THE MYSTERY OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD
THE SECRET OF JESUS’ MESSIAHSHIP AND PASSION
BY
ALBERT SCHWEITZER
Author of “The Quest of the Historical Jesus”
TRANSLATED WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY
WALTER LOWRIE
NEW YORK
DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY
1914
DEDICATED WITH SINCERE
RESPECT AND DEVOTION TO
_Dr. H. J. Holtzmann_
BY HIS GRATEFUL PUPIL
ALBERT SCHWEITZER
[pg 003]
PREFACE
THE attempt to write a life of Jesus, commencing not at the beginning
but in the middle, with the thought of the Passion, must of necessity
sometime be made. Strange that it has not been made earlier, for it is
in the air!
The fact is that all presentations of the life of Jesus are
satisfactory up to a certain point,—the inception of the thought of
the Passion. There, however, the connection fails. Not one of them
succeeds in rendering intelligible why Jesus now suddenly counts his
death necessary, and in what sense he conceives it as a saving act. In
order to establish this connection one must try the experiment of
making the thought of the Passion the point of departure, for the sake
of rendering the former and latter periods of the life of Jesus
comprehensible. If we do not understand the idea of the Passion, may
not that be due to the fact that we have formed an erroneous notion of
the first period of the life of Jesus and so have precluded for
ourselves in advance all possibility of attaining insight into the
genesis of the Passion idea?
The last years of research have revealed on [pg 004] what slight
grounds our historical conception of the life of Jesus really rests.
It cannot be concealed that we are confronted by a difficult antinomy.
Either Jesus really took himself to be the Messiah, or (as a new
tendency of the study now seems to suggest) this dignity was first
ascribed to him by the early Church. In either case the “Life of
Jesus” remains equally enigmatical.
If Jesus really regarded himself as Messiah, how comes it that he
acted as if he were not Messiah? How is it to be explained that his
office and dignity seem to have nothing to do with his public
activity? How are we to account for the fact that only after his
public activity was ended (not to reckon the last few days at
Jerusalem) did he disclose to his Disciples who he was, and at the
same time enjoined upon them strict silence with regard to this
_secret?_ It explains nothing to suggest that such conduct was
prescribed by motives of prudence or by pedagogical considerations. In
the Synoptical accounts where is there even the slightest hint that
Jesus wished to educate the Disciples and the people up to a knowledge
of his messiahship?
The more one thinks about it the more clearly one recognises how
little the assumption that Jesus took himself to be the Messiah [pg
005] suffices to explain his “life,” inasmuch as no connection
whatever results between his selfconsciousness and his public
activity. It may sound banal to ask the question, but it is one which
cannot on that account be avoided, why Jesus never tried through
instruction to raise the people up to the new ethical conception of
messiahship. The attempt would not have been so hopeless as one
commonly assumes, for at that time there was a deep spiritual movement
going on in Israel. Why did Jesus maintain persistent silence about
his conception of messiahship?
On the other hand, if one assumes that he did not take himself to be
the Messiah, it must be explained how he came to be made Messiah after
his death. Certainly it was not on the ground of his public activity,
for this had nothing to do with his messiahship. But then again, what
was the significance of the revelation of the secret of his
messiahship to the Twelve and the confession before the high-priest?
It is a mere act of violence to declare these scenes unhistorical. If
one resolves upon such aggression, what is there then left of the
whole Gospel tradition?
And withal one should not forget, that if Jesus did not take himself
to be the Messiah, this means the death blow to the Christian [pg 006]
faith. The judgment of the early Church is not binding upon us. The
Christian religion is founded upon the messianic consciousness of
Jesus, whereby he himself in a signal manner sharply distinguished his
own person from the rank of the other preachers of religious morality.
If now he did not take himself to be the Messiah, then the whole of
Christianity rests—to use honestly a much perverted and abused
word—upon a “value judgment” formed by the adherents of Jesus of
Nazareth after his death!
Let us not forget that we are dealing here with an antinomy from which
only one conclusion can be drawn, namely, that what has hitherto been
accounted the “historical” conception of the messianic consciousness
of Jesus is false, because it does not explain the history. Only that
conception is historical which makes it intelligible how Jesus could
take himself to be the Messiah without finding himself obliged to make
this consciousness of his tell as a factor in his public ministry for
the Kingdom of God,—rather, how he was actually compelled to make the
messianic dignity of his person a secret! Why was his messiahship a
secret of Jesus? To explain this means to understand his life.
This new conception of the life of Jesus has [pg 007] grown out of a
perception of the nature of this antinomy. How far it is capable of
solving the problem may be determined by the result of further
discussion. I publish this new view as a _sketch,_ since it belongs of
necessity within the frame of this work on the Lord’s Supper. I hope,
however, from the criticism of its general lines to reach greater
clearness with regard to many exegetical details before I can think of
giving these thoughts definitive shape in an elaborated “life of
Jesus.”
I have generally been able only to suggest the literary foundation, as
comports with the sketchy character of this presentation. Any one,
however, who is thoroughly familiar with this subject will readily
perceive that behind many an assertion here made there lurks more
detailed study of Synoptic texts than appears at the first glance.
For the Synoptic question especially, the new conception of the life
of Jesus is of great importance. From this point of view the
composition of the Synoptists appears much simpler and clearer. The
artificial redaction with which scholars have felt themselves
compelled to operate is very much reduced. The Sermon on the Mount,
the commission to the Twelve, and the eulogy of the Baptist are not
“composite speeches,” but were for the most [pg 008] part delivered as
they have been handed down to us. Also the form of the prophecy of the
Passion and the Resurrection is not to be ascribed to the early
Church, but Jesus did actually speak to his Disciples in these words
about his future. This very simplification of the literary problem and
the fact that the credibility of the Gospel tradition is thereby
enhanced is of great weight for the new interpretation of the life of
Jesus.
This simplification rests, however, not upon a naïve attitude towards
the Gospel accounts, but is brought about by insight into the laws
whereby the early Christian conception and estimate of the person of
Jesus conditioned the representation of his life and work. Here is a
question which hitherto has not been treated perhaps systematically
enough.
On the one hand it is indeed certain that the early Church had a
significant influence upon the representation of the public activity
of Jesus. But on the other hand we have again in the very nature of
the early Christian faith justification for the presumption that the
Church did not alter the main lines of the account, and above all that
it did not “fabricate facts” in the life of Jesus. For in fact the
early Church maintained an attitude of indifference towards the life
of Jesus as such! [pg 009] The early Christian faith had not the least
interest in this earthly life, because the messiahship of Jesus was
grounded upon his resurrection, not upon his earthly ministry, and the
disciples looking forward expectantly to the coming of the Messiah in
glory were interested in the earthly life of Jesus of Nazareth only in
so far as it served to illustrate his sayings. There was absolutely no
such thing as an early Christian conception of the life of Jesus, and
the Synoptic Gospels contain nothing of the sort. They string together
the narratives of the events of his public ministry without trying to
make them intelligible in their sequence and connection, or to enable
us to perceive the “development” of Jesus. Then in the course of time,
as the eschatological expectation waned, as the emphasis upon the
earthly appearing of Jesus as the Messiah began to preponderate, and
thus led to a particular view (a theory) of the life of Jesus, the
accounts of his public ministry had already assumed so fixed a form
that they could not be affected by this process. The Fourth Gospel
furnishes a historical picture of the life of Jesus, but it stands in
much the same relation to the Synoptic account of the public ministry
of Jesus as does Chronicles to the books of Samuel and Kings. The [pg
010] difference between the Fourth Gospel and the Synoptics consists
precisely in the fact that the former furnishes a “life of Jesus”
whereas the Synoptics give an account of his public ministry.
The faith of the early Church influenced by immanent laws the mode in
which the public ministry of Jesus was represented, just as the
Deuteronomic reform affected men’s conception of the course of events
during the period of the judges and the Kings. It was a case of
inevitable and unconscious shifting of the perspective. The new view
here presented takes due account of this shifting of the perspective,
and from this reckoning it results that the influence which the belief
of the early Christian community exerted upon the Synoptical accounts
does not go nearly so deep as we have hitherto been inclined to
suppose.
_Strassburg, August, 1901._
[pg 011]
Contents
Author’s Preface [3]
Translator’s Introduction [17]
Footnotes
CHAPTER I THE MODERN “HISTORICAL” SOLUTION
1. Summary account of it [59]
2. The four assumptions upon which it is based [63]
3. The two contrasted periods (first assumption) [64]
4. The influence of the Pauline theory of the atonement upon the
formulation of the Synoptical prediction of the Passion (second
assumption) [70]
5. The Kingdom of God as an ethical entity in the Passion Idea
(third assumption) [73]
6. The form of the Prediction of the Passion (fourth assumption) [80]
7. Résumé [81]
CHAPTER II THE “DEVELOPMENT” OF JESUS
1. The Kingdom of God as an ethical and as an eschatological fact [84]
2. The eschatological character of the charge to the Twelve [87]
3. The new view [92]
CHAPTER III THE PREACHING OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD
1. The new morality as repentance [94]
2. The ethics of Jesus and modern ethics [99]
CHAPTER IV THE SECRET OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD
1. The parables of the secret of the Kingdom of God [106]
2. The secret of the Kingdom of God in the address to the people
after the mission of the Twelve [110]
3. The secret of the Kingdom of God in the light of the Prophetic
and Jewish expectation [112]
4. The secret of the Kingdom of God and the assumption of a
fortunate Galilean period [115]
5. The secret of the Kingdom of God and the universalism of
Jesus [117]
6. The secret of the Kingdom of God and Jesus’ attitude towards
the Law and the State [119]
7. The modern element in Jesus’ eschatology [120]
CHAPTER V The Secret of the Kingdom of God in the Thought of the
Passion [124]
CHAPTER VI THE CHARACTER ASCRIBED TO JESUS ON THE GROUND OF HIS
PUBLIC MINISTRY
1. The problem and the facts [127]
2. Jesus is Elijah through his solidarity with the Son of Man [135]
3. Jesus is Elijah through the signs which proceed from Him [139]
4. The victory over demons and the secret of the Kingdom of God [143]
5. Jesus and the Baptist [145]
6. The Baptist and Jesus [147]
7. The blind man at Jericho and the ovation at the entrance of
Jesus to Jerusalem [156]
CHAPTER VII AFTER THE MISSION OF THE TWELVE LITERARY AND HISTORICAL
PROBLEMS
1. The voyage on the lake after the return of the Twelve [164]
2. The supper by the seashore [168]
3. The week at Bethsaida [174]
CHAPTER VIII THE SECRET OF MESSIAHSHIP
1. From the Mount of Transfiguration to Cæsarea Philippi [180]
2. The futuristic character of Jesus’ messiahship [185]
3. The Son of Man and the futuristic character of Jesus’
messiahship [190]
4. The resurrection of the dead and the futuristic character of
Jesus’ messiahship [201]
5. The betrayal by Judas—the last disclosure of the secret of
messiahship [214]
CHAPTER IX THE SECRET OF THE PASSION
1. The pre-messianic affliction [219]
2. The idea of the Passion in the first period [223]
3. The “Temptation” and the divine omnipotence [226]
4. The idea of the Passion in the second period [230]
5. Isaiah 40-66: the secret of the Passion foretold in the
Scripture [236]
6. The “human” element in the secret of the Passion [240]
7. The idea of the Passion in the primitive Church. The shifting
of the perspective [242]
CHAPTER X
Summary of the Life of Jesus [253]
Postscript [274]
THE MYSTERY OF
THE KINGDOM OF GOD
[pg 017]
AN INTRODUCTION
BY THE TRANSLATOR
1. An Account of Schweitzer’s Work and Its Reception.
THE work which is here translated was published in 1901 as the
_second_ part of a treatise entitled _Das Abendmahl._ The full title
reads: _The Lord’s Supper in connection with the Life of Jesus and the
History of Early Christianity._ This second part was issued separately
and bore also the following sub-title: _Das Messianitäts und
Leidensgeheimnis. Eine Skizze des Lebens Jesu._
It implies no disparagement of Schweitzer’s novel and important study
of the Lord’s Supper that this second part is here separated from the
first and published by itself in English. This part is really
independent. It has moreover a much broader scope and appeals to a far
wider interest than does the treatise as a whole. There is reason to
fear that, appearing as a part of a study of the Lord’s Supper and
under that title, it might be ignored by many of the persons who most
would desire to read it. The scant [pg 018] attention accorded at
first to Schweitzer’s work in Germany may be ascribed in part to that
very cause, and there appears to be no other reason to account for the
fact that the “Sketch” has not yet been publicly noticed in England or
America, so far as the translator is aware.
It will not be denied, even by those who are least inclined to agree
with the views of the Author, that this first work of the young
Strassburg student did not deserve the oblivion which seemed to
threaten it for some years after its appearance. It is manifest now
that Schweitzer’s theory, to say the least of it, must be _reckoned_
with by every one who would seriously study the Gospels or the Life of
Jesus. Obviously it was not the weakness of the book, but rather its
strong originality, and in particular the trenchant way in which it
demolished the “liberal life of Jesus,” which accounts for the passive
hostility with which it was greeted. In fact it contained more than
could be readily digested at once either by a liberal or a
conservative mind. Most of the New Testament students in Germany had
collaborated in the fabrication of the “liberal life of Jesus” and
they could not patiently endure to see their work destroyed. Those
among us who fancy that German [pg 019] professors are bloodless
beings who live in an atmosphere purified of passion and prejudice,
need to be informed that on the contrary they are human, all too
human. The animosities of party and school and the jealousies of the
cathedra have been proverbial for generations. The reception accorded
to Schweitzer’s work does not seem creditable. It was met by something
like a conspiracy of silence.
Schweitzer, however, _compelled_ attention by the publication in 1906
of a much larger work entitled, _“Von Reimarus zu Wrede,”_ which is a
history of the study of the life of Jesus during the last century. A
work like this, practically the only one of its sort, supplied a felt
need and could not be passed by without notice. Schweitzer’s own view,
however, though it was presented clearly in this volume, was still not
taken due account of in Germany. Jülicher’s supercilious criticism in
_“Neue Linien”_ (190—) is characteristic of the treatment it received.
The translator knows of no prominent scholar in Germany who has
cordially welcomed Schweitzer’s view, nor of any that has thoroughly
and ably opposed it. They have been occupied there rather with
Wrede’s_(_1_)_acute criticism of the messianic element in the Gospels
[pg 020] and with the denial by Drews_(_2_)_and others of the
historical existence of Jesus. To destructive criticism of this sort
Schweitzer’s own work is the best answer. The only work which
seriously reckons with this new point of view is a brief but
magisterial book by H. J. Holtzmann: _Das messianische Bewusstsein
Jesu,_ 1907.
Very different was the reception of Schweitzer’s latter work in
England. The interest there centred at once upon Schweitzer’s own
view. In 1907, the year after its publication, Professor Sanday
delivered a course of lectures at Oxford and Cambridge in which he
enthusiastically accepted Schweitzer’s position with hardly a
reservation._(_3_)_In 1910 this second work of Schweitzer’s was
translated into English and published under the title: _The Quest of
the Historical Jesus,_ with a preface by Professor Burkitt. By this
time the interest in Schweitzer and his theory had become a furore
among the younger men in Oxford and Cambridge. But just then there
came an emissary from Germany, Professor Ernst von Dobschütz, who
essayed to disprove Schweitzer’s theory in a course of lectures
delivered at [pg 021] Oxford in 1909._(_4_)_Whereupon Professor
Sanday, in a pathetic article in the _Hibbert Journal_ for October,
1911, retracted his support of Schweitzer’s position. He felt that he
had been over hasty in adopting it. And so indeed it seems he was, for
it appears that in preparing his lectures he had not taken the pains
to read the “Sketch,” that is to say, Schweitzer’s first and
fundamental and most carefully reasoned argument for his view. By the
same token Canon Sanday seems to have been over hasty in making his
retraction, for he had not _yet_ read the “Sketch,”—and von Dobschütz’
criticism after all is not very impressive.
In America the whole question has been simply ignored. It generally
takes, in fact, about a decade for an important foreign work to reach
us,—except in the case of a very few scholars who have already gained
our ear. According to this reckoning it is time the “Sketch” were
translated. In view both of the acceptance which Schweitzer’s theory
has met with in England and of the opposition made to it there, it is
high time that his most cogent and careful statement of his position
be made known. For although Schweitzer’s position is restated in his
latter work already [pg 022] translated into English, and is there
also illuminated from various sides, particularly in its relation to
Wrede’s work—which appeared in the same year as the “Sketch” and is so
strikingly like it so far as its criticism goes and so different in
its result,—yet it cannot be adequately appreciated without a study of
the earlier work.
It is known that Albert Schweitzer has for some time been preparing to
go as medical missionary to the Congo. But in spite of his medical
studies he has recently found time to publish a brilliant “History of
Pauline Study since the Reformation.”_(_5_)_This is in a way a
continuation of the history of the study of the life of Jesus. Here
again Schweitzer has a view of his own: in all the complexity of
Paul’s thought he perceives a unity which is due to the pervading
eschatological outlook. Fortunately, this view of his own, instead of
being appended to the historical study, as in the former book, is to
be published separately under the title: _Die Mystic des Apostles
Paulus._ This practical measure will insure that it shall not be
overlooked. It is to be hoped too that it will not have to wait long
for an English translation.
[pg 023]
Professor Schweitzer found time also to prepare a new and much
enlarged edition of his _Geschichte der Leben-Jesu-Forschung_ (History
of the Study of the Life of Jesus), which is the title by which he now
more aptly describes his well known work. He has brought this history
down to date, and in the short concluding chapter he suggests a number
of pregnant reflections which will later be referred to in this
introduction with the aim of conciliating this archæological world of
Jesus’ thought with our religious estimate of his person. It must be
recognised from the outset that _time_ is necessary for such an
adjustment. The perception of the eschatological character of the
Gospels is a sudden emergency: we have not yet had time to assimilate
it.
At this writing Professor Schweitzer is already at work as medical
missionary in Africa. It is of interest to know that his plan is to
return after three years to Europe, and again after an equal period;
to Africa. On account of the radical character of his critical works
he was not accepted as a fellow-worker in any of the German missions
and is labouring in conjunction with (though independently and at his
own expense) the station of the Paris Evangelical [pg 024] Missionary
Society at Lambarene in French Equatorial Africa—the country which
used to be called the French Congo. “Schweitzer as Missionary” is the
title of an article in the _Hibbert Journal_ for July 1914 based upon
the printed circular letters which he sends to his friends and
supporters. In a letter to the translator he speaks of his efforts to
mitigate the scourge of leprosy and the sleeping sickness as an
example of “practical eschatology.”
2. The Significance of Schweitzer’s Work.
The opportuneness of Schweitzer’s eschatological interpretation of the
life of Jesus appears the more manifest the more one knows of the
recent history of Gospel study. To bring that out clearly is the
special purpose of the Author in his _Quest of the Historical Jesus,_
particularly in chapters I, XIX, and XX. It could not be done better.
At all events such a task is obviously beyond the scope of this
introduction. Here it need only be pointed out that Schweitzer’s
theory, striking as it is, did not spring into being without roots in
a soil prepared for it. The eschatological question itself had been
sharply brought to the fore. Contention for and against the
recognition of it as an important [pg 025] element in the Gospels was
the order of the day. All that tended to concentrate attention upon
the problem of the personal consciousness of Jesus (as, in particular,
Baldensperger’s work),_(_6_)_was a direct preparation for Schweitzer.
Johannes Weiss had already stood out as the foremost champion of
eschatology in the Gospel._(_7_)_His recognition of eschatology was
confined, however, to the _teaching of Jesus._ Hence he did not avail
himself of it for the solution of the historical problems. For this
reason he cannot be regarded as an exponent—to use Schweitzer’s
phrase—of “thoroughgoing eschatology” (konsequente Eschatologie). But
the solution Schweitzer proposed was already “in the air,” as he said
himself in his preface. That presentiment was strikingly fulfilled in
the fact that in the selfsame year Wrede published a book with a title
almost identical, which envisaged the same problems in the same way,
only that it sought to solve them by eliminating eschatology as an
intrusion in the historical narrative, thus resulting in
“thoroughgoing scepticism.” Schweitzer is justified in insisting that
his work and [pg 026] Wrede’s cannot be played off against each other,
but constitute a combined attack, so far as concerns the criticism of
the common, liberal life of Jesus.
There is nothing audacious in Schweitzer’s proclamation of the
collapse of the liberal life of Jesus. He does not claim to have
destroyed it, he merely attests the fact of its collapse. “The Jesus
of Nazareth who appeared as the Messiah, proclaimed the morality of
the kingdom of God, established the kingdom of heaven upon earth, and
died in order to consecrate his work,—this Jesus never existed. It is
a figure sketched by Rationalism, enlivened by Liberalism, and dressed
up by Modern Theology in the clothes of historical
science.”_(_8_)_This fabric did not fall by reason of the strength of
any attack from without, but collapsed through its inherent weakness,
“shattered and cloven by the actual historical problems which one
after another emerged and would not down in spite of all the cunning,
art, artifice, and force” which was expended upon this picture of
Jesus during the last hundred years. In spite of the protestation that
this picture still stands undemolished, no one can be found any more
to write a liberal life of Jesus. On [pg 027] the other hand sceptical
works have multiplied so rapidly that it would be difficult to
enumerate them here. After Kalthoff_(_9_)_ and Drews_(_10_)_the
designation of “thoroughgoing scepticism” can hardly be applied to
Wrede’s theory. All the books of this class owe what appearance of
strength they have, not to their inherent worth, but to the weakness
of the theory which opposes them—the current liberal life of Jesus.
Solely with a view to maintaining the integrity of this picture it has
been found necessary from time to time to sacrifice so much of the
documentary evidence—the Synoptic Gospels or their sources—upon which
the history of Jesus reposes, that in the end it seems not very
unreasonable for Drews and others to assume, from the admissions of
their opponents, that there is no convincing historical evidence for
the existence of Jesus, and that the real task of the scholar is to
show how such a figure was invented.
“It is extraordinary,” says Schweitzer in the last chapter of the new
edition of his History of the Life of Jesus Study, “how it has fared
with the study of the life of Jesus. It set out to find the historical
[pg 028] Jesus, and fancied that when he was found he could be set,
just as he is, in the midst of our age as Teacher and Saviour. It
loosed the bands which fettered him to the rock of ecclesiastical
dogma, and rejoiced when life and movement returned to the figure and
the historical man Jesus was seen approaching. He did not stay,
however, but passed our age by and returned again to his own. That is
what astonished and alarmed the theology of the last decades,—that by
no violence of misinterpretation could they succeed in keeping him in
our age, but had to let him go. He returned to his own age with the
same necessity that the freed pendulum swings back to its original
position.
“The historical foundation of Christianity, as rationalism,
liberalism, and modern theology count it, exists no longer,—which,
however, is not to say that Christianity has therefore lost its
historical foundation. The work which historical theology believed it
must carry out, and which it sees falling to pieces at the very moment
when the completion was near, is only the terra cotta veneer of the
true, indestructible, historical foundation, which is independent of
any historical [pg 029] knowledge and proof—simply because it is
there, it exists.
“Jesus is something to our world because a mighty stream of spiritual
influence has gone forth from him and has penetrated our age also.
This fact will be neither shaken nor confirmed by an historical
knowledge.
“One fancied he could be more to our time by the fact that he entered
it vitally as a man of our humanity. That, however, is not possible.
For one reason, because this Jesus never so existed. Also, because
historical knowledge, though it can clarify spiritual life already
existing, can never awaken life. It is able to reconcile the present
with the past; to a certain degree it can transport the present into
the past; but to construct the present is not within its power.
“One cannot estimate highly enough what the study of the life of Jesus
has accomplished. It is a great and unique demonstration of veracity
and love of the truth,—one of the most significant occurrences in the
whole spiritual life of mankind. What the modern-liberal and the
popularising investigation has done, in spite of all its errors, for
the present and for the coming state of religion can only be measured
when one takes [pg 030] into comparison the Roman Catholic—or more
broadly the Latin—culture and literature which has been touched little
or not at all by the influence of these spirits.
“And yet the disillusion had to come. We modern theologians are too
proud of our historical learning, too proud of our historical Jesus,
too confident in our faith in what our historical theology can
spiritually contribute to the world. The notion that by historical
knowledge we can construct a new and vigorous Christianity and let
loose spiritual forces in the world dominates us like a fixed idea and
does not permit us to perceive that all we have done thereby is to
assail, not the great religious problem itself, but one of the
problems of general culture which is entrenched in front of it, and
which we would solve as well as we can. We thought that we had to lead
our age as it were through a by-path, through the historical Jesus, in
order that it might come to Jesus who is present spiritual power. The
by-path is now barred by real history.
“We were in danger of putting ourselves between men and the Gospels
and not leaving the individual any longer alone with the sayings of
Jesus.
“We were in danger, too, of presenting to [pg 031] them a Jesus that
was too little, because we had forced him into man’s measure and into
the mould of average human psychology. Read through the ‘lives of
Jesus’ since the sixties and behold what they have made of the
imperial words of our Lord, what a weak and ambiguous sense they have
put upon his peremptory, other-worldly requisitions, in order that he
might not clash with our ideals of civilisation and his
other-worldliness might be brought to terms with our this-worldliness.
Many of his greatest words one finds lying in a corner, a heap of
discharged spring-bolts. We make Jesus speak with our time another
language than that which passed his lips.
“Thereby we ourselves became impotent and deprived our own thoughts of
their proper energy by transposing them into history and making them
speak to us out of antiquity. It is nothing less than a tragedy for
modern theology that it confounds with history everything it attempts
to expound, and is actually proud of the virtuosity with which it
contrives to discover its own thoughts in the past.
“Therefore there is hopeful significance in the fact that modern
theology with its study of the life of Jesus, however long it may
resist [pg 032] by the invention of fresh shifts and expedients, must
in the end find itself deluded in its manufactured history, overcome
by real history and by the facts—which according to Wrede’s fine
saying are often more radical than theories.
“What is the historical Jesus to us when we keep him clear of any
admixture of the present with the past? We have the immediate
impression that his person, in spite of all that is strange and
enigmatical, has something great to say to all ages, as long as the
world endures, may views and knowledge change never so much, and that
it means therefore to our religion also a far-reaching enrichment. It
behooves us to bring this elementary feeling to a clear expression, so
that it may not soar away in dogmatic assertions and phrases and
beguile historical science ever anew into the hopeless undertaking of
modernising Jesus by diluting or explaining away what is historically
conditioned in his preaching, as though he would become more to us
thereby.
“The whole study of the life of Jesus has in fine only the one aim, of
establishing the natural and unbiased conception of the earliest
accounts. In order to know Jesus and to apprehend him there is need of
no preparatory [pg 033] erudition. It is also not requisite that a man
comprehend the details of Jesus’ public ministry and be able to
construct with them a ‘life of Jesus.’ His nature, and that which he
is and wills, appears in certain lapidary expressions of his and
forces itself upon us. One _knows_ him without knowing much about him,
and apprehends the eschatological note even if he attain no clear
conception of the details. For this is the characteristic thing about
Jesus, that he looks beyond the perfection and blessedness of the
individual to the perfection and blessedness of the world and of an
elect humanity. His will and his hope is fixed upon the Kingdom of
God.”
It is much to be wondered at that conservative scholars have not
generally recognised the strong constructive consequences of
Schweitzer’s theory, in particular the proof it incidentally affords
of the historical worth of the Synoptic Gospels. Schweitzer
rehabilitates the credit of S. Mark’s Gospel simply by showing that no
important parts of it need be discarded on the ground that they are
inconsistent with the sketch which he draws of the history of Jesus.
When it is objected to him that he bases his view upon “the weakest
passages,” it is time we make clear to [pg 034] ourselves that
“strong” and “weak” in this connection mean no more than _consistent_
or _inconsistent_ with the _assumptions_ of the modern “liberal life
of Jesus.” It is only a roundabout way of begging the question.
Generally speaking, such a document as Mark, antecedent to any theory
we may attempt to apply, must be presumed to be of pretty equal value
throughout. That theory which, without artifice or violence, best
accords with the greatest number of facts recorded, and so best
preserves the credit of the documents upon which it seeks to found
itself, is presumably the right theory. Schweitzer’s view, as he
himself says in the Preface, greatly simplifies and clarifies the
Synoptic problem. It is no longer necessary to attribute so much to
“the editor’s hand.” The Sermon on the Mount, the Charge to the
Twelve, and the Eulogy over the Baptist are not collections of
scattered sayings, but were in the main delivered as they have come
down to us. Especially important is the recognition that even for
constructing the history of Jesus Mark by itself does not suffice: the
discourses in Matthew are invaluable indications.
Nor is this the only positive and comforting element in Schweitzer’s
view. In the Postscript he has himself laid stress upon the [pg 035]
aim of his work: “to impress upon the modern age and upon modern
theology the figure of Jesus in its overwhelming heroic greatness.”
And this he has accomplished in unexpected ways. The figure of Jesus
which we have striven so hard to bring into nearness and sympathy
through our psychological analysis has eluded our grasp, and under the
hands of the historian and archæologist it has receded inexorably into
the remote past and into a corner of Galilee. It looks to us strange
and even petty in its remote Galilean surroundings. Now that figure,
by the force of an elemental energy, is seen to break the shackles
which would bind it to a particular time and place and become—not
modern, indeed, but—universal.
One may easily be so much absorbed with the difficulties in the way of
accepting Schweitzer’s construction as to ignore the light which it
sheds upon some of the major difficulties of the traditional view with
which we have long wrestled in vain. One may mention at least eight
obscure points which are illuminated for the first time by the
eschatological view of the Gospel history. 1. Jesus’ use of the title
“Son of Man,”—commonly in the third person and with a futuristic
sense, as denoting a dignity and [pg 036] power which were _not yet_
his. Jesus was the Messiah designate. 2. The position of John the
Baptist: it was Jesus alone that discovered in him the character of
Elijah “the Coming One” (cf. Jn 1:21 ). 3. The conception of the
Kingdom of God as a _gift,_ to be received passively as by a little
child—and yet as a thing that “violent men” must wrest to themselves
“by force.” 4. The relation of Jesus’ messianic expectation to that
which was current among the people. Jesus moralised the popular
eschatological ideal by combining it with the preaching of the
Prophets. That Jesus opposed a purely moral ideal to a popular
political agitation is doubly a fiction. 5. The significance of the
Mission of the Twelve and its connection with the popular excitement
which drew five thousand men into the desert by the seashore. 6. The
significance of the Transfiguration, coming _before_ the Confession of
Peter, and explaining how the knowledge of Jesus’ Messiahship was
given by divine revelation. 7. The character of the secret which Judas
possessed and was in a position to betray. Our notion that during the
last days in Jerusalem every one knew of Jesus’ claim to be the Christ
is plainly contrary to the record. The famous disputes [pg 037] of
those days would have taken a very different form if the question
which agitated all minds was, Is he the Christ? or is he not? 8.
Jesus’ notion of the _necessity_ of his death, his resolution to die
at Jerusalem, and his conception that he was giving his life as “a
ransom for _many.”_
Unquestionably it is no easy matter to assimilate so novel and
striking a view as that of Schweitzer. To bring it into relation with
the presuppositions of our religious view in general involves
demolition and reconstruction—a labor heavy and grievous to the soul.
The mind instinctively recoils from such a labour and is fain to
protect itself by a general repudiation and denial. Moreover the
Author has presented his view with a naked simplicity which, while it
renders it easier to understand and more difficult to confute, makes
it also, one must confess, more difficult to accept. We are not
inclined to accept opinions in the face of a display of force, and as
it were at the muzzle of a gun—even when the gun is loaded with logic.
Practically we must first contrive to see how the opinions may be made
acceptable. This task the Author has not unreasonably left to
us,—although a careful study of his work will reveal many suggestions
helpful to this end. [pg 038] The translator has read this little book
not once but many times and through a course of years, with ever
increasing appreciation of its worth—not only in view of its logical
force but of its _acceptability._ On the other hand, many of us have
felt that the liberal life of Jesus was becoming increasingly more
_unacceptable._
Canon Sanday confesses_(_11_)_that he recoils from Schweitzer’s view
chiefly on account of his “tendency to push things to extremes at the
dictates of logical consistency.” It is _too_ “thoroughgoing.” It
seems indeed as though the Author were inclined to press this word to
an extreme, proposing to explain _all_ the words and acts of Jesus
with reference to his eschatological outlook. But that is only a
threat. What he _has_ done falls very far short of it, and it is upon
_that_ we have to pass judgment. _That,_ in fact, is “thoroughgoing”
enough to justify the term even if it went no further. The principle
of “thorough” might very well apply to the construction of the history
as a whole without implying that every trait of Jesus’ life and
teaching was coloured by it and that he himself was so obsessed by a
single idea that he was unable to see things as they are. [pg 039]
This is precisely what the Gospels do not permit us to believe. It is
manifest that Jesus had a peculiarly acute sensibility to his
surroundings, whether it were nature or human society, and responded
feelingly, spontaneously. His sense of right and wrong was so clearly
intuitive that he could deal sovereignly with the Law. Schweitzer
himself furnishes suggestions which tend to render even the word
“Interimsethik” acceptable. Jesus’ moral teaching was oriented towards
the coming Kingdom. It was “penance” in preparation for the Kingdom of
God. But it was not for all this an arbitrary penance: like the ethics
of the Prophets it was the prescription of righteousness. In one sense
at least, it was not of merely transitory importance. From the
expectation of the approaching Kingdom it received a sharpness of
emphasis which it could not otherwise have had,—but it was a _true_
emphasis. It described the conduct appropriate to man in this present
world _so long as this world shall last_—a conduct which is justified
here by the expectation of a better world to come, “beyond good and
evil” if you will.
