freedom. And the Gentiles to whom Paul preached would never accept the yoke of the Law; the simpler way was that to which all the practical needs of his mission drew him. So it is natural that he should have felt a rush of scorn for all that older religious machinery, and bidden his converts "stand fast in the freedom wherewith Christ hath set us free, and not be entangled again in the yoke of bondage.” As he had found the power of a better life born in him at his conversion, had felt himself saved, cleansed from his burden of sin, and endowed with a new spirit, so peculiarly Jewish in the experience opening their hearts to Christ's spirit and letting it dominate them, to rise into the redeemed life and become heirs of the promises.1

there being nothing they might hope, by

(2) This was no invitation to laxity. On the contrary, it involved a complete renunciation of the unregenerate life; when Christ lived in the believer he would no longer care for the lusts of the flesh. To Paul, Christ's death had a deep symbolic meaning; the preaching of the Cross was, practically, an invitation to die to the old life and rise with Christ to the new. Instead of the Hellenic ideals of culture and moderation, which had proved ineffective against the temptations to cruelty and lust, Paul demanded an absolute turnabout. "Be not fashioned according to this world," he wrote, "but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind . . . always bearing about in the body the dying of Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be manifested in our body." "Put to death, therefore, your earthly impulses fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness . . . anger, wrath, malice, railing, shameful speaking out of your mouth; lie not to one another; seeing that ye have put off the old man with his doings and have put on the new

1 For further discussion of salvation by faith, see below, pp. 17273; 180-86.

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man." 'Abhor that which is evil, cleave to that which is good." 1

(3) But with all this stern and high summons to mer there is mingled the caritas, the tender, ministering love, which he owned as Christ's work in him and so memorably eulogized in the poetic phrases of 1 Cor. 13. He is usually very patient with his weak and troublesome flock, admonishing them gently, and picturing for them the beauty of the life of mutual helpfulness and affection. "Bear ye one another's burdens," he wrote, "and so fulfill the law of Christ." "In love of the brethren be tenderly affectioned one to another bless them that persecute you, bless and curse not. . . Render to no man evil for evil . . . but if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him to drink." "Let no man seek his own, but each his neighbor's good." "For the whole law is fulfilled in one word, even in this: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." "Put on, therefore, as God's elect, holy and beloved, a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, long-suffering; forbearing one another, and forgiving each other, if any man have a complaint against any; even as the Lord forgave you, so also do ye. And above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfectness." "For even as we have many members in one body, and all the members have not the same office; so we, who are many, are one body in Christ and severally members one of another.'

2

(4) The regeneration and peace of the believers were but the pledge and foretaste of the glorious life in the Messianic era about to open. This present world was soon "coming to nought,” the new age at hand, wherein "each shall receive his reward according to his own labor." "The time is short,

1 Rom. 12:2. 2 Cor. 4:10. Col. 3:5-10. Rom. 12: 9.

2 Gal. 6:2. Rom. 12: 10-20. 1 Cor. 10:24. Gal. 5: 14. Col. 3: 12-14. Rom. 12:4-5.

brethren; meanwhile, let those that have wives live as though they had none; those that weep as though they wept not; those that rejoice as though they rejoiced not; those that buy as though they possessed not; and those that use the good things of the world, let them use them sparingly; for this manner of world soon passeth away." "Now we see as in a mirror, darkly; but then, face to face." "We shall not all die, but we shall all be transformed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet-call; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will rise incorruptible, and we shall be transformed." "We that are left alive unto the coming of the Lord shall by no means precede those that have died. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven, with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet of God; and those that have died in the faith shall first rise; then we who are still alive shall together with them be caught up into the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we forevermore be with the Lord." "But concerning the exact time, brethren, you have no need that aught be written you. For you know perfectly that the day of the Lord is to come like a thief in the night. When they are saying, Peace and safety, then sudden destruction is to come upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall in no wise escape. But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you like a thief; . . . so then... let us watch and be sober." And later in his ministry, "Salvation is now nearer us than when we first believed. The night is far spent and the day is at hand.” 1

This pathetic hope of a supernaturally transformed earthly life, derived from contemporary Jewish anticipations, and shared, evidently, by Jesus himself, was destined,

1 1 Cor. 2: 6; 3:8; 7: 29-31; 13: 12; 15: 51–52. 1 Thess. 4: 15 to 5: 8. Rom. 13: 11-12.

in the nature of things, soon to pass away or rather to be transformed into the hope of future life in an unseen heavenly realm. But the eagerness and consolation of this primitive Christian hope can hardly be imagined by us, in our soberer world. Naïve and illusory as it was, it gave an immense stimulus to that life of faith, that new dedication of the soul, that crucifixion of the fleshly life and happy espousal of the Christ-life, which made Paul's little churches the source of so much that is best in our modern life.

H. Weinel, St. Paul, the Man and His Work. W. Wrede, Paul, A. Schweitzer, Paul and His Interpreters. J. Moffatt, Paul and Paulinism. C. Clemen, Paulus. B. W. Bacon, Story of St. Paul; Founding of the Church. A. Sabatier, Apostle Paul. P. Gardner, Religious Experience of St. Paul. A. Deissmann, St. Paul. E. R. Wood, Life and Ministry of Paul. C. C. Everett, Gospel of Paul. M. Arnold, St. Paul and Protestantism. J. R. Cohn, St. Paul in the Light of Modern Research. K. Lake, Earlier Epistles of St. Paul. C. von Weizsäcker, Apostolic Age, vol. 1, p. 79 f. R. Scott, Pauline Epistles. S. Reinach, Orpheus, chap. VIII, secs. 42-69. Hibbert Journal, vol. 10, p. 45. American Journal of Theology, vol. 14, p. 361. New World, vol. 8, p. 111; vol. 9, p. 49. Constructive Quar terly, vol. 1, p. 163. Biblical World, vol. 44, p. 375.

CHAPTER VII

EARLY CHRISTIANITY

What were the causes of the triumph of Christianity?

THE times were ripe for the new faith. The old pagan religions had waned and were taken lightly or openly disbelieved. The Roman Empire was corrupt to the core; the virtue and austerity that made Rome what it was had given way to extremes of bestiality and lust. A loss of hope in human effort, a despair of the natural sources of happiness, a revulsion from the wantonness of the age, led to a lapse of patriotism and a hunger for individual salvation, for some supernatural personal assurance and guidance. The best men found a modicum of happiness in fleeing from the world and living a life of Stoic self-containment. Just as among the Hindus, centuries before, the need was for a religion of deliverance. Any number of salvation-cults were introduced; none was so simple, so full of hope, so beautiful in the pure and brotherly life of its adherents, as this Christianity that Paul and his followers taught. It caught men's imaginations and spread with marvellous rapidity.

(1) The sweetness of consolation that it offered needs no comment. The great loving Father-God had sent his Anointed One to earth to announce his plan for men; a glorious future awaited them if they would but believe and trust in him; this Divine Man had suffered, just as they had to suffer; all was intended and right and paved the way to a great consummation. A new value was at once added to life; its accidents became unimportant in the light of the future. Christ, the Good Shepherd, came closer to the heart than the