Part 39 (1/2)
The accuracy of this interpretation is seen by the following citation from the Savior's own words, when he is speaking in his prayer at the last supper of sending his disciples out to preach the gospel: ”As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world.” The reference, evidently, is to a Divine choice and sealing, not to a descent upon the earth from another sphere.
That the author of the Fourth Gospel believed that Christ descended from heaven literally we have not the shadow of a doubt.
He repeatedly speaks of him as the great super angelic Logos, the first born Son and perfect image of G.o.d, the instrumental cause of the creation. His mind was filled with the same views, the same lofty Logos theory that is so abundantly set forth in the writings of Philo Judaus. He reports and describes the Savior in conformity with such a theological postulate. Possessed with the foregone conclusion that Jesus was the Divine Logos, descended from the celestial abode, and born into the world as a man, in endeavoring to write out from memory, years after they were uttered, the Savior's words, it is probable that he unconsciously misapprehended and tinged them according to his theory. The Delphic apothegm, ”Know thyself,” was said to have descended from heaven:
”E coelo descendit [non ASCII characters].”
By a familiar Jewish idiom, ”to ascend into heaven” meant to learn the will of G.o.d.8 And whatever bore the direct sancion of G.o.d was said to descend from heaven. When in these figurative terms Jesus a.s.serted his Divine commission, it seems that some understood him literally, and concluded perhaps in consequence of his miracles, joined with their own speculations that he was the Logos incarnated. That such a conclusion was an unwarranted inference from metaphorical language and from a foregone pagan dogma appears from his own explanatory and justifying words spoken to the Jews.
For when they accused him of making himself G.o.d, he replies, ”If in your law they are called G.o.ds to whom the word of G.o.d came, charge ye him whom the Father hath sanctified and sent into the world with blasphemy, because he says he is the Son of G.o.d?”
Christ's language in the Fourth Gospel
8 Schoettgen, in John iii. 13.
may be fairly explained without implying his actual pre existence or superhuman nature. But it does not seem to us that John's possibly can be. His miracles, according to the common idea of them, did not prove him to be the coequal fac simile, but merely proved him to be the delegated envoy, of G.o.d.
We may sum up the consideration of this point in a few words.
Christ did not essentially mean by the term ”heaven” the world of light and glory located by the Hebrews, and by some other nations, just above the visible firmament. His meaning, when he spoke of the kingdom of G.o.d or heaven, was always, in some form, either the reign of justice, purity, and love, or the invisible world of spirits. If that world, heaven, be in fact, and were in his conception, a sphere located in s.p.a.ce, he never alluded to its position, but left it perfectly in the dark, keeping his instructions scrupulously free from any such commitment. He said, ”I go to Him that sent me;” ”I will come again and receive you unto myself, that where I am there ye may be also.” The references to locality are vague and mysterious. The nature of his words, and their scantiness, are as if he had said, We shall live hereafter; we shall be with the Father; we shall be together. All the rest is mystery, even to me: it is not important to be known, and the Father hath concealed it. Such, almost, are his very words. ”A little while, and ye shall not see me; again, a little while, and ye shall see me, because I go to the Father.” ”Father, I will that they also whom thou hast given me be with me where I am.” Whether heaven be technically a material abode or a spiritual state it is of little importance to us to know; and the teachings of Jesus seem to have nothing to do with it. The important things for us to know are that there is a heaven, and how we may prepare for it; and on these points the revelation is explicit. To suppose the Savior ignorant of some things is not inconsistent with his endowments; for he himself avowed his ignorance, saying, ”Of that day knoweth no man; no, not even the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father.” And it adds an awful solemnity, an indescribably exciting interest, to his departure from the world, to conceive him hovering on the verge of the same mystery which has enveloped every pa.s.sing mortal, hovering there with chastened wonder and curiosity, inspired with an absolute trust that in that fathomless obscurity the Father would be with him, and would unveil new realms of life, and would enable him to come back and a.s.sure his disciples. He certainly did not reveal the details of the future state: whether he was acquainted with them himself or not we cannot tell.
