I TIMOTHY III. i6 103
Now it is well to understand that the word in the New Testa- ment has no such sense. It means a thing once hidden, but now brought to light. It means a new discovery. It does not at all imply that the matter, when once revealed, is difficult of under- standing. It may be a very simple and elementary matter, such as simple minds can easily grasp when it is brought to them. Our Lord did not call around Him, for His disciples, a group of twelve acute philosophers ; but to the twelve simple and teachable fishermen whom He did call He said, " To you it is given to Icnow the mysteries of the kingdom of God." ^
2. But the Christian faith is not only a mystery; it is a "mystery of godliness." It not only tells of the bounty of Almighty God in revealing His eternal counsels to man ; it also tells of man's obligations in consequence of being initiated. It is a mystery, not "of lawlessness" but "of godliness." Those who accept it " profess godliness," profess reverence to the God who has made it known to them. It teaches plainly on what principle we are to regulate " how men ought to behave them- selves in the household of God." The gospel is a mystery of piety, a mystery of reverence and of religious life. Holy itself, and proceeding from the Holy One, it bids its recipients be holy, even as He is holy who gives it.
^ Those for whom St. Paul wrote knew well what " mysteries of ungodliness " were ; for there were several such mysteries, which formed a part of the old Pagan religions. Mysteries were certain sacred rites, in which a traditional secret was divulged to the initiated, and made the nucleus and centre of a form of worship. Some of the rites connected with this worship were horribly impure and cruel ; the heathen mysteries were " mysteries of ungodliness." But God's revelation in Christ, the magnificent secret into which the Church indoctrinates mankind, the secret of redeeming love and grace, the secret of the atonement and its allied truths, which also is the centre and nucleus of the Church's whole system of worship, is a " mystery of godliness " ; that is, a secret which, really imbibed by the inner man, produces the fruit of godliness.2
3. The Apostle proceeds to give "the mystery" in the enforced terms in which the Church had received it. " Who was
^ L. W. Bacon, The SimpUci/y that is in Christ, 81. « E. M. Goulburn, The Holy Catholic Church, 253.
104 THE MYSTERY OF GODLINESS
manifested in the flesh, justified in the spirit, seen of angels, preached among the nations, believed on in the world, received up in glory."
^ After the text about the three Heavenly Witnesses in the First Epistle of St. John, no disputed reading in the New Testament has given rise to more controversy than the passage before us. It is certain that St. Paul did not write, " God was manifest in the flesh," but " who was manifested in the flesh." The reading " God was manifested in the flesh " appears in no Christian writer until late in the fourth century, and in no translation of the Scriptures earlier than the seventh or eighth century. And it is not found in any of the five great primary MSS., except as a correction made by a later scribe, who knew of the reading " God was manifested," and either preferred it to the other, or at least wished to preserve it as an alternative reading, or as an interpretation. In an old Greek MS., it would require only two small strokes to turn " who " into " God " ; and this alteration would be a tempting one, seeing that the masculine " who " after the neuter " mystery " looks harsh and unnatural. But here we come upon a highly interesting consideration. The words that follow look like a quotation from some primitive Christian hymn or confession. The rhythmical movement and the parallelism of the six balanced clauses, of which each triplet forms a climax, points to some such fact as this. It is possible that we have here a fragment of one of the very hymns which, as Pliny the Younger tells the Emperor Trajan, the Christians were accustomed to sing antiphonally at daybreak to Christ as a God. Such a passage as this might well be sung from side to side, line by line, or triplet by triplet, as choirs still chant the Psalms in our churches. " Who was manifested in the flesh ; justified in the spirit ; seen of angels ; preached among the nations ; believed on in the world ; received up in glory." Let us assume that this very reasonable and attractive conjecture is correct, and that St. Paul is here quoting from some well-known form of words. Then the " who " with which the quotation begins will refer to some- thing in the preceding lines which are not quoted. How natural, then, that St. Paul should leave the " who " unchanged, although it does not fit on grammatically to his own sentence. But in any case there is no doubt as to the antecedent of the " who." " The mystery of godliness " has for its centre and basis the life of a Divine Person ; and the great crisis in the long process by which the mystery was revealed was reached when this Divine Person " was manifested in the flesh." ^