Chapter II: The Jesus of the Gospels (5)

[371] Stephen's so-called "martyrdom," whose feast falls on December 26th, the day after the birth of Christ, owes its existence to astrology, and rests on the constellation of Corona (Gr., Stephanos), which becomes visible at this time on the eastern horizon (Dupuis, op. cit., 267). Hence the well-known phrase "to inherit the martyr's crown." Even the theologian Baur has found it strange that the Jewish Sanhedrin, which could not carry into effect any death sentence without the assent of the Roman governor, should completely set aside this formality in the case of Stephen; and he has clearly shown how the whole account of Stephen's martyrdom is paralleled with Christ's death (Baur, "Paulus," 25 sqq.).

[372] Smith, op. cit., 23-31.

[373] Frazer, "Golden Bough," iii. 197.

[374] Smith, op. cit., 30 sq.

[375] As to the small value of Papias' statement, cf. Gfrörer, "Die heilige Sage," 1838, i. 3-23; also Lützelberger, "Die kirchl. Tradition über den Apostel Johannes," 76-93. The whole story, according to which Mark received the essential content of the Gospel named after him from Peter, is based on 1 Peter v. 13, and merely serves the purpose of increasing the historical value of the Gospel of Mark. "As the first Gospel was believed to be the work of the Apostle Matthew, and the second (Luke) the work of an assistant of Paul, it was very easy to ascribe to the third (Mark) at least a similar origin as the second, i.e., to trace it back in an analogous way to Peter; as it would have seemed natural for the chief of the apostles, longest dead, to have had his own Gospel, one dedicated to him, as well as Paul. The passage 1 Peter v. 13, "My son Mark saluteth you," gave a suitable opportunity for bestowing a name on the book," (Gfrörer, op. cit., 15; cf. also Brandt, "Die evangelische Geschichte u. d. Ursprung des Christentums," 1893, 535 sq.)

[376] Op. cit., 58.

[377] xv. 39.

[378] 60.

[379] Id.

[380] The proper explanation for this should lie in the fact that the Jesus-faith was set up as a sect-faith and not for "outsiders."

[381] 63 sqq.

[382] 68.

[383] 70.

[384] 3.

[385] It strikes the reader, who stands apart from the controversy, as comical to find the matter characterised in the theological works on the subject as "undoubtedly historical," "distinct historical fact," "true account of history," and so forth; and to consider that what holds for one as "historically certain" is set aside by another as "quite certainly unhistorical." Where is the famous "method" of which the "critical" theologians are so proud in opposition to the "laity," who allow themselves to form judgments as to the historical worth or worthlessness of the Gospels?

[386] Wrede, op. cit., 91.

[387] 104.

[388] 129.

[389] 131.

[390] 148.

[391] 148.

[392] Cf. Pfleiderer, "Entstehung des Christentums," 207, 213. All estimates as to the time at which the Gospels were produced rest entirely on suppositions, in which points of view quite different from that of purely historical interest generally predominate. Thus it has been the custom on the Catholic side to pronounce, not Mark or Luke, but Matthew, to be the oldest source. "Proofs" for this are also given--naturally, as it is indeed the "Church" Gospel: it contains the famous passage (xvi. 18, 19) about Peter's possession of the keys; how, then, should this not be the oldest? And lately Harnack ("Beiträge zur Einl. in das N.T.," iii., "Die Apostelgeschichte," 1908) has tried to prove that the Acts, with the Gospel of Luke, had been already produced in the early part of the year 60 A.D. But he does not dare to come to a real decision; and his reasons are opposed by just as weighty ones which are against that "possibility" suggested by him (op. cit., 219 sqq.). Such is, first, the fact that all the other early Christian writings which belong to the first century, as the Epistle of Barnabas and the Shepherd of Hermas, evidently know nothing of them. In the Epistle of Barnabas, written about 96 A.D., we read that Jesus chose as his own apostles, as men who were to proclaim his Gospel, "of all men the most evil, to show that he had come to call, not the righteous, but sinners, to repentance" (iv.). As to this Lützelberger very justly remarks, "That is more even than our Gospels say. For these are content to prove that Jesus did not come for the righteous by saying that he ate with publicans and was anointed by women of evil life; while in this Epistle even the Apostles must be most wicked sinners, so that grace may shine forth to them. This passage was quite certainly written neither by an Apostle nor by a pupil of an Apostle; and also it was not written after our Gospels, but at a time when the learned Masters of the Church had still a free hand to show their spirit and ingenuity in giving form to the evangelical story" ("Die hist. Tradition," 236 sq.). But also the so-called Epistle of Clement, which must have been written at about the same time, is completely silent as to the Gospels, while the "Doctrine of the Twelve Apostles," which perhaps also belongs to the end of the first century, cites Christ's words, such as stand in the Gospels, but not as sayings of Jesus. Moreover, according to Harnack, the "Doctrine of the Twelve Apostles" is the Christian elaboration of an early Jewish document; whence we may conclude that its Words of Christ have a similar origin in Jewish thought to that from which the Gospels obtained them. (Cf. Lützelberger, op. cit., 259-271.)

