T0 THE ORIGIN OF PAUL'S RELIGION
sources by the fact that the Pauline terminology does not occur in the pagan sources. It will not do for him to say that the terminology is of little importance and that the ideas of Paul, if not the terminology, are derived from the pagan mysteries. For it is just Reitzenstein who insists upon the importance of words as the vehicle of ideas. His fundamental argument is that Paul used the terminology of the mystery religions, and with the terminology received also the ideas. It is therefore important to observe that Reitzenstein's lexical parallel utterly breaks down.
But if the Pauline doctrine of the Spirit was not derived from the pagan mystery religions, whence was it derived.'' The answer is perfectly plain. It was derived ultimately from the Old Testament.^ Unquestionably, indeed, it goes far beyond the Old Testament, and the enrichment of its content may conceivably be explained in various ways. The Gospels and Acts explain the enrichment as due partly to the teaching of Jesus Himself and to the coming of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost. This explanation will be rejected for the most pare by naturalistic criticism. Paul explains the enrichment as due partly to the experience which he had of the presence of Christ. This explanation is regarded as no explanation at all by the school of comparative religion. But it is not necessary in the present connection to discuss these matters. All that needs to be observed now is that the basis for the Pauline doctrine of the Spirit is found in the Old Testament.
In the Old Testament, the Spirit of. God is represented as distinct from man and higher than man; there is no question in the Old Testament of a usage by which the Spirit is degraded, as in Hermes Trismegistus, below the soul. In the Old Testament, moreover, the Spirit is regarded as bestowing supernatural gifts such as prophecy and producing supernatural experiences — exactly as in Paul. But the fruit of the Spirit according to the Old Testament is something more than prophecy or any momentary experience; it is also a permanent possession of the soul. "Take not thy holy Spirit from me," says the
' Bousset {op. cit., p. 141, Anm. 3) admits that the terminology of Paul, especially his use of the term "Spirit" instead of "mind" and his use of the terms in the contrast between "Spirit" and "flesh" may possibly be due partly to the Old Testament, but insists that such terminological influence does not touch the fundamentals of the thought. Such admissions are important, despite the way in which Bousset qualifies them.
Psalmist. (Ps. li. 11.) Let the student first examine the labored arguments of Reitzenstein, let him examine the few faint approaches to the Pauline terminology which have been gleaned from pagan sources, mostly late and of uncertain origin, let him observe that just where Greek usage approaches Paul most closely in form (as in the "divine Spirit" of Menander),^ it is most diametrically opposed in content, let him reflect that the influence of pagan usage is contrary to Paul's own consciousness. And then let him turn to the Old Testament! Let him remember that the Pauline use of the Old Testament is no matter of conjecture, but is attested everywhere in the Epistles. And. let him examine the Old Testament usage in detail. The Pauline terminology — "the Holy Spirit," the "Spirit of God" — so signally lacking in early pagan sources,- appears here in all its richness; and with the terminology go the depths of life. In turning from Hermes to the Hebrew Scriptures, the student has turned away from Stoic pantheism, away from the polytheism of the mystery religions, away from the fantastic speculations of a decadent philosophy, to the presence of the personal God. And, in doing so, he has found the origin of the religion of Paul.
Thus the lexical argument of Reitzenstein breaks down at the decisive points. It would indeed be rash to assert that Paul never uses a term derived from the pagan mysteries. For example, in Phil. iv. 12 he uses the verb that means "to be initiated." "In everything and in all things I have been initiated," he says, "both to be filled and to suffer hunger, both to abound and to be in want." But this example shows clearly how little importance is sometimes to be attributed to the ultimate derivation of a word. The word "initiate" is here used in a purely figurative way. It is doubtful whether there is the slightest thought of its original significance. The word has been worn down by repeated use almost as much as, for example, the word which means "supply" in Gal. iii. 5. Etymologically that word means "to be the leader of a chorus." It referred originally to the Athenian custom by which a wealthy citizen undertook to defray the cost of the chorus at one of the dramatic festivals. But later it was used to designate any act of bountiful supplying. And when it was used by
Paul, its origin was entirely forgotten. It would be ridiculous to make Paul say that in bestowing the Spirit upon the Galatian Christians God acted as the leader of a chorus. It is not essentially different with the verb meaning "to be initiated" in Philippians. In both cases, an institution of ancient Hellenic life — in the former case, the religious festivals, in the latter case, the mysteries — has given rise to the use of a word, which found its way into the Greek world-language of the Hellenistic age, and continued to be used even where there was no thought of its ultimate origin.
This example is instructive because the context in the Philippians passage is plainly free from all mystical associations. Plainly, therefore, the use of a word derived from the mysteries does not necessarily indicate any agreement with the mystical point of view. Indeed, it may perhaps indicate the exact opposite. If the idea "to initiate" had associations connected with the center of Paul's religious life, it is perhaps doubtful whether Paul could have used the word in so purely figurative a way, just as he would not have used the word meaning "to be the leader of a chorus" in referring to God's bestowal of the Spirit, if he had had the slightest thought of the Athenian festivals.
