Christian consciousness' (Neander, Life of Christ, E. T. 4S7). Beyschlag's comments upon the Ascension cannot be regarded as very satis- factory [Lebcnjesu, i. 460 ff.), and he apparently forgets his own argument with regard to the references to other important facts in the Pauline Epistles, viz. that they were written to Churches already acquainted with the main facts of the Evangelical tradition (ubi sup)-a, i. 62, 67, and articles mentioned above in Studien unci Kritiken). Thus he maintains that the manner in which Paul joins the appearances of Christ vouchsafed to him to the Easter appearances as a proof of the Resurrection (l Cor. xv. 7, 8), makes the impression that he knew of no intervening fact, such as a visible Ascension of Jesus after forty days, which separated His Resurrection from His Exaltation ; and that in his thoughts, as in those of the earliest Christians, the Resurrection and the Ascension were one inasmuch as the latter was only an exaltation of Jesus above the limits of an earthly existence to one celestial and divine. At the same time, while Beyschlag lays great stress upon the circumstance that none of our Gospels relate the Ascension, since in his view Luke xxiv. 51, koX a.ve<(>4pfTo els tw ovpav6v, is only a later gloss, it is to be noted that he is yet unable to regard the narrative of the event in Acts i. entirely as a myth. 400 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES sion : moreover, whilst the reaht)' of the Ascension is the unani- mous assertion of the New Testament writers, no one sees more plainly, or describes in grander terms, the issues and bearings of the fact than the Apostle Paul when occasion demanded.' It will no doubt be urged that the idea of an Ascension of Christ may be easily accounted for by Old Testament precedents, or by a derivation from Pagan sources. If, how- ever, we turn to the Old Testament, it would seem that even the narrative of Elijah's translation to heaven signally fails to account for the narrative of St. Luke, since only one of the particulars which he mentions can be derived from the Old Testament story which, of all others, might be thought the most likely to give rise to the ' myth ' of the Ascension. - Keim, who rejects the visible Ascension as one of the latest and most untrustworthy offshoots of the Resurrection myths, with which the modern Christian consciousness is mature enough to dispense, cannot help being impressed with the narra- tive in St. Luke, and he admits that all the Old Testament's precedents find in the third Gospel and the Acts their finest, noblest, and worthiest expression.'* But there was only one thing which could have created such an expression, and that was the truthfulness of the narrative, for what was there in the existing Messianic conceptions which could possibly have afforded a groundwork for a myth on such a subject ? The Jews pictured to themselves, not a Messiah who should ' The language which even Sabatier uses when describing ' The Epistles of the Captivity,' gives us some idea of this {DApdtre Pmil, pp. 211-238). If the Epistles to the Colossians and Ephesians are rejected, we can at least point to the statements of the Apostle in Philippians ii. 9, iii. 21 ; nor must it be forgotten, as Reuss reminds us in his comments on Phil, {tibi supra, p. 129), that the doctrine of the lordship of Christ over heaven and earth and the under-world, occurs also in Rom. viii. 34, xiv. 9 ; i Cor. xv. 24 ff. ^ Steinmeyer, tibi supra, p. 221 and note. 3 Keim, Geschichte Jeszi, Bd. iii. p. 620. He might well express himself thus when he had just referred (p. 618) to the accounts of the events which we receive from other sources. Thus, as Keim himself tells us, the Acta Pilati narrate an Ascension from the Galilean hill Malek in the sight of more than five hundred unbelieving Jews, and of the special observation of the actual entrance of Jesus into heaven whilst he was yet in the midst of his last words. So, too, the Gnostics speak of a flying up to heaven, and others of a progress through the three or the seven heavens ! Tin-: AscKXsrox axd tiik return 401 ascend into hcax'cn, but a Messiah who should remain on earth.' Are we, then, to turn to the ' discredited official proofs of heathenism,' - to the stories of pagan heroes and emperors deified and immortalised, to account for St. Luke's narrative of the Ascension of Jesus? Take, e.g., the story of Romulus and his ascension to heaven (Livy, i. 16), to say nothing of the doubts which prevailed (doubts to which the historian gives expression) as to the details and the truth of the narra- tive, and what analogy docs it present to the account of the Ascension of Jesus in the record of St. Luke .'' In the former case the story arose upon heathen soil, the customary birth- place of similar legends ; ^ in the latter case, such an origin is a mere assumption. Moreover, there is a fundamental difference between attributing such an exaltation to a Romulus, a king in his lifetime, and in the mcmor}' of all his people, and to Jesus of Nazareth, who came unto His own, and whose own received Him not, whose only earthly throne had been a cross of wood. What was there in such a catastrophe as the execution of Jesus by a death, whose only analogy to ourselves is that of the gallows, to suggest even to the wildest imagination the belief that he had been exalted to the right hand of the Majesty on high }^ ' Schmid, tibi supra, p. 93, 5. Aufl. Steinmeyer reminds us [ubi supra, p. 222) of the extreme improbability that the disciples could have dreamed an occurrence such as that narrated in Acts i. 9, when we remember that these very same men, as Hoffman rightly maintains (Sc/i rift beta. iii. 2), even after the Resurrection, do not seem to have entertained a thought of their Lord leaving the world and going to the Father (Acts i. 6). - Keim, Geschichte Jesii, iii. 619. ^ So Hase, Geschichte Jesit, p. 610. Hase thinks that both Jewish and Grecian elements were probably at work in the production of the Ascension myth. But it is to be remembered that Hase himself only rejects the visible Ascension, and not the .spiritual return of Jesus to the Father —but he has to con- fess that his history ends in vagueness and uncertainty. * No one has spoken more strongly than Keim of the disastrous death of the Messiah, and no one has more strongly emphasised the proof that the belief in the Messiah would have died out without the living Jesus {ubi supra, iii. 605, 413). Comp. Weiss, Leben Jcsu, ii. 588. The remarks of Canon Scott Holland may be quoted in this connection, On Behalf of Belief, p. 17: * Such dim hopes, faintly lingering around the grave of some King Arthur, or some Frederick Barbarossa, or even round the grave of D D 402 THE WITNESS OF THE El'ISTLES ' From thence He shall come to judge both the quick and the dead.' The same great chapter of the First Epistle to the Corinthians (ch. xv.) is alone sufficient to show that this belief was present to the Apostle's mind, and that it occupied a prominent place in his public teaching ; he speaks of the coming of Christ (verses 23-28) ' in a way which evidently presupposes the familiarity of his readers with the expecta- tion of such an event. In the opening chapter of this same Epistle, Christians are described as ' waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, who would also confirm them unto the end, that they might be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ' (ch. i. 8), and Paul himself looks forward to the manifestation of all men before the judgment seat of Christ, and to the day when God should judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to his gospel (2 Cor. v. 10; Rom. xiv. 10 ; Rom. ii. 16).- some hideous nightmare, hke the tyranny of Nero, embody and symbolise nothing else but the profound impression which their actual lives had built up, established, until it had become a part of the common material of general human existence. . . . So a cloud of myth may hang loose about the hero's vanishing ; but the myth is meaningless and unintelligible, except as a reflex of the impressiveness and solidity and importance of the real life lived. It witnesses to that and to nothing else. Strip it away, and the life remains, real, comprehensible, valid. But what fragment of parallel is there here to the Gospel ? With our Lord it is not the life which makes the supernatural myth intelligible, but it is the supernatural act which alone makes the life intelligible. . . . The essence of the Resurrection is that it is not the end, but the beginning. That which, in other stories, is the last flash of the dying sun, is here the first streak of the coming dawn. The activity of the Lord is in reserve, it is withheld, until the Resurrection is past.' ' The word irapovcria, lit. 'presence,' which is so frequently used in the Epistles of the second Advent of Christ, is also found several times in St. Matthew's account of the last great Discourse on the Mount of Olives, but not elsewhere in the Gospels (Humphry's Covniieiitary on R. V. p. 53). - Whatever may be the exact form of the expression, 'according to my gospel ' (Rom. ii. 16), it is quite arbitrary to find in it a proof of the distinction drawn by Paul between his gospel and that preached by the other Apostles, for he speaks in Rom. i. 9. of the ' gospel of his Son,' and in Rom. xvi. 25 of ' my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ.' In each place where it is used it seems to lie connected in the Apostle's mind, as here, with the great facts of the Christian creed. It has sometimes been thought that the expression in Rom. ii. 16 ought to be closely connected with the words ' by Jesus Christ,' as if the Apostle meant to emphasise the fact that the judgment of the secrets of men's hearts will be accomplished, not by God, but by the Messiah Jesus (see, e.g.^ Lipsius, iti loco, Hand-Conunentar ztiin N. T. THE ASCENSION AND THE RETURN 403 In using such language (whatever may be the precise meaning of the term ' according to my gospel ') the Apostle shows that he was as familiar as the Evangelists or the Twelve w ith the thought of Christ as the future Judge of the world.' But it is when we turn to the two Epistles to the Thessa- lonians that we find the most frequent references to the 1891). But although this announcement of the Messiah as the future ]u(\ge would differentiate the Apostle's preaching from Jewish conceptions of the ^Messiah, it would at the same time be in entire harmony with the declarations of the other Apostles -and with those of Jesus Himself. Godet connects the •expression with the words * shall judge the secrets of men,' and thinks that the Apostle is here contrasting the spiritual character of the judgment which he proclaimed with the external righteousness and superficial judgments of Pharisaism. It is at all events very probable that in speaking of ' my gospel,' the Apostle meant to distinguish his own teaching from that of opposing Judaisers, and to emphasise his avowal of the claims of Jesus as his Master, and his recognition of the teaching of the Spirit of Christ, by which the facts of the life and death and resurrection of Jesus had become to him the power of God unto salvation, Mangold, iihi supra, p. 477, note. Comp. Lechler, J^as apost. Zeitalter, p. 485 ; Paret, ubi sitpra, p. 62 ; Gifford, 'Commentary on the Romans,' in Speaket's Comt/ienta)y, iii. 76, 81, 237 ; Godet, VEpttre aux Rotitains, i. 286, 287. On the use of the expression made of this passage by Steck, see above, chap. iii. p. 193. Amongst recent commentators, both Reuss {Die Geschichte der heiligen Sihriften des N. T. p. 168) and P. Ewald [Das Haiip/probkiii, p. 144) reject the view that Rom. ii. 16 and similar expressions refer to a written Gospel. ' On the remarkable fact that in Jewish writings God Himself, and not the Messiah, is always represented as the Judge, see Professor Stanton's The Jewish and the Christian Messiah, pp. 61, 140, 291-293. It is therefore most signifi- cant that the attribution to Jesus of the office of Judge is so emphasised in the Pauline Epistles as a part of the common faith of the early Christians, and that this office is always connected with His Messiahship : ' what makes it the more remarkable is that support was not sought even in prophecy for attributing to Him this tremendous new prerogative. At least no citation from the Old Testa- ment was distinctly made in connection with it. We know of no origin which it could have had save the declarations of Jesus Himself (p. 291). Comp. also the recent remarks of P. Ewald in his Der '■ ^eschichtliclie Christtis^ mid die synoptischen Evangelien, p. 24, 1892. For the significance of this claim of Jesus to be the future Judge of Mankind — which Baur, Strauss, \Veizsacker, Keim, all acknowledge that He made — see Gess, CItristi Person mid IVerk, pp. 241 fif. , erste Ablhcihing, 2. Aufl. With Professor Stanton's remarks we may compare those of Mr. Deane in Pseudepigrapha (T. and T. Clark, 1891), p. 92, where, in speaking of the eschatology of 7he Book of Enoch, he says : ' The final judge is not Messiah, but God Himself, who shall descend from heaven to pass the sentence upon men and angels ' This view is common to all the apocalyptic literature of the period, n I) 2 404 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES coming of Christ, as might indeed be expected, if we consider the circumstances under which they were written, and the restlessness and idleness which prevailed in the Church of Thessalonica through the belief in the nearness of the Advent. In the first Epistle (to which, as we have seen, the most extreme criticism permits us to refer) St. Paul uses words and expressions which not only show the intensity of his own conviction, but his acquaintance with the exact phrases and colouring of the Gospels. ' What is our hope, our joy, our crown of rejoicing ? Are not even ye in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at His coming?' (i Thess. ii. 19) — it is the thought of presenting his converts to Christ which fills the Apostle with hope and pride and joy ; it becomes his earnest prayer that ' the Lord might establish their hearts unblame- able in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, with all His Saints' (i Thess. iii. 13). And here the Greek seems almost to indicate that these ' saints ' are to be assessors in the judgment (/xsrd), and the words may therefore be compared with the thought contained in I Cor. vi. 3, and the expressions in the Gospels which may possibly be connected with it.