The Quest of the Historical Jesus / A Critical Study of its Progress from Reimarus to Wrede

by Albert Schweitzer

Footnotes

[1.] Quoted by Dr. Inge in the Hibbert Journal for Jan. 1910, p. 438 (from “Jesus or Christ,” p. 32). [2.] “Quest,” p. 4. [3.] An order founded in 1776 by Professor Adam Weishaupt of Ingolstadt in Bavaria. Its aim was the furtherance of rational religion as opposed to orthodox dogma; its organisation was largely modelled on that of the Jesuits. At its most flourishing period it numbered over 2000 members, including the rulers of several German States.—Translator. [4.] D. Fr. Strauss, Gespräche von Ulrich von Hutten. Leipzig, 1860. [5.] W. Wrede, Das Messiasgeheimnis in den Evangelien. (The Messianic Secret in the Gospels.) Göttingen, 1901, pp. 280-282. [6.] In the author's usage “the Marcan hypothesis” means the theory that the Gospel of Mark is not only the earliest and most valuable source for the facts, but differs from the other Gospels in embodying a more or less clear and historically intelligible view of the connexion of events. See Chaps. [X.] and [XIV.] below.—Translator. [7.] Dr. Christoph Friedrich von Ammon, Fortbildung des Christentums, Leipzig, 1840, vol. iv. p. 156 ff. [8.] Hase, Geschichte Jesu, Leipzig, 1876, pp. 110-162. The second edition, published in 1891, carries the survey no further than the first. [9.] Das Leben Jesu in seinen neueren Darstellungen, 1892, five lectures. [10.] W. Frantzen, Die “Leben-Jesu” Bewegung seit Strauss, Dorpat, 1898. [11.] Theol. Rundschau, ii. 59-67 (1899); iii. 9-19 (1900). [12.] Von Soden's study, Die wichtigsten Fragen im Leben Jesu, 1904, belongs here only in a very limited sense, since it does not seek to show how the problems have gradually emerged in the various Lives of Jesus. [13.] Hase, Geschichte Jesu, 1876, pp. 112, 113. [14.] Historia Christi persice conscripta simulque multis modis contaminata a Hieronymo Xavier, lat. reddita et animadd, notata a Ludovico de Dieu. Lugd. 1639. [15.] Johann Jakob Hess, Geschichte der drei letzten Lebensjahre Jesu. (History of the Last Three Years of the Life of Jesus.) 3 vols. 1768 ff. [16.] D. F. Strauss, Hermann Samuel Reimarus und seine Schutzschrift für die vernünftigen Verehrer Gottes. (Reimarus and his Apology for the Rational Worshippers of God.) 1862. [17.] The quotations inserted without special introduction are, of course, from Reimarus. It is Dr. Schweitzer's method to lead up by a paragraph of exposition to one of these characteristic phrases.—Translator. [18.] Otto Schmiedel, Die Hauptprobleme der Leben-Jesu-Forschung. Tübingen, 1902. [19.] Döderlein also wrote a defence of Jesus against the Fragmentist: Fragmente und Antifragmente. Nuremberg, 1778. [20.] This is perhaps the place to mention the account of the life of Jesus which is given in the first part of Plank's Geschichte des Christentums. Göttingen, 1818. [21.] Briefe das Studium der Theologie betreffend, 1st ed., 1780-1781; 2nd ed., 1785-1786; Werke, ed. Suphan, vol. x. [22.] A Life of Jesus which is completely dependent on the Commentaries of Paulus is that of Greiling, superintendent at Aschersleben, Das Leben Jesu von Nazareth Ein religiöses Handbuch für Geist und Herz der Freunde Jesu unter den Gebildeten. (The Life of Jesus of Nazareth, a religious Handbook for the Minds and Hearts of the Friends of Jesus among the Cultured.) Halle, 1813. [23.] Paulus prided himself on a very exact acquaintance with the physical and geographical conditions of Palestine. He had a wide knowledge of the literature of Eastern travel.—Translator. [24.] This interpretation, it ought to be remarked, seems to be implied by the ancient reading. “Few things are needful, or one,” given in the margin of the Revised Version.—Translator. [25.] Associations of students, at that time of a political character.—Translator. [26.] The ground of the inference is that, according to this theory, they did not attach much importance to the keeping of the Feasts at Jerusalem. Dr. Schweitzer reminds us in a footnote that a certain want of clearness is due to the fact of this work having been compiled from lecture-notes. [27.]

See Theobald Ziegler, “Zur Biographie von David Friedrich Strauss” (Materials for the Biography of D. F. S.), in the Deutsche Revue, May, June, July 1905. The hitherto unpublished letters to Binder throw some light on the development of Strauss during the formative years before the publication of the Life of Jesus.

Binder, later Director of the Board of Studies at Stuttgart, was the friend who delivered the funeral allocution at the grave of Strauss. This last act of friendship exposed him to enmity and calumny of all kinds. For the text of his short address, see the Deutsche Revue, 1905, p. 107.

He to whom my plaint is
Knows I shed no tear;
She to whom I say this
Feels I have no fear.

Time has come for fading,
Like a glimmering ray,
Or a sense-evading
Strain that floats away.

May, though fainter, dimmer,
Only, clear and pure,
To the last the glimmer
And the strain endure.

The persons alluded to in the first verse are his son, who, as a physician, attended him in his illness, and to whom he was deeply attached, and a very old friend to whom the verses were addressed.—Translator.

Das Leben Jesu-Christi. Hamburg, 1837. Aug. Wilhelm Neander was born in 1789 at Göttingen, of Jewish parents, his real name being David Mendel. He was baptized in 1806, studied theology, and in 1813 was appointed to a professorship in Berlin, where he displayed a many-sided activity and exercised a beneficent influence. He died in 1850. The best-known of his writings is the Geschichte der Pflanzung und Leitung der christlichen Kirche durch die Apostel (History of the Propagation and Administration of the Christian Church by the Apostles), Hamburg, 1832-1833, of which a reprint appeared as late as 1890. Neander was a man not only of deep piety, but also of great solidity of character.

Strauss, in his Life of Jesus of 1864, passes the following judgment upon Neander's work: “A book such as in these circumstances Neander's Life of Jesus was bound to be calls forth our sympathy; the author himself acknowledges in his preface that it bears upon it only too clearly the marks of the time of crisis, division, pain, and distress in which it was produced.”

Of the innumerable “positive” Lives of Jesus which appeared about the end of the 'thirties we may mention that of Julius Hartmann (2 vols., 1837-1839). Among the later Lives of Jesus of the mediating theology may be mentioned that of Theodore Pressel of Tübingen, which was much read at the time of its appearance (1857, 592 pp.). It aims primarily at edification. We may also mention the Leben des Herrn Jesu Christi by Wil. Jak. Lichtenstein (Erlangen, 1856), which reflects the ideas of von Hofmann.

