[Footnote 6: Matt. xvii. 18, 19; Luke xvii. 6.]
[Footnote 7: Matt. ix. 8.]
[Footnote 8: Matt. ix. 2, and following; Mark ii. 5, and following;Luke v. 20, vii. 47, 48.]
[Footnote 9: Matt. xii. 41, 42; xxii. 43, and following; John viii. 52, and following.]
We cannot mistake in these affirmations of Jesus the germ of the doctrine which was afterward to make of him a divine hypostasis,[1] in identifying him with the Word, or "second God,"[2] or eldest Son of God,[3] orAngel Metathronos,[4] which Jewish theology created apart from him.[5] A kind of necessity caused this theology, in order to correct the extreme rigor of the old Monotheism, to place near God an assessor, to whom the eternal Father is supposed to delegate the government of the universe. The belief that certain men are incarnations of divine faculties or "powers," was widespread; the Samaritans possessed about the same time a thaumaturgus named Simon, whom they identified with the "great power of God."[6] For nearly two centuries, the speculative minds of Judaism had yielded to the tendency to personify the divine attributes, and certain expressions which were connected with the Divinity. Thus, the "breath of God," which is often referred to in the Old Testament, is considered as a separate being, the "Holy Spirit." In the same manner the "Wisdom of God" and the "Word of God" became distinct personages. This was the germ of the process which has engendered theSephirothof the Cabbala, theÆonsof Gnosticism, the hypostasis of Christianity, and all that dry mythology, consisting of personified abstractions, to which Monotheism is obliged to resort when it wishes to pluralize the Deity.
[Footnote 1: See especially John xiv., and following. But it is doubtful whether we have here the authentic teaching of Jesus.]
[Footnote 2: Philo, cited in Eusebius,Præp. Evang., vii. 13.]
[Footnote 3: Philo,De migr. Abraham, § 1;Quod Deus immut., § 6;De confus. ling., § 9, 14 and 28; De profugis, § 20;De Somniis, i. § 37;De Agric. Noë, § 12;Quis rerum divin. hæres, § 25, and following, 48, and following, &c.]
[Footnote 4: [Greek: Metathronos], that is, sharing the throne of God; a kind of divine secretary, keeping the register of merits and demerits;Bereshith Rabba, v. 6c; Talm. of Bab.,Sanhedr., 38b;Chagigah, 15a; Targum of Jonathan,Gen., v. 24.]
[Footnote 5: This theory of the [Greek: Logos] contains no Greek elements. The comparisons which have been made between it and theHonoverof the Parsees are also without foundation. TheMinokhiredor "Divine Intelligence," has much analogy with the Jewish [Greek: Logos]. (See the fragments of the book entitledMinokhiredin Spiegel,Parsi-Grammatik, pp. 161, 162.) But the development which the doctrine of theMinokhiredhas taken among the Parsees is modern, and may imply a foreign influence. The "Divine Intelligence" (Maiyu-Khratû) appears in the Zend books; but it does not there serve as basis to a theory; it only enters into some invocations. The comparisons which have been attempted between the Alexandrian theory of the Word and certain points of Egyptian theology may not be entirely without value. But nothing indicates that, in the centuries which preceded the Christian era, Palestinian Judaism had borrowed anything from Egypt.]
[Footnote 6:Actsviii. 10.]
Jesus appears to have remained a stranger to these refinements of theology, which were soon to fill the world with barren disputes. The metaphysical theory of the Word, such as we find it in the writings of his contemporary Philo, in the Chaldean Targums, and even in the book of "Wisdom,"[1] is neither seen in theLogiaof Matthew, nor in general in the synoptics, the most authentic interpreters of the words of Jesus. The doctrine of the Word, in fact, had nothing in common with Messianism. The "Word" of Philo, and of the Targums, is in no sense the Messiah. It was John the Evangelist, or his school, who afterward endeavored to prove that Jesus was the Word, and who created, in this sense, quite a new theology, very different from that of the "kingdom of God."[2] The essential character of the Word was that of Creator and of Providence. Now, Jesus never pretended to have created the world, nor to govern it. His office was to judge it, to renovate it. The position of president at the final judgment of humanity was the essential attribute which Jesus attached to himself, and the character which all the first Christians attributed to him.[3] Until the great day, he will sit at the right hand of God, as his Metathronos, his first minister, and his future avenger.[4] The superhuman Christ of the Byzantine apsides, seated as judge of the world, in the midst of the apostles in the same rank with him, and superior to the angels who only assist and serve, is the exact representation of that conception of the "Son of man," of which we find the first features so strongly indicated in the book of Daniel.
[Footnote 1: ix. 1, 2, xvi. 12. Comp. vii. 12, viii. 5, and following, ix., and in general ix.-xi. These prosopopoeia of Wisdom personified are found in much older books. Prov. viii., ix.; Job xxviii.;Rev.xix. 13.]
[Footnote 2: John, Gospel, i. 1-14; 1 Epistle v. 7; moreover, it will be remarked, that, in the Gospel of John, the expression of "the Word" does not occur except in the prologue, and that the narrator never puts it into the mouth of Jesus.]
[Footnote 3:Actsx. 42.]
[Footnote 4: Matt. xxvi. 64; Mark xvi. 19; Luke xxii. 69;Actsvii. 55; Rom. viii. 34; Ephes. i. 20; Coloss. iii. 1; Heb. i. 3, 13, viii. 1, x. 12, xii. 2; 1 Peter iii. 22. See the passages previously cited on the character of the Jewish Metathronos.]
At all events, the strictness of a studied theology by no means existed in such a state of society. All the ideas we have just stated formed in the mind of the disciples a theological system so little settled, that the Son of God, this species of divine duplicate, is made to act purely as man. He is tempted—he is ignorant of many things—he corrects himself[1]—he is cast down, discouraged—he asks his Father to spare him trials—he is submissive to God as a son.[2] He who is to judge the world does not know the day of judgment.[3] He takes precautions for his safety.[4] Soon after his birth, he is obliged to be concealed to avoid powerful men who wish to kill him.[5] In exorcisms, the devil cheats him, and does not come out at the first command.[6] In his miracles we are sensible of painful effort—an exhaustion, as if something went out of him.[7] All these are simply the acts of a messenger of God, of a man protected and favored by God.[8] We must not look here for either logic or sequence. The need Jesus had of obtaining credence, and the enthusiasm of his disciples, heaped up contradictory notions. To the Messianic believers of the millenarian school, and to the enthusiastic readers of the books of Daniel and of Enoch, he was the Son of man—to the Jews holding the ordinary faith, and to the readers of Isaiah and Micah, he was the Son of David—to the disciples he was the Son of God, or simply the Son. Others, without being blamed by the disciples, took him for John the Baptist risen from the dead, for Elias, for Jeremiah, conformable to the popular belief that the ancient prophets were about to reappear, in order to prepare the time of the Messiah.[9]
[Footnote 1: Matt. x. 5, compared with xxviii. 19.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. xxvi. 39; John xii. 27.]
[Footnote 3: Mark xiii. 32.]
[Footnote 4: Matt. xii. 14-16, xiv. 13; Mark iii. 6, 7, ix. 29, 30;John vii. 1, and following.]
[Footnote 5: Matt. ii. 20.]
[Footnote 6: Matt. xvii. 20; Mark ix. 25.]
[Footnote 7: Luke viii. 45, 46; John xi. 33, 38.]
[Footnote 8:Actsii. 22.]
[Footnote 9: Matt. xiv. 2, xvi. 14, xvii. 3, and following; Mark vi. 14, 15, viii. 28; Luke ix. 8, and following, 19.]
