CHAPTER IIL THE TEMPTATION. Matthew's ac count. IMMEDIATELY after the exciting scene of his baptism, Jesus, entered upon a fearful season of spiritual trial and depression. It is usually known as The Temptation. The history is given by Matthew and Luke, a brief statement being made by Mark also. Matthew's narrative is this: "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, afterward he hungered. And when the tempter came to him, he said, 'If thou art the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread.' But he answered and said, 'It is written, Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word proceeding through the mouth of God.' Then the devil taketh him up into the holy city, and setteth him on the battlement of the temple, and saith to him, 'If thou art the Son of God, cast thyself down: for it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee: and upon their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone.' Jesus said unto him, 'It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.' Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and showeth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; and said to him, 'All these things will I give thee, if falling down thou wilt do me homage.' Then saith Jesus unto him, 'Go away, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt do homage to the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou worship.' Then the devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and ministered unto him." (Matt. iv. 1-11.) Mark's account, and Luke's. All that Mark records is in ch. i. vv. 12, 13: "And immediately the Spirit driveth him into the wilderness. And he was there in the wilderness forty days tempted of Satan; and was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered unto him." St. Luke (iv. 1-13) gives an account of this transaction which is substantially the same as that of Matthew. It cannot now be known in what place this passage in the history of Jesus occurred. Tradition assigns it to one of the mountains opposite Jericho, called now Quarantania, from the forty days of fasting, a name probably given it in the times of the Crusades. Thomson (Land and Book, vol. ii. p. 450) thus describes it: Place of the Ten ptation. “Directly west, at a distance of a mile and a half, is the high and precipitous mountain called Quarantania, from a tradition that our Saviour here fasted forty days and nights, and also that this is the 'high mountain' from whose top the tempter exhibited all the kingdoms of this world, and the glory of them.' The side facing the plain is as perpendicular and apparently as high as the rock of Gibraltar, and upon the very summit are still visible the ruins of an ancient convent. Midway below are caverns hewn in the perpendicular rock, where hermits formerly retired to fast and pray, in imitation of the 'forty days,' and it is said that even at the present time there is to be found an occasional Copt or Abyssinian languishing out his Quarantania in this doleful place." The general reader would be amazed to see the immense amount of literature there is upon the subject of the Temptation of Jesus. Through much of it we have painfully waded, to come back to the conclusion that the simplest way is to read the history in the light of common sense, and derive what lessons our present scientific culture may enable us to educe. It is obvious that the narrative is substantially made by Jesus. The historians could have gathered it from no other source. The narrative made by Jesus. Un less they made great blunders in understanding his statements, or in recording them, we have the whole affair before us as it appeared to the mind of Jesus, quite as nearly indeed as language can convey thought from one mind to another. Explanatory It may be instructive to see how many views have been taken of this portion of the history of Jesus. They show how men allow themselves to interpret facts by dogmas, and that this is quite as common among sceptics as among the credulous,-no more characteristic of the one than of the other, although generally charged vehe mently upon the latter by the former. theories. 1. It has been regarded as an external occurrence, and, as such, (a) as real, the literal apparition of Satan in the form of a man or of an angel;* () as a myth,t in which tradition invests the symbolical idea of a contest between Messiah and Satan; or (c) as a narrative in symbolical language, the real tempter being a man.‡ 2. It has been regarded as an internal occurrence; in other words, a vision: and, as such (a), as excited in the brain of Jesus by the Devil; (b) as created by God; (e) as produced by natural causes, or (d), as "a significant morning dream." ** 3. It has been considered an inward ethical transaction, or a psychological occurrence; and, as such (a), a conflict in the imag ination of Jesus; (b) an inward conflict excited by the Devil;‡‡ (e) a subjective (inward) transaction, to which the New Testament historians gave an objective (outward) form; or (d), as a fragmentary, symbolical representation of transactions in the inner life of Jesus, grouped into one statement. §§ 4. It has been considered as a parable, to instruct the disciples of Jesus as to their spiritual perils and remedies. ||| 5. It has been pronounced a myth.TT This classification and these references are given so that if there be any readers having time, patience, and curiosity enough, they may make a study of this subject for themselves. To many minds the refutation of these positions must have occurred as they have been stated. In all of them there are difficulties. The theories which involve the appearance of Satan in bodily form, whether of man or angel, are open to the objections (1), That This is, I think, the view of most of | prian, Theodorus of