======================================================================== WRITINGS OF JOSEPH A BEET by Joseph A. Beet ======================================================================== A collection of theological writings, sermons, and essays by Joseph A. Beet, compiled for study and devotional reading. Chapters: 21 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ TABLE OF CONTENTS ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1. 1.00. HOLINESS: SYMBOLIC AND REAL A BIBLE STUDY 2. 1.0000. Preface 3. 1.01. Introductory 4. 1.02. Holiness in the Books of the Law 5. 1.03. Holiness in the Other Books of the Old Testament 6. 1.04. Holiness in the Septuagint Version and in the Aprocypha 7. 1.05. Holiness in the New Testament 8. 1.06. Holiness of Christ 9. 1.07. The Holiness of the Servants of Christ 10. 1.08. The New Life of Devotion to God 11. 1.09. Sanctification in Christ 12. 1.10. Sanctification by Faith 13. 1.11. Holiness as Opposed to Sin 14. 1.12. Growth in Holiness 15. 1.13. The Holiness of God 16. 1.14. Holiness in the Methodist Revival 17. 2.00. The Immortality of the Soul: A Protest 18. 2.01. Immortality Before Christ 19. 2.02. The Teaching of Christ 20. 2.03. Immortality in the Early Church 21. 2.04. Immortality in Modern Theology ======================================================================== CHAPTER 1: 1.00. HOLINESS: SYMBOLIC AND REAL A BIBLE STUDY ======================================================================== HOLINESS: SYMBOLIC AND REAL A BIBLE STUDY By JOSEPH AGAR BEET, D.D. LONDON ROBERT CULLEY 25-35 CITY ROAD, AND 26 PATERNOSTER ROW, E.G. BT 76:7 FIRST EDITION .... April 1910 Sanctify them in the Truth. . . . On their behalf I sanctify Myself, in order that also they may themselves be sanctified." John 17:17; John 17:19. May the God of peace Himself sanctify you. . . . Faithful is He who calls you, who also will do it." 1 Thessalonians 5:23-24. It is written, Ye shall be holy : because I am holy." 1 Peter 1:16. HOLINESS SYMBOLIC AND REAL AGAR BEET, D.D BY THE SAME AUTHOR THE CREDENTIALS OF THE GOSPEL. Reissue. With New Preface. Demy 8vo. Cloth gilt, zs. 6d. net "One of the most telling pieces of apologetics written in our time." PROF. G. G. FINDLAY, D.D. THE NEW TESTAMENT: ITS AUTHORSHIP, DATE, AND WORTH. Small crown 8vo. Cloth gilt, is. 6d. net. "An excellent little volume, full of exact information, arranged with expert skill." Methodist Recorder. ROBERT CULLEY 25-35 CITY ROAD, AND 26 PATERNOSTER Row, E.G. A MANUAL OF THEOLOGY. Crown 8vo. Cloth, IDS. 6d. THE CHURCH, THE CHURCHES, AND THE SACRAMENTS. Crown 8vo. Cloth, as. A SHORTER MANUAL OF THEOLOGY. Third Thousand. Crown 8vo. Cloth, zs. 6d. net. "Dr. Beet s previous works have set him in the foremost rank of British Theologians. He reveals on every page the scholar s reverence for truth, and nowhere demands credence for what has net been established by ample and exacting; reasoning." The Scotsman. LONDON: HODDER & STOUGHTON ======================================================================== CHAPTER 2: 1.0000. PREFACE ======================================================================== PREFACE THIS volume, superseding an earlier one published in 1880, embodies the results of a life-long effort to reproduce as accurately and fully as possible the conception of Holiness held by the writers of the New Testament; in order thus to obtain a richer fulness of the New Life in Christ. The method pursued has been a careful search of their writings and of the earlier Scriptures so familiar to them. The book is therefore a Bible Study; and will be helpful to others chiefly so far as they are prepared to follow me along the same path. It is designed in the first place for pastors of the Flock of Christ, commissioned by Him to feed and teach. But it will be easily understood by, and helpful to, all intelligent Christian workers and all devout men and women. Some would prefer a shorter and easier way to the goal. But I am deeply convinced that one of the greatest needs of the present day is accurate grammatical scholarship directed to the aim of obtaining a broader and deeper comprehension of God’s purpose of mercy to men. We need both earnest enthusiasm and careful research. As a good example of a different method, I may refer to an inspiring volume on New Testament Holiness, by my friend, the Rev. Thomas Cook. My book is a bag of seed for patient sowing in good soil; his, a sharp sickle for an immediate harvest. I notice with pleasure, amid differences in detail, substantial agreement. The same may be said of the teaching of John and Charles Wesley, the seed from which sprang the Methodist Revival. This teaching, I have traced back to earlier sources. We who owe so much to this revival are bound to proclaim it to all who will hear us, and to trace it still further back to the words of Christ and His Apostles. To prompt and aid this proclamation, is the purpose of this book. ii DYNEVOR ROAD, RICHMOND, SURREY, March 1910. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 3: 1.01. INTRODUCTORY ======================================================================== CHAPTER I INTRODUCTORY IN this book I shall set forth, as correctly and fully as I can, the teaching of the Bible about Holiness ; the broad principles of essential truth underlying this teaching ; and its practical bearing on the thought and life of our own day. In order to do this, it will be needful to determine what the Sacred Writers meant by the word HOLY. For, unless we understand it in the sense intended by them, we shall be in danger of putting into their writings a meaning far from the writers intention, a meaning derived unconsciously from modern religious thought and life ; and we shall certainly lose much of the truth which their words were designed to convey. This need to determine the meaning of Bible words marks a broad difference between Theology and the Natural Sciences. In these last, modern teachers may choose the sense of their own terms : and, if these are clearly defined and main tained throughout, no confusion arises. But Christian theology rests, in great part, on ancient documents recording the thoughts of a by-gone day. Of these documents, words are the component parts : and only so far as we understand the meaning of these words can we spell out and grasp the truths which find permanent expression in the documents. The words of the Bible are the alphabet of Christian theology. The meaning of these sacred words, we must determine as in childhood we learnt the meaning of the words of our mother tongue. We observed the various concrete objects to which they were applied : we noticed the qualities common to objects called by the same name : and thus, by the inborn faculty of abstraction, we formed a conception of the idea conveyed by the word. In this way, the conception of Holiness must have grown up in the mind of ancient Israel. And thus, as we pass along through the pages of the Bible, shall we learn, from the various objects called holy and from the various connections of thought in which the word holy occurs, the one idea embodied in these various objects and conveyed by the one word used to designate them all. This method has another advantage. As we pass from the Old Testament to the New, we shall notice that the conception of Holiness, while retaining its essential meaning as embodied in the ancient ritual, receives in the New Testament an immense development, and a much wider practical bearing on the everyday thought of men. This marvellous development in the meaning of a word will reveal the change wrought by Christ in the religious thought of mankind ; and marks a new era in the development of the Kingdom of God. In both Testaments, the words holy and hallow correspond exactly to saint and sanctify : and holiness is the state resulting from the act of sanctiftcation. That we have two families of words expressing one idea, results from the composite structure of our language, in which a Latin superstructure is built on a German foundation. From each of these languages we derive words conveying the idea of Holiness. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 4: 1.02. HOLINESS IN THE BOOKS OF THE LAW ======================================================================== CHAPTER II HOLINESS IN THE BOOKS OF THE LAW THE use of a concordance, an invaluable and needful aid to Bible study, at once tells us that the word holy and its cognates are more frequent in the Old Testament than in the New ; but chiefly in Exodus, Leviticus, and Ezekiel, and after these in Isaiah, Chronicles, and the Bk. of Psalms. Moreover, abundant quotations and references in the New Testament prove that the thoughts of its writers were permeated and moulded by the Old Testament. These quotations and references also go far to prove that the earliest followers of Christ possessed the Old Testament in a form practically the same as that pre served in the English Bible. This is raised to absolute certainty by the close agreement, amid differences in detail, between the Hebrew copies preserved by the Jews and the very early MSS. of the Greek Septuagint Version of the Old Testament which have come down to us through Christian hands. Indisputably, in our modern Bibles we have the Jewish Scriptures in a form substantially the same as that used by the immediate disciples of Christ. This being so, we must turn to the Old Testament, in order to learn the significance of the word holy as understood by the writers of the New Testament, and by Christ Himself. Among the Jewish Scriptures, both Jews and Christians gave to the Five Books of the Law the first place. " Moses" and " the Law and the Prophets " were read in the synagogues every Sabbath Day: Acts 13:15; Acts 15:21. To the Law, therefore, we now turn. In so doing, it is needless to discuss the date of the Pentateuch as we now possess it, or of its various component parts as detected by modern scholars. For indisputably the Law as we possess it in Hebrew and Greek is practically the same as when used by Christ and His Apostles. More over, as we shall see, with very slight modifications easily explained, the word holy is throughout the Old Testament used in the same sense. All theological terms belonged originally to secular life. They were born amid, and designated, common things around. Usually therefore our study of Bible words begins with an attempt to determine their original significance in ordinary life. Such significance, doubtless, the Hebrew word rendered holy once had. But it has become altogether indistinguishable in the early twilight of the history of religion. Moreover the meaning of the word in the religious thought of Israel, as far back as we can trace it, is clearly defined by objects so many and so various and so familiar to the eyes and thought of Israel as to admit of no mistake. In Genesis the word holy never occurs; sanctify only once, in a passage closely similar to conspicuous passages in Exodus and Numbers. This remarkable contrast proves that in the thought of Israel the word holy stood in definite and close relation to the immense impulse given by Moses at the Exodus to the religious thought and life of the nation, as attested by the many references to him and to the Exodus throughout the Old and New Testaments. To this one passage in Genesis and to two others containing the same word in other forms, I shall refer again. We turn now to the four books which profess to give an account of the history and contents of the Mosaic covenant. In the solemn opening scene of that covenant, from the lips of God, and in a connection of thought wonderfully indicative of the kind of covenant He had come down to make, we find for the first time in the Book of the Law read every Sabbath in the synagogues of Israel, in what is certainly one of the earliest component parts of the Pentateuch, the great word henceforth to be so deeply inwoven into the religious thought of Israel and of mankind. God s words to Moses from the bush in Exodus 3:5, " Draw not nigh hither ... for the place which thou art standing upon is ground of holiness" introduce a covenant of which one great feature was to be holiness embodied in visible places and things, a holiness which made the holy objects partly or altogether inaccessible to men. Evidently God meant to say that the ground stood in special relation to Himself; and that therefore man might not tread it except by His command. We next meet the word in 2 Chronicles 12:16, " convocation of holiness : " i.e. a calling together of the people, not for some secular purpose, but at the bidding of God, and to work out His purposes. Very instructive is Exodus 13:2 : " Sanctify for Me the firstborn : it is Mine " or " for Me." This is explained in Exodus 15:2 : "Thou shalt make to pass over all that opens the womb, for Jehovah . . . the males are Jehovah’s " or " for Jehovah." So Numbers 3:12-13 : "I have taken the Levites from among the sons of Israel, instead of all the firstborn from the sons of Israel: and the Levites shall be Mine. For Mine is every firstborn. In the day when I smote every firstborn in the land of Egypt, I sanctified for Myself every first born in Israel, from man to beast. Mine they shall be : I am Jehovah." Also Numbers 8:16-17 : "They are altogether given to Me from among the sons of Israel. Instead of such as open every womb, every firstborn from the sons of Israel, I have taken them for Myself. For Mine is every firstborn among the sons of Israel, man and beast. In the day when I smote every firstborn in the land of Egypt, I sanctified them for Myself." Cp. Deuteronomy 15:19: "Every first born male, thou shalt sanctify for Jehovah thy God : thou shalt do no work with the firstborn of thy ox, nor shear the first born of thy sheep." These passages make quite clear the meaning of the word sanctify in Exodus 13:2. The firstborn were made-holy in the sense that God had claimed them for His own, and therefore henceforth none might touch them except at His bidding. In other words, God s command placed the firstborn in a new and solemn relation to Him as His property. They were no longer man s but God’s. The Holiness of God, I shall reserve till we have completed our study of the holiness of the Mosaic ritual. Specially important as illustrating the meaning of the word holy is Exodus 19:4-6: "Ye have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles wings and brought you to Myself. Now therefore if ye will obey My voice indeed, and keep My covenant, ye shall be to Me (or, for Me) a peculiar treasure from among all the peoples : because Mine (or, for Me) is all the earth. And ye shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation." Here the word priests links the word holy to the ritual soon to be established. Just as in Egypt God placed the rescued firstborn in special relation to Himself, so now He claims for Himself the entire nation in virtue of their deliverance from Egypt. This wider reference of the word holy, embracing the whole nation, is also found in Leviticus 11:44-45 : "I am Jehovah your God : and ye shall sanctify yourselves, and ye shall be holy men, because holy am I : and ye shall not defile yourselves with any creeping thing that moves upon the earth. For I am Jehovah who brought you up out from the land of Egypt, to be your God : and ye shall be holy men, because holy am I." Also Leviticus 19:2; Leviticus 20:7-8; Leviticus 20:26. In Exodus 19:22, " the priests who come near to Jehovah " are bidden to " sanctify themselves, lest Jehovah break through among them." This evidently means that they were formally to devote themselves to the service which God had claimed from them, and to separate themselves from everything inconsistent with it. The words in Exodus 5:23, " set bounds about the mount, to sanctify it," are closely related to Exodus 3:5. By putting a fence, Moses marked off the mountain as belonging to God, and therefore not to be trodden by man or beast except at His bidding. In Exodus 20:8, God bade Israel, " Remember the Sabbath Day to sanctify it ; " and adds in v. n, " Jehovah blessed the Sabbath Day and sanctified it." Similarly Genesis 2:3: "God blessed the Sabbath Day, and sanctified it." Still more emphatic is Exodus 31:13-17 : " I am Jehovah who sanctifies you. And ye shall keep the Sabbath: for it is holy to you. He that profanes it shall indeed be put to death. Everyone that does work therein, that soul shall be cut off from among his people." Also Isa. Iviii. 13: "turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy work on My day of holiness" Similarly Leviticus 25:10; Leviticus 25:12: " Ye shall sanctify the fiftieth year ; and ye shall proclaim liberty in the land, for all its inhabitants. . . . For it is a Jubilee : holy shall it be to you." The tabernacle was called the sanctuary or holy place : Exodus 25:8. The outer chamber bore the abstract title holiness. The inner one (Exodus 26:33-34) bore the superlative name holiness of holinesses : in A.V. and R.V. " the most holy place;" but more literally and suitably "holy of holies" as in Hebrews 9:3, and in the Greek Septuagint Version. This august superlative title is in Exodus 29:37 given to the brazen altar ; in 2 Chronicles 30:29 to the holy things inside the tabernacle ; and in Leviticus 2:3 to the bodies of animals offered in sacrifice. In this last passage, it is explained by the words, " the remnant from the meal-offering is for Aaron and for his sons. It is holy of holies from the burnings of Jehovah." In other words, the unburnt parts of the sacrifices were God’s ; and were therefore to be given to the priests, His servants. So intense was the holiness of the altar that three times we read, in Exodus 29:37; Exodus 30:29, Leviticus 6:1; Leviticus 6:8, "whatever touches the altar shall be holy : " i.e. by that touch it ceased to be man s possession, and must henct forth be used only for the purposes of God. Aaron and his clothes, and his sons and their clothes, were sanctified by the ritual of consecration: Exodus 29:21. So was the oil : " Upon man s flesh it shall not be poured, neither shall ye make any like it : holy it is, and holy it shall be to you. Whoever compounds any like it, and whoever puts any like it on a stranger, shall even be cut off from his people : " Exodus 30:32-33. In Leviticus 27:2; Leviticus 27:9; Leviticus 27:14; Leviticus 27:16 we have a voluntary consecration by men, of themselves, their cattle, house, or field. This holiness is thus described in 5:21 : "the field shall be holy for Jehovah, like the field of the Anathema : for the priest the possession of it shall be." If a man wished to take back something he has consecrated, he must pay for it: Leviticus 5:15. But some things were given to God by an irrevocable consecration, and were called anathema and holy of holies : verses 28, 29. Similarly, the Nazarite was holy, and his sacrifice " holiness for the priest : " Numbers 6:5; Numbers 6:8; Numbers 6:20. The censers of Korah were holy, and therefore could not be put to common use : Numbers 16:38. The fourth year’s fruit of the land of Canaan was holy : Leviticus 19:24. Lastly, in close accord with Exodus 19:5, we read in Deuteronomy 7:6, " a holy people thou art for Jehovah, thy God : thee has Jehovah thy God chosen to be His, for a people of peculiar treasure from among all the peoples which are upon the face of the earth." The above passages, from the Books of the Law, are samples of some 200 others. In all of them the meaning is the same, and is clearly marked. These holy objects, men, things, or time, stood in special relation to God as exclusively His own. They had no human owner who could do with them as he pleases. None could touch them except at His bidding. This solemn relation to God is the one element common to all the holy objects. Consequently the word holy is a relative term, denoting always a relation to Deity, viz. unreserved devotion. And, since to Israel there was only one God, the word holy denoted devotion to Jehovah, the God of Israel. The added words, " holy for Jehovah" called attention to the great Object of Israel s devotion. In Numbers 3:13; Numbers 8:16-17 God asserts with emphatic repetition that the first born were sanctified expressly by Himself and for Himself. Similarly, it was God who sanctified the tabernacle and the altar, Aaron and his sons, the people and the Sabbath: Exodus 29:44; Exodus 20:11, Leviticus 22:32. All this and much else similar imply that the devotion to God of the holy objects originated, not in men who gave them to God, but in God who expressly claimed them for Himself. With very few limited exceptions, nothing could be given to God except that which He had first claimed for Himself. This claim of God at once put the objects claimed, apart from anything which man did or failed to do, in a new and very solemn relation to God. Men might desecrate the holy things or holy day : the holy men might desecrate themselves. But they remained holy, to the condemnation and destruction of those who profaned them : Leviticus 10:2, Numbers 15:35. This relation, created by God s claim and incapable of being set aside by man’s unfaithfulness, may be called OBJECTIVE Sanctification and Holiness. It is the most frequent use of the word. Moses also, as the minister through whom the consecration of these objects was brought about, is said in Exodus 19:14; Exodus 19:23; Exodus 19:28:41; Exodus 29:1, Exodus 40:9-13 to have sanctified Israel, Mount Sinai, Aaron, and the tabernacle and its vessels. Since some of the objects claimed by God were themselves intelligent beings, and others were in the control of such, their devotion to God could take place only by man s consent. Consequently, the priests and people are said in Exodus 19:22, Leviticus 11:44; Leviticus 27:14 to sanctify themselves and some of their possessions. They did this, either by formally placing themselves or their goods at the disposal of God, or by separating hemselves from whatever was inconsistent with the service of God. Consequently, in Leviticus 20:25-26; Leviticus 21:1-8, holiness involves renunciation of idolatry and of meats pronounced unclean. This may be called SUBJECTIVE Holiness. It is man s surrender to God of that which He has claimed. This distinction of objective and subjective holiness is, both in Old and New Testament, of utmost importance. For the world around us stands in intimate mutual relation to the subjective world of our own inner thought. This distinction, coextensive with human thought and life, moulds both thought and language. We need ever to distinguish, in the use of words, the objective and subjective. Objective holiness traces holiness to its source in God : subjective holiness points to the obligation laid on man by this claim of God. So in Exodus 20:8 men were bidden to sanctify the Sabbath be cause (Genesis 20:11) God had already sanctified it. It was already objectively holy\ and therefore must needs be sanctified by men. Light is shed on the radical meaning of the word holy in Genesis 38:21, Deuteronomy 23:17, where a cognate word is used to designate a profligate woman. This recalls the " sacred slave-girls" at Corinth " whom both men and women presented to the goddess : " Strabo bk. 8:378. The essential idea of holiness is found here, though in a perverted form. Devotion to an impure deity creates impurity in the devotee : whereas devotion to God involves separation from all impurity. Another trace of the word is found in the name Kadesh in Genesis 14:7; Genesis 16:14; Genesis 20:1, Numbers 13:26; Numbers 20:14; Numbers 20:16; Numbers 20:22, etc. It suggests that these towns were specially devoted to the service of some deity. We may compare the Greek name Hierapolis, of a city in Phrygia, noted for its temple of Cybele ; and of another in the north-west of Syria, a chief seat of the worship of Astarte. We have now gained, from many visible objects described in the Pentateuch, and from much there said about them, a clear and definite conception of holiness. The holy objects, men, things, places, or times, were distinguished from all others in that by the express command of God they had been placed in special relation to Him as devoted to His service. The term is relative, noting always a relation to deity. The idea of morality has not yet been suggested, except so far as it is implied in the devotion of intelligent beings to the service of God. The holiness of God will be considered in our next chapter. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 5: 1.03. HOLINESS IN THE OTHER BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT ======================================================================== CHAPTER III HOLINESS IN THE OTHER BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT THROUGHOUT the Old Testament, the above meaning of the word holy is found. The words of Joshua 3:5, "sanctify your selves : for tomorrow God will do wonders among you," recall Exodus 19:10. With Exodus 3:5 compare Joshua 5:15, "the place whereon thou art standing is holy." Notice also Joshua 6:19, "all the silver and gold . . . are holy for Jehovah : into the treasury of Jehovah they shall come." Also Joshua 20:7, "they sanctified Kadesh in Galilee to be a city of refuge : " for these stood in special relation to God. Micah s mother said, in Judges 17:3, " I have altogether sanctified the silver for Jehovah : " for she supposed that, by using the money to make an image, she was devoting it to His service. In the Bk. of Psalms, the word sanctify is never found : a clear proof that it was not equivalent to purify, an idea which not unfrequently occurs there. It is found only once in the other poetical books, in Job 1:5 ; and then in a ritual sense. In Psalms 89:5, Psalms 89:7, as in Job 5:1; Job 15:15, Daniel 8:13, the word holy or saint denotes the angels. And our chief thought about them is that they stand in special relation to God and are doing His work. In Psalms 106:16, " Aaron, Jehovah’s holy one," recalls the ritual phraseology of the Law. Very rarely in the poetical books does the word holy denote a good man : e.g. Psalms 16:3, " to the holy ones which are in the earth;" and Psalms 34:9, "fear Jehovah, ye His holy ones." A still better case is 2 Kings 4:9, where the lady of Shunem speaks of Elisha as a "man of God, a holy man." This use was prompted by a consciousness that a good man stands in special relation to God. Similarly Jeremiah 1:5, "before thou earnest forth from the womb I sanctified thee, and gave thee as a prophet to the nations." For from his birth Jeremiah was set apart for this special work. As pointing to an intelligent and spiritual service of God, these passages are an anticipation of the New Testament use of these words. This use was rare, because as yet holiness was definitely revealed only in symbolic out line. The inward reality underlying the symbolic form could not be clearly seen until the appearance of Him who was Himself a perfect embodiment in flesh and blood of that which the symbols dimly shadowed. In Isaiah 13:3, the destroyers of Babylon are called God s " sanctified ones ; " because working out a purpose of God. So Jeremiah 51:27-28 : " sanctify against her nations, the kings of the Medes." Also Micah 3:5 : " he that puts not into their mouths, they (the wicked priests) sanctify war against him." They proclaim war, professing to do so in the service of God. Compare also 2 Kings 10:20, " sanctify an assembly for Baal : " the only passage in which the word is used for devotion to a god other than Jehovah. But it was used by one who for the moment professed to believe that Baal was the true God. In the Bks. of Chronicles, Ezra, and Nehemiah the word holy and its cognates are frequent, always in a ritual sense. So 2 Chronicles 23:6: " let none come into the house of Jehovah except the priests. They shall come in : for they are holy These books have much in common, in phrase and tone, with the latter part of Exodus, and with Leviticus. In prophetic vision, we read in Isaiah 4:3, "he that remains in Jerusalem shall be called holy, everyone that is written among the living in Jerusalem;" and in ch. Isaiah 62:12, "they shall call them The people of holiness, Jehovah s redeemed ones." Compare Zechariah 14:20-21 : " In that day there shall be upon the bells of the horses, Holiness for Jehovah . . . yea, every pot in Jerusalem and in Judah shall be holiness for Jehovah of Hosts." In the Bk. of Daniel, Daniel 7:18, Daniel 7:22, Daniel 7:25, Daniel 7:27, the word holy or saint is a frequent designation of the future people of God. This is an all-important anticipation of the use of the equivalent Greek word in the New Testament. The use of the words holy and sanctify in the above passages scattered throughout the Old Testament confirms strongly my exposition of their meaning in the pre ceding chapter. In Exodus 15:2-13 we read of God as glorious in holiness " and of the " dwelling place of Thy holiness" In Leviticus 11:44-45; Leviticus 19:2; Leviticus 20:26; Leviticus 21:8, with conspicuous repetition, in phraseology closely related to that quoted above and describing the holiness of Israel, God solemnly declares, " Holy am I ; " and on the ground of His own holiness commands the people to sanctify themselves, and to be holy. In two of these passages, the holiness of God is given as a reason for abstaining from unclean food : a third passage refers to the holiness of the priests : and another is a warning to honour parents, to keep the Sabbath, and to turn from idolatry. In Leviticus 10:3 God declares, " in those who are near to Me, I will be sanctified: and in the presence of all the people, I will be glorified." Similarly Numbers 20:12; Numbers 27:14, Deuteronomy 32:51. Also Leviticus 22:32: "ye shall not profane the name of My holiness : and I will be sanctified in the midst of the sons of Israel. I am Jehovah who sanctifies you, who brought you out from the land of Egypt, to be your God." To determine the precise meaning of these conspicuous and solemn words, is no easy task. Its difficulty is seen in the widely different expositions of them adopted by the best scholars. See Leviticus 13:1-59. One thing, however, is certain. In the four passages in which God speaks of Himself as Holy, all which passages we find in a book which is occupied almost exclusively with the Mosaic ritual ; in the two passages quoted above from the song of Moses in Exod. xv. ; and in those in which God claims to be sanctified by those who surround Him ; the word holy must represent the same idea as in the hundreds of passages surrounding them in the books of the Law, in which it is predicated of men and things. For the number and commonness and variety of the visible objects called holy in the everyday life of Israel must have given to the word a clearly defined meaning well understood by every Israelite. By representing God as calling Himself holy, the writers and editors of the Sacred Books, and with them the nation which accepted these books as divine, recognised that in dealing with these holy objects Israel stood before a Holy and Supreme Personality, of whose unseen nature these visible objects were a divinely-given expression. We have seen that the one element common to all the holy objects, men, things, places, ritual, and times, was that by God s express command they all stood in a solemn relation to Him as specially His own. To speak of God as holy, is to say that this command and claim were a revelation of His nature. And this we can understand. Moses, Aaron, and Israel, encamped around the Sacred Tent, had thoughts about God very different from those of earlier days. To Aaron, Jehovah was now the supreme Personality who had claimed from him a lifelong and exclusive service. This claim was a new era, not only in his everyday life, but in his conception of God. Consequently, the word holy, which expressed Aaron s relation to God, was suitably used to express also God s relation to Aaron and to Israel. In other words, God s claim to the un reserved and exclusive devotion to Himself of the holy objects was an outflow of His inmost nature : and because He is what He is He can do no other than claim this unreserved devotion. Else where we shall see that it is an outflow of His infinite Love, which is itself the inmost Essence of God. This close relation of the holiness of God to the holy objects of the Old Covenant is clearly asserted in Leviticus 20:26: "Ye shall be for Me holy men ; because holy am I, Jehovah. And I have separated you from the peoples, to be Mine." Since God s claim to the unreserved devotion of His people surpasses infinitely all claims put forth for the gods of the nations around, it reveals the unique majesty of God. So Exodus 15:1; Exodus 15:1 : " Who is like Thee among the gods, Jehovah . glorious in holiness!" And Mount Sinai, where He solemnly announced His claim, is called in 5:13 "the dwelling-place of Thy holiness." Since this claim is an outflow of His inmost nature, and remains the same whatever man may do, it may be called the OBJECTIVE Holiness of God. When He manifested, in word or act, the strictness of His claim and His determination to uphold it, He was said to be sanctified, as in Leviticus 10:3, in the case of Nadab and Abihu. When men yielded to God the devotion He claimed, i.e. when in the subjective world of their own inner and outer life they put Him in the place of honour as their Master and Owner, they were said to sanctify God. So Deuteronomy 32:51, "because ye did not sanctify Me in the midst of the sons of Israel." So Numbers 27:14. This is the SUBJECTIVE Holiness which God claims for Himself in the hearts of His servants. In the Bk. of Psalms, the word holy is sometimes, and the word holiness frequently, applied to God. In the vision in Isa. vi., the Seraphim proclaim three times that Jehovah is Holy. This solemn and emphatic repetition asserts His in violable claim to the devotion of His intelligent creatures. Throughout the Bk. of Isaiah, we find some 24 times (also 2 Kings 19:22) the phrase "Holy One of Israel ; " and in Isaiah 29:23 " the Holy One of Jacob." So Psalms 71:22, Psalms 78:41, Psalms 89:18, Jeremiah 1:29; Jeremiah 51:5; also Ezekiel 39:7, u the Holy One in Israel." The Holy One of Israel is an exact counterpart to " holy for Jehovah ; " just as in Leviticus 20:24; Leviticus 20:26, etc. " I am Jehovah " is practically equivalent to " I Jehovah am Holy" Israel stood before Jehovah in mutual relation as " holy for Jehovah " before " the Holy One of Israel." Israel belonged to Him who had made Himself in a special sense the God of Israel. The obligation to sanctify Jehovah, found above in the Books of the Law, meets us in Isaiah 5:16 : " Jehovah of Hosts is exalted in judgment ; and God the Holy One has been sanctified in righteousness." In the Bk. of Ezekiel we frequently read that God will be sanctified, especially by punishing the wicked. For the punishment of those who reject Him will reveal the inviolability of His claim to the allegiance and devotion of men. In Exodus 20:5; Exodus 34:14, Deuteronomy 4:24; Deuteronomy 5:9; Deuteronomy 6:15; Deuteronomy 29:20; Deuteronomy 32:16, Deuteronomy 32:21, Ezekiel 36:5-6; Ezekiel 38:19; Ezekiel 39:25, Zechariah 1:14; Zechariah 8:2, and elsewhere we read of the JEALOUSY of God. In Joshua 24:19, it is placed in close relation to His holiness : " A holy God is He, a jealous God." This suggests that the God of the Sanctuary has a husband s righteous claim to the undivided loyalty of Israel; and asserts that He will tolerate no rival. It thus confirms the interpretation given above, See further in Deuteronomy 13:1-18. The above quotations are samples of the use of a word found in the Old Testament nearly 800 times. The frequency and variety of its use make the meaning quite clear. In an immense majority of cases, the word holy is spoken of men or things or ritual or periods of time ; and denotes that these stand in special relation to God as His possession, and that therefore men may not touch them except at God’s bidding and to do His work. This special relation arose, not from man s free gift to God, but from God s command and claim, in consequence of which they stand, apart from anything man does or fails to do, in a new relation to Him. This, I have called OBJECTIVE HOLINESS. It is the most frequent use of the word. In this sense, God sanctified these objects for Himself. But, since some of them were intelligent persons and others were under the control of such, the word sanctify denotes also their own formal surrender of themselves and their possessions to God. This may be called SUBJECTIVE HOLINESS. We also found six places in the Books of the Law, and many others in the Psalms and Prophets, in which the words holy and holiness are predicated of, or attributed to, God : and from these we learnt that God s claim was not merely casual, but was an outflow and expression of His Essence; that men sanctified God and His Name by rendering to Him the devotion He claims ; and that as the Creator of the World who had revealed Himself to Israel as to no other ancient nation, and had thus placed Israel in peculiar and solemn relation to Himself as His possession, Jehovah became the Holy One of Israel. These results are independent of the dates and authorship of the Books of the Old Testament. For the general agree ment of all extant Hebrew Manuscripts and the Greek Septuagint Version proves that the Old Testament as we possess it in modern Bibles reproduces with substantial correctness books held sacred by Israel during the Persian dominion. These books preserve for us Israel s memory of its past history ; and reveal a knowledge of God, and a trust and joy in Him, unique in ancient literature. Moreover this memory of the past and these thoughts about God, by whomever the books were written, collected, or edited, were the intellectual and moral and religious back ground and atmosphere of the Gospel of Christ. In these ancient books, from various sources and of different dates, mostly un certain, we cannot detect with confidence any definite and substantial progress of thought. For throughout the Old Testament we find a clear knowledge of one personal God, the Creator of the world, the righteous Ruler of men, and the covenant God of Israel. And, although the symbolic conception of holiness be comes much more prominent in what seem to be the later documents, the radical conception of holiness is the same throughout. Moreover, everywhere we find, alongside the exclusive holiness of certain separated objects, men or things, definite assertions of the holiness of the entire nation. So Exodus 3:5; Exodus 19:4-6; Exodus 19:23; Exodus 19:20, which are probably among the earliest parts of the Old Testament, compared with chs. Exodus 29:37; Exodus 30:29, Leviticus 11:45; Leviticus 19:2, apparently of much later date. This homogeneity of books written during many centuries points to a unique religious impulse which for long ages following dominated the thought and worship of Israel. And it is impossible to doubt that this impulse was due to a teacher of colossal influence, Moses, and to an event unique in the religious history of mankind, the Exodus. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 6: 1.04. HOLINESS IN THE SEPTUAGINT VERSION AND IN THE APROCYPHA ======================================================================== CHAPTER IV HOLINESS IN THE SEPTUAGINT VERSION AND IN THE APOCRYPHA WE come now to the Greek Septuagint (p. 1 6), in which we see Hebrew thought robing itself in European language, and thus unconsciously equipping itself for the conquest of the West, a conquest destined to exercise so mighty an influence on the history of the Kingdom of God, and the fortunes of the world. A word was needed to receive, and to carry forth unalloyed to the nations who spoke Greek, the great truths wrapped up in the Hebrew word we have just been considering. A very common word, an almost exact Greek counterpart to the Hebrew word, was ready for the translator s use. What ever, man or thing, was supposed to stand in some special relation to deity, was said, without consideration of its inherent quality, to be iepos. And, as we have seen, this was the radical Hebrew conception of Holiness. It is, however, significant that the Greek word was never used, whereas the Hebrew word often was, as an attribute of God. But, in a few passages, Greek writers assert the great truth that of all sacred objects the good man is the most sacred ; and they thus approach the moral conception of holiness, of which we have found traces in the Old Testament, and which is so conspicuous a feature of the New. Therefore, in spite of the above-mentioned shortcoming, it might seem that the word iepos was no unworthy Greek representative of the Hebrew conception of Holiness. From this honour, however, the word was, throughout the Septuagint, utterly and rudely thrust out. As a rendering of the adjective holy, it never occurs. And only once is the substantive iepov used in the frequent New Testament sense of sanctuary, viz. in the one strange passage (Ezekiel 28:18) in which we read of the sanctuary, not of Jehovah, but of Tyre. The reason is not far to seek. lepu i had been polluted by contact with the corruptions of idolatry; and was therefore unfit for service in the Temple of God. Of this, we have had an illustration in the sacred prostitutes of Corinth. It is true that in the Hebrew language a similar corruption had defiled (see Deuteronomy 23:17) one member of the family of sacred words. But the defiled member was rigidly excluded from the service of God : and the defilement went no further. Whereas, in Greek, the defilement reached and saturated every member. With the Hebrew word, as a result of its consecration to the service of Jehovah, and in spite of the occasional profanation of sacred things, were associated ideas of purity and goodness. With the Greek word, in consequence of the fearful debasement of idolatry, were associated conceptions the vilest and worst. Another word must therefore be found to carry to the nations of the West, in its purity, the Hebrew conception of Holiness. This honourable office was conferred on the comparatively rare word ayios. Its rarity was a recommendation. For, that it had so few associations of its own made it the fitter to take up the meaning, and appropriate to itself the associations, of the Hebrew word. And its associations, though few, were suitable. In classical Greek, it is never found as a predicate of gods or men ; and was therefore free from the ideas of imperfection and sin which belonged in the minds of idolaters both to gods and men. It is frequently used by Herodotus, and occasionally by other writers, to describe temples of special sacredness ; and seems to denote the reverence which their connection with the deity gave them a right to claim. It is probably akin to a^o/icu, used by Homer (Iliad bk. 1:21, etc.) to denote reverence for the gods and for parents. It was evidently a nobler and purer word than /epo?. The difference arose from the fact that, owing to the degradation of idolatry, there were objects supposed to stand in close relation to the gods, which had no claim whatever to man’s real reverence. A very good example of the distinction is quoted in Cremer’s excellent New Testament Lexicon, from Plato: " Amorous and untamed men are unable to abstain from the most holy bodies ; " which Cremer properly contrasts with the sacred bodies of the sacred slaves, in Strabo bk, 6:272. See p. 28. Such being the associations of the words, the authors of the Septuagint, deeply conscious of the difference between the gods of Greece and the One God of Israel, rejected tepo?, which was already occupied by conceptions partly impure, and chose ^09, which was in part unoccupied and in part occupied by a pure conception, viz. reverence, to receive and bear to the nations of Europe the definite Mosaic conception of Holiness. To represent the modifications of the Hebrew word, the Greek translators thrust aside the existing though rare derivatives of #709, and derived directly from 7to9 a family of words of which every member was altogether new in Greek literature. In Judges 16:17, for the words " Nazarite of God," which the Alexandrian MS. reproduces, the Vatican MS. gives ayw eoi). And rightly so. For the Nazarite was holy. And this holiness, Samson’s deep sin could not obliterate. In the Apocrypha, the use of ayws and its cognates corresponds exactly to its use in the Septuagint, i.e. to the use of the Hebrew word. The purely ritual use is found in Jud1 Thessalonians 11:13 : " the first- fruits of the corn, and the tithes of the wine and the oil, which they kept, having sanctified them for the priests." So i Mace. 10:39: "for the holy things which are at Jerusalem, for the expenses suitable for the holy things." Compare Sir 45:4, " in his faith and meekness, He sanctified (Moses) ; He chose him out of all flesh : " and verses 6, 7, " He exalted Aaron to be holy like him . . . and gave him the priesthood." In 5:10, we have Aaron s holy robe. So ch. 49:12 : "a people holy for the Lord." From the days of the week God "exalted and sanctified the Sabbath : " ch. 33. (36.) 9. God is "the Holy One from heaven," who redeemed Judah from the host of Sennacherib : ch. 48:20. In 2 Mace. 5:15, the temple at Jerusalem, into which Antiochus dared to enter, is called " the most holy sanctuary (ayiwrarov iepov) of all the earth." This use of the word iepov was now safe : for the conception of Holiness was already indissolubly linked to cfyto?. Compare Acts 21:28. Notice 2 Mace. 1:25-26 : " who madest the fathers Thy chosen, and didst sanctify them . . . guard Thy own portion and sanctify it." In the Apocrypha, as in the Septuagint, the word ayw simply takes up the ideas associated with the Hebrew word ; and passes them on unchanged, as an almost lifeless body, awaiting the new life soon to be breathed into it by a new and more glorious revelation. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 7: 1.05. HOLINESS IN THE NEW TESTAMENT ======================================================================== CHAPTER V HOLINESS IN THE NEW TESTAMENT THE writers of the New Testament perpetuate and develop the Old Testament conception of Holiness. It was still remembered, u as written in the Law," that the firstborn was "holy to (or, for) the Lord : " Luke 2:23. The emphatic teaching of Exodus 29:37, etc., " all that touches the altar shall be holy" reappears in Matthew 23:17; Matthew 23:19, where Christ appeals in argument to the fact that the temple has already sanctified (aorist) the gold used in its construction ; and that day by day the altar sanctifies (present tense) the gift laid upon it. As in Nehemiah 11:1, so in Matthew 4:5; Matthew 27:53, Jerusalem is called "the holy city." For it stood in special relation to God. In Acts 7:33, Stephen quotes Exodus 3:5 : " the place on which thou standest is holy ground." The temple is still the " holy place : " See Matthew 24:15, Acts 6:13; Acts 21:28. As in Jeremiah 1:5; Jeremiah 1:1-19:2 Kings 4:9, so in Luke 1:70, Acts 3:21, the prophets are called holy. Similarly, Herod knew that the Baptist was "a righteous and holy man:" Mark 6:20. The holiness of God, so solemnly asserted in Leviticus 11:45, etc., and conspicuously embodied in the term "Holy One of Israel," so frequent in the Bk. of Isaiah, is mentioned in the New Testament only in John 17:11 where Christ addresses God as "Holy Father;" in Hebrews 12:10, " partakers of His holiness ," in 1 Peter 1:15-16, quoting Leviticus 11:44, etc. ; in Revelation 4:8, a repetition of Isaiah 6:3; and in Revelation 6:10, " Master, the Holy and True." In these passages, the meaning of the word holy is practically the same as that deduced above, on PP- 34~39> from its similar use in the Old Testament; except that our conception of the holiness of God will deepen with our deepening sense of the infinite love of God revealed in Christ, and of the unreserved devotion which in Christ He claims from and waits to bestow upon His adopted sons. This topic will there fore be further considered in ch. xiii. after our examination of the holiness ot the servants of Christ. The holiness of God receives conspicuous recognition in the Lord s Prayer : "May Thy Name be sanctified:" Matthew 6:9, Luke 11:2. We pray that the Name of God may elicit the reverence due to Him who claims the unreserved devotion of all His intelligent creatures. It recalls Psalms 103:1; Psalms 105:3; Psalms 111:9; Psalms 145:21. The most conspicuous and frequent use of the word holy in the New Testament, more than one-third of the whole, is the term "Holy Spirit," specially frequent in Luke and Acts. In Psalms 51:11, Isaiah 63:10-11, these words are found in the Septuagint, as a Greek rendering of the Hebrew phrase, "Thy Spirit of Holiness" This epithet reminds us that the Spirit of God is the divine source of an inward influence going forth from God and lead ing men to devote themselves unreservedly to His service. All human inward holiness is an outflow, as we shall see in ch. ix., of the Spirit of God communicating to men, by immediate contact of Spirit with spirit, His own essential devotion to God. The second most frequent use of the word holy in the New Testament is as a designation of church-members indiscriminately without reference to their measure of spiritual development. So 1 Corinthians 1:2, " to the Church of God which is in Corinth, men sanctified in Christ Jesus, called saints" and frequently in the letters of Paul, the Ep. to the Hebrews, and the Bk. of Revelation ; also Acts 9:13; Acts 9:32; Acts 9:41; Acts 9:26, and in Jude 1:3. This use will be further considered in ch. vii. In ch. vi. other important teaching about the holiness of Christ will claim our attention. So far the conception of Holiness has advanced little beyond the development attained in the Old zestament. But the greater frequency of holiness as an attri bute of the Spirit of God is a mark of that better covenant of which the indwelling and sanctifying presence of the Spirit is so conspicuous and glorious a feature. And the underlying similarity of the use of the word holy in the Old and New Tescaments is a proof how fully the earlier conception of holiness lived on in the thought of Israel ======================================================================== CHAPTER 8: 1.06. HOLINESS OF CHRIST ======================================================================== CHAPTER VI HOLINESS OF CHRIST THE recognition, apart from any thought of the ritual of the temple, of Elisha as a " man of God " and therefore " holy" and of Jeremiah as sanctified by designa tion from birth for special service as a prophet, suggests irresistibly that in the Incarnate Son we shall find the Holy of Holies of mankind. This is clearly taught in a few conspicuous passages of the New Testament. On the eve of His birth, He was announced (Luke 1:35) by an angel as " the Holy Thing : " the neuter form leaving out of sight all except that He would be an embodiment of holiness. He was acknowledged, both by His disciples (John 6:69) and by (Mark 1:24) evil spirits, to be " the Holy One of God." The added words " of God " remind us that the holy objects stood in special relation to God. In John 10:36, the Son speaks of Himself as one " whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world." This sanctification is evidently, in close agreement with Jeremiah 1:5, designation to the special work of which in John 17:4 the Son speaks as " the work which Thou gavest Me to do." Touching His own daily self-devotion to this work, He says in John 17:19, " I sanctify Myself." The ascended Saviour is in Acts 3:14 called, like the Baptist in Mark 6:20, " holy and righteous;" and in Acts 4:27 " the holy Servant " of God. In Romans 1:4, Paul asserts that He was " marked out as Son of God, according to a spirit of holiness! In Revelation 3:7, He is called " the Holy, the True." Whether in 1 John 2:20 the word holy refers to the Father or the Son, is uncertain. The above passages imply that in the Incarnate Son there was, amid the limitations of human life on earth, a perfect impersonation of the idea imperfectly shadowed forth in the Mosaic ritual. We expect to find Him standing in special relation to God, and living a life of which the one and only aim is to accomplish the purposes of God. Our expectation is realised. The Son says, in John 4:34, " My food is to do the will of Him that sent Me, and to complete His work ; " i2 Chronicles 5:19, " the Son cannot do anything of Himself, but what He sees the Father doing;" in John 5:30, "I seek, not My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me ; " 2 Chronicles 6:38, " I am come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him that sent Me;" and 2 Chronicles 17:4, " I have glorified Thee on the earth, having accomplished the work Thou gavest Me to do." Similarly Paul teaches in Romans 6:10, " the life which He lives, He lives for God ; " 2 Chronicles 15:3, " Christ did not please Himself;" in 1 Corinthians 3:23, " ye are Christ s and Christ is God s." In Hebrews 3:2 we read that Christ was " faithful to Him that made Him;" and 2 Chronicles 9:14, " He offered Himself spotless to God." In Jesus we see a life, lived in human flesh and blood, of which God was the one and only aim. All the powers, time, and opportunities of Jesus were used, not to gratify self, but to work out the purposes of God. And this devotion was rational. The human intelligence of Jesus, mysteriously informed by the divine intelligence of the Son of God, comprehended and fully approved and appropriated the Father s eternal purpose to save mankind through the death of His Son and to build up an eternal kingdom of rescued humanity : and of this intelligent approval every word and act of the human life of Jesus was a perfect out working. In this sense, in a measure infinitely surpassing the thought of Israel, the Old Testament conception of Holiness found in Him its realisation. This being so, we are not surprised to find, in a few passages, the holy objects of the Old Covenant used as symbols of Christ. In John 2:21, as His words are expounded by the Evangelist, " He spoke of" His body as a " Temple." In Hebrews 3:1, Hebrews 9:11 He is called a " High-Priest :" and in Hebrews 9:11; Hebrews 10:29, we read that the sacrifice which as Priest He offered was His own Body and Blood. In Hebrews 10:29, some who have treated with wanton insult the Spirit of grace are said to have been sanctified in the blood of the Covenant : and in Hebrews 5:14 we read that "by one offering" Christ "has perfected for ever those who are being sanctified" All this recalls the ancient ritual ; and teaches plainly that whatever holiness belonged to the tabernacle and its ritual attained in Christ its perfect realisation. We notice further that, under the Old Covenant, the holy men and things were separated by their holiness from the common work of common life. This is very conspicuous in the last of the prophets, the " righteous and holy man " (Mark 6:20) in whose person and teaching was summed up whatever had been revealed in the earlier dispensation. The contrast of John and Jesus is the contrast of holiness as revealed in the Law and in the Gospel. John lived in the wilderness, away from the dwellings of men, and ate strange food. Jesus lived a common life, toiling at a trade, enjoying social inter course, partaking of human hospitality, and eating the food set before Him. This teaches plainly that holiness in its highest degree, i.e. the highest conceivable devotion to God and His Kingdom, does not involve separation from the common business of life. And, when we see Jesus using the opportunities afforded by this common intercourse with men to advance the interests of the Kingdom of God, we learn that even the common things of common life may be laid on the Altar as a means of doing His holy work. We saw that under the Old Covenant devotion to God involved separation from whatever, in symbol or reality, was opposed to God : for all sin tends to misery and destruction ; whereas God’s purpose is life and happiness. Consequently the holiness of Jesus involved His absolute separation from, and strenuous hostility to, all sin. See further in ch. xi. Again, the only purpose of God which we can conceive as having a practical bearing upon us is His purpose to save men from sin and death, and out of the ruins of lost humanity to build up the eternal Kingdom of which Christ will be King and His servants citizens. Consequently, to us, devotion to God implies devotion to this one purpose : and this one great divine purpose is inseparably linked to our conception of holiness. This is the only explanation, and a complete explanation, of John 10:36, "Whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world"; and of John 17:19, "on their behalf I sanctify Myself, in order that they also may be sanctified" The words, "sent into the world," are the links binding together these two passages. The Father’s mission was the objective sanctification of the Son for this great work. His own fulfilment of this mission day by day throughout His life on earth, culminating in the supreme sacrifice on the cross, was His own subjective sanctification of Himself. The words in 1 Peter 3:15, "sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts," recall Deuteronomy 32:51, Numbers 27:14, "ye sanctified Me not in the midst of Israel." The meaning can only be, Recognise Christ, in the inmost chamber of your being, as your Lord, and therefore justly claiming your unreserved obedience and devotion. These words give to Him the prerogative which in the earlier covenant Jehovah claimed for Himself. They are little or nothing less than a recognition that Christ is divine. From the above passages we learn that the word sanctify does not necessarily involve inward change in the person sanctified. For such change in the Son of God is inconceivable. Thus from the great Author and Archetype of renewed humanity we have obtained a complete conception of Holiness. We have seen a Man, though God yet perfect Man, whose life was a ceaseless and perfect accomplishment of one pur pose, viz. to use all His powers, time, and opportunities, to build up the Kingdom of God. And we have learnt that this purpose was an outflow of an intelligent comprehension and full approval of an eternal purpose of God. In virtue of this intelligent, hearty, and ceaseless appropriation of the Father s purpose, and of its perfect realisation in all the details of the Saviour s life, He was appropriately called " The Holy One of God." In my Manual of Theology^ especially 95, 276, I have endeavoured to prove that the devotion of the human life of the Incarnate Son to the work for which the Father sent Him into the world has its eternal Archetype and Source in the essential devotion of the Eternal Son to the Eternal Father. We there found in God a Person distinct from the Father yet sharing with Him, by eternal derivation from Him, all the attributes of God ; and we saw the divine life thus received flowing back in full volume in unreserved devotion to the Father; the infinite and eternal Stream to its infinite and eternal Source. Thus are the holiness of the Son, as of the Father and the Spirit, and all creaturely holiness, traced up to the eternal and essential relations of the Father, Son, and Spirit. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 9: 1.07. THE HOLINESS OF THE SERVANTS OF CHRIST ======================================================================== CHAPTER VII THE HOLINESS OF THE SERVANTS OF CHRIST ON p. 54 we saw that in the letters of Paul and the Bk. of Revelation frequently, and in the Ep. to Hebrews and the Bk. of Acts, church-members are indiscriminately called saints or holy persons, without thought of the measure of their moral development. The Corinthian Christians were " babes in Christ " and " carnal : " 1 Corinthians 3:1-3. Yet they were " sanctified in Christ : " 1 Corinthians 1:2. All this is explained by the use of the word holy in the Old Testament. They were objectively holy in the sense that " in Christ," i.e. through His incarnation, teaching, and death, God had claimed them for His own, that henceforth " they should live, not for self, but for Him who on their behalf died and rose:" 2 Corinthians 5:15. This claim of God placed them in a new and solemn relation to Him which could not be set aside by, although it greatly aggravated the guilt of, unfaithfulness to this high vocation. So in Hebrews 10:29 we read of one who had " trampled under foot the Son of God and counted as a common thing the blood of the covenant in which he was sanctified." The word saint is therefore very appropriate to designate the professed followers of Christ. For it declares what God requires us to be. To admit sin or selfishness into our hearts is now sacrilege. Nay more. This title sets forth our privilege. The name we bear tells us God s will concerning us. Therefore, since our own efforts have proved that the life He would have us live is altogether beyond our power, we may take back to Him the name He gives and claim with lowly confidence that He will Himself accomplish in our hearts and lives His own purpose. To keep ever before the professed servants of Christ the real significance of their profession, the Holy Spirit moved the early Christians to call each other saints or holy persons. This is the OBJECTIVE holiness of the Church of Christ. A few conspicuous and important passages in the New Testament indicate the SUBJECTIVE holiness set before the professed followers of Christ in the title they bear. In His great prayer on the eve of His betrayal, Christ prays, in John 17:11-19, " Holy Father, keep them in Thy Name . . . keep them from the Evil One . . . sanctify them in the truth. . . . According as Thou didst send Me into the world, also I have sent them into the world. And on their behalf I sanctify Myself, in order that also they may be sanctified in the truth." This recalls John 10:36, " whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world." The connecting link is the phrase, "sent into the world." As the Father consecrated the Son to the special work of rescuing the lost and bringing them back to their Father in heaven, so has the Son sent on the same errand of mercy those who follow Him ; and He now prays that God will breathe into them this new life of unreserved devotion to the task set before them. For nothing less than this can be the answer for which the great Intercessor pleads. It is the subjective realisation of the objective holiness described above. For the same subjective sanctification, Paul prays in 1 Thessalonians 5:23 : " may the God of peace Himself sanctify you." The word following, rendered wholly in the English versions, denotes, not the manner or measure of this sanctification, but its result : " may He sanctify you, and thus make you, in every part, full-grown " or " perfect," or " mature." Now unquestion ably the Thessalonican Christians were already at least on the level of the immature Corinthians who are said to be "sanctified in Christ." Paul s prayer can mean no less than a subjective realisation in them of the devotion which God claims from His adopted sons. He adds a prayer for the maintenance in them of this inward subjective holiness: "may your spirit and soul and body, every part complete, be kept blameless in the coming of Christ;" and a confident hope, " Faithful is He that calls you, who also will do it." This holiness "in body and spirit" is in 1 Corinthians 7:34 set before a Christian woman as her aim in life ; parallel to " how he may please the Lord " in 5:32. In 2 Corinthians 7:1, it is set in relation to cleansing from the defilement of sin : " let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, attaining holiness." The sanctification of the body in a sacrificial sense is taught in Romans 6:13; Romans 6:19: "present the members of your body as slaves to righteousness for sancti fication" So 5:22 : " ye have your fruit for sanctification." So ch. 12:1, at the beginning of the practical application of Paul s great statement of the Gospel, in language redolent of the ritual of the altar : " present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, well-pleasing to God, your rational service." Our hands and feet and lips must be laid on the altar, to be intelligently used for God, this consecration of our bodily powers being the ritual of worship which God requires from us. I2 Chronicles 15:16 Paul describes his own priestly service : " that I should be a minister " (same word in Hebrews 8:2, of Christ as High-Priest and with direct reference to the ritual of the Tabernacle) " of Christ Jesus for the Gentiles, proclaiming as my priestly work the Gospel of God, in order that the offering up of the Gentiles may be acceptable, sanctified in the Holy Spirit." The proclamation of the Gospel to the Gentiles was the sacrifice which Paul laid day by day on the altar. This sacrifice was sanctified by the Holy Spirit who inspired the preacher. Similarly Colossians 1:22, " to present you holy and without blemish and without reproof before Him ;" Ephesians 1:4; Ephesians 5:27. Very emphatic is 1 Peter 1:15; 1 Peter 1:6-14 according to the pattern of the Holy One who called you, also yourselves become holy in all ye do ; because it is written, holy shall ye be because I am holy Here a Christian teacher, writing to men and women in every position in life who had been "begotten again by means of the resurrection of Christ," urges them, in view of the holiness of God who had called them to His service and had rescued them from a worthless life by the precious blood of Christ, to be themselves holy in every movement and turning in life : see 1 Peter 1:3, 1 Peter 1:19, 1 Peter 2:18; 1 Peter 3:1. This exhortation, he supports by quoting the words so conspicuously repeated in Leviticus 11:44-45; Leviticus 19:2; Leviticus 20:26; Leviticus 21:8, " Holy shall ye be ; because I am holy" The word rendered in the A.V. " manner of conversation," in the R.V. " manner of living," denotes all the changing activities of life. The quoted words, " ye shall be holy" are a command and a prophecy ; and, since the command can be obeyed and the prophecy fulfilled only by the work of God in man, they are also a promise. Here is a devotion to God embracing all we do, speak, or think. The sacrificial nature of this sanctification is suggested by the costly blood of the spotless Lamb, in 5:19 ; and is plainly asserted i2 Chronicles 2:5; 2 Chronicles 2:9, "a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God ... a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God s own possession." In all these passages, holiness is set before the readers, not as already possessed, but as an object for their effort and prayer and faith. This aim can be no other than the actual realisation in man of God s purpose that he live a life of which God and His purpose of mercy are the one all-controlling purpose. In this sense, we are holy just so far as we look upon ourselves and our possessions as belonging to God, and use our powers, time, opportunities, to save and bless those for whom Christ died. This is the SUBJECTIVE holiness to which God calls His servants. Since our life on earth is lived in flesh and blood, and since the constitution of our bodies shapes all we do, and exerts on us a constant influence, good or bad, this consecration involves, as quoted on p. 67 f., sanctification of our bodies, our possessions, our time, and our entire environment. Since the Mosaic ritual was, as we have just seen, a prophetic outline of the holiness required in us, the various holy objects of that ritual were types, as of Christ (see p. 58), so of us. We are "a holy Temple," 1 Corinthians 3:16; 1 Corinthians 6:19; 1 Corinthians 6:1-20:2 Corinthians 6:16; a " holy" and " royal priesthood," 1 Peter 2:5; 1 Peter 2:9; and "a holy sacrifice," Romans 12:1. Our future life will be a " Sabbath-keeping:" Hebrews 4:9. All this confirms strongly the above interpretation of the words holy and sanctify ; and still further links them to the holy objects of the Old Covenant. This ideal life of unreserved devotion to God is also in the New Testament described in other phraseology. So Romans 6:2 : "Reckon yourselves to be . . . living for God, in Christ Jesus ; " followed, as noted above, by the sacrificial language in verses 13, 19, 22. So ch. 14:7: " none of us lives for himself; for, if we live, we live for the Lord." Also very clearly in 2 Corinthians 5:15 : "He died in order that they who live may live no longer for themselves but for Him who on their behalf died and rose." Similarly, 1 Corinthians 6:19; 1 Corinthians 3:23 : " ye are not your own . . . but Christ’." We also notice that in the New Testament the word sanctify occurs most frequently in the Ep. to the Hebrews, the book which deals most fully with the Mosaic ritual. This suggests that in the Apostolic Churches the word had not shaken off, as to a large extent it has now, its original relation to that ritual. To this original reference of the word, we must ever recur if we wish to think of holiness as it was understood by the early Christians. Very interesting is 1 Corinthians 7:14 : " the unbelieving husband is sanctified in the wife." Since the people of God are holy, it might be thought that, as taught in Ezra 9:2, " the holy seed " ought to separate itself from contact with the unholy. Paul says, No. The Christian wife, in virtue of the universal priesthood of believers, lays her husband on the altar of God, and in all her treatment of him seeks to advance the purposes of God. Therefore, in the subjective world of the wife s inner life, the husband, unbeliever though he be, is a holy object ; and the wife s intercourse with him is a service of God. The correctness of this view, Paul proves by showing that if the principle of separation from the unbelieving were accepted it would in some cases compel a Christian mother to forsake her children, who evidently, in spite of even their possible rejection of the Gospel, have a claim on their mother s care. And, if it be right for her to live with her children, some of whom may be adult idolaters, on the same principle it is right for her to live with her husband. This argument is additional proof of the sacerdotal significance of the word holy in the New Testament. Notice 1 Timothy 4:4 : " Every creature of God is good . . . when received with thanksgiving: for it is sanctified through the word of God and prayer." The " word of God " is the Creator s voice allotting vegetables and animals for man s food : Genesis 1:29; Genesis 9:3. This universal " word " was for a time restricted ; but the restriction had been solemnly revoked, and the original word was again in force : Leviticus 11:4-8, Acts 10:13-15. Whatever we eat " with thanksgiving " is, by the original "word of God" and our thanks, which is a recognition that it is God s gift to us, made holy food suitable for the holy people. Without such intelligent recognition, it would be defiling: Romans 14:14. We have now, by study of the Old and New Testaments, obtained a clear conception of Holiness as understood by the writers of the Bible. The word Holy means unreserved devotion to God ; in nearly all cases, of that which God has claimed for Himself. This idea we have seen realised and embodied in the Son of God, whose life with God, before the world was made, was marked by the unreserved devotion to the Father of a divine Life received from Him ; who took upon Himself our flesh and lived on earth a human life, and now lives upon the throne of God a glorified human life, simply and only to accomplish the Father’s purposes. The same idea, we have seen realised in the Spirit of God, who ever goes forth from the Father in order to lead us back to the Father, and whose every influence tends towards Him. The same idea is in part realised in the adopted sons of God : for God has claimed them for His own; and His claim puts them, whatever they may do, in a new and solemn relation to God. The full idea of Holiness is realised in them only so far as their entire activity of body and mind is the outworking of a single purpose to accomplish the purposes of God. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 10: 1.08. THE NEW LIFE OF DEVOTION TO GOD ======================================================================== CHAPTER VIII THE NEW LIFE OF DEVOTION TO GOD THE above exposition of the words of Christ, as remembered and expounded by the writers of the New Testament, sets before us, when read in the light of their mental and religious environment as preserved for us in the Old Testament, a new ideal of moral excellence, the noblest ideal we can conceive. This ideal found embodiment in the Mosaic priesthood. The ideal priest saw above and within the sacred Tent a supreme Person who had claimed from him a life-long devotion to the due performance of the sacred ritual as an outward symbol of inward truth. The extension in the New Testament of this priestly dignity to all servants of Christ, including men and women in all positions in life, implies that all they say and do is designed to be a sacrifice laid on the altar of God, acceptable to Him. It teaches that God claims that our entire activity of body and mind be controlled by one purpose to use all our powers to work out His purposes. This ideal is realised absolutely in the picture of Christ portrayed on the pages of the New Testament. In Him we see a life lived under the limitations imposed by flesh and blood, in human weakness, surrounded by bad and hostile men, and under the fierce attack of spiritual foes ; a life of unswerving loyalty to God and to the great purpose for which He sent His Son into the world. He thus gave to human life a unity, dignity, and power unknown before and otherwise inconceivable. On p. 62 we saw that this perfect human life was a perfect outflow, under human conditions, of the eternal nature of the pre-incarnate Son of God. Thus the above ideal of Holiness finds its eternal archetype and source in the eternal relation of the Son to the Father. The above ideal sets before us an aim in life, the best possible aim, one which everyone can pursue, at all times amid all the various and varying circumstances of life, and in the pursuit of which he can use to the full all his powers. Now all human effort receives its worth from the object aimed at. No act is trifling which tends to accomplish a great purpose : whereas the greatest effort which aims at nothing beyond itself is worthless. An aim perseveringly pursued gives to life unity, force, and grandeur. This has sometimes been so, to some extent, even when the aim has been unworthy. Life has then been a failure ; but sometimes a splendid failure. Now all self-chosen aims must needs be selfish, and therefore unworthy. For the stream cannot rise above its source. Therefore God, in order to ennoble even the humblest of His children, has given Himself and His own purpose of mercy in Christ to be their single aim ; in order that thus, by directing their efforts to the accomplishment of a purpose chosen by divine wisdom and love, they may themselves daily rise towards God. This lofty aim prompts all human excellence. For it sets to work all our powers, and sets them to work in the best possible direction. It gives to intellectual effort its strongest motive and noblest aim, viz. to comprehend and convey to others the life-giving Truth of God ; and it guards intellectual success from the perils which surround it. It gives the noblest motive for care and development of the body : for it shows us that the powers even of our perishing body may work out eternal blessing. And it gives the only pure motive, and a very strong motive, for effort after material good : for it teaches that this world’s wealth may be a means of gaining for ourselves, and distributing to others who for want of it are perishing, the infinite wealth of heaven. Such a life must ever be one of ceaseless and strenuous activity. For the misery of the world, seen in the light which shines from the Cross of Christ, lays upon our hearts an obligation to do all we can to seek and to save the lost and to build up the eternal and glorious Kingdom of God. Thus holiness, as expounded above, quickens, develops, and elevates, all human life. Andjdevotion to God becomes devotion to the highest interests of men. Again, Holiness not only develops, but satisfies, the intelligence. The mind of the holy man contemplates with full approval, in spite of any sacrifices it may involve, the aim of his ceaseless efforts. And his best judgment selects from the means at his disposal those which seem to him most fitted to attain this end. Thus he, and he only, lives a life strictly in accordance with the dictates of reason. In him, that which is by nature highest, viz. the mind, actually rules ; and that which is by nature lower, the body, attains its highest well-being by acting under the direction of that which is nobler than itself. Consequently, in him there is perfect harmony and perfect peace combined with highest activity. This ideal life is practicable, in the highest degree, to all persons in all positions in life. The man or woman who has fewest powers may use them all for God. And he whose circumstances are most adverse may yet make it his single aim to do all he can to work out the purposes of God. And, if so, even adversity will show forth the glory, and thus help forward the work, of Him whose grace is ever sufficient. That Holiness is possible to all men always, is some proof that the teaching which claims it is from God. Another proof of the same is found in the fact that Holiness is not only possible in, but fits a man for, every position in life. By making men right with God, it makes them right one with another. For we have seen that he who accepts as his own the purposes of God will seek to do all possible good to all within his reach. He will thus be a good son or a good father, a good neighbour or a tradesman pleasant to deal with, a good citizen, judge, or statesman. His presence wherever he is will be a help to all around ; and a bright and guiding light in a dark world. Lastly, Holiness makes us completely free from bondage to the world around, and from fear of the uncertainties and perils of life. For the world is in the hands of God : and all its forces are controlled and guided by His power to work out His deliberate purpose. And, so far as we are holy, His purpose is our purpose. Therefore, strange as the words may seem, between us and everything around us there is perfect harmony. For whatever comes to us comes from God to help us to accomplish our one earnest purpose. Even the dark things of life are helpers affording us opportunities and aid to serve God. Thus the world is beneath our feet : for it is under the feet of Him who has made us partners of His throne. And in security and peace, a peace passing understanding, we reign with Him. A comparison of the New Testament with all earlier literature proves that this life of unreserved devotion to God in the service of Christ is a new and conspicuous element in the Gospel of Christ. Before His day, men had recognised, especially in Greece and still more in Rome, that the interests of the individual are bound up in the interests of the community. Recognition of this truth raised patriotism into a sacred duty. Loyalty to Jehovah was enjoined by the prophets of Israel : and exclusive devotion to His service was set forth, in symbol, by the ancient ritual. And many religions have demanded from their votaries costly sacrifices to be laid on the altars of their gods. Yet not till Christ came was there set before each of the servants of God one definite work, viz. to save and bless all within our reach, by leading them to bow to Him who justly claims their devotion, a work within the capacity of the humblest yet demanding the full consecration of the most richly endowed, worthy of and abundantly recompensing the greatest sacrifices, and ennobling everyone engaged in it. This lofty conception, fulfilling earlier anticipations, and affording a new standard of human excellence, we have traced by decisive documentary evidence to Jesus of Nazareth. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 11: 1.09. SANCTIFICATION IN CHRIST ======================================================================== CHAPTER IX SANCTIFICATION IN CHRIST THE realisation in themselves of the above ideal is the task set before the servants of Christ. We ask how it may be achieved. Evidently the first step towards, and an abiding condition of, this life of loyalty to Christ is a deliberate and resolute purpose to devote ourselves without reserve to His service. This involves a surrender of all other purposes except so far as they can be and are subordinated to this one great purpose ; and an acceptance of a path in life marked out not by our own choice but by the will of Another. This initial and continued self-surrender is the costly sacrifice which God claims : it is the costliest sacrifice which man can lay upon the altar of God. It is our self-consecration to the great work of Him who said, "On their behalf I sanctify Myself, in order that also they may be sanctified in the Truth." Strange to say, an immediate result of this resolve is a painful discovery of our inability to accomplish, or even to maintain, it. In proportion to our earnest ness, we become conscious of a hostile force within us hindering the accomplishment of our purpose and even more or less dethroning the purpose itself. This felt inability becomes to us an intolerable bondage and condemnation. Henceforth for us there can be no real peace until we yield to Christ the devotion He claims. For deliverance from this bondage, and for a realisation in ourselves of this new life of loyalty to Christ, we turn again, as when seeking pardon for past sins, to the Gospel of Christ. Our inability to live for Christ by any moral strength of our own proves at once that devotion to Him is possible to us only as a gift and work of Him who gave His Son to rescue man from sin. This is implied in the prayer of Christ in John 17:17, "sanctify them in the Truth;" and in that of Paul in TActs 5:23, " may the God of peace Himself sanctify you : " for, as we saw on pp. 66-68, these prayers ask for no less than the actual realisation in men of their purpose to live for God. It is also implied in Philemon 1:6, " He who has begun in you a good work will complete it till the day of Jesus Christ ; " and i2 Chronicles 2:12-13, "work out your own salvation . . . for it is God who works in you both to will and to work, on behalf of His good pleasure," i.e. in order to accomplish what seems good to Him. So also 2 Corinthians 5:17, " if anyone be in Christ, he is a new creature;" Galatians 6:15, "in Christ Jesus neither circumcision is anything nor uncircumcision, but a new creature," or " creation." For a new creature involves a fresh putting forth of the creative power of God. In Ephesians 1:19-20, the surpassing power of God put forth in those who believe is compared to the power which raised Christ from the dead and to heaven. Consequently, as we read i2 Chronicles 2:10, "we are His work, created in Christ Jesus for good works ; " and i2 Chronicles 4:24 we read of " the new man which, in harmony with God, has been created in righteousness and purity of truth." Now whatever God does, especially in the work of salvation, must have been a definite thought and purpose in His mind from eternity. This eternal purpose must have included a selection of the objects of salvation and of the path along which God was minded to lead them to the goal He had selected. In this sense, God " chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy . . . having, in love, predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ:" Ephesians 1:4-5. Since this adoption and sanctification are a reproduction in us of Christ s human devotion to God, and of the eternal devotion of the Son to the Father, Paul could write, in Romans 8:28-29, " called according to purpose : because whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son." For, of this image, as reflected in the pages of the New Testament, unreserved devotion to the Father is an essential and conspicuous element. This realisation of an eternal purpose, no external force can hinder : for " neither death nor life . . . can separate us from the love of God." We are therefore " more than conquerors : " verses 37-39. But the realisation is none the less altogether contingent on man s self-surrender to the divine purpose. For Christ said, " I would . . . and ye would not :" Matthew 23:37. This purpose to save and sanctify sinful man must have been an essential part of God s original purpose to create the universe and man. For the human race is infinitely the most important part of the material universe as known to us. And when God made man free, and therefore liable to fall, He must have foreseen man s misuse of his freedom and the whole course of history. Consequently creation and redemption, including the death of Christ, must have been parts of one great purpose. In view of all this, we expect to find that the devotion to God of ourselves, our powers, and our possessions, is a result, not only of God s claims, but of His power working in us the devotion He claims. So Colossians 1:29, "for which end I also toil, agonizing according to His inworking, inwrought in me in power." This implies that Paul s intense efforts for the full development of his readers were wrought in him by the power of God. Our sanctification stands also in definite relation to Christ, So 1 Corinthians 1:2, "sanctified in Christ." In Rom. vi. u, the ideal life which Paul bids his readers claim, viz. "dead to sin but living for God," is said to be "like" Christ and "in Christ," who Himself (v. 10) "died to sin ... and lives for God." 2 Chronicles 14:9, we read that "for this end Christ died and lived, in order that both of dead and living He might be Lord." Still more definitely in 2 Corinthians 5:15: "on behalf of all He died, in order that they who live may live, no longer for themselves, but for Him who on their behalf died and rose." This implies that the new life of devotion to God and to Christ was a definite purpose for which He laid down His life. So Galatians 2:19-20: "I died to law, in order that I may live for God. With Christ I am crucified. And there lives no longer I, but in me Christ lives." This implies that, just as our spirit gives to our body life and activity, so the living inward presence of the Crucified was the source in Paul of a higher life and activity. Similarly Hebrews 13:12 :" Jesus, in order that He might sanctify the people through His own blood, suffered outside the gate." So Hebrews 10:10, Hebrews 10:14, Hebrews 10:29 : "we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus . . . by one offering He has perfected for ever those who are being sanctified . . . the blood of the Covenant in which he was sanctified. " In this sense, in ch. ii. ii we read of "Him who sanctifies and them who are being sanctified" All this places, as we shall see further in ch. xi., the sanctification of believers in close relation to the death of Christ. And this sacrificial teaching suggests irresistibly that when, as recorded in John 17:19, Christ said "on their behalf I sanctify Myself," He had special reference to His own approaching death. If then to-day, in response to God’s claim, we are in any measure living for God, it is because centuries ago, n fulfilment of an eternal purpose of God, the Holy One of God consecrated with His Own Blood the altar on which are laid today in willing sacrifice whatever we have and are ; and because He who once lived a human life on earth and now lives a glorified human life upon the throne of God, simply and only to work out the Father s purposes, now lives in us as the mysterious inward Source of a life like His own life of unreserved devotion to God. Thus has Christ " become to us sanctification : " 1 Corinthians 1:30. This sanctification in Christ involves 11 fellowship," i.e. partnership (same word in Luke 5:10), with Christ in all that He has and is, in His Sonship and service, in His sufferings, in His inheritance as Son of God, and in His glory: Romans 8:17, Ephesians 2:5-6; Ephesians 2:1-22:1 Timothy 2:11-12. It involves also a felt inward presence of Christ dwelling in our hearts, living in our lives, guiding and guarding and helping us in all we do, and enabling us to live a life of devotion to God like that of the incarnate Son. And this inward presence of Christ evokes in us a sense of companionship with One infinitely strong and wise and loving, a Person distinct both from ourselves and from the Father to whom He bows. To unnumbered thousands, this unseen companionship has supplied abundantly the lack of all other fellowship, even in the loneliest and darkest paths in life. In this mysterious and glorious fellowship, which words fail utterly to describe, has been fulfilled the Master s parting promise, " I am with you always : " Matthew 28:20. Of this inward presence of Christ, as of all else which God does in man, the Holy Spirit is the Agent. Where He is, there is Christ, and not elsewhere. So 2 Thessalonians 2:13; 2 Thessalonians 2:1-17:1 Peter 1:2, " sanctification of the Spirit : " and Romans 15:16, where Paul desires that the Gentiles, offered in sacrifice to God, may be "sanctified in the Holy Spirit." Indeed the new term, " the Holy Spirit," conspicuous throughout the New Testament, suggests at once that the Spirit of God stands in special relation to God as an inward influence ever leading us to devote ourselves to the service of God. Just as (Genesis 2:7) God breathed into a human form the "breath of life, and man became a living soul," so to all who believe the Gospel God gives His Spirit, who is also (Romans 8:9, 1 Peter 1:1-25. n) the " Spirit of Christ," to be in them the animating principle of a new life of devotion to God, like the life of Christ. That Christ will baptize with the Spirit is, in all four Gospels, a conspicuous element in the teaching of the Baptist : Mt. iii. ii, Mark 1:8, Luke 3:16, John 1:33. In Luke 11:13 Christ promises that " the Father from heaven will give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him." In John 7:39, a wonderful promise that from those who believe in Christ " shall flow rivers of living water" is thus explained : " this He spoke about the Spirit which they who believed in Him were about to receive." The promise that Christ will baptize with the Spirit is repeated in Acts 1:5, by the risen, but not yet ascended, Lord. And from Pentecost onwards the gift of the Spirit is conspicuous : Acts 2:4; Acts 2:38; Acts 2:4-8; Acts 6:3, Acts 6:5, Acts 10:44-45, etc. In Galatians 3:2-3 Paul assumes that his readers have received the Spirit, and says in verses Galatians 3:13-14 that "Christ bought us off from the curse of the Law ... in order that we may receive the promise of the Spirit." 2 Chronicles 5:16 (cp. 5:25) he urges his readers to " walk by the Spirit ; " he speaks in 5:18 of those who are " led by the Spirit;" and in 5:22 describes all moral excellence as a " fruit of the Spirit." Similar teaching meets us in Romans 8:2-16; Romans 8:26; Romans 8:27, and throughout his epistles. This gift of the Spirit is sufficient for all our needs. They who are filled with the Spirit of Christ are filled with the mind and power and holiness of Christ. Their life is thus in some sense a continuation of His Incarnation. He who of old manifested Himself to men in the flesh and blood born of Mary now manifests Himself in His servants living on earth, by His Spirit dwelling in them. They are conscious that their life and purposes and actions have their source not in themselves but in God ; and are led onwards and upwards by a wisdom and power not human but divine. Other teachers can impart knowledge, and set before their pupils a worthy example. But Christ breathes into His servants His own life, His own intelligence to enlighten them, His own moral strength to make them strong, and His own love to be the mainspring of their life. Thus in the sanctification of men each divine Person takes His characteristic part. Of all holiness, the Father is the ultimate Source and Aim. In virtue of His own essential nature of Love, He can do no other than claim the unreserved devotion of all His rational creatures; and what He claims He is ready to work in them. Thus we " partake His holiness : " Hebrews 12:10. For our devotion to Him is the due complement of His claim. In the eternal devotion of the Son to the Father, of one divine Person to another; we have the eternal archetype of man’s devotion ; and a personal influence com municating by personal contact with another person the mind of Christ. And of this influence the Spirit of God, who is also the Spirit of Christ, is the divine and inward personal Agent. For the one is the Holy One of God, and the other is the Holy Spirit. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 12: 1.10. SANCTIFICATION BY FAITH ======================================================================== CHAPTER X SANCTIFICATION BY FAITH WE have now seen that Holiness, from beginning to fullest development, is al together a work of God in man. It is also indisputably conditional on man’s surrender to this divine inworking. For our own frequent unfaithfulness leaves no room for doubt that these divine influences are not irresistible. Otherwise our own actual experience and action would have been absolutely in accord with the will of God. Our conscience tells us that this has not been so. We therefore ask, How may I obtain, sinner as I am, in fullest measure, this divine inworking ? In John 17:17-19 Christ prays, "Sanctify them in the Truth : Thy word is Truth . . . that they may be also themselves sanctified in the Truth." Now truth, as I under stand it, is reality as comprehended in thought and expressed in words. It is a correspondence between objective existence and subjective apprehension and expression of it. Reality, thus apprehended, is here stated to be the environment of sanctification. Now a spoken word is real to us only so far as we believe it, i.e. accept it as our own personal conviction. Hence in 2 Thessalonians 2:13 " sanctification of the Spirit " is traced to "belief of the truth." In Acts 26:1; Acts 26:8 Christ describes the purpose of the mission of Paul, "that they may obtain forgiveness of sins and a lot among the sanctified, by faith in Me." So Galatians 3:14, " that we may receive the promise of the Spirit through faith;" and Ephesians 1:13; Ephesians 1:11 having believed, ye were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise." Similarly Romans 1:16, " the Gospel is a power of God for salvation to everyone who believes;" and Ephesians 2:8, "ye have been saved through faith : " for salvation includes sanctification. In Galatians 2:19-20, after saying " I died to law in order that I may live for God," Paul adds, " the life which I now live in flesh, I live in faith." He thus implies that faith in Christ who gave Himself for us is the surrounding element of the consecrated life which God would have His servants live. This is in close harmony with the broad principle asserted in Mark 9:23, " all things are possible to him who believes ; " and with John 7:38-39, " He who believes in Me, from within him shall flow rivers of living water. This He spoke about the Spirit, which they who believed in Him were about to receive." Very instructive is Rom. vi. n. " In this way (i.e. like as Christ died to sin once : 5:10) reckon ye also yourselves to be dead to sin, but living for God, in Christ Jesus." This reckoning is the mental process of faith. For our own past experience contradicts flatly the reckoning which Paul bids us make. His words are therefore virtually a promise that what we reckon at his bidding God will from this moment work in us, saving us from sin and enabling us to live for Him. This promise of God, passing human thought, demands a faith like that of him who was " fully assured that, what He had promised, He was able also to perform : " Romans 4:21. And, as we stand beneath the cross of Him who died in order that we may live no longer for ourselves but for Him, and feel the constraining power of His love, we dare not hesitate. With a lowly con fidence which seems to us akin to madness, but which is commanded by God, we venture to expect that from this moment we shall experience a salvation from the power and defilement of sin and live a life of intelligent devotion to God hitherto unknown to us. The command of God, which in believing we obey, is itself a pledge that He will Himself make good in us the reckoning He bids us make. That God claims from His people unreserved devotion to Himself, and that what He claims from us He works in all who believe His implied promise, is the great doctrine of SANCTIFICATION BY FAITH ; a necessary complement of JUSTIFICATION BY FAITH. For the Spirit of Holiness given to those who believe is Himself a witness of their forgiveness : and that He is given to rebels to work in them whole-hearted allegiance, reconciles their forgiveness with the holiness of God. Moreover, this doctrine implies that complete victory over sin and full devotion to God are the present privilege of all believers. For, if these blessings came through efforts of our own, they would be obtained only by gradual and slow approach. But if they are God s gifts to us, they may be ours today. For we are sure that God requires them today: and what He requires He is able and willing, and is pledged, to impart. Although not stated so formally and conspicuously as Justification by Faith, the doctrine of Sanctification by Faith is clearly implied, in its due place in the Gospel of Christ, in Romans 6:1; Romans 6:1 : for the reckoning is the process of intelligent faith ; and to live for God is holiness. So verses 19, 22 : " for sanctification r It under lies also much else in the New Testament: e.g. above, pp. 97, 98. And it has been understood by the best men in all Churches and ages ; and has been the secret of their power. Like Justifying Faith, also Sanctifying Faith has God and Christ for its PERSONAL OBJECT : so 1 Timothy 1:12, " I know whom I have believed, and I am persuaded that He is able to guard that which I have committed to Him till that day ; " Mark 11:22-23, Galatians 2:20. In each department, saving faith is an assurance, resting on the word and power and love of God, that He will fulfil in us His promise of salvation : and in this conviction the believer is at rest. They differ in their OBJECT-MATTER, i.e. in the specific promise believed. The one grasps the promise of pardon for all who believe, and thus obtains pardon : the other ventures to believe that God will Himself work in us here and now, by His Spirit, the unreserved devotion which He claims. Thousands can bear witness that in proportion to their faith this promise has been fulfilled in them. Moreover, as Justifying Faith is impossible without repentance, i.e. an earnest purpose to forsake all sin, so Sanctifying Faith is impossible without self-consecration. For we cannot believe that God will work in us a life of which He is the one aim unless we deliberately choose such a life. Consequently, holiness involves self-consecration. This is clearly set forth in Romans 6:13, where, after bidding us (v. 11) to reckon ourselves to be living for God, Paul bids, " present yourselves to God . . . and the members of your bodies." And in 5:19 he adds, " present the members of your bodies . . . for sanctification" In ch. xii. i he enters on the topic of Christian morals by bidding, " present your bodies a living, holy sacrifice to God." We present our bodies to God when we deliberately and solemnly resolve that henceforth our lips shall speak only His message, our hands do only His work, our feet run only on His errands, and our life show forth His glory. Henceforth we look upon our bodily powers as belonging no longer to ourselves but to God. And, since our body is the only link which unites us to the world in which we live, to present our bodies, is to present ourselves. To be effective, this consecration must be accompanied by sanctifying faith, i.e. by an assurance resting upon the word of God that in spite of the allurements and threats of the world, and of our own weakness, He will maintain in us this resolve and enable us to work it out practically in the details of life. Without this faith, our resolve will be vain. Self-consecration is obedience to God s command claiming from us unreserved devotion : sanctifying faith is acceptance of the promise that what He claims He will work in us. This claim and this promise are the Law and the Gospel of Holiness. Sanctifying Faith differs further from the faith which justifies in that the former is at once and in increasing measure verified by actual experience. Justification is the smile of a pardoning God replacing, for the justified, His righteous anger against sin : and, that God smiles on them, the justified know at first only by faith. But the new life in Christ is matter of direct experience. The sanctified are conscious of a Hand from above raising them, and breaking their previous bondage to sin : and they feel in their hearts the pulsations of a new life. They are conscious of new aims and efforts which their moral sense approves. This new and self-attested life is complete verification of the faith with which in their felt moral weakness they ventured to expect it ; and of the earlier faith with which they accepted the Gospel promise of forgiveness. For, that they have now power to do right in a measure unknown before, is complete proof that their past sins are forgiven. Thus sanctifying faith and its results both supplement and verify the faith which justifies. Compare 2 Corinthians 1:12 : " Our exultation is this, the testimony of our conscience that in holiness and sincerity of God, not in fleshly wisdom but in God’s grace, we have behaved ourselves in the world." The three elements discussed above, viz. (i) unreserved loyalty to Christ, (2) breathed into man by the Holy Spirit, (3) on the condition of faith, are in their nature inseparably connected. For, through our inborn bondage to sin, God s purpose that we live for Him cannot be accomplished unless by His power He work in us the devotion He claims. Moreover, if this devotion is to be in any sense our own, God s work in us must be conditioned by our own free surrender to Him : and, of this surrender, faith is the simplest form. Thus the Holy Spirit is a link connecting faith with the new life. For faith has not in itself power to save : but, to those who believe, God gives, in sovereign mercy, the divine Bearer of the power and life of God. To know this, greatly helps our faith. For we cannot doubt that the Spirit thus given is able to impart even to us the devotion which God claims. The above doctrine changes completely the whole aspect of the Christian life. It becomes now an effort to understand the will of God, and to believe that what He demands He will Himself work in us. This new aspect greatly increases our obligation to give to God that which He claims : for we can no longer plead the excuse of inability. On the other hand, it brings within our reach a devotion to God otherwise impossible and inconceivable. Henceforth we wait, in confi dence and joy, to see in our own experience the wonderful works of God. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 13: 1.11. HOLINESS AS OPPOSED TO SIN ======================================================================== CHAPTER XI HOLINESS AS OPPOSED TO SIN So far, we have studied Holiness without any direct reference to sin. Indeed we have found the word holy predicated of not a few objects about which there can be no thought either of sin or the absence of sin, e.g. the gold of the Temple. But, when predicated of men, holiness, i.e. unreserved devotion to God, implies complete victory over all sin. For all sin, in thought, word, or deed, tends to hinder God s purposes. As soon as we resolve to live for God, devoting to His service all we have and are, and in proportion to the earnestness of our resolve, we become conscious of a force within us tending to thwart, and actually thwarting, our earnest purpose. This adverse influence brings moral bondage and moral defilement, i.e. a felt inability to refrain from what we know to be wrong and a sense of shame which prompts us to hide our conduct and inner life from the view of others. This bondage is in part a result of inherited tendencies to evil, and in part a consequence of our own indulgence in personal transgression. It is directly opposed to God. There can, therefore, be no complete devotion to God without complete victory over this inward force of evil. We now ask, In what relation do the sanctified stand to this hostile and defiling power ? In Matthew 1:21, an angel directs, "Thou shalt call His name Jesus : for it is He who will save His people from their sins." Similarly, in John 1:29 the Baptist points to " the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world." These conspicuous assertions imply that to save men from sin was a chief part of the work which Christ came to do. In 1 Corinthians 6:11, after a list of sins of which some of his readers had been guilty, Paul writes, " ye washed yourselves, ye were sanctified, ye were justified." In other words, at their baptism they had symbolically put away the defilement of sin, had been consecrated to the service of God, and had been received by the great Judge as righteous. In 2 Corinthians 7:1 he bids them realise in their inner and outer life this outward symbol : " let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of flesh and spirit, accomplishing holiness in fear of God." This outward and inward purification is here represented as their own act : for although wrought entirely by the power of God, salvation is conditional on our acceptance of that which God waits to give. After completing, in Romans 3:21; Romans 5:21, his exposition of Justification through faith and through the death of Christ, and proving that through Christ we are saved from the consequences not only of our own past sins but of a fatal heritage received from the father of our race, Paul goes on to discuss, in ch. vi., the moral consequences of this deliverance. He asks a question implying that we can no longer continue in sin, because "we have died to sin ; " and justifies this last assumption by saying that at our baptism we were buried in the grave of Christ, and thus became sharers with Him in the consequences of His own death. Now by His death on the cross, and in the moment of His death, Christ escaped absolutely from that contact with sinful humanity which had caused His suffer ings and death. By death, He was set free. Paul bids his readers "reckon" that in this deliverance they are sharers, and are therefore, in Christ, " dead to sin." This expLamentations 5:6: "crucified with Him ... in order that we may no longer be slaves to sin." All this means that just as a dead man is absolutely separated from the world in which he lived, and just as Christ by His death escaped from all His foes, so they who put faith in Christ are saved from all enslaving and defiling contact with sin. We have thus, in v. ii, in few words, the negative and positive sides of holiness : " dead to sin but living for God, in Christ Jesus." That this deliverance from sin is due to the death of Christ is plainly asserted in Titus 2:14, "who gave Himself on our behalf, that He might ransom us from all lawlessness, and cleanse for Himself a people of His own, zealous for good works;" in Ephesians 2:7, " redemption through His blood;" in Hebrews 9:14, " how much more shall the blood of Christ cleanse your conscience from dead works, to serve the living God;" and in 1 John 1:7, "the blood of Jesus, His Son, cleanses us from all sin." CompaRevelation 5:9 : li He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." Here pardon and cleansing are placed in due sequence. That purification, like pardon, is obtained by faith is implied in Acts 15:9 : " having cleansed their hearts by faith." Similarly 1 Peter 1:5 : " who are guarded in the power of God, through faith." For sin is man s worst foe : and none are safely guarded unless they are saved from all sin. Also 1 John 5:4 : " this is the victory which has conquered the world, even our faith." The language quoted above does not necessarily imply annihilation of all in herited tendencies to evil or of the influence of formed habits of sin : for these do not defile us unless yielded to. Consequently, a felt tendency to evil, trampled under foot by the power of God, is not inconsistent with the purity described above. So Christ, though dead to sin, is ever from His throne carrying on war against it. These passages each plainly complete victory over every temptation to sin, a victory gained for us by the death of Christ. For we cannot be dead to sin while we are led astray and polluted by it. But if, as each temptation rises, it is overcome, even though we be. conscious of its presence as a conquered enemy ever ready to rebel and therefore an abiding danger, then are we, kept by the power of God, both cleansed from sin and dead to sin. This distinction is of utmost practical importance. For many who have ventured to accept the full salvation promised in the Gospel have been disappointed to find the old tendencies to evil, perhaps after a period of apparent quiescence, again asserting themselves and endeavouring to regain their lost power; and thus occasioning fresh conflict with a foe supposed to be dead. The disappointment is needless. If we abide in faith and thus abide in God, each temptation will be followed by victory. And each victory will weaken the power of our adversary; and will reveal the impregnability of the fortress in which we have taken refuge. Sinful habits can be eradicated only as they have been formed, viz. by a course of action. God will both rescue us from, and destroy, formed habits of sin, in thought, word, or act, by giving us constant victory over them. The man who has been a slave to drink will probably not at once lose finally and altogether his appetite for it. But he will receive power to conquer it. And each victory will weaken it. But possibly it may recur as a danger needing to be guarded against with constant watchfulness. Very instructive is Galatians 5:16-17: " Walk by the Spirit, and ye will not accomplish the desire of the flesh. For the flesh desires against the Spirit; and the Spirit against the flesh. For these are hostile, each to the other, in order that, whatever things ye wish, these ye may not do." Here is no word of blame ; but simply a statement of fact. We may therefore take it as describing the normal state of the adopted sons of God. Two mutually hostile influences seek to control their action, viz. the bodily life which they share with animals, and the Spirit of God. This suggests a continuance of inborn influences opposed to the Spirit of God. To these evil influences, we must offer stern resistance. God will enable us to trample them utterly under our feet. That, as we have seen, salvation from sin is wrought in us by the Holy Spirit on the condition of faith, puts within our reach a degree of purity otherwise impossible. For to the power of the Spirit there are no limits : and we cannot doubt the promise of Christ. We therefore go each day into the conflict against sin, even against the accumulated power of our own past sins, and in spite of our own felt moral weakness, with a shout of victory. For we know that the conflict is carried on, not by our weakness, but by the infinite power of the Spirit of God dwelling in our hearts and keeping us from all evil. To thousands of the servants of Christ, the discovery that salvation from sin is a w r ork and gift of God in those who believe has been an era in their spiritual life. Probably each day, as they review it, they are ready to admit that through defective faith it has been marked by sinful imperfection. But they thankfully acknowledge that by the grace of God they have lived a life of victory over sin unknown to them until they ventured to trust the keeping of their wayward hearts to the great Shepherd. Their song is, " To God be thanks, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ:" 1 Corinthians 15:57. From the above we learn that, although from one point of view the new life is a march of triumph following a victory already gained for us by Christ, from another point of view it is a continued conflict needing constant watchfulness and strenuous effort. So Ephesians 6:12, "we wrestle not with flesh and blood, but with principalities and powers : " and 1 Peter 5:8-9, u be watchful : your adversary the Devil, as a roaring lion, walks about seeking whom he may devour." Each aspect must be kept in view. The solution of the apparent contradiction is that, although the conflict continues, it is altogether changed. The shout of battle has become a shout of victory. On the relation of Holiness to Sin, 1 Thessalonians 4:3 sheds light. The words " your sanctification " are in apposition with the words "will of God:" and the word " this " points forward to " that ye abstain from fornication, that each, etc." Paul says that "God s will" about us, i.e. His " sanctification " of us claiming our devotion, involves our abstinence from all that He forbids. In giving us the Gospel " call," He was sanctifying us for Himself. To this passage we have in Leviticus 11:43-44 an Old Testament parallel. In 1 John 3:6 we read, " everyone who abides in Him does no sin : everyone that sins has not seen Him, nor knows Him." Song of Solomon 5:9 : " everyone born from God does no sin ... and cannot sin." Probably the word " sin " refers here to actual transgression; as in James 1:15, where it is distinguished from " desire," which, " having conceived, brings forth sin." These words assert that the new life is altogether hostile to sin ; and that they who commit sin either (note the Greek perfect tense) have not seen the heavenly light, or have lost the effect of the vision. The victory over sin described above is a wonderful and decisive verification of the faith with which, while groaning under the power of sin, we ventured to accept the promise of deliverance. For our sins were essentially our own : and we found ourselves in the past utterly under their power. But now their power is broken : and this salvation reveals the presence in our hearts of a Helper mightier than the sins which formerly held us in bondage. Moreover, this Helper moves us to bow to Christ and to call God our Father. This proves that He is the Holy Spirit given by God in Christ to His adopted sons. In other words, we are directly conscious of an unseen Hand raising and guarding us : and we know that it is the hand of our Father in heaven. This inward experience of the presence and power of God becomes at once a ground of still firmer faith in God and an inspiration of still more joyous hope of final victory. At this point a caution is needed. Although frequently mentioned in close connection with deliverance from sin, holiness is never a synonym of purity. We never find the exact phrase, " sanctify from sin." Even in the comparison of Hebrews 9:13-14, the word sanctify is re placed in the second member by " cleanse." And the reason is not far to seek. Although without purity we cannot be subjectively holy, yet holiness is much more than purity. For purity is a mere negative excellence ; and might be conceived as existing without activity. Indeed a mere negative sinlessness has sometimes been the aim of mistaken spiritual effort. But holiness implies the most intense mental and bodily activity of which we are capable. For it is the employment of all our powers and opportunities to work out God s purposes : and this implies the use of our intelligence to learn how best to do His work, and the bodily effort which His work requires. In order to keep before us the essentially positive nature of holiness, the word holy is never used to denote simple salvation from sin. Nevertheless, just as there cannot be holiness without purity, so practically there cannot be purity without holiness. We shall never be set free from sin until all our powers are devoted to God. For sin arises from the erection of Self into the supreme power within us. And self will reign till a Mightier One occupies the throne it has usurped. Our hearts are emptied of sin by being filled with the Holy Spirit. