THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
formed orthodoxy. The interest in the individual reception of justification drew attention from an allsided objective observation of Christ and his gifts. There was even a tendency to In Lu- reduce the twofold office of Christ to a theran single function. According to Me-
Theology. lanchthon and Hesshusen, Christ is before everything priest; even as king he exercises essentially priestly functions. Selnecker seems to have been the first who used the formula of a threefold office, but his exposition is governed also by the priesthood of Christ, to which the two other offices are related like introduction and conclusion. Others again, like Gerhard, tried to identify the priestly and prophetical offices. Hemming and Nicolaus Hunnius taught that the office of the king was supreme and that it comprehended the other two functions. Everywhere the same concentration upon one point is found. In the mean time, however, Hafenreffer and especially Gerhard had directed their attention to the idea of a threefold office as advocated by Eusebius and Calvin. Gerhard not only used the new expression, but tried to prove that only the sum of the three offices offers the fulness of Christ's benevolent gifts. In the regnum potentiae he found a specific function for the royal office. Since the middle of the seventeenth century, after the old Melanchthonian scheme of dogmatics had been replaced by an objective and historical arrangement of the material, there was room for a coherent representation of the work of Christ, which was systematized according to the threefold office. There was a reaction of the old Lutheran sentiment in 1773 when Ernesti criticized the reigning doctrine because he could not see why the clear and sufficient designation of the work of Christ as satisfactio should be obscured by metaphorical phrases. Moreover, he was of the opinion that the different offices were not clearly separated from each other, so that one title might justly cover all of them. Other dogmaticians after him raised similar objections on the ground that neither the prophetical nor the royal office stands upon equal footing with the priestly office, but that both point to the atonement which is included in it. But the majority of recent dogmaticians adhere to the scheme of a threefold office. Schleiermacher took the lead in this tendency by attempting the successful proof that the three offices in their indissoluble union completely define and circumscribe the character of redemption as accomplished by Christ. With the exclusion of the prophetic office, he holds, the clear consciousness of the believer would be superseded by a magical mediation of salvation. Without the royal office, there would be lacking the relation of the individual believer to a community. Finally, the absence of the priestly office would rob the foundation of Christ of its religious content.
The doctrine of Christ's threefold office represents the redeemer as the fulfiller of all Old-Testament prophecies and thus of all needs of the human being. Everything that Israel expected of its future salvation had concentrated itself more and more in the hope of the Messiah, " the anointed of God " (John i. 41, iv. 25). He was thought of as the king who was to restore the glory of David's kingdom.
In the course of time the prophet, who as successor of Moses was never to be wanting among God's people (Deut. xviii. 15), became identical with the Messiah (John vi. 14-15). The third office is Interpreta- reflected in the picture of the Mestion and siah in Isa. liii. God's people can feel Significance themselves secure only when all conof the flict of the theocratic offices is excluded Doctrine, by unity and every blessing of salvation is to be found in one single person (Heb. vii. 23 sqq.). There was a longing especially for the solution of the frequent historical conflict between kingdom and priesthood (I Sam. ii. 35; Zech. vi. 12 sqq.). A priest-king after the manner of Melchizedek was hoped for (Ps. ex. 4). All these elements were combined in the idea of the Messiah who was to possess the spirit of God in many-sided fulness and as the power of a comprehensive redeeming activity (Isa. xi. 1 sqq., lxi. 1 sqq.; cf. Luke iv. 18 sqq.; John iii. 34). The anointing with the spirit mentioned in these passages has the significance of the anointing of kings, priests, and to a certain extent also of prophets in so far as they were endowed with the charismata. By confessing Jesus as Christ, the Christian congregation expresses that it finds in him the performer of all activities which secure salvation to the people of God. Jesus is king (Matt. xxi. 5, xxvii. 11), prophet (Matt. xxi. 11; Luke vii. 16), and high priest (Heb. ii. 17, iii. 1). The scheme of the threefold office permits of arranging the Biblical material in its original connection, as it belongs to a complete representation of the person of Christ. Its systematic value becomes evident only from the proof that for the fulfilment of the Messianic activity there is necessary nothing more and nothing less than the functions designated by it. The three offices of prophet, priest, and king correspond to the needs of the moral education of man and of his connection with human society and the surrounding world. If the activity of Christ on earth were restricted to atonement, it would not be possible to speak of the perfection of the human being in connection with Christ. It is a matter of course that in every moment of his earthly and heavenly activity Christ exercises at one and the same time all his offices. Socinianism claims for the entire activity of Christ on earth only the prophetical office in order to reserve the other functions as faint ornaments for the state of exaltation (Racovian Catechism, §§ 191 sqq., 456 sqq.). The permanent union and simultaneous exercise of the three functions do not exclude, however, a fixed aim, namely, the kingdom. To this as the organizing purpose of the whole points before everything the Biblical basis of the formula, the starting-point and essential content of the Messianic office is royal dominion over and for God's people, the peculiar modification of which is described by the other titles.
(E. F. Karl Muller.)
Bibliography: For history of the doctrine consult: H. L. J. Heppe, Dogmatik des deulschen Protestantismus im IS. Jahrhundert, pp. 209 sqq., 222 sqq., Gotha, 1857; idem, Dogmatik der evangelisch-reformirten Kirche, Elberfeld. 1861; A. Schweizer, Glaubenslehre der evangelisch-reformirten Kirche, vol. ii., Zurich, 1847; H. Schmid, Dogmatik der evangelisch-reformirten Kirche, Frankfort, 1876; A.