^ But the connection with the Gospels, and with the last solemn discourses of our Lord on the Mount of Olives, becomes unmistakable when the Apostle proclaims, in the very words of Christ, that ' the day of the Lord ^ so cometh as a thief in the night' (i Thess. v. 2 ; Matt. xxiv. 43, Luke xii. 39), where the season of distress which precedes that coming so that our Lord's statement, "The Father judgeth no man, but hath given all judgment unto the Son" (John v. 22), was a novel idea to His hearers, even to those of them who had learned some portion of the truth concerning Christ's nature and attributes.' Comp. also pp. 189, 229; and Edersheim, IVarbiir/onian Lecii/res, pp. 247y 348. ' See EUicott's Cominentary (Cassell), iii. 137, in loco (comp. Luke xxii. 30), and i. 346. On i Cor. vi. 3 see above, p. 311. 2 On the peculiar force of the expression the day of the Lord, see above, p. 266 ; comp. Sabatier, iihi supra, p. 93. Even Weiss admits the connection between the Epistles and the Gospels in the imager)- of verse 2 {Einle!t!i7ig,pp. 24, 171); so, also, Renan, Les EvangileSy p. 78 ; Paret, Paulus mid Jesus, p. 55. THE ASCKXSIOX AM) TIIK RETURN 405 is likened to the tra\ail panics of a woman (i Thess. v. 3 ; Matt. xxiv. 8, 9, St. Mark xiii. 8),' when that reiterated and most merciful warning; of the Saviour to watch and be sober is heard again (i Thess. v. 6, Luke xxi. 34-36). For St. Paul, like the Baptist, has to tell of a wrath to come (i Thess. i. 10, Matt. iii. 7),- like his Lord he knows how successive genera- tions of His people were filling up the measure of iniquity (i Thess. ii. 16, Matt, xxiii. 32),'' how when men cried peace ' The Cireek word elSiV, which is used in eacli of these ]iassages, means the pangs of child-birth, and therefore in the two places in the Gospels the Revisers have substituted ' travail ' for 'sorrows' (A. V.). ' The great pain and peril, of which the word is a symbol, gives rise to many allusions and comparisons in the Old Testament, and if we assume, as we well may, that our Lord here gives a higher significance to the word and to the thought connected with it, we better iiccount for the frequent recurrence and development of the same figure of speech in the Epistles. The "regeneration,"' or new l)irth of the world, of which He -speaks is to be accomplished through pain and travail, " the whole creation groaning and travailing together until now" (Rom. viii. 22).' Humphry's Com- mentary on the R. V. p. 53. It will be noticed that in Luke xxi. 35, the expression is as a snare (qjs iro7iy), whilst in i Thess. v. 3, we find as ti-avail (Sxrirtp rj oiiSiV). It is ujion this dift'er- ence that Professor Marshall lays stress in his important article, ' Did Paul use a Semitic Gospel?' {Expositor [4th series], July 1890, pp. 74, 75). The Hebrew word for ' snare ' and ' travail ' is identical so far as the consonants are concerned, which of course were all that was written in the days of early Christian literature. Admit then, argues the Professor, that both Luke and Paul possessed some evangelic fragment written in Hebrew ; or, he adds, if this is asking too much, admit that both were acquainted with an oral tradition in Hebrew or in Palestinian Aramaic — and the difficulty disappears; the original fragment written by one who heard the Saviour speak, was, let it be assumed, in the language of Palestine, and that it contained the word 73nj) which might mean either ' as a snare ' or ' as travail.' St. Luke translated it in the former way, and St. Paul in the latter. But it will be observed that the Professor decides in favour of Paul's translation, because it more accurately conveys the thought of the 6'rtZ';'(?//r expressed both in Matt. xxiv. 8 and Mark xiii. 8 : Tavra. apxv u5ivwv, ' these things are the beginning of the birth-pangs ' : this thought would have been easily intelligible to the disciples, who were already familiar with the popular expressions, ' the birth-pangs of the Messiah,' or 'the birth-pangs of the Kon.' Whilst, then, Professor Marshall's theory may explain the discrepancy in .St. Luke, his exegesis of the passage certainly confirms our belief in St. Paul's familiar acquaintance with one very important and significant word in our Lord's last discourses. - Sabatier, u/'i supra, p. 93 : ' L'apotre des Genlils, comme les autres, a commence par precher I'imminence du jugementde Dieu, et decrire, comme Jean- Baptiste, " la colcre a venir" ' (opyrip 6f>xoM*»"?'') i Thess. i. 10). ' Sabatier, iii as the angels went forth to gather together the elect (i Thess. iv. 16, Matt. xxiv. 31 ; comp. i Cor. xv. 52).- The extreme similarity of these passages to the Gospels, especially the opening verses of i Thess. v. to St. Luke xxi. 34, inclined Bishop Wordsworth to the view that the Thessa- lonians had before them the Gospel of St. Luke, while Mr. Lewin, struck with the marks of close similarity, argued that they were in possession of the Gospel of St. Matthew. Mr. Lewin remarks that 'The Apostle says " yourselves know " (ch. V. 2), for he had placed in their hands the Gospel of St. Matthew, in which the warning was contained. The first eleven verses of this fifth chapter suppose the reader to have before him St. Matt. xxiv. from verse 36 to the end.' ^ More recent criticism cannot affirm such conclusions,^ but they at least testify to the force of the resemblance, a resemblance iii. 134 ; and especially Ewald, Die Sendschreiben des Aposteh Pauliis, p. 42 ; and also Die dj-ei ersten Evaitgelien, i. 62, 63, 2. Aufl. 1871. ' On the close similarity of language — for example, in the use of the word al(pvlSios, which is only found in the New Testament in these two places — see Ellicott's Comi)ie7itary, i. 346, and iii. 142 ; Holtzmann, Die synoptischen Evangelien, p. 324 ; comp. also Holtzmann's parallel between Luke xxi. 24, i-xpi ■nKt\paiQw(n Kaipol tSvwv, and Paul's phrase in Rom. xi. 25, aXP'^ "u to ir\7]pu/jLa rwy edvwv elffeXdri ; Godet, U Epitre aiix Romains, ii. 405, 2nd edit. 1890. - Meyer, Comnieiitar, ' Matthaus,' p. 466, 7. Aufl,; and especially Salmon, Iit/rodititioi! to the N. T. p. 459. ' Taking the very lowest view of the authenticity of the Gospels, it still seems to me unreasonable to doubt that the 24th Matthew and the parallel chapters of the other Gospels record in substance a real discourse of our Lord. The description (Matt. xxiv. 30, 31) of our Lord coming in the clouds of heaven, and sending His angels with "a great sound of a trumpet," seems to me to have prompted both St. Paul's phrase, " the last trumpet " in i Cor. xv. 52, and the description in i Thess. iv. of our Lord descending with the voice of the Archangel and the trump of God. ' ' Life of St. Paul, i. 308. M. Renan, after quoting i Thess. v. i ff. and 2 Thess. ii. i-ii, adds : ' On voit que, dans ces textes ecrits vingt'ans apres la mort de Jesus, un seul element essentiel a ete ajoute au tableau du jour du Seigneur tel que Jesus le concevait ; c'est le role d'un antichrist ' (Saint Paid, p. 252 ; see also p. 250, 12th edit. 1888). ■■ See, e.g., Reuss, Die Geschichte der heiligen Scliriften des N. T. p. 164, 6. Aufl.; and Mangold's note in Bleek's Einleitiing in das N. T. p. 477, 4. Aufl. 1886. Tin: AscF.xsiox a\d the return 407 which II. I'^wakl has cinphasisctl in the wcll-kiKiwn passage of his ' Sendsclireiben des Apostels Paulus,' ' where he maintains that the Apostle's words could on!}- have been understood, if his readers had before them a primitive written Gospel. Paret discusses Ewald's \-ie\v at lenijth, and although he is not pre- pared to endorse it, he has tabulated the many points of close similarit}' between i Thess. and St. Matthew's Gospel, and he accounts for the likeness on the ground that Paul had gained by tradition a knowledge of many of the historical sayings and discourses of Jesus.- Undoubtedl)' the most difficult passage in this connection is I Thess. iv. 15-18. If \\-c adopt the view that the general imagery and teaching of the passage is derived from Matt. xxiv. 30, 3i,'* we have still to face the difficulty presented by ' P. 48. - Paret in his Patiltis unci Jesus, it.'n supra, p. 55, draws out the comparisons in detail. The passages to which he refers are i Thess. v. i, Matt. xxiv. 3 ; I Thess. V. 2, ]SIatt. xxiv. 36, 43 ; comp. Rev. iii. 3, xvi. 15. The imagery of the thief in the night he considers as derived beyond doubt from Jesus, and not from the Old Testament (i Thess. v. 3, Matt. xxiv. 37-39 ; i Thess. v. 6, Matt. xxiv. 42, XXV. 13). In addition to the authorities mentioned in the preceding notes, it is important to remember that Hausrath connects this same imagery of the thief in the night, I Thess. V. 2, with Malt. xxiv. 36 ; the trumpet in i Thess. iv. 16 with Matt. xxiv. 31 ; the coming in the clouds, i Thess. iv. 17, with Matt. xxiv. 30 (Neiitestametitliche Zcitgeschichte, Bd. iii. p. 70). Ewald, on p. 48 of his Semischreiben des Apostels Paulus, notes not only the connection of the thief in the night with St. Matthew's imagery, but also the reference to the pangs of childbirth and to the duty of watchfulness (i Thess. v. 1-6, Matt. xxiv. 19 42, 43)- In this connection we may add that Dr. Edersheim ( IVarburtoiiiau Lectures, PP- 347> 348), speaking of the fourtii Book of Esdras (our apocryphal second book), dating after the destruction of Jerusalem at the end of the first century, says that if ch. xiii. 27-50 is carefully examined, it will be seen how deeply tinged is the prophetic description which it contains with the teaching of the Gospels, and the word:-, of our Lord concerning 'the last things ' — although not as He put it, but in a Judaic form. In fact, he adds, it seems impossible to avoid the conclusion that the writer had been acquainted with the discourse al>out ' the last things,' and the inference to which this leads as to the date of the Oospels of St. Matthew and St. Luke need scarcely be indicated. Dr. Edersheim compares also ch. V. 1-3 and ch. vi. 18-28 of this same Book of Esdras. For the interesting parallel between the last chapter of the D idache and I Thess. iv. 13-17, see Z(Jckler in Kurzgefasster Commentar, iii. 28, in loco. ' See quotation from .Salmon's Introduction in previous note. Comp. Weiss, Einleitung in das N, T. pp. 24 and 171, where he connects in both places this 408 THE WITNESS OE THE El'LSTLES the Apostle's emphatic declaration : This lue say unto you by t/ie word of the Lord (ycrsc 15). The question at once arises whether the Apostle refers only to historical sayings of Jesus as his source of information, as, e.g., in i Cor. vii. and ix. ; or whether he is referring to some further source of information — to some special revelation ; or whether again (a most im- probable supposition) we are to conjecture that we have here a mere subjective view of the Apostle corresponding to the yi/cofiT] in I Cor. vii. 25, 40. Certainly it would be strange that a mere personal view of the Apostle should be put forward so solemnly and so emphatically as a ' word of the Lord,' even if we allow that such an expression in itself decides nothing.' But amongst the canonical sayings of Jesus there is not one which can be said to correspond exactly with the representation of verse 17, although it would seem that we have intimations of the actual subject which Paul is dis- cussing in some of the words of Jesus in our Gospels (e.g., Matt. xxiv. 30; Luke xiv. 14);-' nor is it unreasonable, in Paret's judgment, to suppose that the vision of the future may have been communicated by our Lord in still more vividly figurative language than in the short Apocalypses (as the same writer calls them) of Matt. xxiv. and the parallel passages. passage in i Thess. iv. 15 with Matt. xxiv. 31, and points out that if at the return of the Lord all His elect should be gathered together about Him (Matt. xxiv. 31), those already dead cannot be excluded, but must rather have been first raised up (i Thess. iv. 15, 16). See also p. 171, and Schmiedel, Hand-Corn- mentar zimi N. T. ii. erste Abtheilung, p. 22, I. Halfte, as against Steck's view that the words in i Thess. are taken from 4 Esdras, and that therefore the Epistle is spurious [Jah-bikher fih- protest. Theol. p. 516, 1883). In this connection we may again refer to the remarks of Mr. Deane, Pseudepigrapha, pp. 87,88 (T. and T. Clark, 1891): ' The tribulations of the last days as delineated in Matt. xxiv. are not unlike the predictions in Enoch Ixxx. ; but no one reading the two would gather that they were borrowed one from the other, the variations being numerous and actual identity not appearing anywhere.' ' Paret, Paiihis iiiui Jesus, pp. 53, 56. It is used, e.g., to signify the Gospel in a general way, as in i Thess. i. 8 ; it can be applied to some particular decision of the historical Christ, as in i Cor. vii. 12; or to a saying of the spiritual and glorified Christ, as in 2 Cor. xii. 9 (p. 53). -' On Wendt's view of i Thess. iv. 15, see Die Lelire Jesii, p. 345, and chap. ii. 103 ff. above. THE ASCENSION AND THE RETURN 409 But on account of the uniqueness of verse 17, so far as the New Testament is concerned, and since the point of view in verses 15, 17 is manifestly that of the time of the writer, Paret inclines to the opinion that many of the particular features introduced in this passage arc derived from apocalyptic visions of Paul, in which, absorbed in contempla- tion of the anticipated coming of Christ, the Apostle already felt himself caught up to meet Him in the air, and he reminds us that the same word apird^sadat (verse 17) is found in 2 Cor. xii. 2, 4.' In this connection Paret mentions the view held by Gess (' Die Lehre von der Person Christi,' pp. 69 f ), and many other commentators, that all which Paul here speaks ' by the word of the Lord ' is to be regarded as actual sayings of the ascended Jesus, to which the same objectivity attaches as to the utterances of the sermon on the Mount which fell from the lips of Jesus while living on earth. But this view is rejected by Paret, not only because it involves the supposition that the glorified Christ related to the Apostle the history of the future, just as it is also supposed that He had related the history of the past — e.g., the institution of the Lord's Supper, and His appearances to the disciples in their order — but because it quite ignores the difficulty of the expression ' we which are ali\-e,' for which Gess (p. 70) substitutes ' those who are still living.' - Paret's own judgment on the passage is summed up as follows : if these disclosures of the Apostle as to the fate of the dead and the living at the acccmplish- ment of the kingdom of God by the glorified re-appearing Lord can be described as spoken sv \6y(p Kvplov, and are to be introduced as a ground of Christian consolation, then, above all things, in the first place a more Christian element must lie at the foundation than that contained in common ' Beyschlag rightly reminds us that there is no evidence whatever for the modern criticism which would declare the words of Jesus in such passages as Matt. xxiv. 29 spurious, and refer them to ' a small Apocalypse ' of a Jewish or Jewish-Christian type, worked up into our Matt, xxiv., .Mark xiii. As Beyschlag remarks, there is no evidence of the existence of any such * small Apocalypse ' (Leben Jcsu, i. 364 ; Weiss, Einlcitiiiti^ i)i das N. 7! p. 49S, 2. Aufl.). - Paiiius iiiid Jesus, pp. 57, 58. 