3

unless He were conscious of standing by His sinlessness in contrast with us. If, then, Christ has directly or indirectly, while regarding all men as sinners, ascribed sinless perfection to Himself, then in view of His lofty moral pre-eminence, which no one denies, the inference follows, that His self-consciousness must have acquitted Him of sin and guilt; for it would be irreconcilable with the most ordinary measure of love for truth, that with the consciousness of being a sinner, He should have represented Himself as sinless. The stress we lay upon this is all the more warranted, as it is this very love of truth, this shrinking from all hypocrisy, self-complacency, and deceitful pretence concerning Himself that is so outstanding a feature in His character.1 He, further, declared without doubt the deliverance of men from sin and their reconciliation to be His life-work and mission.2 He knows that He has come as a divinely sent σwTnp to seek the lost, to heal the spiritually sick. But He could not speak thus if His self-consciousness told Him that He belonged to those who need redemption. He was therefore conscious to Himself of mastery over sin, and of ability to introduce to communion with God. Moreover, as judge of the world He puts Himself, as even the most thoroughgoing scepticism confesses, in contrast with the whole of mankind. Not merely is there no vestige of His having felt the need of conversion and forgiveness, but He lays express claim to having fulfilled God's will without defect, not merely the prophets, but also the law." He could only speak thus, provided His self-consciousness were constituted altogether differently from ours, acquitting Him of sin and guilt. All men not wantonly oblivious of sin, because conscious to themselves of sin and guilt, stand under the law, and upon remembrance of God are so burdened with the consciousness of discord, with fear or anxiety, that of themselves they have no power to stretch their gaze beyond the legal position, and to form a vivid conception of a higher stage of existence than that of the law. Nay, they involuntarily regard the legal stage of piety and devotion to duty as the highest attainable

1 Cf. Matt. vi. 2, 5, 16, vii. 5, xv. 7, xvi. 3, xxiii.

2 Matt. ix. 13, xx. 28, xxvi. 28.

John v. 22-27; Matt. xxv., xiii. 41; Luke xxi. 5 John viii. 29, 44; Matt. v. 17.

3 Matt. xi. 27 ff.

by man, because they are altogether without experience of any higher stage of the spirit. But Christ's position is that of the free Son in the house. In Him the law has become life and power. He is in the law (evvoμos), and the law in Him is transfigured into freedom, into delight in love. This position of His, not legal but free and evangelical, also proves with certainty that the image of His life cannot be the invention. of His disciples, but that they describe Him as they do, full of grace and truth, because they so beheld Him. His being was the ground and source of their image of Him. Only through Him did the intuition of freedom, of a stage above the law, become theirs. The first step was, and must necessarily be, the actual manifestation of the oneness of God and humanity in His person. The second was its intuition, and the delineation of what they beheld in testimony and life. This original, altogether new stage of freedom He assumes in relation to the law of the O. T. as to cleansing, food, the Sabbath, in relation to sacrifice and the temple of Israel, nay, in relation to all O. T. institutions. The Son stands above Moses and the prophets, who, although faithful, were but faithful servants. Finally, the pure historic character, the credibility and uninventibleness of the image of His life is especially seen when we consider the nature of the Messianic hopes cherished by His disciples on their joining themselves to Him, and on the other hand, the plan, and the independently-pursued course of His work; for to the expectations which had led them to Him He presented the sharpest contrast. His work was laid out on a scale of such peculiar grandeur that His disciples could scarcely grasp, to say nothing of inventing it. Without haste, with divine calmness, with wisdom and unwearying patience, He pursued His way. Restlessly He laboured in word, in act, in doing good, while it was day, to gather His people round Him. When the teachings of His wisdom, when His holy walk and the acts of His power and love done to friends and foes, even those of healing, are unable, as He knew before they would be, to evoke any response but treachery and denial, and to impart to them a new and higher life, even then His faithfulness does not give men up. He is conscious of possessing yet another power,

1 John i. 14.

2 Matt. xi. 11, xxi. 33-44.

which can only operate after His death.

