The belief in the second advent of Christ in another way must have helped to maintain the purity of the early Christians. Living in the constant expectation of his immediate coming, worldly pleasures seemed too transient and unsure to be worthy of attention. Their belief too, was invested with a vivid sense of reality. They expected to see their lord in all his heavenly majesty, not under strange and unknown conditions only to be experienced by passing through the gate of death, but in the midst of the familiar associations of earth. They awaited his appearance “in the very world which is the world of all of us,” and the shadow of his coming lay on all the thoughts and actions of their lives.
With the fading of so beautiful a dream the real corruption of Christianity began. As the years passed by, and Christ did not appear, the hopes of the Church gradually died away. The doctrine of his speedy coming at length became the last refuge of fanaticism. With it “the freshness of the early world” of Christianity finally perished; the Church never knew again the simplicity and purity which marked this period of its youth.
The expectation of the immediate coming of Christ was the sustaining principle of Jewish Christianity. The loss of it threw the Church completely into Pagan hands. While it prevailed, Christians cared little about the explanation of their theology; existing conditions were regarded as too provisional. But afterwards, when a long life seemed to lie before the Church, theological “pseudo-science” was born. New and complex doctrines were needed to engage the thoughts of Christians, and these Pagan Christianity supplied.
Though the Christianity of this period was thoroughly Jewish in the character of its doctrines, the preaching of it was addressed chiefly to Pagans. St. Paul was their representative among the heads of the Church, and preached almost exclusively to them. In turning to them, Christianity had to a certain extent to adapt itself to their ideas. The nature of this adaptation is clearly visible in the writings of St. Paul.
I have said that, in preaching to Jews, the watchwords of Christianity probably were “Jesus and the remission of sins.” In preaching to Pagans, these watchwords would not have been worth much. Pagans looked for no Messiah, nor were they likely to be inconveniently conscious of sin. The great doctrine of the Church on which stress was laid when it preached to Pagans, as we have clear evidence in St. Paul’s epistles, was the resurrection. Christianity attracted Pagans mainly by promising them the resurrection of the dead. This was naturally the case, as to them, unlike Jews, it was a novel doctrine. But the strength of Christianity in dealing with Pagans lay not merely in its assertion of the resurrection of the dead, but in the proof of the resurrection it professed to give. This, again, is plainly evident in the epistles of St. Paul. He dwells so much on the resurrection of Christ that we might suspect him to have been tainted originally with the scepticism of the Sadducees. By this peculiarity, however, he was exactly fitted to be the apostle of the Gentiles. With his writings before us, we may be sure that he preached to Pagans, as he is made to do in the Acts of the Apostles, “Jesus and the resurrection.”[70] To him the resurrection of Christ was the evidence for the general resurrection of the dead; while his conviction that Christ had risen from the dead rested on the belief that he as well as others had seen Christ after his death.[71] And so St. Paul could preach the resurrection to Pagans in a very effective manner, declaring that the dead would rise again, and giving as proof of this the fact that one man, Jesus, was known thus to have risen, as after his death he had been seen by many credible witnesses, including St. Paul himself. If God had raised Jesus, why should he not also raise other men? Christ had risen from the dead, and become the first-fruits of them that slept.
Thus while the watchwords of the Church in preaching to Jews were “Jesus and the remission of sins,” its watchwords in preaching to Pagans were “Jesus and the resurrection.” That the evidence on which this preaching was founded should have existed is natural enough. The disciples of Christ, as Jews, necessarily believed that he, after his death, had ascended to heaven, and was living there with God. Such being the case, there is nothing strange in their fancying that he occasionally appeared to them.[72] The death of Christ must have immediately weeded out of the Church all but his most faithful followers. It is not surprising that these, in the midst of the disturbance and excitement of those early days, should have seen visions of their lord, should have imagined that he came sometimes from heaven to console them and strengthen them in their weakness. People so superstitious, in a period of so much supernaturalism, were almost certain to see such visions. St. Paul’s own particular vision, which played so important a part in the history of early Christianity, of course can only be explained by referring to the peculiarities of his personal character.
This basing the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead on the resurrection of Christ had nothing to do with the subsequent belief that he rose on earth and stayed there for a time. St. Paul evidently believed that Christ appeared to others as well as to himself by coming straight from heaven, and that his resurrection had been his entrance into heavenly glory.[73]
In another and a more important respect the influence of its Pagan proselytes affected the principles of Jewish Christianity. In preaching to Pagans it was necessary to determine the nature of Christ. For Jews it was enough to call him the Messiah; their imagination supplied the rest. But Pagans, who had no Messianic expectations, required an explanation of his position as founder of the Church. This influence naturally was most felt by St. Paul, and through him it had a considerable effect in shaping the development of Christian doctrine.
St. Paul believed that Christ “was born of the seed of David according to the flesh, and declared to be the son of God in power by the resurrection from the dead.”[74] Thus St. Paul, as Strauss says, began the deification of Christ. Of course, as Strauss also points out, this was due to the fact that he had never personally seen Christ. Entering the Church some years after its founder’s death, when already legendary influences must have been active in exalting him, St. Paul had no knowledge of Christ to check his natural tendency to glorify the master whom he believed to have appeared to him in a blaze of heavenly light. The other Christians who saw visions of Christ had probably all known him during his life, and this must have interfered with their impulses to magnify him. Naturally, then, St. Paul went further than the other leaders of the Church, and, having seen Christ only in a heavenly vision, thought of him only as a heavenly being. The conception he ultimately formed of Christ in consequence of this tendency to exalt him is somewhat obscure. The term “son of God” in the mouth of a Jew might have only a vague meaning applicable to any man. As employed by St. Paul, it evidently has a special significance. He seems to have believed that Christ was the true Man, Man as he ought to be. Adam was the first and imperfect man, Christ was the second and perfect man. Thus God was the father of Christ in a fuller sense than that in which he was the father of ordinary men, as he had imparted to Christ more of his own nature. Through this possession of elements of the divine nature, Christ was able to represent and redeem mankind fallen under the power of sin. All faithful followers of him were to be made partakers of his divine characteristics, were to become children and heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ, were to suffer and be glorified with him.[75]