Paul"s conception of the foremost feature in Christ"s mission is precisely this. He came to deliver men from the stern law of Judaism, which could not wipe away their transgressions nor save them from Hades, and to establish them in the free grace of Christianity, which justifies them from all past sin and seals them for heaven. What could be a more explicit declaration of this than the following? "When the fulness of the time was come, G.o.d sent forth his Son to redeem them that were under the law." Herein is the explanation of that perilous combat which Paul waged so many years, and in which he proved victorious, the great battle between the Gentile Christians and the Judaizing Christians; a subject of altogether singular importance, without a minute acquaintance with which a large part of the New Testament cannot be understood. "Christ gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of G.o.d." Now, the Hebrew terms corresponding with the English terms "present world" and "future world" were used by the Jews to denote the Mosaic and the Messianic dispensations. We believe with Schoettgen and other good authorities that such is the sense of the phrase "present world" in the instance before us. Not only is that interpretation sustained by the usus loquendi, it is also the only defensible meaning; for the effect of the establishment of the gospel was not to deliver men from the present world, though it did deliver them from the hopeless bondage of Judaism, wherein salvation was by Christians considered impossible. And that is precisely the argument of the Epistle to the Galatians, in which the text occurs. In a succeeding chapter, while speaking expressly of the external forms of the Jewish law, Paul says, "By the cross of Christ the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world;"
and he instantly adds, by way of explanation, "for in Christ Jesus neither circ.u.mcision availeth any thing, nor uncirc.u.mcision."
Undeniably, "world" here means "Judaism;" as Rosenmuller phrases it, Judaica vanitas. In another epistle, while expostulating with his readers on the folly of subjecting themselves to observances "in meat and drink, and new moons and sabbaths," after "the handwriting of ordinances that was against them had been blotted out, taken away, nailed to the cross," Paul remonstrates with them in these words: "Wherefore, if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances?" We should suppose that no intelligent person could question that this means, "Now that by the gospel of Christ ye are emanc.i.p.ated from the technical requisitions of Judaism, why are ye subject to its ordinances, as if ye were still living under its rule?" as many of the best commentators agree in saying, "tanquam viventes adhuc in Judaismo." From these collective pa.s.sages, and from others like them, we draw the conclusion, in Paul"s own words, that, "When we were children, we were in bondage under the rudiments of the world," "the weak and beggarly elements" of Judaism; but, now that "the fulness of the time has come, and G.o.d has sent forth his Son to redeem us," we are called "to receive the adoption of sons" and "become heirs of G.o.d," inheritors of a heavenly destiny.
We think that the intelligent and candid reader, who is familiar with Paul"s epistles, will recognise the following features in his belief and teaching. First, all mankind alike were under sin and condemnation. "Jews and Gentiles all are under sin." "All the world is subject to the sentence of G.o.d." And we maintain that that condemning sentence consisted, partly at least, in the banishment of their disembodied souls to Hades. Secondly, "a promise was given to Abraham," before the introduction of the Mosaic dispensation, "that in his seed [that is, in Christ] all the nations of the earth should be blessed." When Paul speaks, as he does in numerous instances, of "the hope of eternal life which G.o.d, who cannot lie, promised before the world began," "the promise given before the foundation of the world," "the promise made of G.o.d unto the fathers, that G.o.d would raise the dead," the date referred to is not when the decree was formed in the eternal counsels of G.o.d, previous to the origin of the earth, but when the covenant was made with Abraham, before the establishment of the Jewish dispensation. The thing promised plainly was, according to Paul"s idea, a redemption from Hades and an ascension to heaven; for this is fully implied in his "expectation of the resurrection of the dead" from the intermediate state, and their being "clothed in celestial bodies." This promise made unto Abraham by G.o.d, to be fulfilled by Christ, "the law, which was four hundred and thirty years afterwards, could not disannul." That is, as any one may see by the context, the law could not secure the inheritance of the thing promised, but was only a temporary arrangement on account of transgressions, "until the seed should come to whom the promise was made." In other words, there was "no mode of salvation by the law;" "the law could not give life;" for if it could it would have "superseded the promise," made it without effect, whereas the inviolable promise of G.o.d was, that in the one seed of Abraham that is, in Christ alone should salvation be preached to all that believed. "For if they which are of the law be heirs, faith is made useless, and the promise is made useless." In the mean time, until Christ be come, all are shut up under sin. Thirdly, the special "advantage of the Jews was, that unto them this promise of G.o.d was committed," as the chosen covenant people.