This is the power of

His death itself as a loving sacrifice for a thankless world that rejects Him. The fact that of His own free will, defenceless and unarmed, He gives Himself up a complete sacrifice, while not giving up the love which with a Redeemer's heart embraces His people and humanity, and dying, implores forgiveness for the sinners, His foes,-this it is which disarms the enmity, the pride and deceit, the resistance of the stubborn, self-conceited, and self-righteous heart, in altogether another way than could be done by manifestations of power and law, judgment and penalty, this draws forth even from hard hearts the last sparks of human feeling, and by awakening penitence and shame, as well as by encouraging the desponding and self-despairing, makes way for the Spirit of love, who leads those who believe in Him up above the law into a realm of peace, to the stage of freedom belonging to the perfect religion. What can be conceived more daring and withal more humble than the apparent contradiction, that on one side He desires to be king of spirits in a realm of freedom, even as He is in Himself full of a kingly spirit, but desires to become such by giving Himself up a complete sacrifice, allowing sinners to work their will on Him, undergoing thus the death of a transgressor, while not giving up the certainty of the divine force of suffering, dying love? In complete self-forgetfulness of love He would educe blessing from the curse and the curse-deserving, life from death. This is a divine conception so sublime, so full of wondrous originality and wisdom, so opposed to every wish and expectation of His disciples, so contrary to all human calculation and putting it to complete shame, formed in the lonely stillness of His heart at one with God, apart from all fanatical enthusiasm, but carried out in spontaneous obedience to the known will of His Father, with calm energy, patience, and collectedness, that nothing but obtuseness can call in question the uninventibleness, the historic reality of this wondrous character. And this divine folly of self-sacrificing love, how it has proved itself to be divine wisdom, the unveiling of a mystery that contains the power to vanquish hearts, and thus the world, and to unravel all the world's disharmonies! For all strife and discord within us and without us, springs only from the spirit that shuns sacrifice, that

shuns the blessed death of the self-willed, selfish nature. Such love as He displayed is the outflowing of the eternal divine life, the flame of the divine love itself, which was immortal, inextinguishable, "because it knew how to convert even the most hostile element into a stimulus to its own pure energy," so that in contending against hostile powers its fire could only shine the brighter. Moreover, on these grounds this historical manifestation is still warranted in asking to-day, "Which of you convinceth me of sin? But if I speak the truth, wherefore do ye not believe me?" On every one not destitute of susceptibility it must make the impression: Here is holy ground, here is the temple of humanity! He stands there in the character of a phenomenon inexplicable by the continuity of the species. His person is a miracle, consummating the miracle of creation. Such holiness and love of itself suggests a quite peculiar relation to God as its ground, and that from birth, because a previous life of sin could not fail to render itself perceptible in still operative traces. But this union of His with God is also expressed in numerous passages, in which His self-consciousness finds utterance, as when He calls Himself, not merely in John, but also in the other Evangelists, the Son of God and Son of man, who is in the Father as the Father is in Him; or describes Himself as He who brings to completion the O. T. revelation, and as He who realizes righteousness in a perfect, truly human life, and through both together as the establisher of the new eternal covenant between God and humanity, the founder of the kingdom of heaven.1

To this is to be added another aspect of His manifestation closely connected therewith. In general He displayed a freedom in relation to nature that was in close connection with His moral perfection. The stage of moral, divine freedom, is far above the powerlessness of the mere legal standpoint, and presupposes an endowment with real force, which is in itself a new creation, through which the first creation is perfected, and which points back to a divine fountain. In this way it is only in harmony with such a personality, that it did not remain powerless in presence of death, but that after being tested

'Matt. xi. 25 ff., xxii. 41 ff., xxiv. 35, v. 17, xviii. 20, xxviii. 19 f.; Luke iii. 22, iv. 18, v. 24; John xiv. 6, x. 30, vi., vii.

DORNER.-CHRIST. DOCT. II.

T

by death it raised itself to a glorified form of life free from the dominion of death. To the same freedom in relation to nature we are also referred by those works which form a weighty portion of His official life, and are so closely interwoven therewith, that they could not be taken out of it without tearing to pieces the entire web. If it is certain, as was formerly established,1 that in order to the introduction of a revelation, miracles are necessarily to be expected, if Christ's elevation and force of will, such as are bound up with His sinless perfection, are certain, then the reasons which are supposed to justify doubt of the historical credibility of His miraculous. power lose their force, then His miraculous acts in general are not less attested than His just as miraculous personal manifestation. This being so, that we may be able to recognise His dignity, we have beside the moral aspect of His being the evidence of His peculiar power over Nature, a power which, in accordance with His declarations, suggests again His peculiar vital connection with God and souls, as a testimony on His behalf until a body of spiritual testimony to Him has had time to grow up. And thus our summary conclusion is: His moral character, like His endowment with power over Nature, points back to the supreme meeting-point of spirit and nature -to God; and because He is the manifestation of this meetingpoint in a human life or God-man, He was able, along with words of divine wisdom and works of love, also to do works of power, which were themselves again works of love; and by making the impression of power upon those about Him He became worthy of their confidence, and that all the more, since He never used His power for mere exhibition, or attached it to His doctrinal teachings in the character of a demonstrative seal. Rather His miraculous acts were at the same time the ethical works of His mission, designed as acts of love to attract to His person, and by means of faith in these to bring about in the next place inner certainty of the truth of His words. Never, on the other hand, did He desire to substitute sight for faith, the physical for the moral.

4. He in whom God's revelation to humanity is to find its consummation must evince Himself to be the centre of the world's history, whether regarded backwards or forwards. Considered

See above, p. 142 ff.