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diff --git a/32674.txt b/32674.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1d3aea1 --- /dev/null +++ b/32674.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6382 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, Vol. II, by +Charles Gore + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, Vol. II + A Practical Exposition + +Author: Charles Gore + +Release Date: June 3, 2010 [EBook #32674] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS, VOL. II *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + +_St. Paul's_ + +_Epistle to the Romans_ + + +_A Practical Exposition_ + + + +BY CHARLES GORE, M.A., D.D. + + OF THE COMMUNITY OF THE RESURRECTION + CANON OF WESTMINSTER; CHAPLAIN TO THE KING + + + +VOL. II + +(CHAPTERS IX-XVI) + + + +NEW IMPRESSION + + + + +LONDON + +JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET + +1901 + + + + +OXFORD + +HORACE HART, PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY + + + + +{v} + +PREFACE + +There would be no need for a preface to this second volume were it not +that a very kindly and careful review of the first volume in _The +Guardian_ of May 24 last, requires a word of notice. The reviewer +warns me off 'the dialogue system of exegesis.' Now no doubt this +principle, like every other, may be abused. 'The Jewish objector' may, +as the reviewer complains, be allowed to 'run riot.' Still I cannot +doubt that the Jewish objector is a reality of an illuminative kind in +the argument of such passages as Romans iii. 1-8, or the great passage +(ix-xi), to which the first part of this volume is devoted. Of the +other points of detail noticed by the reviewer--which a volume of this +kind is not the place to discuss--many are confessedly doubtful, and +some unimportant. On most of {vi} them I am still disposed to retain +my former opinion, but I would, in accordance with my critic's wishes, +alter 'the actual life' (vol. i. p. 203) into 'the principle of life,' +and (p. 213) instead of saying that the principle of living by dying +'belongs only to a fallen world' say that 'it belongs, _as St. Paul +views it, though probably not in its ultimate law_, to a fallen world.' +I agree that in its deepest sense the principle appears to be an +ultimate law of all created life of which the conditions are known to +us. + +C. G. + +WESTMINSTER ABBEY, + _Conversion of St. Paul_, 1900. + + + + +{vii} + +TABLE OF CONTENTS + + +THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. + + PAGE + +DIVISION IV _The theodicy or justification of God for His + dealings with the Jews_ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 + +CHAPTER + + IX. 1-13 Sec. 1 The present rejection of Israelites no + breach of a divine promise . . . . . . . . . . 14 + + 14-29 Sec. 2 God's liberty in showing mercy and judgement + always retained and asserted . . . . . . . . . 31 + + 30-x.21 Sec. 3 Lack of faith the reason of Israel's rejection 44 + + XI. 1-12 Sec. 4 God's judgement on Israel neither universal + nor final . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59 + + 13-36 Sec. 5 God's present purpose for the Jews through + the Gentiles: and so for all humanity . . . . . 68 + + +DIVISION V _Practical exhortation_ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95 + + XII. 1-2 Sec. 1 Self-surrender in response to God . . . . . . . 97 + + 3-21 Sec. 2 The community spirit . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103 + + XIII. 1-7 Sec. 3 The Christians and the imperial power . . . . . 116 + + 8-10 Sec. 4 The summary debt . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127 + + 11-14 Sec. 5 The approach of the day . . . . . . . . . . . . 133 + + XIV. 1-23 Sec. 6 Mutual toleration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137 + + XV. 1-13 Sec. 7 Unselfish forbearance and inclusiveness . . . . 159 + + + +{viii} + +DIVISION VI _Conclusion_ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170 + + XV. 4-33 Sec. 1 St. Paul's excuse for writing, and his hope + of coming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171 + + XVI. 1-2 Sec. 2 A commendation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189 + + 3-16 Sec. 3 Personal greetings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191 + + 17-20 Sec. 4 Final warning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198 + + 21-23 Sec. 5 Salutations from companions . . . . . . . . . . 200 + + 25-27 Sec. 6 Final doxology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201 + + +APPENDED NOTES:-- + +A. The meanings of the word 'faith' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205 + +B. The use of the word 'conscience' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207 + +C. Recent reactions from the teaching about hell . . . . . . . 210 + +D. Difficulties about the doctrine of the atonement . . . . . . 215 + +E. Evolution and the Christian doctrine of the Fall . . . . . . 219 + +F. Baptism by immersion and by affusion . . . . . . . . . . . . 237 + +G. A prayer of Jeremy Taylor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238 + +H. The origin of the maxim 'In necessariis unitas, &c.' . . . . 239 + +I. St. Augustine's teaching that 'The Church is the + body of Christ offered in the eucharist' . . . . . . . . 240 + + + + +{1} + +THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS + +DIVISION IV. CHAPTERS IX-XI. + +_The theodicy or justification of God for His dealings with the Jews._ + +St. Paul has concluded his great exposition of the meaning of 'the +gospel': that in it is the disclosure of a divine righteousness into +which all mankind--Jews and Gentiles on the same level of need and +sin--are to be freely admitted by simply believing in Jesus. The +believer in Jesus first welcomes the absolute and unmerited forgiveness +of his sins, which his redeemer has won for him, and thus acquitted +passes into the spiritual strength and joy and fellowship of the new +life, the life of the redeemed humanity, lived in Jesus Christ, the +second Adam or head of our race. The {2} contemplation of the present +moral freedom, and the glorious future prospect, of this catholic +body--the elect of God in Jesus Christ--has in the eighth chapter +filled the apostle's language with the glow of an enthusiasm almost +unparalleled in all the compass of his epistles. And he is intending +to pass on to interpret to the representatives of this church of Christ +at Rome some of the moral obligations which follow most clearly from +the consideration of what their faith really means. This ethical +division of the epistle begins with chapter xii. The interval (ix-xi) +is occupied with a discussion which is an episode, in the sense that +the epistle might be read without it and no feeling of a broken unity +would force itself upon us. None the less the discussion not only +confronts and silences an obvious objection to St. Paul's teaching, but +also brings out ideas about the meaning of the divine election, and the +responsibility involved in it, which are vital and necessary for the +true understanding of the 'free grace of God.' For these chapters +serve really to safeguard the all-important sense of our human +responsibility under the rich and unmerited conditions of divine +privilege in which we find ourselves. + +{3} + +St. Paul's argument so far has involved an obvious conclusion. God's +elect are no longer the Jews in particular. On the contrary, the Jews +in bulk have lost their position and become apostates in rejecting the +Christ. This result in the first place cuts St. Paul to the heart, for +his religious patriotism was peculiarly intense. But in the second +place it furnishes an objection in the mouth of the Jew against St. +Paul's whole message. For if God had really rejected His chosen +people, He had broken His word in so doing. God had pledged Himself to +Israel: the Old Testament scriptures were full of passages which might +be quoted to this effect. Thus-- + + 'My mercy will I not utterly take from David + 'Nor suffer my faithfulness to fail. + 'My covenant will I not break, + 'Nor alter the thing that is gone out of my lips. + 'Once have I sworn by my holiness; + 'I will not lie unto David; + 'His seed shall endure for ever, + 'And his throne as the sun before me. + 'It shall be established for ever as the moon, + 'And as the faithful witness in the sky[1].' + +But according to St. Paul's teaching, had not God 'broken His +covenant'? What had {4} become of the 'faithful witness'? To this +objection, then, St. Paul sets himself to reply. The chapters we are +now to consider may be best represented as an animated defence of his +teaching directed toward a Jew who pleads this objection. St. Paul, no +doubt, had heard too much of it since he began to preach the gospel, +and had felt it too deeply in his own mind in the earlier days, when +the word of Jesus was as a goad against which he was kicking, for it to +be possible for him to pass it by. And his defence--his 'theodicy' or +justification of God--is in brief this: God never committed Himself or +tied Himself to Israel physically understood. He always kept hanging +over their heads declarations of His own freedom in choosing His +instruments, and warnings of possible rejection, such as ought to have +prevented their resting satisfied with merely having 'Abraham to their +father' (ix). And if the question be asked: Why has Israel been +rejected? The answer is: That so far as actual Israel has fallen out +of the elect body, it is because they refused to exhibit the +correspondence of faith (x); but also Israel, as such, has not been +rejected; for, as of old, so now there is a faithful remnant. Nor +again is the partial alienation of Israel which {5} has occurred final. +God is simply waiting for their recovery of faith, to restore them to +their ancient and inalienable position of election. Meanwhile He uses +their temporary alienation as the opportunity of the Gentiles, who in +their turn can only retain their newly won position by maintaining the +correspondence of faith with the purposes of God, and who also wait for +their fulfilment and the perfecting of their joy upon the recovery of +Israel as a body. Thus through all stages of election and +rejection--by both methods of mercy and of judgement--God, in His +inscrutable wisdom, works steadily for the opportunity of showing His +mercy upon all men. + +When we have a brief analysis of the argument of these chapters under +our eyes, we may well rub them in astonishment, and look again, and ask +why, in the reaction against Calvinism[2], we had come (to put it +frankly) to dislike these chapters so much. We know that as a fact +these chapters have been taken as a stronghold of the Calvinistic +position by both its {6} friends and foes. They have come to +constitute in modern literature a sort of reproach upon +Christianity[3], just on the ground on which the best Christian +conscience of our time is most sensitive. Many of us would have to +admit that we have shrunk from these chapters as we have heard them +read, and probably avoided them in our own reading. We have shrunk +from the sound of the words--'the children being not yet born, neither +having done anything good or bad, that the purpose of God according to +election might stand, not of works but of him that calleth'--'Jacob +have I loved, and Esau have I hated'--'Whom he will he +hardeneth'--'Hath not the potter power over the clay.' Yet these +texts, with their arbitrary, unfair and narrow sound, appear as steps +in an argument which has for its conclusion the most universal +conception possible of the purpose of the divine love. 'God shut up +all unto disobedience, that he might have mercy upon all.' The +conclusion of the argument is so unmistakable, and so plain against any +Calvinistic attribution to God of {7} a narrow and arbitrary +favouritism, that there must have been some great mistake in our +understanding of its main point and drift. It is worth while then to +indicate at starting where the error has lain. + +1. It has been in part owing to our mistaken habit of taking isolated +'texts' out of their connexion, as if they were detached aphorisms. +Now St. John, in his meditative method, does very generally round off a +fundamental Christian truth into an aphorism which really admits of +being detached and quoted apart from its context. And no doubt there +are in St. Paul detachable texts. But on the whole St. Paul, least of +all men, admits of being judged by detached fragments. His thought is +always in process. It looks before and after. He is seriously wronged +by the mere fact of his epistles being divided into separate verses, +and sometimes arbitrary chapters, as in the Authorized Version. Thus +in the case of these three chapters, the common mistake as to the +meaning of particular phrases could hardly have arisen if the argument +had been kept in mind as a whole, and especially its conclusion as to +the universal purpose of divine love--'to have mercy upon all.' + +2. For, among other things, the true meaning {8} of 'election' in +these chapters would then have been apparent. St. Paul has been +popularly misunderstood to be referring to God's 'election' of some +individual men to salvation in heaven, and His abandonment of the rest +to hell. Whereas the argument as a whole and its conclusion make it +quite certain that what he is speaking of is the election of men in +nations or churches (only subordinately of individuals)[4] to a +position of special spiritual privilege and responsibility in this +world, such as the Jews had formerly occupied, and the Christians were +occupying now--an election to be the people of God, and bear His name +in the face of the world--the sort of election which carries with it a +great joy and a special opportunity, but not by any means a certainty +of final personal acceptableness to {9} God, apart from moral +faithfulness. Apart from such faithfulness the 'children of the +kingdom shall be cast into the outer darkness,' and the highest shall +be put lowest, while the lowest are raised highest. + +3. Another cause of misunderstanding has been forgetfulness of the +point of view of the opponent with whom St. Paul is arguing. In modern +times assertions of divine absoluteness, like St. Paul's, have been +made by teachers who were refusing to recognize any such freedom of the +will in the individual human being--any such power to control his own +personal destiny--as seems to our common sense to be involved in moral +responsibility in any real sense. St. Paul has therefore been +supposed, like these more recent teachers, to be asserting divine +absoluteness, or the unrestricted freedom of divine choice, as against +human freedom, or in such a way as to destroy the idea of moral +responsibility. But in fact St. Paul is vindicating moral +responsibility. His opponent is the Jew, who holds that God had so +tied His hands and lost His liberty in choosing Israel once for all for +His elect people, that every child of Abraham can at all times claim +the privileges of his election for no other reason than because of his +{10} genealogy. Such a doctrine of election does indeed destroy all +real moral responsibility in the subject of it, and all freedom of +moral choice in God. St. Paul, on the other hand, asserts that God +remains free and absolute to elect and to reject, irrespective of all +questions of race, where He will and as He will. The absolute reason +of God's selections, the reason why certain races and individuals are +chosen for special privileges and as special instruments of the divine +purpose, lies in a region into which we cannot penetrate. But because +God has shown us His moral character and requirement, we can know how, +and how only, we may hope to retain any position which God has given +us; it is by exhibiting moral correspondence with His purpose--that is +faith--or malleability under His hand. + +This is a doctrine then which lays upon 'the elect,' at any particular +moment, the moral responsibility of correspondence with a divine +purpose. In a word, St. Paul asserts divine sovereignty in such a +sense as vindicates instead of destroying moral responsibility, while +his opponent is claiming for Israel a sort of freedom from being +interfered with, which would really destroy their moral responsibility +altogether. {11} Thus, as has already been pointed out[5], nothing can +well be more important than to keep clearly in mind, here as elsewhere, +_with whom_ St. Paul is arguing. + +4. It is worth while remarking, before we apply ourselves to St. +Paul's argument in detail, that it is essentially 'apologetic': it is a +justification of God in view of certain felt difficulties: and it is an +argument _ad hominem_, that is an argument with certain people on their +own assumptions, the sort of argument which takes the form of saying, +'you at least have no right on your own principles to urge such and +such difficulties.' Now we are bound to recognize how very important +at all periods this _ad hominem_ appeal is: how very important it is to +get men to see what their own principles really involve. A great part +of the evil of the world comes through people not thinking out what +they really mean and believe. But on the other hand, this sort of +argument, which proceeds upon a certain set of assumptions, has often a +merely temporary force, and carries with it an accompanying danger. +When the state of mind contemplated becomes a matter of history, the +argument based on its assumption has lost its power. In {12} view of a +quite different set of assumptions it may become even misleading. For +example, Bishop Butler argued for the truths of natural and revealed +religion, on the analogy of the facts of nature and on the assumption +of a divine author of nature, thus--If, as you admit, God made nature, +and yet nature is shown to contain such and such facts or processes, +how can you argue against the divine authorship of natural religion and +revelation on the ground that it attributes to God similar facts and +processes? This was a very effective argument so long as men did treat +the doctrine of God having created the world as a matter of course. +But when 'agnosticism' arose--when men ceased to discover in nature any +decisive argument for God or against God, and professed only an +inability to draw any conclusion at all, Butler's argument had lost its +force, and the difficulties in nature and religion to which he called +attention could even be used against ascribing a divine authorship to +either. Apologetic arguments are always liable to this peril. Thus +St. Paul's arguments, based on an unhesitating belief that the Old +Testament contained really the words of God, that what they asserted +about God was certainly true, and that God was certainly just {13} and +the standard of justice, may have an effect very contrary to his +intention when they are applied to people who feel no such certainties. +St. Paul may seem to be making the difficulties of believing in the +Bible only more obvious, by calling attention to its 'harsh and +unedifying' elements. + +But this unfortunate result of most 'apologies' is, at least in the +case of St. Paul and Bishop Butler, only superficial. If the +apologetic argument is really deep, it retains, if not exactly its +original value, yet a value not the less real. Butler's indications of +the profound analogy which holds between the doctrines of religion and +the facts of nature, can never be out of place or lose force. Still +less can men ever cease to learn the deepest lessons from his temper of +mind and method. And that it is so with St. Paul's apology--that it +contains the profoundest and most abiding lessons about the +responsibility and danger of all elect bodies and individuals--will +appear plainly enough in what follows, now that we are in a position to +approach his argument in detail. + + + +[1] Ps. lxxxix. 33-7. + +[2] By this phrase is commonly meant the doctrine that God created some +men absolutely and irresistibly predestined to eternal life and joy, +and created the rest of mankind absolutely and hopelessly abandoned to +eternal misery. + +[3] Matthew Arnold, _St. Paul and Protestantism_ (Smith, Elder, 1870), +p. 99, admits that St. Paul 'falls into Calvinism,' but patronizingly +excuses him on the ground that this Calvinism is with him secondary, or +even less than secondary. + +[4] Of course the election of the nation or the church is felt, +especially in the New Testament, or whenever in the Old Testament +individuality is fully realized, to involve the election of each of the +persons composing the nation or the church. But still their election +is a challenge to their faith, and no guarantee of ultimate salvation. +St. Paul is left praying and suffering 'for the elect's sake that they +also may obtain the salvation ... with eternal glory' (2 Tim. ii. 10). +The elect have to 'make their calling and election sure' (2 Peter i. +10). It should, however, be noticed that election may be, and in the +Gospels is, used to describe the final selection of those who are +proved worthy of the 'marriage supper of the Lamb.' (Matt. xxii. 14.) + +[5] Vol. i. pp. 114 f. + + + + +{14} + +DIVISION IV. Sec. 1. CHAPTER IX. 1-13. + +_The present rejection of Israelites no breach of a divine promise._ + +St. Paul has finished his glowing description of the position and +prospects of the elect people of God. And then, by contrast, the +misery of the outcast people once called elect--his own people--wrings +his heart with pain. The very idea that in his new enthusiasm for the +catholic church he can be supposed to be forgetting those who are of +his own flesh and blood, stirs him to a profound protest. He solemnly +asseverates that the pain which Israel's rejection causes him is acute +and continuous. He has caught himself at the point of praying to be +himself an outcast from Christ, if so be he could bring the people of +his own kindred and blood into the Church. For who indeed could seem +to have so good a title to be there? They are the Israelites--that is +God's own people: the eye of God was so specially upon this race {15} +that He redeemed it and made it His own son[1]: to them was vouchsafed +the shining of His continual presence in the tabernacle[2]: to them, in +the persons of the patriarchs and of Moses, God gave special covenants, +that is to say, pledged His word to them in an unmistakable manner and +repeatedly that He should be their God and they should be His people: +thus in pursuance of a divine purpose they were brought under the +education of the divinely given law and ritual worship: and all this +with direct and repeated promises of a more glorious position in the +future to be brought about by the divine king, the Christ who was to +be. To them finally belongs all the sanctity which can attach to a +people from having numbered among its members the holy ones of God: for +of this race were the patriarchs, the friends of God; and of this race, +so far as human birth is concerned, came in fact the Christ who, born a +Jew, is sovereign of the universe and ever blessed God. Surely then, +St. Paul implies, that this race, now that the Christ they were +expecting is at last come, now that the goal of all God's dealings with +them is at last reached, should have fallen outside the circle of His +people and be no longer sharers in {16} the sonship or the election, +would seem a result too monstrous to contemplate. The contrast between +what they were and were intended for, and what in present appearance +they are, is indeed appalling. + +Yet the natural conclusion for the Jew to draw, which at this point +flashes into St. Paul's mind, the conclusion that God has proved +unfaithful, is not the true one. No: God's word, God's promise, has +not broken down. For, if the facts are looked at, it appears quite +plainly that the Israel of God was never simply the Israel of physical +descent, nor the children of Abraham simply his physical seed. Plainly +not. For Isaac and Ishmael were equally Abraham's seed, physically +considered, but for the purpose of God the promise is given only to the +family of the younger son, Isaac (Gen. xxi. 12), who moreover was born, +not in the mere natural order, but under circumstances of special +divine promise and intervention (Gen. xviii. 10). And if in this case +it be said that the younger son Isaac was the only son of Sarah, the +wife and free woman, and therefore had a natural prerogative over +Ishmael, yet the same inscrutable principle of selection is apparent in +the next generation, in a case where there is no possible inequality +{17} of natural claim--in the case of the two sons born simultaneously +to Isaac of the same mother. Prior to their birth, and prior therefore +to any possible merit or demerit on their own part--so that God's +absolute freedom of choice should appear quite conspicuously--the +younger Jacob was deliberately preferred over the elder Esau (Gen. xxv. +23). And in fact this race of Esau, this Edom--though they were +Israelites after the flesh--appear in history as something much worse +than merely secondary to the true Israel; for God speaks by Malachi and +declares that, whereas Israel is His beloved son, Esau, that is Edom, +He has 'hated' (Mal. i. 3). No Israelite therefore who reads his +scriptures (St. Paul would conclude) ought to have failed to perceive +an inscrutable element in God's choice of his chosen people. He ought +not to have felt in his own case, any more than in that of the first +children of Abraham or Isaac, that he could be sure of membership in +the people of God merely because of his physical descent. + + +I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience bearing witness +with me in the Holy Ghost, that I have great sorrow and unceasing pain +in my heart. For I could wish[3] that I myself were anathema from +Christ for my {18} brethren's sake, my kinsmen according to the flesh: +who are Israelites; whose is the adoption, and the glory, and the +covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service _of God_, and the +promises; whose are the fathers, and of whom is Christ as concerning +the flesh, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen. But _it is_ +not as though the word of God hath come to nought. For they are not +all Israel, which are of Israel: neither, because they are Abraham's +seed, are they all children: but, In Isaac shall thy seed be called. +That is, it is not the children of the flesh that are children of God; +but the children of the promise are reckoned for a seed. For this is a +word of promise, According to this season will I come, and Sarah shall +have a son. And not only so; but Rebecca also having conceived by one, +_even_ by our father Isaac--for _the children_ being not yet born, +neither having done anything good or bad, that the purpose of God +according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that +calleth, it was said unto her, The elder shall serve the younger. Even +as it is written, Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated. + + +1. St. Paul's earnest asseveration is very noticeable in form. It +shows so much of his instinctive inward life. He lives 'in Christ,' +who is light as well as life[4], and to speak the truth is the very +atmosphere of this new life[5]. As it comes natural to many people to +say 'upon my word as a gentleman,' it comes natural to St. Paul to say, +'speaking as in Christ, who is the light.' And his natural +conscience--that is the faculty of passing judgement on one's own +actions, {19} which in St. Paul's case bears witness to the truth of +what he says by passing no censure on him--that too does not act of +itself merely, but in the Spirit of the new life, the Holy Spirit of +Christ, which inspires and ratifies the moral judgement, otherwise so +liable to be degraded or perverted or silenced: his conscience bears +witness with his word in the Holy Ghost. Here, then, is the whole +secret of Christian truthfulness. The Christian is truthful because he +lives and speaks in God, in Christ, in the Spirit. + +As to St. Paul's half-expressed prayer ('I was praying,' he says, i.e. +'I caught myself praying'), it resembles that of Moses for his +rebellious people[6]. 'And now, O Lord, if thou wilt forgive their +sin--; and if not, blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book which thou +hast written.' But St. Paul's instinctive desire is not apparently +like that of Moses, to perish with his people rather than be saved +without them; but to offer himself for rejection with a view to their +salvation. The prayer is, as St. Paul implies, an impossible prayer, +but it expresses, as hardly anything else could, the intensity of his +feeling. And such intensity of feeling was natural to the deep +religious patriotism of a Jew. + +{20} + +We may illustrate St. Paul's feeling by comparing a fine expression of +a more commonplace sorrow over the ruin of Israel from a period after +the destruction of Jerusalem[7]. 'Now therefore I will speak; touching +man in general, thou knowest best; but touching thy people will I +speak, for whose sake I am sorry; and for thine inheritance, for whose +cause I mourn; and for Israel, for whom I am heavy; and for the seed of +Jacob, for whose sake I am troubled.' 'Thou seest that our sanctuary +is laid waste, our altar broken down, our temple destroyed; our +psaltery is brought low, our song is put to silence, our rejoicing is +at an end; the light of our candlestick is put out, the ark of our +covenant is spoiled, our holy things are defiled, and the name that is +called upon us is profaned; our freemen are despitefully treated, our +priests are burnt, our Levites are gone into captivity, our virgins are +defiled, and our wives ravished; our righteous men carried away, our +little ones betrayed, our young men are brought into bondage, and our +strong men are become weak; and, what is more than all, the seal of +Sion--for she hath now lost the seal of her {21} honour, and is +delivered into the hands of them that hate us.' + +2. As we read St. Paul's enumeration of the glories of Israel, it is +of course obvious for us to pursue the line of thought taught us +elsewhere by St. Paul, and in the Epistle to the Hebrews; and to +recognize how each element of the 'glory,' which belonged once to the +Jewish 'ministration of condemnation,' belongs in deeper and fuller +measure to the Christian 'ministration of the Spirit[8].' Ours is the +vocation of the chosen people; ours is the sonship to God; and the +perpetual presence; and the security of divine covenant; ours is the +divine law, and with it, what is much better, the Spirit for its +accomplishment; ours is the corporate worship in spirit and in truth, +the Church's eucharist; for us, too, are promises which the realization +of those of the first covenant has made 'more sure'; ours finally is +the communion of the saints from Abraham onward into the body of +Christ. And in proportion therefore to the greatness of our +privileges, even as compared with those of the older covenant, is the +greatness of our responsibility; 'For I would not, brethren, have you +ignorant[9],' St. Paul would {22} say; he would not have us fail to +profit by the warnings of old days. And another voice warns us 'Of how +much sorer punishment shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden +under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant, +wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite +unto the Spirit of grace[10].' + +3. There has been amongst critics, since Erasmus, much controversy +over the clause, 'who is over all, God blessed for ever.' There is no +doubt that it is translated most naturally, and most agreeably to the +balance and movement of the sentence, if we attribute it to Christ, as +above. But many critics, including some who were orthodox, have +stumbled at the idea of St. Paul speaking of Christ straight out as +'over all, God blessed for ever.' Generally no doubt 'God' is used by +St. Paul as a proper name of the Father. But Christ is continually +recognized as possessing strictly divine attributes, and exercising +strictly divine functions; and in all St. Paul's epistles, beginning +with his earliest to the Thessalonians, He is God's Son, His own or +proper Son[11]. His blood, as shed for our ransoming, is God's own +blood, or {23} (possibly) the blood of one who is 'His own'[12]. He +subsisted eternally in the form, or essential attributes, of God, and +in possession of equality with Him; and He possesses now, as glorified +in humanity, the divine name of universal sovereignty, the object of +universal worship[13]. Therefore He is in the strictest sense divine; +and whatever or, I should say, whoever is essentially divine and proper +to the being of God, can rightly be called God. For, indeed, there is +nothing in the strict sense divine but God Himself. It was then merely +a question of time when Christians would become sufficiently familiar +with the new revelation of the threefold name to apply the word God to +the Son and the Spirit as naturally as to the Father. And there is +nothing really to surprise us in St. Paul here applying it to +Christ[14]: nothing certainly to warrant us in doing violence to the +sentence, in order to obviate the conclusion that he did so, by putting +a full stop after 'flesh,' and then supposing an abrupt exclamation 'He +who is over all is God blessed for ever[15]!' + +{24} + +Let it be recognized, then, that St. Paul here plainly speaks of Christ +as 'over all,' i.e. in His glorified manhood, and also as 'God blessed +for ever'--that is, as the one proper and eternal object of human +praise; and that he speaks of Him again elsewhere[16], as 'our great +God and Saviour.' It was only because He was essentially and eternally +'God' that He could, in our manhood and as the reward of His human +obedience, be exalted to divine sovereignty and be 'over all.' + +4. In the rest of the section St. Paul is arguing with a Jew, who +makes the claim that because of the divine covenant God is bound to the +Israelites, and to all Israelites for ever. 'We have Abraham to our +father,' and that is enough[17]. The higher prophetic spirit of the +Old Testament had already realized that God's election of Israel was a +challenge to her to prove herself worthy of an undeserved +privilege[18], and that, though a faithful remnant would {25} never +fail, yet unfaithfulness in the bulk of the nation would bring +destruction upon them and loss of God's favour[19]. The prophetic +spirit had realized also that God's servant Israel was not 'called' for +his own selfish honour's sake, but was entrusted with a divine ministry +to fulfil for all the nations of the earth[20]. It is to this higher +sense of what Israel's position meant, and the perils it involved, that +John the Baptist and our Lord Himself had sought to recall the Jews. +They must not 'think to say within themselves, They had Abraham for +their Father; for God was able of the stones to raise up children unto +Abraham.' For 'many should come from the east and the west, and sit +down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of God, and the +sons of the kingdom should be cast into {26} the outer darkness[21].' +But it is evident that this higher meaning of the doctrine of election +had been forgotten by contemporary Judaism, and they would not be +recalled to it. They refused to contemplate the spiritual risk of +missing their vocation, or the universal purpose for which it was +given. They chose to think that Israel, i.e. the actual Israelites in +bulk, _must_ remain God's elect; that the Christ, when He came, must +come to exalt their race and nation: that they were bound to inherit +the blessings of the world to come: that the divine government of the +world existed for their sakes[22]. + +St. Paul, then, is here intending to vindicate the real meaning of +election, in the sense in which it is bound up with the ethical +character of God and carries with it a deepened feeling of +responsibility in those who are the subjects of it. {27} But his +argument is directed, first of all, to one point only--to bringing the +eyes of the Jews straight up to their own scriptures, and forcing them +to see that _they_ do not justify the idea of election purely by race. +It is not all of a certain seed, but only part of it, that is chosen. +There is nothing to hinder a great part of the race again becoming as +Ishmael or as Edom by the side of Israel. Ultimately, no doubt, there +are _two_ points to be proved. First, that God's method of choosing an +elect body to be His people in the world is inscrutable, so that we +cannot produce or determine His election by any calculation, or by any +real or supposed merits, of ours; secondly, that though we cannot +create our vocation, we can retain it by moral correspondence or faith, +and by that only. But at present it is only the first point that is +insisted upon--the absolute, inscrutable element in the divine choice. +And that, we should notice, is a fact not merely of scriptural evidence +but of common experience. Men are born to higher and lower positions +of privilege and opportunity. They are born Jacobs or Esaus, in +respect of moral, intellectual, religious, or physical endowment--with +ten talents, or five, or two, or one; and God does not often give us so +{28} much as a glimpse of the reason why. All He does make clear to us +is that the determination of human vocations, higher or lower, is in +wiser hands than ours. + +It is of course evident, as has already been said, that what St. Paul +is speaking about is the election of men, and specially races or +nations of men, to a position of _spiritual privilege in this world_. +We know now, better than the Jews of the Old Covenant could know it, +that behind all the apparent injustices and inequalities of this world +lies the rectifying equity of God. St. Peter had come to believe that +the divine mercy had rectified in the world beyond death the apparently +rough and heavy handed judgement upon the rejected mass of mankind in +the time of the Flood. That physical catastrophe at least was an +instrument of mercy in disguise[23]. St. Paul believed the same about +all God's rejections, as well as elections, in this world. They served +one universal purpose: 'That he might have mercy upon all[24].' But +{29} all the same here and now in this world God does work by means of +enormous inequalities. There are Jacobs whom He plainly loves, upon +whom He showers all His richest blessings, and Esaus whom, to judge +from present evidence, we should say He hates--whom He sets to live in +hardest and most cramping surroundings. And no man can determine which +lot he shall enjoy. That lies in the inscrutable selectiveness of God. + +That there is no question at all about the eternal welfare of the +individual Esau's soul--that the question is simply of the comparative +status of Israel and Edom in this world--appears plainly in the passage +of Malachi, which St. Paul quotes. And we must notice how unexpected +an application St. Paul gives to this passage in a direction most +unfamiliar to Jewish thought. For Edom was to the Jew the very type of +all that was most hateful. He anticipated for the Edomites God's worst +vengeance, as for Israel God's best blessings. But St. Paul forces him +to think--Why should he assume that he will be better off than Edom? +Edom was once physically on Israel's level, or his superior in claim, +when their first fathers were but just born infants. But God chose one +{30} and not the other. He may exercise the like unscrutable +selectiveness upon the seed of Israel to-day. And Edom did not remain +in a merely secondary position. He sank to be a byword for all that is +most hateful to God. Be warned, St. Paul would say, it may be that +'with change of name the tale is told of thee[25].' + + + +[1] Exod. iv. 23; Hos. xi. 1. + +[2] Exod. xvi. 10. + +[3] Or 'pray' (marg.) literally 'I was praying.' + +[4] Cf. Eph. v. 8-14. + +[5] Cf. Col. iii. 9. + +[6] Exod. xxxii. 