PART I.

HIS OWN IDEA OF HIS PUBLIC LIFE.

His public position, the act of his own will.—His claim to Messiahship.—His idea of Messiahship.—Not temporal but spiritual.—Not national but universal.—Jesus alone in his age, his country, the world

IT is a fact that Jesus of Nazareth rose to a position of unrivaled prominence in the eyes of his country. Whether this may appear to have resulted, according to the natural succession of events, from causes which are at once obvious, or whether it shall be found inexplicable on ordinary principles, the fact itself remains; and no naturalistic, rationalistic, or mythic theory, can expunge it from the record.

Perhaps the broad and startling peculiarities of the age in which Jesus appeared, on the one hand, influenced his mind, and on the other hand, prepared his countrymen to recognize his assumed prominence. The great epochs in the history of the world, when it is laboring under some intolerable burden, or heaving with some new and urgent mission just ripe for development, find for themselves 58the men equal to their wants. Unwonted results are always exhibited at such times—powers which had never before revealed their existence are drawn forth, and latent attributes of character start into sudden energy at the bidding of extraordinary emergencies. Individuals; in spite of themselves, are then elevated to celebrity, or the necessities of the times appeal to some mind so resistlessly, that although uninvited, yet secretly conscious of resolution and energy, equal to the crisis, the man feels himself compelled to step forth at once into publicity.

It is certain, that no demand from any quarter was made upon Jesus to attempt the emancipation of his country and his age. The eyes of the nation were not turned to him and no party in the nation, perhaps not an individual, was prepared to find a Redeemer in him. The transition from private to public life was spontaneous on his part. The first thought, the matured purpose, and the decisive act, were all entirely his own. He came forth of his own accord—he assumed a public position, and was not compelled, or even invited, or even encouraged, to accept it. This was marvellous. We can not but ask, did it not abash a man in his condition to become, and above all, to make himself, an object of universal attention? Did not his want of preparation, and his conscious incapacity for a great public enterprise overwhelm him? Did he not 59tremble to encounter the caprice of the multitude—the learning, bigotry, and jealousy, of the priesthood, and the tyranny, and cruelty of the civil rulers? He did not, so far as can be discovered. Without fear, but with no ostentation of courage, Jesus placed himself on an unusual elevation. His entrance into public life, whatever it might mean, and whatever it might involve, was not a foreign suggestion, but a native impulse—a deliberate purpose of his own; and his own purpose also regulated all his movements throughout. Neither the popular feeling, nor even the wishes of his disciples, nor the current of events, were suffered to govern him, for he repeatedly acted in the face of them all. His own idea from the first was supreme, and his life was a determined realization of that idea, in spite of every opposing force.

The highest end of Christ’s mission, whether in his mind, or in the evangelic record, is not now the subject of investigation. His entire life, his personal character, and his public labors would require to be spread out; and not only his life, but his death, with all its mysterious meaning; and not only his life and his death, but the subsequent history of himself and his cause would require to be examined, before we could reach even the materials for forming a correct judgment of his mission, in its wide and holy significance. It is enough at present to know, that he claimed to be The 60Messiah of the Jews. He repeatedly avowed this claim in plain terms; and it is obvious, on the face of the gospels, that from first to last, the conviction in his mind, one of the formative and governing principles of his public life, was this, that he was The Messiah.

It is historically certain that at this period the advent of a deliverer was widely expected, and expected with intense enthusiasm. The Gentile world, groaning beneath its burden of darkness and crime, awaited a supernatural redemption; and Judea was tremulous with a hope well defined, and established by the authority of many a sacred text. It was not wonderful that, in a time of universal and high excitement many unfounded claims should be put forward, and especially that among the Jews pretenders should start up, moved by personal ambition or patriotism, or religious enthusiasm. Besides, it must not be overlooked that the appearance of John the Baptist, a genuine claimant of religious distinction, whose success at this period was unbounded, was calculated not to repress, but to deepen the aspirations of other susceptible souls. Perhaps in this way, humble as Jesus was, the latent spark of ambition, patriotism, or piety, was kindled up in his breast, and at last in that obscure village, he came to hope and believe that he was “the elect of God.” But a critical and vital question demands solution here, before we can consent 61to this interpretation of the origin of his movements. It is this: were the received views of the character and the mission of the Messiah, Christ’s views? Had he only caught the spirit of his times? Was he only an embodiment of the popular faith? Was he only a creation, naturally springing up out of sentiments and feelings which had long rooted themselves in the heart of the nation? He was not; but he was diametrically the opposite of all this. His idea had nothing in common with the views and the spirit which were then universal, but was peculiar to himself and perfectly original.

