-^NRYOFPW^vcf^ 
 
 2565 
 
THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO 
 ST. MARK. 
 
THE GOSPEL ACCOEDING TO 
 
 ST. MARK 
 
 WITH NOTES CRITICAL AND PRACTICAL. 
 
 BY THE REV. M. F. SADLER, 
 
 RECTOR OF HOXITOX; PREBEN'DART OF WELLS; AUTHOR OF " CHURCH DOCTRIXK BIBLE 
 
 TRUTH," "CHURCH TEACHER'S MAXUAL," "NOTES CRITICAL AND PRACTICAL 
 
 OX ST. MATTHEW, ST. JOHX, AXD ST. LUKE," ETC. 
 
 FOURTH EDITION. 
 
 LOXDOX: GEORGE BELL AND SONS, 
 
 YORK STREET, COYENT GARDEN. 
 
 1892. 
 
:ms\viCK press: — c. whittinguam and co., tooks court. 
 
 CHAKCEKV LAKE. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 THE Clmrcli has never known but one St. Mark, the Evan- 
 geUst and the companion of St. Peter and St. Paul. The 
 first mention of liim in the New Testament is in Acts xii. 12 : [Peter] 
 *'came to the house of Mary, the mother of John, wliose surname 
 was Mark, where many were gathered together, praying." From 
 this w^e gather that he was the son of a Christian lady of much con- 
 sideration in the early Church of Jerusalem, whom we afterwards 
 learn to have been the sister of Barnabas (Col. iv. 10). We next 
 find him at Antioch in the comjiany of Barnabas and Saul (xii. 25), 
 and acting as their minister at the commencement of their first 
 missionary journey, but leaving them for some reason not specified, 
 and returning to Jerusalem (xiii. 13). 
 
 It was a reason, however, w^hich Paul resented as unworthy of a 
 special messenger of Christ, and he refused to have him as their 
 minister on their next journey. Barnabas, however, took him and 
 sailed to Cyprus. The whole passage runs : "And some days after 
 Paul said unto Barnabas, Let us go again and visit our brethren in 
 every city where we have preached the word of the Lord, and see how 
 they do. And Barnabas determined to take with them John, wliose 
 surname was Mark. But Paul thought not good to take him with 
 them, who departed from them from Pamphylia, and went not 
 with them to the work. And the contention was so sharp between 
 them, that they departed asunder one from the other : and so 
 Barnabas took Mark, and sailed unto Cyprus " (xv. 36-39). I can- 
 not forbear giving the reader the remarks of the late Professor 
 Blunt (in his " Scriptural Coincidences ") on this place : " A curious 
 chain of consistent narrative may be traced throughout the whole 
 of this passage. The cause of the contention between Paul and 
 Barnabas has been already noticed by Dr. Paley. I need not 
 therefore do more than call to my reader's mind .... the pas- 
 sage in the Epistle to the Colossians (iv. 10), where it is casually 
 
VI INTRODUCTION. 
 
 said that "Marcus was sister's son to Barnabas," a relationship 
 most satisfactorily accounting for the otherwise extraordinary per- 
 tinacity with which Barnabas takes up Mark's cause in this dispute 
 with Paul .... One circumstance more remains still to be 
 noticed. Mark, it seems, in the former journey, "departed from 
 them from Pamphylia, and went not with them to the work." 
 How did this happen ? The explanation, I think, is not difficult. 
 Paul and Barnabas are appointed to go forth and preach. Accord- 
 ingly they hasten to Seleucia, the nearest seaport to Antioch, 
 where they were staying, and taking with them John Mark, "sailed 
 to Cyprus" (xiii. 4). Since Barnabas was a Cypriote, it is pro- 
 bable that his nephew Mark was the same, or at any rate that he 
 had friends and relations iu that island. His mother, it is true, 
 had a house in Jerusalem, where the discijiles met, and where some 
 of them perhaps lodged (xii. 12) ; but so had Mnason, who was 
 nevertheless of Cyprus (xxi. 16). How reasonable, then, is it to 
 suppose that in joining himself to Paul and Barnabas in the outset 
 of their journey, he was partly influenced by a very innocent desire 
 to visit his kindred, his connections, or ^Derhaps his birthplace, and 
 that having achieved this object, he landed with his two com- 
 panions in Pamphylia, and so returned forthwith to Jerusalem. 
 And this supposition, it may be added, is strengthened by the ex- 
 pression applied by St. Paul to Mark, that " he went not with 
 them io the ivorlc," as if in the particular case the voyage to Cyprus 
 did not deserve to be considered even the beginning of their 
 labours, being more properly a visit of choice to kinsfolk and 
 acquaintance, or to a place at least having strong local charms for 
 Mark (p. 334-336). 
 
 It is satisfactory to find that this temporary estrangement was 
 turned into attachment arising from the sense of Mark's value as a 
 labourer in the same holy cause, for St. Paul writes to Timothy, 
 " Take Mark and bring him with thee, for he is profitable to me 
 for the ministry." He had before this been in the band of Paul's 
 fellow-labourers, for in the Epistle to Philemon we read his name 
 as sending his salutation to him (v. 23-24). 
 
 The last allusion to him makes him a companion of St. Peter. 
 " The Church that is at Babylon [probably Eome] , elected together 
 with you, saluteth you, and so doth Marcus, my son." It is con- 
 jectured that St. Peter calls Mark his son, because he had been 
 converted by him. 
 
INTRODUCTION. Vll 
 
 These are all the allusions to him in Scripture. It is clear that 
 notwithstanding his first slight defection, he became afterwards so 
 established in the faith, as to be a fellow-helper and close companion 
 of the two leading Apostles. 
 
 Ecclesiastical records make him to have been the founder of the 
 Church in Alexandria. Eusebius thus writes of it : — 
 
 '•' The same ^fark, they also say, being the first that was sent to Egypt, 
 proclaimed the Gospel there which he had written, and tirst established 
 Churches at the city of Alexander."' (" Eccles. Hist." bk. ii. ch. 16.) 
 
 The Holy Scripture tells us nothing whatsoever respecting the 
 writing of his Gospel. There is no preface to it fixing its author- 
 ship, as in the case of St. Luke's Gospel, of the Acts, and of most 
 of the Epistles ; but if there be one single fact of the early Church 
 more certain from the united concurrence of all Church history than 
 any other, it is that the composition of his Gospel was occasioned 
 by, and closely connected with, St, Mark's intimacy with St. Peter. 
 Papias, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, 
 Origen, and Eusebius, are alike in their testimony on this. 
 
 Papias was Bishop of Hierapolis in the time of Polycarp, i.e., 
 very early in the second century. He took pains in collecting 
 reminiscences of our Lord and of His Apostles, and the following 
 extract from his exposition of the oracles of the Lord, is }3reserved 
 in Eusebius : — 
 
 "And John the Presbyter also said this, 'Mark, being the interpreter of 
 Peter, wrote accurately all that he remembered, but not, however, in the 
 order in which it was SiDoken or done by our Lord, for he neither heard nor 
 followed our Lord, but, as before said, he was in company with Peter, who 
 gave him such instruction as was necessary [or as rendered by Dr. "\Yestcott 
 * Who used to frame his instruction to meet the [immediate] wants of his 
 hearers ;' the sentence is ambiguous], but not to give a history of the Lord's 
 discourses ; so Mark has committed no error, writing (as he did) some things 
 as he has recorded them (or remembered them). For he was carefully at- 
 tentive to one thing, not to admit anything that he had heard, or to state 
 anything falsely in these accounts.' " (" Eccles. Hist.," bk. iii. ch. 39.) 
 
 The reader will here observe that this very early writer notices 
 the almost entire absence of our Lord's discourses in St. Mark's 
 Gospel in the words, " but not to give a history of the Lord's 
 discourses." 
 
 Justin Martyr's covert allusion to this Gospel is remarkable. It 
 
viii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 is to be remembered that the account of the Lord's giving the namo 
 Boanerges to the two sons of Zebedee is recorded in St. Mark only. 
 Justin has occasion to mention this, and writes thus (Dial, cb. 
 106). 
 
 " And when it is said that He imposed on one of the Apostles the name 
 Peter, and when this is recorded in his (Peter's) memoirs, with this other 
 fact, that He named the two sons of Zebedee Boanerges, which moans, •' sons 
 of Thunder,' this is a sign," &c. 
 
 Justin's name for the Gospels is " Memoirs of the Apostles," so 
 here having mentioned the Apostle Peter, he calls the Gospel of 
 St. Mark, so particularly identified with him, " his" Memoirs. 
 
 Irenseus thus alludes to St, Peter's connection with this 
 
 Gospel : — 
 
 " ]Matthew also issued a written Gospel among the Hebrews in their own 
 dialect, while Peter and Paul were preaching at Rome, and laying the 
 foundation of the Church. After their departure Mark, the disciple and 
 interpreter of Peter, did also hand down to us in writing what had been 
 preached by Peter." (" Adv. Haeres." iii. ch. 1.) 
 
 Clement of Alexandria is quoted by Eusebius as bearing the 
 same testimony, which is thus cited by Eusebius from a lost work, 
 the Hypotyposes, sixth book. 
 
 " So greatly, however, did the splendour of piety enlighten the minds of 
 Peter's hearers, that it was not sufficient to hear but once, nor to receive 
 the unwritten doctrine of the Gospel of God, but they persevered in every 
 variety of entreaties, to solicit Mark as the companion of Peter, and whose 
 Gospel we have, that he should leave them a monument of the doctrine thus 
 orally communicated, in writing. Nor did they cease their solicitations 
 until they had prevailed with the man, and thus become the means of [the 
 composition of] that history which is called the Gospel according to Mai-k. 
 They say also that the Apostle [Peter], having ascertained what was done 
 by the Revelation of the Spirit, was delighted by the zealous ardour ex- 
 pressed by these men, and that the history obtained his authority for the 
 purpose of being read in the Churches." (" Eccles. Hist." bk. ii. ch. 15.) 
 
 There is another passage from Clement quoted by Eusebius, in 
 which he gives the same account of the occasion which induced 
 Mark to put in writing what had been preached by Peter, though 
 he somewhat modifies the statement respecting St. Peter's ap- 
 proval : — 
 
INTRODUCTION. IX 
 
 " "When Peter lad proclaimed the Word publicly at Eome, and declai-ed 
 the Gospel under the influence of the Spirit, as there was a great number 
 present, they requested Mark, which had fulluwed him from afar, and re- 
 membered well what he had said, to reduce these things to writing, and that 
 after composing the Gospel, he gave it to those who requested it of him, 
 which, when Peter understood, he directly neither hindered nor encouraged 
 it." (" Eccles. Hist." bk. vi. c. 14.) 
 
 TertuUian very shortly, but still more decisively affirms the con- 
 nection between St. Mark's Gospel and St. Peter's preaching : — 
 
 "The same authority of the Apostolic Churches will afford evidence to 
 the other Gospels also (besides St. Luke's) which we possess equally through 
 their means — I mean the Gospels of John and ]Matthew — whilst that which 
 Mark published may be affirmed to bo Peters, whose interpreter Mark 
 was." (•' Against Marcion," bk. iv. ch. 5.) 
 
 Similarly Origen : — 
 
 *' The second is according to Mark, who composed it as Peter guided 
 him'' {iKpyjyi^aaro avn^). (Eus. " Eccles. Hist." bk. vi. ch. 25.) 
 
 Lastly, Eusebius, in whose works so many of these extracts are 
 preserved. : — 
 
 " It is Mark indeed who writes these things. But it is Peter who testifies 
 them concerning himself [particularly in the matter of his denial], for all 
 the contents of Mark's Gospel are regarded as memoirs of Peter's discourses." 
 (" Evangelical Demonstration.") 
 
 In glancing over the preceding statements the reader will notice 
 that they all testify to the same fact, which is the entire dependence 
 of St. Mark's Gospel on the preaching of St. Peter. Most of them 
 teach that it was an accurate reproduction, and yet there is suffi- 
 cient discrepancy between them to show that they were not all 
 derived from the same source, as, for instance, from Papias. The 
 differences in the above statements are j)rincipally upon the matter 
 of the extent of St. Peter's superintendence, from that of Origen, 
 who tells us that St. Peter "guided" St. Mark in his composition, 
 to that of one of the statements of Clement, " which when Peter 
 understood, he directly neither hindered nor encouraged it," but this 
 latter seems to refer rather to the publication than to the writing. 
 
 The contents of the Gospel, I need hardly say, fully bear oitt the 
 external evidence for the Petrine origin of this Gospel, for they 
 
X INTRODUCTION. 
 
 present the extraordinary phenomenon of one who was certainly 
 not an eye-witness of the acts of the Lord, describing them as if he 
 had not only been an eye-witness, but a very observant one. I 
 have made it my business, throughout the notes, to direct the 
 reader's attention to the proofs that the writer must have derived 
 his information respecting the scenes in the life of the Lord which 
 he delineates from a constant companion and faithful and loving 
 observer. It is a remarkable fact that St. Mark's real Gospel, 
 i.e., that which presents his peculiarities of close observance and 
 faithfulness in minute detail, really commences with St. Peter's 
 first enhance into close companionship with the Lord, i.e., at 
 chap. i. 18. Immediately following upon this, we find a very de- 
 tailed description of a miracle of the casting out of an evil spirit in 
 the synagogue, an account only found in Mark : then the going 
 to Peter's house, and the healing of his wife's mother, present two 
 or three slight touches true to nature which are not in St. Matthew, 
 which I have noticed in the commentary. Then the sojourn in 
 Peter's house is given with many details, which would not be pre- 
 served in a body of tradition, but which would abide in a loving 
 memory, particularly that the Lord rose up early a great while 
 before day, and went out to a solitary place to pray. Again, in the 
 beginning of the next chapter we have the healing of the sick of 
 the palsy, " borne of four," given with a fulness of incidental detail 
 which is in extreme contrast with the somewhat bare and hurried 
 notice of the same in St. Matthew. 
 
 To give more of such instances would only be to re-write what 
 is in my notes. I would only mention that St. Mark, more than 
 any other Evangelist, notices the looks and gestures of the Lord. 
 Thus : He looked round al»out to see her that had done this 
 thing ; He beheld the rich j'oung ruler, and loved him ; He looked 
 round about upon His disciples when He warned them of the 
 danger of riches. 
 
 Whether, then, we look to the extraordinary unanimity in eccle- 
 siastical records, or whether we look to the contents of this Gospel, 
 nothing can be more certain than that it is based upon the teaching 
 and preaching of St. Peter, and indeed reproduces it, so that we 
 may adopt the words of Tertullian : " The Gospel which Mark 
 published may be affirmed to be Peter's, whose interpreter Mark 
 was," and of Origen, " Mark composed it as Peter guided him." 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 THE RELATIONS OF ST. MARK TO ST. MATTHEW. 
 
 The great bulk of the Gospel of St. Mark is the reproduction ol 
 the same tradition respecting our Lord's life and acts which is to 
 be found in St. Matthew. Very little is contained in St. Mark 
 which is not to be found in St. Matthew. Not only the incidents, 
 but the order of the incidents (except in chap, v.) is much the 
 same. For instance, they both mention out of its proper order and 
 apparently for the same purpose, the anointing at Bethany. They 
 both omit the ministry at Jerusalem described by St. John. They 
 both omit the ministry (in Peraea) described in Luke x.-xviii. 14. 
 But though St. Mark reproduces so much that is to be found in St. 
 Matthew, it is clear that he could not have copied it from St. 
 Matthew's Gospel, as he reproduces it frequently in needlessly 
 different words, sometimes with omissions of small matters which, 
 if it had been his design to give us the incident in a perfect form, 
 he would not have left out. Take, for instance, the Transfigura- 
 tion. If St. Mark simply copied St. Matthew's Gospel, with addi- 
 tions and minute touches of detail to make a more perfect narra- 
 tive, why should he omit the important fact that the Lord's face 
 "did shine as the sun"? Why should he omit the words of the 
 Father, " In Whom I am well pleased " ? Why should he omit the 
 contents of the sixth and seventh verses of St. Matthew's account ? 
 " And when the disciples heard it they fell on their face, and were 
 sore afraid. And Jesus came and touched them, and said. Arise, 
 and be not afraid." 
 
 Owing then to the great similarity of the matter common to both, 
 and yet that there are such manifest indications that the one could 
 not have borrowed from the other, the relations of St. Mark to St. 
 Matthew have presented very great difficulties, and yet it seems 
 to me that there need be little or no difficulty, for the oldest account 
 of the origin of St. Mark's Gospel, that of Papias, which I have just 
 quoted, directs us to as satisfactory a solution of the x^roblem as at 
 this distance of time and with our lack of historical materials we 
 can well expect. 
 
 It is particularly mentioned by Papias that St. Peter gave Mark 
 Buch instruction as was necessary, but not to give a history (or con- 
 
Xll INTRODUCTION. 
 
 nected narrative) of our LorcVs disco^irses.'' ^ Now it is the cbaracter- 
 istic of St. Mark's Gospel to be a Gospel of incidents, particularly 
 miracles, but not of discourses or parables as St. Matthew's. St. 
 Mark gives only four parables, while St. Matthew gives fourteen ; 
 and yet they both alike record that " without a parable spake he not 
 unto them." The omission then of so many parables must have 
 been intentional on the part of St. Mark or St. Peter. Then there 
 is not a single line in St. Mark's Gospel of the sort of teaching 
 which we have in the Sermon on the Mount, whereas in St. Luke's 
 Gospel we have much of the teaching of that sermon reproduced. 
 Take, again, the charge to the Apostles. In St. Matthew x. it 
 occupies thirty-six verses. In St. Mark vi. 7, 11, it occupies four or 
 five. Take, again, the denunciation of the Scribes and Pharisees. 
 In St. Matthew it runs over a chapter of thirty-nine verses. In St. 
 Mark it occupies but three verses of chap. xii. I need scarcely 
 mention that St. John's Gospel is principally a gospel of discourses. 
 So that, compared with the other three Gospels, St. Mark's is so 
 absolutely without didactic matter that it must have been inten- 
 tionally omitted. To have given more could not have fallen in 
 with the plan of St. Mark, or St. Peter. Now why was this? 
 Evidently because in the body of tradition which St. Peter preached, 
 which is virtually the same as St. Matthew's Gospel as we now 
 have it, there was sufficient didactic instruction, and that given in 
 as perfect a form as possible, whereas in that same body of tradi- 
 tion, the incidents of the Lord's life were not given in as graphic 
 and full a manner as they might have been. The hearers of 
 Peter had been particular!}'- struck with this. The Apostle Peter 
 in his teaching added nothing to the discourses of the Lord, as 
 embodied in the tradition reproduced in St. Matthew (or in some 
 collection of tradition answering to it, but now lost), whereas 
 he did add very materially to the account of the incidents and 
 miracles of the Lord's life. He added those details, those touches 
 of nature which made his accounts that photographic representa- 
 tion, if one may reverently use the expression, which we have in 
 this Gospel, as compared with that of St. Matthew. God, Who gives 
 to each man his particular gift, one after this manner, another after 
 that, may have given to St. Matthew, a retentive memory to repro- 
 
 ^ og irpoQ TiiQ xpEt'ae IttouIto tciq Ci5a<TKa\iag, dXX' oi'X io(nrep crvvra^iv 
 tojv Kvpiaiciov Troiovn^vog Xoyujv. 
 
INTRODUCTION. xiii 
 
 duce faithfully parables and long discourses. He gave to St. Peter 
 an eye observant of all the lesser details which add lifelike charm 
 to a narrative. And these it was which the Eoman Christians 
 desired to have jDreserved, and so they begged St. Mark to repro- 
 duce the accounts of miracle and incident, and as the oldest his- 
 torian tells us, " not to give a history of our Lord's discourses." 
 
 If the didactic teaching of the Lord is part of the everlasting 
 Gospel, and it would be blasphemy to say that it is not, then St. 
 Mark's is a subsidiary Gospel, not intended by the Inspiring Spirit 
 to be a book by itself, but to be the companion, the inseparable 
 companion of three others, two of which supply the more human, 
 the last, St. John, the more divine and exalted discourses of the 
 Word made flesh. In saying this we do not assert the inferiority 
 of St. Mark's Gospel. On the ground which it covers we assert its 
 superiority, but it does not cover all the necessary ground. St. 
 Matthew and St. Luke give us in the matter of discourses, the human 
 side of the Lord's didactic teaching, St. John the divine side. 
 
 I may be asked, then, whether I believe that St. Matthew'a 
 Gospel was in the hands of the Christians of Eome who entreated 
 Mark to write what Peter had taught so graphically. I answer, that 
 there is much probability that it was. St. Peter must have been 
 acquainted with the full body of Palestinian tradition or original 
 teaching respecting the Lord. It is impossible to suppose that in 
 his instructions to his converts he did not preach the doctrine con- 
 tained in the Sermon on the Mount and in the parables, such as. 
 " the field sown with wheat and tares," " the leaven," *' the 
 merchantman," which are not in St. Mark. He gives us through 
 St. Mark one parable not found in St. Matthew. He of all men 
 could not have been ignorant of the very striking parable of the 
 labours in the vineyard, for it arose directly out of his own 
 question, " What shall we have, therefore ? " (Matt. xix. 27, &c.) He 
 must have known and taught all this. And yet it is quite clear 
 that he had never thought of putting any of his teaching into 
 writing. Why was this ? Was it because the teaching of the New 
 Testament era was oral teaching, and so much so that throughout the 
 Apostolical Epistles we have not one word of any written Gospel 
 being in the hands of any Church of Christian converts ? And yet 
 do not such precepts as, "Let the word of Christ dwell in you 
 richly in all wisdom," demand some written Gospel containing the 
 sermons and parables of Christ ? 
 
XIV INTRODUCTION. 
 
 My own belief is that St. Matthew's Gospel was in the hands of 
 St. Peter and his converts, that St. Peter preached its contents with 
 additions of his own, not because it was the work of his brother 
 Apostle, but because it comprehended the bulk of the tradition 
 respecting the life, death, and teaching of Jesus ; but, being a tra- 
 dition, it could only represent the acts of the Lord in a somewhat 
 formal and general way. But St. Peter's mode of describing the 
 incidents of the Lord's life was so graphic and striking, that his 
 converts desired a permanent record of iliat particular part of his 
 instruction. This St. Mark accomplished, and St. Peter, according 
 to some accounts, with some hesitation gave his approval. 
 
 I cannot think for a moment that St. Peter would have left his 
 converts without any permament authoritative record of the Lord's 
 life and teaching, but he may have hesitated, or at least not been 
 forward to publish his own particular rendering of the principal 
 things which the Lord did. Happily his natural backwardness was 
 overruled by the Spirit of God, AVho made St. Mark His instrument 
 in handing down to us a more lifelike delineation of the x^rincipal 
 acts of Christ. 
 
 What I have traced out is, I believe, the sole reason for the 
 existence and form of this Gospel, but it is a worthy reason. 
 
 I cannot agree with those good men who think that this Gospel 
 was written to exhibit the power of Christ, and for that purpose 
 Q^y — for if St. Matthew's Gospel or St. Luke's) was divested of all 
 its didactic teaching, i.e., all its record of the words of Christ — then 
 the miracles and other acts of power, being by themselves, would 
 come out in stronger relief, with quite as much emphasis as they do 
 in St. Mark's. And far less can I believe that this Gosj)el was written 
 with any controversial view, as some German critics have most 
 absurdly imagined. I believe that nothing was further from the 
 thought of the Evangelist than to uphold some imaginary Petrine 
 or Pauline views. He was importuned to reproduce a certain phase 
 of Apostolic delineation of miracles and incidents, and ho did this, 
 so that we see in his pages at times the very manner, the look, the 
 iresture of the Lord. 
 
T 
 
 A COMMENTARY. 
 
 ST. MARK. 
 
 CHAP. I. 
 
 HE beginning of tlie gospel of Jesus Clirist, ^ tlie Son 
 
 of GrOd ; * Matt.xiv.33. 
 
 Luke i. 35. 
 
 John i. 3i. 
 
 1. "[The] Son of God." These words retained by all principal Uncials except ti, by 
 Vulgate and Syriac, and almost all cursives. 
 
 1. " The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God." 
 The most probable meaning of this verse is that which con- 
 nects it with the two following. " The beginning" of the Gospel, 
 or good tidings of salvation, was the preaching of the Baptist, 
 because it was good tidings to right-minded men that God was on 
 the eve of fulfilHng His ancient promise of sending His Son into the 
 world as its Eedeemer. That this should be the heginning of the 
 New or Gospel state of things was in accordance with the declara- 
 tions of God by the prophets Malachi and Isaiah ; and so the 
 Evangelist proceeds to say, " As it is written in the prophets." 
 The prophets foretold that God would not send the Messiah into 
 the world without having His coming announced, so that men 
 should not be taken by surprise ; but that He, before He actually 
 was manifested, should be duly heralded by one who should stir 
 the religious heart of the chosen people far more deeply and widely 
 than any prophet who had gone before him. And so Malachi pro- 
 phesies : "Behold, I send my messenger before my face;" and 
 Isaiah foretells the sound of a " voice of one ciying in the wilder- 
 ness, prepare ye the way of the Lord." The Evangelist here com- 
 bines two prophecies, as if they were one, as in reality they are ; 
 
 B 
 
2 I SEND MY MESSENGER. [St. Mark. 
 
 2 As it is written in the prophets, ^ Behold, I send my 
 
 b Mai. iii. 1. messenger before thy face, which shall prepare 
 
 Matt. xi. 10. -, ■, o ji 
 
 Luke vii. 27. thy Way oeiore tnee. 
 
 2. "In the prophets." So A,, E., F., (i., H., K., M., &c., most Cursives, and some 
 versions ; but " in Esaias the prophet " is read in K, B., D., L. 33, Vulg., Coptic, Syriae. 
 (Schaaf.) 
 
 and he probably includes both under the name of the older and 
 more important prophet. 
 
 "The gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God." The works 
 which Christ undertook to perform for our salvation — the reconcilia- 
 tion of the world to God, and the exercise of His Mediatorship and 
 Headship over the Church — could only be brought about by One 
 Who shared our nature, and yet had in Himself the fulness of the 
 Divine Nature ; and so the Gospel is here called the Gospel of Jesus 
 Christ, the Son of God. The Gospel of Jesus — of Him who was in 
 very deed the Lord, the Saviour — of Christ, as One anointed with 
 the Holy Ghost and with power, and the whole Divine Person was 
 the " Son of God." 
 
 The two prophecies which the Evangelist combines and cites are 
 unintelligible, unless they set forth the coming of a Divine Person 
 amongst us. It will be well to show this by giving them with their 
 context. The first is from Malachi iii. 1 ; " Behold, I will send my 
 messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me, and the Lord 
 whom ye seek shall suddenly come to his temple, even the mes- 
 senger of the covenant, whom ye delight in. Behold he shall come, 
 saith the Lord of Hosts. But who may abide the day of his coming, 
 and who shall stand when he appeareth?" Now the Evangelist 
 quotes this passage, not exactly, but freely, and his freedom is seen 
 in his substitutiDg ''thy way" and "before thee" for "my way" 
 and "before me." In making this alteration, he identifies the 
 Divine Being Whose way is being prepared with the Lord Jesus. 
 According to the prophet, St. John the Baptist was God's mes- 
 senger, to prepare the way before God ; according to the Evangelist, 
 to prej)are the way before Christ : so that he who, is sent before the 
 face of Christ is sent before the face of God ; the way of the Lord 
 which he prepares is the way of the Son of God. 
 
 The citation from Isaiah teaches precisely the same : " The voice 
 of him that crieth in the wilderness, prepare ye the way of the 
 Lord ; make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every 
 
Chap. I.] PREPARE YE THE WAY. 3 
 
 3 *^ The voice of one crying in tlie wilderness, Prepare ye 
 the wav of the Lord, make his paths straio-ht. •= is. xi. 3. 
 
 . . Matt. iii. 3. 
 
 4 *^John did baptize in the wilderness, and Luke iii. 4. 
 
 ■^ John i. 1.5, 23. 
 
 d Matt. iii. 1. 
 
 Luke iii. 3. 
 
 John iii. 23. 
 
 4. "John did baptize," &c. "John came who baptized in the wilderness," &c., or, 
 *'John appeared who baptized," &c. The Greek word for "was" [lyEi-ero] lays more 
 emphasis on the existing or appearing of John, s, B., L., read article 5 before " baptizing." 
 
 valley shall be exalted . . . and the glory of the Lord shall be re- 
 vealed." Whose way is the Baptist sent to prepare ? The way of 
 Christ, but of Christ as the Lord, according to the words : " Thou, 
 child, shalt be called the prophet of the Highest, for thou shalt go 
 before the face of the Lord, to prepare his ways." Whose glory 
 shall be revealed ? St. John answers, " The Word was made flesh, 
 and dwelt amongst us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the 
 Only-begotten of the Father." 
 
 The gospel, then, of this Evangelist is the gospel of the Son of 
 God in the highest sense which we can give to the word " Son," for 
 the Son of God is the Lord Whom men sought — coming to His 
 temple, according to one prophet, and " our God," W^hose way is 
 prepared and made straight, according to another. 
 
 Now these two prophecies are to the Catholic behever the key- 
 note of all that follows. Every miracle and every action and every 
 suffering of Jesus recorded in this evangelical narrative is to be 
 looked upon in the light of these two prophecies. It is the Lord, 
 the Messenger or Apostle sent by His Father to bring in the new 
 and better covenant ; it is " our God " W^ho, throughout this Gospel, 
 casts out devils, cleanses the lepers, gives sight to the blind, feeds 
 the multitude, and at last dies on the Cross for our sins. 
 
 Unless we remember this throughout, we lose the significance of 
 the Gospel itself : for it is not the Gospel of a created teacher, or 
 mere human Messiah, but of One Whose Person was such that pro- 
 phecies like these of " the Lord coming to His temple," and of " our 
 God having His waj^- prepared," could fitly be spoken of Him only. 
 
 4. " John did baptize [or John was one baptizing] in the wilder- 
 ness, and preach [or was one preaching] the baptism of repentance 
 for the remission of sins." Having cited the prophetic utterances 
 respecting the preparation for the Lord's coming, the Evangelist 
 now names the person who prepares the way of the Lord, the place 
 
4 THE BAPTISM OF REPENTANCE. [St. Mark. 
 
 preacli tlie baptism of repentance || for the remission of 
 
 II Or, v7ito. sins. 
 
 e Matt. iii. 5. att i-iittt 
 
 5 ® And there went out nnto him all the land 
 
 where he exercised his ministry, and the nature of that ministiy. 
 The person was John the Baptist, whose parentage and birth out of 
 the due course of nature is told us by St. Luke. The place where 
 he preached and baptized was not Jerusalem, but the wilderness : 
 60 that men had to go out of the wicked city into a rugged and 
 desolate tract, to hear his preaching and receive his baptism, 
 betokening how men must spiritually go out of the world if they 
 would truly receive Christ. 
 
 The manner of his preparation was to preach repentance, and 
 proclaim the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins. 
 
 As the dispensation of the Baptist was not a permanent, but a 
 transitory and preparatoiy one, so this repentance and this baptism 
 were not final, but preparatory. Both the rej)entance and the bap- 
 tism were without ef&cacy, unless the one led to the acceptance of 
 Christ as the Saviour from sin, and the other led to the Baptism 
 of Begeneration, whereby men were engrafted into His mystical 
 Body, in order that they might partake of His Life. 
 
 In my notes on St. Matthew, I have dwelt on the very prominent 
 position of repentance and baptism, in the New Dispensation, as 
 compared with their place in the old. 
 
 In the new state of things, repentance has become " repentance 
 unto life," and baptism is an essential part of the Gospel: for the 
 Lord says, "He that believeth, and is baptized, shall be saved," 
 and His servant speaks of our having been saved by the washing 
 or bath of regeneration ; and asserts its doctrine to be one of the* 
 first principles or foundations of the doctrine of Christ (Titus iii. 5 
 Heb. vi. 1, 2). The ministry of the Baptist made men more ready 
 to receive these first truths of repentance and sacramental union 
 with the Son of God. 
 
 The reality of the Baptist's work of preparation was not seen till 
 Pentecost, when two thousand were in one day added to the Church. 
 Even at Ephesus, St. Paul found men ready to receive Christ, 
 because of their previous baptism by John (Acts xix. 3) ; and even 
 ApoUos preached Christ fervently, knowing only the baptism of John 
 (Acts xviii. 24-28). 
 
 5. " And there went out to him all the land of Judaea, and they 
 
Chap. I.] CONFESSING THEIR SINS. 5 
 
 of Judaea, and they of Jerusalem, and were all baptized of 
 him in the river of Jordan, confessing their sins. 
 
 6 And John was ^ clothed with camel's hair, ^ Matt. iu. 4, 
 and with a girdle of a skin about his loins ; and 
 he did eat ^ locusts and wild honey ; s i-ev. xi. 22. 
 
 5. "And they of Jerusalem, and were all baptized of him." N, B., D., L., some Cur- 
 sives, Old Latin (a, b), Vulg., and many versions read, "And all they of Jerusalem, and 
 were baptized;" A., later Uneials, and most Cursives read as in Rec. Text; Syriac, 
 Et baptizabat eos in Jordanefl amine quum confiterentur peccata sua. 
 
 6. " And with a girdle of a skin." Revisers, " And had a leathern girdle about his 
 loins ; " zona pellicea, Vulg. 
 
 of Jerusalem." St. Matthew adds, *' And all the region round about 
 Jordan." From this we gather how effectual was ih.e preparation 
 on the part of the Baptist. Never before in all theu' history were 
 the souls of the chosen people so stirred. The most part went to a 
 considerable distance to hear the preaching, and through a rugged 
 country where there was little or no lodging or provisions for such 
 multitudes. They went to hear x'l'eaching which reproved the 
 wickedness of their lives, and to undergo the bm'den of shame in 
 the confession of sins. 
 
 But was this an effectual stirring of the dry bones? If we 
 judge by the comparative fewness of those who became the dis- 
 ciples of the Lord in His own lifetime, it was not ; but we must 
 not so judge, for amongst those who flocked to John were the first 
 Apostles, the chosen instruments by whom Christ founded His 
 Church. The coming of such as these to the Son of God, through 
 the ministry of John, made amends for the falling away of 
 thousands ; and, besides this, we know not how much of the rapid 
 increase of the Church, as described in the Acts of the Apostles, was 
 owing to the memory of the ministry of John. 
 
 6. *' And John was clothed with camel's hair, and with a girdle 
 of a skin," &c. The garb and food of the holy ascetic were suitable 
 to his preaching, as Bede writes: *' The dress and food of John may 
 also express of what kind was his inward walk. For he used a dress 
 more austere than was usual, because he did not encourage the life 
 of sinners by flattery, but chid them by the vigour of his rough 
 rebuke ; he had a ghdle of a skin round his loins, for he was one 
 who crucified his flesh with the affections and lusts." And, again, 
 Quesnel says, " In times of greatest corruption, God generally gives 
 
6 ONE MIGHTIER THAN I. [St. Mark. 
 
 7 And preached, saying, ^ There cometh one mightier than 
 h Matt. iii. 11. I after me, the latchet of whose shoes I am not 
 
 John i. 27. ^ _ ^ ^ 
 
 Acts xiii. 25. woi'thy to stoop down and unloose. 
 
 Li. le! &^xix. 4. 8^1 indeed have baptized you with water : but 
 
 joeuf^fe ^' -^^ shall baptize you ^ with the Holy Ghost. 
 
 Acts ii. 4. & X. 
 
 45. & xi. 15, 16. 
 
 1 Cor. xii. 13. 
 
 7. "One mightier;" better, "he that is mightier." 
 
 8. " I indeed have baptized." Perhaps, " I baptized you with water, but He shall 
 baptize you in the Holy Ghost." gv before vian omitted by Neutral Text. 
 
 extraordinary examples of self-denial and holy zeal for His glory 
 and the salvation of others, to awaken sinners who are asleep in a 
 state of carnal security to a lively sense of their danger, and confound 
 'he slothfulness of sensual men." 
 
 7. " And preached, saying. There cometh one mightier than I 
 after me," &c. There were many more things which the Baptist 
 preached, but that feature of it is here mentioned which consisted 
 in his witness to the exalted nature of the Person of the Eedeemer. 
 It is to be borne in mind that St. John himself was of the very 
 highest rank among his countrymen, for he was the son of one of 
 the heads of the courses of the priests. As such he would have 
 received his rank from God, Who ordained the Aaronic priesthood. 
 It would have been an unworthy degradation of that which God 
 had Himself exalted to describe the difference between Jesus and 
 himself in such terms as these, unless Jesus was in very deed the 
 only Son of God. For all men are equal in nature, as partaking of 
 a common humanity ; and it could only be because the Divine 
 nature was inherent in Jesus of Nazareth, that John could say 
 with truth that he was unworthy to render to Him the lowest 
 menial service. We could not imagine such a man as the Baptist 
 saying this of himself and Csesar. 
 
 8. " I indeed have bax)tized you with [in] water." The contrast 
 here is not between St. John's baptism as being in water and the 
 Lord's baptism as not being so, but between John's baptism as 
 being in water only, and Christ's baptism as not being in water 
 only, but in water and the Holy Ghost accompanying the element, 
 and using it as His visible instrument, whereby the man is born of 
 water and of the Spirit into the kingdom of God. By John's 
 baptism, no change of spiritual condition was brought about ; but, 
 in Christ's baptism, " by one Spirit we are all baptized into on© 
 
Chap. I.] JESUS BAPTIZED. 7 
 
 9 ^And it came to pass in those clays, that Jesus came 
 from Nazareth of Galilee, and was baptized of ■ ^^att. iii. 1.3. 
 
 ^ , . -r -, Luke iii. 21. 
 
 John m Jordan. 
 
 10 "And straightway coming np out of the J^oif^f^^"' 
 
 body." Petter, a Puritan commentator on this Gospel, expresses well 
 the true meaning : " Our Saviour Christ, giving commission to the 
 Apostles to baptize, He doth promise the presence and assistance of 
 His Spirit with them nnto the world's end, thereby to make that 
 outward sacrament which should be administered by them effectual 
 to those that should receive it." Quesnel gives a short but admirable 
 prayer, that we should retain the grace of Christian baptism : 
 " Grant, Jesus, that the Spirit with which Thou hast baptized 
 me may awaken and enlighten me more and more, remaining 
 continually in me, and animating all the actions of my life." 
 
 Not, of course, as if Christ imparts the Holy Spirit only in bap- 
 tism. The Lord constantly, in answer to their prayers, pours upon 
 men the Holy Spirit abundantly. By His Spirit He fills them 
 with repentance and faith and love and peace and every Christian 
 grace. 
 
 9. " And it came to pass in those days, that Jesus came from 
 Nazaretli of Galilee," &c. From this we learn that He dwelt at 
 Nazareth till His baptism — i.e., till He was above thirty years of 
 age, — so that He was rightly called a Nazarene, His whole private 
 life having been spent at Nazareth. 
 
 Eespecting the reason for this humiliation on the part of Christ 
 to receive the baptism of sinners, see my note on Matthew iii. 13. 
 To what I have there said, it may be added that He received 
 baptism as the Second Adam, the New Head of the race, denoting 
 that all, no matter how seemingly enlightened or holy, must be 
 washed from sin in Him. In this, as in aU. things. He was " made 
 like unto His brethren." In this submission, though sinless Him- 
 self, He was first "numbered with the transgressors." 
 
 10. "And straightway coming up out of the water, he saw the 
 heavens opened," &c. Each Evangelist notices that the aj^pearance 
 of the Spirit, and the opened heavens, and the voice of the Father, 
 took place when He came up out of the water. " That the out- 
 pouring of the Spirit did not take place before the submersion, per- 
 fectly accords with the symbolical character of the action [see Piom. 
 
8 THE VOICE FEOM HEAVEN. [St. Mark. 
 
 water, lie saw the heavens || opened, and the Sj^irit like a 
 Or, cloven, dove descending npon him : 
 
 or TBTtt 
 
 11 And there came a voice from heaven, say- 
 n Ps. ii. 7. ing, ^ Thou art my beloved Son, in whom I am 
 
 Matt. iii. 17. ti n t 
 
 ch. ix. 7. well pleased. 
 
 oMatt. iv. 1. 12 °And immediately the spirit driveth him 
 
 Luke iv. 1. • j ji m t 
 
 into the wilderness. 
 
 10. " Opened." The marginal rendering, " cloven " or " rent," is a better translation. 
 Vidit quodfissi sunt coeli, Syriae. 
 
 11. " In whom I am well pleased." H, B., D,, L., some Cursives, some Old Latin, 
 Vulg., and Syriac, and some other versions read, " In thee I am well pleased ; " A. and 
 later Uncials and most Cursives read as in Authorized. 
 
 vi. 1-6] , which is not, indeed, in itself applicable to John's baptism, 
 but which the Saviour typically imparted to the action of His 
 baptism. The one part of the action — the submersion — re-presents 
 the negative aspect, viz., the taking away of the Old Man [Rom. 
 vi. 4] ; in the other part — the emersion — the ]30sitive aspect, viz., 
 the appearance of the New Man, is denoted; the communication of 
 the Holy Ghost must, therefore, have been connected with the 
 latter." (Olshausen.) 
 
 ** He saw . . . the Spirit like a dove descending." The i^ronoun 
 "He" no doubt refers here to our Lord. But John also saw the 
 descent of the Sjjirit. It was the sign promised by God, by which 
 he was to recognize the Messiah (John i. 32, 33). 
 
 11. " And there came a voice from heaven, saying. Thou art my 
 beloved Son," &c. There is a difference between St. Matthew, on 
 the one hand, and St. Mark and St. Luke on the other, in that the 
 two latter make the Voice addressed to Christ, " Thou art my beloved 
 Son ; " whereas St. Matthew writes as if it were spoken of Christ, 
 "This is my beloved Son," The sense is precisely the same. If 
 we are obliged to choose, we must take St. Mark as giving most 
 probably the more exact account ; but it is not improbable that the 
 Voice as heard by Christ was addressed to Him to strengthen and 
 assure His human nature; whereas the Baptist heard it said of 
 Christ, showing to him that This was the One Who came to baptize 
 with the Spirit. Bede remarks : " The same voice has taught us, 
 that we also, by the water of cleansing, and by the Spirit of sancti- 
 fication, may be made the sons of God." 
 
 12. "And immediately the Spirit driveth him into the wilder- 
 
Chap. I.] TEMPTED OF SATAN. 9 
 
 13 And lie was there in the wilderness forty days, tempted 
 of Satan ; and was with the wild beasts ; ^ and p Matt, iv. ii. 
 the ano-els ministered unto him. 
 
 ness." "Why are we here told that the spirit driveth the Lord into 
 the wilderness ? It seems to teach us that the human soul or 
 spirit of the Son of God shrank from such nearness to Satan as to 
 be tempted by him, and to receive into His holy Soul the cursed 
 suggestions of the Evil One. This teaches us how reluctant we 
 should be to go to i)laces or company in which we know that we 
 shall be tempted. The holy, sinless Jesus was driven into the place 
 of danger ; and we too often rush into it of ourselves. 
 
 13. "And he was there .... forty days, tempted of Satan." 
 From St. Matthew alone we should rather gather that the devil 
 came to Him at the end of the forty days ; whereas from this 
 Evangelist and from St. Luke we learn that the whole forty days 
 was a season of temj)tation, and the three recorded temptations were 
 the last assault. How does this enhance the humiliation of the 
 Lord, that He should suffer Himself so long to be assailed by the 
 Evil One ! 
 
 " With the wild beasts." This is mentioned to show us that He 
 was in the wildest and most unfrequented part of the desert — some 
 tract absolutely untrodden by the feet of men. 
 
 "And the angels ministered unto him." This seems to imply 
 that, in some way unknown to us. He was comforted by the presence 
 of these ministering spirits even before they brought Him food at 
 the termination of His long fast. 
 
 Bishop Hall (quoted by Ford) remarks well : " I have ever with 
 me invisible friends and enemies. The consideration of mine 
 enemies shall keep me from security, and make me fearful of doing 
 aught to advantage them. The consideration of my spiritual 
 friends shall comfort me against the terror of the other ; shall 
 remedy my solitariness ; shall make me wary of doing aught in- 
 decently ; grieving me rather that I have ever heretofore made 
 them turn away their eyes for shame of that whereof I have not 
 been ashamed ; that I have no more enjoyed their society ; that I 
 have been no more affected with their presence. What, though I 
 see them not ? I believe them. I were no Christian, if my faith 
 were not as sure as my sense." 
 
10 THE TIME IS FULFILLED. [St. Mark. 
 
 14 ^ Now after tliat Jolin was put in prison, Jesus came 
 q Matt. iv. 12. into Gralilee, ^ preaching the gos2)el of the kingdom 
 
 r Matt. iv. 23. r. /-v t 
 
 of Grod. 
 » Dan. ix. 25. 15 And sayiug, ^The time is fulfilled, and Hhe 
 Epii. i.io. kingdom of Grod is at hand: repent ye, and 
 
 t Matt. iii. 2. , t ,-• i 
 
 & iv. 17. believe the gospel. 
 
 14, "Preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God." "Of the kingdom " omitted by 
 MSS. of Neutral Text, S, B., L., a few Cursives, Coptic, &c. ; retained by A., D., later 
 Uncials, almost all Cursives, some Old Latin, Vulg. and Syriac, and some versions. 
 
 14. " Now after tliat John was put in prison, Jesus came into 
 Galilee," &c. How is it said that He came into Galilee, when, ap- 
 parently, He had only left Nazareth of Galilee to be baptized and 
 tempted? We should rather have expected that it would have 
 been said, " He returned." The answer is that, between His bap- 
 tism and the imprisonment of John, He exercised a ministry in 
 Jerusalem which is recorded only by St. John in his Gospel (ii. 13; 
 iv. 3). We must interi^ose between verses 13 and 14 the whole of 
 the events recorded in St. John, from chap. i. 19 to iv. 54 — viz., the 
 call of the first disciples, the miracle in Cana, the first cleansing of 
 the temple, the interview with Nicodemus and with the woman of 
 Samaria, and the miracle of the healing of the nobleman's son. 
 
 " Preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God." The words " of 
 the kingdom " are not in the Neutral Text ; but that the Lord's 
 preaching could most properly be described as the preaching of the 
 kingdom of God is certain from Matthew iv. 23, where the Gospel 
 which He xn'eached is called the Gospel of the kingdom of God (see 
 my note on Matt. iv. 23). 
 
 15. " And saying, The time is fulfilled." The Lord means that 
 the time of the Law is completed, as if He said : " Up to this time 
 the Law was at work : from this time the kingdom of God will 
 work, that is, a conversation according to the Gospel, which is with 
 reason likened to the kingdom of God. For when you see a man 
 clothed in flesh, living according to the Gospel, do you not say that 
 he has the kingdom of God (Eom. xiv. 17), for the kingdom of 
 God is not meat and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy in 
 the Holy Ghost ? " (Theophylact. in Catena Aurea.) 
 
 " Kepent ye, and believe the gospel." Notice how both the Lord, 
 and His forerunner, and St. Peter (Acts ii.), and St. Paul (Acts 
 
Chap. L] AS HE WALKED BY THE SEA. 11 
 
 16 "Now as lie walked by the sea of G-alilee, " Matt. iv. is. 
 
 Luke V. 4. 
 
 16. "Now as he walked." ^f, B., D., L., some Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg. read, " Aud 
 as He passed by," &c. ; A., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, and Syriac read as in 
 Anthorized. 
 
 xxvi. 20) ]3i'eacli first of all repentance ; and it must be so, for re- 
 pentance being a sense of sin, and a turning from it, and a desire 
 to be delivered from it, makes the soul realize the glad tidings of the 
 Gospel respecting such dehverance. Faith itself is quickened and 
 transformed from a dead notion to a hving energy by repentance. 
 
 16. " Now as he walked by the sea of Galilee . . . they were 
 fishers." For full remarks on this call of four Apostles, I must 
 refer the reader to my notes on St. Matthew iv. 18, &c. The pre- 
 sent observations will be necessarily supplementary. St. Matthew 
 and St. Mark give almost verbatim the same account ; St. Mark's 
 real addition to the account being that James and John were the 
 sons of one who had hired servants to help him in his occupation ; 
 and so they did not leave their father unprovided for when they went 
 after the Lord. And as we read of no remonstrance or opposition 
 on the part of Zebedee, whose wife was now probably a believer, 
 we may conclude that it was with his permission, perhaps approval. 
 
 The important question is. Why should the Lord choose His 
 foremost Apostles from among fishermen ? The answer is twofold. 
 
 First, their calling had inured them to hardship, and had accus- 
 tomed them to face sudden and extreme danger — the lake on which 
 they exercised their craft being ex2D0sed to sudden and violent 
 storms. Then such a calling, demanding a constant exercise of 
 patience and watchfulness, and, above all, being a very precarious 
 mode of living, would make them familiar with disappointment 
 (" We have toiled all night, andhave taken nothing ") ; so that they 
 would not be discouraged by it ; and when they came to experience 
 such disappointment in their apostolate, would not throw it up in 
 despair, but go on letting down the net of the Gosi^el till the Lord 
 was pleased to reward them. Their worldly calling would be the 
 best discipline for their spiritual work. They must be prepared to 
 endure hardness, for they had no settled incomes ; they must be 
 ready to face death, for at any moment a storm of bloody persecu- 
 tion might arise ; they must be patient, both towards Churches and 
 souls ; and they must be content at times with taking a few converts 
 in their nets, where they might have expected abundant draughts. 
 Then, in the next place, the Lord chose men who, owing to their 
 
12 SIMON AND ANDREW. [St Mark. 
 
 he saw Simon and Andrew his brother casting a net into the 
 sea : for they were fishers. 
 
 17 And Jesus said unto them, Come ye after me, and I 
 will make you to become fishers of men. 
 
 calling, must have been " unlearned and ignorant men," that His 
 grace might be made jjerfect in their weakness. That the then 
 known world should have been, in two or three centuries, subdued 
 to the faith by such men, and by such as succeeded them, was, next 
 to the Resurrection of Christ, the greatest miracle of Christianity. 
 Calvin has some admirable remarks on this : " Christ selected per- 
 sons not only destitute of learning, but inferior in capacity, that 
 He might train, or rather renew, them by the power of His Spirit* 
 60 as to excel all the wise men of the world. He intended to 
 humble in this manner the pride of the flesh, and to present in their 
 persons a remarkable instance of spiritual grace, that we may learn 
 to implore from heaven the light of faith, when we know that it 
 cannot be acquired by our own exertions. When our Lord chose 
 persons of this condition, it was not because He preferred ignorance 
 to learning, as some fanatics do, who are delighted with their own 
 ignorance, and fancy that, in proportion as they hate literature, 
 they approach the nearest to the Apostles. He resolved at first, no 
 doubt, to choose despised persons, in order to humble the pride of 
 those who think that heaven is not open to the unlearned ; but He 
 afterwards gave to those fishers, as an associate in their office, 
 Paul, who had been carefully educated from his childhood." 
 
 Again, we may add, in choosing such to be Apostles, Christ 
 called religious men, for they had "justified God" by attaching 
 tliemselves to the ministry of the Baptist, and yet not prejudiced 
 Pharisees, who would have had a world of traditional interpretation 
 to unlearn. And, above all, not superstitious men, men by no 
 means ready to look for supernatural action from their Master, as 
 we shall have many oi^portunities of observing — in fact, men slow 
 of belief, rather than otherwise. 
 
 This was their second call. The first, in John i., was rather to 
 companionship and friendship than to the ministry. Now He calls 
 them to discipleship ; and afterwards, out of the mass of the disciples, 
 He chose them with others to be Apostles. 
 
 17. "And Jesus said unto them . . . fishers of men." As I rs- 
 
Chap. I.] JAMES AND JOHN. 13 
 
 18 And straiglitway ^ tliey forsook tlieir nets, and followed 
 
 ■|ti%t, ^ Matt. xix. 
 
 ^ 2i. Luke V. 11. 
 
 19 ^ And wlien lie liad gone a little farther r Matt. iv. 21. 
 thence, lie saw James tlie son of Zebedee, and Jolin his 
 brother, who also were in the ship mending their nets. 
 
 20 And straightway he called them : and thej left their 
 father Zebedee in the ship with the hired servants, and went 
 after him. 
 
 21 ^ And they went into Capernaum : and == Matt. iv. 13. 
 
 ' 1 1 111T1 t ' Luke iv. 31. 
 
 straightway on the sabbath day he entered into 
 the synagogue, and taught. 
 
 22 ^ And they were astonished at his doctrine : » Matt. vii. 28. 
 for he taught them as one that had authority, 
 
 and not as the scribes. 
 
 19. "Thence" omitted by B., D., L., a few Cursives, some Old Latin, Syriac, &c. ; 
 retained by A , C„ later Uncials, and almost all Cursives and Vulgate. 
 
 marked in St. Matthew, none but He Who could sway all hearts by 
 His Divine power could promise from Himself, " I will make you 
 fishers of men." 
 
 18. "And straightway they forsook their nets" — i.e., they for- 
 sook their means of livelihood, and gave themselves wp to the 
 Apostolic life of poverty, depending henceforth upon nothing but 
 the goodwill with which God inspired the faithful to support their 
 pastors. 
 
 21, 22. " And they went into Capernaum . . . taught them as 
 one that had authority." Inasmuch as exactly the same words 
 occur in St. Matthew, as describing the effect of the Sermon on the 
 Mount upon the people who heard it, we can, by noticing the 
 peculiarly authoritative statements in that sermon, tell the nature 
 of this authority also. It was plenary authority, not only to set 
 aside all the traditional interpretations of the law, but to put a 
 spiritual gloss upon that law, to add a spiritual meaning to it, so as 
 to make it a new thing. It was authority to use such expressions 
 as " ye have heard that it was said to them of old time . . . but I 
 say unto you." It was authority to promise that the man who 
 heard His sayings, and did them, should be like unto a man " who 
 built his house upon a rock," and to foretell that a day should come 
 
14 I KNOW THEE WHO THOU AET. [St. Mark. 
 
 23 ^And there was in tlieir synagogue a man witli an 
 b Luke iv. 33. unclean spirit ; and lie cried out, 
 c Matt.viii.29. 24 Saying, Let us alone; *^wliat have we to do 
 with thee, thon Jesus of Nazareth ? art thou come to destroy 
 us ? I know thee who thou art, the Holy One of God. 
 
 23. "And there was in their synagogue." MSS. of Neutral Text, H, B,, L., and two 
 or three Cursives read, " And straightway there was in their synagogue," but it adds 
 nothing to the sense, rather the contrary. A., C, D., later Uncials, Vulg., &c., omit. 
 
 24. " Let us alone ; " rather, "ah!" a mere exclamation. Neutral Text omits word 
 altogether, so also Vulgate and Syriac. 
 
 when He would sit as Supreme Judge, and say to those whom He 
 condemned : " Depart from me, I never knew you." So that it was 
 nothing less than the assumption of divine authority which 
 astonished these dwellers in Galilee. 
 
 23. "And [straightway] there was in their synagogue a man 
 with an unclean spirit, and he cried out." It is to be noticed that 
 this miracle (which is common to St. Mark and St. Luke) is the 
 first miracle recorded by St. Mark. This Evangelist seems to bring 
 out more fully than the rest the Lord's power over the hosts of evil 
 spirits. 
 
 " With an unclean spirit." Is the word " unclean " used here 
 as synonymous with unholy ? for we can hardly suppose that evil 
 spirits have the same fleshly j)ropensities as evil men. The Scrip- 
 tures regard all opposition to God as unholiness, and so impurity ; 
 God alone being the Holy One, and so the fountain of all holiness, 
 and all beings cut off from Him are unholy : or must we not rather 
 suiDpose that some of those evil spirits had special power of acting 
 on their victims through the lusts of the flesh ? 
 
 24. " And he cried. Let us alone [or simply " ah ! " but omitted by 
 neutral text], what have we to do with thee," &c. The personality 
 of the evil spirit seems to have overborne that of the man, for the 
 words which follow are the expression of no mere human thought 
 or human knowledge. They seem to have been uttered spon- 
 taneously. The Lord had said nothing, but the evil spirit could 
 not endure His presence, and perhaps the searching look directed 
 on His victim, and so, in anticipation of his being cast forth, he 
 cried, " What have we to do with thee ? " As if he said, " In what 
 way have I offended Thee? Hast Thou not permitted us to 
 enter into sinners, and dwell in them ? Is the time of our judg- 
 
Chap. I.] COME OUT OF HIM. 15 
 
 25 And Jesus ^ rebuked liim, saying, Hold tliy peace, and 
 come out of him, <^ ^er. 34. 
 
 26 And wlien tlie unclean spirit ^ liad torn liim, * ^h. ix. 20. 
 and cried with a loud voice, he came out of him. 
 
 ment so nigh? Have we not yet some respite ? a little time longer 
 to continue out of prison ? " 
 
 " I [or we] know thee who thou art, the Holy One of God." It 
 is to be remembered that by far the most frequent application of 
 the term Holy One is to God Himself, and it stands to reason that 
 here it must be spoken in the highest Divine sense, for the unclean 
 spirit uses it to deprecate the wrath of One Who had authority to 
 judge the world of angels. 
 
 It has been asked, "Why did the evil spirits confess Him to be the 
 Holy One, or the Son of God ? Such an avowal woukl seem to tend 
 to make men believe on Him. And ingenious reasons have been 
 given to show their craft in so doing ; but may it not have been the 
 cry of fear, mingled with despair? ["The devils believe and tremble," 
 James ii.J Again, why did our Lord so energetically forbid these 
 evil spirits to acknowledge His Divine Sonship ? Because Ho 
 would not receive the testimony of these enemies of God. Perhaps 
 it is only holy angels and holy men who can so testify of Him as to 
 advance His kingdom ; or perhaps the time had not yet come for 
 the full revelation of Himself as the Eternal Son. The times of all 
 things relating to Redemption were ordered by God, and it would 
 have been as harmful that the full confession of faith should havo 
 been anticipated, as that it should have been delayed. 
 
 26. "And when the unclean spirit had torn him." St. Luke, in re- 
 lating this, tells us that the evil spirit " threw him in the midst, and 
 hurt him not," so that we must understand this tearing rather of a 
 severe paroxysm, which seemed to wrench every sinew, but which 
 the Lord so ordered that he was not injured by it. 
 
 Quesnel has a most pertinent remark on this : " When the temp- 
 tations of the flesh are most violent in one who resolves to surrender 
 himself to God, they are sometimes the last efforts of the devil, and 
 the signs of the approaching deliverance of that soul. It is then 
 that a man ought to redouble his prayer, to cry to God with all the 
 strength of faith, and to invoke his Deliverer with the greater 
 earnestness." 
 
16 WHAT NEW DOCTRINE? [St. Mark. 
 
 27 And they were all amazed, insomucli that they ques- 
 tioned among themselves, saying. What thing is this ? what 
 new doctrine is this ? for with authority commandeth he even 
 the unclean spirits, and they do obey him. 
 
 28 And immediately his fame spread abroad throug-hout 
 all the region round about Galilee. 
 
 f Matt.viii.i4. 29 ^Aud forthwith, wlion they were come out 
 
 Luke iv. 38. *' 
 
 of the synagogue, they entered into the house of 
 Simon and Andrew, with James and John. 
 
 27. "What thing is this.P what new doctrine is this? for with authority," &c. Revisers 
 (following Neutral Text), read, " What is this ? a new teaching! with authority he com- 
 mandeth even the unclean spirits," &c. Some translate it, "A new docti'ine with autho- 
 rity!" I do not think, however, the Galilean multitude were at all likely to rush about 
 exclaiming, "A new doctrine with authority!" The most likely exclamation by far to 
 escape them is that in the Authorized. 
 
 28. "Spread abroad." "Everywhere" is inserted after "abroad" in B., C, L., one 
 or two Cursives, Old Latin (b, e), Coptic, but omitted by N, A., D., later Uncials, all 
 Cursives, some Old Latin, Vulg. 
 
 29. " They were come " — " they entered," B., and seven or eight Cursives read, " he 
 was come" — " he entered." 
 
 *' How strange and fearful must all this have seemed to those who 
 were looking on ! The sudden cry of horror of the evil spirit, his 
 fear of vengeance, and confession of helplessness, Christ's word of 
 power, commanding him to depart, and then the last effort of im- 
 potent fury — his violently shaking and tearing his victim, but with- 
 out power to hurt him." No wonder that 
 
 27. " They were all amazed, insomuch that they questioned 
 among themselves, saying, What new doctrine is this ? for with 
 authority . . . obey him." Seeing the teaching of the Lord en- 
 forced by so stupendous an act of authority over the powers of heU, 
 they naturally exclaimed, " What thing is this ? what new doc- 
 trine is this ? " &c. The reader will remember how, when Sergius 
 Paulus saw the power of the apostle exerted against an emissary 
 of Satan, he is said to have been " astonished at the doctrine of 
 the Lord" (Acts xiii. 12). 
 
 28. " And immediately the fame spread abroad," &c. It is to be 
 noticed how St. Mark seems delighted to notice the popularity of 
 the Lord, thus in this chapter, verses 32, 33, 37 ("All men seek for 
 Thee"), 45. 
 
 29,30. "And forthwith when they were come out of the synagogue, 
 
Chap. I.] SIMONS WIFE S MOTHER. 17 
 
 30 But Simon's wife's mother lay sick of a fever, and 
 anon they tell him of her. 
 
 31 And he came and took her by the hand, and lifted 
 her np ; and immediately the fever left her, and she minis- 
 tered unto them. 
 
 32 ^ And at even, when the sun did set, they ? Matt.viii.ie. 
 
 ■^ Luke iv. 40. 
 
 . . . anon they tell him of her." It is interesting to notice how 
 the account of this miracle compared with that of the same in 
 St. Matthew, shows the presence of an eye-witness, of course St. 
 Peter. St. Mark notices how it occurred when they came out of 
 the synagogue — how Andrew, James, and John accompanied them 
 — how when He entered the house He did not immediately see the 
 sick woman, but they tell Him of her. This is most natural. He was 
 not hkely to see the sick woman at first, as she must have been in 
 some quiet chamber, but " they tell Him of her." And so our Evan- 
 gelist says. He " came," i.e., into her chamber. St. Matthew says, 
 He touched her hand ; but St. Mark, He took her by the hand, and 
 lifted her up. He, no doubt, touched her hand first, and then 
 grasped it, and lifted her up, knowing that by His previous touch, 
 but a moment before, the fever had left her. SS. Matthew and 
 Luke say that she arose and ministered unto them ; but St. Mark 
 does not mention that she arose, because she had not risen of her- 
 self, but the Lord had lifted her up. Anti-Eoman commentators 
 notice, and with reason, that the Lord chose as the first of the 
 apostles a married man, and that after his election to follow the 
 Lord he did not separate from his wife, but the Lord honours the 
 family, by sometimes dwelling in their house. Again St. Paul im- 
 plies that at times, at least, she accompanied St. Peter in his jour- 
 neys (1 Corinth, ix. 5). It appears from a very touching account 
 given by Clement of Alexandria, that they were living together 
 when she was called to be one of Christ's martyrs. " They say, 
 accordingly, that the blessed Peter, on seeing his wife led to death, 
 rejoiced on account of her call and conveyance home, and called 
 very encouragingly and comfortingly, addressing her by name, 
 * Eemember thou the Lord.' Such," he adds, " was the marriage 
 of the blessed, and their perfect disposition towards those dearest to 
 them " (Miscellanies VII., chap. xi.). 
 
 32. •' And at even, when the sun did set, they brought . . , 
 
 c 
 
18 ALL THE CITY AT THE DOOR. [St. Maric. 
 
 broiisrlit unto him all that were diseased, and them that 
 were possessed with devils. 
 
 33 And all the city was gathered together at the door. 
 
 34 And he healed many that were sick of divers diseases, 
 
 34. So K, A., E , F., K., some other later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin, 
 Vulg. ; but B., C, G., L., M., some Cursives and versions read, " knew him to be the 
 Christ." 
 
 possessed with devils." It being the Sabbath, it would have been 
 held unlawful to carry the weight of their sick folk from all parts 
 to the Lord to be healed. Notice how all that were brought to the 
 Lord for the exercise of His merciful power upon them, are divided 
 into two classes onlj^ — those that were diseased, and those that were 
 possessed. The reader, if he has not remembered it already, will 
 thank me for reminding him of the hymn o£ Mr. Twells [20 A. 
 and M.] :— 
 
 *' At even 'ere the sun was set, 
 
 The sick, Lord, around Thee lay ; 
 
 Oh, in what divers x^ains they met, 
 Oh, with what joy they went away! 
 
 Saviour Christ, our woes dispel. 
 For some are sick and some are sad ; 
 
 And some have never loved Thee well, 
 And some have lost the love they had. 
 
 Thy touch has still its ancient power, 
 No word from Thee can fruitless fall ; 
 
 Hear in this solemn evening hour. 
 And in Thy mercy heal us all." 
 
 33. "And all the city was gathered together at the door." This 
 verse also is peculiar to St. Mark. It is the reminiscence of one 
 who was somewhat perplexed at the multitudes who were crowding 
 in front of his house, and knew not how they were to be satisfied, 
 or where it would all end. 
 
 34. "And he healed many that were sick . , . they knew him." 
 Here we have, again, the recipients of the Lord's benevolent acting 
 divided into those that were sick, and those possessed. May not the 
 first be taken to signify all afflicted in body, and the latter all 
 diseased in soul or spirit ? 
 
 " Suffered not the devils to speak." Theophylact remarks that 
 
CuAP. I.] A GREAT WHILE BEFORE DAY. 19 
 
 and cast out many devils ; and ^ suffered not tlie devils || to 
 
 speak, because they knew him. ^ ch. m. 12. 
 
 .^K A n • 1 • . . Luke iv. 41. 
 
 35 And ^ m the morning, rising up a great See Acts xvi. 
 while before day, he went out, and departed into j br, to say 
 a solitary place, and there prayed. l^eVkim. 
 
 36 And Simon and they that were with him >i'akeiv.42. 
 followed after him. 
 
 it was dangerous to receive witness from such spirits, "for if once they 
 find persons to believe thein, they mingle truth with falsehood." 
 
 " Because they knew him." The MSS. of neutral text add, 
 " Knew him to be the Christ; ".but surely this is a very inadequate 
 gloss. Before this they confessed Him to be "the Holy One of 
 God," afterwards (iii. 11) "the Son of God." They knew Him to 
 be the Euler and Judge of the unseen world of good and evil sj)irits. 
 
 35. "And in the morning, rising up a great while before day," 
 &c. It is from St. Mark alone (doubtless through St, Peter) that 
 we get this most precious knowledge of the Saviour's practice in re- 
 gard of prayer. St. Matthew says nothing of it, St. Luke that He 
 departed and went into a desert place, but does not mention that it 
 was for prayer; St. Mark teaches us that "He rose u^) a great while 
 before day," that He might enjoy uninterrupted communion with 
 God. What a lesson does this teach us, that if we would pray well 
 we must pray early ! How often have Christians to choose between 
 the indulgence of a little more sleep and the time of jDrayer cut short, 
 and scant and hurried devotion, or between a little self-denial in 
 sleep and the freshest and best hours of the day given to God, and 
 God blessing the self-denial by answering the prayer. 
 
 But how is it that St. Mark alone mentions this ? Because he 
 wrote what St. Peter taught, and the Lord was lodging in St. 
 Peter's house, so that the apostle had means of noticing how the 
 Divine Inmate rose up very early, before any of the household was 
 astir, that He might go to some unfrequented place, and there be 
 alone with His Father. Quesnel remarks : " Prayer is so necessary 
 to him who preaches and labours in the Church, that, far from dis- 
 pensing with himself on this account, he ought to take a time for 
 it out of that which belongs to rest and the other necessities of life, 
 rather than be deficient therein." 
 
 36. " And Simon and they that were with him [probably Andrew, 
 
20 ALL MEN SEEK FOR THEE. [St. Mark. 
 
 37 And when tliey liad found him, they said unto him, 
 All men seek for thee. 
 
 k Luke iv. 43. 38 And he said unto them, ^ Let us go into the 
 next towns, that I may preach there also : for 
 I Is. ixi. 1. 1 therefore came I forth. 
 
 John xvi. 28. 
 
 & xvii. 4. 
 
 38. "Let us go." H, B., C.*, L., Cursive 33, and some versions insert "elsewhere," 
 but A., D,, later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Vulg,, Syriae, Old Latin, &c., omit the 
 word. 
 
 James, and John]," &c. This also must have come direct from one 
 who took part in this following of the Lord. But does it not seem 
 presumptuous that they should go after Him to break upon His re- 
 tirement? They acted so because they understood not then, as 
 afterwards they did, the need of prayer and retirement for the 
 minister of God ; and so we read, 
 
 37. *' When they had found him, they said unto him. All men 
 seek for thee." But that was the very reason why the Lord had 
 withdrawn Himself. As long as the people of the place were crowd- 
 ing about Him for the exercise of His power of healing, or perhaps 
 in many cases out of mere wonder or curiosity, He was unable to 
 do that which by this His example He teaches us to be as needful 
 as active work. Very probably, however, He had been a con- 
 siderable time alone before they overtook Him, and so the work of 
 intercourse with His Father was then ended, for 
 
 38. "He said unto them, Let us go into the next towns, that I 
 may preach there also." By this time considerable numbers had 
 gathered together, and had followed close after Simon, and they 
 that were with him ; so we learn from St. Luke's account, " The 
 people sought him, and came to him, and stayed him that he should 
 not depart from them." They desu-ed somewhat selfishly, though 
 naturally, to keep such a teacher and healer to themselves. But 
 
 "He said unto them. Let us go into the next towns, that I may 
 preach there also: for therefore came I forth." His great work 
 was preaching — the proclamation of the truth of God. Miracles 
 were performed by Him in order to arrest men's attention, and to 
 make them ask, as they did, What new doctrine is this ? But their 
 souls were saved, not by seeing His miracles, or even by being 
 healed by them, but by receiving His message. 
 
 " Therefore came I forth." Does this mean come forth from His 
 
Chap. I.] THERE CAME A LEPER TO HIM. 21 
 
 39 "^ And he preaclied in their synagogues tlirougliout all 
 Galilee, and cast out devils. ^ l^i^."- »;;• 23. 
 
 Luke IV. 44. 
 
 40 ^ And there came a leper to him, beseeching n Matt. viii. 2. 
 him, and kneeling down to him, and saying unto 
 
 him, If thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. 
 
 39. Revisers (following Neutral Text), render, "And he went into their synagogues 
 throughout all Galilee, preaching and casting out devils." Vnlg., Et erat pradicans in 
 synagogis eorum, et in omni GalilcBa, et damonia ejiciens. 
 
 40. •' And kneeling down to him." So A., H, C, L., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, 
 Valg., and rersions ; omitted by B., D., G., and Old Latin. 
 
 retirement, or came forth from God ? Undoubtedly the latter. To 
 the thoroughly believing mind all " comings forth " from Nazareth, 
 from Capernaum, from His family, from His private life, cannot be 
 compared to the great " coming forth " from God. " For this end 
 was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should 
 bear witness unto the truth" (John xviii. 37). 
 
 40. " And there came a leper to him, beseeching him," &c. Re- 
 specting the typical nature of the disease of leprosy, and its incura- 
 bility by any art of man, I have written sufficiently in my notes on 
 St. Matthew (viii. 2). 
 
 " Beseeching him, and kneeling down to him." St. Matthew 
 says : " worshipped him." St. Luke : " who seeing Jesus, fell on his 
 face." Was this deep reverential kneeling or prostration of the 
 nature of Divine worship, or was it only that somewhat exaggerated 
 humiliation before those invested with rank and power which has 
 always prevailed in the East? Taking all circumstances into 
 account, it must have been more than the latter. St. Chrysostom 
 brings this out well : " Great was the understanding and the faith 
 of him who so drew near. For he did not interrupt the teaching, 
 nor break through the auditory, but awaited the proper time, and 
 approaches Him when He is come down [Matt. viii. 1, 2]. And 
 not at random, but with much earnestness ; and on his knees he 
 beseeches Him, and with genuine faith, and right opinion about 
 Him. For neither did he say, ' H thou request it of God,' nor ' Ili 
 thou pray,' but ' If thou wilt thou canst make me clean.' Nor 
 did he say, ' Lord, cleanse me,' but leaves all to Him, and makes 
 his recovery depend on Him, and testifies that all the authority is 
 His. 'What, then,' saith one, *if the leper's opinion was mis- 
 taken ? ' Then (on the part of Christ) it were meet to do away 
 
22 I AYILL; be thou clean. [St. Mark. 
 
 41 And Jesus, moved with compassion, put fortli his hand, 
 and touched him, and saith unto him, I will ; be thou 
 clean. 
 
 41. "Be thou clean," Revisers, " Be thou made clean " — the same word as the leper 
 uses. 
 
 with it, and to reprove and set it right. Did Christ, then, do so ? 
 By no means ; but, quite on the contrary, He establishes and con- 
 firms what had been said. For this cause, you see, neither did 
 He say, ' Be thou cleansed,' but * I will : be thou made clean,* 
 that the doctrine might no longer be a thing of the other's sur- 
 mising, but of His own approval." 
 
 Be this so or not, it is quite clear that the man could not have 
 spoken or acted otherwise, if he had believed that the Lord was a 
 Divine Being; and the Lord answered him in terms which accepted 
 the acknowledgment of Divine power. Chrysostom goes on to 
 contrast with tnis the conduct of the Apostles, on the occasion of 
 the healing of the impotent man. " Why look ye so earnestly on 
 us, as though by our own power or holiness we had made this man 
 to walk ? " (Acts iii. 12). Not so the Lord here. He assumes all 
 power unreservedly: "I will: be thou clean." If it be objected 
 that it was very unlikely that this poor leper should have such faith, 
 we can only answer that, on natural principles, it was not only un- 
 likely, but impossible, but " faith is the gift of God." 
 
 41. *' And Jesus, moved with compassion, put forth his hand, and 
 touched him," &c. St. Mark alone specially notices that the Lord 
 was moved with compassion. Must not this remark have come 
 direct from Peter, who was struck with some evident outward mark 
 of compassion in the Lord's Divine Countenance, or in some 
 gesture of pity which He showed ? 
 
 " Put forth his hand, and touched him." " Wherefore, when 
 cleansing him by will and word, did He also add the touch of His 
 hand ? It seems to me for no othei? end but that He might signify 
 by this also that He is not subject to the law, but is set over it ; 
 and that to the clean, henceforth, nothing is unclean. For this 
 cause, we see Elisha did not so much as see Naaman ; but though 
 he perceived that he was offended at his not coming and touching 
 him, yet, observing the strictness of the law, he abides at home, and 
 sends him to Jordan to wash. Whereas the Lord, to signify that 
 He heals not as a servant, but as absolute Master, doth also touch. 
 
Chap. I.] THE LEPROSY DEPARTED. 23 
 
 42 And as soon as he had spoken, immediately the leprosy- 
 departed from him, and he was cleansed. 
 
 43 And he straitly charged him, and forthwith sent him 
 away ; 
 
 42. " And as soon as he had spoken " omitted by N, B., D., L., a few Cursives, Old Latin, 
 Goptic, and Syriac ; retained by A. , C, later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Vulg., and other 
 versions. 
 
 43. "Straitly charged him." This translation too weak— "sternly charged him." 
 Comminatus est ei, Vulg. 
 
 " Sent him away." Literally, " cast him out ; " statim ejecit ilium, Vulg. 
 
 for His hand became not unclean from the leprosy, but the leprous 
 body was rendered clean by His holy hand" (Chrysostom on St. 
 Matthew viii., &c.). 
 
 42. "And as soon as he had spoken, immediately the leprosy." 
 The skin of the man, which a moment before had been one foul 
 blotch or sore, was instantly restored to its natural state at the 
 word of Christ. By using the words, "as soon as he had spoken," 
 the Evangelist emphasizes the fact that it was by the word of 
 Christ accompanying the touch ; and the word was, "I will: be thou 
 cleansed." The cure was not gradual, but instantaneous — to show 
 that all was by the Lord's power. If it had been gradual, it might 
 have been ascribed to some natural cause. So, in the spiritual 
 world, the Lord can convert men, and cleanse them in a moment ; 
 and, in the Lord's Sacramental action on men, the inward grace 
 comes by, and along with, the recej)tion of the outward sign. 
 
 43. "And he straitly [or sternly] charged him, and forthwith," 
 &c. " See thou say nothing to any man," &c. The words of the 
 Lord, in forbidding this man to mention the cleansing, are very 
 much stronger in St. Mark than in the other Evangelists. *' Sent 
 him away," should properly be rendered "cast him out; " andfrom 
 this it has been conjectured that the man, being unclean, had un- 
 duly intruded into the synagogue ; but it is very unlikely that he 
 had come into a synagogue to be healed. Two explanations may 
 be given — one (that which I have alluded to in my notes on St. 
 Matthew), that the Lord foresaw the hindrance to His ministry 
 which would result from the crowds which the fame of the miracle 
 would attract, and sought to avoid it ; another, that the Lord 
 desired him to go at once, without saying a word about the matter, 
 to the priests, to be examined and pronounced clean by them, and 
 to tender them the Levitical offering. Otherwise, if the priests 
 
24 SHEW THYSELF TO THE PRIEST. [Sr. Mark. 
 
 44 And saith unto him, See thou saj nothing to any man : 
 but go thj way, shew thyself to the priest, and offer for thy 
 o Lev. xiv. 3, cleausiug those things ° which Moses commanded, 
 
 4, 10. Luke „ . 
 
 V. 14. for a testimony unto them. 
 
 P Luke V. 15. 45 p But he went out, and hegan to publish it 
 
 had heard of the cleansing through other means, it is probable that 
 out of opposition to the Lord, and from a desire to discredit His 
 miracles, they might liaxe refused to pronounce the man clean. 
 
 "But go thy way, shew thyself to the priest, and offer for thy 
 cleansing those things which Moses commanded." The offering 
 which Moses, by the Word of God, commanded to be offered when 
 the leper was pronounced healed, are very remarkable indeed, and 
 serve to show that (no doubt, for tyjpical reasons) God made the 
 greatest possible difference between this disease and all others. 
 The account of these offerings is to be found in Leviticus xiv. The 
 most noticeable of them seems to be strictly parallel to the offer- 
 ing of the two goats on the great day of atonement, and is thus 
 described : " Then shall the priest command to take for him that is 
 to be cleansed two birds, alive and clean, and cedar, and scarlet, 
 and hyssop ; and the priests shall command that one of the birds be 
 killed in an earthen vessel, over running water. As for the living 
 bird, he shall take it, and the cedar wood, and the scarlet, and the 
 hyssop, and shall dip them and the living bird in the blood of the 
 bird that was killed over the running water. And he shall sprinkle 
 upon him that is to be cleansed seven times, and shall pronounce 
 him clean, and shall let the living bird loose upon the open field." 
 
 " For a testimony unto them." Most probably "for a testimony 
 that I have by My power healed a disease beyond all the skill 
 of man to cure, so that they may acknowledge the power of God 
 in Me, and may be led to accept Me." I have noticed in my 
 Introduction to St. John's Gospel, that this sending of the leper to 
 the priests is one of those incidents related in the Synoptics which 
 seem to necessitate a previous ministry in Jerusalem. A prophet 
 of Galilee, unknown in Jerusalem to the priests of the Temple, was 
 not likely to send the lepers to the priests for a testimony, unless he 
 had exercised a ministry of healing and teaching under the shadow 
 of the Temple, which the priests had rejected. 
 
 45. " But he went out, and began to publish it much, and to 
 
CiiAP. II.] HE rHEACHED THE WORD. 25 
 
 mucli, and to blaze abroad the matter, insoinucli tbat Jesus 
 could no more openly enter into tbe city, but was without 
 in desert places : ^ and they came to him from q ch. ii, 13. 
 every quarter. 
 
 45. " Into the city." Not the particular city, but any city, as we use the word " town " 
 in opposition to " country." 
 
 blaze abroad," &c. St. Mark alone mentions that the man delibe- 
 rately disobeyed the Word of the Lord. Our feelings would lead 
 us to applaud, rather than to blame, the man's conduct ; but the 
 sequel shows that it was an hindrance to the Lord's work. Must 
 we not gather from this that all and every preaching of Christ may 
 not be in accordance with His W^ill ? The preaching which, under 
 pretence of honouring Christ, divides His Church, and, by its 
 irreverence and fanaticism, brings discredit on religion, really 
 hinders the work of Christ. It frustrates the intention of His own 
 holy prayer, for the unity of His Church, offered just before His 
 Passion (John xvii. 20, 21). 
 
 CHAP. II. 
 
 AND again ^ he entered into Capernaum after some days ; 
 and it was noised that he was in the house. » Matt. ix. 1. 
 
 Luke r. 18. 
 
 2 And straightway many were gathered to- 
 gether, insomuch that there was no room to receive them, no, 
 not so much as about the door : and he preached the word 
 unto them. 
 
 1. " And again he entered into Capernaum after some days ; and 
 it was," &c. Capernaum is called in St. Matthew " his own city," 
 because, after leaving Nazareth, He dwelt there. 
 
 "That he was in the house." Probably the same house men- 
 tioned in i. 29-32, &c., which would be Simon Peter's. 
 
 2, "And straightway many were gathered together . . . preached 
 the word unto them." The expression, " no room to receive them, 
 
26 THEY UNCOVERED THE ROOF. [St. Mark. 
 
 3 And they come unto him, bringing one sick of the palsy, 
 which was borne of four. 
 
 4 And when they could not come nigh unto him for the 
 press, they uncovered the roof where he was : and when they 
 had broken it up, they let down the bed wherein the sick of 
 the palsy lay. 
 
 4. "When tfeey could net come nigh him." So A., C, D., later Uncials, almost all 
 Cursives, Old Latin, Syriac, and some versions. "Bring him in," S, B., L., a few Cur- 
 sives, Vnlg., and some versions. 
 
 no, not so much as about the door," implies that our Lord was in 
 such a place in the house that His words could be heard about the 
 door. The most probable explanation which agrees with all the 
 circumstances is that He was preaching in a large room with an 
 open court before it, enclosed on all sides, and full of people, the 
 ceiling of the room being close under the roof. The roof could be 
 reached by an outside staircase, or from the roof of the neighbouring 
 house. 
 
 3. "And they come unto him, bringing one sick of the palsy, 
 which," &c. The remark, " which was borne of four," is peculiar to 
 our Evangelist, and seems to show that the narrator, St. Peter, had 
 watched the transaction. 
 
 4. " And when they could not come nigh unto him for the press," 
 &c. St. Luke tells us that they made several ineffectual efforts to 
 bring him into the presence of the Lord. " They sought means to 
 bring him in, and to lay him before Him. And when they could 
 not find by what way they might bring him in because of the 
 multitude," &c. This shows their perseverance, and so the strength 
 of their faith. If they had not had a very firm belief that Jesus 
 was both able and willing to restore the poor sufferer to health and 
 strength, they would have been daunted by the difficulties they met 
 with. 
 
 " They uncovered the roof where he was : and when they had 
 broken it up," &c. 
 
 " They let down the bed wherein," &c. All this, of course, must 
 have been done with the permission of the owner of the house, the 
 Lord Himself being conscious of what was going on. From St. 
 Luke we learn that they broke through the tiling, and probably 
 through a ceihng underneath it. It may be that they had brought 
 
Chap. II.] WHEN JESUS SAW THEIR FAITH. 27 
 
 5 Wlien Jesus saw their faitii, he said unto tlie sick of the 
 palsy, Son, thy sins be forgiven thee. 
 
 5. " Thy sins be forgiven thee," or, " Thy sins are forgiven thee." Demittuntur 
 tibi peccata [tria}, Vulg. [CoJex Amiat. omitting tua]. 
 
 "Thee," N, B., D., G., L., a few Cursives. Old Latin [b, e, ff] omit "thee." A., 
 later Uncials, most Cursives, some Old Latin retain it. 
 
 the sufferer from some distance, and that this was the only 
 opportunity which they were likely to have of setting him before 
 the Lord. 
 
 5. " When Jesus saw their faith, he said," &c. The question has 
 been asked, W^as it right thus to interrupt the spiritual teaching of 
 the Lord ? He was then, by His holy doctrine, healing men's 
 souls ; why should this be broken in upon, in order that he might 
 heal a sick man's body ? The answer is, that our Lord very dis- 
 tinctly stamped it with His approval. And, indeed, it presented in 
 itself one of the best illustrations both of the nature and of the success 
 of His teaching, and gave Him an opportunity of setting forth afar 
 higher and more spiritual doctrine than hitherto. For all tho 
 Lord's teaching was designed by Him to bring about faith in Him- 
 self, as the personal Manifestation of the power and goodness of God 
 His Father. 
 
 And here was a case in which that faith which He desired to 
 work in men was exhibited in a very noble and instructive way. 
 For these men exhibited the right sort of faith — a faith which 
 would overcome difficulties, — in fact, a determined and persevering 
 faith. 
 
 Quesnel hints that, in breaking through the roof, they used a 
 sort of violence which illustrates the words of the Lord spoken on 
 another occasion : " The kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and 
 the violent take it by force." " That is a holy and necessary violence 
 which a man uses in order to approach Christ. Happy that person 
 for whom pious souls use so many good endeavours that he is at 
 last brought nigh to Christ. It is absolutely necessary to come 
 nigh unto Him, some way or other, either by the door or by the 
 roof." 
 
 5. " When Jesus saw their faith, he said unto the sick of the 
 palsy," &c. How is it that the Lord is said to see their faith — i.e., 
 the faith of the bearers, — and then addresses Himself, not to them, 
 but to the sick man ? He speaks to the paralytic as if he had not 
 
28 CERTAIN OF THE SCRIBES. [St. Mark. 
 
 6 But there were certain of the scribes sitting there, and 
 reasoning in their hearts, 
 
 only faith to be healed in body, but also religious faith — a sense of 
 Bin, which would make him accept and welcome words of pardon. 
 Very probably the bearers had been (as, indeed, seems from the 
 narrative in St. Luke) most forward and urgent in contriving means 
 by which they might bring the paralytic into the presence of the 
 Lord. Perhaps he himself had been somewhat discouraged at the 
 difficulties, and was afraid of intruding into His presence whilst 
 teaching, and they had made light of the difficulties, and over- 
 caine his scruples. 
 
 Whatever be the explanation, the fact is noticeable that the Lord 
 recognizes at once the strength of their faith, and also the sense of 
 sin in the man himself : for if the man had been utterly indifferent 
 to such things as the sinfulness of his past sins, and the need of 
 pardon, the Lord could not have thus accosted him. This we seem 
 to learn, from the Lord's words, as recorded in St. Matthew : " Son, 
 be of good cheer." 
 
 " Thy sins be forgiven thee," or " are forgiven," making the de- 
 claration of absolution more distinct and authoritative. Here we 
 have an advance on the teaching which accompanied the former 
 miracles recorded by St. Mark. The Lord first applies His for- 
 giving power to the man's soul before He restores health to his 
 body. It seems that the man must have been in a fit spiritual 
 state of mind to receive this absolution, not only from a sense of 
 the evil of sin, but from some (perhaps undefined) sense of the 
 power of such a Teacher and Worker of miracles to speak in God's 
 name. 
 
 It is too much, however, to say, as some seem to do, that there 
 must be some sx)iritual work in the souls of those who came to 
 Christ before there could be healing for their bodies ; but un- 
 doubtedly by thus putting forth the cure of the soul, the Lord 
 seems to emphasize that as the jpurpose for which He did His 
 mighty works. 
 
 6. " But there were certain of the scribes sitting there, and 
 reasoning," &c. St. Luke mentions the presence of these men far 
 more circumstantially: "As he was teaching, there were Pharisees 
 and doctors of the law sitting by, which were come out of every 
 
Chap. II.] HE BLASPHEMETH. 29 
 
 7 Why doth this man thus speak blasphemies ? •' who can 
 forgive sins but Grod only ? b job xiv. 4. 
 
 8 And immediately ""when Jesus perceived in cVau.ix" 
 
 7. " Why does this man thus speak blasphemies ? " So A., C, almost all later Uncials 
 and Cursives, Syriae, and some versions ; but X, B., D., L., some Old Latin and Vulgate, 
 " Why doth this man thus speak 1 He blasphemeth." 
 
 town of Gahlee and Judea and Jerusalem." From this we gather 
 that this was not a chance presence, as it were, but a gathering of 
 His principal enemies from all quarters to observe His words, with 
 the view of finding some cause of accusation against Him. 
 
 " Reasoning in their hearts." They seem not to have had time 
 to consult together, and express aloud their condemnation. 
 
 *' Why doth this man thus speak blasphemies ? [or as Eevisers, 
 "Why doth this man thus speak? He blasphemeth."] It is to 
 be noticed that blasphemy is committed against the sux^reme God 
 in two ways : either by ascribing to God what is unworthy of Him, 
 or by ascribing to His creatures what belongs solely to the 
 Creator and Supreme Judge. They did not know that " what 
 things so ever the Father doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise " 
 (John V. 19). 
 
 *' AVho can forgive sins but God only ? " This is perfectly true, but 
 did not apply to the present case, or to any other case of such 
 power exercised either by Christ or by those who are commissioned 
 by Him. For the kingdom of God is one vast system of Mediator- 
 ship, in which God is the Sovereign, in Whom resides all authority, 
 all power, all grace of forgiveness or strength. God only can 
 forgive sins because He is the supreme Judge, but He has com- 
 mitted all judgment, t.e., all remitting or retaining of sins, to His 
 Son. He judges, but He judges in and through and by His Son. 
 And as He has commissioned and sent His Son, so His Son has 
 commissioned and sent His apostles ; and they in their tm'n have 
 commissioned and sent the ministers who have succeeded them. 
 God only forgives, but He conveys forgiveness by whatsoever 
 channels — ministerial or sacramental — He sees fit to employ. [See 
 my note on St. Matthew ix. 3, 4.] 
 
 8. "And immediately when Jesus perceived in his spirit that 
 they," &c. The Lord at once gives them a proof by His revealing 
 to them the secret reasonings of their hearts, that He was far 
 
30 WHY REASON YE THESE THINGS ? [St. Mark. 
 
 his spirit that they so reasoned within themselves, he said 
 unto them, Why reason ye these things in your hearts ? 
 d Matt. ix. 5. 9 "^ Whether it is easier to say to the sick of 
 the palsy, Thy sins be forgiven thee ; or to say, Arise, and 
 take up thy bed, and walk ? 
 
 9. " Thy sins be forgiven thee." See as above, " Thy sins are forgiven thee," 
 " Walk." So A., B., C, later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic, 
 •Syriac, &c. ; but N, L. read, " go thy way." 
 
 nearer to God, far more closely and personally connected with 
 Him than they had imagined. It is the prerogative of God alone to 
 search the heart. " I, the Lord, search the hearts " (Jerem. xvii. 
 10). St. Paul speaks of Him as the God Who searcheth the hearts 
 (Kom. viii. 27) ; and Christ, again, in His message to the Church 
 of Thyatira, " I am He that searcheth the reins and hearts " 
 
 (Eev. ii. 23). 
 
 9. " Whether is it easier to say . , . thy sins be forgiven thee ; 
 or to say . . . walk." The Lord not only noticed their thoughts 
 against Himself, but the very line which their false reasoning 
 took. They must have said within themselves, " To say thy sins 
 are forgiven is easy enough, for no one can prove or disprove 
 whether what is so said is ratified in heaven or not ; but let 
 Him do something by which He can show that He wields the 
 authority of God." Perhaps they thought that to heal this man's 
 rdisease would be beyond His power. Thus Theophylact [quoted in 
 Catena Aurea] : "The Pharisees thought it more difficult to heal 
 the body, as being more open to view ; but the soul more easy 
 to cure, because the cure is invisible ; so that they reasoned thus : 
 * Lo, He does not now cure the body, but heals the unseen soul ; 
 if He had had more power He would at once have cured the body, 
 and not have fled for refuge to the unseen world.' The Saviour, 
 therefore, showing that He can do both, says, ' Which is the 
 easier ? ' as if he said, ' I, indeed, by the healing of the body, which 
 is in reality more easy, but appears to you more difficult, wiU 
 prove to you the healing of the soul, which is really the harder of 
 the two.' " 
 
 10. " But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on 
 earth," &c. By using the words, "the Son of man hath power on 
 »earth," it seems to me that the Lord exercises this power, not as the 
 
Chap. II.] ARISE, AND TAKE UP THY BED. 31 
 
 10 But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power 
 on earth to forgive sins, (he saith to the sick of the palsy,) 
 
 111 say unto thee. Arise, and take up thy bed, and go thy 
 way into thine house. 
 
 12 And immediately he arose, took up the bed, and went 
 forth before them all ; insomuch that they were all amazed, 
 
 10. The order is um-ertaia. It may be, "The Son of man hath power to forgive sins 
 on earth," or, " The Son of man on earth hath power," or as in Authorized. 
 
 12. " And immediately he arose." So A., all later Uncials, Syriac, Old Latin, Vulg. ; 
 but H, B., C, L., read, " And he arose, and immediately took up," &c. 
 
 Eternal Word, but as the Mediator. He exercises the power as the 
 Son of man, but it is not inherent in Him as the Son of man of 
 Himself, bnt as the Son of man the Messiah, ordered, sent, commis- 
 sioned by His Father— and " on earth ; " He has all power in heaven 
 and in earth. At the last day He will judge, and so absolve or con- 
 demn, not men only but angels ; but, in the face of His enemies, it 
 was sufficient to assert that He had this power on earth. The 
 sphere, both of the absolution and the miracle, was on earth. In 
 all probability there had been something in the man's sin which 
 required that it should be put away by such means, before the 
 Saviour could fitly restore him to health. 
 
 11. "I say unto thee, Arise, and take up thy bed, and go thy 
 way," &c. Notice how, whilst he was without power, the Lord 
 bids him arise. That he should do this there must have been 
 an instantaneous feeling of restored strength accompanying the 
 Lord's words, so that he did what he had not done perhaps for 
 years before, he made the effort to arise, and he found that he had 
 strength from the Saviour so to do. 
 
 " Take up thy bed." By this the Lord showed that the restora- 
 tion was instantaneous and complete. Though the bed was but a 
 mat, it would have been far too heavy for one not properly restored 
 to strength to carry away. 
 
 12. " And immediately he arose, took up the bed," &c. Mark 
 the prompt obedience. As the Saviour had joined the " taking u^j 
 the bed " with the arising from it, so he did. 
 
 It is said in St. Mark, that "he immediately arose, took up the 
 bed, and went forth before them all, insomuch that they were all 
 amazed." St. Mark's account is, that of one who saw the whole 
 
32 FOLLOW ME. [St. Mark, 
 
 and glorified God, saying, We never saw it on this fashion, 
 e Matt. ix. 9. 13 ^ And he went forth again by the sea side; 
 
 and all the multitude resorted unto him, and he 
 
 taught them. 
 f Matt. ix. 9. 14 f And as he passed by, he saw Levi the son 
 
 Luke V. 27. . , ■■• . 
 
 B Or, at the of Alphaeus sitting |1 at the receipt of custom, and 
 v!e^custom was said unto him, Follow me. And he arose and 
 
 received. r> ^^ i i • 
 
 followed him. 
 
 14. " He saw Levi the son of Alphaeus." It is worth while noticing the fact that D. and 
 the Old Latin read here, " James the son of Alphaeus," a manifest blunder of a very gross 
 kind ; and yet such a blot as this is actually registered as a marginal reading in Westcott 
 and Hort's Greek Text. 
 
 Bc^ne, and on whom the signs of astonishment in the faces of the 
 bystanders had made an indelible impression. 
 
 " And glorified God, saying, We never saw it after this fashion." 
 St. Matthew reports that they " glorified God which had given such 
 power imto men." St. Luke that they were filled with fear, saying, 
 "We have seen strange things to-day." St. Mark: "We never 
 saw it after this fashion." Each Evangelist reports different ex- 
 clamations on the part of the crowd ; but is not this most natural, 
 and a proof of the faithfulness of the narrative ? Would a crowd of 
 excited persons, filhng the house and court — perhaps two or three 
 hundred — have all uttered simultaneously the same exclamation ? 
 Would not some have referred all the power to God, would not 
 others have exclaimed that they had seen nothing to compare to it ; 
 would not others have simply stared, and thought it strange ; and 
 would not the admiration of the most part have been mixed with 
 fear at an exhibition of supernatural power so close to them ? 
 
 13. "And he went forth again by the sea side ; . . . and he 
 taught them." The account of His teaching of multitudes by the 
 sea-side is peculiar to St. Mark. It is no doubt mentioned because 
 it was the occasion on which He fell in with St. Matthew, and called 
 him. 
 
 14. " And as he passed by, he saw Levi the son of Alphaeus 
 sitting at the," &c. In SB. Mark and Luke this apostle is called 
 Levi, in St. Matthew he is called Matthew, the name by which ho 
 has ever since been known in the Church. That he had the name 
 of Matthew (given by the Lord) added to his first name is in 
 
Chap. II.] PUBLICANS AND SINNERS. 33 
 
 15 ^ And it came to pass, that, as Jesus sat at meat in his 
 house, many publicans and sinners sat also to- s Matt. ix. lo. 
 gether with Jesus and his disciples : for there were many, 
 and they followed him. 
 
 accordance with what is told us of nearly all the other apostles, 
 the greater part having some additional name. Such were the 
 names of Peter, Boanerges, Didymus, Thaddeus, Iscariot, Zelotes, 
 Nathanael, &c. We have here the call of one in a very different 
 state and worldly position to those who hitherto had left all to 
 follow the Lord. He was, from his occupation, in all probability 
 far richer, and yet far less respectable, for the name of publican 
 was a byword of contempt, our Lord Himself at times using it 
 as if those whom it designated were, on the whole, a disreputable 
 class. 
 
 Kespecting St. Matthew's previous history we are told nothing 
 whatsoever ; but when we remember that when theLord called Peter, 
 James, John, Andrew, and Philip, he called men who had been 
 under the instruction and discipline of the Baptist, and so were not 
 called by any means in a state of indifference or unpreparedness, 
 so it very probably was with St. Matthew. From many hints and 
 notices respecting the pubUcans, we are led to believe that there 
 had been some special religious movement among them as a class. 
 Our Lord speaks of all the people that heard John, and thepuhlicans, 
 justifying God by submitting to receive his baptism (Luke vii. 29). 
 He speaks of the ]Dubhcans and harlots entering into the kingdom 
 of God before the Pharisees (Matt. xxi. 31). We are told that 
 the publicans came to be baptized, and the Bajptist seems to have 
 addressed them as if they had come separately and in a body 
 (Luke iii. 12, 13). With this agrees our Lord's choosing the Pub- 
 lican in His parable as a special example of contrition. From all 
 this I think it is more than probable that Levi, or Matthew, had 
 been a disciple of the Baptist, or had submitted to his baptism, that 
 his heart had been some time worked upon by the Spirit of God, 
 and that the Lord's call was the decisive crisis in his religious 
 history. 
 
 15. " And it came to pass, that, as Jesus sat at meat," &c. In 
 my Commentary on St. Matthew, I noticed how the Apostle at 
 once threw himself heart and soul into the new state of things, 
 
 D 
 
34 NOT THE RIGHTEOUS, BUT SINNERS. [St. Mark. 
 
 16 And wlien the scribes and Pharisees saw him eat with 
 puhlicans and sinners, they said unto his disciples, How is 
 it that he eateth and drinketh with publicans and sinners ? 
 
 17 When Jesns heard it, he saith nnto them, ^They that 
 h Matt. ix. 12. are whole have no need of the physician, but 
 
 13. & xviii. 11. , , -IT , . 11 -, . 1 
 
 Luke V. 31, 32. thcv that are sick : i came not to call the righ- 
 
 & xix. 10. 1 , . . , 
 
 1 Tim. i. 15. tcous, but siuucrs to repcntancc. 
 
 16. " Scribes and Pharisees." So A., C, later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Vulg., &c. ; 
 but " Scribes of the Pharisees " read by N, B., L., &c. 
 
 17. ** Sinners to repentance." " To repentance" omitted by A., Vulg., and Syriac, as 
 well as by N, B., D. It is consequently very probably spurious so far as this Gospel is 
 concerned, but that it formed a part of our Lord's words is certain from Luke v. 32. 
 
 and made a feast, to which he invited his brother pubUcans, in 
 order that they might hear and receive the words which had saved 
 him. 
 
 Each Evangelist remarks that many of such sat down. St. 
 Matthew, that many pubhcans and sinners came ; St. Mark adds, 
 " and they were many ; " St. Luke, " there was a great company of 
 publicans and of others." Quesnel (a Romanist) remarks on this : 
 "Every sinner converted to Christ must endeavour to conduct 
 his friends to Him. Fruitfulness is a certain proof of the reality 
 of conversion." 
 
 16. "And when the scribes and Pharisees . . . with publicans 
 and sinners." It is quite possible that this was said, not out of 
 malice, but out of sheer ignorance respecting the way of getting at 
 the hearts of sinners, or out of inability to understand that Divino 
 grace can reach the souls of the most abandoned. All their system 
 of religion was external and unreal, and so they could not enter into 
 the mind of One Who would condescend to mix and converse with 
 the lowest, if He could only win them to God. 
 
 17. " When Jesus heard it, he saith unto them. They that are 
 whole," &c. I must refer the reader to my note in St. Matthew, 
 respecting the universal application of this verse to those who have 
 kept themselves, by God's grace, comparatively pure from sin, as 
 well as to those who have plunged into uncleanness. 
 
 " They that are whole have no need," &c., as if He said, "Why are 
 you surprised to see Me in the company of sinners ? You know well 
 My purpose in mixing with them ; surely it is as unreasonable to 
 wonder at it as to be surprised at seeing a physician in an hospital. 
 
Chap. II.] THE DISCIPLES OF JOHN FAST. 35 
 
 18 'And the disciples of John and of the Pharisees used 
 to fast : and they come and say unto him, Why l ^f*"* !fo ^^' 
 
 18. " The disciples of John and of the Pharisees." Properly, " the disciples of John 
 and the Pharisees." So N, A., B., C, D., K., M., Vulg., and Syi-iac; but many of the 
 later Uncials (E., F., G., H., L.) and the gi-eater part of Cursives agree vnth Ree. Text. 
 
 " I came not to call the righteous," &c. It has been asked, how 
 our Lord could call by implication any human beings righteous. 
 We answer that He could not speak otherwise. It is true that 
 none are absolutely righteous, sinless as God, or even as the angels, 
 and yet numbers are, and all are capable of being, and intended by 
 God to be, made righteous. That very Word of God which con- 
 vinces all of sin, speaks in every page of some being righteous and 
 others wicked, some good and others evil. For purposes of salva- 
 tion, all are accounted sinners, that all may partake of the righteous- 
 ness of Christ ; and God can in very deed so convince those who 
 have lived in all good conscience (as St. Paul had) of their sinful- 
 ness, that their repentance is deeper and humbler than that oi 
 those who have lived in wilful sin, and so such are in a condition 
 to receive Christ as heartily, and rely upon Him as implicitly 
 as the grossest sinners to whom God has granted repentance unto 
 life. 
 
 It is needful, however, to put in a word of caution. The Lord 
 mixed with the lowest sinners, to win them to repentance ; but for 
 those to do so who are neophytes, who have but lately turned to 
 Him, and who have had little or no experience of some of the most 
 insidious forms of temptation, is exceedingly perilous. I knew one 
 who began very well, and seemed to be truly converted, who fell 
 terribly, and made utter shipwreck of his Christian character by 
 taking part in one of the best of works — the London Midnight 
 Mission. 
 
 18. " And the disciples of John and of the Pharisees used to 
 fast," &c. " The disciples of John " — how is it that they joined 
 with those whom their Master had denounced as " a generation of 
 vipers " ? It has usually been put down to jealousy of the growing 
 success of Christ whilst their master was shut up in prison ; but 
 was it not owing to the marked difference between the outward life 
 of John and that of the Lord ? Jesus had Himself drawn attention 
 to this difference, when He said, " John came neither eating nor 
 drinking — the Son of Man came eating and drinking. It is to be 
 
36 THY DISCIPLES FAST NOT. [St. Mark. 
 
 do tlie disciples of John and of the Pharisees fast, but thy 
 disciples fast not ? 
 
 19 And Jesus said unto them, Can the children of the 
 bridechamber fast, while the bridegroom is with them? as 
 long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot 
 fast. 
 
 remembered that these disciples of John were those in whom the 
 chief mission of the Baptist was not fulfilled. They had not, as the 
 Apostles, been drawn through his teaching to Christ. They would 
 naturally rest on what was outward in the mission of John, hold it 
 to be final, be ofi'ended at the liberty allowed by the new Teacher, 
 and so join with the Pharisees in putting such a question to the 
 Lord. 
 
 "And John's disciples and the Pharisees were fasting." It has 
 been supposed, with some probability, that the feast in Matthew's 
 house was on some day set apart by the Pharisees as a fast day, 
 though not one of the appointed fasts of the Jews. 
 
 " Thy disciples fast not." In this they accuse by implication the 
 great Teacber of not being sufficiently ascetic in His teaching and 
 discipline, forgetting that the disciples of the Lord had forsaken all 
 to follow Him — a far greater sacrifice than fasting twice in the 
 week, and retaining all their possessions. 
 
 19. "And Jesus said unto them, Can the children [sons] of the 
 bridechamber," &c. This answer of the Lord is one of those places 
 in the Syncoptics which exhibit both the sentiments and the lan- 
 guage of the fourth Gospel. The Baptist there (John iii. 29) speaks 
 of Christ as the bridegroom, and himself as only the friend of the 
 bridegroom ; and the Lord may have here intended to remind 
 these disciples of John that their master had borne this witness to 
 Him. 
 
 Fasting is connected with sorrow and mom-ning. The time of 
 Christ's visible presence was a time of deep joy to those who recog- 
 nized Him ; and so it would be incongruous, if not hypocritical, to 
 make such a time a time of fasting. But the bright day of gladness 
 was to be succeeded by the night of bereavement : " and then shall 
 they fast." 
 
 This is not so much a command, or direction, or law, as a 
 prophecy ; and the later parts of the New Testament teach us how 
 
Chap. II.] THEN SHALL THEY FAST. 37 
 
 20 But tlie days will come, wlien the bridegroom sliall 
 be taken away from them, and then sliall they fast in those 
 days. 
 
 21 No man also seweth a piece of 11 new cloth ii Or, raw, or, 
 on an old garment : else the new piece that filled 
 
 it np taketh away from the old, and the rent is 
 made worse. 
 
 20. " In those days." So most later Uncials, Old Latin ; but i<. A., B., C, D., K., L., 
 some Cursives, Syriac, Vulg. [Cod. Amiat.], read, " In that day." 
 
 21. "Also." Probably should be omitted after H, A., B., C, L., Vulg., &c. 
 
 hterally and universally it was fulfilled. When the Bridegroom 
 was taken away, the Church, in its earliest and best days, did indeed 
 fast. Thus, when Paul and Barnabas were set apart to the work 
 to which the Holy Ghost had called them, the word came to 
 those who were "ministering to the Lord, and fasting" (Acts 
 xiii. 2). St. Paul ordained elders, after prayer with fasting (xiv. 23). 
 He speaks of himself as being " in fastings often " (2 Corinth, xi. 27). 
 He speaks of ministers commending themselves to God, " in 
 labours, in watchings, and in fastings " (2 Cor. vi. 5). 
 
 All branches of the Church Catholic have from very early times 
 observed times of fasting, particularly the day of the Lord's Death, 
 and His rest in the grave. The Church of England gives abundant 
 opportunity to her children to fulfil this prophecy of the Lord : 
 such as the forty days of Lent, the Ember days, the Vigils, and 
 each Friday in the year. That her children but scantily observe 
 such seasons in no way puts her in the wrong as regards her duty 
 to her Lord. 
 
 21. " No man also seweth . . . rent is made worse." In my 
 notes on St. Matthew, I have dwelt upon the great principle under- 
 lying these two parables or similitudes — viz., that the kingdom of 
 God, or the polity and religion brought in by Jesus, cannot be a mere 
 I)atch upon Judaism to make up some deficiency in the older 
 religion ; neither can its spirit be made to work under the dead 
 forms of the old system. On the contrary, the new religion is a 
 new and far more glorious garment, and is animated by a spirit 
 which would utterly refuse to be restrained in such worn-out vessels 
 as the Mosaic laws and ordinances. At present, the disciples were 
 as raw, un wrought cloth, which must be made into its own garment. 
 
38 NEW WINE, OLD BOTTLES. [St. Mark. 
 
 22 And no man pntteth new wine into old bottles : else 
 the new wine doth burst the bottles, and the wine is sfjilled, 
 and the bottles will be marred : but new wine must be put 
 into new bottles, 
 k Matt. xii. 1. 23 ^ And it came to pass, that he went through 
 
 Luke vi. 1. 
 
 22. The text and translation of this verse in our Authorized is according to A., Vulg., 
 and SjTiac. The Revisers, following Neutral Text, render, " No man putteth new wine 
 into old wine skins : else the wine will burst the skins, and the wine perisheth and the 
 skins, but they put new wine into fresh wine skins." 
 
 and not added as a mere makeshift to another ; they were as new 
 wine, which must be enclosed in the new vessel preparing for them, 
 as the old was quite powerless to hold them together, and preserve 
 them. The persons who were now blaming the disciples for want 
 of strictness, were anxious to impose upon them mere outward 
 Pharisaical strictness ; but this was both foohsh and premature. 
 The time would shortly come when these disciples would lead far 
 stricter and more self-denying lives than those who were now call- 
 ing them to account, but they would be animated in this new life by 
 different principles and a different spirit. 
 
 An inference is drawn by many pious writers from these words 
 of the Lord, which is quite legitimate, though I am not sure that it 
 was in His mind. It is thus well expressed by Quesnel : " Men 
 often spoil all for want of well considering the strength and ability 
 of such souls as begin to tm-n to God. The indiscreet zeal of a 
 pastor, who requires too much of a penitent at first, often makes 
 him give over all, and renders him the worse. It is a temptation 
 to some beginners to be desirous of following the most advanced 
 Christians in everything. The devil seeks either to discourage 
 them, or to puff them up. We must lay deej) foundations of 
 humility and the love of God before we can possibly raise the 
 spiritual building. Love wUl furnish us with all materials, and 
 humility will preserve them." 
 
 23. " And it came to pass ... to pluck the ears of com." The 
 narrative of this incident seems to be a fitting sequel to what had 
 just occurred. In the former verses the Lord had defended His dis- 
 ciples against the charge of laxity in the matter of fasting. They 
 were in no way bound to keep the Pharisaical fasts. Now He 
 claims on behalf of His own a far greater liberty in the matter of 
 
Chap. IL] NOT LAWFUL ON THE SABBATH. 39 
 
 tlie corn fields on tlie sabbatli day ; and liis disciples began, 
 as they went, ^ to pluck tlie ears of corn. i Deut. xxiii. 25. 
 
 24 And the Pharisees said unto him, Behold, why do they 
 on the sabbath day that which is not lawful ? 
 
 23. " His disciples began, as they went, to pluck the ears of corn." Literally, " His 
 disciples began to make a way, plucking the ears of corn." Vulg., Cceperunt progredi, et 
 vellere spicas. 
 
 Sabbath observance than the religious leaders of that time per- 
 mitted. The rules which the Pharisees had enforced seemed in- 
 tended to make the Sabbath an intolerable burden, and the Lord 
 having emancipated His disciples from any such yoke, proceeds 
 to enunciate in a short and very decisive aphorism, preserved only 
 by St. Mark, the true principle of the weekly day of rest and re- 
 freshment. 
 
 " He went through the corn fields on the sabbath day." Perhaps 
 from one synagogue to another ; but no doubt the incident was so 
 ordered by God (Who had given Him commandment what He 
 should say and what He should feach, John xii. 49) that it might 
 afford Him opportunity to establish the greater freedom of the New 
 Kingdom, the relation of the Sabbath to man as a great boon from 
 God to those who live by hard labour, and His own power over the 
 Sabbath as its Lord. 
 
 " To pluck the ears of com." St. Matthew notices that the dis- 
 ciples were an hungred. The disciples in thus satisfying their 
 hunger, did a thing which the law of Moses expressly permitted 
 them to do; for we read, "When thou comest into the standing 
 corn of thy neighbour, then thou mayest pluck the ears with thine 
 hand ; but thou shalt not move a sickle unto thy neighbour's stand- 
 ing corn" (Deut. xxiii. 25). Of course after they had done this, 
 they must of necessity have rubbed the ears in their hands, or they 
 could not have got at the kernels as they walked through the fields, 
 and it would not have been lawful to take any quantity away. This 
 we should have been sure of, even if St. Luke had not mentioned it. 
 The Pharisees object, not to the plucking of the ears — that was 
 clearly allowed — but to the action of rubbing them in their hands* 
 And the Lord answered them by showing that it is according to the 
 Father's will that all rules respecting outward things must give way 
 to the needs of men. He cites as strong a case in point as can well 
 
40 DAVID EATING THE SHE WERE AD. [St. Mark. 
 
 25 And he said unto them, Have ye never read ™what 
 »isam.xxi.6. David did, when he had need, and was an 
 hungred, he, and they that were with him ? 
 
 26 How he went into the house of God in the days of 
 Abiathar the high priest, and did eat the shewbread, ^ which 
 n Ex. xxix. is not lawful to eat but for the priests, and gave 
 xxiv 9. ' also to them which were with him ? 
 
 26. In the days of Abiathar the high priest ; " or, " When Abiathar was high priest ; " 
 iub Abiathar principe sacerdotum, Vulg. 
 
 be conceived. It was not lawful for any but the priests to eat the 
 shewbread, and yet David asked for this bread; and Ahimelech 
 (with whom was Abiathar, his son) gave it to him, and to those 
 that were with him, and very probably on the Sabbath day, for it 
 would appear from 1 Samuel xxi. 6, that it had been changed on 
 jhat very day. 
 
 A difficulty has been made respecting the name of the priest. 
 Ahimelech, the father of Abiathar, was the priest who gave the 
 bread to David, but Abiathar was certainly present, and would, no 
 doubt, concur in the act. This explanation is as old as the time of 
 Venerable Bede, who says, " There is, however, no discrepancy, for 
 both were there, when David came to ask for bread, and received 
 it : that is to say, Ahimelech, the high priest, and Abiathar, his 
 son ; but Ahimelech having been slain by Saul (very shortly after), 
 Abiathar fled to David, and became the companion of all his exile 
 afterwards. When he came to the throne, Abiathar himself also 
 received the rank of high priest, and the son became of much greater 
 excellence than the father, and therefore was worthy to be men- 
 tioned as the high priest, even during his father's lifetime." Such 
 seems, in all respects, a fair and likely account of the substitution 
 of the son's name for that of the father. If, however, St. Mark 
 wrote Abiathar in mistake, it merely shows that the inspiration 
 vouchsafed to him, whilst enabling him to give the most graphic 
 account of the Lord's works of any of the four, was not intended 
 to raise him above the liability to make mistakes in matters of 
 chronology, or locality, or grammar, which could deceive no one, 
 and which any reader could correct for himself. (See particularly 
 my note on St. Matthew xxvii. 9.) 
 
Chap. II.] THE SABBATH MADE FOR MAN. 41 
 
 27 And he said unto them, The sabbath was made for 
 man, and not man for the sabbath : 
 
 27. " And he said unto them . . . not man for the Sabbath." 
 St. Mark omits the Lord's reference to the more laborious work of 
 the priests in the temple on the Sabbath, and to Himself as one 
 greater than the Sabbath, and the reference to the prophetical 
 utterance, " I will have mercy and not sacrifice " (Matt. xii. 5, 6, 7), 
 and proceeds to enunciate the principle on which such a day as the 
 weekly festival can only be observed. The Sabbath was made for 
 man, for his rest and refreshment, particularly if he has to labour 
 to get his bread at the will of others, and so God says in the book 
 of Deuteronomy : " Keep the Sabbath day to sanctify it . . . that thy 
 manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou " 
 (v. 12, 14). But this gift of God to the sons of toil, whether the 
 Sabbath of the Jew, or the Lord's Day of the Christian, is turned 
 into an imbearable burden if it is to be kept after the manner of the 
 Pharisees. It is then turned from its first intention of being a day 
 of refreshment subordinate to man's needs, and so observed as if 
 man was subordinate to it. It is surprising how many pious, God- 
 fearing men have not seen this, and have refused, of set purpose, to set 
 before themselves how every allusion to the Sabbath in the accoimt 
 of the Lord's ministry seems to tell against its too strict enforcement. 
 "Whole bodies of professing Christians seem to make the Pharisees 
 rather than the Lord their exemplars in this matter. I read lately 
 in the life of a pious Scotch minister of this generation how his 
 home looked upon an open park in the suburbs of a crowded city, 
 and how, when he saw his fellow-citizens taking a quiet walk for 
 the sake of fresh air and innocent relaxation on the Sunday, he 
 wondered how it was that the earth did not open her mouth and 
 swallow them up as it did Korah and his company. But, on the 
 other hand, man is robbed of this gift of God by laxity and self-in- 
 dulgence on the part of employers. If men give sumptuous enter- 
 tainments and use their costly equipages on this day, how can their 
 man-servants and their maid-servants rest as well as they ? 
 
 I am thankful to see that in this matter the great country of 
 France seems returning to a better mind. The national church is 
 everywhere encouraging societies and guilds whose work it is to 
 form public opinion and so bring about a better observance of 
 
42 LORD OF THE SABBATH. [St. Mark. 
 
 o Matt. xii. 8. 28 Therefore ° the Son of man is Lord also of 
 the sabbath. 
 
 Sunday, and Services of Reparation are appointed by authority to 
 deprecate God's anger for past violations of His holy day. 
 
 Quesnel expresses himself admirably upon this : " The usages 
 and ordinances of rehgion ought to be regulated according to their 
 end, which is the honour of God, and the advantage of men. It is 
 the property of the religion of the true God, to contain nothing in 
 it but what is beneficial to man. Hereby God plainly shows, that 
 it is neither out of indigence nor interest that He requires men to 
 worship and obey Him, but only out of goodness, and on purpose 
 to make them happy. God prohibited work on the Sabbath day for 
 fear lest servants should be oppressed by the hard-heartedness of 
 their masters, and to the end that men might not be hindered from 
 attending upon Him and their own salvation. Religion, therefore, 
 salvation, and mercy, are the things which should employ us on 
 that holy day." 
 
 28. " Therefore the Son of Man is Lord also of the Sabbath." 
 Not, of course. Lord of the Sabbath as the Son of Man, for as Son 
 of Man He is, as St. Paul says, " made under the law ; " but the 
 Son of Man is also the Son of God, and so being " God of the sub- 
 stance of His Father, begotten before the worlds," He is Lord of the 
 Sabbath. Nothing can show the Divine Nature of our Lord more 
 clearly than that He is above such a law of God, so that He should 
 modify it, relax it, and change it at His pleasure. He exercised but 
 a small part of this authority when He freed His disciples from the 
 yoke of its burdensome Pharisaic observance. He exercised His 
 lordship over the day far more royally when He by His Spirit 
 made the day of His Resurrection the weekly religious festival of 
 His Church. By this He gave it altogether a new character. 
 Henceforth it is a day, not of mere rest, but of renewed life, the 
 Life of His own Resurrection, and so its characteristic ordinance is 
 not the slaying of beasts, but the life-giving celebration of the 
 Sacrament of His rison Body. 
 
Chap. III.] A MAN WITH A WITHERED HAND. 43 
 
 CHAP. ni. 
 
 AND ^he entered again into the synagogue; and there 
 was a man there which had a withered hand. ^ Matt. xji. 9. 
 2 And they watched him, whether he would 
 heal him on the sabbath day ; that they might accuse him. 
 
 1. " Had a withered hand." Better, *' Had his hand withered." 
 
 1. "And he entered again into [the] synagogue . . . withered 
 hand." This narrative very fitly follows up the teaching of what 
 has just preceded it ; for, in the last verses of the former chapter, 
 the Lord vindicates the lawfulness of works of necessity on the 
 Sabbath — now He claims for Himself (and if for Himself, for His 
 Church) the right of doing worlds of mercy on the same day. But 
 He does more than this : He seems to teach us that works of heal- 
 ing and restoration are very appropriate to the holy festival ; for it 
 might have been supposed, even by those who were not Pharisees, 
 that such a work as follows might have been postponed — that the 
 man might have been bid to come to Christ on some other day ; 
 but the Lord does not put off the act of mercy on account of the 
 day. He took into account that the healing of the man on the 
 spot was saving him one day of discomfort and loss of means of 
 livelihood, and so He delayed not a single hour. 
 
 " A man there which had a withered hand," or rather had his hand 
 withered, intimating that the man was not born with the defect. 
 The Gospel according to the Hebrews, or Nazarenes, quoted in 
 Jerome, represented him as saying : " I was a mason seeking sus- 
 tenance by my hands : I beseech thee, Jesus, that Thou restore me 
 health that I may not shamefully beg for food." (From Nicholson's 
 comment on St. Matthew xii. 10.) 
 
 2, " And they watched him, whether he would heal him on the 
 Sabbath day," &c. What mingled impiety and malignity, that 
 they should seek occasion against anyone for performing an act of 
 benevolence, and not only of benevolence, but of Almighty power, 
 for without such power the act could not have been performed at 
 all! 
 
44 STAND FOKTH. [St. Mark. 
 
 3 And lie saith unto the man wliicli had the withered 
 
 t Gr. Arise, hand, f Stand forth. 
 
 in the midst. 4 And he saith unto them, Is it lawful to do 
 
 3. ** Stand forth." See margin, and old translation, quoted below. 
 
 I cannot help giving a very good reflection of Bishop Hall's 
 (quoted by Ford) on this watching. ''There is no public action 
 which the world is not ready to scan ; there is no action so private 
 which the evil spirits are not witnesses of. I will endeavour so 
 to live as knowing that I am ever in the eyes of mine enemies." 
 (" Meditations and Vows," cent. iii. 73.) 
 
 St. Matthew does not mention that they watched Him, but that 
 they first asked Him, " Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath-day? " 
 St. Augustine remarks: "We must understand that they first asked 
 the Lord, if it was lawful to heal on the Sabbath day, then that 
 understanding their thoughts, and that they were seeking an 
 opportunity to accuse Him, He placed in the middle him whom 
 He was about to cure, and put those questions which Mark and 
 Luke relate. "We must then suppose that when they were silent 
 He propounded the parable of the sheep, and concluded that it was 
 lawful to do good on the Sabbath day." 
 
 Canon Cook, in the *' Speaker's Commentary," remarks that the 
 word "watched" is scarcely strong enough, the original denotes 
 jealous, perverse, uncandid observation, the watching of one 
 already hostile. The word occurs but seldom, and only in passages 
 where perverse intention is indicated. (Luke xiv. 1 ; Acts ix. 24 ; 
 Gal. iv. 10.) 
 
 3. "And he said unto the man which had the withered hand. Stand 
 forth." Our translation, " stand forth," scarcely gives the full mean- 
 ing, which is, "Arise (and come forth) into the midst," as if He would 
 have him come where all eyes might see him. Thus Wickliffe has : 
 "And he seide to the man that hadde a drye honde, rise into the 
 myddil." TyndaU has : "Arise, and stond in the middes." Per- 
 haps, also, the Lord did this, that, by directing their looks to the 
 sufferer. He might rouse the consciences of these men, or excite 
 any better feeling which might be remaining in any of them. 
 
 4. "And he saith unto them, Is it lawful to do good . . . save 
 life, or to kill ? " &c. The instruction conveyed by this question is 
 very remarkable. To "do good" is paralleled by to "save life;" to 
 
Chap. III.] THEY HELD THEIR PEACE. 45 
 
 good on the sabbatli days, or to do evil ? to save life, or to 
 kill ? But they lield their peace. 
 
 5 And when he had looked round about on them with 
 
 *' do evil " by " to kill." But " to kill," in the case before us, would 
 be merely to defer relief, and that not of life, but of limb ; but the 
 Lord teaches us that the underlying principle is the same. It was 
 a part of the same power of evil that a man's hand should be 
 deadened by the withering of the nerve, as that his whole body 
 should be dead by the extinction of the principle of life in all the 
 nerves; and so it was apart of the same power of Good, that the life 
 of the single limb should be "saved," as that the life of the whole 
 body should be "saved." The benevolent power which would 
 save the life of the limb would save that of the whole body ; and, 
 on the contrary, the malevolent wish which would, for base pur- 
 XDOses, defer the healing of the limb, would not rest there, but would, 
 if opportunity offered, destroy the whole life. This was, as we all 
 know, x^roved to the letter when the enemies of Christ, in order 
 that they might prevent men believing in Him, sought to put 
 Lazarus to death. The Lord in a true sense saved this man's life 
 when He saved to him the means of life. A modern expositor, 
 Morison, has put this well : " All good-doing to men's bodies lies 
 on the line of life ; all withholding of good-doing lies on the line of 
 killing, or of death. If it would be wrong, in the absence of higher 
 claims, to withhold the good-doing that would save life, it must also 
 be wrong, when the higher claims are still absent, to withiiold the 
 good-doing that may be needed to develop life into its fulness of 
 vigour and beauty." 
 
 Lange also remarks well : " The Lord declares the work of com- 
 passionate love or doing good generally to be always urgent ; and 
 the thought is further involved, that sickness does not tarry at a 
 stand, but that there is a continual sinking into deeper danger and 
 need." 
 
 5. " And when he had looked round about on them with anger, 
 being grieved," &c. Notice how he to whom St. Mark owed this 
 whole account — no doubt, St. Peter— had had the look of mingled 
 anger and grief indelibly impressed upon him. St. Mark could 
 scaiwely have derived such a fact, except from one who followed 
 the Lord's eye, and observed every change in His Divine counte- 
 
46 STRETCH FORTH THINE HAND. [St. Mark. 
 
 anger, being grieved for the |1 hardness of their hearts, he 
 I Or, blindness, saith "iinto the man. Stretch forth thine hand. 
 And he stretched it out : and his hand was restored whole 
 as the other. 
 
 5. "Whole as the other" omitted by ,V, A„ B., C, D., K., Vnlg., and Syriac; there- 
 fore most probably not a part of the original text, though inserted in L., later Uncials, 
 and most Cursives. 
 
 nance. " He looked upon them with those eyes which, the Psal- 
 mist says, ' consider the poor,' and those eyehds which ' try the 
 children of men.' " He looked upon them, says Chrysostom, that 
 by His very eye He might win them over. 
 
 " With anger, being giieved." His anger was at their sin — i.e., 
 their hypocrisy and malice, — His grief at the state to which these 
 sins had reduced their hearts. They were in the most pitiable 
 condition, being hardened against compassion and goodness ; and 
 He Who knew what the future consequences of these sins would be 
 was grieved. May we hope that this. His grief, was effectual to 
 find, some day or other, a way for His mercy to reach them ? 
 
 " Stretch forth thine hand." It is most probable that the wither- 
 ing of the hand had affected the whole arm. In such a case, the 
 Lord here calls upon the man to perform an act of faith, to endea- 
 vour to do that which, a moment before, he had not power to do : 
 and the Lord met this, his endeavour, by instantaneous restoration 
 of health and strength. 
 
 " He stretched it forth, and his hand was restored," &c. We are 
 to remember that this was a visible miracle — not merely a restora- 
 tion of secret power to the internal ners^es, but of fulness of flesh 
 in the place of shrunken and withered muscle and sinew. All in 
 the Synagogue witnessed this, and must have been, willingly or 
 not, convinced of the exercise of Divine Power. 
 
 The whole miracle is suggestive to eveiyone who has the smallest 
 spirituality of mind of the heahng of the soul. " The man with a 
 withered hand shows the human race, dried up as to its fruitfulness 
 in good works, but now cured by the mercy of the Lord ; the hand 
 of man which, in our first parents, had been dried up, when he 
 plucked the fruit of the forbidden tree, through the grace of the 
 Eedeemer, Who stretched His guiltless hands on the tree of the 
 Cross, has been restored to health" (Bede, in " Catena Aurea"). 
 
Chap.IIL] PHARISEES AND HERODIANS. 47 
 
 6 ''And the Pharisees went forth, and straightway took 
 counsel with ^ the Herodians against him, how ^ Matt. xii. 14. 
 they might destroy him. lef^^"- ^^'^• 
 
 7 Bnt Jesus withdrew himself with his disciples to the 
 sea : and a great multitude from G-alilee followed him, ^ and 
 from Judaea, Luke vi. 17. 
 
 6. " And the Pharisees went forth, and straightway took counsel 
 with the Herodians." It is difficult to understand what common 
 ground these two parties could have in seeking the life of the Lord. 
 We can well understand the ground which the Pharisees, the up- 
 holders of formalism and spurious traditions, took against One Who 
 laid bare their hypocrisy ; but why the party of Herod, the secu- 
 larists and worldlings, should trouble themselves with the matter, 
 so as to unite with their theological adversaries (for it is generally 
 understood that the adherents of Herod and the Eoman power, if 
 they professed any religion at all, would profess Sadduceeism) is 
 more difficult to account for. Some (amongst them Theophylact) 
 consider that the adherents of Herod claimed on his behalf certain 
 Messianic pretensions, as the possessor of the throne of David. 
 Others (amongst them Bede), that the adherents of Herod, on 
 account of the hatred which their lord had for John, pursued also 
 with treachery and hate the Saviom' Whom John preached. But 
 will not all anti-Christs sink their differences, and eventually unite 
 against Christ ? The claims of Christ, whether He was to be received 
 or not, were at this juncture far more pressing than the decision as 
 to whether formalists or secularists were nearest the truth. All 
 questions, even between Pharisees and Sadducees, could and must 
 wait. The question respecting whether Jesus was the Christ of 
 God could not wait. Every miracle, every sermon forced them to 
 a decision one way or another. 
 
 7. " But Jesus withdrew himself with his disciples to the sea." 
 His hour was not yet come ; so He went with His disciples to the 
 borders of the lake of Galilee, where, if pursued, He could the more 
 easily take ship, and escape to some other part, out of the reach of 
 His persecutors. 
 
 "And a great multitude from Galilee followed him," &c. We 
 should put a full stop after "followed him," and read the two 
 verses thus : *' And a great multitude from GaUlee followed him. 
 
48 A GREAT MULTITUDE. [St. Mark. 
 
 8 And from Jerusalem, and from Idumsea, and from beyond 
 Jordan ; and they about Tyre and Sidon, a great multitude, 
 ■wlien they had heard what great things he did, came unto 
 him. 
 
 9 And he spake to his disciples, that a small ship should 
 wait on him because of the multitude, lest they should throng 
 him. 
 
 10 For he had healed many ; insomuch that they || pressed 
 U Or, rushed, upon him f or to touch him, as many as had 
 
 plagues. 
 
 And a great multitude from Judsea, and from Jerusalem, and from 
 Idumsea, and from beyond Jordan, and about Tyre and Sidon, 
 hearing what great things He did, came unto Him." The multitude 
 from the neighbouring Galilee, in which He had been preaching 
 and healing, followed Him ; the multitude from Judaea, and Jeru- 
 salem, and from all the regions bordering on the Holy Land, 
 attracted by the fame of His miracles, " came " to Him. Notice 
 how, though He is rejected by the leaders both in Church and 
 State, the people from all parts seem to accept Him. I say 
 ** seem," for the Evangelist is careful to inform us that they were 
 attracted, not by His preaching, but by His miracles. 
 
 Let the reader notice how here, as before, this Evangelist loves 
 to dwell upon the widespread popularity of the Lord. 
 
 9. " And he spake to the disciples, that a small ship should wait 
 on him," &c. The word " wait " does not give the full meaning of 
 the original, which is the same word as that used in the Apostolic 
 precept, " continue instant in prayer," of Eomans xii. 12. It means 
 that the ship should be always at His beck and call, so that, by 
 escaping the pressure of the multitude, He should not be unduly 
 hindered in the exercise of His ministry. 
 