[393] 81.

[394] 71.

[395] 81 sq.

[396] Id.

[397] The laity has, as is well known, but a slight suspicion of this. So S. E. Verus' "Vergleichende Übersicht der vier Evangelien" (1897), with the commentary, is to be recommended.

[398] 83.

[399] 83.

[400] 85 sq.

[401] "Jesus u. d. neutestamentl. Schriftsteller," ii. 43. Let us take the final paragraph in E. Petersen's "Die wunderbare Geburt des Heilandes," which reaches the zenith in proving the mythical nature of the evangelical account of the Saviour's birth: "If, not because we wish it, but because we are forced to do so by the necessity of History, we remove the sentence, 'Conceived of the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary'--Jesus nevertheless remains the 'Son of God.' He remains such because he experienced God as his father, and because he stands at God's side for us. Also, in spite of our setting aside the miraculous birth as unhistorical, we are quite justified in declaring 'Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God.'" M. Brückner speaks similarly at the close of his otherwise excellent work. "Der sterbende und auferstehende Gottheiland." For the person to whom such phraseology is not--futile, there is no help.

[402] Cf. "Jesus Christus," a course of lectures delivered at the University of Freiburg i. B., 1908.

[403] Schäfer, "Die Evangelien und die Evangelienkritik," 1908, 123. The story of the Church's development in the first century is a story of shameless literary falsifications, of rough violence in matters of faith, of unlimited trial of the credence of the masses. So that for those who know history the iteration of the "credibility" of the Christian writers of the age raises at most but an ironical smile. Cf. Robertson, "History of Christianity," 1910.

[404] Cf. Hochart, "Études au sujet de la persécution des Chrétiens sous Néron," 1885, cp. 4.

[405] A. Kalthoff, "Das Christusproblem, Grundzüge zu einer Sozialtheologie," 1902, 14 sq.

[406] Kalthoff, "Die Entstehung des Christentums: Neue Beiträge zum Christusproblem," 1904, 8.

[407] If v. Soden ("Hat Jesus gelebt?" vii. 45) has proved wrong the comparison with the Tell-legend, and thinks I have "probably once more" forgotten that Schiller first transformed a very meagre legend, which was bound up in a single incident, from grey antiquity into a living picture, he can know neither Tschudi nor J. v. Müller. Cf. Hertslet, "Der Treppenwitz der Weltgeschichte," 6 Aufl., 1905, 216 sqq.

[408] The passage runs: "At this time lived Jesus, a wise man, if he may be called a man, for he accomplished miracles and was a teacher of men who joyously embrace the truth, and he found a great following among Jews and Greeks. This one was the Christ. Although at the accusation of the leading men of our people Pilate sentenced him to the cross, those who had first loved him remained still faithful. For he appeared again to them on the third day, risen again to a new life, as the prophets of God had foretold of him, with a thousand other prophecies. After him are called the Christians, whose sect has not come to an end."

[409] "Einl. ins N.T.," 1836, 581.

[410] "Gesch. d. jüd. Volkes," i. 548.

