St. Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians: A Practical Exposition

Mr. R. H. Charles gives us the following statement[[226 - The Apoc. of Baruch (A. and C. Black, 1896), p. lxxxii. The statement is compiled from Weber, Lehre des Talmuds.]]: —

'The Talmudic doctrine of works may be shortly summarized as follows: Every good work – whether the fulfilment of a command or an act of mercy – established a certain degree of merit with God, while every evil work entailed a corresponding demerit. A man's position with God depended on the relation existing between his merits and demerits, and his salvation on the preponderance of the former over the latter. The relation between his merits and demerits was determined daily by the weighing of his deeds. But as the results of such judgements were necessarily unknown, there could not fail to be much uneasiness; and, to allay this, the doctrine of the vicarious righteousness of the patriarchs and saints of Israel was developed not later than the beginning of the Christian era (cf. Matt. iii. 9). A man could thereby summon to his aid the merits of the fathers, and so counterbalance his demerits.

'It is obvious that such a system does not admit of forgiveness in any spiritual sense of the term. It can only mean in such a connexion a remission of penalty to the offender, on the ground that compensation is furnished, either through his own merit or through that of the righteous fathers. Thus, as Weber vigorously puts it: "Vergebung ohne Bezahlung gibt es nicht." Thus, according to popular Pharisaism, God never remitted a debt until He was paid in full, and so long as it was paid it mattered not by whom.

'It will be observed that with the Pharisees forgiveness was an external thing; it was concerned not with the man himself but with his works – with these indeed as affecting him, but yet as existing independently without him. This was not the view taken by the best thought in the Old Testament. There forgiveness dealt first and chiefly with the direct relation between man's spirit and God; it was essentially a restoration of man to communion with God. When, therefore, Christianity had to deal with these problems, it could not accept the Pharisaic solutions, but had in some measure to return to the Old Testament to authenticate and develope the highest therein taught, and in the person and life of Christ to give it a world-wide power and comprehensiveness.'

The doctrine called Talmudic in the above extract receives remarkable illustration in a Jewish work, The Apocalypse of Baruch, which dates from the same period as the writings of the New Testament (A.D. 50-100; or if the work be regarded as composite, we should say that its component elements are of that date), and represents to us in a very vivid and touching form the hopes and beliefs of a pious orthodox Jew. Thus —

1. The doctrine of the merit of good works, ii. 2 [words spoken to Jeremiah by God], 'Your works are to this city as a firm pillar.' xiv. 5: 'What have they profited who confessed before Thee, and have not walked in vanity as the rest of the nations … but always feared Thee, and have not left Thy ways? And, lo, they have been carried off, nor on their account hast Thou had mercy on Zion. And if others did evil, it was due to Zion that on account of the works of those who wrought good works she should be forgiven, and should not be overwhelmed on account of the works of those who wrought unrighteousness.' lxiii. 3: 'Hezekiah trusted in his works, and had hope in his righteousness, and spake with the Mighty One … and the Mighty One heard him.' lxxxv. 1: 'In the generations of old those our fathers had helpers, righteous men and holy prophets … and they helped us when we sinned, and they prayed for us to Him who made us, because they trusted in their works, and the Mighty One heard their prayer and was gracious unto us.' li. 7: 'But those who have been saved by their works, and to whom the law has been now a hope, and understanding an expectation, and wisdom a confidence, to them wonders will appear in their time.'

It is very noticeable in the above quotations that it is the works of the righteous rather than their persons (as in Genesis xviii. 23-33) that are put forward as the grounds of confidence with God. The claim of righteousness in the second quotation (xiv. 5) may be paralleled in the somewhat earlier work called The Assumption of Moses[[227 - Edited also by R. H. Charles (A. and C. Black, 1897), p. 37.]]: 'Observe and know that neither did our fathers nor their forefathers tempt God so as to transgress His commandments.'

2. The doctrine of the treasury of merits. The good works of the righteous are laid up as in a treasury to avail for themselves and for others. Thus (xiv. 12): 'The righteous justly hope for the end, and without fear depart from this habitation, because they have with Thee a store of works preserved in treasuries.' xxiv. 1: 'Behold the days come when the books will be opened in which are written the sins of all those that have sinned, and again also the treasuries in which the righteousness of all those who have been righteous in creation is gathered.'

