“multitude” in Mark viii. 34, after the incident of Caesarea Philippi, is
dragged into the theory of secrecy.(267) Wrede does not feel the
possibility or impossibility of the sudden appearance of the multitude in
this locality as an historical problem, any more than he grasps the sudden
withdrawal of Jesus from His public ministry as primarily an historical
question. Mark is for him a writer who is to be judged from a pathological
point of view, a writer who, dominated by the fixed idea of introducing
everywhere the Messianic secret of Jesus, is always creating mysterious
and unintelligible situations, even when these do not directly serve the
interests of his theory, and who in some of his descriptions, writes in a
rather “fairy‐tale” style. When all is said, his treatment of the history
scarcely differs from that of the fourth Evangelist.
The absence of historical prepossessions which Wrede skilfully assumes in
his examination of the connexion in Mark is not really complete. He is
bound to refer everything inexplicable to the principle of the concealment
of the Messiahship, which is the only principle that he recognises in the
dogmatic stratum of the narrative, and is consequently obliged to deny the
historicity of such passages, whereas in reality the veiling of the
Messiahship is only involved in a few places and is there indicated in
clear and simple words. He is unwilling to recognise that there is a
second, wider circle of mystery which has to do, not with Jesus’
Messiahship, but with His preaching of the Kingdom, with the mystery of
the Kingdom of God in the wider sense, and that within this second circle
there lie a number of historical problems, above all the mission of the
Twelve and the inexplicable abandonment of public activity on the part of
Jesus which followed soon afterwards. His mistake consists in endeavouring
by violent methods to subsume the more general, the mystery of the Kingdom
of God, under the more special, the mystery of the Messiahship, instead of
inserting the latter as the smaller circle, within the wider, the secret
of the Kingdom of God.
As he does not deal with the teaching of Jesus, he has no occasion to take
account of the secret of the Kingdom of God. That is the more remarkable
because corresponding to one fundamental idea of the Messianic secret
there is a parallel, more general dogmatic conception in Jesus’ preaching
of the Kingdom. For if Jesus in Matt. x. gives the disciples nothing to
take with them on their mission but predictions of suffering; if at the
very beginning of His ministry He closes the Beatitudes with a blessing
upon the persecuted; if in Mark viii. 34 ff. He warns the people that they
will have to choose between life and life, between death and death; if, in
short, from the first, He loses no opportunity of preaching about
suffering and following Him in His sufferings; that is just as much a
matter of dogma as His own sufferings and predictions of sufferings. For
in both cases the necessity of suffering, the necessity of facing death,
is not “a necessity of the historical situation,” not a necessity which
arises out of the circumstances; it is an assertion put forth without
empirical basis, a prophecy of storm while the sky is blue, since neither
Jesus nor the people to whom He spoke were undergoing any persecution; and
when His fate overtook Him not even the disciples were involved in it. It
is distinctly remarkable that, except for a few meagre references, the
enigmatic character of Jesus’ constant predictions of suffering has not
been discussed in the Life‐of‐Jesus literature.(268)
What has now to be done, therefore, is, in contradistinction to Wrede, to
make a critical examination of the dogmatic element in the life of Jesus
on the assumption that the atmosphere of the time was saturated with
eschatology, that is, to keep in even closer touch with the facts than
Wrede does, and moreover, to proceed, not from the particular to the
general, but from the general to the particular, carefully considering
whether the dogmatic element is not precisely the historical element. For,
after all, why should not Jesus think in terms of doctrine, and make
history in action, just as well as a poor Evangelist can do it on paper,
under the pressure of the theological interests of the primitive
community.
Once again, however, we must repeat that the critical analysis and the
assertion of a system running through the disorder are the same in the
eschatological as in the sceptical hypothesis, only that in the
eschatological analysis a number of problems come more clearly to light.
The two constructions are related like the bones and cartilage of the
body. The general structure is the same, only that in the case of the one
a solid substance, lime, is distributed even in the minutest portions,
giving it firmness and solidity, while in the other case this is lacking.