4IO THE WITNESS OE THE EITSTLES Jewish representations of the period, which could only have been superficially Christianised by the insertion of the name Lord or Jesus ; in the second place, they must contain a more objective element than could be derived from the mere ecstatic and apocalyptic revelations of Paul himself. Paul must at any rate be certain that no historical sayings of Jesus describe the events here in question in a deviating or contradictory manner, and further, that his teaching in this passage was similar to that of the other Apostles, or at least not opposed to it. For what confusion would exist, if here something was reckoned as ' a word of the Lord,' whilst there, at a place distant a few days' journey, the direct opposite of it were taught ! With regard to the question of circumcision, Paret admits that James apparently taught the opposite of Paul, but he adds that that was a practical matter, on which Jesus had given no decisive utterance, and with regard to which it might be open to discussion what view was more correctly a deduction from the general conception of the life, work, suffering, and teaching of the Saviour. But the teaching as to the return of Jesus had, when Paul wrote, all the import- ance of one of the most weighty articles of the Christian religion. Beyond this general result as to the sources of this passage in i Thess. iv., Paret concludes that we cannot proceed, and it is impossible for us, he thinks, to separate in detail the features of it which may be derived from some popular Jewish Apocalypse, or from a Pauline Apocalypse, or from an historical saying of Jesus.' But whilst we recognise the serious importance of any matter relating to the irapovaia of the Lord, may not the key to the introduction of the representation in verse 17 be found in the fact that St. Paul here, as elsewhere in his letters, is meeting an immediate and pressing difficulty in the most direct and practical way ? The joy with which the Christians of Thessalonica anticipated the speedy appearing of Christ's kingdom on earth was mingled with hopeless sorrow as to the fate of their departed brethren : and this hopelessness of sorrow, which made the grave as dark for the ' Paret, iiln supra, p. 59 and note. THE ASCENSION AND THE RETURN 411 Christian as for the Jew, was working its ill effects upon the daily life of the Christian community.' But their sorrow was turned into joy when St. Paul could assure the mourners that their dead friends should not be left behind, or without lot and portion in the glories of Christ's kingdom, but that the dead in Christ, being first raised, should come with Him, and share with their brethren in meeting their Lord, and in the blessedness of an eternal union. If, however, the Apostle could thus authoritatively in- troduce the exact words of comfort suitable to this particular case, it seems unreasonable to affirm decisively that there was no reference in his mind to some sayings of the Lord Jesus in the expression su Xoycp KupLov, unless we are pre- pared to maintain that we possess all the information which Jesus had vouchsafed with reference to His coming. But such an assertion is obviously beyond our power, when we recollect that our Gospels contain so little of all that Jesus said or did, and that we have no record of His discourses with His disciples during the forty days before His Ascension. On the other hand, if we consider the restless and unquiet state of the Thessalonian Church, and the deep need of some words of comfort to lighten the darkness of the grave, and to answer a question which, so far as we know, had not arisen in the Saviour's lifetime, we may see why a special assurance might have been granted to the Apostle, just as a message of hope and strength had been vouchsafed to him in his own hour of need and suffering (2 Cor. xii.). If, however, we cannot determine the exact source of St. Paul's message of consolation to the sorrowing Thessalonians, may we not see in the expression ' we which are alive ' (verse 15) a reference in thought to an emphatic declaration of the Lord, and an acquaintance with such sayings as are recorded in each of the first three Gospels, not only in the great eschatological discourses, but in the earlier chapters (cf. Matt. xvi. 27, 28 ; Mark viii. 32 and ix. i ; Luke ix. 26, 27) ? In each of these passages Christ associates the presence of the angels with the manner of His coming, and that coming ' Sabatier, UApotre Paul, p. 158. 412 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES is spoken of as taking place in the existing generation. The attitude of St. Paul in these Epistles to the Thessalonians is that of a man who had this solemn prophecy ever in mind, whilst he also knows that the exact day and hour of Christ's coming was hidden in the counsels of the Father. Nor must it be forgotten, in this connection, that in I Cor. XV. 51, 52 a very similar phrase is found (together with the mention of the sound of the trumpet, verse 52) ; and this fact alone ought to make us hesitate before we conclude that St. Paul's views upon the subject of Christ's coming underwent such a rapid change as many writers have affirmed. Thus Sabatier, while he carefully guards himself against affirming any contradiction in the Apostle's views of the future, seems hardly justified in maintaining that his earlier ideas were entirely transformed, and freed from the bonds of a traditional Judaism, and the narrow limits of a Pharisaic eschatology in the short period between the two Epistles to the Corin- thians — a period which must at all events have been very considerably shorter than that which elapsed between I Thessalonians and i Corinthians.^ No doubt change of circumstance might well alter the current of the Apostle's thoughts: when death came so near (2 Cor. i), and bodily suffering pressed upon Him so heavily, and when his life was one constant round of anxiety and care, it might well be that his gaze was fixed, not upon the Saviour descending in triumph on the clouds of heaven with the voice of the arch- angel and the trump of God, but upon Him crucified in weakness, yet living by the power of God the Father, and imparting the strength of His life to His suffering and dying followers : it might well be that the gloom of Sheol is dis- persed, and that in its place there rises the Christian hope of immediate reunion with the Lord (2 Cor. v. i-ii).^ But when we speak of the Apostle's emancipation at this period of his life from the narrowing influences of a Jewish Apoca- lypse, we cannot forget that our Lord had expressed Himself in similar terms, and that the seriousness of this fact cannot ' Sabatier, DApotre Paul, pp. loi, 156, 157, 294, ^ Ibid. p. 157. THE ASCENSION AND THE RETURN 413 be lessened by drawing a hard and fast line of distinction between the teaching of the Apostle and that of his Master.' In the nature of the case a letter would be likely to contain allusions, but not more than allusions, to a series of prophecies which there is every reason to believe must have been impressed at a very early period upon the mind of the Christian Church. On the other hand, the fact that the coming of the Son of Man was realised at least primarily in the destruction of Jerusalem^ as all schools of Christian thought admit, should surely prevent us from sacrificing the spirit to the letter, from explaining our Lord's prophecies arbitrarily, and from forgetting that they are capable of many interpretations and will yet receive many fulfilments. There is, in conclusion, one most important point of view from which we may consider the confident expectation of Christ's return which, as we ha\'e been well reminded, next to the fact of His Resurrection, is the topic most frequently insisted upon in the Apostolic writings. If it can be reason- abl}- maintained that there was nothing in current Jewish views of the Messiah's ofifice to create this expectation, and if it can be reasonably shown (see last chapter) that there is no parallel between the return of a Nero, and the belief in Christ's coming again from heaven, it is well to remember that just as little basis for such a belief is to be found in the fact that nations have often looked for the restoration of some hero king to fulfil their hopes of a triumphant future. In each case where such an expectation has arisen — just as in the belief that Nero would return with his avenging host — the expectation Jias beeti based upoji the denial of death. But ' For the manner in which Sabalier expresses and supports this view, see iil>i supra, p. 98. Sahatier indeed admits that our Lord actually expressed Himself in Jewish Apocalyptic terms, but he adds that in this imagery as used by our Lord : ' II y a dans les predictions de Jesus je ne sais quel spiritualisme interieur, qui leur donne une grande elasticite et transforme ces peintures en symboles.' But he adds : ' Dans I'enseignement apostolique, ces donnees, au contraire, se roidissent et s'epaississent ; elles s'organisent dans un cadre rigide. ' If, as Keim fully admits, there is no reason to doubt that Jesus spoke the solemn words before the high priest recorded in Matt. xxvi. 64 ; Mark xiv. 62 ; Luke xxii. 69 {Geschichte Jesu, iii. 335 and note), it is difficult to see why He should not have expressed Himself in the imagery employed in Matt. xxiv. 414 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES St. Paul can exclaim, ' It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even now at the right hand of God ' (Rom. viii. 34) — the death, the resurrection, the ascension of the Lord, each was equally a fact, each was equally an article of the creed of St. Paul and his fellow Apostles : and if we ask for an explanation of this fundamental difference be- tween those stories which grow up around some great national hero and the testimony of the Gospels and the Epistles, between the persistent denial of death on the one hand and its persistent glorification on the other, it is to be found in the fact that between the crucifixion of the Saviour and the belief in His return, there lay the glory of His Resurrection : in the presence of that fact the hope of the Christians was based not upon the uncertainty or the denial of the death of 'another King, one Jesus,' but upon its reality.' ' See Westcott, Gospel of the Resurrection, pp. 128 ff. ; Fairbairn, Studies in the Life of Christ, p. 345 ; Row, Bampton Lectures, p. 363 ; Milligan, Our Lord's Ascension, p. lo. 415 CHAPTER IX ST. PAUL AS AN 'EVANGELIST'' There arc important questions which the previous chapters will doubtless raise in many minds : why, it will be asked, is St. Paul's knowledge of the historical Jesus apparently so meagre, and his references to the Saviour's life and teaching so few .-• Was the Apostle's knowledge mediate or iuiviediate, i.e. was it derived from tradition or revelation .'' and how far did other sources of information influence his mind .'' Some earlier considerations will have suggested the probability that St. Paul was much more intimately acquainted with the facts of the Gospel history than might at first sight appear to be the case. But without again insisting upon the unlikelihood that a man who had shown such a close acquaintance with the Saviour's last moments should have absolutely ignored the other events in His life,' let us look once more at the propo- sition which contains the sum and substance of the Apostolic preaching, /^j-?/i- z> ///£? Christ. It might seem at first sight as if this brief but all important declaration would divert the Apostle's mind from the consideration of the human sur- roundings of Jesus, and lead him to seek in the Old Testa- ment for t)'pes and prophecies of the Messiah. But, from another point of view, this diligent inquiry into the Jewish Scriptures rather tends to prove the surety and firmness of the historical knowledge of Jesus which Paul possessed : for ' The Apostle to whom we owe the preservation of the saying ' It is more blessed to give than to receive,' has thereby become to us truly an ' Evangelist ' (Stanley's Corinthians, p. 588). * Sabatier, ti/n supra, pp. 60, 62, 63. Amongst recent English writers, Prof. Carpenter, whilst pointing out that Paul's allusions to the human life of Jesus are indeed but few, admits that much more may have been included in what the Apostle describes in Rom. vi. 17 (itlii supra, pp. 64, 65). 4l6 THE WITNESS OE THE EPISTLES only after the knowledge relating to the life of Jesus had assumed a concrete form, and had become, as it were, a fixed quantity, could he have felt induced to seek out prophecies and prototypes and even preludes in the Scriptures of that which had occurred afterwards.' To reverse the argument^ and to maintain that the details of the life of Jesus were shaped in accordance with prophecies of the Messiah,'-^ is to lose sight of a previous question, Why was this particular Jesus (out of so many Jews who bore the name) '^ fixed upon as the Messiah, unless the circumstances of His life rendered Him specially suitable ? Nor can we argue from the frequency of St. Paul's quota- tions from the Old Testament that he was only scantily acquainted with sayings of Jesus which he could substitute for them. To judge from all the traces, the first Apostles, who must undoubtedly have been fully acquainted with the sayings of Jesus, adopted the same method as Paul in their teaching (which is to be distinguished from the preaching of the Gospel in the stricter sense) ; so that, in reality, we have here only one of those points of contact between them and Paul, in which he takes his stand upon the same ground and retains the same method."