CHAPTER XXIX THE SOCIAL SITUATION IN THE TIME OF JESUS § 1. HEBREW INSTITUTIONS AS AFFECTED BY THE JESUS's life at Nazareth was typical of the Galilæan experience of his day. It was of strictly Jewish character, but all surrounded by the influences of the wider civilization that had swept over Palestine without being able to submerge it. The dress and language of Jesus and of his fellow townsmen were Jewish, but the Greek tongue was spoken and understood by all. The copper coins that were used bore the name of the Idumæan ruler at Tiberias, who had built his capital after the models of Greece and Italy, had named it after the Roman emperor, had gathered about him a little court in imitation of that of Rome, and yet professed himself a Jew and scrupulously attended the festivals at Jerusalem. The synagogue at Nazareth was Jewish after the custom that had existed for centuries, and the Sabbath was kept with rigid exactness; but the land was full of heathen who cared nothing for the Sabbath. It might well be that on that day a caravan of traders would pass across the plain in full view from the hill behind Nazareth, or couriers from Rome would be on their way from the coast, or soldiers would enter the town to carry out the orders of their master. At great t-days of the year the Jewish pilgrims would lem, and the temple with all its magnificence hem with the glories of their ancient faith; of Antonia filled with the barbarian soldiery ed them that their city was in the hands of strangers and that they carried on their ritual under sufferance. The presence of the hated publican, the renegade Jew in the pay of Rome, wringing taxes from his own people for the oppressors, was ever a bitter evidence of their servitude. The very priests who represented the sanctity of their religion were living luxuriously in almost pagan fashion. Games and theatrical exhibitions that were little in accord with Hebrew notions of propriety were attended by the aristocratic youth even of the priestly families. It was well known that the high priest himself, the official head of Judaism, was the creature of the Roman procurator, who had appointed him and might depose him at his pleasure. The old institutions preserved their continuity through all these complex changes, yet there was ever a strong influence, especially upon the young, the ambitious, the pleasure-loving, to yield to the challenge of the freer life of the pagan world. The cleavage had appeared in the third century, when the Hellenizers had looked with contempt upon their sterner brethren. The fierce days of persecution had forced the issue and Judaism had come forth under the Maccabees purified from the conflict. But the old antagonism reappeared. The strict Jews were always against the policy of the court. With the fall of the Asmoneans and the triumph of the Herods the Hellenizers were in complete control. There was nothing for the strict party to do but to fall into opposition and endeavor by the severest literalism, and the strongest emphasis upon the sanctity of the law in its minutest particulars, to stand against the tide of levity and ich threatened the foundations of Hebrew life. Some presence of different moral standards and customs. thing of the difficulty that confronts us in America in the presence of peoples from all over the earth, who are losing their own racial standards without acquiring ours, and who are consequently weakening the significance of all standards, was present in Palestine, where the Greek, the Syrian, the Roman, and the barbarian from a score of lands mingled with the Jew, who was tenaciously seeking to live his own peculiar life. § 2. THE SENSE OF IMPENDING CRISIS As if this mingling of peoples were not enough to confuse social ethics, another element even more disturbing was ever present. There had been developed during the dark days. of persecution a passionate hope that God would soon save his chosen people from their miseries. We have noted the long history of the Messianic hope through the prophetic times. The insignificance of the Jewish community during the Persian period, and the extraordinary interest in the development of the law combined to obscure this great expectation. But the awful experiences of the Syrian persecution revived it. Prophecy had already in Zechariah taken on the form of apocalypse. This obscure type of literature seemed well suited to express the mysterious longings of a persecuted race. The book of Daniel was the first splendid example of this new philosophy of history. It pictured the succeeding empires of the world as ravening beasts, each more terrible than his predecessor; but the last kingdom was to be the everlasting kingdom of righteousness. It was a fine interpretation of the confused political process. It enabled the little community of baffled, harried saints to believe in a moral government of the world. The reign of the tyrants would soon end; the kingdom of God would soon begin. Later apocalypses followed upon the book of Daniel more specifically proclaiming the advent of a King who should be God's servant in the great redemption. Rome and the Herods took possession of the little Hebrew state, but still the Messianic hope survived, and the Messianic apocalypses were written and eagerly read. When, therefore, John the Baptist came in the strange likeness of the old prophets, and proclaimed, "The kingdom of God is at hand," the nation was stirred to its depths, for the end of the old age, with its dire distress, seemed to be approaching. The coming of the Messiah was associated with the idea of Judgment. The kingdom of God was to be entered only by those who were worthy. John the Baptist himself expected that there would be a fearful dividing of the wicked from the righteous (Matt 3. 10-12). A practical problem, therefore, of the greatest moment was to discover how one could be acquitted in the Judgment and admitted to the glory. The scribes insisted that the minutest obedience to the law was the ground upon which the judgment would be made. Every infraction of the law was a debit on the great book of accounts, and every observance was a credit. The question of the balancing of the account was, then, of the highest importance. Social values are easily minimized when conduct is considered from this transcendental point of view. It is difficult to hold a natural relation toward one's neighbor when one is forever calculating how his acts will be estimated on the heavenly records. Moreover, what did social values particularly matter when the whole world was trembling on the edge of the great gulf that should separate forever the common ways of the past from the utterly new and infinitely significant conditions of the future? Human history was to be divided by the cataclysm into two great ages-the present age and the coming age. The phrase, "the end of the world" in our English Bible (Matt 24. 3, see marg.) is confusing. The Jews had no such expectation as the traditional Christian idea that this human life in the world would end and a new life of the soul would ensue in heaven. They believed in the resurrection of the |