[Footnote 1:  Matt. xxii. 2, and following; Luke xiv. 16, and following.  Comp.  Matt. viii. 11, 12, xxi. 33, and following.]

Pure Ebionism—­that is, the doctrine that the poor (ebionim) alone shall be saved, that the reign of the poor is approaching—­was, therefore, the doctrine of Jesus.  “Woe unto you that are rich,” said he, “for ye have received your consolation.  Woe unto you that are full, for ye shall hunger.  Woe unto you that laugh now, for ye shall mourn and weep."[1] “Then said he also to him that bade him, When thou makest a dinner or a supper, call not thy friends, nor thy brethren, neither thy kinsmen, nor thy rich neighbors, lest they also bid thee again, and a recompense be made thee.  But when thou makest a feast, call the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind:  and thou shalt be blessed; for they cannot recompense thee; for thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just."[2] It is perhaps in an analogous sense that he often repeated, “Be good bankers"[3]—­that is to say, make good investments for the kingdom of God, in giving your wealth to the poor, conformably to the old proverb, “He that hath pity upon the poor, lendeth unto the Lord."[4]

[Footnote 1:  Luke vi. 24, 25.]

[Footnote 2:  Luke xiv. 12, 14.]

[Footnote 3:  A saying preserved by very ancient tradition, and much used, Clement of Alexandria, Strom. i. 28.  It is also found in Origen, St. Jerome, and a great number of the Fathers of the Church.]

[Footnote 4:  Prov. xix. 17.]

This, however, was not a new fact.  The most exalted democratic movement of which humanity has preserved the remembrance (the only one, also, which has succeeded, for it alone has maintained itself in the domain of pure thought), had long disturbed the Jewish race.  The thought that God is the avenger of the poor and the weak, against the rich and the powerful, is found in each page of the writings of the Old Testament.  The history of Israel is of all histories that in which the popular spirit has most constantly predominated.  The prophets, the true, and, in one sense, the boldest tribunes, had thundered incessantly against the great, and established a close relation, on the one hand, between the words “rich, impious, violent, wicked,” and, on the other, between the words “poor, gentle, humble, pious."[1] Under the Seleucidae, the aristocrats having almost all apostatized and gone over to Hellenism, these associations of ideas only became stronger.  The Book of Enoch contains still more violent maledictions than those of the Gospel against the world, the rich, and the powerful.[2] Luxury is there depicted as a crime.  The “Son of man,” in this strange Apocalypse, dethrones kings, tears them from their voluptuous life, and precipitates them into hell.[3] The initiation of Judea into secular life, the recent introduction of an entirely worldly element of luxury and comfort, provoked a furious reaction in favor of patriarchal