“This is sacred ground. I fear even to kneel, much less to tread upon it. But I think the Lord Jesus meant this also, amidst a multitude of meanings, ‘O Father, why hast thou forsaken me, making me feel one with the sinners whom thou forsakest? Is it that thou art breaking for a time the sensible bond between me and thee in order to bind me to them? Is it that I may be made one with them, so as to make them one with me? Wouldst thou make me to be sin that the world may be made to be righteousness?’”
I remembered the words of Paul, “Him that knew not sin God made sin in our behalf”: but I had never understood them before. Nor did I now, but I thought I caught a glimpse of their meaning. It was only a glimpse, and I sat silent, afraid as it were to move lest I should lose it. I seemed in a new world, or rather, in a mixed world, in which the old and the new were contending. I could neither see clearly nor move freely as yet. I felt that light and freedom were around and very near, forcing their way towards me, if I would but reach out my hand to them. But I could not do it.
“I feel,” said I, “as though, in time, these hard words might become intelligible, or rather, I should say, beautiful and full of comfort to me. But how different they are from the last words of Socrates!” “Most different,” replied Clemens. “Often have I pondered on the difference. I was born in Athens, and I admire the literature and language of my native city. But my mother was of Jewish extraction; and when I worship, and pray, and feel sorrow, and seek consolation, it is in the thought and phrase (though not in the language) of my mother’s people. And again and again have I reflected on the strange contrast between the two ‘last words,’ the Jewish and the Greek. These ‘last words’ represent last thoughts. Socrates felt righteous, and happy, and not ‘forsaken,’ and not at all anxious about his friends nor about his doctrine. The Lord Jesus felt forsaken—doubly forsaken. First He sorrowed for His disciples because He knew that they would forsake Him; and He prayed for them that they might not utterly fail. Afterwards He Himself felt forsaken by the Father.
“Perhaps, so far, Socrates may seem to have the advantage. But what has followed? Socrates is enshrined in books, a companion and dear friend of students for ever, but in books. He is not for the crowd in the street, nor for the ploughman in the field, nor for the poor, the simple, and the unlettered. And though he may fortify some of us against the fear of death, he does not bring the deepest consolation to those who are suffering under a perpetual burden of pains or sorrows. But the Spirit of the Lord Jesus moves among all sorts and conditions of life in all the races of mankind, bringing joy to them that rejoice righteously, and wholesome sorrow to those that sin, and strength to the heavy laden, and comfort to all that mourn, and freedom from all servile fear. Yes, He brings freedom, even to those enemies against whom He makes war, turning their consciences against themselves and making them His willing captives to lead others captive in turn. For indeed this captivity is no captivity but an embracing with the arms of a Father revealed in the Son according to the words of Hosea ‘I taught Ephraim to walk. I took him in my arms. He knew not that I healed him. I drew him with cords, with bands of love.’ Dear friend, it is my firm conviction that those only can relieve pain of the heart who have felt pain of the heart. Those only can save the forsaken who have felt forsaken. It was in fact because Christ had been forsaken that He was enabled to draw Paul towards Him with the cords of His constraining love.”
“But,” said I, “if love was the foundation of Christ’s doctrine, how is it that Mark hardly ever mentions it? Should I be wrong in saying that Mark never mentions ‘love’ at all except in one place where Jesus, being asked what is the greatest commandment, quotes from the scripture the ancient commandment to love God and one’s neighbour?” “Alas,” replied Clemens, “you would be only too right! Yet believe me, Christ’s doctrine of doctrines was ‘love’—and that, too, not the old commandment, but a new commandment, because Christ introduced into the world a new kind of love, a more powerful love, a constraining love. This He imparted through His blood to His disciples, as is made clear in this new gospel”—and here he took a roll out of his garment—“about which I spoke to you lately, and in a letter, by the same author, which is an appendix to the gospel.” And then he read to me, from John’s gospel, the words, “A new commandment give I unto you that ye love one another,” and “By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples if ye have love one to another”; and he pointed out the newness and greatness of the love, reading the words, “Greater love hath no man than this that a man lay down his life for his friends.” Lastly, he added, from the epistle, “God is love.”
