Pastor Pastorum Part 3

If it be, as I have argued, that evil had a function in the world, then we can see why it could not be removed by a _universal_ decree. But a _single_ act of relief might be admissible in order to testify to the presence of an exceptional power; this would not engender in people the habit of helplessly throwing themselves upon G.o.d. For instance, Christ cures the son of the centurion merely by speaking the word, but if He had abolished all fevers by one decree, this would have been to disorganise the existing order in the universe. A King going on a royal progress relieves the misery that comes in his way; his own kindliness, his royal dignity, and the need of impressing on the people that their King delights in doing good, and can do it, require him so to do. But a regal donation for the relief of all distress in the kingdom would turn it into a nation of paupers. So our Lord bestows His bounty on those who fall in His way.

He who asks, Why did not Christ suppress evil? may naturally ask also, Why did not Christ sweep away all human error as to the relations of G.o.d with man? And why did He not so vouch for the authenticity of His communication that any doubt about it should be impossible? Now we believe, that G.o.d has revealed Himself to man, and yet has left men in some degree free as to what they will think about Him, and as fully at liberty to examine the credentials of those who have claimed to be His messengers, and to judge of their authenticity, as they would be in a purely human matter.

We find, as a matter of fact, that men who have accepted Christ's revelation are not fettered in mind by it; but are most often enterprising, energetic and bold searchers after truth. I believe that it would have been unfavourable to the preservation of this vigour of mind and to the temper which should "try all things and hold fast those which are good," if the full and absolute revelation which some demand had been delivered to mankind, and all the problems which beset human life had thereby been settled once for all. To the questions "Why we are told what we are told?" "Why we are not told more?" and "Why doubt and ambiguities are not all cleared away?"-we cannot hope to give _answers_, but we may find ways of looking at them which shall help in some degree

"To justify the ways of G.o.d to man."

It will be best to discuss this subject in a separate Chapter.

CHAPTER III. OF REVELATION.

If I took the word Revelation in its widest sense I should not attempt to treat of it here, for it would comprise nothing less than G.o.d's education of the human race. We talk of Natural Religion and Revealed Religion, but all Religion has in it an element of revelation from G.o.d. If G.o.d had not provided man with a mind's eye suited to see Him by, and also something that shadowed Him forth which that eye could behold, we could have no religion at all. Of the processes by which belief has come about in men not the least notable is this. Men have recognised in some new tidings what they seemed to have been looking for, without being aware of it. Some new teacher has become the spokesman of thoughts which were lying in them in a state too vague for utterance. Thus "thoughts out of many hearts may be revealed."(10) Now it is G.o.d who has planted these thoughts in men, and He brings about the occasions which reveal them.

There are for man two worlds, that which is without him and that which is within. Some races from temperament or circ.u.mstances have been most taken up with the former, with the workings of nature and with active social life; while others have looked within rather than without;-their minds have found most congenial play in the contemplation of their own natures, and in brooding over the mystery of how they came to be what they were.

Corresponding to these two leading diversities of the human mind, there are two modes by which men are brought to recognise a great spiritual agency in the world.

The man of Aryan race, the type of the first variety, caught sight of an infinite force underlying all the workings of nature, and so conceived Deities, with a personal will like his own, animating the physical world.

For the people of the Semitic race on the other hand, the surpa.s.sing wonder was their own selves-their minds turned to contemplating their own nature. In so doing they noted this; they found something within them which caused them to be happy when they acted in one way-when they had done a kindness for example-and made them unhappy when they had behaved differently. This was so, even when no one knew of the act, and when they looked to no consequences from it. They called such actions right and wrong; but they asked, Where can this notion of right and wrong come from?

This conscience too which witnessed of it-which strove with them just as a friend might, and seemed to be something outside them-Where did that come from? They were led by this to conceive a spiritual personal Being in the world who had left some trace of himself in men's hearts, and kept up some communion with them through this voice of conscience. Thus men of different stamps of mind were led along different roads, to the notion of something Divine in the world; and we may say that G.o.d revealed himself to man in these two ways. Now for knowledge to be sure and solid two elements must go to the making of it. One from outside the learner, and the other supplied by him. This outside element is in physical science provided by observed fact, and what answers to it in theology is authoritative revelation. Men can never feel fully a.s.sured about what is wholly spun out of their own brains, and has no external sign or testimony to lend it support.

Revelation, in the sense in which I have to do with it just now, means an authoritative communication from the Almighty, vouched by some outward sign, or manifestation. It is with this outward sign, and with the difficulties attending the ways of bringing it about, that I am now chiefly concerned.

