Solomon And Solomonic Literature Part 17

One may readily understand how it was that personal traditions of Jesus and his teachings remained unwritten until his contemporaries were dead (although this may not have been the case with the suppressed "Gospel according to the Hebrews"); the hourly expected return of Christ rendered such memoirs unimportant until it became clear that the expectation was erroneous. The age of John, of whom Jesus was rumoured to have predicted survival till his return (John xxi. 22), was stretched out to a mythical extent; he became an undying sleeper at Ephesus, and finally a pious "Wandering Jew"; but when at length such fables lost their strength, some imaginative impersonator brought forth an apocalyptic bequest of John postponing the second advent a thousand years. The conventicles had thus no resource but to turn into orthodoxy the heresy of Hymenoeus and Alexander, for which Paul delivered them over to Satan, that the resurrection occurs at death; to collect the traditional sayings of Jesus; and to adapt these to the new situation. A thousand years later, when the expected catastrophe did not occur, the substantial churches and cathedrals were built, as the Gospels had been built after the first-century disappointment.

These Gospels contain things from which some of the real teachings of the wise man of Nazareth may be fairly conjectured. That the synoptical records are palimpsests, though denied by the prudent, is a truth felt by the unsophisticated who, in their use of such words as "Christian" and "a Christian spirit," quite ignore the fearful anathemas and d.a.m.natory language ascribed to Jesus.

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE LAST SOLOMON.

Every race has a pride in its great men which ultimately prevails over any pious taboo imposed on them in life or by tradition. Some years ago it was announced that a German scholar was about to publish proofs that Jesus was not of the Hebrew race, and while Christendom showed little concern, all Israel sat upon that German almost furiously. It is an old story. Banished Buddha becomes an avatar of Vishnu, and his image now appears in India beside Jagenath. For the heresiarch must be adapted before adoption. So Solomon returns as a preacher of orthodox Jahvism, in the "Wisdom of Solomon," but so rigid had been the taboo in his case that the writer did not venture to insert the name of so famous a liberal and secularist.

That was about the first year of our era. But presently we hear about the "Son of David." Was that because of David himself? Interest in David had so receded that in the "Wisdom of Solomon" the resuscitated Wise Man barely alludes (once) to his "father's seat." Was it because of any popular interest in the legendary throne or house of David? That old "covenant" is not alluded to by the resuscitated monarch, and in the apostolic writings nothing is said about it. In the Gospels the t.i.tle "Son of David" is generally connected with certain alleged miracles of Jesus, which recalled legends of Solomon, and it is only in the account of the entry into Jerusalem that it carries any connotation of royalty corresponding to the genealogies afterwards elaborated. Unless these narratives are accepted as historical they must be regarded as phenomena, and, taken in connection with what may be reasonably regarded as genuine teachings of Jesus, the phenomena point to a probability that he had reawakened interest in the Wise Man's teachings, and that this interest, by a compromise with Jahvist prejudices, coined the expression "Son of David" as an alias of Solomon.

However this may be, it appears certain that there was in the teachings of Jesus some substantial recovery of the ancient and unconverted Solomon, the proverbial philosopher, the man of the world. How much Jesus may have said to revive interest in Solomon, and how many of his secular utterances have been hidden in the grave of his humanity, can only be conjectured; but there are two direct sayings concerning Solomon ascribed to him which may be regarded as the only unreserved tributes to the Wise Man that had ever been uttered since his idealization in Chronicles. And our own Protestant Jahvism has tried so hard to manipulate these tributes into partial disparagements that we may easily imagine early Christian Jahvism destroying similar testimonies altogether.

A. S. V. Luke xi. 31: "The Queen of the South shall rise up in judgment with the men of this generation and condemn them: for she came from the uttermost parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and behold a greater than Solomon is here."

True rendering: "The Queen of the South shall stand in the judgment with the men of this [Abrahamic] brood, and condemn them; for she came from the farthest parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and behold something more than Solomon is here." (pleion Solomonos hode)

The word mistranslated "greater," pleion, is neuter and cannot be applied to a man. Jesus is not speaking of himself, but of the new Spirit animating a whole movement.

The word "generation" as a translation of genea is, in this connection, misleading. No one English word can convey the satire on people who regarded themselves as holy by generation from Abraham (cf. Luke iii. 8), which is in the vein of Carlyle's ridicule of English "Paper n.o.bility." Above these self-satisfied claimants of inherited wisdom Jesus sets the Gentile Queen journeying to sit at the feet of Solomon. At the feet of Solomon Jesus also was sitting, and he certainly did not call himself personally greater than Solomon.

The other allusion to Solomon (Matt. vi. 28, 29) is rendered thus: "Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they toil not, neither do they spin; and yet I say unto you that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these."

