reign with more triumphant power, he may have adopted the grand imagery of the apocalyptic seer, and in the rapt vision of a poet have used phrases which were afterwards translated into literal prose. This view finds some support in the fact that he never says expressly, I Jesus will return and reign in Palestine within the present generation. The predictions are always in the third person, and even as they stand there is a certain grandeur and vagueness about them which tempts us to avoid a perfectly literal interpretation. It is also apparent in one or two cases that we cannot rely on the accuracy of the reports. We have already noticed that in the remarkable passage where it is said that the Son of Man will be ashamed of those who are ashamed of him these words are wanting in Matthew, and that if you omit them in Mark and Luke the return of the Son of Man disappears. Matthew, accordingly, inserts the Son of Man in the final part of the quotation, from which he is absent in Mark and Luke. Now in an earlier chapter of Matthew1 there is a saying which, though in very different words, may be taken to represent the declaration which is omitted in the later narrative :- Every one therefore who shall confess me before men, him will I also confess before my Father which is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven.' Here the Son of Man disappears, and Jesus speaks in his own person; but there is no reference to a return or to any particular time. Is not the conclusion justified that sayings have been combined, and to some extent interpreted, according to the judgment of the narrator? There is another passage, about the final judgment, which is equally instructive. Towards the end of the Sermon on the Mount are the words, Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, . . . and then will I profess unto them, I never knew you.'2 Here Jesus distinctly claims for himself the office of final judge of those who are 1 Matt. x. 32 sq. 2 Matt. vii. 22 sq. fit or unfit for the kingdom of heaven in the day when it will be established. But this saying is wanting in the corresponding passage in Luke; and we find its equivalent in a different place,1 and there the declaration in the first person is put into the mouth of a figurative master of the house.' This again betrays the work of combination and interpretation; and the latter instance especially shows how easily the figurative statement of a general principle might, in perfect good faith, be changed so as to express the prevalent belief. I am therefore inclined to the opinion that the universal belief of primitive Christianity in the bodily return of Christ rested upon certain utterances of Jesus himself; but that these utterances were misinterpreted owing to the inability of the disciples to shake off the expectation that the present age was to be closed by a grand catastrophe; and, further, that owing to this misinterpretation the reports which have come down to us are more or less distorted. This whole vein of thought must seem to us strange and fantastic; but we must remember that in the science of that age heaven, with its hosts of angels, was only a few miles off, and the fate of man was the great object of interest to the celestial hierarchy. At any moment a tremendous crisis might come, and the predicted Son of Man appear in the clouds to establish his empire of righteousness. It is all the more impressive that Jesus recognizes the beauty of the natural order, and declares that the kingdom of God shall come with the same gradual development as the growing seed or the hidden working of leaven; and we may infer that in his own thought his coming was to be of a spiritual kind, conformed to the slow and equable processes of nature, a secret germ of life planted in the heart of society, and silently working out, in the progress of the centuries, its determinate results. 1 Luke xiii. 25-27. THE END INDEX ('Contents' refers to the table of contents at the beginning of the volume.) ABBOTT, E. A., on the existence of thinks good works may exceed duty, 350. his view of the cause of Christ's Ante-Nicene Fathers, imperfect in their doctrine of the Trinity, 138. Antioch, Theologians of, 255. Adam, his fall contingent or pre- Apollinaris of Laodicea, 254. destined, 468. Paul's allusions to, 206. the phrase in Adam,' 274. his sin and its result, 221-228,465. unfallen, 205. unhistorical, 206. referred to, 277. Adoptianism, 259. Advent, second, 516-523. Agape, 449. Agnosticism, 114. Alexandrian theologians, 255. Apologetics, 4. Apology for the Augsburg Confes- 411. doctrine of Grace, 481. faith and the Holy Spirit, relation of, 492-493. faith makes righteous, 500. the godless do not belong to the grace of the Sacrament received only through faith, 413. Apostles' Creed, 138, 255, 332, 396. rejects the notion that Christ bore Apostolical succession, 395-397, 460. Assos, Inscription at, 310. referred to, 139, 333. of fatherhood, 146. asserts the eternity of the Son, 139. on the argument that creation taught that man was to be thought Christ's sonship unique use of κυριακόν, 368. Atonement, see Contents, Part IV, in The Christian World,' 346. Augsburg Confession, on the Church, 373- on faith and works, 492-493. on free will, 481. on Original sin, 224-225. on the Sacraments, 411, 413. Augustine, definition of the Church, 370. definition of a Sacrament, 405. on the infallibility of Scripture, 86. referred to, 177, 215, 479. BAB, 311. Bacon, Professor, 382-383. among the inhabitants of Mexico, of infants, 420, 432. Barling, 157. Basil of Ancyra, 125. Bethune-Baker, 124, 125. Bible, see Contents, Part I, Chapter Bishop, regarded as a mediator and Bossuet, 116. Bousset, 430. Browne, Professor, 311, 441. CÆSAR, Julius, 309, 310. on the argument from love, 146. Calvin, 442-443, 465. on free will, 464. Catechismus Romanus, on Baptism, Church, doctrine of the, see Con- 417. on the Church, 369-372, 384. on the dignity of the priesthood, on the Eucharist, 435-438. on the functions of Christ, 317. on the Means of grace, 399. on the permanent character of on Purgatory, 511. on Reconciliation, 244. on Sacraments, 405. on Satisfaction, 341. on the work of the Trinity in the recognizes Jesus as a prophet on the imperfection of the doc- 'notes' of the, 371-372, 390-397. visible and invisible, 374, 376. denies salvation to those outside on Baptism, 421-422. on Christ's present condition, 277. on the Eucharist, 448. Cicero, 188, 309. Clement of Alexandria, allegorizes applied dogma' to articles of doctrine of the work of Christ, 303. rests predestination on foreknow- ledge, 469. referred to, 225, 426. Clement of Rome, Epistle of, 387. Clementine Homilies, 428. Communicatio idiomatum, 258, 261. |