If, then, it should appear that Paul uses a vocabulary derived from the mysteries, the fact would not necessarily be of any significance whatever in determining the origin of his religion. Every missionary is obliged to take the words which have been used in the religion from which converts are to be won in order to express the new ideas. Translators of the Bible in the modern mission fields are obliged to proceed in this way. Yet the procedure does not necessarily involve any modification of Christian ideas. The old words are given loftier meanings in order to become the vehicle of Christian truth; the original meanings provide merely a starting-point for the new teaching. Conceivably, the apostle Paul might have proceeded in this way; conceivably he might have used words connected with the mystery religions in order to proclaim the gospel of Christ.
As a matter of fact, the evidence for such an employment of a mystery terminology in the Pauline Epistles is very slight. In 1 Cor. ii. 6, 7, Paul uses the terms "mystery" and "perfect" or "full-grown." ^ The former word was sometimes used to
' ixvariipiov and reXews.
designate the "mysteries" in the technical, religious sense. But it is also used in Greek in a very much more general way. And certainly as it is used in Paul it is very remote from the technical meaning. The Christian "mystery" according to Paul is not something that is to be kept secret on principle, like the mysteries of Eleusis, but it is something which, though it was formerly hidden in the counsels of God, is now to be made known to all. Some, it is true, may never be able to receive it. But that which is necessary in order that it may be received is not "gnosis" or an initiation. It is rather acceptance of a message and the holy life that follows. "If you would know the deep things of God," Paul says to the Corinthians, "then stop your quarreling." We find ourselves here in a circle of ideas quite different from that of the mystery religions. As for the word "teleios," it seems not to have been discovered in pagan sources in the sense of "initiated," which is sometimes attributed to it in 1 Corinthians. Apparently it means simply "full-grown"; Paul contrasts the fullgrown man with the babes in Christ.
On the whole, it seems improbable that the converts of Paul, in any great numbers, had lived in the atmosphere of the mystery religions.'- At any rate, Paul certainly does not use the technical vocabulary of the mysteries. That fact has been amply demonstrated by Von Harnack in the illuminating study which he has devoted to the "terminology of the new birth." ^ The earliest genuine technical term in the vocabulary of the early Church, Von Harnack believes, is "illumination," as Justin Martyr uses it to designate baptism. Certainly in the earUer period, there is not the slightest evidence of any such fixity in the use of terms as would have appeared if the New Testament writers had adopted a technical vocabulary.
Therefore, if the dependence of Paul upon the mystery religions is to be demonstrated, the lexical method of Reitzenstein must be abandoned. The terminology of Paul is not derived from the terminology of the mysteries. But possibly, it may be said, although there is no clear dependence in the terminology, the fundamental ideas of Paul may still be shown
' Von Harnack, "Die Terminologie der Wiedergeburt und verwandter Erlebnisse in der altesten Kirche," in Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geachichte der altcknstlicheit Literatur, xlii, 1918, pp. 97-143. See especially pp. 139-143.
to have come from the surrounding paganism. It is in this more cautious form that the hypothesis is maintained by Bousset; at least Bousset is less inclined than Reitzenstein to lay stress upon verbal coincidences.^ The entire outlook of Paul, Bousset believes, regardless of the way in which that outlook is expressed, was derived from the mystical piety of the Hellenistic age; it was from his pagan environment that Paul derived the pessimistic estimate of human nature which is at the basis of his teaching.
At this point it may be admitted very freely that Paul was convinced of the insufficiency of human nature, and that that conviction was also prevalent in the paganism of the Hellenistic age. The Hellenistic age, like Paul, recognized the need of redemption; salvation, it was believed, could not be attained by unaided human resources, but was a gift of higher powers. But this similarity is quite insufficient to establish any relationship of dependence. Both Paulinism and the Hellenistic mystery religions were religions of redemption. But there have been many religions of redemption, in many ages and among many peoples, which have been entirely independent of one another. It will probably not be maintained, for.example, that early Buddhism stood in any fundamental causal relation to the piety of the Hellenistic age. Yet early Buddhism was a religion of redemption.
No attempt indeed should be made to underestimate the community of interest which binds all redemptive religions together and separates them sharply from all others. Common recognition of the fundamental evil of the world is a far closer bond of union than agreement about the details of conduct. Gautama under the tree of knowledge in India, seeking in ascetic meditation for freedom from the misery of existence, was inwardly far nearer to the apostle Paul than is many a modem liberal preacher who loves to read the sixth chapter of Ephesians in Church. But such community of interest does not indicate any relation of dependence. It might do so if the sense of human inadequacy were an abnormal thing. In that case, the appearance of a pessimistic view of human nature would require explanation. But if human nature is really hopeless and helpless in an evil world, then the independent * But compare Jesus der Herr, 1916, pp. 80-85.
recognition of the fact by many men of many minds is no longer cause for wonder.