32. + +[7] 2 Esdr. viii. 15-16, x. 21-23. The latter passage is not spoken to +God, but by one Jew to another. + +[8] 2 Cor. iii. 8. + +[9] See 1 Cor. x. 1-13. + +[10] Heb. x. 29. + +[11] 1 Thess. i. 10; Rom. viii. 3. + +[12] Acts xx. 28. + +[13] Phil. ii. 6-11. + +[14] Without the article which makes it a proper name of the Father. + +[15] R. V. margin^2. It does further violence to the Greek to +translate as R. V. margin^1, 'He who is God over all is (be) blessed +for ever.' I have nothing to add on the matter to S. and H. _in loc._, +especially p. 236. + +[16] Tit. ii. 13. This is probably the right rendering. + +[17] St. Matt. iii. 9. + +[18] Great stress was laid by the prophets on the absence of any +original merit or power in Israel, which caused the divine election; +see Ezek. xvi, Deut. xxvi. 5. + +[19] See especially Amos ix. 7-10: 'Are ye not as the children of the +Ethiopians unto me, O children of Israel? saith the Lord. Have not I +brought up Israel out of the land of Egypt, and the Philistines from +Caphtor, and the Syrians from Kir? Behold, the eyes of the Lord God +are upon the sinful kingdom, and I will destroy it from off the face of +the earth; saving that I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob, +saith the Lord. For, lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of +Israel among all the nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve, yet +shall not the least grain fall upon the earth. All the sinners of my +people shall die by the sword, which say, The evil shall not overtake +nor prevent us.' + +[20] Gen. xii. 3; Isa. lxvi. 18; Zech. viii. 23, &c. + +[21] Matt. viii. 11, 12. + +[22] In Weber's _Juedische Theologie_ (Leipzig, 1897, formerly called +_System der Altsynagog. Palaestin. Theol._ or _Die Lehre des Talmud_), +pp. 51 ff, there are striking illustrations from the Talmud of this +fixed tendency of thought among the Jews. Thus 'there exists no +clearer proof of the Talmudic conviction of the absolutely holy +character of Israel than that in all the places of Scripture in which +Israel is reproved and has evil attributed to it, the expression, "the +haters of Israel," is substituted for Israel.' 'We read: Isaiah was +punished, because he called Israel a people of unclean lips,' &c. Cf. +S. and H., p. 249, and my _Ephesians_, p. 261. + +[23] 1 Pet. iv. 6. 'The gospel was preached to' these 'dead men that +they might be judged according to men in the flesh,' i.e. by perishing +in the flood, 'but live according to God in the spirit,' i.e. through +our Lord's preaching in Hades. There is, I think, so far, no ambiguity +about this passage. + +[24] Not, however, without regard to man's will to respond to the +divine offer, see later, p. 82 ff. + +[25] Mal. i. 2, 3. 'Was not Esau Jacob's brother? saith the Lord: yet +I loved Jacob; but Esau I hated, and made his mountains a desolation, +and gave his heritage to the jackals of the wilderness. Whereas Edom +saith, We are beaten down, but we will return,' &c. This passage (1) +plainly refers to _Esau_ as meaning _Edom_, the people; (2) describes +not the original lot of Esau, which was secondary indeed, but highly +blessed (Gen. xxvii. 39, 40); but the ultimate lot of Esau when he had +misused his original endowment in violence and cruelty. + + + + +{31} + +DIVISION IV. Sec. 2. CHAPTER IX. 14-29. + +_God's liberty in showing mercy and judgement always retained and +asserted._ + +But the obvious reply of the Jewish objector to St. Paul's assertion of +the absolute and apparently arbitrary freedom of God's election is that +it is unfair. It convicts God of unrighteousness. To this objection +(ver. 14), which St. Paul deprecates with horror, he replies not by any +large consideration of divine justice, but still by keeping the Jew to +his own scriptures. The God revealed in scripture must be to the +objector still the just God. He cannot call God unjust if His method +as it now appears is that to which He called attention long ago. Look +back, then, at the past records. Did God disclose Himself as bound to +show mercy on Moses the Israelite, or to harden and judicially condemn +Pharaoh the Egyptian? No, He declares to Moses His unrestricted +freedom to exhibit His {32} compassion on whom He will (Exod. xxxiii. +19). Men cannot by any choice or efforts of their own produce an +exhibition of divine favour such as was shown to Moses the leader of +Israel: the absolute initiative must come from God, and in taking that +initiative He declares Himself absolutely free. In the same way God +implicitly asserts His sovereign freedom when He brings Pharaoh out +upon the stage of history as an example of the way in which He hardens +men's hearts with a hardening which is the prelude to overthrow, that +men all over the world may see and tremble at the divine power. It is +not because Pharaoh is an Egyptian that he is hardened. He is +hardened, as Moses has compassion shown him, simply because it is the +will of God so to do in his case. + +But the objector comes forward again (ver. 19): 'If this is the +arbitrary method of God--if we are simply powerless puppets in the +hands of an absolute and arbitrary will, to be saved or be +destroyed--at any rate He has no reason to complain of us. If all the +power is His, so is the responsibility.' Now St. Paul has it in his +hand to show that there remains to man a very real power to retain his +position, and consequently a very real responsibility and room for {33} +being blamed or praised: for if we cannot create our vocation, we can +and we are required to correspond with it in a reverent and docile +faith; and it was exactly here that the Jews had failed, in spite of +all their prophets had taught them. But he keeps back this answer +awhile, because he finds the attitude of such an objector toward God in +itself so reprehensible. Such an one has not given consideration to +what the relation of man to God really is--the creature to the creator. +His critical, complaining attitude is nothing better than foolish. + +Thus he takes his antagonist back upon the old prophetic metaphor of +the potter and his clay, with which Isaiah and Jeremiah had rebuked the +arrogance and impatience of men long ago: 'Shall the thing framed say +of him that framed it, He hath no understanding; and shall the clay say +to him that fashioneth it, What makest thou[1]?' He follows, however, +most closely upon the later writer of the Book of Wisdom: 'For a +potter, kneading soft earth, laboriously mouldeth each several vessel +for our service: nay, out of the same clay doth fashion both the +vessels that minister to clean uses, and those of a contrary sort. All +in {34} like manner; but what shall be the use of each vessel of either +sort, the craftsman himself is the judge[2].' The thought was often in +St. Paul's mind of the inequality of lots in the world and the Church. +There are more and less honourable limbs in the body politic: there are +vessels for honourable and vessels for dishonourable purposes in the +great social economy[3]. So it is with the races of men. They are all +of one blood--of the one lump. But some have high and others low +vocations, and the right to determine of what sort the lot shall be in +each case lies absolutely with the Divine Potter. It is childish to +dispute His title. And not only so: when the potter, whom Jeremiah was +ordered to observe, found a vessel he was making marred under his hand, +'he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make +it[4].' Accordingly, when the chosen material (i.e. the Jews) would +not mould to the high purpose for which the Potter was fashioning it, +who shall complain if He diverted it to lower uses or threw it away to +destruction, and produced out {35} of His stores other vessels which He +had already prepared and destined for glorious functions (that is to +say, the Gentile Christians)? But the case is even stronger than this. +Who indeed shall complain if, when the vessels originally destined for +the higher uses prove fit for nothing but destruction, the Divine +Potter--though willing, now as in the case of Pharaoh, to let His wrath +fall and to manifest His power--yet shows almost unlimited forbearance +with them (as in fact God did with the Jews); and when at last He does +let His wrath fall, only does so in order to manifest anew the +resourcefulness of His mercy[5] upon a new and larger Israel, gathered +not from among the Jews only, but from among all nations, to be the +object of His compassionate regard? + +Indeed, the prophet Hosea (ii. 23, i. 10) foresaw this choice of a yet +unrecognized people to be God's people. Isaiah again (x. 22) +anticipated no more than a remnant surviving of all the multitudes of +Israel, because of the sharpness and conclusiveness of the divine +judgement upon them. And (i. 9) it is only to the compassion of God +that he attributes their exemption by means {36} of the faithful +remnant from entire annihilation, like that of the Cities of the Plain. + + +What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God +forbid. For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, +and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion. So then it is +not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that hath +mercy. For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, For this very purpose did +I raise thee up, that I might shew in thee my power, and that my name +might be published abroad in all the earth. So then he hath mercy on +whom he will, and whom he will he hardeneth. + +Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he still find fault? For who +withstandeth his will? Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest +against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why +didst thou make me thus? Or hath not the potter a right over the clay, +from the same lump to make one part a vessel unto honour, and another +unto dishonour? What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make +his power known, endured with much longsuffering vessels of wrath +fitted unto destruction: and that he might make known the riches of his +glory upon vessels of mercy, which he afore prepared unto glory, _even_ +us, whom he also called, not from the Jews only, but also from the +Gentiles? As he saith also in Hosea, + + I will call that my people, which was not my people; + And her beloved, which was not beloved. + And it shall be, _that_ in the place where it was said + unto them, Ye are not my people, + There shall they be called sons of the living God. + +And Isaiah crieth concerning Israel, If the number of the children of +Israel be as the sand of the sea, it is the {37} remnant that shall be +saved: for the Lord will execute _his_ word upon the earth, finishing +it and cutting it short. And, as Isaiah hath said before, + + Except the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed, + We had become as Sodom, and had been made like + unto Gomorrah. + + +What has been already said will have been enough to guard against the +main sources of mistake in reading this section. St. Paul might have +much to say about God's righteousness in general, and large ways of +vindicating it. But here he holds fast to the single aspect of +righteousness according to which it means that God has been true to the +original principles of His covenant. The God who chose Abraham and +Moses is the God who is now, and rightly on His own declared principles +of government, rejecting the greater part of the people of Abraham and +Moses. This--faithfulness to His own declared principles--is what St. +Paul here means by His righteousness. And as it was God's declared +principle to retain His own liberty to show mercy on men according to +His free will, inside or outside the chosen people, so on the other +hand He retained His liberty to exhibit His judgement of hardening +according to His will inside or outside the chosen people. He who +brought Pharaoh the Egyptian upon the stage {38} of history[6], as an +example of hardening judgement, is within His right in doing the same +now with (the mass of) the people of His choice. The liberty asserted +for God is wholly consistent with His being found, in fact, to have +'hardened' those only who have deserved hardening by their own +wilfulness. It was for such a moral cause that God hardened the hearts +of the Jews, that 'seeing they might not see, and hearing they might +not hear[7].' We can feel no doubt that some similar moral cause +underlay the hardening of Pharaoh. But this is not St. Paul's present +point. All his argument is directed to asserting God's liberty to show +mercy or harden, irrespectively of considerations of race, when and +where He in His sovereign moral will chooses. + +We should notice that St. Paul's method is here, as elsewhere, what is +called ideal or abstract, in the sense that he makes abstraction {39} +of a particular point of view; and, apparently indifferent to being +misunderstood, substantiates his argument upon the particular aspect +which he has taken apart from the whole matter in hand, till it is done +with, and then other points can be taken in their turn. And he does +not, as a modern writer would do, painfully correlate the various +aspects of the subject[8]. + +By means of the famous simile of the potter St. Paul asserts two +principles about God: (1) that God is free, and condescends to give no +account to His creatures, in absolutely determining the high or low +vocations of men. To one man or nation He gives five talents, to +another two, to another one. He makes vessels to honourable and +vessels to (comparatively) dishonourable uses. He makes men Jews or +Assyrians, Englishmen or Hottentots, at His absolute discretion. (2) +That God is absolutely free, when the human material which He is +moulding for His purposes proves intractable, to repudiate and reject +what has, by its refusal to mould, become a 'vessel of wrath' fit 'to +be taken and destroyed.' And it is only by a voluntary limitation of +this freedom that He exhibits long toleration with the intractable and +{40} obstinate, and is longsuffering with them even when His wrath is +ready and waiting to show itself. These are the two distinct points in +the simile of the potter. We must distinguish carefully between the +'vessels _destined for_ dishonour'--the 'less honourable limbs' of +humanity--and the 'vessels _of_ wrath,' or 'vessels fitted for +destruction,' i.e. those which have proved themselves unfit for the +vocation to which they were destined and have to be rejected. We note +that St. Paul does not say that _God fitted_ vessels for destruction, +but that He bore long with those which had so _become fitted_. St. +Paul never gives us any real justification--if we look at his language +carefully--for the idea of any predestination to _rejection_, as +distinct from predestination to higher or lower purposes. And the New +Testament is full of assurances that a predestination to a low vocation +in this world may be a predestination to high glory in eternity, if the +humble calling is faithfully followed. + +It ought not to be denied, however, that in all this passage St. Paul's +feet, as he moves along his argument, are dogged by the metaphysical +difficulty of finding room for human free-will inside the universal +scope of the divine action and the prescience of the divine wisdom. +This {41} is a perennial difficulty. But St. Paul does not touch it. +He does not even touch the question of whether God does actually (in +our sense) _foreknow_ the final destiny of every individual, and how he +will act on each occasion[9]; he does not touch the question how or how +far human wilfulness can be allowed to disturb the divine order. In +the Pharisaic schools he would certainly have been brought up, as +Josephus tells us, both to 'attribute everything to fate and God,' and +also to recognize that it 'lay with men for the most part to do right +or wrong': to believe that 'everything was foreseen,' and also that +'free-will was given'; or, as Josephus elsewhere puts it (as if it made +no difference), to believe 'that some things, but not all, are the work +of fate, and other things are in men's own power and need not +happen[10].' That is to say, he would have been educated to believe +both in predestination and in freedom, without any {42} special attempt +to reconcile the two. We can tell for certain that this inherited +belief was further moralized in St. Paul's case by his enlarged view of +the divine purpose as working through high and low estates alike, for +the final good of all men; and by his deepened perception of the +correspondence with God's purpose, which, in the exercise of our +freedom, is required of us. But, so far as we know, St. Paul left the +strictly metaphysical question exactly where he found it--as an +imperfectly reconciled antithesis. And there perhaps we men shall +always have to leave it, or at least till we come to know even as we +are known. + +In the quotations from the Old Testament, with which the section +concludes, we notice that St. Paul varies the original application of +the passages from Hosea. In the prophet they refer to the recovery of +dejected and dishonoured _Israel_, while the apostle applies them to +the exaltation of _the Gentiles_ from their low estate. As is often +the case, while other passages in the prophets were there to prove +exactly what he wanted[11], St. Paul takes the words which come {43} +into his mind with a considerable latitude of application, and without +any critical argument. Thus, if he makes somewhat free with the +particular texts, it is in order to vindicate the real teaching of the +Old Testament. He has, if not exact criticism, what is much better, +profound spiritual insight. + +The passages quoted from Isaiah are characteristic and central. This +great prophet first clearly perceived that most striking law of human +history--that progress comes, not mostly through the majority of a +nation, but through the faithful remnant. It is the few best through +whom alone God can freely work. It is the best who in the long run +determine the moral level of the nation, and either keep the mass of +men around them from corruption, or, if that is impossible, provide a +fresh point of departure and hope in a society now inevitably, as a +whole, hastening to decay and judgement. 'As a terebinth, and as an +oak, whose stock remaineth, when they are felled; so the holy seed is +the stock thereof[12].' + + + +[1] Isa. xxix. 16, xlv. 9, lxiv. 8; Jer. xviii. 6; Ecclus. xxxiii. 13. + +[2] xv. 7. + +[3] 1 Cor. xii. 22-5; 2 Tim. ii. 20. + +[4] Jer. xviii. 4. The passage continues with a strong assertion of +God's freedom to govern the destinies of nations on moral principles. + +[5] When Moses asked to see God's glory (Exod. xxxiii. 18), what was +revealed to him was His goodness and free mercy, and what St. Paul here +means by God's glory is His mercy especially. + +[6] In the original the words run, 'For this cause have I made thee to +stand,' i.e. probably, 'I have preserved thy life under the plague of +boils, and other plagues, in order to make thee an example of a more +conspicuous judgement.' But St. Paul, departing from the Greek Bible, +uses a word 'raised thee up,' which in Pharaoh's case, or in that of +Cyrus, means to bring upon the stage of history. Isa. xli. 2; cf. Jer. +1. [xxvii in the Greek] 41; Hab. i. 6. + +[7] See Matt. xiii. 14, 15; Mark iv. 12; John xii. 40. + +[8] Cf. vol. i. p. 75. + +[9] On the meaning of divine foreknowledge in St. Paul see vol. i. p. +317. + +[10] See Joseph. _Antiq._ xiii. 5, 9; xviii. 1, 3; _Bell. Jud._ ii. 8, +14. Cf. Schuerer, _Jewish People_ (English trans.), Div. ii. vol. ii. +pp.14 ff.; James and Ryle, _Ps. of Solomon_, p. 96. The Essenes, +Josephus says, believed in fate, and not in free-will; the Sadducees in +free-will and not in fate; but the Pharisees in both. No doubt +Josephus is importing Greek philosophical views into his account of +Jewish parties, but substantially his account is probably true. + +[11] e.g. Isa. xix. 24; Ezek. xvi. 55. (The exaltation into the +fellowship of the chosen people of Egypt, Assyria, Sodom, and Samaria.) + +[12] Isa. vi. 13. + + + + +{44} + +DIVISION IV. Sec. 3. CHAPTER IX. 30-X. 21. + +_Lack of faith the reason of Israel's rejection._ + +What is to be our conclusion then? That Gentiles, men beyond the pale +of God's covenant, who made no pretension of pursuing righteousness, +all at once laid hold on righteousness and made it their own, simply by +accepting in faith the divine offer which came their way; while Israel, +the chosen people, devoted to pursuing a law of righteousness, never +caught up with that of which it was in pursuit. The result seems +strange enough. But the reason of it is apparent. Israel[1] had been +put under a divine election, which required of them the open ear, the +responsive will, of faith. But instead of cultivating this temper of +faith, they fastened upon the specified {45} observances of the Mosaic +law, and blindly adhered to them, as if God had nothing deeper or +greater to teach them, and they had nothing deeper or greater to +receive. Thus, when the Christ came, with His completer light and +claims, they would not have Him. They wanted nothing further, nothing +more than they were accustomed to. And thus Isaiah's prophecy was +fulfilled, that the Christ, the tried foundation stone, the destined +security of all who should believe in Him, would turn out to be a stone +at which the chosen people should stumble, and a rock on which it +should meet disaster[2] (ix. 30-33). + +And here is the pathos of the situation. Here is what puts passion +into St. Paul's desire and his prayer for Israel's entrance into the +great deliverance. It is that they have such a real zeal for God, +though without any spiritual insight to guide it. A real zeal for God! +of that St. Paul's own experience qualified him to testify. But in +what sense without insight? In the sense that with Jesus of Nazareth +there appeared a divine righteousness, which God was communicating to +men[3]; but the Jews, {46} preoccupied with maintaining a standard of +righteousness which they had taken for their own--which had become +identified, that is to say, with their own self-satisfaction and pride +of privilege and independence of interference--failed to perceive the +divine purpose, and, in fact, refused to submit themselves to it. For +that principle of law which the Jews had come to regard as God's final +word, He really intended only as a temporary discipline to be brought +to an end by the coming of the Christ, and by the disclosure of the +real righteousness which, in Christ, God should offer and man should +simply accept in faith. Law and faith are in sharp and intelligible +contrast. Under the law of works a man, as Moses says[4], stands to +preserve his life (or save his soul) according as he performs the +specified requirements (as if man were an independent being who could +thus stand over against God on his merits). But faith, attributing +nothing to itself, simply accepts the offer of God, the divine message +of compassion brought near to it. Moses of old told the Israelites[5] +that the commandment was not {47} too hard for them, neither was it far +off. _It was not in heaven, that they should say, who shall go up for +us to heaven, and bring_ it unto us, and make us to hear it, that we +may do it? Neither was it beyond the sea, that they should say, _who +shall go_ over the sea for us, _and bring_ it unto us, and make us to +hear it that we may do it? But _the word was very nigh unto them, in +their mouth and in their heart_, that they might do it. These words +really describe the character of the Christian message of faith, of +which the apostles are the heralds. Truly there is no need for the +believer in Jesus to seek some one to scale heaven to reach a remote +God, for Christ is come down. Or to descend into the abyss to seek a +Christ dead and lost, for Christ is risen. The great deliverance is +offered to us on very easy terms. A man has only openly to confess +that the human Jesus is really the divine Lord, and heartily to believe +that God raised Him from the dead. Let him heartily accept that +message, and the fellowship in the divine righteousness is his. Let +him publicly confess that creed, and the great salvation is open to +him. It is the old teaching of Isaiah[6]--if a man but believe (in the +Christ) there is no {48} fear of his being put to shame. And here Jews +and Greeks are all on the same level of need and opportunity. There is +over all the same Lord Christ, with the same inexhaustible good will +towards all who simply call on Him. Again the old scripture testifies +that it is every one who calls on the name of the Lord who shall be +saved[7]. The conditions then are very simple. To call on the Lord, +we may say, men must believe in Him. To have the opportunity of +believing on Him, they must have heard about Him. To hear about Him, +they need one to speak in His name. And how can men speak in the name +of God except as His apostles, as men commissioned and sent from Him? +And these terms we know well enough have all been fulfilled. The +commissioned heralds of the good tidings of God have gone forth, so +that all men may hear and believe and call out to God. Truly Isaiah's +vision of the welcome preacher of good tidings[8] is realized to-day +(x. 1-15). + +Now we have clear before us the simplicity of the gospel, the message +to faith. And we have before us the plain fact that the Israelitish +people, preoccupied with their own temporary {49} and misunderstood +standard of the law, have not generally accepted it. But this is no +more than Isaiah led us to expect. 'Lord,' he cries, 'who gave +credence to our message[9]?' (Faith, you see, according to the +prophet, requires just a listening to a divine message; and this +message has come to men by the preaching about Christ.) And can it be +pleaded that the Jews have not had the opportunity of hearing the +message? No, truly, as the Psalmist says, the voice of God's +messengers has gone over all the earth, and their words to the end of +the inhabited world[10]. Or can it be said that Israel did not know +that a preaching to the _Gentiles_ was to be looked for? No, a +succession of warnings had reached them. Thus Moses foretold that it +should be a nation which (religiously speaking) was no nation, a people +without understanding, that God would use to provoke His people to +jealousy, and stimulate their emulation[11]. Again, Isaiah uses +startling words, and declares that God has been discovered by those who +never sought Him, and revealed to those who never asked for +Him[12]--that is the Gentiles. But the words of Isaiah {50} that +follow describe truly the relation of God and Israel. God has tenderly +and persistently been offering His love to them, but they have proved +themselves only rebellious and full of contradiction (x. 16-21). + +This, then, is the plain summary. Israel is rejected because, after +every offer, and with every opportunity, they have refused God's +leading, refused to be docile, refused to believe, refused to obey. + + +What shall we say then? That the Gentiles, which followed not after +righteousness, attained to righteousness, even the righteousness which +is of faith: but Israel, following after a law of righteousness, did +not arrive at _that_ law. Wherefore? Because _they sought it_ not by +faith, but as it were by works. They stumbled at the stone of +stumbling; even as it is written, + + Behold, I lay in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of offence: + And he that believeth on him shall not be put to shame. + +Brethren, my heart's desire and my supplication to God is for them, +that they may be saved. For I bear them witness that they have a zeal +for God, but not according to knowledge. For being ignorant of God's +righteousness, and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject +themselves to the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the +law unto righteousness to every one that believeth. For Moses writeth +that the man that doeth the righteousness which is of the law shall +live thereby. But the righteousness which is of {51} faith saith thus, +Say not in thy heart, Who shall ascend into heaven? (that is, to bring +Christ down:) or, Who shall descend into the abyss? (that is, to bring +Christ up from the dead.) But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, +in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we +preach: because if thou shalt confess with thy mouth Jesus _as_ Lord, +and shalt believe in thy heart that God raised him from the dead, thou +shalt be saved: for with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; +and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. For the +scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be put to shame. +For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek: for the same _Lord_ +is Lord of all, and is rich unto all that call upon him: for, Whosoever +shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. How then shall +they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they +believe in him whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear +without a preacher? and how shall they preach, except they be sent? +even as it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that bring +glad tidings of good things! + +But they did not all hearken to the glad tidings. For Isaiah saith, +Lord, who hath believed our report? So belief _cometh_ of hearing, and +hearing by the word of Christ. But I say, Did they not hear? Yea, +verily, + + Their sound went out into all the earth, + And their words unto the ends of the world. + +But I say, Did Israel not know? First Moses saith, + + I will provoke you to jealousy with that which is no nation, + With a nation void of understanding will I anger you. + +And Isaiah is very bold, and saith, + + I was found of them that sought me not; + I became manifest unto them that asked not of me. + +{52} + +But as to Israel he saith, All the day long did I spread out my hands +unto a disobedient and gainsaying people. + + +In this passage St. Paul gives us the other side of the question of the +rejection of the Israelites. God had retained an absolute freedom, not +to be questioned by men, to reject whom He willed. That was the first +point. But can we see whom our God wills to reject, or why in +particular He rejected (though not finally, as will appear) the chosen +people? It is because they failed in faith. And faith is precisely +that which is necessary to maintain correspondence with God--it is +_the_ faculty of fellowship with Him. They failed because the false +principle of justification by works had obscured in their minds the +need and meaning of faith. The false principle meant, as we have +already seen, the maintaining an accepted standard of conduct and +divine service, especially in outward matters, and for the rest +claiming to be left alone. The accepted standard was that which +distinguished Israel from the rest of the world, and what they had +become accustomed to. It was a righteousness of 'their own.' They +prided themselves on it. Their public opinion required its observance. +It had come to usurp the place of any direct {53} relationship to the +voice of God. They had no idea that God could have anything more or +deeper to require of them. They had lost personal touch with Him. +Therefore seeking to establish this, their own righteousness, they +failed to submit themselves to the (now newly revealed) righteousness +of God in Christ. This unprogressiveness of the Jewish ideal, this +substitution of the accepted standard under the law for the word of +God, on the part of the Pharisees, the religious representatives of +Israel, is precisely what the pages of the Gospel record. Therefore +the 'corner stone of sure foundation' for the divine building became to +them the stone on which they stumbled and fell. And yet that the law +was a temporary expedient, and not the whole counsel of God, was the +deepest witness of the Old Testament; and in being false to the further +revelation of the will of God in Christ, they were false to their own +deepest principles. All this ground we have gone over already, and +need not traverse again[13]. + +So also we have already become familiar with the simplicity of the +message of God in Christ, and the simplicity of the faith which, {54} +rooted in the consciousness of sin and need, and equally possible for +all men who can share this consciousness, is required to welcome God's +offer, and so be brought by Christ into living union with Him. All +this St. Paul has already elaborated, and is here only resuming and +recapitulating by the way. But one or two points in the recapitulation +require notice. + +1. St. Paul takes the basis of his statement of the principle of grace +and faith out of the heart of the books of Moses--the idea of the 'word +very nigh thee,' of the simple message claiming only to be simply +accepted, and of the 'very present help' of a gracious God needing only +to be welcomed. The fact is that St. Paul usually idealizes when he +treats of 'the law of Moses'; as, for example, when he here says that +'Moses writeth that the man that _doeth_ the righteousness ... shall +_live_ thereby,' as if that was all that Moses said. The principle of +law, as Saul the Pharisee had learned to understand it, is the dominant +principle in the five Books of the Law, but not the only one. 'Grace, +already existing in the Jewish theocracy, was the fruitful germ +deposited under the surface, which was one day to burst forth and +become the peculiar character {55} of the new covenant[14].' The God +of the new covenant is the God also of the old, and was there already +intimating His truer and deeper character. To this St. Paul bears +witness by resting his statement of the principle of the new covenant +upon the words of the old. + +2. In this passage we have the germ of what we call the creed. The +lordship of Jesus, in the sense which implies His proper divinity, and +His resurrection and triumph over death--was already matter of public +confession in the Christian church: to make profession that 'Jesus is +Lord' qualified for 'the salvation'[15]: and in this lay hid all that +is essential to the Christian creed. Already then in the earliest +church subjective faith involved a certain objective and public +creed[16] which came very soon to be called 'the faith.' In this +passage also, as in xiv. 9 and in St. Peter's epistle, we recognize, as +an element in the common tradition, the belief in the Descent into +Hades (the abyss). + +3. St. Paul incidentally shows us his {56} instinctive feeling that to +be a trustworthy ambassador for God one needs 'apostolate.' 'How shall +they preach except they be _sent_?' And this apostolate, as he uses +it, means not only an inward sense of mission, but an external sending +by Christ Himself; and in pursuance of the same principle, when once +the Church has been established, it would mean a sending by those +authorized to send in His name. This is the root principle of the +Christian 'stewardship.' As the subapostolic Clement expresses it, +'Christ (was sent) from God, and the apostles from Christ. Each came +in due order from the will of God. Therefore, having received the +words of command, and having been fully convinced by the resurrection +of our Lord Jesus Christ, and been assured in the message of God with +conviction of the Holy Ghost, they came forth, preaching the gospel +that the kingdom of God was to come. Therefore as they preached in +country and towns they established their first-fruits, when they had +put them to the proof, to be bishops (i.e. presbyters), and deacons of +those who were to come to the faith.' And afterwards, in view of +disputes over the presbyteral office, which divine inspiration enabled +them to anticipate, they made provision for a due succession {57} in +the 'episcopate' on the death of those first appointed[17]. + +4. St. Paul's singularly free, but deeply inspired, manner of applying +texts from the Old Testament is especially illustrated in this passage. + +Thus the passages quoted from Isaiah about the Stone, which St. Paul +applies to Christ, refer originally to Jehovah simply in one case (Isa. +viii. 14), and probably to His will and covenant as the foundation of +Israel's polity in the other (Isa. xxviii. 16). Jewish tradition had +possibly already referred them to the Christ[18]; and certainly our +Lord's use of Ps. cxviii. 22--'The stone which the builders +rejected'--as applying to His own rejection, made the reference more +obvious. It is indeed in deepest accordance with the spirit of Isaiah: +and St. Peter (1 Peter ii. 6), we notice, follows St. Paul in the use +of them. Another passage (lii. 7) about 'the feet of those who preach +good tidings' is transferred, with added meaning, from the heralds of +the redemption from Babylon, to the heralds of the greater redemption. +And the opening of chapter lxv, which originally refers altogether to +apostate Israel, is divided, {58} and applied in part to the Gentiles, +in part to the Jews. (Other passages in the prophets, we should +observe, would justify the former application.) Again, a passage from +Ps. xix is transferred very beautifully from the witness of the heavens +to the witness of the Gospel; as if St. Paul would say--grace is become +as universal as nature. The language of a passage from Deuteronomy, as +we have seen, is taken from the law to express the spirit of the +gospel. The calling upon Jehovah in Joel becomes in St. Paul's +quotation the calling upon Christ. All this free citation, uncritical +according to our ideas and methods, yet rests upon a profoundly right +apprehension of the meaning of the Old Testament as a whole. The +appeal to the Old Testament, even if not to the particular passage, is +justified by the strictest criticism. + + + +[1] I have endeavoured sometimes in this analysis to expand what St. +Paul means by 'pursuing righteousness,' by 'works' and by 'faith,' in +accordance with the meaning already assigned to these words; see vol. +i. pp. 7-24. + +[2] Isa. viii. 14; xxviii. 16. Cf. Matt. xi. 6. + +[3] See above, vol. i. p. 17. + +[4] Levit. xviii. 5. + +[5] Deut. xxx. 11-14. I have italicized the words substantially +reproduced by St. Paul, but I have quoted the whole passage because its +whole meaning is in his mind. + +[6] Isa. xxviii. 16. + +[7] Joel ii. 32. + +[8] Isa. lii. 7. + +[9] Isa. liii. 1. + +[10] Ps. xix. 4. + +[11] Deut. xxxii. 