■lilii 
 
 
tihvavy of trKe trheolo^ical ^minavy 
 
 PRINCETON • NEW JERSEY 
 PRESENTED BY 
 
 John Stuart Conning, D.D, 
 
 BM 620 .E6 1920 c.l j 
 
 Enelow, H. G. 1877-1934. ! 
 A Jewish view of Jesus 
 
A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 
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 ATLANTA • SAN FRANCISCO 
 
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 TORONTO 
 
A JEWISH VIE 
 OF JESUS 
 
 BY 
 
 H. G. ENELOW 
 
 THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 
 1920 
 
 All rights reserved 
 
COPTEIGHT, 1920. 
 
 BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
 
 Set up and electrotyped. Published May, 1920. 
 
TO 
 MRS. HENRY BURNETT 
 
 WITH GRATEFUL RECOLLECTION 
 
 OF THE 
 
 MONDAY MORNING BIBLE CLASS 
 
 IN KENTUCKY 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I The Jewish Interest of Jesus . i 
 II The Jewish Heritage of Jesus . ii 
 
 III The Jewish Environment of Jesus 28 
 
 IV The Jewish Characteristics of 
 
 Jesus 44 
 
 V The Jewish Element in the 
 
 Teachings of Jesus .... 63 
 
 VI Jesus and His Contemporaries . . 84 
 
 VII The Jewish Messiah Idea and 
 
 Jesus 106 
 
 VIII The Jews and the Death of Jesus 133 
 
 IX Jesus AND Jewish History . . .151 
 
 X The Modern Jewish Attitude to 
 
 Jesus 167 
 
A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 THE JEWISH INTEREST OF JESUS 
 
 A STUDY of the relation of Jesus to the 
 Jews, from the Jewish point of view, is still 
 a somewhat hazardous undertaking, exciting 
 suspicion or fear of one kind or another. 
 Orthodox Christians will suspect an element 
 of Irreverence in a Jew's treatment of Jesus. 
 The old-fashioned Jew, on the other hand, 
 may object altogether to such a discussion, 
 as giving undue attention to a forbidden sub- 
 ject. Consideration of Jesus on the part of 
 a Jew is regarded as a sign of weakness, if 
 not disloyalty, as a leaning in the wrong di- 
 rection, particularly if it shows symptoms of 
 admiration for Jesus. 
 
 Suspicion and prejudice, however, should 
 not keep us aloof from a subject, which, as 
 
2 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 a matter of fact, is of vital interest to the 
 modern Jew. Until the nineteenth century, 
 Jews, for various reasons, maintained silence 
 in regard to Jesus. One reason, no doubt, 
 was that it was not safe for them to discuss 
 him. Jews were denied political rights in the 
 Western world, and, by implication, the priv- 
 ilege of free comment on the dominant re- 
 ligion and its chief hero. Whenever they 
 broke the rule of silence — even when forced 
 into religious disputations — they had to pay 
 a heavy penalty. 
 
 A unique exception was " The Fortifica- 
 tion of Faith," a Hebrew work issued in the 
 year 1593 by Isaac of Troki, a Karaite. It 
 contains a defense of Judaism and a criticism 
 of Christian dogmas, and it resulted from the 
 author's friendly intercourse with Christians 
 of all schools, trinitarians as well as uni- 
 tarians, the latter having just then found 
 shelter in Poland from the persecutions of 
 other countries. A Latin translation of this 
 
THE JEWISH INTEREST OF JESUS 3 
 
 work, published by a German scholar in 1 68 1 , 
 under the title of " Satan's Fiery Arrows," 
 introduced It to the Christian world and 
 made it popular with eighteenth-century skep- 
 tics, Voltaire remarking that It contained 
 all the difficulties which latter-day unbeliev- 
 ers had propagated. 
 
 This book, however, sprang from un- 
 usually favorable circumstances. As a rule, 
 Jews were silent on the subject of Jesus. 
 Besides, as long as they lived apart, it was 
 of no particular moment whether they had 
 any clear idea of Jesus, or no. 
 
 Nowadays the situation is different. The 
 Jews are free, civilly as well as intellectually. 
 They live in close contact with the rest of the 
 world; they read the same books, they hear 
 the same lectures, they breathe the same at- 
 mosphere. It is, therefore, impossible for 
 them to Ignore a subject which is part of the 
 very fabric of the life round about them. 
 Moreover, in venturing to express his views 
 
4 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 on this subject, the Jew has no more serious 
 obstacle to face than custom or prejudice. 
 
 There are many reasons why a Jew should 
 be interested in Jesus. 
 
 First of all, Jesus has become the most 
 popular, the most studied, the most influen- 
 tial figure in the religious history of man- 
 kind. This alone should be enough to com- 
 pel the Jew's attention. 
 
 The Jew is a religious being. All Jewish 
 history is the result of religious passion and 
 purpose, and, whatever is said to the con- 
 trary, the continuity of the Jew is bound up 
 with the retention of his religion. Wipe 
 out the rehgious element from the equation 
 of his hfe, and the Jew would cease automat- 
 ically. It is just because the Jew is so 
 wholly bound up with his religion, that he 
 can tolerate, or digest, all the indifference 
 and atheism found in his midst. They are 
 a foreign substance not strong enough to af- 
 fect the general character and endurance of 
 
THE JEWISH INTEREST OF JESUS 5 
 
 his people. Had the Jewish religion been 
 obliterated, for example, when Christianity 
 arose, there would be no Jews to-day — no 
 Jews of any kind. Religion belongs to the 
 Jewish substance; all the rest Is accident. 
 
 As a religious being, however, the Jew 
 cannot help taking an interest in the man who 
 above all others has played a part in religious 
 history — at least In so far as the latter has 
 touched the Western world. There may be 
 more Mohametans and Hindus in the world 
 than Christians and Jews. But no Mo- 
 hametan prophet nor Hindu saint has exer- 
 cised the same sway on the heart and imag- 
 ination of the world as Jesus. Whether we 
 like it or no, Jesus has fascinated mankind. 
 Even in circles which have discarded Chris- 
 tian dogmas and creeds, Jesus has preserved 
 his influence. Indeed, in many cases admira- 
 tion for Jesus has grown In proportion to the 
 abandonment of the dogmas of traditional 
 Christianity. 
 
6 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 This is illustrated by the large number of 
 lives of Jesus that have appeared in recent 
 years. In the second half of the nineteenth 
 century, we know, there were many attacks 
 upon traditional religion. Criticism of every 
 kind, historical and philosophical, was di- 
 rected against it. Many thought that the 
 fortress of faith could not possibly endure. 
 One thing, however, is remarkable. Amid 
 all these assaults, the world kept on study- 
 ing Jesus, and regarding him from every 
 conceivable angle. New biographies of 
 Jesus were produced from most diverse 
 points of view: from the physiological, the 
 psychological, and the pathological point of 
 view, as well as from the orthodox. When, 
 several years ago, the theory was revived 
 that Jesus never existed — that he was a 
 myth — it only served as an incentive to the 
 production of new biographies of Jesus. 
 
 The creation of this literature is not con- 
 fined to specialists or theologians. Jesus 
 
THE JEWISH INTEREST OF JESUS 7 
 
 has continued to occupy the pen of literary 
 authors, who have approached him from the 
 human end, rather than as theological stu- 
 dents. Recently, we have been given, for 
 Instance, Mary Austin's book on Jesus, 
 George Moore's novel, "The Brook Ker- 
 Ith," Mr. Masefield's poem, " Good Friday," 
 and Mr. Shaw's brilliant dissertation In his 
 Preface to " Androcles and the Lion." 
 These Instances show how fascinating and 
 fecund a theme the life of Jesus offers to 
 modern students and poets. 
 
 Now, it would be foolish for any one to 
 affirm that all such writings are of no In- 
 terest to the Jew. They must be of supreme 
 interest, if the Jew cares at all for his spirit- 
 ual Integrity and honor, and for the general 
 determination of religious truth. It Is im- 
 possible for any writer to discuss Jesus, with- 
 out touching upon the Jew and the Jew's 
 religion, and upon the relation of Jesus to 
 the Jews. When Mr. Wells, for Instance, 
 
8 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 in " Mr. Brltling Sees it Through," avers 
 that the real God of the modern world is 
 Christ, and that God the Creator, whom 
 Mr. Wells finds uncongenial, is a survival 
 of ^' the Jew Gbd," whom Christianity has 
 rejected, he makes affirmations which the 
 Jewish reader cannot ignore, and which even 
 an intelligent Christian should not leave un- 
 challenged. Similarly, Mr. Shaw's facile 
 differentiation between Jesus and the Jews, 
 with its conventional disparagement of the 
 Jews, is of import to the Jewish reader. 
 Even such brilliant men as Mr. Shaw and 
 Mr. Moore, unfortunately, do not know 
 enough about the Jews and the Jewish re- 
 ligion, either of the age of Jesus or of any 
 other age, to be able to speak of them ac- 
 curately. That their assertions perpetuate 
 error in Christian minds is bad enough; that 
 they make confusion worse confounded for 
 uninformed Jewish readers, is worse. 
 
 I have spoken of the interest that the 
 
THE JEWISH INTEREST OF JESUS 9 
 
 Jew, as a religious being, must take in Jesus. 
 Another reason, however, is that Jesus was 
 a Jew. No sensible Jew can be indifferent 
 to the fact that a Jew should have had such 
 a tremendous part in the religious education 
 and direction of the human race. 
 
 We often speak of the religious mission 
 of the Jewish people. We speak of the 
 wonderful influence of Moses, of the Proph- 
 ets, not only upon Israel, but upon the world 
 at large. How can we ignore the work of 
 Jesus? It matters not, for the moment, 
 whether we consider him original or no, 
 right or wrong; the fact of his influence 
 cannot be blinked, nor his connection with 
 the Jewish people. " The origins of Chris- 
 tianity," says Renan, " are in Judaism: they 
 have to be set at least seven hundred and 
 fifty years before Jesus. In that early age 
 there appeared the great prophets, creators 
 of an entirely new idea in rehgion." Hence, 
 in order to explain the rise of Christianity, 
 
lo A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 Renan wrote a history of the Jewish people. 
 Similarly, no intelligent Jew can fail to be 
 interested in the one Jew whose name is so 
 intimately linked with the origin of Chris- 
 tianity and the evolution of the rehgious 
 life of mankind. 
 
 Nor is the actual attitude of modern Jews 
 to Jesus of any less importance. Historical 
 considerations apart, there is the practical 
 question. What do modern Jews think of 
 Jesus? It is a query we cannot put aside. 
 We cannot shut ourselves up in the silence 
 of past centuries. Be our answer what it 
 may, we should try to frame one. 
 
THE JEWISH HERITAGE OF JESUS 
 
 In her book on Jesus, Mary Austin justly 
 emphasizes the fact that Jesus was a Jew. 
 Yet, recent years have witnessed attempts to 
 set Jesus apart from the Jewish people. 
 
 This practice originated with people an- 
 tagonistic to the Jew and so convinced of 
 the inferiority of his race and religion, as 
 to find it hard to treat Jesus as a Jew. Thus, 
 Houston Stewart Chamberlain, a fanatic on 
 raciaHsm, and yet an admirer of Jesus, in his 
 work on " The Foundations of the Nine- 
 teenth Century," sought to show that Jesus, 
 being a Galilean, was not a Semite at all, 
 but an Aryan, as Galilee contained a con- 
 siderable Aryan element. On the other 
 hand, others more interested in religion than 
 in race, but equally loath to leave Jesus to 
 II 
 
12 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 the Jews, have sought to demonstrate that 
 though Jesus may have sprung from the 
 Jews, in religion he differed from them to- 
 tally, — one might say miraculously. That 
 neither of these views is based on the truth, 
 any fair reader of the story of Jesus must 
 realize. 
 
 No matter how long after the death of 
 Jesus the story of his life, as we have it, 
 was written, and what guided its authors, 
 one thing stands out clearly, namely, that not 
 only did Jesus belong to the Jews in every 
 way, but also that to the very last he was 
 fully conscious of that kinship and of what it 
 implied. 
 
 In theological writings of the past century, 
 much has been made of the question of the 
 self-consciousness of Jesus. There has been 
 all manner of debate as to what Jesus 
 thought of himself and his mission. In 
 other words, a real effort has been made 
 to penetrate beyond the portrayal of Jesus 
 
THE JEWISH HERITAGE OF JESUS 13 
 
 by the creeds and the churches to his own 
 conception of himself and his task. 
 
 Now, If anything seems to be clear about 
 the self-consciousness of Jesus, as far as we 
 can gather from the gospels. It is this : that 
 he was conscious of his Jewish derivation, 
 as well as of his debt to his Jewish heritage 
 and his duty to the Jewish people. His 
 noblest teachings were Illustrated by citations 
 from the Jewish Scriptures, his most solemn 
 admonitions were addressed to the Jewish 
 people, and his most tender words were 
 spoken concerning the Jewish people. " Oh, 
 Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that klllest the 
 prophets and stonest them which are sent 
 unto thee, how often would I have gathered 
 thy children together!" Jesus would not 
 have been Jesus if he had not loved first 
 and last the people from which he sprang 
 and from whose heart his life-blood was 
 drawn — if he had not been gratefully con- 
 scious of his heritage. 
 
14 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 Unfortunately, this fact has been obscured 
 by the latter-day quarrel about the originality 
 of Jesus. This combat was the natural off- 
 spring of the historical or comparative 
 method of study so dear to the modern mind. 
 Jesus, it is argued by some, was not original 
 at all; his teachings were borrowed from 
 Hindu and Egyptian sources. The chief 
 controversy, however, has turned about Ju- 
 daism. Jewish writers have tried to prove 
 that everything taught by Jesus may be 
 found in Jewish literature, and that there- 
 fore he could not be called original; while 
 Christians have deemed it necessary to de- 
 fend Jesus against the charge of borrowing 
 or reproducing from Jewish sources, lest his 
 originality be impugned. 
 
 This controversy may seem momentous to 
 the learned disputants. But it has very little 
 to do with the character of Jesus or the 
 worth of his work, and one is almost sure 
 that he himself would have cared very little 
 
THE JEWISH HERITAGE OF JESUS 15 
 
 about It. It springs from a peculiar con- 
 ception as to what really constitutes origin- 
 ality, particularly in the spiritual and ethical 
 sphere, which was preeminently the sphere of 
 Jesus' life and work. 
 
 What is originality? We could do no bet- 
 ter than accept a definition offered by Haz- 
 litt. " Genius or originality," he says, " is 
 for the most part some strong quality in the 
 mind, answering to and bringing out some 
 new and striking quality in nature." " This," 
 he adds, " is the test and triumph of or- 
 iginality, not to show us what has never been, 
 and what we may therefore very easily never 
 have dreamt of, but to point out to us what 
 is before our eyes and under our feet, though 
 we have had no suspicion of its existence, 
 for want of sufficient strength of intuition, 
 of determined grasp of mind, to seize and 
 retain it." 
 
 This Is the true nature of originality, par- 
 ticularly in the domain of spiritual percep- 
 
i6 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 tion and instruction. That is why the Jew- 
 ish Prophets never pretended to teach any- 
 thing new. What they taught, they felt, 
 was but a renewal, a fresh proclamation or 
 revelation, of what had been revealed and 
 proclaimed long ago. " The Lord, the God 
 of your fathers," Moses was to say to Israel, 
 '' the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, 
 and the God of Jacob, hath sent me unto you ; 
 this is My name for ever, and this is My 
 memorial unto all generations." The pro- 
 phetic successors of Moses never deviated 
 from his example of addressing their people 
 in the name of the God and the faith of the 
 fathers. " When Israel was a child," we 
 read in Hosea, 
 
 " When Israel was a child, then I loved him, 
 And out of Egypt I called My son. 
 The more they called them, the more they went 
 
 from them; 
 They sacrificed unto the Baalim, 
 And offered to graven images. 
 And I, I taught Ephraim to walk, 
 
THE JEWISH HERITAGE OF JESUS 17 
 
 Taking them by their arms; 
 
 But they knew not that I healed them. 
 
 I drew them with cords of a man 
 
 With bands of love. 
 
 How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? 
 
 How shall I surrender thee, Israel? " 
 
 In Jeremiah, the Lord says: 
 
 ** I remember for thee the affection of thy youth. 
 The love of thine espousals; 
 
 How thou wentest after Me in the wilderness, 
 In a land that was not sown." 
 
 And in Malachi we read: 
 
 ** From the days of your fathers ye have turned aside 
 From Mine ordinances, and have not kept them. 
 Return unto Me, and I will return unto you, 
 Saith the Lord of hosts." 
 
 In his own way Jesus did what the Proph- 
 ets had done : he gave a fresh interpretation 
 of the laws governing the spiritual life, a 
 fresh message concerning the meaning and 
 the purpose of religion, a new illumination 
 of the sense and the object of the old law 
 
i8 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 and of the old prophetic utterances. Here 
 lay his genius and originality. Moreover, 
 he sought to teach his hearers and disciples 
 the need of gaining, each for himself, such 
 a fresh and personal appreciation of religion. 
 Even in this very important matter Jesus did 
 not profess to say anything that had never 
 been said before: he could not have pro- 
 fessed it in view of what he had read in 
 Jeremiah and the Psalms. But he did try 
 to teach these essential truths and central 
 beauties of the religious life in his own way, 
 and through his own experience, and by 
 means of his own personal life. And wher- 
 ever we find true personality, we have orig- 
 inality. Supreme personality is greatest or- 
 iginality. 
 
 To realize this, however, does not mean 
 to lessen the value to Jesus of his Jewish 
 spiritual heritage. Mary Austin is certainly 
 right when she Insists that Jesus was a Jew 
 
THE JEWISH HERITAGE OF JESUS 19 
 
 born and bred, and that " always, to his 
 death, Judaism was there about the roots 
 of his Hfe." Indeed, in order to appreciate 
 his ideal and his work fully, we must con- 
 sider what ideals and thoughts he inherited 
 from the Jewish people that had produced 
 him. 
 
 One impression we cannot help gaining of 
 Jesus, is that he was not a bookish man. His 
 denunciation of the scribes, the scholars of 
 the time, we need hardly take Hterally. He 
 probably was not as bitter against the scribes 
 as sometimes he is made out to be, though 
 undoubtedly he detested the pedants and the 
 hypocrites among them. None the less, we 
 may be sure that his habits were not those 
 of the professional scholar. They were 
 those of the man of the people, rather than 
 the studious recluse, of the lover of the out 
 of doors, rather than of the study. Yet, 
 to learn what sort of spiritual and intellect- 
 ual heritage Jesus got from his people, there 
 
20 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 Is but one thing for us to do, namely, con- 
 sider the Jewish literature that existed at 
 the time. For, In that literature are stored 
 up the Ideas that helped mold his mind, 
 and through It we get an Idea of the mental 
 and spiritual atmosphere that surrounded 
 him. 
 
 Now, the first and foremost part of his 
 heritage was the Jewish Bible. We must 
 recall, however, that the Bible was not as 
 ancient a book then as it Is now. It was 
 not as antique, as remote, as detached a 
 book. It was still a recent creation or com- 
 pilation. Parts of It were less than two 
 hundred years old; and as a final compilation 
 It was even younger. It had not become 
 as petrified a book as to many people It Is 
 to-day. To Jesus, no doubt. It was a live 
 book. He had his preferences in it (as. 
 Indeed, had every Intelligent Jew of his day 
 and of every other day) and he read In It, 
 and chose from It, according to his prefer- 
 
THE JEWISH HERITAGE OF JESUS 21 
 
 ences, and according to what appealed most 
 to his ethical sense and spiritual nature. We 
 have no reason to think that he discarded 
 the Pentateuch; on some important occasions 
 he quoted from it, and he took from it his 
 famous summary of the substance of religion. 
 But he was particularly fond of certain por- 
 tions of the Prophets and of the Psalms, 
 probably because in them he found closest 
 kinship to his own spirit. In this regard, as 
 I have said, he did what spiritual and en- 
 lightened Jews have done more or less in 
 all ages. The Jews have not been bibliola- 
 ters; and the individual Jew, despite the can- 
 onization of the Bible, has always exercised 
 the privilege of choice and preference in the 
 Bible. 
 
 But the Bible was not the whole of the 
 Jewish heritage of Jesus. One still meets 
 with people that think of the Bible as the 
 product of a single period. They do not 
 realize that the Bible was the product of 
 
22 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 many centuries of Jewish spiritual activity 
 and creation, and that in the Bible itself 
 nothing is so clear as the process of spiritual 
 development — of the growth, the evolution 
 of religious and ethical ideas. Nor do they 
 realize that when the Bible was closed, it 
 meant, indeed, the close of a period in Jewish 
 life and thought, but by no means the cessa- 
 tion of the spiritual development of the Jew- 
 ish people. None the less, there is no doubt 
 that that spiritual development went on, just 
 as vigorously and just as vitally as before 
 the Bible had been compiled. And of this 
 spiritual activity we find records in a very 
 important part of Jewish literature : first, in 
 what is known as the Apocrypha and the 
 Pseudo-Epigrapha, and secondly, in such 
 works as those of the Jewish philosopher 
 Philo, who lived in Alexandria during the 
 very century of Jesus. 
 