Anna Katharina Emmerich was born in 1774 at Flamske near Coesfeld. Her parents were peasants. In 1803 she took up her abode with the Augustinian nuns of the convent of Agnetenberg at Dülmen. After the dissolution of the convent, she lived in a single room in Dülmen itself. The “stigmata” showed themselves first in 1812. She died on the 9th of February 1824. Brentano had been in her neighbourhood since 1819. Das bittere Leiden unseres Herrn Jesu Christi (The Bitter Sufferings of Our Lord Jesus Christ) was issued by Brentano himself in 1834. The Life of Jesus was published on the basis of notes left by him—he died in 1842—in three volumes, 1858-1860, at Regensburg, under the sanction of the Bishop of Limberg.

First volume.—From the death of St. Joseph to the end of the first year after the Baptism of Jesus in Jordan. Communicated between May 1, 1821, and October 1, 1822.

Second volume.—From the beginning of the second year after the Baptism in Jordan to the close of the second Passover in Jerusalem. Communicated between October 1, 1822, and April 30, 1823.

Third volume.—From the close of the second Passover in Jerusalem to the Mission of the Holy Spirit. Communicated between October 21, 1823, and January 8, 1824, and from July 29, 1820, to May 1821.

Both works have been frequently reissued, the “Bitter Sufferings” as late as 1894.

Ch. G. Wilke, Tradition und Mythe. A contribution to the historical criticism of the Gospels in general, and in particular to the appreciation of the treatment of myth and idealism in Strauss's “Life of Jesus.” Leipzig, 1837.

Christian Gottlob Wilke was born in 1786 at Werm, near Zeitz, studied theology and became pastor of Hermannsdorf in the Erzgebirge. He resigned this office in 1837 in order to devote himself to his studies, perhaps also because he had become conscious of an inner unrest. In 1845 he prepared the way for his conversion to Catholicism by publishing a work entitled “Can a Protestant go over to the Roman Church with a good conscience?” He took the decisive step in August 1846. Later he removed to Würzburg. Subsequently he recast his famous Clavis Novi Testamenti Philologica—which had appeared in 1840-1841—in the form of a lexicon for Catholic students of theology. His Hermeneutik des Neuen Testaments, published in 1843-1844, appeared in 1853 as Biblische Hermeneutik nach katholischen Grundsätzen (The Science of Biblical Interpretation according to Catholic principles). He was engaged in recasting his Clavis when he died in 1854.

Of later works dealing with the question of myth, we may refer to Emanuel Marius, Die Persönlichkeit Jesu mit besonderer Rücksicht auf die Mythologien und Mysterien der alten Völker (The Personality of Jesus, with special reference to the Mythologies and Mysteries of Ancient Nations), Leipzig, 1879, 395 pp.; and Otto Frick, Mythus und Evangelium (Myth and Gospel), Heilbronn, 1879, 44 pp.

Wissenschaftliche Kritik der evangelischen Geschichte. (Scientific Criticism of the Gospel History.) August Ebrard. Frankfort, 1842; 3rd ed., 1868.

Johannes Heinrich Aug. Ebrard was born in 1818 at Erlangen, was, first, Professor of Reformed Theology at Zurich and Erlangen, afterwards (1853) went to Speyer as “Konsistorialrat,” but was unable to cope with the Liberal opposition there, and returned in 1861 to Erlangen, where he died in 1888.

A characteristic example of Ebrard's way of treating the subject is his method of meeting the objection that a fish with a piece of money in its jaws could not have taken the hook. “The fish might very well,” he explains, “have thrown up the piece of money from its belly into the opening of the jaws in the moment in which Peter opened its mouth.” Upon this Strauss remarks: “The inventor of this argument tosses it down before us as who should say, ‘I know very well it is bad, but it is good enough for you, at any rate so long as the Church has livings to distribute and we Konsistorialrats have to examine the theological candidates.’ ” Strauss, therefore, characterises Ebrard's Life of Jesus as “Orthodoxy restored on a basis of impudence.” The pettifogging character of this work made a bad impression even in Conservative quarters.

Georg Heinrich August Ewald, Geschichte des Volkes Israel. (History of the People of Israel.) 7 vols. Göttingen, 1843-1859; 3rd ed., 1864-1870. Fifth vol., Geschichte Christus' und seiner Zeit. (History of Christ and His Times.) 1855; 2nd ed., 1857.

Ewald was born in 1803 at Göttingen, where in 1827 he was appointed Professor of Oriental Languages. Having made a protest against the repeal of the fundamental law of the Hanoverian Constitution he was removed from his office and went to Tübingen, first as Professor of philology; in 1841 he was transferred to the theological faculty. In 1848 he returned to Göttingen. When, in 1866, he refused to take the oath of allegiance to the King of Prussia, he was compulsorily retired, and, in consequence of imprudent expressions of opinion, was also deprived of the right to lecture. The town of Hanover chose him as its representative in the North German and in the German Reichstag, where he sat among the Guelph opposition, in the middle of the centre party. He died in 1875 at Göttingen. His contributions to New Testament studies were much inferior to his Oriental and Old Testament researches. His Life of Jesus, in particular, is worthless, in spite of the Old Testament and Oriental learning with which it was furnished forth. He lays great stress upon making the genitive of “Christus” not “Christi,” but, according to German inflection, “Christus'.”

Christian Gottlob Wilke, formerly pastor of Hermannsdorf in the Erzgebirge. Der Urevangelist, oder eine exegetisch-kritische Untersuchung des Verwandschaftsverhältnisses der drei ersten Evangelien. (The Earliest Evangelist, a Critical and Exegetical Inquiry into the Relationship of the First Three Gospels.) The subsequent course of the discussion of the Marcan hypothesis was as follows:—

In answer to Wilke there appeared a work signed Philosophotos Aletheias, Die Evangelien, ihr Geist, ihre Verfasser, und ihr Verhältnis zu einander. (The Gospels, their Spirit, their Authors, and their relation to one another.) Leipzig, 1845, 440 pp. The author sees in Paul the evil genius of early Christianity, and thinks that the work of scientific criticism must be directed to detecting and weeding out the Pauline elements in the Gospels. Luke is in his opinion a party-writing, biased by Paulinism; in fact Paul had a share in its preparation, and this is what Paul alludes to when he speaks in Romans ii. 16, xi. 28, and xvi. 25 of “his” Gospel. His hand is especially recognisable in chapters i.-iii., vii., ix., xi., xviii., xx., xxi., and xxiv. Mark consists of extracts from Matthew and Luke; John presupposes the other three. The Tübingen standpoint was set forth by Baur in his work, Kritische Untersuchungen über die kanonischen Evangelien. (A Critical Examination of the Canonical Gospels.) Tübingen, 1847, 622 pp. According to him Mark is based on Matthew and Luke. At the same time, however, the irreconcilability of the Fourth Gospel with the Synoptists is for the first time fully worked out, and the refutation of its historical character is carried into detail.

