Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker volume 3.djvu/81

68 ciples to observe all the Mosaic law, as the Pharisees interpreted that law, though such a command is utterly inconsistent with the general spirit of Christ's teachings, and even with his plain declaration, as preserved in other parts of the same Gospel. It is worthy of note that this command is peculiar to Matthew. But there is another instance of the same Jewish tendency, though not so obvious at first sight. Matthew represents Jesus as saying, "The Son of man," that is, the Messiah, "is Lord even of the Sabbath day." Accordingly, he is competent to expound the law correctly, and determine what is lawful to do on that day. In Matthew, therefore, Jesus, in his character of Messiah, is represented as giving a judicial opinion, and ruling that it t€ is lawful to do well on the Sabbath days/' Now, Mark and Luke represent it a little different. In Mark, Jesus himself declares that "The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath," Matthew entirely omits that remarkable saying. According to Mark, Jesus declares in general terms, that man is of more consequence than the observance of the Sabbath, while Matthew only considers that the Messiah is "Lord of the Sabbath day." The cause of this diversity is quite plain. Matthew was a Jewish Christian, and thought Christianity was nothing but restored Judaism.

The other party may be called liberal Christians, though they must not be confounded with the party which now bears that name. They were the new school of early Christians. They rejected the Hebrew law, so far as it did not rest on human nature, and considered that Christianity was a new thing; Christ not a mere Jew, but a universal man, who had thrown down the wall of partition between Jews and Gentiles. All the old artificial distinctions, therefore, were done away with at once. Paul was the head of the liberal party among the primitive Christians. He was considered a heretic ; and though he was more efficient than any of the other early preachers of Christianity, yet the author Of the Apocalypse thought Trim not worthy of a place in the foundation of the new Jerusalem, which rests on the twelve apostles. The fourth Gospel, with peculiarities of its own, is written wholly in