6. The Gospel according to St John.

With regard to traditional sayings or doings of our Lord, which were

only written down at a later period, it will suffice to say that those

which have any claim to be genuine are very scanty, and that their

genuineness has to be tested by their correspondence with the great

bulk of information which is derived from the sources already

enumerated. The fictitious literature of the second and third

centuries, known as the Apocryphal Gospels, offers no direct evidence

of any historical value at all: it is chiefly valuable for the

contrast which it presents to the grave simplicity of the canonical

Gospels, and as showing how incapable a later age was of adding

anything to the Gospel history which was not palpably absurd.

1. _Letters of St Paul._--In the order of chronology we must give the

first place to the earliest letters of St Paul. The first piece of

Christian literature which has an independent existence and to which we

can fix a date is St Paul's first Epistle to the Thessalonians.

Lightfoot dates it in 52 or 53; Harnack places it five years earlier. We

may say, then, that it was written some twenty years after the

Crucifixion. St Paul is not an historian; he is not attempting to

describe what Jesus Christ said or did. He is writing a letter to

encourage a little Christian society which he, a Jew, had founded in a

distant Greek city; and he reminds his readers of many things which he

had told them when he was with them. The evidence, to be collected from

his epistles generally must not detain us here, but we may glance for a

moment at this one letter, because it contains what appears to be the

first mention of Jesus Christ in the literature of the world. Those who

would get a true history cannot afford to neglect their earliest

documents. Now the opening sentence of this letter is as follows: "Paul

and Silvanus and Timothy to the Church of the Thessalonians in God the

Father and the Lord Jesus Christ: Grace to you, and peace." Three men

with Greek or Latin names are writing to some kind of assembly in a city

of Macedonia. The writers are Jews, to judge by their salutation of

"peace," and by their mention of "God the Father," and of the assembly

or society as being "in" Him. But what is this new name which is placed

side by side with the Divine Name--"in God the Father and the Lord Jesus

Christ"? An educated Greek, who knew something (as many at that time

did) of the Greek translation of the ancient Hebrew Scriptures, if he

had picked up this letter before he had ever heard the name of Jesus

Christ, would have been deeply interested in these opening words. He

would have known that "Jesus" was the Greek form of Joshua; that

"Christ" was the Greek rendering of Messiah, or Anointed, the title of

the great King for whom the Jews were looking; he might further have

remembered that "the Lord" is the expression which the Greek Old

Testament constantly uses instead of the ineffable name of God, which we

now call "Jehovah" (q.v.). Who, then, he might well ask is this Jesus

Christ who is lifted to this unexampled height? For it is plain that

Jesus Christ stands in some close relation to "God the Father," and that

on the ground of that relation a society has been built up, apparently

by Jews, in a Greek city far distant from Palestine. He would learn

something as he read on; for the letter makes a passing reference to the

foundation of the society, and to the expansion of its influence in

other parts of Greece; to the conversion of its members from heathenism,

and to the consequent sufferings at the hands of their heathen

neighbours. The writers speak of themselves as "apostles," or

messengers, of Christ; they refer to similar societies "in Christ

Jesus," which they call "churches of God," in Judaea, and they say that

these also suffer from the Jews there, who had "killed the Lord Jesus"

some time before. But they further speak of Jesus as "raised from the

dead," and they refer to the belief which they had led the society to

entertain, that He would come again "from heaven to deliver them from

the coming wrath." Moreover, they urge them not to grieve for certain

members of the society who have already died, saying that, "if we

believe that Jesus died and rose again," we may also be assured that

"the dead in Christ will rise" and will live for ever with Him. Thus the

letter assumes that its readers already have considerable knowledge as

to "the Lord Jesus Christ," and as to His relation to "God the Father,"

a knowledge derived from teaching given in person on a former visit. The

purpose of the letter is not to give information as to the past, but to

stimulate its readers to perseverance by giving fresh teaching as to the

future. Historically it is of great value as showing how widely within

twenty or twenty-five years of the Crucifixion a religion which

proclaimed developed theological teaching as to "the Lord Jesus Christ"

had spread in the Roman Empire. We may draw a further conclusion from

this and other letters of St Paul before we go on. St Paul's missionary

work must have created a demand. Those who had heard him and read his

letters would want to know more than he had told them of the earthly

life of the Lord Jesus. They would wish to be able to picture Him to

their minds; and especially to understand what could have led to His

being put to death by the Romans at the requisition of the Jews. St Paul

had not been one of his personal disciples in Galilee or Jerusalem; he

had no memories to relate of His miracles and teaching. Some written

account of these was an obvious need. And we may be sure that any such

narrative concerning One who was so deeply reverenced would be most

carefully scrutinized at a time when many were still living whose

memories went back to the period of Our Lord's public ministry. One such

narrative we now proceed to describe.

2. _St Mark's Gospel._--The Gospel according to St Mark was written

within fifteen years of the first letter of St Paul to the

Thessalonians--i.e. about 65. It seems designed to meet the requirements

of Christians living far away from Palestine. The author was not an

eye-witness of what he relates, but he writes with the firm security of

a man who has the best authority behind him. The characteristics of his

work confirm the early belief that St Mark wrote this Gospel for the

Christians of Rome under the guidance of St Peter. It is of the first

importance that we should endeavour to see this book as a whole; to gain

the total impression which it makes on the mind; to look at the picture

of Jesus Christ which it offers. That picture must inevitably be an

incomplete representation of Him; it will need to be supplemented by

other pictures which other writers have drawn. But it is important to

consider it by itself, as showing us what impress the Master had made on

the memory of one disciple who had been almost constantly by His side.

Beginning of Christ's Mission.

The book opens thus: "The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ." This

"beginning" is shown to be itself rooted in the past. Hebrew prophets

had foretold that God would send a "messenger"; that a voice would be

heard saying, "Prepare the way of the Lord." And so, in fact, John came,

baptizing in the wilderness and turning the heart of the nation back to

God. But John was only a forerunner. He was himself a prophet, and his

prophecy was this, "He that is stronger than I am is coming after me."

Then, we read, "Jesus came." St Mark introduces Him quite abruptly, just

as he had introduced John; for he is writing for those who already know

the outlines of the story. "Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee." He was

baptized by John, and as He came out of the water He had a vision of the

opened heavens and the Holy Spirit, like a dove, descending upon Him;

and He heard a Voice saying, "Thou art My Son, the Beloved: in Thee I am

well pleased." He then passed away into the wilderness, where He was

tempted by Satan and fed by angels. Then He begins His work; and from

the very first we feel that He fulfils John's sign: He is strong. His

first words are words of strength; "the time is fulfilled"--that is to

say, all the past has been leading up to this great moment; "the kingdom

of God is at hand"--that is to say, all your best hopes are on the point

of being fulfilled; "repent, and believe the Gospel"--that is to say,

turn from your sins and accept the tidings which I bring you. It is but

a brief summary of what He must have said; but we feel its strength. He

does not hesitate to fix all eyes upon Himself. Then we see Him call two

brothers who are fishermen. "Come after Me," He says, "and I will make

you fishers of men." They dropped their nets and went after Him, and so

did two other brothers, their partners; for they all felt the power of

this Master of men: He was strong. He began to teach in the synagogue;

they were astonished at His teaching, for he spoke with authority. He

was interrupted by a demoniac, but He quelled the evil spirit by a word;

He was stronger than the power of evil. When the sun set the Sabbath was

at an end, and the people could carry out their sick into the street

where He was; and He came forth and healed them all. The demoniacs

showed a strange faculty of recognition, and cried that He was "the holy

one of God," and "the Christ," but He silenced them at once. The next

morning He was gone. He had sought a quiet spot for prayer. Peter, one

of those fishermen whom He had called, whose wife's mother had been

healed the day before, found Him and tried to bring Him back. "All men

are seeking Thee," he pleaded. "Let us go elsewhere" was the quiet reply

of one who could not be moved by popular enthusiasm. Once again, we

observe, He fulfils John's sign: He is strong. This is our first sight

of Jesus Christ. The next shows us that this great strength is united to

a most tender sympathy. To touch a leper was forbidden, and the offence

involved ceremonial defilement. Yet when a leper declared that Jesus

could heal him, if only He would, "He put forth His hand and touched

him." The act perfected the leper's faith, and he was healed

immediately. But he disobeyed the command to be silent about the matter,

and the result was that Jesus could not openly enter into the town, but

remained outside in the country. It is the first shadow that falls

across His path; His power finds a check in human wilfulness. Presently

He is in Capernaum again. He heals a paralysed man, but not until He has

come into touch, as we say, with him also, by reaching his deepest need

and declaring the forgiveness of his sins. This declaration disturbs the

rabbis, who regard it as a blasphemous usurpation of Divine authority.

But He claims that "the Son of Man hath authority on earth to forgive

sins." The title which He thus adopts must be considered later.

Attitude towards Religious Tradition.

We may note, as we pass on, that He has again, in the exercise of His

power and His sympathy, come into conflict with the established

religious tradition. This freedom from the trammels of convention

appears yet again when he claims as a new disciple a publican, a man

whose calling as a tax-gatherer for the Roman government made him odious

to every patriotic Jew. Publicans were classed with open sinners; and

when Jesus went to this man's house and met a company of his fellows the

rabbis were scandalized: "Why eateth your Master with publicans and

sinners?" The gentle answer of Jesus showed His sympathy even with those

who opposed Him: "The doctor," He said, "must go to the sick." And

again, when they challenged His disciples for not observing the regular

fasts, He gently reminded them that they themselves relaxed the

discipline of fasting for a bridegroom's friends. And He added, in

picturesque and pregnant sayings, that an old garment could not bear a

new patch, and that old wine-skins could not take new wine. Such

language was at once gentle and strong; without condemning the old, it

claimed liberty for the new. To what lengths would this liberty go? The

sacred badge of the Jews' religion, which marked them off from other men

all the world over, was their observance of the Sabbath. It was a

national emblem, the test of religion and patriotism. The rabbis had

fenced the Sabbath round with minute commands, lest any Jews should even

seem to work on the Sabbath day. Thus, plucking and rubbing the ears of

corn was counted a form of reaping and threshing. The hungry disciples

had so transgressed as they walked through the fields of ripe corn.

Jesus defended them by the example of David, who had eaten the

shewbread, which only priests might eat, and had given it to his hungry

men. Necessity absolves from ritual restrictions. And he went farther,

and proclaimed a principle: "The Sabbath was made for man, and not man

for the Sabbath, so that the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath."

For a second time, in justifying His position, He used the expression

"the Son of Man." The words might sound to Jewish ears merely as a

synonym for "man." For Himself, and possibly for some others, they

involved a reference, as appears later, to the "one like to a son of

man" in Daniel's prophecy of the coming kingdom. They emphasized His

relation to humanity as a whole, in contrast to such narrower titles as

"Son of Abraham" or "Son of David." They were fitted to express a wider

mission than that of a merely Jewish Messiah: He stood and spoke for

mankind. The controversy was renewed when a man with a withered hand

appeared in the synagogue on the Sabbath, and the rabbis watched to see

whether Jesus would heal him. For the first time, we read that Jesus was

angry. They were wilfully blind, and they would rather not see good done

than see it done in a way that contradicted their teachings and

undermined their influence. After a sharp remonstrance, He healed the

man by a mere word. And they went out to make a compact with the

followers of the worldly Herod to kill Him, and so to stave off a

religious revolution which might easily have been followed by political

trouble.