Here "glory," which when applied to a man has a connotation of pride and pomp, is made to translate doxe, which means honour in its best sense, as preserved in "doxology." Jesus really says, "Solomon amid all his honours never arrayed himself (periebaleto) like one of these." The greatest and wisest of men did not affect display in dress. [51]

The apparent slightness of these English changes reveals their deliberate subtlety. Puritanism, taking its cue from King James's translators, has bettered the instruction, and steadily pictured Jesus pointing to a lily,--white emblem of purity,--and censuring (implicitly) the ostentation of Solomon. Even in rationalistic hymn-books is found the pretty hymn of Agnes Strickland, beginning:

"Fair lilies of Jerusalem, Ye wear the same array As when imperial Judah's stem Maintained its regal sway: By sacred Jordan's desert tide As bright ye blossom on As when your simple charms outvied The pride of Solomon."

Very sweet! But the "lilies of the field" in Palestine are not "fair,"

their charms are not "simple"; they are large and gorgeous combinations of red and gold; and Solomon, so far from being proud in the contrast, "outvied" in simplicity the pride of the lily.

Jesus may not indeed have said these things concerning Solomon, but the probability that he did say something of the kind is suggested by the adroit mistranslations. The same puritanical spirit, the same prejudice against human wisdom and love of beauty, prevailed even more when the Gospels were written. The Jahvist jealousy of the wisdom of the world which in a Targum added to Jeremiah ix. 23 a fling at Solomon,--"Let not Solomon the Son of David, the Wise Man, glory in his Wisdom,"--screamed on in Christian anathemas on science, and laudations of the silly. (For "silly" is of pious derivation, from German selig--blessed.) Solomon had not been named in any canonical scripture for centuries, and even in apocryphal "Wisdom" (Ecclesiasticus) he appears as if a brilliant but fallen Lucifer. The cult of Solomon continued no doubt, in a sense, among the Sadducees (respectfully treated, by the way, by Jesus), but they were comparatively few, and like the rationalists of the English Church, cautious about outside heresies. It was probably characteristic that their name is derived from Solomon's priest, Zadok, instead of from Solomon himself. As for the Gentile Queen, she is not named in the Bible after the record of her visit to Solomon until the homage of Jesus was given her. It appears, therefore, very unlikely that such homage and the unqualified tributes to Solomon, would have been put into the mouth of Jesus.

But why, it may be asked, were not these tributes suppressed? There is in one case a recognition of a Gentile lady which would recommend the text to the writer of Luke, and in the other a lesson against luxury which would recommend this to all believers. At any rate, whatever may have been the suppressions, and no doubt there were many, two of the Gospels have preserved these sentences, which, so far as the glorious "idolator" is concerned, neither of them would have invented. There are the words; somebody uttered them; and the question arises, who was that daring man who broke the severe silence or reservations of centuries and did honour to the king who built shrines to G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses? [52]

As Solomon said, "A man is proved by what he praises." That Jesus did appreciate the greatness of the Solomonic literature is not a matter of conjecture. The sayings ascribed to him in the Gospels--apart from Pauline importations and quotations from Jahvist scriptures--are largely pervaded by the spirit and even by the phraseology of the Solomonic books. Remembering that the phrases "kingdom of heaven,"

"kingdom of G.o.d," are post-resurrectional, and that Jesus could not, unless by miraculous foresight, use those phrases for any external dominion connected with himself, there is reason to believe that his conception was of a sway of Wisdom, and that Wisdom was to him the Saviour, as to Jesus Ben Sira, her realm "within," her leaven hid in the world, her advance without observation.

Of course those who read the Bible in the light of a supernatural theory, see these things very differently, but considering the records as if they were those of uninspired people, one may say that some of the sayings ascribed to Jesus are, in their present form, meaningless. For example, what should we think if we found an ancient record of some poor Egyptian reported as saying, "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly of heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light." How incongruous the "I am meek" with "learn of me"! How could he give the heavy laden rest? And what rest? what yoke? But we would surely feel enlightened should we presently discover an Egyptian book of "Wisdom," with proof of its popularity when the mysterious words were orally repeated, containing such language as this from personified Wisdom: "Come unto me, all ye that be desirous of me, and fill yourselves with my fruits." And if we found in the same book a teacher saying: "I directed my soul unto Wisdom, and I found her in pureness.... Draw near unto me, ye unlearned, and dwell in the house of Wisdom.... Buy her for yourselves without money. Put your neck under her yoke, and let your life receive instruction: she is near at hand to find. Behold with your eyes that I have had but little labour, and have gotten unto me much rest."