The connexion of the mediaeval doctrine of the treasury of merits with the similar Jewish doctrine needs to be traced out.

3. Righteousness identified with the keeping of the law. For the Pharisaic Jew righteousness meant simply the keeping of the law. Thus xv. 5: 'Man would not have rightly understood My judgement if he had not accepted the law.' Again, lxvii. 6: 'So far as Zion is delivered up and Jerusalem laid waste … the vapour of the smoke of the incense of righteousness which is by the law is extinguished in Zion.' Thus the merits of Abraham are attributed to his having kept the law before it was written. lvii. 2: 'At that time the unwritten law was named among them, and the works of the commandments were then fulfilled.'

Of course it must be said that 'the Law' may mean the ceremonial law, as in the lower form of Jewish thought, or special stress may be laid on its moral precepts, as is the case in Baruch, and in the higher Jewish teaching generally.

4. The Gentiles are therefore incapable of righteousness. lxii. 7: 'But regarding the Gentiles it were tedious to tell how they always wrought impiety and wickedness, and never wrought righteousness.' Thus the best hope of the Gentiles is that in the Messianic kingdom they should become servants to Israel. This will be their lot if they have never vexed the holy people; see lxxii. 2-6.

5. The world created on account of Israel, xiv. 18: 'Thou didst say that Thou wouldst make for Thy world man as the administrator of Thy works, that it might be known that he was by no means made on account of the world but the world on account of him. [But "man" is at once interpreted as the Jewish race.] And now I see that as for the world which was made on account of us, lo! it abides, but we on account of whom it was made depart' [i.e. into captivity], xv. 7: 'As regards what thou didst say touching the righteous, that on account of them has this world come into being, nay more, even that world which is to come is on their account.' xxi. 23: 'Reprove therefore the angel of death … and let the treasuries of souls restore them that are enclosed in them, for there have been many years like those that are desolate, from the days of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and of all those who are like them, who sleep in the earth, on whose account Thou didst say that Thou hadst created the world.' (This idea of the treasury of the souls of the righteous recurs in xxx. 2.) In The Assumption of Moses (i. 12) it is said, 'God hath created the world on behalf of His people. But He was not pleased to manifest this purpose of creation from the foundation of the world, in order that the Gentiles might thereby be convicted [i.e. of ignorance], yea to their own humiliation might by their arguments convict one another.'

The above teaching shows us exactly what it was to which St. Paul opposed his doctrine of Justification by Faith. We see it here on its own ground. Its close association with 'boasting' is apparent even in its better form; and its view of election contrasts, by its selfish narrowness, with the view of election put forward by St. Paul, viz. that God's election of a chosen people or society, together with His apparent reprobation of others left outside, both alike subserve a purpose of infinite width, the ultimate divine purpose to 'have mercy upon all.' See Romans ix-xi, especially xi. 32, and cf. Eph. i. 9-10: 'the secret of His will with a view to the dispensation of the fulness of the times, to bring together all things in the Christ, things in heaven and things in earth.'

The marked contrast between the doctrine of Baruch and the doctrine of St. Paul must of course be admitted in general; but it has been asked whether the doctrine of the Atonement is not a fragment of the abandoned Jewish doctrine of merit, borrowed inconsistently by St. Paul, or inconsistently tolerated by him. To this the reply is surely in the negative. The Jews undoubtedly held that Enoch, Moses, Jeremiah, and others were, on account of their righteousness, the accepted mediators with God on behalf of the chosen people, and propitiators of His wrath (see especially Assumption of Moses, xi, and passages from Baruch cited above). But the doctrine of the Atonement, when it is examined, proves to have one feature which puts it into marked opposition with the Judaic doctrine of human merit.

According to the Christian doctrine of the Atonement, Christ is purely and simply God's gift to man. He is the Son of God, given to man by the Father, in order that, taking our nature upon Him, living the perfect human life, and dying the death of perfect obedience, He might satisfy the divine requirement, which we could not satisfy, and procure for us what we could not procure for ourselves, no, not the best of us. Therefore this doctrine puts all men, the best and worst alike, in the common attitude of simply receiving from God, as an unmerited boon, the gift of forgiveness and reconciliation in Christ. It is in fact the strongest possible negation of the Jewish idea of human merit, personal or vicarious.