Recapitulation.

Up to this point what have we seen? On the stage of Palestine, an

outlying district of the Roman Empire, the home of the Jewish nation,

now subject but still fired with the hope of freedom and even of

universal domination under the leadership of a divinely anointed King, a

new figure has appeared. His appearance has been announced by a

reforming prophet, who has summoned the nation to return to its God, and

promised that a stronger than himself is to follow. In fulfilment of

this promise, who is it that has come? Not a rough prophet in the desert

like John, not a leader striking for political freedom, not a pretender

aiming at the petty throne of the Herods, not even a great rabbi,

building on the patriotic foundation of the Pharisees who had secured

the national life by a new devotion to the ancient law. None of these,

but, on the contrary, an unknown figure from the remote hills of

Galilee, standing on the populous shores of its lake, proclaiming as a

message from God that the highest hopes were about to be fulfilled,

fastening attention on Himself by speaking with authority and attaching

a few followers to His person, exhibiting wonderful powers of healing as

a sign that He has come to fulfil all needs, manifesting at the same

time an unparalleled sympathy, and setting quietly aside every religious

convention which limited the outflow of this sympathy; and as the result

of all this arousing the enthusiasm of astonished multitudes and evoking

the opposition and even the murderous resentment of the religious guides

of the nation. Of His teaching we have heard nothing, except in the

occasional sentences by which He justified some of His unexpected

actions. No party is formed, no programme is announced, no doctrine is

formulated; without assuming the title of Messiah, He offers Himself as

the centre of expectation, and seems to invite an unlimited confidence

in His person. This, then, in brief summary, is what we have seen: the

natural development of an historical situation, a march of events

leading rapidly to a climax; an unexampled strength and an unexampled

sympathy issuing inevitably in an unexampled liberty; and then the

forces of orthodox religion combining with the forces of worldly

indifference in order to suppress a dangerous innovator. Yet the writer

who in a few pages presents us with so remarkable a representation shows

no consciousness at all of artistic treatment. He tells a simple tale in

the plainest words: he never stops to offer a comment or to point a

moral. The wonder of it all is not in the writing, but in the subject

itself. We feel that we have here no skilful composition, but a bare

transcript of what occurred. And we feel besides that such a narrative

as this is the worthy commencement of an answer to the question with

which its readers would have come to it: What was the beginning of the

Gospel? How did the Lord Jesus speak and act? and why did He arouse such

malignant enmity amongst His own people?

We have followed St Mark's narrative up to the point at which it became

clear that conciliatory argument could have no effect upon the Jewish

religious leaders. The controversy about the Sabbath had brought their

dissatisfaction to a climax. Henceforth Jesus was to them a

revolutionary, who must, by any means, be suppressed. After this

decisive breach a new period opens. Jesus leaves Capernaum, never again,

it would seem, to appear in its synagogue. Henceforward He was to be

found, with His disciples, on the shore of the lake, where vast

multitudes gathered round Him, drawn not only from Galilee and Judaea,

but also from the farther districts north and east of these. He would

take refuge from the crowds in a boat, which carried Him from shore to

shore; and His healing activity was now at its height. Yet in the midst

of this popular enthusiasm He knew that the time had come to prepare for

a very different future, and accordingly a fresh departure was made when

He selected twelve of His disciples for a more intimate companionship,

with a view to a special mission: "He appointed twelve that they might

be with Him, and that He might send them forth to preach and to have

power to cast out the devils." The excitement and pressure of the crowds

was at this time almost overwhelming, and the relatives of Jesus

endeavoured to restrain Him; "for they said, He is mad." The scribes

from Jerusalem offered a more sinister explanation, saying that He was

possessed by the prince of the devils, and that this was why He was able

to control all the evil spirits. He answered them first in figurative

language, speaking of the certain downfall of a kingdom or a family

divided against itself, and of the strong man's house which could not be

looted unless the strong man were first bound. Then followed the

tremendous warning, that to assign His work to Satan, and so to call

good evil, was to blaspheme against the Holy Spirit--the one sin which

admitted of no forgiveness. Presently, when He was told that His mother

and brethren were calling for Him, He disclaimed their interference by

pointing to a new circle of family relationship, consisting of all those

who "do the will of God."

Christ's Teaching.

Again we find Him teaching by the lake, and the pressure of the

multitude is still so great that He sits in a boat while they line the

shore. For the first time we are allowed to hear how He taught them. He

gives them a parable from nature--the sower's three kinds of failure,

compensated by the rich produce of the good soil. At the close He utters

the pregnant saying: "He that hath ears to hear let him hear." When His

disciples afterwards asked for an explanation, He prefaced it by saying

that the inner circle only were intended to understand. The disciples

might learn that the message would often prove fruitless, but that

nevertheless an abundant harvest would result. For the light was

intended to shine, and the hidden was meant to be revealed. Another

parable compared the kingdom of God to seed which, when once planted,

must inevitably germinate; the process was secret and slow, but the

harvest was certain. Again, it was like the tiny mustard-seed which grew

out of all proportion to its original size, till the birds could shelter

in its great branches. These enigmatic speeches were all that the

multitudes got, but the disciples in private were taught their lesson of

hope. As we review this teaching it is very remarkable. The world of

common things is seen to be a lesson-book of the kingdom of God to those

who have eyes to read it. What that kingdom is to be we are not told; we

are only taught that its coming is secret, slow and certain. If nature

in its ordinary processes was thus seen to be full of significance, the

disciples were also to learn that it was under His control. As the boat

from which He had been teaching passed to the other side, the tired

Teacher slept. A sudden storm terrified the disciples, and they roused

Him in alarm. He stilled the storm with a word and rebuked their want of

faith. "Who then is this," they whispered with awe, "that even the wind

and the sea obey Him?" On the opposite hills a solitary spectator had

watched the rise and the lull of the tempest, a fierce demoniac who

dwelt among the tombs on the mountain-side. He believed himself to be

possessed by a regiment of demons. When Jesus bade them go forth, he

begged that they might be allowed to enter into a herd of swine which

was hard by. His request was granted, and the swine rushed over a steep

place into the lake. It is worth while to note that while most of the

cures which Jesus had performed appear to have belonged to this class,

this particular case is described as an exceptionally severe one, and

the visible effect of the removal of his tormentors may have greatly

helped to restore the man's shattered personality.

We must not attempt to trace in detail the whole of St Mark's story. We

have followed it long enough to see its directness and simplicity, to

observe the naturalness with which one incident succeeds another, and to

watch the gradual manifestation of a personality at once strong and

sympathetic, wielding extraordinary powers, which are placed wholly at

the service of others, and refusing to be hindered from helping men by

the ordinary restrictions of social or religious custom. And we have

seen as the consequence of all this the development of an historical

situation in which the leaders of current orthodoxy ally themselves with

the indifferentism which accepts existing political conditions in order

to put down a disturber of the peace. We must now be content with a

broader survey of the course of events.

Healing Powers.

Two notable cures were wrought on the western side of the lake--the

healing of the woman with the issue and the raising of Jairus's

daughter. In each of these cures prominence is given to the requirement

and the reward of faith--that is to say, of personal confidence in the

Healer: "Thy faith hath made thee whole." "Fear not, only believe."

After this Jesus passed away from the enthusiastic crowds by the lake to

visit His own Nazareth, and to find there a strange incredulity in

regard to one whom the villagers knew as the carpenter. Once more we

come across a mysterious limitation of His powers: "He could not do

there any miracle," save the cure of a few sick folk; and He marvelled

because of their want of faith. The moment had now come when the twelve

disciples were to be entrusted with a share of His healing power and

with the proclamation of repentance. While they are journeying two and

two in various directions St Mark takes occasion to tell us the current

conjectures as to who Jesus really was. Some thought him Elijah or one

of the ancient prophets returned to earth--a suggestion based on popular

tradition; others said He was John the Baptist risen from the dead--the

superstition of Herod who had put him to death. When the disciples

returned, Jesus took them apart for rest; but the crowds reassembled

when they found Him again near the lake, and His yearning compassion for

these shepherdless sheep led Him to give them an impressive sign that He

had indeed come to supply all human needs. Hitherto His power had gone

forth to individuals, but now He fed five thousand men from the scanty

stock of five loaves and two fishes. That night He came to His disciples

walking upon the waters, and in the period which immediately followed

there was once more a great manifestation of healing power.

Opposition of the Scribes.

We have heard nothing for some time of any opposition; but now a fresh

conflict arose with certain scribes who had come down from Jerusalem,

and who complained that the disciples neglected the ceremonial washing

of their hands before meals. Jesus replied with a stern rebuke,

addressing the questioners as hypocrites, and exposing the falsity of a

system which allowed the breach of fundamental commandments in order

that traditional regulations might be observed. He then turned from them

to the multitude, and uttered a saying which in effect annulled the

Jewish distinction between clean and unclean meats. This was a direct

attack on the whole Pharisaic position. The controversy was plainly

irreconcilable, and Jesus withdrew to the north, actually passing

outside the limits of the Holy Land. He desired to remain unknown, and

not to extend His mission to the heathen population, but the

extraordinary faith and the modest importunity of a Syrophenician woman

induced Him to heal her daughter. Then He returned by a circuitous route

to the Sea of Galilee. His return was marked by another miraculous

feeding of the multitude, and also by two healing miracles which present

unusual features. In both the patient was withdrawn from the multitude

and the cure was wrought with the accompaniment of symbolic actions.

Moreover, in one case Jesus is described as groaning before He spoke; in

the other the cure was at first incomplete; and both of the men were

strictly charged to observe silence afterwards. It cannot be a mere

coincidence that these are the last cures which St Mark records as

performed in Galilee.

Messianic Teaching.

In fact the Galilean ministry is now closed. Jesus retires northwards to

Caesarea Philippi, and appears henceforth to devote Himself entirely to

the instruction of his disciples, who needed to be prepared for the

fatal issue which could not long be delayed. He begins by asking them

the popular opinion as to His Person. The suggestions are still the

same--John the Baptist, or Elijah, or some other of the prophets. But

when He asked their own belief, Peter replied, "Thou art the Christ." He

warned them not to make this known; and He proceeded to give them the

wholly new teaching that the Son of Man must suffer and be killed,

adding that after three days He must rise again. Peter took Him aside

and urged Him not to speak so. But He turned to the other disciples and

openly rebuked Peter. And then, addressing a yet wider circle, He

demanded of those who should follow Him a self-sacrifice like His own.