[411] Origen, though he collected all Josephus' assertions which could serve as support to the Christian religion, does not know the passage, but probably another, in which the destruction of Jerusalem was represented as a punishment for James' execution, which is certainly a forgery.

[412] Cf. Kalthoff, "Entstehung d. Chr.," 16 sq. As to the whole matter, Schürer, op. cit., 544-549.

[413] V. Soden proves the contrary in his work, "Hat Jesus gelebt?" (1910), "in order to show the reliability of Drew's assertions," from Clement's letter of 96 A.D., from Dionysius of Corinth (about 170) from Tertullion and Eusebius (early fourth century, not third, as v. Soden writes); and wishes to persuade his readers that the persecution under Nero is testified to. The authenticity of the letter of Clement is, however, quite uncertain, and has been most actively combated, from its first publication in 1633 till the present day, by investigators of repute, such as Semler, Baur, Schwegler, Volkmar, Keim, &c. But as for the above-cited authors, the unimportance of their assertions on the point is so strikingly exhibited by Hochart that we have no right to call them up as witnesses for the authenticity of the passage of Tacitus.

[414] Cf. Hochart, op. cit., 280 sqq.; H. Schiller, "Gesch. d. röm. Kaiserzeit," 447, note.

[415] "Consulting the archives has been but little customary among ancient historians; and Tacitus has bestowed but little consideration on the Acta Diurna and the protocols of the Senate" ("Handb. d. klass. Altertumsw.," viii., 2 Abt., Aft. 2, under "Tacitus"). Moreover, the difficulties of the passage from Tacitus have been fully realised by German historians (H. Schiller, op. cit., 449; "De. Gesch. d. röm. Kaiserreiches unter der Regierung des Nero," 1872, 434 sqq., 583 sq.), even if they do not generally go as far as to say that the passage is completely unauthentic, as Volney did at the end of the eighteenth century ("Ruinen," Reclam, 276). Cf. also Arnold, "Die neronische Christenverfolgung. Eine historiche Untersuchung zur Geschichte d. ältesten Kirche," 1888. The author does indeed adhere to the authenticity of the passage in Tacitus, but as a matter of fact he presupposes it rather than attempts to prove it; while in many isolated reflections he gives an opinion against the correctness of the account given by Tacitus, and busies himself principally in disproving false inferences connected with that passage, such as the connection of the Neronic persecution with the Book of Revelation. The conceivable possibility that the persecution actually took place, but that at all events the sentence of Tacitus may be a Christian interpolation, Arnold seems never to have considered.

[416] Op. cit., 227.

[417] Kalthoff, "Christusproblem," 17.

[418] Weinel, "Jesus im 19 Jahrhundert," 1907, 68.

[419] "Babylonisches im Neuen Testament," 109 sq.

[420] "Zerduscht Nameh," ch. xxvi.

[421] Gfrörer, "Jahrhundert des Heils," Part II., 380 sqq.

[422] Luke iii. 23.

[423] Numb. iv. 3.

[424] Matt. xxi. 12 sqq.

[425] Zech. xiv. 21 runs in the Targum translation: "Every vessel in Jerusalem will be consecrated to the Lord, &c., and at that time there will no longer be shopkeepers in the House of the Lord." In this there may have been a further inducement for the Evangelists to state that Jesus chases the tradesmen from the Temple.

[426] 2 Sam. xvii. 23; cf. also Zech. xi. 12 sq.; Psa. xli. 10.

[427] Gfrörer, "Jahr. d. Heils," ii. 318 sqq.

[428] Cf. 1 Cor. x. 1 sq.

[429] 2 Kings iv. 19 sqq.

[430] Numb. i. 44; Jos. iii. 12; iv. 1 sqq. Cf. "Petrus-legende," 51 sq.

[431] Cf. p. 127, note.

[432] Josephus, "Antiq.," iv. 8, 48; Philo, "Vita Mos.," iii.

[433] 2 Kings ii. 11.

[434] E.g. also the account of the arrest of Jesus (Matt. xxvi. 51 sqq.) cf. 2 Kings vi. 10-22.

