His own blood entered in once for all into the presence of Jehovah, there to plead with sovereign efficacy, as the true Melchizedek, for His people. In like manner, although He already sits as a Priest upon a throne, and reigns in the hearts of those, made willing to serve Him, by divine grace, in the midst of His enemies, He cannot take unto Himself His great power, and fully establish His royal authority over a ransomed or a conquered earth, until all those enemies have been made His footstool, and Israel is restored in glory. In the days of His prophecy, therefore, His teaching was necessarily diversified in character, as it had reference to one or other of the great ends of His Advent, and was addressed either to the multitude at large, or exclusively to His immediate disciples. A parabolical style was characteristic of every Eastern Teacher; but the use of elaborate parables seems not to have been adopted, until the Pharisees had openly opposed Him, and by their wicked insinuations and reproaches laboured to set the people against Him, because they were at once envious of His growing popularity, and irritated by His zealous exposure of the moral evil, which they loved and cherished.* He had cried, "repent and believe the Gospel;" because "the time was fulfilled, and the kingdom of God was at hand;" and it was His declared object to carry on the work commenced by His immediate Forerunner, checked by his imprisonment. Attention was very generally excited by His miracles, and by the peculiar authority and grace, with which He * See p. 294. spake; so that even officers, sent to apprehend Him, partook of the general impression, and could only account for the spell which bound them, by declaring that never man spake as He did.† On one of those frequent occasions, when great multitudes flocked to hear Him, He ascended the mount, or a commanding eminence at hand, to which probably He had often resorted with His disciples, in the vicinity of Capernaum,‡ and when He had sat down, in the calm majesty of His office, He began a formal exposition of those laws, by which His kingdom is governed, and in conformity to which alone. true happiness can be realised. It was thus a preliminary work. Repentance implies a turning from sin to God, and this necessarily involves the production of suitable fruit. But what is sin? and what is the character and will of God; or the fruit which He requires, or that mode of life, in which alone we can habitually enjoy real spiritual communion with a heavenly Father? The multitude had been hitherto unable to answer these questions; for they * Mark xii. 37; Luke xix. 48, &c. † John vii. 45, 46. Bishop Middleton refers the original phrase to "the mountain district" generally, but this interpretation seems too vague to suit the context. Compare Luke vi. 12. The Harmonists, however, seem very erroneously to identify the short address in that context, pronounced after the ordination of the apostles, with this earlier and more systematic discourse. It was to be expected that the divine Teacher would frequently repeat its more important lessons with additions or variations; and the Table at the close of this Introduction will prove that He did so. It appears that the entrance into Capernaum is immediate in Luke vii. 1, but not in Matt. viii. 5. really "knew not the law." But the simple, concise definition of sin, given by the apostle, is its opposition to the divine will, as "the transgression of the law;"* for "where no law is, there is no transgression."† This alone will enable us to discern our sin, and its bitterness and power, as it explicitly unfolds the holy and benevolent will of an unchangeable Creator, and points out that undefiled way, in which no mere man, or natural child of Adam, has ever yet been enabled uninterruptedly to walk. The law, indeed, as the object of Israel's pride, was more or less diligently taught to their children, whilst portions of it were ostentatiously written on their phylacteries. But although the whole was read in order in their synagogues, and to a certain extent constantly studied, expounded and enforced by their doctors, the Scribes and Pharisees, these "blind leaders of the blind"§ virtually annulled and repealed it, by their traditions, false glosses, and unholy limitations, in many important particulars, and thus deceived the people, and rendered them wretched hypocrites, or cold and lifeless formalists, like themselves. In another point of view, St. John teaches us to contrast with the law, given by Moses, that grace and truth, which came by Jesus Christ.|| Not that He superseded its holy rule, its necessary sanctions, or * See page 87. † Rom. iv. 15. Id. iii. 20; viii. 7-13; 1 Cor. xv. 56. § Matt. xv. 1-14; Mark vii. 1-13. | John i. 17. a its salutary doctrines; but that He supplied what it could neither impart nor reveal, pardon to transgressors, and grace to His servants to enable them to fulfil its requirements; and that He Himself accomplished all that had been hitherto prefigured by its appendix of types, sacrifices, and ceremonies, and thus developed the substance of that shadowy outline, or the truth wrapt up in its symbols.* But at present Jesus exhibits His gracious compassion towards the people, by simply removing the stumbling blocks in their way, and by substituting the true meaning of His own law for the deceitful representations of its false teachers; in order to show them their sin and danger, and thus prepare them, in the way of painful convictions, to seek earnestly for a Saviour, or to prize His forgiving mercy. Hence again, at a later period, when this object had been in some good measure accomplished in the hearts of His disciples, and when they already knew Him to be the Christ, the Son of the living God, the Lamb “that taketh away the sin of the world," the Bread of life, His teaching assumed a different form. Thus we find Him speaking in the private (or, esoteric) discourses, recorded by the beloved disciple, rather as a High Priest and Mediator, with reference to the office so soon to be more clearly revealed, for the special consolation of His faithful but imperfect servants, who enjoyed "the blessing of Abraham," and were therefore, like him, lovingly addressed as His Friends! But now as a man, in the form of a servant Himself, *The law is the image and shadow of the truth. Clemens A. Strom. vi. 7, 58. See p. 83, 84. and as one "made under the law," with reverence be it spoken, in referring to that law, He could only speak as a Teacher and Expositor, not as a Lawgiver; and we shall presently see how emphatically He corrects any false impression, which might possibly have arisen in the minds of His hearers, that He was come to dissolve existing laws, or to extend them, as if they were deficient in breadth and spirituality.* It certainly is a very grievous error to contrast the standard of morality inculcated in various parts of the one Holy Bible, which is all given by like inspiration from God, and which everywhere unfolds the same sublime and comprehensive rule of supreme love to God, and of equal love to every man. The apostle declared, that, even in those parts which alone were familiar from childhood to Timothy, it was all "profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness;" because its details, when rightly expounded, warn us to abstain from all evil, and tend to * See p. 81, &c. Chrysostom ignorantly said, "if it were not to lay down new rules, why did Christ come? If we are only to hear the same things, what need was there of a heavenly Teacher?" T. viii. p. 489, 490: (ed. Commel. and Paris, 1603, &c., in ten folio volumes.) See note P. 6. It must be observed that there is no reference in any of the parallels in St. Luke to any opposite precepts to those inculcated by the Lord, and that the same Evangelist omits the statements in Matt. v. 17, 20; xv. 1-9; with the last clause in vii. 12. The reason seems to be obvious. He wrote for Gentiles, neither acquainted with the traditions of the elders, nor jealously suspicious of any contradiction of the Old Testament. His omissions, therefore, seem strongly to corroborate the argument in the following pages. (p. 113, &c.) |