only for the sake of completing the parable-narrative, in order that the one point of comparison may be set in clear relief. Who is the rich man in the parable of the Rich Man and the Steward (Lk. xvi. 1 8q.)? Some say, God; others, the Romans; still others, the devil; and these are but a few of the answers which have been given. Who is the steward? We find a similar variety of answers: the wealthy, the Israelites, sinners, and even Judas Iscariot. The fact is that it makes no difference who the rich man is, or who the steward is. The point of the parable does not depend upon finding a counterpart for these persons. Whom does the servant who owed ten thousand talents represent? Who is the merchant who sought goodly pearls? Who the woman who puts the leaven in the meal, or the one who sweeps the house in search of the lost piece of money? No answers are to be sought to such questions. The meaning hinges on the action, not on the personnel, of these parables. The persons intro

duced are merely necessary as instruments to represent the significant act or event, and have, in themselves, no significance whatever.1

It is necessary now to illustrate, in some important. points, that popular Jewish theology which forms the background and presupposition of so much of Jesus' teaching. We will notice, first, the Jewish idea of God. The idea of God's exaltation above the world was carried so far by the Jews of Jesus' time that he was almost separated from the world. God was chiefly thought of as a judge Gos › JUDGE or governor. His relations with men were conceived of AND GOVER in a legal, rather than in a vital, way. God was an ac- AND EXACTIA .. countant who exactly credited all good deeds, and, with ADMINISTRAT equal exactness, estimated and punished all transgressions

a traditional form which the explanation had taken in the teaching of the community. Most interpreters have not hesitated, in spite of the absence of a formal and precise congruity in the explanation, to ascribe it to Jesus himself. Wendt, Teaching, I. 125, attributes this interpretation to Jesus, although he thinks it has been displaced from its original connection. See Lehre Jesu, p. 30 sq.

1 In this connection I would refer to the exhaustive study of the parabolic teaching of Jesus in Jülicher's Gleichnisreden Jesu.

R

of his law. It will readily be seen how the extreme deS.A'S GRACE velopment of this idea would tend to exclude the truth of God's grace from the minds of men, for the very idea of God's grace is that he treats men better than they deserve. This conception of God exerted a most potent influence on practical religion. The God who was far away in the heavens had made a revelation of his will in the laws and ceremonies of the Pentateuch, and religion consisted, to the mind of the Jew, in strict obedience to all the requireFMTHA IS ON ments of this legal system. The main emphasis was, accordingly, laid on the externals of religion as means of pleasing God and winning his favor.

EXTERNALS

FKTURE

There were, however, important elements of truth in the popular Jewish idea of God. The transcendence of God-his independence of the world and superiority to it was strongly emphasized, but the complementary truth of God's constant presence in the world was correspondingly obscured. And with this transcendence were associated ideas of arbitrariness, legal strictness and harshness, rather than ideas of moral excellence or love. So perverted an idea of God's nature and relations to the world could only lead to superficial conceptions of his will and requirements. The allusions which Jesus made to the religious ideas of the Pharisees show what popular religion had become. It was a round of ceremonies and observances most of which had nothing to do with the state of the heart and life-a tithing of mint, anise, and cummin, while judgment and the love of God were forgotten.

We are thus led to the consideration of the current idea of righteousness among the Jews in contrast to that which Jesus presents. Their idea of righteousness grew out of their conception of God and of his revelation. It consisted in obedience to commandments, and these commandments were looked at in quite an external way. The rich young ruler who came to Jesus asking what he should do to inherit eternal life (Mk. x. 17 sq.) is a concrete illustration of the view which the Jews took of the commandments. He said that he had kept them all. He

considered that to refrain from doing such evil deeds as stealing, lying, sabbath-breaking, and the like, which the commandments forbade, was to keep the commandments perfectly. Only a superficial conception of the import and bearing of the commandments could underlie his claim that he had kept them all from his youth. The same faulty notion of the real moral requirements of the law lay at the root of the pride and self-righteousness of the Pharisees. They thought themselves righteous only because they measured themselves by an imperfect standard.