For the present we will suppose that among the elements of human knowledge are _truths revealed by G.o.d_. How is this element of absolutely certain knowledge to be made to fit in with that which is only matter of opinion or provisionally true? Here we come on the great problem of Revelation.

How can the infinite be brought into the same account with the finite? We know that if we give one term in an algebraical expression an infinite value, all the rest go for nothing; so likewise do probable judgments vanish in the face of absolute authority. But if Revelation is delivered _in such a mode_ that its declarations admit of no question whatever, then its statements possess _absolute certainty_. Compared with such certainty all our judgments would be doubtful and dim, like candles in the presence of electric light. Would not this sharp contrast discourage man from using his own powers? But is it not by regarding this world as an exercise ground for these same powers that we come most near to understanding it?

Is it consistent with G.o.d's ways, such as we make them out to be, that after giving us faculties which would find their amplest field in the consideration of spiritual problems he should preclude the investigation of them by solving them all Himself.

Again the truth delivered in any Divine Revelation of the problems of the Universe would come into contact with views based on supposed facts drawn from History or Geology, or with truths discovered by the human mind, and difficulties would occur all along the line of demarcation between what was infallible and what was not. For instance, if the history of one nation were absolutely revealed, much of that of the nations contiguous would be revealed too; more particularly the results of the wars between them: and if isolated facts belonging to science, such as those relating to the formation of our globe, were communicated on Divine Authority, then systems of Natural Philosophy, starting from these facts as axioms, might claim, upon religious grounds, acceptance for every one of their conclusions. If an independent system essayed to rear its head, it would be crushed by coming into collision with some statement that brooked no question. Such scientific investigation as would be possible could only proceed by deduction from truths authoritatively delivered. Observation and induction, which have led up to the knowledge of nature we now possess, would find no place. Man would be discouraged from using his own endeavours to understand the problems of the universe, and instead of so doing, he would only pray the Almighty to tell him all he wanted to know.

These ill effects do not follow in the case of Christ's religion for two reasons. First, because Christ does not reveal what man could find out for himself; and therefore this revelation does not come, so to say, into compet.i.tion with human investigations. Secondly, because the genuineness of the revelation is not vouched for by evidence which is _overwhelming_ and which finally settles the question; but is only supported by just enough external testimony to command attentive consideration and respect.

The evidence that the Sign is of G.o.d is not so cogent that there is no escape from it. If it were so, it would silence all discussion about the fact of Revelation having been given, in the way in question, and would narrow the area for the exercise of religious thought.

Reason may agree to bow to Revelation as being G.o.d's declaration; but she has a right to satisfy herself that it _is_ G.o.d's declaration, and she will call in learning and rules of criticism to help her in determining the question. Even when Reason has satisfied herself as to the credentials of this Revelation, there comes another question which gives play for human intelligence. It is asked "What does this Revelation mean?" Language is the outcome of the human mind, and all statements made in language, this Revelation among the rest, must be subject to the laws of the human understanding.

We see then, that both as to its credentials and its meaning Revelation must always be open to question; and that a man is as much bound to exercise his judgment upon these points as upon the other problems of life. This would seem a very natural state of things, yet it causes dismay to some persons when they first begin to look into these matters for themselves. They had expected, moreover, to find such a balance of evidence on their own side, that no one except from wilfulness and perversity could decide the other way. Examination shews that, regarding the question as one of historical evidence, and putting all prepossessions apart, the two sides are more nearly in a state of equipoise than they had been supposed to be; and it is remarkable that this kind of equipoise has been maintained, as far as we can make out by history, from the time of the Apostles till now. Arguments and testimony have, from time to time, appeared on one side, and have been answered from the other; and now and then some discovery has been made turning the balance on this side or that; but soon some new idea has been started which has put another complexion on the matter. So that positive evidence has never been so complete and decisive on either side as to prevent a man's habits or the bent of his mind from swaying his verdict.

When young men first look into these matters for themselves, having heretofore taken certain notions on trust, they are apt to be aghast at the unsettlement, and at the call on them to use their own judgments and make up their minds. Unhappily they have often been led to suppose that to hold a particular set of opinions, _merely as opinions_, without any effect being produced in their character thereby, gives them a claim to some degree of favour in the eyes of the Almighty: while to question these opinions, or to enquire too closely into the grounds on which they rest, is dangerous, and calculated to bring them into disfavour with Him. I cannot stop to combat this notion now. But whatever the reason may be, the fact is certain, that when persons begin to investigate for themselves the bases of their belief, they find that many statements which they had regarded as true beyond all question are found to stand on less sure ground than they had thought; and since they fancy that if the authority of any word of the Bible is shaken they will soon have no standing ground left, they become much disturbed.