The Gentiles, groaning under the universal sentence of sin, were ignorant of the sure promise of a common salvation yet to be brought. While the Jews indulged in glowing and exclusive expectations of the Messiah who was gloriously to redeem them, the Gentiles were "aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without G.o.d in the world." Fourthly, in the fulness of time long after "the Scripture, foreseeing that G.o.d would justify the heathen, had preached the gospel beforehand unto Abraham, saying, In thy seed shall all nations be blessed" "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us, that the blessing promised to Abraham might come upon the Gentiles." It was the precise mission of Christ to realize and exemplify and publish to the whole world the fulfilment of that promise. The promise itself was, that men should be released from the under world through the imputation of righteousness by grace that is, through free forgiveness and rise to heaven as accredited sons and heirs of G.o.d. This aim and purpose of Christ"s coming were effected in his resurrection. But how did the Gentiles enter into belief and partic.i.p.ation of the glad tidings? Thus, according to Paul: The death, descent, resurrection, and ascent of Jesus, and his residence in heaven in a spiritual form, divested him of his nationality.13 He was "then to be known no more after the flesh."
He was no longer an earthly Jew, addressing Jews, but a heavenly spirit and son of G.o.d, a glorified likeness of the spirits of all who were adopted as sons of G.o.d, appealing to them all as joint heirs with himself of heaven. He has risen into universality, and is accessible to the soul of every one that believeth. "In him there is neither Greek nor Jew, circ.u.mcision nor uncirc.u.mcision, barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free." The experience resulting in a heart raised into fellowship with him in heaven is the inward seal a.s.suring us that our faith is not vain. "Ye Gentiles, who formerly were afar off, are now made nigh by the blood of Christ; for he hath broken down the middle wall of part.i.tion between Jews and Gentiles, having abolished in his flesh the enmity, namely, the law of commandments in ordinances, in order to make in himself of twain one new man. For through him we both have access by one spirit unto the Father. Now, therefore, ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of G.o.d." Circ.u.mcision was of the flesh; and the vain hope of salvation by it was confined to the Jews. Grace was of the spirit; and the revealed a.s.surance of salvation by it was given to the Gentiles too, when Christ died to the nationalizing flesh, rose in the universalizing spirit, and from heaven impartially exhibited himself, through the preaching of the gospel, to the appropriating faith of all.
The foregoing positions might be further substantiated by applying the general theory they contain to the explication of scores of individual texts which it fits and unfolds, and which, we think, cannot upon any other view be interpreted without forced constructions unwarranted by a thorough acquaintance with the mind of Paul and with the mind of his age. But we must be content with one or two such applications as specimens. The word "mystery"
often occurs in the letters of Paul. Its current meaning in his time was "something concealed," something into which one must be initiated in order to understand it.
13 Martineau, Liverpool Controversy: Inconsistency of the Scheme of Vicarious Redemption.
The Eleusinian Mysteries, for instance, were not necessarily any thing intrinsically dark and hard to be comprehended, but things hidden from public gaze and only to be known by initiation into them.
Paul uses the term in a similar way to denote the peculiar scheme of grace, which "had been kept secret from the beginning of the world," "hidden from ages and generations, but now made manifest."
No one denies that Paul means by "this mystery" the very heart and essence of the gospel, precisely that which distinguishes it from the law and makes it a universal method of salvation, a wondrous system of grace. So much is irresistibly evident from the way and the connection in which he uses the term. He writes thus in explanation of the great mystery as it was dramatically revealed through Christ: "Who was manifested in the flesh, [i. e. seen in the body during his life on earth,] justified in the spirit, [i. e. freed after death from the necessity of imprisonment in Hades,] seen of angels, [i. e. in their fellowship after his resurrection,] preached unto the Gentiles, [i. e. after the gift of tongues on Pentecost day,] believed on in the world, [i. e. his gospel widely accepted through the labors of his disciples,]
received up into glory, [i. e. taken into heaven to the presence of G.o.d.]" "The revelation of the mystery" means, then, the visible enactment and exhibition, through the resurrection of Christ, of G.o.d"s free forgiveness of men, redeeming them from the Hadean gloom to the heavenly glory. The word "glory" in the New Testament confessedly often signifies the illumination of heaven, the defined abode of G.o.d and his angels. Robinson collects, in his Lexicon, numerous examples wherein he says it means "that state which is the portion of those who dwell with G.o.d in heaven." Now, Paul repeatedly speaks of the calling of believers to glory as one of the chief blessings and new prerogatives of the gospel. "Being justified by faith, we rejoice in hope of the glory of G.o.d." "Walk worthy of G.o.d, who hath called you unto his glory." "We speak wisdom to the initiates, the hidden wisdom of G.o.d in a mystery, which before the world [the Jewish dispensation] G.o.d ordained for our glory." "Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of G.o.d: behold, I show you a mystery: we shall all be changed in a moment, and put on immortality." In the first chapter of the letter to the Colossians, Paul speaks of "the hope which is laid up for you in heaven, whereof ye have heard in the gospel;" also of "the inheritance of the saints in light:" then he says, "G.o.d would now make known among the Gentiles the mystery, which is, Christ among you, the hope of glory." In the light of what has gone before, how significant and how clear is this declaration! "All have sinned, and failed to attain unto the glory of G.o.d; but now, through the faith of Jesus Christ, [through the dispensation brought to light by Christ,] the righteousness of G.o.d [G.o.d"s method of salvation]
is unto all that believe." That is, by the law all were shut up in Hades, but by grace they are now ransomed and to be received to heaven. The same thought or scheme is contained in that remarkable pa.s.sage in the Epistle to the Galatians where Paul says the free Isaac and the bond woman Hagar were an allegory, teaching that there were two covenants, one by Abraham, the other by Moses. The Mosaic covenant of the law "answers to the Jerusalem which is on earth, and is in bondage with her children," and belongs only to the Jews. The Abrahamic covenant of promise answers to "the Jerusalem which is above, and is free, and is the mother of us all." In the former, we were "begotten unto bondage." In the latter, "Christ hath made us free."