21. + +[12] Isa. lxv. 1, 2. + +[13] See vol. i. pp. 7 ff., 165 f., 250 ff. + +[14] Godet _in loc._ + +[15] Cf. 1 Cor. xii. 3. The lordship of Jesus, we see in this passage, +means that He can have applied to Him the sayings of the Old Testament +about the Lord Jehovah; and can be 'called upon' as such in prayer +(Joel ii. 32). + +[16] Cf. 1 Cor. xv. 1-3. + +[17] Clem, _ad Cor._ 42, 44. + +[18] See S. and H. _in loc._ + + + + +{59} + +DIVISION IV. Sec. 4. CHAPTER XI. 1-12. + +_God's judgement on Israel neither universal nor final._ + +But if Israel has thus by her own fault fallen from her high estate, +are we then to suppose that God has simply rejected His own chosen +people? Such a thought cannot be entertained. How could it have been +in the mind of such an Israelite as St. Paul, one who came of Abraham's +genuine seed, and of the tribe which held so fast by Judah? No: the +people on whom from eternity God's eye rested, to mark them out for +Himself and for His purposes, assuredly cannot, as a people, have been +cast away[1]. What has happened now is only what is recorded long ago +in the history of Elijah. Then, as now, a general unfaithfulness in +the bulk of the nation concealed the existence of a faithful remnant. +Yet God had, as He assured the prophet, {60} reserved for Himself such +a remnant, and of very considerable numbers. And now also such a +remnant of true Israelites exists in accordance with the selective +action of grace--that is to say, God's gratuitous and unmerited good +will. Yes: let there be no mistake about it; their position is due to +nothing else than the original and continuous action of God's grace; +and grace means God's absolutely gratuitous and unmerited good will +(which may therefore come upon Gentiles equally with Jews). It +excludes the idea of these remnants owing their position to previous +merits, or of its being in any way God's response to an antecedent +claim[2]. + +This then is what we have to recognize. What Israel in bulk sought for +(by way of its supposed merit), that it did not get, but a select +remnant got it; and upon the rest there fell that judicial +hardening--that reversal of their true relation to God--which Moses and +Isaiah already discerned in the chosen people[3]: an abiding {61} +stupor, and deafness, and blindness, with regard to God's purpose and +will for them. David too, as God's righteous servant, demands, as a +divine requital upon his bitter and cruel enemies, that their very +abundance should betray them into captivity and prove their +stumblingblock; that their spiritual vision should be lost and their +backs bent downward to the ground. Which is just what has happened to +Israel through their rejection of the Son of David. + +The bulk of the people then has stumbled. But we must not exaggerate +what has happened. As it is not all of them who have stumbled, so also +it is not for ever. Their stumbling is not equivalent to a final fall. +Already we can perceive how it may be reversed. The refusal of the +Jews to recognize the Christ has been the occasion for a turning to the +Gentiles. Thus the salvation of the Christ has come to them. And this +has happened in the divine providence in order that, as Moses +anticipated, they may in their turn provoke the Jews to jealousy--to a +jealous determination not to lose their old {62} privileges. Thus if +even the transgression of Israel has proved the occasion for enriching +the world as a whole, if even the deficiency of Israel (leaving vacant +space, as it were, in the Church) has proved the occasion for enriching +the Gentiles, how much more enrichment is to be expected when the +chosen people are recovered in their full number? + + +I say then, Did God cast off his people? God forbid. For I also am an +Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. God did +not cast off his people which he foreknew. Or wot ye not what the +scripture saith of Elijah[4]? how he pleadeth with God against Israel, +Lord, they have killed thy prophets, they have digged down thine +altars: and I am left alone, and they seek my life. But what saith the +answer of God unto him? I have left for myself seven thousand men, who +have not bowed the knee to Baal. Even so then at this present time +also there is a remnant according to the election of grace. But if it +is by grace, it is no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. +What then? That which Israel seeketh for, that he obtained not; but +the election obtained it, and the rest were hardened: according as it +is written, God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes that they should not +see, and ears that they should not hear, unto this very day. And David +saith, + + Let their table be made a snare, and a trap, + And a stumblingblock, and a recompense unto them: + {63} + Let their eyes be darkened, that they may not see, + And bow thou down their back alway. + +I say then, Did they stumble that they might fall? God forbid: but by +their fall salvation _is come_ unto the Gentiles, for to provoke them +to jealousy. Now if their fall is the riches of the world, and their +loss the riches of the Gentiles; how much more their fulness? + + +1. We learn a little more exactly about St. Paul's doctrine of +election in this chapter. God's final purpose for good is, as we shall +see at the end of the chapter--and in what sense we shall have to +consider--upon all men whatsoever. But this universal purpose is +worked out through special 'elect' instruments. Thus God recognized[5] +Israel beforehand, i.e. in His eternal counsels, as the people to bear +His name in the world. This was the selection of Israel, and was an +act of which the initiative was wholly on God's side. It was a pure +act of the divine favour. This 'selection of grace' was upon Israel as +a whole, but at later stages of the history, frequently enough, owing +to the disobedience and apostasy of the majority, it is found to rest +in an effective sense only upon a 'remnant' whom God has reserved for +Himself, because they have not utterly refused to {64} correspond to +the original and continuous call of the divine grace. For the rest +their privileges become the occasion of their fall: their light becomes +their darkness. For judgement always and inevitably waits upon any +form of misused privilege. Thus, when the Christ came, only an elect +remnant of the nation welcomed Him. The rest fell under judgement. +But God overrules even this apostasy. He takes the opportunity of the +absence of those who should have been at the marriage supper of the +king's son, to fill the great vacancy from the Gentile world. They are +brought within the scope of the selecting call. But God's original +vocation is still irrevocably upon apostate Israel. The new Gentile +converts are to stimulate them to recover their lost privileges. Their +wilfulness and obstinacy is to give place to humility and faith; and +Jew and Gentile all together are to constitute the elect catholic +church. + +This is very simple and cheerful teaching. It leaves for us to +consider later the question whether God's original and special vocation +resting upon the Jews is finally to _constrain_ them all to conversion, +and whether in the same way His ultimate purpose of salvation for all +men is to take place infallibly in all cases. This {65} question is +still to be considered. But at any rate the doctrine of election has +lost all that gave it a colouring of arbitrariness and injustice and +narrow sympathies. + +We ought to notice in the above passage how St. Paul, in recalling the +continual obstinacy and hardening of the majority of the chosen people, +is following on the lines of St. Stephen's speech (Acts vii. 51). + +2. The imprecatory psalms are, especially in our Anglican public +services, a great stumblingblock to many--especially the 69th (here +cited by St. Paul) and the 109th. These psalms do not represent barely +the cry of an individual sufferer invoking God's curse upon his private +enemies. The sufferer, who is the psalmist, or with whom at least the +psalmist identifies himself, represents afflicted righteousness. It is +God's people, His 'servant' and 'son' according to the language of the +Old Testament, that is under persecution from the enemies of God. And +he calls upon God to vindicate Himself by punishing the adversary; to +let it be seen that His word and promise is truth. 'How long, O God, +holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge?' Even from this point +of view, however, when with the assistance {66} of the modern critics +we have in the main purged away the element of private vindictiveness, +these psalms no doubt remain with the stamp of narrowness and +bitterness upon them. They have none of the larger New Testament sense +that the worst enemies of the Church may be converted and live: that +our attitude towards all men is to wish them good, purely good and not +evil, even though it be under the form of judgement: 'Rejoice when men +revile you and persecute you'; 'Bless them that curse you, do good to +them that hate you, pray for them which despitefully use you'; 'That by +your good works which they shall behold, they may glorify God in the +day of visitation.' + +But granted the limitation and bitterness still remaining in these +psalms, their citation in the New Testament shows us what is for us the +right use of them. They are by implication taken up--where we should +least expect them--into the mouth of the Son of Man[6]. That is to +say, it is His enemies on whom the judgements are imprecated. There is +a wrath of the Lamb. There is a divine sword of judgement which +proceeds out of His mouth. He, the administrator of the righteousness +of God, {67} expects from His Father judgement on His enemies. It is +not necessarily, as St. Paul here indicates, final judgement: the +judgement upon the Jews was not yet that; but judgement of some +sort--temporal or final--upon His wilful adversaries, the Son expects +of the Father. And we men, as we repeat these psalms, are, like the +first Christians in face of the suicide of Judas, to identify ourselves +with the divine righteousness and accept the law of just retribution. +This is the deepest and truest sense in which we can still say the +imprecatory psalms; and in these days of a philanthropy that often +lacks the stern savour of righteousness, it is very necessary that we +should make this sense our own. + + + +[1] Three times--1 Sam. xii. 22, Ps. xciv. 14, xcv. 3 (in the +Greek)--the promise occurs 'The Lord will not cast away His people.' + +[2] The vocation and election which made Israel the chosen people were +absolutely of God. What distinguished the faithful remnant from the +bulk of the nation was simply that they had not altogether failed in +faith, so that the unchanging election was not in their cases +practically suspended, but God 'reserved them for Himself.' + +[3] St. Paul refers chiefly to Isa. xxix. 10--the description of a +besotted people whose prophets are eyes that cannot see, and their +seers ears that cannot hear; so that the word of God has become as a +sealed book; cf. also Isa. vi. 9. But there is a similar passage in +Deut. xxix. 4, which partly moulds his language, and supplies the words +'unto this day.' + +[4] Rather, as margin, in Elijah, i.e. the passage of Scripture about +Elijah. + +[5] This--to recognize or mark out beforehand--is the meaning of divine +'foreknowing' in St. Paul. See vol. i. pp. 317 f. + +[6] Both in this passage and in Acts i. 20. + + + + +{68} + +DIVISION IV. Sec. 5[1]. CHAPTER XI. 13-36. + +_God's present purpose for the Jews through the Gentiles: and so for +all humanity._ + +St. Paul would not have it supposed that, in his zeal for the recovery +of Israel, he was proving faithless to his vocation as the apostle of +the Gentiles. On the contrary, he explains (assuming the Roman +Christians to be Gentiles in the mass) that he is, by this very zeal, +fulfilling that vocation. The conversion of the Gentiles was meant to +react as a stimulus on the Jews. When St. Paul magnifies his Gentile +ministry, he does so always with the motive of stinging the jealousy of +his own people, and so bringing some of them to salvation. How can +such a consummation be too eagerly desired? For if even so pitiable an +event as their rejection has yet, in God's providence, been overruled +for {69} a good end--the bringing back of the outside world into the +fellowship of God[2]: can we doubt that so happy an event as their +recovery would be indeed (what Ezekiel saw in vision in the valley of +the dry bones) a veritable resurrection? For the consecration of God +is still upon them. The holy (i.e. consecrated) people they still +remain. As the 'heave offering' of the 'first of the dough'[3] +consecrates the whole lump, so the first of the nation offered to +God--Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob--have consecrated the whole nation. The +holiness of the root of God's olive tree[4] has passed to the latest +branches. It is quite true that some of these branches of the Jewish +olive tree were broken off, and that the Gentiles were introduced in +their place; like a wild olive grafted upon the root of a cultivated +plant, and so sharing its rich sap. But that--to let the metaphor +continue--gives the wild olive no ground for an insolent contempt of +the branches which naturally belonged to the tree. What advantage it +now has it wholly derives from that which it is {70} affecting to +despise. It is the root that supports it, not it the root. And are +the Gentiles disposed to argue that these rejected Jewish branches were +broken off in order that they might take their place; and that they, +the Gentiles, are thus plainly preferred by God to the Jews? The +answer is plain. Why were they broken off? Because they would not +maintain the correspondence of faith with the purpose of God; and it is +simply by maintaining this attitude that the newly introduced Gentiles +can hope to retain their place. They had better exhibit, not a +groundless pride, but a reasonable fear. Is God likely to be more +sparing towards them than towards His first chosen? God has displayed +before their eyes both His attributes of severity and goodness, and +they must take note of both. At the present moment it is severity +towards Jews, goodness towards Gentiles. Yes, goodness towards +Gentiles; but so long only as they abide faithfully in His goodness, no +longer. When they fail of faithfulness, they too, like their Jewish +predecessors, shall be cut off. And, on the other hand, when those +Jews change their attitude, and their hardness melts and faith returns, +they shall be recovered and reingrafted into the old olive tree. If +God {71} could graft into it branches cut out of an alien and inferior +stock, how much more easily can He reingraft into it what is really +part of its very self? + +Here then we have a real disclosure of a divine secret[5], to which the +Gentiles would do well to keep their eyes open, lest (like the Jews +before them) they mistake for wisdom their own self-conceit. The +hardening of the Jews has been used by God as an opportunity for the +gathering in of the full number of the nations of the earth; and that +with the further purpose that, when the nations are gathered in, Israel +in all its completeness should be recovered too. And so shall be +fulfilled Isaiah's prophecy of a redeemer from Zion, who should restore +Israel, and of a new covenant with them, based on a fresh forgiveness +of their sins[6]. Thus if we think of the actual relation of the Jews +to the present preaching of the Gospel, we must think of them as God's +enemies, and as having by their very enmity secured the Gentiles their +opportunity; but if we think of them in relation {72} to God's eternal +choice, they still must appear as sharing the divine love which rests +on the people of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God's gifts and vocation +do not admit of being repented of and recalled. Thus we know what to +expect. As the Gentiles passed out from disobedience under the divine +compassion through the opportunity afforded by the disobedience of the +Jews; so now the divine compassion which rests on the Gentiles is +intended (by stimulating the Jews to recover their lost privileges) to +prove the means of recovering them too out of their disobedience into +the shelter of the divine compassion which is the common heritage of +all. We see, in fact, all men in turn shut up in disobedience to God, +as in a prison house: it is God who has so shut them up; but it is done +in view of the largest and most compassionate purpose which can be even +conceived. It is done that (when men have become wearied of their own +wilfulness, and have experienced their own need) the divine mercy may +welcome and embrace all alike at last. + +And if this is the purpose of God disclosed to us, how can we fail to +adore the fathomless resourcefulness of His wisdom in determining how +to act, and His skill in executing what He {73} has determined? How +can we fail to recognize our utter incompetence to explore His +judgement, or track out His ways? Like inspired men of old[7] we must +recognize that the absolute initiative is His, and our only reasonable +attitude the humblest correspondence. Truly in counsel and operation +we have contributed to God nothing of our own: we have no claim with +which to approach Him. He is the unique source of whatever is, and the +sole executor of whatever takes place, and the only end to which all +things tend: and to Him, therefore, alone all praise is due, and shall +be given. + + +But I speak to you that are Gentiles. Inasmuch then as I am an apostle +of Gentiles, I glorify my ministry: if by any means I may provoke to +jealousy _them that are_ my flesh, and may save some of them. For if +the casting away of them _is_ the reconciling of the world, what +_shall_ the receiving _of them be_, but life from the dead? And if the +firstfruit is holy, so is the lump: and if the root is holy, so are the +branches. But if some of the branches were broken off, and thou, being +a wild olive, wast grafted in among them, and didst become partaker +with them of the root of the fatness of the olive tree; glory not over +the branches: but if thou gloriest, it is not thou that bearest the +root, but the root thee. Thou wilt say then, Branches were broken off, +that I might be grafted in. Well; by their unbelief they were broken +off, and thou standest by thy faith. Be not highminded, but fear: for +{74} if God spared not the natural branches, neither will he spare +thee. Behold then the goodness and severity of God: toward them that +fell, severity; but toward thee, God's goodness, if thou continue in +his goodness: otherwise thou also shalt be cut off. And they also, if +they continue not in their unbelief, shall be grafted in: for God is +able to graft them in again. For if thou wast cut out of that which is +by nature a wild olive tree, and wast grafted contrary to nature into a +good olive tree: how much more shall these, which are the natural +_branches_, be grafted into their own olive tree? + +For I would not, brethren, have you ignorant of this mystery, lest ye +be wise in your own conceits, that a hardening in part hath befallen +Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in; and so all Israel +shall be saved, even as it is written, + + There shall come out of Zion the Deliverer; + He shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob: + And this is my covenant unto them, + When I shall take away their sins. + +As touching the gospel, they are enemies for your sake: but as touching +the election, they are beloved for the fathers' sake. For the gifts +and the calling of God are without repentance. For as ye in time past +were disobedient to God, but now have obtained mercy by their +disobedience, even so have these also now been disobedient, that by the +mercy shewn to you they also may now obtain mercy. For God hath shut +up all unto disobedience, that he might have mercy upon all. + +O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and the knowledge of God! +how unsearchable are his judgements, and his ways past tracing out! +For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his +counsellor? or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed +{75} unto him again? For of him, and through him, and unto him, are +all things. To him be the glory for ever. Amen. + + +1. There is a true patriotism which must at times be content to wear +the guise of disloyalty; and not even Jeremiah 'weakening the hands of +the men of war[8]' in the conflict with the power of Babylon, while all +the time his very heart was bleeding for Jerusalem, presents a more +pathetic and moving picture of such patriotism than does St. Paul as he +here shows himself to us. While he was shaking off the dust of his +feet, as he left the synagogues to turn to the Gentiles, while he was +throwing all his tremendous energy into the apostolate of the nations, +and vindicating their cause, even to fierceness, against the narrowness +of his own nation, all the time the thought which buoyed him up was +that when the catholic church had become an established fact--when it +should have become plain, even to Jewish eyes, that the elect people of +God is now a fraternity of all nations, and not their own race +only--then it could not fail to happen, that the members of the ancient +people, finding themselves in their turn 'alienated,' 'strangers,' and +'far off,' while {76} they knew so well, and needed so deeply, the +fellowship of the covenant, should be stimulated to resume their former +privileges. Surely then at last Israel 'should remember her way and be +ashamed,' and 'receive' her Gentile 'sisters,' though they had been to +her as 'Sodom and Samaria,' and though they were now given to her for +'daughters, but not by her covenant'--not by any means on her own +terms[9]. All the time that St. Paul is fighting Judaism and +vindicating Catholicism, laying down the lines of the great church of +the nations, this is the vision that cheers him--an Israel, penitent, +humbled, worshipping the Christ whom she had crucified, and therefore +welcomed back again with the honour due to her great memories and her +inextinguishable vocation. But we notice by the way, as throwing an +unmistakable light on the circumstances of Roman Christianity, that +while St. Paul thus shows his own Jewish feeling, he speaks to the +Roman Christian as in the mass Gentile[10]. + +2. If so miserable an event, one so revolting to the divine heart, as +the apostasy of Israel, had yet in the determinate counsel and +foreknowledge of God been overruled so as to {77} become the occasion +for the calling of the Gentiles, it must needs be, St. Paul argues, +that an event so dear to the heart of God as the recovery of Israel, +would have a result even more blessed, nothing less than 'life from the +dead.' What does this last expression mean? Does St. Paul mean that +when once the chosen people was recovered into a really catholic +church, there would be no further delay--the consummation would be +reached, the resurrection of the dead which is to accompany the +(second) coming of the Christ would take place at once? This thought +would be very natural to St. Paul, and thoroughly agreeable to the old +Messianic expectation; and it would give, as nothing else gives so +well, the needed climax to the sentence. Moreover it cannot be said +that the idea of the resurrection was not intimately associated among +Christians with the return of the Christ in glory. But, on the other +hand, nowhere else does St. Paul speak of 'the resurrection' so +absolutely and without explanation as the goal of all things; and, if +he had meant so to speak of it here, he would surely have said '_the_ +resurrection,' and not used the vaguer expression 'life from the dead.' +As he has used this we must interpret it in terms {78} of Ezekiel's +vision[11]: the recovery of Israel will be nothing less than a case of +dead men coming to life again, of dry bones revivified. The only +drawback to this interpretation is--what need not trouble us much--the +failure of rhetorical climax. This revival of dead Israel is hardly a +greater thing than the reconciliation of an alienated world. And, +though it would improve the rhetorical climax to interpret the phrase +as meaning that the whole catholic church would have new life put into +it by Israel's recovery, and though we should expect this idea to prove +true, yet I do not think it is natural to introduce it here. + +3. St. Paul's language--'beloved for the fathers' sake,' 'if the root +be holy, so are the branches'--comes very close to the current Jewish +language about 'the merits of the fathers,' and yet is deeply +distinguished from it. The Jews as represented in the Talmud--and the +belief goes back to St. Paul's time[12]--believed that no prayer was so +effective as that which was offered in the name of 'the fathers.' +Thus: 'How many prayers did Elijah speak on Mount Carmel that fire +might fall from heaven, and he was not heard; but when he mentioned +{79} the name of the dead, and called Jehovah the God of Abraham, Isaac +and Jacob, then at once he was heard. So was it in the case of Moses. +When the Israelites had accomplished that bad work, Moses stood up and +spoke for their justification forty days and forty nights, and was not +heard. But when he mentioned the dead, he was at once heard.... +Therefore as the living vine supports itself on a dead stock (i.e. +grows out of a stock dry and seemingly dead), so Israel lives and +supports itself on the fathers since they are dead[13].' The +individual Israelite, moreover, could supply his own deficiencies in +righteousness out of the treasury of merits which belonged to him in +virtue of his descent from the common fathers of the race, or the holy +progenitors of his own family. In other words the Israelites in +various ways and senses depended for salvation on having 'Abraham to +their father.' And it has already appeared sufficiently how dangerous +this belief was; and how utterly St. Paul, like Ezekiel[14] and John +{80} the Baptist before him, repudiated this idea of genealogical and +traditional merit as a ground of confidence before God. + +On the other hand, this belief in the transference of merit was based +on a true idea of the organic unity of the race. The Jewish race was +bound up into one with its great progenitors; and it is these men who +are its true representatives. They show what their race can be and is +meant to be, and along what lines it is meant to move. Their election +and walk with God laid a consecration on all who came after them; as +St. Paul elsewhere says that the children of a Christian parent in a +mixed marriage are holy, i.e. have a consecration laid upon them by +their partly Christian parentage[15]. The patriarchs exhibit Israel as +God means it to be. And God, so to speak, cannot forget that every +Israelite is a child of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and that in their +faith and religion lies his possibility and his glory. + +Thus stated, the idea of the 'communion of saints' in the Jewish race +is nothing else than a ground of hope, and a stimulus to recovery. And +the idea admits at once of being transferred to the catholic Israel, as +in fact its Jewish {81} parody has, at certain periods, been only too +fully and fatally transferred. I say, the true idea admits of being +transferred. We belong to the same body as the apostles and martyrs, +the virgins and saints, the Jewish patriarchs and prophets also. Their +possibilities are ours. Their God is our God for ever and ever. And +God looks on us as in one body with them. We too are beloved for these +our fathers' sakes. And they too, we cannot doubt, are conscious of +our fellowship with them, and if we are trying to live in the same +spirit with them, we must believe, all the limitations of our knowledge +notwithstanding, that they are supporting and helping us, as in Christ +our sympathetic advocates and allies. + +4. The metaphor of the olive and the grafting is intelligible enough +without explanation. We know how often the olive and the vine are +taken in the Old Testament and in other Jewish writings--as in the +passage just quoted from the Talmud--for a symbol of Israel; we must +frankly recognize that St. Paul, apparently in forgetfulness and not by +design, accommodates the physical process of grafting to its spiritual +counterpart; for in physical fact, of course, the ingrafted shoot +(which represents the Gentiles), {82} and not the stock upon which it +is grafted (which represents the Jews), would determine the character +and produce of the tree: but when this is once recognized it may be +forgotten, and the metaphor is as intelligible to us as if the physical +process of grafting were really as St. Paul represents it. + +5. As we read the words, 'And so all Israel shall be saved,' we cannot +help asking ourselves--Does St. Paul mean us to believe this of all +Israelites without exception, or even of Israel in general with an +absolute necessity? I think the answer should be a negative in both +cases[16]. Just above St. Paul says, looking at the matter from the +side of Israel, 'They also, _if they continue not in unbelief_, shall +be grafted in.' Here he is looking at the matter from the side of God. +It lies in the divine purpose that the establishment of the catholic +church, and the experience of alienation on the part of the Jews, +should stimulate them to regain their ancient privileges on a new +basis; 'and so,' looking at the matter from the point of view of the +divine intention, 'all Israel shall be saved.' Just below, from the +same point of view, it is stated to be God's purpose {83} 'to have +mercy upon all men.' But, in interpreting this latter passage, we are +doing violence to what St. Paul says elsewhere with emphatic +distinctness, if we imagine that he asserts that all individual men +without exception shall ultimately attain the end of their being and +the fellowship of God. In these passages, as elsewhere, St. Paul looks +at things from two points of view, without attempting to present us +with a harmony of them. From one point of view we have spread out +before us the 'mystery,' or revealed secret of God, and discern the +purpose of His love working on, and finding its opportunities even in +the gravest moral disasters. From the other point of view we detect +human wilfulness, able in a measure, but never completely or on the +whole, to baffle and thwart the divine purpose. St. Paul, I say, is +content to recognize both points of view, and not to hold them in +complete combination. He uses the perception of the divine purpose--in +this case, the recovery of the Jews--as a motive for hope and +thankfulness and renewed energy; but he does not, apparently, ask +himself the metaphysical questions whether God foreknows how particular +individuals or groups of men will act, or, if we must say that God does +so foreknow how each {84} man will act, how this is reconcilable with +his moral freedom. He is content to adore the divine purpose, and rest +upon it; and recognize, on the other hand, the thwarting power of human +wilfulness. + +From the point of view of God's patiently loving purpose, then, a great +and fresh opportunity is being prepared for the recovery of the whole +of Israel, when 'the times of the Gentiles' are fulfilled and the +Church stands really catholic before their eyes. Just in the same way, +in the larger field of all mankind, the purpose of God is at work +through all rejections, and all judgements of hardening, to convince +all men of their need of God, and so prepare their hearts 'that he +might have mercy upon all.' But from the other point of view God +respects human freedom. Thus over against the divine purpose stands +the ambiguous human 'if'--'if they continue not in their unbelief.' + +This ambiguous human element is a prominent feature in Old Testament +prophecy, though there too the thwarting power of man's perverseness is +limited. If not in one way then in another, if not through one set of +agents then through others--on the whole the purpose of God finds its +sure way to accomplishment. + +{85} + + * * * * * + +_Retrospect over the argument_ + +And now that we have given all the pains we can to entering into the +spirit of these chapters, may we not say that they have become no +longer repellent but deeply attractive? Where could we find a more +liberating outlook over the wide purpose of God in redeeming the world? +Sin is a stern fact, and demands stern dealing to overcome it by moral +discipline. Men of all sorts must be brought to realize their need of +God, utterly to expel the false dream of independence, and humbly to +welcome the unmerited bounty of the divine 'mercy,' the free gift of +pardon and new life. This then is the way in which the fundamental +purpose of God for man shows itself in a world of sin; it is by a +discipline preparing men to welcome a divine mercy of which they have +learnt to know their need. 'That he may have mercy upon all'--this is +the generous end upon which all the divine dealings with men converge. +The Jews by one kind of discipline while they still were standing +together as the elect people of God, and by another when, having +rejected the Christ and fallen out of their religious leadership, they +were to be stirred to {86} jealousy by the spectacle of a divine +fellowship from which they were excluded: the Gentiles by a different +sort of discipline, and each separate race by its own; nay more, every +individual, Jew and Greek, Englishman or Hindoo, by a distinctive +personal chastening, in as many ways as man is various and God is +resourceful: all men are so to be dealt with as that all men shall be +brought to confess themselves to be as they are in God's sight, and +surrender themselves to Him to be refashioned after the divine image. +Through all national and personal vocations realized, by which human +character is educated: through all national and personal humiliations, +which are divine judgements by which human character is corrected and +made docile: God's untiring patience and forbearance, in sternness and +in love, works on to the one universal end--that He might have mercy +upon all. The uttermost and most pitiable collapse, even the imminence +of death itself, may be, nay certainly in God's intention is, His +remedy for human wilfulness: a means by which-- + + 'God unmakes but to remake the soul + He else made first in vain, which must not be[17].' + +{87} --must not be, that is, so far as the resourcefulness of divine +love, going all lengths short of destroying the fundamental moral +choice of the soul, can avail to prevent it. This teaching of St. Paul +suggests a wonderful way of reading human history, and inspires us with +the right sort of patience and hopefulness in our attitude towards the +wider problems of missionary work and our own dealings with +individuals. The races to whose conversion we would fain minister seem +so immovable and so indifferent. The men and women whom we would fain +help seem so hardened or so weak. But 'the gifts and callings of God' +within them and about them, 'are without repentance.' God's remedies +for them are not yet exhausted. We therefore have a right to hope and +labour on, 'never despairing[18].' + +And where is a nobler presentation to be found than here of the idea of +divine election? That in the great household of the world there are +magnificent and (comparatively, at least) ignominious vocations among +races and individuals; {88} that some men are born for the top, and +other men for the bottom of society; that there are 'honourable' and +'dishonourable' limbs in the body of humanity, the latter fulfilling +their necessary function no less than the former, is an indisputable +fact. It is no use challenging it, any more than any other fundamental +law of the universe. And, if we can see why certain races and certain +individuals are fitted for certain tasks, yet on the whole we can +advance but a very little way in seeing the reason of human +inequalities as in fact they exist. All that lies in the inscrutable +and free counsels of God, and the responsibility is--in spite of the +modifying effects of human sin--ultimately His[19]. But in St. Paul's +treatment of it, the recognition of the fact that God works universal +ends through selected races and individuals, is robbed of all that +ministers to pride and narrowness in the elect, or to hopelessness and +a sense of injustice in the rest. + +The New Testament writers in general would teach us that with God is no +respect of persons; {89} so that the lowest vocation may result in the +highest glory, where it is faithfully fulfilled, and the highest +vocation, misused, in the deepest degradation; but St. Paul in +particular makes us feel the humbling responsibility which attaches +necessarily to any state of election. The Jews failed because they +lacked the faith and docility which would have enabled them to +correspond to God's larger leading. The time came when God who had, +'through the Jews, prepared the Christ for the world,' had also, +'through the Gentiles, prepared the world for Christ'; but the Jews +were ready neither to welcome the Christ, nor to 'receive' the world. +Thus the richest ministry ever vouchsafed to a race was waiting for the +Jews, and they proved false to it, because they had turned their +privileges into an occasion for pride and selfishness, and would not +learn the new truth or rise to the new opportunity. + +Here is a serious warning to the 'elect' of every age. How often has +the church at large, or a national church, refused the call to +expansion, and lost some rich part of its heritage because it was +self-satisfied, and therefore blind? How often does a 'good catholic' +fail to recognize that he is utterly misusing the gifts of grace, {90} +if his Catholicism does not mean a generous and self-sacrificing desire +to win the lost and save the world? How often has the profession of +being 'saved' put an end to spiritual growth and the struggle with sin? +How many religious orders and societies have lived on the reputation of +the past, and appeared to fancy that the achievements of their +founders--'the merits of the fathers'--would justify the apathy and +carelessness of those who had inherited an honourable name? Indeed, to +whatever we are elect--whether national, or ecclesiastical, or personal +privileges--the temptation dogs us to rest on our inherited merits and +have no open ear to the guiding voice of God, as it calls us to fresh +ventures and renewed sacrifices, like those which laid the basis of the +position of which we now make our empty or insolent boast. But thus to +evade the uncomfortable requirements of the present by an appeal to the +achievements of the past--whether it be the past of catholic tradition +or 'the Reformation settlement'--is to expose ourselves inevitably to +divine condemnation. + +Those who keep the open ear are the 'remnant' in every age and church +and nation. They are the men who refuse to 'make the word of God {91} +of none effect,' because of the blinding, deadening force of social +tradition. They are alive and awake to 'buy up the opportunity,' as it +presents itself. And for such St. Paul's teaching, inherited from the +prophets, of the function of the remnant is full of encouragement. The +Bible is a book contemptuous of majorities. The mass of men, +conventional, easily satisfied, self-centred, accomplish nothing, +redeem and regenerate nothing. But those who have ears to hear have +every motive, though they be few in number, to live at the highest +level possible, and believe to the full that the purpose of God can be +realized. God's purpose can work, and has in history worked, through +small minorities, through single individuals. They are the true +representatives of their church, their nation, their class. And when +the inner history of any epoch comes to be known, while the inert mass +of people, 'important' or 'unimportant,' is lost in the dim background, +they will be seen distinctive in the foreground: the real movement of +God in history, the real witness of the truth, the real spiritual +succession of the kingdom of God, will be seen to have been carried on +through them for the enriching of the whole world. + +I would add two reflections on subordinate, {92} but still important +points. It is the function of the catholic church to let its light so +shine before men that it shall 'provoke to jealousy,' by the manifest +presence of God in the midst of it, the ancient and now alienated +people, the Jews. At the moment, with the anti-semite cry strong +throughout Europe, and on the morrow of the 'affaire Dreyfus,' these +words ring with a bitter irony. And in our own East London how utterly +unlikely it is that the spectacle of our Christianity should make the +Jews feel that Christian society cannot but be divine! Indeed, the +unfulfilled debt Christendom owes to the Jews is appalling. That +ancient and indomitable race retains, with all its faults, its +close-knitting sense of brotherhood, its faith, its frugality, its +industry, its patience, its heroism. We are meant to show it the +greater glories of the New Covenant, the splendour of the purity, the +unworldliness, the expansiveness, the love of the brotherhood of +Christ. And we do show it--what? Is there that in our common +Christianity, as they see it, which should obviously make Judaism +ashamed of itself? Could St. Paul, looking at our Christendom, have +expected 'all Israel to be saved' by the spectacle of a catholic +church? These are considerations {93} which indeed should drive us to +bitter penitence and earnest prayer. + +Finally, before we leave these chapters, we shall do well to look +steadily at St. Paul's habit of mind in dealing with antithetic or +complementary truths. No one could believe with a more glorious +conviction than St. Paul in the dominance of the purpose of God in the +world: in the certainty of the accomplishment of what God has +predestined. If the very rejection of the Christ by the Jews was +turned into an opportunity for the conversion of the Gentiles, what +crime can be too great for the divine wisdom to overrule it for good? +No one, on the other hand, could realize more deeply the responsibility +which lies upon men: their strange power to correspond with God, or +partly thwart His purpose for them and through them. My point is only +this: he is true to both sides of an antithesis, even though the exact +relationship and interworking of the twin truths is necessarily and +finally obscure. He refuses to be one-sided at the requirement of an +incomplete human logic. It has been often pointed out, and in many +directions, how prone we all are to take up with one side of +truth--with predestination or free-will, with the divinity or the +manhood {94} of Christ, with the unity or the trinity of the Godhead, +with sacraments or conversion, with authority or personal judgement; +and if we are intellectually disposed, we call our one-sidedness 'being +logical.' But we had better let St. Paul teach us once for all that +impartiality is a greater thing than this cheap logic; even as Church +history teaches us that a sharp-witted but one-sided zeal for truth is +one main cause of bitterness, narrowness, and schism. + + + +[1] I follow, by preference, the paragraphs of the R.V., unless there +is very strong reason to the contrary. + +[2] Cf. 2 Cor. v. 19, 'God was in Christ reconciling the world unto +Himself.' + +[3] Num. xv. 20, 21. + +[4] 'The Lord called thy name A green olive tree.' Jer. xi. 16; Hos. +xiv. 6. + +[5] On 'mystery,' see _Ephesians_, p. 73. It means a divine secret +disclosed to the elect. + +[6] Isa. lix. 20, according to the Greek, and xxvii. 