He even used the metaphor of the cross which was carried by the sufferer

to the place of execution. Life, he declared, could only be saved by

voluntary death. He went on to demand an unswerving loyalty to Himself

and His teaching in the face of a threatening world; and then He

promised that some of those who were present should not die before they

had seen the coming of the kingdom of God. We have had no hint of such

teaching as this in the whole of the Galilean ministry. Jesus had stood

forth as the strong healer and helper of men; it was bewildering to hear

Him speak of dying. He had promised to fulfil men's highest

expectations, if only they would not doubt His willingness and power. He

had been enthusiastically reverenced by the common people, though

suspected and attacked by the religious leaders. He had spoken of "the

will of God" as supreme, and had set aside ceremonial traditions. He had

announced the nearness of the kingdom of God, but had described it only

in parables from nature. He had adopted the vague title of the "Son of

Man," but had refrained from proclaiming Himself as the expected

Messiah. At last the disciples had expressed their conviction that He

was the Christ, and immediately He tells them that He goes to meet

humiliation and death as the necessary steps to a resurrection and a

coming of the Son of Man in the glory of His Father. It was an amazing

announcement and He plainly added that their path like His own lay

through death to life. The dark shadows of this picture of the future

alone could impress their minds, but a week later three of them were

allowed a momentary vision of the light which should overcome the

darkness. They saw Jesus transfigured in a radiance of glory: Elijah

appeared with Moses, and they talked with Jesus. A cloud came over them,

and a Voice, like that of the Baptism, proclaimed "This is My Son, the

Beloved: hear ye Him." They were bidden to keep the vision secret till

the Son of Man should have risen from the dead. It was in itself a

foretaste of resurrection, and the puzzled disciples remembered that the

scribes declared that before the resurrection Elijah would appear. Their

minds were confused as to what resurrection was meant. Jesus told them

that Elijah had in fact come; and He also said that the Scriptures

foretold the sufferings of the Son of Man. But the situation was wholly

beyond their grasp, and the very language of St Mark at this point seems

to reflect the confusion of their minds.

The other disciples, in the meantime, had been vainly endeavouring to

cure a peculiarly violent case of demoniacal possession. Jesus Himself

cast out the demon, but not before the suffering child had been rendered

seemingly lifeless by a final assault. Then they journeyed secretly

through Galilee towards Judaea and the eastern side of the Jordan. On

the way Jesus reinforced the new lesson of self-renunciation. He offered

the little children as the type of those to whom the kingdom of God

belonged; and He disappointed a young and wealthy aspirant to His

favour, amazing His disciples by saying that the kingdom of God could

hardly be entered by the rich; he who forsook all should have all, and

more than all; the world's estimates were to be reversed--the first

should be last and the last first. They were now journeying towards

Jerusalem, and the prediction of the Passion was repeated. James and

John, who had witnessed the Transfiguration, and who were confident of

the coming glory, asked for the places nearest to their Master, and

professed their readiness to share His sufferings. When the other ten

were aggrieved Jesus declared that greatness was measured by service,

not by rank; and that the Son of Man had come not to be served but to

serve, and to give His life to ransom many other lives. As they came up

from the Jordan valley and passed through Jericho, an incident occurred

which signalized the beginning of the final period. A blind man appealed

to Jesus as "the Son of David," and was answered by the restoration of

his sight; and when, a little later, Jesus fulfilled an ancient prophecy

by mounting an ass and riding into Jerusalem, the multitudes snouted

their welcome to the returning "kingdom of David." Hitherto He had not

permitted any public recognition of His Messiahship, but now He entered

David's city in lowly but significant pomp as David's promised heir.

Entry into Jerusalem.

Two incidents illustrate the spirit of judgment with which He approached

the splendid but apostate city. On His arrival He had carefully observed

the condition of the Temple, and had retired to sleep outside the city.

On the following morning, finding no fruit on a fig-tree in full leaf,

He said, "Let no man eat fruit of thee henceforth for ever." It was a

parable of impending doom. Then, when He entered the Temple, He swept

away with a fiery zeal the merchants and merchandise which had turned

God's House into "a robbers' den." The act was at once an assertion of

commanding authority and an open condemnation of the religious rulers

who had permitted the desecration. Its immediate effect was to make new

and powerful enemies; for the chief priests, as well as their rivals the

scribes, were now inflamed against Him. At the moment they could do

nothing, but the next day they formally demanded whence He derived His

right so to act. When they refused to answer His question as to the

authority of John the Baptist, He in turn refused to tell them His own.

But He uttered a parable which more than answered them. The owner of the

vineyard, who had sent his servants and last of all his only son, would

visit their rejection and murder on the wicked husbandmen. He added a

reminder that the stone which the builders refused was, after all, the

Divine choice. They were restrained from arresting Him by fear of the

people, to whom the meaning of the parable was plain. They therefore

sent a joint deputation of Pharisees and Herodians to entrap Him with a

question as to the Roman tribute, in answering which He must either lose

His influence with the people or else lay Himself open to a charge of

treason. When they were baffled, the Sadducees, to whose party the chief

priests belonged, sought in vain to pose Him with a problem as to the

resurrection of the dead; and after that a more honest scribe confessed

the truth of His teaching as to the supremacy of love to God and man

over all the sacrificial worship of the Temple, and was told in reply

that he was not far from the kingdom of God. Jesus Himself now put a

question as to the teaching of the scribes which identified the Messiah

with "the Son of David"; and then He denounced those scribes whose pride

and extortion and hypocrisy were preparing for them a terrible doom.

Before He left the Temple, never to return, one incident gave Him pure

satisfaction. His own teaching that all must be given for God was

illustrated by the devotion of a poor widow who cast into the treasury

the two tiny coins which were all that she had. As He passed out He

foretold, in words which corresponded to the doom of the fig-tree, the

utter demolition of the imposing but profitless Temple; and presently He

opened up to four of His disciples a vision of the future, warning them

against false Christs, bidding them expect great sorrows, national and

personal, declaring that the gospel must be proclaimed to all the

nations, and that after a great tribulation the Son of Man should

appear, "coming with the clouds of heaven." The day and the hour none

knew, neither the angels nor the Son, but only the Father: it was the

duty of all to watch.

Final Scenes.

We now come to the final scenes. The passover was approaching, and plots

were being laid for His destruction. He Himself spoke mysteriously of

His burial, when a woman poured a vase of costly ointment upon His head.

To some this seemed a wasteful act; but He accepted it as a token of the

love which gave all that was in its power, and He promised that it

should never cease to illustrate His Gospel. Two of the disciples were

sent into Jerusalem to prepare the Passover meal. During the meal Jesus

declared that He should be betrayed by one of their number. Later in the

evening He gave them bread and wine, proclaiming that these were His

body and His blood--the tokens of His giving Himself to them, and of a

new covenant with God through His death. As they withdrew to the Mount

of Olives He foretold their general flight, but promised that when He

was risen He would go before them into Galilee. Peter protested

faithfulness unto death, but was told that he would deny his Master

three times that very night. Then coming to a place called Gethsemane,

He bade the disciples wait while He should pray; and taking the three

who had been with Him at the Transfiguration He told them to tarry near

Him and to watch. He went forward, and fell on the ground, praying that

"the cup might be taken away" from Him, but resigning Himself to His

Father's will. Presently Judas arrived with a band of armed men, and

greeted his Master with a kiss--the signal for His arrest. The disciples

fled in panic, after one of them had wounded the high priest's servant.

Only a nameless young man tried to follow, but he too fled when hands

were laid upon him. Before the high priest Jesus was charged, among

other accusations, with threatening to destroy the Temple; but the

matter was brought to an issue when He was plainly asked if He were "the

Christ, the Son of the Blessed One." He answered that He was, and He

predicted that they should see the fulfilment of Daniel's vision of the

Son of Man sitting on the right hand of power. Thereupon He was

condemned to death for manifest blasphemy, and a scene of cruel mockery

followed. Meanwhile Peter in the court below had been sitting with the

servants, and in his anxiety to escape recognition had thrice declared

that he did not know Jesus. Thus the night passed, and in the morning

Jesus was taken to Pilate, for the Jewish council had no power to

execute their decree of death. Pilate's question, "Art Thou the King of

the Jews?" shows the nature of the accusation which was thought likely

to tell with the Roman governor. He had already in bonds one leader of

revolution, whose hands were stained with blood--a striking contrast to

the calm and silent figure who stood before him. At this moment a crowd

came up to ask the fulfilment of his annual act of grace, the pardon of

a prisoner at the Passover. Pilate, discerning that it was the envy of

the rulers which sought to destroy an inconvenient rival, offered "the

King of the Jews" as the prisoner to be released. But the chief priests

succeeded in making the people ask for Barabbas and demand the

crucifixion of Jesus. Pilate fulfilled his pledge by giving them the man

of their choice, and Jesus, whom he had vainly hoped to release on a

satisfactory pretext, he now condemned to the shameful punishments of

scourging and crucifixion; for the cross, as Jesus had foreseen, was the

inevitable fate of a Jewish pretender to sovereignty. The Roman soldiers

mocked "the King of the Jews" with a purple robe and a crown of thorns.

As they led Him out they forced the cross, which the sufferer commonly

carried, upon the shoulders of one Simon of Cyrene, whose son's

Alexander and Rufus are here mentioned--probably as being known to St

Mark's readers; at any rate, it is interesting to note that, in writing

to the Christians at Rome, St Paul a few years earlier had sent a

greeting to "Rufus and his mother." Over the cross, which stood between

two others, was the condemnatory inscription, "The King of the Jews."

This was the Roman designation of Him whom the Jewish rulers tauntingly

addressed as "the King of Israel." The same revilers, with a deeper

truth than they knew, summed up the mystery of His life and death when

they said, "He saved others, Himself He cannot save."

A great darkness shrouded the scene for three hours, and then, in His

native Aramaic, Jesus cried in the words of the Psalm, "My God, My God,

why has Thou forsaken Me?" One other cry He uttered, and the end came,

and at that moment the veil of the Temple was rent from top to

bottom--an omen of fearful import to those who had mocked Him, even on

the cross, as the destroyer of the Temple, who in three days should

build it anew. The disciples of Jesus do not appear as spectators of the

end, but only a group of women who had ministered to His needs in

Galilee, and had followed Him up to Jerusalem. These women watched His

burial, which was performed by a Jewish councillor, to whom Pilate had

granted the body after the centurion had certified the reality of the

unexpectedly early death. The body was placed in a rock-hewn tomb, and a

great stone was rolled against the entrance. Sunset brought on the

Jewish sabbath, but the next evening the women brought spices to anoint

the body, and at sunrise on the third day they arrived at the tomb, and

saw that the stone was rolled away. They entered and found a young man

in a white robe, who said, "He is risen, He is not here," and bade them

say to His disciples and Peter, "He goeth before you into Galilee; there

ye shall see Him, as He said unto you." In terror they fled from the

tomb, "and they said nothing to any man, for they feared...."

So with a broken sentence the narrative ends. The document is imperfect,

owing probably to the accidental loss of its last leaf. In very early

times attempts were made to furnish it with a fitting close; but neither

of the supplements which we find in manuscripts can be regarded as

coming from the original writer. If we ask what must, on grounds of

literary probability, have been added before the record was closed, we

may content ourselves here with saying that some incident must certainly

have been narrated which should have realized the twice-repeated promise

that Jesus would be seen by His disciples in Galilee.

3. _Document used by St Matthew and St Luke._--We pass on now to compare

with this narrative of St Mark another very early document which no

longer exists in an independent form, but which can be partially

reconstructed from the portions of it which have been embodied in the

Gospels of St Matthew and St Luke.