 10. " For he had healed many : insomuch that they pressed 
 upon him," &c. "Pressed upon him" should rather be rendered 
 *'fell upon him," as if there was a rush towards Him of all who 
 had plagues — ^plagues (literally "scourges") describing the painful- 
 ness and distress of disease, as if it were a scourging inflicted on man 
 as a punishment for his sin. 
 
 " To touch him." It was the Lord's will most frequently to heal 
 
Chap. III.] THOU ART THE SON OF GOD. 49 
 
 11 ^And miclean spii'its, wlieii thev saw him, fell down 
 before him, and cried, saying, ^ Thou art the Son e ch. i. 23, 21. 
 
 „ ™ , Luke iv. 41. 
 
 01 UOa. f Matt, xiv.33. 
 
 12 And ^he straitly charged them that they '^^r'}' .. ,^. 
 
 J n J S Matt. xn. lb. 
 
 should not make him known. ^^- '• 25, 34. 
 
 13 ^'And he goeth up into a mountain, and ££"1^12!' 
 
 & ix. 1. 
 
 men by contact with His body. He makes communication with 
 His Body the means by which virtue flows from Himself to those 
 whom He wills to benefit. The reader will understand. 
 
 11. "And unclean spirits, when they saw him, fell down before 
 him." The uniformity of action on the part of all evil spirits in 
 the presence of the Lord, in that they should fall down and confess 
 Him, is exceedingly remarkable (Matt. viii. 29; Mark i. 23, 24). 
 These fallen beings seem to be under a law that they should thus 
 acknowledge the Son of God. I cannot think that this is to be 
 explained, as so many attempt to do, on the ground of diabohcal 
 cunning. It seems as if they were compelled to fall down, and 
 confess their Maker, even though they had made it the one object 
 of their existence to oppose and thwart Him. 
 
 12. " And he straitly charged them that they should not make 
 him known." On this Bede remarks, " A sinner is forbidden to 
 l^reach the Lord, lest any one listening to his preaching should fol- 
 low him in his error, for the devil is an evil master, who always 
 mingles false things with true, that the semblance of truth may 
 cover the witness of fraud. But not only devils, but persons healed 
 by Christ and even Apostles (Mark viii. 9) are ordered to be silent 
 concerning Him before the Passion, lest by the preaching of the 
 majesty of His Divinity, the economy of His Passion should be 
 retarded." 
 
 13. "And he goeth up into a [the] mountain and calleth unto 
 him whom he would," &c. St. Luke is more full upon this, inas- 
 much as he gives us the reason why He went up and how long He 
 continued there : "He went out into a mountain to pray, and con- 
 tinued all night in prayer to God." St. Matthew makes this choos- 
 ing of the twelve to follow upon the Lord beholding the multitudes, 
 compassionating their condition as that of sheep without a shepherd, 
 and calling upon His disciples, as distinguished from the Apostles, to 
 pray the Lord of the harvest that He would send forth labourers 
 
 E 
 
50 THE APOSTLES CALLED. [St. Makk. 
 
 calletli unto him -wliom lie would : and they came unto Mm. 
 
 into liis harvest. The harmonists consider that this was said just 
 before the Lord sent forth the Apostles to preach, but it seems very 
 appropriately placed as preceding the designation of the twelve. 
 
 Eespecting the doctrinal significance of the call of the ajjostles I 
 have enlarged in my notes on St. Matthew x. 1, &c. Its importance, 
 however, ]3articnlarly at this time, is so great that I will reproduce 
 in other words the substance of my former remarks. 
 
 There are two theories respecting the nature and origin of the 
 Church of Christ. The first, that of the Catholic Church, that it 
 was founded on the day of Pentecost through and by the Apostles, 
 on whom the Lord had breathed the Holy Ghost for this purpose, 
 so that from its very birth it was an organized body, and the 
 means of its organization and consequent unity was the Apostolic 
 company, the twelve. According to this view God has made the 
 ministry essential to the Church, for in the Apostles the ministry was 
 founded before the Church, and was the ordained means by which the 
 Church was founded, so that the Church as it came from the hands of 
 Christ cannot be conceived of apart from the ministry. This is per- 
 fectly compatible with the fact that the ministry is, in purpose, 
 subordinate to the Church, that is, that it exists not for itself, but 
 for the Church, ue., the whole mass of believers, for the "joints and 
 bands " to which St. Paul compares the ministry (Coloss. ii. 19) 
 are not the Church, but exist for it, that the whole body may 
 receive in an orderly way grace from the Head, even Christ. 
 According then to this view, the ministry in the Apostles derived 
 its origin and commission, not from the Church, or from the peox^le, 
 but from Christ. It was in the power of Christ to have called all 
 His peoi^le together, and bid them choose their future rulers 
 from amongst themselves ; but He did not so — they were chosen 
 by Christ alone. Who Himself designated them, and afterwards 
 breathed upon them when He ordained them with full Apostolic 
 power. And when it pleased Christ to raise up another Apostle it 
 was by the Holy Ghost, saying, " Separate me Barnabas and Saul 
 for the work whereunto I have called them," and this Apostle 
 expressly disclaims any commission from the people, for he calls 
 himself " an Apostle, not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ 
 and God the Father, Who raised Him from the dead." (Gal. i. 1.) 
 
Chap. III.] HE ORDAINED TWELVE. 5 1 
 
 14 And lie ordained twelve, that they slionld be witli Mm, 
 
 14. " He ordained." Literally, " He made twelve/' or, " He constituted twelve," After 
 "He ordained twelve" N, B., C, five or six Cursives, and some versions add, "Whom 
 also He named Apostles." 
 
 The second theory is, that the Church is in the Divine mind an 
 unorganized body to which God has given the Sx)irit, and that its 
 ministry, ■i.e., its organization, is an after-thought, as it were, not in 
 the least degree of its essence, so that the model Church is like the 
 Society of Friends or certain sects of the so-called "brethren " who 
 aro without an ordained or stated ministry : but, strange to say, 
 this Church only exists in idea. It has had no existence in reality^ 
 for when the Church came into existence on the day of Pentecost it 
 had a ministry already provided for it which instructed it, which 
 held it together, and which claimed and received its obedience. 
 
 I do not know one single New Testament fact which can be ap- 
 pealed to in favour of this last theory, whilst every fact which bears 
 upon the ministry upholds the former, i.e., the Apostolic or CathoHc 
 view of the matter. 
 
 The first great fact is that this solemn choosing of the twelve 
 Apostles took place after a night spent in prayer. It is recorded by 
 each of the Synoptics, and is followed by a list of their names in 
 each of the three, and there is another list at the outset of the 
 history of the Church in the Acts of the Apostles (Acts i. 13), so 
 that extraordinary emphasis is laid upon their names, and the 
 number of these names as forming a definite company or college. 
 
 14. " And he ordained twelve, [whom also he named apostles] 
 that they should be with him." No number had so many holy 
 associations connected with it as this number of twelve : there 
 were the twelve Patriarchs, the twelve wells in Elim, the twelve 
 stones on the breastplate of the High Priest, the twelve loaves of 
 the shewbread. It seems to have been because of the sacredness 
 of this number that the Lord chose it to be the number of the 
 Apostles, for we do not read that each Apostle had a particular 
 tribe of Israel assigned to him. 
 
 " He ordained twelve." This was not their solemn ordination. It 
 was rather designating them that they should be educated as it 
 were, and trained, before they received their real ordination when 
 He breathed on them, and said unto them, " Keceive ye the Holy 
 Ghost " (John xx. 21, 22). 
 
52 SIMON HE SURNAMED PETER. [St. Mark. 
 
 and tliat lie might send tliem forth to preach, 
 
 15 And to have power to heal sicknesses, and to cast out 
 devils : 
 I John i. 42. 16 And Simon ^ he sumamed Peter ; 
 
 15. " Power to heal sicknesses, and." These words omitted by S, B,, C, L,, Coptic, 
 but retained by A., D., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., &c. 
 
 16. The MSS. of the Neutral Text, a, B., C.*, repeat before this verse the words, 
 " He ordained the twelve ; " but A., D., L., most later Uncials, all Cursives, and most 
 versions omit the words. 
 
 " That they should be with him." This was to be their real 
 preparation for their high position in the Church, that they had 
 been with Jesus so as to watch all His Holy Life, to see all His 
 miracles, to hear all His words, to be carefully tended by Him, 
 and reproved and exhorted, and so kept in the Name which He 
 had given them (John xvii. 12). When one fell away another was 
 chosen who, as near as may be, had enjoyed their privileges, for 
 he was of the number of those men who had "companied with the 
 Apostles all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among 
 them " (Acts i. 21). 
 
 14, 15. " And that he might send them forth to preach, and to 
 have power to heal sicknesses, and to cast out devils." He sent 
 them to do the things which He did, or at least the most promi- 
 nent. After this on His departure He enlarged Ttheir commission 
 so that they should represent Him even in the remitting and 
 retaining of sins. 
 
 16. "And Simon he surnamed Peter." The Neutral Text 
 repeats before this mention of Simon the words, " and he appointed 
 the twelve." If this be the true reading it still further emphasizes 
 the call and designation of this definite number to be the fountain 
 of the Christian ministry. 
 
 The name of Simon Peter is always mentioned as the first 
 (Matthew x. 2). It waano doubt the intention of the Lord to assign 
 to him a personal primacy, so that the Apostles should not choose 
 their own leader, but one amongst them was designated to be their 
 leader and spokesman by the Lord, Who saw in him, notwithstand- 
 ing his faults, the courage and prompt decision which fitted him to 
 take the first place. It was, no doubt, through this that the Church 
 was kept together one and undivided in its infancy till it was estab- 
 lished in faith and discipline. It is useless denying this primacy. 
 
Chap. III.] BOANERGES. 53 
 
 17 And James the son of Zebedee, and John the brother 
 of James ; and he surnamed them Boanerges, which is, The 
 sons ©f thunder : 
 
 18 And Andrew, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Mat- 
 
 It appears to me that they who do so for polemical purposes, put 
 themselves in the wrong, and play into the hands of those who, 
 also for polemical purposes, exaggerate Peter's position, and vir- 
 tually ignore the Apostolic office, except as it existed personally in 
 him. 
 
 17. "And James the son of Zebedee .... sons of thunder." 
 Very much has been written upon this name. It is, however, in- 
 terpreted for us by the Evangelist, and is no doubt the word Benai- 
 reges, pronounced broadly in the provincial accent of Galilee. In 
 what sense it was applicable to the character or teaching of these 
 two brethren is not certain, particularly in the case of St. John, the 
 Apostle of Gentleness and Love. Perhaps, however, if we had 
 heard him preach we should have discerned in a moment the fit- 
 ness of the name. If he preached as he wrote in his Epistle there 
 would be much to vindicate the title, for he wrote such terrible 
 words as " Who is a liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ ? " 
 " He that committeth sin is of the devil." " Whosoever sinneth hath 
 not seen him." "Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer, 
 and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him." 
 And respecting a certain troubler of the Church he writes, "If I 
 come I will rememberhis deeds which he doeth." Much stronger and 
 more scathing words than the platitudes usually uttered by those 
 who in this day profess to follow him. And we must remember, 
 too, that this Epistle was written in his old age, when years had 
 toned down his decisiveness and vehemence. Eespecting the 
 preaching of the other brother we know nothing except this, that 
 when Herod would gratify the Jewish hatred of the Gospel, he 
 singled out James as his first victim, which he would hardly have 
 done unless this Apostle also had been the foremost in aggressive 
 energy of speech. 
 
 18. "And Andrew and Philip., .went into an house." The 
 length to which this note on the call of the Apostles has extended 
 prevents me from speaking of what is known in Scripture and eccle- 
 siastical history of the remainder of the Apostles. I must reserve 
 this till (D.V.) I come to the parallel place in St. Luke. Suffice it to 
 
54 HIS FEIENDS HEARD OF IT. [St. Mark. 
 
 thew, and Thomas, and James the son of Alpliseus, and 
 Thaddseiis, and Simon the Canaanite, 
 
 19 And Judas Iscariot, which also betrayed him : and they 
 II Or, home. went || into an house. 
 
 20 And the multitude cometh together again, 
 k ch. vi. 31. ^so that they could not so much as eat bread. 
 II Or, kinsmen. 21 And whou his \\ friouds heard of it, they 
 
 18. " The Canaanite." Spelt in Greek " Kananite ; " derived not from " Canaan," but 
 from "Kana," he was jealous. So " Zelotes" or "Zelot." But N, B., C, D., L., Vulg., 
 and some versions read, "Cananean." 
 
 "And they went." Perhaps, "he comes;" but A., C, L., later Uncials, Cursives, 
 Vulg.,, and Syriac as in Authorized. 
 
 say at present that the four lists (in the three Sjmoptics and Acts i.) 
 resolve themselves into two — that in Matthew and that in Luke — 
 the only discrei^ancy being in the name Lebbaeus, or Thaddeus, in 
 the first two lists, which answers to Judas the brother of James in 
 the last two. 
 
 19. " And they went into an house." This is translated by many, 
 they [or He came] came home, or into the house, where He usually 
 lived, and from which He departed when He went out to spend the 
 night in prayer. It is the beginning of a new paragraph describing 
 the crowding of the multitude about Him, the unbelief of His friends, 
 and the renewed and still more bitter opposition of the Scribes. 
 
 20. " And the multitude came together again . . . eat bread." 
 Let the reader again notice how this Evangelist neglects no oppor- 
 tunity of showing how popular the Lord was with the multitude. 
 It is also distinctly im^jlied that the Lord neglected the supply of 
 His own needs and of those attached to Him in order that He 
 might minister to the people. " He teaches His ministers by His 
 own example, to look upon themselves as the servants of those 
 souls who are committed to their charge, to wait for and embrace 
 every occasion that offers to promote their si)iritual benefit, never 
 to think any time inconvenient to themselves, when called to their 
 service, and to forego even the necessary refreshments of life when 
 the harvest is great, and an opportunity which may irrevocably be 
 lost presents itself" (Quesnel). 
 
 21. "And when his friends heard of it, they went out to lay hold 
 on him . . . beside himself." His friends, literally, they that were 
 with Him, probably his kinsmen, including, it may be, His nearest 
 
Chap. III.] HE IS BESIDE HIMSELF. 55 
 
 went out to lay liold on liim : ^ for they said, He is beside 
 
 himself. l John vii. 5. 
 
 & X. 20. 
 
 22 1 And the scribes which came down from 
 Jerusalem said, "" He hath Beelzebub, and by the "» Matt. ix. 34. 
 
 & X. 25. Lake 
 
 prmce of the devils casteth he out devils. xi. 15. John 
 
 23 ^And he called them unto Mm, and said 48,' 52.* & x. 20. 
 
 " Matt. xii. 2-5. 
 
 relatives, who were alarmed for Him, when they heard how He was 
 neglecting His own bodily wants, and how He was stirring up still 
 more bitter enmity against Himself. 
 
 " They went out," literally, "they came out," perhaps out of the 
 home at Nazareth. 
 
 " He is beside himself," literally, " He stands out of himself." 
 This need not mean that he was insane, but that He was carried 
 away by His devotion and enthusiasm beyond all self-control. Thus 
 Lange : " It is designedly ambiguous, inasmuch as the word 
 [e^fiOT?;] may mean, in a good sense, the being for a season wrapped 
 into ecstasy by religious enthusiasm (2 Cor. v. 13), as well as in a 
 bad sense, the being permanently insane. In His ecstasy, He is 
 no longer master of Himself." 
 
 22. "And the scribes which came down from Jerusalem said 
 . , . casteth he out devils." St. Mark here omits to mention the 
 particular miracle which gave occasion to this remark, which is 
 thus described in St. Matthew : " There was brought unto him one 
 possessed with a devil, blind, and dumb, and he healed him, 
 insomuch that the blind and dumb ^both spake and saw. And all 
 the people were amazed and said. Is not this the Son of David? " 
 
 Notice the fearful length to which the malignity of the Pharisees 
 proceeds. He is not only possessed of a devil, but by Satan him- 
 self. It is as if they said, " He is an incarnation of the Evil One, 
 and by Satan's own power He expels his subordinate spirits." 
 
 " The scribes which came down from Jerusalem." It would 
 seem from this that those in power in Jerusalem — the Sanhedrim — 
 were becoming thoroughly alarmed at the increasing po^Dularity of 
 the Lord, and so they sent down scribes, chosen, no doubt, for 
 their ability as disputants and their unscrupulousness, to oppose 
 Him. From St. Matthew we learn that the Scribes were also 
 Pharisees. 
 
 23. "And he called them unto him, and said unto them in 
 
56 HOW CAN SATAN CAST OUT SATAN ? [St. Mark. 
 
 unto them in parables, How can Satan cast out Satan ? 
 
 24 And if a kingdom be divided against itself, that 
 kingdom cannot stand. 
 
 25 And if a house be divided against itself, that house 
 cannot stand. 
 
 parables, How can Satan cast out Satan ? " Olshausen's remarks 
 upon the mercy of the Saviour in thus endeavouring to bring to a 
 better mind those who so malignantly opposed Him are very good : 
 " This endeavour of the merciful Eedeemer, Who knew what was 
 in their hearts, is full of consolation. We are entitled to infer from 
 it that He perceived in their hearts the germ also of something 
 better, to the vivification of which He might direct His attention, 
 in the course of His instruction. Had these unfortunate men, who 
 called light darkness, and converted that which was holy into 
 an unholy thing, not been blinded by passion, they would then have 
 committed the sin against the Holy Ghost, and thus have been 
 deprived of all hope of forgiveness. But in that case it would have 
 been inconceivable that our Saviour should have addressed to those 
 peoi^le who could not be redeemed words having a tendency to 
 deliver them from their error. 
 
 24, 25. " And if a kingdom . . . that house cannot stand," &c. 
 As if the Lord said, "What you allege against me is an impossible 
 thing. I preach the law of God in all its spiritual fulness and 
 significance. I uphold the honour of God and advance His 
 kingdom over men's souls and spirits. All My teaching is on the 
 side of goodness and righteousness. But to enforce this My teach- 
 ing as coming from God I perform acts which it is within the power 
 of God only to perform. In particular I cast out of their victims 
 the spirits which belong to Satan's kingdom. Now, if I did this by 
 Satan's power, or if he assisted me in doing this, he would work 
 against himself ; he would war against his own kingdom, and he 
 would destroy it just as a kingdom weakened by civil war is ready 
 to fall a prey to its enemies, and a house which has within it those 
 who would 0];)en the door to its spoilers must be plundered and 
 ruined." 
 
 As I remarked on the parallel place in St. Matthew, the Lord 
 does not here allude to minor divisions on matters of policy in a 
 senate or in a household, but divisions which touch the very exis- 
 tence of the kingdom 
 
Chap. III.] THE STRONG MAN. 57 
 
 26 And if Satan rise np against himself, and be divided, 
 he cannot stand, but hath an end, 
 
 27 ° No man can enter into a strong man's ° is- xiix. 24. 
 
 Matt. xii. 29. 
 
 house, and spoil his goods, except he will first 
 
 26. Revisers translate this, "And if Satan hath risen up against himself, and is divided, 
 he cannot stand, but hath an end." 
 
 27. " But no one can enter into the house of the strong man, and spoil his goods, except 
 he first bind the strong man, and then he will spoil his house." 
 
 26. " If Satan rise up against himself, and be divided, he cannot 
 stand, but hath an end." This is as if the Lord said : " The power 
 of Satan consists in this, that he is thoroughly and entirely evil. 
 If he assisted Me in performing miracles which substantiate and 
 enforce the truth of My doctrine, he could only do this because there 
 is some good remaining in him, and this presence of good in him 
 would immeasurably weaken his power for evil and eventually 
 destroy it, for he would be then like weak, wavering mortals, 
 whose nature, being a mixture of good and evil, is unable of itself 
 to sustain a kingdom of evil, just as it is unable to sustain a king- 
 dom of good." 
 
 27. " No man can enter into a strong man's house, and spoil . . . 
 he will spoil his house." In my comment on St. Matthew I ex- 
 plained the strong man's house as human nature in general, and 
 the Lord as entering into it by His Holy Incarnation. But what is 
 true of human nature is true of every unit which composes it. Satan 
 is the strong man who, by nature, has hold of every human being. 
 He is strong, so that nothing whatsoever can drive him out 
 except that Second Man, "Who is stronger than he. No power of 
 education, for instance, ax)art from Christ, no change of circum- 
 stances, no example of goodness, none of these things will of them- 
 selves, dispossess Satan, though the Lord may use them in effecting 
 His entrance into each soul whom He delivers. 
 
 But how is it that the Lord speaks here of having bound the strong 
 man as if it was a thing past and comj)leted, whereas we suppose 
 that it was by His Death and Eesm-rection that He destroyed him 
 that had the power of death. Probably He speaks by anticipation. 
 God having brought about the Incarnation of His Son and sent 
 Him into the world, all must follow in due com'se. What is fixed 
 in God's will is as certain to be brought about as if it had already 
 been brought about. Or the Lord may allude to some casting out 
 
58 ALL SINS SHALL BE FOEGIVEN. [St. Mark. 
 
 bind tlie strong man ; and then lie will spoil his house. 
 pMatt.xii.3i. 28 P Verily I say nnto you, All sins shall be 
 
 Luke xii. 10. , ./ ^ ^ 
 
 1 John V. 16. forgiven unto the sons of men, and blasj^hemies 
 wherewith soever they shall blaspheme : 
 
 28. The Revisers give the force of the definite article by translating, "All their sins 
 shall be forgiven to the sons of men, and their blasphemies," &c. 
 
 of Satan which took i^lace in the unseen world in accordance with 
 His mysterious words: "I beheld Satan as lightning fall from 
 heaven." 
 
 "Then he will spoil his house." He has spoiled his house and 
 his goods. His goods are those men who are " delivered out of 
 the power of darkness, and translated into the kingdom of God's 
 dear Son" (Coloss. i. 13). 
 
 28, 29, 80. " I say unto you, All sins shall be forgiven . . . He 
 hath an unclean spirit." We learn clearly from this place in what 
 this fearful sin consists the only one of all the evils which the 
 sons of men commit which will not be forgiven. Those with whom 
 the Lord was now remonstrating were in danger of committing it, 
 " because they said. He hath an unclean spirit." This was, in point 
 of fact, almost equivalent to their calling the Lord an Incarnation of 
 Satan. In order to see something of the wickedness of this sin we 
 must realize that all our Lord's teaching was on the side of God and 
 goodness, and all His miracles, especially that of the expulsion of 
 evil spirits, were done to enforce such teaching, and to set forth 
 the character of God — the God Who sent Him, as at once a holy 
 and benevolent God, desirous to free men from the yoke of all 
 moral and spiritual as well as of all physical evil. To call the 
 Spirit of such an One as our Lord an evil spirit was the extremest 
 form of that wickedness denounced by the prophet when he said : 
 " Woe unto them that call evil good and good evil ; that put dark- 
 ness for light, and light for darkness " (Is. v. 20). For a man to 
 have a mind which could deliberately ascribe such a si)irit to the 
 Saviour is, as far as man can, to cut himself off from redemption — 
 to make the acceptance of redemption impossible to him. This 
 will be more clearly seen if we remember certain words said on 
 this occasion by the Lord, which are only given in St. Matthew, 
 " Whosoever si^eaketh a word against the Son of Man it shall be 
 forgiven him, but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost it 
 
Chap. III.] NO FORGIVENESS. 59 
 
 29 But lie tliat shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost 
 hath never forgiveness, but is in danger of eternal damnation : 
 
 29. " Is." a, D., L., Old Latin [a, c, e, f], Vulg. read shall be. 
 
 '♦ In danger of eternal damnation." N, B., L., D., two or three Cursives, Vnlg., and 
 some versions read, "Of an eternal sin; " A,, C»', later Uncials, and almost all Cursives 
 read as in Rec. Text. 
 
 shall not be forgiven him." A man might, through prejudice, 
 speak against the claims of Jesus to be the Messiah. He might 
 not be the Messiah whom he expected. He might be led away by 
 false hopes of an earthly temporal Messiah, to reject the true one. 
 Such an one might continue in infidelity, but the door of repen- 
 tance and faith would be open to him, because, as Saul of Tarsus, 
 what he did in rejecting Christ he did ignorantly and in unbehef. 
 But if such an one had an opportunity of observing the Spirit of 
 Christ — the Spirit of goodness and love displayed in all His cha- 
 racter and discourses, and enforced by His mighty deeds, all on the 
 side of benevolence and holiness, and yet deliberately called such a 
 Spirit the Spirit of Evil, then there was nothing left in him for 
 Kedemption to take hold of. He was reprobate in the deepest sense 
 of the word. He had first given himself over, and then he was 
 given over by God, to a reprobate mind — that is, to bis own evil, 
 absohitely evil, self. But if a person thus 'ascribed the works of 
 Christ to the power of evil, would that not be blasph3ming against 
 the Son of Man — not against the Holy Spirit ? No, we are told 
 that both the teaching and the mighty works of Christ were done 
 by the Sxjirit (Acts i. 2 ; Matt. xii. 28). Christ taught very em- 
 phatically that He did nothing of Himself. He must, consequently, 
 act by some spiritual power not His Own. Was that power Divine 
 or diabolical ? Of God, or of God's enemy ? If a man deliberately 
 said it was from God's enemy he displayed an intensity of perverse 
 and mahcious wickedness almost incredible. 
 
 Some of the most acute observations on this difi&cult subject are 
 to be found in Calvin's " Commentary on the Synoptics." " Shall any 
 unbeliever curse God ? It is as if a blind man were dashing against 
 a wall. But no man curses the Spirit, who is not enlightened by 
 Him, and conscious of ungodly rebellion against Him ; for it is 
 not a superfluous distinction, that all other blasphemies shall bo 
 forgiven, except that one blasx^hemy which is directed against tho 
 Spirit. If a man shaU simply blaspheme against God, ho is not 
 
60 HIS BRETHREN AND HTS MOTHER. [St. Mark. 
 
 30 Because they said, He liatli an micleaii spirit. 
 
 31 ^ "^ There came then his brethren and his mother, and, 
 q Matt.xii. 46. standinoj without, sent unto him, calhno: him. 
 
 Luke via. 19. ^ ' o 
 
 declared to be beyond the hope of pardon, but of those who have 
 offered outrage to the Spirit it is said that God will never forgive 
 them. Why is this but because those only are hlas'pliemers against 
 the Spirit, who slander His gifts and power contrary to the con- 
 viction of their own mind ? " 
 
 Two observations on all this may not be out of place. 
 
 1. It is clear that no one can have committed the sin against the 
 Holy Ghost who deshes the influence of the Holy Ghost to deliver 
 him from sin, and to make him love God, for such an one must 
 believe that the power exhibited in Christ was on the side of God 
 and goodness. He must believe that Christ was actuated and im- 
 pelled by a holy and good spirit, which must be from God. 
 
 2. Looked at in the light of this one exception to the forgiving 
 power of God, how exceedingly broad and large is the promise im- 
 plied in the 28th verse, " Verily, I say unto you, all sins shall be 
 forgiven unto the sons of men." The one exception proves the 
 universality of the rule. If any sinner has a mind to lay hold on 
 the Divine mercy, no memory of past sin need deter him ; and the 
 state of mind which he has towards sin, and his desire of deliver- 
 ance, forbids the idea that he has committed the one uni^ardonable 
 sin. Quesnel concludes some good observations with this prayer: 
 "Lord, it is Thou alone Who art my salvation; it is from Thy 
 Spirit alone that I hope for the administration of those blessings 
 and privileges which Thou hast purchased for me with Thy 
 precious Blood. Absolve, justify, sanctify, and save me for Thy 
 mercy's sake." 
 
 31. "There came then his brethren and his mother, and, stand- 
 ing without, sent," &c. From "the brethren " being here mentioned 
 first, there can be little doubt but that they were the foremost in 
 this well-meant, but mistaken, interference. They probably had 
 regard either to the way in which He was wearing Himself out 
 without due rest and sustenance (verses 20, 21), or they feared the 
 ever-increasing mahgnity of His enemies the scribes. They brought 
 His mother with them, that by her influence He might be induced 
 to look more to Himself. 
 
Chap. lU.] WHO IS MY MOTHER? 61 
 
 32 And the multitude sat about him, and they said unto 
 him, Behold, thy mother and thy brethren without seek for 
 thee. 
 
 33 And he answered them, saying, Who is my mother, or 
 my brethren ? 
 
 34 And he looked round about on them which sat about 
 him, and said. Behold my mother and my brethren ! 
 
 32. "And thy brethren." A., D„ E., F., H., M., other later Uncials, above one 
 hundred Cursives, Old Latin [a, b, e, f ] add, " And thy sisters," but this is omitted by 
 ti, B., C, G., K., L., Vulg., Coptic, Syriac. 
 
 32. "And the multitude sat about him, and they said unto him," 
 &c. It is interesting to note the difference between the report of 
 each of the Synoptics : St. Matthew, " one said unto him ; " St. 
 Luke, "it was told him;" St. Mark, "the multitude . . . said 
 unto him." There is no discrepancy. It would be buzzed about 
 in the crowded assembly that His mother desired to speak to Him, 
 and one of them who sat near would be the spokesman. 
 
 33, 34. " And he answered them, saying, Who is my mother or 
 my brethren ? . . . The same is my brother, and sister, and mother." 
 Notice how St. Matthew records that the Lord " stretched forth 
 his hands ; " but St. Mark describes the incident as it appeared to 
 a close observer, one who watched His very looks : " He looked 
 round about on them that sat about him" (see Mark iii. 5 ; x. 21, 
 23). Of course, St. Peter was the observer. 
 
 35. " For whosoever shall do the will of God, the same is my 
 brother," &c. This is one of the household words of the kingdom 
 of God. It teaches, with an emphasis which it seems impossible 
 to exceed, that there are but two divisions of mankind — those who 
 do the will of God, and those who disobey that will, and that not 
 even the closest blood relationships, much less the possession of 
 national, or Church, or religious privileges, can in the slightest 
 degree affect the distinctness and permanence of the hne between 
 these divisions. Of all relationships, spiritual ones are the closest ; 
 and there is but one permanent relationship to God, and that is, 
 conformity to His will. 
 
 In my note on St. Matthew, I drew attention to Chrysostom, as 
 taking much too harsh a view of the conduct of the Virgin. The 
 most lenient and charitable view seems that taken hj one in whose 
 
62 HE ENTERED INTO A SHIP. [St. Mark. 
 
 35 For whosoever shall do the will of Grod, the same is my 
 brother, and my sister, and mother. 
 
 writings we should have least expected it — i.e., John Calvin : " ' His 
 mother and brethren came to him.' The reason must have been 
 either that they were anxious about Him, or that they were desirous 
 of instruction ; for it is not without some good reason that they 
 endeavour to approach Him, and it is not probable that those who 
 accompanied the Holy Mother were unbelievers. Ambrose and 
 Chrysostom accuse Mary of ambition, but without any probabiUty. 
 What necessity is there for such a conjecture, when the testimony 
 of the Spirit everywhere bestows commendation on her distin- 
 guished piety and modesty ? The warmth of natural affection may 
 have carried them beyond the bounds of propriety. This I do not 
 deny ; but I have no doubt that they were led by pious zeal to seek 
 His society " (Calvin, in " Harmony "). 
 
 And Augustine sums up the teaching thus : " Men are not blessed 
 for this reason, that they are united by nearness of flesh unto just 
 and holy men ; but that, by obejang and following, they cleave unto 
 their doctrine and conduct. Therefore, Mary is more blessed in 
 receiving the faith of Christ (Luke i.) than in conceiving the flesh 
 of Christ " (Augustine, " Tract, de Virginitate," quoted in Ford). 
 
 CHAP. rv. 
 
 ND ^ he began again to teach by the sea side : and there 
 was gathered mito him a great multitude, so that he 
 a Matt. xiii. 1. entered into a ship, and sat in the sea ; and the 
 whole multitude was by the sea on the land. 
 
 A 
 
 1. "And he began to teach by the sea side. ... by the sea on 
 the land." The place where He then taught was at the north end 
 of the lake, "and probably near Bethsaida, where the beach rises 
 rapidly, and there is deep water within a few yards of the shore, 
 while at the same time a multitude of hearers could place them- 
 
Chap. lY.] THERE WENT OUT A SOWER. 63 
 
 . 2 And he taught them many things by jDarables, ^and 
 said unto them in his doctrine, ^ ch. xii. 38. 
 
 3 Hearken ; Behold, there went out a sower to sow : 
 
 4 And it came to pass, as he sowed, some fell by the way 
 side, and the fowls of the air came and devoured it up. 
 
 5 And some fell on stony ground, where it had not much 
 earth; and immediately it sprang up, because it had no 
 depth of earth : 
 
 6 But when the sun was up, it was scorched ; and because 
 it had no root, it withered away. 
 
 4. " Fowls of the air." "Of the air" omitted by ii. A., B., C, L., later Uncials, very 
 many Cursives, Syriac, Vulg. [Cod. Amiat.], versions, &c. 
 
 5. "Stony." Properly, " rocky." 
 
 selves so as to see the Saviour in the boat " (McGregor's " Eob Eoy 
 on the Jordan"). 
 
 2, 3. " And he began to teach them many things ... a sower 
 to sow." " The sower." The reader scarcely needs to be reminded 
 how the Lord of all things, in striving to impress holy truths upon 
 men, especially draws his illustrations from the works of hus- 
 bandry : the sower and his seed ; the reaper and his barns and 
 fan ; the shepherd and his sheep and goats ; the gardener and 
 owners of vineyards, and their figs, their vines, and winepresses. 
 Men daily see these things ; and the Lord would have those who 
 see them daily reminded of the spiritual truths which He has so 
 gi'aphically drawn from them. 
 
 4. " And it came to pass, as he sowed, . . . devoured it up." 
 Not, of course, the high road, but the narrow paths through the 
 fields, trodden down hard by the feet of those continually passing ; 
 or, if it formed the division between two lots, not jiloughed over. 
 
 5. " And some fell on stony ground." Not as ground in many 
 of our fields, covered with stones on the surface, but a thin layer of 
 earth spread over the hard rock, which here and there appears 
 above it. The very shallowness of the ground would prevent its 
 sinking to any depth, so that at first it would spring up, as if sown 
 in a hotbed, but would the sooner wither, as the noontide heat would 
 dry up all moisture. 
 
 The roots had no deep ground below them, where the scorching 
 heat could not penetrate, into which they might strike down. 
 
64 THORNS — GOOD GROUND. [St. Mark. 
 
 7 And some fell among tliorns, and the thorns grew up, 
 and choked it, and it yielded no fruit. 
 c John XV. 5. 8 And other fell on good 2rround, '^ and did 
 
 Col. i. 6. . 1 T P • 1 
 
 yield fruit that sprang up and increased; and 
 brought forth, some thirty, and some sixty, and some an 
 hundred. 
 
 4-8. The Revisers give the article before the words " sower," " stony ground," " thorns," 
 ■" good ground ; " but for reasons which I have given in my notes on the parable in St. 
 Matthew, I do not think that our English idiom allows it. 
 
 7. "And some fell among thorns . . . yielded no fruit." In- 
 stead of being stubbed up by the roots, the thorns could be only 
 burnt off the surface, and so would spring up together with the 
 wheat, and, being the stronger plant, would deprive the wheat of all 
 nourishment and air. 
 
 8. "And other fell on good ground . . . some an hundred." In 
 Dean Stanley's " Sinai and Palestine," there is a remarkable pas- 
 sage which, though often quoted, we cannot omit : " Is there any- 
 thing on the spot to suggest the images thus conveyed ? So (if I 
 Bpeak for a moment of myself) I asked, as I rode along the track, 
 under the hill-side, by which the plain of Gennesareth is approached. 
 So I asked [myself], at the moment, seeing nothing but the steep 
 sides of the hill, alternately of rock and grass. And when I thought 
 ^f the parable of the sower, I answered, that here at least was 
 nothing on which the Divine teaching could fasten : it must have 
 been the distant cornfields of Samaria or Esdraelon on which His 
 mind was dwelUng. The thought had hardly occurred to me, when 
 .a slight recess in the hill-side, close u^Don the plain, disclosed at 
 once, in detail, and with a conjunction which I remember nowhere 
 else in Palestine, every feature of the great parable. There was the 
 undulating cornfield, descending to the water's edge. There was 
 the trodden pathway running through the midst of it, with no fence 
 or hedge to prevent the seed from falling here and there on either 
 side of it, or upon it ; itself hard with the constant tramp of horse 
 and mule, and human feet. There was the good rich soil, which 
 distinguishes the whole of that plain, and its neighbourhood, from 
 the bare hills elsewhere, descending into the lake, and which, where 
 there is no interruption, produces one vast mass of corn. There 
 was the rocky ground of the hill-side protruding here and there 
 
Chap. IV.] WHEN HE WAS ALONE. 65 
 
 9 And he said Tinto them, He that hath ears to hear, let 
 him hear. 
 
 10 ^ And when he was alone, they that were ^ Matt. xiii. 
 about him with the twelve asked of him the 9, &c. 
 parable. 
 
 through the cornfields, as elsewhere through the grassy slopes. 
 There were the large bushes of thorn — the Nabk, that kind of which 
 tradition says the Crown of Thorns was woven — springing up hke 
 the fruit trees of the more inland parts, in the very midst of the 
 waving corn " (chap. xiii. p. 426). 
 
 9. "And he said unto them, He that hath ears to hear, let him 
 hear." As often as this is inserted in the Gospel, or in the Apocalypse 
 of St. John, that which is spoken is mystical, and is pointed out as 
 healthful to be heard and learnt. For the ears by which they are 
 heard belong to the heart ; and the ears by which men obey, and 
 do what is commanded, are those of an interior sense (Bede). And 
 Quesnel well remarks : " Let all the world confess that it is God 
 Who gives these ears of the heart, without which none can accom- 
 plish His Will, to the end that those who have received them may 
 bless God for this free gift ; and that those who have not may 
 humble themselves, and have recourse to Him, in order to obtain 
 them." 
 
 10. " And when he was alone, they that were about him with 
 the twelve," &c. They that were about Him with the twelve. 
 Who were these ? The Lord having taught the multitudes out of 
 the ship came ashore, no doubt, into some house, and then it was 
 that, as St. Matthew says, the disciples came to Him. If He had 
 continued out of doors, the people would have thronged about Him 
 so that it could not be said that " He was alone." The persons, 
 then, who were about Him may have been those in the house, for if 
 the whole twelve were there, there could hardly have been other 
 disciples — such as some of the Seventy. Still it is possible. How 
 little of retirement or privacy was there in which the Lord could 
 be at rest ! For He had always twelve about Him, and often, it seems, 
 more, and was ever answering their questions, resolving their doubts, 
 dispelling their delusions, strengthening their wavering faith. 
 
 11. 12. *' And he said unto them. Unto you it is given to know. 
 , . . parables." Unto you is given the mystery of the kingdom of 
 
 F 
 
66 THEM THAT ARE WITHOUT. [St. Mark. 
 
 11 And he said unto them, Unto you it is given to know 
 the mystery of the kingdom of God : but unto ^ them that 
 e 1 Cor. V. 12. are without, all these thiners are done in parables : 
 
 Col. iv. 5. ' o r 
 
 1 Thess. iv. 12. . 
 
 1 Tim. iii. 7. 
 
 11. " Unto you it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God." N, A., B., C, 
 K., L. read, " Unto you is given the mystery of the kingdom," &c, ; Vulg. and Syriac, 
 later Uncials, most Cursives, and Old Latin as in Rec. Text. 
 
 God, Why ? Because, to use the figure of the next clause, they — 
 the disciples — had come "within." They had accepted the call of 
 God to come within, and abide within, the sphere, the teaching, 
 the influence of the Lord ; they were in His training, in His school, 
 in His family, in His love. But those that were without, were 
 without because they had refused to come within. They had heard 
 His sayings, and had made no attempt to do them. Though He 
 had invited them (Matt. xi. 28) they had not willed to come to 
 Him that they might have life (John v. 40). And now He changed 
 His mode of teaching. Before, in such sermons as that on the 
 mount, and on the plain (Luke vi. 17, &c.) He had spoken plainly ; 
 now He began to speak enigmatically, mysteriously, in parables ; 
 the meaning of which did not force itself upon men's minds, but 
 needed that men should have the seeing eye, and the hearing ear, 
 and the understanding heart, so that they who cared to know would 
 ponder and inquire, and come to Him to be taught, and they who 
 cared not to know would say among themselves, " Why should we 
 listen to such stories ? What are they to us ? We have no time 
 for such inquiries. Let Him speak as before, and we will pay 
 attention." 
 
 Such would be the disposition of mind of those " within " and 
 those "without" respectively. 
 
 And now the Lord proceeds to give the reason for this change in 
 His mode of teaching. As the words stand in St. Mark they are 
 exceedingly difficult, for they seem to make the merciful Saviour 
 utter parables, lest at any time those who heard him should be 
 converted and forgiven. The words are : — 
 
 12. " That seeing they may see, and not perceive ; and hearing 
 they may hear, and not understand; lest at any time they should be 
 converted, and their sins should be forgiven them." Now if the 
 reader turn to the parallel place in Matthew xiii. 13, 14, 15, he will 
 see that the Lord in the first place declares that He speaks to them 
 
Chap. IV.] SEE, AND NOT PERCEIVE. 67 
 
 12 ^That seeing they mav see, and not perceive; and 
 hearing they may hear, and not understand ; lest ^ is. vi. 9. 
 
 I-.,, ., ,-. Matt. xiii. 14. 
 
 at any time they should be converted, and their Luke'viii. 
 
 I 1 T 1 n ' J 1 John xii. 4U. 
 
 sms should be lorgiven them. Acts xxviii. 26. 
 
 Rom. xi. 8. 
 
 in parables, not to produce a certain state of heart in them, but 
 because they had already, through their own fault, produced that 
 reprobate state of heart in themselves which prevented them receiv- 
 ing the Word in love and obedience. *' Therefore speak I unto them 
 in parables, because they seeing see not," &c. And he proceeds to 
 quote the prophecy of Isaiah, not according to the harsher reading 
 of the Hebrew, but according to the milder reading of the Septua- 
 gint, which renders the prophet's^Hebrew words," Make the heart 
 of this people gross, and make their ears heavy," &c., by the indi- 
 cative, " This peoj)le's heart is waxed gross . . . and their eyes they 
 have closed . . . lest at any time they should see with their eyes . . . 
 and should be converted." In the quotation and application of the 
 words of the prophet in St. Matthew, the Lord states that in them 
 [i.e. those without) is fulfilled the words of the prophet, that " this 
 people's heart is waxed gross and their eyes they have closed " 
 through their hatred of good and love of evil before He began to 
 speak to them in j)arables, and so His speaking to them in this dark 
 enigmatical way was in mercy, as well as in judgment — it was that 
 those amongst them who rejected His message, should not incur 
 the greater guilt of rejecting plain words, the meaning of which 
 forced itself, as it were, upon them, whilst those who accepted, or 
 were inclined to accept His message, would be struck by the words 
 and see in them mysteries of grace which they then would but 
 faintly apprehend, but which would attract them to Him. The Lord's 
 words as given in St. Matthew, being so much fuller, are evidently 
 the words which He actually used ; and this is in accordance with 
 the characteristic difference between these Evangelists : St. Mat- 
 thew giving more perfectly the Lord's words, whether in discourse 
 or parable ; St. Mark dwelling more circumstantially and graphi- 
 cally on His miracles and the incidents of His life. 
 
 To those then without faith in Him the Lord's parables veiled 
 the mysteries of the kingdom, but to those who had faith and de- 
 sired instruction, they unveiled and shed light on the same mys- 
 teries. " God gives sight and understanding to men who seek for 
 
68 KNOW YE NOT THIS PARABLE ? [St. Makk. 
 
 13 And lie said unto tliem, Know ye not this parable ? 
 and how then will ye know all parables ? 
 g^Matt. xiii. 14 ^ ^ The sower soweth the word. 
 
 them, but the rest He blinds, lest it become a greater accusation 
 against them, that though they understood they did not choose to 
 do what they ought." (Theophylact.) 
 
 13. " And he said unto them, Know ye not this parable ? . . . 
 all parables ? " The Lord seems to imply that this parable was the 
 easiest of all. And, indeed, to us it seems to bear its signification 
 on the face of it. But we are living after Pentecost, and the 
 Apostles were then living before the outpouring of the Spirit. 
 
 14. " The sower soweth the word." The sower was first of all the 
 Lord Himself, and it may be a comfort to faithful preachers, who 
 see so many utterly hard and unreceptive, so many falling away, 
 so many bearing little or no fruit, that as it is with them so it was 
 with the Lord and with His Apostles. To the hearers of Christ 
 and the hearers of St. Paul the preacher was to some a savour of 
 life unto life, to others of death unto death. 
 
 But Who is the sower now, and what is his sowing, and what 
 is the seed he sows ? The sower is the preacher, the sowing is 
 preaching, the seed sown is the word preached. First of all 
 the " word " is the word respecting repentance, for the Lord 
 and His Apostles, first of all, in all cases preached rex^entance, 
 or things that would lead to or bring about repentance, such as 
 righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come. Then the word 
 is the declaration of the truths of the Gospel, which would lead to 
 living faith in the Saviour, that He is the Son of God, that by His 
 Incarnation He became for us the Son of Man; that He lived a 
 life which reveals to us the goodness and hohness of God Himself 
 brought down to the level of our understandings and of our endea- 
 vours; that He died an atoning and reconciHng Death; that 
 through the Blood shed in His Death our sins can be blotted out ; 
 that He arose again to assure us of the truth of all His promises, 
 and to impart to us of His new, His Kesurreetion Life ; that He 
 ascended to the right hand of God to intercede for us, and to 
 order all things for the well-being of His Church ; that He will 
 come again to judge ; that He has sent His Spirit Who now dwells 
 in His Church, and by His entrance into each soul makes it a par- 
 
CuAP.IY.] THEY BY THE WAY SIDE. 69 
 
 15 And tliese are they by tiie way side, where the word is 
 sown ; but when they have heard, Satan cometh immediately, 
 and taketh awav the word that was sown in their hearts. 
 
 15. " In their hearts." N, C, L. read, " In them ; " B. and some Cursives read, " into 
 them ;" D., hiter Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin, Syriac, and some versions as 
 in Rec, Text; Vulg. [Cod. Amiat.], In corda eorum, A. alone reads, "From their 
 hearts." The differences of reading are more important in this case than in many, as 
 they raise the question. Could the word be said, to have reached their hearts ? 
 
 taker of the benefits of Christ's Incarnation, Death, and Eesm-rec- 
 tion ; that in order that all may receive these inestimable blessings 
 He gives them to our faith easily and as a free gift ; that He has 
 ordained such things as Sacraments, in one of which He grafts us 
 into Himself, and makes us members of His Body, and branches of 
 Himself the True Vine, and, in the other, He gives His Body and 
 Blood to be our spiritual food and sustenance ; that He has ordained 
 a perpetual ministry to represent Himself, and that through the 
 action of this ministry He instructs His people in His doctrines, 
 makes them partakers of His Sacraments, and absolves them from 
 sin. All these are parts of that word which the Apostles preached. 
 They one and all set forth some aspect of God's grace and goodness. 
 They are to be preached in their turn as men are able to hear and 
 bear them ; but they are all to be preached if the sower is to deliver 
 his conscience in the matter of his sowing. 
 
 15. " And these are they by the way side, where the word is 
 sown . . . taketh away the word that is sown in their hearts" [or 
 in them] . Those by the way side may be divided into two classes, 
 (1) the utterly indifferent, who shut their ears, and pay no atten- 
 tion whatsoever to the words of the preacher: and (2) those who 
 hear and who, because they know what the word is about, that it 
 demands of them that they turn from sin and turn to God, at once 
 dismiss it from their minds. They dismiss it by forcibly turning 
 their minds to other things : their business, their pleasures, their 
 ambitions, their rivalries, their possessions, their fancies, are the 
 things which make up their inner lives, and the thoughts of these 
 are ever at hand, and at once rush in as birds swooping down on 
 the grain on the hardened soil, and efface not only all impressions, 
 but the very remembrance of the good things preached. Now the 
 Lord teaches us that this indifference to the word by which it fails 
 to convince and convert, is brought about, not through natural, but 
 
70 , NO ROOT IN THEMSELVES. [St. Mark. 
 
 16 And these are they likewise which are sown on stony 
 ground ; who, when they have heard the word, immediately 
 receive it with gladness ; 
 
 17 And have no root in themselves, and so endure but 
 for a time : afterward, when affliction or persecution ariseth 
 for the word's sake, immediately they are offended. 
 
 through supernatural agency. An enemy does this. In our present 
 fallen state he is able to summon up thoughts which may distract 
 the attention from the thoughts which the life giving Word suggests, 
 and our evil wills fall in with the thoughts which he instils. These 
 thoughts may not always be evil by any means, but they do his 
 work, for they distract the attention, and being far more in accor- 
 dance with the evil bent of the heart, the good thought is swallowed 
 up, effaced, and forgotten. I think that there can be no minister 
 who comes closely into contact with the souls of men but must 
 be aware that there is not only an evil principle at work in 
 the heart, but an evil personal agency which is able to suggest 
 doubts and interpose difficulties, and assist the soul in barring out 
 the word by placing all his cunning at the disposal of the evil will. 
 Satan or his emissary, the evil spirit to whom he has committed 
 the destruction of the man's soul, cometh immediately. See note 
 on parallel passage in Matthew xiii. 
 
 16. " And these are they likewise which are sown on stony ground 
 [" rocky places," Eev., 1881] . . . with gladness." These differfrom 
 the first (those by the way side) in that they " receive " the word, 
 which the first did not ; and not only receive it, but do so " with 
 gladness." As soon as ever they are converted, they seem to be 
 able to rejoice in the Lord, and are in our day, on this account, 
 pronounced " saved," whilst holier, humbler souls are held to be in 
 darkness, because they have a deeper sense of sin, and a clearer 
 view of the requirements of the Gospel. But it is only for a short 
 time that this class of hearers make a profession even. 
 
 17. " And have no root in themselves . . . immediately they are 
 offended." Just as the rock underneath the thin soil prevents the 
 roots from striking down, and becoming proportionate to the plant, 
 so, in their souls, the hardness and unpreparedness of the will and 
 all that forms the deep, abiding character, prevents the word from 
 penetrating into the depths of the soul. If it does not do so, if it 
 
Chap. IV.] THOSE SOWN AMONG THORNS. 71 
 
 18 And these are they whicli are sown among thorns ; such 
 as hear the word, 
 
 18. "And these are they which are sown among thorns." So A., later Uncials, almost 
 all Cursives, Syriae ; but S, B., C, D., L., Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic read, "And there 
 are others which are sown among thorns ; these are they which," &c. ,\ 
 
 does not penetrate deeply, there is no perseverance, no stability. 
 " The hidden hfe must be nourished underground, or the outward 
 will soon fail." And this agrees with the true theory of Divine 
 grace : for it is from the secret depths of the soul that the Holy 
 Spirit begins to act, not from the surface. He renews and sancti- 
 fies from within — from the very centre. Such hearers many of the 
 Galatian Christians seem to have been of whom St. Paul writes : 
 •'Ye received me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus. Where 
 is, then, the blessedness ye spake of? for I bear you record, that, if 
 possible, ye would have plucked out your own eyes, and have given 
 them to me" (iv. 14). The reader will also remember the ex- 
 ample of Herod, who heard John gladly, and the Jews, who were 
 willing, for a season, to rejoice in the Baptist's "burning and 
 shining light." 
 
 But what makes these hearers to rejoice so soon? In my notes 
 oiji St. Matthew, I said that it was that which was bright in Chris- 
 tianity — its promises of heaven, its security. I find that a similar 
 explanation is given by Hammond (quoted in Ford) : " These per- 
 sons take Christ, but under a false person : either they take the 
 promises only, and let Christ alone ; or they take Christ the Saviour, 
 but not Christ the Lord, are willing to be saved by Him, but never 
 think of serving Him. They abstract the cheap and profitable 
 attributes of Christ, His priestly office of satisfaction and propitia- 
 tion ; but never consider Him as a King." 
 
 18. " These are they [or there are others] which are sown among 
 thorns .... cares of this world .... lusts of other things . . . , 
 unfruitful." In this case, the seed springs and grows up ; but, side 
 by side with it, there springs up and grow noxious plants, stronger 
 than itself; and these take away its nourishment, not perhaps at 
 first, but when the ear begins to form, and shows signs of fruit, and 
 before the ear can form any kernels worth speaking of. It may be 
 profitable to consider how this takes place. In this way: the culti- 
 vation of Christian graces and habits of devotion and religious use- 
 fulness requires time, and thought, and watchfulness, and attention. 
 
72 IT BECOMETH UNFRUITFUL. [Sr. Mark. 
 
 19 And tlie cares of this world, ^ and tlie deceitfulness of 
 
 h 1 Tim. vi. riches, and the lusts of other thincjs enterins: in, 
 9, 17. o & » 
 
 choke the word, and it becometh unfruitful. 
 
 Now, if the Christian, neglecting the words of his Saviour respecting 
 taking no anxious thought for the morrow, and not realizing the 
 promise of God, that if he seeks the kingdom of God and His 
 righteousness all needful things will be added, allows the anxieties 
 of life always to be preying upon him, he cannot give the things of 
 God and eterniky the place in his soul which their importance re- 
 quires. The fear that he shall lose what he has, or the desire of 
 getting richer and richer, or some over-mastering longing to attain 
 some higher worldly position, or to excel in such a pursuit or 
 accomplishment : all these so fill the mind with other thoughts 
 that there is no room for spiritual desires. The stated times of 
 prayer, if kept to through habit, are yet curtailed and broken in upon 
 by alien thoughts of all kinds, such thoughts are allowed unchecked 
 to range through the mind, even in the house of God, perhaps even 
 at the altar; and so, though there may be certain regular habits, 
 and a resj)ectable life, and abstention from gross vices, there is not 
 those fruits of the Spirit which God looks for. 
 
 *' The lusts of other things." St. Matthew only mentions " the 
 cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches ; " St. Luke men- 
 tions "j)leasures of this life," as answering to" lusts of other things." 
 Under this head, then, the Lord places the love of pleasure, of 
 amusements, and sensual gratifications, and even the cultivation 
 of refined tastes : all which have a tendency to engross the mind, 
 and induce it quietly to take up with a world which yields it so 
 much satisfaction. 
 
 '* Entering in." This expression is only to be found in St. Mark's 
 Gospel. And it is very suggestive : it teaches us that these cares of 
 the world, and deceitfulness of riches, may not be present or 
 sensibly felt when the word first springs up in the heart ; but, when 
 opportunity offers, they may make theu' appearance, and grow far 
 faster and more vigorously than the true religious life, and ultimately 
 destroy it. 
 
 " And it becometh unfi-uitful." The word " becometh " seems to 
 imply that " fruit " had begun to be formed ; but these evil things 
 " coming in," the growth of the grain is checked. Are we to 
 
Chap. IV.] SOWN ON GOOD GROUND. 73 
 
 20 And these are tliej wliicli are sown on good ground ; 
 sucli as hear the word, and receive it, and bring forth fruit, 
 
 understand, then, that it is quite fruitless? The parallel expres- 
 sion in St. Luke — " bring no fruit to perfection " — seems to imply 
 that there may be some scanty fruit of an inferior quality, but none 
 answering to the goodness of the seed, or even of the soil, if it had 
 not been robbed of its nourishing qualities by the thorns. So many 
 a good heart may be spoilt as to its religion by unwatchfulness in 
 prosperity. 
 
 20. "And these are they which are sown on good ground .... 
 hundred fold." "Are sown" (lit., "have been sown," past parti- 
 ciple). St. Mark uses a different form here, and in verses 16, 18. 
 This seems to imply complete or effectual action (Canon Cook, in 
 " Speaker's Commentary ") ; but St. Matthew uses the past participle 
 in all four cases. 
 
 " Good ground." This is interpreted in St. Luke as " an honest 
 [sincere] and good heart." 
 
 " Such as hear the word and receive it." It is interesting to 
 comx^are the corresponding words in the two other Synoptics with 
 these, as they mutually exi)lain one another. St. Matthew has, 
 " heareth the word, and understandeth it ;" St. Mark, " hear the 
 word, and receive it; " St. Luke, "having heard the word, keep 
 it," or, rather, " keep hold of it." According to St. Mark, they hear 
 the word, and receive it : doubtless, according to the highest mean- 
 ing of the word " receive," i.e., "receive in the love of it." These 
 are they who, according to St. Matthew, " understand it " — not with 
 the intellect only, but with the understanding heart ; understand 
 its application to themselves, and act on that understanding — as 
 our Collect says, " inwardly digest it." And these are they who, 
 according to St. Luke, " keep it " — i.e., hold it fast, grasp it, em- 
 brace it. 
 
 " Some thirtyfold, some sixty, some an hundred." Everyone has 
 observed the difference between those who may be called good 
 Christians, in the matter of their good works — how some seem to 
 produce twice or thrice the fruit that others do. Some are, com- 
 pared with others, three times more attentive in prayer, three times 
 more careful in all the trifling matters which make up so much of 
 life; three times more self-denying, three times more liberal, three 
 
74 THIRTY, SIXTY, AN HUNDREDFOLD. [St. Mark. 
 some thirtyfold, some sixty, and some an hundred. 
 
 20. " Some thirty, some sixty," &c. Owing to the earliest MSS. being without accents, 
 it is impossible to say whether this should be read "in [lv] thirty, in sixty," &c., or, 
 ♦' some [evj thirty, some sixty," &c., but there is not the slightest difference in meaninj?. 
 The Vulgate has, unum triginta, as iu Authorized; the Syriac, tricenos et sexagenos, &c. 
 
 times more humble, subdued, and thankful. Does not the Lord 
 recognize this dijfference in the parable of the pounds — when the 
 nobleman, in leaving, gives a pound to each of his servants ; and 
 one servant makes it ten pounds, and another five ; and he com- 
 mends both, but gives to the more industrious worker twice the 
 reward ? Look at the lives of John Wesley, Charles Lowder, 
 Selwyn, Pattison, Fenelon, St. Theresa, Eidley, Latimer, Bernard, 
 Anselm, Savanarola, Augustine, Ambrose, and see what sacrifices 
 of time and labour and self-denial and prayer these have offered 
 to God, not by fits and starts, but during their whole lives. 
 
 Such then is the parable of the sower. Its scope is admirably 
 summed up by Bishop Beveridge : " We may observe in general, 
 that of the three unprofitable hearers the first hear the word, but 
 do not mind it ; the second minded it for a time, but did not keep 
 it ; the third kept it, but did no good with it. But the fruitful 
 hearers do all that these did and more ; they hear so as to mind it, 
 they mind so as to keep it : and they keep it so as to use and 
 improve it to God's glory and their own good." 
 
 One word by way of caution. No one parable can possibly express 
 every feature of the Divine life, or every circumstance bearing on it. 
 In this parable the ground is represented as unchanged, and the 
 fruit produced by the seed is according to the soil. But throughout 
 all Scripture the soil, that is, the heart of man, is set forth as 
 capable of being changed ; God, by the severest of all the prophets, 
 says to His people, '* I will take away the stony heart out of your 
 flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh " (Ezek. xxxvi. 26) ; and 
 we are ourselves called upon to take our part in this : " Make you 
 a new heart and a new spirit : for why will ye die, house of 
 Israel?" (Ezek. xviii. 31). 
 
 Thus Chiysostom says : " And how can it be reasonable, saith 
 one, to sow among the thorns, on the rock, on the way-side ? With 
 regard to the seeds and the earth it cannot be reasonable, but in 
 the case of men's souls and their instructions, it hath its praise, and 
 that abundantly. For the husbandman indeed, would reasonably 
 
Chap. IV.] SET ON A CANDLESTICK. 75 
 
 21 ^ * And he said unto them, Is a candle brought to be 
 put under a 11 bushel, or under a bed ? and not ' ^lat*- ^'- 1-5- 
 
 ■"■ • n Luke viii. 16. 
 
 to be set on a candlestick ? & xi. 33. 
 
 22 ^ For there is nothing hid, which shall not the or>gumi '" 
 
 •1 '£ 1. n '2.1 J.1 • 1 j_ j_ signifieth a less 
 
 he maniiested ; neither was any thing kept secret, measure, ns 
 but that it should come abroad. l^ll\J' ^%^ 
 
 k Matt. X. 2b. 
 Luke xii. 2. 
 
 22. "Which shall not be manifested," rather "but that it should be manifested." 
 S, B., and some Cursives read, "Except that it may be manifested;" A., C, K., L., 
 and many Cursives, "Except it be mauifested ; " Vulg., Quod non vianifestetur ; Syriac, 
 Quod non sit revelandum. 
 
 be blamed for doing this, it being impossible for the rock to become 
 earth, or the wayside not to be a wayside ; but in the things that 
 have reason it is not so. There is such a thing as the rock changing 
 and becoming rich land ; and the wayside being no longer trampled 
 on, nor lying open to all that pass by, but it is possible that it may 
 be a fertile field, and the thorns may be destroyed, and the seed 
 enjoy full security. For had it been impossible, the Sower would 
 not have sown. And if the change did not take place at all, that is 
 no fault of the Sower, but of those who are unwilling to be changed" 
 ("Homilies on St. Matthew," xiii. 19-21). 
 
 And Augustine : " Change the soil while you may. Break up 
 your fallow-ground with the plough ; from your field cast forth the 
 stones, and pluck out the thorns. Be unwilling to have a hard 
 heart, such as makes the word of God of none effect. Be unwiihng 
 to have a thin layer of soil, in which the root of Divine love can 
 find no depth of entrance. Be unwilling to choke the good seed 
 by the cares and lusts of this life, when by our labour it is scattered 
 for your good. For God sows ; while we are His workmen ; but be 
 the good ground." (Quoted in Ford from Serm. xiii. c. 3). 
 
 21. "And he said unto them, Is a [or the] candle brought to be 
 put under," &c. 
 
 22. "For there is nothing hid which shall not be manifested " [or, 
 save that it should be manifested] . 
 
 These verses must be taken together, and their meaning seems to 
 be something of this sort. The Lord had for certain wise, and, we 
 believe, merciful reasons, adopted a new mode of teaching, in which 
 He veiled His meaning from the multitude under parables, but this 
 was not because He intendedtheirmeaning to be permanently hidden 
 
76 EARS TO HEAR. [St. Mark, 
 
 \tir%^' *'" ^^" ^^ ^ ^^ '^^J nisiia. have ears to hear, let him hear. 
 
 frora the world, but because He intended that it might be the better 
 known to the world when the fitting time was come. To this end 
 He made known the interpretation to His Apostles, not for them- 
 selves, but for the world. His truth — the truth of the Gospel — was 
 the lamp ; this lamp of truth He intended not for a corner of the 
 world, or for a select few, but for all men of all nations, who would 
 turn their faces towards it and receive it, and so He gave it now 
 to the AjDOstles, who, after Pentecost, were to make it known to all 
 nations for the obedience of faith. 
 
 God does not conceal any mystery, any religious truth, merely 
 for the sake of concealing it. If He conceals any truth it is that 
 He may ultimately make it the better known. This very parable 
 is an illustration of this. If any truth ever shone forth upon the 
 lamp -stand of the Church it is that which is taught us by this 
 parable, that the word of the Gospel is efficacious or not, according to 
 the state of heart of the recipients; so that men must in very deed 
 " take heed " as to " how " thej^ hear and " what " they hear. This 
 meaning is still more clearly enforced by the true reading of the 
 first clause of verse 22. There is nothing hidden, save that it 
 should be manifested. So we have this parable given in full in 
 three out of the four Gospels, and we may safely say that, with the 
 exception of that of the returning prodigal, there is none which has 
 been more expounded and enforced by preachers in all ages. The 
 meaning, however, of verse 21, is much obscured by deficiency of 
 translation. We lose much of the significance if we think of the 
 modern candle and candlestick carried about in the hand. On the 
 contrary, it is the lamp of the house put upon the lamp-stand, or 
 candelabrum, which is so elevated that any lamp upon it can lighten 
 up all the interior. 
 
 The reader will notice that the Lord uses this aphorism here with 
 quite a different significance to that which He gives to it in 
 Matt. X. 26. 
 
 23. " If any man have ears to hear," &c. If this was said not in 
 the hearing of the multitude, but to the Apostles, or to those select 
 ones to whom He had just expounded the parable, then it implies 
 that there are still deeper mysteries of grace which require, for their 
 apprehension, a more effectual opening of the soul's ear, and a 
 deeper preparation of heart. Men have ears to hear certain funda- 
 
Chap. IV.] TAKE HEED WHAT YE HEAK. 77 
 
 24 And he said imto tliem, Take heed what ye hear : ™ with 
 what measure ye raete, it shall be measured to " Matt. vii. 2. 
 you : and unto you that hear shall more be given. 
 
 25 "For he that hath, to him shall be ffiven: ^ Matt. xni. 
 
 12. & XXV. 29. 
 
 and he that hath not, from him shall be taken Luke viii." 18. 
 even that which he hath. 
 
 24. " To you that hear shall more be given." " That hear " omitted by >i, B., C, D., 
 L. Vulg., and some other versions ; but A., later Uncials, most Cursives, and Syriac read 
 as in Kec. Text. 
 
 mental, or practical truths, who still have not as yet ears to hear 
 certain deep mysteries. 
 
 24. " And He said unto them, Take heed what ye hear : with what 
 measure ye mete," &c. This seems to mean, " Take heed that ye 
 attend to and lose none of My x^resent words. In proportion to 
 your present profiting ye shall in due time receive more sj)iritual 
 benediction and grace. This is also another instance in which the 
 Lord uses a short aphoristic saying in another and totally different 
 sense to that in which He had formerly applied it. In Matthew 
 vii. 2 it is used with reference to retribution, and is in connection 
 with " with what judgment ye judge ye shall be judged." Here it has 
 to do with the dissemination of truth. The more industrious the 
 Apostles should be in the preaching and expounding of the truth — 
 the more would the treasm'es of Divine Truth be revealed to them. 
 Or it may be more closely connected with " Take heed what ye 
 hear," and may mean, " The more closely you apply yourselves 
 to the understanding and preaching of revealed truth, the more you 
 shall enter into its depths." So Theophylact : " That is, that none 
 of those things which are said to you by Me should escape you. 
 * With what measure ye mete it shall be measured to you,' that is, 
 'whatsoever degree of application ye bring, in that degree ye will 
 receive profit.' " But the former is preferable. 
 
 "And unto you [who thus measure] shall more be given," the 
 words "that hear" being probably a later gloss. Nothing can be 
 more apposite than the words of Venerable Bede on this : " Or else 
 if ye diligently endeavour to do all the good which you can, and teach 
 it to your neighbours, the mercy of God will come in to give you 
 both in the present life a sense to take in higher things, and a will to 
 do better things, and will add for the future an everlasting reward. 
 
78 THE MAN CASTING IN SEED. [St. Mark. 
 
 26 % And lie said, ° So is the kingdom of God, as if a man 
 o^Matt. xiii. sliould cast Seed into the ground ; 
 
 And therefore it is added, ' And to you shall more be given.' " 
 
 26. "And he said, so is the kingdom of heaven .... seed into 
 the ground." The parable which follows — that of the seed growing 
 secretly — is the only one peculiar to St. Mark. St. Mark, along with 
 St. Matthew, gives the parable of the Sower, and of the Mustard Seed, 
 but omits all the others which we have in Matthew xiii. It seems 
 then to have been delivered at the same time as the rest of those 
 given in St, Matthew, and as it is unlike any of them, I think 
 we must take it as having a meaning peculiar to itself. We 
 must not interpret it then by the parable of the leaven, as some 
 have done, for that of the leaven has to do with the change of 
 the body in which the leaven is deposited, whereas, in this parable, 
 we have no such change. It is simply the history of the growth 
 and development of the plant of grace. The teaching seems to be 
 something of this sort. The greatest mystery in nature answers to 
 the greatest mystery, or one of the greatest mysteries, of grace. The 
 greatest mystery of nature — taking nature to mean the order of 
 things in the world in which God has placed us — the greatest mystery 
 of nature is Reproduction, the reproduction of new forms of the same 
 living thing from seed, and the greatest mystery of grace is the 
 reproduction of new forms of the New Man in the world, or in the 
 Church, or, as we may say, in the soil of human nature, from the 
 Divine Seed. If we hold fast to this as the one teaching of the 
 parable, it will enable us in a very great degree to put aside such 
 questions as " who is the sower of verse 26, or the reaper of verse 29 ? " 
 The sower may be the Lord, or he may be the human minister ; 
 the reaper would appear, at first sight, to be the Lord only, at the 
 last day by His ministers the angels reaping the world, but looking 
 at such places as Matthew ix. 37, 38, John iv. 35-6, 38, it is clear 
 that the Lord contemplates His ministers as being reapers as well 
 as sowers, some as assisting at the beginning of any work of grace, 
 some as gathering the fruits of it into comparative safety in the 
 storehouse of the Church. Just as the sower of the earthly field 
 sows the grain in the earth, and then must leave it so far as its ger- 
 mination and internal principle of growth is concerned, till its fruit 
 is ready to be gathered, so in heavenly spiritual husbandry, the 
 sower has to sow the seed, but when this is done he has done all 
 
CiiAP. iy."l HE KNOWETH NOT HOW. 79 
 
 27 And should sleep, and rise night and daj, and the seed 
 should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how. 
 
 that he can do to make it germinate. He has committed it to the 
 earth, and there he must leave it. If it germinates it is owing to 
 hidden processes of nature over which he has no control. If it ap- 
 pears above ground he cannot by any watching of it, or by any- 
 thing he can do to the plant itself, make it grow faster or produce 
 more grain. He can, it is true, dress the soil in which he sows it, 
 or he can drain that soil of its superfluous moisture, and he can clear 
 it of weeds, or gather the stones from the surface, but these opera- 
 tions are outside of the scope of this parable. It would be within 
 the scope of this parable if the husbandman could go to each seed 
 after it was sown, examine it, see if it was germinating, and if it 
 was not, do something to it which would make it spring up, or if 
 it was weakly, infuse by some process of his own, some new life 
 into it, or restore it to life if it was dead. But the temporal 
 husbandman can do none of these things. He must leave the grain 
 to itself, so far as the vital principle of its springing up and its 
 growth is concerned. And so with the spiritual husbandman in 
 sowing the seed of the word. He sows it, but the reason why one 
 seed germinates and another does not, is a thing known only to 
 God, and one of the deepest of all mysteries. To say that this depends 
 upon God's secret election is only putting the difficulty one step 
 back, for God must have a reason for predestinating that the seed 
 of the word should spring up in any particular soul. He must in 
 such a matter act reasonably, and not as the Calvinists would have 
 men believe, out of sheer wilfulness, indeed out of caprice. Now the 
 secret cause of this springing up of the word we must leave to God, 
 and with it the whole progress of spiritual growth and develop- 
 ment. It is as completely out of the range of our faculties as the 
 commencement and development of life in the world of nature. 
 
 In the production of spiritual fruit or corn, just as in the produc- 
 tion of the natural, there are two agents — the seed, or rather the 
 germ of life in the seed, on the one side, and the secret influence of 
 the earth which receives it on the other. And the action and 
 reaction of these upon one another is known only to Him Who 
 knows what the mystery of life is, and what is the mystery of its 
 nourishment. The first of these unknown agents, the life of the 
 seed, we have in the words "the seed should spring up and grow, 
 
80 THE BLADE, THE EAE, THE CORN. [St. Mark. 
 
 28 For the earth "bringeth forth fruit of herself ; first the 
 blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear. 
 
 28. "For the earth." s. A., B., C, L., omit "For;" later Uncials, almost all 
 Cursives, some Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic, Syriac retain it. 
 
 he knoweth not how ; " the second of these, the action of the ground 
 or soil, we have in the words, "the earth bringeth forth fruit of 
 itself." The gist of the parable is, that these are the only two 
 agents in the development of life, and they postulate one another. 
 The seed springs up only when sown in the ground, and the ground 
 produces of itself only when it has received the seed. The part done 
 by man, the sowing — the intermediate processes of dressing, weed- 
 ing, and irrigating, and at last the reaping, are in no respect 
 raysteries, but the beginning and continuance of the life is the 
 deepest of mysteries. 
 
 And in what is the practical use of tlie lesson of the parable ? 
 Alford thinks that it warns us against undue interference with the 
 seed when once sown. "No trouble of ours," he writes, " can 
 accelerate the growth or shorten the stages through which each seed 
 must pass. It is the mistake of modern Methodism, for instance, 
 to be always working at the seed, taking it uj) to see whether it is 
 growing, instead of leaving it to God's own good time, and mean- 
 while diligently doing God's work elsewhere." But many bodies 
 and schools in the Catholic Church fall into this mistake quite as 
 much as Methodists, and this simply by overdoing the " direction " 
 of souls. This is not to be taken as disparaging the anxious and 
 careful work of the pastor, for St. Paul bids the Ephesian Elders 
 remember " that by the space of three years he ceased not to warn 
 every one night and day with tears." Wesley has a most admirable 
 pithy note on this parable : " Even he that sowed it cannot explain 
 how it grows. For as the earth by a curious sort of mechanism 
 which the greatest philosophers cannot comprehend, does as it were 
 spontaneously bring forth first the blade, then the ear, then the full 
 corn in the ear : so the soul in an inexplicable manner, brings 
 forth first weak graces, then stronger, then full holiness : and all 
 this, of itself, as a machine, whose spring of motion is within itself. 
 Yet observe the amazing exactness of the comparison. The earth 
 brings forth no corn (as the soul no holiness) without both the care 
 and toil of man and the benign influence of heaven," 
 
Chap. IV.] THE HARVEST IS COME. 8L 
 
 29 But when the fruit is || brought forth, immediately 
 Phe putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is i Or, ripe. 
 
 P Rev. xiv. 15. 
 
 come. 
 
 29. " Broaght forth." " Ripe," see margin. Cum produxerit fructus, Vulg. 
 
 Most commentators consider that the parable applies to the 
 growth of the Church in the world, as well as to the growth of the 
 plant of grace in the individual soul. ** Again, the parable speaks 
 of the whole Church. The Son of Man sows the seed, having pre- 
 pared the ground and done His labour: and then He seems hke a 
 man gone into a far country — as He is described in another parable 
 — as a husbandman who has done his work and leaves it. So it is 
 now. He has prepared the ground. He has planted His Church ; 
 He may be even as one that sleeps while his enemy sows tares. 
 He seems to have left it to itself, waiting for the end, and when He 
 sees it is ripe. He will again visibly return. When the Day of 
 Pentecost is fully come, — the time of the ingathering, — then that 
 which is spoken of in the Revelation takes place. * Upon the cloud 
 sat one like unto the Son of Man, having on His head a golden 
 crown, a-nd in His hand a sharp sickle. And the voice is heard, 
 saying. Thrust in thy sickle and reap, for the harvest of the earth 
 is ripe." (I. Williams.) 
 
 In this latter case, of course, the full corn in the ear would 
 not be good works only, but rather the perfect number of the 
 elect. 
 
 And this leads to the further and far deeper question, " What is 
 the seed? " It may be the Son of Man Himself, according to His 
 words : " Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it 
 abideth alone, but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." Tliis is 
 the true idea of Christian reproduction, the Son of Man, the Nctt 
 Man reproduced in the true members of His mystical Body. 
 
 But it may be asked, Why should the Lord set forth in Ji 
 parable a mystery ? " To which we answer that one chief part of 
 the education of the soul for the eternal service of God, is the sub- 
 mission or bowing down of the soul and spirit before the revealed 
 mysteries of God ; the adoring acknowledgment of that which is not 
 only difficult, but beyond the gras^) of all our faculties ; the confession 
 that, as the mysteries of the natural life are unthinkable, so also are 
 the mysteries of the Divine Life. 
 
 G 
 
82 WITH WHAT COMPARISON. [St. Mark. 
 
 30 ^ And he said, ^ Wliereunto shall we liken the king- 
 4 Matt. xiii. dom of God P or with what comparison shall we 
 
 31. Luke xiii. . 
 
 18. Acts ii. 41. compare it r 
 
 & iv. 4. & V. 
 
 14. & xix. 20. 
 
 30. " Whereunto shall we liken ? " So A., D., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, some 
 Old Latin (c, f), Vulg., Syriac, Coptic ; but N, B., C, L., a few Cursives, Old Latin (b, e) 
 read, " how." 
 
 " With what comparison shall we compare it ? " " In what parable shall we set it forth ? " 
 (Revisers) is read by N, B., C, L., A, a few Cursives, Old Latin (b, e) ; but A., D., later 
 Uncials, most Cursives, Vulg., Syriac, as in E,ec. Text. 
 
 30. " And he said, AVhereunto shall we liken the kingdom of 
 God? or with what," &c. No other parable is introduced in this 
 way. It is as if the Lord had a multitude of illustrations before 
 Him, and He was revolving in His human mind which to select. 
 Or, perhaps. He prefaced it thus that the hearers might exercise 
 their own minds as to what they thought the kingdom of God 
 would be like, and so His own explanation would take firmer hold 
 of them. 
 
 As the former parable — that of the seed growing secretly — sets 
 forth the mysterious vitality of the seed of grace, so this teaches us 
 its expansive power. It not only bears fruit for food, as in the 
 parable of the '* Sower," and the " seed growing secretly," but from 
 a very small seed expands into a great tree which affords shelter to 
 those which take refuge in it. 
 
 The Lord, as I explained in my notes on St. Matthew, made 
 choice of the grain of mustard seed because of a common proverb 
 among the Jews, " small as a grain of mustard seed," and we havo 
 the testimony of those who have seen it in warm climates, that it 
 grows to such a size that it may be called the greatest of all herbs. 
 Maldonatus speaks of it as in "very warm places rising above the 
 height of a man. I have often seen, in Spain, large ovens heated 
 by the mustard plant in place of wood. Birds are exceedingly 
 fond of the seed, and when it is ripened settle on its branches, which 
 are strong enough to bear them, however numerous they may be." 
 There can be no doubt that this concluding part of the parable— 
 where the plant which the Lord speaks of grows to such a size that 
 it gives shelter to the fowls of heaven— is not thrown in by way of 
 setting off the picture, but contains an important feature of the 
 teaching, for the Lord, no doubt, had in His Mind one of the most 
 remarkable prophecies in the Old Testament respecting the king- 
 
Chap. IV.] THE GRAIN OF MUSTARD SEED. 83 
 
 SI It is like a grain of nmstard seed, which, when it is 
 sown in the earth, is less than all the seeds that be in the 
 earth : 
 
 32 But when it is sown, it groweth np, and hecometh 
 greater than all herbs, and shooteth out great branches so 
 that the fowls of the air may lodge under the shadow of 
 
 31. "Is less than all the seeds." Revisers (following Neutral Text, s, B., D., L., A, 
 and one Cursive, 33), "though it be less than all the seeds," &c. ; but A., C, later 
 Uncials, Cursives, Vulg., and most versions read as in E,ec. Text. 
 
 dom of the Messiah. It runs thus : " Thus saith the Lord God, I 
 will also take of the highest branch of the high cedar, and will set 
 it ; I will crop off from the top of his young twigs a tender one, and 
 will plant it upon an high mountain and eminent. In the mountain 
 of the height of Israel will I plant it ; and it shall bring forth 
 boughs, and bear fruit, and be a goodly cedar : and under it shall 
 dwell all fowl of every wing ; in the shadow of the branches thereof 
 shall they dwell" (Ezek. xvii. 22, 23). There can be no doubt 
 that these parables of Ezekiel and of Christ relate to the same 
 kingdom, and so the fact that the tree becomes a place of shelter 
 and refuge for all the people of the world, is one principal purpose of 
 it, if not the principal. Now this parable of our Lord's is, as much 
 as that of Ezekiel's, a prophecy, and has been fulfilled to the letter. 
 In the course of little more than one century after it was uttered 
 there was not a city of any size in the Koman Empire which had 
 not its bishoj), with his priests and deacons, preaching the Word of 
 God, baptizing, and so admitting men into the new kingdom, cele- 
 brating the Eucharist, and exercising discipline over the faithful. 
 It was not the spread of a philosophy, or of a system of opinions, 
 or even of a gospel only. It was the spread of an organization for 
 purposes of rule and discipline, of exclusion of the unworthy, and 
 of pastoral care over the worthy. And it went on progressing and 
 prospering till it became a great power in the world, though not of 
 it. For centuries, emperors, kings, and people had to take it into 
 account in every department of government and civil policy. Its 
 present weakness is a reaction against its former abuse of its power 
 when it had become secular, and failed to fulfil some of the chief 
 purposes of its institution. 
 
 But in all ages the Catholic Church has afforded to men what the 
 
84 MANY SUCH PARABLES. [St. Mark. 
 
 33 ' And with many such parables spake he the word nnto 
 r Matt.xiii.34. them, as they were able to hear it. 
 
 34 But without a parable spake he not unto 
 them : and when they were alone, he expounded all things 
 to his disciples. 
 
 • Matt. viii. 35 * And the same day, when the even was 
 
 viii. 22. come, he saith unto them. Let us pass over unto 
 
 the other side. 
 
 34. " To his disciples." Revisers, "To his owh disciples." So N, B., C, L., A, Vulg., 
 and Syriac ; bat A., D., later Uncials, ail Cursives, as in Rec. Text. 
 
 prophet and the Lord foretold, rest and shelter. No human phi- 
 losophy has afforded any rest or refuge for the wandering spirit. 
 Only the Church has done this, and the Church has been able to do 
 this because the foundation of all her doctrine has been the Incar- 
 nation of her Lord. She teaches the soul to look for the foundation 
 of her hope, not into herself, her frames and feelings, but to the 
 historical facts of the Incarnation, Death, and consequent Resur- 
 rection and Ascension of the Eternal Son, together with the Church 
 system and sacramental means which are the logical outcome of 
 that Incarnation ; and because of this, and this only, she is an 
 abiding refuge. 
 
 33, 34. " And with many such parables spake he the word .... 
 disciples." We have some of these "many such parables" in St. 
 Matthew, viz., the wheat and tares, the leaven, the treasure hid in 
 the field, the pearl of great price, and the net cast into the sea. All 
 these are hke the three which St. Mark has recorded, not only in 
 their simplicity, but in their object, to set forth some aspect of the 
 kingdom or Church of God. 
 
 " As they were able to hear." Even in the Lord's parables there 
 was this difference, that some must be uttered by Him before others. 
 They would not be able to apprehend or to hear as yet the parable 
 of the ten virgins, or of the Vine and the branches. 
 
 " When they were alone, he expounded all things to his disciples." 
 This was in accordance with what HeJhad before said, " Unto you 
 it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God." 
 
 35. "And the same day, when the even was come, he saith unto 
 them," &c. The account which follows of the miracle of the stilling 
 
Chap. IV.] OTHER LITTLE SHIPS. 85 
 
 36 And when they had sent away the multitude, they took 
 him even as he was in the ship. And there were also with 
 him other little ships. 
 
 37 And there arose a great storm of wind, and the waves 
 
 36. " Little ships." " Little " omitted by H, A., B., C, D., K., M., and some Cursives, 
 Vulg. ; retained in E., F., G., H,, L., and most Carsives. 
 
 of the tempest, must have come from one who was in the ship, and 
 kept all in a loving memory, as we shall notice as we go on. 
 
 "And the same day when the even was come." St. Mark 
 alone gives this note of time, and the very words which the Lord 
 used in bidding them pass over. 
 
 26. "And when they had sent away the multitude . . . even as 
 he was." No doubt without any preparation for the journey, per- 
 haps weary and needing repose, which he refused to take in the 
 house on the land. " They made no special preparation. They 
 did not land first to obtain provisions. It would have been incon- 
 venient to go ashore in the midst of the crowd. They made at once, 
 as He told them to do, for the other side." (Dean Bickersteth.) 
 
 " And there were with him also other [little] ships." No doubt, 
 whilst He was preaching, others having boats on the lake, crowded 
 around, each little ship, with its freight of eager listeners, and some 
 of them would follow in the wake of His ship. 
 
 Archer Butler (quoted in Ford) has a suggestive remark : " When 
 our Lord was in that ship in the tempest, which all ages have 
 agreed in employing as a type of His Church, St. Mark alone of the 
 Evangelists, as it were incidentally, observes, ' And there were also 
 with him other little ships.' Yet they doubtless enjoyed a share in 
 the blessing of calm obtained by the ship that bare Jesus. I have 
 sometimes thought that they picture vividly the fortune of those 
 societies, that, in these latter days, have moved in the wake of the 
 ancient Apostolic Church, that, with it, are forced to endure the 
 storms of a world impartially hostile to every form of religious 
 effort, and that not without participating in the blessings of the 
 Holy Presence, abiding in that Church as long as in sincerity of 
 heart they endeavour to keep up with the Master in his course." 
 
 37. " And there arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat 
 into the ship," &c. We should have thought that there must have 
 been indications in the heavens of the comine: storm which would 
 
86 ASLEEP ON A PILLOW. [St. Mark. 
 
 beat into the sMp, so that it was now full. 
 
 38 And he was in the hinder part of the ship, asleep on a 
 pillow: and they awake him, and say unto him, Master, 
 carest thou not that we perish ? 
 
 38. " On a pillow." " On the pillow," probably a bench fixed on the ship, 
 
 have induced them to postpone their journey for a short time ; but 
 on inland lakes, as in Switzerland, as well as in Galilee, storms brew 
 up with astonishing rapidity. Dr. Buchanan (quoted in Gray's 
 " Museum ") gives a strikingly graphic account of a storm spring- 
 ing up without the least perceptible warning. "While gazing 
 upon the suggestive scene around us [on the sea of Galilee], our 
 earnest conversation was suddenly disturbed by a movement 
 among our Arab crew. All at once they pulled in their oars, 
 shipped their mast, and began to hoist their long and very ragged 
 lateen sail. What can the fellows mean to do with a sail in a 
 dead calm ? But they were right. There comes the breeze rip- 
 pling and roughening the lately glassy surface of the lake. It 
 reaches us before the sail is rightly set. A few minutes more and it 
 is blowing hard. The bending and often spliced yard threatens to 
 give way . . . . ' And where are we going now ? ' was our first in- 
 quiry, when things had been got a little into shape. ' Where the 
 wind will take us,' was the reply of the old greybeard at the helm. 
 And away we went, the lake all now tost into waves, and covered 
 with foaming white heads, as if a demon had got into its lately 
 tranquil bosom ; an adventure that afforded us a fresh illustration 
 of the reality of those events which the narratives of Scripture 
 relate." 
 
 37. " The waves beat into the ship, so that it was now full." 
 St. Luke says, that " they were filled with water, and were in 
 jeopardy." This was, of course, permitted by the Lord, Who knew 
 all that was coming, in order to test their faith. 
 
 38. *'And he was in the hinder part of the ship, asleep on a 
 [the] pillow." From the article before the Greek word, this was 
 probably not a soft pillow, but a bench in the prow of the ship on 
 which the captain rests his head, when, as is his custom, he 8leej)S 
 on the quarter deck. (Speaker's Commentary). 
 
 How mysterious the sleep of the Lord ! To recruit His wearied 
 body He submitted to be unconscious, so far as His human faculties 
 
Chap. IV.] PEACE, BE STILL. 87 
 
 39 And lie arose, and rebuked the wind, and said unto 
 the sea, Peace, be still. And the wind ceased, and there was 
 a great calm. 
 
 39. " And he arose." Rather, " he awoke." 
 
 were concerned ; and yet His Divine Personality could not sleep. 
 "Whilst He appeared to be sharing then* danger He was watching 
 over them. 
 
 "And they awake him, and say unto him, Master [Teacher], 
 carest thou not," &c. These words are words of remonstrance, we 
 may almost say, of presumption. Seeing that St. Peter was usually 
 the sj)okesman of the Apostolic band, we can have little or no doubt 
 that they were the exact words which he uttered in rousing the 
 Lord. They savour of the same presumption as characterized his 
 remonstrance with Christ when he said, " Be it far from Thee, Lord, 
 this shall not hapx)en unto Thee." They betray some unworthy 
 doubt of the love of the Lord, but if taken as said, not in the liurry 
 and fear of the moment, but in their full significance, they undoubt- 
 edly show some faith in His supernatural power ; they seem to 
 imply that though asleep, He was still in some degree conscious of 
 the danger they were in. 
 
 39. "And he arose, and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea. 
 Peace, be still," &c. According to St. Matthew, He first rebuked 
 the disciples ; but according to St. Mark and St. Luke, He first re- 
 buked the wind and sea. It is just possible that He rose from His 
 slumbers with the words of St. Matthew, and after the stilling of 
 the tempest again remonstrates with them for their unbelief. St. 
 Mark, alone, notices the double rebuke which, doubtless, St. Peter 
 had felt, and made special mention of in his preaching. And 
 the double rebuke first of the wind, then of the sea, corresponds to 
 the double miracle. For if the wind only had been suddenly 
 arrested, the sea would have continued agitated, perhaps for hours, 
 and in the then state of the ship, filled with water, the danger would 
 seem prolonged ; and unbelievers might have said that it was but a 
 natural occurrence, the wind having sunk as suddenly as it arose- 
 But the Lord, by separate words of power, restrained first, the fury 
 of the wind, and then, as instantaneously, the natural effect of that 
 fury in the surging of the waves, so that there could have been no 
 doubt that He wielded that fulness of Almighty power with which 
 
88 THEY FEARED EXCEEDINGLY. [St. Mark. 
 
 40 And lie said -iiiito them, Why are ye so fearful ? how is 
 it that ye have no faith ? 
 
 41 And they feared exceedingly, and said one to another. 
 
 4.0. "How is it that ye have no faith?" N, B., D., L., Vulg., Old Latin, Coptic, &c., 
 read " not yet ; " but A., C, later Uncials, almost all Cursives, and Syriac, as in Rec. Text, 
 
 God rules the elements. Let me also be forgiven for repeating 
 what I said in St. Matthew, that this was not only an instance of 
 Divine omnipotence, but of Divine Majesty in its exercise. It for- 
 cibly reminds us of the words, " Thou rulest the raging of the sea, 
 Thou stillest the storms thereof when they arise." 
 
 40. •' And he said unto them, Why are ye [so] fearful ? how is 
 it that," &c. The MSS. of the Neutral Text, supported by the Vul- 
 gate, read the latter part of the rebuke more mildly.' " Have ye not 
 yet faith ? " What was their unbelief ? It was either that they sup- 
 posed it possible that the ship should go down whilst He was in it, 
 or that they could be in any real danger whilst he was in the ship. 
 In the first case their faith in His Divine mission must have been 
 very weak, if they imagined for a moment that it could be so cut short. 
 In the second case, He had chosen them to be His Apostles and 
 representatives ; would He permit their work and witness to be 
 so soon put an end to ? In either case it was a sad eclipse of 
 faith. 
 
 But in what was their unbelief shown? Was it in that they 
 awoke Him ? I think not. Knowing His power, and seeing that the 
 ship was fast filling with water, they would naturally awake Him, 
 and invoke His aid ; but their unbelief was shown in their fear. 
 They were afraid that they might perish whilst He was in the ship 
 with them, and so in St. Matthew's account, he distinctly associates 
 their fear with their unbelief. " Why are ye fearful, O ye of little 
 faith?" 
 
 41. "And they feared exceedingly, and said one to another," &c. 
 Mark how, when they seemed in danger of perishing, they feared ; 
 but when all danger was over, and their faith restored, it is said 
 that they "feared exceedingly." The fear of incredulity lest they 
 should perish in His presence, was changed into the fear of deep 
 reverential awe at the nearness of the Divine and Supernatural. 
 Was not this the very fear which God by His prophet demanded 
 of His people? "Fear ye not me, saith the Lord? will ye not 
 
Chap, v.] WHAT MANNER OF MAN IS THIS? 89 
 
 What manner of man is this, that even the wind and the 
 sea obey him ? 
 
 tremble at my presence which have placed the sand for the bound 
 of the sea by a perpetual decree that it cannot pass it : and though 
 the waves thereof toss themselves, yet can they not prevail ? " 
 (Jeremiah v. 22.) 
 
 And does not all this instruct us as to our realization of the pre- 
 sence of Christ in His Church ? If He be the ship of the Church, 
 as He is, are not all fears respecting the safety of that Church 
 guilty because unbelieving fears ? And are not all compromises of 
 God's truth to suit the taste of the unbelieving world, and to disarm 
 its opposition, the offspring of this guilty fear ? And, on the other 
 hand, should not the assured presence of the Eternal Son in our 
 midst fill us with deep reverential awe ? Have we not reason to 
 fall on our faces and say with Jacob, '* God is in this place, and I 
 knew it not " ? 
 
 CHAP. y. 
 
 ND ^ they came over unto the other side of * Matt.viii.28. 
 
 Luke viii. 26. 
 
 1. "And they came over unto the other side of the sea," &c. 
 The Lord having hushed the tempest of the natural elements, now 
 exhibits His Divine Power in quelling a far more terrible storm. 
 *' In the former miracle we behold the visible creation obeying the 
 Creator ; in this the invisible ; in the former things insensible ; in 
 this spiritual. The former teaches us to fly under the shadow of His 
 wings from the evils of this world : this from the worse evils of the 
 next. The storm at sea was not more awful than this tempest in 
 the spiritual world. The nakedness, the chainless fury, the moun- 
 tains and tombs, the crying night and day, the injuring others and 
 himself ; a sight indescribably fearful ; as it were affording a glimpse 
 into the unseen abyss of woe." (Williams.) 
 
 " They come over unto the other side of the sea." This implies 
 that they merely crossed to some near point, not that they sailed to 
 
90 THE GADARP:NE demoniac. [St. ]\Iark. 
 
 the sea, into the country of the G-adarenes. 
 
 2 And when he was come out of the ship, immediately 
 there met him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit. 
 
 1. "Gadarenes" read by A., C, later Uncials, most Cursives, Syriac ; "Gerasenes" 
 read by S, B., D., Old Latin, and Vulgate ; but L., five or six Cursives, and some versions 
 read, " Gergesenes." It is not impossible that either of the two readings, Gadara and 
 Gerasa, may be right. If Gadara was the nearest city of importance, though at some 
 distance, the whole district might be called the country of the Gadarenes, though Gerasa 
 was the exact spot where the miracle took place. 
 
 the other end of the lake, which they would have had to do if the 
 scene of what follows was at Gadara. 
 
 " Into the country of the Gadarenes." I mentioned in a critical 
 note on St. Matthew viii. 18, 28, the differences of reading — Gada- 
 renes, Gergesenes, or Gerasenes. Our opinion of the genuineness 
 of the reading in the case of each Evangelist depends on the value 
 assigned to certain manuscripts, and can (it seems to me) never be 
 more than a matter of conjecture, but not so, happily, with the 
 locality itself. There can be no doubt that Dr. Thomson has suc- 
 cessfully identified the site with the ruins of Kerea or Gerea, near 
 the part of the shore where Gergesha is marked on most maps. 
 After showing conclusively that Gadara, or the district immediately 
 about it, is impossible, he writes, " In this Gerea, or Chersa, we 
 have a position which fulfils every requirement of the narrative, and 
 with a name so near that in Matthew as to be in itself a strong cor- 
 roboration of the truth of this identification. It is within a few 
 rods of the shore, and an immense mountain rises directly above 
 it, in which are ancient tombs, out of some of which the two men 
 possessed of the devils may have issued to meet Jesus. The lake is 
 so near the base of the mountain, that the swine rushing madly down 
 it could not stop, but would be hurried on into the water .... The 
 name, pronounced by Bedouin Arabs, is so similar to Gergesa, that, 
 to all my inquiries for the place, they invariably said it was at Chersa ; 
 and they insisted that they were identical, and I agree with them 
 in this opinion." 
 
 2. " And when he was come out of the ship ... a man with an 
 unclean spirit." St. Matthew mentions two, St. Mark and St. 
 Luke only one. All commentators seem agreed that the solution 
 of this difficulty is that one was much more fierce and intractable 
 than the other. St. Mark's narrative requires that one should have 
 
Chap. V.] NO MAN COULD BIND HIM. 91 
 
 3 Who had Ms dwelling among the tombs ; and no man 
 could bind him, no, not with chains : 
 
 4 Because that he had been often bound with fetters and 
 chains, and the chains had been plucked asunder by him, 
 and the fetters broken in pieces : neither could any man tame 
 liim. 
 
 3. *' With chains." So H, A., D., later Uncials, most Cursives, Old Latin (b, f). Vulg , 
 &c. ; " With a chain," B., C, L., Old Latin (c, e). 
 
 4, " Could any man." Properly, " Was any man strong enough." 
 
 been more prominent, as the Lord asks him his name, and 
 receives as answer, " My name is Legion," as if one only made 
 answer. 
 
 3. " Who had his dwelling cmang the tombs." The spirit or 
 spirits which possessed him were unclean spirits. Literally, it is a 
 man in an unclean spirit. No other demoniac whom our Lord dispos- 
 sessed was like this. They came to the synagogues, or were brought 
 to our Lord along with other diseased persons, but this man took 
 refuge in the abodes of corruption, among bones and putrefying 
 carcases. Archbishop Trench gives a strikingly illustrative passage 
 out of Warburton's " Crescent and Cross." " On descending from 
 these heights (those of Lebanon) I found myself in a cemetery 
 whose sculptured turbans showed me that the neighbouring village 
 was Moslem. The silence of the night was now broken by fierce 
 yells and bowlings, which I discovered proceeded from a naked 
 maniac who was fighting with some wild dogs for a bone." 
 
 " No man could bind him, no, not with chains , . . cutting him- 
 self with stones." The description of his state in St. Mark is more 
 fearful than those of the other Evangelists, far more so than that 
 of St. Matthew, whose only words to this effect are, '* exceeding 
 fierce, so that no man might pass by that way." What a terrible 
 parable this is of the possession of the soul by some master sin, at 
 times, to all appearances, effectually restrained (bound with fetters 
 and chains), but to no purpose ; the evil habit may seem subdued, 
 but it is only an outward restraint, the love of sin yet remains in 
 possession of the soul, and till this is driven out by the power of 
 Christ, and the soul becomes the dwelling-place of the Spirit of 
 Christ, there is always a danger of relapse ; the evil spirit returns 
 with ten-fold violence, the chains of merely worldly fear and 
 
92 HE RAN AND WORSHIPPED HIM. [St. Mark. 
 
 5 And always, niglit and day, lie was in tlie mountains, 
 and in the tombs, crying, and cutting Mmself witli stones. 
 
 6 But when he saw Jesus afar off, he ran and worshipped 
 him, 
 
 shame, and the fetters of conventional restraint or respectability are 
 snapped, and the wretched being is again an outcast from the true 
 Church or kingdom of God. 
 
 " Crying, and cutting himself with stones." So that his cruel 
 fierceness was not against his fellows only, but against himself. 
 In this the possession by the external evil power was manifestly 
 seen. The spirits within him were spirits of destruction. They 
 compelled him to destroy and torment his own body. And this is 
 a parable also. The sins of lust and drunkenness make a man the 
 enemy, not only of his immortal spirit and eternal interests, but of 
 his own body, his own flesh and blood. The sins of envy and 
 malice lacerate and envenom, and fill sometimes with maddening 
 anguish the man's soul, and at the same time make his whole frame 
 to quiver. 
 
 The question arises, " How did he get into this state, why did 
 God permit him to give entrance to such an enemy ? " Almost all 
 writers upon demoniacal possession (I mean, of course, those who 
 look at it from a believing stand-point) — almost all such seem to 
 agree that it was the man's own evil will which first opened the 
 door. We are not, of course, for a moment to suppose that such 
 were the most wicked of men. On the contrary, this man, in his 
 worst state, was a happier being than Judas, into whom Satan was 
 permitted to enter without injuring one of his natural faculties. 
 All remains of good were expelled from such an one as Judas, and 
 being wholly given up to the Evil One there was no conflict within. 
 But in the demoniacs it was the struggle between the remaining 
 good feeling and respect for virtue with the spirit of wickedness 
 which gave rise to the internal war, and violently shook the soul 
 from its resting-place of reason and sound sense. Whatever this 
 man's sin had been, it might be truly said of him that for a brief 
 time he was " given over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, 
 that the spirit might be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus." 
 (1 Cor. V. 5.) 
 
 6. " But when he saw Jesus ... he ran and worshipped him." Who 
 was it who came thus to Jesus ? Was it the man who of his own 
 
Chap. V.] I ADJURE THEE BY GOD. 93 
 
 7 And cried with a loud voice, and said, What have I to 
 do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of the most high God? I 
 adjure thee by God, that thou torment me not. 
 
 8 For he said unto him, Come out of the man, thou unclean 
 spirit. 
 
 accord, having perceived by some spiritual instinct that the Man 
 Who had just landed was his deliverer, asserted his own freedom 
 and ran to Him for salvation, or was it the indwelling evil spirit ? 
 It seems to have been the latter. For how could the mere human 
 intelUgence of the possessed man have addressed the Lord as the 
 Son of the Most High God ? How could such an one recognizing in 
 some unknown way that the Lord was His deliverer, beseech Him 
 to torment him not ? The personality which thus recognizes and en- 
 treats the Lord is evidently that of the spirit, or the leader of the 
 band of sphits. If it be asked, why should such an one run to the 
 feet of Jesus ? We answer, simply because the Lord compelled 
 him. The Lord had come across the sea to restore this man, for 
 He knew that he would be the only fruit of the toilsome and dan- 
 gerous voyage. The man seems to have been, for the time, wholly 
 overborne by the malignant spirit. The Lord, it is to be noticed, 
 only addresses the spirit, " Come out of the man, thou unclean 
 spirit," and these words of the Lord are given as the reason why 
 the spirit deprecates His wrath in the words, "I adjure thee, by 
 God, that thou torment me not." 
 
 But why should the spirit entreat the Lord not to torment him, 
 when the Lord had simply said, ** Come out of the man " ? Some 
 would gather from this that he would be in a state of torment if he 
 could not disorganize or destroy. He must exercise his destructive 
 powers upon something ; and so we read elsewhere of the evil spirit 
 who was cast out, wandering through dry places, seeking irest and 
 finding none. These wicked beings having made evil their good, 
 find their rest and an alleviation of the hell within them in the 
 paroxysms and tortures of their victims. But may it not be simply 
 the cry of fear ? He knew that he was in the presence of the Supreme 
 Judge, Whose will, ever since his fall, he had been thwarting, and 
 Whose creatures he had been tempting, and deprecates His wrath, 
 and asks for a respite, knowing that the hour of judgment was not 
 yet fully come. 
 
94 WHAT IS THY NAME ? [St. Mark. 
 
 9 And lie asked him What is thy name ? And he answered. 
 
 What follows in this account is exceedingly difficult, and contains 
 glimpses of the spiritual world, which it seems unlawful to specu- 
 late upon, since we know nothing whatsoever about the conditions 
 under which the world of evil spirits exist, and what is told us 
 here enhances rather than dispels the thick darkness in which God 
 has shrouded it. 
 
 9. " And he asked him. What is thy name ? . . . Legion : for 
 we are many." It has been conjectured that the Lord asked the 
 man his name as a step towards his cure, to remind him of hisper- 
 sonahty, of what he once was before he allowed the first inroads 
 into himself of these cursed spirits ; but this is very unlikely, for^ 
 in the first place, the Lord never mixes up natural and supernatural 
 modes of cure. It was His intention in all His miracles to exhibit 
 the power of God, apart from, and independent of, all human means : 
 and in the second place He was not likely to adopt a tentative 
 method, which in His foreknowledge He must have seen would fail 
 utterly, for the man was not reminded by the question of his human 
 personality, but continued to answer solely as the Evil One within 
 him dictated. " My name is Legion : for we are many," and as St. 
 Luke explains, " because many devils were entered into him." I 
 have no doubt that the Lord asked the question in order to elicit 
 this answer. It was His will that the Apostles, and, through them, 
 all after ages of the Church, should know that this was not an ordi- 
 nary case of possession, such as those with which they had, in time 
 past, seen Him deal. It was unique amongst the multitudes of 
 such cases as had come in His way, or been brought under His 
 notice. He had crossed the sea in the fearful storm that they 
 should be witnesses of this desperate subjugation of a fellow crea- 
 ture to many evil powers, and of His complete control over all such 
 influences. 
 
 And now let us consider the import of this answer. It is gene- 
 rally taken to mean that the devils which had entered into this 
 man were so many as to be comparable in number to a Koman 
 Legion, a body of men, when complete, five or six thousand in 
 number ; but are we at all warranted in taking the words in this way ? 
 Is it not most probable that the man used the word with somewhat 
 the same latitude as we use the term " host " ? If a man were to 
 tell us that he was overwhelmed with a "host" of troubles, we 
 
chaf-. v.] my name is legion. 95 
 
 saying, My name is Legion : for we are many. 
 
 10 And lie besought him much that he would not send 
 them away out of the country. 
 
 should not for a moment consider that he meant one thousand or 
 one hundred, or even twenty. We should think him quite war- 
 ranted in using the expression if five or six were worrying him. In 
 writing this, the reader will, I trast, give me credit for making 
 no concession whatsoever to Eationalism. It is just as contrary to- 
 the spirit of Eationalism that one evil spirit should so possess a 
 man so as to inject thoughts into his heart, and speak words by bis, 
 tongue, as that a thousand should ; but it seems the most natural 
 way of understanding the words, and goes far to remove somewhat 
 of the grotesqueness which, in many minds, is associated with this 
 miracle. It seems right to remark that, if we had only St. Mat- 
 thew's account, we should certainly gather that there were only 
 two, one in each demoniac. This in no way detracts from the truth 
 of the fact that "many" had been permitted to take possession of 
 the one, but it should make us hesitate in accounting the number 
 so very large as some do. 
 
 From the answer of the evil spirit, "ill?/ name is Legion," we are 
 led to conclude that there was one leading one who spoke for the 
 rest, and held rule in the possessed man, and that the others were 
 j)ermitted by him to take part in exciting the turmoil. So in the 
 moral world, one master lust given way to, opens the door to a 
 multitude of others. 
 
 Drunkenness, for instance, opens the door to unbounded selfish- 
 ness, and the use of profane and obscene language, and violent 
 outbreaks of angry passion, and all sorts of fraudulent devices 
 whereby the means for self-indulgence may be acquired. 
 
 With respect to the fact that a man may be possessed by more 
 than one evil spirit, we are told by the Lord that the evil spirit when 
 exorcised may return "with seven other more wicked than himself" 
 (Matt. xii. 45). And out of Mary Magdalen He cast seven devils. 
 
 10. "And he besought him much that he would not send them 
 away out of the country." This place also presents extraordinary 
 dif&culty, and I confess that I cannot explain the reason, nor have 
 I seen any explanation which seems at all satisfactory, especially 
 when we take into account that the parallel place in St. Luke is, 
 
96 SEND US INTO THE SWINE. [St. Mark. 
 
 11 Now there was there nigli -unto the mountains a great 
 herd of swine feeding. 
 
 12 And all the devils besought him, saying, Send us into 
 the swine, that we may enter into them. 
 
 12. " All the devils." So A., E., F., G., H., almost all Cursives, Old Latin (a); Vulg. 
 and Syriac omit " all." K, B., C, L., and a few Cursives read, " they " besought Him. 
 
 ^' They besought him that he would not command them to go into 
 the abyss," i.e., the bottomless pit (Eev. ix. 2). I can only mention 
 briefly the opinions of others. Canon Cook, in the Speaker's Com- 
 mentary, says that they besought him not to send them out of the 
 country, because it was a heathenish district. Olshausen, and after 
 him Archbishop Trench : " These words are, doubtless, connected 
 with the Jewish popular opinion, that certain spheres of operation 
 were assigned to the bad angels as well as to the good (Daniel x. 13, 
 20, 21). The demon desires not to be removed out of his. If a re- 
 moval out of one country into another was regarded as impossible, 
 their being driven out of the country assigned would be precisely 
 equivalent to being sent down into the abyss." Lange suggests : " The 
 lawless nature of the country (where Jews lived mingled with 
 Gentiles), which pleased the demons well." ^ 
 
 11. "Now there was there nigh unto the mountains . . . swine 
 feeding." Dr. Thomson, in his "Land and Book," gives us a 
 fitartling illustration of this also : " This AVady Semak (in which 
 Gersa is situated) is everywhere ploughed up by wild hogs in search 
 of the esculent roots upon which they live at this season of the year. 
 ... It is a fact, however, that these creatures still abound at this 
 place, and in a state as wild and fierce as though they were still 
 possessed." 
 
 As the whole region was partially Gentile, we are not to consider 
 the possession of this herd as unlawful. 
 
 12. "And all the devils besought him saying . . . enter into 
 them." Some think that this request proceeded from their being 
 unclean and yet disembodied spirits : they could not be at rest, or 
 the nearest state which they could enjoy approaching to rest was 
 
 ^ Cornelius ^ Lapide, Maldonatus, and Estius, none of whom 
 seem to shirk difficulties, make no allusion to this in their notes on 
 any of the Gospels. 
 
Chap, v.] JESUS GAVE THEM LEAVE. 97 
 
 13 And fortliwith Jesus gave them leave. And the un- 
 clean spirits went out, and entered into the swine : and the 
 herd ran violently down a steep place into the sea, (they were 
 about two thousand ;) and were choked in the sea. 
 
 13. " A steep place." Properly, " the steep " (Revisers). 
 
 the possession of some living body, if not of a man yet of a brute ; but 
 the greater part of commentators seem to think that they requested 
 this for the purpose of destroying the swine, in order that, through 
 their loss, the people of the district might be turned against the 
 Lord. I believe that this was the reason. If it be asked. Why 
 should the Lord permit them thus to hinder His work ? I answer, 
 that His work was not hindered. He came over, as I said, simply 
 for the restoration to a sound mind of the one or, rather, of the 
 two men. When He had made them experience His almighty 
 power in rescuing bodies and souls from Satan, He had done His 
 work there. He left one monument of His power to be His witness 
 and apostle in that region, and we know not how many were 
 afterwards gathered into the Church through his testimony. Any- 
 how the men of the place were then wholly unfit to receive the 
 preaching of the Lord.* 
 
 13. " And forthwith Jesus gave them leave . . . choked in the 
 sea." There is no cliff or precipice near Cliersa over which the 
 swine could have thrown themselves into the lake, but there is 
 a very steep descent down which animals rushing in a panic would 
 infallibly be destroyed. " Take your stand," Dr. Thomson writes, 
 " a little to the south of this Chersa. A great herd of swine, we will 
 suppose, is feeding on the mountain that towers above it. They are 
 seized with a sudden panic — rush madly down the almost perpen- 
 dicular declivity — those behind tumbling over, and thrusting for- 
 ward those before ; and as there is neither time nor space to recover 
 on this narrow shelf between the base and the lake, they are crowded 
 headlong into the water and perish. AU is perfectly natural just at 
 this point ; and here, I suppose, it did actually occur. Further 
 south the plain becomes so broad that the herd might have recovered 
 and recoiled from the lake, whose domain they would not willingly 
 invade." 
 
 ^ See Excursus on Demoniacal Possession at the end of this 
 volume. 
 
 H 
 
98 IN HIS EIGHT MIND. [St. Mark. 
 
 14 And they tliat fed the swine fled, and told it in the 
 city, and in the country. And they went out to see what 
 it was that was done. 
 
 15 And they came to Jesus, and see him that was pos- 
 sessed with the devil, and had the legion, sitting, and clothed, 
 and in his right mind : and they were afraid. 
 
 " They were about two thousand." We are not to suppose for a 
 moment that by this is implied that there were so many evil spirits. 
 All flocks of animals of every kind have leaders, and it would be 
 quite sufficient to strike a panic into the whole herd, if they saw a 
 very few rush down the steep. 
 
 14. " And they that fed the swine fled . . . what was done." 
 They could give no rational account of matters. They would have 
 noticed the demoniac of whom they were always in terror running 
 and falHng down at the feet of some one who had just disembarked. 
 And a short time after this they would see the panic-stricken herd 
 rush down into destruction. They would blindly connect these two 
 things, and leave it to the inhabitants of the city to examine the 
 matter as best they could. St. Matthew, whose account of the 
 whole matter is very short, seems to give only the traditionary out- 
 line. St. Mark here is evidently more true to nature, as the swine- 
 herds are not likely to have been near enough to understand that a 
 miracle had been wrought. 
 
 15. "And they come to Jesus . . . and they were afraid." Notice 
 how instantaneous the cure had been. He who, not perhaps an 
 hour before, had been rushing down from the tombs a raving, naked 
 maniac, was now sitting quietly, clothed already by the kindness of 
 some friendly hand, listening to the Lord. It is to be noticed that 
 St. Mark never mentions that the man in his wild state was un- 
 clothed, whereas St. Luke alone tells us that he " wore no clothes." 
 Another instance of undesigned coincidence. 
 
 St. Luke says, " sitting at the feet of Jesus;" both tell us that 
 he was clothed, both that he was in his right mind. And is not this 
 also a parable ? Is not the man who is willingly under the dominion 
 of sin, " naked," so that men see his shame, and " out of his mind," 
 so that whilst confessing with his lips that he believes in God and 
 in the life everlasting, he yet lives as if there were no God, no judg- 
 ment, no heaven, no hell ; and when the Lord restores him, does 
 
Chap. Y.] ALSO CONCERNING THE SWINE. 99 
 
 16 And they that saw it told them how it befell to him that 
 was possessed with the devil, and also concerning the swine. 
 
 17 And ^ they began to pray him to depart out ^ Matt. viii. 
 
 „ . , . , 34. Acts xvi. 
 
 oi their coasts. 39. 
 
 18 Ajid when he was come into the ship, ^ he ^ Luke viii. 38. 
 that had been possessed with the devil prayed him that he 
 might be with him. 
 
 17. "Coasts." Rather, " borders " (Revisers). 
 
 18. " He was come." N, A., B., C, D., K., L., M., a, some Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg,, 
 read, " When he was coming; " later Uncials and most Cursives read as in Rec. Text. 
 
 he not sit at His feet as a humble disciple, and is he not clothed 
 with a better righteousness, and is not his mind now made " right" 
 80 that he sees all things — God, Christ, the Spirit, the Church, the 
 world to come, judgment, and eternity — all in their true light ? 
 
 16. "And they that saw it . . . concerning the swine." " They 
 that saw it." These may have been the Apostles or the bystanders, 
 who would naturally gather round any ship from which men were 
 disembarking. Very probably they told it to the praise of the Lord ; 
 but there would be some who would be far more struck with the re- 
 quest to enter into the swine, and the permission so readily granted, 
 and the consequent destruction of the unclean animals. 
 
 17. " And they began to pray him to depart out of their coasts." 
 We are not t(» judge too harshly i;)f these people, seeing that, in all 
 probability, they were heathen, and so knowing little or nothing of 
 the God of Israel, or of the jDromises of the Messiah, they could not 
 but look upon the Lord with very mixed feelings ; they would see 
 the maniac restored to his senses evidently by an act of super- 
 natural power, and they would see closely following upon this, and 
 as an effect of it, the destruction of an immense herd of swine. So 
 St, Luke says, "they were taken with great fear," as men always 
 are in the presence of the supernatural, or the supposed super- 
 natural. Of course, judged by Christian principles, they ought to 
 have allowed the restoration of the maniac to his senses to outweigh 
 the destruction of ten thousand swine, but they had never been 
 taught Christian principles, and the Lord evidently did not hold them 
 to be fit, at that time, to receive them. We are not warranted, I 
 think, in ascribing their conduct so much to avarice as to fear. 
 
 18. "And when he was come into the shi]3 . . . might be with 
 
100 GO HOME TO THY FRIENDS. [St. Mark. 
 
 19 Howbeit Jesus suffered liim not, but saitli unto liim, 
 Gro home to tliy friends, and tell them how great things the 
 Lord hath done for thee, and hath had compassion on thee. 
 
 20 And he departed, and began to publish in Decapolis 
 how great things Jesus had done for him : and all men did 
 marvel. 
 
 19. "Howbeit Jesus suffered." N, A., B., C, K., L., M., A, some Cursives, Vulg., and 
 Syriac read, " And he suffered him not ; " but I)., some later Uncials, most Cursives, and 
 Old Latin read as iu Rec. Text. 
 
 him." Some suppose that he imagined that he would be only 
 thoroughly safe from a relapse and re -possession in the presence 
 of his Deliverer ; but may we not think that, out of gratitude and 
 love, he desired to follow One to Whom he owed his very self? 
 
 19. "Howbeit Jesus suffered him not . . . compassion on thee." 
 How is it that the Lord commands this man to go home and tell 
 his friends of the blessing he has received whilst he strictly charges 
 others not to open their lips about it ? No doubt the Lord had in 
 each case regard to the natural disposition or temperament of the 
 man healed. On the garrulous and self- asserting, on those who 
 would be talking of themselves and directing attention to them- 
 selves He would enjoin silence, whilst others who would sink 
 themselves in their Deliverer, as He saw this man would do, He 
 commanded to spread abroad the fame of the mighty work among 
 their friends. 
 
 Archbishop Trench has a valuable remark as to how the com- 
 mand had reference to the permanence of the cure : " Where there 
 was a temperament over-inclined to melancholy, sunken and shut 
 up in itself, and needing to be drawn out from self, and into 
 healthy communion with its fellow-men, as was evidently the case 
 with such a solitary, melancholic person as we have here, then the 
 command was, that he should go and tell to others the great things 
 which God had done for him, and in this telling preserve the 
 healthy condition of his own soul." 
 
 20. " And he departed, and began to publish ... all men did 
 marvel." So that he became the first missionary of the Lord to 
 the heathen, for the region of Decapolis was mainly Gentile. 
 
 "All men did marvel." This is only noticed by St. Mark, and 
 is another instance how he (or rather the great Apostle who was 
 
CuAP. v.] JAIRUS. 101 
 
 21 ^ And when Jesus was passed over again by sliip unto 
 the otlier side, mucli people eratliered unto liim : ^ Matt. ix. i. 
 
 ^ ^ ^ Luke viii. 10. 
 
 and lie was nigli unto the sea. 
 
 22 ^ And, behold, there cometh one of the *" Matt. ix. is. 
 
 , Luke viii. 41. 
 
 rulers or the synagogue, Jairus by name; and 
 when he saw him, he fell at his feet, 
 
 23 And besought him greatly, saying, My little daughter 
 
 22. "Behold" omitted by S, B., D., L., A, Old Latin (a, b, e), Vulg., Coptic, SjTiao ; 
 retained by A., C, latei" Uncials, and almost all Cursives. 
 
 the real author of this Gospel) takes every opportunity of noticing 
 the stir which the Lord's mighty works made among the common 
 people. 
 
 21. *' And when Jesus was passed over . . . nigh unto the sea." 
 From St. Mark we should infer that this gathering of the people to 
 Him, as He was nigh unto the sea, took place immediately on His 
 landing. St. Matthew, however, introduces here the healing of the 
 man sick of the palsy, is. 2-9 ; his (St. Matthew's) own call, ix. 9 ; 
 the feast in his house, ix. 10-18. St. Mark reports these occurrences 
 in ii. 2-23, evidently out of their proper order. The inspiration of 
 not one of the three Synoptics reaches to their giving an exact 
 chronological order of events. 
 
 22. "And [behold] there cometh one of the rulers of the 
 synagogue . . . feet." As this took place in Capernaum, where the 
 centurion of Matthew ix. had built a sj-nagogue, it is not at all im- 
 probable that this man was one of those rulers, or elders, whom he 
 sent to entreat the Lord on behalf of his servant. He is here called 
 one of the rulers, there being several to each synagogue. 
 "Jairus," the same as the Jair of Numbers xxxii. 41. Commenta- 
 tors notice that the word signifies "he shall enlighten" or " he 
 shall gladden," and if God exercises any providence over the giving 
 of names, doubtless He did so here. St. Mark writes as if the whole 
 scene was before him. St. Matthew has, " he worshipped Him." 
 St. Luke, "he fell down at Jesus's feet," but St. Mark, "having 
 seen Him he fell down," as if the narrator had seen the man come 
 near — seen him recognize the Lord and then fell down at once. 
 
 23. "And besought him greatly, saying, . . . she shall live." The 
 Greek is more disjointed and broken than the authorized version. 
 *' My little daughter is at her last gasp — that thou wouldest come 
 
102 LAY THY HANDS ON HER. [St. Mark. 
 
 lieth at the point of deatli : I pray thee, come and lay thy 
 hands on her, that she may be healed ; and she shall live. 
 
 24 And Jesus went with him ; and much people followed 
 him, and thronged him. 
 f Lev. XV. 25. 25 And a certain woman, ^ which had an issue 
 
 Matt. ix. 20. 
 
 of blood twelve years, 
 
 23. " And she shall live." So A., later Uncials, &c. ; but a, B , C, D., L., and some 
 Cursives read, " And live ; " Old Lutin, Vulg., Ut salva sit et vivat. 
 
 and lay hands on her — that she may be healed [saved] and live." 
 It seems from this as if the father's feehngs had overcome him, 
 and his utterance was choked through sorrow. 
 
 From St. Matthew, whose account is a mere outline compared 
 to St. Mark's, we should at first sight gather that the man believed 
 his daughter to be already dead. " My daughter is even now dead." 
 In this case there would be a serious discrepancy between his 
 account and St. Mark's, who represents the faith of this ruler to be 
 much weaker and to require sustaining by the encouragiug words 
 of the Lord (verse 36), but St. Matthew's words must be taken as 
 the words of earnest entreaty : " She is, maybe, even now dead, for 
 I left her at the very point of death ; delay not, or it will be all 
 over." The words of those who came to meet him (verse 35) are 
 more decisive as to death having actually taken place. 
 
 24. " And Jesus went with him ; and much people followed him 
 and thronged him." Notice how all things are ordered for the best. 
 This man's faith was weaker than that of the centurion who asked 
 our Lord to say but the word, but if the Lord had done this and not 
 set out to the house of the ruler we should have lost the inestimable 
 encouragement which we derive from the miracle which Jesus per- 
 formed on the way. 
 
 " Much people thronged him." This is said as an introduction 
 to what follows. 
 
 25. " And a certain woman, which had an issue of blood twelve 
 years," &c. There are several legends respecting this woman : 
 amongst them the following is preserved by Eusebius. "They 
 say that the woman which had the issue of blood mentioned by tha 
 Evangelists, and who obtained deliverance from her affliction by 
 our Saviour, was a native of this place (Panium), and that her house 
 is shown in the city, and the wonderful monuments of our Saviour's 
 
Chap. V.] SHE TOUCHED HIS GARMENT. 103 
 
 26 And had suffered many things of many physicians, and 
 had spent all that she had, and was nothing bettered, but 
 rather grew worse, 
 
 27 Wlien she had heard of Jesus, came in the press behind, 
 and touched his garment. 
 
 28 For she said, If I may touch but his clothes, I shall be 
 whole. 
 
 benefit to her are still remaining. At the gates of her house, on an 
 elevated stone, stands a brazen image of a woman on her bended 
 knee, with her hands stretched out before her, like one entreating. 
 Opposite to this there is another image of a man, erect, of the same 
 materials, decently clad in a mantle, and stretching out his hand 
 to the woman . . . This statue, they say, is a statue of Jesus 
 Christ, and it has remained there even until our times ; so that we 
 ourselves saw it whilst tarrying in that place." (B. vii. c. 18). 
 
 26. "And had suffered many things . . . rather grew worse." 
 Considering the remedies then tried, and of which we have accounts 
 in Eabbinical writers, it is no wonder that she suffered much under 
 such treatment and was the worse for it. This woman is a type of 
 poor human nature which, by no skill of man, can bring about the 
 remedy for its own loathsome and deep-seated disease, but must come 
 to Him, "Who by assuming our nature has endowed it with heavenly 
 and supernatural virtue. Human nature must exercise faith in 
 Him and strive to touch Him if it is to be healed and renewed. 
 
 27. " When she had heard of Jesus, came . . . his garment." 
 Why did she not boldly come forward and beg a blessing ? To 
 which it may be replied, she was restrained through modesty from 
 the nature of her disorder, or rather, as Chrysostom says, it might 
 have been the sense of her ceremonial uncleanness which held her 
 back. 
 
 28. " For she said. If I may touch but his clothes, I shall be 
 whole." Chrysostom, unlike many modern commentators, instead 
 of drawing attention to the want of faith exhibited in what she did, 
 notices the strength of her faith. " For she did not doubt, nor say 
 in herself, ' Shall I indeed be delivered from the disease ? shall 
 I indeed fail of deliverance ? ' But confident of her [sure restoration 
 to] health, she so approached Him, for she said, * If I may only 
 touch his garment I shall be whole.' Yea, for she saw out of what 
 
104 SHE WAS HEALED OF THAT PLAGUE. [St. Mark. 
 
 29 And straiglitway the fountain of her "blood was dried 
 up ; and she felt in her body that she was healed of that 
 plague. 
 
 30 And Jesus, immediately knowing in himself that ^ virtue 
 g Luke vi. 19. had goue out of him, turned him about in the 
 
 press, and said. Who touched my clothes ? 
 
 30, " Knowing in himself that virtue had gone out of him." Eevisers, " Perceiving in 
 himself that the power proceeding from him had gone forth," So Vulg., Cognoscens in 
 se:net ipso virtutem, quce exierat de eo. 
 
 manner of house He was come, that of the publican, and who they 
 were that followed Him, sinners and publicans, and all these 
 things made her to be of good hope." 
 
 But men blame her ignorance that she should think to steal heal- 
 ing virtue from the Lord by a mechanical act. As to her ignorance, 
 she had to do with One "Who " can have compassion on the igno- 
 rant," and He had compassion on her. 
 
 And in what consisted her ignorance ? Not in her believing, as 
 she did, that our Lord's Person overflowed with healing virtue, but 
 in her imagining that this could be communicated to her without 
 His knowledge, and apart from His "Will. 
 
 Call it ignorance, or call it superstition, as we will, whatever was 
 wrong in it the Lord pardoned, and then met, and rewarded her faith, 
 for we read, 
 
 29. " And straightway the fountain of her blood was dried up 
 .... that plague." The cure was instantaneous, and she was 
 conscious of it. And so if the Lord will, the cure of any sin or evil 
 habit may be instantaneous, and we may be conscious that the 
 power of Christ has been manifested in us. 
 
 30. " And Jesus immediately knowing, &c., . . , . who touched 
 my clothes ? " This conduct of the Lord is exceedingly remarkable, 
 for He speaks for the moment as if power had gone out of Him in- 
 dependent of His own will. In St. Luke it is still more emphatic : 
 " I perceive that virtue is gone out of me." We should rather have 
 expected Him to say ; " Someone came behind Me to be healed, 
 and touched Me, and I healed her, but I cannot suffer My act to be 
 concealed." Now, the Lord speaks as if He desired to emj^hasize 
 the fact that power or virtue was actually lodged (if one may use 
 the expression) in His Body, and that that power or virtue would 
 
CiiAP. v.] SAYEST THOU, WHO TOUCHED ME? 105 
 
 31 And liis disciples said imto liim, Tlion seest tlie multi- 
 tude tlironging thee, and sajest thou, "Who touched me ? 
 
 32 And he looked round about to see her that had done 
 this thing. 
 
 83 But the woman fearing and trembling, knowing what 
 
 be given to the faith which discerned that this power or virtue was 
 in His Bod}^, or human person : in fact, the word must be spoken, 
 He acted as if He would by this miracle adumbrate His Sacra- 
 mental action in His Church, and prepare men to approach Him 
 through the Sacramental Elements. 
 
 It was given to this woman to discern a stupendous truth, that the 
 Lord's Human Person was full of healing j)ower : but providentially 
 it was not given to her to realize how the reception of this virtue 
 depended on an act of the Lord's will — providentially, I say, for if 
 she had realized this we should not, humanly speaking, have had 
 this miracle and its wondrous teaching. If anyone hesitates about 
 accepting this fulness of power in the Lord's Body, let him ponder 
 over the words of the Spirit : " In him dwelleth all the fulness 
 of the Godhead bodily" (Col. ii. 9). 
 
 31. "And his disciples . . . sayest thou, Who touched me?" The 
 Lord instantly discerned the touch of faith. The touch of the 
 crowd was that of mere external nearness, of indifference, perhaps 
 of rudeness — aimless, purposeless, but the touch of the woman was 
 for a purpose. The disciples (of whom Peter was the mouthpiece) 
 have been blamed for their want of spiritual discernment, but how 
 could they have divined that such an one was in the crowd with 
 such secret thoughts respecting the Lord ? 
 
 82. "And he looked round about to see her that had done this 
 thing." It is very characteristic of St. Mark, and adds much to the 
 vividness of this picture, that he on this and other occasions, notices 
 the very look of the Lord (thus iii. 34 and x. 21). We can think 
 we see Him scanning the crowd with a searching eye, and all 
 wondering at the sudden pause — wondering at the Lord looking so 
 earnestly into their faces — except one who had a sort of guilty 
 consciousness of the meaning of it all, and would have hid herself, 
 but found that that could not be. 
 
 33. *' But the woman fearing and trembling ... all the truth." 
 Why did the Lord thus compel the woman to come forward, and 
 
106 TOLD HIM ALL THE TEUTH. [St. Mark. 
 
 was done in Tier, came and fell down before him, and told 
 him all the truth. 
 
 33. "In her." So A., most later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Vulg. [in se]; but S, 
 B., C, D., L., a few Cursives, some Old Latin (a has ei), Syriac, " to her." 
 
 declare before the crowd her uncleanness, and the virtue which 
 she had received at the moment of the touch ? 
 
 For three reasons especially. First, for the woman's own sake. 
 Had she been allowed to carry away her blessing in secret, as she 
 purposed, it would not have been at all the blessing to her and to her 
 whole after spiritual life that it now was when she was obliged by 
 this relocated question of the Lord to acknowledge that she had 
 come to seek, and that she had found, help and healing. 
 
 Then, secondly, it was only by the confession which the Lord 
 compelled her to make that the Church in all ages has seen in her 
 so remarkable an example of faith of no common sort, a faith which 
 realized not only the power of the Lord's Will, but the virtue and 
 grace of the Second Adam in His human bodily Presence. Her 
 faith which realized the virtue of His Body for the purpose of bodily 
 healing, must be in us when we draw near to the Sacrament of 
 His Body for the purposes of Spiritual healing. Her faith is that 
 which animates our prayer of humble access. " Grant us, gracious 
 Lord, so to eat the Flesh of Thy Son Jesus Christ and to drink His 
 Blood, that our sinful bodies may be made clean by His Body and 
 our souls washed through His most precious Blood ;" and that of 
 our prayer of Consecration, " Grant that we, receiving these Thy 
 creatures of bread and wine, according to thy Son Jesus Christ's 
 Holy Institution, in remembrance of His Death and Passion, may 
 be partakers of His most Blessed Body and Blood." 
 
 And in the third place, the healing and the manner of it was 
 made public in order to sustain the faith of Jairus. So Chrysostom: 
 " Moreover the ruler of the synagogue, who was on the point of 
 thorough unbelief, and so of utter ruin. He corrects by the example 
 of the woman. Since both they that came said, ' Trouble not the 
 master, for the damsel is dead,' and those in the house laughed him 
 to scorn when He said * She sleepeth,' it was hkely that the father 
 too should have experienced some such feeling." 
 
 34. " And he said unto her. Daughter, thy faith .... whole of 
 thy plague." It was His power that had made her whole, but her 
 
Chap, v.] GO IN PEACE. 107 
 
 34 And lie said unto lier, Dangliter, ^ thy faith hath made 
 thee whole ; sro in peace, and be whole of thy ^ Matt. ix. 22. 
 
 ' ^ ^ -^ ch. X. 52. Acts 
 
 plague. xiv. 9. 
 
 35 ^ Wliile he yet spake, there came from the » i^uke viii. 49. 
 ruler of the synagogue's house certain which said. Thy daughter 
 is dead : why troublest thou the Master any further ? 
 
 36 As soon as Jesus heard the word that was spoken, he 
 saith unto the ruler of the synagogue, Be not afraid, only 
 believe. 
 
 84. " Thy faith hath made thee whole ; " rather, "hath saved thee." The terms used 
 to signify temporal or bodily healing marvellously run up into spiritual healing. 
 