We next advance to the most important portion of the words of Christ regarding the life and destiny of the soul, those parts of his doctrine which are most of a personal, experimental character, sounding the fountains of consciousness, piercing to the dividing asunder of our being. It is often said that Jesus everywhere takes for granted the fact of immortality, that it underlies and permeates all he does and says. We should know at once that such a being must be immortal; such a life could never be lived by an ephemeral creature; of all possible proofs of immortality he is himself the sublimest. This is true, but not the whole truth. The resistless a.s.surance, the Divine inspiration, the sublime repose, with which he enunciates the various thoughts connected with the theme of endless existence, are indeed marvellous. But he not only authoritatively a.s.sumes the truth of a future life: he speaks directly of it in many ways, often returns to it, continually hovers about it, reasons for it, exhorts upon it, makes most of his instructions hinge upon it, shows that it is a favorite subject of his communion. We may put the justice of these statements in a clear light by bringing together and explaining some of his scattered utterances.
His express language teaches that man in this world is a twofold being, leading a twofold life, physical and spiritual, the one temporal, the other eternal, the one apt unduly to absorb his affections, the other really deserving his profoundest care. This separation of the body and the soul, and survival of the latter, is brought to light in various striking forms and with various piercing applications. In view of the dangers that beset his disciples on their mission, he exhorted and warned them thus: ”Fear not them which have power to kill the body and afterwards have no more that they can do; but rather fear Him who can kill both soul and body;” ”Whosoever will save his life shall lose it; and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it;” that is, whosoever, for the sake of saving the life of his body, shrinks from the duties of this dangerous time, shall lose the highest welfare of the soul; but whosoever loveth his lower life in the body less than he loves the virtues of a consecrated spirit shall win the true blessedness of his soul. Both of these pa.s.sages show that the soul has a life and interest separate from the material tabernacle. With what pathos and convincing power was the same faith expressed in his e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n from the cross, ”Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit!” an expression of trust which, under such circ.u.mstances of desertion, horror, and agony, could only have been prompted by that inspiration of G.o.d which he always claimed to have.
Christ once reasoned with the Sadducees ”as touching the dead, that they rise;” in other words, that the souls of men upon the decease of the body pa.s.s into another and an unending state of existence: ”Neither can they die any more; for they are equal with the angels, and are children of G.o.d, being children of the resurrection.” His argument was, that ”G.o.d is the G.o.d of the living, not of the dead;” that is, the spiritual nature of man involves such a relations.h.i.+p with G.o.d as pledges his attributes to its perpetuity. The thought which supports this reasoning penetrates far into the soul and grasps the moral relations between man and G.o.d. It is most interesting viewed as the unqualified affirmation by Jesus of the doctrine of a future life which shall be deathless.
But the Savior usually stood in a more imposing att.i.tude and spoke in a more commanding tone than are indicated in the foregoing sentences. The prevailing stand point from which he spoke was that of an oracle giving responses from the inner shrine of the Divinity. The words and sentiments he uttered were not his, but the Father's; and he uttered them in the clear tones of knowledge and authority, not in the whispering accents of speculation or surmise. How these entrancing tidings came to him he knew not: they were no creations of his; they rose spontaneously within him, bearing the miraculous sign and seal of G.o.d, a recommendation he could no more question or resist than he could deny his own existence. He was set apart as a messenger to men. The tide of inspiration welled up till it filled every nerve and crevice of his being with conscious life and with an overmastering recognition of its living relations with the Omnipresent and Everlasting Life. Straightway he knew that the Father was in him and he in the Father, and that he was commissioned to reveal the mind of the Father to the world.
He knew, by the direct knowledge of inspiration and consciousness, that he should live forever. Before his keen, full, spiritual vitality the thought of death fled away, the thought of annihilation could not come. So far removed was his soul from the perception of interior sleep and decay, so broad and powerful was his consciousness of indestructible life, that he saw quite through the crumbling husks of time and sense to the crystal sea of spirit and thought. So absorbing was his sense of eternal life in himself that he even constructed an argument from his personal feeling to prove the immortality of others, saying to his disciples, ”Because I live, ye shall live also;” ”Ye believe in G.o.d, believe also in me.” Ye believe what G.o.d declares, for he cannot be mistaken; believe what I declare for his inspiration makes me infallible when I say there are many spheres of life for us when this is ended.