It would not be correct to suppose that all the Jews believed themselves to have kept the law perfectly. On the contrary, they invented various devices by which they thought they could make good their personal deficiencies. Specially great sufferings and meritorious works, such as alinsgiving, were thought to have an atoning efficacy. The extraordinary merits of one's ancestors or friends. might avail to supply defects in obedience.1

One of two results was quite sure to flow from this externalism in religion, either of which would be destructive of a healthy religious life. On the one hand, if one supposed himself to have done all that was required, he would easily fall a prey to spiritual pride, for had not he achieved this lofty height of goodness by his own exertions? On the other hand, if a man felt that he had failed to do the divine will and to win acceptance with God, he would naturally become hopeless and despondent. We accordingly find that the religious life of the Jewish people, to a great extent, oscillated between self-righteousness and despair. The former of these tendencies is illustrated by the hypocrisy and self-righteousness which were the common characteristics of the Pharisees; the latter by the gloom and despair of a sincere religious mind in the pre-Christian experience of the apostle Paul which is reflected in the seventh chapter of Romans.

Now when Jesus came, he presented a very different idea of the way in which men are to find acceptance with God. He taught that trust or faith was what God required. 1 Cf. Weber, Jüdische Theologie (1897), § 63.

This teaching opens a way of salvation on which any one, however weak and sinful, may enter. It is not necessary to climb up into God's favor by meritorious works; nor is it possible, since the power of sin is so great in unrenewed human nature. In substituting faith for works Jesus gave quite a new character to religion. He opened the way to real repose of soul because in faith men do not rest upon their own achievements, but in God's mercy. They have a secure ground of hope in the goodness of God. But this faith is not a mere passive principle; it involves love and Tobedience. Real trust in God implies living fellowship with him. Thus faith sets man in his true relation to God because it both opens his life to the divine grace and also calls forth his own best aspiration and effort after likeness to God. Christ's teaching, therefore, replaces self-righteousness by humility, and substitutes confidence for despair. Its whole idea is that of a vital, loving relation with God.

LAR LEA

The teaching of Jesus presents a great contrast to the Jewish ideas of his time in regard to the person and work of the Messiah. The popular Messianic idea had been formed from those prophecies which represented the Messiah as a Prince or King. These representations were taken in a political sense. The Messiah was to be another David who should restore the Jewish monarchy to power and glory, subdue hostile nations, and rule the conquered world in unsurpassed majesty. When, therefore, Jesus appeared, claiming to be the Messiah, and yet did nothing which the Jews expected the Messiah to do, it is not strange that they rejected his claim. And when he began to teach that he must suffer death, his contemporaries were more than ever offended at his claim to be the Messiah. Even his disciples found it hard to overcome their Jewish prejudices respecting Messiah's person so far as to see how their Master could be destined to suffer death. "Be it far from thee, Lord; this shall never be unto thee" (Mt. xvi. 22), exclaimed Peter when Jesus said that he must suffer many things, and be put to death, and in so doing he doubtless voiced the general feeling.

The doctrine of a suffering Messiah was not current in pre-Christian Judaism.1 The dolores Messiae of which Jewish writers speak are not the Messiah's personal sufferings, but calamities which, it was believed, would come upon Israel and the world previous to, and in connection. with, Messiah's coming. The Old Testament passages which describe the suffering Servant of Jehovah, such as Isa. liii., were not applied to the person of the Messiah until Christian times. The Jewish Messianic ideal at the time when Jesus appeared was too much associated with thoughts of earthly power and glory to permit of reconciliation with the notion that the Messiah should die an ignominious death. The ideas of Jesus, therefore, stood in sharp contrast with the popular expectations of the Jews of his time respecting Messiah's work and kingdom.

The Jews of a later period believed that there was to be a preparatory Messiah, the son of Joseph, who was to die. as a warrior in defending the nation. He was not conceived of as preeminently a sufferer, nor was his death regarded as atoning. He was to prepare the way for the victorious Messiah, the son of David. Preparatory sufferings of a sympathetic and disciplinary nature were sometimes attributed to him during the time preceding his entrance upon his Messianic vocation.2

An inevitable result of the ideas of salvation, righteousness, and the kingdom of God which we have noticed, was that the Jews regarded themselves as the special favorites of heaven. To them, as they thought, God had given his only revelation, and to them he had restricted his saving mercy. The Old Testament had presented the idea that God had bestowed peculiar privileges upon the Jews in order that they might be the bearers of true religion to the world. They, on the other hand, considered their privi

1 Cf. Stanton, The Jewish and the Christian Messiah, pp. 122, 123; Schürer, Jewish People, Div. II. § 29. 12.

2 See Dalman, Der leidende und der sterbende Messias der Synagoge, who has shown that the dying Messiah, ben Joseph, and the suffering Messiah, ben David, must be kept entirely distinct. Cf. Weber, Jüdische Theologie, § 79. The contrary view is represented by Wünsche, Die Leiden des Messias.