necessity to the great fact, that this Son of God was also really and truly man, since his humanity was the basis of his whole redemptive work. Yet it is worthy of our highest admiration that the apostles, while they make the divinity of Jesus the foundation of our salvation, equally emphasize his real humanity. It is well known, that Christology, as it has been developed by the church, has indeed never been guilty of encroaching upon the humanity of Christ, but has yet apprehended but slowly what is included in his humanity. Yea, notwithstanding the development of many centuries, modern (orthodox) Christology is so constructed, that docetic inferences can scarcely be avoided. And have not many Christians to confess from their own experience, that in the time of their first love they emphasized the divinity of their Master, while they underrated his humanity? Earnest thought and reflection will correct this error; but the first love of the apostles was never guilty of such one-sidedness.

Peter, while he declares it an impossibility that the Prince of life should have been held of death, speaks of the Father as having loosed the pains of death (Acts ii. 24; iii. 15).

Paul knows that Jesus, before he entered upon the form of existence of a servant, was in the shape of, and equal with, God, and that all things were made by him (Phil. ii.; 1 Cor. viii.; Col. i.). Even during his pilgrimage on earth his inward being is the "Spirit of holiness," i.e. the Spirit of God (Rom. i. 4). Notwithstanding this, however, the apostle speaks distinctly of him as a 66 man. "There is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus" (1 Tim. ii. 5); "By one man came death, by one man the resurrection

of the dead" (1 Cor. xv. 21); "If through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of God and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, has abounded unto many" (Rom. v. 15). In the same passage in which the apostle speaks of Jesus passing from his divine form of existence into that of a servant he represents his (Christ's) restoration to glory as the reward of his human moral obedience (Phil. ii. 5–11). The same apostle uniformly ascribes the resurrection of Jesus to the Father. This unvarying type of Pauline doctrine, as well as of that of the other apostles, is of the utmost importance in the true construction of Christology, which the church has not yet fully appreciated. From Eph. i. 19, etc. especially, it appears how much stress the apostle lays on the fact that it is the Father who raised Jesus from the dead. The apostle here presents the resurrection of Christ as a proof of the superabundant power of God, and compares with it the quickening of humanity from a state of death in sin; he desires Christians to learn from the resurrection of Jesus what God's power can do for them. Christ's death was, accordingly, real, involving all the consequences of death, a real prostration in impotence and helplessness.1 This is the most important, but not the only, truth that we gather from this statement.

The Epistle to the Hebrews also represents Christ as him by whom, in his antemundane existence, God created the world, and in chap. i. calls him directly, God. The inward being of Jesus is also, during his earthly existence, "eternal Spirit." And yet it is especially

1 The reality of Christ's death must, however, not be construed as excluding the possibility of his rising of himself, according to John x. 18.TR.

this epistle which stamps both his outward and inward life as wholly human. The author showing, in the first part of his epistle (from i. 4 to ii. 18), to the Hebrew Christians with what reverence they ought to listen to the gospel of Christ, since he was higher than all angels, takes, at the same time, occasion to warn them (ii. 9-18) not to he offended at the Son of God humbling himself unto death, since it became God to make the Captain of salvation perfect through suffering (vs. 10). The writer continues, he that sanctifieth, as well as those who are sanctified, is of the seed of Abraham (v. 2) and therefore, like them, partook of flesh and blood, in order to destroy by his death the prince of death, and to set free the slaves of death (vs. 14, 15), not the holy angels, but the seed of Abraham which was subject to death, being the object of his pity and commiseration (Éπiλaμßáveтai). Thus the author ascribes to him flesh and blood or humanity, as being necessary to him, in order that he might die our death, and destroy the prince of death. To this the apostle immediately adds: without having been made like unto his brethren in all things he could not have that feeling of compassion, which is indispensable in a successful High Priest in atoning for sin; but as he suffered himself in being tempted, he can now, by his atonement, succor those who are tempted (vs. 17, 18). In like manner it is urged in the demonstration of the perfect priesthood of Christ, that he is touched with the feeling of our infirmities, because he was tempted in all points like as we are (iv. 15); for, argues the apostle, every Levitical high priest must be a man who can have compassion on the ignorant and on them that are out of the way, being himself encompassed with infirmity (v. 1–3).

The apostle, in the following verses. attempting to show (vs. 4-10) the spotless character of the priesthood of Christ, and that he had not arrogated it to himself, but had been called by God to it, says, that Christ, "in the days of his flesh, offered up prayer and supplication, with strong crying and tears, unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard on account of his piety (aπò TŶs evλaßeías). Though he were the Son, yet he learned obedience by the things which he suffered, and having been made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him; called, for this reason, of God, a high priest of the order of Melchisedec." In these passages the emphasis lies on the close connection between the humanity of Christ and his mediatorial office. But in setting Christ before us as our pattern and example, the author has likewise taken occasion to emphasize his full and real humanity. Thus in iii. 1, 2: "Consider the High Priest of our profession, Jesus Christ, who was faithful unto him that appointed him, as also Moses was"; again in xii. 2: "Let us look unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who, in place of the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." Christ, in doing what was necessary for him to do, not for his own sake, but in order to fulfil the work of our redemption, which he had assumed, has become for all his followers an example of patience and obedience.

What, now, does John teach concerning the true humanity of Christ, who affirms of the pre-existent Logos, that he was toward God, that he was God, and that all things were made by him? He lays so much stress on the humanity of Jesus, that some of his inter

preters have come to the conclusion that the apostle's object in writing his Gospel and Epistles was to refute docetism. That the Logos became flesh is, in John's view, just as important as that he who dwelt among us was the Logos (John i. 14). The phrase "he became flesh," implies also that the assumption of flesh and blood affected the inward being of the Logos. As early as in the time of John, the doctrine arose in Asia Minor, that Jesus was a mere man, with whom at his baptism the aeon Christ united himself, yet in such wise that they remained two distinct personalities. To refute this error, which viewed Jesus as the Ebionites did, and Christ after the manner of the Gnostics docetically, the apostle teaches in his first epistle, that the denial of Jesus as the Christ constituted the centre of falsehood and anti-Christianity, but that the confession. that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh was the evidence of divine doctrine (John ii. 22; iv. 2). It must also be borne in mind that many of Jesus's own declarations concerning his real humanity have been preserved to us by John; declarations which imply, not only that Jesus had a real human body, but also that his physical life was really human and dependent on God.