صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

Let us leave the whole passage with a settled determination to watch and pray against hypocrisy in religion. Whatever we are as Christians, let us be real, thorough, genuine, and sincere. Let us abhor all canting, and affectation, and part-acting in the things of which is utterly loathsome in Christ's eyes.

God, as that

We may be

short of our

weak, and erring, and frail, and come far aims and desires. But at any rate, if we profess to believe in Christ, let us be true.

NOTES. LUKE XI. 37-44.

37.-[A certain Pharisee.] We do not know who this Pharisee was. It seems clear that he was not a disciple of Christ. Yet our Lord accepted his invitation, and dined with him. From this circumstance the conclusion is often drawn by weak believers that it is lawful and desirable to keep up social intercourse with unconverted people. As to the lawfulness there can be no doubt. As to the desirableness and expediency, every one must judge for himself, and consider what he can do, and what he cannot. Those Christians who plead our Lord's example as an argument for dining with unconverted people, would do well to mark our Lord's conduct and conversation at the tables of those with whom He dined. Let them copy Him in His conversation as well as in the acceptance of invitations. Unhappily, there are many who will accept the invitation as our Lord accepted, but will not talk at table as our Lord talked.

38.—[That he had not first washed.] Let this expression be carefully noted. The Greek word literally translated would be rendered, "that he had not first been baptized" before dinner. It is clear that the washing spoken of cannot be a washing of the whole body, but a partial washing, as of the hands and feet, or a sprinkling of water on the hands, after the manner of Eastern nations. (2 Kings iii. 11.) The opinion held by some Baptists that the Greek word to "baptize" is never used except in the sense of a total immersion of the body, is one that cannot be reconciled with the expression used in this text.

39.-[Your inward part.] This of course means your inward man -your heart. It is what St. Peter calls "the hidden man of the heart." (1 Pet. iii. 4.)

40.-[Ye fools.] The literal meaning of the Greek word so translated is, "persons without mind or understanding." It is the same word that St. Paul uses. (1 Cor. xv. 36.) It is not the

word that our Lord forbids to be used in the sermon on the mount. (Matt. v. 22.)

[Did not he that made that which is without, &c.] Our Lord's meaning in this verse appears to be that it is absurd and unreasonable to suppose that God can be pleased with mere external and ceremonial purity, while inward purity and the cleansing of the heart are neglected. He who made all things, made the inner man as well as the outward, and requires the heart to be washed from its wickedness, as well as the hands from unclean

ness.

41.-[But rather give alms, &c.] This is a very difficult verse. The variety of interpretations of it shews plainly that it has perplexed the commentators.

Some think that the whole verse is ironical, and that our Lord means, "Go on in your practice of giving alms of such things as ye have, and then indeed ye are very holy people! All things are clean unto you!-Give alms and keep up the ceremonial law, and then no doubt ye are the people! None so holy as ye!" This is the opinion of Lightfoot, who thinks that our Lord is quoting the tenets of the Pharisees “in mere scoff and displeasure." However it does not seem a satisfactory mode of explaining the verse, and is unlike our Lord's usual mode of speaking. This interpretation may therefore be dismissed at once.

The real difficulty of the verse no doubt lies in the words which we translate "such things as ye have." Some think that this expression is elliptical, and that it means, "Give alms every one according to his ability." This is the view of Euthymius, Maldonatus, Cocceius, Hammond, Whitby, Schottgen, and Doddridge. Others think that the expression means, "Give as alms to the poor those things that ye have," that is, the things that ye have obtained by avarice and plunder, as Zacchæus did.-Others think that the expression means, "All that ye have all your property."-Others think that it means, "That which is over and above, your superfluities,-give them as alms."-Others think that it means, "Give alms with all your might."—Others think that it means, "Give alms, which is the only remedy left to you."

All these interpretations appear very unsatisfactory. None of them meets the grave objection, that, taken in connection with the concluding sentence of the verse, they teach false doctrine. Alms do not make our souls clean, and all our actions pure, no matter how, or in what way, or to what extent we give them.

I take leave to suggest another explanation, which seems to me to deserve consideration. The literal meaning of the Greek words is as follows,-"But rather give the things that are in, as alms."-The simplest sense of this sentence appears to be, “Give first the offering of the inward man. Give your heart, your affec

tions, and your will to God, as the first great alms which you bestow, and then all your other actions, proceeding from a right heart, are an acceptable sacrifice, and a clean offering in the sight of God.-Give the inner man first, and then the gifts and service of the external man will be acceptable.-Give yourselves first to the Lord, and then He will be pleased with your gifts. See that your persons are first accepted, and then your works will be acceptable. To the pure all things are pure.' Let the expression in this sense be compared with Rom. xii. 1. Psalm li. 17. 2 Cor. viii. 5.

42.-Woe unto you.] Here, as in other places, the stern and severe language of our Lord deserves notice. Gracious and loving as He was, He could rebuke when there was need. Nothing seems so odious in His eyes as hypocrisy.