* It may seem strange that in this respect the Apostle who so freely opposes the permanent obligation of the law should act in the same manner as the older Apostles ' of the circumcision ' (Gal. ii. 9). But, as Paret reminds us, this cir- cumstance becomes less surprising, when we remember that scarcely anywhere in the Pauline Churches could communities be found composed exclusively of Gentile Christians. Ju- daism had its colonists everywhere before Christianity ap- peared : it exercised a mighty charm upon the population of the Roman empire in days which witnessed the breaking- ' Paret, Paidus loni Jesus, p. 28. ^ Comp., e.g., Weizsiicker, Das apost. Zeitalter, p. 35, or Holtzmann, Hajid- Commeniar %um N. 7". i. 17 ; and Baur's expression (quoted by Paret), in which, with reference to Paul, he speaks of ' die Gebundenheit seines Bewusstseyns aa das Alte Testament. ' ^ Paret, Paulus und Jesus, pp. 9, 10, and note. ^ Ibid. pp. 20 and 40. ST. PAUL AS AX ' KVANCKLIST ' 417 Up of all rclii^ions : there was scarcely anywhere a town in which a number of proselytes of the gate was not to be found amongst whom the Old Testament was in use, and from whom the Pauline Churches must have been largely recruited.' It will also be noticed that these quotations arc found for the most part in those Epistles in which the Apostle had to enter into explanations with Jews or Judaism : in the Epistle to the Galatians. c.j,'-., we find about ten, in that to the Romans about fifty-two of them, whilst none occur in the Epistles to the Thessalonians, Thilippians, Colossians, Philemon : so, too, such turns of thought as we find in Rom. vii. i., or Gal. iv. 21 (where there is a decidedly ironical colouring) show that it was often onl}- regard for Jewish opponents, and Jewish objections, which occasioned a dialectical or allegorical excur- sion into Old Testament territory.'- But whilst there is every reason to suppose that Paul valued the confirmation which the Jewish Scriptures gave to his Christian belief, it is quite another thing to affirm with Baur that the Old Testament was for the Apostle the source of all objective truth, the only external support of his religious faith. Sabatier, whose remarks upon Paul's use of the Old Testament are in close harmon}^ with those of Paret, is equally emphatic in condemning Baur's conclusion : he admits the important part which type and allegory played in the Pauline method, but like Paret he denies that the Apostle's convictions were the result of the bold method of interpretation, with which his rabbinical education enabled him to deal at a great ad\-antage over the other Apostles ; and whilst it ma\- be said that Paul read the Old Testament with the eyes of a Christian and the penetration of a Rabbi, it must not be forgotten that his exegesis depended much more upon his faith than his faith upon his exegesi.s.* ' Paret, Paulus umi Jesus, p. 42. ^ Paret, ilnJ. See also Weiss, Bihl. Theol. des N. T. p. 273, 5. Aufl. ' Sabatier, UApotre Paul, pp. 64-67, 258 ; comp. also Reuss, Die Geschichte der heiligen Schriften des N. T. p. 56, 6. Aufl. 1887, where he points out that we are not to see in Paul's appeal to the Scriptures a mere accommodation to the customs and demands of the Jews, but a part of his own theology, which, after E E 41 8 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES But whether St. Paul knew our Lord during His earthly ministry, and whether he was present in Jerusalem during the closing scenes of His earthly life, or not, or whether he was one of those of Cilicia who disputed with Stephen : there is another point of view from which that same statement Jesus is the Christ must have awakened in him the keenest interest, and supplied a basis for definite inquiry. He must at least have known before his conversion that the Christians, whom he so zealously persecuted, proclaimed a crucified malefactor as the Messiah of the Jewish nation — but unless his hatred was a mere blind and senseless zeal,' it is difficult to suppose that he would not acquaint himself with the ground upon which the presence of the Christians in the Jewish National Church could no longer be tolerated ; for, as Paret reminds us, the Christians stood before his eyes not merely as foolish visionaries, but as dangerous heretics, and he was their persecutor because, as a Pharisee and the son of a Pharisee, he regarded them as opponents of the traditions of the elders and destroyers of the law : his position as one who thus persecuted ' above measure ' becomes un- intelligible unless as a Pharisee he had gained some accurate information of that side of the teaching of Jesus hostile to Pharisaism, and unless it was clear to him that in the com- munities which regarded Jesus of Nazareth as their Founder, there was some living agency at work not derived from Judaism. - the veil of literalism had been removed from his eyes, had found in these Scrip- tures a revelation previously unsuspected. * The Old Testament text is altogether, and considered as a whole, not the substance from which the thoughts of the Apostle proceed, but only the form and garment in which he clothes his purely Christian and independent thoughts ; he reads the Old Testament with Christian eyes, and finds therein only what is Christian ' (Paret, ul>i supra, pp. 42, 43). ' ' Soil er denn da verfolgt haben, was er noch in keiner Weise kannte ? ' (Beyschlag, Studien und Kritiken, pp. 22 ff. 1870). So, too, Paret, ubi snpi-a, p. 65 : ' So stark auch sein Hass gegen die Christen war: ein blinder Hass ist es gewiss nicht gewesen.' To the same effect Linde- mann, Die Echtheit der paulitiischen Hauptbriefe, p. 40, 1889. Even Strauss cannot deny that as their persecutor Saul must have known something of the beliefs of his victims. Leben Jesu fiir das detttsche Volk, i. 368. - Paret, Paulus und Jesus, pp. 65, 66 ; Sabatier, VApotre Paul, p. 6 ; comp. Beyschlag, Studien und Kritiken, pp. 31 ff. 1 870. See, however, Nosgen, ubi supra, p. 22. ST. PAUL AS AN 'EVANGELIST' 419 But Paul's position after he became a Christian is equally unintelligible unless wc bear in mind another fact, which indeed can scarcely be pressed too strongly against the criticism which would place an impassable gulf between the teaching of Paul on the one hand, and that of Jesus and the first disciples on the other. There were, no doubt, in his preaching of the gospel some bearings of it which in his character of ' the Apostle of the Gentiles' Paul most strongly emphasised,' but in order to be sure of his ground he must have known that wo positive sayings of Jesus could be quoted against him. If, then, he had no knowledge of the discourses of Jesus, if this whole province in the teaching of his Master had been to him an unknow^n land, what would have been his position } He could never have been sure but that at any moment he might find himself confronted with some saying of the Lord, vouched for by a James or a Peter, as, e.g., ' unless ye are circumcised, ye cannot enter the kingdom of heaven,' or, * I will not receive the Gentiles unless they keep the law of Moses.' 2 But if Paul was at any time opposed in this manner on the authority of an explicit saying of the Lord there is no evidence of it in the New Testament ; indeed his recognition by the elder Apostles, Gal. ii. 9, furnishes us with direct proof of the contrary, as also the impression which the Jewish Churches entertained of him : ' he preaches the faith which once he destroyed ' (Gal. i. 23) — i.e. the same belief which he once sought to exterminate. It would therefore seem that wherever Paul differed from the other Apostles the points at issue could not have been decisively settled by the historical Christ in favour of either sidc.^ Certainly there is a Christ who lives and speaks in Paul (Gal. ii. 20, 2 Cor. xiii. 3), but there is also a Christ to whose example Paul is conformed, and whose teaching Paul repeats ; and there was need of ' Weiss, Einlcititng in das JV. T. pp. 131, 133, 137, and conip. also pp. iS6 and 237, 2. Aufl. 1889. - Paret, Paulus und Jesus., p. 34; Sabaticr, L\-lpolre Paul, p, 61. Comp. also P. Ewald's argument in proof of Paul's knowledge that his ' universalism was in accordance with the will of Christ {Das Hauptprobkiii, p. 84). ' Paret, ibid. pp. 34, 35, 60. E E 2 420 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES the assurance that the Christ within him could not be affirm- ing one thing and an external Christ another. Without this security his whole Apostolic work was endangered, un- less we make the inconceivable supposition that the Apostle was prepared to place himself above Christ, and to proclaim himself as a kind of Montanist Paraclete. But the whole attitude of Paul is clearly that of a man who is sure of his ground, and that confidence was his because he was quite familiar with the historical teaching of the historical Christ.' But we are justified in believing that there was a further reason which would cause Paul to refrain from multiplying quotations even from the teaching of Jesus — a reason sug- gested by his own previous training and controversial know- ledge. There is undoubted evidence that he was well acquainted with the methods of Rabbinical argument, and that on occasion he had recourse to such methods after he became a Christian : - but it is equally certain that his Christian point of view was in direct contrast and opposition to the Rabbinical wisdom and instruction of the time. To make the teaching of Christ a mere collection of texts, a mere external law, to reduce it to a mere lifeless and mechan- ical thing, to heap together piecemeal sentences from revered teachers, from this Rabbi or from that — this, as Paret argues, would have constituted for the Apostle a true service of death, a service in the letter. Nothing could have been further removed, not only from the example of Jesus of Nazareth, who taught as one having authority, and not as the scribes, but also from the belief of the Apostle that the Christ in him was a life-giving quickening Spirit.^ No doubt it will be urged that the arguments to which we have just referred are of negative rather than of positive ' Paret, Paitlus und Jesus, pp. 35, 36. 2 Sabatier, L'ApStre Paul, pp. 28, 303 ; Weizsacker, Das apost. Zeitaliery p. 114; Harnack, Dogmengeschichte, i. 37. See also the interesting remarks of Dr. Edersheim in his Sketches of Jetvish Social Life, p. 187. ' Paret, ibid. p. 69 ; Sabatier, ul>i supra, p. 60. Compare P. Ewakl, Das Hauptprohlem, p. 140 : ' Nichts hat Jesu ferner gelegen als die Weise der jiidischen Rabbinen.' ST. PAUL AS AN ' KVANGELIST ' 42 I value in establishing St. Paul's knowledge of the historical life and teaching of our Lord. But we have sccit occasion to believe that the Apostle was much more full}- acquainted with the historical Christ than has often been supposed to be the case, and wc ground that belief not merely upon his elementary preaching, which presupposes such an acquaint- ance, but upon the fact that he is able to solve some press- ing difficulty, or to answer some practical question, by a reference to the words and acts of Jesus. Whence did he derive the knowledge which he is thus prepared to apply so practically and so decisively ? With regard to our Lord's words, and the important place which they occupied in Paul's thoughts and teaching, nothing could be more emphatic than the remarks of Weizsacker (see above, chapter ii. pp. 6t, ff ), in spite of his interpretation of 2 Cor. v. 16, according to which the Apostle attaches no significance to the events of the life of Jesus.^ Certainly Weizsacker supposes that Paul's quotations of the Lord's words are derived from the ' Spruchsammlungen,' - but we may well ask if it is possible to make collections of our Lord's sayings, or of His dis- courses, quite apart from the events of His life ? Do not these discourses often presuppose an historical introduction, and are they not in many cases quite inconceixable apart from some historical framework ? ^ If we seek from St. Paul's own statements for the sources of his knowledge it would seem that they were twofold — tradition, oral or written,' and revelation. It is a difficult, ' See, e.}^.. Das apost. 7,eit alter, pp. 121-123. - Ibid. p. 386. ' See the important remarks of Weiss, Eiiileilitng in das N. T. pp. 487, 488, and notes, and comp. P. Ewald, Das Haiiptproblcni, p. 78. ' Reference has already been made to H. Kwald's opinion that Paul was quoting from a written Gospel in i Thess. v. (see above, chap. ii. , for Ewald's views), and to Professor Marshall's belief that Paul and Luke (comp. i Thess. v. i-S with Luke xxi. 34-36), were quoting from some original Gospel fragment written in Aramaic, or at least perpetuated by oral tradition. At the same time Ewald distinctly admits that Paul does not always appeal to a written document. Bleek held that Paul, even before his conversion, was not only acquainted with the outward circumstances of the life of Jesus, but also with many of Mis discourses, partly through oral tradition, parlly also through smaller Gosj^el writings which were early in existence, and especially collections of the sayings of Jesus. But in the latest edition of VA^^qV^^ Einleituni; in das 422 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES perhaps a hopeless, task to attempt to assign positively the part due to each, but it is a far more hopeless task to explain St. Paul's Epistles by denying that he had any knowledge of the historical Jesus, since even Pfleiderer admits that without some historical data of the personal life of Jesus the work of Paul would be ' a castle in the clouds,' ' or, as Paret and N. T. (4. Aufl. 1886), Mangold considers that Paul's acquaintance with any written source is very questionable, although he has no doubt that the Apostle had an intimate knowledge of the life of Jesus by means of oral tradition (note p. 477 ; Mangold here refers to Paret's article, Paiiliis uiid Jesits). The question as to whether Paul used a written document has lately acquired a fresh interest from the learned work of Dr. Resch, in which he advocates the Apostle's acquaintance with a Hebrew U7-eva]ige/hi supra, pp. 60 flf. ; and comp. with his results P. Ewald, Das Hauplprobkm Jer Evan-relieii/rat^e, p. 75 ; Gess, Das apostolische Zeuptiss, p. 371, in his Christi Person umi IVerk ; Sabatier, VApolre Paul, p 56 ; Beyschlag, Lebeu Jesu, i. 66; Godet, V Epitre aux Komains, Introd. p. 30 ; Weiss, Einleituiig in das N. T. p. 119, 2. Aufl. * Paret, Paulus und Jesus, pp. 62 and 71, 72, with which comp. the remarks of Roos, Die Briefe des Apostels Paulus, pp. 8, 9. 