This reinforcing substance is the eschatological world‐view.
How is it to be explained that Wrede, in spite of the eschatological
school, in spite of Johannes Weiss, could, in critically investigating the
connecting principle of the life of Jesus, simply leave eschatology out of
account? The blame rests with the eschatological school itself, for it
applied the eschatological explanation only to the preaching of Jesus, and
not even to the whole of this, but only to the Messianic secret, instead
of using it also to throw light upon the whole public work of Jesus, the
connexion and want of connexion between the events. It represented Jesus
as thinking and speaking eschatologically in some of the most important
passages of His teaching, but for the rest gave as uneschatological a
presentation of His life as modern historical theology had done. The
teaching of Jesus and the history of Jesus were set in different keys.
Instead of destroying the modern‐historical scheme of the life of Jesus,
or subjecting it to a rigorous examination, and thereby undertaking the
performance of a highly valuable service to criticism, the eschatological
theory confined itself within the limits of New Testament Theology, and
left it to Wrede to reveal one after another by a laborious purely
critical method the difficulties which from its point of view it might
have grasped historically at a single glance. It inevitably follows that
Wrede is unjust to Johannes Weiss and Johannes Weiss towards Wrede.(269)
It is quite inexplicable that the eschatological school, with its clear
perception of the eschatological element in the preaching of the Kingdom
of God, did not also hit upon the thought of the “dogmatic” element in the
history of Jesus. Eschatology is simply “dogmatic history”—history as
moulded by theological beliefs—which breaks in upon the natural course of
history and abrogates. it. Is it not even a priori the only conceivable
view that the conduct of one who looked forward to His Messianic
“Parousia” in the near future should be determined, not by the natural
course of events, but by that expectation? The chaotic confusion of the
narratives ought to have suggested the thought that the events had been
thrown into this confusion by the volcanic force of an incalculable
personality, not by some kind of carelessness or freak of the tradition.
A very little consideration suffices to show that there is something quite
incomprehensible in the public ministry of Jesus taken as a whole.
According to Mark it lasted less than a year, for since he speaks of only
one Passover‐journey we may conclude that no other Passover fell within
the period of Jesus’ activity as a teacher. If it is proposed to assume
that He allowed a Passover to go by without going up to Jerusalem, His
adversaries, who took Him to task about hand‐washings and about rubbing
the ears of corn on the Sabbath, would certainly have made a most serious
matter of this, and we should have to suppose that the Evangelist for some
reason or other thought fit to suppress the fact. That is to say, the
burden of proof lies upon those who assert a longer duration for the
ministry of Jesus.
Until they have succeeded in proving it, we may assume something like the
following course of events. Jesus, in going up to a Passover, came in
contact with the movement initiated by John the Baptist in Judaea, and,
after the lapse of a little time—if we bring into the reckoning the forty
days’ sojourn in the wilderness mentioned in Mark i. 13, a few weeks
later—appeared in Galilee proclaiming the near approach of the Kingdom of
God. According to Mark He had known Himself since His baptism to be the
Messiah, but from the historical point of view that does not matter, since
history is concerned with the first announcement of the Messiahship, not
with inward psychological processes.(270)
This work of preaching the Kingdom was continued until the sending forth
of the Twelve; that is to say, at the most for a few weeks. Perhaps in the
saying “the harvest is great but the labourers are few,” with which Jesus
closes His work prior to sending forth the disciples, there lies an
allusion to the actual state of the natural fields. The flocking of the
people to Him after the Mission of the Twelve, when a great multitude
thronged about Him for several days during His journey along the northern
shore of the lake, can be more naturally explained if the harvest had just
been brought in.