Then it is that we hear the outcry: "Why cannot all be made clear? Or, if we cannot be told every thing, why, at any rate, is not that which we _are_ told put so plainly, that there can only be one way of looking at it? Why were not things so written that one who runs may read? Why are we not given quite positive a.s.surance of the truth of what is revealed? Why have we not a Sign in Heaven as the Jews demanded, or, what would suit our times better, an incontestable demonstration of the truth of Christianity?" "Why, in short," to use the words of the objectors of the last century, "If G.o.d desired to make a Revelation to man, did He not write it in the skies?"

To none of these "Whys" can we supply its proper "Because." We cannot give the reasons of a man's conduct unless we can enter into his mind; and as we cannot enter into G.o.d's mind, we cannot give His reasons for having made the ways of the universe such as we find them. But though we cannot give the enquirer what he asks, we can do something to help him all the same.

We may be able to shew him that it is better for him only "to know in part;" and we may also be able to explain to him that a certain fringe of shadow must needs encompa.s.s those portions of truth which are revealed; for if they had clear-cut edges and hard outlines, when we had to fit them together, like pieces in a dissected map of knowledge, we should meet with all those difficulties about a line of demarcation between truth absolute and beliefs of opinion of which I spoke just now. The service of all Revelation is to supply our craving after infinity; and if our demand to have this infinity presented to us in a finite form-for that is really what we are clamouring for-could be approximately gratified, then we should find that, though a certain portion of the infinite field lying outside human knowledge had been enclosed and added on to our intellectual possessions, still we were as far as ever from having what we wanted: this new possession would have become _finite_, and what we wanted was the _infinite_. We should have got a new science in exchange for our old religion, but the craving after infinitude would still remain. The very definiteness introduced into these matters we should find destructive of their fascination for us.

To take one point at a time, I will begin with a side of the question which fits on to the subject of the last chapter. These cries after cert.i.tude are, in fact, pet.i.tions to be relieved of free will and responsibility in deciding religious matters for ourselves. What the complaints come to is this: Why am not I and every one else compelled to believe certain truths about G.o.d's dealings with man _whether we like to do so or not_?

The point of the matter lies in these last words. If we had no part of our own to perform in accepting this belief, if it were no more a matter of our own choice and feeling whether or not we admitted the revealed truths, than whether we admitted some indisputable fact in history or some proposition in science; then this belief would not be religion for us at all, it would be a branch of science and nothing more. It would have no more moral significance than a proposition in Euclid. To admit that a certain system may be built up from premises that are undoubted, is merely a matter of intellect. One man may have a head to follow the steps and another not, but conscience has no part in the matter.

It was distinctive of the Son of Man that His Gospel was to be preached to the poor; and a system which addressed only minds capable of clear reasoning, could not be suited to all mankind; in fact, it would necessarily set up a Hierarchy of intellectual culture. So our Lord did not speak to the understandings but to the hearts of His hearers. He dealt with His disciples on the supposition, that there was in them a germ which would respond to the quickening influences of His teaching, and grow into a capacity for eternal life. Just as the dormant seed germinates when warmth and moisture reach it, so would what was dormant in their hearts burst into life and growth, when the required vivifying influence was brought to bear. Our spiritual life is made to depend not only on what is delivered to us, but on our recognising the truth we want, and seizing on it as what we are craving after: so that we say, "I have always felt that there was something I was in want of; now I know what it is, and I have it here."

The Jews, who would not believe, wanted to be shewn a Sign from Heaven.

They said, "Give us a proof which is beyond contradiction, and we will believe," which comes to saying: If we cannot help believing, believe we will. But they did not mean the same thing by the word "believe" as our Lord did. Our Lord did not call on His disciples to accept notions _about_ Him, but to believe _in_ Him, to trust Him as a child does his parent, or a soldier his commander. What the Jews meant was, that they would give credence to a particular kind of evidence, as to the fact of His being their Messiah.

The demand for additional proof is dealt with by our Lord in the parable of Dives and Lazarus. The drift of a parable is usually pointed out in the concluding words; and the verse "If they believe not Moses and the prophets, neither will they believe though one rose from the dead,"(11) spoken of the rich man's brethren, is, I believe, the key to one intent of this parable.(12) The state of mind here pointed at is a common one enough. It is that of the man who is rather uneasy at his own want of belief; but thinks the blame should be laid, not on any defect in himself, but on the want of proper proofs and external light. He thinks that his difficulty comes from the scanty evidence offered him; he has no idea that what he really wants is a better moral eyesight to see it by. So he begs for a little bit more of proof. If he could only be satisfied, he says, on this point and that, he would believe. But what would his belief be worth?