The order Matthew, Mark, Luke is defended by Adolf Hilgenfeld in his work Die Evangelien. Leipzig, 1854, 355 pp.

Karl Reinhold Köstlin's work, Der Ursprung und die Komposition der synoptischen Evangelien (Origin and Composition of the Synoptic Gospels), is rendered nugatory by obscurities and compromises. Stuttgart, 1853, 400 pp. The priority of Mark is defended by Edward Reuss, Die Geschichte der heiligen Schriften des Neuen Testaments (History of the Sacred Writings of the New Testament), 1842; H. Ewald, Die drei ersten Evangelien, 1850; A. Ritschl, Die Entstehung der altkatholischen Kirche (Origin of the ancient Catholic Church), 1850; A. Réville, Études critiques sur l'Évangile selon St. Matthieu, 1862. In 1863 the foundations of the Marcan hypothesis were relaid, more firmly than before, by Holtzmann's work, Die synoptischen Evangelien. Leipzig, 1863, 514 pp.

We subjoin the titles of the divisions of this work, which are of some interest:

Vol. i. Book i. The Sources of the Gospel History.
Vol. i. Book ii. The Legends of the Childhood.
Vol. i. Book iii. General Sketch of the Gospel History.
Vol. i. Book iv. The Incidents and Discourses according to Mark.
Vol. ii. Book v. The Incidents and Discourses according to Matthew and Luke.
Vol. ii. Book vi. The Incidents and Discourses according to John.
Vol. ii. Book vii. The Resurrection and the Ascension.
Vol. ii. Book viii. Concluding Philosophical Exposition of the Significance of the Person of Christ and of the Gospel Tradition.

One of the most ingenious of the followers of Venturini was the French Jew Salvator. In his Jésus-Christ et sa doctrine (Paris, 2 vols., 1838), he seeks to prove that Jesus was the last representative of a mysticism which, drawing its nutriment from the other Oriental religions, was to be traced among the Jews from the time of Solomon onwards. In Jesus this mysticism allied itself with Messianic enthusiasm. After He had lost consciousness upon the cross He was succoured by Joseph of Arimathea and Pilate's wife, contrary to His own expectation and purpose. He ended His days among the Essenes.

Salvator looks to a spiritualised mystical Mosaism as destined to be the successful rival of Christianity.

Charles Émile Freppel (Abbé), Professeur d'éloquence sacrée à la Sorbonne. Examen critique de la vie de Jésus de M. Renan. Paris, 1864. 148 pp.

Henri Lasserre's pamphlet, L'Évangile selon Renan (The Gospel according to Renan), reached its four-and-twentieth edition in the course of the same year.

Lasserre, Das Evangelium nach Renan. Munich, 1864.

Freppel, Kritische Beleuchtung der E. Renan'schen Schrift. Translated by Kallmus. Vienna, 1864.

See also Lamy, Professor of the Theological Faculty of the Catholic University of Louvain, Renans Leben-Jesu vor dem Richterstuhle der Kritik. (Renan's Life of Jesus before the Judgment Seat of Criticism.) Translated by August Rohling, Priest. Münster, 1864.

Dr. Michelis, Renans Roman vom Leben Jesu. Eine deutsche Antwort auf eine französische Blasphemie. (Renan's Romance on the Life of Jesus. A German answer to a French blasphemy.) Münster, 1864.

Dr. Sebastian Brunner, Der Atheist Renan und sein Evangelium. (The Atheist Renan and his Gospel.) Regensburg, 1864.

Albert Wiesinger, Aphorismen gegen Renans Leben-Jesu. Vienna, 1864.

Dr. Martin Deutlinger, Renan und das Wunder. (Renan and Miracle. A contribution to Christian Apologetic.) Munich, 1864. 159 pp.

Dr. Daniel Bonifacius Haneberg, Ernest Renans Leben-Jesu. Regensburg, 1864.

Chr. Ernst Luthardt, Doctor and Professor of Theology, Die modernen Darstellungen des Lebens Jesu. (Modern Presentations of the Life of Jesus.) A discussion of the writings of Strauss, Renan, and Schenkel, and of the essays of Coquerel the younger, Scherer, Colani, and Keim. A Lecture. Leipzig, 1864.

Of the remaining Protestant polemics we may name:—

Dr. Hermann Gerlach, Gegen Renans Leben-Jesu 1864. Berlin.

Br. Lehmann, Renan wider Renan. (Renan versus Renan.) A Lecture addressed to cultured Germans. Zwickau, 1864.

Friedrich Baumer, Schwarz, Strauss, Renan. A Lecture. Leipzig, 1864.

John Cairns, D. D. (of Berwick). Falsche Christi und der wahre Christus, oder Verteidigung der evangelischen Geschichte gegen Strauss und Renan. (False Christs and the True, a Defence of the Gospel History against Strauss and Renan.) A Lecture delivered before the Bible Society. Translated from the English. Hamburg, 1864.

Bernhard ter Haar, Doctor of Theology and Professor at Utrecht, Zehn Vorlesungen über Renans Leben-Jesu. (Ten Lectures on Renan's Life of Jesus.) Translated by H. Doermer. Gotha, 1864.

Paulus Cassel, Professor and Licentiate in Theology, Bericht über Renans Leben-Jesu. (A Report upon Renan's Life of Jesus.)

J. J. van Oosterzee, Doctor and Professor of Theology at Utrecht, Geschichte oder Roman? Das Leben-Jesu von Renan vorläufig beleuchtet. (History or Fiction? A Preliminary Examination of Renan's Life of Jesus.) Hamburg, 1864.

Theodor Keim, Die Geschichte Jesu von Nazara, in ihrer Verhaltung mit dem Gesamtleben seines Volkes frei untersucht und ausführlich erzählt. (The History of Jesus of Nazara in Relation to the General Life of His People, freely examined and fully narrated.) 3 vols. Zurich, 1867-1872. Vol. i. The Day of Preparation; vol. ii. The Year of Teaching in Galilee; vol. iii. The Death-Passover (Todesostern) in Jerusalem. A short account in a more popular form appeared in 1872, Geschichte Jesu nach den Ergebnissen heutiger Wissenschaft für weitere Kreise übersichtlich erzählt. (The History of Jesus according to the Results of Present-day Criticism, briefly narrated for the General Reader.) 2nd ed., 1875.