“Thoroughgoing eschatology” is surely not incompatible with the
recognition of a deeper [pg 040] intuition in Jesus which is necessary
to explain the intensity of this very eschatology itself. It would be
a rigorous extreme indeed which would exclude the recognition of
Jesus’ God-consciousness—his consciousness of God as Father—as the
primary and all-controlling fact of his religious experience. Nothing
is more obvious than that out of that consciousness he acted and spoke
_immediately._ And when his acts were influenced and his speech
coloured by the eschatological outlook, what was that ultimately but
the consciousness of God’s _nearness?_ How could the expectation of a
divine world be so constant and so vivid without the feeling that it
is in a sense locally near, imminent, impending, ready to break in,
indeed actually intruding upon this present world, as it were “the
finger of God” touching us here? Intuitional feeling, presentiment,
insight, does not readily distinguish between nearness in time and in
space. Jesus’ eschatology was an expression of his
God-consciousness—the most eminent expression of it.
Eschatology in the strict sense, with all its apocalyptic features,
has long ago passed out of our view of the world. Schweitzer shows us
with what justification the Church discarded it. But the feeling that
was behind [pg 041] it remains, and still constitutes the fundamental
experience of religion. It is the feeling of a divine environment,
close to us, unspeakably close, imminent, intruding even upon the
every-day world.
“This is the finger of God,
The flash of the will that can,
Existent behind all laws,
That made them, and lo! they are.”
Intuitional feeling is not especially inclined to express
the sense of God in terms of time. Space is the category
more familiar to it. Wordsworth finds terms to express
what is so intangible.
“Those obstinate questionings
Of sense and outward things,
Fallings from us, vanishings;
Blank misgivings of a creature
Moving about in worlds not realised
High instincts, before which our mortal nature
Did tremble like a guilty thing surprised.”
Apocalyptic eschatology no one could even wish to revive. But this
does not mean that Biblical eschatology—the expectation of the great
Event—must be dissolved in the modern hope of the gradual amelioration
of the world in the course of historical evolution. We cannot but feel
how great a breach that would constitute between our thought and the
[pg 042] mind of Jesus. Schweitzer remarks upon the heavy dose of
“resignation” which such a view implies. Strange that we do not more
often realise this! Does our optimism blind us to the fact that we
shall not partake in “the far off divine event”—except our spirit
survive the bodily death? _There_—in the hope of life beyond death—is
the expectation which we substitute for apocalyptic eschatology,—a
substitution so natural that it came about without observation. S.
Paul lived in the expectation of the coming of the Lord, but he
evidently felt no sense of incongruity when he expressed the feeling
that “to depart and be with Christ is very far better”—he was
referring to the natural death of the body and the hope of life
immediately beyond it. This is the hope which has ever since
characterised the Christian Church. To dwell upon that hope, to set
our “affections upon things above, where Christ is, seated at the
right hand of God”—that is “heavenly mindedness.” With respect to the
feeling at the base of it, it is not so very different from
apocalyptical eschatology. In this view Christian ethics still remains
“conditional”—you may call it _Interimsethik_ if you like. The conduct
it requires of us is conditioned by the hope of a future [pg 043] life
and is absurd under any other supposition. “The practice of the
presence of God” is the most fundamentally important religious
exercise. But if we succeed in persuading ourselves that here and now
we have the only kingdom of God we shall ever know; if all our
interest and effort is absorbed in realising a kingdom of God upon
earth; then not only have we need of “resignation,” but we cannot
avoid feeling the breach between our thought and activity and that of
Jesus. We are puzzled to distinguish between worldly and heavenly
mindedness because even our religious interest is focussed upon this
earth, as the sphere not only of our moral duty but of our ultimate
hope—the gradual evolution of a perfect human society. That is what we
have made of the Kingdom of God, interpreting it uneschatologically.
Is not this after all a more credulous hope than that which expects a
divine intervention, a “regeneration” of heaven and earth, which shall
prepare the fit abode for the perfect society? And does it not strike
at the very roots of the religious sentiment when we distract the mind
from its natural interest and curiosity about the Beyond? Our personal
fate is not so much involved in the far off amelioration of human
society as in something [pg 044] much nearer, very near and imminent,
the estate just beyond death. It is not altogether without reason that
in Christian dogmatics the name of eschatology has been applied to
this topic. The earlier type of eschatology Jesus himself has rendered
forevermore impossible. It is likely that the first objection _we_
feel to apocalyptic eschatology lies in the fact that it was expressed
in terms of an erroneous cosmology and is therefore incompatible with
our modern view of the world. But as a matter of fact apocalyptic
eschatology vanished from the vital creed of the Church long before
the cosmology upon which it was founded was proved to be false. It was
Jesus who brought it to an end. Another sort of eschatology promptly
took its place—another heavenly hope, which was substantially not
apocalyptic. Yet this doctrine too—the early Christian notion of the
soul and of heaven—was necessarily founded upon the opinions of
ancient science. The doctrine of the soul and the doctrine of heaven,
being less directly affected by the findings of modern science, have
been more slow to change in conformity with our changed view of the
world than has, for example, the doctrine of creation. But in their
old form they are none the less incompatible [pg 045] with our modern
thought; and for this reason we feel forced to put _every_ sort of
eschatology aside, we are no longer able to place the heavenly hope,
and the heavenly mindedness which it prompts, in the central position
which belongs to them. That is to say, we urgently need to express the
Christian doctrine of the soul in terms of the highest modern
psychology and to express our heavenly hope in terms of a modern
cosmology. We need a new cosmology! That may seem to express an
unpractical and fantastic desire. But it will not so seem to any one
who knows what his theory of the soul and his grandiose cosmology
meant practically and religiously to Gustav Theodor Fechner,_(_12_)_
or who has experienced what this may mean for the orientation of his
own personal religion. The old view of the world has passed away: we
have been too slothful and cowardly to take full possession of the
new. There is really nothing in the modern view of the world which
effectually precludes us from directing our hope and orienting our
life towards the Beyond, as did Jesus in his way, and as the early
Church did in its way. From the moment that Jesus passed into the
invisible and was there felt and recognised as the correspondent [pg
046] of our religious faculty we find that spatial terms better
express the substance of our heavenly mindedness than do temporal. We
“seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated on the right
hand of God.” To recognise that our “citizenship is in heaven” is not
to render ourselves inept for the performance of our duty upon earth.
Rather it needs to be reflected whether, without the detachment,
without the superiority to earthly circumstance, happy or untoward,
which comes from setting our “mind on the things that are above,” we
possess any fulcrum for doing a real work upon the world.
The eschatological interpretation of the Gospels does not thrust Jesus
so far from us as we are prone to think: rather calls us to approach
nearer to him, to share again more closely “the mind which was in
Christ Jesus” and which in one form or another has been at all times
the chief inspiration of the Church.
In his “Concluding Reflections” Schweitzer says: “Every full view of
life, cosmic philosophy, _Weltanschauung_ (the German word it is
impossible to translate) contains side by side elements which are
conditioned by the age as well as others which are unconditioned, for
it consists in the very fact that a penetrating _will_ has pervaded
and [pg 047] constituted the conceptual material furnished it by
history. This latter is subjected to change. Hence there is no
_Weltanschauung,_ however great and profound it may be, which does not
contain perishable material. But the will itself is timeless. It
reveals the unsearchable and primary nature of a person and determines
also the final and fundamental definition of his _Weltanschauung._ May
the conceptual material alter never so much, with consequent diversity
between the new _Weltanschauung_ and the old, yet these in reality
only lie just so far apart as the wills which constitute them diverge
in direction. The differences which are determined by the alteration
of the conceptual material are in the last analysis merely secondary
in importance, however emphatically they may make themselves felt; for
the same will, however different be the conceptual material in which
it manifests itself, always creates _Weltanschauungen_ which in their
nature correspond with one another and coincide.
“Since the time when man attained the conditions precedent to such an
apprehension and judgment of things as we might call in our sense a
_Weltanschauung_—that is, since the individual learned to take into
consideration the totality of being, the world as a [pg 048] whole,
and to reflect as a knowing and willing subject upon the reciprocal
relations of a passive and active sort which subsist between himself
and the All—no far-reaching development has really occurred in the
spiritual life of humanity. The problems of the Greeks turn up again
in the most modern philosophy. The scepticism of to-day is essentially
the same as that which came to expression in ancient thought.
“The primitive, late-Jewish metaphysic in which Jesus expressed his
_Weltanschauung_ aggravates exceedingly the difficulty of translating
his ideas into the formulas of our time. The task is quite impossible
so long as one tries to accomplish it by distinguishing in detail
between the permanent and the transitory. And what results as the
consequence of this procedure is so lacking in force and
conclusiveness that the enrichment it contributes to our religion is
rather apparent than real.
“In truth there can be no question of making distinction between
transitory and permanent, but only of transposing the original
constitutive thought of that _Weltanschauung_ into terms familiar to
us. How would the Will of Jesus—apprehended in its immediateness, in
its definiteness and in its whole [pg 049] compass—how would it
vitalise our thought material and construct from it a _Weltanschauung_
of so moral and so mighty a sort that it could be counted the modern
equivalent of that which he created in terms of the late-Jewish
metaphysics and eschatology?
“If one tries, as has been done hitherto almost invariably, to
reconcile Jesus’ _Weltanschauung_ with ours any way it will go—which
can be accomplished only by paring away all that is
characteristic—this procedure strikes also at the will which is
manifested in these conceptions.
“It loses its originality and is no longer able to exert an elemental
influence upon us. Hence it is that the Jesus of modern theology is so
extraordinarily lifeless. Left in his eschatological world he is
greater and, for all the strangeness, he affects us more elementally,
more mightily than the modern Jesus.
“Jesus’ deed consists in the fact that his original and profound moral
nature took possession of the late-Jewish eschatology and so gives
expression, in the thought material of the age, to the hope and the
will which are intent upon the ethical consummation of the world. All
attempts to avert one’s vision from this _Weltanschauung_ as a whole
and to make Jesus’ significance for us to consist in [pg 050] his
revelation of the “fatherhood of God,” the “brotherhood of man,” and
so forth, must therefore of necessity lead to a narrow and peculiarly
insipid conception of his religion. In reality he is an authority for
us, not in the sphere of knowledge, but only in the matter of the
will. His destined rôle can only consist in this, that he as a mighty
spirit quickens the motives of willing and hoping which we and our
fellowmen bear within us and brings them to such a height of intensity
and clarity as we could not have attained if we were left to ourselves
and did not stand under the impression of his personality, and that he
thus conforms our _Weltanschauung_ to his own in its very nature, in
spite of all the diversity of thought material, and awakens in it the
energies which are active in his.
“The last and deepest knowledge of things comes from the will. Hence
the movement of thought which strives to frame the final synthesis of
observations and knowledge in order to construct a _Weltanschauung_ is
determined in its direction by the will, which constitutes the primary
and the inexplicable ultimate essence of the persons and ages in
question.
“If our age and our religion have not apprehended the greatness of
Jesus and have [pg 051] been frightened back by the eschatological
colour of his thought, this was due only in part to the fact that they
could not accommodate themselves to the strangeness of it all. The
decisive reason was another. They lacked the strong and clear stamp of
a will and a hope directed towards the moral consummation of the
world, which are decisive for Jesus and for his _Weltanschauung._ They
were devoid of eschatology,—using the word here in its broadest and
most general sense. They found in themselves no equivalents for the
thoughts of Jesus, and were therefore not in a position to transpose
his _Weltanschauung_ from the late-Jewish terms of thought into their
own.
“There was no answering chord of sympathy. Hence the historical Jesus
had to remain strange to them to a very great extent, and that not
only with respect to his thought material but also with respect to his
very nature. His ethical enthusiasm and the immediateness and might
which characterised his thought seems to them excessive because they
know nothing that corresponds to it in their own thought and
experience. So they were constantly intent upon making out of the
“enthusiast” a modern man and theologian duly observant of metes and
bounds [pg 052] in all his doings. Conservative theology, like the
older orthodoxy to which it is akin, was not able to do anything with
the historical Jesus, because it likewise makes far too little of the
great moral ideas which in his eschatology were struggling for life
and practical expression.
“It was therefore the lack of an inward tuning to the same pitch of
will and hope and desire which made it impossible to attain a real
knowledge of the historical Jesus and a comprehensive religious
relationship with him. Between him and a generation which was lacking
in all immediateness and in all enthusiasm directed towards the final
aims of humanity and of being, there could be no lively and
far-reaching fellowship. For all its progress in historical perception
it really remained more estranged from him than was the rationalism of
the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth century, which was
brought closer to him by its enthusiastic faith in the possibility of
rapid progress towards the moral perfection of humanity.”
I marvel that Schweitzer in his “Concluding Reflections” can dwell so
insistently upon one side of Jesus’ eschatology and ignore so
completely the other. Jesus’ [pg 053] eschatology, the white light of
his conception of the Kingdom of God, has come to us through the
medium of history refracted in two rays of different colour and of
different direction. One represents more specifically the
other-worldly side of Jesus’ preaching, the hope of eternal
blessedness beyond death,—which the dogmatic theologians are pleased
to call “eschatology,” as though our modern idea really reflected
Jesus’ conception in its totality. Commonly this is what we understand
by the “Kingdom of Heaven.” To denominate the other ray, Schweitzer
has appropriated (with as questionable a right) the “Kingdom of God.”
He means to indicate by this simply the moral development of humanity,
here and under present terrestrial conditions. We readily understand
what he means, because that is what _we_ mean commonly by “the kingdom
of God upon earth.” We are convinced that the progress of mankind in
true worldly culture and civilisation constitutes a high moral aim
which we dare not relinquish; but we have all experienced the
difficulty of reconciling this secular enthusiasm with the
other-worldliness of Jesus. Schweitzer helps us in a measure to
surmount this difficulty. He also makes it in a measure clear to us
_how_ (for the fact itself was [pg 054] patent) this enthusiasm for
the progress of humanity has been reinforced by Jesus’ preaching. But
it is a mistake to expect of this one coloured ray that it can ever
give back to us the whole white light of Jesus’ inspiration. We can
not return again to Jesus’ conception. History stands in the way—real
history, not written narrative. Nor shall we ever be able to combine
again in one white light the “broken lights” which have come to us
from his teaching. But we have the two rays, and in their separateness
they are both familiar to us. Our eyes bear better the coloured light.
Celestial blue denotes the heavenly hope; red will do for this earth
and our passionate hopes for its betterment. But why behave as if we
had only one colour and all of Jesus’ light must be forced into that?
Schweitzer ignores the heavenly hope (the thought of life beyond
death) as though it were no longer open to the modern man. One may get
a notion of what it still may mean to the modern scientific mind from
Gustav Theodor Fechner’s _Büchlein vom Leben nach dem Tode,_ or more
largely from his _Zend-Avesta,_ or his _Tagesansicht._ Though to be
sure it can mean nothing to one who is bound by a materialistic
philosophy. At all events it is certain that Jesus’ will and
aspiration can be [pg 055] much more readily and fully expressed in
these terms than in the terms of ethical and social progress here
below. To translate his thought into these terms requires no elaborate
effort. The first generation of his disciples did it without knowing
what they did. Schweitzer himself observes in another place that our
modern faith in the final but slow perfection of the world “requires a
larger dose of resignation” than most people are aware. And how can
any perfection upon this earth be final, since none can be eternal?
We are all of us feeling after a solution of our modern difficulties.
Schweitzer’s effort after a tolerable accommodation is poignantly
personal like ours—and like ours it is tentative. It is too early to
hope for complete satisfaction. Yet his efforts obviously tend in the
same direction as ours. Schweitzer perceives that “in the last resort
our relation with Jesus is a mystical one.” For the sake of this
acknowledgment, as well as for other reasons which will be evident, I
am fain to conclude this Introduction with Schweitzer’s own words—the
words with which he concludes his latest book:
“In the last resort our relationship to Jesus is of a mystical sort.
No personality of the past can be installed in the present [pg 056] by
historical reflection or by affirmations about his authoritative
significance. We get into relation with him only when we are brought
together in the recognition of a common will, experience a
clarification, enrichment, and quickening of our will by his, and find
ourselves again in him. In this sense every deeper relationship
between men is of a mystical sort. Our religion, therefore, so far as
it proves itself specifically Christian, is not so much ‘Jesus-cult’
as Jesus-mystic.
“It is only thus that Jesus creates fellowship among us. It is not as
a symbol that he does it, nor anything of the sort. In so far as we
with one another and with him are of one will, to place the Kingdom of
God above all, and to serve in behalf of this faith and hope, so far
is there fellowship between him and us and the men of all generations
who lived and live in the same thought.
“From this it will be manifest also in what way the free and the
confined movements of religion which now go side by side will come
together in unity. False compromises are of no avail. All concessions
by which the free conception seeks to approach the confined can only
result in ambiguity and inconsequence. The differences lie in the
thought [pg 057] material which is presupposed on either side. All
efforts after an agreement in this sphere are hopeless. These
differences appear so prominent because there is a lack of elementary
and vital religiousness. Two threads of water wind along side by side
through the boulders and gravel of a great stream bed. It is of no
avail that one seeks here and there to clear out of the way the masses
that are piled up between them, in order that they may flow on in one
bed. But when the water rises and overflows the boulders they find
themselves together as a matter of course. So will the confined and
the free spirit of religion come together when will and hope are
directed again towards the Kingdom of God, and the fellowship with the
spirit of Jesus becomes in them something elemental and mighty, and
they are thereby brought so near together in the essence of their
_Weltanschauung_ and religion that the differences of thought material
still exist indeed, but sink beneath the surface, as the boulders are
covered by the rising flood and in the end barely glimmer out of the
depths.
“The names by which Jesus was called in the thought material of late
Judaism—Messiah, Son of Man, and Son of God—have [pg 058] become to us
historical parables. Even when he applied these titles to himself,
this was an historically conditioned expression of his apprehension of
himself as a commander and ruler. We find no designation that might
express his nature for us.
“Unknown and nameless he comes to us, as he approached those men on
the seashore that knew not who he was. He says the same word: But do
thou follow me! and he sets before us the tasks which we in our
generation must accomplish. He commands. And to those that obey him,
wise and unwise, he will reveal himself in what may be given them to
experience in his fellowship of peace and activity, conflict and
suffering, and as an unutterable secret they shall come to know who he
is. ...”
FOOTNOTES
1 _Das Messiasgeheimnis in den Evangelien,_ 1901.
2 _Christusmythe._
3 _The Life of Christ in Recent Research,_ 1907.
4 _Eschatology of the Gospels,_ 1910.
5 _Geschichte der paulinischen Forschung,_ 1911.
6 _Das Selbstbewusstsein Jesu,_ 1st ed., 1888.
7 _Die Predigt Jesu vom Reiche Gottes,_ 2d ed., 1900; also _Das
älteste Evangelium,_ 1903.
8 _Quest of the Historical Jesus,_ cap. XX.
9 _Das Christus-Problem,_ 1902.
10 _Op. cit._
11 _Hibbert Journal,_ Oct., 1911, p. 84.
12 _Vide The Living Word_ by Elwood Worcester, 1908.
[pg 059]
CHAPTER I
THE MODERN “HISTORICAL” SOLUTION
1. Summary Account of It.
THE Synoptical texts do not explain how the idea of the Passion forced
itself upon Jesus and what it meant to him. The speeches of Peter and
Paul viewed the Passion in the aspect of a divine necessity which was
prophesied by the Scripture. The Pauline theory likewise has nothing
to do with history.
Therefore the idea of the Passion as it is developed here in
connection with an account of Jesus’ life is not directly furnished by
the texts but is deduced from them by implication. One is left here to
the unavoidable necessity of formulating a theory, the truth of which
can only be judged by the measure of clearness and order which it
introduces into the Synoptic accounts.
All of the theoretical constructions which have an outspoken
historical interest coincide in an alleged solution which we
denominate the modern-historical. What is historical about it is the
interest which prompts [pg 060] the endeavour to explain history. The
modern factor in it is the psychological sympathy of comprehension by
the help of which one endeavours to show how, under the impression of
particular experiences, the idea of the Passion forced itself upon
Jesus and was given by him a religious significance. This solution is
based upon the following considerations:
For Jesus there could be no question of constituting a ground for the
forgiveness of sins. That he already assumed, as the petition in the
Lord’s Prayer shows,—it flowed indeed quite naturally from the
pardoning father-love of God. Now the thought of the ransom (Mk 10:45
) recalls the Pauline theory of the atonement with its juridical
character. This, indeed, has reference to the forgiveness of sins. It
is therefore to be presumed that the juridical notion of the
atonement, like the thought of the forgiveness of sins, was strange to
Jesus, since it is not suggested by anything in the whole character of
his teaching. Consequently the expressions about the significance of
his Passion are in their traditional form influenced somehow or
another by Pauline conceptions.
If one takes due account of this influence, the historical saying (Mk
10:45) contains the [pg 061] notion of serving through sacrifice. This
thought is here expressed in its highest potency. We stand upon the
border where the heightened conception of service leads to that of
sacrifice and atonement. The value of this sacrifice for others
consists in the fact that this suffering death which Jesus underwent
is at the same time the inaugural act through which the new morality
of the Kingdom of God receives emphatic sanction and the new condition
contemplated in the idea of the Kingdom is itself realised. This deed
is the efficient first factor in a chain of transformations the
supernatural conclusion of which is his “coming again” in glory, where
the New Covenant which he sealed with his blood is fulfilled in him.
Therewith it is also explained why the determination to encounter
suffering and death could and must suggest itself. The realisation of
the Kingdom of God was Jesus’ mission. This he had undertaken to
effect at first within narrow limits during his Galilean ministry.
Through his preaching of the new morality grounded upon faith in the
divine Father, and under the influence of the power which proceeded
from him, the beginnings of this Kingdom developed. It was a happy,
successful period—the “Galilean spring [pg 062] time,” Keim called it.
The climax of this period was reached with the mission of the
Disciples. Through their preaching the glorious seed was to be strewn
abroad everywhere. As they upon their return announced to him their
success he broke out with the cry of exultation which accounted the
victory already present (Mt 11:25-27).
Then came the time of defeat. The opposition was contrived and carried
out from Jerusalem (Mk 7:1). Before this the sympathy of the people
delivered him from the consequences of occasional friction with the
officials. Now, however, as the opposition was systematically pursued,
even his followers fell away from him. It was ominous that the
discussion about ceremonial purification brought to light the
contradiction in which Jesus found himself with the legal tradition
(Mk 7:1-23). Before spring had again returned to the land he had been
obliged to leave Galilee. Far away in the north, in quiet and solitary
retirement, he collected his energies in the effort perfectly to
understand himself.
For the realisation of the Kingdom there remained but one way still
open to him,—namely, conflict with the power which opposed his work.
He resolved to carry this conflict into the capital itself. There fate
should decide. [pg 063] Perhaps the victory would fall to him. But,
even if it should turn out that in the course of earthly events the
fate of death awaited him inevitably, so long as he trod the path
which his office prescribed, this very suffering of death must signify
in God’s plan the performance by which his work was to be crowned. It
was then God’s will that the moral state appropriate to the Kingdom of
God should be inaugurated by the highest moral deed of the Messiah.
With this thought he set out for Jerusalem—in order to remain Messiah.
2. The Four Assumptions of the Modern-Historical Solution.
1. The life of Jesus falls into two contrasted epochs. The first was
fortunate, the second brought disillusion and ill success.
2. The form of the Synoptical Passion-idea in Mk 10:45 (his giving
himself a ransom for many) and in the institution of the Lord’s Supper
(Mk 14:24: his blood given for many) is somehow or another influenced
by the Pauline theory of the atonement.
3. The conception of the Kingdom of God as a self-fulfilling ethical
society in which service is the highest law dominated the idea of the
Passion.
[pg 064]
4. If Jesus’ Passion was the inaugural act of the new morality of the
Kingdom of God, the success of it depended upon the Disciples being
led to understand it in this sense and to act in accordance with it.
The Passion-idea was a reflection.
Are these assumptions, considered individually, justified?
3. The Two Contrasted Periods. (First Assumption.)
The period of ill success is dated from the time following the mission
of the Twelve. What are the events of the supposedly fortunate period?
We pass over the vexatious discussion with the Pharisees about the
healing of the paralytic (Mk 2:1-12), over the question of fasting (Mk
2:18-22), and that of the observance of the Sabbath (Mk 2:23-[3:6]).
Already in Mk 3:6 it has come to the point of a murderous attack.
Jesus has to renounce his family because they wish to fetch him home
by force as one who is mentally incompetent (Mk 3:20-22, Mk 3:31-35).
At Nazareth he is rejected (Mk 6:1-6).
In the same period occurs the attack which shocked him most
profoundly. The Pharisees discredited him with the people by [pg 065]
charging that he was in league with the devil (Mk 3:22-30). How deeply
this saying wounded him may be seen from his reference to it in the
commission to the Twelve. He prepared his Disciples for a similar
experience. “If they have called the master of the house Beelzebub,
how much more those of his household” (Mt 10:25).
Such are the well known events of the “successful period”! But they
are nothing in comparison with those which he hints at when he is
sending out the Twelve. In general terms he has already pronounced
those blessed who are reproached and persecuted for his sake (Mt 5:11,
12). Now he leads his Disciples to expect oppression and distress (Mt
10:17-25). Faithfulness to him involves the endurance of enmity (Mt
10:22), the severance of the dearest ties (Mt 10:37), and the bearing
of the cross (Mt 10:38). The Galilean period is to be regarded as a
_happy_ one: the commission to the Twelve is _pessimistic_ in tone.
How does that agree?
The hints also which he drops at that time in the presence of the
people point to bitter catastrophes. What must have occurred in
Chorazin, in Capernaum, and in Bethsaida that he calls down upon them
the wrath of [pg 066] the Day of Judgment, in which it shall be more
tolerable for Tyre and Sidon than for them (Mt 11:20-24)!
Because this gloomy tone accords ill with the happy Galilean period,
there is an obvious temptation to regard the Matthean speeches of the
time of the Apostles’ mission as compositions which include fragments
belonging to a later period. Where, however, could Jesus have spoken
such words? So long as he remained in the north after the flight he
made no speeches, and the utterances of the Jerusalem days have their
own peculiar character, so that it is hard to know where to introduce
references to Galilean occurrences and warnings to the Disciples in
prospect of their journey.
Moreover, it is a fact that nothing is related about conspicuous
successes in the first period. The successes first begin with the
mission of the Twelve. Jesus celebrates the great moment of their
return with words of enthusiasm (Mt 11:25-27). Are we to suppose now
that in the sequel the Pharisees triumphed over him completely and the
people deserted him? Of such a retrogression of his cause the texts,
however, record nothing. The discussion about ceremonial purification
(Mt 7:1-23) does not furnish what was expected [pg 067] of it. Jesus
had already at an earlier time come into much hotter conflict with the
theologians of the capital (Mk 3:22-30). In the question about the
laws of purification it was not he that was worsted.
Jesus’ defeat has been inferred from the fact that the “flight” to the
north followed this scene (Mk 7:24 ff[.]). But the accounts do not in
the least represent this departure as a flight, nor do they account
for this journey to the north as a result of the previous controversy;
rather it is _we_ who interpolate a fictitious causal connection in
the chronological sequence of the narrative. If Jesus immediately
before this was supported by the popular favour and now leaves the
region, we have a fact before us which stands unexplained in the
texts. That it was a flight is an unprovable conjecture.
No importance need be attached to the fact that subsequently Jesus
again appears on two occasions surrounded by a multitude (Mk 8:1-9:
feeding of the 4000; and Mk 8:34 ff[.]: the scenes before and after
the Transfiguration). This fact might perhaps be attributed to a
literary reconstruction of the respective accounts,—as may be
considered established, for example, in the case of the _doublette_ of
the feeding of the multitude.
[pg 068]
Decisive, however, is the reception which the Passover caravan
accorded to Jesus as he overtook it at Jericho. This ovation was not
accorded to the man who had lost ground before the Pharisees in his
own country and among his own people and at last had been forced to
flee, but to the celebrated prophet emerging from his retirement. If
this Galilean populace supported him now by their acclaim and enabled
him to terrorise the magistrates in the capital for several days—for
his purification of the Temple was nothing else but that—and to expose
the scribes with his dry irony, is it possible that they did it for
the man who a few weeks before had to yield to these theologians in
his own land?
If one insists upon speaking of a successful period, it is the
_second_ that must be so denominated. For wherever Jesus appears in
public after the return of the Twelve he is accompanied by a devoted
multitude—in Galilee, from the Jordan to Jerusalem, and in the capital
itself. The surly Jewish populace is an invention of the Fourth
Evangelist. Then, too, the illegality of his secret arrest and hasty
conviction shows what the Council feared from the popular favour in
behalf of Jesus. That was the only “ill[ ]success” of [pg 069] the
second period. It was indeed a fatal one.
The first and successful Galilean period is therefore in reality a
time of humiliation and ill[ ]success. There is a double reason for
regarding it nevertheless as a “happy” time. In the first place there
is an æsthetic element in it, which Keim in particular strongly
emphasises. A series of parables drawn from nature, as well as the
wonderful speech against worldly care (Mt 6:25-34), seem hardly
intelligible except as the reflection of a glad and cheerful sense for
the beauty of nature.
With this is associated, in the second place, an _historical
postulate._ In the first period no trace is discoverable of the idea
of the Passion: the second is dominated by it. Hence the first was
successful, the second unsuccessful,—for otherwise there is no way of
accounting, psychologically or historically, for the change.
The historical facts speak differently. In the real period of ill[
]success the resolution to suffer did not come to light. In the
successful second period, on the other hand, Jesus disclosed to his
Disciples that he must be put to death by the scribes. Thus the
relation was the reverse. Herewith modern-historical psychology finds
itself before an enigma.
[pg 070]
4. The Influence of the Pauline Theory of the Atonement upon the
Formulation of the Synoptical Prediction of the Passion. (Second
Assumption.)
No proof can be brought to support the contention that the Passion
passages in the Synoptic Gospels are influenced by Pauline
conceptions. Here again we have a sort of postulate. For if the
juridical character of Mk 10:45 and Mk 14:24 cannot be set down to the
account of the Pauline medium, one must assume that Jesus’ own notion
of the Passion contained this bold conception of atonement. The
modern-historical solution, however, is not adapted to that
alternative.
As a matter of fact it is demonstrable that no Pauline influence can
be discerned here. According to Paul, Jesus said at the Last Supper:
My body for _you_ (1 Cor. 11:24). In the same manner Luke has: My body
which is given for _you;_ the blood which is shed for _you_ (Lk 22:19,
20). Both the older Synoptists invariably write instead of this: for
_many._ Mk 10:45 = Mt 20:28: to give his life a ransom for _many._ Mk
14:24 = Mt 26:28: my blood of the covenant which is shed for _many_.
In the one case the persons who are to benefit by the Passion are
definitely determined: they [pg 071] are the Disciples. In the other
case it is a question of an indefinite number.
Nothing is accomplished by the argument that it comes in the end
substantially to the same thing. Why, according to the older
Synoptists, did Jesus speak of the _many,_ according to Paul, of _his
own?_ The sole explanation lies in the fact that Paul wrote from the
standpoint of the Church after the death of Jesus. From this point of
view the saving efficacy of Jesus’ death is applied to a determinate
community, to those, namely, who believe on him. The Disciples
represent this community of believers in the historical sayings of
Jesus, because from the standpoint of the Church, founded as it was
upon belief in the Messiah, one could not conceive that Jesus’ words
about his Passion could have any other reference but to the believers.
The early Synoptic “for many” is uttered, however, from the
_historical standpoint._ That is to say, it is appropriate to the time
when Jesus did not yet require belief in his messiahship, when
consequently the number of persons whom his death is to benefit is
left indeterminate. Of only one thing is he certain, that it is
greater than the circle of his Disciples: hence he said, “for many.”