 36. "As soon as." So A., C, later Undals, most Cursives; but omitted by H, B., D., 
 L., some CursiA-es, Old Latin, Syriac, and some versions. 
 
 " Jesus heard." So A., C, D., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg. ; but 
 N, B., L. read, " took no heed, neglected " [what was said]. 
 
 faith had laid hold of His power, and won from Him the exercise 
 of His healing Will. And this is a parable for ns. We have not to 
 come to Him to steal a blessing, but to receive one, which He, in 
 the most open way, offers to our acceptance in His Church. 
 
 "Go in peace." "For thou hast in no way offended Me, but 
 hast pleased Me in that thou hast set an example of faith to My 
 people in all ages." 
 
 "Be whole of thy plague." But was not the woman already 
 whole ? Yes, but may not this be an assurance to her that her 
 plague should never return again ? 
 
 35. " While he yet spake, there came .... why troublest thou 
 the Master any further?" Hitherto He had not shown His power 
 over death, and so there may be an excuse for the message, but 
 surely there might be some consolation in the words of such a 
 Master ! His presence need not be out of place in the house of 
 mourning. There is a curtness and abruptness in this message 
 which savours of unbelief. 
 
 36. " As soon as Jesus heard [or not heeding] the word .... Be 
 not afraid, only believe." Jesus, perceiving the mischief which the 
 message might work, at once put in a comforting and hope -inspiring 
 word, " Be not afraid, only believe." 
 
 Belief is in one sense the only thing needful, because it is the one 
 condition on which we can receive salvation and grace from the 
 Lord. But what does the Lord here mean by "only believe?" 
 
108 HE SEETH THE TUMULT. [St. Mark. 
 
 37 And lie suffered no man to follow liim, save Peter, and 
 James, and Jolin tlie brother of James, 
 
 38 And lie cometli to the lionse of the ruler of the svna- 
 gogne, and seetli the tumult, and them that wept and wailed 
 gi-eatlj. 
 
 38. " He coraeth." So L., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin (a, c, f), some 
 versions ; but H, A., B., C, D., F., two Cursives (1, 33), Old Latin (b, e, g), Vulg., Coptic, 
 Syriac read, *' they come." 
 
 Only believe what ? Why, evidently, that " I have power after 
 death, that My might reaches beyond death, beyond the grave." 
 If the man believed that his daughter was dead, and the Lord bid 
 hira " fear not," it must mean "fear not, but that I will give her to 
 you again." If He added to this " fear not " the words " only be- 
 lieve," it must mean, " Believe that I am life to the dead. You may 
 not know how, but let not your faith in Me fail, and you shall see." 
 
 If it be said that this was too much to require of this ruler, we can 
 only answer that the Lord thought otherwise. The man had known 
 of the healing of the centurion's servant, and of the woman with the 
 issue, most probably also of the casting out of the devils out of the 
 Gergesenes ; and we know not how many more mighty works per- 
 formed in Capernaum, and around the borders of the lake, and now 
 he was asked to go one step further in the same road, -i.e., to be- 
 lieve that death was not the termination of the Lord's power. 
 
 37. " And he suffered no man to follow him, save Peter, and 
 James, and John," &c. The three who were to be witnesses of His 
 Transfiguration, and of His Agony. 
 
 88. " And he cometh to the house .... wept and wailed greatly." 
 From the parallel words in St. Matthew, *' Saw the minstrels and 
 the people making a noise," there is no doubt that these were 
 hired mourners, such as are described in Jeremiah ix. 17, 18 : " Con- 
 sider ye, and call for the mourning women that they may come ; 
 and send for cunning women, that they may come, and let them 
 make haste, and take up a wailing for us, that our eyes may run 
 down with tears, and our eyelids gush out with waters." 
 
 Dr. Thomson, in " The Land and the Book," says : '* Every par- 
 ticular here alluded to is observed on funeral occasions at the pre- 
 sent day. There are in every city and community women exceed- 
 ingly cunning in this business. These are always sent for and kepi 
 in readiness. "When a fresh comi)any of sympathizers comes in, 
 
Chap, v.] TALITHA CUMI. 109 
 
 39 And wlien lie was come in, lie saitli unto tliem, Wlij 
 make je tliis ado, and weep ? the damsel is not dead, but 
 
 ^ Sleepeth. k John xi. 11. 
 
 40 And they laughed him to scorn. ' But when ^ Acts ix. 40. 
 he had put them all out, he taketh the father and the mother 
 of the damsel, and them that were with him, and entereth in 
 where the damsel was lying. 
 
 41 And he took the damsel by the hand, and said unto 
 her, Talitha cijmi ; which is, being interpreted, Damsel, I 
 say unto thee, arise. 
 
 42 And straightway the damsel arose, and walked ; for 
 she was of the age of twelve years. And they were astonished 
 with a great astonishment. 
 
 41. "CuMi." Neutral Text reads, cum, without final /, but manifestly wrong, as the 
 final letter is the sign of the feminine imperative. 
 
 these women ' make haste ' to take up a wailing, that the newly come 
 may the more easily unite their tears with the mourners. They 
 know the domestic histoiy of every person, and immediately strike 
 up an impromptu lamentation, in which they introduce the names 
 of their relations who have recently died, touching some tender 
 chord of every heart, and thus each weeps for his own dead." 
 
 39. "And when he was come in, he saith .... sleepeth." There 
 can be little doubt but that the Saviour here employs the same way 
 of speaking as when He says, " Our friend Lazarus sleepeth, but I 
 go that I may awake him out of sleep ; " and immediately after- 
 wards He told them plainly, "Lazarus is dead." Some have said 
 that the maiden had fallen into the death-like swoon which often 
 precedes, and then passes into actual death ; but those watching her 
 must have been conscious that so far as the help of man was con- 
 cerned, all was over, or they would not have sent the message to 
 the ruler which they did. 
 
 40. " And they laughed him to scorn." This ridicule would be 
 stimulated by their interests, for their wages as mourners depended 
 on the death having actually taken place. 
 
 " Them that were with him." Only Peter, James, and John. 
 
 41. 42. " And he took the damsel by the hand .... Talitha 
 cumi .... astonishment." The very Syriac or Aramaic words 
 
110 HE CHARGED THEM STRAITLY. [St. Mark. 
 
 43 And '"he cHarged them straitly that no man should 
 
 m Matt. viH. 4. know it : and commanded that something should 
 
 & ix. 30. & xii. , ' ^ 
 
 16. & xvii. 9. be priven her to eat. 
 
 ch. iii. 12. ° 
 Luke V. 14. 
 
 which the Lord used are here x^reserved by the Evangelist, doubt- 
 less from the recollection of St. Peter. The words properly trans- 
 lated are, " Girl, arise." Quesnel's remarks on this are well worth 
 reproducing: " The sacred Humanity is, as it were, the hand and 
 instrument of the Divinity, to which it is united in the j)erson of 
 the Word. It is from this Humanity that our life proceeds, because 
 it was in this that Christ died and rose again, and completed His 
 Sacrifice. He is man, since He takes the dead person by the hand ; 
 He is God since He commands her to live, and to arise, and is im- 
 mediately obeyed." 
 
 43. "And he charged them straitly .... given her to eat." It 
 is to be noticed that in the case of the Gergesene demoniac, after 
 healing He bade him make known what God had done for Him, and 
 He Himself compelled the woman, in the last miracle, to confess 
 her healing before the crowd. How is it that here He forbids the 
 parents to make it known ? Very probably He foresees how in some 
 oases the fame of some mighty deed might be an hindrance to, as 
 in other cases it might forward His real work. 
 
 Or in each He might have had regard to the spiritual tempera- 
 ment of those whom He charged. Canon Farrar has a good remark : 
 ^' If He added His customary warning, that they should not speak 
 of what had happened, it was not evidently in the intention that 
 the entire fact should remain unknown, for that would have been 
 impossible, when all the circumstances had been witnessed by so 
 many, but because those who had received from God's hand un- 
 bounded mercy are more likely to reverence that mercy with 
 adoring gratitude, if it be kept like a hidden treasure in the inmost 
 heart." 
 
 " And commanded that something should be given her to eat." 
 There must be some reason why this is specifically mentioned. It 
 may have been to show the completeness of the recovery, in that 
 one, a short time before so utterly prostrated and weak, should be 
 able to take ordinary nourishment. It may be mentioned for a 
 mystical significance, that those to whom God has given spiritual 
 life, require spiritual food for its continuance. 
 
CuAP. VI.] HIS OWN COUNTRY. Ill 
 
 CHAP. VI. 
 
 ND * he went out from tlience, and came into his own 
 country : and his disciples follow him. » Matt. xiii. 
 
 ^ A -. 1 1 1 1 1 n -.5^- Lukeiv.16. 
 
 2 And when the sabbath dav was come, he 
 began to teach in the synagogue : and many hear- 
 ing him were astonished, saying, ^ From whence ^ John vi. 42. 
 
 A 
 
 2. " And many." B., L., with four Cursives read, " The many," i.e. the most, the 
 greatest part; but S, A., C, D., later Uncials, and almost all Cursives as in Rec. Text. 
 
 1. "And he went out from thence, and came into his own coun- 
 try," &e. From thence, i.e. from Capernaum. 
 
 " Came into his own country." The things related in the follow- 
 ing verses, as occurring immediately after the raising to life of the 
 little maid, are related by St. Matthew as following close upon the 
 setting forth of the parable in the 13th chapter. We have, I think, 
 no certain key to the right order. A question of more interest is 
 "Was this journey to Nazareth, and preaching there, the same as that 
 related in Luke iv. ? We can hardly think so, for though there are 
 one or two points of resemblance, yet St. Matthew and St. Mark 
 would certainly not have omitted all reference to the exhibition of 
 angry feeling in the synagogue, when His enemies attempted His 
 life, and He escaped by miracle. We must account this a second 
 visit to Nazareth, in order to give His own city one more oppor- 
 tunity of receiving Him as the Messiah. 
 
 " And his discixoles follow him." What means this passing re- 
 mark ? Did they not always follow Him, or does it mean that He 
 went on this occasion some way in front ? He may have wished to 
 show to His townsmen that He was not now the despised, lonely 
 Teacher which they had once known Him to be ; but, like other 
 rabbis, had a retinue of disciples who had given up all to follow 
 Him. 
 
 2. " And when the sabbath was come, . . . wrought by his 
 hands ? " How besotted they were ! Instead of receiving in faithful 
 hearts what they acknowledged to be superhuman wisdom, and 
 
112 IS NOT THIS THE CARPENTER? [St. Maek. 
 
 hatli this man tliese tilings? and what wisdom is this which 
 is given iinto him, that even such mighty works aire wrought 
 by his hands ? 
 
 3 Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, ^ the brother 
 c See Matt. of James, and Joses, and of Juda, and Simon ? 
 
 xii. 46. Gal. 
 
 i. 19. and are not his sisters here with us ? And they 
 
 d Matt. xi. 6. ** werc offouded at him. 
 
 2. "That even sut-h mighty works are wrought." A„ 02., E., F., G., H., M., S., and a 
 large number of Cursives read, "And whence are such mighty works wrought?" The 
 SISS., &c. are so conflicting upon the separate words that the true reading is very doubtful. 
 The Revisers translate, "And what mean such mighty works wrought by his hands?" 
 
 avaiUng themselves of His mighty power for the healing of their 
 sick, they asked whence it all came from, insinuating apparently 
 that it was from beneath, not from above. 
 
 3. " Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, &:c. ? " This seems 
 to teach that the Lord Himself had worked in the shop of his foster- 
 father. The reader has, no doubt, seen a passage quoted from one- 
 of the earliest of the Fathers, Justin Martyr, a native of Palestine, 
 who writes thus : — *' And when Jesus came to the Jordan, He was 
 considered to be the son of Joseph the carpenter ; and He appeared 
 without comeliness, as the Scriptures declared ; and He was deemed 
 a carpenter (for He was in the habit of working as a carpenter 
 when among men, making ploughs and yokes ; by which He 
 taught the symbols of righteousness and an active life)." 
 
 *' The son of Mary." The omission of St. Joseph's name seems 
 to show that that saint of God had long been called to his rest. 
 
 " The brother of James, and Joses (Joseph), and of Juda, and 
 Simon? " Not His uterine brothers, but most probably His cousins ; 
 not the sons of Joseph by a former wife, for the two first, James and 
 Joses, are called in this very Gospel (xv. 40) the children of another 
 Mary, who stood at the foot of the cross. (See Excursus at the 
 end of this volume.) 
 
 " And they were offended at him." They could not bear to think 
 that one whom they had known so familiarly was now so im- 
 measurably their superior. His reputation was not so sufficiently 
 recognized by the world that they should be proud of Him ; and 
 the whole line of His teaching being so unworldly, forbids that they 
 should look for advancement from Him, 
 
Chap. VI.] HE MARVELLED. 113 
 
 4 But Jesus said unto tlieni, ^A propliet is not without 
 honour, but in his own country, and amons: his « Matt. xiii. 
 
 _ . - . ^ -^ ^ 57. John iT. 
 
 own km, and m his own house. 44. 
 
 5 ^ And he could there do no mighty work, f see Gen. xix. 
 save that he laid his hands upon a few sick folk, Matt. xiii. 58.* 
 and healed them. 
 
 6 And ^ he marvelled because of their unbelief. ^ is. iix. le. 
 
 ^ And he went round about the villao^es, teaching;-. ^ Matt, ix 35. 
 
 o ' o Luke xiii. 22. 
 
 4. " But Jesus." N, B., C, D., L., two Cursives, most Old Latin, Vulg., Syriac, and 
 Coptic read, "And Jesus; " but A., most later Uncials, almost all Cursives, and many 
 versions read as in Authorized. 
 
 4. " But Jesus said unto them, A prophet is not without honour," 
 &c. Jesus speaks of this as an universal truth, and, indeed, it is 
 rooted in our nature to look down upon those with whom we are, 
 or have been, familiar, and whom we have watched in the days of 
 their infancy and weakness. But in an extended sense it applies to 
 the people of the Jews. The Lord is now held in most dishonour 
 by His own nation, whilst the Gentiles worship Him as a Person in 
 the Godhead. 
 
 5. "And he could there do no mighty work," &c. It was His 
 will to demand that those who came to Him for healing should 
 believe that He was able to do the thing which they came to Him 
 for. He would allow no tentative requests. Before He raised 
 Lazarus, He set Himself forth to Martha as the Eesurrection and 
 the Life, and then put the direct question to her, *' Believest thou 
 this ? " He could then do no miracles consistently with the rale He 
 laid down, and which His Father had laid down for Him. It is 
 necessary to draw attention to this, because some commentators, 
 even believing ones, speak as if faith gave a man a sort of physical 
 capacity for receiving benefits from Christ, just as faith in a phy- 
 sician is supposed to be a considerable step to the recovery of the 
 patient. 
 
 6. "And he marvelled because of their unbelief." The reader 
 cannot but contrast this marvelling at the unbelief of His towns- 
 men with His wonder at the faith of the Gentile centurion. The 
 Lord's true human nature, not crushed or obliterated by the in- 
 dwelling of the Divine, was affected as our human nature is. It was 
 astonished at that which is unlooked for, and in a wav unnatural, 
 
 I 
 
114 HE CALLED THE TWELVE. [St. Mark. 
 
 7 ^ ^And lie called imto Mm the twelve, and began to 
 i Matt. X. 1. send tliem fortli by two and two ; and gave them 
 
 ch. iii. 13, 14. 1 . .^ ' o 
 
 Luke ix. 1. power ovei' unclean spirits ; 
 
 just as it was grieved at hardness of heart, and loved with a human 
 as well as with a Divine love, and shrunk at the near approach of 
 frightful suffering. 
 
 Lange has a very suggestive remark on the conduct of the Naza- 
 renes. " Tlie history of Nazareth has been rej)eated on a large scale 
 in the history of Israel. Israel, as a whole, also made the nearness 
 of Jesus, His external, ' not being afar off,' an occasion of unbelief, 
 and fell. . . . This temptation . . . besets the dependents and fellow- 
 citizens of chosen spirits, theologians in the daily study and service 
 of the truths of revelation, ministers in theh commerce with the 
 ordinances of grace, and all the lesser officers of the house of God in 
 their habitual contact with the externals of Divine things," This 
 temptation is well expressed in the common saying, " famiharity 
 breeds contempt." 
 
 7. " And he called unto him the twelve, and began . . . spirits." 
 In St. Matthew's Gospel this mission of the twelve takes place after 
 the Lord looked on the multitudes, and had compassion on them, 
 and had bid those about Him to " pray the Lord of the harvest that 
 he would send forth labourers into his harvest." This was some 
 little time after the healing of Jairus's daughter, and the restoration 
 of sight to two blind men. St. Mark, as is his wont, gives the words 
 of the Lord with much less fulness than St. Matthew, who appends 
 to the first short address as given in St. Mark some further instruc- 
 tions (x. 16-42). 
 
 St. Chrysostom remarks on the Lord not sending forth His 
 Apostles till they had been well prepared and grounded in the true 
 faith of His Messiahship : " Mark, I pray you, also, how well timed 
 was the mission. For not at the beginning did He send them forth, 
 but when they had enjoyed sufficiently the advantage of following 
 Him, and had seen a dead person raised, and the sea rebuked, and 
 devils expelled, and a paralytic new strung, and sins remitted, and 
 a leper cleansed, and had received a sufficient proof of His power, 
 both by deeds and words, then He sends them forth." 
 
 " And began." This was evidently their first mission. 
 
 " To send them forth by two and two." This is noticed only 
 
Chap. YI.] NO SCRIP, NO BREAD, NO MONEY. 115 
 
 8 And commanded tliem that thej should take nothing 
 iov their journej, save a staff only; no scrip, no Ji'^^U^'''^ 
 bread, no 11 money in their purse : a piece of brass 
 
 ' " •' ■■- money, in value 
 
 somewhat less 
 than a far- 
 thing. Matt. 
 
 ___^___ X. 9, but here 
 
 it is taken in 
 general for 
 money, Luke 
 ix. 3. 
 
 by St. Mark, who in his list of the names of the Apostles does 
 not group them by pairs ; whereas they are so grouped by St. 
 Matthew and St. Luke, who say nothing of this sending by two 
 and two. This is an undesigned coincidence worth remembering, 
 as sustaining the naturalness, and so the truth, of the three-fold 
 narrative. 
 
 He sent them " two and two that they might have the mutual 
 helj) and comfort of one another's fellowship, in this resisting and 
 rebellions world ; because they were yet like us, poor weak men, 
 not filled with the mighty rushing of the Holy Ghost, which after 
 came on them, and enabled them to go {sive hinos, sire solos, in pairs, 
 or singly), as the Spirit should best direct them." From Ludolph's 
 "Life of Christ," quoted in Ford. 
 
 " And gave them power over unclean spirits." It is remarkable 
 that this casting out of evil spirits should be the first and fore- 
 most part of this their first commission to represent the Lord. It 
 would impress upon them that, as Christ came to destroy the 
 works of the devil, so the first work of His ministers is opposition 
 to the Evil One. Their first crusade was not so much against 
 the evils of humanity as against him who is himself the root of 
 all evil. 
 
 8, "And commanded them ... no money in their purse." In 
 other words, they were to depend upon the providence of God, not 
 only from day to day but from hour to hour — they were to make 
 no provision for their next meal, no scrip in which to hold any 
 provision, no money wherewith to purchase provision. They were 
 to depend entirely upon God opening the hearts of those to whom 
 they preached to give them their needful food and lodging. The 
 reader will remember that the Lord subsequently ap^oeals to the care 
 which God took of them. " When I sent you without purse, and 
 scrip, and shoes, lacked ye any thing? And they said, Nothing." 
 (Luke xxii. 35.) 
 
116 SHAKE OFF THE DUST. [St. Mark. 
 
 9 But ^ he shod with sandals ; and not put on two coats. 
 kActsxii. 8. 10^ And he said unto them, In what place 
 
 Liike ix. 4. & soGvei' jB enter into an house, thei'e abide till ye 
 
 X 7 S 
 
 ' ' depart from that place, 
 
 m Matt. X. 14. 11 "^ And whosoever shall not receive you, nor 
 
 Luke X. 10. J ' 
 
 n Acts xiii. 51. hear you, when ye depart thence, ^ shake off the 
 dust under your feet for a testimony against 
 them. Yerily I say unto you, It shall be more 
 
 t Gr. or. tolerable for Sodom f and Gomorrha in the day 
 
 of judgment, than for that city. 
 
 11. *'And whosoever shall not receive you." k, B., L., and a few Cursives read, 
 " whatsoever place ; " but A., C^., D., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., 
 and Syriac read as in Rec. Text. 
 
 "Verily I say unto you, it shall be more tolerable . . . than for that city." This clause 
 omitted by K, B., C, D., L., two Cursives (17,28), some Old Latin (b, c), Vulg., and some 
 versions ; but A., later Uncials, most Cursives, some Old Latin (a, f), Syriac, and some 
 versions as in Rec. Text. 
 
 9. *' But be shod with sandals ; and not put on two coats." The 
 coat was a tunic, or shirt ; a second over-tunic was worn by 
 persons of more consideration. Neither of these was, of course, 
 the long robe or cloak (Matt. v. 40). They were to go about as 
 poor men would do. 
 
 10. " And he said unto them, In what X3lace soever je enter into 
 an house," &c. This means, of course, that having taken up their 
 abode in any house they were not to leave it in the hope of getting 
 better lodgings, or iDrovisioc, or attendance at a richer man's house. 
 In fact, that they were both to be, and to show themselves, indifferent 
 to worldly comfort. 
 
 11. " And whosoever [whatsoever place] shall not receive you, nor 
 hear you," &c. " It is a token," says Jerome, " that they would 
 receive nothing from them." Perhaps it may be, as Origen explains 
 it, a solemn act of adjuration and appeal to the Judgment. The ex- 
 pression, " for a testimony against them," seems to have this force. 
 (WiUiams.) 
 
 The latter clause, "Verily I say unto you, It shall be more 
 tolerable," &c., is probably supplied from St. Matthew's gospel. 
 
CuAp. VL] AND ANOINTED WITH OIL. 117 
 
 12 And tliey went out, and preached that men sliould 
 repent. 
 
 13 And they east out many devils, ° and anointed ° James v. u. 
 with oil many that were sick, and healed them. 
 
 12. "And they went out, and preached that men should repent." 
 This was always the first message of the New Testament 
 preacher. It was the first proclamation of the Baptist, of the Lord 
 Himself, of St. Peter, of St. Paul. All preaching of the Gospel is 
 unreal without it. 
 
 13. " And they cast out many devils, and anointed with oil many 
 that were sick," &c. Some commentators gravely remind us that 
 oil has medicinal virtues ; but, as Calvin says, " Nothing is more 
 unreasonable than to imagine that the Apostles employed ordinary 
 and natural remedies, which would have the effect of obscuring the 
 m.u'acles of Christ. They were not instructed by our Lord in the art 
 and science of healing, but, on the contrary, were enjoined to perform 
 miracles which would arouse all Judea. I think, therefore, that 
 this anointing was a visible token of spiritual grace, by which the 
 healing that was administered by them was declared to proceed 
 from the secret power of God ; for, under the law, oil was employed 
 to represent the grace of the Spirit." 
 
 The use of this anointing with oil in the case of the sick con- 
 tinued till the time of the writing of St. James's Epistle and was 
 enjoined by him : "Is any sick among you ? let him call for the 
 elders of the Church, and let them pray over him, anointing him 
 with oil in the name of the Lord : And the prayer of faith shall 
 save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up ; and if he have 
 committed sins, they shall be forgiven him" (v. 14, 15). Here 
 the anointing mentioned by St. Mark is more directly connected 
 with the grace of forgiveness (of course with prayer) — in other 
 words, it is more sacramental ; still, being used where there was 
 hope of recovery, it does not appear to be the same as the later 
 extreme unction. Of this, however, there can be no doubt, that the 
 use of anointing with oil in a sacramental, or quasi-sacramental, 
 sense, was universal in the Church from the earliest periods. It is 
 distinctly mentioned by TertuUian as, in the second century, the 
 means of miraculous healing. " Even Severus himself, the father 
 of Antoninus, was mindful of the Christians. For he sought out also 
 
118 KING HEROD HEARD OF HIM. [St. Mark. 
 
 14 p And king Herod heard of Mm ; (for his name was 
 p Matt. xiv. 1. spread abroad :) and lie said, That John the 
 
 Luke ix. 7. . 
 
 Baptist was risen from the dead, and therefore 
 mighty works do shew forth themselves in him. 
 
 14. "And he said." B., D., two Uncials, some Old Latin (a, b) read, " They said ; " bnt 
 N, A., C, L., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, some Old Latin, Vulg., Coj*tic, Syriac, 
 &c., read as in Rec. Text. 
 
 Proculus, a Christian, who was surnamed Torpacion, the steward 
 of Euodia, who had once cured him by means of oil, and kept him 
 in his own palace even to his death " (" Address to Scapula," iv). It 
 is also mentioned by him as following upon Baptism : " After this, 
 having come out from the bath, we are anointed thoroughly with 
 a blessed unction, according to the ancient rule by which they were 
 wont to be anointed for the priesthood with oil out of an horn. 
 So in us also the anointing runneth over us bodily, but profiteth 
 spiritually, as likewise in Baptism itself the act is carnal that we 
 are dipped in the water, the effect spiritual that we are delivered 
 from our sins." 
 
 14. " And king Herod heard of him . . . shew forth themselves 
 in him." St. Matthew and St. Luke called Herod Tetrarch, which 
 was, speaking strictly, his title as the ruler of the fourth part of the do- 
 minions of his father, but he might properly be called king,as ruling 
 with royal power and state over the part which fell to his share. 
 
 " (For his name was spread abroad)." This parenthesis is an 
 illustration of how St. Mark seems to lose no opportunity of 
 noticing the impression which the works and teaching of Jesus 
 made upon the people. 
 
 " And he said. That John the Baptist was risen from the dead." 
 Herod's conscience smote him. He heard others speaking of the 
 Lord as Elias — as the expected prophet — as one of the prophets, 
 but remembering the virtues of him whom he had so wantonly 
 murdered, he came to another conclusion ; he exclaimed, " It is 
 John the Baptist. He is risen from the dead, and therefore the 
 powers of the unseen and eternal world energize in him." 
 
 Very probably Herod was an avowed Sadducee or Secularist, but 
 this did not prevent his dread of a just retribution from conjuring 
 up within him all sorts of uneasy fears, that he whom he had put, 
 as he thought, out of the way, had, like others of the dead, retm-ncd 
 to the earth to assert his innocence and terrify his persecutors. 
 
Chap. VI.] IT IS JOH:^, WHOM I BEHEADED. 119 
 
 15 ^ Others said, That it is Elias. And others said, That 
 it is a prophet, or as one of the prophets. i Matt. xvi. 
 
 16 ^But when Herod heard thereof, he said, It r Matt, xiv, 2. 
 is John, whom I beheaded : he is risen from the ^"'^^ "'" ^^' 
 dead. 
 
 17 For Herod himself had sent forth and laid hold upon 
 
 15. " Or as one." "Or" omitted by ^f, A., B., C, L., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, 
 Vulg., Syriac, &c. ; retained by D. It is most probably spurious. 
 
 16. "It is John, whom I beheaded." So A., C, later Uncials, most Cursives; but 
 Nc, B., D., L. read, "John whom I beheaded, he is risen." Vulg., Quem ego decoUavi 
 Jonnnem hie a mortuis resurrexit. 
 
 " From the dead." So A., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin (b, c, d, f), and 
 some versions ; omitted by H, B., L., and two Cursives (33, 102). 
 
 Theological or dogmatic acknowledgment is one thing, practical 
 belief is another. Olsliausen well says, " A consistent carrying out 
 of their sentiments on the part of such sensualists is not to be looked 
 for ; they deny the reality of what is Divine, yet amidst their very 
 denial their heart quakes with the secret belief of it." 
 
 15. " Others said, That it is Elias. And others said, That it is 
 a prophet [or] as," ka. According to the prophecy of Malachi a 
 personal advent or resurrection of Elijah was expected before the 
 coming of the Messiah. 
 
 Tliere can be little doubt but that the " or " between the two last 
 clauses of this verse is spurious, and being so, we should under- 
 stand the sense to be, " It is a prophet, as one of the prophets," that 
 is, that a prophet has appeared in all the mighty power of one of the 
 former prophets, "of the old proj)hets," as St. Luke has it. 
 
 16. "But when Herod heard thereof, he said. It is John, whom 
 I beheaded," &c. [the John whom I beheaded is risen]. The 
 " others," i.e.^ the holders of the various opinions respecting Jesus, 
 surmised according to their rehgious behef or their imagination, 
 Herod according to his guilty conscience. 
 
 17. " For Herod himself had sent forth and laid hold upon John," 
 &c. It is to be remarked that the whole of what follows (to verse 
 30), respecting the martyrdom of John the Baptist, is given simply 
 to account for the fact that Herod supposed Jesus to be no other 
 than the Baptist returned again to this world. If it had not been 
 for this, we should, most prabably, have had to rely upon the 
 meagre account in Josephus for all that we could know respecting 
 
120 HEROD FEARED JOHN. [St. Mauk. 
 
 Jolin, and bound him in j^rison for Herodias' sake, liis 
 
 brother Philip's wife : for he had married her. 
 
 « Lev. xviii. 16. 18 For John had said unto Herod, ^It is not 
 
 &XX. 21. 
 
 lawful for thee to have thy brother's wife. 
 I Or, an 19 Therefore Herodias had || a quarrel against 
 
 ' ^ " him, and would have killed him ; but she could 
 
 not : 
 &^xxi2t''^' 20 For Herod * feared John, knowing that he 
 
 18. "For John had said." Properly, "said," i.e. " continually said." 
 
 19. "Had a quarrel with him." Perhaps, " Set himself against him." Vuig., liisi- 
 diabatur illi. 
 
 the martyrdom of this great servant of God. So true is it that the 
 Gospel was written for one purpose, to reveal what relates to the 
 person and work of the Lord Jesus. 
 
 It is also to be noticed that the account in St. Mark, being much 
 the most circumstantial, is more in favour of Herod, as it shows that 
 not he, but Herodias, was the real cause of the persecution and 
 murder of St. John. 
 
 '* For Herodias' sake, his brother Philip's wife." This Herodias 
 was the daughter of Aristobulus, his brother. She first married 
 Phil'ip, son of Herod the Great, and so her own uncle, thereby com- 
 mitting incest, and afterwards she deserted him for this Herod 
 Antipas, thereby adding adultery to her incest. 
 
 18. " For John had said [or was continually saying] to Herod," 
 &c. We learn from St. Luke that not only for this, but for 
 all the evil which Herod had done, did St. John reprove him. 
 Even if Philip had been dead, and there had been no relationship) 
 between them, yet according to Levit. xviii. 16 and xx. 21, it would 
 have been unlawful for Herod to have married her. 
 
 19. " Therefore Herodias had a quarrel against him [or set her- 
 self against him — Revisers] ," &c. No doubt she feared the preach- 
 ing and reproofs of the holy man, lest they should work repentance 
 in her paramour, and move him to discard her for his former wife 
 whom he had divorced. 
 
 20. " For Herod feared John, knowing that he was a just man 
 and an holy," &c. How was it that a king, having all power of 
 life and death, feared a poor prisoner who was entirely at his 
 mercy ? Simply because evil has a divinely implanted instinct 
 
Chap. VI.] HE DID MANY THINGS. 121 
 
 was a just man and an lioly, and |1 observed him ; and when 
 he heard hnn, he did many things, and heard him ii ov, kept htm, 
 
 or, saved him. 
 
 gladly. 
 
 21 And when a convenient day was come, that ^^ Matt. xiv. 6. 
 
 20. " He did many things." So A., C, D., all later Uncials except L., all Cursives, 
 Old Latin, Vulg., Syriae, &c. ; but \, B., L., Coptic read, "he was perplexed." 
 
 within it that its power is but for a time, and that God must finally 
 prevail against it, and judge it, and cast it out. There is nothing 
 in all nature from which such a fear could arise. It could only 
 come from God, the author of all good, and the hater and punisher 
 of all evil. 
 
 "And observed him." Eather kept him in safe keeping, or 
 custody, so that though he was a prisoner he was safe from the 
 malice and wiles of Herodias. 
 
 " And when he heard him, he did many things, and heard him 
 glady." " He did many things." Perhape this meane he was in- 
 duced by the preaching or advice of the Baptist to do some acts of 
 charity, or of common justice, or to initiate some reforms, but the 
 one thing needful he did not do, — he did not repent and forsake 
 sin, and put away the evil woman who was the curse of his life. 
 
 The reader will notice the extraordinary difference of reading in 
 the MSS. of the (so called) Neutral Text : instead of " He did many 
 things," they read, " He was much perplexed : " but this reading can 
 only be accepted on the ground that it is a difficult, indeed an ex- 
 tremely unlikely one, as in direct opposition to the next words, 
 "and heard him gladly." It is very likely that he should "do 
 many things and hear St. John gladly." It is extremely unlikely 
 that he should be perplexed and hear him gladly. (See Dean 
 Burgon's "Kevision Kevised," p. 66. 
 
 "And heard him gladly." Here again is the God-implanted 
 homage which vice pays to virtue. Men who have no desire to be 
 holy, and good, and just, like to hear the claims of holiness, and 
 goodness, and justice, warmly and eloquently asserted. Perhaps 
 they secretly flatter themselves that loving to hear the praises of 
 virtue shows that they have some good thing yet left in them — that 
 they are not wholly abandoned to their own evil selves. 
 
 21. "And when a convenient day was come," &c. A convenient 
 day, that is, an opportune or favourable day for cariying out the 
 machinations against the life of the Baptist. 
 
122 HEROD ON HIS BIRTHDAY. [St. Mark. 
 
 Herod on his birthday made a supper to Ms lords, high 
 K Gen. xi. 20. captains, and chief estates of G-alilee ; 
 
 22 And when the daughter of the said Herodias came in, 
 and danced, and pleased Herod and them that sat with him, 
 the king said unto the damsel, Ask of me whatsoever thou 
 wilt, and I will give it thee, 
 y Esth. V. 3, 6. 23 And he sware unto her, ^ Whatsoever thou 
 
 & vii. 2. 
 
 shalt ask of me, I will give it thee, unto the half 
 of my kingdom. 
 
 24 And she went forth, and said unto her mother, What 
 shall I ask ? And she said. The head of John the Baptist. 
 
 25 And she came in straightway with haste unto the king. 
 
 22. "The daughter of the said Herodias." So A., C, later Uncials, almost all Cur- 
 sives, Old Latin, Vulg., Syriac ; but S, B., D., L., adopt the reading, "her daughter 
 Herodias," contrary to the testimony of St. Matthew, who calls her " the daughter of 
 Herodias," and of Josephus, who calls her " Salome." 
 
 " To his lords, high captains, and chief estates " — lit. his mag- 
 nates, chiliarchs, and principal or first men. It is very probable, 
 from the fact that Herod was afraid of the faces of these men, in 
 the matter of the performance of his wicked oath, that they were 
 heathen. 
 
 22. " The daughter of the said Herodias." Probably the daughter 
 of Herodias herself. This daughter of a king demeaned herself to 
 act the part of a lascivious dancing girl in order to accomplish the 
 designs of her mother. Josephus tells us her name was Salome. 
 Nicephorus, a late ecclesiastical historian, preserves to us a tra- 
 dition that she perished miserably in a manner which cannot 
 but recall the wicked act in which she took so prominent a part ; 
 for, walking over some ice, it gave way, and she fell under the ice, 
 which closing round her neck, nearly severed her head from her 
 body by its sharp edges. 
 
 23. "And he sware unto her, Whatsoever thou shalt ask of me," 
 &c. Very probably at her mother's instigation she insisted on a 
 solemn oath in addition to the promise. 
 
 24. 25. " And she went forth .... The head of John the Baptist." 
 No doubt the bad woman insisted on the head being given to her 
 on a charger, not only that ahe might glut her revenge by the sight, 
 
Chap. VI.] FOE HIS OATH's SAKE. 123 
 
 and asked, saying, I will tliat thou give me by and by in a 
 charger the head of John the Baptist. 
 
 26. ^ And the king was exceeding sorry ; yet for ^ Matt. xi^. 9. 
 his oath's sake, and for their sakes which sat with him, he 
 would not reject her. 
 
 27. And immediately the king sent 11 an execu- II Or, oneoj 
 
 ^ his guard. 
 
 tioner, and commanded his head to be brought: 
 and he went and beheaded him in the prison, 
 
 28 And brought his head in a charger, and gave it to 
 the damsel : and the damsel gave it to her mother. 
 
 27. " Sent an executioner." " A soldier of his guard " (Revisers), 
 
 but that she might be sure that no ignoble criminal had been sacri- 
 ficed in the stead of her enemy. 
 
 26. " And the king was exceeding soriy ; yet for his oath's 
 sake," &c. There cannot be a moment's hesitation respecting the 
 keeping of such an oath. Not only for his own sake, but for the 
 sake of Herodias and Salome, that their guilt should not be in- 
 creased by the consummation of their wicked intention, he was 
 bound to break such an engagement. He ought to have said, 
 " The Baptist is a great prophet, and his life belongs to God, not to 
 me. In demanding such a thing you have asked me to commit a 
 fearful crime, and it is my duty to God, as well as to yourselves and 
 to all around me, to confess my folly in volunteering such an oath, 
 and to disregard it utterly." 
 
 "For their sakes which sat with him." As I said, they were 
 very probably heathen officers and soldiers, and had no respect 
 whatsoever for human life ; certainly none for the life of such a 
 fanatic as they supposed John to have been. 
 
 27. " And immediately the king sent an executioner [or one of 
 his guards] .... prison." Josephus tells us that St. John was im- 
 prisoned in the fortress of Machgerus, within the walls of which 
 Herod the Great had built a palace. It is probable, then, that 
 Herod was keeping this feast within the same building in which 
 St. John was immured. 
 
 "And brought his head in a charger .... to her mother." 
 This murder seems to have deeply affected the Jews, or those of 
 them, at least, who respected this great preacher of righteousness, 
 
124 REST A WHILE. [St. Mark. 
 
 29 And when his disciples heard of it, they came and took 
 up his corpse, and laid it in a tomb. 
 
 a Luke ix. 10. 30. ^ And the apostles gathered themselves to- 
 gether unto Jesus, and told him all things, both what they 
 had done, and what they had taught. 
 
 bMatt. xiv. 31. ^And he said unto them. Come ye your- 
 
 selves apart into a desert place, and rest a while : 
 c ch. iii. 20. for ^ there were many coming and going, and they 
 had no leisure so much as to eat. 
 
 for according to Josephus, they thought that the total destruction 
 of Herod's army, which occurred afterwards, came from God, and 
 that very justly, as a punishment for what he did against John that 
 was called the Baptist." (" Antiquities," xviii. 5, 2.) 
 
 29. "And when his disciples heard of it ... in a tomb." It is 
 somewhat uncertain why this is mentioned. Some think that his 
 body was cast out of the prison unburied, and so his disciples found 
 it, and gave it decent burial ; others, that Herod, out of respect for 
 the remains of the man he had so foully murdered, sent for the 
 disciples of John, and delivered to them the corpse, that their loving 
 hands might commit it to the ground with all due solemnity. The 
 wording of the verse, however, is decidedly in favour of the former 
 view. 
 
 30. "And the apostles gathered themselves together unto Jesus, 
 and told him," &c. At this time also the disciples of John, having 
 buried the dead body of their Master, " went and told Jesus " 
 (Matt. xiv. 12) ; and we should gather from what follows in that 
 Evangelist that it was on account of this — i.e., lest Herod, having 
 slain the forerunner, should seek out Him Whose way the forerunner 
 prepared — that the Lord departed privately by ship into a desert 
 place. But this could scarcely have been the reason, for the place 
 to which He retired was not sufficiently distant, nor was the Lord's 
 retirement sufficiently long to enable Herod to forget his purpose. 
 St. Mark then gives the true reason in the following verse. 
 
 31. " And he said unto them, Come ye yourselves apart into a 
 desert place," &c. The Apostles were well-nigh overwhelmed with 
 their labours, for work had made work : they were cumbered with 
 much serving — not preaching the Gospel only, but healing and 
 
Chap. VI.] MANY KNEW HIM, AND EAN AFOOT. 125 
 
 32 And ^ tliey departed into a desert place by ship privately. 
 
 33. And the people saw them dej^arting, and ^ Matt. xiv. 
 many knew him, and ran afoot thither out of all 
 
 cities, and outwent them, and came together unto him. 
 
 34. ^ And Jesus, when he came out, saw much l ^^'^"- i^- 36. 
 
 & XIV. 14, 
 
 33. "And the people saw them departing, and many knew him." The most probable 
 reading is that of X, A., B., D., L., later Uncials, most Cursives, Valg., &c., "And many- 
 saw them departing, and knew them [or him]." M viderunt eos abeuntes, et cognoverunt 
 multi, Vulg. 
 
 exorcising ; their meals and needful rest was broken in upon by im- 
 portunate crowds ; and so the Lord, to teach us that His ministers 
 must have time for needful refreshment, does not recruit them by 
 a miracle, but insists upon their using natural means. " Come ye 
 yourselves into a desert place, and rest awhile." And is it not so 
 now ? Is not many an active and self-denying minister well-nigh 
 broken down and worn out, because there is no time for thought 
 and rest, and tranquil meditation, and a change of scene ? Eich 
 men, with many-roomed mansions, could not do a gi-eater kindness 
 to poor over-worked priests than by inviting them, from their 
 crowded streets and alleys, to find a little rest and leisure in their 
 multitudes of unused apartments. 
 
 32, 33. " And they departed . . . and came together unto him." 
 It seems almost cruel that the little leisure which Christ won for 
 His disciples should be so soon broken in upon ; but it must have 
 been specially ordered by God, for if it had not been for this pursuit 
 of the Lord by the crowd into the desert place, far away from any 
 town or village where they could buy food, we should not have had 
 one of the most stupendous of the Lord's mighty works — that of the 
 miraculous feeding of the multitudes. 
 
 We now enter upon the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand 
 with the five loaves and two fishes. This is the only one of our Lord's 
 miracles of which we have an account in each of the four Evange- 
 Hsts ; and by this its teaching is emphasized as of the utmost im- 
 portance for us to realize. I gave the principles of this teaching 
 very fully in my notes on St. Matthew. I shall now consider the 
 details of the miracle, and what instruction we can gather from 
 them. 
 
 34. " And Jesus, when he came out, saw much people, and was 
 moved with," &c. His first thought was of their ignorance and 
 
126 THEY HAVE NOTHING TO EAT. [St. Mark. 
 
 l^eople, and was moved with compassion toward them, because 
 they were as sheep not having a shepherd : and *he began 
 f Luke ix. 11. to tcach them many things. 
 
 g Matt. xiv. 35. ^ And when the day was now far spent, his 
 
 12! ""^ ' disciples came unto him, and said. This is a desert 
 place, and now the time is far passed : 
 
 36. Send them away, that they may go into the country 
 round about, and into the villages, and buy themselves 
 bread : for they have nothing to eat. 
 
 36. " And buy themselves bread, for they have nothing to eat." So A., later Uncials, 
 most Cursives, &c.; but Neuti'al Text reads, " buy themselves somewhat to eat." 
 
 spiritual destitution — " they were as sheep not having a shepherd." 
 Those who had assumed to teach them — the Scribes and Phari- 
 sees — had fouled the waters of life to which they professed to lead 
 them (Ezek. xxsiv, 18). 
 
 "And he began to teach them many things." St. Luke has : "He 
 received them, and spake unto them of the kingdom of God, and 
 healed those that had need of healing." 
 
 Let it be particularly noted that, in doing this, the Lord kept 
 them from returning home, or to the neighbouring villages for food, 
 knowing how He was about to supply their wants. 
 
 35, 36. "And when the day was now far spent . . . nothing to eat." 
 From St. John's narrative we gather that when He first discerned 
 the vast crowd, He suggested to one of the Apostles, Philip, the 
 difficulty of sux^plying such a multitude with food. " Whence shall 
 we buy bread, that these may eat ? " This He said to prove him — 
 to try and see, that is, whether Philip, having witnessed such 
 mighty exhibitions of supernatural power, had faith to suggest one 
 more ; but there was no response, only an answer of perplexity : 
 " Two hundred pennyworth of bread is not sufficient for them, that 
 every one of them may take a little." 
 
 It has been supposed, and with some show of reason, that two 
 hundred pence (denarii) was the sum that they had then in the 
 purse or chest, because, according to our Evangelist, they suggested, 
 " Shall we go and buy two hundred pennyworth of bread? " They 
 could scarcely have mentioned such a sum, much less volunteered 
 to go and purchase bread with it, unless they had it by them. 
 
Chap. VI.] GIVE YE THEM TO EAT. 127 
 
 37 He answered and said unto them, G-ive ye tliem to eat 
 And they say unto him, ^ Shall we go and buy Jg^^o^sKin 
 two hundred || pennyworth of bread, and give *' ■ ^'^■ 
 
 „ II The Roman 
 them to eat r penny is seven 
 pence half- 
 penny ; as 
 Matt, xviii. 28. 
 
 37. " He answered and said unto them, Give ye them to eat." 
 Upon this, they mentioned the two hundred pence ; and then the 
 Lord inquired, "How many loaves have ye? go and see." 
 
 Then it was that Andrew said, " There is a lad here which hath 
 five barley loaves and two small fishes." We gather from St. Mark 
 and St. Luke that this was their stock of provision for the night, 
 and that the boy was only carrying it. For they said, " We have 
 no more, but five loaves." It is exceedingly important to note 
 this, for apparently they at once and cheerfully made an offering of 
 all the night's provision, still, however, doubting whether it could 
 be of any use : " What are they among so many ? " (John vi. 9). 
 If any of them had been selfish or churhsh,they would have asked, 
 *' What shall we do for the evening meal ? " 
 
 Isaac WilHams brings this out feelingly and well : '* It must be 
 noticed that they had just retired to this desert, because they had 
 no leisure so much as to eat, which makes it likely that this was 
 the very provision they had taken with them. This was, there- 
 fore, in St. Andrew, the eldest of that company, a giving-up of all 
 they had for themselves ; this adds a force to such his free oblation. 
 It was, indeed, but little for their own number ; but we must re- 
 member that, on one occasion, we find the disciples plucking for 
 hunger the ears of corn ; at another, that when at sea they had 
 forgotten to take bread ; here they have retired to the desert to eat, 
 and yet have but five barley loaves. It is amid an overwhelming 
 multitude, faint and weary ; in the desert, and in hunger ; and 
 man's helplessness is God's opportunity. In the desert came the 
 manna ; in the desert was Elijah sustained ; and Elisha multiplied 
 barley loaves ; therefore, in childlike, wondering, inquiring faith, 
 looked up the disciple, bringing the child with five loaves ; not 
 shaping to himself a definite thought, but gazing ux?, not without 
 hope ; in perplexity, but not in despair." If this be so, and it 
 seems true to nature, this stupendous miracle was consequent upon 
 an act of self-denial and unselfishness on the part of the Apostles. 
 And equally willingly did they offer to part with all that might be 
 
128 HOW MANY LOAVES HAVE YE ? [St. Mark. 
 
 38 He saith unto tliem, How many loaves have ye ? go 
 Matt. xiv. 17. and see. And when they knew, they say, * Five, 
 
 Luke ix. 13. 
 
 John vi. 9. aiid two fishes. 
 
 See Matt. XV. ati tti in- 
 
 84. ch.Tiii. 5. 39. And he commanded them to make all sit 
 down hy companies upon the green grass. 
 
 40 And they sat down in ranks, hj hundreds, and by 
 fifties. 
 
 in the bag. " Shall we go and buy two hundred pennyworth of 
 bread, that these may eat ? " 
 
 39. " And he commanded them to make all sit down by com- 
 panies." This is not mentioned by St. Matthew, nor by St. John, 
 but it was evidently a necessity. Unless they were orderly arranged 
 in groups, and all keeping their places, such a company could not 
 have been fed before midnight. Such an arrangement is a fore- 
 shadowing of the parochial or territorial system of the Church, 
 assigning definite districts with manageable numbers to individual 
 priests, so that all may be within reach of instruction and worship, 
 and none may be overlooked. 
 
 "Upon the green grass" — green, because it was then, being 
 Passover time, the finest spring time. During a great part of the 
 year there is no green to be seen on these hills by the Galilean 
 lake, all is brown and scorched. This, too, must have been the re- 
 miniscence of an observant witness, who had himself assisted in 
 seating the multitudes. 
 
 40. " And they sat down in ranks, by hundreds, and by fifties." 
 " In ranks " — that is, in plots, like beds or plots of i)lants, with 
 gangways or paths between, as in a garden. In order that the 
 Apostles who had the office of distribution might get easily at 
 each man, in order to give him his portion, it has been conjec- 
 tured, with much show of reason, that they were groups of double 
 rows, of one hundred each, fifty in front, and one behind each — i.e.f 
 only two deep. There must have been some arrangement like this, 
 because if there were but fifty persons in a square crowd, or knot, 
 there would be difficulty and confusion in reaching those in the 
 middle. Wesley has, " by hundreds and fifties — i.e., fifty in a rank, 
 and one hundred in file." 
 
 The exact spot where all this occurred seems to be ascertained by 
 Dr. Thomson, in his "Land and Book," to be at a place called 
 
Chap. VL] HE LOOKED UP TO HEAVEN. 129 
 
 41 And wlieii lie had taken the five loaves and the two 
 fishes, he looked up to heaven, ^ and blessed, and Mift^TxtiJJ 
 
 Butaiha. " This bold headland marks the spot, according to my 
 topography, where the five thousand were fed with five barley loaves 
 and two small fishes. From the four narratives of this stupendous 
 miracle we gather, 1st, that the place belonged to Bethsaida ; 2nd, 
 that it was a desert place ; 3rd, that it was near the shore of the 
 lake, for they came to it by boat ; 4th, that there was a mountain 
 close at hand; 5th, that it was a smooth grassy spot capable of seat- 
 ing many thousand people. Now all these requisites are found in 
 this exact locality, and nowhere else, as far as I can discover. This 
 Butaiha belonged to Bethsaida. At the extreme south-east comer 
 of it the mountain shuts down upon the lake bleak and barren. It 
 was, doubtless, desert then as now, for it is not capable of cultiva* 
 tion. In this little cove the ships (boats) were anchored. On this 
 beautiful sward at the base of the rocky hill the people were seated 
 to receive from the hands of the Lord the miraculous bread, emble- 
 matic of His Body, which is the true bread from heaven." I would 
 beg the reader to remember that this closing observation respecting 
 the typical and sacramental significance of the feeding is not mine 
 but Dr. Thomson's, who is, I believe, a Presbyterian. It illus- 
 trates how true Christians, when not on their guard to defend the 
 particular tenets of their sect, approach the doctrine, and fall into 
 the language of the Catholic Church. 
 
 41. " And when he had taken the five loaves and the two fishes," 
 &c. I pray the reader to notice the solemn, mysterious circum- 
 stantiality of what follows. The loaves were not sufi'ered to lie 
 about the ground at His feet ; neither did He say, " Take them 
 yourselves, and begin to divide, for the time hastens away." Each 
 Evangehst expressly notices the solemnity of His " taking" them ; 
 then three — the Synoptics — make express mention of His looking 
 up to heaven, then "He blessed them; " He blessed not God only 
 as the Giver, but the loaves, the gift of God. St. John says, also, 
 "He gave thanks." He eucharistisized, then " He brake." The 
 Jewish loaves were thin broad cakes, and must be broken, but the 
 breaking is in each account mentioned, as if in this case it was not 
 a thing of course, but a part of a great solemnity ; then He gave, 
 or as St. John has it. He distributed to the disciples. He gave, 
 
 K 
 
130 THEY DID ALL EAT. [St. Mark. 
 
 brake the loaves, and gave them to his disciples to set before 
 them ; and the two fishes divided he among them all. 
 42 And they did all eat, and were filled. 
 
 apparently, none with His own hands to the people, only through 
 the hands of the Apostles, yet every morsel, over and above the first 
 scanty basketful, was the immediate creation of His power. 
 
 Such was the action of the Lord in feeding the five thousand. 
 It clearly adumbrates a far more mysterious " taking " of biead, 
 and blessing it, and breaking it, and giving it to the very men who 
 were the agents in carrying out this miracle. The Lord's action in 
 '■ his miracle, and in the institution of the Eucharist, are so reported 
 to us that the one in thought leads on to the other. And, if so with 
 us, what must it all have been to those who were present at both — 
 at the miracle, and at the institution ? In fact, the Lord's action at 
 this miracle prepared the Apostles for the outward circumstances of 
 the institution, just as His discourse in John vi., arising out of this 
 very miracle, prepared for the doctrine of the Divine Gift vouch- 
 safed under the outward signs. When they saw Him repeat the 
 action of "taking," most x)robably looking up to heaven, *' bless- 
 ing," "breaking," "giving" to each, they would remember what 
 He had done before, and they would naturally expect some great 
 thing ; they would see no outward creation of bread, but they would 
 remember the discourse at Caj)ernaum, how He set forth Himself 
 as the Bread of Life, how His Flesh was to be that Bread, howthej^ 
 who received it would have eternal life, and their faith in Him as 
 the Bread of Life would be strengthened. 
 
 42. " And they did all eat, and were filled." That is, they did 
 not eat only a little, just sufficient to keep them from fainting, but 
 each one had a full meal. As I showed in my notes on St. Matthew, 
 the miracle must have taken place in the hands of the Apostles. If 
 it took place in the hands of the Lord, much time would have been 
 lost by the disciples having to go to and fro from the place where 
 He was standing, and then distributing to the various groups which, 
 from their numbers and orderly arrangement, must have covered a 
 large area. Neither could it have taken place in the hands of the 
 multitude, or in their bodies, by enabling them to be satisfied and 
 strengthened by a few crumbs, for then no such amount of frag- 
 ments would have been left ; but it miraculously increased in the 
 
Chap. VI.] THEY TOOK UP TWELVE BASKETS. 131 
 
 43 And they took up twelve baskets full of the fragments, 
 and of the fishes. 
 
 44 And they that did eat of the loaves were about five 
 thousand men. 
 
 45 ^ And straightway he constrained his dis- ^ Matt. xiv. 22. 
 ciples to get into the ship, and to go to the other 
 
 44, "Were about five thousand." A., B., D., L., later Uncials, most Cursives, many 
 Old Latin, Vulg,, Coptic, Syriac omit " about." 
 
 hands of each Apostle. It grew, as it were, in their hands, and as 
 they brake off piece by XDiece to each man, woman, and child, a 
 multitude of broken pieces would necessarily fall to the ground. 
 
 43. "And they took up twelve baskets full of the fragments." 
 That is, more than twelve times as much as was originally blessed. 
 Theophylact (quoted in Ford) remarks well: "It was a proof of 
 overflowing power not only to feed so many men, but also to leave 
 such a superabundance of fragments. Even though Moses gave 
 manna, yet what was given to each was measured by his necessity, 
 and what was over and above was overrun by worms. Elias also 
 fed the woman, but gave her just what was enough for her ; but 
 Jesus being the Lord, makes His gifts with superabundant pro- 
 fusion." 
 
 This very plentiful miraculous supply bears upon the truth of a 
 saying, now often repeated, that God employs the miraculous with 
 great parsimony. If by this is meant that He performs miracles at 
 few times in the world's history, and through the instrumentality 
 of very few x^ersons, it is undoubtedly true. If miracles were 
 common they would lose all their evidential power. But it is abso- 
 lutely contrary to the truth to say that this parsimony applies to 
 the life and acts of our Lord. He performs His miracles royally. 
 There is no stint of supernatural -power. It is not doled out by 
 measure, but bountifully, generously, unsparingly. 
 
 45. " And straightway he constrained his disciples," &c. Here 
 we must notice the fact which St. Mark omits, but is mentioned by 
 St. John, that the people exclaimed, " This is of a truth that pro- 
 phet which should come into the world." Close upon this we read, 
 also in St. John, that " Jesus perceived that they would come and 
 take him by force to make him a king." 
 
 In my commentary on St. John, I quoted a remark of Godet's 
 
1 32 WHEN EVEN AVAS COME. [St. Mark. 
 
 II Or, aver side before 11 unto Bethsaida, wliile lie sent away 
 
 agdinst *' 
 
 BethsaicUi. the people. 
 
 46 And when he had sent them away, he departed into a 
 mountain to pray. 
 mMatt. xiv. 47 '"And when even was come, the ship was 
 
 23. John vi. . • -, o a t i i 
 
 16, 17. m the midst of the sea, and he alone on the land. 
 
 46. " A mountain." " The mountain." 
 
 on the use of this word " constrained." Why should the Lord use 
 constraint with them ? It is generally explained as if their affection 
 for Him would make them anxious not to leave Him alone, but 
 may it not be that the disciples were in danger of being infected 
 with the desire of the multitude to make Him a temporal King, and 
 so He wished to preserve them from the temptation to join in 
 asserting claims which would have destroyed the whole value of His 
 work hitherto ? 
 
 " Unto Bethsaida." Betbsaida Julias was at, or near, the extreme 
 north of the lake, and Capernaum a little further to the west, where 
 the shores just begin to bend southward. He probably directed them 
 to skirt by the shore, so as to take Him up at some point where the 
 Jordan enters the lake near Bethsaida. They would set out then 
 towards Bethsaida, but their ultimate point would be further in the 
 same direction, -i.e., at Capernaum. 
 
 46. " And when he had sent them away, he departed .... to 
 pray." St. John seems to tell us that this departure was in order 
 that He might escape from the importunity of the multitude, but 
 may it not have been for both reasons ? This was a great crisis in 
 His history, for the misdirected zeal of the multitude was hurrying 
 matters on too rapidly, His disciples might be perverted by it, and 
 lose faith when He disappointed them. And yet the zeal of the 
 multitude must be kept up, or they would not pursue Him to the 
 other side, to Capernaum, and their zeal in following Him thither 
 would be the direct occasion for the delivery of the most important 
 and deeply mysterious of His discourses. All this was before Him, 
 for His Father had given Him a commandment respecting what He 
 should do, and what He should teach. He might well then retire 
 to unbosom Himself to His Father. 
 
 47. " And when even was come, the ship was in the midst," &c. 
 AVhat even was this ? It is generally assumed to be the evening of 
 
Chap. VI.] THE WIND WAS CONTHAHY. 133 
 
 48 And he saw tliein toiling in rowing ; for the wind was 
 contrary unto them : and about the fourth watch of the night 
 
 the same day on which He fed the multitude, and so was what the 
 Jews called the second evening. But is this possible ? The day was 
 declining when His disciples asked Him to send away the multitude. 
 After this came the arrangement of the vast number in plots or 
 groups, then the feeding till they were all filled, and then the dis- 
 missal of the crowd. I cannot but think that it must have been 
 the evening of the next day. 
 
 '* The ship was in the midst of the sea." The wind had driven 
 it far from its course. St. John alone mentions the very great 
 violence of the storm. St. Matthew and St. Mark merely tell us 
 that "the wind was contrary." 
 
 48. *' And He saw them toiling in rowing ; for the wind was con- 
 trary." "And such is our success, when Jesus is not with us : we 
 labour against the stream of our corruptions, even against the wind 
 of a thousand temptations. Save us, Jesu, or else we perish ! 
 Come thou into the ship, and immediately we arrive at the haven 
 of our wishes." [W. Austin, quoted in Ford.] 
 
 " He saw them .... and ahout the fourth watch of the night 
 he Cometh," &c. Notice how He had His eye upon them, but He 
 suffered them to toil on, and be in jeopardy for many hours, be- 
 cause they had not learnt their lesson of faith in His Almighty 
 power. 
 
 And do we not learn a lesson from this, that no matter what the 
 tempest of trouble we are in. He sees us, He has His eye upon us, 
 and is trying us, and will help us at the fitting moment ? So Theo- 
 phylact : " Now the Lord permitted His disciples to be in danger, 
 that they might have patience ; wherefore He did not immediately 
 come to their aid, but allowed them to remain in danger all night, 
 that He might teach them to wait patiently, and not to hope at 
 once for help in tribulations." 
 
 I must refer the reader to my notes on St. Matthew for an ex- 
 tract from Chrysostom, bringing out, with great force, another 
 teaching of this miracle as compared with the former one when 
 Christ was asleep in the vessel when the storm raged. " It was 
 His purpose in all the events of this night to discipline and lead 
 them up to higher things than hitherto they had learned." Again, 
 another writer : " In the first storm (Matt. viii. 24) He was present 
 
1 34 WALKING UPON THE SEA. [St. Mark. 
 
 lie Cometh -unto them, walking upon the sea, and "would 
 a See Luke havo passcd hj them. 
 
 49 But when they saw him walking upon the 
 sea, they supposed it had been a spirit, and cried out : 
 
 50 For they all saw him, and were troubled. And imme- 
 
 49. " A spirit." The word rather signifies " apparition." See below. 
 
 in the ship with them, and thus they must have felt all along that, 
 if it came to the worst, they miglit arouse Him ; while the mere 
 sense of His presence must have given them the feeling of a com- 
 parative security. But He will not have them to be clinging only to 
 the sense of His bodily presence, not as ivy, needing always an out- 
 ward support, but as hardy forest trees which can brave a blast ; and 
 this time He puts them forth into the danger alone, even as some 
 loving mother-bird thrusts her fledglings from the nest, that they 
 may find their own wings and learn to use them." 
 
 " And about the fourth watch of the night he cometh unto them, 
 walking upon the sea." This miracle was not a law of nature sus- 
 pended. It was rather one of the forces of natm-e counteracted by a 
 superior force, that is, a Divine force or power. It was the law of 
 gravity counteracted by the innate force or power of the will of the 
 God-Man (see note in St. Matthew). Let us remember that the 
 Lord did not make a calm, but walked on the sea at its roughest, 
 for the wind did not cease till He had got unto the ship (verse 51). 
 
 " Would have passed by them." Compare with this, Luke xxiv. 
 28, when " He made as though he would have gone further," for 
 this very purpose that He niight make them evince their love of the 
 truth in which He was instructing them by constraining Him to 
 abide with them. God cannot effectually discipline us, without at 
 times seeming to take no notice, so that we may be the more impor- 
 tunate in prayer. See also the parable of the Unjust Judge and of 
 the friend who was unwilling to be disturbed. 
 
 49, 50. " But when they saw him walking .... troubled." A 
 spirit, rather an apparition, i.e., of some inhabitant of the unseen 
 world. The word employed (phantasma) is quite different from 
 that indicating a spirit (pneuma). 
 
 " They all saw him." This is peculiar to St. Mark, and the 
 fact would have made a deep impression on one who was present. 
 
Chap. VI.] BE OF GOOD CHEER: IT IS I. 135 
 
 diately lie talked with them, and saith tuito them, Be of good 
 cheer : it is I ; be not afraid. 
 
 51 And he went up iinto them into the ship ; and the wind 
 
 If all saw Him, how is that not one recognized Him ? It may 
 have been because of the darkness, but probably their eyes were 
 holden. 
 
 " And saith unto them. Be of good cheer : it is I ; be not afraid." 
 Would our Lord have after this fashion walked on the sea, and after 
 this fashion reassured His disciples, unless He was fully conscious 
 of the Divine within Him ? For it was the especial glory of God 
 thus to walk on the waters : " Thy way is on the sea, and thy x^aths 
 in the great waters." Here we have, as I remarked on iv. 39, the 
 Lord acting, not only with the power, but with the majesty of God. 
 "How often does it happen that Christ comes to His people, and 
 they do not know Him! He comes to them in some unexpected 
 trouble or bereavement, or disappointment, or worldly loss, and 
 they do not recognize Him. He comes to them in love and they 
 are full of fear. But let it once be brought home to them that it is 
 really He, and what peace and comfort does this assurance bring 
 with it, ' It is I, be not afraid ' " (P. Young). Quesnelhas a remark- 
 able application, which is very illustrative of the revival of Cathohc 
 teaching in our Church in our own day : "There is sometimes a 
 kind of mutiny in the shij) of the Church, and a great clamour is 
 raised at the hearing of certain truths, as if they were errors ; and 
 even those who sit at the helm are alarmed at a phantom which 
 they fancy they see. But as soon as Christ speaks, and they are 
 capable of hearing Him, His truth manifestly appears, their appre- 
 hensions vanish, and all grows quiet." 
 
 At this point comes in the episode of the miracle of St. Peter walk- 
 ing on the water to meet Jesus. The only reason why it is omitted in 
 St. Mark, who is much more full in his account of the miracles than 
 St. Matthew, must be the desire of St. Peter that what in a measure 
 distinguished him, should be omitted. Thus the words of the Lord 
 to St. Peter, " Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my 
 Church," are not to be found in this (St. Peter's) Gospel, though 
 Christ's rebuke, which followed upon it, is given in full. 
 
 51,52. "And he went up unto them . . . their heart was hardened." 
 This, their unbounded astonishment, was a sign of their unbelief — 
 
136 THEIR HEART WAS HARDENED. [St. Mark. 
 
 ceased : and they were sore amazed in themselves beyond 
 
 measure, and wondered. 
 
 ch. viii. 17, 52 For ° they considered not the miracle of the 
 
 p ch. iii. 5. & loaves : for their ^ heart was hardened. 
 
 rMatt xiv ^^ ^ And when they had passed over, they came 
 
 ^'*- into the land of Gennesaret, and drew to the shore. 
 
 51. " Beyond measure." So A., later Uncials, almost all Cursives ; omitteJ by N, B., 
 L., Sj'riac ; Vulg., Plus magis intra se shipebcmt. 
 
 "And wondered." So A.* D., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin, and Syriac ; 
 omitted by S, B., L., some Cursives, and Vulg. 
 
 52. " For they considered not the miracle of the loaves." More literally as Re\isers, 
 " They understood not concerning the loaves." JVon enim intellexerunt de 2^nnihus. 
 
 " For." So A., D., later Uncials, most Cursives, most Old Latin, Vulg., Syriac— N, B., 
 L., one Cursive (33) read, " but " instead of " for." 
 
 53. " Into the land of Gennesaret." So A., D., later LTncials, almost all Cursives, Old 
 Latin, Vulg., Syriac, and versions ; but N, B., L., t^YO Cursives, "They came to the land 
 unto Gennesaret." 
 
 but unbelief in what ? Not surely in His Messiahship, but in His 
 Divine Power. His Messiahship they must have beHeved in, or 
 they would not have followed Him, but what they were slow to 
 believe was that He was the Son of God in the true and natural 
 sense of the word, so that He could wield the full power of God. 
 If they had duly considered the miracle of the loaves, — how such a 
 thing could have taken place — they must have seen that it could be 
 only by a direct creative act, i.e., an act of God. 
 
 But here we have to note an apparent discrepancy of a very 
 marked character between St. Mark's narrative and that of St. 
 Matthew. St. Mark finishes his narrative with a notice of the 
 unbelief of the Apostles — St. Matthew of their belief, " They that 
 were in the ship came and worshipped him, saying, Of a truth 
 thou art the Son of God." But the reconciliation is plain to a 
 believer. They were sore amazed — their heart was hardened — 
 till He called Peter to come to Him — till He returned with Peter 
 into the ship — till the wind ceased. Then their unbelief was dis- 
 pelled — then they at once fell down and worshipped Him and 
 acknowledged Him to be the Son of God. 
 
 53. And when they had passed over . . . drew to the shore." 
 St. John alone notices that as soon as they had taken the Lord 
 into the ship it was immediately at the land whither they went ; 
 but he says nothing of what follows that. 
 
CuAP. VII.] STRAIGHTWAY THEY KNEW HIM. 137 
 
 54 And when they were come out of the ship, straightway 
 they knew him, 
 
 55 And ran through that whole region round about, and 
 began to carry about in beds those that were sick, where they 
 heard he was. 
 
 56 And whithersoever he entered, into villages, or cities, 
 or country, they laid the sick in the streets, and besought 
 him that ^ they might touch if it were but the «• Matt. ix. 20. 
 border of his garment: and as many as touched Actsxix.'i2.* 
 
 11 him were made whole. * ^^' ^^' 
 
 54. "When they were come out of the ship, straightway they 
 [the men of that place] (Matt.), knew him ; . . . those that 
 were sick, where they heard he was." All this took place the day 
 on which He lands, and the day before He was found, by those 
 who had pursued Him, in the synagogue of Capernaum. He 
 probably landed some way beyond Capernaum, but His arrival was 
 soon discovered. This seems implied in the words of St. Matthew: 
 " When the men of that place had knowledge of him." 
 
 55. " Where they heard he was." This seems to imply that He 
 did not go at once to Capernaum, but continued, perhaps a day, in 
 the neighbourhood. 
 
 56. "And whithersoever He entered . . . were made whole." 
 As this is the first time we read of the touching of His garment as 
 a recognized means of receiving healing, it is probable that it took 
 its rise from the report of the blessing which the woman had 
 received who had endeavoured in this way to snatch a secret cure. 
 
 T 
 
 CHAP. YII. 
 
 HEN ^ came together unto him the Phari- ^ Matt. xv. 1. 
 
 1. " Then came together unto him the Pharisees . . . Jerusa- 
 lem." From the Greek word used to express "came together," 
 Lange supposes that this meeting was of the nature of an ecclesias- 
 
138 UNWASHEN HANDS. [St. Mark. 
 
 sees, and certain of the scribes, which came from Jeru- 
 salem. 
 
 2 And when they saw some of his disciples eat bread with 
 II Or, common. || defiled, that is to say, with unwashen, hands, 
 they found fault. 
 
 1, 2. "Which came from Jerusalem. And when they saw some of his disciples eat 
 bread." The Revisers, following N, B., L., and one Cursive (33) read, "Which had come 
 from Jerusalem, and had seen that some of his disciples ate their bread," &c. ; but A,, D., 
 later Uncials, and most Cui'sives as in Rec. Text. 
 
 " They found fault." So some later Uncials, most Cursives, and Syriac ; but X, A,, B., 
 E., G-., H., L., and many Cursives omit. Old Latin and Vulg., Vituperaveruyit. 
 
 tical investigation — " an official interference of the Sanhedrim with 
 our Lord." Olshausen and most others, however, see no such 
 marked official action. The Pharisees, we must remember, were 
 a religious sect, or school, rather than an authorized public legal 
 corporation. 
 
 "And when they saw some of his disciples eat bread," &c. 
 " Some of his disciples," apparently not all. Some out of a body 
 of twelve would be less scrupulous about such matters than others. 
 
 "With defiled, that is to say, with unwashen hands." Defiled, 
 i.e., not ceremonially cleansed, literally "common." Thus St. Peter 
 says (Acts x. 14) with reference to the eating of animals forbidden 
 in the Levitical law, " Not so, Lord, for I have never eaten any- 
 thing that is common or unclean." 
 
 It is to be noticed that the explanation of the word " common" 
 or "unwashen " is thrown in for the benefit of the Eoman Gentile 
 Christians, at whose immediate instance St. Mark wrote this Gospel. 
 The same applies to the fuller explanation of Jewish ceremonial 
 ablutions in the following verses. These washings, it must be 
 remembered, were not done for the sake of cleanliness, but as 
 religious observances over and above what the Law had com- 
 manded. 
 
 " They found fault." These words are not in the great majority 
 of the older Uncial MSS. If they are to be omitted the two verses 
 should be read, " And there were gathered together unto him [the] 
 Pharisees, and certain of the Scribes, which had come from Jerusa- 
 lem, and had seen that some of His disciples ate bread with defiled, 
 that is, unwashen hands. For the Pharisees," &c. ; and then, after 
 the parenthesis which sets forth the Jewish ceremonial washing in 
 
Chap. VIL] HOLDING THE TRADITION. 139 
 
 3 For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, except thej wash 
 their hands || oft, eat not, holding the tradition "g^J'/^'^.'^nthe 
 of the elders. T^'^'J'f^' ^l^'' 
 
 thejist : Theo- 
 
 4 And when they come from the market, except phyiaLt, up to 
 
 "^ ^ the elbow. 
 
 3. " Oft." See below and also margin. 
 
 verses 3 and 4, the thread is resumed at verse 5 : " And the 
 Pharisees and Scribes ask him," &c. 
 
 3. *' For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, except they wash their 
 hands oft," &c. "All the Jews "are mentioned to show that the Phari- 
 sees were the leaders in this ultra ceremonialism, and that the whole 
 body of the Jews had been influenced by them to conform to it. 
 
 "Wash their hands oft," or, as the margin has it, " diligently," 
 or, in the original, "with the fist." Immense difficulty has been 
 made of this expression "with the fist." One commentary now 
 before me has three large closely-printed pages upon it ; but I con- 
 fess I cannot see any, or at least very little difficulty, in the matter. 
 The ceremonial rule was that they were not merely to dip their 
 fingers into the water, but to dip in both hands, and first to rub one 
 hand with the other hand doubled up, or clenched, and then the 
 second with the first. That the Pharisees should have prescribed 
 this particularity is only in accordance with all their system of 
 making rules about trifles. Of course the first marginal reading 
 " diligently," expresses the idea of the requirement. 
 
 The excess to which these regulations were carried is well illus- 
 trated by a tradition respecting one Eabbi Akaba, the abettor of 
 Barchocab's rebellion, who, in his dungeon, being driven by a pit- 
 tance of water to the alternative of neglecting ablution or dying 
 with thirst, preferred death to failing in ceremonious observance. 
 (From " Notes on the Gospels," by F. M.) The Vulgate, which our 
 authorized translation on this point follows, has crehro, "frequently ;" 
 the Syriac, " carefully ; " but the true reading is undoubtedly " with 
 the fist." 
 
 " Holding the tradition of the elders." This tradition was 
 asserted, most falsely, to have been handed down from the time of 
 Moses, but its germs even could not well have been earlier than the 
 time of the Captivity — as I have shown in notes on St. Matthew. 
 
 4. " And when they come from the market, except they wash," 
 &c. " Except they wash." The word is, except they baptize them- 
 
140 THE WASHING OF GUPS. [St. Mark. 
 
 they wash, they eat not. And many other things there be, 
 which they have received to hold, as the washing of cnps, 
 p Sextariusis and 11 Dots, hrasen vessels, and of 11 tables. 
 
 about a pint k h 
 
 and an half. 5 ^ Then the Pharisees and scribes asked him, 
 
 b Matt^ XV. 2. ^^J walk not thy disciples according to the tra- 
 dition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashen 
 hands ? 
 6 He answered and said unto them. Well hath Esaias 
 
 4. " Except they wash." Literally, " Unless they be baptized or bathe." 
 
 " Of tables." So A., D., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., SjTiac, 
 
 &c, ; but A., B., L., A omit. 
 6. " With unwashen hands." So A., L., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin 
 
 (b, c, f), Syriac; but N*, B., D., and five Cursives (1, 28, 33, 118, 209), Old Latin (a, i, 
 
 &c.), Vulg., and some versions read, " With common hands." 
 
 selves, or bathe themselves. It is difficult to believe that all such 
 Jews as did business^in market-places should have been obliged to 
 take a complete bath afterwards. In fact, taking into consideration 
 the rainless state of Palestine during much of the year, it seems im- 
 possible, and so this can only mean, unless they cleanse themselves 
 more thoroughly. 
 
 The washing of cups, and pots, and brasen vessels." The cup 
 (poterion) was a drinking vessel ; the pot [xestes, corrupted from the 
 Latin sextuarnis), holding above a pint, was a vessel for holding or 
 measuring fluids ; the brazen vessel {calcion), probably a cauldron. 
 It is to be remembered that this washing which is here noticed was 
 over and above all washing of these objects for the sake of cleanli- 
 ness or health : it was strictly ceremonial or quasi-religious. 
 
 " And of tables." If the word represented by this " tables " be a 
 part of the original text, it must mean couches, or the furniture on 
 which the guests reclined. It cannot mean such tables as we have. 
 
 5. *' Then the Pharisees and scribes asked him .... unwashen 
 hands." We know that, on a later occasion, a Pharisee marvelled 
 that our Lord "had not first washed before dinner." So we 
 cannot but gather from this that on the present occasion only some 
 of the disciples had eaten without the customary ablutions. Other- 
 wise His enemies would not have been slow to charge the Lord 
 Himself. 
 
 6, 7. "He answered and said . . . teaching for doctrines the 
 
CiiAP. VII.] IN VAIN DO THEY WORSHIP ME. 141 
 
 proj)liesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, " This -people 
 lionouretli me with their lips, but their heart is <= is. xxix. 13. 
 
 » /. Matt. XV. 8. 
 
 lar irom me. 
 
 7 Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching /or doc- 
 trines the commandments of men. 
 
 8 For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the 
 tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups : and many 
 other such like things ye do. 
 
 8. "As the washing of pots and cups: and many other," &c. So A., later Uncials 
 almost all Cursives, Vulg., Syriac, Old Latin, and versions ; but omitted by H, B., L., A 
 a few Cursives, and Coptic. 
 
 commandments of men." Our Lord here quotes, not the Hebrew, 
 but the Septuagint : " Well, (that is, admirably,) hath Esaias pro- 
 phesied of you hypocrites. As it is written, * This people honoureth 
 me,' " &c. It is the very essence of hypocrisy in religion to render 
 to God an outward or lip service, while the heart is not His. And 
 the quotation goes on : " In vain do they worship me " — that is, 
 their worship, such as it is, is unaccepted by Me, because they 
 teach doctrines which are not My commands, but the commands 
 of men which overload, and obscure, and make void My 
 commands. 
 
 It has been asked whether Isaiah had prophetically in his mind 
 the Pharisees of our Lord's day, to which it may be answered, forms 
 of sin and evil continually repeat themselves and reappear. The 
 prophecy in Isaiah exactly describes the hypocritical or Pharisaic 
 mind, substituting the merest and most meaningless external forms 
 for internal purity and heart devotion, and so teaching the doctrines 
 and commandments of men that there is no room for the jjure word 
 of God. Olshausen has a very suggestive remark : " The whole 
 Old Testament history was prophetic of Christ, and of those around 
 Him, in this respect, that everywhere, in the continually recurring 
 contest between light and darkness, between truth and error, there 
 were displayed the types of that which, in its highest energy, 
 developed itself in and around Christ." 
 
 8,9. "For laying aside the commandment of God . . . keep 
 your own tradition.'* The extent to which the Pharisaic Jews 
 went, in exalting their own traditions above the written words, 
 seems incredible. One saying was, the Scriptures are like " water : " 
 
142 IT IS COKBAN. [St. Mark. 
 
 9 And he said unto them, Full well ye || reject the com- 
 U Or, frustrate, mandment of God, that ye may keep your own 
 
 tradition, 
 d Ex. XX. 12. 10 For Moses said, ^ Honour thy father and 
 
 Matt! XV. 4. thy mother ; and, ^ Whoso curseth father or 
 Lev^"xx^9. " mother, let him die the death : 
 Piov. XX. 20. 21 But ye say. If a man shall say to his father 
 
 f Matt. XV. 5. or mother. It is ^ Corban, that is to say, a gift, by 
 
 whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me ; he 
 
 shall he free. 
 12 And ye suffer him no more to do ought for his father 
 or his mother ; 
 
 12. " And." So A., later Uncials, most Cursives, Vulg., Syriac ; but omitted by N, B., 
 D., some Cursives, Old Latin, and Coptic. 
 
 the jMishna — i.e., the text or body of the traditions, after they 
 were committed to writing — is as " wine ; " the Gemara — i.e., the 
 comment on the Mishna, embodying still more blasphemous absur- 
 dities — is as " spiced wine." Mr. Nicholson gives a passage out of 
 Lightfoot, quoting from the Jerusalem Talmud, "out of infinite ex- 
 amples which we meet in their writings," the following : " The 
 words of the scribes are lovely, above the words of the Law : for the 
 words of the Law (of Moses) are weighty and light, but the words 
 of the scribes are all weighty." And, again : " The words of the 
 elders are weightier than the words of the prophets." It is, how- 
 ever, improbable that they went to such depths of blasphemy in 
 our Lord's time. It was after their rejection of Him that they were 
 wholly given over to such a reprobate mind. In their case, the 
 latter -part of this prophetic utterance of Isaiah, as read in the 
 Septuagint, seems to have been most literally fulfilled, both in their 
 temporal and spiritual punishment : " Therefore, behold, I will 
 proceed to remove this people, and I will remove them. And I will 
 destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will hide the understanding of 
 the prudent." 
 
 10, 11, 12. *' For Moses said, Honour thy father and thy mother 
 . . . his father or his mother." This j)lace is somewhat obscured 
 by the insertion of the words, in italics, " he shall be free," with 
 the copula, "and," in verses 11 and 12. The meaning is plainer, 
 
Chap. VII.] YOUR TRADITION. 1 43 
 
 13 Making the word of Grod of none effect through yonr 
 tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like 
 things do ye. 
 
 if we read and expound it thus : If a man shall say to his father or 
 mother, " Whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me, whatever 
 income or allowance I ought to make for thy support, or whatever 
 gift I ought, as a son, to give thee, is corban — i. e., dedicated to the 
 temple service, and to be put into the treasury ; " then, no matter 
 how hastily or rashly he has said this, the vow is registered against 
 him: "Ye suffer him no more to do ought for his father or his 
 mother." The moment it rises up in his mind to give anything to 
 his father, the vow intervenes, and stays his hand. He need not 
 actually pay the money into the temple treasury, he may keep it 
 in his own possession, or spend it on himself; but the only person 
 to whom he is not to give it, is his father. 
 
 The reader will not fail to notice how the Lord here lays His 
 finger on the fifth commandment, and upholds its authority. H& 
 was subject to His earthly parent and her husband (Luke ii. 51), 
 and it was His meat and drink to do the will of His Heavenly 
 Father, and to finish His work (John iv. 34). 
 
 13. " Making the word of God of none effect by your traditions 
 . . . do ye." "Many such hke things do ye." Through their 
 traditions, they made the Sabbath a burden ; through their tradi- 
 tions, they inverted the relative obligation of oaths (Matt, sxiii. 
 16-22) ; through their traditions, they allowed frequent divorces, 
 and so destroyed the sanctity of marriage (Matt. xix. 3). 
 
 It may be well, now, to restate shortly, in other words, some of 
 the leading x)oints of my note in St. Matthew on Christian tradition, 
 or what is so called, as distinguished from Jewish. 
 
 The traditions of the Jews — i.e., the traditions of the elders or 
 rabbis, were all, without exception, the product of the later ages of 
 the Jewish dispensation in the time of its decay and fall, when it 
 was at its worst ; whereas the opinions and practices, which are 
 invidiously called traditions in these days, i.e., the opinions and 
 practices of the earliest Fathers of the Christian Church, are th& 
 products of the earliest ages of the Christian Eeligion, when it was 
 at its best, and was least contaminated with the influence of the 
 world from without, and kept most pure by godly discipline from 
 within. The opinions of the Fathers on the interpretation of 
 
144 HEARKEN UNTO ME EVERY ONE. [St. Mark. 
 
 14 ^ ^ And wlien he liad called all the people unto him, 
 g Matt. XV. 10. he said unto them, Hearken unto me every one 
 of you, and understand : 
 
 15 There is nothing from without a man that entering 
 into him can defile him : but the things which come out of 
 him, those are they that defile the man. 
 
 u Matt. xi. 15. 16 ^ If any man have ears to hear, let him hear. 
 
 14. " All the people." So A., later Uncials, most Cursives, Syriac (Schaff ) ; but N, 
 B., D., L., A, Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic read. The people again ("called the people 
 Again "). 
 
 16. "If any man," &c. So A., D., later Uncials, most Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., and 
 versions ; but H, B., L., and Coptic omit the verse. 
 
 Scripture, when they can be ascertained, are far more likely to be 
 in accord with the real meaning of the words of the Apostles than 
 any opinions or practices of later ages, whether so-called Catholic 
 or BO-called Protestant. It is on these principles that the Refor- 
 mation of the Church of England was brought about, retaining 
 what was early and primitive, and rejecting what was merely 
 mediaeval, no matter how far-spread, as the denial of the cup to the 
 laity. 
 
 14. " And when he had called all the people . . . understand." 
 Compared with the parallel passage of St. Matthew (xv. 10), these 
 words evince far more earnestness on the Lord's part that all the 
 people should hear and receive this His saying, for by it He once 
 and for ever distinguishes between ceremonial and personal religion. 
 And so in a matter of such moment He summons all the people, 
 and says to them, "Hearken unto Me every one of you (for it con- 
 cerns you all), and understand." 
 
 15. "There is nothing from without a man . . . the man." 
 This saying of the Lord's contains a principle or rule of the widest 
 application. "It is," as Quesnel writes, "a rule of great impor- 
 tance and full of instruction and comfort to souls which seek God, 
 that no sin or spiritual defilement can arise from anything but the 
 will, as nothing sanctifies our food but the word of God, and prayer 
 from the heart renewed by grace. Whatever i)roceeds from the 
 desire of an impure heart is evil, and whatever does not, cannot 
 but be good. It is not that which enters into the mouth which de- 
 files even him who sins in eating and drinking to excess, but the 
 
CiiAP. VII.] ARE YE WITHOUT UNDERSTANDING? 145 
 
 17 ^And when lie was entered into the house from the 
 people, his discij^les asked him concerning the » Matt. xv. 15. 
 parable. 
 
 18 And he saith nnto them, Are ye so without under- 
 standing also ? Do ye not perceive, that whatsoever thing 
 from without entereth into the man, it cannot defile him ; 
 
 19 Because it entereth not into his heart, but into the 
 belly, and goeth out into the draught, purging all meats ? 
 
 19. " Purginpf." Properly, " cleansing," This participle is in the mascnline gender in 
 S, A., B., E., F., G., H., L,, some Cursives, and a quotation from Origen in Tischendorf; 
 K., M., and most Cui'sives, as in Ree, Text, 
 
 will and disposition of the heart, which inclines hira to trangress 
 the Divine Law." 
 
 17, 18, " And when he was entered ... it cannot defile him." 
 This is one of the many places which show us the enormous difi"e- 
 rence made in men's knowledge of spiritual things by the coming 
 of the Saviour and the descent of the Spirit. It seems incredible 
 that the Apostles should consider the words of the Saviour in 
 which He speaks of nothing from without defiling a man, as a 
 parable — that is, a dark saying, which required exx:)lanation. Even 
 if they had in their minds the Levitical law of meats, they should 
 have seen — if they had any spiritual perception — that if a man 
 transgressed this law unwittingly, that is, if by mistake or accident 
 he ate of some unclean animal, he could not be morally defiled, and 
 that if a man transgressed the law of meats willingly to gratify his 
 appetite, it was his evil will, which had its rise in his heart, which 
 really defiled him. To take the strongest conceivable case, it was 
 not any physical property of the forbidden frait which defiled 
 Adam and his descendants, but it was the evil will, which, con- 
 trary to God's will, made him desire to be as a god, and plunged 
 him and all his descendants into sin. 
 
 19. " Because it entereth not into his heart . . . purging all 
 meats." No food, of course, can enter into the heart, and our 
 Lord is upon the subject of the defilement occasioned by meats ; but 
 temptations to sin from Satan or from our fellows come from with- 
 out, and by assenting to them or harbouring them, they may defile 
 us, but even in this case the real defilement is in our own evil 
 assent — in other words, in our will. The outer defiling word or sug- 
 
 L 
 
146 EVIL THOUGHTS. [St. Mark. 
 
 20 And he said, That which cometh out of the man, that 
 defileth the man. 
 
 k Gen. vi. 5. & 21 ^ For from within, out of the heart of men, 
 xv.*i9.' " proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, 
 murders, 
 
 gestion is like a seed which finds corrupt ground in the soul iu 
 which it can germinate. 
 
 ** Purging all meats." The translation " purging " is exceedingly 
 misleading. It really signifies " cleansing." It is commonly 
 taken as alluding to the process by which the meat which enters 
 into the body by the mouth is, by the process of digestion, which 
 takes place within the body, separated, or purged from all useless 
 particles, which are received into the sewer or drain, and those only 
 which can be converted into blood are retained. In this case the 
 participle "cleansing," is in the neuter. But the best manuscripts 
 read it in the masculine gender, in which case it refers to the Lord 
 Himself, and the words which He was then uttering. These words 
 uttered by Him as the supreme Lawgiver abrogated all distinctions 
 between meats as clean and unclean, and made from that moment 
 all equally clean. 
 
 Chrysostom takes it in this sense. In his comment on the 
 parallel place in St. Matthew, he refers to these words of St. Mark, 
 *' Mark saith, He spake this cleansing the meats." So that this was 
 ihe cleansing alluded to by the voice from heaven in Acts x. 15, 
 " What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common." 
 
 21. " For from within, out of the heart proceed evil thoughts," 
 &c. Notice how evil thoughts are by the Saviour said to be the 
 first of the evil things which, coming out of the heart, defile. We 
 bhould not, I think, have put evil thoughts amongst the things 
 which come out of the heart, because we suppose them to be 
 in the heart. But is not what the Saviour says true of that 
 which He alone knows — the very nature and substance of the 
 soul ? In its very centre, or close to its centre, the evil has its 
 root or fountain. The evil suggestion arises, and then the will 
 or affection takes notice of it. If the will is right with God, it 
 immediately puts out the evil thing as if it were a loathsome 
 reptile, but if the will be not right with God, it harbours the first 
 suggestion of evil, it cogitates it, thinks it over and over, dwells 
 upon it in imagination, chews the food of the evil fancy, desires to 
 
Chap. VII.] THESE EVIL THINGS DEFILE. 147 
 
 22 Thefts, f covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lascivious- 
 ness, an evil eye, blaspheniy, pride, foolisliness : t Gr. covetous- 
 
 23 All these evil things come from within, and iiesses'. 
 defile the man. 
 
 24 % ^ And from thence he arose, and went into ' Matt. xr. 21. 
 
 do the evil deed, resolves to do it, and so has already done it in 
 the heart. So that out of the heart;, out of the unseen and un- 
 thinkable depths within, proceed the evil thoughts which become 
 evil acts within before they are incarnated, as it were, in some evil 
 deed without. 
 
 The word emx)loyed by the Saviour certainly implies more than 
 sudden or chance thoughts. It even means reasonings put into 
 words, whereby we unsettle the faith of one another (thus Luke 
 ix. 46, Kom. xiv. 1). 
 
 Of all evils, we account evil thoughts the least. "What ! thoughts 
 defile a man ? What, so light a matter as thoughts ? Can they 
 make any impression ? Yes, and defile a man too, leaving such a 
 spot behind as nothing but the hot blood of Christ can wash away." 
 (Archbp. Usher, quoted in Ford.) 
 
 It is to be particularly noted that, according to St. Mark, the 
 Saviour sj)ecifies many additional evil things defiling the man, 
 which are not mentioned in St. Matthew's account, viz., covetous- 
 ness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, 
 XDride, foolishness. How few think that covetousness, or deceit, or 
 an evil eye, i.e., envy, defile ! Christian people who pronounce these 
 things wrong would hesitate to say that they clpfile; and how few, 
 how very few, would allow that pride defiles ! and yet the Saviour 
 enumerates covetousness and pride among such defiling things as 
 fornication and lasciviousness. Well may the wise man say, " Keep 
 thy heart with all dihgence, for out of it are the issues of life" 
 (Prov. iv. 23). Well may we say to God in daily worship, " God, 
 make clean our hearts within us, and take not Thy Holy Spirit 
 from us." Surely it was a man after God's own heart who said, 
 " Try me, O God, and seek the ground of my heart, prove me and 
 examine my thoughts. Look well if there be any way of wickedness 
 in me, and lead me in the way everlasting " (Ps. cxxxix. 23, 24). 
 
 24. " And from thence he arose. . . . He could not be hid." Not 
 to Tyre and Sidon themselves, but into the coasts or borders, the 
 
148 HE COULD NOT BE HID. [St. Mark. 
 
 the borders of Tyre and Sidon, and entered into an house, 
 and would have no man know it : but he could not be hid. 
 
 25 For a certain woman, whose young daughter had an 
 imclean spirit, heard of him, and came and fell at his feet : 
 
 24. "And Sidon." So N, A., B., N., all later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin 
 (c, f), Vulg., Coptic, Syriac, and some versions; only D., L., Cursive 28, and some Old 
 Latin (a, b, flF) omit. Notwithstanding the apparently enormous preponderance in favour 
 of the reading, Tischendorf omits it, and Westcott and Hort mark it as doubtful by 
 putting it in brackets. 
 
 parts adjacent. From this verse we learn that He did not go into 
 these parts to preach, and to do miracles, for He endeavoured to 
 keep Himself in retirement, otherwise it would not have been said, 
 " He could not be hid." 
 
 For what purpose then did He take this journey ? It could only 
 have been for one. He saw that there was one hving in these parts 
 whom He could set forth to all after ages as an extraordinaiy ex- 
 ample of persevering faith. To call forth such faith, and to show 
 it to His disciples, so that they should have it deeply impressed 
 upon them, and should afterwards embody it in the tradition which 
 was the groundwork of the written Gospels, in two of which it 
 should in due time be embodied, and be read now as an example 
 for all ages, to show them what difficulties true faith can conquer — 
 this was worth the journey in the sight of the Son of God. 
 
 25. " For a certain woman . . . cast forth the devil out of her 
 daughter." From St. Matthew's account we should gather that 
 she accosted first Himself, and then the body of the disciples as they 
 passed on the road. From St. Mark, that she came and fell at 
 His feet when He was seeking retirement in a house. St. Mark 
 says nothing about the request of the Apostles to the Lord to grant 
 her prayer, " Send her away, for she crietli after us." It is just 
 possible that St. Peter was for some reason not in the company of 
 the Apostles when they preferred this request. 
 
 " She was a Greek, a Syrophenician by nation." That is, she 
 was not only a Gentile, and so out of the pale of God's covenanted 
 mercies, but of a race accursed beyond all others, a descendant of 
 one of those nations whom God commanded His people to exter- 
 minate. 
 
 " Whose daughter had an unclean spirit." From her words as 
 recorded in St. Matthew, " My daughter is grievously vexed with a 
 
CiiAP. VII.] A SYROPHENICIAN. 149 
 
 26 Tlie woman was a || G-reek, a Syroplienician by nation ; 
 and she besought him that he wonld cast forth |i Or, Centue. 
 the devil out of her daughter. 
 
 27 But Jesus said unto her, Let the children first be filled : 
 for it is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it 
 unto the dogs. 
 
 devil," we should gather that this jDOSsession was attended with 
 violent paroxysms. 
 
 " And she besought him that he would cast forth." From St. 
 Matthew we learn that she appealed to Him as Son of David. 
 From this we should infer that she was not altogether ignorant 
 of the Messianic hopes of the Jews, and that they looked for some 
 mighty deliverer who should be a Son of David. 
 
 27. " But Jesus said unto her, "Let the children first be filled," 
 &c. This was her third repulse. First, when she accosted Him, 
 even as Son of David, He answered her not a word (Matth. xv. 23). 
 Then when the disciples besought Him, He said, "I am not sent 
 but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel," and now He answers 
 still more strangely, "Let the children first be filled : for it is not 
 meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it unto the dogs." This 
 was indeed the severest trial of her faith, but as the Lord foresaw, 
 it came forth as the " silver purified seven times in the fire." The 
 one great lesson we learn from this is, that the truest faith is the 
 humblest. "Would not any of us, if we had heard such words, have 
 started and shrank away, or in wrath returned bitter words ? It 
 would have been human nature so to do ; but this woman must 
 have been a humble behever in the one true God. She must have 
 realized that it was in wisdom and justice, and perhaps too, even 
 in far-seeing mercy, that the God of Israel had, till then, made 
 Himself known to one race only, and had so shut out others from the 
 knowledge of Himself, that, compared with those who knew or could 
 know Him, they were as a lower order of creatures. This is akin to 
 what the Psalmist says in describing the exaltation of those to whom 
 the Word of God came, " I have said, ye are Gods, and ye are all the 
 children of the Most Highest" (Ps.lxxxii. 6, John x.34, 35). TheLord 
 Himself in His pre-existent state, as the Giver of the Mosaic Law, had 
 constituted this difference between His people and all other nations ; 
 and within a very short time from this He was about to " break down 
 
150 THE DOGS UNDER THE TABLE. [St. Mark. 
 
 28 And slie answered and said unto liim, Yes, Lord : yet 
 the dogs under the table eat of the children's crumbs. 
 
 28. " Yes, Lord : yet the dogs," &c. See below for translations of Revisers. So Vulg., 
 Utique, domine! nam et catelli. 
 
 the wall of partition," and to reconcile all to His Father in One 
 Body on His Cross, but till this took place He respected the require- 
 ments of the system of which He Himself had been the Author. 
 He went not into the way of the Gentiles to teach and to heal ; 
 when He crossed the sea, to land for a short time on heathen soil, 
 it was to heal but one possessed man. All this state of things was 
 shortly to cease, but it had not yet ceased, and so here, for the last 
 time. He asserted the ancient exclusion ; and yet, all through. He 
 was secretly upholding the faith of this poor creature, so that she 
 should knock the more importunately at the seemingly closed door, 
 and cause that it should be opened to her, and receive as her reward 
 not only the salvation of her daughter, but that everywhere where the 
 Gospel is preached what she had done should be spoken of as a me- 
 morial of her. But even this is not all. As Keble reminds us in 
 his wonderful sermon on this woman's faith, " We adopt her lan- 
 guage in the deepest prayer of our Eucharistic Service. There we 
 are taught by the Church to confess that we are not worthy so 
 much as to gather up the crumbs under God's Table ; and yet, at the 
 same time we ask for the highest blessing He can give — that our sin- 
 ful bodies may be made clean by His Body, and our souls washed 
 through His most precious blood, and that we may ever more dwell 
 in Him, and He in us." (" Sermons for the Christian Year," 
 vol. iv. Sermon xiv. I desire very earnestly to commend this sermon 
 to the reader, so that he should make some endeavour to become 
 acquainted with its contents.) 
 
 28. " And she answered and said unto him, Yes, Lord .... 
 children's crumbs." The translation of this in the Eevised version, 
 brings out more fully the real meaning. " Yea, Lord, even the dogs 
 under the table eat of the children's crumbs." Upon this Arch- 
 bishop Trench remarks : " She accepts the Lord's declaration, not 
 immediately to make exception against the conclusion which He 
 draws from it, but to show how, in that very declaration, is involved 
 the granting of her petition. ' Saidest Thou dogs ? It is well : I 
 accept the title and the place : for the dogs have a portion of the 
 
Chap. VII.] FOR THIS SAYING GO THY WAY. 151 
 
 29 And lie said unto her, For this saying go thy way ; the 
 devil is gone out of thy daughter. 
 
 meal, not the first, not the children's, but a portion still, the 
 crumbs which fall from the master's table. In this very statement 
 of the case thou bringest us heathen, thou bringest me within the 
 circle of the blessings which God the great Householder is ever dis- 
 pensing to His family. We also belong to His household, though 
 we occupy but the lowest place in it. According to Thine own 
 showing I am not wholly an alien, and, therefore, I will abide by 
 this name, and will claim from Thee all which is included in it.' " 
 
 29. "And he said unto her, For this saying go thy way," &c. 
 The full words of the Lord (as reported in the two Evangelists) 
 were, " Oh, woman, great is thy faith ; be it unto thee even as thou 
 wilt. For this saying go thy way : the devil is gone out of thy 
 daughter." Truly it may be said of her, "With the heart she believed, 
 and with the mouth she made confession unto salvation." Quesnel 
 remarks, " How great comfort is it to a Christian mother, when 
 God is pleased at last to grant to her prayers the salvation of a 
 daughter possessed with the spirit of the world ! " ^ 
 
 ^ Keble also, in the sermon to which I have just alluded, makes 
 a still closer application. "The woman's daughter was 'vexed 
 with an unclean spirit.' Poor creature ! she was like thousands 
 more who grow up and go on in uncleanness till they are quite 
 possessed with it as with a bad and fallen angel. They feel as if 
 they could not help themselves, so entirely subject have they be- 
 come to evil lust, ' The law in their members warring against the 
 law of their mind.' ' Having eyes full of adultery, and that cannot 
 cease from sin.' God help them, poor creatures, against the great 
 enemy ! May God touch and turn their hearts, for vain is the help 
 of man. But then, the less you can do for them, the more you 
 should pray for them. The woman of Canaan could, of herself, do 
 nothing for her child, but this one thing she could do, she could 
 find out Jesus, and pray to Him, and this she did with all her 
 might. She prayed and prayed, and by-and-by came the answer. 
 Will 3'^ou do the same for any friend or kinsman of yours whom you 
 believe or fear to be Hving in uncleanness? Try! it will be the 
 least you can do, but it will prove a great thing if you try in 
 earnest." 
 
152 THE EVIL SPIRIT EXPELLED. [St. Mark. 
 
 30 And when slie was come to her house, she found the 
 devil gone out, and her daughter laid upon the bed. 
 
 As in all probability extremely few of those who read these 
 notes will possess the Biblical Commentary of Olshausen on the 
 Gospels, I will conclude my remarks on this miracle with a 
 passage from him of remarkable power, which sums up its teaching : 
 "This little narrative lays open the magic that lies in a humbly 
 believing heart more dhectly and deeply than all explanations or 
 descriptions would do. Faith and humility are so intimately at 
 one, that neither can exist without the other, both act as by a 
 magic spell on the unseen world of the spirit, they draw the 
 heavenly essence itself down into the earthly. In this case faith is 
 again obviously seen, not as knowledge, not as the upholding of 
 certain doctrines for true, but an internal state of the mind — the 
 tenderest susceptibility for what is heavenly — the most entire 
 womanhood of the soul." And respecting our Lord's seeming 
 severity he remarks : " It would seem as if He Who knew what was 
 in man (John ii. 25) must have been constrained at once to help 
 this woman, as her faith could not have been concealed from Him, 
 and even though, for wise reasons, He was led to confine His 
 ministry to the Jews, yet as in other instances He made excexotions 
 (comp. on Matt. viii. 10), so might He have done in her case at 
 once, without laying on her the burden of His severity .... It 
 is Christian experience alone which opens our way to the right 
 understanding of this. As God Himself is compared by our Lord 
 to an unjust judge who often turns away the well-grounded suppli- 
 cation (Luke xviii. 32), as the Lord wrestles with Jacob at Jacob's 
 ford, and thus exalts him to be Israel (Gen. xxxii. 24), as He seeks 
 to kill Moses, who was destined to deliver his people (Exod. iv. 21), 
 so faith often in its experience finds that 'the heaven is of brass,' 
 and seems to despise its prayers. A similar mode of dealing is here 
 exhibited by the Saviour. The restraining of His grace, the mani- 
 festation of a treatment wholly different from what the woman 
 may at first have expected, acted as a check usually does on power, 
 when it really exists : the whole inherent energy of her living faith 
 broke forth, and the Saviour suffered Himself to be overcome by 
 her as He had when wrestling with Jacob. In this mode then of 
 Christ's giving an answer to prayer we are to trace only another 
 
Chap. Vir.] ONE THAT WAS DEAF. 153- 
 
 31 ^'^And again, departing from the coasts of Tyre and 
 Sidon, lie came unto the sea of G-alilee, througli » Matt, xv, 29. 
 the midst of the coasts of Decapolis. 
 
 32 And ^ they bring unto him one that was « Matt. ix. 32, 
 deaf, and had an impediment in his speech ; and 
 
 they beseech him to put his hand upon him. 
 
 31. " Departing from the coasts of Tj-re and Sidon, he came unto the sea of Galilee," 
 &c. So A., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Syriac, and some versions ; but .V, B., D., 
 L., A, Cursive 33, Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic, ^thiopic read, " From the coasts of Tyre 
 he came through Sidon unto," &c. 
 
 form of His love. Where faith is weak, He anticipates and comes 
 to meet it ; where faith is strong, He holds Himself far off in order 
 that it may in itself be carried to perfection." 
 
 31. " And again, dex3arting from the coasts . . . coasts of Deca- 
 polis." The following miracle is peculiar to St. Mark. Not being 
 related in either SS. Matthew or Luke, it seems to have not been 
 embodied in the original tradition of the Lord's life. May not this 
 be accounted for if we suppose that when the Lord took the man 
 aside, only Peter, and James, and John were witnesses of the 
 miracle, and not the whole body of the Apostles ? 
 
 " Departing from the coasts . . . Decapolis." Whether we read 
 with the Authorized or with the Vulgate (departing from the 
 borders of Tyre, he came through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee 
 through the midst of the coasts of Decapolis), the Lord, in either 
 case, made a considerable circuit through a heathen region to get 
 back to the Galilean Sea. Of the incidents of this journey we are 
 told nothing, so that it is not at all likely that in making it He 
 either preached to the x^eople or healed those that were sick. 
 
 32. "And they bring unto him one that was deaf." "Had an 
 impediment in his speech." Not one absolutely dumb, as some 
 would have it, but one who spoke with difiQ.culty. 
 
 " They beseech him to put his hand upon him." It has been 
 suggested by some (among them L Williams) that this request 
 arose from imperfect belief. The object of their petition, that He 
 would lay His hand on him, though a sacred and priestly custom, 
 yet implied less of an inherent Divine power than any other mode 
 of healing, just as on another occasion it is said that He did not many 
 miracles there because of their unbelief. " Except," adds St. Mark, 
 
154 HE TOOK HIM ASIDE. [St. Mark. 
 
 33 And lie took him aside from the multitude, and put 
 o ch. viii. 23. his fins^ers into his ears, and ^ he spit, and touched 
 
 John ix. 6. . ^ ^ 
 
 his tonofue : 
 
 "that He laid His hands on a few sick folk" — a customary 
 action, too, among the pro^^hets, which Naaman the Syrian ex- 
 pected of Elisha. 
 
 33. " And he took him aside from the multitude, and put . . . 
 and he spit, and touched his tongue." " There must be a deep 
 meaning in all the variations which mark the healings of diffe- 
 rent sick and afflicted ones, a wisdom of God ordering all the cir- 
 cumstances of each particular cure. Were we acquainted as 
 accurately as He Who ' knew what was in man ' with the spiritual 
 condition of each one who was brought within the circle of His 
 grace, we should then perfectly understand why one was healed in 
 the crowd, another led out of the city ere the work of restoration 
 was commenced ; why for one a word effected a cure, for another 
 a touch, while a third was sent to wash in the pool of Siloam ' ere 
 he came seeing ; ' why for some the process of restoration was 
 instantaneous, while another ' saw men as trees walking.' Our 
 ignorance prevents us from at once seeing the manifold wisdom 
 which ordered each of His proceedings, and how it was conducted 
 so as best to make the bodily healing a passage to the spiritual 
 which the Lord had ever in His eye" (Trench). 
 
 Many reasons have been given for the Lord's thus taking the 
 man aside ; as that He wished to avoid unnecessary display, or that 
 the presence of the multitude was distracting to His own prayers, 
 and hindered the devotion with which He desired to inspire the deaf 
 man. A more ingenious reason is that being in a heathen country He 
 wished to avoid giving the slightest encouragement to superstitious 
 I^ractices, which they might have learnt if they had seen Him touch 
 the man's tongue with his finger moist with saliva ; but is it not 
 probable that this "taking aside" is most consonant with that 
 privacy in which He .desired to be all through this journey ? At the 
 beginning it is said that He could not be hid, though He evidently 
 desired it, and of this journey no public acts are recorded. 
 
 Why did the Lord put His fingers into the ears of the deaf man, 
 and spit and touch His tongue ? On two other occasions He made 
 use of spittle in healing — in the case of a blind man at Bethsaida, 
 whom He also led out of the town (Mark viii. 23), and when He 
 
Chap. VII.] HE SIGHED. 155 
 
 34 And P lookinpr up to lieaven, "^ lie siglied, and p ch. vi. 41. 
 
 ° ^ O ' John xi. 41. & 
 
 xvii. 1. 
 
 q John xi. 33, 
 
 38. 
 
 healed the man born blind (John ix. 6), and there may have been 
 many others unrecorded. There must be some significance in so 
 strange an act. I have not the least doubt that it was to empha- 
 size the truth that the healing of our whole nature proceeds from 
 His own Person. It is not an act of His power only, but an 
 emanation from His Person through its lower part, His Body. 
 Let the reader remember how He said, " Somebody hath touched 
 me, for I perceive that virtue is gone out of me." (Luke viii. 46.) 
 Ptemember also how it is said, " The whole multitude sought to 
 touch him : for there went virtue out of him and healed them all." 
 (Luke vi. 19.) 
 
 Of course there was not the least natural virtue in saliva, or in 
 any bodily contact, but the Lord had it in His Mind that we are to 
 receive healing virtue not merely from the teaching of His higher 
 or intellectual and spiritual Nature, but also from partaking of His 
 lower — His Body. The Lord's action must have been either 
 natural in the way of medical application, or mystical ; the former 
 is absolutely inadmissible, and without curiously searching, much 
 less defining, we must see the significance of such actions of His in 
 the latter. " It is not for its medicinal vu-tue that use is made of 
 this, but as the suitable symbol of a power residing in and going 
 forth from His Body." (Trench.) 
 
 34. "And looking up to heaven, he sighed." Looking up to 
 heaven, i. e., putting Himself into du'ect and open communion with 
 His Father, without "Whom He did nothing (John v. 19, 30). 
 Kemember Mark vi. 41, when He looked up before He brake the 
 loaves, and John xi. 41, before He raised Lazarus. 
 
 " He sighed," or " groaned." The reader will remember how 
 just before the raising of Lazarus, when He knew that He was 
 about to restore him to life He " groaned in the spirit." How was 
 it that He exhibited sorrow when He was on the point of im- 
 parting such joy ? It may be that these instances of relief vouch- 
 safed to His fellows, so very few in comparison with what He could 
 have performed for them if they had only believed in Him, brought 
 before His soul more feelingly the mass of misery which they repre- 
 eented, but which, owing to men's perverseness and rejection of 
 
156 EPHPHATHA. [St. Mark. 
 
 saith unto him, Ephphatha, that is, Be opened. 
 
 r Is. XXXV. 5, 35 r And straicjlitway his ears were opened, and 
 
 6. Matt. XI. 5. , . r ' 
 
 the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spake 
 
 plain. 
 • ch. T. 43. 36 And ^ he charged them that they should tell 
 
 no man : but the more he charged them, so much the more a 
 great deal they published it ; 
 
 37 And were beyond measure astonished, saying. He hath 
 
 Himself, He was not able to alleviate. Did not our great Christian 
 poet strike the true chord when he wrote, — 
 
 " O'erwhelming thoughts of pain and grief 
 
 Over His sinking spirit sweep : 
 What boots it gathering one lost leaf 
 
 Out of yon sere and withered heap, 
 Where souls and bodies, hopes and joys, 
 
 All that earth owns or sin destroys, 
 Under the spurning hoof are cast 
 
 Or tossing in the autumnal blast ? 
 
 The deaf may hear the Saviour's voice, 
 
 The fettered tongue its chain may break, 
 But the deaf heart, the dumb by choice, 
 
 The laggard soul, that will not wake, 
 The guilt that scorns to be forgiven, 
 
 These baffle e'en the spells of heaven. 
 In thought of these, ffis brows benign 
 
 Not e'en in healing cloudless shine." 
 
 " Ephphatha." How wondrously large the spiritual application 
 of these words ! They may be said to closed eyes (Psalm cxix. 18), 
 to closed ears (Isaiah 1. 4, 5), to closed lips (Psalm li. 15), to closed 
 hearts (Acts xvi. 14). Quesnel founds on them a very simple, but 
 all-embracing prayer: "0 Jesus, pronounce over mine, over the 
 hearts of sinners, and of all those who ought to hear Thee, and to 
 speak in Thy stead, these words. Be opened, and Thou shalt be forth- 
 with obej^ed." 
 
 36, 37. " And he charged them that .... deaf to hear, and the 
 
Chap. VIII.] HE HATH DONE ALL THINGS WELL. 157 
 
 done all things well : he maketh both the deaf to hear, and 
 the dumb to speak. 
 
 dumb to speak." "Why He gave such a charge on this occasion, 
 knowing that it would not be obeyed, we cannot tell. It may have 
 been because in certain cases, and this one of them, His spiritual 
 ministry of teaching and preaching was seriously hindered by the 
 crowds of those who came with no other thought than either to be 
 cured of bodily infirmities, or to gaze idly upon the performance of 
 His mighty works. "We shall know one day that, whether He for- 
 bid men to proclaim His mighty deeds of grace, or whether He 
 encouraged them so to do, " He hath done all things well." 
 
 CHAP. Yin. 
 
 IN those days ^ the multitude being very great, and having 
 nothing to eat, Jesus called his disciples unto » Matt. xv. 32. 
 Mm, and saith unto them. 
 
 1. "The multitude being very great." So A., E., F., H., K., other later Uncials, 
 most Cursives, and Syriac ; but N, B., D., G., L., M., N., fourteen or fifteen Cursives, 
 Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic, and other versions read, " There being again a great multitude." 
 
 1. "In those days the multitude being very great," &c. We 
 now come to what is called " the Second Miracle of the loaves." 
 From the fact that we have two miracles performed almost under 
 the same circumstances, and in the same manner, and the accom- 
 jianying details very much resembling one another in both cases, 
 we cannot but gather that we have here a peculiar phase of Christ's 
 love and jpower presented to us, and by its repetition commended 
 very urgently to our notice, so that we should be very anxious to 
 realize all that is taught us in these two accounts. It would seem 
 at first sight impossible to do more than repeat what has been 
 before remarked on the two miracles, as related in St. Matthew, 
 and on the first one which has already been fully described in 
 St. Mark, but it is not so. "We have yet many fragments to gather 
 
158 I HAVE COMPASSION. [St. Mark. 
 
 2 I have compassion on tlie multitude, because they have 
 now been with me three days, and have nothing to eat : 
 
 3 And if I send them away fasting to their own houses, 
 they will faint by the way : for divers of them came from far. 
 
 4 And his disciples answered him, From whence can a man 
 satisfy these men with bread here in the wilderness ? 
 
 up if nothing is to be lost. In the first place, then, the Lord here 
 takes the initiative. 
 
 2. " I have com^Dassion on the multitude, because they have now 
 been with me three days," &c. In the former miracle He felt 
 equal compassion for the multitude, but did not express it. The 
 disciples urge upon Him to send them away, and then He, as it 
 were, invites them to suggest some exercise of the mighty power 
 which they had so repeatedly seen put forth by Him. But they 
 can suggest nothing except what is natural, that they should be 
 dismissed to take care of themselves. Now the Lord Himself 
 begins : " I have compassion on the multitude, they have been with 
 me three days. If I send them to their own houses, they will faint 
 by the way," &c. Here was the hint given that they should ask 
 Him to do as He had done jast before, but apparently not a thought 
 of the former mighty work presented itself. They seem to have 
 altogether forgotten it. 
 
 4. "And his disciples answered him, From whence," &c. We 
 marvel at (must not the word be said?) this stupidity, but is it not 
 natural ? This surprise arises out of our ignorance of man's heart, 
 of our own hearts, and of the deep root of unbelief therein. " It is 
 ever more thus in times of difficulty and distress. All former de- 
 liverances are in danger of being forgotten, the mighty interj)ositions 
 of God's hand in former passages of men's lives fall out of their 
 memories. Each new difficulty appears insurmountable, as one 
 from which there is no extrication ; at each recurring necessity it 
 seems as though the wonders of God's grace are exhausted, and 
 have come to an end. God may have diverted the Ked Sea for 
 Israel, yet no sooner are they on the other side than, because there 
 are no waters to drink, they murmur against Moses, and count that 
 they must perish through thirst (Exod. xvii. 1-7), crying 'Is the 
 Lord amongst us or not? ' Or, to adduce a still nearer parallel, once 
 already the Lord had covered the camp with quails (Exod. xvi. 13), 
 
Chap. VIII.] HOW MANY LOAVES HAVE YE? 15^ 
 
 5 ^ And he asked tliem, How many loaves liave ve ? And 
 they said, Seven. I ^i-'^t^- ^v. 34. 
 
 •^ ' See ch. vi. 38. 
 
 yet for all this, even Moses himself cannot believe that He will pro- 
 vide flesh for all that multitude." (Abp. Trench.) 
 
 But the backwardness of the Apostles to believe in Christ's readi- 
 ness to feed the multitudes miraculously, is in strong contrast with 
 their readiness to believe in His powers of healing. They had but 
 a short time before urged the Lord to grant the request of the Syro- 
 phenician woman, when He seemed unwilling. May it not, in 
 part, have arisen from the infrequency of this sort of miracle ? 
 As Theophylact says, *' He did not always work miracles for the 
 feeding of the multitude, lest they should follow Him for the sake- 
 offood." 
 
 And may there not be also something typical, something pro- 
 phetical, about it ? Do not many true disciples of the Lord in 
 these days, who thankfully acknowledge the Lord's power to cleanse 
 and heal, seem to have their eyes closed to the supernatural or- 
 eucharistic feeding, of which this miracle is so remarkable an 
 adumbration ? 
 
 Again, do we not learn from this miracle how Christ will exer- 
 cise acts of special providence to help and succour those who are 
 following Him ? Is there any life of a poor humble Christian which 
 does not contain some account of interpositions almost super- 
 natural in favour of those who have given up all to follow Him ? 
 Dean Hook, in a lecture on this very miracle, gives a striking one : 
 " There was an individual who gave up a profitable employment,, 
 acting under advice, and not from the mere caprice of his own 
 judgment, because he thought, taking his temptations into account, 
 he could not follow it without peril to his soul. And after many 
 reverses he was reduced to such a state of distress, that the last 
 morsel in the house had been consumed, and he had not bread to 
 give his children. His faith did not, however, forsake him ; and 
 when his distress was at the height, he received a visit from one 
 who called to pay him a debt he had never hoped to recover, but 
 the payment of which enabled him to support his family until he 
 again obtained employment." And he adds, " Many a similar tale 
 can our poorer brethren tell." 
 
 5. " And he asked them. How many loaves have ye ? " Sec. 
 This question was not for information. He knew well how many 
 
160 HE GAVE THANKS AND BRAKE. [St. Mark. 
 
 6 And lie commanded tlie people to sit down on tlie ground: 
 .-and lie took the seven loaves, and gave thanks, and brake, 
 and gave to his disciples to set before them ; and they did set 
 them before the people. 
 
 :• Matt. xiv. 7 And they had a few small fishes : and "^ he 
 
 - ' "- '^^' ■ "blessed, and commanded to set them also before 
 the7n. 
 
 they had, but he asked it that there should be no mistake about the 
 miraculous nature of the feeding. There were two more loaves and 
 a somewhat smaller multitude than on the former occasion, but 
 this does not, in the smallest degree, affect the character of the 
 mighty work. 
 
 6. "And he commanded the people to sit down on the ground," 
 .&c. From the fact that it is expressly mentioned in the account of 
 the former miracle, that there was much grass in the place, and 
 that they sat by companies on the green grass, it has been argued 
 with much probability that this second miracle took place at a much 
 later time in the year, when the grass had been dried up by the 
 scorching rays of the sun. 
 
 "And gave thanks." We have before noticed the symbolical 
 character of this " giving thanks " as foreshadowing the Eucha- 
 -ristic Benediction ; but we learn also from it a more homely lesson, 
 how that for all food, whenever received, thanks should be rendered, 
 and we also learn how we ought to be thankful for all means and 
 opportunities of doing good. The thanks of the Lord would be ten- 
 dered to His Father not only in anticipation of the actual food soon 
 to be so marvellously provided, but for the opportunity of showing 
 forth the Divine glory and power, and also of relieving the wants 
 of so many who were following Him for a good purpose. 
 
 "And gave thanks, and brake, and gave to his disciples," &c. 
 From the circumstantiality with which these details are given in 
 each of the four accounts, it is clear that there is some particular 
 lesson which the Lord and His Spirit would have us draw from 
 ■this. That lesson seems to be that the true feeding in the Church 
 of Christ is not that each man should take for himself, but that all 
 that can be called food is to be given through ministerial inter- 
 vention. 
 
 7, 8. "And they had a few small fishes .... seven baskets 
 
Chap. VIII.] SEEKING A SIGN FllOM IlExVVEN. 161 
 
 8 So tliey did eat, and were filled : and they took up of 
 the broken meat that was left seven baskets. 
 
 9 And they that had eaten were about four thousand : 
 and he sent them away. 
 
 10 ^ And ^ straightway he entered into a ship ^ Matt. xv. 39. 
 with his disciples, and came into the parts of Dal- 
 manutha. 
 
 11 "^And the Pharisees came forth, and besran ^ Matt. xn. 38. 
 
 & xvi. 1, John 
 
 to question with him, seeking of him a sign from vi. so. 
 heaven, tempting him. 
 
 9. "And they that had eaten." So A., C, D., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old 
 Latin, Vulg., Syriac, &c. ; but H, B., D., L., Cursive 33, and a few others, and Coptic, 
 emit " they that had eaten." 
 
 sent them away." From the mention of a few small fishes, 
 
 it seems evident that the disciples gave all their provisions of every 
 kind for the sustentation of the multitude ; but notwithstanding 
 this they were not in want, for a much larger quantity of fragments 
 or broken pieces was taken up than in the case of the miracle of 
 the feeding of the five thousand : the v/ord here used signifying 
 hampers or panniers, rather than baskets. The same word is used 
 to denote the basket in which St. Paul was let down from the walls 
 of Damascus (2 Cor. xi. 33). 
 
 10. "And straightway he entered into a ship .... parts of 
 Dalmanutha." Dr. Thomson, in " The Land and the Book," thinks 
 that he can identify this place with a certain Dalhamia, about half- 
 way down on the western side of the Lake. It is about two miles 
 south of El Medjet, which has been supposed to be the site of the 
 ancient Magdala [or Magadan] Matt. xv. 39). 
 
 11. " And the Pharisees came forth, and began to question with 
 him," &c. How diffused and ramified throughout the whole of the 
 country this sect must have been, if even at these insignificant 
 places they were ready to meet and oppose the Lord as soon as He 
 landed. 
 
 " Seeking of him a sign from heaven." They made an absurd 
 difference between a miracle wrought upon the surface of the earth, 
 and one which seemed to have its sphere of action above this world. 
 They considered that, if the Lord had caused the food for the five 
 
 M 
 
162 HE SIGHED DEEPLY IN SPIRIT. [St. Mark . 
 
 12 And he siglied deej)ly in his si^irit, and saith, Why doth 
 this generation seek after a sign ? verily I say unto you, There 
 shall no sign be given unto this generation. 
 
 13 And he left them, and entering into the ship again 
 departed to the other side. 
 
 f Matt. xvi. 5. 14 ^ ^ Now the disciples had forgotten to take 
 bread, neither had they in the ship with them 
 more than one loaf. 
 
 Luk^xii'^i*' ^' ^^ ^ And he charged them, saying, Take heed. 
 
 thousand and the four thousand to descend from the sky, it would 
 have been a greater proof of His Messiahship than the creation of 
 new food in the hands of His Apostles. 
 
 12. " And he sighed deeply in his spirit, .... no sign be given 
 to this generation." He sighed deeply, because He read their 
 hearts, and saw that their implacability was the real cause of their 
 unbelief. If the signs already vouchsafed on the shore of this very 
 lake had not already convinced them, nothing would. They asked 
 for a sign from heaven, believing that He would not perform it. 
 Their demand was not prompted by the spirit of inquiry, and the 
 desire to ascertain the truth, but because they had already fore- 
 judged Him. They would not be persuaded though one rose from 
 the dead. 
 
 14. " Now the disciples had forgotten to take bread." Bede 
 says: " Scripture relates that they had forgotten to take bread with 
 them, which is a proof how little care they had for the flesh in 
 other things, since in their eagerness to follow the Lord, even the 
 necessity of refreshing their bodies had escaped from their mind." 
 
 How plain and coarse must have been the fare of these princes 
 of the kingdom of God ! Five barley loaves and two fishes ; again, 
 seven loaves and a few fishes — only the barest necessaries ! 
 
 15. " And he charged them, saying. Take heed, beware of the 
 leaven of the Pharisees .... leaven of Herod." In Luke xii. 1, 
 our Lord explains this "leaven of the Pharisees" as being " hypo- 
 crisy " — the show of religion without the substance. In St. 
 Matthew, on the contrary, it is explained as the doctrine or teach- 
 ing of the Pharisees. But these things agree together. For the 
 doctrine of the Pharisees against which our Lord inveighed was 
 
Chap. VIII.] THE LEAVEN OF THE PHARISEES. 163 
 
 beware of tlie leaven of tlie Pharisees, and of tlie leaven of 
 Herod. 
 
 that part of their teaching by which through their traditions they 
 made void the law of God. It was the attention to ceremonial 
 minutiae (much of it mere human invention) whilst they neglected 
 judgment, mercy, and faith. Such teaching, by its very nature, 
 engendered and fostered hypocrisy, for it enabled men to make a 
 show of religion without any corresponding internal substance. 
 The substance of religion is that which requires faith and prayer 
 and pains, and the doctrine of the Cross in all its forms is the 
 cleansing of the heart, the rectifying of the conscience, the right 
 direction of the will, the crucifying the flesh with its affections and 
 lusts. Now the putting of what is external in the place of these, so 
 as to make a fair show externally, is in very dead, wherever and 
 whenever it occurs, the leaven of the Pharisees. 
 
 The question must now be met, is Sacramentalism (commonly 
 so called) the leaven of the Pharisees ? for it is continually in- 
 sinuated that it is. Now what is Sacramentalism? By the very name 
 is implied a high view of the Sacraments as being not mere forms 
 or external rites, but outward visible signs of inward spiritual grace. 
 The Sacramentalist, as such, believes that the Son of God would 
 not have ordained mere external forms, mere ceremonies, mere 
 types teaching only the need of grace, mere shadows of good things 
 to be received at almost any time rather than the time when men 
 receive the outward sign ; on the contrary, he believes that the Son 
 of God ordained these Sacraments to make us partakers of His own 
 Adorable Human Nature as the Second Adam, and this for the 
 highest moral and evangelical purposes, "that our sinful bodies 
 may be made clean by His Body, and our souls washed through 
 His most precious Blood," and " that we may evermore dwell in 
 Him, and He in us." The Sacramentalist [so called] believes all 
 this simply on the words of the Lord. He cannot see that these 
 words mean anything else except the conveyance of a very great 
 Gift indeed, in and through and by the Sacraments. He is exceed- 
 ingly afraid to lower, or explain away, or in the very least detract 
 from, the mysterious meaning of these words, lest at the last he be 
 found to have done this through the leaven of the Sadducees, 
 which is, in its root, the denial of the Supernatural and so is the 
 leaven of Infidelity. So far from Sacramentalism being opposed 
 
164 TIIEY REASONED AxMONG THEMSELVES. [Sr. Mark. 
 
 16 And tliey reasoned among themselves, saying, It is 
 t Matt. xvi. 7. ^ because we have no bread. 
 
 16. " They reasoned among themselves, saying, Jt is because," &c. So A., C, L., N., 
 later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Vulg., Syriac, Coptic, &c. B. and D., omit "saying,'" 
 and read, " [Because] they had no bread." 
 
 to Spirituality, the most Spiritual Christians have been Sacra- 
 mentalists in the sense of holding the highest views of the grace 
 of Sacraments, witness Augustine, Bernard, Ansehn, Thomas a 
 Kempis, Quesnel, Keble. 
 
 " And of the leaven of Herod." In the parallel passage of 
 St. Matthew we read (the leaven) of the Sadducees, and it is 
 supposed from this, with much reason, that the party of Herod 
 were mostly Sadducees, if they professed any religion at all. The 
 leaven of Herod would be the secular leaven, which not only 
 the Apostles, but all generations of Christians, need to beware 
 of. It is at the bottom the leaven of unbelief. Amongst the 
 Jews it appeared in the denial, as far as was possible, of every- 
 thing divine in their religion — in the denial of the existence of 
 angels, of spirits in a separate state, of the resurrection, and of 
 judgment to come. In fact, it was a religion of sight, a creed 
 whose dogma was the non-existence of the unseen and spiritual 
 world. And constantly has this leaven reappeared in the Church of 
 Christ, under the form of Arianism, Socinianism, Eationalism, but 
 wherever it has worked it has destroyed all true faith, witness the 
 state of Protestantism in France, Holland, Switzerland, and to a 
 very great extent, in Germany. It is in direct opposition to the very 
 intent and purpose of the revelation of the Son of God, which is 
 given for the express purpose of evidencing to us things not seen. 
 Let us remember also that the words of Christ bid us beware not 
 merely of an openly professed doctrine, but of a leaven, i.e., a secret 
 working, an infection, a spirit rather than a definite form of evil. 
 
 16. " And they reasoned among themselves, saying, .... It is 
 because we have no bread." Commentators ask what is the imme- 
 diate link between the Lord's mention of leaven, and their being 
 conscious that they had forgotten to take bread ? Some suppose it 
 to be, that in bidding them beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, 
 they thought He had denounced even their bread as polluted, but 
 need we seek any such reason ? When a person has committed a 
 fault, any chance word dropped by a second party will suggest 
 
Chap. VIII.] WHY KEASON YE? 165 
 
 17 And wlien Jesus knew it, he saith unto them, Why 
 reason ye, because ye have no bread ? ^ perceive > ch. vi. 52. 
 ye not yet, neither understand ? have ye your heart yet har- 
 dened ? 
 
 18 Having eyes, see ye not ? and having ears, hear ye not ? 
 and do ye not remember ? 
 
 19 ^ When I brake the five loaves among five ^ Matt. xiv. 
 thousand, how many baskets full of fragments Liike ix. 17. 
 took ye up ? They say unto him. Twelve. 
 
 20 And ^ when the seven amonor four thousand, ' Matt. xv. 37. 
 
 ° ver. 8. 
 
 how many baskets full of fragments took ye up ? 
 And they said, Seven. 
 
 21 And he said unto them, How is it that "^ ye "^ ch. vi. 52. 
 
 ver. 17. 
 
 do not understand ? 
 
 21. "That j-e do not understand.?" A., Vulg., Sj-riac, and most other MSS. (except 
 B.) add "yet." 
 
 blame, though the connection is of the remotest. Sm-ely here is a 
 touch of nature which is beyond the reach of the cleverest invention. 
 
 17,21. "And when Jesus knew it ... . How is it that you do not 
 understand ? " As if He said, Did I ever blame yon for forgetfulness 
 about the goods of this world ? Are not My reproofs always ad« 
 dressed to you because you know not yet, after all My teaching, the 
 good things of that heavenly and eternal kingdom which I am come 
 to reveal ? "Whilst I am in your company, how can you perish with 
 hunger ? I have but very lately twice multiplied a very small 
 amount of bread, so that in the one case you gathered of fragments 
 twelve smaller baskets after feeding five thousand, and in the other 
 seven panniers full after feeding four thousand. Are you not yet in 
 many things in much the same spiritual condition as the multitude 
 to whom I spake in parables, because seeing they see not, and 
 hearing they hear not, neither do they understand ? After all 
 My miracles, and all My teaching, and all My explanation of My 
 teaching, do ye not yet understand ? 
 
 Must we not learn from this how the all-sympathizing Lord can 
 enter into the feelings of teachers of the Scriptures in this day, 
 whose scholars, whilst they are capable of understanding all else. 
 
-166 THEY BRING A BLIND MAN TO HIiM. [St. Mark. 
 
 22 ^ And lie cometli to Bethsaida ; and tliey bring a blind 
 man nnto liim, and besought bim to toncb bim. 
 
 23 And be took tbe blind man by tbe band, and led bim 
 
 22. "He cometh." So N, A., N., later Uncials, most Cursives, and Syriac ; but B., 
 C, D., L., some CursiA'as, Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic, &c., " they come." 
 
 seem unable to take in, sometimes even to remember, the plainest 
 Gospel truths ? 
 
 And, on the other hand, may not the same teachers take heart 
 when they remember bow these dull and ignorant fishermen, un- 
 able to associate leaven with anything but barley loaves, became, 
 shortly after this, the overtbrowers of idolatry and false philosophy, 
 and the instructors of the world in tbe knowledge of God? 
 
