Apparently Jesus' demeanor was so cordial and sympathetic that, as the evangelist tells us, "Now no man at the table knew for what intent he spake this unto him. For some of them thought, because Judas had the bag, that Jesus had said unto him, Buy those things that we have need of against the feast, or that he should give something to the poor."[10] Thus in this simple act of the Master, so rarely noticed by preachers, we have perhaps the finest practical example of "Love your enemies" in the entire Gospel. {70} Is it therefore to be wondered at that in speaking of Judas, the writer of St. John's Gospel says, "And after the sop Satan entered into him"? For, how can one who is a traitor at heart reach for the gift of true friendship without being transformed into the very spirit of treason? Again, Judas's treasonable kiss in Gethsemane was a perversion of an ancient, deeply cherished, and universally prevalent Syrian custom. In saluting one another, especially after having been separated for a time, men friends of the same social rank kiss one another on both cheeks, sometimes with very noisy profusion. When they are not of the same social rank, the inferior kisses the hand of the superior, while the latter at least pretends to kiss his dutiful friend upon the cheek. So David and Jonathan "kissed one another, until David exceeded." Paul's command, "Salute one another with a holy kiss," so scrupulously disobeyed by Occidental Christians, is characteristically Oriental. As a child I always felt {71} a profound reverential admiration for that unreserved outpouring of primitive affections, when strong men "fell upon one another's neck" and kissed, while the women's eyes swam in tears of joy. The passionate, quick, and rhythmic exchange of affectionate words of salutation and kisses sounded, with perhaps a little less harmony, like an intermingling of vocal and instrumental music. So Judas, when "forthwith he came to Jesus, and said, Hail, Master, and kissed him,"[11] invented no new sign by which to point Jesus out to the Roman soldiers, but employed an old custom for the consummation of an evil design. Just as Jesus glorified the common customs of his people by using them as instruments of love, so Judas degraded those very customs by wielding them as weapons of hate. [1] Matt. xxvi: 23. [2] Matt. xxvi: 21. [3] Revised Version, xiv: 17-20. [4] Mark xiv: 23. [5] 1 Thess. iii: 6. [6] Luke xxii: 19. [7] Matt. xxviii: 10. [8] John xiii: 23. [9] John xiii: 26. [10] John xiii: 28, 29. [11] Matt. xxvi: 49. {72} CHAPTER VII THE LAST SCENE Perhaps nowhere else in the New Testament do the fundamental traits of the Oriental nature find so clear an expression as in this closing scene of the Master's life. The Oriental's _dependence_, to which the world owes the loftiest and tenderest Scriptural passages, finds here its most glorious manifestations.