An absolute conviction, or rather the enthusiasm, which freed him from even the possibility of doubt, shrouded all these boldnesses. We little understand, with our cold and scrupulous natures, how any one can be so entirely possessed by the idea of which he has made himself the apostle. To the deeply earnest races of the West, conviction means sincerity to one's self. But sincerity to one's self has not much meaning to Oriental peoples, little accustomed to the subtleties of a critical spirit. Honesty and imposture are words which, in our rigid consciences, are opposed as two irreconcilable terms. In the East, they are connected by numberless subtle links and windings. The authors of the Apocryphal books (of "Daniel" and of "Enoch," for instance), men highly exalted, in order to aid their cause, committed, without a shadow of scruple, an act which we should term a fraud. The literal truth has little value to the Oriental; he sees everything through the medium of his ideas, his interests, and his passions.
History is impossible, if we do not fully admit that there are many standards of sincerity. All great things are done through the people; now we can only lead the people by adapting ourselves to its ideas. The philosopher who, knowing this, isolates and fortifies himself in his integrity, is highly praiseworthy. But he who takes humanity with its illusions, and seeks to act with it and upon it, cannot be blamed. Cæsar knew well that he was not the son of Venus; France would not be what it is, if it had not for a thousand years believed in the Holy Ampulla of Rheims. It is easy for us, who are so powerless, to call this falsehood, and, proud of our timid honesty, to treat with contempt the heroes who have accepted the battle of life under other conditions. When we have effected by our scruples what they accomplished by their falsehoods, we shall have the right to be severe upon them. At least, we must make a marked distinction between societies like our own, where everything takes place in the full light of reflection, and simple and credulous communities, in which the beliefs that have governed ages have been born. Nothing great has been established which does not rest on a legend. The only culprit in such cases is the humanity which is willing to be deceived.
Two means of proof—miracles and the accomplishment of prophecies—could alone, in the opinion of the contemporaries of Jesus, establish a supernatural mission. Jesus, and especially his disciples, employed these two processes of demonstration in perfect good faith. For a long time, Jesus had been convinced that the prophets had written only in reference to him. He recognized himself in their sacred oracles; he regarded himself as the mirror in which all the prophetic spirit of Israel had read the future. The Christian school, perhaps even in the lifetime of its founder, endeavored to prove that Jesus responded perfectly to all that the prophets had predicted of the Messiah.[1] In many cases, these comparisons were quite superficial, and are scarcely appreciable by us. They were most frequently fortuitous or insignificant circumstances in the life of the master which recalled to the disciples certain passages of the Psalms and the Prophets, in which, in consequence of their constant preoccupation, they saw images of him.[2] The exegesis of the time consisted thus almost entirely in a play upon words, and in quotations made in an artificial and arbitrary manner. The synagogue had no officially settled list of the passages which related to the future reign. The Messianic references were very liberally created, and constituted artifices of style rather than serious reasoning.
[Footnote 1: For example, Matt. i. 22, ii. 5, 6, 15, 18, iv. 15.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. i. 23, iv. 6, 14, xxvi. 31, 54, 56, xxvii. 9, 35; Mark xiv. 27, xv. 28; John xii. 14. 15, xviii. 9, xix. 19, 24, 28, 36.]
As to miracles, they were regarded at this period as the indispensable mark of the divine, and as the sign of the prophetic vocation. The legends of Elijah and Elisha were full of them. It was commonly believed that the Messiah would perform many.[1] In Samaria, a few leagues from where Jesus was, a magician, named Simon, acquired an almost divine character by his illusions.[2] Afterward, when it was sought to establish the reputation of Apollonius of Tyana, and to prove that his life had been the sojourn of a god upon the earth, it was not thought possible to succeed therein except by inventing a vast cycle of miracles.[3] The Alexandrian philosophers themselves, Plotinus and others, are reported to have performed several.[4] Jesus was, therefore, obliged to choose between these two alternatives—either to renounce his mission, or to become a thaumaturgus. It must be remembered that all antiquity, with the exception of the great scientific schools of Greece and their Roman disciples, accepted miracles; and that Jesus not only believed therein, but had not the least idea of an order of Nature regulated by fixed laws. His knowledge on this point was in no way superior to that of his contemporaries. Nay, more, one of his most deeply rooted opinions was, that by faith and prayer man has entire power over Nature.[5] The faculty of performing miracles was regarded as a privilege frequently conferred by God upon men,[6] and it had nothing surprising in it.
[Footnote 1: John vii. 34;IV. Esdras, xiii. 50.]
[Footnote 2:Actsviii. 9, and following.]
[Footnote 3: See his biography by Philostratus.]
[Footnote 4: See the Lives of the Sophists, by Eunapius; the Life ofPlotinus, by Porphyry; that of Proclus, by Marinus; and that ofIsidorus, attributed to Damascius.]
[Footnote 5: Matt. xvii. 19, xxi. 21, 22; Mark xi. 23, 24.]
[Footnote 6: Matt. ix. 8.]
The lapse of time has changed that which constituted the power of the great founder of Christianity into something offensive to our ideas, and if ever the worship of Jesus loses its hold upon mankind, it will be precisely on account of those acts which originally inspired belief in him. Criticism experiences no embarrassment in presence of this kind of historical phenomenon. A thaumaturgus of our days, unless of an extreme simplicity, like that manifested by certain stigmatists of Germany, is odious; for he performs miracles without believing in them; and is a mere charlatan. But, if we take a Francis d'Assisi, the question becomes altogether different; the series of miracles attending the origin of the order of St. Francis, far from offending us, affords us real pleasure. The founder of Christianity lived in as complete a state of poetic ignorance as did St. Clair and thetres socii. The disciples deemed it quite natural that their master should have interviews with Moses and Elias, that he should command the elements, and that he should heal the sick. We must remember, besides, that every idea loses something of its purity, as soon as it aspires to realize itself. Success is never attained without some injury being done to the sensibility of the soul. Such is the feebleness of the human mind that the best causes are ofttimes gained only by bad arguments. The demonstrations of the primitive apologists of Christianity are supported by very poor reasonings. Moses, Christopher Columbus, Mahomet, have only triumphed over obstacles by constantly making allowance for the weakness of men, and by not always giving the true reasons for the truth. It is probable that the hearers of Jesus were more struck by his miracles than by his eminently divine discourses. Let us add, that doubtless popular rumor, both before and after the death of Jesus, exaggerated enormously the number of occurrences of this kind. The types of the gospel miracles, in fact, do not present much variety; they are repetitions of each other and seem fashioned from a very small number of models, accommodated to the taste of the country.
It is impossible, amongst the miraculous narratives so tediously enumerated in the Gospels, to distinguish the miracles attributed to Jesus by public opinion from those in which he consented to play an active part. It is especially impossible to ascertain whether the offensive circumstances attending them, the groanings, the strugglings, and other features savoring of jugglery,[1] are really historical, or whether they are the fruit of the belief of the compilers, strongly imbued with theurgy, and living, in this respect, in a world analogous to that of the "spiritualists" of our times.[2] Almost all the miracles which Jesus thought he performed, appear to have been miracles of healing. Medicine was at this period in Judea, what it still is in the East, that is to say, in no respect scientific, but absolutely surrendered to individual inspiration. Scientific medicine, founded by Greece five centuries before, was at the time of Jesus unknown to the Jews of Palestine. In such a state of knowledge, the presence of a superior man, treating the diseased with gentleness, and giving him by some sensible signs the assurance of his recovery, is often a decisive remedy. Who would dare to say that in many cases, always excepting certain peculiar injuries, the touch of a superior being is not equal to all the resources of pharmacy? The mere pleasure of seeing him cures. He gives only a smile, or a hope, but these are not in vain.
[Footnote 1: Luke viii. 45, 46; John xi. 33 and 38.]
[Footnote 2:Actsii. 2, and following, iv. 31, viii. 15, and following, x. 44 and following. For nearly a century, the apostles and their disciples dreamed only of miracles. See theActs, the writings of St. Paul, the extracts from Papias, in Eusebius,Hist. Eccl., iii. 39, &c. Comp. Mark iii. 15, xvi. 17, 18, 20.]
