were they to be deterred from announcing in the clearest and most public manner, in broad daylight, and from the flat roofs of houses, that which had been first told them in the darkness, as Jewish teachers communicated the deepest and highest doctrines in secret to their disciples, or as the preacher would whisper his discourse into the ear of the interpreter. The deepest truths concerning His Person, and the announcement of His Kingdom and Work, were to be fully revealed, and loudly proclaimed. But, from a much higher point of view, how different was the teaching of Christ from that of the Rabbis! The latter laid it down as a principle, which they tried to prove from Scripture, [b Lev. xviii. 5.] that, in order to save one's life, it was not only lawful, but even duty, if necessary, to commit any kind of sin, except idolatry, incest, or murder, [c Sanh. 74 a comp. Yoma 82 a.] Nay,even idolatry was allowed, if only it were done in secret, so as not to profane the Name of the Lord, than which death was infinitely preferable. [2 I confess myself unable to understand the bearing of the special pleading of Wunsche against this inference from Sanh. 74 a. His reasoning is certainly incorrect.] Christ, on the other hand, not only ignored this vicious Jewish distinction of public and private as regarded morality, but bade His followers set aside all regard for personal safety, even in reference to the duty of preaching the Gospel. There was a higher fear than of men: that of God, and it should drive out the fear of those who could only kill the body. Besides, why fear? God's Providence extended even over the meanest of His creatures. Two sparrows cost only an assarion (), about the third of a penny. [3 The Isar ( ), or assarion, is expressly and repeatedly stated in Rabbinic writings to be the twenty-forth part of a dinar, and hence not a halfpenny farthing, but about the third of a penny. Comp. Herzfeld, Handelsgeschichte, pp. 180-182.] Yet even one of them would not perish without the knowledge of God. No illustration was more familiar to the Jewish mind than that of His watchful care even over the sparrows. The beautiful allusion in Amos iii. 5 was somewhat realistically carried out in a legend which occurs in more than one Rabbinic passage. We are told that, after that great miracle-worker of Jewish legend, R. Simeon ben Jochai, had been for thirteen years in hiding from his persecutors in a cave, where he was miraculously fed, he observed that, when the bird-catcher laid his snare, the bird escaped, or was caught, according as a voice from heaven proclaimed, 'Mercy,' or else, 'Destruction.' Arguing, that if even a sparrow could not be caught without heaven's bidding, how much more safe was the life of a 'son of man' (), he came forth, [a Ber. R. 79, ed. Warsh. p. 142 b; Jer. Shebh. ix. 1; Midr. on Eccl. x. 8; on Esth. i. 9; on Ps. xvii. 14.]
Nor could even the additional promise of Christ: 'But of you even the hairs of the head are all numbered,' [1 This is the literal rendering.]surprise His disciples. But it would convey to them the gladsome assurance that, in doing His Work, they were performing the Will of God, and were specially in His keeping. And it would carry home to them, with the comfort of a very different application, while engaged in doing the Work and Will of God, what Rabbinism expressed in a realistic manner by the common sayings, that whither a man was to go, thither his feet would carry
him; and, that a man could not injure his finger on earth, unless it had been so decreed of him in heaven, [b Chull. 7 b; comp. also the even more realistic expression, Shabb. 107b.] And in later Rabbinic writings [c Pesiqta 18 a.] we read, in almost the words of Christ: 'Do I not number all the hairs of every creature?' And yet an even higher outlook was opened to the disciples. All preaching was confessing, and all confessing a preaching of Christ; and our confession or denial would, almost by a law of nature, meet with similar confession or denial on the part of Christ before His Father in heaven. [2 This appears more clearly when we translate literally (ver. 32): 'Who shall confess in Me', and again: 'in him will I also confess.'] This, also, was an application of that fundamental principle, that 'nothing is covered that shall not be revealed,' which, indeed, extendeth to the inmost secrets of heart and life.
What follows in our Lord's Discourse [d St. Matt. x. 34.] still further widens the horizon. It describes the condition and laws of His Kingdom, until the final revelation of that which is now covered and hidden. So long as His claims were set before a hostile world they could only provoke war. [3 The original is very peculiar: 'Think not that I came to cast peace on the earth,' as a sower casts the seed into the ground.] On the other hand, so long as such decision was necessary, in the choice of either those nearest and dearest, of ease, nay, of life itself, or else of Christ, there could be no compromise. Not that, as is sometimes erroneously supposed, a very great degree of love to the dearest on earth amounts to loving them more than Christ. No degree of proper affection can ever make affection wrongful, even as no diminution of it could make wrongful affection right. The love which Christ condemneth differs not in degree, but in kind, from rightful affection. It is one which takes the place of love to Christ, not which is placed by the side of that of Christ. For, rightly viewed, the two occupy different provinces. Wherever and whenever the two affections come into comparison, they also come into collision. And so the questions of not being worthy of Him (and who can be positively worthy?), and of the true finding or losing of our life, have their bearing on our daily life and profession. [1 The meaning of the expression, losing and finding one's life, appears more markedly by attending to the tenses in the text: 'He that found his life shall lose it, and he that lost his life for My sake shall find it.']
