3. Hellenistic -Jewish tendencies. — The tend- encies introduced into the Gentile Churches by Hellenized Jews were fraught with important consequences. The issues are seen with special clearness in the Epistles to the Corintliians, but it is evident from Ph 3 that similar phenomena had emerged in Kome and Macedonia, while the
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Pastoral Epistles and the Johannine writings show that they had appeared also in Asia Minor. In this Gentile soil the gift of the Spirit was accounted the supreme prerogative of Christians. But the idea of perfection was taken over from the Greek and Jewish religious tradition, and fused with faith in the Spirit. In Corinth this led to the zealous cultivation of glossolalia — partly because of the state of devout exaltation to which the gift raised the speaker and in which he experienced a strange delight, partly because of the admiration which its striking manifestations evoked. That one who prays should be exalted above reason by the Spirit was regarded as something eminently desirable. Here too, however, Christianity simul- taneously acquired an intellectual istic tendency. The Spirit endows man with knowledge, and sets him among the wise who can interpret the work of God. In his conduct, again, the trvevfiaTLKds attests his privilege by the daring which enables him to do what for others would be a sin. He enters heathen temples without fear (1 Co 8^"); he does not need to shun impurity (6'^), and he can even contract a marriage revolting to ordinary human feeling (5'). In Corinth, likewise, the possession of the Spirit was supposed to be attested by contempt for the natural, and this in turn gave rise to ascetic tendencies (7'). As the perfectionist finds complete satisfaction in the communion with God bestowed upon him by the Spirit, his hope for the future dies away ( 15'^, 2 Ti 2'^) ; for naturally such a religious attitude could have no final ideal standing supreme above present attainment. It thus tended to arrest that forward process into which St. Paul had brought his churches (Ph 3). Moreover, the link with the earthly career of Jesus was dissolved. The moral intensity of His call to repentance was not realized, and, accordingly, His Death upon the Cross lost all significance. The Exaltation of Jesus could, tiierefore, no longer be based upon the self-humiliation in which He became obedient to the death of the Cross (Ph 25-"), The immediate outcome of these views was a division of the Church into distinct groups, since the irvev- fiariKoL had sought to institute a spiritual despotism over it (1 Co 3^-^^ 2 Co ll-»), treating the rest— those who did not possess the characteristic tokens of the Spirit — as spiritual minors. Tliese facts explain the manner in which the later Epistles of St. Paul speak of the Spirit ; and, with regard to the Johannine writings as well, we must take into consideration not only their relation to tiie Pales- tinian type of Christianity, but also their opposition to the TvvevjxaTiKoi who made the Spirit subservient to religious egotism. Similar considerations must be kept in view in our interpretation of the Epistle to the Hebrews. This Epistle does not treat of the doctrine of the Spirit with anything like the elaboration we find in its Christology ; it says very little of the Spirit's work in the Church. It refers to it once as the power which lends authority to the words of those who preach Jesus (2'*) ; and, again, it brings out the awful degi-ee of guilt incurred by those who fall away, by pointing to the greatness of the gift they have despised (6^ 10^*). The apostles sought to maintain the purity of their views regarding the Spirit and to prevent its being made a mere tool of religious egotism by making the Church subordinate to Jesus, and engaging it in the practical tasks necessary to the formation of pure and perfect fellowship within its own circle and in all the natural relations of life. It was the operation of that ideal that led to the ranking of faith above knowledge, and to the expulsion of the egoistic tendency from the religious life of the Church. The preaching of the Resurrec- tion of Jesus as the act of God that procures life for the world (1 Co 15) ; the concentration of
personal volition on the one aim of knowing Christ (Ph 3) ; the Johannine representation of the unity of Jesus with the Father as that which exalts Him above all ; the portrayal of Jesus in Hebrews as the One Priest, who, having Himself been made perfect through sufferings, has also made us perfect — all these converge in a single point : they show that the essential element of the Christian life is faith in Jesus Christ. Perfectionism with its egotistic tendency is thus overcome, for faith turns us away from ourselves, and looks to the grace of Christ as the source of our righteousness and of our spiritual life. In this way the Christian society maintains its place in the great forward process which presses towards the realization of the perfect in the future age.
And with faitli in Jesus the apostles co-ordinated the commandment of love, calling upon the Church to engage in the tasks that arise out of our inter- course with one another. This, again, meant not only the overcomingof the in tellectualistic tendency which would have made the Church the arena of theological disputation, but also the repudiation of all opposition to the natural relations of human life, for love becomes perfect only when it takes account of our neighbour's situation as a whole, and cares for his natural as well as his spiritual needs. Thus the labours and controversies of the Apostolic Age had as their outcome the establish- ment of the principle that the Spirit of God manifests His work in man by endowing him with faith and love (cf. 1 Ti 1^).