It was from the fulness of this experience that Jesus addressed his hearers. He spoke not so much as one who had faith that immortal life would hereafter be revealed and certified, but rather as one already in the insight and possession of it, as one whose foot already trod the eternal floor and whose vision pierced the immense horizon. ”Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that heareth my word and believeth on Him that sent me hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation, but is pa.s.sed from death unto life.” Being himself brought to this immovable a.s.surance of immortal life by the special inspiration of G.o.d, it was his aim to bring others to the same blessed knowledge. His efforts to effect this form a most constant feature in his teachings. His own definition of his mission was, ”I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.” We see by the persistent drift of his words that he strove to lead others to the same spiritual point he stood at, that they might see the same prospect he saw, feel the same cert.i.tude he felt, enjoy the same communion with G.o.d and sense of immortality he enjoyed. ”As the Father raiseth up the dead and quickeneth them, even so the Son quickeneth whom he will;” ”For as the Father hath life in himself, so hath he given the Son to have life in himself;” ”Father, glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee; as thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he might give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him: and this is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true G.o.d, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.” In other words, the mission of Christ was to awaken in men the experience of immortal life; and that would be produced by imparting to them reproducing in them the experience of his own soul. Let us notice what steps he took to secure this end.
He begins by demanding the unreserved credence of men to what he says, claiming to say it with express authority from G.o.d, and giving miraculous credentials. ”Whatsoever I speak, therefore, as the Father said to me, so I speak.” This claim to inspired knowledge he advances so emphatically that it cannot be overlooked. He then announces, as an unquestionable truth, the supreme claim of man's spiritual interests upon his attention and labor, alike from their inherent superiority and their enduring subsistence. ”For what shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul?” ”Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall be those things thou hast gathered?” ”Labor not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life.”
The inspiration which dictated these instructions evidently based them upon the profoundest spiritual philosophy, upon the truth that man lives at once in a sphere of material objects which is comparatively unimportant because he will soon leave it, and in a sphere of moral realities which is all important because he will live in it forever. ”Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of G.o.d.” The body, existing in the sphere of material relations, is supported by material bread; but the soul, existing in the sphere of spiritual relations, is supported by truth, the nouris.h.i.+ng breath of G.o.d's love. We are in the eternal world, then, at present. Its laws and influences penetrate and rule us; its ethereal tides lave and bear us on; our experience and destiny in it are decided every moment by our characters. If we are pure in heart, have vital faith and force, we shall see G.o.d and have new revelations made to us. Such are among the fundamental principles of Christianity.
There is another cla.s.s of texts, based upon a highly figurative style of speech, striking Oriental idioms, the explanation of which will cast further light upon the branch of the subject immediately before us. ”As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father, so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me;” that is, As the blessed Father hath inspired me with the knowledge of him, and I am blessed with the consciousness of his immortal love, so he that believes and a.s.similates these truths as I proclaim them, he shall experience the same blessedness through my instruction. The words. ”I am the bread of life” are explained by the words ”I am the truth.” The declaration ”Whoso eateth my flesh hath eternal life” is ill.u.s.trated by the declaration ”Whosoever heareth my word and believeth on Him that sent me hath everlasting life.” There is no difficulty in understanding what Jesus meant when he said, ”I have meat to eat ye know not of: my meat is to do the will of Him that sent me.” Why should we not with the same ease, upon the same principles, interpret his kindred expression, ”This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof and not die”? The idea to be conveyed by all this phraseology is, that whosoever understands, accepts, a.s.similates, and brings out in earnest experience, the truths Christ taught, would realize the life of Christ, feel the same a.s.surance of Divine favor and eternal blessedness. ”He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood dwelleth in me and I in him;” that is, we have the same character, are fed by the same nutriment, rest in the same experience. Fortunately, we are not left to guess at the accuracy of this exegesis: it is demonstrated from the lips of the Master himself. When he knew that the disciples murmured at what he had said about eating his flesh, and called it a hard saying, he said to them, ”It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life. But there are some of you that believe not.” Any man who heartily believed what Christ said that he was Divinely authorized to declare, and did declare, the pervading goodness of the Father and the immortal blessedness of the souls of his children, by the very terms was delivered from the bondage of fear and commenced the consciousness of eternal life. Of course, we are not to suppose that faith in Christ obtains immortality itself for the believer: it only rectifies and lights up the conditions of it, and awakens the consciousness of it. ”I am the resurrection and the life: whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die.” We suppose this means, he shall know that he is never to perish: it cannot refer to physical dissolution, for the believer dies equally with the unbeliever; it cannot refer to immortal existence in itself, for the unbeliever is as immortal as the believer: it must refer to the blessed nature of that immortality and to the personal a.s.surance of it, because these Christ does impart to the disciple, while the unregenerate unbeliever in his doctrine, of course, has them not.
Coming from G.o.d to reveal his infinite love, exemplifying the Divine elements of an immortal nature in his whole career, coming back from the grave to show its sceptre broken and to point the way to heaven, well may Christ proclaim, ”Whosoever believes in me” knows he ”shall never perish.”
