jewish and christian ethics

Irish Church Quarterly

Jewish and Christian EthicsAuthor(s): John Mullins AldridgeSource: The Irish Church Quarterly, Vol. 7, No. 26 (Apr., 1914), pp. 139-147Published by: Irish Church QuarterlyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/30067478 .

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JEWISH AND CHRISTIAN ETHICS.

ON reading the Gospels we are not surprised that the listeners to our Lord's teaching were struck by its regal tone. He spoke as King of the moral world. His

promises imply an ownership of celestial wealth, and a

royal control over all the forces of the spiritual life. His hearers declared that " He spoke with authority, and not as the scribes;" and we may add, not as the ancient lawgivers and prophets. " Ye have heard that it hath been said," "but I say unto you." In thus speaking, however, our Lord claims for the human mind in every age freedom of expression and

thought; the right to criticize the utterances and institu- tions of the past. We may move to a higher plane if we can. WVe may gain a wider outlook. Ve are not tied down to the letter. It is in no spirit of irreverence to Divine enactments that we depreciate Judaism in comparison with Christianity. And for further light surely we may rely on the fulfilment of our Lord's promise respecting the gift of the Holy Spirit, " He will guide you into all the truth, for he will take of mine and will declare it to you."

A preliminary observation must be made here. In

enumerating any features of difference between Jewish and Christian Ethics, we must regard the difference as one not so much of antagonism as of development. There is a moral and spiritual evolution plainly trace- able, that is, if we understand by evolution what we ought, a superintended, guided evolution, into which Jesus Christ came as a tangential impulse, as it were, superlkuman (from outside, and to that extent abnormal), but mingling with, and co-operating with, the pre- existent forces of development. His fife, His words,



140 JEWISH AND CHRISTIAN ETHICS.

His spirit, became henceforth part of the world's order and equipment.

No doubt when we compare Jewish with Christian Ethics, our thoughts turn immediately to the ten commandments on the one hand, and to the Sermon on the Mount on the other. But we must not overlook the longer codes which followed the Decalogue, nor the strains of Psalmists and Prophets, with their broadening light of revelation, and growing insight into the duty of man towards God and his neighbour. Nor ought we to omit from our purview of Christian Ethics the other discourses and the parables of our Lord, as well as the teaching of the New Testament Epistles. All around great peaks lie, many a hill and valley leading by gentle undulations to the loftiest height which the mind can climb. The progress of development is, however, often best noted by comparing two different stages, that stand out clearly as landmarks of progress.

We proceed then to our specific subject; and though it is of course impossible to cover the whole ground, we will consider four essential differences between Jewish and Christian Ethics. They are all connected with the idea emphasized by our Lord, in His words, " Except your righteousness shall exceed that of the Scribes and Pharisees ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven." Christian Ethics oversteps, out- stretches, surpasses, Jewish Ethics in respect of its form, its content, its ideal, and its motive power. It boasts a freer form, a fuller content, a loftier ideal, a stronger motive power.

I. The very form in which our Lord clothes His commands exhibits a striking advance on the form of the Decalogue. " Thou shalt not" is virtually super- seded by " thou shalt." Positive precepts take the place of prohibitions. This is the Ethics of the adult man as distinguished from the child. The negative teaching of morals is suited to the imperfect intelligence of the child.



JEWISH AND CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 141-

vWe are satisfied if he does not break down certain barriers. A humorous illustration of this was given in a popular illustrated paper; the mother was represented as saying to the maid, " Go down stairs and see what the child is doing, and tell him he musn't "! The grown man has more expected of him; positive duties to discharge; certain positions to fill. Our Lord alters the sixth commandment from the merely negative " thou shalt not," first into the larger command " thou shalt not even be angry with thy brother," and then into the positive " be reconciled with him." So the seventh commandment, against adultery, is transformed first into a rebuke even of lustful desire, " Whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath already com- mitted adultery with her in his heart," and then into the injunction to cut off and cast away any cause of stumbling, " if thine eye, even the right eye, ensnare thee, tear it out and away with it." Mere abstention from the crime is not sufficient, Christ actually enjoins the extreme of loss in preference to the presence of evil.

It is significant to note that the one commandment of the Decalogue, the fifth, which is couched in positive form, " Honour thy father and thy mother," is the one commandment to which a promise is attached, "that thy days may be long in the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee." Promises are naturally connected with the actual performance of an obligation rather than with the non-violation of a limit. And hence the great promise of the New Testament Ethics-which is not " happiness " but " blessedness "-is placed by our Lord in the forefront of the Sermon, as assured to those who keep the precepts of the kingdom of God. " Blessed are the poor in spirit." " Blessed are they who hunger and thirst after righteousness." " Blessed are the pure in heart." " Blessed are the peacemakers."