In other respects the doctrine of The Apocalypse of Baruch affords at once interesting contrasts and parallels to St. Paul's doctrine. Thus —

(a) In Baruch as in St. Paul, we have a combination of the doctrine of divine predestination with the insistence on human free will and responsibility. lxix. 4: 'Of the good works of the righteous which should be accomplished before Him, He foresaw six kinds' should be compared with Eph. ii. 10: 'Good works which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.'

(b) The eschatology of the New Testament, including St. Paul's, is of course especially Jewish. It does not however concern us much in the Epistle to the Ephesians; but we notice that in The Apocalypse of Baruch the idea of 'the consummation of the times' (cf. Eph. i. 10, 'the fulness of the times') appears and reappears constantly. See xiii. 3; xxi. 8, 17; xxx. 3; xlii. 6; liv. 21; lvi. 2; lix. 4; lxix. 4, 5; cf. The Assumption of Moses, i. 18: 'The consummation of the end of the days.'

(c) The connexion of St. Paul's doctrine with the Jewish doctrine is also illustrated in The Apocalypse of Baruch on the following points. That the Gentiles had the opportunity of the knowledge of God through His works in nature, but refused it. See Baruch, liv. 18, and cf. Romans, i. 20: The pre-existence of the Messiah. This is suggested but not very clearly stated in xxx. 1, cf. Charles's note and The Assumption of Moses, i. 14, where the pre-existence of Moses seems to be asserted. Again, the Fall of Adam and its effect in introducing death (or premature death) into the world. See xxiii. 4; xlviii. 42; liv. 15; lvi. 6, and Charles's notes. Once more The Resurrection of the Body. See Baruch, l; li. On all these points we see what was the material in existing Jewish thought or, in other words, what were the existing developements of Old Testament belief, which the Christian inspiration had to work upon. The effect of the specifically Christian inspiration is chiefly seen (1) in selection among existing beliefs – taking some and utterly rejecting others; (2) in giving a definite and fixed form to current Messianic and other ideas which were continually shifting and incoherent; and (3) in spiritualizing and moralizing what it appropriated. Of course it is in the Revelation or Apocalypse of St. John that we have the most signal instance of the New Testament use of contemporary Jewish material. But such material holds a very large place in the whole of the New Testament, and there is no more important assistance to the study of the New Testament than is afforded by contemporary Jewish literature, especially that of an Apocalyptic character.

NOTE D. See p. 120

THE BROTHERHOOD OF ST. ANDREW

After the above passage was written, as to the need amongst us of a deeper idea of the obligations of church membership, it fell to my lot to go to the United States, to make acquaintance with the work of the Brotherhood of St. Andrew in that country, and to assist at its general convention in Buffalo. It seemed to me that nothing could be better calculated to revive the true spirit of laymanship than that society, 'formed in recognition of the fact that every Christian man is pledged to devote his life to the spread of the kingdom of Christ on earth.'

It was started among a small band of young men, of the number of the apostles, nearly fifteen years ago, in St. James's parish, Chicago, and has spread till to-day it numbers more than 1,200 parochial chapters in the United States alone, and has taken firm root in Canada and other parts of the world. It has a double rule of Prayer and of Service. The point of the service required is that it should have the character especially of witness among a man's equals. So much 'church work' is directed towards raising those who are in some ways our inferiors, that we forget that the real test of a man is the witness he bears for Christ among his equals. There is many a man who, especially in his youth, fails to confess Christ in his own society, and then, if I may so express it, sneaks round the corner to do something to raise the degraded or takes orders and preaches the gospel. Nobody can possibly disparage these efforts of love, but a certain character of cowardice continues to attach to them, if they are not based on a frank witness for Christ in a man's own walk of life, where it is hardest. It is this witness which the Brotherhood requires.

