THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
15; Acts xxi. 2S), city (Rev. xxi. 2), law (Rom. vii. 21), the Scriptures (Rom. i. 2), calling (II Tim. i. 9), covenant (Luke i. 72), and nation (I Pet. ii. 9). From the foregoing, it is evident that while the idea of holiness in the New Testament follows lines already clearly marked in the Old Testament, it is characterized by a distinctive difference. It is, e.g., finally emancipated from all ceremonial associations. As applied to God, it is no longer as in contemporary Judaism connected with transcendence in the sense of exaltation and aloofness from the world and men. Its sole reference is as in Hos. xi. 9 to the inner essence of the nature of God, whether God is thought of as a personal being or in relation to men. It is true that holiness as the designation of God is far less frequent in the New than in the Old Testament and the term holiness is giving place to that of love, but this does not justify the contention of Ritschl that its meaning in the New Testament is lacking in clearness and that it is not valid for Christianity (Justification and Reconciliation, iii. 255, Edinburgh, 1900). No tension is affirmed as between holiness and love; holiness is rather the essential quality of love viewed in relation to the inner side of God's character as perfect consistency with the ethical ideal of personality. As applied to men, holiness is also freed from all ceremonial content and refers only to their God or Christlike character and deeds.
In theology, the holiness of God has several references— an immanent predicate of his nature, a transitive attribute of activity, which, moreover, sustains a particular relation to love in the doctrine of the atonement. As an immanent predicate of the divine Being, it designates the inmost and
fundamental essence of God in which
8. In all other properties are embraced and
Theology, from which all activities originate.
Something of its etymological significance has always clung to it; God is supramundane, exalted, incorruptible, absolutely unique. In comparison with the defects and impurity of the world, he is the perfectly pure and spotless One. Holiness in God is the " infinite beauty and excellence of his nature " (Jonathan Edwards, Essay on the Trinity, ed. G. P. Fisher, p. 97, New York, 1903), " the perfect agreement of the divine willing with the divine being " (G. Thomasius, Christi Person und Werk, i. 137, Erlangen, 1856), " Conformity to his own perfect nature " (W. G. T. Shedd, Dogmatic Theology, i. 362, New York, 1888). On account of this inner essential excellence, God is the absolutely good Being; from this fact springs his ethical sovereignty; here too is found the principle which determines his redemptive activity. Holiness is also a transitive attribute of God. In this sense it was defined by Baier as the " rectitude of the divine will in virtue of which he wills all that is just and good in accordance with his eternal law." Quenstedt held that it is the " supreme, faultless purity in God which demands from his creatures a corresponding purity." According to Schleiermacher it is the " legislative divine causality in human life." Holiness is that attribute in God by which in all his relations to moral beings he maintains and realizes bis ethical perfection.
Thus " he is the one unconditioned Law of the good the Power which both must and does react against the evil " (F. A. B. Nitzsch, Dogmatik, p. 415 Freiburg, 1902). It is therefore directed not merely to the conquest and eradication of sin, but to the creation and perfection of the highest good and the kingdom of God. So far as holiness involves the consistency of God's holy action with reference to men, it is designated as Righteousness (q.v.). Since the Reformation, holiness has been conceived with special regard to love: holiness the fundamental attribute of God, love conditioned and limited by it. Thus, it has been affirmed that God may be merciful but he must be just. Mercy may exist under conditions which preclude its expression; holiness, never, since the very existence of holiness is dependent on its being exercised. Mercy is therefore optional, but justice is necessitated. The significance of this conception of the relation of holiness to love appears in the doctrine of the atonement, where the application of mercy — once justice is satisfied — is limited to those whom God has chosen (Calvin, Institutes, III., xxiii. 11; J. Owen, Works, " Dissertation on the Divine Justice," x. 483-624; W. G. T. Shedd, op. cit., i. 218- 219, 319-390; A. H. Strong, Systematic Theology, i. 296, Philadelphia, 1907). Holiness and love have also been related to each other as distinct attributes of God, but yet not as implying conflict or requiring reconciliation. God's action in redemption thus equally expresses both qualities, and each of these is as fundamental as the other. The distinction between holiness and love, however, except so far as love is regarded as primarily emotional in content, is hard to maintain and in the discusion tends to fade out (W. N. Clarke, Christian Theology, pp. 83-93, New York, 1898). The reason for this is not far to seek. If love is regarded as the supreme designation of God in the New Testament (I John iv. 16), we shall find in the history of the idea of God the explanation of what would otherwise not be clear. Holiness, God's elevation above the world, his ethical absoluteness, his persistent reaction against sin, and as such the moral ideal of his people's life, was the earlier form of the idea of God (Lev. xx. 2). Later, both experience and reason yielded up that wider interpretation of the character of God in relation to men which is registered in the term " righteousness." In Jesus' consciousness, however, appears the full disclosure of the divine nature and will; the Fatherhood of God lays bare the hidden depths of God's being. The association of the terms " holy " and " righteous " in Jesus' prayer in the upper room as descriptive of " Father " is in the highest degree significant (John xvii. 11, 25). Instead, therefore, of being left behind in Christianity Jcf. A. Ritschl, Justification and Reconciliation, iii. 255), or regarding it as antagonistic to love, " holiness and " righteousness " are the earlier yet integral forms through which God was leading his people to the perfect knowledge of himself as love. It is an anachronism in the doctrine of the atonement to set holiness over against love, as having to be satisfied ere love can come to expression. On the other hand, to express the divine purpose of love to set