You put around the child confines beyond which he must not stray. You send the man out into the world with busy hands and feet and eyes to obey everywhere

D




the law, " Replenish and subdue." He is not simply to avoid certain unlawful acts, but to do the will of God. It is evident then what a poor conception of Christian Ethics those entertain who imagine that its requirements are satisfied by merely refraining from certain gross vices and wrongs. Many a man feels quite satisfied with himself if he has not transgressed certain recognized boundaries; he fails to ask how far he has been mindful of the positive precepts, to help and bless and save his fellowmen. Negative virtue is of the scantiest, it yields no comely fruits of righteousness. Abstinence Societies are very well in their way. But they are only a starting point and not a goal.

II. Our second point is, Christianity has a richer and fuller content. It lays emphasis on the internal rather than the external. It substitutes spiritual for legal obedience. It adopts principles rather than rules of conduct. With incisive force Christ makes it clear that God looks upon the heart, the thought, the secret motions of the soul; and that the sin of intention passes with Him for no less than the overt act. It is true that we speak of our Lord's injunction, " Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye also the same to them," as " the Golden Rule "; but in strictness of meaning it is not a rule of conduct. It does not tell us what men wish, nor wherein lies ihe real good; nor does it mean that what we want for ourselves we should strive to give to others. As one has said, " Because I am fond of classical music it does not follow that I should thrust as much of it as possible upon my neighbours " i The Rule is rather a moral principle, it does not issue specific commands, but it supplies a standpoint of view and method of analysing a given situation. Christian Ethics belongs to the stage when men pass from simple tribal rules to reflection upon those rules; when the law written on tables of stone becomes the new covenant written on the tablets of the heart; when the man becomes a law unto himself; and his " predominant universe" (to use



JEWISH AND CHRISTIAN ETHICS. 143

Mackenzie's phrase) is that of a desire to take up his cross and follow Christ, in trying to ascertain the mind and do the will of God.,

External, legal codes must be limited in extent; whereas principles of action range through the whole gamut of human experience. The Righteousness which Christ demanded exceeds the righteousness of scribes and Pharisees, since no law-book nor Talmud can cover the entire ground of life. Striking are the words in which Christ asserted that He came " not to destroy the law but to fulfil it "; to perfect it, to fill it out till its requirements, numerous as they seemed before, are naught compared with the new obligations which the thin membrane of Objective Law is powerless to confine. The old skin bursts, and it is seen that all those outward requirements are belittled by the stringency and fulness of Spiritual Law. The lawyer who questioned Christ was able to sum up the six commandments we are con- sidering in the terse formula, " thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself"; but he seemed to shrink appalled from the revelation of the far-reaching con- sequences of his answer; for seeking to " justify himself " he enquired, " Who then is my neighbour "? shifting the onus of obligation on to the shoulder of a mental difficulty. The parable of the Good Samaritan, spoken in reply, illustrated the point we have been press- ing. Christian Ethics makes every man a possible neighbour; there is no such thing as jotting down a certain number of precepts, and being satisfied with this circumscribed obedience. The Jews allowed the letter of the Bible to over-ride its spirit. Our Lord constantly and steadfastly set His face against worshipping the letter of the Bible. " It was said," " but I say unto you." He thought that it was wrong for a more advanced age to be content with a literal interpretation of precepts, which were given and meant for their ruder forefathers. He came not to break with the past, or in any way to abrogate the Law or the Prophets, but to




give them their completion, to reform, invigorate, and re-interpret old truths, and adapt them to a more developed environment. He lopped off the dead branches of the tree, and grafted on new and living wood. He would not allow the Jewish teaching of the old truths to be an absolute finality. The preparatory dispensation of the " Law and the Prophets were until John, since that time the Kingdom of God is preached."

III. Christian Ethics presents us with a nobler, loftier ideal. It lays stress on character rather than on conduct. If the fountain be pure and sweet, so will be the issues therefrom. One cannot read our Lord's utterances without observing how He traces acts to their motives; how He requires sincerity, reality, uprightness, love, as the springs of action, without which there is no pro- perly ethical behaviour. Where the men of old stopped short with the letter, Christ unfolds the inward principle to be the higher ideal, as the true aim of the commandments. "Thou shalt not kill," prohibits for the Christian anger, scorn, contempt. " Thou shalt not commit adultery " demands chastity of heart as well as of outward act. The law that forbids " false swearing," requires perfect simplicity and truthfulness. " Let your language be Yea, yea, or Nay, nay." Our Lord thus inculcated that it is not only the formal enactments that are sacred and binding, but the grand principles which lie behind them, viz., their inward spirit and purpose. As hinted before, we would not imply that there are no germs of this conviction to be met with in the Old Testament. On the contrary, we find passages like " Man looketh on the outward appearance, but God regardeth the heart;" " Bring no more vain oblations;" " Love right and seek justice." These were rays of light that fell on the consciousness of seer and prophet, and heralded the dawn of perfect day. And it is remarkable that the last of the ten Commandments should contain the most ethical injunction of the entire series. " Thou shalt not covet." For here appears the touchstone of




the inner life; the command probes to the very centre of man's being. But it was left for Christianity to focus attention on this vital matter.

