upon God's fair creation, threatening to inoculate it with a poison that
should leaven the whole lump, and change its beauty into corruption. But
around the dark sin-spot, and because the sin-spot was there, divine
love showered down, like the impalpable silver gathering on its object
in the electrotype, embracing, surrounding, covering, killing the evil
and bitter thing that threatened to destroy the works of God. Death was
swallowed up in victory. The Son of God came into the world because sin
was on it. He, the Holy One, took sin into his bosom, that he might
quench it in his own embrace. It was sin that summoned the Saviour to
the world, and gave shape to the Gospel of God. To the devil's wile in
Eden, as the occasion, though not the cause, unfallen angels and
ransomed men will for ever be indebted for that specific work of their
Creator which will most attract their eyes and inspire their songs. On
one side they behold mercy, in spotless, unmingled white; and on the
other side they behold judgment, darker, indeed, yet equally
resplendent. But here in the midst, in the person of God incarnate, they
see mercy and judgment meeting--the pearl of great price--where two
different and apparently opposite glories mysteriously and beauteously
mingle and play. Death swallowed up in victory; sin embraced and so
destroyed in the person of Immanuel; sin lost in the holiness and love
that agglomerated round it;--this pearl will shine in heaven with a
glory that excelleth, when the sun and stars shall have fallen like
unripe figs from the sky.
VII.
THE DRAW-NET.
"Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a net, that was cast into the
sea, and gathered of every kind: which, when it was full, they drew
to shore, and sat down, and gathered the good into vessels, but cast
the bad away. So shall it be at the end of the world: the angels
shall come forth, and sever the wicked from among the just, and
shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and
gnashing of teeth."--MATT. xiii. 47-50.
Great variety obtains in the size and structure of fishing-nets; and
great variety, too, in the manner of using them. Some are stationary,
fixed to poles in the sea or the estuaries of rivers; some are dropped
in a straight line into the water, and allowed to remain there suspended
until a shoal of fish, endeavouring to pass, become entangled one by one
in the meshes; others are shot in a semicircular form into the sea, and
immediately drawn back by both extremities simultaneously to the shore.
It is this last mentioned species of net that is employed in the
parable. Its depth is comparatively small, but its length is great. One
side is kept close to the bottom by weights, and the other side drawn
towards the surface by corks or bladders. Thus when spread it stands
erect like a wall in the water, enclosing a large space. As soon as it
has been spread, the fishermen begin to draw it at both ends slowly and
steadily towards the land. As the enclosed semicircle gradually
diminishes, the captured fishes, having still room for motion, retire
before the advancing prison wall, until they are at length confined
within a very narrow space, and drawn into shallow water. There is then
a violent flutter for a few moments, and the whole are laid helpless on
the sand.
Then begins that operation on which the Master has here mainly fixed his
eye, and to which exclusively he directs attention in his own
exposition. When the fishermen have at last drawn the net wholly out of
the water and secured its contents on dry land, they sit down to examine
leisurely the worth of their capture, and to separate the precious from
the vile. The good they gather into vessels for preservation; the bad
they simply throw away. The net surrounded and brought to land every
living creature that fell within its sweep, and was not small enough to
escape through its meshes. Some of these are in their own nature and at
all times unfit for food; others are useless at particular seasons.
Every one who has watched the operations of fishermen on the shore is
familiar with the appearance of star-fish and other low forms of marine
life, which are drawn out by the nets, and cast away upon the sand.
Large predatory fishes of a low type are also sometimes caught, when
they venture too near in search of prey. In some instances, moreover,
fishes that are dead and partially decayed are brought up in company
with the living, and these are of course cast out as vile.