We will notice but one more text in pa.s.sing: it is, of all the proof texts of the doctrine of a subst.i.tutional expiation, the one which has ever been regarded as the very Achilles. And yet it can be made to support that doctrine only by the aid of arbitrary a.s.sumptions and mistranslations, while by its very terms it perfectly coincides with nay, expressly declares the theory which we have been advocating as the genuine interpretation of Paul. The usual commentators, in their treatment of this pa.s.sage, have exhibited a long continued series of perversions and sophisms, affording a strong example of unconscious prejudice. The correct Greek reading of the text is justly rendered thus: "Whom G.o.d set forth, a mercy seat through the faith in his blood, to exhibit his righteousness through the remission of former sins by the forbearance of G.o.d." For rendering [non-ASCII characters]
"mercy seat," the usus loquendi and the internal harmony of meaning are in our favor, and also the weight of many orthodox authorities, such as Theodoret, Origen, Theophylact, OEc.u.menius, Erasmus, Luther, and from Pelagius to Bushnell. Still, we are willing to admit the rendering of it by "sin offering." That makes no important difference in the result. Christ was a sin offering, in the conception of Paul, in this sense: that when he was not himself subject to death, which was the penalty of sin, he yet died in order to show G.o.d"s purpose of removing that penalty of sin through his resurrection. For rendering [non-ASCII characters]
"through," no defence is needed: the only wonder is, how it ever could have been here translated "for." Now, let two or three facts be noticed.
First, the New Testament phrase "the faith of Christ," "the faith of Jesus," is very unfairly and unwarrantably made to mean an internal affection towards Christ, a belief of men in him. Its genuine meaning is the same as "the gospel of Christ," or the religion of Christ, the system of grace which he brought.14 Who can doubt that such is the meaning of the word in these instances?
"Contend for the faith once delivered to the saints;" "Greet them that love us in the faith;" "Have not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ with respect of persons." So, in the text now under our notice, "the faith which is in his blood" means the dispensation of pardon and justification, the system of faith, which was confirmed and exemplified to us in his death and resurrection.
Secondly, "the righteousness of G.o.d," which is here said to be "pointed out" by Christ"s death, denotes simply, in Professor Stuart"s words, "G.o.d"s pardoning mercy," or "acquittal," or "gratuitous justification," "in which sense," he says truly, "it is almost always used in Paul"s epistles."15 It signifies neither more nor less than G.o.d"s method of salvation by freely forgiving sins and treating the sinner as if he were righteous, the method of salvation now carried into effect and revealed in the gospel brought by Christ, and dramatically enacted in his pa.s.sion and ascension. Furthermore, we ask attention to the fact that the ordinary interpreter, hard pressed by his unscriptural creed, interpolates a disjunctive conjunction in the opposing teeth of Paul"s plain statement. Paul says, as the common version has it, G.o.d is "just, and [i. e. even] the justifier." The creed bound commentators read it,
14 Robinson has gathered a great number of instances in his Lexicon, under the word "Faith," wherein it can only mean, as he says, "the system of Christian doctrines, the gospel."