The particular rule is 'to make an earnest effort each week to bring some one young man within hearing of the Gospel of Christ as set forth in the services of the Church and in men's Bible classes.' This rule is no doubt open to criticism. But it is interpreted in the spirit rather than in the letter, and for its definite requirement it is successfully pleaded that it keeps the members from vagueness and slackness.

Certainly the result appears to be excellent. The brethren are pervaded by a spirit of frank religious profession and devotion. There appears to be a general tone among them of reality and good sense. Their missionary zeal does not degenerate into an intrusive prying into other men's souls.

The Brotherhood was developed in the atmosphere of the United States, and it remains a question whether it will flourish in England. The more sharply defined distinctions of classes among us; our exaggerated parochialism; the shyness and reserve in religious matters which characterizes many really religious Englishmen and degenerates into a sort of 'hypocrisy reversed,' or pretence of being less religious than one is – these things will constitute grave obstacles. But the need is at least as crying among us, as on the other side of the Atlantic, to emphasize among professing Christians and churchmen the duty of witness. At least we may trust the Brotherhood will be given a good trial. But if it is to have a fair chance among us, the greatest care must be taken that it should develope as a properly lay movement; and while it receives all encouragement from the clergy, should not be taken up by them to be turned into a guild of 'church workers,' useful for purposes of parochial organization.

One of the most striking facts about the Brotherhood in the States is that, while the church spirit is unmistakable – as no one who was present at the corporate Communion of 1,300 delegates in October of this year at half-past six in the morning in a great church at Buffalo could possibly doubt – it has successfully avoided becoming either a party society or a society rent by factions.

It is because I believe the witness of this Brotherhood to the true church spirit has already proved invaluable that I venture to dedicate this little exposition of the great book of brotherhood – though without leave granted or asked – to its founder and president.

NOTE E. See pp. 164, 166

THE CONCEPTION OF THE CHURCH (CATHOLIC) IN ST. PAUL

IN ITS RELATION TO LOCAL CHURCHES

By far the most frequent use of the word 'church' or 'churches' in the New Testament is to designate a local society of Christians or a number of such societies taken together, 'the church at Jerusalem,' 'the church at Antioch,' 'the churches of Galatia,' 'the seven churches which are in Asia,' 'all the churches.' But it is used also for the church as a whole. In fact, before Christ's coming the word in the Greek of the Old Testament had passed from meaning an assembly of the people, as in classical Greek, to meaning the sacred people as a whole[[228 - Not, as Dr. Hort points out (Christian Ecclesia, p. 5), 'the elect (called-out) people.' The word has in fact no such association attached to it.]], as St. Stephen uses it in his speech 'The church in the wilderness' (Acts vii. 38). And it is exactly in this sense that it is used by our Lord in St. Matthew, xvi. 18. 'The church' which our Lord there promises to 'build' is the Church of the New Covenant as a whole. We might paraphrase His words (as Dr. Hort suggests[[229 - pp. 10, 11.]]) 'on this rock I will build my Israel.' Thus there is throughout the Acts and St. Paul's earlier epistles, a tendency to pass from the use of 'church' as a local society to its use as designating the whole body of the faithful. This was but natural seeing that each local society did but represent the one divine society, the church of the Old Covenant, refounded by Christ. See Acts ix. 31: 'The church throughout all Judaea and Galilee and Samaria.' xii. 1: 'Herod the king put forth his hands to afflict certain of the church.' xx. 28: 'The church of God which he purchased with his own blood.' Gal. i. 13: 'I persecuted the church of God.' 1 Cor. xii. 28: 'God hath set some in the church, first apostles,' &c. In this last passage and in St. Paul's speech to the Ephesian elders this general use of the term is unmistakable.

