So far in the course of our inquiry we have traced the development of Christian doctrine simply through the religious ideas of the Jewish people. But from this point we shall have to consider the relations of opposite tendencies, the collision between Judaism and Paganism in Christianity to which I have referred in the Introduction. And in dealing with this subject, it is a fair canon of historical criticism to say that so far as any dogma is distinctly Jewish, its origin should be assigned to the earliest period of the Christian Church, and so far as any dogma is distinctly Pagan, its origin should be assigned to a later period, after the conversion of the Gentiles had begun. The justice of this canon is evident when we remember that Christianity at the time of Christ’s death had none but Jewish adherents, and that thenceforth it grew to be more and more accepted by Pagans, until at last its ranks were filled with Pagans alone. The Atonement is the chief Jewish dogma, and the Incarnation the chief Pagan dogma of Christianity, and they obviously conform to the requirements of the canon. For the present we shall be occupied with the doctrines of Christianity which are mainly Jewish in form. Though the Christian Church started with belief in the Atonement, the dogma at the beginning could not have been fully grasped and understood. For a time it was probably only latent in the doctrines of the Church. His disciples were not likely at once to recognize the significance of what Christ did at the passover supper; up to the last they could hardly have been prepared for his death. But even with a blind obedience they would naturally obey their lord’s commands. As they commemorated the Christian passover and repeated its forms, the meaning of it would gradually dawn on their minds. This repetition must have been from the first the centre of the early Church, a distinctive ceremony which brought the Christians together and marked them off from the Jews around them. While thus incessantly repeating the form of sacramental communion with the body of Christ, sooner or later they would be sure to recognize what this sacramental communion implied, the sacrificial character of his death. Then the latent dogma of the Atonement would be fully understood. As Jews, they would readily accept it; indeed, it would be to them an explanation of their strange position as disciples of a crucified Messiah.