Had [pg 072] he used the expression, “for you,” which Paul thought it
natural to attribute to him, the Disciples must have concluded from it
that he was dying for them alone, inasmuch as they could not then have
the feeling that they were representatives of a future community of
believers, according to the conception which was so obvious to Paul
and the Church.
Inasmuch as this _“for many”_ has held its place, in spite of the fact
that Paul, writing from the churchly point of view, felt instinctively
the necessity of substituting _“for you”_ (though he thereby coined an
expression which is historically impossible), one is not justified in
assuming any sort of Pauline influence upon the traditional form of
the early Synoptic Passion-idea. The bold theory of the atonement in
the Synoptists is therefore historical. Any softening of it, such as
the modern-historical solution must assume, is without justification.
Hence in the interpretation of Jesus’ saying the first requisite is to
do justice to the expression “for many.” Because they have not done
this, all expositions of the significance of Jesus’ death—from Paul to
Ritschl—are unhistorical. One has but to substitute, for the community
of believers with which they deal, the indeterminate and unqualified
[pg 073] “many” of the historical saying, and their interpretation
become simply meaningless. That interpretation alone is historical
which renders it intelligible why, according to Jesus, the atonement
accomplished by his death is to redound to the benefit of a number
which is intentionally left indeterminate.
5. The Kingdom of God as an Ethical Entity in the Passion Idea. (Third
Assumption.)
(a). Mk 10:41-45. Service as the ethical conduct prescribed in
expectation of the coming Kingdom.
The sons of Zebedee had advanced the claim to sit on either side of
the Lord in his glory, i. e. when he should reign as Messiah upon his
throne. The other Disciples object to this. Jesus calls them together
and speaks to them about serving and ruling in connection with the
Kingdom of God.
In this saying one is accustomed to find the ethical conception of the
Kingdom of God. There is to be a revaluation of all values. The
greatest in the Kingdom of heaven is he who becomes least, like a
child (Mt 18:4), and the ruler is he who serves. Self-humiliation and
the meekness of service, such is the [pg 074] new morality of the
Kingdom of God which comes into force through Jesus’ service unto
death.
With this, however, the fact is ignored that the Kingdom in which one
reigns is thought of as a future thing, whereas the serving applies to
the present! In our ethical fashion of viewing the matter, serving and
reigning coincide logically and chronologically. With Jesus, however,
it is not at all a question of a purely ethical exchange of the
notions of serving and ruling; rather it is a contrast which develops
in a chronological sequence. There is a sharp distinction made between
the present and the future æon. He who is one day to count among the
greatest in the Kingdom of God must _now_ be as a child! He who
advances a claim to a position of rule therein must _now_ serve! The
more lowly the position of humble service which one _now_ assumes, in
the time when the earthly rulers exercise authority by force, so much
the more lofty will be his station as ruler when earthly force is done
away and the Kingdom of God dawns. Hence he especially must humble
himself even unto death who is to come as the Son of Man upon the
clouds of heaven to judge and to rule the world. Before he mounts his
throne he drinks the cup of suffering, [pg 075] which they also must
taste who would reign with him!
So soon as one pays due attention to this “now and then” in Jesus’
speech, the trivial parallelism of phrase is replaced by a real and
effective climax. The descending stages of service correspond to the
ascending stages of rule.
1. Whosoever would become great _among you,_ shall be _your_
servant—Mk 10:43.
2. Whosoever _of you_ would be first, shall be bondservant of _all_
(others)—Mk 10:44.
3. Therefore the Son of Man expected the post of highest rule because
he was not come to be served but to serve, in giving his life a ransom
for _many_—Mk 10:45.
The climax is a double one. The service of the Disciples extended only
to _their_ circle: the service of Jesus to an unlimited number,
namely, to all such as were to benefit by his suffering and death. In
the case of the Disciples it was merely a question of unselfish
_subjection:_ in the case of Jesus it meant the bitter _suffering of
death._ Both count as serving, inasmuch as they establish a claim to a
position of rule in the Kingdom.
The ordinary explanation does not satisfy the early Synoptic text but
only that of Lk 22:24-27. This text has torn the narrative from [pg
076] its proper connection, so that it appears as a dispute among the
Disciples “which of them is accounted to be the greatest.”
With this, the “now and then” is eliminated from the situation, and it
is only a question of a purely ethical inversion of the ideas of
ruling and serving. Accordingly, Jesus’ speech, too, runs on in a
lifeless parallelism. He that is greater among you, let him become as
the younger, and he that is chief, as he that doth serve (Lk 22:26).
Instead of exemplifying by his own sacrifice of himself unto death for
the great generality of men the conduct required of those who would
reign with him, he speaks only of his serviceable character as
displayed towards the Disciples: But I am in the midst of you as he
that serveth (Lk 22:27). By this he means a serving that is at the
same time ruling. In the case of the two older Synoptists, however, it
is not at all a question of the proclamation of the new morality of
the Kingdom of God, where serving is ruling; rather it is a question
of the significance of humility and service in _expectation of the
Kingdom of God._ Service is the fundamental law of _interim-ethics._
This thought is much deeper and more vital than the modern play upon
words which we attribute to the Lord. Only through lowliness [pg 077]
and childlikeness in this æon is one worthily prepared to reign in the
Kingdom of God. Only he who is here morally purified and ennobled
through suffering can be great there. Hence suffering is for Jesus the
moral means of acquiring and confirming the messianic authority to
which he is designated.
Earthly rule, because it depends upon force, is an emanation of the
power of ungodliness. Authority in the Kingdom of God, where the power
of this world is destroyed, signifies emanation from the divine power.
Only he can be the bearer of such authority who has kept himself free
from the contamination of earthly rule. To allot it to such as have
prepared themselves through suffering is God’s affair and his alone
(Mk 10:39, 40).
But if service does not represent the morality of the Kingdom of God,
Jesus’ conception of the Passion does not deal with the corresponding
notion of the Kingdom as a self-developing ethical society, but rather
with a super-moral entity, namely, the Kingdom of God in its
eschatological aspect.
(b). The idea of the Passion and the Eschatological Expectation.
The investigation of the accounts of the Lord’s Supper [in the first
part of this work] revealed a close connection between the
eschatological [pg 078] conclusion (Mk 14:25) and the expression about
the blood shed for many (Mk 14:24). The other passages about the
Passion suggest a similar connection.
After Jesus with his “Yes” had himself pronounced the verdict of death
he speaks of his “coming again” upon the clouds of heaven. Hereby,
according to Mark’s text, he associates the two events in a single
thought. Mk 14:62: I am, and ye shall see the Son of Man sitting at
the right hand of the Power and coming with the clouds of Heaven. This
logical connection is already weakened by Matthew, as in the case of
the word about the cup. He substitutes for the “and” an expression
which denotes a temporal sequence merely. Mt 26:64: Thou hast said:
_nevertheless_ I say unto you, _henceforth_ shall ye, etc. The
eschatological reference is lacking in Luke: he has omitted it also
from the word about the cup.
A close connection between the thought of the Passion and eschatology
is implied also in Jesus’ saying about the path of suffering which his
followers must tread (Mk 8:34- 9:1). Whosoever shall be ashamed of
Jesus when he suffers reproach and persecution in this adulterous and
sinful world, of him will the Son of Man be ashamed when he cometh in
the glory [pg 079] of his Father with the holy angels. For this
generation shall not sink into the grave until they see the Kingdom of
God come with power!
This connection must have appeared extremely prominent to the hearers.
After the departure from Cæsarea Philippi, under the impression of the
secret of the Passion, which filled them with a sense of sadness and
fear (Mk 9:30-32),—the Disciples dispute which of them shall receive
the highest place in the Kingdom. In the house at Capernaum Jesus had
to rebuke them (Mk 9:33-37). That was after he had spoken for the
second time about his Passion.
On the way to Jerusalem the same scene was reenacted in closest
conjunction with the third prediction of the Passion. (Mk 10:32-41).
The sons of Zebedee advance their claim to the seats upon the throne.
This is not in the least a case of childish misunderstanding on the
part of his followers, for Jesus in fact treats their suggestion with
perfect seriousness. The eschatological expectation must accordingly
have been thrown into such strong relief for the Disciples by Jesus’
prediction of his Passion that they necessarily reasoned within
themselves about the position they should occupy in the coming
Kingdom.
[pg 080]
The modern-historical solution eliminates the eschatological
conception of the Kingdom of God from the Passion, reducing it to the
notion of an apotheosis, “the coming _again,”_ as it is called. This
expression is entirely false. Jesus never spoke of his coming _again_
but only of his _coming_ or of the _advent_ of the Son of Man. We use
the expression “coming again” because we connect death and glory by
contrast, as though the new situation were conditioned merely upon a
victorious transfiguration of Jesus. Our view makes him say: “I shall
die, but I shall be glorified through my coming again.” As a matter of
fact, however, he said: “I must suffer _and_ the Son of Man shall
appear upon the clouds of heaven.” But that for his hearers meant much
more than an apotheosis—for with the appearing of the Son of Man
dawned the eschatological Kingdom. Jesus therefore sets his death in
temporal-causal connection with the eschatological dawning of the
Kingdom. The _eschatological_ notion of the Kingdom, not the
_modern-ethical_ notion, dominates his idea of the Passion.
6. The Form of the Prediction of the Passion. (Fourth Assumption.)
If the modern historical solution be correct [pg 081] in its
conception, Jesus must have communicated the thought of the Passion to
his Disciples in the form of an ethical _reflection._ If they were to
comprehend the approaching catastrophe as the inauguration of the new
morality, and were to derive from it incentive to a change of conduct,
then he must have familiarised them with the character of this event
from the very beginning, as soon as ever he announced it.
As a matter of fact, however, he imparted to them the thought of the
Passion, not in the form of an _ethical reflection,_ but as a
_secret,_ without further explanation. It is dominated by a “must,”
the expression for incomprehensible divine necessity. The fact that
the Passion-idea was a secret stands opposed to the modern-historical
solution.
7. Résumé.
1. The assumption of a fortunate Galilean period which was followed by
a time of defeat is historically untenable.
2. Pauline influence cannot have conditioned the form of the early
Synoptic sayings about the Passion.
3. Not the ethical but the hyper-ethical, the eschatological, notion
of the Kingdom [pg 082] dominates the Passion as Jesus conceived it.
4. The utterances of the Passion-idea did not occur in the form of an
ethical reflection but it was a question of an incomprehensible secret
which the Disciples had not the least need to understand and in fact
did not.
Such is the situation with regard to the four pillars of the
modern-historical solution. With them the whole structure collapses.
It is after all a lifeless thought! The feeble modernity of it is
visible in the fact that it does not get beyond a sort of
representative significance of Jesus’ death. Jesus effects by his
offering of himself nothing absolutely new, since throughout his whole
public ministry he assumes that the Kingdom of God is already present
as a dispensation of the forgiveness of sin or as the morally
developing society. With his very appearance upon earth it is there.
The performance of atonement, however, requires a _real_ significance
in Jesus’ death.
Herein lies the weakness of the modern dogmatic in contrast with the
old. Paul, Anselm, and Luther know of an absolutely new situation
which follows in time the death of Jesus [pg 083] and results as a
consequence of it. Modern theology talks all around the subject; it
has nothing specific to say, however, but involves itself in the cloud
of its own assumptions. Both accounts, indeed, are unhistorical.
Religiously considered, only the modern view is justifiable. The old
dogmatic, however, is in this point the more historical, for it
postulates at all events a real effect of the death of Jesus, as the
Synoptical passages require.
In what, however, does this absolutely new thing consist which is
there made to depend upon the death of Jesus? The Synoptic sayings
give but one answer to this: the eschatological realisation of the
Kingdom! The coming of the Kingdom of God with power is dependent upon
the atonement which Jesus performs. That is substantially the secret
of the Passion.
How is that to be understood? Only the history of Jesus can throw
light upon it. _In place of the modern-historical solution we advance
now the eschatological-historical._
[pg 084]
CHAPTER II
THE “DEVELOPMENT” OF JESUS
1. The Kingdom of God as an Ethical and as an Eschatological Fact.
THE concurrence in Jesus of an ethical with an eschatological line of
thought has always constituted one of the most difficult problems of
New Testament study. How can two such different views of the world, in
part diametrically opposed to one another, be united in _one_ process
of thought?
The attempt has been made to evade the problem, with the just feeling
that the two views cannot be united. Critical spirits like T. Colani
_(Jesus-Christ et les croyance messianique de son temps._ 1864, pp. 94
ff., 169 ff.) and G. Volkmar _(Die Evangelien._ 1870, pp. 530 ff.)
went to the length of eliminating altogether eschatology from the
field of Jesus’ thought. All expressions of that sort were accordingly
to be charged to the account of the eschatological expectation of a
later time. This procedure is frustrated by the stubbornness of the
texts: the eschatological sayings belong precisely to the best
attested passages. [pg 085] The excision of them is an act of
violence.
No more successful has been the attempt to evade the problem by
_sublimating_ the eschatology, as though Jesus had translated the
realistic conceptions of his time into spiritual terms by using them
in a figurative sense. The work of Eric Haupt _(Die eschatologischen
Aussagen Jesu in den synoptischen Evangelien,_ 1895) is based upon
this thought. But there is nothing to justify us in assuming that
Jesus attached to his words a non-natural sense, whereas his hearers,
in accordance with the prevailing view, must have understood them
realistically. Not only are we at a loss for a rational explanation of
such a method on Jesus’ part, but he himself gives not the slightest
hint of it.
So the problem remains as urgent as ever, how the juxtaposition of two
discordant views of the world is to be explained. The sole solution
seems to lie in the assumption of a gradual development. Jesus may
have entertained at first a purely ethical view, looking for the
realisation of the Kingdom of God through the spread and perfection of
the moral-religious society which he was undertaking to establish.
When, however, the opposition of the world put the organic completion
of the Kingdom in doubt, the eschatological [pg 086] conception forced
itself upon him. By the course of events he was brought to the pass
where the fulfilment of the religious-ethical ideal, which hitherto he
had regarded as the terminus of a continuous moral development, could
be expected only as the result of a cosmic catastrophe in which God’s
omnipotence should bring to its conclusion the work which he had
undertaken.
Thus a complete revolution is supposed to have occurred in Jesus’
thought. But the problem is veiled rather than solved by disposing the
terms of the contrast in chronological sequence. The acceptance of the
eschatological notion, if it is to be rendered intelligible in this
fashion, signifies nothing less than a total breach with the past, a
break at which all development ceases. For the eschatological thought,
if it be taken seriously, abrogates the ethical train of thought. It
accepts no subordinate place. To such a position of impotence it was
brought for the first time in Christian theology as the result of
historical experience. Jesus, however, must have thought either
eschatologically or uneschatologically, but not both together—nor in
such a wise that the eschatological was superadded to supplement the
uneschatological.
[pg 087]
It has been proved that in the thought of the Passion it is only the
eschatological idea of the Kingdom of God which is in view. It has
been shown likewise that the assumption of a period of ill[ ]success
after the mission of the Twelve is without historical justification.
This, however, constitutes the indispensable presumption for every
such development as has been assumed on the part of Jesus. Therefore
the eschatological notion cannot have been forced upon Jesus by
outward experiences, but it must from the beginning, even in the first
Galilean period, have lain at the base of his preaching!
2. The Eschatological Character of the Charge to the Twelve.
“The Kingdom of God is at hand” (Mt 10:7)—this word which Jesus
commissions his Disciples to proclaim is a summary expression of all
his previous preaching. They are to carry it now throughout the cities
of Israel. The charge of Jesus to the Twelve furnishes no means of
determining in what sense this proclamation is meant.
If the common conception is right about the significance of this
mission of the Twelve, the words with which he dismisses them present
an extraordinary riddle. Full of hope [pg 088] and with the joy of
productive effort he goes about to extend the scope of his activity
for the founding of the Kingdom of God. The commission to the Twelve
ought therefore to contain instruction about the missionary propaganda
they were to carry out in this sense. One must hence expect that he
would direct them how they should preach about the new relation to God
and the new morality of the Kingdom.
The commission, however, is anything but a summary of the “teaching of
Jesus.” It does not in the least contemplate instruction of a
thoroughgoing kind, rather what is in question is a flying
proclamation throughout Israel. The one errand of the Apostles as
teachers is to cry out everywhere the warning of the nearness of the
Kingdom of God—to the intent that all may be warned and given
opportunity to repent. In this, however, no time is to be lost;
therefore they are not to linger in a town where men are unsusceptible
to their message, but to hasten on in order that they may pass through
all the cities of Israel before the appearing of the Son of Man takes
place. But “the coming of the Son of Man” signifies—_the dawning of
the Kingdom of God with power._
When they persecute you in this city flee [pg 089] unto another, for
verily I say unto you, Ye shall not have gone through the cities of
Israel till the Son of Man be come (Mt 10:23). If one so understands
the com[m]ission to the Twelve as to suppose that Jesus would say
through his Disciples that the time is now come for the realisation of
the Kingdom by a new moral behaviour, that eschatological saying lies
like an erratic boulder in the midst of a flowery meadow. If, however,
one conceives of the embassage eschatologically, the saying acquires a
great context: it is a rock in the midst of a wild mountain landscape.
One cannot affirm of this saying that it has been interpolated here by
a later age; rather with compelling force it fixes the presence of
eschatological conceptions in the days of the mission of the Twelve.
The one and only article of instruction that is required is the call
to repentance. Whosoever believes in the nearness of the Kingdom,
repents. Hence Jesus gives the Disciples authority over unclean
spirits, to cast them out and to heal the sick (Mt 10:1). By these
signs they are to perceive that the power of ungodliness is coming to
an end and the morning-glow of the Kingdom of God already dawns. That
belongs to their errand as teachers, for whosoever fails to believe
their [pg 090] signs, and thereupon brings forth no works of
repentance unto the Kingdom of God,—that man is damned. Thus have
C[h]orazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum come into condemnation. Faith and
repentance were made easy for them by the signs and wonders with which
they were favoured beyond others—and yet they did not come to
themselves, as even pagan cities like Tyre and Sidon would have done
(Mt 11:20-24). This saying addressed to the people shows what
significance Jesus ascribed to the signs in view of the eschatological
embassage.
Thus the Disciples were to preach _the Kingdom, Repentance, and the
Judgment._ Inasmuch, however, as the event they proclaimed was so near
that it might at any moment surprise them, they must be prepared for
what precedes it, namely, for the final insurrection of the power of
this world. How they are to comport themselves in the face of this
emergency so as not to be confounded—here is the point upon which
Jesus’ parting words of instruction bear! In the general tumult of
spirits all ties will be dissolved. Faction will divide even the
family (Mt 10:34-36). Whosoever would be loyal to the Kingdom of God
must be ready to tear from out his heart those who were dearest [pg
091] to him, to endure reproach, and to bear the cross (Mt 10:37, 38).
The secular authority will bring upon them severe persecution (Mt
10:17-31). Men will call them to account and subject them to torture
in order to move them to denial of their cause. Brother shall deliver
up brother to death, and the father his child; and children shall rise
up against parents and cause them to be put to death. Only he who
remains steadfast in the midst of this general tumult, and confesses
Jesus before men, shall be saved in the Day of Judgment, when he
intervenes with God in their behalf (Mt 10:32, 33).
In the commission to the Twelve Jesus imparts instruction about the
woes of the approaching Kingdom. In the descriptive portions of it
there may be much perhaps that betrays the colouring of a later time.
By this concession, however, the character of the speech as a whole is
not prejudiced. The question at issue is not about a course of conduct
which they are to maintain _after his death._ For such instruction not
a single historical word can be adduced. The woes precede the dawning
of the Kingdom. Therefore the victorious proclamation of the nearness
of the Kingdom must accommodate itself to the woes. Hence this
juxtaposition of optimism [pg 092] and pessimism which the current
interpretation finds so unaccountable. It is the sign manual of every
eschatological _Weltanschauung._
3. The New View.
The idea of Passion is dominated _only_ by the eschatological
conception of the Kingdom. In the charge to the Twelve the question is
_only_ about the eschatological—not about the ethical-nearness of the
Kingdom. From this it follows, for one thing, that Jesus’ ministry
counted _only_ upon the eschatological realisation of the Kingdom.
Then, however, it is evident that the relation of his ethical thoughts
to the eschatological view can have suffered no alteration by reason
of outward events but must have been the same from beginning to end.
In what relation, however, did his ethics and his eschatology stand to
each other? So long as one starts with the ethics and seeks to
comprehend the eschatology as something adventitious, there appears to
be no organic connection between the two, since the ethics of Jesus,
as we are accustomed to conceive it, is not in the least accommodated
to the eschatology but stands upon a much [pg 093] higher level. One
must therefore take the opposite course and see if the ethical
proclamation in essence is not conditioned by the eschatological view
of the world.
[pg 094]
CHAPTER III
THE PREACHING OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD
1. The New Morality as Repentance.
IF the thought of the eschatological realisation of the Kingdom is the
fundamental factor in Jesus’ preaching, his whole theory of ethics
must come under the conception of _repentance_ as a preparation for
the coming of the Kingdom. This conception seems to us too narrow a
one to apply to the whole extent of this moral-religious proclamation.
This is due to the fact that the word repentance as we use it has
rather a negative significance, laying emphasis as it does chiefly
upon foregoing guilt. It is a far richer conception, however, which
the Synoptists express by the word repentance (_μετάνοια_). It is not
merely a recovery which stands in retrospective relation with a sinful
condition in the past, but also—and this is its predominant
character—_it is a moral renewal in prospect of the accomplishment of
universal perfection in the future._
Thus “the repentance in expectation of the Kingdom” comprises all
positive ethical requirements. [pg 095] In this sense it is the lively
echo of the “repentance” of the early prophets. For what Amos, Hosea,
Isaiah, and Jeremiah mean by repentance is moral renovation in
prospect of the Day of the Lord. Thus Isaiah says: “Wash you, make you
clean; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; seek
judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the
widow” (Isai. 1:16, 17). It is precisely this Old Testament conception
of repentance, with its emphasis upon the new moral life, which one
must have in mind in order to understand aright the Synoptical
repentance. Both have a forward vision, both are dominated by the
thought of a condition of perfection which God will bring to pass
through the Judgment. This, in the Prophetic view, is the Day of the
Lord; in the Synoptic it is the dawn of the Kingdom.
The ethics of the Sermon on the Mount is therefore repentance. The new
morality, which detects the spirit beneath the letter of the Law,
makes one meet for the Kingdom of God. Only the righteous can enter
into the Kingdom of God—in that conviction all were agreed. Whosoever,
therefore, preached the nearness of the Kingdom must also teach the
righteousness pertaining to the Kingdom. [pg 096] Hence Jesus
proclaimed the new righteousness which is higher than the Law and the
Prophets,—for they extend only up to the Baptist. Since the days of
the Baptist, however, one stands immediately within the pre-messianic
period.
The Day of Judgment puts this moral transformation to the proof: only
he who has done the will of the heavenly Father can enter into the
Kingdom (Mt 7:21). The claim that one is a follower of Jesus, or has
even wrought signs and wonders in his name, is of no avail as a
substitute for this new righteousness (Mt 7:22, 23). Hence the Sermon
on the Mount concludes with the admonition to build, in expectation of
the momentous event, a firmly founded structure capable of resisting
storm and tempest (Mt 7:24-27).
The Beatitudes (Mt 5:3-12) come under the same point of view. They
define the moral disposition which justifies admission into the
Kingdom. This is the explanation of the use of the present and the
future tense in the same sentence. Blessed are the meek, those that
hunger and thirst after righteousness, the merciful, the pure in
heart, the peacemakers, the poor in spirit, those that endure
persecution for righteousness’ sake, because such character and
conduct is their security [pg 097] that with the appearing of the
Kingdom of God they will be found to belong to it.
A series of parables illustrates the same thought. Thus the parables
of the treasure in the field and of the pearl of great price (Mt
13:44-46) show how one must stake all upon the hope of the Kingdom
when the prospect of it is held out to him, and must sacrifice all
other goods for the sake of acquiring this highest good that is
proposed to him.
Thus already in the ethics of the Galilean period we find the “now and
then” which accounts for the estimate put upon serving (Mk 10:45). _As
repentance unto the Kingdom of God the ethics also of the Sermon on
the Mount is interim-ethics._ In this we perceive that the moral
instruction of Jesus remained the same from the first day of his
public appearance unto his latest utterances, for the lowliness and
serviceableness which he recommended to his Disciples on the way to
Jerusalem correspond exactly to the new moral conduct which he
developed in the Sermon on the Mount: they make one meet for the
Kingdom of God. Only, they constitute a climax in the attainment of
the new righteousness, inasmuch as they render one meet not merely for
entrance into the Kingdom but for bearing rule in it.
[pg 098]
We encounter again the _Leitmotiv_ of the Sermon on the Mount in the
epilogue to the great parables uttered in Jerusalem. Nothing but the
maintenance of the new morality in all relations of life guarantees
entrance into the Kingdom. Hence Jesus can say to the Pharisee who
agrees to the summary of this new morality as it is expressed in the
commandment of love: Thou art not far from the Kingdom of God (Mk
12:34). That does not mean that the Pharisee by such a disposition of
mind has already well nigh risen to the height of the “morality of the
Kingdom.” For if the double commandment of love constituted the
morality of the _Kingdom,_ Jesus must have said to him (since he
entirely agreed to these commandments): Thou belongest to the Kingdom.
The “not far” must in fact be understood in a purely chronological
sense, not as denoting some small measure of perfection which the man
still lacks. He is not far from the Kingdom of God because he
possesses the moral quality which will identify him as a member of the
same when after a short space it appears. The “not far” contains
therefore the same mixture of present and future tense which we have
remarked in the Beatitudes.
Reasoning from our ethical point of view [pg 099] we are inclined to
apply the conception of reward to this relation between membership in
the Kingdom and the new morality. This, however, does not completely
render the thought of Jesus, which had to do above all with the
_immediateness_ of the transition from the condition of moral renewal
into the super-moral perfection of the Kingdom of God. Whosoever at
the dawning of the Kingdom is in possession of a character morally
renovated, he will be found a member of the same. This is the adequate
expression for the relation of morality to the coming Kingdom of God.
2. The Ethics of Jesus and Modern Ethics.
The depth of Jesus’ religious ethics encourages us to expect that we
can find our own modern-ethical consciousness reflected in it. With
respect to its eternal inward truth it is indeed independent of
history and unconditioned by it, since it already contains the highest
ethical thoughts of all times. Nevertheless there exists a great
difference between Jesus’ sentiment and ours. Modern ethics is
“unconditional,” since it creates of itself the new ethical
situation,—the presumption being that this situation will evolve unto
final perfection. Ethics is here an end in itself, [pg 100] inasmuch
as the moral perfection of mankind comes to the same thing as the
perfection of the Kingdom of God. That is Kant’s thought. This
self-sufficiency of ethics (which however, exacts a certain
resignation in view of the distant consummation) shows that the
modern-Christian theory is permeated by Hellenistic-rationalistic
ideas and has undergone a development of two millenniums.
The ethics of Jesus on the other hand is “conditional,” in the sense
that it stands in indissoluble connection with the expectation of a
state of perfection which is to be supernaturally brought about.
Thereby its Jewish origin is revealed, and its immediate connection
with the Prophetic ethics, in which the moral conduct of the people
was conditioned by a definite expectation. Hence, if any parallel at
all may be adduced in explanation of the ethics of Jesus, it can be
only the Prophetic, never the modern. For in proportion as the latter
enters into it the mode of conception becomes unhistorical, Jesus’
ethics being treated as self-sufficient, whereas in fact it is
oriented entirely by the expected supernatural consummation.
So there has been created the insoluble [pg 101] problem, that a
person thoroughly modern so far as his ethics is concerned should
incidentally give utterance to eschatological expressions. But if we
once perceive the conditional character of Jesus’ ethics, and
seriously consider its connection with the ethics of the Prophets, it
is immediately clear that all conceptions of the Kingdom as a growth
out of small beginnings, all notions about an ethics of the Kingdom,
or about the development of it, have been foisted upon Jesus by our
modern consciousness—simply because we could not readily familiarise
ourselves with the thought that the ethics of Jesus is conditional.
We make him conceive of the Kingdom of God as if its historical
realisation represented a narrow opening through which it had to
squeeze before attaining the full stature which belongs to it. That is
a modern conception. For Jesus and the Prophets, however, it was a
thing impossible. In the immediateness of their ethical view there is
no place for a morality of the Kingdom of God or for a development of
the Kingdom—it lies beyond the borders of good and evil; it will be
brought about by a cosmic catastrophe through which evil is to be
completely [pg 102] overcome. Hence all moral criteria are to be
abolished. _The Kingdom of God is super-moral._
To this height of hyper-ethical idealism the modern consciousness is
no longer capable of soaring. History has aged us too much for that.
But for the historical understanding of the ethics of Jesus it is the
indispensable assumption.
In addition to this, when we think of the Kingdom, our thought
stretches forward to the coming generations which are to realise it in
ever increasing measure. Jesus’ glance is directed backward. For him
the Kingdom is composed of the generations which have already gone
down to the grave and which are now to be awakened unto a state of
perfection. How should there be for him any ethics of sexual
relations, when he explains to the Sadducees that in the Kingdom of
God after the great Resurrection there will be no longer any sexual
relations at all, “but they will be like the angels of heaven” (Mk
12:25)?
Every ethical form of Jesus, be it never so perfect, leads therefore
only up to the frontier of the Kingdom of God, while every trace of a
path disappears so soon as one advances upon the new territory. There
one needs it no more.
[pg 103]
We have a prejudice against this conception of conditional ethics. It
is an unjustified prejudice if it is due to a suspicion that Jesus’
ethics is thereby disparaged. Exactly the opposite is the case. For
this conditionality springs from an absolute ethical idealism, which
postulates for the expected state of perfection conditions of
existence which are themselves ethical. In our unconditional and
self-sufficing ethics we, however, assume that the conflict between
good and evil must go on forever, as belonging constantly to the
nature of the ethical. Ethics and theology do not stand for us in the
same lively relationship as they do with Jesus. The vividness of the
colours of the absolute ethical idealism has been faded by history.
So, to render the ethics of Jesus unconditional and self-sufficing is
not only unhistorical, but it means also the degradation of his
ethical idealism.
On one point, however, our ethical sentiment is justified in its
prejudice. If ethics has to do only with the expectation of the
supernatural consummation, its actual worth is diminished, since it is
merely individual ethics and is concerned only with the relation of
each single person to the Kingdom of God. The thought, however, that
the moral community [pg 104] which has been constituted by Jesus’
preaching must as such be in some way the effective first stage in the
realisation of the Kingdom of God—this thought belongs not alone to
_our_ ethical sentiment, but it animated also the preaching of Jesus,
for he wrought out in strong relief the social character of his
ethics. This explains the reluctance one feels to admit that the
eschatological idea of the Kingdom of God lay at the basis of Jesus’
preaching from beginning to end, since _then_ one cannot explain how
the new moral community which he formed about himself was in his
thought organically connected with the Kingdom which was
supernaturally to appear.
One glides here unintentionally into a modern line of thought. The
idea of development furnishes what we want, allowing us to conceive of
the moral community as an initial stage which by constant growth,
extensive and intensive, is ever approaching the final stage. The
gradually widening circle represents, however, a modern way of viewing
history. It is completely foreign to Jesus. Yet even though he cannot
have made use of this explanation of ours, the _fact_ that this new
community stands in an organic relation with the final stage was for
him as [pg 105] certain as for us. But because he expected this final
stage as a purely supernatural event the connection was not to be
apprehended by human reflection, rather it was a _divine secret,_
which he illuminated only by pointing to analogies in the processes of
nature.
[pg 106]
CHAPTER IV
THE SECRET OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD
1. The Parables of the Secret of the Kingdom of God.
WE have to do here with the “secret of the Kingdom of God” (Mk 4:11),
which is dealt with in the parables of the sower, of the self-growing
seed, of the grain of mustard, and of the leaven. We commonly find in
these parables the illustration of a constant and gradually unfolding
through which the petty initial stage of a development is connected
with the glorious final stage. The seed that is sown already contains
the harvest, inasmuch as each seed is devised for the production of
plant and fruit. They develop from the seed by natural law. So it is
likewise with the development of the Kingdom of God from small and
obscure beginnings.
This attractive interpretation of the parables takes from them,
however, the character of _secrets,_ for the illustration of a steady
unfolding through the processes of nature is no secret. Hence it is
that we fail to understand what the secret is in these parables. [pg
107] We interpret them according to our scientific knowledge of nature
which enables us to unite even such different stages as these by the
conception of development.