The Jewish Messiah,⁸⁸   Channing’s Sermon on the Character of Christ, Glasgow edition of works. p. 425. in the belief of the Jewish people, was to be a monarch and a conqueror; his kingdom was to be an earthly kingdom, and his glory, gathered first from the conquest, and then from the sovereignty of the whole world, was to be earthly glory. Such a creed to a youthful heart, must have been powerfully seductive. A throne, a crown, and the empire of a world, might well have kindled ambition in the dullest soul. But Jesus of Nazareth never aspired to sovereignty, of wealth, or earthly glory of any kind. He collected no armies and no instruments and resources of war; he invaded no territory and assumed no state such as became a warrior or a prince. The idea that the love of conquest, or of the splendors 62and pomp of royalty, the love of fame or of worldly power, ever had a place in his mind, is utterly destitute of support. It is even in the face of all the evidence. No part of his conduct, none of his proceedings, and none of his sayings, awaken such a suspicion. “My kingdom is not of this world,” he declared to Pontius Pilate; “If my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered unto the Jews; but now is my kingdom not from hence.”⁹⁹   John, xviii. 36. If he had it in his heart to be a king, and he certainly had, it was to be a king not of bodies, but of souls; if he aspired to reign, it was to reign not over men, but in them, in their judgments, affections, and consciences. “I am come,” he said, “light into the world.”¹⁰¹⁰   Ib. iii. 46. “To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth.”¹¹¹¹   Ib. xviii. 37. The only weapon of which he made use was spiritual truth; he did nothing but teach. His life, his words, all the manifestations of his character, are consistent only with the design to achieve, not a material, but a moral conquest, and to effect not a political, but a spiritual revolution in the world. He had risen to the conception of a purely spiritual reign, the conception of a palace and a throne for God in the soul of man, the conception of the regeneration of man’s inward nature, and the free and glad restoration of 63that nature to the unseen, but living and ever-present Father of souls.

We have looked only at one side of the popular faith. Viewed from an opposite side, the originality and individuality of Christ’s idea will be still more apparent. The Messiah, in the belief of the Jewish nation, was to be not only a monarch, but emphatically a Jewish monarch; reigning, indeed, over all the kingdoms of the world, but acknowledging a peculiar relation to the ancient people; his throne being in Jerusalem, and his ministers and distinguished servants, Jews. This belied at a time when they were laboring under a foreign yoke, had become tenfold more dear; every feeling of patriotism was enlisted on its side, in circumstances when, if ever, patriotism is genuine and fervid; not to say that, in this case, patriotism was invested with the sanctity of religion. Last of all, the popular faith harmonized with the deep hereditary contempt of the Jews for the rest of mankind, with their settled persuasion of the distinction which God had made between them and all other nations, and with their long-cherished anticipations of permanent and undisputed pre-eminence. Nothing can be more clear than that, to oppose a belief so deep-seated, to crush hopes so sacred, to disown the distinction between Jews and Gentiles, and to look with equal favor on both, was to invite unmeasured and relentless hatred, and certain disgrace 64and defeat. If Jesus had meant to ingratiate himself with his countrymen, his course would have been to sympathize with their creed and their hopes.¹²¹²   See Whately’s Introductory Lessons on the Christian Evidences.

But, independently of any personal or public object which he might have in view, how could he have failed to adopt as his own, the faith of his country in this matter? He had been brought up, like others, in all the common views; he must have heard them often from his mother’s lips, from. grave and pious men also, and especially in the synagogue of Nazareth on the Sabbath days. There is no reason to think that he can have heard any thing but the common views, from his infancy upward. But he had risen, nevertheless, to a purer and loftier faith, and somehow had formed for himself quite a novel and original idea of the character of the Messiah. “The hour cometh,” he said to the woman of Samaria, “when neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, ye shall worship the Father; . . . when the true worshipers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth.”¹³¹³   John iv. 21-23. Religion to him, and the bonds of religious fellowship, were not national, but spiritual; connected, not with place or people, but with the state of the soul. He believed in something more dear than country, more dear than even the closest of earthly 65relationships. “Whosoever shall do the will of my Father who is in heaven, the same is ray brother and sister and mother.”¹⁴¹⁴   Matthew xii. 50. “They shall come from the east and from the west, and from the north and from the south, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven.”¹⁵¹⁵   Matthew viii. 11. and Luke xiii. 29.—See Channing’s Sermon as above. God’s kingdom and his own mission, as he understood it, embraced the world, and was designed, not to confer peculiar distinctions on a single nation, but to originate and diffuse blessings to which all nations alike should be welcome. His idea was catholic, as it was purely spiritual. Born and educated a Jew, associating only with Jews, never beyond the limits of Judea in his life, whence had he derived this idea, whence caught this spirit? how gained this expansion and nobility of soul, how reached this large, and lofty, and Godlike faith?

That poor young man whose external history we have looked upon, was alone in his country, in his age, in the world. His great soul rose above religious prejudices and errors, and above all national, educational, and social influences. He stood forth not a Jew, but a man to fulfill a high and purely spiritual mission; embracing not Judea only, but the world; not a nation only, but universal 66humanity. And was he, then, essentially, nothing more than he seemed to be? Was all this possible, in the circumstances, to a mere man? Above all, was it possible to such a man as we have found Jesus outwardly was?