Our Lord's answer goes to this:-No amount of external testimony can supply what you want, because the defect is within you. If a man _did_ come to you from the dead, you might be terrified into acquiescence in everything he told you-you would probably be stupefied into the most abject submission-but instead of being elevated into trust in G.o.d, you would, very likely, be so cowed and paralysed, as to be incapable of any feeling of a n.o.ble or spiritual kind.

In the present day people do not ask for Signs from Heaven, or that men should rise from the dead-but the same spirit shews itself in the same way. The corresponding demand is, "Give us an undeniable philosophical proof of the truth of Christianity." "Shew us this," say men, "and we will believe." Accept the demonstration of course they must, if it be irrefragable; just as they must accept the truth that the three angles of a triangle are equal to two right angles; but such acceptance is a mental act of a wholly different order from adopting a religious belief-from feeling for instance that "Christ is with us to the end of the world."

Much confusion has arisen from this difference not being properly marked.

From what I said at first, as to the nature of a revelation it appears that there are two elements in it, one within us and one without us. We must have "ears to hear" when G.o.d speaks-a faculty that discerns His voice-and also we must have some outward sign cognisable by human senses, or by such judgments based on experience as we form about historical evidence. I have just shewn that the first requisite is essential for any religious belief, and that it is a quality different from the logical understanding. But when we come to the attestation of the Sign which vouches the revelation, then the understanding a.s.sumes its ordinary jurisdiction. We are to judge by the common rules of evidence as to the authenticity of this Sign and the genuineness of our information. Reason and instructed judgment are to be used in these matters as in all others, and external evidence is allowed its weight by our Lord. When the Baptist sends his disciples to enquire, our Lord works cures before them, and bids them report what they _saw_.

A man wants some testimony to which he may turn, which is independent of himself. There are times when the surest believers mistrust themselves and their intuitions and ask, "How am I to know that this persuasion of mine is not a creature of my own brain, due to my temperament and mental conformation." "How can I call on other men to accept it?" Men are not left, unaided, to the distress of this kind of doubt. The Apostles were allowed to witness the Transfiguration and the presence of Jesus risen from the dead that doubt might not overcome them in moments of physical weakness or distress of mind. They could always turn to these recollections and say "We know the glory of G.o.d; for we have seen it."

We are not to expect that the Sign which attests a Revelation shall be guaranteed by a standing miracle; because such a standing miracle would be out of harmony with all G.o.d's ways as revealed in the Universe. For a standing miracle means that G.o.d is always, in one particular direction, visibly displaying the power elsewhere concealed. If such a miracle existed there would be one set of facts in the world not of a piece with the rest. If instead of working the world as He does by self-acting machinery, G.o.d were to reserve one department for His personal management, He might as well interpose in all, and direct all the movements in the world; in which case, as I said in the last chapter, the world would cease to have any independent existence, and would become merely a portion of the Divine existence.

So when it is demanded "That a revelation should be written in the skies"

we may ask, How would you have G.o.d's autograph attested? The Jews, it will be said, had the visible Shechinah, the light between the Cherubim; but if this light existed now, there would be no proof of its being Divine: it would only be another phenomenon, and science would take cognisance of it.

If we had an oracle declaring future events, all human enterprise would perish-for enterprise rests on hope and fear. The Delphic oracles would have paralysed action, if they had been unerring, unambiguous, and easy of access. A series of prophecies, it may be thought, fulfilled from time to time, would serve to authenticate revelation: and this aid is, indeed, admissible in attestation of the Sign we speak of; but it must be subject to the same condition which must attach to all external testimony: it must not be too clear or too strong. Men must always be able to reject it, if they like: either by ascribing the coincidences to chance, by declaring that the prophecy brought about its own fulfilment, or by some similar argument. If we had a series of prophecies all of which, up to the present time, had been fulfilled with due regularity, so that no one could doubt but that the rest would punctually come to pa.s.s, human action would be very much paralysed.

The miracles of our Lord's life serve us for our "Signs;" and our a.s.surance that they occurred is to be based both on the external evidence, which in this case is the testimony to the authenticity of the record, and on the internal probability, which comes out of the conformity of the miracles with the Laws of Christ's action and the declared purpose of His coming. The miracles could always be referred to Beelzebub in old days, and they can always be disbelieved or explained away now.