Here is sense. These are the words of Wisdom in Jesus Ben Sira (Ecclesiasticus xxiv. 19, li. 23-27). Can any unbiased mind fail to recognize in Matthew xi. 28-30 a mangled quotation from this Hebrew book of the second century, before Jesus of Nazareth was born, but in his time cherished in many Jewish households as much as any Gospel is cherished in Christian households?

Consider the Sermon on the Mount. In the Proverbs ascribed to Solomon is found the beat.i.tude p.r.o.nounced by Jesus on the lowly, no doubt literally quoted by him: "With the lowly is wisdom"

(Prov. xi. 2). The blessing of those who hunger for righteousness (justice) is in Prov. x. 24, where it is said their desire shall be granted. The blessing of the peacemakers is joy (Prov. xii. 20). The merciful man doeth good to his own life (Prov. xi. 17). The pure in heart shall have the King for his friend (Prov. xxii. 11). The house that stands and the house overthrown (Prov. x. 25; xii. 7; xiv. 11); the two ways (Prov. xii. 28, xiv. 12, xvi. 17); the tree known by its fruits (Prov. xi. 30, xii. 12); give and it shall be given you (Prov. xxii. 9); the sower (Prov. xi. 18, 24, 25); taking the lower place so as to be placed higher and not moved down (Prov. xxv. 6-8); searching for and buying Wisdom as the precious silver, the pearl, the treasure (Prov. vi. 11, 12, 17, 19, 35; xx. 15; xxiii. 23); the prodigal (Prov. xxix. 3); those who wrong parents (Prov. xx. 20; xxviii. 24; cf. Matt. xv. 5; Mark vii. 11). The lamps of the wise and foolish virgins are found in Prov. xiii. 9; also xxiv. 20.

In Proverbs xx. 9, we have the words, "Who can say, 'I have made my heart clean, I am pure from sin?'" In Ecclesiastes iii. 16, it is said, "Moreover, I saw under the sun, in the place of judgment, that wickedness was there; and in the place of righteousness that wickedness was there." (Cf. also vii. 20.) In the "Gospel according to the Hebrews" Jesus, declaring that an offender should be forgiven seventy times seven, adds: "For in the prophets likewise, after they were anointed by the Holy Spirit, utterance of sin was found."

Although in the language ascribed to Jesus in the fourth Gospel (iii. 1-10) there are post-resurrectional phrases, whatever he may have said about birth and about the wind-like spirit seems to have been what he expected Nicodemus, as a teacher in Israel, to understand. We may therefore suppose that it was substantially a quotation from Ecclesiastes xi. 5: "As thou knowest not the way of the wind, nor the growth of the bones in the mother's womb, even so thou canst not fathom the work of G.o.d, who compa.s.seth all things."

In relation to Woman Jesus seems to have appealed to Solomon against Ecclesiastes, where (vii. 25-29) it is said:

I have turned my heart to know, And to explore, and search out wisdom and the reason of things; And to know that wickedness is Folly, and Folly madness: And I have found what is more bitter than death-- The Woman who is a snare, her heart nets, her hands chains: He who pleases G.o.d shall be delivered from her, But the offender shall be captured by her.

See, this have I found (saith the Speaker).

Adding one to another, to find out the account, Which I am still searching after, but have not found-- One man in a thousand I have found, But a woman among all these I have not found.

Look you, only this have I found-- That G.o.d made man upright, But they have sought out many devices.

In the first seven lines of this pa.s.sage we may recognize the personification in Proverbs ix. 13-18. The Woman of the fifth line is "Dame Folly"; but the last eight lines relate to womankind. The a.s.surance in the eighth line that it is Koheleth who speaks raises a suspicion that the last eight lines are commentary,--a suspicion further confirmed by the awkwardness of the writing. Strictly read, it is left uncertain whether no woman is ever captured by Dame Folly, or not one escapes. However, as commentators are generally men, the interpretation has been adverse to woman.

But Jesus, perhaps remembering that Wisdom is as much a woman as Folly, is reported (Matthew xi. 19) to have said: "Wisdom is justified by her works." In Luke vii. 35 it is, "Wisdom is justified of all her children." Both of these readings appeal to the Solomonic portrait of the virtuous woman, in Proverbs x.x.xi. the last line of which says, "Let her works praise her," and verse 28, "her children rise up and call her blessed."