Historical judgments at this point, then, are apt to be influenced by the presuppositions of the investigator. To Bousset the whole notion of redemption is distasteful. It seems to him to be an abnormal, an unhealthy thing. To explain its emergence, therefore, in the course of human history he is prone to look for special causes. So he explains the Pauline doctrine of the radical evil of human nature as being due to the piety of a decadent age. But if this world is really an evil world, as Paul says it is, then recognition of the fact win appear spontaneously at many points. For a time, in an age of high achievements like the age of Pericles, the fundamental problem of life may be forgotten. But the problem is always there and will force itself ever anew into the consciousness of men.
At any rate, whether desirable or not, the longing for redemption is a fundamental fact of history, and may be shown to have emerged independently at many points. The character of Paulinism as a redemptive religion, the Pauline doctrine of human depravity, is therefore insufficient to establish dependence of Paul upon the mystery religions of the Hellenistic age. Dependence could be established only by similarity in the form in which the doctrine of depravity appears. But as a matter of fact such similarity is strikingly absent. The Pauline use of the term "flesh" to denote that in which evil resides can apparently find no real parallel whatever in pagan usage. And the divergence appears not only in terminology but also in thought. At first sight there might seem to be a parallel between the Pauline doctrine of the flesh and the Greek doctrine of the evil of matter, which appears in the Orphic sects, then in Plato and in his successors. But the parallel breaks down upon closer examination. According to Plato, the body is evil because it is material; it is the prison-house of the soul. Nothing could really be more remote from the thought of Paul. According to Paul, the connection of soul and body is entirely normal, and the soul apart from the body is in a condition of nakedness. It is true, the body will be changed at the resurrection or at the coming of Christ; it will be made more adequate for the Kingdom of God. But at any rate, there is in Paul no doctrine of the inherent evil of matter. The real starting-point of the Pauline doctrine of the flesh is to be found in the Old Testament, in the passages where "flesh" denotes human nature in its frailty. Certainly the Pauline teaching is far more highly developed than the teaching of the Old Testament. But the Old Testament provides the startingpoint. The "flesh" in Paul, when it is used in its developed, ethical sense, does not mean the material nature of man; it includes rather all that man receives by ordinary generation. The contrast between "flesh" and "Spirit" therefore is not the contrast between matter and spirit; it is a contrast between human nature, of which sin has taken possession, and the Spirit of God.
Certainly, at any rate, whatever solution may be found for the intricate problem of the Pauline use of the term "flesh," the Pauline pessimism with regard to human nature is totally different from the dualistic pessimism of the Hellenistic age. It is different because it does not make evil reside in matter as such. But it is different also in a far more fundamental way. It is different in its ethical character. The Hellenistic age was conscious of the need of salvation; and salvation, it was recognized, must come from outside of man. But this consciousness of need was not always, and not clearly, connected with questions of right and wrong. The Hellenistic age was conscious of inadequacy, of slavery to fate, of the futility of human life as it is actually lived upon the earth. Here and there, no doubt, there was also a recognition of existing moral evil, and a longing for a better life. But such longings were almost submerged amidst longings of a nonethical kind. The mysteries were cherished for the most part not because they offered goodness but because they offered happiness.
In Paul, on the other hand, the consciousness of human inadequacy is essentially a consciousness of sin. And redemption is desired because it satisfies the hunger and thirst after righteousness. At this point the contrast with the Hellenistic mystery religions is profound. The religion of Paul is like the mystery religions in that it is a religion of redemption. But there the similarity ceases. There is certainly no such similarity in the conception of that from which men are to be redeemed as would raise any presumption of dependence in the presentation of the means of redemption. And it is dependence in the presentation of the means of redemption which alone would serve to explain the origin of the religion of Paul. It is unwarranted to argue that because Paul agrees with the mystery religions in a longing for redemption therefore he must have derived from the mystery religions his method of satisfying the longing — namely his conception of the redemptive work of the Lord Jesus Christ. For even in the longing for redemption — to say nothing of the way of satisfying the longing — Paul was totally different from the mysteries. The longing which was aroused in the devotees of the mysteries was a longing for a happier immortality, a freedom from the pressure of fate; the longing which Paul sought to arouse in those for whom he labored was a longing for righteousness and for acceptance by the righteous God.