 I shall not undertake to say that Jesus 
 directly or indirectly was acquainted with 
 
THE JEWISH HERITAGE OF JESUS 23 
 
 any of those works. But this may be said 
 and ought not to be lost sight of: It Is In 
 those works that we find a picture of the 
 development of Jewish thought In the cen- 
 turies between the close of the Jewish Bible 
 and the birth of Jesus, and whether or no 
 Jesus himself had any actual contact with 
 them, they formed part of the thought-life 
 Into which he was born, part of the spiritual 
 atmosphere that he breathed. As it would 
 be Impossible to understand him fully with- 
 out knowledge of the Jewish Bible, so it is 
 Impossible to understand him fully — or 
 shall I say to explain him fully? — without 
 familiarity with those other parts of Jewish 
 literature and without proper appreciation 
 of their content. 
 
 And what do those parts of Jewish litera- 
 ture teach us? 
 
 First, that the centuries between the close 
 of the Old Testament and Jesus were not 
 
24 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 dead centuries, but full of life and activity, 
 producing a rich and varied literature of 
 their own. 
 
 Secondly, that no less than previous pe- 
 riods they were a period of religious develop- 
 ment for the Jewish people : that the old re- 
 ligious ideas were not carried along merely 
 as the dead luggage of the past, but that 
 they were interpreted and amplified accord- 
 ing to the deeper insight and fuller knowl- 
 edge of the times. 
 
 Thirdly, that certain religious ideas, found 
 in the Old Testament not at all, or merely 
 in embryo, first grew up during that period, 
 or found their full and conscious expression: 
 as, for example, the idea of immortality. 
 
 And, finally, we are taught by this litera- 
 ture that during this period, as at all other 
 times, there was no spiritual uniformity in 
 Israel, there being room and recognition 
 within its household for men of different 
 spiritual temperaments and religious views. 
 
THE JEWISH HERITAGE OF JESUS 25 
 
 The essentials were the same; in particulars, 
 they differed. 
 
 It is necessary to consider this part of 
 the Jewish heritage of Jesus in order to 
 understand aright his relation to it. He 
 was not hostile in his attitude to it. He was 
 very little of a controversialist. I doubt 
 whether he willingly would have said a word 
 against a single law, except insofar as it was 
 used to thwart rather than to advance true 
 religion. " If ye had known what this mean- 
 eth, ' I desire mercy and not sacrifice,' ye 
 would not have condemned the guiltless." 
 It was not his habit to go about carping at 
 the commandments, or their abuses. He 
 did not bother much about the tares in the 
 garden of life. His concern was for the 
 wheat, and his eye on the final harvest, and 
 how to help it grow. 
 
 " The kingdom of heaven," he taught, " is likened 
 unto a man that sowed good seed in his field: but 
 while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares 
 also among the wheat, and went away. But when 
 
26 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 the blade sprang up, and brought forth fruit, then 
 appeared the tares also. And the servants of the 
 householder came and said unto him, Sir, didst thou 
 not sow good seed in thy field? whence then hath 
 it tares? And he said unto them. An enemy hath 
 done this. And the servants say unto him. Wilt 
 thou then that we go and gather them up ? But he 
 saith. Nay; lest haply while ye gather up the tares, 
 ye root up the wheat with them. Let both grow 
 together until the harvest: and in the time of the 
 harvest I will say to the reapers. Gather up first 
 the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them: 
 but gather the wheat into my bam." {Matt. 13, 
 24-30) 
 
 And therein lay the originality of Jesus. 
 He made religion a personal matter. Re- 
 ligion and personality with him became one. 
 Religion, he said, could be something real 
 only when expressed through a person. One 
 cannot know God save one knows man, or, 
 as he was fond of putting it, with the thought 
 of the fatherly relation between man and 
 God ever In his mind, one cannot know the 
 Father save one knows the Son. " I do 
 
THE JEWISH HERITAGE OF JESUS 27 
 
 nothing of myself, but as the Father taught 
 me.'' Moreover, a similar personal experi- 
 ence and expression of Religion he asked 
 of others. " He that hath ears, let him 
 hear!" His message was not, Make me, 
 or my words, the means of your religion. It 
 was. Let religion be to you and with you 
 what it is to me and with me, a means of 
 personal Hfe, an expression of personal ex- 
 perience, a token of personal relationship 
 with God, of filial self-identification with 
 God. " The kingdom of Heaven," he said, 
 according to the Sayings of Jesus, discovered 
 recently, " is within you, and whosoever him- 
 self shall know shall find it; and having found 
 ye shall know yourselves, that sons and 
 daughters are ye of the Father Almighty, and 
 ye shall know that ye are in His precincts, 
 and ye are the city." 
 
 It is thus that Jesus through his own per- 
 sonality interpreted, transmitted, and trans- 
 fused his Jewish heritage. 
 
THE JEWISH ENVIRONMENT OF 
 JESUS 
 
 " If you would understand the poet," 
 Goethe has said, *' go to the poet's coun- 
 try." His counsel has been seconded by the 
 best modern criticism and psychology. No 
 lesson of science is accepted more generally 
 than this: that two main factors enter into 
 the making of the individual, namely, hered- 
 ity and environment. Of course, both to- 
 gether do not explain completely any real 
 personality. Wherever we find true person- 
 ality, we find something added to the sum 
 total, to the resultant, of both heredity and 
 environment. It is this addition that often 
 forms the unique personality — a source of 
 wonder and an object of admiration. Abra- 
 ham Lincoln, for example, was something 
 28 
 
JEWISH ENVIRONMENT OF JESUS 29 
 
 more than the product of antecedent and sur- 
 rounding forces. None the less, heredity 
 and environment are surely active in the crea- 
 tion of even the most independent and un- 
 explainable individuals, though their work- 
 ing may not always be patent. To under- 
 stand the character and the work of even the 
 greatest, most unique, men we must take 
 these factors into account. 
 
 We cannot do otherwise in the case of 
 Jesus. We have seen how essential an ap- 
 preciation of his Jewish heritage is to an 
 understanding of his personality and his doc- 
 trine. Who can hope to understand Jesus 
 without a proper estimate of those spiritual 
 treasures of the Jewish people that Jesus 
 loved, of those spiritual fountains from 
 which he drank from beginning to end? 
 Nor can one possibly hope to grasp the mean- 
 ing of Jesus's work and the secret of his per- 
 sonality — with its fusion of diverse quali- 
 ties, tenderness and passion, mildness and 
 
30 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 vehemence, eloquence and eluslveness, fervor 
 and reticence — without some appreciation 
 of the environment In which he lived and 
 moved and taught. 
 
 That an uncommon scene witnessed the 
 growth and work of Jesus, we all know. It 
 may be said, however, that It was one of 
 the most unique and dramatic scenes in all 
 human history — a scene of spiritual unrest, 
 among a people accustomed by nature and 
 habit to spiritual striving, a scene of feverish 
 agitation and excitement, of political and 
 religious ferment. " Outside of the French 
 Revolution," says Renan, " no historic milieu 
 was so well adapted as the one In which Jesus 
 was formed to develop those hidden forces 
 which humanity holds In reserve and which 
 it discloses only In its days of fever and 
 peril." It was a time of wars and rumors 
 of war, of Roman oppression and Jewish 
 rebellion, a period of political ambitions and 
 intrigue; in such an age arose Jesus with 
 
JEWISH ENVIRONMENT OF JESUS 31 
 
 his gospel of gentleness, of love, of a dreamy 
 detachment from the material world, with 
 his affirmation of the supremacy of spirit- 
 ual intuitions, discernments, and devotions. 
 This very contrast between himself and the 
 mad whirl of his times, no doubt, served to 
 arrest attention and to gain for him a hear- 
 ing and a following; it gave dramatic dis- 
 tinctness to his personality, and invested it 
 with the originality about the genuineness of 
 which so many of late have taken to quarrel- 
 ing. A glimpse of his environment we must 
 therefore try to get, in order to perceive 
 both his origin and orginality. 
 
 What was the character of this environ- 
 ment? It was Jewish from beginning to 
 end, and it lay between Galilee and Jeru- 
 salem. Galilee and Jerusalem, with all they 
 signified in point of ideals, customs, contem- 
 porary struggles and hopes, with all their 
 pecuHarities of Nature and of people: these 
 two formed the environment of Jesus. We 
 
32 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 can understand him better, if we take this 
 into account. 
 
 First, there was Galilee, the northern Jew- 
 ish province, with Nazareth as one of its 
 numerous and densely peopled towns. It is 
 commonly accepted nowadays that Jesus was 
 born in Nazareth, though the old tradition 
 represents him as a native of Bethlehem of 
 Judea, in order to conform his place of birth 
 to an ancient prophecy (which in reality is 
 irrelevant). No matter, however, where he 
 was born, in Nazareth he grew up and in 
 Galilee he spent almost all his life. Even 
 when in the closing years of his life he en- 
 tered upon what is called his pubhc ministry 
 and appeared in Judea, he was wont to re- 
 turn as quickly and as frequently as possible 
 to the Galilee he knew and loved. 
 
 Now, Galilee was a beautiful country, the 
 very country for the life, the thought, the 
 love of a dreamer and poet — a poet of 
 Nature and of human life. It was a land of 
 
JEWISH ENVIRONMENT OF JESUS 33 
 
 superb situation and enchanting scenery. It 
 was full of hills and dales. From any lofty 
 spot the eye could travel to the mountains 
 round about: to the West, Mount Carmel, 
 dropping gently to the sea; further away, 
 the mountains of Shechem and Gilboa and 
 Tabor, with their wonderful historic asso- 
 ciations. Through a gap between the hills 
 of Shunem and Tabor, one saw the Valley of 
 Jordan and the high plains of Perea, forming 
 a straight line to the East. To the north 
 there were the mountains of Safed, and fur- 
 ther on, Hermon, with the life of large cities 
 teeming behind its peaks, while to the south 
 stretched the hills of Judea, with the beauty 
 of Jerusalem beyond. Such was GaHlee, 
 and such in particular the situation of Naz- 
 areth. Renan, who visited it himself, dwells 
 on the fascination of Nazareth and its sur- 
 roundings. " No place in the world," he 
 says, " was made so well for dreams of 
 perfect happiness." 
 
34 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 Nor must we forget the people. Galilee 
 was one of the most populous provinces of 
 the land. At the time of Jesus It was under 
 Roman rule, and Its population was the most 
 mixed In Israel. It contained Phoenicians, 
 Arabs, Syrians, and Greeks, as well as Jews. 
 Besides, It had suffered all kinds of admix- 
 tures In the course of its variegated history. 
 Nevertheless, the life of Galilee was Jewish, 
 though in many ways It differed from that 
 of Judea. At no time was there complete 
 uniformity in all things throughout Israel — ■ 
 neither during the period of the Bible nor 
 after. The Galileans were more Informal 
 than the Judeans, less bound by rules and 
 regulations, more spontaneous, less learned 
 and more poetic, less legaHstlc and more 
 lyrical. Certain customs and ceremonies of 
 theirs differed from Judea. Their language 
 was not as accurate nor as pure as In Jeru- 
 salem, which the men of the latter attributed 
 to lack of good teachers and to Indifference. 
 
JEWISH ENVIRONMENT OF JESUS 35 
 
 Yet, the Galileans did not fail to produce 
 some illustrious rabbis, who had a share in 
 the making of the Talmud. Jose the GaU- 
 lean, the learned and magnanimous rabbi of 
 the first century, was one of them. 
 
 The Galileans cared more for the Agada 
 than the Halakha — for the poetic, ethical, 
 and spiritual interpretation of Scripture 
 rather than the legalistic. Withal, they 
 were, according to the testimony of Josephus, 
 brave, courageous, and industrious. They 
 knew no cowardice. For several centuries 
 they gave heroes and martyrs to the cause 
 of Jewish emancipation from the yoke of 
 Rome. They were a temperamental people, 
 according to the Talmud, excitable and en- 
 thusiastic, capable of profound hate as well 
 as of ardent love and devotion. Moreover, 
 they learnt the lessons of tolerance from 
 their relation with the outside world — with 
 Greek speech and Roman officials. In a 
 word, they combined the quahties bred by 
 
36 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 contact with the mountains, on the one 
 hand, and with a cosmopolitan life, on the 
 other. 
 
 Amid such scenes Jesus grew up. If we 
 understand the Galileans, it is easier to un- 
 derstand him; if we understand Galilee, with 
 its mountains and lakes and rivers, and far- 
 off sea, it is easier to realize the inspiration 
 of his thought and far-off dream. 
 
 To no people in the world have the moun- 
 tains meant and said just the things they 
 meant and said to the Jews; nor the sea. 
 They were reminders of the grandeur and 
 of the deep mystery of life, and of its divin- 
 ity. " Thy righteousness is like the mighty 
 mountains; Thy judgments are the great 
 deep." 
 
 Meditating amid the mountains and on 
 the shore of the sea, Jesus realized the mean- 
 ing of Righteousness and the depth and 
 power of the Spirit. He perceived the 
 transiency and unimportance of material 
 
JEWISH ENVIRONMENT OF JESUS 37 
 
 things, and the sovereign significance of God. 
 He realized his own unity with his Father; 
 and that that unity was really the only thing 
 that mattered. To know God was to know 
 himself, and to know himself was to know 
 God. " As the Father knoweth me, even 
 so know I the Father." " No man knoweth 
 the son, but the Father; neither knoweth 
 any man the Father, save the son." " I do 
 nothing of myself, but as the Father taught 
 me, I speak these things." To understand 
 man was to understand God; to understand 
 God was to understand man: neither could 
 be understood fully without the other. 
 
 *' 'Tis the sublime of man, 
 Our noontide Majesty, to know ourselves 
 Parts and proportions of one wondrous whole! 
 This fraternizes man, this constitutes 
 Our charities and bearings. But 'tis God 
 Diffused through all, that doth make all one 
 whole! " 
 
 The modern poet perceives in the little 
 
38 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 flower In the crannied wall an intimation of 
 the secret of existence : Jesus was taught by 
 the mountains and the sea of Galilee, as well 
 as by the lily and the sparrow. " Ye ask," 
 we read in the New Sayings of Jesus, " who 
 are they that draw us up to heaven, if the 
 kingdom Is in heaven? Verily I say, the 
 fowls of the heaven, and every creature that 
 is under the earth or upon the earth, and the 
 fishes of the sea, these are they that draw 
 you!" 
 
 Moreover, to know the Galileans, I said, 
 is to understand better the personality of 
 Jesus. He, too, is a man of temperament. 
 He Is capable of love and of hate, of devo- 
 tion and of detachment; a man of fervid 
 friendships and of solitude. His mood is 
 not always the same. He Is lyrical, rather 
 than legalistic. He does not set out to break 
 the laws, but he knows that character is 
 greater than conformity. He is loyal and 
 devout, true to the past, but also to himself. 
 
JEWISH ENVIRONMENT OF JESUS 39 
 
 He is now tolerant and now contemptuous 
 of the Gentiles. A true Galilean! 
 
 Some would have us believe that Jesus was 
 an Essene, and that he learnt his lessons 
 from the Essenes. On this idea is founded 
 Mr. Moore's imaginative novel about Jesus. 
 The Essenes were one of the three parties 
 then known among the Jews, the others being 
 the Pharisees and the Sadducees. They 
 were mystics, ascetics, and communists — a 
 brotherhood scattered through various cities, 
 according to Josephus, though it is commonly 
 held that they lived apart in some one place. 
 
 In reality, however, we have no right to 
 identify Jesus with the Essenes. Like all 
 great personalities, Jesus was no party man; 
 he was himself: he never really belonged to 
 a crowd, nor could he attach himself to one; 
 time and again we see him leave the multi- 
 tude for the mountains or the sea. Insofar, 
 however, as he belonged to any group, it 
 was the Pharisees, whom he is said to have 
 
40 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 denounced repeatedly, but whose schools he 
 attended and In whose synagogues he prayed, 
 studied, and preached. 
 
 The Pharisees were the teachers of the 
 people; they were the spiritual leaders; they 
 were the heads of the schools and of the 
 synagogues; they were the true friends of 
 the people. And though in Galilee their ac- 
 tivity was not as vigorous as In Judea, the 
 synagogues and the schools, there as else- 
 where, were under their influence and direc- 
 tion. The Sadducees were the priests and 
 aristocrats, and their domain was Jerusalem. 
 
 What did Jesus know of Jerusalem, and 
 in what way did Jerusalem form part of his 
 environment ? 
 
 Like every loyal Galilean, Jesus was de- 
 voted to Jerusalem. It was part of every 
 good Jew's hfe to make periodic pilgrim- 
 ages to the capital and the Temple. No 
 doubt, Jesus, in his youth, made such pil- 
 grimages, and we can imagine what a deep 
 
JEWISH ENVIRONMENT OF JESUS 41 
 
 impression the life of the capital must have 
 made on his quick, poetic mind. At first, 
 the glory of it may well have captivated him. 
 But as his knowledge grew fuller, as his 
 perception deepened, as he realized the mean- 
 ing of the intrigues, and ambitions, and ri- 
 valries, and hypocrisies that centered about 
 the Temple, how keen must have been the 
 pang of his disappointment! And when 
 from the riotous and pompous whirl of Je- 
 rusalem he returned to the quiet hills of 
 Galilee, how must his heart have mourned 
 over the corruption of the capital! Such 
 experience — the revolt of the dreamer at 
 the violation of his dream — led finally to 
 his clash with the Temple forces and de- 
 nunciation of the pompous and hypocritical 
 Temple piety. It was like the indignation 
 of Elijah at the court of Ahab, like that of 
 Amos at Bethel — or of Jeremiah at the 
 Jerusalem of his day. It was not the de- 
 nunciation of hate, but the denunciation of 
 
42 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 love — of the idealist against the corruptors 
 of the city he had loved and dreamed about 
 and ideahzed from afar. " Oh, Jerusalem, 
 Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, 
 and stonest them which are sent unto thee, 
 how often would I have gathered thy chil- 
 dren together, even as a hen gathereth her 
 chickens under her wings, and ye would 
 not I" 
 
 What was the character and the great 
 work of Jesus? He was a man of vision, 
 a revealer, a spiritual perceiver and dreamer, 
 a man who sought to point out the eternal 
 things of life — the things that mean most 
 in the universe. More and more he real- 
 ized the insignificance of the outward and the 
 temporary, and the supremacy of the spirit. 
 And that conviction and realization he ex- 
 pressed through his own life and death. 
 That Is what has made him the fascinating 
 figure he has formed In human history. 
 
JEWISH ENVIRONMENT OF JESUS 43 
 
 That is what still gives him a place in the 
 hearts of men — weary, as were many round 
 about him, of plotting and plodding for ex- 
 ternal things, for things of little worth. 
 
 This Jesus we can understand only in con- 
 nection with his environment. One to whom 
 Jesus is but a miracle-monger, a controver- 
 sialist on the oMigatoriness or futiHty of the 
 law, or a metaphysical concept, might neg- 
 lect the study of his Jewish environment. 
 But he to whom Jesus is the great dreamer, 
 the spokesman of the spiritual ideal, the 
 appraiser of the essential values of life, the 
 man who discerned the difference between 
 show and reality, between the fleeting and 
 the eternal, and tried to fix the eyes of his 
 fellow-men on the real and the eternal, — to 
 such, an appreciation of the environment of 
 Jesus is an inevitable prerequisite to an ap- 
 preciation of Jesus himself. 
 
THE JEWISH CHARACTERISTICS 
 OF JESUS 
 
 A STUDY of the Jewish characteristics of 
 JeSus is compHcated by the pecuHar notion 
 the world still has of the character of the 
 Jew. Nothing would look more incongruous 
 than a collocation of the diverse estimates 
 of the Jewish character. 
 
 Suffice to say that extremes have met in 
 the appraisal of the Jew. To some, the 
 Jewish character is all gold, to others it is 
 all dross. Some see In the Jew the proto- 
 type of Idealism and faith; to others he is 
 a monument of materialism and calculation. 
 To some, he is the typical anarchist; to 
 others, he is legalism incarnate. To some, 
 he is the world's leader of progress, to 
 others, he is the predestined conservative. 
 44 
 
JEWISH CHARACTERISTICS 45 
 
 Thus, there are no two opposltes of virtue 
 and vice which, at one time or another, have 
 not been attributed to the Jew. 
 
 As a matter of fact, the Jew, as such, is 
 neither the one extreme, nor the other. The 
 Jew represents, as such, neither the gold of 
 Idealism, nor the dross of materialism, al- 
 together. Like the rest of human life, Jew- 
 ish life has formed a mixture, a skein of 
 tangled yarn, good and ill together, though 
 certain forces have from the very start sought 
 to make the soul of goodness and Idealism 
 prevail In Israel. The Jew has been a com- 
 posite; and the Jew knows it, if no one else. 
 