 22. "And he cometh to Bethsaida." It is doubtful whether this 
 ' is the city of Bethsaida Julias, or a small unimportant fishing 
 
 village on tbe coast, very near Capernaum. 
 
 " And they bring a blind man unto him, and besought him to 
 touch bim." This miracle strangely resembles the miracle of the 
 restoration to his bearing and speech of tbe deaf and stammering 
 man narrated in the last chapter. It may be worth while drawing 
 attention to the resemblances. In both cases the men were brought 
 by friends. In tbe first case the friends besought tbe Lord to lay 
 His hands upon the man ; in the second, to touch bim. In both 
 cases the Lord leads the person to be healed away — in tbe first 
 case, from the crowd, in the second, out of tbe town. In both He 
 touched tbe afi'ected part with His spittle, and also put His hands 
 upon the blind man, answering to putting His fingers in the ears 
 of tbe deaf man. But tbe difference is, that in tbe first case the 
 man was at once restored to hearing and distinct utterance, whilst 
 in the second there were two stages in tbe progress of the cure. 
 
 23. " And he took tbe blind man by tbe hand, and led bim out 
 of tbe town." Here we have mystically the Lord foretold by the 
 prophet " leading the blind by a way that they knew not " (Isaiah 
 xlii. 16). 
 
 It has been supposed that the Lord led tbe man out of the city 
 in order that tbe inhabitants of that city (Bethsaida) who had re- 
 jected His teaching might not incur greater guilt, by still further 
 making nought of the witness of this exceedingly great miracle ; 
 but may it not have been that the presence of a crowd, many of 
 
Chap. VIIL] I SEE MEN AS TREES, WALKING. 167 
 
 ont of the town ; and wlien ° lie liad spit on his eyes, and put 
 his hands upon him, he asked him if he saw ought. ° ch. vii. 33. 
 24 And he looked up, and said, I see men as trees, walking. 
 
 24. "I see men as trees, walking." A., ^?, B., C, L., M., N., later Uncials, almost all 
 Cursives rearl, " I see men, for I behold [them] as trees walking." So Revisers; but D., 
 Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic, Syriac, as in Rec. Text. 
 
 whom, perhaps, would jeer and flout, was inimical to the spiritual 
 effect which the Lord desired each of His miracles to have ? 
 
 Is not this leading the blind man typical ? Are not many who are 
 spiritually blind led, even in their blindness, by the compassionate 
 Lord, till the fit time and opportunity comes for their restora- 
 tion to spiritual sight ? 
 
 " And when he had spit on his eyes, and put his hands upon him, 
 he asked," &c. For the significance of this spitting see my note on 
 corresponding part of the former miracle (Mark vii. 33). 
 
 "He asked him if he saw ought." He asked this, of course, for 
 the sake of the spectators, among whom, probably, were St. Peter 
 and other Apostles, that they might notice how in this case He 
 chose to heal gradually. 
 
 24. " And he looked up, and said, I see men as trees, walking." 
 That is, he saw certain forms moving about him, but without the 
 power of discerning their shape and magnitude — "trees he should 
 have accounted them from their height, but men fi-om their 
 motion." 
 
 Theophylact supposes that the imperfection of his vision was 
 owing to his want of faith. " The reason why he did not see at 
 once perfectly, but in part, was that he had not perfect faith ; for 
 healing is bestowed in proportion to faith " (quoted in Ford, " Cat. 
 Aurea "). Also I. Williams : " It was probably thus to lead him on 
 by degrees to the full faith required. Although it is the only in- 
 stance in which the attempt is thus repeated, as if the first were not 
 altogether successful ; yet it is in this respect similar to that gradual 
 drawing on to the fulness of belief which is found in other miracles : 
 as in our Lord's conduct to Jairus, and to Martha on raising her 
 brother Lazarus, and others ; it is like supporting Peter on the 
 water by the hand, when his own faith was too imperfect to sustain 
 him ; it is like the carrying in His arms, or gently leading, the 
 weak ones of His flock." 
 
; 
 
 168 HE SAW EVERY MAN CLEARLY. [St. Mark. 
 
 25 After that he put his hands again upon his eyes, end 
 made him look up : and he was restored, and saw every man 
 clearly. 
 
 26 And he sent him away to his house, saying, Neither go 
 
 25. "And made him look up." So A., N., later Uncials, almost all Cnrsives, some Old 
 Latin (a, f, g) : but S, B., C, L., A, and four or five Cursives read, "And he looked 
 steadfastly." So Revisers. D., some Old Latin, and Vulg., " he began to see." 
 
 But must we not remember that this man was brought by the 
 faith of others, who certainly believed that our Lord's touch would 
 cure him? 
 
 25, "After that he put his hands again upon his eyes," &:g. 
 May not the Lord's conduct in healing this blind man gradually be 
 best explained by taking into account the typical import of the 
 miracle ? This miracle sets for-th the restoration, to the spiritually 
 blind, of their sight of God and eternal things. And are not men's 
 eyes gradually opened, at least for the most part ? Bishop Hall, 
 than whom a better judge in spiritual matters could hardly be 
 found, seems to think that the cure of spiritual blindness is alv/ays 
 graduaL He writes: " I find but one example, in all Scripture, of 
 any bodily cure, which our Saviour wrought by degrees : only the 
 bhnd man, whose weak faith craved help by others, not by himself, 
 saw men first, lilce trees; then in their true shape ; all other mira- 
 culous cures of Christ were done at once, and perfect at first. Con- 
 trarily, I find but one example of a soul fully healed, that is, sanc- 
 tified and glorified, both in a day ; all others by degrees and leisure. 
 The steps of grace are soft and short. Those external miracles He 
 wi-ought immediately by Himself; and therefore no marvel if they 
 were absolute [at once perfect] like their Author. The miracu- 
 lous work of our regeneration He works together with us ; He giveth 
 it efficacy : we give it imperfection." (" Holy Observations," quoted 
 in Ford.) 
 
 Even in men who are suddenly converted, i.e., turned from sin, 
 the opening of the eyes to see some of the greatest wonders of the 
 kingdom of God is very gradual. It requires a man to be fully en- 
 lightened indeed to see in their due proportions all the great truths 
 of the Catholic faith. 
 
 26. "And he sent himaway to his house, saying, Neither go into the 
 town," &c. May not the Lord, in giving this strict injunction, Iiave 
 
Chap. VIII.] WHOM DO MEN SAY THAT I A:^I ? 169 
 
 into the town, ° nor tell it to any in the town. ch^^v "43^'"' ^' 
 
 27 ^ P And Jesus went out, and his disciples, p Matt. xvi. 
 
 13. Luke ix. 
 
 into the towns of Csesarea Philippi : and by the is. 
 way he asked his disciples, saying unto them, 
 Whom do men say that I am ? 
 
 26. "Nor tell it to any in the town." So A., C, N., later Uncials, most Cursives, 
 Syriac, &c. ; oritted by N, B., L. Vulg., Et si in vicum introieris nemini dixeris. 
 
 foreseen that many in the town, Pharisees and Scribes, would strive 
 to destroy the weak faith of this man, as they did in the case of the 
 man healed at the pool of Siloam ? Perhaps the Lord, Who knew 
 this man's heart, foresaw that he would not be able to give to his 
 questioners the noble answer, " One thing I know, that, whereas I 
 was blind, now I see " (John ix. 25). 
 
 27. " And Jesus went out, and his disciples, into the towns of 
 Cjesarea Philippi." Called Caesarea Philippi to distinguish it from 
 the Caesarea on the coast of Palestine where Cornelius lived. There 
 is a very interesting account of it in " The Land and the Book," to 
 which I refer the reader. The question arises, why did the Lord 
 take the Apostles thus northward, almost out of the Holy Land, 
 Caesarea itself being a heathen city ? It is not, however, said that 
 He took them as far as Caesarea, but to its coasts or borders. I 
 think it must have been for retirement, and that they might have 
 leisure and quiet to think upon the meaning of the marvellous acts 
 which for a long time past they had seen Him performing, and in 
 many of v/hich they had themselves taken part. What was the 
 significance of the Lord's wonder-working power ? They had called 
 Him — nay, they had even worshipped Him as — the Son of God ; 
 but now He desired a more deliberate and distinct confession — de- 
 liberate, as not being the product of the temporary excitement pro- 
 duced by some mighty act, and distinct, as distinguished from, 
 and in contrast to, the vague and inadequate opinions of the 
 multitude. 
 
 St. Mark then tells us that " by the way," i.e., whilst they were 
 on the journey, not in a house or village. He asked them the all- 
 important question, and St. Luke tells us that it was after prayer : 
 " It came to pass, as he was alone praying, his disciples were with 
 him." Perhaps He had withdrawn Himself to a very short dis- 
 tance, and then beckoned them to Him. First of all He prepared 
 
170 THOU ART THE CHRIST. [St. Mark. 
 
 28 And they answered, ** John the Baptist : but some say, 
 q Matt. xiv. 2. Elias ; and others, One of the prophets. 
 
 29 And he saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am ? 
 •■ Matt. xvi. and Peter answereth and saith unto him, ^ Thou 
 
 16. John vi. 
 
 69. & xi. 27. art the Christ. 
 
 them for the home question respecting their own faith, by asking 
 them what others said of Him ; and from the answers we gather that 
 the people thought him to be a messenger of God, John the Baptist, 
 or EUjah, or one of the old prophets returned to earth ; but none 
 believed Him to be the Very Christ, the long looked for Messiah. 
 And then the Lord put the solemn question to them, "Whom say 
 ye that I am ? Ye whom I have chosen and separated from all 
 other men to be with Me, to see all my life, to hear all My words, to 
 be witnesses to all My works. Whom say ye that I am? " The 
 question was to all, " Whom say ye," and so the answer was in the 
 name of all. There was no division, no hesitation, " Thou art the 
 Christ." St. Matthew appends to this answer the words, "the Son 
 of the Living God." St. Luke, " of God," "the Christ of God." 
 Now how is it that St. Mark omits the most important, if not all 
 important words, " the Son of the Living God ? " Simply for this 
 reason, that the confession that Jesus was the Christ necessarily 
 carried with it the confession of the truth of all that Jesus claimed 
 to be. Was Jesus the Christ, the Messiah ? then He was the 
 Messenger, or Apostle, or Eepresentative of God in a sense in which 
 none else could be. He was the promised Seed of Abraham, the 
 "anointed king on God's holy hill" of David; the "Wonderful 
 Counsellor" of Isaiah; "the Lord our Righteousness" of Jeremiah; 
 the Lord and " Angel of the covenant " of Malachi. Without, how- 
 ever, insisting that the Apostles grasped the significance of all these 
 Divine titles, one thing is abundantly plain, that the true Messiah 
 must be whatsoever He claimed to be, and that the development of 
 His claims, and functions, and offices, and prerogatives was only a 
 matter of time ; and another thing, also, was as perfectly plain, (as 
 we shall soon see,) that the danger of the Apostles was not on the 
 side of unbelief in the glories of Christ's Person, but on the side of 
 unbelief in the humiliation, and shame, and death, which were 
 equally associated with the Lord's redeeming work. In fact, so 
 far as the supernatural — the (humanly speaking) incredible was 
 
Chaf. VIIL] THE SON OF MAN MUST SUFFER. 171 
 
 30 "And he charged tliem that they should tell no mar, 
 
 of him. ' Matt. xvi. 
 
 20. 
 
 31 And * he began to teach them, that the Son t Matt. xvi. 
 of man must su:ffer many things, and be rejected ^^^^ fxrz-l^' 
 of the elders, and of the chief priests, and scribes, 
 
 concerned — these very Apostles had passed unscathed through an 
 ordeal which could hardly be equalled. They had but very lately 
 heard the Lord give utterance in the synagogue of Capernaum to 
 words which had sifted and winnowed the disciples of inferior faith, 
 so that many had left Him, and they had stood firm and accejpted 
 all these words, no matter how incomprehensible, in simple faith. 
 *'Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life, 
 and we believe and are sure that thou art the Christ, the Son of the 
 Living God [the Holy One of God] ." No, their stumbling-block 
 was not the glories of the throne, or, much less, the enunciation of 
 the mysteries — it was The Ceoss. 
 
 30. " And he charged them that they should tell no man," &c. 
 "Why? Simply because the Jews to a man mistook the nature of 
 the ofiS.ce and kingdom of the Messiah. They looked for a Messiah 
 who should conquer through armies : the true Messiah was to con- 
 quer by the Cross. To proclaim, then, that He was the Christ 
 would utterly mislead all who heard them. They must first learn 
 what sort of a dehverer the true Messiah was to be : and the next 
 verses show that the Apostles themselves were unable to teach them 
 that, because to a great extent they shared in the mistake of their 
 countrymen. 
 
 31. " And he began to teach them," &c. This was the first dis- 
 tinct teaching on the part of the Lord of His coming Sufferings 
 and Death. Before this time they could not have borne it, and, 
 indeed, now they could not bear it. But they must now be told 
 all, for otherwise, when the terrible events come to pass, they would 
 make utter shipwreck of faith and hope. 
 
 So " he began to teach them, that the Son of man must suffer 
 many things, and be rejected of the elders," i.e., of the governing 
 body in the Jewish Church ; " of the chief priests," i.e., of the God- 
 ordained ministers of the Jewish sacrificial system ; " and of the 
 scribes," i.e., of the authorized expounders of the law. 
 
 " And be killed." Mark that the Lord does not, as yet, distinctly 
 
172 PETER BEGAN TO EEBUKE IlIM. [St. Mark. 
 
 and be killed, and after three days riae agrin. 
 
 32 And lie spake that saying openly. And Peter took 
 him, and began to rebuke him. 
 
 33 But when he had turned abou' and looked on his dis- 
 
 foretell the cruel and. degrading form of death that awaited Him. 
 That He reserved till He set out on His last jom-ney to Jerusalem 
 (Matth. XX. 19). It required the sight of His Transfigured Body to 
 enable them to bear such an announcement. 
 
 "And after three days rise again." The significance of this we 
 know was especially " hidden from them." They seem never to 
 have dreamt of taking comfort under the thought of the coming 
 Death, by setting against it this most distinct enunciation of the 
 Eesurrection. 
 
 32. "And he spake that saying openly," &c. This seems to 
 mean that He spake it in such a way as to show that He did not 
 (leske it to be concealed, in contrast to what He had said respecting 
 His being the Christ, which was not to be openly made known. 
 Perhaps others might have just before joined the company. With 
 this, perhaps, agrees the fact that Peter " took him " — that is, aside. 
 
 " And began to rebuke him." If St. Matthew gives the words 
 which St. Peter actually used [" Mercy on thee, Lord, this shall not 
 be unto thee"], then our word " rebuke " is too strong. It should 
 be " remonstrated " with Him, or some similar expression. The 
 original is capable of expressing somewhat milder meanings, which 
 our word " rebuke" cannot. 
 
 33. " But when he had turned about and looked on his disciples," 
 &c. He " looked on His disciples," such was His manner when He 
 would, at once, solemnly, and yet lovingly, impress them with some 
 truth. " He looked round about to see her that had touched the 
 hem of His garment" (Mark v. 82). "He looked on" the rich 
 young man, and " loved him " (x. 21). He " looked round about" 
 when he warned his disciples of the danger of riches (x. 23). He 
 "looked round about on the Pharisees, being grieved for the hard- 
 ness of then- hearts" (iii. 5.) "He looked round about on them 
 that sat about Him," when he spake of them as those who were 
 spiritually nearest to Him (iii. 34). Most of these, if not all, we 
 owe to St. Mark, who, himself, owed them to the observant eye of 
 St. Peter. 
 
Chap. VIIL] HE EEBUKED PETER. 173 
 
 ciples, lie rebuked Peter, saying, G-et thee behind me, Satan : 
 for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but the 
 things that bo of men. 
 
 34. ^And when he had called the people unto him with 
 
 33. " Thou sa onrest not." Revisers, ' Thou mindest not." " 
 
 " Get thee behind me, Satan.'" Does the Lord here rebuke Peter 
 under the name of Satan ? If so, we must, undoubtedly, take the 
 word Satan in its original meaning as adversaiy. Our Lord's way 
 to His throne was through His Sufferings and Cross. He that would 
 stand in the way of His suffering, and beseech Him to spare Him- 
 self, in reality, though he knew it not, stood in the way of Christ's 
 greatest glory — the overcoming of evil through humiliation and 
 self-denial. Quesnel well remarks, " How dangerous a counsellor 
 is natural tenderness in the affairs of salvation ! " 
 
 " Thou savourest not the things that be of God, but the things 
 that be of men." The " thing of God" which the Lord had then 
 before Him, was obedience to His Father's will in submission 
 to death. " I have power to lay down my life, and I have 
 power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my 
 Father" (John x. 18). The things that be of men are that men 
 should look to their own interests, and spare themselves, and 
 exalt themselves, and above all things, avoid a cruel aud shameful 
 death. 
 
 34. "And when he had called the people unto him with his dis- 
 ciples," &c. St. Matthew reports merely that " Jesus said unto his 
 disciples." St. Luke that " He said unto them all," but St. Mark 
 is much more full : " When he had called the people unto him with 
 his disciples also." The significance of this is well brought out by 
 Quesnel : " Self-denial concerns everybody, and consists in renounc- 
 ing, not only some external things, but the old man enthely, 
 namely, whatever is corrupt in the understanding, judgment, 
 memory, will, and affection, and whatever is therein opposite to 
 the Spirit of Christ and His Gospel. There is no privilege, nor any 
 difference of exemption from the Cross, betwixt the ^Dastors and the 
 flock, with respect to evangelical self-denial : it is for this reason 
 that Christ joins the people with His disciples." 
 
174 LET HIM TAKE UP HIS CROSS. [St. Mark. 
 
 his disciples also, he said -unto them, " Whosoever will come 
 u Matt. X. 38. after me, let him deny himself, and take up his 
 
 & xvi. 24. T (> n 
 
 Luke ix. 23. cross, and lollow me. 
 
 X john'xii. 25. 35 For "" whosocvcr will save his life shall lose 
 
 85. " Will save his life," i.e. desires or wills. 
 
 "Whosoever will come after me," rather, whosoever desires; 
 " whosoever has a mind to come after me." It may be that attracted 
 by His words and struck by the power of His marvellous work, some 
 were saying, " Lord, I will follow thee whithersoever thou goest." 
 But as the way to His glory was through the Cross, so must theirs be. 
 They must mortify their ambitious self-seeking, so as to accept Him 
 as a spiritual and suffering Messiah. They must mortify their love 
 of this world's goods, as the Apostles had done, by giving up all, and 
 as the Pentecostal Christians did, by selling their possessions and 
 goods, and parting them to all men. They must mortify themselves 
 in the matter of favour with the great, and of self-esteem, and self- 
 i-ighteousness, as Saul of Tarsus did, when " those things which were 
 his worldly gain, he counted loss for Christ." Such was the lot of 
 those who followed Christ then, to be the first missionaries and 
 heralds of His truth. The question is, Is this true now of us, in 
 these quiet calm days ? Unquestionably it is, according to the words 
 of the Apostles : " They that are Christ's, have crucified the flesh 
 with its affections and lusts." No words illustrating this can be 
 given better than those of Bishop Wilson : " Every day deny your- 
 self some satisfaction. Deny the eye all objects of mere curiosity ; 
 the tongue everything that may feed vanity, or vent enmity ; the 
 palate what it most delights in (but this not to be seen by others) ; 
 the ear by rejecting all flattery, all conversation that may corrupt 
 the heart ; the body all delicateness, ease, and luxury, by bearing 
 all inconveniences of life for the love of God, cold, hunger, restless 
 nights, ill-health, the negligence of servants and friends, contempt, 
 calumnies, our own failings, melancholy, and the pain we feel in 
 overcoming the corruptions of nature." (" Maxims of Piety," quoted 
 by Ford.) 
 
 35. " For whosoever will save his life shall lose it." There is a 
 remarkable saying of one of the fathers : " If you keep your seed 
 you lose it : if you sow it, you will find it again." It is first spoken 
 
Chap. VIII.] WHAT SHALL IT PKOFIT ? 175 
 
 it ; but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the 
 gospel's, the same shall save it. 
 
 36 For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the 
 whole world, and lose his own soul ? 
 
 37 Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul ? 
 
 36. " Whr.t shall it profit ?" So A., C, D., A, later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old 
 Latin mostly, Vulg. ; but N, B., L., Old Latin (a), Syriac (Schaaf) read, "Kvhat doth it 
 
 profit ?'' 
 
 of martyrdom, and of him who shall sacrifice this temporal life for 
 the sake of God ; but from thence the principle extends to all 
 sacrifices of bodily health, worldly advantage, and reputation with 
 men. 
 
 " For my sake and the gospel's." The words " and the gospel's " 
 are peculiar to St. Mark, and they are written for those who in this 
 day cannot follow Christ personally, as the Apostles did. They 
 teach us that those who now forsake the comforts of home and in- 
 tellectual society, and the prospects of preferment in a wealthy 
 Church, to preach the Gospel amongst uncivilized or savage tribes, 
 in so doing lose their lives, or all that worldly raen esteem life 
 worth living for, not only for the Gospel, or for the Church's sake, 
 but for Christ Himself. 
 
 The term " save his life " has a very wide application. It means 
 not only " save his life from death," but save his life, i.e., save 
 himself from the bearing of the cross, from labour for Christ, or for 
 the people of Christ. He shall lose it in eternity. 
 
 36. '*For what shall it profit a man, . . . lose his own soul [or 
 life "J . The word " soul " is the same as that which is translated 
 "life" in the previous verse. It is true both of the higher and 
 the lower sense of (pixv or "life." What use would it be to a 
 man if on one day he had all the riches and honours that this 
 world could bestow upon him, if he knew that he must die the 
 next day ; or what profit would it be to a man, if he should have all 
 the wealth and enjoyments and sumptuous fare of Dives, if in 
 hell he must lift up his eyes being in torments, and see afar ofi" 
 the blessed ones from whose society he is excluded ? 
 
 37. "Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?" 
 Chrysostom asks : " When a man at the cost of his soul, that is, 
 his life, gains the whole world, what has he besides, now that his 
 
176 ASHAMED OF ME. [St. Mark. 
 
 38 ^ Wliosoever therefore ^ sliall be atiliained of me and of 
 
 y Matt. X. 33. my words in tliis adulterous and sinful orenera- 
 
 Luke ix. 26. & . -^ . ° 
 
 xii. 9. tion ; of him also shall the Son of man be 
 
 16. ^^2 T*iS." i.' ashamed, when he cometh in the glory of his 
 
 s. 11. 12. Father with the holy angels. 
 
 •soul is perishing ? Has he another soul to give for his soul ? For 
 a man can give the price of his house in exchange for the house, 
 but in losing his soul he has not another soul to give. And it is 
 with a purpose that He says, " Or what shall a man give in ex- 
 change for bis soul ? " for God, in exchange for our salvation, has 
 ^iven the precious Blood of Jesus Christ." 
 
 38. "Whosoever therefore shall be ashamed of me and of my 
 words, &c. . . . holy angels." St. Matthew does not give these 
 words, but only " The Son of man shall come in the glory of his 
 Father with his angels, and then he shall reward every man 
 according to his works." No doubt the Lord said the latter words 
 respecting the judgment according to works immediately after the 
 words in St. Mark. They teach us that our great " work for Christ " 
 -is to confess Him. But this confession of Christ's — this not being 
 ashamed of Him and His words — is different in different genera- 
 tions and in different societies. In the earliest age of all the offence 
 was the offence of the Cross, — that men should be ashamed to 
 confess that they believed that He Who was crucified was the Son 
 of God, and that they hoped to be saved by His very Cross. Since 
 then this offence has ceased in outward form, but in reality it has 
 reappeared under different forms of religious cowardice. In licen- 
 tious ages and societies men have been ashamed of the self-denying 
 words and example of the Lord ; in superstitious ages of upholding 
 'the purity of His religion ; in heretical ages of manfully contending 
 for the faith of His true Godhead ; in later periods of our history 
 men seem to have been ashamed of confessing that we are saved 
 through Christ aloae, and in this age and in learned and scientific 
 societies are not men ashamed of confessing those words of Ch ri&t 
 and of His servants which assert the supernatural in our Holy 
 Religion, especially as it appears in the mysteries of the Divine life 
 :md of the Sacraments ? At the same time, the thoughtful reader 
 will remember that these pearls of Divine truth are the very last 
 -which are to be cast before swine. 
 
Chap. IX.] SOME STANDING HERE. 177 
 
 A 
 
 CHAP. IX. 
 
 ND lie said unto them, ^ Yerily I say unto you, Tliat 
 there be some of tliem that stand here, » ^latt. xvi. 
 
 28. Luke ix, 
 
 27. 
 
 1. "And he said unto them, Verily I grj unto you, . . . come 
 with power." Upon this exceedingly difficult place I can only 
 repeat what I said in my notes on St. Matthew, that I have not 
 met with any exposition of it at all satisfactory. There seems to 
 me now, however, a certain connection with the last five verses of 
 the last chapter which may be worth stating. 
 
 The words of the Lord were, *' AYhosoever will come after me, 
 let him take up his cross ; " *' Whosoever will save his life shall lose 
 it ; " " What shall a man give in exchange for his soul (or life) ? " 
 "Whosoever shall be ashamed of me in this adulterous generation, 
 of him shall the Son of man be ashamed when he cometh," &c. 
 
 Now what would be the effect of these words on the minds of the 
 Apostles? Evidently a very discouraging one. They would think 
 that, if they were true followers of their Master, they would have 
 soon, perhaps very soon, to be called upon to suffer death ; and if 
 they confessed His words, the reward which they would look for in 
 the sight of His triumph (coming in the glory of His Father) would 
 be very remote. Now in these words, Christ promised that the 
 three leading ones (there be some, i.e., a very few, standing here) 
 should see a glimpse of His heavenly glory long before they were 
 called upon to choose death with Him, rather than life with the world. 
 
 But why, then, does the Lord express Himself obscurely, which 
 He undoubtedly does ? Evidently because He had reasons — 
 known only to Himself in their fulness — why the Transfigura- 
 tion should be kept secret from the body of His disciples. If He 
 strictly enjoined them, after it had taken place, to tell the vision 
 to no man, then, if He found it needful to give some promise of it 
 beforehand, that promise must be expressed obscurely — it could 
 not be given plainly, or it would undo the purpose which He had in 
 commanding it to be kept secret. 
 
 The Transfiguration was as near an approach as could then be 
 
 N 
 
178 SHALL NOT TASTE OF DEATH. [St. Mark. 
 
 wHcli shall not taste of death, till they have seen ^ the 
 b Matt. xxiv. kinsrdom of Grod come with power. 
 
 30. & XXV. 31. ° AT^ -T -r IT. 71. 
 
 Luke xxii. 18. 2 1 ° And after six days Jesus taketh with him 
 Luke ix. 2V.'' ' Peter, and James, and John, and leadeth them np 
 
 given to men in flesh and blood, of "the Son of man coming in 
 His kingdom," or of " the kingdom of God coming in power." The 
 Lord's Person was ineffably glorious, His face shining as the sun, 
 His raiment white as the light ; He came not alone or unattended, 
 but with two of the greatest saints of the old covenant as the earnest 
 of His coming with ten thousand of His saints. The sight was 
 vouchsafed to the leaders, to those on whose faith the faith of the 
 weaker Apostles very much rested. It had a very deep and lasting 
 effect upon the two who have left us any writings. Both St. John 
 and St. Peter speak of it as if of all the visible manifestations of 
 Christ it struck them most; St. John in part at least where he 
 writes, " We beheld his glory, the glory as of the Only Begotten of 
 the Father" (John i. 14); and St. Peter, where he writes, "We 
 have not followed cunningly debased fables when we made known 
 unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were 
 eye witnesses of His majesty. For He received from God the 
 Father honour and glory, when there came such a voice to him 
 from the excellent glory. This is my beloved Son, in whom I am 
 well pleased. And this voice which came from heaven we heard 
 when we were with him in the Holy Mount " (2 Pet. i. 17, 18). 
 
 So that, remembering the influence of these men in the earliest 
 Pentecostal Church, we can scarcely overestimate the power of the 
 Transfiguration in confirming and exalting the faith of the Saints. 
 These considerations may abate some of the difficulty in interpret- 
 ing this saying of the Lord, of that event to which it appears so 
 immediately to refer, but I do not put them forward as a solution 
 by any means. 
 
 2. " And after six days." St. Luke says, " about an eight days 
 after," adopting a frequent mode of reckoning among the Jews, in 
 including parts of days as wholes. No doubt it was six full days, 
 and a small part of the day before the first, and of the day after the 
 sixth, reckoned as whole days. This bears on the notices of the 
 Eesurrection, that He was three days in the tomb, the parts of 
 Friday and Sunday being counted as " days." 
 
 " Leadeth them up into a high mountain apart by themselves." 
 
Chap. IX.] THE TKANSFIGURATION. 179 
 
 into an liigli mountain apart bj themselves : and lie was 
 transfigured before them. 
 
 It is very difficult to set aside the tradition of the Palestinian 
 Christians that this was Mount Tabor. Cyril, Bishop of Jerusalem* 
 early in the fourth century, speaks of it as a thing commonly known 
 and recognized. *' There, Moses and EUas were present with Him 
 in Mount Tabor when He was Transfigured." Commentators con- 
 tinually assert that the tradition dates from this time, as if Cyril 
 himself invented it, but this is impossible. It must have been held 
 for years before he wrote ; and yet it could hardly have been Tabor, 
 for Tabor was in Galilee, and putting together all the notices of our 
 Lord's movements at this time, He could not now have been either 
 travelling about or sojourning in Galilee. Dr. Thomson, in " The 
 Land and the Book," gives the preference to Panium: " If all that 
 is recorded," he writes, "in the 16th and 17th of St. Matthew, in 
 immediate connection with the visit of our Saviour, actually oc- 
 curred in this neighbourhood (Cassarea Philippi, now Banias), it 
 has been the scene of some remarkable transactions, and among 
 them the Transfiguration. I have supposed, ever since my first 
 visit to Tabor, that that could scarcely have been the place, for the 
 whole summit was covered by a vast castle, which we know was 
 occupied, if not then, yet shortly after, by soldiers. It is true that 
 Josephus says he built the castle, the only foundation for which 
 assertion being that he repaired one that had been there for ages. 
 Moreover, that locahty does not suit the accounts given of events 
 immediately connected with the Transfiguration, as recorded by 
 the Evangelists : though it must be confessed that these are not de- 
 finite or very decisive. I would not, therefore, contend with those 
 who prefer the old tradition in favour of Tabor, and yet I think it 
 l^robable that it was somewhere in this direction, and see no good 
 reason why it may not have been on this lofty and lonely Panium, 
 or rather Hermon, of which it forms the southern termination." 
 St. Luke alone mentions that He went up to pray, and that the 
 transfiguration took place while He prayed. " And he was trans- 
 figured before them." 
 
 3. " And his raiment became shining, exceeding white as snow." 
 This, as I have shown in my notes on St. Matthew, was the glory 
 of His Godhead which was suffered for a very brief season to shine 
 through the veil of His humanity. So Cyril of Jerusalem : " Where- 
 
180 ELIAS WITH MOSES. [St. Mark. 
 
 3 And liis raiment became sMning, exceeding "^ white as 
 d Dan. xii. 9. snow ; SO as no fuller on eartli can white them. 
 
 Matt, xxviii. 3. . . 
 
 4 And there appeared unto them Elias with 
 Moses ; and they were talking with Jesus, 
 
 3. "As snow." So A., D., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., 
 Syriac; omitted by S, B., C, L., d. (Latin of D.), and some versions. 
 
 fore, since no man living conld see the face of the Godhead, He took 
 on Him the face of human nature, that we, though seeing it, might 
 live. Yet when He wished to show even that with a little majesty, 
 when His face did shine as the sun, the disciples fell to the ground 
 affrighted : if, then, His Bodily countenance, shining not in the 
 fulness of Him Who wrought, but in the measure of those who 
 followed Him, yet teirified them, and was too much for them, how 
 could any man gaze on the majesty of the [unveiled] Godhead?" 
 (X. 7.) 
 
 " Exceeding white as snow ; so as no fuller on earth can white 
 them." Archbishop Trench well remarks on this : " All words seem 
 weak to the Evangelists, all images to fail them here. St. Mark, 
 whose words I have quoted, borrows one image from the world of 
 nature (snow), another, homely but effective, from that of man's art 
 and device (that of the fuller) : struggling by aid of these to set forth 
 and reproduce for his readers the transcendent brightness of that 
 light which now clothed from head to foot the person of the Lord, 
 breaking forth from within, and overflowing the very garments 
 which He wore : until in their eyes who beheld. He seemed to array 
 Himself with light, which is ever the proper and peculiar investi- 
 ture of Deity (Ps. civ. 2), ' as with a garment.' " 
 
 4. " And there appeared unto them Elias with Moses : and they 
 were talking," &c. Tertullian, in his Treatise against Marcion, has 
 a very remarkable chapter on the Transfiguration, dwelling par- 
 ticularly on this appearance of Moses and Elias in glory with 
 Jesus, and conversing with them, as setting forth in the most sensible 
 way how Christ came, not to destroy the Law and the Prophets, 
 but to fulfil them. " What could so befit the Creator's Christ as to 
 manifest Him in the company of His own fore-announcers ? to let 
 Him be seen with those to whom He had appeared in revelations ? 
 to let Him be speaking to those who had spoken of Him ? — to share 
 His glory with those by whom He used to be called the Lord of 
 
Chap. IX.] A VOICE OUT OF THE CLOUD. 181 
 
 5 And Peter answered and said to Jesus, Master, it is 
 good for us to be here : and let us make three tabernacles ; 
 one for thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elias. 
 
 6 For he wist not what to say ; for they were sore afraid. 
 
 7 And there was a cloud that overshadowed them : and 
 a voice came out of the cloud, saying. This is my beloved 
 Son : hear him. 
 
 5. " Three tabernacles." Better, " booths " (Revisers). 
 
 6. " What to say." So A., D., N., later Uncials, most Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., Syriac, 
 &c. ; but \, B., C, L., and two or three Cursives read, "What to answer." 
 
 Glory, even with those chief servants of His, one of whom was 
 once the moulder of His people, the other afterwards the reformer 
 thereof? " (Bk. iv. ch. xxii.) 
 
 5-6. "And Peter answered and said to Jesus, Master," &c. 
 Many commentators reflect with somewhat of scorn on the sugges- 
 tion of Peter, but it was said as " not knowing what he said ; " and 
 well might he be so overwhelmed with awe and astonishment as to 
 be at a loss for words, for no eye of man had seen what these simple 
 Gahleans were then seeing. But what he said was to his honour, 
 he wished to detain Jesus and the two heavenly visitants, so that from 
 their converse they might learn more of heavenly and eternal truth. 
 
 It is surprising that some should have asked such a question as 
 "how came theApostles to know that the two were Moses and Elias?" 
 Surely the same Power Who brought them out of the unseen 
 world, and made them visible to the eyes of the Apostles, would 
 take care that the whole significance of their appearance should not 
 be lost through ignorance of their names. Tertullian says that it was 
 through Peter and the Apostles being in the Spirit. " Now it is no 
 difficult matter to prove the raiJtm'e of Peter. For how could he 
 have known Moses and Elias except by being in the Spirit ? People 
 could not have had their statues, or images, or hkenesses : for that 
 the law forbade. How, if it were not that he had seen them in the 
 Spirit?" 
 
 7. "And there was a cloud that overshadowed them." St. Matthew 
 calls it a bright cloud. In 2 Pet. i. 17, it is called the excellent 
 glory, but the word " excellent " is much too feeble. It is rather the 
 very magnificent glory. It was, no doubt, that Shekinah, respecting 
 which God said, " I will appear in the cloud above the mercy seat." 
 
182 NO MAN SAVE JESUS ONLY. [St. Mark. 
 
 8 And suddenly, wlien tliey liad looked round about, tliey 
 saw no man any more, save Jesus only witli tliemselves. 
 e Matt. xvii. 9. 9 ^ And as tliey came down from the mountain, 
 lie charged them that they should tell no man what things 
 they had seen, till the Son of man were risen from the dead. 
 
 From this cloud of glory, as from God Him.self, proceeded the 
 Voice, " This is my beloved Son [in whom I am well pleased], hear 
 Him." This witness of the Father to the Divine Sonship of the 
 Lord was to the Apostles what the same Voice at the Lord's Bap- 
 tism had been to the Baj)tist. It was the most direct witness from 
 God the Father which was ever vouchsafed to them. The Eesur- 
 rection, and the Descent of the Spirit, and the miracles they per- 
 formed in His Name, were sure and certain witnesses, but inferential 
 so far as the Eternal Father was concerned. Here was His very 
 Voice out of the outward visible sign of His presence, and so the 
 Apostle who heard it looks back upon it as the Eternal Father 
 personally acknowledging and so glorifying His Son. "He received 
 from God the Father honour and glory, when there came such a 
 voice to Him from the excellent glory. This is my beloved Son in 
 whom I am well pleased " (2 Pet. i. 17). 
 
 8. " And suddenly, when they had looked round about," &c. To 
 understand this we must refer to St. Matthew's account. From him 
 we learn that when they heard the Voice of the Father, they were 
 a second time overwhelmed with fear. " When the disciples heard 
 it, they fell on their face and were sore afraid, and Jesus came and 
 touched them, and said. Arise, and be not afraid." And when thus 
 aroused suddenly by the touch and voice of the Lord, they looked 
 round and saw none but the Lord with them. So suddenly did the 
 glorious sight come to an end. 
 
 9. "And as they came down from the mount, he charged them 
 . , . risen from the dead." Probably this was principally for their 
 own benefit. If they had been permitted to make known the reve- 
 lation vouchsafed to them, they would have spoken of it in a 
 boastful spirit ; for two of the three very shortly afterwards asked 
 for the highest places in His kingdom. Such glimpses of heaven 
 were to humble and to abase, not to exalt. Thus St. Paul, under great 
 constraint and unwillingly, and not till it was forced upon him, 
 spake of the visions and revelations of the Lord, — of being " caught 
 
Chap. IX.] ELIAS MUST FIRST COME. 183 
 
 10 And tliej kept that saying with themselves, questioning 
 one with another what the rising from the dead should mean. 
 
 11 ^And they asked him, saying, Why say the scribes 
 ^ that Elias must first come ? f Mai. iv. 5. 
 
 12 And he answered and told them, Elias verily 
 
 up unto the third heaven " — of seeing Paradise, and bearing un- 
 speakable words, but adds that, " lest he should be exalted above 
 measure " by the revelations, there was given him " a thorn in 
 the flesh," the messenger of Satan to keep him low and humble. 
 
 10. " And they kept that saying with themselves," &c. Probably 
 the saying that they were not to speak of the vision which they had 
 seen. Theyreligiouslyobserved the injunction respecting silence, but 
 withal wondering at the nature of that Eesurrection from the dead, 
 after which they were no longer to keep silence respecting the glory 
 just revealed. As Jews they must have believed in the Eesurrec- 
 tion from the dead. There were many prophecies of it in the 
 Scriptures, but these were of a general Eesurrection. "Would the 
 Lord rise again before this ? Must He die in order to rise again ? The 
 Eesurrection of the Lord, as I have more than once noticed, seems 
 to have been providentially hidden from the Apostles, so that none 
 can say with the least shadow of truth that they expected it, and so 
 imagined it, and so pictured it to themselves till they thought they 
 saw their risen Master. (See observations on the Eesurrection of 
 our Lord in my notes on St. Matthew, pages 468 and 470.) 
 
 11. " And they asked him, saying, "Why say the scribes that Elias," 
 &c, ? Tliis, which may be either a question, or an assertion put in 
 order to elicit an explanation, was probably suggested by the ap- 
 j)earance of Elias with the Lord. . ** Surely this appearance of Elias 
 in glory with you, speaking of your shortly approaching Exodus, 
 is not the appearance which the Scribes bid us look for. If you are 
 the Messiah, you must be preceded by Elias." 
 
 12. "And he answered and told them, Elias verily cometh first, 
 and restoreth," &c. Two very difl'erent meanings have been assigned 
 to this restoration of all things by Elias. First, that Elias shall 
 restore all things by reconciling the fathers with their children, in 
 bringing them to the faith of the Apostles. " Eeconciling the un- 
 believing fathers the Jews, to the Apostles, their children," says 
 Chrysostom : but Augustine, "reconciling their fathers the Prophets 
 
184 ELIAS IS INDEED COME. [St. Mark. 
 
 cometh first, and restoreth all things ; and ^ how it is written 
 B Ps. xxii. 6. of the Son of man, that he must suffer many 
 
 Is. liii. 2, &c. 
 
 Dan. ix. 26. thmgs, and be set at nought. 
 
 11. '^Phn!'!!!"?. 13 But I say unto you. That ^ Elias is indeed 
 
 &^ivH*"i2'' ^^' come, and they have done unto him whatsoever 
 
 Luke i. 17. they listed, as it is written of him. 
 
 H^^^Lu'i-etx 14 ^ ^ And when he came to Ms disciples, he 
 
 37'. 
 
 12. " How it is written." Revisers, " How is it written ?" &c. 
 
 14. " When he came ... he saw." So A., C, D., I., N., later Uncials, almost all 
 Cursives, all Old Latin (except k), Vulg., Coptic, Syriac, Gothic, ^thiopic ; but J<, B., 
 L., A, and Old Latin (k) read, " When they came . . . they saw." 
 
 with tlieir unbelievicg children the Jews." But must not the true 
 meaning be of this sort ? The Baptist restored and rectified the 
 natural conscience of the people in the matter of domestic virtue 
 and the plain rules of righteousness. The former he did when he 
 turned the hearts of the fathers to their children, and conversely the 
 hearts of the children to their fathers, making goodness [as they 
 say of charity] to begin at home. The latter he did when he bid 
 the soldiers do no violence, the publicans exact no more than their 
 due, and the body of the people lay aside their covetousness and be 
 charitable to one another (Luke iii. 10-14). The importance of all 
 this had been utterly obscured by their Pharisaic traditions, and 
 the Baptist, by awakening the slumbering conscience, restored all 
 the fitness for the coming of the Messiah. 
 
 "And how it is written of the Son of man that he must sufi'er many 
 things." This place is at first sight somewhat obscure, however 
 translated, but a glance at the parallel places in St. Matthew seems 
 to clear up its meaning. St. Matthew adds to the saying of the Lord, 
 " They have done unto him whatsoever they listed," the words, 
 "likewise shall also the Son of man suffer of them." The Saviour 
 seems to say that His case would be parallel to the Baptist's : as 
 they knew not the forerunner and destroyed him, so they would not 
 know Him Whoso way he prepared, but would do unto Him also 
 whatsoever they listed : they would make Him suffer many things, 
 and set Him at naught, and this according as it is written of Him. As 
 it is written of the Christ that He should have a forerunner, so also 
 the prophets foretold that He must suffer and be set at naught. 
 
 14. "And when he came to his disciples, he saw a great multi- 
 
Chap. IX.] THE SCRIBES QUESTIONING. 185 
 
 saw a great multitude about them, and the scribes questioning 
 with tliem. 
 
 15 And straightway all the people, when they beheld him, 
 were greatly amazed, and running to him saluted him. 
 
 tude," &c. This is one of the almost innumerable indications in 
 this Gospel that its real author was an eye-witness of all that he de- 
 scribes. St. Peter having seen, with his two fellow Apostles, the 
 Transfiguration, descended with the Lord, and watching, as he ever 
 did, his Master's countenance, observed how the Lord took parti- 
 cular notice of what was going on among the rest — how a great 
 multitude were crowding about the disciples, and how, above all, 
 His enemies were at their old work of instilling unbelief. 
 
 15. "And straightway all the people, . . . were greatly amazed," 
 &c. St. Mark alone notices this also. St. Matthew says, "when 
 they came to the multitude." St. Luke, " much people met him." 
 How was it that the people, when they beheld Him, were " greatly 
 amazed ? " The word is a remarkable one, and is used to describe 
 the commencement of our Lord's Agony. " He began to be sore 
 amazed." It denotes very great awe and j)rostration of spirit. How, 
 then, were the multitude thus affected ? It has been supposed that 
 the Lord retained on His countenance some remnant of the bright- 
 ness of His Transfiguration. Thus Archbishop Trench : " Suddenly 
 He, concerning Whom the strife was, appeared, returning from the 
 Holy Mount, His face and person yet glistering, as there is reason 
 to believe, with traces of the glory which had clothed Him there." 
 The strong objection to this is, as Williams remarks, that not a 
 word is said about it in the narrative, and the words of the Evan- 
 gelist, V. 8, seem to imply that all trace of the Transfiguration had 
 disappeared when the three were aroused by the Lord from their 
 stupor. May not their astonishment have been occasioned by the 
 strange suddenness of the appearance of the Lord, and its oppor- 
 tuneness, just when the bewildered disciples were overwhelmed with 
 the questionings of the scribes ? 
 
 It is to be remembered that we are not at all called upon to be- 
 lieve that the Lord led the Apostles to the very top of the mountain. 
 If the mountain be a spur of Hermon, He would have led them 
 almost into the region of perpetual snow. May He not have led 
 them to a point sufficiently high to be above the world, as it were. 
 
186 WHAT QUESTION YE? [St. Mark. 
 
 16 And he asked the scribes, What question ye || with 
 
 B Or, ainovg them ? 
 
 yourselves ? ^ . _ 
 
 iMatt. xvii. 17 And ^one of the multitude answered and 
 
 ss! " ^ '^' said, Master, I have brought unto thee my son, 
 which hath a dumb spirit ; 
 
 16, "The Scribes." So A., C, N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin (a), 
 Syriac; but ^f, B., D., L., A, three Cursives (1, 28, 209), most Old Latin, Vulg., and 
 Coptic read, " them" — [" He asked them "]. 
 
 and yet not so far above but that He might suddenly reappear to 
 aid His own in their strife and perplexity ? I confess that all my 
 ideas of the Transfiguration are taken from Eaphael's picture — for 
 no effort of man's imagination can well be worthier of the reality ; 
 but one of the most striking features of that grand conception is the 
 proximity of the scene of glory and peace above to the scene of 
 hellish confusion and strife below. The Lord seems just hovering 
 over the war of passionate words and frantic gestures, so that He 
 might descend and reappear as a visitant from above would do. Of 
 course this is imagination, but may it not point to the reality ? The 
 words of our Evangelist certainly seem to postulate an almost 
 miraculous suddenness in the Lord's appearance. But beyond all 
 doubt, that picture of pictures is a grand parable, teaching us how 
 near the glory of heaven and the confusion and hate of hell may be 
 to one another. 
 
 16. " And he asked the scribes [or them] , What question ye? " 
 If the words " the scribes " be genuine, then the Lord first ad- 
 dressed His enemies ; but for very shame and awe they could not 
 answer, and the man most concerned, the father of the maniac boy^ 
 came forward. 
 
 17. " And one of the multitude answered and said, Master, I 
 have brought," &c. This was a case of possession, akin to that of 
 the Gergesene demoniac, as violent and as destructive, not only rack- 
 ing his victim with spasms [" teareth him "], and afflicting him with 
 fits akin to epilepsy [" he foameth and gnasheth with his teeth "J, 
 but urging him to destroy himself [" ofttimes it hath cast him into 
 the fire, and into the waters, to destroy him "]. Archbishop Trench 
 quotes a remarkable passage out of Lucian, the scofi'er at Chris- 
 tianity, in which he seems to make sj)ecial allusion to this case of 
 demoniacal possession: *'A11 know the Syrian of Palestine, the 
 clever man in matters of this kind, how many lunatics (persons 
 
Chap. IX.] HE TEARETH HIM. 187 
 
 18 And wheresoever lie taketli him, he || teareth him : and 
 he foameth, and gnasheth with his teeth, and I! Or, dashttk 
 pmeth away : and I spake to thy disciples that 
 
 they should cast him out ; and they could not. 
 
 19 He answereth him, and saith, O faithless generation, 
 how long shall I he with you ? how long shall I suffer you ? 
 bring him unto me. 
 
 19. "Answereth him." So later Uncials, most Cursives, some Sjrriac; but H, A., B., 
 D., L., several Cursives, most Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic, and some Syriac read "them." 
 
 falling clown before the moon), and distorted in eye, and full of 
 foam in mouth, at the same time he raises up and sends them away 
 whole for a great fee, having delivered them from their terrible 
 sufferings." 
 
 " And I spake to thy disciples that they should cast him out," &c. 
 Very probably the faith of the nine was very sensibly lessened by 
 the absence of the Lord, and of the three leading ones. Williams 
 notices aptly the example of the people when Moses was withdrawn 
 from them : " It was, perhaps, in this respect, as well as in others, 
 strangely corresponding with the descent of Moses from the Mount. 
 For then, at the instigation and gainsaying of the people, Aaron 
 made the molten calf; as now, the disciples seem to give way under 
 the urgency of the Scribes, and that faithless generation." 
 
 19. "He answereth him, and saith, faithless generation, how 
 long," &c. This exclamation is levelled against all around — the 
 disciples, who had, but a short time before, been sent on a mission 
 to cast out evil spirits, " and who had returned with joy, saying. 
 Lord, even the devils are subject to us in thy name " (iii. 15 ; Luke 
 X. 17) ; the multitude, who would not have come together unless 
 they expected to see some mighty work similar to those they had 
 seen or heard of very frequently, for the Lord's fame had spread 
 over all the districts round about the Holy Land ; and the Scribes, 
 who, maliciously ignoring all former exorcisms, insisted on this 
 single failure as destructive of the claims of Jesus. 
 
 " How long shall I be with you ? how long shall I suffer you ? " 
 (fee. From this we learn that it is lawful for the ambassadors of 
 God to groan under the unbelief and opposition of a world at 
 enmity with God, and to long for peace and rest. So the Lord's 
 
188 HE WALLOWED FOAMING. [St. Mark. 
 
 20 And tliey brouglit him unto Mm : and ^ wlien lie saw 
 » ch. i. 26. liim, straioflitwaY the spirit tare him ; and he fell 
 
 Luke ix. 42. ^ _ "^ _ j. _ . 
 
 on the ground, and wallowed foaming. 
 
 21 And he asked his his father, How long is it ago since 
 this came unto him ? And he said, Of a child. 
 
 22 And ofttimes it hath cast him into the fire, and into 
 
 great forefather : " The enemy crieth so, and the ungodly cometh 
 on so fast .... and I said, O that I had wings like a dove, for 
 then would I flee away and be at rest." 
 
 20. "And they brought him unto him: and when he saw him, 
 straightway^" &c. The evil spirits seem always compelled to recog- 
 nize the presence of the Lord. The reader will remember how the 
 unclean spirit of chapter i. 24, cried out, '* What have we to do with 
 thee ? " and how in chapter iii. 11, all seem forced to fall down be- 
 fore Him, and so also, "he that had the Legion ran forward to fall 
 down before Him." Here, however, a spmt more inveterate in 
 malice acknowledges the Divine presence by defiance, as it were, 
 and more violent attempts on the life of his victim. Peter Chryso- 
 logus, a father of the fifth century. Bishop of Eavenna, remarks: 
 "The youth fell on the ground: but it was the devil who was 
 racked with pain : the possessed had trouble ; but the usurping 
 spirit was convicted before the awful Judge : the captive was de- 
 tained, but the captor was punished : through the suffering of the 
 human body, the punishment of the devil was made manifest." 
 (Quoted in Ford.) 
 
 21. "And he asked his father. How long is it ago since this came 
 unto him ? " &c. This He asked, not for His own information, but 
 for the benefit of the bystanders, that they might know how inve- 
 terate this case was, and above all, that the providence of God had 
 so guarded the youth that the evil spirit was restrained from de- 
 stroying him. Again : " In this, as in some other remarkable in- 
 stances, our Lord seems long to linger and to ask questions, before 
 He works the miracle, as if thus by degrees, and by the aid of His 
 voice and presence, to call every latent germ of faith into operation: 
 by His words as the dew of heaven ; by His countenance as the 
 genial sun, eliciting and giving strength." 
 
 22. " If thou canst do anything, have compassion on us, and help 
 us." Here was seen the mischief which the questioning of the 
 
Chap. IX.] HELP THOU MINE UNBELIEF. 189 
 
 the waters, to destroy liim : but if tliou canst do any thing, 
 have compassion on ns, and help us. 
 
 23 Jesus said unto him, ^ If thou canst believe, " ^latt. xth. 
 
 20. ch. xi. 23. 
 
 all things are possible to him that believeth. Luke xvii. e. 
 
 1 1 -n • T John xi. 40. 
 
 24 And straightway the father of the child cried 
 
 out, and said with tears. Lord, I believe ; help thou mine 
 unbelief. 
 
 23. "Believe" omitted by M, B., C.*, L., A, four Cursives (1, 118, 209,211), Coptic^ 
 Armenian, .^Ethiopic ; but retained by A., D., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old 
 Latin, Vulg., and Syriac. 
 
 24. " With tears." So A. (very early correction), D., N., later Uncials, almost nil 
 Cursives, Old Latin (a, b, c, i, 1), Vulg., Syriac ; omitted by N, B., C, L., three or four 
 Cursives, Coptic, Armenian, .^Ethiopic. (In Cowper's edition of the Codex Alexandrinus 
 there is a note, "TraiSno uerct Saxfvm. — TraiSiou u-era. addita in marg., et Suicfuw prhcs 
 omissum scriptum super rasura ; 1 m. [primd niayiu] ut videtur.'") 
 
 Scribes had done. It had well-nigh deprived the man of the bless- 
 ing he desired. How different from the words of the Centm'ion, 
 " Speak the word only," or of the Leper, " If thou wilt, thou canst 
 make me clean," or of the woman with the issue, to herself, " If I 
 may but touch his clothes, I shall be whole ! " 
 
 23. *' If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that 
 believeth." A large number of authorities omit the word " believe " 
 from the clause, "If thou canst believe," supposing the word to^ 
 be spm-ious. Thus the Lord's words may be paraphrased. As to 
 this, "If thou canst" what meanest thou by it? Then, after 
 a short, emphatic pause, " All things are possible to him that 
 beheveth." 
 
 If we retain the word " believe," the meaning may be, " Thou 
 saidst to me. If thou canst do anything. I say. If thou canst be- 
 lieve, all things are possible," &c. 
 
 24. "And straightway the father of the child .... helj) thou 
 mine unbelief." These words of the afflicted father are priceless, as. 
 revealing to us, more clearly than, perhaps, any other in Scripture, 
 the first effect of gi'ace on the soul, how by its entrance it shows to the- 
 soul its want, and deficiency, and weakness. The first spark of true 
 faith reveals to the man the extent of the darkness of his unbehef,. 
 and draws from him a prayer of mingled f^ith and humility. Thus 
 Quesnel excellently says, " The humble man is himself distrustful 
 of his faith, and prays without ceasing for an increase of it. It ia 
 
190 HE WAS AS ONE DEAD. [St Mark. 
 
 25 Wlien Jesus saw that tlie people came running together, 
 he rebuked the foul spirit, saying unto him, Thou dumb and 
 deaf spirit, I charge thee, come out of him, and enter no more 
 into him. 
 
 26 And tTie sjpirit cried, and rent him sore, and came out 
 of him : and he was as one dead ; insomuch that many said, 
 He is dead. 
 
 27 But Jesus took him by the hand, and lifted him up ; 
 and he arose. 
 
 often so weak that it scarce deserves the name. Who amongst us 
 has, after the example of this man, made use of prayers and tears 
 to obtain it ? An humble acknowledgment of the imperfection of 
 om' faith, and of our other defects, is capable of making up any- 
 thing which is wanting to us ; or rather, nothing is wanting to him 
 who has humility." Thus, also, Wesley : " Although my faith is 
 so small, that it might rather be termed unbelief, yet help me." 
 Leighton also : " The direct and proper act of faith is of perpetual 
 use and necessity, and then most where there is least of assurance ; 
 and it is no other than a remembrance or reliance, a rolling over of 
 the soul upon free mercy." (Ford.) These words may be applied 
 to every Christian grace or feeling. "Lord, I repent; help Thou 
 mine impenitency." " Lord, I love ; help Thou my coldness." 
 " Lord, I resolve ; help Thou the weakness of my will." 
 
 25. "When Jesus saw that the people came running together," 
 &c. The Lord had most probably taken the man and his son aside. 
 The crowd running up to them from mere curiosity, and crowding 
 about, would tend to destroy all the spiritual effect of the mighty 
 work which the Lord intended, and so He at once, with words of 
 irresistible power, cast forth the evil spirit. " Thou deaf and dumb 
 .spirit, I command thee, come out of him, and enter no more into 
 
 him." 
 
 26 27. " And the spirit cried, and rent him sore .... and he 
 arose," &c. It has been remarked that this cry of the boy was the 
 first sign of restoration ; before, he had been dumb and foamed at 
 the mouth only ; now the sharp cry is the prelude to restoration, to 
 speech and reason. Here the Lord permits the violence and power 
 of the spirit to be seen in this last paroxysm, so that when He took 
 him by the hand and lifted him up, it was all but a restoration to 
 
CuAP. IX.] PRAYER AND FASTING. 191 
 
 28 ° And wlien he was come into the house, his disciples 
 asked him privatelv, Why could not we cast him ° Matt. xvn. 
 out? ' ' ' 
 
 29 And he said unto them, This kind can come forth by 
 nothing, but by prayer and fasting. 
 
 29. "And fasting." So A., C, D., L., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, all Old 
 Latin except k, Vulg., Syriac, Coptic, Gothic, &c. ; but S, B., and one Old Latin only omit. 
 This is one out of many cases in which certain critics (Tischendorf and Westcott and 
 Hort) make two MSS., noted for scandalous omissions, nullify all other evidence. 
 
 life, and so the most violent commotion of the spirit, at times, pre- 
 cedes restoration to spiritual Hfe. 
 
 28, 29. *' And when he was come into the house .... prayer 
 and fasting." St. Matthew adds, '* because of your unbelief, for 
 verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed 
 .... nothing shall be impossible unto you." 
 
 But the answers, as given by the two Evangelists, supplement 
 each other, for true faith will be shown in the earnest and continual 
 use of the means of grace, such as prayer and fasting, not in their 
 neglect. No human being ever had such confidence in God as 
 Christ had, and yet in the view of His great conflict with Satan, 
 He fasted forty days and forty nights. If His great servants the 
 Apostles Peter and Paul were men of faith, they were equally men of 
 fasting. (Acts x. 30 ; xiii. 2, 3 ; xiv. 23 ; 2 Cor. vi. 5 ; xi. 27.) The 
 more a man has true faith in God, the more likely he is to use extra 
 means of humbling himself before God. Wesley remarks on the 
 parallel text in Matt. xvii. 21 : " What a testimony is here of the effi- 
 cacy of fasting, when added to fervent prayer ! " And Calvin's words 
 are also worth reproducing : " The meaning, therefore, is, that it is 
 not every kind of faith that will suffice, when we have to enter into 
 a serious conflict with Satan, but that vigorous efforts are indispens- 
 ably necessary. For the weakness of faith. He prescribes prayer as 
 a remedy, to which He adds fasting by way of an auxiliary : ' You 
 are effeminate exorcists,' said He, ' and seem as if you were en- 
 gaged in a mock battle got up for amusement ; but you have to 
 deal with a powerful adversary, who will not yield till the battle 
 has been fought out. Your faith must, therefore, be excited by 
 prayer, and as you are slow and languid in prayer, you must resort 
 to fasting as an assistance.' " 
 
192 HE SHALL EISE THE THIRD DAY. [St. Mark. 
 
 30 1" And they departed thence, and passed tlirongh 
 Galilee ; and lie would not that any man should know it. 
 p Matt. xvii. 31 p For he taug^ht his disciples, and said unto 
 
 22. Luke ix. . ■, . . 
 
 44. them, The Son of man is delivered into the hands 
 
 of men, and they shall kill him ; and after that he is killed, 
 he shall rise the third day. 
 
 31. " He shall rise the third day." So A., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, some 
 Old Latin, Vulg., Syriac (Schaaf) ; but K, B., C, D., L., A, most Old Latin and Coptic 
 read, " after three days." 
 
 Certain MSS. noted for their monstrous omissions, leave out the 
 words " and fasting," but the reader will see that the overwhelming 
 mass of authorities are in favour of retaining the words. And the 
 sense is on the side of so doing. All attempts at expelling evil spirits 
 must be preceded by prayer, i.e., by invoking the Name and power 
 of God, but in the case of certain more stubborn forms of evil some- 
 thing must be added to prayer. Our Lord Himself adds fasting to 
 prayer as a means of grace, in His Sermon on the Mount (Matt. vi.). 
 He added intense and long-continued fasting to prayer in view of 
 His own conflict with the most powerful of evil spirits, and so the 
 sense here requires that something more than mere prayer is 
 wanted to expel an evil spirit of more than ordinary power and 
 malignity. 
 
 30, 31. "And they departed thence, and passed through Galilee 
 . . . . he shall rise [again] the third day." " Thence " indicates 
 the place where the Transfiguration occurred, probably much to the 
 north of Galilee, near Cassarea Phillippi. If the previous events had 
 occurred near Mount Tabor, it could hardly have been said that He 
 departed thence and "passed through Galilee," and afterwards that 
 He " came to Capernaum." Lange supposes that this secret abode 
 of Christ's in Galilee coincides with the Lord's refusal, on occasion 
 of His brethren's challenge to Him to go up with them to the 
 feast of Tabernacles in Jerusalem (John viii. 1), and that took place 
 before the penultimate, and certainly concealed journey of Jesus to 
 Jerusalem. 
 
 Why should He wish now to be in retirement (" He would not 
 that any man should know it ") ? Evidently because the matter upon 
 which He was now instructing His disciples. His fast approaching 
 Passion and Resurrection, could not be spoken of in public. We 
 
Chap. IX.] WHO SHOULD BE THE GREATEST. 193 
 
 32 But they understood not tliat saying, and were afraid 
 to ask him. 
 
 83 ^ "^ And he came to Capernaum : and being i Matt, xviii. 
 
 -m-i • T ^' I-ukeix. 46. 
 
 m the house he asked them, What was it that ye & xxii. 24. 
 disputed among yourselves by the way ? 
 
 34 But they held their peace: for by the way they had 
 disputed among themselves, who sJiould he the greatest. 
 
 33. " He came." So A., C, L., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Coptic, Gothic ; 
 but N, B„ (D.), three Cursives (1, 118, 209), most Old Latin (a, b, e, g, i, k, 1), Vulg., 
 Sj-riac (Schaaf ) read, " they came." 
 
 must remember that what he is represented in verse 31 as teach- 
 ing, was not said once for all, but was the continuous theme of His 
 discourses. He had now done with teaching and healing the multi- 
 tudes. He had borne His witness, and now He laid Himself out 
 to prepare His followers for His Death and Kesurrection. 
 
 32. " But they understood not that saying, and were afraid to 
 ask him." The truth, respecting the atoning Sacrifice of Himself, 
 which He was about to offer, seems preternaturally hidden from 
 them. Not in such a sense as that they were without blame in not 
 receiving it. But their intense personal love to Him, their admira- 
 tion of Him, their hopes of His futm-e glory closed their ears to the 
 truth of His sayings. Their secret thought ever was, " Be it far 
 from thee, Lord : this shall not be unto Thee." And so iiutting 
 away the idea of His Death, they could not receive what He said of 
 His Eesurrection : wherefore, for His own purposes, God permitted 
 the veil which they had woven for themselves out of blind love and 
 misplaced hope to abide on their hearts. 
 
 33, 34. "And he came to Capernaum .... by the way .... 
 who should be the greatest." This is the only instance on record, 
 in which the Lord questions them respecting their conduct. With 
 their low and imperfect views of the Kingdom of God, it was 
 only natural for them to dispute who should be the greatest in it, 
 but being natural, i.e., the outcome of the natural and only ]par- 
 tially renewed heart, it must be corrected. And according to the 
 Lord's words as recorded in St. Matthew, it could only be corrected 
 by their "conversion." Wonderful fact this, that the men who 
 had given up all to follow Christ needed to be converted. But 
 
 o 
 
194 HE TOOK A CHILD. [St. Mark. 
 
 35 And lie sat down, and called the twelve, and saith unto 
 r Matt. XX. 26, them, ^ If any man desire to be first, the same 
 
 shall be last of all, and servant of all. 
 s Matt, xviii. 36 And ® lie took a child, and set him in the 
 
 midst of them : and when he had taken him in 
 
 his arms, he said unto them. 
 
 from what, and to what did they need to be converted? They 
 needed to be converted as to their whole views of the relative impor- 
 tance of things, so that they should desire to be the last of all, and 
 the servants of all — so that they should esteem it the greatest 
 honour and privilege to receive not a king, or a governor, or a 
 philosopher, or a statesman, but a little child in the Name of 
 Christ. How little do those who go about amongst us preaching 
 conversion, preach such a conversion as this ! 
 
 " But they held their peace." That is, they were thoroughly 
 ashamed. This shame was the beginning of the particular conver- 
 sion which the Lord declared to be needful. 
 
 85. " And he sat down." Not for rest's sake, but to assume the 
 attitude of the teacher, 
 
 "And called the twelve." He summoned together the whole 
 body, or college, for the lesson was one which touched the spiritual 
 life of each and every one of them. 
 
 *' And saith unto them .... last of all, and servant of all." 
 This may be understood in one of two senses ; either, " if any de- 
 sire to be the first in Christ's kingdom hereafter, he must be on 
 earth the lowliest of all, and minister as a servant to others ; " or it 
 may be, " if any one be ambitious of pre-eminence above his 
 brethren here on earth, he shall be the last in that eternal king- 
 dom." I incline to the last; for I do not see how any one could 
 set before himself the definite desire to be first either here or here- 
 after, without forfeiting all claim to be first or indeed great in any 
 way, even though he would attain the object of his desire by self- 
 abnegation, and self-humiliation. Such humiliation for a set pur- 
 pose could not be true humility. 
 
 36. " And he took a child, and set him in the midst . . . said 
 unto them." Some great writer — I am not certain who it is — has 
 noticed the extreme originality, as well as appositeness, of this illus- 
 tration. It has also been noticed that only a httle child would not 
 
Chap. IX.] ONE OF SUCH CHILDREN. 195 
 
 37 WLosoever shall receive one of such children in my 
 
 be injured in heart by so extraordinary a distinction being put upon 
 him. "These children," says St. Hilary, "follow their father, 
 love their mother ; wish no ill to their neighbour ; have no care for 
 wealth ; vaunt not ; hate not ; nor deceive ; believe what is told ; 
 hold as true what they hear. And these affections, received into 
 the heart and the will, lay open to us the way to heaven." 
 
 Let us put together the things which we learn from each Evan- 
 gelist of this lovely scene. St. Matthew tells us that He called the 
 child to Him, and St. Matthew and St. Mark that He put him 
 " in the midst " of the disciples, after which St. Mark alone tells us 
 that He " took him up in His arms," and St. Luke, that He set him 
 by Him. 
 
 37. "Whosoever [therefore] shall receive one of such children in 
 my name," &c. "What is the meaning of " receiving" such a child? 
 Chrysostom thinks it means so as to educate it and bring it up; but 
 probably the raeaning is to do to it any sort of kindness wliat- 
 soever. 
 
 " One of such cMldren.'" Almost all expositors consider that such 
 a term includes all who are in any way like such children, as, for 
 instance, all who are helpless, as children are ; all who are simple- 
 minded, or even weak in mind, or, particularly all who are young 
 in the faith, who, like children, require the " milk " of the Word, 
 and not its " strong meat " (Heb. v. 12-14). 
 
 "In my name," ?.e., for My sake; not only because they are 
 baptized or belong to Christian parents, though these are good 
 reasons indeed, but because they partake of the nature which Christ 
 took upon Him, because they belong to the race which Christ re- 
 deemed — because like Him they are poor, and have no settled homes, 
 or because He may be honoured in their after life. 
 
 Such children are received in Christ's Name, not only in orphan- 
 ages or in Sunday schools, but by many of the Christ-loving poor, 
 who have children of their own, and yet take into their homes some 
 poor waif or stray, and cherish it as their own flesh and blood for 
 no reward except the Lord's approval. 
 
 " Eeceiveth me." The grace of this promise seems almost in- 
 credible. What an honour would any Christian have esteemed it, 
 if he had been permitted to receive Christ under his roof for a single 
 hour, and yet that receiving might have been external and transi- 
 
196 WHOSO SHALL KECEIVE ME. [St. Mark. 
 
 name, receiveth me: and * whosoever shall receive me, re- 
 
 t Matt. X. 40. ceiveth not me, but him that sent me. 
 
 u Num.'xi."28. 38 Tf "And John answered him, saying, Master, 
 
 Luke ix. 49. 
 
 tory, but the Lord here, undoubtedly, promises that to receive a 
 little one in His Name, is to receive Him effectually. But this is 
 not an isolated promise. There are several such. '' He that re- 
 ceiveth you, receiveth Me." "Verily, I say unto you, inasmuch 
 as ye did it unto one of the least of these, My brethren, ye did it 
 unto Me." 
 
 "Whosoever shall receive me, receiveth not me, but him that sent 
 me." This sentiment is Johannine in its character and expression. 
 It belongs to that numerous class of passages, mostly in the fourth 
 Gospel, which set forth the oneness of nature, character, attributes, 
 will, action between the Father and the Son. Just as "he who 
 hath seen Me, hath seen the Father," "he that believeth on Me, 
 believeth on Him that sent Me; " "he that hateth Me, hateth My 
 Father also ; " so here, " he that receiveth Me, receiveth Him that 
 sent Me." 
 
 38. "And John answered him, saying. Master, we saw one cast- 
 ing out devils," &c. It is very remarkable that this question is the 
 only one word of St. John which he himself addressed singly to our 
 Lord, which has come down to us. Along with his brother James, 
 he moved his mother to ask for the first places in Christ's king- 
 dom, and along with his brother he asks whether they should call 
 down fire from heaven upon the Samaritan village ; but in this 
 case only does he address the Lord by himself. It is interesting to 
 consider what it was which moved him. Most probably his con- 
 science ; he had just heard the Lord say, " Whoso shall receive one 
 such little child in My Name." Then it struck him that lately he, in 
 common with the rest, or some of them, had forbidden someone 
 to do a good thing in the Name of Christ, and had forbidden him 
 because he did not belong to, or follow, the Apostolic company. 
 The man in question must have been a believer in Christ, and 
 must have been in heart attached to Him. The Lord in His 
 answer claimed him as "for Him," i.e., on His side (Luke ix. 50). 
 Owing to the attention with which the Lord's preaching was 
 listened to, and the effect of His miracles, there must have been 
 many who, without attaching themselves to Him as the Apostles 
 
Chap. IX.] WE FOKBAD HIM. 197 
 
 we saw one casting out devils in thy name, and lie followeth 
 not us : and we forbad liim, because he followeth not us. 
 
 38. "And he followeth not vs." This first "followeth not us" omitted by w, B., C, 
 L., A, three Cursives, Coptic, Syriac, and some versions; but retained by A., D., N., 
 later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., some Syriac, Gothic, &c. 
 
 did, yet believed in Him as the Christ. We know that there were 
 more than two such among the rulers themselves (John xii. 42). The 
 Lord had not as yet laid it upon these that they should openlyjoin 
 themselves to the Church ; indeed they could not, for there was, as 
 yet, no organized body to receive them, as there would be after 
 the Day of Pentecost. So that the Lord naturally said, " Forbid 
 him not." If he was sincere we may be sure that the providence 
 of God would, in due time, bring him into the Apostles' fellowship 
 and add him to the Church (Acts ii. 42, 47). 
 
 This account is exceedingly important as bearing upon the pre- 
 sent state of religion amongst ourselves. There are great numbers 
 of persons amongst us who are preaching Christ after their fashion, 
 who have had not only no commission from the Church, but no 
 training even in the Scriptures from any professedly religious body 
 whatsoever. Are we of the Church to forbid them, i. e., to de- 
 nounce them as necessarily schismatic and anti-Christian ? I think 
 that this place, together with such words as those of the Holy Spirit 
 by St. Paul, in Phil. 1. 18, settles the matter that we are not. But 
 then we are bound to do that which will entail upon ourselves far 
 more trouble and far more odium. We are bound to witness to 
 such preachers and their followers, that Christ desires the absolute 
 Unity of His Church, and exhibited His desire by very earnestly 
 praying for it (John xvii. 20, 21), so that if they preach such things 
 as conversion and present acceptance of Christ without regard to the 
 truth that there is not only *' one Spirit " but " one body," they may 
 destroy with one hand what they think they build up with the other. 
 Christ by no means laid it upon all those who had received the most 
 signal benefits from Him, that they should so much as tell to others 
 what they had received (Matt. viii. 4 ; ix. 30 ; xii. 16 ; Mark v. 43), and 
 such would show their truest gratitude by obedience to what must 
 have been to their grateful hearts a very hard command. Again, 
 we are bound to do another thing, which will entail still more 
 trouble and odium. We must bring before such irregular preachers, 
 and those influenced by them, as opportunity offers, that in all 
 
198 FORBID HIM NOT. [St. Mark. 
 
 39 But Jesus said, Forbid him not : ^ for there is no man 
 X 1 Cor. xii. 3. which shall do a miracle in my name, that can 
 
 lightly speak evil of me. 
 r See Matt. 40 For '' he that is not aojainst us is on our 
 
 xii. 30. 
 
 part. 
 
 40. " Against us is on our part" [or, "for us"]. So H, B., C, A, many Cursives, and 
 the Elzevir edition of Stephens ; but A., D., N,, later Uncials, seventy Cursives, Old 
 Latin, Vulg., Syriac, Gothic, &c., " Against you is on your part." 
 
 probability they hold an imperfect, indeed, a very mutilated Chris- 
 tianity ; for all such persons are, by the necessity of their position 
 as external to the Catholic Church, unable to comprehend the 
 truths which relate to the Mystical Body, and, in consequence, 
 they ignore the leading truths of the Apostolic writings, especially 
 those of the Apostle Paul (Eom. vi. xii, 1-4; 1 Cor. vi. 18-20; 
 X. 16-18 ; xii. 12-30 ; Ephes. i. 22, 23 ; iii. 6 ; iv. 4-6) ; they, in conse- 
 quence, disparage altogether the grace of Sacraments, holding them, 
 at the highest, to be mere badges of fellowship ; they have, to a 
 man, the most imperfect views of the holiness of the Christian's 
 body, and of set purpose absolve their followers from all need of 
 preparation for the judgment of Christ. 
 
 The loss of these truths we should bring before them very prayer- 
 fully and very humbly, knowing that the Church herself has in time 
 past, through her ministers, imperfectly taught them ; but still we 
 should set them before them very decidedly, for they are not our 
 truths, but the Lord's, and in so doing we shall not be without success. 
 I have now before my mind one whose conscience was awakened 
 by one of the most fanatical and wrong-headed of such irregular 
 preachers, but who through instruction was brought to see the 
 Catholic truth in its full proportions, and is now a priest second to 
 none in usefulness and zeal. The Catholic Church alone is capable 
 of setting forth the whole truth, the whole historical, doctrinal, 
 evangelical, moral, sacramental truth of God. 
 
 " Lightly speak evil of me. " Kather, " quickly speak evil of me." 
 Most likely meaning, he may gradually fall away from Me, but 
 whilst he performs miracles in My Name, he must be a true be- 
 liever in Me. 
 
 40. " He that is not against us is on our part." This is not for a 
 
Chap. IX.] A CUP OF WATER IN MY NAME. 199 
 
 41 ^ For wliosoever shall give you a cup of water to drink 
 m my name, because ye belong to Christ, verily I ^ Matt. x. 42. 
 say unto you, lie shall not lose his reward, 
 
 41. "In my name." So K*, C3., D., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin, 
 Vulg., &c. ; but No, A., B., C, K., L., some Cursives, and Syriac omit. 
 
 moment to be taken as if a man indifferent to religion or to the 
 Church or the Gospel were not against Christ, for the Lord had 
 said, " He that is not with Me is against Me, and he that gathereth 
 not with Me scattereth " (see my note on this place — Matt. xii. 3). 
 The man whose conduct gave rise to this saying was not indifferent 
 and careless of the honour of Christ. On the contrary, he was a 
 believer above the common run of behevers, for he invoked the 
 Name of Christ over those possessed, and on account of the sin- 
 cerity of his faith, was successful, and so was decidedly on the side 
 of Christ in His contest with the powers of darkness, but if after 
 the Lord had on Pentecost established the fellowship of the Apostles, 
 and began to add to the Church those who were being saved, he 
 had continued in his isolation, then his conduct would have been 
 mischievous and schismatical. He would have attempted to divide 
 that for whose unity Christ had earnestly prayed. And this is the 
 case with many irregular and unauthorized preachers now — they 
 begin through religious fervour to preach Christ, but are afterwards, 
 through vanity, or the evil influence of others, persuaded to act in 
 opposition to Catholic truth. 
 
 41. " For whosoever shall give you a cup of water only . . . his 
 reward." This verse seems to follow close upon verse 37, and to 
 be a continuation of a short discourse which seems to have been 
 interrupted somewhat abruptly by the question of St. John, and the 
 Lord's answer in verses 38, 39, 40. 
 
 Both Theophylact and Augustine, however, as quoted in Catena 
 Aurea, connect the sense with what immediately precedes. Thus 
 Augustine : — " By which He shows that he of whom John had 
 spoken, was not so far separated from the fellowship of the disciples 
 as to reject it as a heretic, but (in the same way) as men are wont 
 to hang back from receiving the sacraments of Christ, and yet 
 favour the Christian name, so as even to succour Christians, and 
 do them service only because they are Christians. Of these he 
 
200 CUT IT OFF. [St. Mark. 
 
 42 *And whosoever shall offend one of these little ones 
 a isiatt. xviii. that believe in me, it is better for him that a» 
 
 millstone wqxq hanged about his neck, and he 
 
 were cast into the sea. 
 b Deut. xiii. 6. 43 ^A.iidi if thy hand || offend thee, cut it off : 
 xTiii. 8. it is better for thee to enter into life maimed, than 
 
 n Or, ccnise 
 thee to offend; 
 
 and so ver. 45, 
 
 47. 
 
 42, " In me," So A,, B,, 0,2, L,, N., later Uncials, all Cursives, many Old Latin (c, f, 
 gi 1> q)» Vulg'j Syriac; " in me " omitted by n, A, and a few Old Latin. 
 
 says, ' They shall not lose their reward ; ' not that they ought 
 already to think themselves secure on account of this goodwill 
 which they have towards Christians without being washed in His 
 Baptism, and incorporated in His Unity, but that they are already 
 so guided by the mercy of God, as also to attain to these, and thus 
 to go away from this life in security." 
 
 42. *' Whosoever shall offend one of these little ones that believe," 
 &c. This applies equally to little children whose souls are ruined 
 by the bad example of those to whom they look up, or to weak 
 believers, who are perverted from the truth into heresy, or some 
 form of false religion, by the persuasion of those who seem to speak 
 with more confidence. 
 
 *' Shall offend" — i.e., "shall cause to fall," "shall trip them up 
 in their Christian walk." "It is better for him that a millstone," 
 &c. A millstone here is probably one of such size and weight that 
 it could not be turned by the human hand, but required an ass to 
 move it. [See my note on St. Matthew respecting the allusion to 
 that which was considered so terrible in those days, the loss 
 of religious burial — for the weight of the stone would prevent 
 the body being raised up from the depths of the sea to receive 
 burial.] 
 
 " Better for him," &c. "What a fearful passage this is against those 
 who have seduced female innocence, or instilled the seeds of infi- 
 delity into the minds of those once religious, or initiated any of 
 their brethren into evil practices. If this meets the eye of any such, 
 let them, as they value their eternity, rej^ent, and seek out those 
 whom they have wronged, and strive to undo the effects of their 
 wicked seduction, and pray God without ceasing for the souls once 
 
Uhap. IX.] THE FIRE IS NOT QUENCHED. 201 
 
 having two hands to go into hell, into the fire that never shall 
 be quenched : 
 
 44 ^ Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is « is.ixvi.24. 
 not quenched. 
 
 44. "Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched." This verse with 
 Terse 46 omitted by N, B., C, L., A, four or fire Cursives ; but retained both here and in 
 verse 46 by A., D., N., later Uncials, most Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., SjTiac, Gothic, 
 i£thiopic. 
 
 wronged by them, or assuredly they will find that the Lord will 
 keep His word, and His word is very terrible. 
 
 43-48. " And if thy hand offend thee, cut it off ... . where their 
 worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched." We earnestly wish 
 that it was allowable for us not to comment upon this passage, but 
 to leave it as it is, in its unutterable power, grandeur, and awful- 
 ness. As Williams says : " With regard to what is here repre- 
 sented as the parts of the body to be cut off, all comments on 
 the passage are remarkable as showing how human explanations 
 limit, weaken, and darken what is in itself so great ; there is an all- 
 seeing eye in God's Word which meets every case, as being Omni- 
 scient, Infinite, and Omnipotent. It is rightly imderstood by a 
 child or illiterate person ; it is sufficient to carry those who would 
 pass thereon to the heavenly Canaan, but contains depths which no 
 one can fathom." This is very true, but still the hands, the feet, 
 the eyes, are set forth in God's Word as the instruments of the soul 
 in compassing the gratification of certain distinct evil lusts : the 
 hand is the instrument of covetous grasping and of violence ; the 
 feet are the means of evil companionship, and running into the 
 ways of temptation and sin ; through the eyes the soul covets what 
 is not her own, and lusts after what is forbidden and polluting ; 
 through the eyes also the soul envies and hates, and the Lord classes 
 " an evil eye " amongst the things that defile. But it may be asked, 
 seeing that the members are but the instruments of the evil will, 
 why does not the Lord denounce that, and that only ? He does so 
 we answer, when occasion serves, as we have lately seen where He 
 speaks of what defiles coming out of the heart : but now He sets 
 forth the all important truth that the evil will is mortified and slain 
 not by arguing with it, but by starving it ; i.e., by forbidding the 
 members to yield themselves to its gratification. When the Lord 
 bids a soul for the sake of eternity mortify its members, its outward 
 
202 IF THY FOOT OFFEND THEE. [St. IVIark. 
 
 45 And if tliy foot offend thee, cut it off : it is better for 
 thee to enter halt into life, than having two feet to be cast 
 into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched : 
 
 46 Where their worm dieth no , and the fire is not 
 quenched. 
 
 II Or, cniLse 4i7 And if thine eye 11 offend thee, pluck it out : 
 
 thee to offend. . . r. i • 
 
 it is better for thee to enter into the kingdom of 
 God with one eje, than having two eyes to be cast into hell 
 fire. 
 
 45. " Into the fire that never shall be quenched" omitted by a, B., C, L., A, a few 
 Cursives, Old Latin (b, k), Coptic, Syriac ; but retained by A., D., N., later Uncials, 
 almost all Cursives, Vulg,, many Old Latin, &c. 
 
 members, He necessarily speaks to one who has two wills, an evil 
 will belonging to the old man, and a better and holier belonging to 
 the new. The evil will would gratify its lusts through its members, 
 but the better will can forbid the members to lend themselves to the 
 evil within, and can call to its aid the Sp rit of God by prayer, and 
 can mortify the flesh, and use in faith the means of grace. 
 
 44, 46, 48. "Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not 
 quenched." "The awful and solemn emphasis which the distinc- 
 tion of the clauses and the repetition of words gives this passage, 
 renders it, for the form of expression, the most remarkable in the 
 Bible ; the three-fold enunciation having, in Divine sayings, a pecu- 
 liar force, as the Three Persons of the Godhead setting thereon their 
 seal. The trix)le declaration of the latter part is, doubtless, on 
 account of the unwillingness of the human heart to accept the doc- 
 trine of Eternal Punishment. The worm that preys on the dead 
 body yet is no worm, for it dies not, and a fire that consumes the 
 dead corpse yet is no fire, for it never goes out ; a never-dying 
 death, a never-living life ; a punishment of the body when the body 
 has been no more (?), the instruments of sin, the hand, the foot, the 
 eye, taken into a state of suffering ; these all are replete with mys- 
 tery ; clouds that envelop the King of Terrors." So Williams, and 
 Quesnel writes : " These words, repeated three times, are so many 
 admonitions to avoid the last, great, general and eternal excommu- 
 nication, which will separate the sinner from all hapj)iness, and 
 overwhelm him with all internal and external miseries, denoted here 
 
Chap. IX.] IF THINE EYE OFFEND THEE. 203 
 
 48 "Where tlieir worm dietli not, and the fire is not 
 quenched. 
 
 48. This verse in all MSS. Tischendorf appends, Jvunc versum nemo omittit. 
 
 by the worin and the fire. Let ns hearken to this wholesome advice 
 of our Blessed Saviour, while, as yet, the worm may be crushed by 
 faith in Him." 
 
 That He Who is at once the manifestation of the eternal Truth, 
 and the eternal Son of God, should utter, with such emphasis, such 
 words as these must impress u]3on us all two things : — 
 
 1st. That the condition of those who have finally rejected the re- 
 deeming grace of God will be unutterably fearful ; so that the wrath 
 to come is indeed a thing to be fled from, the Being Whose wisdom 
 sees it necessary for the sake of the intelhgent universe to inflict 
 such a punishment, is in very deed a Being to be feared, the means 
 by which this wrath is to be escaped must in very deed be known 
 and be grasped with all the strength of our wills, the soul which is 
 capable of suffering such a doom, must unceasingly commend 
 itself to the safe keeping of Him Who has redeemed it. 
 
 2. And secondly, no soul which consistently with the interests of 
 the intelligent universe He can save from this doom will perish in it. 
 He Who, as Mediator, now carries on the perpetual application of 
 His redeeming work, and Who will hereafter pronounce the sentence 
 upon each and every soul, is the Lamb of God Who takes away the 
 sins of the world, the Shepherd Who goes after the lost sheep till He 
 find it, the Receiver of the fulness of the Spirit in order that He 
 may bestow it, the Drawer to Himself of all men who will not re- 
 sist His drawing. May I here quote words of surprising beauty, 
 cited with manifest approbation byDr.Pusey, in his answer to Canon 
 Farrar : " I have no profession of faith to make about them (those 
 without) except that God is infinitely merciful to every soul ; that 
 no one has been, or ever can be lost by surprise, or trapped in his 
 ignorance ; and as to those who may be lost, I confidently believe 
 that our Heavenly Father threw His arms round each created spirit, 
 and looked it full in the face with bright eyes of love, in the dark- 
 ness of its mortal life, and that of its ovni dehberate will it would 
 not have Him." (From Faber, " The Creator and the Creature," 
 cited in Pusey's " What is of Faith as to Everlasting Punishment ? " 
 p. 17.) 
 
204 EVERY ONE SALTED WITH FIRE. [St. Mark. 
 
 dLev. ii.i3. 49 For every one shall he salted with fire, 
 
 ^ and every sacrifice shall be salted with salt, 
 e Matt. V 13. 50 « Salt is good : but if the salt have lost his 
 
 Luke XIV. 34. ^ 
 
 49. " Every sacrifice shall be salted with salt." So A., C, D., N., later Uncials, almost 
 all Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., Syriac, Coptic, Gothic, and other versions ; omitted by 
 N, B., L., A, several Cursives, and some Coptics. 
 
 49, 50. "For every one shall be salted with fire .... peace one 
 with another." According to the unanimous confession of all com- 
 mentators, these are as difficult verses as any in the New Testa- 
 ment ; but wherein consists the difficulty ? Evidently in making 
 out their connection with what precedes, and with one another. 
 For in the two verses there are four distinct propositions, each of 
 which has a good meaniug in itself, but it is next to impossible to 
 ascertain the sequence of thought. I believe the explanation of this 
 to be that we have not the whole of the discourse, and by comparing 
 the parallel places in St. Matthew and St. Mark, it is perfectly clear 
 that we have not. For in this Gospel, immediately after the words 
 '* have peace one with another," which is the conclusion of the dis- 
 course which arises out of the dispute of the disciples in the way 
 respecting precedence, the Lord arises and goes unto the coasts of 
 Judaea ; whereas in St. Matthew the discourse occupies twenty-five 
 more verses, including the parable of the lost sheep, the instructions 
 respecting the treatment of the brother who trespasses, Peter's ques- 
 tion respecting forgiveness, and the parable of the unmerciful ser- 
 vant arising out of it. The only thing in St. Mark answering to all 
 this matter peculiar to St. Matthew, being the words, " Have peace 
 one with another." It seems quite clear then that verses 49 and 
 50 are fragments. Indeed they cannot be otherwise than fragments 
 to us in our present state of knowledge, for we are obliged to supply 
 long sentences and whole trains of thought between each to connect 
 them together. Let us now take each clause separately. 
 
 "For every one shall be salted with fire." This admits of two 
 meanings — one a very terrible one, fearful to contemplate. It is 
 that the words " every one " refer to those lost ones just mentioned 
 " whose worm dieth not," and it means that the fire of Gehenna will 
 act like salt, it will preserve them from perishing as salt does those 
 things which are salted by it, whilst it is the instrument of their 
 punishment. But it is hard to believe that such is the meaning. 
 Has God provided us in His word with any passage which willsug- 
 
Chap. IX.] HAVE SALT IN YOURSELVES. 205 
 
 jsaltness, wherewitli -will ye season it ? ^Have salt cS^h-^e" ^^* 
 
 gest a better ? I tliink He has, and in a place which, like this, asserts 
 the universal application of fire. This is 1 Corinth, iii. 11-15, where 
 we are told that at the day of judgment the fire [whatever it be] 
 will try every man's work ; and this work, be it remembered, must 
 be primarily the work of each man in building up his own soul on 
 the One Foundation. Now the action of that fire will be like that of 
 salt in this respect, by consuming that which is corrupt in the soul 
 it will preserve what is left which is incorrupt, and so indestructible. 
 It is that which is sinful and corrupt which destroys the soul in which 
 it dwells. If that corruption be purged out, there is nothing left 
 which can destroy the soul or spirit. By thus understanding the 
 verse we give a meaning to the words of Christ which in itself is 
 true, that is, if 1 Cor. iii. 11-15 gives us a true view of the judg- 
 ment ; and we preserve the universal application of the verse " eve)"y 
 one shall be salted with fire." What the fire actually is, we must 
 leave to God, only it acts as salt and it acts on all. 
 
 " And every sacrifice shall be salted with salt." Here the Lord 
 seems to pass somewhat abruptly to a different kind of salting ; but, 
 perhaps, if we had the whole discourse verbatim we should find that 
 the transition was by no means so abrupt. Fire has two uses. It has 
 a purifying one, and a sacrificial one. The Lord passes from the 
 purifying to the sacrificial. The sacrifices which God ordained were 
 " offered by fire" (Exod. xxix. 18, 25, 41, " An offering made by fire 
 unto the Lord," and so avast number of other places) ; but there was 
 a preliminary absolutely necessary, they must all be salted (Levit. 
 ii. 13). Now all Christians, as far as I can see, are agreed upon the 
 typical meaning of these sacrifices being never without salt. It is 
 that the living sacrifices of themselves which men offer to the Lord 
 (Eom. xii. 1, 2), must be salted with Divine Grace, i.e., the Holy 
 Spirit incorruptible in Himself, and destroying the corruption of 
 those who are sprinkled with Him, or salted by Him. And now 
 comes the real crux of the passage, the transition from the salting 
 of the sacrifice to "the salt which may lose its saltness," but we 
 have, from the Lord Himself, a sufficient guide as to the meaning 
 of this in Matthew v. 13, where the Lord speaks, as here, of salt 
 losing its saltness. The significance is plainly this : Divine grace is 
 not only salt (and so good in itself), but it makes those to whom it 
 is given to be iu their turn " salt." The Apostles were, as the Lord 
 
206 HAVE PEACE ONE WITH ANOTHER. [St. Mark. 
 
 i8^&™iv "i9 ^ yourselves, and ^ have peace one witli another. 
 
 2 Cor. xiii. 11. 
 
 Heb. xii. 14. 
 
 says, " The salt of the earth," and this not from anything in them- 
 selves, but because they were the recipients of the salt of Divine 
 grace to a greater extent than any other men. But there was this 
 difference between the Divine Incorruptible Salt of Grace, and those 
 which were made the salt of the world by receiving it, that the 
 latter had to retain the grace and to increase in it. And so the 
 Lord says, " Have salt in yourselves," i.e., retain, hold fast, increase, 
 and grow in, Divine grace, and this you cannot do unless you con- 
 tinue in the Divine fellowship in which you are, by being at peace 
 one with another. 
 
 CHAP. X. 
 
 ND ^ he arose from thence, and cometh into the coasts 
 of Judsea by the farther side of Jordan: and the 
 a Matt. xix. 1. people resort unto him asrain ; and, as he was 
 
 John X. 40. & -^ -^ . 
 
 xi. 7. wont, he taught them again. 
 
 A 
 
 1. "By the farther side of Joi'dan." So A., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives; 
 bnt H, B., C, L., Coptic read, "And beyond Jordan." C.2, D,, G-., A, some Cursives, 
 Old Latin, Vulg., Syriac, and some versions omit " and." 
 
 1. " And he arose from thence, and cometh into the coasts of 
 Judsea by the farther," &c. It will be necessary to say a word or 
 two respecting the sequence of events. Gresswell, with whose " Har- 
 mony" most commentators substantially agree, having inserted as 
 the continuation of this discourse, as given in Matt, sviii. 10-35, the 
 dealing with an offending brother, and St. Peter's question respecting 
 how often he ought to forgive, and the parable of the Unmerciful 
 Servant,then puts down the events from Jesus's goingup to Jerusalem 
 at the Feast of Tabernacles in John vii. 2, to the departure of the 
 Lord, after His discourse respecting the Good Shepherd, to Bethany, 
 beyond Jordan, where John first baptised (John x. 40). Either 
 during this stay at Jerusalem, or at its conclusion, the Lord enters 
 into a certain village, no doubt Bethany, near Jerusalem, where 
 
Chaf. X.] DIVOECE. 207 
 
 2 ^ ^ Aud the Pharisees came to him, and asked him, Is it 
 lawful for a man to imt away Ms wife ? tempting ^ Matt. xix. 3. 
 him. 
 
 He is entertained by the sisters Martha and Mary (Luke x. 38). 
 After this when in Bethany, beyond Jordan, he hears of the sickness 
 of Lazarus, and returns to Jerusalem and raises him from the dead, 
 then He again retires, but now into the "city called Ephraim" 
 (John xi. 54). Between this retirement and the final entry into 
 Jemsalem occur most of the events recorded between Luke x. 1 and 
 Luke xviii. 14, and at the account of the Lord's taking up and bless- 
 ing the little children the three Synoptics again coincide (Matt. xix. 
 13 ; Mark x. 13 ; Luke xviii. 15) and substantially continue to do 
 so to the end. 
 
 We cannot then understand the word " thence " as referring to 
 the place where the Lord had been speaking of the salt losing its 
 savour, and was urging the Apostles to " have salt in themselves." 
 It is quite necessary to understand it, so far as we are concerned, 
 indeterminedly as referring to some place in Galilee not mentioned. 
 
 " Cometh into the coast of Judaa by the farther side of Jordan," 
 i.e., by Persea. This was the second residence in Peraea, and so the 
 Evangelist intimates, by twice making use of the word " again." 
 
 " And the people resort unto him again ; and as he was wont he 
 taught them again.''^ 
 
 2. "And the Pharisees came to him, and asked him . . . tempt- 
 ing him." In what consisted the tempting ? Most probably in 
 this. The whole of that generation, Jewish and heathen, was, as 
 the Lord declares, adulterous to the last degree ; not only " adul- 
 terous " in the spiritual sense of forsaking God, but adulterous in 
 the sense of utterly disregarding the sanctity of marriage. The 
 Lord's questioners hoped — nay, they were sure, that the Lord 
 would express Himself on the side of strictness in respect of the 
 marriage contract. He had done so before in the most public 
 manner in His Sermon on the Mount (Matt. v. 32) : and so, as 
 divorces were then shamefully frequent, He would render Himself 
 unpopular with the adulterous generation. It has been supposed, 
 however, that they wished to entangle Him with Herod, who had 
 j)ut away his own lawful wife and taken his brother's : for being in 
 Peraea, He was in the dominions of Herod. Or, it may be, that 
 they simply wished to try to which school of opinion on the subject 
 
208 WHAT DID MOSES COMMAND? [St. Mark. 
 
 3 And lie answered and said unto them, What did Moses 
 command you ? 
 
 c Deut. xxiv. 4 And they said, '^ Moses suffered to write a bill 
 & xix, 7. of divorcement, and to put her away. 
 
 of divorce He belonged — the school of Schammai, or that of 
 Hillel. In Notes on the Fom- Gosi^els by F. M., which I have 
 several times quoted, there is a comprehensive but terse note 
 which gives all that need be given for the understanding of this 
 abominable subject : " The School of Hillel, who af&rmed that a 
 man might divorce his wife for the most trivial matter, such as over- 
 salting or over-roasting her husband's food (nay, E. Akiba taught, it 
 sufficeth if a man see a woman handsomer than his own wife, for 
 it is written : ' If she find not favour in his eyes,' Deut. xxiv. 1) : 
 and the school of Schammai, who from the succeeding words 
 ('because he hath found some uncleanness in her') allowed it 
 only in cases of adultery. Josephus, a respectable Pharisee, put 
 away his second wife, by whom he had three children, because he 
 did not fancy her (Life, 76)." 
 
 3, 4. "And he answered and said unto them. What did Moses 
 , . . put her away ?" In St. Matthew's account the question comec 
 later on, and is asked of the Lord by the Pharisees. The command 
 of Moses was intended to be a restraint upon divorce. It would 
 serve to prevent the Jew doing anything in the heat of passion. 
 St. Augustine remarks well on this : " Moses, however, was against 
 a man's dismissing his wife, for he interposed this delay, that a 
 person whose mind was bent on separation might be deterred by 
 the writing of the bill, and desist ; particularly since, as is related, 
 among the Hebrews no one was allowed to write Hebrew characters 
 but the Scribes. The law, therefore, wished to send him, whom it 
 ordered to give a bill of divorcement, before he dismissed his wife, 
 to those who ought to be wise interpreters of the law and just 
 opponents of quarrel. For a bill could only be written for him by 
 men who, by their good advice, might overrule him, since his cir- 
 cumstances and necessity had put him into their hands, and so by 
 treating between him and his wife, they might persuade them to 
 love and concord." 
 
 5. " And Jesus answered and said unto them. For the hardness 
 of your heart," &c. This precept means that a man, if he divorced 
 
Chap. X.] NO MOKE TWAIN BUT ONE FLESH. 209 
 
 5 And Jesus answered and said unto tliem, For tlie hard- 
 ness of your heart he wrote you this precept. 
 
 6 But from the bes^inning of the creation ^ G-od ^ Gen. i. 27. 
 
 & T. 2. 
 
 made them male and female. 
 
 7 ®For this cause shall a man leave his father e Gen. 11.24. 
 and mother, and cleave to his wife ; Eph. V. 31. ' 
 
 8 And they twain shall be one flesh : so then they are no 
 more twain, but one flesh. 
 
 9 What therefore G-od hath joined together, let not man 
 put asunder. 
 
 6. "God made them." So A., D., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, most Old 
 Latin, Vulg., Gothic, Syriac ; but N, B., C, L., A, Old Latin (c), Coptic omit " God." 
 
 7. "And cleave to his wife." So A., C, L., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives; 
 omitted by H, B., Gothic. 
 
 his wife, must give her a bill of divorcement. The precept involved 
 the permission, and it was the permission that was given " because 
 of their hardness of heart," as appears from what immediately 
 succeeds. 
 
 6. "But from the beginning of the creation God made them 
 male and female." St. Matthew inserts before this, "but from the 
 beginning it was not so," i.e., not so ordered by God that a man 
 could put away his wife ; because, at the beginning, God made 
 one man and one woman, by this intimating His will that each 
 man should have one wife and one only. 
 
 7. " For this cause shall a man leave . . . cleave to his wife 
 . . . one flesh." The bearing of this on the indissolubleness of 
 marriage is well brought out by Chrysostom: "If, however, 
 He had wished one wife to be put away, and another to be brought 
 in, He would have created several women. Nor did God only join 
 one woman to one man, but He also bade a man quit his parents, 
 and cleave to his wife." Wherefore it goes on : " And He said 
 [that is, God said by Adam] , For this cause, shall a man leave his 
 father and mother, and cleave to his wife. From the very mode 
 of speech, showing the impossibility of severing marriage, because 
 He said, ' He shall cleave.^ " 
 
 9. "What therefore God hath' joined together, let not man put 
 asunder." A somewhat deep and difi&cult question arises out of 
 the foregoing argument. The law of God, from the creation itself, 
 
 p 
 
210 HIS DISCIPLES ASKED HIM. [St. Mark. 
 
 10 And in the house his disciples asked him again of the 
 same matter. 
 fMatt. V. 32. 11 And he saith unto them, ^Whosoever shall 
 
 & xix. 9. Luke t . • <» t ^ • i 
 
 xvi. 18, Rom. put awav his Wife, and marry another, committeth 
 
 vii. 3. 1 Cor. -^ ^ , *^ . , , 
 
 vii. 10, 11. adultery against her. 
 
 12 And if a woman shall put away her husband, and be 
 married to another, she committeth adultery. 
 
 was that marriage should be indissoluble. One female was created 
 for one male, and when they were given to one another in marriage 
 they became one flesh, so that it was like dividing asunder one 
 person to sever the marriage tie. But Moses evidently gave the 
 man a power, under certain restrictions, to put away his wife. Was 
 this from God, or from Moses — from the Divine or from the human 
 lawgiver ? Evidently from the human ; but with permission (and 
 if it be lawful we should say with reluctant permission) from the 
 Divine. For the Divine law of indissolubility was based on the 
 original law or act of creation, as well as on the fact of marriage 
 making man and wife, in God's sight, one flesh ; so that the Mosaic 
 indulgence was temporary, and like many other things in that 
 dispensation, only till *'the time of Eeformation," and that time of 
 Reformation was the coming of the Son of God, Who brought into 
 the world a new Nature and a far more abundant Gift of the Spirit, 
 and a new and far stricter and holier example. This case of Moses 
 giving permission is in some sort j)arallel to that of St. Paul, who 
 at times spoke not by the full authority of the Holy Spirit, but 
 " by permission," as in 1 Corinth, vii. 6. 
 
 10. " And in the house his disciples asked him again," &c. St. 
 Maithew seems to recognize this more private word to the disciples 
 when He makes the Lord say, " I say unto you." Why was it said 
 to the disciples when in the house ? Because the disciples, or 
 apostles, represented the Church, and there was to be in the Church 
 a return to the original strictness of the Paradisaical state. 
 
 I must refer the reader to what I have said in my notes on St. 
 Matthew on marriage contracted by divorced persons. I cannot 
 add anything to what I have there said. Quesnel's remark on these 
 verses is worthy of consideration: " The union of marriage re- 
 sembles that of Christ with His Church, which He will never 
 forsake to take another, as the faithful members thereof will never 
 
CuAP. X.] JESUS MUCH DISPLEASED. 211 
 
 13 ^^And they brought young children to him, that he 
 
 should touch them : and his disciples rebuked e Matt. xix. 
 
 11117 1-5- ^"^^« 
 
 those that brought them. xviii. 15. 
 
 14 But when Jesus saw it, he was much displeased, and 
 said unto them, Suffer the little children to come unto me. 
 
 forsake Him. God suffered divorce in the synagogue, to signify the 
 future rejection of the people which that assembly represented ; He 
 re-established the indissolubility of marriage in the Church, to 
 show that she is the inseparable spouse of Jesus Christ. It is upon 
 this account that the adulterer does, by his lewdness and injustice, 
 particularly dishonour Christ and His Church, Whose mysterious 
 figure he so shamefully violates and abuses." 
 
 13. " And they brought young children to him, that he should 
 touch them," &c. St. Luke calls these children " infants," thereby 
 assuring us of their very tender years — that they were not of an 
 age to understand what was implied by being blessed by the Lord. 
 
 " And his disciples rebuked those that brought them." By this 
 we are certified that they were not brought to be healed of any in- 
 firmity or sickness, for the disciples were accustomed almost hourly 
 to see siich brought to our Lord. They could only be brought to 
 Him as the great Prophet, that He should impart such unseen and 
 spiritual blessing to them as they in their then tender years were 
 capable of receiving. 
 
 14. " But when Jesus saw it, he was much displeased." The 
 translation "much displeased" is not at all too strong. It is the 
 same word as is similarly rendered in verse 41 of this chapter, and 
 in every place where it is used signifies not only to be angry, but 
 to be very angry. 
 
 " Suffer the little children to come unto me." It is particularly 
 to be observ^ed here that our Lord imputes to the children's benefit 
 the faith of those who brought them. He accounts the parents or 
 friends " bringing " to be the child's " coming," What an economy 
 is this, not of superstition, as some most vainly talk, but of love! 
 <Ford). 
 
 " And forbid them not." The reader will be grateful to me for 
 giving him a comment on this passage, not in my own words, but 
 in those of that great saint and ornament of our Church of England, 
 John Keble. " That displeasure of His was one token of His special 
 
212 rOKBID THEM NOT. [St. Mark. 
 
 h 1 Cor. xiv. and forbid them not : for ^ of sucli is the kiri;::- 
 
 20. lPet.ii.2. T „ ^ T * 
 
 dom 01 Grod. 
 
 love for young children. Another was His express command, 
 ' Suffer them to come to Me,' as if He should say, ' There is some- 
 thing in them which will cause them, if let alone, to come to Me : 
 do not you hinder them. They cannot do without Me, and I, in a 
 manner, cannot do without them. They want Me for a Saviour, 
 and I want them for members. Who dare take on him to hinder us 
 from coming together ? ' Then our Lord's saying, ' Suffer them to 
 come ' is a second and most clear token of His love. A third is 
 His adding, ' Forbid them not.' For when a master not only 
 commands his servant to do a thing, but adds, * Take care you 
 leave it not undone,' the servant understands that his master's 
 heart is more than usually set upon that thing. But again our 
 Master gives the reason why He is so earnest upon having all the 
 little ones brought to Him ; and this is another and an unspeakable 
 token of His love. For what is the reason ? ' Of such is the 
 kingdom of God,' i.e., the blessed condition which I came into the 
 world to provide for men belongs, as it were, by right to them, and 
 to such as they are. Instead of being unfit they are the very 
 measure and standard of fitness for it, so that by comparison of 
 them shall be known who are true children of the kingdom." 
 Again, in the page before, he writes : " The Church, which is Christ's 
 Body, pertains to such as they are ; they were made for it, and it 
 for them : and what right they have to the Church, just the same, 
 of course, they have to the way into the Church, i.e.^ to Holy 
 Baptism. For if God calls them into His house, of course He 
 calls them to go through the door. If the kingdom is theirs, so is 
 the entrance into it. And so, as the Jews knew for certain that all 
 their boys were to be circumcized, so Christians know for certain 
 that all their children are to be baptized : not only that they may 
 be, but that our Lord is very earnest, very desirous to have them 
 all so brought to Him." (From "Village Sermons on the Baptismal 
 Office," pp. 109-111.) 
 
 The reader will see that the spirit of faith which pervades this 
 passage is but an echo of that of the Church. It is the reproduction 
 and expansion of the words of the Church, "Ye perceive how by 
 His outward gesture and deed He declared His goodwill towards 
 them . . . Doubt ye not, therefore, but earnestly believe, that He 
 
Chap. X.] HE SHALL NOT ENTER THEREIN. 213 
 
 15 Yerilj I say unto you, ' Whosoever shall not receive the 
 kingdom of God as a little child, he shall not ^ Matt.xviii.s. 
 enter therein. 
 
 will likewise favourably receive this present infant, that He will 
 embrace him with the arms of His mercy." 
 
 But we must remember that this bringing of little ones to Christ is 
 not done and over when we have brought them to Him in baptism. 
 This first bringing must be followed up by a continual, in fact, by a 
 daily bringing. The more we believe in the reality of Christ's recep- 
 tion of little ones in Baptism the more we shall pray that they may 
 continue and grow in the grace of it — the more carefully we shall 
 shield them from evil influence, the earher we shall sow in their 
 minds the seed of God's Holy Word. 
 
 15. "Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive . . . 
 not enter therein." In the first ages of the Church this was literally 
 true. We can now scarcely realize of what a world of pride and 
 prejudice a man then had to divest himself, to submit to receive 
 baptism ; for instance, an educated Gentile had to account Plato, 
 Socrates, Aristotle, as at the best but very partially enlightened 
 teachers, and to submit to receive the salvation of his soul and the 
 resurrection of his body by believing that a Crucified Jew was the 
 only Son of God. At the same time the Eabbinical Jew had to 
 cast aside the traditions of his elders, over which he had spent the 
 best years of his life, as mischievous nonsense, and to receive at the 
 hands of a fisherman initiation into a system which was to super- 
 sede his own. The nearest thing to it in this our day is the bap- 
 tism of a high caste Brahmin, so that he" may receive salvation on 
 the same terms as a Sudra {i.e., one of the lowest caste), and kneel 
 by the side of the same Sudra to receive the pledges of it.^ 
 
 ^ The following is related in one of our missionaiy journals. A 
 high caste Brahmin came to receive Holy Baptism. He approached 
 the font wearing the sacred thread which, amongst his Hindoo co- 
 religionists was the badge of his being amongst the " twice bom," 
 and entitled him to little short of religious worship from those of a 
 lower caste. But at the moment when he answered, " I renounce 
 them all," he stripped off the sign of idolatrous pre-eminence and 
 trampled it under his feet. 
 
214 WHY CALLEST THOU ME GOOD? [St. Mark. 
 
 16 And lie took them up in his arms, put Ids hands upon 
 them, and blessed them, 
 k Matt. xix. 17^^ And wheu he was srone forth into the 
 
 16. Luke ' • n -, T n , , . 
 
 xviii. 18. way, there came one running, and kneeled to him, 
 
 and asked him, Grood Master, what shall I do that I may 
 inherit eternal life ? 
 
 18 And Jesus said unto him. Why callest thou me good ? 
 
 16. " And he took them up in his arms, put his hands," &c. 
 Notice not one, but three signs of goodwill. He took them up in 
 His arms as a sign of fatherly affection, He laid His hands upon 
 them in token of blessing proceeding from Himself, and He blessed 
 them, and so by word of mouth assured all of His heavenly Father's 
 benediction, for they had asked Him " to lay His hands upon them 
 and pray.'' 
 
 17. " And when he was gone forth . . . there came one running 
 . . . eternal life." St. Mark's narrative, as usual, bears every sign 
 of having been learned from an eye-witness, for whereas St. Matthew 
 merely notices that one came to Him, and St. Luke that a certain 
 ruler asked Him, St. Mark mentions that it occurred when the 
 Lord was going forth, no doubt out of the house, and that this 
 young man, evidently one of rank and consideration, came running, 
 that is, in haste and eagerness, and kneeled to Him, that is, in 
 lowly deference, and asked — 
 
 " Good Master, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life ? '* 
 The question was evidently asked in all sincerity, by one who had 
 listened to the words of the Lord, and been convinced by His 
 mighty works that He was a teacher sent from God. We cannot 
 help remarking that his coming to our Lord thus in public when 
 He was in the way, and confessing His greatness by kneeling to 
 Htm, is in honourable contrast to the coming of another ruler 
 secretly, by night. 
 
 18. "And Jesus said unto him, "Why callest thou me good ? . . ► 
 God." Why did the Lord so abruptly meet his inquiry with this 
 question ? In my notes on St. Matthew I said that it was as if the 
 Lord asked, " Dost thou call me good out of mere courtesy, as thou 
 wouldst call any scribe or Eabbi good ? " And so He did this in 
 order to rectify the man's views of what was good. He had come 
 asking " what good shall I do ? " and the Lord directs him at once 
 
Chap. X.] NONE GOOD BUT GOD. 215 
 
 there is none good but one, that is, God. 
 
 to the only true standard of goodness, God Himself, and to His 
 Law, which sets forth the goodness which God, the only Good, de- 
 sired to see in His creatures. 
 
 Was, then, this young man wrong in thus addressing the Lord 
 (he being, of course, ignorant of our Lord's claim as the Eternal 
 Son of God, to partake of the essential goodness of His Father) ? No, 
 for Christ Himself had continually applied the term "good "to the 
 imperfect human being, as when He said, " a good man out of the 
 good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good," and 
 He speaks of " an honest and good heart." He was not wrong, 
 but ignorant— ignorant of the infinite depth and meaning of the 
 word he used, and the thing respecting which he came to inquire. 
 "What shall I do ? " St. Matthew alone represents him as asking 
 " What good shall I do ? " St. Mark and St. Luke merely, " What 
 shall I do?" Very many of the best commentators believe that 
 by what the Lord asked. He intended to lead the young man to the 
 knowledge and confession of His Godhead. Thus Lange : " Jesus 
 teaches him to apprehend good in its absoluteness, and to that end 
 he must understand the being good, which he ascribes to Christ as 
 being founded in God. Thus the answer is not to be explained 
 Deistically, but Christologically ; 'If thou wouldest call Me good, 
 thou must apprehend My unity with God, and My Divine Nature.'' 
 Now without for a moment denying, but rather affirming, that any 
 true, honest, searching investigation of the character, claims, mighty 
 works and superhuman words of Christ, would infallibly lead to 
 the belief of His absolute union with God, I do not think that the 
 Lord means this by His question. I think He means to lead the 
 man to a simpler issue, more on his level as not yet a disciple, 
 and so not instructed in the mysteries of the kingdom, of which 
 our Lord's essential Godhead is the highest. I think the Lord's 
 drift will be best ascertained by considering what answer the young 
 man must necessarily have given if the Lord had compelled him 
 (and He may have done so) to say why he called Him good. He 
 could only say, " I call you good because you seem to me, and to all 
 who observe you, to do the will of God. You seem to keep all 
 God's commandments, and to keep them in the highest and most 
 spiritual way that men can. If the Scriptures give us the true 
 character of God as good and merciful, and yet severe, then you set 
 
216 THOU KNOWEST THE COMMANDMENTS. [St. Mark. 
 
 19 Thou knowest tlie commandments, 'Do not commit 
 1 Exod. XX. adultery, Do not kill. Do not steal, Do not bear 
 
 Rom. xiii. 9. . -r\ p 
 
 false witness. Defraud not. Honour tlij father and 
 mother. 
 
 forth the character of God, for you go about doing works of mercy 
 and goodness ; you set forth forgiveness to the penitent, and yet 
 you give no indulgence whatsoever to any sin." Such must neces- 
 sarily have been the substance of the young man's answer if the 
 Lord had compelled hira to give one to His question, "Why callest 
 thou Me good ? " And with respect to the Lord's further remark, 
 " There is none good but One, that is God," we can well suppose 
 him to say, " There is, it is true, but One Who is really good, but 
 then He is the Author of all good, He does not keep His goodness 
 to Himself, He diffuses it. The Scri^Dtures teach us that He is able 
 and wilHng to make men good after the pattern of His own good- 
 ness ; and He has made You thus good, and we know this because 
 You so faithfully keep His commandments and do His will." 
 
 We must assume that the young ruler, from his position, must 
 have been educated in the Scriptures, and, if so, he must have 
 known all this. He must have known, for instance, that God 
 promised to circumcise the hearts of His people, and he must have 
 known that the Psalms, which he constantly used in his synagogue, 
 supplied him with prayers in which to ask God to do this in each 
 man's case, such as " Create in me a clean heart, God, and renew 
 a right spirit within me." " Make me to go in the path of Thy 
 commandments." 
 
 So then the Lord evidently intended to remind him of what he 
 knew, and bid him realize it, and follow up his knowledge to its 
 issues, and above all not speak words or ask questions hastily and 
 thoughtlessly, but consider and weigh his words well, for he had to 
 do with One Who was able to hold him to what he might say, and 
 would so do. 
 
 And now the Lord, having reminded him of ih.e one standard 
 and source of goodness, proceeds : " Thouaskest the way of Eternal 
 Life : Do the will of Him Who is Life, and thou shalt enter into 
 His Life. If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments, for 
 they were given to lead men to life." " Which ? " was his reply. 
 To which the Lord rejoins, " Thou knowest the commandments, 
 
Chap. X.] ALL THESE HAVE I OBSERVED. 217 
 
 20 And lie answered and said unto liim, Master, all these 
 have I observed from my youth. 
 
 Do not kill ; do not commit adultery ; do not steal ; do not bear 
 false witness ; defraud not ; thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy- 
 self." Now the reader will notice that the Lord here does not 
 bring forward some test commandment, such as " Thou shalt love 
 the Lord thy God with all thy heart," which would at once, and 
 without any further trouble, have convicted the man as a trans- 
 gressor, but He brings forward commandments which anyone 
 respectably religious might have kept, and when the j^oung man 
 answered, " All these have I kept from my youth up," the Lord's 
 conduct is in the most marked contrast to what, according to all 
 principles of so-called Evangelical Keligion, we should have ex- 
 pected. Instead of saying to him, "You miserably deceive your- 
 self, for you have never really obeyed any one of these command- 
 ments in the spirit. Every single act you have performed is tainted 
 with sin. Your supposed righteousness is a delusion. Y^'ou are 
 utterly alienated from God, for you are a prey to the worst of all 
 evils — self-righteousness." Instead of this, it is said bj' our Evan- 
 gelist that " the Lord looked upon him, and loved him." This 
 action of the Lord's is unique. The look of the Son of God must 
 have searched him through and through, and yet notwithstanding 
 the imperfection He saw within him, He loved him. This would 
 not have been if He had seen in him insincerity, or hypocrisy, or 
 pride, or selfishness. If the righteous Lord loveth righteousness, 
 He must have seen something very lovable and good in this man, 
 60 as to call forth His love, after that, by His look, the Lord had 
 searched his heart. 
 
 But the young man asked, " What lack I yet ? " and the Lord 
 answered, " One thing thou lackest : if thou wilt be perfect, sell 
 that thou hast, and give to the poor : [so that thou altogether 
 partest with it and canst not ask it back again, or receive any 
 further benefit from it in this world] , and come, take up the cross, 
 and follow me." 
 
 Now it is of the utmost impoi-tance to the understanding of the 
 whole transaction, that we do not mistake the purport of this an- 
 swer. If we understand that this answer was designed to convict 
 this man openly of secret covetousness, and so to dismiss him to 
 the fate of Balaam or Judas, or any other covetous reprobate, we 
 
218 ONE THING THOU LACKEST. [St. Mark. 
 
 21 Then Jesus beholding him loved him, and said unto 
 him, One thing thou lackest: go thy way, sell whatsoever 
 
 lose the whole lesson which the Lord intended to teach us. We 
 have only to contrast the Lord's conduct in respect of this rich 
 young man with that to another rich man, viz., Zacchjeus, to see 
 this. It is said of Zacchaeus that he was the chief of the publicans, 
 and that he was rich ; and it is also said that he stood and said 
 unto the Lord, " Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give unto the 
 poor," and the Lord, instead of requiring of him the remaining half, 
 approved of the partial surrender, which no doubt would have left 
 him a comparatively wealthy man, and said, " This day is salvation 
 come to this house, for as much as he also is a son of Abraham." 
 Now why was this difference made ? 'WTiy did the Lord approve of 
 the surrender by Zacchaeus of half of his goods, and require the sur- 
 render of all this young ruler's ? It could not have been because it 
 was necessary to salvation, or the Lord would have required the 
 same of Zacchseus, and of every other man whom He willed to save. 
 Why was it then required in this case ? Simply because the man 
 had asked the way of perfection. He had asked, " What lack I 
 yet? " and the Lord sets before him the way of perfection, i.e., the 
 Apostolic life. " Sell that thou hast, and come, take up the cross, 
 and follow me. Do what these My twelve companions have done, 
 they have forsaken all and followed Me, in the way of enduring 
 hardship ; follow their example." 
 
 This incident is of the utmost importance, as showing that Christ 
 distinctly recognizes two ways of reUgious life, the ordinary reli- 
 gious life, and the life of perfection. The ordinary religious life, 
 so far as the retention of worldly possessions is concerned, is set forth 
 in the injunctions of St. Paul to Timothy : " Charge them who are 
 rich in this world . . . (not that they surrender at once all that 
 they have, but) that they be not high minded, nor trust in uncer- 
 tain riches, but in the living God . . . that they do good, that they 
 be rich in good works." The life of perfection was set forth in the 
 life of St. Paul himself. The Lord, then, did not require this young 
 man to embrace the Apostolic life in order that he might enter into 
 life — the way to that the Lord had set before him at the first ; but 
 because his self-esteem had prompted him to inquire after the way 
 of perfection. [What lack I yet ? If thou wilt be perfect.] 
 
 All professing Christians are called to the ordinary religious life, 
 
Chap. X.] HE WAS SAD AT THAT SAYING. 219 
 
 thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have "^ trea- 
 sure in heaven : and come, take up the cross, and •" Matt. vi. 19. 
 
 ' r ' 20. &xix.21, 
 
 follow me. Luke xii. b3. 
 
 . & xvi. 9. 
 
 22 And he was sad at that saymg, and went 
 away grieved : for he had great possessions. 
 
 ?'.e., to a godly, righteous, and sober life, springing (in this dispen- 
 sation) out of faith in the Person and Work of the Eedeemer, 
 guided by His Spirit, accepted through His Merits and Intercession, 
 and nourished by His Body and Blood ; but so far as we can see, 
 all are not called to the Apostolic Life ; though how many may be 
 secretly called by God to a higher life, even a life of Apostolic per- 
 fection, which call of God they resist as this young ruler did, is 
 known only to the Searcher of hearts. 
 
 Anyhow, the place teaches us the danger of using unreal words. 
 How much, in this day, we hear of self- surrender which means 
 only a surrender of self- righteousness, so that we should lean, not 
 on ourselves, but on Christ, and submit to be saved, as the expres- 
 sion is, not in our own way, but in His ; whereas, the self-surrender 
 which the Lord required of this young ruler was a very different 
 thing indeed, for it was a surrender of all that ministered to self. 
 It was a surrender, not only of worldly company, that of course 
 was included, but of worldly possessions. It was that he should 
 enter upon a life of " simple " faith, which simple faith was to be 
 shown not in words and phrases of reliance on Another's merits, but 
 in the surrender of all settled income, so that he should rely for his 
 daily sustenance on the Lord's opening the hearts of the brethren 
 to minister to his necessities. The writer of these lines has not 
 lived this life himself, nor anything like it ; but as he is called upon 
 in due course to expound this remarkable incident, he feels that 
 he must do it honestly, and not deprave Scripture by ignoring 
 the existence of this higher and more perfect way of serving 
 God. 
 
 22. "And he was sad at that saying, and went away grieved," 
 &c. It is a sad ending of the interview, but we may be sm-e that, 
 since the Lord loved Him, it could not have been the ending of his 
 day of grace. The author of the "Christian Year," asks, "Who 
 can say that his heart did not turn afterwards, that He was not 
 among those whom the Holy Ghost at His first coming moved to 
 
220 JESUS LOOKED EOUND ABOUT. [St. Mark. 
 
 23 ^ '^ And Jesus looked round about, and saith unto his 
 n Matt. xix. disciples, How liardly sliall tliey that have riches 
 xviii. 2i. enter into the kinordoni of God ! 
 
 lay all at the Apostles' feet ? " (Keble's " Sermon on Prov. xxii. 2,'* 
 quoted in Ford.) 
 
 23. "And Jesus looked round about, and saith unto his disciples,'* 
 &c. Notice how the real author of this Gospel observed, not only 
 the actions, but the very looks and gestures of the Lord. This 
 "looking round about" implied a solemn pause, and a call to 
 thought and serious reflection, for He was about to enunciate a 
 truth very difficult for the world to receive when He exclaimed 
 "How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of 
 God ! " 
 
 The kingdom of God here does not mean the eternal state of 
 future blessedness in the immediate presence of God, but that visible 
 state of things upon earth — that Church, the body of Christ, which 
 God designed to be the state of preparation for it. It was a fact 
 that for years, we might almost say for centuries, the saying of the 
 Apostle was literally true, "not many wise men after the flesh, 
 not many mighty, not many noble were called." It was the re- 
 proach of the philosophers and the higher classes against the 
 Church that it chiefly consisted of low-born persons and slaves. 
 This I have noticed in my note on verse 15. 
 
 Now riches gave men consideration in this world. The wealth 
 of this world made its possessors looked up to, and they were loth 
 to enter into a society which was then looked down upon as low, 
 and vulgar, and joyless. Some author has remarked that if a rich 
 man was converted and baptized, he might find his former slave 
 his bishop to exercise discipline over him, or his priest to administer 
 to him elements which, on no account, could he consecrate or 
 administer to himself And that which would be an hindrance to 
 a man in those days entering into the visible kingdom of God upon 
 earth, would also be then and will be now an hindrance to him in 
 attaining that heavenly state of final glory for which the Church 
 upon earth is intended to be the state of preparation. For a man 
 may be in the Church outwardly and visibly, and yet not of it — not 
 of it in spirit, for the wealth of this world is certainly not conducive 
 to poverty of spirit, and the Lord's first blessing is, " Blessed are 
 the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." 
 
Chap. X.] THE DISCIPLES ASTONISHED. 221 
 
 24 And the disciples were astonished at his words. But 
 
 There can be no doubt of the fact, that all Christians, especially 
 all teachers of religion, must face it, that the Lord of salvation lays 
 down with veiy great seriousness and very great earnestness the 
 hindrances which all worldly advantages are to attaining spiritual 
 and eternal benefits. This is, in many ways, contrary to our 
 worldly reasonings. "We are tempted to think that the superior 
 education which naturally accompanies wealth — that the broader 
 and wider views of things which a higher worldly position assists 
 men in taking — that the desire to maintain respectability of de- 
 meanour in a sphere above that of the many — that these things 
 must be on the side of religion, but our Lord, Whose heavenly wis- 
 dom must have taken into account all such considerations, makes 
 nothing of them, literally nothing, and lays down in the broadest 
 and most absolute way, that wealth and the things which wealth 
 procures are not only detrimental, but dangerous to the soul. Now 
 it seems to me that those who teach the religion of Christ are bound 
 to set this forth, though it may be urged against them. *' See," it 
 may be flung in our teeth, " see what comparative affluence you 
 possess, what a position even in the eyes of the world you occupy, 
 what society you are able to enjoy ! " Well, if we are faithful we 
 must submit to this taunt, and we must reproduce the words of our 
 Master and Judge. We can, of course, take off much of the edge of 
 such reproaches by self-denial — by simplicity of manners and living, 
 and by liberality. No matter what the difficulty, either on our 
 part or on the part of those we teach, the words of the Lord must 
 be set forth, " How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the 
 kingdom of God." 
 
 24. "And the disciples were astonished at his words." But had 
 He not said the same thing in effect before, as in the Sermon on the 
 Mount, and when He sent them forth on their first mission ? Yes, 
 but He had never before enunciated it so broadly, so unreser- 
 vedly, so like an universal axiom as now. Might they not also be 
 astonished at the differences between the new and the old state of 
 things in this respect ? Under the Old Covenant the man who 
 obeyed God was to be blessed in his basket and in his store. David 
 sang of him, "Blessed is the man that feareth the Lord," for 
 " Riches and plenteousness shall be in his house," Ps. cxi. But 
 now all is reversed. 
 
222 THEY THAT TRUST IN RICHES. [St. Mabk. 
 
 Jesus answereth again, and saitli unto them, Children, how 
 o Job xxxi. 21. hard is it for them ° that trust in riches to enter 
 
 Ps. lii. 7 & . . ^ 
 
 ixii. 10. 1 Tim. into the kinsfdom of God ! 
 
 vi. 17. ^ 
 
 24. " For them that trust in riches." So A., C, D., N., later Uncials, all Cursives, all 
 Old Latin except one (k), Vulg,, Syriac, Coptic, Gothic, Armenian ; omitted by K, B., A, 
 Old Latin, &c. 
 
 " But Jesus answereth again . . . Children, how hard is it for 
 them that trust." Before we comment on this, we must ascertain 
 what the true reading is. The Vatican and Sinaitic MSS. in 
 company with two other authorities only, which I have given in the 
 critical notes above, omit the words, '* for them that trust in riches," 
 and read "how hard it is " ({.e., for anyone rich or otherwise) "to 
 enter into the kingdom of God." Now, these MSS. are noted for their 
 omissions, so that if our copies of the New Testament were based 
 on them, we should have wliat all true Christians would consider a 
 very mutilated Word of God. But the sense and consistency of 
 the whole argument requires that these words should be genuine, 
 for in the twenty-third verse we have the Lord speaking of the 
 danger of riches, and in the tweuty-fifth verse reiterating in a para- 
 bolic expression what He had said before respecting this particular 
 danger. So that if in this intervening verse our Lord speaks 
 generally, that salvation is a very difficult matter to all alike, the 
 whole point of His argument is destroyed. It is hard for rich men 
 to be saved, only because it is hard for any man to be saved. Thus 
 the most solemn warnings of the Son of God upon a point in which 
 His principles are irreconcilably at variance with the principles of 
 the world are neutralized. The two MSS. which omit these words 
 rave derived from one which must have been the production of some 
 scribe who did not do his work conscientiously. 
 
 We must treat then these words as part of the words of the Lord. 
 
 They teach us, taken in connection with His preceding words, 
 that the danger of riches is, that they almost compel us to trust in 
 them. We naturally look to them rather than to any superior 
 power " for defence, or happiness or deliverance, from the thousand 
 ■dangers that life is continually exposed to." See what they do — 
 they procure us friends, deference, influence, honourable office : if 
 carefully used and invested they relieve us from all anxiety about 
 the future, and at very little sacrifice indeed they win for us a 
 i-eputation for generosity and kindness. So that, as I said, they 
 
Chaf. X.] WHO THEN CAN BE SAVED? 223 
 
 25 It is easier for a camel to go through the eje of a needle, 
 than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God. 
 
 26 And they were astonished out of measure, saying among 
 themselves, Who then can be saved ? 
 
 27 And Jesus looking upon them saith. With men it is 
 impossible, but not with God: for ^with God all p Jer. xxxii. 
 
 j-i • „ ., , 17. Matt. X'x. 
 
 things are possible. 26. Luke i. 37 
 
 compel us to trust in them as being our fast friends. At times they 
 fail us, but very seldom, if we exercise XDrudence and foresight, so 
 that, as Wesley turns it, " It is easier for a camel to go through a 
 needle's eye than for a man to have riches and not trust in them." 
 
 25. " It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle 
 than," kc. Of course this betokens an impossibihty, and was in- 
 tended to do so. An impossibility on man's side, left to himself 
 with only a common measure of grace, and so it is said : 
 
 26. *' They were astonished out of measure, saying among them- 
 selves, Who, then, can be saved ? " As Jews they thought of tlie 
 promises of tbe Old Testament of prosperity and safety to those who 
 kept the law. It may be, also, that they considered among them- 
 selves that riches raise men above certain temptations, and put it 
 in their power to relieve the poor, and to do much good. 
 
 27. "And Jesus looking upon them." They had said among 
 themselves, not apparentlj'- to Him, or so that He should hear, 
 "Who, then, can be saved?" and by His look He at once riveted 
 their attention and, as Chrysostom explains, dispelled any unneces- 
 sary fear. " With a mild and meek look having soothed their 
 shuddering mind, and having put an end to their distress [for this 
 the Evangelist signified by saying, 'He beheld them'] then by 
 His words also he relieves them, bringing before them God's 
 power." 
 
 27. "With men it is impossible, but not with God: for with 
 God all things are possible." With men {i.e., with men without 
 God's Spirit and Grace), it is impossible, but what is impossible ? 
 Not merely to save themselves, but to deliver themselves from the 
 power of things temporal. Just as God only can deliver men from 
 the love of sin, so God only can deliver men from reliance on 
 riches. 
 
 *' With God all things are possible." Thus God saved Zacchseus, 
 
224 WE HAVE LEFT ALL. [St. Mark. 
 
 28 ^ ^ Then Peter began to say iinto him, Lo, we have 
 q Matt xix. igft all, and have followed thee. 
 