When we review St Mark's narrative as a whole we are struck, first of

all, with its directness and simplicity. It moves straightforward upon a

well-defined path. It shows us the Lord Jesus entering on the mission

predicted by the Baptist without declaring Himself to be the Messiah;

attracting the multitudes in Galilee by His healing power and His

unbounded sympathy, and at the same time awakening the envy and

suspicion of the leaders of religion; training a few disciples till they

reach the conviction that He is the Christ, and then, but not till then,

admitting them into the secret of His coming sufferings, and preparing

them for a mission in which they also must sacrifice themselves; then

journeying to Jerusalem to fulfil the destiny which He foresaw,

accepting the responsibility of the Messianic title, only to be

condemned by the religious authorities as a blasphemer and handed over

to the Roman power as a pretender to the Jewish throne. That is the

story in its barest outline. It is adequate to its presumed purpose of

offering to distant Gentile converts a clear account of their Master's

earthly work, and of the causes which led to His rejection by His own

people and to His death by Roman crucifixion. The writer makes no

comment on the wonderful story which he tells. Allusions to Jewish

customs are, indeed, explained as they occur, but apart from this the

narrative appears to be a mere transcript of remembered facts. The

actors are never characterized; their actions are simply noted down;

there is no praise and no blame. To this simplicity and directness of

narrative we may in large measure attribute the fact that when two later

evangelists desired to give fuller accounts of our Lord's life they both

made this early book the basis of their work. In those days there was no

sense of unfairness in using up existing materials in order to make a

more complete treatise. Accordingly so much of St Mark's Gospel has been

taken over word for word in the Gospels of St Luke and St Matthew that,

if every copy of it had perished, we could still reconstruct large

portions of it by carefully comparing their narratives. They did not

hesitate, however, to alter St Mark's language where it seemed to them

rough or obscure, for each of them had a distinctive style of his own,

and St Luke was a literary artist of a high order. Moreover, though they

both accepted the general scheme of St Mark's narrative, each of them

was obliged to omit many incidents in order to find room for other

material which was at their disposal, by which they were able to

supplement the deficiencies of the earlier book. The most conspicuous

deficiency was in regard to our Lord's teaching, of which, as we have

seen, St Mark had given surprisingly little. Here they were happily in a

position to make a very important contribution.

For side by side with St Mark's Gospel there was current in the earliest

times another account of the doings and sayings of Jesus Christ. Our

knowledge of it to-day is entirely derived from a comparison of the two

later evangelists who embodied large portions of it, working it in and

out of the general scheme which they derived from St Mark, according as

each of them thought most appropriate. St Luke appears to have taken it

over in sections for the most part without much modification; but in St

Matthew's Gospel its incidents seldom find an independent place; the

sayings to which they gave rise are often detached from their context

and grouped with sayings of a similar character so as to form

considerable discourses, or else they are linked on to sayings which

were uttered on other occasions recorded by St Mark. It is probable that

many passages of St Luke's Gospel which have no parallel in St Matthew

were also derived from this early source; but this is not easily capable

of distinct proof; and, therefore, in order to gain a secure conception

of the document we must confine ourselves at first to those parts of it

which were borrowed by both writers. We shall, however, look to St Luke

in the main as preserving for us the more nearly its original form.

We proceed now to give an outline of the contents of this document. To

begin with, it contained a fuller account of the teaching of John the

Baptist. St Mark tells us only his message of hope; but here we read the

severer language with which he called men to repentance. We hear his

warning of "the coming wrath": his mighty Successor will baptize with

fire; the fruitless tree will be cast into the fire; the chaff will be

separated from the wheat and burned with unquenchable fire; the claim to

be children of Abraham will not avail, for God can raise up other

children to Abraham, if it be from the stones of the desert. Next, we

have a narrative of the Temptation, of which St Mark had but recorded

the bare fact. It was grounded on the Divine sonship, which we already

know was proclaimed at the Baptism. In a threefold vision Jesus is

invited to enter upon His inheritance at once; to satisfy His own needs,

to accept of earthly dominion, to presume on the Divine protection. The

passage stands almost alone as a revelation of inner conflict in a life

which outwardly was marked by unusual calm.

The Sermon on the Mount.

Not far from the beginning of the document there stood a remarkable

discourse delivered among the hills above the lake. It opens with a

startling reversal of the common estimates of happiness and misery. In

the light of the coming kingdom it proclaims the blessedness of the

poor, the hungry, the sad and the maligned; and the woefulness of the

rich, the full, the merry and the popular. It goes on to reverse the

ordinary maxims of conduct. Enemies are to be loved, helped, blessed,

prayed for. No blow is to be returned; every demand, just or unjust, is

to be granted: in short, "as ye desire that men should do to you, do in

like manner to them." Then the motive and the model of this conduct are

adduced: "Love your enemies ... and ye shall be sons of the Highest; for

He is kind to the thankless and wicked. Be merciful, as your Father is

merciful; and judge not, and ye shall not be judged." We note in passing

that this is the first introduction of our Lord's teaching of the

fatherhood of God. God is your Father, He says in effect; you will be

His sons if like Him you will refuse to make distinctions, loving

without looking for a return, sure that in the end love will not be

wholly lost. Then follow grave warnings--generous towards others, you

must be strict with yourselves; only the good can truly do good; hearers

of these words must be doers also, if they would build on the rock and

not on the sand. So, with the parable of the two builders, the discourse

reached its formal close.

It was followed by the entry of Jesus into Capernaum, where He was asked

to heal the servant of a Roman officer. This man's unusual faith, based

on his soldierly sense of discipline, surprised the Lord, who declared

that it had no equal in Israel itself. Somewhat later messengers arrived

from the imprisoned Baptist, who asked if Jesus were indeed "the coming

One" of whom he had spoken. Jesus pointed to His acts of healing the

sick, raising the dead and proclaiming good news for the poor; thereby

suggesting to those who could understand that He fulfilled the ancient

prophecy of the Messiah. He then declared the greatness of John in

exalted terms, adding, however, that the least in the kingdom of God was

John's superior. Then He complained of the unreasonableness of an age

which refused John as too austere and Himself as too lax and as being

"the friend of publicans and sinners." This narrative clearly

presupposes a series of miracles already performed, and also such a

conflict with the Pharisees as we have seen recorded by St Mark.

Presently we find an offer of discipleship met by the warning that "the

Son of Man" is a homeless wanderer; and then the stern refusal of a

request for leave to perform a father's funeral rites.

Other Sayings of Jesus.

Close upon these incidents follows a special mission of disciples,

introduced by the saying: "The harvest is great, but the labourers are

few." The disciples as they journey are to take no provisions, but to

throw themselves on the bounty of their hearers; they are to heal the

sick and to proclaim the nearness of the kingdom of God. The city that

rejects them shall have a less lenient judgment than Sodom; Tyre and

Sidon shall be better off than cities like Chorazin and Bethsaida which

have seen His miracles; Capernaum, favoured above all, shall sink to the

deepest depth. If words could be sterner than these, they are those

which follow: "He that heareth you heareth Me; and he that rejecteth you

rejecteth Me; but He that rejecteth Me rejecteth Him that sent Me." This

reference to His own personal mission is strikingly expanded in words

which He uttered on the return of the disciples. After thanking the

Father for revealing to babes what He hides from the wise, He continued

in mysterious language: "All things are delivered to Me by My Father;

and none knoweth who the Son is but the Father; and who the Father is

but the Son, and he to whom the Son chooseth to reveal Him." Happy were

the disciples in seeing and hearing what prophets and kings had looked

for in vain.

When His disciples, having watched Him at prayer, desired to be taught

how to pray, they were bidden to address God as "Father"; to ask first

for the hallowing of the Father's name, and the coming of His kingdom;

then for their daily food, for the pardon of their sins and for freedom

from temptation. It was the prayer of a family--that the sons might be

true to the Father, and the Father true to the sons; and they were

further encouraged by a parable of the family: "Ask and ye shall

receive.... Every one that asketh receiveth": for the heavenly Father

will do more, not less, than an earthly father would do for his

children. After He had cast out a dumb demon, some said that His power

was due to Beelzebub. He accordingly asked them by whom the Jews

themselves cast out demons; and He claimed that His power was a sign

that the kingdom of God was come. But He warned them that demons cast

out once might return in greater force. When they asked for a sign from

heaven, He would give them no more than the sign of Jonah, explaining

that the repentant Ninevites should condemn the present generation: so,

too, should the queen of Sheba; for that which they were now rejecting

was more than Jonah and more than Solomon. Yet further warnings were

given when a Pharisee invited Him to his table, and expressed surprise

that He did not wash His hands before the meal. The cleansing of

externals and the tithing of garden-produce, He declares, have usurped

the place of judgment and the love of God. Woe is pronounced upon the

Pharisees: they are successors to the murderers of the prophets. Then

citing from Genesis and 2 Chronicles, the first and last books in the

order of the Jewish Bible, He declared that all righteous blood from

that of Abel to that of Zachariah should be required of that generation.

After this the disciples are encouraged not to fear their murderous

opponents. The very sparrows are God's care--much more shall they be;

the hairs of their head are all counted. In the end the Son of Man will

openly own those who have owned Him before men. For earthly needs no

thought is to be taken: the birds and the flowers make no provision for

their life and beauty. God will give food and raiment to those who are

seeking His kingdom. Earthly goods should be given away in exchange for

the imperishable treasures. Suddenly will the Son of Man come: happy the

servant whom His Master finds at his appointed task. In brief parables

the kingdom of God is likened to a mustard-seed and to leaven. When

Jesus is asked if the saved shall be few, He replies that the door is a

narrow one. Then, changing His illustration, He says that many shall

seek entrance in vain; for the master of the house will refuse to

recognize them. But while they are excluded, a multitude from all

quarters of the earth shall sit down with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and

the prophets in the kingdom of God.

His eyes are now fixed on Jerusalem, where, like the prophets, He must

die. "Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often have I desired to gather thy

children together, as a bird her brood beneath her wings, but ye

refused." "Ye shall not see Me, until ye shall say, Blessed is He that

cometh in the name of the Lord." After this we have the healing of a

dropsical man on the Sabbath, with a reply to the murmuring Pharisees;

and then a parable of the failure of invited guests and the filling of

their places from the streets. A few fragmentary passages remain, of

which it will be sufficient to cite a word or two to call them to

remembrance. There is a warning that he who forsakes not father and

mother cannot be a disciple, nor he who does not bear his cross.

Savourless salt is fit for nothing. The lost sheep is brought home with

a special joy. "Ye cannot serve God and Mammon." Scandals must arise,

but woe to him through whom they arise. The Son of Man will come with

the suddenness of lightning; the days of Noah and the days of Lot will

find a parallel in their blind gaiety and their inevitable disaster. He

who seeks to gain his life will lose it. "One shall be taken, and the

other left." "Where the carcase is, the vultures will gather." Then,

lastly, we have a parable of the servant who failed to employ the money

entrusted to him; and a promise that the disciples shall sit on twelve

thrones to judge the twelve tribes of Israel. We cannot say by our

present method of determination, how this document closed; for in the

narratives of the Passion and the Resurrection St Matthew and St Luke

only coincide in passages which they have taken from St Mark.