 Among the ancient rabbis, close to the age 
 of Jesus, we find true descriptions of the 
 character of the Jew. " A peculiar people, 
 this," said one rabbi, referring to the Jews, 
 "their character is hard to fathom; when 
 Aaron asked them to give for the golden 
 calf, they did so, and when Moses asked for 
 the tabernacle, they also gave." " The 
 
46 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 Jews," said another rabbi, " are likened in 
 Scripture to the stars and the dust; and so 
 they are: when they ascend, they go up to 
 the stars; and when they descend, they go 
 down to the dust." 
 
 Thus the old teachers sought to describe 
 the contrary characteristics of their people. 
 Some Jews to them were disciples of Abra- 
 ham, others disciples of Balaam. Jeremiah 
 had hkened Israel to two baskets of figs: 
 " the good figs, very good; and the bad, very 
 bad, that cannot be eaten, they are so bad." 
 A variety of opposite dispositions and traits, 
 indeed, have made up the Jewish character. 
 Men who know the Jewish people from 
 within have time and again recognized its 
 twofoldness, its duahty, as does Mr. Zang- 
 will In one of his penetrating poems. 
 
 Perhaps this is why it might be said that 
 no one can understand Jesus so well as the 
 sympathetic Jew. There are those who 
 imagine that a study of Jesus requires chiefly 
 
JEWISH CHARACTERISTICS 47 
 
 a knowledge of languages and exegesis. 
 Thus they set about interpreting and disen- 
 tangling the gospels. But what is needed 
 even more than Greek and hermeneutics is 
 psychology — the sort of knowledge, sym- 
 pathy, and imagination that help one to un- 
 derstand a soul. For that reason, a sympa- 
 thetic and imaginative student like Renan 
 and a novelist like Mr. Moore, despite their 
 errors, are apt to get closer to the true story 
 of Jesus than many a man whose chief aim 
 is not the reading of a soul but the amassing 
 of theological and linguistic footnotes. Un- 
 fortunately, neither Mr. Moore nor Renan 
 have known the Jew from within, and Renan 
 particularly is often led astray by his racial 
 theory, according to which the Semitic race 
 differed radically from the Aryan race and 
 produced spiritual characteristics, founded 
 on racial peculiarities, common to all Semites, 
 including the Jews. This was the error of 
 Renan, which unwittingly made him the 
 
48 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 father of modern anti-Semitism, and for 
 which he has been reproved both by bibhcal 
 students conversant with the spiritual differ- 
 ence that existed between the Jews and other 
 Semites, and by such a critic as Ferdinand 
 Brunetiere, who hated the racial theory as 
 subversive of all religion. 
 
 A man like Mr. Claude G. Montefiore, 
 in his study of Jesus, escapes the psychologic 
 mistakes of Moore and Renan, being himself 
 a Jew, and therefore able to view, to realize, 
 Jesus from within. His enthusiasm may 
 carry him too far; but not often. 
 
 " We others," says Charles Peguy, the 
 French poet, " are also Jesus's brothers, we 
 are his brothers through Adam, through our 
 father Adam; we are brothers of Jesus in 
 our humanity. But you, Jews, you were his 
 brothers through his very family — brothers 
 of his race and Hneage." 
 
 Indeed, whatever has been said to the con- 
 trary, Jesus was a Jew. Strange, indeed, 
 
JEWISH CHARACTERISTICS 49 
 
 are the ways of anti-Semitism. For thou- 
 sands of years the world has had a grievance 
 against the Jews for not acknowledging Jesus 
 as their messiah. He had come unto his 
 own, they argued, and his own not only re- 
 jected him, but they continue to reject him. 
 Yet, what some learned men of late have 
 sought to impress on our minds is that Jesus 
 was not a Jew after all, not even an Israelite, 
 nor even a Semite. What Christians have 
 beheved for nineteen centuries, what the 
 writers of the gospels unanimously affirmed 
 and took pains to prove, what all these years 
 the Jews have heen blamed for not sufficiently 
 appreciating, it took some learned leaders 
 of modern anti-Semitism to seek to wipe out. 
 Chamberlain, Dehtzsch, Haupt, Haeckel — 
 whether conscious or unconscious anti-Se- 
 mites—and their outspoken anti-Semitic 
 followers are now affirming that Jesus was 
 not really a Jew. 
 
 They have their reasons. Of course, the 
 
50 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 fundamental, sub-conscious argument prob- 
 ably is this: Jesus was a good man; a good 
 man cannot be thought of as a Jew; there- 
 fore, Jesus was not a Jew. I have already 
 referred to Houston Stewart Chamberlain's 
 lucubrations on the subject. According to 
 him, Jesus, a native of Galilee, could not 
 possibly be a Jew by race. The more Cham- 
 berlain thinks about it, the more ecstatic his 
 conviction grows and the profounder his con- 
 tempt for those that still hold that a Galilean, 
 and especially a good Galilean, could have 
 been a Jew. 
 
 Professor Haupt is not satisfied with the 
 mere negations of Chamberlain. He goes 
 further. Jesus, according to his gospel, is 
 an Aryan, an Indo-German, nothing less blue 
 than Greek blood flows in the veins of Jesus, 
 and the Greek spirit dwells in him. Thus 
 alone Professor Haupt can account for the 
 universalism and spiritual liberty of Jesus. 
 
 Other writers of the same school have 
 
JEWISH CHARACTERISTICS 51 
 
 made the final summary on the subject. 
 *' Not from Judea," says one of them, " but 
 from Galilee, the heathen country, came the 
 man who to the base materialism of the He- 
 brew opposed the loftiest idealism and who, 
 realizing the perversity of Jewish thinking, 
 preached a doctrine that marked a complete 
 reversal of Jewish ideas." Thus runs the 
 latter-day message. And again : '' While 
 the Jew saw his chief goal in earthly gain 
 and enjoyment, the Galilean taught disdain 
 of all earthly goods and sought happiness in 
 poverty and in spiritual satisfaction, in the 
 cultivation of all the virtues, in selflessness 
 and in purity of thought. He sought the 
 weal of the soul in the dominion of the ideals, 
 which he designated as the kingdom of God. 
 The spiritual world of Christ and that of the 
 Jews are as far apart as two suns." No 
 wonder we are told that " it marks a perfect 
 blindness to psychologic facts for one to find 
 it possible to regard Jesus as a Jew." 
 
52 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 There are so many inaccuracies in these 
 statements that it would take more than one 
 chapter to point them out in detail. Pro- 
 fessor Koenig has both cited and refuted 
 them in his httle book on " The Chief 
 Dogma of Anti-Semitism" (concerning 
 which, written in German, we should have 
 heard more had it not appeared just before 
 the outbreak of the war) . But it is this very 
 bhndness to psychologic facts that is behind 
 the efforts of those who have been trying to 
 tear the story of Jesus out of the history 
 of the Jewish people, as well as of those who 
 find it hard to reconcile the character of Jesus 
 with that of the Jewish people. Better 
 knowledge of Jewish psychology, of the soul 
 of the Jewish people, would remove many a 
 difficulty. 
 
 As a matter of fact, the student of the 
 Jewish people knows that throughout history 
 there have been two leading types of Jews; 
 on the one hand, the physical Jew, on the 
 
JEWISH CHARACTERISTICS 53 
 
 other, the spiritual Jew. The Jew belonging 
 to the first class has Identified Jewry with 
 racialism. To him, Jewish aflihatlon Is a 
 matter solely of descent, with Its accidents 
 and prerogatives. Not Infrequently this 
 Idea has gone with a certain pride of race, 
 and even degenerated, as such things will, 
 into chauvinism. The Jew of the second 
 type, on the other hand, has Identified Juda- 
 ism with spiritual distinction and purpose. 
 He also has been proud of his descent, of the 
 Jewish past; but all this has spelt for him 
 spiritual obHgatlon and responsibility, with- 
 out which physical appurtenances would 
 mean nothing. There has never been a time 
 when these two classes have not been repre- 
 sented In Israel, and their concurrence ex- 
 plains many a Jewish conflict and tragedy. 
 But it is from the second class I have de- 
 scribed that have sprung all the Idealists of 
 Israel, with their passions and exaltations, 
 with their spiritual visions and valor; out 
 
54 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 of It has come the Immortal and unequaled 
 Idealism of the Jewish people. 
 
 Needless to say, the supreme representa- 
 tives of this latter class were the men known 
 as the Prophets of Israel. They were the 
 chief idealists of the people, which means 
 that they interpreted in terms of spiritual 
 Idealism both the past and the purpose of 
 Israel. It Is they that gave to the people 
 the true meaning of the choice of Israel, 
 and namely, in ideal terms, in terms of con- 
 secration and of righteousness, and they con- 
 strued the religious tasks of the people in 
 terms of spiritual elevation and ethical prac- 
 tice. To them everything else was as noth- 
 ing in the balance against the moral and 
 spiritual ends : the sacrifices, the temple, the 
 state, the priests, kings, and politicians were 
 nothing as against the people's consecration 
 to spiritual and ethical ends. Such, on the 
 whole, was the attitude and activity of the 
 Prophets. And that is why, after the fash- 
 
JEWISH CHARACTERISTICS 55 
 
 Ion of Idealists, the Prophets criticized their 
 people so often and so severely. But did 
 they hate their people? Never! They 
 loved it even unto death. They beheved in 
 It. That is why they sought to correct it. 
 And they comforted it, and wonderful pic- 
 tures they drew of its future restoration and 
 its fixed part in the future glories of man- 
 kind. Such were the Prophets. They were 
 the pattern Jews of the spiritual type. 
 
 This type of Jew Jesus, in his own way and 
 In his own age, exempHfied. It is folly to 
 fasten on minor points of Jesus' teaching as 
 the distinctive parts of his message. What- 
 ever he taught about religion and ethics, 
 about godliness and the virtues, about broth- 
 erliness and unlversalism, may be found in 
 the Jewish teachings of his predecessors and 
 contemporaries and independent successors. 
 It is not what he taught about humility or 
 compassion or chastity that gave him dls- 
 tinction, or made him important. Any Jew- 
 
56 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 ish teacher worthy his name no doubt taught 
 the same. The importance of Jesus lay in 
 that he gave another expression and was an- 
 other incarnation of that great principle 
 which the Jewish soul at its best has contin- 
 ually impressed upon the world — the pro- 
 phetic principle, the principles of ideahsm 
 and spirituality, of godhness and goodness, 
 as against materialism and earthiness. In 
 Jesus we find a fresh exemplification of Jew- 
 ish characteristics, of those traits which the 
 Prophets eternalized, and which have made 
 for the immortality of the Jew. Thus, he 
 exemplified the eternal struggle in Israel be- 
 tween what Charles Peguy, with remarkable 
 insight, has called the mysticism and the poli- 
 tics of Israel. " There is a Jewish poHtics," 
 says Peguy, " but there is also a Jewish mys- 
 ticism. And the whole mysticism of Israel 
 is that Israel pursues in the world his tena- 
 cious and tragic mission. Hence, the an- 
 guish, the most doleful of antagonisms that 
 
JEWISH CHARACTERISTICS 57 
 
 can exist between politics and mysticism. A 
 people of merchants, and also a people of 
 prophets. The ones know for the others 
 what calamity means." 
 
 In this light we can understand the atti- 
 tude of Jesus to the Jews. He criticized his 
 people. He chastised It. He sought to cor- 
 rect It. But he did not hate It. And he 
 would not have been he, If he had hated It. 
 " It means to leave humanity," says Pascal, 
 " for a man to leave his own milieu: the 
 grandeur of the human soul consists In know- 
 ing how to cling to the latter; the more it 
 would seem to be the part of greatness to 
 leave one's milieu, the more it is true great- 
 ness not to leave it." Jesus did not hate his 
 people. He did not leave It. He loved It. 
 Hence he pitied It, and comforted it, and 
 sought to help it, as did the Prophets before 
 him, and as every Jew belonging to the same 
 type has tried to do ever since, according 
 to his powers. All this served not to eclipse 
 
58 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 or efface the Jewish characteristics of Jesus 
 but rather to accentuate them. 
 
 What, then, are these characteristics? 
 They are as follows : 
 
 Jesus was not only born a Jew, but con- 
 scious of his Jewish descent. 
 
 Jesus realized the spiritual distinction of 
 the Jewish people, and regarded himself as 
 sent to teach and help his people. 
 
 Jesus, like other teachers, severely criti- 
 cized his people for their spiritual short- 
 comings, seeking to correct them, but at the 
 same time he loved and pitied them. His 
 whole ministry was saturated with love for 
 his people, and loyalty to it. 
 
 Jesus, like all other of the noblest type 
 of Jewish teachers, taught the essential les- 
 sons of spiritual religion — love, justice, 
 goodness, purity, holiness — subordinating 
 the material and the poHtical to the spiritual 
 and the eternal. 
 
JEWISH CHARACTERISTICS 59 
 
 Is not this the Inward meaning of the story 
 of Jesus' temptation In the wilderness? * 
 
 " Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the 
 wilderness to be tempted of the devil. And when 
 he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he after- 
 ward hungered. And the tempter came and said 
 unto him, If thou art the Son of God, command 
 that these stones become bread. But he answered 
 and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread 
 alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the 
 mouth of God. Then the devil taketh him into 
 the holy city; and he set him on the pinnacle of 
 the temple, and saith unto him. If thou art the Son 
 of God, cast thyself down: for it is written, 
 
 He shall give his angels charge concerning thee: 
 And on their hands they shall bear thee up, 
 Lest haply thou dash thy foot against a stone. 
 
 Jesus said unto him. Again it is written. Thou 
 shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. Again, the 
 devil taketh him into an exceeding high mountain, 
 and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, 
 and the glory of them; and he said unto him. All 
 these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down 
 and worship me. Then saith Jesus unto him. Get 
 thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt 
 worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou 
 
6o A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 serve. Then the devil leaveth him ; and behold, 
 angels came and ministered unto him." {Mat. 
 4:1-10.) 
 
 The facts of faith and of life — all of them, 
 Jesus reads in the manner of the spiritual 
 teachers of Israel. No wonder Professor 
 Santayana has called the teaching of Jesus 
 " pure Hebraism reduced to its spiritual 
 essence." 
 
 In one other respect Jesus showed himself 
 the true Jew. He was ready to die for his 
 ideal, for his teaching, for his belief. His 
 death has since meant a great deal of suffer- 
 ing to the Jew. The Jew has been blamed 
 foT it. But as a matter of fact, Jesus never 
 was more the Jew than when he was willing 
 quietly to die for his teaching and belief. 
 
 He was not the only Jew so to do. The 
 story of martyrdom in Israel began several 
 centuries before he came into the world. 
 Suffering for religion's sake had become the 
 badge and the business of the Jew. About 
 
JEWISH CHARACTERISTICS 6i 
 
 the time Jesus lived, a Jewish author pro- 
 duced as noble a panegyric of martyrdom as 
 was ever written, the so-called " Fourth 
 Book of the Maccabees." In Jesus' own 
 day many a Jew died for trying to liberate 
 their people, and particularly Galilean Jews, 
 who were among the most loyal and zealbus, 
 and during the subsequent period Jews by 
 the thousands took the same heroic course. 
 It is a fate Jewish martyrs have shared 
 throughout the ages, and their last words, 
 when bidden to deny their faith or their 
 teaching, invariably were: "Hear, O 
 Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One ! " 
 — the very words which, according to Jesus, 
 were the essence of true Religion. 
 
 That Jesus died as he did was destined to 
 bring endless agony to the Jew; but, on the 
 other hand, it is something to make the Jew 
 proud that Jesus was wiUing and ready so 
 to die. It proved him the true Jew, show- 
 ing forth in his dying moment that fidehty 
 
62 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 to faith which has formed the chief glory 
 of the Jewish character. 
 
 The words addressed by the author of 
 the Fourth Book of the Maccabees to the 
 martyr-mother of the seven sons slain by 
 the cruel tyrant of the Greeks, are true of 
 Israel: 
 
 " As the Ark of Noah, with the whole living 
 world for her burden in the world-whelming 
 Deluge, did withstand the mighty surges, so thou, 
 the keeper of the Law, beaten upon every side by 
 the surging waves of the passions, and strained as 
 with strong blasts by the tortures of thy sons, didst 
 nobly weather the storms that assailed thee for 
 religion's sake." 
 
THE JEWISH ELEMENT IN THE 
 TEACHINGS OF JESUS 
 
 Latter-day lives of Jesus have brought 
 out one point above all others — the univer- 
 sal readiness to treat Jesus as a spiritual and 
 ethical teacher, if nothing else. Even those 
 who decline to accept the figure of Jesus as 
 drawn by traditional Christianity, are ready 
 to pay him tribute as a unique teacher. In- 
 deed, there are such as affirm that the true 
 greatness of Jesus can be appreciated only 
 when dissociated from the dogmas and pe- 
 culiar concepts gathered by the churches. In 
 Mr. George Moore's novel, " The Brook 
 Kerith," there is the subtle suggestion that 
 as a teacher Jesus was impressive and fas- 
 cinating, but it required Paul's peculiar illu- 
 sions about Jesus to make him the hero he 
 63 
 
64 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 became; otherwise he might have ended his 
 days in the obscure seclusion of an Essene 
 monastery. Be that as it may, the modern 
 disposition is certainly to treat Jesus less as 
 a metaphysical personage than as a religious 
 and ethical teacher. Regarding him thus, 
 we cannot fail to reahze how much of the 
 Jewish element pervaded the teaching of 
 Jesus, particularly that part of it which Is 
 permanent and not merely a reflex of the 
 circumstances of his time. 
 
 In a study of the teachings of Jesus, the 
 unbiased student encounters one inevitable 
 difficulty. It is not easy to determine what 
 parts of the Gospels represent the authentic 
 utterances of Jesus, as distinguished from 
 those attributed to him by his disciples and 
 by the founders of the early Christian com- 
 munities. All the Gospels were written 
 years after the death of Jesus — at least 
 from thirty to sixty years after that event, 
 and It Is very doubtful whether we have them 
 
JEWISH ELEMENT IN TEACHINGS 65 
 
 in the original form. There are differences 
 among them, not only in details but in the 
 general treatment of the subject. The 
 Fourth Gospel, for instance, though com- 
 monly accepted as the work of Jesus' favor- 
 ite disciple, John, gives by no means the 
 most attractive picture of its hero, mingling^ 
 as it does, mystical teaching of profound 
 beauty with a story of constant querulous- 
 ness. If John did write it, he wrote it as 
 an old man, influenced by the memory of 
 many a controversy and strife which occurred 
 in the estabhshment of the early Christian 
 communities rather than in the life of Jesus. 
 Thus, in all the Gospels it is by no means 
 easy to fix the actual utterances of Jesus. 
 This much, however, the sympathetic and un- 
 prejudiced student can do. He can sense 
 those teachings and those sayings that most 
 surely represent the spirit of Jesus. 
 
 I say, he can sense them. It might be ob- 
 jected that this means the introduction of too 
 
66 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 much intuition into historic study — too 
 much subjective treatment. Yet, is not this 
 what we have to do, and are wont to do, in 
 the study of any personality? There are 
 certain central, fundamental facts on which 
 every personality is built. A sincere and 
 consistent personality is an expression of such 
 central facts. They form the spirit of the 
 personality. They form its core, its char- 
 acter, and we can usually guess particulars 
 from those central truths, from that spirit. 
 In the case of Jesus that was supremely true. 
 No one was ruled more completely by the 
 central truth of his life than he, and it does 
 not require overmuch wisdom to determine 
 what is likely to have expressed his spirit, 
 to have harmonized with the ethical and 
 spiritual purpose of his life — in a word, 
 what in all likelihood formed an authentic 
 part of his teaching. 
 
 In order to understand the teaching of 
 Jesus, we must abandon, first of all, the com- 
 
JEWISH ELEMENT IN TEACHINGS 67 
 
 mon notion that the purpose of Jesus was to 
 overthrow the Jewish religion, or the old 
 law, and to found a new one. This notion 
 he himself sought to uproot when first it 
 cropped up among his contemporaries. The 
 words in which he tried to do it now form 
 part of the Sermon on the Mount, and prob- 
 ably were spoken early in his ministry. 
 " Think not that I am come to destroy the 
 Law, or the Prophets; I am not come to de- 
 stroy, but to fulfill. For verily I say unto 
 you. Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or 
 one tittle shall in no wise pass from the Law, 
 till all be fulfilled." 
 
 What do these words mean? If anything, 
 it is this: first, that Jesus does not mean to 
 say or to do anything that might destroy 
 or damage the inherited law and doctrine of 
 his people; then, that the welfare of the 
 world depends upon the observance and the 
 fulfillment of those teachings; and, finally, 
 that it is his purpose and conscious mission 
 
68 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 to advance the fulfillment of the old law 
 and the old Prophets. 
 