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 14: 1.12. GROWTH IN HOLINESS ======================================================================== CHAPTER XII GROWTH IN HOLINESS IN the New Testament we never read expressly and unmistakably of a gradual progress in sanctification. Or, if the present participles in Hebrews 2:11; Hebrews 10:14 refer to such progress, they shed no light on the upward path. The same may be said of a difficult passage, Revelation 22:1; Revelation 22:1 : " the righteous one, let him do righteous ness still more : and the holy one, let him be sanctified still more." It may be that the prophet here exhorts the holy man to a further consecration and a still higher service. But he does not indicate the steps of this advance. The reason of this silence is not far to seek. The very idea of holiness involves entirety. For God claims the whole of all we have and are. He claims every moment of our time, every penny we possess, and to be Himself the one aim of our every purpose and effort. He claims all this now; not by partial and gradual, but by immediate, surrender. And what He claims, He is ready this moment to impart. To keep this great truth before us, the writers of the New Testament were held back from speaking of partial or imperfect holiness. So we read, without any note of degree : " that she may be holy both in body and spirit," 1 Corinthians 7:34; "that it may be holy and spotless," Ephesians 5:27; "to present you holy and spotless and unimpeachable," Colossians 1:22 ; " holy in all behaviour," 1 Peter 1:15. In all these passages, the simple word holy denotes absolute devotion to God. In 1 Thessalonians 5:23, the adjective rendered in A.V. and R.V. wholly denotes, not the measure or manner, but either the objects or the result, of sanctification. Paul prays that God may sanctify his readers, and thus make them all-mature, i.e. bring to maturity every part of their being. He then prays that their " spirit and soul and body," i.e. their entire personality, may be so kept that no part will be defective, so that no part may be open to blame in the day when Christ will come to judge the world. The adjective which I have rendered all-mature links together, in the above passage, sanctification with the word rendered (R.V.) perfect in Matthew 5:48 twice, Matthew 19:21, Romans 12:2; Romans 12:1-21:1 Corinthians 13:10, Philemon 3:15, Colossians 1:28; Colossians 4:12, Heb. ix. u,James 1:4 twice, verses James 1:17, James 1:25, James 3:2, 1 John 4:18. The same word is in 1 Corinthians 2:6 rendered perfect, marg. full-grown ; 2 Chronicles 14:20, it is rendered men, marg. of full age\ in Ephesians 4:13, full-grown; in Hebrews 5:14, full-grown men, marg. perfect. The corresponding substantive is in Colossians 3:14 rendered perfectness ; and in Hebrews 6:1, perfection^ marg. full growth. The corresponding verb is found in Philemon 3:12, James 2:22, 1 John 2:5; 1 John 4:12; 1 John 4:17; 1 John 4:18, always rendered made perfect or perfected. This variety of rendering, and these marginal notes, are due to the fact that we have no one English word which conveys exactly the sense of the Greek word usually rendered perfect. Its meaning, however, is open to no doubt. It denotes everywhere maturity, or full growth, that which has attained its full development. This meaning is not adequately suggested by the English rendering perfect. Moreover this last word suggests to English ears a stage of development not needing, and perhaps not admitting, further progress. It therefore ought not to be used without careful guarding. And a term needing to be carefully guarded is undesirable, as always liable to be misunderstood. For the term will be remembered when the safe guard is forgotten. The term Christian maturity represents more accurately the Greek conception ; and is much less liable to misunderstanding than is the phrase Christian perfection. That the word did not in Paul s thought denote a definite stage of spiritual growth, is proved by his explicit disavowal in Philemon 3:12: "not that I have already obtained or am already made perfect" Yet in some sense he seems in 5:15 to claim perfection for himself and others : " so many then as are perfect, (or mature or full-grown) let us be thus minded." Similarly 1 Corinthians 2:6: " we speak wisdom among the full-grown ones." The sense of maturity is made conspicuous in 1 Corinthians 3:1-2, where "spiritual " men are contrasted with " babes in Christ " who must be fed, not with strong food, but with milk, The same contrast is found in 1 Corinthians 14:20, " become not children in your minds, but in wickedness be babes, and in your minds become perfect ." so Hebrews 5:12-14: "having need of milk, not of solid food. For everyone who partakes of milk ... is a babe. Solid food belongs to full-grown ones." This use of the word before us determines generally the idea conveyed by it, but leaves it on the indefinite boundary between youth and adult age. In 1 John 2:12-14 we have three stages, fathers, young men, and children : but they cannot be accurately distinguished : and no one of them can be identified with Paul s word full-grown or perfect. Further light is shed on the same word in James 2:22 : " faith was working with his works, and from the works the faith was made perfect." By producing good works, faith was attaining its purpose and goal, and in this sense its full development. Similarly 1 John 2:5; 1 John 4:12; 1 John 4:17; 1 John 4:18. God s love to us, manifested in sending His Son into the world, attains its goal in us, and in this sense is made perfect, when we keep His word, love our brethren, and are saved from fear of judgment. In Luke 6:40, 2 Corinthians 13:9; 2 Corinthians 13:1; 2 Corinthians 13:1, Ephesians 4:12; Ephesians 4:1-32:1 Thessalonians 3:10, Hebrews 13:21; Hebrews 13:1-25:1 Peter 5:10 we have another Greek word denoting " ready for use " or " to equip fully." This implies progress. Other references to spiritual growth are found in 2 Thessalonians 1:3, " we ought to thank God always about you . . . because your faith grows exceedingly and the love of each one of you all increases ; " in Romans 1:1-32. u, "that I may impart to you some spiritual gift, in order that ye may be established." So Philemon 1:6-10, " He who began in you a good work will complete it ... in order that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and all discernment; that ye may approve the better things, that ye may be sincere and without stumbling, till the day of Christ, filled with fruit of righteousness." I2 Chronicles 3:12-14 Paul gives a graphic picture of his own spiritual progress : "I press on, if also I may lay hold of that for which I have been laid hold of by Christ ... I press on towards the goal for the prize ... let us therefore, as many as are perfect, be thus minded." All this implies that intense effort with a definite aim, like that of a racer, is the normal attitude of the servants of Christ. Progress is an unfailing mark of spiritual health ; stagnation, of spiritual decay. In Ephesians 4:13-14 we have again a "full-grown (or perfect) man " contrasted with babes tossed like waves and carried about by every wind of teaching : and a sublime prayer i2 Chronicles 3:14-17, marking out the direction of spiritual growth. In 1 Corinthians 14:20 we have, in contrast to mental childishness, a mental man hood or perfection : " become not children in your minds, but in wickedness be babes, and in your minds become perfect " or "full-grown" Indisputably mental development admits of progress abso lutely unlimited. For none but the Omniscient knows all things. The above New Testament teaching implies that whereas the word holy con veys one definite idea, and Sanctification by Faith marks a definite stage in spiritual thought and growth, the New Life in Christ is marked throughout by sustained progress. Each point gained is a starting-point for further advance. All this is confirmed by the experience of the servants of Christ. To learn that God claims, not only to set limits to our actions and aims, but the unreserved devotion to His work of all our powers and possessions, has been to thousands a new revelation. And when, after fruitless personal efforts to render to Him the devotion He requires, we learn for the first time that God will work in us by His Spirit and by actual spiritual contact with Christ the devotion He requires ; and when we venture to believe that He does now and will henceforth work in us this devotion to Himself; and when we find by happy experience that according to our faith it is done to us ; the experience thus gained becomes an era in our spiritual life. Henceforth we walk in a new light, and measure ourselves by a higher standard. On the other hand, it frequently, perhaps usually, happens, as in Justification so in Sanctification, that only gradually we lay hold by faith of the promises of the Gospel ; and therefore obtain by gradual approach these great benefits. But neither for Justification nor Sanctification is lapse of time needful. God is waiting to forgive now all those who turn from sin and believe His promise of forgiveness. He claims now, from all the justified, unreserved devotion : and what He claims He is ready here and now to work in them ; to save them from all sin and to breathe into the adopted sons of God the Spirit of the Only-be gotten Son to be in them the inspiration of a new life like His. We have no need to climb to Heaven or to descend into the abyss. This, Christ has done for us. We venture to believe : and, in proportion to our faith, the promised blessings are ours. Nevertheless, our best works are sadly defective. Frequently we mistake the best means of working out the purposes of God : and our mistakes are often due to culpable spiritual blindness, for which we stand condemned. Or in the moment of temptation, like Peter on the stormy lake, our faith fails, and we yield and sink; or like him even after the baptism of Pentecost, as is asserted in Galatians 2:11, we are unfaithful to what we know to be right and true. But for these cases, provision is made. " These things I write to you in order that ye may not sin. And if anyone sin, a Paraclete we have with the Father, Jesus Christ, a righteous one; and Himself is a propitiation for our sins:" 1 John 2:1-2. We go at once, as penitent sinners, and humbly beg forgiveness : we stretch out our feeble hands to Him who is able and ready to save. Moreover each day we learn better what will, and what will not, advance the purposes of God : and each day our one great purpose permeates more fully our entire thoughts and more fully directs our entire activity. Each day brings to us fresh proof of the Faithfulness, Power, and Love, of God ; and thus strengthens and widens the faith with which we lay hold of the promised blessings. Our daily submission to the guidance of the Spirit brings us more completely under His holy influence. Thus are formed habits of intelligent devotion to God. And, to those who have put on the new man, there is a progressing renewal, in the direction of clearer understanding, according to the image of Him who created us : Colossians 3:10. They who con tinue looking into the Gospel mirror are day by day transformed into the image of Christ: 2 Corinthians 3:18. To this renewal and transformation there is no limit. And, since the entire life and activity of the servants of Christ take the form of devotion to God, all spiritual progress is growth in holiness. From all this we learn that the New Life in Christ is designed by God to be sustained progress in knowledge and faith, each helping the other, and in the development of character : on the other hand, along this upward path we have found definite points of advance, each marking a new era and leading up to still further and more rapid progress. In Matthew 22:37-40, Christ sums up the whole law, quoting Deuteronomy 6:5, Leviticus 19:18, in two great commands: (i) "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God in all thy heart and in all thy soul and in all thy mind," and (2) " Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." This last, Christ makes in Matthew 5:44-48 a "perfect" pattern for imitation of our " heavenly Father." And in Romans 13:8-10 Paul declares it to be "fulfilment of the Law." All this makes whole-hearted love to God and to man obligatory to all servants of Christ; and gives it as another ideal and measure of the New Life in Christ. This " new commandment " is more difficult to obey than was the ancient Decalogue. But even in Deuteronomy 30:6 it is met by an adequate prophetic promise : "Jehovah thy God will circumcise thy heart and the heart of thy seed, to love Jehovah thy God in all thy heart and in all thy soul." This love to God and to those for whom Christ died is a needful complement to the devotion of all our powers to His service, as set forth in this volume. For whole-hearted devotion is possible only for those whom we love supremely : and love to God evokes love to the objects of His love, to all those embraced in His great purpose of mercy. Consequently, although love to God and holiness are not expressly associated in the Bible and are distinct elements of the New Life in Christ, they are inseparably connected. As we lay upon the altar sanctified by the blood of Christ our own poor sacrifice, it is accepted by a further revelation of God s love to us, which kindles a brighter flame of love to God and man. This love is also distinct from, though closely related to, the "perfected love" in 1 John 2:5; 1 John 4:12; 1 John 4:17; 1 John 4:18. This last is God s love to us, evoking our love to Him, and attaining its aim by transform ing our entire thought and life into love towards men. This love to God and man is breathed into us by the Holy Spirit revealing to us the significance of the death of Christ as a manifestation of the Father s love : Romans 5:5; Romans 5:8; Romans 5:1-21; 1 John 4:9-10; 1 John 4:19. " We love, because He first loved us." Indis putably this love to God and man admits of, and requires, unlimited growth, both in intensity and intelligence. This development, we shall best obtain, not by painful introspection whether and how much we love God, or man, but by con templating His infinite love to us, and remembering that the same love embraces the whole race for whom Christ died. Such growth in love makes our devotion to God more effective. It is therefore a growth in holiness ; and a measure of our spiritual stature. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 15: 1.13. THE HOLINESS OF GOD ======================================================================== CHAPTER XIII THE HOLINESS OF GOD WE have now learnt that the word holy is a relative term denoting always, when applied to created objects, rational or irrational, something or someone devoted to Deity. This essential and simple meaning is made conspicuous in 2 Kings 10:20, where we have the phrase " sanctified for Baal." For by his worshippers Baal was looked upon as divine. That the word holy is relative, is conspicuously proved by the fuller and frequent phrase " holy to (or, for) Jehovah ; " in which the deity to whom the holy objects were devoted is expressly mentioned. But, since the one and only deity recognised by Israel was Jehovah, the word holy is frequently used, without any addition, as itself sufficient to denote devotion to Jehovah, the God of Israel. The above is the only meaning common to the various visible holy objects of the Old Covenant ; e.g. the Sabbath, Mount Sinai, the firstborn, and the temple with its altar and ritual. Consequently the word holy does not in itself convey the idea of morality. For it is frequently used where there is no thought of morality or immorality. On the other hand, inas much as God requires in His worshippers absolute devotion to His service, this in volving every moral excellence, the word implies, when used of intelligent persons, the highest morality. In them, in consequence of the conspicuous moral nature of God, a changed relation to deity involves a change of character reaching to the inmost thought of the heart. In the Old Testament, the devotion of the holy objects to Jehovah was due ultimately, not to man s gift, but, with very few exceptions, to the express command of God. They were holy because God had claimed them for His own. This objective holiness, man s disobedi ence could not set aside. It remained to condemn those who, by defiance of God, desecrated His holy things. But, since God s claim laid upon men a solemn obligation to give to Him that which He claimed, the word holy sometimes, and the cognate verb sanctify always when applied to created objects, are used to denote the actual consecration by men of objects which God had claimed for Himself. Since these objects were surrounded by others not thus consecrated, e.g. the Sabbath as compared with other days of the week, Mount Sinai in contrast to the surrounding desert, the Tabernacle and its courts in contrast to the camp of Israel, the word holy associated with itself the idea of separation. But this was only a secondary and derived meaning ; due to the nearness of the not-sanctified. In Heaven there will be perfect holiness without thought of separation. In the New Testament, the symbolic conception of holiness is kept up in the holiness of the firstborn ; and of the Temple which sanctified the gold used in its construction. But the words holy and sanctify receive an infinitely higher sig nificance in the great prayer of Christ, "Sanctify them in the Truth," followed by the assertion, " on their behalf I sanctify Myself, in order that also they may be sanctified" This Sanctification in Christ receives further expression in the title saint or holy given to all professed followers of Christ ; and in Paul s prayer that God would sanctify^ and thus raise to spiritual maturity, those who were already " called saints! All this gives to the words holy and sanctify, both in the Old and New Testaments, one clear and definite meaning, viz. a giving up to God of that which He has claimed to be specially His own ; this claim involving a special obligation, and a special privilege. This term, with this definite meaning when applied to men and things, is used in certain parts of the Old Testament, and in a few places in the New, as an attribute or predicate of God. See pp. 33-39. This use at once gives to the word holy infinite dignity, as worthy to describe an element in the nature of God. But it is not sufficiently definite in Old or New Testament to distinguish clearly the Holiness of God from His other attributes. Our only way to learn the meaning of the word holy when applied to God is to compare its indisputable and clearly-defined meaning when applied to created objects ; and especially to men, who are created in the image of God. In this way only, would those who heard the Jewish Scriptures read in the Synagogue interpret the phrase " Holy One of Israel." To them the use of the same term to describe God and man would reveal in God an element common to God and man. Indeed we can know God only so far as we find in ourselves something akin to God. This method cannot be set aside by the fact that holiness in God cannot be exactly the same as in man. Certainly God cannot be devoted to Himself. Nor can the Holiness of God be His devotion to us and our highest good. For Holiness is always, not devotion simply, but devotion to deity, to one infinitely superior to the objects devoted to Him. The relation of God to man, of the Creator to the created, cannot be exactly the same as that of man to God. Just so the Righteousness of God, who administers with equal hand His own laws, is not quite the same as the righteousness of men who obey His laws. Yet the idea of righteousness is the same in both cases, viz. conformity to law, in Ruler or ruled. We must seek a meaning of the term before us which stands related to the holiness of men as the Creator is related to the creature. Since holiness in man is a relation of man to God, we expect to find in the Holiness of God an element of His nature underlying man s relation to Him. The term " Holy One of Israel " is evidently a divine counterpart to " holy for Jehovah." This implies that God s claim to the devotion to Himself of that which He has made, and especially to the unreserved devotion of His intelligent creatures, is an outflow of His inmost nature : it implies that He can do no other than claim their devotion. One step further, we can safely take. We reverently ask, Why does God claim the unreserved devotion of our time, opportunities, talents, and all we have and are, to work out His own purposes ? The answer is easy. An intelligent being can attain his highest welfare only by concentrating his powers and effort on the attainment of a worthy purpose. Now all self-chosen purposes are unworthy : for the stream cannot rise above its source. Therefore God, seeking ever our highest good, gives Himself, and His pur pose of mercy, to His servants to be their one aim, in order that thus, by pursuing the noblest aim possible, men may ever rise towards God. The Love of God, the one central and essential attribute from which all His other moral attributes flow, moves Him to claim for Himself all we have and are. In other words, the Holiness of God is His Love contem plating intelligent creatures, capable of selecting and pursuing an aim in life, and giving Himself to be their one and only aim. Yet Holiness is distinct from Love. Its specific quality is that it keeps ever in view man s capacity for choosing and pursuing a deliberate aim. It has been well said that Purpose is the autograph of Mind. Wherever there is purpose, there is mind. Wherever mind and purpose are directed towards the one supreme Source of mind, there is holiness. As the Supreme Mind, holiness has its source in God. Of this essential holiness of the Father, the eternal devotion of the Son is an eternal outflow; and, of this holiness of the Father and the Son, the holiness of men is a created and human outflow and copy. Since all sin, in action, word, or thought, is hurtful to men, and therefore opposed to the loving purposes of God, His holiness, as an outflow of His love, is utterly and strenuously opposed to all sin. Con sequently, in so far as we are subjectively holy, we shall share this hostility to all sin. Moreover, as an influence against sin, God s holiness and love moved Him to threaten punishment for sin, and moves Him to punish sin, and to destroy those who persist in sin. Hence the solemn words in Deuteronomy 28:58, "that thou mayest fear this glorious and fearful name, Jehovah thy God " ; and Hebrews 12:29, " our God is a consuming fire." The above exposition retains the definite and conspicuous meaning of the word holy as embodied in various visible objects ever before the eyes of Israel in the ritual of the temple, and familiar on the pages of their sacred books ; and traces the idea thus embodied to the in most nature of God. It cannot be said that the Holiness of God is a conspicuous element of the Gospel as set forth in the New Testament. It is found there, apart from two important quotations from the Old Testament, only three times : see p. 52. But the conception of holiness was kept before the earliest followers of Christ in the term saint or holy person, used to describe them, and in the new title, "Holy Spirit," given to the Spirit of God. On no important topic in theology do we find so much diversity of opinion and consequent uncertainty as about the Holiness of God. So Prof. Davidson, in his very able volume on The Theology of the Old Testament, p. 144, says, " The Holiness of Jehovah is a very obscure subject, and the most diverse views regarding it have prevailed among Old Testament students." He goes on to say that in Phoenician the term holy as applied to God is " a mere epitheton ornans, having no force." This is almost a suggestion of despair. He agrees with the exposition given in this volume that " the word is applied to men and things, not as describing any quality in them, but to indicate their relation to deity." Consequently, "in its original use the term holy when applied either to God or to men, does not express a moral quality." He goes on to say, but without giving any adequate proof, that the word holy " as applied to Jehovah is a general term expressing Godhead." He adds that the word " holy acquired contents, and one prophet puts in one kind of contents into it and another another." If this be so, the word in their lips was practically meaningless. On p. 149 f., he properly places, as I have done on p. 39 of this volume, the holiness of God in close relation to His "jealousy." But his entire discussion of the Holiness of God, on pp. 144-160, leaves the whole matter shrouded in uncertainty. The same may be said of a very devout and excellent book by the Rev. Andrew Murray entitled Holy in Christ. Pages 281-283 are occupied by quotations from my earlier book on Holiness. On p. 284 Mr. Murray adds, " However much truth there be in the above exposition, it hardly meets our desire for an insight into what is one of the highest attributes of the very Being of God. When the Seraphs worship Him as the Holy One, and in their Thrice Holy reflect something of the deepest mystery of Godhead, it surely means more than merely the expression of God s claim as Sovereign Proprietor of all." But can even the noblest creatures of God pay to Him higher honour than by recognising His rightful " claim as Sovereign Proprietor of all ? " The only higher honour known to us is to recognise, in the light which shines from the cross of Christ, that this supreme claim is an outflow of infinite love, and that God claims our devotion because only by devoting to Him, in lowly gratitude, all we have and are and using all our powers to work out His purposes, can we attain our highest well-being. The Seraph cry, " Holy, Holy, Holy, Jehovah of Hosts," is surpassed only by the repeated assertion that " God is Love." Indeed Mr. Murray says, on p. 47, that 11 proprietorship is one of the central thoughts both in redemption and in sanctification." He then, on p. 284, continues, " The mistake appears to originate in taking first the meaning of the word holy from earthly objects, and then from that deducing that holiness in God cannot mean more than it does when applied to men. The Scriptures point to the opposite way. When Old and New Testaments say Be ye holy, for I am holy, I make holy, they point to God s holiness as the first, both the reason and the source of ours. We ought first to discover what holiness in God is." But in all human research we must proceed, not necessarily or usually, from cause to effect, but from that which is better known to that which is less known, from that which is nearer to us to that which is further off. Now the meaning of the word holy as applied to men, things, places, and times, was clearly taught by visible holy objects familiar to the eyes and thought of Israel, and familiar to us in the pages of the Old Testament. But the whole teaching of the Bible gives us no definite conception of the Holiness of God, except so far as the idea of holiness is embodied in the visible objects just referred to. Of this indefiniteness, the fifteen different and conflicting opinions about the Holiness of God quoted by Mr. Murray on pp. 286- 297, and the obscurity admitted by Prof. Davidson, are complete proof. On the other hand, we have, among all scholars, a general agreement touching the meaning of the word holy when applied to men and things. This practical certainty is our only avenue of approach to the mysterious Holiness of God. Just as God has in some measure revealed His natural attributes in the material Universe, so that " the Heavens are telling the glory of God," so also in the ancient ritual pre scribed to Israel He has given to them and to us a further and far deeper revela tion of Himself, of His relation to us, and of ours to Him. Mr. Murray says, on p. 285, that if "Holiness in God" is "a mere relation, . . . we should then have no attribute ex pressive of God s moral perfection." That Holiness in God is a mere relation, I have never said. It is a relation revealing His personal character. But it is not the highest revelation of His character. This is summed up in three words : " God is Love." For " love is the fulfilment of the Law : " Romans 13:10. Love involves all morality, and makes needless any further law. Moreover, to define God s holiness as His moral perfection, does not tell us in what His moral perfection consists. It adds nothing to our conception of God ; but is a mere blank label on which each one writes what he likes. In the book quoted above, Prof. David son discusses the important and conspicuous topic of Holiness only under the heading of the Holiness of God : see pp. 144-160, and again pp. 252-259, 264. But, as applied to created objects, he incidentally confirms the exposition given by me ; except that he has not adequately called attention to the fact that, as I have shown on pp. 18 f. and 26, the consecration of the holy things and men had its ultimate origin, not in man s gift, but almost always in the express command of God. This marks an infinite difference between the worship of Israel and the gifts laid on the altars of the Gentiles. We notice also that Dr. Davidson s ex position of holiness under the Old Covenant has little or no bearing on the Christian life of today. Yet this bearing gives to the ancient ritual its chief interest for us. Mr. Murray s volume, quoted above, is a most careful and reverent study of the teaching of the whole Bible about Holiness ; and an application of it throughout to the inward and outward life of the servants of Christ. Except in reference to the Holiness of God, he is in close general agreement with my earlier volume which he quotes at some length, and with this volume. Indeed he follows my method by tracing the use of the words holy and sanctify in Genesis and Exodus. More over, after calling attention, in a footnote on p. 49, to his long quotations from my book, he adopts on p. 52 my distinction between objective and subjective holiness: " The objective Divine gift, bestowed once for all and completely, must be appropriated as a subjective personal possession." Mr. Murray s careful and devout search of both Old and New Testaments, seeking at every point the bearing of holiness, in the ancient ritual and in the teaching of Christ and His apostles, on the spiritual life of men and women today, is worthy of all commendation. The results gained in this volume by careful inference from the teaching of the Old and New Testaments, read in the light of our own experience, we will now further test and develop by deduction from the nature of God as expounded above. In my Manuals of Theology I have pointed to various and decisive evidence attesting that beyond and above the visible universe is a Supreme Intelligence, the Creator of the world and the righteous and loving Ruler of men ; also to evidence proving that with Him, from eternity, is One Other than Himself, a Sharer by derivation from Him of His eternal and infinite attributes, the Only- begotten Son of God. We there saw that the entire activity of the Son is devoted to realisation of the Father s purposes ; the eternal Stream flowing back in full volume to its eternal Source. Thus in God, as an essential element of His nature, and in the relation of the Son to the Father, we have the eternal Arche type of Holiness. The infinite Love which is the inmost essence of God, seeking objects worthy of His love, moved Him to create finite creatures in His own image, in order that they may be sharers, with the Son, of His unreserved devotion to the Father ; in order that thus the Only-begotten might become the " Firstborn among many brethren." With this aim, God claims the unreserved devotion of all His intelligent creatures, this being the only way in which they can attain the purpose for which they were created, and their highest well-being. Since all sin hinders this divine purpose of mercy, God forbad sin, and supported His prohibition by tremendous penalties proportionate to the injury and loss which sin everywhere causes. This prohibition finds silent expression in the law written in the hearts of all men. Its positive counterpart, viz. that God claims not only avoidance of sin but unreserved devotion of all our powers to work out His purposes, found visible and symbolic, yet only partial and local, expression in the ritual prescribed for Israel. The separation of the holy things and men from all else around set forth the reality, nearness, and majesty of God. Thus the Creator of the world and of man became the God of the temple, the altar, the sacrifices, and the ritual; the Holy One of Israel. This conception of Holiness, derived from visible objects separated by God s command from all others, lived on in the thought of Israel through the Exile, the Return, the Maccabean struggle, to the days of Christ ; and perceptibly colours the language of the New Testament. In the supreme crisis of His life on earth, the Son prayed, touching His disciples, " Holy Father . . . Sanctify them in the Truth . . . and on their behalf I sanctify Myself that also they may be sanctified." This prayer was re-echoed in other prayers and exhortations and teaching in the New Testament. The sanctification involved therein found expression in the title saint given to all professed followers of Christ. And inasmuch as this active and unreserved devotion to God is realised in men only so far as they are purified and filled and moved by the inward presence of the Spirit of God, breathing into them the life and devotion of the Incarnate and Crucified and Risen Son, the Spirit of God receives, as His ordinary designation in the New Testament, the title HOLY SPIRIT. Hitherto we have sought, by study of the Mosaic Ritual, to understand the holiness which Christ came to realise in His people. The process may be profitably reversed. The holiness for which Christ prayed for His disciples explains, and is the only conceivable explanation of, a great part of the Mosaic Ritual. It has frequently been observed that the only explanation of the Mosaic sacrifices, and of the prominence given to blood in the ritual, is the doctrine that in later ages Christ came to save mankind by His own death ; and that apart from the death of Christ the Old Testament sacrifices are meaningless and therefore unaccountable. It is equally true that the prominence given in the Old Covenant to ceremonial holiness receives its only explanation from the holiness prayed for by Christ. In order to teach men, in the only way they could understand, that God bids them to look upon themselves as belonging to Him, and to use all their powers to work out His purposes, God set apart for Himself, in visible and symbolic form, a certain place, and certain men, things, and periods of time. Afterwards, when in this way men had become familiar with the idea of holiness, God proclaimed in Christ that this idea must be realised in every man and place and thing and time. Thus-, in the Biblical conception of holiness, we have an explanation of a marked and otherwise inexplicable feature of the Old Covenant ; a link binding the Covenants together; and a light which each Covenant reflects back on the other. In this volume we have seen the abiding practical worth of the Old Testa ment Ritual as a symbol of the New Life in Christ. To this abiding value, abundant witness is borne in Christian literature, and especially in Christian psalmody. In all ages and races Christian thought has found appropriate expression in the phraseology of the ancient ritual. This abiding spiritual benefit of symbols which have long ago passed away reveals their divine origin and thus confirms the narratives which trace them to commands given by God to ancient Israel. Of this far-reaching benefit, the writers of the Old Testament seem to have been themselves almost unconscious. And their unconsciousness of the real significance of that which they carefully describe indicates clearly a Hand unseen guiding their hands, or at least attests the divine origin of that which they describe. That in this remarkable manner the Old Covenant prepares a way for the New, proves that it came from Him who in later days sent His Son to announce the salvation dimly foreshadowed in the ancient symbols. This confirmation extends only to the broad principles under-lying the ritual, not to all its details; and it sheds little light on the author ship or age of the documents from which we derive our knowledge of the ritual. But it affords important evidence for the general historical truth of these documents. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 16: 1.14. HOLINESS IN THE METHODIST REVIVAL ======================================================================== CHAPTER XIV HOLINESS IN THE METHODIST REVIVAL So far we have considered Holiness as set forth in the Old and New Testaments : and in ch. viii. we paused for a moment to consider the intrinsic excellence of the New Life there depicted in symbol and in reality. We come now to consider this doctrine as it was apprehended and preached by the leaders of a movement which has permeated and raised the entire religious thought and life of the Anglo- Saxon race. Indisputably the Methodist Revival had its source in the religious experience of John and Charles Wesley. Of these, the latter still speaks to us in his hymns : and the evolution of the inner life of John Wesley lies open to us, in good part, in his various writings. From this last we have a treatise entitled A Plain Account of Christian Perfection, written evidently in A.D. 1765 : see Wesley s Works vol. xi. pp. 381 note and 444; and compare a letter reprinted in his Journal and dated 14 May 1765. In this treatise, Works vol. xi. p. 366, we read: "In the year 1725, being in the twenty-third year of my age, I met with Bishop Taylor s Rule and Exercises of Holy Living and Dying. In reading several parts of this book, I was exceed ingly affected ; that part in particular which relates to purity of intention. In stantly I resolved to dedicate all my life to God, all my thoughts, and words, and actions ; being thoroughly convinced, there was no medium; but that every part of my life must either be a sacrifice to God, or myself, that is, in effect, to the devil. Can any serious person doubt of this, or find a medium between serving God and serving the devil ? " In the year 1726, I met with Kempis s Christian s Pattern. The nature and extent of inward religion, the religion of the heart, now appeared to me in a stronger light than ever it had done before. I saw, that giving even all my life to God (supposing it possible to do this, and go no farther) would profit me nothing, unless I gave my heart, yea, all my heart to Him. I saw that simplicity of intention and purity of affection, one design in all we speak or do, and one desire ruling all our tempers, are indeed the wings of the soul, without which she can never ascend to the mount of God. " A year or two after, Mr. Law s * Chris tian Perfection and Serious Call were put into my hands. These convinced me, more than ever, of the absolute impossi bility of being half a Christian ; and I determined, through His grace, (the absolute necessity of which I was deeply sensible of,) to be all-devoted to God, to give Him all my soul, my body, and my substance." We have here, in its essence and fulness, the doctrine of Holiness as set forth in symbol in the Old Testament and applied in the New Testament to men and women in all positions in life, as expounded in this volume. See especially Law s Christian Perfection, where the title of ch. ii. is : " Christianity requires a change of Nature : a new life perfectly devoted to God." Also below : " It implies an entire Change of Life, a Dedication of ourselves, our Souls and Bodies unto God." This thought dominates the whole book. Wesley then quotes a sermon preached by himself in A.D. 1733, before the University of Oxford ; adding " his was the view of religion I then had, which even then I scrupled not to term perfection. This is the view I have of it now, without any material addition or diminution." He then appeals to hymns translated or published by him ; and to a sermon published by him in 1740, and entitled "Christian Perfection." After a long series of quotations, with here and there retractions or modifications of opinions formerly held, Wesley sums up his treatise on p. 444, " This is the whole and sole perfection, as a train of writings prove to a demonstration, which I have believed and taught for these forty years, from the year 1725 to the year 1765." It is worthy of note that, in this long and full chronological account of his own experience and of his subsequent teaching, Wesley does not mention the great spiritual crisis described in his Journal for 24 May 1738, in which he entered into joyful assurance of the favour of God. Yet indisputably this crisis was the great turning-point of his life, the transition from the comparative barren ness of his earlier years to the abundant and successful evangelism described in the subsequent pages of the Journal. Nor does he, in the treatise on Christian Perfection, lay emphasis on faith as the condition and means of obtaining this great blessing. Yet, in the months preceding the crisis of May 1738, he was carefully investigating the nature of justifying faith, which he describes in Sermon i., preached within a month of his obtaining peace with God. Moreover, in Sermon xliii., on the same text, Ephesians 2:8, published as a tract in 1765, about the time of the publication of the treatise on Christian Perfection, he asserts as follows : " I have continually testified in private and in public, that we are sanctified as well as justified by faith. And indeed the one of those great truths does exceedingly illustrate the other. Exactly as we are justified by faith, so are we sanctified by faith. Faith is the condition, the only condition, of sanctification, exactly as it is of justification. It is the condition : None is sanctified but he that believes; without faith no man is sanctified. And it is the only condition : This alone is sufficient for sanctification. Every one that believes is sanctified, whatever else he has or has not." In the same sermon, Wesley describes clearly and well " that faith whereby we are sanctified ; saved from sin, and perfected in love." We may almost say that the Plain Account of Christian Perfection needs to be supplemented by Sermon xliii. It is not unlikely that with this purpose the sermon was written and published. See also Sermon Ixxxiii., where the same account of Sanctifying Faith is given. Comparing the above dates, we see that John Wesley began to seek the Holy Living and Christian Perfection described by Jeremy Taylor and William Law before he began to seek forgiveness of sins ; possibly before he became conscious of his great need of forgiveness. This need was brought home to him by his felt failure in Georgia; and finds pathetic expression in his Journal for Feb. 1738, when reviewing the results of his sojourn there : " What have I learnt myself in the mean time? Why, (what I the least of all suspected,) that I who went to America to convert others, was never myself converted to God." This lesson, well learnt, was abundantly worth the long journey. And Wesley had learnt more than this : he had found teachers able to guide him further. Yet for twelve long years he had been earnestly, though unsuccessfully, seeking the holiness set before him by Taylor and Law. The explanation of Wesley s silence about the blessing found in May 1738 is probably that the Plain Account of Christian Perfection was written to meet a special need, viz. to prove that through out the forty years from 1725 to 1765 he had taught the same doctrine about Christian Perfection, in reply to some who said that he had changed his position ; that these opponents admitted and asserted (see Journal for i Nov. 1762) that sanctification is by faith ; and that therefore it was needless to re-assert this important truth. This sanctification was correctly described by Taylor and Law, and became in 1725 the object of Wesley s eager, though unsuccessful, effort. But they did not teach that it may be obtained here and now by faith. This serious defect, of which Wesley complains in letters to W. Law dated 14 and 30 May 1738, left him for many years in the wilderness of a vain search. From this twilight Wesley was in part delivered by the teaching of Peter Bohler and of Luther about Justification by Faith. But Wesley s sermon (No. xl.) on Christian Perfection, written in 1740, has the same defect ; and suggests that he had not then learnt clearly that sanctification, like justification, is obtained here and now in the moment we believe. His concluding words are, " Let us press towards the mark, for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus ; crying to Him night and day, till we also are delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the sons of God." But in Sermon xliii., as we have seen, the full light shines. In his Journal for i Nov. 1762 John Wesley says that he and his brother had known and taught instantaneous sanctification "above these twenty years." This implies sanctification by faith. The " twenty years " take us back to 1742; and suggest that, in the Wesleys, the great doctrine of Justification by Faith received within some four years its needful complement in the doctrine of Sanctification by Faith. The above account of the teaching of John Wesley receives remarkable confirmation in the hymns of his brother Charles, in which we find, in a larger measure than in the writings of John Wesley, holiness represented as unreserved devotion of all our powers to God, and this expressed in language borrowed from the ancient ritual. As examples, I may quote from The Methodist Hymn-Book the following : HYMN 561. Lord, in the strength of grace, With a glad heart and free, Myself, my residue of days, I consecrate to Thee. Thy ransomed servant, I Restore to Thee Thy own ; And, from this moment, live or die, To serve my God alone. HYMN 562. If so poor a worm as I May to Thy great glory live, All my actions sanctify, All my words and thoughts receive ; Claim me for Thy service, claim All I have and all I am. Take my soul and body s powers; Take my memory, mind, and will, All my goods, and all my hours, All I know and all I feel, All I think, or speak, or do; Take my heart but make it new. HYMN 583. End of my every action Thou, In all things Thee I see : Accept my hallowed labour now, I do it unto Thee. Whate er the Father views as Thine, He views with gracious eyes ; Jesus, this mean oblation join To Thy great sacrifice. HYMN 584. Thy bright example I pursue, To Thee in all things rise ; And all I think, or speak, or do, Is one great sacrifice. HYMN 588. Jesus, confirm my heart s desire To work, and speak, and think for Thee ; Still let me guard the holy fire, And still stir up Thy gift in me. Ready for all Thy perfect will, My acts of faith and love repeat, Till death Thy endless mercies seal, And make the sacrifice complete. A close parallel to Wesley s Sermon, No. xliii., expounding Sanctifying Faith, is found in Hymn 557. I cannot wash my heart, But by believing Thee, And waiting for Thy blood to impart The spotless purity. While at Thy cross I lie, Jesus, the grace bestow, Now Thy all-cleansing blood apply, And I am white as snow. The blessings conveyed, by these and many other similar hymns of Charles Wesley, to the hearts of unnumbered thousands, wherever the English language is spoken, cannot be measured. And the various writings of John and Charles Wesley contain abundant proof that the Methodist Revival was due to the doctrines of Justification and Sanctification by Faith apprehended by the Wesleys as the in spiration of their own life and fearlessly preached, by them and others, to all who would hear them. In my Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans, I have endeavoured to show that the above two doctrines are the chief elements in Paul s orderly statement of the Gospel he preached ; the former being stated, defended, and illustrated in Romans 3:21 v., and the latter in chs. vi. viii. Similarly, in the introduction to the Fourth Gospel, while asserting that the Word was with God in the beginning and was God, and became flesh and dwelt among men, the writer asserts also that to those who believe in His name He gave " a right to become children of God," and that these were " born from God : " John 1:1-14. Also in ch. iii., which was evidently designed to be an outline of His teaching, Christ asserts, in 5:16, that " God gave His only-begotten Son, in order that everyone who believes in Him may have eternal life." This statement, frequently repeated by the same writer in various forms, is an exact counterpart to Paul s statement that " the Gospel is a power of God for salvation to everyone who believes." With this compare John 7:38-39 : " He that believes in Me, from within Him shall flow rivers of living water. This He said touching the Spirit which they who believe in Him were about to receive." This marvellous promise found in the Methodist Revival a marvellous fulfilment. It is scarcely too much to say that this Revival was due to a rediscovery, and wide-spread proclamation, of the central elements of Christ s message of salvation. It is worthy of note that the Evangelical doctrines of Justification and Sanctification by Faith assume and rest upon the doctrines of the Divinity of Christ and of His Death as the mysterious means of our salvation, Himself raised from the dead. These great Catholic doctrines have been held even in ages of spiritual darkness. They are a needful foundation for, but they need to be supplemented and illumined by, the glad tidings of pardon of sins for all who believe and a new life inbreathed by the Spirit of God into all who put faith in Christ. To a still earlier rediscovery of the same two doctrines of Justification and Sanctification by Faith, was due the German Reformation. For, in spite of many details in which Wesley differs from Lather, a comparison of their writings, especially of Luther s Commentary on Galatians and his treatise on Christian Liberty, reveals a deep underlying harmony between these two epoch-making teachers, in reference both to Justification and Sanctification. That the two greatest and most helpful religious movements since the days of the Apostles were due to a similar cause, points to the source of strength in all Evangelical work. The hope of the Church today is, and its strength has ever been, the Gospel of salvation through faith in Christ. The relation between the teaching of Luther and that of Wesley is still closer than mere agreement. In his Journal for 24 May 1738, Wesley tells us that it was while listening to the reading of a work by Luther that he obtained assurance of the pardon of sins. A few days earlier we find Charles Wesley reading to others Luther s Commentary on Galatians. See the new Standard Edition of Wesley s Journal, vol. 1. pp. 475 f, note. Moreover Peter Bohler, who more than anyone else was the means of leading both John and Charles Wesley to saving faith, was a Lutheran, as was Spangenberg, with whom Wesley was associated in Georgia. See Journal, as above pp. 1 50 f, 436. Both Bohlerand Spangenberg, also Zinzendorf, to whom reference is frequently made in the Journal, were followers of Spener, (1635-1705,) the leader of the Pietist move ment, an attempt to revive religion in Germany, in a time of spiritual darkness, by drawing into closer fellowship for mutual help the more godly members of the Lutheran Church. The above followers of Spener threw in their lot with godly exiles from Bohemia and Moravia, persecuted followers of Huss ; and with them formed the Moravian Church. Wesley s doctrine of Sanctification by Faith was anticipated, not only by the Pietists in Germany, but at the same time by the Quietists in Spain, Italy, and France ; especially by Molinos, a Spanish priest, (1640- 1 697,) who had the friendship and approval of several cardinals and of Pope Innocent XI. ; and by Archbishop Fenelon (1651-1715) and Madame Guyon (1648-1717) in France. Of the teaching of these two last, a full account is given in Upham s Life of Madame Guyon, which contains long extracts from Fenelon’s Maxims of the Saints, a work written in defence of the teaching of Madame Guyon. See also Madame Guyon s Autobiography. 1 In the writings of Fenelon and Madame Guyon, and indeed of Molinos, we have the fundamental teaching of Sanctification by Faith in the phrases afterwards used by Wesley. We have Sanctification by Faith compared with Justification by Faith, and great prominence given to Faith as the condition and means of the indwelling of Christ in the hearts of His people; also the phrases " Entire Sanctification " and "Christian Perfection." In the writings of Madame Guyon, amid much which delights and helps us, there are opinions we cannot approve. But evidently these two French writers and Molinos had learnt the great secret, which Wesley learnt later, that God is waiting here and now to breathe into all who in faith accept His promise, by His Spirit dwelling in their hearts, a full salvation from all sin and a new life of unreserved devotion to God. This profound agreement, the similarity of phrase, and Wesley s high, though discriminating, commenda tion of these French writers, suggest 1 The Autobiography is published by Kegan Paul Co. ; the Life and Maxims by Allenson.. irresistibly that he learnt this great truth, in part, from them. That Wesley edited An Extract of the Life of Madam Guion, and his strong praise, mixed with serious criticism, reveal the deep impression made upon him by her writings and personality. Thus from various nations, differing widely in their religious history and modes of thought and life, came spiritual influences destined to create, through the Wesleys, a new and better era in the religious life of the entire Anglo-Saxon race. Having said this, I venture to add that the term Christian Perfection, borrowed by Wesley from William Law, (see below,) seems to me a very unsuitable name for the experience which Wesley had in view. As I have shown on pp. 120-124, the English word perfect is a misleading rendering of its Greek equivalent. For it suggests an attainment not needing, or perhaps not admitting, further progress ; and leaves out of sight the contrast be tween adult age and childhood so conspicuous in 1 Corinthians 2:6; 1 Corinthians 3:1-2; 1 Corinthians 3:14-20, Ephesians 4:13-14, Hebrews 5:12-14, where the same Greek word is used. As used by William Law, " Christian Perfection" was an ideal ever to be kept in view, but one to which, like the supreme example of Christ, none can ever absolutely attain. On the other hand, Wesley constantly uses the term as synonymous with " sanctification" and "cleansing from all sin," which he says usually or frequently takes place instantaneously. But no one springs at once into manhood. While thus discarding this English phrase as an inadequate rendering of a Greek word, we must ever remember that the experience Wesley had in view is of infinite importance. Nothing weakens the power of the Gospel today more than the childish immaturity rebuked in the New Testament passages quoted above, and still prevalent in all Churches. Moreover Wesley s own word instantaneous embodies important truth. In our struggle with sin and with our own sluggishness and selfishness, we have no need to wait for a partial and gradual salvation from sin. God is ready, as Wesley teaches in Sermon xliii., here and now to save us from all sin and to fill us with His Spirit : and this full salvation is the shortest path to Christian maturity. But this last is reached only by the slow development of character, a development to which there is no limit. The best phrase to describe this full salvation is that frequently used by Wesley in Sermon xliii., " Sanctified by Faith." For the distinctive feature of the doctrine before us is that, to all who accept in faith His promise so to do, God gives His Spirit, who, by uniting them to Christ, breathes into them the devotion which God claims. In this doctrine, faith is a distinct and essential element, and therefore ought to have a place in the term used to describe it. Moreover this term affords a useful parallel, observed by the Quietists and by Wesley, to Paul s phrase, " Justified by Faith," in Romans 3:28; Romans 3:30; Romans 3:5:1, Galatians 2:1; Galatians 2:6. The phrase " Sanctified by Faith " is not found in the New Testament. But in Romans 6:19; Romans 6:22 we have the word sanctification as a description of the devotion of themselves to God to which Paul calls his readers : and, as I have shown on p. 98, the fore going words in 5:11, " reckon yourselves dead to sin, but living for God," are an exact description of the mental process of sanctifying faith. The term " Entire Sanctification," used by the Quietists and by Wesley, is also suitable, as describing the consecration of all we have and are. This sense of entirety is very conspicuous throughout William Law s treatise on Christian Perfection. It is also suggested in the absolute separation of the holy objects of the Mosaic ritual from all else. The defect of Law s book is the absence of mention of Faith as in a unique sense the means of sanctification. To this important element, the term " Sanctification by Faith " gives due prominence. Another point in Wesley s teaching needs to be carefully guarded. At first sight Sermon xliii. may suggest that they who put faith in Christ obtain at once complete annihilation of all inward tendencies towards evil, that henceforth temptation will find no ally in their hearts, and that they will be as pure as we may suppose Adam to have been when first created. If so, to them the conflict and probation of life are over. For temptations from without are dangerous only so far as they are aided from within. But, as I have shown on p. no, the teaching of the New Testament does not necessarily imply annihilation of these inherited tendencies to evil or of the influence of formed habits of sin. For these tendencies and influences do not defile unless we yield to them. But they are an abiding danger. From this danger, against which, in many cases, our own moral strength is powerless, God will save, even the worst who put trust in Him, so completely that these inward tendencies to evil will neither enslave nor defile. They who have full victory over each temptation as it arises are already saved, and therefore cleansed, from all sin. They are "guarded in the power of God through faith : " 1 Peter 1:5. For the above teaching, I cannot claim definitely the authority of Wesley. Apparently, in the presence of his own unswerving loyalty to God and simple faith, temptation to known sin had little power. It seemed to him to be only an influence from without. His temptations and danger lay in another direction. But the teaching on pp. 110-112 is, if not demanded by, yet in harmony with, his whole teaching. Wesley did good service by calling attention, in Sermons xiv. and xliii., to a state of mind leading up to sanctification analogous to the " repentance " which leads up to justification. But in these excellent sermons the idea of holiness is limited to salvation from all sin, except a passing reference in each to loving God with all our heart. The central conception of holiness, viz. unreserved devotion of all our powers to the service of God, is not mentioned. Yet this was the first lesson in holiness which Wesley learnt from William Law. It is very conspicu ous in Charles Wesley s hymns. All else flows naturally from it. For devotion to God involves salvation from all sin ; and is ever ready to burst into a flame of love to God. This central idea should be prominent in all teaching about holiness. We can now trace the chief influences which moulded the thought and life of the Wesleys, and through them the Methodist Revival. These influences may be divided into three; (i) English, (2) German, (3) other influences, chiefly French. i. As quoted on p. 153f, John Wesley mentions four books as having helped him in his earliest manhood, by Jeremy Taylor, Thomas a Kempis, and William Law, representing the best thoughts about personal religion then current in the Roman Catholic and Anglican Churches. From these books Wesley learnt the great fundamental doctrine of Holiness, as set forth in the Mosaic Ritual and brought to bear in the New Testament on the everyday life of all the followers of Christ, viz. that One infinitely greater than ourselves, our Creator and Lord, claims the unreserved devotion to His service of all our powers. To this claim, a young student of keen intelligence and immense activity, with all advantages of education and brilliant prospects at the University, gave an unreserved and earnest response. This early consecration bore abundant fruit throughout a long life of ceaseless toil : it was the seed from which sprang the Methodist Revival. Of these four books, the third seems to have had on Wesley the greatest in fluence. He began to read it in 1726, the year of its publication ; took it with him to America in 1735 ; and read it to various persons on the voyage and in Georgia. The text of Wesley s sermon on " Christian Perfection," viz. " Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect," is printed on, and was probably taken from, the title-page of Law s book : and, of the influence of this book on Wesley, his writings bear many indica tions. Evidently to this source is due Wesley s phrase, " Christian Perfection," his favourite term for the ideal Christian life ; and apparently the prominence he gave to the new birth into a life of victory over sin. But this teaching, correct and all-important as it was, did not give Wesley peace, or save him from the failure confessed at the close of the First Part of his Journal, written on his return from Georgia. The lessons learnt in this preliminary period were only a solid experimental foundation on which was afterwards built, with materials from other sources, a structure of doctrine and experience in which he found both peace for himself and guidance and strength for successful service. 2. Another clearly-marked influence came through Wesley s Moravian fellow- travellers to America; and more espe cially through their leaders, the Lutheran Pietists, to whom he was afterwards in troduced. Spangenberg s question on 7 Feb. 1736 found an answer in Wesley s doctrine of the Witness of the Spirit ; and to Peter Border, a young man of twenty- five, was given the honour of explaining to the future evangelist the nature of Justifying Faith : see his Journal. Nothing in the story of the Kingdom of God is more significant than the picture of Wesley at Hernhuth in Aug. 1738 listening to the testimonies of a carpenter, a knife-smith, and others, and recording their words in what is now one of the classics of the English language. It is an interesting proof of the value of the inward experience of others as a help even to educated inquirers. Equally significant is the record of 24 May 1738. " In the evening I went very unwillingly to a society in Aldersgate St., where one was reading Luther s preface to the Epistle to the Romans. About a quarter before nine, while he was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone, for salvation : And an assurance was given me, that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death." In a note on the same page of the Standard Edition of the Journal we find Charles Wesley reading to others the Preface to Luther s Commentary on Galatians. These references trace back to Martin Luther s writings and to the Pietist Revival in Ger many, the wonderful change which indisputably came over the Wesleys soon after their return from Georgia. Thus the Wesleys learnt the great fundamental doctrine of Justification by Faith. But, from Sermon xl., we inferred on p. 159 that John Wesley did not at once obtain the sanctifying faith which, several years later, he so well described in Sermon xliii. This great lesson, Luther learnt at Rome and teaches in his Commentary on Galatians. Wesley also learnt it, possibly from Luther : but in his teaching about it we detect another line of influence. 3. Already on p. 166f. we have found in the writings of Molinos, Fenelon, and Madame Guyon, i.e. among the Quietists of Spain, Italy, and France, remarkable anticipations of Wesley s teaching and phraseology about Sanctification by Faith as distinguished from Justification by Faith. That Wesley was so greatly in fluenced, both in thought and phraseology, and helped, by English and German writers, and that he translated and published a large part of Madame Guyon s chief work, her Autobiography, suggests that in his own clear teaching about Sanctifying Faith he was aided by these writers. If so, at two points, in Thomas a Kempis and the Quietists, the Theology of the Methodist Revival owes something to Roman Catholic writers. It is painful to remember that, in consequence of their teaching, Molinos was incarcerated by the Inquisition, Madame Guyon in the Bastille, and that Archbishop Fenelon was practically condemned to silence. The above historical sketch is full of instruction for all followers of Christ, especially for those who are set in the Church to feed and train the Flock of Christ. Four points demand special attention. i. The Gospel of Christ assumes and rests upon the broad moral principles common to all races and ages, and embodied in the moral teaching of the Pre-Christian and Non-Christian nations, appealed to by Paul in Romans 2:14-15 as " the law written in their hearts," by which the Gentiles will be judged. This natural morality, interwoven by the Creator in the heart and thought of all men, is summed up, in its best form, in the golden rule of Christ, "All things so many as ye would wish that men should do to you, so also do ye to them." This broad foundation of all morality may be called the Law of Righteousness. 2. Embracing and supplementing this natural law, we find, underlying the New Testament, the higher Law of Holiness, viz. that God claims from all His servants the unreserved devotion of all their powers of body and mind, of all their time and opportunities, to work out the purposes of mercy for which He sent His Son into the world. This higher morality, including and supplementing all lower forms of it, is a new and distinctive feature of the religion founded by Christ ; and is the standard by which is and will be measured and rewarded, both now and in the Day of Judgment, the faithfulness of all His servants. This lofty standard, severe as it may seem, is erected for us by the infinite wisdom and love of our Father in heaven. He claims our devotion because only thus can we attain our highest good. The call to sacrifice is a call to infinite blessing for ourselves and others. 3. Judged by this standard, all sin and selfishness are at once condemned as inexcusable and shameful rebellion against infinite wisdom and love. In this Court of Holiness every mouth is shut and all the world stands guilty before God. We cannot atone for the past : and many efforts prove that we cannot obey for the future. We can only cry " God, have mercy on me, the sinner." The cry is heard. The herald of the Gospel announces, " Be it known to you, brethren, that through this Man, to you, is proclaimed forgiveness of sins ; and that, from all things from which ye could not be justified in Moses law, in this Man everyone who believes is justified : " Acts 13:38-39. In proof of this for giveness, the Apostles pointed exultingly to the empty grave of the Crucified ; and, in proof of the love which prompted it, to the shed blood of the Son of God. This is the Gospel of Pardon. 4. But more than pardon is needed. For the pardoned ones are still in the midst of temptation and conflict. The path to the throne is occupied by terrible foes. And the adopted sons of God are bidden, not only to fight their way through, but to rescue others. For all this, they are powerless. Yet this command, and God s claim to our unreserved obedience and devotion, are imperative. In our powerlessness we see before us One, human flesh and blood like ourselves, who did to absolute perfection what God bids us do. He calls us to His side, and bids us walk in His steps. In view of His authority and example, we dare not hesitate. And the raging waters are solid rock beneath our feet. The secret is out. Every command of Christ is a promise in disguise. Our powerlessness apart from Him tells us that, what He bids us do, He will Himself, by His Spirit in our hearts, do in us. Henceforth all is changed. We walk by His side along the path He trod, Him self our Guide and Companion. He who is with us is also within us, our Life, and Light, and Strength. While we walk with Him, and He in us, we rest in Him, as our Home, and impregnable Fortress, and our vital Atmosphere. And His presence with us now guiding our steps, and our rest in Him amid the weariness and conflict of the journey, are a sure pledge of the reality of that City Unseen towards which He is leading us and of the endless rest and fulness of joy awaiting us there. To proclaim to all who will hear us, as clearly and forcibly as we can, this Law and Gospel of Holiness, is the duty and privilege of all who have heard these glad tidings of salvation and life eternal. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 17: 2.00. THE IMMORTALITY OF THE SOUL: A PROTEST ======================================================================== The Immortality of the Soul: A Protest by Joseph Agar Beet D.D. "WHO ALONE HATH IMMORTALITY" BY THE SAME AUTHOR Commentaries on St. Paul’s Epistles. 