Did he have a social plan, and was it adapted to the needs of the twentieth as well as to those of the first Christian century? The records of Jesus’ work are so fragmentary that they have given to most readers the impression that he was simply an itinerant preacher and teacher without definite plan and method. Paul is ordinarily regarded as the great organizer who gave Christianity its corporate form. A more careful study of the facts, however, reveals a clearly defined aim and a systematic, comprehensive plan underlying all of Jesus’ work.
It is important to remember that for more than three-fourths of his life Jesus was an active business man and, therefore, in close touch with the economic and social life of his age. He was a son of Joseph, the technôn, that is, the constructor or builder. It is probable that the early death of Joseph left Jesus, the eldest son, in charge of this family firm of builders. The names of four other sons are given. This added responsibility would mean that Jesus was not only a manual laborer himself but was also accustomed to directing the work of others. The conclusion that he was a master builder, who knew the importance of a definite plan and method and of carefully counting the cost, is confirmed by many of his teachings. “Who of you, if he wishes to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the costs to see whether he has money to complete it? Or what king, on going to war with another king, does not first sit down and deliberate whether with ten thousand men he can withstand the one who is coming against him with twenty thousand?”
No one laid greater stress on foresight than did Jesus. At every point he reveals familiarity with system, method, and organization. In this respect he is more like the modern Occidental than the Orientals of his day. His detailed directions to his disciples, when he sent them out two by two to extend the bounds of his work, are models of business efficiency. “Take nothing but a staff,” which makes long journeys on foot comparatively easy. “Take no extra baggage,” which impedes progress. “Do not stop to greet any one on the road,” for the elaborate Oriental greetings often consumed hours of precious time. Commanded to take no food, they were dependent upon that Oriental hospitality which opened wide the door and the heart of those whom the disciples were to reach and to help. “Stop only at the homes where you receive a hearty welcome,” for there only can you do efficient work. “Be content with the entertainment provided, and do not go from house to house,” for in this way will you avoid wasteful distraction. “Go out two by two,” for this is the best unit in doing effective work (as our modern drives have amply demonstrated). Directness, economy, and practical efficiency characterize each of these commands. The principles underlying them are everywhere accepted as standard in the scientific business world of to-day.
Jesus, as portrayed in the earliest records, was not an impractical dreamer nor a wan ascetic, as ordinarily pictured in art and in popular imagination, but a practical man of affairs with definite plans and systematic methods of carrying them into execution.
The evidence that Jesus has a definite social plan is cumulative and convincing. From the beginning of his public appearance his thought and activities were shaped by it. It is the background of that dramatic story of the temptation, which comes straight from the lips of Jesus himself. Though its language is highly figurative, the story throws a flood of light upon Jesus’ purpose. The first temptation suggests the vigor with which he rejected the natural inclination to yield to the instinctive desire for ease and self-indulgence and to use his divine powers for his own happiness rather than that of society. The second and third temptations deal with the methods to be used in carrying out his far-flung social programme. Should he use sensational devices and by some miraculous act, such as throwing himself down from the temple heights, gratify the popular demand for divine credentials? Or should he realize his plan by compromise?
The breadth of his social outlook is clearly disclosed by this third temptation; from the first his plan included “all the kingdoms of the world and their glory.” The tempting thought came to him that these could easily be brought under his benign sway, if he would but set aside his lofty ideals, if he would but be silent regarding the crimes of the ruling powers, if he would but give up his exalted conception of the rule of God and fulfil the current national expectations that were beating strong in the hearts of the multitudes that thronged about him. As the event proved, they were eager to hail him as the popular Messiah. His temptation to bow down to Satan is vividly illustrated in the dramatic scene where Peter professes his faith in Jesus as the Messiah, and then tries to dissuade him from going up into Jerusalem to face shame and probable death. “Away with you, Satan,” is Jesus’ vehement exclamation, “for you are thinking the thoughts of man, not of God!” This striking incident makes it very clear that in the mind of Jesus there was a definite, practical plan, far different from that which obsessed his race and in the end lured them on to their ruin in the tragic years of 69 and 70. So eager was he to see its early adoption, not only by his race but by all nations, that short cuts and even compromises were to him very real temptations. But his social plan was so clearly defined that the specious doctrine that the end justifies the means could not swerve him. He had no desire to build a social structure that would rise and fall like the thousands that have been reared before and since—what Henry Adams describes as “the perpetual building up of an authority by force and the perpetual appeal to force to overthrow it.”
Jesus’ words to Peter, “On this rock I found my community,” indicated that he was seeking to build a structure that would endure, because it was built on the solid rock of reality and in accordance with the divine purpose. For this reason he keenly appreciated the importance of building on the right foundations and with the right material. The major part of his time and energy was devoted to preparing these materials. Hence his intense interest in the saving and remaking of men and women. Peter, the rock, was typical of the social citizens that he was seeking to develop and out of which he planned to build his new society.
Like Zoroaster, Confucius, and Gautama Buddha, Jesus was not content with presenting merely an abstract social programme. He was eager to incarnate it in flesh and blood, so that men could see it with their eyes and participate in it. With all the enthusiasm and energy of his kinetic personality, he went about laying the foundations for the new society. This aim alone explains why at first he left Galilee, went down into Judea, and allied himself with that courageous herald of the new social order, John the Baptist. When the opposition of the Jewish leaders and the cruel relentlessness of Herod Antipas closed the doors of Jerusalem and Judea to Jesus he returned to Galilee but not to Nazareth. He chose instead, as the scene of his future work, the great Jewish metropolis of Capernaum. Its choice as the centre of his public activity is exceedingly significant. Jesus was by birth and training a peasant. He always felt most at home among the tree-clad hills. City life had none of the attractions for him that it had for Paul, the cosmopolitan. Going to a great city was for Jesus a daring adventure. He went to Capernaum because it was the largest centre of Jewish population in northern Palestine. As the present ruins indicate, it extended for four or five miles along the northern shores of the Sea of Galilee, from the point where the Jordan enters the lake on the north to the borders of the plain of Genneseret to the northwest. Across the Jordan was Bethsaida, and a few miles to the north, at the head of a rocky gorge, was Chorazin, another of the many populous suburbs of the greater Capernaum.
In this huge metropolis were crowded “the lost sheep of the house of Israel” whom Jesus came to seek and to save. Jesus went down into the sickness and crime-infected slums of Capernaum to transform them and to make them the homes of happy, co-operating men and women. In that large, typical suburban centre he aimed to establish the fraternal community that was to be the corner-stone of the new social order that he hoped would ultimately include “all the nations of the world.”
He also chose the greater Capernaum because it was the focal centre from which the great international highways radiated in all directions. Past its western suburbs ran the main caravan road from Egypt and Philistia to Damascus and Babylonia. Other roads ran southward to Jericho and Jerusalem. Another great highway ran past it from Arabia northwestward across the plain of Genneseret to Tyre and Sidon, and then on to Antioch, Ephesus, Corinth, and Rome. It is evident that Jesus, not Paul, initiated early Christianity’s broad policy of establishing fraternal communities in the great strategic centres, and from there extending their influence to the smaller cities and towns, and thence to the surrounding country districts. This was clearly a part of his social plan, and the spread of these Christian communities to Jericho, Damascus, Cæsarea, and Antioch within the first decade after his death confirmed its practical wisdom.