It is at ttiis point that we note the closest contact with the ideas of contemponary Judaism. Coming to Christianity from an atmospliere charged with the hope of earthly, even if of superhuman prosperity, it was impossible but that the dis- ciples should show some traces of their early training. The letters of St. Paul show us what a struggle it took before Christianity freed itself from the yoke of Jewish legalism. Not dissimilar was the relation to the eschatological ideas of Judaism. The thoughts of the early Christians clothed them- seh'ea naturally in imager}' taken from the Jewish apo<\alyptic books. They looked for a heavenly Jerusalem (Rev 2r-'i',cf. also He Vi'--, Gal 42i>), Kitb Its streets of gold and its gates of pearl, and did not resign without a struggle the hope of a millennial Kingdom on earth anticipating and preparing the way for the Joys of the heavenly Kmgdom (see .MiLtP..s'NnTM). The Apocalj-pse introduces us most deeply into this world of Jewish-Christian thought, which, however, has left its traces In other books of the NT (e.g. 2 P, Jude), and is not wholly absent even from him who did the most to overcome It — the Apostle Paul (e.g. Oal 4!«, 2 Co 2»).
And yet it is easy to exaggerate the extent of this influence. In spite of all the points of contact with Judaism, the early
Christians lived in a new world. To them as to their Mastsi salvation was a new life (Ac 2'-*, cf. 3"* ll^**), entered upon bj repentance and faith. It was a life of forgiven sin, of Hlial trust, ol brotherly service, of present comniuuion with Christ. H tha full enjo,\'ment of the promised salvation still lay in the future, they were yet not without experience of Christ's present blessing and" help. In the miracles of healing and deliverance which characterized the opening days of the Church (Ac 31*^) ; above all. in the presence and power of the Iloly Ghost (Ac 2i* 431 10*1), they saw the pledge of their Saviour's power and rule. The sanctification without which no man shall see the Lord (He 12'-*) was not only the ideal, but to a large extent a character- istic of their daily living. The social joys of the Kingdom were anticipated in daily communion with the brethren (Ac 2'*^*''), Thus the life experiences of the earl}' Christians, even as re- vealed in such books as Acts, are truer to the teaching of their Master than a superficial study of the use of such theological terms as 'salvation' and ' kingdom ' would seem to indicate. JIuch more shall we find this the case when we pass to the mora developed conceptions of St. Paul and St. Joim.
(6) St. Paul. — We have already touched upon the points which the teaching of St. Paul .shares with the rest of the NT^the conception of salva- tion as deliverance from sin, the emi)liasia upon the mediation of Jesus, and especially upon the significance of His death, the importance given to the eschatological element, the Jewish dress in which many of his ideas are clothed. Some inter- preters have indeed carried the relation to Judaism so far as to contend that St. Paul was a cliiliast, distinguishing, on the ground of 1 Co 15^- '", an earlier resurrection of believers from the later and general resurrection (see Parousia). But this view cannot be successfully mainlained. So far as the resurrection is concerneii, St. Paul's ideas are as far as possible removed from the crass materialism which characterized the thought of many of his contemporaries (cf. 1 Co 15" ' That which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall be,' etc.), and the salvation of the Par- ousia, which, unlike the coming in Rev 19, intro- duces the final blessL-dness of the saints, is only the working out to their full completion of prin- ciples and forces already active in this present life. Indeed the conception of salvation as a jiresent experience is characteristic of all St. Paul's teaching, and gives it its chief significance.
To appreciate St. Paul's doctrine of salvation, we must set it against the background of his view of the Jlesh. Whatever be the exact interpreta- tion given to the terra ; whether, with Holsten, it be unJer.stood metaphysically, as implying, on St. Paul's part, a dualistic view of tlie universe, or, with most interpreters, be regarded simply as the synonym for corrupt human nature, there can be no doubt that, to St. Paul, mankind as a whole is the prey of a power of evil which it cannot resist, and from -which it is unable to escape. From Adam do}vnwards all men have sinned, and come sliort of the glorj' of God (Ro 3^). Being sinful, they are exposed to the curse of the law, and to the death which is the inevitable consequence and penalty of broken law. The glory of Christ's salvation consists in the fact that it delivers man from this sinful flesh, and so at the same time from the law which is its judge, and the death which is its penal consequence.
Thus salvation, while a sinjrle process, involves different elements, and may oe looked at from different points of view. In the first place (or, to be more accurate, in the last place), it involves deliverance from death. To St. Paul, as to the other apostles, salvation is so far an eschatological conception, that its full efiects will be apparent only at the Parousia. In that great day, when the terrors of the Divine wrath shall be revealed from lieaven ' upon every soul of man that worketh evil ' (Ro 2S cf. 1'*), Christians shall be safe. The Parousia, which to others is a day of death (2 Th 1" ' who shall sutler punishment, even eternal destruction from the face of the Lord and from th« glory of his might '), is to usher them into the pre*