B82
SON OF MAN
SON OF MAN
Bupposed, it is difficult to conjecture a motive for extending tlie usajje to a number of other passages of an entirely ditferent character (lialdensperger [§ 24], p. 254). (5) As regards the supposition that the ascription of the expression to Christ was due to the early Churcli, Dr. Drummond ob.serves : 'The Church was more likely to omit than to insert the phrase. Reliance is placed on the sUence of Christian writers to show that the plirase was not known. The Gospels conclusively prove that it icas known ; and to imagine that it was a favourite expression just durin"; the period when the Gospels were composed, and that before that time it was not known, and after that time it was not in common use, is to construct liistory to suit the h}'pothesis. The Church would have preferred some title apparently higher and more dignified.' (6) St. Paul, it is urged, never uses the title. But neither do the evangelists in speaking of Christ, and yet their own narratives show that they were acquainted with it, and believed it to have been used by Christ. Unless Ac 7°* is to be eliminated as unhistorical, along with the numerous occurrences of the title in the mouth of Christ found in the Gospels, it must have been known at the time of Stephen's martyrdom as a designation of Jesus ; for otiierwise there would be no sufficient cause in Steplien's exclama- tion to account for the fury of tlie Jews (Drum- mond). Schmiedel, moreover,* argues at length tliat the use made of Ps 8 in 1 Co 15" and He 2*'" presupposes the acquaintance of the a]jostles with the expression as a designation of Clirist ; the fact that they do not use it more frequently is not difficult to explain. They wrote largely for converts from heathenism, wlio would be liable to misunderstand it; and they naturally chose by preference terms which would give prominence to the Divinity of Christ. The case would be similar with the sub-apostolic writers. Barnab. 12'''"', however, which, it had been alleged, was proof tliat the wTiter was unacquainted with the title, had been wrongly explained (as Lietzmann after- wards admitted t).
10. All tliese considerations would, however, un- doubtedly have to yield, if it were philologieally certain that ' the son of man ' could not have been an expression used by our Lord. The reasons ad- duced in support of this conclusion are, beyond question, weighty ; we must consider carefully whether they are conclusive.
In the first place, it must be clearly understood that we have no actual knoirledqe of the Aram, original used (presumably) bj Christ. We have no records of ttie Galila-an dialect as early as the first cent. A.D. ; and hence the Aram, original of ' the son of man ' is a matter not of actu;U know- ledge, but of inference. Tliree possibilities nuist lie kept in view. (1) Wellh. says that bamasli[d) in the sense of 'man' is common to Aramaic dialects in general ; but this statement is in excess of the evidence ; its occurrence in the exceptional passage Dn 7'' (in whicli a semi-poetical expression wonlcl be but natural) is not proof that it was in general use in that sense in Bibl. Aramaic ; and it is not found in other passages of Dn. (as 7*'), in wliich, if it were as commonly in use as it is in the Jerus. Talm., it might be naturally expected. It does not occur in the Aram, of Ont., and oitcurs but rarely in that of Jon. (§ la); and tliough Wellh. (pp. vi, 195) explains its absence from these Targums by the fact that their authors adhered closely to the Heb. (in which, as pointed out in § 6, the sing. ' son of man ' is of rare occurrence), yet it is not certain that this explanation is the ;orrect one. The Pal. Targ. on the Psalms and
• Prot. ilonaUhf/le, Juli 1898, p. 260 ff.
t Theol. Arl: aus dcm Ithein. Pred.-Verein, 1898, H. 2, p. 8.
Job, and the Pesh., are also in general literal translations, and yet bar nash(d) occurs in both frequently (cf. above, § 7 (c), {d}}.
Onlj. uses regularly CJ'M for 'soul' (=per80n), Lv 2* i**l 51- i •• etc. ; and Kinn ke-j-n for ' that soul,' On 17H, Ex 31i«, Lv 720 21. 27 198 20« and elsewhere. In all these passage* pseudo-Jon. uses as refjutarly 'barnash,' 'barnasha.' So in Dt f" s (for 0"1N.^) pseudo-Jon. has KB'3 ^3, while Onk. has KB'O'K ; and in the expression 'the work of man's {or men's) hands' DIN is rendered bj batnashiii) in the Palest. Targruras (Ps llM )3.6ii>, 2 Ch sal"), "but by fmleha in Onk. (Dt 42») and Jon. (2 K 1918, Is 3718). Similarly isnjx is rendered in the Pal. Targums bv bamdslHa), Ps 8' ff^.o 103I6 1041» etc., but by Yiulnha in Jon. (Is 13' 246 51 .2 662). ct. also Ps 1188>' (Pal. Targ. : C'3 ID) with Jer 17» (Jon. : nBTN). So Fiebig, p. 11.
It is true (V>7jd*(Ad is used mostly as a collective terra ; but Wellh. 's argument (p. v) to shou "that it_ is used so always, and that consequently, unless bar ('(*)?uis/i(a) were in use. there would have been no means of expressing the idea of (a single, particular) man {homo) in Aram.,ia surely not conclusive; for in Onlj. Kl.in Kf 3'n, as has been just shown, occurs repeatedly in the sense of thai mun (oonip. in Heb. the analogous indi- \'idual and collective applications of C"N). So Fiebig, p. 11.