However that may be, it is certain that Jesus, in the midst of His initial
success, left Galilee, journeyed northwards, and only resumed His work as
a teacher in Judaea on the way to Jerusalem! Of His “public ministry,”
therefore, a large section falls out, being cancelled by a period of
inexplicable concealment; it dwindles to a few weeks of preaching here and
there in Galilee and the few days of His sojourn in Jerusalem.(271)
But in that case the public life of Jesus becomes practically
unintelligible. The explanation that His cause in Galilee was lost, and
that He was obliged to flee, has not the slightest foundation in the
text.(272) That was recognised even by Keim, the inventor of the
successful and unsuccessful periods in the life of Jesus, as is shown by
his suggestion that the Evangelists had intentionally removed the traces
of failure from the decisive period which led up to the northern journey.
The controversy over the washing of hands in Mark vii. 1‐23, to which
appeal is always made, is really a defeat for the Pharisees. The theory of
the “desertion of the Galilaeans,” which appears with more or less
artistic variations in all modern Lives of Jesus, owes its existence not
to any other confirmatory fact, but simply to the circumstance that Mark
makes the simple statement: “And Jesus departed and went into the region
of Tyre” (vii. 24) without offering any explanation of this decision.
The only conclusion which the text warrants is that Mark mentioned no
reason because he knew of none. The decision of Jesus did not rest upon
the recorded facts, since it ignores these, but upon considerations lying
outside the history. His life at this period was dominated by a “dogmatic
idea” which rendered Him indifferent to all else ... even to the happy and
successful work as a teacher which was opening before Him. How could Jesus
the “teacher” abandon at that moment a people so anxious to learn and so
eager for salvation? His action suggests a doubt whether He really felt
Himself to be a “teacher.” If all the controversial discourses and sayings
and answers to questions, which were so to speak wrung from Him, were
subtracted from the sum of His utterances, how much of the didactic
preaching of Jesus would be left over?
But even the supposed didactic preaching is not really that of a
“teacher,” since the purpose of His parables was, according to Mark iv.
10‐12, not to reveal, but to conceal, and of the Kingdom of God He spoke
only in parables (Mark iv. 34).
Perhaps, however, we are not justified in extending the theory of
concealment, simply because it is mentioned in connexion with the first
parable, to all the parables which He ever spoke, for it is never
mentioned again. It could hardly indeed be applied to the parables with a
moral, like that, for instance, of the pearl of great price. It is equally
inapplicable to the parables of coming judgment uttered at Jerusalem, in
which He explicitly exhorts the people to be prepared and watchful in view
of the coming of judgment and of the Kingdom. But here too it is deserving
of notice that Jesus, whenever He desires to make known anything further
concerning the Kingdom of God than just its near approach, seems to be
confined, as it were by a higher law, to the parabolic form of discourse.
It is as though, for reasons which we cannot grasp, His teaching lay under
certain limitations. It appears as a kind of accessory aspect of His
vocation. Thus it was possible for Him to give up His work as a teacher
even at the moment when it promised the greatest success.
Accordingly the fact of His always speaking in parables and of His taking
this inexplicable resolution both point back to a mysterious pre‐
supposition which greatly reduces the importance of Jesus’ work as a
teacher.
One reason for this limitation is distinctly stated in Mark iv. 10‐12,
viz. predestination! Jesus knows that the truth which He offers is
exclusively for those who have been definitely chosen, that the general
and public announcement of His message could only thwart the plans of God,
since the chosen are already winning their salvation from God. Only the
phrase, “Repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand” and its variants belong
to the public preaching. And this, therefore, is the only message which He
commits to His disciples when sending them forth. What this repentance,
supplementary to the law, the special ethic of the interval before the
coming of the Kingdom (_Interimsethik_) is, in its positive acceptation,
He explains in the Sermon on the Mount. But all that goes beyond that
simple phrase must be publicly presented only in parables, in order that
those only, who are shown to possess predestination by having the initial
knowledge which enables them to understand the parables, may receive a
more advanced knowledge, which is imparted to them in a measure
corresponding to their original degree of knowledge: “Unto him that hath
shall be given, and from him that hath not shall be taken away even that
which he hath” (Mark iv. 24‐25).