Karl Theodor Keim was born in 1825 at Stuttgart, was Repetent at Tübingen from 1851 to 1855, and after he had been five years in the ministry, became Professor at Zurich in 1860. In 1873 he accepted a call to Giessen, where he died in 1878.

Geschichte Jesu. Nach akademischen Vorlesungen von Dr. Karl Hase. 1876. Special mention ought also to be made of the fine sketch of the Life of Jesus in A. Hausrath's Neutestamentliche Zeitgeschichte (History of New Testament Times), 1st ed., Munich, 1868 ff.; 3rd ed., 1 vol., 1879, pp. 325-515; Die zeitgeschichtlichen Beziehungen des Lebens Jesu (The Relations of the Life of Jesus to the History of His time).

Adolf Hausrath was born at Karlsruhe. He was appointed Professor of Theology at Heidelberg in 1867, and died in 1909.

Bernhard Weiss, Das Leben Jesu. 2 vols. Berlin, 1882. See also Das Markusevangelium, 1872; Das Matthäusevangelium, 1876; and the Lehrbuch der neutestamentlichen Theologie, 5th ed., 1888. Bernhard Weiss was born in 1827 at Königsberg, where he qualified as Privat-Docent in 1852. In 1863 he went as Ordinary Professor to Kiel, and was called to Berlin in the same capacity in 1877.

Among the distinctly liberal Lives of Jesus of an earlier date, that of W. Krüger-Velthusen (Elberfeld, 1872, 271 pp.) might be mentioned if it were not so entirely uncritical. Although the author does not hold the Fourth Gospel to be apostolic he has no hesitation in making use of it as an historical source.

There is more sentiment than science, too, in the work of M. G. Weitbrecht, Das Leben Jesu nach den vier Evangelien, 1881.

A weakness in the treatment of the Johannine question and a want of clearness on some other points disfigures the three-volume Life of Jesus of the Paris professor, E. Stapfer, which is otherwise marked by much acumen and real depth of feeling. Vol. i. Jésus-Christ avant son ministère (Fischbacher, Paris, 1896); vol. ii. Jésus-Christ pendant son ministère (1897); vol. iii. La Mort et la résurrection de Jésus-Christ (1898).

F. Godet writes of “The Life of Jesus before His Public Appearance” (German translation by M. Reineck, Leben Jesu vor seinem öffentlichen Auftreten. Hanover, 1897).

G. Längin founds his Der Christus der Geschichte und sein Christentum (The Christ of History and His Christianity) on a purely Synoptic basis. 2 vols., 1897-1898.

The English Life of Jesus Christ, by James Stalker, D. D. (now Professor of Church History in the United Free Church College, Aberdeen), passed through numberless editions (German, 1898; Tübingen, 4th ed., 1901).

Very pithy and interesting is Dr. Percy Gardner's Exploratio Evangelica. A Brief Examination of the Basis and Origin of Christian Belief. 1899; 2nd ed., 1907.

A work which is free from all compromise is H. Ziegler's Der geschichtliche Christus (The Historical Christ). 1891. For this reason the five lectures, delivered in Liegnitz, out of which it is composed, attracted such unfavourable attention that the Ecclesiastical Council took proceedings against the author. (See the Christliche Welt, 1891, pp. 563-568, 874-877.)

Holtzmann, Neutestamentliche Einleitung, 2nd ed., 1886. Weizsäcker declares himself in the Theologische Literaturzeitung for 1882, No. 23, and Das apostolische Zeitalter, 2nd ed., 1890.

Hase and Schenkel accepted this position in principle, but were careful to keep open a line of retreat.

Towards the end of the 'seventies the rejection of the Fourth Gospel as an historical source was almost universally recognised in the critical camp. It is taken for granted in the Life of Jesus by Karl Wittichen (Jena, 1876, 397 pp.), which might be reckoned one of the most clearly conceived works of this kind based on the Marcan hypothesis if its arrangement were not so bad. It is partly in the form of a commentary, inasmuch as the presentment of the life takes the form of a discussion of sixty-seven sections. The detail is very interesting. It makes an impression of naïveté when we find a series of sections grouped under the title, “The establishment of Christianity in Galilee.” No stress is laid on the significance of Jesus' journey to the north. Wittichen, also, misled by Luke, asserts, just as Weisse had done, that Jesus had worked in Judaea for some time prior to the triumphal entry.

A new edition appeared in 1891. There is no fundamental alteration, but in consequence of the polemic against opponents who had arisen in the meantime it is fuller. The first part of a third edition appeared in 1903 under the title Die messianisch-apokalyptischen Hoffnungen des Judentums.

See also the interesting use made of Late-Jewish and Rabbinic ideas in Alfred Edersheim's The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, 2nd ed., London, 1884, 2 vols.

Emil Schürer, Geschichte des jüdischen Volkes im Zeitalter Jesu Christi. (History of the Jewish People in the Time of Christ.) 2nd ed., part second, 1886, pp. 417 ff. Here is to be found also a bibliography of the older literature of the subject. 3rd ed., 1889, vol. ii. pp. 498 ff.

Emil Schürer was born at Augsburg in 1844, and from 1873 onwards was successively Professor at Leipzig, Giessen, and Kiel, and is now (1909) at Göttingen.

The latest presentment of Jewish apocalyptic is Die jüdische Eschatologie von Daniel bis Akiba, by Paul Volz, Pastor in Leonberg. Tübingen, 1903. 412 pp. The material is very completely given. Unfortunately the author has chosen the systematic method of treating his subject, instead of tracing the history of its development, the only right way. As a consequence Jesus and Paul occupy far too little space in this survey of Jewish apocalyptic. For a treatment of the origin of Jewish eschatology from the point of view of the history of religion see Hugo Gressmann, now Professor at Berlin, Der Ursprung der israelitisch-jüdischen Eschatologie (The Origin of the Israelitish and Jewish Eschatology), Göttingen, 1905. 377 pp.

Der Grundcharakter der Ethik Jesu im Verhältnis zu den messianischen Hoffnungen seines Volkes und zu seinem eigenen Messiasbewusstsein. Freiburg, 1895, 119 pp. See also his inaugural dissertation of 1896, Le Principe de la morale de Jésus. Paris, 1896.

A. K. Rogers, The Life and Teachings of Jesus; a Critical Analysis, etc. (London and New York, 1894), regards Jesus' teaching as purely ethical, refusing to admit any eschatology at all.

Israelitische und jüdische Geschichte, 1st ed., 1894, pp. 163-168; 2nd ed., 1895, pp. 198-204; 3rd ed., 1897; 4th ed., 1901, pp. 380-394. See also his Skizzen (Sketches), pp. 6, 187 ff.

