Keeping in mind this usage, we shall be enabled to apprehend more fully the thought underlying the language of Jesus about His power of impart- ing Himself in His perfect humanity (cf. Jn 6^'-^). His ' flesh,' by virtue of its union with His Divine Personality, is ' living ' (6 fiif) food, and therefore possesses tlie power of communicating its life to all who will eat tliereof {4av /xri tpayiiTe ttiv cripKa, k.t.\. ). Without this participation and consequent assimi- lation on the part of His followers, there can be no such thing as ' life' within them, for they deliber- ately reject what contains for them the germinal principle of that ' life ' {ovk ?x""e fwijv ^v eoiTois).
The question may be asked whether it is possible to trace any likeness or fundamental connexion between the Gospel and the Pauline uses of <7d/){. In St. Paul's writings very marked emphasis is laid upon this word, and for him it clothes a con- ception rich with ethical signiHeance. The ' flesh ' is the present abode of sin, which requires an obedi- ent subject to execute its behests. So closely does he connect the jiower of sin with the existing weak- ness of the flesh that he does not hesitate to say from his own experience ' I know that in . . . my flesh dwelled! no good thing' (Ro 7"). At the same time, he is careful to point out that this is not the state appointed for man by God. The ' cruci- fixion ' of the flesh is possible for every man who wills to walk not 'according to the flesh' but ' according to the Spirit ' (ol . . . rriv adpKaeaTavpd]- aav, (C.T.X., Gal S^-, cf. Ko 8«-), and those who have the indwelling presence of the Spirit are no longer in the flesh (iv aapKl) but in the Spirit (if irptifian, Ro 8'). With these we may conii)are such exjires
sions as ' the mind of the flesh ' ((ppSyrj/ia, rrji cropK6s) and ' the mind of the Spirit' ((t>p6vri/i.a tou irpfviiaroi, Ro 8'^ ; iiwi TOU voJs ttjs ffapxis, Col 2"), from which we can gather how present to St. Paul's mind was the connexion betAveen sin and the flesh, and at the same time how strong within him was the glorious hope that such connexion in the ultimate result was abnormal and destined for destruction. There is no sign in the Pauline terminology that he was influenced in his theological conceptions by the spirit of that Greek dualism which womied its way into subsequent Christian thought with lasting and for the most part evil consequences (see Miiller, Christian Doct. of Sin, i. 320 fl'.).
The redemption and the quickening of the body (. . . TT]v CLTToXiTpioatv TovawfiaTOSfHo 8^ ; . . . fa)07roii)<rei to. flvijra ffJifxara, Ro 8" ; cf. 6'-, 2 Co 4") are features essential to the scheme of salvation as outlined and sj^steniatized by St. Paul. The con- demnation of sin ' in the flesh ' by God, who for this purpose sent His Son ' in the likeness of the flesh of sin ' (Ro 8^), is evidence that there is, for him, no naturally essential connexion between the flesh and evil.
We are not without signs that this is just the point of view from which the Evangelists looked at this question (cf. Jn 1" 17", Lk3« ll" = Mt6-'=), .and that neither thej- nor the Apostle of the Gentiles were touched by that false belief which identified sin with matter, and, therefore, with ' the body of the flesh ' (cf. Col 1'-- 2"). Tlie anthropology of the Gospels, as well as the psychological concep- tions which emerge but rarely and incidentally from their pages, are essentially Hebrew, and are never stained by the potential immoralities which characterized the later Alexandrian and Hellenistic theology.
Literature.— Stevens, The Theolwiy of the XT, pp. 189 f.,
Bible Doctrine of JIan,a.ni bis :\rlt \ .ml ' Flesh ■
in Hastings' DB; Weiss, Bibliral I .\ r, § 27;
Cremer, Bibt.-Theol. Lex. of XT dr. ,
J. K. Willis. FLIGHT.— The story of the flight of the Holy Family into Egj'pt is peculiar to the First Gospel (Mt 2'^''^-)- The omission of it, and also of the manifest<ation to the Gentiles (Mt 2'-'-), from the Tliird Gospel is surprising, since there rather than in Mt. we should have expected to find any story that brought Jesus into contact with the Gentile world. The surprise would deepen into suspicion were it not that the records of the Evangelists are so f ragmentarj' ; but that fact instantly relieves the strain.
O. Holtzmann, who cites the well-linown omission in Ac 919-2C of anv reference to St. Paul's journey to Arabia (Gal 1"), frankly states that ' the author who left out this journey of Paul to Arabia might well pass over, in his other account, the ■ " ■■ ■ ■'-'• --J '>--'':■-■, had m
absolute] V abov_ . _
difficult to get over the gap in the narrative of Luke ' {Life of Jesm, p. 85).
The silence of St. Luke does not, then, discredit the narrative of St. Matthew. But their records might prove to be mutually exclusive, so that acceptance of the one would involve rejection of the other. How stand tlu- f:i.ls? According to the Third Gospel, Na/.m-U, uas, prior to their marriage, the hoiur l"iili "i .l.i-i'i.li and of Mary (Lk 2'' 1=*), whereas St. .Muttlirw (2°') first associ- ates them with Nazareth after tlieir return from Egypt, and gives no hint of any previous residence there. Further, St. Matthew, having told the storj' of the Nativity (I'^'^s), goes on to record the visit of the Magi (2'"'-), the huiTied flight from Bethlehem and the sojourn in E<;ypt (2""'-), whereas St. Luke records merely the circumcision of^the child (2'-') and His presentation to the Lord (2""), and then adds that ' when they had p-rformed all