Comparison with St Mark.

Now that we have reconstructed in outline this early account of the Lord

Jesus, so far as it has been used by both the later evangelists, we may

attempt to compare the picture which it presents to us with that which

was offered by St Mark. But in doing so we must remember that we know it

only in fragments. There can be little doubt that much more of it is

embedded in St Luke's Gospel, and something more also in St Matthew's;

but in order to stand on firm ground we have considered thus far only

those portions which both of these writers elected to use in composing

their later narratives. To go beyond this is a work of delicate

discrimination. It can only be effected by a close examination of the

style and language of the document, which may enable us in some

instances to identify with comparative security certain passages which

are found in St Luke, but which St Matthew did not regard as suitable

for his purpose. Among these we may venture, quite tentatively, to

mention the sermon at Nazareth which opened with a passage from the Book

of Isaiah, the raising of the widow's son at Nain, and the parable of

the good Samaritan. These are found in St Luke, but not in St Matthew.

On the other hand, it is not improbable that the wonderful words which

begin, "Come unto Me all ye that labour," were drawn by St Matthew from

the same document, though they are not recorded by St Luke. But here we

have entered upon a region of less certainty, in which critical

scholarship has still much to do; and these passages are mentioned here

only as a reminder that the document must have contained more than what

St Matthew and St Luke each independently determined to borrow from it.

Looking, then, at the portions which we have indicated as having this

two-fold testimony, we see that in their fragmentary condition we cannot

trace the clear historical development which was so conspicuous a

feature of St Mark's Gospel; yet we need not conclude that in its

complete form it failed to present an orderly narrative. Next, we see

that wherever we are able to observe its method of relating an incident,

as in the case of the healing of the centurion's servant, we have the

same characteristics of brevity and simplicity which we admired in St

Mark. No comment is made by the narrator; he tells his tale in the

fewest words and passes on. Again, we note that it supplies just what we

feel we most need when we have reached the end of St Mark's story, a

fuller account of the teaching which Jesus gave to His disciples and to

the people at large. And we see that the substance of that teaching is

in complete harmony with the scattered hints that we found in St Mark.

If the fatherhood of God stands out clearly, we may remember a passage

of St Mark also which speaks of "the Heavenly Father" as forgiving those

who forgive. If prayer is encouraged, we may also remember that the same

passage of St Mark records the saying: "All things whatsoever ye pray

for and ask, believe that ye have received them and ye shall have them."

If in one mysterious passage Jesus speaks of "the Father" and "the

Son"--terms with which the Gospel of St John has made us familiar--St

Mark also in one passage uses the same impressive terms--"the Son" and

"the Father." There are, of course, many other parallels with St Mark,

and at some points the two documents seem to overlap and to relate the

same incidents in somewhat different forms. There is the same use of

parables from nature, the same incisiveness of speech and employment of

paradox, the same demand to sacrifice all to Him and for His cause, the

same importunate claim made by Him on the human soul.

The Element of Warning.

But the contrast between the two writers is even more important for our

purpose. No one can read through the passages to which we have pointed

without feeling the solemn sternness of the great Teacher, a sternness

which can indeed be traced here and there in St Mark, but which does not

give its tone to the whole of his picture. Here we see Christ standing

forth in solitary grandeur, looking with the eyes of another world on a

society which is blindly hastening to its dissolution. It may be that if

this document had come down to us in its entirety, we should have

gathered from it an exaggerated idea of the severity of our Lord's

character. Certain it is that as we read over these fragments we are

somewhat startled by the predominance of the element of warning, and by

the assertion of rules of conduct which seem almost inconsistent with a

normal condition of settled social life. The warning to the nation

sounded by the Baptist, that God could raise up a new family for

Abraham, is heard again and again in our Lord's teaching. Gentile faith

puts Israel to shame. The sons of the kingdom will be left outside,

while strangers feast with Abraham. Capernaum shall go to perdition;

Jerusalem shall be a desolate ruin. The doom of the nation is

pronounced; its fate is imminent; there is no ray of hope for the

existing constitution of religion and society. As to individuals within

the nation, the despised publicans and sinners will find God's favour

before the self-satisfied representatives of the national religion. In

such a condition of affairs it is hardly surprising to find that the

great and stern Teacher congratulates the poor and has nothing but pity

for the rich; that He has no interest at all in comfort or property. If

a man asks you for anything, give it him; if he takes it without asking,

do not seek to recover it. Nothing material is worth a thought; anxiety

is folly; your Father, who feeds His birds and clothes His flowers, will

feed and clothe you. Rise to the height of your sonship to God; love

your enemies even as God loves His; and if they kill you, God will care

for you still; fear them not, fear only Him who loves you all.

Here is a new philosophy of life, offering solid consolation amid the

ruin of a world. We have no idea who the disciple may have been who thus

seized upon the sadder elements of the teaching of Jesus; but we may

well think of him as one of those who were living in Palestine in the

dark and threatening years of internecine strife, when the Roman eagles

were gathering round their prey, and the first thunder was muttering of

the storm which was to leave Jerusalem a heap of stones. At such a

moment the warnings of our Lord would claim a large place in a record of

His teaching, and the strange comfort which He had offered would be the

only hope which it would seem possible to entertain.

The Earlier Narratives.

4. _Additions by the Gospel according to St Matthew._--We have now

examined in turn the two earliest pictures which have been preserved to

us of the life of Jesus Christ. The first portrays Him chiefly by a

record of His actions, and illustrates His strength, His sympathy, and

His freedom from conventional restraints. It shows the disturbing forces

of these characteristics, which aroused the envy and apprehension of the

leaders of religion. The first bright days of welcome and popularity are

soon clouded: the storm begins to lower. More and more the Master

devotes Himself to the little circle of His disciples, who are taught

that they, as well as He, can only triumph through defeat, succeed by

failure, and find their life in giving it away. At length, in fear of

religious innovations and pretending that He is a political usurper, the

Jews deliver Him up to die on a Roman cross. The last page of the story

is torn away, just at the point when it has been declared that He is

alive again and about to show Himself to His disciples. The second

picture has a somewhat different tone. It is mainly a record of

teaching, and the teaching is for the most part stern and paradoxical.

It might be described as revolutionary. It is good tidings to the poor:

it sets no store on property and material comfort: it pities the wealthy

and congratulates the needy. It reverses ordinary judgments and

conventional maxims of conduct. It proclaims the downfall of

institutions, and compares the present blind security to the days of

Noah and of Lot: a few only shall escape the coming overthrow. Yet even

in this sterner setting the figure portrayed is unmistakably the same.

There is the same strength, the same tender sympathy, the same freedom

from convention: there is the same promise to fulfil the highest hopes,

the same surrender of life, and the same imperious demand on the lives

of others. No thoughtful man who examines and compares these pictures

can doubt that they are genuine historical portraits of a figure wholly

different from any which had hitherto appeared on the world's stage.

They are beyond the power of human invention. They are drawn with a

simplicity which is their own guarantee. If we had these, and these

only, we should have an adequate explanation of the beginnings of

Christianity. There would still be a great gap to be filled before we

reached the earliest letters of St Paul; but yet we should know what the

Apostle meant when he wrote to "the Church of the Thessalonians in God

the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ," and reminded them how they had

"turned from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for His

Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, even Jesus who delivereth

us from the wrath to come."

If these two narratives served the first needs of Christian believers,

it is easy to see that they would presently stimulate further activity

in the same direction. For, to begin with, they were obviously

incomplete: many incidents and teachings known to the earliest disciples

found no place in them; and they contained no account of the life of

Jesus Christ before His public ministry, no record of His pedigree, His

birth or His childhood. Secondly, their form left much to be desired;

for one of them at least was rude in style, sometimes needlessly

repetitive and sometimes brief to obscurity. Moreover the very fact that

there were two challenged a new and combined work which perhaps should

supersede both.

The Gospel of St Matthew.

Accordingly, some years after the fall of Jerusalem--we cannot tell the

exact date or the author's name--the book which we call the Gospel

according to St Matthew was written to give the Palestinian Christians a

full account of Jesus Christ, which should present Him as the promised

Messiah, fulfilling the ancient Hebrew prophecies, proclaiming the

kingdom of heaven, and founding the Christian society. The writer takes

St Mark as his basis, but he incorporates into the story large portions

of the teaching which he has found in the other document. He groups his

materials with small regard to chronological order; and he fashions out

of the many scattered sayings of our Lord continuous discourses,

everywhere bringing like to like, with considerable literary art. A wide

knowledge of the Old Testament supplies him with a text to illustrate

one incident after another; and so deeply is he impressed with the

correspondence between the life of Christ and the words of ancient

prophecy, that he does not hesitate to introduce his quotations by the

formula "that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet."

His Hebrew instinct leads him to begin with a table of genealogy,

artificially constructed in groups of fourteen generations--from Abraham

to David, from David to the Captivity, and from the Captivity to the

Christ. The royal descent of the Messiah is thus declared, and from the

outset His figure is set against the background of the Old Testament. He

then proceeds to show that, though His lineage is traced through

Joseph's ancestors, He was but the adopted son of Joseph, and he tells

the story of the Virgin-birth. The coming of the Child draws Eastern

sages to his cradle and fills the court of Herod with suspicious fears.

The cruel tyrant kills the babes of Bethlehem, but the Child has been

withdrawn by a secret flight into Egypt, whence he presently returns to

the family home at Nazareth in Galilee. All this is necessarily fresh

material, for the other records had dealt only with the period of public

ministry. We have no knowledge of the source from which it was drawn.

From the historical standpoint its value must be appraised by the

estimate which is formed of the writer's general trustworthiness as a

narrator, and by the extent to which the incidents receive confirmation

from other quarters. The central fact of the Virgin-birth, as we shall

presently see, has high attestation from another early writer.

Discourses and Parables.

The next addition which St Matthew's Gospel makes to our knowledge is of

a different kind. It consists of various important sayings of our Lord,

which are combined with discourses found in the second document and are

worked up into the great utterance which we call the Sermon on the

Mount. Such grouping of materials is a feature of this Gospel, and was

possibly designed for purposes of public instruction; so that continuous

passages might be read aloud in the services of the Church, just as

passages from the Old Testament were read in the Jewish synagogues. This

motive would account not only for the arrangement of the material, but

also for certain changes in the language which seem intended to remove

difficulties, and to interpret what is ambiguous or obscure. An example

of such interpretation meets us at the outset. The startling saying,

"Blessed are ye poor," followed by the woe pronounced upon the rich,

might seem like a condemnation of the very principle of property; and

when the Christian Church had come to be organized as a society

containing rich and poor, the heart of the saying was felt to be more

truly and clearly expressed in the words, "Blessed are the poor in

spirit." This interpretative process may be traced again and again in

this Gospel, which frequently seems to reflect the definite tradition of

a settled Church.

