* See, e.fi., Deissmann, Bible Studies, 1901, pp. 7.3, 233 ; Percy Gardner, Exploratlu Emnfielica (1899); cf. Ramsav, 'Greek of Early Church and Pagan Ritual ' (Erpos. Tiinen [1898], p. 9).
t See Deissmann, pp. 142, 147, 197 ; Moulton, Gram. ST Greek, (1996), has shown that the prepositions are practically identical in meaning as used in the papyri.
X .Mt 19-"S is doubtful, and at anv rate vSv is omitted.
§ Compare the proverb yet to be heard in Jerusalem, ' What salt is it that keeps money good ? ' Answer : ' Charity.'
I! Jiilicher {Die Gleichninreden Jean, p. 120) looks "upon the narrative as contradictory and suspicious, because at one time Jesus is represented as the Door and at another as the Shepherd
Both Mk. and Mt. teach that he who ' findeth his life shall lo.se it,' but Lk. enlarges the mean- ing of ^vxh until it includes the Avhole man (9-^'). Mt. alone says. Have no anxiety for j-our life, ' for each to - morrow will be anxious for itself (6-5-3''), though both Mt. and Lk. remark that even the birds, which have neither farming imi)lements nor granaries, are cared for (6^** 8'-", cf. Lk 12-^--^). The metaphorical allusion to new Mine in fresh wine-skins, Mk 2--, is explained in ilt 9^" and enlarged in Lk 5^". The patch which in Mk. and Mt. tears out a larger hole from the old garment, is in Lk. condemned for two alto- gether different reasons (5^'') ■ — the necessitj' of tearing a new piece of cloth in order to get the patch, and because it Avould be a difierent kind of cloth. Eveiy one who heard this remark in either form would be caught bj- the unspoken metaphor : Judaism cannot be patched by this new doctrine of Jesus ; it must be replaced by it. The gospel is no imtch ; it must replace the old and worn-out garment. In Mk. there is onlj* a brief alliLsion to the coming of the Son of Man (13^^-"), in Mt. an extended description.
' Let the dead bury their dead ' (8-'-) ; ' Cast not j-our pearls before swine' (7"); 'Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?' (7^**), are some of the striking expressions found in Mt. alone, as also the declaration that no man should be called 'father' [2Z^) ; cf. the acted metaphor (17^^), no- where else recorded, by which Jesus metaphorically claims that the God of the Temple is His Father, when He declares His legal exemption from the Temple tax. There are a number of peculiarly pic- turesque and humorous metaphors for which we are indebted to Matthew. The Pharisees are ' white- washed tombs ' full of putriditj^ (23-") ; ' blind guides of the blind ' (15'^^ 23"'- '^) ; ' wolves in sheep's clothing' (7"). One who truly exhibits the law of righteousness (which is unselfishness and love) does not let his left hand know what his right hand doeth (6^) ; but these men blow a trumpet before them, not onljMvhen they give alms, but when they pray (cf. the remark in the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles [xii. 1], that a teacher of the true doc- trine is known to one who ' has understanding of the right hand and the left'). They make long prayers and ' devour widows' houses ' (23*'* or ^^ ?). These hair-splitting theologians, .so particular in their eating, strain out the gnat but swallow the camel (23^).* Christ's yoke does not gall (1P«), but these men laj' upon the shoulders of others burdens which they will not move even with the finger (23-'). For such is the ' weeping and the gnashing of teeth ' (8'^ 1342. so 2213 24^1 23^, else- where only Lk 13-'*). These satiric pictures of the theologians of the day are peculiar to Matthew. Both Mt. and Lk. refer to the same individuals as hyper-critics, who are gi'eatly disturbed by the mote in their brother's eye, although they have a beam in their own. Forgetting their own in- firmity and need of immediate surgical assistance, thej' use the otlier eye, which must also have been sympathetically afflicted, in spying out and ridi- culing the speck of dust in the eye of their neigh- bour (Mt 7^-5 = Lk 6«'-). Nothing in Hogarth is better than that.
In Lk., several of the Beatitudes concerning the poor and hungry take on a distinctlj' difierent meaning from what they had in Mt. (5^- ^) ; the words ' poor ' and ' hungrj' ' (6^"- ^) having perhaps ob- tained a settled ecclesiastical, non-literal meaning.
who enters it ; but no Oriental would have criticised the use of these varying metaphors.
* All the Synoptists report the sa>-ing of Christ that it is easier for a camel to go through a needle's eve than, etc. (Mk 1025, lit 1924^ Lk 1825). The Talmud has the same expression, excepting that an elephant takes the place of the camel (quoted by Arthur Wright, Some ST Problems, p. 127).
METAPHORS
MILL
181
The storming of the Kingdom of heaven by those Avho upset the Law in tlieir anxiety to hurry into the Kingdom of the gospel, while obscured in Mt. (IV-), is explained in Lk. (16'6- i"). The mixed tigures used by Mk. (ii^-is) and Mt. (ISi*),— some- times similes and sometimes metaphors, — represent- ing men in one breath as both soil and seed, dis- appear in Lk.s beautiful symmetrical narrative (8^"^-). He, too, is responsible for the injunction ' ^lake for yoiu'selves purses which wax not old' (12*"), and for the attractive Orientalism 'son of peace ' (10^) added to Mt 10^^, and for the less com- mendable addition that the descent of the Spirit at the baptism of Jesus, which Mk. and Mt. had said to be ' like a dove,' — and which Jn. explains to have been 'as a dove,' i.e. in a softly, floating manner (Moulton), — was ' in bodily form ' (3--). Instead of Mt.'s metaphorical reference to the Pharisees as painted sepulchres (23^), beautiful to look at but foul within, Lk. makes Jesus speak of them as unsuspected graves {/uLVTipLeia) which defile every one who comes near them ( 1 1^). The ' moun- tain ' of Mt. (17*^), which can be ca*t into the sea by any disciple who has faith as fully alive as a mustard seed, becomes a ' tree ' in Lk. (17°). The ' seventy- seven ' acts of forgiveness required of Jesus' dis- ciples, according to Mt. (18~), are expressed with equal truth and vigour by Lk. when he reduces that number to 'seven' (17''). The satirical re- mark that wealth can build a man an ' eternal tent ' (Lk 16^), and the hyperbole that one must ' hate ' (fiKjiw) his father and mother in order to be a true disciple of Jesus (1-4^), are original with Lk. ; as also the statement that the disciples must ' win their souls ' (2P^), and that the Pharisees take away the 'key of knowledge' (IP-, cf. Mt 161^).