This difference is intimately connected with a highly significant fact — the presence in Paid of a "forensic" view of salvation. Salvation, according to Paul, is not only salvation from the power of sin; it is also salvation from the guilt of sin. Not only regeneration is needed, if a man is to be saved, but also justification. At this point, there is apparently in the mystery religions no parallel worthy of the name. At least there is none if Reitzenstein's attempt to exhibit a parallel ■'■ is at all adequate; for Reitzenstein has succeeded only in setting in clearer light the enormous difference at this point between Paul and his pagan environment. The word "justify" appears, indeed, in the Hermetic corpus (xiii. 9), but as Reitzenstein himself observes, it means not "declare righteous" but "make righteous." A parallel with Paul can be set up, therefore, only if "justify" in Paul also means "make righteous." Reitzenstein actually finds such a meaning in Rom. vi. 7, and in Rom. viii. 30. But the expedient is desperate in the extreme. It will probably be unnecessary to review again the absolutely overwhelming evidence by which the word "justify" in the Pauhne Epistles is shown to mean not "make righteous" but "declare righteous." Without the slightest question Paul did maintain a forensic view of salvation. The believer, according to Paul, is in himself guilty in the sight of God. But he is given a sentence of acquittal, he is "justified," because
Christ has borne on the cross the curse of the Law which rightly rested upon those whom Christ died to save.
The presence of this forensic element in the teaching of Paul is universally or generally recognized; and it is usually admitted to be not Greek but Jewish. But there is a tendency among recent scholars to minimize its importance. According to Wrede, the forensic conception of salvation, the complex of ideas centering around justification apart from the works of the Law, was merely a weapon forged by Paul in the exigencies of controversy.^ Against the Judaizing contention for the continued validity of the Law Paul developed the doctrine that the penalty imposed by the Law upon sin was borne by Christ, so that for the believer the bondage of the Law is over. But, Wrede believes, this whole conception was of minor importance in Paul's own life; it was merely necessary in order that he might refute the Judaizers and so continue his free Gentile mission. A somewhat similar view is advocated by Bousset; Bousset believes, at least, that the forensic conception of salvation occupies a subordinate place in the thought and life of Paul.
But there could be no greater mistake. The doctrine of justification by faith alone apart from the works of the Law appears indeed in the Epistle to the Galatians as a weapon against the Judaizers. But why was Paul opposed to the Judaizers in the first place.? Certainly it was not merely because the Judaizing demand that Gentile Christians should be circumcised and keep the Law would interfere in a practical way with the Gentile mission. Paul was not like some modem leaders of the Church, who are interested in mere bigness; he was not interested in the extension of the Church if such extension involved the sacrifice of principle. Nothing could be more utterly unhistorical than the representation of Paul as a practical missionary, developing the doctrine of justification by faith in order to get rid of a doctrine of the Law which would be a hindrance in the way of his Gentile mission. Such a representation reverses the real sta,te of the case. The real reason why Paul was devoted to the doctrine of justification by faith was not that it made possible the Gentile mission, but rather that it was true. Paul was not devoted to the doctrine of justification by faith because of the Gentile mission; he was devoted to the Gentile mission because of the doctrine of justification by faith. And he was opposed to the Judaizers, not merely because they constituted a hindrance in the way of the Gentile work, but because they made the cross of Christ of none effect. "If righteousness is through the law, then Christ died in vain" (Gal. ii. 21). These words are at the very heart of Paul's life; for they involve the Pauline doctrine of the grace of God.
There could be no greater error, therefore, than that of representing the Pauline doctrine of justification by faith as a mere afterthought, as a mere weapon in controversy. Paul was interested in salvation from the guilt of sin no whit less than in salvation from the power of sin, in justification no whit less than in the "new creation." Indeed, it is a great mistake to separate the two sides of his message. There lies the root error of the customary modern formula for explaining the origin of the Pauline theology. According to that formula, the forensic element in Paul's doctrine of salvation, which centers in justification, was derived from Judaism, and the vital or essential element which centers in the new creation was derived from paganism. In reality, the two elements are inextricably intertwined. The sense of guilt was always central in the longing for salvation which Paul desired to induce in his hearers, and imparted to. that longing an ethical quality which was totally lacking in the mystery religions. And salvation in the Pauline churches consisted not merely in the assurance of a blessed immortality, not merely in the assurance of a present freedom from the bondage of fate, not merely even in the possession of a new power of holy living, but also, and everywhere, in the consciousness that the guilt of sin had been removed by the cross of Christ.
There is no affinity, therefore, between the Pauline doctrine of salvation and that which is found in the mystery re- Hgions. The terminology is strikingly different, and the difference is even greater in the underlying ideas. Paulinism is like the mystery religions in being a religion of redemption, but within the great category of redemptive religions there could be no greater contrast.
This conclusion might be overthrown if certain recent contentions should prove to be correct with regard to the second of the elements in Paulinism which are being derived from pagan religion. 'Diis second element is found in the Pauline doctrine of the sacraments. In the teaching of Paul about baptism and the Lord's Supper, we are told, there is clearly to be observed the influence of the mystery religions.