15 Stuart"s Romans i. 17, iii. 25, 26, &c.
"just and yet the justifier." We will now present the true meaning of the whole pa.s.sage, in our view of it, according to Paul"s own use of language. To establish a conviction of the correctness of the exposition, we only ask the ingenuous reader carefully to study the clauses of the Greek text and recollect the foregoing data. "G.o.d has set Christ forth, to be to us a sure sign that we have been forgiven and redeemed through the faith that was proved by his triumphant return from death, the dispensation of grace inaugurated by him. Herein G.o.d has exhibited his method of saving sinners, which is by the free remission of their sins through his kindness. Thus G.o.d is proved to be disposed to save, and to be saving, by the system of grace shown through Jesus, him that believeth." In consequence of sin, men were under sentence of condemnation to the under world. In the fulness of time G.o.d fulfilled his ancient promise to Abraham. He freely justified men, that is, forgave them, redeemed them from their doom, and would soon open the sky for their abode with him. This scheme of redemption was carried out by Christ. That is to say, G.o.d proclaimed it to men, and asked their belief in it, by "setting forth Christ" to die, descend among the dead, rise thence, and ascend into heaven, as an exemplifying certification of the truth of the glad tidings.
Thirdly, Paul teaches that one aim of Christ"s mission was to purify, animate, and exalt the moral characters of men, and rectify their conduct, to produce a subjective sanctification in them, and so prepare them for judgment and fit them for heaven.
The establishment of this proposition will conclude the present part of our subject. He writes, "Our Saviour, Jesus Christ, gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify unto himself a peculiar people zealous of good works." "Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity." In various ways he often represents the fact that believers have been saved by grace through Christ as the very reason, the intensified motive, why they should scrupulously keep every t.i.ttle of the moral law and abstain even from the appearance of evil, walking worthy of their high vocation. "The grace of G.o.d that bringeth salvation to all men hath appeared, teaching us that, denying all unG.o.dliness and worldly l.u.s.ts, we should live soberly, righteously, and G.o.dly in this present world." Bad men, "that obey not the gospel of Christ," such characters as "thieves, extortioners, drunkards, adulterers, shall not inherit the kingdom of G.o.d." He proclaims, in unmistakable terms, "G.o.d will render to every man according to his deeds, wrath and tribulation to the evil doer, honor and peace to the well doer, whether Jew or Gentile." The conclusion to be drawn from these and other like declarations is unavoidable. It is that "every one, Jew and Gentile, shall stand before the judgment seat of Christ and receive according to the deeds done in the body; for there is no respect of persons." And one part of Christ"s mission was to exert a hallowing moral influence on men, to make them righteous, that they might pa.s.s the bar with acquittal. But the reader who recollects the cla.s.s of texts adduced a little while since will remember that an opposite conclusion was as unequivocally drawn from them. Then Paul said, "By faith ye are justified, without the deeds of the law." Now he says, "For not the hearers of the law are just before G.o.d, but the doers of the law shall be justified in the day when G.o.d shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ." Is there a contradiction, then, in Paul? Only in appearance. Let us distinguish and explain. In the two quotations above, the apostle is referring to two different things.
First, he would say, By the faith of Christ, the free grace of G.o.d declared in the gospel of Christ, ye are justified, gratuitously delivered from that necessity of imprisonment in Hades which is the penalty of sin doomed upon the whole race from Adam, and from which no amount of personal virtue could avail to save men.
Secondly, when he exclaims, "Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of G.o.d?" his thought is of a spiritual qualification of character, indispensable for positive admission among the blest in heaven. That is to say, the impartial penalty of primeval sin consigned all men to Hades. They could not by their own efforts escape thence and win heaven. That fated inability G.o.d has removed, and through Christ revealed its removal; but, that one should actually obtain the offered and possible prize of heaven, personal purity, faith, obedience, holiness, are necessary. In Paul"s conception of the scheme of Christian salvation, then, there were two distinct parts: one, what G.o.d had done for all; the other, what each man was to do for himself. And the two great cla.s.ses of seemingly hostile texts filling his epistles, which have puzzled so many readers, become clear and harmonious when we perceive and remember that by "righteousness" and its kindred terms he sometimes means the external and fulfilled method of redeeming men from the transmitted necessity of bondage in the under world, and sometimes means the internal and contingent qualifications for actually realizing that redemption. In the former instance he refers to the objective mode of salvation and the revelation of it in Christ. In the latter, he refers to the subjective fitness for that salvation and the cert.i.tude of it in the believer. So, too, the words "death" and "life," in Paul"s writings, are generally charged, by a constructio proegnans, with a double sense, one spiritual, individual, contingent, the other mechanical, common, absolute.
