CHAPTER XIV.

THE AGE TO COME AND THE WORLD TO COME. CHRIST'S TEACHINGS CONCERNING THE FIRST, AND HIS

SILENCE CONCERNING THE SECOND.

Perils of the present Transition of Opinion.-Solution of Difficulties to be found in the Silence of Jesus Christ concerning the Future Life.-Sources of Misinterpretation.-Judaism corrupted by Admixtures of Pagan Eschatology.-The Messianic "Age to Come," not the "World to Come."-The "Conclusion of this Age," not the "End of this World."-Parables of The Tares, of The Pounds, of Lazarus and Dives.—A Fallacious Foundation for a Gigantic but Unsubstantial Superstructure. -The Critical Proof of Christ's Silence as to the Future Life confirmed, 1, by his Character as a Teacher; 2, by the Character of that Old Testament Dispensation which he came to Fulfill.-The Characteristics of the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures, at this Point, distinguish them from the Pagan Eschatologies.-And Harmonize them with True Ideas of (1) the Sphere of Law; (2) the Worth of Humanity; (3) of Progress by Evolution and not Catastrophe; (4) of Spiritual Immortality.

By Rev. T. W. FOWLE, M.A, Rector of Islip, Oxford, England.

It is sometimes said, and perhaps more often hoped, that the received doctrine concerning the future life, in other words, heaven and hell, is yielding to the influences of humanity, and to the growth of a kindlier spirit, and so is taking a silent departure from the beliefs of man. This may very probably be true, but it involves the Christian religion in a serious, not to say mortal, danger. For Christianity maintains its hold upon the mass of men through the life, the character, and the teaching of Christ, as presented to us in the gospels; and of these three the last, namely, his teaching, has a special evidential value, because it can, more easily than the other two, be tested by the intelligence and moral judgment of those to whose acceptance it is submitted. If, then, men resolve to reject the received doctrine as contrary to justice, to reason, and the love of

God, and if, as they very well may, they come to the conclusion that all dogmas concerning an unknown and inconceivable future are only productive of embarrassment and delusion, then there will emerge a plain contradiction on a vital point between the teaching of Christ, as commonly received, and the best and final thoughts of man concerning himself and his destiny. The belief that Christ taught the popular doctrine, together with the certain fact that Christianity has promulgated it in his name, will prove, as indeed it always has done, a stumbling-block over which the best spirits, otherwise drawn to Christ, will be sure to fall.

It is of no use, in such a crisis as this, to resort to a nice interpretation of his recorded language, in order to raise plausible doubts as to his exact meaning, or to mitigate some of its more glaring harshness. By so doing, we only compromise his character as a teacher more gravely than ever, and lay ourselves open to a charge of dishonesty-for there is nothing that honest people dislike more than "explaining away." And if Christ intended to make an authoritative revelation about the future life, if that were the principal object of his thoughts, then we ought to admit boldly, because men will say it whether we like it or not, that he should not have spoken on such serious and difficult subjects in vague and obscure language, calculated to leave the mind in doubt and misapprehension. It will be said, and with justice, that if he had nothing clear, precise, and, above all, true, to disclose, he ought never to have spoken at all.

ALL.

And this is the plain truth of the case-HE HAS NOT SPOKEN AT All our errors and difficulties have come just of this: That we have attributed to him declarations concerning the future life, when he was thinking and speaking of something else. How to bring this statement home to the reader's mind in the limits of a brief essay, or how, even, to touch upon the many serious considerations involved in it, is, I am painfully aware, an almost impossible undertaking; however, we will start from the well-known crucial. passage, which brings the whole subject dramatically and positively

before our minds. In the parable of The Sheep and the Goats (Matt., 25), our Lord, seated upon the judgment throne, summons before him all nations, awarding to some eternal life, to others eternal punishment, the test being whether they have or have not performed deeds of mercy and kindness. Now, were the persons thus described supposed by him to have died bodily and risen again, or not? If the former, then it is not easy to imagine how words could be chosen to affirm more decisively the received doctrine of a division into two classes, the eternally lost and the eternally saved. Attempts to evade the plain meaning of the words used, more especially when they are perhaps only a translation of what he said, may possibly succeed in making his meaning unintelligible and inconsistent, but at what a cost to his authority as a divine teacher! But if the second alternative be true, i. e., that our Lord was contemplating human beings in their relation to him under present mundane conditions, then the parable ceases to concern the future life at all, and becomes, as a very cursory examination shows that it must be, a description of our Lord's Messianic kingdom, which began with his resurrection, and exists now as Christian civilization. The punishment describes the condition of those (with a special reference to the Jews of that time) who, whether as nations or individuals, are for their own fault excluded from the blessedness of the Christian religion; the reward is the realization in all its fullness of the Christian life.

This, then, raises very clearly the question we have to discuss: Did our Lord contemplate here and elsewhere the establishment of the Messianic kingdom, or the state of rewards and punishments in a future life? In the popular theology of the day, both ideas—one derived from the Old Testament, the other from Persian or oriental sources were combined together, and embodied in a number of phrases, which teachers who wished to address the people in language familiar to them must of necessity employ. Now, their use in the New Testament is a question for criticism to decide, and I shall make bold to affirm that a very small expenditure of the labor