424 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES perfectly in him that we must seek the cause of his retire- ment to the desert of Arabia.' No doubt there are some very famihar passages in the Apostle's writings in which we must face this difficulty of distinguishing between that which he received from others and that which was specially revealed to him. We have already had occasion to refer to this difficulty in examining I Thess. iv. 15, and if we turn to the important passage I Cor. xi. 23, the same question again arises — although, whichever way it is decided, whether, i.e., we refer the Apostle's statement to tradition or revelation, the fact remains that at the date of this undoubtedly genuine Epistle St. Paul is acquainted with the significance of the death of Christ and with the details of the institution of the Eucharist. Certainly the Apostle's mode of expression has naturally excited the closest attention. He does not merely draw a parallel (as in i Cor. xv. i, 3) between his own traditional knowledge and that of his converts — he does not merely say, ' I received that which also I have delivered unto you,' but irapsXa^ov airo tov Kvplov, ' I received /r^;// t/ie Lord! In dealing with these words, it has been sometimes alleged that Meyer has built an argument for an indirect as dis- tinguished from a direct reception by Paul of the commands and acts of Jesus at the Last Supper upon the one word airo? But, in the first place, it should be noticed that Meyer does not deny that the knowledge came to the Apostle by revela- tion, as he distinctly admits that Paul's expressions preclude the thought that he was merely dependent upon human information. No doubt the middle course which Meyer adopts in introducing the thought of a revelation by the Spirit, or by an angel, is open to criticism ; •' but it is remark- ' Weiss, Eiiileitimg hi das N. T. pp. Ii6, 117, 2. Aufl. 18S9; comp. Ilolsten, Das Evaiigeliiiiti des Paitliis, p. 7 ; Neander, Geschichte der PJlaitziing, i. 154, 155, in the new issue (1890) of the fifth edition. - See Meyer's Koriutherbriefe, i. 315, 316; and comp. Canon Evans, ?« loco. Speaker'' s Commentary, iii. 324 ; Alford's Greek Testament, ii. 572, ^ For a criticism of this view put forward by Meyer, see Gess, Das aposto- lische Zeiigfiiss, pp. 356, 357, l. Halfte, in his Chrisli Person mid IJ^erk ; comp. also Paret, ubi supra, pp. 51-53- ST. PAUL AS AX ' EVANGKLIST ' 425 able that the preposition airo, which is generally used of the more remote source of information, is found here instead of Trapd, which the Apostle employs not only in the iniportant passage Gal. i. 12, but in i Thess. ii. 13, iv. i, 2.' But if we admit that the words do not point to a special' revelation, what do they mean .-• Is any light thrown upon them by the context ? There are passages in i Corinthians in which the Apostle is dealing with matters which admitted of discussion and controversy (i Cor. xi. 16); or, occasions had arisen when he had prescribed directions for divine service upon his own authority (i Cor. vii. ly)'- — but here the case is different. Here he blames with reiterated emphasis the treatment by the Corinthian Christians of a part of God's service which was no ordinance of man, no ecclesiastical festival of man's device, but which was actually the Lord's Supper — i.e. a meal insti- tuted by the Lord Himself. It is as if the Apostle would say : ' This Holy Communion is not merely a matter of my arrangement, but it has its origin from the Lord ; in this particular you have to deal with a greater than I : for as the P'ounder He is also the Guardian, to maintain the sanctity of His Institution : He will not allow those who desecrate the memorial of His death, and reduce it to the level of a mere common meal, to go unpunished. And that it is in this ' See the important remarks of Bishop Westcott on this employment of o.Tr6 in I Cor. xi. 23, showing that the Apostle received mediately (and not directly) from the Lord the account of the institution of the Eucharist (Study of the Gospels, p. 180, and also 177, note 2). It must, however, be remembered that in Bishop Lightfoot's opinion the aliove distinction between airJ and irapa. cannot be insisted upon (Ga/atians, p. 80). But, on the other hand, the distinction has very recently been endorsed by Schniiedel, Ilaiid-Comiitciitar zuiii N. T. ii. erste Abtheilung, 2. Hiilfte, p. 133 (1891), where he remarks that air6 as distinguished from irapa (i Thess. ii. 13, iv. i ; Gal. i. 12) points to an indirect reception, which he prefers to derive, not with Resch (comp. i Cor. ii. 9) from an Urevange- Hum, but from oral tradition. - Paret, Patilus und Jesus, pp. 38, 52, 56 ; Weizsacker, uln supra, pp. 619, 620. If in I Cor. xiv. 37 we retain the reading Ki/pi'ou 4vTo\ai, it is plain that even here the Apostle does not place his own directions upon a level with the objective word of Christ (see i Cor. vii. 10); they become * conunands of the Lord ' only in so far as they are recognised to be so by the man who claims to be .spiritual (xiv. 37), see Meyer, Korivtherbricfe, p. 189. 426 TIIK WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES sense " a Supper of the Lord " }'ou have already had to feel (xi. 30) — and indeed, in a very painful way.' ' If it is said that, had St. Paul been referring to the general Evangelical tradition, he would have used the plural and not the singular {irapiXa^ov), it is to be remembered that in I Cor. XV. I he uses, not the plural but the singular, where he evidently has in mind the main facts of the Apostolic preaching (verse 11) ; nor is it strange that he should speak with such personal emphasis to a Church where his own authority was in question, and whose members had so flagrantly desecrated the Holy Feast. If we wish to proceed further, and ask for the exact source of the Apostle's information we can scarcely hope to get beyond the region of conjecture. It may have come to him from one who, like Mnason, had been a disciple ' from the beginning' (Acts xxi. 16), or, from those who were 'in Christ ' before him (Rom. xvi. 7) - — it may have formed part of that oral tradition which, like other words of the Lord Jesus, had not yet been precisely fixed in all the Churches — he may be solemnly reiterating some liturgical formula of habitual use in ' the breaking of the bread ' ; ^ or he may have had before him some written document, some Urevangeliunt} ' Paret, Pauhis tind Jesus, pp. 52, 53 ; and comp. Gess, nbi supra, p. 357 : '"Das vom Herrn -her" ist beigefugt, weil die Corinther das Abendmahl behandelten, als ware dessen Stiftung nicht eine hochheilige Stiftung des Herrn selbst, das eyd, weil er sich, der diese Herrnstiftung in ganz anderer Weise, als der jetzt eingerissenen, unter ihnen geordnet hat, ihnen, die solche Abirrung erlaubt haben, gegeniiberstellt. ' - Paret, Pauhis und Jesus, p. 53 ; Kitrzgefasster Connnentar (Strack and Zockler), dritte Abtheilung, p. 174. It is of interest and importance to note the force of the word a.^x"^'-^^ ^s applied to Mnason ; it is rendered by the Revisers ' an early disciple,' i.e. one who had been a disciple from the beginning, from the great Pentecost (see Humphry on R.V. p. 239). Comp. also Keim, Geschichte Jesu, i. 37, and Beyschlag, Leben Jesu, i. 66, Dr. Matheson's view of i Cor. xi. 23 in his recent Spiritual Development of St. Paul, pp. 118-121, will also be read with interest. ^ The view maintained by Godet and Dr. Salmon (see above, p. 352). * See Professor Marshall's discussion of the words of Institution in his article, ' Did Paul use a Semitic Gospel?' in Expositor (4th series), July 1890, pp. 77 ff. ; comp. also Resch, Agrapha, p. 178. For further remarks on this theory of a primitive written document and its employment by St. Paul, see above, chap. ii. pp. io6 ff. It must not be forgotten that Professor Marshall admits the possibility of an Aramaic oral tradition. ST. PAUL AS AN ' EVANGELIST ' 427 But whilst wc cannot interpret Gal. i. 12 so as to exclude a knowledge of the historical Christ on the part of Paul, we can see how the transforming spirit of the Apostle made itself felt in relation to the simplest historical data, so that they are no longer ' dead facts,' but indued with the power of an endless life. To take one instance only. Supposing that Paul, as wc have seen every reason to believe, had been informed of the details of the Saviour's Passion ; he could not have contented himself in his preaching with a mere recital of facts, or with more or less ingenious references to Old Testament types and prophecies — only a man all aglow, so to speak, with the love of Christ, who could describe him- self as crucified with Him (Gal. ii. 20), could stir the hearts of his converts so deeply, and appeal to the self-sacrifice of Jesus as the law of the Christian life (Gal. iv. 14 ; 2 Cor. v. 14), and inspire so fully and plainly the new spirit of Sonship and boldness towards God (Gal. iv. 5, 6).' But if it is thus necessary to take into account the personality of the Apostle in his presentation of the facts of the life of Jesus, and in the teaching which he bases upon them, it is not sufficient to dwell upon his reasoning and dialectical powers to the entire exclusion of the mystical and spiritual side of his nature.- This consideration weighed so powerfully with Weizsacker that he introduces a whole section on the Spirit as one of the chief sources of the Apostle's knowledge, assigning it a place not only in the divine revelation at Damascus but in Paul's subsequent teaching (i Cor. ii. 10-16), and tracing the working of its influence in the claim to have the mind of Christ and the Spirit of God (i Cor. vii. 40).'^ It is no doubt easy to dis- miss this spiritual element in the Apostle's character, to describe it as morbidness, or to relegate it to the same category as the hallucination of dreams and visions — to ridi- cule it as a factor which finds no place in human psychology. But has it, then, no place in a character which the keenest ' Paret, ubi supra, p. 63 ; conip. Mangold's note in Bleek's Einleitung in das N. T. p. 477, 4. Aufl. ^ Sabatier, VApotre Paul, p. 68. ' Das apost. Zeitalter, pp. 116, 117. 428 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES criticism acknowledges to be faultless, in a character so harmonious, humanly speaking, as that of Jesus of Nazareth ? He, too, we are justly reminded, had his hours of ecstacy, holy seasons which a vulgar profanity might describe as halluci- nations (Mark i. 12 ; Luke x. 18, ix. 29).' But further : this Spirit which was the source of St. Paul's deepest knowledge, the fountain light of all his day, the master light of all his seeing, was clearly in the Apostle's view no mere occasional or ecstatic influence : he manifestly identified it with Christ Himself, ' Noiu the Lord is the Spirit' (2 Cor. iii, 17).^ And thus we are led up to that one mode of the expression of that mystical union with Christ which is characteristic of the writings of St. Paul equally with those of St. John. Let us take, e.g., St. Paul's own account of the divine purpose of God in his conversion, ' to reveal His Son in vie! It is here that we meet for the first time with that use of the preposition sv which so often recurs in the language of St. Paul, in such formulje as 01 hv XpiarM, v[xsls sv Xpio-TM, and the like ; its i/ijsticai use, which runs through the whole Gospel of St. John, and which is already present in germ in the first three Gospels under the figure of the bridegroom, and in various sayings (cf Matt, xviii. 20, xxviii. 20, X. 40).^ This communion between St. Paul and his Lord, if gauged by the language of the New Testament, is altogether some- thing unique, something far transcending the relations which exist between one man and another.^ A Plato carries on the work and perfects the philosophy of a Socrates ; and there is no doubt a sense in which a man may be said to live ' Sabatier, ndt supra, p. 70. ^ Sabatier, z'h'd. pp. 260, 311 ; Paret, Paxilus ttitd Jesus, p. 72. ^ Paret, ibid. pp. 72, 73 ; Sabatier, VApotre Paul, p. 51 ; and comp. P, Ewald, ubi supra, p. 82, and chap. v. p. 343 above. On the significance of this figure, used by our Lord, see Maclear, Evidential Value of (he Holy Eucharist, p. 113; and Kennedy, Self- Revelation of Jesus Christ, p. 63. For this mystical element in the Pauline teaching, and its great importance, see also Reuss, Die Geschichte der heiligen Schriften des N. T. p. 53, 6. Aufl. 1887. ^ For this and the following paragraphs, see Sabatier, VApotre Paul, pp. 259, 260 ; Paret, Paulus und Jesus, pp. 71 ff. ST. I'Al'L AS AN ' EVANCKLIST ' 429 again in the lix'cs aiul the thoughts of others — a master in his disciples — a spiritual father like St. Paul in his spiritual sons, and in the Churches which he had begotten. We may even admit that there are expressions in which St. Paul speaks of the relation between Christ and the Christian to which parallels may be found in the ordinary phrases of human life : ' Thus we say,' writes St. Chrysostom, in commenting on Ephes. iv. 24, ' in the case of friends : such an one has put on such an one.' But here, in its bearing upon human friendship, the expression used is a metaphor, and is evidently recognised as one. When, however, St. Paul employs again and again such expressions as these, 'To me to live is Christ,' ' It is no longer I that live, but Christ liveth in me,' ' Christ in you, the hope of glory,' do not such words express something far be- yond a mere metaphor? Do they not point to some spiritual reality, to some present living and abiding union with that Lord who is the Spirit .'' We may justly speak of reverencing a fellow-man, we may be constrained to offer him our love and homage alike, but neither reverence nor love adequately express the relationship between the Christian and Christ, only one word can express it, religion, i.e. a living tie which unites the man to a Divine Person.' To Him, the Risen Saviour, in St. Paul's language, believers belonged. The Apostle knew Jesus as the living One for him and in him, and therefore he speaks so little in his letters of Him who lived before him {i.e. of the historical Jesus).' And yet, all the more wonderful is it how his faith is rooted in the historical Christ when we consider how his thoughts are centred on a present living Saviour, and how near that Saviour appeared to him as the Lord also of the future (comp. e.g. Phil, iv. 5 ; i Cor. xvi. 22).