of a multitude of parts which harmoniously blend into a complicated
whole. It is composed, in fact, of as many distinct portions as there
are incidents recorded in the Gospels, which all concur in imparting
to it a common effect. Those with whom I am contending admit that
the character is a very great one. Many of them allow that it is
greater and more perfect than any which has ever existed as a fact
or been conceived as a fiction. Yet the character, taken as a whole,
presents us with an essential unity. This is obviously the case in the
three first Gospels, and will hardly be disputed except on a very few
subordinate points. But it is equally remarkable that of the various
traits which compose the character, and which are very numerous, each
presents us with a similar unity, although they are dramatized over
a very wide sphere of action. To this fact I earnestly invite your
attention. In the portraiture of Jesus at least twenty distinct aspects
of moral character are blended together, and a number of subordinate
ones not easy to be counted; and each of these constitutes a separate
unity, which harmoniously blends with the others, and together
compose the great unity of the portraiture. Numerous as they are, and
dramatized over a wide sphere of action, they are yet depicted with a
faultless propriety, even in the most minute details. Nor does it to
any serious extent differ with the fourth Gospel. This is certainly the
case as far as the actions attributed to Jesus are concerned, though it
is not so obvious in the case of the discourses. Still even in these
an underlying unity of conception can be found.[107] The four Gospels
contain, in fact, four portraitures of one and the same Christ, only
differing from each other in the point of view from which they are
taken.
Now the obvious course would have been to have assumed that the
conception of the original character was the creation of some great
poet, and that the fourfold modification of it which our present
Gospels exhibit has been the work of four subsequent poets. But this
supposition the facts and phenomena of the case consign to the region
of hopeless impossibilities. It is therefore necessary to assume that
the character itself, and the Christianity of the New Testament, have
been gradually elaborated bit by bit, not by a succession of great
poets, but of credulous, enthusiastic mythologists; and that the
Synoptic Gospels originated in piecing together a multitude of tales
which in the latter end of the first century were floating on the
surface of the Christian Church.
It is impossible to deny that the Jesus of the Evangelists is an
immeasurably finer conception than either the Prometheus of Æschylus,
which exhibits the divine in suffering, or the Macbeth or Hamlet of
Shakspeare. Each of these characters is distinguished by a unity of
conception which proves that as characters they are the creation of
a single mind. But supposing we were to be told that these, and the
dramas which contain them, were not the creations of single poets,
nor even of a succession of poets, but had been slowly elaborated,
step by step, during a considerable interval of time by a number of
credulous enthusiasts. My opponents would be the first to receive such
a suggestion with shouts of derision.
It is plain that if the portraiture of our Lord be an ideal creation,
those who framed it must have been gifted with a high order of genius.
Let me illustrate the position by the art of painting. High genius in
painting is analogous to high genius in poetry. Let us suppose that we
are contemplating a great ideal picture,--_e.g._, the Marriage Feast in
Cana of Galilee, at the Louvre,--and that we are told that it is not
the work of a single artist, nor even of four, but of a succession who
gradually developed it.
Nor, to make the case a parallel one, is this all which we should be
asked to believe. As I have already observed, the portraiture of the
Jesus of the Evangelists is made up of a multitude of parts, each
of which has a separate unity, from the union of which the unity of
the whole results. These are said to have been elaborated out of a
number of myths and developments which have been the creations of many
minds. In a similar manner the picture of the Marriage Feast at Cana
consists of a number of separate figures which harmoniously blend
into a whole, and to which the magnificent colouring has been adapted.
Now suppose that we were told that each of these figures had been
gradually developed into its present form by a set of improvements
effected unconsciously by a succession of painters; and that all that
the artist who formed the picture did was skilfully to combine these
separate figures, and place them in juxtaposition. Surely one would not
be uncharitable in assuming that the author of such a suggestion had
escaped from a lunatic asylum.
Similar is the theory of these Schools as to the origin of the Gospels,
and of the great character contained in them. Such a theory of their
origin demands our acquiescence in a greater miracle than all the
miracles of the New Testament united together.
Viewed in its great outlines, this theory is self-condemned by its
inherent absurdity. But when we apply a sound logic to its details, it
vanishes like one of the palaces of the Arabian Nights. Professing to
be based on rational principles, it violates all the laws of reason.
For historic truth it substitutes wild dreams of the imagination.
You will please to keep steadily in mind that the means by which my
opponents undertake to metamorphose a Jew of the year 30 into a divine
Christ, stated generally, are a succession of mythical and legendary
creations and developments, contests and compromises, between hostile
sects evolved in conformity with the laws of the intellectual and moral
world. Let us now assume the truth of their position, and see how it
will work.
