but a deliverance of the physical and social life from narrowing restrictions. That principle opened a pathway of far-reaching consequence for the progress of human culture.

But why, then, was it that Jesus could, with such clear assurance, use that idea-that the heart is the sole criterion of righteousness—for condemning and abrogating those prescribed purifications? And why, on the other hand, did not the fact that these prescriptions were sanctioned by the revelation of the law, rather lead Him somewhat to doubt, and to restrict the significance of the inner nature as the sole standard of judging in regard to righteousness? Our answer must be, Because of the purity of His view of the ethical nature of God. Jesus knew from His own personal experience that the highest and surest revelation of God consists in a knowledge of the fatherly character of God; and He regarded the Divine holiness and perfection as depending upon the supremacy and perfection of the Father's goodwill. Therefore it was inconceivable to Him that God would make His fellowship with men dependent upon any kind of merely external physical conditions. Neither could He imagine that the Divine commands would have any other object than men's assimilation with the moral and spiritual character of God.

6. Is it then only by us that this inner relation is established between Jesus' conception of God and His doctrine of righteousness as founded on the state of the heart, and was Jesus Himself aware of this relation? Even had no positive assertion that Jesus was aware of this been handed down to us, we should have to take

the fact for granted; for His clear exposition of the consequences resulting from His conception of Godnot as to this one point only, but all through His teaching-cannot be attributed to His having only accidentally hit upon the truth, since His whole line of thought exhibits an organic unity of clearly conceived truth. It is not expressly declared in the Logia and the Gospel of Mark, that Jesus was conscious of this necessary connection of thought. But we find a significant passage of the Johannine discourses which appropriately supplements the deliverances of the other main sources, so far as they have reference to this point. That principle of Jesus in regard to the founding of righteousness on the state of the heart does not elsewhere occur in the

Johannine discourses. And, indeed, as those discourses belong to the closing period of Jesus' ministry, they do not deal so much with His conflict with the Pharisees touching the nature of righteousness, as with His conflict with the priests at Jerusalem in regard to His Messiahship. But in His conversation with the woman of Samaria at the well, Jesus has given a deliverance in regard to the right mode of worship to be observed in the Messianic time, wherein He has clearly expressed the reciprocal relation existing between spiritual worship and God's spiritual nature: "The hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth for the Father seeketh such to worship Him. God is spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth" (iv. 23 f.).

According to the occasion which prompted it, this

utterance directly refers only to the honouring of God by worship. What makes such worship genuine (οἱ ἀληθινοὶ προσκυνηταί) and conformable to God's requirements, is not that it should take place in a definite spot and according to definite external forms, but that it should be practised in the minds of men. So far as it is expressed by external words and acts, it must be done in truth, i.e. it must be a genuine product of the inner being. Indirectly, however, this utterance refers to piety of conduct in general, such as the Father would accept as true veneration from men. Since God is spirit, and has nothing limited or material in His nature, and since He stands related to those who worship Him as a Father who seeks that His children should possess the same nature as He Himself has, therefore He claims from them a truly spiritual reverence, and can attribute no value for that end to any merely external conditions, places, and acts.

B.-The Righteous Conduct required towards God.

7. When Jesus was asked by one of the scribes which was the first of all the commandments, He replied: "The first is this, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength. The second is, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is no other commandment greater than these (Mark xii. 28-31).

We do not enter now upon the question as to why

Jesus in that answer indicated not the first of the commandments only, but the first and second; nor as to the inner relation in which, according to His view, the commandment of love to our neighbour stands towards that of love to God. Here we shall only consider the first half of that answer. It shows that Jesus included in the idea of a righteousness acceptable to God something more than what is embraced by the due fulfilment of the Divine law of love to our fellow-men-something, namely, that has direct reference to God Himself. And this necessary inward attitude towards God He found comprehensively expressed in the phrase, love to God with the whole inner being, as it was taught in the Mosaic command, Deut. vi. 4 f.-that "Schma" which by the Jews was regarded as the most holy.

Certainly it is not accidental that Jesus is not wont to employ the idea of love to God in other parts of His teaching, where He had not special occasion, as in replying to that question of the scribe, to follow the Old Testament phraseology.' That idea of love to God certainly corresponds to the childlike relation. which, according to Jesus, should be cherished by men towards their heavenly Father. That idea emphatically indicates the moral inwardness of man's due attitude to the will of God, in contrast with mere external worship-a mere servile obedience or a mercenary legality. Yet, on the other hand, the conception is so general, that it does not adequately express that special kind of relation of men to God.

1 Cf. A. Ritschl, Doctrine of Justification and Reconciliation, 3rd German ed. ii. p. 99 f.

demanded by the knowledge of His full sovereignty over them, the greatness and gratuitousness of His fatherly love towards them, and the immensity of His power placed at the disposal of His love. So far as these latter qualities were involved in His conception of God, it was a matter of course that Jesus should enjoin upon men that disposition and peculiar relation to God which, according to its very idea, includes both the attitude of spirit towards God and the acknowledgment of His infinite love and power, and the humble yet happy assurance of His salvation-I mean Trust (TÍOTIS, πιστεύειν).

With Jesus the opposite of the idea of trust is not doing or knowing, but timidity and fear in regard to dangers and evils (Mark iv. 40; v. 36), and doubt as to the obtaining of good things (Mark xi. 23 f.). The object to which this trust-that is, the boldly confident and happy expectation of good things— refers, is not specially the forgiveness of sins, but more generally the grace of God or the glad tidings of the kingdom of God, which include the proclamation both of the love and of the blessings of God. Jesus requires of His hearers and disciples trust in general (Mark i. 15; xi. 22)-trust that God will set up His kingdom, and grant in it all grace to His people: "Fear not, little flock; it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom" (Luke xi 32). But He also requires trust that the Father will grant, to those who seek His kingdom, all the earthly blessings they need. In this sense He forbids disquieting care on His disciples' part as to

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