The lesson that Christ taught was well learned by the Apostles. St. Paul, in his earliest letter, warns his readers to ' see that none render evil for evil \into any man ' (1 Th SJS, cf. 1 P S^). Again, he points out that men should not seek their own vindi- cation, but should leave that to God (Ro I'^i'? 19). Lawsuits of Christians between themselves are frowned upon by this same broad reading of Christ's teaching. When Christians are more concerned with gaining a ]>ersonal victory than with seeking the honour of God, Christ's cause suffers (1 Co 61-'').
4. Is Christ's tertehinrj a new laiv ? — Literal obedience to Christ's teaching on this subject would destroy tlie structure of society. If no man were, in tlie strictest sense, to count as his own that which he had, there could be no such thing as private property ; the home would disappear ; the State would lapse into a condition of anarchy. And while a believer might, in his desire to obey his Lord, give to any one who took away his coat his cloak also, he might be doing the robber and society a very ill turn. The beggar is best helped not by indiscriminate charity, Avhich does not attempt to get at the root of the trouble, but by being put in the way of earning a living for him-
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self. Tlie robber has information laid against him and is punished, not to satisfy a personal grudge, but to force him to amend his ways and to protect the fabric of civil life. It is clear that what Christ laj-s do^^'n in these particular verses, and in the Sermon on the Mount generally, is not a new code of law, but a broad principle of action. As much of the discourse is aimed at the Pharisees, who had made an idol of the minutiaj of the Law, it is wholly improbable that Christ meant to lay down a new set of rules, which could be worthily observed only by adhering to their letter. It was necessary, in order that men should remember His teaching, that He should put the truth He had to propound in vivid and concrete form. St. Matthew, the most Judaistic of all the Evangelists, does appar- ently read tlie new principles as being legal direc- tions ; but the version of the Sermon given by St. Luke shows tliat this was not how the Apostles, whose outlook was towards the Gentiles, under- stood them. The injunction to turn the other cheek is thus not an injunction to be fulfilled to the letter, but an illustration of the principle that is to guide a man in disputes. He is not in passion to smite the wrong-doer, and to requite one wrong by another ; he is to try to win the offender by love. He is to consider tire other.
' So far as our personal feeling goes,, we ought to be ready to offer the other cheek, and to give, without desire of recovery, whatever is demanded or taken from us. Love knows no limits but those which love itself imposes. When love resists or refuses, it is because compliance would be a violation of love, not because it would involve loss or suffering ' (Gore, Sermon on the Mount, p. 103).
5. Modern theories of non - resistance. — George Fox took the Sermon on the Mount as another law ; and as he fulfdled the injunction to take no thought for clothing, by wearing a leather suit, so he practised to the letter the injunction with regard to non-resistance. ' Did we ever resist them ? Did we not give them our backs to beat, and our cheeks to pull off the hair, and our faces to spit on ? ' is a familiar phrase in his Journal. But his followers have got below the letter into the spirit. With all their charity, they have not given indiscriminately. They have made their place in philanthropic Avork by their insistence on searching into the causes of social evils, and, while helping others, have them- selves accumulated wealth.
Tlie great modern representative of the non- resistance view is Tolstoi, who carries his adherence to the letter of Scripture to a point which involves a return to anarchy. He takes the case (Letter on Non-Resistance) of a robbar found killing or out- raging a child. The child can be saved only by killing the robber. Should the robber be killed? Tolstoi answers in the negative. Even the non- Christian shotild not kill the man, Tolstoi argues, because he cannot say whether the child's life is more needed or is better than the robber's life. He, therefore, has no sufficient rational ground for action. But the Christian, who sees the meaning of life in fulfilling God's will, has no ground at all for killing the robber. ' He may plead with the robber, may interpose his own body between the robber and the victim ; but there is one thing lie cannot do— he cannot deliberately abandon the law he has received from God, the fulfilment of which alone gives meaning to his life.' The answer, of course, is that the fulfilment of God's law may not mean the observance to the letter of one phrase. We are to manifest love towards others. In this case, should it not be shown to the child who is innocent and helpless rather than to the man who is proving himself by his deed to be dangerous to his human kind ?