How is it, then, that this term 'flesh,' properly denoting the lower, corporeal or physical element in human nature, should come to denote the being of sin in that nature ? Is it because this phj'sical element is the main seat, or the original source of evU in man? But, according to St. Paul, it is not in the physical alone that sin has its seat. There are sintul desires of the mind as well as of the Hesh (Eph 2^). There is defilement of ' the spirit' (2 Co 7')- There are works called ' of the flesh ' whicli have nothing to do with sensuality, e.g. hatreds, variance, emulation, wraths, factions, divisions, heresies (Gal 5-", ICoS'-*). The apostle calls by the name of 'floshlj' wisdom' what was evidently speculative tenden< y derived from the Greek schools (2 Co 1'-). There were heretics at Colossoe whose ruling impulse he calls their ' fleshly mind,' though they were extreme ascetics, attached to some form of Gnosticism (Col 2'»- "■ ■•"■ ^).
It might indeed be maintained that if we assume the physical nature in man to be the source of evil in him, it would be easy to explain how the whole man under that influence should be ciilled 'the flesh ' or 'the bod}' of sin.' Btit this assumption will not tally with the treatment of man's bodily nature in these writings. Any view implying the inherent evil of matter is radically opposed to the whole Bible philo.sophy. It is as ojiposed to the Scripture account of its beginning in the race, as it is to our experience of its first outbreak in the in- dividual. In Genesis the first sin is represented as the consequence of a primary rebellion against God. The earliest manifestations of evil in chil- dren are selfishness, anger, and self-will. Again, that the corporeal nature is necessarily at strife with the s])iritual, is a view which cannot be recon- ciled with the claims made upon ' the body ' in tho Christian system. Throughout St. Paul's Epistles, Christians are enjoined 'to yield their mcnil i s instruments of righteousness unto God' (Ro 6"), to ' present their bodies a living sacrifice' (Ro 12'), to regard their bodies as 'members of Christ,' and as 'the temple of the Holy Ghost' (1 Co C"-"*) ; that the body is for the Lord, and the Lord for the body (1 Co 6'"). Still more impossible is it to reconcile with such a view the Christian revelation concern- ing the future of the redeemed, and the consumma- tion of redemption. If sin were the inevitable outcome of man's possession of a bodj', redemption ou";ht to culminate in his deliverance from the body, instead of in its change and restoration to a higher form (Ph S^'). To say that the matter of the body is, or contains, the princi]ile of sin, and then to say, as St. Paul does (Ilo 8"), that the last result of the Redeemer's Sjiirit indwelling in us shall be to quicken these mortal bodies, would be flat self-contradiction. But the view which con- nects sin with the material body is neither Hebrew nor Christian. It is essentially alien to the whole spirit of revelation. No dou\it, at a very early period in Christian history, chiefly through the influence of the Greek and some of the Latin Fathers, it obtained such hold of Christian thought that it continues to colour popular modes of con- ception and speech to the present day. One of the most obvious examples is that men imn^ne they are uttering a scrijitural sentiment when they spcalc of welcoming death as the liberation of the soul from the body. Yet the idea of St. Paul is exactly the reverse, when he declares that even tiio re- deemed, who have the first-fruits of the Spirit, ^roan within themselves waiting for the adoption. I.e. for tho redemption of their body (Ro 8^). Two additional reasons why the apostle cannot be held as tracing man's evil to the corporeal element, may be summed uj) in tho words of .lulius Mliller : ' He denies the presence of evil in Christ who was par- taker of our fleshly nature, and he recognizes iti
166
PSYCHOLOGY
PSYCHOLOGY
presence in spirits, who are not partakers thereof. Is it not, tlierefore, in the highest dep'ee probable tliat, accordin<r to him, evil does not necessarily pertain to man s sensuous nature, that jarx denotes Boraetliing different from this?' {I.e. i. 321).
Taking, then, the two meanings of the term ' flesh,' we note how impossible it is, in a way of mere ratiocination, to develop the one out of the other. The attempt to get the ethical significance which St. Paul gives to it (lut of the elementary Hebrew conception of the perishable or earthly part of man, signally fails. It leaves out the clearly biblical account of the change in human nature caused by the Fall. It is quite inadequate to ex- plain how selfishness, wrath, pride, and other non- tleshlv sins, bear prominently the name ' works of the flesh.' To assert, for instance, that sarx from its prinuiry meanin", 'living material of the body,' came by a natural process of thought and language to mean 'the principle of sin,' is to assume human nature to be subject to sin by its physical constitution — a view wholly untenable, because at variance with the most radical con- ception of the Bible from its earliest to its latest writings.