To His words have to be added HLs works. His ordinary doings were those of a good man (Ac 1(P*). His miracles proved a special presence of God with Him (Jn 3-). There is a crude view of tlie Gospel wonders which has made many see in them an unimportant part of the Gospel story, and even feel it desirable to do without them. So long as they are looked upon as thaumaturgic signs or violations of Nature's sequence, so long mil both religion and science reject them. If, however, they are considered a.s indications of laws which emfirace and in a sense unite the seen and unseen worlds, it is of immense importance to Christianity
' It hardly comes within the scope of this article to consider the alleged intluence of Buddhism or Mithraism. t Cf. Perowne's llnlscan Lecls. pp. 93, 94.
not produce infallible certainty of the truth of Christ's Divinity. But no infallible certainty can
that they should occur in connexion with the foundation of that faith. As a matter of fact, in face of all attempts to explain them or explain them aw^ay, a certain robust sense of the general mind has refused to concur in any view that denies their reality or their essential place in the history. They reveal Christ no less than His doc- trine. They constitute warrants of His Di\-ine power : they also form part of the Gospel. They stand as a real item in the list of testimonies to His inipression. They are one of the modes in which His life found utterance, ' an authentic ele- ment of the original gospel oflered to faith ' (A. B. Bruce, Apologetics, p. 376 ; Miraculous Elements in Gospels, chs. vi. and \'iii.). In this respect they are on a different plane from the prodigies credited to pagan heroes. That men miglit see the will of God at work, Jesus did the works of His Father. A reckless historical scepticism evaporates the miracles partly into odd natural events, partly into nervous healings, partly into gi-adually grow- ing legends. Sane criticism, however, admits their congi'uity with the record, their naturalness to His Person, and their value to faith. The supreme miracle of the Resurrection (wh. see) is of primary import.
3. Validity of the experience. — The lines tluLs traced converge in one picture. Their eftect is striking, and of the cumulative kind. They may " ;y of ' llible be given. The Christ they portray is not aUsolute in the sense of abstract ; He is absolute in the sense of the fullest concrete ; all the elements, therefore, which go to make up this impression of His Person contribute to the proof of its power : by exhibiting what He is they testify to Him : their witness is, ' This is the Son of God.' It was men's experience of Christ as Divine that gave them the right to affirm His DiWnity. Is the wit- ness true ? The contention here made is that what we know along many lines as the Christian experience is a new and distinctive development, and demands a new- and unique factor introduced to the human consciousness. Is the contention verifiable ? The witness is an interpretation : can we trust it ? Has the impression an exact eqiuva- lent behind it of objective fact ? What were the dimensions of the objective fact capable of pro- ducing this inner eS'ect ? The answer must be that the same law of rationality holds here as in other parts of knowledge. The effect must have an adequate cause. What the .soul realizes as the highest in its inner feeling is proof of reality that the rea.'ion may recognize. If the soul attains the vision of a Reality whose authority over it is absolute and from whom it receives a power that masters all other powers, then it knows the mean- ing of God. The finality of such experience cannot be questioned, when its source is per.sonality (per- sonality being the only fvdl reality of which we have knowledge), and its seat the moral disposition and not individual temperament. Now to those conditions the impression of Christ recorded in the Gospels conforms. Behind the records He stands, greater than themselves, and that by their own showing ; and because of this they furnish to their readers a vision which does not fade but grows, a power that is new and permanent, a command from which the conscience cannot dis.sent, a mas- tery that sets free. He Himself had this effect on men as they companied with Him ; the record of their intercourse \vith Him has the .same effect. The effect is a fact of <iiiitiMuous exjierience funda- mentally identical in Uiiid llm.imliDut the Christian centiirie.s. Both arc I In' chm'Ioiic that ciiwraiis Truth transcending time ami jilaic. Only the univei-sal and everlasting can transcend the limita-
DIVINITY or CHEIST
DIVINITY or CHRIST
475
tions of our separateness and speak in the same manner to thousands of different souls. The phenomena of Cliristiau history are so diverse in kind from those of other Iiistoric faitlis as to re- quire the sup])osition of a supernatural origin (of. Illingworth, PcrsonaliUj Human and Divine, p. 200). _ The witness that God Himself is here step- ping into tlie liistory of the race must be accounted true.
III. Beginnings of the doctrine of Christ's Person in the NT.— 1. General eheiraeter of the, doctrine. — It has been necessary to make the above analysis of the bases of belief in Christ as pre- sented in the Gospels and to justify it, because it is only by luulerstanding them fully that we gain any test by which to determine the character and worth of the belief itself, or reach the point of view for appreciating aright its beginnings and its growth. It is a doctrine that has no finality. It is based on an experience which cannot rest, but must grow with the growth of all life, and pervade all other experience of life. It is a doctrine there- fore that has a history down to the present, and which is destined to continue beyond the present. We are now in the midst of a new growth of its meaning. In moving on we can purchase security only by retracing our steps, unravelling the web of the iiast and weaving it over again. RecuiTence to the original will reinvigorate like tlie touch of earth to the feet of Ant;eus. In the lirst expres- sion there is a universality which is ajjt to be lost in the divisions of later opinion : there is an implicit fulness in the beginning which is not completely represented in any subsequent stage. To that beginning we now advert. In the conviction that ' in Christ' they were ' a new creation,' ' partakers of a Divine nature ' (2 Co 5", 2 P l*), the Apostles must seek expression of their conviction. The ex- pression runs over into every phase of tlieir thought and life. It breeds in them a sense of new relation to Christ akin to that felt towards God, originating a new thought of His Person. We see it in the Names they give to Him, in the Pro].erties and Attributes they ascribe to Him, in tln'ir .ucciitance of wonders attending His Origin aii<l His ji.issing from sight, in the relations they piiMcicI to insti- tute between Him and previous histmy .hs well as future ages. The NT idea of His Divinity is not to be built up as an induction from these par- ticulars ; these, on the contrary, are the reflexions, inevitable and faint, of the experience of His Divinity ; they are tlie inward seeking utterance.