1. Our Lord's personal teaching on the subject is positive, not negative ; He inculcates unity rather than forbids division. It is to be gathered (1) from His example, (2) from His recorded sayings.
(1) The condition of religion in the Jewish commonwealth of His time was profoundly unsatis- factory to Him. It called forth His sharp rebuke. Its teachers, their doctrine and their practice, in- curred His denunciation. The Temple demanded cleansing at His hands ; the synagogues were in possession of those scribes and lawyers and Phari- sees on whom He cried 'Woe,' as hypocrites. Nevertheless, He bade His disciples respect their authority and obey their ordinances— always with- out imitating their conduct. They ' sit m Moses seat ' (Mt 232) . a seat self -assumed,— their office had no recognition in the Law,— but in a sense they represented the prophetic succession, and de facto stood for constituted order. Christ neither separ- ated Himself, nor allowed others to separate, on the ground of their corruption, error, or abuse of power ; though He recognized that all these existed, and protested against them. His custom was to go up to the synagogue on the Sabbath days. He observed the Feasts of the Temple, that of the Dedication (which had only customary sanction) as well as those prescribed. His example suggests no extremity of circumstance under which separa- tion from the Divine Society becomes the course of duty.
(2) His express teaching is as emphatic as the circumstances permit us to expect. He establishes a Kingdom which in time and place is to be repre- sented by the Ecclesia which He will build upon the confession of Himself (Mt l&^). The essential unity of the Kingdom necessarily reflects itself in the unity of the representative society. Unity is involved in the fact that its bond is a relation to Himself : the one Sliepherd implies the one flock, the one door implies the one fold (Jn IP- ^•'). It is presented under similes which convey the idea of unity : it is one building on one foundation (Mt 1618), one enclosed vineyard (20i-"), one shoal taken in a single net (13"-**), one company of watchers (251-1^), or of guests at one feast (Lk W-"^^) ; it is a perfect century of sheep, a complete sum of money, and the breaking of its completeness is intolerable
(15*-«).
Its unity is primarily theological, necessitated by its causation in the unity which is in God (Jn 17"- 21), and objectively ettected by the indwelling in its constituents of the one Christ (H^^). The subjective unity in mutual affection of which Christians are conscious is a result of this objective unity, and is evidential of their common relation to Christ ( Jn 13^5, cf . 1 Jn 3i-»- ^^) ; but that sense of unity does not constitute the bond which unites Christians ; the bond is antecedent to the sense of it, and stands in the life of Christ transfused through the discipleship. This transfusion of life is effected by the mission of the Paraclete, the Holy Ghost mediated by Christ in His heavenly intercession (Jn Ui^-is), and results in a vital unity of Christ with the recipients of the Paraclete; which is comparable to that of a single organism (the True Vine, 15^-^) in which the individual inheres by the fact of his inherence in Christ (15"-^). So much our Lord declares of His own operation ; for the rest. He implies that He is in
UNITY
measure, in this as in all, dependent for the realization of His purpose on our apprehension of it and co-operative obedience. Undoubtedly He desires that the vital and spiritual unity which He ettects should have a concrete expression — such expression as is apprehensible, not only to the spiritual man discerning spiritual things (1 Co 2""^^), but to the world, which cannot receive the Spirit (Jn 14^''), and is aware of that only which with eyes of flesh it sees. He commands us, as a condition of the world's recognition of our disciple- ship, to love one another ' as I have loved you ' (13^^). He prays the Father that we majr be one in such fashion that the world, seeing it, may believe in His mission : and defines this unity as comparable to His own unity with the Father. Beyond question He demands a unity manifested in terms of the common understanding of the man of this world. He prays, not that believers may be ' at one' (in harmony of faith or temper— or as Abraham and Lot were at one in agreeing to part peaceably), but that they may be ' one thing,' iVa cDo-tj/ ev (17"- 21- 22) ; ' completed into one thing ' (H^^). It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that this ' one thing' is, spiritually, the Kingdom which His Incarnation brings among us (Lk 17^^) ; represen- tatively, the Society which He builds (Mt W^), to which by His institution the one Baptism (Eph4'') admits, and which the one Bread (1 Co 10") shows. Every kingdom; He says, divided against itself (tlie Kingdom of heaven is included in the argu- ment) is brought to desolation ; every city or house (the City of God, the House built of living stones, is included) divided against itself shall not stand (Mt 12=^ Mk 32^- 25). The unity which our Lord teaches appears, then, to be a visible and organic unity, based upon a vital unity in the Holy Ghost, and necessary both for evidence and for stability. His verdict upon schism, as the interruption of such unity, must be inferred— it is nowhere stated * —from the sanctions assigned to unity, and from tlie intensity of His supplication that it may be realized in the experience of His Church.