[Ye tithe mint, &c.] This expression means that the Pharisees pretended to such excessive scrupulosity about giving a tenth of all their possessions to the service of the temple and to the maintenance of the ceremonial law, that they were not content with tithing their corn. They even tithed their garden herbs. Yet all this time they entirely neglected the plain duties of jus tice to man, and real love to God.

The neglect of distinction between that which is great and that which is small, that which is first and that which is second, that which is essential and that which is non-essential, has been the source of enormous evil in every age of the Church. It is a distinction which the never-dying school of the Pharisees is unable to draw.

43.-[Ye love the uppermost seats, &c.] Let it be noted, that ambition and the love of precedence are common marks of the formalist and the self-righteous. To exalt themselves under pretence of honouring the Church, and to obtain power under cover of obtaining respect for their own order, has been the practice of Pharisees all over the world and in every age of the Church of Christ.

Our Lord, in this verse, exposes the hollowness of the motives by which His enemies were actuated. Self, and self-aggrandizement, were the true spring of all their conduct.

44.-[Ye are as graves which appear not.] There is a remarkable difference between the comparison which our Lord draws here and that which He draws in St. Matt. xxiii. 27, where He likens the Pharisees to whitened sepulchres.

In the comparison before us He rebukes the cunning with which they concealed their own inward corruption, so that men were not aware of it.-In the one in St. Matthew He exposes the false profession which they made outwardly to the eye, in having a beautiful semblance of religion, while there was nothing

corresponding in the state of their hearts.-In the case before us He exposes what men did not see in the Pharisees. In the case in St. Matthew He rather exposes what men did see.-In the one case it was a grave full of corruption, but a grave concealed from the eye. In the other it was a grave equally full of corruption, but outwardly beautiful and white, so as to deceive a beholder as to the nature of its contents.-In the one case there was corruption, but made outwardly beautiful and harmless. In the other there was corruption hidden, concealed, and entirely kept back from the eye.-In both cases the heart was the same. The whitened sepulchre and the sepulchre concealed were both sepulchres full of corruption.

LUKE XI. 45-54.

45 Then answered one of the Lawyers, and said unto him, Master, thus saying thou reproachest us also.

46 And he said, Woe unto you also, ye Lawyers! for ye lade men with burdens grievous to be borne, and ye yourselves touch not the burdens with one of your fingers.

47 Woe unto you! for ye build the sepulchres of the prophets, and your fathers killed them.

48 Truly ye bear witness that ye allow the deeds of your fathers: for they indeed killed them, and ye build their sepulchres.

49 Therefore also said the wisdom of God, I will send them prophets and apostles, and some of them they shall slay and persecute:

50 That the blood of all the prophets, which was shed from the founda

tion of the world, may be required of this generation;

51 From the blood of Abel unto the blood of Zacharias, which perished between the altar and the temple: verily I say unto you, It shall be required of this generation.

52 Woe unto you, Lawyers! for ye have taken away the key of knowledge: ye enter not in yourselves, and them that were entering in ye hindered.

53 And as he said these things unto them, the Scribes and the Pharisees began to urge him vehemently, and to provoke him to speak of many things:

54 Laying wait for him, and seeking to catch something out of his mouth, that they might accuse him.

THE passage before us is an example of our Lord Jesus Christ's faithful dealing with the souls of men. We see Him without fear or favour rebuking the sins of the Jewish expounders of God's law. That false charity which calls it "unkind" to say that any one is in error, finds no encouragement in the language used by our Lord. He called things by their right names. He knew that acute diseases need severe remedies. He would

have us know that the truest friend to our souls, is not the man who is always "speaking smooth things," and agreeing with everything we say, but the man who tells us the most truth.

We learn, firstly, from our Lord's words, how great is the sin of professing to teach others what we do not practise ourselves. He says to the lawyers, "Ye lade men with burdens grievous to be borne, while ye yourselves touch not the burdens with one of your fingers." They required others to observe wearisome ceremonies in religion which they themselves neglected. They had the impudence to lay yokes upon the consciences of other men, and yet to grant exemptions from these yokes for themselves. In a word, they had one set of measures and weights for their hearers, and another set for their own souls.

The stern reproof which our Lord here administers, should come home with special power to certain classes in the church. It is a word in season to all teachers of young people. It is a word to all masters of families and heads of households. It is a word to all fathers and mothers. Above all, it is a word to all clergymen and ministers of religion. Let all such mark well our Lord's language in this passage. Let them beware of telling others to aim at a standard which they do not aim at themselves. Such conduct, to say the least, is gross inconsistency.

Perfection, no doubt, is unattainable in this world. If nobody is to lay down rules, or teach, or preach, until he is faultless himself, the whole fabric of society would be thrown into confusion. But we have a right to expect some agreement between a man's words and a man's

« السابقةمتابعة »