But even in this respect the disciples must, to some extent, have been prepared to receive the teaching of Christ. It was generally expected, that a time of great tribulation would precede the Advent of the Messiah. Again, it was a Rabbinic axiom, that the cause of the Teacher, to whom a man owed eternal life, was to be taken in hand before that of his father, to whom he owed only the life of this world, [a B. Mets 33 a.] [2 Expecially if he taught him the highest of all lore, the Talmud, or explained the reason for the meaning of what it contained.] Even the statement about taking up the cross in following Christ, although prophetic, could not sound quite strange. Crucifixion was, indeed, not a Jewish punishment, but the Jews must have become sadly familiar with it. The Targum [b On Ruth i. 17.] speaks of it as one of the four modes of execution of which Naomi described to Ruth as those in custom in Palestine, the other three being, stoning, burning, and beheading. Indeed, the expression 'bearing the cross,' as indicative of sorrow and suffering, is so common, that we read, Abraham carried the wood for the sacrifice of Issac, 'like who bears his cross on his shoulder.' [c Ber. R. 56, on Gen. xxii. 6.]
Nor could the disciples be in doubt as to the meaning of the last part of Christ's address, [d St. Matt. x. 40- 42.] They were old Jewish forms of thought, only filled with the new wine of the Gospel. The Rabbis taught, only in extravagant terms, the merit attaching to the reception and
entertainment of sages, [e Comp. for example the long discussion in Ber. 63 b.] The very expression 'in the name of a prophet, or a righteous man, is strictly Jewish ( ), and means for the sake of, or with intention, in regard to. It appears to us, that Christ introduced His own distinctive teaching by the admitted Jewish principle, that hospitable reception for the sake of, or with the intention of doing it to, a prophet or a righteous man, would procure a share in the prophet's righteous man's reward. Thus, tradition had it, that a Obadiah of King Ahab's court [f 1 Kings xviii. 4.] had become the prophet of that name, because he had provided for the hundred prophets, [g Sanh. 39 b.] And we are repeatedly assured, that to receive a sage,or even an elder, was like receiving the Shekhinah itself. But the concluding promise of Christ, concerning the reward of even 'a cup of cold water' to 'one of these little ones' 'in the name of a disciple,' goes far beyond the farthest conceptions of His contemporaries. Yet even so, the expression would, so far as its form is concerned, perhaps bear a fuller meaning to them than to us. These 'little ones' () were 'the children,' who were still learning the elements of knowledge, and who would by- and-by grow into 'disciples.' For, as the Midrash has it: 'Where there are no little ones, there are no disciples; and where no disciples, no sages: where no sages, there no elders; where no elders, there no prophets; and where no prophets, there [a According to Is. viii. 16.] does God not cause His Shekhinah to rest.' [b Ber. R. 42, on Gen. xiv. 1. ]
We have been so particular in marking the Jewish parallelisms in this Discourse, first, becaust it seemed important to show, that the words of the Lord were not beyond the comperhension of the disciples. Starting from forms of thought and expressions with which they were familiar, He carried them far beyond Jewish ideas and hopes. But, secondly, it is just in this similarity of form, which proves that it was of the time, and to the time, as well as to us and to all times, that we best see, how far the teaching of Christ transcended all contemporary conception.
But the reality, the genuineness, the depth and fervour of selfsurrender, which Christ expects, is met by equal fulness of acknowledgement on His part, alike in heaven and on earth. In fact, there is absolute identification with His ambassadors on the part of Christ. As He is the Ambassador of the Father, so are they His, and as such also the ambassadors of the Father. To receive them was. therefore, not only to receive Christ, but the Father, Who would own the humblest, even the meanest service of love to one of the learners, 'the little ones.' All the more painful is the contrast of Jewish pride and self-righteousness, which attributes supreme merit to ministering, not as to God, but as to man; not for God's sake, but for that of the m an; a pride which could give utterance to such a saying,' All the prophets have announced salvation only to the like of those who give their daughters in marriage to sages, or