Jesus had no more idea than his countrymen of a rational medical science; he believed, like every one else, that healing was to be effected by religious practices, and such a belief was perfectly consistent. From the moment that disease was regarded as the punishment of sin,[1] or as the act of a demon,[2] and by no means as the result of physical causes, the best physician was the holy man who had power in the supernatural world. Healing was considered a moral act; Jesus, who felt his moral power, would believe himself specially gifted to heal. Convinced that the touching of his robe,[3] the imposition of his hands,[4] did good to the sick, he would have been unfeeling, if he had refused to those who suffered, a solace which it was in his power to bestow. The healing of the sick was considered as one of the signs of the kingdom of God, and was always associated with the emancipation of the poor.[5] Both were the signs of the great revolution which was to end in the redress of all infirmities.
[Footnote 1: John v. 14, ix. 1, and following, 34.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. ix. 32, 33, xii. 22; Luke xiii. 11, 16.]
[Footnote 3: Luke viii. 45, 46.]
[Footnote 4: Luke iv. 40.]
[Footnote 5: Matt. xi. 5, xv. 30, 31; Luke ix. 1, 2, 6.]
One of the species of cure which Jesus most frequently performed, was exorcism, or the expulsion of demons. A strange disposition to believe in demons pervaded all minds. It was a universal opinion, not only in Judea, but in the whole world, that demons seized hold of the bodies of certain persons and made them act contrary to their will. A Persiandiv, often named in the Avesta,[1]Aeschma-daëva, the "div of concupiscence," adopted by the Jews under the name of Asmodeus,[2] became the cause of all the hysterical afflictions of women.[3] Epilepsy, mental and nervous maladies,[4] in which the patient seems no longer to belong to himself, and infirmities, the cause of which is not apparent, as deafness, dumbness,[5] were explained in the same manner. The admirable treatise, "On Sacred Disease," by Hippocrates, which set forth the true principles of medicine on this subject, four centuries and a half before Jesus, had not banished from the world so great an error. It was supposed that there were processes more or less efficacious for driving away the demons; and the occupation of exorcist was a regular profession like that of physician.[6] There is no doubt that Jesus had in his lifetime the reputation of possessing the greatest secrets of this art.[7] There were at that time many lunatics in Judea, doubtless in consequence of the great mental excitement. These mad persons, who were permitted to go at large, as they still are in the same districts, inhabited the abandoned sepulchral caves, which were the ordinary retreat of vagrants. Jesus had great influence over these unfortunates.[8] A thousand singular incidents were related in connection with his cures, in which the credulity of the time gave itself full scope. But still these difficulties must not be exaggerated. The disorders which were explained by "possessions" were often very slight. In our times, in Syria, they regard as mad or possessed by a demon (these two ideas were expressed by the same word,medjnoun[9]) people who are only somewhat eccentric. A gentle word often suffices in such cases to drive away the demon. Such were doubtless the means employed by Jesus. Who knows if his celebrity as exorcist was not spread almost without his own knowledge? Persons who reside in the East are occasionally surprised to find themselves, after some time, in possession of a great reputation, as doctors, sorcerers, or discoverers of treasures, without being able to account to themselves for the facts which have given rise to these strange fancies.
[Footnote 1:Vendidad, xi. 26;Yaçna, x. 18.]
[Footnote 2:Tobit, iii. 8, vi. 14; Talm. of Bab.,Gittin, 68a.]
[Footnote 3: Comp. Mark xvi. 9; Luke viii. 2;Gospel of the Infancy, 16, 33; Syrian Code, published in theAnecdota Syriacaof M. Land, i., p. 152.]
[Footnote 4: Jos.,Bell. Jud., VII. vi. 3; Lucian,Philopseud., 16; Philostratus,Life of Apoll., iii. 38, iv. 20; Aretus,De causis morb. chron., i. 4.]
[Footnote 5: Matt. ix. 33, xii. 22; Mark ix. 16, 24; Luke xi. 14.]
[Footnote 6:Tobit, viii. 2, 3; Matt. xii. 27; Mark ix. 38;Actsxix. 13; Josephus,Ant., VIII. ii. 5; Justin,Dial. cum Tryph., 85; Lucian, Epigr., xxiii. (xvii. Dindorf).]
[Footnote 7: Matt. xvii. 20; Mark ix. 24, and following.]
[Footnote 8: Matt. viii. 28, ix. 34, xii. 43, and following, xvii. 14, and following, 20; Mark v. 1, and following; Luke viii. 27, and following.]
[Footnote 9: The phrase,Dæmonium habes(Matt. xi. 18: Luke vii. 33; John vii. 20, viii. 48, and following, x. 20, and following) should be translated by: "Thou art mad," as we should say in Arabic:Medjnoun enté. The verb [Greek: daimonan] has also, in all classical antiquity, the meaning of "to be mad."]
Many circumstances, moreover, seem to indicate that Jesus only became a thaumaturgus late in life and against his inclination. He often performs his miracles only after he has been besought to do so, and with a degree of reluctance, reproaching those who asked them for the grossness of their minds.[1] One singularity, apparently inexplicable, is the care he takes to perform his miracles in secret, and the request he addresses to those whom he heals to tell no one.[2] When the demons wish to proclaim him the Son of God, he forbids them to open their mouths; but they recognize him in spite of himself.[3] These traits are especially characteristic in Mark, who is pre-eminently the evangelist of miracles and exorcisms. It seems that the disciple, who has furnished the fundamental teachings of this Gospel, importuned Jesus with his admiration of the wonderful, and that the master, wearied of a reputation which weighed upon him, had often said to him, "See thou say nothing to any man." Once this discordance evoked a singular outburst,[4] a fit of impatience, in which the annoyance these perpetual demands of weak minds caused Jesus, breaks forth. One would say, at times, that the character of thaumaturgus was disagreeable to him, and that he sought to give as little publicity as possible to the marvels which, in a manner, grew under his feet. When his enemies asked a miracle of him, especially a celestial miracle, a "sign from heaven," he obstinately refused.[5] We may therefore conclude that his reputation of thaumaturgus was imposed upon him, that he did not resist it much, but also that he did nothing to aid it, and that, at all events, he felt the vanity of popular opinion on this point.
[Footnote 1: Matt. xii. 39, xvi. 4, xvii. 16; Mark viii. 17, and following, ix. 18; Luke ix. 41.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. viii. 4, ix. 30, 31, xii. 16, and following; Mark i. 44, vii. 24, and following, viii. 26.]
[Footnote 3: Mark i. 24, 25, 34, iii. 12; Luke iv. 41.]
[Footnote 4: Matt. xvii. 16; Mark ix. 18; Luke ix. 41.]
[Footnote 5: Matt. xii. 38, and following, xvi. 1, and following; Mark viii. 11.]
We should neglect to recognize the first principles of history if we attached too much importance to our repugnances on this matter, and if, in order to avoid the objections which might be raised against the character of Jesus, we attempted to suppress facts which, in the eyes of his contemporaries, were considered of the greatest importance.[1] It would be convenient to say that these are the additions of disciples much inferior to their Master who, not being able to conceive his true grandeur, have sought to magnify him by illusions unworthy of him. But the four narrators of the life of Jesus are unanimous in extolling his miracles; one of them, Mark, interpreter of the apostle Peter,[2] insists so much on this point, that, if we trace the character of Christ only according to this Gospel, we should represent him as an exorcist in possession of charms of rare efficacy, as a very potent sorcerer, who inspired fear, and whom the people wished to get rid of.[3] We will admit, then, without hesitation, that acts which would now be considered as acts of illusion or folly, held a large place in the life of Jesus. Must we sacrifice to these uninviting features the sublimer aspect of such a life? God forbid. A mere sorcerer, after the manner of Simon the magician, would not have brought about a moral revolution like that effected by Jesus. If the thaumaturgus had effaced in Jesus the moralist and the religious reformer, there would have proceeded from him a school of theurgy, and not Christianity.
[Footnote 1: Josephus,Ant., XVIII. iii. 3.]
[Footnote 2: Papias, in Eusebius,Hist. Eccl., iii. 39.]
[Footnote 3: Mark iv. 40, v. 15, 17, 33, 36, vi. 50, x. 32; cf. Matt. viii. 27, 34, ix. 8, xiv. 27, xvii. 6, 7, xxviii. 5, 10; Luke iv. 36, v. 17, viii. 25, 35, 37, ix. 34. The Apocryphal Gospel, said to be by Thomas the Israelite, carries this feature to the most offensive absurdity. Compare theMiracles of the Infancy, in Philo,Cod. Apocr. N.T., p. cx., note.]
The problem, moreover, presents itself in the same manner with respect to all saints and religious founders. Things now considered morbid, such as epilepsy and seeing of visions, were formerly principles of power and greatness. Physicians can designate the disease which made the fortune of Mahomet.[1] Almost in our own day, the men who have done the most for their kind (the excellent Vincent de Paul himself!) were, whether they wished it or not, thaumaturgi. If we set out with the principle that every historical personage to whom acts have been attributed, which we in the nineteenth century hold to be irrational or savoring of quackery, was either a madman or a charlatan, all criticism is nullified. The school of Alexandria was a noble school, but, nevertheless, it gave itself up to the practices of an extravagant theurgy. Socrates and Pascal were not exempt from hallucinations. Facts ought to explain themselves by proportionate causes. The weaknesses of the human mind only engender weakness; great things have always great causes in the nature of man, although they are often developed amidst a crowd of littlenesses which, to superficial minds, eclipse their grandeur.
[Footnote 1:Hysteria Muscularisof Shoenlein.]
In a general sense, it is therefore true to say that Jesus was only thaumaturgus and exorcist in spite of himself. Miracles are ordinarily the work of the public much more than of him to whom they are attributed. Jesus persistently shunned the performance of the wonders which the multitude would have created for him; the greatest miracle would have been his refusal to perform any; never would the laws of history and popular psychology have suffered so great a derogation. The miracles of Jesus were a violence done to him by his age, a concession forced from him by a passing necessity. The exorcist and the thaumaturgus have alike passed away; but the religious reformer will live eternally.
Even those who did not believe in him were struck with these acts, and sought to be witnesses of them.[1] The pagans, and persons unacquainted with him, experienced a sentiment of fear, and sought to remove him from their district.[2] Many thought perhaps to abuse his name by connecting it with seditious movements.[3] But the purely moral and in no respect political tendency of the character of Jesus saved him from these entanglements. His kingdom was in the circle of disciples, whom a like freshness of imagination and the same foretaste of heaven had grouped and retained around him.
[Footnote 1: Matt. xiv. 1, and following; Mark vi. 14; Luke ix. 7, xxiii. 8.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. viii. 34; Mark v. 17, viii. 37.]
[Footnote 3: John vi. 14, 15.]
We suppose that this last phase of the activity of Jesus continued about eighteen months from the time of his return from the Passover of the year 31, until his journey to the feast of tabernacles of the year 32.[1] During this time, the mind of Jesus does not appear to have been enriched by the addition of any new element; but all his old ideas grew and developed with an ever-increasing degree of power and boldness.
[Footnote 1: John v. 1, vii. 2. We follow the system of John, according to whom the public life of Jesus lasted three years. The synoptics, on the contrary, group all the facts within the space of one year.]
The fundamental idea of Jesus from the beginning, was the establishment of the kingdom of God. But this kingdom of God, as we have already said, appears to have been understood by Jesus in very different senses. At times, we should take him for a democratic leader desiring only the triumph of the poor and the disinherited. At other times, the kingdom of God is the literal accomplishment of the apocalyptic visions of Daniel and Enoch. Lastly, the kingdom of God is often a spiritual kingdom, and the approaching deliverance is a deliverance of the spirit. In this last sense the revolution desired by Jesus was the one which has really taken place; the establishment of a new worship, purer than that of Moses. All these thoughts appear to have existed at the same time in the mind of Jesus. The first one, however—that of a temporal revolution—does not appear to have impressed him much; he never regarded the earth or the riches of the earth, or material power, as worth caring for. He had no worldly ambition. Sometimes by a natural consequence, his great religious importance was in danger of being converted into mere social importance. Men came requesting him to judge and arbitrate on questions affecting their material interests. Jesus rejected these proposals with haughtiness, treating them as insults.[1] Full of his heavenly ideal, he never abandoned his disdainful poverty. As to the other two conceptions of the kingdom of God, Jesus appears always to have held them simultaneously. If he had been only an enthusiast, led away by the apocalypses on which the popular imagination fed, he would have remained an obscure sectary, inferior to those whose ideas he followed. If he had been only a puritan, a sort of Channing or "Savoyard vicar," he would undoubtedly have been unsuccessful. The two parts of his system, or, rather, his two conceptions of the kingdom of God, rest one on the other, and this mutual support has been the cause of his incomparable success. The first Christians were dreamers, living in a circle of ideas which we should term visionary; but, at the same time, they were the heroes of that social war which has resulted in the enfranchisement of the conscience, and in the establishment of a religion from which the pure worship, proclaimed by the founder, will eventually proceed.
[Footnote 1: Luke xii. 13, 14.]
The apocalyptic ideas of Jesus, in their most complete form, may thus be summed up. The existing condition of humanity is approaching its termination. This termination will be an immense revolution, "an anguish" similar to the pains of child-birth; apalingenesis, or, in the words of Jesus himself, a "new birth,"[1] preceded by dark calamities and heralded by strange phenomena.[2] In the great day, there will appear in the heavens the sign of the Son of man; it will be a startling and luminous vision like that of Sinai, a great storm rending the clouds, a fiery meteor flashing rapidly from east to west. The Messiah will appear in the clouds, clothed in glory and majesty, to the sound of trumpets and surrounded by angels. His disciples will sit by his side upon thrones. The dead will then arise, and the Messiah will proceed to judgment.[3]
[Footnote 1: Matt. xix. 28.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. xxiv. 3, and following; Mark xiii. 4, and following; Luke xvii. 22, and following, xxi. 7, and following. It must be remarked that the picture of the end of time attributed to Jesus by the synoptics, contains many features which relate to the siege of Jerusalem. Luke wrote some time after the siege (xxi. 9, 20, 24). The compilation of Matthew, on the contrary (xxvi. 15, 16, 22, 29), carries us back exactly to this precise period, or very shortly afterward. There is no doubt, however, that Jesus predicted that great terrors would precede his reappearance. These terrors were an integral part of all the Jewish apocalypses.Enoch, xcix., c., cii., ciii. (division of Dillman);Carm. sibyll., iii. 334, and following, 633, and following, iv. 168, and following, v. 511, and following. According to Daniel also, the reign of the saints will only come after the desolation shall have reached its height. Chap. vii. 25, and following, viii. 23, and following, ix. 26, 27, xii. 1.]
[Footnote 3: Matt. xvi. 27, xix. 28, xx. 21, xxiv. 30, and following, xxv. 31, and following, xxvi. 64; Mark xiv. 62; Luke xxii. 30; 1Cor.xv. 52; 1 Thess. iv. 15, and following.]
At this judgment men will be divided into two classes according to their deeds.[1] The angels will be the executors of the sentences.[2] The elect will enter into delightful mansions, which have been prepared for them from the foundation of the world;[3] there they will be seated, clothed with light, at a feast presided over by Abraham,[4] the patriarchs and the prophets. They will be the smaller number.[5] The rest will depart intoGehenna. Gehenna was the western valley of Jerusalem. There the worship of fire had been practised at various times, and the place had become a kind of sewer. Gehenna was, therefore, in the mind of Jesus, a gloomy, filthy valley, full of fire. Those excluded from the kingdom will there be burnt and eaten by the never-dying worm, in company with Satan and his rebel angels.[6] There, there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.[7] The kingdom of heaven will be as a closed room, lighted from within, in the midst of a world of darkness and torments.[8]
[Footnote 1: Matt. xiii. 38, and following, xxv. 33.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. xiii. 39, 41, 49.]
