of wisdom (iii. 13 ff.). In the use of this term he seems to be referring to the Old Testament doctrine of wisdom, i.e. the inward knowledge of the Divine will which results in active and habitual obedience.1 In any case, S. James' thought seems to be based on the teaching of Jeremiah as to the Messianic age, a predicted note of which was to be the writing of the law in the heart of God's people. In Christ, not only is the will of God perfectly revealed, but the means of its accomplishment by man is provided. The Word of God has thus a twofold aspect: it is, on the one hand, God's authoritative message of requirement; on the other, it is a regenerating force imparted to Christians by which they are begotten again to a new life, which liberates from the power of sin, and brings about the actual realisation of the Divine kingdom on earth.

IV. S. Peter's first Epistle.

The Christology of S. Peter has the simple, direct, objective character which we should expect in view of the writer's own vivid experience of our Lord's life. Four leading thoughts may be discerned in the first Epistle. 1. The continuity of the covenant people. The titles of God's ancient people belong by right to Christians. They are the elect race, the royal priesthood, the holy nation, the people of possession, to which the Divine promises had been vouchsafed.3 fulfilment of the inspired visions of prophecy; it is the full and glorious satisfaction of Israel's hopes, the crown and climax of its history. Even the Old Testament was as it were an organism quickened by the Spirit of Christ, foretelling the grace and glory that should follow

1 So Weiss, Bibl. Theol. of N. T. § 52.

2 Jerem. xxxi. 33; cp. Weiss, 1.c.

The gospel is the

1 Pet. ii. 9; cp. Ex. xix. 6; Deut. iv. 20, etc.

1 Pet. i. 10-12. See Weiss, Bibl. Theol. of N.T. § 48.

His sufferings. Christianity is in fact the embodiment of an eternal purpose. The sanctification of an elect people, consecrated to obedience by the blood of Jesus Christ, was foreknown from the beginning.1 The Gentile Christians whom the apostle addresses are treated "as sharers in the ancestral prerogatives of Israel; and that not by an afterthought, as it were, of the Divine will, but in accordance with the Divine purpose as it existed before the beginning of things.""

2. The reality of the historic Christ. His appearance in the flesh was real and substantial; both in flesh and in spirit He was a partaker of our human nature (iii. 18, 19, iv. 1). The value of His example lies in the fact that He actually suffered for us in the flesh, endured the penalty of sin, became by meek submission the pattern of faith (1 Pet. ii. 21-25), passed into the sphere of departed spirits (iii. 18 ff.). The saving power of Christian sacraments is derived from the grace of Christ's resurrection and ascension (1 Pet. i. 3, iii. 21, 22). Enthroned at God's right hand, He has power to bestow the gift of the Spirit by whose operation Christians are regenerated (cp. 1 Pet. i. 23).

3. The preternatural power of Christ's human acts and sufferings. S. Peter lays special stress on the atoning virtue of the Passion (ii. 22 ff., iii. 18 ff.). The blood of Christ is precious (Tíμov alμa, i. 19); His bloodshedding derives its efficacy from the merit of His eternal person. Corresponding with this is the ascription of

1 Pet. i. 2.

2

Hort, Judaistic Christianity, p. 155. On 1 Pet. i. 20 ff., where Christ is said to be pоeyvwσμévov μèv πрd καταβολῆς κόσμου, φανερωθέντος δέ, κ.τ.λ., Harnack says: “We may trace the specially Jewish idea of pre-existence, i.e. existence in the foreknowledge of an omniscient and omnipotent God, of a being afterwards visibly manifested on earth" (Dogmengeschichte, vol. i. Appendix I.). In the same way pre-existence was attributed to the Church by early writers. S. Peter implies the real pre-existence of Christ in chap. i. 11.

glory to Christ in chap. iv. 11, and the use of λóyos in chap. i. 23, which implies "a perfect revelation of God apparent personally." Like S. James, S. Peter regards this living word as the source or instrument of the new birth. Christ is, in fact, the perfect Mediator, revealing God to man, and bringing man to God (iii. 18). Here we have a point of contact between S. Peter's Epistle and the Epistle to the Hebrews; the sufferings of Christ restore to man the right of access to God which had been hindered by human sin. The whole body of Christian believers constitutes a holy or royal priesthood, all the privileges which under the Old Covenant belonged to the Levitical high priest alone having been transferred to the Church. The sufferings and exaltation of Christ are thought of as consecrating to the perpetual service of God all those who bear the Christian name.

