INCREASING PROGRESSION OF ENTHUSIASM AND OF EXALTATION.
It is clear that such a religious society, founded solely on the
expectation of the kingdom of God, must be in itself very incomplete.
The first Christian generation lived almost entirely upon expectations
and dreams. On the eve of seeing the world come to an end, they
regarded as useless everything which only served to prolong it.
Possession of property was interdicted.[1] Everything which attaches
man to earth, everything which draws him aside from heaven, was to be
avoided. Although several of the disciples were married, there was to
be no more marriage on becoming a member of the sect.[2] The celibate
was greatly preferred; even in marriage continence was recommended.[3]
At one time the master seems to approve of those who should mutilate
themselves in prospect of the kingdom of God.[4] In this he was
consistent with his principle--"If thy hand or thy foot offend thee,
cut them off, and cast them from thee; it is better for thee to enter
into life halt or maimed, rather than having two hands or two feet to
be cast into everlasting fire. And if thine eye offend thee, pluck it
out, and cast it from thee; it is better for thee to enter into life
with one eye, rather than having two eyes to be cast into
hell-fire."[5] The cessation of generation was often considered as
the sign and condition of the kingdom of God.[6]
[Footnote 1: Luke xiv. 33; _Acts_ iv. 32, and following, v. 1-11.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. xix. 10, and following; Luke xviii. 29, and
following.]
[Footnote 3: This is the constant doctrine of Paul. Comp. _Rev._ xiv.
4.]
[Footnote 4: Matt. xix. 12.]
[Footnote 5: Matt. xviii. 8, 9. Cf. Talmud of Babylon, _Niddah_, 13
_b_.]
[Footnote 6: Matt. xxii. 30; Mark xii. 25; Luke xx. 35; Ebionite
Gospel, entitled "Of the Egyptians," in Clem. of Alex., _Strom._ iii.
9, 13, and Clem. Rom., Epist. ii. 12.]
Never, we perceive, would this primitive Church have formed a lasting
society but for the great variety of germs deposited by Jesus in his
teaching. It required more than a century for the true Christian
Church--that which has converted the world--to disengage itself from
this little sect of "latter-day saints," and to become a framework
applicable to the whole of human society. The same thing, indeed, took
place in Buddhism, which at first was founded only for monks. The same
thing would have happened in the order of St. Francis, if that order
had succeeded in its pretension of becoming the rule of the whole of
human society. Essentially Utopian in their origin, and succeeding by
their very exaggeration, the great systems of which we have just
spoken have only laid hold of the world by being profoundly modified,
and by abandoning their excesses. Jesus did not advance beyond this
first and entirely monachal period, in which it was believed that the
impossible could be attempted with impunity. He made no concession to
necessity. He boldly preached war against nature, and total severance
from ties of blood. "Verily I say unto you," said he, "there is no man
that hath left house, or parents, or brethren, or wife, or children,
for the kingdom of God's sake, who shall not receive manifold more in
this present time, and in the world to come life everlasting."[1]
[Footnote 1: Luke xviii. 20, 30.]
The teachings which Jesus is reputed to have given to his disciples
breathe the same exaltation.[1] He who was so tolerant to the world
outside, he who contented himself sometimes with half adhesions,[2]
exercised toward his own an extreme rigor. He would have no "all
buts." We should call it an "order," constituted by the most austere
rules. Faithful to his idea that the cares of life trouble man, and
draw him downward, Jesus required from his associates a complete
detachment from the earth, an absolute devotion to his work. They were
not to carry with them either money or provisions for the way, not
even a scrip, or change of raiment. They must practise absolute
poverty, live on alms and hospitality. "Freely ye have received,
freely give,"[3] said he, in his beautiful language. Arrested and
arraigned before the judges, they were not to prepare their defence;
the _Peraklit_, the heavenly advocate, would inspire them with what
they ought to say. The Father would send them his Spirit from on high,
which would become the principle of all their acts, the director of
their thoughts, and their guide through the world.[4] If driven from
any town, they were to shake the dust from their shoes, declaring
always the proximity of the kingdom of God, that none might plead
ignorance. "Ye shall not have gone over the cities of Israel," added
he, "till the Son of man be come."
[Footnote 1: Matt. x., entirely, xxiv. 9; Mark vi. 8, and following,
ix. 40, xiii. 9-13; Luke x. 3, and following, x. 1, and following,
xii. 4, and following, xxi. 17; John xv. 18, and following, xvii. 14.]
[Footnote 2: Mark ix. 38, and following.]
[Footnote 3: Matt. x. 8. Comp. Midrash Ialkout, _Deut._, sect. 824.]
[Footnote 4: Matt. x. 20; John xiv. 16, and following, 26, xv. 26,
xvi. 7, 13.]