Among the Savior's parables is an impressive one, which we cannot help thinking perhaps fancifully was intended to ill.u.s.trate the dealings of Providence in ordering the earthly destiny of humanity. ”So is the kingdom of G.o.d, as if a man should cast seed into the ground and the seed should grow up; but when the fruit is ripe he putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is come.” Men are seed sown in this world to ripen and be harvested in another.
The figure, taken on the scale of the human race and the whole earth, is sublime. Whether such an image were originally suggested by the parable or not, the conception is consistent with Christian doctrine. The pious Sterling prays,
”Give thou the life which we require, That, rooted fast in thee, From thee to thee we may aspire, And earth thy garden be.”
The symbol shockingly perverted from its original beautiful meaning by the mistaken belief that we sleep in our graves until a distant resurrection day is often applied to burial grounds. Let its appropriate significance be restored. Life is the field, death the reaper, another sphere of being the immediate garner. An enlightened Christian, instead of ent.i.tling a graveyard the garden of the dead, and looking for its long buried forms to spring from its cold embrace, will hear the angel saying again, ”They are not here: they are risen.” The line which written on Klopstock's tomb is a melancholy error, engraved on his cradle would have been an inspiring truth: ”Seed sown by G.o.d to ripen for the harvest.”
Several fragmentary speeches, which we have not yet noticed, of the most tremendous and even exhaustive import, are reported as having fallen from the lips of Christ at different times. These sentences, rapid and incomplete as they are in the form in which they have reached us, do yet give us glimpses of the most momentous character into the profoundest thoughts of his mind.
They are sufficient to enable us to generalize their fundamental principles, and construct the outlines, if we may so speak, of his theology, his inspired conception of G.o.d, the universe, and man, and the resulting duties and destiny of man. We will briefly bring together and interpret these pa.s.sages, and deduce the system which they seem to presuppose and rest upon.
Jesus told the woman of Samaria that G.o.d was to be wors.h.i.+pped acceptably neither in that mountain nor at Jerusalem exclusively, but anywhere, if it were worthily done. ”G.o.d is a Spirit; and they that wors.h.i.+p him must wors.h.i.+p him in spirit and in truth.” This pa.s.sage, with others, teaches the spirituality and omnipresence of G.o.d. Christ conceived of G.o.d as an infinite Spirit. Again, comforting his friends in view of his approaching departure, he said, ”In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.” Here he plainly figures the universe as a house containing many apartments, all pervaded and ruled by the Father's presence. He was about taking leave of this earth to proceed to another part of the creation, and he promised to come back to his followers and a.s.sure them there was another abode prepared for them. Christ conceived of the universe, with its innumerable divisions, as the house of G.o.d. Furthermore, he regarded truth or the essential laws and right tendencies of things and the will of G.o.d as identical.
He said he came into the world to do the will of Him that sent him; that is, as he at another time expressed it, he came into the world to bear witness unto the truth. Thus he prayed, ”Father, sanctify them through the truth: thy word is truth.” Christ conceived of pure truth as the will of G.o.d. Finally, he taught that all who obey the truth, or do the will of G.o.d, thereby const.i.tute one family of brethren, one family of the accepted children of G.o.d, in all worlds forever. ”He that doeth the truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest that they are wrought in G.o.d;” ”Whosoever shall do the will of G.o.d, the same is my brother, and my sister, and mother;” ”Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin. And the servant abideth not in the house forever; but the son abideth forever. If the Son, therefore, make you free, ye shall be free indeed.” That is to say, truth gives a good man the freedom of the universe, makes him know himself an heir, immortally and everywhere at home; sin gives the wicked man over to bondage, makes him feel afraid of being an outcast, loads him with hards.h.i.+ps as a servant. Whoever will believe the revelations of Christ, and a.s.similate his experience, shall lose the wretched burdens of unbelief and fear and be no longer a servant, but be made free indeed, being adopted as a son.
The whole conception, then, is this: The universe is one vast house, comprising many subordinate mansions. All the moral beings that dwell in it compose one immortal family. G.o.d is the universal Father. His will the truth is the law of the household. Whoever obeys it is a worthy son and has the Father's approbation; whoever disobeys it is alienated and degraded into the condition of a servant. We may roam from room to room, but can never get lost outside the walls beyond the reach of the Paternal arms. Death is variety of scenery and progress of life: