Christianity and the Christ...

Preface

THE purpose of this book is to show that the Christian faith is reasonable. The whole subject is made to revolve around the Christ. The Christian Hfe involves a vital relation to him, the four gospels are a record of his life, his deeds, and his doctrines, of which the other books of the New Testament are an unfoldment. The Old Testament leads directly to him, the doctrine of the supernatural finds its strongest support at last in his majestic personality, the needs of the sinner are met by him, the peace and joy of the believer are assured by him, the course of history is being and is to be determined by him, the hope of humanity is in him, and the realization of our religious ideals is guaranteed by him. In a treatise so brief it was neeviii Preface.

essary to select a few of the essential points in the '* System of Christian Evidences'* and to ignore a great many critical questions. The discussion of these must be left to the larger treatises on the subject. It is hoped, however, that although critical questions have been for the most part avoided the results of such critical study have been fairly represented in the conclusions reached, and that all that is of importance in these questions has been carried in the few essentials treated. The chapters vary greatly in length. That on " Christ and the Prophets " is the longest. Since its purpose is to set forth the fact that the preparation for Christ was a vast historic movement, and not merely to establish a few marvelous predictions, it was necessary to show the sweep of this movement and the evolution of its conditions in a somewhat extended way. Only in this way could the unique character of the movement be portrayed and its argumentative force made to appear. The same is

Preface. ix

true of the chapter on '^Christ and History."

Chapters III to VII inclusive, are all related to the supernatural, and must all be taken into account in any estimate of the argument for the supernatural. Indeed, no one line of argument can be isolated and fairly estimated. Each line of proof is related to every other, and it is the convergence of all lines in Christ that makes faith reasonable.

Chapters VIII, IX, and XII involve certain philosophic principles which could not be debated, but were essential to the argument and must be assumed. These assumptions may all be summed up in the doctrine that our religious ideals are rational and must therefore be met. The only alternative is blank skepticism. We shall never consent to deny the rationality of these ideals in the interest of intellectual confusion and moral chaos. If Christ continues to satisfy these ideals the race will continue to believe in him and to recite

X Preface.

its creed, " I believe in God the Father Ahiiighty, Maker of heaven and earth : and in Jesus Christ, his only Son our Lord.'* Bradford P. Raymond.

Middletmini, Conn., May, 1S94.

Chapter I. Christ And The Christian Life

PAGE

Christianity revolves around the Christ —

Christ as seen in the gospels 7, 8

Christ in Paul's epistles 9, 10

Christianity a spiritual life —

Life not easily defined 11,12

The Christian life in its manifestations. . . 12

The word "life ** characteristic of John. . 12, 13

Its characteristics in the synoptics I3» 14

Related to the whole man —

Scripture usage of the word " heart " 15

Heart faith involves the intellect 16

Heart faith involves the emotions 16

The man must be put in motion by the act

of will 17

The purpose of the study 18

Chapter II. Christ And The Revised Version

The Revised Version and the gospel of the second century —

Tertullian and his coadjutors 19-23

Polycarp, Clement, and Pantoenius 20-23

2 Contents.

PAGE

Justin Martyr 23-28

Tatian's Diatessaron 29

Baur and John's gospel 30-32

The outcome of scholarly work in this Jield —

Mair's table 33

Confirmatory lines 34

Aiiother zvitness —

Paul's four epistles 35

The four central doctrines 35-37

His intercourse with the apostles 38

Variations in the manuscript —

The three versions compared 40-44

The outcome 43» 44

CHAPTER in.

CHRIST AND THE PROPHETS.