The central figure of the parable, round which the other features
congregate only as fore or back ground accessories--the central figure
is, A group of fishermen, panting from recent exertion, sitting on a
knoll close by the sea-side, with the newly-drawn net lying in a soaking
heap at their feet, picking up one by one the fishes that are fit for
food, and putting them on one side into baskets, and casting the rest
away. The men are skilful, experienced, and cool; they have no interest
in forming an erroneous judgment, and they are not liable to fall into
mistakes. The separation between good and bad is made without partiality
and without hypocrisy; it is deliberate, accurate, inevitable. At the
close, not one good fish has been cast away, and not a bad one has been
admitted into the vessels.
It is of great importance to note that when the Lord undertakes to
explain this parable, he determines for us the spiritual meaning of the
last act only of the fishermen's labours, and passes in silence all the
rest. I do not conclude from this fact that the earlier features of the
scene possessed no spiritual significance, or that their meaning cannot
be ascertained. But it is undeniable that when Christ himself gives the
meaning of his own parable, the part that he leaves unexplained cannot
be as surely and clearly understood as the part which he has explained:
and further, the portion of a parable on which he maintained silence
while he explained another part, is not for us in the same position as
another parable of which he has not given an exposition at all. Some of
them are so transparent that he did not count it needful to give the
interpretation; in other cases, such as the sower, he gave the
signification of the whole; in a third class of cases, to which this
parable belongs, he explains one feature of the picture, and maintains
silence regarding the rest. Now it is precisely the portions left
without explanation in parables partially explained, that must in the
nature of the case be to us most uncertain. It may be assumed regarding
them that their spiritual meaning is either self-evident, and therefore
required not a comment, or of subordinate importance, and therefore did
not obtain one. In this case it is certain, from the diversity of
opinion that prevails regarding them, that these portions are not easily
understood: there remains only the other alternative, that they are not
essential.
Our view of the grand lesson which the Master taught from the closing
act of the fishermen, is very little affected by the opinion which we
may form regarding the preparatory portions. Those who differ widely
regarding the significance of trees and animals that occupy the
background of a picture, may notwithstanding agree entirely regarding
the meaning of the picture itself. Although we entertain various views
in respect to the spreading and drawing of the net, we come all, under
the Master's guidance, to substantially the same view of the separation
between good and evil which was accomplished when the net was brought to
shore. Upon this point the Lord fixed his eye and expressed his mind. He
has made it so plain that there is not room among Christians for serious
diversity concerning it.
A river in Africa is known and navigated in its lower reaches near the
sea. Ships from many nations frequent the estuary, and obtain cargoes of
oil, and wax, and fruit from the inhabitants on its shores. But a
question, meantime, arises among geographers regarding the source of
this river in the interior of the continent, and the direction of its
current before it reaches the navigable portion near the ocean. One
believes the river rises in the north, and flows mainly southward;
another contends that it springs in a mountainous ridge far to the
eastward, and flows in a westerly course to the Atlantic. In defect of
an actual exploration, there is room for differences of opinion; and
differences have accordingly sprung up. The right is better than the
wrong even here; but the importance of the point is, in a commercial
point of view, secondary. Waiting till time shall afford the materials
for decision, the disputants meanwhile frequent the deep estuary in
company, and grow rich by the merchandise which it supplies. Thus we all
understand, from the Lord's own transparent, decisive exposition, the
last, the deepest, the most profitable portion of the parable. While we
endeavour reverently to investigate the portions that are still
uncertain, we should rejoice with thankfulness that where agreement was
most necessary, the Great Teacher has made it impossible to differ.
After this explanation, I need not hesitate to admit that the view of
the parable, in its earlier and unexplained portions, which on the whole
most commends itself to my judgment, differs essentially from the
expositions that are generally given. With modest, grave, watchful
spirit should one student of the Scripture suggest and another receive,
an interpretation of any portion different from that which has been
given by the earnest, accomplished, and devout scholars, who in various
countries and times have sought to discover the mind of the Spirit. On
the other hand, to suppress a judgment, in deference to human authority,
would be disloyal to the Lord and contrary to the principles of
Protestants.
