130 The Designations of Our Lord
cause they were foolish and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets had spoken and their eyes were holden that they should not know Him as He walked with them in the way (Lk 24^*^'-^). So little were they left in ignorance of who It was to whom they listened J as their Teacher, and, obeyed as their Master and rev-
--tWu erenced as their Lord, that it is represented that an-
1 gelic messengers descended from heaven to announce
Him as the promised Messiah before His birth (Lk j32,3o 2"'26), that the predicted messenger who should go before the Lord, coming to redeem His people, pointed Him out as the One who should come after Him (Mt 3" II), that God Himself proclaimed Him from heaven as His Son (Mt 3^'^ ||), that Satan and his subject spirits recognized Him on sight as the One who had been appointed to destroy them (Mk i^^ 5'^ || etc.), and that His whole career and teaching alike were or- dered to convey to every seeing eye the great Intelligence. The difficulty, according to the representation of the evangelists, was not that there was not evidence enough that here was the Messiah of God, the King come to His Kingdom; but that the evidence was not of the nature that had been expected and therefore puzzled men's minds rather than convinced them. The gist of our Lord's message to the Baptist (Mt 11^) was not that John might see In His works such things as he had been looking for in the Messiah, but that he might see In them such things as he ought to be looking for. " Go and tell John that these are the kinds of things you see In me — the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up ; and the poor have the good tidings preached to them: and blessed is he who shall find
The Jesus of the Synoptists 131
none occasion of stumbling in Me! " It is as much as to say, " Go and tell John to revise his conception of the Messiah, and to look and see if it is not these things which, according to the Scriptures (Is 61^), should mark His work: go and tell John, I am indeed He who is to come, but I am not the manner of Mes- siah who is expected to come."^®
Accordingly the Synoptic narrative is marked no more by the stress it lays on the Messiahship of Jesus Transfigured than by the transfigured conception of Conception of this Messiahship which it in every line Messiah insists upon. This constantly vibrating note is already struck in the supernatural announce- ments of the birth of Jesus. It is the Son of David who is to be bom (Mt i"°, Lk i-'^-^-), the promised King (Mt 2^ Lk i^^) ; but, above all else and before all else, that Saviour who is Christ the Lord (Lk 2"), and whose name shall be called Jesus, because it is He who in fulfillment of the ancient prophecy promis- ing the coming of Jehovah to His people, shall save His people from their sins (Mt i^^). It is not merely a spiritual function which is here announced for this Messiah: it is also a divine personality. Who is that Saviour who is Christ " the Lord" and whose name shall be called Jesus because He shall save from their sins His people — " His " people, let us take good note, Jesus' people, although it is clear it is Jehovah's peo- ple who are meant? No wonder that it is immediately added that in this birth there is, therefore, fulfilled the
I*' Cf, the discussion by Shailer Mathews, The Messianic Hope in the N. T., 1905, pp. 95-6; although Professor Mathews' treatment is dominated by the idea that our Lord's followers saw in Jesus rather one who was after a while to do Messianic works than one who was already doing them.
132 The Desigtiahons of Our Lord
prophecy of the issue from a virgin of one whose name is to be called Immanuel, which is, being interpreted, "God with us" (Mt 1-3).