The Making of the New TestamentBacon, Benjamin Wisner
Religion
The Making of the New Testament
Bacon, Benjamin Wisner
Bible. New Testament -- Introductions
pedigree of Jesus from "Adam, which was the son of God." But the object
is far more to prove the pedigree of the faith than the pedigree of
Jesus. Christianity is to be defended against the charge of being a
_nova superstitio_, a _religio illicita_. On the contrary it is the one
true and revealed religion, the perfect flower and consummation of
Judaism. Yet it is not, like Judaism, particularistic and national, but
universal; for while God at first made that nation the special
repository of his truth, it was his "determinate foreknowledge and
counsel" that they should reject and crucify their Messiah, making it
possible to "proclaim this salvation unto the Gentiles." The one thing
Luke is so anxiously concerned to prove that he wearies the reader with
constant reiteration of it, proclaims it, argues it, in season and out
of season, with his sources, against his sources, with the facts,
against the facts, is that this faith was never, never, offered to the
Gentiles except by express direction of God and after the Jews had
demonstrated to the last extremity of stiff-necked opposition that they
would have none of it. Christianity, then, and not Judaism, is the true
primitive and revealed religion, the heir of all the divine promises.
Footnote 23: Note, also, how in Acts vi. 5 the list of
deacon-evangelists concludes "and Nicholas _a proselyte of
Antioch_."
We can see now why Luke finds it impossible to adopt Mark's story of a
missionary journey of Jesus in "the coasts of Tyre and Sidon" and will
not even mention the name of Cæsarea Philippi. His method in omitting
Mark vi. 45--viii. 26 is more radical than Matthew's, but his motive is
similar. The central theme of this portion of Mark appears in the
chapter (ch. vii.) recording Jesus' repudiation of the Jewish
distinctions of clean and unclean as "precepts of men," and departing to
heal and preach in phoenecia and Decapolis. This is the theme of Luke's
second treatise; and, as we have seen, his solution of the problem is
radically different. If he cannot admit that even Paul disregarded "the
customs" or Peter preached to Gentiles until after express and
reiterated direction of "the Spirit," we surely ought not to expect him
to admit the statement that Jesus repudiated the distinctions of
Mosaism, declared "all meats clean," and departing into the coasts of
Tyre and Sidon first healed the daughter of "a Gentile" and afterward
continued his journey "through Sidon" and "the regions of Decapolis,"
repeating the symbolic miracles of opening deaf ears and blind eyes, and
feeding with loaves and fishes. Even if this supposed ministry of Jesus
among the Gentiles stood on a much stronger foundation of historical
probability than is unfortunately the case (_cf._ Rom. xv. 8), it could
not logically be admitted to the work of Luke without an abandonment of
one of his firmest convictions and a rewriting of both his treatises.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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