^ But if by the indwelling Spirit of the Lord St. Paul could speak of himself as ' a new creature,' and declare ' See Paret, iibi supra, p. 73. Amongst English writers we may compare such expressions as those used by the author of Ecce Homo, pp. 156, 157, 301 (small edit.), and with a much deeper and fuller meaning such passages as those contained in Dr. Liddon's Bampton Lectures, pp. 347, 5th edit., and Sovie Elements of Relii;ioti, pp. 19-21. - Paret, ibid. p. 30. * Paret, ibid. pp. 29, 30. 430 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES that ' old things had passed away,' ' if Romans vii. reveals to us something of the struggle which the Apostle had himself realised in his own bitter experience '^ — such a change involved something beyond a mere intellectual acceptance of the Mes- siahship of Jesus. It is a favourite position of the Tubingen school that gradual reflection upon the saving significance of the death of the Cross brought Paul to acknowledge that this same Jesus who was crucified is both Lord and Christ, and the extreme representatives of the school are never tired of enforcing the view that to Paul everything else in the life of Jesus vv^as unimportant save the two events of His death and resur- rection.^ But if Old Testament prophecy, or at least current Jewish interpretations of it, did not point to the belief in a suffering Messiah,^ and if it is altogether a fancy picture to imagine the Apostle transformed from a Pharisee into a Christian by reflecting upon Isaiah liii., ^ is it possible that any other sources of knowledge can account for this marvellous change of character and life .'' Supposing, e.^., that St. Paul ' Gloel, Die jiingste Kritik des Galaterhriefes, pp. 77, 78 ; Godet, VEpttre aux Romains, i. Introd, p. 22 ; Beyschlag, Stndien nnd Kritiken, p. 241, 1864. '■^ This is the view taken by various writers ; comp. , e.g. , Sabatier, U A pot re Paul, p. 34 ; Godet, tdn supra, ii. 87, 88 ff. So, too, Pfleiderer, Das Urchristenthuni, p. 38 ; Hibbert Lectures, p. 79. See also Hausrath's remarks, Neidestanientliche Zeitgeschichte, iii. 37. ^ Beyschlag remarks with much force that from one point of view this was the position of the older Apostles no less than of Paul ; they, too, base their authority, not so much upon their long intercourse with Jesus, as upon their brief and transient view of the Christ who died and was risen again. According to Luke xxiv. 46-49 their Apostolic mission consists in testifying to these two facts, the Passion and Resurrection of Christ ; in Acts i. 21-22 Peter indeed mentions their former continuous companying with Jesus, but lays stress upon the testimony to His Resurrection; so, too, in i Cor. xv. 11 and 15, their personal testimony as eyewitnesses to the facts of the Death and Resurrection of Jesus forms the essential element in the preaching of the older Apostles also (Stiidien mid Kritiken, p. 225, 1864). * See chap. i. p. 23, and chap. vi. pp. 360 ff. ; comp. Beyschlag, Stndien nnd Kritiken, p. 19, 1870 : ' Fiir den Pharisaer und Schriftgelehrten fiel dagegen entscheidend ins Gewicht, dass weder Schrift noch Tradition etwas von einem stellvertretend leidenden und sterbenden Messias wussten, vielmehr eine solche Idee mit der orthodoxen Messiasvorstellung sich im schneidendsten Widerspruch befand.' * Hausrath, Neiitestamentliche Zeitgeschichte, Bd. iii. p. 59. ST. PAUL AS AN ' EVANGF.LIST ' 43 1 did not give up his Jewish theology when he became a Christian, and that \vc take into account the fact that a question of frequent discussion in the Rabbinical Schools was how a man could be righteous before God — supposing even that a prophetic passage like that in Isaiah liii. was referred to the Messiah ' — still we are compelled to ask why did Paul attach such a tremendous significance to the death of Jesus of Nazareth? That the Apostle, with his profound sense of sin, and with his rigid Pharisaism,' should conceive of the life and death of Jesus as that of the Jewish Messiah, and of a perfectly righteous man whose sufferings had power with God and made atonement for the defects of his fellow-men, Avould at least lead us to infer that Paul had gained something beyond a mere superficial knowledge of the Jesus to whose life and death he attached such an importance. How much more so, when we are required to belicxc that all this b}- no means exhausts St. Paul's conception, and that the death of Jesus, the heavenly and spiritual man, the representative Head of the whole human race, has an atoning power for Gentile and Jew alike, that it was a divine act of atonement for the whole world, since the world was represented in the death of its Head, a way opened out to Jew and Gentile by which the imputed righteousness of Christ might compensate for the righteousness unobtainable by the law.'"* Certainly to account for some of the elements in these Pauline conceptions, we are asked to look far beyond the limits of the Rabbinical Schools, and the influence of Hellenism ' See, e.g., the picture drawn by Hausrath among otliers, Neiiiestainoitliche Zeitgeschichte, Bd. iii. pp. 58 ff., and 97 ; and see especially in answer, Weiss, Einleituug in das N. T. p. 116, 2. Aufl. 1889 ; and Beyschlag, ^dn supra, where, with reference to the idea of an atoning human sacrifice and its connection with Isaiah's prophecy, he adds this important note : ' Ein einziges Mai tritt dieselbe im Alten Testament hervor, Jes. liii. 10 ; aber es ist bekannt, wie weit entfernt das Judentum zur Zeit Jesu davon war, diese Stelle dogmatisch und messianisch zu deuten. Und selbst der nachmalige Apostel Paulus hat sich auf diese Stelle nirgends ausdrlicklich berufen, zum Zeugniss daftir, dass dieselbe ihm nicht die Bedeutung eines Zeitsterns zur Erkenntniss des Kreuzes Christi gehabt hatte.' ^ See Hausrath, uln supra, pp. 37, 38, Si, 82. ' See the review of I'fleiderer's ' Urchristentlium,' in Thcologischc Studicn aits Wiirttemberg, x. Jahrgang, 1889, I. Heft, pp. 9-I2. 432 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES is freely invoked to explain the workings of the Apostle's mind. There is, indeed, nothing strange in the fact that the Pauline Epistles should contain some allegorical interpreta- tions,' and when we remember that it was the object of St. Paul to present the Gospel to the great Hellenic world, no less than to that of his own countr3/men, it is not surprising to read that his Epistles ' contain almost as many allusions to Hellenism as to Rabbinism.' - But it is quite a different thing to maintain that the fundamental conceptions of St. Paul's theology were derived from Hellenic sources, a position which is the direct reverse of the truth ; ^ his deep sense and horror of sin, e.g., certainly did not come to him from Hellenism. Pfleiderer, the great advocate of these Hellenistic influences, admits that Paul shows no acquaintance whatever with the works of Philo (a most important concession), and although he depends a great deal upon the alleged acquaintance of the ' Dr. Edersheim, speaking of the connection between Greek thought and the Bible, remarks that Plato and the Stoic school had busied themselves in finding a deeper allegorical meaning, especially in the writings of Homer, and that this allegorical method was the welcome key by which the Hellenists sought to un- lock the hidden treasury of Scripture {Jesus the Messiah., i. 33, 34). He adds in a note (p. 34) that he cannot discover any traces of the existence of allegorical interpretations in the Synoptic Gospels, or of any connection with Hellenism such as Hartmann, Siegfried, and Loesner {Ohs. ad N. T. e Phil. Alex.) put into them ; similarity of expressions, or even of thought, afiford no evidence of inward connection. But he points out that in the Pauline Epistles some allegorical interpretations are found, as might be expected, and that as they occur chiefly in the Epistles to the Corinthians they are perhaps owing to the connection of that Church with Apollos. Comp. Hausrath, iibi supra, pp. 23 ff. ; Pfleiderer, Urchristenthum, pp. 154- 158. - Edersheim, ibid. p. 55. ' How entirely the fundamental conceptions of the Pauline theology were rooted in the Old Testament, and how directly they were opposed to the current systems of philosophy, has been well pointed out by Godet (see for his remarks chap. iii. p. 241 above). Comp. also Sabatier, UApotre Paul, pp. 29-32, 48 ; Weiss, Ei7ileitujtg in das N. T. p. 120 and note 2, 2. Aufl. 1889; Gloel, Die jiingste Kritik des Galaterbriefes, pp. 76-78. No one has protested more strongly than Schenkel against the derivation of Paul's theology from the Philo- nian teaching of the Logos, or from the formularies of the Alexandrian School {Das Chrisfusbiid, pp. 299, 300). Hausrath, who finds so many fanciful points of connection between Hellenism and St. Paul's teaching, admits that, so far as he Apostle's anthropology is concerned, his thoughts are rather derived from Jewish than from Grecian sources, whilst with Philo the opposite is the case {Neutest. Zeitgeschichte, iii. 84, note). See also the strictures of Harnack upon the • Hellenism ' of Paul, tdn supra, p. 45 note, 83, 84, and note. ST. TAUL AS AN 'EVANGELIST' 433 Apostle with the Bdok of Wisdom,' yet it is to be observed that this book contains nothing from which the idea of the atoning efficacy of the death of Jesus could be derived.'- The truth is that even if we Hmit the Apostle's knowledge of the historical Christ to the two events of His death and resurrection, we are still face to face, not only with 'Jesus Christ the righteous,' but with a life-giving Personality which neither Hellenism nor Judaism can explain, with a new re- lationship between God and man, which could only be realised b}' those who were personally united to Jesus by faith, by the m}'stical union preached alike by St. Paul and St. John.^ It will be noticed that before he introduces his hero, the great Apostle of the Gentiles, Pfleiderer speaks of the ex- ceeding might and power of that social revolution which was destined to transform and renew the face of the earth, which had its origin among those simple Jews who had not yet separated from their fellow-countrymen, and which made its way, not in a spirit of violence and self-seeking, but by self- sacrificing ministering love — which found its ideal in Jesus, the F'riend of the heavy laden and the poor, and recognised in Him the sure pledge of victory. But whilst such considera- tions alone point to a more than human power in Christianity, a power which was not created by the wisdom and skill of Paul, any picture of the early Christian Church which would reduce the religion of Christ to the level of a mere Jewish sect entirely fails to do justice to one fact (upon which an earlier chapter insisted) — the offence of the Cross /lad not ceased. If, indeed, the Christian community had been undistinguish- able from a sect like that of the Pharisees, if there was no new principle in the Gospel differentiating it from Judaism, ' Speaking of Philo as Paul's contemporary and the most important repre- sentative of the Alexandrine-Jewish theology, I'fieiderer writes : ' Dass Paulus mit dessen Schriften bekannt gewesen sei, ist nicht nachzuweisen und kaum wahrscheinlich ; auch wiirden ihn, wenn er sie je gekannt hiitte, die specifisch philosophischen Speculationen Philosohne Zweifel eher abgestossen alsangezogen hahen' {[/rc/iris/cn/Zita/i, p. 158). - Expositor, vol. vii. pp. 367-371, 3rd series. ' See for Pfleiderer's acknowledgment of this ' mystical ' clement in Paul, Urchrislenthum, p. 24 1 ; and Tlicologische Sludicn ans IViirtli'mliero^ ubi supra, p. 12. F F 434 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES wh}' should Saul of Tarsus have passed from one to the other?' That new motive principle was, in a word, the preaching and the power of the Cross. The scene on Calvary was in reality the irretrievable break between the old religion and the new ; henceforth between Judaism and Christianity there stood the Cross,'^ although the disciples did not at first perceive all that the Cross involved, and did not foresee its far-reaching universal power : that was grasped in the first place by St. Paul. But we shall not understand St. Paul's teaching if we regard it as a mere theological system apart from the man ; God did not choose a Gentile to become the Apostle of the Gentiles — He chose a Pharisee.-* The univcrsalism of St. Paul has its root, not in his Hel- lenism, but rather in the fact that he was a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee, and if he had been less a Jew his work would probably have been marked by less boldness and less freedom. But because he was a Jew he had known only too well the utter vanity of mere external ceremonies, and the crushing yoke of the law, its condemnatory power, its strength, its terror ; because he was a Jew, he could say, under the deepest sense of the burden of sin, ' Who shall deliver me from the body of this death ? ' and in the thankfulness which followed upon so great a deliverance, why should he become a transgressor by building again the things which he had destroyed ? ' God forbid that I should glory save in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.' ^ The words were true of each portion of the Apostle's Christian life ; ' whatever was the development of his thoughts, ' Sabatier, UApotre Paul, pp. 6, lo. - Sabatier, UApotre Paul, p. 12: 'La rupture irremediable entre la religion du passe et celle de I'avenir avail eu lieu au Calvaire. Jesus, en mourant, a garanti son ceuvre contre toute reaction inintelligente ou timide. Des le commencement, entre elle et le judaisme, il a plante sa croix, et, quand les disciples seront tentes de rebrousser chemin, ils la rencontreront toujours entre eux et leur peuple comme une infranchissable barriere. C'est la croix, en efiet, qui est le vrai principe moteur de tous les developpements qui ont suivi.' ' Sabatier, tibi supra, p. 49. See also a remarkable passage to the same effect in the fourth edition of Neander's Geschichte der PJlanzuiig, revised by the author, and incorporated in the fifth edition, i. 118. < Sabatier, ubi supra, pp. 48, 49. »See for this, Sabatier, tdn stipra, pp. 12, 54, 79, 85, 86, 215-220, 232, 277, 313. 