[Footnote 3: Matt. xxv. 34. Comp. John xiv. 2.]
[Footnote 4: Matt. viii. 11, xiii. 43, xxvi. 29; Luke xiii. 28, xvi. 22, xxii. 30.]
[Footnote 5: Luke xiii. 23, and following.]
[Footnote 6: Matt. xxv. 41. The idea of the fall of the angels, detailed in the Book of Enoch, was universally admitted in the circle of Jesus. Epistle of Jude 6, and following; 2d Epistle attributed to Saint Peter, ii. 4. 11;Revelationxii. 9; Gospel of John viii. 44.]
[Footnote 7: Matt. v. 22, viii. 12, x. 28, xiii. 40, 42, 50, xviii. 8, xxiv. 51, xxv. 30; Mark ix. 43, &c.]
[Footnote 8: Matt. viii. 12, xxii. 13, xxv. 30. Comp. Jos.,B.J.,III. viii. 5.]
This new order of things will be eternal. Paradise and Gehenna will have no end. An impassable abyss separates the one from the other.[1] The Son of man, seated on the right hand of God, will preside over this final condition of the world and of humanity.[2]
[Footnote 1: Luke xvi. 28.]
[Footnote 2: Mark iii. 29; Luke xxii. 69;Actsvii. 55.]
That all this was taken literally by the disciples and by the master himself at certain moments, appears clearly evident from the writings of the time. If the first Christian generation had one profound and constant belief, it was that the world was near its end,[1] and that the great "revelation"[2] of Christ was about to take place. The startling proclamation, "The time is at hand,"[3] which commences and closes the Apocalypse; the incessantly reiterated appeal, "He that hath ears to hear let him hear!"[4] were the cries of hope and encouragement for the whole apostolic age. A Syrian expression,Maran atha, "Our Lord cometh!"[5] became a sort of password, which the believers used amongst themselves to strengthen their faith and their hope. The Apocalypse, written in the year 68 of our era,[6] declares that the end will come in three years and a half.[7] The "Ascension of Isaiah"[8] adopts a calculation very similar to this.
[Footnote 1:Actsii. 17, iii. 19, and following; 1Cor.xv. 23, 24, 52; 1 Thess. iii. 13, iv. 14, and following, v. 23; 2 Thess. ii. 8; 1 Tim. vi. 14; 2 Tim. iv. 1; Tit. ii. 13; Epistle of James v. 3, 8; Epistle of Jude 18; 2d Epistle of Peter, iii. entirely;Revelationsentirely, and in particular, i. 1, ii. 5, 16, iii. 11, xi. 14, xxii. 6, 7, 12, 20. Comp. 4th Book of Esdras, iv. 26.]
[Footnote 2: Luke xvii. 30; 1Cor.i. 7, 8; 2 Thess. i. 7; 1 Peter i. 7, 13;Revelationsi. 1.]
[Footnote 3:Revelationsi. 3, xxii. 10.]
[Footnote 4: Matt. xi. 15, xiii. 9, 43; Mark iv. 9, 23, vii. 16; Luke viii. 8, xiv. 35;Revelationsii. 7, 11, 27, 29, iii. 6, 13, 22, xiii. 9.]
[Footnote 5: 1Cor.xvi. 22.]
[Footnote 6:Revelationsxvii. 9, and following. The sixth emperor, whom the author represents as reigning, is Galba. The dead emperor, who was to return, is Nero, whose name is given in figures (xiii. 18).]
[Footnote 7:Revelationsxi. 2, 3, xii. 14. Comp. Daniel vii. 25, xii. 7.]
[Footnote 8: Chap. iv., v. 12 and 14. Comp. Cedrenus, p. 68 (Paris, 1647).]
Jesus never indulged in such precise details. When he was interrogated as to the time of his advent, he always refused to reply; once even he declared that the date of this great day was known only by the Father, who had revealed it neither to the angels nor to the Son.[1] He said that the time when the kingdom of God was most anxiously expected, was just that in which it would not appear.[2] He constantly repeated that it would be a surprise, as in the times of Noah and of Lot; that we must be on our guard, always ready to depart; that each one must watch and keep his lamp trimmed as for a wedding procession, which arrives unforeseen;[3] that the Son of man would come like a thief, at an hour when he would not be expected;[4] that he would appear as a flash of lightning, running from one end of the heavens to the other.[5] But his declarations on the nearness of the catastrophe leave no room for any equivocations.[6] "This generation," said he, "shall not pass till all these things be fulfilled. There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom."[7] He reproaches those who do not believe in him, for not being able to read the signs of the future kingdom. "When it is evening, ye say, It will be fair weather; for the sky is red. And in the morning, It will be foul weather to-day; for the sky is red and lowering. O ye hypocrites, ye can discern the face of the sky; but can ye not discern the signs of the times?"[8] By an illusion common to all great reformers, Jesus imagined the end to be much nearer than it really was; he did not take into account the slowness of the movements of humanity; he thought to realize in one day that which, eighteen centuries later, has still to be accomplished.
[Footnote 1: Matt. xxiv. 36; Mark xiii. 32.]
[Footnote 2: Luke xvii. 20. Comp. Talmud of Babyl.,Sanhedrim, 97a.]
[Footnote 3: Matt. xxiv. 36, and following; Mark xiii. 32, and following; Luke xii. 35, and following, xvii. 20, and following.]
[Footnote 4: Luke xii. 40; 2 Peter iii. 10.]
[Footnote 5: Luke xvii. 24.]
[Footnote 6: Matt. x. 23, xxiv., xxv. entirely, and especially xxiv. 29, 34; Mark xiii. 30; Luke xiii. 35, xxi. 28, and following.]
[Footnote 7: Matt. xvi. 28, xxiii. 36, 39, xxiv. 34; Mark viii. 39;Luke ix. 27, xxi. 32.]
[Footnote 8: Matt. xvi. 2-4; Luke xii. 54-56.]
These formal declarations preoccupied the Christian family for nearly seventy years. It was believed that some of the disciples would see the day of the final revelation before dying. John, in particular, was considered as being of this number;[1] many believed that he would never die. Perhaps this was a later opinion suggested toward the end of the first century, by the advanced age which John seems to have reached; this age having given rise to the belief that God wished to prolong his life indefinitely until the great day, in order to realize the words of Jesus. However this may be, at his death the faith of many was shaken, and his disciples attached to the prediction of Christ a more subdued meaning.[2]
[Footnote 1: John xxi. 22, 23.]
[Footnote 2: John xxi. 22, 23. Chapter xxi. of the fourth Gospel is an addition, as is proved by the final clause of the primitive compilation, which concludes at verse 31 of chapter xx. But the addition is almost contemporaneous with the publication of the Gospel itself.]
At the same time that Jesus fully admitted the Apocalyptic beliefs, such as we find them in the apocryphal Jewish books, he admitted the doctrine, which is the complement, or rather the condition of them all, namely, the resurrection of the dead. This doctrine, as we have already said, was still somewhat new in Israel; a number of people either did not know it, or did not believe it.[1] It was the faith of the Pharisees, and of the fervent adherents of the Messianic beliefs.[2] Jesus accepted it unreservedly, but always in the most idealistic sense. Many imagined that in the resuscitated world they would eat, drink, and marry. Jesus, indeed, admits into his kingdom a new passover, a table, and a new wine;[3] but he expressly excludes marriage from it. The Sadducees had on this subject an apparently coarse argument, but one which was really in conformity with the old theology. It will be remembered that according to the ancient sages, man survived only in his children. The Mosaic code had consecrated this patriarchal theory by a strange institution, the levirate law. The Sadducees drew from thence subtle deductions against the resurrection. Jesus escaped them by formally declaring that in the life eternal there would no longer exist differences of sex, and that men would be like the angels.[4] Sometimes he seems to promise resurrection only to the righteous,[5] the punishment of the wicked consisting in complete annihilation.[6] Oftener, however, Jesus declares that the resurrection shall bring eternal confusion to the wicked.[7]
[Footnote 1: Mark ix. 9; Luke xx. 27, and following.]