By reason of the immediateness with which the unschooled spirit of
olden time observed the world, nature had, however, still secrets to
offer,—in the fact, namely, that she produced two utterly distinct
conditions in a sequence, the connection of which was just as certain
as it was inexplicable. This immediateness is the note of Jesus’
parables. The conception of development in nature which is
contemplated in the modern explanation is not at all brought into
prominence, but the exposition is rather devised to place the two
conditions so immediately side by side that one is compelled to raise
the question, How can the final stage proceed from the initial stage?
1. A man sowed seed. A great part of the seed was lost on account of
circumstances the most diverse—and yet the produce of the corn which
fell upon good ground was so great that it restored the seed sown
thirty, sixty, even an hundred fold.
The detailed interpretation of the description of this loss, and the
application to particular classes of men, as it lies before us in [pg
108] Mk 4:13-20, is the product of a later view which perceived no
longer any secret in the parable. Originally, however, the single
points of the description were not independent, but the seed which was
lost upon the path, or upon the stony ground, or among the thorns,
together with that which the fowls of heaven devoured, constituted
altogether a unified contrast to that which fell upon good ground. The
manner in which it was destroyed has no importance for the parable. In
spite of the description so wonderfully wrought out, this saying of
Jesus expresses one single thought: So small, considering all that was
lost, was the sowing; and yet the harvest so great!—Therein lies the
secret.
2. A man scattered seed upon the ground. He slept, went about his
affairs, and concerned himself no further about the seed. Before he
realised it the harvest stood already in the field, and he could send
his servants to gather it in. How did it come to pass that after the
seed was sunk in the earth the ground _of itself_ brought forth the
blade, the ear, and the full corn?—That is the secret.
3. A grain of mustard seed was sown; from it sprouted a great shrub,
with [pg 109] branches under which the birds of the heaven could
lodge. How did it come to pass, since the mustard seed is so
small?—That is the secret.
4. A woman added a little leaven to a great mass of dough. Afterwards
the whole lump was “leaven.” How can a little leaven leaven a whole
great lump?—That is the secret.
These parables are not at all devised to be interpreted and
understood; rather they are calculated to make the hearers observant
of the fact that in the affairs of the Kingdom of God a secret is
preparing like that which they experience in nature. They are
_signals._ As the harvest follows upon the seed-sowing, without it
being possible for any one to say how it comes about; so, as the
sequel to Jesus’ preaching, will the Kingdom of God come with power.
Small as is the circle which he gathers about himself in comparison
with the greatness of God’s Kingdom, it is none the less certain that
the Kingdom will come as a consequence of this moral renewal,
restricted as it is in scope. It is no less confidently to be expected
than that the seed, which while he speaks is slumbering in the ground,
will bring forth a glorious harvest. Watch not only for the harvest,
but watch for the Kingdom of God!—so speaks [pg 110] the spiritual
sower to the Galileans at the season of the seed-sowing. They ought to
have the presentiment that the moral renewal in consequence of his
preaching stands in a necessary but inexplicable connection with the
dawning of the Kingdom of God. The same God who through his mysterious
power in nature brings the harvest to pass will also bring to pass the
Kingdom of God.
Therefore, when it was the season of the harvest, he sent his
Disciples forth to proclaim: The Kingdom of God is at hand.
2. The Secret of the Kingdom of God in the Address to the People after
the Mission of the Twelve.
Jesus was alone. The Disciples carried the news of the nearness of the
Kingdom throughout the cities of Israel. While the people thronged him
there came the emissaries of the Baptist with their question. He
dismissed them with the answer: the Kingdom stands before the door,
one needs only the language of the signs and wonders in order to
understand. Turning to the people he speaks of the significance of the
Baptist and of his office. With this he lets drop a hint of mystery
(Mt 11:14, “If you are able [pg 111] to conceive it,” Mt 11:15, “he
hath ears to hear, let him hear”). John is Elijah, i. e. the
personality whose advent marks the immediate dawning of the Kingdom.
“From the days of John the Baptist until this moment the Kingdom of
Heaven suffereth violence, and men of violence take it by force. For
all the Prophets and the Law prophesied until John; and, if ye are
able to conceive it, this is Elijah, which is to come. He that hath
ears to hear, let him hear” (Mt 11:12-15).
This saying resists all exegesis, for it does not in the least contain
the thought that the individuals gain access to the Kingdom by force.
What might that mean anyway? In what sense does that come to pass from
the days of the Baptist on? The picture which Jesus employs is
unintelligible if it has to do with the entrance of individuals into
the Kingdom. It remains just as incomprehensible, however, if it is
supposed to refer to the realisation of the Kingdom through gradual
development. In the first place, the image of an act of violence
contradicts the notion of development; in the second place, the
beginning of this compelling force must be dated not from John but
from Jesus.
It is a question of the secret of the Kingdom of God,—hence the hint:
He that hath [pg 112] ears to hear, let him hear. This phrase occurs
only in connection with the parables of the secret of the Kingdom and
as the conclusion of apocalyptic sayings (cf. the use of the
expression in the Apocalypse: 2:7, 11, 17, 29, 3:6, 13, 22).
Repentance and moral renewal in prospect of the Kingdom of God are
like a pressure which is exerted in order to compel its appearance.
This movement had begun with the days of the Baptist. The men of
violence who take it by force are they which put into practice the
moral renewal. They draw it with power down to the earth.
The saying in the speech about the Baptist and the parables of the
Kingdom of God mutually explain and supplement one another. The
parables bring chiefly into prominence the _incommensurateness_ of the
relation between the moral renewal that is practised and the
consummation of the Kingdom of God, while the image in the speech
after the Mission dwells more upon the compelling connection between
the two.
3. The Secret of the Kingdom of God in the Light of the Prophetic and
Jewish Expectation.
Jesus’ ethics is closely connected with that of the Old Testament
prophets, inasmuch as [pg 113] both are alike conditioned by the
expectation of a state of perfection which God is to bring about. But
also the secret of the Kingdom of God, according to which the moral
renewal hastens the supernatural coming of the Kingdom, corresponds
with the fundamental thought of the Prophets. In the case of the
Prophets, the relation between the moral reform which they would bring
about and the glorious condition which God will bring to pass at the
Day of Judgment is not that of a mere temporal sequence, but it rests
upon a supernatural causal connection. Godless behaviour brings nearer
the Day of Judgment and of condemnation. Therefore, God chastises the
people and gives them into the hand of their oppressors. When,
however, they determine to reform their ways, when they seek refuge in
him alone with trusting faith, when righteousness and truth prevail
among them, then will the Lord deliver them from their oppressors, and
his glory will be manifest over Israel, to whom the heathen will do
service. In that day there will then be peace poured out over the
whole world, over nature as well as man.
After the Exile this thought was still operative in the conception of
the Law. By the observance of the Law the promised glorious [pg 114]
estate will be wrung from God. Not the individual but the collectivity
influences God through the Law. This generic mode of thought is the
primary, the individual mode is secondary. “Israel would be redeemed
if only it observed two Sabbaths faithfully.” (Schabbath 118_b_.
Wünsche, _System der altsynagogalen Palästinensischen Theologie,_
1880, p. 299). Here we meet with the early prophetic thought in
legalistic form.
In general, however, it was the individualistic view which prevailed
later. The Law, and moral conduct in general, were only the
preparation for the expected estate of glory. The lively generic view
of the Prophets was replaced by individualistic and lifeless
conception. Eschatology became a problem of accounting and ethics
became casuistry.
Jesus, however, reached back after the fundamental conception of the
prophetic period, and it is only the _form_ in which he conceives of
the emergence of the final event which bears the stamp of later
Judaism. He no longer conceives of it as an intervention of God in the
history of the nations, as did the Prophets; but rather as a final
cosmical catastrophe. His eschatology is the apocalyptic [pg 115] of
the book of Daniel, since the Kingdom is to be brought about by the
Son of Man when he appears upon the clouds of heaven (Mk 8:38- 9:1).
_The secret of the Kingdom of God is therefore the synthesis effected
by a sovereign spirit between the early prophetic ethics and the
apocalyptic of the book of Daniel._ Hence it is that Jesus’
eschatology was rooted in his age and yet stands so high above it. For
his contemporaries it was a question of _waiting for_ the Kingdom, of
excogitating and depicting every incident of the great catastrophe,
and of preparing for the same; while for Jesus it was a question of
_bringing to pass_ the expected event through the moral renovation.
_Eschatological ethics is transformed into ethical eschatology._
4. The Secret of the Kingdom of God and the Assumption of a Fortunate
Galilean Period.
According to the secret of the Kingdom of God, the coming of the
Kingdom is not dependent upon the broad success of Jesus’ preaching.
Indeed, he expressly emphasises the fact that the limitation of the
circle which performs the moral renovation stands in no [pg 116]
relation whatever to the all-embracing greatness of the Kingdom which
is to come about by reason of their conduct. It suffices that a scanty
part of the seed falls upon good ground—and the overplentiful harvest
is there, through God’s power. Not by the multitude but by the men of
violence is the Kingdom compelled to appear.
Hence the secret of the Kingdom of God makes the assumption of a
fortunate Galilean period entirely superfluous. Jesus can enjoy the
expectation of the speedy realisation of the Kingdom even when he
experiences the greatest ill[ ]success and when whole districts close
themselves against his preaching. They do not thereby delay the coming
of the Kingdom of God but only deliver themselves to the judgment, for
the Kingdom comes necessarily by reason of the moral renewal of the
circle which gathered about Jesus.
The justice of this interpretation of the secret of the Kingdom of God
is shown therefore, in the fact that it renders unnecessary, as an
explanation of Jesus’ life, an assumption which is otherwise
absolutely unavoidable but cannot in any way be historically
confirmed.
[pg 117]
5. The Secret of the Kingdom of God and the Universalism of Jesus.
So long as the moral renewal upon the basis of Jesus’ preaching is
brought into relation with the realisation of the Kingdom through the
modern thought of evolutionary development the factor correlative to
the perfection of the Kingdom is likewise modern, that is, “humanity
as a moral whole.” One attributes then to Jesus’ reflection upon the
growth of the new moral community which he founded, foresight of its
gradual extension till it embraces the whole of Israel—here, however,
the thought of Jesus stops; one may not attribute to him
universalistic ideas, for the commission to the Disciples shows that
he did not reflect about a moral renewal beyond the borders of Israel.
(Mt 10:5, 6): Go [not] into any way of the Gentiles, and enter not
into any city of the Samaritans: but go rather to the lost sheep of
the house of Israel.
The preaching of the Kingdom of God is therefore particularistic; the
Kingdom itself, however, is universalistic, “for they shall come from
the east and from the west, from the north and from the south.” The
generation which required a miracle shall experience [pg 118] such:
The Ninevites shall arise at the Day of Judgment and condemn it,
because they repented at the preaching of Jonah, “and here is a
greater than Jonah.” Also the Queen of the South shall rise in
judgment against the contemporaries of Jesus, because she came from
the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, “and behold, a
greater than Solomon is here” (Mt 12:41-42).
For the modern consciousness, because it applies to everything the
rubrics of evolution, there is an insuperable contradiction between
the particularism of the preaching of the Kingdom and the universalism
of its consummation. In the secret of the Kingdom of God, however,
particularism and universalism go together. The Kingdom is
universalistic, for it arises out of a cosmic act by which God awakes
unto glory the righteous of all times and of all peoples. The bringing
about of the Kingdom, on the other hand, is dependent upon
particularism, for it is to be forced to approach by the moral renewal
of the contemporaries of Jesus. Salvation comes out of Israel.
[pg 119]
6. The Secret of the Kingdom of God and Jesus’ Attitude towards the
Law and the State.
Jesus did not declare himself either for the Law or against it. He
recognised it simply as an existing fact without binding himself to
it. He felt no obligation to decide in principle whether it was to be
regarded as binding or as not binding. For him this was a question of
no practical importance. The real concern was the new morality, not
the Law. This Law was for him holy and inviolable in so far as it
pointed the way to the new morality. But therewith it did away with
itself, for in the Kingdom which comes into being on account of the
new morality the Law is abrogated, since the accomplished condition is
super-legal and super-ethical. Up to this point it had a right to
last. Whether the Law should also be binding upon his followers in the
future was a question which did not exist for Jesus; it was history
which first proposed this problem to the primitive Church.
It was the same with regard to the State. The question which was put
to him in the Jerusalem days had for him no practical importance. As
he replied to the Pharisees’ question, whether one should give tribute
to [pg 120] Cæsar, he had no thought of defining his attitude towards
the State or determining that of his followers. How could any one be
concerned at all about such things! The State was simply earthly,
therefore ungodly, dominination [domination]. Its duration extended,
therefore, only to the dawn of God’s dominion. As this was near at
hand, what need had one to decide if one would be tributary to the
world-power or no? One might as well submit to it, its end was in fact
near. Give to Cæsar what is Cæsar’s and to God what is God’s (Mk
12:17)—this word is uttered with a sovereign irony against the
Pharisees, who understood so little the signs of the time that this
still appeared to them a question of importance. They are just as
foolish in the matter of the Kingdom of God as the Sadducees with
their catch-question to which husband the seven times married wife
should belong at the resurrection; for they, too, leave one thing out
of account—the power of God (Mk 12:24).
7. The Modern Element in Jesus’ Eschatology.
“Let it be the maxim in every scientific investigation for one to
pursue undisturbed the due course of it with all possible exactitude
[pg 121] and frankness, not considering what it may collide with
outside of its own field, but following it out, so far as one can,
truly and completely for itself alone. Frequent observation has
convinced me that when one has brought this task to an end, that which
in the midst of it appeared to me for the time being very questionable
with respect to other teaching outside, if only I closed my eyes to
this questionableness and attended merely to my task till it was
finished, finally in unexpected wise proved to be in perfect agreement
with those very teachings,—though the truth had presented itself
without the least reference to those teachings, without partiality and
prejudice for them.”(Footnote. _Kritik der praktischen Vernunft. _ Ed.
Reclam, p. 129.)
Kant uttered this profound word at the moment when the correspondence
of the notion of transcendental freedom with the practical first
occurred to him. The case is the same with the relation of Jesus’
ethics to his eschatology. It is a postulate of our Christian
conviction that the ethics of Jesus in its basic thoughts is modern.
Hence we come back again and again to the search after the modern
element in his ethics, and for this cause we force into the background
his eschatology, [pg 122] since it appears to us unmodern. If,
however, one resolves to ignore for a moment this interest, which is
so deeply grounded in our being and so well justified, and regards the
relation of Jesus’ eschatology to his ethics simply for itself, as a
purely historical question, the investigation brings to light the
astonishing result that the latter (i. e. Jesus’ ethics) is modern in
a far higher degree than any one hitherto has dared to hope. Jesus’
ethics is modern, not because the eschatology can be reduced somehow
to a mere accompaniment, but precisely because the ethics is
absolutely dependent upon this eschatology! The fact is, this
eschatology itself, as it is exhibited in the secret of the Kingdom of
God, is thoroughly modern, inasmuch as it is dominated by the thought
that the Kingdom of God is to come by reason of the religious-moral
renovation which the believers perform. _Every moral-religious
performance is therefore labour for the coming of the Kingdom of God._
As the eschatology in this ethical-eschatological Weltanschauung
gradually faded in the course of history, there remained an ethical
Weltanschauung in which the eschatology persisted in the form of an
imperishable faith in the final triumph of the good. The [pg 123]
secret of the Kingdom of God contains the secret of the whole
Christian Weltanschauung. The ethical eschatology of Jesus is the
_heroic form_ in which the modern-Christian Weltanschauung first
entered into history!
[pg 124]
CHAPTER V
THE SECRET OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD
IN THE THOUGHT OF THE PASSION
IN the last period of his life Jesus again uttered parables of the
Kingdom of God: God’s vineyard (Mt 21:33-46); the royal marriage (Mt
22:1-14); the servant watching (Mt 24:42-47); the ten virgins (Mt
25:1-13); the talents (Mt 25:14-30).
These parables, in contrast to those about the secret of the Kingdom,
contain no secret, but rather they are teaching parables pure and
simple, from which a moral is to be drawn. The Kingdom of God is near.
Those only will be found to belong to it who by their moral conduct
are prepared for it.
The second period contains instead the _secret of the Passion._ Jesus’
utterances, as we have seen, point to a mysterious causal connection
between the Passion and the coming of the Kingdom, because the
eschatology and the thought of the Passion always emerge side by side,
and the Disciples’ expectation of the future is in every case roused
to the [pg 125] highest pitch by the proclamation of his suffering.
_The secret of the Passion takes up, therefore, the secret of the
Kingdom of God and carries it further._ To the moral renewal which,
according to the secret of the Kingdom of God, exercises a compelling
power upon the coming of the Kingdom, there is adjoined another
factor—_the redeeming death of Jesus._ That completes the penitence of
those who believe in the coming of the Kingdom. Therewith Jesus comes
to the aid of the men of violence who are compelling the approach of
the Kingdom. The power which he thereby exerts is the highest
conceivable—he gives up his life.
The idea of the Passion is therefore the transformation of the secret
of the Kingdom of God. Hence it is no more designed to be understood
than are the parables of the secret of the Kingdom. In each case it is
a question of a fact which can be probed no further.
The connection between the thought of the Passion and the secret of
the Kingdom of God guarantees the continuity of Jesus’ world of
thought. All constructions which have been devised with a view to
establishing this continuity have proved insufficient to [pg 126]
accomplish what was expected of them. The acceptance of the thought of
the Passion means in all cases a complete change in his idea of the
Kingdom and in his Weltanschauung. If, however, one places the thought
of the Passion in the great context of the secret of the Kingdom of
God, the continuity is furnished naturally. The thought of the
supernatural introduction of the Kingdom of God runs through the whole
of Jesus’ life: the idea of the Passion is merely the fashion in which
it is formulated in the second period.
How comes it that the secret of the Kingdom of God takes the form of
the secret of the Passion?
Why must the atonement of Jesus be added to complete the moral renewal
and the penitence of the community which believes in the Kingdom?
In what sense has the redeeming death of Jesus an influence upon the
coming of the Kingdom?
[pg 127]
CHAPTER VI
THE CHARACTER ASCRIBED TO JESUS ON THE
GROUND OF HIS PUBLIC MINISTRY
1. The Problem and the Facts.
THE experience at the Baptism signified the inception of Jesus’
messianic consciousness. In the neighbourhood of Cæsarea Philippi he
revealed his secret to the Disciples. It was before the High Priest
that he first openly made profession of his messianic office.
Therefore the messianic consciousness underlay all the while his
preaching of the Kingdom of God. But he does not assume on the part of
his hearers any knowledge of the position which belonged to him. The
faith which he required had nothing to do with his person, but it was
due only to the message of the nearness of the Kingdom. It was the
Fourth Evangelist who first presented the history of Jesus as if it
concerned itself chiefly with his personality.
We cannot estimate how far his real character may have shone through
his message, for such as had an awakened understanding. One thing is
certain: up to the time of the [pg 128] mission of the Twelve no one
had the faintest idea of recognising in him the Messiah. At Cæsarea
Philippi the Disciples could only reply that the people took him for a
prophet or for Elijah the Forerunner, and they themselves knew no
better, for Peter, as Jesus himself said, did not derive his knowledge
from the Master’s ministry in work and word, but owed it to a
supernatural revelation.
The Synoptical notices must be judged in accordance with this
fundamental fact. In the first place, there is a series of Matthean
passages which stand at variance with it.
Mt 9:27-31: In the Galilean parallel to the healing of the blind man
at Jericho it is related that two blind men pursued him through the
whole village with the cry, “Son of David.” What Jesus means by the
warning, “See that no man knows it,” remains indeed obscure.
Mt 12:23: After a miraculous healing the people whisper to themselves
whether this is not the Son of David.
Mt 14:33: After their experience at sea in the boat the Disciples fall
down before him saying, “Truly thou art the Son of God.”
Mt 15:22: The Canaanitish woman addresses him as the Son of
David,—whereas [pg 129] according to Mark she simply falls at his feet
and cries for help.
All of these passages are peculiar to Matthew and belong to a
secondary literary stratum. For the history of Jesus they have no
importance, but a great deal for the history of the history of Jesus.
They show us, that is, how the later time was inclined even more and
more to depict his life in harmony with the presumption that he not
only knew himself to be the Messiah but that others also had this
impression of him.
In the second place, it is a question of the speeches of the
demoniacs. According to Mk 3:11 the unclean spirits, as often as they
saw him, threw themselves at his feet and addressed him as the Son of
God (cf. also Mk 1:24, Mk 5:7). It is true, he rebuked this cry and
commanded silence. But if we did not have the incontestably sure
information that during the whole of his Galilean ministry the people
knew no more than that he was a prophet or Elijah, we should be forced
to assume that these cries of the demoniacs made the people somehow
aware of his true character. As it is, however, we may discern with
precision, from the fact that the demon-cries were ignored, how very
far men were from suspecting him to be the Messiah. [pg 130] Who
believed the devil and the wild speech of the possessed?
In the third place, it is a question of the expression “Son of Man.”
If Jesus used it as a self-designation before Cæsarea Philippi, that
would constitute in each case a messianic suggestion, for every one
must refer this expression of the book of Daniel to the person who was
to characterise the last time.
According to Mark, Jesus twice employed this expression as a
self-designation _before_ Cæsarea Philippi (Mk 2:10 and 2:28), and it
occurs in the same sense in a series of passages peculiar to Matthew
(Mt 8:20, 11:19, Mt 12:32, 40, 13:37, 41 and 16:13). In judging these
passages also one must proceed from the sure ground which is furnished
by the reply of the Disciples at Cæsarea Philippi.
Either Jesus had not used this expression up to that time, in which
case these Son of Man passages are chronologically anticipated, and
constitute a mere literary phenomena.
Or else he had used the expression. Then he must have done so in such
a way that no man could suppose that he assumed for himself the
dignity of the Son of Man of Daniel.
The problem in the second period is still harder. The Disciples knew
his secret, but they dared reveal it to no one. But how [pg 131] about
the people? Did they now have a presentiment of the messianic dignity
of Jesus?
The problem has to do therefore with three facts:
1. The whole discussion in the Jerusalem days turns in no wise upon
the messianic dignity of Jesus, but has to do rather with legal
propositions and with questions of the day. Far too little weight has
been attached hitherto to the fact that neither the people nor the
scribes took up a position towards him as the messianic personality.
How different the Jerusalem days would have been if the question which
agitated them was: Is he the Messiah—is he not? can he be—can he not?
In reality he is merely the unofficial authority of the Galilean
people, before whom the scholars of the capital bring their questions
of the school, whether with a sincere mind, or with the perfidious
intention of destroying his authority.
2. In the second period Jesus had the people about him only for a few
days,—from the crossing of the Jordan until his death. During this
time he made to them no disclosure about his messiahship, and gave
them also no hint which they could and must understand in this sense.
The bribed witnesses know nothing of the sort to allege. What is [pg
132] remarkable in their evidence—upon which too little weight has
been laid—consists precisely in the fact that _they in no wise charge
him with wishing to be the Messiah._ For them his impious pretention
exhausts itself in a disrespectful word about the Temple. Let one
picture to himself what the procedure of the trial would have been if
the hired accusers had of themselves discovered messianic hints in
Jesus’ speeches!
3. From this point one arrives necessarily at the conclusion that up
to the last moment he was for the people in Jerusalem just what he was
in Galilee,—the great Prophet or the Forerunner, but in no wise the
Messiah! There are two facts, however, which do not comport with this.
The entrance into Jerusalem was—according to the common
apprehension—_a messianic ovation._ Therefore the people must have had
a presentiment of Jesus’ dignity.
The High Priest put to him the question, whether he were the Messiah.
Therefore he knew of Jesus’ claim.
We have here a clear question to deal with: was Jesus regarded in the
Jerusalem days as a messianic pretendant or no? One should not obscure
this question by speaking of a more or less clear “presentment” in [pg
133] this matter. The “presentiment of the messiahship of Jesus” is a
modern invention. The populace would hardly be swayed hither and yon
by a dark mysterious presentiment, but rather it must have been a
question of belief or unbelief. Whosoever held that he was the Messiah
must accompany him through fire and death—to glory. Whosoever held no
such faith, but had only a presentiment of such a pretention on his
part, must give the signal to stone the blasphemer. There was no third
course.
The facts in general speak in favour of the opinion that the people
and the Pharisees in the Jerusalem days ascribed to Jesus no messianic
pretention,—no more indeed than they did at an earlier period. Only in
this case the entrance into Jerusalem, understood as a messianic
ovation, remains an enigma, and it is likewise unaccountable how it
occurred to the High Priest to question him about his messiahship.
On the one hand the situation must be understood in the way which is
commonly assumed. Then one must renounce every hope of an historical
understanding of the last public period of Jesus. It will not do to
suppose that at the beginning of this period (entrance into Jerusalem)
and at the [pg 134] end of it (question of the High Priest at the
trial) he was taken for the Messiah, while the Jerusalem days which
lay in the interval knew nothing of this claim whatever.
Or else—the entrance into Jerusalem and the question of the High
Priest have not been rightly and historically understood. Was the
ovation offered to the messianic pretendant? Did the High Priest in
his question give utterance to something which all knew? Did he deduce
the claim of messiahship from Jesus’ life, activity, and speech?—or
did he perhaps learn through betrayal the innermost secret of Jesus,
which since Cæsarea Philippi was known only to his trusted intimates?
The problem of Jesus’ messiahship in all its difficulty may be
formulated as follows: How was it possible that Jesus knew himself as
the Messiah from the beginning, and yet to the very last moment did
not give in his public preaching any intimation of his messiahship?
How could it in the long run remain hidden from the people that these
speeches were uttered out of a messianic consciousness? _Jesus was a
Messiah who during his public ministry would not be one, did not need
to be, and might not be, for the sake [pg 135] of fulfilling his
mission! It is thus that history puts the problem._
2. Jesus Is Elijah through His Solidarity with the Son of Man.
_What character could and must the people ascribe to Jesus on the
ground of his public ministry?_ That is the question with which we
have now to do.
The Messiah and the messianic Kingdom belong inseparately together.
Hence if Jesus had preached a present messianic Kingdom, it would have
been at the same time incumbent upon him to indicate the Messiah,—he
would have had to begin by legitimating himself as the Messiah before
the people.
The fact is, however, that he preached a future kingdom. With this the
possibility was completely excluded that any one could suppose him to
be the Messiah. _If the Kingdom was future, so also was the Messiah._
If Jesus nevertheless had messianic pretensions, this thought was
thoroughly remote from the people, for his preaching of the Kingdom
excluded even the least conjecture of the sort. Hence even the cries
of the demons did not avail to put the people on the right track.
[pg 136]
Conjectures of that sort were rendered completely impossible by the
way in which Jesus spoke of the Messiah in the third person and as a
character of the future. He intimated to the Disciples as he sent them
upon their mission that the Son of Man would appear before they had
gone through all the cities of Israel (Mt 10:23). In Mk 8:38 he gave
promise to the people of the speedy appearing of the Son of Man for
judgment and the coming of the Kingdom of God with power. In the same
way at Jerusalem he still spoke of the judgment which the Son of Man
will hold when he appears in his glory surrounded by the angels (Mt
25:31).
Only the Disciples after the revelation of Cæsarea Philippi, and the
High Priest after the “Yes” of Jesus, could trace a personal relation
between him and the Son of Man of whose coming he spoke,—for they knew
his secret. For his other hearers, however, _Jesus of Nazareth_ and
the individual who was the subject of his discourse, the _Son of Man,_
remained two entirely distinct personalities.
Before the people Jesus merely suggested the _absolute solidarity_
between himself and the Son of Man whom he proclaimed.
It was only in this form that his own gigantic personality obtruded in
his preaching of [pg 137] the Kingdom of God. Only he who under all
conditions confesses him, the proclaimer of the coming of the Son of
Man, will be discovered as a member of the Kingdom at the Day of
Judgment. Jesus, in fact, will intervene before God and before the Son
of Man in his behalf (Mk 8:38- 9:1, Mt 10:32-33). One must be ready
to give up the dearest things to follow him, for only so can one show
one’s self _worthy of him_ (Mt 10:37, 38). Hence Jesus is grieved when
the rich young man cannot make up his mind to give up his riches in
order to follow him (Mk 10:22), for now he cannot appear for him at
the Day of Judgment to insure that he shall be accepted as a member of
the Kingdom of God. Still, in the measureless omnipotence of God he
finds reason to hope that this rich man will nevertheless find
entrance into the Kingdom (Mk 10:17-31). If this man, therefore,
because Jesus cannot intervene in his behalf, is not sure “to inherit
eternal life” (Mk 10:17), those, on the other hand who, confessing him
and his message, endure death are certain to save their life, _i. e._
to be found as members of the Kingdom at the resurrection of the dead
(Mk 8:37). Hence in the beginning of the sermon on the mount he
pronounces them blessed who [pg 138] for his sake suffer reviling and
persecution, because thereby, like the meek and the merciful, they are
designated as members of the Kingdom (Mt 5:11 f.).
From Jesus’ standpoint, this absolute solidarity between God and the
Son of Man on the one hand, and himself on the other presented no
enigma, for it was based upon his messianic selfconsciousness; he can
speak thus because he is conscious of being himself the Son of Man. It
was quite different for the people, and for the Disciples before the
revelation at Cæsarea Philippi. How can Jesus of Nazareth, in a manner
so sovereignly self-confident, proclaim his absolute solidarity with
the Son of Man? This assertion forced the people to reflect upon his
personality. Who was this whose manifestation mightily extended out of
the pre-messianic and into the messianic æon itself, so that God and
the Son of Man receive into the Kingdom such as had confessed him, if
this confession did not lose its value by reason of the defect of
moral worthiness, as he himself once expressly declared by way of
warning? Such importance as Jesus claimed for himself belonged to only
_one_ personality,—Elijah, the mighty Forerunner,—for his
manifestation stretched out of the present into the messianic [pg 139]
æon and bound both together. Hence the people held that Jesus was
Elijah. In this was expressed the highest estimate which Jesus’
personality could wring from the masses. In this case it is not a
question of one of the customary misunderstandings so beloved of the
secondary Gospel narrators, but the people _could not,_ from Jesus’
appearance and proclamation, come to any other conclusion about him.
3. Jesus Is Elijah through the Signs which Proceed from Him.
In order to render intelligible the attitude of Jesus’ contemporaries
towards himself and his work, we must rid ourselves of two false
presuppositions with which we constantly though unconsciously operate.
First, the expectation at that time was not fixed upon the Messiah but
upon the Forerunner promised by prophecy. Secondly, no one in any way
detected this Forerunner in the person of the Baptist. Both of our
presuppositions run precisely to the contrary effect, and thereby we
spoil our historical perspective.
The appearing of the Messiah in conjunction with the great crisis
which he brings about constitutes the supernatural drama which the
world awaits. But before the curtain [pg 140] rises there must arise
among the expectant sons of men the man who is to speak the prologue
of the piece; who then, so soon as the curtain is lifted, associates
himself with the celestial personages which conduct the action of the
drama. Hence men are in expectancy first of all not for the rising of
the curtain and the appearing of the Messiah but for the speaker of
the prologue. _It was important to signalise the entrance of the
Forerunner upon the stage in order to know to what hour the hand of
the world clock pointed._
Elijah, however, had not as yet appeared, for the Baptist had not
legitimated himself as such. He lacked to this end the display of
supernatural power. Signs and wonders, however, belonged necessarily
to the epoch which immediately preceded the Kingdom. A general pouring
out of the Spirit and prophesying, wonders in heaven and upon
earth,—all that was to occur before the Day of God comes. So it was
defined by the prophet Joel (3:28 [2:28] ff.). Peter in his
sermon at Pentecost appealed to this passage (Acts 2:17-22). One ought
to recognise from the supernatural ecstatic “tongues” that one is
approaching the end of the days. The crucified Jesus hath God raised
up to be the [pg 141] Messiah in the Resurrection, and the Kingdom
will soon dawn.
This passage in Joel was therefore applied to the time immediately
preceding the messianic age, the time of miracles, in which according
to the prophecy of Malachi the Forerunner should appear (Mal 4:5-6).
Moreover, the selfsame refrain unites these two fundamental passages
of pre-messianic expectation: Mal 4:5 is the same as Joel
2:31—“Before the coming of the great and terrible Day of the Lord.”
_The Forerunner without miracles in an unmiraculous age was therefore
unthinkable._
For the contemporaries the characteristic difference between John and
Jesus consisted precisely in the fact that the one simply pointed to
the nearness of the Kingdom of God while the other confirmed his
preaching by signs and wonders. Men had the consciousness of entering
with Jesus upon the age of miracles. He was the Baptist,—but the
Baptist, as it were, translated into the supernatural. After the
mission of the Twelve, as his emergence and his signs became known
abroad together with the news of the death of the Baptist, people
said: The Baptist is raised from the dead. Hence the Disciples
answered him at Cæsarea Philippi [pg 142] that men took him for Elijah
or for the Baptist (Mk 8:28). Herod as he heard of him would not give
up the notion that he was the Baptist: “The Baptist is risen from the
dead, and therefore do these powers work in him” (Mk 6:14).
