Chapter I: The Life of Jesus

§ 13. JESUS CHRIST, THE SAVIOUR OF THE WORLD.

“But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons” (Gal. iv. 4, 5). In accordance with prophetic announcements, He was born in Bethlehem as the Son of David, and, after John the Baptist, the last of the prophets of the Old Covenant, had prepared His way by the preaching of repentance and the baptism of repentance, He began in the thirtieth year of His age His fulfilment by life and teaching of the law and the prophets. With twelve chosen disciples He travelled up and down through the land of the Jews, preaching the kingdom of God, helping and healing, and by miracles and signs confirming His divine mission and doctrine. The Pharisees contradicted and persecuted Him, the Sadducees disregarded Him, and the people vacillated between acclamations and execrations. After three years’ activity, amid the hosannas of the multitude, He made His royal entry into the city of His kingly ancestors. But the same crowd, disappointed in their political and carnal Messianic expectations, a few days later raised the cry: Crucify Him, crucify Him! Thus then He suffered according to the gracious good pleasure of the Father the death of the cross for the sins of the world. The Prince of life, however, could not be holden of death. He burst the gates of Hades, as well as the barriers of the grave, and rose again the third day. For forty days He lingered here below, promised His disciples the gift of His Holy Spirit, and commissioned them to preach the gospel to all nations. Then upon His ascension He assumed the divine form of which He had emptied Himself during His incarnation, and sits now at the right hand of power as the Head of His church and the Lord of all that is named in heaven and on earth, until visibly and in glory, according to the promise, He returns again at the restitution of all things.

§ 13.1. In regard to the =year of the birth= and the =year of the
death= of the Redeemer no absolutely certain result can now be
attained. The usual Christian chronology constructed by Dionysius
Exiguus in the sixth century, first employed by the Venerable
Bede, and brought into official use by Charlemagne, assumes the
year 754 A.U.C. as the date of Christ’s birth, which is evidently
wrong, since, in A.D. 750 or 751, Herod the Great was already
dead. Zumpt takes the seventh, others the third, fourth, or fifth
year before our era. The length of Christ’s public ministry was
fixed by many Church Fathers, in accordance with Isaiah lxi. 1, 2,
and Luke iv. 19, at one year, and it was consequently assumed
that Christ was crucified when thirty years of age (Luke iii. 21).
The synoptists indeed speak only of one passover, the last,
during Christ’s ministry; but John (ii. 13; vi. 4; xii. 1) speaks
of three, and also besides (v. 1) of a ἑορτὴ τῶν Ἰουδαίων.

§ 13.2. Among the non-biblical =witnesses to Christ= the earliest
is probably a Syrian Epistle of =Mara= to his son Serapion,
written, according to Cureton (“_Spicileg. Syriacum_.” Lond.,
1855), about A.D. 73. The father, highly cultured in Greek wisdom
but dissatisfied with it, writes from exile words of comfort
and exhortation to his son, in which he places Christ alongside
of Socrates and Pythagoras, and honours him as the wise King,
by whose death the Jews had brought upon themselves the swift
overthrow of their kingdom, who would, however, although slain,
live for ever in the new land which He has given. To this period
also belongs the witness of the Jewish historian =Josephus=,
which in its probably genuine portions praises Jesus as a worker
of miracles and teacher of wisdom, and testifies to His death on
the cross under Pilate, as well as the founding of the church in
His name. Distinctly and wholly spurious is the =Correspondence
of Christ with Abgar=, Prince of Edessa, who entreats Christ
to come to Edessa to heal him and is comforted of the Lord by
the sending of one of His disciples after His ascension. This
document was first communicated by Eusebius (_Hist. Eccl._, i. 13)
from the Archives of Edessa in a literal translation from the
Syriac, and is also to be found in the Syrian book _Doctrina
Addæi_ (§ 32, 6). Of a similar kind are the apocryphal =Acta
Pilati=, as well the heathen form which has perished (§ 22, 7),
as the Christian form which is still extant (§ 32, 4). An
=Epistle of Lentulus,= pretending to be from a Roman resident
in Palestine on terms of intimacy with Pilate, containing a
description of the appearance of Christ, is quoted, and even then
as a forgery, by Laurentius Valla in his writing on the _Donation
of Constantine_. Since in many particulars it agrees with the
description of the person of Christ given in the Church History
by Nicephorus Callisti (§ 5, 1), in accordance with the type then
prevailing among Byzantine painters, it may fairly be regarded
as an apocryphal Latin retouching of that description originating
in the fifteenth century. At Edessa a picture of Christ was known
to exist in the fourth century (according to the _Doctr. Addæi_),
which must have been brought thither by the messengers of Abgar,
who had picked it up in Jerusalem. During the fourth century
mention is made of a statue of Christ, first of all by Eusebius,
who himself had seen it. This was said to have been set up in
Paneas by the woman cured of the issue of blood (Matt. ix. 20).
It represents a woman entreating help, kneeling before the lofty
figure of a man who stretches out his hand to her, while at his
feet a healing herb springs up. In all probability, however,
it was simply a votive figure dedicated to the god of healing,
Æsculapius. The legend that has been current since the fifth
century of the sweat-marked handkerchief of =Veronica=--this name
being derived either from _vera icon_, the true likeness, or from
Bernice or Beronice, the name given in apocryphal legends to the
woman with the issue of blood,--on which the face of the Redeemer
which had been wiped by it was imprinted, probably arose through
the transferring to other incidents the legendary story of Edessa.
On the occurrence of similar transferences see § 57, 5.