BOOK IV discipleship. Best here to start from what was admitted as binding -the ten commandments-and to lead from that in them which was least likely to be broken, step by step, upwards to that which was most likely to awaken consciousness of sin. And the young Ruler did not, as that other Pharisee, reply by trying to raise a Rabbinic disputation over the Who is neighbour to me?' but in the sincerity of an honest heart answered that he had kept that is, so far as he knew them all these things from his youth.' On this St. Matthew puts into his mouth the question"What lack I yet?' Even if, like the other two Evangelists, he had not reported it, we would have supplied this from what follows. There is something intensely earnest, genuine, generous, even enthusiastic, in the higher cravings of the soul in youth, when that youth has not been poisoned by the breath of the world, or stricken with the rottenness of vice. The soul longs for the true, the higher, the better, and, even if strength fails of attainment, we watch with keen sympathy the form of the climber upwards. Much more must all this have been the case with a Jewish youth, especially in those days; one, besides, like this young Ruler, in whose case affluence of circumstances not only allowed free play, but tended to draw out and to give full scope to the finer feelings, and where wealth was joined with religiousness and the service of the Synagogue. There was not in him that pride of riches, nor the self-sufficiency which they so often engender; nor the pride of conscious moral purity and aim after righteousness before God and man; nor yet the pride of the Pharisee or of the Synagogue-Ruler. What he had seen and heard of the Christ had quickened to greatest intensity all in him that longed after God and heaven, and in this supreme moral earnestness had brought him, lowly, reverently, to the Feet of Him in Whom, as he felt, all perfectness was, and from Whom all perfectness came. He had not been first drawn to Christ, and thence to the pure, as were the publicans and sinners; but, like so many-even as Peter, when in that hour of soul-agony he said: "To whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life,'-he had been drawn to the pure and the higher, and therefore to Christ. To some the way to Christ is up the Mount of Transfiguration, among the shining Beings of another world; to some it is across dark Kedron, down the deep Garden of Gethsemane with its agonies. What matters it, if it equally lead to Him, and equally bring the sense of need and experience 1 In St. Matt. xix. 20, these words should be struck out as spurious. THE ONE THING WHICH THE YOUNG RULER LACKED. of pardon to the seeker after the better, and the sense of need and experience of holiness to the seeker after pardon? 6 And Jesus saw it all: down, through that intense upward look; inwards, through that question, 'What lack I yet?' far deeper down than that young man had ever seen into his own heart-even into depths of weakness and need which he had never sounded, and which must be filled, if he would enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Jesus saw what he lacked; and what He saw, He showed him. For, 'looking at him' in his sincerity and earnestness, He loved him as He loves those that are His Own. One thing was needful for this young man: that he should not only become His disciple, but that, in so doing, he should come and follow' Christ. We can all perceive how, for one like this young man, such absolute and entire coming and following Christ was needful. And again, to do this, it was in the then circumstances both of this young man and of Christ necessary, that he should go and part with all that he had. And what was an outward, was also, as we perceive it, an inward necessity; and so, as ever, Providence and Grace would work together. For, indeed, to many of us some outward step is often not merely the means of, but absolutely needful for, spiritual decision. To some it is the first open profession of Christ; to others, the first act of self-denial, or the first distinct No '-saying; to some, it may be, it is the first prayer, or else the first act of self-consecration. Yet it seems, as if it needed not only the word of God but a stroke of some Moses'-rod to make the water gush forth from the rock. And thus would this young Ruler have been perfect;' and what he had given to the poor become, not through merit nor by way of reward, but really,' treasure in heaven.'1 What he lacked-was earth's poverty and heaven's riches; a heart fully set on following Christ; and this could only come to him through willing surrender of all. And so this was to him alike means, the test, and the need. To him it was this; to us it may be something quite other. Yet each of us has a lack-something quite deep down in our hearts, which we may never yet have known, and which we must know and give up, if we would follow Christ. And without forsaking, there can be no following. This is the law of the Kingdom-and it is such, because we are sinners, because sin is not only the loss of the good, but the possession of something else in its place. the There is something deeply pathetic in the words with which St. spurious the gloss of a clumsy interpolator. The words 'take up the cross,' in the textus receptus of St. Mark x. 21, are 341 CHAP. XXIII 4 BOOK IV 2 Mark describes it: he was sad'-the word painting a dark gloom that overshadowed the face of the young man.' Did he then not lack it, this one thing? We need scarcely here recall the almost extravagant language, in which Rabbinism describes the miseries of poverty; we can understand his feelings without that. Such a possibility had never entered his mind: the thought of it was terribly startling. That he must come and follow Christ, then and there, and, in order to do so, sell all that he had and give it away among the poor, and be poor himself, a beggar, that he might have treasure in heaven; and that this should come to him as the one thing needful from that Master in Whom he believed, from Whose lips he would learn the one thing needful, and Who but a little before had been to him the All in All! It was a terrible surprise, a sentence of death to his life, and of life to his death. And that it should come from His lips, at Whose Feet he had run to kneel, and Who held for him the keys of eternal life! Rabbinism had never asked this; if it demanded almsgiving, it was in odious boastfulness; 3 while Arach. viii. it was declared even unlawful to give away all one's possessions* at most, only a fifth of them might be dedicated." b Chethub. 50 a • Ber. 55 b, last line; comp. also Baba Mez. 38 b And so, with clouded face he gazed down into what he lackedwithin; but also gazed up in Christ on what he needed. And, although we hear no more of him, who that day went back to his rich home very poor, because very sorrowful,' we cannot but believe that he, whom Jesus loved, yet found in the poverty of earth the treasure of heaven. Nor was this all. The deep pity of Christ for him, who had gone that day, speaks also in His warning to His disciples. But surely those are not only riches in the literal sense which make it so difficult for a man to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven-so difficult, as to amount almost to that impossibility which was expressed in the common Jewish proverb, that a man did not even in his dreams see an elephant pass through the eye of a needle. when in their perplexity the disciples put to each other the saddened question: Who then can be saved? He pointed them onward, then upward, as well as inward, teaching them that, what The word is only used in St. Matt. xvi. 3, of the lowering sky. 2 Many sayings might here be quoted. It was worse than all the plagues of Egypt put together (Baba B. 116 a); than all other miseries (Bezah 32 b), the worst affliction that could befall (Shem. R. 31). 3 See a story of boastfulness in that But respect in Wünsche, ad loc. To make a merit of giving up riches for Christ is, surely, the Satanic caricature of the meaning of His teaching. 4 The words in St. Mark x. 24, for them that trust in riches,' are most likely a spurious gloss. CHRIST'S REWARD OF GRACE TO HIS DISCIPLES AND APOSTLES. was impossible of achievement by man in his own strength, God would work by His Almighty Grace. They who 6 manifold a 343 CHAP. XXIII St. Matt. St. Mark x. Luke xviii. xix. 29; 29, 30; St. 29, 30 xix. 28 • St. Mat thew and d St. Mark St. Mark It almost jars on our ears, and prepares us for still stranger and sadder to come, when Peter, perhaps as spokesman of the rest, seems to remind the Lord that they had forsaken all to follow Him. St. Matthew records also the special question which Simon added to it: What shall we have therefore?' and hence his Gospel alone makes mention of the Lord's reply, in so far as it applied only to the Apostles. For, that reply really bore on two points: on the reward which all who left everything to follow Christ would obtain ; and on the special acknowledgment awaiting the Apostles of Christ. In regard to the former we mark, that it is twofold. had forsaken all for His sake' and the Gospel's,' Kingdom of God's sake and these three expressions explain and supplement each other-would receive in this time' more' of new, and better, and closer relationships of a spiritual kind for those which they had surrendered, although, as St. Mark significantly