Also the significance which Jesus ascribed to the signs must have led
his hearers to suppose that they were in the midst of the era of the
Forerunner. Their significance consisted, namely, in the fact that
they confirmed the nearness of the messianic Kingdom. The people ought
to believe him for the sake of the signs and repent unto the Kingdom
of God.
The signs are an act of God’s grace through which he would make men
aware what hour it is. Whosoever does not repent is damned. So it
comes to pass with the inhabitants of Chorazin, Bethsaida, and
Capernaum. But whosoever blasphemes against the Holy Ghost and
ascribes the signs to the power of ungodliness has no forgiveness in
eternity. The scribes from Jerusalem made themselves guilty in Galilee
of this offence (Mk 3:22 ff.). Those, however, who did not harden
themselves held that the Kingdom of God stands at the door and that
Jesus is the Forerunner, because they had evidently entered [pg 143]
the age of signs which the Scripture had prophesied.
4. The Victory over Demons and the Secret of the Kingdom of God.
For Jesus the signs signified the nearness of the Kingdom in a sense
still higher than the purely temporal, chronological nearness. By his
victory over the demons he was conscious of _influencing the coming of
it._ The secret of the Kingdom of God plays into this conception. The
thought is contained in the parable with which he repels the false
suspicions of the Jerusalem scribes (Mk 3:23-30).
The meaning of this parable is, in fact, not exhausted by the thought
that the argument that evil spirits do not undermine their own
dominion by rising up one against another. In the concluding word we
encounter unexpectedly the “now and then” which is characteristic of
the secret of the Kingdom of God: “No one can enter into the house of
the strong man and spoil his goods, except he _first_ bind the strong
man, and _then_ he will spoil his house.” The casting out of demons,
therefore, signified for Jesus the binding of the power of ungodliness
and rendering it harmless. Hence this activity, like the moral renewal
in the secret of the [pg 144] Kingdom, stands in causal relation with
the dawning of the Kingdom of God. Through his conquest of the demons
Jesus is the man of violence who compels the approach of the Kingdom.
For when the power of ungodliness is bound, then comes the moment when
the dominion shall be taken from it. In order that this may happen it
must first be rendered harmless. Hence in sending the Disciples upon
their mission Jesus not only commands them to proclaim the nearness of
the Kingdom, but he also gives them authority over the demons (Mt
10:1). In that moment of highest eschatological expectation he sends
them out as the men of violence who are to deal the last blow. The
repentance which is to be accomplished by their preaching, and the
overcoming of the power of ungodliness in the demoniacs, work together
for the hastening of the Kingdom.
Thus the parables of the secret of the Kingdom (Mark 4), the parable
in Jesus’ apology to the Pharisees (Mk 3:23-30), and the parable in
the eulogy of the Baptist (Mt 11:12-15) all express the same thought.
The two latter correspond even in the drastic image of violent action,
whence the notion of “robbery” is common to them both (Mk 3:27 = Mt
11:12).
[pg 145]
For Jesus’ consciousness the healing of the demoniacs was therefore a
part of the secret of the Kingdom of God. It sufficed for the people,
however, to grasp the purely chronological connection.
5. Jesus and the Baptist.
We have seen above that no one could recognise Elijah in the person of
the Baptist because his ministry and preaching without miracle did not
correspond with the Scriptural representation of the Forerunner’s
time. None thought of ascribing to him this office and dignity
except—for there was one exception—_Jesus!_ He it was that first gave
the people a mysterious hint that this man was the Forerunner: “If ye
are willing to receive it, he himself is Elijah, the coming-one” (Mt
11:14). He is aware, however, that with this he is giving utterance to
an incomprehensible secret which to his hearers remains just as
obscure as the word uttered in the same connection about the man of
violence who since the days of the Baptist compel the Kingdom (Mt
11:12). Hence he concludes both these sayings with the oracular
phrase: He that hath ears to hear, let him hear (Mt 11:15).
The people, however, were very far from [pg 146] comprehending that
this Baptist who had fallen into the hands of Herod could be the
prodigious personality who was to stand upon the threshold between the
pre-messianic and the messianic age. So the mysterious word of Jesus
died upon the air, and the people stuck to the opinion that John was
really a prophet (Mk 11:32).
The rulers also could reach no conclusion about the personality of the
Baptist. For this reason they were worsted in their colloquy with
Jesus when they would challenge him for his purifying of the Temple
(Mk 11:33).
The case was quite the same with the Disciples: they were incapable by
themselves of recognising in John the expected Elijah. On the descent
from the Mount of Transfiguration they were assailed by scruples about
the messiahship of Jesus and about the possibility of the resurrection
of the dead which Jesus had touched upon in his discourse. This
assumed, indeed, that the messianic era was already present, and this
could not yet have dawned, for “Elijah must first come, as the scribes
demonstrate” (Mk 9:9-11). Thereupon Jesus replied to them that John
was this Elijah, even though he was delivered into the power of men
(Mk 9:12, 13).
[pg 147]
How did Jesus arrive at the conviction that the Baptist was Elijah? It
was through a necessary inference from his own messiahship. Because he
knew himself to be the Messiah, the other must be Elijah. Between the
two ideas there was a necessary correspondence. No one could know that
the Baptist was Elijah except he derived this cognisance from the
messiahship of Jesus. No one could arrive at the thought that John was
Elijah without at the same time being obliged to see in Jesus the
Messiah. For after the Forerunner there remained no place for a second
manifestation of the kind. No one knew that Jesus took himself to be
the Messiah. Therefore in the Baptist men perceived a prophet and
raised the question whether Jesus were not Elijah. No one understood
in their full bearing the mysterious concluding sentences of the
eulogy over the Baptist. _Only for Jesus was John the promised
Elijah._
6. The Baptist and Jesus.
What was the Baptist’s attitude to Jesus? If he had been conscious of
being the Forerunner, he must have surmised that Jesus was the
Messiah. One generally assumes this and supposes that he as the
Forerunner [pg 148] put the question to Jesus whether he were the
Messiah (Mt 11:2-6). This supposition seems to us perfectly natural
because we always represent to ourselves the two characters in the
relation of Forerunner-Messiah.
In this connection, however, we forget a perfectly obvious question.
Did the Baptist feel himself to be Elijah, the Forerunner? In no
utterance before the people did he raise such a claim. They stubbornly
recognised in him only a prophet. Also during his imprisonment he can
have claimed no such thing, for in Jerusalem the people still held to
the same opinion, that he was a prophet.
If somehow or another the presentiment had prevailed that he
represented the character of Elijah, how then could men generally get
the notion that John was a prophet, Jesus the Elijah? That this was
the general view even after the death of the Baptist, is proved by the
reply of the Disciples at Cæsarea Philippi.
To view the Baptist’s query under the presumption that the Forerunner
is asking whether Jesus be the Messiah is to put the question in a
light which is completely unjustified; for whether John took himself
to be the Forerunner is not in the least to be proven. Therefore it is
also by no means [pg 149] made out that his question referred to the
messianic dignity. The people standing by, as they did not take John
to be the Forerunner, must have interpreted it in a very different
way,—namely, in the sense: Art thou Elias?
The fact is that the usual perspective hides a characteristic detail
in this very section, the fact, namely, that Jesus applies again to
the Baptist the same designation which the Baptist in his question had
applied to him! Art thou the Coming One? asked the Baptist. Jesus
replied: If ye are willing to receive it, _he himself_ is Elijah, the
Coming One! The designation of the “Coming One” is therefore common to
both speeches, only that we arbitrarily refer it to the Messiah in the
question of the Baptist. This proceeding, which appears so natural in
the naïve perspective, will show itself to be unjustified so soon as
one becomes aware that it is in fact only a question of perspective
and not of any real standard. For then the phrase “He himself” in
Jesus’ reply acquires suddenly an unsuspected significance: “_he
himself_ is Elijah,” the Coming One! This reference compels us to
understand by the Coming One in the Baptist’s question, not the
Messiah, but—as in Jesus’ reply—Elias.
[pg 150]
“Art thou the expected Forerunner?”—thus the Baptist through his
disciples makes inquiry of Jesus. “If ye are able to receive it, he
himself is this Forerunner,” said Jesus to the people after he had
spoken to them about the greatness of the Baptist.
By this reference the scene now receives a far more intense colouring.
First of all, it becomes clear why Jesus speaks about the Baptist
_after the departure of the messengers._ He feels himself obliged to
lead the people up climactically from the conception that John is a
prophet to the presentiment that he is the Forerunner, with whose
appearing the hand of the world clock nears the fateful hour to which
refers the word concerning “him who prepares the way,” and of whom the
scribes say “that he must first come” (Mk 9:11).
John, in fact, with his question was backward in his reckoning of the
Messianic time. His messengers seek information about the Forerunner
at the moment when Jesus’ confidence that the Kingdom is immediately
to dawn was at the highest pitch. He had just sent out his Disciples
and given them to expect that the appearing of the Son of Man might
surprise them on their way through the cities of Israel. The hour is
already far more advanced—that is what Jesus would [pg 151] give the
people to understand in his “eulogy over the Baptist,” if they can
receive it.
John reached this surmise about Jesus in the same way as did the
people. That is to say, as he heard _of the signs and deeds of Jesus_
(Mt 11:2), there occurred to him the thought that this might be
something more than a prophet with a call to repentance. So he sends
messengers to him in order to have assurance upon this point.
Herewith, however, the proclamation of the Baptist is put in an
entirely different light. He never pointed to the coming Messiah, _but
to the expected Forerunner._ So is to be explained the proclamation
about “him that is to come after him” (Mk 1:7, 8). As applied to the
Messiah, the expressions he uses remain obscure. They denote, that is,
only a difference of degree, not a total difference in kind, between
himself and the person whom he announces. If he were speaking of the
Messiah, it would have been impossible for him to employ these
expressions, in which, in spite of the mighty difference in rank, he
still compares the Coming One to himself. He thinks of the Forerunner
as like himself, baptising and preaching repentance unto the Kingdom,
only that he is incomparably greater and mightier. Instead of
baptising [pg 152] with water, he will baptise with the Holy Ghost (Mk
1:8).
This cannot apply to the Messiah. Since when does the Messiah baptise?
Then, too, the famous pouring out of the Spirit does not occur within
but _before_ the messianic era! Before the coming of the great Day of
the Lord he will pour out his Spirit upon all flesh, and signs and
wonders shall be showed in heaven and on earth (Joel 2:28 ff[.]).
Before the coming of the great Day of the Lord he will send Elijah the
Prophet (Mal 4:5). The Baptist combines these two chief indications of
the character of the great events that are to precede the Last Time,
and he arrives at the conception of the Forerunner who is to baptise
with the Holy Ghost! One sees from this what a supernatural light
surrounded the figure of the Forerunner in the current conception.
Hence it is that John felt himself so little before him.
Jesus was put by this question in a difficult position. The Baptist in
asking him, Art thou the Forerunner? or art thou not? had proposed a
false alternative to which Jesus could answer neither yes nor no. He
was not willing to entrust the secret of his messiahship to the
messengers. He therefore replied with a hint of the nearness of [pg
153] the Kingdom which was revealed in his deeds. At the same time he
thrust his own personality mightily into the foreground. He alone can
be blessed who stands by him and who finds no occasion of stumbling in
him. With this he would say the same as he said once also to the
people: membership in the Kingdom is dependent upon one’s attachment
to him (Mk 8:38).
Jesus’ remarkable evasive answer to the Baptist, in which exegesis has
always believed that it must discover a special finesse, is explained
therefore simply by the necessity of the situation. Jesus could not
answer directly. Hence he gave this obscure response. The Baptist was
to gather from it what he would and could. Besides, it was of no
importance how he understood it. Events would soon teach him, for the
time is already much further advanced than he supposes, and the hammer
is already lifted to strike the hour.
It is exceedingly difficult for us to get rid of the notion that the
Baptist and Jesus stood to one another in the relation of Forerunner
and Messiah. It is only through intense reflection that we can reach
the perception that the two characters stand in this relation in our
perspective only [pg 154] because we assume the messiahship of Jesus;
but that in order to discover the historical relationship we must
calculate and apply the right perspective.
So long as one is still prejudiced in any way by the old perspective,
one cannot do justice to the foregoing investigation. That is, one
will still have the notion that it is a question of “the forerunner of
the Forerunner” and the Forerunner—an ingenious multiplication of the
Forerunner by himself. That is falsely expressed. A prophet of
repentance, John the Baptist, directs men’s attention to the
prediction of the mighty figure of Elijah the Forerunner, and as he
hears in prison of the signs of Jesus he wonders if this may not be
Elijah—and does not dream that this man holds himself to be the
Messiah, and that for this reason he himself will henceforth be
designated in history as the Forerunner. That is the historical
situation.
The moment the conception of history was defined by the conviction
that Jesus was the Messiah the historical perspective was necessarily
shifted. The Gospels display this shifting in increasing measure. In
the introductory verses of Mark the quotation from Malachi about the
Forerunner who is to prepare the way (Mal 3:1) is already applied to
[pg 155] John. According to Matthew, the Baptist hears in prison of
“the works of the Messiah” (Mt 11:2). If here it is only a question of
the casual and unreflecting introduction of a new mode of conception,
the Fourth Gospel, on the other hand, has made a principle of it and
consistently represents the history in line with the presumption that
because Jesus was the Messiah the Baptist was the Forerunner and must
have felt himself to be such. The historical Baptist says: I am not
the _Forerunner,_ for he is incomparably greater and mightier than I.
According to the Fourth Gospel the people could conjecture that he was
the Christ. He was obliged to say, therefore: I am not the _Christ_
(Jn 1:20)!
Thus has the relation been altered under the influence of the new
perspective. The person of the Baptist has become historically
unrecognisable. Finally they have made out of him the modern doubter,
who half believed in Jesus’ messiahship, and half disbelieved. In this
apprehensive indecision, this backing and filling, is supposed to lie,
in fact, the tragedy of his existence! Now, however, one may
confidently strike him from the list of those characters, so
interesting to us moderns, who come to ruin through a tragic [pg 156]
half-faith. Jesus spared him that. For so long as he lived he required
of no man faith in him as the Messiah—and yet that is what he was!
7. The Blind Man at Jericho and the Ovation at the Entrance to
Jerusalem.
Was the entrance into Jerusalem a messianic ovation? That depends, in
the first place, upon how one interprets the cry of the people; but
then also, upon one’s notion of the encounter between Jesus and the
blind man. If it was actually a question there of his being greeted as
the Son of David,—a greeting which he no longer repudiates, but
tacitly admits, so that the people learn to apprehend what he takes
himself to be,—the consequence is inevitable that it was a messianic
ovation.
For the exact understanding of the description of Jesus’ entrance into
Jerusalem, the differences in detail between Mark and the parallels
are of far reaching importance. In Mark we have two clearly
distinguishable acclamations. The first is directed to the person of
Jesus in their midst: “Hosanna! Blessed be ‘the Coming One’ in the
name of the Lord” (Mk 11:9). The second refers to the expected coming
of the Kingdom: [pg 157] “Blessed be the coming Kingdom of our father
David. Hosanna in the highest!” The Son of David is thus not mentioned
at all!
It is different in Matthew. There the people shout “Hosanna to the Son
of David! Blessed be the Coming One in the name of the Lord. Hosanna
in the highest!” (Mt 21:9). We have here therefore only the cry which
was directed to the person of Jesus; the Kingdom is not mentioned; men
acclaim instead the Son of David and, at the same time, the Coming
One.
Luke’s version does not come into account, for he deals with
reminiscences from the history of the infancy “Blessed be the king
that cometh in the name of the Lord. Peace in heaven and glory in the
highest” (Lk 19:38).
Thus Matthew in his account interprets the Coming One as the Son of
David. We possess no direct proof that this expression (the Coming
One), which is derived from Psalm 118:25 ff[.], was employed in Jesus’
time for the Messiah. It has been shown, however, that _the Baptist as
well as Jesus applied it rather to the Forerunner Elijah._ It is
therefore unhistorical when Matthew represents the people as
acclaiming in the same [pg 158] breath both the Coming One and the Son
of David.
Mark has here, too, preserved in his detail the original situation.
The people acclaimed Jesus as the “Coming One,” i. e. as the
Forerunner, and sings an “Hosanna in the highest” to the Kingdom which
is soon to descend upon earth. A fine distinction is made in the use
of _Hosanna_ and _Hosanna in the highest_ (“places” is to be
supplied). The former applies to the Forerunner present in their
midst; the latter, to the heavenly Kingdom. The secondary character of
the account in Matthew is evident in the fact that it applies to the
Son of David and to the Coming One not only an Hosanna but likewise an
Hosanna in the highest,—whereby the Messiah is first assumed to be on
earth and then, still in heaven! Here it becomes plain that the second
Hosanna belonged originally with the Kingdom.
_The entrance into Jerusalem, therefore, was an ovation not to the
Messiah but to the Forerunner._ But then it is impossible that the
people understood the scene with the blind man as indicating that
Jesus welcomed the address “Son of David.”
Here again it is a question of Synoptical detail by which the scene is
totally changed. [pg 159] The shout in the name of the Son of David is
incidental. The question is only whether the public could and must
conceive it as a form of address. This conception is evidently that of
Matthew and Luke, _but by Mark it is excluded._
According to the Matthean account, two blind men sit by the wayside
and cry, Have mercy upon us, Son of David (Mt 20:30).
In Luke the cry runs: Jesus, thou Son of David, have mercy upon me (Lk
18:38). Thereupon Jesus comes to a stand before him, converses with
him, and heals him.
According to Mark, the blind beggar, son of Timæus, is sitting behind
the multitude at the edge of the road. _Jesus does not see him, cannot
address him, but hears only a voice, which reaches him as from the
ground out of the midst of the stir,_ of one calling upon the Son of
David for help. Jesus comes to a stand and sends _to have him
fetched!_ They follow the voice and find the man sitting upon the
ground. Rise, he calleth thee! they say to him. He throws away his
garment, springs up, and presses through the crowd to Jesus. As Jesus
sees the man approaching him thus he can have no idea that he is
blind! He has to ask him, therefore, what he wants. The distance, the
heat, [pg 160] the sending to fetch him, the nimble approach,—all this
Matthew has dropped. He has simplified the situation: Jesus encounters
the two blind men on the road and at once addresses them. Only he has
retained from the original situation the question, “what is
wanted?”—which in Mark is actually necessary, but in Matthew remains
unaccountable, for there Jesus must see that he has to do with two
blind men!
But if there lay such a distance between Jesus and the blind man, no
one could have an idea that he took the monotonous cry about the Son
of David as an address to himself! It was just simply an annoying cry,
which the bystanders sought in vain to silence. The people attached as
little importance to it as to the cries of the demons—if in fact they
understood it at all.
The _address_ of the beggar was of an entirely different tenor and
shows that he no more took Jesus for the Messiah than did the people:
“Rabbi, that I may receive my sight.” For him, therefore, Jesus was
the rabbi from Nazareth.
If one keep this situation in view, it will be seen that the
bystanders could in no way get the idea that Jesus here welcomes a
messianic [pg 161] acclaim. This, however, was the first sign which he
again performed after coming out of his retirement. Thereby he
legitimated himself before the Paschal caravan as the Forerunner, for
which his adherents in Galilee took him before he suddenly withdrew
into solitude in the north. Now the demonstration is let loose, and
they prepare for him as the Forerunner the ovation at the entrance
into Jerusalem.
In demonstrating the proper character of this occurrence one has to
deal with apparently insignificant detail to which not everyone may be
inclined to ascribe due importance. In view of this the following
points are to be kept in mind:
1. In the representation which assumes the messiahship of Jesus there
must come about as of itself a shifting of detail which has the effect
of describing a messianic entrance. This is the case with Matthew.
There is no evidence of a deliberate purpose on the part of the
writer.
2. Mark’s delineation shows such originality in comparison with the
parallels (one has but to think of the story of the Baptism and the
report of the Last Supper) that one cannot easily lay too great weight
upon the peculiarity [pg 162] of his account,—especially when it
results in so clear and consistent a picture as is here the case.
3. Nothing is accomplished by the assertion that proof has not been
brought that it was assuredly a question of an ovation to the
Forerunner. For then it remains to demonstrate how it was, that, on
the presumption that it was actually an ovation to the Messiah, the
transactions in the Jerusalem days make no allusion at all to the
presumed messianic pretension and the venal accusers do not appeal to
any such claims. What must the Roman procurator have done if a man had
marched into the city hailed by the populace as the Son of David?
4. The true historical apprehension is peculiarly difficult for us
here because of our notion that the signs and wonders were regarded by
the contemporaries as a confirmation of the messiahship of Jesus. In
that opinion we share the standpoint upon which the Johannine
representation is based. According to the conception of Jesus’
contemporaries, however, the Messiah needs no signs, but rather he
will be at once manifest in his power! The signs belong on the
contrary to the period of the Forerunner!
5. Our translation also has a prejudicial [pg 163] effect. The word
_ἐρχόμενοζ_ denotes in all passages a personality sharply defined for
that time. Hence one must in every case translate it in accord with
this perception,—not one time as a substantive [cf. the German Bible]
and again (in the story of the ovation) as a verb-form, just as
happens to be most convenient. “The Coming One” is the Forerunner,
because before the messianic judgment he is to come in the name of God
to put everything in order.
We arrive therefore at the conclusion: _Until the confession before
the council Jesus was publicly regarded as the Forerunner, as he had
been already in Galilee._
[pg 164]
CHAPTER VII
AFTER THE MISSION OF THE TWELVE. LITERARY
AND HISTORICAL PROBLEMS
1. The Voyage on the Lake after the Return of the Twelve.
It is exceedingly difficult to gather from the Synoptic accounts a
clear picture of the events which happened after the mission of the
Twelve. When did the Disciples return? Where did Jesus betake himself
during their absence? What sort of success did the Disciples have?
What events happened between their return and the departure for the
north? Were these events of a sort to account for Jesus’ determination
to withdraw with them into solitude?
The accounts supply no answer to these questions. Moreover they
confront us with another, a purely literary problem. The connection
between the several scenes is here extraordinarily broken. It seems
almost as if the thread of the narration were here completely lost.
Only at the moment of departure for the journey to Jerusalem do the
[pg 165] scenes begin to stand again in a clear and natural
relationship.
First of all we have to do with two obvious doublettes: the feeding of
the multitude and the subsequent journey on the lake (Mk 6:31, 56 = Mk
8:1, 21). In both instances Jesus is overtaken by the multitude as he
lands on a lonely shore after a journey across the lake. Then he
returns again to the Galilean village on the west shore. Here in his
accustomed field of activity he encounters the Pharisaic emissaries
from Jerusalem. They call him to account. In the series which contains
the first account of the feeding of the multitude the question at
issue is about hand-washing (Mk 7:1-23), in the second case it is the
requirement of a sign (Mk 8:11-13). The first series concludes with
the departure for the north, where in the neighbourhood of Tyre and
Sidon he meets the Canaanitish woman (Mk 7:24-30). In the second
series the journey to Cæsarea Philippi (Mk 8:27) follows upon his
encounter with the Pharisees.
We have here therefore two independent accounts of the same epoch in
Jesus’s life. In their plan they match one another perfectly,
differing only in the choice of the events to be related. These two
narrative series are as it were predestinated to be [pg 166] united
instead of being placed side by side. It happens that each of the
northern journeys, according to the narrative, begins and ends with a
sojourn in Galilee. Mk 7:31: After leaving the region of Tyre he came
through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee. Mk 9:30, 33: And they went forth
from thence (i. e. from Cæsarea Philippi) and wandered through Galilee
and came to Capernaum. At the end of one narrative series one finds
oneself again at the beginning of the other. Hence if one connect the
one return from the north with the beginning of the other narrative
series, one has, superficially viewed, a perfectly natural
continuation,—only that Jesus must now, incomprehensibly enough, start
back immediately for the north, instead of the return to Galilee being
a stage on the journey to Jerusalem! This is the order that was
finally followed, but it is only in the second return that the
narrative finds a point of attachment for the journey to Jerusalem.
This return movement in both series accounts for the fact that the two
narratives, though they are really parallel cycles, are yet attached
to one another in chronological sequence. The present text has
completed the process of harmonising them. It is not simply that the
story of the second feeding of [pg 167] the multitude makes reference
to the first in the word “again” (Mk 8:1): the reconciliation is in
fact carried so far that Jesus in one word addressed to the Disciples
assumes both miracles (Mk 8:19-21)! How far this process was already
accomplished in the oral tradition, and how much is to be charged to
the account of the final literary composition, is a question which we
are no longer in a position to answer.
Only the first cycle is complete. Jesus and his Disciples travel by
boat north-east along the coast and return then again to the country
of Genezareth (Mk 6:32, 45, 53).
The second cycle is incomplete and fallen somewhat into disorder.
Jesus is back on the west coast after his voyage. Mk 8:10 ff.
corresponds with Mk 6:53 ff. and Mk 7:1 ff. Dalmanutha lies on the
west coast. But instead of his departing now directly for the north,
there comes first another voyage to the east coast (Mk 8:13). It is
not till they reach Bethsaida that he starts with his Disciples
northward (Mk 8:27). The first cycle on the other hand relates _this
voyage to Bethsaida as an episode of the famous coasting voyage and
places it immediately after the feeding of the multitude_ (Mk 6:45
ff[.]). And as a matter of fact the second narrative series also shows
[pg 168] that this was the original connection. For here, too, as in
the first series, the conversation upon landing deals with the
foregoing miracle. Mk 6:52: “For they understood not concerning the
loaves, but their heart was hardened.” Mk 8:19-21: “When I brake the
five loaves—when the seven—do ye not yet understand?” It is therefore
impossible that between this voyage and the feeding of the multitude
all the events were crowded which were enacted upon the west shore.
The minds of all are still full of the great event. The new sea
journey of the second cycle is nothing else but the original
continuation of the voyage to Bethsaida from the scene of the feeding
of the multitude.
Therewith the parallelism of the two series is proven. The events
follow one another in this order: coasting voyage from the west shore,
feeding of the multitude, continuation of the voyage to the
north-east, “walking upon the sea” and conversation in the boat,
arrival at Bethsaida, return to the region of Genezareth, discussion
with the Pharisees, departure with the Disciples to the north.
2. The Supper by the Seashore.
The Disciples’ proclamation of the immediate approach of the Kingdom
must have [pg 169] had a great success. A mighty multitude of such as
believed the message crowded around Jesus. He had about him a
community inspired by the most lively eschatological expectation. They
would not let go of him. In order to be alone with his Disciples he
embarks in a boat. He meant to withdraw to the north-east shore. But
the people, when they learned that he would take himself away,
streamed together from all sides and followed him along the beach. Mk
6:32, 33: “For there were many coming and going, and they had no
leisure so much as to eat. And they went away in a boat to a desert
place apart. And the people saw them going, and many knew them, and
they ran there together on foot from all the cities and outwent them.”
They meet him in a lonely region and immediately surround him. The
hour comes for the daily meal. In the accounts of the following
miracle the meal which they celebrated is preserved to us. _The
occasion was a solemn cultus-meal!_ After the loaves which he had
broken were consecrated by a prayer of thanksgiving Jesus has them
distributed to the multitude by his Disciples. Except for the addition
of the two parables [“My body—my blood”] we have absolutely the same
solemn ceremony at the Last Supper. [pg 170] There he personally
distributed the food to his table-companions. The description of the
distribution of the bread in the two cases corresponds perfectly. Mk
6:41: He took the loaves, and looking up to heaven, he blessed them,
and he gave to the Disciples to set before them. Mk 14:22: He took a
loaf, and when he had blessed, he brake it, and gave to them.
Hence the _solemn act of distribution_ constitutes the essence, as
well of that meal by the seashore, as of the last meal with his
Disciples. The “Lord’s Supper” is a name appropriate to both, for that
meal by the sea also took place at the evening hour. Mk 6:35: And when
the day was now far spent his Disciples came to him, etc. Here the
table-company is composed of the great multitude of believers in the
Kingdom: at the Last Supper it was limited to the circle of the
Disciples. _The celebration, however, was the same._
The story of this event has been distorted into a miracle: the
cultus-meal which Jesus improvised by the seashore has been
represented as a hearty and filling supper. That the scanty provision
which was at hand, the food designed for himself and his Disciples,
was solemnly distributed to the people is historic. [pg 171] That this
meal took the place of the evening repast likewise corresponds with
the fact. But that through a supernatural process the multitude was
_filled_ by it,—that belongs to the miraculous character which the
later age ascribed to the celebration because its significance could
not be apprehended.
The historical procedure is the following: The Disciples ask Jesus to
send the people away that they may be fed. For him, however, it is not
an appropriate moment to think of an earthly meal and so to disperse,
for the hour is near when they shall all be gathered about him at the
messianic banquet. Hence he would not have them go yet, but before he
dismisses them he commands them to recline as at table. In place of
the full meal he introduces a ceremonial meal, in which the
satisfaction of earthly appetite has no part, so that the food
intended for himself and his Disciples sufficed for all.
Neither the Disciples nor the multitude understand what goes on. As
Jesus afterwards in the boat directs the conversation to the
significance of the meal—this alone can be the historical meaning of
the obscure intimations of Mk 6:52 and Mk 8:14-21, it appears that the
Disciples have understood nothing.
He celebrated, therefore, a sacred cultus-meal [pg 172] the meaning of
which was clear to him alone. He did not count it necessary to explain
to them the meaning of the ceremony. The memory, however, of that
mysterious supper on the lonely seashore lived on vividly in the
tradition and grew to the account of the miraculous feeding. Wherein
did the solemnity of this distribution consist for Jesus? The
gathering at the feast is of an eschatological character. The people
that gathered about him by the seaside were awaiting with him the dawn
of the Kingdom. In replacing now the customary full meal with a sacred
ceremonial meal, at which he distributed food with thanksgiving to
God, he acted at the prompting of his messianic consciousness. _As one
who knew himself to be the Messiah, and would be manifested to them as
such at the imminent dawn of the Kingdom, he distributes, to those
whom he expects soon to join him at the messianic banquet, sacred
food, as though he would give them therewith an earnest of their
participation in that future solemnity._ The time for earthly meals is
passed: hence he celebrates with them a foretaste of the messianic
banquet. They, however, understood it not, for they could not guess
that he who distributed to them such consecrated eucharistic [pg 173]
food was conscious of being the Messiah and acted as such.
In this connection there falls a light upon the nature of the Last
Supper at Jerusalem. There the Disciples represented the community of
believers in the Kingdom. In the course of that last meal Jesus
distributed to them with a word of thanksgiving food and drink. But
now they know what he assumes to be: he had disclosed to them the
secret of his messiahship. From this they are able to divine in his
distribution the reference to the messianic banquet. He himself gave
this significance to his action in the fact that he concluded the
ceremony with a hint of their proximate reunion when he should drink
the wine new with them in his Father’s Kingdom!
The supper by the seaside and the supper at Jerusalem therefore
correspond completely, except that in the latter Jesus signified to
his Disciples the nature of the ceremony and at the same time
expresses the thought of the Passion in the two parables [“My body— my
blood”]. The cultus-meal was the same: a foretaste of the messianic
banquet in the circle of the fellowship of the believers in the
Kingdom. _Now for the first time one is able to understand how the
nature [pg 174] of the Last Supper can be independent of the two
parables._
3. The Week at Bethsaida.
During the ceremony Jesus was deeply moved. For this reason he urged
immediate departure and dismissed the people. He himself withdrew to a
mountain in order to be alone in prayer. On the beach at Bethsaida,
whither he had charged them to row, he again met his Disciples. They,
battling with wind and wave, had the illusion that a supernatural
apparition approached them as they descried his figure on the beach.
They still were so much under the influence of the impression lately
made upon them by the mighty personality who with mysterious majesty
had distributed to the multitude sacred food and then had suddenly
broken off the ceremony (Mk 6:45-52).
Whither had he sent away the multitude? What did they do at Bethsaida?
How long did they stay there? Our text merely recounts that they
returned again to Genezareth.
At this point, however, we encounter a difficult literary problem, in
the Synoptical narrative of the period immediately preceding the
departure for Jerusalem (Mk 9:30). [pg 175] According to Mk 8:27-33,
Jesus is now alone with his Disciples far away in the north, in
heathen territory,—from which point also he sets out on the rapid
march through Galilee to Jerusalem (Mk 9:30 ff.): “And they went forth
from thence and passed through Galilee, and he would not that any man
should know it.” Between the disclosure of his messiahship and this
departure there intervenes only one scene (Mk 8:34- 9:29), where he
appears surrounded by a great multitude of people. In company with the
three intimate Disciples he leaves the multitude, only to return to
them shortly again. It is nowhere recounted how this multitude
suddenly gets to him in heathen territory. And just as little are we
informed how it leaves him again, so that (according to Mk 9:30 ff.)
he can march through Galilee alone with his Disciples and
unrecognised.
