Lord-living and active now. To attain to personal union with Christ, to share the fellowship of His spirit now, to have implanted within us a living seed which will unfold to perfect fulness hereafter, that is for Paul the Christian ideal, God's best for man, "the last of life for which the first was made.” 1

3. The Brotherhood and Unity of Man. Up to this point, in our consideration of the ideal of Paul, the emphasis has seemed to lie on the perfection of the individual. But none knew better than Paul that the individual is not perfected alone. Paul's aim may be individual, but it is not individualistic. He may endeavour to present every man perfect before God, but he well knows that no man can find himself until he finds his duties, and that the single soul is completed in the brotherhood of the race.

Two things especially, according to Mr. Lecky, the world owes to Jesus Christ-the new sacredness of life and the new sense of brotherhood. These two ideas find repeated expression in the epistles. The one is a consequence of the other. To those who came under the power of the Gospel life appeared to be of quite infinite worth, for the Cross of Christ had supplied a new and an unique standard of value; and in addition the actual character of Jesus had set before men an altogether new ideal of humanity. If we compare the teaching of Paul with the teachings of contemporary writers, we find ourselves at once confronted with an entirely different order of values. It is no longer the man as citizen, ruler or philosopher; no more the noble or the slave as such that comes before us; but man as created in the image of God, man as redeemed by the blood of Christ, and,

1See Du Bose, Gospel According to Paul, p. 296, who works out the three senses in which Christ is ours in a somewhat different manner.

therefore, both to himself and to others, of transcendent potential worth and dignity. Nor is there any longer a distinction between man and man. God has made of one every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth. He has sent His Son to die for all men, and by His word and spirit He is calling all into a common fellowship in which there is neither Greek nor Jew, bond nor free, male nor female, but in which all are one in Christ Jesus.1

Many of the precepts of the apostle refer, not to single individuals, but to humanity as an organic whole. Paul recognizes that no man can live to himself alone, and that in seeking his own good he ought to seek his brother's good as well. Christians can only fulfil the law of Christ as they bear one another's burdens. One of the

first steps which the apostle took was to gather the disciples together into organized communities. He recognized that no Christian could have fought his way through the dark night of idolatry and immorality which surrounded him as an isolated unit. The congregation, or the Church, as Paul calls it, was a necessary condition for all permanent religious life. These organizations were probably first modelled partly upon the Greek and partly upon the Jewish pattern. But however they originated, such communities of brethren, closely knit together for religious and social purposes, gave to the individual members a sense of strength and comfort, and often stood to them in the place of the family. To these congregations Paul's chief epistles were written, and, though the aim of his preaching was in the first instance the conversion of the individual, he conceived the power of the new life to be centred in the Church.

1 Cp. Fordyce, The New Social Order, p. 39.

2 Wernle, Beginning of Christianity, vol. i. p. 190.

The Church was Christ's body, of which individuals were the members, necessary to one another, and deriving their strength and nutriment from Christ, the head. The (daily needs of the congregations forced the apostle to elaborate a kind of sociology. Though perhaps Paul can scarcely be styled a social reformer in the modern sense of the phrase, and though his first thoughts are for the Church of God, the body of Christ, it must not be forgotten that the whole of humanity is for him the aim of final redemption, and the field is the world. It is surely a mistake to say, as Weinel does, " that Paul's teaching is altogether cut off from national life; his ethical system is that of anarchism without and of a conventicle within, it does not move along with the full stream of a broad life in touch with the world at every point, nor has it to do with people who either could or would acquire any influence in the shaping of society or the state.1 It is true "that the vices and virtues with which he is concerned " are in the first instance those of a little circle of believers, but they are the vices and virtues which for the most part have to do with men and women of all conditions and all times. Many of his precepts may be particular; but the principles from which they are deduced are universal and applicable to all men. Temporary and local as some of the questions may be which Paul discusses, there is nothing trivial in his treatment of them. The matter of eating meat offered to idols has no practical interest for us now, but his large-heartedness and moral earnestness, his resolute appeal to the loftiest principles, lifts the subject out of its immediate connection, and makes it an object-lesson for all times in the delicate task of adjusting the rival claims of Christian liberty and expediency. Indeed Paul, 1 Weinel, St. Paul, p. 334. 2 Jackson, Expos., vol. xi. p. 149.

as Harnack says, "dominates all earthly things and circumstances like a king." Instead of "provincial edicts" he issues "imperial laws," which are applicable to the whole moral world. He is the apostle of emancipation and liberty, fighting as the conscript of posterity the battle of spiritual freedom. His Gospel is social as well as individual. His goal is the brotherhood of man. He proclaims the unity and equality before God of Greek and Roman, of barbarian and civilized, of bond and free, and yet it is a significant fact that the spirit of national independence has nowhere been so strong as in those nations which have received most plainly the impress of his powerful mind. It is not too much to say that many of the great political and social questions which are so full of significance for modern times, though not directly referred to by Paul, are to be solved only in the light and by the application of the great broad principles of equity and justice, of Christian charity and forbearance, of brotherhood and unity which he lays down. It is impossible to interpret the splendid ideal which the apostle holds up before the gaze of the Ephesian Church in any limited or local sense. It is nothing if not a prayer and prophecy for the whole complex and manifold life of humanity-"till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ." 2

II.

So far, we have considered in a general way the nature and contents of Paul's ethical ideal. It may be well for the sake of greater definiteness and clearness to specify certain important characteristics which cannot fail to strike the reader of the epistles.

1 What is Christianity? p. 17.

H

2 Eph. iv. 13.

1. The absoluteness of Paul's ideal may first be noted. Nothing higher or more commanding is conceivable. It God" hath is like the ideal of Jesus Himself, absolute.

chosen us in Christ before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love." Our walk is to be worthy of God. Our thoughts and actions are to be measured only by the highest standard and authority known to us-the commandments of God, which are to be read in the light of Christ-God's image and the Revealer of His character and will. What Kant sought to secure for morality by his "categorical imperative," Paul found in the living imperative of the Spirit of Christ. "If any man hath not the Spirit of Christ he is none of His."3 The Christian law is "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus."4

Paul never forgets that he is the envoy of Jesus to the nations. Never once does he lower his ideal or mitigate his supreme demands. Everywhere the power of the world was opposing and thwarting his work. One has but to think of the condition of life in such cities as Corinth, Ephesus and Rome to realize the greatness of the apostle's task. Expressions like these-" be not conformed to the world," "set your minds on things which are above," "our citizenship is in heaven "-show how high the apostle bore among the nations the flag of the Gospel's absolute and imperative demands. To break with his heathen surroundings was the Christian's first and foremost duty. With colossal courage Paul drove straight against the mighty mass of heathen idolatry and vice. He will make no He will listen to no terms with evil. compromise with expediency. In every crisis he adheres firmly to his principles. As against the Judaizing party

22 Cor. iv. 6.

4 Rom. viii. 2.