 27. Luke 
 xviii. 28. 
 
 and in this onr day some rich and noble men seem to abound in 
 every Christian grace ; but though it be possible with God, we may 
 be sure that the Lord did not intend by these words to cancel the 
 warnings He had just uttered. Does the Lord here mean that all 
 things are equally easy to God ? By no means. All things may 
 be equally easy to Him as looked at from the side of mere power — 
 mere physical force ; but God does not deal with intelligent crea- 
 tures in the way of overwhelming power. So far as their will is 
 concerned He deals with them, then, after such sort that they 
 should co-operate with Him, and yield willingly to Him: and the 
 Lord if He teaches us anything by the whole matter teaches us this, 
 that it requires more spiritual effort on God's part to deliver a man 
 from the love of the world, when the man's wealth enables him to 
 enjoy all that the world has to offer. 
 
 28. *'Then Peter began to say unto him." Why is it particularly 
 stated that Peter began to say ? It seems as if he began and did 
 not finish. Lange seems to have hit upon the right explanation 
 when he says, " It is evident that the beginning signifies a ventm^e- 
 some interruption, or taking up the word [compare chap, viii, 31, 
 32] followed by embarrassment. According to Mark, Peter him- 
 self seems here to have broken off in inward confusion, or at the 
 suggestion of modesty." 
 
 " Lo, we have left all, and have followed thee." St. Matthew 
 adds, "What shall we have, therefore? " This is omitted by both 
 St. Mark and St. Luke. May we suggest, that it was meant, and 
 must necessarily be supplied to complete the sense, but that it was 
 not expressed in words ? 
 
 After this the Lord, as reported by St. Matthew, proceeds to give 
 the promise of the twelve thrones on which the Apostles were to sit 
 and judge the twelve tribes of Israel. Of this St. Mark says nothing, 
 and it has been suggested that, as he was writing for Gentiles, such 
 a promise would not be well understood by them ; but in the vast 
 majority of cases no account can be given why one Evangelist 
 omits a matter, and another inserts it. The Spirit, in inspiring 
 them to relate the Lord's words or actions, "Divided to every man 
 severally as He wiUed " (1 Cor. xii. 11). 
 
Cdaf.X.] leaving all FOR CHRIST's SAKE. 225 
 
 29 And Jesus answered and said, Yerilj I say unto you, 
 Tliere is no man that liath left house, or brethren, or sisters, 
 or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my 
 sake, and the gospel's, 
 
 29. " Or wife " omitted by it, B., D., A, Carsives 1, 66, 209, most Old Latin (a, b, c, 
 &c.), Vulg., Coptic, Armenian ; retained by A., C, N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, 
 Old Latin (f), Syriac, Gothic, yEthiopic. 
 
 29, 30. And Jesus answered and said, Verily I say unto you, there 
 is no man that hath left house or brethren . . . world to come 
 eternal Hfe." In my notes on St. Matthew I remarked on the 
 difficulty of this saying of the Lord as we have it in his gospel, but 
 that the words as given by St. Mark being more circumstantial are 
 still more difficult. It is only right to state and face this difficultj^, 
 though we can only indicate the direction in which we believe the 
 true solution is to be found. St. Matthew's words, "shall receive 
 an hundredfold, and shall inherit eternal life," may be explained 
 of a reward in the future state : but the words "now in this time," 
 which are added by St. Mark and virtually by St. Luke, altogether 
 forbid this explanation, and show that the reward is to be expected 
 here. Much more do the words, "with persecution," peculiar to 
 St. Mark, forbid us to look for the fulfilment in heaven only. 
 
 Neither do I think it is possible to explain the words of the Lord 
 merely in a s^jiritual way — as that we receive Christ, and in Him 
 we receive all things : as the Apostle says, " All things are yours 
 . . . and ye are Christ's, and Christ is God's." This is a most 
 blessed truth, but the words of the Saviour are very express as to 
 the man who surrenders certain worldly blessings for the sake of 
 Christ receiving at this jpresent time these blessings back again in- 
 creased a hundredfold. The history of the New Testament forbids 
 us to take the words literally, and yet the very circumstantial terms 
 of the promise compel us to seek for as literal an interpretation as 
 we can. 
 
 First let us take the relationships mentioned here. Suppose that 
 a man, one out of a family of many brothers and sisters, was con- 
 verted and felt it his duty (being clearly called by God to preach 
 the Gospel) to leave his home and their society; or suppose, which 
 must have been much more common, that a man belonging to such 
 a family was converted to see the wickedness of idolatry, and the 
 
 Q 
 
226 RECOMPENSE NOW IN THIS TIME. [St. Mark. 
 
 30 ^But lie shall receive an hundredfold now in this time, 
 r 2 chron. hoiiscs, and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, 
 
 XXV. 9, Luke 
 
 xviii. 30. 
 
 profane and immoral character of the whole heathen family life, so 
 that, consistently with his duty to God, he could no longer live in a 
 house where all sorts of pollutions were daily taking place — by so 
 doing did he cut himself off from all fellowship, all society ? So far 
 from it, instead of one brother or sister in the flesh, with whom from 
 their abominable idolatries and degrading habits he could no more 
 hold pleasant converse, he was welcomed into the society of a mul- 
 titude, all like himself enlightened and purified, all the children of 
 the same Heavenly Father, and the brethren of the same Saviour, 
 with whom, as his brethren, he could hold perpetual intercourse on 
 the greatest things which can possibly engage the heart or mind of 
 a human being. AVe thus see in a moment how, in the matter 
 of human converse and fellowship, he would literally receive an hun- 
 dredfold in return for what he surrendered for Christ's sake. He 
 would not receive a hundred natural brothers or sisters, but he 
 would receive a hundred brethren who would be far more to him 
 than his own natural brethren as long as they continued what they 
 were. 
 
 Then take the case of wife and children : it is not to be sup- 
 posed for a moment that he would have to desert these. What the 
 Lord says must be taken on the principles of common sense, that, 
 for the sake of the Gospel, the man would remain unmarried, and 
 so give up the innocent pleasures of home and family. Such an one 
 would find in the souls won by him to the Church of Christ, a joy 
 and satisfaction which Christ would take care should be a far 
 greater recompense to him than children of his own. 
 
 And this helps us to meet the more difficult question of what we 
 are to understand by " houses " and " lands " — how they who give up 
 fcuch purely material things for Christ, shall receive an hundredfold 
 more of such tilings in this life. This is not to be understood, as some 
 seem to take it, in the sense that he who, like Barnabas, surrendered 
 his property would become a member of a society which, having 
 all things in common, would see that none should want anything, 
 and so would relieve each Christian of all worldly anxiety. This 
 seems an unworthy meaning ; to arrive at the true one we must 
 consider what is wealth in houses or lands valuable for ? Simply 
 and solely for the satisfaction or gratification it affords. It can 
 
Chap. X.] FIRST LAST — LAST FIRST. 227 
 
 and children, and lands, with persecutions ; and in the world 
 to come eternal life. 
 
 31 ^ But many that are first shall be last ; and • Matt. xix. 
 
 *' 30. & XX. 16. 
 
 the last first. Luke xiii. 30. 
 
 only be prized for the happiness or feeling of security, which it gives, 
 or is supposed to give. Now, what our Lord promised to those who 
 should surrender any good things of this world for His sake was, 
 that even in this present time, so far from losing they should be 
 gainers by it. They should be very much happier indeed for the 
 surrender. His words are to be understood, not of spiritual joys 
 only, but of happiness in its plainer and more common sense ; of 
 happiness as it is derived from things out of ourselves, from our 
 worldly condition, and the treatment which we meet with from 
 those around us. Just as they who lost the love of their natural 
 friends and relations would have the place thus left empty in their 
 hearts filled with more and dearer friends than nature had given 
 them, so they that parted with house and lands for Christ's sake, 
 would have their loss more than made up to them in such things as 
 contentment, absolute freedom from the trouble and worry which 
 almost always accompany worldly possessions, in peace of mind, 
 not merely rehgious peace, but tranquillity in respect of all the 
 changes and chances of this mortal life : above all, in the fact that 
 their happiness does not depend upon what the world can deprive 
 them of, for they have it very deeply engraven in their hearts that 
 "the world passeth away and the lusts thereof, but he that doeth 
 the will of God abideth for ever." 
 
 But the Lord adds that this manifold recompense in this world 
 will not be of the world, for it will be attended with persecutions. 
 "In the world ye shall have tribulation." "If they have perse- 
 cuted Me they will also persecute you." But these persecutions 
 will have two good effects. They will drive the soul more and 
 more from the world to take refuge in God, and they will make 
 the Christian long for His return. Who, when He comes, will destroy 
 every enemy, and turn this present very imperfect state of happi- 
 ness into a perfect one ; but a perfect one in which this rule will hold 
 good, that they who have laboured most, surrendered most, denied 
 their wills most, will receive the greatest recompense of reward. 
 
 31. " But many that are first shall be last, and the last first." 
 These words, as they are read in St. Matthew's Gospel, seem to 
 
228 JESUS WENT BEFORE THEM. [St. Mark. 
 
 32 ■[[ * And they were in tlie way going np to Jerusalem ; 
 t Matt. XX. 17. and Jesns went before them : and they were 
 u ch. viii. 31. amazed ; and as they followed, they were afraid. 
 £.'22! & xvS^ "" And he took again the twelve, and began to tell 
 ^^' them what things should happen unto him, 
 
 33 Saying, Behold, we go up to Jerusalem ; and the Son of 
 man shall be delivered unto the chief priests, and unto the 
 scribes ; and they shall condemn him to death, and shall 
 deliver him to the Gentiles : 
 
 32. "And as they followed, they were afraid." So A., N., later Uncials, almost all 
 Cursives, some Old Latin, Vulg., Gothic, Syriac ; but H, B., C, L., A, one or two 
 Cursives, Coptic, Armenian, " They that followed were afraid." 
 
 introduce the parable of the "labourers in the vineyard," of which 
 St. Mark says nothing. They have, however, a meaning, or indi- 
 rect meaning, independent of the significance of that parable. One 
 of the original twelve then present was cast away, and one not yet 
 called [called, as he says, "out of due time"] laboured more abun- 
 dantly than they all. " It also," as Williams says, "seems to refer 
 to the last in time ; that although the Apostles were first to give up 
 all, yet even to the end the same renunciation of the world for Christ's 
 sake, were it to exist, would raise to an equal dignity with them." 
 
 32. " And they were in the way going up to Jerusalem . . . were 
 amazed . . . were afraid . . . should happen unto him." They were 
 amazed at the alacrity with which He went up to the ]place where they 
 knew His most bitter enemies were plotting His destruction [Let the 
 reader remember how they said, " Master, the Jews of late sought to 
 stone thee, and goest thou thither again? "]. They knew He was 
 rushing into danger, but they did not know the form which the perse- 
 cution would take. Naturally, as they followed they were afraid. 
 
 And the Lord now took them aside and told them the worst more 
 distinctly than He had done before. 
 
 33, 34. " Saying, Behold, we go up . . . the third day he shall rise 
 again." Notice the two deliverings up, first by Judas to the chief 
 priests, then by them to the Gentiles. They were both betrayals of 
 Him Whom the betrayers knew to be innocent. Notice also how 
 the indignities and insults are dwelt upon as well as the death. 
 "They shall mock Him, and scourge Him, and shall spit upon 
 Him " (see note on Matt, xxvii. 26, 27, 28). Theophylact writes 
 
Chap. X.] THE SONS OF ZEBEDEE. 229 
 
 34 And they shall mock him, and shall scourge him, and 
 shall spit upon him, and shall kill him : and the third day 
 he shall rise again. 
 
 35 % ^ And James and John, the sons of Zebedee, * Matt. xx. 20. 
 come unto him, saying, Master, we would that thou shouldest 
 do for us whatsoever we shall desire. 
 
 on all this, " He did this to confirm the hearts of the disciples, thaf, 
 from hearing these things beforehand, they might the better bear 
 them afterwards, and might not be alarmed at their suddenness, 
 and also in order to show them that He suffered voluntarily : for 
 he who foreknows a danger and flies not, though flight is in his 
 power, evidently of his own will gives himself up to suffering.'' 
 
 " The third day he shall rise again." This is the third plain 
 declaration of His Eesurrection which the Lord had given to tliem. 
 When we add to these the intimations in His last discourse, such as, 
 ** I go away and come again to you;" "Ye now therefore have 
 sorrow, but I will see you again," »&c., their want of expectation of 
 His Eesurrection seems almost miraculous. It is one of the grossest 
 of all falsehoods to assert that He first rose again in their loving 
 imaginations, and then they turned the creation of their fancies into 
 reality. 
 
 35. *' And James and John, the sons of Zebedee, come unto him," 
 &c. In St. Matthew we read that it was their mother who came 
 and spoke for them, of which St. Mark says nothing : so there is at 
 first sight a discrepancy, but there is underlying the account a real 
 and manifestly undesigned coincidence, for the Lord, having heard 
 the mother's petition, turns to the two disciples, and treats it as if 
 it was theirs, not hers, implying that the mother was merely 
 prompted by the two. St. Mark, well informed by St. Peter of 
 the nature of the matter, ignores the mother, and treats it as the 
 petition of the disciples, which it was. 
 
 " Master, we would that thou shouldest do for us," &c. This 
 seems a very unworthy way of preferring their petition. It seems 
 as if, through His known affection and regard for them, they would 
 entrap our Lord to promise something which they were afraid 
 would be denied, if it was boldly mentioned at first. 
 
 36. "And he said unto them, "What would ye," &c The Lord 
 knew well what they wanted to ask ; but for the sake of the all- 
 
230 WHAT WOULD YE? [St. Mark. 
 
 36 And lie said unto them, What would ye that I should 
 do for you ? 
 
 37 They said unto him, G-rant unto us that we may sit, 
 one on thy right hand, and the other on thy left hand, in 
 thy glory. 
 
 38 But Jesus said unto them, Ye know not what ye ask : 
 
 important lesson which he foresaw that he should be able to draw 
 from it, and from the indignation which it excited in the ten against 
 the two ambitious brethren, He made them repeat it themselves, 
 probably in the hearing of the rest. 
 
 37. " They said unto him, Grant unto us that we may sit, one on 
 thy right hand," &c. But had He not said to all, "Ye shall sit 
 upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel ? " Bishop 
 Bull suggests that "as in the ancient kingdom of Israel the two 
 first places belonged to the Princes of the Tribes of Judah and Joseph; 
 these two places, therefore, she asks for her two sons in the king- 
 dom of Christ." A more important question is, what prompted 
 them to prefer the request at this time ? For the Lord had just 
 been speaking of the deep suffering and humiliation He was shortly 
 about to undergo. Very probably, from all that the Lord had been 
 saying, they knew that the crisis was at hand. ^Vliat the events 
 of that crisis were they most probably refused to steadily contem- 
 plate, but they were certain of its issue in the speedy establishment 
 of the Messianic kingdom : and so they thought that they would be 
 beforehand, and secure the first places of honour. 
 
 This was the first ecclesiastical intrigue for high places in the 
 Church. The Lord exposed it and did not allow it to be kept 
 secret, though the two were His most loving friends and followers. 
 And is not this an earnest that in the great day all attempts at 
 attaining high places in so holy a Society by favour, will be made 
 known to the shame of those who have engaged in them ? 
 
 38. " But Jesus said unto them, Ye know not what ye ask," &c. 
 Ye vainly imagine that I shall give the places on my right hand or 
 on my left, as Csesar or any earthly king does — that I shall give 
 them to those whom I favour, and that I bestow my favour as men 
 do, through caprice, or through partiaUty, or because they are im- 
 portuned, or to those who have made themselves useful to them : 
 but I tell you that it is not so. For men to share with Me in my 
 
Chap; X.] CAN YE DRINK OF MY CUP ? 231 
 
 can ye drink of the cup that I drink of? and be baptized 
 with the baptism that I am baptized with ? 
 
 39 And they said unto him, We can. And Jesus said 
 unto them, Te shall indeed drink of the cup that I drink 
 of; and with the baptism that I am baptized withal shall 
 ye be baptized : 
 
 glory they must share with Me in My labours and sufferings. To sit 
 on the right hand of God is not given even to Me of mere favour. 
 " Because I drink of the brook in the way, God will lift up My 
 head." " Because I make Myself of no reputation, and being found 
 in fashion as a man I humble Myself, and become obedient unto 
 death, even the death of the cross, — because of this, God will highly 
 exalt me." This is My Cup — this is My Baptism. 
 
 " Can ye drink of the cup that I drink of, and be baptized with 
 the baptism ? " &c. Can ye cast in your lot with Me, and face the 
 sujfferings and contumely and cruel death which I have told you that 
 I must undergo ? *' There are inward mortifications, which pierce 
 the heart, expressed here by the cup, which is to be drunk of; and 
 there are outward, denoted by the Baptism." So Quesnel, and 
 Bengel remarks : " The mention of both [Cup and Baptism] is 
 suitably introduced, for they who receive the Sacraments, share in 
 the Baptism, and in the Cup of the Lord. The Baptism of Christ 
 and our Baptism, and the Holy Supper, are closely allied with the 
 Death and Passion, both of Christ and of ourselves." 
 
 39. " And they said unto him. We can," &c. There is a strange 
 mixture of faith and of presumption in this answer. Of presump- 
 tion, arising from their want of self-knowledge. They had been 
 astonished that the Lord so boldly stepped forward to go to the 
 place where His enemies were plotting His Life, and they were 
 afraid. How, then, could they say that they were able to drink of His 
 Cup ? They could and they did say it, and apparently in faith and sin- 
 cerity ; for the Lord, instead of blaming them for their presumption, 
 or prophesying of their approaching cowardice and desertion, ac- 
 cepted their words. Is it too much to suppose that they said it rely- 
 ing on His help and grace ? And so with all Christ's followers. They 
 are not able, and they are able. They are " not able of themselves 
 to do anything as of themselves," but they are able through the 
 strength of Christ to do and to endure what Christ allots to them. 
 
232 NOT MINE TO GIVE. [St. Mark. 
 
 40 But to sit on my right hand and on my left hand is 
 not mine to give ; but it shall he given to them for whom it is 
 prepared. 
 
 And Jesus said unto them, " Ye shall indeed drink of the cup that 
 I drink of," &c. Jerome writes : " It is made a question, how the 
 sons of Zebedee, James and John, did drink the cup of Martyrdom, 
 seeing that Scripture relates that James only was beheaded by 
 Herod, while John ended his life by a peaceful death. But when 
 we read in Ecclesiastical History that John himself was thrown 
 into a cauldron of boiling oil with intent to martyr him, and he 
 was banished to the isle of Patmos, we shall see that he lacked not 
 the will of martyrdom, and that John had drunk the cup of con- 
 fession, the which also the three children in the fiery furnace did 
 drink of, albeit the persecutor did not shed their blood." 
 
 40. " But to sit on my right hand, and on my left is not mine to 
 give, but for whom it is prepared of my Father." The words 
 inserted in italics, both in the Authorized and in the Eevised of 1881 
 (which professes to be an improvement upon the older versions) 
 give a wrong meaning. A plain man would understand, that 
 not Christ but someone else will assign these rewards, when he 
 reads, " Is not Mine to give, but it shall be given," &c., as if He did 
 not, as the Judge of all, assign all and every place in His Eternal 
 Kingdom. But it is remarkable that He Himself, in His message 
 to the Church of Laodicea, claims to give the highest conceivable 
 glory : " To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me on My 
 throne, even as I also overcame and am set down with My Father 
 on His Throne." (Eev. iii. 21.) And St. Paul asserts that he will 
 receive his reward from the hands of Christ Himself, when he says, 
 "Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness which 
 the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me that day, and ... to 
 all that love His [Christ's] appearing." So that whatever places 
 in His Kingdom are given, will be given by Christ Himself, but 
 not according to a rule of favour, but to a rule of right and justice, 
 which rule is laid down by the Holy Ghost in the words, "Every 
 one shall receive his own reward according to his own labour." 
 (1 Cor. iii. 8.) Bede remarks, " The kingdom of heaven is not so 
 much of Him that giveth, as of him that receiveth." For " there is 
 no respect of persons with God." My Father hath prepared it for 
 those who conquer and triumph. If such be your character you will 
 
Chap. X.] WHEN THE TEN HEARD IT. 233 
 
 41 ^ And when the ten heard it, they began to be much 
 displeased with James and John. r Matt. xx. 24. 
 
 42 But Jesus called them to Mm, and saith imto them, 
 
 obtain it. It belongs not to Me to give it to the proud. Do you 
 wish to receive it ? be dissatisfied with your present state. It is pre- 
 pared for others : be no longer like yourselves [be other than you 
 are in self-seeking], and it is prepared for you." 
 
 41. " And when the ten heard it, they began to be much dis- 
 pleased," &c. Thus one evil begets another. The self-seeking of the 
 two brothers very naturally called out bitter feelings in those over 
 whom they sought pre-eminence ; feelings which, though provoked, 
 sprang naturally frora the same evil root as the ambitious request 
 of James and John. 
 
 42. " But Jesus called them to him, and saith unto them, Ye 
 know that they which are accounted .... your minister .... 
 servant of all." In these words the Lord lays down, not the prin- 
 ciple, but the spirit of all Ecclesiastical Kule. It is to be the rule 
 not of servants only, for servants may be proud, tyrannical, and over- 
 bearing; but of servants who feel that their service, their holy, un- 
 selfish service, is their exaltation. A few remarks in addition to 
 those I have written on the corresponding passage in St. Matthew's 
 gospel will be necessary. 
 
 First of all, notice that the Lord does not meet the spirit of am- 
 bition and self-seeking which, as long as men are what they are, must 
 exist in every large society like the Church, by laying down the 
 principle of equality. On the contrary, he presupposes that some 
 will be great, and that some wiU be chief in the Church ; but this 
 greatness and pre-eminence is to be attained by becoming ministers 
 and servants — not by self-exaltation, but by self-abasement. Now 
 a very little thought will make it clear that though a position of 
 honour and rule may be accorded to self-abasement, yet it never 
 can be sought by self-abasement, because in such a case self-abase- 
 ment would be consciously used as the instrument of self-aggran- 
 dizement. 
 
 If, then, there are to be, as there must be, first and second places 
 in the Church, and the first places are not to be attained by interest, 
 canvassing, pushing ourselves forward, constituting ourselves 
 leaders, and certainly not by an hypocritical show of humiliation, 
 
234 NOT so AMONG YOU. [St. Mark. 
 
 ' Ye know that they which. || are accounted to rule over the 
 « Lukexxii.25. Gcutiles excrcisc lordship over them; and their 
 good'. ^" great ones exercise authority upon them. 
 
 28^^\^h Tx' 35' ^^ ^ ^^^ ^^ shall it not be among you : but who- 
 
 Luke ix. 48. 
 
 42, " They which are accounted." See margin. Vulg., Qui videntur principari Gen- 
 tibus; Syr'iac, ii qui reputantur pri7icipes Gentium. 
 
 43. " So shall it not be." So A., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, some Old 
 Latin, Coptic, Syriac, Armenian, Gothic ; but S, B., C, D., L., A, most Old Latin, Vulg. 
 read, " is " (" so it is not "). 
 
 then it follows that these places of honour and power are not to be 
 sought by any members of the Church for themselves ; and that is 
 precisely what the Lord indicates in these words of His to the dis- 
 ciples. The whole history of Christendom shows that there can be 
 no equality properly so called, in any organized body of professing 
 Christians. There must be either the pre-eminence of bishops, or 
 of party leaders. Now the pre-eminence of the latter is doubly 
 wrong, because it not only engenders the use of all sorts of arts for 
 gaining influence, but is founded upon that which is in itself con- 
 trary to the mind of Christ, viz.. Church parties. 
 
 We will now make some remarks on the separate verses. 
 
 42. " Ye know that they which are accounted to rule," &c. There 
 seems to be but one meaning which can be attached to this, viz., 
 that all rule in the Church is to be very different from that exer- 
 cised by the Caesars, and those who govern under them. For Church 
 rule is not to be arbitraiy, autocratic, tyrannical, but paternal ; 
 resting on love and reverence, not on force. The rule of the Gen- 
 tile powers is described by a word which expresses not only lording 
 over, but lording it down upon those beneath. Dr. Morison has 
 " exercise authority upon them." But not so much " up " on them 
 as " down " on them. The preposition (/card) in the Greek is well 
 expressed by the homely and somewhat vulgar but graphic phrase, 
 "coming down upon one." 
 
 " But so shall it not be [or so it is not] among you, but whoso- 
 ever will be great," &c. Olshausen writes : " The idea of a special 
 exaltation and glory in the kingdom of God is not the least con- 
 demned, but is acknowledged as correct." For the comparison of the 
 rulers {dpxovreg) and great ones (/ufydXoi has positively no meaning, 
 if it was intended that there should be no " first " or *' great ones" 
 in the kingdom of God. 
 
Chap. X.] WHOSOEVER WILL BE GREAT. 235 
 
 soever will be great among you, shall be your minister : 
 44< And whosoever of you will be the chief est, shall be 
 
 servant of all. 
 
 45 For even ^ the Son of man came not to be ^ Jobn xin. i4. 
 
 Phil.ii. 7. 
 
 ministered unto, but to minister, and *^ to srive his <= Matt. xx. 28. 
 
 ,.„ „ *^ lTim.ii.6. 
 
 lite a ransom tor many. Titus ii. 14. 
 
 43, 44. " Will be." "Desires to be." Quicunque voluerit, Vnlg. 
 
 43. " "Whosoever will be great among you, shall be your minister 
 .... servant." Not only all Church rule, but all Church functions 
 which reflect any degree of honour or pre-eminence in the adminis- 
 trator are to be administered in the spirit of service. As the 
 Apostle writes, " ourselves your servants for Jesus' sake." All minis- 
 ters, bishops, priests, deacons, are in the first place the servants of 
 Christ, and in the second His servants towards the flock. So that 
 self is to be completely sunk, and all exaltation on account of the 
 service to be avoided. The spirit of this is admirably expressed by 
 Quesnel : *' The greatest minister of the Church is he who is 
 most conformable to the example of Christ by humility, love, and 
 continual attendance on his flock, and also looks upon himself as a 
 servant to the children of God. We do not know what an exceeding 
 honour it is to serve one single soul for the sake of God, in the 
 spirit of the Holy Servitude of Christ." 
 
 45. " For even the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, 
 but to minister," &c. The word used by the Lord for "minister" 
 is usually derived from cid, a preposition signifying through, and 
 Kovig, dust, one who works in the dust and runs through the dust, 
 by this signifying low and hard labour : and His life was a life of 
 hard labour, and unceasing spending of Himself for His fellow men. 
 He was perpetually labouring as through the dust for the good of 
 the bodies and souls of His fellow men, unceasingly healing, and 
 preaching ; having, as I remarked on St. Matthew, so far as we can 
 learn, no hired servant, having a following of poorly-clad men, not 
 to wait upon Him, but to learn of Him. 
 
 " And to give his life a ransom for many." These many, we 
 know, from various assertions in Holy Writ, are all mankind : " Who 
 gave himself a ransom for all " (1. Tim. ii. 6). " He is the propitia- 
 tion for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the 
 
236 BLIND BARTIMJi:US. [St. Mark. 
 
 4:6 ^ ^ And they came to Jericho : and as he went out of 
 d Matt. XX. 29. Jericho with his disciples and a great number of 
 
 Luke xviii. 35. t i t n -t-» i • n r» m- 
 
 people, bnnd Bartimseus, the son or Timseus, sat 
 by the highway side begging. 
 
 46. " Blind Bartimsens, the son of Timaeus, sat by the highway side begging." So A., 
 and the MSS. usually following it; but ^f, B., L., A read (with Revisers), "The son of 
 Timaeus, Bartimaeus, a blind beggar, sat by the wayside." Many small insignificant 
 differences amongst MSS. and versions. 
 
 whole world " (1 John ii. 2). The assertion, in all probability, is not 
 spoken doctrinally or dogmatically, but in sequence to the former 
 clause. He came to minister, and He ministered not only in His 
 Life, but, above all, in His Death. He ministered to very many in 
 His Life, but to far, far more in His Death : inasmuch as by His 
 Death He ransomed them from the worst of evils, the dominion of 
 sin, death, and Satan. [For comparative infrequency of the men- 
 tion of the atonement in our Lord's discourses, see my note on St. 
 Matt. XX. 28.] 
 
 ^"^6. " And they came to Jericho : and as he went out of Jericho," 
 &c. They came to Jericho, probably from Ephraim, to which place 
 the Lord had retired after the raising of Lazarus (John xi. 54), but 
 upon the sequence of events the Harmonists are divided. 
 
 There seems to be an irreconcileable discrepancy between the three 
 Synoptics on the circumstances of this miracle. St. Matthew men- 
 tions two blind men — St. Mark only one, giving us his name. St. 
 Luke mentions only one, as '* a certain " blind man. Again, St. Mat- 
 thew and St. Mark tell us that He restored the blind man to sight "as 
 he went out of Jericho " [" as they departed from Jericho," Matt.], 
 but St. Luke says, ** as he was come nigh to Jericho." May I be 
 permitted to repeat the substance of what I wrote on St. Matthew 
 (xxvi. 69-75) ? For the more confirmation of our faith in the power 
 of His Son, God has given to us a threefold account of some of the 
 principal miracles and incidents ; and these accounts, in order that 
 we may the more rely upon their truth, are evidently independent 
 accounts ; but how is their independence to be manifested ? I answer, 
 by those small discrepancies which would exist in any threefold 
 account whatsoever, if we had an account of it from three indepen- 
 dent persons. It is not in human nature that any three men, how- 
 ever truthful, should give exactly the same account of any transaction 
 
Chap. X.] JESUS, THOU SON OF DAVID. 237 
 
 47 And when lie heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, 
 he began to cry out, and say, Jesus, thou son of David, have 
 mercy on me. 
 
 48 And many charged him that he should hold his peace : 
 
 which was made up of a number of details more or less minute. If 
 there was exact accord in all the lesser circumstances it would show 
 either that the three accounts were copied from one original, and so 
 were in fact only one, or that the three witnesses, or narrators, had 
 met together to consult about the elimination of discrepancies — in 
 fact, to use the vulgar expression, had cooked their account. The 
 discrepancy has been met and explained in this way. As the Lord 
 enters Jericho from the north, Bartimasus prays the Lord that he 
 may receive his sight ; his prayer is not answered then, but the 
 Lord passes on and spends the night at the house of Zacchgeus. And 
 on the morrow as He left the city, Bartim^us and another who had 
 joined him, called to the Lord, Who now takes notice of them, and 
 they receive their sight ; but is it not far better to suppose that the 
 inspiration of the Evangelists did not extend to minutise of this sort, 
 and that there is a mistake in the narrative, and that either St. 
 Luke on the one side, or St. Matthew and St. Mark on the other, 
 were misinformed ? 
 
 " Bartimaeus, the son of Timseus." On account of the mention 
 of his name it is supposed that he was afterwards well known in the 
 early Church. 
 
 47. " And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth," &c. 
 The name was first given by way of reproach, but in the later period 
 of the Lord's ministry it seems to have been the most popular 
 appellation. When men asked, as he entered into Jerusalem, AVho is 
 this? they were answered, " This is Jesus, the prophet of Nazareth 
 of Galilee." 
 
 "Jesus, thou son of David." Thus addressing Him as the 
 Messiah. . If the Syrophenician woman thus called on Him (Matt. 
 XV. 22), much more would one of His own nation who had heard 
 the fame of His mighty works. 
 
 48. " And many charged him that he should hold his peace," &c. 
 It has been supposed that the Lord was teaching as He went on His 
 way ; and certainly a very little after this, whilst on the journey, 
 He set forth the parable of the Pounds (Luke xix. 11) ; but was it 
 
238 rise: he calleth thee. [St. mark. 
 
 but he cried the more a great deal, Thou son of David, have 
 mercy on me. 
 
 49 And Jesus stood still, and commanded him to be called. 
 And they call the blind man, saying unto him. Be of good 
 comfort, rise : he calleth thee. 
 
 not most probably out of mere officiousness ? The Lord had set forth 
 on His last journey full of holy resolve to finish at Jerusalem His 
 great work, and many had caught some of His enthusiasm, and were 
 accompanying Him. They knew not distinctly for what He went 
 up, and were annoyed that the progress should be interrupted. 
 
 But the blind man, sustained, no doubt, in his importunity by 
 the secret grace of God, " cried the more a great deal. Thou Son of 
 David, have mercy upon me." This showed his true faith in the 
 power of Christ, and also in His compassionate loving character. 
 It is as if he had heard and realized the words, " Him that cometh 
 to me I will in no wise cast out." 
 
 49. "And Jesus stood still, and commanded .... Be of good 
 comfort, rise : he calleth thee." Very probably the very persons 
 in the crowd who had, but a little before, officiously bidden him 
 to hold his peace, now turned and encouraged him. So thought 
 Augustine when he wrote : "When a Christian first enters into a 
 religious life, and begins to be zealous in good works, and to despise 
 the world, he finds at this early stage of his amendment of life 
 many lukewarm Christians who are ready to blame, and to oppose 
 him ; but should he persevere, and overcome them by continuance 
 in well doing, these same persons will take his part. As long as 
 they entertain the least hope of gaining their point, they molest 
 and find fault ; but when they are outdone by resolute determina- 
 tion, they change sides and exclaim, * This is really a great man, a 
 blessed man, to receive such grace from God.' " 
 
 "Be of good comfort, rise: he calleth thee." There can be no 
 greater encouragement to the sinner than to know that the Saviour 
 calls him, not only calls him by the general call which all share in the 
 preaching of the Word, and the witness of the Church and Sacra- 
 ments ; but with that particular call which moves him personally 
 to come to the Lord — that Divine call heard within, with the ear 
 of the soul, which assures the sinner that amidst the distracting 
 crowd the Saviour recognizes liim^ and desires that he should come 
 
Chap.X.] casting away HIS GARMENT. 239 
 
 50 And he, casting away liis garment, rose, and came to 
 Jesus. 
 
 51 And Jesus answered and said unto him, What wilt 
 thou that I should do unto thee ? The blind man said unto 
 him, Lord, that I might receive my sight. 
 
 50. " Rose." So A., C, later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Syriac, Armenian, ^thiopic ; 
 but N, B., D., L., Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic read, "leapt up " or "sprang up," 
 
 and partake of His restoring, and enlightning, and sanctifying 
 grace. 
 
 50. " And he, casting away his garment, rose, and came to Jesus." 
 Is not this a parable teaching us that we must show our earnest- 
 ness and our sincerity, by casting aside every impediment which 
 hinders us in coming to the Lord ? This does not mean that we are 
 to wait till we are cured before we come to Him. The blind man 
 did not wait till he partially saw before He came, but we are to lay 
 aside all in our surroundings which hinders us, such as evil com- 
 panions, evil books, evil gains, evil practices in business or in daily 
 life. 
 
 " And came to Jesus." Quesnel remarks well : " The blind man 
 stands before Jesus without seeing Him, yet he believes and hopes 
 in Him, which gives us a representation of this life, wherein our 
 cure is wrought under the obscurity of faith. We shall see this 
 adorable Truth which is at present veiled from our sight, when our 
 cure shall be perfected and our eyes opened, and the darkness of 
 faith (1 Cor. xiii. 12) changed into the light of glory." 
 
 51. " And Jesus answered and said unto him. What wilt thou ? " 
 &c. He had before cried out, " Thou son of David, have mercy 
 upon me." Now the Lord requires that he should openly and dis- 
 tinctly state the particular mercy he needed. And this, also, is a 
 parable for us. In our prayers we must not only ask in general terms, 
 but we must particularize the mercy we need. We must come to 
 Him Who saves His people from their sins, not merely asking to be 
 saved from our sinfulness, or sinful nature, but from this or that 
 particular sin, in which our sinful nature makes itself known. We 
 must look into ourselves so as to understand what are the wounds 
 and ailments of our souls, and come to Him mentioning each one 
 thing of which wo have reason to be ashamed. 
 
240 HE RECEIVED HIS SIGHT. [St. Mark. 
 
 52 And Jesus said tinto him, Go thy way ; ^ thy faith hath 
 e Matt. ix. 22. || made thee whole. And immediately he received 
 11 ot^ saved liis sight, and followed Jesus in the way. 
 
 thee. 
 
 52. "And Jesus said unto him, Go thy way; thy faith," &c. 
 Faith is believing. "What did this man believe ? In the first place, 
 he believed that the Lord was the Messiah, or he would not have 
 called on Him as the Son of David. In the next place, he believed 
 that as the Messiah He could open the eyes of the blind, i.e., that 
 He could heal the disease, or restore the substance of the most deli- 
 cate and tender and withal perishable organ of the body. In the 
 next place, he believed that the Lord was so benevolent and merci- 
 ful that He would do this, no matter what else He was engaged in 
 doing ; for he had heard how the Lord had suffered His teaching to 
 be interrupted in order that He might heal a paralytic (Mark ii. 
 2-12), and so he thought that the same Lord would stay His jour- 
 ney for a few minutes in order to heal him. This was his belief, 
 and it made him persevere in asking for mercy, when those who 
 seemed to surround the Lord bid him be silent, and so, though no- 
 thing in itself, it won the blessing from the Lord. 
 
 •'And immediately he received his sight, and followed Jesus in 
 the way." No doubt that he might be to others a proof of the 
 power and goodness of the Lord. And those too who have received 
 spiritual sight from the Lord will follow Him in the way of life. 
 
 The Lord now having done this great work proceeds on His 
 journey to Jerusalem. As He drew nigh He utters the parable of 
 the Pounds (Luke xix. 11, 28). Then He lodges at Bethany, and 
 there in the house of Simon the Leper they make a supper for Him, 
 at which Mary anoints His feet with the ointment (Mark xiv. 37) 
 and excites the anger of Judas (John xii- 4-8), who then determines 
 to betray the Lord. Then many of the Jews from Jerusalem, when 
 they knew He was in Bethany, came that they might see Him and 
 Lazarus (John xii. 9-11), and then began to occur the events re- 
 corded in the next chapter. So that the matters narrated in Mark 
 xiv. 1-10, occur earlier in the history, and are only mentioned 
 there because of their connection with the Passover and the 
 Betrayal. 
 
CuAP. XI.] THEY CAME NIGH TO JERUSALEM. 241 
 
 A 
 
 CHAP. XI. 
 
 ND ^ when tliey came nielli to Jerusalem, unto * Matt. xxi. i. 
 
 •^ ° Luke xix. 29. 
 John xii. 14. 
 
 1. " And when they came nigh to Jerusalem, unto Bethphage and 
 Bethany," &c. Almost all commentators believe that this trium- 
 phal procession of the Son of God into His own city, " The city 
 of the Great King," took place on the first day of the week in which 
 the great events of Eedemption took place, i.e.^ on Palm Sunday. 
 The Lord had spent the Sabbath (Saturday) in Bethany ; on the 
 evening of that Sabbath He partook of the feast in Simon's house, 
 and the next morning, perhaps after He had set out for a short 
 way on foot. He sent the two disciples to find the colt on which He 
 was to ride and fulfil the prophecy. 
 
 "When they came nigh to Jerusalem," &c. This verse, if the 
 events of it were fully related so as to include the incidents men- 
 tioned only in St, John, would run : " They went on their way from 
 Jericho to Jerusalem, and, as they drew nigh to Jerusalem, they 
 halted at Bethany, where the Lord spent the Sabbath, and on the 
 morning of the first day, leaving Bethany, He set out on His way 
 to Jerusalem, through Bethphage, over the south side of the Mount 
 of Olives." 
 
 "He sendeth forth two of his disciples," &c. The two Synoptics 
 Matthew and Mark being led to omit, at the exact time, the account 
 of the Supper at Bethany and the anointing which there took place 
 in order to connect it more intimately with the betrayal, speak as if 
 the Lord made no halt on His journey ; and also since Jerusalem 
 was the termination, mention it first, and Bethphage and Bethany 
 in the order of their nearness to it. 
 
 This entry of the Lord into the city of David is described by each 
 of the four Evangelists, so that we must consider well its mean- 
 ing. Its significance is twofold. It is the great King coming, as 
 was prophesied of Him, to receive the homage of the people of His 
 own city — to be acknowledged by them, if but for a brief season, as 
 the Son of David, in fact to receive praise and adoration as if He 
 was a Divine Being — and it is the Priest Victim of Humanity 
 coming at the time appointed to offer Himself to be slain, so that 
 
 B 
 
242 BETHPHAGE AND BETHANY. [St. Mark. 
 
 Bethpliage and Bethany, at the mount of Olives, he sendeth 
 forth two of his disciples, 
 
 1. " Unto Bethphage and Bethany." So S, A., B., C, L., later Uncials, almost all 
 Cursives and versions ; but D., Old Latin, and Vulg., omit " Bethphage." 
 
 He might fulfil all that was written of Him ; and become in His 
 own Person that all-reconciling Sacrifice, of which the sacrifices 
 of the temple which He entered and cleansed were but forecasts 
 and shadows. 
 
 Hitherto He had steadily avoided all public recognition of His 
 claims to be the Messiah. He had even refused to say publicly, 
 and before friends and foes alike, Who He was. Now He Himself 
 made preparation to be received as the King of Sion ; coming, it is 
 true, in lowly guise, but coming as it had been foretold that the 
 long expected Son of David should come. He bowed the hearts of 
 the vast crowd to go before Him, and to follow Him with shouts of 
 welcome which seemed in the eyes of His enemies to be nothing 
 short of the adoration due to God only, and He went to the temple of 
 God, and acted in it with the authority of a Son over His own house. 
 
 And yet this Melchizedec, King of Salem, entered into His city 
 as the Priest Victim. His hour was come, and He came as a lamb 
 to the slaughter. He came to be lifted up not on a throne, but 
 on a cross. Hitherto as He had withdrawn Himself from public 
 recognition, so He had withdrawn Himself from threatened danger, 
 but now, unarmed and undefended. He put Himself into the hands 
 of His enemies, that they should do to Him "whatsoever they 
 listed," and what they " hsted " to do for the gratification of their 
 malice was no other than that " which was written in the Law and 
 in the Prophets, and in the Psalms concerning Him." 
 
 The entry in triumph as King, and the succeeding Crucifixion as 
 the Priest Victim, were as cause and effect. If He had not thus entered 
 as a King and been hailed as a King, they could not possibly have 
 acted on Pilate's fears as they did. All their accusations respecting 
 Hisbeing "the King of the Jews," would have been meaningless un- 
 less there had been some show of public recognition. And all the city 
 must have heard of the entry, and of the shouting " Hosanna to the 
 Son of David," "Blessed be the King that cometh in the name of 
 the Lord." And Pilate, we may be sure, was not the last to hear of it. 
 Amongst such a vast and excited concourse there were sure to have 
 been some of his soldiers watching what was going on. And when 
 
Chap. XI.] THE MOUNT OF OLIVES. 243 
 
 2 And saith unto tliem, Go your way into tlie village 
 over against you : and as soon as ye be entered into it, ye 
 
 lie inquired about it, tliey would assure him that there was no need 
 for the smallest alarm, for it was all beneath contempt, very like a 
 stupid joke — they were in the very midst of the throng, and they saw 
 nothing but a fanatical crowd shouting and waving palms round a 
 poor humble man whom they had seated on a colt because these 
 besotted Jews believed that he had raised a dead man to life. 
 
 Such was the triumphal entry. It was the necessary prelude to 
 the Crucifixion. His own city must acknowledge Him, and glorify 
 Him before it rejected Him and cried '* Crucify Him." There must 
 have been some public act recognizing His Royalty known to Pilate, 
 or they could hardly have approached the Governor with such accu- 
 sations as " He stirred up the people," and " made Himself a King." 
 There must have been some extraordinary disappointment of Mes- 
 sianic hopes, or the multitude could not so speedily have turned 
 against Him with the cry, " Crucify Him," or have left Him to His 
 fate. There must have been some pregnant crisis which compelled 
 the chief priests to delay no longer, but at all risks to take that 
 bold and decisive action to put Him to death at once, which resulted 
 in the true Paschal Lamb being sacrificed at the moment of the 
 Paschal solemnity. 
 
 We must now examine the narrative in detail. 
 
 " He sendeth forth two of his discix^les." No doubt Peter was 
 one of them, as the succeeding narrative bears strong marks of 
 being derived from an eye-witness. 
 
 2. "And saith unto them, Go your way into the village over 
 against you," &c. Most probably Bethphage. This village has 
 perished, but there are old tanks and discernible foundations of 
 houses on the spot which is its most probable site. 
 
 " As soon as ye be entered into it, ye shall find a colt tied," &c. 
 St. Matthew alone makes mention of the ass, the mother which was 
 with it ; and this, no doubt, because writing especially for the 
 chosen people, he was led to cite the prophecy mentioning together 
 both the ass and the colt, the foal of the ass. St. Mark, writing in 
 Eome for Gentiles, would only mention the creature on which the 
 Lord actually rode. 
 
 "Whereon never man sat." The Lord, in giving this direction, 
 dieted as if He were Divine, for God required that the creatures 
 
244 THE LORD HATH NEED OF HIM. [St. Mark. 
 
 shall find a colt tied, whereon never man sat ; loose him, and 
 bring him. 
 
 3 And if any man say unto you, Why do ye this? say 
 ye that the Lord hath need of him ; and straightway he will 
 send him hither. 
 
 3. "And straightway he will send him hither." So A,, C.2, later Uncials, almost all 
 Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., Sah., Copt., Syriac, Goth., Arm., .^Ith. ; but N, B., C.*, 
 D., L., A, a few Cursives, and Origen add "again," "And straightway he [the Lord] will 
 send them hither again,'" i.e. he will return them. The latter seems most unlikely. Dean 
 Burgon has discussed this reading at page 58 of his " Revision ReAised." 
 
 offered, or dedicated to Him, should be unused ; thus Numbers xix. 
 2 [" Speak unto the children of Israel, that they bring thee a red 
 heifer without spot, wherein is no blemish, and upon which never 
 came yoke." So also Deut. xxi. 3, and 1 Sam. vi. 7] . The Lord 
 under such a dispensation as the Jewish never could have made 
 such a requirement if He had been a mere man. 
 
 3. " And if any man say unto yon, Why do ye this ? say ye that 
 the Lord hath need," &c. Several questions present themselves 
 here : first, were the words which our Saviour commanded the dis- 
 ciples to say ordinary words, which the owners of the colt would 
 understand as a message from One "Whom they knew well, having 
 often seen Him pass between Jerusalem and Bethany, and Whom 
 they would connect with the raising of Lazarus ; and so, looking 
 upon Him as a great Prophet, they would readily send the colt ; or 
 were they words which were to be addressed to strangers, and 
 which, when they were uttered, the Lord would accompany with a 
 secret putting forth of His power, so that they at once compelled 
 the obedience of the owners ? It appears to me that the owners 
 must have been strangers, as the disciples were not sent to the 
 house of a particular person, but into a village in the open street of 
 which they were to find the colt tied. When they found all as 
 Jesus had said unto them, they are distinctly reported to have said 
 the very words which the Lord commanded, and it is noticed b}'' 
 the Evangelists that they had the immediate effect which the Lord 
 intended and foretold. 
 
 All this circumstantiality seems exceedingly unlike an ordinary 
 case of borrowing, and could not be well expressed differently, if the 
 words which Jesus commanded them to use were to be words of 
 compelling power. Besides, the two disciples were not to wait to 
 
Chap. XL] WHAT DO YE LOOSING THE COLT ? 245 
 
 4 And they went their way, and found the colt tied by the 
 door without in a place where two ways met ; and they loose 
 him. 
 
 5 And certain of them that stood there said unto them, 
 What do ye loosing the colt ? 
 
 6 And they said unto them even as Jesus had commanded : 
 and they let them go. 
 
 see the owner, and ask his leave ; but to act as if the Owner of all 
 things were simply exercising His right in demanding the use of 
 the animal. 
 
 4. " And they went their way, and found the colt tied by 
 the door in a place," &c. This must have come from one of 
 the two who were sent. They found a colt tied by a door, in a 
 place where two ways met, i.e., in a crossing. All this is very dif- 
 ferent from St. Luke's *' they found even as He had said unto them." 
 The one mentions what he had heard, the other describes circum- 
 stances which made an impression upon him. 
 
 5. " And certain of them that stood there said unto them ... let 
 them go." Notice that they entered into no explanations such as 
 seem to have been required, but simply repeated the words, "The 
 Lord hath need of them." They must have known and felt that 
 their conduct was unusual. It was not taking the colt by stealth, 
 but in the highway, in the sight of the owners. Their words impUed 
 that the animal belonged to the Lord more than to the owners, as 
 in fact all which we call our own does. This was a foreshadowing 
 of that absolute demand which Jesus Christ makes on all we pos- 
 sess, — property, intellect, time, even life. 
 
 7. •' And they brought the colt to Jesus, and cast their garments 
 on him, and he sat upon him." The Lord thus prepares to make 
 His triumphal entry into the city of God riding on a colt, the foal 
 of an ass. Now, the significance of this to the bystanders would 
 altogether depend upon their knowledge of Scripture, together 
 with the views which they took of the claims of Jesus to be the 
 Messiah. If they considered the time, that it was the period when 
 the prophecies were rapidly receiving fulfilment, and already the 
 impending coming of the Messiah had been announced by John 
 whom all men looked upon as a prophet ; if they remembered that 
 the Messiah was to be a king, such as the Holy City had Eover 
 
246 HE SAT UPON HIM. [St. Mark. 
 
 7 And they brouglit the colt to Jesus, and cast their 
 garments on him ; and he sat upon him. 
 
 before seen, and if they remembered that the most distinct prophecy 
 of His personal apx^earance when He came to take possession of His 
 city was, that He should come riding " on the foal of an ass ;" — if 
 they realized all this, they would, beyond all doubt, consider that no 
 Messianic claims which Jesus had ever made came near to this, 
 that He should come after this fashion into the city of David. H 
 He had entered on a richly caparisoned steed at the head of a 
 mounted troop, with all the insignia of a military triumph, the obser- 
 vant Jew, who knew the words of the prophets, would say, " This 
 is very grand, very imposing, but it is not what Zechariah has led 
 me to expect." But if the same man was cognizant of the claims 
 of the Lord, and rejected them, he would exclaim, "What amazing 
 presumption thus to ride into Jerusalem ! Does He pretend to be 
 the King who rides upon the colt, and is to cut off the chariot from 
 Ephraim, and the horse from Jerusalem . . . and speak peace to 
 the heathen, and reign from sea to sea ? And does He hear what the 
 crowds are shouting, ' Hosannah to the Son of David, Hosannah 
 in the highest ? ' What presumption ! What arrogance ! What 
 blasphemy ! " So it would be to the unbelieving Jew who knew 
 the prophecies. And yet the ass's colt was without all doubt the 
 symbol of meekness and patience, just as the horse would have been 
 the symbol of pride and bloodshed. The King coming to His 
 Kingdom was actually to triumph through humiliation and patience 
 under blows and insults; He was to "have salvation," and to "speak 
 peace to the heathen " by an ignominious death. In the prophecy of 
 Zechariah there is a contrast between the ass and the horse. He 
 Who is lowly, riding upon the ass, is to cut off the horse, the war- 
 horse from Jerusalem. Williams remarks well : " The more noble 
 animal, the horse, as ministering to human pride, does not appear 
 to be praised in Scripture, nor selected for Divine purposes, but the 
 contrary. It is connected with Pharaoh and Sennacherib, ' The 
 horse and his rider hath He thrown into the sea ' (Exod. xv. 1), 
 and * at thy rebuke both the chariot and the horse are fallen ' 
 (Ps. Ixxvi. 6), and 'woe to them that go down to Egypt and stay 
 on horses ' (Is. xxxi. 1). The celebrated description of the horse in 
 Job (xxxix. 18), is all of war : * his neck is clothed with thunder,' 
 and " he rejoices in the sound of the trumpet.' " The very contrast 
 
CiiAP. XL] HOSANNA. 247 
 
 8 ^ And many spread their garments in the way : and others 
 cut down branches off the trees, and strewed them ^ Matt. xxi. 8. 
 in the way. 
 
 9 And they that went "before, and they that 
 followed, cried, saying, ^ Hosanna ; Blessed is he <= Ps. cxviii. 26. 
 that Cometh in the name of the Lord : 
 
 8. " Others cut down branches off the trees." The alteration made by the Revisers in 
 this place is remarkable. In the margin for "branches" they read, "layers of leaves," 
 appending the letters Gr., implying that it is the literal translation of the Greek ; but 
 Dean Burgon, in his " Revision Revised," remarks that the word which they have trans- 
 lated thus (stibas) never signified " layers of leaves," but rather, " a rough bed, pallet, or 
 mattress." The word in A., C, and in most Cursives is stoibas, which may signify "small 
 branches," " foliage," and so agrees better with the " branches " of St. Matthew. By far 
 the greater part of Uncials, however (V, B., D., E., G., H., K., L., M.), and many 
 Cursives read stibidas, ace. of stibas. Liddell and Scott in their last edition make no dis- 
 tinction between the words. 
 " Off the trees." Some MSS., K, D., L. read, " from the fields." 
 
 "Strawed them in the way." So A., D., later Uncials, Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., 
 Syriac, &c. ; omitted by S, B„ C, L., &c. 
 
 to all this is this meek animal ; and therefore it is said to Jerusalem, 
 " Fear not." " Fear not, but feel confidence," says St. Chrysostom, 
 "it is not as the unjust and warlike kings of the world, but One 
 meek and gentle, which He shows by the ass, for He cometh not 
 with an army, but with the ass alone." 
 
 8. "And many spread their garments in the way," &c. The 
 welcome on the part of the multitude was unpremeditated, and 
 so they honoured Him with what came first to their hands, 
 some witli their garments which they were wont to spread in the 
 paths of kings (2 Kings ix. 13), others with the waving of palm 
 branches, others with twigs of trees cut from the neighbouring fields 
 and copses. 
 
 9. These shouts and songs of praise are mostly part of a Psalm 
 of God, the one hundred and eighteenth; the Hosannah is the 
 " Save now, I beseech thee," of the 25th verse, and is com- 
 pounded of two words, "Hoshia," "save," and "na," "I pray." 
 " Blessed be he that cometh in the name of the Lord," is taken 
 verbatim from the 26th verse. That the anthem of praise, or parts 
 of it, should be taken from this Psalm, is exceeding significant, 
 for just before it we have, " The stone which the builders rejected is 
 become the head stone of the comer," and just after, " God is the 
 
248 HOSANNA IN THE HIGHEST. [St. Mark. 
 
 10 Blessed he the kingdom of our father David, that 
 d Ps. cxiviii. 1. Cometh in the name of the Lord : ^ Hosanna in 
 
 the highest. 
 • Matt xxi.i2. 11 ^ And Jesus entered into Jerusalem, and into 
 the temple : and when he had looked round about upon all 
 things, and now the eventide was come, he went out into 
 Bethany with the twelve, 
 f Matt, xxi. 18. 12 •[[^And on the morrow, when they were 
 
 come from Bethany, he was hungry : 
 
 10. " la the name of the Lord." So A., N., later Uncials, most Cursives, Syriac, Gothic, 
 ^thiopic ; omitted by N, B., C, D., L., eight or ten Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic, 
 Syriac (Schaaf). 
 
 Lord, who hath showed us light ; bind the sacrifice with cords, yea 
 even unto the horns of the altar." The King in triumph was to be 
 Himself, the sacrificial Victim, as He was Himself, " the light of 
 the world." 
 
 Here St. Luke tells ns that the Pharisees desired the Lord to 
 rebuke His disciples, and that the Lord wept when the view of 
 Jerusalem in all its grandeur rose before Him, as He descended the 
 Mount of Olives. 
 
 11. "And Jesus entered into Jerusalem, and into the temple 
 . . . Bethany with the twelve," &c. St. Matthew here tells us 
 what a stir the triumphant procession had made in the city, how 
 all asked, "Who is this? " how He healed the blind and the lame 
 in the temple, how the chief priests would have Him restrain the 
 clnldren who shouted "Hosanna," and how He claimed in their 
 behalf and for Himself the words of the Psalmist, " Out of the 
 mouths of babes and sucklings Thou hast perfected praise." 
 
 He did nothing that evening in the way of cleansing the temple, as 
 probably the buyers and sellers had left the scene of their unholy 
 traffic for the night, but "looked round about upon all things." 
 The reader will remember how repeatedly this Evangelist speaks 
 of the Lord looking around Him, surveying the crowd. His disciples, 
 or His enemies. 
 
 12. "And on the morrow, when they were come from Bethany, he 
 was hungry." Chrysostom (who believes that our Lord was not really 
 hungry, but that from His going up to the fig tree to see if there 
 were fruit on it, His disciples thought Him to be so) asks, " What 
 
Chap. XL] A FIG TREE AFAR OFF. 249 
 
 13 * And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves, « Matt, xxi.ia. 
 
 prevented the Lord from eating before He left Bethany? " Some 
 suppose that He did not lodge that night in His accustomed home, 
 the home of Lazarus and the two sisters, but that He and the dis- 
 ciples slept all night in the open field, wrapped up, as Jews were 
 often wont to be, in their large outer garments. And there is this 
 to be said in favour of such a supposition that, according to St. 
 John's account, at this time He " departed, and did hide Himself 
 from them," so that probably He would not sleep in a house to 
 which His enemies knew that He resorted. It was also the common 
 custom of those from a distance who came up to Jerusalem for the 
 Passover to camp out in the fields. 
 
 13. " And seeing a fig tree afar off having leaves ... for the 
 time of figs was not yet." In entering upon the examination of 
 this most remarkable and unique miracle, we are to remember that 
 that is more especially applicable to it which is said of all the Lord's 
 miracles, that it is an acted parable. The true meaning of every 
 part of it is to be brought out and vindicated on this principle only. 
 The Lord then sees a fig tree afar off covered with leaves. Now, 
 inasmuch as in the fig tree the fruit appears and gets to some size 
 before the leaves are well out, there was some prospect of finding a 
 few figs on such a tree, and so the Lord came up to it if haply He 
 might find any thereon. Now, the question has been repeatedly 
 asked, Did not the Lord, Who knew all things, know that there 
 were no figs on the tree ? To this some believing expositors 
 have replied, that as man He did not know it, or He chose not to 
 know it. It was hidden from His human cognizance, just as 
 many other things must have been, if it could be said of Him 
 that He " increased in wisdom " (Luke ii. 52). But is it not the 
 case that He often asked for information in order that those about 
 Him might learn something from the answer ? And is it not also 
 the fact that God Himself is represented in Scripture as coming down 
 to see what men were doing? Thus it is said (Gen. xi. 5) that 
 " The Lord came down to see the city, and the tower which the 
 children of men builded." And as soon as He did so He executed 
 judgment upon them, and confounded their language. Again 
 (Genesis xviii. 20), " The Lord said. Because the cry of Sodom and 
 Gomorrha is great, and because their sin is very grievous, I will go 
 down now, and see whether they have done altogether according to 
 
250 IF HAPLY HE MIGHT FIND. [St. Mark, 
 
 he came, if haply he might find any thing thereon : and when 
 
 the cry of it which is come unto Me, and if not I will know.'* 
 Now just as God knew every sin of Sodom, and had all written in 
 His books for judgment, so His Son knew that there were no figs 
 on this tree. Why, then, do God and the Son of God feign igno- 
 rance ? In order to impress upon us that He has " times of visita- 
 tion." He judges and condemns, or acquits at all times ; but there 
 are times when He comes near to judgment. At such times He 
 does what a human judge does. A criminal's guilt is perfectly 
 plain ; not only the judge, but every person in the court knows it, 
 and yet the judge acts as if he were ignorant, and looks into the 
 matter as if it required to be jproved, when really it does not. Now, 
 this tree was emblematical or typical, 1st, Of the people of the 
 Jews who professed the religion of the true God, and the hope of 
 the Messiah ; and, 2nd, Of every kingdom, society, church, or indi- 
 vidual similarly circumstanced, ?.e., called by God to the profession 
 of His truth. In addition to the constant, never-ceasing observation 
 with which the unseen Judge watches them, there is a time, or there 
 are times, in which God or Christ come near [perhaps in the sight 
 of angels, and of the powers of the unseen world] and conduct a sort 
 of formal examination, though perfectly knowing what the result 
 will be. It is one great part of the duty of a nation, or church, or 
 soul to be prepared for such a visitation. Now, taking this miracle, 
 as I said, as an acted parable, which it unquestionably is, the 
 hunger of the Saviour, the seeing the leafy fig tree when all others 
 of its kind were leafless, afar off, the coming, the searching, the 
 disappointment, the condemnation, the withering, all are signifi- 
 cant, and all are indispensable, if the lesson is to be impressed 
 upon us. I look upon it, then, that the Saviour acts here as God 
 the Observer, the Visitor, and the Judge, all which He is. Besides 
 this, the Saviour sets forth two other matters, viz., God, as ever 
 earnestly desiring the fruits of righteousness in His people, so that 
 He hungers for them ; and God seeing ostentatious or conspicuous 
 profession afar off, and being attracted to it, to see whether the fair 
 profession is accompanied by fruits answering to its attractiveness. 
 So that in this case we cannot tell how far the human soul of the 
 Saviour was ignorant, or kept itself ignorant. If the actions have 
 any typical meaning, then the Lords acts here as the Supreme 
 Judge, i.e., as a Divine Being, a Person in the Trinity. 
 
Chap. XI.] NOTHING BUT LEAVES. 251 
 
 he came to it, lie found nothing but leaves ; for the time 
 of figs was not yet. 
 
 13. " The time of figs was not yet," or, as Revisers, " It was not the season of figs," 
 after Neutral Text. 
 
 " And when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves ; for the 
 time of figs was not yet." It is very surprising that so many diffi- 
 culties should have been raised upon the statement " the time of 
 figs was not yet," for this sentence is the key of the whole parable. 
 All know that the fig tree shows its fruit before its leaves. If then 
 our Lord had seen a fig tree at some distance without leaves, He 
 would have known that in the course of nature no figs sufficiently 
 ripe for eating were, at that time of the year, to be looked for on 
 it ; but if it was covered with leaves He might naturally expect to 
 gather some of the first ripe figs from it. The only remaining 
 point to be ascertained is, can instances be found of fig trees so for- 
 ward as to be covered with leaves so early as the middle of April, 
 which would then be about the Passover time ? ^ Now we have a 
 distinct and satisfactory answer to this question in Dr. Thomson's 
 *' The Land and the Book." He proposes the question. Have you 
 met with anything in this country (Palestine) which can clear 
 away the apparent injustice of seeking figs before the proper time 
 for them? And he answers : " There is a kind of tree which bears a 
 large green- coloured fig that ripens very early. I have plucked 
 them in May, from trees on Lebanon, a hundred and fifty miles 
 north of Jerusalem, and where the trees are nearly a month later 
 than in the south of Palestine ; it does not, therefore, seem impos- 
 sible but that the same kind might have ripe figs at Easter, in the 
 warm sheltered ravines of Olivet. The meaning of the phrase, 
 • the time of figs was not yet,' may be, that the ordinary season 
 for them had not yet arrived, which would be true enough, at any 
 rate. The reason why He might, legitimately, so to speak, seek 
 fruit from this particular tree at that early day, was the ostenta- 
 tious show of leaves. The fig often comes with, or even before the 
 leaves, and especially on the early kind. If there was no fruit on 
 this leafy tree, it might justly be condemned as barren, and hence 
 
 ^ Sco Smith's "Dictionary of the Bible," article "Month," page 
 417. 
 
252 NO MAN EAT FRUIT OF THEE. [St. Mark. 
 
 14 And Jesus answered and said unto it, No man eat 
 fruit of thee hereafter for ever. And his disciples heard it. 
 
 the propriety of the lesson it was made to teach — that those who 
 put forth in profusion only the leaves of empty profession are nigh 
 unto cursing." This seems as comj)lete and satisfactory an answer 
 as can well be given. 
 
 Another objection is, that this " tree did not belong to the Saviour, 
 but must have been the property of some other person ; so that He 
 had no right to take its fruit." This is also answered perfectly by the 
 same author. '* Eeferring to the Mosaic law in such cases, Josephus 
 thus expounds it: "You are not to prohibit those that pass by 
 where your fruit is ripe to touch them, but to give them leave to 
 fill themselves full with what you have." And the custom of pluck- 
 ing ripe figs as you pass by the orchards, is still universal in this 
 country, especially from trees by the road side, and from all that 
 are not enclosed." 
 
 But did the Lord do right in destroying the property of another 
 man ? Now the very great j)robability is, that it was not the pro- 
 perty of any one in particular, but by the side of a road, or on an 
 unenclosed space, and its very barrenness goes far to prove this, for 
 the same author tells us : " There are many such trees now ; and 
 if the ground is not properly cultivated, especially when the trees 
 are young .... thoy do not bear at all ; and even when full grown 
 they quickly fail and wither away if neglected. Those who expect 
 to gather good crops of well-flavoured figs are particularly atten- 
 tive to their culture ; not only do they plough and dig about them 
 frequently, and manure them plentifully, but they carefully gather 
 out the stones from the orchards, contrary to their general slovenly 
 habits." 
 
 One objection more. Did not the Lord by withering the fig tree 
 prevent future wayfarers from being refreshed by the fruit ? No ; 
 from what has been just quoted this tree had no owner, was never 
 likely to have any pains taken with it, and so the Lord saved future 
 wayfarers from disappointment. 
 
 14. *' And Jesus answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit of 
 thee hereafter for ever." In St. Matthew we read, " And presently 
 the fig tree withered away," as if the word of the Lord at once took 
 effect. It is not impossible that such should have been the case, 
 for the disciples were on their way, and would not turn or look back ; 
 
Chap. XL] JESUS IX THE TEMPLE. 253 
 
 15 ^ '^ And tliej come to Jerusalem : and Jesus ^ Matt. xxi. 
 went into the temple, and began to cast out them 45.' John ii. 14, 
 
 but St. Mark notices that " the disciples heard it," but not till the 
 next day did they see what had taken place. 
 
 [20. " And in the morning, as they passed by, they saw the fig tree 
 dried up by the roots."] This is the one miracle which sets forth 
 Christ as the Judge and the Executor of the wrath of God. In all 
 His other miracles He appears as the Saviour from sin and all forms 
 of spiritual evil, spiritual bhndness, spiritual dumbness, spiritual 
 hunger, spiritual death. In this alone we have Him " retain- 
 ing sin." " Our most merciful Lord, Who expressed His ever- 
 lasting bounties towards us by numberless miracles, with one 
 miracle only (and that not in the case of a man, but of an insensible 
 tree) denoting the severity of His judgment against unprofitable 
 men ; that we might be certain of this fact, that barrenness in good 
 works is punished by the witholding of that grace which causes to 
 fructify." So Grotius, and he seems to have taken the idea from 
 St. Hilary : " Herein we find proof of the Lord's goodness. When 
 He was minded to show forth an instance of the salvation procui-ed 
 by His means. He exerted the power of His might upon the persons 
 of men, by healing their sicknesses, encouraging them to hope for 
 the future, and to look for the healing of the soul ; but now, when 
 He would exhibit a type oiHiQ judgments on the obstinately rebel- 
 lious. He represents the picture by the destruction of a tree,'' So 
 that this miracle, so unlike any other in its severity, was done in 
 great mercy. It sets before us the severe side of His character, 
 that He is the Judge and the Executor of God's wi-ath, and that 
 God will punish not only the wicked, as we call gross and open 
 sinners, but the fruitless. What is the reality of the *' withering? " 
 Is it not that which the Lord sets forth in the parable of the vine : 
 *' If a man abide not in Me, He is cast forth as a branch and is 
 withered " ? 
 
 15. "And they come to Jerusalem: and Jesus went into the 
 temple, and began to cast out," &c. It seems, at first sight, almost 
 incredible that men who professed such reverence for the temple, 
 and were so scrupulous about the slightest ceremonial defilement 
 (John xviii. 28), should actually let out, as they did, a portion of 
 the sacred precincts, the court of the Gentiles, or a part of it, to 
 dealers in cattle and sheep and doves, and to money-changers, but 
 
254 THE TRAFFICKERS CAST OUT. [St. Mark. 
 
 that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the 
 
 unscrupulous men will do anything for the sake of gain. It would 
 be a great convenience to a Jew from a distance to buy his Passover 
 Lamb close to the spot where it had to be killed ; and the Sadducean 
 priests, taking advantage of this, were themselves the realdesecrators 
 of the most sacred building of which they were the guardians, by en- 
 couraging the unholy traffic. But the Lord, Who ever regarded the 
 temple as His Father's house, and looked upon the very building as 
 imparting its sanctity to all in it, resented this as He had done on a 
 former occasion, alone and unaided, for this occurred on the day 
 after His arrival, and the enthusiastic crowds were dispersed. He 
 drove out all the traffickers, overthrew the tables of the money- 
 changers, and the seats of those who sold doves to those who were 
 too poor to bring a more costly offering, and, according to our 
 EvaDgelist, even went further, by forbidding the temple to be made 
 a thoroughfare, so that vessels should be carried through it. 
 
 Now we must ask first, " Was this an ordinary exercise of power? " 
 and then, " What was its significance ? " 
 
 It would have been a natural, though, of course, a remarkable 
 exercise of power if it had been, as is asserted, through the personal 
 greatness and intensity of will that showed itself in our Lord's 
 look and word and tone. But if this personal greatness means 
 a very commanding presence, so that all enemies should be 
 at once overawed, why did not this save Him from the insults and 
 outrages which were heaped upon Him during this very week ? We 
 have no reason to beheve from anything in the gospel that the 
 Lord had a presence which greatly overawed men, and He must 
 have had a very commanding personal presence indeed, to disperse 
 without apparently the faintest opposition a crowd of cattle-dealers 
 and money-changers. It seems to me that the faculty of trans- 
 figuring Himself at will, so as on one day to put on an appearance 
 which overawed the roughest of men, and on the next day so to dis- 
 guise His majesty as that the very slaves should spit on Him and 
 strike Him, is as much a supernatural endowment as the power of 
 healing the sick or casting out devils. 
 
 Why do men treat the exercise of the Lord's Divine power as if 
 it were something immoral, something to be ashamed of, something 
 that we must get rid of even at the expense of common sense, unless 
 we are compelled to acknowledge it ? It may interest the reader io 
 
Chap. XI.] THE MONEY CHANGERS. 255 
 
 tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that 
 sold doves ; 
 
 contrast with the modern view, that of a Father of the Church, St. 
 Jerome : " To me it appears that amid all the signs of our Lord, 
 this was the most wonderful ; that one single man, at a time too 
 when He was an object of scorn, and accounted so vile as soon 
 after to have been crucified, while the Scribes and Pharisees [chief 
 priests ?J moreover were furiously raging against Him, on account 
 of the loss through Him of their worldly gain, should nevertheless 
 have succeeded with a whip of small cords (John ii. 15), in driving 
 out of the temple so vast a multitude, overthrowing the tables and 
 the seats, and doing other like things, which scarcely a troop of 
 soldiers could have accomplished." 
 
 The second question is, " What is the significance of the act ? 
 Did its significance cease when the fane whose sanctity Christ thus 
 marvellously vindicated, was for ever desecrated and cast to the 
 ground, or has it any reference to the new state of things in the 
 kingdom of God ? To this we answer, it asserts an universal prin- 
 ciple, that whatsoever is consecrated to the true God, be it building, 
 or societ}'-, or body, cannot be profaned without bringing on those 
 who desecrate it the severe anger of God. God has nowhere, in so 
 many words, commanded that the buildings devoted to the prayers 
 and Eucharists of the New Covenant should be dedicated with a 
 special service. He has left such a thing to be inferred from His 
 Word, and a certain Divine instinct has led Christians everywhere 
 solemnly to set apart their material churches to the exclusive ser- 
 vice of God ; but when they do so God holds them to their word. 
 They have set apart these buildings to Him, He has accepted the 
 offering, and inasmuch as He has not ceased to be a jealous God, 
 He will certainly regard any desecration of them as profanity and 
 impiety. If it be asserted that the Jewish temple was of greater 
 sanctity than a Christian Church, because so much is said in Scrip- 
 ture about its dedication, we answer, No. A building, however 
 humble, set apart for the offering up of prayer in the Name of Jesus, 
 must be greater than a temple, however magnificent, in which His 
 Name was never invoked — a building set apart for the celebration 
 of the Eucharist must be holier than a building set apart for the 
 offering of bullocks and calves. And so with the Mystical Body, the 
 Church, in all its branches. It also is defiled by heresy and false 
 
256 MY HOUSE THE HOUSE OF PRAYER. [St. Mark. 
 
 16 And would not suffer that any man should carry any 
 vessel througli tlie temple. 
 
 17 And lie taught, saying unto them, Is it not written, 
 1 Is. ivi. 7. ^ My house shall be called || of all nations the 
 ofvrayerpr^ house of prayer? but ''ye have made it a den 
 
 all nations ? u xi_ • 
 
 i^Jer.vii.ii. of thieves. 
 
 doctrine, and traffic in holy offices ; and Christ will assuredly look 
 upon this with more anger than He looked upon the profanation of 
 the temple, inasmuch as a temple of living stones, built into a spiri- 
 tual house, is a greater thing than a building even of marble and 
 gold. And so with the bodies of Christians, which together with 
 their souls, are so made the temple of God in Holy Baptism, that 
 an inspired Apostle could ask, " Know ye not that your body is the 
 temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you ? " and so he says, " If 
 any man defile the temple of God, him will God destroy." Let us 
 then cleanse our souls by prayer and thoughts about the holiest 
 things, or Christ may suddenly visit us and cast us out of the true 
 house of God. 
 
 With respect to our Lord's not suffering anyone to carry a vessel 
 through the temple. Dr. South has a good remark: "We must 
 know that the least degree of contempt weakens religion ; because 
 it is absolutely contrary to the nature of it ; religion properly con- 
 sisting of reverential esteem for things sacred." (Quoted in Ford.) 
 
 17. " And he taught, saying unto them, My house shall be called," 
 &c. If, as is very probable, the marginal translation (" a house of 
 prayer for all nations ") is the true one, then there may be here a 
 tacit reference to the fact that the court of the Gentiles, as being 
 the least sacred part of the temple, had been employed, in part at 
 least, for the infamous traffic ; in which case the Lord's words would 
 mean, " My house shall be called the house of prayer for all the 
 Gentiles, but ye have driven them out and polluted their share, and 
 made it a den of thieves." 
 
 It has been asked, Were not the future houses of God to be houses 
 of preaching — was not, that is, preaching to be their characteristic ? 
 No, we answer, and for this reason : preaching may be, and ought to 
 be, everywhere ; wherever people can be congregated to hear it : 
 Whereas the celebration of the Eucharist and also united Church 
 prayer ought, if possible, to be in places set apart from the world, 
 
Chap. XL] THE FIG TREE WITHERED. 257 
 
 18 And ^ tlie scribes and chief priests heard it, and souglit 
 how they might destroy him : for they feared him, * Matt, xxi. 45, 
 because ali the people was astonished at his 47. 
 
 n • ' ^ Matt.vii.28. 
 
 doctrine. eh.i.22. Luke 
 
 19 And when even was come, he went out of ^^" ^^' 
 the city. 
 
 20 ^° And in the morning, as they passed by, » Matt. xxi. 19. 
 they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. 
 
 21 And Peter calhng to remembrance saith unto him, 
 Master, behold, the fig tree which thou cursedst is withered 
 away. 
 
 22 And Jesus answering saith unto them, 1 1 Have \\ or, iiave the 
 laith m Grod. 
 
 its associations, its businesses, and pleasures ; and ought to be in 
 places, the architecture and arrangement and associations of which 
 tend to raise the worshipper above the world. The restriction on 
 the part of the authorities of the English Church, for nearly two 
 centuries, of j)reacbing to the interior of churches, has been most 
 disastrous. It has been the real reason why she has lost so many 
 of the working classes. Our missionaries in India preach to the 
 heathen in thoroughfares, in bazaars, at times even in the temples, 
 and the heathen of England require to be met in the same way. 
 
 18. " And the scribes and chief priests heard it, and sought how 
 they might," &c. This is the first instance in the Synoptics of the 
 " chief x^riests " taking serious measures to destroy Him, and the 
 reader will notice how closely it follows upon the cleansing of the 
 temple. 
 
 " They sought how they might destroy him." Their fears made 
 them think that it would be no easy thing to destroy Him. They 
 did not count upon the fleeting nature of all popularity. Three 
 days after this the people who were astonished at His doctrine 
 made no effort to save Him. 
 
 19, 20, 21. "And when even was come, he went out .... 
 withered away." I commented on these verses above, and shall 
 not now refer to them. 
 
 22. "And Jesus answering saith unto them, Have faith in God." 
 We have explained the miracle of the withering of the fig tree 
 
 s 
 
258 BE THOU CAST INTO THE SEA. [St. Mark. 
 
 23 For ° verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say 
 o Matt. xvy. unto this mouiitam, Be thou removed, and be 
 
 20. & xxi. 21. . T 1 n i T 1 • 1 . 
 
 Luke xvii. 6. tliou cast luto the sea ; and shall not doubt m his 
 
 23. " For " omitted by ^{, B., D., N., eight or ten Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., Syriac 
 fSchaaf), Armenian ; retained by A., C, L., later Uncials, most Cursives, Coptic, some 
 Syriac, Gothic. 
 
 entirely on its typical side, as setting forth the withering up of 
 all life in nations or Churches, who, at the time of their visitation, 
 have no fruit to show ; but the Lord makes no allusion whatsoever 
 to its spiritual import, and treats it as simply a putting forth of 
 Divine power. But this is the- case with all His miracles. He 
 never attaches a distinct spiritual meaning to them. To lis they 
 shadow forth His action on the souls of His people, but it is 
 impossible that they should have conveyed this lesson to those who 
 saw them performed. It required the full light of Pentecost 
 to teach their spiritual meaning. And especially would it have 
 been impossible to make the disciples receive the import of the 
 withering of the fig tree, which was, in the first place, the diying 
 up of the spiritual life of their own nation. History alone could 
 teach the Church this. 
 
 23. "For verily I say unto you. That whosoever shall say unto 
 this mountain," &c. The removal of the mountain, and the cast- 
 ing of it into the sea was, no doubt, a proverbial expression, or 
 would remind the Apostles of one. Thus St. Paul alludes to it : 
 " Though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains," and a 
 similar figure was used by the prophets : thus, Zechariah, " Who art; 
 thou, O great mountain ? before Zerubbabel thou shalt become a 
 plain " (iv. 7). Not, of course, that anyone in his senses would ever 
 pray to God that He would, at his word, remove an actual mountain : 
 no one having any true conception of God would pray for such a 
 thing ; but the meaning is, that those whom God has inspired with 
 a true faith would perform miracles, and remove obstacles requiring 
 as great an exertion of Divine power as the removal of a mountain. 
 But as the true significance of the Lord's illustration has been 
 much misunderstood, it may be well to dwell somewhat upon it. 
 
 The Apostles, when the Lord was taken away from them, would 
 have to commend His doctrine to the world by miracles. To this 
 end it was needful that their faith in God, as the Bestower of all 
 
Chap. XL] THE POWER OF FAITH. 259 
 
 heart, but sliall believe that those things which he saith shall 
 come to pass ; he shall have whatsoever he saith. 
 
 23. "Those things which he saith." So A., C, later Uncials, almost all Cursives; but 
 K, B., L., one or two Cursives, some Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic, Gothic, Syriac (Schaaf) 
 read, "What he saith" in the singular. 
 
 " Shall come to pass." Properly, " Cometh to pass." 
 
 "Whatsoever be saith" omitted by N, B., C, D., L., A, three or four Cursives, Vulg.; 
 but A., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Syriac, Gothic, Armenian retain, 
 
 power to do such things, should be raised. For the real doer of 
 every miracle or sign was God, and God only. When the Apostles 
 healed suddenly any sick person, or cast out any evil spirit, it was 
 by the combined exercise of prayer and faith. They secretly, or 
 openly, called upon God, and they impHcitly believed that He 
 would accompany their word with His power. Now being men 
 totally ignorant of science, and so unable to form a conception of 
 the kind or amount of power put forth in the performance of any 
 miracle, they would naturally look upon it as a matter of size, or 
 weight, or extension. They would, as a matter of course, look 
 upon the removal of the Mount of Olives as a far greater thing, de- 
 manding far greater power, than the sudden drying-up of the life- 
 juices of a single fig-tree ; but it may not really be greater, by any 
 means. On the contrary, the sudden touching and arresting the 
 springs of life in the living thing may require far more knowledge 
 of the greatest secret of all — the secret of hfe, and far more real 
 power in applying that knowledge, than the removal of the most 
 stupendous mass of dead matter. Now the Apostles, though they 
 could not understand this, must yet act as if it were so. They 
 must not judge by the sight of their eyes of the difficulty or easi- 
 ness of anything which they felt moved by the Spirit to peform. 
 They must think of nothing but the almighty power of God, and 
 His pledge to accompany their prayers or words with that power.' 
 
 ■^ A very distinguished scientist has somewhere said that to bring 
 down from the clouds a single shower, or to stay its falling, would 
 be as great a miracle as to reverse the falls of Niagara, and make 
 the water rise upwards. And he is perfectly right, for undoubtedly 
 the change of atmospheric influences which would bring about or 
 stay a single shower would extend over an area vastly more exten- 
 sive than a thousand Niagaras ; but then we believe that scientists 
 
260 WHEN YE PRAY, BELIEVE. [St. Mark. 
 
 tJke xi 9"' ^" ^'^ Therefore I say unto you, ^ What things so- 
 
 Jo^n ^iv 13. ever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive 
 
 24. James i. them, and ve shall have them. 
 
 5, 6. ' .> 
 
 24. "Believe that ye receive." So A., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Syriae, 
 Gothic, Armenian; but N, B., C, L., A, Coptic, "Ye have received them." D., Old 
 Latin, Vulg., "Ye shall receive." 
 
 Now with respect to spiritual miracles — miracles, that is, of con- 
 version, of sudden influx of spiritual light, of sudden subjugation of 
 evil habits or removal of evil tendencies. If the spiritual world is 
 higher than the natural, any one of these very probably requires a 
 higher exertion of power than any miraculous changes in the 
 physical sphere ; and yet men who have doubts and difficulties 
 respecting physical miracles, seem willingly to accept such as 
 these. 
 
 24. " Therefore I say unto you. What things soever ye desire, 
 when ye pray," &c. It has been supposed that the Lord here refers 
 to the faith of miracles, emphatically so called, because it was a 
 certain supernatural confidence and assurance wrought by the 
 Spirit in the soul of a man, by which he was sure he could do such 
 or such miracles before he attempted to do them. By this super- 
 natural confidence or impulse it was that men knew, as by a sign, 
 when they could work wonders, and when not. (Dr. Hickes, in 
 Ford.) 
 
 But I do not think that the Lord here alludes to this. He had 
 considered this sort of faith in the previous verse ; and now, lest 
 His hearers should think that what He had said only referred to 
 such acts of faith as preceded the performance of miracles, He 
 apparently lays down in this verse a general truth. 
 
 Now, I think that we must apply to these words that principle 
 
 are not the highest beings in the universe, as, by denying the super- 
 natural, they profess to be. We believe that there is an omnipotent, 
 omniscient, omnipresent Intelligence, to Whom the highest science 
 of our scientists is a very clumsy, roundabout, imperfect way of 
 expressing the relations to one another of the various things — atoms, 
 molecules, energies, vital forces, &c. — to which He has given exis- 
 tence, and of which He alone knows the real nature, and on which 
 He has reserved to Himself the right and power of acting as He 
 pleases. 
 
Chap. XL] WHEN YE PRAY, FORGIVE. 261 
 
 25 And wlien ye stand praying, ^ forgive, if ye have ouglit 
 against any : that your Father also which is in i Matt. vi. i4. 
 
 , o • . Col, iii. 13. 
 
 heaven may lorgive yon yonr trespasses. 
 
 which I have before noticed, as applying to so many of our Lord's 
 startling sayings. He lays down with solemnity and decisiveness 
 some great principle, and does not mention, or, for the time, makes 
 no account of, the necessary exceptions. Thus it seems quite pos- 
 sible that a man may with great confidence pray for what is 
 contrary to the will of God, or for what would be injurious to him- 
 self or to others, and an hindrance to the work of God in the world, 
 or he may pray for some Christian grace for himself which it is 
 well that he should have, but not at present, for he may require 
 another grace first, which is, in the order of God, its necessary 
 antecedent : for instance, he may pray for comfort when God sees 
 that he requires a much decider sense of sin. Now it seems that a 
 man may pray with much confidence for such things, and God may 
 not hear his prayer, at least at the time. Well, it is very neces- 
 sary, on principles of common sense, to take account of such 
 exceptions ; but what om* Lord here desires to impress upon us is 
 that our ^rs^ duty is to have faith in God, "Who always hears every 
 prayer. Who always regards it with favour, if it be ofi"ered in the 
 least sincerity, Who always registers it in His memory, and Who 
 will not allow one sincere prayer to be really lost, and to be as if 
 it had not been offered to Him. In coming to God in prayer, then, 
 the first and foremost thing is to come with confidence — to look to 
 the promises only, and not to think of the necessary limitations or 
 exceptions. One who is led by the grace of God to pray earnestly 
 is most likely to pray for what God has it in His mind to grant to 
 him. When Christ, then, bids us believe that we receive what we 
 ask. He bids us put before ourselves the promises of God to hear 
 prayer ; He bids us put before ourselves the intercession of Christ, 
 and the assistance of the Spirit, and the many instances which 
 every Christian has heard of, in which God has answered the petition 
 of those that have asked in His Son's Name, for by such en- 
 deavours we can do our part to excite in ourselves the faith here 
 commended by the Lord. 
 
 25, 26. *' And when ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have ought 
 against any: . . . forgive your trespasses." Our Lord seems io 
 
262 IF YE DO NOT FORGIVE. ^ [St. Mark. 
 
 26 But '"if ye do not forgive, neither will your Father 
 rjMatt. xviii. whicli is in licaven forgive your tresspasses. 
 8 Matt.xxi.23. 27 ^ And they come again to Jeinisalem : ^ and 
 ^ ^ ^^' ^' as he was walking in the temple, there come to 
 him the chief priests, and the scribes, and the elders. 
 
 23. " But if ye do not forgive," &c. This verse omitted by V, B., L., S., A, seven or 
 eight Cursives, some Old Latin, and some versions; but retained by A., C, D., E., Gr., 
 H., K., M., N., and some other Uncials, almost all Cui'sives, nearly all Old Latin, Vulg., 
 G«thic, Syriac. 
 
 speak with greater earnestness respecting this matter of forgiveness 
 of injuries than He does upon any other subject. In the Sermon 
 on the Mount He teaches His hearers the Lord's Prayer, and He 
 directs their attention to but one jpart of it, and that is the petition, 
 "Forgive us our trespasses as ive forgive iliem that trespass against 
 us" And none of his parables end with so very severe a warning 
 as that of the unmerciful servant, which He concludes with : " So 
 shall also my heavenly Father do also unto you, if ye from your 
 hearts forgive not every one his brother their trespasses." Thus 
 Tertullian : " The remembrance of the commandments paveth the 
 way to heaven for prayers, of which commandmer.fs the chief is 
 that we go not up to the altar of God before that we undo what- 
 ever quarrel or enmity we may have contracted with our brethren. 
 For what is it to retire into the peace of God without peace? unto 
 the remission of debts, retaining debts ? How shall he appease the 
 Father who is angry with his brother, seeing that all anger is from 
 the beginning forbidden us ? . . . How rash a thing is it either to 
 pass a day without prayer, while thou delayest to make satisfaction 
 to a brother, or by persisting in wrath to undo prayer!" (On 
 Prayer, xi.) 
 
 27. " And they come again to Jerusalem : and as he was walking 
 in the temple," &c. This was, no doubt, on the Tuesday. 
 
 As He was walking in the temple, very probably employed in 
 works of mercy, according as St. Matthew says, " The lame and the 
 bUnd came to him in the temple, and he healed them." St. Luke 
 also adds, "As he preached the gospel." 
 
 " There come to him the chief priests," &c. This was the one 
 public intimation which He receired from these very dignified 
 persons that TTir pretensions were known to them. Hitherto they 
 
CuAP. XL] WHO GAVE THEE THIS AUTHORITY? 263 
 
 28 And say unto liim, Bj what authority doest thou these 
 things ? and who gave thee this authority to do these things ? 
 
 29 And Jesus answered and said unto them, I will also 
 ask of you one 1| question, and answer me, and 11 Or. thing. 
 
 I will tell you by what authority I do these things. 
 
 had simply ignored Him as a bodj^, though individual priests or 
 rulers may have remonstrated with Him. 
 
 28. " By what authority doest thou these things ? " What is 
 meant by " these things ? " If it was the healing of the lame and 
 the bhnd, such power of doing good, especially in the very temple 
 of God, must have come from the Author of all good ; and they 
 ought to have been the very first to confess it. If they alluded to 
 His preaching and teaching, there seems to have been among the 
 Jews a veiy great liberty for preaching — the rulers of the syna- 
 gogues frequently sending to strangers to ask them if they had any 
 word of exliortation. But if, as no doubt was the case, it was 
 because He had interfered in the management of the temple, then, 
 as rulers of the temple, they had a perfect right to ask the question, 
 only they must come with clean hands, which they were not doing, 
 as their hands were defiled with the ill-gotten gains of sacrilege. 
 They must also ask the question in sincerit}^, which they were not 
 doing : for they had prejudged Him, and were watching for their 
 opx^ortunity to destroy Him. 
 
 But the question arises, seeing that they were the religious rulers 
 and leaders of the Jewish nation, — how was it that they were so 
 late in inquiring personally into His claims ? They had sent a 
 deputation to the Baptist on the banks of the Jordan to inquire who 
 he was : how was it, then, that they allowed the Lord to teach and 
 preach and perform miracles in the most open way, all over the Holy 
 Land, for three years, and did not solemnly, and as the God-ap- 
 pointed leaders of Israel, require publicly and personally of Him to 
 give account of Himself? It was surely their duty to do so. It was 
 clearly the most cowardly dereliction of their highest functions, as 
 judges in matters ©f religion, to ignore such claims. They knew 
 well all that He had done. They knew well the resurrection of 
 Lazarus, which had taken place but a very short time before. They 
 had had theu' solemn conclave, and an animated discussion about 
 it (John xi. 47) ; but all conducted with the determination of con- 
 
2 64 FROM HEAVEN, OR OF MEN ? [St. Mark. 
 
 30 The baptism of John, was it from heaven, or of men ? 
 answer me. 
 
 31 And they reasoned with themselves, saying, If we shall 
 say. From heaven ; he will say, "Why then did ye not believe 
 him? 
 
 32 But if we shall say, Of men ; they feared the people : 
 t Matt. iii. 5. for * all men counted John, that he was a prophet 
 
 & xiv. 5. ch. ■*• •"• 
 
 vi. 20. indeed. 
 
 32. Revisers, following a, A., B., C, L., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Coptic, 
 Gothic, read, " But should we say from men," or, " Shall we say from men ? " No doubt 
 the preferable reading. 
 
 demning Him, no matter what the signs of His Messiahship. Such 
 was the spirit in which they approached the Lord — insincere* 
 hypocritical, crafty, bloodthirsty. And the Lord met them — met 
 not their words only, but the secret machinations of their hearts, 
 and at once and effectually silenced them, not only by a simple 
 question, but by one which, above all men, He had a right to ask. 
 They had sent to John to ask who he was, and John had told them 
 that he was but a forerunner — a voice to call men's minds to One 
 Who should come after. They must have known, their emissaries 
 must have told them, that the One Whom John pointed to was 
 Jesus ; and the Lord fulfilled in His own person all that John had 
 foretold: for He had filled the Holy Land, and the neighbouring 
 territories, even Jerusalem itself, with the fame of His mighty 
 deeds. John baptized, but it was not into the belief of himself, 
 but of One that should come after him. What was the significance 
 of John's baptism — His Baptism, of course, including his whole 
 mission — was it earthly or heavenly ? 
 
 30. " The baptism of John, was it from heaven, or of men ? '* 
 And, apparently, they were confounded by the question; and, after 
 pausing for an answer, He, no doubt, looked them in the face, and 
 said, " Answer me." 
 
 31. "And they reasoned with themselves, saying, If we shall 
 say," &c. *' Why then did ye not believe him ? " of course, here 
 means, Why did ye not believe him when he testified of Me ? John's 
 mission and baptism had no meaning, except as preparing for 
 Another's. He founded no Church, no institution, no sect. He 
 was a herald, and, so far as office was concerned, nothing more; 
 
Chap. XII.] WE CANNOT TELL. 265 
 
 33 And they answered and said unto Jesus, We cannot 
 tell. And Jesus answering saith unto them, Neither do I 
 tell you by what authority I do these things. 
 
 and yet he had so stirred the rehgious heart of the whole people 
 that they were persuaded that he was a prophet indeed. And the 
 chief priests and scribes dare not shipwreck their whole influence 
 with the people by denying this. And so they were in a dilemma. 
 The Lord in His wisdom conducted them, with their eyes wide 
 open, into the snare. And they were forced to say, " We cannot 
 tell." We, the judges of the faith and worship of Israel, cannot tell 
 whether the greatest teacher who has appeared amongst us for 
 many centuries is from God or not. 
 
 To have to make such a confession was to seal their own con- 
 demnation as the leaders of the people of God. 
 
 And so the Lord answered them : " Neither do I tell you by what 
 authority I do these things." If they had possessed the smallest 
 residue of the spirit of their great and holy predecessors, Phinehas, 
 Abiathar, Zadok, Jehoiada, Joshua, the Lord would not have 
 answered them thus. 
 
 CHAP. XII. 
 
 A 
 
 ND ^ he began to speak unto them by parables. A 
 certain man planted a vineyard, and set ^Matt.xxi.33. 
 
 1. "And he began to speak unto them by parables. A certain 
 man planted," &c. This parable of the "wicked husbandmen" 
 is not the first of those which the Lord now began to speak. 
 According to St. Matthew's account, it succeeds the short parable 
 of the Two Sons, in which the same lesson is taught. 
 
 In the parable of the vineyard let out to unthankful husbandmen, 
 the Lord brings before us by a parable exactly the same lesson as 
 He had taught men by the withering of the fruitless fig tree, except 
 that, in the parable, instead of one time of visitation only, we have 
 
266 THE HEDGE, THE WINE FAT. [St. Mark. 
 
 an hedge about it, and digged a place for tlie winefat, and 
 
 many ; the last and final one, however, gathering up into itself all 
 former ones. 
 
 The "certain man," or householder (St. Matt.) is God the 
 Father. The time of the planting was the time when God, having 
 disciplined them and given them His law, and His ordinances of 
 Divine service, put them in possession of the land of Canaan. 
 Thus the Psalmist sings : " Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt, 
 Thou hast cast forth the heathen and j)lanted it. Thou maclest 
 room for it, and when it had taken root it filled the land" 
 (Ps. Ixxx. 8). 
 
 " And set a hedge about t." This hedge is by some explained 
 to be the protecting providence of God, by others the guardianship 
 of angels ; but most probably it is the Law, esx^ocially those pro- 
 hibitory statutes which prevented the Israelites from mixing with 
 the heathen, and so kept them a separate people. 
 
 "And digged a place for the winefat, and built a tower." It is 
 uncertain whether the Lord means by the winefat and the tower 
 any special institution of the Jews. The planting and the due 
 ordering of the vineyard could not be described in any picturesque 
 and striking way without bringing in such accessories. Most exposi- 
 tors, however, have assigned a special meaning to the " winefat," 
 and to the " tower." 
 
 Inasmuch as the winefat is the instrument for pressing out the 
 juice or blood of the grape, most of the ancient commentators (who, 
 unlike the moderns, delight to see a reference to Christ in every- 
 thing) believe that it means those parts of the Jewish system which 
 set forth the Sacrifice of the Son of God. Thus Origen sj)eaks of 
 it as the place of Sacrifice ; another as the altar; another as the 
 word of God, which cnicifies the old man, and to which the nature 
 of the flesh is opposed. If it has any special meaning it must 
 accord with the fact that the winefat or winepress is that which 
 makes the very perishable fruit of the vine profitable by extracting 
 wine from it, and so it may mean God's perpetual discipline of His 
 people. The tower is the place in which the keeper of the vineyard 
 dwelt, and from which he could discern the approach of enemies, 
 and guard against them. It has been explained by Origen and 
 Chrysostom to signify the temple in which God dwelt among His 
 people. 
 
Chap. XIL] THEY CAUGHT HIM AND BEAT HIM. 267 
 
 built a tower, and let it out to liusbandmen, and went into 
 a far country. 
 
 2 And at the season lie sent to tlie liusbandmen a servant, 
 tliat he might receive of the husbandmen of the fruit of 
 the vineyard. 
 
 3 And they caught him, and beat him, and sent Mm away 
 empty. 
 
 4 And again he sent unto them another servant ; and at 
 him they cast stones, and wounded Mm in the head, and 
 sent Mm away shamefully handled. 
 
 4. "[At] him ttey cast stones, and," &e. So A., C, N., later Uncials, most Cursives, 
 Syriac, Gothic, Armenian, ^thiopic, "Cast stones" omitted by ^f, B., D., L., A, a few 
 Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., Sahidic, Coptic. 
 
 " Sent him away shamefully handled." So A., C, N., later Uncials, almost all Cur- 
 sives, Syriac, Gothic, Armenian, iEthiopic ; but ^f, B., D., L., one Cursive (33), Vulg., 
 Sahidic, Coptic read, " shamefully handled," omitting "sent him away." 
 
 " And let it out to husbandmen." That is, to the children of 
 Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob ; whom He had trained in the wilder- 
 ness to keej) and cultivate the religion which He gave them. 
 
 "And went into a far country." This probably means that He 
 quickly withdrew the sensible tokens of His presence, and left them 
 in great part to themselves. Thus Jerome: "He went into afar 
 country, not by a change of place, for God, by "Whom all things are 
 filled, cannot be absent from anyplace ; but He seems to be absent 
 from the vineyard, that He may leave the vine-dressers a freedom 
 of acting." 
 
 2. " And at the season he sent to the husbandmen a servant, that 
 he might," &c. The season cannot be limited to any particular 
 time of their history, but covered the whole life of the nation from 
 Moses to Christ. Still there were particular periods when God 
 seemed to demand an account from them of their fruits or works ; 
 the time of Samuel seems to have been one, the time of Elijah 
 another, that of Jeremiah and Ezekiel another, and perhaps we 
 may add that of the Maccabees, and, of course, that of the Baptist. 
 
 3, 4, 5. " And they caught him .... And again he sent another 
 .... beating some and killing some," &c. In all the three 
 EvangeHsts there seems to be three servants especially alluded to, 
 but it is impossible to identify any of these servants with any 
 
268 ONE SON, HIS WELL-BELOVED. [St. Mark. 
 
 5 And again lie sent another ; and him thej killed, and 
 many others ; beating some, and killing some. 
 
 6 Having yet therefore one son, his wellbeloved, he sent 
 
 6. " Having yet therefore one son, his -well-beloved." " Therefore " read in A., C, D., 
 N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Vulg., Syriac; but S, B., L., A, and one or two 
 Cursives omit. 
 
 " His well-beloved." " His " omitted by H, B., C, D., L., A, some Old Latin, Vulg., 
 Sahidic, Coptic, Syriac (Schaaf). The Revisers render, "He had yet one, a beloved 
 son, he sent him last," &c. 
 
 messengers of God under the Old Testament, treated so as here 
 described. The Lord may have had certain individual prophets, 
 or messengers, in His mind ; but we must remember that it was 
 the Lord's intention to make the Jews who heard Him pass sentence 
 upon themselves, either in their own conscience or, as St. Matthew 
 seems to imply, openly and aloud (Matt. xxi. 41) ; and if He had 
 enabled them easily to identify these servants of the householder 
 with prophets whom their fathers had persecuted, they would have 
 seen the drift of His parable too soon and would have been'on the 
 watch lest they should have condemned themselves. There seems, 
 however, to have been three orders of messengers who were succes- 
 sively raised up by God to act on the consciences of His people : 
 first, the Law pure and simple as represented by Moses, Joshua, and 
 the elders who outlived Joshua ; then the judges, and after that the 
 prophets from Samuel to Malachi. That they persecuted and 
 martyred these prophets, or servants of God is clear from the 
 appeal of St. Stephen: "Which of the x)rophets have not your 
 fathers persecuted ? " and the latter part of the 11th chapter of the 
 Epistle to the Hebrews, vv. 36,37, seems to indicate far more severe 
 and prolonged persecution of the true servants of God than is 
 recorded in the Old Testament. Even Moses and Samuel were 
 rejected by them (Exod. xxxii. 1 ; 1 Sam. viii. 6, 7). 
 
 6. " Having yet therefore one son, his well-beloved, . . . last 
 unto them." But were not the prophets who bore faithful witness 
 true sons of God ? So far as mere men could be, they were, but in 
 a very subordinate sense compared to the Lord. They were sons 
 by adoption and by being " led by the Spirit " (Eom. viii. 12). He 
 was the Son in the unique sense of being the only begotten — fully 
 partaking of His Father's nature. The complement of this place 
 is, •' God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son." 
 
Chap. XII.] THEY WILL REVERENCE MY SON. 269 
 
 liim also last unto them, saying, They will reverence my 
 son. 
 
 7 But those husbandmen said among themselves, This is 
 
 " They will reverence my son." " Thus did the Almighty Father 
 please to express Himself in the wonderful condescension of human 
 language, as 'hoping against hope,' and though He knew that 
 such reverence was far from them, yet did He deliver up from His 
 bosom His well-beloved into their merciless hands : as if still look- 
 ing for other treatment from them .... The parable is spoken of 
 a certain man^ a householder. But yet, nowithstanding, these 
 words, ' They will reverence my Son,' though He knew what would 
 follow, are not said lightly and after the manner of men, but seem 
 to contain within them a descrij)tion of all God's deahngs with 
 mankind — for even when He knows their wickedness and final im- 
 penitence, yet He mysteriously acts towards them as having hox^e 
 of them. For if the words which are here used contain any 
 apparent contradiction to the foreknowledge of God, it is precisely 
 the same which pervades all His dealings with mankind." Jerome 
 well remarks, " God is spoken of as being uncertain in order that 
 freewill may be left to man." 
 
 And yet the words are true, and are a Divine prophecy ; for 
 though the mass of the chosen people rejected the Lord, yet a 
 remnant received Him, and this remnant was the root of His 
 Church, and made His Name reverenced throughout all nations by 
 the obedience of faith. 
 
 7. " But those husbandmen said among themselves, This is the 
 heir, come," &c. This is what any ignorant peasants, when the 
 lord of the property which they farmed lived at a great distance, 
 might do. Eegardless of future consequences, and remembering 
 how hitherto they had successfully resisted all his claims, they 
 would think only of the gratification of their envy and greed ; but 
 could this be put into the mouths of the Jews who rejected and 
 crucified the Lord ? Of course they would not dare to say among 
 themselves, " This is the Son of God, let us kill him ; " but if 
 ever men sinned against the truth — sinned against the plainest 
 evidence that He Whom they persecuted came from God — the high 
 priests and scribes and elders did : they knew the prophecies re- 
 specting the Messiah — they knew that the times were drawing to a 
 close — they had, in part, acknowledged the mission of the Baptist, 
 
270 THIS IS THE HEIR. [St. Mark. 
 
 the heir ; come, let us kill him, and the inheritance shall be 
 
 our s. 
 
 they knew perfectly the miracles of Jesus and the extraordinary 
 holiness of His teaching, and the blamelessness of His life ; they 
 had every means of arriving at a true and right conclusion. But 
 they were like men who had a problem before them which they 
 were bound to work out, and they saw as distinctly as men could do 
 what the solution would be — that it would be against them — against 
 their false pretensions, or self-righteousness, or covetous gains. 
 And so they refused to take the last steps and work it out. 
 
 '' And the inheritance shall be our's." In what sense could the 
 Jews who killed the Lord be said to do so that they might have 
 the inheritance of God — whatever that meant — to themselves? 
 Somewhat, I think, in this way. They were then lording it over 
 God's heritage — treating it as if it were their own ; they even went 
 to the extent of letting out the courts of the temple, as if it were 
 their private property. In them was fulfilled the words of Ezekiel 
 respecting the apostate shepherds : " Ye eat the fat and ye clothe 
 you with the wool, ye kill them that are fed, but ye feed not the 
 flock" (xxxiv. 8). Now the presence and teaching of the Lord 
 shook their self-security. It was the earnest that God would 
 dehver His flock out of their hands, and set shepherds over it 
 that should feed it. It was the earnest of the fast approaching 
 purification when He should purify the sons of Levi, and purge 
 them as gold and silver. The thought of this was hateful to men 
 with unclean hands. They wanted to live to themselves — to be 
 their own — to enjoy their proud position in Israel for their own 
 sake : but if there was one thing which all the Lord's teaching im- 
 pressed upon men, it was that they were not their own. Archbishop 
 Trench explains it thus : " They desired that the inheritance should 
 be theirs ; they desired that what God had intended should only be 
 transient and temporary, enduring till the times of reformation, 
 should be made permanent, — and this because they had preroga- 
 tives and privileges in the imperfect system which would cease 
 when the more perfect scheme was brought in, or rather which, not 
 ceasing, would yet be transformed into higher privileges, for which 
 they had no care." But is not this to credit them with an insight 
 into a great truth, which was especially revealed to St. Paul only 
 among the Apostles (Ephes. iii. 3-7), and which the Christian Jews 
 
CflAP. XIL] THEY TOOK HIM AND KILLED HIM. 271 
 
 8 And thej took him, and killed Mm, and cast him out of 
 the vineyard. 
 
 9 What shall therefore the lord of the vineyard do ? he 
 will come and destroy the husbandmen, and will give the 
 vineyard unto others. 
 
 9. "Therefore" omitted by B., L., and Coptic; retained by y. A., C.,D., N., later 
 Uncials, all Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., Syriac, &c. I notice this merely for the purpose 
 of drawing attention to the way in which certain modern editors (Tischendorf and 
 Westcott and Hort, who omit the word) throw aside the evidence of all Christendom on 
 the authority of two MSS. 
 
 of Jerusalem would not submit to till it was bound on them by the 
 authority of the first council (Acts xv.) ? 
 
 8. " And they took him, and killed him, and cast him out of the 
 vineyard." There can be no particular significance in the order 
 here, for both St. Matthew and St. Luke put the *' casting out of 
 the vineyard " first. They gave Him into the hands of the heathen 
 as a reprobate, and slew Him without the city. But Theopbylact 
 says, " not Jerusalem, but the people are called the vineyard of the 
 Lord, so as suffering not by their own hands, but by the hands of 
 the Gentiles He is said to be cast without the vineyard." 
 
 9. " What shall therefore the Lord of the vineyard do ? He will 
 come and destroy the husbandmen ? " According to St. Mark and 
 St. Luke the Lord answers His own question, but according to St. 
 Matthew they first answer Him in the words, " He will miserably 
 destroy those wicked men, and will let out his vineyard unto other 
 husbandmen." I cannot but think that St. Matthew gives us the 
 more correct account. The Lord here deals with them as Nathan 
 did with David. He makes them condemn themselves, and then 
 He reiterates what they had said and so confirms it, or it may be 
 that St. Mark and St. Luke represent that He Himself says what 
 He had led them to say. Thus Augustine : " Matthew indeed 
 subjoins that they answered and said, He will miserably destroy 
 those wicked men," which Mark says here was not their answer, 
 but that the Lord, afier putting the question, as it were, answered it 
 Himself. But wo may easily understand, either that their answer 
 was subjoined without the insertion of " they answered," or " they 
 said," which at the time was implied; or else that their answer 
 being the truth, was attributed to the Lord, since He also Himself, 
 being the Truth, gave this answer concerning them. Here those 
 
272 THE HEAD OF THE CORNER. [St. Mark. 
 
 10 And have ye not read tliis scripture ; ^ The stone which 
 b Ps. cxviii. the huilders reiected is become the head of the 
 
 22, •' 
 
 corner : 
 
 11 This was the Lord's doing, and it is marvellous in 
 
 our eyes ? 
 
 who heard Him understood that He referred to their Church and 
 nation, and exclaimed, " God forbid" (Luke xx. 16). 
 
 10. " And have ye not read this scripture ; The stone .... 
 marvellous in our eyes ? " Bishop Andrewes notices how very 
 frequently Christ is x^rophesied of as a stone. He is Daniel's stone, 
 " cut forth without hands" (Dan. iii. 24). In His Passion He was 
 Zachary's stone, " graven and cut full of eyes all over " (Zech. iii. 
 9). In His Kesurrection He was Isaiah's stone, "laid in Zion" 
 (Is. xxviii. 16). He was the stone or rock in the wilderness, for 
 St. Paul says, " that rock was Christ " (1 Cor. x. 4). 
 
 There is a legend which I have seen somewhere, which describes 
 the origin of the figure in this way : That at the building of the 
 temple a stone was cut and shaped in the quarries, of which the 
 builders could make no use. It lay about during the i^eriod of the 
 building, held by all to be a hindrance (a stone of stumbling), but 
 at the very last its jplace was found to be at the head of the corner, 
 binding the two sides together. And so the Fathers explain Christ 
 the corner stone, as binding Jew and Gentile in one Church of 
 God. 
 
 It is vei-y remarkable how this has been repeated in the history 
 of the Church — how great religious movements have been frowned 
 down, if not actively opposed by those in high places, which have 
 afterwards subdued all opposition. In our own times, in this very 
 century, this has occurred twice. First, the great Evangelical 
 movement in our Church was set at naught by the builders, though 
 it was the assertion of the primary truth of personal religion — that 
 each soul must have a personal apprehension of Christ, and look 
 to Him with the eye of a living faith ; and then the great Church 
 movement was almost unanimously rejected by the Bishops between 
 1840 and 1850, though it was the assertion of the truths patent 
 through all the New Testament, that the Church, though a visible 
 organisation, is the mystical body of Christ — that it is a super- 
 natm-al system of grace, and that its Sacraments are the signs of 
 grace actually given in and with the outward sign. Are then the 
 
Chap. XIL] WE KNOW THAT THOU ART TRUE. 273 
 
 12 ° And tliey sought to lay hold on liim, but feared the 
 i)eople : for they knew that he had spoken the *= Matt. xxi. 
 
 ^ ^ '' -■■ , 45, 46. ch. xi. 
 
 parable against them: and they left him, and is. Johnvii. 
 
 ■'■ . "^ 25, 30, 44. 
 
 went their way. 
 
 13 ^'^And they send unto him certain of the ^ Matt. xxii. 
 
 , T . . 15. Luke XX. 
 
 Pharisees and of the Herodians, to catch mm m 20. 
 Ms words. 
 
 14 And when they were come, they say unto him, Master, 
 we know that thou art true, and carest for no man : for 
 thou regardest not the person of men, but teachest the way 
 
 leaders and heads of the Church as guilty as the Jewish builders 
 were ? God forbid that we should say so, if for no other reason 
 than this — that so much of what was human, imperfect, and ex- 
 travagant, was mixed up with both these movements ; but it is not 
 the less true that in neither case did "the builders" discern the 
 strength of the principles asserted, and foresee that they must win 
 their way : though the formularies of the Church, of which these 
 builders were the exponents and guardians, assert very unmistak- 
 ably both these truths in conjunction, viz., spiritual apprehension of 
 Christ, and Sacramental union in His Body. 
 
 12. "And they sought to lay hold on him, but feared the 
 XDCople." They seem to have retained this fear of the Lord's 
 popularity to the last, for their bargain with Judas was, that he 
 should betray Him unto them, "in the absence of the multitude." 
 
 13. "And they sent unto him certain of the Pharisees and of 
 the Herodians." This was done in order that they might lay 
 hands on Him. They must, consequently, have hoped that He 
 would have taken the popular side, for the mass of the people 
 hated the Eoman yoke, and they knew that His whole life was 
 opposed to the worldliness of the Herodian following, and His 
 whole teaching to the Sadduceeism which was the only form of 
 religion which they professed, if, indeed, they professed any at all. 
 
 14. " And when they were come, they say unto him. Master, we 
 know that thou art true, and carest for no man." Observe the 
 flattery and seeming fairness with which they approached Him. 
 " Thou regardest not the person of men." This must mean : " One 
 who trusts in God as Thou dost, and has such a message from Him 
 
 T 
 
2 74 . WHY TEMPT YE ME ? [St. Mark. 
 
 of Grod in truth: Is it lawful to give tribute to Caesar, or 
 not? 
 
 15 Shall we give, or shall we not give ? But he, knowing 
 their hypocrisy, said unto them. Why tempt ye me? bring 
 I Valuing of mo a 11 peuuv, that I may see it. 
 
 our money w i. ^ j 
 
 smen pence 16 And they brought it. And he saith unto 
 
 halfpenny, _^^ \ . . 
 
 as Matt, xviii, them, Whoso is this image and superscription ? 
 And they said unto him, Caesar's. 
 17 And Jesus answering said unto them. Render to Caesar 
 the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are 
 God's. And they marvelled at him. 
 
 as Thou hast, cannot be in fear of Csesar, or of his representative. 
 One who professes to be the Messiah, and so the true King of 
 Israel, as Thou dost, must sooner or later assert His claims against 
 all foreign usurpation." 
 
 14, 16. "Is it lawful to give tribute .... and they said unto 
 him, Csesar's." The courage, if one may reverently use the word, 
 of our Lord, in thus demanding the coin, was remarkable, for they 
 hated the Eoman money, not only for its being the badge of foreign 
 subjection, but also because it had engraven on it an image of the 
 Emperor, a thing which they held to be utterly unlawful. In the 
 temple they would not receive this coin because of the head 
 engraven upon it, which seemed to them to savour of idolatry ; and 
 yet to this very hated image the Lord appealed, as witnessing to 
 them that through the righteous judgment of God, they were not 
 their own masters, and must submit to their conquerors. 
 
 17. " And Jesus answering said unto them, Kender therefore 
 unto Csesar the things,'' &c. The best comment on this is in the 
 words of Christ's ins ired servant. " Eulers are not a terror to good 
 works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power ? 
 Do that which is good, and thou shalt have j)raise of the same. 
 For he is the minister of God to thee for good . . . wherefore ye must 
 needs be subject, not only for wrath, but also for conscience sake. 
 Eender, therefore, to all their dues ; tribute to whom tribute is due, 
 custom to whom custom, fear to whom fear, honour to whom 
 honour." (Kom. xiii. 3-7.) 
 
 "And to God the things that are God's." The best exposition of 
 
Chap. XII.] TUE SADDUCEES ASKED IIOI. - 275 
 
 18 ^^Then come unto him tlie Sadducees, ^wliicli say 
 there is no resurrection ; and they asked him, « Matt. xxii. 
 
 23. Luke xx. 
 
 sajmg, 27. 
 
 f Acts xxiii. 8. 
 
 this also is in the words of the same blessed Apostle, " Ye are not 
 your own, for ye are bought with a price, therefore glorify God in 
 your body, and in your spirit, which are God's " (1 Cor. vi. 19). 
 '* The coin of Caesar is on gold on which his image is depicted. But 
 the coin of God is man, on whom His image is stamped. Give 
 therefore your money tribute to Caesar, but preserve for God your 
 conscience and your innocence " (Williams). In the former parable 
 the Lord sets forth the relation of His kingdom to the ancient 
 theocracy, here He shows its relation to the kingdoms of this world, 
 that it in no way interferes with them, but upholds their rightful 
 claims in the matter of tribute, as the means whereby, though im- 
 perfectly, they maintain peace and order. The reader will also 
 perceive that the Lord's answer in no respect bears on the questions 
 now agitated amongst us, such as the relations of the sphituality 
 to the temporality in a professedly Christian kingdom, courts of 
 final appeal, the position of an ecclesiastical corporation holding 
 property as well as doctrine. The Church being in the world, and 
 having no carnal weapons, must of necessity be at the mercy of the 
 world, but the world itself is at the mercy of God, and under His 
 control ; so that the weapons of an aggrieved Church are prayer 
 and faith, and passive resistance, and unity in itself; and very 
 powerful weapons these are, as the world has found. 
 
 18. " Then come unto him the Sadducees, which say there is no 
 resurrection." How is it that the Sadducees came to the Lord 
 with this question ? It does not seem to have been intended to 
 entrap Him into saying something for which they might accuse 
 Him : — it may have been for some reason of this sort. They had 
 heard how He had raised the dead, and they knew that the doctrine 
 of the Eesurrection and futm'e retribution was taught most ex- 
 plicitly in all His discourses ; they had also seen how He had 
 silenced those who questioned His authority, and 'those who had 
 thought to entrap Him in the matter of the tribute. They thought 
 then they would try Him on the point of their favourite doctrine, 
 or rather negation, that there was no real ground for the doctrine 
 of a Eesurrection, or even of a future state, or it would have been 
 distinctly asserted in the Law, which all Jews looked upon as f] e 
 
276 THE SEVEN BRETHREN. [St. IVIakk, 
 
 19 Master, ^ Moses wrote unto us, If a man's brother die, 
 s Dent. XXV. 5. and leave his wife behind Mm, and leave no 
 children, that his brother should take his wife, and raise up 
 seed unto his brother. 
 
 20 'Now there were seven brethren : and the first took a 
 wife, and dying left no seed. 
 
 21 And the second took her, and died, neither left he any 
 seed : and the third likewise. 
 
 22 And the seven had her, and left no seed: last of all 
 the woman died also. 
 
 22. ** And the seven had her, and left no seed." " Had her " omitted by ^, B., C, L., 
 A, two Cursives (28, 33), Coptic, Armenian ; retained by A. (virtually), most later 
 Uncials, almost all Cursives, Syriac (Scbaaf), also, virtually, by Old Latin, Vulg., and 
 versions. 
 
 most sacred and the most highly inspired part of the Old Testa- 
 ment. They were thorough-going materialists, and could form no 
 conception of any future state, except one which reproduced after 
 death this miserable life, with its affections and lusts. They con- 
 sequently came to Him with a question which seemed to make the 
 idea of a future life absurd and impossible, because they assumed 
 that it must be clogged with all the selfish and sensual conditions 
 of this life. 
 
 19. " Master, Moses wrote unto us, If a man's brother die, and 
 leave his wife," &c. The law alluded to is the Levirate, and is thus 
 laid down in Deut. xxv. 5 : "If brethren dwell together, and one of 
 them die, and have no child, the wife of the dead shall not marry 
 without unto a stranger : her husband's brother shall go in unto 
 her, and take her to him to wife. . . . And it shall be, that the 
 first-born which she beareth shall succeed in the name of his 
 brother which is dead, that his name be not put out of Israel." 
 
 20, 22. " Now there were seven brethren . . . last of all the woman 
 died also." It shows clearly the low and debased state of their 
 minds, that they should have chosen such a case, for the sort of 
 marriage in question was not for the sake of affection, but for the 
 most secular of purposes ; simply that the estate might not be 
 alienated. It was not a matter of choice with the brother or 
 brothers of the deceased — they were publicly disgraced (Deut. 
 XXV. 7-11) if they did not comply with the law, though they would 
 
Chap. Xir.] YE KNOW NOT THE SCRIPTURES. 277 
 
 23 In tlie resurrection therefore, wlien tliej shall rise, whose 
 wife shall she be of them ? for the seven had her to wife. 
 
 24 And Jesns answering said unto them, Do je not there- 
 fore err, because ye know not the scriptures, neither the 
 power of God ? 
 
 23. "When they shall rise" omitted by N, B., C, D., L., A, two or three Cursives 
 (23, 33), Old Latin (c, k), Coptic, Syriac (Schaaf); retained by A., later Uncials, almost 
 all Cursives, several Old Latin, Vulg., Gothic, 
 
 have in most cases wives and children of their own, and so it mi"-ht 
 affect the interests of their own children. 
 
 24. " And Jesus answering said unto them, Do ye not therefore 
 err, because ye know not the scrii^tures," &c. They were, no doubt, 
 very well acquainted with the mere letter of Scripture ; but they 
 knew not its hidden depths of meaning, its absolute truth in the 
 expression of the spiritual and eternal relations between God and 
 His creatures, and this because they read it and judged respecting 
 it, as they would of any other book. They read the words, " I am 
 the God of Abraham," and they never asked themselves how He 
 could be the God of one long before annihilated — on their prin- 
 cij)les it meant, " I am the God of a little dust ; " and so they erred 
 upon the most vital question that can interest a human being, 
 whether he shall live after death, and be judged for the things done in 
 the body. And they erred also because they knew not " the power 
 of God." They knew not and cared not to contemplate the 
 power of God in bringing about the Eesurrection of the whole 
 man, body, soul, and spirit, and his resurrection, not to live over 
 again the same sort of life which he lives now, but to live for ever 
 in a far higher, because a more si)iritual sphere. 
 
 These two things must go together, to know the Scripture, and 
 to know the i)ower of God to bring about that which is promised or 
 implied in Scripture, which is, in fact, a belief in Scripture as being 
 the word of Almighty God. 
 
 *' Neither the power of God." Most of those who notice these 
 words consider that they set forth the power of God in the natural 
 world. It seems as if He said, "Ye know not, ye realize not the 
 power of God in the world around you. As Sadducees ye j)rofess 
 to hold the Books of Moses, ye acknowledge God, if ye believe in 
 Him at all, as the Creator and Upholder of all things. If, then, He 
 3ms made you, and the world around you, and adapted it to your 
 
278 THEY ARE AS THE ANGELS. [St. Mark, 
 
 25 For when they shall rise from the dead, they neither 
 h I Cor. XV. marry, nor are ffiven in marriage : but ^ are as the 
 
 42,49,52. 1 T • 1 . -, 
 
 angels which are m heaven. 
 
 25. " As the angels which are in heaven," or, " As angels in heaven." So A., B., E., 
 G., H., S., &c. ; but H, C, D., F., K., L., M., A, a large number of Cursives, Coptic, 
 Syriac, Ethiopia omit "which are." "But are as angels in heaven" (Revisers); sed 
 sunt sicut angeli in calls (Vulg.). 
 
 wants and preservation, why can ye not believe that He can raise 
 you into a higher state of existence in which He can reward you 
 or punish you ? which state of existence will be infinitely above 
 this, so that ye will not be in bondage to the same wants, the same 
 low desires, the same narrow limitations as ye are now." " Sup- 
 posing man to be just such a nothing after this life as he was 
 before it, yet as he had his being at first from nothing, so surely he 
 may be restored to that being again from such a nothing. For it 
 seems to be a work of greater difficulty to give a beginning to what 
 is not, than a restoration of being to what has been. Do you 
 beheve that which is vanished from our short sight to be lost to 
 God? For all bodies, whether dried to powder, or dissolved to 
 water, or crumbled to ashes, or attenuated to smoke, are lost to us 
 indeed ; but God, the Almighty Guardian of the elements, has 
 
 them still in reserve as much as ever Behold how all 
 
 nature is at work to comfort us with images of our future Resur- 
 rection. The sun sets and rises again, the stars glide away and 
 return, the flowers die and revive, the trees put forth afresh after 
 the decay of age, and ' that which thou sowest is not quickened 
 except it die ; ' and just so may our bodies lie in the grave till the 
 season of Resurrection. Why then so hasty for a resurrection in 
 the dead of winter ? We must wait with patience for the spring of 
 human bodies " (Minucius Felix). It is to be remembered, of course, 
 that this Christian writer cites these things as parables or images, 
 not as analogies, much less proofs. 
 
 25. " For when they shall rise from the dead ... in heaven." 
 *' As if He had said, ' There will be a certain heavenly and angelic 
 restoration to life when there shall be no more decay, and we shall 
 remain unchanged, and for this reason marriage shall cease. For 
 marriage now exists on account of our decay, that we may be 
 carried on by succession of our race, and not fail ; but ihen we shall 
 be as the angels which need no succcosion by marriage, and never 
 come to an end.' " (Theophylact.) 
 
Chap. XII.] THE GOD OF THE LIVING. 279 
 
 26 And as toucliing tlie dead, that they rise : have ye not 
 read in the book of Moses, how in the bnsh God spake unto 
 him, saying, ' I am the God of Abrahara, and the » Ex. iii. e. 
 God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob ? 
 
 27 He is not the God of the dead, but the God of the 
 living : ye therefore do greatly err. 
 
 26. "How iu the bush." Some suppose that this means in that section of Exodus 
 •which is called by the name of " the bush ; " but the voice of Goi actually proceeded from 
 the bush. 
 
 27. "But the God of the living." "The God" omitted byN, A., B., C, D., F.,K., sixty 
 Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., &c. So the most probable reading is, "But of the living." 
 
 [For further remarks on this see my notes on St. Matthew.] 
 26, 27. " And as touching the dead, that they rise : have ye not 
 read. . . do greatly err." In order to see something of the force of 
 this, we must remember (1) that the present tense is used, " I am 
 the God of Abraham," not "I was," but "I am;'' and (2) that 
 God, as the God of Abraham, made certain very great promises to 
 Abraham, which promises He did not fulfil in Abraham's life-time, 
 and which promises are clearly distinguished from the promises to 
 Abraham's seed. Thus Abraham's sole spot of land which he 
 could call his own when he died was the cave of Machpelah and 
 the field in which it was situated, and yet God had said, " All the 
 land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed after 
 thee." Again the same is repeated in Gen. xv. 7, and xvii. 8. 
 Now how God will fulfil this to Abraham is yet a mystery. God 
 may have some means of fulfilling this to Abraham literally and 
 personally at the day of the Eesurrection ; or He may fulfil it to 
 him in some infinitely blessed way above all that Abraham can 
 ask or think : but anyhow God, as Abraham's God, having pro- 
 mised to the patriarch personally certain blessings, Abraham must 
 be yet in existence to receive the fulfilment of God's promise. 
 
 And again, as I have shown fully in my notes on St. Matthew, 
 the Name of God to the Jews implied personal relations to them, 
 as Father, and Saviour, and Judge, just as much as father, and 
 saviour, and judge among men imply personal relations to the 
 individuals who are begotten by the father, or saved by the saviour, 
 or judged by the judge ; so that, if God said, " I am the God of 
 Abraham," Abraham must be somewhere in existence as God's 
 
280 ONE OF THE SCRIBES CAME. [St. Mark. 
 
 28 1 '^ And one of the scribes came, and having heard them 
 k Matt. xxii. reasoning together, and perceiving that he had 
 ^^' answered them well, asked him, Which is the 
 
 first commandment of all ? 
 
 28. "Which is the first commandment of all?" or as Revisers, "What commandment 
 is the first of all?" The great majority of authorities, taken literally, make "all" to be 
 neuter, "Which is the first commandment of all things?" but the questioner cannot 
 pu3-ibly have intended to ask such a thing. 
 
 son, io be loved by Ilim, and God's subject., to be judged and re- 
 warded by God for obedience to Himself, for which obedience he 
 received no corresponding reward in his life here on earth. 
 
 Again, and far better than all. AVhen God called Himself the 
 God of Abraham, God in a measure gave Himself to Abraham, so 
 that Abraham should be able to say, Because God is my God, I 
 possess God. Well, tbeu, as St. Hilary argues, " It should be further 
 considered that this was said to Moses at a time when those Holy 
 Patriarchs had gone to their rest, and so they of whom He was the 
 God were in being, for they could have had (possessed) nothing if 
 they had not been in being, for in the nature of things that of 
 which somewhat else is, must have itself a being ; so they w^ho have 
 a God, must themselves be alive, since God is eternal, and it is not 
 possible that that which is dead should possess that which is 
 eternal. How, then, shall it be affirmed that those do not and 
 shall not hereafter exist, of w^hom Etemily liself has said that He 
 is (theirs) ? " 
 
 28. " And one of the scribes came, and having heard them reason- 
 ing," &c. A much more favourable view of this scribe, and of his 
 *' questioning," is given in St. Mark than in St. Matthew. St. 
 Matthew tells us that the Pharisees were gathered together, appa- 
 rently in a hostile spirit ; and one of them asked Him the question, 
 " tempting him." In St. Mark, on the contrary, the same man, 
 called a Scribe (no mention being made of the Pharisees), was 
 struck with admiration at the Lord's reasoning ; and, of his own 
 accord, asked him the question. Both accounts are perfectly true 
 to fact. The Pharisees were gathered together, no doubt, unfavour- 
 ably to Him ; but there were differences among them, and one 
 belter than the rest came forward with a desire to have the question 
 solved, " Which is the first commandment of all? " 
 
Chap. XII.] THE LORD OUR GOD IS ONE LORD. 281 
 
 29 And Jesus answered him, The first of all the command- 
 ments is, ' Hear, Israel : The Lord our God is ' T^eut. vi. 4. 
 
 ' Luke X. 27. 
 
 one Lord ; 
 
 30 Ajid thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy 
 
 29. "The first of all the comman.lmeiits is." Most probably it should be, " The first 
 commandment of all is." So A., C, K., M., or, simply, *'The first is," with S, B., L., 
 A, Coptic ; Primum omnium mnyidatum est (Vulg.). 
 
 "The Lord our God is one Lord." This most sublime utterance is utterly spoilt and 
 turned into something very like nonsense by the Revisers of 1881, " The Lord our God, 
 the Lord is one." The comma they have inserted turns the sentence into two distinct 
 propositions having no connection with one another. Their m;irginal reading, " The Lord 
 is our God, the Lord is one," is still worse. There is no necessity for the smallest 
 alteration. 
 
 29. "And Jesus answered him, The first of all the command- 
 ments is, Hear, Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord," i.e., 
 Jehovah our God is one Jehovah, or, the Eternal One our God is 
 one Eternal. This in no respect militates against the Athauasian 
 formula of Catholic doctrine, in which we confess "so likewise the 
 Father is eternal, the Son eternal, and the Holy Ghost eternal; " 
 for we proceed to confess, " and yet they are not three eternals, but 
 One eternal." 
 
 I have noticed all through my commentary on St. John, how the 
 Son of God constantly maintains His unity with the Father. He 
 does nothing apart from the Father : He does whatsoever He sees 
 the Father do. All that He teaches men He hath heard and learned 
 of the Father. He that hath seen Him hath seen the Father. He 
 and the Father are One. The unity of God is the first principle of 
 all religion, because it is the unity of x)Ower, of will, of wisdom, of 
 goodness at the head of the universe. 
 
 30. "And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, 
 and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy 
 strength." Thou shalt love thy God with thy whole inner being, 
 with thy whole self, with all thy faculties. 
 
 There is nothing tautological in this mention of heart, soul, mind, 
 and strength. The heart signifies the will, the higher power of 
 choice — the soul, the affections — the mind, the intellectual powers, 
 and the strength, the intensity with which in the perfect Christian 
 all are directed God wards. The Fathers, however, give difi-erent- 
 meanings to "heart," "soul," "mind." Thus Augustine : "You 
 are commanded to love God ivitli all ihy heart, that your whole 
 
282 THE FIRST COMMANDMENT. [St. :Mark. 
 
 heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with 
 all thy strength : this is the first commandment. 
 
 30. " This is the first commandment." So A,, D., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, 
 Old Latin (except a), Vulg., Syrlac, Gothic, Armenian, ^thiopic ; omitted by S, B., E., 
 L., A, Sahidic, Coptic, and Old Latin (a). 
 
 thoughts; iviih all thy soul, that your whole life (the word *soul' 
 being often translated 'life'); with all thy mind, that your whole 
 understanding may be given to Him from Whom you have that 
 which you give." But Origen somewhat differently : " With all 
 thy heart — that is, in all recollection, act, thought; with all thy 
 soul (or life) — to be ready, that is, to lay it down for God's religion ; 
 with all thy mind, thy mind bringing forth nothing but what is of 
 God." (From " Catena Aurea.") 
 
