(7) The writer's view of the Church, and the Church's part in the Parousia, are also not clear. Apparently he identities the Church with the Bride and the Holy City. The marriage of the Lamb seems to coincide with the victory over the Beast, i.e. the Parousia. But whether the dead and living believers are raised and changed in order to appear at the Parousia, and whether they are the armies in heaven, are not clear.
In general, we can only say that the writer does not show any signs of the influence of the creative work of St. Paul or of the Fourth Gospel in his treatment of the questions raised above. His greatness lies in another direction from that of the independent thinking of St. Paul. He makes full use of all the existing apocalyptic imagery and machinery to depict the final triumph of God and Christ over all the forces of evU at work in his day that seemed so invincible.
(h) The Fourth Gospel.— The outward change in passing from the Apocalypse to the Fourth Gospel is immense, although one note is fundamental and common to the eschatology of both — ' I have over- come the world.' In the Fourth Gospel we are
TAKOUSIA
PAROUSIA
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back in the atmospliere of creative thoii^jht the re-interpietation of th,- old ,lata in the lij;ht of the fuller meaning of the life, death, and resuriection „f Christ. The impmtant passages fall into two
^'"Tchs. 5-6.— In these chapters we have a group of important eschatological sayings. It is pos- sible that the original order of the chapters is b-o, and the sequence of eschatological thought is im- proved if tiie chapters are taken in this order In ch 6 the discourse arises out of the miracle ot the loaves. The manner of participation in eternal life is developed. It is necessary to eat the llesli and drink the blood of the Son of Man in order to have life Those who eat of this bread will ive for ever; Christ will raise them up 'at the last day.' The last phrase is repeated four times lyy 's». 40. «. 5J) • Although the possession of eternal life by faith "(6^«) is unattectod by death, yet the 'last day' seems to be regarded as the consum- mation, the display of the victory of life occupy- ing the place that the Parousia does in bt. i-aul s later thought. . . .^ r n i v
In eh 5 a discussion arising out of the healing of the impotent, man leads to a statement of the relation between the Son and the Father, and of the activities committed by the Father to the Son. The Son does all that the Father does (5")— raises and quickens the dead, gives life to those who believe, and executes all judgment in His character of Son of Man. In connexion with the last state- ment we have the important passage 5-»--», which Charles considers an interpolation, and alien to the eschatology of the Gospel. It arises, however naturally from the statement about the juilgraent executed by the Son, although it is logically- un- connected with the view of resurrection in ch. b, as the result of possessing eternal life, lioth bt. Paul and the author of the Fourth Gospel practi- cally regard resurrection as the working out of the principle of life in Christ. Hence St. Paul, if he held the doctrine of a general resurrection from his traditional Pharisaic eschatology, does not speak of it in his Epistles,t and its mention here, if the passage be retained, can be regarded only as the retiexion of the current belief in a general resurrection. , i, i ^ j >
But the references to the future—' the last day, ' the hour is coming '—are vague and not distinctly connected with a Parousia. For a fuller discus- sion of their bearing see art. KesuerectioN.
(3) The Supper discourses (chs. 13-17) — corre- sponding to the eschatological discourses of the Synoptists— contain the central statements of the Gospel concerning the Parousia. In U--' we have the promise of the return : ' if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself, that where I am there ye may be also ; U18 ' I will not leave you orphans: I come to you. In 16^" the disciples are told that after a little while they will see Him, and are represented as puzzled by the 'little while.' He explains that the present is the time of sorrow, but that He will see them a"ain, and no man shall take their joy from them (16--). In 17-^ He prays that those whom the Father has given Him may be with Him where He is. In 21-- the possibdity is implied that the disciple whom Jesus loved may abide on earth until He comes, although this is exi^ained as purely hyiiothetical by the writer of the Gospel. It is dithcult, in view of these passages, to accept unreservedly E. F. Scott's view that the author of the Gospel is abandoning entirely the view of a
« Wendt's excision of the words ' in the last, day ' in each ot these passaKes is wholly unjustifiahle. . , ,
t The author ot Acts, in his report ot St. Paul's speech hefore Felix, attributes to him a belief in the resurrection of just and unjust (Ac 2415).