A strange ardor animates all these discourses, which may in part be
the creation of the enthusiasm of his disciples,[1] but which even in
that case came indirectly from Jesus, for it was he who had inspired
the enthusiasm. He predicted for his followers severe persecutions and
the hatred of mankind. He sent them forth as lambs in the midst of
wolves. They would be scourged in the synagogues, and dragged to
prison. Brother should deliver up brother to death, and the father his
son. When they were persecuted in one country they were to flee to
another. "The disciple," said he, "is not above his master, nor the
servant above his lord. Fear not them which kill the body, but are not
able to kill the soul. Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and
one of them shall not fall to the ground without your Father. But the
very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear ye not, therefore, ye
are of more value than many sparrows."[2] "Whosoever, therefore,"
continued he, "shall confess me before men, him will I confess also
before my Father which is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny me
before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in
heaven."[3]
[Footnote 1: The expressions in Matt. x. 38, xvi. 24; Mark viii. 34;
Luke xiv. 27, can only have been conceived after the death of Jesus.]
[Footnote 2: Matt. x. 24-31; Luke xii. 4-7.]
[Footnote 3: Matt. x. 32, 33; Mark viii. 38; Luke ix. 26, xii. 8, 9.]
In these fits of severity he went so far as to abolish all natural
ties. His requirements had no longer any bounds. Despising the healthy
limits of man's nature, he demanded that he should exist only for him,
that he should love him alone. "If any man come to me," said he, "and
hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren,
and sisters, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple."[1] "So
likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath,
he cannot be my disciple."[2] There was, at such times, something
strange and more than human in his words; they were like a fire
utterly consuming life, and reducing everything to a frightful
wilderness. The harsh and gloomy feeling of distaste for the world,
and of excessive self-abnegation which characterizes Christian
perfection, was originated, not by the refined and cheerful moralist
of earlier days, but by the sombre giant whom a kind of grand
presentiment was withdrawing, more and more, out of the pale of
humanity. We should almost say that, in these moments of conflict with
the most legitimate cravings of the heart, Jesus had forgotten the
pleasure of living, of loving, of seeing, and of feeling. Employing
still more unmeasured language, he even said, "If any man will come
after me, let him deny himself and follow me. He that loveth father or
mother more than me, is not worthy of me; and he that loveth son or
daughter more than me, is not worthy of me. He that findeth his life
shall lose it, and he that loseth his life for my sake and the
gospel's, shall find it. What is a man profited if he shall gain the
whole world, and lose his own soul?"[3] Two anecdotes of the kind we
cannot accept as historical, but which, although they were
exaggerations, were intended to represent a characteristic feature,
clearly illustrate this defiance of nature. He said to one man,
"Follow me!"--But he said, "Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my
father." Jesus answered, "Let the dead bury their dead: but go thou
and preach the kingdom of God." Another said to him, "Lord, I will
follow thee; but let me first go bid them farewell, which are at home
at my house." Jesus replied, "No man, having put his hand to the
plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God."[4] An
extraordinary confidence, and at times accents of singular sweetness,
reversing all our ideas of him, caused these exaggerations to be
easily received. "Come unto me," cried he, "all ye that labor and are
heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and
learn of me: for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest
unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."[5]
[Footnote 1: Luke xiv. 26. We must here take into account the
exaggeration of Luke's style.]
[Footnote 2: Luke xiv. 33.]
[Footnote 3: Matt. x. 37-39, xvi. 24, 25; Luke ix. 23-25, xiv. 26, 27,
xvii. 33; John xii. 25.]
[Footnote 4: Matt. viii. 21, 22; Luke ix. 59-62.]
[Footnote 5: Matt. xi. 28-30.]
A great danger threatened the future of this exalted morality, thus
expressed in hyperbolical language and with a terrible energy. By
detaching man from earth the ties of life were severed. The Christian
would be praised for being a bad son, or a bad patriot, if it was for
Christ that he resisted his father and fought against his country. The
ancient city, the parent republic, the state, or the law common to
all, were thus placed in hostility with the kingdom of God. A fatal
germ of theocracy was introduced into the world.
From this point, another consequence may be perceived. This morality,
created for a temporary crisis, when introduced into a peaceful
country, and in the midst of a society assured of its own duration,
must seem impossible. The Gospel was thus destined to become a Utopia
for Christians, which few would care to realize. These terrible maxims
would, for the greater number, remain in profound oblivion, an
oblivion encouraged by the clergy itself; the Gospel man would prove a
dangerous man. The most selfish, proud, hard and worldly of all human
beings, a Louis XIV. for instance, would find priests to persuade him,
in spite of the Gospel, that he was a Christian. But, on the other
hand, there would always be found holy men who would take the sublime
paradoxes of Jesus literally. Perfection being placed beyond the
ordinary conditions of society, and a complete Gospel life being only
possible away from the world, the principle of asceticism and of
monasticism was established. Christian societies would have two moral
rules; the one moderately heroic for common men, the other exalted in
the extreme for the perfect man; and the perfect man would be the
monk, subjected to rules which professed to realize the gospel ideal.
