not immediately and mysteriously through the agency of water, but by means of the moral acts of reformation. [541] The several accounts concerning John are farther at variance, as to the relation in which they place his baptism to the kingdom of heaven, βασιλεία τῶν οὐρανῶν. According to Matthew, the concise purport of the appeal with which he accompanied his baptism was, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand, μετανοεῖτε’ ἤγγικε γὰρ ἡ βασιλεία τῶν οὐρανῶν (iii. 2); according to Luke, the Baptist in the first instance mentions only repentance and remission of sins, but no kingdom of heaven; and it is the conjecture of the people, that he might be the Messiah, by which he is first led to direct them to one who was coming after him (iii. 15 ff.). In Josephus, there is no trace of a relation between the ministry of John and the Messianic idea. Yet we must not therefore conclude that the Baptist himself recognized no such relation, and that its only source was the Christian legend. For the baptism of John, waiving the opinion that it was derived from the baptism of proselytes, is not quite explicable without a reference to the above-mentioned expiatory lustrations of the people—lustrations which were to usher in the times of the Messiah; moreover, the appearance of Jesus is made more comprehensible by the supposition, that John had introduced the idea of the proximity of the Messiah’s kingdom. That Josephus should keep back the Messianic aspect of the fact, is in accordance with his general practice, which is explained by the position of his people with respect to the Romans. Besides, in the expression, to assemble for baptism, βαπτισμῷ συνιέναι, in his mention of popular assemblages, συστρέφεσθαι, and in the fear of Antipas lest John should excite a revolt, ἀπόστασις there lies an intimation of precisely such a religious and political movement as the hope of the Messiah was calculated to produce. That the Baptist should so distinctly foretell the immediate appearance of the Messiah’s kingdom must create surprise, and (Luke’s reference to a divine call and revelation being held unsatisfactory) might lead to the supposition that the Christian narrator, believing that the true Messiah was actually manifested in the person of Jesus, the cotemporary of John, gave to the language of the latter a definiteness which did not belong to it originally; and while the Baptist merely said, consonantly with the Jewish notion already mentioned: Repent, that the kingdom of heaven may come, μετανοεῖτε, ἵνα ἔλθῃ ἡ βας. τ. οὐρ., a later edition of his words gave γὰρ (for) instead of ἵνα (that). But such a supposition is needless. In those times of commotion, John might easily believe that he discerned signs, which certified to him the proximity of the Messiah’s kingdom; the exact degree of its proximity he left undecided.