See also J. Wellhausen, Das Evangelium Marci, 1903, 2nd ed., 1909; Das Evangelium Matthäi, 1904; Das Evangelium Lucae, 1904.

Julius Wellhausen, now Professor at Göttingen, was born in 1844 at Hameln.

Emil Schürer, Das messianische Selbstbewusstsein Jesu Christi. (The Messianic Self-consciousness of Jesus Christ.) 1903, 24 pp.

According to J. Meinhold, too, in Jesus und das alte Testament (Jesus and the Old Testament), 1896, Jesus did not purpose to be the Messiah of Israel.

Die evangelische Geschichte und der Ursprung des Christentums auf Grund einer Kritik der Berichte über das Leiden und die Auferstehung Jesu. (The Gospel History and the Origin of Christianity considered in the light of a critical investigation of the Reports of the Suffering and Resurrection of Jesus.) By Dr. W. Brandt, Leipzig, 1893, 588 pp.

Wilhelm Brandt was born in 1855 of German parents in Amsterdam and became a pastor of the Dutch Reformed Church. In 1891 he resigned this office and studied in Strassburg and Berlin. In 1893 he was appointed to lecture in General History of Religion as a member of the theological faculty of Amsterdam.

Ad. Jülicher, Die Gleichnisreden Jesu. Vol. i., 1888. The substance of it had already been published in a different form. Freiburg, 1886.

Adolf Jülicher, at present Professor in Marburg, was born in 1857 at Falkenberg.

Ad. Jülicher, Die Gleichnisreden Jesu, 2nd pt. (Exposition of the Parables in the first three Gospels.) Freiburg, 1899, 641 pp.

Chr. A. Bugge, Die Hauptparabeln Jesu (The most important Parables of Jesus), German, from the Norwegian, Giessen, 1903, rightly remarks on the obscure and inexplicable character of some of the parables, but makes no attempt to deal with it from the historical point of view.

Die jüdische Apokalyptik in ihrer religionsgeschichtlichen Herkunft und ihrer Bedeutung für das Neue Testament. (Jewish Apocalyptic in its religious-historical origin and in its significance for the New Testament.) 1903.

On the eschatology of Jesus see also Schwartzkoppf, Die Weissagungen Jesu Christi von seinen Tode, seiner Auferstehung und Wiederkunft und ihre Erfüllung. (The Predictions of Jesus Christ concerning His Death, His Resurrection, and Second Coming, and their Fulfilment.) 1895.

P. Wernle, Die Reichgotteshofnung in den ältesten christlichen Dokumenten und bei Jesus. (The Hope of the Kingdom of God in the most ancient Christian Documents and as held by Jesus.)

Franz Delitzsch, Die Bücher des Neuen Testaments aus dem Griechischen ins Hebräische übersetzt. 1877. (The Books of the N.T. translated from Greek into Hebrew.) This work has been circulated by thousands among Jews throughout the whole world.

Delitzsch was born in 1813 at Leipzig and became Privat-Docent there in 1842, went to Rostock as Professor in 1846, to Erlangen in 1850, and returned in 1867 to Leipzig. By conviction he was a strict Lutheran in theology. He was one of the leading experts in Late-Jewish and Talmudic literature. He died in 1890.

For the last phase of the discussion we may name:

Wellhausen, Skizzen und Vorarbeiten (Sketches and Studies), 1899, pp. 187-215, where he throws further light on Dalman's philological objections; and goes on to deny Jesus' use of the expression.

W. Baldensperger, “Die neueste Forschung über den Menschensohn,” Theol. Rundschau, 1900, 3, pp. 201-210, 243-255.

P. Fiebig, Der Menschensohn. Tübingen, 1901.

P. W. Schmiedel, “Die neueste Auffassung des Namens Menschensohn,” Prot. Monatsh. 5, pp. 333-351, 1901. (The Latest View of the Designation Son of Man.)

P. W. Schmidt, Die Geschichte Jesu, ii. (Erläuterungen—Explanations). Tübingen, 1904, p. 157 ff.

See the classical discussion in J. Weiss, Die Predigt Jesus vom Reiche Gottes, 1892, 1st ed., p. 52 ff.

In the second edition, of 1900, p. 160 ff., he allows himself to be led astray by the “chiefest apostles” of modern theology to indulge in the subtleties of fine-spun psychology, and explain Jesus' way of speaking of Himself in the third person as the Son of Man as due to the “extreme modesty of Jesus,” a modesty which did not forsake Him in the presence of His judges. This recent access of psychologising exegesis has not conduced to clearness of presentation, and the preference for the Lucan narrative does not so much contribute to throw light on the facts as to discover in the thoughts of Jesus subtleties of which the historical Jesus never dreamt. If the Lord always used the term Son of Man when speaking of His Messiahship, the reason was that this was the only way in which He could speak of it at all, since the Messiahship was not yet realised, but was only to be so at the appearing of the Son of Man. For a consistent, purely historical, non-psychological exposition of the Son-of-Man passages see Albert Schweitzer, Das Messianitäts- und Leidensgeheimnis. (The Secret of the Messiahship and the Passion.) A sketch of the Life of Jesus. Tübingen, 1901.

See Dalman, p. 60 ff.

John Lightfoot, Horae Hebraicae et Talmudicae in quatuor Evangelistas. Edited by J. B. Carpzov. Leipzig, 1684.

Christian Schöttgen, Horae Hebraicae et Talmudicae in universum Novum Testamentum. Dresden-Leipzig, 1733.

Joh. Gerh. Meuschen, Novum Testamentum ex Talmude et antiquitatibus Hebraeorum illustratum. Leipzig, 1736.

J. Jakob. Wettstein, Novum Testamentum Graecum. Amsterdam, 1751 and 1752.

F. Nork, Rabbinische Quellen und Parallelen zu neutestamentlichen Schriftstellen, Leipzig, 1839.

Franz Delitzsch, “Horae Hebraicae et Talmudicae,” in the Luth. Zeitsch., 1876-1878.

Carl Siegfried, Analecta Rabbinica, 1875; “Rabbin. Analekten,” Jahrb. f. prot. Theol., 1876.

A. Wünsche, Neue Beiträge zur Erläuterung der Evangelien aus Talmud und Midrasch. (Contributions to the Exposition of the Gospels from Talmud and Midrash.) Göttingen, 1878.

Rudolf Seydel, Professor in the University of Leipzig, Das Evangelium von Jesu in seinen Verhältnissen zu Buddha-Sage und Buddha-Lehre mit fortlaufender Rücksicht auf andere Religionskreise. (The Gospel of Jesus in its relation to the Buddha Legend and the Teaching of Buddha, with constant reference to other religious groups.) Leipzig, 1882, p. 337.

