Eublished his AT Theol. (Eng. tr. 1895). In vol. i. pp. 216-221 e avows his firm con\'iction of the genuineness of the Gospel, that it rests on historic facts and is superior to the Synoptists in m.any iiii)>ortanl details, that ' the Logos Romance ' is a criti- cal failure, and, notwithstanding great difficulties, he imagines that the subjective element necessary- to a character formed and trained by the Master Himself may solve them.
VIII. The Teaching of the Fourth Gospel.
— A. Thenlngy and diristolorftj. — The teaching of Jesus cannot be satisfactorily discriminated from tliat of the evangelist, e.xcept in [il.aces wliere the latter speaks in pronriA person/I, or offers his in- terpretation of the Slaster's words. Alike in the Epistle and Prol. to (Gospel, the apostle sums up or generalizes the teaching of Christ or of His mighty deeds, and for the ideas, thouglit by thought, fact by fact, he brings out a justification in the narrative itself. As to the Abbrechungcn and Ineongrnenzen on which Wendt insists as imlicating dillerent strains of thought and purpose, e.g. in the dillerent estimate of tpr/a, arip.e7a, and )>i\naTa in the great plan of the Supreme Teacher, the reconciliation is not far to seek, and is to be found in the divine- human majesty of the Lord, whose Personality gives unity to all his representation. The con- sciousness of the Lord Jesus, as brought out in the fourfold revelation, provides the fact upon which the constructive intelligence of later cen- turies has founded its doctrine of the GODIIEAD. To put it in a word, the Doctrine of the Divinity is simplj' an endeavour to stal*" without explana- tion the various elements of chat tinique con- sciousness. The most fundamental element in the entire teaching is the absolute oneness of the Deity. Christ never taught the existence of two or three Gods, thongh the unity or solity embraced the divine indwelling in the entire univcr.se, an infinite transcendence involving the internal rela- tions of Fatherhood and Sonship, and all the mighty operations of the Spirit in the world and in the minds of men. There is only one veritable God, nbvot dX-nSiyit SeSi (17'), although the Lord was self-conscious of the nearest possible approach of the eentri'S of the spheres, both of His divine .and human nature, to the Centre of the all-includ- ing and embracing Unity. The theoph;uiies of the or are outshone bj' the eternal knowledge of tlie Only-begotten (1'* and 6"), and the adeiiuate sufficing power of the human life and con.scious- ness of Jesus to disclose the secrets of the divine bosom. This revelation differs widely from the Gnostic or Oriental or modern inipersonalitj-, ' the Absolute.' Here the ineffable is clothed in forms not incompatible with the Eternal Unity. 'Father,' 'Son,' 'Word,' 'Love,' 'Life,' 'Light,' 'Spirit' are terras which make no schism of the one Deity, but are each necess.ary concepts in it. This is so complete and thoroughgoing that Fair- bairn has skilfully pressed the position that the Lord .lesus was in fact the first monotheist in the history of the world.
A few of the elements of this great synthesis must be specified.
(1) In 4-*''- the spirituality of the One who is called ' the Father ' is insisted npon. The spirit of man leads the way to the most direct realization of the Eternal.
(2) He is the livinj' and life-giving One, or even Life itself. In the Logos — who is God — there is Life. The mystery of 'life' was not solved, or a definition given, by Jesus or the evangelists ; nor is the mystery reduced, but intensilied, by tlie widest and latest researches of science ; Imt St. John may at least be credited with seeing behind the inexplicable phenomena of ' life ' — pliysieal, ethical, spiritual, and eternal — nothing less than the personal activity of the Lord God, the Living One.
(3) In this life is Nght. In 1 Jn 1» God is (not luminous, but) ' Light, and in him is no darkness at all,' no evil, no imperfection, absolute purity, goodness, righteousness, and illumination (Jn 17" 1«').
(4) The most characteristic doctrine of God which we must attrihf.te to the evangelist is that God is Love (1 Jn 4*). or that the most essential quality
JOHN, GOSPEL OF
JOIIX, GOSPEL OF
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anil absiiliitc essence of God is that which freely lavishes Himself on tlie ohjeots of His love. The moral perfections which our Lord attributes to this living and loving One are truth (8*), right- eousness (17^), and holiness (17")-
(5) I'ut the most characteristic name and function U tliatof ' I'ather,' 'my Father,' 'your Father,' the 'living Father' who has life in Himself (5"), who seeks for sjiiritual worshiiipers (4'^, where the vital internal relation between God as Father and God as Sjiirit is made very e\'ideiit). This fatlierly love is, hrst of all, lavished on the Son and on those who are given to Him. lie becomes tlie source of life to otliers, and in Him God loves the world (S'"-" 10" n"--" and 3'"). Preparation for this revelation of Fatherhood is found in OT and Hel. thought and in the Synop. te.iching, hut the Fourth Gospel is peculiarly saturated with the ennoblin" and uplifting thought. Here we come face to face with one who could speak of the Almighty as 'my Father.' He was the 'wisdom' and the ' power ' of God, not only (as St. Paul represented it) as the 'image,' but as 'the Son of His love.' The relation of Logos to Theos is warmed into the deeper relation of Son to Fatlier, the Only-begotten to the Kternal. The Father- hood is essential to God, and therefore eternal. If the Father be thought of as the Sui)reme Giver evermore lavishing upon an adequate object His own fulness of being, then the Son also is eternal, and from the relation between the giver and re- ceiver, between tlie Father and Son, does the very conception of Deity emerge. From before all time and worlds, and independently of time or space, the writer saw the inlinite giving and receiving of Eternal Love ; and he saw in the completeness of the mutual relation the moral and spiritual dpx^ of tlie universe. This is not the monad of the Platonic schools or the Gnostic sects, but the living fulness of an infinite Personalitj-, within which there is the reciprocal interchange of gra- cious and everla.sting relations. St. .Fohn is alive to the ])rimordial rank ami supremacy of the Father, and tells us by the lips of the Divine Son that the leather is the source of all power, and of the self-dependence of the Son. 'He gave to the Son to have life »» himself,' He is 'greater' than the Son, 'gives the Spirit' to the Son without measure, He 'sent the Son into the world' to le.vrn and fulfil all His will (5" 10"-" 14-'''). Yet the unity and the .solity of the Eternal turns upon tliis very relation ; and so identical is the substance and will of the Father and Son, that 'all things,' wivra, flow out of the mutual relation (1'"'), the monarchy of the Father com- patible with unity of the Father and Son.