In the Epistle to the Ephesians, in which alone among his epistles St. Paul is writing not about the difficulties or needs of a particular congregation, but about the church in its general conception, this larger use of the term becomes dominant. And the point to be noticed is that the church in general, or catholic church, is conceived of, not as made up of local churches, but as made up of individual members. The local church would be regarded by St. Paul not as one element of a catholic confederacy[[230 - Unless indeed, in Eph. iii. 21, we should understand 'every building' as meaning every local church which, fitted together with every other, grows into a holy temple, i.e. into that which only a really catholic church can be.]], but as the local representative of the one divine and catholic society[[231 - The same statement would be true of St. Ignatius of Antioch.]]. But the local church is not, according to St. Paul, a completely independent representative of the church as a whole. The apostles, as commissioned witnesses and representatives of Christ, are over all the churches. They, or their recognized associates and delegates, like Barnabas, Timothy and Titus, represent the general church which every local church must, so to speak, reproduce. The apostles therefore, or their representatives, give to each church when it is first founded 'the tradition' of truth and morals which is permanently to mould it; and they maintain the tradition by a more or less constant supervision. Thus they are the force which holds all 'the churches' together on a common basis. 'So ordain I,' says St. Paul, 'in all the churches[[232 - 1 Cor. vii. 17.]].' 'Hold fast the traditions even as I delivered them to you[[233 - 1 Cor. xi. 2, xv. 2.]].' The apostle has, he teaches, an 'authority' commensurate with his 'stewardship[[234 - 1 Cor. ix. 17.]],' an authority 'which the Lord gave for the edification and not the destruction[[235 - 2 Cor. x. 8.]]' of the Christians, but which at times must take the form of a 'rod' of chastisement[[236 - 1 Cor. iv, 21.]]. The complete doctrinal and moral independence of particular Churches is strongly denied by St. Paul in such phrases as 'Came the word of God unto you alone?' or, 'If any man preacheth unto you any gospel other than that which ye received, let him be anathema[[237 - 1 Cor. xiv. 36; Gal. i. 8.]].'

Dr. Hort's work on The Christian Ecclesia, in many respects, as would be expected, most admirable, seems to me to minimize quite extraordinarily the apostolic authority. The apostles, he says, were only witnesses of Christ. 'There is no trace in Scripture of a formal commission of authority for government from Christ Himself.' This surprising conclusion is reached by omitting many considerations. Thus in St. Matthew xvi. 19 a definite grant of official authority – as appears in the passage, Is. xxii. 22, on which it is based – is promised to St. Peter, and he is on this occasion, as Dr. Hort himself maintains, the representative of the apostles generally. This stewardship granted to the apostles, to shepherd the flock and feed the household of God, is implied again in St. Luke xii. 42, St. John xxi. 15-17; and it seems to be quite unreasonable to dissociate the authoritative commission to 'absolve and retain,' St. John xx. 20-23, from the apostolic office. Dr. Hort would apparently dissociate such passages as those last referred to from the apostolic office, and assign them to the church as a whole. But how then does he account for the authority inherent in the apostolic office, as it is represented by St. Paul, and in the Acts? St. Paul's conception of the authority of the apostles is barely considered by him; and the authority of the apostolate in the Acts is strangely minimized. Nothing is said of Simon's impression – surely a true one – that the apostles had the 'authority' to convey the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of hands (viii. 19). Certainly the phrases used toward the churches of Antioch, Syria, and Cilicia, 'to whom we gave no commandment,' 'it seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things,' imply a governmental authority, which, if it is shared by the presbyters, is substantially that of the apostles (Acts xv. 24-28).

Dr. Hort also minimizes greatly the element of official authority which appears almost at once in the church by apostolic appointment and delegation. No doubt there was at first an authority allowed – as must always be allowed – to the acknowledged possessors of extraordinary divine gifts, especially to the 'prophets.' But in the period of St. Paul's later activity, when he is facing the future of the church and has apparently ceased to expect an immediate return of Christ, these special gifts retire into the background, while the ordinary functions of government, and administration of the word and sacraments, remain in the position which they are permanently to occupy in the hands of regularly ordained officers.

Dr. Hort deals, as it seems to me, most unreasonably with the pastoral epistles. It is surely arbitrary to dissociate 'the gift which was in Timothy by the laying on of St. Paul's hands,' the gift of power, and love, and discipline; which Timothy is to 'stir up' (2 Tim. i. 6), from that mentioned in the first epistle (iv. 14), 'the gift that is in thee, which was given thee by prophecy, with the laying on of the hands of the presbyters'; and to make the former a 'gift' of merely personal piety. And (even if the 'lay hands suddenly on no man' be interpreted, as Ellicott and Hort would interpret it, of the reception of a penitent) it seems absurd to doubt, in view of what is said about the laying on of hands in ordination of 'the seven' and of the 'evangelist' Timothy, and in view of the place it held generally for conveying spiritual gifts in the Christian Church, that this was the accepted method of ordination in all cases; there being in fact no evidence to the contrary.