adds, to prevent all possible mistakes," with persecutions.' But by the side of this stands out unclouded and bright the promise for the world to come ' of everlasting life.' As regarded the Apostles personally, some mystery lies on the special promise to them. We could quite understand, that the distinction of rule to be bestowed on them might have been worded in language taken from the expectancies of the time, so as to make the promise intelligible to them. But, unfortunately, we have here no explanatory information to offer. The Rabbis, indeed, speak of a renovation or regeneration of the world (by nлs wn) which was to take place after the 7,000 or else 5,000 years of the Messianic reign. Such a Sanh. 976 renewal of all things is not only foretold by the prophets, and dwelt upon in later Jewish writings, but frequently referred to in Rabbinic literature.h 2 But as regards the special rule or 'judgment's of the Apostles, or ambassadors of the Messiah, we have not, and, of course, cannot expect any parallel in Jewish writings. That the promise of such rule and judgment to the Apostles is not peculiar to what is called the Judaic Gospel of St. Matthew, appears from its renewal at a later period, as recorded by St. Luke. Lastly, that it is in accordance with Old Testament promise, will be seen by a 1 Of course, the expression 'twelve thrones' (St. Matt. xix. 28) must not be pressed to utmost literality, or it might be asked whether St. Paul or St. Matthias occupied the place of Judas. On the other hand, neither must it be frittered away, as if the regeneration' referred As for exxxxiv. 4; li. ample Is. 6; lxv. 17 Enoch xci. Book of Esd. vii. 28 Onkelos on 12; Targ. Jerus. on Deut. xxxii. 1; Targ. Warsh. p. 24 b, near end; Pirké 2 This subject will be further treated de R. Elies. in the sequel. 51 i St. Luke xxii. 30 BOOK IV A Acts iii. 21; Rom. viii. 19-21; 2 Pet. iii. 13; Rev. xxi. 1 b 1 Cor. vi. 2,3; Rev. xx. 4; xxi. 14 reference to Dan. vii. 9, 10, 14, 27; and there are few references in the New Testament to the blessed consummation of all things in which such renewal of the world, and even the rule and judgment of the representatives of the Church," are not referred to. However mysterious, therefore, in their details, these things seem clear, and may without undue curiosity or presumption be regarded as the teaching of our Lord: the renewal of earth; the share in His rule and judgment which He will in the future give to His saints; the special distinction which He will bestow on His Apostles, corresponding to the special gifts, privileges, and rule with which He had endowed them on earth, their nearness to, and their work and sacrifices for Him; and, lastly, we may add, the preservation of Comp. also Israel as a distinct, probably tribal, nation. As for the rest, as so much else, it is behind the veil,' and, even as we see it, better for the Church that the veil has not been further lifted. Acts xxvi. 7 d St. Matt. xx. 16; St. Mark x. 31 e St. Matt. xvi. 21; xvii. 22, 23 The reference to the blessed future with its rewards was followed by a Parable, recorded, as, with one exception, all of that series, only by St. Matthew. It will best be considered in connection with the series of Christ's last Parables. But it was accompanied by what, in the circumstances, was also a most needful warning. Thoughts of the future Messianic reign, its glory, and their own part in it might have so engrossed the minds of the disciples as to make them forgetful of the terrible present, immediately before them. In such case they might not only have lapsed into that most fatal Jewish error of a Messiah-King, Who was not Saviour-the Crown without the Cross-but, when the storm broke on the Day of His Condemnation and Crucifixion, have even suffered shipwreck of their faith. If ever, it was most needful in that hour of elation to remind and forewarn them of what was to be expected in the immediate future. How truly such preparation was required by the disciples, appears from the narrative itself. There was something sadly mysterious in the words with which Christ had closed the last Parable, that the last should be first and the first last 2-and it had carried dark misgivings to those who heard it. And now it seemed all so strange! Yet the disciples could not have indulged in illusions. His own sayings on at least two previous occasions, however ill or partially understood, must have led them to expect at any rate grievous opposition and tribulations in Jerusalem, and their endeavour to deter Christ from going to Bethany to raise Lazarus proves, that they were well aware of the 1 See in Book V. 2 The words, many be called, but few chosen,' seem spurious in that place. |