[435] Matt. ix. 11 sq., xii. 8 sq., xv. 1 sqq., 11 and 20, xxviii. 18.

[436] Psa. cxlvi. 7.

[437] Bereshith Rabba zu Gen. xli. 1.

[438] Cf. esp. Acts xi. 2 sqq.

[439] Matt. v. 17 sqq.

[440] Id. viii. 11 sqq., x. 5, xxiii. 34 sqq., xxviii. 19 sqq.

[441] Cf. Lützelberger, "Jesus, was er war und wollte," 1842, 16 sqq.

[442] Cf. above, 59 sqq.

[443] It is given as a reason for his appearing first in Galilee that the Galileans were first led into exile, and so should first be comforted, as all divine action conforms to the law of requital (Gfrörer, "Jahr. d. Heils," 230 sq. Cf. also Isa. viii. 23).

[444] Cf. above, 173 sq.

[445] See above, 171.

[446] Exod. xvi. 17 sqq.; Numb. xxi. 1 sqq.; Exod. vii. 17 sqq. 1 Kings xvii. 5 sqq.

[447] "Hist.," iv. 81.

[448] "Vespasian," vii.

[449] lxvi. 8.

[450] Isa. 1. 6 sq.

[451] Zech. xii 10.

[452] Cf. "Petruslegende," 24.

[453] Gen. xxvi. 6; cf. also Tertullian, "Adv. Jud.," 10.

[454] Cf. for this Brandt, "Die Evangelische Geschichte," esp. 53 sqq. Even such a cautious investigator as Gfrörer confesses that, after his searching examination of the historical content of the Synoptics, he is obliged to close "with the sad admission" that their testimony does not give sufficient assurance to enable us to pronounce anything they contain to be true, so far as they are concerned, with a good historical conscience. "In this it is by no means asserted that many may not think their views correct, but only that we cannot rely on them sufficiently to rest a technically correct proof on them alone. They tell us too many things which are purely legendary, and too many others which are at least suspicious, for a prudent historian to feel justified in a construction based on their word alone. This admission may be disagreeable--it is also unpleasant to me--but it is genuine, and it is demanded by the rules which hold everywhere before a good tribunal, and in the sphere of history" ("Die hl. Sage," 1838, ii. 243).

[455] This is the case with the corresponding account in Mark, while in Luke the dramatic presentation seems to be more worked away, and the coherence, through the introduction of descriptions and episodes (disciples at Emmaus) bears more the character of a simple narrative. Cf. Robertson, "Pagan Christs," 186 sqq.; "A Short History," 87 sqq. The fact that in almost all representations of this kind both the scene at Gethsemane and the words spoken by Jesus usually serve as signs of his personality (e.g. also Bousset's "Jesus"--Rel. Volksb., 1904, 56), shows what we must think of the historical value of the accounts of the life of Jesus; especially when we consider that certainly no listeners were there, and Jesus cannot himself have told his experience to his disciples, as the arrest is supposed to have taken place on the spot.

[456] "Messiasgeheimnis," 143.

[457] Gen. xxiv.

[458] E. v. Hartmann, "Das Christentum des Neuen Testaments," 1905, 22.

[459] Op. cit.

[460] Cf. H. Jordan, "Jesus und die modernen Jesusbilder, Bibl. Zeit- u. Streitfragen," 1909, 38.

[461] Mark vi. 1 sq.

[462] Mark xiii. 32.

[463] Mark iii. 20.

[464] 1 Kings xix.; cf. also Isa. xlii. 4.

[465] Cf. Brandt, op. cit., 553 sq.

[466] Hertlein treats of these Bases of Schmiedel in the "Prot. Monatsheften," 1906, 386 sq.; cf. also Schmiedel's reply.

[467] Op. cit., 141.

[468] Bousset agrees with this in his work "Was wissen wir von Jesus?" (1901). "Jesus' speeches are for the most part creations of the communities, placed together by the community from isolated words of Jesus." "In this, apart from all the rest, there was a powerful and decided alteration of the speeches" (47 sqq.).