If the Jesus of the Evangelists be a development, it is evident that it
must have had a starting-point. This could have been none other than
the atmosphere of thought and feeling which existed in Judæa during the
first thirty years of the first century.[108]
But none more firmly profess their belief in the reign of law in the
world of mind and matter than those whose theories I am controverting.
In consequence of this belief they pronounce all supernatural
interventions in human affairs impossible. I thankfully concede to them
the fact that all developments affecting the mind of man which are of
purely human origin must be brought about in conformity with law. Let
it be clearly understood, therefore, that my reasoning is based on this
assumption.
This point being clear, the question immediately presents itself,
what is the nature of the laws which regulate the mental developments
of man, especially in his character of a moral and religious being?
Are they rapid, or do they require long intervals of time for their
elaboration? Are great changes in our moral or religious ideas of a
quick or a slow growth? The answer to these questions is of vital
importance to the argument, because on the showing of my opponents they
have only seventy years at their command during which they can develop
the Christ of the Synoptics, and the Christianity of nearly all the
Epistles, from the religious and moral ideas of the Judaism of the year
30.
Fortunately for us, the universal testimony of history answers
these questions with no ambiguous voice. The developments of man,
whether moral, social, or religious, are slow. The whole course of
civilization, including within that term everything which relates
to the growth of the mind of man, and which tends to his refinement
and higher culture, is a very gradual one; and its successive stages
require long intervals of time for their development. Whenever
unbelievers attempt to account for the growth of human civilization
from a savage state, or to develop a man out of an ape, in the one
case they demand tens of thousands and in the other millions of years
for its accomplishment. As this point is of great importance to the
argument, I must adduce distinctive proof of it.
No truth is more certain than that it is impossible for men, either
individually or collectively, to raise themselves except by very
gradual stages above that moral and spiritual atmosphere in which they
were born. We are united by the closest ties of habit and education
with the past. We breathe from the dawn of our consciousness the
very atmosphere of its thought and feeling. Every succeeding state
of society is most closely bound to that which preceded it. Every
great change in thought or feeling has been produced by a succession
of changes leaving no deep gulf between. Individual progress, unless
external influences are brought to bear on the mind, follows the same
law of gradual growth.
Even genius, and what are called the creative powers of the mind,
are fettered by these conditions. All greatness is relative to and
bears the impress of the age which produced it. Great men differ from
others only in being able to advance a few stages beyond ordinary
humanity. But the greatest genius is unable to elevate itself into a
very high region of thought or feeling at a single bound, or to sever
the links which unite it with the past. The utmost effect which the
greatest of men have been able to produce on those by whom they have
been surrounded is to cause their actual developments to advance at a
somewhat accelerated ratio.
To the truth of these general principles all history testifies. When
we measure each stage of human growth, we find that it has occupied
long intervals of time. So gradual is the process, that considerable
changes can only be discovered after the lapse of lengthened periods.
The whole history of philosophy, art, morality, and religion testifies
to this. All philosophic schools of thought have been of gradual
growth. The daub of a savage has never suddenly developed itself into
the creations of a Michael Angelo or a Rubens, nor have his rough
imitations of the human form passed but by a succession of gradual
stages into the perfection of a Phidias. Poetry, the most creative of
arts, is subject to similar conditions. The ideas with which the poet
works are those of the age in which he lives. He paints the phenomena
and reflects the line of thought, the morality, the religion, the
intellectual and social conditions of the times which gave him birth.
What he accomplishes is to exhibit them under new combinations. A
bushman never at a single bound became a Homer or a Shakspeare.
The history of philosophy bears witness that the universal law of our
nature is a gradual growth. Each of its developments was closely allied
to that which preceded it, and directly grew out of it. Each School has
occupied a considerable time in its development, has grown out of that
which preceded it, and prepared the way for its successor. The interval
which separates the respective stages is small. Each great race of
mankind has also created a philosophy stamped with its own impress, and
directly related to its peculiar character. A native of Australia has
never suddenly elevated himself into a Socrates.
The same law is no less applicable to religions. We know no instance
of the direct creation of one. It is true that the origin of many is
buried in the obscurity of the past. Yet as soon as they emerge into
the light of history, it is clear that they are subject to a law of
gradual growth; and after they have attained their full development, to
a no less remarkable law of gradual decay. All the religions on earth,
with the exception of Christianity, bear witness to this rule. What
have been called new religions, have been evolved out of previously
existing materials, modified and adapted to the growth and decay of
civilization. No Fetish worshipper, however lofty his genius, could
have evolved the systems of Brahmanism or Buddhism by a single bound of
his imagination.