Other works by the same author are Buddha und Christus. Deutsche Bücherei No. 33, Breslau, Schottländer, 1884.

Die Buddha-Legende und das Leben Jesu nach den Evangelien. 2nd ed. Weimar, 1897. (Edited by the son of the late author.) 129 pp.

See also on this question Van den Bergh van Eysinga, Indische Einflüsse auf evangelische Erzählungen. Göttingen, 1904. 104 pp.

According to J. M. Robertson, Christianity and Mythology (London, 1900), the Christ-Myth is merely a form of the Krishna-Myth. The whole Gospel tradition is to be symbolically interpreted.

In the Catholic Church the study of the Life of Jesus has remained down to the present day entirely free from scepticism. The reason of that is, that in principle it has remained at a pre-Straussian standpoint, and does not venture upon an unreserved application of historical considerations either to the miracle question or to the Johannine question, and naturally therefore resigns the attempt to take account of and explain the great historical problems.

We may name the following Lives of Jesus produced by German Catholic writers:—

Joh. Nep. Sepp, Das Leben Jesu Christi. Regensburg, 1843-1846. 7 vols., 2nd ed., 1853-1862.

Peter Schegg, Sechs Bücher des Lebens Jesu. (The Life of Jesus in Six Books.) Freiburg, 1874-1875. c. 1200 pp.

Joseph Grimm, Das Leben Jesu. Würzburg, 2nd ed., 1890-1903. 6 vols.

Richard von Kralik, Jesu Leben und Werk. Kempten-Nürnberg, 1904. 481 pp.

W. Capitaine, Jesus von Nazareth. Regensburg, 1905. 192 pp.

How narrow are the limits within which the Catholic study of the life of Jesus moves even when it aims at scientific treatment, is illustrated by Hermann Schell's Christus (Mainz, 1903. 152 pp.). After reading the forty-two questions with which he introduces his narrative one might suppose that the author was well aware of the bearing of all the historical problems of the life of Jesus, and intended to supply an answer to them. Instead of doing so, however, he adopts as the work proceeds more and more the rôle of an apologist, not facing definitely either the miracle question or the Johannine question, but gliding over the difficulties by the aid of ingenious headings, so that in the end his book almost takes the form of an explanatory text to the eighty-nine illustrations which adorn the book and make it difficult to read.

In France, Renan's work gave the incentive to an extensive Catholic “Life-of-Jesus” literature. We may name the following:—

Louis Veuillot, La Vie de notre Seigneur Jésus-Christ. Paris, 1864. 509 pp. German by Waldeyer. Köln-Neuss, 1864. 573 pp.

H. Wallon, Vie de notre Seigneur Jésus-Christ. Paris, 1865. 355 pp.

A work which met with a particularly favourable reception was that of Père Didon, the Dominican, Jésus-Christ, Paris, 1891, 2 vols., vol. i. 483 pp., vol. ii. 469 pp. The German translation is dated 1895.

In the same year there appeared a new edition of the “Bitter Sufferings of Our Lord Jesus Christ” (see above, p. [109] f.) by Katharina Emmerich; the cheap popular edition of the translation of Renan's “Life of Jesus”; and the eighth edition of Strauss's “Life of Jesus for the German People.”

We may quote from the ecclesiastical Approbation printed at the beginning of Didon's Life of Jesus. “If the author sometimes seems to speak the language of his opponents, it is at once evident that he has aimed at defeating them on their own ground, and he is particularly successful in doing so when he confronts their irreligious a priori theories with the positive arguments of history.”

As a matter of fact the work is skilfully written, but without a spark of understanding of the historical questions.

All honour to Alfred Loisy! (Le Quatrième Évangile, Paris, 1903, 960 pp.), who takes a clear view on the Johannine question, and denies the existence of a Johannine historical tradition. But what that means for the Catholic camp may be recognised from the excitement produced by the book and its express condemnation. See also the same writer's L'Évangile et l'Église (German translation, Munich, 1904, 189 pp.), in which Loisy here and there makes good historical points against Harnack's “What is Christianity?”

Otto Schmiedel, Professor at the Gymnasium at Eisenach, Die Hauptprobleme der Leben-Jesu-Forschung. Tübingen, 1902. 71 pp. Schmiedel was born in 1858.

Hermann Freiherr von Soden, Die wichtigsten Fragen im Leben Jesu. Von Soden, Professor in Berlin, and preacher at the Jerusalem Kirche, was born in 1852.

We may mention also the following works:—

Fritz Barth (born 1856, Professor at Bern), Die Hauptprobleme des Lebens Jesu. 1st ed., 1899; 2nd ed., 1903.

Friedrich Nippold's Der Entwicklungsgang des Lebens Jesu im Wortlaut der drei ersten Evangelien (The Course of the Life of Jesus in the Words of the First Three Evangelists) (Hamburg, 1895, 213 pp.) is only an arrangement of the sections.

Konrad Furrer's Vorträge über das Leben Jesu Christi (Lectures on the Life of Jesus Christ) have a special charm by reason of the author's knowledge of the country and the locality. Furrer, who was born in 1838, is Professor at Zurich.

Another work which should not be forgotten is R. Otto's Leben und Wirken Jesu nach historisch-kritischer Auffassung (Life and Work of Jesus from the Point of View of Historical Criticism). A Lecture. Göttingen, 1902. Rudolf Otto, born in 1869, is Privat-Docent at Göttingen.

Von Soden gives on pp. 24 ff. the passages of Mark which he supposes to be derived from the Petrine tradition in a different order from that in which they occur in Mark, regrouping them freely. He puts together, for instance, Mark i. 16-20, iii. 13-19, vi. 7-16, viii. 27-ix. 1, ix. 33-40, under the title “The formation and training of the band of disciples.” He supposes Mark, the pupil of Peter, to have grouped in this way by a kind of association of ideas “what he had heard Peter relate in his missionary journeys, when writing it down after Peter's death, not connectedly, but giving as much as he could remember of it”; this would be in accordance with the statement of Papias that Mark wrote “not in order.” Papias's statement, therefore, refers to an “Ur-Markus,” which he found lacking in historical order.

But what are we to make of a representative of the early Church thus approaching the Gospels with the demand for historical arrangement? And good, simple old Papias, of all people!

But if the Marcan plan was not laid down in “Ur-Markus,” there is nothing for it—since the plan was certainly not given in the collection of Logia—but to ascribe it to the author of our Gospel of Mark, to the man, that is, who wrote down for the first time these “Pauline conceptions,” those reflections of experiences of individual believers and of the community, and inserted them into the Gospel. It is proposed, then, to retain the outline which he has given of the life of Jesus, and reject at the same time what he relates. That is to say, he is to be believed where it is convenient to believe him, and silenced where it is inconvenient. No more complete refutation of the Marcan hypothesis could possibly be given than this analysis, for it destroys its very foundation, the confident acceptance of the historicity of the Marcan plan.