9. Cf. Ezek. +xxxvi. 25, 26. + +[7] Isa. xl. 13. Cf. Job xxxviii. 4; xli. 11; Wisd. ix. 13. + +[8] Jer. xxxviii. 4. + +[9] Ezek. xvi. 61. + +[10] See above, vol. i. 3. + +[11] Ezek. xxxvii. + +[12] See my _Ephesians_, pp. 258 ff. + +[13] Quoted, with much other illustrative matter, by Weber, _l.c._, pp. +293 ff. The fancy is based on 1 Kings xix. 36; Exod. xxxii. 13. Cf. +on Cant. i. 5, 'I am black but comely'--'The congregation of Israel +speaks: I am black through mine own works, but lovely through the works +of my fathers.' + +[14] Ezek. xiv. 14. + +[15] 1 Cor. vii. 14. + +[16] 'All Israel,' in 1 Kings xii. 1, 2 Chron. xii. 1, Dan. ix. 11, +means 'Israel in general.' + +[17] These words (which in their full sense seem to go beyond what we +have a right to say) occur in Browning's _Ring and the Book_. It is +the Pope's final reflection, when he condemns Guido to death, that his +execution may be the one chance for his spiritual recovery-- + + 'In the main criminal I see no chance + Except in such a suddenness of fate.' + +[18] Luke vi. 35, or 'despairing of no man,' marg. R.V. + +[19] We hold, therefore, with regard to the lots of men in this world, +exactly the opposite of what Plato suggested under the impulse of the +doctrine of transmigration, 'It is the man's own choice, God is +blameless.' + + + + +{95} + +DIVISION V. CHAPTERS XII-XV. 13. + +_Practical Exhortation._ + +We must almost all of us, in climbing some high hill, have experienced +the necessity for two distinct efforts, the second more or less +unanticipated. We started to climb to the apparent summit, only to +find, when we got there, that it was no real summit at all, but a +prominent spur, and that a second climb was required of us before we +were really at the top. An intellectual experience not unlike this is +the lot of the student of the Epistle to the Romans. The apparent +climax of the epistle is the end of chapter viii, and the student at +starting expects his brain to be chiefly taxed in following the closely +knit argument which is to lead him thither. But he reaches it only to +find another like effort of mind required of him in grasping the +meaning of the section (chapters ix-xi) in which St. Paul is occupied +in justifying God's dealings with the chosen people. But now, +intellectually speaking, his work is almost over. {96} As the climber, +seated on the summit of the hill when at last it is gained, lets his +eye range over a rich and wide prospect, and takes in its vastness and +variety, or traces below him the delightful descent: so it is with the +reader of this epistle who has entered sincerely into the spirit of St. +Paul. His intellectual scruples as to the divine dealings have been +just laid to rest; before that his mind had been convinced, and his +heart and will attracted and won, by the unfolding of the divine +righteousness, that is to say of the free grace and love of God. And +now, proportionate to the greatness of the effort by which this +satisfaction of intellect and heart and will has been won, is the joy +of expansion which remains--the joy of the surrendered mind in +appreciating all that is practically possible for it in the light of +the love of God. 'I will run the way of thy commandments, because thou +dost enlarge my heart,' that is, expand it with a sense of liberty and +joy[1]. 'All things are ours,' if but once in completeness of +self-surrendering faith 'we are Christ's' as assuredly 'Christ is +God's[2].' 'I can do all things in Christ that strengtheneth me[3].' + + + +[1] Ps. cxix. 32. See Driver's _Parallel Psalter_, Oxford (1898). + +[2] 1 Cor. iii. 21-3. + +[3] Phil. iv. 13. + + + + +{97} + +DIVISION V. Sec. i. CHAPTER XII. 1-2. + +_Self-surrender in response to God._ + +And first of all the general attitude of mind is defined, which it +befits us to adopt towards God as He has now revealed Himself to us. +It is the response of entire self-surrender--the response of sacrifice +to sacrifice. St. Paul 'beseeches,' or rather 'encourages,' or +'summons' the Roman Christians, using for his motive power[1] all the +rich store of divine compassions which he has just been occupied in +disclosing or explaining to them, to make the only response really +possible to such an exhibition of divine love; and that is to present +themselves in sacrifice to God. What God asks is not dead victims but +living men, in body as well as spirit consecrated to His service and +rendered acceptable in His sight: and this sort of self-oblation, {98} +on the pattern of Christ, is the only reasonable sort of divine service +for man to offer. The transitory world, to which such an ideal is +quite alien, is indeed all around them, but they are not to suffer +themselves to be assimilated to its fleeting fashion. Their whole +point of view is changed and become new; and this must result in so +thorough a transformation of their old worldly ways of thinking that a +new inward light will shine in their hearts, and they will be able to +discriminate and see what God's will is, and so to follow the way of +perfection. + + +I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present +your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, _which_ is +your reasonable service. And be not fashioned according to this world: +but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove +what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God. + + +This short paragraph is full of meaning, and is profoundly +characteristic of St. Paul in thought and language. + +The 'therefore' is one of the great transitional 'therefores[2]' by +which St. Paul shows his constant sense of the inter-connexion of +doctrine and life: the doctrine passing by a clear logic into the +practical life, and the life drawing all its {99} practical motives +from the realities disclosed in the doctrine. It is truly nothing +whatever but shallowness and 'shortness of thought' which can suffer us +to imagine that the Christian character--I do not say all morality, but +the Christian character--could long survive the Christian creed. + +And the character of this summary exhortation shows us that any idea of +a faith which stops short of moral identification with its object is +utterly alien to St. Paul's mind. Faith is no true Christian faith, if +it is content to receive from the Father, or from Christ, a gift which +leaves it still outside the life of God. The faith which Christ +inspires asks for and receives nothing less than real fellowship in His +divine and human life, and that life is, in its joys as well as its +sorrows, a life of self-surrender, of sacrifice. Thus the Christian +only welcomes the gift of pardon through Christ's sacrifice in order to +be admitted into the freedom of the dedicated life in Christ, which is +the life of sacrifice. It is the sort of sacrifice (as St. Paul's +language indicates) which is as different as possible from any such +asceticism as is prompted by contempt of the flesh or the body, or +refusal of joy, or love of death. It is sacrifice which seeks to +cultivate {100} into full vitality every faculty of body as well as of +mind (and that in an active society or brotherhood), in order to +consecrate all we are or can be to the service of God, and so realize +in conscious correspondence with the divine will the rational worship +for humanity. + +St. Paul's words here about a 'living' as opposed to a bloody, and a +'rational' as opposed to an animal sacrifice, may be the basis on which +the eucharist, the Christian worship 'in spirit and in truth,' was +often called in early times the 'reasonable' and 'bloodless +sacrifice[3].' And whether this be the case or no, at any rate we must +relearn the lesson that St. Augustine is for ever insisting upon, that +the eucharistic sacrifice essentially involves and implies the offering +of the Church as the body of Christ, {101} that is, the offering of +ourselves as members of the body; and we may feel profoundly thankful +that, in our service of Holy Communion, this truth has been restored to +its proper prominence, after having been, in the pre-Reformation +service, almost ignored. 'And here we offer and present unto thee, O +Lord, ourselves, our souls and bodies, to be a reasonable, holy, and +lively sacrifice unto thee.' In this prayer is really the climax of +our sacrificial worship[4]. + +The true service of God is intelligent correspondence with the divine +will--this is perfection; and to correspond with the divine will we +must be able to know it: and this is what we can do if we are true to +the principle of our new birth, and suffer it _radically and +permanently to transform_ us and our point of view (for nothing less +than this is carried by St. Paul's expression rendered 'transform'). +Negatively, this means that we must maintain our separateness from the +worldly world, to which we died at our baptism--the world of human +society as it devotes itself to its business and its pleasures, {102} +leaving God out of account[5]. For if the worldly world is suffered to +_fashion us in accordance with its shallow and transitory show_ (this +is the idea conveyed by the word rendered 'fashion'), we shall be +blinded to what our regeneration ought to have made plain to us. + + + +[1] For the use of 'by,' cf. xv. 30; 1 Cor. i. 10 ('through' is the +same word); 2 Cor. x. 1. + +[2] See further, _Ephes._ pp. 172 ff. + +[3] It is more likely, however, that the phrases 'rational worship' and +'bloodless sacrifice' had an earlier Jewish origin. They occur in _The +Testament of the XII Patriarchs_, which is apparently a Jewish document +christianized. There the _angels_ are said (_Levi._ 3) to 'offer to +the Lord a rational odour of sweet savour and a bloodless offering.' +Philo also, as Mr. Conybeare points out to me, in several passages +describes the true sacrifices as 'bloodless': and by bloodless +sacrifices he means either the meal offerings as opposed to the animal +sacrifices (_De Anim. Sacrif._ ed. Mangey ii. 250), or truly spiritual +acts as opposed to merely outward (_De Ebreitate_, i. p. 370, cf. ii. +254). These two ideas run easily into one another, and the earliest +uses of the expression 'bloodless sacrifice' for the eucharist have a +similar ambiguity. + +[4] See further, p. 179. I may be allowed to express the earnest +desire that we might have liberty in our Church to read _both_ of the +Post-Communion Prayers, which seem supplementary rather than +alternative to one another. + +[5] See _Ephes._ p. 92. + + + + +{103} + +DIVISION V. Sec. 2. CHAPTER XII. 3-21. + +_The community spirit._ + +And when St. Paul, justifying himself here, as before and later on, by +the special divine favour which has made him the apostle of the +Gentiles[1], proceeds to develop his exhortation, it appears that with +him, as with St. James[2], the form in which 'divine service' shows +itself must be love of the brethren. To be called into the body of +Christ--the society which is bound into one by His life and spirit--is +to be called to social service, that is, to live a community life, and +to cultivate the virtues which make true community life possible and +healthy. Of these the first is humility, which in this connexion means +the viewing oneself in all things as one truly is, as a part of a +whole. Of the faith by which the whole body lives, a share, but only +{104} a share, belongs to each member--a certain measure of faith--and +he must not strain beyond it. But he is diligently to make the best of +his faculty, and do the work for which his special gift qualifies him, +in due subordination to the welfare of the whole, whether it be +inspired preaching, or ordinary teaching, or the distribution of alms, +or presidency, or some other form of helping others which is his +special function. Besides humility there are other virtues which make +the life of a community healthy and happy, and St. Paul enumerates +them, as they occur to his mind, in no defined order or completeness. +There must be sincerity in love, that is in considering and seeking the +real interest of others; there must be the righteous severity which +keeps the moral atmosphere free from taint; there must be tenderness of +feeling, which makes the community a real family of brothers; and an +absence of all self-assertion, or desire for personal prominence; and +thorough industry; and spiritual zeal; and devotion to God's service; +and the cheerfulness which Christian hope inspires; and the ready +endurance of affliction; and close application to prayer; and a love +for giving whenever fellow Christians need; and an eagerness to +entertain them when they are {105} travelling--for 'the community' +embraces, not one church only, but 'all the churches.' + +Nay in a wider sense the community extends itself to all mankind, even +those who persecute[3] them. According to his Lord's precepts, the +Christian is only to bless his persecutors. Generally he is to be, in +the deep, original sense, sympathetic with his fellow men everywhere in +their joys and sorrows, and (to return to the Christian community) he +is to seek to let it be pervaded by an impartial kindness; and, not +thinking himself a superior person suited only for superior affairs, he +is to let the current of ordinary human needs bear him along. He is +not to set undue store on his own opinions[4]; he is utterly to banish +the spirit of retaliation; he is deliberately to plan so to live as +that his life shall prove, not a stumblingblock, but a moral attraction +to men in general[5]; he is never to quarrel with any one if he can +possibly help it; he is completely to suppress his resentment {106} +when he is wronged, and simply to leave the matter to the wrath of God, +as indeed the law would have him do[6]; so that, by his very meekness +and returning good for evil, he may, according to the wise man's +saying, heap burning shame upon his enemy, like coals of fire[7]. Evil +is all around the Christian, and it is a strong man armed; but the +Christian has with him the forces of good which are yet stronger, and +by no passive withdrawal, but by the active exercise of good, he is to +win the victory over evil. + + +For I say, through the grace that was given me, to every man that is +among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; +but so to think as to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to +each man a measure of faith. For even as we have many members in one +body, and all the members have not the same office: so we, who are +many, are one body in Christ, and severally members one of another. +And having gifts differing according to the grace that was given to us, +whether prophecy, _let us prophesy_ according to the proportion of our +faith; or ministry, _let us give ourselves_ to our ministry; or he that +teacheth, to his teaching; or he that exhorteth, to his exhorting: he +that giveth, _let him do it_ with liberality; he that ruleth, with +diligence; he that sheweth mercy, with cheerfulness. Let love be +without hypocrisy. Abhor that which is evil; cleave to that which is +good. In love of the brethren be tenderly affectioned one to another; +in honour preferring one another; in diligence not slothful; {107} +fervent in spirit; serving the Lord; rejoicing in hope; patient in +tribulation; continuing stedfastly in prayer; communicating to the +necessities of the saints; given to hospitality. Bless them that +persecute you; bless, and curse not. Rejoice with them that rejoice; +weep with them that weep. Be of the same mind one toward another. Set +not your mind on high things, but condescend to things that are lowly. +Be not wise in your own conceits. Render to no man evil for evil. +Take thought for things honourable in the sight of all men. If it be +possible, as much as in you lieth, be at peace with all men. Avenge +not yourselves, beloved, but give place unto wrath: for it is written, +Vengeance belongeth unto me; I will recompense, saith the Lord. But if +thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him to drink: for in +so doing thou shall heap coals of fire upon his head. Be not overcome +of evil, but overcome evil with good. + + +(1) It is the idea of corporate life which dominates all this +exhortation. No writing in the New Testament has done more than the +Epistle to the Romans to strengthen the sense of spiritual +individuality, and to rouse the individual spirit to protest, as it +protested in Luther, against spiritual tyranny. But it is a complete +mistake to suppose that the epistle is individualistic in tendency. +The life into which the individual's faith in Jesus admits him is the +life of a community, and its virtues are the virtues of community life. +The strengthened individuality is to go to enrich an organized society. + +{108} + +This is expressed in the familiar metaphor of the body which had been +employed in non-Christian thought before St. Paul identified it with +himself and Christianity by the vigorous and profound use which he made +of it[8]. The Christian community is a body bound together in a common +life by a common inspiring presence and spirit. The divine grace and +good favour of Christ shows itself in special 'gifts' (in the Greek +this word 'charisma' expresses a particular embodiment of the general +grace, 'charis,' of God); and no individual member is without his +special endowment. It is not a few officers of the community who are +gifted, but all; and all are to co-operate in the common life and work. +Of gifts there are various sorts which we hear of in the New Testament. +There are the official gifts, the result of what we call ordination, as +the gift which was 'in' Timothy 'by the laying on of hands.' And those +among the Christians at Rome, who 'presided' and 'ministered,' would +have been, we should suppose, official presbyters or 'bishops,' and +deacons. But the Roman Christians hardly constituted yet an organized +church, and we cannot tell whence such officers of {109} the community +received their appointment. There is no ground for a positive +assertion of any kind[9]. Again we hear of special gifts, such as +powers of healing, speaking with tongues and prophesying, which +sometimes accompanied the bestowal of the Spirit, through the laying on +of hands which was given to all. And the gift of prophesying among the +Roman Christians may have been a gift of this kind. But St. Paul is +perhaps writing with the circumstances of the Corinthian church, rather +than those of the Roman Christians, in his mind; and we can gather but +little about the exact condition of things at the capital. Once more, +St. Paul uses the word 'gifts' for more personal and moral endowments, +as for the bent of mind which leads men, under divine guidance, towards +celibacy or marriage[10]. But in this place he is not distinguishing. +He is hardly speaking in view of any special circumstances at Rome. He +is but emphasizing the fact which is the basis of all the life of +Christians everywhere--the fact that each individual member of the body +has a special gift, and a special function for the good of the whole +body, by which the gift is to express itself. What every individual +Christian has to do, {110} then, is to realize his own gift and +correspond to it. The gift involves a certain 'measure of faith.' The +faith of each individual Christian is the same in its basis. It holds +him in spiritual allegiance to the same Lord, and in confession of the +same elemental creed. But, besides this, it involves a special +insight, which is the peculiar endowment of the individual. There is +something which each man can realize and impart, as no one else is +qualified to do. The Church is the poorer if he holds back or fails to +stir up this gift of his own, and on the other hand he incurs the peril +of presumption if he ventures beyond it. Even the inspired man, the +prophet, must prophesy within the limits of what his own special +proportion of faith enables him to perceive and grasp[11], even though +another prophet with a larger faith might rightly say what he may not +venture upon. 'Let each man be fully {111} persuaded in his own mind.' +For any assertion which goes beyond what the faith of the individual +enables him to be convinced of, is for him 'sin.' We greatly need this +exhortation to-day. The convictions of many are vague and uncertain, +and their teaching without heart or force, because, like parrots, they +catch up and repeat what others may have insight enough to warrant +their asserting, but they have not. To correspond with one's own +personal gift of faith is to realize one's vocation; and, by the +development of the individual points of view, inside the common +'tradition,' the fullness and richness of the corporate faith is +secured. + +The cohesion of the body lies in each one's realizing his own gift, and +also reverencing that of others. Here is humility. Humility is not +self-contempt, or cringing to others. To realize one's own gift, one's +own relation to God, gives to each man a dignity, a power to stand +upright and face the world. The sovereign Master and Giver has given +me my own life and my own gifts. He is responsible for the existence +which He gave me, and I am not to shame Him by shrinking from making +the best of it. But also humility is, in all relations, truth about +ourselves. It is truth about ourselves as regards God, who {112} is +simply the giver of whatever we have and are; and it is truth about +ourselves as regards our fellow men--our own gifts being justly +appraised only when they are regarded as means of serving the body as a +whole, without any self-aggrandizement, with a due respect to the gifts +of others, and even a positive will to let them have higher place than +ourselves. + +Indeed we shall do well to meditate deeply on this. What good work is +there which is not in more or less continual danger of suffering, or +even being abandoned, because fellow Christians, zealous fellow +Christians, will plainly, and it must be wilfully, yield to the +ambition to be first: will not be content to be second or third: will +not do the unobtrusive work: will think 'How can I shine,' rather than +'How can I serve'? In fact, how very unwilling we are to recognize, in +our ideals of education, and in our theory of grown life, that +ambition, in the strict sense of the word--the desire to obtain +distinction for ourselves, as distinct from the desire to serve--is not +a motive which Christianity can sanction, or from which it can hope for +a blessing. + +We linger lovingly, wistfully, on the picture of the corporate life of +a Christian community. Has it vanished from the earth, this real +fraternal {113} living, 'high and low, rich and poor, one with +another,' each supplementing the deficiencies of the other, and +receiving of their fullness? May we not do something more than we are +doing to realize it in our congregations or parishes? Is nearly enough +emphasis laid on the _social_ relationship of each congregation of +fellow worshippers or each local church? + +Dimly through the mist of ages in old churchwardens' accounts, in the +rare instances where they have been preserved from days before the +Reformation, we discern what a really fraternal, self-governing and +mutually co-operative community the mediaeval English parish was. Let +me extract a few sentences from the excellent preface[12] which Bishop +Hobhouse prefixed to an edition of the surviving _Churchwardens' +Accounts_ of a number of Somersetshire parishes. + +'The (parish) community was completely organized with a constitution +which recognized the rights of the whole and of every adult member to a +voice in self-government, but kept the self-governing community under a +system of inspection and (if need should be) restraint from central +authority.' 'The whole adult population were accounted parishioners, +and had an equal voice {114} when assembled for consultation under the +rector. Seeing that both sexes served the office of warden, there can +be no doubt that both had a vote.' + +The strongly existing spirit of good will and pride in the parish +church found all the necessary funds for the maintaining of the church +and the services, and for the provision of often a sumptuous and rich +treasury of ornaments. The needs of the Church were met generally by +the local industry of 'such as were wise-hearted'--builders, +carpenters, workers in gold and silver, bell-founders, embroiderers, +writers, illuminators, book-binders, and others. + +Hard by the church the church-house was the centre of the popular +recreations of the holy day or holiday. + +The parish elected and paid its own officers, except the rector, and +the affairs and ornaments of the church, even in part the arrangement +of the services, were under the government, not of the rector, but of +the parish meeting, of which he was president, under the restraining +hand of the rural dean and archdeacon. + +The support of the poor or disabled was a wholly voluntary matter. +'The brotherhood tie was so strongly realized by the community, that +{115} the weaker ones were succoured by the stronger as out of a family +store.' + +'All the tendency of the feudal system, working through the machinery +of the manorial court, was to _keep the people down_. All the tendency +of the parochial system, working through the parish council, holding +its assemblies in the churches, where the people met on equal terms as +children and servants of the living God, and members of one body in +Christ Jesus, was to _lift the people up_.' In these assemblies there +was no distinction between lord and vassal, high and low, rich and +poor; in them the people learnt the worth of being free. Here were the +schools in which, in the slow course of centuries, they were +disciplined to self-help, self-reliance and self-respect[13]. + +No doubt these descriptions of mediaeval parish life represent an ideal +very imperfectly realized. But is it not an ideal we need to recover? +Is there not a call for Church reform, both moral and formal, to +restore to us the community life of our parishes, and fill St. Paul's +language again with its primary and natural meaning? + + + +[1] See i. 5, 11-15; xv. 15-17. + +[2] Jas. i. 17. + +[3] The word is the same as St. Paul has just used to describe the +eager 'pursuit' of opportunities of hospitality by the Christian. He +'pursues' opportunities of doing good, while he is himself 'pursued' by +enemies to do him evil. + +[4] Cf. xi. 25, and Prov. iii. 7. + +[5] Prov. iii. 4 LXX. 'Provide things honourable in the sight of the +Lord and of man.' + +[6] Deut. xxxii. 35. + +[7] Prov. xxv. 21. + +[8] The truth, however, which underlies the metaphor of the body is, we +may say, equally present in all the New Testament writers. + +[9] See, however, p. 196. + +[10] 1 Cor. vii. 7. + +[11] Dr. Liddon, with many others, interprets 'according to the +proportion of _the_ faith,' i.e. according to 'the majestic proportion +of the (objective) faith.' This is the characteristically Latin, as +against the Greek, interpretation, and the Greek is certainly to be +preferred, because 'according to the proportion of our faith' follows +naturally upon 'according as ... the measure of faith' just above; +indeed 'faith' in this context can hardly have assigned to it without +violence the objective meaning which, however, in the context of the +Pastoral Epistles it no doubt frequently bears. Cf. app. note A, p. +205. + +[12] _Somersetshire Records_, vol. iv, 1890. + +[13] Dr. Jessop, 'Parish Life in England before the Great Pillage,' +_Nineteenth Century_, Jan. 1898, p. 55; cf. also Dom Gasquet on 'The +Layman in the Mediaeval Period,' _Tablet_, Sept. 2, 1899. + + + + +{116} + +DIVISION V. Sec. 3. CHAPTER XIII. 1-7. + +_The Christians and the imperial power._ + +It is possible that the thought of the innocent victim of injustice and +wrong waiting upon the divine wrath, brings to St. Paul's mind the idea +of the State which exists to represent divine justice in the world, and +minister divine wrath on behalf of the innocent. But, whether this +particular connexion of thought was really in St. Paul's mind or no, at +any rate the previous section has made it plain that the 'love of the +brethren' must extend itself to become a right relation to all men, +whether Christians or not[1]. In particular, therefore, the relation +of the Christians to the imperial authority could not fail to be a +matter which required attention and apostolic counsel. The Jews, whose +theocratic {117} principles made submission to government by 'the +uncircumcised' at least a real abandonment of a religious ideal[2], had +always an instinctive tendency to rebellion; and the Christian church +built upon Judaism might easily have inherited this instinct. The +catholic church of the new covenant, might have claimed to be a +theocracy like that of the old. Especially at Rome, where the Jews +were a vast and formidable body who had recently given trouble and been +expelled[3], the attitude of the Christians, who were identified with +them, might easily be misunderstood. Or on the other hand the Jews +themselves, at Rome as at Thessalonica[4], might represent the +Christians as disloyal to Caesar. Moreover, apart from all unjustified +slanders, the spirit of the 'fifth monarchy men' has seldom been +altogether absent from periods of Christian enthusiasm; and the +restless and undisciplined {118} tendencies at Thessalonica[5], which +the mistaken expectation of the immediate second coming of Christ had +encouraged, were a sign that Christians might easily find it difficult +to settle down as good citizens in the great empire of the world. + +St. Paul therefore, here and elsewhere, would make it quite plain that +the catholic church, if it is like the ancient Israel, is like it only +as it was in exile--when the children of Israel were bidden to be good +citizens of the Babylonian empire, and to seek the peace of the city +whither God had caused them to be carried away captive, and to pray +unto the Lord for it, for in the peace thereof they should have +peace[6]. Thus the Church was not a theocracy, but a 'settlement of +strangers and exiles[7],' waiting for the visible establishment of the +kingdom or city of God, and meanwhile maintaining a polity or ordered +social life of their own, but on a voluntary and catholic (or +non-national) basis. Therefore, so long as God maintains 'the present +world,' they must be good citizens of whatever earthly state they +happen to live under. On this basis, then, St. Paul reminds each +single person {119} of the duty of political loyalty. The earthly +state is of God's establishing, as well as the kingdom of Christ, and +fulfils a divine purpose with divine authority. It exists to suppress +moral outrage and lawlessness[8], to maintain justice and right. Its +officers are God's ministers (as truly as the officers of the Church, +though in a different order), and must be obeyed accordingly, under +peril not only of civil punishment for disobedience, but under peril of +divine judgement also, and as a matter of conscience. The good man, +and therefore the good Christian, has nothing to fear from the empire +or its officers. And he will readily, and as a matter of conscience, +pay his tribute as a subject, and his taxes as a citizen, to the proper +authorities, and give to each imperial officer the respect which is his +due. + + +Let every soul be in subjection to the higher powers: for there is no +power but of God; and the _powers_ that be are ordained of God. +Therefore he that resisteth the power, withstandeth the ordinance of +God: and they that withstand shall receive to themselves judgement. +For rulers are not a terror to the good work, but to the evil. And +wouldest thou have no fear of the power? do {120} that which is good, +and thou shalt have praise from the same: for he is a minister of God +to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he +beareth not the sword in vain: for he is a minister of God, an avenger +for wrath to him that doeth evil. Wherefore _ye_ must needs be in +subjection, not only because of the wrath, but also for conscience +sake. For for this cause ye pay tribute also; for they are ministers +of God's service, attending continually upon this very thing. Render +to all their dues: tribute to whom tribute _is due_; custom to whom +custom; fear to whom fear; honour to whom honour. + + +Our Lord, by His whole bearing towards Jewish nationalism and by His +clear prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem, as well as by His +particular injunction to 'render unto Caesar the things that were +Caesar's,' had made it evident to His disciples that the sceptre had +departed from Judah, and had determined the attitude of Christians +towards the empire. They could not indeed be as other inhabitants of +the empire, for they were waiting, and praying, and working, for the +visible establishment of a city and kingdom of God on earth--little as +either the 'times and seasons,' or the character and manner, of that +city and kingdom had been revealed to them. Thus the Roman empire +could not but be in their eyes a kingdom of this world destined for +overthrow. But it was by the methods of meekness, and by purely +spiritual weapons, that the kingdom of {121} God was to come, and the +great overthrow, whatever it should prove to be, was to be effected. +This at least was certain; and meanwhile the Roman empire represented +the divine principle of authority and order, and must be obeyed. + +St. Paul no doubt had, more than any other apostle, a real feeling for +the empire and the city of which he was a citizen. Moreover, he saw in +the organization of the empire a great framework and vehicle for the +establishment and spread of the catholic church. And hitherto +certainly (at least, since the fatal moment of Pilate's weakness) the +Church had continually experienced the assistance of the imperial +authorities. It was a misused _spiritual_ authority, before which the +protest had to be made, 'We must obey God rather than man[9].' It was +the Jewish authorities who persecuted the Church. It was the Jewish +king who put James to death. At Paphos, Thessalonica, Corinth, +Ephesus, the imperial authorities had been more or less friendly, and +even at Philippi they had been reduced to an attitude of apology by the +bare mention of Roman citizenship. St. Paul's experiences, therefore, +had prepared him to 'appeal unto Caesar,' and to expect justice {122} +and freedom for himself and his cause. Even the beginnings of the +experience of imperial hostility and persecution did not quash or even +weaken this attitude in St. Peter[10]. St. Peter and St. Paul idealize +the empire almost as if it could do no wrong, and the righteous had +nothing to fear from it. Of course, when this expectation had been +rudely shattered--when the imperial authority had come chiefly to mean +the persecution of the saints--an opposite sort of idealism takes +place, and Rome appears as the great 'beast' of violence in the +Apocalypse of John. Both idealizations represent truth--the truth of +what the State is meant to be on the one side, and of what it may +become on the other. But after considerable experience of persecution, +Clement of Rome is still full of admiration for the divine order of the +imperial rule, and recognizes the duty of obedience to his 'rulers and +governors upon earth,' side by side with the duty of obedience to +'God's almighty and most excellent name'; and as it is God who has +given the rulers their authority, he prays for grace to submit to them, +and offers rich prayer for their welfare and that of the empire. And +the spirit lived on in the Christian {123} church through all the +persecutions, and the apologists for Christianity loved to protest +their loyalty to the empire, and to think of their church as 'the soul +of the world,' maintaining it by prayer and virtue in the midst of +impiety and corruption. + +In England this passage has often been put to two conspicuously +unjustifiable uses. First, it was the stronghold of the maintainers of +'the divine right of kings' and of 'passive obedience.' In reality it +asserts the divine right of civil authority, but not of any particular +kind of civil authority. Indeed the government of the empire was still +nominally a republic in its fundamental forms, though it was becoming a +despotism in fact. And supposing the senate and people had--as is of +course conceivable--reasserted their authority over their 'emperors,' +or military officers, the Christian doctrine of divine right would have +afforded no guidance as to which of the claimants to authority had the +divine will on its side. What is barely asserted is the divine right +of the existing civil authority, democratic or regal. And while our +passage exalts the normal duty of obedience, it suggests no answer to +the question--Is there not a point where a government so manifestly +fails to {124} maintain the divine order in the world, or to represent +the will of God and the best interests of the people, that it deserves +to be put an end to? At such a point Christianity can only serve to +reinforce the natural instincts of justice and right. + +And again, the words, 'the powers that be are ordained of God: +therefore he that resisteth the power withstandeth the ordinance of +God,' have often been used in England to justify a claim on behalf of +the State to coerce and govern the Church and the consciences of men in +spiritual matters. But such an idea is utterly alien to the mind of +the New Testament. In the matters which concern our spiritual +salvation, the authority which is to discipline and control us is the +binding and loosing, absolving and retaining, authority which is +entrusted not to the State, but to the Church. Attempts are recorded +in history on the part of the State to crush out the Church, and on the +part of the Church to usurp the authority of the State and use its +weapons. Such attempts, we trust, belong to past history. An attempt, +too, specially identified with England, has been made to identify a +national Church and State as only different aspects of the same +society, so that the government of the national Church can be more +{125} or less fused in that of the State. But whatever may be said of +such an attempt in the past, in our modern England the plain facts of +the political and religious situation are flatly repugnant to it; and +there can evidently be no reasonable religious government in the Church +of England till it is conducted again in obedience to the fundamental +Christian principle that our national and local Church is part of a +great catholic society, which Christ endowed with an independent +spiritual authority, and a law and constitution and ministers of its +own. The State may need an established national church as much as ever +to enable it to fulfil its highest functions, but any 'Establishment' +in these days must be consistent with the fullest recognition of the +spiritual and political liberties of those members of the State who +belong to other religious bodies, and also must be based upon +recognition that the Church and State are fundamentally distinct, and +relatively independent societies. + +But it behoves us Churchmen, not only to assert the spiritual liberties +of the Church, but also to realize a great deal more fully than we do, +the divine authority of the civil ministers and civil laws in their own +department. The State {126} exists to embody and represent in the +world the divine justice, which is to be the basis of the government of +men. Its ministers--magistrates, legislators, officers of justice--are +'God's ministers': laws which are passed by the State in fulfilment of +its divine mission--laws intended to maintain the health and prosperity +of the people as a whole--have a divine sanction; and we Churchmen can +only be what the Church should be, 'the soul of the world,' if we make +it a matter of conscience, a great deal more deliberately than it is at +present with most of us, to aid vigorously in the administration of the +good laws which already exist, national and municipal, and to promote +intelligently and enthusiastically the purposes of civil government by +helping towards better laws; so that our government, as a whole, may +become a continually completer image of the equitable and impartial +righteousness of God. + + + +[1] Cf. 2 Pet. i. 7, 'In your love of the brethren supply love,' i.e. +let the temper bred inside the closer bond of Christian fellowship +extend itself universally. + +[2] Deut. xvii. 15, 'Thou mayest not put a foreigner over thee, which +is not thy brother.' + +[3] Acts xviii. 2. 'Claudius had commanded all the Jews to depart from +Rome,' cf. Suetonius, Claud. 25. 