 I cannot help adhering, however, to the distinction which I have 
 made above, which is true to nature, that the heart signifies the 
 higher and more spiritual power of choice, and the soul the lower 
 and more animal : for is it not often the case that the more spiritual 
 and moral nature fastens on God, but does not take the affections 
 equably with it ? And do not the affections, particularly in excitable 
 persons, move Godwards, but not so much under the influence of 
 the moral and spiritual nature as they should? Thus there is 
 often a sort of animal love to God and Christ shown in excited feel- 
 ings, where there is little or no reverence, no moral earnestness, no 
 depth — in fact, a love hardly worthy of God.^ 
 
 Williams has a beautiful passage on " with all thy mind." " The 
 love of God fills ' the mind,' when knowledge gathereth all things 
 with reference to God ; when speculation ever weigheth the things 
 of God with the things of men ; when imagination compareth all 
 
 ^ Throughout the Old and New Testament, the words translated 
 heart always, I think, stand for the deepest thing within us, and 
 the soul always for one not so deep — being, in fact, interchangeable 
 with animal hfe. Thus, when the Lord says, " Blessed are the pure 
 in heart," this must mean the purity of the highest and most 
 spiritual part, whereas St. Paul uses the adjective derived from the 
 word soul (psychical) to indicate what is natural as opposed to 
 spiritual. " The natural (or psychical man) receiveth not the things 
 of the Spirit of God," &c. (1 Corinth, ii. 14). 
 
CiiAP. XII.] THE SECOND IS LIKE. 283 
 
 31 And tlie second is like, namely this, "^ Thou ™ Lev. xix. is. 
 
 ^ . Matt. xxii. 19. 
 
 shalt love thy neiorhbonr as thyself. There is none Rom. xiii. 9. 
 
 -1 IT GhI.v. 14. 
 
 other commandment greater than these, james a. 8. 
 
 31. " And the second is like, namely this." So A., later Uncials, most Cursives, Old 
 Latin, Vulg., Syriac, &c. ; but N, B., L., D., Sahidic, Coptic omit "like." "The second 
 is this " (Revisers). 
 
 things with the things of God ; when memory storeth in her 
 treasure things of God, new and old ; when the thoughts ever turn 
 to God as their end ; when all studies are in God, and there is no 
 study which hath not God for its end. We are always thinking of 
 something, at all times, and in all places ; we can behold no object 
 in the earth or sky, but thought is busy with the same. The 
 thoughts are according to the heart. If one might say it with 
 reverence, as angelic ministrations execute God's will, so are the 
 thoughts to the heart and soul of man ever busy traversing and re- 
 tm^ning, through earth and heaven, as the heart wills. And these, 
 in the good man, are ever full of God." 
 
 31. "And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy 
 neighbour as thyself." In what respect is the command to love our 
 neighbour like the command to love God, seeing that the objects 
 are so different ? Evidently in this way. The Lord here speaks 
 of the highest love to our neighbour, not the love of mere com- 
 panionship or self-interest. Now the highest love of our neighbour 
 is like the love of God — a holy love. We should love him because 
 he is made in the image and likeness of God. It is the love of that 
 in our neighbour which is from God. 
 
 "As thyself." As thou desirest the preservation and well-being 
 of thine own life, so thou shouldest desire the preservation and 
 well-being of thy neighbour's life. As thou wouldest that men 
 should do to thee, so do thou to thy neighbour. 
 
 Now we must thoroughly understand in what way this command- 
 ment is the second. It is not the second, in that it can be dispensed 
 with, which it often is, when men think that certain lively frames 
 and feelings towards God absolve them from charity, consideration, 
 purity, and even honesty towards their neighbours. To sucli the 
 Apostle writes: "He that loveth not his brother whom he hath 
 seen, how can he love God- whom he hath not seen? " "He that 
 seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his compassion from 
 him, how dwelleth the love of God in him? " 
 
284 THOU HAST SAID THE TRUTH. [St. Mark. 
 
 32 And the scribe said unto him, Well, Master, thou hast 
 
 n Deut. iv. 39. said the truth : for there is one God : ^ and there 
 
 Is. xlv. 6,U. 
 
 & xivi. 9. is none other but he : 
 
 32. "Well, Master, thou hast said the truth." This may more properly he rendered 
 "Well spoken; Master, truly thou hast said." So Vulg., jE>ene, Mcgister! in veritate 
 dixisti, quia Unus est Deus. 
 
 " For there is one God." " God " omitted by H, A., B., K., L., M., other later Uncials, 
 Vulg., [Cod. Amiat.], Syriac ; retained by D., E., F., G., H., many Cursives, most Old 
 Latin, Sahidic, Coptic, Ai'menian, &c. 
 
 But it is the second in this, that he only can truly and perfectly 
 keep it who has some care and earnest desh-e to keep the first. The 
 man who has begun to love God is the only man who can truly and 
 properly love his neighbour : for he only can love that in his neigh- 
 bour which is of God ; he only can love his neighbour as being the 
 image of God ; and he only can earnestly desire that his neighbour 
 should retain, or be restored to, that image. The holy raan only 
 can desire the holiness of his neighbour; the religious man only can 
 care earnestly for the eternal well-being of his neighbour. 
 
 And now, before we leave this all-important subject, two ques- 
 tions have to be considered — 1. Since we cannot command onr 
 affections, how is it that God asks us to love Him, seeing that He is 
 so infinitely above and beyond us, seeing that He is an eternal, in- 
 visible, incomprehensible Sj)irit ? Now the answer is, that God 
 never commands men to love Him till He has made Himself known 
 to them, and entered into relations with them, and shown His 
 regard for them. The God who commanded the children of Israel 
 to love Him supremely was the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, 
 their fathers. He was the God "Who had redeemed them from the 
 slavery of Egypt by bringing them through the Eed Sea, and sus- 
 taining them for forty years by a daily miracle, so that they knew 
 Him as a God Whom they had every reason to love. 
 
 2. The second is, how can we get to love God supremel}^ ? By 
 what process can so exalted an affection become the ruling principle 
 within us ? 
 
 Now the secret of this lies in the extraordinary fact that the first 
 commandment of God's law is not (directly, at least) the first 
 commandment of His Gospel. The Lord Himself distinctly lays 
 down the first requirement of the Gospel to be belief in Himself. 
 ** This is the work of God, that ye beheve on Him Whom He hath 
 
Chap. XII.] MORE THAN ALL OFEERINGS. 285 
 
 33 And to love him with all the heart, and with all the 
 understanding, and with all the sonl, and with all the strength, 
 and to love his neighbour as himself, ° is more ° i Sam. xv. 
 than all whole hurnt offerings and sacrifices. mIc. \i. 6, 7, 8. 
 
 S3, " With all the soul" omitted by ^^, B., L,, A, a few Cursives, Coptic, Armenian ; 
 but retained by A., D., later Uncials, most Cursives, most Old Latin, Vulg., Sahidic, 
 Syriac, &c. 
 
 sent " (John vi. 29). And the beloved disciple, evidently speaking 
 with reference to the two great commandments, has : " This is His 
 commandment, that we should believe in the Name of his Son 
 Jesus Christ, and love one another as He gave us commandment " 
 (1 John iii. 23). It may not be in our power to command our 
 affection towards an invisible Spirit, but it is in our power to set 
 before our minds the Person and Work, the Life and Death, the 
 Character and Exam^ile of the Son of God ; and this, as nothing 
 else can, will form within us the love of that Eternal and Infinite 
 Father Who is so perfectly represented to us in His Son that that 
 Son has said, " He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father." If, 
 then, we would grow and increase in the love of God, we must de- 
 voutly and adoringly contemplate the sufferings of the Son of God. 
 We must take pains to impress upon ourselves that we were the 
 occasion of these sufi'erings, and that they are for us ; " that He was 
 wounded for our transgressions ; that He was bruised for our 
 iniquities ; that the chastisement of our peace was upon Him ; and 
 that by His stripes we are healed." 
 
 Of course, the love of God is the gift of the Spirit ; and this is our 
 great hope, that what is not in us by nature may be in us by grace ; 
 but as God commands us to believe. He commands us to use all the 
 means that He has given to us to strengthen and confirm our faith. 
 And so this is the way of the CathoUc Church, which, instead of 
 setting before us an abstract Christ, the Weaver of an external robe 
 of righteousness, would have us fasten our minds on, and adoringly 
 contemplate, the very Son of God incarnate, in the womb of the 
 Virgin, born, baptized, tempted, living, working, teaching, agonized,, 
 betrayed, deserted, suffering, dying, rising again, ascending, and 
 coming again in the Spirit. 
 
 Such is the path to the love of God set before us by the Spirit 
 both in the Scriptures and in the Church — in her year, in her 
 
286 NOT FAR FROM THE KINGDOM. [St. INIark. 
 
 34 And wlien Jesus saw that he answered discreetly, he 
 said unto him, Thou art not far from the kingdom of God. 
 pMatt, xxii. P And no man after that durst ask him any 
 
 question. 
 q Matt. xxii. 35 T[ ^ And Jesus answered and said, while he 
 
 4i! " ■ taught in the temple, How saj the scribes that 
 
 Christ is the son of David ? 
 
 services, in her creeds, in her Sacraments. Let us try then in 
 sincerity, and we shall have the humble, holy, reverential love of 
 God within us. 
 
 "And the scribe said unto him, Well [or properly, well spoken]. 
 Master," The answer is evidently not a mere formal acknowledg- 
 ment of the truth of a certain abstract proposition ; but an earnest 
 and devout expression of what was to the man a fact — that godli- 
 ness and righteousness were the things to the production of which, 
 in the souls of us His creatures, all other parts of God's religion are 
 subordinate. By the earnest, hearty confession of this the Lord 
 saw that the Scriptures had wrought in this man what God had 
 intended that they should work in every one who possessed them, 
 and so the Lord pronounced him to be " not far from the kingdom 
 of God : " and so we cannot but hope that in less than two months 
 after this he was amongst the number of those whom the Lord 
 " added to the Church." 
 
 35. " And Jesus answered and said." How is it that the account 
 of what follows begins with the words "Jesus answered"? We 
 must turn to St. Matthew, and from him we learn that the Lord 
 Himself hegan by asking the Pharisees, " What think ye of Christ, 
 whose Son is He ? " and when they replied "the Son of David," " He 
 saith unto them," which words correspond with what we have in St. 
 Mark, " H|e answered and said." He answered their low thoughts 
 of the Messiah. They were quite satisfied with their answer that 
 Christ was the Son of David ; but the Lord begins to show them 
 that they, as little as the Sadducees, understood the depth and ful- 
 ness of Scripture. How say the Scribes, i.e., " How say ye, who 
 adopt the opinions of the Scribes, that Christ is the Son of David ? 
 For David himself said by the Holy Ghost, The Lord said unto 
 my Lord, Sit thou," &c. David, therefore, himself calleth Him 
 Lord, and whence is He then His Son? 
 
CuAP. XII.] David's lord, david's son. 287 
 
 36 For David himself said ^ by the Holy Grhost, ® The Lord 
 said to iny Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, till I " 2 Sam. xxih. 
 make thine enemies thy footstool. s pg ^.^ j_ 
 
 37 David therefore himself calleth him Lord ; and whence 
 is he then his son ? And the common people heard him gladly. 
 
 There is but one answer to this question, which the Lord Himself 
 gives in the vision in the last chapiter of the Eevelation, "I am 
 the Root and the Offspring of David." Inasmuch as David calls 
 Him Lord He is David's Root, for all things were made by Him. 
 Each child of Adam, and David among them, though he seems to 
 be brought into being by the law of generation, yet really receives 
 that being from the Eternal Word, " by Whom all things were made, 
 and without Him was not anything made that was made." So 
 that the Root — the Author of the being of all men, and of David 
 among the rest, was that Eternal Word Who was made flesh, and 
 was then questioning the Pharisees and Scribes. This mystery, of 
 course, the Lord's questioners could not then apprehend ; but if 
 they were led by the authority of their own Scriptures, they must 
 acknowledge that the Christ when He comes must be superhuman. 
 He must be such an One that the greatest hero and king of God's 
 IDeople — the real founder of their monarchy, could call Him Lord. 
 Let them think of this — let them think of the very many words 
 of the Psalmists and of the Proj)hets in which superhuman, even 
 Divine names, attributes, and actions are ascribed to the Messiah, 
 Whom they all expected — and they would not be startled when, 
 shortly after this, after He had been crucified and had risen again 
 and had ascended, they heard the Apostles, who were performing 
 stupendous miracles by the mere invocation of His Name, proclaim 
 Him to be the veritable Son of God, the Judge of quick and dead, 
 the Prince of Life, the Lord of all. 
 
 " And the common peo^^le heard him gladly." And yet He spake 
 the deepest mysteries — the highest things in the kingdom of grace, 
 when He thus, by implication, set Himself forth as David's Son and 
 David's Lord. And so it ever is. The common people are like 
 children, and so do not carp and cavil and ask such questions as. 
 How can these things be ? They may be misled, misinformed, 
 mistaken in matters of religion — but they do not reject mysteries 
 as such, i.e., as being above their comprehension. I am well aware 
 
288 BEWAEE OF THE SCRIBES. [St. Mark. 
 
 38 ■[[ And ^ lie said unto tliem in his doctrine, " Beware of 
 
 t ch. iv. 2. ii^Q scribes, whicli love to pro in lonsr clothing^, and 
 
 u Matt, xxiii. . . 11 
 
 1, &c. Luke ^ love salutations m the marketplaces. 
 
 XX. 46. 
 
 s Luke xi. 43. 
 
 38. "And he said unto them." So A., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Vnlg., 
 Sahidic, Gothic, ^thiopic ; but "unto them" omitted by ^f, B., L., A, Cursive 33, Coptic, 
 Syriac (Schaaf), 
 
 that very many working men who have a little knowledge, and 
 are proud of their mechanical skill, are primed by Infidels and 
 Socialists to cavil and question ; but this is not the normal state 
 of the common people, it is an artificial state. It is very sad to see 
 those who have few hopes in this world flinging away the hopes of 
 the eternal world ; but how is it all to be met ? Not by keeping 
 back what is supernatural in Christianity, but by humbly and reve- 
 rently bringing it forward and leaving the issue to God : for that 
 which is Divine and Supernatural supj)lies the deepest wants of the 
 human and the natural. Its devout and careful enunciation finds 
 out those that are of God and attracts them to Him, according to 
 the Divine sayings : " He that doeth truth cometh to the light," 
 and " He that is of God heareth God's words." 
 
 38. " And he said unto them in his doctrine. Beware of the 
 scribes, which love," &c. This and the following two verses are 
 the only portions given to us by St. Mark of a discourse of consider- 
 able length occupying the whole of St. Matthew's 23rd chapter. 
 The reason of this curtailment seems to be clear if St. Mark repro- 
 duced the preaching of St. Peter to the Eoman Christians ; for St. 
 Peter, preaching to Gentiles in Eome, would not give them very 
 much of what concerned Jews only, as a great part of our Lord's 
 denunciation of the Pharisees in Matthew xxiii. does. St. Mark 
 gives only three or four waraings of a general kind, which are 
 needed by all those who have put themselves forv^ard as teachers 
 or leaders of religion. 
 
 First, *' loving to go in long clothing." This "long clothing" 
 was, of course, not the sacerdotal and sacrificial robes worn by the 
 priests, which God had Himself ordained to distinguish, not the 
 man, but the most holy service in which he was, for the time, 
 engaged. Such things as the Lord denounced implied personal 
 distinction, as distinguished from holy service — in fact, what 
 tended to minister to personal display, whether of learning or social 
 
Chap.xil] the uppermost rooms. 289 
 
 39 And the cliief seats in the synagogues, and the upper- 
 most rooms at feasts ; 
 
 39. " Uppermost rooms." " Seats" (Revisers) ; Yulg., Primos discubitus. 
 
 position. What answers to them in this our day would be univer- 
 sity hoods or chaplains' scarves, or whatsoever marks the mere 
 man and not the Divine Function. 
 
 " Salutations in the market-places." This, of course, means not 
 the greetings — the " peace be with you" of their friends — but the 
 deferential recognitions of those assembled in public places. 
 
 " The chief seats in the sjmagogues," answering to the stalls of 
 cathedrals. 
 
 " The uppermost rooms at feasts." Answering to our taking 
 precedence. Now, none of these things are wrong in themselves. 
 Public teachers ought to have deference paid to them. To treat 
 them with anything like contempt would be a very bad thing, not 
 for themselves, but for those who did so. If peox^le sit at tables 
 such as ours, some must be nearer the place of honour than others. 
 If people teach, or perform any divine service in a public assembly, 
 they must be, in some measure, separated from the congregation. 
 Those who make a merit of despising these things, such as Quakers 
 and Plymouth Brethren, are as a rule pretentious and self-com- 
 placent in their religion. 
 
 But what the Lord denounces is the love of these things in 
 teachers ; so that those who ^Dut themselves forward to teach (as 
 some must do) should desire that which x^ersonally exalts and dis- 
 tinguishes them. There must always be such a temx^tation amongst 
 Christian teachers as well as amongst others, and so the Lord's 
 warnings are general and for all time. Now let the reader par- 
 ticularly remark that the Lord here warns men not against the 
 abuses of the Divine Aaronic sacerdotal succession, but against 
 those of a teaching institution of human origin — the order of 
 Scribes. And so it is now. The things which minister now to the 
 self-importance and vanity of Christian ministers are their teaching 
 functions, not their Eucharisticai celebrations. It is the pulpit and 
 the platform which feed pride and vanity, whereas at the altar the 
 sense of the Ineffable Nearness, if men have anv sense of It, humbles 
 them to the dust. 
 
 u 
 
290 A CERTAIN POOE WIDOW. [St. Mark. 
 
 40 ^Whicli devour widows' houses, and for a pretence 
 
 y Matt, xxiii. make long prayers : these shall receive greater 
 
 damnation. 
 
 z Luke xxi. 1. 41 ^ ^ And Jesus sat over against the treasury, 
 
 \ A piece of and beheld how the people cast || money ^into the 
 
 brass money: ,-, , • •, , • ■> 
 
 See Matt. x. 9. troasury : and many that were nch cast m much. 
 
 fl^/fi"Sr" ' ^^ -^^^ there came a certain poor widow, and 
 
 seventh part |^ tlirew in two 11 mitcs, which make a farthing. 
 
 of one piece ^->^^ ^ ll ' o 
 
 of that brass 
 
 inoneij. 
 
 
 40. " Which devour widows' houses, and for a pretence make 
 long prayers." Under the pretence of religion they prey upon 
 those that have lost their natural protectors. Quesnel pertinently 
 asks, " Will widows never learn to mistrust hypocrites ? Give to 
 hospitals, to prisons, to those who are ashamed to ask, above all to 
 poor relations : this is the v/ay to avoid the snares of such as are 
 only pretenders to religion." 
 
 Nothing requires greater watchfulness lest men use it for un- 
 worthy purposes than fluency of utterance. I have known habitual 
 drunkards boast of their proficiency in pouring out floods of words, 
 and that in public prayer to God. 
 
 41. "And Jesus sat over against the treasury, and beheld how 
 the people cast," &c. " In that great central quadrangle, or court 
 of the temple, that was accessible to the Jewish women." It lay 
 in front of the sanctuary, "forming," says Thrupp, " a kind of ante- 
 court to the rest of the inner temple." In the i^lace near which 
 our Saviour sat there stood thirteen brazen vessels shaped like 
 trumpets into which those who visited the temple cast their gifts. 
 These were labelled according to the purposes to which their 
 contents were respectively appropriated. 
 
 " And beheld how the people cast money into the treasury." An 
 interesting question presents itself : Did they give so as that others 
 could see the amount ? From the shape of the boxes for receiving 
 the money it would seem that each person's ofi'ering could not be 
 seen unless he ostentatiously allowed it. So that the Lord alone 
 knew the amount that each threw in, and their circumstances. 
 
 42. " And there came a certain poor widow, and she threw in 
 two mites," &c. The mention of this incident is very remarkable. 
 It must have taken pla:e immediately after the tremendous denun- 
 
Chap. XII.] SHE OF HER WANT. 291 
 
 43 And he called unto him his disciples, and saith unto 
 them, Yerily I say nnto you, That ^ this poor widow ^ 2 cor.viii. 12. 
 hath cast more in, than all they which have cast into the 
 treasury : 
 
 44 For all they did cast in of their abundance ; but she of 
 her want did cast in all that she had, ^ even all <= Deut. xxiv. 
 
 . 6. 1 Juha iii. 
 
 ner living. 17. 
 
 ciations uttered by the Lord against the hypocrisy and avarice of 
 the leaders of religion — the Scribes and Pharisees — which are given 
 us in St. Matthew's Gospel, and which culminate in the words : 
 " Behold, your house is left unto you desolate." The nation and 
 the temple of which they boasted were irrevocably doomed, and 
 yet the Lord noticed with approval this single act of liberality in a 
 poor, unknown giver, though she gave it for the maintenance of a 
 temple destined to speedy destruction, and of a ritual which would 
 soon become obsolete, and pass away. " No stronger proof could 
 have been afforded us that in the midst of the greatest national 
 guilt each individual is still an object of His iDOculiar regard," and 
 that even after the judgment has been finally decreed, no one 
 prayer, no one act of obedience, no single mite, which is in very 
 deed the offering of faith and love, can escape the notice of the 
 Saviour. 
 
 43. " And he called unto him his disciples, and saith unto them," 
 &c. The Lord measures all gifts and off'erings, whether of mind, 
 body, or estate, by the self-denial and labour and purity of intention 
 with which they are accompanied. 
 
 44. " For all they did cast in of their abundance, but she of her 
 want," &c. What the sense of duty was which prompted her to 
 offer that wliich was to her so costly a sacrifice we are not told. 
 She must have done it in great faith that the God of the widow 
 would not allow her to starve. It was a real sacrifice. Mr. H. 
 Gray gives a very apt illustration. " A rich man is much stirred 
 up by the report of some missionary work, and exclaims, ' Well, I 
 will give five pounds ; I can give this amount and not feel it ! ' 
 Suppose, my Christian brother, you should give twenty pounds, and 
 feel it ! Would you be ultimately the worse for it ? " 
 
292 WHAT BUILDINGS ARE HERE ! [Sx. Makk. 
 
 CHAP. xin. 
 
 AND * as lie went out of the temple, one of his disciples 
 saith unto him, Master, see what manner of stones and 
 a Matt, xxiy what buildinfiTS are here ! 
 
 1. Luke XXI. 5. '^ 
 
 1. " And as he went out of the temple, one of his disciples . . . 
 what manner of stones ? " So that the last thing that He did in 
 the house of His Father was to commend the poor widow, and in 
 her to pronounce His eternal approval of all true devotion and self- 
 sacrifice. 
 
 He went out of the doomed sanctuary to be Himself, before a 
 week had passed, in His own Death and Resurrection, the founda- 
 tion of the true temple of God, the temple of living stones, growing 
 up from Him, as its foundation, to Him, as its chief corner-stone. 
 
 " What manner of stones." Notice how the disciple draws 
 attention to the stones, before he mentions the buildings : and, from 
 all accounts, it seems that the magnitude of the stones was even 
 more remarkable than the grandeur of the buildings. Josephus 
 thus describes them : " So Herod took away the old foundations, 
 and laid others, and erected the temple upon them . . . Now the 
 temple was built of stones that were white and strong, and each of 
 their lengths was twenty-five cubits, their height was eight, and 
 their breadth about twelve." There seems to have been two 
 measures of length called cubits, one nearly ten inches, the other 
 double its length — about twenty. Even if the shorter measure is 
 here used the stones were very large — above twenty feet in length, 
 nearly seven feet high, and ten in depth.' 
 
 " What buildings are here ! " It is scarcely possible to form even 
 a remote idea of what the magnificence of these buildings must 
 have been. The principal porch, or covered cloister, was longer, 
 
 ' The reader will see in the article on Weights and Measures in 
 Smith's " Dictionary of the Bible " the difficulties about ascertain- 
 ing the length of the cubit. The two measures, and their respective 
 lengths, I have given from two tables in one of Baxter's Bibles. 
 
Chap. XIII.] NOT ONE STONE ON ANOTHER. 293 
 
 2 And Jesus answering said nnto him, Seest thou these 
 great "buildings ? ^ there shall not be left one stone ^ Luke xix. 44. 
 upon another, that shall not be thrown down. 
 
 2. "Answering." So A., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Vulg. ; but H, B., L., four 
 Cursives (33, 115, 237, 255), Sah., Coptic, Syriac (Schaaf) omit "answering." 
 
 broader, and higher than York Minster, our largest EngHsh 
 cathedral. This huge erection formed one side of the square 
 enclosure, in the midst of which was the most sacred part, the holy 
 place, and holy of holies, all which were built on a platform of 
 such a height that at a distance it would be seen towering over the 
 surrounding porches by those entering Jerusalem. " Whatever 
 the exact appearance of its details may have been, it may safely be 
 asserted that the triple temple of Jerusalem — the lower court stand- 
 ing on its magnificent terraces — the inner court raised on its plat- 
 form in the centre of this, and the temple itself rising out of this 
 group and so crowning the whole — must have formed, when com- 
 bined with the beauty of its situation, one of the most splendid 
 architectural combinations of the ancient world." (From Article 
 *' Temple " in "Dictionary of the Bible," by James Fergusson.) 
 
 2. "And Jesus answering said unto him, Seest thou these great 
 buildings," &c. How complete this destruction was ! We are told by 
 one who was not a Christian, that " it was so thoroughly laid even 
 with the ground by those that dug it up to the foundation, that 
 there was left nothing to make those that came thither believe it 
 had ever been inhabited " (Josephus' "Wars," Bk. VII., chap. i.). 
 The only things left of the ancient temple are the stones of the 
 foundations of the terraces which were then buried. These having 
 been covered with a mass of debris, which appeared to be the side 
 of a considerable hill, have since been discovered by tunnellings ; 
 but of that which was above ground, to which the Lord alluded 
 when He said, " as for these things ivMch ye behold" His words 
 were fulfilled to the letter. The whole army of Titus seems to have 
 been employed in razing it to the ground, so that every city of the 
 world should take warning how it rebelled against the power of 
 Eome. 
 
 And souls also must take warning, lest they know not the time 
 of their visitation, and reject the overtures of Christ tljrough His 
 Spirit. Thus Origen : " Each man being the temple of God, by 
 
294 WPIAT SHALL BE THE SIGN? [St. IMakk. 
 
 3 And as he sat upon the mount of Olives over against the 
 temple, Peter and James and John and Andrew asked him 
 privately, 
 c Matt. xxiv. 4 c Tell us, wheu shall these thiners be ? and 
 
 3 Luke xxi. 7. 
 
 what sliall he the sign when all these things shall 
 be fulfilled ? 
 
 reason of the Spirit of God dwelling in him, is himself the cause of 
 his being deserted, that Christ should depart from him." The same 
 Christian writer brings out a mystical meaning from the fact that 
 the disciples themselves call the Lord's attention to the stones and 
 buildings. " It is worthy of note how they show Him the buildings 
 of the temple, as if He had not seen them. We reply, that when 
 Christ had foretold the destruction of the temple, His disciples 
 were amazed at the thought that so magnificent buildings should 
 be utterly ruined, and, therefore, they show them to Him, to move 
 Him to pity, that He should not do what He had threatened. And 
 because the constitution of human nature is wonderful, being made 
 the temple of God, the disciples and the rest of the saints confessing 
 the wonderful working of God, in respect of the forming of man, 
 intercede before the face of Christ, that He would not forsake the 
 human race for their sins, .... He who after sin has no regard 
 for himself [so as to repent] is gradually alienated, until he has 
 altogether forsaken the living God ; and so one stone is not left 
 upon another of God's commandments which he has not thrown 
 down." (Quoted in " Cat. Aurea.") 
 
 3. " And as he sat upon the mount of Olives over against the 
 temple," &c. Tb's is the only case in which Andrew is associated 
 with the three. " Peter, James, and John and Andrew asked him 
 privately." It may either mean apart from the rest of the Apostles, 
 or that they came in the name of the Apostles, apart from the mul- 
 titude, some of whom were continually following Him about. 
 
 4. " Tell us, when shall these things be ? and what shall be the 
 sign .... shall be fulfilled ? " The latter clause should be trans- 
 lated : '• What shall be the sign, when all these things are about to 
 be accomplished ? " As if they asked, When shall these things be 
 (i.e., the utter overthrow of the city and temple), and what shall 
 be the sign of the time of the impending fulfilment, that we may 
 know it, and be prepared ? 
 
CuAP. XIII.] TAKE HEED. 295 
 
 5 And Jesus answering tliem began to say, "^Take heed 
 
 lest any man deceive you : ^ Jer. xxix. 8. 
 
 •^ •' Eph. V. 6. 
 
 1 Thess. ii. 3. 
 
 5. "And Jesus answering." So A., D., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, most Old 
 Latin, Vulg. ; but N, B., L., Cursive 33, and some versions omit "answering." 
 
 5. " And Jesus answering them began to say, Take heed lest any 
 man deceive you, . . . saying," &c. 
 
 The sublime discourse which follows is the one great prophecy of 
 the Son of Man. The accounts of it in SS. Matthew and Mark are vir- 
 tually the same. In expounding the corresponding verses in St. Mat- 
 thew, Idrew attention to its great principles, and its leading features. 
 I must now ask the reader's permission to repeat what I said of the 
 gist and thread of this discourse, in my notes on St. Matthew: 
 " Christ, in uttering this prophecy, had evidently in His mind two 
 things. He had to hold before His Church in all ages— in the first 
 age immediately after His Ascension, as well as in the last — its one 
 hope, the hope of His appearing: so that each generation of Christians 
 should live in the thought and expectation of it. And yet He had 
 to prepare one particular generation — that of His own Apostles and 
 first followers and believing countrymen — for a catastrophe of a 
 more temporal, but yet most fearful character, which they must, if 
 possible, escape. Now this double purpose was effected by two 
 things — 1st. By setting forth as signs of the impending destruc- 
 tion of Jerusalem certain signs, which would be partially, and yet 
 truly fulfilled then, and yet which would be far more effectually 
 and universally fulfilled just before the Second Advent. 2nd. By 
 a certain indistinctness respecting the termination of the wrath 
 upon the Jews, and the treading down of their city, and their dis- 
 persion, and its attendant persecutions. In the wondrous com- 
 position of this discourse, and arrangement of the various predic- 
 tions the Lord prepares His whole Catholic Church to look for 
 His coming at any time, and at all times ; and yet prepares a part 
 of that Church — the part which, speaking after the manner of men, 
 would be dearest to Himself, because composed of His own country- 
 men — to be ready to escape a particular catastrophe, which might 
 annihilate them. But the ] atter must not interfere with the former. 
 It is the express will of God that all Christians, from the time of 
 Christ's departure on the Mount of Ascension, should be awaiting 
 His return ; and so, the moment He disappeared, two angels were 
 
296 MANY SHALL COME IN MY NAME. [St. Mark. 
 
 6 For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ ; 
 and shall deceive many. 
 
 6. " For many." So A., D., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg,, some 
 -versions; but N, B., L., and y5£thiopic omit " for." 
 
 sent to warn even the Apostles that He should return in like manner 
 as they had seen Him go into heaven; and so SS. Peter and Paul, 
 long before the fall of Jerusalem, looked for Christ's near approach, 
 and preached it to Christians, such as those of Corinth and Thessa- 
 lonica, who were not directly interested in that fall." 
 
 5, 6. "And Jesus answering them began to say, Take heed lest 
 any man deceive you . . . deceive many." This, though said to the 
 Apostles, must have been intended rather for their converts and 
 followers. We do not read of any coming in His Name. Simon 
 Magus apparently came in his own name, giving out that he was 
 some great one, and many gave heed to him as being " the great 
 power of God." But very probably the Lord's words must be taken 
 as referring to the remarkable prevalence of false teachers in the 
 first age of the Church. We should liave thought that when the 
 Church was governed by thv Apostles appointed by Christ Himself, 
 and by St. Paul, whose commission came direct from the Kisen 
 Lord, and was so abundantly supported by miracles and signs, that 
 no false teachers would have dared to thwart and oppose the 
 teaching of such men. But it was not so ; on the contrary, the 
 seeds of all early heresies seem to have been sown in the Apostolic 
 age itself. St. John says that there were in his time many Anti- 
 christs. Now that a false teacher should be an Antichrist does not 
 at all necessitate that he should openly assume the name of Christ. 
 It would effect Satan's purpose far better if he could undermine the 
 truth of Christ's Holy Incarnation ; and so the beloved Apostle warns 
 us, " Every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the 
 flesh is not of God " (1 John iv. 2). It is to be carefully remarked 
 that these false teachers come in the name of Christ, and yet say, 
 " I am." This seems to imply that they were professedly Christian 
 teachers, and yet taught false doctrine, which was incompatible 
 with any true acknowledgment of Christ as the One Great Teacher. 
 Such were both the Judaizers and the earliest Gnostics, and the 
 deniers of the Eesurrection of the Body, who were at their wicked 
 work as early as the writing of the First Epistle to the Corinthians. 
 
Chap. XIIL] WAES AND RUMOURS OF WARS. 297 
 
 7 And when ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars, be 
 
 Still, as our history of the period between the Kesurrection and 
 the destruction of Jerusalem is very imperfect, there may have been 
 actual pretenders to Messiahship not mentioned in either the Acts 
 or in Josephus. 
 
 Again, consider how this "take heed" is required in these last 
 days. Every man who denies the Incarnation of the Son of God, 
 every one who denies the atoning power of His Death, and the 
 truth of His Eesurrection, by so doing sets himself against, and 
 pronounces judgment upon, the Christ of the New Testament, as if 
 he was His superior, at least in knowledge. Such an one virtually 
 says, " I am he ;" for upon some of the things which beyond all 
 others interest mankind — their redemption, their future state, their 
 judgment, — he pronounces Christ to have been mistaken. 
 
 Again, consider that in these latter days there have not been 
 wanting pretensions to actual Messiahship, which have perverted 
 hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of souls. Men may laugh 
 at the pretensions of the Mormon prophet ; but it is a very serious 
 matter to think of what numbers of clever and religiously disposed 
 men, of the lower middle and the labouring class, he has robbed 
 the Church of Christ. 
 
 7, 8. "And when ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars 
 . . . the beginning of sorrows." These verses must be taken as 
 referring far more to the consummation of all things than to the 
 end of the Jewish polity by the destruction of Jerusalem. 
 
 The wars and rumours of wars between the Ascension and the 
 war ending in the Destruction of Jerusalem, were few and insigni- 
 ficant. Dean Mansell, in the " Speaker's Commentary," can give 
 but three or four. An intended war of the Romans against Aretas, 
 hindered by the death of Tiberius (Ant. xvii. 5, sec. 3). One of 
 Caligula against the Jews, which also came to nothing (Ant. xviii. 
 8, sec. 2). An ^insurrection against Cumanus in the reign of 
 Claudius (Ant.xx. 5, sec. 3), and against Felix and Festus, in that of 
 Nero (Ant. xx. 8, see 6-10). But for years before the dehvery of 
 this prophecy, the Jews had constantly revolted against the Roman 
 power, so that the " wars and rumours of wars" in the times before 
 this were more frequent than in those which followed it. But from 
 the breaking up of the Roman Empire to the present, there has been 
 a continuous state of warfare, certainly never twenty years without 
 
298 THE END SHALL NOT BE YET. [St. Mabk. 
 
 ye not troubled : for such things must needs be ; but tlie end 
 shall not be yet. 
 
 8 For nation sball rise against nation, and kingdom 
 against kingdom: and there shall be earthquakes in divers 
 
 7. " For such things." So A., D., L., later Uncials, all Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., 
 Syi'iac ; but K, B., Sah., and Coptic omit "for." This is another glaring instance ia 
 which Tischendorf and "Westcott and Hort make two MSS. and two versions outweigh the 
 testimony of all the rest of Christendom. 
 
 one in Europe or the western parts of Asia ; so that the words of 
 the Lord seem to teach us that a state of actual or impending war 
 is not to be looked upon as necessarily ushering in the end. 
 
 " Such things must needs be." Why ? Because, as St. James 
 teaches us, of the lusts warring in men's members. So that war- 
 fare is not so much a sign of impending judgment, as of the exis- 
 tence and unrestrained power of original sin. 
 
 "For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against king- 
 dom." If this verse is the sequence of the previous one, then it 
 can hardly refer to the time before the destruction of Jerusalem ; 
 for then the Eoman power kept the peace of the world. It is con- 
 sequently explained by many commentators as fulfilled in various 
 local tumults between the Jews who were scattered everywhere, 
 and the various Gentile nations amongst whom they dwelt. But 
 this by no means answers to such expressions as, " nation against 
 nation," and "kingdom against kingdom." They seem rather to 
 refer to such a time as the present, when the civilized world is 
 divided into many sejoarate nationalities. Christianity, though it 
 may have much mitigated the horrors of war, has left it war still, 
 the greatest scourge that can afflict the race. 
 
 " Earthquakes in divers places." A few of these occurred in 
 various parts of the world in Apostolic times, but most of them were 
 insignificant, and not to be mentioned by the side of those which 
 have devastated parts of Europe and America within the present 
 half century. 
 
 " There shall be famines." The reader will, of course, call to 
 mind the dearth prophesied by Agabus (Acts xi. 28), which called 
 forth the outburst of liberality in distant churches of the Gentiles. 
 Others also are recorded, but not apparently in greater number or 
 severity than what is usual among mankind. One would have 
 thought that the various means of rapid communication which 
 
CiiAP. XIII.] THE BEGINNINGS OF SOKROWS. 299 
 
 places, and tliere sliall be famines and troubles : ^ these are 
 the beginnings of || sorrows. ^ Matt.xxiv.s. 
 
 9 ^But Hake heed to yourselves: for they the original ^"^ 
 shall deliver you up to councils ; and in the syna- ]xunsofaico- 
 
 7nan in travail. 
 f Matt. X. 17, 
 18. & xxiv. 9. 
 Rl'v. ii. 10. 
 
 gogues ye shall be beaten : and ye shall be brought 
 
 8. "Famines and troubles." So A., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Sah., Syriac ; 
 but ^/, B., D., L., most Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic, .i5£thiopic omit " and troubles." 
 
 "Beginnings." So A., E., F., G., H., M., most Cursives. " Beginning " (singular) 
 read in N, B., D., K., L., about forty Cursives, many Old Latin, Vulg. 
 
 9. For punctuation of this verse see below. 
 
 characterize this nineteenth century wotdd have made famines 
 impossible, and yet in countries traversed by railways such scourges 
 have occurred : witness that in Ireland in 1847, and in South India 
 but six or seven years ago. 
 
 " These things are the beginnings of sorrows," or, " These things 
 are the beginnings of travail or birth pangs," not of sorrow generally, 
 but of that particular birth anguish which will terminate in the new 
 birth of all things. I gather from this, that before the final catas- 
 trophe, there will be wars, national convulsions, earthquakes in the 
 social and physical world, famine, pestilence, and other woes, such 
 as will make men fear how all will end. Such things may have 
 been more frequent in the two or three decades preceding the over- 
 throw of the Jewish state of things, than the historical records of 
 the time lead us to believe, but they must have been on a small 
 scale, because they were intended to warn only a small portion of 
 the world and of the Church ; but before the day of judgment 
 they will be universal. 
 
 9-13. These verses are given with much less fulness in the cor- 
 responding part of the discourse in St. Matthew, but they are the 
 reproduction, almost word for word, of what we find in a discourse 
 at the first mission of the Apostles in Matthew x. 17, 18, &c. The 
 explanation seems to be that in Matthew x., the Evangelist gives, 
 woven into one, parts of several discourses setting forth the things 
 which shall precede the Second Advent. 
 
 9. " Take heed to yourselves." This appears in St. Matthew as 
 " Beware of men." It seems to mean that they must not rashly 
 expose themselves to danger, but when persecuted in one city flee 
 to another. These words also seem to look to the immediate rather 
 
300 BEFORE RULERS AND KINGS. [St. Makk. 
 
 before rulers and kings for my sake, for a testimony against 
 tliem. 
 
 g Matt, x-siv. 10 And ^ the gospel must first be published 
 among all nations. 
 
 than to the remote futm'e. They contemplate a period when the 
 councils (Sanhedrim) and synagogues would have power to call 
 before them and persecute those whom they esteemed to be heretics. 
 This state of things did not, of course, outlast the destruction of the 
 Jewish polity. There ought, very probably, to be a different punc- 
 tuation of the verse, so that we should read it, *' They shall deliver 
 you to councils and to synagogues : ye shall be beaten and ye shall 
 be brought before rulers and kings." 
 
 " Before rulers and kings." Before Felix, Festus, Agrippa, Domi- 
 tian, and perhaps Nero. " For a testimony against them." Rather, 
 " to them," that they might hear the truth which, perhaps, owing 
 to their high position, they would have no other means of hearing. 
 The reader will remember how two governors, »Felix and Festus, 
 and a king, Agrippa, heard the Gospel through the iDersecutions of 
 St. Paul by the Jews — heard it so that Felix " trembled," and 
 Agrippa said, " Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian." 
 
 10. "And the gospel must first be published among all nations." 
 Does this refer to the preaching of the Gospel before the destruction 
 of Jerusalem, or before the Second Advent ? Apparently to both. 
 Before the year 70 a.d. there were missionary efi"orts made by the 
 Church, through the Apostles and their companions, such as have 
 never been known since. " Ecclesiastical historians testify that 
 this was fulfilled, for they relate that all the Apostles, long before 
 the desolation of the province of Judaea, were dispersed to preach 
 the Gospel over the whole world, except James, the son of Zebedee, 
 and James, the brother of our Lord, who had before shed their 
 blood in Judaea." (Bede.) 
 
 I cannot help thinking that this universal publication of the 
 Gospel, insisted upon as taking place before a particular event, the 
 siege and fall of a particular city, was especially for the sake of the 
 Jews dispersed among all nations, whose ecclesiastical metropolis 
 that city was. When the Gospel was preached unto them, there 
 would be embodied in the account of the preaching and teaching 
 of Christ, this very discourse predicting the absolute and complete 
 
Chap. XIIL] TAKE NO THOUGHT BEFOREHAND. 301 
 
 11 ^But when tliej shall lead you, and deliver you 
 up, take no thought beforehand what ye shall ^ Matt. x. 19. 
 speak, neither do ye premeditate : but whatsoever &''xxl'i4. 
 shall be given you in that hour, that speak ye : for 
 
 it is not ye that speak, ^ but the Holy Ghost. kfv? sJ'sl 
 
 12 Now ^ the brother shall betray the brother ^ Mic, xn. 6. 
 to death, and the father the son; and children &xxi'v."io.* 
 
 Luke xxi. 16. 
 
 11. " Neither do ye premeditate." So A., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Syriac ; 
 but the words omitted by n, B., D., L., some Cursives (1, 33, 69, 157, 209), some Old 
 Latin, Vulg., and some versions. 
 
 destruction of Jerusalem ; so that the Jews everywhere would see 
 the hand of God in fulfilling the prophecy of the Lord, and would 
 be led to believe in Him. 
 
 11. " But when they shall lead you, and deliver you up, take no 
 thought beforehand," &c. This, it is to be remembered, is not said 
 of teaching and preaching generally, but simply of answering when 
 they are examined before magistrates. They were poor men, and 
 could not afford to hire an advocate to plead for them ; their adver- 
 saries, on the contrary, could engage men like Tertullus, versed in 
 all the arts of flattery, and well skilled in making the worse seem the 
 better reason. The Lord here, then, engages to furnish them with 
 an Advocate "Who should si^eak in them, and enable them to bring 
 before their judges just such arguments as He saw would best pro- 
 mote the spread of the truth. 
 
 Should not those who are thrown into the company of infidels 
 recollect this ? and rely more upon silent prayer for God's help, 
 than upon the recollection at the moment of subtle arguments and 
 trains of reasoning, for unbelievers, especially if proselytes, are 
 unscrupulous, and care not what arguments they use, provided they 
 can gain a victory, and impress upon bystanders the falsity of the 
 religion of Jesus Christ. All who can do so should study carefully 
 the evidences of our Holy Kehgion ; but in the conflict they must 
 remember that the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the 
 weakness of God is stronger than men, and that the words for ever 
 hold good, " Not by power, nor by might, but by my Spirit, saith 
 the Lord." 
 
 12. " Now the brother shall betray the brother to death .... 
 cause thfem to be put to death." As the religion of Jesus Christ 
 
302 HATED OF ALL MEN FOR MY NAME. [St. Mark. 
 
 shall rise up against their parents, and shall cause them to be 
 put to death. 
 
 1 Matt, xxir. 13 ^ And je shall be hated of all men for my 
 
 17. name's sake : but ™ he that shall endure unto the 
 
 Mit?"x.^22.\t 6^<i» the same shall be saved. 
 
 xxiv. 13. ilev. 
 
 ii. 10. 
 
 gives birth to and cherishes the most perfect love, so it calls forth 
 the most bitter hatred. It calls forth a love which is above nature, 
 because it makes men love their enemies. Contrariwise it calls 
 forth a hatred which is mmatural, for it makes men hate and 
 betray, and, if they can, destroy their own flesh and blood. Thus 
 we read that the Emperor Domitian, in his hatred of the Christian 
 name, slew Flavins Clemens, and his niece, or near relation Flavia 
 Domitilla ; the Emperor Maximin martyred Artemia, his own 
 sister, and Diocletian his own wife, and other relatives. St. 
 Barbara also was killed by her own father, and if we had a full 
 martyrology of obscure Christians, we should find multitudes of 
 others similarly betrayed by their own flesh and blood. We are 
 told also by Indian missionaries, that as soon as converts are bap- 
 tized, they become objects of hatred to their nearest relatives, even 
 their wives often desert them. Now if this be so in a country where 
 Christianity is the religion of the rulers, what would it be if 
 heathenism were unchecked in its power of persecution? 
 
 13. "And ye shall be hated . . . but he that shall endure unto 
 the end, the same shall be saved." " Ye shall be hated of all men 
 for My Name's sake, and so ye shall be under constant temptation 
 to deny or make shipwreck of your faith, but he that shall persevere 
 in his testimony to Me and My Gospel, the same shall be saved." 
 What means this " saved " ? It can only mean saved in soul at the 
 last ; for in the great catastrophe of the doomed city the Christians 
 saved their lives by fleeing to Pella. It seems to be recorded for 
 all times and all ages : and teaches that in times of persecution, as 
 well as in times of more dangerous peace and prosperity, those who 
 follow Christ have to maintain a lifelong struggle either against 
 outward opposition or inward temptation. (See my note on 
 Matthew x. 22 on the way in which popular Revival teachers and 
 preachers ignore these words of Christ by making a man finally 
 saved at the beginning of his Christian walk, instead of at the end 
 of it.) 
 
Chap. XIII,] THE ABOMINATION OF DESOLATION. 303 
 
 14 ^ '^ But when ye sliall see tlie abomination "Matt. xxiv. 
 of desolation, ° spoken of by Daniel the prophet, o i)an. ix. 27. 
 
 14. " Spoken of by Daniel the prophet." So A., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, some 
 Old Latin and Syriac ; omitted by ,V, B., D., L., some Old Latin, Valg., Sab., Coptic, 
 Armenian. 
 
 14. " But when ye shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken 
 of by Daniel the prophet, standing where it ought not." Further 
 consideration in preparing these notes on St. Mark have not 
 solved to my mind the difficulties surrounding this matter which I 
 mentioned in my comment on St. Matthew. I will now more fully 
 consider the subject, and will ask the reader to bear in mind two 
 or three things. 
 
 1. The word translated "abomination" most usually means an 
 idol, or something connected with idolatrous worship. 
 
 2. In the case before us it seems to mean some idolatrous thing 
 (idol, ensign, rite) connected with desolation. 
 
 3. Its appearance would be a very marked and visible sign or 
 portent, apparently to be known far beyond the walls of the city, 
 for— 
 
 4. It was a sign of imminent danger, not to the Christians in 
 Jerusalem, but to " them that were in Judaea." 
 
 5. No mention of it is made in St. Luke, but the words of the 
 Lord, as reported in the parallel passage (Luke xxi. 20, 21), are : — 
 "When ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies, then know 
 that the desolation thereof is nigh. Then let them which are in 
 Judaea flee to the mountains, and let them which are in the midst 
 of it depart out, and let not them that are in the countries enter 
 thereinto." 
 
 What then have been the interpretations of this ? The Fathers 
 usually explain it of idols or images of the Emperors set up in the 
 temple. Thus Bede, but with evidently no clear view of the 
 historical sequence of facts. " It may either be said simply of 
 Antichrist, or of the statute of Caesar which Pilate put into the 
 temple, or of the equestrian statue of Adrian, which for a long time 
 stood in the holy of holies itself." Theophylact explains it very 
 generally as " the entrance of enemies into the city by violence." 
 Chrysostom of the statue of Titus : " By abomination He meaneth 
 the statue of him who then took the city, which he who desolated 
 the city and temple placed within th temple; wherefore Christ 
 
304 STANDING WHERE IT OUGHT NOT. [St. Mark. 
 
 Btanding where it ought not, (let him that readeth under- 
 
 calleth it * of desolation.' " But this, if it ever took place, would 
 seem to come too late as a sign of warning. Louis Cappel, a 
 considerable Hebrew scholar and critic of his day, propounded 
 another and totally different explanation, which has found favour 
 with many modern critics, even with two men of such different 
 views as Bishop Wordsworth and Dean Alford. It is, that the 
 abomination was the seizure of the temple by the party of Zealots, 
 or, as Josephus calls them, "robbers," who committed in the 
 sanctuary itself unheard of abominations, desolated the city by 
 murder and massacre as long as they had possession of the temple, 
 which they used as a fortress, and were the real cause through their 
 mad resistance of its total destruction. They admitted the Idumeans 
 into the temple to assist them, and so terrific was the slaughter 
 that " the outer temple was all of it overflowed with blood, and 
 that day, as it came on, saw eight thousand five hundred dead 
 bodies there " (Joseph., B. I. iv. 5, sec. 1). Again : " There is nobody 
 but hath tasted of the incursions of these profane wretches, who 
 have proceeded to that degree of madness as not only to have 
 transported their impudent robberies out of the country, and the 
 remote cities into this city, but out of the city into the temple also ; 
 for that is now made their receptacle and refuge, and the fountain- 
 head whence theh preparations are made against us. And this 
 place, which is adored by the habitable world, and honoured by 
 such as only know it by report, as far as the ends of the earth, is 
 tramxDled upon these wild beasts born among ourselves." 
 
 No doubt such a band of lawless wretches polluting such a 
 sanciuaiy, might well be called the abomination of desolation. It 
 is urged against this view that the Hebrew word abomination is 
 almost always applied to something idolatrous, and these murderers, 
 though they polluted the holy place with robbery and blood, did 
 not defile it by idolatry ; ^ on the contrary, they carried on their 
 reign of terror under the cloak of being politcally, at least, the 
 most zealous of Jews ; but there can be little doubt that their 
 seizure of the temple, and continued possession of it as a stronghold, 
 
 '^ By their consecrating an ignorant rustic to be high-priest they 
 expressed the greatest contempt for the Levitical institution, but 
 they are never accused of idolatry. 
 
Chap. XIII.l FLEE TO THE MOUNTAINS. 305 
 
 stand,) then ^let them that be in Judaea flee to p Lukexxi.21 
 the mountains : 
 
 was the most significant of portents to those without — i.e., to the 
 dwellers in the 'Holy Land, especially to the Christians, that God 
 had finally given up His sanctuary. Now we are to remember thai 
 the Christians of Jerusalem were not sufferers by this robbery and 
 massacre on the part of the Zealots, for they had before this quitted 
 the doomed city. Eusebius tells us that " the whole body of the 
 Church of Jerusalem, having been commanded by a Divine revela- 
 tion given to men of approved piety there before the war, removed 
 from the city and dwelt at a certain town beyond the Jordan, called 
 Pella." Some suppose that this took place at the time that Cestiua 
 Gallus having invested Jerusalem, suddenly, and for no apparent 
 reason, withdrew his army, so that all who had fears respecting 
 the fate of the city saw their opportunity, and escaped. Such a 
 portent, then, as the seizure of the temple by the Zealots, would be 
 a sign to all Christians throughout Judaea that they must lose no time 
 in seeking safety by flight. Still there seems to be several reasons 
 against accepting this as the true meaning of " the Abomination of 
 Desolation," as, for instance, why should those who saw or heard 
 of this catastrophe be enjoined such extreme haste in their flight 
 that they were not even to enter their houses to take their clothes 
 with them ? The Zealots were some time in possession of the city 
 and temple before it was finally beleaguered by Titus ; and the 
 parallel passage in St. Luke would lead them to look for the sign 
 in connection with the Koman armies, not with loose bands of 
 robbers and murderers. 
 
 Dr. Morison, to whom I am under obligations for his able his- 
 torical sketch of the interpretations of this passage, quotes the 
 opinion of Grotius as referring it to the idolatrous ensigns of the 
 Eoman army. Having given a remarkable passage from the 
 Antiquities of Josephus, xviii. 3, sec. 1, in which Pilate was 
 threatened with a serious revolt for having introduced these ensigns 
 into the Holy City, he gives the following account : " And now the 
 Romans, upon the flight of the seditious into the city, and upon the 
 burning of the Holy House itself, and of all the buildings round 
 about it, brought their ensigns to the temple, and set them over 
 against its eastern gate. And then did they offer sacrifices to them, 
 and then did they make Titus Imperator with the greatest accla- 
 
 X 
 
306 WOE TO THOSE WITH CHILD. [St Mark. 
 
 15 And let Min that is on the housetop not go down into 
 the house, neither enter therein, to take anj thing out of his 
 house : 
 
 16 And let him that is in the field not tui'n back again 
 for to take up his garment. 
 
 q Lukexxi. 23. V? *^ But WOO to them that are with child, and 
 
 & xxiii. 29. . , 
 
 to them that give suck m those days ! 
 
 mations of joy." (B. I. vi. 6, Sec. i.) If this had occurred somewhat 
 earlier it would have been the best explanation, because connecting 
 the portent more closely with the Eonian armies, according to St. 
 Luke's report of the Lord's words. 
 
 The words thrown in by the Lord, " Let him that readeth under- 
 stand," may either refer to the words of Daniel or to the Lord's 
 citation of those words. The Gospel of St. Matthew had been 
 pubhshed long before this caution was required, and was, no doubt^ 
 in the hands of all leading Christians. 
 
 15, 16. " And let him that is upon the housetop . . . take any- 
 thing out of his house : And let him that is in the field . . . take 
 up his garment." If this refers to those who dwelt in the country 
 at some distance from Jerusalem, it is difficult to explain, as I have 
 just said. Still, the Eoman armies having taken before the siege 
 Bome of the principal towns, very likely scoured the country all 
 round, plundering, burning, and destroying. If it includes those 
 in Jerusalem, then we must suppose that there might remain some 
 few of God's saints in the devoted city : and if so, their flight must 
 be of the character here described if they would save themselves. 
 
 That the man, when he heard of, or saw the portent is to use 
 such haste as not to enter his house on any account, seems to imply 
 that, if he lived in the country, there was an outer staircase by 
 which he might descend and flee at once. Perhaps, however, these 
 expressions are of a proverbial nature, such as ours, that "not a 
 moment is to be lost." 
 
 17. " But woe to them that are with child, and to them that 
 give suck in those days ! " The reader cannot fail to remember 
 the warning words of the Lord : " Daughters of Jerusalem, weep 
 not for Me, but weep for yourselves and for your children. For, 
 behold, the days are coming in the which they shall say, Blessed 
 are the barren, and the wombs that never bare, and the paps which 
 
Chap. XIII.] AFFLICTION SUCH AS WAS NOT. 307 
 
 18 And pray ye that your fliglit be not in the winter. 
 
 19 Tor in those days shall be aflB.iction, such "" Dan.ix. 26. 
 
 P IT-. r. , . & xii. 1. Joel 
 
 as was not irom the beginning of the creation ii. 2. Matt. 
 
 xxiv. 21. 
 
 18. "Ynur flight." So A,, A, later Uncials, most Cursives, Syriac, Sah., Coptic, 
 Gothic, ^thiopic. "Your flight" omitted by S, B., D., L,, a few Cursives, Old Latin, 
 Vulg. 
 
 never gave suck." Theophylact writes : " It seems to me that in 
 these words He foretells the eating of children, for when afflicted 
 by famine and pestilence they laid hands on their children ; " but 
 this can hardly be the meaning ; for it is implied that they were 
 at liberty to flee, but would be in extreme danger from swiftly 
 pursuing foes if their flight was in the least degree impeded. All 
 this seems to imply a very swift destruction, not only of the doomed 
 city, but of the whole country. 
 
 18. " And pray ye that your flight be not in the winter." When 
 the bye roads and paths would be almost im^^assable ; when there 
 would be scanty foliage to conceal fugitives, and when there would 
 be no ears of corn, or roadside fruit, to pluck for some sustentation 
 on the way. 
 
 Several MSS. of the so-called Neutral Text omit " your flight,'' 
 and read, "pray that it be not in the winter ; " but if by this the 
 scribes of these documents mean the siege, then severity of weather 
 would be against the Eoman army camped out in the fields rather 
 than in its favour. 
 
 St. Matthew adds, ** neither on the Sabbath day," on which day the 
 gates of the cities would be shut, and they would be able to get no 
 help in their flight by hiring beasts of burden. The delay in 
 journeys occasioned by the Sabbath seems to have become pro- 
 verbial all over the world. Ovid alludes to it : " nee te peregrina 
 morentur Sabbata." This shows that the particular evils against 
 which the Lord is now warning them were local and Judaical. 
 
 19. " For in those days shall be affliction, such as was not from 
 the beginning . . . neither shall be." Josephus thus describes the 
 miseries of the besieged : " Now of those who perished by famine 
 in the city, the number was prodigious, and the miseries they went 
 through were unspeakable : for if so much as the shadow of any 
 kind of food did anywhere ai)pear, a war was commenced presently, 
 and the dearest friends fell a-fighting one with another for it, 
 snatching one from another the most miserable supports of life. 
 
308 NEITHER SHALL BE. [St. Maek. 
 
 which God created unto this time, neither shall be. 
 
 Nor would men believe that those who were dying had no food ; 
 but the robbers would search them when they were expiring, lest 
 any one should have concealed food in their bosoms, and counter- 
 feited dying. Nay, these robbers gaped for want, and ran about, 
 stumbling and staggering along like mad dogs, and reeling against 
 the doors of the houses like drunken men; they would also, in the 
 great distress they were in, rush into the very same houses two or 
 three times in one and the same day. Moreover, their hunger was 
 so intolerable that it obliged them to chew everything, while they 
 gathered such things as the filthiest animals would not touch, and 
 endured to eat them : nor did they at length abstain from girdles 
 and shoes, and the very leather which belonged to their shields they 
 pulled off, and gnawed : the very wisps of old hay became food to 
 some." (B. J. VL, iii. 3.) 
 
 Again, the historian, adding up the whole number of those slain, 
 says that eleven hundred thousand perished by famine and the 
 sword ; and that the rest — the factions and robbers — mutually in- 
 forming against each other after the capture, were put to death. 
 Of the young men, the tallest, and those distinguished for beauty, 
 were preserved for the triumph. Of the remaining multitude, those 
 above seventeen were sent prisoners to labour in the mines in 
 Egypt. But great numbers were distributed to the provinces, to be 
 destroyed by the sword, or wild beasts in the theatres. Those under 
 seventeen were carried away, to be sold as slaves. Of these alone 
 there were upwards of ninety thousand. 
 
 So that the prophecy of the Lord, that the affliction was beyond 
 anything which had ever befallen the human race, or ever would 
 befall it, was literally fulfilled. There is nothing in history which 
 can compare to it. 
 
 Now all this happened about forty years after the Crucifixion of 
 the Lord ; so that, of those who cried, " Crucify him, crucify him," 
 but the merest faction could then have been alive. Did, then, all 
 this unspeakable misery come upon them because they had crucified 
 the Lord ? No, by no means ; but it came upon them because they 
 had not accepted His Crucifixion as the atonement for their sins. 
 The forty years between the death of Christ and the destruction of 
 the city was a forty years' rejection of the Holy Ghost, Who wit- 
 nessed to them by the presence of the Church among them, and by 
 
Chap. XIII.] HE HATH SHORTENED THE DAYS. 309 
 
 20 And except that the Lord had shortened those days, 
 no flesh should be saved : but for the elect's sake, whom he 
 hath chosen, he hath shortened the days. 
 
 21 * And then if any man shall say to you, Lo, » Matt. xxiv. 
 
 1 7 . , -, -, 23. Luke x^ii. 
 
 here is Christ ; or, lo, he is there ; believe him not : 23. & xxi. 8. 
 
 the preaching and miracles of the Apostles, of the efficacy of the 
 Lord's Death in putting away sin, and of the power of His Eesur- 
 rection, not only in the performance of innumerable miracles, but 
 in the present Eesurrection of myriads of souls from the death of 
 sin to the life of Kighteousness. For forty years after the j)erpetra- 
 tion of their great crime they had offers of mercy and salvation, 
 through the very Death they had inflicted on the Lord ; and, because 
 they rejected these, the long-delayed wrath came upon them to the 
 uttermost. 
 
 20. *' And excex3t that the Lord had shortened those days .... 
 he hath shortened the days." This is taken to refer to the fact that, 
 under ordinary circumstances, the city might have held out much 
 longer ; but that, if it had, the fury of the conquerors would have 
 been so great that the nation would have been exterminated. All 
 flesh can here only refer to all dwellers in Jerusalem or in Palestine. 
 
 " But for the elect's sake, whom he hath chosen," &c. This 
 means for the Christians' sake : the Church of Christ taking the 
 place of the older Jewish election in the favour of God. But what 
 is meant by " for the elect's sake" ? It may mean that, in answer 
 to their prayers for their country, many Jews were spared ; or it 
 may mean that many were spared and escaped the horrors of the 
 siege, because God foresaw that this tremendous visitation would 
 cause many of them to turn to Christ. Some have supposed that 
 the word "elect" refers to the original election of the Jews in 
 Abraham, and that its key is to be found in the words of St. Paul : 
 "As touching the election, they are beloved for the fathers' sake." 
 I do not, however, think that this is the meaning. 
 
 21. " And then if any man shall say to you, Lo, here is Christ ; or, 
 lo, he is there," &c. When Christ comes the second time it wiU not be 
 as He came at the first — in poverty and obscurity — but so that all 
 the world shall recognize Him in a moment. Certain words of St. 
 Matthew, bringing this out with great sublimity, are omitted by 
 St. Mark. They are : " Wherefore, if they shall say unto you, 
 
310 FALSE CHRISTS SHALL ARISE. [St. Mark. 
 
 22 For false Clirists and false prophets sliall rise, and 
 
 Behold, he is in the desert ; go not forth : behold, he is in the 
 secret chambers ; believe it not. For as the lightning cometh ont of 
 the east, and shineth even unto the west ; so shall also the coming 
 of the Son of Man be " (xxiv. 26-8). No Messiah can be looked for 
 except the one Who is to come in the clouds of heaven. We have 
 now to discern His spiritual presence by faith, and this only 
 will enable us to bear the sight of HiiQ when He comes visibly at 
 the end. 
 
 22. "For false Christs and false prophets shall rise, and shall 
 shew signs and wonders." To be a false Christ, it is not needful 
 that a man should assume the name of Christ. The office of Christ 
 was to be the final and perfect Revealer of the Person and Will of 
 God. Anyone, then, who asserts that the final Revelation is not 
 made in Christ, but that Christ's Revelation must be supplemented 
 by something which he teaches as from God, is a false Christ. 
 Such was Mahomet. He acknowledged that Christ was a true 
 prophet ; and he did not assume the name or title of Christ, but he 
 endeavoured to supersede Him. And through the declension of the 
 Church — its laxity, its superstitions, its divisions — he has won 
 nations and empires from Christ. 
 
 And ever since the commencement of Christianity there have 
 been these pretenders to the office of Christ as the final Eevealer. 
 I do not now speak of heretics, but of pretenders to special Revela- 
 tions — Montanus, and the leaders of the Anabaptists of Munster, and 
 the Fifth Monarchy men of the Rebellion, the Mormon prophet or 
 prophets, and others, whose names will suggest themselves to any- 
 one who has taken even a small interest in religious history. None 
 of these movements have been contemptible in their effects. But their 
 importance to us seems to consist in this : they teach us what things 
 serious and religious men are capable of asserting, and what things 
 an immense number of serious and religious men and women are 
 capable of believing. For these men and their movements were 
 not heretical, or fanatical, or enthusiastic merely. They were not 
 men who took certain Scripture statements, and rode them to 
 death, as the saying is ; or, as is the case with all heresy, made all 
 Scripture bend to a text or two. Their speciality was that they had 
 each of them a new revelation from God to declare the final truth — 
 not a mission from God to bring before men's minds an old for- 
 
Chap. XIII.] SHALL SHEW SIGNS AND WONDEES. 311 
 
 shall sliew signs and wonders, to seduce, if it ivere pos- 
 
 gotten truth, but a special revelation, which was to supersede all 
 previous ones; or, what really amounts to much the same thing, to 
 put the top stone to the temple of truth. In this, and not in any- 
 particular heresy or extravagance, they are the foreshadowing of 
 the Antichrist. 
 
 But did these men show "signs and wonders"? Yes, most of 
 them did, more or less. They professed to tell men what they had 
 done in secret, or what was going on at a distance. In some cases 
 they professed gifts of healing, in many more powers of exorcising. 
 Mahomet and his followers appealed to their success, and with 
 reason, for it was portentous ; hut it was a sign of God's wrath upon 
 those whom they subdued, not of the truth of what they taught. 
 Many appealed to their success in converting men, not into sober- 
 minded Christians, but into enthusiasts ; and whenever fanatical 
 men are capable of exciting great enthusiasm, sober-minded men 
 ought to look into and watch the process, and they will probably 
 learn something, sometimes to imitate, always to warn their flocks 
 against. 
 
 If, however, it turns out that these men have done actual miracles, 
 I should not be so much surprised, for I believe that there is a super- 
 natural world ; and if this supernatural world be what its name im- 
 ports, then the actions of its denizens, their powers of motion, their 
 means of acquiring knowledge, their means of imparting knowledge, 
 must be in our eyes sux^ernatural — natural to them, but supernatural 
 to us, for the very reason that they are in a spiritual world, which is 
 a world above ours. Now if a man professes to supiDlement the 
 teaching of Christ, or to be a special messenger from God, to bring 
 in some kingdom or organization over and above the Church of 
 Christ, then it seems to me not unlikely that he has his inspiration, 
 and active but secret assistance from the evil side of the spiritual 
 or unseen world. That God should permit such a thing is not so 
 difficult to me as that He should permit many other forms of evil 
 which I see around me. I believe that every man is safe from any 
 such delusions who consciously commits his way to God, and faith- 
 fully uses the sources of knowledge and means of grace which Christ 
 has left amongst us. 
 
 Our Lord, having thus warned the people against false Christs, 
 does not specifically mention the false Christ which many places of 
 
312 EVEN THE ELECT. [St. Mark. 
 
 sible, even the elect. 
 
 22. "Even." So A., C, L,, later Uncials, almost all Corsires, Old Latin, Valg., 
 Syriac, Coptic, &c. ; but S, B., D., W. omit. 
 
 Scripture lead us to believe will be revealed before His coming. 
 That he will do miracles, or what to all intents and purposes will 
 be miracles to all who see them, is clear from St. Paul's express 
 statement. 
 
 Now will He, or if His coming be delayed, will any other false 
 Christ which may yet arise, be able to do miracles in the face of the 
 advance of modern science ? Most certainly, I answer; and in all pro- 
 bability godless scientists will be the very first to be deceived by them. 
 For the modern scientist rejects the Scripture miracles, because, 
 he says, he can conceive of no higher order of things than the order 
 made known by natural science. He is obliged to confess that there 
 is a moral order, but he does his best to show that this springs by 
 natural evolution from the protoplasm or bacteria or what not, from 
 which he supposes all other forms of life are evolved. Now if, as all 
 Christians believe, there is a God, and this God a moral Being, then 
 the moral order is to Him an infinitely more important thing than 
 the natural, and He has sent His Son into the world to reveal the 
 certainty of this moral order to show to men that goodness and 
 righteousness are in the sight of the unseen God of infinitely 
 more importance than all else ; that He has put it into the power 
 of all men to right themselves with respect to this moral order, by 
 the Redemption which His Son has accomplished, that He will at 
 last make the moral order paramount by the judgment wherewith 
 His Son will judge all men. Now if this be so, and if God accredited 
 His Son by miracles, especially by the miracle of His own Eesur- 
 rection, then God cannot be indififerent as to whether men accept 
 the credentials of His Son or not. If they do not, it must be because 
 they prefer the natural order to the moral, the fleshly to the spiritual, 
 the temporal to the eternal. Not finding eternal life revealed in 
 the crucible or in the microscope or in the solar spectrum, they hold 
 themselves unworthy of it, and so God will tm-n from them. They 
 have rejected His testimony to His Son, which is all on the side of 
 goodness and righteousness, and their Nemesis will be that when 
 one comes doing what they will be obHged to confess to be miracles 
 on the side of evil, they will receive him and share his doom. 
 ** To seduce, if possible, even the elect." It is wrong to trans* 
 
Chap. XIIL] TAKE YE HEED. 313 
 
 23 *But ta"ke ye heed: behold, I have foretold you all 
 
 things. * 2 Pet. iii. 17. 
 
 24 ^ " But in those days, after that tribulation, seph^i.Vs. 
 
 Matt. xxiv. 29, 
 
 &c. Luke xxi. 
 
 2d. 
 
 late this " if it were possible ; " such a rendering implies that it is 
 absolutely impossible. If we render it strictly and literally to 
 "seduce, if possible," then it rather implies that it is very difficult to 
 seduce them. And this is in accordance with common sense, for 
 those whom God has chosen have all of them, in consequence, chosen 
 Him; and, if so, they commit their way to Him, asking Him to 
 direct and protect them from all evil ; and if they see one apparently 
 coming with credentials from the unseen world, they will ask God 
 for special guidance, and remember that Christ has strictly bidden 
 them to look for none but Himself. 
 
 23. " But take ye heed : behold, I have foretold you all things." 
 The " ye " is emphatic. Could it be that any of the Apostles were 
 in danger from false Christs ? We cannot tell : but they represent 
 the Church, and in them the Lord warns first the Church in the 
 age immediately succeeding His own — then the Church in all ages. 
 The Church of Christ has always been in danger, not only from 
 the world without, and the flesh within, but from false teachers, 
 even from false Christs, who come with claims of a special Re- 
 velation, and from false prophets who come with a claim of special 
 Inspiration. 
 
 24. "But in those days, after that tribulation, the sun shall be 
 darkened," &c. What is meant by " those days " ? Evidently the 
 "times of the Gentiles." What is meant by " that tribulation " ? 
 the treading down of Jerusalem by the Gentiles. (Luke xxi. 24.) 
 Now this " treading down " is not the treading down of one city, or 
 one province, but of the whole people. We get this from St. Luke, 
 for the exactly cori'esponding passage in his Gospel is : " They shall 
 fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive unto 
 all nations : and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, 
 until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled." 
 
 We now are living in these " times of the Gentiles," and at this 
 very time there is, in all parts of the world, wrath upon this people 
 of the Jews, for though they may be living in peace amongst us, and 
 in a few other countries, yet we can scarcely take up a newspaper 
 but we see accounts of the Jews being mobbed and left to the fury 
 
314 THE SUN SHALL BE DARKENED. [St. Mark. 
 
 the sun shall he darkened, and the moon shall not give her 
 light, 
 
 of the populace, and dragged before local tribunals uj)on all sorts 
 of absurd charges ; and what is worse than all, the veil of unbelief 
 is yet on their hearts. They are yet in the spiritual state described 
 by St. Paul (Eom. xi.), of branches broken off from their own olive 
 tree — " they abide yet in unbelief." " Blindness in part is hap- 
 pened unto Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in." 
 After this tribulation, when the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled, 
 the Lord tells us that "the sun shall be darkened, and the moon 
 shall not give her light, and the stars," &c. 
 
 These words of the Lord may be interpreted literally or figura- 
 tively. There is no reason whatsoever why they should not be taken 
 literally. God, by ways utterly unknown to us, brought about the 
 obscuration of the sun at the time of the Lord's Crucifixion, and He 
 can, by ways equally unknown, bring about the same phenomena 
 before the time of the end. It is not for a moment to be supposed 
 that the vast luminary is to be annihilated, or that it is to be per- 
 manently deprived of its power of giving light, or that it may not 
 enhghten other worlds besides our own. All that is required is that 
 it should not give light to a doomed world. A short time ago, 
 during the year 1879, we had in this country not one quarter of the 
 average sunshine. There are, at times, even in midday, black 
 thunder clouds which make everywhere under their shadow a 
 darkness which may be felt ; so that we can well suppose that God 
 has abundance of means, even in this lower s^Dhere, of warning men, 
 by depriving them of the light from the heavenly bodies, that they 
 must be prepared for the worst. And I believe that when He does 
 this He will do it in such a manner that it will manifestly appear 
 as something portentous. It will be seen that so-called natural ap- 
 pearances, such as the extinction of the light of the heavenly lumi- 
 naries, however brought about, does not then signify that certain 
 natural changes are taking place upon which men may safely specu- 
 late, but that a certain moral catastrox^he is impending, the thought 
 of which will make the stoutest heart quail. 
 
 Again, when the Lord says that the stars of heaven shall fall. He 
 does not mean that the globes themselves shall fall, but that their 
 light shall not be seen. This would be their falling from heaven, 
 so far as we are concerned. "We must remember that if all this ia 
 
Chap. XIII.] THE STARS SHALL FALL. 315 
 
 25 And the stars of heaven shall fall, and the powers that 
 are m heaven shall be shaken. 
 
 2-5. "And the stars of heaven shall fall." "Stars shall be falling from heaven,"' 
 Revisers, after N, A., B., C, U., about thirty Cursives, Sah., Coptic, Syriac, ^Ethiopic ; 
 but L., later Uncials, most Cursives, Vulg., &e., read as in Authorized. 
 
 to be fulfilled literally, it is for our sakes, that the children of men 
 may be prepared for that which will fix their eternal destiny. 
 
 Another matter should also be noticed, that the Lord here evi- 
 dently moulds His words in the form of the Hebrew Parallelism, 
 which requires that in the sentences which compose the parallelism 
 the idea should be repeated in different words. Thus, instead of 
 saying the sun and the moon shall be darkened, He expresses it in 
 strict Hebrew poetical form, " the sun shall he darl-ened and the 
 moon shall not give her light.'' And so *' the stars of heaven shall 
 fall," is paralleled by " the powers that are in heaven shall be 
 shaken." Now we know not what the Lord means by these " powers 
 in heaven." The only powers or forces which we know are the 
 forces by which the earth and planets move, and by which they are 
 kept in their courses. Now if the Lord was at this tremendous 
 juncture to allow this world to be shaken and in any way deflect 
 from its axis, the fixed stars would apj)ear to move or to fall. 
 
 We have endeavoured hitherto to give a rational and yet a tho- 
 roughly believing view of these words : but it must'be remembered 
 that what the Lord foretells will be the greatest and most visible 
 manifestation of God to the Universe. It will manifest the glory 
 of His moral attributes of righteousness and justice. Its issues 
 will, for aught we know, affect the whole intelligent creation. For 
 this world, inasmuch as it has been the scene of the Incarnation 
 and Death of Christ, has been the theatre of events manifesting the 
 Unseen God such as no other part of God's creation has been or can 
 be. What marvel then if all things visible and invisible are affected 
 by it, even to the remotest star? We know that what takes place 
 in this little world in the development of the Church is for the 
 benefit of "principalities and powers in heavenly places," that 
 they by it may know " the manifold wisdom of God." (Ephes, 
 iii. 10.) 
 
 2. Upon the figurative interpretation of these words — if they are 
 not to be interpreted literally — the greatest differences prevail. 
 Thus, St. Ambrose : " The moon is the Church, which will then 
 
316 
 
 THE SON OF MAN COMING. [St. Mark. 
 
 26 ^ And then shall thev see the Son of man 
 
 X Dan. vii. 13, 
 14. Matt. xvi. 
 27. & xxiv. 30. 
 ch. xiv. 62. 
 Actsi. 11. 
 
 1 Thess. iv. 16. 
 
 2 Thess. i. 7, 
 10. Eev. i. 7. 
 
 borrow no light from Christ, who is her Sun, being echpsed 
 by the earth, i.e. by carnal desires. They will not be able to 
 see the Sun, for faith will fail." St. Augustine also seems to 
 suggest that the Church and the saints will be eclipsed, and scarcely 
 visible on earth from the darkness of those days of Antichrist. 
 Amongst moderns, Lightfoot explains that the Jewish heaven shall 
 X3erish, and the sun and moon of its glory and happiness shall be 
 darkened and brought to nothing." *' The sun is the religion of the 
 Church ; the moon is the government of the state ; and the stars 
 are the judges and doctors of both." (Lightfoot's Exercitations 
 from Dr. Morison's St. Matthew.) Such an interpretation seems 
 absurd : but we are to remember that in the Hebrew Prophets the 
 judgments of God upon various kingdoms are attended by the 
 obscuration of the light of the sun and moon, which seems to point 
 to the kingly or chief powers in these kingdoms being destroyed or 
 weakened. [So Isaiah xiii. 10, spoken of Babylon, and Ezekiel 
 xxxii. 7, of Egypt.] Still, I do not see how such signs as the de- 
 thronement of kings or the weakening of governments can be that 
 universal sign seen by all, and striking terror and amazement into 
 all that see it, which the words of the Lord seem to set forth. 
 
 26. " And then shall they see the Son of man coming in the clouds 
 with great power and glory." " Then shall they see." Who shall 
 see ? St. Matthew tells us, " all the tribes of the earth when they see 
 Him" shall mourn. St. Luke also tells us the same. The hearts 
 of men are " failing them for fear, and for looking after those things 
 which are coming on the earth." And then shall they — these men 
 whose hearts quail — these shall see Him : so that all men alike, 
 good and bad, believers and unbelievers, Christians and heathen, all 
 alike shall see Him. Now men see Him only by faith. Then they 
 shall see Him Whom they have pierced. With what eyes? The 
 living with the eyes of their present bodies before they are changed; 
 the dead with the eyes of the Eesurrection Body. 
 
 " They shall see the Son of Man coming in the clouds." It must 
 be for some purpose that the Lord is so frequently and emphatically 
 said to come with clouds. Thus here, and in the parallel place of 
 
Chap. XIII.] IN THE CLOUDS. 317 
 
 coming in the clouds with great power and glory. 
 
 St. Matthew, *' The Son of Man coming in the clouds : " and again, 
 each Evangelist represents Him as saying before Caiaphas, " Ye 
 shall see the Son of Man sitting on the right hand of power, and 
 coming in the clouds of heaven." Again, the beloved disciples in 
 the Eevelation says, " Behold, He cometh with clouds, and every 
 Gye shall see Him." Now by this the Lord claims to be the Son 
 of Man of whom the Prophet Daniel speaks : "I saw in the night 
 visions, and behold, one like the Son of Man came with the clouds 
 of heaven, and came to the Ancient of Days, and they brought 
 Him near before Him." To those who had the smallest know- 
 ledge of the contents of the Book of Daniel the Lord's saying 
 that He would come with clouds in power and great glory could 
 mean nothing else but that He would come from the presence of 
 the Ancient of Days to judge us as before He had returned to the 
 bosom of the Ancient of Days on His Ascension. 
 
 But there is another reason of infinite importance. By saying 
 that He will come in the clouds of heaven. He declares that He 
 will come visibly, openly, manifestly, in the greatest possible con- 
 trast to His first coming, when He came in a stable and was laid 
 in a manger, and was known only by special revelation — to the 
 shepherds, the Magi, Simeon, and Hannah. 
 
 And He has now various ways of coming to individual souls or 
 to Churches. He comes spiritually to the soul at the time of 
 its true enlightning, *' When the day dawns, and when the day- 
 star arises in the heart." (2. Pet. i.) Or He comes sacramentally, 
 when as the true Priest and Pastor He feeds the soul at the altar 
 with the spiritual food of His most precious Body and Blood, so 
 that He may henceforth dwell in that soul, and that soul dwell 
 in Him. And He comes to a Church, as to the Church of 
 Laodicea, to " remove her candlestick out of her place unless she 
 repent." 
 
 Now His coming in the clouds is in contrast to all these. By 
 no possible straining of language can this coming in the clouds of 
 heaven — this coming with myriads of attendant angels — this 
 coming like the Hghtning, lighting up the heavens from one end to 
 the other — the coming so that every eye should see Him, both of 
 those that rejoice and those that wail, — by no perversion of lan- 
 guage can this be made to mean a spiritual coming — a coming by 
 
318 HE SHALL SEND HIS ANGELS. [St. Mark. 
 
 27 And then shall lie send his angels, and shall gather 
 together his elect from the four winds, from the uttermost 
 part of the earth to the uttermost part of heaven. 
 
 27. "His angels." So K, A., C, later Uncials, almost all Cursives, some Old Latin, 
 Vulg., and some versions ; but B., D., L., some Old Latin read, " the angels." 
 
 "Hi* elect." So X, A., B., C, later Uncials, almost all Cursives and versions; but 
 D., L., four or five Cursives, and some Old Latin read, "the elect." 
 
 Gospel preaching, a coming in conversion, a coming in consecrated 
 elements, a coming in mysterious providences. It can only mean 
 what every little child will understand by it. And it is only right 
 and fitting that this Son of Man, Who in the sight of this visible 
 world endured such unspeakable humiliation, should in the sight 
 of the same visible world be manifested in such unspeakable glory. 
 
 27. "And then shall he send his angels, and shall gather toge- 
 ther his elect," &c. It is to be remarked that the angels are 
 always associated with the proceedings of the last day. They are 
 not only the retinue of the Judge to add to the pomp and glory of 
 the assize, but they take part in the work of the judgment ; they 
 sever the wicked from the just, they gather the elect from the four 
 winds. How can they do this with unerring certainty ? Does the 
 Judge give them some special mark by which in a moment they can 
 tell who are His and who are not ? Or have they powers of spiri- 
 tual discernment whereby they can look into souls and see their 
 state at a glance ? I think it must be the latter. Such beings 
 would scarcely be employed mechanically, as it were, on such a 
 day, and for such a i)urpose. What tbey do they must do intelli- 
 gently. Humanly speaking, such a work may tax their highest 
 faculties to the uttermost ; but we may be sure that an omnipresent 
 and omniscient Guidance will be with them that they fail not in 
 any one case — that they lose not one grain of the wheat of Christ. 
 *' And shall gather together His elect," i.e. those who have made 
 their calling and election sure — those who have endured to the end 
 — those who have watched and prayed that they might stand before 
 the Son of Man — those that have done good — those, above all, who 
 answer to the character of those who in the great vision of judg- 
 ment are set on the right hand ; that is, those who have fed Christ 
 in His hungry brethren, visited Him in His sick brethren, clad 
 Jlim in His naked brethren. 
 
 " His elect." In the procedure of such a Judge on such a day, 
 
Chap. XIIL] KXOW THAT IT IS NIGH. 319 
 
 28 ^" Now learn a parable of the fig tree ; When her branch 
 is yet tender, and i^utteth forth leaves, ye know y Matt. xxiv. 
 
 . 32 Luke xxi. 
 
 that summer is near : 29^ &e. 
 
 29 So ye in like manner, when ye shall see these things 
 come to i^ass, know that it is nigh, even at the doors. 
 
 28. Revisers translate this, " Now from the fig tree learn her parable ; when her 
 branch has now become tender, and putteth forth its leaves," &c. Cum jam ramus ejus 
 tenerfuerit, et natafuer bit folia, Vulg. The word " yet " in our translation confuses the 
 sense. 
 
 it seems absolutely blasphemous to suppose that His elect are His 
 mere favourites, chosen for no other reason than His mere will. 
 
 This daj^ then, will be the manifestation, not only of God, and 
 of his Son, but of the great unseen and spiritual universe — of the 
 innumerable company of angels, of their ranks and orders, thrones, 
 dominions, principalities, and powers — of the whole assembly and 
 Church of the first-born, for "Then shall the righteous shine forth 
 as the sun in the kingdom of their Father." Then it will be ma- 
 nifested once and for ever that the visible and material universe, 
 with all its order and beauty, and contrivances, and forces and laws, 
 is as nothing to the invisible and spiritual. Then will be manifest 
 the wisdom of faith, in that it has discerned the unseen, and pre- 
 pared for its unveiling. 
 
 May God in His mere}' grant to him who writes and to all who 
 read these words, that when the veil is rent and all this breaks upon 
 us, we may be ready ! 
 
 28. " Now learn a parable of the fig tree ; When her branch is 
 yet tender, and putteth forth," &c. This means, now from the fig 
 tree learn her parabolic or mystical lesson. 
 
 In St. Luke we read that the Lord said, " Behold the fig tree and 
 all the trees." The shooting forth of tender twigs and buds in 
 spring is the surest jDledge of the coming of summer. 
 
 If a man were alone in the world and had lost all reckoning of 
 time, yet he would know the near aj)proach of summer from the 
 shooting forth of the tender branches and young leaves in spring ; 
 and so from the signs which I have foretold, ye yourselves may 
 gather the swift approach of the doom of Jerusalem, and of the 
 world. The sequences of nature are not more certain than the 
 sequences of the spiritual world. 
 
320 TILL ALL BE DONE. [St. IMark. 
 
 30 Verily I say imto you, tliat this generation shall not 
 pass, till all these things be done. 
 
 30. " Verily I say unto you, that this generation shall not pass, 
 till all these things be done." A great difficulty has been made of 
 this place, but I do not see that there is any special difficulty in it, 
 over and above what we find in the rest of this discourse. For 
 throughout this prophecy there is no distinct line drawn between 
 the signs which precede the downfall of Jerusalem, and those which 
 harbinger the end of all things ; and, as I have shown, it was the 
 Lord's intention that there should not be, because it was His will 
 that His second coming should be expected from the moment that 
 He left, "We have to explain His words on principles of common 
 sense, not taking them so absolutely as to make them mean what 
 the discourse itself forbids that they should mean. 
 
 Now, taking a generation to signify, what it is always assumed to 
 do, some thirty or forty years, what the Lord evidently means is 
 that one or both of the events with which His prox)hecy has been 
 occupied should take place within the lifetime of those then Hving 
 or of most of them, which the destruction of Jerusalem actually 
 did. One or both, I repeat: for the second coming might take 
 place at any moment at or after the fall of Jerusalem. There is 
 but one note of time, and that a perfectly indefinite one, which we 
 have in St. Luke's report of the discourse, and it is, " Jerusalem 
 shall be trodden down of the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles 
 be fulfilled." Does then the Lord mean that that generation should 
 not pass till the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled ? The event 
 shows that He cannot have meant this. We must then confine the 
 words " all these things " to the events which precede the destruc- 
 tion of Jerusalem, unless we adopt a way of getting over the diffi- 
 culty, which has found favour with Alford and others, that "gene- 
 ration " means, not the lifetime of a man, but of the Jewish race. 
 Now that would be a very short-lived race which should exist one 
 thousand years. The Jews had aheady existed two thousand, and 
 might exist two thousand more, so that, on this hypothesis, our Lord 
 by " this generation," instead of meaning a limited and definite 
 period of the greatest interest to those who heard Him, because it 
 was their period, really meant an indefinite one, which I need not 
 say is exceedingly unlikely, considering the way in which He 
 emphasizes His words. 
 
CiiAP. XIII.] MY WOEDS SHALL NOT PASS AWAY. 321 
 
 31 Heaven and earth shall pass away : but ^ my words shall 
 not pass away. ^ is. xi. 8. 
 
 32 ^ But of that day ?ind. that hour knoweth no man, no, 
 
 The real key to these words, as I have shown in my notes on St. 
 Matthew, is the declaration of the Lord in St. Matthew xxiii. 36. 
 He had been denouncing woes upon the Scribes and Pharisees, and 
 concluded with the words, "Upon you shall come all the righteous 
 blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto 
 the blood of Zacharias, son of Barachias. Verily I say unto you. 
 All these things shall come upon this generation." " These things " 
 most closely affected the persons for whose es^Decial guidance as re- 
 gards their 7iear fulfilment the whole discourse was sx^oken. So 
 that it seems making a gratuitous difficulty to include among "these 
 things" the day and the hour, which no man knew, which was not 
 to be till after the times of the Gentiles had been fulfilled. 
 
 31. " Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not 
 pass away." " For heaven and earth have in their constitution no 
 necessity of existence, but Christ's words, derived from eternity, 
 have in them such virtue that they must needs abide." (Hilary.) 
 Let us remember that this saying of Christ is true not only of His 
 words respecting the coming desolation, or His own second coming, 
 but of all His words : even of those which men are most slow to 
 receive. So that such words of His as, "Blessed are the merciful, 
 for they shall obtain mercy ; blessed are the peacemakers, for they 
 shall be called the children of God," "He that eateth My Flesh and 
 drinketh My Blood, hath everlasting life, and I will raise him up 
 at the last day," and if there be any other of His words at which 
 even many religious men stumble, let them know that such words, 
 no matter what their hardness, no matter what their contrariety to 
 the world's thoughts and the world's maxims — such words, if 
 once uttered by Him, shall surely be fnlfilled. 
 
 32. " But of that day and that hour knoweth no man . . . neither 
 the Son, but the Father." The words "neither the Son," no 
 matter how they are interpreted, contain a very great difficulty, 
 but we must thoroughly understand in what the difficulty consists. 
 It does not consist in reconciling them with the creeds and doc- 
 trines of the Catholic Church, but with the statements of Christ 
 Himself, and of His Spirit through His servants respecting His 
 own omniscience, and particularly that that omniscience includes 
 
 T 
 
322 NEITHER THE SON. [St. Mark. 
 
 not the angels whicli are in heaven, neither the Son, but the 
 Father. 
 
 the perfect knowledge of His Father. Thus He declares, in words 
 which cannot be mistaken, that the knowledge of the Father and 
 of the Son of One Another is the same. "No one knoweth the 
 Son but the Father, neither knoweth any one the Father save the 
 Son;" and again, "As the Father knoweth Me and I know the 
 Father." " I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me." Again, 
 " I and the Father are one." Now the difficulty is that One Who 
 thus knoweth all that is in the Father, should not know the day 
 and hour of the great crisis of the universe. But the difficulty is a 
 Scrij)ture difficulty, not a Church or ecclesiastical one. It has been 
 explained by some of the Fathers as meaning that He does not 
 know the day so as to reveal it. Thus Hilary : " If there are in 
 Him all the treasures of knowledge, He is not ignorant of this day; 
 rather we ought to remember that the treasures of wisdom in Him 
 are hidden ; His ignorance, therefore, must be connected with the 
 hiding of the treasures of wisdom, which are in Him. For in all 
 cases in which God declares Himself ignorant. He is not under the 
 power of ignorance, but it is not a fit time for speaking." (Hilary, 
 quoted in Cat. Aurea.) Lightfoot, who has written an exercitation 
 on this passage, seems to come to the same conclusion. " The Son 
 (in the sense of the Messias) knoweth not, i.e., it is not revealed to 
 Him from the Father, to reveal to the Church." But notwithstand- 
 ing the high authority for this interpretation, it seems to me unlikely. 
 Again, reference has been made to the passage that "He increased 
 in wisdom and stature," which can only be said of His human 
 nature ; and so here some divines interpret that it is said of Him 
 simply as the Son of Man ; but the Lord here speaks as the 
 Eternal Son, not as made a little lower than the angels, but as 
 above them, for He says, " No, not the angels which are in heaven, 
 neither the Son." 
 
 I cannot help thinking that this ignorance of the Lord on this 
 matter must be connected with His " emptying Himself." In the 
 very same breath in which St. Paul intimates the Lord's equality 
 with His Father he says that He " emptied Himself," but of what ? 
 Of His glory ; but of what did His glory consist ? Surely in the 
 glory of Omniscience, as well as of the other attributes of God. 
 The Son of God then, in some way of which it is not lawful to 
 
Chap. XIII.] WATCH AND PRAY. 323 
 
 33 ^ Take ye heed, watch and pray : for ve know * Matt. xxiv. 
 
 •^ . . r ./ .. 42. & XXV. 13. 
 
 not when the time is. Luke xii. 40. 
 
 & xxi. 34. 
 Rom. xiii. 11. 
 1 Thess. V, 6. 
 
 33. " And pray."' So N, A., C, L., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, many Old Latin, 
 Vnlg., and most versions; omitted by B,, D., Old Latin (a, e, k). 
 
 think, exercised power over His Infinite knowledge, so that it 
 should be in abeyance, as it were, at least on this matter. Olshausen 
 has a good remark : " If, however, the Son of God is here referred 
 to, the ignorance of the * day and hour ' predicated of Him cannot 
 be absolute, because the consubstantiality of the Father and the 
 Son does not permit a specific separation between the knowledge 
 of the Father and that of the Son ; on the contrary, it must be 
 understood of the ' emptying Himself on the part of the Lord in 
 His position of humiliation." 
 
 " Of that day and that hour." Is this to be understood as refer- 
 ring to the time of the Second Advent in a general way, as if the 
 time of His coming was wholly hidden from the Lord, or does it 
 refer to the knowledge of the exact time ? I think the latter ; for 
 the Lord prophesies, as if He saw them, of events immediately 
 preceding His Advent. He is sitting ready, but He awaits the 
 signal from His Father. 
 
 33. " Take ye heed, watch and pray : for ye know not when the 
 time is." The Lord finishes this prophecy with three different 
 parables of warning, all of which must be taken together if one 
 would realize the full lesson. First, we may take the Lord's words 
 in St. Luke, which teach us what will hinder us from being 
 ready : " Take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be 
 overcharged with surfeiting and drunkenness and cares of this life, 
 and so that day come upon you unawares ; " also what will enable 
 us to be ready : *' Watch ye, therefore, and pray always, that ye 
 may be accounted worthy," &c. The parable in St. Matthew 
 teaches us that we are to watch as we would against a thief whom 
 we know to be in the neighbourhood, and who was on the watch 
 to force an entrance into our own house. Now this implies some- 
 thing more than ordinary vigilance. It seems a step beyond what 
 is required in the Lord's words in St. Luke — more, that is, than 
 taking heed against intemperance and worldly cares. It is a 
 watching combined with fear, lest we be robbed of our future by 
 remissness. 
 
324 A MAN TAKING A FAK JOUENEY. [St. Mark. 
 
 34 ^For the So7i of man is as a man taking a far journey, 
 b Matt. xxiv. -^]2o left his lioiise, and srave antliority to his ser- 
 
 45. & XXV. 14. ^ . , ^ '' 
 
 vants, and to every man liis work, and commanded 
 the porter to watch. 
 
 34. ** And to every maa his work." "And" omitted by S, B., C, D., L., two or thre« 
 Cursives, most Old Latin, Vulg. ; retained by A., later Uncials, almost all Cursives and 
 versions. 
 
 But the parable in St. Mark is beyond this. It is watching for 
 the return of a Master, whilst we are doing the task He has 
 assigned to us. The Son of Man is represented as a man taking a 
 far journey, who left his house. This He did on His Ascension. 
 " And gave authority to his servants, and to every man his work." 
 This does not mean, I think, that He gave some servants authority 
 over others, though He has done this ; but it should rather be : 
 " He left His house, and gave to His servants the authority which 
 He had Himself exercised, or He gave them authority in the 
 sense of the warrant and permission to work His work in His 
 absence." 
 
 " To every man his work, and commanded the porter to watch." 
 It would seem, then, that one was to watch for the rest, and the 
 members of the Christian ministry have, in a sense, to watch for 
 all: but then immediately after this come the words, "Watch ye, 
 therefore, for ye know not when the master of the house cometh." 
 Does He here speak to them as being porters ? Only a few can be 
 porters, or gate-keepers. No ; He does not assume that they are all 
 porters ; but they are each one, when at his task, to watch as if they 
 were. Among servants it is the duty of the porter to watch, but in 
 regard of the return of the Lord everyone is to behave as if he 
 were the porter, for he is to do his work and to watch. And so He 
 concludes with " What I say unto you I say unto all, Watch." 
 
 Now what is this watching ? It is certainly some act of the soul 
 towards Christ which, tliough it is united with others, is distinct 
 from them. It is something, for instance, distinct from what is 
 commonly understood as "faith." Faith in Jesus Christ is almost 
 always concentrated on His atoning Death. It is believing that 
 Christ made a full, perfect, and sufiS.cient sacrifice, oblation, and satis- 
 faction for the sins of the whole world, and i)leading this Sacrifice, 
 and claiming constantly our part in it, and believing that through 
 
Chap. XIII.] WATCH YE THEREFORE. 325 
 
 35 ^ Watch ye therefore : for ye know not when the master 
 of the house cometh, at even, or at midnight, or « Matt. xxw. 
 at the cock-crowing, or in the morninc^ : 
 
 it we both are and shall be accepted by God. It is, above all, 
 believing that " He Himself bare our sins in His Own Body on the 
 tree, that we, being dead to sin, should live unto righteousness." 
 But watching for Christ is believing that this Christ once crucified 
 will, at a moment known only to the Father, appear again in the 
 clouds of heaven, and then suddenly, in a moment, cut short the 
 present state of things ; and it is the constant acting as if this were 
 true ; and so being in a state of spiritual wakefulness and ex- 
 pectancy. Take two religious men. One believes that the world 
 will last thousands upon thousands of years longer, and that he 
 and those who succeed him will be, one by one, draughted out of 
 it by death, and taken up to a heaven of such glory that it is 
 scarcely conceivable that anything should be added to it by the 
 resurrection of the vile body. Such an one cannot well be said to 
 watch for Christ's coming ; all his religious notions prevent it. All 
 that he does is to watch against the possible suddenness of death. 
 Such a man may have certain lively feelings towards Christ, but 
 not that particular feeling which is demanded by Christ in His 
 discourse — not the attitude of mind contemplated in this parable, 
 or in the parable of the Ten Virgins, But take another religious 
 man who, by God's grace and Holy Spirit, has been taught 
 habitually to look for, not the hour of death, but the Second 
 Coming. See what will be the difference. Take his views of tha 
 world. He will look upon it as a condemned world awaiting its 
 execution. The fashion of it may be grand and beautiful, but " the 
 fashion of it passeth away." " The world passeth away and the 
 lusts thereof." In fact, his views of all temporal things are best 
 described by the words of the Apostle: "The time is short: it 
 remain»eth, that both they that have wives be as though they had 
 none ; and they that weep, as though they wept not ; and they 
 that rejoice, as though they rejoiced not; and they that buy, as 
 though they possessed not ; and they that use this world, as not 
 abusing it: for the fashion of this v/orld passeth away" (1 Cor. vii- 
 29). Again, take his view of his duty. He will regard it as as. 
 signed to him by his Master, but with no time absolutely allotted to 
 
326 I SAY UNTO ALL, WATCH. [St. Mark. 
 
 36 Lest coining suddenly lie find yon sleeping. 
 
 37 And what I say nnto yon I say unto all, Watch. 
 
 him in which he must do it ; consequently he must be ready to 
 submit it at any moment to his Master's inspection. He cannot 
 lay it down and take it up as he pleases, because his Master may 
 at any moment demand not only to see it, but whether he is at work 
 at it. 
 
 Again, take such a man's view of Christ Himself. The man who 
 reahzes the suddenness of the Personal Coming of the Lord in the 
 clouds of heaven, is the only one who realizes the Saviour as a 
 Judge : and the man who does not realize Him fully and heartily 
 in this capacity does not realize the Christ of the New Testament. 
 For in the Christ of the New Testament, the Judge is never lost 
 sight of in the Saviour, just as the Saviour is never lost sight of in 
 the Judge. If any men ever enjoyed the personal love of Christ 
 they were the Apostles. And yet the Lord never treats them 
 as His mere favourites. He always speaks to them as men who 
 will have to give account, and who are to live in the fear of His 
 Father (Luke xii. 4), as well as to abide in His love, and who will 
 not do so as a matter of course. All these warnings respecting 
 watching and praying for the unknown day are given primarily to 
 the Apostles as if they, each one for himself, had need of them, and 
 if the Apostles had need of such warnings, who now can say that 
 he has not ? 
 
 CHAP. XIV. 
 
 AFTEE * two days was tlie feast of the passover, and of 
 unleavened bread: and the chief priests and the 
 
 a Matt. xxvi. 
 2. Luke xxii. 
 1. John xi, 55. 
 & xiii. 1. 
 
 We now enter on the account of the Lord's Passion. As I noticed 
 in my work on St. Matthew, the Evangelists seem to take pains to 
 connect the Eedeeming work of the Lord with the Passover. In 
 St. Matthew, " "When Jesus had finished all these sayings, He said 
 
CuAP. XIV.] HOW THEY MIGHT TAKE HIM. 327 
 
 scribes souglit liow tliej might take him by craft, and put 
 Mm to death. 
 
 unto His disciples, Ye know that after two days is the feast of the 
 Passover." St. Mark, " After two days was the feast of the Pass- 
 over and of unleavened bread." St. Luke, " Now the feast of un- 
 leavened bread drew nigh, which is called the Passover." 
 
 1. " After two days was the feast of the passover, and of un- 
 leavened bread," &c. Properly, after two days was the Passover and 
 the Azuma or Leavenless feast. The two, though inseparably united» 
 being quite distinct. The Passover was the slain Lamb (as God 
 said to Moses, "Ye shall eat it in haste, it is the Lord's Passover "). 
 The unleavened bread, the Azuma, was the accompaniment. The 
 spiritual significance of the two, as distinct and yet united, is well 
 expressed in the words of St. Paul, " Christ our Passover is sacrificed 
 for us, therefore let us keep the feast . . . with the unleavened 
 bread of sincerity and truth." 
 
 Of all the sacrifices of the Jews the Passover was the most 
 national and the most individual. It was the annual commemora- 
 tion of the redemption from bondage of the nation, and as the 
 nation and Church were conterminous, it was the commemoration 
 of the redemption of the Church ; and it was also the most indivi- 
 dual, for (in the original form) the blood had to be sprinkled on 
 every doorpost, and the body of the victim to be partaken of by 
 every individual in the household. It was thus the annual renewal 
 of the covenant by the whole people and church of Israel. So that 
 the fact that so much stress is laid in the Evangelists on the Lamb 
 of God sufi"ering at the time of this festival of the slain Lamb is 
 very significant indeed. 
 
 "And the chief priests and the scribes sought how they might 
 take him by craft," &c. The events of the last three days had 
 thoroughly alarmed them. The entry into Jerusalem, the Hosan- 
 nahs penetrating even into the temple ; the cleansing of that 
 temple ; the parable of the labourers in the vineyard, evidently 
 directed against themselves ; the denunciation of the Scribes and 
 Pharisees, recorded in St. Matthew; the moral and intellectual 
 power displayed in His answers to their ensnaring questions ; the 
 physical jpower wielded by an unarmed man on the side of God's 
 honour against the polluters of the Sanctuary — all this convinced 
 them that the crisis was come. But the popularity of the Lord, 
 
328 NOT ON THE FEAST DAY. [St. Mark. 
 
 2 But they said, Not on tlie feast day, lest there be an 
 uproar of the people. 
 
 3 ^ '^ And "being in Bethany in the house of Simon the 
 b Matt. xxvi. leper, as he sat at meat, there came a woman 
 
 6. Jwhn xii. r»«i jr»ii'i t 
 
 1, 3. See Luke havmg an alabaster box of omtment ot H spikenard 
 H Or, pxire ^^^J precious ; and she brake the box, and poured 
 TquidZcird. 'ii on his head. 
 
 2. "But they said." So A., C2., later Uncials, almost all Cursives and versions; hut 
 S, B., C, D., L., Old Latin, Vulg. [Cod. Amiat.], Coptic read, " for they said." 
 
 3. " Alabaster box." Properly, " An alabaster," there being no mention of " box." It 
 would more probably be a small bottle or cruse. 
 
 " Of ointment of spikenard." The Greek is " pistic nard," " pistic " being supposed to 
 mean " pure." Some, however, think that it means " liquid." 
 
 evinced by the shouts of the multitude, and the crowds that were 
 very attentive to hear him, made them, fear to take the Lord openly ; 
 there would be a dangerous riot and an attempt at rescue, if it was 
 done in broad daylight ; so they must take Him in secret in the 
 absence of the multitude, and not when the city was crowded to 
 excess at the feast so ra^iidly approaching. Every hour made it 
 more dangerous, for Galileans and Pereans were trooping in who 
 thoroughly believed in the mission from God of the Man "Who had 
 wrought such miracles in their borders. So we read : 
 
 2. " But they said, Not on the feast day, lest there be an uproar 
 of the people." They did not say, " Not on the feast day, lest the 
 most holy feast of the redemption of Israel be defiled by the worst 
 of crimes, the shedding of innocent blood, deliberately out of mahce 
 and envy, but — lest there be an uproar of the people." 
 
 3. " And being in Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, as he 
 sat at meat," &:c. "We learn from the account in St. John that this 
 woman was Mary, the sister of Lazarus and of Martha. It is very 
 singular that some of the Fathers — Origen, Jerome, and others — 
 should have supposed that, because there are certain differences 
 between this account (together, of course, with that of St. Matthew) 
 and St. John's account, that there were two women who thus 
 anointed the Lord : One, Mary, the sister of Lazarus, who anointed 
 His feet six days before the Passover, another, an unknown woman, 
 who anointed His head two days before. But the events are mani- 
 festly the same. Why may she not have anointed both His head and 
 
CiiAr. XIV.] SOME THAT HAD INDIGNATION. 329 
 
 4 And there were some that had indignation within 
 
 4. " Within themselves." Revisers, " Among themselves," 
 
 His feet, but one narrator taking more notice of one, the other of the 
 other? And as regards the time, this is i^erfectly explained by the 
 fact that SS. Matthew and Mark do not relate it with the view of 
 accnrately fixing its time, but in regard of the sequence of thought; 
 for Judas being disappointed of making money out of what seemed 
 so utterly wasted, thereupon determined to make money in another 
 way, by betraying the Lord ; or perhaps they may have inserted it 
 because of the Lord's claiming it as the anointing of His most 
 sacred Body, the anointing of which after death was prevented by 
 His Kesurrection. Anyhow, it seems impossible to suppose that on 
 two separate occasions there was the same substance used in anoint- 
 ing, the same murmuring, the same mention of three hundred 
 pence, the same mention of the poor, the same claim on the Lord's 
 part that it was done for His burial. 
 
 It is, to my mind, another instance of the truth of the threefold 
 narrative on account of its independence. The Evangelists are not 
 careful to make everything in one narrative tally with everything 
 in another. No two men would give exactly the same account of 
 the same transaction unless they had compared their experiences 
 together. 
 
 4, 5, C. " There were some that had indignation within them- 
 selves, and said, Why was this waste ? . . . She hath wrought a 
 good work on Me." This verse, together with the parallel one in 
 St. Matthew, seems to show that Judas, who, no doubt, si^oke 
 confidently, and, as we may say, in the interests of charity, carried 
 some of the twelve along with him in his remonstrance. Now we 
 must remember that if the Lord had been an ordinary prophet sent 
 by God with substantially the same message as other prophets, it 
 would have been waste, but inasmuch as He was the "Word made 
 flesh," "God manifest in the flesh," it was not waste, because it 
 was adoration. It was not waste, just as the frankincense and 
 myrrh of the Magi were not waste but sacred ofierings. It was not, 
 perhaps, the conscious adoration of the Lord as Divine, but it was 
 a long step in that direction : anyhow, it was accepted by Him in a 
 sense beyond that in which she meant it. It was given with a 
 
330 WHY THIS WASTE ? [St. Mark. 
 
 themselves, and said, Why was this waste of the ointment 
 made? 
 
 true and right instinct that He Who had raised her brother from the 
 dead, and had set Himself forth to her sister as the Eesurrection 
 and the Life, and the Object of Life-giving faith, must be very near 
 to God indeed. 
 
 Now there is a great principle involved in her offering, or rather, 
 in our Lord's acceptance of it — which is this, that we may give that 
 which is costly to adorn and beautify the sanctuary of God and His 
 worship. God Himself enjoined on the Jews that they should 
 make a tabernacle of worship of such materials as gold, and purple, 
 and fine linen, and precious stones, and the man after God's own 
 heart collected a vast treasure of gold and costly materials to build 
 and beautify a temple which was to be " exceeding magnifical." But 
 since then a new dispensation has been given which had its founda- 
 tions in the deepest humiliation — in the manger of Bethlehem— in 
 the journeying of a poor, homeless man, with the simple peasants His 
 companions — ending in the cross and in the sepulchre. Is there place 
 in such a kingdom for generous men and women to lavish precious 
 things on His sanctuaries and the accompaniments of His worship ? 
 Now this incident at the end of the Lord's life, taken together with 
 that at its beginning, when God-directed men offered to Him gifts 
 of gold, frankincense, and myrrh, teaches us that there is. Just as 
 this woman was led by a Divine instinct to lavish upon His Person 
 what was costly and fragrant, so the Church has, by the same 
 Divine instinct, been led to pour at His feet the richest treasures of 
 the nations she has subdued to His faith. The Church has done 
 what she could. At least her faithful sons and daughters have. At 
 first, in her days of persecution, she could worship only in cata- 
 combs, and in her days of poverty she could only offer what was 
 rude; but when she subdued her persecutors and emerged from 
 her poverty, then also she did what she could. The grandest efforts 
 of architectural skill have been raised to the honour of Christ, the 
 greater part built in the form of the cross on which He hung to 
 redeem us. The noblest paintings are of His acts and sufferings ; 
 and the most elevating strains of music are accompaniments of His 
 worship. It is too true that many have taken part in these offices 
 who have not, like Mary, sat at His feet, and chosen the good part, 
 but what we are now concerned with is, whether this incident 
 
Chap. XIV.] LET HER ALONE. 331 
 
 5 For it miglit liave been sold for more than three hun- 
 dred II pence, and have "been given to the poor, h see Matt. 
 And they mnrnmred against her. 
 
 6 And Jesns said, Let her alone ; why trouble 
 ye her ? she hath wrought a good work on me. 
 
 7 For ^ ye have the poor with you always, and <= u&ut. xv. ii. 
 whensoever ye will ye may do them good : but me 
 
 ye have not always. 
 
 warrants those who have first given themselves to Him to offer in 
 and for His worship what has cost labour and treasure and skill. 
 
 5. " It might have been sold for more than three hundred pence, 
 and have been given to the poor," &:c. But for what pm-pose 
 would it have been sold? Most likely to some rich, vain, luxurious 
 woman — some daughter of Herodias, perhaps to some harlot. Now 
 it had been used for a purpose unutterably sacred. It was pro- 
 nounced by the Lord to be a good work done upon Him, and who 
 but a Judas would grudge a good work upon Him Who during the 
 whole time of His ministry had been living for the poor? 
 
 7. "Ye have the poor with you always .... do them good. 
 Me ye have not always." " Ye have the poor," &c. Here the Lord 
 emphatically declares the truth laid down in the Law : " The poor 
 shall never cease out of the land. Therefore I command thee say- 
 ing. Thou shalt open thy hand wide unto thy brother, to thy poor, 
 and thy needy in thy land." 
 
 " Me ye have not always." It may be well to dwell a little on the 
 question. How can this be true, seeing that the Lord is now with 
 us — with His Chm'ch — far more effectually than He was with the 
 Jews of Jerusalem and Gahlee in the days of His Flesh ? These 
 are the days in which the saying is true : " I will not leave you 
 comfortless, I will come to you . . . the world seeth Me no more, 
 but ye see Me." The sense in which we must receive it is this : 
 "Me ye have not always, so that ye should acknowledge and 
 honour Me in My state of humiliation." Noiv Christ is in a state of 
 glory: and they who honour Him at all do this with the same 
 Divine honour which they accord to the Father. But then it was 
 not so : it was a special grace of God to discern His Divine Great- 
 ness, when He was in such lowly guise, " despised and rejected of 
 
332 A MEMORIAL OF HER. [St. Mark. 
 
 8 She hatli done what she could : she is come af orehand 
 to anoint m j body to the burying. 
 
 9 Yerily I say unto you, Wheresoever this gospel shall be 
 preached throughout the whole world, this also that she hath 
 done shall be spoken of for a memorial of her. 
 
 9. " This Gospel." So A., C, later Uncials, most Cursives, some Old Latin, Vulg., Sah., 
 Coptic, Syriac, &c. ; but N, B,, D., L., and three or four Cursives read, " The" Gospel. 
 
 men." Verily and indeed it; was no flesh and blood which revealed 
 to St. Peter that the Man Who had sojourned in his house was the 
 Son of the Living God. It was given to men in that day that they 
 should succour Christ, assist Him, shelter Him, and pay honour to 
 His Human Person, as in the nature of things they cannot do now. 
 We may honour Him in what is in some respects a better way, but 
 not in this way. 
 
 8. " She hath done what she could : . . . my body to the bury- 
 ing." If the very and eternal Son of God sojourned amongst us, no 
 event relating to Him could be a common passing event — all must 
 be significant of things pertaining to salvation. But especially must 
 this have been so when the end was so fast approaching. Now this 
 anointing on the part of Mary was ordered so as to signify His 
 coming Death and Burial. It signified her deep devotion and love ; 
 but it signified far more — it set forth that, in love to us. He would 
 give His life for us ; and that with the surrender of His life His 
 humiliation should be ended. He should be " with the rich in His 
 .Death." Preparatory to His Body being enclosed in the costly new 
 tomb, hewn out of the solid rock, it should be anointed with an 
 unguent of extraordinary value and fragrance, betokening how not 
 only His Soul, His Spirit, His teaching. His example, but His very 
 Body, the lower part of His adorable human Person, should be had 
 in the deepest reverence in all ages. 
 
 9. "Verily I say unto you, V/heresoever this gospel shall be 
 preached . . . memorial of her." " Who then proclaimed it, and 
 caused it to be spread abroad ? It was the power of Him Who is 
 speaking these words. And while of countless kings and generals, 
 the noble exploits (even of those whoso memorials remain) have 
 sunk into silence ; and having overthrown cities, and encompassed 
 them with walls, and set up trox)hies, and enslaved many nations, 
 
Chap. XIV.] ONE OF THE TWELVE. 333 
 
 10 ^ ^ And Judas Iscariot, one of tlie twelve, went nnto 
 tlie chief priests, to Letray liini unto tliem. ^ Matt. xxvi. 
 
 . 14. Luke xxii. 
 
 11 And wnen they heard it, they were glad, 3,4. 
 
 they are not known so much as by hearsay, nor by name, though 
 they have both set uj) statues, and established laws ; yet that a 
 woman who was a harlot ^ (?) poured out oil in the house of some 
 leper, in the presence of ten men, this all men celebrate through- 
 out the world ; and so great a time has passed, and yet the memory 
 of that which was done hath not faded away ; but alike Persians 
 and Indians, Scythians and Thracians, and Sarmatians, and the 
 race of the Moors, and they that dwell in the British Islands, spread 
 abroad that which was done secretly." 
 
 And since this eloquent Bishop wrote this, continents have been 
 added to the Christian world, in which the book which contains 
 this account is extensively circulated ; so that, to adopt the words 
 of St. John, " the world is filled with the odour of this deed of 
 grace." 
 
 10, 11. "And Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve, went unto the 
 chief priests," &c. For remarks on the steps which led to the fall 
 of Judas, see my notes on St. John (xii. 6). 
 
 *' One of the twelve," i.e. one of those who had companied with the 
 Lord and His Apostles all the time that He went in and out among 
 them : consequently, one of those very few who had opportunities 
 such as no other men had of observing closely the private life of the 
 Word made flesh. During all this time he had an example before 
 him of the highest goodness and hoHness, of the most exalted piety 
 towards God, of the greatest possible kindness and considerateness 
 and patience and forbearance towards men. During this time he 
 had seen stupendous miracles of healing done by the Lord daily ; 
 and had heard such denunciations of the two vices of covetousness 
 and hypocrisy as must have, at the first, at least, made his heart 
 quail and his ears tingle. And yet this man goes to the bitter 
 enemies of the Lord to betray Him unto them — i.e. he undertook to 
 watch all the Lord's movements, so that, if He went to some of His 
 
 ^ He identifies this Mary who anointed the Lord's head and feet 
 with the woman mentioned in Luke vii. 37, but I believe this to 
 be impossible. 
 
334 HE SOUGHT HOW. [St. Maek. 
 
 and promised to give him money. And lie sougM how he 
 
 might conveniently betray him. 
 
 I-^^^LuiSr''' 12 IF ^ And the first day of unleavened bread, 
 
 xxii. 7. 
 
 accustomed resorts for the purpose of secret prayer, he might let the 
 Lord's enemies know where they might seize upon Him without 
 danger of a tumult. Of him Quesnel says : " An apostle of Jesus 
 Christ gives himself up to the devil, betrays his Master into the 
 hands of His enemies, and thinks of nothing but of that which he 
 had engaged to do for the love of money. Who can forbear 
 trembling when he reflects upon this league and conspiracy betwixt 
 an apostle of the Christian Church and the chief priests to destroy 
 its Founder and Head ? Christ sees, and permits it, to teach the 
 faithful not to be greatly troubled at the desertion and treachery 
 even of pastors, when it happens in the Church." 
 
 " And he sought how he might conveniently betray him." Very 
 probably they impressed upon him that it must be done with the 
 greatest possible despatch, so that, if possible, it should be done 
 before, and not after, the feast day — i.e. He must be delivered into 
 their hands before the Friday evening. 
 
 12-16. " And the first day of unleavened bread, when . , . made 
 ready the Passover." It is very important to remember that the 
 word " killed " means sacrificed — the Passover was the great 
 national and federal sacrifice of the Jews. The Paschal Lamb was 
 slain at the place of sacrifice, and its blood poured at the bottom of 
 the altar. So vast was the number of lambs to be slain that the 
 priests were obliged to form two rows from the gate of the court 
 (beyond which the lay Israelite could not pass) to the altar, and 
 to hand the vessel which contained the blood of each lamb from one 
 to another, as rapidly as possible ; and even with these, and per- 
 haps many other contrivances which have not come down to us, it 
 is impossible to imagine how they got through the week in the time. 
 I give in a note an extract from Josephus,^ with a calculation 
 
 ^ '* That this city could contain so many people in it is manifest 
 by that number of them, which was taken under Cestius, who being 
 desirous of informing Nero of the flower of the city, who otherwise 
 was disposed to contemn that nation, entreated the high priests, if 
 the thing were possible, to take the number of their whole multi- 
 
Chap. XIV.] WHEN THEY KILLED THE PASSOVER. 335 
 when they || killed the passover, his disciples said | ^J'' ^"'^'' 
 
 founded upon it, by which the reader will perceive that it is very 
 difficult, indeed impossible, to suppose that the killing of all the 
 lambs required could be accomplished in one day ; so that, in all 
 probability, very many partook of the sacrifice before, as did also 
 very many after, the very short time which was laid down in the 
 Law of Moses for the slaying and sprinkling of the blood. 
 
 tude. So these high priests, upon the coming of their feast, which 
 is called the Passover, when they slay their sacrifices, from the ninth 
 hour to the eleventh, but so that a company not less than ten 
 belong to every sacrifice (for it is not lawful for them to feast singly 
 by themselves) — and many of us are twenty in a company, found 
 the number of sacrifices 256,500, which, upon the allowance of no 
 more than ten that feast together, amounts to two millions seven 
 hundred thousand and two hundred persons " [the reckoning is that 
 of the historian] . ("Wars of the Jews," bk. vi. ch. ix. § 3.) 
 
 Now supposing that we reduce this number of lambs to 200,000, 
 and seeing that there are 7,200 seconds in the two sacrificial hours 
 mentioned by Josephus, this would require that the blood of twenty- 
 seven lambs should be poured at the foot of the altar every second — 
 a thing apparently incredible ; and, in addition to this, all these 
 lambs had to be previously slaughtered within the temple precincts. 
 But take the pouring out of the blood. "We are told that there were 
 two rows of priests, who handed the vessel containing the blood of 
 each lamb from one to another — the first receiving it at the gate of 
 the court, the last pouring it at the foot of the altar. But if the 
 reader considers for a moment he will see that it would require 
 more than twenty rows of priests to get through the work in the 
 time allotted; for no man, however expeditious, could take a basin 
 into his hands, empty it of its contents, and relieve his hands of it 
 by passing it back again, in less than three or four seconds. The 
 slightest hitch in the arrangements might make it minutes instead 
 of seconds. Now why do I dwell upon all this ? Simply to show 
 that it is impossible to say that this, that, or the other rule or rubric 
 must have been observed when you have to prepare sacrificially a 
 sacred meal for between one and two millions of persons. I firmly 
 beheve that the exigencies of such a festival required that very large 
 
336 GO YE INTO THE CITY. [St. Mark. 
 
 ■unto him, Where wilt thou that we go and prepare that thou 
 mayest eat the passover ? 
 
 13 And he sendeth forth two of his disciples, and saith unto 
 them, Go ye into the city, and there shall meet you a man 
 bearing a pitcher of water : follow him. 
 
 *' Where wilt thou that we go and prepare that thou mayest eat 
 the passover ? " Taking these words, together with the account in 
 St. Luke, where we read that it was the Lord who began with the 
 words, "Go and prepare us the passover," and also taking into account 
 other words of His, " With desire I have desired to eat this pass- 
 over with you before I suffer," I think that there can be no doubt 
 that the Lord intended to eat, and therefore sent His discix)les to 
 ]prepare an actual passover. If He had intended them to prepare 
 merely a makeshift passover such as the Jews observe now, He 
 could not have said, " Go and prepare us the passover" for the 
 Passover did not mean a meal of unleavened bread and wine, but 
 a lamb slain and roasted after its blood had been sacrificially pre- 
 sented. I have not the slightest doubt but that He so timed His 
 command that all the requirements of the ceremonial law that in 
 His day needed to be fulfilled were fulfilled, and that the day be- 
 fore the great day of the sacrificing, He ate an anticipatory pass- 
 over which His sovereign wil], always in accord with the will of His 
 Father, combined with the necessities of the case, made to be a true 
 and valid one. In my note on St. Matthew xxvi., I mentioned a 
 number of the features of the original institution which had dis- 
 
 numbers had their Passover lambs prepared, killed, presented, 
 roasted, and eaten, both before and after the strictly legal time. 
 
 Exception may be taken to Josephus's account ; but such excep- 
 tions are taken by those who live 1,800 years after the time when 
 all this took i)lace ; and he was a contemporary of the greater part 
 of the Apostles, and had probably attended at the Passover every 
 year of his life. The ruins of the cities of ancient Palestine are so 
 numerous, especially in Galilee, that the population must have been 
 immense, and every Jew was bound to present himself, with as many 
 of his family as he could bring, at this festival especially ; so that 
 it is not at all improbable that one or, perhaps, nearly two millions 
 of people were at that time in, or camping about, Jerusalem. 
 
Chap. XIV.] WHERE IS THE GUESTCHAMBER? 837 
 
 14 And wlieresoever lie shall go in, say ye to tlie goodman 
 of the house, The Master saith, Where is the guestchamber, 
 where I shall eat the passover with my disciples ? 
 
 15 And he will shew you a large npper room furnished 
 and prepared : there make ready for us. 
 
 14. " The gnestchamber." So A., later Uncials, almost all Cursives ; but N, B., C, D., 
 L., several Cursives, some Old Latin, Vulg., and versions read, "Where is my guest- 
 chamber p " 
 
 appeared altogether in our Lord's time, so that the only parts 
 which then remained seem to have been the slaying and eating of 
 the lamb, and the use of the unleavened bread. Certainly the part 
 which we hold to be by far the most significant, the sprinkling of 
 the blood on the lintel of the door, had been discontinued for 
 ages.-^ 
 
 14. " Wheresoever he shall go in . . . say ye." This action of 
 the Lord seems to be the same as that mentioned a little before 
 this, when He sent the disciples to procure Him the colt. It has 
 been conjectured that the man was a behever, and had had a 
 previous intimation ; but is it not quite as Hkely that he was one 
 who had a room prepared for those who, Uke the Lord, had need 
 to keep the feast a little earlier? 
 
 15, 16. " And he will shew you . . . they made ready the pass- 
 over." It has been conjectured that the name of the man was not 
 mentioned, to conceal the matter from Judas, who was on the 
 watch to show to His enemies where the Lord was to be found ; 
 but I think it is much more likely that the Lord sent them to this 
 
 ^ Archdeacon Farrar, endeavouring to prove that the Lord only 
 ate a quasi-passover, writes, " W^e have not a word about the Lamb, 
 the mazzoth or unleavened bread, the merorim, or bitter herbs, the 
 sauce charoseth," &c ; but why should we if it was, as far as 
 possible, a true passover ? If it was a true passover the Evangehsts 
 would take for granted that all was, as far as could be, in order, and 
 make no mention of particulars ; but if it had been a substitute I 
 think they would have mentioned the circumstance. Again he 
 writes : " The Paschal meat could now have no significance for 
 Him," &c. , . . But it would certainly have the significance of 
 obedience. (Matt. iii. 15.) 
 
 z 
 
338 IS IT I? IS IT I? [St. Mark. 
 
 16 And his disciples went forth, and came into the city, 
 and found as he had said unto them : and they made ready 
 the passover. 
 fMatt. xxvi. 17 ^And in the eveninor he cometh with the 
 
 20, &c. ° 
 
 twelve. 
 
 18 And as they sat and did eat, Jesus said, Verily I say 
 anto you, One of you which eateth with me shall betray me. 
 
 19 And they began to be sorrowful, and to say unto him 
 one by one, Is it I ? and another said, Js it I ? 
 
 19. "And another said. Is it I?" omitted by S, B., C, L., about twenty Cursives, 
 Vulg., Sah., and some versions; retained by A., D., later Uncials, most Cursives, and 
 some Old Latin. 
 
 man as having a room ready to be used by any party who de- 
 sired it. 
 
 16-18. " And in the evening . . . one of you which eateth with 
 me shall betray me." St. Mark gives as the words, " One of you 
 that eateth loith me shall betray me." St. Matthew and St. Luke 
 not mentioning that He said " One that eateth with me." It 
 would be the greatest aggravation of treachery, to the Oriental mind, 
 that one who had partaken food with any man should then and 
 there meditate to do him an injury. This peculiar aggravation of 
 the sin of Judas is foretold in Psalm xli., " Yea, mine own fami- 
 liar friend in whom I trusted, which did eat of my bread, hath 
 lifted up his heel against me." There is a story told of one who 
 had slain a man in the heat of passion, and was fleeing from his 
 pursuers, that he took refuge with a gardener, and described to him 
 his danger, and the cause of it. The gardener said nothing, but 
 offered him half a peach, which the fugitive ate, he eating the other 
 half. As soon as this was done the gardener said to him, " From 
 your account of him whom you slew, I believe that he was my son, 
 but you killed him not in malice, so I invited you to take a morsel 
 of food with me, and I can now do you no harm. If you flee that 
 way you will be secure. I will see to it that your pursuers take 
 another road." 
 
 19. "And they began to be sorrowful, and to say unto him one 
 by one. Is it I ? " &c. Notice how each one suspected himself, 
 none looked at his neighbour, not one looked at Judas. "It is 
 
CuAP. XIV.] IT IS ONE OF THE TWELVE. 339 
 
 20 And he answered and said nnto them, It is one of the 
 twelve, that dippeth with me in the dish. 
 
 21 ^ The Son of man indeed goeth, as it is e Matt. xxvi. 
 
 24. Luke xxii. 
 
 written of him : but woe to that man by whom 22. 
 the Son of man is betrayed ! good were it for that 
 man if he had never been born. 
 
 21. " The Son of Man." So A., C, D., later Uncials, almost all Cursives. "Because 
 the Son of man " read by S, B., L., Sah., Coptic, Vulg. Some Old Latin, Syi-iac, &c. 
 read, Etjilius hominis. 
 
 natural to the just to fear lest some sin should lie hidden in their 
 hearts, without their knowing it. A man ought always to think 
 himself more subject to fall than others ; because every one best 
 knows his own weakness, and has reason to apx^rehend everything 
 from his own infidelity." (Quesnel.) 
 
 20. " It is one of the twelve, that dippeth with me in the dish." 
 The Orientals, instead of bringing the meat in various dishes, 
 arrange it in one large dish, into which everyone dips his fingers. 
 Thus the repast is much more like a common meal, more like eat- 
 ing together than in our meals. We eat, as far as we can, sepa- 
 rately, even when dining together ; they eat, as far as is possible, 
 together. 
 
 21. " The Son of man indeed goeth, as it is written of him." He 
 goeth to death by the way of betrayal, agony, apprehension, denial, 
 insult, mocking, scourging, crucifixion, all these things are written 
 of Him, but though foreseen, they are not the less the actions of 
 wilhng, and self-conscious, and so guilty agents. God foresaw all 
 this excess of guilt, and decreed that it should bring in everlasting 
 righteousness : but the sin was the same. 
 
 " Good were it for that man if he had never been born." Dr. 
 Pusey has some very deep remarks ujDon these words as showing 
 that they are absolutely incompatible with the doctrine of the uni- 
 versal restoration of all sinners, for if after ever so long a punish- 
 ment Judas was restored, in ever so small a degree, to the favour 
 of God, he would be an eternity in that favour, and so it would be 
 impossible to say of him, that it would have been better for him if 
 he had never come into existence. Judas made himself, by his 
 persistence in sm, irredeemable. After he had fallen into sin, and 
 deliberately continued in it, in spite of the example, the teaching, 
 
 \ 
 
340 JESUS TOOK BREAD. [St. Mark. 
 
 h Matt xxvi. 22 ^^And as they did eat, Jesus took bread, 
 
 26. Lnke xxii. u j ' r 
 
 19. 1 Cor, xi. 
 
 23. 
 
 the mighty works, the warnings and threatenings of the Son of 
 God, it is impossible to conceive of any action of God which could 
 tm'n him to God, and yet preserve to him his freewill. 
 
 22. "And as they did eat, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and 
 brake it," &c. We now come to the institution of the Eucharist. 
 I have commented very fully upon this in my notes on St. Matthew, 
 and must refer the reader to those notes upon this point especially, 
 the bearing of the Essential Godhead of Him Who instituted the 
 Eucharist upon what He instituted, and also upon the words in 
 which He instituted it. If the Lord was a mere man, then the 
 Eucharist is one of many merely human memorials. His Flesh 
 and Blood being in this case no more than any other man's flesh 
 and blood, we must apply to the words in which He gave it to us 
 the same rules of interpretation by which we should explain (or ex- 
 plain away) similar words spoken to us by any other mere man. If 
 any mere human being had offered to us on his death-bed bread and 
 wine, calling it his body and his blood, and then departed out of this 
 world without explaining his meaning, we should have thought it a 
 very strange way of speaking, for we should have said to ourselves, 
 Why need we partake of his body and his blood in order to re- 
 member him ? Kemembering him is an act of our minds quite un- 
 connected with his body. When we think of our friends we think 
 of their minds and souls, of their conversation, of their example, 
 not of their body and blood. We should never think of expressing 
 a loving act of memory towards any departed friend by saying that 
 we eat his flesh and drink his blood ; and so we should at once 
 X^roceed to divest the dying man's words of all mystery. We should 
 make excuses for their sti'nngeness by calling to mind that our 
 friend sometimes spoke figuratively, but we should be very hard 
 pressed if we were obliged to explain how he could have used 
 60 extraordinary a figure to set forth so commonplace a reality as 
 remembering him after he was gone. Such would be undoubtedly 
 our view of the matter, if we considered our friend to have been in 
 all respects the same as ourselves, and such have been the views of 
 those who held Christ ^to be nothing more than a man, as Socinus 
 and his followers. 
 