This contention depends partly upon the supposed nature of these particular sacraments and partly upon the mere fact of the presence of sacraments in the religion of Paul.
With regard to the nature of these particular sacraments there might seem at first sight to be a parallel with the mystery religions. The mysteries usually had connected with them ablutions of one kind or another and some sort of partaking of sacred food. But it is singularly difficult to determine the meaning of these practices. The various ablutions which preceded the celebration of the mysteries may have been often nothing more than symbols of cleansing; and such symbolism is so natural that it might appear independently at many places. It appears, for example, highly developed among the Jews; and in the baptism of John the Baptist it assumes a form far more closely akin to Christian baptism than in the washings which were connected with the pagan mysteries. The evidence for a sacramental significance of the ablutions in the mysteries, despite confident assertions on the part of some modem writers, is really very slight. Most interesting, perhaps, of all the passages which have been cited is that which appears in Pap. Par. 4<7, a papyrus letter written in the second century before Christ.^ This passage may be translated as follows: "For you are untruthful about all things and the gods who are with you likewise, because they have cast you into great matter and we are not able to die, and if you see that we are going to be saved, then let us be baptized." It is possible to understand the death that is referred to as the mystical death which would be attained in the mysteries, and to connect the baptism with that death and with the consequent salvation. There would thus be a parallel, external at least, with the sixth chapter of Romans, where Paul connects baptism with the
> See Reitzenstein, op. cit., 2te Aufl., pp. 85f. The passage in the papyrus reads as follows {Notices et extrails des manuscrits de la bibliothique imp4riale, xviii, 1865, p. 315): on ^'f^Sji wavra, Kal oi irapa <re ffeol o/jloIws, art ipfikpXriKav i>ij.a,s (is u\rji/ iieyh\r]V, Kal oi &vvaix(9a &TroSavelv' k&v i5j/s (Iti fitWofiiv aoiBijvai, Tore /SoTTTifw/ieSa. The letter is also contained in Witkowski, Epistulae privatae graecae, 1906, pp. 63-66.
death and resurrection of Christ. But the papyrus passage is hopelessly obscure, and is capable of very different interpretations. Moulton and Milligan, for example, take the verb "to be baptized," in a purely figurative sense, as meaning simply "to be overwhelmed with calamities." ^ According to this interpretation the reference to the mysteries disappears altogether. At any rate, the passage, if it does refer to the mysteries, is altogether isolated. And in view of its extreme obscurity it should not be made the basis of far-reaching conclusions. What is now being maintained is not that the washings which were connected with the mysteries were never sacramental. It is incautious to make such sweeping negative assertions. But so far as the pre-Pauline period is concerned, the evidence which has been adduced is, to say the least, exceedingly scanty. It has by no means been proved that in the pre-Pauline mysteries, "baptism" was connected closely with the new birth. -
With regard to the partaking of sacred food, the evidence is in some respects more abundant. Even in the mysteries of Eleusis, a special significance seems to have been attributed to the drinking of the "kykeon"; and the initiates into the Phrygian mysteries are reported by Clement of Alexandria (similarly Firmicus Matemus) to have used a formula including the words, "I ate from the drum, I drank from the cymbal." So far as the form of the act is concerned, the similarity to the Christian Eucharist is here certainly not great; there was eating and drinking in both cases, but everything else, so far as can be seen, was different. In the mysteries of Mithras the similarity of form seems to have been greater; the initiates partook of bread and of a cup in a way which Justin Martyr regarded as a demoniac imitation of the Christian sacrament. According to Cumont, moreover, the Mithraic practice was clearly sacramental; the initiates expected from their sacred
^Tertullian, de bapt. 5 (ed. ReiflFerscheid et Wissowa, 1890), it must be admitted, connects baptism in heathen religion with regeneration, and mentions the part which sacramental washings had in the mysteries of Isis and of Mithras, and in Eleusinian rites. Despite the post-Pauline date of this testimony, the passage is certainly interesting. Compare Kennedy, op. cit., p. 239.
banquet a supernatural efFect.^ But it will be remembered that considerations of date render an influence of Mithras upon Paul exceedingly improbable. And the significance of the eating and drinking in connection with other mysteries is obscure. Apparently these acts did not form a part of the mysteries proper, but were only a preparation for them.
In a very savage form of religion there appears the notion that men could partake of the divine nature by actually eating the god. For example, in the worship of Dionysus, the worshipers in the height of religious frenzy tore in pieces the sacred bull and devoured the raw flesh. Here the bull apparently represented the god himself. This savage practice stands in external parallel with certain passages in the New Testament, not only with the references in John vi to the eating of the flesh and drinking of the h-ood of Christ, but also (though less clearly) with the Pauline teaching about the Lord's Supper. In 1 Cor. x. 16 Paul speaks of the "cup of blessing" as being communion of the blood of Christ, and of the bread as being communion of the body of Christ. Have we not here a sublimated form of the pagan notion of eating the god? The supposition might seem to be strengthened by the parallel which Paxil draws a few verses further on between the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons, and between the table of the Lord and the table of demons (verse 21),, the demons, it is said, being regarded by Paxil as identical with the heathen gods.
