54
PREDESTINATION
PREDESTINATION
not {Ant. XIII. v. 9). The distribution of the several views amon^ the parties follows the general lines of what might have been anticipated — the Essenic system being pre-eminently supianatural- istic, and the Sadducean rationalistic, while there was retained among the Pharisees a deep leaven of religious earnestness tempered, but not alto- gether destroyed (except in the extremest circles), by their ingrained legalism. The middle ground, moreover, whicli Joseplius ascribes to the Phari- sees in their attempt to distribute the control of human attion between 'fate' and 'free will,' re- flects not badly the state of opinion presupposed in the documents we have already quoted. In his remarks elsewhere (BJ II. viii. 14; Ant. XVIII. i. 3) he appears to ascribe to the Pharisees some kind of a doctrine of concurs^iis also — a Kpaaii between ' fate ' and the human will by which both co-operate in the etl'ect ; but his language is ob- scure, and is coloured doubtless bj' reminiscences of Stoic teaching, with which philosophical sect he compares the Pharisees as he compares the Essenes with the Epicureans.
But whatever may have been the traditional be- lief of the Pharisees, in proportion as the legalistic spirit which constituted the nerve of the move- ment became prominent, the sense of dependence on God, which is the vital breath of the doctrine of predestination, gave way. The Jews possessed the OT Scriptures in which the Divine lordship is a cardinal doctrine, and the trials of persecution cast them continually back upon God ; they could not, therefore, wholly forget the Biblical doctrine of the Divine decree, and throughout their whole history we meet with its echoes on their lips. The laws of nature, the course of history, tlie varying fortunes of individuals, are ever attributed to the Divine predestination. Nevertheless, it was ever more and more sharply disallowed that man's moral actions fell under the same predeter- mination. Sometimes it was said that wliile the decrees of God were sure, they applied only so long as man remained in the condition in which he was contemplated when they were formed ; he could escape all predetermined evil by a change in his moral character. Hence such sayings as, ' The righteous destroy what God decrees' {Tanchuma on cn3i) ; ' Kepentance, prayer, and charity ward oil" every evil decree' (Rosh -hashana). In any event, the entire domain of the moral life was more and more withdrawn from the intrusion of the decree ; and Cicero's famous declaration, which Harnack says might be inscribed as a motto over Pelagianism, might with equal right be accepted as the working hypothesis of the later Judaism : ' For gold, land, and all the blessings of life we have to return tlianks to God ; but no one ever returned thanks to God for virtue ' (dc Nat. Deorum, iii. 36). We read that the Holy One determines prior to birth all that every one is to be — whether male or female, weak or strong, poor or rich, wise or silly ; but one thing He does not determine — whether he is to be righteous or unrighteous ; according to Dt 30'° this is com- mitted to one's own iiands. Accordinglj', it is said tliat 'neither evil nor good comes from God ; both are the results of our deeds' {Mirlra.th rah. on -Ni, and Jnlkut there) ; and again, ' All is in the hands of God except the fear of God' (Meijilla ion) ; so that it is even somewhat cynically said, ' Man is led in the way in which he wishcsto go ' {Maccoth 10); 'If you teach him riglit, his God will make him know' (Is 28^ ; Jerus. Vhallnh i. I). Thus the deep sense of dependence on God for all goods, and especially the goods of the soul, which forms the very core of the religious consciousness of the writers of the Old Testament, gradually vanished from the later Judaism, and was super-
seded by a self-assertiveness which hung all good on the self-determination of the human spirit, on which the purposes of God waited, or to which they were subservient.
iv. Predestination in NT.— The NT teaching starts from the plane of the OT revelation, and in its doctrines of God, Providence, Faith, and the Kingdom of God repeats or develops in a right line the fundamental deliverances of the OT, while in its doctrines of the Decree and of Election only such advance in statement is made as the pro<;res- sive execution of the plan of salvation required.
1. The Tearhing of Jesus. — In the teaching of our Lord, as recorded in the Synoptic Gospels, for example, though there is certainly a new emphasis thrown on the Fatherhood of God, this is oy no means at the expense of His inlinite majesty and might, but provides only a more profound revela- tion of the character of 'the great King' (Mt .'5^), the 'Lord of heaven and earth' (Mt ll^^, Lk 10-'), according to whose good pleasure all that is comes to pass. He is spoken of, tliercfore, speciticallv as the 'heavenly Father' (Mt 5^' &^*-^-^- 15" 188■■'■23^ cf. 5'«- « 6'- » '7"- =' 10'2- 33 125» 10" 18»- '9, Mk 1 1-^- -•«, Lk 11") whose throne is in the heavens (Mt S^ 23"), wliile the earth is but the footstool under His feet. There is no limitation admitted to the reach of His power, Avhether on the score of difficulty in the task, or insigniCeance in the object : the category of the impossible has no ex- istence to Him ' witli whom all things are possible' (Mt 9"-", Mk 10", Lk IS-'', Mt 22-^ Mk 12--" \i^), and the minutest occurrences are as directl5' con- trolled by Him as the greatest (Mt KP-s", Lk 12'). It is from Him that the sunshine and rain come (Mt 5"); it is He that clothes with beauty the flowers of the field (Mt 6-'), and who feeds the birds of the air (Mt 6-*) ; not a sparrow falls to the ground without Him, and the very hairs of our heads are numbered, and not one of them is forgotten by God (Mt 10-^, Lk 12-). There is, of cour.se, no denial, nor neglect, of the mechanism of natui'e implied here; there is only clear per- ception of the providence of God guiding nature in all its operations, and not nature only, but the life of the free spirit as well (Mt 6« S'^ 24-- 7', Mk 11^). Much less, however, is the care of God thought of as mechanical and purposeless. It was not simply of spaiTows tliat our Lord was thinking when He adverted to the care of the heavenly Father for them, as it was not simply for oxen that God was caring when He forbade them to be muzzled as they trod out the corn (1 Co 9') ; it was that they wlio are of more value than sparrows might learn with what confidence they might de- pend on the Father's hand. Thus a hierarchy of providence is uncovered for us, circle rising above circle, — first the wide order of nature, next the moral order of the world, lastly the order of salva- tion or of the kingdom of God, — a preformation of the dogmatic scliema of prnvidcntia gc7>cralis, speciality and specialissima. All these work to- gether for the one end of advancing the whole world-fabric to its goal ; for the care of the heavenly Father over the works of His hand is not merely to prevent the world that He has made from falling into pieces, and not merely to pre- serve His .servants from oppression by tfie evil of this world, but to lead the whole world and all that is in it onwards to the end which He has appointed for it, — to that 7raXi77f>'f<ria of heaven and earth to which, under His guiding hand, the whole creation tends (Mt 19^, Lk 20*^).