The predestinarian view goes along with the eschatology. It is pushed to
its utmost consequences in the closing incident of the parable of the
marriage of the King’s son (Matt. xxii. 1‐14) where the man who, in
response to a publicly issued invitation, sits down at the table of the
King, but is recognised from his appearance as not called, is thrown out
into perdition. “Many are called but few are chosen.” The ethical idea of
salvation and the predestinarian limitation of acceptance to the elect are
constantly in conflict in the mind of Jesus. In one case, however, He
finds relief in the thought of predestination. When the rich young man
turned away, not having strength to give up his possessions for the sake
of following Jesus as he had been commanded to do, Jesus and His disciples
were forced to draw the conclusion that he, like other rich men, was lost,
and could not enter into the Kingdom of God. But immediately afterwards
Jesus makes the suggestion, “With men it is impossible, but not with God,
for with God all things are possible” (Mark x. 17‐27). That is, He will
not give up the hope that the young man, in spite of appearances, which
are against him, will be found to have belonged to the Kingdom of God,
solely in virtue of the secret all‐powerful will of God. Of a “conversion”
of the young man there is no question.
In the Beatitudes, on the other hand, the argument is reversed; the
predestination is inferred from its outward manifestation. It may seem to
us inconceivable, but they are really predestinarian in form. Blessed are
the poor in spirit! Blessed are the meek! Blessed are the
peacemakers!—that does not mean that by virtue of their being poor in
spirit, meek, peace‐loving, they deserve the Kingdom. Jesus does not
intend the saying as an injunction or exhortation, but as a simple
statement of fact: in their being poor in spirit, in their meekness, in
their love of peace, it is made manifest that they are predestined to the
Kingdom. By the possession of these qualities they are marked as belonging
to it. In the case of others (Matt. v. 10‐12) the predestination to the
Kingdom is made manifest by the persecutions which befall them in this
world. These are the light of the world, which already shines among men
for the glory of God (Matt. v. 14‐15).
The kingdom cannot be “earned”; what happens is that men are called to it,
and show themselves to be called to it. On careful examination it appears
that the idea of reward in the sayings of Jesus is not really an idea of
reward, because it is relieved against a background of predestination. For
the present it is sufficient to note the fact that the eschatologico‐
predestinarian view brings a mysterious element of dogma not merely into
the teaching, but also into the public ministry of Jesus.
To take another point, what is the mystery of the Kingdom of God? It must
consist of something more than merely its near approach, and something of
extreme importance; otherwise Jesus would be here indulging in mere
mystery‐mongering. The saying about the candle which He puts upon the
stand, in order that what was hidden may be revealed to those who have
ears to hear, implies that He is making a tremendous revelation to those
who understand the parables about the growth of the seed. The mystery must
therefore contain the explanation why the Kingdom must now come, and how
men are to know how near it is. For the general fact that it is very near
had already been openly proclaimed both by the Baptist and by Jesus. The
mystery, therefore, must consist of something more than that.
In these parables it is not the idea of development, but of the apparent
absence of causation which occupies the foremost place. The description
aims at suggesting the question, how, and by what power, incomparably
great and glorious results can be infallibly produced by an insignificant
fact without human aid. A man sowed seed. Much of it was lost, but the
little that fell into good ground brought forth a harvest—thirty, sixty,
an hundredfold—which left no trace of the loss in the sowing. How did that
come about?
A man sows seed and does not trouble any further about it—cannot indeed do
anything to help it, but he knows that after a definite time the glorious
harvest which arises out of the seed will stand before him. By what power
is that effected?
An extremely minute grain of mustard seed is planted in the earth and
there necessarily arises out of it a great bush, which cannot certainly
have been contained in the grain of seed. How was that?
What the parables emphasise is, therefore, so to speak, the in itself
negative, inadequate, character of the initial fact, upon which, as by a
miracle, there follows in the appointed time, through the power of God,
some great thing. They lay stress not upon the natural, but upon the
miraculous character of such occurrences.
But what is the initial fact of the parables? It is the sowing.