 But supposing that any Christian firmly and thoroughly grasped 
 the truth of the Lord's Godhead, must not his view of the meaning 
 
Chap. XIV.] BLESSED AND BEAKE IT. 341 
 
 and blessed, and brake it, and gave to tliem, and said, 
 
 of such a rite, instituted in such words, be altogether different ? He 
 must plainly put this to himself: " These are the words of One 
 Who is perfect God and perfect man. They are the words of the 
 tender, loving Son of man, but must they not partake of the eter- 
 nity and infinity of the Godhead of the Speaker ? They are the 
 words of God Incarnate ; must they not have to do with the deep 
 and unfathomable mystery of His holy Incarnation? They are the 
 words of One Who could offer His Body a sacrifice for all men ; 
 must they not embody and set forth the mystery of that Sacrificial 
 Body ? They are the words of One Who rose from the dead in a 
 Spiritual Body, having faculties and properties far above those of 
 the natural body ; must they not have to do with the profound 
 mystery of the existence of a Spiritual Body, in which dwells aU the 
 fulness of the Godhead ? They are the words of One Who was able 
 to make Himself the Second Adam of the human race, so as to enable 
 all men to partake of His pure and holy human nature, to counter- 
 act the effects of their having partaken of the impure and unholy 
 nature of the first Adam. Must not such words of necessity be 
 linked with such a mj^steiy ? " 
 
 We must then approach the institution and the words which set 
 it forth in the firm faith that He is the God-man, the Word made 
 flesh, God manifest in the flesh. If we do not do this we are in 
 danger of judging of it as of any other memorial ordained by men. 
 If we do this — if we approach the consideration of it in the faith of 
 His Godhead and Incarnation, then God will open out to us the 
 mystery as we are able to bear it. 
 
 The Lord in the institution of the Eucharist fulfilled three 
 things : — 
 
 1. He fulfilled the prophecy of the llOtli Psalm, " Thou art a 
 priest for ever, after the order of Melchizedek." 
 
 2. He fulfilled the Passover by making Himself the Paschal 
 Lamb, and ordaining a means by which, till He comes again, His 
 Church should i)artake of Him as that Lamb. 
 
 3. He fulfilled the promises which He had given in the syna- 
 gogue of Capernaum, that He would give Himself as the true 
 Manna, the Living Bread which came down from heaven. 
 
 (1.) First He claimed to be the j)riest after the order of Mel- 
 chizedek, and acted as such. Melchizedek is t-he most mysterious 
 
342 THIS IS MY BODY. [St. Mark. 
 
 Take, eat : tliis is mj body. 
 
 22. "Take, eat." The word "eat" omitted by H, A., B., C, D., K., L., M., several 
 
 Cursives, most Old Latin, Vulg., Sah., Coptic, Syi'iac, &c. ; retained by E., F., H., some 
 other later Uncials, and most Cursives. 
 
 character of the Old Testament. He appears for a moment on the 
 scene, and then disappears as if he were a visitant from another 
 world. He is declared to be greater than Abraham, for he pro- 
 nounced a blessing upon that greatest of Patriarchs, and "with- 
 out all contradiction, the less is blessed of the greater." (Heb. 
 vii. 7). Of the way in which he exercised his priesthood, but 
 two things are said — that he brought forth bread and wine, and that 
 he blessed the Father of the faithful. What he did with this bread 
 and wine we know not, but of one thing we may be most certain, that 
 its significance could not end with the temporary refreshment with 
 which it recruited Abraham. In the 110th Psalm, which the Lord 
 claims as referring to Himself, the Messiah is said to be ordained 
 by God with an oath : " Thou art a priest for ever after the manner 
 of Melchizedek ; " not so much after the order, in the sense of suc- 
 cession, but rather after the manner, which is the way of exercising 
 his functions, and which is in extreme contrast with that of Aaron, 
 Aaron slaying animals and offering their blood, of which, in respect 
 of Melchizedek we are told nothing. Well, the Lord on the night 
 before His crucifixion did this thing which His great forerunner 
 and type did, He brought forth bread and wine. But what had 
 this to do with His priesthood ? It was His most characteristic act 
 in His capacity as Priest, as distinguished from His suffering as a 
 Victim, for by this voluntary act on His part He, as the Priest, 
 surrendered Himself to be the Victim. By breaking the bread, and 
 saying over it, " This is my body," He gave up His Body to be 
 wounded and pierced, that is, broken. By saying, " This is my 
 blood," He gave His Blood to be separated from His Body in death. 
 This was His formal surrender of Himself as the Priest-Victim. 
 He offered His Body and Blood as the Priest ; He, by anticipation, 
 surrendered His Life as the Victim. In it He fulfilled His own 
 words, " Noman takethmylifefrom Me, but I lay it down of Myself. 
 I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again " 
 (John X. 18). In this way the bringing forth of bread and wine by 
 Melchizedek betokened the action by which the Eternal Son for- 
 mally offered Himself. As the offerer had to lay his hand upon the 
 
Chap. XIV.] HE TOOK THE CUP. 343 
 
 23 And lie took tlie cup, and when he had given thanks, 
 
 23. " The cup," So A., later Uncials, almost all Cursives. " A cup " read by S, B., C, 
 D., L., and some Cursives. 
 
 victim, and so parted with all power over it and all ownership in it, 
 and gave it up to be dealt with according to the Sacrificial Law, so 
 the Son of God did that which corresponded to this when He brake 
 the bread and took the cup, which betokened the separation of His 
 Blood from His Body in death. Wherefore there follows : " And 
 as they did eat, Jesus took bread ; " that is, in order to show that 
 He Himself is that Person to whom the Lord swore, " Thou art a 
 priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek. . . . He Himself also 
 breaks the bread, which He gives to His disciples to show that the 
 breaking of His Body was to take x^lace, not against His will, nor 
 without His intervention ; He also blessed it, because He, with the 
 Father and the Holy Spirit, filled His human nature, which He 
 took upon Him in order to suffer, with the grace of Divine power. 
 (Bede, Cat. Aurea.) 
 
 (2.) But, in the second place, the Lord in the institution fulfilled 
 the Passover by making Himself the Paschal Lamb. He most 
 earnestly desired to eat the Jewish Passover with His disciples 
 before He suffered, in order that He might regenerate it, as it were, 
 and give it a new form, and invest it with new grace and power. 
 For the Jewish Passover was the feeding upon tens of thousands of 
 lambs, whereas the Christian Passover is the One Lamb once for 
 all slain, "Whose Blood must be sprinkled on every heart, and 
 Whose Body must be partaken of by every believer. The Eucha- 
 ristic Bite which He instituted. He instituted for the purpose of 
 making men everywhere and at all times partakers of the Flesh of 
 the Lamb of God once for all slain upon the Cross. The event 
 on Calvary was hidden from the comprehension of man, the offer- 
 ing was dishonoured, without i)artakers, without public testimony 
 to its dignity and power. The Christian Passover — the Eucharist, 
 remedies this. It honours the One Offering, it enables men to 
 partake of it publicly before God and before His Church, and 
 to show forth the Lord's Death, All this is involved in certain 
 words of St. Paul. To Gentile Christians, who had no interest in 
 Jewish feasts, he writes, " Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us, 
 therefore let us keep the feast." The feast on what? He himself 
 
344 THEY ALL DRANK OF IT. [St. Mark. 
 
 he gave it to them : and they all drank of it. 
 
 tells us in the same epistle, *' The cup of blessing which we bless, is 
 it not the partaking of the Blood of Christ ? the bread which we 
 break, is it not the partaking of the Body of Christ? " (1 Corinth, x. 
 7,8; X. 16.) 
 
 (3.) But, in the third place, the Lord here institutes a means of 
 grace by which men are enabled to lay hold of His promise re- 
 specting the reception of His Body and Blood to be our spiritual 
 food and sustenance, which He gave in the discourse in the syna- 
 gogue at Capernaum. He there sets forth the most astonishing 
 benefits as coming from the beUeving reception of His Body and 
 Blood : but He makes no mention of the form under which, or the 
 means by which, this reception can be brought about. The words 
 of that discourse, as I have shown in my notes on St. John, cer- 
 tainly demand something more than a mere mental or spiritual 
 manducation. What is this "something more"? The words of 
 the Institution teach us this. It is the receiving of the elements 
 of bread and wine, accompanied by a special act of faith, by 
 which we discern in them an Inward Part, even His Body and 
 Blood. 
 
 It is clear that such words as *' Take, eat ; this is my body," 
 must be addressed to faith, and to very special faith too. But how 
 was this faith excited ? What teaching of the Lord would enable 
 the Apostles to hear and receive the words of Institution, and the 
 rite they instituted, in a spirit worthy of Himself, and of the occa- 
 sion, for it was the eve of His own Sacrifice ? Evidently the words 
 uttered in the synagogue of Capernaum, " Verily, verily, I say unto 
 you, except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink His Blood, 
 ye have no life in you. Whoso eatetli My flesh and drinketh My 
 blood hath eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. 
 For My flesh is meat indeed, and My blood is drink indeed. He 
 that eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood hath eternal life, and I 
 will raise him up at the last day." Unless these words were spoken 
 by the Lord to prepare them for the believing reception of the 
 Eucharist, then they received that Eucharist without a word from 
 Christ to prepare them for it : unless the Eucharist be the means 
 whereby we receive what is promised in these words, then the most 
 extraordinary promise was given by the Lord, with no means for 
 our receiving that promise in a way at all corresponding to the 
 
Chap. XIV.] THIS IS MY BLOOD. 345 
 
 24 And lie said unto them, This is mj blood of the new 
 
 24. "Of the new testament." So A., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, most Old 
 Latin, Yulg., Syriac, and some versions. "New" omitted by H, B., C, D., L., Sab., 
 Coptic. 
 
 terms of the promise : for the terms of the promise are not merely 
 spiritual, but also bodily terms ; they refer not to spirit only but 
 to flesh — they refer not to acts of the mind, such as thinking, 
 reflecting, dwelling upon something, but to an act of the body : they 
 seem in fact to demand an outward act of eating, not of mere carnal 
 eating, but of eating in such a way that the highest and most 
 submissive faith can be simultaneously exercised with the bodily 
 act, and these things we have combined in the right and faithful 
 use of what the Lord now ordained.^ 
 
 ^ They had learned before that His Flesh and Blood are the true 
 cause of eternal life ; that this they are not by the bare force of 
 their own substance, but through the dignity and worth of His 
 Person which offered them wp by way of sacrifice for the life of the 
 whole world, and doth make them still effectual thereunto ; finally 
 that to us they are life in particular, by being particularly received. 
 This much they knew, although as yet they understood not per- 
 fectly to what effect or issue the same would come, till, at length, 
 being assembled for no other cause which they could imagine, but 
 to have eaten the Passover only tliat Moses aj)pointeth, when they 
 saw their Lord and Master with hands and eyes lifted up to heaven, 
 first bless and consecrate for the endless good of all generations till 
 the world's end the chosen elements of bread and wine, which 
 elements made for ever the instruments of life by virtue of His 
 Divine benediction, they being the first that were commanded to 
 receive from Him, the first which were warranted by His promise 
 that not only unto them at the present time, but to whomsoever 
 they and their successors after them did duly administer the same, 
 those mysteries should serve as conduits of Life and convej'ance of 
 His Body and Blood unto them, was it possible they should hear that 
 voice, " Take, eat, this is My Body ; Drink ye all of this, this is 
 My Blood ; " possible that doing what was required, and believing 
 what was promised, the same should have present effect in them, 
 and not fill them with a kind of fearful admiration at the heaven 
 which they saw in themselves (Hooker " Eccles. Pol." v. Ixvii. 4). 
 
346 SHED FOR MANY. [St. Mark. 
 
 testament, which is shed for many. 
 
 We now proceed to say a few words apart from the general sub- 
 ject, on the Lord's words as set forth in St. Mark's Gospel. 
 
 22. "And as they did eat, Jesus took bread." This "taking of 
 bread " is mentioned in all the four accounts, i.e., in the Gospels, and 
 in St. Paul's first Epistle to the Corinthians (chaxD. xi. 23). He took 
 it, and, no doubt, raised it up in His hands with peculiar solemnity. 
 It must have formed a prominent feature in this first celebration, 
 or it would not have been specially mentioned. 
 
 " Bread." Augustine has a remark worth reproducing. " The 
 Lord committed His Body and Blood to substances which are 
 formed an homogeneous compound out of many. Bread is made 
 of many grains, wine is produced out of many berries. Herein the 
 Lord Jesus signified us and hallowed in His own table the mystery 
 of our peace and unity." 
 
 "And blessed." What the words of this blessing were we know 
 not, only we are sure of this, that inasmuch as He, the Great Insti- 
 tutor, was celebrating, therefore His blessing reached not merely 
 the elements then on the table, but all future ones : so that when 
 His ministers bless in His Name they fulfil His Institution. For 
 He, as the Great Priest, accomx)anies each blessing, i.e., eachx^i'ayer 
 of consecration pronounced in His Name with His power, so that 
 this Sacrament is to the end of time what it was at the first. 
 
 " And brake." On this account the Sacrament is called the 
 " breaking of bread." I have looked into many Liturgies, and have 
 found none in which the breaking of the bread is in such prominence 
 as it is in the office of the Church of England, where it is embodied 
 in the Consecration Prayer itself. In many offices, notably in that 
 ot the Church of Eome, the actual breaking takes place long after 
 the recital of the words of Institution, i.e., the words, " This is my 
 body," whereas in the case of the institution by the Lord the 
 breaking and the saying, " This is my body," went together. 
 
 "And gave to them, and said. Take [eat] this is my Bod}^" 
 By these words He made the bread to be the Sacrament of His 
 Body, so that it is now a mystery containing two parts, an out- 
 ward of bread, and an Inward Part, the Body of Christ, which, 
 in the words of the Church, is given to us to be our spiritual food 
 and sustenance, and which, in our communion ofl6.ce, is given to 
 the faithful with the words : " The Body of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
 
Chap. XIV.] I WILL DRINK NO MORE. 347 
 
 25 Yerily I say unto you, I will driuk no more of the fruit 
 
 which was given for thee, preserve thy body and soul to everlasting 
 life." Respecting the mode in which all this is brought about, I 
 desire to repeat what I wrote in my note on St. Matthew xxvi. 28, 
 J). 412 : " The Lord has here enshrined a thing, which, being a 
 Mystery, never can be exj)lained, never can be made clear, never 
 can be made simple, never can be so expressed as not to require 
 very humble faith in those who would acce^^t it in Christ's own 
 terms." 
 
 23. " The cup," i.e., of mingled wine and water — for wine was 
 always drunk mingled with water. 
 
 "When he had given thanks." Apparently the same as the 
 *' blessing." Thus St. Paul (in 1 Cor. x. 16) speaks of the cup being 
 blessed. " The cup of blessing which we bless." 
 
 " He gave it to them, and they all drank of it." These words 
 are different from those recorded in St. Matthew, but exactly cor- 
 respond to them. For in St. Matthew we read that theLoixl said : 
 " Drink ye all of it," and St. Mark, without gi^ing these words, 
 tells us that "they all drank of it." Bishop Butler thinks (" Anal." 
 pi. ii. chap. 3) that it might possibly be intended that events as 
 they come to pass, should open and ascertain the meaning of 
 several parts of Scripture. " We can understand, in this view, the 
 emphasis laid on the term ' all,' as a timely protest against the 
 denial of the cup to the laity " (Ford). 
 
 24. "And He said unto them, This is my blood of the new 
 testament." The Lord, in instituting His Sacrament in the element 
 of wine, or of the mixed cup, further fulfils the promise in John vi. : 
 *' He that eateth my Flesh, and drinheth my hlood hath everlasting 
 Life." The Blood especially points to the violent Death of tlie 
 Lord — for a man's blood is only separated from his body by a 
 violent death. The blood is especially the sign of the ratification 
 of a covenant. Thus we read in Hebrews ix. 19 : " When Moses 
 had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he 
 took the blood of calves and of goats, with water, and scarlet wool, 
 and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book, and all the people, saying, 
 This is the blood of the Covenant, which God hath enjoined to 
 you" (quoting Exod. xxiv. 8). 
 
 The Lord's Blood actually shed on the cross is the ratifica- 
 tion of the New or Christian Covenant to the world and the 
 
o48 UNTIL I DRINK IT NEW. [St. Mark. 
 
 of the vine, until that day that I drink it new in the kingdom 
 of God. 
 
 Church, and the same Blood sacramentally applied ratifies the 
 covenant individually to each Christian. 
 
 Of the consecration of the cup, the same must be said as of the 
 consecration of the bread. The Lord, by His word of power, made 
 it a Sacrament, so it also is a twofold mystery, having an outward, 
 and an Inward Part. 
 
 " Which is shed," rather is "being shed." This is not merely 
 said in anticipation of the Death the next day, but it implies the 
 absolute certainty of that shedding. The Lord Who said it, is at 
 once the Lamb " foreordained before the foundation of the world " — 
 *'the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world," and now at 
 this present time He appears in heaven, " the Lamb standing as 
 slain " (1 Pet. i. 20 ; Eev. xiii. 8 ; Rev. v. 6). Bengel remarks : 
 " Such is the Divine efi&cacy in the Holy Supper, as if, at the 
 same moment of time, the Body of Jesus was ever being crucified, 
 and His Blood being shed." 
 
 25. *' Verily I say unto you, I will drink no more of the fruit of 
 the vine," &c. The Lord here calls what He had consecrated the 
 *' fruit of the vine," by this showing that it was yet the same in 
 its natural substance as before. And by the unusual character of 
 the expression, " fruit of the vine " He seems to emphasize this. 
 Dr. Pusey, in his " Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist," in 
 the Notes, vol. i. page 67, Note 3, discusses this matter very fully 
 and acutely. 
 
 " Until that day that I drink it new in the kingdom of God." 
 This place, as I remarked, on St. Matthew, is a very difficult one 
 indeed. I now give Chrysostom's explanation as being, perhaps, 
 the best. "And having spoken of the Passion and Cross He pro- 
 ceeds to sx)eak of His Resurrection : ' I say unto you, I will not 
 drink henceforth,' &c. Bythekingdom He means His Resurrection. 
 And He speaks thus of His Resurrection, because He would then 
 drink with the Apostles, that none might suppose His Resurrection 
 a phantasy. Thus when they would convince any of His Resur- 
 rection they said : ' We did eat and drink with Him after He 
 rose from the dead.' This tells them that they shall see Him after 
 He is risen, and that He will be again with them. That He saj's 
 * New,' is plainly to be understood, after a new manner. He no 
 
Chap. XIV.] I WILL SMITE THE SHEPHERD. 349 
 
 26 % ' And when they had sung an || hjnin, they went 
 out into the mount of Olives. ^ Matt. xxvi. 
 
 30. 
 
 27 ^ And Jesus saith unto them, All ye shall n or, psaim. 
 be offended because of me this night : for it is g^^^'^"- ^^'^'' 
 written, 'I will smite the shepherd, and the sheep ^ Zech. xiu. 7. 
 shall be scattered. 
 
 27. " Because of me this night." So A., E., F., K., M., N., and a few more later 
 Uncials, most Cursives, and some versions ; omitted by S, B., C, D., H., L., and some 
 other later Uncials and Cursives. 
 
 longer having a passible body, or needing food. For after His 
 Resurrection He did not eat as needing food, but to evidence the 
 reality of the Resurrection." 
 
 " And when they had sung an hymn." Probably certain Psalms 
 from the 115th to the 118th. And so we also, at the conclusion of 
 our Eucharistic service, sing one of the most ancient, if not the 
 most ancient of Christian hymns, the " Gloria in Excelsis." 
 
 " They went out into the mount of Olives." The Lord, in the 
 Sacrament just instituted, had formally surrendered His life for us ; 
 now instead of withdrawing Himself, as He had done aforetime, 
 before His hour was come, He went forward to the x:)lace where 
 He knew that they would take Him. 
 
 27. "And Jesus said unto them, All ye shall be offended," &c. 
 That is, because of My apprehension, ye shall be afraid for your- 
 selves, and desert Me, and so commit sin. 
 
 *' For it is written." They did not forsake the Lord and so sin 
 grievously in order to bring about the fulfilment of the prophecy, 
 but God, "Who foresaw their defection now, had caused it to be 
 written in the prophecy of Zechariah, so that when it came to pass, 
 and they repented and looked back with shame at their cowardice 
 they might see that He, in Whose desertion, and betrayal, and 
 humiliation, all these things were fulfilled to the letter was the true 
 " Shepherd ; " even the " Man that was God's Fellow," for the whole 
 prophecy runs : " And one shall say. What are these wounds in 
 thine hands ? Then He shall answer, Those with which I was 
 wounded in the house of my friends. Awake, O sword, against my 
 shepherd, and against the man that is my fellow, saith the Lord of 
 hosts: smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered" 
 (Zech. xiii. 6, 7). • 
 
350 YET WILL NOT I. [St. Mark. 
 
 28 But "* after that I am risen, I will go before you into 
 m ch. xvi, 7. G-alilee. 
 
 nMatt. xxvi. 29 ""But Peter said unto liim, Altliougli all 
 xxiL 33, 34. ^ sliall be offended, yet will not I. 
 johaxui. , g^ ^^^ Jesus saith unto him, Verily I say 
 
 28, " But after that I am risen I will go before you into Galilee." 
 There is a difficulty about these words which none of the commen- 
 tators seem to be able to clear up. It seems to be an intimation, 
 first of His own Kesurrection, then of their restoration after their 
 fall to be again His flock. " I will smite the shepherd, and the 
 sheep shall be scattered." But that smiting, though He was 
 smitten to death, was to be followed by His Eesurrection, and as 
 before He had preceded them to Jerusalem, the place where He 
 was smitten, so now He would go before them to Galilee, their 
 home, and the scene of His and their most successful labours. 
 But this does not remove the difficulty, which is, that He appeared 
 to them twice in Jerusalem before He appeared in Galilee. Very 
 probably there was some circumstance which has not come down 
 to us connected with the appearance in Galilee, which made it of 
 such importance. One thing is certain, that it was the only meet- 
 ing by appointment. At all other manifestations of Himself He 
 appeared suddenly when not expected by them. At the appear- 
 ance in Galilee He made the appointment with them, and gave 
 them their commission to evangelize the world. 
 
 29. " But Peter said unto him. Although all shall be offended, 
 yet will not I." This presumptuous answer, we must remember, 
 was given after the Lord had given Him the special warning men- 
 tioned in Luke xxii. 31, 32. Dean Alford remarks :— " Nothing 
 can bear a greater impress of exactitude than this reply. Peter had 
 been before warned (Luke xxii. 31, 34), and still remaining in the 
 same spirit of self-confident attachment, now that he is included in 
 the ' all,' not specially addressed, breaks out into this asseveration, 
 which carries completely with it the testimony that it was not the 
 first. Men do not bring themselves out so strongly . . . unless 
 their fidelity had been previously attainted." 
 
 30, 31. "And Jesus saith unto Him, Verily, I say unto thee . . . 
 Likewise also said they all." " What the One affirms by His power 
 of foreknowledge, the other denies through love.. Whence we may 
 
Chap. XIV.] THOU SHALT DENY ME THRICE. 351 
 
 unto tliee, Tliat this day, eve^i in this night, before the cock 
 €row twice, thou shalt deny me thrice. 
 
 31 But he spake the more vehemently, If I should die 
 with thee, I will not deny thee in any wise. Likewise also 
 said they all. 
 
 32 ^And they came to a place which was °?^^*t-,^^''i-.. 
 
 •^ -»- 3ti. Luke xxu. 
 
 £9. John 
 
 xviii. 1. 
 
 30. " Crow twice." So A., B., L., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Vulg., Sah., 
 Coptic, Syriac ; but ^f, C, D., some Old Latin, and one or two versions omit. 
 
 take a practical lesson, that in proportion as we are confident of 
 the warmth of our faith, we should be in fear of the weakness of 
 our flesh. Peter seems culpable, first because he contradicted the 
 Lord's words ; secondly, because he set himself before the rest ; 
 and thirdly, because he attributed everything to himself, as though 
 he had power to persevere strenuously. His fall, then, was per- 
 mitted to heal this in him, not that he was driven to deny, but left 
 to himself, and so convinced of the frailty of his human nature." 
 [Eemigius (adapted from Chrj^sostom) in Cat. Aurea.] 
 
 32. " And they came to a place which was named Gethsemane." 
 A small orchard or farm, named from its having contained a press 
 to extract oil out of the olives (literally, wine-press of oil). Its 
 locality is pretty well ascertained. Dean Stanley writes : — "A few 
 words, and perhaps the fewer the better, must be devoted to the 
 Garden of Gethsemane. That the tradition reaches back to the 
 age of Constantine is certain. How far it agrees with the slight 
 indication of its position in the Gospel narrative will be judged by 
 the impression of each individual traveller. Some will think it too 
 public, others will see an argument in its favour from its close 
 proximity to the brook Kedron. . . . But in sjDite of all the doubts 
 that can be raised against their antiquity, or the genuineness of 
 their site, the eight aged olive trees, if only by their manifest 
 differences from all others on the mountain, have always struck 
 even the most indiflerent observer. They are now, indeed, less 
 striking in the modern garden enclosure, built round them by the 
 Franciscan monks, than when they stood free and unprotected in the 
 rough hill-side ; but they will remain, so long as their already pro- 
 tracted life is spared, the most venerable of their race on the 
 surface of the earth ; their gnarled trunks and scanty foliage will 
 always be regarded as the most affecting of the sacred memorials in 
 
352 SIT YE HERE. [St. Mark. 
 
 named Getlisemane : and lie saith to his disciples, Sit ye liere, 
 while I shall pray. 
 
 33 And he taketh with him Peter and James, and John, 
 
 or about Jerusalem ; the most nearly approaching to the everlast- 
 ing hills themselves in the force with which they carry us back to 
 the event of the Gospel history." 
 
 '* And he saith unto his disciples, Sit ye here, whilst I shall 
 pray." The Lord seems always to have retired for prayer, as He 
 bid us to do. " When thou prayest enter into thy closet." " It was 
 His practice to pray apart from them, therein teaching us to study 
 quiet and retirement for our prayers." (Chrysostom.) 
 
 33. " And he taketh with him Peter and James, and John." 
 The three who were witnesses of the short gleam of heavenly glory 
 which shone from Him on the Mount of Transfiguration were now 
 tbe chosen witnesses of His deepest sorrow and distress ; for with the 
 exception of the utterance of the words, " My God, my God, why 
 hast Thou forsaken Me ? " He seems to have exhibited no mental 
 agony on the cross equal to that which He endured in the Garden. 
 And so though the Cross was the time of His agonizing pain of 
 body, this scene in the Garden was emphatically His " Agony." 
 
 33. " And began to be sore amazed, and to be very heavy." 
 How is it that it is said He began to be ? Because He now, as He 
 had perhaps not done before, set before His strictly human con- 
 sciousness the sufferings which He was about to undergo, and the 
 fearful sins of en\y, malice, treachery, falsehood, and resistance to 
 the light of God's truth in the chief actors, as well as the coarse 
 brutality and blasphemy of the subordinate ones, all which were 
 the immediate instruments by which His Passion was brought 
 about, as well as the world's sin and Mdckedness, which was in 
 some mysterious sense to be laid upon Him, and which if borne 
 in any real way must have crushed any merely created nature. 
 Besides this, He may have had the unutterable woes present to 
 His mind which the Father would bring upon the people of the 
 Jews — the Jerusalem over which he wept such bitter tears a few 
 days before, because, having shed His Blood, they refused to have 
 that Blood sprinkled upon them by His Spirit. 
 
 For the expansion of these thoughts, as approaches to the solu- 
 tion of this very bitter agony which the Lord now suffered, I must 
 
CHAr. XIV.] SORE AMAZED. 353 
 
 and began to be sore amazed, and to be very heavy ; 
 
 refer the reader to my exposition of St. Matthew. But I would 
 now bestow a little consideration upon a point noticed by many of 
 the Fathers, as well as by modern writers, with regard to our 
 Lord's Agony in the Garden. Many ancient and modern Christian 
 writers are anxious that we should not think that our Saviour 
 suilered so bitterly through any fear of death. They appeal to tha 
 heroic heathen who met death calmly and resolutely, and to Chris- 
 tian martyrs, who courted it, and if we may say so, joyfully embraced 
 it. But is a stoical indifference to death a Christian thing ? I 
 think not. For in the first place, how must a Christian regard the 
 death of the body ? He cannot but regard it as the remaining 
 penalty of sin, which in his own person he must pay. By the 
 death of Christ its sting is removed, but death itself remains to all, 
 except to those who shall be alive when the Lord comes. Again, it is 
 the closing of a man's state of probation, and the sealing him for 
 judgment, that he should be judged for the deeds done in the body. 
 And surely, if any Christian regards Christ as a Judge, i.e., if he 
 reahzes the plainest statements of Scripture, that Christ will judge 
 all, good and bad alike, if he remembers how such a saint as St. 
 Paul lived in the expectation that the Searcher of hearts would judge 
 him, he must regard that with awe, to say the least, which will 
 terminate his accepted time, his day of salvation. If he has done 
 as much as the angel of the Church of Ephesus — if Christ .the 
 Judge, has " known his works, his labour, his patience, for His 
 name sake," yet, it is quite possible that He may have "somewhat 
 against him." If, as the angel of the Church of Pergamos, he 
 has held fast Christ's name, and has not denied the faith even 
 under j)ersecution, yet the Searcher of the hearts and reins may 
 *• have a few things against him " (Rev. ii. 3, 4, 13, 14). So that so 
 far from the fear of death being a x^roof that a man has no saving 
 hold of Christ, those whom we should account very good Chris- 
 tians may at times be permitted by God to feel it. 
 
 But in such fear can they have any x^art in the sympathy of 
 Christ ? Now it is in the highest degree probable that a feeling 
 akin in many respects to our fear of death, contributed to the 
 Lord's Agony; for there is a Psalm (Iv.) of His great ancestor, 
 David, in which we seem to have a greater than David speaking : 
 "My heart is disquieted within me, and the fear of death is fallen 
 
 A A 
 
354 EXCEEDING SORROWFUL. [St. Mark. 
 
 p John xii. 27. 34 And saith. unto tliem, ^ My soul is exceeding 
 
 upon me. Fearfulness and trembling are come upon me, and an 
 horrible dread hath overwhelmed me." This seems to have its 
 fulfilment in nothing short of the Lord's Agony, and this appears 
 certain when a few verses further on we hear the Psalmist com- 
 plaining of a treachery which can be no other than that of Judas : 
 " It is not an open enemy that hath done me this dishonour, for 
 then I could have borne it . . . But it was even thou, my com- 
 panion, my guide, and mine own familiar friend." ^ 
 
 Now seeing that anything akin to the fear of death in the Lord 
 could not arise from the same feelings from which it can exist in 
 Christians, such as the sense of searching judgment, can we 
 reverently surmise respecting any view which He may have had of 
 death, which we cannot have, which may have contributed to this 
 (I will not say fear of death), but profound and intense shrinking 
 from it ? I think we can, for the Lord alone knew the real mystery 
 of death — He alone knew its mysterious connection with sin, so 
 that in us men, sin and death should be as cause and effect. Now 
 if God be life, death must be most abhorrent to Him, because the 
 opposite of His life, just as sin is the opposite of His righteousness. 
 It is remarkable, as bearing upon this, that in the Levitical Law, 
 God treated death as if it defiled and polluted, so that if a man 
 touched a corpse, he was for a time rendered unfit to enter the 
 Church or Temple of God, or to partake of any consecrated food 
 in religious worship. Now Christ, as the Son of God, knew the 
 reality of all this. He knew the loathsomeness of that which in a 
 few hours turns the image of God into a mass of corruption, so 
 that we must bury our dead out of our sight. And the Lord had 
 to undergo this death. It did not come upon Him a>s an evil thing 
 to which He must, of necessity, submit, as all His brethren have 
 to do. He had voluntarily to surrender Himself into the dread 
 keeping of him whom all His brethren accounted as the King of 
 Terrors. And I believe that His pure human consciousness, know- 
 ing its fearful mystery, shrunk from it with intense horror, so that 
 He could learn from experience what His poor, weak, feeble brethren 
 
 ^ That there are imprecatory passages in the Psalm in no 
 degree affects its Messianic character. The 69tli contains similar 
 imprecations, and yet no one would deny that it is Messianic. 
 
Chap. XIV.] TARRY YE HERE. 355 
 
 sorrowful unto death : tarry ye here, and watch. 
 
 felt at the i^rospect, so that by means of this Agony it comes to pass 
 that "we have not an High Priest which cannot be touched with 
 the feeling of our infirmities," even in the prospect of death, " but 
 was in all points " — even in the point of the fear of death — " tempted 
 like as we are, yet without sin." 
 
 34. " My soul is exceeding sorrowful [even] unto death," &c. 
 *' My soul is exceeding sorrowful." His human soul, of course, was 
 the seat of sorrow, and all other affections as ours are. As Peter 
 Lombard well expresses it : " The sufferings of the soul were the 
 soul of His sufferings. The Divine nature did rest {i.e., was in 
 a manner quiescent) that the human might suffer ; but it upheld 
 the human in its agonies that it might overcome." 
 
 The Godhead did not suffer, because Its Nature is above suffering, 
 as it is above death ; but the Son of God had so knit the human 
 nature to Himself — so taken it into the unity of His 'Person — that 
 the Son of God truly suffered in His lower nature ; so that not the 
 man Christ Jesus, but the Son of God, can truly enter into the feel- 
 ing of all our sufferings, and truly sympathize with us. " It is, to 
 my mind, a most gracious instance of om- Lord's exceeding love to 
 us that He Himself drank the cup of human suffering to the very 
 bottom ; that no servant of Christ can fear his death so painfully, 
 or feel himself so forsaken and miserable, whilst actually under- 
 going it, as his Master did before him " (Dr. Arnold). 
 
 " Even unto death." This seems to mean, " so bitter and so in- 
 tense, as to be able to cause death at once, unless I be sustained to 
 bear it : " but Origen explains it, "As much as to say, ' Sorrow is 
 begun in Me, but not to endure for ever, but only till the hour of 
 death : that when I shall die for sin, I shall die also to all sorrow, 
 whose beginnings only are in Me.' " The former seems much pre- 
 ferable. 
 
 " Tarry ye here, and watch." This was said not merely because 
 He desired their sympathies and, no doubt, their prayers along 
 with His — for it would be some consolation to Him to think that in 
 Buch an hour He was not absolutely alone, altogether friendless ; 
 but because he desired their deliverance from the peril to which He 
 foresaw they would be exposed of forsaking and denying Him, 
 through lack of watchfulness and prayer. " The rest I bade sit 
 yonder as weak, removing them from this struggle, but you I liave 
 
356 TAKE AWAY THIS CUP FROM ME. [St. Mark. 
 
 35 And he went forward a little, and fell on the ground, 
 and prayed that, if it were possible, the hour might pass 
 from him. 
 
 q Rom. viii. 15. 36 And he said, ^ Ahha, Father, ^ all things are 
 r Heb.v. 7, possible Tinto thee ; take away this cup from me : 
 
 35. " Went forward." So ^f, B., F., K., M., N., most Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic ; but A., 
 C, D., E,, G., H., L., some other later Uncials, most Cursives, and Syriac read, "drew 
 near." 
 
 brought hithes as being stronger, that ye may toil with Me in watch- 
 ing and prayer" (Origen). 
 
 35. "And he went forward a little." So as to be but a little 
 way removed from the three : so that He might not feel absolutely 
 alone, and yet be in some degree apart and retired, as all who pray 
 earnestly desire to be, 
 
 " And fell on the ground." With His face to the earth — a posture 
 betokening far more abasement and far more earnestness than even 
 kneeling. That the Son of God should have prayed in such a pos- 
 ture, teaches us the fearful darkness of that shadow of death which 
 He had resolved to pass through on our account ; that the Son of 
 God should have prayed in such a posture teaches us that we must 
 worship God with the worship of the body. "What a reproof to those 
 who would fain make a show of prayer, sitting at ease, to see the 
 Holy One of God prostrated on the ground ! 
 
 " That, if it were possible." That is, if God could be glorified in 
 Eedemption, and man saved from sin and death without it. 
 
 " The hour might pass from him." The hour called by Himself 
 the hour of " the power of darkness," and of evil men who had cast 
 in tneir lot with that power (Luke xxii. 53). 
 
 "And he said, Abba, Father." Did He only use the word which 
 would be used by his countrymen, the Syriac Abba, or did He 
 speak to God in both words ? The one, the word which the chosen 
 race would use, the other the Gentile word, betokening that He 
 was about to bring all men into the true family of God. We would 
 fain believe that He spake both words. And it seems consonant 
 with His deep distress of spirit to use more than one name in His 
 pleading. 
 
 " All things are possible unto thee." This seems to imply that 
 Eedemption might have been brought about in some other way 
 
CnJLP. XIY.] SIMON, SLEEPEST THOU? 357 
 
 • uevertlieless not wliat I will, but wliat tliou wilt. » John v. 30. 
 
 37 And lie cometli, and findeth them sleej^ing, 
 and saith unto Peter, Simon, sleej^est thou ? couldest noi 
 thou watch one hour ? 
 
 than by the Son of God drinking the cup of agony : otherwise, how 
 could the Lord have said, "All things are possible," "Take away 
 this cup " ? This is a matter upon which it is utterly unlawful to 
 speculate, but this we may assert on the warrant of inspiration, 
 that the drinking of this cup was necessary if the Lord was to 
 " learn obedience by the things which He suffered ; " and to be 
 made perfect as an High Priest Who is able to sympathize with us 
 to the uttermost (Heb. ii. 10, 16, 17 ; iv. 14, 15). Whatever depth 
 of misery lies before the Christian, Christ has, in His agony, passed 
 through a deej)er. 
 
 " Not what I will, but what thou wilt." " He was heard in that 
 He feared," or rather for His piety, for His submission to His Father ; 
 for such is the meaning of the words. The cup did not pass from 
 Him, but He was strengthened to drink it ; and, by drinking it, He 
 achieved greater glory, for by draining it to the dregs He was per- 
 fected as the One Mediator. The Captain of our salvation is now 
 "made perfect through sufferings." The shrinking of His human 
 soul from this hour — this cup — was that which made the obedience 
 more meritorious, for it cost Him more to submit under such a 
 shrinking of soul than if He had steeled Himself to lay aside all 
 natural human feeling, and to bear it all stoically as one insensible 
 to ignominy and torture. 
 
 37. " And he cometh," &c. Earnestly desiring their sympathy, 
 wanting to know if they felt for Hiiu in His distress, as He was 
 anxious for iliem in the view of their coming danger. 
 
 " And findeththem sleeping." " We are but too ready to lose our 
 sleep, when it is to watch with the world, and to share in the plea- 
 sures and diversions thereof during the night ; but what pain, what 
 sluggishness seizes us, when we should watch one hour with Christ, 
 either by way of mortification, or out of love towards a sick person, 
 or to praise God in the great solemnities, or to adore Jesus Christ 
 in His sufferings " (Quesnel). 
 
 " And saith unto Peter, Simon, sleepest thou ? " The three were 
 alike asleep, but Peter had made by far the loudest profession ; and 
 
358 WATCH YE AND PRAY. [St. Mark. 
 
 38 Watch ye and pray, lest ye enter into temptation. 
 G^T'i?"* ^^' *T^^® sj)irit truly is ready, but tlie flesh, is weak. 
 
 so the Lord speaks to Him alone, *' Simon, thou who saidst, ' If I 
 should die with thee, yet will I not deny thee ; ' ' Though all shall 
 be offended, yet will not I,' — sleej)est thou ? " The other two, James 
 and John, when He asked them, " Can ye drink of my cup ? " had 
 said, " We are able." But if these chosen ones did not watch, 
 which of us would have watched with the Lord ? 
 
 38. "AVatch ye and pray." We have to watch against sin and 
 Satan ; we have to watch over ourselves ; we have to watch for our 
 Lord's coming ; but we have also to watch ivith the Lord. We 
 cannot now watch with Him in His agony. Mortal men could 
 only do that once, and they failed to do it, and we failed in them : 
 but the nearest thing to watching with the Lord seems to be to 
 watch lest we lose the sense of His presence. They fail to watch 
 with the Lord who si^end time in needless sleep which ought to be 
 given to prayer. 
 
 "Watch ye and pray, lest ye enter," &c. It may be that through 
 too much self-confidence and neglect of the Lord's warnings they did 
 not strive to pray, perhaps they did not put themselves into a posture 
 of praj^er. They could hardly have done so with anything like a 
 will, if He found them asleep. " Christian vigilance and humble 
 prayer are the source of all our strength. The former renders the 
 vigilance of the devil ineffectual, the latter procures the vigilance 
 and protection of God." 
 
 " The spirit truly is ready, but the flesh is weak." As if He said, 
 *' The spirit truly is ready to go with Me to i^rison and to death : 
 for the spirit has apprehended My mission from God ; but the flesh, 
 in which are the lower affections, fear, cowardice, sloth, love of 
 ease, shrinking from the cross — the flesh is weak, and weighs down 
 the spirit, and lusteth against it, so that ye cannot of yourselves do 
 the things which ye would." 
 
 TertuUian pertinently remarks : " We read that the flesh is weak, 
 and hence occasionally we flatter ourselves. But we also read that 
 the Spirit {i.e., the Spirit of God) is strong ; one being an earthly, 
 the other a heavenly quality. Why then, in our proneness to ex- 
 cuse ourselves, do we object our weaknesses, and disregard our 
 means of strength ? '* 
 
Chap. XIV.] HE COMETH THE THIRD TIME. 359 
 
 39 And again lie went away, and prayed, and spake the 
 same words. 
 
 40 And when he returned, he found them asleep again, 
 (for their eyes were heavy,) neither wist they what to answer 
 him. 
 
 41 And he cometli the third time, and saith unto them, 
 Sleep on now, and take your rest : it is enough, ^ the hour is 
 come ; behold, the Son of man is betrayed into " John xiii. i. 
 the hands of sinners. 
 
 40, "And when he returned, he found them asleep again." So A., C, N., later 
 Uncials, almost all Cursives, Vulg., Syriac, Armenian, ^Ethiopic ; but ^f, B., L., read, " He 
 came again, and found them asleep." 
 
 39. *' And again he went away, and prayed, and spake the same 
 words." Sfc. Matthew alone gives us the second words. In spirit 
 they are the same, but their form seems to betoken more clearly 
 the acceptance of the cup : " my Father, if this cup may not pass 
 away from Me, except I drink it, thy will be done." 
 
 40. "And when he returned, he found them asleep again." How 
 is it that the Lord again broke off His prayer, and returned ? Must 
 it not have been through anxiety about His poor disciples, whose 
 only safety from a most grievous fall lay in their watchfulness and 
 prayer ? The good Shex^berd, even in the hour of His agony, can- 
 not forget His sheep, cannot leave them to themselves. He cannot 
 pray for Himself without thinking of them. One says, " Our prayers 
 are most perfect when intermixed with an anxious concern for the 
 welfare of others." 
 
 "Neither wist they what to answer him." As men would not 
 be able to do who were not half awake. St. Peter's memory calls 
 this to mind, as if ashamed to think they were so overcome as not 
 to have a word of sympathy for Him, or a word of prayer to Him 
 to forgive them their unwatchfulness. 
 
 41. "And he cometli the third time, and saith unto them, Sleep 
 on now . . . it is enough, &c. In my notes on St. Matthew on 
 the difficulty of this verse, inasmuch as the Lord bids them sleep 
 and take rest, and then immediately arouses them, I ventured the 
 explanation that between the words, " Sleep on now," and " It is 
 enough," a short time intervened, sufficient for their needful bodily 
 refreshment. I find Augustine takes some such view : " We must 
 
3G0 JUDAS, ONE OF THE TWELVE. [St. Makk. 
 
 42 * Eise up, let us go ; lo, he that betrayeth me is at 
 X Matt. xxvi. hand. 
 
 46. John 
 
 xviii. 1, 2. 43 ^ ^ And immediately, while he yet spake, 
 
 47. \ukexxii. cometh Judas, one of the twelve, and with him 
 xliii. 3. '^ a great multitude with swords and staves, from 
 the chief priests and the scribes and the elders. 
 
 43. " Jadas." A., D., K., M., other later Uncials, and some Cursives read, " Iscariot ; " 
 omitted by K, B., C„ E., G., H., L., N., most Cursives, Vulg. [Cod. Amiat.], Sah., Coptic, 
 Gothic. 
 
 "A great multitude." "Great" omitted by H, B., L., two or three Cursives, some 
 versions ; inserted by A., C, D., N., later Uncials, most Cursives, Vulg., Syriac. 
 
 understand, then, that after saying, ' Sleep on now, and take your 
 rest,' our Lord remained silent for a short time, to give space for 
 that to happen, which He had permitted ; and then that He added, 
 • The hour is come,' and therefore He puts in between, * It is 
 enough,' that is, your rest has been long enough." 
 
 42. " Else up, let us go ; lo, he that betrayeth me is at hand." 
 Notice the alacrity with which the Lord would meet and surrender 
 Himself to those who were coming to apprehend Him. This re- 
 minds us of His stepping forth in front of the disciples when they 
 came up to Jerusalem for the last time, as related by the Evangelist 
 (x. 32). Till His hour was come He hid Himself from His enemies, 
 now that His hour was come, He seems almost in haste to surrender 
 Himself. *' I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how am I 
 straitened till it is accomplished." 
 
 43. " And immediately, while he yet spake, cometh Judas, one of 
 the twelve." Notice here, first, how all the accounts mention the 
 alacrity and shameless effrontery of this most wicked of men. 
 St. Matthew and St. Mark speak of Judas " coming," and the 
 multitude " with him." St. Luke, that " he that was called Judas 
 went before them." 
 
 Notice, also, tbat in each case he is characterized as " one of the 
 twelve " — i.e. one of the Lord's constant companions, one of His 
 own familiar friends, who " eateth bread with him." 
 
 "A great multitude." "Why a great multitude ? Evidently be- 
 cause they remembered what multitudes had, four days before, 
 attended His triumphal entrance. If the report of His capture got 
 abroad, there were multitudes of disciples or adherents who might, 
 
Chap. XIV.] THE TOKEX. 361 
 
 44 And he that betrayed him had given them a token, 
 saying, "Whomsoeyer I shall kiss, that same is he ; take him, 
 and lead Mm away safely. 
 
 45 And as soon as he was come, he goeth straightway 
 to him, and saith. Master, master ; and kissed him. 
 
 46 % And they laid their hands on him, and took him. 
 
 45. "Master, master." Second "Master" omitted by H, B., C, D., L., M., some 
 versions; but retained by A., E., F., G., H., other later Uncials, most Cursives, Syriae, 
 &c. 
 
 as they thought, attempt to rescue Him. St. John speaks of their 
 coming with "lanterns and torches and weapons." 
 
 44. 45. " And he that betrayed him had given them a token, say- 
 ing," &c. But was not the countenance of the Lord sufficiently 
 known ? Had He not daily taught in the temj)le ? Had He not 
 entered Jerusalem publicly, so that the whole city was moved ? Why 
 did they require a special token to distinguish him ? A curious 
 tradition is mentioned by Origen, that the Lord did not appear to 
 all alike, but that " He appeared to each man in such a degree as the 
 beholder was worthy." But this is conjecture. 
 
 45. "And as soon as he was come, he goeth straightway," &c. 
 As if he was afraid that even then the Lord might escape. And so 
 he stipulated that after he had given the sign he had earned the 
 money. Their part was then to hold Him fast, and lead Him away 
 safely. If any mischance occurred after the giving of the kiss it was 
 not the fault of Judas. 
 
 " And kissed him." The compound word signifies not merely to 
 kiss, but to kiss affectionately or eagerly — a further proof of the 
 hypocrisy and degradation of the traitor. 
 
 46. *' And they laid their hands on him, and took him." Between 
 the kiss of betrayal and the apprehension here mentioned there 
 occurred the incident which St. John mentions, that the Lord 
 stepped forward, and asked, " Whom seek ye? " And when they 
 answered, "Jesus of Nazareth," and He replied, "I am [He]," 
 "they went backward, and fell to the ground." 
 
 I commented on this fully in my notes on St. John, showing that 
 it was probably miraculous, being incapable, on principles of 
 common sense, of explanation on any other hypothesis — that it took 
 place as a sign that the Lord delivered Himself up of His own free 
 
362 ONE OF THEM DREW A SWORD. [St. :\Jark. 
 
 47 And one of them that stood by drew a sword, and 
 smote a servant of the high priest, and cut off his ear. 
 z Matt. xxvi. 48 ^ And Jesus answered and said unto them, 
 52*. ' Are ye come out, as against a thief, with swords 
 
 and with staves to take me ? 
 
 will, for they had an overwhelming proof that they could not have 
 touched Him without His own permission, and also to overawe 
 them so that they should obey His words, " Let these go their 
 way." If the Lord had not thus exhibited His power, they would 
 most probably have seized the Apostles. 
 
 47. " And one of them that stood by drew a sword, and smote a 
 servant," &c. St. Mark mentions this incident in the barest and 
 most cursory manner. St. Matthew appends the words, "Put up 
 thy sword into his sheath," &c. St. Luke alone gives the miracle 
 of healing with which it was accompanied. St. John alone men- 
 tions St. Peter as the one who stood by and drew the sword, and 
 also the name of the servant. 
 
 It has been conjectured that St. Mark's account is the briefest, 
 because the incident exhibits the zeal of St. Peter, and brings him 
 somewhat into prominence ; and so, at the suggestion of St. Peter, 
 St. Mark passes over the incident as briefly as possible. Others 
 have suggested that St. John, who wrote when all the other actors 
 had passed from the scene, mentions that it was St. Peter, as there 
 would be then no danger to him from his name being known ; but 
 surely this is unlikely, as the man had received no permanent 
 injury. As I have observed several times, it is impossible to 
 account for the omission of this, and the insertion of that, in the 
 narratives of the four Evangelists, on any principles derived from 
 merely human motives. The only explanation in vast numbers of 
 cases is the control of the Spirit, Who "divideth to evei-y man 
 severally as He will." 
 
 48. " And Jesus answered and said unto them. Are ye come out," 
 &c. Rather as against a robber, the head of a band, having 
 weapons, who could defend themselves. The Lord seems to have 
 felt deeply this indignity. He had spent all His life in doing good 
 to others, in preaching the holiest doctrines, and performing the 
 most beneficent acts of power ; and they treat Him as if He had beeia 
 a Barabbas. 
 
CuAP. XIY.] A CERTAIN YOUNG MAN. 363 
 
 49 I was daily with you in the temple teaching, and ye 
 took me not : but ^ the scriptures must be * ps. xxii. 6. 
 
 Is. liii. 7, &c. 
 lUmlied. Luke xxii. 37. 
 
 50 ''And they all forsook him, and fled. b Ps. ixxxviii. 
 
 51 And there followed him a certain young ^" ^'^^■•-'• 
 man, having a linen cloth cast about his naked body ; and 
 the young men laid hold on him : 
 
 49. "But the scriptures must be fulfilled." Revisers translate more accurately, '"But 
 this is done that the scripture might be fulfilled." 
 
 61. " The young men laid hold on him." So A., N., later Uncials, most Cursives, Gothic, 
 Armenian, .^thiopic ; but N, B., C, D., L., A, Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic, Syriac (Schaaf) 
 read, " They laid hold on him." 
 
 49. " I was daily with yon in the temple teaching, and ye took 
 me not . . . fulfilled." If they had taken Him in the temple, He 
 would have suffered death by stoning, as they would have inflicted 
 summary punishment upon Him. Only at this special juncture 
 could He be taken, so as to suffer crucifixion at the hands of Pilate, 
 and so that particular form of death be inflicted upon Him in which 
 His hands and feet would be pierced. Only at this juncture, also, 
 could He have suffered as the Paschal Lamb. I have brought this 
 out fully in my notes on the parallel passage in St. Matthew, to 
 which I refer the reader. 
 
 50. "And they all forsook him, and fled." This was the fulfil- 
 ment of prophecy: " Smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be 
 scattered " (Zech. xiii. 7) ; also of Psalm Ixxxviii., " Thou hast put 
 away mine acquaintance far from me, and made me to be abhorred 
 of them." It was also the fulfilment of the Lord's prediction : "All 
 ye shall be offended because of Me this night." It was also the 
 fulfilment of the Lord's request, or rather command: "Let these 
 go their way ; " but it was not the less their sin, though it was fore- 
 seen by God, and worked out His purpose, that His Son should be 
 alone in His sufferings. 
 
 51. " And there followed him a certain young man, having a 
 linen cloth," &c. As if he had been suddenly aroused from sleep in 
 some neighbouring house by the tumult, and had come forth with 
 only his night-clothes around him ; and, seeing that they were 
 apprehending the Lord, of Whom he was a disciple, followed Him. 
 From the expression, " there followed him " I cannot think that he 
 
364 HE LEFT THE LINEN CLOTH. [St. Mark. 
 
 52 And he left the linen cloth, and fled from them naked, 
 c Matt. xxvi. 53 ^ c j^j^^ ^-^Qj Yed Jesus away to the high 
 54. Joha priest : and with him were assembled all the chief 
 
 xviii. 13. . 
 
 priests and the elders and the scribes. 
 
 was some indifferent person, who was following after mere curiosity : 
 he must have been attached to the Lord, and on this account he was 
 seized by the soldiers. 
 
 Very many conjectures have been hazarded respecting his name. 
 Many of the Fathers suppose that it was St. John ; but the one sole 
 reason given for this is that he is called " a young man," and St. John 
 was then young ; but St. John's name would have been mentioned. 
 Others, with greater probability, suppose that it was St. Mark him- 
 self; and the extreme simplicity of the incident, almost amounting 
 to the ludicrous, makes us ask why was it mentioned at all, except 
 that it was St. Mark who desires to record that he was once in the 
 presence of the Lord. My own opinion is, that the account was in- 
 serted for a purpose — to show that the Apostles had escaped being 
 taken, not because they were too insignificant, but simply because 
 of the power which accompanied the words of Christ, " Let these go 
 their way." How is it that Peter, who had aimed a deadly blow at 
 one of the servants of the high priest, and had all but taken his life, 
 was allowed to escape unpursued, and this young man, who was 
 only following, seized hold of? It is narrated to show us how, 
 in the matter of the escai:)e of the Apostles, the Lord's word was 
 with power. 
 
 53. *' And they led Jesus away to the high jiriest : and with him 
 were," &c. This, though only a preliminary meeting, must have 
 been a very important one indeed, if it could be said that, at that 
 time of night, under the presidency of the high priest, all the chief 
 priests and the elders and the scribes were assembled. It shows 
 how thoroughly they were in earnest about the Lord's condemna- 
 tion. This, too, was the night before the Passover. 
 
 The high priest here is Caiaphas. They had led the Lord to the 
 house of Annas first ; but as I showed in my notes on St. John, 
 that was in all probability a mere matter of form, though a neces- 
 sary one, for the succession to the high priesthood really centred 
 in Annas." "Jesus appears as a criminal before the ecclesiastical 
 tribunal. How different are things to the eyes of faith from what 
 
Chap. XIV.] PETER FOLLOWED AFAR OFF. 365 
 
 54 And Peter followed him afar off, even into tlie palace 
 of tlie liigh priest : and he sat with the servants, and warmed 
 himself at the fire. 
 
 55 ^ And the chief priests and all the council ^ Matt. xxvi. 
 
 59 
 
 sought for witness against Jesus to put him to 
 death ; and found none. 
 
 54. " At the fire." Properly, " At the light." Probably it is called " the light " because 
 through its light Peter was recognized by the maid. 
 
 they appear to the eyes of the world ! There can be nothing raore 
 august than this assembly, if we judge of it by the state and xH'ofes- 
 sion of those who compose it. Here holiness, authority, and learn-" 
 ing seem to be united and consulting together ; and yet, in reality, 
 it is no better than a sacrilegious meeting, and a cabal of murderers. 
 The criminals usurp the place of the judge, and the judge is arraigned 
 and condemned as a criminal." (Quesnel.) 
 
 54. " And Peter followed him afar off, even into the palace of the 
 high priest ... at the fire." AVe have in Peter a type of the in- 
 consistency of human nature. He bad a most sincere love of the 
 Lord, and so he followed Him ; but he was afraid for himself, and 
 so he followed Him afar off. 
 
 "And he sat with the servants, and warmed himself at the fire." 
 Not the place for one called by Christ to be His representative. 
 Eemembering the character of Caiaphas, a worldly, ambitious, un- 
 scrupulous man, his household was not likely to be God-fearing, 
 nor his servants such as a follower of Christ should even sit 
 with. 
 
 55. "And the chief priests and all the council sought for witness 
 against Jesus," &c. It is singular, and deseiwes notice, that they 
 did not bring against Him some of the words which he spake in 
 the temple, for which their adherents had accused Him of blas- 
 phemy, and attempted to stone Him. Was it that evidence of such 
 sayings was not at hand, or was it that they were afraid of His 
 power of asking them questions in return, and of showing their 
 ignorance and disregard of Scripture? They remembered, perhaps, 
 their discomfiture when He asked them, " What think ye of 
 Christ, whose son is he ? " or " The Baptism of John, whence was 
 it?" 
 
366 MANY BARE FALSE WITNESS. [St. xMahk. 
 
 56 For many bare false witness against liim, but their 
 witness agreed not together. 
 
 57 And there arose certain, and bare false witness against 
 him, saying, 
 
 eeh. XV. 29. 58 We heard him say, *I will destroy this 
 
 Johnii. 19. i i • t • i "i t -, 
 
 temple that is made with hands, and withm three 
 days I will build another made without hands. 
 
 59 But neither so did their witness agree 
 together, 
 f Matt. xxvi. 60 ^ And the high priest stood up in the midst, 
 
 56. " For many bare false witness against him, but their witness 
 agreed not together." It seems, then, that some show of cross- 
 examination was kept up. "Was this out of respect for the forms of 
 justice, or were there men amongst their number who, like Nico- 
 demus, and Josej)h of Arimathea, and others (John xii. 42), made 
 some feeble stand for fairness and decency ? 
 
 57, 58, 59. " And there arose certain, and bare false witness . . , 
 witness agree together." The witnesses distort the Lord's words 
 at the first cleansing of the tem^Dle. And the perversion deserves 
 notice. They made the Lord to say, " I will destroy this temple," 
 whereas He said to them, " Destroy (ye) this temple." They made 
 Him to say, " In three days I will build another," whereas speak- 
 ing of the temple of His body. He had said, " I will raise it," that 
 is, " I will raise the same temple again." 
 
 To judge of the force of this accusation, we must remember that 
 the Jews idolized the temple. Thus the accusation against Stephen 
 was, " We have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth shall de- 
 stroy this place." Again, Jeremiah speaks of the self- deceivers 
 among them, exclaiming, " The temple of the Lord, the temple of 
 the Lord, the temple of the Lord," so that any accusation against 
 Him tliat He had cast a slight on the temple, would be the most 
 invidious of any which they could allege. 
 
 60. *' And the high priest stood up in the midst, and asked Jesus," 
 &c. Some suppose that he stood up to overawe the Lord, some 
 that it was in anger at being foiled by the contradiction of the wit- 
 nesses. But probably ho desired to take the trial entirely into 
 his own hands. 
 
Chap. XIV.] HE HELD HIS PEACE. 367 
 
 and asked Jesus, saying, Answerest tliou nothing ? what is it 
 which these witness against thee ? 
 
 61 But ^ he held his peace, and answered no- k is. Hii. 7. 
 thing. ^ Again the high priest asked him, and ^ Matt. xxvi. 
 said unto him, Art thou the Christ, the Son of 
 
 the Blessed ? 
 
 62 And Jesus said, I am : ' and ye shall see ' ^^^"- ^^^i^"- 
 
 *' .30. & xxvi. 64. 
 
 Luke xxii. 69. 
 
 *' Answerest thou nothing ? what is it which these witness against 
 thee ? " What justice was there in demanding of the Lord that He 
 should take notice of accusations which, when the evidence was 
 sifted, turned out to be false ? and so it is said, " He held his peace 
 and answered nothing." It was then that the high priest adjured 
 Him, that is, put Him on His oath. The form of adjuration is not 
 in St. Mark, but it is given in full in St. Matthew : " I adjure thee 
 by the living God that Thou tell us whether Thou be the Christ, 
 the Son of the Blessed." 
 
 62. " And Jesus said : I am, and ye shall see the Son of man 
 sitting on the right hand," &c. Why did the Lord when thus ad- 
 jured break his silence ? Some have thought that it was out of 
 respect to the office of the high priest, as the representative of God, 
 and the spiritual ruler of the people, and if we can separate the 
 office from tlie character of him who held it, no more fitting oppor- 
 tunity could have presented itself. For here was the head of the 
 nation, considered as a Theocracy, demanding of One whose cre- 
 dentials showed that He came direct from God, Who He was. This 
 was the first time that Jesus was face to face with the chief minis- 
 ter of His Father's religion. It ought not to have been so. His 
 claims ought long ago to have been investigated as to whether He 
 really fulfilled the prophecies of the Messiah. But long ere this they 
 had prejudged His case. Long ere this they had condemned Him. 
 And now they sought not for the truth, but for that which might 
 enable them to carry out their evil will against Him. He might 
 consequently, I think, if He had only looked to the motive of 
 Caiaphas in putting such a question, have declined to answer, but 
 the crisis had come. He must assert Who He was, though He 
 knew it would lead to His crucifixion, and His answer was one 
 which became the Son of God in His character of Supreme Euler 
 
368 THE RIGHT HAND OF POWER. [St. Mark. 
 
 the Son of man sitting on tlie right hand of power, and 
 coming in the clouds of heaven. 
 
 63 Then the high priest rent his clothes, and saith, What 
 need we any further witnesses ? 
 
 and Judge. " I am the Christ, the Son of the blessed God, and 
 whereas I now seem to be in your power, and to be judged by you, 
 yet ye shall see Me, the Son of man, sitting on the right hand of 
 power, and coming in the clouds of heaven." 
 
 " Ye shall see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power," 
 &c. From the expressions used by St. Matthew, ^^from liencpforth 
 ye shall see," &c., many have thought the Lord meant that from 
 the day of His Ascension, they should see the manifestation of 
 His power in the Pentecostal miracles and the irresistible SjDread 
 of the Truth. This would be His sitting at the right hand of power, 
 and that at the great day they should see Him visibly manifested 
 as coming in the clouds of heaven. It seems doubtful, however, 
 whether their experience of His power, whilst they refused to ac- 
 knowledge it, could be expressed by seeing Him "sitting on the 
 right hand of power." When the Lord comes in the clouds of 
 heaven, He will not the less sit on the right hand of power ; for 
 He will come in the glory of His Father, as well as in His own 
 glory. The glory or Schekinah of the Father will appear at the 
 great day to do honour to the Eternal Son as Judge of all. 
 
 The high priest adjures Him to tell them whether He be the 
 Christ, the Son of God, and He answers rather as the Son of man, 
 " I am, and ye shall see the Son of man," &c. By this He claimed 
 as referring to Himself the most exalted prophecy of the Messiah in 
 all the Scriptures — that in Daniel — where " One like the Son of 
 man came with the clouds of hea^-en, and came to the Ancient of 
 days, and they brought Him near before Him. And there was 
 given to Him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, 
 nations, and languages should serve Him: His dominion is an ever- 
 lasting dominion, which shall not pass away " (Dan. viii. 13, 14). 
 
 63. " Then the high priest rent his clothes." Considering his 
 opinions as a Sadducee, and his character as a man, it is evident 
 that this was a piece of hypocritical acting. The Fathers, I think 
 with reason, account it as symbolical. Thus Theophylact and 
 Bede : "The high priest does after the manner of the Jews; for 
 
Chap. XIV.] S0:ME BEGAN TO SPIT ON HIM. 369 
 
 64 Ye have heard tlie "blasphemy : what think ye ? And 
 they all condemned him to be guilty of death. 
 
 65 And some began to spit on him, and to cover his face, 
 and to buffet him, and to say unto him, Prophesy : and the 
 servants did strike him with the palms of their hands. 
 
 65. " The servants did strike him." So E., H., M., some later Uncials, and most Car- 
 sives ; but a, A., B., C, I., K. , L., N., some other later Uncials, and some Cm'sives read 
 " The servants received him with blows of their hands." 
 
 whenever anything intolerable or sad occurred to them, they used 
 to rend their clothes. . . . But it was also with a higher mystery 
 that in the Passion of our Lord the Jewish priest rent his own clathes 
 . . . whilst the garment of the Lord could not be rent, even by the 
 soldiers who crucified Him. For it was a figure that the Jewish 
 priesthood should be rent on account of the wickedness of the 
 Priests themselves." If the rending of the garment of Samuel by 
 Saul was pronounced to be symbolical of the rending of the king- 
 dom from him, must not such a rending by so typical a person as 
 the high priest, and in the very presence of the Son of God, and at 
 the crisis of the greatest conflict which ever took place in the uni- 
 verse between good and evil, be also accounted symbolical ? 
 
 61. " Ye have heard the blasphemy : what think ye? " In what 
 sense blasphemy ? It could not have been blasphemy if the Lord, 
 when He said, "I am," claimed no more than every Jew did for 
 himself when he called himself the son of God, because adopted 
 into God's Church and family. It must have been asserted by 
 the Lord, and accepted by them in that special unique sense 
 which he had used once before in their hearing, when He had said 
 that "God was His Father, isaking Himself equal with God" 
 (John V. 18). 
 
 65. " And some began to spit on him, and to cover his face, and 
 to buffet him, and say unto him, Prophesy : and the servants," &c. 
 In all this, like the heathen soldiers, they knew not what they did, 
 and yet they were verily guilty, for they must have noticed the 
 calmness ond gentleness of His demeanour; they must have known 
 that He worked miracles. Some of them must have seen Him heal 
 by His touch the ear of Malchus, and yet none of these things 
 softened them. They treated Him with more indignity than if He 
 bad been some degraded and blood-stained criminal, for they knew 
 
 B B 
 
370 ' ONE OF THE MAIDS. [St. Mark. 
 
 66 % ^And as Peter was beneath in the palace, there 
 k Matt. xxvi. Cometh one of the maids of the high priest : 
 
 58, 69. Luke . 
 
 xxii. 55. John 67 And when she saw Peter warming himself, 
 
 xviii. 16. 
 
 66. " In the palace." Rather, *' In the court" — the same court at which at its higher 
 end the Lord was, 
 
 that such an one would retaliate and return curse with curse, and 
 gesture with gesture, but they saw that the Lord was patient and 
 unoffending, and in cowardice as well as in malice, they thus 
 abused Him. But was it not to be expected tbat the retainers and 
 ser^^ants of such an one as Caiaphas should be as their master ? 
 
 66. "And as Peter was beneath in the palace [or court] there 
 Cometh one of the maids." I have entered so circumstantially into 
 the examination and (as far as may be consistent with the entire 
 independence of the four narratives) into the reconciliation of 
 the four accounts of St. Peter's denials in my notes on St. John, 
 that I must refer the reader to these notes for the fullest treatment 
 of this matter which I am able to give. In the following notes I 
 shall, as far as I can, confine myself to St. Mark's account. 
 
 " And as Peter was beneath." " Beneath " does not mean that 
 he was in a lower story, or in a room on a lower level, for he must 
 have been in the same court as the Lord, or the Lord could not 
 have turned and looked upon him ; but it signifies that the trial was 
 going on in a raised part of the hall farthest from the door, near 
 which was the fire. 
 
 " There cometh one of the maids of the high priest." After she 
 had, at the request of St. John, who was known to the high priest, 
 opened the door and let in Peter, she came up to him, as the light 
 of the fire gleamed on his features, and said, "And thou, also, wast 
 with Jesus of Nazareth." The word " also " is given in each of the 
 four accounts, but St. John alone who gives the account of himself 
 being there, and using his influence to get Peter admitted, gives us 
 the reason for it. It means, " Thou also as well as John, who 
 asked me to let thee in, wast with Jesus." This is very important, 
 for if John could have been in safety in such a place why not 
 Peter ? The cowardice in this instance in denying the Lord to 
 this maid seems to have been gratuitous. 
 
 " Thou also wast with Jesus of Nazareth." These words are the 
 same as those reported in St. Matthew's Gospel. In St. Luke she 
 
Chap. XIV.] THIS IS ONE OF THEM. 371 
 
 she looked upon him, and said, And thon also wast with 
 Jesus of Nazareth. 
 
 68 But he denied, saying, 1 know not, neither understand 
 I what thou sajest. And he went out into the porch ; and 
 the cock crew. 
 
 69 ^ And a maid saw him asrain, and beo-an to l?^*"-,^^'*'^-.. 
 
 _° ^ 71. Luke xxii. 
 
 say to them that stood by, This is one of them. ^s. Joha 
 
 67. "With Jesus of Nazareth." So N, A., D., later Uncials, most Cursives, Old Latin, 
 Vnlg., &c. ; but B., C, L. (followed by Revisers) read, " Thou also wast with the Nazarene, 
 even Jesus." 
 
 68. "And the cock crew." So A,, C, D., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, some 
 Old Latin, Vulg., and versions; omitted by u, B., L., and Coptic. 
 
 69. " Saw him again, and began to say." So A., later Uncials, almost all Cursives ; 
 but H, C, D., L., " Saw him, and began again to say." 
 
 is said to have addressed the bystanders, " This man was also with 
 him." In St. John's account she prefaced the remark with a ques- 
 tion, "Art not thou also one of this Man's disciples ? " But is it not 
 most probable and true to nature that she should have uttered 
 more than one sentence ? As she looked at his features in the light 
 of the fire, she asked him the question, "Art not thou? " &c. ; then 
 she would express her certainty, and say, " Thou also wast with 
 Jesus." Then she would turn to the bystanders, and exclaim, 
 " This man, too, was with Him." 
 
 68. " But he denied, saying, I know not, neither understand I 
 what thou sayest." It is very unlikely that in this denial St. Peter 
 confined himself to one sentence. Taking the four accounts to- 
 gether, he would say, "Woman" (St. Luke), "I am not" (St. 
 John), " I know him not " (St. Luke), " I know not, neither under- 
 stand I what thou sayest." 
 
 "And he went out into the porch," i.e., probably the wide arch- 
 way leading from without into the court, rendered by the Eevisers 
 " the forecourt." 
 
 " And the cock crew." This was the first crowing, not probably 
 so loud and clear, but distinctly heard by Peter, who yet did not 
 take warning by it. It is only mentioned by St. Mark, who alone 
 of the four reports that the Lord had said (v. 30), " Before the 
 cock crow twice, thou shalt deny Me thrice." 
 
 69. " And a maid saw him again." This was also whilst he was 
 in the porch. Others apparently joined with the maid in this accu- 
 
372 HE DENIED IT AGAIN. [St. Mark, 
 
 70 And he denied it again. "" And a little after, tliey tliat 
 ■° Matt. xxvi. stood by said again to Peter, Surely thou art 
 
 73. Luke xxii. „, r> ' ,-i r^ ti n.i 
 
 59. John one of tnem: "^for thou art a (jraiilaean, and thy 
 n Acts ii. 7. speech agreeth thereto. 
 
 71 But he hegan to curse and to swear, saying, I know not 
 this man of whom ye speak. 
 
 70. '* And thy speech agreeth thereto." So A., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, 
 Syriac, and some versions; omitted by S, B., C, D., L., some Cursives, most Old Latin, 
 Vulg., Sah., Coptic. 
 
 sation, as St. John says, " they said therefore unto him." Accord- 
 ing to St. Matthew another maid, according to St. Luke a man- 
 servant also. St. Mark says merely that he denied it again. St. 
 Matthew that he denied with an oath, " I do not know the Man." 
 St. Luke that he particularly denied to the man-servant, *' Man, I 
 am not." All this is true to nature. The maid who at the first 
 let him in, and first accused him, for some reason resented his 
 presence, and so naturally took with her the second time she at- 
 tacked him, two others, a maid and a man-servant, who set upon 
 him and roused him, so that he denied with an oath, and particu- 
 larly addressing the man-servant said, " Man, I am not." 
 
 70. " And he denied it again. And a little after, they that stood 
 by said again to Peter, Surely thou art one of them." According to 
 St. Luke, this was after an interval of about an hour. Sm-ely 
 during this hour Peter had time for reflection, and should have seen 
 that the longer he remained in such company, the more danger he 
 incurred. In the matter of this third denial, St. Luke notices that 
 one put himself forward with the words, " Of a truth this fellow 
 also was with Him, for he is a Galilaean ; " St. John, that the kins- 
 man of Malchus, whose ear Peter had cut off, joined in the accu- 
 sation ; and St. Matthew and St. Mark merely mention that the 
 accusation was taken up by " them that stood by," who doubtless 
 simply re-echoed what the man in St. Luke's narrative stated 
 when they said, " Thou art a Galilaean, and thy speech agreeth 
 thereto." Then came the'third denial. 
 
 71. " But he began to curse and to swear, saying, I know not," 
 &c. Peter would say to the man who was the first in assert- 
 ing that he was with the Lord because he was a Galilaean, " Man, I 
 
Chap. XIV.] THE SECOND TIME THE COCK CREW. 373 
 
 72 ° And the second time tlie cock crew. And Peter called 
 to mind tlie word that Jesus said unto him, °.Matt. xxvi. 
 
 72. "And the second time," So A., C, later Uncials, almost all Cursives, and some 
 versions. H, B., L., D., G., some Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., Sjriac read, "And imme- 
 diately the second time." 
 
 know not what thou sayest," and to the rest, " I know not the 
 Man — this Man of whom ye speak." 
 
 The difficulties of reconciling the various narratives of the 
 denials have been indefinitely increased by adhering to the absurd 
 and unnatural supposition, that in a crowd of menials only one 
 spoke at a time — that they spoke only to Peter, or must all be 
 assumed to speak only to him — that each denial on the part of St. 
 Peter consisted of but one sentence. Whereas we have only to 
 imagine a scene in which a single person is beset and worried by 
 perhaps a dozen others, to be convinced how true the account is to 
 natm-e, and how impossible it would be for any two bystanders, if 
 afterwards examined, to give an exactly coherent account of all 
 that was said and done. 
 
 For the lessons to be drawn from this fall of the Apostle, and his 
 restoration, I refer the reader to my notes on St. Matthew. I will 
 add two or three now from the Fathers. 
 
 Fhst, Augustine writes : " I boldly assert that it is a useful 
 thing for the proud and self-sufficient sometimes to fall into an open 
 and apparent sin, by means of which they who were sujiplanted 
 by an over great liking of themselves, may be brought to a salu- 
 tary self-abhorrence, just as Peter was more benefited by his self- 
 condemnation, when he wept bitterly, than by his self-complacency, 
 when he presumed." ("De Civ. Dei," Lib. ii. chap. 14. Ford.) 
 
 Again, Ambrose : *' More happily did Peter fall, than others 
 stand upright. The very miscarriages of holy men are useful. I 
 was nothing hurt by Peter's denial ; I am much the better for his 
 repentance. It has taught me to avoid bad company." (Ford.) 
 
 So Leo : *' Blessed tears, holy Apostle, which had the virtue 
 of Holy Baptism in washing ofi" the sin of thy denial. The Eight 
 Hand of the Lord Jesus was with thee to uphold thee before thou 
 wast quite thrown down, and in the midst of thy perilous fall, thou 
 receivedst strength to stand. The rock quickly returned to its 
 stabihty, recovering so great fortitude, that he who in Christ's 
 
O T 
 
 74 THOU SHALT DENY ME THRICE. [St. Mark. 
 
 Before the cock crow twice, tliou shalt deny me tlirice. And 
 Or, heivept || wlieii lie tliouglit tliercon, he wept. 
 
 abundantly, 
 
 or, he began 
 
 to weep. 
 
 " Crow twice." So A., L., N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Vulg., Syriac, &c. 
 " Twice" omitted by N, C, some Old Latin, iEthiopic. 
 
 Passion had quailed, should endure his own subsequent sufferings 
 with fearlessness and constancy." (Cat. Aurea.) 
 
 And Theophylact : " For tears brought Peter by penitence to 
 Christ. Confounded then be those who say, that he who sins after 
 Baptism, is not received to the remission of his sins. For behold 
 Peter, who had also received the Body and Blood of the Lord, is 
 received by penitence, for the failings of saints are written, that if 
 we fall by want of caution, we also may be able to run back 
 through their examx^le, and hope to be reheved by penitence.'* 
 (Cat. Aurea.) 
 
 A 
 
 CHAP. XV. 
 
 ND * straightway in the morning the chief priests held 
 a consultation with the elders and scribes, and the 
 a Ps. ii. 2. whole council, and bound Jesus, and carried Mm 
 
 JViatt. xxvii. 1. 
 
 Luke xxii. 66. awav, and delivered Mm to Pilate. 
 
 & xxiii. 1. "^ 
 
 John xviii. 28. 
 
 Act iii. 13, & 
 
 iv. 26. 
 
 1. "And straightway in the morning, the chief priests," &c. 
 This was a more formal meeting of the Sanhedrim : the meeting in 
 the night being only a preparatory one to collect evidence. 
 
 St. Luke alone gives the account of what took place at this San- 
 hedrim (Luke xxii. 66-71). The examination of the Lord and His 
 answers are so similar, that some have thought that St. Luke is 
 recording the examination of the previous night. But at a second 
 meeting there would be necessarily a repetition of what had taken 
 place at the previous one, as its object was not to collect new 
 evidence, but to record and confirm, as it were, the evidence taken 
 previously. 
 
Chap. XV.] PILATE ASKED HBI. 375 
 
 2 ^ And Pilate asked Mm, Art thou the King J^^^^"- xxvii. 
 
 *' And bound Jesus." He had been previously bound, but was, 
 probably, partially unbound when He stood before the high priest. 
 
 "And carried bim away, and dehvered him to Pilate." Pontius 
 Pilate was the Procurator, or deputy of the Governor of Syria, of 
 which latter province Jud^a formed a part. 
 
 Why was the Lord thus brought before PLlate ? Of course the 
 ready answer is, that the Jews had no power to put any man to 
 death, and this they urged against Pilate when he had said, *' Take 
 ye him, and judge him according to your law." But they had, on 
 several other occasions taken up stones to stone Him — they also 
 stoned Stephen, apparently with impunity ; and if they had excited 
 the people to stone the Lord for blasphemy, it would, probobly, 
 have been winked at. It would have been represented to the 
 governor that this Man had insulted their religion in its holiest 
 place, and that the people could not be restrained from taking 
 summary vengeance upon Him. 
 
 But their real reason was that they might put an end for ever to 
 His pretensions by procuring that a form of death should be in- 
 flicted upon Him which was not only cruel and ignominious, but 
 was accounted cursed, so that anyone who suffered by it must be 
 held to be under the ban of the Almighty. Thus in Deut. xsi. 23 : 
 " He that is hanged is accursed of God ; " and the Apostle cites this 
 as fulfilled in the case of the Lord : " Christ hath redeemed us from 
 the curse of the Law, being made a curse for us : for it is written, 
 Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree " (Gal. iii. 13). 
 
 Now it is clear from the whole narrative that they were deter- 
 mined that He should suffer by this death, and no other. If Ha 
 had suffered by any other, He might have been held to be a martyr, 
 and His doctrine might have spread after His death ; but not if He 
 was hung on a tree, or crucified. And so far as the unbelieving 
 Jews were concerned they were right in their assumption. The 
 name of ignonimy, by which the Saviour of the World is known 
 amongst His unbelieving countrymen, is the One Who was hung, 
 the Taloi. The mere fact that He was thus suspended in death is 
 sufficient to discredit His claims to have been in the favour of God. 
 2. "And Pilate asked him, Art thou the King of the Jews? " 
 What suggested this question to Pilate? for at the two examinations 
 before the Sanhedrim not a word was said about His kingly claims. 
 
376 THOU SAYEST IT. [St. Mark. 
 
 of the Jews? And lie answering said unto him, Thou 
 sayest it. 
 
 All turned upon the unique sense in which He asserted that He 
 was the Son of God. Neither in St. Matthew's, St. Mark's, or St. 
 John's Gospel is there a word of accusation on the part of the Jews 
 that He had made Himself a King, at least at this stage of the pro- 
 ceedings ; but the missing link is to be found in St. Luke, who 
 alone tells us that when He was first brought to Pilate " they began 
 to accuse Him, saying, We found this fellow perverting the nation, 
 and forbidding to give tribute to Caesar, saying that He Himself is 
 Christ a King" (Luke xxiii. 2). 
 
 From this we learn how completely independent the four narra- 
 tives are, and yet that they supplement one another, and that God 
 intended that they should be read and compared together. 
 
 The accusation that the Lord made Himself a King was the only 
 one which Pilate could understand. Any matter respecting the 
 Messiahship, or the Sonship, or of breaking the Sabbath, or of for- 
 giving sins, or destroying the temple, he would have dismissed with 
 contempt as being a " question of their own superstition." Again, 
 it was the only one which they thought Pilate must enter into — it 
 was the only one which touched his own fears : as was proved by 
 the impression made upon him by their exclamation, " If thou let 
 this man go, thou art not Ceesar's friend." Again, it was the only 
 one of which they could get public proof, for a vast multitude had 
 attended the Lord when He rode a few days before into Jerusalem ; 
 which multitude shouted : " Blessed be the King that cometh in 
 the name of the Lord." So that they had the shameless effrontery 
 to condemn Him for blasj)hemy at their own assembly, and to bring 
 Him before Pilate on a totally different charge. 
 
 " Thou sayest it." Notwithstanding that Theophylact, a Greek 
 Father, says : "His answer is doubtful, since it may mean : ' TJiou 
 sayest, but I say not so,' it is agreed by almost all that the words are a 
 decided affirmation : ' Thou sayest the fact,' or ' It is as thou sayest.' " 
 Before this stage of the proceedings the things occurred which are 
 mentioned in St. John's Gospel — that Pilate went out to them — that 
 he bid them take Jesus and judge Him according to their law — 
 that Pilate asked the Lord whether He were the King of the Jews, 
 and received the answer, " My kingdom is not of this world," by 
 which Pilate understood that the Lord claimed cnly a mystical or 
 
Chap. XY.] JESUS ANSWERED NOTHING. 377 
 
 3 And the chief priests accused him of many things : but 
 he answered nothing. 
 
 4 *^ And Pilate asked him asrain, savino^, An- <= Matt, xxvii. 
 swerest thou nothing ? behold how many things 
 
 thej witness against thee. 
 
 5 ^ But Jesus yet answered nothinpr ; so that ^ is. liii. 7. 
 
 •^ ° ' John xix. 9. 
 
 Pilate marvelled. 
 
 3. "But he answered nothing," omitted by H, A., B., C, D., later Uncials, almost all 
 Cursives, some Old Latin, Vnlg. ; retained by some Cursives, Old Latin (a, e), some 
 versions. 
 
 4, "They witness against thee." So A., E., G., H., K., M., N., other later Uncials, 
 most Cursives, some versions; but ^^, B., C, D, read, "They accuse thee of." 
 
 spiritual empire, and that the weapon by which He asserted His 
 kingship was His witness to the truth. 
 
 3. " And the chief priests accused him of many things : but he 
 answered nothing." 
 
 4. " And Pilate asked him again . . . Pilate marvelled." "Why 
 did not the Lord answer these accusations ? Very probably, not 
 only because they were palpably false, but because the leading allega- 
 tions were respecting points which involved His Messiahship. He 
 could not answer accusations respecting His universal Empire — His 
 being the supreme Judge — His being the Lord of the Sabbath, by 
 denying them ; and yet He could not make the sense in which 
 these things were to be understood j)lain to a sceptical and un- 
 Bpiritual heathen like Pilate. 
 
 " Pilate marvelled." On this Calvin sensibly remarks : " The 
 integrity of Christ was such that the judge saw it plainly without 
 any defence. But Pilate wished that Christ might not neglect His 
 own cause, and might thus be acquitted without giving offence to 
 many people. And up to this point the integrity of Pilate is worthy 
 of commendation, because from a favourable regard to the inno- 
 cence of Christ, he urges Him to defend Himself; " and he further 
 remarks : " Christ, therefore, was at that time silent, that He may 
 now be our Advocate and by His intercession may deliver us from 
 condemnation." 
 
 The reader will remember how this silence of the Lord before 
 His accusers was the subject of one very distinct prophecy : " He 
 is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her 
 shearers is dumb, so He openeth not His mouth." 
 
378 ONE NAMED BARABBAS. [St. Mark. 
 
 6 Now ® at that feast lie released unto them one prisoner, 
 e Matt, xxvii. whomsoever they desired. 
 xxiii. 17. John 7 And there was one named Barabbas, ivhich 
 
 xviii 39 
 
 lay bound with them that had made insurrection 
 with him, who had committed murder in the insurrection. 
 
 7. "That had made insurrection with him," So A., G., H., N., &c. ; bnt ^<, B., C, 
 D., K., and a few Cursives, and Sah. read simply, " made insurreetion." 
 
 One of the accusations directed against Him at this time con- 
 tained the word " Galilee." The chief priests said, " He stirreth 
 up the people, teaching throughout all Jewry, beginning from 
 Galilee." Pilate eagerly caught at this word, and hoping to get rid 
 of the foul business he sent the Lord to the Tetrarch of Galilee, 
 who was then in Jerusalem, but Herod sent Him back mocked and 
 insulted, and without a word on which a charge of death could be 
 preferred against Him. 
 
 6. " Now at that feast he released unto them one prisoner, whom- 
 soever they desired." From St. John's account we should gather 
 that Pilate first suggested to them the custom, in order that he 
 might release the Lord (John xviii. 39). 
 
 The custom of having one of the prisoners released by the governor 
 on the festival to gratify the people was " an open abuse of the wor- 
 ship of God ; for nothing could be more unreasonable than that fes- 
 tivals should be honoured by allowing crimes to go unpunished." 
 
 7. *' And there was one named Barabbas, which lay bound with 
 them that had," &c. As nothing is said in Josephus of this man's 
 insurrection, it is not at all probable that it was more than a dange- 
 rous riot attended with murder and plunder, though, no doubt, the 
 insurrection was directed against the Roman authority. 
 
 It is exceedingly improbable that, as some suppose, it was in the 
 remotest degree connected with Messianic claims on the part of the 
 leader. For the remarkable variety of readings supported by one or 
 two later MSS., and known to Origen, see the note in St. Matthew, 
 xxvii. 16. That he was a common, vulgar ruffian, with no re- 
 deeming features in his character, seems evident from St. Peter's 
 reproach : ** Ye denied the Holy One and the Just, and desired a 
 murderer to be granted unto you" (Acts iii. 14). 
 
 8. " And the multitude crying aloud began to desire him to do 
 as he had ever," &c. This is peculiar to St. Mark. It seems at 
 
Cbap. XV.] THE MULTITUDE CRYING ALOUD. 379 
 
 8 And the multitude crying aloud began to desire him 
 to do as he had ever done unto them. 
 
 9 But Pilate answered them, saying, "Will ye that I release 
 unto you the King of the Jews ? 
 
 10 For he knew that the chief priests had delivered him 
 for envy. 
 
 11 But ^the chief priests moved the people, f Matt, xxvii. 
 
 1 -I-. I 1 2*^- Actsiii. 
 
 that he should rather release Barabbas unto i4. 
 them. 
 
 8. " Crjnng aloud." So A., C, N., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, Syriap, and 
 Armenian ; but N, B., D., some Old Latin, Vulg., Sah., Coptic, Gothic i^ad, "went up." 
 So Revisers. "Went up and began to ask him,'' &c. 
 
 "Ever done unto them." So A., C, D,, N,, later Uncials, most Cursives, Vulg. ; but 
 N, B., A, Copt., Sah. omit " ever." 
 
 first not in full accordance with what St. John says — that Pilate 
 himself suggested that he should himself observe the custom of the 
 feast. It may be explained thus : that they bad noticed some 
 hesitation on the part of the governor to observe the custom unless 
 it would result in the release of Jesus. 
 
 9, 10. '• But Pilate answered them, saying, "Will ye . . . delivered 
 him for envy." This saying, " He knew that they had delivered 
 him for envy," distinctly implies that Pilate must have known 
 much of the character and works of Jesus which excited the envy 
 of the chief i)riests. He must have known the favour in which 
 Jesus was with the common people, and the reasons for it. In 
 appealing to the people he trusted that they would go against 
 those in authority, and demand the release of Him Who had done 
 so many miracles of healing amongst them, and Whom they had so 
 lately welcomed into Jerusalem with shouts of triumph. 
 
 11. " But the chief priests moved the people." With what argu- 
 ments did they thus "move the people?" Very probably with 
 appeals to their disax)pointment in that Jesus was not in the least 
 degree the Messiah which the mass of the people expected. Veiy 
 probably they would urge against Him blasphemy, sabbath-break- 
 ing, too great strictness in the upholding of the man-iage vow. But 
 it is likely that the crowd collected at the prsetorium consisted 
 mainly of their own creatm'es — those whom their emissaries had 
 beaten up. And, as Wilhams well remarks, those who were really 
 
380 CRUCIFY HIM. [St. Mark. 
 
 12 And Pilate answered and said again unto them, What 
 will je then that I shall do unto him whom ye call the King 
 of the Jews ? 
 
 13 And they cried out again, Crucify him. 
 
 12, " Pilate answered and said again." So A., F., G., H., K,, M., N., most Cursives; 
 but N, B., C, Vulg., and Sah. I'ead, "Pilate again answered." 
 
 "What \n\\ ye that I shall do unto him whom ye call the King of the Jews?" Great 
 variation of readings here, none of any importance. Vulg., Quid ergo vultis faciam regi 
 Judaeorum? Revisers, "What then shall I do unt© him whom ye call the King of the 
 Jews ? " 
 
 deeply moved by His doctrine, would have been the least loud and 
 prominent in such a multitude, being more in secret ; and in large 
 bodies of men and popular assemblies good is smothered : the bad 
 predominate ; good principle is despised by the wicked, and the 
 weak are ashamed of it. Moreover, on this subject of Barabbas 
 they were seditiously excited, and, perhaps, nationally ; his insur- 
 rection, or riot, having been, in all probability, against some display 
 of Eoman authority. 
 
 12. " And Pilate answered and said again unto them, What will 
 ye then .... King of the Jews ? " Comparing together the ac- 
 counts in St. Matthew and our Evangelist, he said : " What shall I 
 do then with Jesus which is called Christ, whom ye call the King 
 of the Jews?" 
 
 It is to be noticed how in all the accounts Pilate seems either 
 determined in himself or led by a higher Power to impose on the 
 Jews the kingship of our Lord. If this was wholly, or in part, 
 from himself, it came of his utter contempt for the Jewish race. 
 He delighted to call a poor, down-trodden, persecuted, manacled 
 I)risoner their King. But, no doubt, in doing this he "prophesied," 
 as Caiaphas had done. He spoke and acted under the inspiration 
 of a higher Power. What he taunted them with was the truth. And 
 when he wrote the title, and when he refused to alter it, he adhered 
 to the truth of God, that the despised Nazarene was the King of 
 the Jews, the King of Israel, the King of kings. 
 
 13. " And they cried out again. Crucify him." That means, " Kill 
 him by torture. Put Him to the foulest and the most cruel death thou 
 knowest of." Did the people shout for this of themselves, or were 
 they stirred to it by the chief priests ? No doubt the latter is the truth. 
 For the chief priests of that time, particularly those of the family 
 
Chap. XV.] WHAT EVIL HATH HE DONE. 3S1 
 
 14 Then Pilate said unto them, Why, what evil hath he 
 
 of Annas, were men who excelled in wickedness. They had bought 
 their dignity of the Komans. They were Sadducees, and so alien 
 in heart from the system which they administered. They were 
 guardians of the Temple, and yet profaned it by making it a den of 
 thieves. They were men who could suborn witnesses — who could 
 seek out false witnesses. Such men had sold themselves to do evil. 
 No wonder, then, that they hated Jesus with perfect hatred. They 
 hated Him for the claims He made to be a spiritual, unworldly 
 Messiah, for His extreme reverence for His Father's house, for His 
 assertion of the doctrine of the Eesurrection, and for the proof He 
 had given of it by having Himself raised to life a dead body. They 
 hated Him for His influence with the best and most simple-minded 
 of the people, for His purity and goodness. And so being given 
 over to the spirit of envy and cruelty, they scrupled not to move 
 the professing people of God to demand that the worst of Gentile 
 punishments should be inflicted on their Victim. And no doubt, as 
 I said at the outset, they insisted on this punishment as that most 
 akin to the hanging on a tree, which their law pronounced ac- 
 cursed. And so they hoped to extinguish His claims by His 
 death.^ 
 
 14. "Then Pilate said unto them, Why, what evil hath he 
 done ? " Pilate says this not once, but over and over again, " I find 
 no fault in this man." " I find in Him no fault at all. Behold I> 
 having examined Him before you, have found no fault in this Man ; 
 no, nor yet Herod." " I am innocent of the blood of this just 
 Person." I bring Him forth to you that ye may know that I find 
 no fault in Him. " Take ye Him, and crucify Him, for I find no 
 fault in Him." Perhaps it was partly on account of these reiterated 
 assei-tions on the part of His judge that He was innocent, that His 
 common designation amongst the Christian Jews was, "the Just 
 One," " The Holy One and the Just." 
 
 ^ Thus Justin Martyr makes Trypho, the unconverted Jew, say r 
 " This so-called Christ of yours was dishonourable and inglorious ; 
 60 much so, that the last curse contained in the law of God fell- 
 upon Him, for He was crucified." (Ch. xxxii.) 
 
382 HE RELEASED BARABBAS. [St. Mark. 
 
 done ? Aiid tliey cried out the more exceedingly, Crucify 
 
 him. 
 
 g Matt. xxviL 15 ^ ^ And so Pilate, willing to content the 
 
 23. John xix. 
 
 1, 16. people, released Barabbas unto them, and de- 
 
 livered Jesus, when he had scourged him, to be crucified. 
 
 14. " They cried out the more exceedingly." So E., N., some other later Uncials, most 
 Cursives; but N, A., B., C, D., G., H., K., M„ and some Cursives read, "exceedingly." 
 
 " They cried out the more exceedingly, Crucify him." As if this 
 appetite for blood was sharpened by the delay. Bede quotes very 
 appositely : *' Mine heritage is unto me as a lion of the forest, it 
 crieth out against me." (Jerem. xii. 8.) 
 
 15. "And so Pilate, willing to content the people, released 
 Barabbas unto them," &c. How was it that the representative of 
 the Koman power, that crushing iron despotism which had sub- 
 dued the world, would not abide by his convictions, but desired to 
 *' content " them ? St. John tells us what enables us to understand 
 this. The Jews had said to him, when they saw him vacillating 
 and hesitating, " If thou let this Man go, thou art not CaBsar's 
 friend ; whosoever maketh himself a King speak eth against Cassar." 
 It would have gone hard with Pilate at Rome if a report had been 
 sent up that he had allowed a Man to escape without punishment, 
 indeed, without due investigation. Who had a few days before 
 entered the turbulent city at the head of an immense multitude, 
 who hailed him as King, and as the successor of the founder of the 
 Jewish monarchy. *' Hosanna to the Son of David." 
 
 *' Released Barabbas unto them." In the almost ironical words 
 of St. Luke, *' he released unto them him who for sedition and 
 murder was cast into prison." But how astonishing was the retri- 
 bution ! At the time of the siege of Jerusalem, the city which had 
 thus rejected the Lord, suffered unheard of calamities through the 
 tyranny of a band of murderers and robbers of the very type of 
 Barabbas, who got possession of their temple, destroyed their store 
 of provision (which occasioned the fearful famine), and exercised the 
 greatest profanity and cruelty.^ This Barabbas represents our- 
 selves delivered from eternal death by the rejection and crucifixion 
 of the Lord. 
 
 ^ See notes on Chap, xiii., pp. 304, 305. 
 
€hap. XY.] the hall CALLED PRiETORIUM. 383 
 
 16 ^And tlie soldiers led him away into the hall, called 
 Praetoriuni ; and they call together the whole i^ Matt, xxvii. 
 "band. 
 
 "And when He had scourged Jesus." A fearful punishment. 
 The whole back of the victim becoming a mass of raw bleeding 
 flesh through the infliction. This was written in prophecj^ " I gave 
 my back to the smiters," and its saving effects were also written in 
 the same prophet, " He was wounded for our transgressions, He 
 was bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement of our peace was 
 upon him, and with his strij)es we are healed." 
 
 "To be crucified." A faint idea of the extreme indignity of all 
 this inflicted on the Son of God may be got from Cicero's invective 
 against Verres : "To bind Roman citizens, 'tis a thing unlawful; 
 to scourge them 'tis a great crime ; to put them to death, 'tis 
 almost a parricide ; but what shall I say of crucifying them ? It 
 is impossible to find any word of weight and significancy, so as to 
 express a thing so abominable." And to all this the King of Glory 
 submitted for our sakes. Verily, sin must be an evil whicli we can 
 very faintly realize, if the Son of God condescended to such igno, 
 miny to save us from it. It is supposed that Pilate scomged the 
 Lord, in order to excite the pity of the Jews. " Surely," he thought 
 to himself, " it will satiate their malice to see Him all torn and 
 bleeding. After this they cannot clamour for His crucifixion." 
 
 16. "And the soldiers led him away into the hall (or court or 
 court-yard), called Prsetorium." He had been standing without 
 with Pilate, who had come out to hear the accusation of the chief 
 priests, who were afraid to enter within the heathen precincts, lest 
 they should be defiled. Now the soldiers took him within, into the 
 large open court, surrounded by the buildings of the palace. 
 
 "And they called together the whole band." There may have 
 been several hundred. If so many, it was to add to the mockeiy. 
 The word signifies the tenth of a legion, i.e., about 460 men ; but 
 it may have been only those on duty, or they may have been 
 gathered together to see the sport. A nation whose chief public 
 spectacle was gladiatorial shows, must have been given over to the 
 spirit of cruelty. 
 
 How was it that Roman soldiers, who could have known nothing 
 of our Lord, evidently delighted in inflicting upon Him this 
 mockery and cruelty ? It is absurd to suppose that it was from 
 
384 A CROWN OF THORNS. [St. Mark. 
 
 17 And they clothed him with purple, and platted a crown 
 of thorns, and put it about his head, 
 
 hatred of spiritual religion, such as that which our Lord preached, 
 for such a thing was uniraaginable by them. I cannot help think- 
 ing that it was because our Lord was a Jew, belonging to a race 
 which they both despised and hated. They would probably have 
 inflicted it upon any other Jew who was given over to their bru- 
 tality. They would probably also take more seriously the term 
 " King of the Jews," which they had heard applied to Him. 
 Anyhow, their extraordinary malice against One of "Whom they 
 knew nothing, requires to be accounted for. All they do is in 
 mockery of His supposed kingly pretensions, as the next verses 
 tell us. 
 
 17. " And they clothed him with purple." " Purple (porphura) is 
 vaguely used to signify different shades of red, and is especially con- 
 vertible with crimson. Perhaps they may have first put on again the 
 white dress in which Herod had caused Him to be clothed, to 
 mark Him out as a candidate for Royal honours, and then taken it 
 off in order to invest Him with the scarlet robe, the sign of His 
 having attained to kingly dignity. The drama would thus be com- 
 plete. They accordingly again stripped off His outer garment, and 
 instead of it put on a scarlet military cloak (sagum), which was 
 intended to represent the imperial purple." (Lange.) 
 
 "What a reproof to those who call themselves by the name of 
 Christ, and yet deck themselves in " gay clothing ! " That which 
 ministers to their pride, ministered to their Lord's most bitter 
 humiliation. 
 
 "And platted a crown of thorns, and put it about his head." 
 They crown with thorns the Head which St. John sees in vision 
 wearing many diadems. What a lesson are we taught by this, no 
 less than that patience and endurance are the crown of virtue ! In 
 mockery they crowned Him with thorns, and in the eyfe of faith 
 His crown of thorns has turned all other crowns into tinsel. 
 " What sort of garland, I pray you," asked Tertullian, " did he Who 
 is both the Head of the man and the glory of the woman, Jesus 
 Christ, the Husband of the Church, submit to ? ... Of thorns, I 
 think, and thistles, a figure of the sins which the soil of the flesh 
 brought forth for us, but the power of the Cross removed, blending 
 
CuAP. XV.] HAIL, KING OF THE JEWS ! 385 
 
 18 Aiid began to salute him, Hail, King of the Jews ! 
 
 19 And they smote him on the head with a reed, and did 
 spit upon him, and bowing their knees worshipped him. 
 
 in its endurance by the head of our Lord Death's every sting. 
 Yes, and besides the figure, there is contumely with ready lip, and 
 dishonour and infamy, and the ferocity involved in the cruel things 
 which then disfigured and lacerated the temples of the Lord. . . . 
 If for these things you owe your own head to Him, repay it if you 
 can, such as He presented His for yours. . . . Keep for God His 
 own property untainted. He will crown it if He choose. Nay, 
 then, He does even choose. He calls us to it. To Him who con- 
 quers He says, ' I will give thee a crown of life.' " 
 
 18. " And began to salute him> Hail, King of the Jews ! " As I 
 noticed before, I cannot help believing that they thought in their 
 ignorance, that the assertion of our Lord's claim to be a temporal 
 King of the Jews had been serious. So that they supposed that 
 they were mocking One Who was not only called a King in deri- 
 sion, but Who had really in some way pretended to be one. Per- 
 haps some of them had been witnesses of His entry into Jerusalem, 
 and understood nothing of its spiritual significance, but regarded 
 Him as a fanatical pretender. 
 
 19. "And they smote him on the head with a reed." St. Mat- 
 thew tells us that they put a reed in His right hand as a mock 
 sceptre. It was, doubtless, with this reed that they smote Him. 
 
 "And did spit upon him." The verb being in the imperfect, 
 implies that they thus insulted Him over and over again. 
 
 " And bowing their knees worshipped him." That is, fell down 
 before Him as men do before an earthly sovereign. It does not, I 
 think, imply the mockery of adoration as to God. 
 
 Such were the insults endured by the Son of God. What an un- 
 told amount of misery, short of bodily anguish, human beings 
 inflict upon one another by ridicule, mockery, and insult. There 
 seems to be, if it could be added u}?, far more misery in this evil 
 world from these things, than from blows or tortures, or injuries to 
 persons or property through malice and revenge. And the Son of 
 God, Who was made sin for us, in that He submitted to endare all 
 the miseries which sin brings upon us, bore patiently all this mockery 
 and insult. So it was written, " He is despised and rejected of men, 
 a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. He was despised and 
 
 c c 
 
386 ONE SIMON A CYRENIAN. [St. Mark. 
 
 20 And wlien they liad mocked liim, they took off the 
 purple from him, and put his own clothes on him, and led 
 him out to crucify him. 
 *Matt. xxvii. 21 'And they compel one Simon a Cyrenian, 
 
 xxiii. 26. 
 
 we esteemed Him not." " I gave my back to the smiters, and my 
 cheeks to them that plucked off the hair. I hid not my face from 
 shame and spitting." So that aUke in pain of body and in distress 
 of soul, He is One with us. 
 
 At this time the events happened related only by St. John. 
 Pilate brought forth the Lord, Who had suffered these things 
 within the court of the Palace, and showed Him to the people 
 with the words, '* Behold the Man." After this he was awed by 
 the words, "He made Himself the Son of God," and apparently 
 brought Jesus into the hall, and further questioned Him. But at 
 last, after again seeking to release Him, he was decided by their 
 cry, " If thou let this Man go^ thou art not Caesar's friend." 
 Then after sitting down on the judgment seat, and making one 
 more appeal, " Shall I crucify your King ? " and hearing their re- 
 sponse, " We have no King but Csesar," " He delivered Him to 
 them to be crucified." 
 
 20. " And when they had mocked him, they took off the purple 
 from him, and put his own clothes on him." Why did they do 
 this ? Why did they not continue their insults by leading Him on 
 the Via Dolorosa clad with the mock robe of royalty ? Because, if 
 so, the prophecy would not have been fulfilled, " They parted my 
 garments among them, and cast lots upon my vesture." Part of his 
 own clothes was the seamless robe, for the possession of which they 
 must cast lots, ^nd so fulfil the prophecy. 
 
 "And led him out to crucify him." And this also, as the reader 
 knows, was to fulfil that which was written, that " He must suffer 
 without the gate." " Jesus, that He might sanctify the people with 
 His own blood, suffered without the gate. Let us go forth, there- 
 fore, unto Him, without the camp, bearing his reproach " (Hebrews 
 xiii. 12, 13). 
 
 21. "And they compel one Simon a Cyrenian, who passed by, 
 coming out of the country, the father," &c. The Lord, after the 
 protracted watching and sleeplessness of twenty-four hours, the 
 exhaustion of His agony and bloody sweat, the fatigue of being 
 
CuAP. XV.] THE PLACE GOLGOTHA. 387 
 
 who passed by, coming out of the country, the father of 
 Alexander and Eufus, to bear his cross. 
 
 22 ^ And they bring him unto the place Grol- ^ Matt, xxvii. 
 gotha, which is, being inteiT:>reted, The place of a 33! John xix.' 
 skull. ^'• 
 
 hurried to and fro from the com'ts of three judges, the loss of blood 
 through the scourging, and the weakness of body which in every 
 human being must occm' through the harassing of the miri/cl by in- 
 sults and humiliation which He deeply felt, was unable to bear His 
 cross but a short way, perhaps only just beyond the gate. Here 
 His persecutors met one who was probably known to some in the 
 crowd as one who favoured His teaching, and as the soldiers were 
 on military duty, they had power to press men to assist them. 
 And they compelled this man to bear the Cross, so that the Lord 
 might not expire under its weight, but be reserved to the torture of 
 being nailed to it. By thus treating him, they thought to do Simon 
 a dee]) dishonour, but instead of this they enshrined his name in 
 the very Gospel of the Cross, so that wherever "this Gospel is 
 preached," his name is recorded as the Lord's cross-bearer. 
 
 " And who was that man of Gyrene ? What good deed of faith had 
 he done to Christ, or to Christ's little ones, that he, of all the sons 
 of Adam, should have been deemed worthy to be admitted to this 
 the first and greatest of all earthly honours ? Who he was, except- 
 ing the name, we know not, nor what he had done ; for God with- 
 draws from the sight of men and hides, in His own presence, those 
 whom He most delights to honour." 
 
 He is called in St. Mark alone the "father of Alexander and 
 Eufus." Being so mentioned, his two sons were probably of note 
 in the early Church. As St. Mark wrote in Rome, it has been 
 conjectured that one was the Eufus living there to whom St. Paul 
 sent a salutation. (Eom. xtI. 13.) 
 
 22. "They bring him unto the place Golgotha," &c. "They 
 bring him." They do not now lead Him, He was probably too 
 weak, but half carry or drag Him. 
 
 " Unto the ^Dlace Golgotha." No doubt the place of death for the 
 worst criminals. This was also a part of the Lord's humiliation, 
 that He should suffer in the accursed place of public executions. 
 As is natural, all sorts of conjectures have been hazarded respecting 
 the place and its name, as, for instance, that it was the place where 
 
388 WINE MINGLED WITH MYRRH. [St. Mark. 
 
 23 ^And they gave hini to drink wine mingled with 
 I Matt, xxvii. mvrrh : but he received it not. 
 
 34. •' 
 
 23. "Gave him to drink." So A., D., later Uncials, almost all Cursives, some Old 
 Latin, Vulg., Sah., Syriac, ^thiopic, Gothic ; but N, B., C, L., A, Coptic, and Armenian 
 omit " to drink." 
 
 Adam was buried, that it was the place where Abraham laid Isaac 
 on the altar, that it was the centre of the earth. Respecting its 
 identification, there seems little doubt but that it was a small knoll, 
 insignificant in height (a mediaeval traveller calls it monticulus), 
 very near the place of the Holy Sepulchre.-^ As each of the four 
 Evangelists expressly connects it with a skull, I cannot but think 
 that it was a place polluted by the skulls and bones of criminals ; 
 perhaps some one skull was retained there to mark it as accursed. 
 The Jews, from their close association of death with ceremonial 
 pollution, must have had some place set apart for the death of 
 criminals : such could not be put to death anywhere near the Holy 
 City. 
 
 23. " And they gave him to drink wine mingled with myrrh : 
 but he received it not." St. Matthew calls this potion " vinegar 
 mingled with gall : " but both Evangelists evidently mean the same 
 thing. This wine would be the sour wine, tasting like vinegar, 
 which was the ordinary drink of the Roman soldiers, and the myrrh 
 being exceedingly bitter (bitter as gall) would naturally be called 
 gall. It may have had other stupefying ingredients mixed with it. 
 It was, of course, given as an anodyne.'^ " He tastes a little (Mattli. 
 xxvii. 34) of this bitter, intoxicating, and strengthening liquor, that 
 He may suffer from its acrid quality : he refuses the rest, to show 
 that He was resolved to endure all the pains of the Cross, to offer 
 His sacrifice with a perfect freedom of mind. How wonderful, O 
 Jesus, is the whole oeconomy of Thy sufferings ! It is peculiar to 
 Thee alone to suffer with this clear state of mind, this strict confor- 
 mity to the will of Thy Father, and this determinate choice of suf- 
 ferings, out of love to us sinners and for our salvation." (Quesnel.) 
 
 24. '* And when they had crucified him, they parted his garments, 
 
 ^ See note in Speaker's Commentary at the end of Matth. xxvii. 
 ^ According to the Talmud it was provided by the humanity of 
 the ladies of Jerusalem, for all criminals about to be crucified. 
 
Chap. XV.] WHEN THEY HAD CRUCIFIED HIM. 389 
 
 24 And when tliey had crucified him, ™ they ^ T^- ^'^"- ^^■ 
 
 *' ' -^ Luke xxni. 34. 
 John xix. 23. 
 
 casting lots upon them." None of the four EvangeHsts attempt 
 to describe the fearful circumstances of the Crucifixion itself. 
 Three, Matthew, Luke, and John say, " They crucified Him." St. 
 Mark, *' When they had crucified Him." The punishment was too 
 well known to require description. We will (God helping, and, we 
 trust, pardoning any mistake or shortcoming) say a few words first 
 upon the instrument of this punishment, then upon the infliction. 
 The Cross on which the Lord sufi"ered the all-reconciling Death was, 
 no doubt, the Latin Cross, the Cross of the figure with which we are 
 most familiar : only we are to remember that it was much lower 
 than what it is usually represented in pictures. The body of the suf- 
 ferer was not raised far aloft, his feet almost above the heads of the 
 surrounding spectators, but only a little above them, so that they 
 could come close to him to gibe at him, to threaten him with their 
 gestures, even to strike him. There was also a projection in front, 
 not seen in pictures, on which the principal weight of the body 
 rested, as the hands would not be equal to the strain of the whole 
 weight. Such a cross is repeatedly found on the coins and columns 
 of Constantine, who abolished its use throughout the emi)ire. 
 
 The infliction is thus described : " Enough remained to preserve 
 the pre-eminence of torture to the cross. The process of nailing 
 was exquisite torment, and yet worse in what ensued than in the 
 actual infliction. The sj)ikes rankled, the wounds inflamed, the local 
 injury produced a general fever, the fever a most intolerable thirst ; 
 but the misery of miseries to the sufierer was, while racked with 
 agony, to be fastened in a position which did not permit him to 
 writhe. Every attempt to relieve the muscles, eveiy instinctive 
 movement of anguish, only served to drag the lacerated flesh, and 
 wake up new and acuter pangs, and this torture, which must have 
 been continually aggravated until advancing death began to lay it 
 to sleep, lasted on an average two or three days." (Timbs.) 
 
 The endurance of this horrible punishment was the lowest depth 
 of the Lord's humiliation. " Being found in fashion as a man. He 
 humbled Himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death 
 of the cross." 
 
 Two inferences from the Lord's endurance of this death are certain. 
 
 1st. The atoning virtue of such a Death endured in His human 
 nature by the Son of God must reach to the lowest depths of human 
 
390 CASTING LOTS UPON THEM. [St. Mark. 
 
 parted his garments, casting lots upon tliem, what every man 
 should take. 
 
 sin. The Second Adam endured no ordinary death, but the Death 
 which men well versed in contriving tortures had invented for the 
 lowest, the meanest, the most degraded. Such a Sacrifice endured 
 by the Son of God must be all sufficient. So far as an innocent 
 Being could be, He was "made sin for us." In writing this, I do 
 not for a moment broach the doctrine that the Atonement wrought 
 on the Cross is a matter of equivalence, of exact measure, of so 
 much pain for so much sin — I regard this as a perversion of the 
 truth ; but in the counsels of God, the Son of God must suffer, and 
 He endured the extremity of human pain, so that we may be sure 
 tliat if such an One thus suffered, no sin can be out of the reach of 
 the virtue and power of His expiation. 
 
 And, in the second place, by such a form of death the Lord in His 
 own Person sounded the lowest depth of human anguish and distress. 
 
 Is any Christian, for instance, called upon to suffer a public exe- 
 cution, accompanied with torture and attended with every circum- 
 stance of ignominy and disgrace, and to suffer all this iniquitously, 
 the forms of justice having been outraged to bring him under the 
 punishment ? A worse case of human suffering cannot be conceived, 
 and yet the Lord explored before him even this bottomless pit of 
 misery. As in His agony in the garden the Lord explored the 
 depths of mental suffering, so on the Cross He experienced the 
 sharpest bodily anguish, and hereby we are assured of the perfect 
 sympathy of our High Priest in all we are called upon to endure. 
 
 *' They parted his garments, casting lots upon them, what every 
 man should take." Tliis fulfilment of a minute particular proj)hesied 
 of by David above a thousand years before, identifies to the believer 
 this Crucifixion and Death as those by which God intended to re- 
 deem the world. The sufferings as depicted in the former part of 
 this Psalm cannot be imagined to meet in any other death than that 
 of crucifixion. They are not the sufferings of one dying in battle, or in 
 prison, or by poison, or by being burnt to death, or by being strangled, 
 or by being beheaded, or by being stoned. They are the sufferings of 
 one "lifted up," surrounded by an enraged mob of enemies heaping 
 upon Him all manner of taunts and insults, but not attacking Him 
 with weapons: the bones of the Sufferer were out of joint. His 
 strength dried up, His tongue, through thirst, c]eaviDg to the gums, 
 
Chap. Xy.] IT WAS THE THIRD HOUR. 391 
 
 25 And ° it was the tliird hour, and they cruci- » See iNiatt. 
 
 _ in. xxvii. 45. Luke 
 
 ned nim. xxlii. 44. John 
 
 26 And ° the superscription of his accusation o Matt, xxvii. 
 was written over, THE KING OF THE JEWS, ^^• 
 
 His hands and feet pierced. Such were the sufferings of those 
 crucified, those dying by a death unknown to David, a purely Gen- 
 tile punishment. But amidst these inflictions the Psalmist pro- 
 phesies that they should part His garments among them and cast 
 lots for His vesture : this was a circumstance which would not 
 occur in one crucifixion out of ten thousand : the crucifiers might 
 part the garments, but why cast lots for one of these garments? 
 The solution of the senigma is, that the sufferer had a coat woven 
 without seam throughout, and they said among themselves, ** Let 
 us not rend it, but cast lots for it ; " and so they did, and by doing 
 this they fulfilled the prophecy. But the Psalm is one continued 
 prophecy resx)ecting One particular Man Whom, in the extremity 
 of His sufferings, God hears, so that He escapes out of the hands 
 of His enemies by what is to all appearances a Resurrection ; and 
 the consequences of His restoration are, "All the ends of the world 
 shall remember themselves and be turned unto the Lord, and all the 
 kindreds of the nations shall worship before Him." It may seem 
 strange to the unbeliever that the parting of the garments of the 
 Crucified should be mentioned in one breath, as it were, with the 
 Crucifixion, but to the believer it speaks of the One atoning Death, 
 and the Life from the dead, and the Eternal Glor}^ and Reign. 
 
 25, "And it was the third hour, and they crucified him." For 
 the reconciliation of this with the statement of St. John that He 
 was finally led out by Pilate to the Jews about the sixth hour, see 
 note on John xix. 14. The third hour of St. Mark would be nine 
 o'clock, but any time between nine and twelve would be reckoned 
 under the third hour. Augustine considers that the third hour refers 
 to the time when they cried, " Crucify Him, crucify Him," but this 
 seems impossible. 
 
 26. "And the superscription of his accusation was written over, THE 
 KING OF THE JEWS." This is the shortest and most concise of 
 the three titles. In all probability it was that which was written in 
 Latin. St. Luke's " This is the King of the Jews," is evidently the 
 same. The angel had prophesied, " The Lord God shall give unto 
 
392 THEY CRUCIFY TWO THIEVES. [St. Mark. 
 
 27 And ^witli liim tliey crucify two tliieves; the one on 
 P^Matt. xxvii. ijjg right hand, and the other on his left. 
 
 28 And the scripture was fulfilled, which 
 
 qis. iiii.i2 saith, "^And he was numbered with the trans- 
 Luke xxii. 37. 
 
 erressors. 
 
 27. " Two thieves ;" rather, "two robbers." Lntrones, Yulff. 
 
 28. This verse omitted by S, A., B., C, and a good many Cursives ; but inserted by 
 most later Uncials, E., F., G., H., K., L., M., some Old Latin, Vulg., &c. 
 
 Him the throne of His Father David, and He shall reign over the 
 House of Jacob for ever." In fact, we may say that the leading idea 
 of the Messiah in the Hebrew Scrijitures is that He should be first 
 King of Israel, and then an Universal King [thus Psalm Ixxii., Ixxxix., 
 cxxxii., Isaiah ix. 7, Jerem., xxiii. 5, 6] . So that in the eyes of the 
 Priests and Pharisees, who knew at least the letter of Scrii^ture, it 
 was exactly as if Pilate had written, *' This is the Messiah, the King 
 Whom you look for." To us who confess Him to be the Only Be- 
 gotten Son of God, and God of God, the " King of the Jews " is the 
 lowest of His titles ; but though the lowest, yet if He be the veri- 
 table King of the Jews in the sense of the Psalmist and of the 
 Prophets then He is infinitely more — He is all that He claimed to 
 be, the Only Begotten of the Father. 
 
 27. " And with him they crucify two thieves ; the one on his 
 right hand, and the other," &c. I have noticed tliat each Evange- 
 list particularly mentions that He was crucified between these two, 
 and that one was set on His right band, and the other on His left. 
 Remembering that one of these repented and the other died in im- 
 penitence, we cannot but look upon this as typical and prophetical. 
 As Augustine observes : " The very cross was the tribunal of Christ, 
 for the Judge was placed in the middle : one thief who believed was 
 set free, the other, who reviled, was condemned; which signified 
 what he was already about to do with the quick and dead." So 
 also Hilary and Leo. 
 
 28. " And the scripture was fulfilled, which saith, And he was 
 numbered," &c. The reader will see from the critical note that 
 there is some doubt whether this verse was originally written by 
 the Evangelist. Many suppose that it was a very ancient gloss 
 which crept into the text. But that it contains the Truth of God is 
 as certain as possible : for the whole chapter contains a number of 
 places of Scripture cited as having reference throughout to Christ's 
 
Chap. XV.] SAVE THYSELF. 393 
 
 29 And '^ they that passed by railed on him, wagging their 
 heads, and saying, Ah, * thou that destroyest the •" ps. xxii. 7. 
 temple, and buildest it in three days, jjha TJi9^' 
 
 30 Save thyself, and come down from the cross. 
 
 31 Likewise also the chief priests mocking said among 
 
 sufferings and Death, and one of the leading features of the humilia- 
 tion of His Death was, that He being innocent, was crucified with 
 two robbers, as if He were Himself a malefactor worthy of such a 
 fate— which, no doubt, by very many of those who passed by. He 
 was accounted to be. In the company of malefactors of the worst 
 type He died the death of a malefactor. 
 
 29. " x^nd they that passed by railed on him, . . . Ah, thou that 
 destroyed the temple, . . . Save thyself." Surely if they had 
 possessed the common feelings of humanity the knowledge of 
 the agonizing pain which Jesus was then enduring would have 
 moved even their hard hearts to some pity and restained their 
 reproaches. 
 
 "Ah, thou that destroyest the temple and buildest it in three 
 days," &c. How is it that this accusation, brought forward only in 
 the dead of the night before, could have found its way into the 
 mouths of the "passers by"? It seems as if to please the chief 
 priests, or at their instigation, some of those who had heard it 
 went to and fro before the Crucified, jeering the Sufferer, AVho, so 
 far from compassing the destruction of the temple, had cleansed it 
 from the pollutions of their unholy traffic. Surely such a rej)roach , 
 must have come from the lips of those whom the Lord had driven | 
 ignominiously out of it I 
 
 31. " Likewise also the chief priests mocking said among them- 
 selves with the scribes." That any of the heads of the twenty- 
 four courses should have so demeaned themselves — should have been 
 so lost to all sense of the holiness of their office, as to take part on 
 such a solemn day in insulting One "Whom they knew to be innocent, 
 is the most striking vindication possible of the justice of God's deal- 
 ings in rooting them out utterly and destroying every vestige of 
 the temple they had polluted, and the worship by which they had 
 profaned His Name. But there is a greater depth of wickedness 
 still, for they were conscious that the Man Whom they were cruci- 
 fying was in some sense a Saviour — they actually proceed to throw 
 
394 HIMSELF HE CANNOT SAVE. [St. Mark. 
 
 themselves with the scribes, He saved others ; himself he 
 cannot save. 
 
 32 Let Christ the King of Israel descend now from the 
 tMatt. xxvii. cross, that we may see and believe. And Hhey 
 
 44. Luke xxiii. ... . . 
 
 39. that were crucified with him reviled him. 
 
 XI Matt, xxvii. 33 And "when the sixth hour was come, there 
 
 45. Luke xxiii. 
 
 44. 
 
 in His teeth His acts of healing, of restoration of sight, even of 
 restoration to life, for they exclaim : 
 
 *' He saved others : himself he cannot save." What otlveis had 
 He saved ? They knew that He had saved the man born blind, for 
 they had made a show of investigating it (John ix.). They knew 
 that He had raised Lazarus from the dead ; they knew that during 
 this very week the blind and the lame had come to Him in the 
 temple, and He had healed them (Matt. xxi. 14). By whose power 
 had He performed such miracles ? Had any prophet ever ^Der- 
 formed greater ? He saved from disease, from blindness, even 
 from death, and yet these hardened men could exclaim, "He saved 
 others, himself he cannot save." Surely this was perilously akin 
 to the sin against the Holy Ghost, by Whose power He had done 
 His benevolent acts ! 
 
 32. "Let Christ the King of Israel descend now from the cross, 
 that," &c. He came not down from the Cross, for if He had, the offer 
 of salvation could not have been made, even to these His crucifiers, 
 as it was : but He gave them a far greater sign. He came out 
 from the tomb which they had sealed, and which they had guarded 
 with soldiers, but as He had foretold, " they were not persuaded, 
 though He rose from the dead." 
 
 "And they that were crucified with him reviled him." From 
 the accounts of St. Matthew and St. Mark we should gather that 
 both robbers at the first reviled Him, but that one — struck, perhaps, 
 by the meekness and patience of the Sufferer, and overawed by the 
 gathering darkness, repented and confessed Him. Augustine, how- 
 ever, suggests that Matthew and Mark, who touch but lightly on 
 this place, put the plural for the singular. The repentance of one 
 of the thieves does not seem from the first to have had a place in 
 the tradition of the Lord's life and acts, but was afterwards ascer- 
 tained by St. Luke. 
 
 33. " And when the sixth hour was come, there was darkness over 
 
CiiAP. XV.] ELOI, ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI? 395 
 
 was darknc ss over the whole land until the ninth honr, 
 
 34 And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, 
 saying, ^ Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani ? which is, ^Ps. xxii.i. 
 being intBrpreted, My God, my God, why hast 4(5. 
 thou foroaken me ? 
 
 33. " Land." Probably, " earth." See below. 
 
 34. " Lama." This word variously spelt. " Lema " in X, C, L. ; " lima," A., K„ INI., 
 U. ; " lama " iii B., D. ; " lemono," Syriac. 
 
 the whole land," &c. By what physical means God brought about this 
 darkness, it is impossible to conjecture. It was not an eclix)se, for it 
 was the time of full moon, and the darkness of an eclipse could not 
 have lasted above a few minutes. It seems to have been very dis- 
 tinctly referred to by a Gentile chronicler, Phlegon, who lived under 
 the Emperor Hadrian. Eusebius quotes the very words under the 
 date of the fourth year of the 202nd Olympiad: *' Then occurred 
 the greatest darkening of the sun which had ever been known ; it 
 became night at midday, so that the stars shone in the heavens. A 
 great earthquake in Bithynia, which destroyed a part of Nicaea." 
 Phlegon refers it to an eclipse, in which he was manifestly wrong, 
 as it is computed that no eclipse then occurred ; but though he was 
 wrong about the cause, the fact remains that he mentioned the 
 extraordinary darkness. TertuUian, also, in his Apology addressed 
 to the heathen, appeals to their own annals. The passage deserves 
 to be given in full: " At length being nailed to the Cross, He showed 
 many special signs to mark that Death. Of Himself He with a 
 word gave up the ghost, preventing the office of the executioner. 
 At the same moment the light of midday was withdrawn, the sun 
 veiling his orb. They thought it, forsooth, an eclipse, who knew 
 not that t,his also had been foretold concerning Christ ; when they 
 discovered not its cause, they denied it ; and yet ye have this event, 
 that befell the world, related in your own records." From these 
 passages we cannot but gather that this darkness extended far 
 beyond the confines of the Holy Land. Seeing that the Son of 
 God was then expiating the sins of a world, it seems but a small 
 thing that physical nature should, at God's bidding, testify to the un- 
 utterable moment in His sight of what was then being accomplished. 
 34. "And at the ninth hour [that is, at three o'clock] Jesus 
 cried with a loud voice, saying, Eloi . . . forsaken me ? " This is 
 not the cry of despair, as some say, who desire to prove that our 
 
396 HE CALLETH ELIAS. [St. AUrk. 
 
 35 And some of tliem that stood by, when they heard it 
 said, Behold, he calleth Elias. 
 
 Lord suffered all the torments of the lost. Such seems an impious 
 opinion, and the words of the Lord confute it, for in this lowest 
 depth of distress He claims God as His God, " My God, My God." 
 It is rather the cry of One "Who, holding fast by God, is yet de- 
 prived of all sensible consolation, even at the near approach of 
 death. If it be lawful to dwell on these words, we may best illus- 
 trate them by the language of the Psalm of which they form the 
 first words. There the Psalmist is inspired, as it were, to remon- 
 strate with God. " Why art thou so far from my health [sa^dng 
 me] and from the words of my complaint ? I cry in the day 
 time, but Thou hearest not. I am a worm and no man, a very 
 scorn of men and the outcast of the people. Go not from me, for 
 trouble is hard at hand, and there is none to help me." Again, in 
 the,69th, also a purely Messianic Psalm : " Thy rebuke hath broken 
 my heart, I am full of heaviness . . . neither found I any to com- 
 fort me." Again in Psalm Ixxxviii. : *' Lord, why abhorrest Thou 
 my soul, and hidest Thou Thy face from me ? " So that here is the 
 cry of one cast down — deserted utterly by man and forsaken by 
 God, in the only way in which God can possibly forsake the good, 
 by hiding the light of His countenance from them for a brief season. 
 We learn from this that depression of mind and spiritual desertion 
 are no proofs of rejection by God ; but rather, like bodily sufferings, 
 form part of that resemblance to His Son, which render us on that 
 account the more acceptable to our Heavenly Father. Bengel 
 considers that the words really mean, " Why didst Thou forsake 
 me?" the bitterness of the being forsaken, endured in darkness 
 and silence, being then past and over. 
 
 Quesnel remarks : " How many things does this ' why ' compre- 
 hend? It is a question which cannot be fully answered, but by 
 explaining the fall of Adam, and of his posterity in him, the design 
 of God's mercy in their recovery, the nature and rigour of His 
 justice, the necessity of a Sacrifice worthy of God, and all the in- 
 comprehensible designs of His wisdom in the establishment of the 
 Christian religion and in the work of eternal salvation." 
 
 35. ♦• And some of them that stood by, when they heard it, said, 
 Behold," &c. The word for EHas in the Syriac is Eleyo. If the 
 Lord's words were pronounced as written in St. Matthew and were 
 
Chap. XV.] A SPUNGE FULL OF VINEGAR. 397 
 
 36 And y one ran and filled a spunge full of vinegar, and 
 
 put it on a reed, and ^ e^ave him to drink, savins, y Matt, xxvii. 
 
 ^ ' ^ ' -^ ^ 48. Johnxix. 
 
 let alone ; Let ns see whether Elias will come to 29. 
 
 , 1 1 . T * Ps. ixix. 21. 
 tai^e mm down. 
 
 heard somewhat indistinctly, then we can account for their supposing 
 that He called for Elias, or Elijah. If they were pronounced, as 
 they are written in St. Mark, then the Lord must have laid great 
 stress upon the first syllable, which is not unlikely. 
 
 Two explanations have been given of the mistake. First, that it 
 was a wilful mistake, and so was the last of the insults heaped on 
 the Lord. The second, that it was said seriously, but ignorantly. 
 Men's minds were full of the coming of Elias about that time as 
 the i^recursor of the Messiah, and the supernatural darkness made 
 some think that Jesus was the Messiah, and was invoking the aid 
 of His forerunner. 
 
 36. *' And one ran and filled a spunge full of vinegar, and put it 
 on a reed," &c. This followed on the Lord's saying, " I thirst," as 
 we learn from St. John's Gospel. It was done out of humanity. 
 The vinegar not being given because it was nauseous, but because 
 very sour wine was the common drink of the Koman soldiers. It 
 was done also in fulfilment of prophecy. One sign had yet to be 
 fulfilled before He could expire. All had now been accomplished 
 except the words of the Psalmist, " When I was thirsty they gave 
 me vinegar to drink," and so the Lord, that this one prophecy 
 which remained might be fulfilled, exclaimed, " I thirst." In order 
 that it might reach His mouth it was put on a reed, or stalk of some 
 plant of hyssop which was at hand. 
 
 Those who were standing by, apparently Jews, remembering 
 the first word of his cry, said tauntingly, "Let alone; let us see 
 whether Elias will come to take him down." 
 
 "And Jesus cried with a loud voice." By this loud cry of the 
 Lord the moment before He expired we are taught that of His own 
 accord, and by an act of His Own will, He surrendered His Life. 
 The strength of His body, evinced by this " cry with a loud voice," 
 showed that in the natural course of things (if it be right to use such 
 an expression of Him) He would have retained His life for hours, 
 perhaps for a day or more longer ; for it was no uncommon thing 
 for those crucified to live till the third day. So that now at this 
 
398 JESUS GAVE UP THE GHOST. [St. Mark. 
 
 a Matt, xxvii. 37 ^ Aiid Jesus cried with a loud voice, and g^ave 
 
 60. Luke xxiii. ^ 
 
 4i. juhii xix. up tlie e^liost. 
 
 30. ^ ^ 
 
 moment His own words were fulfilled : " No man taketh My life 
 from Me, but Hay it down of Myself; I have power to lay it dowu, 
 and I have power to take it again" (John x. 18). 
 
 " Gave up the Ghost." By one word (for in the Greek " He gave 
 up the ghost " is one word, iUTrvevaev) the Evangelist records the 
 greatest event which has taken place in the history of all worlds, 
 the greatest in itself, for it was the Son of God, Who is the Life, 
 submitting to that which is the negation and opposite of hfe, even 
 to death. " Being in the form of God," and " equal with God," "He 
 became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross." And 
 also an event the greatest in its issues, for having made peace by the 
 Blood shed on this cross, God has by Him Who hung upon it, recon- 
 ciled all things to Himself, both things on earth and things in 
 heaven, so that by this Death not only men but even the angelic 
 spirits are brought nearer to God. 
 
 Astonishing truth, that the greatest putting forth of God's power 
 is the Divine nature, in the Person of the Son, submitting to the 
 extremity of weakness in death ! 
 
 I know no words which better express the Evangelical meaning 
 of this death, than some preached by Cyril, Bishop of Jerusalem, 
 within a stone's throw of the place where the atoning Death took 
 X)lace. " These things the Saviour endured, making peace through 
 the Blood of His Cross for things in heaven and things in earth. 
 For we were enemies of God through sin, and God had appointed 
 the sinner to die. There must needs, therefore, have happened 
 one of two things : either that God, keeping His word, should 
 destroy all men, or that in His loving- kindness. He should cancel 
 the sentence. But behold the wisdom of God ; He preserved both 
 to His sentence its truth, and to His loving-kindness its exercise. 
 Christ took our sins in His own body on the tree, that we being 
 dead to sin, should live to righteousness. Of no small account was 
 He Who died for us. He was not a literal sheep ; He was not a 
 mere man ; He was more than an angel ; He was God made man. 
 The transgression of sinners was not so great as the righteousness 
 of Him Who died for them. We have not committed so much sin 
 as He hath wrought righteousness, Who laid down His Life 
 for us." 
 