'The Jews who had been persistently +breaking into disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus (Christ?) he +expelled from Rome.' We cannot certainly explain these words, but St. +Paul knew all about the occurrence from Priscilla and Aquila, whom the +expulsion had brought across his path at Corinth. + +[4] Acts xvii. 7. + +[5] 1 Thess. iv. 11; v. 14; 2 Thess. iii. 6. + +[6] Jer. xxix. 7; cf. 1 Tim. ii. 2. + +[7] 1 Pet. i. 11. The word for such a 'settlement of strangers,' +_paroecia_, has become, by a suggestive history, our 'parish.' + +[8] Cf. 2 Thess. ii. 6. 'That which restraineth' the outbreak of +lawlessness is (almost certainly) the empire, and 'he that restraineth' +(ver. 7) the emperor. + +[9] Acts v. 29. + +[10] 1 Pet. ii. 13-17. + + + + +{127} + +DIVISION V. Sec. 4. CHAPTER XIII. 8-10. + +_The summary debt._ + +Christians are willingly to pay tribute and tax as a debt, a thing due +in God's sight to His ministers. But this obligation is a specimen of +innumerable obligations which we owe to our 'neighbours'--debts only +limited by human need. And the Christian is to take a wide view of his +obligations, and to let there be no legitimate claim upon him +unfulfilled, no debt unpaid, except the one which a man ought always to +be paying and still to be owing, for it is infinite--the debt of love. +Here, in loving each other man with the same real regard to his +personal interests as we devote to our own, is the satisfaction of the +moral law. All the particular 'commandments'--those of the Second +Table, and any other there may be--are comprehended in this one. For +love can do no harm to any other, and can therefore break no +commandment. + +{128} + +Owe no man anything, save to love one another: for he that loveth his +neighbour hath fulfilled the law. For this, Thou shalt not commit +adultery, Thou shall not kill, Thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not +covet, and if there be any other commandment, it is summed up in this +word, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. Love worketh +no ill to his neighbour: love therefore is the fulfilment of the law. + + +St. Paul gives here a very noticeable expansion to the idea of not +being in debt. In its literal sense we have all of us a horror of it, +at least in theory. + + 'No debtor's hands are clean + However white they be.' + +We must both let that theoretic horror of debt dominate our practice in +money matters, and also expand our idea of 'debts.' According to +Christ's teaching, the priest and Levite did not pay their debt to +their Samaritan neighbour, because they thought him a stranger with no +claim on them. Dives ignored his rich man's debt to Lazarus. Of those +who are to appear on the left hand of Christ's judgement-seat, each +will be condemned because he never realized his debt to Christ in the +persons of all those who had needs to which he might have ministered. +St. Paul, as an apostle, acknowledged his debt {129} to all the Gentile +world[1], and we members of a church, catholic in idea, but as yet so +far from catholic in fact--we Englishmen, members of an imperial and +spreading race, responsible for the name of Christ all over the +world--have a portentous and lamentably unfulfilled debt to the races +of Africa and India, and to the whole world. + +We can all think of manifold debts--to the lonely whom we might visit, +the misunderstood whom we might sympathize with, the ignorant whom we +might teach, the weak and oppressed whom we might support and combine, +the sinful whom we might convert and establish in good living; so many +debts to family and friends; so many debts to Englishmen and fellow +Christians, to Africans and Asiatics. Is it not bewildering even to +attempt to realize our debts? And yet, let a man make a beginning, and +all will be well. Let him steadily set himself to behave towards those +whom he employs or those who employ him, towards his domestic servants +or his masters, towards railway porters and shop assistants and others +who minister to his convenience, as being men and women with the same +right to courteous treatment, and to a real opportunity to {130} make +the best of themselves, as he has himself; let him steadily refuse to +'exploit' those immediately concerned with him, or treat them as merely +means to his ends or instruments of his convenience; let him thus +realize his debts to his nearest 'neighbours,' and the whole idea of +humanity, of brotherhood, will be deepened and made real to him. +Serving the few, he will come to serve the many. His prayers will go +before his actions, and enlarge their scope. He will get a habit of +considerateness and thoughtfulness for others, as belonging to Christ, +which will express itself habitually towards all, and especially the +weak. His 'neighbour' will come to mean, as in our Lord's parable and +in St. Paul's expression in this place, any 'other man[2].' And in our +days when the old personal relations of masters to workers have been so +largely merged in the relation of companies to unions or to men and +women in masses, we shall never allow ourselves to forget that +combinations are combinations of individuals, and that neither +individual responsibility, nor responsibility for the individual, can +be obliterated by union or by numbers. + +St. Paul, we notice, is here plainly {131} reproducing our Lord's +saying about love and the law[3]; and he would seem to have the +teaching of the parable about the Good Samaritan in his mind; as in the +previous section the saying 'Render unto Caesar the things that are +Caesar's,' and in the end of the preceding one (xii. 14, 19) the +prohibition of vengeance and the injunction of love to enemies in the +Sermon on the Mount. St. Paul's ethical teaching is in fact found to +be throughout based on our Lord's, whether our Lord's words were with +him in a written form or came to him simply in the oral tradition. + +And we do well to remember, as we read this familiar passage, that here +is the centre and kernel of Christianity. It is the revelation of a +new and universal duty, based on a revealed relationship of all men to +a common Father: the duty which lies upon all men of loving all men, +because God loves all men with a father's love, or rather because God +is love, and only by the life of love can we share His fellowship[4]. +The {132} Christian 'enthusiasm for humanity' has thus its roots in a +disclosure of the character of God, and of His mind towards every man. + + + +[1] Rom. i. 14. + +[2] ver. 8, 'his neighbours': margin, 'the other.' + +[3] Matt. xxii. 40; cf. Gal. v. 14, and James ii. 8. + +[4] It has been commonly said that Christianity almost created a new +word to express the new duty. But this now appears not to be strictly +the case. _Agape_, love, is a word unknown indeed to classical +writers, but it is found in the popular speech of Alexandria in the +second century B.C. See Deissmann, _Bibelstudien_ (Marburg, 1895), p. +80. (I was referred to this work by Dr. Bernard, _Pastoral Epistles_, +p. 24.) Hence, i.e. from the popular speech of Greek Egypt, it passed +into the Greek Bible and so into Christianity. + + + + +{133} + +DIVISION V. Sec. 5. CHAPTER XIII. 11-14. + +_The approach of the day._ + +And the motive for paying our debts, in this wide sense, is that we +must 'agree with our adversary quickly, while we are with him in the +way,' for the day of account is at hand. This worldly world lies +asleep to the spiritual realities, but its short night--the time of +darkness--is nearly over. The great deliverance is nearer to us than +when we first became Christians. The day of the Lord is almost +dawning. Let us see to it then that all that is only fit for the +darkness is stripped off us: that we are suitably equipped for the day, +so that when it suddenly dawns it shall not put us to shame. Sensual +lusts and loveless passions indulged--gross sins, such as none of the +Christian communities had quite got rid of--will appear improper +conduct indeed when the sun rises. And there is only one garment +proper for the day; it is the garment of Christ's righteousness, or +rather of Christ Himself, with whom we must invest {134} ourselves. As +for our lower nature, it is to be our servant merely--not a master, +whose clamorous demands we are to study to satisfy. + + +'And this, knowing the season, that now it is high time for you to +awake out of sleep: for now is salvation nearer to us than when we +_first_ believed. The night is far spent, and the day is at hand: let +us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the +armour of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in revelling +and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and +jealousy. But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision +for the flesh, to _fulfil_ the lusts _thereof_. + + +St. Paul, no doubt, was still in eager expectation of the immediate +second coming of Christ; and that expectation has proved mistaken. Now +our Lord plainly did not mean His disciples to know when His judgement +was to be made manifest, and St. Paul apparently recognized this[1], so +that his immediate anticipation of the end can never have been part of +his faith--never more than the reflection of the eager desire which +filled the heart of the Church. On the other hand, our Lord did mean +His disciples to go on expecting Him. Thus {135} St. Paul's admonition +is as applicable now as ever. The future of the world and of each +nation and institution is precarious: things which seem solid and +strong may crumble and melt; how soon God is to make plain His +judgements, in part or on the whole, we do not know; when each one of +us is to pass by death to the great account we do not know. There is +no reasonable attitude towards the unknown coming of judgement except +to be ready, and, though the darkness of the alienated and godless +world is all around us, to live as children of the light eagerly +expecting the dawning of the day[2]. + +And to meet Christ we must be like Christ. And to be like Christ we +must be in Christ, clothed with His righteousness, invested with His +new nature, fighting with the weapons of His victorious manhood. The +'evil' which is in ourselves, the unregulated flesh, we can only +'overcome with good'--the good which is Jesus Himself: for it is no +longer we that live in our bare selves, but Christ that liveth in us. +We are baptized into Him, we possess His spirit, we eat His flesh and +drink His blood. What remains is practically to clothe ourselves in +{136} Him[3], appropriating and drawing out into ourselves by acts of +our will His very present help in trouble. So can we become like Him, +and be fitted to see Him as He is[4]. + +This passage played a memorable part in St. Augustine's life; for when +the child's voice had bidden him 'open and read,' these were the words +upon which he opened, and which sealed his conversion to the faith he +served so nobly--'not in rioting and drunkenness, ... but put ye on the +Lord Jesus Christ.' 'I had no wish,' he tells us, 'to read any +further, nor was there any need. For immediately at the end of this +sentence, as if a light of certainty had been poured into my heart, all +the shadows of doubt were scattered[5].' + + + +[1] 1 Thess. v. 1: 'The day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the +night.' To know this is to have answer enough to questions about the +times and seasons of the coming (v. 1). + +[2] It is interesting to compare this passage with the closely similar +one of Thess. v. 1-4. Cf. Eph. v. 14 ff.; vi. 11. + +[3] Christ is 'put on' in baptism by all, Gal. iii. 27; but we all +still need to appropriate what we have received, and so 'put Him on' +for ourselves; cf. Eph. iv. 24; Col. iii. 12. + +[4] See app. note G, p. 238, for an admirable prayer by Jeremy Taylor +based on this thought. + +[5] _Conf._ viii. 12. + + + + +{137} + +DIVISION V. Sec. 6. CHAPTER XIV. 1-23. + +_Mutual toleration._ + +St. Paul's practical exhortations show no definite scheme, but flow out +of one another in a natural sequence. He began with the fundamental +moral disposition required by life in the Christian community (xii). +He proceeded to the relation between the Christian community and the +government of the world outside (xiii. 1-7). This led him to lay brief +and vigorous emphasis upon the universal range of Christian obligation +(8-10), and the motive which is to make Christians zealous in rising to +its fulfilment (11-14). Now[1] he comes back to the difficulties which +arise among Christians--the difficulties in actually living together as +members of the same community--difficulties on those small points of +religious observance which seem so unimportant {138} in the abstract, +and which, in the actual experience of intercourse, prove to be so +terribly important, and so easily give rise to a 'crisis in the +Church.' How were the reasonably-minded majority[2], who thought that +all kinds of food were morally indifferent, to behave towards the +scrupulous who would only eat vegetables? How were those Christians, +who recognized no distinction between one day and another, to behave +towards people who still held the mind of the writer of Ecclesiasticus, +that 'some days God had exalted and hallowed, and some he had made +ordinary days[3]'? + +The problem of 'lawful meats' had often been before the early +Christians. It could not but have been so, seeing that those among +them, who had passed under Jewish influences had been brought under a +system in which the distinction between clean and unclean meats had +been rigorously observed. True, our Lord had 'made all meats +clean[4],' as He had opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers. +And the vision which reassured St. Peter on the {139} latter point, and +forbade him 'to call any man common or unclean[5],' was expressed in a +form which implied that the same principle would apply to food. But +this fundamental catholic principle, in its sharp opposition to Jewish +particularism, was not accepted without a struggle at every point. How +hotly, for a time, the struggle raged, we dimly perceive in the +narrative of the Acts, and especially in St. Paul's Epistle to the +Galatians[6]. But at the Jerusalem conference the fundamental catholic +principle was unmistakably reaffirmed. Gentiles were to be admitted to +brotherhood without circumcision or the keeping of the law. Henceforth +then the reactionaries had no ground to stand on. The law of clean and +unclean meats had gone with the rest of the Jewish laws. But while the +Gentiles won a complete victory on the main principle, they were +required by the apostolic council to make concessions to Jewish habits +in eating, such as could not affect the main principle. They were to +eat meat killed in the Jewish manner, with the blood thoroughly drained +out. This in itself would probably exclude them from {140} the Gentile +shambles, where also much of the meat which was for sale would have +been offered to idols[7]. By the observance of such a concession, +then, Jew and Gentile were to live and eat together in peace. + +The actual enactment of the Jerusalem conference had a limited +application to the Gentile Christians of Antioch and Syria and +Cilicia[8]. But the principle was a vital and universal one: to hold +firm the catholic or 'indifferentist' principle, but to make +concessions for love's sake and to facilitate mutual fellowship. And +this same principle St. Paul soon had reason to apply again at Corinth. +There the problem was not--How could Jew and Gentile live and eat +together? but How far could Gentiles, who had become Christians, +associate with Gentiles who were still adherents of the old religion, +and eat their meats? St. Paul, in answering this question for the +Corinthians, strongly asserts the indifferentist principle--that meat +of all kinds is God's gift and good, and that it can have contracted no +moral pollution through any idolatrous ceremony to which it has been +subjected. No questions, therefore, are to be asked as to its +antecedents. In this physical sense meats which had been {141} offered +to idols might be freely eaten. But when such eating could do harm, +when, for instance, one man points out to another that a particular +portion of food has been part of a sacrifice, and it is plain he will +be scandalized by the eating of it, then the other must abstain[9], +restricting his own lawful liberty for charity and Christian +brotherhood's sake. + +Now St. Paul had heard of a new form of the old difficulty at Rome[10]. +There was a Jewish asceticism--similar to what is found frequently +among orientals, and was practised in Europe among the +Pythagoreans--which required men to abstain from animal food altogether +and from wine. Such was probably the rule of the Essenes in +Palestine[11], as of the Therapeutae in Egypt, and such was, according +to a very early authority, the rule of St. James, the Lord's brother. +Such a practice, then, had found favour among a minority of Christians +at Rome. And {142} St. Paul in the passage we are now to study, in +principle plainly approves of the indifferentist practice of the +majority. He knows, and _is persuaded in the Lord Jesus_, that nothing +is unclean of itself. It is, he implies, a weak and unduly scrupulous +conscience which makes men vegetarians. But, on the other hand, this +weaker brother--this man with less clear perception of Christian +principle in the matter--must in no way be alienated. He is to be made +welcome. There is no obligation upon him to eat meat. God laid no +such requirement upon him when he became a Christian. 'God received +him.' The Church must continue the like liberality, and not even seek +to pronounce judgement in the matter. In life and death each man is +Christ's servant, and is responsible to God for what he does or does +not do. Therefore let each man simply be faithful to his own +conscience before God in this matter, so that whatever he eats he can +'say his grace,' or 'give thanks,' with a good conscience; and let him +be respectfully tolerant of his brother's practice--the strong not +despising the weak, nor the weak judging and condemning the strong. + +So far for liberty. But if, by using our liberty to eat meat, we are +found to run a risk of really {143} troubling our brother, or even +(what is worse) leading him to act against his conscience and eat what +he feels he ought not[12], then we must abstain. This becomes matter +of character and peaceable fellowship and spiritual joy, and these are +the really material things in the kingdom of God. Sooner than do +injury to this really divine cause, sooner than be a hindrance to his +brother, the Christian had better willingly abstain altogether from +flesh and wine too. + +In passing St. Paul had noticed another indifferent matter besides the +eating of meats. It was the observance of days. St. Paul undoubtedly +considered that all distinction of high days and common days, all +distinction of the sabbath from other days, had been in principle +abolished by Christianity. For Gentile Christians, like the Galatians, +to be 'observing (Jewish) days, and months, and seasons, and +years[13],' is to show a miserable disposition to fall back upon a +superannuated legal idea of religion--to fall back from the religion of +the Spirit to the religion of the letter; from the substance to the +{144} shadow. For the Christian, in fundamental principle, there are +no 'sacred days,' for all days are indifferently sacred. As instructed +Christian men could eat all meats, so they could regard all days as on +the same level in God's sight. But all Christians had not the full +perception of principle. Among the Galatians, indeed, the tendency to +observe days is viewed more severely as part of a general reactionary +tendency. But at Rome it appears to have represented simply the +practice of a harmless, if imperfectly enlightened, minority, and St. +Paul merely ranks it among things indifferent, which are to be frankly +tolerated. It is to be purely left to the individual conscience. + +With these preliminary explanations--which in this case will serve our +purpose better than an analysis--we can read this section without +experiencing any great difficulty. + + +But him that is weak in faith receive ye, _yet_ not to doubtful +disputations[14]. One man hath faith to eat all things: but he that is +weak eateth herbs. Let not him that eateth set at nought him that +eateth not; and let not him that eateth not judge him that eateth: for +God hath {145} received him. Who art thou that judgest the servant of +another? to his own lord he standeth or falleth. Yea, he shall be made +to stand; for the Lord hath power to make him stand. One man esteemeth +one day above another: another esteemeth every day _alike_. Let each +man be fully assured in his own mind. He that regardeth the day, +regardeth it unto the Lord: and he that eateth, eateth unto the Lord, +for he giveth God thanks; and he that eateth not, unto the Lord he +eateth not, and giveth God thanks. For none of us liveth to himself, +and none dieth to himself. For whether we live, we live unto the Lord; +or whether we die, we die unto the Lord: whether we live therefore, or +die, we are the Lord's. For to this end Christ died, and lived +_again_, that he might be Lord of both the dead and the living. But +thou, why dost thou judge thy brother? or thou again, why dost thou set +at nought thy brother? for we shall all stand before the judgement-seat +of God. For it is written, + + As I live, saith the Lord, to me every knee shall bow, + And every tongue shall confess to God[15]. + +So then each one of us shall give account of himself to God. + +Let us not therefore judge one another any more: but judge ye this +rather, that no man put a stumblingblock in his brother's way, or an +occasion of falling. I know, and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus, that +nothing is unclean of itself: save that to him who accounteth anything +to be unclean, to him it is unclean. For if because of meat thy +brother is grieved, thou walkest no longer in love. Destroy not with +thy meat him for whom Christ died. Let not then your good be evil +spoken of: for the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but +righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost. For he that herein +{146} serveth Christ is well-pleasing to God, and approved of men. So +then let us follow after things which make for peace, and things +whereby we may edify one another. Overthrow not for meat's sake the +work of God. All things indeed are clean; howbeit it is evil for that +man who eateth with offence. It is good not to eat flesh, nor to drink +wine, nor _to do anything_ whereby thy brother stumbleth. The faith +which thou hast, have thou to thyself before God. Happy is he that +judgeth not himself in that which he approveth. But he that doubteth +is condemned if he eat, because _he eateth_ not of faith; and +whatsoever is not of faith is sin. + + +1. According to St. Paul a catholic church ought to mean a tolerant +church, and a 'good catholic' a large-hearted Christian. If men of all +races, with all sorts of traditional instincts and habits, were to live +together in close social cohesion in the Christian community--and that +was essential--this must involve much mutual forbearance, much +self-restraint, and deliberate toleration of differences[16]. St. Paul +plainly not merely uses, but loves, the language of toleration. 'One +man eateth, another man eateth not,' 'One man esteemeth one day above +another; another esteemeth every day alike. Let each man be fully +assured in his own mind,' 'Receive ye him ... not with a view to +decisions of disputed questions.' Thoroughly in St. Paul's spirit is +{147} the familiar saying 'in necessary things unity: in those less +than necessary liberty: in all things charity[17].' + +In necessary things unity. To St. Paul this principle meant a clear +limit to toleration. There is a common teaching which lies at the +basis of the Church which must not be interfered with, which is +strictly necessary. 'Though we, or an angel from heaven, should preach +unto you any gospel other than that which we preached unto you, let him +be anathema[18].' 'How say some among you that there is no +resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, +neither hath Christ been raised: and if Christ hath not been raised, +then is our preaching vain, your faith also is vain[19].' Plainly +there is an essential fundamental creed which must not be trifled with. +The same is true about the moral law. In respect of that also the +Christian body must exercise upon its members the severity of +judgement[20], that 'he that hath done' the evil deed 'might be taken +away from among them,' or excommunicated. Once more, we cannot +conceive St. Paul making the necessity of visible unity a secondary +consideration[21], nor {148} the recognition of the authority of the +apostolic ministry which is to be the centre of unity, nor the +sacraments, which again are not only means of divine grace to the +individual but instruments and bonds of unity. Nor again would St. +Paul undervalue the spirit of obedience to the rules of the Church. He +hates the spirit of heresy or separatism. 'We have no such custom,' he +would say to the recalcitrant, 'neither the churches of God[22].' Once +again, St. Paul is prepared to let everything turn on even a small and +unessential point, if that point has become the symbol of a vital +principle for good or evil. Thus, in itself, 'circumcision was +nothing,' but when among the Galatians the practice of it came to mean +a practical Judaizing--a practical abandonment of the fundamental +Christian principle--then 'Behold, I Paul say unto you, that, if ye +receive circumcision, Christ will profit you nothing[23].' + +Here, then, are St. Paul's essentials, as to which he is intolerant--a +fundamental tradition of faith and morals: the maintenance of the unity +of the body by means of the apostolic stewardship, and through the 'one +baptism,' and the 'one loaf': and the spirit of due subordination {149} +which is necessary to corporate life. But in a spirit very unlike what +has at times become prevalent in the Church, he would clearly minimize +the action of authority, and leave large room for the free movement of +conscience in Christians. 'Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be +thus minded: and if in anything ye are otherwise minded, even this +shall God reveal unto you: only, whereunto we have already attained, by +that same _rule_ let us walk[24].' + +Surely it is not very difficult to apply this spirit of St. Paul to our +own time, in view of those subordinate points which excite such deep +animosities. Men are by fundamental disposition, in great measure, +ritualist or puritan, ecclesiastically or individually minded, +disciplinarian or mystical. And the Church should lay on all a certain +common law of doctrine and morals and worship, sufficient to keep them +all together in one body. But, consistently with the coherence of the +body, why should there not be both an ornate and a bare ritual of +worship, both societies of strict observance and individual freedom, +and a wide field of open questions in which we do not even expect +'decisions of doubts'? Instead of my own reflections on this {150} +subject I will ask my readers' attention to the following extracts from +a suggestive book[25]. + +'At all times there are those to whom what we may call the minor +symbolism of ritual is far from being as helpful as it is to others. +There is the greatest diversity here. Modes of worship, which repel +one man as bleak and bare, attract another by their very simplicity. +The diversity is so natural and so obvious that it calls for neither +apology nor explanation; yet it is easily strained into a cause of +disruption.' + +'St. Paul is speaking of strong brethren and of weak; of those who need +earthly guides and of those who do not; of those who attach high value +to rules and forms and helps; and of those for whom ordinances have but +little significance; of mystics and disciplinarians.' + +'Again, do we not still want a scientific theology? I mean a theology +which should do what any scientific treatise does. It should lay down +clearly and plainly the essential conditions of unity, and as regards +the unessential should content itself with saying, "Here men differ; +one thinks thus, another thus." ... Ask yourself, What is it that will +carry me, being {151} what I am, to heaven? What is it will carry my +brother here, who is so unlike me, to heaven? What is it that will +carry us both to heaven? There you will find the essential.' + +St. Paul, we observe, lays great stress upon honesty of conscience. He +wishes men, even in small matters, seriously to cultivate a conscience +of what is right, as men should do who even in small things expect a +divine judgement; and seriously also to cultivate the faculty of not +interfering with their brother's conscience. ('Hast thou faith? Have +it to thyself.' Do not parade your superior enlightenment.) He is +greatly afraid of people leading others, or being led for mere +agreement's sake, to do what their own conscience does not justify. +And to do even a good thing because another does it whom we want to be +like, without ourselves feeling sure it is good, or with a doubtful +conscience[26], this, St. Paul says, is sin. This warning we really +need to lay to heart in our age, when fashion is such a very strong +force in religion. This individual follows that individual and +'supposes it must be all right, as every one seems to do it'; this +congregation follows that {152} congregation in adopting a popular +practice, without its real basis and justification being considered. +But fashion and the influence of members is a great danger in religion. +'Let every man be fully assured in his own mind.' 'Whatever is not of +faith is sin[27].' + +2. Plainly, when St. Paul wrote his epistles, there was no observance +of a Sabbath obligatory upon Christians[28]. But was there none of +Sunday? 'The first day of the week' was already 'the Lord's day,' so +far as that Christians who could not meet to 'break the bread' every +day, met on that day specially to commemorate the death of their risen +Lord till He should come again[29]. It was already sufficiently +distinctive for St. Paul to name it as the appropriate day for laying +by alms for the poor[30]. But these special observances of it were not +obligatory. Christians, when they could meet every day, might make +their eucharist every day. No such observance of Sunday was yet +enjoined as was incompatible with regarding {153} all days of the week +alike. Nothing less than this can satisfy St. Paul's words. In +principle, as Bishop Lightfoot said[31], 'the kingdom of Christ has no +sacred days or seasons, because every time alike is holy.' + +Yet the bishop adds, 'appointed days are indispensable to her +efficiency.' This was soon found to be the case. Probably before the +end of the first century, the _Didache_ mentions not only the +observance of Sunday by the eucharistic service, but the observance +also of the Wednesday and Friday fasts. Clement, about the same date, +strongly emphasizes the principle of order in place and time, as still +belonging to Christian worship. 'They, therefore, that make their +offering at the appointed seasons are acceptable and blessed.' The +Canons of Hippolytus show that by the end of the second century there +must have been a great development of ecclesiastical regulations, so +far restraining the individual {154} liberty of the earliest days, and +that, as far as we know, without protest or sense of alarm. Nor need +St. Paul have been in opposition to such church rules. The spirit of +regulation is strong in him[32]. On the other hand, there is no doubt +that the Church has not generally, one might say has hardly ever, been +conscious, as St. Paul was, of the danger of religious regulations as +such. It is so much easier to keep certain rules than to acquire and +maintain a certain mind and spirit and principle of action. In the +history of the Church St. Paul, we feel, would very often have been +saying, 'I am afraid of you: the rules are good in themselves, but +there are dangers attaching to all rules of which you seem to be quite +unconscious. There is a lower sort of religion of forms and +observances, and you may fall back into it as easily as the Galatians.' + +But after all, rules for living religiously, private or ecclesiastical, +are, we all know, invaluable, and practically necessary. A man or a +church that should attempt to dispense with them would come to +disaster. It is very difficult to fathom the depth of the mischief +that has come {155} about in the corporate social life of the Church of +England, through the neglect of the surely moderate amount of +regulation which was provided for us by the Prayer Book in the way of +festival and fast days and of daily service. To keep a few simple, +intelligible, religious rules all together gives almost as much as a +common creed the feeling of social coherence. Even the extremest +Paulinist need have no fear so long as the ecclesiastical regulations +do not reach the point of becoming a burden--so long as no one could be +in danger of priding himself on 'acquiring merit' by their mere +observance; and so long also as the principle is kept clearly in view +that 'the rules were made for man and not man for the rules.' But I do +not think there can be any reasonable doubt that St. Paul would +repudiate the idea that any rules of worship and observance, other than +those which are necessarily involved in the administration of the +sacraments, can obtain by prescription a right to permanence. 'They +may be changed according to the diversities of countries, times, and +men's manners.' They were made for man; and the Church or the +churches--with due regard to mutual fellowship--can modify or abolish +them. + +{156} + +3. 'Overthrow not for meat's sake the work of God.' 'It is good not +to eat flesh nor to drink wine, nor to do anything whereby thy brother +stumbleth.' 'Wherefore, if meat maketh my brother to stumble, I will +eat no flesh for evermore, that I make not my brother to stumble[33].' +Here is the right principle of 'total abstinence' which does not deny +the legitimate use of what it yet permanently abandons for love's sake. +St. Paul would have Timothy use a little wine when it was for his +health's sake, but when health was not in question, he would have all +men ask, not how much liberty in this or that is lawful for them, but +how they can avoid causing offence--how they can do most good. This +principle admits of application in many directions. For instance, it +may be very hard to determine why certain minor forms of gambling are +wrong, or whether they are positively wrong. But St. Paul would have +the other question asked--Can it be denied that the best way to avoid +leading my brother into one of the most common dangers of our time, is +to keep altogether free from a habit which in any case can do no good +to body or mind? + +{157} + +4. Here, as in x. 7, St. Paul touches upon the descent into Hades, and +indicates the purpose of it. 'For this end Christ died, that He might +be Lord of the dead.' It might have been imagined that the dim realms +of the dead were outside the jurisdiction of Christ--that the dead have +no king--that the kingdom of redemption does not include them. To +obviate such an idea, to show the universality of His realm, Christ +went down among the dead. + +5. In many places of the New Testament there is mention of the +thanksgiving before food--the Christian's 'saying grace.' Whether he +eat flesh or vegetables he 'giveth God thanks[34].' And the word used +is the word which, in its substantive form, is 'eucharist.' And indeed +there is meaning in this. The thankful reception by the Christian of +the ordinary bread of his daily life as coming from God, touched his +common meals with something of the glory of divine communion; and the +eucharist in its turn {158} is the common blessing and breaking of the +bread, raised by the Holy Spirit to a higher power and consecrated to +become the vehicle of the bread of life[35]. + + + +[1] Possibly his mind passes by a natural reaction from the thought of +sensual licentiousness (xiii. 13) to that of unenlightened asceticism. + +[2] It is implied (xiv. 1; xv. 1 and 7) that the strong-minded brethren +were in the ascendant. It is them chiefly to whom St. Paul addresses +himself. + +[3] Ecclus. xxxiii. 9. + +[4] Mark vii. 19. + +[5] Acts x. 28. + +[6] The matter of 'eating with the Gentiles' was prominent, cf. ii. 12. + +[7] 1 Cor. x. 25. + +[8] Acts xv. 23. + +[9] 1 Cor. viii, and x. 23-33. + +[10] The exact point--abstaining from all flesh meat--is so different +from what had presented itself at Corinth that there must be a +particular reference to Roman circumstances, of which St. Paul was +probably informed by Priscilla and Aquila. + +[11] This seems to follow from Philo's statement that they did not make +animal sacrifices: and from Josephus' description of their way of life +as Pythagorean. + +[12] Cf. 1 Cor. viii. 10. + +[13] Gal. iv. 10; cf. Col. ii. 16, 17: 'Let no man therefore judge you +in meat, or in drink, or in respect of a feast day or a new moon or a +sabbath day: which are a shadow of the things to come; but the body is +Christ's.' + +[14] Or _for decisions of doubts_, marg. This, or something like this, +is the right meaning; cf. Hebr. v. 14: 'for decision between good and +evil.' 1 Cor. xii. 10: 'discernings of spirits,' i.e. decisions as to +their true character. + +[15] From Isa. xlv. 33. + +[16] Cf. Ephes. pp. 271 f. + +[17] See app. note H, p. 239. + +[18] Gal. i. 8. + +[19] 1 Cor. xv. 12, 13. + +[20] 1 Cor. v. 6 + +[21] Cf. Ephes. p. 126. + +[22] 1 Cor. xi. 16. + +[23] Gal. v. 2. + +[24] Phil. iii. 15, 16. + +[25] _Unity in Diversity_, by Charles Bigg, D.D. (Longmans, 1899), pp. +84, 85, 95. + +[26] 'Whatever is not of faith is sin--that is whatever is against +conscience.' Aquinas, quoted in _S. and H. in loc._ + +[27] Cf. xii. 6: 'Let us prophesy according to the proportion of our +faith.' + +[28] Col. ii. 16: 'Let no man judge you in respect of a sabbath day.' + +[29] This is probably implied in Acts xx. 7. + +[30] 1 Cor. xvi. 1. + +[31] _Philippians_, on 'the Christian Ministry,' p. 181. The language +in the immediate context I cannot make my own. But the statement +quoted is surely true. And to this day I suppose, for those living in +religious communities and similar institutions, there is very little +practical difference between Sundays and week-days. This almost +complete absence of distinction, however, must always come about, if it +is to be legitimate, by raising the week-days to the spiritual level of +the Sundays, and not by the opposite process. + +[32] Especially in the Pastoral Epistles: but also in the epistles to +the Thessalonians and Corinthians. + +[33] 1 Cor. viii. 13. + +[34] Cf. 1 Cor. x. 30: 'Why am I evil spoken of for that for which I +give thanks.' 1 Tim. iv. 3, 4: 'Meats, which God created to be +received with thanksgiving.... For every creature of God is good ... +if it be received with thanksgiving: for it is sanctified through the +word of God and prayer. Cf. Acts xxvii. 