314- ST. PAUL AS AN 'EVANGELIST' 435 whatever the animosities he had to face, or tiie questions he was called upon to decide, the Cross remained the central point of his thcolog)-, a revelation of the depth of the love of God and of the sin of man, a revelation of life in the midst of death. In the highest conception of the Pauline theology, in the Paulinism des dcrniers temps (as it is called), no less than in that of the earliest missionary labours, it is in the Cross that the Apostle sees the great historical fact of the world's redemption ; and as he extends his gaze beyond the outward form of this world, which was ever passing away, it is by the blood of the Cross that he beholds all things recon- ciled unto Christ, the Firstborn from the dead, whether they be things on earth, or things in heaven — the circumference is enlarged, the central point is still the same.' There is, then, a sense in which it is most true to say that from its commencement to its close Paul's whole Christian life depended upon the death and resurrection of Christ, and in his theology, as in his own soul, those two facts claimed and held the foremost place.- Near the city of Rome there stands at this day a church dedicated to the memory of St. Paul : over what is said to be his tomb, his own words find a fitting place — \^as Electionis ; below it runs the legend which sums up in one brief sentence all his answer to the puzzling riddle of human existence : MiJii vivere CJiristus est, et inori lucrum. When he writes to the Corinthians that henceforth he will not know Christ after the flesh, we need not suppose that he undervalued the human life of Jesus ; he could still love to think of the Christ who died — but he adds, 'yea rather, who is risen again'; he was still ' crucified with Christ ' — but he adds, ' nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ livcth in me.' He felt within himself the beatings of the pulse of a Risen Life, and while, in one sense, ' former things ' — the memories of the earthly life of Jesus — never ' passed awa}',' yet they had most surely ' become new.' ' I remember,' says Bishop Ewing, ' one night sitting with Pcre Hyacinthe in Rome, in the midst of his troubles, ' Sabatier, ithi supra, pp. 215, 216. ^ Il>iti. pp. 53-55. V V 2 436 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES at a time when there seemed to him an end of all perfection, and his heart failed and flesh fainted. But when one said : " Mild vivere CJiristiis est" he exclaimed, " Yes, that is enough, that is all." ' ' It is the simple testimony of the great multi- tude whom no man can number, who, through all the changes and chances of this mortal life have had the witness in them- selves, the witness borne by the Spirit and the Presence of Jesus Christ, ' the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever,' ' Christ is the end, for Christ was the beginning ; Christ the beginning, for the end is Christ.' ' Quoted by Dr. Story in Creed and Conduct. INDEX OF AUTHORITIES QUOTED Arnold, M. : on the Incarnation, p. 278 Bauer: his arguments against the Haitptbriefe reproduced by Steck and Vcilter, pp. 133, 202, 214 ; his attempt to disprove the historical reality of Jesus, 139 ; his invidious tone and reckless criticism condemned by Steck, 140 ; his embittered career, and his failure, ibid. ; his negative conclusions advocated by Loman, 144, 145; remarks of Weiss upon, 157; Bauer's theory of the dependence of the Pauline writings upon Seneca, revived by Steck, 214 Baur: on 2 Cor. v. 16, p. 2 ; criticism on his rejection of Rom. xv. xvi., 5 ; on Philemon, 8, 9 ; dates assigned to the Gospels, 12 ; influence on Strauss, 18 ; object in minimising Paul's acquaintance with the historical Jesus, 27, 28 ; on Paul's acquaintance with the human life of Jesus, 28 ; Paret's criticism, ibid. ; on I Cor. vii. 25, 63 and 319 ; Zahn's criticism of, 134 ff. ; Baur's position reversed by Steck, 157 ; his remarks on the Hauptbriefe, 243 ; his view of I Cor. viii. 6 and Phil. ii. 6, 260; on Rom. ix. 5, 281 ; on 2 Cor. viii. 9, 292 ; on the Resurrection of Jesus, 378 ; on Gal. i. 15, 379 ; on efCTpco^a, 381 ; on 2 Cor. xii. 9, 383 ; on Paul's conversion, 395 ; Lichtenbcrger's criticism, 396 ; Paul and the Old Testament, 416 ; claim of Jesus to be the future Judge of mankind, 403 Beyschlag : on Paul's acquaintance with Jesus, p. 2 ; on the value of the Pauline Epistles, 19; references in them to the human life of Jesus, 93 ff. ; on the institution of the Lord's Supper, 97, 99 ; on the pre-existence of Christ, 270 ; on the Incarnation, 289 ; on the Passion, 350 ; reference to his criticism of Strauss's account of the last hours of Jesus, 355 ; date of the Hebrews, 356 ; on its references to the human life of Jesus, 357 ; the burial of Jesus, 363 ; the Old Testament and the Resurrection of Jesus, 365 ; on John xi. 24, 366 ; on Paul's list of appearances of the Risen Christ, 369, 373 ; reference to his criticism of the word ic(pd-n, 370 and 386 ; on the appearance to the five hundred, 374 ; agreement between Paul and the Twelve, 377 ; the truthfulness of the accounts of Paul's conversion, ibid. ; criticism of Baur's account of the Resurrection of Jesus, and of Gal. i. 15, 378, 379 ; importance of inference from I Cor. xii. 28, 380; explanation of Paul's 'reserve,' 381 ; Paul dis- tinguishes between visions and realities, 383 ; on the force of the words ' last of all ' in I Cor. xv. 8, 386 ; further objections to the vision-theory, 3S9 ; on Paul's mental state at his conversion, 390, 391 ; on the Ascension, 399 ; no evidence of any ' Small Apocalypse,' 409 ; Paul's knowledge of Chris- tianity before his conversion, 418; Paul and the older Apostles, 430; doc- trine of a suffering Messiah foreign to Jewish tradition and interpretations, 430, 43» 438 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES Bi)-f;s : on Rom. xv. 17-19, and Paul's claim to miraculous powers, p. 303 ; on I Thess. ii. 14, 15, 350 ; on i Cor. v. 7 as a note of time, 351 Boiissei : his criticism of Resch, pp. 129-131 ; on the Words of Institution, 352 Carpeiite}- : on i Cor. viii. 5, 6, p. 266 ; on the miraculous birth of Plato, 279 ; reference to the birth stories of the Buddha, 281 ; on points of connection between Mark and Paul, 315 ; on Mark xv. 21, and Rom. xvi. 13, 358 ; I'aul's knowledge of the human life of Jesus, 415 Christlieh : on I Cor. xv. p. 365 Dalinan: on the doctrine of a Suffering Messiah, pp. 23 and 360, 361 Danuin : his loss of faith, and the Cospel records, p. i Daivson: on the Incarnation, p. 281 Deane : on the doctrine of a Suffering Messiah, p. 361 ; significance of Jesus regarded as the future Judge, 403 ; Matt. xxiv. and Jewish Apocalyptic litera- ture, 408 Deck : his criticism of Weizsacker on i Cor. xv. 3-8, pp. 371, 393 Deny, Bishop of: on the word Kvpios in relation to Jesus Christ, p. 263 ; on the word AMa, 313 ; on I Cor. x. 27 and Luke x. 8, 322 ; on i Cor. vii. 35 and Luke X. 40, 326 ; on ^Llrk xv. 21 and Rom. xvi. 13, 358 ; on 2 Tim. i. 12, z'l'id. De Wette : on Ephesians and Colos«ians, pp. 9, 256 ; Steck's criticism of his view on 2 Cor. viii. 9, 292 ; on the Hebrews, 356 Didon: on the Incarnation, pp. 274, 279, 281, 287 ; on Matt, xxviii. 16, 373 Dorner : on the Adam Kadmon, p. 273 ; on the title ' Son of Man,' 282 Druminond,/. : the doctrine of a Suffering Messiah and Jewish expectations, 361 Edersheim : Jewish ideas, and the Christ of the Gospels, pp. 22, 23 ; Pfleiderer on the value of Edersheim's work, 22 itole ; on the accuracy of St. Luke, 245, 246 ; on the title 'Son of David,' 253 ; Paul's Christology and Philo, 259 ; on Old Testament prophecy and the narratives of the Incarnation, 277 ; on Jewish views of marriage, 279 ; on the lineage of the Virgin and Joseph, 289 ; the Resurrection of Jesus, as it took place, quite foreign to Jewish ideas, 366 ; force of the word laTopr\aa.i in Gal. i. 18, 372 ; Jesus as the future Judge of mankind, 403 ; St. Matthew and St. Luke and 4 Esdras, 407 ; Paul's Epistles and Hellenism, 432 ; Paul's Epistles and Rabbinism, ibid. Evans : on the force of onro in i Cor. xi. 23, p. 424 Ewald, H. : his judgment on the Pauline Epistles, p. 7 ; on the Risen Jesus, ibid. ; Paul's acquaintance with the historical Jesus, 34 ff. ; agreement between Paul and the Twelve, 158 and 377 ; on Ephesians, 256 ; the character of Jesus in the Gospels and Epistles, 294, 295 ; reference to the Temptation of Jesus, 297 ; reference to the Gospel miracles in James ii. 19, 302 ; the Epistles and the teaching of Jesus, 311, 314; distinction in i Cor. vii. between Paul's own opinion and the command of the Lord, 319 ; on i Cor. ix. 14, 321 ; further connections between the Gospels and Epistles, 324, 325 ; date of the Hebrews, 356 ; on I Cor. xv. 3, 367 ; i Thess. v. and the Gospels, 407, 421 Eivald, P. : refers to Paret's treatise, p. 86 ; criticism of Resch's Agrapha, 106 ff. ; Paul's acquaintance with the life and teaching of Jesus, 113, 114, 318-321 ; on Rom. vi. 3, 115 ; on I Cor. ii. 9, 116 ; on Col. iii. 18, 121 ; on the force of fSios in Rom. viii. 32, 255 ; connection between Paul and John, 329 ff. ; his criticism of Roos, 330 ; on I Tim. vi. 13, 351 ; on Col. i. 20, 359 ; reference to the appearance to James, 373 ; to the five hundred, 376 ; on Rom. ii. 16, 403 ; Jesus as the future Judge, ibid. ; Rabbinism and INDKX OF AUTHORITIES QUOTED 439 the teaching of Jesus, 420; the iliscourscs of Jesus aiul tlicir liistorical frame- work, 421 ; the sources of Paul's knowledge, 422 Fairhaint : criticism of the mythical theory, p. 20 ; Jewish ideas and the Christ of the ("lospels, 23 ; reference to the silence of Josephus as to Jesus, 152 ; on the title ' Son of Man,' 282 ; on the beauty of St. Luke's narrative of the In- carnation, 290; on Judaism and ' the Suffering Messiah,' 361 ; the Resurrec- tion of Jesus, as it took place, quite foreign to Jewish ideas, 366 ; on Paul's character, 392 ; criticism of Baur on the Resurrection of Jesus, 396 ; significance of the belief in the return of Jesus, 414 Farrar, A. S. : on the distinction between myth and legend, p. 17 ; on Bruno Bauer, 140 Farrar, F. IV. : on the title 'Son of Man,' p. 287 ; on the use of the word tic- ((A.7j 373 ; the Ascension of Jesus, 399 ; Paul and written memoirs of Jesus, 422 ; his retirement to Arabia, 424 ; choice of Saul the Pharisee to be the Apostle of the Gentiles, 434 Nicholson: on the traditionary sayings of Je.'us, pp. 115, 120, 129, 131 ; on I Cor. XV. 7, 373 ; on i Cor. xv. 8, 374 Nosgen : on the mythical theory, p. 17; time essential for the growth of the myth, 19 ; reference to his criticism of Beyschlag on the Incarnation, 100, 290 ; on the extra canonical sayings of Jesus, 105, 13 1 ; on Acts ix. 27 and Gal. i. 18, 230 ; opposes Steck's theory, 242 ; on the Incarnation, 275, 277, 278 ; the contents of Paul's preaching, 308 ; on Baptism, 317 ; on i Cor. ix. 14, 321 ; Paul's acquaintance with the teaching of Jesus, 347 ; the reality of the death of Jesus, 363 ; His burial, ibid. ; ' the first day of the week,' 368, 369 ; the appearance to the five hundred, 376 ; the appearance to Paul, I Cor. XV. 8, 385 ; the Ascension of Jesus, 397 Paret : on Paul's acquaintance with Jesus, p. 2; Paul's Christology, 15; the Tubingen School and Paul, 27 ; on Baur, 28, 29 ; his writings, 85 ; recognition by various theologians, 86; on Rom. vi. 3, 115; on I Cor. ix. 10, 118; reference to by Resch, ibid. ; agreement between Paul and the Twelve, 158 ; the title • Son of Man,' 282 ; ' the Second Adam ' and ' the Son of Man,' 282, 284 ; the human surroundings of Jesus, 293 ; His character and ministry, 294 ; His example, 295 ; His sinlessness, 298 ; the historical terms in Paul's Epistles, 302 ; Paul and the miracles of Jesus, 302-304 ; no miracles ascribed to the Baptist, 305 ; Paul's preaching of Jesus as the Christ, 307 ; its signifi- cance, 307-309 ; the teaching of Jesus in the Epistles, 311-315 ; significance of Paul's account of the Lord's Supper, 315, 316 ; on Baptism, 316, 317 ; the distinction in i Cor. vii. between Paul's own opinion and a command of Jesus, 319, 320 ; on i Cor. ix. 14, 320-322 ; on I Cor. x. 27, 322 ; on I Cor. ix. 10, 323 ; Paul and John, 329 ; on the word ■irpoeypd agreement with Paret on Paul's own statements with regard to his con- version, 379 ; similar agreement with regard to 2 Cor. xii. 9, 385 ; on the bodily resurrection of Jesus, 386 ; Sabatier"s present views, 388 note ; Paul's mental state at his conversion, 390, 391 ; eschatology of the Gospels and Epistles, 404, 405 ; change in Paul's eschatology, 412 ; the use of Jewish Apocalyptic terms by Jesus, 413 ; Paul's acquaintance with the human life of Jesus, 415, 419; Paul and the Old Testament, 417; Paul and Rabbinism, 420 ; the sources of Paul's knowledge, 422, 423 ; the spiritual side of Paul's nature, 427 ; the spiritual element in Jesus, 428 ; a mystical union with Jesus in St. Paul and St. John alike, 428, 429 ; Paul and the power of the Cross, 434, 435 Sadler : The Lost GosJ>e/ and the expression ' contemporary history,' p. 4 .Sainton : on Ploltzmann's theorj- on Colossians, p. 9 ; evidential value of Paul's Epistles, 13 ; refers to Resch, 106 ; Hermas and Ephes. iv. 30, 126 ; on the traditional saying ' show yourselves approved money-changers,' 129 ; on patristic quotations, 131 ; reference to Gloel, 161 ; version of the Words of Institution, 199, 353 ; Paul and John, 260, 330 ; on 2 Timothy, 253 ; date of the Apocalypse, 259 ; reference to Acts xx. 28, 315 ; on i Cor. x. 27 and Luke X. 8, 322, 327 ; Holtzmann and Luke's dependence upon the Pauline Epistles, 327 ; reference to his criticism of Strauss's account of the Last Supper, 355 ; date of the Hebrews, 357 ; the eschatology of the Epistles and the Gospels, 406, 408 INDEX OF AUTHORITIES QUOTED 447 Sunday : reference to his remarks on the evidential value of Paul's Epistles, p. 13 ; reference to Resch, 105 ; on the Agrapha, 105, 118, 119, 128, 129 ; his strictures upon, 131 ; on Peter's conduct, Gal. ii., 160 ; on Gloel, 161 Schanz : time in growth of myths, p. 20 ; on Rom. ix. 5, 262 ; the force of Kupios, 266 ; on i Cor. x. 4, 270; ' the heavenly man,' i Cor. xv., 272 ; the Incarnation, 281 ; ' the Son of Man,' 285, 286 ; the death of Jesus, 363 ; on Paul's list of appearances of the Risen Jesus, 376 Schcnkcl : accepts i and 2 Thessalonians, p. 10 ; defence of Philippians, Ephesians, Colossians, ibid. ; on Paul's acquaintance with the life of Jesus, 43, 44 ; on Col. ii. II, 245 ; his Christolog)% 260, 261, 270 ; on 2 Cor. viii. 9, 292 ; on the sinlessness of Jesus, 299; on the burial of Jesus, 363 ; reference to Milli- gan's reply to his strictures on the Ascension, 399 ; Paul and I'hilo, 432 Schkierniacher : his denial of the Ascension, p. 397 Schmid : testimony to the evidential value of Paul's Epistles, p. 13 ; the teaching of Paul and Luke, 251 ; descent of Jesus from David in the New Testa- ment, 253; Paul's monotheism, 255, 276 ; on i Cor. viii. 6, 260, 272; on I Cor. XV. 47, 269; the personal pre-existence of Christ, 271 ; on Isaiah vii. 14, 277 ; future participation of Gentiles in salvation, 294 ; the sinless- ness of Jesus, 29S, 299; continuance of miraculous power in early Church, 301, 306; Paul's teaching on righteousness, derived from Jesus, 312; Paul's distinction in i Cor. vii. between his own opinion and a command of Jesus 319 ; reference of the w^ords of Jesus at the Last Supper, 356 ; the narratives of Paul's conversion, 377 ; the Ascension of Jesus, 397 ; Jewish ideas of the Messiah and the Ascension of Jesus, 400 Schmiedel : on 2 Cor. v. 16, p. 2 ; accepts i Thessalonians, 4 ; on i Cor. xi. 26, 121 ; criticism of Steck, 207, 240 ; on harmonising appearances of the Risen Jesus, 375 ; on the Resurrection appearances, 386 ; on 1 Thess. iv. 15, 408 ; on the distinction between kito and Trapa (i Cor. xi. 23), 425 Scholten: dissent from, and reply to, Loman, pp. 151 ff. Schiirer : on Keim's chronology, p. 3 ; ' the Suffering Messiah,' 23 ; reference to his remarks on Luke ii. 42, 246 ; on i Cor. vi. 2, 311 ; i Cor. ix. 14 and Matt. x. 10, Luke x. 7, 320 Schwei^Ier : his position criticised by Pfleiderer, p. 29 ; on Jewish and Pauline Chris- tianity, ibid. ; Paul's relation to the historical Christ, 32 ; to Christ's teachin'', ibid. ; on Jesus as the Christ, 32, 347 ; on the personality of fesus, 33 ; on the death of Jesus, 34, 361 Stanley: ' the Christ' of the Epistles and of the Gospels, p. 24 ; on the phrase lived amongst men, 291 ; on 2 Cor. viii. 9, 292; the miracles of Jesus and the Epistles, 301 ; on Acts xx. 28, 315 ; Paul and Luke's Gospel, 326 ; I Tim. vi. 13 and John xviii. 