Since the external evidence is not conclusive on this side or on that, the judgment formed must depend partly on the degree in which the Scriptures establish their own authority; and this degree depends on the mind and heart which the investigator brings to his work. One critic will see nothing but difficulties. Another will say, Our histories are photographs, imperfect no doubt, but what they show must have been there when they were taken: we see the main figures under different aspects, but we know them for the same. Some will feel as much convinced, from the character of thought and expression, that certain sayings came from our Lord, as a connoisseur in art might be that a certain picture came from the easel of a great master whose works had been the study of his life: he knows the touch.

Christ's great Revelation was not given in a book, not in a history or a treatise, but in a Life and Death. He shewed the world a Man who knew not Self, and He also shewed it the Force that came from G.o.d. Men will realize this Revelation in different ways in different ages; part may come to light at one time, part at another. Sayings which have long lain hardly noticed are one day found to be keys to unlock a treasure, and give insight beyond what we dreamt of. But besides this Revelation, personal to individuals, broad Truths are conveyed which we should not otherwise possess.

Some of the leading Truths are these. That Jesus came from the Father.

That the Father loved men who believed in Him, and owned them as sons, and sent into their hearts(13) a filial spirit which should enable them to lay hold more firmly of this Revelation. Christ tells them that He came to manifest G.o.d to the world,(14) and that, whether they chose to believe it or not, the kingdom of G.o.d was drawn nigh to them.(15) He tells them that to know G.o.d is eternal life,(16) and that they who are counted worthy will attain a resurrection to such a life.(17) Above all he tells them-and this is the very charter of the Christian Church, without which her Doctrines would be only a set of notions, dest.i.tute of real vital power-"Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world."(18)

There is no clashing with human knowledge here, nothing that can tie the hands of the enquirer. The advance in spiritual knowledge is not brought about, simply by the communication of a new truth from without, which had never been dreamt of before: men feel rather as if they were reminded of something they must once have known. There appears, if I may so say, a tenderness of G.o.d in dealing with man, a carefulness so to reveal himself as not to obliterate a man's own personality, but to leave him to feel that any resolution he has reached is his own, arrived at, no doubt, by listening to G.o.d's prompting; without such prompting superseding the action of his proper self. No two men represent G.o.d to themselves quite in the same way: He was not the same for Peter that He was for John.

I believe that a revelation of G.o.d is needed for the education of what is highest in man, and for bringing him to the highest point he can reach; and that G.o.d has been always revealing Himself in one way or another. But the revelation of every age must be suited to the character of that age.

Man must be educated up to it, or he cannot receive it. Our Lord tells his disciples "I have yet many things to say unto you but ye cannot bear them now."(19) Later generations are taught in this same way. The events related in the Acts, and the labours which came upon the Apostles fitted them by degrees for fresh revelations. If our Lord had declared to St Peter when he first joined him in Galilee that the Gentiles should have as full a share in Him and in the Kingdom as he would have; might not he too have turned away? Or if, as is likely, he had been personally drawn to Christ too powerfully to quit Him, yet such a sudden shock to all his notions might have closed his mind spasmodically against new ideas? For when a man recoils from a view which unsettles him and turns him giddy, he clutches at his supports with iron grip. Many have been made bigots in this way. Our Lord is careful to avoid for the disciples all turmoil of mind; the new seed must be left undisturbed that it may take firm root; so that for our Lord to have disordered all St Peter's convictions by a premature disclosure, would have been contrary to His ways of acting.

An age must be ripe for the truth, and the truth must be ripe for the age for the last to profit by the first. If the theory of gravitation had appeared ten centuries ago, it would have pa.s.sed unregarded away, for then, n.o.body thought the outer world worth scrutiny. On the other hand the neo-Platonic philosophy which once moved ma.s.ses of men has now become so many words. How then is Christ's revelation to last for all time? It is enabled to do so, because there is _life_ in it and _growth_ along with life; because Christ does not deliver propositions about G.o.d which men are pa.s.sively to receive once for all, but his sayings fall upon the human heart, and are quickened there, some in one generation and some in another: each generation seizes on its proper nutriment, and brings out of His sayings the special lesson it requires.

St Paul, to recur to the quotation which is, in fact, the burden of this chapter, speaking of the effect produced by the preaching of the word on the hearers says-

"The secrets of his heart are made manifest."(20)

Christ's words reveal for a man the secrets of his own heart to himself.