[469] Cf. Robertson, "Christianity and Mythology," 424 sqq., 429.

[470] Op. cit., 43.

[471] "Protest. Monatshefte," 1903, Märzheft.

[472] Op. cit., 161 sq.

[473] Matt. xviii. 15 sqq.

[474] Id. xxix. 3 sqq.

[475] Cf. Pfleiderer, "Urchristentum," i. 447 sq.; van den Bergh van Eysinga, op. cit., 57 sqq.

[476] Smith, op. cit., 107 sqq.

[477] Cf. Nork, "Rabbinische Quellen und Parallelen zu neutestamentlichen Schriftstellen," 1839.

[478] Cf. Robertson, "Christianity and Mythology," 440-457.

[479] Cf. v. Hartmann, op. cit., 131-143. It will always be a telling argument against the historical nature of the sayings of Jesus that Paul seems to know nothing of them, that he never refers to them exactly; and that even up to the beginning of the second century, with the exception of a few remarks in Clement and Polycarp, the Apostles and Fathers in all their admonitions, consolations, and reprimands, never make use of Jesus' sayings to give greater force to their own words.

[480] V. Hartmann, op. cit., 44 sq.

[481] Let us hear what Clemen says against this: "In its reduction of the Law to the Commandment of love, though this was already prominent in the Old Testament [!] and even earlier had here and there [!] been characterised as the chief Commandment, Christianity is completely original [!]. And for Jesus the subordination of religious duties to moral was consequent on this, though in this respect he would have been equally influenced by the prophets of the Old Testament" (op. cit., 135 sq.).

[482] "We must (as regards the moral ideals of Jesus) pay just as much attention to what he does not treat of, to what he set aside, as to what he clung to, indeed, setting it in opposition to all the rest. At least this wonderfully sure selection is Jesus' own. We may produce analogies for each individual thing, but the whole is unique and cannot be invented" (v. Soden, op. cit., 51 sq.). This method, practised by liberal theology, of extolling their Jesus as against all other mortals, and of raising him up to a "uniqueness" in the absolute sense, can make indeed but a small impression on the impartial.

[483] Wrede, "Paulus," 91.

[484] We admit that besides the eschatological grounding of his moral demands, Jesus also makes use occasionally of expressions that pass beyond the idea of reward. But they are quite isolated--as, e.g., Matt. v. 48, "Be ye perfect, even as your Father in Heaven is perfect," a phrase which is, moreover, in accord with Lev. xi. 44 and xix. 3--and without any fundamental significance. In general, and in particular even in the Sermon on the Mount, that "Diamond in the Crown of Jesus' ethics," the idea of reward and punishment is prevalent (Matt. v. 12 and 46; vi. 1, 4, 6, 14, 18; v. 20; vi. 15; vii. 1, &c.). Views may still differ widely as to whether it is historically correct to estimate, as Weinel would like to, Jesus' ethics in this connection really by the few sayings which go beyond that idea. (Cf. v. Hartmann, op. cit., 116-124.) The favourite declaration, however, is quite unhistorical, that Jesus was the first who introduced into the world the principle of active love; and that the Stoics, as Weinel represents, only taught the doing away with all our passions, even that of love; or indeed that Jesus, who wished salvation only to benefit the Jews, who forbade his people to walk in the ways of the Gentiles, and who hesitated to comply with the Canaanite woman's prayer, "raised to the highest degree of sincerity" the "altruistic ideal," and that in principle he broke down the boundaries between peoples and creeds with his "Love thy enemy," (Weinel, op. cit., 55, 57). As against this cf. the following passage from Seneca: "Everything which we must do and avoid may be reduced to this short formula of human obligation: We are members of a mighty body. Nature has made us kindred, having produced us from the same stuff and for the same ends. She has implanted in us a mutual love, and has arranged it socially. She has founded right and equity. Because of her commands to do evil is worse than to suffer evil. Hands ready to aid are raised at her call. Let that verse be in our mouths and our hearts: I am a man, nothing human do I despise! Human life consists in well-doing and striving. It will be cemented into a society of general aid not by fear but by mutual love. What is the rightly constituted, good and high-minded soul, but a God living as a guest in a human body? Such a soul may appear just as well in a knight as in a freedman or in a slave. We can soar upwards to heaven from any corner. Make this your rule, to treat the lower classes even as you would wish the higher to treat you. Even if we are slaves, we may yet be free in spirit. The slaves are men, inferior relatives, friends; indeed, our fellow-slaves in a like submission to the tyranny of fate. A friendship based on virtue exists between the good man and God, yes, more than a friendship, a kinship and likeness; for the good man is really his pupil, imitator, and scion, differing from God only because of the continuance of time. Him the majestic father brings up, a little severely, as is the strict father's wont. God cherishes a fatherly affection towards the good man, and loves him dearly. If you wish to imitate the gods, give also to the ungrateful; for the sun rises even on the ungodly and the seas lie open even to the pirate, the wind blows not only in favour of the good, and the rain falls even on the fields of the unjust. If you wish to have the gods well-disposed towards you, be good: he has enough, who honours and who imitates them." Cf. also Epictetus: "Dare, raising your eyes to God, to say, Henceforth make use of me to what end thou wilt! I assent, I am thine, I draw back from nothing which thy will intends. Lead me whithersoever thou wilt! For I hold God's will to be better than mine." (Cf. also Matt. xxvi. 39.)