Chap. XV.] THE VEIL RENT IN TWAIN. 399 
 
 38 And ^'the veil of the temple was I'ent in twain ^ Matt, xxvii. 
 
 51. Luke xxiii. 
 
 from the top to the bottom. 45. 
 
 And with respect to the pleading of His Death with a just and 
 righteous God, I know no words fitter than those of the great 
 Archbishop of Canterbuiy, St. Anselm, in a tract written for the 
 use of priests in dealiDg with men on their death-beds. " See that, 
 while life remains in thee, thou repose thy confidence only in the 
 Deatli of Christ ; trusting in nothing else ; commit thyself wholly to 
 this Death ; cover thyself wholly with this alone. And if the Lord 
 will judge thee, say, ' Lord, I cast the Death of my Lord Jesus 
 Christ between me and Thy judgment : otherwise I will not engage 
 in judgment with Thee.' And if He shall say to thee, that thou 
 art a sinner, say, ' I place the Death of my Lord Jesus Christ be- 
 tween me and my sins.' If He shall say to thee that thou hast 
 deserved damnation, say, ' I cast the Death of my Lord Jesus 
 Christ between me and my evil deserts, and I offer His merits for 
 that merit which I ought to have, and have not.' If He shall say 
 that He is angry with thee, say, ' Lord, I cast the Death of the 
 Lord Jesus Christ between me and Thy displeasure.' " 
 
 38. "And the veil of the temple was rent in twain," &c. This 
 was the inner veil, the veil between the Holy Place and the Holy 
 of Holies. It was of immense thickness, and hanging loosely from 
 the top could not have been rent by the earthquake, but must L av3 
 been torn asunder by angel hands. I have commented upon its 
 most intimate connection with the surrender of the Lord's Life in 
 my notes on St. Matthnw at such length, that I cannot do more 
 than say that it was the most significant of signs, betokening that 
 every obstacle between the soul, and the immediate presence and 
 favour of God, was once and for ever removed by the Death of 
 Christ. 
 
 But it has a sacramental significance, which we gather from the 
 application made of it by the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews 
 (x. 19). "Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the 
 holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which He 
 hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh ; 
 and having an high priest over the House of God, let us draw 
 near with a true heart, in full assurance of faith," &c. Here 
 the sacred writer teaches us that, perhaps thirty, perhaps forty 
 years after the rending of the veil of the Lord's Flesh, there was a 
 
400 THE CENTURION. [St. Mark. 
 
 39 ^ And *" when the centurion, which stood over against 
 c Matt xxvii. ]^jj^ ga-^ ti^a^^ }^Q gQ cried out, and crave up the 
 
 64. Luke xxiu. " J^ 
 
 47. 
 
 39. " He so cried out, and gave up," &c. So A., C, later Uncials, almost all Cursives, 
 Vnlg., Syriac, Gothic, iEthiopic ; but " cried out, and " omitted by >i, B., L., Coptic. 
 
 way of access to God through the veil, i.e., through that Flesh. 
 The way of access through the body of Christ was aud is always 
 open, and we must in all sincerity and in all confidence avail cur- 
 selves of it. Every time we sincerely and faithfully communicate 
 in the Sacrament of His Body, we draw near to the very presence 
 of God through the rent veil — the bruised and torn Flesh of the Son 
 of God. 
 
 39. " And when the centurion, which stood over against him, 
 saw that he so cried out," &c. There is a noticeable difference be- 
 tween the narratives of St, Matthew and St. Mark here. St. Mat- 
 thew tells us that " When the centurion and they that were with 
 him saw the earthquake and those things which were done, they 
 said, Truly this was the Son of God ; " but St. Mark, who only 
 mentions the centmion as making the confession, tells us that he 
 was mostly influenced by the manner in which the Lord volun- 
 tarily surrendered His Spirit, — " saw that He so cried out and gave 
 up the ghost " — cried as if He yet retained bodily strength to keep 
 Him alive much longer. There can be no doubt that the Death of 
 the Lord was a supernatural act. "What puts it beyond all doubt 
 that He died not by the failing of nature is, that " He gave up the 
 ghost, crying with a loud voice." A thing so extraordinary, as the 
 Evangelist reports, that when the centurion who stood over 
 against Him, and so was accurately observing all that took place, 
 saw that He so cried out and gave up the ghost, he said, "Truly 
 this man was the Son of God." So that Bourdalone says elo- 
 quently and truly, "His death, if we consider it thoroughly, is 
 itself the greatest of all miracles, inasmuch as, far from dying like 
 other men, through loss of spirit, He dies, on the contrary, through 
 an effort of His omnipotence." And this will not seem an exag- 
 gerated way of representing the matter, if we consider that the 
 Lord Jesus being the Life, and having Life in Himself, for Him to 
 submit to death was to submit to what was most opposite to His 
 nature, whilst to rise again was to do that which was most natural 
 to Him — most in accordance with His nature as the Life. 
 
CiiAi-. XV.] THIS WAS THE SON OF GOD. 401 
 
 ghost, he said, Truly this man was the Son of God. 
 
 40 ^ There were also women looking on ^afar dMatt. xxvii. 
 
 55. Luke xxiii. 
 
 off : among whom was Mary Magdalene, and 49. 
 Mary the mother of James the less and of Joses, ^^ '•^^^^"^• 
 and Salome : 
 
 " The Son of God " without definite article — " a Son of God." 
 
 40. "James the less." So called, perhaps, on account of his stature — "James the 
 little." 
 
 " This man was the Son of God." Of course he could not have 
 used these words in the sense of the Catholic creed. He had, 
 however, heard that the chief priests had come to Pilate with the 
 words, "We have a law, and by our law He ought to die, because 
 He made Himself the Son of God." Eemembering this, he con- 
 sidered that the signs and wonders which attended the Lord's 
 Death, showed that the Lord was just and good, and that His -per- 
 secutors were utterly unjust and wicked in condemning Him, and 
 SO in some very high way He was the Son of God, in the sense in 
 which they had accused Him of making Himself. No doubt he 
 said together, and as with one breath, "Certainly this was a 
 righteous man — truly He was the Son of God." 
 
 40. "There were also women looking on afar off: among whom 
 was Mary Magdalene," &.G. The presence of these women, though 
 afar off, seems to be particularly recorded, as in constrast with the ab- 
 sence of the disciples. They showed more love and regard for the 
 Lord in His extreme agony, than those who were emphatically His 
 own. His chosen. With respect to these names, one must observe 
 first, that it is extremely unlikely, if not impossible, that the Mary 
 named as Magdalene should be Mary, the sister of Lazarus. She 
 would certainly have been called such, or the sister of Martha ; 
 and Mary, who the second time anointed the Lord's feet, and 
 who is all but named as the sister of Lazarus and Martha (John 
 xii. 23), is never identified with the Magdalen. The Magdalen 
 is most probably not the woman mentioned in Luke vii. 37, though 
 some of the fathers think so. Besides, these women had followed 
 Him when He was in Galilee, and came up with Him to Jeru- 
 salem, which seems to exclude Mary of Bethany, 
 
 2. "Mary the mother of James the less and of Joses." Seeing 
 that James and Joses (together with Judas and Simon) are men- 
 tioned in both Matthew and Mark as the nearest relatives of the 
 
 D D 
 
402 MANY OTHER WOMEN. [St. Mark. 
 
 41 (Wlio also, when he was in Galilee, * followed him, and 
 
 r Lnke viii. ministered unto him ;) and many other women 
 
 ' ' which came up with him unto Jerusalem. 
 
 g Matt, xxvii. 42 ^ ^And now when the even was come, he- 
 
 50*. Johnxix. ' causc it was the preparation, that is, the day 
 
 before the sabbath, 
 
 Lord who could properly be called His brethren, it seems certain 
 that this Mary, who was their mother, must have been the sister, or 
 some very near relative of the Blessed Virgin ; but this we shall 
 consider more fully in an excursus on the Lord's brethren. 
 
 3. " Salome." She is called in the parallel place in St. Matthew, 
 " the mother of Zebedee's children." She has been supposed, on 
 the ground of a peculiar reading of John xix. 25, to have been the 
 sister of the Virgin. 
 
 It may be asked, Where was the Virgin herself? St John, in xix. 
 27, seems to imply that at the time that the Lord committed her to 
 his care he took her to his own home, perhaps in a fainting state, 
 or distracted, or otherwise totally unable to bear the scene of 
 horror. The other women, or two of them, were with her and St. 
 John when she was committed to his care, but very probably all 
 were driven to a distance by the mob or by the soldiers. 
 
 41. "Who also, when he was in Galilee . . . with him unto 
 Jerusalem." Here we are told how the Lord had lived. He was 
 sustained by the kindness and piety of his followers. So in St. 
 Luke, viii. 2, we read of " certain women which had been healed of 
 evil spirits and infirmities, Mary called Magdalene, out of whom 
 went seven devils. And Joanna, the wife of Chuza, Herod's 
 steward, and Susanna, and many others who ministered unto Him 
 of their substance." These also, or some of them, would doubtless 
 be amongst the many others who came uj) with Him. It has 
 been remarked that no woman is to be found amongst the number 
 of those who oj^posed or persecuted Christ. 
 
 42. " And now when the even was come, because it was the pre- 
 paration, that is," &c. This Sabbath was one of very peculiar 
 solemnity, being at once Sabbath and Passover. The preparation 
 would be Friday afternoon before sunset, at which time the Sabbath 
 would begin, and they would naturally hasten to take Him down 
 before it began. The Jews also, for the same reason, lest the Sab- 
 
Ckap. XV.] JOSEPH OF arimathj^:a. 403 
 
 43 Joseph of Arimatliaea, an honourable counsellor, which 
 also ^ ^Yaited for the kino-dom of God, came, and ^ Luke ii. 25, 
 
 38 
 
 went in boldly unto Pilate, and craved the body 
 of Jesus. 
 
 44 And Pilate marvelled if he were already dead : and 
 calling unto Mm the centurion, he asked him whether he had 
 been any while dead. 
 
 43. "Which also waited for."' Rathei", as Revisers, "Who also himself was looking 
 for." 
 
 44. " Had been any while dead." So >i. A., C, E., G., K., L., M., S., &c., and almost 
 all Cursives ; but B. and D. read, " If He were already dead." 
 
 bath should be polluted by the corpses hanging on the crosses on 
 that day, were anxious that they should be desj)atched and taken 
 down as soon as possible (John xix. 31). 
 
 43. " Joseph of Arimathaa, an honoin-able counsellor, which also 
 waited for the kingdom." St. Matthew describes this man as Jesus' 
 disciple. St. Mark calls him an honourable counsellor, St. Luke's 
 addition to this, that he "had not consented to the counsel and 
 deed of them," i.e., of course, of the great majority, shows that he 
 was in all probability a member of the Sanhedrim. St. Mark and 
 St. Luke mention that " he waited for the kingdom of God." St. 
 John that he was a disciple, but "secretly for fear of the Jews." 
 
 "Came, and went in boldlj^ unto Pilate." This bold confession 
 of his regard for the Crucified One, must be put by the side of St. 
 John's word, " secretly." The Death of Christ seems to have made 
 him ashamed of his former cowardice, and inspired him with 
 courage to confess that he had the greatest regard for One Whom 
 his fellow-rulers had treated with such cruelty and ignominy. 
 When all the world had opposed the Lord, and thought that they 
 had made an end of Him, when even His own had deserted Him, 
 then this good man came forward to save His Dead Body from 
 further dishonour. This, and the centurion's confession, were thus 
 the first fruits of the Death of Christ. 
 
 44. " And Pilate marvelled if he were already dead," &c. This 
 is peculiar to St. Mark. It is an additional confirmation of the 
 fact that the Lord's Death had that in it which no other man's 
 decease ever had. 
 
 "And calling unto him the centm-ion, he asked him," kc. The 
 
404 HE GAVE THE BODY TO JOSEPH. [St. Mark. 
 
 45 And when lie knew it of the centurion, lie gave the 
 body to Joseph, 
 i Matt, xxvii. 46 ^ Aiid he boTiprht fine linen, and took him 
 
 69,60. Luke ^° . . ., .. ., ^ . ^ . . 
 
 xxiii. 53. John dowQ, and Wrapped him m the linen, and laid him 
 in a sepulchre which was hewn out of a rock, and 
 rolled a stone unto the door of the sepulchre. 
 
 45. " He gave the body" (so?)i.'7). So A., C, E., G., K., M., other later Uncials, almost 
 all Cursives, Old Latin, Vulg., Coptic, &c. ; but S, B., D., L. read, "the corpse" (ptoma). 
 
 centurion who had been so struck with the manner of the Lord's 
 Death and the signs attending it, that he had made the confession 
 that He was the Son of God, would have given Pilate an account 
 of what had occurred very unlike that of an enemy. This, no 
 donbt, would revive Pilate's awe of the Lord as One altogether 
 different from any other prisoner he had ever had before him ; 
 and probably from a desire of making some reparation for his 
 criminal weakness, he apparently gave the body very wilHngly to 
 Joseph. 
 
 46. " And he bought fine linen, and took him down, and wrapped 
 him in the linen," &c. St. John tells us that in this he was assisted 
 by his fellow ruler Nicodemus, who brought a mixture of myrrh and 
 aloes. 
 
 They " wrapped him in tl'e linen, and laid him in a sepulchre," 
 because the sabbath had ah-eady come, and the embahning was 
 reserved till early on the first day. 
 
 "In a sepulchre which was hewn out of a rock," &c. All the 
 three Synoptics particularly mention that the sepulchre was hewn 
 out of a rock. So that the sepulchre having but one entrance, 
 there would be no undermining it, no possibility of entering by 
 chiselling through the sides to make a new entrance, and so by 
 no human means could the body emerge except through the door, 
 which was, as we know from St. Matthew, both sealed and closely 
 f^uarded. Such was the Burial of the Lord. The reader will re- 
 member the words of the hymn for Easter Eve : 
 
 ** Let me hew Thee, Lord, a shrine. 
 
 In this rocky heart of mine, 
 Where in pure embalmed cell 
 
 None but Thou may ever dwell. 
 
Chap. XVI.] WHEN THE SABBATH WAS PAST. 405 
 
 47 And Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses 
 beheld wliere lie was laid. 
 
 Myrrh and spices will I bring, 
 
 True afifection's offering : 
 Close the door from sight and sound 
 
 Of the busy world around, 
 And in patient watch remain 
 
 Till my Lord appears again." 
 
 47. " And Mary Magdalene and Maiy the mother of Joses," &c. 
 In St. Matthew she is called " the other Mary ; " as one of those 
 standing by the Cross she is called " Mary the mother of James the 
 less and of Joses." This is important. It identifies her as beyond all 
 doubt the real mother of those who in chap. vi. 3 are called the 
 brethren of the Lord. She must then have been in the closest rela- 
 tionship with the Virgin, who very probably was too weak and 
 prostrate to move, and had sent this Mary to represent her. 
 *' Seest thou," says Chrysostom, "women's courage? seest thou 
 their affection ? seest thou their noble spirit in (bestowing) money ? 
 their noble spirit even unto death. Let us men imitate these 
 women ; let us not forsake Jesus in temptations. For they for Him 
 even when dead spent so much and exposed their lives, but we 
 neither feed Him when hungry, nor clothe Him when naked, but 
 seeing Him in want [in His poor members] we pass Him by." 
 
 A 
 
 CHAP. XYI. 
 
 ND ^ when the sabbath was past, Mary ^ Matt, xxviii. 
 
 HT 11 -I T»/r 17 1. Luke XXIV. 
 
 Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, i. Joha xx. i. 
 
 1. " And when the sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, and Mary 
 the mother of James," &c. They purchased these on Saturday 
 night, the Sabbath ending at six o'clock. 
 
406 THE FIRST DAY OF THE WEEK. [St. Mark. 
 
 and Salome, ^ had bought sweet spices, that they might come 
 b Luke xxiii. and anoint him. 
 
 56 
 
 c Luke xxiv. 1. 2 ^ And very early in the morning the first day 
 John XX. 1. ^£ ^-^^ week, they came unto the sepulchre at the 
 rising of the sun. 
 
 3 And they said among themselves, Who shall roll us 
 away the stone from the door of the sepulchre ? 
 
 2. " At the rising of the sun." Revisers, " When the sun was risen." Vulg., Orto 
 jam sole. 
 
 " That they might come and anoint him." They did this to ward 
 off corrni^tion for as long a time as possible from the body of Him 
 Whom they loved. They had, seemingly, no idea of His Resurrec- 
 tion. The thought never crossed their minds that in Him was ful- 
 filled the words of the Psalmist, " Thou wilt not suffer Thy Holy 
 One to see corruption." 
 
 2. " And very early in the morning the first day of the week," 
 &c. "When they set off it was yet dark (John xx, 1), but it began 
 to dawn (Matth. xxviii. 1), and when they neared the sepulchre 
 the sun was rising and they could see all things clearly. Mary 
 Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Salome are 
 mentioned ; but were there not others ? St. Luke seems to imply 
 that there were, for he speaks of the women also who came with 
 Him from Galilee (xxiii. 55), that they came very early in the 
 morning " and certain others with them : " but this latter reading 
 is doubtful. 
 
 It is conjectured, not without some show of probability, that there 
 were two companies of women : the first that mentioned by St. 
 Mark, who had purchased their spices the night before, i.e.^ on 
 Saturday evening after six o'clock, when the Sabbath was past ; and 
 another consisting, among others, of Joanna and the women who 
 came up with him from Galilee, who had prepared the spices and 
 ointments before the Sabbath, i.e., on Friday evening (Luke xxiii. 
 55, 56; xxiv. 10). 
 
 3. " And they said among themselves, Who shall roll us away 
 the stone from the door," &c. It is impossible to say whether the 
 Lord arose and the angel descended and the earth shook before 
 this, or whilst they were on their way. I should think before. The 
 appearance of the angel, his countenance as lightning, his raiment 
 
CiJAr. XVI.] ENTERING THE SEPULCHRE. 407 
 
 4 And wlien tliey looked, they saw that the stone was rolled 
 away : for it was very great. 
 
 5 ^ And entering into the sepulchre, they saw a t ^""^^ '"'''''■'■ ^' 
 
 '^ i ' ./ John XX. 11, 12. 
 
 4. " Was rolled away," So A., C, later Uncials, all Cursives, &c. ; but N, B., L, read, 
 " rolled back." 
 
 glistering, seems more in accordance with a bright vision in the 
 obscurity of the earliest hours. 
 
 St. Mark says nothing of the things which St. Matthew relates 
 about the earthquake, and the appearance of the angel to the sol- 
 diers, and his sitting on the stone when, apparently, the women 
 came up, and yet St. Mark must have learnt what he relates from 
 one of the party, no doubt through St. Peter ; for he mentions how 
 before they reached the tomb, they said among themselves " Who 
 shall roll us away the stone ? " The relation of such a circumstance 
 is eminently characteristic of the manner of St. Mark in noticing 
 little incidents. 
 
 4. " And when they looked, they saw that the stone was rolled 
 away ; for it was very great." This also must have been received 
 from one of the group. As Lange says, "These are all accurate 
 statements which are characteristic of St. Mark's clear view of 
 things. The stone was lying in the hollow cut deep into the rock, 
 so as to form the door, and must accordingly be rolled forth from 
 this recess outwards ; hence * rolled away.' The rock tomb, how- 
 ever, itself lay upon a height (a very slight elevation) ; hence the 
 women saw the stone when they looked tip ; and because the stone 
 was very great they could, even from a great distance, see it lying.'' 
 "Williams, however, supposes that they saw that the stone was 
 rolled away, not from seeing the stone, but the wide-open aperture 
 which would form the entrance. 
 
 At this moment it was that Mary Magdalene seeing the sepulchre 
 open, hastens back at once to the A^DOstles, Peter and John, with 
 the words, " They have taken away the Lord out of the sepulchre* 
 and we know not where they have laid Him." 
 
 5. " And entering into the sepulchre, they saw a young man sit- 
 ting on the right side," &c. St. Matthew seems to say that the 
 angel was sitting on the stone which was rolled to the outside-. 
 From St. Mark, on the contrary, we seem to learn that they saw 
 the angel as they entered into the hoUow chamber of the tomb sit- 
 
408 YE SEEK JESUS OF NAZARETH. [St. Mark. 
 
 young man sitting on the right side, clothed in a long white 
 
 garment ; and they were a&ighted. 
 
 e Matt, xxviii. 6 ^ And he saith unto them, Be not affriQ:hted : 
 
 5 6 7. ' o 
 
 Te seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was crucified : 
 
 ting there ; but there need be no discrepancy whatsoever, for St. 
 Matthew speaks of the angel immediately on his having descended, 
 and of his position as he appeard to the keepers, from which place 
 when the women came up he may have moved, and gone further 
 in : St. Matthew not telling us that he was sitting on the stone 
 when he appeared to the women, but merely recording what he 
 said to them wherever he was. St. Mark's account is, however, 
 quite consistent with the fact that he was sitting on the stone on 
 one side of the doorway, for he speaks of their seeing the angel as 
 they were entering in, not before ; the angel not being permanently 
 visible, but showing himself to them according as he had had instruc- 
 tions as to what he should do. One thing, however, is clear, that 
 whatever slight discrepancy there may be, we are not to imagine 
 two appearances of angels recorded, one by St. Matthew, another 
 by St. Mark, as it is clear from their delivering, almost verbatim, 
 the same message, that they were one and the same. 
 
 " They were affrighted." The last thing which they expected 
 was to see either the Lord Himself or any sujiernatural messenger 
 from Him about His tomb. They came to embalm the Body — to 
 wind it in linen clothes as the manner of the Jews was to bury ; 
 beUeving that the rock-hewn sepulchre would hold it till the day of 
 judgment. 
 
 6. " And he saith unto them, Be not affrighted : Ye seek Jesus of 
 Nazareth, which was," &c. God accepted their love to His Son as 
 crucified in lieu of their faith in Him as risen. These words are 
 capable of the widest Evangelical application. If we seek Jesus 
 Who was crucified, nothing in the visible or in the invisible world — • 
 nothing in heaven, or earth, or hell, can harm us. 
 
 *' He is risen ; he is not here." Such is the announcement of the 
 Gospel of the Eesurrection, such are the few plain, simple words 
 which teach mankind that death is swallowed up in victory. 
 
 *' He is risen." All the gospel of the grace of God is contained 
 in these words, "He is risen." 
 
 "He is risen." Therefore He is the Only -begotten Son of God, 
 
Chap. XVI.] HE IS RISEN. 409 
 
 he is risen ; lie is not here : behold the place where they 
 laid him. 
 
 7 But go your way, tell his discij^les and Peter that he 
 goeth before you into Galilee : there shall ye see him, ^ as he 
 said unto you. f Matt. xxvi. 
 
 S2. ch. xiv. 
 
 "~ ■ 28. 
 
 for God would not have raised One from the Dead Who claimed to 
 he His Son when He was not. 
 
 "He is risen." Therefore His Death was a full and perfect atone- 
 ment for our sins, for He died not for His own sins, but for om-s ; 
 and God would not have raised Him from the dead if He had not 
 done them away by His Sacrifice. 
 
 "He is risen." Therefore we can now partake of His Life — of 
 His risen Life. He is risen as the Second Adam. By His Resm*- 
 rection Life, imparted to us in baptism, we can now walk in new- 
 ness of life. By His Piesurrection He is able to feed us with the 
 Living Bread, even His Flesh. 
 
 " He is risen." And so we shall rise again, according to His own 
 words, " I am the Resurrection and the Life." " Because I live ye 
 shall live also." 
 
 "Behold the place where they laid him." This is very properly 
 said to those women who according to the last verse of the last 
 chapter, " beheld where he was laid." 
 
 They had had the love and the courage to witness His burial, and 
 were rewarded with the sight of the Empty Sepulchre shown to 
 them by an angel of God to'assure them of His Resurrection. 
 
 7. " But go your way, tell his disciples and Peter," &c. No 
 doubt the Divine message is sent to Peter for his reassurance. He 
 had fallen deei^lj^ and had wept bitterly, and lest he should despair 
 his name is expressly mentioned as having a part in the Lords 
 favour. 
 
 "That he goeth before you into Galilee." The reason why the 
 Lord by His angel, and afterwards Himself personally, reminds 
 them so particularly that He went before them into Galilee, and 
 that there they were to meet Him. has not been clearly revealed. 
 The difficulty is, that on the evening of that very dsbj He intended 
 to meet them before they could possibly set out to meet Him in 
 Galilee, and would there give them the power of remitting and re- 
 taining sins. The reason must be something intimately connected 
 
410 THEY WENT OUT QUICKLY. [St. Mark. 
 
 8 And they went out quickly, and fled from the sepulchre ; 
 
 8. " Quickly" omitted by if, A., B., C, D., most later Uncials, a very large number of 
 Cursives, Old Latin, &c. 
 
 with His former work in Galilee, but the words seem to express 
 that they were to set out at once, which, apparently with His own 
 sanction, they did not do, but lingered in Jerusalem eight days. 
 The appearance in Galilee, or one of them, if it is that alluded to by 
 St. Paul as the one in which He was seen by above five hundred 
 brethren at once (1 Cor. xv. 6), was, in one sense, the most important 
 of all, as it was the only great public appearance. 
 
 8. " And they went out quickly, and fled frora the sepulchre ; for 
 they trembled," &c. St. Matthew tells us that they departed 
 quickly from the sepulchre, "with fear and great joy." St. Mark, 
 without denying the undercurrent of joy, lays most stress upon the 
 fear. The words, literally translated, would be, " Trembling and 
 ecstasy took possession of them." The trembling, or agitation, 
 would naturally arise from the visible presence of a denizen of the 
 unseen world. 
 
 " Neither said they any thing to any man ; for they were afraid." 
 That is, they said not a word to anyone by the way, but ran off as 
 quickly as possible to carry the message to the disciples. 
 
 Whilst they were making their way to the body of the disciples, 
 Peter and John, having heard from Mary Magdalene that the 
 sepulchre was empty, ran thither, and shortly after this the Lord 
 Himself appeared to these women, or to some of them, as narrated 
 in Matth. xxviii. 9. It is wrong to say that St. Mark takes no 
 notice of this, for his mode of narration undergoes a marked change 
 at this point. 
 
 This change of the mode of narration, I shall now proceed to 
 examine. The reader will have noticed two things : 1st, That up 
 to this point, i.e., up to the end of the eighth verse, St. Mark follows 
 the course of events as given by St. Matthew. He does not follow 
 it minutely, for he omits several things which St. Matthew notices, 
 particularly the appearance of the angel to the keepers ; and he 
 adds several of those minutiae which are characteristic of him, as, for 
 instance, the anxiety of the women about the removal of the stone — 
 their looking and seeing that the stone was removed — the api^ear- 
 ance of the angel as that of a young man — the place where he sat, 
 i.e., on the right side — the length of his garment — their first seeing 
 him as they entered in — their frigiit at eyeing him, — al] these cir- 
 
Chap. XVI.] THEY TREMBLED AND WERE AMAZED. 411 
 
 for they trembled and were amazed : ^ neither said thej any 
 thing to any man ; for they were afraid. g See Matt. 
 
 ' . Tin xxviii. 8. Luke 
 
 9 1 JN ow whon Jesus was risen early the first xxiv. 9. 
 
 cumstantials are peculiar to St. Mark, and the noticing of such 
 things forms the characteristic of his Gospel, as we have abun- 
 dantly shown. It is on this account (combined with the direct 
 testimony of early Church history) that his Gospel is allowed to be 
 mainly that of St. Peter. But now his narrative and that of St. 
 Matthew diverge altogether : and this is the more noticeable 
 because St. Mark, along with St. Matthew, mentions the message 
 of the angel to the disciples, that the Lord would go before them 
 into Galilee. St. Mark, in company with St. Matthew, alone had 
 recorded the Lord's promise on the way to Gethsemaue that He 
 would thus go before them. In company with St. Matthew alone, 
 he tells us that the angel reiterated this promise. One might say, 
 then, that, in the ordinary course of circumstances, he was bound to 
 follow St. Matthew's narrative on this matter, and give us his own 
 version of the Lord's appearance in Galilee as narrated in Matth. 
 xxviii. 16-18. But he does not, and at this point his mode of narrating 
 events undergoes a marked change. Instead of being minutely ch- 
 cumstantial, his naiTative becomes epitomizing. It is more like a 
 resume, or a few recollections somewhat hastily put together. 
 
 Learned men have pui; forth several ways of accounting for this 
 change. One is that at, or after, the writing of the eighth verse, 
 St. Mark's source of information for some reason suddenly failed 
 him, and for the finishing of his narrative he had to fall back upon 
 his own resources. In other words, as he was writing this last 
 chapter of his Gospel, he was deprived of the companionship of 
 St. Peter, or for some reason had omitted to take down what he 
 liad heard from St. Peter, and so had hastily to finish his Gospel 
 from what he had learnt from other som'ces. 
 
 Another conjecture is that the last leaf of the Gospel containino- 
 these twelve verses was accidentally lost or destroyed ; and so the 
 Gosj)el was finished by some person or persons unknown. I trust 
 to show the impossibility of accounting for the difiiculty in any 
 such a way. 
 
 I shall again take up the subject of the authorship of these last 
 twelve verses in an excursus at the end of this volume. 
 
 9. " Now when Jesus was risen early the first day of the week, 
 
412 FIRST TO MAEY MAGDALENE. [St. Mark. 
 
 day of the w^eek, ^ he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, 
 h John XX. 14. ^ out of wliom he had cast seven devils. 
 1, Lukexxiv." 1^ ^ And she went and told them that had been 
 10. John XX. -^ith him, as they mourned and wept. 
 1 Lukexxiv. 11 ^And they, when they had heard that he 
 
 was alive, and had been seen of her, believed not. 
 
 he apioeared," &c.^ This is a very short notice indeed of that 
 which is given in full in John xx. 14-18. As we have it reported 
 in St. John's Gospel, it is one of the most interesting accounts in 
 the New Testament ; as we find it recorded here it is the merest 
 reference. St. Luke, who gives the account of the visit of other 
 women to the sepulchre, among whom aj^parently was Mary 
 Magdalene, omits all notice of the separate ax)pearance to her, but 
 agrees with St. Mark in this, that when the news of the Eesurrec- 
 tion was told to the Apostles they received it as " idle tales." It 
 is, consequently, impossible to suppose that the writer of these 
 three verses followed the account in St. Luke, even if he knew of 
 its existence. 
 
 10. " And she went and told them that had been with him, as 
 they mourned and wept." St. John, in his account of the Magda- 
 len telling what she had seen to the Apostles, says nothing of their 
 *' mourning and weeping," and nothing of their unbelief. St. Luke 
 also says nothing of the mourning and weeping. 
 
 11. " And they, when they had heard that he was alive, and had 
 been seen of her, beheved not." Now, in looking over these three 
 short verses (9, 10, 11), we must ask ourselves the question "for 
 what purpose were they written ? " The answer, of course, would 
 seem to be to tell the Church that the Lord's first appearance was 
 to Mary Magdalene alone, and so, perhaps, to correct the impression 
 that might have been received from St. Matthew's account, that 
 He appeared first to several women. 
 
 But is it not clear that there is another purpose equally important, 
 viz., that the report of the person who first saw Him was rejected 
 by those to whom she told it, that is, by the Apostles? 
 
 ^ For the supposed discrepancy between St. Matthew and St. 
 Mark respecting the time of the Lord's Resurrection see note in 
 St. Matthew. 
 
Chap. XVL] NEITHER BELIEVED THEY THE:>r. 413 
 
 12 ^ After that lie appeared in anotlier form ™imto two of 
 em, as they walked, and ^ 
 
 13 And they went and t( 
 neither believed they them. 
 
 them, as they walked, and went into the country. >" Lute xxiv. 
 13 And they went and told it unto the residue : 
 
 This certainly seems to be tJie purpose for which the Magdalene 
 and her testimony is brought in ; not simply to emphasize the fact 
 that He first appeared to this woman, but that when she told the 
 fact of His Eesurrection to those who ought to have been expecting 
 it, they believed her not. 
 
 12. " After that he appeared in another form imto two of them, 
 as they walked," &c. There cannot be the least doubt but that 
 this is the same appearance as that to the two disciples (one of 
 whom was named Cleopas) on the way to Emmaus. 
 
 " In another form," that is, of course, a form or appearance in 
 which He was not recognized by them at the first. He was recog- 
 nized by the Magdalen as soon as He called to her by name : but not 
 so with the two. He walked some time and conversed withthem^ 
 and not till the moment when He vanished did they know Him. 
 He must, consequently, have presented to them an appearance 
 different from that in which He was usually known. 
 
 13. " And they went and told it unto the residue : neither believed 
 they them." There is a real, though not absolutely irreconcilable 
 discrepancy between this and St. Luke's account. For, from 
 the latter account, we gather that, when the two joined the 
 company of the disciples, " and of them that were with them," they 
 were met with the exclamation: "The Lord is risen indeed, and 
 hath appeared unto Simon." A very great number of devices for 
 reconciling the two accounts have been proposed, as that tlie meet- 
 ings of the disciples were different, or that the two to whom the 
 Lord had appeared were not the same couple in the two Evangelists: 
 or that they were in a state of bewilderment, and so fluctuating 
 between a state of belief and unbelief. But is it not most likely 
 that while some believed, the rest, perhaps the majority, withheld 
 their hearty assent, and the person from whom the author of these 
 verses received the account was more struck with the unbelief 
 manifested by the larger number than with the assent of the few ? 
 We must remember that the Apostles present would be ten in num- 
 ber, and there were others expressly mentioned as present (Luke- 
 
414 HE APPEARED UNTO THE ELEVEN. [St. Mark. 
 
 14 ^ ° Afterward lie appeared unto the eleven as they sat 
 n Luke xxiv. 11 at meat, and upbraided them with their un- 
 
 36. Jo-hn XX. " -,01 
 
 19. 1 Cor. belief and hardness of heart, because they be- 
 II Or, together, lieved uot them which had seen him after he was 
 risen. 
 
 xxiv. 33), so that it is not improbable that eighteen or twenty per- 
 sons were present. Among these there would certainly be many 
 degrees, or shades, of assent, or dissent, as, for instance, at the 
 Lord's last appearance, as recorded in St. Matthew, it is signifi- 
 cantly said : " They worshipped Him, but some doubted." 
 
 Now again I ask (as I did with reference to the notice of the 
 appearance to the Magdalen) why is this appearance to the two, 
 and their report of it to the rest, inserted in this very brief account 
 of the Lord's manifestations ? Nothing whatsoever is said respect- 
 ing the conversation with the two on the way, nor of their " con- 
 straining " Him to stop with them, and of His being known in the 
 breaking of bread. The notice in St. Mark is evidently inserted for 
 one purpose, and for one only — to show that the Apostles and those 
 with them rejected the second account of the Lord's appearances, 
 which was told them by two eye-witnesses. 
 
 14. " Afterwards he appeared unto the eleven as they sat at 
 meat," &c. This appears to be, in fact must be, a notice of the 
 meeting recorded in John xx. 19, and Luke xxiv. 36, but in St. 
 John's account nothing whatsoever is said of their sitting together 
 at meat : and from St. Luke's account we should gather that if 
 they had had a meal together it had been finished, for He asked^ 
 *' Have ye here any meat? And they gave him a piece of a 
 broiled fish, and of an honeycomb." He could scarcely have asked 
 them if they had any meat if they had been sitting together 
 eating a meal. There is also another noteworthy difference 
 between St. Luke's account and this notice. In St. Luke's narra- 
 tive the Lord very gently reproaches them with their terror and 
 fright, as supposing that He was a spirit, and proves to them by 
 his allowing them to feel Him and by His eating before them, that 
 He was not a mere disembodied spirit ; but in St. Mark's notice 
 He upbraids them, or reproaches them with their unbelief in the 
 testimony of others who had seen Him. So that the one purpose 
 for which this most important appearance is recorded in this Gospel 
 
CiiAP. XVI.] GO YE INTO ALL THE WORLD. 415 
 
 15 ° And lie said unto them, Go ye into all the ° Matt.xxviii. 
 world, p and preach the gospel to every creature. i6. 
 
 P Col. i. 23. 
 
 is to bring out more strongly the unbelief of the Apostles. So that, 
 strange as it may appear, it is most certainly true that the three 
 recorded instances of the Lord's appearance, as given here, are 
 given to prove not the reality of the Lord's resurrection (that of 
 course is involved in all), but the slowness of the Apostles to 
 receive it. 
 
 15. " And he said unto them. Go ye into all the world, and 
 preach the Gospel," &c. Two questions suggest themselves re- 
 specting this commission, which though they cannot be answered 
 should both be stated. Are they sayings which were spoken on 
 several occasions and are here placed together, just as three appear- 
 ances of the Lord occurring apart from one another have been placed 
 together, each oAie illustrating the slowness of belief on the part of 
 the Apostles ? Or are these words a parting commission delivered 
 as a whole to the Apostles just before the Ascension ? If so, their 
 chronological place in the narrative would be after Luke xxiv., 
 verse 50, and between Acts i. and verses 8 and 9. This is quite 
 possible, and the mention of the Ascension, in verse 19, as ap- 
 parently coming immediately after, is in favour of their being 
 such a final word. In this case they would be the one teaching 
 of this chapter for which we are indebted to St. Mark alone. 
 The Lord appears to have several times repeated His commission 
 in different words. At His first appearance to the assembled 
 Apostles He delivered to them a very full commission which seems 
 to comprehend all: "As My Father sent Me, so send I you. 
 Keceive ye the Holy Ghost. Whose soever sins ye remit, they are 
 remitted unto them." Then, after this, Peter was reinstated in 
 the words, " Feed my lambs." Feed, or pasture. My sheep. 
 Then there was the commission on the mountain in Galilee, which 
 seems final, though it could not have been the Lord's last charge. 
 
 Of these verses the 15th and 16th seem part of a final charge, 
 and verses 17th and 18th not. We can scarcely think that the 
 Lord's very last words were contained in these verses, so that, upon 
 the whole, I incline to think that the two pairs of verses were 
 spoken at different times. 
 
 " Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every crea- 
 ture." " To all the world," i.e., penetrate into every country where 
 
416 BELIEF AND BAPTISM. [St. Mark. 
 
 q John iii. 18, 16 ^ He tliat believetli and is "baptized shall be 
 
 36. Acts ii. 
 3S, & xvi. 30, 
 31, 32. Rora. 
 
 X. 9. 1 Pet. 
 
 iii. 21. 
 
 men dwell, no matter what the distance, climate, or dangers of the 
 way. 
 
 " Preach the gospel to every creature." No matter how ignorant 
 the races to which ye come, no matter how sux^erstitious, how be- 
 sotted, how low in the scale of civilization, or how hardened and 
 demonized by the vices of cruelty and unnatural lust, preach to all 
 that I have died for them all, and that they can be saved. 
 
 *' Preach the gospel." AVhat is the gospel? It is the message of 
 the Incarnation, Life, Death, Kesurrection, and Ascension of the 
 Son of Man, and of His coming again to raise the dead and to 
 judge all men. This is the gospel (Rom. i. 2, 3, 4 ; 1 Cor. xv. 1, 
 10), all other things which men preach, such as God's willingness 
 to accept the vilest, His saving them by grace through faith, His 
 fully and freely pardoning, His loving His own to the end, — all are 
 deductions from this gospel of the Death and Eesurrection of the 
 Eternal Son. 
 
 " He that believetli and is baptized shall be saved." He that 
 believeth with the heart, he that receiveth into his spirit the truths 
 of the Lord Incarnate, Crucified, Piisen, and Ascended; he that em- 
 braceth these great things of God, because he feels that they answer 
 to his needs, and reconcile all within him to God. 
 
 " And is baptized." He that seeks admission into the mystical 
 Body which Christ came upon earth to found, or having been ad- 
 mitted into it seeks continuance in it, and strives to abide in Him 
 as a living member of His Church. 
 
 *' Shall be saved " — now and hereafter. He shall be saved now 
 from the power of sin and from this present evil world, and here- 
 after at the Great Day, he shall stand before the Son of Man. 
 
 By joining, " believing," and " being baptized," as both neces- 
 sary to salvation, did the Lord mean to put on an equality the 
 highest action of the soul in embracing the truth of God and of 
 Christ, and the reception of an outward rite ? Certainly not. For 
 He did not consider that the Baptism which He ordained was an 
 outward rite. It is, according to His own words, a new birth of 
 Water and of the Sphit into His Kingdom. According to the 
 teaching of His great servant, it is a death and burial with Him to 
 
Chap. XVI.] BELIEF AND BAPTISM. 417 
 
 saved ; ^ "but lie tliat believetli not shall be "■ John xii. 48. 
 damned. 
 
 siu, and a rising again with Him to newness of life (Eom. vi. 1-4), 
 so that the baptized man must, no matter what the difficulty, count 
 himself to be in a new state, born anew into the Second Adam, 
 grafted into the True Vine, endued with a new life from Christ, and 
 gifted, if he wiU faithfully strive to use them, with new powers 
 against sin and on the side of holiness of life. 
 
 It was the Lord's intention by His Death and Eesurrection, not 
 only to deliver men from sin as individuals, but to incorporate them 
 into His mystical Body, i.e., His Holy Catholic Church, so that in 
 the unity of that Church, in the unity of its faith, its ho^De, its 
 charity, they might grow up, not singly, but together, in the fellow- 
 ship of the One Body. And so the reception of His baptism being 
 the outward sign of this, and the means for bringing it to each 
 one, was worthy to be put side by side with believing. 
 
 " He that believeth not shall be damned." This ought rather to 
 be translated "condemned." We have no right to say that God 
 can inflict no condemnation or punishment short of the extremest 
 final one. 
 
 Why is there no mention of baptism in the second clause? 
 Simply because a man, no matter how validly baptized, will not be 
 saved unless he heartily believes, and continues to believe in, the 
 gospel. 
 
 These words have been held to be harsh ; and so it has actuallj^ 
 been made a matter of exultation, even by some in the Church of 
 England, that, owing to the assumed doubtfulness of the whole 
 passage, the terrible alternative contained in them is uncertain ; 
 but are not these words the exact reproduction of many uni- 
 versally acknowledged sayings of Christ? Such as "He that 
 beheveth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed 
 in the name of the only begotten Son of God." " If ye believe not 
 that I am He, ye shall die in your sins." " No man cometh unto the 
 Father but by Me." God, we firmly believe, will make all allow- 
 ances for the effects of evil education, bad example, the distortion 
 of the truth by superstition on the one side, and by human logic 
 perversely applied on the other, the want of unity in the Church, 
 and the worldliness and shortcomings of the preachers of the 
 truth — God, we may be sm-e, will take all this and every other 
 
 E E 
 
418 THESE SIGNS SHALL FOLLOW. [St. Mark. 
 
 17 And these signs shall follow them that believe; ®In 
 » Luke X. 17. my name shall they cast out devils : * they shall 
 
 Actsv. lt>. & , . , "^ 
 
 viii. 7. & xvi. speak with new tongues ; 
 
 18. & xix. 12. 1 n 1 T • -1 
 
 * Acts ii. 4, & lo They shall take up sei-pents ; and if they 
 I'co^r.^it'Tof drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them j 
 
 28. ' 
 
 u Luke X. 19. 
 
 Acts xxviii. 5. 
 
 17. " New tongues." "New" omitted by C, L., A., Coptic, Armenian; retained by 
 A., Vulg. 
 
 mitigating circumstance into account, but if we are faithful to 
 Christ, we must hold to His words, " He that believeth and is 
 bai^tized, shall be saved, but he that believeth not shall be con- 
 demned." 
 
 17. " And these signs shall follow them that believe ; In my 
 name shall they cast out devils." The mention of this sign as the 
 first is in accordance with all St. Mark's Gospel, in which the ex- 
 pulsion of demons occujDies a more prominent place than in any 
 other of the Gospels. 
 
 " They shall speak with new tongues." New tongues, i.e. 
 tongues new to them, which they had not learnt before. It has 
 been remarked that this is the only prophecy in all the gospel 
 narrative of the great Pentecostal sign. 
 
 18. *' They shall take up serpents." The only instance of this 
 in the New Testament is in Acts xxviii. 3, 5, when St. Paul shook 
 off the viper which had fastened on his hand, having received no 
 hurt from its fangs. 
 
 "And if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them." 
 The reader will remember the apocryphal (but it may be true) 
 account of St. John having drunk a cup of poison and received 
 no hurt. Eusebius gives another instance in his Eccles. Hist., 
 book iii. ch. 39 (taken from Paj)ias) : "Another wonderful event 
 happened respecting Justus, surnamed Barsabas, who though he 
 drank a deadly poison experienced nothing injurious, through the 
 grace of the Lord." 
 
 ♦' They shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover." The 
 gifts of healing together with " tongues," are mentioned amongst 
 the manifestations of the Spirit, in 1 Cor. xii. 9, 10. 
 
 These signs were to " follow them that believe," and there is no 
 limitation to the first ages of the Church, from which some have 
 
Chap. XVI.] LAYING HANDS ON THE SICK. 419 
 
 * they shall lay Lands on tlie sick, and they shall * Acts v. 15, 
 
 -^ -^ -^ 16, & ix. 17. 
 
 recover. & xxviii. s. 
 
 — - James V. 14, 15. 
 
 understood that if there was a like faith now, there would be Uke 
 signs. But if these signs were to be the attendants on faith to the 
 end, then God's providential dealings would Lave been entirely 
 different from what they have been for the last 1800 years. The 
 power of healing each and every disease by miracle would have left 
 little or no room for the thousand forms which Christian benevo- 
 lence has assumed, in healing, tending, nursing the sick, and alle- 
 viating the poverty which follows so closely and almost universally 
 on long-continued disease. Thus St. Gregory : " Are we then 
 without faith because we cannot do these tilings ? Nay, but these 
 things were necessary in the beginning of the Church, for the faith 
 of believers was to be nourished by miracles, that it might in- 
 crease. Thus we also when we plant groves pour water upon 
 them, until we see that they have grown strong in the earth, but 
 when once they have firmly fixed their roots, we leave off irrigating 
 them." 
 
 Again, though these signs, as miraculous or supernatural attesta- 
 tions of the faith, seem to have been suspended (for a time at least), 
 yet they may be said to have been transfigured and to survive in 
 another shape. In Christ's name, i.e., by the influence of His 
 gospel, the demons of avarice, and pride, and hatred, and vindic- 
 tiveness, have been cast out of those who were once held in bon- 
 dage by these evil spirits. Again, the " speaking with new 
 tongues," was for the purpose of commending Christianity to all, 
 and now one of the most wonderful signs of the times is the mul- 
 tiplicity of languages into which the Bible, and not only the Bible, 
 but the Prayer-Book, has been translated. 
 
 Again, those who are Christ's in deed and in truth can work 
 freely amongst the most deadly forms of evil, and be unpolluted 
 and unharmed. Their hearts being purified by faith, in them is 
 fulfilled the truth of the Apostolic saying, " To the pure all things 
 are pure." And though believers cannot now lay hands on the 
 sick for their recovery, yet in nothing has the spirit of Christianity 
 been more apparent than in the treatment of the sick. The latest 
 discoveries of medical science are in our great hospitals and in- 
 firmaries, immediately on their discovery, applied to the benefit 
 of the poorest and meanest who have been taken to these places. 
 
420 THE LORD RECEIVED UP. [St. Mark. 
 
 19 1[ So tlien ^ after tlie Lord liad spoken unto them, lie 
 
 7 Acts i. 2, 3. was ^ received up into heaven, and ^ sat on the 
 
 z u e XXIV. ;^.jo;ht hand of Grod. 
 
 Xltl'v^'h ^^ -^^^ ^^^^ went forth, and preached every 
 
 b Acts V. 12. where, the Lord working with them, ^ and con- 
 
 & xiv, 3. 1 Cor. T , , . o ■t^ • * 
 
 ii. 4, 5. Heb. firming the word with signs toliowmg. Amen. 
 
 ii. 4. 
 
 19. "After the Lord." So A., E., G., M., Vulg. (Col. Amiat.), &c. ; but C, K., L., 
 A, a few Cursives and versions read, " The Lord Jesus." 
 
 "Amen" om-itted by A., but read by C. E., F. Gr., K., L., M., and almost all Cur- 
 sives. 
 
 19. " So then after the Lord had spoken unto them .... 
 signs following." The reader will see that these two verses are 
 not an account of the Ascension, but merely a notice of it. 
 Nothing can be more brief and succinct than " He was received up 
 into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God." We shall reserve, 
 then, to future occasions, remarks on the Ascension of the Lord. 
 
 20. "And they went forth, and preached every where." This 
 must have been appended after the final dispersion of the Apostles. 
 
 " The Lord working with them." This corresponds with the pro- 
 mise, " Lo I am with you alway." 
 
 "And confirming the word with signs following." The reader 
 will remember how St. Peter when he healed Jj^neas said unto him, 
 " iEneas, Jesus Christ maketh thee whole ; " and how St. Paul speaks 
 of the power of Christ resting upon him. 
 
 " The Lord working with them." This is the secret of all suc- 
 cess in the Christian religion, the power of an ever-present Christ. 
 Theophylact ends his exposition, and we will adopt it as ours, with 
 this prayer : " Grant then, Christ, that the good words which we 
 speak may be confirmed by works and deeds, so that at the last, 
 Thou working with us in word and in deed, we may be perfect ; for 
 Thine, as is fitting, is the glory both of work and deed. Amen." 
 
DEMONIACAL POSSESSION. ^ 421 
 
 EXCUESUS I. 
 
 ON DEMONIACAL POSSESSION. 
 
 Many persons who accept in good faith the Gospel Narrative as 
 containing a true account of the Life and Miracles of our Blessed 
 Lord have a certain difficulty in recei\ing the statements which we 
 find in the Gospels of men being possessed by devils or evil spirits, 
 and of our Lord casting them out by His word. Such persons 
 suggest that our Lord in these cases accommodated Himself to the 
 ignorance, or even to the superstition, of the times; or that the pre- 
 judices of the Evangelists colom-ed their reports, and so they have 
 represented the Lord as acting in accordance with the general 
 opinion respecting certain cases of madness or lunacy, whereas, if 
 we had an exact account of His proceedings, we should have seen 
 that He avoided so committing Himself. 
 
 Now inasmuch as in the Gospel according to St. Mark, the casting 
 out of evil spirits is much more prominent than in the other gospels, 
 it may be well to devote a little space to the consideration of it. 
 
 The whole analogy of the natural world would lead us to beheve 
 that, as there is a descending scale of animated beings below man, 
 reaching down to the lowest forms of life, so there may be an 
 ascending scale above man, between him and God. 
 
 They who believe in any Being worthy of being called the Supreme 
 Intelligence must acknowledge that such an idea is a reasonable 
 one. Otherwise they would commit themselves to the astounding 
 notion that there are, in all this wide universe, no beings between 
 man — weak, short-lived, finite man — and the Infinite God: in fact, 
 that the human intelligence is the highest in existence. 
 
 Now the Scrij^tures support the inference which we draw from 
 the analogy of the natural world, and teach us that, just as in this 
 visible state of things there are gradations of beings between our- 
 selves and the lowest forms of life, so in the spiritual, to which we 
 through our own spirits in part belong, there are gradations of 
 beings between us and the God Who made all things. 
 
 The Scriptures would lead us to believe that these beings are in- 
 telligent free agents, and, like ourselves, have had their time of 
 probation ; that some fell under this trial, and are now the enemies 
 
422 DEMONIACAL POSSESSION. 
 
 of God, as wicked men are, though, of course, hating Him more 
 intensely ; and that others stood firm in the time of trial, and are 
 His willing servants. 
 
 The Scriptures reveal that good angels act as good men do — 
 they endeavour to confirm others in goodness, and to succour them 
 in distress ; and that evil spirits act as evil men do — they en- 
 deavour to seduce others, and involve them in their own con- 
 demnation. 
 
 The Scripture writers say nothing to satisfy our mere curiosity 
 respecting this great spiritual universe. They simply describe the 
 good denizens of it as sent on errands of mercy from God, and the 
 evil as also acting under a leader against God. The mystery of the 
 fall of some of these angels, and their consequent opposition to 
 God, is analogous to what takes place amongst ourselves — some men 
 falling from, and others abiding in, virtue and goodness. It has no 
 special difficulty in itself, but is simply the oldest form of that 
 which is, to those who believe in the reality of the goodness and 
 holiness of God, the great problem of the universe, the origin and 
 continuance of evil. 
 
 It is the counterpart in a world of free agents above us of what 
 takes place amongst ourselves. 
 
 That evil angels can tempt the spirits of men, and in some cases 
 injure their bodies and animal souls, is not a whit more difficult 
 than that evil men can do the same under the government of a 
 God who exerts so universal a providence as is described in the 
 Bible. 
 
 I cannot understand the difficulty which some Christian writers 
 evidently feel respecting the existence of such a thing as demoniacal 
 possession, whilst they seem to feel, or at least they express, no 
 difficulty respecting demoniacal temptation. Demoniacal possession 
 is the infliction of a physical evil (at least, not a moral one), for 
 which the person possessed is not accountable ; but demoniacal 
 temjptation is an attempt to deprive a man of that for the keeping of 
 which he is accountable — his own belief or his own innocence. 
 Demoniacal possession, as represented in Scripture, is a temporal 
 evil, whilst the yielding to demoniacal temptation may cast a man 
 out of the favour of God for ever. And yet demoniacal temptation 
 is perfectly analogous to human temptation. A human seducer has 
 it in his power, if his suggestions are received, to corrupt innocence^ 
 render hfe miserable, undermine faith in God and in Christ, and 
 
DEMONIACAL POSSESSION. 423 
 
 destroy the hopes of eternity ; and a diabolical seducer can do no 
 more. 
 
 Again, the Scriptures seem to teach us that these wicked spirits 
 are the authors of certain temporal evils ; and I do not see that 
 there is anything unreasonable in this, if it be granted that there 
 are spirits which exist independent of bodies, or at least of such bodies 
 as we have ; that these spirits are free agents, and have different 
 characters, and act according to their characters ; and also that 
 within the limitations, and according to the laws of their nature, 
 they have power to act upon those below them in the scale of being, 
 just as we can act upon the creatures below us, within the limita- 
 tions, and according to the laws of our nature. We are, in our 
 way, able to inflict evil, or to ward off evil from our fellow creatures, 
 under the Hmitations which a Higher Power has set over us; and the 
 Scriptures teach us that there are other beings in the great spiritual 
 kingdom of God who are able to do us good or mischief, under the 
 conditions which the same Supreme Power has imposed on their 
 action. So that the one thing which the Scriptures reveal to us is 
 that there is a far vaster spiritual kingdom of God than the human 
 race. 
 
 With respect to demoniacal possession our difficulties arise from 
 two things — from our ignorance of the nature and real causes of 
 mental diseases, and from our ignorance of the way in which incor- 
 poreal intelligences can act upon beings such as ourselves, inasmuch 
 as we ordinarily receive impressions only through our bodily 
 organs. We know not, for instance, how God Himself acts upon 
 our spirits ; and yet, if He cannot. He has less power over us thap 
 we have over one another. 
 
 But there is another difficulty respecting demoniacal possession 
 "which requires notice. It is assumed that it is altogether a thing 
 of the past — that no such cases exist at the present time ; and from 
 this sceptical minds infer that the malady has disappeared before 
 the advance of accurate scientific knowledge. 
 
 But this is said in utter disregard of facts. There are now in 
 this nineteenth century numbers of instances of persons afflicted 
 exactly in the same way as those with whom our Lord is recorded 
 in the Gospels to have come in contact. They may not have lost 
 the use of their reason — on the contrary, at times their mental 
 faculties seem perfectly unimpaired — but they have all the appear- 
 ance of being at other times under the influence of another per- 
 
424 DEMONIACAL POSSESSION. 
 
 sonality, who has so taken possession of the place of command 
 within them that he thinks, si)eaks, and acts through them — through 
 their organs. 
 
 I have memoranda of a number of such instances. I will give 
 two or three. 
 
 (A.) A father, mother, and daughter — very ordinary persons, not 
 in the least degree excitable or superstitious, and absolutely dis- 
 believing in spirit manifestations and things of that sort — go into a 
 new house. Some short time afterwards the daughter, who had given 
 no signs of failing health, was taken with what seemed to be a fit, 
 and, whilst in this state, lost the use of her voice, and could only 
 make herself understood and her wants known by signs like the 
 deaf and dumb alphabet. This state, however, was not continuous, but 
 came on at certain intervals, and between the intervals she had no 
 memory whatsoever of what had occurred whilst the fit was upon 
 her. By degrees, however, when she was under the influence of 
 these attacks, whatever they were, a voice totally unlike her natural 
 voice proceeded from her. This voice and its utterances had all the 
 appearance of proceeding from another personality, and an evil 
 one, which for the time had complete dominion over her, com- 
 pelling her to go, or desire to go, to low places of amusement, from 
 which, when mistress of herself, she would have shrunk; com- 
 pelling her to dress altogether differently, and to use language and 
 express desires altogether foreign to her better self. This second 
 personality spoke to the bystanders, reminding them of passages in 
 their past lives which were, as they thought, secret to all save 
 themselves, and of which the young ]Derson who was under this 
 malignant influence could not possibly have known anything what- 
 soever; so that some who had their secret iniquities thus brought 
 to light hurried out of the house. But as soon as the interval of 
 possession came to a close, the person seemed as if she resumed her 
 former self, and as if she awoke out of sleep, and remembered 
 nothing of what had occurred. In the book from which I have 
 epitomized the above (where it occupies several pages), all particu- 
 lars are given, such as the name of the town and street, the name, 
 age, and occupation of the father, &c. (From " The Gadarene," by 
 J. 0. Barrett and J. W. Peebles, Boston.) 
 
 (B.) A second case is of a person who was attacked every two or 
 three days, and in the intervals between the attacks was perfectly 
 well. They commenced with pains, palpitation, anxiety, and ex- 
 
DEMONIACAL POSSESSION. 425 
 
 banstioD. The patient became perfectly apathetic, and there was 
 manifested, as a mental anomaly (these are the words of the 
 physician narrating the case), an internal contradiction against her 
 own thoughts and conclusions, a constant, immediate opposition 
 against all which she thought and did. An inward " voice," which 
 she, however, did not hear with her ear, opposed everything which 
 she herself would do, especially did it set itself against any elevation 
 of the sentiments, praying, &c. The voice is always wicked when 
 the patient would do good ; and sometimes calls to her, but without 
 being heard externally : " Take a knife, and kill yourself." The 
 attack lasted from twenty-four to forty-eight hours. ^ 
 
 (C.) A third case is from the same work as the former. A 
 young person, without having been previously ill, was seized with 
 convulsive attacks, in which she spoke with two voices, neither of 
 them her natural voice : one seemed to come from a good per- 
 sonality, and exhorted to prayer (kept repeating, " I pray earnestly 
 for you"). Another voice afterwards commenced to speak in a 
 tone distinctly different from the fore-mentioned bass voice. This 
 voice spoke almost without intermission, as long as the crisis 
 lasted — that is, for half hours, hours, or even longer, — and was 
 only occasionally interrupted by the bass voice, which still repeated 
 the fore-mentioned words. In a moment this voice would repre- 
 sent a person different from that of the patient, and perfectly dis- 
 tinct from her, speaking of her always objectively, and in the third 
 person. There was no confusion or incoherence in the words of the 
 voice ; but great consistency was shown in answering all the ques- 
 tions logically, or in skilfully evading them. But that which princi- 
 pally distinguished these sayings was their moral, or rather their 
 immoral, character. They expressed pride, arrogance, mockery, or 
 hatred of truth. The voice would say, " I am the Son of God, the 
 Saviour of the world ; you must adore me ; " and immediately 
 afterwards rail against everything holy, blaspheme against God, 
 against Christ, and against the Bible; express a violent dislike 
 against all who follow what is good ; give vent to the most violent 
 maledictions, a thousand times repeated, and furiously rage on per- 
 ceiving anyone engaged in prayer, or merely folding their hands. 
 
 ^ From *' Mental Pathology," by Dr. TV. Griesinger, Professor 
 of Clinical Medicine and of Mental Science in the University of 
 Berlin : translated by Eobertson and Piutherford, p. 242. 
 
^26 DEMONIACAL POSSESSION. 
 
 This evil consciousness was apparently not driven out by any 
 medical treatment, but by the voice of the better personality com- 
 manding it to depart. 
 
 When this girl came to herself she felt tired and exhausted. She 
 was perfectly unconscious of what had passed, and merely said 
 that she had been dreaming/ 
 
 (D.) Another case investigated by two German physicians is that 
 of a woman in good health who was possessed by the evil spirit of one 
 long dead, who described crimes which he had committed of which 
 the woman could not possibly have known anything, and what is 
 more, made excuses for crimes which the woman, when herself, 
 promptly disallowed. This case the reader will find given at great 
 length in "Temple Bar" for January, 1862, and what is more, 
 carefully criticized by one who, though not an unbeliever in Chris- 
 tianity, professed himself exceedingly sceptical as regards all 
 present manifestations of good or evil spiritual influence.^ 
 
 Now, of course I am well aware of all the exceptions that can be 
 taken to these accounts. An objector may say they occurred at a 
 distance, in other countries, and assuming himself to be the centre 
 of truth, the further off they took place from the sphere of his ex- 
 
 ^ Dr. Griesinger's " Mental Pathology," pp. 243-4. 
 
 ^ There are other cases much more akin in their symptoms to 
 possession than to ordinary lunacy or mania, in Dr. Griesinger's 
 book. Such are to be found in pages 220 and 242 (example xvi.), 
 251, 257, 266, 282 (paragraph beginning, " scarcely it is necessary 
 to remark "), 294, 295, 297. The justly celebrated work of Brierre de 
 Boismont, a leading physician of mental diseases in Paris, contains 
 also a number of similar instances well worthy of notice, particu- 
 larly the following : — Case iii., p. 47 ; case vi., pp. 50, 51 ; case 
 xxviii., p. 77 ; case xxxvii., p. 90 ; case xxxix., p. 97 : case xlv., 
 p. 114 ; case 1., p. 122 ; case li. ; case Ix., p. 144 ; case Ixi., p. 148 ; 
 case Ixxxviii. This last, from an incident in the life of Talleyrand, 
 seems like a case of temporary possession rather thon ordinary 
 lunacy. 
 
 I have also now before me five other cases, all occurring in Ger- 
 many, in each of which there are all the evidences of a personality 
 wholly different from that of the person under the influence, but do 
 not give them because I am not able to refer to the works of the 
 physicians from which they are extracted. 
 
DEMONIACAL POSSESSION. 427 
 
 perience the more unlikely tliey are to be true. If he had had the 
 investigation of them, he would have been able to show that they 
 were fraudulent, or mere ordinary cases of lunacy, and so on. Or he 
 may object to the evidence, for in no case have we the results of 
 legal investigation with the attestation of public notaries, and the 
 seal of the maj^or or parochial magistrate appended ; it also, in its 
 turn, duly attested. But if we happened to have such attestation, 
 the case so attested would lie under still greater suspicion, for if the 
 facts were true, why such pains to prove them : does not anxiety to 
 prove the truth, betray consciousness of falsehood ? 
 
 I give no opinion upon the foregoing instances. I simply cite 
 them as showing that we have credible evidence that, in this nine- 
 teenth century, we have numbers of instances in the works of men 
 of eminence, of persons afflicted with symptoms precisely similar to 
 those of the persons of whom we have accounts in the Gospel nar- 
 rative. The miraculous cure of demoniacal possession presents, I 
 need hardly say, less physical difficulty than any other cure j)er- 
 formed by our Lord. Assuming the presence of an evil spiritual 
 intelligence in the possessed person coming face to face with the 
 most exalted Spiritual Power and Goodness in the Person of our 
 Lord, the natural result is, that the one quails before the Other. 
 
 But, in truth, all the difficulties respecting possession arise, not 
 so much from our ignorance, as from our dogmatism. We assert 
 the dogma, or at least we quietly assume its truth, that there are no 
 spiritual or intellectual beings higher than om'selves, or in any other 
 sphere than our own : or if we shrink from an assertion which so 
 nearly implies our own omniscience, we lay down that these supe- 
 rior beings, of whose laws or limitations we know nothing, can only 
 act upon us in ways precisely similar to those in which we act upon 
 one another. 
 
 In the above excursus I have made much use of the contents of 
 a chapter on Demoniacal Possession in a work entitled " The Lost 
 Gospel," which I wrote a few years ago. 
 
428 THE BRETHREN OF OUR LORD. 
 
 EXCURSUS II. 
 
 ON THE BRETHREN OF OUR LORD, 
 
 The most important notice of any " brethren of the Lord" is in 
 Matthew xiii. 54, 55, "Is not this the carpenter's son? is not his 
 mother called Mary? and his brethren James, and Joses, and 
 Simon, and Judas? And his sisters, are they not all with us? 
 whence, then, hath this man all these things ? And they were 
 offended in Him." This is part of the original tradition of the 
 Lord's life and works, for it is repeated, almost verbatim, in Mark 
 vi. 3 : "Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, the brother of 
 James and Joses, and of Judas and Simon ? And are not his sisters 
 here with us ? And they were offended at him." 
 
 His brethren are also mentioned in John vii. 3, 5 : " His brethren, 
 therefore, said unto him, Depart hence," &c. " For neither did his 
 brethren believe in him." And also in Matthew xii. 47 : "His 
 mother and His brethren stood without desiring to speak with 
 Him." But from neither of these x)laces do we learn anything of 
 their names or of the degree of their relationship to Him. It 
 seems almost certain, however, that they were the same persons 
 mentioned in Matthew xiii. 65 and Mark vi. 3. 
 
 Now, from this notice of His brethren in the first two Synoptics 
 we gather with almost absolute certainty two things. 
 
 1. That these four persons were the relatives nearest to our Lord 
 who could with any propriety be called His brethren. The Naza- 
 renes were offended at him, because they considered that by His 
 teaching and His miracles. He set up pretensions to be some great 
 projphet or messenger of God, and so exalted Himself above them- 
 selves, His neighbours and His equals. " Whence hath this man," 
 they asked, " all these things ? " He is but one of us, for we have 
 His brethren and sisters dwelling here amongst us, and they are no 
 better than ourselves. This would have lost much, if not all its 
 point, if He had had other brethren more nearly related to Him. 
 Being also his townsmen, some the near neighbours of His 
 m.other, and living, perhaps, in the same street, they must have 
 known all that mere men could know about His family. It is 
 
THE BRETHREN OF OUR LORD. 429 
 
 absolutely impossible to suppose tbat He could have had nearer 
 relatives than these unknown to the Nazarenes. 
 
 2. Then, in the next place, it seems perfectly clear that if we had 
 only these two parallel notices (Matt. xiii. 55, and Mark vi. 3), 
 and could put out of our minds all considerations of the extreme 
 sacredness of even His earthly relationships derived from His Incar- 
 nation, we should gather from them that these four were His 
 uterine brothers, sons of Mary and Joseph after the Lord's birth. 
 
 The next notice, however, entirely and for ever dispels any such 
 idea, for in Matt, xxvii. 55, 56, we read that " many women were 
 there, beholding (the crucifixion) afar off, among which was Mary 
 Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joses," and in the 
 corresponding passage in Mark xv. 40, " There were also women 
 looking on afar off, among whom was Mary Magdalene and Mary 
 the mother of James the less and of Joses." This is decisive as to 
 the fact that the two brethren mentioned as first of the four in 
 Matthew xiii. 55, and Mark vi. 3, were not the Lord's uterine 
 brothers, for they are said to be the children of another woman, 
 and if the two first were not, neither can the two last have been, 
 for it is absurd to supx^ose that the Nazarenes, in speaking of the 
 brethren of the Lord, would x^lace his cousins, or putative half- 
 brothers first, and His own natural uterine brothers last.^ 
 
 There are three other references to this Mary : one in Luke xxiv. 10, 
 as the mother of James, another in Mark xvii, as the mother of James,, 
 and in the verse before this (Mark xv. 47) as the mother of Joses, the 
 
 ■^ The James and Joses of the latter two passages (Matt, xxvii. 55- 
 and Mark xv. 40) must have been the same as those of the former 
 (Matt. xiii. 56 and Mark vi. 3), for in each Evangelist they are cited 
 as persons well known ; or, at least, as persons before mentioned ;. 
 which they could not have been if, in each case, they had been 
 a different pair of brothers. That two names should have been 
 mentioned in conjunction by two writers, and the same two names- 
 mentioned afterwards by the same writers also in conjunction, and 
 not denote the same persons, seems incredible. There can be no- 
 imaginable reason for mentioning this Mary as the mother of these 
 two sons, except they were the two already alluded to. If they 
 were two different pairs of brothers, the latter reference seems 
 gratuitously misleading. 
 
430 THE BRETHREN OF OUR LORD. 
 
 second of the four. These notices seem to have been written to 
 show that the mother of the James who afterwards occupied so high 
 a place in the Church, was not only a near relative of the Lord, but 
 very deeply attached to Him. May I hazard the conjecture that it 
 was in reward of the deep devotion of this woman that her children 
 became believers ? 
 
 There is another reference to James as the Lord's brother in 
 Galatians i. 19 : " Other of the Apostles saw I none, save James, the 
 Lord's brother." This is no proof that James was one of the 
 twelve, for Paul and Barnabas were both called Apostles. 
 
 There are two other references to the Lord's brethren. One in 
 Acts i. 14: '• These all [i.e. all the eleven Apostles] continued with 
 one accord in prayer and supplication with the women, and Mary 
 the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren." Another, in 1 Cor. 
 ix. 5 : " Have we not power to lead about a sister, a wife, as well 
 as other apostles, and as the brethren of the Lord, and Cephas ? " 
 Both these places are important as distinguishing between the 
 Apostles and "the brethren of the Lord." 
 
 Lastly, Jude, the writer of the Epistle, calls himself " Jude, 
 the servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James." Now, this 
 James must have been a person of the greatest eminence in the 
 Church if one like Jude distinguishes himself from all others bear- 
 ing the same very common Jewish name as " the brother of James." 
 He could only be the James the brother of the Lord, and the first- 
 named of the four brethren of Matthew xiii. 57, and so Jude natu- 
 rally calls himself his brother, as he appears to be in the two notices 
 of the Lord's brethren in the Synoptics. 
 
 These are all the places in the New Testament in which the Lord's 
 brethren are mentioned. 
 
 If we take Biblical considerations only into account there seems 
 io be no room for doubt as to their parentage on the mother's side. 
 Those who from their being the nearest neighbours of the Holy 
 Pamily must have known all about the Lord's belongings, name 
 four persons from among His nearest relatives who could properly 
 be called the Lord's brethren. A certain Mary (not the Virgin) is 
 .expressly mentioned in the same Gospels in which the names of 
 these brethren are recounted, as the mother of two — the two first ; 
 and a third distinguishes himself from all others, bearing a very 
 common Jewish name, as the brother of the first, and most famous 
 of the four (Jude i.). 
 
THE BRETHREN OF OUR LORD. 431 
 
 No difficulties respecting the tracing out of the relationship of 
 these four brethren to other persons named in the sacred narrative 
 can, as far as I can see, affect, much less upset, the fact that all the 
 persons called the brethren of the Lord were the sons of one 
 mother — a Mary who stood at some distance from the cross, and 
 afterwards with other women attended at the sepulchre. 
 
 Now of the four persons called the Lord's brethren, unquestion- 
 ably the one who has most claim to the title — indeed, the only 
 individual who is designated by name as the Lord's brother — is the 
 first of the four, viz., James ; and this Mary is four times said to be 
 the mother of James (Matt, xxvii. 56 ; Mark xv. 40; Mark xvi. 1 ; 
 Luke xxiv. 10). The parentage, then, of this James (and, if of him, 
 of his three brethren), on the mother's side, is as certain as any 
 Scripture fact can well be, and, I need hardly say, is totally 
 unaffected by the question as to his father, who he was. 
 
 There are either two or three Apostolic or quasi- Apostolic persons 
 of the name of James; and this is not at all strange, for the name 
 is one of the most common of Jewish names. 
 
 One of these is the son of Zebedee, called afterwards by Church 
 writers, but not in Scripture, James the Great. In the account of 
 his martyrdom he is called James, the brother of John (Acts xii. 2). 
 
 Another James is designated in each of the four lists of the 
 Apostles (Matt. x. 3 ; Mark iii. 18 ; Luke vi. 15 ; Acts i. 13) as the 
 son of Alphseus. In St. John's account of the crucifixion, one of 
 the Maries cited, who stood at the first by the cross, is Mary, the 
 wife of Clopas ^ (not Cleophas) ; and it is supposed that Alphaeus is 
 the Grecized name of Clopas (in Aramaic it would be pronounced 
 Chalphai, or Cholphai), in which case James, the second Apostle of 
 the name, and James the Lord's brother and bishop of Jerusalem, 
 would be the same person. 
 
 But the difficulties in the way of this identification are exceed- 
 ingly great :— 
 
 1. James, the son of Alphseus, was, from the first selection of the 
 Apostles, one of the twelve, and so was ever after that in the com- 
 pany of the Lord : whereas the Nazarenes speak of the James, 
 
 ^ It is very probable that four persons rather than three are men- 
 tioned as standing by the cross in John xix. 25 — 1, His mother ; 
 2, His mother's sister (name not mentioned) ; 3, Mary (the wife) of 
 Clopas ; 4, Mary Magdalene. 
 
432 THE BRETHREN OF OUR LORD. 
 
 whose name they mentioned, as if he were one of four who were 
 with them, not with the Lord. 
 
 It would have been directly contrary to their purpose in naming 
 the brethren of the Lord, if one or more of them had espoused 
 His cause, and were now His companions and disciples, doing 
 miracles and casting out devils in His Name : their allegation 
 being that those who were nearest to Him were no different from 
 themselves. 
 
 2. Then, in the next place, how is it that the Apostle James, the 
 son of Alphffius, is never once distinguished by his relationship to 
 the Lord, and the James who afterwards held so unique a place 
 in the Church of Jerusalem, is never mentioned as the son of 
 Alphaeus ? 
 
 3. Again, in two places (Acts i. 14 and 1 Cor. ix. 5) the brethren 
 of the Lord are clearly distinguished from the Apostles. And of 
 these brethren James was unquestionably the leading one. 
 
 4. Again, from all the accounts which we have of the Apostles, it 
 seems to have been contrary to their original commission that they 
 should ever become local bishops. 
 
 5. Again, how is it that, in the Synoptics, the Mary who was at 
 the sepulchre in company with Mary Magdalene is four times called 
 the mother of James, and twice (apparently) "the other Mary," 
 but never once the wife of Alphaeus ? 
 
 These considerations seem to go very far towards showing that 
 James the Apostle, the son of Alphaeus, and James the Lord's 
 brother, were different persons. If they were the same, then the 
 brethren of the Lord, and unquestionably the first-named of the 
 four, were not the sons of the Lord's mother by Joseph, nor were 
 they the children of Joseph by a former wife. 
 
 Again, a moment's consideration will serve to show the reader 
 that the degree of relationship of Mary, the mother of these 
 brethren, to Mary, the Lord's mother, in no way affects the fact 
 that, in the inspired narrative, they are called the brethren of the 
 Lord, and yet are said to be the children of another Mary, not the 
 Lord's mother. If this Mary was the cousin of the Virgin, or her 
 half-sister, or any other near relative, then it affects the propriety, 
 or the strict accuracy of the people of Nazareth, in calling her chil- 
 dren the brothers of Jesus ; but it does not take away her children 
 from her, and assign them to another woman. It merely shows 
 that in the time of our Lord, and in the language then spoken, 
 
THE BRETHREN OF OUR LORD. 433 
 
 the term brethren was used in a wider or looser sense than that in 
 which we use it. 
 
 Two other considerations are important — 
 
 (A.) In the accounts of the infancy of the Lord in St. Matthew and 
 St. Luke there is no word or hint of any other children than the 
 Lord in the household of Joseph. From St. Luke's account, which 
 reaches to the twelfth year of His age, the Holy Family would 
 seem to consist of only three persons — the Lord, the Virgin, and 
 St. Joseph. 
 
 (B.) But the second is of far deeper and more certain significance. 
 The Lord on the cross commits His mother to the care of St. John, 
 which He could not have done if she had children of her own, 
 whose duty it was to take care of her ; which children, be it re- 
 membered, though some time before this they were not be- 
 lievers, had certainly accepted Him as the Christ before the day 
 of Pentecost. 
 
 An objection also requires notice. It has been asked : " If these 
 persons were the cousins of the Lord, why should they not be 
 called so ? " To which the answer is, that there was no word for 
 cousins in either the Hebrew or Aramaic. These languages have 
 very few words to express degrees of consanguinity ; and any word 
 answering to our term "cousin" is certainly not among them. 
 Thus, in Luke i. 36 and 58, the word " cousin " is the translation of 
 one signifying kinsman or relative generally, and not specifically 
 cousin. It is translated into the Aramaic by a word, " achin," also 
 signifying kinsman in the wider sense. It would not have suited 
 the purpose of the Nazarenes to call the Lord's brethren " kins- 
 men ; " their aim was to bring Him down to their own level, and to 
 discredit His claims : and for this pm'pose they would naturally 
 bring forward the names of those who were of the same generation, 
 and so might be assumed to be His equals, and so furnish a standard 
 of comparison whereby to disparage Him. 
 
 The fact, then, that these brethren of the Lord have a mother 
 assigned to them other than the Virgin, and one who also survived 
 St. Joseph, seems to preclude the idea that they were children of 
 Joseph by a former wife. 
 
 This latter hypothesis, however, requires some further notice, 
 because it was adopted by many eminent Fathers — as Clement of 
 Alexandria and Origen — and has been accepted by a biblical critic 
 of the highest eminence amongst us, the present Bishop of Dur- 
 
 F F 
 
434 THE BRETHREN OF OUR LORD. 
 
 ham, in his Excursus on the Lord's Brethren, in his Commentary 
 on the Epistle to the Galatians. 
 
 In the latter part of the Bishop's essay the reader will find the 
 opinions of Apocryphal writers, and of a few Fathers. It appears to 
 me that many of his citations are uncertain and indirect in their 
 reference to the matter in hand. Some of the Fathers, however, 
 are very explicit in favour of the view that the brethren of the 
 Lord were children of Joseph by a former wife ; the foremost of 
 those who held this opinion being Clement of Alexandria, Origen, 
 Hilary, Gregory Nyssen, and Epiphanius. I would, however, desire 
 the reader to notice particularly that neither the Bishop nor any 
 of the Fathers who uphold what he calls the Epiphanian view 
 {{.e, that the Lord's brethren were children of Joseph), attempt to 
 give any explanation of the fact that the persons mentioned in the 
 Gospels as the Lord's brethren are expressly said to be the children 
 of a woman who was certainly not the Lord's mother, and was 
 certainly not the former wife of Joseph, for she survived him. I 
 mean, of course, any explanation worth serious consideration, for 
 Gregory Nj^ssen puts forward a view which seems absurd, viz., 
 that the mother of James and Joses was no other than the mother 
 of the Lord ; but that the Evangelists, for no earthly reason, go out 
 of the way to sink her more honourable appellation, and on this 
 occasion only distinguish her as the mother of these two stepsons 
 of hers because she undertook their education. 
 
 The Bishop summarily dismisses such a view ; but as far as I can 
 gather from an attentive reading of his essay, nowhere tells us how 
 it can be that these four brethren are said to be the sons of a mother 
 who cannot have been St. Joseph's deceased wife. The only 
 hypothesis on which they can be accounted the children of Joseph, 
 viz., that they were the sons of some deceased brother of his by this 
 Mary, and were adopted by him (Joseph), being also dismissed by 
 the Bishop as untenable. 
 
 I have little doubt, however, that the reason why the Epiphanian 
 view was adopted by so many Fathers is that which is tacitly 
 suggested by Gregory Nyssen. They could not bear to think 
 that the Virgin did not stand by the cross till the last, and that 
 she was not present at the sepulchre.' It never seems to have 
 
 ^ Helvidius, the denier of the perpetual virginity of St, Mary, 
 whom St. Jerome answered, puts this argument most impudently. 
 
THE BRETHREN OF OUR LORD. 435 
 
 occurred to them that she was most probably led from the cross in 
 a distracted state, or perhaps more dead than alive ; and so they 
 invented the extraordinary figment that this Mary, the mother of 
 James and Joses, was the Virgin herself, called for no assignable 
 reason, the mother of James and Joses, rather than the mother of 
 the Lord. 
 
 With respect to the bearing of all on the perpetual virginity of 
 St. Mary, the reader must, of course, remember that the fact that 
 these four were not her children does not prove the doctrine, 
 it only removes that which would be incompatible with it. The 
 perpetual virginity of the mother of our Lord and God is an 
 opinion which seems to be forced upon the Catholic mind by the 
 unutterable sacredness of that of which she was the means of 
 bringing amongst us, the manifestation of God in the flesh. The 
 union of the Holy Virgin with St. Joseph is unique amongst human 
 marriages. It was not for that purpose for which all other marriages 
 are. It was to provide protection and a home for the Only Begotten 
 during His Infancy ; so that we cannot think of it as we do of any 
 other marriage. 
 
 Besides this, the Incaruation of the Eternal Son was designed to 
 bring about a change in the condition of the race, bo that it should 
 be raised to a state above the necessity of marriage — in which they 
 will neither marry nor be given in marriage, but will be the children 
 of God, being the children of the resurrection. 
 
 And there is a truth even beyond this, for the Eternal Son was 
 to enter into a spiritual marriage and unity betwixt himself and His 
 Church. The Catholic mind instinctively turns to the earthly home 
 of the Lord, as containing a foreshadowing of this highest spiritual 
 relationship. 
 
 He is thus quoted in Jerome, " Adversus Helvidium," ch. xii. : " Et 
 utique ait. Quam miserum erit et impium de Maria hoc sentire, 
 ut quum alisB feminae curam sepultures Jesu habuerint, matrem 
 ejus dicamus absentem : aut alteram esse Mariam, nescio quam, 
 confingamus : prsesertim quum Evangelium Joannis testetur pre- 
 sentem eam illic fuisse." 
 
436 THE LAST TWELVE VERSES. 
 
 EXCUESUS IIL 
 
 ON THE AUTHOKSHIP OF THE LAST TWELVE VERSES OF MAEK XVI, 
 
 The problem presented by the last twelve verses of this Gospel 
 requires separate notice. The external evidence for, or against, its 
 genuineness, as contained in Manuscripts, Versions, citations in 
 Fathers, &c., seems to me very subordinate to certain internal con- 
 siderations, the true significance of which I cannot but think has 
 been very seriously misunderstood. First and foremost amongst 
 these is the coherence of what comes after verse 8 with what goes 
 before it. 
 
 The question of the discontinuity of this latter part (beginning with 
 verse 9) with the former part, seems to me altogether independent 
 of its authorship, for if one were absolutely assured that St. Mark 
 was the writer (and I, for one, believe that there are overwhelming 
 considerations in favour of his being so), still it would leave un- 
 touched the singular fact that, up to verse 8, he follows very strictly 
 in his narrative one line of tradition which is common to him and 
 to St. Matthew, and then he breaks off, and follows another line, 
 or rather makes a somewhat abrupt ending, with incidents ap- 
 parently derived from some other source altogether. 
 
 The following observations will, I hope, make my meaning clear. 
 Taking as our starting point the beginning of the twenty-sixth 
 chapter of St. Matthew, and the fourteenth of St. Mark, the reader 
 will find that the narratives not only run parallel, but are very fre- 
 quently for many verses together verbatim the same. They both 
 begin with a reference to the coming feast of the Passover, they 
 both relate the anointing at Bethany out of its chronological order 
 (to me a very significant fact indeed). Their accounts of the Pass- 
 over, of the Institution of the Eucharist, of the Lord's words of 
 warning on the way to Gethsemane, of the Agony, of the Appre- 
 hension, of the trial before the High Priest, of the denials by St. 
 Peter, of the leading to Pilate, of the trial before Pilate, of the 
 Crucifixion, are virtually the same — in many cases word for word 
 the same. It is true that some incidents are peculiar to each, as, 
 for instance, in St. Matthew alone we have the remorse and suicide 
 of Judas, and in St. Mark alone the account of the young man in- 
 
THE LAST TWELVE VERSES. 437 
 
 the linen garment who attempted to follow the Lord ; but whenever 
 they have matter in common, it is produced in almost the same 
 words. They each record but one of the seven words said by the 
 Lord on the Cross, and in each it is the same. 
 
 After the Lord's Death the former agreement continues. They 
 both notice the presence of the same women — first standing at 
 some distance from the Cross, then coming to the sepulchre. 
 
 The only difference is, that St. Mark notices the wonder of Pilate 
 that the Lord was already dead, and St. Matthew the granting of 
 the watch by Pilate. 
 
 We now coma to the morning of the Resurrection. With one 
 exception — that, of course, an important one — they give the same 
 account, the exception being that St. Matthew records the account 
 of the earthquake, and the descent of the angel, which St. Mark 
 does not notice ; but this brings out more prominently the fact that 
 they each begin their account of the great forty days with the visit 
 of the same women, who see one and the same angel, who gives 
 them the same message that the Lord is risen, and that they are to 
 go at once and bear this particular message to the disciples, that 
 Ha goeth before them into Galilee, and that there they are to meet 
 Him. 
 
 Now these two Evangelists, and these only, had recorded the 
 words of the Lord said just before the Agony, "After that I am 
 risen I will go before you into Galilee " (Matt. xxvi. 32 ; Mark xiv, 
 28), and both tell us that the angel refers to these words, and bids 
 them go to Galilee. 
 
 So that, if we had not known the actual conclusion of St. Mark, 
 we should have said, with almost absolute certainty, that he would 
 have finished his Gospel with some account of the meeting in 
 Gahlee, following up the same line of tradition as St. Matthew. 
 
 So that the break of continuity is not merely the snapping of the 
 thread of a short narration, but of a long traditional account of the 
 Lord, occupying, one may say, the whole of this Gospel. Now this 
 appears to me to dispose altogether of the notion that the last part 
 of the Gospel was accidentally lost, as (according to Alford's con- 
 jecture), by the last leaf having been torn out and destroyed, for by 
 this hypothesis we are landed in some extraordinary difficulties ; 
 for instance, the leaf must have been torn out not only before any 
 copy had been made of it, but before anybody had even seen it ; and 
 unknown to the Evangelist, who for some extraordinary reason was 
 
438 THE LAST TWELVE VERSES. 
 
 never asked to make it good. For let the reader remember that 
 the conjecture of the leaf torn out implies that the Evangelist 
 actually finished the Gospel in the way in which all men would 
 have expected from his strict adherence to the same line of tra- 
 dition as that in St. Matthew. The torn-out leaf is a conjecture 
 to account for the difference of the conclusion from what men, on 
 natural principles, would have expected. 
 
 If the last leaf had been destroyed some one must have known, 
 in a general way at least, its contents, and in these contents there 
 must have been the fulfilment of the Lord's promise, first by Him- 
 self, then by the mouth of the angel, to meet the disciples in 
 Galilee. 
 
 If then any person, who, from his position in the Church at 
 Eome could, with any show of propriety, have been called upon to 
 finish the Gospel, was requested to do so, surely his first inquiry 
 must have been, "Has anyone seen the missing leaf ? " and if it 
 was found that no one had seen it — that it seemed to have been 
 lost almost before the ink was dry, and the Evangelist was also not 
 to be found, then the person must have said, " We are not left 
 entirely to ourselves in this dilemma. We have often heard the 
 blessed Peter deliver the tradition, how that the Lord, first by His 
 own lips, then by His angel, promised to meet them in Galilee, and 
 fulfilled His promise, and we must at least mention, as well as we 
 can, what we remember that he preached respecting this meeting." ^ 
 
 The same reasoning applies to the Evangelist leaving his Gospel 
 
 ^ We may illustrate the reasonableness of this by the following. 
 Supposing that instead of the leaf containing the last twelve 
 verses, some other leaf, say that which contains the Institution of 
 the Eucharist, had been lost, and some of the Church had met 
 together to supply the deficiency, would they not have said. We 
 know the traditionary account of this, which was brought to us 
 from Palestine, and which the Blessed Peter expounded to us. 
 Most of his words are retained in the memory of at least some or 
 other of us. Let us see if we can put them together, assisted by a 
 copy of the tradition which we have received from Palestine. 
 They would do so, and they would reproduce mainly what was to 
 be found in St. Matthew's Gospel. Afterwards if the missing 
 part were recovered, then they would find that what they had 
 
THE LAST TWELVE VERSES. 439 
 
 iatentionally unfinished. The more we think of it, the more im- 
 possible this seems, not merely from the incongruity of concluding 
 a Gospel of Salvation with the words, " They were afraid ; " but 
 because what he had previously mentioned bound him, if I may 
 reverently use the expression, at least to notice the fultilment of 
 the Lord's twice repeated promise, to meet the Apostles in Galilee. 
 
 Did he leave it, then, unintentionally unfinished ? If so, it must 
 have been because he was suddenly obliged to flee, or suddenly cut 
 off by martyrdom, or his connection with St. Peter suddenly 
 severed. But all historical notices of him forbid the former, for, 
 after leaving Rome, he preached the Gospel in Alexandria, and 
 founded the Church there, so that we have no reason whatsoever to 
 suppose that the writing of this Gospel was the last act of his life. 
 Again, supposing that he was suddenly deprived of the guidance 
 of St, Peter, yet one who had been so long in the company of the 
 Apostle, must have heard him speak of the appearance of the Lord 
 in Galilee, and, having recorded the promise of the Lord, and 
 having heard something of its fulfilment, he would have at least 
 made some allusion to it, inasmuch as he had put on record the 
 promise of the Lord by His own mouth and by the angel. 
 
 And now let us look to the contents of this, the only paragraph 
 which has come down to us in the least degree worthy of being 
 considered the conclusion of this Gospel, and see whether it is pos- 
 sible for a moment to ascribe it to anyone except an Apostle, or to 
 one who, like St. Mark, having been the companion of two 
 Apostles, might be considered an Apostle in the sense that Bar- 
 nabas was. 
 
 For in the first i^lace, the first six verses (9-14), are the most 
 derogatory to the character of the Apostles as believers, of any in all 
 Scripture. Can we possibly suppose that anyone not an Apostle, 
 or not writing under the immediate influence or dictation of an 
 Apostle, would have noticed two apx3earances of the Lord, not ap- 
 parently for the purpose of showing (primarily) that the Lord had 
 risen, but that the Apostles did not believe those who had seen Him 
 after He was risen ; and a third to the assembled Apostles, apparently 
 
 reproduced was virtually, if not verbatim the same : as the reader 
 may see if he compares Matthew xxvi. 20-32, with Mark xiv. 17-29, 
 in each case twelve verses. 
 
440 THE LAST TWELVE VERSES. 
 
 to " upbraid them with their unbelief and hardness of heart, because 
 they believed not those which had seen Him after He was risen." 
 The leading teaching of these six verses is not so much the Eesur- 
 rection of the Lord, as the slowness of heart of His chosen ones to 
 credit those who announced to them a Eesurrection, which He 
 Himself had so distinctly foretold. I have thought long and care- 
 fully about these verses, and I cannot imagine anyone not an 
 Apostle, or not under the strong influence of an Apostle, giving to 
 posterity in so short a space so much to the discredit of the 
 Apostolic body. The few scattered notices of unbelief, or rather 
 slowness of belief, in the three other Gospel narratives seem con- 
 centrated in these few verses. 
 
 It is to me a matter of great surprise that so many commentators 
 have not observed this. Thus in " Notes on Select Eeadings," by 
 Drs. Westcott and Hort, we have the following way of accounting 
 for these verses : " (1) That the true intended continuation of vv. 1-8 
 was either very early lost by the detachment of a leaf, or was 
 never written down ; and (2) that a scribe, or editor, unwilling to 
 change the words of the text before him, or to add words of his 
 own, was willing to furnish the Gospel with what seemed a worthy 
 conclusion, by incorporating with it unchanged a narrative of 
 Christ's appearances after the Eesurrection which he found in some 
 secondary record (!) then surviving from a previous generation." 
 
 But this ' secondary record ' could not have been a narrative 
 of Christ's appearances. It takes no notice of the two in St. 
 Matthew, and of two out of the four in St. John, and of, at least, 
 three alluded to by St. Paul. It must rather have been a record 
 of Apostolic unbelief, for the prominence is undoubtedly given to 
 that, not to the proof of the reahty of the Lord's Body. 
 
 So far for the first part of the conclusion to the Gospel. 
 
 There follows upon this a commission of the Lord of the most 
 universal scope and character, to which is added a promise of 
 supernatural assistance. This is by much the longest of any of the 
 sayings of the Lord during the great forty clays. It is quite inde- 
 pendent, and cannot be identified with the commission in St, 
 Matthew as being another version of the latter, and it covers 
 different ground. If one may utter such a thing with the greatest 
 reverence, it equals in authority, in simplicity, in comprehensive- 
 ness, in decisiveness any other saying of the Lord. 
 
 Of this (considered as an integral part of tlie whole conclusion) 
 
THE LAST TWELVE VERSES. 441 
 
 Drs. Westcott and Hort write : *' It manifestly cannot claim any 
 Apostolical authority, but it is doubtless founded upon some tradi- 
 tion of the Apostolic age." 
 
 But why "manifestly"? Is there such a difference between 
 these words and other words of the great forty days, that on the 
 face of them they could not have come through any Apostle, and 
 are not worthy to be considered part of the original tradition ? Is 
 there any marked contrast between them and the words of the 
 commission in St. Matthew, or any similar words of the Lord in 
 St. Luke ? I cannot think that there is. If any words can have 
 the marks of being an utterance of Christ these seem to have. 
 
 They must be either the words of Christ, or an impudently 
 wicked forgery. 
 
 Assuming them to be the latter, some one must have composed 
 them who had an astonishing power of imitating the Lord's 
 language in its combined authority and simplicity. He has put 
 into the Lord's mouth words by which holy men, from the time of 
 Irenseus downwards, have been deceived, as being His when they 
 are not ; and this for the veiy secondary purpose of making a 
 decent finish to another man's book. And how could he have 
 ventured to do so ? For it surely must have occurred to him that 
 some of his Christian brethren would ask, " Where did you get 
 these words ? Who told you that the Lord said this ? We have 
 never heard any such words ascribed to the Lord." 
 
 But now, assuming that they were the genuine words of the 
 Lord, why should we go about to conjecture that they were 
 founded upon some tradition of the Apostolic age, when the earliest 
 notices of the production of the books of the New Testament 
 assure us that there was a close connection between the writer of 
 this Gospel, and one who, if the Lord ever said them, must have 
 heard these words from His lips ; even St. Peter himself? It seems 
 absurd to supi^ose that there was any trustworthy record of one of 
 the principal sayings of the Lord after His Resurrection which 
 would have perished unless some " scribe," or " editor " had routed 
 it up, and made it serve for a fit conclusion which he thought that 
 it was not presumptuous to append to a Gospel always accounted 
 to embody the teaching of the principal companion of the Lord. 
 
 But it has been objected that these words are unworthy of the 
 Lord, particularly because He here says, "He that believeth not 
 shall be damned." " If it be acknowledged," writes Dean Stanley, 
 
442 THE LAST TWELVE VERSES. 
 
 *' that the passage has a harsh sound, unhke the usual utterances 
 of Him Who came not to condemn but to save, the discoveries of 
 later times have shown, almost beyond doubt, that it is not a part of 
 St. Mark's Gospel, but an addition by another hand; of which the 
 weakness in the external evidence coincides with the internal 
 evidence in proving its later origin." 
 
 Notice here the word " usual." Of course the Lord usually 
 utters words of encouragement and peace, but sometimes, ought 
 we not to say frequently. He utters words of terrible significance in 
 the way of warning, and particularly in respect of this matter of 
 belief in Himself. " He that believeth not is condemned already, 
 because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son 
 of God " (John iii. 18). "If ye believe not that I am He, ye shall 
 die in your sins." " Ye do the deeds of your father." " Ye are of 
 your father the devil." *' He that is of God heareth God's words ; 
 ye therefore hear them not because ye are not of God." " Ye be- 
 lieve not because ye are not of My sheexD " (John viii. 24, 41, 44, 
 47; ix. 26). "No man cometh unto the Father, but by Me." 
 (John xiv. 6.) 
 
 What are these words in Mark, but an echo of those in St. John : 
 " He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life, and he that 
 believeth not the Son shall not see life ? " 
 
 So that this saying, putting in such close juxtaposition Salvation 
 and condemnation — Salvation through belief, and condemnation 
 through unbelief, is in the very style and manner of the Lord Him- 
 self, and is an additional proof that it is the very utterance of the 
 Saviour and Judge. 
 
 And now before noticing the external evidence for, or against, 
 the genuineness of these twelve verses, let us look a little to the 
 internal in the matter of style and phraseology. Here we can do 
 little more than refer the reader to the very exhaustive chapter (the 
 ninth) on these points in Dean Burgon's " Last Twelve Verses of 
 St. Mark's Gospel Vindicated." I never remember to have seen 
 the tables so turned against gainsayers as in this chapter. In case 
 after case of supposed unlikelihood from the employment, or non- 
 employment, of particular words, he shows that what has been 
 cited as against the Markian authorship is in its favour. 
 
 First as regards the style. It is quite true that the style of these 
 vorses does not show the peculiarity of St. Mark in the way of 
 
THE LAST TWELVE VERSES. 443 
 
 graphic delineation, and the noticing of minute circumstantials, but 
 it is to be remembered that St. Mark has another style besides 
 this, which is a compressed narrative style, and Dean Bm-gon takes 
 chap. i. 8-20, as an example of this shorter and more compressed 
 style, and shows how exactly it corresponds with the composition 
 of xvi. 8-20. In both these St. Mark (to adopt the words of Dean 
 Alford) appears as an abridger of previously well-known facts. 
 *' It is a mistake to speak as if ' graphic, detailed description,' 
 invariably characterizes the Second Gospel. St. Mark is quite as 
 remarkable for occasionally exhibiting a considerable transaction in 
 a highly abridged form. Tlie opening of his Gospel is singularly 
 concise and altogether sudden. His account of John's preaching 
 (i. 1-8) is the shortest of all. Very concise is his account of our 
 Saviour's baptism (vv. 9-11). The brevity of his description of our 
 Lord's temptation is even extraordinary " (j). 144). 
 
 With respect to the employment or non-employment of particular 
 words, Dean Burgon examines seriatim no less than twenty-six 
 words or phrases which occur in (or are absent from, as evOaojg 
 and TTciXiv) these twelve verses, and shows, I think conclusively, that, 
 in no case, do they make against, but rather for, the Markian origin. 
 
 It would far exceed the limits I am obliged to assign to this 
 excursus to put down even a resume of the Dean's remarks on these 
 twenty-six instances, and they cannot well be compressed. I will 
 mention one, however, which has, on examination, struck me much, 
 and to which I trust I can add something. It has been noticed 
 that in these twelve verses only is the word QiaaBca used by St. 
 Mark — in verse 11 " had been seen of her," and in verse 14, "them 
 which had seen him ; " whereas in St. Matthew, whose phraseology 
 is very much the same as that of St. Mark, it is used fom* times in 
 the body of his Gospel. But on turning to these instances in 
 St. Matthew, I was surprised to find that not one of them is in 
 the least to the point, because they all occur in places to which 
 there are no corresponding passages in St. Mark. The first is in 
 Matthew vi. 1 : " Take heed that ye do not your alms before men, 
 to he seen of them." This being a part of the Sermon on the Mount 
 is not reproduced in St. Mark. The second is in Matt. xi. 7 : 
 " What went ye out into the wilderness io see ? To this passage 
 there is no corresponding place in St. Mark. The third is Matt. 
 xxii. 11: "When the king came in to see the guests." This 
 parable has no place in St. Mark. And the fourth, xxiii. 5 ; " All 
 
444 THE LAST TWELVE VERSES. 
 
 their works they do to he seen of men." To which also the second 
 Gospel has no corresponding passage. So that to cite the use of 
 OtaaQai in these verses as contrary to the usage of Mark betrays a 
 plain disregard of facts or a most culpable carelessness. 
 
 Again, I will take another case out of these twenty-six exhibiting 
 the extraordinary want of either carefulness or good faith on tlie 
 parfc of objectors. It has been noticed, as casting doubt on the 
 authenticity of these verses, that the adverb iv9e<x)g is nowhere to be 
 found in them, though it is a very favourate one with St. Mark, 
 being used no less than twelve times in chapter i., and six times in 
 chapter v. ; but what can the reader think of the employment of 
 Buch an argument when he learns that this word evOkiog, is not once 
 used from chapter xi. 3 to chapter xiv. 43, i.e., in a space of 154 
 verses ? If the Evangelist writes 154 verses without it, why can he 
 not have written 12 ? 
 
 We now come to the external evidence of Manuscripts, Versions, 
 quotations from Fathers, &c., for the genuineness or authenticity of 
 these verses. It seems a matter embarrassed with some peculiar 
 complications, and I cannot pretend to give more than its leading 
 features. The reader who desires to enter into its mazes is referred 
 to Dean Burgon's volume of 320 pages, all which, however, is in- 
 teresting ; to Dr. Scrivener's shorter and more condensed notice in 
 his Introduction to the " Criticism of the New Testament," 3rd 
 edition, pp. 583-590; to Canon Cook's "Critical Notes" on the 
 authenticity of these verses in the Speaker's Commentary, pp. 301- 
 308. These three are in favour of the authenticity of these verses. 
 And to Dr. Hort's " elaborate and very able counter- j)lea," in " Notes 
 on Select Readings," pp. 29-51, which is against the authorship by 
 the Evangehst. 
 
 The evidence in favour, is that of all the Uncials x^reserved to us, 
 except B. and fe^ (the evidence of B., however, being decidedly against 
 the fact that St. Mark's Gospel ended with xvi. 8). The MSS. then 
 in favour are A., C, D., and of the later Uncials E., F., G., H., K., 
 L, (see below), M., S., U., V., X., r, A, 2, in fact all the Uncials which 
 are available, i.e., which contain the Gospels entire (L, N., 0., P., 
 E., T,, W., Y., containing only fragments of the Gospels). All the 
 cursives contain it, even those which frequently support B., or the 
 Neutral Text, as 33. 
 
 It is supported by the oldest versions, all the Old Lat. available 
 
THE LAST TWELVE VERSES. 445 
 
 (except k.), viz. c, ff, g, 1, n, o, q (a, b, e, and f, all being unavail- 
 able), the Vulgate, the three Syriacs, the Memphitic and Gothic. 
 
 B., though it does not contain these verses, witnesses to the fact 
 that St. Mark does not end here, by leaving a column blank, which 
 it does nowhere else, as well as by leaving the rest of the column, 
 containing verse 8, blank also. So that the scribe of B. must have 
 found in the MS. which he was copying a somewhat long ending 
 which, for some reason, he did not reproduce, or when he wrote 
 i<po(3ovvro yap he must have known that in many copies the Gospel 
 did not so end ; and so he left sufficient space for the well-known 
 conclusion, if someone should wish to conclude the Gospel with it. 
 Codex L. gives two alternative endings, the first introduced by the 
 words : " Something to this effect is also met with : * All that was 
 commanded them they immediately rehearsed unto Jesus and the 
 rest. And after these things, from East even unto West, did Jesus 
 Himself send forth by their means the holy and incorruptible 
 message of eternal salvation.' " After this, this MS. gives the 
 words of our present ending, introduced by " But this also is met 
 with after the words, ' For they were afraid.' " 
 
 As regards the Fathers, it is in all probability quoted by Justin 
 Martyr [a.d. 140] . He is showing that the 110th Psalm, in the 
 words, " He shall send forth the rod of thy power from Jerusalem," 
 was a prophecy of the mighty word which, when the Apostles went 
 forth from Jerusalem, they preached everywhere, ov cctto 'ItpovaaXrm 
 01 aTTocTToXoi avTOv i^eXOovTSQ TzavTa\ov lic))pv^av. Evidently the same 
 as Ueivoi Sk e^eXOovreg tKtjpv^av Travraxov, in Mark xv. 20. The quota- 
 tion of these verses in Irenasus [a.d. 180] is unmistakable. "In 
 the end of his Gospel Mark saith, ' And the Lord Jesus, after He had 
 spoken unto them, was received into heaven, and sitteth at the right 
 hand of God.' " (Adv. Hsr. iii. 10.) 
 
 Such is a short resume of the evidence in its favour. 
 
 It appears that there is only one Greek MS. from which it is 
 absolutely excluded, i.e., i^, which not only does not contain the 
 words, but, unlike B., leaves no space in which they might afterwards 
 be supplied. It is not found in the Old Lat. k., which concludes 
 with the short ending found in L. It is also absent from some old 
 Armenian MSS. 
 
 So that so far as MSS. and Versions are concerned, there is no 
 reason whatsoever to doubt its authenticity. 
 
 But there can be Httle doubt, but that in the time of Eusebius, its 
 
446 THE LAST TWELVE VERSES. 
 
 reception was not general, as in discussing a difficulty arising out of 
 the reconciliation of verse 9 with St. Matthew's account, he sup- 
 poses that an unscrupulous objector, who wished to get rid of the 
 whole passage, " might say that it is not in all the manuscripts of 
 St. Mark's Gospel: " again, "Those MSS. which are most accurate 
 terminate the Gospel with the words 'for they were afraid.'" Again, 
 *' In nearly all the copies of St. Mark's Gospel, the end comes with 
 these words [they were afraid] : but the following words extant 
 rarely in some, but not in all, may be regarded as superfluous, and 
 especially if they should contain a contradiction to the other 
 Evangelists : this one might say, declining controversy," &c. 
 Dean Burgon has shown that this passage has been copied with- 
 out acknowledgment by Jerome, Hesychius of Jerusalem, and 
 Victor of Antioch, the last, however, giving his testimony to the 
 verses in the words, "We, at all events, inasmuch as in very many 
 we have discovered it to exist, have out of accurate copies subjoined 
 also the account of our Lord's ascension (following the words * for 
 they were afraid'), in conformity with the Palestinian Exemplar of 
 St. Mark which exhibits the Gospel Verity ; that is to say, from the 
 words, * Now when Jesus was risen early the first day of the week,' 
 &c., down to 'With signs following. Amen.' " 
 
 It is difficult not to beheve that Eusebius exaggerates when he 
 speaks of so many copies being without the 12 verses, for, if so, how 
 is it that there is so universal a consent of MSS. and Versions now 
 remaining for the genuineness of these verses : how is it that all 
 the Uncials, except in point of fact one, all the Cursives, all the 
 Lectionaries, all the Versions, except one, which have survived are 
 in their favour ? 
 
 And now let us review what I have written, and show its 
 bearing. 
 
 1. The first point of all is the break in the traditional narrative 
 common to both St. Matthew and St. Mark. This is not by any 
 means a want of continuity in a short paragraph, but the snapping 
 of a chain of traditionary matter from which St. Mark has scarcely 
 ever departed (p. 436). 
 
 2. This break or discontinuity is the more extraordinary, because 
 owing to his having mentioned the Lord's promise to meet the 
 Apostles in Galilee, and the reiteration of that promise by the 
 angel, St. Mark seems almost pledged to conclude his Gospel on the 
 Bame lines as Matthew had done (p. 437). 
 
THE LAST TWELVE VERSES. 447 
 
 3. His not having done so, appears decisive against several hypo- 
 theses — as that the leaf containing the last 12 verses was destroyed 
 before it had be-en copied, or that he left his Gospel unfinished, 
 either intentionally or unintentionally (p. 438-9). 
 
 4. If, as all ecclesiastical history agrees in telling us, St. Mark 
 wrote his Gospel from what he heard of the preaching of St. Peter, 
 and that it was published with his approval (and, in fact, if the cir- 
 cumstances were at all what they are related to have been by Euse- 
 bius and others, it could hardly have been published without), then 
 it seems to me that this break in the traditional narrative must have 
 been by the authority of the Apostle himself (p. 440). 
 
 5. This is confirmed by the contents of the concluding part : none 
 but an Apostle would have written them, or declared them to an- 
 other, for if there be one characteristic of the Apostolic writings 
 more than another, it is this, that they conceal or palliate nothing 
 which is to their own discredit. They seem to have been holy and 
 humble men of heart, who would rejoice in their own abasement, 
 provided it was to the furtherance of their Master's Gospel. And, on 
 the other hand, all notices of them in post-Apostolic ages are lauda- 
 tory, excusing or casting a veil over their faults, and not unfre- 
 quently honouring them above what is written. So that it seems 
 impossible to conceive that verses 9-14 could have been written 
 under any influence except that of a present Apostle. I do not 
 think that St. Mark himself, left to himself, would have written 
 them. 
 
 6. The authority, majesty, and simplicity of the Apostolic Com- 
 mission in verses 15 and 16 seem to make it worthy to be accounted 
 the saying of the Lord. The short decisive juxtaposition of faith in 
 its saving and unbelief in its condemnatory effects is in exact accor- 
 dance with many other words of the Lord recorded in St. John, 
 especially John iii. 18, 36 (p. 441). It is also in strict accordance 
 with that manner of the Lord to which I have so frequently directed 
 attention, of laying down very strongly some great princijple un- 
 reservedly without any mention of the necessary reservations or 
 limitations, but leaving them to be inferred. (See notes on chap. xi. 
 Y. 24.) 
 
 The reproduction of this commission can only, as far as I can 
 see, be accounted for by the presence of one who heard it, and on 
 whose memory it was indelibly written, viz., St. Peter. It seems 
 absurd to suppose that one of the most striking sayings of the great 
 
448 THE LAST TWELVE VERSES. 
 
 forty days could be floating loosely by itself down the stream of 
 oral tradition, and picked out by some " scribe " or " editor," who 
 thought it would make a good finish to a truncated Gospel. The 
 idea that such a saying is a forgery or invention, seems to me 
 exceedingly improbable, and attended with overwhelming moral 
 difficulties. 
 
 7. The style is exactly that of parts of St. Mark, where he com- 
 presses the account of the transactions of many months, or even 
 years, into a short space, as for instance Mark i. 1-20 (p. 443). 
 
 The phraseology has been shown, by competent critical scholars, 
 to be, to say the least, as agreeable to the usage of St. Mark as the 
 phraseology of any short extract from any other writer is agreeable 
 to the usage of the writer (p. 443). 
 
 Particularly the argument from the use of the words not elsewhere 
 used by the Evangelist, and the omission of words, such as EvQkujq^ 
 frequently used by him, has been shown to be worthless. I beHeve 
 then that the chain of tradition ending in verse 8, was broken by 
 the authority of St. Peter himself, that the words so derogatory to 
 the character of the Apostles in the matter of their faith were written 
 down at the command of Peter, for no one else would have ventm^ed 
 to do so, and that the Lord's Commission, as here stated, came out 
 of the memory of the Apostle himself. 
 
 But how does the omission in two MSS. and one Version, and the 
 testimony of Eusebius bear upon the authorship ? I believe not 
 at all. 
 
 We are here obliged to fall back upon conjecture, and to me the 
 most likely conjecture seems to be that after the writing of the 
 eighth verse there was some delay in finishing the Gospel, and that 
 consequently copies were made of the unfinished Gospel, which 
 became the parents of others. 
 
 But this does not in the least degree afi'ect the authorship. That 
 anyone should have written these verses except St. Mark, at the 
 dictation of St. Peter, or at least under his strong influence, is to 
 me as incredible as that some unknown person should have in- 
 vented the first words on the Cross, and put them into the Lord's 
 mouth. 
 
 In estimating the force of the testimony of Eusebius, it is quite 
 clear that for some reason he disliked the passage, perhaps because 
 he could not harmonize it with others ; and so in speaking of the 
 number of MSS. which did contain it, he would unconsciously 
 
THE LAST TWELVE VERSES. 449 
 
 exaggerate. And it is to be remembered that lie would do this with 
 no unbelieving predilections — indeed, without any doctrinal bias of 
 any sort, for the passage contains no appearance of the Kisen Lord 
 which is not to be found elsewhere ; and with respect to the Lord's 
 words respecting belief and unbelief, the doctrine of the saving 
 nature of the one, and the damning nature of the other was far too 
 deeply rooted in the mind of the Church to be affected by the loss 
 or retention of one passage. 
 
 It has not been till this nineteenth century that the all-seeing 
 wisdom of the Providence which guided — which rather overruled 
 the mind of the sacred writer to insert this whole passage, has be- 
 come ai)parent, for the popular argument against the Lord's Resur- 
 rection is now the Vision Theory, that the loving hearts of the dis- 
 ciples led them to dwell in thought upon the dead Christ so much, 
 that at last they thought they saw Him, and they went forth and lived 
 lives of poverty and self-denial, and braved deaths of ignominy and 
 torture, and founded the greatest institution which the world has 
 ever seen, all on the strength of this phantom of their imagination. 
 Now the accounts of the Resurrection in all the Gospels give the lie 
 to this, for with one voice they tell us that the Apostles themselves 
 neither expected the Resurrection nor believed in its reality when 
 they were told of it. 
 
 And above all, these closing words of St. Mark teach us that the 
 belief in the Risen Lord was forced upon them. 
 
 So that by the good providence of God their unbelief makes our 
 assurance doubly sure. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 CHISWICK PRESS :— C. WHITTINGHAM AND CO., TOOKS COURT, CHANCKKY LANE. 
 
 G G 
 
CHURCH COMMENTARY ON THE 
 NEW TESTAMENT. 
 
 WITH NOTES, CRITICAL AND PRACTICAL. 
 
 By the Rev. M. F. Sadler, 
 
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OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 THE GOSPELS. 
 
 From The Chuech Quarterly, October, 1883. 
 " It is far the best practical Commentary that we know, being plain- 
 spoken, tearless, and definite, and containing matter very unlike the milk 
 and water which is often served up in [so-called] practical Commentaries. 
 . . . For solid Church teaching it stands unrivalled. Nothing could be 
 better than the notes on the Sermon on the Mount, and the practical lessons 
 drawn with convincing clearness from our Lord's words on the subject of 
 Almsgiving, Prayer, and Fasting. Throughout the whole book the writer 
 is ever on the watch for general principles and teaching applicable to the 
 wants of our own day, which may legitimately be deduced from the Gospel 
 narrative." 
 
 From The Church Times, February 22>rd, 1883. 
 " The question of the origin of the Four Gospels is well treated, and a 
 more succinct account of the real standing of the Evangelists with respect to 
 each other, or to a supposed original document from whicn all copied, could 
 scarcely be found than that contained in these few pages. Some few pages 
 introductory to the critical portion of the volume, and explaining the 
 elements of textual criticism, bring us to the text of the Commentary itself. 
 Throughout the whole of its pages the same evidence of scholarship and 
 critical acumen, which distinguishes all the author's work, is apparent ; 
 while the facult}' of conveying such knowledge to the minds of the least 
 learned in a simple and forcible manner, is abundantly preserved, and will 
 procure lor this work the position of one of the best of popular commentaries. 
 Many of the notes extend beyond the scope generally implied by the term, 
 and become full explanations of doctrinal subjects such as will prove of 
 immense value to the student as well as to the general reader. We may 
 cite as an instance of this exhaustive process the lengthy note on St. Matt. 
 xvi. 18, and those notes on the Parables, which, severally treated in their 
 entirety, present a more intelligible meaning than when explained in sliort 
 disjointed notes. Finally, it remains to mention the fact, which, however, 
 goes without saying, that the tone of the Commentary is thoroughly 
 Catholic, so that the reader will find here a firm defence of the supernatural 
 and divine character of the Gospel story, which never condescends to the 
 tone of much of modern criticism, but remains true to primitive Catholic 
 teaching." 
 
 From Chtjrch Bells, November ISth, 1882. 
 
 " It is written in a clear and sensible style, with a healthy tone ; and its 
 practical portions are devout without being wearisome or ' goody.' " 
 
 From The Church Eeview, November, 1883. 
 
 " A valuable and substantial contribution to the literature of the New 
 Testament is made by Mr. Sadler in the volume now before us. . . . It 
 might be said that every page of the work lights up the grand historical 
 character of the Church as the one supreme authority for the authenticity 
 and interpretation of the books of Scriptm'e," 
 
From The Church Times, December '21st, 1883. 
 
 " We have much pleasure in announcing the issue of ' The Gospel according 
 to St. John, with Notes, Critical and Practical,' by the Rev. M. F. Sadler 
 (George Bell and Sons), a companion volume to his gloss on St. Matthew, 
 and a redemption of the pledge he gave therein to carry on his labours 
 to the remaining Gospels. This is admirably done, being exactly what 
 is wanted for that large and increasing class of readers who need the results 
 of genuine scholarship and sound vigorous thought, but who are repelled by 
 any surface display of erudition, and still more by dryness of treatm.ent, 
 
 The admirable lucidity, which is the distinctive quality of Mr. 
 
 Sadler's style, comes out markedly in his annotations, whether they take 
 the form of pithy clearings up of verbal difficulties or more ehiborate 
 dissertations on impoi'tant points of doctrine ; and he is a good judge in 
 selecting the be^t matter supplied by his precursors, such as Olsliausen, 
 Stier, Godet, and, above all, St. Augustine, whose commentary on St. John 
 is one of that Father's ablest works. This is much less of a mere 
 grammatical inquiry than Professor Westeott's volume in the ' Speaker^s 
 Commentary,' bat it is much more of a theological explanation, and that of a 
 far sounder and deeper school." 
 
 From The Literaey Chtjechman, December 7th, 1883. 
 
 "... Apart from these longer and more continuous glosses, the reader 
 constantly meets with single pithy notes, which by their clear common 
 sense solve a difficulty at once, and satisfy the understanding promptly, 
 so that this is quite the best popular commentary on S. John we know, 
 without implying by that epithet that even advanced students of Biblical 
 literature will not find ample profit in consulting it." 
 
 From The Church Times, October Srcl, 1884. 
 " We gladly chronicle the thix'd instalment of Prebendary Sadler's clear 
 and sensible Commentary on the Gospels, which exactly meets the needs 
 of that large and increasing class, which, without pretending any interest 
 in the more abstruse problems of scholai-ship in connection with the Greek 
 Testament, is desirous of having in its hands a trustworthy guide to the 
 actual meaning of the sacred writers, and some plain statement of the 
 results accepted by that calmer type of scholars who understand the nature 
 of evidence, and are not disposed to admit the validit}' of unsupported con- 
 jecture, however original and brilliant, as proof. .... The notes, as 
 always with Mr. Sadler, are singularly lucid, pithy, and to the point." 
 
 From Church Bells, November 22nd, 1884. 
 " This is a work of a veteran scholar and divine to whom the Church 
 owes much. Prebendary Sadler's \\Titing is characterized by great clear- 
 ness of style, and he has a remarkably persuasive w^ay of putting things. 
 His sermons, as well as his ' Church Doctrine Bible Truth,' &c., have done 
 much towards furnishing the parochial clergy with materials for feeding 
 their flocks. In this commentary he aims at a yet more important object, 
 the instruction of the educated classes. He has carefully compared the 
 original Scriptures with the authorized and revised versions, and has §et 
 himself to meet objections of scientific sceptics, and he has achieved great 
 
 success The volume is full of thoughts and suggestions for preachers 
 
 as well as for general readers." 
 
From The Saturday Eeyiew, Fehnuvnj 21st, 1885. 
 
 *' We can recommend his book to devout and cultivated Churchraoi who 
 want to read the Gospels for instruction as well as for edification." 
 
 From The Church Quarterly, January, 1885. 
 " The Notes are, like all Mr. Sadler's works, straightforward and to the 
 point. The difficulties are not shirked, but are fairly stated and grappled 
 with, so that the volume forms a welcome addition to the literature of the 
 Second Gospel. In reading the notes upon the text, the feature which 
 strikes us most in their intensely practical character. Mr. Sadler has a 
 remarkable faculty of bringing the teaching of the incidents of our Lord's 
 life on earth to bear upon the circumstances of our own time. Even where 
 the points brought out are well worn and familiar, there is a freshness in 
 his manner of treating them which adds greatly to the charm and value of 
 the Commentary." 
 
 From The Chuech Times, July Srd, 1886. 
 
 '• Indeed, one great merit in this commentary and its companion volumes 
 is the frequency with which notes are found, which are capable of being each 
 expanded into useful sermons. They are like very strong essences or tinc- 
 tures, which will bear considerable dilution before being employed medically, 
 though for convenience they are usually kept in the more portable form." 
 
 From The Chuech Quaeteely, July, 1886. 
 
 " VV^e must begin our notice of this volume by offering Prebendary Sadler 
 our hearty congratulations on the completion of his work on the four 
 Gospels. The pi*evious volumes were all reviewed in our columns as they 
 appeared, and we have no hesitation in extending the welcome which we 
 gave to them to their present companion. It is no slight distinction for u 
 writer, after having made his reputation by what is confessedly the best 
 popular work on Church doctrine, to have produced what we hold to be the 
 best popular commentary on the Gospel narrative. There is no other 
 occupying quite the same ground, and we cordially recommend these four 
 volumes, in the now familiar blue binding, as for practical purposes the 
 most useful to the general reader." 
 
 From Church Bells, July 2ncl, 1886. 
 " Mr. Sadlei*'s excellent qualities as a theological writer and expositor 
 are so well known that we need only introduce the reader to this, his last 
 Commentai*y on the Gospels, completing the series, by saying that it 
 presents the same features as its predecessors. It is somewhat longer than 
 any of the other three, a circumstance quite intelligible to those who con- 
 sider how a commentator's view of his responsibility must enlarge as he 
 proceeds with his work. To begin at the beginning, the Introduction is 
 excellent, clear, concise, and full. In short, it says all that need be said on 
 the authorship of the Gospel, and says it well." 
 
 From The Irish Ecclesiastical Gazette, Nov. 6th, 1886. 
 
 '* Originality of treatment, depth of insight, and thorough grasp of the 
 ]iractical side of Divine truth characterize these commentaries of Mr. Sadler 
 on the four Goipels." 
 
THE ACTS OF THE HOLY APOSTLES. 
 
 Frcmi The Guardian, July, 1887. 
 
 " We find, however, in the notes on St. Luke and the Acts the same 
 freshness in thought and style, the same dii*ect and independent considera- 
 tion of the themes brought up on the sacred pages, the same knowledge of 
 what has been said by others, the same masterly use, alike without sub- 
 servience and without neglect, of the great and varied stores which our 
 predecessors have left to us of these days who study the New Testament. 
 The result is that Mr. Sadler's Commentary is decidedly one of the most 
 unhackneyed and original of any we have. It will often be found to give 
 help where others quite fail to do so, and its special value will be to the 
 preacher or teacher Avho has to give oral and practical instruction ; Mr. 
 Sadler's strong iwint being decidedly in pointing the application to con- 
 temporary thought and to life, its trials and its duties, of the divine words 
 with which he has to deal." 
 
 From Church Bells, July Sth, 1887. 
 
 " We can hardly imagine a commentary better adapted than Mr. Sadler's 
 fur giving to the reader an antidote to that unsettling influence which is 
 now going about in the world, making people have a different set of 
 religious opinions every month or so." 
 
 From The Church Quarterly Review. 
 
 " There is vigour and freshness about his writings which makes it 
 a pleasure to read them, while there is certain to be much that is in- 
 structive, and their tone and tendency are equally certain to be sound and 
 edifying. I'his short commentary on the Acts of the Apostles is no 
 exception to the rule, and it well supports the established reputation of its 
 author." 
 
 From The Church Times, August 26th, 1887. 
 
 " Prebendary Sadler's useful commentary on the New Testament is 
 advanced another important stage by the issue of this volume on the Acts 
 of the Apostles, a part of Scripture whose interest and value seems to 
 increase daily, as investigation into the beginnings of the Christian Church 
 are pressed on with fresh vigour, alike by those who Avish to prove 
 Christianity a mere human evolution out of materials lying to hand in 
 the Augustan era, and those who accept it as a divine revelation. Much of 
 the work which has been done of late years in cormexion with the Acts and 
 other Pauline records has been devoted chiefly to the externals of histor}', 
 geography, antiquities, and the like, rather than to the religious teaching 
 Avhich they contain ; and this fact makes a gloss from a theologian like 
 Mr. Sadler all the more welcome." 
 
THE EPISTLES. 
 
 From Church Bells, May 18th, 1888. 
 
 " Mr. Sadler carries on his work with unabated vigour, and now we have 
 some hope of his being able to give us a commentary on the whole of the 
 New Testament. Undoubtedly such a work when completed will be of 
 great value, as giving a well-thought-out exposition of the whole of the 
 sources from which we derive the history of the founding, as well as the 
 doctrines, of the Christian Church, and this, too, an exposition which sup- 
 plies, not the mere personal opinions of its writer, although it is everywhere 
 tinged by his individuality, but the historical meaning of the teaching of 
 individual writers and of the Church at large. The ' introduction ' to the 
 present volume is excellent, giving all the requisite information without 
 any unnecessary waste of words." 
 
 From The Church Times, Ju7ie, 1888. 
 
 " There are three excursuses at the end of the volume, on Justification, 
 on Election, and on the Christology of St. Paul, all carefully written, but 
 with most pains bestowed upon the second. We do not know a better book 
 than this Commentary to put into the hands of an intelligent Evangelical 
 who is beginning to doubt the soundness of the system he has heretofore 
 accepted, and is striving to find his way out and up into a higher and 
 clearer atmosphere." 
 
 From The Church Quarterly Reyiew. 
 
 "We hail with pleasure this addition to the Commentary on the New 
 
 Testament We think this volume will certainly sustain the high 
 
 position which Mr. Sadler has gained as a practical interpreter of Holy 
 Scripture." 
 
 From The Irish Ecclesiastical G-azette, April ISth, 1890. 
 
 " Incomparably the best Commentary on the New Testament extant. " 
 
 From The Banner, May 23rd, 1890. 
 
 " Ordinary readers could hardly have a better exposition of the sacred 
 books." 
 
 From The Literary Churchman, February 6th, 1891. 
 
 " This volume will be found to present all the characteristic excellences 
 of Mr. Sadler's method ; and it would be hard, indeed, to find any points of 
 objection to these terse, thoughtful, Church-like notco." 
 
Uniform unth the Church Comvientarf/ . 
 Second edition. Groivn 8vOj 6s. 
 
 SERMON OUTLINES 
 
 FOR THE CLERGY AND LAY-PREACHERS. 
 
 321 Outlines arranged according to the 
 Church's Year. 
 
 This book, a book of suggestions rather than of mere divi- 
 sions, or skeletons as they were formerly called, has been 
 composed with a view to meeting the objection heard on all 
 sides that sermons at the present day are very deficient in 
 setting forth Christian doctrines. 
 
 From The Guardian, April 12th, 1893. 
 " It is easy to prophesy a considerable sale for this volume. , . . We 
 meet here all the welJ-known characteristics of his writings. The style is 
 straightforward and vigorous. There is never any doubt about his meaning. 
 His remarks are always pointed, and the arrangement of his material is 
 excellent." 
 
 From The Church Times, February 17th, 1893. 
 '•'This volume differs in three respects from most similar volumes: (1) 
 It aims, primarily, at supplying sketches of sermons on Christian Doctrine, 
 couched in clear, definite language. (2) It is a book of ' suggestions, rather 
 than of mere divisiims or skeletons.' (3) It includes lists of texts and 
 subjects for courses of Lenten and other sermons. The well-earned reputa- 
 tion of its author will be a sufficient guarantee for the soundness and 
 usefulness of the work." 
 
 From Church Bells, December 16th, 1892. 
 
 " They are adequate, and they are helpful ; they set forth the elementary 
 teaching of the Church's seasons, the redemption, salvation, and sanetifica- 
 tion of mankind. Each Sunday of each Church season has several appro- 
 priate texts and heads of discourses, and these are rich in wise suggestions 
 as to helpful teaching. There is much simplicity and strong meat for 
 learners. Prayer-book lines are made the rule throughout — the best rule 
 of all." 
 
 From The Rock, November Uh, 1892. 
 
 *' We should think that it would be difficult to find anywhere such a real 
 help for preachers as these outlines affijrd. . . . Such depth of spiritual 
 teaching is seldom to be found." 
 
 From The Irish Ecclesiastical Gazette, Nov. IWi, 1892. 
 " This should be among the most popular and useful of Prebendary 
 Sadler's wi'itings." 
 
 From The Clergyman's Magazine, December, 1892. 
 " These outlines are both Evangelical and doctrinal. They occupy 
 exactly one page of the book^ and therefore afford ample opportunity for 
 the preacher's own powers of expansion." 
 
WORKS BY THE REV. M. F. SADLER, 
 
 Rector of Honiton and Prebendary of Wells. 
 
 49 th Thoiisand. 
 CHURCH DOCTRINE—BIBLE TRUTH. Price Zs. ^d. 
 
 "Mr. Sadler takes Chnrch Doctrine, specifically so called, subject by subject, and 
 elaborately shows its specially marked Scripturaluess. The objective nature of the faith, 
 the Athanasian Creed, the Baptismal Services, the Holy Eucharist, Absolution and the 
 Priesthood, Church Government and Confirmation, are some of the more prominent suh- 
 jects treated. And Mr. Sadler handles each with a marked degree of sound sense, and 
 with a thorough mastery of his subject." — Guardian. 
 
 Thirteenth Edition, completing Forty-sixth ITiousand. 
 THE CHURCH TEACHER'S MANUAL OF CHRISTIAN IN- 
 STRUCTION. Being the Church Catechism expanded and explained 
 in Question and Answer, for the Use of Clergymen, Parents, and 
 Teachers. Price 2s. 6d. 
 
 " Far the best book of the kind we have ever seen." — Literary Churchman. 
 
 Confirmation : An Extract from the " Church Teacher's Manual." 10th 
 Thousand. Price \d. 
 
 Wth Thousand. 
 
 THE ONE OFFERING : a Treatise on the Sacrificial Nature of the 
 Eucharist. Price 2.9. ^d. 
 
 "A treatise of singular clearness and force, which gives us what we did not really 
 possess till it appeared." — Church Times. 
 
 Second Edition, Revised. 
 JUSTIFICATION OF LIFE: its Nature, Antecedents, and Results. 
 
 Price 4s. 6d. 
 
 12th Edition. 
 THE SECOND ADAM and THE NEW BIRTH ; or, The Doctrine of 
 Baptism as contained in Holy Scripture. Price 4s. 6d. 
 
 " The most striking peculiarity of this useiul little work is that its author argues almo.st 
 exclusively from the Bible. We commend it most earnestly to Clergy and laity, as con- 
 taining in a small compass, and at a trifling cost, a body of sound and Scriptural doctrine 
 respecting the New Birth, which cannot be too widely circulated." — Guardian. 
 
 1th Edition. 
 THE SACRAMENT OF RESPONSIBILITY; or, Testimony of the 
 Scripture to the Teaching of the Church on Holy Baptism. Price 2s. (id. 
 Cheap Edition. 9th Thousand. Price 6d. 
 
 Il4th Thousand. 
 THE COMMUNICANT'S MANUAL ; being a Book of Self- Examina- 
 tion, Prayer, Praise, and Thanksgiving. 32mo. Price Is. 6d. 
 Cheap Edition for Distribution. Price 8d. 
 A Larger Edition. Red rubrics. Fcnp. Svo. Price 2s. 6d. 
 
 SFiRMONS. Plain Speaking on Deep Truths. 8th Edition. Price 6s. 
 Abundant Life, and other Sermons. 2nd Edition. Price ^js. 
 
 C. p. •2.90.-0000. 
 
BS2585 .S126 
 
 The Gospel according to St. Mark : with 
 
 Princeton Theological Semlnary-Speer Library 
 
 1 1012 00055 9254 
 
 DATE DUE 
 
 DEMCO 38-297