4. The expectation of the Messianic judgment.2 Through His resurrection Christ has been exalted to the Messianic glory (i. 21), and placed at the right hand of God, sharing the honour and sovereignty of the Most High (iii. 22). On this fact Christian hope is securely based; a hope which fixes itself upon the second coming of the Messiah. But His revelation will be a manifestation of Divine judgment. He who preached the message of salvation even to the spirits that once were disobedient (iii. 19) will Himself judge the quick and the dead. The salvation ready to be revealed (i. 5) means deliverance in the impending judgment, which therefore is the goal of Christian hope, and the moment of entry on the Christian inheritance.3

1 Dorner, Person of Christ, div. i.vol. i. p. 70 ; cp. pavepwłévros, 1 Pet. i. 20. * See generally Weiss, Bibl. Theol. of N.T. §§ 49, 50.

The authorship and date of the so-called second Epistle are alike uncertain. It represents our Lord as an object of knowledge (élyvwois, 2 Pet. i. 8, ii. 20; cp. chap. iii. 18), and this knowledge is the end of the life of grace. Here again by implication is given the most exalted view of Christ's person. Το Him belong μεγαλειότης (i. 16), δόξα καὶ ἀρετή (1. 3).

S. Jude speaks of himself as the slave of Christ (v. 1) His main thought is the finality of the faith of Christ, as One in whom we have union with God. His gift is eternal life; His mercy the object of hope; He whom heretics deny is ὁ μόνος δεσπότης καὶ κύριος.

§ III. THE CHRISTOLOGY OF S. PAUL1

The form of S. Paul's Christological doctrine is largely determined by the moral and practical aim which the apostle had in view at different epochs of his life, and by the spiritual experiences of his own career. In his earlier letters he exhibits Jesus Christ in His relation chiefly to the fundamental need of humanity, justification before God; and in relation on the other hand to the expectations and claims of the Jewish people. Christ is at once the Messiah, the promised seed of Abraham, and the source of the righteousness in virtue of which man finds acceptance with God. In later Epistles we find a more comprehensive view of Christ's person. The historical and cosmic significance of the Incarnation is insisted on; the fact that it is at once the consummation of an age-long purpose of God for man and for the universe; and the revelation of a mystery of godliness hitherto hidden from mankind.

I. In the two earlier groups of Epistles (ranging in To know Christ is to be a partaker of the Divine nature (i. 4). "The author, in teaching such a participation, shows that he has passed beyond the Jewish separation between God and the world; that a mighty revolution of Jewish conceptions has been brought about by the knowledge that in Christ the union of God and man had been accomplished " (Dorner, div. i. vol. i. note X. p. 353).

On the question of the genuineness of 2 Peter, see Sanday, Bampton Lectures, vii. note B.

1 See generally Liddon, Bampton Lectures, pp. 331-337; Pfleiderer, Paulinismus, esp. c. 3; Pressensé, Early Years of Christianity, vol. i. pp. 264 ff. (E.T.).

date from 52 to 59 A.D.) teaching as to our Lord's person is mainly implicit. A position is assigned to Christ which seems inevitably to imply His divinity.

He

Thus, in respect to His nature and rank in the scale of being, Christ is invested with Divine attributes. is co-ordinated with God in greetings and farewells (e.g., 2 Thess. i. 2; 2 Cor. xiii. 14). He is the source of S. Paul's own apostolate (Gal. i. 1). He is represented as a pre-existent Being (Rom. i. 4, πνeûμа;1 1 Cor. xv. 47; 2 Cor. viii. 9); as the agent in creation (1 Cor. viii. 6), as exercising a mediatorial function (1 Cor. x. 4). Finally, He is called Lord (kúptos), and in a great climactic passage, God over all, blessed for evermore. On the other hand, S. Paul has a clear grasp of our Lord's real humanity, His humiliation, His sinlessness, His sufferings (Rom. i. 3, viii. 3; 2 Cor. v. 21, viii. 9, xiii. 4; Gal. iv. 4). Pfleiderer infers from the comparative absence of reference to the details of our Lord's earthly life that S. Paul had little or no knowledge of the traditional facts, but in reply it has been urged that S. Paul's experience was of a kind peculiar to himself. By a sudden and violent transition he was called on "to believe in a glorified Lord, and not to follow a suffering teacher." The Church instinctively felt that

his conversion was to him what death was to the other saints, the entrance into a higher life."3 Henceforth

1 The doctrine of the Son's pre-existence seems to be implied in this expression of S. Paul, as certainly it is in later theology. Cp. Lightfoot, S. Clement of Rome, vol. ii. p. 230, note.

2 Rom. ix. 5. See Sanday and Headlam, ad loc. The arguments as to the application of this passage are well stated in Gifford's Commentary, add. note on ix. 5. Liddon, Bampton Lectures, pp. 316 ff.; cp. Fairbairn, Christ in Mod. Theol. p. 308, note.

3 Westcott, Introd. to the Gospels, p. 220; cp. Weiss, Bibl. Theol. of N.T. § 58; and Fairbairn, Christ in Mod. Theol. p. 305: "The history is the very groundwork of the apostle's thought, everywhere assumed in it, inseparable from it, the element in which it lives, moves, and has its being."