But it is not only the multitude that appears unexpectedly: the whole
scenery also is altered. One finds oneself in a familiar region, for
Jesus enters with his Disciples “into the house,” while the people
stay without (Mk 9:28)!
The literary context in which the section stands is absolutely
impossible, for this cannot have been enacted in _heathen territory,_
[pg 176] but only in _Galilee!_ But as Jesus subsequently had only a
fleeting contact with Galilee, passing through it incognito, this
piece belongs in the Galilean period _before the departure for the
north, and more precisely, at the time of the return of the
Disciples,_ for it is then that he was constantly surrounded by a
throng of people and was seeking to be in solitude with his Disciples!
The situation, however may confidently be defined with still greater
exactness. Jesus dwelt in a village (Mk 9:28) in the neighbourhood of
which there was a mountain to which he betook himself with the three
Disciples (Mk 9:2). All this agrees, however, most certainly with the
sojourn in _Bethsaida._ The mountain which he seeks with the Three is
_the mountain on the north shore of the lake where he prayed in the
night when he came to Bethsaida!_
The passage Mk 8:34- 9:29 belongs therefore in the days at Bethsaida!
It is no longer possible to make out by what process it came into the
present impossible context. The adoption of the present order may have
been prompted in part by the consideration that the impressive word
about the obligation of following Jesus in suffering (Mk 8:34- 9:1)
seemed to form a most natural conclusion to [pg 177] the prediction of
the Passion at Cæsarea Philippi (Mk 8:31-33).
Moreover the transformation of the account of Jesus meeting his
Disciples at their landing into a miracle made it difficult to effect
a natural connection with the events which occurred the following
morning. And yet Mk 8:34 ff. may fairly be said to imply such measures
as were adopted the evening before (Mk 6:45-47). Jesus had dismissed
the people, had himself retired to solitude, and while it was yet
night had overtaken his Disciples at Bethsaida, where they found
lodging in a house (Mk 9:28). The next day he calls the people about
him with the Disciples (Mk 8:34) and speaks to them about the
requirement of self-denial on the part of his followers, readiness to
endure shame, scorn, ridicule, rather than prove untrue to him. This
conduct is justified by the nearness of the coming of the Son of Man,
who will perform judgment in the person of Jesus.
This admonition concludes with a word about “the coming of the Kingdom
of God with power,” i. e. the eschatological realisation of it. In its
present form it is toned down: some of them that stand by shall not
taste of death till that moment arrive. As the conclusion of this
address, however, it [pg 178] must have run: Ye who stand here shall
soon experience the great moment of the mighty dawn of the Kingdom of
God! Thus this earnest address at Bethsaida reflects the expectations
which stirred Jesus and the throng about him.
Six days after that address at Bethsaida Jesus took with him the Three
and led them to the mountain where he had prayed in solitude at
evening after the great cultus-meal in common. At their return they
find the other Disciples surrounded by the people. In spite of the
authority over demons of which they had made proof during their
progress through the cities of Israel, they were now not able to
master a demoniac boy who was brought to them. Jesus takes the father
and boy apart. The very moment that the people come running together
(Mk 9:25-27) the crisis begins, after which Jesus takes by the hand
the lad, who was lying as dead, and raises him up.
This passage, therefore, which has been wrested so strangely out of
its connection, contains a striking account of the first and last days
of the week which Jesus passed in Bethsaida between the return of the
Disciples and the departure for the north.
It will now be perfectly clear how unhistoric [pg 179] is the view
that Jesus left Galilee in consequence of growing opposition and
spreading defection. On the contrary, this is the period of his
highest triumph. A multitude of people with faith in the Kingdom
thronged him and pursued him everywhere. Hardly has he landed upon the
west coast but they are already there. Their number has grown still
greater and increases more and more (Mk 6:53-56). That they deserted
him, that they even showed the least motion of doubt or defection, the
texts give no intimation. _It was not the people that deserted Jesus
but Jesus that deserted the people._
This he did, not out of any fear of the emissaries from Jerusalem, but
only as carrying out what he already had in mind since the return of
the Disciples. He wishes to be alone. The people had defeated this aim
by following him along the shore as he sailed. When he had returned to
the west coast he found himself again surrounded. Because he felt it
absolutely necessary to be alone with the Disciples, and because he
was not able to effect this purpose in Galilee, for this cause he
suddenly vanished and betook himself into heathen territory. _The
journey into the north country is not a flight, rather it has the same
motive as the voyage on the lake._
[pg 180]
CHAPTER VIII
THE SECRET OF MESSIAHSHIP
1. From the Mount of Transfiguration to Cæsarea Philippi
COMING after Cæsarea Philippi the Transfiguration is an obscure
episode devoid of historical significance. The Three learn no more
about Jesus than Peter had already confessed in the presence of the
Twelve and Jesus himself had confirmed. Thus the whole section is
plainly an intrusion: the apotheosis and obscure dialogue have no
historical significance.
If, however, as has been proved above by literary evidence, this scene
was enacted some weeks after the mission of the Twelve and _before_
Cæsarea Philippi—not upon the mountain of the legend, but on the
mountain in the lonely region by the seashore near Bethsaida,—then we
behold an idle addendum transformed at one stroke into a Galilean
occurrence of far reaching historical importance, which explains the
scene at Cæsarea Philippi, and not vice versa. What we call [pg 181]
the Transfiguration is in reality nothing else but the revelation of
the secret of messiahship to the Three. A few weeks later comes then
its disclosure to the Twelve.
This revelation to the Three is handed down to us in the form of a
miracle-tale. It has undergone the same transformation as have all the
incidents of that voyage along the north coast. The scene on the
mountain, like the feeding of the multitude and the encounter of Jesus
with his disciples at dusk, bears evident marks of the intense
eschatological excitement of the moment. For this reason the
historical facts are no longer clear in detail. There appear unto them
Moses and Elijah, the two characters most prominently associated with
the expectation of the last times. To what extent may ecstatic
conditions, and perhaps glossolalia, have contributed to this
experience? The present form of the story permits us to infer
something of the sort (Mk 9:2-6). Does the voice out of the cloud (Mk
9:7, “This is my beloved Son, hear ye him”) repeat in some sort Jesus’
experience at his baptism?
There is in fact an inward connection between the Baptism and the
Transfiguration. In both cases a condition of ecstasy accompanies the
revelation of the secret of Jesus’ [pg 182] person. The first time the
revelation was for him alone; here the Disciples also share it. It is
not clear to what extent they themselves were transported by the
experience. So much is sure, that in a dazed condition, out of which
they awake only at the end of the scene (Mk 9:8), the figure of Jesus
appears to them illuminated by a supernatural light and glory, and a
voice intimates that he is the Son of God. The occurrence can be
explained only as the outcome of great eschatological excitement.
It is remarkable that the revelation of the secret of Jesus’
messiahship appears always to be connected with such conditions. At
Pentecost, when Peter openly proclaimed Jesus as the Christ, we have
an example of glossolalia. Peter, to be sure, had already had a taste
of such an experience as the revelation was made to him on the
mountain near Bethsaida. Paul also was in a state of ecstasy when he
heard the voice before the Damascus gate.
It has been shown above that no one could conclude from Jesus’ speech
or behaviour that he regards himself as the Messiah. Properly the
question is not, how the people could remain ignorant of Jesus’
messianic claim, but how Peter at Cæsarea Philippi [pg 183] and the
High Priest at the trial could come into possession of this secret.
The Transfiguration answers the first question. Peter knew that Jesus
is the “Son of God” through the revelation which he in common with the
two other Disciples received on the mountain near Bethsaida. For this
reason he answered the question with such confidence (Mk 8:29). The
text of St. Matthew’s Gospel records an additional saying of Jesus
which seems to allude to the very experience in which this knowledge
was supernaturally imparted to Peter: “Blessed art thou, Simon
Bar-Jonah: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my
Father which is in heaven” (Mt 16:17).
Moreover, the scene which follows upon Peter’s answer clearly has to
do with a secret common to him and to Jesus. When Jesus disclosed that
he must die in Jerusalem Peter turns upon him impetuously, takes him
apart, and speaks to him in excited tones. As Jesus sees that the
other Disciples are attentive he abruptly turns away from Peter with a
sharp word, calling him the Tempter, who minds not the things of God
but the things of men (Mk 8:32 and 8:33).
Why this agitation of Peter over Jesus’ disclosure about the fatal
journey to Jerusalem? [pg 184] Because it comes as a new factor, above
and beyond what was disclosed on the mountain near Bethsaida. About
that experience he dare not speak in the presence of the other
Disciples, because Jesus had forbidden it. For this reason he takes
Jesus apart. Jesus, however, seeing that the other Disciples are
listening, cannot explain matters to him, and so with passionate
abruptness enjoins silence.
Only the connection with the foregoing Transfiguration explains the
characteristic traits of the scene at Cæsarea Philippi. Psychological
observations about the quick apprehension and lively temperament of
Peter—the common expedients of modern interpretation—do not in fact
begin to explain why he alone should arrive with such confidence at
the knowledge of Jesus’ messiahship, only to fall a moment later into
such misunderstanding that he gets into an excited dispute with Jesus.
Why do they both go apart together? Why, instead of instructing him,
does Jesus leave him there with a hard word of rebuke?
Taken by itself the whole scene at Cæsarea Philippi is an enigma. If,
however, we assume that the Transfiguration preceded it, the enigma is
solved and the scene is illuminated [pg 185] down to the smallest
details. The revelation to the Twelve was preceded by the disclosure
to the Three of the secret of Jesus’ messiahship.
2. The Futuristic Character of Jesus’ Messiahship.
Meanwhile the revelation of the secret of his messiahship alters
nothing in the behaviour of the Disciples to Jesus. They do not sink
before him in the dust as if now the man whom they had known was
become a superhuman being. They only manifest in consequence of this
revelation a certain awe. They dare not interrogate him when they fail
to understand his words (Mk 9:32), and as they company with him they
appear to be aware that he carries within him a great secret.
Are we to imagine then that after this revelation of his secret Jesus
was henceforth regarded by his disciples as the Messiah? No, _not yet_
was he the Messiah. It must constantly be kept in mind that the
Kingdom and the Messiah are correlative terms which belong inseparably
together. Now if the Kingdom was not yet come, neither was the
Messiah. Jesus’ disclosure had reference to the time of the dawning of
the Kingdom. When [pg 186] that hour shall strike, then shall he
appear as Messiah, then shall his messiahship be revealed in glory.
Such was the secret which he solemnly made known to his disciples.
Jesus’ messiahship was a secret, not merely because he had forbidden
it to be spoken, but in its very nature it was a secret, inasmuch as
it could be realised only at a definite time in the future. It was a
conception which could be formulated fully only in his own
consciousness. Wherefore the people could not understand it—and need
not know anything about it. It was enough if by his word and his signs
he might convert them to faith in the nearness of the kingdom, for
with the coming of the Kingdom his messiahship would be manifest.
It is almost impossible to express in modern terms the consciousness
of messiahship which Jesus imparted as a secret to his Disciples.
Whether we describe it as an identity between him and the Son of Man
who is to appear, whether we express it as a continuity which unites
both personalities, or think of it as virtually a pre-existent
messiahship,—none of these modern conceptions can render the
consciousness of Jesus as the Disciples understood it.
What we lack is the “Now and Then” [pg 187] which dominated their
thinking and which explains a curious duality of consciousness that
was characteristic of them. What we might call identity, continuity,
and potentiality was in their mind confounded in a conception which
quite eludes our grasp. Every person figured himself in two entirely
different states, according as he thought of himself now, in the
pre-messianic age, or then in the messianic. Expressions which we
interpret only in accordance with our unity of consciousness, they
referred as a matter of course to the double consciousness familiar to
them. Therefore when Jesus revealed to them the secret of his
messiahship, that did not mean to them that he is the Messiah, as we
moderns must understand it; rather it signified for them that their
Lord and Master was the one who in the messianic age would be revealed
as Messiah.
They think of themselves also in terms of this double consciousness.
As often as Jesus made known to them the necessity of his suffering
before entering upon his rule they questioned within themselves what
manner of persons they should be in the coming age. Wherefore,
following upon the prophecies of the Passion we find rivalry among the
Disciples as to which shall be the greatest in the [pg 188] Kingdom,
or to whom shall be accorded the seats of honour on either side of the
throne. In the meanwhile, however, they remain what they are, and
Jesus remains what he is, their Teacher and Master. The sons of
Zebedee address him as “Master” (Mk 10:35). As Teacher they expect him
to give promise and assurance of what shall come to pass when the
Kingdom dawns and his messiahship is revealed.
In this sense, then, Jesus’ messianic consciousness is futuristic.
There was nothing strange in this either for him or for his Disciples.
On the contrary, it corresponded exactly to the Jewish conception of
the hidden life and labour of the Messiah. (Cf. Weber: _System der
altsynagogalen Theologie,_ 1880, pp. 342-446). The course of Jesus’
earthly life preceded his messiahship in glory. The Messiah in his
earthly estate must live and labour unrecognised, he must teach, and
through deed and suffering he must be made perfect in righteousness.
Not till then shall the messianic age dawn with the Last Judgment and
the establishment of the Kingdom. The Messiah must come from the
north. Jesus’ march from Cæsarea Philippi to Jerusalem was the
progress of the unrecognised Messiah to his triumph in glory.
[pg 189]
Thus in the midst of the messianic expectation of his people stood
Jesus as the Messiah that is to be. He dare not reveal himself to
them, for the season of his hidden labour was not yet over. Hence he
preached the near approach of the Kingdom of God.
It was this futuristic consciousness of messiahship which prompted
Jesus in the Temple to touch upon the messianic dogma of the Scribes,
as though he would call their attention to the secret which lurks
behind it. The Pharisees say, “The Messiah is David’s Son;” but David
calls him his Lord. How can he still be his Son (Mk 12:35-37)?
The Messiah is David’s Son—that is, subordinate to him—since in this
era he is born of human parentage and lives and labours in obscurity.
David’s Lord, because at the dawn of the coming era he will be
revealed as Christ in glory. Jesus has no notion of impeaching the
pharisaic dogma. It is correct, the Scripture so teaches. Only, the
Pharisees themselves cannot properly interpret their dogma, and so
cannot explain how the Messiah can be in one instance David’s Son and
in another, David’s Lord.
This saying of Jesus to the people in the Temple—(only Matthew has
made of [pg 190] it an embarrassing polemic)—is on a line with his
utterance about the Baptist. Whoever could apprehend with what
authority John baptised—that is, with the power and authority of
Elijah,—whoever could understand how the Messiah could be in one
instance David’s son, in another David’s Lord,—he must know also who
_he_ is that so speaks. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear!
3. The Son of Man and the Futuristic Character of Jesus’ Messiahship.
The expression “Son of David” contains an enigma. Therefore Jesus
never used it in speaking of his messiahship, but always refers to
himself as the “Son of Man.” Consequently this designation must have
been peculiarly apt as a rendering of his messianic consciousness.
It is evident that he chose this term deliberately. Every other
messianic designation that is applied to him he corrects and
interprets by “Son of Man.”
As they descend from the mountain where the Disciples had come to
recognise him as the Son of God he speaks of himself as the “Son of
Man” (Mk 9:7-9).
Peter proclaimed him before the others as “the Anointed one” (Mk
8:29). Jesus immediately [pg 191] proceeds to instruct them about the
fate of the “Son of Man” (Mk 8:31).
“Art thou the Christ the Son of the Blessed?” the High Priest asked
him (Mk 14:61). “Ye shall see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand
of power and coming with the clouds of heaven,” is Jesus’ answer. That
signifies, Yes. The same expression occurs in the second and in the
third prophecy of the Passion (Mk 9:30-32 and Mk 10:32-34) and in the
saying about serving (Mk 10:45).
The messianic title “Son of Man” is futuristic in character. It refers
to the moment in which the Messiah shall come upon the clouds of
heaven for judgment. From the beginning this was the sense in which
Jesus had used the expression, whether in speaking to the people or to
the Disciples. In sending out his Apostles he warned them of the
impending approach of the day of the Son of Man (Mt 10:23). He spoke
to the people of the coming of the Son of Man as an exhortation to be
faithful to him, Jesus (Mk 8:38).
Withal, he and the Son of Man remain for the people and for the
Disciples two entirely distinct personalities. The one is a
terrestrial, the other a celestial figure; the one belongs to the age
that now is, the other to the messianic period. Between the two there
exists [pg 192] solidarity, inasmuch as the Son of Man will intervene
in behalf of such as have ranged themselves on the side of Jesus, the
herald of his coming.
These are the passages one must take as the point of departure in
order to understand the significance of this expression in Jesus’
mouth. Jesus and the Son of Man are different persons for such as do
not know his secret. They, however, to whom he has revealed his secret
are aware of a personal connection between the two. Jesus it is who at
the messianic day shall appear as the Son of Man. The revelation at
Cæsarea Philippi consists in this, that Jesus reveals to his Disciples
in what personal relationship he stands to the coming Son of Man. As
the one who is to be the Son of Man he can confirm Peter’s confession
of him as the Messiah. His reply to the High Priest is affirmative in
the same sense. He is the Messiah—that they will see when he appears
as the Son of Man upon the clouds of heaven.
“Son of Man” is accordingly the adequate expression of his
messiahship, so long as he, in this earthly æon as Jesus of Nazareth,
has occasion to refer to his future dignity. Hence when he speaks to
the Disciples about himself as the Son of Man he assumes this [pg 193]
duality of consciousness. “The Son of Man must suffer and will then
rise from the dead:” that is to say, “As the one who is to be Son of
Man at the resurrection of the dead I must suffer.” To the same effect
we must understand the word about serving: As the one who in the
character of the Son of Man is destined to the highest rule I must now
humble myself to the lowliest service (Mk 10:45). Therefore he says
when they come to arrest him: The hour is come in the which he who is
to be the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinners (Mk
14:21, 41).
The problem about the Son of Man is herewith elucidated. It was not an
expression which Jesus commonly used to describe himself, but a solemn
title which he adopted when in the great moments of his life he spoke
about himself to the initiated as the future Messiah, while before the
others he spoke of the Son of Man as a personality distinct from
himself. In all cases, however, the context shows that he is speaking
of one who is yet to come, for in all these passages mention is made
either of the Resurrection or of the appearing upon the clouds of
heaven. The philological objections do not therefore apply here.
Initiated and uninitiated must understand from the situation that he
is speaking [pg 194] of a definite personality of the future,—and not
of man in general, even though the expression in both cases would be
the same.
The case is entirely different with another set of passages where the
expression occurs arbitrarily as a pure self-designation, a roundabout
way of saying “I.” Here all critical and philological objections are
thoroughly in place.
Mt 8:20,—The Son of Man hath not where to lay his head.
Mt 11:19,—The Son of Man is come eating and drinking (in contrast to
the Baptist).
Mt 12:32,—Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is a worse crime than
speaking evil of the Son of Man.
Mt 12:40,—The Son of Man will be three days in the earth, like Jonah
in the belly of the fish.
Mt 13:37, 41,—The Son of Man is the Sower; the Son of Man is the
lord of the reapers.
Mt 16:13,—Who do the people say that the Son of Man is?
Here the expression is philologically impossible. For if Jesus had so
used it, his hearers must simply have understood him to [pg 195] mean
“man.” There is nothing here to indicate that the word is meant to
express a future messianic dignity! Here in fact he designates by it
his actual present condition! But “Son of Man” is a messianic title of
futuristic character, since it always suggests a coming upon the
clouds, according to Daniel 7:13-14. Furthermore, in all of these
passages the Disciples are as yet ignorant of Jesus’ secret. For them
the Son of Man is still an entirely distinct person. The unity of the
subject is still completely unknown to them. Therefore they were not
in a position to understand that by this term he refers to himself,
but they must refer everything to that Son of Man of whose coming he
also spoke elsewhere. Therewith, however, the passages would be
meaningless, for they imply that Jesus is thus speaking of himself.
Historically and philologically it is therefore impossible that Jesus
could have employed the expression as a purposeless and matter of
course self-designation. Even as a self-designation referable to the
future messianic dignity that was to be his, only they could
understand it who knew his secret. Hence all the passages are
unhistorical in which, _previous to Cæsarea Philippi_ (or, for the
Three, previous to the Transfiguration), [pg 196] he designates
_himself_ as Son of Man. Only those in that period are historical in
which he speaks of the Son of Man as a figure yet to come, not
identical with himself (Mt 10:23 and Mk 8:38). The passages cited
above, in which the expression is used without its proper significance
as a mere self-designation, are therefore not historical, but are
comprehensible only as the result of a literary process. How does it
come about that a later period of Gospel composition regarded this
expression as “Jesus’ self-designation”?
This was due to a shifting of the perspective. It is observable from
the moment when men began to write the history of Jesus upon the
assumption that on earth he was already the Messiah. From that time on
men lost consciousness of the fact that for the earthly existence of
Jesus his very messiahship was something future, and that by the very
expression Son of Man he designated himself as the future Messiah.
Since, then, it was an historic fact that he spoke of himself as the
Son of Man, the writers appropriated this emphatic term and without
suspecting that it was appropriate only in certain sayings and in
definite situations, they employed it indifferently in any passage
where Jesus spoke of himself,—and thereby [pg 197] created these
philological and historical impossibilities.
This erroneous use was due therefore to a literary development of
markedly secondary character. In this respect it was like the
unhistorical use of the expression “Son of David” by Matthew. It
agrees thereto that the “Son of Man” passages here in question belong
likewise to a secondary stratum of St. Matthew’s Gospel.
What chiefly reveals their secondary character is: the transformation
of the simple question asked at Cæsarea Philippi (Mt 16:13); the
application of the parable of the sower (Mt 13:37, 41); and the false
interpretation of the saying about Jonah (Mt 12:40).
No less secondary is the formulation of the speech about the sin
against the Holy Ghost, where a contrast is drawn between blasphemy
against the Holy Ghost and against the Son of Man (Mt 12:32), whereas
in Jesus’ thought both came to the same thing, since it was a question
of conscious hardening against the power of the coming Kingdom which
worked in him. In the passages Mt 8:20 and Mt 11:19 the expression is
arbitrarily used, for Jesus merely wishes to say: _I_ have nowhere to
lay my head; and, _I_ eat and drink, in contrast to the ascetic
practice of the Baptist.
[pg 198]
It is quite a different case which is presented by the two
unhistorical “Son of Man” passages in St. Mark’s Gospel.
Mk 2:10—The Son of Man hath authority to forgive sins upon earth.
Mk 2:28—The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.
The secondary character appears in the fact that Jesus is supposed to
have used the expression here as a self-designation. The historical
fact is that he used it in that connection in the third person,
referring either to the Son of Man as an eschatological figure, or to
man in general. In either case it makes sense.
1. Man as such can by works of healing declare the forgiveness of sins
upon earth.
Man as man is lord of the Sabbath.
2. In view of the coming of the Son of Man forgiveness of sins is
already available, as the works of healing show.
In view of the coming of the Son of Man a higher factor already
emerges to modify the legalistic observance of the Sabbath.
The Law yields to something higher. The case of David shows it.
However one may explain these passages, [pg 199] one thing is clear:
the expression did actually occur here and did somehow modify Jesus’
statement. The only secondary trait appears in the use of the
expression as a self-designation, whereas in fact Jesus spoke of man
in general or of the Son of Man. These passages, therefore, are on the
threshold between the historical and the literary-unhistorical use of
the name “Son of Man.”
We can now understand the peculiar difficulty of the “Son of Man”
problem. Hitherto, the deeper the investigation went, so much the
further the solution seemed to recede. This was due to the fact that
no amount of reflection could effect the separation of passages of
such unequal worth. Thus the literary and historical sides of the
problem remained confounded with one another. The moment, however, the
discovery is made, from the study of Jesus’ messianic consciousness,
that the expression Son of Man is the only one by which he could utter
the secret of his future dignity, the separation is given. All those
passages are historical which show the influence of the apocalyptic
reference to the Son of Man in Daniel: all are unhistorical in which
such is not the case. At the same time the shifting of the perspective
explains why for writers of a later generation this [pg 200]
expression in Jesus’ mouth could have only the significance of an
arbitrary self-designation, appropriate in all situations where he
spoke of himself.
Finally, the last enigma is also solved. Why does the expression
disappear from the language of the primitive Church? Why does no one
(with exception of Acts 7:56) designate the Messiah by the title Son
of Man, notwithstanding that Jesus had used it exclusively to indicate
his dignity? This is due to the fact that “Son of Man” was the
messianic expression for a clearly defined episode of the messianic
drama. The Messiah was the Son of Man in the moment of his
manifestation upon the clouds of heaven to reign in judgment over the
world. Jesus thought exclusively of that moment, since only from that
moment on was he for men the Messiah. The primitive Church, however,
seeing that a transitional period intervened, beheld Jesus as the
Messiah in heaven above at the right hand of God. He was already the
Messiah and did not have to become such at the moment of the appearing
of the Son of Man. Because the perspective was shifted here also, one
used the general expression “Messiah” instead of the title “Son of
Man” which pointed to a particular scene.
[pg 201]
Jesus would have expressed himself inaccurately had he said, I am the
Messiah,—for that he was to be only when he appeared in glory as the
Son of Man.
The primitive Church would have expressed itself inaccurately had it
said, Jesus is the Son of Man,—for after the Resurrection he was the
Messiah at the right hand of God, whose coming as Son of Man the
Church expected.
4. The Resurrection of the Dead and the Futuristic Character of Jesus’
Messiahship.
What is the significance of the resurrection-prophecies? It seems to
us hard to admit that Jesus could have foretold so precisely an event
of that sort. It seems much more plausible to suppose that general
utterances of his about a glory that awaited him were editorially
transformed _ex eventu_ into predictions of the Resurrection.
Such criticism is in place so long as one holds the view that the
prophecy of the Resurrection referred to an isolated event in the
personal history of Jesus. So it appears, however, only to our modern
consciousness, because we think uneschatologically even in the matter
of the Resurrection. For Jesus and his Disciples, on the other hand,
the [pg 202] Resurrection which he spoke about had an entirely
different significance. It was a messianic event which signified the
dawn of the full glory that was to come. We must eliminate from the
Resurrection predicted by Jesus all modern notions suggestive of an
apotheosis. The contemporary consciousness understood this
“Restoration” (Acts 3:21) as a revelation of Jesus’ messiahship at the
dawn of the Kingdom. Therefore when Jesus spoke of his resurrection
the Disciples thought of the great messianic Resurrection in which he
as the Messiah would be raised from the dead.
The conversation during the descent from the mountain of
Transfiguration is decisive on this point. Jesus spoke then for the
first time to his most intimate disciples of “the resurrection of the
Son of Man from the dead” (Mk 9:9). They, however, were quite unable
to think of “the resurrection of the Son of man” apart from the
messianic Resurrection. Their attention was entirely occupied with the
messianic event which Jesus’ words suggested to them. They question
therefore among themselves about the Resurrection of the dead. What
should that mean (Mk 9:10)? That is to say, the conditions thereof, so
far as they can see, are not yet [pg 203] fulfilled. Elijah is not yet
come (Mk 9:11). Jesus puts their minds at rest with the hint that
Elijah had already appeared though men did not recognise him. He means
the Baptist (Mk 9:12-13).
This conversation, in which otherwise it is impossible to detect at
all any reasonable sequence of thought, becomes perfectly transparent
and natural the moment it is noticed how the Disciples are unable to
think of the resurrection which Jesus’ words suggest except in the
same thought with the general messianic Resurrection. Therefore this
talk during the descent from the mountain throws a clear light upon
Jesus’ later prophecies of his Passion and Resurrection, because we
are here in a position to observe the thoughts and questions which
these words awaken in the hearts of the Disciples. Moreover this
“resurrection prophecy” lacks the mention of the three days which
furnishes precisely the occasion for the critical attitude toward the
subsequent prophecies of the Passion. In this respect the prediction
during the descent agrees thoroughly with the last utterance before
the High Priest. Both lack the definite indication of the time when
the Resurrection or the appearing upon the clouds of heaven shall take
place. In the [pg 204] messianic event both correspond
chronologically: resurrection and coming on the clouds signify only
the revelation of Jesus’ messiahship on the great Resurrection Day.
This expectation of the eschatological Resurrection of the dead ruled
the consciousness of Jesus and his contemporaries. He assumes it in
his discourses at Jerusalem. Expectation of the Kingdom and belief in
the approaching Resurrection of the dead belong together. It is, as we
have already observed, an error in perspective to represent Jesus’
thought in regard to the coming Kingdom as directed toward the future
as if it had to do with subsequent generations. So the modern mind
thinks. It was just the opposite with Jesus. The Kingdom had to do
with the past generations. They rise up to meet the Judgment which
inaugurates the Kingdom.
The Resurrection of the dead is the condition precedent to the
establishment of the Kingdom. Through it all generations of the world
are lifted out of their temporal sequence and placed before God’s
judgment as contemporaries. For example, such a parable even as that
of the Lord’s Vineyard requires the assumption of the Resurrection of
the dead (Mk 12:1-12). The whole history of [pg 205] Israel is there
described in the conduct of the husbandmen. Jesus speaks of the
generations of Israel from the days of the Prophets unto the people
then present to whom his warning is addressed. The parable, however,
pictures only one generation, because when it is a question of the
Judgment, the whole people in its consecutive generations appears
before God as one collective whole,—which means that it is raised up
as a whole from the dead.
In the same way it is to be explained that the people of Sodom of a
generation long gone by are assured of a more tolerable fate than the
present inhabitants of Capernaum (Mt 11:23-24).
Those who believed in the coming of the Kingdom believed also in the
approaching Resurrection of the dead. Wherefore the attack of the
Sadducees was directed precisely against this point. Jesus’ reply to
them, that “when they shall rise from the dead they neither marry nor
are given in marriage, but are as the angels in heaven” (Mk 12:25), is
to be understood as descriptive of conditions in the Kingdom of
heaven, into which they enter through the Resurrection from the dead.
The “Resurrection of the dead” was, in [pg 206] fine, only the mode in
which the transformation of the whole form of existence was
accomplished upon those who had already succumbed to death. By the
coming of the Kingdom of God, however, the earthly form of existence
in general must be raised to another and an incomparably higher
estate. From this point of view, those also are to experience a
“resurrection” who before the great Event have not succumbed to death;
for by a higher power their mode of existence, too, will suddenly be
transformed into another, which they will then share with those that
have been awakened from death. In comparison with this new form of
existence the foregoing condition is a matter of indifference. It is
all one whether from our earthly existence or from the sleep of death
we pass into the messianic mode of being. In comparison with the
latter all being is “death.” It alone is “life.”
Wherefore, to the living, Jesus speaks of the way that leadeth unto
“life” (Mt 7:14). He counsels men rather to part with a member of the
body, when “life” is in question, than to fail of gaining through the
Resurrection a part in the messianic existence (Mt 18:8, 9). The rich
young man asks what he must do “to inherit eternal life.” Jesus [pg
207] is very sorrowful when he will not follow the counsel given him,
because it is so hard for a rich man “to enter into the Kingdom of
heaven” (Mk 10:17, 25).
This disparagement of the earthly form of existence goes to the length
of sacrificing altogether the earthly life for the sake of full
assurance of life in the coming age. Hence, with the exhortation to
follow him in suffering and reproach, Jesus declares that “whosoever
would save his life shall lose it.” That is to say, Whosoever, through
anxiety about his earthly existence, makes himself unworthy that the
Son of Man intervene for him before God, forfeits thereby the
messianic life which commences with the Resurrection (Mk 8:35).
When the Kingdom dawns it is all one whether we exist in a living or
in a dead body. It is only with this persuasion that a man can meet
persecution boldly. Wherefore Jesus says to the Apostles as he sends
them forth: Be not afraid of them which kill the body but are not able
to kill the “soul,” but fear him who hath power to destroy both “soul”
and body in hell (Mt 10:28).
St. Paul furnishes a classical instance of this same connection
between the eschatological expectation of the early Church and [pg
208] the Resurrection of the dead (1 Cor. 15:50-54). What we have here
is not a specifically Pauline thought, but a primitive Christian
conception to which Jesus had already given utterance. Flesh and
blood, whether quick or dead, can in no wise have part in the Kingdom.
Therefore when the hour strikes and the dead are raised incorruptible,
the living also shall be changed, putting on incorruption and
immortality.
The Resurrection of the dead is the bridge from the “Now” to the
“Then.” It accounts for the duality of consciousness. Hence when Jesus
spoke of his resurrection the Disciples correlated this word with the
great context. It signified for them the general Resurrection in which
they too would arise in the form of existence appropriate to the
Kingdom of God. True, they expected his resurrection,—not, however, as
the “Easter event,” but as the dawn of the messianic Kingdom. Jesus
was to be revealed as the risen Christ when he should come as Son of
Man upon the clouds of heaven to usher in the messianic day.
