sent an advanced and rounded expression of Pauline teach- ing, “bringing the doctrines of grace to a rounded fulness and chastened ripeness of expression that warrants us in see- ing in them the authentic conclusion of the Pauline gospel of salvation in the mind which first conceived it” (Findlay).
No special pleading can get round the clear difference between the types of Christianity and of Christian teaching as set forth in the Pastorals and in the Pauline Epistles ; between the modes of presenting the doctrine of salvation and the relative emphasis on its great factors.
The death and resurrection of Christ are matters of allusion rather than central truths. As regards resurrection, the Pastorals resemble the Epistle to the Hebrews. The vital union of the believer with Christ, which is the essence of Paul’s Christian ideal, may possibly be implied, but is not emphasised, and certainly does not underlie the Pastoral teaching. The conception of Justification is not sharply defined. Acxatodyv occurs but twice, and in one of the cases is predicated of Christ (1 Tim. iii. 16). The teaching is pre- dominantly ethical. Its two key-notes are practical piety and sound doctrine. ’EuoéBea piety or godliness plays the part which is borne by wioms faith in the Paulines. IHéors does not occupy the commanding and central position which it does in Paul’s teaching. Only in 1 Tim. i. 16; 2 Tim. iii. 15, does faith clearly appear as the means of the subject- ive appropriation of salvation. In Tit. iii. 5, just where we should expect it, we do not find faith set sharply over against righteousness by works. Faith is emphasised as confiding acknowledgment of the truth, and sometimes as the virtue of fidelity. See 1 Tim. v.12; Tit. ii. 10. It appears either: as one of the cardinal virtues following in the train of evcé. Bea, or as the acknowledgment of the teaching in which. evoéSea finds expression.
These Epistles deal much with the character and attributes: of God, and exhibit them in terms which are mostly foreign to Paul, such as God our Saviour. This, however, may have been partly due to the false representations of contemporary heresies. I cannot but feel that there is too much truth. in:
VoL, Iv. —13