But the trouble is that the savage notion of eating the god does not seem to have survived in the Hellenistic mystery religions. At this point, therefore, the student of comparative religion is faced with a difiiculty exactly opposite to that which appears in most of the parallels which have been set up between the teaching of Paul and pagan religion. In most cases the difficulty is that the pagan parallels are too late; here, on the contrary, they are too early. If Paul is dependent upon the pagan notion of eating the god, he must have deserted the religious practice which prevailed in his own day in order to have recourse to a savage custom which had long since been abandoned. The suggestion does not seem to be very natural. It is generally admitted that even where Christianity is dependent upon Hellenistic religion it represents a spiritualizing modification of the pagan practice. But at this point it would have to be supposed that the Christian modification proceeded in exactly the opposite direction; far from marking a greater spiritualization of pagan practice, it meant a return to a savage stage of religion which even paganism had abandoned.
Efforts are sometimes made to overcome this objection. "We observe in the history of religion," says HeitmiiUer, "that tendencies connected with low stages of religious development, which in the higher stages were quiescent or extinct, suddenly spring up again — of course in a modified form adapted to the changed circumstances." ^ Such general observations, even if they are based upon fact, will hardly serve to render the present hypothesis any more plausible. Dependence of the Pauline teaching about the Lord's Supper upon the savage notion of eating the god, when even paganism had come to abandon that notion, will always seem very unnatural.
Certainly the hypothesis is not supported by the parallel which Paul draws in 1 Cor. x. 21 between the table of the Lord and the table of demons. Paul does not say that the heathen had fellowship with their gods by partaking of them in a meal; the fellowship with those gods (verse 20) could be conceived of in other ways. For example, the cult god may have been conceived of in the sacrificial meals as the host at a feast. In point of fact, such an idea was no doubt widely prevalent. It is attributed to the Phrygian mysteries, for example, by Hepding, who supposes that the eating from the drum and drinking from the cymbal meant the entrance of the initiate into the circle formed by the table-companions of the god.^ At any rate, the savage notion of eating the god is not clearly attested for the Hellenistic period, and certainly dependence of Paul upon such a notion is unlikely in the extreme.
No close parallel, then, can be established between the Christian sacraments and the practices of the pagan cults. But the very fact that the Pauline churches had sacraments at all — ^irrespective of the form of the particular sacraments — may conceivably be made a ground for connecting Paulinism with the Hellenistic religions. The argument depends upon one particular view of the Pauline sacraments; it depends upon the view that baptism and the Lord's Supper were conceived of as conveying blessing not in virtue of the disposition of soul with which they were administered or received but in virtue of the sacramental acts themselves. In other words (to use traditional language), the argument depends upon the view that the PauHne sacraments conveyed their blessing not ex opere operantis but ex opere operato. In the Pauline churches, it is argued, the beginning of the new life and the communion with the cult god were connected with certain ceremonial acts. So it was also in the mystery religions. Therefore Paulinism is to be understood in connection with the mysteries.
But the interpretation of the Pauline Epistles upon which this hypothesis is based is fraught with serious difficulty. Did Paul really conceive of the sacraments as conveying their blessing ex opere operato? The general character of the Epistles certainly points in an opposite direction. An unprejudiced reader of the Epistles as a whole certainly receives the impression that the writer laid extraordinarily little stress upon forms and ceremonies. Salvation according to Paul was dependent solely upon faith, the simple acceptance of the offer contained in the message of the Cross. Any connection of such a religion with external forms seems even to be excluded expressly by the Epistle to the Galatians. A dispensation of forms and ceremonies, according to that Epistle, belongs to the period of childish bondage from which Christ has set men free.
Yet such a writer, it is maintained, actually taught that the mere act of baptism conveyed the blessing of a new life and the mere partaking of food and drink conveyed the blessing of communion with the risen Christ. The supposition seems at first sight to be preposterous. If it is to be established, it can only be on the basis of the clearest kind of evidence.