For our feeling, the death of Jesus is related to the Resurrection as
a discord in music to its resolution. Owing to the disparagement of
every form of existence prior [pg 209] to the messianic age, a much
weaker accent, for the Disciples lay upon the death. What they
conceived was an endless, eternal accord following upon a brief
earthly prelude.
Where we see a juxtaposition of messianic claim, Passion prediction,
and Resurrection prophecy, the Disciples perceived a much stricter
connection of thought. They beheld all in a messianic light. Hence
they did not draw from Jesus’ words three separate conclusions: (1)
that he was the Messiah; (2) that he must suffer and die; (3) that he
would rise from the dead. Rather, the impression they received was
this: Our master will after his death, at the Resurrection, be
revealed as the Son of Man. At the same time they question within
themselves what sort of persons they then will be and what office and
dignity will fall to their lot in the new existence.
It can thus be explained why their messianic conception was not
completely overthrown by the notion of “the suffering and dying
Messiah.” Jesus had revealed to them neither the suffering, nor the
dying, nor the risen Christ; but he spoke to them of the Son of Man
who was due to appear, and revealed to them that it was he who should
come in that character when he had perfected himself by suffering here
below.
[pg 210]
It can never be emphasised enough that in this respect Jesus’
messiahship was completely in line with the popular conception. The
tragedy of his life is not to be accounted for by the incompatibility
of his notion of messiahship and the general expectation, so that only
conflicts could ensue which must bring about his death. This
conception first appears in the Fourth Gospel. The historical Jesus
laid claim to messiahship only from the moment of the Resurrection.
This view of Jesus’ messianic disclosures in the early Synoptic
tradition is absolutely required by the conception of the primitive
Church. The primitive Church assumes that Jesus’ messianic
consciousness was futuristic when he talked to the Disciples and even
when he gave answer to the High Priest. Even Peter’s discourse in the
Acts dates his messiahship from the moment of the Resurrection. Until
then he was Jesus of Nazareth. Only, the provisional condition of
sitting on the right hand of God takes the place of the coming upon
the clouds of heaven. “Jesus the Nazarene, a man approved of God unto
you by mighty works and wonders and signs which God did by him in the
midst of you (Acts 2:22), him did God raise up (Acts 2:32) and hath
made him both Lord and [pg 211] Messiah, this Jesus whom ye crucified”
(Acts 2:36).
This testimony to the primitive conception of Jesus’ messiahship is of
itself so weighty that it would put to silence the whole Synoptical
tradition if that were of a different tenor. How is it conceivable
that the Disciples proclaimed that Jesus had entered upon his
messianic existence through the Resurrection, if already upon earth he
had spoken of his messiahship as a dignity then actually possessed? As
a matter of fact the early Synoptic tradition and the view of the
primitive Church agree together completely. Both affirm with one voice
that Jesus’ messianic consciousness was futuristic.
If we had not this witness, the knowledge of Jesus’ historical
character and personality would be forever closed to us. For after his
death all sorts of presumptions arose to obscure the consciousness of
the futuristic character of his messiahship. His resurrection as
Messiah coincided with the general Resurrection which should usher in
the messianic age—such was the perspective of the Disciples before his
death. After his death his resurrection as Messiah constituted a fact
for itself. Jesus was the Messiah _before_ the messianic age! That is
the fateful shifting [pg 212] of the perspective. Therein lies the
tragical element—but the magnificent as well—in the whole phenomenon
of Christianity.
The primitive Christian consciousness made the most strenuous efforts
to fill the breach, trying in spite of it to conceive of Jesus’
resurrection as the dawn of the messianic era in the general rising of
the dead. There was an effort to make it intelligible as analogous to
a somewhat protracted interval between two scenes of the first act of
a drama. Properly, however, they already stood within the messianic
Resurrection. Thus for Paul, Jesus Christ, proved to be the Messiah
through the Resurrection of the dead, “is the first fruits of them
that sleep” (1 Cor. 15:20). The whole structure of Pauline theology
and ethics rests upon this thought. Because they find themselves
within this period, believers are in reality buried with Christ and
with him raised again through baptism. They are “new” creatures, they
are the “righteous,” whose citizenship is in heaven. Until we grasp
this fundamental notion we cannot perceive the unity in the manifold
complications of St. Paul’s world of thought.
The Christian historical tradition sought another way out. It assumed
a sort of preresurrection which coincided with the resurrection [pg
213] of Jesus. It lent to this the colouring of the messianic Day. Mt
27:50-53 furnishes an example in legendary form of such a method of
reconciling fact and theory. With Jesus’ death upon the cross a new
world era dawned. When he yielded up his spirit the veil of the Temple
was rent from the top to the bottom and earthquakes, the signs of the
end of the world, shook the earth; the rocks were rent; the graves
opened; and many bodies of the saints that had fallen asleep were
raised. After Jesus’ resurrection they go forth out of the tombs into
the holy city and appear unto many. So this narrative clings to the
conception that the general Resurrection of the dead under the omens
of the messianic Day comes in conjunction with Jesus’ death and
consequent resurrection,—but still only as a sort of prelude.
Time, indeed, proved mightier than the original conceptions.
Inexorably it thrust itself like a splitting wedge between Jesus’
resurrection and the expected general Resurrection of the messianic
Day, and with the temporal coincidence it destroyed also the casual
[causal] connection in the original sense. The messiahship of Jesus
stood up solidly out of the past. Those who confessed it and at the
same time expected the Kingdom as a future [pg 214] event lost all
consciousness of the fact that in the preaching of Jesus his
messiahship and the Kingdom were both of them future and coincident
events. They began to regard the Gospel history from the point of view
that _Jesus was the Messiah._ The title for this new view of the
Gospel history was written by St. Paul. It reads: _“Jesus
Christ,”_—the office and dignity of the risen Lord is combined with
the historical personality in one idea. The Fourth Gospel has drawn
the logical consequence therefrom and has so depicted the history of
Jesus as if he had come upon earth as the Messiah.
It is the task of the historical investigator to emancipate himself
for a moment from the unhistorical perspective and place the Synoptic
accounts in the right light. Only then, when one has grasped the
futuristic element in Jesus’ messianic consciousness, can one
understand why he revealed his dignity to the Disciples as a “secret,”
why he designated himself thereby as the Son of Man, and in what sense
he spoke of his resurrection.
5. The Betrayal by Judas—the Last Disclosure of the Secret of
Messiahship.
What did Judas actually betray? According to the accounts of our
Gospels it [pg 215] looks as if he had informed the Sanhedrin where at
a particular hour they could apprehend Jesus. But, even if this
indication of the place did play some part in the betrayal of Judas,
it could only have been incidental. Where Jesus abode they could at
any time find out, since he did nothing to make his coming and going
secret. If then they desired to seize him, they had only to send a spy
after him as he left Jerusalem in the evening, and they could have got
all the information they wanted. For this purpose they did not need
one of the inner circle.
As a matter of fact, however, the principal difficulty lay in an
entirely different direction. Not to _arrest_ him but to _convict_ him
was what they could not accomplish, for they could bring nothing
against him. With respect to him and his following they found
themselves in the embarrassing fix into which every conscientious
church discipline must necessarily fall some time or another: these
people were too pious for them, pious beyond proper limits, inasmuch
as they with too great enthusiasm believed what the others with seemly
moderation of feeling confessed in their creed,—namely, that the
Kingdom is near. They could not get a conviction on the ground of the
title of Forerunner [pg 216] which the people attributed to him, for
he had justified this attribution by signs. Moreover he had never
openly claimed for himself such a dignity. Nevertheless the manner of
his behaviour was for them dangerous in the highest degree. At the
head of the pious populace he terrorised them. For this reason they
would gladly have made away with him—and could not.
One can understand the attitude of the Sanhedrin and their
difficulties if one steadily keeps in mind that, in view of Jesus’
whole activity, the thought had not occurred to anybody that he could
take himself to be the Messiah. Thus they knew no charge to bring
against him, and had nothing for it but to try to catch him in his
speech and discredit him with the people—and in this they were not
successful.
Then Judas appeared before them and put the deadly weapon into their
hand. As they heard what he told them “they were glad,” for now was he
delivered into their power. Judas now seeks a favourable moment to
deliver the betrayed into their hands (Mk 14:11).
What he had betrayed to them we can see from the process of the trial.
The witnesses of the Pharisees can adduce nothing that would justify
his conviction. When, however, [pg 217] the witnesses have withdrawn,
the High Priest puts the question to Jesus directly, whether He is the
Messiah. To prove such a claim on Jesus’ part they could not adduce
the necessary witnesses,—for there were none. The High Priest is here
in possession of Jesus’ secret. That was the betrayal of Judas!
Through him the Sanhedrin knew that Jesus claimed to be something
different from what the people held him to be, though he raised no
protest against it.
They got the decisive charge through the betrayed secret of Cæsarea
Philippi. To be Elijah, the prophet of the last times, was no
religious crime. But to claim to be Messiah, that was blasphemy! The
perfidy of the charge lay in the High Priest’s insinuation that Jesus
held himself then to be the Messiah, just as he stood there before
him. This Jesus repudiated with a proud word about his coming as Son
of Man. Nevertheless he was condemned for blasphemy.
We have therefore three revelations of the secret of messiahship,
which so hang together that each subsequent one implies the foregoing.
On the mountain near Bethsaida was revealed to the Three the secret
which was disclosed to Jesus at his baptism. That was after the
harvest. A few weeks later it was [pg 218] known to the Twelve, by the
fact that Peter at Cæsarea Philippi answered Jesus’ question out of
the knowledge which he had attained upon the mountain. One of the
Twelve betrayed the secret to the High Priest. This last revelation of
the secret was fatal, for it brought about the death of Jesus. _He was
condemned as Messiah although he had never appeared in that rôle._
[pg 219]
CHAPTER IX
THE SECRET OF THE PASSION
1. The Pre-Messianic Affliction.
THE reference to the Passion belonged as a matter of course to the
eschatological prediction. A time of unheard of affliction must
precede the coming of the Kingdom. Out of these woes the Messiah will
be brought to birth. That was a view prevalent far and wide: in no
other wise could the events of the last times be imagined.
According to this view Jesus’ words must be interpreted. It will
appear then that in his preaching of the Kingdom he brought into sharp
prominence the thought of the Affliction of the last times. We always
assume that when he speaks of persecutions which his Disciples shall
encounter he means to predict what they must go through when they are
left alone and orphaned on earth after his death. That is totally
false. After his death Jesus will be Messiah through the Resurrection,
and therewith the glory of the Kingdom dawns. Not what they must
withstand after his death, but what they are to be in the Kingdom [pg
220] is the thought which concerns the Disciples on the way to
Jerusalem.
When Jesus speaks of suffering and persecution it is a question of the
afflictions which his followers must bear with him before the dawn of
the Kingdom. What is meant is the last desperate attack of the powers
of this world at enmity with God, which shall sweep like a flood over
those who in expectation of the Kingdom represent the divine power in
the godless world. Hence Jesus constitutes the focus upon which the
Affliction concentrates. He is the rock upon which the waves dash
themselves to pieces. Whosoever would not be torn away by the flood
must cling stedfastly to him.
When he says that his mission is not to bring peace upon earth but a
sword, when he speaks of the uprising which he brings about, in which
the most sacred earthly ties shall be broken, in which one must follow
him laden with the cross and count one’s earthly life for naught (Mt
10:34-42), he means by this the great persecution of the last times.
He who hastens the coming of the Kingdom brings also this Affliction
to pass, for it is out of this travail indeed that the Kingdom and the
Messiah are born.
Hence the harsh accord heard throughout [pg 221] the messianic
harmonies! Jesus concludes the Beatitudes with the intimation that his
Disciples are blessed if they are hated and persecuted and all manner
of evil is spoken against them for his sake. Then have they indeed
reason to rejoice and be exceeding glad, for in what they must endure
is revealed their right to membership in the Kingdom of God. While
they are still afflicted by the power of this world their reward is
already prepared in heaven (Mt 5:11, 12).
“Preach, saying, the Kingdom of God is at hand,” was Jesus’ injunction
to the Apostles when sending them out. Therewith, however, he prepared
them impressively for the Affliction of the last times, for the hand
of the world-clock approaches the great hour. They must know it, in
order that they may not think that something strange has befallen them
when they are brought to trial by the world-power, when uprising and
persecution threaten them and bring their life into danger. They must
know it, in order that they may not doubt and deny him and be offended
in him when he is delivered into the hands of men, for he himself as
the mighty preacher of the Kingdom has incited this uprising. When,
however, the world-power appears to conquer, then God in his
omnipotence [pg 222] stands above. Not those that kill the body must
they fear, but the almighty Lord who in the Judgment can destroy both
soul and body in hell. In this last uprising the world-power judges
itself: after the Judgment comes the Kingdom. That is the fundamental
thought of the charge to the Apostles.
Likewise the embassage to the Baptist concludes with a similar
intimation. The Kingdom is near, he would have them say to him; my
preaching, signs, and wonders confirm it; and he attains blessedness
whosoever is not offended in me, i. e. whosoever is faithful to me in
the pre-messianic Affliction.
His warning of the heavy time to come is directed most impressively,
however, to those whom the Apostles’ preaching has drawn about him in
trustful expectation of the Kingdom. In the gathering dusk of evening
he had celebrated with them the great Supper beside the sea. As one
who knew himself to be the Messiah he had distributed to them sacred
food, and thereby, without their suspecting it, had consecrated them
to be partakers of the messianic feast. The following morning,
however, he called them about him at Bethsaida and exhorted them to be
ready to sacrifice their life in the Affliction. Whosoever [pg 223]
shall be ashamed of him and of his words in the humiliation which must
overtake him in this adulterous and sinful world, him will the Son of
Man refuse to recognise when he shall appear in the glory of his
Father surrounded by his angels (Mk 8:35-38).
2. The Idea of the Passion in the First Period.
The Passion therefore belonged to Jesus’ preaching from the beginning.
In the Affliction of the last times his followers must pass with him
through suffering to glory—so his hearers understood him. Only, they
did not know that he with whom they must suffer would be revealed as
Messiah.
In Jesus’ messianic consciousness the thought of suffering acquired
now, as applied to himself, a mysterious significance. The messiahship
which he became aware of at his baptism was not a possession, nor a
mere object of expectation; but in the eschatological conception it
was implied as a matter of course that through the trial of suffering
he must become what God had destined him to be. His messianic
consciousness was never without the thought of the Passion. Suffering
is the way to the revelation of messiahship!
[pg 224]
What he experienced in this age represented the hidden life and labour
of the Messiah. Suffering, however, was allotted to this rôle. It was
Jewish doctrine that the Messiah must be full of chastisement, for the
sufferings are necessary to the making of the perfectly righteous man
(Weber, p. 343).
This messianic consciousness of Jesus shows the same deepening of
moral tone as does his eschatology. According to the customary
modernising conception, it is assumed that during the greater part of
his ministry Jesus did not think of the Passion, but was first obliged
to entertain that thought by the malicious enmity of the Scribes. Thus
his messiahship receives in the first period an ethical-idyllic cast,
in the second, a modern hue of resignation. The
historic-eschatological picture is at once livelier, deeper, and more
moral. Jesus’ character did not undergo an “evolution” through the
acceptance of the idea of the Passion. From the beginning he knew
himself as Messiah only in so far as he was resolved through suffering
to be purified unto perfection. As the one who is destined to bear
rule in the new age he must beforehand be delivered into the power of
ungodliness in order that he may there approve [pg 225] himself for
the divine lordship he is to exercise. Out of such a messianic
consciousness as this he adjures those about him to remain true so
that he can recognise them as his own when the glory dawns. Thus the
active ethical trait which constituted the depth of the secret of the
Kingdom is a controlling factor also in the secret of messiahship.
The historical problem presents itself now in this form: In the first
period Jesus expressed the thought of the Passion much more frequently
than in the second, and he uttered it openly. Every discourse of some
length concludes with such an intimation. His own Disciples were
familiar with the thought of seeing him humiliated in the Affliction.
In spite of this, however, the disclosure at Cæsarea Philippi appeared
to the Disciples a new thing, and so it was in fact. For it was no
longer a question simply of the suffering which the great herald of
the Kingdom must undergo in company with his own in the final
Affliction; but now he suffers who is to be the Messiah. This
suffering, moreover, does not any longer occur in the general
Affliction of the last times, but Jesus suffers alone, and his
suffering is now represented as a purely earthly, historical event! He
will [pg 226] be delivered to the Council and by it condemned to
death! That was the new thing which remained a secret for the
Disciples.
3. The “Temptation” and the Divine Omnipotence.
A peculiar note of hesitancy appears in the thought of the Passion. At
one time death seems an absolute necessity; then again—for example, in
Gethsemane—Jesus recognises once more the possibility that the Passion
may still be spared him. But as a matter of fact the idea of the
Passion subsisted without respect to earthly success or failure.
Therefore the hesitancy ought not to be brought into connection with
this. As Jesus journeyed towards Jerusalem to die he did not in a
corner of his heart indulge the thought that God in his omnipotence
might perhaps be able nevertheless to make his way a triumphal march
and show himself through him victorious over the Pharisees and the
Council. That, according to his feeling, would have been a “human” way
of thinking, such as he had reproved in Peter (Mk 8:33). For in the
affairs of God’s Kingdom he cannot oppose to one another the
opposition of the Scribes and the divine omnipotence; it is a question
of a divine drama [pg 227] in which they were mere subordinate actors
with a prescribed rôle, like the minions that arrested him at their
behest. The hesitancy must therefore have its ground in the divine
will itself.
It is the specific characteristic of Jesus’ view, that the divine will
has indeed, on the one hand, designedly preordained the messianic
drama in the well known form; yet, on the other hand again, God
remains sovereignly free with respect to his plan. By a messianic
programme established once and for all the divine omnipotence behind
it is in no wise bound! It knows no determinism at all.
Jesus expected of this omnipotence that it could still receive into
the estate of blessedness even such as by their behaviour had
forfeited membership in the Kingdom. According to the accepted
standards it is indeed impossible that the rich can enter into life.
But with God all things are possible (Mk 10:27).
It was a maxim that whosoever would reign with the coming Messiah must
suffer with Jesus. But yet he dared not promise his two intimate
Disciples, James and John, the seats upon the throne, although he
expected that they would share his Passion. [pg 228] He might by this
infringe upon God’s omnipotence (Mk 10:35-40).
Thus the Affliction also of the last times had its place indeed in the
divinely ordained course of the messianic drama. But yet it lay in
God’s unrestricted omnipotence that he might eliminate it and permit
the Kingdom to dawn without this season of trial. Therefore men might
pray God that he would suffer that heavy hour of probation to pass by.
Jesus enjoined this upon his Disciples in the same prayer in which he
taught them to make petition for the coming Kingdom. He teaches them
to implore God for the final state of blessedness, in which his name
will be hallowed and his will be done on earth as it is in heaven; but
at the same time they are to beg him not to lead them into the
“Temptation,” not to give them into the power of the Evil, not to
oblige them to make satisfaction for their sins by the endurance of
the Affliction of the last times; but to deliver them by his
omnipotence from the power of the Evil when the ungodly world for the
last time asserts itself at the coming of the Kingdom for which they
pray. That is the inner connection of the last three petitions of the
Lord’s Prayer.
The Lord’s Prayer thus exhibits in the [pg 229] first three and the
last three petitions a purely eschatological character. We have the
same contrast as in the Beatitudes, the charge to the Apostles, the
embassage to the Baptist, and the discourse at Bethsaida. First it is
a question of the coming of the Kingdom, then of the Affliction of the
last times. We perceive from the Lord’s Prayer, however, that there is
no absolute necessity for this Affliction, but that it is only
relatively determined in God’s almighty will.
The Affliction, in fact, represents in its extremest form the
repentance requisite for the Kingdom. Whosoever comes through that
test approved makes satisfaction for his transgressions in the godless
æon. Through conflict and suffering men wrest themselves free from
this power to become instruments of the divine will in the Kingdom of
God. That is to be conceived collectively. The faithful adherents of
the Kingdom as a community make the satisfaction. The individual
thereby perfects and approves himself. Such is God’s will. Jesus,
however, prays with them to God that he may be pleased in his
omnipotence to forgive them the debt without satisfaction, as they
forgive their debtors. That means remission pure and simple, without
atonement. May it please [pg 230] God not to lead them through the
“Temptation,” but straightway to release them from the power of the
world.
Only so can one understand how Jesus throughout his ministry can
assume forgiveness of sins and yet here expressly prays for it; and
how he can speak of a temptation which comes from God. It is a
question in fact of the general messianic remission of debts and the
Temptation of the messianic Affliction. Therefore these petitions
constitute the conclusion of the Kingdom-prayer.
What Jesus here in common prayer petitions for the community, that he
implores for himself when his hour is come. In Gethsemane he
prostrates himself before God. In moving prayer he appeals to God’s
omnipotence: Abba, Father, all things are possible unto thee (Mk
14:36). He would that the cup of suffering might pass his lips without
his needing to taste it. Also he rouses the three Disciples, bidding
them to watch and pray God that he may spare them the Temptation, for
the flesh is weak.
4. The Idea of the Passion in the Second Period.
With the revelation at Cæsarea Philippi cease all intimations that the
believers must [pg 231] pass with Jesus through the Affliction.
According to the secret which he imparts to the Disciples he alone
suffers. In Jerusalem he addressed not one urgent word, either to the
people or to the Disciples, about following him in suffering. Indeed
he actually takes back what he before had said. The morning after the
Supper by the seashore, addressing those whom he had consecrated unto
the messianic banquet, he makes their blessedness dependent upon
following him in suffering. To the partakers of the Last Supper at
Jerusalem he calmly stated beforehand that they would all be
“offended” in him that night! He coupled this with no condemnation—for
it is so determined in the Scripture! Is it not written, “I will smite
the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered”? Therefore, even if
they are offended in him, if even they forsake him, in his glory he
will still gather them again, and as Messiah—for that he is as the
risen one—he will go before them unto Galilee (Mk 14:26-28).
What at an earlier period he had required of all, that he now does not
expect even of him who boasted that he alone would stand by him.
“Before the cock crow twice thou shalt deny me thrice,” said he to
Peter (Mk 14:29, 31).
[pg 232]
This change must be connected with the form which the idea of the
Passion assumed in the second period. There must have occurred an
alteration in the conception of the Affliction of the last times. The
others are freed from the trial of suffering, Jesus suffers alone;—and
in fact the humiliation consists in the death to which the scribes
consign him. It is by this means that the final affliction now
accomplishes itself. His faithful followers are spared. _He suffers in
their stead, for he gives his life a ransom for many._
Jesus has not disclosed in what way this secret was made known to him
in the days of solitude after the mission of the Twelve. The form of
the secret of the Passion shows, however, that two experiences had
influence upon him.
First, the death of the Baptist. The Baptist for him was Elijah. If he
was slain by the hand of man before the messianic Day, such was God’s
will, and so it was foreordained in the messianic drama. This occurred
while the Disciples were away. His embassage to the Baptist perhaps
never reached him. He must come now to an understanding of this
matter. For this cause he wishes to withdraw into solitude with his
companions.
[pg 233]
How much he was preoccupied with the thought of the Baptist’s death is
shown by the conversation which followed the revelation to the Three
on the mountain. It was ordained in the Scripture that Elijah must
meet such a fate at the hands of men. So also it is written of the Son
of Man that he must suffer many things and be set at naught (Mk
9:12-13).
Hitherto he had spoken only in general terms of the final Affliction
as an event of the last times. Now, however, it has been fulfilled
upon the Baptist as an _historical event._ That is a sign, which
indicates how it will be fulfilled upon himself.
This indication came precisely at the time when he was compelled by
the course of events to reflect upon the final Affliction. After the
return of the Twelve he had expected it as an impending event. But it
failed to occur. What is more, the Kingdom failed therewith to appear!
In sending out the Twelve he had told them that they would be
surprised by the overflowing woes ere they had gone through all the
cities of Israel,—and they had returned without witnessing the
beginning of the woes or the dawn of the Kingdom.
The report with which they returned [pg 234] showed, however, that all
was ready. Already the power of ungodliness was broken, for else the
unclean spirits would not have been subject to them. The Kingdom was
compellingly hastened by the repentance practised since the days of
the Baptist. In this respect also the measure was full,—that was
proved by the multitudes which thronged about him in faithful
expectation. So all was ready—and still the Kingdom did not come! The
delay of the eschatological coming of the Kingdom,—that was the great
fact which drove Jesus at that time once and again into solitude to
seek light upon the mystery.
Before the Kingdom could come the Affliction must arrive. But it
failed to arrive. It must be brought about in order that the Kingdom
may thus be constrained to come. Repentance and the subjugation of the
power of ungodliness did not avail by themselves; but the violent
stormers of the Kingdom must be reinforced by one stronger still, the
future Messiah, who brings down upon himself the final Affliction in
the form in which it had already been accomplished upon Elijah. Thus
the secret of the Kingdom merges in the secret of the Passion.
The conception of the final Affliction contains [pg 235] the thought
of atonement and purification. All they who are destined for the
Kingdom must win forgiveness for the guilt contracted in the earthly
æon by encountering stedfastly the world-power as it collects itself
for a last attack. For through this guilt they were still subject to
the power of ungodliness. This guilt constitutes a counter weight
which holds back the coming of the Kingdom.
But now God does not bring the Affliction to pass. And yet the
atonement must be made. Then it occurred to Jesus that he as the
coming Son of Man must accomplish the atonement in his own person. He
who one day shall reign over the believers as Messiah now humbles
himself under them and serves them by giving his life a ransom for
many, in order that the Kingdom may dawn upon them. That is his
mission in the estate which precedes his celestial glory. “For this he
is come” (Mk 10:45). He must suffer for the sins of those who are
ordained for his Kingdom. In order to carry this out, he journeys up
to Jerusalem, that there he may be put to death by the secular
authority, just as Elijah who went before him suffered at the hand of
Herod. That is the secret of the Passion. Jesus did actually die for
the sins of men, [pg 236] even though it was in another sense than
that which Anselm’s theory assumes.
5. Isaiah 40[-66]: The Secret of the Passion Foretold in the
Scripture.
“How is it written of the Son of Man? That he must suffer many things
and be set at naught” (Mk 9:12). The new form of the secret of the
Passion is derived from the Scripture. In the picture of the suffering
servant of God Jesus recognised himself. There he found his vocation
of suffering depicted in advance.
In order, however, to understand how his secret came to him from out
the Scripture, the picture of the suffering servant of God must be set
in the great framework in which it belongs. The modern-historical
solution cannot do this. It confines itself to the notion of a meek
self-surrender. As soon, however, as it is once perceived that Jesus’
idea of the Passion was eschatological, it is evident also in what a
great context he must view the figure of the suffering servant of God.
Accordingly, Isa. 40-66 was nothing else but the prophetic
representation of the events of the last time in the midst of which he
knew himself to be.
The passage commences with the proclamation [pg 237] that God’s reign
is about to begin. The preparer of the way comes upon the scene. He
cries that the earthly passes away when the Lord, dealing reward and
recompense, appears in his glory. The hour dawns in which he gathers
his flock and brings in the era of peace.
The Elect is there. He proclaims righteousness in truth. God has put
his spirit upon him (Isai. 42:1 ff.). He shall establish judgment upon
the earth; the cities wait upon his teaching. But before the glory
dawns and the bearer of the divine spirit rules with power and
righteousness over the peoples he must pass through an estate of
humiliation. Others do not understand why he is put to shame. They
think God has rejected him, and know not that he bears their
infirmities, is pierced for their transgressions, and smitten for
their offences. The oppressed servant is meek and openeth not his
mouth. For the transgression of the people he is stricken to death.
Then, however, will the Lord glorify him. He hath called him to this
from his mother’s womb. He is ordained to bring again Jacob and to
save Israel. He shall be for a light to the Gentiles, that God’s
salvation may extend unto the ends of the earth (Isai. 49:1 ff.; Isai.
52:1 ff.; Isai. 53:1 ff.).
[pg 238]
Upon the delineation of the suffering of the servant of God there
follows a description of the judgment upon the whole world and upon
Israel (Isa. 54-65). In the end, however, the glory of God breaks
forth. He is enthroned above the new heaven and the new earth (Isa. 65
and 66). When the Judgment is accomplished, then the rejoicing breaks
out, for the blessed out of the whole world, out of every tribe and
nation, will gather unto him and do him reverence.
One must grasp the dramatic unity in these chapters in order to enter
into sympathy with one who sought here mysterious intimation about the
things of the last time. Jesus’ idea of the Passion is in the end
completely absorbed in that of the Deutero-Isaiah. Like the servant of
God, he too is destined to reign in glory. But first he appears, meek
and unrecognised, in the rôle of a preacher who works righteousness.
He must pass also through suffering and humiliation ere God permit the
glorious consummation to dawn. What he endures is an atonement for the
iniquity of others. This is a secret between himself and God. The
others cannot and need not understand it, for when the glory dawns
they will recognise that he has suffered for them. Wherefore Jesus did
not need to explain [pg 239] his Passion to the people and to the
Disciples, and ought not to do so. It must remain a secret,—so it is
written in the Scripture. Even to those to whom he foretold what was
coming he uttered it as a secret. At his appearing as Son of Man the
scales must fall from their eyes. In the glory of the Kingdom they
then shall recognise that he has suffered in order that they may be
spared and have peace. The secret is intelligible only
retrospectively, from the point of view of the glory that shall be
revealed.
Therefore it makes no difference if his own followers turn away from
him in his humiliation and men are offended in him as though he were
chastised of God. The Scripture does not reckon it against them as
sacrilege, but has so ordained it. The moment therefore the secret of
the Passion is made clear to him by the Scripture he no more says,
Whosoever is ashamed of me in my humiliation, the same is condemned;
but, Ye shall all be offended in me,—knowing at the same time that
they all shall be gathered about him at the Resurrection.
Under the influence, therefore, of the Deutero-Isaiah the idea of the
general Affliction of the last times was transformed into the personal
secret of Jesus’ Passion.
[pg 240]
6. The “Human” Element in the Secret of the Passion.
The innermost nature of the idea of suffering underwent no change in
consequence of the secret of the Passion of the second epoch. For
Jesus, suffering, even in this form, remained pre-eminently the moral
condition of the dignity ordained to him.
Now, however, the Affliction exhibits the concrete traits of a
determinate event. Jesus brings it down from the vague heights of
apocalyptic drama to the level of human history. Therein lies
something prophetic of the future of Christianity. After Jesus’ death
the whole messianic drama of the last times is dissolved in human
history. This development began with the secret of the Passion.
Thus it is, too, that the secret of the Passion, as compared with the
idea of suffering of the first period, exhibits more human traits.
There is a quality of compassionate consideration for others in the
thought that he makes satisfaction in the Passion for the adherents of
the Kingdom, in order that they may be exempted from the trial in
which perchance they might prove weak. The petition, “Lead us not into
the Temptation, but [pg 241] deliver us from the Evil,” is now
fulfilled in his Passion.
This deeply human trait is especially evident in Gethsemane. Only over
the three intimate Disciples still hovers the possibility that they
may be obliged to pass with him through suffering and temptation. The
sons of Zebedee, to secure their claim that they sit with him upon the
throne, boasted that they could drink with him his cup and undergo
with him the baptism of suffering—and this prospect he held out to
them (Mk 10:38-40). Peter, however, swore that he would not deny him;
even if all others should forsake him, he desired to die with him (Mk
14:31). These three Jesus had taken with him to the place where he
prayed. While he implored God that the cup might pass him by, there
overcame him a sorrowful anxiety for the Three. If God does now
actually send them with him through the Passion, will they hold out as
they are bold to believe? Wherefore he is mindful of them in that sad
hour. Twice he arouses himself and wakes them out of sleep, bidding
them watch and pray to God that he lead them not into the Temptation,
even if he will not spare him this cup; for the spirit is willing, but
the flesh is weak. That is perhaps [pg 242] the most touching moment
in Jesus’ life. Some have dared to call Gethsemane Jesus’ weak hour;
but in reality it is precisely the hour in which his supernatural
greatness is revealed in his deeply human compassion.
7. The Idea of the Passion in the Primitive Church. The Shifting of
the Perspective.
Jesus carried with him to the grave the secret of the Passion which
was to be revealed to the inheritors of the Kingdom at its coming. But
the Kingdom did not come. Thus it is to be explained that though he
indeed had given intimation of his Passion to the Disciples, yet they,
when the event came to pass, knew no interpretation of it.
