KINGDOM OF GOD
KINGDOM OF GOD
853
earthly care (Mt G^'** 7''") ; in its estimate of goods, it sets supreme store on the kingdom and its righteousness, and seeks these beyond all material blessinjfs (Mt G^'-"- "■") ; in its relation to man, it shows itself in mercy, forbearance, forgiveness of inj tries, active beneficence, and in the bright shming of a holy example (Mt 5'- '• »-« 7'2). its standards of judgment are the direct inversion of most of those which prevail in the world. It inverts, e.g., the world's standards of blessedness in calling the poor in spirit, the mourning, the meek, the persecuted, etc., blessed (Mt 5»-" ; cf. Mai 3"); the world's standards of greatness in pronouncing that true greatness lies in humility and service (Mt 18»- *, Mk 10", Jn 13"- ">) ; the world's standards of wisdom in pronouncing the typical wise man of the world a fool (Lk 12""'") ; the world's standards of the chief ^ood in making that consist in the kingdom and it» righteousness (Mt 6"), etc. Yet, in His doctrine of the righteousness of the king- dom, Jesus declares that He is not introducing anything absolutely new, but only unfolding the deepest spirit and teaching of law and prophets (Mt 5"- '» e2»«'").
(rf) It follows from the nature of the kingdom, as just described, that it is a kingdom entirely tpiritual and umvorldly in its nature (Jn IS", ct. Mk 10^**) — supernatural and heavenly in its origin, powers, blessings, aims, and ends, — a kingdom free alike from national and ceremonial limitations, working by its own laws, and destined in the end to embrace all peoples. There is thus given us from another side what we saw to lie already in the Lord's designation of Himself as ' Son of'^Man ' — the universal it 1/ of the kingdom of God. Jesus already hints at this in Mt 8" ' They shall come from the east and from the west, and shall sit down with Abraham,' etc. ; it is implied in His parables (Mt 13 'the field is the world,' v.** ; parable of Mustard Seed, etc.); is declared else- where ( Mt 21*" The kingdom of God shall be taken from you,' etc. ) ; and is announced in several sayings of Jn (e.g. Jn 12*' ' I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto me,' etc.). It comes out uistinctly in the commission after the resurrection (Mt 28", Mk l(i").
It must also have been given to the consciousness of Jesus from the first by the j)rophecy in Dn (OM. « 7i«. "). Equally clear is it from the attitude of Jesus to mere ceremonial observances (Mt IS''"), and the critical, discretionary position He assumed to the whole Mosaic Law {e.q. the Sabbath, Mk 2*; marriage, Mt 19*"'), that, while Himself observing the ordinances of His nation, He did not bind these on the members of His kingdom, but claimed the right aa Son of Man — i.e. the Messiah — to alter, change, and abrogate them. His relation to the Jewish law He lays down in the principle that He came, not to destroy, but to fulfil (Mt 5"). Hut this fulfilment was of a nature which meant in part destruction. His aim through- out was to judge the details of the law by reference to its underlying principle, and to the highest needs of men (>fk 2"), — to po back at every point clearly from commands to pnnciples, from outward conduct to di»i)ositions of the heart, from forms of worship to spirit of worship— and this led to the dropping away of everything that was of mere provisional or temporary value. In the Sermon on the Mount, atxordingly, and in all the Go8i>els, the whole stress is laid on the spiritual, the ethical, the eternal, and no reference is made to the ceremonial law at all. Nay, in the two similitudes of the I'atoh on the Old Garment, and the New Wine in Old Uottlea (Mt 9"-"), Jesus indicates in the clearest way His consciousness that His kiii(;dom was something ratiically new, and not simp-y a reformed and purified Judaism, and that the M forms were itterly inadequate to
contain the si)irit of the new nligion — that the latter would indeed burst and rend them, if it were put into them.
(e) The kingdom thus intro<luced into time and history has two stadia — an earthly and an eternal. The consideration of this point involves, finally, some investigations to which we proceed.
(a) .\ question of much iuiportanii- here is as to the conne.xiou which Jesus conceived to subsist be- tween the founding of His kingdom and His death. The question is twofold : whether from the be- ginning of His ministry He clearly recognized the necessity of His death ; and, if He did, or even if this knowledge came later, what .significance He attributed to His death for the founding of His kingdom? The first point is not to be settled on a priori grounds, but from an impartial considera- tion of the history. We cannot, however, doubt, from a review of all the circumstances, that Jesus did, from the commencement of His Messianic career, recognize the fate in store for Him — whether tlie precise mode of His death is another question (but cf. Jn 3"-"). It is true that it was not till after the memorable confes.sion atC'se.sarea I'liilippi that Jesus began to speak plainly to His discijiles of His approaching sullerings and death (Mt W^ etc.), but it does not follow that tliis was the beginning of His own knowledge on the subject. On the contrary, it is evident from the clearness, fulness, and decision with which He then an- nounces His death and resurrection, that these topics had long occupied His own thoughts, and were already settled convictions in His mind. But we are not left entirely to conjecture. It is, on the face of it, in the highest aegree improbable that one who from the outset grasped so clearly the essential nature of His kingdom in its contrast with the world, who had rejected the temptations to give it another shape (>lt-4'""), who predicted 80 accurately in His parables the stadia of its development in history (Mt 13), who forewarned His disciples of the certain persecutions which awaited them for His sake (MtS'"-" lO'*-*), could have been ignorant of the inevitable collision which mu.st occur between Himself and the Jewish authorities, and wliich He must have foreseen could not but issue in His death. That He did anticipate it is expres.slj- imiilied in His saying, 'Tlie disciple is not above his Master,' etc. (Mt 10**), and in Hia allusion to the bridegroom being taken away from them (Mt 9"). More definitely, Jesus had deeply studied the prophecies, and in the very beginning of His ministry announced that those relating to the Servant of J" in I« were fulfilled in Himself (Lk 4'"). But He could not be unaware of what was wTitten of the death of this Ser\'ant in Is 53 ; and the recorde d greeting of the Baptist, ' Behold the I^mb of God,' ete. (Jn 1^), would recall that passage. There are other sayings in Jn— those to Nicodemus (Jn 3'*- '•), and especially the enigmatic utterances al)Out giv- ing His flesh for the life of the world (Jn 6"-")— which point in the same direction. Hut if Jesus foresaw His death, it was impossible that He should not have regarded His teniiiorary sub- mission to it as in some way necessary for the ends of His kingdom— for, that His subjection to death was, and could l>e, only temiHirarj', He never, in the strength of His Me.s.sianic conscious- ness, doubted. His announcement of His death is always conjoined with the declaration of His rising again (Mt Iti*' "Jii" etc.); and the sliadow of the Cross never clouds for a moment His a.s»ur- ance of 11 is final coming in glory to judge the world (Mt 7" 10» 13" 16", Lk l™* etc.). If. accordingly, we ask. What was the significuica which .lesus attncliol to His death in connexion with the establishment of His kingdom! we ar*