The evidence, it should be noted at the start, is at any rate decidedly limited in extent. It is only in the First Epistle to the Corinthians that Paul mentions the Lord's Supper at all, and it is only in Rom. vi and Col. ii. 12 that baptism is connected with the death and resurrection which the believer is said to have shared with Christ. The limited extent of the evidence may in itself be significant. If Paul held the high sacramentarian view of baptism and the Lord's Supper, it seems a little strange that he should have laid so little stress upon the sacraments. High sacramentarians of all ages have preserved a very different proportion. It seems still more strange, perhaps, that Paul should have said that Christ sent him not to baptize but to preach the gospel (1 Cor. i. 17). On the ex opere operato view of baptism, baptism was the highest possible function. Could an apostle who held that view have attributed relatively so little importance to it? In order to appreciate how much less importance is attributed in the Epistles to baptism and the Lord's Supper than to certain other elements in Paul's teaching, it is only necessary to compare the references to the sacraments with the references to faith. The fact is perfectly plain. When Paul speaks, in the large, about the way of salvation, it never seems to occur to him to mention the sacraments; what he does think of is the message of the gospel and the simple acceptance of it through faith.
These facts are sometimes admitted even by those who attribute a high sacramentarian view of the sacraments to Paul; Paulinism when taken as a whole, it is admitted, is certainly not a sacramentarian religion. What has happened, then, it is supposed, is that Paul has retained in the doctrine of the sacraments an element derived from a lower type of religion, an unassimilated remnant of the type of religion which is represented by the mystery cults. Thus the Pauline doctrine of the sacraments is thought to introduce a glaring contradiction into the thought and life of Paul.
Can such a glaring contradiction be attributed to Paul.'' It could probably be attributed to Hermes Trismegistus. But can it be attributed to Paul? The writer of the Pauline Epistles was no mere compiler, receiving unassimilated materials from many sources. He was a person of highly marked characteristics. And he was a person of commanding intellect. Could such a writer have introduced a glaring contradiction into the very center of his teaching? Could a writer who in the great mass of his writing is triumphantly and even polemically anti-sacramentarian have maintained all along a crassly sacramentarian view of the way in which religious blessing was to be obtained?
An affirmative answer to these questions could be rendered only on the basis of positive evidence of the most unequivocal kind. And such positive evidence is not forthcoming. The most that can by any possibility be said for the strictly sacramentarian interpretation of Rom. vi is that it is possible. It might conceivably be adopted if Rom. vi stood alone. But as a matter of fact Rom. vi does not stand alone; it stands in the midst of a considerable body of Pauline Epistles. And it must be interpreted in the light of what Paul says elsewhere. If Rom. vi stood absolutely alone, Paul might conceivably be thought to mean that the act of baptism in itself involves a dying with Christ and a rising with Him to a new life. But the whole character of the Pauline Epistles absolutely precludes such an interpretation. And another interpretation does full justice to the words as they stand. That interpretation is the obvious one which makes the act of baptism an outward sign of an inner experience. "We were buried with him," says Paul, "through baptism unto death." These words are pressed by the modern school of comparative religion very much as Luther at the Marburg Conference pressed the Latin words of institution of the Lord's Supper. Luther wrote on the table, "This is my body" ("hoc est corpus meum"), and would not hear of anything but the most literal interpretation of the words. So the modem school of comparative religion presses the words "through baptism" in Rom. vi. 4!. "We were buried with him through baptism," says Paul. Therefore, it is said, since it was through baptism, it was not through faith, or through any inner disposition of the soul; therefore the sacramentarian interpretation is correct. But if Luther's overliteralness, fraught with such disastrous consequences for the Church, is deserted by most advocates of the grammatico-historical method of exegesis, should an equally bald literalness be insisted upon in connection with Rom. vi. 4!?
Interpreted in connection with the whole trend of the Epistles, the sixth chapter of Romans contains an appeal to the outward sign of an inner experience. It is perfectly natural that Paul should here appeal to the outward sign rather than to the inner experience. Paul desires to strengthen in his readers the conviction that the life which they are leading as Christians is a new life in which sin can have no place. Unquestionably he might have appealed to the faith which had been the means by which the new life had been begun. But faith is not something that can be seen. Baptism, on the other hand, was a plain and obvious fact. To use a modern term, it "visual- ized" faith. And it is just the visualizing of faith that Paul here desires. When the Roman Christians were baptized, they were convinced that the act meant a dying with Christ and a rising with Him; it meant the beginning of their Christian life. It was a solemn and a definite act. It was something that could be seen as well as felt. Conceivably, indeed, the act in itself might have been unaccompanied by faith. But in the early Church such cases were no doubt extremely rare. They could therefore be left out of account by Paul. Paul assumes — and no doubt he is correct — that, whatever might conceivably have been the case, as a matter of fact when any one of the Roman Christians was baptized he died and rose again with Christ. But Paul does not say that the dying and rising again was produced by the external act otherwise than as that act was an expression of faith. Here, however, it is to the external act that he appeals, because it is the external act which can be seen and can be realized. It can only be because the newness of the Christian life is not realized that Christians can think of it as permitting a continuance in sin. What enables it to be realized is that which can actually be seen, namely, the external and obvious fact of baptism. In other words, baptism is here made to discharge in typical fashion its divinely appointed function as an external sign of an inner experience, and an external sign which is made the vehicle of special blessing.