If there is to be an analysis of sources in Mark, then the Marcan plan must be ascribed to “Ur-Markus,” otherwise the analysis renders the Markan hypothesis historically useless. But if “Ur-Markus” is to be reconstructed on the basis of assigning to it the Marcan plan, then we cannot separate the natural from the supernatural, for the supernatural scenes, like the feeding of the multitude and the transfiguration, are among the main features of the Marcan outline.

No hypothetical analysis of “Ur-Markus” has escaped this dilemma; what it can effect by literary methods is historically useless, and what would be historically useful cannot be attained nor “presented” by literary methods.

Von Soden, for instance, germanises Jesus when he writes, “and this nature is sound to the core. In spite of its inwardness there is no trace of an exaggerated sentimentality. In spite of all the intensity of prayer there is nothing of ecstasy or vision. No apocalyptic dream-pictures find a lodging-place in His soul.”

Is a man who teaches a world-renouncing ethic which sometimes soars to the dizzy heights such as that of Matt. xix. 12, according to our conceptions “sound to the core”? And does not the life of Jesus present a number of occasions on which He seems to have been in an ecstasy?

Thus, von Soden has not simply read his Jesus out of the texts, but has added something of his own, and that something is Germanic in colouring.

Albert Kalthoff, Das Christusproblem. Grundlinien zu einer Sozialtheologie. (The Problem of the Christ: Ground-plan of a Social Theology.) Leipzig, 1902. 87 pp.

Die Entstehung des Christentums. Neue Beiträge zum Christusproblem. (How Christianity arose.) Leipzig, 1904. 155 pp.

Albert Kalthoff was born in 1850 at Barmen, and is engaged in pastoral work in Bremen.

Against Kalthoff: Wilhelm Bousset, Was wissen wir von Jesus? (What do we know about Jesus?) Lectures delivered before the Protestantenverein at Bremen. Halle, 1904. 73 pp. In reply: Albert Kalthoff, Was wissen wir von Jesus? A settlement of accounts with Professor Bousset. Berlin, 1904. 43 pp.

A sound historical position is set forth in the clear and trenchant lecture of W. Kapp, Das Christus- und Christentumsproblem bei Kalthoff. (The problem of the Christ and of Christianity as handled by Kalthoff.) Strassburg, 1905. 23 pp.

“Jesus,” by Jülicher, in Die Kultur der Gegenwart. (An encyclopaedic publication which is appearing in parts.) Teubner, Berlin, 1905, pp. 40-69.

See also W. Bousset, “Jesus,” Religionsgeschichtliche Volksbücher. (A series of religious-historical monographs.) Published by Schiele, Halle, 1904.

Here should be mentioned also the thoughtful book, following very much the lines of Jülicher, by Eduard Grimm, entitled Die Ethik Jesu, Hamburg, 1903, 288 pp. The author, born in 1848, is the chief pastor at the Nicolaikirche in Hamburg.

Another work which deserves mention is Arno Neumann, Jesu wie er geschichtlich war (Jesus as he historically existed), Freiburg, 1904, 198 pp. (New Paths to the Old God), a Life of Jesus distinguished by a lofty vein of natural poetry and based upon solid theological knowledge. Arno Neumann is headmaster of a school at Apolda.

La Vie inconnue de Jésus-Christ. Paris, 1894. 301 pp. German, under the title Die Lücke im Leben Jesu (The Gap in the Life of Jesus). Stuttgart, 1894. 186 pp. See Holtzmann in the Theol. Jahresbericht, xiv. p. 140.

In a certain limited sense the work of A. Lillie, The Influence of Buddhism on Primitive Christianity (London, 1893), is to be numbered among the fictitious works on the life of Jesus. The fictitious element consists in Jesus being made an Essene by the writer, and Essenism equated with Buddhism.

Among “edifying” romances on the life of Jesus intended for family reading, that of the English writer J. H. Ingraham, The Prince of the House of David, has had a very long lease of life. It appeared in a German translation as early as 1858, and was reissued in 1906 (Brunswick).

A fictitious life of Jesus of wonderful beauty is Peter Rosegger's I.N.R.I. Frohe Botschaft eines armen Sünders (The Glad Tidings of a poor Sinner). Leipzig, 6th-10th thousand, 1906. 293 pp.

A feminine point of view reveals itself in C. Rauch's Jeschua ben Joseph. Deichert, 1899.

La Vie ésotérique de Jésu-Christ et les origines orientales du christianisme. Paris, 1902. 445 pp.

That Jesus was of Aryan race is argued by A. Müller, who assumes a Gaulish immigration into Galilee. Jesus ein Arier. Leipzig, 1904. 74 pp.

Did Jesus live 100 b.c.? London and Benares. Theosophical Publishing Society, 1903. 440 pp.

A scientific discussion of the “Toledoth Jeshu,” with citations from the Talmudic tradition concerning Jesus, is offered by S. Krauss, Das Leben Jesu nach jüdischen Quellen, 1902. 309 pp. According to him the Toledoth Jeshu was committed to writing in the fifth century, and he is of opinion that the Jewish legend is only a modified version of the Christian tradition.

William Wrede, born in 1859 at Bücken in Hanover, was Professor at Breslau. (He died in 1907.)

Wrede names as his real predecessors on the same lines Bruno Bauer, Volkmar, and the Dutch writer Hoekstra (“De Christologie van het canonieke Marcus-Evangelie, vergeleken met die van de beide andere synoptische Evangelien,” Theol. Tijdschrift, v., 1871).

In a certain limited degree the work of Ernest Havet (Le Christianisme et ses origines) has a claim to be classed in the same category. His scepticism refers principally to the entry into Jerusalem and the story of the passion.

Joel iii. 13, “Put in the sickle for the harvest is ripe!” In the Apocalypse of John, too, the Last Judgment is described as the heavenly harvest: “Thrust in thy sickle and reap; for the time is come for thee to reap; for the harvest of the earth is ripe. And he that sat on the cloud thrust in his sickle on the earth; and the earth was reaped” (Rev. xiv. 15 and 16).

