shall be assigned to later origin. Accordi _ . , . ,
details in the alleged predictions are quite generally denied Jesus, and represented as easily explicable modifications, m accordance witn the actual course of events, of what Jesi said. The prediction of resurrection on the third day ample, ia held by many («.?. _Schwartzkopff)_ to be too preoi:
* really
determination,
or explained as only a pe:
after the analogy of Hos
prediction
therefore
eluded from the prophecy, for an indefinite short time, en B. Weiss). To others a seems incredible (Strauss,
Schenkel, Weizsacker, Keim, Brandt), and it is transmuted into,
at most, a premonition of future victory.
Holsten) even the anticipation of death is d
of forecast is left to Jesus except, possibly,
of difficulty and suffering ; while with ot
way, and Jesus ia represented as passint
part of His life (Fairbairn), or the whole of
tion of more or less unbroken success,
\et other
brought gradually the discovery of the hopeh ness of drawing them to His spiritual ideals ; the growing enmity of the rulers opened before Him the prospect of disaster ; and thus there came to Him the slow recognition, first of the possibility, m 1 then of the certainty, of failure ; or, at least, f iluie was impossible f<iv tlie imssum He 1 I t peiform, of tin' ii.r.-^iiy ..I passing 1 I ilieun^ to the ulliin.ilr Mir, ess. So
I l\ \ IS the rexdjustment to lliis lll■^^ ("lint of \RV\ intde that even at the end— as the prayer at Gethsemane shows — there remained a lingering hope that the extremity of death might be avoided. So far as a general sketch can be made of a view presented by its several adherents with great variety of detail, this is the essential fabric of the new view (cf. the general statements of Kiihler, Zur Lehrc von dcr Vcrsohnung, 159 ; Denney, Death of Christ, 11; Wrede, Messiasr/r/iciiunis, SO). Only such parts of the predictive element of the teach- ing attributed to Jesus in the Gospels as are thmiglit capable of naturalistic interpretation are inroi |iurated into this new construction. By those « li.. \\ i>li to bring in as much as possible, it is said, lor ixaiujile, that our Lord v.as too firmly pcr- -11,1. Ir, I iif His Messianic appointment and function, :Mhl \\.i~ 1(10 clear that this function centred in the .■ I 111. iilnnent of the Kingdom, to accept death itself II- I II 1 1 111... When He perceived death impending, Ih.il III, lint to Him, therofore, return; and return I,, \niiri in 111.. Mi'^siaiiir ulory meant resurrection. W Ii,„ ll,. II, on.. Ill iin.l >'|ioke of death, therefore, II,. 11,., ,--,arily tliom^hl and spoke also of resurrec- li,,ii 1111,1 return; the three went inevitably to- .,ili,.i ; and if He anticipated tiie one, He must liiiMiinlicipatedtheothersalso. Under this general -,li,iii,. all sorts of opinions are held as to when, li,,\v, an,! un.lor what impulses Jesus formed and lainjlil I liis ,.^,liatological programme. As notable
II ,,.n-tni,ti,>n ii< any holds that He first became cortain of His Messiahship in an ecstatic vision which accompanied His baptism ; that the Messiah must suffer was already borne in upon His convic- tion in the course of His temptation ; but it -vvas not until the scene at Ca;sarea Philippi that He attained the happy assurance that tli,' M,-.-iiinic glory lay behind the dreadful death iiiii..'n.lin- ,.\ .o- Him. This great conviction, attain! '.1 in ).i in. i].lo in tbe pcstasv of that moment, was, ii,\ ,tI In !'■ -, only ..^rinlnailv assimilated. Wlmn .Iomi- uhs lali'onrin.4 «ilii His disciples. He xmi- liiLonrm- also witli Ilinisi'lf. In this particuliii ...n 1 1 n, I wn (it is U. Iloltzmaiin's) an element ol SmMiisv is
introduced; more commonly tho ; '
Mipposed to make in His antic'i]ial
',' , lo rest on processes of formal roii-' cr ' case. He is pictured as only slow ly
iiro thought
In either
icr the stress
614
FORESIGHT
FORESIGHT
of compelling ciicunistances, reach ing convictions of what awaited Him in the future ; and thus He is conceived distinctly as the victim rather than as the Lord of His destiny. So far from entering the world to die, and by His death to save the world, and in His own good time and way accom- plishing this great mission, He enters life set upon living, and only yields step by step reluctantly to the hard fate which inexorably closes upon Him. That He clings through all to HLs conviction of His Messiahship, and adjusts His hope of accom- plishing His Jlessianic mission to the overmastering pressure of circumstances, — is that not a pathetic trait of human nature? Do not all enthusiasts the like? Is it not precisely the mark of their fanaticism ? The plain fact is, if we may express it in the brutal frankness of common speech, in this view of Jesus' career He miscalculated and failed ; and then naturally sought (or His followers sought for Him) to save the faUure (or the appear- ance of failure) by inventin" a new denouement for the career He had hoped for in vain, a new de- nouement which — has it failed too ? Most of our modern theorizers are impelled to recognize that it too has failed. When Jesus so painfully adjusted Himself to the hard destiny which more and more obtruded itself upon His recognition, He taught that death was but an incident in His career, and after death would come the victory. Can we be- lieve that He foresixw that thousands of years would intervene between what He represented as but an apparent catastrophe and tlie glorious reversal to which He directed His own and His followers' eyes ? On the contrary. He expected and He taught tliat He would come back soon^-cer- tainly before the generation which had witnessed His apparent defeat liad passed away ; and that He woukl then establish that Messianic Kingdom which from the beginning of His ministry He had unvaryingly taught was at hand. He did not do so. Is there any reason to believe that He ever will return ? Can the ' foresight ' which has repeatedly failed so miserably be trusted still, — for what we choose to separate out from the mass of His expectations as the core of the matter? On what grounds shall we adjust the discredited ' foresight ' to the course of events, obviously unforeseen by Him, since His death? Where is the end of these ' adjustments ' ? Have we not already with 'adjustment' after 'adjust- ment' transformed beyond recognition the expecta- tions of Jesus, even the latest and fullest to which He attained, and transmuted them into something fundamentally different, — passed, in a word, so far beyond Him, that we retain only an artificial connexion with Him and His real teacliing, a con- nexion mediated by little more than a word ?