The view commonly entertained is, that the net is the Church, or, as
some express it, the Bible and the ordinances of religion; while the
fishermen who spread and draw it are the apostles in the first instance,
and afterwards the ordinary ministers of the word. If the net is the
Church, and its drawers the Church's ministers, the whole question of
discipline is immediately raised. This parable, accordingly, like that
of the tares, has been impressed into their own service by the
opponents of discipline both in ancient and modern times. We
emphatically repeat here, what we formerly stated in connection with the
cognate parable, that no consistent argument can be maintained in regard
to discipline from this scripture, except an absolute and entire
repudiation of all effort, by a human ministry and in this present
world, to keep any person or class of persons without the pale of the
visible Church on account of their opinions or their conduct. Very few,
however, venture to take this ground. The ordinary method is to contend
for some measure of Church order--for the right and duty of excluding
some of the worst--and then to lean on this parable for an argument in
favour of a lax and against a stringent administration. We submit that
to take your stand on this parable, and thence contend for the exclusion
to some extent of the evil from the pale of the Church, is to trample
all logical and critical laws under foot. This scripture manifestly
either forbids all effort to discriminate in this world, or says nothing
at all on the subject.
I shall now state, as distinctly and fairly as I can, some of the
difficulties and inconsistencies which adhere to the common
interpretation of the net and its drawers, and convince me that it is
not the true interpretation.
1. It makes those who draw the net through the water, and those who
separate between good and evil on the shore, not the same, but different
persons, and persons of different classes,--the one representing men
ministering to the Church in time, the other angels executing judgment
in eternity; whereas, both from the terms of the narrative and the
ordinary practice of fishermen, we know that the same persons who draw
the net to shore afterwards divide between the worthless and vile of
its contents. The net "was cast into the sea, and gathered of every
kind: which, when it was full, they drew to shore, and sat down, and
gathered the good into vessels, but cast the bad away." There is no
ambiguity here; the drawers are also the dividers. I suppose none will
take advantage of the impersonal form in which the casting of the net is
expressed, and assume that while one class, representing a human
ministry, cast the net into the water, another class, representing
ministering angels, drew it to land and divided its contents; for it
would be, contrary to all analogy and propriety, to assume that the Lord
introduced into his picture a feature that is never found in fact. There
is no such thing in reality as one set of men throwing the net into the
water, and then retiring from the scene, while another set of men draw
it out.
The ordinary interpretation assumes, contrary both to the letter of
Scripture and the custom of men, that when ministers of flesh and blood
have spread the net, and drawn it toward the shore, enclosing a
multitude good and bad of their brethren, they disappear and take no
part further in the transaction. Another party, representing the angels,
now fasten on the net, and pick out the good from the bad. A late German
expositor, learned, suggestive, and devout, Olshausen, yielding to the
inexorable logic of the case, concedes that the drawers of the net and
the dividers of the fish are not diverse, but the same. He turns,
however, to the other side for a solution of the difficulty. Instead of
simply proceeding to determine the unknown by the known;--instead of
owning that as angels separate the good from the evil on the shore, they
must have also thrown and drawn the net, he explains away the specific
signification of angels, and supposes that those who minister the Gospel
in time are employed, under the general designation of angels, to
separate between good and evil in the world to come. This solution will
not readily commend itself to British students of the Scripture. The
fact therefore remains, that the ordinary exposition of the parable, in
this part of its progress, is palpably at variance with the structure of
the parable itself, and the facts on which it is founded.
2. In the visible Church, the profession, at the very least, is to
enclose the good within the communion of saints, or to rescue the evil
by making them new in the act of entrance; whereas the net is let down
at a certain spot to sweep indiscriminately all within its circle to the
shore. It makes absolutely no distinction between good and bad; it can
discriminate only between great and small. The net is laid down in the
sea along a certain line: twelve inches beyond that line fishes good and
bad are swimming, which it does not touch; while an inch within that
line are fishes good and bad which it draws indiscriminately to the
shore. I can perceive no likeness between this and the kingdom of
heaven, if you understand thereby the visible Church and the efforts of
the ministry.