The prophets —

Their number 46, 47

Differentiated from the priest 48

Related to the hope of Israel 48-50

The lower and the higher in prophecy. ... 51, 52

The starting poiitt and the goal —

The covenant and the Messias . 53-55

The historic moveinent —

The religious hope, how planted 55-57

The religious hope, how rooted 57-^3

The settlement in Canaan 64-66

The monarchy 66-68

Progress in ideals —

Moral life conceived as subjective, personal,

and universal 68-80

Predictive prophecies —

Balaam's prophecy 80

Contents

PAGE

The tribe of Judah and house of David. . . 8i, 82

The Divine thought 83, 84

Chapter IV. Christ And The Supernatural

Miracles denied —

Paulus, Renan, Strauss 93, 94

General considerations —

Miracles defined 95

Are miracles necessary ? 96, 97

Not a violation of nature's laws 98

Miracles and their context —

Belong to a system of philosophy 99

Position of modern philosophy 100-102

Relation to Old Testament 102, 103

Involved in the teaching of Jesus 103, 104

The matchless character —

Mill's testimony 105

Renan's testimony 106

Jean Paul Richter*s testimony 107

Paulus's testimony 108

Conclusion 109

Chapter V

Christ's self-consciousness. The assumptions He makes —

The New Testament narratives 110-112

His relation to prophecy 11 2-1 15

4 Contents.

PAGE

His attitude toward nature 115

The sinlessness of Jesus 117, iiS

He forgives sin 119, 120

Authority over men 120, 121

His attitude toward Jehovah 122, 123

CHAPTER VL

CHRIST AND THE RESURRECTION.

Various naturalistic theories —

The swoon theory 125

Disciples competent witnesses 126-128

Discrepancies exaggerated 128, 129

Reno US theory —

Vision hypothesis overworked 130-135

What to do with Paul's testimony 135

What Renan does not explain 135, 136

The Lord's day 137, 138

Apostles were chosen witnesses 138-140

Appeal to evidence of the senses 140-143

Conclusion 144

CHAPTER Vn.

CHRIST AND THE APOSTLE PAUL.

PduPs conversion and life —

Luke's account 145

Paul's 14^

Renan* s account —

Theory of remorse i47-i 50

The great change —

In relation to Messiah 153

In relation to salvation 154

His affections 154

Contents. 5

PAGE

His emotions 154-156

His explanation of the change 156, 157

The conclusion 157, 158

CHAPTER Vni.

CHRIST AND THE SINNER.

Sin —

Our consciousness of it 159, 160

Sin not inherited 161

Sin at root is selfishness 162, 163

Can man be redeemed? 163, 164

Christ* s answer to the question —

The first step is repentance 165-167

The meaning of repentance 167

The second step is faith 167, 168

Filial faith and fatherly love go together. . i6g

Love, when applied to God 169, 170

Christ meets our necessities 171, 172

CHAPTER IX.

CHRIST AND THE BELIEVER.

Our experience —

Related to the sensibility 174

Involves cognitive act 174, 175

The great facts of experience —

Paul's peace and joy 176-179

Not exceptional. 180-182

Church hymns and revivals 183-1S5

This life, how sustaiited —

A system of thought 185-1S7

A divine life . . 187-189

The meaning of our religious ideals — 189, 190

No adverse facts can destroy them 191, 192

6 Contents.

PAGE

CHAPTER X.

CHRIST AND HISTORY.

Christ's theory of man and its relation to slavery —

Celsus and the early disciples 197

Slavery and philosophy 199, 200

The period of the Refor7nation —

Philosophy and Church authority 204, 205

Conflict of Church and State and individual

freedom 205-210

The new principle applied 211,212

The Wesley an revival —

The individual in modern civilization. . . . 2.\/\-iiti

CHAPTER XI.

CHRIST AND HUMANITY.

The clai??i of Christianity and its reasons —

The Old and New Testaments 218, 219

Its 'doctrines, conquests, agencies, and

problems 219-225

Heathenism —

Ethnic faiths and religious ideals 228-233

Christ supplies defects and meets the demands of our nature 234-237

CHAPTER XII.

CHRIST AND IMMORTALITY.

The question of the ages —

Christ's teaching and science. 238-241

The expectation of a future life 241-243

Revelation needed —

Christ's method and our ideals 244-248

The poet's interpretation 249, 250

CHRISTIANITY AND THE CHRIST.

