The Jesus of History Part 11

1. "Into this world came the Church!" With what aspects of the religion and life of the early Roman Empire, as outlined in the chapter, would the Church find itself in conflict?

2. How would you introduce the Christian faith to one who believed and took part in the Eleusinian cult of Demeter? (Cf. 1 Corinthians and St Paul's method of dealing with a similar situation, and notice the things he stresses--e.g. elementary morality.)

3. "Christ has conquered and all the G.o.ds are gone." Why did they go?

4. But have they gone? What resemblances are there between the world to-day (in the West and in the East) and the problem of the Church to-day and the Roman world and the problem of the Church then?

5. It was often remarked in India that, point by point, the writer's description of religion in the Roman world is true to the letter of Hinduism to-day. Work out this parallel. (See Dr J. N. Farquhar, Crown of Hinduism and Modern Religious Movements in India.)

CHAPTER X

1. "It is the heart that makes the theologian." Where does your theology come from?

2. The doctrine of the Atonement has often been stated as an attempt to reconcile Jesus and an un-Christian conception of G.o.d.

"G.o.d was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself." "The Cross is the revelation in time of what G.o.d is always." Discuss.

3. What are the three ways of answering the question: "Who and what is this Jesus Christ?" Why must people make up their minds about him?

4. Does the writer make Jesus too human? Or has the reading of this book made you feel his divinity more strongly just because he was so perfectly human?

FOOTNOTES

[1] The Conflict of Religions in the Early Roman Empire, p. 157.

[2] "We are nothing; Christ alone is all."

[3] Canon Streeter in Foundations

[4] Cf. the foreigner's touch at Athens (Acts 17:21).

[5] because, later on, the Sabbath and Jewish ceremony were not among the most living issues, after the Church had come to be chiefly Gentile.

[6] On this point see R. W. Dale, "The Living Christ and the Four Gospels"; and W. Sanday, "The Gospels in the Second Century."

[7] The reader will see that I am referring to Bishop Lightfoot's article on "The Brethren of the Lord" in his commentary on "Galatians", but not accepting his conclusions.

[8] That this is not quite fanciful is shown by the emphasis laid by more or less contemporary writers on the increased facilities for travel which the Roman Empire gave, and the use made of them.

[9] Wordsworth, Prelude, i. 586.

[10] Cf., F. G. Peabody, "Jesus Christ and Christian Character", pp.

57-60.

[11] H. S. Coffin, Creed of Jesus. pp. 240-242.

[12] "Prelude" xiii. 26 ff.

[13] See further, on this, in Chapter VII., p.168

[14] E.g., in his essay on "Mirabeau": "The real quant.i.ty of our insight ... depends on our patience, our fairness, lovingness"; and in "Biography": "A loving heart is the beginning of all knowledge."

[15] Cf. Deissmann, Light from the Ancient East, p. 154. I have omitted one or two less relevant clauses--e.g. greetings to friends.

[16] Horace, "Epistles", i. 16, 48.

[17] Homer, "Odyssey", xvii. 322.

[18] It is only about four times that personal immortality comes with any clearness in the Old Testament: Psalms 72 and 139; Isaiah 26; and Job 16:26.

[19] Cf. A. E. J. Rawlinson, Dogma, Fact and Experience, p. 16. "All the virtues in the Aristotelian canon are self-contained states of the virtuous man himself .... In the last resort they are entirely self-centred adornments or accomplishments of the good man; and it is significant of this self-centredness of the entire conception that the qualities of display (megaloprepeia) and highmindedness, or proper pride (megalopsychia), are insisted on as integral elements of the ideal character. On the other hand, the three characteristic Christian virtues--faith, hope and charity--all postulate Another."

[20] Cf. Chapter II

[21] A French mystic is quoted as saying, "Le Dieu defini est le Dieu fini."

[22] Peabody, Jesus Christ and Christian Character, p. 97.

[23] H. R. Mackintosh, "The Doctrine of the Person of Jesus Christ", p. 399.

[24] Clement, "Protrepticus", 100, 3, 4

[25] The more or less contemporary Greek orator, Dio Chrysostom, refers to the old-fas.h.i.+oned ways of the Tarsiots, especially mentioning their insistence on women wearing veils.

[26] Wernle, "Beginnings of Christianity", vol. i. p. 286, English translation.

[27] So too says Josephus, who gives this as the reason of Herod's suspicion of him.

[28] "Antiquities of the Jews", xviii. 5, 8, 117, cf. what Celsus says of righteousness as a condition of admission to certain mysteries that offer forgiveness of sins (Origen, c. "Celsum", iii.

59). The "purification of the body" has a ritual and ceremonial significance.

[29] Lines Composed above Tintern, 34.

[30] That he did so is emphasized again and again, in striking language, by St. Paul--e.g. Rom. 5:15-16, 20; 1 Tim. 1:14.

[31] Horace, "Ars Poetica", 191, "Nec deus intersit nisi dignus vindice nodus inciderit".

[32] Daily reading of the Scriptures is recommended by Clement of Alexandria ("Strom". vii. 49).

[33] Perhaps one may quote here, not inappropriately, the famous saying of Aristotle in his "Poetics", that "poetry is a more philosophic thing than history, and of a higher seriousness." The latter term means that the poet is "more in earnest" about his work, and puts more energy of mind into it than the historian. If the reader hesitates about this, let him try to write a great hymn or poem.

[34] Do not let us be misled by the thin pedantries of the Revised Version here, or in Romans 5:1 shortly to be cited. In both places literary and spiritual sense has bowed to the accidents of MSS.

[35] If my readers do not know his Christmas hymn for children, they have missed one of the happiest hymns for Christmas.

[36] What Carlyle says in "The Hero as a Poet" ("Heroes and Hero Wors.h.i.+p") on the close relation of Song and Truth is worth remembering in this connexion.