Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 2.djvu/296

 282 7HE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

this was the condition of entering the kingdom "a man was to be born again." ' " He that hath the Son hath the life." 2

The older theologians seldom failed to read the words of Jesus at this point with unanimity, 3 and that too while tending to displace the psychological fact with forensic justification. Nothing is nearer the heart of the teaching of both Jesus and Paul than the moral change that is the result of the interpenetra- tion of the human and the divine personalities a process that is with Jesus no more figurative than the ordinary change which is wrought in the characters of two friends through their con- stant intercourse. It is precisely at this point that the unique significance of Jesus as an ethical teacher appears. So far from divorcing morals and religion, or from making morals the basis of religion, he makes religious experience the fountain head of good conduct, and in his own life gave a concrete illustration of his philosophy. He revealed God and he revealed also the possibilities of human life. It is not necessary to follow the straitest sect of the orthodox to appreciate the truth of this revelation made by Jesus of divine sonship. Nor is it necessary to follow the mystic into the heights of his ecstasy. 4 The thought of Jesus himself is very simple and concrete. By son- ship he meant an actual likeness in the characters of men and God. And this likeness while made possible by the original capacities of humanity is something more distinct. It is the result of the influence of God upon a man's heart. Those who thus have come under the renewing influence of the Divine Spirit are none the less themselves. On the contrary they have found themselves 5 in their new ideal the perfection of their Father. 6

1 John 3: 3, 6. 2 John 5: 12.

3 There may have been wide divergence among theologians in the explanation and the philosophical placing'of regeneration, but they were at one in emphasizing the fact. For outline statement see SHEDD, Dogmatic Theology, II, 490 sq. And yet at this point the Ritschlian school seems weakest.

And one is tempted to add, the newer Ritschlian school into the mysteries of a new birth that can be neither "seen nor grasped but only believed in," something which it is " absurd to suppose can be experienced as a process in time." See HERRMANN, The Communion of the Christian with God.

'Matt. 10:39. Compare Luke 15. 6 Matt. 5 :48.