Apart from the important parables of the tares, the pearl and the net,

the writer adds little to his sources until we come to the remarkable

passage in ch. xvi., in which Peter the Rock is declared to be the

foundation of the future Church, and is entrusted with the keys of the

kingdom of heaven. The function of "binding and loosing," here assigned

to him, is in identical terms assigned to the disciples generally in a

passage in ch. xviii. in which for the second time we meet with the word

"Church"--a word not found elsewhere in the Gospels. There is no

sufficient ground for denying that these sayings were uttered by our

Lord, but the fact that they were now first placed upon record

harmonizes with what has been said already as to the more settled

condition of the Christian society which this Gospel appears to reflect.

The parables of the two debtors, the labourers in the vineyard, the two

sons, the ten virgins, the sheep and goats, are recorded only by this

evangelist. But by way of incident he has almost nothing to add till we

come to the closing scenes. The earthquake at the moment of our Lord's

death and the subsequent appearance of departed saints are strange

traditions unattested by other writers. The same is to be said of the

soldiers placed to guard the tomb, and of the story that they had been

bribed to say that the sacred body had been stolen while they slept. On

the other hand, the appearance of the risen Christ to the women may have

been taken from the lost pages of St Mark, being the sequel to the

narrative which is broken off abruptly in this Gospel: and it is not

improbable that St Mark's Gospel was the source of the great commission

to preach and baptize with which St Matthew closes, though the wording

of it has probably been modified in accordance with a settled tradition.

The work which the writer of this Gospel thus performed received the

immediate sanction of a wide acceptance. It met a definite spiritual

need. It presented the Gospel in a suitable form for the edification of

the Church; and it confirmed its truth by constant appeals to the Old

Testament scriptures, thus manifesting its intimate relation with the

past as the outcome of a long preparation and as the fulfilment of a

Divine purpose. No Gospel is so frequently quoted by the early

post-apostolic writers: none has exercised a greater influence upon

Christianity, and consequently upon the history of the world.

Yet from the purely historical point of view its evidential value is not

the same as that of St Mark. Its facts for the most part are simply

taken over from the earlier evangelist, and the historian must obviously

prefer the primary source. Its true importance lies in its attestation

of the genuineness of the earlier portraits to which it has so little to

add, in its recognition of the relation of Christ to the whole purpose

of God as revealed in the Old Testament, and in its interpretation of

the Gospel message in its bearing on the living Church of the primitive

days.

5. _Additions by St Luke._--While the needs of Jewish believers were

amply met by St Matthew's Gospel, a like service was rendered to Gentile

converts by a very different writer. St Luke was a physician who had

accompanied St Paul on his missionary journeys. He undertook a history

of the beginnings of Christianity, two volumes of which have come down

to us, entitled the Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles. His Gospel,

like St Matthew's, is founded on St Mark, with the incorporation of

large portions of the second document of which we have spoken above. But

the way in which the two writers have used the same materials is

strikingly different. In St Matthew's Gospel the original sources are

frequently blended: the incidents of St Mark are rearranged and often

grouped afresh according to subject matter: harsh and ambiguous

sentences of both documents are toned down or interpreted. St Luke, on

the contrary, chooses between parallel stories of his two sources,

preferring neither to duplicate nor to combine: he incorporates St Mark

in continuous sections, following him alone for a time, then leaving him

entirely, and then returning to introduce a new block of his narrative.

He modifies St Mark's style very freely, but he makes less change in the

recorded words of our Lord, and he adheres more closely to the original

language of the second document.

In his first two chapters he gives an account of the birth and childhood

of St John the Baptist and of our Lord Himself, gathered perhaps

directly from the traditions of the Holy Family, and written in close

imitation of the sacred stories of the Old Testament which were familiar

to him in their Greek translation. The whole series of incidents differ

from that which we find in St Matthew's Gospel, but there is no direct

variance between them. The two narratives are in agreement as to the

central fact of the Virgin-birth. St Luke gives a table of genealogy

which is irreconcilable with the artificial table of St Matthew's

Gospel, and which traces our Lord's ancestry up to Adam, "which was the

son of God."

The opening scene of the Galilean ministry is the discourse at Nazareth,

in which our Lord claims to fulfil Isaiah's prophecy of the proclamation

of good tidings to the poor. The same prophecy is alluded to in His

reply to the Baptist's messengers which is incorporated subsequently

from the second document. The scene ends with the rejection of Christ by

His own townsfolk, as in the parallel story of St Mark which St Luke

does not give. It is probable that St Luke found this narrative in the

second document, and chose it after his manner in preference to the less

instructive story in St Mark. He similarly omits the Marcan account of

the call of the fishermen, substituting the story of the miraculous

draught. After that he follows St Mark alone, until he introduces after

the call of the twelve apostles the sermon which begins with the

beatitudes and woes. This is from the second document, which he

continues to use, and that without interruption (if we may venture to

assign to it the raising of the widow's son at Nain and the anointing by

the sinful woman in the Pharisee's house), until he returns to

incorporate another section from St Mark.

Characteristic Section of St. Luke's Gospel.

This in turn is followed by the most characteristic section of his

Gospel (ix. 51-xviii. 14), a long series of incidents wholly independent

of St Mark, and introduced as belonging to the period of the final

journey from Galilee to Jerusalem. Much of this material is demonstrably

derived from the second document; and it is quite possible that the

whole of it may come from that source. There are special reasons for

thinking so in regard to certain passages, as for example the mission of

the seventy disciples and the parable of the good Samaritan, although

they are not contained in St Matthew's Gospel.

For the closing scenes at Jerusalem St Luke makes considerable additions

to St Mark's narrative: he gives a different account of the Last Supper,

and he adds the trial before Herod and the incident of the penitent

robber. He appears to have had no information as to the appearance of

the risen Lord in Galilee, and he accordingly omits from his

reproduction of St Mark's narrative the twice-repeated promise of a

meeting with the disciples there. He supplies, however, an account of

the appearance to the two disciples at Emmaus and to the whole body of

the apostles in Jerusalem.

St Luke's use of his two main sources has preserved the characteristics

of both of them. The sternness of certain passages, which has led some

critics to imagine that he was an Ebionite, is mainly, if not entirely,

due to his faithful reproduction of the language of the second document.

The key-note of his Gospel is universality: the mission of the Christ

embraces the poor, the weak, the despised, the heretic and the sinful:

it is good tidings to all mankind. He tells of the devotion of Mary and

Martha, and of the band of women who ministered to our Lord's needs and

followed Him to Jerusalem: he tells also of His kindness to more than

one sinful woman. Zacchaeus the publican and the grateful Samaritan

leper further illustrate this characteristic. Writing as he does for

Gentile believers he omits many details which from their strongly Jewish

cast might be unintelligible or uninteresting. He also modifies the

harshness of St Mark's style, and frequently recasts his language in

reference to diseases. From an historical point of view his Gospel is of

high value. The proved accuracy of detail elsewhere, as in his narration

of events which he witnessed in company with St Paul, enhances our

general estimation of his work. A trustworthy observer and a literary

artist, the one non-Jewish evangelist has given us--to use M. Renan's

words--"the most beautiful book in the world."

6. _Additions by St John._--We come lastly to consider what addition to

our knowledge of Christ's life and work is made by the Fourth Gospel. St

Mark's narrative of our Lord's ministry and passion is so simple and

straightforward that it satisfies our historical sense. We trace a

natural development in it: we seem to see why with such power and such

sympathy He necessarily came into conflict with the religious leaders of

the people, who were jealous of the influence which He gained and were

scandalized by His refusal to be hindered in His mission of mercy by

rules and conventions to which they attached the highest importance. The

issue is fought out in Galilee, and when our Lord finally journeys to

Jerusalem He knows that He goes there to die. The story is so plain and

convincing in itself that it gives at first sight an impression of

completeness. This impression is confirmed by the Gospels of St Matthew

and St Luke, which though they add much fresh material do not disturb

the general scheme presented by St Mark. But on reflection we are led to

question the sufficiency of the account thus offered to us. Is it

probable, we ask, that our Lord should have neglected the sacred custom

in accordance with which the pious Jew visited Jerusalem several times

each year for the observance of the divinely appointed feasts? It is

true that St Mark does not break his narrative of the Galilean ministry

to record such visits: but this does not prove that such visits were not

made. Again, is it probable that He should have so far neglected

Jerusalem as to give it no opportunity of seeing Him and hearing His

message until the last week of His life? If the writers of the other two

Gospels had no means at their disposal for enlarging the narrow

framework of St Mark's narrative by recording definite visits to

Jerusalem, at least they preserve to us words from the second document

which seem to imply such visits: for how else are we to explain the

pathetic complaint, "Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have

gathered thee, as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings; but ye

would not"?

St John's Gospel meets our questionings by a wholly new series of

incidents and by an account of a ministry which is concerned mainly not

with Galileans but with Judaeans, and which centres in Jerusalem. It is

carried on to a large extent concurrently with the Galilean ministry: it

is not continuous, but is taken up from feast to feast as our Lord

visits the sacred city at the times of its greatest religious activity.

It differs in character from the Galilean ministry: for among the

simple, unsophisticated folk of Galilee Jesus presents Himself as a

healer and helper and teacher, keeping in the background as far as

possible His claim to be the Messiah; whereas in Jerusalem His authority

is challenged at His first appearance, the element of controversy is

never absent, His relation to God is from the outset the vital issue,

and consequently His Divine claim is of necessity made explicit. Time

after time His life is threatened before the feast is ended, and when

the last passover has come we can well understand, what was not made

sufficiently clear in the brief Marcan narrative, why Jerusalem proved

so fatally hostile to His Messianic claim.

The Purpose of St John's Gospel.

The Fourth Gospel thus offers us a most important supplement to the

limited sketch of our Lord's life which we find in the Synoptic Gospels.

Yet this was not the purpose which led to its composition. That purpose

is plainly stated by the author himself: "These things have been written

that ye may believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and that

believing ye may have life in His name." His avowed aim is, not to write

history, but to produce conviction. He desires to interpret the coming

of Jesus Christ into the world, to declare whence and why He came, and

to explain how His coming, as light in the midst of darkness, brought a

crisis into the lives of all with whom He came in contact. The issue of

this crisis in His rejection by the Jews at Jerusalem is the main theme

of the book.

St John's prologue prepares us to find that he is not writing for

persons who require a succinct narrative of facts, but for those who

having such already in familiar use are asking deep questions as to our

Lord's mission. It goes back far behind human birth or lines of

ancestry. It begins, like the sacred story of creation, "In the

beginning." The Book of Genesis had told how all things were called into

existence by a Divine utterance: "God said, Let there be ... and there

was." The creative Word had been long personified by Jewish thought,

especially in connexion with the prophets to whom "the Word of the Lord"

came. "In the beginning," then, St John tells us, the Word was--was with

God--yea, was God. He was the medium of creation, the source of its

light and its life--especially of that higher life which finds its

manifestation in men. So He was in the world, and the world was made by

Him, and yet the world knew Him not. At length He came, came to the home

which had been prepared for Him, but His own people rejected Him. But

such as did receive Him found a new birth, beyond their birth of flesh

and blood: they became children of God, were born of God. In order thus

to manifest Himself He had undergone a human birth: "the Word was made

flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory"--the glory, as the

evangelist has learned to see, of the Father's only-begotten Son, who

has come into the world to reveal to men that God whom "no man hath ever

seen." In these opening words we are invited to study the life of Christ

from a new point of view, to observe His self-manifestation and its

issue. The evangelist looks back across a period of half a century, and

writes of Christ not merely as he saw Him in those far-off days, but as

he has come by long experience to think and speak of Him. The past is

now filled with a glory which could not be so fully perceived at the

time, but which, as St John tells, it was the function of the Holy

Spirit to reveal to Christ's disciples.