[485] Kautsky, "Ursprung des Christentums," 17.

[486] Op. cit., 3.

[487] "How is it conceivable," even Pfleiderer asks, "that the new community should have fashioned itself from the chaos of material without some definite fact, some foundation-giving event which could form the nucleus for the genesis of the new ideas? Everywhere in the case of a new historical development the powers and impulses which are present in the crowd are first directed to a definite end and fastened into an organism that can survive by the purpose-giving action of heroic personalities. And so the impulse for the formation of the Christian community must have come from some definite point, which, from the testimony of the Apostle Paul and of the earliest Gospels, we can only find in the life and death of Jesus" ("Entstehung des Chr.," 11). But that the "testimony" for an historical Jesus is not testimony, and that the "definite fact," the "foundation-giving event," is to be looked for, if anywhere, in Paul himself and nowhere else--such is the central point of all this analysis.

[488] Op. cit., 61 sq.

[489] "Von Reimarus bis Wrede," 396.

[490] ii. 44.

[491] "Gesch. Israels," ii. 1 sqq.

[492] Holtzmann, "Zum Thema 'Jesus und Paulus'" ("Prot. Monatsheft," iv., 1900, 465).

[493] Parerga, ii. 180.

[494] Neutest. Theol. ii. 4. Cf. R. H. Grützmacher: "Ist das liberale Christusbild modern? Bibl. Zeit- und Streitfragen," 39 sq.

[495] Pfleiderer, "Entstehung d. Chr.," 108 sqq.

[496] Cf. Stendel, op. cit., 22.

[497] "Von Reimarus bis Wrede," 313.

[498] Gal. i. 24.

[499] 1 Cor. ii. 1; 2 Cor. xix. 9.

[500] Acts i. 3, x. 41.

[501] Acts i. 21 sq.

[502] Seufert, "Der Ursprung und die Bedeutung des Apostolates in der christlichen Kirche der ersten Jahrhunderte," 1887, 143. Cf. also my "Petruslegende," in which the unhistorical nature of the disciples and apostles is shown, 50 sqq.

[503] Op. cit., 42.

[504] Cf. my work "Die Petruslegende."

[505] Cf. Hausrath, "Jesus und die neutestamentl. Schriftsteller," ii. 203 sqq.

[506] "Entstehung d. Chr.," 239.

[507] Cf. above, p. 31. sqq.

[508] Cf. Arnold Meyer, "Was uns Jesus heute ist. Rel. Volksb.," 1907--a very impressive presentation of the liberal Protestant point of view; also Weinel, "Jesus im 19ten Jahrhundert."

[509] "Entstehung d. Chr.," 98 sq.

