'Refrain from these men, and let them alone; for if this counsel or
this work be of men, it will come to nought: 39. But if it be of God,
ye cannot overthrow it; lest haply ye be found even to fight against
God.'--ACTS v. 38, 39.
The little that is known of Gamaliel seems to indicate just such a man
as would be likely to have given the advice in the text. His was a
character which, on its good side and by its admirers, would be
described as prudent, wise, cautious and calm, tolerant, opposed to
fanaticism and violence. His position as president of the Sanhedrin,
his long experience, his Rabbinical training, his old age, and his
knowledge that the national liberty depended on keeping things quiet,
would be very likely to exaggerate such tendencies into what his
enemies would describe as worldly shrewdness without a trace of
enthusiasm, indifference to truth, and the like.
It is, of course, possible that he bases his counsel of letting the
followers of Jesus alone, on the grounds which he adduces, because he
knew that reasons more favourable to Christians would have had no
weight with the Sanhedrin. Old Church traditions make him out to have
been a Christian, and the earliest Christian romance, a very singular
book, of which the main object was to blacken the Apostle Paul, roundly
asserts that at the date of this advice he was 'secretly our brother,'
and that he remained in the Sanhedrin to further Christian views. But
there seems not the slightest reason to suppose that. He lived and died
a Jew, spared the sight of the destruction of Jerusalem which,
according to his own canon in the text, would have proved that the
system to which he had given his life was not of God; and the only
relic of his wisdom is a prayer against Christian heretics.
It is remarkable that he should have given this advice; but two things
occur to account for it. Thus far Christianity had been very
emphatically the preaching of the Resurrection, a truth which the
Pharisees believed and held as especially theirs in opposition to the
Sadducees, and Gamaliel was old and worldly-wise enough to count all as
his friends who were the enemies of his enemies. He was not very
particular where he looked for allies, and rather shrank from helping
Sadducees to punish men whose crime was that they 'preached through
Jesus a resurrection from the dead.'
Then the Jewish rulers had a very ticklish part to play. They were
afraid of any popular shout which might bring down the avalanche of
Roman power on them, and they were nervously anxious to keep things
quiet. So Gamaliel did not wish to have any fuss made about 'these
men,' lest it should be supposed that another popular revolt was on
foot; and he thought that to let them alone was the best way to reduce
their importance. Perhaps, too, there was a secret hope in the old
man's mind, which he scarcely ventured to look at and dared not speak,
that here might be the beginning of a rising which had more promise in
it than that abortive one under Theudas. He could not venture to say
this, but perhaps it made him chary of voting for repression. He had no
objection to let these poor Galileans fling away their lives in
storming against the barrier of Rome. If they fail, it is but one more
failure. If they succeed, he and his like will say that they have done
well. But while the enterprise is too perilous for him to approve or be
mixed up in it, he would let it have its chance.
Note that Gamaliel regards the whole movement as the probable germ of
an uprising against Rome, as is seen from the parallels that he quotes.
It is not as a religious teaching which is true or false, but as a
political agitation, that he looks at Christianity.
It is to his credit that he stood calm and curbed the howling of the
fanatics round him, and that he was the first and only Jewish authority
who counselled abstinence from persecution.
It is interesting to compare him with Gallio, who had a glimpse of the
true relation of the civil magistrate to religious opinion. Gamaliel
has a glimpse of the truth of the impotence of material force against
truth, how it is of a quick and spiritual essence, which cannot be
cleaved in pieces with a sword, but lives on in spite of all. But while
all this may be true, the advice on the whole is a low and bad one. It
rests on false principles; it takes a false view of a man's duty; it is
not wholly sincere; and it is one impossible to be carried out. It is
singularly in accordance with many of the tendencies of this age, and
with modes of thought and counsels of action which are in active
operation amongst us to-day, and we may therefore criticise it now.
I. Here is disbelief professing to be 'honest doubt.' Gamaliel
professes not to have materials for judging. 'If--if'; was it a time
for 'ifs'? What was that Sanhedrin there for, but to try precisely such
cases as these?
They had had the works of Christ; miracles which they had investigated
and could not disprove; a life which was its own witness; prophecies
fulfilled; His own presence before their bar; the Resurrection and the
Pentecost.
I am not saying whether these facts were enough to have convinced them,
nor even whether the alleged miracles were true. All that I am
concerned with is that, so far as we know, neither Gamaliel nor any of
his tribe had ever made the slightest attempt to inquire into them, but
had, without examination, complacently treated them as lies. All that
body of evidence had been absolutely ignored. And now he is, with his
'ifs,' posing as very calm and dispassionate.
So to-day it is fashionable to doubt, to hang up most of the Christian
truths in the category of uncertainties.
(_a_) When that is the fashion, we need to be on our guard.
(_b_) If you doubt, have you ever taken the pains to examine?
(_c_) If you doubt, you are bound to go further, and either reach
belief or rejection. Doubt is not the permanent condition for a man.
The central truth of Christianity is either to be received or rejected.