35: 'And when he had taken +bread, he gave thanks to God in the presence of all: and he brake it, +and began to eat.' + +[35] Matt. xxvi. 26; cf. Luke xxiv. 30. + + + + +{159} + +DIVISION V. Sec. 7. CHAPTER XV. 1-13. + +_Unselfish forbearance and inclusiveness._ + +It was essential, as has been said, that men whose prejudices and +instincts were different should live in the same church and eat at the +same love feast. This would require a large-hearted and unselfish +self-control. Formerly, as in Syria and Palestine, it was the Jews who +occupied the position of vantage in the Christian communities, and were +not disposed to tolerate the ways of the Gentiles. Now the tables are +turned, and the Gentiles are in the majority. The danger is now that +those whose instincts are Gentile should bear hardly upon the minority +whose prejudices are more or less Jewish. Such St. Paul anticipates, +or knows from Priscilla and Aquila, will be the danger among the Roman +Christians. Formerly Judaic narrowness had been a formidable danger. +It had developed a most perilous heresy, and St. Paul had dealt with it +as a deadly poison. Now what remained {160} of Jewish feeling was a +weakness to be generously borne with. It affords St. Paul an +opportunity of falling back on the general principle, that the measure +of Christian strength and full-grown manhood is the readiness to bear +the weaknesses of others. + +To be told he must not use his normal liberty, must not eat his usual +meal or drink his usual cup of wine, because it might scandalize some +Christian with the ascetic prejudices of an Essene, or even induce him +to do the same against his own conscience--to be told this was annoying +to a man who held the 'strong' Christian conviction that all kinds of +food were indifferently allowable. The weak scruple of his brother +Christian had become an annoying burden of self-denial and +self-restraint laid on himself. But this, St. Paul says, is how +Christian strength--whether it be the moral strength of clear +convictions, or any other sort of faculty[1]--must show itself, in +readiness to suffer on account of other people's deficiencies, in not +resenting the restraints they lay on us, in not expecting to do as we +please, but being {161} ready to accommodate ourselves to our +neighbour's tastes where it is for his good. That is what our great +example did. Plainly His whole human life was putting Himself under +the restraints which our weaknesses and narrownesses and slownesses +laid on Him. The righteous man in the psalm complains that he has to +bear all the reproaches of God which impatient and rebellious +Israelites might utter; and that is the picture of Christ bearing our +infirmities. (The reproaches which fell on Him were for the very +largeness of His love; 'because He received sinners,' and because He +received them on the Sabbaths as well as on other days. They were +reproaches of God, like Jonah's, because He was too forbearing, too +generous.) + +Then St. Paul pauses a moment to justify his use of the Psalms. These +ancient scriptures did not fulfil their purpose in their own time, or +for the old covenant. God intended them for Christians. Their +teaching is what they need. The burdens of life are so many, its +requirements upon their patience so constant, that they find it hard to +maintain their hope. Yet what is the Old Testament so full of? +Lessons of endurance and words of encouragement. The encouragement and +endurance then, which they gain from {162} the Old Testament, are to +help them to maintain Christian hope. They must not lose heart. The +end is a great one: it is the maintenance of a united spirit in the +Church, such as Christ can approve, such as can express itself in a +really unanimous adoration of Him whom Christ recognized as His God and +Father. May the God who inspires endurance and encouragement, grant +them not to fail in this great end! + +Here is the central requirement, then, which a catholic church lays on +them. It is to be unselfishly inclusive, to welcome into fellowship +people who are not naturally to their taste. Our Lord did not +scrutinize us men, but received us, of whatever sort we were, that God +might be glorified in human brotherhood. He vindicated the truth of +God by fulfilling the covenant of circumcision: first, to confirm the +promises given to the fathers of Israel[2]; and, secondly, to enlarge +the compass of Israel, so that the Gentiles too might share its +blessings, out of God's pure mercy apart from any promises. And this +also--the fellowship of Jew and Gentile--was matter of ancient +prediction by psalmist {163} and prophet. The Roman Christians must +not therefore let themselves be discouraged because they have a +difficult task to fulfil. And the apostle prays that God, the inspirer +of hope, may fill them with such a rich sense of the blessings of +believing in Him, that His Spirit, dwelling in them, may make hope to +abound in their hearts. + + +Now we that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and +not to please ourselves. Let each one of us please his neighbour for +that which is good, unto edifying. For Christ also pleased not +himself; but, as it is written, The reproaches of them that reproached +thee fell upon me. For whatsoever things were written aforetime were +written for our learning, that through patience and through comfort of +the scriptures we might have hope. Now the God of patience and of +comfort grant you to be of the same mind one with another according to +Christ Jesus: that with one accord ye may with one mouth glorify the +God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Wherefore receive ye one +another, even as Christ also received you, to the glory of God. For I +say that Christ hath been made a minister of the circumcision for the +truth of God, that he might confirm the promises _given_ unto the +fathers, and that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy; as it +is written, + + Therefore will I give praise unto thee among the Gentiles, + And sing unto thy name. + +And again he saith, + + Rejoice, ye Gentiles, with his people. + +{164} + +And again, + + Praise the Lord, all ye Gentiles; + And let all the peoples praise him. + +And again, Isaiah saith, + + There shall be the root of Jesse, + And he that ariseth to rule over the Gentiles; + On him shall the Gentiles hope. + +Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that +ye may abound in hope, in the power of the Holy Ghost. + + +1. The connexion of thought in this passage is undoubtedly somewhat +obscure. But we know to-day, as well as ever, how difficult it is to +bear with what is disagreeable to us in others, with what seem to us +their deficiencies, without breaking real Christian brotherhood and +co-operation. And we know also that where we are possessed by an +enthusiasm for brotherhood such as inspired the early Christians, the +divisions which small differences tend to produce are peculiarly +discouraging, because they suggest that real brotherhood is impossible +where men are so differently constituted. We ought not, therefore, to +be at a loss to see why St. Paul should pass so easily from speaking of +divisions among Christians to speak of the grounds of patience and +encouragement and hope. The Christian hope is--in substantial +part--the hope {165} of a really catholic church--a real brotherhood +among people of different races, classes, tastes, and habits; and it is +this great hope which, even in St. Paul's day, was continually +suffering discouragement and continually needed reinforcing. And the +reinforcement must be 'supernatural.' It is the divine love of the +Spirit possessing us which alone can give it vigour. When we are full +of the divine consolation, then it is that we are least inclined to be +critical, and most disposed 'to receive one another, as Christ also +received us, to the glory of God.' For this is the thought we are to +have constantly in view, when we find people 'aggravating'--Christ +received us, and made the best of those whom 'God gave him,' in spite +of the infinite annoyances which we men, even the apostles, caused Him; +He dealt with us with infinite patience; He made us welcome; He +'received us.' + +In fact, the reason why the connexion of thought in this passage seems +obscure to us, is probably in part that we have ceased to think of the +real fellowship of the naturally unlike--fellowship in all that makes +up human life--as a necessary part of the Christian religion. But to +St. Paul there was no Christianity without the reality of catholic +brotherhood. + +{166} + +2. St. Paul here, as in writing to the Corinthians[3], shows himself +specially anxious that Gentile Christians should not think they could +make light of the Old Testament, or imagine that 'Christ was the end of +the law' in any such sense as would make the books of the old covenant +superfluous under the new. Their value, he insists, remains permanent. +When he is writing to the Corinthians, he finds it in the moral +warnings--the warnings of divine judgement upon the chosen people--of +which the history is full. In this epistle he is thinking chiefly of +the lessons of 'endurance' and divine 'encouragements,' which histories +and prophets provide. In his epistle to Timothy[4] he thinks of the +books as instruments by the use of which the minister or representative +of God may become fully educated and equipped for all the purposes of +moral supervision and discipline. They can thus educate and equip him, +St. Paul {167} teaches, because they were originally written under the +influence of a divine inspiration; but it is only when faith has +finally attained its true object in Jesus Christ that their real +meaning becomes apparent. And this last principle is implied in almost +all his use of the Old Testament. + +It is a comfort to perceive that none of the elements of permanent +value, which St. Paul discerns in the Old Testament, are the least +likely to be affected by reasonable criticism of its documents. Its +history, critically read, does not become less truly pregnant with +moral warnings or lessons of endurance. The encouragements of the +prophets are in no respect reduced in force when they are brought into +right relation to their own times. The whole library of books is, at +least, as capable of educating and equipping the minister of Christ as +ever. Their inspiration is still obvious, when it is interpreted +candidly in view of all the facts. And still they can only be rightly +regarded when they are looked upon as various elements in a progress +which has Christ for its goal. + +In his use of particular passages in the Old Testament St. Paul here +shows himself as free as ever, but with the same fundamental {168} +adherence to the true tendency of the Old Testament as a whole. In +quoting Ps. lxix. 9 (ver. 3) he is seeing in the afflicted righteous +man a type of Christ. This psalm is constantly cited in the New +Testament with the same reference[5]. It has been supposed[6] that St. +Paul here adopts a cry addressed _to God_ by the righteous sufferer in +the psalm, and represents it as addressed by Christ _to his brother +man_. 'The reproaches aimed at thee, my despised brother, have fallen +upon me.' But, as I have tried to show in the analysis above, this +supposition is not needed. Christ is represented appealing to God for +succour, because He utterly refuses to take the line of self-pleasing; +but bears all that men's impatience of God lays upon Him--all their +'wild and weak complaining.' And it is suggestive to remember, with +Origen, that it was Christ's 'receiving of sinners and eating with +them,' receiving them on the Sabbath as well as other days, that +chiefly brought on Him the reproaches of men. This was probably in St. +Paul's mind. + +In Ps. xviii. 49 (quoted ver. 9) the victorious {169} king declares +that he will praise God for his victory 'among the nations.' St. Paul +applies this to Christ, whose victory among the nations means their +redemption--their becoming His people. + +In Deut. xxxii. 43 (ver. 10) 'the nations are invited to congratulate +Israel on possessing a God like Jehovah, who will effectually take up +His people's cause. Such an invitation addressed to the nations (cf. +Isa. xlii. 10-12; Ps. xlvii. 2, lxvii. 1-7, &c.) involves implicitly +the prophetic truth that God's dealings with Israel have indirectly an +interest and importance for the world at large[7].' This is still more +plainly implied in Ps. cxvii. 1 (ver. 11). + +Isa. xi. 10 (ver. 12) is quoted from the Greek Bible, which is +paraphrastic; but the Hebrew also asserts that the messianic king of +David's line is to be a 'signal to the nations,' and that they are to +'resort to him' as to an oracle or place of refuge[8]. + + + +[1] We are all 'strong' in some respect, Origen remarks, so that 'ye +that are strong bear the infirmities of the weak' comes to be as broad +a precept as 'bear ye one another's burdens.' + +[2] Cf. Gal. iv. 4, 5: 'Christ, born of a woman, born under the law, +that he might redeem them which were under the law, that we (Jews and +Gentiles) might receive the adoption of sons.' + +[3] 1 Cor. x. ii: 'These things happened unto them (the Jews in the +Wilderness) by way of example; and they were written for our +admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages are come.' + +[4] 2 Tim. iii. 15-17. 'Sacred writings which are able to make thee +wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. Every +scripture inspired by God _is_ also profitable for teaching, for +reproof, for correction, for instruction which is in righteousness: +that the man of God may be complete, furnished completely unto every +good work.' + +[5] Cf. above, xi. 9; in the Gospels, Matt. xxvii. 34; John ii. 17; +xix. 28; also Acts i. 20. + +[6] See _S. and H. in loc._ + +[7] Driver, _in loc._ + +[8] Cheyne, _in loc._ + + + + +{170} + +DIVISION VI. CHAPTERS XV. 14-XVI. 27. + +_Conclusion._ + +The long letter is almost ended. St. Paul has developed the meaning of +the revelation of the divine righteousness. He has vindicated the ways +of God to the Jews. He has drawn out sufficiently the moral +conclusions from God's mercy to mankind. Now he has only to secure +again his good terms with the Roman Christians--which he does with the +same tact and the same anxiety as at the beginning[1],--to explain his +movements, to send his greetings to individuals, and to bid farewell. + + + +[1] Vol. i. p. 53. + + + + +{171} + +DIVISION VI. Sec. 1. CHAPTER XV. 14-33. + +_His excuse for writing and his hope of coming._ + +St. Paul is very anxious not to be understood as if, while giving the +Christians at Rome these exhortations which we have just been reading, +he stood in any doubt himself of their goodness of heart and full grasp +of Christian principles, or of their fitness to admonish one another. +He has only been bold to put them in mind of what they already knew, +because of the priestly commission on behalf of his Lord towards all +the Gentiles, which the divine grace has bestowed upon him as apostle +of the Gentiles. The gospel entrusted to him requires him as a priest +to prepare and offer sacrifice; and the sacrifice which he is to +prepare, which the consecration of the indwelling Spirit alone can make +acceptable, is that of the whole Gentile world. The extent to which +this great charge laid upon him has been fulfilled, gives him good +reason for {172} boasting as he stands before God--not in himself, but +in Christ Jesus. His work has been a pioneer's work. He has made it +his ambition purely to lay foundations. Taking words of Isaiah[1] for +his motto, he had resolved to go nowhere where any other had been +before him to make Christ known. But in that free and open area of a +yet unevangelized world, Christ had worked through him to bring the +Gentiles to His obedience, and had accompanied his preaching with +evidences of miraculous power and with the strong manifestations of the +Spirit. So that in the result the work of proclaiming the gospel had +been accomplished, starting from Jerusalem, in an extending circuit[2] +or irregular progress, as far as Illyria. + +This world-wide mission would give St. Paul his title to visit Rome[3]. +But its very greatness has hitherto hindered him. Now however he is +hoping to satisfy the desire that has so long possessed him, and to pay +them a visit of some length on his way to Spain. That is to say, he +hopes to come to them when the task is over {173} which is immediately +occupying him. The good will of the churches in Macedonia and Achaia +has shown itself in a collection of money for the poor Christians at +Jerusalem. This is really the payment of a debt to those to whom they +owe their fellowship in Christ's salvation. When then St. Paul has +handed over this collection, and secured to its recipients this fruit +of his mission, he hopes to pass to Spain by way of Rome; and again, as +in his introduction[4], he expresses his confidence that at Rome, as +elsewhere, the fullness of the rich gifts of Christ will accompany his +coming. + +Meanwhile he makes his urgent request, by their allegiance to Christ +and their fellowship in the spirit of love, that they will join with +him in wrestling with God in prayer for the success of his present +undertaking--that he may escape the danger to which he is exposed from +the hostility of the unbelieving Jews, and that the gift, as ministered +by him, may not prove unacceptable to the Jerusalem church; so that he +may get happily to Rome and find repose there with them. And he prays +for the blessing of the God of peace upon all of them. + +{174} + +And I myself also am persuaded of you, my brethren, that ye yourselves +are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, able also to admonish +one another. But I write the more boldly unto you in some measure, as +putting you again in remembrance, because of the grace that was given +me of God, that I should be a minister of Christ Jesus unto the +Gentiles, ministering[5] the gospel of God, that the offering up of the +Gentiles might be made acceptable, being sanctified by the Holy Ghost. +I have therefore my glorying in Christ Jesus in things pertaining to +God. For I will not dare to speak of any things save those which +Christ wrought through me, for the obedience of the Gentiles, by word +and deed, in the power of signs and wonders, in the power of the Holy +Ghost; so that from Jerusalem, and round about even unto Illyricum, I +have fully preached the gospel of Christ; yea, making it my aim so to +preach the gospel, not where Christ was _already_ named, that I might +not build upon another man's foundation; but, as it is written, + + They shall see, to whom no tidings of him came, + And they who have not heard shall understand. + +Wherefore also I was hindered these many times from coming to you: but +now, having no more any place in these regions, and having these many +years a longing to come unto you, whensoever I go unto Spain (for I +hope to see you in my journey, and to be brought on my way thitherward +by you, if first in some measure I shall have been satisfied with your +company)--but now, _I say_, I go unto Jerusalem, ministering unto the +saints. For it hath been the good pleasure of Macedonia and Achaia to +make a certain contribution for the poor among the saints that are at +Jerusalem. Yea, it hath been their good pleasure; and their debtors +they are. For if the Gentiles have been {175} made partakers of their +spiritual things, they owe it _to them_ also to minister unto them in +carnal things. When therefore I have accomplished this, and have +sealed to them this fruit, I will go on by you unto Spain. And I know +that, when I come unto you, I shall come in the fulness of the blessing +of Christ. + +Now I beseech you, brethren, by our Lord Jesus Christ, and by the love +of the Spirit, that ye strive together with me in your prayers to God +for me; that I may be delivered from them that are disobedient in +Judaea, and _that_ my ministration which _I have_ for Jerusalem may be +acceptable to the saints; that I may come unto you in joy through the +will of God, and together with you find rest. Now the God of peace be +with you all. Amen. + + +1. St. Paul has a habit of representing those he writes to in the best +light[6]. But the words 'full of goodness,' 'filled with all +knowledge,' 'able to admonish,' are no idle compliments. It is not too +much to suggest that St. Paul, as he sees the high part which the +church of the capital must play in the world, perceives also, in what +he hears of the Roman Christians, evidences of the spirit which will +enable them to fulfil it. And history verifies the apostle's +anticipation. The letter of the Roman church to the Corinthians, which +passes under Clement's name, and was written some forty years after +{176} this letter of St. Paul's, is the very embodiment of the spirit +of goodness, knowledge, and power to admonish. The princely generosity +of the Roman church in all directions was proverbial in the second +century[7]. If it did not become as distinguished as Alexandria in +theological science, it did become a chief centre of theological +orthodoxy and government. And the repeated evidences we gain that +rigorists, from Hippolytus to Novatian, were so dissatisfied with the +policy of the Roman bishops as to separate themselves from their +communion, give us good reason to believe that the internal policy of +this church was, within just limits, liberal and tolerant. + +2. St. Paul here describes his apostolic commission in priestly +language. 'The sacrificial terminology is far more marked in the +original than it can be in a translation[8].' The word for 'minister +of Christ Jesus' is a technical word for priest in the Greek Old +Testament[9]. The word translated 'ministering' means 'offering +sacrifice.' (That which St. Paul describes {177} himself as offering +in sacrifice is not the gospel, as our translation might imply: the +gospel assigns the sphere of the sacrifice[10], but the sacrifice he +has to offer is that of the Gentile world, in Christ, consecrated to be +a fit sacrifice by the Spirit.) The phrase also, 'in things pertaining +to God' (cf. Hebr. ii. 17), is appropriate to the priest as he stands +before God. 'But this is all symbolical language,' it is said. That +depends on what we take as the standard of reality in the sacrificing +priesthood. If Christ is the standard of priesthood, and His method of +making sacrifice the standard method, then St. Paul's account of his +priestliness is not appreciably metaphorical, except so far as metaphor +belongs to all earthly expressions of heavenly realities; it is rather +true to say that the Jewish or heathen priest, with his material +victims, was but the dim shadow of a true priest. + +The point is that the true Christian idea of sacrifice makes the +substance of it to be always persons returning to God the life He gave +them. If we must offer sacrifices of money and fruits of the earth, +that is because we cannot offer ourselves without our bodies[11], or +our bodies {178} without the material supplies on which they depend. +'All things come of God, and of His own do we give Him.' And all our +labour and prayer for others must be an offering of them, or a +preparation to offer them[12], to God; which again is only our +assisting them to offer themselves. And all this offering in sacrifice +of ourselves and others is rendered possible by the one effectual +sacrifice, through which alone we and all men have access to the +Father. It takes place 'in Christ Jesus,' who, 'through eternal Spirit +offered _himself_ without spot to God.' There, at the head of all, is +the sacrifice of the person, and that person the Son of Man, who can +take up into His very life and sacrifice even all mankind. Throughout +it is a sacrifice of persons, or of things only as appertaining to +persons. This is the fundamental Christian idea, and this at the +bottom necessarily forbids us to separate the thing offered from the +person offering, the victim from the priest. The priest is the victim, +for what he offers is himself. + +It is this idea of sacrifice which is realized in the eucharist. The +eucharist is the central sacrifice of the Christian body. It is to +start {179} with a presentation of material things, bread and wine of +the fruits of the earth, with alms and other offerings it may be: and +these oblations are accompanied with prayers and symbolic rites. But +all is done that both by word and act the One Sacrifice may be +commemorated and pleaded. The outward rite but finds its meaning and +justification in that--the sacrifice of the Person. Again we can only +take part in it with any spiritual reality by becoming ourselves +sharers of His sacrifice--ourselves the sacrifice we offer. 'And +here,' we cry, 'we offer and present unto Thee ourselves.' We men, St. +Augustine does not scruple to say, are the body of Christ, which is +offered in that sacrifice[13]. And a quite new light is shed on +intercessory prayer, in the eucharist and in the rest of life, when we +view it as St. Paul would have us view it, as a presenting in sacrifice +before God those for whom we pray, according to the true idea of them +which the sanctification of the Spirit would make possible and actual. +And a quite new light is shed upon all work for others, when we regard +it as the preparing of such a sacrifice for the Holy Spirit to +consecrate. + +From a different point of view St. Paul's {180} conception of his +mission as the priest of the Gentile world, might well suggest +reflections to the Church of England. If a Christian nation in the +providence of God is to overrun the world and possess the nations not +yet Christian, it goes with a mission entrusted to it by God. Its +mission may be expressed, according to St. Paul's idea, as that of +evangelizing the world, but also as that of preparing the heathen +nations to be offered to God. It is the return of all humanity to +Himself that God desires, and we are to be the ministers of this +perfected offering. It strikes us with profound humiliation to realize +how 'far fetched' St. Paul's idea would appear to-day to the mass of +our nation, which, more than any other, is called by circumstances to +an apostolate of the world. + +3. St. Paul speaks, here and in many places elsewhere, of his grounds +for 'glorying,' or rather 'boasting[14],' in what Christ has wrought +through him, and of his 'being ambitious' to preach only where no one +had been before him[15]. And in reading such passages the question +{181} sometimes arises in Christian minds--was there, after all, a +strain of egotism unsubdued in St. Paul's character? Now no doubt, +unlike other apostles whose writings remain in the New Testament, St. +Paul had that sort of passionately personal and individual nature which +easily passes into spiritual egotism. This at least is discernible in +his epistles. It is also true that the necessity which lay so long +upon him of vindicating his own apostolic authority, makes it necessary +for him at times to talk about himself and his experiences and his +personal methods in a way that to some minds suggests egotism; and +there is no obligation upon us to maintain that St. Paul was perfect. +But we only understand these passages aright when we remember that +there runs through them all a conscious irony. The basis of St. Paul's +whole theology was the denial of any possible ground for a man to boast +in himself. 'Where is boasting? it is excluded.' 'He that boasteth, +let him boast in the Lord.' It is Christ who 'leads St. Paul in' His +'triumph.' What he boasts of is not his own, but Christ's. Of course, +this sort of language very easily admits of self-deception. St. Paul +shows himself conscious of its danger[16]. But there can {182} be no +question of the vehement sincerity of St. Paul in repudiating any +homage to himself which seemed to put him in the place of Christ, or to +substitute the teacher for his message[17]. And where his personal +gifts of intellect might most easily have shone, he had determined to +abjure all 'the wisdom of men' in the method of his preaching[18]. It +is remarkable again that as soon as ever the real peril from Judaism +was over in the Church, St. Paul drops his anti-Judaistic polemic, and +all that brings the personal element into prominence. He is absolutely +free from the charge of pursuing his advantage so as to magnify a +personal victory. The more thoroughly we grow to know St. Paul, the +more, I think, we feel that his profession is true that he will 'boast' +only 'in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ'; and that truly the world, +with all its personal ambitions, had been for him nailed to the cross +and killed[19]. + +But what exactly was it that St. Paul had to 'boast' that Christ had +wrought through him? + +He had, he says, accomplished the preaching of the gospel in an +irregular circuit from Jerusalem to Illyria. After he had made a +beginning of Christian preaching at Damascus, he {183} had, in fact, +shared the apostolic preaching at Jerusalem (Acts ix. 29), but his own +special work began at Tarsus, or rather at Antioch. After that he had +'fulfilled the proclamation of the gospel,' so far, that is to say, as +it belonged to the apostolic office, by founding churches in a +gradually enlarging circuit, especially in the chief centres, as the +narrative of the Acts shows us, till travelling by the Egnatian way he +would have come within sight of the Illyrian mountains at +Thessalonica[20]. He may even have entered Illyria when the Acts +vaguely describes him as going to Macedonia and then 'passing through +those parts[21]'; but the expression in this epistle does not require +this. It is sufficient that the border of Illyria, through which the +Egnatian way led to Rome, had been so far his nearest point to the +capital. + +St. Paul certainly implies that Rome was included in his province of +work, and that he owed them a yet unpaid debt[22]. This must surely +mean, according to St. Paul's principle, that no other of the greater +apostles had yet evangelized them or founded the church there[23]. +{184} Rome was no other man's foundation. But none the less, the +elements of a church had collected there. The gospel was being +preached there by 'apostles' from among his own circle. And St. Paul, +for this reason, does not contemplate any permanent stay with the +Romans, but regards Rome only as a place where he can rest and refresh +himself, as well as supply deficiencies in the spiritual equipment of +the church there, before he passes further west to the untouched region +of Spain. St. Paul, we see plainly enough, had no power to foresee the +future. But after the long residence at Rome during his first +captivity, which he did not the least anticipate, did he, we ask, +actually get to Spain? There is certainly no good reason to say he did +not, for his movements are, in the main, unknown to us in the last +period of his life; and on the other hand in Clement's letter to the +Corinthians, written within the first century, he is said to have +passed before his martyrdom to 'the limits of the west'--the extreme +west--which is certainly most naturally interpreted of Spain[24]. + +4. St. Paul speaks of having wrought 'signs and wonders.' The two +words are habitually {185} combined in the New Testament. The word +'wonders' describes the miraculous and astonishing character of the +events, while 'signs' indicates that moral witness and significance +which distinguishes Christian miracles from vulgar portents. We read +of St. Paul working miracles in the Acts. What he says here, and +elsewhere[25], implies that they were frequently worked, and especially +at Corinth, where no such events are recorded in the history. What it +is important for us to recognize is, that St. Paul so plainly and +repeatedly appeals, in the face of those who could bear witness, to the +fact that he himself had power given to him to work miracles, as if it +were indisputable. + +5. St. Paul tells us that he had it specially laid upon him by the +apostles of the circumcision that he was to 'remember the poor,' i.e. +the poor Christians at Jerusalem; where poverty was specially rife, +because, as we should gather, the wealthier Jews had held aloof from +Christianity[26]. And this, he adds, was the very thing he himself was +zealous to do[27]. How much it was in his mind, both the Acts and his +own epistles bear witness. We hear much in {186} the epistles to the +Corinthians[28] of the collection made in the churches of Macedonia and +Achaia. Not only was this expression of Gentile good will intended to +conciliate the half-alienated and suspicious Jewish Christians of +Jerusalem, but the acceptance of the gift at St. Paul's hands, as the +fruit of his own labour, was to diminish their suspicion of himself. +St. Paul was at pains to prevent any suspicion attaching to his +administration of this bounty, and at every point we perceive how much +trouble he took about the matter. But, hopeful and zealous as he was +about this work of charity, he did not underrate its dangers. His +urgent request for the Roman Christians' prayers in this passage, and +his readiness to meet his death, if need be, at Jerusalem, as expressed +in the narrative of the Acts, show us that he knew the danger he was +incurring from the fierce hostility of the Jerusalem Jews. + +6. This passage about the collection[29], coupled with the allusion to +Cenchreae, the port of Corinth, at the beginning of the next chapter, +and the allusion to the Corinthian Gaius as St. Paul's host[30], enable +us to fix the occasion of {187} the writing of this epistle exactly at +the moment recorded in Acts xx. 3--the end of his three months' +residence in Greece. We also gather from the Acts[31], as well as from +this epistle, that it was his intention at that period, when he had +paid his visit to Jerusalem, to go to Rome. Once more we know from the +Acts[32] that Sosipater and Timothy were with him at this point, and +they join in the greetings of the epistle[33]. So that all the +indications taken together fix with wonderful accuracy the exact point +when the epistle was written[34]. + +7. We do well to note the word used by St. Paul in asking the Roman +Christians' prayers. He begs them to 'strive together' with him in +their prayers. This word is a derivative of that which describes our +Lord's 'agony' in prayer; and Origen's comment upon it is this: 'Hardly +any one can pray without some idle and alien thought coming into his +mind, and leading off and interrupting the intended direction of his +mind to God.... And, therefore, prayer is a great striving (_agon_, +wrestling), so that the fixed direction of the soul towards God may +{188} be maintained, in spite of the enemies which interfere and seek +to scatter the sense of prayer; so that one who prays may justly say, +with St. Paul, "I have fought a good fight; I have finished my course."' + + + +[1] lii. 15, according to the Greek. + +[2] 'Round about,' literally 'in a circle,' as opposed to a straight +course; cf. Mark vi. 6, 'round about the villages.' + +[3] Cf. i. 13-16. + +[4] i. 11. + +[5] '_Ministering in sacrifice_' marg. + +[6] Cf. the opening of 1 Cor., a letter which contains on the whole so +much blame. + +[7] Euseb. _H. E._ iv. 23. + +[8] Sanday, _Conception of Priesthood_ (Longmans), p. 89. + +[9] Like 'agape' (see above, p. 131, n. 2) so this word 'liturgus' +appears to have been adopted in its priestly sense by the Greek +translators of the Bible from the current Greek of Alexandria, cf. +Deissmann, _Bibelstudien_, pp. 137 f. + +[10] Cf. _S. and H. in loc._ 'Making sacrifice as a priest under the +Gospel.' + +[11] Cf. xii. x. + +[12] Col. i. 28: 'Teaching every man ... that we may present every +man,' i.e. present him in sacrifice. + +[13] For his repeated statements see app. note I. p. 240. + +[14] Cf. 1 Cor. ix. 15; xv. 31; 2 Cor. i. 14; vii. 4, 14; viii. 24; ix. +3; x. 8, 13; xi. 10, 16-xii. 9; Phil. ii. 16; 1 Thess. ii. 19. These +passages are worth examining in connexion. + +[15] Cf. 2 Cor. x. 15, 16. + +[16] See 2 Cor. xi. 17; xii. 1. + +[17] 1 Cor. i. 13 ff. + +[18] 1 Cor. ii. 1-5. + +[19] Gal. vi. 14. + +[20] See _S. and H. in loc._ + +[21] Acts xx. 2. + +[22] i. 14, 15. + +[23] Not Peter therefore, though he was doubtless afterwards at Rome. + +[24] _Ad Cor._ 5, see Lightfoot _in loc._ + +[25] 2 Cor. xii. 13. + +[26] Cf. Jas. ii. 5, 6. + +[27] Gal. ii. 10. + +[28] 1 Cor. xvi. 1-4; 2 Cor. viii, ix. + +[29] Cf. Acts xxiv. 17. + +[30] Rom. xvi. 23. Cf. 1 Cor. i. 14, which shows us a Gaius at +Corinth. Cf. the allusion to Erastus in the same verse, coupled with 2 +Tim. iv. 20. + +[31] Acts xix. 21. + +[32] Acts xx. 4. + +[33] Rom. xvi. 21. + +[34] See further, on the purpose of the epistle, vol. i. pp. 4 ff. + + + + +{189} + +DIVISION VI. Sec. 2. CHAPTER XVI. 1-2. + +_A commendation._ + +One strong link among Christians of different towns, constraining them +to remember that their brotherhood did not depend on physical nearness +or personal acquaintance, lay in the 'letters of commendation' from one +local church to another, which the Christian traveller carried with +him. And here we have an example of such a letter given by St. Paul to +the Corinthian deaconess, Phoebe, who was probably the bearer of his +letter to the Roman Christians. + + +I commend unto you Phoebe our sister, who is a servant[1] of the church +that is at Cenchreae: that ye receive her in the Lord, worthily of the +saints, and that ye assist her in whatsoever matter she may have need +of you: for she herself also hath been a succourer of many, and of mine +own self. + + +The necessity of instructing women inquirers or catechumens, visiting +them at their homes, preparing them for baptism, attending to their +{190} unclothing and reclothing at the font, and looking after them +afterwards, forced upon the Church the institution of an order of +deaconesses, side by side with the deacons and for similar purposes. +Pliny found these female officers among the Christians in Bithynia in +the beginning of the second century, and there is no reason why already +at this date the female order should not have existed[2]. 'Here we +learn,' says Origen on this passage, 'that female ministers are +recognized in the Church.' + +Phoebe is also called a succourer or 'patroness' of Christians, +including St. Paul, which suggests a woman of wealth and influence. If +so, we have here an example of wealth, not asserting itself but +devoting itself to service, according to our Lord's teaching: 'He that +is greatest among you shall be your servant (deacon)'; 'I am in the +midst of you as he that serveth (the deacon)[3].' Such an one is to be +received in a manner 'worthy of the saints,' the consecrated family of +God, and to be allowed to lack nothing which the Roman Christians can +supply her with. + + + +[1] Or _deaconess_, as margin. + +[2] See on this subject Deaconess Cecilia Robinson, _The Ministry of +Deaconesses_ (Methuen, 1898), and Bernard, _Pastoral Epistles_, p. 59. +With Lightfoot, he interprets 1 Tim. iii. 11 of deaconesses rather than +of the wives of the deacons. + +[3] Matt, xxiii. 