A similar interpretation may be applied to all the references to the sacraments which occur in the Pauline Epistles. What sometimes produces the impression of an ex opere operato conception of the sacraments is that Paul does not take into account the possibility that the sacraments might be unaccompanied by faith. So in Gal. iii. 27 he says, "All ye who were baptized into Christ did put on Christ." These words if taken alone might mean that every man, whatever the condition of his soul, who went through the external form of baptism had put on Christ. But of course as a matter of fact Paul means nothing of the kind. What he does mean is that the baptism of the Galatians, since that baptism was accompanied by faith (Gal. iii. 2), meant in that concrete case the putting on of Christ. Here again there is an appeal, in the presence of those who were in danger of forgetting spiritual facts, -to the external sign which no one could forget.
This interpretation cannot be invalidated by the passages which have been appealed to as supporting a crassly ex opere operato conception of the sacraments. In 1 Cor. xi. 30, for example, Paul says that because of an unworthy partaking of the Lord's Supper many of the Corinthians were ill and many had died. But these words need not necessarily mean that the bread and wine, because of a dangerous magical virtue that was in them, had inflicted harm upon those who had not used them aright. They may mean at least equally well that the physical ills of the Corinthians were a chastisement which had been inflicted by God. As for 1 Cor. xv. 29 (baptism in behalf of the dead), it can be said at least that that verse is isolated and exceedingly obscure, and that it is bad historical method to allow what is obscure to color the interpretation of what is plain. Many interpretations of the verse have been proposed. And it is by no means clear that Paul lent his own support to the custom to which reference is here made.
Thus it cannot be maintained that Paulinism was like the pagan mysteries even in the general sense that both Paulinism and the mysteries connected salvation with external acts. The acts themselves were different; and the meaning of the acts was still more diverse. An element of truth does indeed underlie the sacramentarian interpretation of Paul. The element of truth consists in the protest which is here raised against the interpretation which has sometimes been favored by "liberal" scholars. According to this liberal interpretation, when Paul speaks of dying and rising with Christ he is referring to a purely ethical fact; when he says that he has died to the Law, he means that he has made a radical break with an external, legalistic type of religion; when he says that it is no longer he that lives but Christ that lives in him, he means that he has made Christ his supreme guide and example; when he says that through the Cross of Christ he has been crucified to the world, he means that the Cross has led him to renounce all worldliness of purpose. Such interpretation is exceedingly common. But it is radically false. It is false because it does away with the supernaturalism of Paul's teaching. There could be no greater mistake than that of making salvation according to Paul an affair of the human will. On the contrary, the very essence of Pauhne teaching is supemat- uralism. Salvation, according to Paul, is based upon a supernatural act of God — the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And equally supernatural is the application of salvation to the individual. The new creation which stands at the beginning of the Christian life is according to Paul just as little a product of natural forces, and just as little a product of the human will, as the first creation was. The modern school of comparative religion is entirely correct in insisting upon the thoroughgoing supernaturalism of the Pauline gospel. Paulinism is a redemptive religion in the most thoroughgoing sense of the word; it finds salvation, not in a decision of the human will, but in an act of God.
But the error comes in confusing supernaturalism with sacramentalism. Paul's conception of salvation is supernatural, but it is not external. It is indeed just as supernatural as if it were external. The beginning of a man's Christian life, according to Paul, is just as little a product of his own moral forces, just as little a product of any mere moral influence brought to bear upon him, as it would be if it were produced by the water into which he was dipped or the bread and wine of which he partakes. Conceivably God might have chosen to use such means. If He had done so. His action would have been not one whit more supernatural than it actually is. But as a matter of fact, He has chosen, in His mysterious wisdom, to use the means of faith. Such is the teaching of Paul. It is highly distasteful to the modern liberal Church. But even if it is to be rejected it should at least be recognized as Pauline.
Thus the interpretation of the sacraments which is proposed by the modern school of comparative religion — and indeed the whole modern radical treatment of Paulinism as a thoroughgoing religion of redemption — marks a reaction against the modernizing exegesis which was practised by the liberal school. But the reaction has at any rate gone too far. It cannot be said that the newer exegesis is any more objective than the liberal exegesis which it endeavors to replace. The liberal scholars were concerned to keep Paul as near as possible to their modern naturalistic principles, in order to continue to use him for the edificatipn of the Church; the radical scholars of the school of comparative religion are concerned to keep him as far away as possible from modem naturalistic principles in order to bring him into connection with the crass externalism of the mystery religions. Neither group has attained the whole truth. The Pauline conception of salvation is just as spiritual as it is thought to be by the liberal scholars; but on the other hand, it is just as supernatural as it is represented as being by Reitzenstein and Bousset.