The first name which occurs in this Gospel is that of John the Baptist.

He is even introduced into the prologue which sketches in general terms

the manifestation of the Divine Word: "There was a man sent from God,

whose name was John: he came for witness, to witness to the Light, that

through him all might believe." This witness of John holds a position of

high importance in this Gospel. His mission is described as running on

for a while concurrently with that of our Lord, whereas in the other

Gospels we have no record of our Lord's work until John is cast into

prison. It is among the disciples of the Baptist on the banks of the

Jordan that Jesus finds His first disciples. The Baptist has pointed Him

out to them in striking language, which recalls at once the symbolic

ritual of the law and the spiritual lessons of the prophets: "Behold,

the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world."

Soon afterwards at Cana of Galilee Jesus gives His first "sign," as the

evangelist calls it, in the change of water into wine to supply the

deficiency at a marriage feast. This scene has all the happy brightness

of the early Galilean ministry which St Mark records. It stands in sharp

contrast with the subsequent appearance of Jesus in Jerusalem at the

Passover, when His first act is to drive the traders from the Temple

courts. In this He seems to be carrying the Baptist's stern mission of

purification from the desert into the heart of the sacred city, and so

fulfilling, perhaps consciously, the solemn prophecy of Malachi which

opens with the words: "Behold, I will send My Messenger, and He shall

prepare the way before Me; and the Lord whom ye seek shall suddenly come

to His Temple" (Mai. iii. 1-5). This significant action provokes a

challenge of His authority, which is answered by a mysterious saying,

not understood at the time, but interpreted afterwards as referring to

the Resurrection. After this our Lord was visited secretly by a Pharisee

named Nicodemus, whose advances were severely met by the words, "Except

a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." When Nicodemus

objected that this was to demand a physical impossibility, he was

answered that the new birth was "of water and spirit"--words which

doubtless contained a reference to the mission of the Baptist and to his

prophecy of One who should baptize with the Holy Spirit. Towards the end

of this conversation the evangelist passes imperceptibly from reporting

the words of the Lord into an interpretation or amplification of them,

and in language which recalls the prologue he unfolds the meaning of

Christ's mission and indicates the crisis of self-judgment which

necessarily accompanies the manifestation of the Light to each

individual. When he resumes his narrative the Lord has left Jerusalem,

and is found baptizing disciples, in even greater numbers than the

Baptist himself. Though Jesus did not personally perform the rite, it is

plain once again that in this early period He closely linked His own

mission with that of John the Baptist. When men hinted at a rivalry

between them, John plainly declared "He must increase, and I must

decrease": and the reply of Jesus was to leave Judaea for Galilee.

Away from the atmosphere of contention we find Him manifesting the same

broad sympathy and freedom from convention which we have noted in the

other Gospels, especially in that of St Luke. He converses with a woman,

with a woman moreover who is a Samaritan, and who is of unchaste life.

He offers her the "living water" which shall supply all her needs: she

readily accepts Him as the expected Messiah, and He receives a welcome

from the Samaritans. He passes on to Galilee, where also He is welcomed,

and where He performs His second "sign," healing the son of one of

Herod's courtiers.

The Ministry at Jerusalem.

But St John's interest does not lie in Galilee, and he soon brings our

Lord back to Jerusalem on the occasion of a feast. The Baptist's work is

now ended; and, though Jesus still appeals to the testimony of John, the

new conflict with the Jewish authorities shows that He is moving now on

His own independent and characteristic lines. In cleansing the Temple He

had given offence by what might seem an excess of rigour: now, by

healing a sick man and bidding him carry his bed on the Sabbath, He

offended by His laxity. He answered His accusers by the brief but

pregnant sentence: "My Father worketh even until now, and I work." They

at once understood that He thus claimed a unique relation to God, and

their antagonism became the more intense: "the Jews therefore sought the

more to kill Him, because He had not only broken the Sabbath, but had

also said that God was His own Father, making Himself equal to God." His

first reply is then expanded to cover the whole region of life. The Son

beholds the Father at work, and works concurrently, doing nothing of

Himself. He does the Father's will. The very principle of life is

entrusted to Him. He quickens, and He judges. As Son of Man He judges

man.

The next incident is the feeding of the five thousand, which belongs to

the Galilean ministry and is recorded by the three other evangelists. St

John's purpose in introducing it is not historical but didactic. It is

made the occasion of instruction as to the heavenly food, the flesh and

blood of Him who came down from heaven. This teaching leads to a

conflict with certain Judaeans who seem to have come from Jerusalem, and

it proves a severe test even to the faith of disciples.

The feast of tabernacles brings fresh disputes in Jerusalem, and an

attempt is made to arrest Jesus. A climax of indignation is reached when

a blind man is healed at the pool of Siloam on the sabbath day. At the

feast of the dedication a fresh effort at arrest was made, and Jesus

then withdrew beyond the Jordan. Here He learned of the sickness of

Lazarus, and presently He returned and came to Bethany to raise him from

the dead. The excitement produced by this miracle led to yet another

attack, destined this time to be successful, on the life of Jesus. The

Passover was at hand, and the last supper of our Lord with His disciples

on the evening before the Passover lamb was killed is made the occasion

of the most inspiring consolations. Our Lord interprets His relation to

the disciples by the figure of a tree and its branches--He is the whole

of which they are the parts; He promises the mission of the Holy Spirit

to continue His work in the world; and He solemnly commends to His

Father the disciples whom He is about to leave.

The account of the trial and the crucifixion differs considerably from

the accounts given in the other Gospels. St John's narratives are in

large part personal memories, and in more than one incident he himself

figures as the unnamed disciple "whom Jesus loved." In the Resurrection

scenes he also gives incidents in which he has played a part; and the

appearances of the risen Lord are not confined either to Jerusalem or to

Galilee, but occur in both localities.

If we ask what is the special contribution to history, apart from

theology, which St John's Gospel makes, the answer would seem to be

this--that beside the Galilean ministry reported by St Mark there was a

ministry to "Jews" (Judaeans) in Jerusalem, not continuous, but

occasional, taken up from time to time as the great feasts came round;

that its teaching was widely different from that which was given to

Galileans, and that the situation created was wholly unlike that which

arose out of the Galilean ministry. The Galilean ministry opens with

enthusiasm, ripening into a popularity which even endangers a

satisfactory result. Where opposition manifests itself, it is not native

opposition, but comes from religious teachers who are parts of a system

which centres in Jerusalem, and who are sometimes expressly noted as

having come from Jerusalem. The Jerusalem ministry on the contrary is

never welcomed with enthusiasm. It has to do with those who challenge it

from the first. There is no atmosphere of simplicity and teachableness

which rejoices in the manifestation of power and sympathy and liberty.

It is a witness delivered to a hostile audience, whether they will hear

or no. Ultimate issues are quickly raised: keen critics see at once the

claims which underlie deeds and words, and the claims in consequence

become explicit: the relation of the teacher to God Himself is the vital

interest. The conflict which thus arose explains what St Mark's succinct

narrative had left unexplained--the fatal hostility of Jerusalem. It may

have been a part of St John's purpose to give this explanation, and to

make other supplements or corrections where earlier narratives appeared

to him incomplete or misleading. But he says nothing to indicate this,

while on the other hand he distinctly proclaims that his purpose is to

produce and confirm conviction of the divine claims of Jesus Christ.

For bibliography see BIBLE; CHRISTIANITY; CHURCH HISTORY; and the

articles on the separate Gospels. (J. A. R.)

JET (Fr. _jais_, Ger. _Gagat_), a substance which seems to be a peculiar

kind of lignite or anthracite; often cut and polished for ornaments. The

word "jet" probably comes, through O. Fr. _jaiet_, from the classical

_gagates_, a word which was derived, according to Pliny, from Gagas, in

Lycia, where jet, or a similar substance, was originally found. Jet was

used in Britain in prehistoric times; many round barrows of the Bronze

age have yielded jet beads, buttons, rings, armlets and other ornaments.

The abundance of jet in Britain is alluded to by Caius Julius Solinus

(fl. 3rd century) and jet ornaments are found with Roman relics in

Britain. Probably the supply was obtained from the coast of Yorkshire,

especially near Whitby, where nodules of jet were formerly picked up on

the shore. Caedmon refers to this jet, and at a later date it was used

for rosary beads by the monks of Whitby Abbey.

The Whitby jet occurs in irregular masses, often of lenticular shape,

embedded in hard shales known as jet-rock. The jet-rock series belongs

to that division of the Upper Lias which is termed the zone of

_Ammonites serpentinus_. Microscopic examination of jet occasionally

reveals the structure of coniferous wood, which A. C. Seward has shown

to be araucarian. Probably masses of wood were brought down by a

river, and drifted out to sea, where becoming water-logged they sank,

and became gradually buried in a deposit of fine mud, which eventually

hardened into shale. Under pressure, perhaps assisted by heat, and

with exclusion of air, the wood suffered a peculiar kind of

decomposition, probably modified by the presence of salt water, as

suggested by Percy E. Spielmann. Scales of fish and other fossils of

the jet-rock are frequently impregnated with bituminous products,

which may replace the original tissues. Drops of liquid bitumen occur

in the cavities of some fossils, whilst inflammable gas is not

uncommon in the jet-workings, and petroleum may be detected by its

smell. Iron pyrites is often associated with the jet.

Formerly sufficient jet was found in loose pieces on the shore, set

free by the disintegration of the cliffs, or washed up from a

submarine source. When this supply became insufficient, the rock was

attacked by the jet-workers; ultimately the workings took the form of

true mines, levels being driven into the shales not only at their

outcrop in the cliffs but in some of the inland dales of the Yorkshire

moorlands, such as Eskdale. The best jet has a uniform black colour,

and is hard, compact and homogeneous in texture, breaking with a

conchoidal fracture. It must be tough enough to be readily carved or

turned on the lathe, and sufficiently compact in texture to receive a

high polish. The final polish was formerly given by means of rouge,

which produces a beautiful velvety surface, but rotten-stone and

lampblack are often employed instead. The softer kinds, not capable of

being freely worked, are known as bastard jet. A soft jet is obtained

from the estuarine series of the Lower Oolites of Yorkshire.

Much jet is imported from Spain, but it is generally less hard and

lustrous than true Whitby jet. In Spain the chief locality is

Villaviciosa, in the province of Asturias. France furnishes jet,

especially in the department of the Aude. Much jet, too, occurs in the

Lias of Württemberg, and works have been established for its

utilization. In the United States jet is known at many localities but

is not systematically worked. Pennsylvanian anthracite, however, has

been occasionally employed as a substitute. In like manner Scotch

cannel coal has been sometimes used at Whitby. Imitations of jet, or

substitutes for it, are furnished by vulcanite, glass, black obsidian

and black onyx, or stained chalcedony. Jet is sometimes improperly

termed black amber, because like amber, though in less degree, it

becomes electric by friction.