Chapter I. Christ And The Christian Life

IT is important, first of all, to get a well-defined idea of the subject in hand and of the end to be reached by this study; and for our idea on the subject we must go to the original sources in the New Testament Scriptures. It is evident that the New Testament makes Christianity revolve around the Christ. There are many evidences in Matthew's gospel, such as his quotations from prophecy and its fulfillment in Christ, his references to the law, to Christ's Jewish genealogy, and to his use of Jewish thought, that he had the Jew in mind while he wrote, and that he used his material

.HRTSTTANITY AND THE

-. Chr

TST.

accordingly. Mark's gospel was just as evidently written for the Gentiles. He makes no reference to the Jewish law, but is careful to explain w^ords and usages with which the Gentiles would not be likely to be familiar. He deals largely with the external life of the Lord, and gives us a vivid picture of the things Jesus did and the circumstances under which he wrought the mighty works recorded. Luke's gospel looks toward neither Jew nor Gentile, but toward all men. John writes, according to his own words, to show that ^^ Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God.""^ He carries us on beyond the deeds and words of the Lord, and opens to us the depth of his nature, thereby showing us something of his relation to God and giving us grounds for faith in him, for the work which he undertook to do.

If we examine Paul's epistles, some of which were written at an earlier date than the gospels, it is easy to see that Christ is

* Jolin XX, 31.

always the central figure. He writes to the Galatians as follows : *^ When the fullness of the time came, God sent forth his Son ; ""^ and he assumes that all the preceding ages were preparatory for that advent ; to the Ephesians he declares that God proposes, in a ** dispensation of the fullness of the times, to sum up all things in Christ, the things in the heavens, and the things upon the earth/'f This carries the thought in Galatians on to the end of time, and then enthrones Christ head over all. This phase of Christ's supremacy is emphasized again in his letter to the Philippians, in the following sublime passage : ^' Wherefore also God highly exalted him, and gave unto him the name which is above every name ; that in the name of ^ Jesus every knee should bow ; *':{: and he returns to it in his letters to the Colossians and to the Romans, where the whole creation is related to him, and is made to go groaning and trav-

* Gal. iv, 4. f Eph. i, 10. J Phil, ii, 9.

ailing on in pain, working toward the realization of the ideal for which Christ came. The Book of Acts is the earliest Church history. It begins the disclosure of the agencies through which Christ moves out into the centuries for the dominance of the world, while the prophetic Book of Revelation, with its eager eyes to the future, seeks with glowing imagery to portray the final and glorious consummation. The first and the most important teaching of the New Testament, that which is always and of necessity assumed when not explicitly expressed, is that Jesus Christ is '^ the Light of the world,'' the ^^ Son of God,'' the only and all-sufficient Saviour. Take this out, and the remains are ^^ remains," fragments, and nothing more.

A second characteristic, and one flowing directly from the first, is that Christianity in its most essential meaning is a life, a spiritual life, rooted in the Christ. But for this very reason, because Christianity is a life, it is hard to define. No one has answered the question, What is Hfe? We may see the Christian Hfe in its manifestations in the individual, in word and deed, and if the words are rich with the spirit of the Master, and the deeds loyal to the law, ** thy neighbor as thyself," we call a man a Christian ; the life, however, existed before either the words which confessed it or the deeds which manifested it. This life is manifest also in the various creeds of Christendom ; like a fruitful root it has grown itself into the forms of thought of Catholic and Greek and of the various denominational creeds of Protestantism ; but it was before all formulated creeds, and the creeds are to be recognized as only the intellectual molds into which the thinking Church has run this flowing life. We may see it manifested in the institutions of the Church, educational and philanthropic; in civil institutions, in constitutions and statutes. It shows itself in commerce, literature, art, and in all the forms of intercourse between men and nations; but it existed before its manifestation in these forms. These are the external forms which address the senses ; but what is the spiritual life itself? Like every other form of life, it eludes all definitions; put it into a word, and it is no longer life. A word is only a mental irritant which may help the living man to think something about life. We must not then be thrown into panic because under the needle point of a flippant skepticism we cannot answer, in perfectly fitting and satisfactory phrases, the question. What is the Christian life ? A very good answer is the Yankee*s answer, '^You tell, what is your life?**