It is not said that by the man who sows the seed Jesus means Himself. The
man has no importance. In the parable of the mustard seed he is not even
mentioned. All that is asserted is that the initial fact is already
present, as certainly present as the time of the sowing is past at the
moment when Jesus speaks. That being so, the Kingdom of God must follow as
certainly as harvest follows seed‐sowing. As a man believes in the
harvest, without being able to explain it, simply because the seed has
been sown; so with the same absolute confidence he may believe in the
Kingdom of God.
And the initial fact which is symbolised? Jesus can only mean a fact which
was actually in existence—the movement of repentance evoked by the Baptist
and now intensified by His own preaching. That necessarily involves the
bringing in of the Kingdom by the power of God; as man’s sowing
necessitates the giving of the harvest by the same Infinite Power. Any one
who knows this sees with different eyes the corn growing in the fields and
the harvest ripening, for he sees the one fact in the other, and awaits
along with the earthly harvest the heavenly, the revelation of the Kingdom
of God.
If we look into the thought more closely we see that the coming of the
Kingdom of God is not only symbolically or analogically, but also really
and temporally connected with the harvest. The harvest ripening upon earth
is the last! With it comes also the Kingdom of God which brings in the new
age. When the reapers are sent into the fields, the Lord in Heaven will
cause His harvest to be reaped by the holy angels.
If the three parables of Mark iv. contain the mystery of the Kingdom of
God, and are therefore capable of being summed up in a single formula,
this can be nothing else than the joyful exhortation: “Ye who have eyes to
see, read, in the harvest which is ripening upon earth, what is being
prepared in heaven!” The eager eschatological hope was to regard the
natural process as the last of its kind, and to see in it a special
significance in view of the event of which it was to give the signal.
The analogical and temporal parallelism becomes complete if we assume that
the movement initiated by the Baptist began in the spring, and notice that
Jesus, according to Matt. ix. 37 and 38, before sending out the disciples
to make a speedy proclamation of the nearness of the Kingdom of God,
uttered the remarkable saying about the rich harvest. It seems like a
final expression of the thought contained in the parables about the seed
and its promise, and finds its most natural explanation in the supposition
that the harvest was actually at hand.
Whatever may be thought of this attempt to divine historically the secret
of the Kingdom of God, there is one thing that cannot be got away from,
viz. that the initial fact to which Jesus points, under the figure of the
sowing, is somehow or other connected with the eschatological preaching of
repentance, which had been begun by the Baptist.
That may be the more confidently asserted because Jesus in another
mysterious saying describes the days of the Baptist as a time which makes
preparation for the coming of the Kingdom of God. “From the days of John
the Baptist,” He says in Matt. xi. 12, “even until now, the Kingdom of
Heaven is subjected to violence, and the violent wrest it to themselves.”
The saying has nothing to do with the entering of individuals into the
Kingdom; it simply asserts, that since the coming of the Baptist a certain
number of persons are engaged in forcing on and compelling the coming of
the Kingdom. Jesus’ expectation of the Kingdom is an expectation based
upon a fact which exercises an active influence upon the Kingdom of God.
It was not He, and not the Baptist who “were working at the coming of the
Kingdom”; it is the host of penitents which is wringing it from God, so
that it may now come at any moment.
The eschatological insight of Johannes Weiss made an end of the modern
view that Jesus founded the Kingdom. It did away with all activity, as
exercised upon the Kingdom of God, and made the part of Jesus purely a
waiting one. Now the activity comes back into the preaching of the
Kingdom, but this time eschatologically conditioned. The secret of the
Kingdom of God which Jesus unveils in the parables about confident
expectation in Mark iv., and declares in so many words in the eulogy on
the Baptist (Matt. xi.), amounts to this, that in the movement to which
the Baptist gave the first impulse, and which still continued, there was
an initial fact which was drawing after it the coming of the Kingdom, in a
fashion which was miraculous, unintelligible, but unfailingly certain,
since the sufficient cause for it lay in the power and purpose of God.