 But what does he mean by fulfillment? 
 That we must seek to understand in order 
 to grasp the relation of Jesus to those proph- 
 ecies and precepts. By fulfillment he does 
 not mean merely a mechanical fulfillment; 
 he means a spiritual fulfillment; he means 
 a grasp of the full content and aim of the 
 Law, an absorption and application of its 
 spirit, an inward apprehension of its content, 
 and the unfoldment of its purpose in actual 
 life. 
 
 That this is what fulfillment of the Law 
 meant to Jesus, we are moved to believe by 
 the general Jewish attitude. This the best 
 Jewish teachers sought to teach at the time 
 of Jesus, as well as before and after it. 
 
 It is commonly said that the life of the 
 Jewish people in the age of Jesus was gov- 
 erned by the Law. Of course, it was; but 
 the Law that did so govern it, was not a 
 
JEWISH ELEMENT IN TEACHINGS 69 
 
 dead law. It was a living law, though come 
 down from the past, and all the efforts of the 
 teachers were directed toward discovering 
 the ethical contents and the spiritual Impli- 
 cates of the Law. That formed the chief 
 task of the teachers, and gave birth to the 
 enormous literature of the age. For the 
 rabbis, as for Jesus, the letter did not suffice. 
 What lay behind and within the letter their 
 eyes sought continually, and every teacher 
 tried to find In it more than his predecessors 
 and colleagues had found. There was ri- 
 valry among them in the discovery of the 
 ethical and spiritual implications of tradition 
 — so much so that they came to regard wis- 
 dom as the result of the rivalry of Scribes 
 (or teachers). Mechanical conformity was 
 not enough. The Law demanded spiritual 
 discernment and realization. 
 
 No doubt, this is what Jesus meant when 
 he spoke about having come to fulfill the 
 Law and the Prophets, and when he admon- 
 
70 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 ished his hearers not only to fulfill every 
 tittle and iota of the Law, but to do more; 
 to go farther and deeper than all formal 
 teaching and academic interpretation. ^' Ex- 
 cept your righteousness shall exceed the 
 Scribes and the Pharisees, ye shall in no 
 case enter into the kingdom of heaven." 
 
 Such teaching was Jewish. It was 
 founded on Jewish precepts and precedents. 
 Its effort to penetrate and amplify the Law 
 was in harmony with the practice and meth- 
 ods of Jewish teachers. Its motive as well 
 as its aims were Jewish. Even where Jesus 
 offered something in a new form or in a new 
 way, it accorded with his general aim to 
 disclose the ethical and spiritual contents of 
 the old Law. 
 
 This idea underlies two of the most preg- 
 nant parables of Jesus. 
 
 First, we have it in the parable of the new 
 wine and the old bottles. Questioned as to 
 why his disciples violated some old forms. 
 
JEWISH ELEMENT IN TEACHINGS 71 
 
 Jesus replies that the new wine of Religion 
 requires new bottles. This parable is often 
 cited as indicative of Jesus' hostility to the 
 old forms of Judaism. It is accepted as 
 authentic. But there is another parable 
 which is not quoted so frequently, and yet 
 supplements it, nor is there any reason for 
 regarding it as less authentic. After ex- 
 plaining his parables to the disciples, it is 
 related that he asked, " Have ye understood 
 all these things? " " Yes," they answered. 
 Then he said unto them: 
 
 "Therefore every scribe which Is in- 
 structed unto the kingdom of heaven is hke 
 unto a man that is a householder, which 
 bringeth forth out of his treasures things 
 new and old." {Mat. 13:51-52.) 
 
 In other words, the wise teacher of 
 spiritual and ethical truth, hke the good 
 householder, will use and cherish both new 
 things and old, according to their worth to 
 the promotion of his aim. 
 
72 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 There Is no more reason for denying the 
 authenticity of this parable than of the one 
 about the new wine and the old bottles. On 
 the contrary, it represents the very spirit 
 of the method of teaching used by Jesus. 
 It is the more comprehensive, though not the 
 more familiar, of the two parables. Out of 
 his spiritual treasures Jesus brought forth 
 things old and new, as they served the great 
 purpose of his ministry. In this respect, he 
 did what every great Jewish teacher of his 
 time sought to do. 
 
 What formed the essential teaching of 
 Jesus? We may sum it up briefly. He be- 
 gan with the idea of the Divine judgment 
 that was at hand. That led on to the idea 
 of repentance, as the one great need of his 
 people. From that he was led to an affirma- 
 tion of the essential character of religion — 
 the spiritual fulfillment of the law, rather 
 than mere outward conformity. And from 
 
JEWISH ELEMENT IN TEACHINGS 73 
 
 that he pushed on, quite naturally, to an 
 exposition of how the spiritual side of re- 
 ligion can be expressed in conduct — in the 
 particulars of everyday conduct. These lat- 
 ter points are developed in his various par- 
 ables and sentences on love and forbearance 
 and faith and humility, on service and godli- 
 ness. But the quintessence of his teaching 
 is summed up pithily in the opening chapter 
 of Mark. 
 
 " After that John was put in prison, Jesus 
 came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of 
 the kingdom of God, and saying, The time 
 is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is 
 at hand: repent ye, and believe the gos- 
 pel." 
 
 Now, it means no denial of the power, nor 
 of the originahty, of Jesus to recognize in 
 this teaching a new expression of what the 
 religious leaders of Israel, and particularly 
 the Prophets, had sought to teach. The 
 Prophets time and again spoke of the com- 
 
74 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 ing of the Divine judgment — the Doom. 
 " Hear, ye peoples," cried Micah, 
 
 " Hear, ye peoples, all of you ; 
 Hearken, O earth, and all that therein is; 
 And let the Lord God be witness against you, 
 The Lord from His holy temple. 
 For, behold, the Lord cometh forth out of His 
 
 place. 
 And will come down, and tread upon the high 
 
 places of the earth. 
 And the mountains shall be molten under Him. 
 And the valleys shall be cleft, 
 As wax before the fire. 
 
 As waters that are poured down a steep place. 
 For the transgression of Jacob is all this, 
 And for the sins of the house of Israel." 
 
 Again and again the Prophets pleaded for 
 repentance, as a means of moral improve- 
 ment and of recovery of relationshp with 
 God; and namely, for spiritual, rather than 
 outward, repentance. " Yet even now," we 
 read in Joel, 
 
 " Yet even now, saith the Lord, 
 Turn ye unto Me with all your heart, 
 
JEWISH ELEMENT IN TEACHINGS 75 
 
 And with fasting, and with weeping and with 
 
 lamentation ; 
 And rend your heart, and not your garments, 
 And turn unto the Lord your God; 
 For He is gracious and compassionate, 
 Long-suffering, and abundant in mercy, 
 And repenteth Him of the evil." 
 
 Without ceasing the Prophets pointed out 
 the uselessness of a mere formal religion 
 and the paramountcy of the spiritual and 
 ethical element In all religious profession and 
 practice. Who does not recall Isaiah's 
 burning words concerning it? 
 
 " Hear the word of the Lord, 
 Ye rulers of Sodom ; 
 Give ear unto the law of our God, 
 Ye people of Gomorrah. 
 To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices 
 
 unto Me? 
 Saith the Lord; 
 
 I am full of the burnt-offerings of rams, 
 And the fat of fed beasts; 
 And I delight not in the blood 
 Of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he-goats. 
 
76 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 When ye come to appear before Me, 
 
 Who hath required this at your hand, 
 
 To trample my courts? 
 
 Bring no more vain oblations ; 
 
 It is an offering of abomination unto Me; 
 
 New moon and sabbath, the holding of convoca- 
 tions — 
 
 I cannot endure iniquity along with the solemn 
 assembly. 
 
 Your new moons and your appointed seasons 
 
 My soul hateth; 
 
 They are a burden unto Me; 
 
 I am weary to bear them. 
 
 And when ye spread forth your hands, 
 
 I will hide Mine eyes from you; 
 
 Yea, when ye make many prayers, 
 
 I will not hear; 
 
 Your hands are full of blood. 
 
 Wash you, make you clean, 
 
 Put away the evil of your doings 
 
 From before Mine eyes. 
 
 Cease to do evil ; 
 
 Learn to do well: 
 
 Seek justice, relieve the oppressed. 
 
 Judge the fatherless, plead for the widow." 
 
 Conditions may have changed from age to 
 
JEWISH ELEMENT IN TEACHINGS 77 
 
 age, but the idea and the purpose of the 
 Prophet remained ever the same. 
 
 " By a prophet the Lord brought Israel up out of 
 Egypt, 
 And by a prophet was he kept." 
 
 That is the common link between Elijah and 
 Amos and Isaiah and Jeremiah and Ezekiel, 
 and the rest: thy all have the same ideal. 
 And the same purpose, under new conditions, 
 animated the teachings of Jesus, and found 
 in them a new expression. 
 
 Yet, there were certain things which 
 formed the unique power and fascination of 
 Jesus' teaching, and the secret of his popu- 
 larity. 
 
 First, Jesus put the personal element into 
 the heart of his teaching. He did not teach 
 in mere academic fashion, as did others. He 
 taught in a personal way, by means of per- 
 sonal appeal and through personal experi- 
 ence. He identified himself with his teach- 
 ing. He and his doctrine were one. He 
 
78 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 was part of the truth he felt and sought to 
 spread. It was of the very essence of his 
 outlook. Of course, other teachers also 
 made direct appeals and used personal experi- 
 ence. But in their case it was accidental, 
 a mere illustration of their teaching. In the 
 case of Jesus it was part of his very being. 
 
 The truth with which he was concerned 
 formed his sole passion, to which he sacri- 
 ficed, paradoxically, even his closest relations. 
 " Kinship," says Philo, the Jewish philoso- 
 pher of the first century, " is in truth not 
 reckoned merely by blood; it is rather doing 
 the same actions and seeking the same ends." 
 We hear little about Jesus' association with 
 his own family. Dearest to him were those 
 that felt and toiled with him, and understood 
 him. 
 
 "And there came his mother and his brethren; 
 and, standing without, they sent unto him, calling 
 him. And a multitude was sitting about him ; and 
 they say unto him. Behold thy mother and thy 
 
JEWISH ELEMENT IN TEACHINGS 79 
 
 brethren without seek for thee! And he answered 
 them, and saith, Who is my mother and my breth- 
 ren? And looking round on them which sat round 
 about him, he saith, Behold, my mother and my 
 brethren ! For whosoever shall do the will of God, 
 the same is my brother, and sister, and mother." 
 {Mark 3:31-35.) 
 
 Similarly, those who would become his 
 friends, had to sacrifice everything to the 
 ideal he taught. 
 
 " And a certain ruler asked him, saying, Good 
 Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? 
 And Jesus said unto him. Why callest thou me 
 good? None is good save one, and that is God. 
 Thou knowest the commandments; Do not commit 
 adultery ; do not kill ; do not steal ; do not bear false 
 witness; honor thy father and thy mother. And 
 he said, all these have I kept from my youth up. 
 Now, when Jesus heard these things, he said unto 
 him: Yet, lackest thou one thing. Sell all that 
 thou hast and distribute it unto the poor, and thou 
 shalt have treasure in heaven ; and come follow me. 
 And when he heard this, he was very sorrowful, 
 for he was very rich. And when Jesus saw that 
 he was very sorrowful, he said, How hardly shall 
 they that have riches enter into the kingdom of 
 
So A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 God, for it is easier for a camel to go through the 
 needle's eye than for a rich man to enter into the 
 kingdom of God. And they that heard it said, 
 Who, then, can be saved ? And he said, The things 
 which are impossible with men are possible with 
 God. And Peter said later, We have left all and 
 followed thee. And he said unto them. Verily, I 
 say unto you, there is no man that hath left house 
 or parents or brethren or wife or children for the 
 Kingdom of God's sake, who shall not receive mani- 
 fold more in this present time and in the world 
 to come life everlasting." (Luke i6: 18-30.) 
 
 Jesus beheld everything under the aspect of 
 the personal, as part of himself, and as re- 
 lated to himself: God, Nature, and his fel- 
 lowmen. It was Inevitable, therefore, that 
 all his teaching should be permeated with 
 his personality. His chief concern was not 
 discussion of academic questions, nor partici- 
 pation In learned disputes, but to help men 
 in the actualities of hfe by opening up to 
 their vision the world of spiritual truth. 
 
 Then, Jesus appealed with special force to 
 the poor, the lonely, the forlorn, and partlcu- 
 
JEWISH ELEMENT IN TEACHINGS 8i 
 
 larly to those who had gone astray. Here, 
 again, it was not so much a matter of nov- 
 elty: the teaching was not new; the Prophets 
 were friends of the poor, defenders of the 
 oppressed, and so were the rabbis; but the 
 personal relation made a difference. Jesus 
 not only championed the poor, he lived their 
 life; he not only pitied sinners, but mingled 
 with them; he not only praised penitents, 
 as did every conventional rabbi, but he 
 showed his love for them in personal contact. 
 
 " And he went forth again by the sea side ; and 
 all the multitude resorted unto him, and he taught 
 them. And as he passed by, he saw Levi the son 
 of Alphaeus sitting at the place of toll, and he saith 
 unto him, Follow me! And he arose and followed 
 him. And it came to pass, that he was sitting at 
 meat in his house, and many publicans and sinners 
 sat down with Jesus and his disciples: for there 
 were many, and they followed him. And the 
 scribes of the Pharisees, when they saw that he was 
 eating with the sinners and publicans, said unto 
 his disciples. He eateth and drinketh with publi- 
 cans and sinners! And when Jesus heard it, he 
 
82 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 salth unto them, They that are whole have no need 
 of a physician, but they that are sick: I came not 
 to call the righteous, but sinners." {Mark 2: 13- 
 17.) 
 
 Jesus did not preach on the problems of 
 poverty and of penitence; he dealt tenderly, 
 lovingly, with the penitent and the poor. 
 
 As we study the ethical and religious teach- 
 ing of Jesus, we cannot help recognizing the 
 Jewish element in it, its Jewish authenticity, 
 its relationship to the best prophetic tradi- 
 tions and ideals. The merit of Jesus lay in 
 giving to those traditions and ideals a new 
 expression, a new emphasis, and in endowing 
 them with the perennial appeal of a fascinat- 
 ing personality. That he himself regarded 
 his teaching as a pure expression of the 
 Jewish religious ideal — as a fulfillment of 
 the Law and the Prophets — one can hardly 
 doubt. Indeed, we have it from his own 
 lips. When asked by a scribe what were the 
 essentials of Religion, he answered, it is said. 
 
JEWISH ELEMENT IN TEACHINGS 83 
 
 with citations from the Jewish Law. The 
 scribe assented and evoked from Jesus the 
 remark: " Thou art not far from the king- 
 dom of God!" 
 
 *' And one of the scribes came, and heard them 
 questioning together, and knowing that he had an- 
 swered them well, asked him, What commandment 
 is the first of all? Jesus answered, The first is, 
 Hear, O Israel; the Lord our God, the Lord is one: 
 and thou shalt love thy God with all thy heart, 
 and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and 
 with all thy strength. The second Is this. Thou 
 shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is none 
 other commandment greater than these. And the 
 scribe said unto him. Of a truth. Master, thou hast 
 well said that He is one; and there is none other 
 but He; and to love Him with all the heart, and 
 with all the understanding, and with all the strength, 
 and to love his neighbor as himself is much more 
 than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices. And 
 when Jesus saw that he answered discreetly, he said 
 unto him, Thou art not far from the kingdom of 
 God." {Mark 12:28-34.) 
 
JESUS AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES 
 
 A man's greatest treasures are his ideals. 
 They are the thoughts, the aims, the dream 
 by which his life is fashioned and directed. 
 They are his inward treasure, the light by 
 which he lives. A man's life is according to 
 his ideals, and according to their hold upon 
 him. When we speak of an idealist, we 
 mean a man to whom his ideals are the most 
 precious thing in life, and on whom they 
 have a hold above everything else — above 
 material possession and advancement, even 
 life itself. 
 
 " The kingdom of heaven is like unto a treasure 
 hidden in the field; which a man found and hid; 
 and in his joy he goeth and selleth all that he hath, 
 and buyeth that field. 
 
 " Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man 
 that is a merchant seeking goodly pearls: and hav- 
 84 
 
HIS CONTEMPORARIES 85 
 
 ing found one pearl of great price, he went and 
 sold all that he had, and bought it." {Mat. 13: 
 44-45-) 
 
 Like other treasures, then, ideals cannot 
 be gotten nor held without a certain cost. 
 The idealist must be ready to pay the price 
 of his ideals, and usually it means facing 
 the opposition and misunderstanding of his 
 fellowmen. There is hardly an idealist who 
 has not been forced to endure the antago- 
 nism of the world, and particularly the un- 
 happiness of being misunderstood by it. 
 Had the world understood Its idealists, and 
 had it sought to put into effect their teach- 
 ings and visions, it would be different than 
 it is. But the world has hardly ever really 
 grasped what its ideal teachers meant to 
 convey and to accomplish. This has formed 
 the tragedy of ideahsts. Sooner or later it 
 is the fate of every ideaHst to realize the dis- 
 tance between himself and the world, the 
 difficulty of making himself understood, and 
 
86 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 the remote chance of his words and visions 
 finding fulfillment. 
 
 To this rule Jesus, the arch-idealist, was 
 no exception. If ever man spurned the ma- 
 terial and devoted himself to the promotion 
 of the spiritual, it was he, and it would have 
 been truly miraculous had his contemporaries 
 received his doctrine with unanimous com- 
 prehension and approval. 
 
 We cannot read the life of Jesus, how- 
 ever, without concluding that very early in 
 his ministry he realized the difliculty of his 
 task. It did not take him long to learn that 
 it was one thing to have discovered for one- 
 self the spiritual character of Religion, and 
 quite another thing to bring the truth home 
 to others, and particularly to the mass of the 
 people. Did all those that heard him really 
 grasp the purpose and the inwardness of his 
 words? His outward acts, his helpful per- 
 formances, the multitude understood; they 
 made him popular; but did they understand 
 
HIS CONTEMPORARIES 87 
 
 his doctrine, which to him was the chief thing, 
 the real bread of life? The loaves they 
 appreciated; but how about the spiritual 
 food? Worst of all, Jesus was not long 
 In recognizing that even those closest to him, 
 his chosen disciples, could not be depended 
 upon for a real comprehension of what he 
 was trying to do and say. " Are ye so with- 
 out understanding also?" he demands. 
 " Hear and understand! " This is his con- 
 stant plea, and " Have ye understood all 
 these things?" is the question he is repeat- 
 edly moved to ask his disciples, in one form 
 or another. Time and again he has sought 
 to make his purpose clear; but whether they 
 have really understood is quite doubtful. It 
 makes for the sadness of Jesus — for the sad 
 undercurrent in many of his teachings and 
 experiences. 
 
 The longer Jesus taught, the more con- 
 vinced he grew of this futility — of this diffi- 
 culty to communicate his spirit to others, 
 
88 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 fully to share his ideal with others, to flood 
 with the Hght of his doctrine those souls that 
 had not received it themselves from the 
 Father. " No man can come to me except 
 the Father who hath sent me draw him." 
 
 In the early days of his teaching he cer- 
 tainly felt that it was possible for him, the 
 son, to make known God, the Father. He 
 conceived it his mission to do this. It is er- 
 roneous to think that Jesus was the first to 
 introduce into the vocabulary of Israel the 
 designation of God as Father. This ap- 
 pellation goes back to the Jewish Bible, and 
 to Jesus it had become familiar from the 
 Bible and many another Jewish writing, as 
 well as from the prayers that were in every- 
 day use among his people. " Our Father 
 who art in heaven " was part of many a Jew- 
 ish prayer of his day. But the designation 
 of God as Father was Jesus' favorite form, 
 expressing his basic and most intimate con- 
 ception of his own and other men's relation- 
 
HIS CONTEMPORARIES 89 
 
 ship to God. He was convinced that there 
 was no such efficacious way of knowing God 
 as through His child, Man, and no such cer- 
 tain way of knowing Man as through his 
 Father, God. The conception was not new; 
 it was common among his people ; but it was 
 personalized in him and became his profound 
 conviction. 
 
 This conviction came to him from his own 
 experience, and, in his enthusiasm, he 
 dreamed of making this truth known to 
 others, felt by others. But the longer he 
 taught, the more deeply he realized that 
 while the truth was there, it was not easy 
 to make it clear to those to whom the Father 
 — God — Himself had not revealed It. 
 " Unto you it is given to know the mysteries 
 of the Kingdom of heaven, but to them It 
 is not given. For whosoever hath, to him 
 shall be given, and he shall have abundance : 
 but whosoever hath not, from him shall be 
 taken away even that which he hath." Jesus 
 
90 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 became more and more silent. Even his 
 speech was half-silence. He spoke in half- 
 words. He was convinced of the futility of 
 explanation to people who could not under- 
 stand, who could not perceive for themselves, 
 who were blind to the light. 
 