It is certain that this ideal, if only on account of the celibacy and
poverty it imposed, could not become the common law. The monk would be
thus, in one sense, the only true Christian. Common sense revolts at
these excesses; and if we are guided by it, to demand the impossible,
is a mark of weakness and error. But common sense is a bad judge where
great matters are in question. To obtain little from humanity we must
ask much. The immense moral progress which we owe to the Gospel is the
result of its exaggerations. It is thus that it has been, like
stoicism, but with infinitely greater fulness, a living argument for
the divine powers in man, an exalted monument of the potency of the
will.
We may easily imagine that to Jesus, at this period of his life,
everything which was not the kingdom of God had absolutely
disappeared. He was, if we may say so, totally outside nature: family,
friendship, country, had no longer any meaning for him. No doubt from
this moment he had already sacrificed his life. Sometimes we are
tempted to believe that, seeing in his own death a means of founding
his kingdom, he deliberately determined to allow himself to be
killed.[1] At other times, although such a thought only afterward
became a doctrine, death presented itself to him as a sacrifice,
destined to appease his Father and to save mankind.[2] A singular
taste for persecution and torments[3] possessed him. His blood
appeared to him as the water of a second baptism with which he ought
to be baptized, and he seemed possessed by a strange haste to
anticipate this baptism, which alone could quench his thirst.[4]
[Footnote 1: Matt. xvi. 21-23, xvii. 12, 21, 22.]
[Footnote 2: Mark x. 45.]
[Footnote 3: Luke vi. 22, and following.]
[Footnote 4: Luke xii. 50.]
The grandeur of his views upon the future was at times surprising. He
did not conceal from himself the terrible storm he was about to cause
in the world. "Think not," said he, with much boldness and beauty,
"that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but
a sword. There shall be five in one house divided, three against two,
and two against three. I am come to set a man at variance against his
father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law
against her mother-in-law. And a man's foes shall be they of his own
household."[1] "I am come to send fire on the earth; and what will I,
if it be already kindled?"[2] "They shall put you out of the
synagogues," he continued; "yea, the time cometh, that whosoever
killeth you, will think that he doeth God service."[3] "If the world
hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you. Remember the
word that I said unto you: The servant is not greater than his lord.
If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you."[4]
[Footnote 1: Matt. x. 34-36; Luke xii. 51-53. Compare Micah vii. 5,
6.]
[Footnote 2: Luke xii. 49. See the Greek text.]
[Footnote 3: John xvi. 2.]
[Footnote 4: John xv. 18-20.]
Carried away by this fearful progression of enthusiasm, and governed
by the necessities of a preaching becoming daily more exalted, Jesus
was no longer free; he belonged to his mission, and, in one sense, to
mankind. Sometimes one would have said that his reason was disturbed.
He suffered great mental anguish and agitation.[1] The great vision of
the kingdom of God, glistening before his eyes, bewildered him. His
disciples at times thought him mad.[2] His enemies declared him to be
possessed.[3] His excessively impassioned temperament carried him
incessantly beyond the bounds of human nature. He laughed at all human
systems, and his work not being a work of the reason, that which he
most imperiously required was "faith."[4] This was the word most
frequently repeated in the little guest-chamber. It is the watchword
of all popular movements. It is clear that none of these movements
would take place if it were necessary that their author should gain
his disciples one by one by force of logic. Reflection leads only to
doubt. If the authors of the French Revolution, for instance, had had
to be previously convinced by lengthened meditations, they would all
have become old without accomplishing anything; Jesus, in like manner,
aimed less at convincing his hearers than at exciting their
enthusiasm. Urgent and imperative, he suffered no opposition: men must
be converted, nothing less would satisfy him. His natural gentleness
seemed to have abandoned him; he was sometimes harsh and
capricious.[5] His disciples at times did not understand him, and
experienced in his presence a feeling akin to fear.[6] Sometimes his
displeasure at the slightest opposition led him to commit
inexplicable and apparently absurd acts.[7]
[Footnote 1: John xii. 27.]
[Footnote 2: Mark iii. 21, and following.]
[Footnote 3: Mark iii. 22; John vii. 20, viii. 48, and following, x.
20, and following.]
[Footnote 4: Matt. viii. 10, ix. 2, 22, 28, 29, xvii. 19; John vi. 29,
etc.]
[Footnote 5: Matt. xvii. 16; Mark iii. 5, ix. 18; Luke viii. 45, ix.
41.]
[Footnote 6: It is in Mark especially that this feature is visible;
iv. 40, v. 15, ix. 31, x. 32.]
[Footnote 7: Mark xi. 12-14, 20, and following.]
It was not that his virtue deteriorated; but his struggle for the
ideal against the reality became insupportable. Contact with the world
pained and revolted him. Obstacles irritated him. His idea of the Son
of God became disturbed and exaggerated. The fatal law which condemns
an idea to decay as soon as it seeks to convert men applied to him.
Contact with men degraded him to their level. The tone he had adopted
could not be sustained more than a few months; it was time that death
came to liberate him from an endurance strained to the utmost, to
remove him from the impossibilities of an interminable path, and by
delivering him from a trial in danger of being too prolonged,
introduce him henceforth sinless into celestial peace.