[Footnote 2: Dan. xii. 2, and following; 2 Macc. vii. entirely, xii. 45, 46, xiv. 46;Actsxxiii. 6, 8; Jos.,Ant., XVIII. i. 3;B.J., II. viii. 14, III. viii. 5.]
[Footnote 3: Matt. xxvi. 29; Luke xxii. 30.]
[Footnote 4: Matt. xxii. 24, and following; Luke xx. 34-38; Ebionite Gospel, entitled, "Of the Egyptians," in Clem. of Alex.,Strom.ii. 9, 13; Clem. Rom., Epist. ii. 12.]
[Footnote 5: Luke xiv. 14, xx. 35, 36. This is also the opinion of St.Paul: 1Cor.xv. 23, and following; 1 Thess. iv. 12, and following.]
[Footnote 6: Comp. 4th book of Esdras, ix. 22.]
[Footnote 7: Matt. xxv. 32, and following.]
It will be seen that nothing in all these theories was absolutely new. The Gospels and the writings of the apostles scarcely contain anything as regards apocalyptic doctrines but what might be found already in "Daniel,"[1] "Enoch,"[2] and the "Sibylline Oracles,"[3] of Jewish origin. Jesus accepted the ideas, which were generally received among his contemporaries. He made them his basis of action, or rather one of his bases; for he had too profound an idea of his true work to establish it solely upon such fragile principles—principles so liable to be decisively refuted by facts.
[Footnote 1: See especially chaps. ii., vi.-viii., x.-xiii.]
[Footnote 2: Chaps. i., xiv., lii., lxii., xciii. 9, and following.]
[Footnote 3: Book iii. 573, and following; 652, and following; 766, and following; 795, and following.]
It is evident, indeed, that such a doctrine, taken by itself in a literal manner, had no future. The world, in continuing to exist, caused it to crumble. One generation of man at the most was the limit of its endurance. The faith of the first Christian generation is intelligible, but the faith of the second generation is no longer so. After the death of John, or of the last survivor, whoever he might be, of the group which had seen the master, the word of Jesus was convicted of falsehood.[1] If the doctrine of Jesus had been simply belief in an approaching end of the world, it would certainly now be sleeping in oblivion. What is it, then, which has saved it? The great breadth of the Gospel conceptions, which has permitted doctrines suited to very different intellectual conditions to be found under the same creed. The world has not ended, as Jesus announced, and as his disciples believed. But it has been renewed, and in one sense renewed as Jesus desired. It is because his thought was two-sided that it has been fruitful. His chimera has not had the fate of so many others which have crossed the human mind, because it concealed a germ of life which having been introduced, thanks to a covering of fable, into the bosom of humanity, has thus brought forth eternal fruits.
[Footnote 1: These pangs of Christian conscience are rendered with simplicity in the second epistle attributed to St. Peter, iii. 8, and following.]
And let us not say that this is a benevolent interpretation, imagined in order to clear the honor of our great master from the cruel contradiction inflicted on his dreams by reality. No, no: this true kingdom of God, this kingdom of the spirit, which makes each one king and priest; this kingdom which, like the grain of mustard-seed, has become a tree which overshadows the world, and amidst whose branches the birds have their nests, was understood, wished for, and founded by Jesus. By the side of the false, cold, and impossible idea of an ostentatious advent, he conceived the real city of God, the true "palingenesis," the Sermon on the Mount, the apotheosis of the weak, the love of the people, regard for the poor, and the re-establishment of all that is humble, true, and simple. This re-establishment he has depicted as an incomparable artist, by features which will last eternally. Each of us owes that which is best in himself to him. Let us pardon him his hope of a vain apocalypse, and of a second coming in great triumph upon the clouds of heaven. Perhaps these were the errors of others rather than his own; and if it be true that he himself shared the general illusion, what matters it, since his dream rendered him strong against death, and sustained him in a struggle, to which he might otherwise have been unequal?
We must, then, attach several meanings to the divine city conceived by Jesus. If his only thought had been that the end of time was near, and that we must prepare for it, he would not have surpassed John the Baptist. To renounce a world ready to crumble, to detach one's self little by little from the present life, and to aspire to the kingdom about to come, would have formed the gist of his preaching. The teaching of Jesus had always a much larger scope. He proposed to himself to create a new state of humanity, and not merely to prepare the end of that which was in existence. Elias or Jeremiah, reappearing in order to prepare men for the supreme crisis, would not have preached as he did. This is so true that this morality, attributed to the latter days, is found to be the eternal morality, that which has saved humanity. Jesus himself in many cases makes use of modes of speech which do not accord with the apocalyptic theory. He often declares that the kingdom of God has already commenced; that every man bears it within himself; and can, if he be worthy, partake of it; that each one silently creates this kingdom by the true conversion of the heart.[1] The kingdom of God at such times is only the highest form of good.[2] A better order of things than that which exists, the reign of justice, which the faithful, according to their ability, ought to help in establishing; or, again, the liberty of the soul, something analogous to the Buddhist "deliverance," the fruit of the soul's separation from matter and absorption in the divine essence. These truths, which are purely abstract to us, were living realities to Jesus. Everything in his mind was concrete and substantial. Jesus, of all men, believed most thoroughly in the reality of the ideal.
[Footnote 1: Matt. vi. 10, 33; Mark xii. 34; Luke xi. 2, xii. 31, xvii. 20, 21, and following.]
[Footnote 2: See especially Mark xii. 34.]
In accepting the Utopias of his time and his race, Jesus thus was able to make high truths of them, thanks to the fruitful misconceptions of their import. His kingdom of God was no doubt the approaching apocalypse, which was about to be unfolded in the heavens. But it was still, and probably above all the kingdom of the soul, founded on liberty and on the filial sentiment which the virtuous man feels when resting on the bosom of his Father. It was a pure religion, without forms, without temple, and without priest; it was the moral judgment of the world, delegated to the conscience of the just man, and to the arm of the people. This is what was destined to live; this is what has lived. When, at the end of a century of vain expectation, the materialistic hope of a near end of the world was exhausted, the true kingdom of God became apparent. Accommodating explanations threw a veil over the material kingdom, which was then seen to be incapable of realization. The Apocalypse of John, the chief canonical book of the New Testament,[1] being too formally tied to the idea of an immediate catastrophe, became of secondary importance, was held to be unintelligible, tortured in a thousand ways and almost rejected. At least, its accomplishment was adjourned to an indefinite future. Some poor benighted ones who, in a fully enlightened age, still preserved the hopes of the first disciples, became heretics (Ebionites, Millenarians), lost in the shallows of Christianity. Mankind had passed to another kingdom of God. The degree of truth contained in the thought of Jesus had prevailed over the chimera which obscured it.
[Footnote 1: Justin,Dial. cum Tryph., 81.]
Let us not, however, despise this chimera, which has been the thick rind of the sacred fruit on which we live. This fantastic kingdom of heaven, this endless pursuit after a city of God, which has constantly preoccupied Christianity during its long career, has been the principle of that great instinct of futurity which has animated all reformers, persistent believers in the Apocalypse, from Joachim of Flora down to the Protestant sectary of our days. This impotent effort to establish a perfect society has been the source of the extraordinary tension which has always made the true Christian an athlete struggling against the existing order of things. The idea of the "kingdom of God," and the Apocalypse, which is the complete image of it, are thus, in a sense, the highest and most poetic expressions of human progress. But they have necessarily given rise to great errors. The end of the world, suspended as a perpetual menace over mankind, was, by the periodical panics which it caused during centuries, a great hindrance to all secular development. Society being no longer certain of its existence, contracted therefrom a degree of trepidation, and those habits of servile humility, which rendered the Middle Ages so inferior to ancient and modern times.[1] A profound change had also taken place in the mode of regarding the coming of Christ. When it was first announced to mankind that the end of the world was about to come, like the infant which receives death with a smile, it experienced the greatest access of joy that it has ever felt. But in growing old, the world became attached to life. The day of grace, so long expected by the simple souls of Galilee, became to these iron ages a day of wrath:Dies iræ, dies illa!But, even in the midst of barbarism, the idea of the kingdom of God continued fruitful. In spite of the feudal church, of sects, and of religious orders, holy persons continued to protest, in the name of the Gospel, against the iniquity of the world. Even in our days, troubled days, in which Jesus has no more authentic followers than those who seem to deny him, the dreams of an ideal organization of society, which have so much analogy with the aspirations of the primitive Christian sects, are only in one sense the blossoming of the same idea. They are one of the branches of that immense tree in which germinates all thought of a future, and of which the "kingdom of God" will be eternally the root and stem. All the social revolutions of humanity will be grafted on this phrase. But, tainted by a coarse materialism, and aspiring to the impossible, that is to say, to found universal happiness upon political and economical measures, the "socialist" attempts of our time will remain unfruitful until they take as their rule the true spirit of Jesus, I mean absolute idealism—the principle that, in order to possess the world, we must renounce it.