 Nowhere do we find this confirmed more 
 strongly than in the closing scenes of his life. 
 In his trial before the high-priest, in his stand 
 before Pilate, on the very cross — he does 
 nothing so little as explain. " Jesus held his 
 peace." He is the man of silence through- 
 out. *' He gave no answer, not even to one 
 word." He is the man who has learnt the 
 folly of trying to explain the incomprehen- 
 sible, who has learnt the sorrow of misun- 
 derstanding. " Thou hast said." " Thou 
 sayest." His final cry betrays it. It is ad- 
 dressed not to man, but to God — with 
 whom he has been communing, sharing his 
 thoughts — the Father whom it had been his 
 aim to make known to others. " My God, 
 
HIS CONTEMPORARIES 91 
 
 my God, why hast Thou forsaken me? " It 
 is a cry out of the depths of a silent soul 
 — a soul forced into the regions of silence 
 by the misunderstanding, the incomprehen- 
 sion, of the world. 
 
 What we should bear in mind, however, 
 Is that it was natural for Jesus to have .been 
 misunderstood and opposed by his contem- 
 poraries, allowing for those peculiarities of 
 human nature which have always existed and 
 have not yet ceased. 
 
 At first, the public appearance of Jesus 
 created surprise amon'g those that knew 
 him. 
 
 '' Coming into his own country, he taught them 
 in their Synagogue inasmuch that they were aston- 
 ished and said, Whence hath this man this wisdom 
 and these powers? Is not this the carpenter's son? 
 Is not his mother called Mary and his brethren 
 James and Joseph and Simon and Judas, and his 
 sisters, are they not all with us? Whence, then, 
 hath this man all these things? And they were 
 surprised in him." {Mat. 13:54-57-) 
 
92 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 Presently, however, surprise turned to re- 
 sentment and antipathy. Jesus stood for 
 something that differed radically from the 
 conventional religion of the masses : he stood 
 for prophetic religion as against mechanical 
 religion, for a spiritual and not a material 
 faith: he stood for Jewish mysticism rather 
 than for Jewish politics. What more natu- 
 ral than that he should have aroused all 
 kinds of discussion and opposition (which 
 is the natural offspring of discussion) ? 
 "Some said he is a good man; others said 
 nay, he deceiveth the people." To some he 
 was a prophet, to others an imposter. Some 
 thought him inspired, others queer. Some 
 considered him a saint, others a doubtful 
 character, a glutton and wine-bibber, hardly 
 respectable, because he associated with pub- 
 licans and was charitable to sinners. 
 
 "Whereunto shall I liken this generation? It is 
 like unto children sitting in the market places which 
 call unto their fellows and say: We piped unto 
 
HIS CONTEMPORARIES 93 
 
 ye and ye did not dance, we wailed and ye did not 
 mourn. For John came neither eating nor drinking, 
 and they say he hath a devil. The son of man 
 came' eating and drinking, and they say. Behold, a 
 gluttonous man and a wine bibber, a friend of pub- 
 licans and sinners! " {Mat. 11: 16-19.) 
 
 Indeed, there was so much doubt of Jes-us' 
 worth, and aspersion of his motives, that 
 there were moments when the worst thing 
 happened that can possibly befall the ideal- 
 ist: he began to question himself, trying to 
 determine what his real character and com- 
 mission were, and seeking an answer to those 
 crucial questions from friends and disciples. 
 It is a sad moment for the idealist when 
 conflict and mistrust have served so to con- 
 fuse him as to send him to others for a de- 
 termination of his individuality. 
 
 As for the various leaders of the people, 
 it was, again, quite natural for them to 
 treat him either with aloofness or with hos- 
 tility. The heads of the schools, who were 
 
94 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 Pharisees, no doubt regarded him as an en- 
 thusiast, a detached preacher of ethical and 
 spiritual religion, which In itself coincided 
 with the ethical and spiritual purposes of the 
 authorized teachers, notwithstanding his oc- 
 casional attacks on old and commonly ac- 
 cepted laws. And as for the priestly class 
 and the aristocrats, they treated him with 
 the suspicion and hostihty which his attitude 
 to them, and his utterances, could not but 
 provoke. 
 
 Since Jesus sought to teach and to do what 
 he did, I say. It was natural that he should 
 have encountered misunderstanding, suspi- 
 cion, and hostihty. But we ought not to 
 forget that in this regard Jesus shared what 
 thus far has proved the Inevitable fate of all 
 IdeaHsts, and what particularly had to be 
 endured by most. If not all, the Prophets 
 of Israel. Amos, Jeremiah, Ehjah, Moses, 
 and many others had to face no less a 
 measure of misunderstanding and abuse. 
 
HIS CONTEMPORARIES 95 
 
 Jeremiah depicts their common experience 
 when he laments his own. 
 
 " O Lord, Thou hast enticed me, and I was enticed, 
 Thou hast overcome me, and hast prevailed ; 
 I am become a laughing-stock all the day, 
 Every one mocketh me. 
 Because the word of the Lord is made 
 A reproach unto me, and a derision, all the day, 
 And if I say : ' I will not make mention of Him 
 Nor speak any more in His name,' 
 Then there is in my heart as it were a burning fire 
 Shut up in my bones. 
 And I weary myself to hold it in, 
 But cannot." 
 
 Yet, it is just here that we witness one 
 of the paradoxes of Jewish history, and, per- 
 haps, of Jewish character. While the Jews 
 persecuted and tormented their Prophets, 
 they none the less, by some peculiar procliv- 
 ity or predestination, respected them and 
 their mission. There was always enough 
 regard for the Prophet to make it possible 
 for him to proclaim his message, no matter 
 
96 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 how bitter a denunciation of the people it 
 carried. The Jews were accustomed to the 
 freedom of prophesying, and they preserved 
 the prophetic castigations as part of their 
 sacred literature. 
 
 This Jewish toleration of the Prophet, 
 and of the ethical critic, attended Jesus. It 
 made it possible for him to go about teaching 
 in the synagogues and the Temple, and ar- 
 guing with scribes and priests, despite the 
 opposition he aroused. As a teacher of re- 
 ligion and morality, no one could interfere 
 with him, even had his teachings been more 
 revolutionary than they were. If later on 
 Jesus died for his utterances or enterprises, 
 it was certainly not because of anything he 
 taught in connection with religion or ethics. 
 
 But Jesus was not merely tolerated by his 
 Jewish contemporaries. By many of them 
 he was treated with love, friendship, and 
 tenderness. 
 
 One of the great errors usually commit- 
 
HIS CONTEMPORARIES 97 
 
 ted Is the assumption that from his Jewish 
 contemporaries Jesus received nothing but 
 hatred and perescution. The Jews are sup- 
 posed to have made his life miserable and 
 continually to have plotted to kill him. Of 
 course, this peculiar notion dates back to 
 the age of the Gospels. It is a strange pe- 
 culiarity of the Gospels that the word 
 " Jews " is constantly used in contrast to 
 Jesus and his followers. But were not the 
 latter also Jews? It betrays the anti-Jewish 
 bias of the Gospels, the fact that they re- 
 ceived their present form when antagonism 
 already existed between the churches and the 
 Jews, as well as an effort to please the non- 
 Jewish world, for whom the Gospels were 
 chiefly written, at the expense of the Jews. 
 This peculiar notion has been perpetuated to 
 this day. The Jews are all supposed to have 
 been arrayed against Jesus. 
 
 As a matter of fact, the contrary is true. 
 For an ideahst, Jesus found more than the 
 
98 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 common measure of appreciation among his 
 Jewish contemporaries. As a teacher, he 
 was not merely tolerated. By many he was 
 lov^ed. First, there were the crowds of 
 which we hear repeatedly as thronging to 
 him and hailing him as teacher and friend. 
 They were all Jews. Then, there were his 
 disciples : they were Jews. Then, there were 
 his intimate friends, apart from those said 
 to have been officially appointed as apostles. 
 And, finally, there were the women who were 
 devoted and ministered to him, and brought 
 their children to be touched and blessed by 
 him. 
 
 Was any teacher ever surrounded by so 
 large a number of loving and loyal friends? 
 And that in spite of the complete surrender 
 he exacted. To be his disciple one had to 
 give up everything, even kith and kin. 
 Everything had to be sacrificed to the ideal. 
 
 " Why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the 
 things which I say? " 
 
HIS CONTEMPORARIES 99 
 
 " Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, 
 shall enter into the kingdom of heaven ; but he that 
 doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven." 
 
 " If any man cometh unto me, and hateth not 
 his own father, and mother, and wife, and children, 
 and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, 
 he cannot be my disciple. Whosoever doth not bear 
 his own cross, and come after me, cannot be my 
 disciple." 
 
 " There is no man that hath left house, or breth- 
 ren, or sisters, or mother, or father, or children, or 
 lands, for my sake, and for the gospel's sake, but he 
 shall receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses, 
 and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and chil- 
 dren, and lands, with persecutions; and in the 
 world to come eternal life." 
 
 Notwithstanding the severe test, the circle 
 of Jesus' friends, apart from his official 
 disciples, is both varied and interesting: 
 Lazarus, Nicodemus, Joseph of Arimathea, 
 Zaccheus; and among the women, Mary and 
 Martha (sisters of Lazarus) , Mary of Mag- 
 dala (out of whom went seven devils), 
 Joanna (wife of Herod's steward), Susanna, 
 
loo A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 Salome : surely an array of friends, loyal and 
 true, as has seldom been excelled; and they 
 were all Jews. To think of this is to realize 
 the foolishness of the assumption that Jesus 
 failed to receive appreciation and love from 
 his Jewish contemporaries. 
 
 " And Jesus went about in all Galilee, teaching in 
 their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the 
 kingdom, and healing all manner of disease and all 
 manner of sickness among the people. And the 
 report of him went forth into all Syria; and they 
 brought unto him all that were sick, holden with 
 diverse sicknesses and torments, possessed with devils, 
 and epileptics, and palsied, and he healed them. 
 And there followed him great multitudes from 
 Galilee and Decapolis and Jerusalem and Judea and 
 from beyond the Jordan." 
 
 Nor is it strange that Jesus should have 
 gained such a following. 
 
 It was due, first of all, to the personal 
 character of his teaching and work. Jesus 
 differed in this respect from the majority of 
 Jewish teachers. The latter, as a rule, were 
 
HIS CONTEMPORARIES loi 
 
 interested in principles, in doctrines, In Ideals; 
 they taught Impersonally: this Is true from 
 the Prophets down. Some regard It as the 
 special merit of the Jewish method — this 
 spiritual and ethical objectivity. Jesus 
 taught personally. He pointed to himself 
 not merely as an illustration of his teaching, 
 but as an incarnation of it. When Moses 
 addressed the Israelites, and wished to bring 
 the thought of God home to them, he said: 
 " The God of your fathers has sent me unto 
 you ! " Jesus, on the other hand, always 
 spoke of his own God, his own Father. It 
 was not a different idea; it was a change of 
 emphasis, and the change was toward the ac- 
 centuation of the personal element, Jesus' 
 own personal interfusion with his teaching. 
 The natural consequence was his personal ap- 
 peal to his hearers, and the personal response 
 of not a few. 
 
 There must be added, of course, the help- 
 ful healing power which Jesus exercised, and 
 
I02 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 which gained for him the gratitude and good- 
 will of many, as well as the ultimate repu- 
 tation of a worker of miracles. 
 
 Moreover, that such a teacher should have 
 won the friendship of Jewish women is also 
 easy to understand, particularly if one thinks 
 of the remarkable part that women played 
 in the Jewish life of the time. 
 
 Some think that the presence of women In 
 the story of Jesus marks a complete change 
 In the position of woman in Israel. That, 
 of course, Is an error. One must not forget 
 the great women of the Old Testament, nor 
 of the Talmud, nor the fact that the pages 
 of Josephus are crowded with references to 
 women, and to their conspicuous part in the 
 religious and political agitations of the time. 
 Jewish women took part in the activity of 
 Jesus, because they were accustomed to take 
 part In the religious and political life of the 
 people. 
 
HIS CONTEMPORARIES 103 
 
 It is these friendships, of both men and 
 women, that put sweetness and satisfaction 
 into the life of Jesus. Always humble and 
 unpretentious, always tolerant and human, 
 always sensible of the mixture of frailty and 
 divinity in human nature, he was grateful for 
 signs of friendship, whatever their form. 
 The hardest thing Jesus had to bear, as 
 Padraic Pearse, the Irish poet, has pointed 
 out, was the scattering of his friends. " Is 
 it not a sad thing," asks the poet, " that every 
 good fellowship is broken up? Even that 
 little league of twelve in Gahlee was broken 
 full soon." Having learnt that it is the lot 
 of the idealist to be misunderstood by most, 
 Jesus was the more grateful for the few who 
 were likely to understand — whose soul was 
 likely to prove a good and fertile soil for the 
 seed he was seeking to sow. 
 
 " Behold, the sower went forth to sow ; and as 
 he sowed, some seeds fell by the way side, and the 
 
I04 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 birds came and devoured them: and others fell upon 
 the rocky places, where they had not much earth: 
 and straightway they sprang up, because they had 
 no deepness of earth: and when the sun was risen, 
 they were scorched; and because they had no root, 
 they withered away. And others fell upon the 
 thorns; and the thorns grew up, and choked them: 
 and others fell upon the good ground, and yielded 
 fruit, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. 
 He that hath ears, let him hear." {Mat. 13 : 3-9.) 
 
 In the parable of the sower, we have a com- 
 plete picture of the reception Jesus expected 
 and found among his contemporaries. 
 *' Know ye not this parable, and how shall 
 ye know all the parables? " 
 
 " Hear then ye the parable of the sower. When 
 any one heareth the word of the kingdom, and 
 understandeth it not, then cometh the evil one, and 
 snatcheth away that which hath been sown in his 
 heart. This is he that was sown by the way side. 
 And he that was sown upon the rocky places, this 
 is he that heareth the word, and straightway with 
 joy receiveth it; yet hath he not root in himself, 
 but endureth for a while; and w^hen tribulation 
 or persecution ariseth because of the word, straight- 
 
HIS CONTEMPORARIES 105 
 
 way he stumbleth. And he that was sown among 
 the thorns, this is he that heareth the word; and 
 the care of the world, and the deceitfulness of 
 riches, choke the word, and he becometh unfruitful. 
 And he that was sown upon the good ground, this 
 is he that heareth the word, and understandeth 
 it; who verily beareth fruit, and bringeth forth, 
 some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty." 
 {Mat. 13: 18-23.) 
 
THE JEWISH MESSIAH IDEA 
 AND JESUS 
 
 *' How did Jesus become the Messiah? 
 Here," says a French author, " is the para- 
 mount, the essential question in the concep- 
 tion of Jesus." 
 
 It is certainly true that with the idea of 
 Jesus as the Messiah is bound up most of his 
 history. Jesus may have been a unique per- 
 sonaHty and a unique religious teacher, but 
 to the great majority of those who have 
 accepted him through the ages he has been 
 chiefly the Messiah, the Christ. Even to- 
 day the question in regard to Jesus upper- 
 most in the average mind is whether or no 
 one acknowledges him as the Messiah. 
 Equally true it is that it is impossible to un- 
 derstand the causes that led to the death of 
 Jesus without considering the Jewish idea 
 io6 
 
MESSIAH IDEA AND JESUS 107 
 
 of the Messiah and the relation of Jesus to 
 It. 
 
 There are those who regard the messianic 
 idea as the most beneficent contribution of 
 the Jew to human Hfe. Others try to prove 
 that the idea of a Messiah, a redeemer, a 
 final restorer and joy-bringer, was not con- 
 fined to the Jewish people, but that, in one 
 form or another, it existed among other 
 early races. Certain it is that nowhere the 
 idea of a Messiah came to play as important 
 a part as in Israel. Among the Jews it 
 assumed a central place in the order of life 
 and faith. Moreover, from Israel it was 
 taken over by others, serving as the core 
 of religion to uncounted millions. With 
 non-Jews the idea has undergone many modi- 
 fications, some of a radical nature. But it 
 originated among the Jews, and among them 
 also it passed through a process of develop- 
 ment before it received the form and the 
 force it possessed in the age of Jesus. 
 
io8 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 It Is Important to understand the Influ- 
 ence the Jewish Idea of the Messiah exercised 
 on Jesus, and the attitude he took to It. But 
 we can hope to understand It only by tracing 
 its development among the Jews. 
 
 The origin of the Idea of a Messiah we 
 find In the teachings and visions of the Jewish 
 Prophets. 
 
 We know that the Prophets were first and 
 last . teachers of Righteousness. As such 
 they frequently had to perform the unpleas- 
 ant task of criticizing their people, of rebuk- 
 ing It severely for moral and spiritual trans- 
 gressions. Sometimes we are told that the 
 Prophets were pohtlcal leaders. But their 
 Interest In pohtlcs was Inspired altogether by 
 religious and ethical motives. To the 
 Prophets the chief concern of life was Right- 
 eousness and their Intercession In the political 
 life of their people was for the purpose of 
 vindicating or advancing the demands of 
 Righteousness. An unrighteous Israel to 
 
MESSIAH IDEA AND JESUS 109 
 
 them was a disloyal and treacherous Israel, 
 for the reason that God was the true king 
 of Israel, and God was a God of Righteous- 
 ness, or of Holiness, who expected the same 
 qualities of His people, and particularly of 
 the rulers, the kings of the people, regarded 
 as God's representatives on earth and 
 anointed as such. For this reason the 
 Prophets were moved to castigate their peo- 
 ple, and even to predict its fall and destruc- 
 tion, because of its unfaithfulness. 
 
 On the other hand, however, the Prophets 
 loved their people and were convinced that 
 God's choice and love, once bestowed upon 
 Israel, were everlasting. 
 
 '* How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? 
 How shall I surrender thee, Israel? 
 My heart Is turned within Me, 
 My compassions are kindled together! " 
 
 God's love was stronger than His wrath. 
 Even after periods of faithlessness and for- 
 saking, there was bound to be a renewal of 
 
no A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 the old love, the old faith, the old cove- 
 nant. 
 
 "And I will betroth thee unto Me for ever; 
 
 Yea, I will betroth thee unto Me, 
 In righteousness, and in justice. 
 
 And in lovingkindness, and in compassion. 
 And I will betroth thee unto Me 
 
 In faithfulness : 
 And thou shalt know the Lord ! " 
 
 This conviction of the Prophets inspired 
 them with hope, and, amid visions of de- 
 struction and desolation, it caused them to 
 raise sanguine eyes to the future, however 
 distant. " In the end of days it shall come 
 to pass " — this vision ever and anon formed 
 for the Prophets a wondrous antidote to 
 the bitterness of the present. 
 
 "In the end of days!" What was to 
 happen in the end of days? In those days 
 there would be a restoration of Israel, a res- 
 toration of the rule of righteousness, a res- 
 toration of the covenant between God and 
 
MESSIAH IDEA AND JESUS iii 
 
 His people, a renewal of the reign of peace, 
 justice, charity, and happiness. The ruler 
 of those days would be the true king, the 
 true representative of God, the true Anointed 
 .(or, Messiah). Before the advent of that 
 messianic age, the world would witness much 
 suffering and tribulation, there would be the 
 day of Judgment — the Day of the Lord — 
 many would be sifted out and only a residue 
 would remain, but the glorious age in the 
 end would compensate for all the troubles 
 and miseries of the past, and, as its blessings 
 will extend to all nations, Israel will by his 
 afflictions and bruises have benefited not only 
 himself but all mankind. It is in some such 
 way as this that the Prophets thought and 
 dreamed of the future, and thus they created 
 the messianic idea, which came to play so 
 vital a part In Jewish history. 
 
 One cannot help realizing that with the 
 Prophets this Idea was almost .unconscious. 
 It was a natural sequel of their belief in 
 
112 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 the future of their people, In the eternity of 
 the Divine Covenant. This Covenant was 
 bound to reassert Itself when the people had 
 suffered sufficiently for — had expiated — 
 Its faithlessness. It was part of the Inevit- 
 able triumph of love, as Hosea conceived It, 
 over temporary estrangement and Infidelity. 
 Granted the faith and the vision of the 
 Prophets, we can see how natural to them 
 was the messianic hope. 
 
 Of course, to each of the Prophets, ac- 
 cording to temperament, certain features of 
 the future stood out most conspicuous and 
 alluring. To Isaiah It was the coming of 
 a perfect ruler, different from the timid, va- 
 cillating, and Inconfident king with whom he 
 dealt at the Court of Jerusalem; to Jeremiah, 
 one of the most spiritual and subjective — 
 one of the most lyrical — of Prophets, It 
 meant the actualization of personal religion, 
 religion as an Inward revelation and power, 
 as a covenant not taught by man to man, but 
 
MESSIAH IDEA AND JESUS 113 
 
 written deep in every man's heart; to MIcah 
 It signified the consummation of the real 
 meaning of religion in all Its moral grandeur 
 and simplicity and the Interlinking of nations 
 In the chains of peace and good will : and so 
 forth for each of the Prophets, according 
 to his particular predisposition and, perhaps, 
 according to the peculiar conditions of his 
 age. But to every one of them the messianic 
 hope and conviction as such was a natural, 
 a wellnigh If not wholly unconscious, result 
 of his faith in the indestructible character 
 of his people and of the Divine Covenant 
 with it. 
 