3. One of the chief practical lessons which expositors ancient and
modern have drawn from the parable, under this view of its meaning, is
extremely incongruous, and even grotesque. Churchmen cling to it as a
sheet anchor in controversy with Nonconformists. If this notion were
adopted only by mediæval monks and modern Romanists, I would reckon it
unworthy of notice; but it is received and uttered again as genuine at
this day by grave and learned Protestant theologians of Germany, and
notwithstanding the solidity and good sense which characterize his
"Notes" generally, is formally reproduced in its boldest form by Dr.
Trench.[26]
[26] "They [this and the parable of the tares] convey, too, the same
further lesson, that this fact [the actual intermixture of evil in
the visible Church] does not justify self-willed departure from the
fellowship of the Church, and impatient leaping over or breaking
through the nets, as here it has often been called; but the Lord's
separation is patiently to be waited for, which shall surely arrive
at the end of the present age."--_Dr. Trench, Notes on the
Parables_, p. 133. This is a style far too loose for a critical
exposition of Scripture. If the actual presence of tolerated
impurity within the Church does not justify a "self-willed"
departure from her communion, does it justify a departure that is
not self-willed, but a solemn separation in order to carry out the
will of the Lord? The assumption that the separation of the English
Nonconformists was "self-willed," of course begs the whole question.
The practical lesson, then, which these expositors draw from the parable
is, that disciples of Christ are not justified in leaving an organized
Church with which they were connected, and forming a Christian community
beyond its pale, on the ground that unworthy members are tolerated
within its communion. This is, indeed, not the true state of the
question as between the Established Episcopal Church in England and the
early Nonconformists; the Puritans did not spontaneously retire, they
were ejected by the hand of power because they refused to comply with
new ordinances imposed upon the Church of Christ by human authority. But
although the state of the question were conceded, the argument
completely fails. If this lesson against separation is justly deduced
from the parable, there must be in the natural object some parallel more
or less distinct which suggests and supports it. What is that parallel,
and where does it lie? Translate the spiritual lesson, which men profess
to find, back into the material facts, and observe the straits into
which your mistake has brought you. The parallel obviously must be,--The
good fishes that are enclosed within the net, or those that count
themselves good, should not leap out because star-fish and molluscs are
enclosed along with them. Either this is the parallel on which the
lesson leans, or it has no foundation at all; but there is no such thing
in nature, and no such representation in the parable. The fishes when
they are once enclosed within the net cannot break out; and even if they
could, they would break out not because they were confined in low
company, but because they were confined. The good would fain be free;
and the bad too. From first to last the net is to all its inmates and to
all alike a dreaded prison. I do not descry a solitary feature of
resemblance between the parable at this stage and the doctrine regarding
Church discipline which the expositors deduce from it.[27]
[27] While Stier and Trench seem to start with the same principle of
interpretation on this subject, they are led ultimately to opposite
practical results. Trench, as we have seen, gathers from the parable
that the pure, or those who consider themselves pure, are not
justified in leaping out of the net at their own pleasure; that is,
the Nonconformists should not go and constitute conventicles beyond
the pale of the Establishment. Stier, on the contrary, represents
the evil as endeavouring to break out of the net, but unable to
accomplish their purpose: "Many a leviathan is caught, and although
he would fain get out, yet cannot break the net."--_Stier_ in loc.
4. The sea, according to the interpreters, being the world, and the net
being the Church, I want to know what is meant by drawing the net to
land. To be drawn from the sea to the land must mean to be led, willing
or unwilling, from this life into eternity; for both good and bad are
brought to the shore; then and there the separation takes place which
all acknowledge to be final. But are the members of the visible Church
alone drawn out of this life into the other world? Do the ministers of
the Gospel occupy themselves in dragging their brethren away from the
world? Here, too, the interpretation is inconsistent with the facts of
the case and the representations of the parable.