If the law of the growth of religions is a very gradual one, that
of our moral ideas is far more so. Improvements in the great moral
principles which regulate the life of man are most painfully slow. All
the great races of mankind have presented the same general outlines of
character, with only slight improvements, from age to age. I quote only
two examples, the modern French and Germans. How strikingly like are
certain portions of the character of the former, to the picture of the
Gauls given in the pages of Cæsar; or to the descriptions of the same
race inhabiting a distant region which the great apostle has drawn in
the Epistle to the Galatians. We may still read the general outline of
the character of the German race in the pages of Tacitus. Developments
there have been, and the slowness is sadly disappointing to the
philanthropist. To be able even to recognize progress, we must survey
long intervals of time. The optimist has indeed need of patience;
and the most enthusiastic may be certain that long ages before any
considerable advance is made, according to the mere laws of natural
development, he will be slumbering in the grave.
But it must not be forgotten that the developments which our opponents
postulate are always in the way of progressive improvements. Stern
historical fact compels us to assert that developments are frequently
retrogressive.
No less gradual is the moral progress of the individual. It is also a
painful but undeniable fact that retrogressive ones are much more rapid
than progressive ones. The moral ideas in the midst of which we are
educated cling to us with the firmest grasp. The best men exhibit only
a slight advance above the general morality of their age.
I now draw your attention to the fact that the inventive powers of
the composer of fiction are limited by the same laws. He too, in the
strict sense of that term, is unable to create the new. The materials
with which he can work are the idealization of the times in which he
lives. Whether he be poet or novel writer, he can neither invent a new
religion or a new morality. Mythical inventions of every kind embody
the state of thought, feeling, and general idealization of the times
which produced them. The entire mass of existing mythology testifies to
this fact.
Such, then, are the instruments and materials with which my opponents
have to work in the elaboration of Christianity out of Judaism, and in
metamorphosing a human Jesus into a divine Christ. Let us examine the
possibility of the attempt.
We must place ourselves in the position of the followers of Jesus on
the evening of the crucifixion. His individual influence had gathered
around Him a number of enthusiastic and credulous followers who mistook
Him for the Messiah of popular expectation. The crucifixion certainly
dashed their hopes. But according to the theory of my opponents, in
the height of their enthusiasm they determined to believe in Him as
the Messiah still. To carry out this resolution, it is obvious that
new ground had to be taken. A development of some kind was absolutely
necessary. No amount of credulity could mistake a dead body mouldering
in the grave for the Messiah of Jewish expectation.
It was absolutely necessary, therefore, if His Messiahship could
become a possibility, that the crucified Jesus should be rescued from
the tomb. If a resurrection could not be effected in reality, it was
indispensable that one should be in imagination. Until His followers
could be brought in considerable numbers to believe that this had
happened, no developments in the direction of the Gospels were possible.
The most obvious expedient to have accomplished this would have been
for some of the disciples to have done that which, according to one
of the Evangelists, the Jews accused them of, viz., to have stolen
the body, and report that Jesus was risen from the dead. But those
against whom I am reasoning do not venture to accuse them of conscious
fraud. This assumption all educated unbelievers have long abandoned as
hopelessly untenable. Such a basis will certainly not bear the weight
of the Christianity of the New Testament. In place of this, they assume
that the credulity, idealism, and enthusiasm of the followers of Jesus
was bottomless. With this machinery they think that He can be rescued
from the grave.
Two theories have been propounded for this purpose. One is that some
enthusiastic woman--Mary Magdalene, for example--thought that she
saw Jesus with the mind's eye, or mistook the gardener for Him, and
converted this appearance into a bodily reality. She communicated
her enthusiasm to the rest. Others may have imagined that they saw
Him in a similar manner, and committed a similar mistake. The other
theory is that He was buried in a swoon, that He managed to creep out
of His grave, that He partially recovered, and died shortly after in
retirement. On such a foundation my opponents propose to erect the
whole weight of the historic Church, and from such a chimera to develop
the portraiture of the divine Christ.
The second theory I should not have mentioned if it had not been
dignified by the name of Bunsen. It is obvious that it will not support
the weight of the Christian Church. What! a man who died from weakness
shortly after creeping out of his grave, metamorphised by his followers
into a divine Messiah, and seated on the right hand of God! If He lived
in retirement, and died in Phœnicia shortly afterwards,--according
to an assumption for which there is not even the ghost of historical
testimony,--His followers had access to Him or they had not. If we
adopt the former part of the alternative, no amount of credulity could
have mistaken Him for a glorious Messiah rescued from the tomb. The
very sight of Him must have acted as a complete extinguisher on the
powers of the imagination. If we adopt the latter, it falls under the
general head that the belief in the resurrection was merely due to an
excited imagination. All the assistance which it renders is to dispose
of the dead body.