Once more, Dr. Hort is surely maintaining an impossible position when, even in face of the salutation to the Philippians, he denies that the term 'episcopus' is used in the New Testament as a regular title of an ecclesiastical office.

Not even Dr. Hort's reputation for soundness of judgement could stand against many posthumous publications such as The Christian Ecclesia.

NOTE F. See p. 188

THE ETHICS OF CATHOLICISM

The world at large is fully aware of the claim of 'Catholicism,' i.e. the claim of the one visible church for all sorts of men. But the ethical meaning of the claim has been strangely subordinated to its theological and sacerdotal aspects. Its ethical meaning seems to me to require developing under heads such as these: —

1. The requirement of mutual forbearance if men of all races and classes and idiosyncrasies are to be bound to belong to one organization and to worship in common, 'breaking the one bread.' Herein lies the moral discipline of Catholicism: see above, pp. 123 foll.

2. The consequent obligation of toleration in theology, ritual, &c., on all matters which do not touch the actual basis of the Christian faith. St. Cyprian, though he believed that those baptized outside the church were not baptized at all, yet deliberately remained in communion with those bishops who thought differently, trusting to the mercy of God to supply the supposed deficiency in those who, outside his jurisdiction, were admitted into the church, as he believed, without baptism. And St. Augustine, who, most of ancient writers, understands the moral meaning of Catholicism, repeatedly holds up this toleration of Cyprian as an example to the Donatist separatists of his own day: 'If you seek advice from the blessed Cyprian, hear how much he anticipates from the mere advantage of unity: so much so that he did not separate himself from those who held different opinions: and, though he thought that those who are baptized outside the communion of the church do not receive baptism at all, yet he believed that those who had thus been simply admitted into the church could on no other ground than the bond of unity come under the divine pardon.' Then he quotes Cyprian's words: 'But some one will say: what will happen to those who in the past, when coming from heresy to the church, have been admitted without baptism? (I reply): God is powerful to grant them forgiveness by His mercy, and not to separate from the gifts of His church those who, after being thus simply admitted into her, have fallen asleep.' And again: 'judging no man and separating no man from the rights of communion because he thinks differently.' And St. Augustine continues: 'All these catholic unity embraces in her motherly bosom, bearing one another's burdens in turn and endeavouring to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace, until, in whatever respect they disagreed, the Lord should reveal (the truth) to one or the other of them[[238 - S. Aug. de Baptismo, ii. [xiii.] 18, [xiv.] 20.]].' Not to St. Paul then, only, but to St. Cyprian and St. Augustine, doctrinal toleration is an essential of Catholicism. Would to God the claim of the one church had not come to be associated so generally with the opposite tendency! See above, pp. 158 f.

3. Catholicism, as meaning a church of all races and sorts of people, postulates a constant missionary enthusiasm in all the members of the church till this ideal be realized. 'To do the work of an evangelist,' to have the 'feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace,' to be content to leave nothing but evil outside the church – that is to be a real catholic.

4. To St. Paul's mind the Catholicism of the church is to lead the way to an even wider 'reconciliation.' Through the catholic union of men in the church the whole universe is to come back into unity. The kingdom of God is to be something wider than the church which exists to prepare for it. This principle once recognized secures that the church shall feel and exhibit a constant interest in all departments of knowledge and progress. The universe is one, and redemption is for the whole.

5. Catholicism is the antithesis of esotericism. All – men and women, slave or free, Greek or Scythian – are capable of full initiation into Christianity. All – not apostles and presbyter-bishops and deacons only – but all Christians make up the high priestly body and have on their foreheads the anointing oil: see above, pp. 111 ff.

Forbearance between divergent classes and races and individuals – doctrinal toleration – missionary enthusiasm – universal sympathy – recognition of a universal priesthood of Christianity – these constitute the moral content of Pauline Catholicism.

NOTE G. See p. 190

THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE AND INDUSTRIAL PROBLEMS