11; Luke xxii. 37. + + + + +{191} + +DIVISION VI. Sec. 3. CHAPTER XVI. 3-16. + +_Personal greetings._ + +Then St. Paul, according to his custom, winds up his epistle with +personal greetings. In this case they are sent to the individual +Christians, among those who from various parts of the empire had +collected at Rome, whose names his memory--so retentive of personal +relationships--enabled him to recall. + + +Salute Prisca and Aquila my fellow-workers in Christ Jesus, who for my +life laid down their own necks; unto whom not only I give thanks, but +also all the churches of the Gentiles: and _salute_ the church that is +in their house. Salute Epaenetus my beloved, who is the firstfruits of +Asia unto Christ. Salute Mary, who bestowed much labour on you. +Salute Andronicus and Junias[1], my kinsmen, and my fellow-prisoners, +who are of note among the apostles, who also have been in Christ before +me. Salute Ampliatus my beloved in the Lord. Salute Urbanus our +fellow-worker in Christ, and Stachys my beloved. Salute Apelles the +approved in Christ. Salute them which are {192} of the _household_ of +Aristobulus. Salute Herodion my kinsman. Salute them of the +_household_ of Narcissus, which are in the Lord. Salute Tryphaena and +Tryphosa, who labour in the Lord. Salute Persis the beloved, which +laboured much in the Lord. Salute Rufus the chosen in the Lord, and +his mother and mine. Salute Asyncritus, Phlegon, Hermes, Patrobas, +Hermas, and the brethren that are with them. Salute Philologus and +Julia, Nereus and his sister, and Olympas, and all the saints that are +with them. Salute one another with a holy kiss. All the churches of +Christ salute you. + + +1. Aquila, a Pontic Jew, had resided in Rome, doubtless in pursuit of +his business as a tent-maker; but the edict of Claudius had compelled +him to quit the capital in common with his brethren, and he had taken +refuge at Corinth with his wife Prisca (as St. Paul calls her), or +Priscilla (according to St. Luke[2]); and there, shortly after their +arrival, St. Paul had found them, made their acquaintance, and combined +with them in a common trade. To this was possibly due their conversion +to Christianity. When St. Paul left Corinth, they accompanied him to +Ephesus, and remained there when he left for Jerusalem; their +influential position in the Christian community being indicated to us +by their dealings with so important a teacher as {193} Apollos. When +St. Paul had returned to Ephesus, and was writing his First Epistle to +the Corinthians, their house was the centre for a Christian +congregation[3]. It was possibly during the Ephesian disturbances that +they risked their lives, or 'laid down their own necks' for St. Paul. +Whether on account of this peril incurred, or for whatever reason, they +returned, as they were now free to do, to Rome. The Epistle to the +Romans follows the First Epistle to the Corinthians by not more than a +year, and it finds Prisca and Aquila established at Rome, with a church +meeting at their house. Probably they had been St. Paul's informants +as to affairs among the Roman Christians. A good many years +afterwards, when St. Paul was writing his Second Epistle to Timothy[4], +we hear of them again at Ephesus. So much travelling as we find in +their life was not unusual in the Roman empire, and perhaps least of +all among the Jews. + +The fact that Priscilla is generally mentioned before her husband, both +by St. Paul and St. Luke[5], as if she were more important, combined +with (1) a tradition which connects her with the {194} _titulus_ (or +parish-church) _Priscae_ at Rome, (2) evidence connecting the +_Coemeterium Priscillae_ with the Acilian gens,--has led some scholars +to believe that Priscilla was a noble Roman lady married to a Jewish +husband. But the evidence is not cogent, and it is more likely that +both she and her husband owed their Roman names to being freedmen[6]. +It was probably her prominence among the Christians which led to her +name preceding that of her husband. We need only think of Phoebe and +Priscilla to understand how influential women were in the earliest +Christian churches. + +'The church (which met) at their house' is a significant phrase[7]. +The wealthier Christians, or those whose houses were commodious, turned +them into churches, where the neighbouring Christians met for worship, +love feast and eucharist. Several of the oldest churches {195} in Rome +grew in this manner out of private houses. + +2. St. Paul's brief characterizations of individuals are full of +personal memory and tenderness--'my beloved, who is the firstfruits of +Asia unto Christ[8],' 'who bestowed much labour on you,' 'my kinsmen +(i.e. Jews) and fellow prisoners (on some occasion which we cannot fix, +but which St. Paul remembers), who also were in Christ before me,' 'our +fellow worker,' 'the man approved in Christ,' who has been tried and +found not wanting, 'his mother and mine.' St. Paul, notwithstanding +his wide ecclesiastical plans and theological labours, as he thought no +pains too much to bestow on the details of his scheme for collecting +Gentile money for the needs of poor Jews, so also never lets great +designs obscure the memory of persons and their intricate relations to +himself. + +3. Andronicus and Junias (or junianus) are 'of note among the +apostles.' There are other indications that the term 'apostle' was not +confined to the twelve. Not St. Paul only, but Barnabas also, and the +Lord's brother, were included in it. Later, in the _Didache_, we find +it used in a wide but somewhat dim sense, for the {196} chief teachers +of the Church who were not settled in particular churches[9]. +Nevertheless, this passage describing two men of unknown names as +'conspicuous among the apostles' is surprising. Probably the real +requirement for sharing the title of apostle was to have received +commission from the Lord (as 'other seventy' did besides the Twelve), +and to have seen Him after His resurrection. These two--'early +disciples' as St. Paul tells us--may have fulfilled these requirements. +They were Jews like himself, who with him had laboured and suffered. +They would be centres of authority among the Christians at Rome[10]: +and possibly to the laying on of their hands other brethren at Rome who +'ruled' or 'taught' or 'ministered' owed their qualifying gift. + +Chrysostom takes the second name to be a woman's--Junia; and expresses +his astonishment at finding a woman thought worthy of the title of an +apostle. + +4. 'Them that are of the household of Aristobulus.' This Aristobulus +was very probably the {197} grandson of Herod the Great, who lived and +died at Rome in a private station, and whose 'household' would +naturally include many Jews and orientals. The following name of a Jew +suggests connexion with the Herods. + +5. 'Rufus' may very likely be the son of Simon of Cyrene, whom St. +Mark, writing probably at Rome, refers to as well known[11]. + +6. 'A holy kiss.' 'It was from this and similar words,' says Origen, +'that it has been handed down as a custom in the Church that after the +prayer the brethren should welcome one another with a kiss.' He goes +on to urge that this ritual kiss should be neither unchaste nor without +real feeling. + +7. 'All the churches of Christ salute you.' This unique phrase is +probably used, as Dr. Hort suggests, to express how 'the church of Rome +was an object of love and respect to Jewish and Gentile churches alike.' + + + +[1] Or _Junia_ (a woman's name), as margin. + +[2] See the readings of Rom. xvi. 3; 1 Cor. xvi. 19; 2 Tim. iv. 19 (in +R. V. which is probably right); and of Acts xviii. 2, 18, 26. + +[3] 1 Cor. xvi. 19. + +[4] 2 Tim. iv. 19. + +[5] Twice out of three mentions in each case. + +[6] Perhaps both freedmen of the same member of the Acilian gens. For +Priscus or Prisca (or Priscilla) was a favourite cognomen in the gens, +and the nomen itself was commonly written Aquilius. This nomen a male +slave, when freed, would have borne (besides his own name and his +master's praenomen); and a female could have borne the cognomen Prisca +or Priscilla. '[Greek] _Akulios_ could be corrupted into {Greek] +_Akulas_, the Greek form of a different name Aquila. + +[7] Cf. Acts xii. 12; Col. iv. 15; Philem. 2. See _S. and H. in loc._ + +[8] Cf. 1 Cor. xvi. 15. + +[9] The term 'apostle' is also used in 2 Cor. viii. 23, Phil. ii. 25, +apparently in the sense of messenger. + +[10] Others, including Liddon, would translate 'highly esteemed among, +i.e. _by_, the apostles' but this is not probable. + +[11] Mark xv. 21. + + + + +{198} + +DIVISION VI. Sec. 4. CHAPTER XVI. 17-20. + +_Final warning._ + +Something occurred before the letter to the Romans was concluded and +dispatched to make St. Paul insert a final warning against false +teachers, who were causing divisions and perverting the gospel as all +Christians had at first received it, in the interests of their personal +aggrandizement. St. Paul makes a brief but vigorous appeal to the +Romans to be true to their first obedience, and maintain their +reputation unsullied. + + +Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which are causing the divisions +and occasions of stumbling, contrary to the doctrine which ye learned: +and turn away from them. For they that are such serve not our Lord +Christ, but their own belly; and by their smooth and fair speech they +beguile the hearts of the innocent. For your obedience is come abroad +unto all men. I rejoice therefore over you: but I would have you wise +unto that which is good, and simple unto that which is evil. And the +God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly. + +The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. + +{199} + +This abrupt insertion strongly reminds us of the Epistle to the +Galatians (see i. 7-9, vi. 13), and of the similar outburst in the +Epistle to the Philippians (iii. 1-3). St. Paul believed that such +Judaizing teaching was inconsistent with the fundamental Christian +'tradition.' He does not imply that Rome was already corrupted, but he +scents danger. + + + + +{200} + +DIVISION VI. Sec. 5. CHAPTER XVI. 21-23. + +_Salutations from St. Paul's companions._ + +Timothy my fellow-worker saluteth you; and Lucius and Jason and +Sosipater, my kinsmen. I Tertius, who write the epistle, salute you in +the Lord. Gaius my host, and of the whole church, saluteth you. +Erastus the treasurer of the city saluteth you, and Quartus the brother. + + +Most of these persons are very probably otherwise known to us. Leaving +aside the well-known Timothy, we find a Lucius of Cyrene among the +prophets in Acts xiii. 1[1]; a Jason at Thessalonica, as St. Paul's +host, in Acts xvii. 5 ff; a Sopater (or Sosipater) of Beroea, Acts xx. +4. Gaius was one of the few whom St. Paul had baptized at Corinth (1 +Cor. i. 14), and the Christian church, it appears, met at his house. +Erastus, the treasurer of Corinth, is probably the man mentioned in 2 +Tim. iv. 20. + + + +[1] And closely associated with St. Paul. + + + + +{201} + +DIVISION VI. Sec. 6. CHAPTER XVI. 25-27. + +_Final Doxology._ + +Now to him that is able to stablish you according to my gospel and the +preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery +which hath been kept in silence through times eternal, but now is +manifested, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the +commandment of the eternal God, is made known unto all the nations unto +obedience of faith; to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ, to +whom[1] be the glory for ever. Amen. + + +There is no idea in this doxology with which this epistle has not made +us familiar in substance. We have been led to think of the gospel, now +proclaimed and entrusted to St. Paul, as the disclosure of a divine +purpose long working secretly: we have been bidden to adore the +unfathomable resourcefulness of the wisdom of God: we have been +constantly referred to the {202} testimony borne by law and prophets to +the gospels: we have been made familiar with the object of the +evangelical preaching, as being to secure 'the obedience of faith among +all the nations.' And a particular phrase in an epistle written about +the same time[2]--'We speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the +wisdom that hath been hidden, which God foreordained before the worlds +unto our glory, which ... unto us God revealed by his Spirit,'--is +strikingly parallel to the beginning of the doxology. At the same time +the elaborate richness of the style, as well as many of the ideas, +reminds us irresistibly of the Epistle to the Ephesians[3]. This, +coupled with the fact that there is considerable authority for placing +the doxology at the end of chap. xiv, has led some scholars to adopt +the idea--accepted and elaborated by Dr. Lightfoot--that St. Paul first +wrote the epistle down to xvi. 23, as his Epistle to the Romans, and +subsequently, perhaps during one of his sojourns at Rome, turned it +into a circular letter, omitting for this purpose the last two +chapters, with their personal matter, and adding the doxology in {203} +the rich manner of the Epistle to the Ephesians. Subsequently the +doxology would have been added also to the complete epistle. There are +many difficulties in such a theory. Especially why should the +beginning of chap. xv be cut off from the end of chap. xiv, when there +is no break in thought? But I do not pursue the subject here[4], for +it would be out of place, and alien to our practical purpose. There is +no ground for doubting that the whole of what we receive as the epistle +was written by St. Paul; and no ground for thinking that any part of +the whole, down to xvi. 23, was not found in the letter as originally +carried by Phoebe; but it cannot be denied that some mystery, not +easily solved, hangs about the manifold and interrupted conclusions of +the epistle; and that the rich style of the doxology is somewhat unlike +both the rest of the epistle, and the other epistles of this period. +However, whether or no it was written at a later date, at least it +forms a splendid summing up of what is probably the greatest and most +influential letter ever written. + +And there is no teaching which we more {204} urgently need to-day than +the teaching of this epistle. Whether the need be to expand our +personal religion into social service, and also to reinvigorate our +social service with the power of personal religion; or so to reassert +the divine authority of the Church as never to forget that it depends +for its vitality upon personally converted hearts; or to teach men to +remember the inexorable severity of divine judgement, as well as the +depth of the divine compassion; or to rebuke the shallowness which +attempts to separate Christian character from Christian doctrine; or to +harmonize individual freedom with the social claim; or to impart to +self-sacrifice the spirit of humility and gladness and indomitable +hope; or at once to exalt and restrict the function of the State; or to +emphasize the true grounds and limits of toleration in a catholic +church--whatever, one may almost say, be the need to which the special +deficiencies and perils of our church and age give rise, or of which at +the moment we are most conscious, the teaching of St. Paul in this +epistle is found to meet it full face. + +Truly we may thank God with a continually growing gratitude for the +gift to us of a letter so inexhaustibly full of spiritual wealth, and +so complete in its provision for the whole of life. + + + +[1] If we retain the words 'to whom' the grammar of the sentence breaks +down, but the object to whom praise is ascribed is probably the Father. + +[2] 1 Cor. ii. 7, 10. + +[3] See especially Eph. iii. 1-13. Cf. also 2 Tim. i. 9-11; Titus i. +2, 3. + +[4] It is fully treated in Lightfoot's _Biblical Essays_ (Macmillan, +1894), pp. 287 ff, by Lightfoot himself and Hort from different points +of view, and by S. and H., pp. lxxxv. ff. + + + + +{205} + +APPENDED NOTES + + +NOTE A. See vol. i. p. 59. + +THE MEANINGS OF THE WORD 'FAITH.' + +The history of the original Hebrew and Greek words for believing or +faith, is very interesting. The Hebrew verb ('aman') means 'to prop' +or 'support'[1]. Now (1) a form of this verb means 'to be supported,' +hence 'to be firm,' hence '_to be trustworthy_'; (2) another form of +the verb means 'to support oneself on,' and hence '_to trust_,' '_to +believe_.' From (1) comes the Hebrew substantive ('emunah') meaning +'faithfulness,' 'trustworthiness,' which is used, as elsewhere, so also +in Habakkuk ii. 4. In that passage it is revealed to the prophet, +that, while the apparently overwhelming wave of Chaldaean barbarism +rolls over him and passes away, 'the just man shall live (or save his +life) by his faithfulness.' But this faithfulness of the righteous +Israelite means a faithful holding on through the dark days to the word +of God as to a secure ground of confidence; and thus the substantive +used in this place in the Greek Bible ('pistis') tends to pass into the +meaning which it mostly, though not always[2], has in the New +Testament--a meaning derived {206} not from form (1) but from form (2) +of the Hebrew verb mentioned above (which however had no corresponding +substantive)--trust or faith in the word and promise of another, +especially God or Christ; or, still more characteristically, trust in +_the person_ of Christ and so of God. + +Even under this heading of belief or trust the range of the word's +meaning is considerable. In one passage of St. James' Epistle it is a +bare intellectual recognition of the truth of things, without any moral +value ('the devils also believe' that God is one, James ii. 19). More +often it is that confidence in the divine word or promise, by which the +good man, in lack of present evidence, sustains his courage or his +prayer and wins his victory over the world: so especially in Hebr. xi, +Luke xviii. 8, James ii. 23, 2 Cor. v. 7, 1 John v. 4. But its most +characteristic use, as said above, is what first appears in the +Gospels. The person of Jesus is there represented as eliciting from +men a supreme trust in His power to heal diseases, and also to satisfy +that deeper human need of which the disease is an outward symbol. And +this power of Jesus to heal men in body and soul is seen in the Gospels +to depend upon the extent of their faith: 'Thy faith hath saved thee;' +'According to thy faith be it unto thee.' Thus Jesus Christ appears +constantly as inspiring, requiring, and rewarding faith in Himself, and +that as the manifested Son of God, e.g. John xiv. 1. This is 'the +faith which is through Him,' i.e. which He produces; and which as +'faith in His name' remains the characteristic Christian quality when +He is gone from sight (Acts iii. 16). 'The faith' in the Acts (vi. 7, +xiii. 8, xiv. 22, &c.) means this Christian attitude towards the unseen +but living and energizing Christ. + +Thus when St. Paul came to believe in Jesus Christ, 'faith in +Jesus,'--as meaning not merely acceptance of His claim or of His word +or of His grace, but {207} whole-hearted devotion to His person, entire +self-surrender or self-committal to Christ or God in Christ--became the +dominant note of his new state: 'I know him whom I have believed, and I +am persuaded that he is able to guard that which I have committed unto +him against that day' (2 Tim. i. 12[3]). And this same devotion to +Christ becomes, in St. Paul's theology, in its various stages, the only +ground of man's acceptance with God. And though he uses 'faith' in a +morally lower sense, as distinct from love--the faith which qualifies +for miracles (1 Cor. xiii. 2)--yet in his characteristic sense of the +term it involves the deepest love towards its divine object[4]. + +Naturally, as faith is thus _the_ characteristic of Christianity, and +this faith in a person involves a belief about Him--His divine sonship, +His resurrection, His mission of the Spirit--so 'the faith' comes to +mean (objectively) that which the Christian believes, or his creed; and +this sense of the word appears almost in the Acts, in Gal. i. 23, and +in Eph. iv. 5, and certainly in the Pastoral Epistles frequently (see +Dr. Bernard in _Camb. Gr. Test._ on 1 Tim. i. 19) and St. Jude's +Epistle, verse 2. + + + +[1] We are familiar with the derived adverb of confirmation, 'Amen.' + +[2] In Rom. iii. 3, Matt, xxiii. 23, it is still used for +'faithfulness.' + +[3] In spite of Ellicott, Holtzmann, and Bernard, I believe this to be +the true rendering, and not that of the R.V. margin. + +[4] On the development of the principle of faith in the soul, see vol. +i. pp. 29, 30; and on its naturalness, in the highest sense, for man, +see pp. 21, 22. + + + + +NOTE B. See vol. i. p. 103. + +THE USE OF THE WORD 'CONSCIENCE.' + +There is no word for conscience in the Old Testament. 'The +conception,' says Delitzsch (_Bibl. Psychology_, Clark's {208} trans., +p. 160), 'is not yet impressed upon it.' And he accounts for this by +quoting, 'The positive law took away its significance from the natural +moral consciousness.' The Jews, that is--like other nations at certain +stages of their history--lived so constantly under the detailed +guidance of a law believed to be divine, that there was not much room +for reflection as to the right and wrong of things. For the idea of +conscience to develop, the will of God must be less clearly and +decisively pronounced as to the details of conduct. There was, +however, of course among the Jews, in proportion to their belief in a +clear divine law, the consciousness of having done wrong; and on this +account a man's 'heart' is described as 'privy to' an offence, and as +'reproaching' or 'smiting' him: see 1 Kings ii. 44, Job xxvii. 6[1], 1 +Sam. xxiv. 5, xxv. 31, 2 Sam. xxiv. 10. Here is the root of the idea +of conscience, i.e. of something in the man behind his surface self, +reflecting upon what he has done, a self behind himself acquitting or +condemning him, and so anticipating the divine judgement. For, as +stated above[2], this was in the main the Stoic doctrine of conscience, +and it was among them that the idea was first developed. Conscience +was conceived of as that in man which lay behind his working self and +reflected on his actions _after they were done_, bringing them into the +light of the 'law of nature' or universal divine law for man. There is +thus, as it were, in each man a double self, or double consciousness +(_conscientia_), so that one can reflect upon himself, and pass +judgement on his own actions. + +It is in this sense of a self-judging faculty in all men reflecting on +what they have done, anticipating a divine {209} judgement, that the +idea of conscience was acclimatized among the Jews. Thus, in Wisdom +xvii. 11, we read, 'For wickedness, condemned by a witness within, is a +coward thing, and being pressed hard by conscience, always forecasteth +the worst lot.' In St. John viii. 9, according to one reading, the +Jews are 'convicted by their own conscience.' So St. Paul, in the +passage discussed above (ii. 15), seems to distinguish the subsequent +reflective 'conscience' from the previous informing reason, 'the effect +(equivalent) of the law written in their hearts.' And in most of the +passages of the New Testament, this meaning of conscience--the faculty +by which we sit in judgement on what we have already done--is +sufficient. But sometimes, as also among the Stoics[3], the word +passes into meaning the positive directing faculty, as when (1 Cor. +viii. 10) a man's 'conscience' is said to be 'emboldened' to adopt a +new practice, or (Hebr. ix. 14) to be cleansed for positive service. +Moreover, though it is an individual faculty (see Rom. ii. 15), and +exists primarily to pass judgement on one's own actions only, yet +perforce it must also look without and condemn or approve the actions +of others (2 Cor. iv. 2, v. 11). + +St. Paul also brings into notice that our conscience is a faculty for +the condition of which we are responsible. It is not the voice of God, +but a faculty capable of reflecting His voice, if it be well guarded. +Thus you may have a 'weak' or a 'strong,' i.e. a more or less +enlightened, conscience (1 Cor. viii). And a man may 'defile' his +'mind and conscience,' i.e. he may corrupt his moral reason and powers +of moral self-judgement (Tit. i. 15). {210} Then the 'conscience' may +become hardened and 'seared' (1 Tim. iv. 2), so that 'the light that is +in' men becomes itself 'darkness' according to our Lord's warning (St. +Matt. vi. 23). And there is nothing which is more necessary at the +present day than to remind men that they are not 'safe' because they +are not acting against their conscience, unless they are also +constantly at pains to enlighten their conscience and keep it in the +light, by the help of the best moral thought of their time, the +guidance of the Church and the word of God. Our conscience, if it is +rightly to reassure us by its witness, must, like St. Paul's +conscience, bear its witness 'in the Holy Ghost' (Rom. ix. 1). + +With us moderns 'conscience' has generally the wider meaning of the +whole practical moral consciousness. It enjoins as well as judges, and +is occupied with the present and the future, as well as with the past. + + + +[1] In LXX [Greek] _ou gar sunoida emauto atopa praxas_. + +[2] Vol. i. p. 103, n. 2. + +[3] e.g. when conscience was described by Epictetus as the grown man's +inward tutor [pedagogue], which must obviously mean that it is to +instruct as well as reprove. + + + + +NOTE C. See vol. i. p. 129. + +RECENT REACTIONS FROM THE TEACHING ABOUT HELL. + +There is no doubt that there has been within the last forty years a +great, and in large measure legitimate, reaction from the +old--mediaeval and Calvinist--teaching about hell. But one who reads +the early chapters of the Epistle to the Romans, or the Gospels, or +other parts of the New Testament, in view of this reaction, will +probably feel an uncomfortable sense that it has gone too far. It is +worth while then to try and discriminate. + +To put the matter in as brief a summary as befits a note, I should hold +that the reaction has been legitimate so far as it has involved a +repudiation of-- + +{211} + +(1) the Calvinist doctrine that God has created some men, no matter +whether many or few, inevitably doomed to everlasting misery. This +doctrine is flat contrary to some particular statements of the New +Testament (as to its general spirit) and is only a misunderstanding of +others (see above, pp. 8, 29). + +(2) any such crude idea of the divine judgement as that God condemns +men for merely _external_ reasons, e.g. because in fact, apart from any +question of will, they were not baptized, or remained pagans or +heretics. Such a conception is quite inadequate, for the divine +judgement penetrates to the heart. God is a father: He is absolutely +equitable: He judges men in the light of their opportunities. He will +reject none whose will is not set to evil. 'This is the judgement that +... men loved the darkness rather than the light, for their works were +evil' (John iii. 19). + +(3) the tendency to exaggerate what is revealed to us, and what, +therefore, we can say we _know_ about the state of man after death. +Thus (_a_) there is nothing really revealed to us as to the relative +proportions of saved and lost. (_b_) It is certain that we only _know_ +of a probation for man here and now--'Now is the accepted time--now is +the day of salvation.' And the absolutely equitable Father may see the +conditions of an adequate probation equally in every man's earthly lot. +It is therefore foolish to entertain, or encourage any one else to +entertain, an expectation of any other state of probation except that +which we certainly have here in this world. 'It is appointed unto men +once to die, and after that the judgement.' But if St. Peter could +speak (as of a familiar subject) of the 'gospel' as having been +'preached' by our Lord's human spirit in Hades 'to the dead,' i.e. to +those who had perished in their wickedness under the divine judgement +of the flood: and preached with the intention {212} that _the judgement +might be turned into a blessing and means of spiritual life_--and he +certainly does speak thus (1 Peter iv. 6, cf. iii. 19): I do not see +how we can deny the possibility at any period, or in the case of any +person, of an unfulfilled probation being accomplished beyond death. +(_c_) Careful attention to the origin of the doctrine of the necessary +immortality or indestructibility of each human soul, as stated for +instance by Augustine and Aquinas[1], will probably convince us that it +was no part of the original Christian message, or of really catholic +doctrine[2]. It was rather a speculation of Platonism taking +possession of the Church. And this consideration leaves open +possibilities of the ultimate extinction of personal consciousness in +the lost, which Augustinianism somewhat rudely, closed. + +But to have convicted our forefathers of going, in certain parts of +their teaching, beyond what was certainly revealed, affords no +justification for doing the same ourselves in an opposite extreme; by +asserting for example positively (_a_) that almost all men will be +'saved'; or (_b_) that there is probation to be looked for beyond +death; or (_c_) that the souls of 'the lost' will be at the last +extinguished. These positive positions are no more justified than +those of our forefathers which we have deprecated. We must recognize +the limits of positive knowledge. + +And when we have come to the end of what a legitimate reaction from the +teaching of our forefathers restores to us, in the direction of a +'larger hope,' we are still face to {213} face with the fact of +'eternal judgement.' Men, as far as their individual destinies are +concerned, are passing towards one of two ends, not towards one only--a +divine judgement of approval _or_ of condemnation; and both judgements +are represented as final and irreversible; and they are the inevitable +outcome of the moral law by which our probation is realized--that +voluntary acts form habits, and habits stereotype into a fixed +character. It is foolish to look to the process or moment of death for +redemption from sin; for death, as far as we know, only transplants us +with the character we have made for ourselves, and with continuous +consciousness, into the unknown world; so that if in this life we have +unfitted ourselves for God, we must find it out beyond death, and know +there the full meaning of our awful miscalculation here. And the +awakening of the 'lost' to what they have cast away--to the meaning of +irreversible self-exclusion from the presence of God--is imaged as +unspeakably awful; and their state is pictured in metaphors and phrases +descriptive both of torment and finality--'outer darkness,' 'gnawing +worm,' 'unquenchable fire,' 'eternal punishment,' 'eternal sin,' 'sin +which shall not be forgiven, neither in this world, nor in that which +is to come,' eternal 'death,' or exclusion from eternal life, 'eternal +ruin,' 'wrath and indignation, tribulation and anguish.' + +In face of all these sayings, it seems to me indisputable that +'universalism'--the teaching that there are to be none finally lost--is +an instance of wilfulness. To speak of that which lies beyond death, +even in the case of the worst and most impenitent criminal, as a place + + 'Where God unmakes but to remake the soul + He else made first in vain--which must not be,' + +is, I cannot but feel, in flat contradiction to the whole tone of the +New Testament. + +{214} + +It is no doubt true that there is in the New Testament an expectation +of a final unity of the whole universe in God, and that we find it hard +to conceive the relation of lost souls in hell to this final unity. +Certainly all legitimate avenues of dim conjecture that a very limited +revelation allows to be kept open, ought to be kept open. Certainly we +know in part--the partialness of our knowledge can hardly be +exaggerated. But we must be true to both elements in what is disclosed +to us; and Dr. Martineau has reminded us[3] how deeply 'the belief in a +separate heaven and hell, and a corresponding distribution of men into +only two classes of good and bad, friends and enemies of God,' though +'at first sight nothing can appear more unnatural and defiant of all +fact,' is yet bound up with 'the inward look' of moral evil and the +fundamental reality of moral choice. In fact it seems to be true to +say that a really Christian Theism, and a really Christian doctrine of +human freedom, are inseparable from the belief in the possibility of +wilful sin leading to final ruin. + +'It is appointed unto men once to die, and after that the judgement'; +and this judgement in the case of those of us who have wilfully +hardened themselves, or remained loveless and love-rejecters, in face +of the real offer of God to man in Christ Jesus, is a divine +condemnation which takes effect in an eternal punishment, the +bitterness as well as the justice of which the soul realizes, and +which--if it does not necessarily mean an everlasting continuance of +personal consciousness--is yet final and irreversible, and unspeakably +awful[4]. + + + +[1] _Summa_, pars. 1, qu. 75, art. 6, 'Respondeo dicendum, quod necesse +est dicere, animam humanam, quam dicimus intellectivum principium, esse +incorruptibilem.' + +[2] See Dr. Agar Beet's _Last Things_ (Hodder and Stoughton, 1898), pp. +194 ff, and Gladstone's _Studies Subsidiary to Butler_ (Oxford, 1896), +part ii. pp. 260 ff. + +[3] See _Types of Ethical Theory_ (Oxford, 1885), ii. pp. 60 ff. + +[4] The only passage in the New Testament which strongly suggests an +_everlasting_ persistence of personal consciousness of pain, is Rev. +xx. 10, 'Shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever.' This is +explicit enough. But I am persuaded that all the numbers and +expressions for periods of time in the Apocalypse are strictly +symbolical. 'A thousand years,' 'forty and two months,' 'three days +and a half,' 'day and night for ever and ever,' are expressions which +have to be translated into some moral equivalent before they can be +made the basis of literal teaching. Thus 'day and night for ever and +ever' describes in a picture the _completeness_ of the final overthrow +and the anguish of the enemies of the Lamb. The symbolical character +of the expression is further indicated by 'the beast' and 'the false +prophet'--themselves symbolical figures--being with the devil the +subjects of the torment. + +Some will say that the deterrent effect of the doctrine of hell depends +upon its being held to be a state of strictly endless conscious +torment. I do not believe this is the case. The language of the New +Testament is full enough of deterrent horror if we are faithful to it. +And after all, this is all we have a right to be. + + + +{215} + +NOTE D. See vol. i. pp. 143 ff. + +DIFFICULTIES ABOUT THE DOCTRINE OF THE ATONEMENT. + +I have endeavoured above to sketch the positive conception of the +Atonement, as St. Paul seems to put it before us. Christ inaugurates +the church of the new covenant, the new life of union with God. He +lays its basis in a great act of reparation to the righteousness of +God, which 'the old Adam' had continually outraged. This act of +reparation lies in a moral sacrifice of obedience, carried to the +extreme point by the shedding of His blood. This is the great +propitiation in virtue of which God is enabled, without moral +misunderstanding, to forgive freely the sins of any one who comes in +faith to unite himself to Christ, and set him free to begin the new +life. + +The subject is a divine 'mystery,' and we shall never adequately probe +it. Nay more, one man's thought will rightly seem inadequate to +another, who has gained, or thinks he has gained, some special avenue +of insight into {216} the divine depths. But when we pass from special +points of view, which are necessarily more or less individual, and can +never become certainties for men in general--when we pass on to the +ground of what should be the common church belief, the statement of the +original revelation, it is not, it seems to me, liable to any of the +familiar moral objections, or indeed a subject of any special +difficulty. The difficulties experienced by the moral consciousness of +our age have been due to gross and unnecessary misunderstandings, of +which the following are, perhaps, the most considerable. + +(1) The propitiation has become separated from the new life, for which +it merely prepares the way. It has been elevated, with disastrous +moral results, from a means to an end. Christ's work _for us_ has been +treated apart from His work _in us_, in which alone it is realized. He +alone can act _for_ all men, because He only can be their new life +within. But on this see vol. i. pp. 141 f, and _Ephes._ pp. 54 ff. + +(2) The idea of injustice has been introduced into the 'transaction' of +the Atonement, and has been the most fruitful source of +difficulty;--but quite unnecessarily. There is a story that when +Edward VI was a child, and deserved punishment, another boy was taken +and whipped in his place. This monstrously unjust transaction has been +taken by Christian teachers as an illustration of the Atonement; and it +is truly an illustration of the Atonement as they misconceived it. But +the misconception is gratuitous: there is no real resemblance in the +two cases. For first, what is represented to us in the New Testament +is not that Jesus Christ, an innocent person, was punished, without +reference to His own will, by a God who thus showed Himself indifferent +as to whom He punished so long as some one suffered. But He, being +Himself very God, the Son of the Father, the administrator of the {217} +moral law and judge of the world, of His own will became man, and +suffered what the sin of the world laid upon Him, in order that He +might lift the world out of sin. Voluntary self-sacrifice for others +is at least not to be described as injustice. At least we rejoice to +recognize that God accepts such self-sacrifice. It is to vicarious +self-sacrifice like our Lord's that the human race owes the greater +part of whatever moral progress it has hitherto made. + +Secondly, God is not represented as imposing any specially devised +punishment on His only Son in our nature. As the matter is stated in +the New Testament, He required of Him obedience, the obedience proper +to man; and, if we regard sympathy with our fellow men as a part of our +duty to God, we may say obedience only. Thus, 'Lo, I come to do thy +will, O God' is the one cry of the Christ. In His simple acceptance of +the whole of human duty lies the moral essence and value of His +sacrifice. All the physical and mental sufferings of Christ came out +of His fulfilment of the human ideal, Godward and manward, and were +involved in it. He died because obedience to the terms of His +mission--'the word of truth, and meekness, and righteousness'--in a +world of sin such as this is, involved dying. 'He was obedient' +without reserve--'unto death, even the death of the cross[1].' The +value of the bloodshedding lies in this, so far as Scripture enables us +to judge--that it represents utter obedience under conditions which +human sin, the sin of Jews and Gentiles, laid upon Him: and it was in +this sense, which does not leave out of consideration the mental +torment caused to His sinless spirit by contact with sin[2], that He +'bare our sins in his body {218} on the tree,' and that 'the Lord made +to light on him the iniquity of us all.' What is ascribed to the +Father is that He 'spared not' His only Son by miraculously exempting +Him from the consequences of His mission; and that He foresaw, +overruled, and used for His own wise and loving purposes the sin of +men[3]. + +Thirdly and lastly, the Christ (as represented in the New Testament) +did not suffer in order that we might be let off the punishment for our +own sins, but in order to bring us to God. 'By his stripes we +are'--not excused punishment, but--'healed.' In fact, there are two +distinguishable punishments for sin. There is the spiritual +punishment, which is involved in being morally alienated from God, +which may become irreversible and eternal, but which is gone when the +moral alienation is gone. From this Christ delivers us in making us at +one again with the Father, but He Himself did not endure it. God +forbid that we should imagine such a thing! Besides this there is the +temporal penalty which our sins bring as inevitable consequences upon +ourselves and upon the race. All these consequences of human sin the +sinless Christ bore for us, but not that we might be let off {219} +bearing them. We must bear them too--both the death of the body and +the chastisement of particular sins. Christ bore the punishment of +sins that were not His own, in order that in our case the punishments +of sins which are our own might, through His bringing us back to God, +be converted into healing chastisements and gracious penances. The +record of God's dealings with His saints is still, as in Ps. xcix. 8, +that they are heard, forgiven and punished. + +How gratuitously then the idea of injustice has been introduced into +the doctrine of Christ's sacrifice for us becomes evident when once it +is brought within the scriptural limits. Christ suffered voluntarily. +He suffered simply what was involved in becoming man in a world of sin. +He suffered, the righteous for the unrighteous, that He might bring us +back to God, that so we might have grace to bear our own sufferings and +share His. + +This alone, it seems to me, is what the New Testament certainly +teaches. And the matter of most importance is that, ridding our minds +of distracting and often needless difficulties, we should drink in, +with heart and intelligence alike, the full force of what is certainly +part of the Gospel--the doctrine of the one, full, perfect, and +sufficient atonement with the Father, won for us by the self-sacrifice +of the Christ. + + + +[1] Phil. ii. 8; Hebr. x. 5-9. + +[2] The perfect Man perfectly realized the misery and horror of the +sins on behalf of which He suffered. How much is involved in this in +the way of detailed realization of each individual sin of each +individual sinner, is a matter on which we have no clear grounds for +exact statement. + +[3] I believe that nothing more than this is really suggested by +Scripture. The phrase, 'made _sin_ for us' (2 Cor. v. 21), means, I +believe, according to the clear use of the word in the LXX, 'made a +_sin-offering_ for us.' The same words in the Hebrew stand for sin and +sin-offering, and the use of the Greek follows: see especially (in LXX) +Lev. iv. 31, 'It is the sin (= sin-offering) of the assembly;' 24, 'It +(the goat) is a sin;' 29, 'He shall lay his hand upon the head of the +sin;' vi. 25, 'This is the law of the sin'; viii. 14, 'The bullock of +the sin.' Cf. Hos. iv. 8, &c. + + + + +NOTE E. See vol. i. p. 196. + +EVOLUTION AND THE CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE OF THE FALL. + +There is a wide-spread and popular notion that a marked contradiction +exists between the biological theory {220} of evolution and the +Christian doctrine of the Fall, which may be stated and examined under +several heads:-- + +I.