1. ROMANS. 2. CORINTHIANS. 3. GALATIANS. 4. EPHESIANS, PHILIPPIANS, COLOSSIANS. Summary: This is a brief 4 chapter work by Beet (Methodist) to examine immortality. He looks at the concept from before Christ, what Christ Taught, in the early church, and in modern theology. CONTENTS Chapter 1. Immortality Before Christ’ Chapter 2. the Teaching of Christ Chapter 3. Immortality in the Early Church Chapter 4. Immortality in Modern Theology In Dr. Agar Beet the Wesleyans have now a theologian who takes his place among the best of living expositors.... It is no small achievement to have carried into its ninth edition a book on so well worked a theme as the Epistle to the Romans. This success is the reward of solid and sober work. The writer has the great merit of knowing his own mind and of expressing his meaning with lucidity; and his literary skill enables him to give his readers most of the results attained by scholarship without distracting the unlearned by a parade of Greek. But he is more than a commentator; he applies the lessons of the Epistle with impressive earnestness and unfailing good taste." - THE SATURDAY REVIEW. " This is one of the greatest extant commentaries on Romans; and it is more, for it is also a compendium of theology, as must needs be the case with a work on the Epistle that deals at all adequately with its subject. Again and again as we turn over the pages we are delighted with some happy rendering, the skilful unravelling of some knotty phrase, the keen cut of thought into the heart of some tough sentence." - THE CHRISTIANWORLD. LONDON: HODDER AND STOUGHTON. P R E F A C E THE following pages are a reprint of articles published in THE EXPOSITOR during the last six months. They are a protest against a doctrine which, during long centuries, has been almost universally accepted as divine truth taught in the Bible, but which seems to me altogether alien to it in both phrase and thought, and derived only from Greek Philosophy. Until recent times, this, alien doctrine has been comparatively harmless. But, as I have here shown, it is now producing most serious results. My protest against it is appeal, which no Protestant can disallow, from the traditional teaching of the Church to authority of Holy Scripture. Of justice of this appeal, my readers must judge. It will of course be said, of this as of some other doctrines, that, if not explicitly taught, in the Bible, it is implied and assumed there. But they who ask us to accept all important doctrine on this ground must prove clearly that it is so implied and assumed. For we cannot accept their mere dictum as evidence. They who claim for their reaching the authority of God must prove that it comes from Him. Such proof in this case, I have never seen. RICHMOND, August 25th, 1901 ======================================================================== CHAPTER 18: 2.01. IMMORTALITY BEFORE CHRIST ======================================================================== CHAPTER I IMMORTALITY BEFORE CHRIST DURING long ages, until some thirty years ago the doctrine of The Immortality of the Soul was accepted almost without contradiction as fundamental to Christianity and even to religion. In the following pages I shall discuss the history of the phrase and the doctrine, the evidence on which the doctrine rests, and its worth as a factor of Christian thought. We shall find the phrase and doctrine among the Greeks; other similar yet different doctrines, but not the phrase, among the Egyptians; and the phrase and doctrine in some Jewish writers shortly before or soon after the appearance of Christ. THE GREEKS. That the soul of man is immortal or deathless, or in other words that every soul will exist in happiness or misery for endless ages, is a conspicuous feature of the reaching of PLATO. But that this doctrine was by no means universal among the Greeks of his day, we learn from p 70 of his Phaedo, where we read, "In what relates to the soul men are apt to be incredulous; they fear that when she has left the body her place may be nowhere, and that on the very day of death she may be destroyed and perish, (diaphtheiretai te kai apolluetai) immediately on her release from the body issuing forth like smoke or air and in her flight vanishing away into nothingness." In the pages following, Socrates is represented as arguing against this popular belief. He endeavours first to prove that the soul existed before birth, and then that it will exist after death. On p. 70 he goes on to say, "Whether the souls of men after death are or are not in Hades, may be argued in this mariner:- The ancient doctrine of which I have been speaking affirms that they go from hence into the other world, and return hither, and are born from the dead. Now if this be true, and the living come from the dead, then our souls must exist there: for, if not, how could they be born again ?" Lower down, at the foot of p 72, an interlocutor says, "Your favourite doctrine, that knowledge is simply recollection, if true, also necessarily implies a previous time in which we have leant that which we now recollect. But this would be impossible unless our soul had been in some place before existing in the human form. Here then is another proof that the soul is an immortal something:" (athanaton ti eoiken e psyche einai) On p. 77, the argument and dialogue continue. I think, said Simmias, that Kebes is satisfied. Although he is the most incredulous of mortals, yet I think that he is persuaded of this, that our soul existed before we were born. But that after death the soul will continue to exist is not yet proved even to mv own satisfaction. I cannot get rid of the feeling of the many to which Kebes was referring, that when the man dies the soul may be scattered, and that this may be the end of her. For, admitting that she may have been born elsewhere and framed out of other elements and was in existence before entering the human body, why after having entered in and gone out again may she not herself be destroyed and come to an end ? Very true, Simmias, said Kebes that our soul existed before we were born, was the first half of the argument, and this appears to have been proved. That the soul will exist after death as well as before birth, is the other half of which the proof is still wanting and has to be supplied." On the pages following, Socrates argues that the soul is not compounded, and therefore cannot be dissolved; that it is unseen, and that while the seen changes the unseen remains; and that at death the soul goes to the pure and the always-existing and the immortal and the unchangeable, to which it is akin. On p. 81, he says that the soul which has learnt the lessons of philosophy goes at death to the divine and immortal and rational, and dwells in peace ; but that the sensual are dragged down into gloom until they are imprisoned in another body appropriate to their former lives. "Men who have followed after gluttony and wantonness and drunkenness, and have no thought of avoiding them, will probably pass into asses and beasts of that sort. And those who have chosen the portion of injustice and tyranny and violence will pass into wolves or into hawks or kites. Whither else can we suppose them to go?" And Socrates goes on to argue at length that the true philosopher has no need to fear that at death his soul will cease to be. Having thus endeavoured to prove that the soul will survive death, the dialogue goes on to adduce evidence that by its own nature the soul of man can never cease to be. On p. 88, a serious question is raised. "Suppose we grant even more than you say, and besides acknowledging that the soul existed before birth admit also that after death the souls of some exist and will continue to exist, and will be born and die again and again, and that there is a natural strength in the soul which w ill hold out and be born many times, nevertheless we may still be inclined to think that she will weary in the labours of successive births and may at last succumb in one of her. deaths and utterly perish ; and this death and dissolution of the body which brings destruction to the soul may be unknown to any of us, for no one of us can have had any experience of it: and, if so, I maintain that he who is confident about death has but a foolish confidence, unless he is able to prove that the soul is altogether immortal and imperishable; (psyche athanaton te kai anolethron). But, if he cannot prove it, he who is about to die must needs fear about his soul lest when it is unyoked from the body it may altogether perish." Against this serious objection, Plato, speaking through the lips of Socrates, argues at great length. His arguments move our pity. For they are the painful efforts of a good man straining his eyes, in the twilight and uncertainty of Greek philosophy, to catch a glimpse of a ray of light from beyond the grave: and for us, walking in the light of the "promise of life in Christ Jesus," they have no practical value. In these arguments we frequently find the phrase the soul is immortal: it occurs four times on p.95, and not less than twenty times in the whole dialogue. Moreover, its meaning is indisputable. Plato uses the phrase to assert that every human soul, by its very nature, will continue in conscious existence for endless ages. This teaching is put to noble moral use. On p.107 we read: "If the soul is really immortal, what care should be taken of her, not only for this time only which we call living, but for all time. And the danger would seem to be awful if one shall neglect her. For if death were an end of all, a fortunate thing it would be to the wicked when dead to be quit of the body, and at the same time of their wickedness along with the soul. But now, since the soul is manifestly immortal, there is no other. escape or salvation from wickedness except for it to become as good and as wise as possible. For the soul takes nothing else with her into Hades except education and nurture, which are said very much to help or injure the dead man straightway at the beginning of his journey thither." At the conclusion of the work we read that those guilty of great crimes will be cast into Tartarus, whence they will never go out ; that those less guilty will be cast into Tartarus for a time, and then if their victims take pity on them they will be allowed to escape ; and that the righteous will go to the mansions of the blessed. The same teaching, clothed in the same language, is found in Plato’s Republic. The writer argues, in bk. x. pp. 608-610, that vice cannot destroy the soul, and that therefore nothing else can. "Do the injustice and other badness of the soul waste and consume the soul? do they by inhering in her and clinging to her at last bring her to death and separate her from the body ? Certainly not. And it is unreasonable to suppose that anything can perish from without through external operation of evil, which could not be destroyed from within by internal corruption." Lower down he says: " But the soul, which cannot be destroyed by evil inherent or external, must it not be something always existing, and it always existing immortal ? Certainly. And if so, the souls must always be the; same ; for they will not become fewer, it not one perishes ; nor more." Here again we find frequently the same phrase, the soul is immortal. The book concludes with a tremendous vision of judgment, in which all men good and bad receive beyond death exact retribution according to their works. Similarly in Plato’s Meno, p. 81 "The soul of man is immortal, and at one time has an end which they call dying, and then again is born, but never perishes: (apollusthai d’ oudepote.) We must therefore live our life in the most holy way. . . . The soul then, as being immortal and having been born again many times," etc. We have the same phraseology and reaching in the Phaedrus., where, on pp. 245-6, we read, "Every soul is immortal. For that which is always in motion is immortal. . . . But if that which is moved by itself is declared to be immortal, he who says that this is the essence and description of the soul will not be put to confusion. For the body, as being moved from without, is soulless :’ but that which is moved from within has a soul, this being the nature of the soul. But if this be so, that which is self-moved being no other than soul, necessarily the soul must be unbegotten and immortal." The immortality of the soul is discussed at great length in bk. i. of CICERO’S Tusculan Disputations. He admits the wide diversity of opinion on the subject. So in art. 9: "Some imagine death to be the departure of the soul from the body: others think that the soul and body perish together, and that the soul is extinguished in the body. Of those who think that the soul departs, some think it to be immediately dissipated, others that it continues for a time, others that it continues always." We frequently meet the phrase immortalitas animorum or "immortality of souls," or other equivalent phrases, e.g. arts. 11, 14, 16, 17. In art. 16, we read that "Pherecydes, a Syrian, first said that the souls of men are eternal;" that his disciple, Pythagoras, held the same opinion; and that Plato was said to have come to Italy and there learnt the Pythagorean teaching about the eternity of souls. In art. 32, Cicero speaks of the Stoics as saying that human souls survive death, but not for ever. He accepts Plato’s metaphysical arguments for the endless permanence of the human soul; and indeed quotes at full length the passage from the Phaedrus given above in part. But of Plato’s conspicuous and noble teaching of moral retribution beyond death, he has but slight hold. He rather looks upon bodily life as an evil, and death as release from it; thus contradicting Plato. Of the moral issues involved, he seems to have thought little. That Pythagoras taught that the soul is immortal, is also asserted by Diogenes Laertius (bk. viii. 19) and by other ancient writers. The same phrase, that man’s soul is immortal, is used by Herodotus, bk. ii. 123. This proves that the phrase and thought were earlier than Plato. To what extent the doctrine of the immortality of the soul was accepted by the masses in ancient Greece, we do not know. But in later days the popularity of Plato made it widely known, as matter for discussion, among educated Greeks and Romans. THE EGYPTIANS. We turn now to teaching about the soul much earlier than the earliest Greek philosophers those opinions have come down to us. Throughout THE BOOK OF THE DEAD, recently published in English by Dr. Wallis Budge, curator of Egyptian antiquities in the British Museum, immortal and endless life beyond the grave, with all good things, very much like the good things of earth, is promised to the righteous on condition of observance of certain religious duties. So ch. xxxi., rubric: "If this chapter be known by the deceased, he shall come forth by day, he shall rise up and walk upon the earth among the living, and he shall never fail and come to an end, never, never, never." But this immortality of blessing is never supported, as are the rewards for which Plato looked, by any teaching about the indestructible nature of the soul. Its permanence is always represented as a reward of righteousness and religion. About the fate of the wicked, little is said. But apparently their doom was annihilation. In Dr. Budge’s Introduction to The Book of the Dead, p. cvii, we read : "The evil heart, or the heart which had failed to balance the feather symbolic of the law, was given to the monster Ammit to devour; thus punishment consisted of instant annihilation, unless we imagine that the destruction of the heart was extended over an indefinite period." The judgment scene here referred to is reproduced, from the famous papyrus of Ani, now in the British Museum and also published by Dr. Budge, as frontispiece to his edition of The Book of the Dead. The man being judged stands before scales in which his heart is being weighed. The god Thoth records the result. Behind him stands a monster ready to devour him if in the balance his heart is found wanting. In an admirable little book, Wiedemann’s Egyptian Doctrine of Immortality (translation by Grevel), we read : "Nowhere are we clearly informed as to the fate of the condemned who could not stand before the god Osiris. We are told that the enemies of the gods perish, that they are destroyed or overthrown; but such vague expressions afford no certainty as to how far the Egyptians in general believed in the existence of a hell as a place of punishment or purification for the wicked; or whether, as seems more probable, they held some general belief that when judgment was pronounced against a man his heart and other immortal parts were not restored to him. For such a man no re-edification and no resurrection were possible. The immortal elements were divine, and by nature pure and imperishable; but they could be preserved from entering the Osiris, from re-entering the hull of the man who had proved himself unworthy of them. The soul, indeed, as such did not die, although personal annihilation was the lot of the evildoer in whom it had dwelt. But it was the hope of continued individuality which their doctrine held out to the Egyptians; this it was which they promised to the good and in all probability denied to the wicked. After Judgment the righteous entered into blessedness, unchanged in appearance as in nature; the only difference being that, while the existence which they had led upon earth had been limited in its duration, the life of the world to come was eternal." The above is confirmed by Canon Rawlinson in his History of Ancient Egypt, vol. i p.318: "Ultimately, after many trials, if purity was not attained the wicked soul underwent a final sentence at the hands of Osiris, Judge of the Dead, and, being pronounced incurable, suffered complete and absolute annihilation." Herodotus reports (bk. ii. I23) that the Egyptians "were the first who taught that man’s soul is immortal ;" using the phrase soon afterwards so common in the writings of Plato. Indisputably the Egyptians anticipated Plato by teaching that beyond death retribution awaits all men good and bad. But, as we have just seen, they did not base this doctrine, as did Plato and probably Pythagoras, on the endless and essential permanence of all human souls. We need not wonder that Herodotus, a Greek stranger visiting Egypt, did not find out this important difference between teaching familiar to him and the belief of the Egyptians. Herodotus also says that some Greeks borrowed, from the Egyptians the doctrine of the transmigration of human souls into the bodies of various kinds of animals. But Plato taught, as do the Hindus, that this transmigration is strictly retributive. The Egyptians looked at the power to assume various forms as a reward given to the righteous. In all ancient literature, so far as I know, the phrase every soul immortal, or phraseology equivalent, is found only in the school of Greek philosophy of which Plato is the most conspicuous representative. Doctrine equivalent to that conveyed by these words of Plato underlies the’ religion of the Hindus; but is not, so far as I know, found in any school of thought which influenced the Jews of our Lord’s day or the early Christians. Common to Plato and the Hindus, whatever be the link or connection, is also the doctrine of retributive transmigration which also is, I believe, unknown elsewhere in ancient literature. THE JEWS. That all human souls are immortal, or that they will think and feel for ever, is not taught or implied in the Old Testament. That man was made in the image of God, by a definite act, and in fulfilment of a deliberate purpose of God, is conspicuously taught in Genesis 1:26-27, Genesis 2:7; and reveals the infinite superiority of man to the lower animals. But this by no means implies that he will necessarily continue to exist for endless ages after the moral purpose of his existence has finally failed and when existence has become an unmixed curse. Certainly these passages are a very unsafe basis for dogmatic assertion that all human souls good and bad will exist for ever. In Ecclesiastes 12:7 we read that at death "the spirit will return to God who gave it." But this return to God implies only (see Ecclesiastes 12:14) the judgment of the dead, not necessarily their endless permanence. In Daniel 12:2 we read that "many who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake, some, to eternal life and some to shame, to eternal abhorrence." This last word does not necessarily imply eternal consciousness, but only the lasting effect on others of the doom of the lost. So Isaiah 66:24 : "they shall be an abhorrence to all flesh." That retribution beyond the grave, so important an element in Christian teaching, occupies so small and indefinite a place in the Old Testament, in contrast to its large place in the religion of ancient Egypt and in the teaching of Plato, is one of the most perplexing facts in Old Testament theology. After the close of the canon, retribution beyond the grave became more definite in the thought of Israel. So Jdt 16:17 "The Lord Almighty will take vengeance on them in the day of judgment, to put fire and worms in their flesh; and they shall wail, feeling the pain, for ever. In Wis 2:23 we read that "God created man for incorruptibility." But this does not imply that in all cases this purpose will be accomplished. For it is equally true that God created man in order that he might love and serve his Creator. Are we then to infer that in all men this purpose also will be attained? The writer continues in Wis 3:1-4 : "The souls of righteous men are in God’s hands; and torment shall not touch them. They seemed, in the eyes of foolish ones, to be dead: and their departure was reckoned an injury, and their journey from us, a calamity. But they are in peace. For, even if in the sight of men they be punished, their hope is full of immortality." In the book of ENOCH we read of a resurrection of the dead, of destruction and torment by fire for the wicked, and of eternal life and endless days for the righteous. So ch. li : "Sheol will give back that which it has received, and hell will give back that which it owes." Also ch. liii. 2: "Sinners will perish before the face of the Lord of Spirits and will be removed from off the face of His earth, continually for ever and ever." And ch. liv. 6: "And cast them on that day into a burning furnace, that the Lord of Spirits may take vengeance upon them." Also ch. lviii 3: "And the righteous will be in the light of the sun, and the elect in the light of eternal life: there will be no end to the days of their life, and the days of the holy will be without number. And they will seek the light and find righteousness with the Lord of Spirits: and there will be peace to the righteous." But we have no definite teaching about the endless permanence of the soul. A few references to the immortality of the soul are found in the voluminous theological writings of PHILO, an Egyptian Jew, an older contemporary of Christ. In his work on The Creation of the World, § 46, in a comment on Genesis 7, we read : "One may rightly say that man is on the boundary-line of a mortal and an immortal nature, partaking so far as is needful of each ; and that he has been born both mortal and immortal, mortal as to the body, but as to the mind immortal." Similarly, On Dreams, bk. i. 22, where men good and bad are spoken of as " incorruptible and immortal." But the writings of Philo are permeated by the philosophy of Plato ; and cannot therefore be appealed to as embodying independent Jewish thought. Josephus reports, in his Wars, bk. ii. 8. 11; that the Pharisees believed that the "bodies are indeed corruptible and their substance not abiding, but that the souls continue immortal always; "that the souls of the righteous pass the ocean to a place of rest and blessing, but that the wicked go to a subterranean abode "full of ceaseless punishments." This teaching, Josephus compares with that of the Greeks. He attributes similar teaching to the Essenes. Also in his Antiquities, bk. xviii. 1.3, 5, he says that the Pharisees believed that souls have "immortal strength" and that the Essenes "make souls to be immortal." But these statements of Josephus cannot be accepted as decisive evidence that the Jews of his day accepted the natural immortality of the soul. For, like Philo, he wrote in Greek, was familiar with Greek philosophy, and was eager to call attention to elements common to this last and the Jewish Scriptures. On the other hand, this doctrine of Plato would be welcome to the Pharisees, as in later days it was welcomed by Christian teachers, because of the support it rendered to the all-important doctrine of retribution beyond the grave, which was common to the Pharisees and to Plato. Moreover, we must remember that for three centuries before Christ the Jewish nation had been either under Greek rule or at least in close contact with Greek thought. We may therefore not unfairly attribute to Plato and his school, of whose influence in the age preceding that of Christ Cicero affords abundant roof, the doctrine of the natural immortality of the soul so far as it influenced Jewish thought. In other words, we have so far found no trace of this doctrine outside the school of thought of which Plato is the best-known representative. And we are unable to determine how far this school of thought was prevalent among the Jews of the Apostolic age. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 19: 2.02. THE TEACHING OF CHRIST ======================================================================== CHAPTER II THE TEACHING OF CHRIST In ch. i. we found abundant proof that Plato taught retribution beyond the grave, blessing for the righteous and terrible suffering for the wicked; and that he supported this teaching by endeavouring to prove that the soul of man is in its very nature indestructible, that it will never finally cease to think and feel. We found also decisive evidence that, long before the time of Plato, the ancient Egyptians lived in hope of endless life beyond the grave for the righteous and religious, and expected apparently extinction for the wicked. We found proof that during the three centuries before Christ the godly Jews looked forward to "eternal life," and warned the wicked of punishment awaiting them beyond death. A Jewish contemporary of Christ, a student of Plato, accepts in a few places the teaching of this last about the immortality of the soul: and Josephus, a later contemporary of Paul, says that the same teaching was held by the Pharisees and Essenes of his own day. Retribution beyond the grave is implied clearly in the teaching of John the Baptist recorded in Matthew 3:10-12. For the reward and punishment there described can have no place in the present life. The same is implied in the teaching of Christ in the Sermon on the Mount : Matthew 7:19-27. Earlier in the same discourse (Matthew 7:13-14), we read of two paths, one leading to destruction and the other to life. In a parable recorded in Matthew 13:24-30, explained in Matthew 13:39-43, Christ declares that at the completion of the age, at His bidding, the wicked will be cast into "the furnace of fire," where "shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth," and that then "the righteous will shine as the sun in the kingdom of their Father." On this teaching, emphasis is laid by its repetition inMatthew 13:48-50. Similar teaching, at an important turning-point in the life of Christ, is found in Matthew 16:27 : "The Son of Man will come in the glory of His Father with His angels: and then He will give back to each according to his action." A vision of judgment is given in Matthew 25:31-46, where "all the nations" are gathered before Christ sitting on a throne of glory, and receive their award from His lips. He welcomes "the righteous into eternal life," and dismisses others, under a curse, "into eternal punishment." The above teaching is confirmed by other passages in the First Gospel, and by parallels in the Second and Third Gospels. In John 3:16 we meet with the alternative, "may not perish but may have eternal life." In John 5:28-29, Christ announces that at a definite "hour" He will summon all the dead to a resurrection of life or of judgment. In Acts 17:31, Paul is reported to have said at Athens that God has fixed a day on which He will judge the world by a Man whom He has marked out for that honour by raising Him from the dead. Before Felix, as we read in Acts 24:25, Paul reasoned about "the coming judgment." These scanty references in addresses of Paul are abundantly confirmed by his Epistles. In Romans 2:6-12 we read that God "will give back to each according to his works," in close accord including glory, honour, with Matthew 16:27 ; peace, and eternal life for the righteous, and for the wicked anger and fury, affliction and helplessness, and destruction. So Matthew 14:10 : "We all shall stand at the judgment-seat of God." Exact retribution is conspicuously announced in 2 Corinthians 5:10 : "All of us must needs be made manifest before the judgment-seat of Christ, in order that each may obtain the things done through his body, whether good or bad." It is announced with equal definiteness and solemnity in Galatians 6:7-8 : "Be not deceived ; God is not mocked. For whatever a man sow, this he will also reap. Because he that sows for his own flesh shall, from the flesh, reap corruption. But he that sows for the Spirit shall, from the Spirit, reap eternal life." In Php 3:19, we read of some "whose end is destruction." This can only mean destruction beyond the grave: for destruction of the body by death is the lot of all men, good and bad. In 2 Thessalonians 1:8-9, we read of Christ "giving just punishment to them that know not God and obey not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus, who shall pay penalty, even eternal destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of His strength." On the other hand, in 2 Timothy 4:7-8, at the close of his life the Apostle writes, "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give me in that day; and not to me only, but to all them that have loved His appearing." The above passages refer evidently to a retribution beyond the grave; and, with others similar, they leave no room for doubt that this was an important element in the teaching of Paul. In 1 Peter 5:4, we read of the unfading crown of glory awaiting faithful shepherds of the flock of Christ. A more tremendous vision of judgment is found in Revelation 20:11-15 : "I saw a great white throne, and Him that sat upon it, from whose face fled the earth and the heaven, and place was not found for them. And I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne: and books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the Book of Life. And the dead were judged from the things written in the books, according to their works. And the sea gave up the dead in it : and death and Hades gave up the dead in them. And they were judged, each according to their works. And death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if any was not found written in the Book of Life, he was cast into the lake of fire." The above quotations, which represent teaching running through the entire New Testament, are complete documentary evidence that retribution beyond death for all actions done on earth was an important and conspicuous element of the teaching of Christ and His Apostles. The reward awaiting the righteous is in Matthew 19:16, Matthew 19:29 and its parallels, in Matthew 25:46, Luke 10:25, seventeen times in the Fourth Gospel, eleven times in the addresses and letters of Paul, and six times in the First Epistle of John, described by the term eternal life. The word eternal, aionios, from aion, an age or lifetime, may be literally rendered age-lasting. In Proverbs 22:28, Proverbs 23:10, "Remove not eternal landmarks which thy fathers set," it describes a boundary which has stood for ages. Similarly Psalms 77:5, where eternal years are parallel to "ancient days." But much more frequently it refers to the future. The ordinances of the Levitical ritual are very frequently e.g. Exodus 12:14, Exodus 12:17, Exodus 12:24, Leviticus 23:14, Leviticus 23:21, Leviticus 23:31, Leviticus 23:41, - described as eternal statutes, nomimon aionion . Similarly, in Genesis 17:8, Genesis 48:4, Canaan is promised to the seed of Abraham "for an eternal possession." This use in the Septuagint, where the word is found some hundred and fifty times, must have influenced the meaning attached to it by the writers and early readers of the New Testament, who frequently quote the Septuagint. It forbids us to interpret the word eternal in the New Testament as in itself equivalent to endless. For no Christian will claim endless permanence for the Levitical ordinances. But this use of the word casts no shadow of doubt on the absolute endlessness of the life promised by Christ to His faithful servants. For this rests on grounds independent of the word before us. For, as we read in John 3:16, God gave His Son in order that they may not perish: and cessation of the life promised to them would be perdition. In Luke 1:33 we read that of the Kingdom of Christ "there will be no end:" and of that Kingdom they are citizens. The inheritance awaiting them is, in 1 Peter 1:4, said to be incorruptible and unfading. So is the crown of glory: 1 Peter 5:4. But cessation of blessedness would be both decay and corruption. That the life promised by Christ to those who put faith in Him and obey Him is absolutely endless, is still further removed from all possibility of doubt by the immortal life of Christ Himself which His human brethren will share: see John 14:19, Romans 8:17, Romans 8:35-39, Revelation 3:21. This "promise of life in Christ Jesus" and the hope of endless blessedness thereby evoked in us rest securely on the word of Christ confirmed by Him who gave His only-begotten Son in order that every one who believes in Him may not perish but may have eternal life, and raised Him from the dead, so that our faith and hope (1 Peter 1:21) may be in God. For no historic fact is more certain than that Jesus of Nazareth promised to all who put faith in Him a new life of devotion to God on earth, and endless blessedness beyond the grave. In awful contrast to this blessed life stands, throughout the New Testament, the destruction of the wicked: olethros, apoleia, apollumi. These words are found in the New Testament in this technical theological sense more than thirty times. They are rendered in the R.V. destruction and destroy, perdition and perish, lose and lost; and convey in Greek the combined significance of these English equivalents. They denote neither suffering nor extinction, nor do they exclude these ideas, but simply ruin, the loss of all that gives worth to existence, whether the ruined object ceases to be or continues in a worthless mode of existence. These words, and their cognates and equivalents, are frequently used by Plato to denote the extinction of the soul. But, while thus using them, he puts his meaning beyond doubt by careful circumlocution: see p. 50. On the other hand, they are frequently used in Greek literature in cases in which there is no thought of extinction, but only of utter ruin. So Luke 15:6, Luke 15:9, Luke 15:32, where the lost was afterwards found; apololos kai eurethe. In addition to this loss of endless blessedness, we find in the teaching of Christ recorded in the Synoptist Gospels and in the Book of Revelation pictures of actual and acute suffering e.g., Matthew 8:12, Matthew 13:42, Matthew 13:50, Matthew 22:13, Matthew 24:51, Luke 16:23-25. It is worthy of note that by Christ and the Apostles this promise of blessing and this threatening of punishment are never directly or indirectly supported, as the hope of reward after death is conspicuously supported in the writings of Plato, by any doctrine of the essential and endless permanence of the human soul. Both phraseology and thought of Plato are altogether absent from the New Testament. The word immortality is found there only in 1 Corinthians 15:53-54, in reference not to the soul but to the body, which though mortal must put on immortality and in 1 Timothy 6:16, as an attribute of God. An equivalent term, incorruptibility (aphtharsia), or absence of decay, is found in reference to the body in 1 Corinthians 15:42, 1 Corinthians 15:50, 1 Corinthians 15:53-54; and in other references in Romans 2:7, Ephesians 6:24, 2 Timothy 1:10. The cognate adjective is used as an attribute of God in Romans 1:23, 1 Timothy 1:17; as a description of the reward of the righteous in 1 Corinthians 9:25, 1 Peter 1:4; of their risen bodies in 1 Corinthians 15:52; and in other references in 1 Peter 1:23, 1 Peter 3:4. The infinite value of the soul is recognised by Christ in. Matthew 16:26. But the New Testament never asserts or implies its essential and endless permanence; or, in other words, that, in virtue of its own nature or by the will of God, every human soul will think and feel for an endless succession of ages. The above denial will find presumptive support in ch. iv., where I shall refer to the absence of any direct appeal to the Bible in various modern theological works which maintain the immortality of the soul. It is worthy of note that whereas, as "we saw on p.3, Plato taught that the soul of man is a immortal (anolethrov) and imperishable, Christ asserts or implies the possibility of its destruction. So Matthew 10:28 : "Fear Him that is able to destroy both body and soul": psychen apolesai. Similarly Matthew 16:25 : "Whoever desires to save his soul will lose it: apolesai auten. The word destruction, used frequently in the New Testament to describe the doom of the wicked, is quite alien to the thought and phrase of Plato. In this respect, modern popular Christian eschatology is much nearer to Plato than to Christ. On the other hand, Christ’s promise of life eternal for the righteous and His threatening of destruction for the wicked were anticipated in a remarkable way, as we saw on pp. 12-15, in the teaching of the ancient Egyptians. It has been suggested that the endless permanence of all human souls, even of the wicked, about whom alone there can be any question, may be inferred from the descriptions, in the Synoptist Gospels and the Book of Revelation, of the actual torment of the lost, implying continued existence, without any suggestion that their sufferings will ever cease. This inference would be legitimate if the endless suffering of the lost were taught clearly and without contradiction by the various writers of the New Testament. But, in this case, the immortality of the soul, as an inference from the endless suffering of the lost, could not be appealed to, as has frequently been done, in support of this latter doctrine. Otherwise, we should be arguing in a circle. But, as I shall show in ch. v., the doctrine of the endless suffering of the lost is supported by at most some six or seven passages of Holy Scripture, and these by no means decisive; and against these must be set a still larger number of passages quite as definite which seem to assert or imply the ultimate extinction of sinners or of evil. This doctrine also lies open to most tremendous, and to many minds insuperable, moral objection. A doctrine itself resting on a foundation so unsafe cannot be made a safe foundation for another doctrine so important as the immortality of the soul. On the other hand, since in the New Testament life beyond the grave is reserved for the righteous, and the wicked are said to be destroyed, it has been inferred that the punishment of the wicked will be ultimate extinction. This inference also is unsafe. For the life referred to is much more than existence. It is the normal and blessed state of a rational creature of God. And the loss of this life may be fitly described as destruction, even though the ruined ones continue to exist: for it is the loss of all that gives worth to existence. We have now seen that the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, i.e. the essential and endless permanence of all human souls, so prominent in the teaching of Plato, has no place in the teaching of Christ and His Apostles. The difference is significant. In the absence of an historic revelation, Plato appealed, in proof of a retribution beyond the grave, a most important element in morality and religion, to the spiritual nature of the soul. But Christ claimed to be a Teacher sent from God to announce eternal life for all who put faith in Him. And, in support of His claim and of His gospel of life eternal, His followers appealed to His resurrection from the dead. To appeal now to the immortality of the soul in support of the Christian hope, is to illumine the light of the Gospel with the dim torch of Greek philosophy. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 20: 2.03. IMMORTALITY IN THE EARLY CHURCH ======================================================================== CHAPTER III IMMORTALITY IN THE EARLY CHURCH IN ch. i. we saw that Plato taught that the soul of man is immortal, i.e. that, for good or ill, immortality is its inalienable attribute; in contrast, as we saw in ch. ii., to Christ and His Apostles, who taught that incorruptibility - i.e. a state without decay - and eternal; life are the reward awaiting the righteous, whereas destruction awaits the wicked. We shall now consider what the early Christian writers, living in an intellectual environment greatly influenced by the teaching of Plato, said about the immortality of the soul and about the eternal life promised by Christ to the righteous. The earliest Christian writers reproduce the thought, and in large measure the language, of the New Testament, and say nothing about, or reject, the immortality of the soul. CLEMENT OF ROME, in his Epistle To the Corinthians, ch. 35, speaks of "life in immortality" as a gift of God to the righteous. So IGNATIUS, To Polycarp, Ch. 2, "Be sober, as God’s athlete: the prize is incorruptibility and life eternal." He writes To the Magnesians, ch. 20, about "the medicine of immortality, an antidote so as not to die but to live in Jesus Christ always." In JUSTIN’s Dialogue with Trypho, chs. 5, 6, we have a conversation of the writer with an aged Christian about the immortality of the soul as taught by Plato. This doctrine, both speakers repudiate on the ground that the soul has been begotten, and therefore cannot be immortal. The old man continues, "I do not say that all souls die: for that were truly a piece of good fortune for the wicked." (This means, apparently, that they do not die when the body dies.) "The souls of the pious remain in a better place, while those of the unjust and the wicked are in a worse, waiting for the time of judgment. Thus some who have appeared worthy of God never die; but others are punished so long as God wills them to exist and be punished. . . . Now the soul partakes of life, since God wills it to live. Thus then it will not even partake of life when God does not will it to live. For, to live is not its attribute, as it is God’s; but, as a man does not live always and the soul is not for ever joined to the body, since whenever this harmony must be broken up the soul leaves the body and the man exists no longer, even so, whenever the soul must cease to exist, the spirit of life is removed from it and there is no more soul but it goes back to the place from whence it was taken." The whole dialogue leaves no room to doubt that Justin did not hold Plato’s doctrine of the endless permanence of all human souls. THEOPHILUS To Autolycus, bk. ii. 27, writes: "But some will say to us, Was man by nature mortal ? Certainly not. Was he, then immortal? Neither do we affirm this. But one will say, Was he then nothing? Not even this hits the mark. He was by nature neither mortal nor immortal. For, if He had made him immortal from the beginning, He would have made him God. Again, if He had made him mortal, God would seem to be the cause of his death. Neither then immortal nor yet mortal did He make him, but, as we have said above, capable of both; so that if he should incline to the things of immortality, keeping the commandment of God, he should receive as reward from Him immortality, and should become God; but if, on the other hand, he should turn to the things of death, disobeying God, he should himself be the cause of death to himself. For God made man free, and with power over himself. That, then, which man brought upon himself through carelessness and disobedience, this now God bestows on him as a gift, through His own kindness and pity, when men obey Him. For, as man, disobeying, drew death upon himself, so, obeying the will of God, he who desires is able to gain for himself life eternal. For God has given us a law and holy commandments; and every one who keeps these can be saved, and, obtaining the resurrection, can inherit incorruptibility." Somewhat later IRENAEUS writes, in bk. ii. 34- 3, that "The Father of all imparts continuance for ever and ever on those who are saved. For life does not arise from us, nor from our own nature, but is bestowed according to the grace of God. And therefore he who shall preserve the life bestowed upon him and give thanks to Him that imparted it, shall receive also length of days for ever and ever. But he who shall reject it and prove himself ungrateful to his Maker, inasmuch as he has been created and has not recognised Him who bestowed the gift upon him, deprives himself of the privilege of continuance for ever and ever. And for this reason the Lord declared to those who showed themselves ungrateful to Him, If ye have not been faithful in that which is little, who shall give you that which is great? indicating that those who, in this brief temporal life, have shown themselves ungrateful to Him who bestowed it, shall justly not receive from Him length of days for ever and ever." On the other hand, in bk. v. 4. 1, (cf. ch. 7. 1,) Irenaeus speaks of the soul as one of the things "which are by nature immortal, and to which it belongs by their own nature to live." This apparent contradiction reveals the influence of two contradictory lines of thought." At the close of the second century CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA writes, "Let us observe God’s commandments and follow His counsels: they are the short and direct way that leads to eternity," i.e. to eternal existence ; and again, "When baptized, we become enlightened; enlightened, we become sons; as sons we become perfect and immortal." See Paed. 1. 3, 6. From a fragment of a lost work On the Soul, the following words are quoted in Migne’s edition of Clement, vol. ii. p.751: All souls are immortal even of the godless, to whom it were better not to be incorruptible." But nothing similar is found in Clement’s extant voluminous works. In the middle of the second century TATIAN writes, in his Address to the Greeks, ch. 13: "The soul is not in itself immortal, O Greeks, but mortal. Yet it is possible for it not to die. If indeed it knows not the truth, it dies and is dissolved with the body, but rises again at last at the end of the world with the body, receiving death by punishment in immortality." About the demons, he says, in ch. 14: "That which is now their chief distinction, that they do not die like men, they will retain when about to suffer punishment: they will not partake of everlasting life so as to receive this, instead of death, in a blessed immortality. And as we, to whom it now easily happens to die, afterwards receive the immortal with enjoyment or the painful with immortality, so the demons who abuse the present life to purposes of wrong doing, dying continually even while they live, will have hereafter the same immortality, like that which they had during the life they lived, but in its nature like that of men, who actually performed what the demons prescribed to them during their lifetime." The phrases punishment in immortality and the painful with immortality deviate from the phraseology of the New Testament. For there the term immortality and its equivalents incorruptibility and eternal life are used only to describe a state of blessing. Thus Tatian approaches the language of Plato, with whose writings he was familiar. We turn now to a very able treatise on The Resurrection of the Dead by ATHENAGORAS, an Athenian philosopher who became a Christian in the latter half of the second century. He writes in ch. 13 that God "made man of an immortal soul and a body;" in ch. 24, of "men possessing an immortal soul and a rational judgment;" in ch. 20, of "the soul as incorruptible;" and in ch. 23, of an "immortal nature." Here for the first time probably in Christian literature we find the favourite phraseology of Plato: and, remembering that the writer was a student of Plato before he became a Christian, we cannot doubt the source from which it was derived. The writer’s aim is to prove the resurrection of the body: and in his effort to do this he shows much skill. His main argument is that the creative purpose of God included both soul and body; that each of these is an integral part of the man, is concerned in his actions, and therefore must share his judgment and final destiny. Some of his arguments seem to imply that the creative purpose must necessarily be accomplished; and he tells us, in ch. 25, that the end of an intelligent creature is to delight in contemplation of God. But he admits that many men fail of this end. He does not discuss the ultimate fate of the lost; and leaves us in uncertainty whether or not all will finally be saved. His one point is to prove that in the destiny of man the body will share. In this he differs widely from Plato, who claims immortality only for the soul. We come now to TERTULLIAN, who, in North Africa, wrote in Latin at the beginning of the third century. He accepts from Plato the doctrine of the immortality of the soul. So in ch. 3 of his treatise On the Resurrection of the Flesh: "Some things are known even by nature: the immortality of the soul, for instance, is held by many; the knowledge of God is possessed by all. I will use, therefore, the opinion of a Plato when asserting Every soul is immortal." But, as a Christian, he rejects the theory of the uncreated pre-existence of the soul. So his treatise On the Soul, ch. 4: "When we acknowledge that the soul originates in the breath of God, it follows that we attribute to it a beginning. This Plato refuses, representing it as not born and not made." In ch. 10 he says, "It belongs to firm faith to say with Plato that the soul is simple, i.e. uniform in substance." Throughout these two works, Tertullian constantly speaks of the soul as immortal in Plato’s sense of the word, and sometimes of the wicked as in endless suffering. So Resurrection of The Flesh, ch. 34: "We so accept the soul’s immortality as to believe it lost, not in the sense of destruction but of punishment, i.e. in Gehenna." Also in ch. 35: "If any one supposes that the destruction of soul and flesh in Gehenna refers to an annihilation and end of both substances, as if they were to be consumed, not punished, let him remember that the fire of Gehenna is announced to be eternal, for eternal punishment, and let him recognise that eternity of killing is more to be feared than anything temporal which man could inflict." He argues, in ch. 14 of his treatise On the Soul, that, since the soul is simple, not composite, it cannot be dissolved or cease to be. No one can read these two treatises of Tertullian, and compare them with earlier Christian literature, without feeling that this impulsive African has introduced into Christian literature, or given greater prevalence to, two new and lower elements, the natural immortality of the soul and the endless torment of the lost. In the sufferings of these last he exults with fiendish delight : On Public Exhibitions, ch. 30. But I forbear to quote his awful lines. Somewhat later, in a far different spirit, ORIGEN, the earliest Christian Biblical scholar, accepted the immortality of the soul, and from it inferred that all souls will ultimately be saved. In his First Principles, bk. iii. I3, we read "It is not without reason then that he who is abandoned is abandoned to the Divine judgment, and that God is long-suffering with certain sinners but because it will be for their advantage, with respect to the immortality of the soul and the unending world, that they be not quickly brought into a state of salvation, but be conducted to it more slowly, after having experienced many evils. For as physicians who are able to cure a man quickly when they suspect that a hidden poison exists in the body, do the reverse of healing, making this more certain through their very desire to heal, deeming it better to retain the patient for a considerable time under inflammation and sickness, in order that he may recover his health more surely, rather than to appear to produce a rapid recovery, and afterwards to cause a relapse and thus that hasty cure last only for a time; in the same way God also, who knows the secret things of the heart and foresees future events, in His longsuffering permits certain events to occur, and by means of those things which happen from without extracts the secret evil, in order to cleanse him who through carelessness has received the seeds of sin. . . . For God governs souls not with reference, let me say, to the fifty years of the present life, but with reference to the limitless age: for He made the thinking principle in its nature immortal and kindred to Himself: and the rational soul is not, as it is in this life, excluded from cure." In the above quotations we see two practical and opposite consequences of the doctrine of the immortality of the soul. Tertullian inferred from it the endless suffering of the lost; Origen inferred the ultimate salvation of all men. Each of these inferences seems to me legitimate; and each is prevalent now. They reveal the greatness of the issues involved in the doctrine before us. Very perplexing is the following apparent contradiction between two closely related works of ATHANASIUS. In §§ 32, 33 of his treatise Contra Gentes, he speaks several times of the soul as immortal; and argues that, "just as the senses of the body, it being mortal, contemplate mortal things, so the soul, since it contemplates and takes into calculation immortal things, must necessarily also itself be immortal and live always." He thus reproduces the phrase and thought of Plato, as accepted by Athenagoras and Tertullian. On the other hand, in his famous treatise, On the Incarnation of the Word of God, he writes as though the lost would sink into the non-existence from which originally the Creator called them. So § 4: "For the transgression of the commandment was turning them back to their natural state; so that, just as while not existing they have begun to be, so also naturally, in course of time, they may undergo corruption into nonexistence. For if, being once by nature nonexistent, by the coming, and the philanthropy of the Word they were called into existence, it was a consequence that men, having been emptied of thought about God and having turned away to things non-existent - for the evil things are nonexistent and the good things existent, since they have come into being from the Existent God - should be emptied even of existing always. This means that they be dissolved, and remain in death and corruption. For man is by nature mortal, having come into being out of things not existing. But, because of his likeness to Him that exists, if he guard it by his contemplation of Him, he would disarm the corruption by nature and remain incorruptible." Similarly, in § 6 he speaks of men, though made in the image of God, as disappearing and being destroyed in consequence of sin; and gives this as a reason for the mission and gift of the Son to save man. "It was unfitting that beings once made rational and partakers of His Word should perish and turn again, by corruption, into non-existence." The only explanation of this contradiction which I can suggest is that the above incompatible statements of doctrine reflect different types of teaching prevalent in the Church in Athanasius’ day, each going, in my opinion, beyond the teaching of the Bible, viz. (1) the essential permanence of all human souls, and (2) that the destruction threatened to those who reject salvation involves ultimate loss of existence. The incompatibility of these types of teaching had apparently not arrested the attention of the youthful theologian destined to mould so greatly and so beneficially the theology of the Church of Christ. The prevalence, in the West, of the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, in the sense of its essential and endless permanence, is due probably to the immense influence of AUGUSTINE. This great father was familiar with the systems of the Greek philosophers; and among them gives the palm to Plato. But he contradicts Plato’s teaching that human souls are pre-existent and without beginning; and meets an argument that whatever had a beginning must also have an end. His whole teaching about the future punishment of sin rests on the assumption that the human soul is immortal. So his City of God, bk. xiii. 2: "The human soul is truly affirmed to be immortal . . . it is said to be immortal because in some way it does not cease to live and feel." Similarly bk. xxi. 3: "Death will be eternal; since the soul, through not having God, will not be able to live, nor by dying to escape the pains of the body." So a little lower: "The soul can suffer pain and cannot die. Here is found a thing which, since it has sense of pain, is immortal." And much more of the same sort. To sum up. The phrase, the soul immortal, so frequent and conspicuous in the writings of Plato, we have not found in pre-Christian literature outside the influence of Greek philosophy; nor have we found it in Christian literature until the latter part of the second century. We have noticed that all the earliest Christian writers who use this phrase were familiar with the teaching of Plato; that one of these, Tertullian, expressly refers both phrase and doctrine to him; and that the early Christian writers never support this doctrine by appeals to the Bible, but only by arguments similar to those of Plato. We have learnt that by this phrase Plato and the earliest Christian writers who use it asserted the endless and essential permanence of all human souls, and appealed to this doctrine in proof of retribution beyond the grave. But we have failed to find any trace of this doctrine in the Bible. On the other hand, Christ and His Apostles teach clearly and frequently retribution beyond death, and eternal life with God for all who put faith in Christ. The hope of immortality, however, rests, in the New Testament, not on the nature of the soul, but on the "promise of life in Christ Jesus." The doctrine of the immortality of the soul differs further from the immortality promised in the New Testament in that this last is not for the body only, as Plato taught, but for the whole man, body and soul. Doubtless the doctrine before us was welcome in the early Church, as in a still earlier day to some devout Jews, because of the support it renders to the all-important doctrine of retribution beyond the grave. But, as we have seen, it is altogether alien, both in phrase and thought, to the teaching of Christ and His Apostles. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 21: 2.04. IMMORTALITY IN MODERN THEOLOGY ======================================================================== CHAPTER IV IMMORTALITY IN MODERN THEOLOGY WE shall now consider the doctrine of the Immortality of the Soul as treated by representative modern theologians. My first reference shall be to an excellent work well known in all Protestant Churches and nations, the Christian Dogmatics of DR. VAN OOSTERZEE. In §§ 66-71 the writer discusses "Man’s original nature." But he nowhere asserts the endless permanence of the soul. On the contrary, he says in § 68. 4, "Of the soul we know too little to find, by an appeal to its constitution, sufficient ground for our demonstration; we cannot even represent to ourselves this soul, or its independent continuance separated from the bodily life; and the uncertain can hardly be proved by the unknown. Throughout § 68 he speaks of "the hope of immortality" and of "the immortality of man." This last phrase he defines to mean "not merely the continuance of life, but also of the sense of life." Dr. Oosterzee asserts clearly that the soul of man is designed by God for immortal life, and that retribution beyond the grave awaits all men, good and bad. But he does not attempt to prove that all human souls will exist and think and feel for ever. In § 69 the writer discusses the image of God in man; and asserts that it was not destroyed, though sadly marred, by sin. He says in art. 7: "While we must regard this image as natural and capable of propagation, we must deny that it is, as something accidental, even in the least degree capable of being lost. It was not merely an ideal after which man was to strive, but actually a treasure which he was to keep, and hand over to posterity unimpaired. ‘The image of God in man cannot be destroyed. Even in hell it can burn, but cannot be consumed: it may be tormented, but cannot be extirpated’ (Bernard of Clairvaux). Certainly, for it forms an original element of our human nature; and if we were wholly despoiled of it, we should then be as little men as the bird when deprived of the means of flying can bear the name of bird." This comparison leaves open the question whether the soul may ever cease to exist: for indisputably a bird may both lose its wings and by dissipation into inorganic matter cease to be in any sense a bird. Moreover, a treasure which we are bound "to keep and to hand over to posterity unimpaired" may nevertheless be lost. Yet Dr. Oosterzee seems to believe in the endless permanence of all human souls. But this is not plainly stated; and no attempt is made to prove it. In § 149 the theory of the final restoration of all men is discussed; and we have a few words about annihilation. In art. 2 we read : "Annihilation of the incurably evil would, we readily confess; appear most acceptable to us, if we should give to our thoughts the highest authority in this province. For it is very difficult to conceive of an endless existence in connection with one who is entirely separated from God, the source of life, on which account accordingly Scripture has described this condition as the second death." But this theory, if I rightly understand him, Dr. Oosterzee rejects as disproved by Revelation 6:16, Revelation 14:11. On the whole, the important doctrine of the immortality of the soul, i.e. the essential permanence of all human souls, though apparently assumed, is no part of the definite teaching of this volume; and the writer does nothing whatever in any way to prove it. We come now to a work marked by deep and loving insight into the things of God and by great beauty of diction, DR. POPE’S Compendium of Theology. In vol. i. p. 423 we read, in reference to "the image of God in man" that "it was Essential and Indestructible: the self-conscious and self-determining personality of man, as a spirit bearing the stamp of likeness to God and capable of immortality, was the reflection in the creature of the Divine nature. . . . From beginning to end the holy record regards this image as uneffaced and ineffaceable, and still existing in every human being." This language is further explained on p. 426: "No clearer evidence of the indestructibility of the Divine likeness could be given than that of the sanction thrown around human life; it is inviolate, for in the image of God made He man. Of course this does not decide the question whether or not immortality was part of the indestructible image, though it might seem that we affirm it by using the term indestructible." On this last important question the writer says nothing whatever. He seems to be unwilling to state his own opinion. Dr. Pope returns to the immortality of the soul in vol. iii. p. 372. He says, "The immortality or continued conscious existence of man’s spirit is everywhere assumed in Scripture and nowhere proved." That the spirit will survive the body is assumed or stated throughout the New Testament in terms as decisive as the clearest categorical assertion; e.g. in 2 Corinthians 5:10, where Paul asserts that we must all be manifested before the judgment seat of Christ in order that each may receive according to his conduct on earth; similarly John 5:28-29, Hebrews 9:27, etc. But this is very different from assuming the endless existence of all human souls. Our author says that the immortality of man’s spirit is in Scripture nowhere proved. Is the divinity of Christ proved there? It is: for in the New Testament we find decisive documentary evidence that Christ on earth claimed a superiority to men and a unique and close relation to God involving, in contrast to all mere creatures, a share of the Divine nature. But throughout the Bible we have no such proof, direct or indirect, or any clear suggestion, of the endless permanence of all human spirits. Dr. Pope adds: "The absolute immortality of the human spirit is not in question as yet." And it does not come into question throughout his work. On p. 403, after a quotation of John 5:24-29, the writer adds: "The fuller revelation of immortality and eternal life includes, therefore, the foreannouncement of a resurrection of the whole man, and of the whole race of man to an endless existence." But of this last all important statement no shadow of proof is given. On p. 421 we read of "the misery of the conscious eternal exclusion from" the vision of God; and that whatever the word eternal in Matt. xxv. 46 "means to the righteous it means also to the wicked." On pp. 435-44 Dr. Pope discusses the theory of the annihilation of the wicked. He says: "1. The question of man’s natural immortality is not allowed to be absolutely decisive; and perhaps more has been made to depend on this in the controversy than it will bear. Those who maintain that in the image of God, impressed upon man, there was a reflection in the creature of His eternity, and that this natural image was not destroyed by the Fall, are in possession of an argument which settles the matter at once. This is undoubtedly the view of Scripture, which nowhere asserts or proves the deathlessness of the human spirit any more than it asserts or proves the being of God. To us, therefore, the question is determined at the outset." Now, in Gen. i., are thirty statements which imply decisively the existence of an intelligent Creator who speaks and acts, and are therefore equivalent to categorical assertions of the existence of God: and these are followed by innumerable similar statements throughout the Bible. But no such statements implying the deathlessness of the human spirit are to be found there. On p. 437 we read, "It may be added that annihilation is to all intents and purposes an eternal punishment of sin committed in time. On p. 442 we read, "It must be admitted that the theologians of this new school (annihilation) have steadfastly asserted some fundamental principles. They hold fast the doctrine of the eternal punishment of sin." This is a most important admission. For the phrase eternal punishment, solemnly used by Christ in Mt. xxv. 46 in awful contrast to the eternal life awaiting the righteous, is the strongest argument from the Bible for the endless suffering of the lost. This argument is surrendered by Dr. Pope, who anticipated my volume on The Last Things by asserting that final extinction of men created by God for endless blessedness would be eternal punishment. (See on p. 70, a quotation from Irenaeus.) He also anticipated me by endeavouring to prove that extinction of the lost is not taught in the Bible. On p. 443 he quotes with disapproval the Rev. E. White as saying that "Christ comes not to save an immortal sinner; but to give a mortal sinner, who had sinned, the offer of immortality. But I do not see that he has brought any serious objection to the doctrine of annihilation except by overturning, as I do, arguments in its favour. Certainly he has done nothing to prove the immortality of the soul. Much more definite and valuable, in reference to the subject before us, than either of the works quoted above, is DR. LAIDLAW’S admirable book on The Bible Doctrine of Man. In lecture vi. he discusses "Man’s nature and a future life." On pp. 224ff we read: "During most of the Christian centuries, the Scripture doctrine concerning the life to come has been held as bound up with and based upon that of the indestructibility of the human soul. Man is a being who must live after death, must live for ever. Conscience declares that present conduct and character are to influence an eternal hereafter. Nay, the very make of the soul tells of the timeless and changeless sphere to which it belongs. The doctrine of the natural and necessary immortality of the human soul has been religiously cherished as of the very essence of the scriptural or Christian belief in a life to come. . . . More cautious Christian opponents of the prevailing method of identifying divine revelation as to a future life with the tenet of the soul’s indestructibility have preferred to rest the doctrine of survival on the resurrection of Jesus and the affirmations of Scripture, without insisting on the soul’s natural immortality. . . . The Bible does not affirm the immortality of the soul in any abstract or general form. Much less does it define the constitution of the soul as involving its necessary indestructibility. So much we may freely concede." This last is a most important concession. Throughout the volume Dr. Laidlaw does not appeal to the Bible in proof of the popular doctrine of the endless permanence of all human souls. Nor does he assert plainly that he accepts this doctrine. The writer continues : "But when it is said that the notion of a separable soul or spirit in man is unscriptural, is nothing but a philosophical figment, and that the soul’s separate existence is no necessary part of Christian belief, we are prepared on the strongest grounds to demur. . . . The personal existence of human beings after death is a doctrine that pervades the whole system of Scripture. The Bible sustains and illumines, in the most remarkable and varied ways, man’s instinctive belief that he was made for an everlasting existence. . . . It would be wrong to import into these terms (breath and spirit) the metaphysical idea of an indissoluble substance, and thus commit the Scripture to the philosophical argument that the soul cannot die because it cannot be dissolved or dissipated. But the author of the Book of Wisdom seems to be fairly following the doctrine of Genesis when he says, ‘For God created man to be immortal, and made him to be an image of His own peculiar nature.’" With all this I heartily agree. Dr. Laidlaw then (on page 229) distinguishes between "the Bible mode of affirming man’s future existence and the methods of other religions and philosophies," especially that of Plato, "which has such close affinities with scriptural doctrine as to have been greatly identified with Christian eschatology, elaborated by the schoolmen as the foundation of the faith, and often preached from the Christian pulpit as a substitute for the fuller light of the gospel on life and immortality." So on p. 233: "Gradually, in Christian schools, the Greek influence prevailed, and even in the Christian Church the idea of the soul’s immortality for long took the place of the Scripture doctrine of a future life." In other words, our author admits, as is proved by me in ch. i., that the popular doctrine of the immortality of the soul was derived from Plato. Dr. Laidlaw writes, on p. 240 This theory of ’conditional immortality,’ or of the ultimate annihilation of the wicked, may claim one advantage over its rival, the theory of universal restoration. In its appeal to the certainty of future punishment and to the irrevocably character of future destiny, it is somewhat more in accordance than the other with the findings at once of conscience and of Scripture. But both theories are incompetent solutions of the awful problem which they attempt. It is obvious that neither of them can be made to consist with the whole doctrine of Scripture as to the future of man." But the writer does not discuss the popular theory of the endless suffering of the lost, nor does he give his own interpretation of the teaching of the Bible about the future punishment of sin. By asserting that the popular doctrine of the natural immortality of the soul - i.e. of the necessary and endless permanence of all human souls - has no place in the Bible, and differs from the teaching of the New Testament, and that it was derived from Plato, and by his own rejection of this doctrine as destitute of adequate proof, Dr. Laidlaw has anticipated my teaching in this volume. It is worthy of note that, while rejecting, as not taught in the Bible, the theory of conditional immortality, he does not quote any passage of Holy Scripture as contradicting it. We come now to DR. SALMOND’S volume on The Christian Doctrine of Immortality. This title he appropriately explains in the preface, ed. 1: "It will be seen that the word ‘Immortality’ is used in the large sense which Paul gives it when he speaks of ’this mortal’ putting on ‘immortality.’ Life, eternal life, the immortality of the man, not the immortality of the soul, is the message of the Bible, alike in Old Testament and in New, in Christ and in Apostle, in John and in Paul." The writer expounds, in general agreement with the present work, the opinions of the Jews and of various ancient nations about a future life; and indicates correctly the essential difference between the teaching of Plato and that of the New Testament. He adds, on p. 126, (The references are to the fourth edition, just published.) that "when Christ came, Hellenic thought ruled the world." Dr. Salmond expounds also the teaching of Christ, the general apostolic doctrine, and the Pauline doctrine. Of Christ he says, on p. 316, "His gift to men is not the inculcation of the truth of an endless existence, not any dogma of the soul’s deathless perpetuity, but the revelation of a higher life, and the inspiration of a hope stronger than any speculation, sacredly governing conduct, and accessible to the humblest soul." Of Paul he says, on p. 458, "He never contemplates a simple immortality of soul; he never argues for man’s survival merely on the ground that there is a mind or spirit in him." It is quite clear that, in Dr. Salmond’s view, the Bible does not teach the endless permanence of all human souls. This last doctrine, which has occupied so large a place in popular theology he passes over almost in silence. Of "the doctrine of Annihilation" our author says, on p. 473, that, "It had a large and well-understood place in pre-Christian speculation. It assumed different shapes, and was taught in different interests in the faiths and philosophies of the old world." He thus admits, in harmony with ch. ii. of this book, that Plato’s doctrine of the immortality of the soul was far from universal in the ancient world. On p. 474 Dr. Salmond says, in my opinion justly, that the advocates of conditional immortality have overstated their case by claiming as on their side the earliest Christian writers. But he mistranslates his most important quotation in proof of the endless suffering or the lost, viz. words attributed to Polycarp in ch. xi. of the Epistle of the Church at Smyrna, which should be, not "perpetual torment of eternal fire," but "the fire of the coming judgment and eternal punishment;" same words as in Matthew 25:46. The same mistranslation is given in Dr. Pusey’s Eternal Punishment, p. 153. Our author says, on p. 475, that Irenaeus "speaks also of ’immortal souls’ and of the ‘eternal’ duration of punishments." But unfortunately Dr. Salmond does not say where Irenaeus uses these phrases. Possibly he refers to the two passages mentioned on p. 42 of this book. Irenaeus frequently quotes Matthew 25:41, "Perpetual" or "eternal fire;" eg. bks. iv. 28. 2, iii. 23. 3; but so far as I have noticed he does not expound the meaning of the word eternal in this verse or in v. 46. On the other hand, he argues, in bk. v. 27. 2, as I do on p 176 of my Last Things, that "the good things from God being eternal and endless, the privation of them also is, for this reason, eternal and endless:" aionios kai ateleutetos. Notice that here the word endless is added to the word eternal as a description of the loss of endless blessing. This suggests strongly that the words were not synonymous; for otherwise the addition would be meaningless tautology. In contending against the theory of conditional immortality, Dr. Salmond sometimes betrays a disposition to accept the doctrine of the endless permanence of all human souls. He quotes with approval, on p. 487, a writer who says that, the notion of a soul immortal enough to live through death, but not immortal enough to live for ever, is too childish to be entertained beyond the little school of literalists who delight in it." Again, on p. 497, he asks: "If man is not inherently immortal, why should the sinful man subsist at all after death ? " The answer to this question is easy. God has decreed that, whatever a man sows, this he shall also reap. And, because for this reaping there is not space in the present life, He has decreed that after death comes judgment, this last involving conscious existence at least for a time. But this moral necessity for the survival of the wicked affords no proof or presumption that they will abide for ever in suffering. For, though we can see a moral necessity for judgment after death, we can conceive no moral ends to be served by endless permanence of evil in this awful form, an irremovable blemish on the rescued and glorified universe of God. Certainly the above suggestion is not absurd. It has been vindicated as legitimate by not a few modern theologians who cannot be dismissed as "childish." An all-important point in Dr. Salmond’s book is that while evidently disliking the doctrine of the ultimate extinction of the wicked, and apparently favouring the traditional doctrine of the endless permanence of all human souls, this involving endless suffering of the lost, he does not state plainly his own belief. Certainly he brings no proof from the Bible or elsewhere for the popular doctrine of the immortality of the soul. He thus affords strong presumption that it is not taught there, and that it does not rest on any reliable evidence. That in a work on "The Christian Doctrine of Immortality " the writer does not discuss or mention the doctrine of the Immortality of the Soul, which has exerted so remarkable an influence on all Christian thought, is a serious defect in this interesting volume. DR. WELLDON, bishop of Calcutta, in his attractive book on The Hope of Immortality, endeavours to say something for the immortality of the soul without appealing to the Bible. But he is not very sure of his ground. For, on p. 3, he writes: "I do not aspire to prove Immortality, but to make it probable." His doubt is far-reaching. For, on p. 5, he says: "No historical fact is certain." And he fears (see p. 10) that his book may leave his readers "in some uncertainty;" a probable consequence which, strange to say, he does not regret. Dr. Welldon defines clearly, on p. 57, the opinion he endeavours to make probable. "The soul is immortal, i.e. everlasting. It does not merely survive death; it survives everlastingly. It survives in virtue of the character which distinguishes it from all that is dissoluble and destructible." Again, on p. 63 he writes: "The soul which lives after death is not only spiritual but emotional and rational. It is the whole immaterial part of man. It survives and survives eternally in the fulness of its intellectual, moral, and spiritual powers. The third chapter, on "The Value of the Belief," is an able and beautiful statement of the moral worth of a belief that beyond the grave endless reward awaits the righteous. In chs. iv. and v. the writer adduces the evidences, external and internal, for immortality. Unfortunately, in so doing, he omits, as outside the scope of his work, the one ground on which the Christian hope rests securely, viz. the promise of life in Christ Jesus with its historical and experimental credentials. This omission is most serious. For Dr. Welldon’s book leaves the impression that this hope rests only on what he admits to be the uncertain grounds here adduced. Whenever these outlying proofs are brought forward, they ought to be supplemented by the more solid proof given to us in Christ. The evidence adduced is halting and uncertain. So far as it goes it affords a probability that man will survive death. And this survival the writer accepts as proof or presumption of the truth of his main thesis, viz, that all human souls will in virtue of their nature, survive for ever; thus confounding survival with endless survival. The last chapter discusses "The Christian Amplification of the Belief in Immortality." Like some other writers, Dr. Welldon says Christianity does not prove immortality. It assumes immortality; or to speak exactly, it breathes a spiritual atmosphere in which the assumption of immortality is felt to be natural or even necessary." This is a terrible understatement. For Christ and His Apostles asserted again and again in plainest language that eternal life awaits all who put faith in Him: and in proof of this assertion God raised Him from the dead. Consequently the Christian hope of immortality rests, not on the uncertain grounds adduced in this book, but on the sure word of our risen Lord. On p. 342 we read: "Of Hell, as it is called, and of the disciplinary process to which unhallowed souls are subjected when this life is ended, it is impossible to form a conception save through the contrast in which it stands to the beatific state; for it has not been the will of God to reveal more than its mere shadowy outline." Dr. Welldon suggests the hope that "when the soul stands at the judgment-bar, the misery of sin, the pain of loss, the burning sense of all that might have been and yet is not and may never be, above all the ever present consciousness of alienation from Him to whom man’s spiritual being tends unceasingly, will be an agony so sharp and subtle as to extort all exceeding bitter cry for the pardon and peace of Heaven." Although Dr. Welldon asserts, eg. on p.349, that "immortality is the inalienable prerogative of man," his essay affords fair presumptive proof that this is not taught in the Bible; which is my contention in this volume. What degree of probability he has claimed for his assertion, his readers will judge. The last book to which I shall refer, as defending the immortality of the soul, is a most attractive and in many respects excellent volume on Christian Theology recently published by an American theologian, DR. W. N. CLARKE. He asserts, on p. 192, that "MAN IS IMMORTAL, that is to say, the human personality is undying. The spirit is the person, and what is here affirmed is that the human spirit, with its essential powers in which it resembles God, is destined to live on endlessly. A human being will never cease to be a human being." But, for this statement, he does not quote Holy Scripture. On p. 198 he writes : "The influence of Jesus certainly has supported in Christians the conviction that all men live for ever; for among Christians this belief has been held, with only occasional variations, not merely as a natural conviction but as a Christian certainty. Christ does not affirm in so many words that all men live for ever, but He powerfully teaches it by His attitude and mode of appeal to men." On pp. 450-453 Dr. Clarke refers to the doctrine of conditional immortality; but without approval. He denies a bodily return of Christ and a judgment at the end of the world. So p. 458: "If the coming of Christ is conceived as spiritual, not visible, and as a process, not an event, a change in one’s idea of the resurrection will necessarily follow. If no visible descent of Christ is looked for, no simultaneous resurrection of humanity on the earth will be expected. If we accept the view of Christ’s coming that has been expressed on previous pages, we shall naturally think that each human being’s resurrection takes place at his death, and consists in the rising of the man from death to life in another realm of life. . . . According to this view resurrection is not simultaneous for all, but continuous, or successive; and for no human being is there any intervening period of disembodiment." How far removed this teaching is from that of the New Testament, I have in my volume on The Last Things endeavoured to prove. In his discussion of final destinies, on pp. 474 - 480, Dr. Clarke expresses a hope that for most or for all men there may be probation and salvation beyond the grave. On p. 477 he reminds us that "there are passages in the New Testament in which there seems to be hope that God will yet gain the love and devotion of all souls. There arises also the question whether God would not be just so far defeated if an endless dualism were established in His universe by the endless sway of sin over a part of His intelligent creatures. From such considerations comes the hope of many that God will finally bring all souls from sin to holiness." So on p. 478 : "It is hard to believe that God indefinitely perpetuates suffering that, is not useful." These two volumes, by Bishop Welldon and Dr. Clarke, reveal the natural tendency of the doctrine of the immortality of all human souls. They who believe that to every man God has given an intelligence which, whatever he may do, will for an endless succession of ages know and feel, may well be pardoned if they cherish a hope that this imperishable gift will be to him, not an endless curse, but ultimately an endless blessing. Thus, as with Origen in the third century, so with many now, Plato’s doctrine of the immortality of the soul has been the parent of a doctrine of universal salvation. They also illustrate the danger involved in adding to the theology of the Church, even in the supposed interests of the Christian life, doctrines not taught in the Bible. We have no right to go beyond the plain and abundant teaching of the Sacred Book. And, to do so, is perilous in the extreme. To sum up. Of the six modern works quoted in this chapter, not one attempts to prove from the Bible, although some of them endeavour to prove in other ways, or assume without proof, the endless permanence of all human souls. This affords a presumption hardly distinguishable from certainty that this doctrine is not directly or indirectly taught in the Holy Scriptures. And in a matter pertaining altogether to the unseen world, other proof is worthless. It may therefore be dismissed as no part of the Gospel of Christ. The most conspicuous protest in our time against the doctrine of. the immortality of the soul, in the sense of the endless survival of all human souls, is that made by the REV. EDWARD WHITE in his Life in Christ, published in 1875, a third edition, revised and enlarged, in 1877. This bold protest rendered great service by claiming a reconsideration of the whole subject. It was, however, in my view, weakened by the writer’s endeavour to prove that the Bible teaches the ultimate extinction of the lost, thus himself going, as I think, beyond the teaching of Holy Scripture in another direction. Mr. White’s book also lies open to objection on sundry matters of detail. But, in spite of all this, it remains a most honourable protest against prevalent and popular error. The teaching of Mr. White is ably supported by DR. E. PETAVEL, of Lausanne, in a very useful volume entitled The Problem of Immortality. A very remarkable and valuable protest against the same doctrine is found in GLADSTONE’S Studies subservient to the works of Bishop Butler. On p. 142 the writer calls attention to the two meanings, frequently confused or identified, eg. by Bishop Welldon quoted above, of the phrase immortality of the soul, viz. its survival of death or its endless survival. He points out that Butler’s argument in his Analogy, pt. i. ch. 7, "is a plea not for immortality, properly so called, but for persistence of life as against the special occasion of death. . . . There are those who say these two things, survival and immortality, are but one; and who seem to suppose that the case of surmounting death is like that of obtaining a passport which will carry us over the frontier of some foreign country; where, this once done, we have no other impediment to apprehend. But, on such an assumption of the identity of survival with immortality, it is to be observed that it is a pure assumption, and nothing more. We have no title to postulate in limine that powers, which may be so adjusted or equipped as to face the contingency of death, must therefore be in all respects such as to be certain of facing with a like impunity every other contingency which, for aught we know, the dimness of the future may enfold in its ample bosom. Such questions may remain open, and without prejudice for independent discussion." Mr. Gladstone denies strongly, and again and again, that the Bible ever teaches, in the proper sense of the phrase, the immortality of the soul. So, on p. 197f: "Another consideration of the highest importance is that the natural immortality of the soul is a doctrine wholly unknown to the Holy Scriptures, and standing on no higher plane than that of an ingeniously sustained, but gravely and formidably contested, philosophical opinion. And surely there is nothing, as to which we ought to be more on our guard, than the entrance into the precinct of Christian doctrine, either without authority or by an abuse of authority, of philosophical speculations disguised as truths of Divine Revelation. They bring with them a grave restraint on mental liberty; but what is worse is, that their basis is a pretension essentially false, and productive by rational retribution of other falsehoods. Under these two heads, we may perhaps find that we have ample warrant for declining to accept the tenet of natural immortality as a truth of Divine Revelation." Contrast this plain statement, which, if untrue, may be disproved by one quotation from the Bible, with the equivocal language quoted above from writers who assert, or assume, or do not deny, the doctrine in question. The venerable statesman denies that this doctrine was taught in the earliest age of the Church. So on p. 184 : "The secret of this mental freedom, the condition which made it possible, was the absence from the scene of any doctrine of a natural immortality inherent to the soul. Absent it may be termed, for all practical purposes, until the third century; for though it was taught by Tertullian in connexion with the Platonic ideas, it was not given forth as belonging to the doctrine of Christ or His Apostles. . . . It seems to me as if it were from the time of Origen that we are to regard the idea of natural, as opposed to that of Christian, immortality as beginning to gain a firm foothold in the Christian Church." This is an important confirmation of ch. iii. of this volume. On p. 188f. we read, "It seems indisputable that the materials for the opinion that the soul is by nature immortal, whether we call it dogma or hypothesis, were for a long period in course of steady accumulation; though this was not so from the first. After some, generations, however, the mental temper and disposition of Christians inclined more and more to its reception. Without these assumptions it would be impossible to account for the wholesale change which has taken place in the mind of Christendom with regard to the subject of natural immortality. It would be difficult, I think, to name any other subject connected with religious belief (though not properly belonging to it) on which we can point to so sweeping and absolute a revolution of opinion, from the period before Origen, when the idea of an immortality properly natural was unknown or nearly hidden, to the centuries of the later Middle Ages and of modern time, when, at least in the West, it had become practically undisputed and universal." In further agreement with p. 52 of this book, Mr. Gladstone says on p. 191 : "It seems, however, to be generally felt that the determining epoch in the history of seminal Christian thought upon this Subject was the life of St. Augustine, together with that period following closely upon it, when the Western Church became rapidly imbued with his theology in almost its entire compass." CANON GORE, in vol. ii. pp. 210-214 of his recent work on The Epistle to the Romans, accepts without modification the teaching in Gladstone’s Studies and in my own volume on The Last Things in reference both to the future punishment of sin and the immortality of the soul. On p. 212 he writes: "Careful attention to the origin of the doctrine of the necessary immortality or indestructibility of each human soul, as stated for instance by Augustine or Aquinas, will probably convince us that it was no part of the original Christian message, or of really catholic doctrine. It was rather a speculation of Platonism taking possession of the Church. And this consideration leaves open possibilities of the ultimate extinction of personal consciousness in the lost, which Augustinianism somewhat rudely closed." The writer protests, as I do, against the assertion "that the souls of the lost will be at the last extinguished. These positive positions are no more justified than those of our forefathers which we have deprecated. We must recognize the limits of positive knowledge." This confirmation, by a theologian so eminent as Canon Gore, of the protest now restated and amplified in this book is of utmost value. And against it I know nothing. So far as I have read, no modern writer has done anything whatever to prove, from the Bible or in any other way, the endless permanence of the human soul. This is strong presumptive evidence that no valid proof of this doctrine can be brought; and thus confirms my contention in ch. ii. that it was not taught by Christ. in the cup of His anger," suggests a combination of different elements together with undiluted intensity. This terrible description of suffering is then strengthened by a change of metaphor they shall be tormented with fire and sulphur." A visible memento of suffering is seen in "the smoke of their torment;" and we are told that "for ages of ages" it "goes up." Even this does not close the awful picture. A few more words take us almost into that sulphurous flame, and reveal the ceaseless unrest of the sufferers there: "and they have no rest day and night." An announcement of suffering so terrible requires careful specification of the sufferers: "who worship the wild beast and his image, and if any one receives the mark of his name." This passage suggests perhaps, but does not expressly assert, the endless suffering of the persons whose doom is thus described. For the smoke may go up even when the suffering of which it is a visible memento has ceased. Age-lasting torment is asserted in Rev. xx. 10, "The devil was cast into the lake of fire and sulphur, where are the wild beast and the false prophet: and they shall be tormented day and night for the ages of the ages." But these words refer not to men, but to persons or abstractions whose active sin has been age-lasting. These two passages, in highly figurative language, from the most obscure book in the Bible, a book whose origin is veiled in insoluble mystery, are a very unsafe foundation for important Christian doctrine. It may be admitted that the above passages, or some of them, suggest, if they do not assert, the endless suffering of the lost. We now ask, Are they sufficient to justify a confident assertion that those excluded from the City of God will undergo endless suffering? For the following reasons, I think not. We find in the New Testament other passages which, taken by themselves, suggest, or seem to assert, doctrines which we are compelled to reject. To thousands of devout men Romans 8:29, Romans 9:14-23, Ephesians 1:4-5, John 15:16, have seemed to assert the doctrine of unconditional election and predestination, now almost universally repudiated. And Matthew 16:27-28, Matthew 24:34, seem to assert that Christ would come to judge the world during the lifetime of those around Him. These passages are quite as clear, in a sense we cannot accept, as are any which seem to assert the endless suffering of the lost. They warn us not to accept, especially in proof of a doctrine open to serious objection, a few texts from the Bible. All the great doctrines of the Gospel are supported by abundant and decisive teaching of Holy Scripture. And no doctrine ought to be asserted with confidence unless thus supported. Moreover, against this doctrine may be set other passages as clear and as numerous as those quoted above. In Matthew 3:12, the Baptist says, "The chaff He will burn-up with fire unquenchable:" similarly Matthew 3:10, "cast into the fire." This teaching is confirmed by Christ, who says in Matthew 13:30, "At the time of the harvest I shall say to the reapers, Gather first the tares and bind them into bundles to burn them up." Notice here twice and again in Matthew 13:40 the strong word katakausei. It suggests irresistibly the extinction of the objects burnt-up. For no process known to us is more like annihilation than is the destruction of vegetable matter by fire; whereas it has nothing in common with endless suffering. The same metaphor is found in John 15:6, Hebrews 6:8. These passages, I do not quote in proof of the ultimate extinction of the lost; but only to show how serious are the consequences of building important doctrine on a few verses of the Bible. Equally opposed to the traditional doctrine of the endless suffering of the lost is another group of passages, viz. those which assert or imply the universal reign of Christ. So Isaiah 45:23, quoted in Romans 14:11 as including both Jews and Gentiles: "As I live, says the Lord, to Me every knee shall bow; and every tongue shall confess to God." This great prophecy, a categorical and solemn assertion, refers evidently to the willing homage of happy souls. It cannot be fulfilled in the endless wail of the lost. The same may be said of the purpose expressed in Php 2:10 : "That at the name of Jesus every knee may bow, of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth; and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." Similarly 1 Corinthians 15:28 : "The Son Himself shall be subjected to Him who subjected all things to Him, in order that God may be all things in all." These two passages describe the ultimate aim of the work of Christ. And, although the accomplishment of this purpose of infinite blessing is contingent, in reference to each individual, on his own personal submission to Christ, it is in the last degree unlikely that this Divine purpose of universal homage to Christ will be for ever frustrated. Certainly these two groups of passages, from all four Gospels and from the undisputed epistles of Paul, are equal in number and weight to the passages from the Synoptist Gospels only and the Book of Revelation which suggest or seem to imply the endless suffering of the lost. Viewed in the light of the two other groups, this last group is an altogether unsafe foundation for confident assertion in God’s name that those condemned in the great day will undergo endless suffering. Notice now the extreme seriousness of the popular doctrine which in this book I have discussed. If we accept as indisputable truth, as it has been accepted during fifteen centuries, the doctrine of the endless permanence of all human souls, the few and uncertain passages, quoted above, which suggest or seem to assert the endless suffering of the lost are reinforced by the more numerous and much more decisive passages which assert or imply the finality of their doom, e.g. Php 3:19, 2 Corinthians 11:15, Hebrews 6:8, 1 Peter 4:17, Matthew 26:24, Mark 14:21, and those which compare the doom of the lost to the destruction of vegetable matter by fire. In other words, the doctrine before us leaves open only one alternative, either the endless suffering of the lost or their ultimate restoration to the favour of God and eternal life. Not only against the endless torment of the lost, as our fathers taught it, but against any form of endless suffering, or of an endless prolongation of all existence which is only a helpless consciousness of utter ruin, the moral sense of thousands of intelligent and devout men and women is in stern revolt. The more carefully they consider it, the less are they able to harmonize it with the infinite love, or even with the justice, of God. To such persons, it is useless to say that they are unable to estimate the evil of sin, and the punishment it deserves. For, amid human fallibility and error, there is in man an inborn sense of justice and of the due proportion of sin and punishment which, in all ages, has been recognized as a reflection, imperfect but real, of the justice of God. There are children of ten years old who, if told that their father had punished another child, however naughty, by burning him to death, would at once and justly repudiate the statement with indignation. Moreover, the picture of Christ in the New Testament, and His teaching as recorded there, claim and secure the homage of the moral sense of man, and this homage paid by that in us which is noblest and best to the teaching and character of Christ is the most powerful proof of His divine excellence. A doctrine which, instead of gaining the homage of our moral sense, drives it into revolt, has no moral authority over us. Man’s sense of right and wrong needs to be educated; and at best is fallible. But, as taught by Paul in Romans 2:14-15, it is a divine transcript of the Law of God; and as such, it cannot be silenced even by quotation from the Holy Scriptures. The practical consequence is that not a few, assuming as not open to question, that every human soul will think and feel for ever, have been driven to hope and expect that all men will ultimately be received into the abode of the blessed. Thus, as with Origen, the doctrine of the immortality of the soul has been the parent of universalism. In other words, this doctrine closes a way of escape from serious difficulty which the Bible leaves open to us. By so doing, it has driven many to force a way violently through a door which the Sacred Writers do not leave open. We will now, after eliminating the doctrine of the Immortality of the Soul, restate briefly the teaching of the New Testament about the future punishment of sin. The various writers of the New Testament and Christ as His words are there recorded divide the human race at the last judgment into two widely separated classes. The one class will be received into a glory on which falls no shadow; the other will be banished into a darkness in which we look in vain for one ray of light. Between these classes stands an impassable barrier. To our view, this dual division presents serious difficulties. It finds no place for a large number of persons who seem to us unworthy of either blessedness or destruction. This difficulty, the New Testament does nothing to remove or mitigate. Christ promises to all who put faith in Him eternal happiness; but, having said all that is needful for our salvation, He does nothing to satisfy our curiosity about the destiny of the persons just referred to. We must leave them to the wisdom and love of our Father in heaven. The various writers of the New Testament describe the punishment to be inflicted on the great day as ruin, utter, hopeless, and final. The Synoptist Gospels also represent Christ as teaching, and the Book of Revelation teaches, in plain and awful language, that the lost will suffer acute and continuous pain. This actual suffering is implied in the teaching, by Paul and other writers, that retribution will be according to works. For proportionate retribution involves degrees of punishment: and degrees of punishment imply consciousness; for unconsciousness is alike to all. Moreover, consciousness of endless and glorious life forfeited through our own inexcusable folly and sin involves remorse and mental anguish beyond conception. To be compelled, in the unsparing light of eternity, to contemplate our own past sins, when all fascination of sin has worn away, and our rejection of the infinite love of God and our consequent and deserved loss of the glories of heaven, and this without room for amendment or hope of restoration, will be an undying worm and unquenchable fire. In other words, the vivid pictures in the Synoptist Gospels and in the Book of Revelation do but delineate a necessary inference from teaching permeating the entire New Testament. Of this acute suffering, the writers of the New Testament see no end; nor do they teach anything which logically implies that it will ever end. On the other hand, they do not go so far as expressly and indisputably to assert the endless permanence of these ruined and wretched ones, and the consequent endlessness of their torment. The curtain is raised for a moment, revealing the anguish of the lost ; and then falls, hiding them from our view. This picture of judgment reveals to us intelligent persons created by God in order that they may share His endless blessedness, yet, through their own sin and their rejection of salvation from sin, shut out, without hope of return, from the glory and happiness for which they were created. To this teaching, no objection can be made on the ground of the character of God. It cannot be objected that His purpose will be defeated. For His purpose in creating man was to surround the eternal Son with later born sons who by their own free choice have accepted Him as their Lord. This purpose will find eternal and glorious realization. Nor can we object to the doom of the lost as unjust. For of no one case are all the facts before us. We know not the greatness of the sins which will be punished by exclusion from the glory of God; and therefore cannot compare the sin and punishment. The analogy of parental and royal love forbids us to say that the love of God is inconsistent with severe punishment of sin, or indeed with the final exclusion of sinners from the happy family of God. On the other hand, the principles of human justice warn us not to put into the threatenings of the New Testament more than its words legitimately convey. The above teaching may be traced by decisive documentary evidence to the pen of the Apostles and Evangelists and to the lips of Christ. This teaching has, in ancient and modern times, been supplemented or limited in three directions by other teaching about the ultimate destiny of the wicked. 1. To the pictures of actual suffering found in the New Testament, the traditional teaching of the Church has added the assertion that this suffering will be endless. This addition is a necessary consequence of the doctrine of the immortality of the soul unconsciously borrowed, as we have seen, from Greek philosophy. From the days of Tertullian to days remembered by men still living, imagination ran riot in depicting the physical sufferings of the lost and comparing them to the excruciating bodily pain caused by fire. In recent days, others have recoiled from bodily torment and have put the word suffering in its place. But the word torment is found in the New Testament as a description of the future punishment of sin. Moreover, it is difficult or impossible to conceive a lost and ruined soul, in full possession of consciousness, knowing itself to be finally shut out from the City of God in just punishment of inexcusable sin, otherwise than as in unspeakable misery. Now all will admit that no theory about the future punishment of sin ought to be put forth as revealed truth unless supported by clear and abundant teaching of the Bible. This theory, which in many minds lies open to most serious objection, has, as I have endeavoured to show, no adequate support in Holy Scripture. And, from the nature of the case, it can have no adequate support elsewhere. 2. Others, especially In recent times, have added to, and limited, the teaching of the New Testament by endeavouring to prove that the suffering therein depicted will ultimately, after different degrees of suffering in proportion to different degrees of guilt, be lost in unconsciousness. This theory maintains the finality of the punishment of the wicked, and at the same time avoids the difficulties involved in the endlessness of their suffering and the consequently endless permanence of evil. It finds some support in the metaphor, not uncommon in the New Testament of the destruction of vegetable matter by fire to describe the doom of the ungodly, and indeed in the word destruction, frequently used by Plato to describe the extinction of the soul, which he denies. But this metaphor and this use of the word destruction seem to me an altogether insufficient ground for definite assertion. This second theory is but a human attempt to remove a difficulty which the New Testament leaves unsolved. 3. Others have not only gone beyond the New Testament, but have as I think contradicted it by asserting with more or less confidence that all men will ultimately be saved. This last theory has found some support in passages which speak of the ultimate and universal triumph of good, taken in connection with the traditional assumption of the indestructibility of the human soul. But, as we have seen, this assumption is without foundation. And this theory, destitute of solid foundation, is, in various ways, directly and indirectly contradicted in the New Testament. The theory of a probation beyond death, of which we have no reliable indication in the Bible, has no practical bearing on the ultimate destiny of those who die in sin. For a further probation involves a possibility of further failure. And this brings back, in full force, the old difficulties. Retribution beyond the grave and especially the future punishment of sin are to us, reason about them as we may, insoluble mysteries. The entire teaching of the Bible, abundantly sufficient as it is to guide us safely along the way of life, is altogether insufficient to enable us to anticipate the sentence which the great Judge will pronounce on the men and women around us. But to every careful student of the New Testament two doctrines stand out as clearly and frequently taught there: (1) that eternal life in infinite blessing awaits all who put trust in Christ and walk in His Steps (2) that ruin, complete and final, awaits those who reject the salvation He offers and persist in what they know to be sin. These doctrines may be traced by decisive documentary evidence to His lips as part of the message from God which He announced to men. As His servants, we are bound, especially those who are recognized teachers in His Church, to announce these solemn truths to all who will hear us. To go further, is to overstep the limits of the revelation given to us in Christ, and to announce in His name that which He has not spoken. To add to, is as perilous as to take away from, "the words of the prophecy of this Book." We have no right to assert in God’s name anything more than we can trace by abundant and decisive evidence to the lips of Christ and the pen of the Apostles and Evangelists. And the teaching which can be so traced is all we need. ======================================================================== Source: https://sermonindex.net/books/writings-of-joseph-a-beet/ ========================================================================