[Footnote 1: See, for example, the prologue of Gregory of Tours to hisHistoire Ecclesiastique des Francs, and the numerous documents of the first half of the Middle Ages, beginning by the formula, "On the approach of the night of the world…."]
The phrase, "kingdom of God," expresses also, very happily, the want which the soul experiences of a supplementary destiny, of a compensation for the present life. Those who do not accept the definition of man as a compound of two substances, and who regard the Deistical dogma of the immortality of the soul as in contradiction with physiology, love to fall back upon the hope of a final reparation, which under an unknown form shall satisfy the wants of the heart of man. Who knows if the highest term of progress after millions of ages may not evoke the absolute conscience of the universe, and in this conscience the awakening of all that has lived? A sleep of a million of years is not longer than the sleep of an hour. St. Paul, on this hypothesis, was right in saying,In ictu oculi![1] It is certain that moral and virtuous humanity will have its reward, that one day the ideas of the poor but honest man will judge the world, and that on that day the ideal figure of Jesus will be the confusion of the frivolous who have not believed in virtue, and of the selfish who have not been able to attain to it. The favorite phrase of Jesus continues, therefore, full of an eternal beauty. A kind of exalted divination seems to have maintained it in a vague sublimity, embracing at the same time various orders of truths.
[Footnote 1: 1Cor.xv. 52.]
That Jesus was never entirely absorbed in his apocalyptic ideas is proved, moreover, by the fact that at the very time he was most preoccupied with them, he laid with rare forethought the foundation of a church destined to endure. It is scarcely possible to doubt that he himself chose from among his disciples those who were pre-eminently called the "apostles," or the "twelve," since on the day after his death we find them forming a distinct body, and filling up by election the vacancies that had arisen in their midst.[1] They were the two sons of Jonas; the two sons of Zebedee; James, son of Cleophas; Philip; Nathaniel bar-Tolmai; Thomas; Levi, or Matthew, the son of Alphæus; Simon Zelotes; Thaddeus or Lebbæus; and Judas of Kerioth.[2] It is probable that the idea of the twelve tribes of Israel had had some share in the choice of this number.[3]
[Footnote 1:Actsi. 15, and following; 1Cor.xv. 5; Gal. i. 10.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. x. 2 and following; Mark iii. 16, and following;Luke vi. 14, and following;Actsi. 13; Papias, in Eusebius,Hist.Eccl., iii. 39.]
[Footnote 3: Matt. xix. 28; Luke xxii. 30.]
The "twelve," at all events, formed a group of privileged disciples, among whom Peter maintained a fraternal priority,[1] and to them Jesus confided the propagation of his work. There was nothing, however, which presented the appearance of a regularly organized sacerdotal school. The lists of the "twelve," which have been preserved, contain many uncertainties and contradictions; two or three of those who figure in them have remained completely obscure. Two, at least, Peter and Philip,[2] were married and had children.
[Footnote 1:Actsi. 15, ii. 14, v. 2, 3, 29, viii. 19, xv. 7; Gal. i. 18.]
[Footnote 2: For Peter, see ante, p. 174; for Philip, see Papias,Polycrates, and Clement of Alexandria, quoted by Eusebius,Hist.Eccl., iii. 30, 31, 39, v. 24.]
Jesus evidently confided secrets to the twelve, which he forbade them to communicate to the world.[1] It seems as if his plan at times was to surround himself with a degree of mystery, to postpone the most important testimony respecting himself till after his death, and to reveal himself completely only to his disciples, confiding to them the care of demonstrating him afterward to the world.[2] "What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light; and what ye hear in the ear, that preach ye upon the housetops." This spared him the necessity of too precise declarations, and created a kind of medium between the public and himself. It is clear that there were certain teachings confined to the apostles, and that he explained many parables to them, the meaning of which was ambiguous to the multitude.[3] An enigmatical form and a degree of oddness in connecting ideas were customary in the teachings of the doctors, as may be seen in the sentences of thePirké Aboth. Jesus explained to his intimate friends whatever was peculiar in his apothegms or in his apologues, and showed them his meaning stripped of the wealth of illustration which sometimes obscured it.[4] Many of these explanations appear to have been carefully preserved.[5]
[Footnote 1: Matt. xvi. 20, xvii. 9; Mark viii. 30, ix. 8.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. x. 26, 27; Mark iv. 21, and following; Luke viii. 17, xii. 2, and following; John xiv. 22.]
[Footnote 3: Matt. xiii. 10, and following, 34 and following; Mark iv. 10, and following, 33, and following; Luke viii. 9, and following; xii. 41.]
[Footnote 4: Matt. xvi. 6, and following; Mark vii. 17-23.]
[Footnote 5: Matt. xiii. 18, and following; Mark vii. 18, and following.]
During the lifetime of Jesus, the apostles preached,[1] but without ever departing far from him. Their preaching, moreover, was limited to the announcement of the speedy coming of the kingdom of God.[2] They went from town to town, receiving hospitality, or rather taking it themselves, according to the custom of the country. The guest in the East has much authority; he is superior to the master of the house, who has the greatest confidence in him. This fireside preaching is admirably adapted to the propagation of new doctrines. The hidden treasure is communicated, and payment is thus made for what is received; politeness and good feeling lend their aid; the household is touched and converted. Remove Oriental hospitality, and it would be impossible to explain the propagation of Christianity. Jesus, who adhered greatly to good old customs, encouraged his disciples to make no scruple of profiting by this ancient public right, probably already abolished in the great towns where there were hostelries.[3] "The laborer," said he, "is worthy of his hire!" Once installed in any house, they were to remain there, eating and drinking what was offered them, as long as their mission lasted.
[Footnote 1: Luke ix. 6.]
[Footnote 2: Luke x. 11.]
[Footnote 3: The Greek word [Greek: pandokeion], in all the languages of the Semitic East, designates an hostelry.]
Jesus desired that, in imitation of his example, the messengers of the glad tidings should render their preaching agreeable by kindly and polished manners. He directed that, on entering into a house, they should give the salaam or greeting. Some hesitated; the salaam being then, as now, in the East, a sign of religious communion, which is not risked with persons of a doubtful faith. "Fear nothing," said Jesus; "if no one in the house is worthy of your salute, it will return unto you."[1] Sometimes, in fact, the apostles of the kingdom of God were badly received, and came to complain to Jesus, who generally sought to soothe them. Some of them, persuaded of the omnipotence of their master, were hurt at this forbearance. The sons of Zebedee wanted him to call down fire from heaven upon the inhospitable towns.[2] Jesus received these outbursts with a subtle irony, and stopped them by saying: "The Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them."
[Footnote 1: Matt. x. 11, and following; Mark vi. 10, and following;Luke x. 5, and following. Comp. 2 Epistle of John, 10, 11.]
[Footnote 2: Luke ix. 52, and following.]