--'According to the theory of evolution man began his career at the +bottom, emerging from purely animal life, and slowly struggled upwards +to his present level of attainment. According to the Christian +doctrine, on the contrary, he was created perfect, and then +subsequently fell into sin and accompanying misery. Thus, according to +one theory, man began at the bottom; according to the other, he began +at the top.' + +Now there is no doubt that when so stated the evidence is all in favour +of the scientific point of view, and against the Christian. But such a +contrast requires the greatest modification on both sides before it can +be taken as truly representing the facts. Thus, it is not the case +that the Bible suggests that man was created perfect, i.e. perfectly +developed, and that his later course has been simply the effect of the +Fall, i.e. a downward course. Leaving first out of account Gen. i-iii, +we notice that the Bible is conspicuously, and in marked contrast to +the religious books of other nations, the book of development. It +looks continuously and systematically forward, not backward, for the +perfecting of man. It traces the beginning of civilization in Abel, +the keeper of sheep, Cain, the tiller of the ground, in Jabal, 'the +father of such as dwell in tents and have cattle,' in Jubal, the father +of music, 'of all such as handle the harp and pipe,' in Tubal Cain, the +first forger of brass and iron work; it indicates the origin of +religious worship (in some sense) at the time of Enoch, and the origin +of building with the tower of Babel. The names of Noah, Abraham, +Moses, Samuel, David, &c., represent stages of advance along the line +of a chosen people; and later on it appears also that upon the chosen +people centres a hope for all nations, and a purpose is discovered in +universal history. The special {221} intellectual qualities of various +races or civilizations, as of Egypt and Tyre, are recognized by some of +the prophets, and recognized as part of a divine purpose for the +world[1]. The Bible then is the book of development; it looks forward, +not backward. But it is also true that all this development is +represented as having been (we may say) a second-best thing. It has +not been according to God's first purpose. There has been a great and +continual hindrance, which has consisted in a persistent rebellion or +sin on man's part against God; and this again has had its root in a +certain perversion of the heart of mankind which is regarded as +approximately universal. If we now take into account again the first +three chapters of Genesis (which, however, have left much less trace +than is commonly supposed in the Old Testament as a whole[2]) we find +that they describe an original act of rebellion on the part of the +first human pair, which is there spoken of as at least entailing +external consequences of a penal sort upon their descendants--that is +death, pain, and the loss of Paradise; and that later, especially in +the teaching of St. Paul, the universal moral flaw in human nature +(original sin) is also represented as having its source in this initial +act of rebellion. + +Sin is therefore, according to our Christian scriptures, something +unnatural to man: the violation of his nature by his rebellion; and it +is a continual element of deterioration. But the idea that man was +created perfect, i.e. so as not to need development, is not suggested. +No doubt theologians, from the age of Augustine down to recent times, +have done something more than suggest it. Thus Robert South supposes +that 'an Aristotle was but the rubbish of an Adam, and Athens but the +rudiments of Paradise'; and Milton implanted the idea in the {222} +imagination of Englishmen; but it is in no way suggested by the Bible, +and was expressly repudiated by the earliest Christian theologians in +east and west. Thus, in answer to the question whether Adam was formed +perfect or imperfect, Clement of Alexandria replied, 'They shall learn +from us that he was not perfect in respect of his creation, but in a +fit condition to receive virtue.' And Irenaeus says that it was in the +power of God to make men perfect from the beginning, but that such an +initial perfection would be contrary to the law of human nature, which +is the law of gradual growth[3]. We must therefore modify the +statement of Christian doctrine from which we started, thus:--_Man has +been slowly led, or has slowly developed, towards the divine ideal of +his Creator; but his actual development has been much less rapid and +constant than it might have been, owing to the fact of sin from which +he might have been free_. + +Now, can it be fairly said that science can take any legitimate +exception to such a statement? The progress of man which +anthropological science discloses is very broken, very partial; if +development of some sort is universal, progress is very rare, distinct +deterioration not uncommon. Science, like poetry and philosophy, must +bear witness to the disappointing element in human nature, of which He +was so conscious of whom it is said that 'He did not trust himself to +man, because he needed not that any one should bear witness concerning +man, for he himself knew what was in man'--the sad secret of human +untrustworthiness and unsatisfactoriness[4]. + +Again, can science assert that this actual development of man, so +thwarted and tainted and partial, has been the only possible +development, and that there could not have been a better? If it cannot +say this, there is in the {223} general view of human progress and +deterioration no antagonism between religion and science. + +II.--But it may be said, 'Science certainly does say that the actual +development of man has been the only possible development. Science +excludes the idea of sin in the sense of something which need not have +happened, because it excludes the idea of freedom or contingency +altogether. Good and bad characters are like good and bad apples--mere +facts of natural growth'; or more suggestively, 'Sin (so called) is +only the survival of brute instincts, which, from a higher condition of +evolution, men have come to be ashamed of.' + +It cannot be made too emphatic that here is the real battle-ground of +religion and science to-day, though the fact is often concealed in +popular controversy. _I do not believe there is any real difficulty in +adjusting sufficiently the relations of religion and science as to the +Fall when once the idea of sin has been admitted--that is, the idea of +free, responsible action, with its correlative, the possibility of +wrong action which might have been avoided_. Christian and other +teachers have, no doubt, often failed to see how limited human freedom +is, but they have never been wrong in asserting that the reality of +freedom within limits is essential to Christianity and morality. Sin +is not a mere fact of nature. It is a perversion which ought not to +have been. This subject is not what is directly before us now; but the +heart of the controversy is here; and I will make the following very +brief remarks upon it. + +(1) A theory that cannot be put into practice, or a theory that cannot +account for the facts, is a false or at least inadequate theory. Now +the theory of necessary determinism cannot be put into practice. To +believe that our own conduct is not really under our own control--that +the idea of responsibility is at bottom an illusion--is to destroy the +basis of human life and education. Even {224} the holders of the +theory admit that it must be kept out of sight in practice. + +Further, it is a theory that cannot account for the facts--viz. for the +existence of the universal sense of responsibility; and the application +to human action of moral blame and praise, which penetrates the whole +of thought and language, and which holds too large a place in human +life to be a delusion. We are not ashamed of a physical accident, but +we are ashamed of telling a lie. And this difference is fundamental +and based on reality. + +(2) The Christian assumption may be stated as follows: granted that we +cannot increase the sum of force which passes from external sources +into our system, and passes out again in manifold forms of human +action, yet within certain limits we can direct it for good or +evil--i.e. the 'voluntary' part of a man's action may be determined +from below, so to speak, by purely animal motives, or by rational and +spiritual motives. In the latter case, the action is of the proper +human quality, and stamps a rational and spiritual character upon all +that falls within its range. In the former case, it may be truly +regarded as a survival of the physical instincts of animal progenitors, +and no doubt it emerges as a part of the physical order of the world. +But, considered as human action, it represents a lapse, a culpable +subordination of the higher to the lower in our nature, a violation of +the law proper to manhood[5]. This is the point. St. John says, 'All +sin is lawlessness,' and (by the exact form of expression which he +uses) he implies also that all lawlessness is sin. Here, and here only +where voluntary action begins, do you see violation of law, and +therefore, within limits, a disturbance of the divine order--something +which ought to have been otherwise. + +{225} + +(3) The belief that the moral evil of our nature does not properly +belong to our nature but is its violation, and that if once the will be +set right it can be remedied, has been the secret of the moral strength +of Christianity. Christianity has said to all men, However corrupted +your nature, the corruption does not essentially belong to you. Give +your wills to God, and, if slowly, yet surely, if not fully in this +world, then beyond it, all can be set right. 'According to thy faith +be it unto thee.' And the practical power of this appeal, shows its +agreement with reality. + +(4) On the other hand, it cannot be claimed that the theory is contrary +to any real scientific _knowledge_; for biology confesses that it knows +very little as to the actual methods by which force is redistributed in +human action. It is contrary only to some large and unverifiable +assumptions--assumptions which ignore the abstract character of +biological psychology, as of other sciences. + +Now granted this reality of free voluntary action, it will hardly be +denied that history discloses to us a practically universal prevalence +of sin[6], in the present and in the past; and we can hardly fail to +perceive, lying behind actual sins, a tendency to sin--what Shelley +calls 'the ineradicable taint of sin,' a perverse inclination inhering +in the stock of our manhood, which is what theology calls original sin. + +III.--But here a more modern objection occurs. Christianity assumes +that this moral flaw or taint, weakness or grossness, in human nature +is the outcome of actual transgressions, in other words that original +sin is due to actual sin, whereas the tendency of recent biological +science is to deny that acquired characters can be inherited, and +therefore to deny that any acts of any man or men could have any effect +on the congenital moral nature of their descendants; the taint or fault +in {226} human nature, must be a taint or fault in that original +substance which what is called man derived from his pre-human ancestry. +To this I reply:--This is no doubt the view which Professor Weismann +has made more or less prevalent. The substance of heredity +('germ-plasm') is taken to be a substance _per se_, which has always +occupied a special 'sphere' of its own, without any contact with that +of 'somatoplasm' further than is required for its lodgement or +nutrition; hence it can never be in any degree modified as to its +hereditary qualities by use-inheritance. It has been absolutely +continuous 'since the first origin of life.' + +But this doctrine does not appear yet to have assumed a fixed form[7]; +and in its extreme or absolute form it is highly disputable, and +rejected by large sections of biologists. Professor Haeckel[8] +declares contemptuously that he should feel it more reasonable to +accept the Mosaic account of special creations! The late Mr. Romanes, +after summing up the evidence on both sides without any contempt, +decides: 'No one is thus far entitled to conclude against the possible +transmission of acquired characters[9].' Again, 'that this substance +of heredity is largely continuous and highly stable, I see many and +cogent reasons for believing. But that this substance has been +uninterruptedly continuous since the origin of life, or absolutely +stable since the origin of sexual propagation, I see even more and +better reasons for disbelieving[10].' And he remarks[11], 'I doubt not +Weismann {227} himself would be the first to allow that his theory of +heredity encounters greater difficulties in the domain of ethics than +in any other--unless indeed, it be that of religion.' + +I ought to add, in view of the apparently improbable event of the +doctrine of Weismann becoming in its absolute form the accepted +doctrine of biologists, that of course it only concerns the material +organism. No one who is not a materialist would deny the _possibility_ +of the character of the parent modifying at its very root that of the +child, without even the smallest conceivable modification of the +physical organism; because in the origination of a spiritual +personality, and in the link which binds it to the antecedent +personalities to which it owes its being, there is that which lies +outside the purview of biological science. There _may_ be an +inheritance of sinful tendencies derived from sinful acts in the region +of the spiritual personality, even if no physical transmission is +possible. + +However it be explained, it appears to be the case that Christianity is +bound to maintain the position that in the region of moral character +there is, in fact, a solidarity in humanity. We are bound together. +Our acts, as they form our own character, do somehow or other, however +slightly, modify the characters of our descendants for good or evil. +And this modification of the tendencies of the race by the acts of +individuals may have been more marked at the beginning than it is +to-day. + +On the other hand Christianity is not in any way interested in denying +that man derives a physical heritage of habits and tendencies from a +pre-human ancestry. All I imagine that Christianity is interested in +affirming is this--that when the animal organism became the +dwelling-place of the human spirit (so to speak) that human spirit +might have taken one of two courses. It {228} might have followed the +path of the divine will; and in that case human development would have +represented a steady and gradual spiritualizing of the animal nature +reaching on towards perfection. It might have taken, on the other +hand, and did in fact take (more or less), the line of wilful +disobedience. And the moral effects of this wilfulness and +disobedience from the beginning onwards have been felt from parent to +son. So that the springs of human conduct have been weakened and +perverted, and no man has started without some bias in the wrong +direction which would not have been there if his ancestors for many +generations had been true to God. + +It is worth noticing in passing that 'original sin' is not a fixed +quantity derived from one lapse of the original man, but is a moral +weakness continually reinforced by every actual transgression, and, on +the other hand, reduced in force by moral resistance and self-control. +Individuals start at very different levels of depravity. Only it would +appear that practically in no man but One is there any reason to +believe the fundamental nature immaculate. + +IV.--But it will be said 'You have not yet touched upon a big central +contradiction between religion and science. According to the Christian +doctrine mankind is derived from a single specifically human pair, made +human by a special inspiration of the Divine Spirit. According to the +theory of evolution, a certain species of apes under specially +favourable conditions gradually advanced to become what might be called +man, though of a very low type.' To this I am inclined to make reply +thus: Christianity is really bound up with maintaining four +positions--(1) the reality of moral freedom; (2) the fact of sin, +properly so called as distinct from imperfection; (3) its practical +universality, at least as an inherited tendency; and (4) the unity of +the human race in such {229} sense that the same postulates may be made +with regard to all men, and the same capacity for moral redemption +(more or less) assumed to be in them. Now, as regards the first three +of these positions enough has been said already, and the last of them +does not appear to be at present in dispute between science and +religion. St. Paul says, 'God made of one' (or 'of one blood,' for +this reading is possibly right) 'every nation of men' (Acts xvii. 26). +And of one blood, if not of one individual, all men are, according to +the present conclusions of biological science. A recent work on +ethnology, by Mr. Keane (Cambridge Geographical Series), speaks +thus:--'The hominidae are not separately evolved in an absolute +sense--i.e. from so many different anthropoid precursors, but the +present primary divisions are separately evolved from so many different +pleistocene precursors, themselves evolved through a single pliocene +prototype from a single anthropoid precursor[12].' + +It does not seem to me, then, that Christianity is really bound up with +anything more than the unity of the human race, which science also +strongly asserts. But to pass from these positions, which may be +regarded as certain, to something more conjectural (apart from any +question of the literary character of Genesis iii), we may argue thus: +Sin is a fact having the same character universally in human history, +though the sense of sin has varied greatly, reaching back as far as +human history extends. This would lead us to suppose that it goes back +to the roots of the race. It suggests some original {230} fall, some +tainting of the race in its origin. I do not see, then, anything +absurd or contrary to evidence in such a hypothesis as this.--The +Divine Spirit is assumed to be at work in all the development of the +world. The 'laws of nature' are but His methods. At a certain moment +a new thing had emerged in the universe hitherto inorganic. It was the +fact of life. It was new[13]. But it was in continuity with what had +gone before. This principle of life had its great development, +vegetable and animal. It had attained a form in certain anthropoid +apes such as we are familiar with in men. Suppose then that the Divine +Spirit breathes Himself, again in a new way, into one single pair or +group of these anthropoid animals. There is lodged in them for the +first time a germ of spiritual consciousness, continuous with animal +intelligence, and yet distinct from it. From this pair or group +humanity has its origin. If they and their offspring had been true to +their spiritual capacities the animal nature would have been more +rapidly spiritualized in motives and tendencies. +Development--physical, moral, spiritual--would have been steady and +glorious. Whereas there was a fall at the very root of our humanity; +and the fall was repeated and reiterated and renewed, and the +development of our manhood was tainted and spoiled. There was a lapse +into approximately animal condition, which is dimly known to us as +primitive savagery. So that the condition of savage man is a parody of +what God intended man in his undeveloped stages to be, just as the +condition of civilized man in London and Paris is a parody of what God +intended developed man to come to. And there have been long and dreary +epochs when men have {231} seemed to lose almost all human ideals and +divine aspirations; when, in St. Paul's phrase, they were 'alive +without the law,' living a physical life unvisited by the remorse +consequent upon any knowledge of better things. And there have been, +on the other hand, epochs and special occasions of spiritual +opportunity and spiritual restorations. And so, on the whole, side by +side with the continually deteriorating effect of sin, has gone on the +slow process of redemption, the undoing of the evil of sin and the +realization of the divine purpose for man. Such an idea of human +history, partly only hypothetical, partly assured, conflicts with no +scientific ethnology, and is but a restatement of old-fashioned +Christianity in all that has religious importance. + +V.--Of course, in all this I am assuming that the doctrine of sin and +of the Fall in its true importance has a much securer basis than the +supposition that Genesis iii is literal history. The doctrine of the +Fall is, as I have said, not separable from the doctrine of sin, or the +doctrine of sin from that of moral freedom. It rests upon the broad +basis of human experience, especially upon Christian experience, which +is bound up with its reality. Most of all it rests, for Christians, on +the teaching of Christ. For Christ's teaching and action postulate +throughout the doctrine of sin. But that doctrine in its turn goes +back upon the Old Testament, which is full of the truth that the evils +of human nature are due, not to its essential constitution, but to +man's wilfulness and its results; that the disordering force in human +nature has been moral, the force of sin; that human history represents +in one aspect a fall from a divine purpose, a fall constantly +reiterated and renewed in acts of disobedience. These constant acts of +disobedience are in part caused by an evil heart in human nature, and +this in its turn exhibits the fruits of past sins. Granted this, {232} +the story in Genesis iii, whether it be historical or whether (as not +only many modern Christians, but some of the greatest of early +Christians, have thought) it be not an historical account of a single +event, but a generalized account of what is continually happening, has, +at any rate, vital spiritual truth. The character of its inspiration +is apparent. Teach a child what sin is, first of all on the ground of +general Christian experience and the teaching of Christ, and then read +to it the story of Genesis iii, and the child must perforce recognize +the truth in a form in which it cannot be forgotten. There in that +story all the main points of truth as to the meaning of sin are +suggested, and the main sources of error precluded. Sin is not our +nature, but wilfulness; sin is disobedience to the divine law, the +refusal of trust in God; there is such a thing as being tempted to sin, +and yielding to it, and then finding that we have been deceived, being +conscience-stricken and fearing to face God; and the curse of our +manhood springs from nowhere ultimately but our own evil heart. And if +our sins lay us under an outward discipline, which is God's punishment, +yet in the very discipline lies the hope of our recovery. God the +destroyer is also the God who promises redemption. Thus all that we +most need to know about God and man, about obedience and disobedience, +about temptation, about the blessing and the cursing of human nature, +about conscience good and bad, is to be found in the story of Genesis +iii, written in language suitable to the childhood of the individual +and of the race. + +VI.--But once more, and for the last time, the biologist will reply, +'You are not going to get off so easily. The fact of physical death is +inextricably interwoven into the structural growth of the world long +before men appeared. But Christianity regards it as a mere consequence +of human sin.' This is not the case. Long before science {233} had +investigated the early history of life on our globe, Christian teachers +both in East and in West--St. Augustine as well as St. Athanasius--had +taught that death is the law of physical nature, that it had been in +the world before man, and that 'man was by nature mortal,' because, as +being animal, he was subject to death. How, then, do they interpret +the language of Scripture? In this way: They hold that if man had been +true to his spiritual nature, the supernatural life, the life in God, +would have blunted the forces of corruption, and lifted him into a +higher and immortal state. + +Certainly, in some sense, death, as we know it, for man, is regarded, +especially in the New Testament, as the penalty of sin. But then what +do we mean by death? If sin is said to have introduced human death, +Christ is constantly said to have abolished it. 'This is the bread +that cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof and not die.' +'Whosoever believeth on me shall never die.' 'Christ Jesus abolished +death.' Sin, then, we may suppose, only introduced death in some sense +such as that in which Christ abolished it. Christ has not abolished +the physical transition from this world to the invisible world, but He +has robbed it of its terror, its sting, its misery. Apart from sin we +may suppose man would not have died; that is, he would never have had +that horrible experience which he has called death. There would have +been only some transition full of a glorious hope from one state of +being to another. + +We are again in the region of conjecture. All that I am here +interested in asserting is that Christianity never has held to the +position that human sin first introduced death _into the world_. What +it has taught is that _human_ death, as men have known it, with its +horror and its misery, has represented not God's intention for man, but +the curse of sin. + +{234} + +VII.--Now I have endeavoured to face and meet the points which are +urged in the name of science against the Christian doctrine of the +Fall. I have endeavoured to point out that what is essential to +Christianity is to believe in the reality of moral freedom, and the +consequent reality of sin, as something which need not have been in the +individual, or in the race considered as a unity. This is all that +Christianity is really pledged to maintain. In maintaining this we are +maintaining what is absolutely essential to the moral well-being of the +race, and, moreover, what has the deepest roots in man's moral +experience and in the teaching of Christ. In holding this we hold the +doctrine of the Fall, a doctrine, that is, that man's condition has +been throughout a parody of the divine intention, owing to the fact of +sin tainting and spoiling his development from the root. But +Christianity is not in any kind of way pledged against the doctrine of +development, only against the doctrine which no reasonable science can +hold, that the actual development of man has been the best or only +possible one. Nor, I have urged, can it be reasonably said that the +Christian doctrine of sin and of the Fall is bound up with one +particular interpretation of Genesis iii. All, then, that we must +admit in the way of collision between Christianity and science is, on +the one hand, that Christianity is not intended to teach men science, +and that when there is any great advance in human knowledge it takes a +little while for Christianity to extricate itself from the meshes of +the language and ideas belonging to one stage of scientific knowledge, +and to assimilate the terms and ideas of the new. But, on the other +hand, there is perennial and necessary warfare between Christianity and +materialistic science, or a science which denies the reality of moral +freedom. And as to Christianity giving up what is proper to its own +ground--its teaching about {235} freedom and sin and the Fall, and +God's purpose for man, and the love shown in his redemption--to give up +this is to give up what is the best and deepest motive of human +progress, and what is most surely certificated by the witness of Christ +and the spiritual experience of Christendom. Indeed all schemes of +human improvement are shallow and inadequate, which do not deal with +man as what, in fact, he has been proved to be, a sinful, that is a +fallen, being, needing not only education but redemption. + +Before leaving this attempt to show that there is no necessary conflict +between biological and theological science, it is important to call the +attention of the intelligent public to the fact that what formerly +appeared to be the solid consistency of the 'Darwinian' creed, has been +broken up into a state not far removed from chaos. It has become +apparent how very little way has really been made towards showing what +have been the actual factors in evolution--how the fact of evolution +through variation has actually occurred. Thus Mr. Bateson[14] remarks, +'If the study of variation can serve no other end, it may make us +remember that the complexity of the problem of specific difference is +hardly less now than it was when Darwin first showed that natural +history is a problem, and no vain riddle.' What is the cause of +variations occurring? What law do they exhibit in their occurrence? +Do variations occur with a certain degree of sudden completeness[15]? +Or how are we to {236} explain the maintenance of variations, which in +a more developed stage are to be very useful, before they can be shown +to be useful at all? What is the place held in evolution by 'natural +selection'? What, if any, the place held by use-inheritance? Is the +factor of 'mimicry,' supported by Darwin, an important or even real +factor in evolution? What is to be the issue of the controversy +between the biologist and the physicist on the question of the time +required for organic development? Are we to suppose that organic +development at the beginning proceeded very much more rapidly than at a +later stage? Or even that it exhibited laws of which we have no +experience now, such as would admit of a 'natural' development of life +out of what is not living? All these, and many more questions, appear +to be so completely open that, granted the general theory of continuous +evolution as against special creation, hardly anything as regards the +factors or causes of evolution can be said to be scientifically +settled. Thus on such subjects as the origin of the human race, its +exact relation to an animal ancestry, and the right interpretation of +the fact of sin, {237} before science can make demands on theology, +there must be more agreement in her own camp. + + + +[1] See especially Ezekiel xxviii, xxxi. + +[2] See vol. i. p. 193. + +[3] Clem. Alex. _Strom_, vi. 12. 96; Iren. _c. Haer._ iv. 38. + +[4] See also above, vol. i. pp. 78, 79. + +[5] On the meaning of 'freedom of will,' see vol. i. pp. 230 ff. + +[6] See above, vol. i. pp. 80-1. + +[7] Romanes, _Examination of Weismannism_ (Longmans, 1893), pp. 61-70, +153. + +[8] _The Last Link_ (Black, 1899), p. 79. + +[9] Romanes, _Darwin and after Darwin_ (Longmans, 1895), ii. p. 279. + +[10] _Examination of Weismannism_, pp. 114, 115. + +[11] _Darwin and after Darwin_, ii. p. 90. + +[12] See also in Haeckel, _Last Link_, p. 148: 'We assume the single +monophyletic origin of mankind at one place, in one district'; and +passages cited above, vol. i. p. 196, n. 1. The science of comparative +religions also suggests the same conclusion. Everywhere common +underlying religious needs and tendencies appear. Acts xvii. 27 is +justified by a comparison of religions. + +[13] It must not be left out of sight that the idea of life as +naturally derived from what was inorganic, has not yet been made to +appear even scientifically probable, in view of the evidence. + +[14] W. Bateson, _Materials for the Study of Variations, treated with +especial regard to discontinuity in the origin of species_ (Macmillan, +1894), p. xii. + +[15] Biologists are now apparently more disposed than formerly to admit +the sudden appearance of considerable and important modifications and +rapid developments. Cf. Haeckel, _l. c._ p. 144, and Bateson, p. 568. +He concludes that 'discontinuity of species results from discontinuity +of variation.' 'The existence,' he says, 'of sudden and discontinuous +variation, the existence, that is to say, of new forms having from +their first beginning more or less of the kind of perfection which we +associate with normality, is a fact that disposes, once and for all, of +the attempt to interpret all perfection and definiteness of form as the +work of selection. The study of variation leads us into the presence +of whole classes of phenomena that are plainly incapable of such +interpretation.' This relative perfection of variations at starting +Mr. Bateson attributes in great measure to the principle of 'symmetry,' +or 'repetition of parts' in living things. An organism is symmetrical, +and thus what happens in one of many similar organs repeats itself +normally in all the others. Change in one part is not an isolated +fact, but there is 'similarity and simultaneity of change.' + + + + +NOTE F. See vol. i. p. 215. + +BAPTISM BY IMMERSION AND BY AFFUSION. + +The following passage in the Didache, c. 7, is of the plainest +importance for the history of this matter: 'If thou have not living +[i.e. running] water, baptize into other water; and if thou canst not +in cold, then in warm. And if thou have not either [in sufficient +amount for baptism, i.e. immersion in the water] pour forth water +thrice upon the head into the name of Father and Son and Holy Ghost.' +Cf. Dr. Taylor, _Teaching of the Twelve Apostles_ (Cambridge, 1886), p. +52: 'The primitive mode of baptism was by immersion. According to the +Jewish rite a ring on the finger, a band confining the hair, or +anything that in the least degree broke the continuity of contact with +the water, was held to invalidate the act. The Greek word "baptize," +like the Hebrew _tabol_, means to dip: to "baptize" a ship is to _sink_ +it. The construction [in the above passage of the Didache] "baptize +_into_ other water," points to immersion, as likewise does Hermas, when +he writes (_Simil._ 9): "They go down therefore into the water dead, +and come up living;" and Barnabas (chap. xi): "Herein he saith that we +go down into the water laden with sins and filthiness, and come up +bearing fruit in our heart, and having our fear and our hope towards +Jesus in the Spirit." This was still the normal way of administering +the rite, but it was no longer insisted upon as necessary: {238} "_If +thou have not either_," not enough of "living" or "other" water for +immersion, "_pour water thrice upon the head_," &c.' + + + + +NOTE G. See vol. ii. p. 136. + +A PRAYER OF JEREMY TAYLOR. + +O holy and almighty God, Father of mercies, Father of our Lord Jesus +Christ, the Son of Thy love and eternal mercies, I adore and praise and +glorify Thy infinite and unspeakable love and wisdom; who hast sent Thy +Son from the bosom of felicities to take upon Him our nature and our +misery and our guilt, and hast made the Son of God to become the Son of +Man, that we might become the sons of God and partakers of the divine +nature; since Thou hast so exalted human nature be pleased also to +sanctify my person, that by a conformity to the humility and laws and +sufferings of my dearest Saviour I may be united to His Spirit, and be +made all one with the most holy Jesus. Amen. + +O holy and eternal Jesus, who didst pity mankind lying in his blood and +sin and misery, and didst choose our sadnesses and sorrows that Thou +mightest make us to partake of Thy felicities; Let Thine eyes pity me, +Thy hands support me, Thy holy feet tread down all the difficulties in +my way to heaven; let me dwell in Thy heart, be instructed with Thy +wisdom, moved by Thy affections, choose with Thy will, and be clothed +with Thy righteousness; that in the day of judgement I may be found +having on Thy garments, sealed with Thy impression; and that, bearing +upon every faculty and member the character of {239} my elder Brother, +I may not be cast out with strangers and unbelievers. Amen. + +O holy and ever blessed Spirit, who didst overshadow the Holy +Virgin-mother of our Lord, and caused her to conceive by a miraculous +and mysterious manner; be pleased to overshadow my soul, and enlighten +my spirit, that I may conceive the holy Jesus in my heart, and may bear +Him in my mind, and may grow up to the fullness of the stature of +Christ, to be a perfect man in Christ Jesus. Amen. + +To God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ; to the eternal Son that +was incarnate and born of a virgin; to the Spirit of the Father and the +Son, be all honour and glory, worship and adoration, now and for ever. +Amen.--Jeremy Taylor, _Holy Living_; see his _Works_, vol. iii. p. 238. + + + + +NOTE H. See vol. ii. p. 147. + +THE ORIGIN OF THE MAXIM--'IN NECESSARIIS UNITAS, ETC.' + +The expression 'In necessariis unitas, in non necessariis libertas, in +omnibus caritas' is cited by Richard Baxter in the dedication of _On +the True and Only Way of Concord of all Christian Churches_, 1679, +thus, 'I once more quote you the pacificator's old and despised words.' +But the pacificator appears to be no one older than a Protestant who +wrote (1620 to 1640), under the name of Rupertus Meldenius, a +_Paraenesis votiva pro pace ecclesiae ad theologos Augustanae +Confessionis_. In the Paraenesis occurs the sentence 'si nos +servaremus in necessariis unitatem, in non necessariis libertatem, in +utrisque caritatem optimo certe loco essent res nostrae.' See A. P. +Stanley in _Macmillan_, {240} Sep., 1875, referring to G. C. F. Luecke, +_Ueber das Alter, den Verfasser, die urspruengliche Fonn und den wahren +Sinn des kirchlichen Friedensspruchs_: 'in necessariis unitas &c.,' +Goettingen, 1850. + +This information was supplied me in correction of a mistaken +attribution of the saying of which I was guilty in a sermon; and has +been verified for me by Mr. Arthur Hirtzel. The saying has been +commonly attributed to St. Augustine, and indeed the matter of it is +thoroughly in his spirit; cf. my _Ephesians_, p. 272; and see also _De +Gen. ad litt._, viii. 5: 'Melius est dubitare de occultis quam litigare +de incertis.' _De Civ. Dei_, xix. 18: 'qua [i.e. faith in scripture] +salva atque certa, de quibusdam rebus quas neque sensu, neque ratione +percepimus, neque nobis per Scripturam canonicam claruerunt, nec per +testes, quibus non credere absurdum est, in nostram notitiam +pervenerunt, sine iusta reprehensione dubitamus.' + + + + +NOTE I. See vol. ii. p. 179. + +ST. AUGUSTINE'S TEACHING THAT 'THE CHURCH IS THE BODY OF CHRIST OFFERED +IN THE EUCHARIST.' + +The following passages are full of interest:--_De Civ. D._ x. 6: 'So +that the whole redeemed city, that is the congregation and society of +the saints, is offered as a universal sacrifice to God by the High +Priest, who offered nothing less than Himself in suffering for us, so +that we might become the body of so glorious a head, according to that +'form of a servant' which He had taken. For it was this (our human +nature) that He offered, in this that He was offered, because it is in +respect of this that He is mediator, priest and sacrifice.' Then after +a reference to Rom. xii. 1-6 {241} he continues, 'This is the Christian +sacrifice: the "many" become "one body in Christ." And it is this that +the Church celebrates by means of the sacrament of the altar, familiar +to the faithful, where it is shown to her that in what she offers she +herself is offered.' And x. 20: Of Christ's perfect sacrifice of +Himself 'He willed the Church's sacrifice to be a daily sacrament. For +as she is the body of Him the head, she learns through Him to offer up +herself.' Again xix. 23: 'God's most glorious and best sacrifice is we +ourselves, that is His city, of which we celebrate the mystery in our +oblations, which are known to the faithful.' Cf. xxii. 10: 'The +sacrifice itself is the body of Christ, which is not offered to them +(the martyrs), for they themselves also are it' (quia hoc sunt et +ipsi). Cf. _Serm._ 227: 'If you have well received (the body of Christ +in the sacrament) you are what you have received ... He willed us to be +His sacrifice.' + +In all this we have a very plain and much forgotten teaching. But we +must not misunderstand St. Augustine's use of apparently exclusive +language--as if the sacrifice of ourselves was the only sacrifice +offered in the eucharist. The sacrifice of the Church is offered up +through Christ. Thus he also speaks of the celebration of the +eucharist (on the occasion of his mother's death, _Conf._ ix. 12) in +the phrase 'the sacrifice of our ransom (pretii nostri) was offered for +her.' + +We do well to remember by the way that in _De Civ._ x. 5, 6, St. +Augustine twice over defines what he means by sacrifice thus: 'A true +sacrifice is everything that is done in order that we may by a holy +fellowship inhere in God.' + + + + +OXFORD: HORACE HART + +PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY + + + + +_A Series of Simple Expositions_ + +_of_ + +_Portions of the New Testament_ + +BY THE + +REV. CHARLES GORE. + + +THE SERMON ON THE MOUNT. + +THE EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS. + +THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. In Two Vols. + + + +IN CONTEMPLATION. + +THE EPISTLES OF ST. JOHN. + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, Vol. +II, by Charles Gore + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS, VOL. 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