Undismayed, then, by the fact that we cannot define life, we may note that this word is characteristic with John ; it is he who reports Christ *s words to the Jews: '' Ye search the Scriptures, because ye think that in them ye have eternal life; and these are they which bear witness of me ; and ye will not come to me, that ye may have life.' ' ^ From him we have those remarkable words in the parable of the Good Shepherd, '^ I came that they may have life, and may have it abundantly." f Paul exhorts the Colossians to set their minds *' not on the things that are upon the earth," and adds as his reason, '* For ye died, and j/our life is hid with Christ in God \'' % he counts all else but loss if he may but win Christ and the life which is by faith in him. The word is very infrequently used in the synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke ; but the distinctive characteristics are nowhere else so boldly set forth. We there learn that we are to find life by losing it ; we must not suffer an offending hand or eye to prevent us from entering into life. In the Sermon on the Mount the Master lays bare the root of this life in the inner man ; it is a right heart, a heart that puts reconciliation with a brother before a gift at the altar; that will not tolerate the eye of lust ; that overcomes

* John V, 39, 40. f John x, 10. % Col. iii, 2.

evil with good, putting the merciless enemy to the blush by the deed of love ; that prays to God, and not as do the Pharisees, to be seen of men ; that forgives and expects to be forgiven ; that trusts God, who cares for the birds and will not forget his children ; that builds with unshaken confidence and for eternity upon the Rock of ages, and not upon the sand. That comment upon the Preacher of the Sermon on the Mount, which went the rounds among the hearers, " He taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes," ^ was no shrewd guess, but rather a flash of the soul's hidden fire, which always responds to the electric touch of truth.

The Christian life, whose root John and Paul find in our relation to Christ, whose inner characteristics Jesus portrays in startling words in the Sermon on the Mount, is a life that carries with it the whole man, and is often comprehensively spoken of as the life of faith. Paul goes to

* Matt, vii, 29.

the root of the matter when he says : '' With the heart man beheveth unto righteousness/*"^ But the word heart has pecuHar significance in scriptural usage. We generally think of it as the seat of the affections, and often use the term figuratively in that sense ; but in the Hebrew usage there was no such limitation ; with them it was ** the central seat of the lifeblood, the central organ of the body, with a motive force of its own to set agoing the whole circulation of the blood, a propelling force to draw out the vital materials and energies and keep them moving in all directions, and an attractive force to absorb and concentrate the vital streams/' Haller calls it, *^ the first living and last dying thing ; '' its '* first motion is the sure sign of life, its stillness the sure sign of death/* It was to the Hebrew ^^ the center of all active life, . . . the workshop of all independent activity and vitality/* f

It was the central unit, therefore, from

* Rom. X, lo, f See Beck's Biblical Psychology, p. 8i.

which went forth all the higher forms of spiritual power, in the processes of reflective thought, the glow of moral emotion, and the act of free volition. The life of faith must not, then, be thought of as the credulous act of a superstitious man, since faith, even in its lowest exercise, involves all the powers, and in its highest, the heart-throb of faith, is the impulse which sets the whole man in motion and at his best. It is an act of the intellect ; the Christian believes something, and for reasons satisfactory to him, and that is an intellectual exercise. But that alone does not make a man a Christian ; the affections must be touched and the emotions kindled. Neither is this enough, for, however he may weep over his sins, or lustily sing, *' O, how I love Jesus ! " he may yet be the veriest fraud, a perfect caricature of Christianity. When Jesus summoned Simon and Andrew from their nets on the Sea of Galilee the record informs us that *' they straightway left the nets, and followed him. *' "^ And when he called James and John, the sons of Zebedee, *' they straightway left the boat and their father, and followed him/'f Their act illustrates the Christian faith in this particular; they turned their belief in Jesus and their motives for following him into the act of following. However far the intellect may carry a man into a belief in the doctrines which Christ taught ; however deeply his emotions may be stirred, or powerfully his motives for action may crowd him on toward discipleship, unless, in obedience to these motives and in harmony with his belief, he put forth volition, and begin to follow, he comes short of Christian faith. This life of faith, then, brooks no rival; it commands the whole man. It appears, therefore, from our study of the New Testament, that Christianity is a life ; it is a life of faith, which commands the intellect, affections, and will ; it is a life of faith in the Son of God. These are the three