He sought in every way to establish as a principle that his apostles were as himself.[1] It was believed that he had communicated his marvellous virtues to them. They cast out demons, prophesied, and formed a school of renowned exorcists,[2] although certain cases were beyond their power.[3] They also wrought cures, either by the imposition of hands, or by the anointing with oil,[4] one of the fundamental processes of Oriental medicine. Lastly, like the Psylli, they could handle serpents and could drink deadly potions with impunity.[5] The further we get from Jesus—the more offensive does this theurgy become. But there is no doubt that it was generally received by the primitive Church, and that it held an important place in the estimation of the world around.[6] Charlatans, as generally happens, took advantage of this movement of popular credulity. Even in the lifetime of Jesus, many, without being his disciples, cast out demons in his name. The true disciples were much displeased at this, and sought to prevent them. Jesus, who saw that this was really an homage paid to his renown, was not very severe toward them.[7] It must be observed, moreover, that the exercise of these gifts had to some degree become a trade. Carrying the logic of absurdity to the extreme, certain men cast out demons by Beelzebub,[8] the prince of demons. They imagined that this sovereign of the infernal regions must have entire authority over his subordinates, and that in acting through him they were certain to make the intruding spirit depart.[9] Some even sought to buy from the disciples of Jesus the secret of the miraculous powers which had been conferred upon them.[10] The germ of a church from this time began to appear. This fertile idea of the power of men in association (ecclesia) was doubtless derived from Jesus. Full of the purely idealistic doctrine that it is the union of love which brings souls together, he declared that whenever men assembled in his name, he would be in their midst. He confided to the Church the right to bind and to unbind (that is to say, to render certain things lawful or unlawful), to remit sins, to reprimand, to warn with authority, and to pray with the certainty of being heard favorably.[11] It is possible that many of these words may have been attributed to the master, in order to give a warrant to the collective authority which was afterward sought to be substituted for that of Jesus. At all events, it was only after his death that particular churches were established, and even this first constitution was made purely and simply on the model of the synagogue. Many personages who had loved Jesus much, and had founded great hopes upon him, as Joseph of Arimathea, Lazarus, Mary Magdalen, and Nicodemus, did not, it seems, join these churches, but clung to the tender or respectful memory which they had preserved of him.
[Footnote 1: Matt. x. 40, 42, xxv. 35, and following; Mark ix. 40;Luke x. 16; John xiii. 20.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. vii. 22, x. 1; Mark iii. 15, vi. 13; Luke x. 17.]
[Footnote 3: Matt. xvii. 18, 19.]
[Footnote 4: Mark vi. 13, xvi. 18; Epist. Jas. v. 14.]
[Footnote 5: Mark xvi. 18; Luke x. 19.]
[Footnote 6: Mark xvi. 20.]
[Footnote 7: Mark ix. 37, 38; Luke ix. 49, 50.]
[Footnote 8: An ancient god of the Philistines, transformed by theJews into a demon.]
[Footnote 9: Matt. xii. 24, and following.]
[Footnote 10:Actsviii. 18, and following.]
[Footnote 11: Matt. xviii. 17, and following; John xx. 23.]
Moreover, there is no trace, in the teaching of Jesus, of an applied morality or of a canonical law, ever so slightly defined. Once only, respecting marriage, he spoke decidedly, and forbade divorce.[1] Neither was there any theology or creed. There were indefinite views respecting the Father, the Son, and the Spirit,[2] from which, afterward, were drawn the Trinity and the Incarnation, but they were then only in a state of indeterminate imagery. The later books of the Jewish canon recognized the Holy Spirit, a sort of divine hypostasis, sometimes identified with Wisdom or the Word.[3] Jesus insisted upon this point,[4] and announced to his disciples a baptism by fire and by the spirit,[5] as much preferable to that of John, a baptism which they believed they had received, after the death of Jesus, in the form of a great wind and tongues of fire.[6] The Holy Spirit thus sent by the Father was to teach them all truth, and testify to that which Jesus himself had promulgated.[7] In order to designate this Spirit, Jesus made use of the wordPeraklit, which the Syro-Chaldaic had borrowed from the Greek ([Greek: paraklêtos]), and which appears to have had in his mind the meaning of "advocate,"[8] "counsellor,"[9] and sometimes that of "interpreter of celestial truths," and of "teacher charged to reveal to men the hitherto hidden mysteries."[10] He regarded himself as aPeraklitto his disciples,[11] and the Spirit which was to come after his death would only take his place. This was an application of the process which the Jewish and Christian theologies would follow during centuries, and which was to produce a whole series of divine assessors, theMetathronos, theSynadelpheorSandalphon, and all the personifications of the Cabbala. But in Judaism, these creations were to remain free and individual speculations, whilst in Christianity, commencing with the fourth century, they were to form the very essence of orthodoxy and of the universal doctrine.
[Footnote 1: Matt. xix. 3, and following.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. xxviii. 19. Comp. Matt. iii. 16, 17; John xv. 26.]
[Footnote 3:Sap.i. 7, vii. 7, ix. 17, xii. 1;Eccles.i. 9, xv. 5, xxiv. 27; xxxix. 8;Judithxvi. 17.]
[Footnote 4: Matt. x. 20; Luke xii. 12, xxiv. 49; John xiv. 26, xv. 26.]
[Footnote 5: Matt. iii. 11; Mark i. 8; Luke iii. 16; John i. 26, iii. 5;Actsi. 5, 8, x. 47.]
[Footnote 6:Actsii. 1-4, xi. 15, xix. 6. Cf. John vii. 39.]
[Footnote 7: John xv. 26, xvi. 13.]
[Footnote 8: ToPeraklitwas opposedKatigor, ([Greek: katêgoros]), the "accuser."]
[Footnote 9: John xiv. 16; 1st Epistle of John ii. 1.]
[Footnote 10: John xiv. 26, xv. 26, xvi. 7, and following. Comp.Philo,De Mundi opificio, § 6.]
[Footnote 11: John xiv. 16. Comp. the epistle before cited,l.c.]
It is unnecessary to remark how remote from the thought of Jesus was the idea of a religious book, containing a code and articles of faith. Not only did he not write, but it was contrary to the spirit of the infant sect to produce sacred books. They believed themselves on the eve of the great final catastrophe. The Messiah came to put the seal upon the Law and the Prophets, not to promulgate new Scriptures. With the exception of the Apocalypse, which was in one sense the only revealed book of the infant Christianity, all the other writings of the apostolic age were works evoked by existing circumstances, making no pretensions to furnish a completely dogmatic whole. The Gospels had at first an entirely personal character, and much less authority than tradition.[1]
[Footnote 1: Papias, in Eusebius,Hist. Eccl., iii. 39.]
Had the sect, however, no sacrament, no rite, no sign of union? It had one which all tradition ascribes to Jesus. One of the favorite ideas of the master was that he was the new bread, bread very superior to manna, and on which mankind was to live. This idea, the germ of the Eucharist, was at times expressed by him in singularly concrete forms. On one occasion especially, in the synagogue of Capernaum, he took a decided step, which cost him several of his disciples. "Verily, verily, I say unto you, Moses gave you not that bread from heaven; but my Father giveth you the true bread from heaven."[1] And he added, "I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger, and he that believeth on me shall never thirst."[2] These words excited much murmuring. "The Jews then murmured at him because he said, I am the bread which came down from heaven. And they said, Is not this Jesus the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? how is it then that he saith, I came down from heaven?" But Jesus insisting with still more force, said, "I am that bread of life; your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness and are dead. This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die. I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world."[3] The offence was now at its height: "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?" Jesus going still further, said: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. Whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood dwelleth in me, and I in him. As the living Father has sent me, and I live by the Father: so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me. This is that bread which came down from heaven: not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead: he that eateth of this bread shall live for ever." Several of his disciples were offended at such obstinacy in paradox, and ceased to follow him. Jesus did not retract; he only added: "It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing. The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life." The twelve remained faithful, notwithstanding this strange preaching. It gave to Cephas, in particular, an opportunity of showing his absolute devotion, and of proclaiming once more, "Thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God."