iii. Judicial authority in religion. — 1. Term defined.— An legislative authority has par- ticularly to do with duty, so judicial authority has particularly to do with triith : the former prescribes what one is to do or to be ; the latter, what he is to believe : the former creates and defines relation and obligations ; the latter declares and interprets them : the former is mainly con- cerned with the conscience ; the latter, with the understanding. It is worth noting further that legislative differs from judicial authority in that the former is original and the latter derivative. Legislative authority, along with other things, prescribes who is to interpret the laws it makes, and how much of finality shall attach to their interpretation by diff'erent persons. At the same time, we should not overlook the fact that the most limited judicial authority, so far as it goes, is no less real than the most absolute. Further, judicial authority, though derived, is just as real authority as is legislative authority. And, finally, when the judicial function vests in the same person as the legislative, then the maxim, ' The interpretation of the law is the law,' receives its highest exemplification ; for then the law and the interpretation of the law are but different modal manifestations of one and the same personal will or a^lthor■ity. For, in this case, the same char- acter that guarantees to the conscience the right- eousness of the relation or obligation created by tlie will of the lawgiver, guarantees also to the understanding the truth of the finding of the judge. And this, be it observed, is precisely the function of judicial authority, namely, not to create a right, not to make an idea correspond with reality, but to certify to the understanding the existence or non-existence of a right, the truth or the falsity of an idea or a statement. The vital lortance of this distinction will appear more more as the discussion proceeds.
2. Repositories. — As to judicial authority, our Lord teaches that it is distributed among a number of repositories, somewhat as the same kind of authority in a modern State is distributed
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156 AUTHOEITY IN RELIGION
AUTHORITY IN RELIGION
among a number of courts from the lowest to the highest.
In the case of such courts, no one thinks o( denying to the least and lowest of them the charar-ter of a true court. Its jurisdiction may be limited, it's .(.•.■i^in-..- ih'>l- In r.-.-.-viiI. but so long as it keeps within its jm i-l)' 1 1 n, .. : >h ■ - i Im ,ipji,-al from its decisions is pending, i . ■ . n-al
but as absolute as that of tt. i i r. i \eu
the lowest court possesses a uihumi- iml' p- nl. ih - : ii^ iniMiiijns cannot be discharged for it, iioi i.u. Un.v i.i- unolid Hum it by anv other court. Further still, it is fur eacli i.ourt, at least in the first instance, to interpret and declare the law by which it was created, and its duties and prerogatives under the law. Nor does the fact that it may err in the exercise of this right either nullify or invalidate the right itself. We elaborate this analogy thus in detail, because we believe that it will prove helpful in enabling us to understand our Lord's teachings con- cerning judicial authority in the sphere of religion.
Proceeding now to note His distribution itself, we find that He accords the fullest recognition (1) to what is commonly known as the right of private judgment. For Him each individual is clothed with a large, though not an absolute or final, judicial authority. Indeed, it is safe to say that no one has surpassed Christ in the honour, and even — if such words may be used of Him — in the deference with which in practice He treated the judicial rights of the darkest and humblest human souls. Despite the supreme claims that He made for Himself, He habitually permitted both Himself and His claims to be put upon proof at the bar of such souls. Not only did He consent, like any other man of His day, to plead at the bar of the ecclesiastical and civil authorities, but, while He always spake as one having authority, He never failed to submit His credentials along with His claims at the bar of the individual reason and con- science. But here we must particularize.
Christ taught, then, (a) That it is the inalien- able prerogative of every man to verify for himself the truth of a proposition before assenting to it as true ; and to verify for himself the rectitude of a command before yielding obedience to it as right (cf. Jn \5-\ Mt 16^ II'"'- 9« 11=°).
(b) Further, as is involved in what has been already said, Christ teaches that the conclusions reached in the exercise of this prerogative are not to be, if, indeed, we should not say ccmnot be, dictated by any form of external compulsion. In many ways He emphasizes the position that the individual is to be left wholly untrammelled in the exercise of his judicial rights. What else, after all, is the meaning of His words to Pilate, ' My kingdom is not of this world : if my kingdom were of this world, then would ray servants light, that I should not be delivered to the Jews : but now is my kingdom not from hence ' ( Jn 18^") ? If men were to be left free to deal with His own claims, including, of course. His teachings, with- out constraint or compulsion of any kind, and to do this even when the decision reached afl'ected not only His liberty but His very life, certainly He would have them no less untrammelled in dealing with every other question of truth or of duty with which they might find themselves con- fronted. Nor was it only the compulsion of force that Christ declined to countenance.