36, 351 ; on the appearance to the five hundred, 374 ; Paul as an ' Evangelist,' 415 Stanton: the evidential value of the I'auline Epistles, pp. 13, 15, 25 ; the title ' Son of Man ' and the Epistles, 287 ; no miracles ascribed to the Baptist, 305; on the Church (Matt. xvi. 18, 19), 309; the doctrine of a 'Suffering Messiah,' 361 ; Old Testament prophecy and the Resurrection of Jesus, 365 ; significance of the claim of Jesus to be the future Judge, 403 Steck: repeats the argument of Bruno Bauer, p. 133; condemns his tone and recklessness, 140 ; attack upon \\\q Hauptbricfc, 156; alleged discrepancies between Acts and Galatians, 156-163 ; alleged dependence of Galatians upon Romans and i and 2 Corinthians, 164- 176 ; method of dealing with the external 448 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES evidence in support of the Haiipthriefe, 1 76-188 ; alleged instances of depen- dence of the Hauptbrkfc upon the Gospels, 189- 193 ; Pauline Epistles and the Gospel of St. Luke, 193-196 ; on the account of the Lord's Supper, 197- 200, 352 ; on the Resurrection appearances in i Cor. xv. , 200-207, 373 ; Paul's Christology, 207-211 ; i\ic Hanpthriefe and extra-canonical writings, 211-213 ; Philo and Seneca, 213-216 ; criticism of his position by Hilgenfeld, Godet, &c., 239-241 ; on Gal. iv. 4, 247; Phil. ii. 5, 270 ; i Cor. x. 4, 270; refers Rom. ix. 5 to Christ, 281 ; on Gal. i. 17, 380 Steinhart : on the story of Plato's miraculous birth, pp. 279, 280 Steinmeyer : significance of Gal. iv. 4, 5, p. 245 ; on Isaiah vii. 14, 277; Strauss and the Incarnation, 280 ; Strauss and Heb. v. 7, 357 ; Heb. xiii. 12, 13, 357 ; Old Testament prophecy and the Resurrection of Jesus, 365 ; Jewish ideas and the Resurrection of Jesus, 366 ; the death of Jesus, 367 ; on i Cor. XV. 5, 370 ; on I Cor. xv. 7, 373 ; reference to his remarks on the word 6K7pu)yua, 381 ; criticism of Strauss on Paul's conversion, 390; Paul's conver- sion and his Apostleship, 392 ; the Ascension of Jesus, 397, 399, 400 ; the Old Testament and the Ascension, 400 ; truthfulness of the Ascension, 401 St rack and Zbckler (Commentary) : on Gal. iv. 4, p. 245 ; on Col. ii. II, ibid. ; on Heb. V. 7, 357 ; on i Cor. xv. 5, 373, 374 ; on i Cor. xv. 6, 374 ; on e/frpw/xa, 381 ; I Thess. iv. 15 and the Didache, 407 ; sources of Paul's information, 426 Strauss: the mythical theory, pp. 16, 17; influenced by Baur, 18 ; ignores the value of Paul's testimony, 19, 20 ; weakness of the mythical theory, 16, 20- 23 ; attaches no importance to the likelihood of Paul's acquaintance with the historical Jesus, 29 ; attempt to explain the Incarnation from heathen sources, 280; his demand for absence of preconception, 304; Jesus and the Last Supper, 354, 355 ; on Heb. v. 7, 357 ; on the reality of the death of Jesus, 362, 363 ; on the burial of Jesus, 363 ; the Resurrection and Jewish ideas, 366 ; on the appearances of the Risen Jesus, 367 ; his account of Paul's conversion, 390 ; the Ascension of Jesus, 397, 399 ; claim of Jesus to be the future Judge, 403 ; on Paul's knowledge of Christian belief, 418 Thenius : his letter to Bruno Bauer, p. 86 ; recent references to it, ibid. ; antici- pates Pfleiderer's theory, 87 ; the aim of the Epistles, 291 ; Paul's knowledge of the human surroundings of Jesus, 293 ; the example of Jesus known to Paul, 296, 297 ; triumph of Jesus over the power of the senses, and Paul's testimony to his sinlessness, 298, 299; the teaching of Jesus, 311 ff. ; on Baptism, 317 ; distinction in i Cor. vii. between Paul's own opinion and the command of Jesus, 319, 320 ; on i Cor. xiii. 2, 325 ; Luke and Paul, 326 ; John and Paul, 330 ; the agents in the death of Jesus, 350 ; on i Tim. vi. 13 and John xviii. 36, 351 ; on i Cor. v. 7 as a note of time, 351 ; 'the first day of the week,' 368 ; the bodily Resurrection of Jesus, 386 Uhlhorn : Paul's character and his miracles, 306 ; critical discernment of the early Church, ibid. ; Baptism, 317 ; Paul's acquaintance with the historical Jesus, 347 ; the fact of the burial of Jesus, 363 Ulliiiann : on myths, p. 16 ; the Pauline Epistles and the mythical theory, 19; Strauss and the Gospels, 20; in relation to Strauss, 21, 132 ; on the Apo- cryphal Gospels, 287 ; the sinlessness of Jesus, 298-300 ; the miraculous power of Jesus, 301, 305 ; no miracle ascribed to the Baptist, 305 ; the signifi- cance of the Crucifixion of Jesus, 360 ; the Old Testament and the Resurrec- tion of Jesus, 365 Vail Manen : his article against Pierson and Naber, and his own subsequent INDEX OF AUTHORITIES QUOTED 449 position, p. 144 ; summary of Loman's view, 148 ; his judgment on Lonian 149 ; account of Loman's opponents, 150 ff. ; on the historical Paul, 160 Vischer: and the Apocalypse, p. 259 Volkmar : on Paul's conversion, p. 3 ; date to which he assigns the Gospels, 12, 88, 90 ; on Luke's narrative of the Incarnation and the Pauline Epistles, 88 ff. ; on the narrative in Matt. ii. , 89 ; criticism of his position, 92, 93, 245 ; adverse to Steck, 239 ; the kingdom in the Gospels and Epistles, 310-314 ; Mark and Paul, 314 ; the word eua-yyi\iov, 321 ; date of the Hebrews, 357 Vdlter : reproduces the arguments of Bruno Bauer, p. 133 ; attack on the Hauptbriefc similar in many respects to that of Steck, 189, 216 ; examination of his theories with regard to the Romans, 216-224 » with regard to the Galatians, 225-239 ; his disintegration of the Apocalypse, 259; Mark xv. 21 and Rom. xvi, 13, 358 ; on Gal. i. 17, 380 Von Soden : accepts l Thessalonians, p. 4 ; defends Colossians, 8 ; on the Ephesians, 256 ; on i Cor. x. 4, 270; on the Hebrews, 357 ; the Hebrews and the life of Jesus, 357 Wace : on significance of 2 Cor. xiii. 14, p. 262 ; the Epistles and the Nicene Creed, 263 Watkins : on Evanson's attack upon the Romans, 134; the date of classical MSS., 134 ; on Ritschl, 138 Weiss, B. : on Paul's acquaintance with Jesus, p. 2 ; on Rom. xv. xvi., 6 ; on the Pauline Epiitles, 12 ; the mythical theory, 17, 20, 21 ; on Paul's acquaint- ance with the details of the earthly life of Jesus, 77-84 ; refers to Paret's treatises, 86; on the words of the Lord, 115, 116 ; I Cor. ix. 10, 119; on the Logia, 119, 129; on the acquaintance of Hermas with James and Ephesians, 126 ; forgeries and the early Church, 144 ; on Steck and the Acts, 157 ; Steck's doubts upon Paul's long absence from Jerusalem after his conversion, 162 ; on Marcion, 187 ; St. John's Gospel and Justin Martyr, 194 ; on the supposed ' tendency' of the Acts, and the discrepancies alleged by Volter and others between Galatians and Acts, 230, 231 ; Steck's attack upon the Hauptbriefe, 239, 242 ; on Gal. iv. 4, 245 ; Paul and the miraculous conception of Jesus, 250, 257 ; stress laid by Paul upon Christ's descent from David, 253 ; Colossians and Ephesians, 256 ; the Christology of the Apocalypse, 259 ; on Col. i. 18, ibid. ; l Cor. viii. 6 as against Baur and Schenkel, 260, 272; Rom. ix. 5, 262, 281 ; the force of the title Kupios, 265, 266; i Cor. XV. 47, 268, 269 ; Christ's pre-existence no merely ideal, 270, 271 ; Paul and Philo, 273 ; the Ebionites and the Incarnation, 277, 290 ; on the Jewish interpretation of Isaiah vii. 14, 277 ; the Incarnation not derived from pagan sources, 278 ; Jewish views of marriage and the Incarnation, 279 ; Canonical and Apocryphal Gospels, 288 ; comparison between his arguments and those of W. H. Mill, 289 ; criticised by Beyschlag, 289, 290 ; Paul's references to the sufferings of Jesus, 296 ; to the sinlessness of Jesus, 298 ; the Ne%v Testament and the sinlessness of Jesus, 300 ; on Gal. v. 14 and Rom. xiii. 8, and the commands of Jesus, 314 ; on Matt, xxviii. 19, 318 ; Paul's express reference to the words of Jesus in i Cor. vii. 10 and ix. 14, 318, 319 ; Luke and Paul, 327 ; Luke's ' universalism,' 328 ; on the supposed anti-Judaic ' ten- dency ' of Luke's Gospel, 329 ; on Johannine ideas and words in the Didache, 332 ; on Gal. iii. i, 349 ; the agents in the death of Jesus, 350 ; on i Cor. xi. 23, 351 ; on i Cor. v. 7 as a note of time, ibid. ; on the accounts of the Lord's Supper, 352, 356 ; date of the Hebrews, 357 ; on Ilcb. v. 7, ibid. ; G G 450 THE WITNESS OF THE EPISTLES on Rom. xv. 3, 359 ; the burial of Jesus, 363 ; Old Testament prophecy and the Resurrection of Jesus, 365 ; the Resurrection, as it took place, contrary to Jewish ideas, 366-368 ; the appearances of the Risen Jesus in i Cor. xv., 373> 374> 394 ; on 2 Cor. xii. 9, in agreement with Paret, 385 ; significance of I Cor. XV. 8, ibid. ; Paul's mental state at his conversion, 390, 391 ; the Resurrection of Jesus, 395 ; connection between the Resurrection and the Ascension, 397 ; the infamy of the death of the Cross, 401 ; on i Thess. v. 2, 404 ; on Matt, xxiv., 409 ; Paul's preaching as ' the Apostle of the Gen- tiles,' 419 ; the sajnngsand discourses of Jesus, and their historical framework, 421 ; on Gal. i, 12 and 17, 423, 424 Weizsdcker : on 2 Cor. v. 16, pp. 2, 3, 62 fT. ; on Rom. xv. xvi., 5, 6 ; accepts I Thessalonians and Philippians, 1 1 ; Paul's respect for the older Apostles, 14; the Cross a stumbling-block in the second century, 23; on Paul's ac- quaintance with the historical Jesus, 62, 63 ; importance attached to the words of Jesus, 63, 64 ; refers to Paret's treatise, 85 ; on i and 2 Corinthians, 243 ; on the personal pre-existence of Christ, 249 ; on i Cor. x. 4, 270 ; on lidKoviiv in Paul and the Gospels, 283 ; the intrepid calmness of Paul, 306 ; Paul's use of the term ' the Church of God,' 310 ; Matt. v. 39 and I Cor. vi. 7, 311 ; the word Abba in Gal. iv. 6 and Rom. viii. 15, 313 ; on the law of Christ in Gospels and Epistles, 314 ; distinction in i Cor. vii. between Paul's own opinion and the command of Jesus, 319; on i Cor. ix. 14, 321 ; the Words of Institution, 353 ; on the Baptist, 366; the appearances of the Risen Jesus in Galilee, 367, 370 ; criticism of his theory with regard to the part played by Peter in the belief in the Resurrection, 370-372 ; Paul and his Apostleship, 393 ; claim of Jesus to be the future Judge, 403 ; Jesus and the prophecies of the Messiah, 416 ; Paul's Rabbinical knowledge, 420 ; I Cor. vii. 17, 425 Wendt : the doctrine of a ' Suffering Messiah,' pp. 23 and 361 ; on the extension of the Gospel to the Gentiles, 61 ; on Paul's acquaintance with the life and sayings of Jesus, loo ff. ; on the traditionary sayings of Jesus, 104 ; reference to Paul's testimony to the Davidic descent of Jesus, 294 ; the kingdom of God in the Epistles and Gospels, 309, 310; on the word Abba, Gal. iv. 6, Rom. viii. IS, 313 ; on Acts xx. 28, 315 ; distinction in i Cor. vii. between Paul's opinion and a command of Jesus, 319 ; Luke and Paul, and the teaching of Jesus, 328 ; reference to the Words of Institution, 352 ; on the sig- nificance of the Lord's Supper, 356 ; reference to his view of i Thess. iv. 15, 408 Westcott : reference to his Study of the Gospels, p. 25 ; on our Lord's traditional sayings, 116, 117, 118, 120, 123, 125, 127 ; on Col. ii. 11, 245 ; force of the word Kwptos, 267 ; on I Thess. i. 6, 296 ; the Epistles and the miracles of Jesus, 301 ; no miracle attributed to the Baptist, 305 ; the connection between the Epistles and the Gospels, 347 ; on the force of TrpofypoKpri in Gal. iii. i, 349 ; on I Tim. vi. 13 and St. John xviii. 36, 351 ; on i Cor. v. 7, ibid. ; date of the Hebrews, 357 ; the Hebrews and the life of Jesus, ibid. ; the doctrine of a • Suffering Messiah,' 361 ; the significance of the New Testa- ment accounts of the Resurrection of Jesus, 367, 394 ; significance of the belief in the return of Jesus, 414 ; on dxo in i Cor. xi. 23, 425 Wilson : on the derivation of Paul's miraculous power from Christ, p. 306 IVittichen : date of Paul's conversion, p. 3 ; accepts i Thessalonians and the Uauptbrieje, 4, 62 ; on Paul's knowledge of the historical Jesus, 54 tf. ; on INDEX OF AUTHORITIES QUOTED 45 1 Rom. i. 3, 57, 252 ; on Gal. iv. 4, 245 ; the ministry of Jesus, 294 ; Jesus as an example, 296 ; the impression made by Jesus, 301 ; distinction in i Cor. vii. between Paul's own opinion and a command of Jesus, 319 ; on I Cor. ix. 14, 321 ; the Epistles and the teaching of Jesus, 323 ; the agents in the death of Jesus, 350 lVo>-(is7uorth : on Luke's Gospel and i Thessalonians, p. 406 Wright : importance attached to the Catechists in the early Church, p. 35 IVynnc : reference to his Fragmentary Records, &c., p. 25 Zahn : criticism of the Pauline Epistles, p. 134; Baur's position, 134-138 ; on Weisse and Hitzig, 138 ; on Pierson and Naber, 139-144 ; criticism of Stcck, 156; insufficient list of Stcck's authorities, 183 ; criticism of Sleck's view of Marcion's testimony, 187 ; and of Polycarp's testimony, 188 PRINTED BV SruTTlbWUOUE AND CO., NHW-STREET SQUARE LONDON Date Due 1 i- 21 "><■■ 1 >. ttViXtt" •^*«*rr^ i f) ■'<:'Ay.