And so the great Teacher lifted the whole question of Ethics to a higher plane, when He set before men the ideal of resemblance to their Father in Heaven. " Be ye therefore perfect even as your Father who is in heaven is perfect "-human will and human character corresponding to the will and purpose of God.

Here then we have come to the fullest enlargement possible of the ethical standard both in breadth and height. There is one sense in which Ethics can never be complete. Life increases in complexity. Modern civilization brings in its train new problems of conduct. And it is the business of Ethics to deal with them, and to give guidance as to the right behaviour which new situations require.

New occasions teach new duties; Time makes ancient good uncouth;

They must upward still and onward, Who would keep abreast of Truth.

But we can never outgrow the Pattern set before us on the New Testament " Mount, " that we should think, act, and live as the children of our Father in Heaven, mem- bers of that " Kingdom of God " which the Church was designed to represent and establish on earth. The idea of a righteous, blameless Jew is replaced by the ideal of a saved man, like unto the Son of iMian, his elder brother; and the narrow confines of a nation are widened to take in the " whole family of God," every " father- hood " in heaven and earth.

This leads to the concluding distinction :- IV. Christian Ethics surpasses Jewish, in that it

supplies a stronger Motive-power for the realization of its behests. The crux of ethical systems is their treat- ment of the insistent question, " What necessity lies upon me to conform to the ideal propounded ?" or, in other words, " Why must I do right"? and of the




question which follows, " How am I to do right" ? "How can I attain to this model you set before me "? It is the glory of Christian Ethics that the same answer suffices for both inquiries. The Pattern is also the Power. The good had been known as a requirement; with the advent of Christ came the possibility of good- ness. It is no mere dead statue before which we stand, wondering at its cold marble beauty; it is a living Person, warming our hearts by His Presence, breathing into us His own Spirit, evoking, challenging, compelling us to loving obedience. This is the motive-power, the " love of God " manifested and realized in Jesus Christ, necessarily begetting love for love, and as a consequence love to our fellow-men. Love is the fulfilment of the Law.

Duty, that " stern daughter of the voice of God," breaks into a smile and comes with the garlands of joy to greet us, when enunciated by the lips of Him who is " all one could wish." A sense of duty may leave us cool and collected. Love rises into enthusiasm. Duty examines each article of the bond, lest there should be any excess of demand. Love delights in all extra occasions of service. Duty moves with measured step. Love runs to execute the wishes of the loved one. Duty is the reverence paid by a subject to his king. Love is the service of a son to his father, and this service is perfect freedom. So complete, so radical is the change from Judaistic to Christian Ethicization that our Lord termed it a " new birth," and St. Paul described it as a " new creation." The Jew was conscious, sublimely conscious of obligation; he said and felt with regard to the Law, " I ought." The Christian adds, " I can " and " I will." " I can do all things through Christ who strengtheneth me."

We may not be sure that Christians ought to be Socialists, if it means adopting all the economic tenets and theories of present-day Socialism. But we may be sure that all Socialists should be Christians, if they wish




their conception of the equality and brotherhood of men to be more than an academic thought. Socialism could be practicable only if Christian Ethics everywhere pre- vailed. Thoreau, in his Walden, tells of a horseman who, asking a boy if there was firm footing through a swamp, and receiving the answer "Yes," was disgusted to find himself and his steed sinking in the morass. " I thought you said there was a firm bottom," he called out to the boy. " So there is," was the reply, " but you haven't got down to it yet." And so with respect to so many of the plans for manifesting the brotherhood of man. We must go down deeper, and find the founda- tion laid in the Gospel of the grace of God. " Ye are all the children of God through faith in Jesus Christ." Thus only does the inward law become the law of love, and the ethical development is complete. Sweet then is the inner constraint of doing the will of God from the heart, as we say with the great Apostle, " the love of Christ constraineth us." About the ordinary men and women with whom we come daily in contact, there may seem little to respect and admire; little that should make us deem them worthy of any self- sacrifice on our part. But let the light of Christ's teaching and of the Cross shine on them, see them i.radiated with the love of God, worth to Him the inestimable gift of His only-begotten Son, and we discover mysteries, heights and depths of possibility, that evoke the cry, " I will love my neighbour not as myself, but as ' God in Christ' has thought fit to love him."

J. M. ALDRIDGE.



jewish and christian ethics

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