Mopsuestia, Olsthe commentators who consider them- hausen, and Hübner. selves orthodox. Set forth by Farmer in his "Inquiry I need hardly say that this is the into the Nature and Design of Christ's Temptation in the Wilderness." London, 1761. riew of Dr. Strauss. The man being, as some hold, a member of the Jewish Sanhedrim. Bengel says: "The tempter did not wish it to be known that he was Satan, yet Christ, at the conclusion of the inter view, calls him Satan, after that Satan hal plainly betrayed his satanity." He cs: "The tempter seems to have appeared under the form of a papareus, scribe, since our Lord thrice replies to him by the word yeуpatta, it is written." See Gnomen N. T., vol. i. p. 149. Prof. Paulus and many others. tt Eichhorn, Weisse, and others. SS This is Neander's view. It may be regarded as a specimen of what Strauss well calls "the palliative theology." The opinion of Schleiermacher, Baumgarten-Crusius, etc. TT Strauss, Meyer, De Wette, and all This view was held by Origen, Cy- that school of course give this solution The " "bodily form" theory. Satan nowhere else is so represented by these historians,* which, I acknowledge, may be very feeble as an ob jection, but is noticeable in this connection; and (2), That this theory is incompatible with the narrative; as, for instance, the taking of Jesus to the pinnacle of the Temple and to the top of the mountain, and showing him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment, which no member of the Sanhedrim and no "scribe" would have essayed to do. The person who could have done so would have assumed the rôle of the Messiah himself, made aërial excursion in the presence of the multitude, and won all the éclat of a thaumaturgist. Moreover (3), According to this view, the Devil knew that the person he was tempting was divine; and this fact greatly embarrasses the idea of a personal conflict between the two. So that it seems we must give up that theory. The idea of any myth forming itself in the Angustan age, between the times of Livy and Tacitus, and especially that of a theologic myth forming itself among the Jews, at The myth theory. the time of their history which is so near its close as this, is perfectly preposterous. One may safely challenge, I humbly think, any man of any amount of learning to point out any myth, or sign of a myth, which had its origin in any notable centre of political influence in any portion of the Roman Empire after the accession of Augustus to the imperial throne. One may challenge the whole school of myth-philosophers to indicate anything, aside from the history of Jesus, which gives evidence of mythical tendency even among the people of the Jews, at any time of their history after the beginning of the third century before the Christian era. Why then should the history of Jesus, and that alone, be interpreted against all known laws of mental progress? Does any man ever apply the myth theory to the times of Julius Cæsar or Pompey? A myth is the product of the childhood of a people, and never survives the maturity of a nation, as a matter of belief, any more than the traditionary stories of fairics, wherewith we still allow the children of Europe and America to be amused, have power over the consciences of the people. *If the reader recalls John vi. 70, he | ish." I do not recollect any case of a must be reminded that Jesus calls Judas man being called diaßoλos, the devil. BaBoxos, which is the generic substan- Alford (Gr. Test. in loco) says that no tive, a devil," in the sense of "devil-such case can be adduced. Among the Greeks and Romans the theologic myths which their early ancestors had originated were fast losing all respect among the uncultivated masses and the lower orders, as they had long before ceased to be regarded by the learned and the tasteful as worth more than merely the poetical element that was in them The Jewish nation never were much given to that form of thought Perhaps the infancy of no community known to history was freer from myths than the early life of the Hebrew people. How impracticable, then, must it have been to generate a myth under Herod and Pontins Pilate, in Judæa, just before or soon after the destruction of Jerusalem, by people who had been bred Jews and were scattered over the Roman Empire! These general remarks, applying to the biography of Jesus in the mass, are equally forceful as to any particular passage in his history. We must give up the myths. Those who earnestly held to them a few years ago are forced by the advancing spirit of critical investigation to abandon them. As for the theories which involve visions and "significant morning dreams," perhaps nothing shorter or better can be said than Lange's sentence: "Decisive ethical conflicts do "" a state not take place in the form of dreams; The "dream' theory. Let all dogmas be laid aside and the record of these historians be examined to see what they teach any fair-minded reader. In general they give us the knowledge of what Jesus thought of a supreme passage in his own mental and spiritual history. As no man who existed before his time, or has risen since, has so influenced the intellectual and moral condition of the world, this piece of autobiography becomes to us a history of unspeakable importance. We wish to ascertain his views of the subjects involved, and compare them with what we believe to be ascertained laws of psychology. It is first to be noticed that this important and testing occurrence enters his history just at the moment we should naturally look for it. He was a man. Marvellous and wonderful, in birth and growth, he was a man. From perhaps an earlier period than even the beginning Sense of his humanity in Jesus. of conscious self-inspection there had been a sense of spiritual idiosyncrasy present with him. It may have been at first the |