These difficulties in which the common interpretation is involved, go
far to prove that it must be erroneous; a true principle of exposition
would surely not lead its adherents into such straits. The real key, if
it were found, might be expected to open the lock without wrenching its
parts asunder.
Although for my own part I would be content to take the plain and
undoubted doctrine which the closing scene of the parable contains, and
leave the earlier stages of it as the Lord left them, without attaching
to them any definite and distinct significance, I am prepared at the
same time to suggest a totally different interpretation of the net
drawing the fishes to land, for the consideration of those who love to
search the Scriptures. I shall state the principle of interpretation
which commends itself to my judgment, and leave everyone to judge for
himself whether it will consistently and profitably explain all the
facts.
The net is not the visible Church in the world, and the fishes good and
bad within it do not represent the true and false members of the Church.
The sea is the world. The net, almost or altogether invisible at first
to those whom it surrounds, is that unseen bond which, by an invisible
ministry, is stretched over the living, drawing them gradually,
secretly, surely, towards the boundary of this life, and over it into
another. As each portion, or generation of the human race, are drawn
from their element in this world, ministering spirits, on the lip of
eternity that lies nearest time, receive them and separate the good from
the evil.
I shall enumerate here some of the reasons which commend this
interpretation, and notice some of the objections which may be urged
against it.
Among the reasons which commend it,--
1. It assumes, according to the facts of the case and the express terms
of the scripture, that the same persons who draw the net also separate
the worthy from the worthless of its contents on shore.
2. In owning this along with Olshausen, it owns also that the angels who
separate the good from the evil at the end of the world are angels, and
does not with him explain them away into the human ministry of the
Gospel.
3. It is perfectly congruous with the habits of fishermen and the
character of the instruments which they employ. As fishers drop the net
over a certain space, and, without making any pretence of discriminating
between good and bad, drag all within that space to shore; so the
invisible agents whom God employs in his universal administration,
whether laws or angelic spirits or both combined, make no distinction
between good and bad, when by successive castings of the net, as it
were, they enclose section after section, generation after generation of
human kind, and draw them slowly, silently, but inevitably to the edge
of this life, and over it into the unseen world. I scarcely know in the
whole range of nature an analogy more true and touching than this. When
you allow that the angels cast and draw the net as well as divide its
contents, the incongruities disappear, and the picture starts into life,
true to the original. The fishes, enclosed within the net when it is
first thrown out, but still swimming in the sea, not aware that the net
is round them, are intensely like a human generation, with the sentence
of death hanging over them, yet living and moving freely, and looking
for many days. As the circle of the net grows narrower the fishes
gently give way before it, and so enjoy for a little longer the
sensation of floating at liberty in the water; and it is not until they
touch the ground that they become thoroughly alarmed. The struggle then
is sudden, earnest, short, unavailing. Thus are mankind, without respect
to their vice or their virtue, indiscriminately drawn to the margin of
this world's life, and, willing or unwilling, thrown into an unknown
state beyond.
4. If any struggles are made against the encircling net during the slow,
solemn process of drawing--any efforts on the part of the captives to
leap out into freedom, they are made, not by one kind in displeasure at
being shut up with another, but by every kind indifferently in
displeasure at being shut up at all. Like the indefinite terror of mute
fishes when they feel the net coming closer in, is the instinctive alarm
of human beings when the hand of death is felt gradually contracting the
space in which the pulses of life are permitted to play.
I shall now notice and endeavour to estimate the principal objections,
as far as I am able to anticipate them, which may be urged against the
interpretation that I have suggested.
1. The Lord at another time, in calling some of his apostles, said,
"Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men" (Matt. iv. 19). He did;
and I think it is by a mistake in instituting an analogy between that
fact and this parable that interpreters have been led into a wrong
track.