The Pulpit Commentary — Galatians — Section 75

express testimony of St. John (vii. 5) Hea.v~-direeted Joseph. Is it conceivable tha.t, down to within a. few months of our tha.t, in so small e. town as Nazareth, mis- Lord's death, "his brothers did not believe judging gossip did not me.ke itself during on him." In the history of the Acts, in- those months only too busy with e. theme, deed, immedla.tely a.fter the Ascension, we the ree.l che.racter of which men could not find them a.eeociated with tba.t innermost possibly understa.nd, e.nd which yet was so circle of believers who, with the eleven, sure to e.ttract attention-distressfully busy, were devoutly wa.iting for "the Promise of both for the holy Virgin herself and for her the Fa.ther." But on the eve of the Fee.et affianced husband? And would none of of Tabema.cles in the previous autumn, they that malign whispering percolate to the ears bad not a.s yet professed tbemsel ves to be of the older members of Joseph's family, Jesus' disciples. 'This statement of St. depositing in their minds almost ineradic- John's is made of them as a body. No hint able seeds of prejudice against their step- is given of a.ny exception, either by St. John mother and against her offspring? Shame or by the Synoptiste (Matt. xii. 46; Mark e.nd sorrow invested our Redeemer's de- iii. 21, 31; Luke viii. 19). Ingenious com- cease from the world ; shame and sorrow binations of various extremely questionable overclouded also even his entrance into it; premisses would fain interpolate into the by the necessity of the case, all, whether eva.ngelist's statement at least one excep- old or young, who after the flesh were then tion ; but none presents itself upon the face brought into close connection with him, of the story. There the brethren of the were also brought into fires of temptation, Lord stand before us as unitedly holding out of which only much especial interposing aloof, and a.s even inclined to treat his claims gra.ce could rescue them unscathed. At with derision (John vii. 3, 4, 8; comp. e.ll event<!, the new brother whom Joseph's ll:lark iii. 21). Which of those two hypo- already numerous family were called upon theses which we are now comparing with to accept must he.ve been to their feelin1. each other, as to the nature of their brother- no own brother of theirs; his mother was ship to our Lord, is the one which the better not their mother. This was a super-e11- agrees with this unquestionable fact? Let grafted scion, half alien to the original us first consider the one which supposes his stock to which they belonged. In ordinary brothers and his sisters to have formed an domestio experience is not this usually cA elder branch of Joseph's family born of a itself a source of jealousy and estrangement? former marriage. There must have been at We can well believe that, in course of time, least six in number living at the time of the beauty of their stepmother's character our Lord's ministry (Mark vi. 3), and there would be certain to win their esteem and may have been more than six then; and their confidence. And that it really did so there may, again, have well been some seems betokened by what we read in tho others besides, then deceaeed. It is there- evangelical history some thirty years after fore probable that some of them-James, for their father's union with l\Iary, when he example, the eldest apparently of the bro- had himself, for some while apparently, de- thers-were adolescent, or even quite grown parted this life; the mother and the brethren up at the time of their father's second mar- of J esue, though not ns yet knit together riage. Judging from the ordinary experi- by mutual faith in him, are, however, seen ence of human households, what would seem acting in unison, as if swayed by their likely to have been the attitude of feeling mutual feeling of family connection (see animating this whole group of brothGrs and John ii. 12; l\Iark iii. 31). It is, however, sisters, and in particular animating James- questionable whether the sto.inless purity who would, of course, take the place of their o.nd the exalted moral e:i:cellencu which 1·epresentative and domestio champion, and characterized their stepmother's Son wouhl who is shown in the Acts and by his own in an equa.l d~gree draw tl.ieir hearts to him. Epistle to have been a person of singuforly Of old, Joseph the son of the p.1triarch grave, taciturn, and magisterial tempera- Jacob was isolated from his elder half-bro- ment-both towards their probably youthful thers by the very virtues which exalteu stepmother from the time of her marriage him. They hated him, if in part for certain with their fe.ther, e.nd towards the Lord other causes of offence, yet no doubt mtiinly Jesus himself during the period of his boy- for this, that they felt that in moral qm\lity hood, youth, and early manhood ? May it be was not of them. But the contrast not be proba.bly assumed that it was apt to which obtained between the moml being of be o.t least unsympathetic-reserved? We the Lord Jesus and his e.doptive half-brn- know from the "Fear not" of the Divine thers must have been incompambly grel\ter message recorded Matt. i. 20, that the cir- than tl.iat which made Joseph tho •• sepa- cumstances attending on our e.domble Lord's rated from his brethren." He was alto- inoornation well-nigh proved a stumbling- gether "holy and harmless," and thereforo block even to the just-minded, pious, altogether " separate from sinners." True, 4.0 THE EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. [ OH, I, 1-24,