(b) What the Bible says of Jesus.
S. Matth. i. 21. Thou shalt call his name Jesus. xvi. 16 Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. S. John i. 14 the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth, 1 Cor. xvi. 23 our Lord Jesus Christ. S. Matth. i. 18 his mother Mary was found with child of the Holy Ghost. S. Luke i. 35 that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. S. Matth. xxvi. 39 O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. S. Mark xv. 15 Pilate, willing to content the people, released Barabbas unto them, and delivered Jesus, when he had scourged him, to be crucified. 25 and they crucified him. 37 And Jesus cried with a loud voice, and gave up {108} the ghost. 44 And Pilate marvelled if he were already dead. 45 And when he knew it of the centurion, he gave the body to Joseph. 46 And he . . . took him down . . . and laid him in a sepulchre which was hewn out of a rock, and rolled a stone unto the door of the sepulchre. xvi. 1-6 And when the sabbath was past . . . very early in the morning the first day of the week, they came unto the sepulchre at the rising of sun . . . the stone was rolled away . . . entering into the sepulchre, they saw a young man sitting on the right side . . . And he saith unto them . . . Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was crucified: he is risen; he is not here. S. John xx. 20 he shewed unto them his hands and his side. Then were the disciples glad, when they saw the Lord. Acts i. 10, 11 And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven. 1 Pet. iii. 22 (Jesus Christ) is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God; angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto him. S. Mark viii. 38 when the Son of Man cometh in the glory of his Father with the holy angels, S. Matth. xxv. 32 before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another. Rom. ii. 16 God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ. Acts x. 42 it is he which was ordained of God to be the judge of quick and dead. Rom. xiv. 10 we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ.
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Note i. Quick=living. Cf. S. John vi. 63, it is the spirit that quickeneth, A.-S. cwic.
Jesus=God the Saviour; or God is my Saviour: the same word as Joshua.
S. Matth. i. 21.
Christ=Anointed. Ps. ii. 2; cf. Acts iv. 26.
Note ii. Death is the separation of soul and body: the body returns to earth as it was (Eccl. xii. 7), and the spirit, or soul, returns to God who gave it. Resurrection is when the soul and body are reunited. While we are alive there is a continual change of particles which form the body; yet it is the same body. Similarly after death the particles decay, but the body of the Resurrection will be in that sense the same body (1 Cor. xv. 38). When we say that Christ was buried, we mean that His Body was buried, and in this Creed we add that He descended into hell: and we mean that His Soul went to the place of departed spirits, which are waiting for the Judgment. The word, Hell, has no meaning here of punishment. In Anglo-Saxon, helan=to cover, and hell=a covered place. In some parts of England we still hele (=cover) over roots to keep off the frost. Thus hell is used to translate Gehenna in S. Matt. v. 22, and also Hades in Acts ii. 27, 31, which last is the meaning here. This Creed should be compared in parallel lines with the Nicene Creed, in order to see what phrases are here which are omitted there. We shall notice the following: conceived, born, dead. He descended into hell, from the dead. It is clear that the Nicene Creed was framed to express more clearly the Godhead of Jesus, which had been denied {110} by Arius. The Apostles' Creed, on the other hand, expresses more clearly the true human nature of our Lord: His Birth and Death are more definitely stated—either because His Resurrection from the dead had been doubted, or because the verity of His human nature was not well understood. The words, He descended into hell, complete the statement that he died as truly and completely as other men die.
The passage, 1 Peter iii. 19, 20 has often been quoted as indicating that, in His death, He had a work to do amongst those who had died before He came on earth—viz. to carry to the blessed dead the glad tidings of His Conquest of Sin, whereby they, as well as others after them, are saved.
Note iii. Among early heretics were some who thought that Jesus, being truly God, could not have died except by a substitute—that he seemed to die. They were thence called Docetae (from dokein to appear). In like manner, many people have since attributed His Perfect Holiness to His Godhead only, and not to His human victory over real temptations. This Creed sets forth the Bible doctrine of His Manhood more particularly. But it also declares His Godhead—partly because the words, I believe in God, belong to all three paragraphs of it; and partly by the words, his only Son. See S. John i. 1-4, 14, 18; 1 S. John i. 3; S. Matth. xvi. 16. The Nicene Creed was prepared at a time when His Perfect Manhood was universally believed, but some thought that He was not God. It is therefore much fuller in the statement of His Godhead.
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