Page:The Necessity of Atheism (Brooks).djvu/87

Rh "fire and sword" sayings on the one side, and the beatitudes on the peacemakers and the meek, the prohibition to kill, to be angry; to resist wrong, and the command to love one's enemy, contained in the Sermon on the Mount, on the other.

In the early period of his messianic career, the period of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus was a thorough quietist. But if we realize that the delusion that he was "The Messiah" had entered his mind so vehemently that he firmly believed that the end of the world was imminent, and that it was his duty to save as many as possible, we can understand his acquiescence to the violence which followed.

Moreover, he was clearly forced to the fatal road by the idea that he must set on foot a movement of hundreds of thousands, the picture of the exodus from Egypt with the fantastic figures given in the Old Testament. The Messianic rising he was to initiate could not be regarded as realized if he left the country with a band of some hundred elect. If he wished, however, to put at least two-fifths of the population in motion, the method of sending out messengers had proved altogether unsatisfactory. He must try the effect of his own words in a place where, and at a time when, he was sure to reach the greatest multitude of his people. That could only be in Jerusalem, at the time of the great pilgrimage at the feast of the Passover. Moreover, the desired result could only be, obtained of course. if he openly proclaimed himself to be the Messiah.

Then it was that the Prophet of quiet reversed his words and armed his disciples. Jesus was fully aware of the illegality of this arming of his disciples and of his own direction to purchase a weapon ; none the less, he saw no escape from this bitter necessity. The prediction of the prophet must be fulfilled, according to which the