Death, in its full Pauline force, includes inward guilt, condemnation, and misery, and outward descent into the under world. Life, in its full Pauline force, includes inward rect.i.tude, peace, and joy, and outward ascent into the upper world. Holiness is necessary, "for without it no one can see the Lord;" yet by itself it can secure only inward life: it is ineffectual to win heaven. Grace by itself merely exempts from the fatality of the condemnation to Hades: it offers eternal life in heaven only upon condition of "patient continuance in well doing" by "faith, obedience to the truth, and sanctification of the spirit." But G.o.d"s free grace and man"s diligent fidelity, combined, give the full fruition of blessedness in the heart and of glory and immortality in the sky.
Such, as we have set forth in the foregoing three divisions, was Paul"s view of the mission of Christ and of the method of salvation. It has been for centuries perverted and mutilated. The toil now is by unprejudiced inspection to bring it forward in its genuine completeness, as it stood in Paul"s own mind and in the minds of his contemporaries. The essential view, epitomized in a single sentence, is this. The independent grace of G.o.d has interfered, first, to save man from Hades, and secondly, to enable him, by the co operation of his own virtue, to get to heaven. Here are two separate means conjoined to effect the end, salvation.
Now, compare, in the light of this statement, the three great theological theories of Christendom. The UNITARIAN, overlooking the objective justification, or offered redemption from the death realm to the sky home, which whether it be a truth or an error is surely in the epistles, makes the subjective sanctification all in all. The CALVINIST, in his theory, comparatively scorns the subjective sanctification, which Paul insists on as a necessity for entering the kingdom of G.o.d, and, having perverted the objective justification from its real historic meaning, exaggerates it into the all in all. The ROMAN CATHOLIC holds that Christ simply removed the load of original sin and its entailed doom, and left each person to stand or fall by his own merits, in the helping communion of the Church. He also maintains that a part of Christ"s office was to exert an influence for the moral improvement and consecration of human character. His error, as an interpreter of Paul"s thought, is, that he, like the Calvinist, attributes to Christ"s death a vicarious efficacy by suffering the pangs of mankind"s guilt to buy their ransom from the inexorable justice of G.o.d; whereas the apostle really represents Christ"s redeeming mission as consisting simply in a dramatic exemplification of the Father"s spontaneous love and purpose to pardon past offences, unbolt the gates of Hades, and receive the worthy to heaven. Moreover, while Paul describes the heavenly salvation as an undeserved gift from the grace of G.o.d, the Catholic often seems to make it a prize to be earned, under the Christian dispensation, by good works which may fairly challenge that reward. However, we have little doubt that this apparent opposition is rather in the practical mode of exhortation than in any interior difference of dogma; for Paul himself makes personal salvation hinge on personal conditions, the province of grace being seen in the new extension to man of the opportunity and invitation to secure his own acceptance. And so the Roman Catholic exposition of Paul"s doctrine is much more nearly correct than any other interpretation now prevalent. We should expect, a priori, that it would be, since that Church, containing two thirds of Christendom, is the most intimately connected, by its scholars, members, and traditions, with the apostolic age.
A prominent feature in the belief of Paul, and one deserving distinct notice as necessarily involving a considerable part of the theory which we have attributed to him, is the supposition that Christ was the first person, clothed with humanity and experiencing death, admitted into heaven. Of all the hosts who had lived and died, every soul had gone down into the dusky under world. There they all were held in durance, waiting for the Great Deliverer. In the splendors of the realm over the sky, G.o.d and his angels dwelt alone. That we do not err in ascribing this belief to Paul we might summon the whole body of the Fathers to testify in almost unbroken phalanx, from Polycarp to St. Bernard. The Roman, Greek, and English Churches still maintain the same dogma. But the apostle"s own plain words will be sufficient for our purpose.
"That Christ should suffer, and that he should be the first that should rise from among the dead." "Now is Christ risen from among the dead and become the first fruits of them that slept." "He is the beginning, the first born from among the dead, that among all he might have the pre eminence." "G.o.d raised Christ from among the dead, and set him at his own right hand16 in the heavenly places, far above every princ.i.p.ality, and power, and might, and dominion."
The last words refer to different orders of spirits, supposed
16 Griesbach argues at length, and shows unanswerably, that this pa.s.sage cannot bear a moral interpretation, but necessarily has a physical and local sense. Griesbachii Opuscula Academica, ed.
Gabler, vol. ii. pp. 145-149.
by the Jews to people the aerial region below the heaven of G.o.d.
"G.o.d hath" (already in our antic.i.p.ating faith) "raised us up together with Christ and made us sit in heavenly places with him."
These testimonies are enough to show that Paul believed Jesus to have been raised up to the abode of G.o.d, the first man ever exalted thither, and that this was done as a pledge and ill.u.s.tration of the same exaltation awaiting those who believe.