* Matt, iv, 20. f Matt, iv, 22.

distinctive characteristics given to Christianity in the New Testament. Leave out the third characteristic, and whatever else the faith maybe, it is not a Christian faith. This faith in Christ means that we find in and through him the satisfaction of our present rehgious needs (forgiveness of sin, regeneration, assurance, etc.), and the guarantee of our religious hopes, both for time and eternity. Can we reasonably receive Christ's teaching and obey him at all hazards, even though it cost life itself? If we can, our faith is reasonable, and if we cannot, the Christian faith is a superstition. Assuming that this chapter has given a fairly well-defined idea of the subject in hand, we may now add that the purpose of this study is to show that the Christian faith is reasonable, and the only reasonable faith.

Chapter II. Christ And The Revised Version

TTT'E have studied Christianity as we ^ ^ find it set forth in the Revised Version of the New Testament, and have found it to be a Hfe, a hfe of faith in the Christ. We have called this Revised Version the original source of information ; but how shall we assure ourselves that this Gospel of ours is identical with the Gospel of the apostles ? The argument, exhaustively carried out, is a very long one ; but the gist of it can be very briefly stated. If we compare our Gospel with the wTitings of Tertullian, Irenaeus, and Clement of Alexandria, who lived in the latter part of the second century, we find that they had the very same Gospel that we have. They defend it as the Gospel that came down to them from the apostles ; and they had opportunity to know that it was the Gospel accepted by the universal Church. Tertullian^was Bishop of Hippo, in northern Africa, Irena^uswas Bishop of Lyons, in Gaul, and Clement was the head of a celebrated school in Alexandria. They were learned men, had traveled widely, and must have known not only the faith of the Church* at that time, but what had been the faith of the Church for a very long time. We know, therefore, from their writings that far back in the second century the Church held and taught all the great essential facts and truths of the Gospel, just as we hold and teach them.

Moreover, there were living witnesses at that time connecting these writers directly with the apostles, so that they had the opportunity of verifying the faith of the Church of their time by the testimony of those who had seen, heard, and conversed with the apostles.

Clement was trained at Alexandria, under Pantaenus, in the school over which he at a later time presided, and Pantsenus is represented as a hearer of the apostles. There can be Httle doubt that Clement had opportunity of knowing the facts concerning the Hfe of Jesus from those who had heard the story from the apostles themselves. How eagerly these men would gather up the facts from such witnesses, how reverently they would regard them, and with what care would they preserve them ! Clement heard Pantaenus speak often of these things. He writes : ** And these men, preserving the true tradition of the blessed teaching, directly from Peter and James, from John and Paul, the holy apostles, son receiving it from father (but how few are they who are like their fathers !), came by God*s providence even to us, to deposit among us those seeds (of truth) which were derived from their ancestors and the apostles." '^ Polycarp, who became a martyr about

* See Salmon's Introduction to the New Testament, p. 36.

the year 155 A. D., when he was eighty-six years of age, had been a disciple of the apostle John, and Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons, writes of him : '* I can recall the very place where Polycarp used to sit and teach, his manner of speech, his mode of life, his appearance, the style of his address to the people, his frequent references to St. John, and to others who had seen the Lord ; how he used to repeat from memory their discourses, and the things which he had heard from them concerning our Lord, his miracles and his teaching, and how, being instructed himself by those who were eyewitnesses of the life of the Lord, there was in all that he said a strict agreement with the Scriptures/'"^

Such a witness as Polycarp, whose lifetime runs back into the first century, who tells us that he knew St. John and others that had seen the Lord ; who was accustomed to repeat ^* from memory their dis-

* See Salmon's Introduction to the New Testame^tt, p. 32.

courses," according to Irenaeus ; whose faith was tested by the fires of persecution, and who ^^ steadfastly refused before the proconsul to deny his King and Saviour, whom he had served six and eighty years, and from whom he had experienced nothing but love and mercy ;"'^ who went joyfully to the stake and praised God amid the flames that he was worthy " to be numbered among his martyrs, to drink of the cup of Christ's suffering'' f — such a witness puts the question of the identity of our Gospel and that taught by the apostles almost beyond controversy.