 In the course of time, however, the mes- 
 sianic idea became the subject of conscious 
 speculation and minute discussion. As peo- 
 ple began to realize that Israel had suffered 
 beyond measure and none the less the perfect 
 age and final restoration had not arrived, 
 they began to employ their minds on the old 
 prophecies. They began to calculate when 
 
114 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 the messianic age finally would come, to spec- 
 ulate as to just what its nature would be, 
 and to look for the man who might bring 
 It about. 
 
 It Is easy to conceive the conditions likely 
 to engender such studies and to stimulate 
 such speculation. Such conditions arose In 
 times of persecution, of warfare, of uncom- 
 mon struggle and distress. No wonder, 
 then, that the first extant result of such spec- 
 ulations we have in the book of Daniel, which 
 was probably written In the days of the Mac- 
 cabean revolt. This book is not only itself 
 an attempt to forecast the messianic age, but 
 it started a whole literature similarly em- 
 ployed. In this literature — the apocalyptic 
 books — and In the subsequent rabbinical 
 writings we find traces of the several forms 
 that the messianic idea gradually assumed in 
 Israel. 
 
 It Is a mistake to think that all Jews had 
 the same idea on the subject. Uniformity 
 
MESSIAH IDEA AND JESUS 115 
 
 was never an Intellectual or spiritual char- 
 acteristic of the Jews. They all hoped for 
 a messianic time; all beheved in it, yearned 
 for it. But as to its character, there was 
 variation. 
 
 There were, at least, three different in- 
 terpretations. First, there was the purely 
 political expectation — that of a perfect 
 emancipator and ruler of Israel. Then, 
 there was the construction of those who, 
 tired of waiting for an earthly paradise, 
 transferred their hopes for the future to 
 heaven, to the hereafter. And, finally, there 
 was the view of those who attached little 
 importance to political schemes and fastened 
 their whole attention on Rehgion and its 
 tasks, regarding them as the whole and sole 
 concern of man. All these groups were 
 hoping for the Kingdom of God, as the mes- 
 sianic age was designated, but to the different 
 groups the Kingdom of God connoted differ- 
 ent things, though no doubt there were some 
 
ii6 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 to whom they meant all these things together. 
 The messianic hope envisaging a perfect 
 ruler we find expressed, for example, in the 
 Psalms of Solomon, which were probably 
 composed about a half century before Jesus. 
 
 " Behold, O Lord, and raise up unto them their 
 
 king, the son of David, 
 At the time in which Thou seest, O God, that he 
 
 may reign over Israel Thy servant. 
 And gird him with strength, that he may shatter 
 
 unrighteous rulers. 
 And that he may purge Jerusalem from nations 
 
 that trample her down to destruction. 
 Wisely, righteously he shall thrust out sinners 
 
 from the inheritance. 
 He shall destroy the pride of the sinner as a 
 
 potter's vessel. 
 With a rod of iron he shall break in pieces all 
 
 their substance. 
 He shall destroy the godless nations with the 
 
 word of his mouth; 
 At his rebuke nations shall flee before him, 
 And he shall reprove sinners for the thoughts of 
 
 their heart. 
 
MESSIAH IDEA AND JESUS 117 
 
 " And he shall gather together a holy people, whom 
 
 he shall lead in righteousness. 
 And he shall judge the tribes of the people that 
 
 has been sanctified by the Lord his God. 
 And he shall not suffer unrighteousness to lodge 
 
 any more in their midst, 
 Nor shall there dwell with them any man that 
 
 knoweth wickedness, 
 For he shall know them, that they are all sons 
 
 of their God. 
 And he shall divide them according to their tribes 
 
 upon the land. 
 And neither sojourner nor alien shall sojourn 
 
 with them any more. 
 He shall judge peoples and nations in the wisdom 
 
 of his righteousness. 
 
 '' And he shall have the heathen nations to serve 
 
 him under his yoke; 
 And he shall glorify the Lord in a place to be 
 
 seen of all the earth; 
 And he shall purge Jerusalem, making it holy as 
 
 of old: 
 So that nations shall come from the ends of the 
 
 earth to see his glory. 
 Bringing as gifts her sons who had fainted. 
 
ii8 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 And to see the glory of the Lord, wherewith God 
 
 hath glorified her. 
 And he shall be a righteous king, taught of God, 
 
 over them, 
 And there shall be no unrighteousness in his days 
 
 in their midst. 
 For all shall be holy and their king the anointed 
 
 of the Lord. 
 For he shall not put his trust in horse and rider 
 
 and bow, 
 Nor shall he multiply for himself gold and silver 
 
 for war. 
 Nor shall he gather confidence from a multitude 
 
 for the day of battle, 
 The Lord Himself is his king, the hope of him 
 
 that is mighty through his hope in God. 
 
 " For he will smite the earth with the word of his 
 
 mouth for ever. 
 He will bless the people of the Lord with wisdom 
 
 and gladness, 
 And he himself will be pure from sin, so that he 
 
 may rule a great people. 
 He will rebuke rulers, and remove sinners by 
 
 the might of his word ; 
 And relying upon his God, throughout his days 
 
 he will not stumble; 
 
MESSIAH IDEA AND JESUS 119 
 
 For God will make him mighty by means of His 
 
 holy spirit, 
 And wise by means of the spirit of understanding, 
 
 with strength and righteousness. 
 And the blessing of the Lord will be with him: 
 
 he will be strong and stumble not; 
 His hope will be in the Lord : who then can pre- 
 vail against him? 
 He will be mighty in his works, and strong in the 
 
 fear of God, 
 He will be shepherding the flock of the Lord 
 
 faithfully and righteously. 
 And will suffer none among them to stumble in 
 
 their pasture. 
 He will lead them aright, 
 And there will be no pride among them that any 
 
 among them should be oppressed. 
 
 This will be the majesty of the king of Israel 
 
 whom God knoweth; 
 He will raise him up over the house of Israel to 
 
 correct him. 
 His words shall be more refined than costly gold, 
 
 the choicest ; 
 In the assemblies he will judge the peoples, the 
 
 tribes of the sanctified. 
 
I20 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 His words shall be like the words of the holy 
 ones in the midst of sanctified peoples. 
 
 Blessed be they that shall be in those days, 
 
 In that they shall see the good fortune of Israel 
 which God shall bring to pass in the gather- 
 ing together of the tribes. 
 
 May the Lord hasten His mercy upon Israel! 
 
 May He deliver us from the uncleanness of un- 
 holy enemies! " 
 
 A good illustration of the messianic de- 
 spair of the material world and a withdrawal 
 into the spiritual realm, we find in the Fourth 
 Book of Ezra, which was probably written 
 in the first century of the Christian era. 
 
 *' For the world has lost its youth, 
 
 The times begin to wax old. 
 
 Now, therefore, set in order thy house, and re- 
 prove thy people; 
 
 Comfort the lowly among them, and instruct 
 those that are wise. 
 
 Now do thou renounce the life that is corruptible, 
 let go from thee the cares of mortality; cast 
 from thee the burdens of man, put off now 
 the weak nature; lay aside thy burdensome 
 cares, and hasten to remove from these times! 
 
MESSIAH IDEA AND JESUS 121 
 
 For still worse evils than those which thou hast 
 seen happen shall yet take place. For the 
 weaker the world grows through age, so much 
 the more shall evils increase upon the dwellers 
 on earth. 
 
 Truth shall withdraw further off, and falsehood 
 be nigh at hand." 
 
 Again : 
 
 *' Behold the days come, and it shall be. 
 
 When I am about to draw nigh to visit the dwell- 
 ers upon earth, 
 
 And when I require from the doers of iniquity the 
 penalty of their iniquity; 
 
 And when the Age which is about to pass away 
 shall be sealed, then will I show these signs: 
 the books shall be opened before the face of 
 the firmament, and all see together. 
 
 And one-year-old children shall speak with their 
 voices ; pregnant women shall bring forth un- 
 timely births at three or four months, and 
 these shall live and dance. And suddenly 
 shall the sown places appear unsown, and the 
 full storehouses shall suddenly be found 
 empty. And the trumpet shall sound aloud, 
 at which all men, when they hear it, shall 
 be struck with sudden fear. And at that 
 
122 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 time friends shall war against friends like 
 enemies, the earth shall be stricken with fear 
 together with the dwellers thereon, and the 
 springs of the fountains shall stand still so 
 that for three hours they shall not run. 
 
 And it shall be whosoever shall have survived all 
 these things that I have foretold unto thee, 
 he shall be saved and shall see my salvation 
 and the end of my world. And the men 
 who have been taken up, who have not tasted 
 death from their birth, shall appear. Then 
 shall the heart of the inhabitants of the world 
 be changed, and be converted to a different 
 spirit. 
 For evil shall be blotted out, and deceit extin- 
 guished ; 
 
 Faithfulness shall flourish, and corruption be van- 
 quished ; 
 
 And truth which for so long a time has been 
 without fruit, shall be made manifest." 
 
 Finally, in the Book of Enoch, composed 
 in the first century before Jesus, we have 
 a good picture of the heavenly Messianic 
 Kingdom. 
 
MESSIAH IDEA AND JESUS 123 
 
 " And there I saw another vision, the dwelling- 
 places of the holy, 
 And the resting-places of the righteous. 
 
 " Here mine eyes saw their dwellings with His right- 
 eous angels. 
 And their resting-places with the holy. 
 
 " And they petitioned and interceded and prayed 
 for the children of men, 
 And righteousness flowed before them as water, 
 And mercy like dew upon the earth: 
 Thus it is amongst them for ever and ever. 
 
 And in that place mine eyes saw the Elect One 
 of righteousness and of faith, 
 
 And I saw his dwelling-place under the wings 
 of the Lord of Spirits, 
 
 And righteousness shall prevail in his days. 
 
 And the righteous and elect shall be without num- 
 ber before Him for ever and ever. 
 
 And all the righteous and elect before Him shall 
 be strong as fiery lights, 
 
 And their mouth shall be full of blessing. 
 
124 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 " And their lips extol the name of the Lord of 
 
 Spirits, 
 And righteousness before Him shall never fail, 
 And uprightness shall never fail before Him. 
 There I wished to dwell, 
 
 And my spirit longed for that dwelling-place: 
 And there heretofore hath been my portion. 
 For so has it been established concerning me before 
 
 the Lord of Spirits." 
 
 Now, the thing to bear in mind Is that 
 the age of Jesus was a time when all these 
 Interpretations of the messianic idea were 
 found side by side and fought for recogni- 
 tion. For that there was ample reason. 
 For centuries the Jews had suffered all kinds 
 of political persecution and tribulation. One 
 after the other, their own rulers failed them, 
 their most brilliant hopes were extinguished. 
 The Maccabean dynasty, first hailed as mes- 
 sianic, deteriorated disgracefully. The reign 
 of Herod was a mixture of cruelty and scan- 
 dal. The rule of Rome was Intolerable. It 
 was a time of Intrigue and tyranny. No 
 
MESSIAH IDEA AND JESUS 125 
 
 wonder the hope for the messianic day be- 
 came intense, and no wonder different men 
 held different ideas as to what it would be. 
 Some waited for the poHtical redeemer; 
 others said, Oh, no, it means scorn of mate- 
 rial things and engrossment in spiritual real- 
 ities, while still others turned their eyes to 
 heaven, hoping there to find reward, har- 
 mony, and peace. 
 
 A time came, some years after Jesus, when 
 the Jews grew weary of speculation and left 
 the coming of the Messiah to God. The 
 failure of numerous attempts at poUtical 
 emancipation had worn them out. There 
 was nothing to do but wait for God's own 
 time. Faith took the place of human effort. 
 Indeed, certain rabbis declared it sinful to 
 try by human effort to hasten the advent of 
 the Messiah. " I adjure you, O daughters 
 of Jerusalem," they quoted from The Song 
 of Songs, " that ye awaken not, nor stir up 
 love, until it please." This they interpreted 
 
126 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 as a Divine protest against hastening the 
 Messiah by human means. " When Divine 
 Justice considers the time ripe, I shall cause 
 the day of Love to come with many voices, 
 and I shall not delay." Such redemption, 
 held the rabbis, would be permanent. " Said 
 the Holy One blessed be He, Hitherto ye 
 have been redeemed by flesh and blood, and 
 ye have been returned time and again to 
 servitude In exile, but in the days to come 
 you shall be redeemed by the Holy One with 
 an everlasting redemption after which there 
 shall be no servitude. As it Is written: 
 
 ' And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, 
 And come with singing unto Zion, 
 And everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; 
 They shall obtain gladness and joy, 
 And sorrow and sighing shall flee away ; ' 
 and also : 
 
 ** ' Israel shall be helped by the Lord with an 
 everlasting redemption.' " 
 
 The relegation of the Messianic day to the 
 
 remote realm of faith, however, occurred 
 
MESSIAH IDEA AND JESUS 127 
 
 after the age of Jesus. In the days of Jesus, 
 the different currents of messianic expecta- 
 tion met together — they formed the mes- 
 sianic whirlpool of the times. 
 
 What attitude did Jesus take to those 
 ideas? Of one thing, no doubt, he was con- 
 vinced from the outset, namely, that the king- 
 dom of God was at hand. It was this teach- 
 ing of John the Baptist that inspired him to 
 enter upon his public ministry, having hith- 
 erto Hved and taught more or less privately 
 — preferably privately. (He never quite 
 outgrew the reluctance to reach " the multi- 
 tude.") When he began to teach broad- 
 cast, this was his message: "The time is 
 fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand: 
 repent ye, and beheve the good tidings!" 
 Nor did his message fail of a hearing. For 
 many reasons he drew multitudes. His own 
 personality, as well as the temper of the 
 times, gained him hearers. 
 
128 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 Ere long, however, he was called upon to 
 answer two questions of vital import. First, 
 what was to be the nature of the kingdom 
 that was at hand, as he said it was? And, 
 secondly, what was his own relation to the 
 kingdom that he forecast, his own place in 
 it? It is easy enough to ridicule the people 
 of the time for having asked such questions, 
 to scorn them as men of little faith, and such- 
 like; but no reasonable person will deny that 
 they were most natural questions from people 
 as vitally concerned as were the Jews of the 
 time. 
 
 Jesus himself felt that he had to answer 
 those questions. He had to decide — not 
 only for others, but for himself. A private 
 person might harbor vague notions about 
 vital questions. But the public teacher may 
 not. He must decide. It was the necessity 
 of decision on that vital point of his ministry 
 that created the crisis in the life of Jesus. 
 
 He began to wonder — to reasfon — to 
 
MESSIAH IDEA AND JESUS 129 
 
 ask others. What did the Messiah mean? 
 What did the Kingdom mean? And what 
 was he himself with respect to It? "Who 
 do men say that I am? Who say ye that 
 I am?" Simon Peter (one of his closest 
 disciples) answered, " Thou art the Mes- 
 siah ! " We do not know whether that an- 
 swer at first pleased Jesus or no, or whether 
 the suggestion that he was the Messiah first 
 came from his disciples, or whether he made 
 It to them. Certain It Is that he was reticent 
 about It and asked his disciples at first to 
 say nothing about It. 
 
 " And Jesus went forth, and his disciples, into the 
 village of Caesarea Philippi: and in the way he 
 asked his disciples, saying unto them, Who do men 
 say that I am? And they told him, saying, John 
 the Baptist: and others, Elijah; but others, One 
 of the prophets. And he asked them, But who say 
 ye that I am? Peter answereth and saith unto 
 him, Thou art the Christ. And he charged them 
 that they should tell no man of him." {Mark 8, 
 27-30) 
 
I30 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 When finally Jesus reached a decision, it 
 was true to the ruling thought of his life. 
 It was spiritual. The Kingdom of God, he 
 decided, was not political, it was not of this 
 world: It was spiritual. 
 
 " And when he was demanded of the Pharisees 
 when the kingdom of God should come, he an- 
 swered them and said: The kingdom of God 
 Cometh not with observation : neither shall they say, 
 Lo! here; or Lo! there. For, behold, the kingdom 
 of God is within you ! " 
 
 The Kingdom of God is already here — 
 for those that understand, and for those that 
 do not understand, why, one must pray for 
 its coming. " Thy kingdom come. Thy will 
 be done, as in heaven, so on earth!" 
 As for himself, he decided, if to realize in- 
 wardly the kingdom of God meant to be the 
 Messiah, the Anointed of God, God's Son, 
 he was the Messiah. 
 
 " And he began to teach them, that the Son of 
 man must suffer many things, and be rejected by 
 
MESSIAH IDEA AND JESUS 131 
 
 the elders, and the chief priests, and the scribes, 
 and be killed, and after three days rise again. And 
 he spake the saying openly. And Peter took him, 
 and began to rebuke him. But he turning about, 
 and seeing his disciples, rebuked Peter, and saith. 
 Get thee behind me, Satan: for thou mindest not 
 the things of God, but the things of men. And he 
 called unto him the multitude with his disciples, 
 and said unto them, If any man would come after 
 me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, 
 and follow me. For whosoever would save his 
 life shall lose it; and whosoever shall lose his life 
 for my sake and the gospel's shall save it. For what 
 doth it profit a man to gain the whole world, and 
 forfeit his life? " {Mark 8, 31-36) 
 
 No doubt it meant a great relief for Jesus 
 to harmonize his inmost convictions with the 
 messianic passion of the age. But, on the 
 other hand, it involved him in the most tragic 
 misunderstanding of his career. If his other 
 teachings were so often misunderstood — at 
 times even by his closest disciples — how 
 much more likely was this one to be misun- 
 derstood, touching as it did the most sensi- 
 
132 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 tive spot In the life of the age ! The multi- 
 tude that had been fired to believe that here 
 at last was a true deliverer, the Messiah they 
 had hoped for, turned away from him, dis- 
 appointed, disillusioned, embittered. One 
 of his own disciples turned against him — 
 betrayed him. On the other hand, the 
 rulers, hearing that he had proclaimed him- 
 self Messiah, and having had experience with 
 other self-styled messiahs, decided to hand 
 him over to the Roman authorities, lest the 
 whole people be charged with rebeUion. 
 They were not in a mood — perhaps they 
 had no taste — for fine spiritual analysis. 
 Thus, Jesus lost his life in the messianic mael- 
 strom of his age. 
 
THE JEWS AND THE DEATH OF 
 JESUS 
 
 Professor Graetz has said that Jesus is 
 the only human being of whom it may be 
 said without exaggeration that he achieved 
 more by his death than by his Ufe. 
 
 It is certainly remarkable to what extent 
 the world's attention has been focused on 
 the death, rather than the Ufe, of Jesus. 
 Among Christians there is no doubt a much 
 larger number of such as regard the death 
 of Jesus as the core of their faith than of 
 those who concentrate on his life and teach- 
 ings. Moreover, none will deny that a great 
 deal of the world's feehng against the Jews 
 has been fed by the behef that they were 
 responsible for the death of Jesus. It is 
 paradoxical, but true that even those who 
 treat the self-sacrifice of Jesus as essential 
 133 
 
134 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 to the universal scheme of salvation, are 
 yet hostile to the Jews, because they are held 
 to have brought about that self-sacrifice. It 
 Is therefore important to determine the part 
 that the Jews had In the death of Jesus and 
 also to what It was due. 
 
 Unfortunately, It Is far from easy to do 
 so. If most of the Incidents of Jesus' life 
 are known but vaguely. If the greater part 
 of his life Is practically unknown, what we 
 know about the causes that led up to his 
 death is equally uncertain and based to a 
 large extent on conjecture. And this for 
 the very simple reason that the accounts we 
 possess are obscure, conflicting, and incom- 
 plete. 
 
 It Is peculiar and regrettable that there is 
 no reference to Jesus In the literature of his 
 own age. Neither his life nor his death Is 
 mentioned In the Talmudic portions of his 
 period. What references there are In the 
 Talmud to Jesus originated later on, and 
 
THE DEATH OF JESUS 135 
 
 are In themselves so obscure and doubtful as 
 to be of very little historic value. There 
 Is no reference to Jesus In the works of the 
 Jewish philosopher Phllo, nor In the histori- 
 cal writings of Josephus, though both lived 
 in the first century, the former In Alexandria 
 and the latter In Jerusalem and In Rome, 
 and both were well-informed. It Is well- 
 known that one sentence on the subject In 
 Josephus Is universally considered a later 
 interpolation, made no doubt by a Christian 
 writer eager to remedy the obnoxious omis- 
 sion. Whatever the cause, the silence of 
 contemporary Jewish literature in regard to 
 Jesus is unfortunate for the study of the 
 subject. 
 