See P. E. Spielmann, "On the Origin of Jet," _Chemical News_ (Dec. 14,

1906); C. Fox-Strangways, "The Jurassic Rocks of Britain, Vol. I.

Yorkshire," _Mem. Geol. Surv._ (1892); J. A. Bower, "Whitby Jet and

its Manufacture," _Journ. Soc. Arts_ (1874, vol. xxii. p. 80).

JETHRO (or JETHER, Exod. iv. 18), the priest of Midian, in the Bible,

whose daughter Zipporah became the wife of Moses. He is known as Hobab

the son of Reuel the Kenite (Num. x. 29; Judg. iv. 11 ), and once as

Reuel (Exod. ii. 18); and if Zipporah is the wife of Moses referred to

in Num. xii. 1, the family could be regarded as Cushite (see Cush).

Jethro was the priest of Yahweh, and resided at the sacred mountain

where the deity commissioned Moses to deliver the Israelites from Egypt.

Subsequently Jethro came to Moses (probably at Kadesh), a great

sacrificial feast was held, and the priest instructed Moses in

legislative procedure; Exod. xviii. 27 (see EXODUS) and Num. x. 30 imply

that the scene was not Sinai. Jethro was invited to accompany the people

into the promised land, and later, we find his clan settling in the

south of Judah (Judg. i. 16); see KENITES. The traditions agree in

representing the kin of Moses as related to the mixed tribes of the

south of Palestine (see EDOM) and in ascribing to the family an

important share in the early development of the worship of Yahweh.

Cheyne suggests that the names of Hobab and of Jonadab the father of the

Rechabites (q.v.) were originally identical (_Ency. Bib._ ii. col.

2101).

JETTY. The term jetty, derived from Fr. _jetée_, and therefore

signifying something "thrown out," is applied to a variety of structures

employed in river, dock and maritime works, which are generally carried

out in pairs from river banks, or in continuation of river channels at

their outlets into deep water; or out into docks, and outside their

entrances; or for forming basins along the sea-coast for ports in

tideless seas. The forms and construction of these jetties are as varied

as their uses; for though they invariably extend out into water, and

serve either for directing a current or for accommodating vessels, they

are sometimes formed of high open timber-work, sometimes of low solid

projections, and occasionally only differ from breakwaters in their

object.

_Jetties for regulating Rivers._--Formerly jetties of timber-work were

very commonly extended out, opposite one another, from each bank of a

river, at intervals, to contract a wide channel, and by concentration

of the current to produce a deepening of the central channel; or

sometimes mounds of rubble stone, stretching down the foreshore from

each bank, served the same purpose. As, however, this system

occasioned a greater scour between the ends of the jetties than in the

intervening channels, and consequently produced an irregular depth, it

has to a great extent been superseded by longitudinal training works,

or by dipping cross dikes pointing somewhat upstream (see RIVER

ENGINEERING).

[Illustration: FIG 1.--Timber Jetty across Dock Slope.]

_Jetties at Docks._--Where docks are given sloping sides, openwork

timber jetties are generally carried across the slope, at the ends of

which vessels can lie in deep water (fig. 1); or more solid structures

are erected over the slope for supporting coal-tips. Pilework jetties

are also constructed in the water outside the entrances to docks on

each side, so as to form an enlarging trumpet-shaped channel between

the entrance, lock or tidal basin and the approach channel, in order

to guide vessels in entering or leaving the docks. Solid jetties,

moreover, lined with quay walls, are sometimes carried out into a wide

dock, at right angles to the line of quays at the side, to enlarge the

accommodation; and they also serve, when extended on a large scale

from the coast of a tideless sea under shelter of an outlying

breakwater, to form the basins in which vessels lie when discharging

and taking in cargoes in such a port as Marseilles (see DOCK).

_Jetties at Entrances to Jetty Harbours._--The approach channel to

some ports situated on sandy coasts is guided and protected across the

beach by parallel jetties, made solid up to a little above low water

of neap tides, on which open timber-work is erected, provided with a

planked platform at the top raised above the highest tides. The

channel between the jetties was originally maintained by tidal scour

from low-lying areas close to the coast, and subsequently by the

current from sluicing basins; but it is now often considerably

deepened by sand-pump dredging. It is protected to some extent by the

solid portion of the jetties from the inroad of sand from the adjacent

beach, and from the levelling action of the waves; whilst the upper

open portion serves to indicate the channel, and to guide the vessels

if necessary (see HARBOUR). The bottom part of the older jetties, in

such long-established jetty ports as Calais, Dunkirk and Ostend, was

composed of clay or rubble stone, covered on the top by fascine-work

or pitching; but the deepening of the jetty channel by dredging, and

the need which arose for its enlargement, led to the reconstruction of

the jetties at these ports. The new jetties at Dunkirk were founded in

the sandy beach, by the aid of compressed air, at a depth of 22¾ ft.

below low water of spring tides; and their solid masonry portion, on a

concrete foundation, was raised 5(3/5) ft. above low water of neap

tides (fig. 2).

[Illustration: FIG. 2.--Dunkirk East Jetty.]

_Jetties at Lagoon Outlets._--A small tidal rise spreading tidal water

over a large expanse of lagoon or inland back-water causes the influx

and efflux of the tide to maintain a deep channel through a narrow

outlet; but the issuing current on emerging from the outlet, being no

longer confined by a bank on each side, becomes dispersed, and owing

to the reduction of its scouring force, is no longer able at a

moderate distance from the shore effectually to resist the action of

the waves and littoral currents tending to form a continuous beach in

front of the outlet. Hence a bar is produced which diminishes the

available depth in the approach channel. By carrying out a solid jetty

over the bar, however, on each side of the outlet, the tidal currents

are concentrated in the channel across the bar, and lower it by scour.

Thus the available depth of the approach channels to Venice through

the Malamocco and Lido outlets from the Venetian lagoon have been

deepened several feet over their bars by jetties of rubble stone

surmounted by a small superstructure (fig. 3), carried out across the

foreshore into deep water on both sides of the channel. Other examples

are provided by the long jetties extended into the sea in front of the

entrance to Charleston harbour, formerly constructed of fascines,

weighted with stone and logs, but subsequently of rubble stone, and by

the two converging rubble jetties carried out from each shore of

Dublin bay for deepening the approach to Dublin harbour.

[Illustration: FIG. 3.--Lido Outlet Jetty, Venice.]

[Illustration: FIG. 4.--Mississippi South Pass Outlet Jetty.]

_Jetties at the Outlet of Tideless Rivers._--Jetties have been

constructed on each side of the outlet of some of the rivers flowing

into the Baltic, with the objects of prolonging the scour of the river

and protecting the channel from being shoaled by the littoral drift

along the shore. The most interesting application of parallel jetties

is in lowering the bar in front of one of the mouths of a deltaic

river flowing into a tideless sea, by extending the scour of the river

out to the bar by a virtual prolongation of its banks. Jetties

prolonging the Sulina branch of the Danube into the Black Sea, and the

south pass of the Mississippi into the Gulf of Mexico (fig. 4), formed

of rubble stone and concrete blocks, and fascine mattresses weighted

with stone and surmounted with large concrete blocks respectively,

have enabled the discharge of these rivers to scour away the bars

obstructing the access to them; and they have also carried the

sediment-bearing waters sufficiently far out to come under the

influence of littoral currents, which, by conveying away some of the

sediment, postpone the eventual formation of a fresh bar farther out

(see RIVER ENGINEERING).

[Illustration: FIG. 5.--River Maas Outlet, North Jetty.]

[Illustration: FIG. 6.--River Nervion Outlet, Western Jetty.]

_Jetties at the Mouth of Tidal Rivers._--Where a river is narrow near

its mouth, and its discharge is generally feeble, the sea is liable on

an exposed coast, when the tidal range is small, to block up its

outlet during severe storms. The river is thus forced to seek another

exit at a weak spot of the beach, which along a low coast may be at

some distance off; and this new outlet in its turn may be blocked up,

so that the river from time to time shifts the position of its mouth.

This inconvenient cycle of changes may be stopped by fixing the outlet

of the river at a suitable site, by carrying a jetty on each side of

this outlet across the beach, thereby concentrating its discharge in a

definite channel and protecting the mouth from being blocked up by

littoral drift. This system was long ago applied to the shifting

outlet of the river Yare to the south of Yarmouth, and has also been

successfully employed for fixing the wandering mouth of the Adur near

Shoreham, and of the Adour flowing into the Bay of Biscay below

Bayonne. When a new channel was cut across the Hook of Holland to

provide a straighter and deeper outlet channel for the river Maas,

forming the approach channel to Rotterdam, low, broad, parallel

jetties, composed of fascine mattresses weighted with stone (fig. 5),

were carried across the foreshore into the sea on either side of the

new mouth of the river, to protect the jetty channel from littoral

drift, and cause the discharge of the river to maintain it out to deep

water (see RIVER ENGINEERING). The channel, also, beyond the outlet of

the river Nervion into the Bay of Biscay has been regulated by

jetties; and by extending the south-west jetty out for nearly half a

mile with a curve concave towards the channel the outlet has not only

been protected to some extent from the easterly drift, but the bar in

front has been lowered by the scour produced by the discharge of the

river following the concave bend of the south-west jetty. As the outer

portion of this jetty was exposed to westerly storms from the Bay of

Biscay before the outer harbour was constructed, it has been given the

form and strength of a breakwater situated in shallow water (fig. 6).

(L. F. V.-H.)

JEVER, a town of Germany, in the grand-duchy of Oldenburg, 13 m. by rail

N.W. of Wilhelmshaven, and connected with the North Sea by a navigable

canal. Pop. (1901), 5486. The chief industries are weaving, spinning,

dyeing, brewing and milling; there is also a trade in horses and cattle.

The fathers (_Die Getreuen_) of the town used to send an annual birthday

present of 101 plovers' eggs to Bismarck, with a dedication in verse.

The castle of Jever was built by Prince Edo Wiemken (d. 1410), the ruler

of Jeverland, a populous district which in 1575 came under the rule of

the dukes of Oldenburg. In 1603 it passed to the house of Anhalt and was

later the property of the empress Catherine II. of Russia, a member of

this family. In 1814 it came again into the possession of Oldenburg.

See D. Hohnholz, _Aus Jevers Vorgangenheit_ (Jever, 1886); Hagena,

_Jeverland bis zum Jahr_ 1500 (Oldenburg, 1902); and F. W. Riemann,

_Geschichte des Jeverlandes_ (Jever, 1896).

JEVEROS (JEBEROS, JIBAROS, JIVAROS or GIVAROS), a tribe of South

American Indians on the upper Marañon, Peru, where they wander in the

forests. The tribe has many branches and there are frequent tribal wars,

but they have always united against a common enemy. Juan de Velasco

declares them to be faithful, noble and amiable. They are brave and

warlike, and though upon the conquest of Peru they temporarily

submitted, a general insurrection in 1599 won them back their liberty.

Curious dried human heads, supposed to have been objects of worship,

have been found among the Jeveros (see _Ethnol. Soc. Trans._ 1862, W.

Bollaert).