If we go back to the first half of the second century we find there another witness for the facts and teachings of our gospels. Justin Martyr was born about the close of the first century, and died about the middle of the second. He was converted to the Christian faith after he had come to mature manhood, and we have

* See Schaff s History of the Christ'uDi CJiurch^ vol. i, p. i66. \Ilnd.

two of his works in our libraries to-day ; from these we learn that he had all the facts and teachings of the gospels. He held a discussion at Ephesus with the Jew Trypho, and, after giving him an account of his studies in philosophy and of his conversion to Christianity, he assures him that the Christians '^ have not believed empty fables or words without any foundation, but w^ords filled with the Spirit of God and big with power and flourishing with grace." He then proceeds to show from the Old Testament Scriptures that Jesus is the Christ. In the course of his argument he makes so many references to the life of Christ that one could almost write out the whole Gospel narrative from this one work. He shows that John w^as his forerunner, that he was born of a virgin, and laid in a manger because there w^as no room in the inn ; he describes the visit of the Magi, mentions Bethlehem as the place of Christ's birth, Herod's wrath, the massacre of the innocents, the flight into Egypt with

Joseph and Mary, and' his return after Archelaus had succeeded Herod. He speaks of his being thirty years of age when he began his public ministry, of his baptism by John, whose dress and food he mentions, and of the descent of the Holy Ghost in the form of a dove. He quotes the two great commandments by which Christ sums up all righteousness, describes his triumphal entry into Jerusalem, enters into the details of his trial and crucifixion, speaks of his answers to the Pharisees, his silence before Pilate, mentions his resurrection and ascension, and assumes that these are the well-known and universally accepted facts concerning Jesus throughout the whole Church. These references which come from the dialogue with Trypho might be greatly extended. They show conclusively that our Gospel is the old Gospel. When we remember that Justin lived from the latter part of the first century until the middle of the second ; that Christianity had spread far and wide over the region where he spent his life ; that he was not converted until he had come to mature manhood ; that he was a philosopher and had sought rest for his soul in all the philosophies, and that finally he was led by an aged man to the light and the life found in Jesus of Nazareth and became an ardent propagandist of the faith, we have very cogent reasons for believing that his testimony as to the content of the gospels is entirely trustworthy. The question whether Justin had the four gospels that we now have has been much debated.

He neither gives the names of the authors whom he quotes, nor does he quote the gospels accurately. It has been conjectured that he drew his information from some gospels extant in his time, but now lost, or that he had many of his facts from tradition. If that were true, it would only show that the facts narrated in our gospels were widespread, and that they constituted the substance of the '' lost gospels " and the content of current tradition. But the argument is forced and exaggerated which attempts to deny to Justin the knowledge of the four gospels. In the first place he informs us that the writings to which he refers are memoirs of the life of the Lord, that they are called gospels, that they were written by the apostles and by companions of the apostles. These facts point directly to our four gospels. Matthew and John were apostles, and Mark and Luke were companions of apostles. He assures us that these gospels were read in the churches in connection with the prophets. We know from the writings of Irenaeus, who became Bishop of Lyons about i8o A. D., that the four gospels we now have w^ere the gospels then accepted by the Church as having apostolic authority, the gospels read in the services of the Church in connection with the prophets. It would have been almost, if not quite, impossible to have introduced Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John in the place of other gospels accepted in the time of Justin. Irenaeus was born and brought up ill Asia Minor, and must have been thoroughly familiar with the practice of the Church in this respect during the very period of which Justin writes. The improbability of the hypothesis which denies to Justin the knowledge of these gospels is, therefore, very great. And as to the accuracy of his quotations it may be said that they are as accurate as were his quotations from the Old Testament Scriptures, which w^ere certainly in his possession. The fact is, the Scripture rolls were inconvenient ; they were not divided into chapter and verse as our New Testament is ; there was no concordance lying at hand to enable him to verify his quotations, and he quoted from memory, or often only attempted to give the substance of the passage to which he referred.