 Our only source of Information on the 
 death of Jesus are the Gospels. But the 
 accounts contained in them vary. There are 
 differences between the Synoptic Gospels, on 
 the one hand, and the Gospel of John, on 
 the other. Minor differences occur even In 
 
136 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 the Synoptic Gospels, particularly In the de- 
 scription of the trials of Jesus. Evidently 
 the accounts were written many years after 
 the Crucifixion. None of the writers had 
 himself been present at the trials, at least 
 not at the Jewish trial, though perhaps John 
 (if he was the beloved disciple) was present 
 at the Crucifixion. What they wrote about 
 the Jewish trial of Jesus — or the circum- 
 stances leading up to the Crucifixion — was 
 based on hearsay, opinion, and tradition. 
 By the time they committed their accounts 
 to writing, moreover, the church had already 
 been founded, dogmas on the subject of the 
 character and the fate of Jesus had been 
 formulated, and many a controversy between 
 the Jews and the founders of the new sect 
 had taken place. The narration of the 
 death of Jesus no longer was a mere question 
 of history, but of religious Interpretation and 
 argument. What wonder that the diverse 
 accounts should be more or less at variance, 
 
THE DEATH OF JESUS 137 
 
 obscure, and incomplete, and that we of to- 
 day should find it difficult to determine just 
 what really happened to bring about the 
 death of Jesus? 
 
 One thing seems certain. Jesus, within a 
 few days before his death, suffered a most 
 complete change of fortune. I have had oc- 
 casion to point out that the strange thing 
 in the Ufe of Jesus is not that he encountered 
 so much misunderstanding and hostility, but 
 rather that he enjoyed such great popularity 
 with the multitude. 
 
 Jesus was an idealist. He interpreted life 
 in terms of spirit. He scorned and smashed 
 the idols of the masses. Such a man could 
 scarcely hope for universal recognition and 
 approval. Jesus himself felt it. He was 
 constantly haunted by the apprehension that 
 even those that hung on his lips did not really 
 perceive the inner meaning of his words. 
 Time and again he questioned his closest 
 disciples as to whether they understood what 
 
138 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 he was trying to say, and more than once 
 disciples left him as a result of his scrutiny. 
 All this is perfectly in accord with the usual 
 fate of the idealist. 
 
 The strange thing about Jesus, however, 
 is that he should have gained such marked 
 popularity. It is an indication of what 
 power of attraction his personaHty possessed, 
 and, also, of the strong appeal of his mes- 
 sage to his age, with its unusual spiritual 
 and political unrest. This popularity seems 
 to have increased particularly in the closing 
 days of his life. 
 
 Perhaps it was due to his self-association 
 with the messianic movement. No matter 
 what construction he put on the word Mes- 
 siah, and on the idea of the Kingdom of 
 Heaven : those were the things the people 
 dreamed of, desired, and discussed more than 
 any other, and the self-identification of a 
 young, enthusiastic, and cherished leader 
 with them was bound to enhance his popu- 
 
THE DEATH OF JESUS 139 
 
 larlty. Was he thinking of one thing when 
 he spoke of the Kingdom of Heaven, and 
 was the multitude thinking of another? 
 That is what formed the tragedy. But that 
 identification with the Messianic thought in- 
 creased his hold on the people, we cannot 
 doubt. 
 
 Jesus' last entry into Jerusalem was 
 triumphal. It was different from that of 
 the Galilean dreamer and enthusiast of for- 
 mer days. It was that of a hero ! The 
 people waved palm branches before him and 
 his followers, and hailed him leader. 
 
 *' And many spread their garments upon the way; 
 and others branches, which they had cut from the 
 fields. And they that went before, and they that 
 followed, cried, Hosanna ; Blessed is he that cometh 
 in the name of the Lord: Blessed Is the kingdom 
 that cometh, the kingdom of our father David: 
 Hosanna in the highest! " 
 
 Jesus was at the height of his power. It 
 was on the Sunday before Passover. The 
 
I40 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 city was full of pilgrims from all over the 
 country. Pilate, the governor, was there 
 with his soldiers, on the lookout for signs of 
 revolt, which had grown rather frequent. 
 Jesus was more outspoken and aggressive 
 than ever. He taught In the synagogue of 
 the city and In the Temple; he not only de- 
 nounced the merchants and moneychangers 
 that had their stalls In the Temple, but drove 
 them out; he affirmed his authority against 
 priests and scribes : In every way he showed 
 that he was In a state of excitement and the 
 hero of the hour. 
 
 Yet, within a couple of days, all this Is 
 changed. His own exultation gives way to 
 depression; he reahzes that the end of his 
 earthly career Is near; he catches wind of 
 a plot forming against him, with one of his 
 own disciples betraying him; and forthwith 
 he finds himself deserted by the multitude 
 that had but just hailed his coming; his ac- 
 tivity Is stopped, he Is seized, abused, and 
 
THE DEATH OF JESUS 141 
 
 crucified, with the loud approval of the multi- 
 tude. 
 
 What was behind this terrible change? 
 What was the cause of it all? The answer 
 we must seek in the accounts of the Gospels 
 concerning the trial of Jesus. Were these 
 accounts clear and consistent, we should know 
 definitely why the people suddenly turned 
 against Jesus and why a few days after 
 his triumphal entry into Jerusalem he was 
 crucified. But there's the rub. The stories 
 of the Gospels are inadequate and confus- 
 ing. 
 
 Who tried Jesus? When was he tried? 
 Was he tried by the full Sanhedrin of sev- 
 enty-one, or by a smaller Sanhedrin of twen- 
 ty-three, or was there no trial by the Sanhe- 
 drin at all? Was he tried by the Sanhedrin 
 at night, or in early morning? What were 
 the charges against him, and by whom were 
 they brought? Of what was he convicted 
 by the Jewish court — of caUing himself 
 
142 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 Messiah, of blaspheming, or of what ? Was 
 he crucified on the eve of Passover or on the 
 first day of Passover? 
 
 The very fact that there has been no end 
 of debate of these crucial points shows how 
 doubtful and deficient are the accounts of 
 the Gospels. The author of the latest book 
 on the subject reaches the conclusion that 
 the Sanhedrin merely acted as an investigat- 
 ing body in regard to the charges brought 
 against Jesus, whereas the actual trial took! 
 place before Pilate, who, as Roman gover- 
 nor, had sole right of jurisdiction and punish- 
 ment, and that both the investigation and 
 the trial, as well as the execution, were per- 
 fectly legal and In accord with Roman pro- 
 cedure. But, on the other hand, is It not 
 noteworthy that the Gospel of John, which 
 is particularly full In the narration of the 
 last scenes of Jesus' life, has nothing to say 
 about a trial by a Jewish court? It is ex- 
 
THE DEATH OF JESUS 143 
 
 tremely difficult to draw definite information 
 from the Gospels about the Jewish trial of 
 Jesus. 
 
 What we know of Jewish legal procedure 
 and religious observance makes it most im- 
 probable that Jesus was tried by the Sanhe- 
 drin. First, it would have been most unusual 
 that the Sanhedrin should have been sum- 
 moned in the middle of the night. Secondly, 
 no man could have been tried for his Hfe at 
 a night session, unless the trial had gone on 
 during the preceding day. Thirdly, the trial 
 and the Crucifixion are supposed to have 
 taken place on the night and the day of the 
 first day of Passover, which is quite out of 
 the question in view of the hoHness of the 
 day. The Jewish trial described in the Gos- 
 pels is so full of irregularities and improba- 
 bilities that we may well assume that it repre- 
 sents a later assumption rather than an actual 
 fact. 
 
144 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 On the other hand, it seems most probable 
 that Jesus was seized by the Roman govern- 
 ment and tried and executed by the orders 
 of Pilate. Indeed, this is all that Tacitus, 
 in his Annals, written in the closing years 
 of the first century, has to say about the 
 death of Jesus. Referring to the Christians, 
 he says that they are called thus from Christ, 
 who was executed by Pilate in the reign of 
 Tiberius. 
 
 When the Gospels, however, were com- 
 posed, Pilate had become an almost pious 
 figure — a wellnigh Christian soul : efforts 
 were made to exculpate him as far as possi- 
 ble, to minimize his share in the Crucifixion. 
 He is represented as trying to release Jesus, 
 and even his wife is brought in, pleading with 
 him to the same effect. He is made to wash 
 his hands, Jewish fashion, as a symbol of 
 his rejection of all responsibility. 
 
 There can be little doubt that this coloring 
 of the story of the Crucifixion was inspired 
 
THE DEATH OF JESUS 145 
 
 by consideration for the Roman world and 
 by animosity to the Jews who so resolutely 
 declined to accept the new religion. 
 
 In reality, there seems no reason to doubt 
 that Pilate, hearing of Jesus, regarded him 
 as a new claimant to the part of Messiah, 
 of the kind he had learnt to fear as chiefs of 
 rebellion. As it was the season of Passover, 
 when the city was full of pilgrims and of 
 national enthusiasm, his fears grew the 
 worse. He, therefore, ordered the arrest of 
 the new leader and his immediate trial and 
 execution. 
 
 As portrayed in the Gospels, one would 
 think that Pilate was on the one hand a 
 saint, and, on the other, a coward. As a 
 saint, he discerns the innocence of Jesus and 
 tries to save him; as a coward, he is afraid 
 of the Jews, and yields to them. This de- 
 piction is altogether out of accord with the 
 characterization of Pilate given by contem- 
 porary historians. Both Philo and Josephus 
 
146 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 describe him as cruel, tyrannical, and arbi- 
 trary, and In most sacred matters heedless 
 of the traditions and pleadings of the Jew- 
 ish people. His rule of Palestine often led 
 to outbreaks and he did not hesitate to order 
 massacres of the people. It Is altogether Im- 
 probable that he should have so far deviated 
 from his customary conduct as to plead for 
 the release of a man charged with rebellion, 
 or that he should have been unable to re- 
 lease him had he chosen so to do. Of course, 
 it is quite likely that Jesus was denounced 
 to Pilate, or that Pilate was aided, by some 
 of the Jewish rulers. The priests and offi- 
 cers of the Jews had reason to oppose Jesus 
 and to fear his activity. But the actual ar- 
 rest and trial of Jesus were no doubt con- 
 ducted by Pilate In accordance with his usual 
 methods. 
 
 This assumption Is confirmed by the fol- 
 lowing circumstances. 
 
 First, the captors of Jesus are said not to 
 
THE DEATH OF JESUS 147 
 
 have known him personally, and it required 
 the betrayal of one of his disciples to Identify 
 him. Is It possible that a man who had 
 grown so well known In Jerusalem, should 
 have remained a total stranger to Jewish 
 officers? It Is possible, however. If those 
 arresting him were Roman officers come to 
 the city for the occasion. 
 
 Secondly, the charge on which Pilate tries 
 Jesus Is that of being the Messiah — the 
 King of the Jews. It Is the only question 
 that Interested Pilate. On the other hand, 
 it could not form the cause for a criminal 
 trial from the Jewish point of view. It 
 might have been thought madness. It was no 
 crime, to call oneself a king or to represent 
 oneself as redeemer of one's people. 
 
 Thirdly, the form of Jesus' execution was 
 Roman, not Jewish. The Jews did not know 
 of crucifixion until the Romans brought It 
 to Palestine. Varus, according to Josephus, 
 crucified two thousand Jews at once, while 
 
148 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 Titus is said to have crucified so many that 
 " room was wanting for the crosses, and 
 crosses for the bodies." What the Jews 
 tried to do was to mitigate the horrors of 
 crucifixion by allaying its pain and hastening 
 death. 
 
 Fourthly, the Crucifixion was attended by 
 jeers of Roman soldiers, mocking Jesus for 
 playing the Messiah, while on the Cross 
 Pilate ordered the inscription : Jesus of Naz- 
 areth, King of the Jews, which he insisted 
 on keeping there even when the Jews pro- 
 tested against it and its implications. 
 
 Amid the uncertainties one thing stands 
 out, namely, the spirit in which Jesus met 
 both his trial and his death. Whatever 
 doubts and speculations the Messiah-idea 
 may have engendered within him, whatever 
 futile efforts he may have made as leader of 
 the people, at the last moment his old self 
 reasserted itself. He felt afresh, and more 
 
THE DEATH OF JESUS 149 
 
 strongly than ever, that his kingdom was not 
 of this world, that true power was not ma- 
 terial but spiritual, and that he was at one 
 with his Father. Above all, he felt again 
 what his years of teaching had taught him 
 that it was useless to try to explain spiritual 
 truth to such as did not perceive it by them- 
 selves. When Pilate questions him about 
 his being King of the Jews, Jesus asks for 
 the source of his information. " Knowest 
 thou it of thyself or have others told thee 
 it of me?" It was not irony, as is com- 
 monly assumed: it was a reflection of Jesus' 
 inmost thought. The high-priest is an- 
 swered in the same way. 
 
 " The high priest therefore asked Jesus of his 
 disciples and of his teaching. Jesus answered him, 
 I have spoken openly to the world; I ever taught 
 in synagogues, and in the temple, where all the 
 Jews come together; and in secret spake I nothing. 
 Why askest thou me? ask them that have heard 
 me, what I spake unto them: behold, these know 
 the things which I said." 
 
I50 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 One's own knowledge is the only knowl- 
 edge that counts. It Is the only knowledge 
 that reveals the truth. And his last word is 
 that those that know the truth shall hear him. 
 Only his agony wrings from him the cry: 
 " My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken 
 me? " But He is his God still. And it cer- 
 tainly is in tune with his whole character 
 and course — with his sad realization of 
 people's Imperfect understanding, his exalta- 
 tion of the spirit, his ever-present sense of 
 union with his Father — to close his life with 
 the words: '' Father, forgive them: for 
 they know not what they do," and, with his 
 last breath, to call aloud those fine Hebrew 
 words: "Father, into Thy hands I com- 
 mend my spirit ! " 
 
 " Father." 
 
 " They know not." 
 
 " Into Thy hands I commend my spirit." 
 In these sentences we have a summary of the 
 life and death of Jesus. 
 
JESUS AND JEWISH HISTORY 
 
 Often one wonders why Jesus has played 
 so small a part in Jewish history. In the 
 Jewish literature of his own time there is no 
 mention of him, and such references as are 
 found in later talmudic passages are meager 
 and of doubtful value. They are vague al- 
 lusions to Jesus, or traditions about him, 
 rather than direct citations of his work and 
 teachings. Some people grow indignant at 
 the thought that those sparse allusions are 
 not very appreciative or reverential. But 
 it is foolish wrath. Those passages in them- 
 selves were the result of controversy and 
 bitterness, and are no more hostile to Jesus 
 than many a passage found in the Gospels 
 and attributed to Jesus (as the result no 
 doubt of similar conditions) are to the Jews. 
 People also wonder why in subsequent ages 
 151 
 
152 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 the Jews had made so Httle of Jesus, seeing 
 that, after all, he was one of their own, 
 and had so continually addressed himself to 
 them and their spiritual welfare. This ques- 
 tion we can answer only by taking a look at 
 the course of Jewish history, insofar as Jesus 
 is related to it. 
 
 One thing must be clear to any one at 
 all acquainted with the history of Jewish 
 thought. Jesus could not possibly have been 
 excluded from Jewish history, nor ignored 
 by it, for the mere reason that he was a re- 
 former, or that he thought and taught about 
 religion in a way different from others, nor 
 because he criticized his contemporaries. In 
 that respect, he was not so unique among the 
 Jews as to have incurred the punishment of 
 silence at the hands of his contemporaries or 
 of history. 
 
 The Jews believed in individuality of 
 teaching, in freedom of expression, and, 
 
JESUS AND JEWISH HISTORY 153 
 
 though they may not have accepted a teach- 
 er's opinion, they listened to what he had 
 to say. The whole Talmud owes its origin 
 and bulk to this very characteristic, and to 
 the extent to which it was applied. 
 
 Even excommunication for overmuch In- 
 dividuality of expression or eccentricity of 
 ^practice could not have removed Jesus from 
 the history of his time. There are instances 
 of some of the greatest scholars of the Tal- 
 mud being excommunicated by their col- 
 leagues; one of the most eminent and most 
 popular of them all — Eleazer ben Hyr- 
 canos, in the first half of the second century 
 — died excommunicate; yet their names were 
 not blotted out, nor did they cease being cited 
 afterwards. Over three hundred and thirty 
 utterances of Eleazer ben Hyrcanos are 
 cited In the MIshnah, the basic portion of 
 the Talmud. His Illustrious contemporary, 
 Akabiah ben Mahalalel, also was excommu- 
 nicated for not yielding to the majority, 
 
154 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 which at that particular time formed a new 
 rule. 
 
 Neither could Jesus' self-declaration as 
 Messiah have blotted his name from the an- 
 nals of his people. Others have called them- 
 selves Messiah, and Jewish history has taken 
 account of them and their followers, even 
 though their enterprises and pretensions 
 proved pitiable failures. When in the sec- 
 ond century Bar Kochba announced himself 
 as the Messiah and led a revolt against 
 Rome, Akiba, one of the foremost rabbis of 
 the age (and no doubt others also), sup- 
 ported him — and though Bar Kochba's mes- 
 siahship collapsed, Jewish history has not 
 made it a reproach against Akiba that he 
 supported the temporary leader. There are 
 similar instances in later Jewish history. 
 
 If Jesus's appearance and disappearance 
 were followed by silence, it was due to two 
 causes. 
 
JESUS AND JEWISH HISTORY 155 
 
 First of all, to the character of his own 
 personality. He himself was a silent man. 
 He was not a man of the multitude, save 
 through the necessity of his ideal and the 
 peculiar circumstances of his age that thrust 
 him into the public current. " Seeing the 
 multitudes he went up into a mountain." 
 *' Now when Jesus saw great multitudes 
 about him, he gave commandment to depart 
 unto the other side." Jesus was a man of 
 silence, and such a man is followed by silence 
 when he leaves the world. As soon as the 
 multitude observed that he was different than 
 they, that his words were different, that his 
 thoughts and purposes were different, they 
 turned away and left him to himself. He 
 was none of them, and little did they care 
 about finding out what he really meant. As 
 for the schools and their leaders, he never 
 had been one of them; though in teaching 
 he used at times their methods, he was apart 
 from them : no wonder they did not cite him. 
 
156 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 That was the first cause of silence. The 
 second lay in the conditions which put Jesus 
 forth as the founder and protagonist of a 
 new faith. 
 
 It is well to remember that Jesus died a 
 Jew, and not a Christian. His last prayers 
 were Jewish, hallowed by Jewish tradition 
 and usage. " My God, my God, why hast 
 Thou forsaken me? " " Into Thy hands I 
 commend my Spirit ! " He died a Jew, hav- 
 ing no idea that he was destined to be called 
 the founder of a new faith, to supersede or 
 destroy his own. That this part fell to him 
 was due entirely to the small group of men 
 and women that had followed him and stood 
 by him to the last, because they loved him. 
 
 If Christianity is a religion of love, as is 
 commonly affirmed, it is such for no reason 
 so truly as that which brought it into being. 
 Lovers of Jesus, in the literal sense, formed 
 the first band of Christians; simple folk, who 
 had followed Jesus with their hearts, rather 
 
JESUS AND JEWISH HISTORY 157 
 
 than their heads, who probably knew little, 
 and cared less, about the doctrinal implica- 
 tions of his utterances, but who gave them- 
 selves to him because they loved him for 
 what he was, for himself, loved him with a 
 love that passeth understanding. And he 
 loved them for this very simplicity of trust, 
 for this very lack of pretense, having real- 
 ized the emptiness of pretense and the hypo- 
 crisy of priestly and academic pomp. 
 
 It is those simple, loving, devoted men 
 and women — some of whom had silently 
 wept at the Cross — that were first of all re- 
 sponsible for the perpetuation of the name of 
 Jesus. His death made their attachment the 
 more intense. That also is part of love. 
 True love is deepened and strengthened by 
 misfortune. True love is subHmated by suf- 
 fering. It feeds on tragedy, which is the 
 grave of false love. 
 
 ** For love is strong as Death, 
 A very flame of the Lord ! '* 
 
158 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 The multitude — the mob — that had waved 
 palm branches before Jesus when they took 
 him for a king who was going to make them 
 free and happy, deserted him when they saw 
 him a martyr. But those that truly loved 
 him, loved him the more for his Passion. 
 Love said he was the true Messiah, the suf- 
 fering Messiah, the self-sacrificing Messiah. 
 It was this band of loyal men and women 
 that thus saved the name of Jesus from ob- 
 livion. Whether Jesus would have ap- 
 proved their conception of him as the Mes- 
 siah, or whether it meant to them what 
 later It came to mean. Is quite apart. It was 
 they who made the name of Jesus immortal. 
 Naturally their number grew, but the most 
 important addition to their ranks they gained 
 when joined by Paul. 
 