Now, in theory, nothing is easier than to say that an excited woman
saw Jesus with her mental eye, mistook it for a bodily reality, and
communicated her enthusiasm to the rest of His followers. But in
practice, such things are not quite so easy. Although it is no hard
matter to persuade the credulous to believe in the appearance of ghosts
and phantoms, yet I do not know that the whole history of man presents
us with a single example of a great institution which owes its origin
to such a belief. But even the credulous believers in such apparitions
are very difficult to persuade that they have actually seen a man who
once had died again restored to life. I doubt whether the entire mass
of fictitious literature presents us with anything at all analogous
to the supposed belief of the credulous followers of Jesus in the
resurrection of their Master. Even persons who have a most imperfect
knowledge that nature is governed by law, are quite aware that dead
men do not revive. The followers of Jesus could have been hardly more
credulous than modern spiritualists, yet these latter have not yet
succeeded in erecting a great institution on the basis of an actual
resurrection from the dead, or even on the presence of a spirit in a
table. Supposing, therefore, that some fanatic follower of our Lord
made the mistake in question, it could really have been no easy matter
to have communicated this enthusiasm to the rest, damped as their
spirits were by the crucifixion. Still more difficult would it have
been for any considerable number to have made the mistake of converting
a flight of the imagination into an objective fact. At any rate my
opponents must concede that to have persuaded any number of men under
such circumstances that the crucified Jesus was actually risen from the
dead must have required a considerable interval of time.
It would be much more easy to create a belief in a resurrection after
the lapse of a century, than within a few years of the event. When we
survey a past event through the haze of time, it helps to confuse our
ideas as to what is possible. But long intervals of time so convenient
for the physical speculator are precisely the things which my opponents
have not at their disposal. Seventy years is all which they themselves
think it possible to ask for; and as all developments are slow, one or
two entirely exhaust it, and they require a multitude to effect their
purpose. But not only was it necessary to get some of the enthusiastic
followers of our Lord to believe in His resurrection, but also to
constitute a society founded on its basis. Until this was done, all
development was impossible. But each step requires a considerable
interval of time. But how could the Church be held together while the
belief in the resurrection was forming?
But even supposing that Jesus by the power of the imagination had been
rescued from the grave, it became a very serious question what to do
with Him. No amount of credulity could have brought Him into daily
communication with His followers. If He continued on earth, His not
doing so was a very serious affair. The obvious expedient was that He
should be taken up into heaven, from which at some future day he should
come back again and take possession of his Messianic throne. Such
is the idea adopted by these schools of thought, and they are never
wearied with telling us that the chief if not the only article in the
primitive belief of the followers of Jesus was His speedy return to
realize their expectations of His Messianic glory.
Be it so; for the consequences are very serious to the position of
those whose views I am combating. His followers then expected Him to
return as the Jewish Messiah. Now nothing is more certain than as long
as this expectation lasted there could have been no development in the
direction of the Christ of the Gospels. How long, then, did this state
of stagnation last in the bosom of the Church? When did it occur to
the followers of Jesus that the expectation of the speedy return of
their Master was a baseless one, and that they must set themselves to
work to develop a different conception of a Christ? It is a fact that
such beliefs do not speedily die out, and that they can survive many
a disappointment. The modern prophetic School affords a striking proof
of the tenacity of such hopes. They have repeatedly prophesied that the
Advent will happen in our times; and notwithstanding the falsification
of their predictions, I believe that they still cling to this belief.
At any rate it has required a long interval of time to undeceive them;
and as credulity was, according to the views which I am combating,
the leading trait of the followers of Jesus, it must have been a
considerable interval of time before they could have been persuaded to
part company with their darling expectation. But as long as a Jewish
Messiah satisfied their aspirations, the Church could have developed no
new Messianic conceptions.
But to afford something like a basis for reasoning, I will suppose
these obstacles to have been surmounted; that the work of development
has commenced, and that the womb of the Church is at last become
pregnant with its future Christ. Fresh and ever-increasing difficulties
present themselves for solution.
Let it be observed that, after they have effected the resurrection, all
which has been accomplished was to repair the damage inflicted on the
Church by the crucifixion, and to restore to it, as a necessity of its
existence, a living instead of a dead Messiah. That Messiah was still
the Messiah of Judaism. They have scarcely advanced a stage in the
creation of the Gospels, and of the Christ therein delineated,--not to
say of the entire moral and spiritual teaching of the New Testament.