"If we be dead with Christ, we believe we shall also live with him." And the apostle teaches that we are not only connected with Christ"s resurrection by the outward order and sequence of events, but also by an inward gift of the spirit. He says that to every obedient believer is given an experimental "knowledge of the power of the resurrection of Christ," which is the seal of G.o.d within him, the pledge of his own celestial destination. "After that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy spirit of promise which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession." The office of this gift of the spirit is to awaken in the believing Christian a vivid realization of the things in store for him, and a perfect conviction that he shall yet possess them in the unclouded presence of G.o.d, beyond the canopy of azure and the stars. "Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, the things which G.o.d hath prepared for them that love him. But he hath revealed them unto us; for we have received his spirit, that we might know them." "The spirit beareth witness with our spirit that we are children and heirs of G.o.d, even joint heirs with Christ, that we may be glorified [i. e.
advanced into heaven] with him."
We will leave this topic with a brief paraphrase of the celebrated pa.s.sage in the eighth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans. "Not only do the generality of mankind groan in pain in this decaying state, under the bondage of perishable elements, travailing for emanc.i.p.ation from the flesh into the liberty of the heavenly glory appointed for the sons and heirs of G.o.d, but even we, who have the first fruits of the spirit, [i. e. the a.s.surance springing from the resurrection of Christ,] we too wait, painfully longing for the adoption, that is, our redemption from the body." By longing for the adoption, or filiation, is meant impatient desire to be received into heaven as children to the enjoyment of the privileges of their Father"s house. "G.o.d predetermined that those called should be conformed to the image of his Son, [i. e. should pa.s.s through the same course with Christ and reach the heavenly goal,] that he might be the first born among many brethren." To the securing of this end, "whom he called, them he also justified, [i. e. ransomed from Hades;17] and whom he justified, them he also glorified," (i. e. advanced to the glory of heaven.) It is evident that Paul looked for the speedy second coming of the Lord in the clouds of heaven, with angels and power and glory. He expected that at that time all enemies would be overthrown and punished, the dead would be raised, the living would be changed, and all that were Christ"s would be translated to heaven.18 "The Lord Jesus shall be revealed from
17 That "justify" often means, in Paul"s usage, to absolve from Hades, we have concluded from a direct study of his doctrines and language. We find that Bretschneider gives it the same definition in his Lexicon of the New Testament. See [non ASCII characters]
18 "Every one shall rise in his own division" of the great army of the dead, "Christ, the first fruits; afterwards, they that are Christ"s, at his coming."
heaven, with his mighty angels, in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not G.o.d and obey not the gospel of Christ." "We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, at the last trump." "We who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord shall not antic.i.p.ate those that are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of G.o.d;19 and the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so we shall always be with the Lord. Brethren, you need not that I should specify the time to you; for yourselves are perfectly aware that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night." "The time is short." "I pray G.o.d your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." "At his appearing he shall judge the living and the dead." "The Lord is at hand." The author of these sentences undeniably looked for the great advent soon. Than Paul, indeed, no one more earnestly believed (or did more to strengthen in others that belief) in that speedy return of Christ, the antic.i.p.ation of which thrilled all early Christendom with hope and dread, and kept the disciples day and night on the stretch and start of expectation to hear the awful blast of the judgment trump and to see the glorious vision of the Son of G.o.d descending amidst a convoy of angels. What sublime emotions must have rushed through the apostle"s soul when he thought that he, as a survivor of death"s reign on earth, might behold the resurrection without himself entering the grave! Upon a time when he should be perchance at home, or at Damascus, or, it might be, at Jerusalem, the sun would become as blood, the moon as sackcloth of hair, the last trump would swell the sky, and,
"Lo! the nations of the dead, Which do outnumber all earth"s races, rise, And high in sumless myriads overhead Sweep past him in a cloud, as "twere the skirts Of the Eternal pa.s.sing by."
The resurrection which Paul thought would attend the second coming of Christ was the rising of the summoned spirits of the deceased from their rest in the under world. Most certainly it was not the restoration of their decomposed bodies from their graves, although that incredible surmise has been generally entertained. He says, while answering the question, How are the dead raised up, and with what body do they come? "That which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body which shall be, but naked grain: G.o.d giveth it a body as it hath pleased him." The comparison is, that so the naked soul is sown in the under world, and G.o.d, when he raiseth it, giveth it a fitting body. He does not hesitate to call the man "a fool" who expects the restoration of the same body that was buried. His whole argument is explicitly against that idea. "There are bodies celestial, as well as bodies terrestrial: the first man was
19 Rabbi Akiba says, in the Talmud, "G.o.d shall take and blow a trumpet a thousand G.o.dlike yards in length, whose echo shall sound from end to end of the world. At the first blast the earth shall tremble. At the second, the dust shall part. At the third, the bones shall come together. At the fourth, the members shall grow warm. At the fifth, they shall be crowned with the head. At the sixth, the soul shall re enter the body. And at the seventh, they shall stand erect." Corrodi, Geschichte des Chiliasmus, band i. s.