 Paul was the intellectual founder of the 
 Christian religion. His adoption of his pe- 
 culiar theory about Jesus and the nature of 
 
JESUS AND JEWISH HISTORY 159 
 
 religion, marked one of the most significant 
 moments in the spiritual history of the 
 world. Paul was an intellectual giant. 
 Had he not founded the Christian church, 
 he might have become one of the greatest 
 rabbis. He had had the training of a rabbi, 
 had lived the life of one, and his entire 
 method of teaching and debate was that of 
 the brilliant rabbis of the time. He is all 
 intellect, though he speaks of love and grace. 
 With all the weapons of the Intellect, he 
 fights against the intellect in Religion. At 
 first, it would appear, that he was a zealous 
 opponent of the followers of Jesus. Contact 
 with them, though hostile, probably led him 
 to marvel at their devotion and thus to pon- 
 der on Jesus, and finally to his own conclusion 
 about Jesus. 
 
 Paul's conclusion was that Jesus was the 
 Messiah, that after the Crucifixion he was 
 resurrected, that his resurrection was a sign 
 of his messiahship, and that Jesus thus had 
 
i6o A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 become the savior of the world. To believe 
 In Jesus was to be saved. It was the new 
 miracle, which heralded the abrogation of 
 the old Law. The old Law was dead. It 
 had become nothing but a stumbling-block. 
 Faith was to take Its place, and namely faith 
 in Jesus. Whoever believed In Jesus, was 
 saved, no matter whether he observed the 
 Law or no. Jesus Is first and last. Noth- 
 ing else counts. Once Paul had embraced 
 this theory, he brought to bear the power 
 of his intellect and the brilliancy of his style 
 on the task of persuading others. He be- 
 came the fanatic exponent of his Idea. He 
 traveled from place to place In pursuit of 
 converts. And it was by him and his disci- 
 ples that many Christian communities were 
 founded both In Palestine and elsewhere — 
 all the way to Athens and Rome. 
 
 It was perfectly natural that very serious 
 differences on the subject of Jesus should crop 
 up among those early Christian communities. 
 
JESUS AND JEWISH HISTORY i6i 
 
 Paul's policy was to be all things to all men 
 — in other words, to connive at all manner 
 of unimportant differences, for the sake of 
 his chief object — the recognition of Jesus. 
 But some of the differences were fundamental 
 and were due to the origin of the several 
 communities. 
 
 On the one hand, there were the Christians 
 sprung from among the Jews; on the other, 
 there were the pagan converts. It would 
 have been idle to expect that all of them 
 should understand the character and function 
 of Jesus alike. Nor did they. The Jewish 
 Christians had one conception of Jesus; the 
 pagan Christians quite another. To the for- 
 mer Jews, Jesus was a great man, descended 
 of David, a noble teacher, a lover of the poor 
 and of poverty, who would some day return 
 and finish the work he had begun and inter- 
 rupted by his death. Their name, Ebionites, 
 from the Hebrew for " poor," probably indi- 
 cated both their class and character. They 
 
i62 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 came from among the lowly, the humble, the 
 needy, whose godliness the Psalmists had 
 sung — the poor in spirit whom Jesus had 
 called blessed. To the pagan converts, on 
 the other hand, what could a descendant of 
 David mean? To them Jesus became the 
 actual son of God, miraculously begotten, and 
 sacrificed for the redemption of the world. 
 It was such ideas as these that not only sepa- 
 rated the Ebionites (or Jewish Christians) 
 from the Hellenes (or pagan Christians), 
 but also soon gave rise to all manner of fric- 
 tion and controversy between the two groups. 
 And it is such controversies and differences 
 that found their expression both in the Gos- 
 pels, where we find traces of both sets of 
 views, as well as in other writings of the 
 times. 
 
 Whatever the merit of these differences, 
 the fact is that the Ebionites soon lost 
 ground. Both human nature and history 
 were against them. It was human nature 
 
JESUS AND JEWISH HISTORY 163 
 
 for those that left the parent faith gradually 
 to be merged altogether In the extreme form 
 of the new faith. And, besides, just then 
 the Temple was destroyed, and Jerusalem 
 fell. That event served as an important 
 means of propaganda for the new faith, and 
 helped to consolidate the pagan-Christian 
 forces. It was thus that the CathoHc, or 
 non-Jewish, elements of Christianity gained 
 ascendancy over the Jewish, and that Jesus 
 was removed more and more from the sphere 
 and the sympathy of the Jews. 
 
 This estrangement, of course, was in- 
 creased when Christianity was adopted by 
 the Roman Empire, and entered upon a 
 policy of persecution against the Jews. I 
 shall not dwell on the difference that soon 
 arose between the teachings of Jesus and 
 those of the church organized under his 
 name. Others have pointed it out, though 
 the old habit has not yet died of attributing 
 everything that is bad in Christianity to Jew- 
 
i64 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 Ish Influence and precedent. But it Is easy 
 to see how the outrageous persecution of the 
 Jews on the part of the Christian world ne- 
 cessarily must have made for the neglect of 
 Jesus, and for the creating of antagonism to 
 him, among Jews. Montesquieu, in his great 
 work on the Spirit of the Laws, depicts the 
 effect on the Jews of Christian persecution in 
 the chapter called " A Remonstrance with the 
 Inquisitors of Spain and Portugal." " You 
 want us to become Christians," he makes the 
 Jews say, " but you do not want to be Chris- 
 tians yourselves. But If you do not want to 
 be Christian, be at least human." Robert 
 Browning satirizes the unchristian efforts to 
 convert the Jews in his grotesque poem, 
 '' Holy-Cross Day." The more remarkable 
 is the fact that even in the middle ages Jew- 
 ish teachers were not wanting who, with 
 Maimonides, pointed out the merits of Chris- 
 tianity as a divine factor In spreading the 
 ideals of Rehglon and Morality In the world. 
 
JESUS AND JEWISH HISTORY 165 
 
 No student of the words of Jesus can pos- 
 sibly hold him responsible for such applica- 
 tion or construction of his utterances as led 
 to the excision of his name from Jewish his- 
 tory. Surely, his aim was to the contrary 
 effect. He spoke of himself as part of the 
 Jewish people, as sent to the,m as devoted 
 to them. Nor did he — while speaking of 
 himself as he did — arrogate any powers in 
 heaven or on earth that others might not at- 
 tain. Even to his favorite disciples he could 
 not, nor would, promise any special honors in 
 the Kingdom of God. 
 
 " And there come near unto him James and John, 
 the sons of Zebedee, saying unto him, Master, we 
 would that thou shouldest do for us whatsoever we 
 shall ask of thee. And he said unto them, What 
 would ye that I should do for you ? And they said 
 unto him, Grant unto us that we may sit, one on 
 thy right hand, and one on thy left hand, in thy 
 glory. But Jesus said unto them, Ye know not 
 what ye ask. Are ye able to drink the cup that I 
 drink? or to be baptized with the baptism that I am 
 baptized with? And they said unto him, We are 
 
i66 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 able. And Jesus said unto them, the cup that I 
 drink ye shall drink; and with the baptism that I 
 am baptized withal shall ye be baptized: but to sit 
 on my right hand or on my left hand is not mine 
 to give: but it is for them for whom it hath been 
 prepared." (M^r^ lo: 35-40.) 
 
 When we think of what doctrines were 
 founded on the hfe and the words of Jesus 
 subsequently, and to what treatment of the 
 Jews the religion named after him lent itself, 
 we can understand why so little attention 
 was paid to Jesus in the course of Jewish 
 history. 
 
THE MODERN JEWISH ATTITUDE 
 TO JESUS 
 
 The attitude of the modern Jew to Jesus 
 is a subject of absorbing interest. Just be- 
 cause for many years there has been silence 
 and estrangement, one wants to know what 
 is the present-day attitude. 
 
 As a matter of fact, the interest of Jews 
 in Jesus was never dead. How could they 
 fail to have such an interest in one who had 
 sprung from their own midst and had become 
 the most dominant personality in history? 
 An illustration is offered by the legends about 
 Jesus that sprang up among the Jews and 
 were embodied in an apocryphal biography. 
 This biography enjoyed considerable popu- 
 larity throughout the Middle Ages and down 
 to modern times, while its origin goes back 
 167 
 
i68 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 to antiquity, perhaps to the third or fourth 
 century. Jewish curiosity about Jesus, how- 
 ever, was thwarted and directed into hostile 
 channels by those untoward conditions which 
 were responsible for the gradual elimination 
 of Jesus from the history of his own people: 
 on the one hand, by the ideas about Jesus 
 that were taken over from non-Jewish 
 sources and finally triumphed over the Jewish 
 ideas; and on the other, by the persecution 
 of the Jews on the part of the people that 
 called themselves followers of Jesus. It was 
 thus that the Jews' natural interest in Jesus 
 was either suppressed or misdirected. 
 
 One of the benefits of the modern age has 
 lain in bringing people of different races 
 and faiths closer together. The old bar- 
 riers have been lowered. If not removed, and 
 men have come to feel that the chief glory 
 and beauty of life lies not in polemics, but 
 In appreciation — not in antagonism, but in 
 sympathy. Though Religion has always 
 
MODERN JEWISH ATTITUDE 169 
 
 been represented as men's relation to God, 
 their Father, and as the bond binding men 
 together. It Is only recently that men have 
 begun to feel the tragic disparity between 
 religious profession and the facts of human 
 strife and antagonism, particularly when the 
 latter are carried on in the name of ReHgion. 
 This new realization, which has gone hand In 
 hand with the latter-day attention to a com- 
 parative study of religions, has led to an 
 appreciation of the ideals common to all re- 
 ligions, and has engendered a larger measure 
 of sympathy and mutual understanding 
 among the followers of various faiths. 
 
 The spirit of enlightenment and sympathy 
 has brought about a new era in the relation 
 of the Jews to Jesus. On the one hand, 
 it has caused Christian scholars to revise 
 somewhat the ancient conventional interpre- 
 tation of the Jewish contemporaries of Jesus, 
 particularly the much-maligned Scribes and 
 Pharisees. On the other hand, It has made 
 
I70 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 it possible for the Christian believer to listen 
 to a Jew's appraisal of Jesus, and to treat 
 it with respect and without fear of the Jew's 
 eternal damnation, though it differ from his 
 own construction. 
 
 Of course, it must be stated that there is 
 no official attitude of modern Jews to Jesus. 
 Neither the Jewish people, nor any consid- 
 erable part of it, has made any formal dec- 
 laration on the subject. Such discussion of 
 Jesus as has taken place among modern Jews 
 has been individual and subjective, expressing 
 in each instance personal study and tempera- 
 ment. It is significant, however, that such 
 discussion has formed an important part of 
 modern Jewish thought. Modern writers 
 of Jewish history, such as Graetz and Jost, 
 have not failed to devote attention to Jesus 
 and the rise of Christianity. Similarly, the 
 French Jewish scholars Salvator and Darm- 
 stetter. The late Mr. Joseph Jacobs wrote 
 a charming study of Jesus under the title, 
 
MODERN JEWISH ATTITUDE 171 
 
 " As Others Saw Him," and Mr. Claude G. 
 Montefiore has written both an appreciation 
 of the religious teachings of Jesus and a 
 learned commentary on the Synoptic Gospels. 
 Reform rabbis, from Rabbi Isaac M. Wise 
 down, have often discussed the personality 
 and the teachings of Jesus, for the reason 
 that they have felt the Importance of the 
 subject, and the Jew's legitimate Interest in 
 it, and not, as some would have It, because 
 of any leaning to sensationalism. 
 
 What conclusion, then, may we draw as 
 to the attitude of the modern Jew to Jesus? 
 Perhaps it is well, first of all, to dispose of 
 the question asked most often and most in- 
 stinctively by Christians, namely, whether 
 the modern Jew accepts Jesus as the Mes- 
 siah. That Jews, whether modern or an- 
 cient, Reform or Orthodox, do not acknowl- 
 edge the divinity of Jesus, is known to all. 
 It Is understood that Jews could not do that. 
 
172 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 and still remain Jews, as the very foundation 
 of all Judaism is the unity and the spiritual 
 nature of God, and the Jewish religion has 
 never in the least compromised on this funda- 
 mental principle. Only insofar as all hu- 
 manity is divine, formed in the divine image 
 and with divine possibilities, can the Jew 
 associate the idea of divinity with Jesus. It 
 is commonly understood that the acceptance 
 of Jesus as Divinity is quite out of the ques- 
 tion for the Jew. But do the Jews of to- 
 day, or any part of them, find it possible 
 to accept Jesus as the Messiah? 
 
 The answer is that they do not find it 
 possible so to do. And for the reason that 
 the ideas associated in the Jewish mind with 
 the Messiah not only were left unrealized 
 by Jesus, but have remained unfulfilled to 
 this day. 
 
 The Messiah-idea has been one of the 
 most valuable elements of Jewish life. Its 
 origin goes back to earliest times, and it has 
 
MODERN JEWISH ATTITUDE 173 
 
 found an extensive and manifold develop- 
 ment in Israel. Nor can any one study the 
 history of this idea without realizing that 
 it underwent numerous changes. When 
 Jesus was born, there was no uniformity of 
 interpretation as to the character of the Mes- 
 siah and of the messianic kingdom. All this 
 we gather from a study of the idea of the 
 Messiah in Israel. But among all its varia- 
 tions, one thing always remained associated 
 In the Jewish mind with the messianic hope, 
 namely, that the messianic age would be an 
 age of human perfection, of human happi- 
 ness, of justice and peace, as drawn by Isaiah 
 and other Prophets. 
 
 " And there shall come forth a shoot out of the stock 
 of Jesse, 
 And a twig shall grow forth out of his roots. 
 And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, 
 The spirit of wisdom and understanding. 
 The spirit of counsel and might. 
 The spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the 
 Lord. 
 
174 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 And his delight shall be in the fear of the Lord; 
 And he shall not judge after the sight of his 
 
 eyes, 
 Neither decide after the hearing of his ears; 
 But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, 
 And decide with equity for the meek of the land; 
 And he shall smite the land with the rod of his 
 
 mouth. 
 And with the breath of his lips shall he slay the 
 
 wicked. 
 And righteousness shall be the girdle of his 
 
 loins. 
 And faithfulness the girdle of his reins. 
 And the wolf shall dwell with the lamb. 
 And the leopard shall lie down with the kid; 
 And the calf and the young lion and the fatling 
 
 together ; 
 And a little child shall lead them. 
 And the cow and the bear shall feed; 
 Their young ones shall lie down together; 
 And the lion shall eat straw like the ox. 
 And the sucking child shall play on the hole of 
 
 the asp, 
 And the weaned child shall put his hand on the 
 
 basilisk's den. 
 They shall not hurt nor destroy 
 In all My holy mountain; 
 
MODERN JEWISH ATTITUDE 175 
 
 For the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the 
 
 Lord, 
 As the waters cover the sea." 
 
 Every Jewish messianic hope is crowned 
 with that vision. At the time of Jesus, it 
 was often expressed in the literature of the 
 people. Be the Messiah whoever he be — 
 all man or half angel — be his origin earthly 
 or celestial — be his kingdom natural or su- 
 pernatural, one thing was inseparable from 
 the very idea of the Messiah, namely, that 
 his coming and his reign were to mark the 
 beginning of a period of human perfection 
 and peace. 
 
 Such a period not only failed to commence 
 for the Jews with Jesus, but to this day it 
 has not come. The Jews still hope for the 
 messianic age; it still forms the acme of 
 their religious ideal; they still wonder 
 when and how it may come; they still are 
 unable to believe that the Messiah had 
 come. 
 
176 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 On the other hand, the modern Jew real- 
 izes the ethical power and spiritual beauty of 
 Jesus. In this regard Jesus takes his place 
 among the noble teachers of morality and 
 heroes of faith Israel has produced. It mat- 
 ters not that Jesus dwelt on certain aspects 
 of the spiritual and the ethical life that other 
 Jewish teachers failed to treat with the same 
 stress or the same charm. That constituted 
 the originaHty of Jesus, and Judaism is not 
 averse to originality. 
 
 Every one of Israel's Prophets was or- 
 iginal in this sense. While all sought to 
 communicate the same truth, and to serve the 
 same divine end, each of them saw from his 
 own point of view and spoke with an em- 
 phasis peculiar to himself: Elijah in terms 
 of God's Unity, Amos of His Justice, Hosea 
 of His Love, and so forth. It would be 
 foolish to call the one or the other the more 
 original. 
 
 The precedent of the Prophets was fol- 
 
MODERN JEWISH ATTITUDE 177 
 
 lowed by later Jewish teachers. There were 
 always different temperaments and tendencies 
 represented among them, often radically op- 
 posed to one another. In the very age of 
 Jesus there were the schools of Shammal 
 and of HlUel, the one known for severity 
 In the application of the Law, the other for 
 moderation and flexibility. The synthesis 
 of both schools made for true progress. 
 
 Touching the Judaism of Jesus, one must 
 bear this in mind. It does not mean that 
 Jesus was any less In harmony with Judaism 
 because he accented In his teaching the ele- 
 ments of love, of kindness, of brotherliness, 
 of Indifference to the material world with Its 
 cares and rewards. He thus taught a phase 
 of religion that was part of Judaism, and that 
 has formed the most precious part of It to 
 many a Jewish devotee. Nor Is It profitable 
 to debate as to whether those several teach- 
 ings of Jesus were duplicated or anticipated 
 by other Jewish teachers. The fact is that in 
 
178 A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 him they found their most harmonious and 
 most complete expression, and that his whole 
 personality, as well as the story of his life, 
 served to impress them most memorably on 
 the mind of the world. The modern Jew, 
 therefore, cannot fail to appreciate Jesus as 
 a religious and ethical teacher. 
 
 Of course, the modern Jew deplores the 
 tragic death of Jesus. Yet, if it was not 
 inevitable — which perhaps it was — it cer- 
 tainly is irrevocable. Some say it was in- 
 evitable, as part of a universal scheme of sal- 
 vation. Others believe that insofar as it was 
 inevitable, it was due to the calamitous con- 
 ditions of the age, which destroyed many a 
 Jewish patriot and leader, and ended by de- 
 stroying the Jewish state, and also, in no 
 small measure, to Jesus' own character, 
 which made him choose rather to die than 
 try to disentangle the web of circumstance 
 
MODERN JEWISH ATTITUDE 179 
 
 in which he was caught. Yet, Jesus died as 
 the true idealist is ever ready to die, with 
 his ideals untouched, uncomprehended but 
 uncowed, with a faith in that Spirit of which 
 he ever felt himself a child and a part, whose 
 sway he had sought to spread, and in whose 
 keeping he felt safe. And who knows 
 whether it was not by this very death that 
 Jesus gained his immortality, that he won 
 his ascendancy over human hearts, and an 
 imperishable place in the affections of man- 
 kind? The modern Jew would rather Jesus 
 had not died as he did; but, after all, physical 
 death is nothing compared to the eternal life 
 of the spirit, and, as for martyrs, Jewish 
 history has known them without number. 
 
 Nor can the modern Jew fail to glory in 
 what Jesus has done for the growth of the 
 ethical and spiritual life of humanity. A 
 great many peculiar notions about the nature 
 and the function of Jesus have accumulated 
 
i8o A JEWISH VIEW OF JESUS 
 
 in the course of the ages. Almost all of 
 them are foreign to the Jewish conception, 
 and no doubt would have been equally for- 
 eign to Jesus himself. Jesus was neither a 
 Grecian philosopher nor a mediaeval meta- 
 physician, and many of the things attributed 
 to him he probably would have resented even 
 more vigorously than the squabbles of the 
 Scribes and the pedantic punctiliousness of 
 the Pharisees. I have repeatedly referred 
 to the misunderstanding of Jesus which pre- 
 vailed among his associates, in his audience, 
 and which he suspected and dreaded even in 
 his disciples. It was the cause of his sadness 
 and solitude. It made for his spiritual iso- 
 lation, — for that spiritual apartness, even 
 while among his companions, of which we get 
 a ghmpse in Leonardo da Vinci's '* Last 
 Supper." But is not this tragedy of mis- 
 understanding even increased by the construc- 
 tion which Jesus and his teachings were given 
 in subsequent history? 
 
MODERN JEWISH ATTITUDE i8i 
 
 Yet, these things apart, who can compute 
 all that Jesus has meant to humanity? The 
 love he has inspired, the solace he has given, 
 the good he has engendered, the hope and 
 joy he has kindled — all that is unequalled in 
 human history. Among the great and the 
 good that the human race has produced, none 
 has even approached Jesus in universality of 
 appeal and sway. He has become the most 
 fascinating figure in history. In him is com- 
 bined what is best and most mysterious and 
 most enchanting in Israel — the eternal peo- 
 ple whose child he was. The Jew cannot 
 help glorying in what Jesus thus has meant 
 to the world; nor can he help hoping that 
 Jesus may yet serve as a bond of union be- 
 tween Jew and Christian, once his teaching 
 is better known and the bane of misunder- 
 standing at last is removed from his words 
 and his ideal. 
 
 THE END 
 
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