All this astonished me not a little, and I replied, “Here at last, it seems to me, we have the only true gospel, Paul’s gospel, the gospel of the constraining love of Christ. But how came it to pass that, whereas this was the true gospel, such a gospel as Mark’s, full of marvels, and portents, and exorcisms, should be the first published to the world—so I have been told on good authority—a gospel that gives a whole column to the dancing of the daughter of Herodias and not one line to ‘love one another’?”
“Often and often,” replied Clemens, “have I asked myself the same question. I think, though I am not sure, that the reason is this. After the resurrection of the Lord, the apostles went forth to the world to attest the resurrection, and to preach the gospel, saying, in effect, what we find Peter and Paul actually saying in their epistles. But perhaps you have not read Peter’s epistle?” I had not. “If you had, you would have found that Peter, like Paul, teaches this commandment of love. Doubtless all the apostles did the same. Consequently, before any gospels were written, all the churches were familiar with this doctrine of love, and with the doctrine of the resurrection. These were the important things. These had been handed down by the apostles to the elders, and by the first generation of the elders to the second. These, therefore, the churches knew. But the unimportant things, as Paul deemed them, the things that concerned Christ in the flesh, and His works of healing and of casting out spirits, and His sayings in the flesh to the disciples, and His discussions and controversies with the Pharisees, and how He was delivered over to Pilate, and how He suffered this and that particular humiliation (such as ‘spitting’ and ‘smiting’) in exact accordance with the scriptures—these things the churches had not committed to memory in any kind of detail. These therefore the earliest evangelist wrote down. Hence it came to pass that he recorded, in large measure, not the most important but the least important things.”
“I understand now,” said I, “but is it not to be regretted?” “For all reasons but one,” replied Clemens, “I think it is to be regretted. I am often sorry that Mark does not give us the Lord’s Prayer. I suppose he omitted it, as being known to everybody. But, as it is, we have two versions, and Matthew’s is very different from Luke’s. A version by Mark might have taught us whether the two versions are from one original, or whether the Lord gave His disciples two prayers at two different times—perhaps one before the resurrection, one after it. Again, Mark does not give us any account of the Lord’s resurrection. Some think that a page of the manuscript of his gospel was lost. I, too, once thought so; but now I am disposed to think that he stopped short here, saying, ‘Here begins the testimony of the apostles. It is their part to testify to the Lord’s resurrection.’ In any case it is to be regretted.”
“But,” said I, “your expression, just now, was, ‘to be regretted for all reasons but one.’ What did you mean by that?” “I meant,” said Clemens, “that if all the evangelists had agreed exactly in their reports of all Christ’s words, there might have been, amidst many advantages, this one disadvantage, the danger that the letter of the words of the Lord might have become a second law, like the law of Moses, to be interpreted by lawyers. In that case, what the Lord said about divorce, and marriage, and about the manner of life of the evangelists, and their sustenance, and about giving up or retaining one’s possessions—all these things might have been collected into a small code. On this code might have been written a large commentary; on that, perhaps, another commentary, still larger. Thus the Church of Christ might have drifted into the legalities of men far away from the one true law of Christ, as it is defined in Paul’s epistles ‘Bear ye one another’s burdens,’ and (in the new gospel that I shewed you just now) ‘Love one another with the love with which I have loved you’.”
“Tell me more about that new gospel,” said I. “I would gladly do so,” said Clemens, “if time permitted. But the shadows are lengthening and the hour we were to spend together is past. Most willingly would I stay with you, but my work calls me away. Tomorrow, however, if you would like to come to my lodging in the house of Justus, at the corner of the market-place, soon after sunset, I shall have returned to Nicopolis, and you shall have a sight of the new gospel and such aid as I can give you in explaining it.” So we parted for the time, after I had eagerly accepted his invitation.