Even more severe than his apostles in his use of denunciation, was the Great Master himself. In his controversies with the recognized religious leaders of his day, he heaped coals of fire upon their claims and teachings and practices.
“Ye leave the commandment of God and hold fast to the tradition of men,” he says to the Scribes and Pharisees; and then adds, with terrible irony, “Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your tradition.” Surely, when the commandments of God were placed side by side with rabbinical glosses, they were in an extremely cruel position!
No passage of invective, in any literature, is more crushing than this: “Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men; for ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in. Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made, ye make him two-fold more the child of hell than yourselves. * * * Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye devour widows’ houses and for a pretense make long prayers; therefore ye shall receive the greater damnation. * * * Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess. Blind Pharisees! cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also! Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchers which, indeed, appear beautiful outward, but within are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness. Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity. * * * Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, for ye are as graves which appear not, and men walk over them and are not aware of them.”
But not only the leaders, but the people also, fall under his lash. “The men of Nineveh shall rise up in judgment with this generation and shall condemn it, because they repented at the preaching of Jonas; and behold a greater than Jonas is here. The queen of the South shall rise up in the judgment with this generation and shall condemn it; for she came from the uttermost parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and behold a greater than Solomon is here! When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through dry places, seeking rest and findeth none. Then he saith, I will return to my house from whence I came out; and when he is come, he findeth it empty, swept and garnished. Then goeth he and taketh with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first. Even so shall it be also unto this wicked generation!”
Upon another occasion, he upbraided the cities in which he had wrought and preached. “Woe unto thee, Chorazin; woe unto thee Bethsaida; for if the mighty works had been done in Tyre and Sidon, which have been done in you, they had a great while ago repented sitting in sackcloth and ashes. But it shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the judgment than for you. And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted to heaven, shalt be thrust down to hell!”
Does it seem strange that such language should have come from the lips of Jesus? Should we not rather have expected it from the stern Baptist, his forerunner, who denounced the “brood of vipers” that came to his baptism? Is it inconsistent with that spirit of love which we believe to have been the distinguishing characteristic of Christ? But love is not mere invertebral amiability or moon-faced complacency. By as much as love is strong and true, by so much does it seek, at any cost and by any means, to remove the faults and follies of its object. If the lash be needed, the lash it will take. “He who has never experienced the affectionate bitterness of love,” says F. W. Robertson, “who has never known how earnest irony and passionate sarcasm may be the very language of love in its deepest, saddest moods is utterly incapable of even judging this passion!”
Here the writer’s task ends. The subject may be capable of much more elaborate treatment; it would be claiming too much to suppose that these chapters exhaust it. The writer trusts, however, that he may have suggested a line of study to others, as it was first suggested to him. The poetry, the dramatic portions, the oratory of the Scriptures, are unsurpassed. Viewed simply as a literary work, the Bible is the most interesting in the whole realm of letters. It becomes increasingly interesting, as its great human elements are recognized. Over history, biography, and most serious discourse, play the soft gleams of healthful humor and the lightning-like bolts of sarcasm and wit. The book touches human nature at all points. The more we view it as “literature,” the less as “dogma,” the firmer will become its hold upon the heart of man.
That these fragmentary studies may help some one to appreciate his Bible better and enjoy it more, is the writer’s wish. He may also express, in closing, the hope that whoever has taken the trouble to read these pages may have found them free from that which he disclaimed at the outset—irreverence; as he believes them to be free from the other extreme, superstition.