Nevertheless, in some way they had to explain it, by the help of such
intimations as they could recall. This accounts for the fact that the
theory of the early Church regarding the Passion of Jesus was far
poorer than his Secret. The explanation of the Church focussed
principally upon one fact: In consequence of the Passion and the
Resurrection from the dead he is the Messiah. In this sense the
Passion and the Exaltation are foreordained in the Scripture.
While Jesus’ secret brought his death and the dawning of the Kingdom
into the closest [pg 243] temporal and causal connection, for the
primitive Church, on the other hand, a past event, as such,
constituted the object to be explained, since the Kingdom had not
arrived and the original causal connection was dissolved along with
the temporal.
Now with reference to his death Jesus had spoken also of atonement and
forgiveness of sins. But the thoughts which he associated therewith
the events had rendered entirely impossible. The indefinite “many,”
who were to apply the ransom to themselves in the knowledge that he
had suffered for them, simply did not exist; for the Kingdom had not
yet appeared. Only from that point of vantage, however, could one
apprehend that he had performed the Atonement of Affliction for the
inheritors of the Kingdom.
In the meantime the situation was entirely different: “the believers”
had taken the place of the “many.” Those who believe in the
messiahship of Jesus have the forgiveness of sins,—this sentence, as
the sermon at Pentecost shows, was a constituent of the earlier
Apostolic preaching (Acts 2:38). But to what extent one had thereby
forgiveness of sins,—in that consisted the problem. This, however, was
historically insoluble, for according to Jesus’ secret of the Passion
[pg 244] the forgiveness of sins applied not to those who believe in
Jesus-Christ, but to the inheritors of the Kingdom. Therefore, however
profound they may be, and however true to the religious consciousness
of their time, none of the attempts to explain the significance of the
Passion, from Paul to Ritschl, apprehend the thought of Jesus, because
they proceed upon an entirely different assumption.
As all of these theories sought nevertheless to legitimate themselves
historically, we witness the astonishing spectacle, that the most
diverse interpretations of his Passion are put into the mouth of
Jesus,—of which, however, not one can even remotely explain how out of
such a conception the primitive Apostolic estimate of the Death could
have been derived. The same is true of the modern-historical solution.
If Jesus taught the Disciples to understand the ethical significance
of his death, why did the primitive Christian explanation of the
Passion confine itself to the notion of conformity with Scripture and
the “forgiveness of sins”?
To this question the modern-historical solution furnishes no answer.
The eschatologico-historical, on the other hand, is able to take
account perspectively of the necessary distortion which Jesus’ idea of
the Passion [pg 245] underwent in the primitive Church. It indicates
which elements alone of the Passion secret could still subsist after
his death. Because it grasps the connection between the early
Christian interpretation and the thought of Jesus the
eschatologico-historical solution is the right one.
The abolition of the causal connection between the death of Jesus and
the realisation of the Kingdom was fatal to the early Christian
eschatology. With the secret of the Passion, the secret of the Kingdom
likewise perished. This, however, meant nothing less than that
eschatology lost precisely that specific “Christian” character which
Jesus had imparted to it. The active ethical element which served to
moralise it dropped out. Thus the eschatology of the early Church was
“dechristianised” by Jesus’ death. Therewith it sank back again to the
level of contemporary Jewish thought. The Kingdom is again an object
of expectation merely. That moral conversion is effective actively to
hasten its coming,—this secret was buried with Jesus. Now men repented
and strove after moral renewal _as in the days of the Baptist._
This dechristianising was manifest especially in the matter of the
final Affliction. [pg 246] According to the Passion idea of the first
period, the believers must suffer along with the Messiah; according to
that of the second, he was resolved to endure the Affliction for them.
In the early Church the believers expected the Affliction _before_ the
appearing of the Messiah, as was the case in the contemporary Jewish
conception; for the Passion secret of Jesus was not known to them.
Therefore the Jewish apocalypses belonged to them just as much as to
the other Jews, only with the difference that the crucified Jesus was
to be the coming Messiah. Early Christian eschatology was therefore
still “Christian” only through the _person_ of Jesus, no longer
through his _spirit,_ as was the case in the secret of the Kingdom of
God and in the secret of the Passion.
This furnishes a criterion for judging “the Synoptic apocalypse” (Mark
13). Even though it may contain single eschatological sayings
attributable to Jesus, the discourse as such is necessarily
unhistorical. It betrays the perspective of the time after Jesus’
death. During the days at Jerusalem Jesus could speak of no general
Affliction before the coming of the Son of Man. The Synoptic
apocalypse stands in direct contradiction to the secret of the
Passion, since this indeed simply [pg 247] abolishes the general
Affliction of the last times. Therefore it is unhistorical.
Apocalyptic discourses with intimation of the final Affliction belong
to the Galilean period at the time of the mission of the Twelve. The
discourse to the Apostles on that occasion is the historical Synoptic
apocalypse. About a time of affliction after his death Jesus never
uttered a word to his Disciples, for it lay beyond his field of
vision.
Therefore with the death of Jesus, and precisely by reason of it,
eschatology—notwithstanding that the primitive Christian community
still completely lived in it—was virtually done away with. It was
destined to be forced out of the Christian “Weltanschauung,” for it
was “dechristianised” by the fact that in parting with the secret of
the Kingdom of God and the idea of the Passion it had forfeited also
the inner ethical life which was breathed into it by Jesus. A tree in
full bloom stricken at the root,—such was the fate of eschatology, to
wilt and wither, although no one at first suspected it was doomed. In
the fact that subsequent history compulsorily created in the Church an
uneschatological view of the world, it only accomplished what in the
nature of things was already determined by Jesus’ death.
[pg 248]
The death of Jesus the end of eschatology! The Messiah who upon earth
was not such—the end of the messianic expectation! The view of the
world in which Jesus lived and preached was eschatological: the
“Christian view of the world” which he founded by his death carries
mankind forever beyond eschatology! That is the great secret of the
Christian “scheme of salvation.”
For Jesus and his Disciples his death was, according to the
eschatological view, merely a _transitional_ event. As soon, however,
as the event occurred it became the _central fact_ upon which the new,
uneschatological view was built up. In primitive Christianity the old
and new were still side by side.
The adherents of Jesus believed in the coming of the Kingdom because
his imposing personality accredited the message. The Church after his
death believed in his messiahship and expected the coming of the
Kingdom. We believe that in his ethical-religious personality, as
revealed in his ministry and suffering, the Messiah and the Kingdom
are come.
The situation may be likened to the course of the sun. Its brightness
breaks forth while it is still behind the mountains. The dark clouds
take colour from its rays, and the conflict [pg 249] of light and
darkness produces a play of fantastic imagery. The sun itself is not
yet visible: it is there only in the sense that the light issues from
it. As the sun behind the morning glow,—so appeared the personality of
Jesus of Nazareth to his contemporaries in the pre-messianic age.
At the moment when the heaven glows with intensest colouring the sun
itself rises above the horizon. But with this the wealth of colour
begins gradually to diminish. The fantastic images pale and vanish
because the sun itself dissolves the clouds upon which they are
formed. As the rising sun above the horizon,—so appeared Jesus Christ
to the primitive Church in its eschatological expectation.
As the sun at midday,—so he appears to us. We know nothing of morning
and evening glow; we see only the white brilliance which pervades all.
But the fact that the sun now shines for us in such a light does not
justify us in conceiving the sunrise also as if it were a brilliant
disk of midday brightness emerging above the horizon. Our modern view
of Jesus’ death is true, true in its inmost nature, because it
reflects his ethical-religious personality in the thoughts of our
time. But when we import this into the history [pg 250] of Jesus and
of primitive Christianity we commit the same blunder as were we to
paint the sunrise without the morning glow.
In genuine historical knowledge there is liberating and helping power.
Our faith is built upon the personality of Jesus. But between our
world-view and that in which he lived and laboured there lies a deep
and seemingly unbridgeable gulf. Men therefore saw themselves obliged
to detach as it were his personality from his world-view and touch it
up with modern colours.
This produced a picture of Jesus which was strangely lifeless and
vague. One got a hybrid figure, half modern, half antique. With much
else that is modern, men transferred to him our modern psychology,
without always recognising clearly that it is not applicable to him
and necessarily belittles him. For it is derived from mediocre minds
which are a patchwork of opinions and apprehend and observe themselves
only in a constant flux of development. Jesus, however, is a
superhuman personality moulded in one piece.
Thus modern theology does violence to history and psychology, inasmuch
as it cannot prove what right we have to segregate Jesus from his age,
to translate his personality into the terms of our modern thought, and
to conceive [pg 251] of him as “Messiah” and “Son of God” outside of
the Jewish framework.
Genuine historical knowledge, however, restores to theology full
freedom of movement! It presents to it the personality of Jesus in an
eschatological world-view, yet one which is modern through and through
because _His_ mighty spirit pervades it.
This Jesus is far greater than the one conceived in modern terms: he
is really a superhuman personality. With his death he destroyed the
form of his “Weltanschauung,” rendering his own eschatology
impossible. Thereby he gives to all peoples and to all times the right
to apprehend him in terms of their thoughts and conceptions, in order
that his spirit may pervade their “Weltanschauung” as it quickened and
transfigured the Jewish eschatology.
Therefore may modern theology, just by reason of a genuine historical
knowledge, claim freedom of movement, without being hampered
continually by petty historical expedients which nowadays are often
resorted to at the expense of historical veracity. Theology is not
bound to graze in a paddock. It is free, for its task is to found our
Christian view of the world solely upon the personality of Jesus
Christ, irrespective of the [pg 252] form in which it expressed itself
in his time. He himself has destroyed this form with his death.
History prompts theology to this unhistorical step.
As Jesus gave up the ghost, the Roman centurion said, “Truly this man
was the Son of God” (Mk 15:39). Thus at the moment of his death the
lofty dignity of Jesus was set free for expression in all tongues,
among all nations, and for all philosophies.
[pg 253]
CHAPTER X
SUMMARY OF THE LIFE OF JESUS
THE “Life of Jesus” is limited to the last months of his existence on
earth. At the season of the summer seed-sowing he began his ministry
and ended it upon the cross at Easter of the following year.
His public ministry may be counted in weeks. The first period extends
from seed time to harvest; the second comprises the days of his
appearance in Jerusalem. Autumn and winter he spent in heathen
territory alone with his Disciples.
Before him the Baptist had appeared and had borne emphatic witness to
the nearness of the Kingdom and the coming of the mighty pre-messianic
Forerunner, with whose appearance the pouring out of the Holy Ghost
should take place. According to Joel, this among other miracles was
the sign that the Day of Judgment was imminent. John himself never
imagined that he was this Forerunner; nor did such a thought occur to
the people, for he had not ushered in the age of miracles. [pg 254] He
is a prophet,—that was the universal opinion.
About Jesus’ earlier development we know nothing. All lies in the
dark. Only this is sure: at his baptism the secret of his existence
was disclosed to him,—namely, that he was the one whom God had
destined to be the Messiah. With this revelation he was complete, and
underwent no further development. For now he is assured that, until
the near coming of the messianic age which was to reveal his glorious
dignity, he has to labour for the Kingdom as the unrecognised and
hidden Messiah, and must approve and purify himself together with his
friends in the final Affliction.
The idea of suffering was thus included in his messianic
consciousness, just as the notion of the pre-messianic Affliction was
indissolubly connected with the expectation of the Kingdom. Earthly
events could not influence Jesus’ course. His secret raised him above
the world, even though he still walked as a man among men.
His appearing and his proclamation have to do only with the near
approach of the Kingdom. His preaching is that of John, only that he
confirms it by signs. Although his secret controls all his preaching,
yet no [pg 255] one may know of it, for he must remain unrecognised
till the new æon dawns.
Like his secret, so also is his whole ethical outlook ruled by the
contrast of “Now and Then.” It is a question of repentance unto the
Kingdom, and the conquest of the righteousness which renders one fit
for it,—for only the righteous inherit the Kingdom. This righteousness
is higher than that of the Law, for he knows that the law and the
Prophets prophesied until John,—with the Baptist, however, one finds
oneself in the ages of the Forerunner, immediately before the dawn of
the Kingdom.
Therefore, as the future Messiah, he must preach and work that higher
morality. The poor in spirit, the meek, those that endure suffering,
those that hunger and thirst after righteousness, the merciful, the
pure in heart, the peacemakers,—these all are blessed because by this
mark they are destined for the Kingdom.
Behind this ethical preaching looms the secret of the Kingdom of God.
That which, as performed by the individual, constitutes moral renewal
in preparation for the Kingdom, signifies, as accomplished by the
community, a fact through which the realisation of the Kingdom in a
supernatural way will [pg 256] be hastened. Thus individual and social
ethics blend in the great secret. As the plentiful harvest, by God’s
wonderful working, follows mysteriously upon the sowing, so comes also
the Kingdom of God, by reason of man’s moral renewal, but
substantially without his assistance.
The parable contains also the suggestion of a chronological
coincidence. Jesus spoke at the season of seed-sowing and expected the
Kingdom at the time of the harvest. Nature was God’s clock. With the
last seed-sowing he had set it for the last time.
The secret of the Kingdom of God is the transfiguration in celestial
light of the ethics of the early prophets, according to which also the
final state of glory will be brought about by God only on condition of
the moral conversion of Israel. In sovereign style Jesus effects the
synthesis of the apocalyptic of Daniel and the ethics of the Prophets.
With him it is not a question of eschatological ethics, rather is his
world view an ethical eschatology. As such it is modern.
The signs and wonders also come under a double point of view. For the
people they are merely to confirm the preaching of the nearness of the
Kingdom. Whosoever now does not believe that the time is so far
advanced, [pg 257] he has no excuse. The signs and wonders condemn
him, for they plainly attest that the power of ungodliness is coming
to an end.
For Jesus, however, there lay behind this affirmation the secret of
the Kingdom of God. When the Pharisees wished to ascribe these very
signs to the power of Satan, he alluded to the secret by a parable. By
his acts he binds the power of ungodliness, as one falls upon a strong
man and renders him harmless before attempting to rob him of his
possessions. Wherefore, in sending out his Apostles, he gives them,
together with the charge to preach, authority over unclean spirits.
They are to deal the last blow.
A third element in the preaching of the Kingdom was the intimation of
the pre-messianic Affliction. The believers must be prepared to pass
with him through that time of trial, in which they are to prove
themselves the elect of the Kingdom by stedfast resistance to the last
attack of the power of the world. This attack will concentrate about
his person; therefore they must stand by him even unto death. Only
life in God’s Kingdom is real life. The Son of Man will judge them
according as they have stood by him, Jesus, or no. Thus Jesus at the
conclusion of the [pg 258] Beatitudes turns to his own Disciples with
the words “Blessed are ye when men persecute you for my sake.” The
charge to the Apostles turns into a consideration of the Affliction.
The embassage to the Baptist about the imminence of the Kingdom
concludes with the word “Blessed is he whosoever shall not be offended
in me.” At Bethsaida, the morning after he had celebrated the Supper
by the seashore, he adjured the multitude to stand by him, even when
he shall become an object of shame and scorn in this sinful
world,—their blessedness depends upon this.
This Affliction meant not only a probation but also an atonement. It
is foreordained in the messianic drama, because God requires of the
adherents of the Kingdom a satisfaction for their transgressions in
this æon. But he is almighty. In this omnipotence he determines the
question of membership in the Kingdom and the place each shall occupy
therein, without himself being bound by any determining cause
whatsoever. So also in view of his omnipotence the necessity of the
final Affliction is only relative. He can abrogate it. The last three
petitions of the Lord’s Prayer contemplate this possibility. After
beseeching God that he would send the [pg 259] Kingdom, that his name
might be blessed and his will be done on earth as it is in heaven, men
beg him to forgive them the transgressions and spare them the
Temptation, rescuing them directly from the power of evil.
This was the content of Jesus’ preaching during the first period. He
remained throughout this time on the northern shore of the lake.
Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum were the principal centres of his
activity. From thence he made an excursion across the lake to the
region of the Ten Cities and a journey to Nazareth.
Precisely in the towns which were the scenes of his chief activity he
encountered unbelief. The curse which he must utter over them is proof
of it. The Pharisees, moreover, were hostile and sought to discredit
him with the people, on account of his very miracles. In Nazareth he
had experience of the fact that a prophet is without honour in his own
country.
Thus the Galilean period was anything but a fortunate one. Such
outward ill[ ]success, however, signified nothing for the coming of
the Kingdom. The unbelieving cities merely brought down judgment upon
themselves. Jesus had other mysterious indications for measuring the
approach of the Kingdom. By [pg 260] these he recognised that the time
was come. For this reason he sent forth the Apostles just as they were
returning from Nazareth, _for it was harvest time._
By means of their preaching and their signs the reputation of his
mighty personality spread far and wide. Now begins the time of
success! John in prison hears of it and sends his disciples to ask him
if he is “he that should come,” for from his miracles he concluded
that the time of the mighty Forerunner whom he had heralded had
arrived.
Jesus performed signs, his Disciples had power over the spirits. When
he spoke of the Judgment he laid stress upon the fact that the Son of
Man stood in such solidarity with him that he would recognise only
such as had stood by him, Jesus. The people therefore opined that he
might be the one for whom all were looking, and the Baptist desired to
have assurance on this point.
Jesus cannot tell him who he is. “The time is far advanced”—that is
the gist of his reply. After the departure of the messengers Jesus
turned to the people and signified in mysterious terms that the time
is indeed much further advanced than the Baptist dreamed in asking
such a question. The era of the Forerunner had already begun [pg 261]
with the appearance of the Baptist himself. From that time on the
Kingdom of God is with violence compelled to draw near. He himself who
asks the question is Elijah—if they could comprehend it. Men were not
able to perceive that the man in prison was Elijah. When he began his
preaching, they knew not the time. That was due not alone to the fact
that John performed no miracles, but to the hardening of their hearts.
They are unreasonable children that do not know what they want. Now
there is one here who performs signs,—but even on his testimony they
do not believe the nearness of the Kingdom. So the curse upon Chorazin
and Bethsaida concludes the “eulogy upon the Baptist.”
The sending of the Twelve was the last effort for bringing about the
Kingdom. As they then returned, announced to him their success, and
reported that they had power over the evil spirits, it signified to
him, _all is ready._ So now he expects the dawn of the Kingdom in the
most immediate future,—it had seemed to him, indeed, already doubtful
whether the Twelve would return before this event. He had even said to
them that the appearing of the Son of Man would overtake them before
they had gone through the cities of Israel.
[pg 262]
His work is done. Now he requires to collect himself and to be alone
with his Disciples. They enter a boat and sail along the coast towards
the north. But the multitude which had gathered about him at the
preaching of the Disciples, in order to await the Kingdom with him,
now follow after them along the shore and surprise them at their
landing upon a lonely beach.
As it was evening the Disciples desired that he would send the people
away to find food in the neighbouring hamlets. For him, however, the
hour is too solemn to be profaned by an earthly meal. Before sending
them away he bids them sit down and celebrates with them an
anticipation of the messianic feast. To the community that was
gathered about him to await the Kingdom, he, the Messiah to be,
distributes hallowed food, mysteriously consecrating them thereby to
be partakers of the heavenly banquet. As they did not know his secret,
they understood as little as did his Disciples the significance of his
act. They comprehended only that it meant something wonderfully
solemn, and they questioned within themselves about it.
Thereupon he sent them away. He ordered the Disciples to skirt the
coast to Bethsaida. [pg 263] For his part he betook himself to the
mountain to pray and then followed along the shore on foot. As his
figure appeared to them in the obscurity of the night they
believed—under the impression of the Supper where he stood before them
in mysterious majesty—that his supernatural apparition approached them
over the turbulent waves through which they were toiling to the shore.
The morning after the Supper by the seashore he collected the people
and the Disciples about him at Bethsaida and warned them to stand by
him and not to deny him in the humiliation.
Six days later he goes with the Three to the mountain where he had
prayed alone. There he is revealed to them as the Messiah. On the way
home he forbade them to say anything about it until at the
Resurrection he should be revealed in the glory of the Son of Man.
They, however, still remark the failure of Elijah to appear, who yet
must come before the Resurrection of the dead can take place. They
were not present at the eulogy over the Baptist to hear the mysterious
intimation he let fall. He must therefore make it clear to them now
that the beheaded prisoner was Elijah. They should take no offence at
his fate, for it was so ordained. He also who [pg 264] is to be Son of
Man must suffer many things and be set at naught. So the Scripture
will have it.
The Kingdom which Jesus expected so very soon failed to make its
appearance. This first eschatological delay and postponement was
momentous for the fate of the Gospel tradition, inasmuch as now all
the events related to the mission of the Twelve became unintelligible,
because all consciousness was lost of the fact that the most intense
eschatological expectation then inspired Jesus and his following.
Hence it is that precisely this period is confused and obscure in the
accounts, and all the more so because several incidents remained
enigmatical to those even who had a part in the experience. Thus the
sacramental Supper by the seashore became in the tradition a
“miraculous feeding,” in a sense totally different from that which
Jesus had in mind.
Therewith, too, the motives of Jesus’ disappearance became
unintelligible. It seems to be a case of flight, while on the other
hand the accounts give no hint how matters had come to such a pass.
The key to the historical understanding of the life of Jesus lies in
the perception of the two corresponding points at which the
eschatological expectation [pg 265] culminated. During the days at
Jerusalem there was a return of the enthusiasm which had already
showed itself in the days at Bethsaida. Without this assumption we are
left with a yawning gap in the Gospel tradition between the mission of
the Twelve and the journey to Jerusalem. Historians find themselves
compelled to _invent_ a period of Galilean defeat in order to
establish some connection between the recorded facts,—as if a section
were missing in our Gospels. _That is the weak point of all the “lives
of Jesus.”_
By his retreat into the region of the Genesareth Jesus withdrew
himself from the Pharisees and the people in order to be alone with
his Disciples, as he had in vain tried to do since their return from
their mission. He urgently needed such a retreat, for he had to come
to an understanding about two messianic facts.
Why is the Baptist executed by the secular authority before the
messianic time has dawned?
Why does the Kingdom fail to appear notwithstanding that the tokens of
its dawning are present?
The secret is made known to him through the Scripture: God brings the
Kingdom [pg 266] about _without the general Affliction._ He whom God
has destined to reign in glory accomplishes it upon himself by being
tried as a malefactor and condemned. Wherefore the others go free: he
makes the atonement for them. What though they believe that God
punishes him, though they become offended in him who preached unto
them righteousness,—when after his Passion the glory dawns, then shall
they see that he has suffered for them.
Thus Jesus read in the Prophet Isaiah what God had determined for him,
the Elect. The end of the Baptist showed him in what form he was
destined to suffer this condemnation: he must be put to death by the
secular authority as a malefactor in the sight of all the people.
Therefore he must make his way up to Jerusalem for the season when all
Israel is gathered there.
As soon therefore as the time came for the Passover pilgrimage he set
out with his Disciples. Before they left the north country he asked
them whom the people took him to be. For reply they could only say
that he was taken for Elijah. But Peter, mindful of the revelation on
the mountain near Bethsaida, said: Thou art the Son of God. Whereupon
Jesus informed them of his secret. [pg 267] Yes, he it is who shall be
revealed as Son of Man at the Resurrection. But before that, it is
decreed that he must be delivered to the high priests and elders to be
condemned and put to death. God so wills it. For this cause they are
going up to Jerusalem.
Peter resents this new disclosure, for in the revelation on the
mountain there was nothing said to such an effect. He takes Jesus
apart and appeals to him energetically. Whereupon he is sharply
rebuked as one who gives ear to human considerations when God speaks.
This journey to Jerusalem was the funeral march to victory. Within the
secret of the Passion lay concealed the secret of the Kingdom. They
marched after him, and knew only that when all this was accomplished
he would be Messiah. They were sorrowful for what must come to pass;
they did not understand why it must be so, and they durst not ask him.
But above all, their thoughts were occupied about the conditions that
awaited them in the approaching Kingdom. When once he was Messiah,
what would they then be? That occupied their minds, and about it they
talked with one another. But he reproved them and explained why he
must [pg 268] suffer. Only through humiliation and the meek sacrifice
of service is one prepared to reign in the Kingdom of God. Therefore
must he, who shall exercise supreme authority as Son of Man, make now
an atonement for many by giving up his life in meek sacrifice.
With the arrival upon the Jewish territory begins the second period of
Jesus’ public ministry. He is again surrounded by the people. In
Jericho a multitude gathers to see him pass through. By the healing of
a blind beggar, the son of Timæus, the people are convinced that he is
the great Forerunner, just as they thought already in Galilee. The
jubilant multitudes prepare for him a festal entry into Jerusalem. As
the one who according to prophecy precedes the Messiah they acclaim
him with _Hosanna. Hosanna in the highest,_ however, is their acclaim
of the Kingdom about to appear. Therewith the same situation is
reached again as in the great days near Bethsaida: Jesus is thronged
by the multitudes expectant of the Kingdom.
The instruction contained in the parables which were uttered at
Jerusalem has to do with the nearness of the Kingdom. They are cries
of warning, with a note of menace as well for those that harden their
hearts [pg 269] against the message. What agitates men’s minds is not
the question, Is he the Messiah, or no? but, Is the Kingdom so near as
he says, or no?
The Pharisees and Scribes knew not what hour had struck. They showed a
complete lack of sensibility for the nearness of the Kingdom, for else
they could not have propounded to him questions which in view of the
advanced hour had lost all significance. What difference does it make
now about the Roman tribute? What do the farfetched Sadduceean
arguments amount to against the possibility of the resurrection of the
dead? Soon, with the advent of the Kingdom, all earthly rule is done
away, as well as the earthly human nature itself.
If only they understood the signs of the times! He proposes to them
two questions, which should cause them to ponder and hence take note
that the time they live in is pregnant with a great secret which is
not dreamed of in the learning of the Scribes.
_By what authority did the Baptist act?_ If they but knew that he was
the Forerunner, as Jesus had mysteriously suggested to the people,
then they must know too that the hour of the Kingdom had struck.
_How is the Messiah at one time David’s [pg 270] Son—that is,
subordinate to him; at another, David’s Lord—that is, his superior?_
If they could explain that, then would they understand also how he who
now labours lowly and unknown in behalf of God’s Kingdom shall be
revealed as Lord and Christ.
But as it is they do not even suspect that the messianic indications
harbour _secrets._ With all their learning they are blind leaders of
the blind, who, instead of making the people receptive for the
Kingdom, harden their hearts, and instead of drawing out from the Law
the higher morality which renders men meet for the Kingdom, labour
against it with their petty outward precepts and draw the people after
them to perdition. Hence: Woe to the Pharisees and scribes!
True, even among them are such as have kept an open eye. The scribe
who put to him the question about the great commandment and welcomed
his reply is commended as “having understanding” and therefore “not
far from the Kingdom of God,”—for he shall belong to it when it
appears.
But the mass of the Pharisees and scribes understand him so little
that they decree his death. They had no effective charge to bring
against his behaviour. A disrespectful word about the Temple—that was
all. [pg 271] _Then Judas betrayed to them the secret._ Now he was
condemned.
In the neighbourhood of death Jesus draws himself up to the same
triumphant stature as in the days by the seaside,—for with death comes
the Kingdom. On that occasion he had celebrated with the believers a
mystic feast as an anticipation of the messianic banquet; so now he
rises at the end of the last earthly supper and distributes to the
Disciples hallowed food and drink, intimating to them with a solemn
voice that this is the last earthly meal, for they are soon to be
united at the banquet in the Father’s Kingdom. Two corresponding
parables suggest the secret of the Passion. For him, the bread and
wine which he hands them at the Supper are his body and his blood, for
by the sacrifice of himself unto death he ushers in the messianic
feast. The parabolic saying remained obscure to the Disciples. It was
also not intended for them, its purpose was not to explain anything to
them,—_for it was an enigma-parable._
Now, as the great hour approaches, he seeks again, as after the Supper
by the seashore, a lonely spot where he may pray. He bears the
Affliction for others. Therefore he can say to the Disciples
beforehand that in the [pg 272] night they shall all be offended in
him—and he does not need to condemn them, for the Scripture had so
determined it. What endless peace lies in this word! Indeed, he
comforts _them:_ after the Resurrection he will gather them about him
and go before them in messianic glory unto Galilee, retracing the same
road along which they had followed him on his way to death.
It still remained, however, within the scope of God’s omnipotence to
eliminate the Affliction for him also. Wherefore, as once he prayed
with the believers, “And lead us not into the Temptation,” so now he
prays for himself, that God may permit the cup of suffering to pass
his lips by. True, if it be God’s will, he feels himself strong enough
to drink it. He is sorrowful rather for the Three. The sons of
Zebedee, to gain the seats upon the throne, have boasted that they can
drink with him the cup of suffering and receive with him the baptism
of suffering. Peter swore that he would stand by him even if he must
die with him. He knows not what God has ordained for them,—whether he
will lay upon them what they desire to undertake. Therefore he bids
them remain near him. And while he prays God for himself he thinks of
them and twice wakes them up, bidding [pg 273] them remain awake and
beseech God that he may not lead them through the Temptation.
The third time he comes to them the betrayer with his band is near.
The hour is come,—therefore he draws himself up to the full stature of
his majesty. He is alone, his Disciples flee.
The hearing of witnesses is merely a pretence. After they have gone
the High Priest puts directly the question about the messiahship. “I
am,” said Jesus, referring them at the same time to the hour when he
shall appear as Son of Man on the clouds of heaven surrounded by the
angels. Therefore he was found guilty of blasphemy and condemned to
death.
On the afternoon of the fourteenth of Nisan, as they ate the Paschal
lamb at even, he uttered a loud cry and died.
[pg 274]
POSTSCRIPT
THE judgments passed upon this realistic account of the life of Jesus
may be very diverse, according to the dogmatic, historical, or
literary point of view of the critics. Only, with the _aim_ of the
book may they not find fault: _to depict the figure of Jesus in its
overwhelming heroic greatness and to impress it upon the modern age
and upon the modern theology._
The heroic recedes from our modern “Weltanschauung,” our Christianity,
and our conception of the person of Jesus. Wherefore men have
humanised and humbled him. Renan has stripped off his halo and reduced
him to a sentimental figure, coward spirits like Schopenhauer have
dared to appeal to him for their enervating philosophy, and our
generation has modernised him, with the notion that it could
comprehend his character and development psychologically.
We must go back to the point where we can feel again the heroic in
Jesus. Before that mysterious Person, who, in the form of his time,
knew that he was creating [pg 275] upon the foundation of his life and
death a moral world _which bears his name,_ we must be forced to lay
our faces in the dust, without daring even to wish to understand his
nature. Only then can the heroic in our Christianity and in our
“Weltanschauung” be again revived.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
I have used scans of two copies of the original version of the book:
one from the New York Public library (scanned by Google) and one from
the University of Princeton. This was necessary because both books had
considerable hand-written additions/changes that obscured the original
text. Both are available from the Internet Archive.
The formatting of both the .htm and .txt files has followed that of a
similar book, The Quest of the Historic Jesus, already in Project
Gutenberg. Evidently this was a poor choice since several of the problems
identified in my first submission were copied from that book.
I have included page numbers in the format [pg xxx] for
both .htm and .txt.
I have made several changes to the printer’s text, which are listed
below. Each change has been surrounded with [] characters, if the
change was only an addition of some characters. If some characters
have been changed, the correct word is placed after the incorrect word
and surrounded with [] characters. Scripture references in the
original book are formatted as (chapter)(verse). In the .txt version I
have used the more common form (chapter):(verse).
Within the printed book both ill success and illsuccess appear. The
two-word version seemed the better choice. (see 4. below)
Several terms appear in both two-word and hypenated forms:
high-priest, morning-glow, world-clock, modern-historical, far-reaching,
passion-idea, coming-one, jesus christ. I left all these as they are in the
book. I decided to harmonize fore-ordained (see below).
1. page 5: self-(line break)consciousness becomes selfconsciousness
(as on page 138).
2. page 64: Mk 2:23-3, 6 becomes Mk 2:23-[3:6]
3. page 67 (twice), 152, 157, 167: ff) changed to ff[.])
4. page 68, 69, 87, 116, 259, : illsuccess changed to ill[]success
5. page 89: comission changed to com[m]ssion
6. page 90: Corazin changed to C[h]orazin
7. page 117: [not] inserted into Mt 10:5, 6
8. page 120: dominination changed to domination
9. page 140: scripture reference corrected from Joel 3:28 to 2:28
10. page 213: casual changed to causal
11. page 236: Isaiah 40:66 changed to Isaiah 40-66
12. page 242: changed fore-ordained to foreordained
In the .txt version I have used utf8 encoding and the following markers:
1. italic text surrounded by _
2. footnote references in the form _(_number_)_Project Gutenberg
The mystery of the Kingdom of God : $b The secret of Jesus' messiahship and passion
Schweitzer, Albert
Chimera57
Graduate