[510] Weinel, indeed, resolutely denies that this is a real characteristic of liberal Protestantism, and asserts that he has looked for it in vain in any liberal theologian's book. But he need only look in A. Meyer's work, which is cited by me, to find my idea confirmed. There it is said of Jesus inter alia: "Not only should we move and live in his love, but we are as he was, of the faith that this love will overcome the world, that it is the meaning, end, and true content of the world; that the power which uniformly and omnipotently fills and guides the world, is nothing but the God in whom he believed [was Jesus then a Pantheist?], and whom he calls his heavenly father. As he believed, so let us also, that whoever trusts in this God and lives in his love has found the meaning of life and the power which preserves him in time and in eternity. Jesus was the founder of our religion, of our faith, and of our inner life" (31). According to Meyer, Jesus attracts us by his manner, his Being, his love and his faith, we feel ourselves bound to him, become kin with him and so live by his strength; he is called "the voice of God to us," "our redeemer," and so forth. Those are simply expressions which applied to God have at least a valid meaning, but applied to the historical man Jesus are nothing but phrases, and are to be explained purely psychologically from the fact that liberalism in honouring the "unique" man Jesus does nevertheless unwittingly allow the belief in his divinity to come into play. In this atmosphere, obscured with phrases, the so-called "theology" of liberal Protestantism moves. Moreover, Weinel himself quotes a sentence of Herrmann with approval, which also gives expression to the idea that Jesus is for Protestant liberalism a kind of "demonstration of God" (80), and he adds himself: "It may indeed be that our conception of the significance of Jesus has often been expressed unskilfully enough. It may be that in discourses, lectures, or other popular ways of speaking something is at times said which may be so clumsily put as to give occasion for such things to be said." Indeed, he himself maintains regarding Jesus: "Whoever places the ideal of his life in him, he experiences God in him" (84). He also finds that the desire for God of the Jews, Greeks, Semites, and Germans "could be stilled in him." Taking into account these expressions and the whole tone which it pleases Herr Weinel to adopt towards the opponents of his standpoint, it appears time to remind him once again of E. v. Hartmann's "Die Selbstzersetzung des Christentums" (it is obvious he has only a third-hand acquaintance with the author whose point of view he calls Neo-Buddhism, counting him among the supporters of the morality of pity!) and especially of the chapter on "Die Irreligiosität des liberalen Protestantismus." Here, in connection with the lack of metaphysics displayed by liberal Protestantism (and admitted even by Weinel) and the latter's principle of love, he says: "If we transform the whole of religion into Ethics and soften down the whole of Ethics into love, we thereby renounce everything that is in religion besides love, and everything which makes love religious. We thereby confess that the impulse of love is raised into religion since religion properly so called has been lost. It is true religion is not a shark, as the inquisitors thought, but at the same time it is not a sea-nettle. A shark can at least be terrifying, a sea-nettle is always feeble." Liberal Protestantism, as Hartmann sums it up, consists "of a shapeless, poor, shallow metaphysic, which is concealed as far as possible from critical eyes; of a worship successfully freed from all mystery, but one that has become thereby by no means incapable of being objected to; of an Ethics forcibly separated from Metaphysics and on that account irreligious. It rests upon a view of the world which by its worldliness and optimistic contentment with the world is by no means in a position to give birth to a religion, and which sooner or later will allow the remnants of religious feeling which it brought with it to be smothered in worldly ease."

[511] Op. cit., 39.

[512] Cf. E. v. Hartmann, "Die Selbstzersetzung des Christentums und die Religion der Zukunft," 2nd ed., 1874, especially chaps. vi. and vii.

[513] Cf. W. v. Schnehen, "Der moderne Jesuskultus," 2nd ed., 1906; also "Naumann vor dem Bankerott des Christentums," 1907.

[514] Cf. my work, "Die Religion als Selbstbewusstsein Gottes," 1906, 199 sq.

[515] Cf. my work, "Die Religion als Selbstbewusstsein Gottes," in which the attempt has been made to form a general religious view of the world in the sense mentioned.

[516] Cf. "Der Monismus, dargestellt in Beiträgen seiner Vertreter," 2 vols., 1908.