The most remarkable parallel to the discourse at the sending forth of the disciples is offered by the Syriac Apocalypse of Baruch: “Behold, the days come, when the time of the world shall be ripe, and the harvest of the sowing of the good and of the evil shall come, when the Almighty shall bring upon the earth and upon its inhabitants and upon their rulers confusion of spirit and terror that makes the heart stand still; and they shall hate one another and provoke one another to war; and the despised shall have power over them of reputation, and the mean shall exalt themselves over them that are highly esteemed. And the many shall be at the mercy of the few ... and all who shall be saved and shall escape the before-mentioned (dangers) ... shall be given into the hands of my servant, the Messiah.” (Cap. lxx. 2, 3, 9. Following the translation of E. Kautzsch.)

The connexion between the ideas of harvest and of judgment was therefore one of the stock features of the apocalyptic writings. And as the Apocalypse of Baruch dates from the period about a.d. 70, it may be assumed that this association of ideas was also current in the Jewish apocalyptic of the time of Jesus. Here is a basis for understanding the secret of the Kingdom of God in the parables of sowing and reaping historically and in accordance with the ideas of the time. What Jesus did was to make known to those who understood Him that the coming earthly harvest was the last, and was also the token of the coming heavenly harvest. The eschatological interpretation is immensely strengthened by these parallels.

The thought of the Messianic feast is found in Isaiah lv. 1 ff. and lxv. 12 ff. It is very strongly marked in Isa. xxv. 6-8, a passage which perhaps dates from the time of Alexander the Great, “and Jahweh of Hosts will prepare upon this mountain for all peoples a feast of fat things, a feast of wine on the lees, of fat things prepared with marrow, of wine on the lees well refined. He shall destroy, in this mountain, among all peoples, the veil which has veiled all peoples and the covering which has covered all nations. He shall destroy death for ever, and the Lord Jahweh shall wipe away the tears from off all faces; and the reproach of His people shall disappear from the earth.” (The German follows Kautzsch's translation.)

In Enoch xxiv. and xxv. the conception of the Messianic feast is connected with that of the tree of life which shall offer its fruits to the elect upon the mountain of the King. Similarly in the Testament of Levi, cap. xviii. 11.

The decisive passage is in Enoch lxii. 14. After the Parousia of the Son of Man, and after the Judgment, the elect who have been saved “shall eat with the Son of Man, shall sit down and rise up with Him to all eternity.”

Jesus' references to the Messianic feast are therefore not merely images, but point to a reality. In Matt. viii. 11 and 12 He prophesies that many shall come from the East and from the West to sit at meat with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. In Matt. xxii. 1-14 the Messianic feast is pictured as a royal marriage, in Matt. xxv. 1-13 as a marriage feast.

The Apocalypse is dominated by the thought of the feast in all its forms. In Rev. ii. 7 it appears in connexion with the thought of the tree of life; in ii. 17 it is pictured as a feeding with manna; in iii. 21 it is the feast which the Lord will celebrate with His followers; in vii. 16, 17 there is an allusion to the Lamb who shall feed His own so that they shall no more hunger or thirst; chapter xix. describes the marriage feast of the Lamb.

The Messianic feast therefore played a dominant part in the conception of blessedness from Enoch to the Apocalypse of John. From this we can estimate what sacramental significance a guarantee of taking part in that feast must have had. The meaning of the celebration was obvious in itself, and was made manifest in the conduct of it. The sacramental effect was wholly independent of the apprehension and comprehension of the recipient. Therefore, in this also the meal at the lake-side was a true sacrament.

Difficult problems are involved in the prediction of the resurrection in Mark xiv. 28. Jesus there promises His disciples that He will “go before them” into Galilee. That cannot mean that He will go alone into Galilee before them, and that they shall there meet with Him, their risen Master; what He contemplates is that He shall return with them, at their head, from Jerusalem to Galilee. Was it that the manifestation of the Son of Man and of the Judgment should take place there? So much is clear: the saying, far from directing the disciples to go away to Galilee, chains them to Jerusalem, there to await Him who should lead them home. It should not therefore be claimed as supporting the tradition of the Galilaean appearances.

We find it “corrected” by the saying of the “young man” at the grave, who says to the women, “Go, tell His disciples and Peter that He goeth before you into Galilee. There shall ye see Him as He said unto you.”

Here then the idea of following in point of time is foisted upon the words “he goeth before you,” whereas in the original the word has a purely local sense, corresponding to the καὶ ἦν προάγων αὐτοὺς ὁ Ιησοῦς in Mark x. 32.

But the correction is itself meaningless since the visions took place in Jerusalem. We have therefore in this passage a more detailed indication of the way in which Jesus thought of the events subsequent to His Resurrection. The interpretation of this unfulfilled saying is, however, wholly impossible for us: it was not less so for the earliest tradition, as is shown by the attempt to give it a meaning by the “correction.”

Weisse and Bruno Bauer had long ago pointed out how curious it was that Jesus in the sayings about His sufferings spoke of “many” instead of speaking of “His own” or “the believers.” Weisse found in the words the thought that Jesus died for the nation as a whole; Bruno Bauer that the “for many” in the words of Jesus was derived from the view of the later theology of the Christian community. This explanation is certainly wrong, for so soon as the words of Jesus come into any kind of contact with early theology the “many” disappear to give place to the “believers.” In the Pauline words of institution the form is: My body for you (1 Cor. xi. 24).

Johannes Weiss follows in the footsteps of Weisse when he interprets the “many” as the nation (Die Predigt Jesu vom Reiche Gottes, 2nd ed., 1909, p. 201). He gives however, quite a false turn to this interpretation by arguing that the “many” cannot include the disciples, since they “who in faith and penitence have received the tidings of the Kingdom of God no longer need a special means of deliverance such as this.” They are the chosen, to them the Kingdom is assured. But a ransom, a special means of salvation, is needful for the mass of the people, who in their blindness have incurred the guilt of rejecting the Messiah. For this grave sin, which is, nevertheless, to some extent excused as due to ignorance, there is a unique atoning sacrifice, the death of the Messiah.

This theory is based on a distinction of which there is no hint in the teaching of Jesus; and it takes no account of the predestinarianism which is an integral part of eschatology, and which, in fact, dominated the thoughts of Jesus. The Lord is conscious that He dies only for the elect. For others His death can avail nothing, nor even their own repentance. Moreover, He does not die in order that this one or that one may come into the Kingdom of God; He provides the atonement in order that the Kingdom itself may come. Until the Kingdom comes even the elect cannot possess it.

As long ago as 1880, H. W. Bleby (The Trial of Jesus considered as a Judicial Act) had emphasised this circumstance as significant. The injustice in the trial of Jesus consisted, according to him, in the fact that He was condemned on His own admission without any witnesses being called. Dalman, it is true, will not admit that this technical error was very serious.

But the really important point is not whether the condemnation was legal or not; it is the significant fact that the High Priest called no witnesses. Why did he not call any? This question was obscured for Bleby and Dalman by other problems.

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