In Luke the sentence is a verse by itself, and the word "all" renders it probable that the sentiment has a bearing on the story that follows of the anointing of Jesus by a sinful woman. [53] Some such incident may have occurred, but the address to Simon the Pharisee making him to be the offender, and the woman one delivered from Dame Folly by her faith ("pleasing G.o.d") looks like a criticism on the "fling" at woman in Ecclesiastes, with a proverb taken for text. This rebuke of the Pharisee, who thought "the prophet" ought to abhor the "sinner,"

immediately precedes an account of the eminent women who supported Jesus by their means,--Mary, called Magdalene; Joanna, the wife of Herod's steward; Susanna, "and many others." They "ministered to him of their substance," and possibly the Pharisee and others might naturally suspect him of being among "the ensnared." The fact is strange enough to be genuine, and Luke thinks it important to say that Jesus had healed these ladies of bad spirits and infirmities. Of course it is necessary to divest Gospel anecdotes of much post-resurrectional vesture, and in this case it cannot be credited that Jesus said that the woman's sins were "many," which he could not have known, or that he gave her formal absolution.

The indications of the study of Ecclesiasticus by Jesus are very remarkable. This book appears to have been a sort of nursery in which proverbs were trained for their fruitage in the last Solomon's religious testimonies. What those testimonies were we cannot easily gather, but it is useful for comparative study to remark the sentences in Ecclesiastictus which correspond, either in thought or phraseology, with those ascribed to Jesus. The broad and the narrow ways barely suggested in "Proverbs" are here developed (Ecclesiasticus iv. 17, 18). "Hide not thy wisdom" (iv. 23, xx. 30). "Say not, 'I have enough (goods) for my life'" (v. 1, xi. 24). "Extol not thyself" (vi. 2). We find the exhortation to judge not (vii. 6); rebuke of much speaking in prayer (14); warning against the l.u.s.tful gaze (ix. 5, 8); the night cometh when no man can work (xiv. 16-19; cf. Eccles. ix. 10); the proud cast down, the humble exalted (x. 14, xi. 5); one only is good (xviii. 2); swear not (xxiii. 9); forgiven as we forgive (xxviii. 2); treasure rusting and treasure laid up according to the commandments of the Most High (xxix. 10, 11); "Judge of thy neighbor by thyself"

(x.x.xi. 15); the altar-gift and the wronged brother (x.x.xiv. 18-20); he that seeks the law shall be filled (x.x.xii. 15); charity and not sacrifice (x.x.xv. 2).

These resemblances, of which more might be quoted, between teachings ascribed to Jesus and pa.s.sages in the Wisdom Books, are so important that by the aid of these books some of the confused utterances attributed to him may be made clear. [54] Apart from the importations of Paul, and one or two from the epistle to the Hebrews, no reference by the Jesus of the Gospels to Jahvist books can be shown of similar significance. Combined as his Solomonic ideas are with his homage to Solomon and the Gentile Queen, and followed, as we shall see, by a resuscitation of Solomonic legends in connection with him, it appears clear that Jesus was of the Solomonic and anti-Jahvist school.

It would, however, be a great mistake to suppose that Jesus was simply a philosophical and ethical teacher. He cannot be so explained. The fragmentary sayings, so far as discoverable amid their post-resurrectional perversions, have the air of obiter dicta from a man engaged in a local propaganda of subversive principles. What the propaganda really was is but dimly discernible under its own subsequent subversion by his ghost, but there are a few sayings not traceable to his predecessors, and beyond the capacity of his contemporaries or his successors, which bring us near to an individual mind, and suggest the general nature of the agitation he caused.

The story of the woman taken in adultery, known to have been in the suppressed "Gospel according to the Hebrews," and by some strange chance preserved in the fourth gospel (viii), I believe to have really occurred. It would have required a first-century Boccaccio to invent such a story, and I cannot discover anything similar in Eastern or in Oriental books. Augustine says that some had removed it from their ma.n.u.scripts, "I imagine, out of fear that impunity of sin was granted to their wives." It is not likely that any of the earlier fathers, any more than the later, would have invented so dangerous a story.

Another anecdote, preserved only in the fourth Gospel, probably contains some elements of truth, namely, the words uttered to the Samaritan woman. Who would have been bold enough, even had he been liberal enough, to invent the words: "Neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, shall ye worship the Father"? Even in the one Gospel that ventures to preserve it this n.o.ble catholicity is immediately retracted (John iv. 22) in a verse which obviously interrupts the idea. That the story is an early one is also suggested by the fact that no reproach to the woman on account of her many husbands is inserted. It is remarkable to find such a story related without any word about sin and forgiveness.

The so-called "Sermon on the Mount" is well named: it is evidently made up of reports of sermons in amplification of sayings of Jesus in the style of the Wisdom Books, among which probably were:

"Let your light shine before men. A lamp is not lit to be put under a bushel."

"The lamp of the body is the eye. If thine eye be sound the whole body is illumined; if the eye be diseased the whole body is in darkness. If the inner eye be darkened how great is the darkness."

"Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof."

"By their fruits both trees and man are known."

"Each tree is known by its own fruit."