The workof Jost {Gesch. d. Judenthums u. s. Sek- tm, 1863) shows less of exaggeration than that of /Griitz, and perhaps even more of personal venera- tion towards Jesus. Jost's chief contribution is his indignation against the 'judicial murder' of Jesus. There was no regular trial, such as Jewish law required. There was only a high-handed act of violence on the j)art of the chief priests.
He says : ' We hold it to be historical honesty, without regard to misinterpretation, to give to the fact its right name, in order to throw the responsibility upon those fanatics who did such a deed by their own power. It was not the Jews who crucified Jesus. Thousands of them revered in Jesus their teacher and friend. ... It is time at last to judge without prejudice the authentic records of the Evangelists, who relate the course of events in simple words, albeit according to traditions of very VOL. II. — 56
unequal worth. Onlj' the most blinded partisan can wish to justify the crucifixion of Jesus as it was effected, and to burden afresh the whole nation, or its law-abiding posterity, with the hateful deed of Caiaphas and his associates.'
J. H. Weiss {Gesch. d. jiid. Tradition, 1871, Hebrew) is interesting chiefly Jis showing how the radical influence of Gratz and Jost reacted upon the more conservative Jew. AVeiss asserts the Essenism of Jesus (i. p. 232), and remarks that His deplorable fate was due not to His teaching, which was not new, but to the means which He took to promote it.
' For he claimed to be a prophet, and drew away many in Israel to believe in his Divine work and his miracles. And he said, before the multitude and even before his judges, that he was the Son of God. These three claims were the reason for all that was done against him.'
Weiss, beyond question, here puts his finger on the real Jewish grievance against Jesus — ' He spake as one having authority, and not as their scribes.' Griitz and Jost had made it impossible for a Jewish historian to revert to the mediaeval attitude to- wards Jesus ; but one seems to hear, in Weiss, the echo of the ancient condemnation, ' He was a magician, and deceived and led astray Israel.'
The Jewish Encyclopedia may be taken as the authorized exponent of Jewish opinion, and in its 7th volume it contains a careful and critical article upon 'Jesus.' It is the work of three writers, Jacobs, Kohler, and Krauss ; and is written with a full knowledge of recent Christian as well as Jewish scholarship. It is admitted tliat, while the teaching and practice of Jesus were in many re- spects Jewish and even Essene, He yet departed widely in otiier respects from Essenism, j^articu- larly in His association with publicans and sinners. His attitude towards the Law, insisting on the spirit rather than on the Halacliic development of it, is represented as not necessarily or essentially un-Jewish. He was, in fact, the representative of the Am-ha-aretz, the ' people that knoweth not the Law ' — a rather acute remark. Weiss was right in pointing to His assumption of i^ower and authority as the reason ' of much modern antipathy to Jesus, so far as it exists.' He did not, at least publicly, claim to be the Messiah ; and His trial and execution were quite irregular. But, after all, it is freely admitted that ' a great historic move- ment, of the character and importance of Chris- tianity, cannot have arisen without a great per- sonality to call it into existence and give it shape and direction. Jesus of Nazareth had a mission from God ; and he must have had the spiritual power and fitness to be chosen for it.' That is finely said, and it is with one exception the fullest Jewish recognition of the greatness of Jesus that is known to us. That exception is contained in an article by C. G. Montefiore {JQR, 1894, p. 381 ft'.). He there speaks of Jesus as ' the most important Jew who ever lived, one who exercised a greater influence upon mankind and civilization than any other person, whether within the Jewish race or without it.' . . . 'A Jew whose life and character have been regarded by almost all the best and wisest people who have heard or read of his actions and his words, as the greatest religious exemplar for every age.' . . . ' It may be asked, " Was Jesus •an original teacher, and on what grounds does his originality depend ? " Now tliere is no a priori reason why Jesus should not have been original. Jewish autiiors sometimes write as if there were an antecedent improbability in his having made any big religious or moral step in advance.' ... 'A religious teacher might, I suppose, be called original who combined and collected together the best ele- ments of religion existing in his time, emphasized tliose most important and fruitful, developed them, drew out their implications, and rejected or ignored
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other elements which either did not harmonize with the first, or which, though he and Ids con- temporaries may have been unaware of it, be- longed in reality to a lower level and an outgrown age. I am inclined to believe that herein to a great extent lay the originality of Jesus.' Mr. Montefiore's article shows how it is possible for a Jew to remain a whole-hearted Jew, while yet he feels a frank admiration and reverence towards Jesus. With his full recognition of the spiritual grandeur of Jesus, the fullest that would seem to be possible without crossing the frontier of Juda- ism, we will close this study of Christ in the Jewish literature. (See, further, the histories of Gratz, Jost, and Weiss ; Jewish Encyc. vol. vii. , and JQR, 1894). K. Travers Herford.