IV. Capernaum the chief residence of Jesus. him up the slope, and were preparing to cast him down from the abrupt cliff on the other side, when they found that the intended victim of their wrath had disappeared. Jesus retired to Capernaum, which from this time became, as it were, his head-quarters. This place was admirably situated for his purpose, both from the facility of communication, as well by land as by the lake, with many considerable and flourishing towns, and of escape into a more secure region, in case of any threatened persecution. It lay towards the northern extremity of the lake or sea of Gennesareth.† On the land side it was a centre from which the circuit of both Upper and Lower Galilee might begin. The countless barks of the fishermen employed upon the lake, many of whom became his earliest adherents, could transport him with the utmost ease to any of the cities on the western bank; while, if danger approached from Herod or the ruling powers of Galilee, he had but to cross to the opposite shore, the territory, at least at the commencement of his career, of Philip, the most just and popular of the sons of Herod, and which on his death reverted to the Roman government. Nor was it an unfavourable circumstance, that he had most likely secured the powerful protection of the officer attached to the court of Herod, whose son he had healed, and who probably resided at Capernaum. *Luke, iv. 31, 32. This is the usual position of Capernaum, but it rests on very uncertain grounds, and some cir cumstances would induce me to adopt Lightfoot's opinion, that it was much nearer to the southern end of the lake. IV. chosen. The first act of his public career was the perma- CHAP. nent attachment to his person, and the investing in the delegated authority of teachers of the Apostles new religion, four out of the twelve who afterwards became the apostles. Andrew and Peter were originally of Bethsaida, at the north eastern extremity of the lake, but the residence of Peter appears to have been at Capernaum. James and John were brothers, the sons of Zebedee.* All these men had united themselves to Jesus, immediately after his baptism; the latter, if not all, had probably attended upon him during the festival in Jerusalem, but had returned to their usual avocations. Jesus saw them on the shore of the lake,— two of them were actually employed in fishing, the others at a little distance were mending their nets. At the well-known voice of their master, confirmed by the sign of the miraculous draught of fishes †, which impressed Peter with so much awe, that he thought himself unworthy of standing in the presence of so wonderful a Being, they left their ships and followed him into the town; and though they appear to have resumed their humble occupations, on which, no doubt, their livelihood depended, it should seem that from this time they might be considered as the regular attendants of Jesus. The reception of Jesus in the synagogue of Jesus in Capernaum was very different from that which he the synaencountered in Nazareth. He was heard on the Capernaum, *Matt. iv. 22.; Mark, i. 17—20.; Luke, v. 1—11. † This supposes, as is most pro bable, that Luke, v. 1–11. refers gogue of IV. CHAP. regular day of teaching, the Sabbath, not only undisturbed, but with increasing reverence and awe.* And, indeed, if the inhabitants of Nazareth were offended, and the Galileans in general astonished at the appearance of the humble Jesus in the character of a public teacher, the tone and language which he assumed was not likely to allay their wonder. The remarkable expression, "he speaks as one having authority and not as the scribes," seems to imply more than the extraordinary power and persuasiveness of his language. His mode different from that of the Rabbins. The ordinary instructors of the people, whether of teaching under the name of scribes, lawyers, or rabbis, rested their whole claim to the public attention on the established sacred writings. They were the conservators, and perhaps personally ordained interpreters of the law, with its equally sacred traditionary comment; but they pretended to no authority, not originally derived from these sources. They did not stand forward as legislators, but as accredited expositors of the law; not as men directly inspired from on high, but as men who, by profound study and intercourse with the older wise men, were best enabled to decide on the dark, or latent, or ambiguous sense of the inspired writings; or who had received, in regular descent, the more ancient Cabala, the accredited tradition. Although, therefore, they had completely enslaved the public mind, which reverenced the sayings of the masters or rabbis equally with the original text of Moses and the * Luke, iv. 31-38.; Mark, i. 21, 22. IV. prophets; though it is quite clear that the spiritual CHAP. rabbinical dominion, which at a later period established so arbitrary a despotism over the understanding of the people, was already deeply rooted, still the basis of their supremacy rested on the popular reverence for the sacred writings. "It is written," was the sanction of all the rabbinical decrees, however those decrees might misinterpret the real meaning of the law, or "add burdens to the neck of the people," by no means intended by the wise and humane lawgiver. Jesus came forth as a public teacher in a new and opposite character. His authority rested on no previous revelation, excepting as far as his divine commission had been foreshown in the law and the prophets. He prefaced his addresses with the unusual formulary, "I say unto you." Perpetually displaying the most intimate familiarity with the Sacred Writings, instantly silencing or baffling his adversaries by adducing, with the utmost readiness and address, texts of the law and the prophets according to the accredited interpretation, yet his ordinary language evidently assumed a higher tone. He was the direct, immediate representative of the wisdom of the Almighty Father; he appeared as equal, as superior, to Moses; as the author of a new revelation, which, although it was not to destroy the law, was in a certain sense to supersede it, by the introduction of a new and original faith. Hence the implacable hostility manifested against Jesus, not merely by the fierce, the fanatical, the violent, or the licentious, by all who might take offence at the purity IV. CHAP. and gentleness of his precepts, but by the better and more educated among the people, the scribes, the lawyers, the pharisees. Jesus at once assumed a superiority not merely over these teachers of the law, this acknowledged religious aristocracy, whose reputation, whose interests, and whose pride were deeply pledged to the maintenance of the existing system, but he set himself above those inspired teachers, of whom the rabbis were but the interpreters. Christ uttered commandments which had neither been registered on the tablets of stone, nor defined in the more minute enactments in the book of Leviticus. He superseded at once by his simple word all that they had painfully learned, and regularly taught as the eternal, irrepealable word of God, perfect, complete, enduring no addition. Hence their perpetual endeavours to commit Jesus with the multitude, as disparaging or infringing the ordinances of Moses; endeavours which were perpetually baffled on his part, by his cautious compliance with the more important observances, and, notwithstanding the general bearing of his teaching towards the development of a higher and independent doctrine*, his uniform respect for the letter as well as the spirit of the Mosaic institutes. But as the strength of the rabbinical hierarchy lay in the passionate jealousy of the people about the law, they never abandoned the hope of convicting Causes of the hosti lity of the ordinary teachers. Compare the whole of the tard seed-the frequent intimations of the comprehensiveness of the "kingdom of God," as contrasted with the Jewish theocracy. |