355.
of the earth, earthy; the second man was the Lord from heaven; and as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly; for flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of G.o.d." In view of these declarations, it is astonishing that any one can suppose that Paul believed in the resurrection of these present bodies and in their transference into heaven. "In this tabernacle we groan, being burdened," and, "Who shall deliver me from this body of death?" he cries. If ever there was a man whose goading experience, keen intellectual energies, and moral sensibilities, made him weary of this slow, gross body, and pa.s.sionately to long for a more corresponding, swift, and pure invest.i.ture, it was Paul. And in his theory of "the glorious body of Christ, according to which our vile body shall be changed," he relieved his impatience and fed his desire. What his conception of that body was, definitely, we cannot tell; but doubtless it was the idea of a vehicle adapted to his mounting and ardent soul, and in many particulars very unlike this present groaning load of clay. The epistles of Paul contain no clear implication of the notion of a millennium, a thousand years" reign of Christ with his saints on the earth after his second advent. On the contrary, in many places, particularly in the fourth chapter of the First Epistle to the Thessalonians, (supposing that letter to be his,) he says that the Lord and they that are his will directly pa.s.s into heaven after the consummation of his descent from heaven and their resurrection from the dead. But the declaration "He must reign till he hath put all enemies under his feet," taken with its context, is thought, by Bertholdt, Billroth, De Wette, and others, to imply that Christ would establish a millennial kingdom on earth, and reign in it engaged in vanquishing all hostile forces.
Against this exegesis we have to say, first, that, so far as that goes, the vast preponderance of critical authorities is opposed to it. Secondly, if this conquest were to be secured on earth, there is nothing to show that it need occupy much time: one hour might answer for it as well as a thousand years. There is nothing here to show that Paul means just what the Rabbins taught. Thirdly, even if Paul supposed a considerable period must elapse before "all enemies" would be subdued, during which period Christ must reign, it does not follow that he believed that reign would be on earth: it might be in heaven. The "enemies" referred to are, in part at least, the wicked spirits occupying the regions of the upper air; for he specifies these "princ.i.p.alities, authorities, and powers."20 And the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews represents G.o.d as saying to Jesus, "Sit thou on my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool." Fourthly, it seems certain that, if in the apostle"s thought a thousand years were interpolated between Christ"s second coming and the delivering of his mediatorial sceptre to G.o.d, he would have said so, at least somewhere in his writings. He would naturally have dwelt upon it a little, as the Chiliasts did so much. Instead of that, he repeatedly contradicts it. Upon the whole, then, with Ruckert, we cannot
20 The apocryphal "Ascension of Isaiah," already spoken of, gives a detailed description of the upper air as occupied by Satan and his angels, among whom fighting and evil deeds rage; but Christ in his ascent conquers and spoils them all, and shows himself a victor ever brightening as he rises successively through the whole seven heavens to the feet of G.o.d. Ascensio Vatis Isaia, cap. vi x.
see any reason for not supposing that, according to Paul, "the end" was immediately to succeed "the coming," as [non-ASCII characters] would properly indicate.
The doctrine of a long earthly reign of Christ is not deduced from this pa.s.sage, by candid interpretation, because it must be there, but foisted into it, by Rabbinical information, because it may be there.
Paul distinctly teaches that the believers who died before the second coming of the Savior would remain in the under world until that event, when they and the transformed living should ascend "together with the Lord." All the relevant expressions in his epistles, save two, are obviously in harmony with this conception of a temporary subterranean sojourn, waiting for the appearance of Jesus from heaven to usher in the resurrection. But in the fifth chapter of the Second Epistle to the Corinthians he writes, "Abiding in the body we are absent from the Lord." It is usually inferred, from these words and those which follow them, that the apostle expected whenever he died to be instantly with Christ.
