CHAPTER X

1.  “It is the heart that makes the theologian.”  Where does your theology come from?

2.  The doctrine of the Atonement has often been stated as an attempt to reconcile Jesus and an un-Christian conception of God.  “God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself.”  “The Cross is the revelation in time of what God is always.”  Discuss.

3.  What are the three ways of answering the question:  “Who and what is this Jesus Christ?” Why must people make up their minds about him?

4.  Does the writer make Jesus too human?  Or has the reading of this book made you feel his divinity more strongly just because he was so perfectly human?

FOOTNOTES

[1] The Conflict of Religions in the Early Roman Empire, p. 157.

[2] “We are nothing; Christ alone is all.”

[3] Canon Streeter in Foundations

[4] Cf. the foreigner’s touch at Athens (Acts 17:21).

[5] because, later on, the Sabbath and Jewish ceremony were not among the most living issues, after the Church had come to be chiefly Gentile.

[6] On this point see R. W. Dale, “The Living Christ and the Four Gospels”; and W. Sanday, “The Gospels in the Second Century.”

[7] The reader will see that I am referring to Bishop Lightfoot’s article on “The Brethren of the Lord” in his commentary on “Galatians”, but not accepting his conclusions.

[8] That this is not quite fanciful is shown by the emphasis laid by more or less contemporary writers on the increased facilities for travel which the Roman Empire gave, and the use made of them.

[9] Wordsworth, Prelude, i. 586.

[10] Cf., F. G. Peabody, “Jesus Christ and Christian Character”, pp. 57-60.

[11] H. S. Coffin, Creed of Jesus. pp. 240-242.

[12] “Prelude” xiii. 26 ff.

[13] See further, on this, in Chapter VII., p.168

[14] E.g., in his essay on “Mirabeau”:  “The real quantity of our insight ... depends on our patience, our fairness, lovingness”; and in “Biography”:  “A loving heart is the beginning of all knowledge.”

[15] Cf.  Deissmann, Light from the Ancient East, p. 154.  I have omitted one or two less relevant clauses—­e.g. greetings to friends.

[16] Horace, “Epistles”, i. 16, 48.

[17] Homer, “Odyssey”, xvii. 322.

[18] It is only about four times that personal immortality comes with any clearness in the Old Testament:  Psalms 72 and 139; Isaiah 26; and Job 16:26.

[19] Cf.  A. E. J. Rawlinson, Dogma, Fact and Experience, p. 16.  “All the virtues in the Aristotelian canon are self-contained states of the virtuous man himself ....  In the last resort they are entirely self-centred adornments or accomplishments of the good man; and it is significant of this self-centredness of the entire conception that the qualities of display (megaloprepeia) and highmindedness, or proper pride (megalopsychia), are insisted on as integral elements of the ideal character.  On the other hand, the three characteristic Christian virtues—­faith, hope and charity—­all postulate Another.”