Certainly they do mean pretty nearly that; but they mean it in connection with the second advent and the accompanying circ.u.mstances and events; for Paul believed that many of the disciples possibly himself would live until Christ"s coming. All through these two chapters (the fourth and fifth) it is obvious, from the marked use of the terms "we" and "you," and from other considerations, that "we" here refers solely to the writer, the individual Paul. It is the plural of accommodation used by common custom and consent. In the form of a slight paraphrase we may unfold the genuine meaning of the pa.s.sage in hand. "In this body I am afflicted: not that I would merely be released from it, for then I should be a naked spirit. But I earnestly desire, unclothing myself of this earthly body, at the same time to clothe myself with my heavenly body, that I may lose all my mortal part and its woes in the full experience of heaven"s eternal life. G.o.d has determined that this result shall come to me sooner or later, and has given me a pledge of it in the witnessing spirit. But it cannot happen so long as I tarry in the flesh, the Lord delaying his appearance. Having the infallible earnest of the spirit, I do not dread the change, but desire to hasten it. Confident of acceptance in that day at the judgment seat of Christ, before which we must all then stand, I long for the crisis when, divested of this body and invested with the immortal form wrought for me by G.o.d, I shall be with the Lord. Still, knowing the terror which shall environ the Lord at his coming to judgment, I plead with men to be prepared." Whoever carefully examines the whole connected pa.s.sage, from iv. 6 to v. 16, will see, we think, that the above paraphrase truly exposes its meaning.
The other text alluded to as an apparent exception to the doctrine of a residence in the lower land of ghosts intervening between death and the ascension, occurs in the Epistle to the Philippians: "I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart and to be with Christ, which is far better; but that I should abide in the flesh is more needful for you." There are three possible ways of regarding this pa.s.sage. First, we may suppose that Paul, seeing the advent of the Lord postponed longer and longer, changed his idea of the intermediate state of deceased Christians, and thought they would spend that period of waiting in heaven, not in Hades. Neander advocates this view. But there is little to sustain it, and it is loaded with fatal difficulties. A change of faith so important and so bright in its view as this must have seemed under the circ.u.mstances would have been clearly and fully stated. Attention would have been earnestly invited to so great a favor and comfort; exultation and grat.i.tude would have been expressed over so unheard of a boon. Moreover, what had occurred to effect the alleged new belief? The unexpected delay of Christ"s coming might make the apostle wish that his departed friends were tarrying above the sky instead of beneath the sepulchre; but it could furnish no ground to warrant a sudden faith in that wish as a fulfilled fact. Besides, the truth is that Paul never ceased, even to the last, to expect the speedy arrival of the Lord and to regard the interval as a comparative trifle. In this very epistle he says, "The Lord is at hand: be careful for nothing." Secondly, we may imagine that he expected himself, as a divinely chosen and specially favored servant, to go to Christ in heaven as soon as he died, if that should happen before the Lord"s appearance, while the great mult.i.tude of believers would abide in the under world until the general resurrection. The death he was in peril of and is referring to was that of martyrdom for the gospel at the hands of Nero. And many of the Fathers maintained that in the case of every worthy Christian martyr there was an exception to the general doom, and that he was permitted to enter heaven at once. Still, to argue such a thought in the text before us requires an hypothesis far fetched and unsupported by a single clear declaration of the apostle himself. Thirdly, we may a.s.sume and it seems to us by far the least enc.u.mbered and the most plausible theory that attempts to meet the case that Paul believed there would be vouchsafed to the faithful Christian during his transient abode in the under world a more intimate and blessed spiritual fellowship with his Master than he could experience while in the flesh. "For I am persuaded that neither death [separation from the body] nor depth [the under world] shall be able to separate us from G.o.d"s love, which he has manifested through Christ." He may refer, therefore, by his hopes of being straightway with Christ on leaving the body, to a spiritual communion with him in the disembodied state below, and not to his physical presence in the supernal realm, the latter not being attainable previous to the resurrection. Indeed, a little farther on in this same epistle, he plainly shows that he did not antic.i.p.ate being received to heaven until after the second coming of Christ. He says, "We look for the Savior from heaven, who shall change our vile body and fashion it like unto his own glorious body." This change is the preliminary preparation to ascent to heaven, which change he repeatedly represents as indispensable.
What Paul believed would be the course and fate of things on earth after the final consummation of Christ"s mission is a matter of inference from his brief and partial hints. The most probable and consistent view which can be constructed from those hints is this.
He thought all mankind would become reconciled and obedient to G.o.d, and that death, losing its punitive character, would become what it was originally intended to be, the mere change of the earthly for a heavenly body preparatory to a direct ascension.
"Then shall the Son himself be subject unto Him that put all things under him, that G.o.d may be all in all." Then placid virtues and innocent joys should fill the world, and human life be what it was in Eden ere guilt forbade angelic visitants and converse with heaven.21 "So when" without a
21 Neander thinks Paul"s idea was that "the perfected kingdom of G.o.d would then blend itself harmoniously throughout his unbounded dominions." We believe his apprehension is correct. This globe would become a part of the general paradise, an ante room or a l ower story to the Temple of the Universe.