The life and work of St. Paul

80 THE LIFE AND WORK OF ST. PAUL.
Jews or Gentiles, should see how impossible it was to put a new patch on an
old garment.
This truth had been preached by Jesus to His Apostles, but, like many othet
of His words, it lay long dormant in their minds. After some of His deepest
utterances, in full consciousness that He could not at once be understood, He
had said, " He that hath ears to hear, let him hear." And as they themselves
frankly confess, the Apostles had not always been among those "who had ears
to hear." Plain and reiterated as had been the prophecies which He had
addressed to them respecting His own crucifixion and resurrection, the first of
these events had plunged them into despair and horror, the second had burst
upon them with a shock of surprise. He who commanded the light to shine
out of darkness had, indeed, shined in their hearts " to give the light of the
knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ;" 1 but still they
were well aware that they had this treasure "in earthen vessels." To
attribute to them an equality of endowments, or an entire unanimity of
opinion, is to contradict their plainest statements. To deny that their knowledge
gradually widened is to ignore God's method of revelation, and to
"
set aside the evidence of facts. To the last they knew in part, and they
prophesied in part." 2
Why was James the Lord's brother so highly respected
by the people as tradition tells us that he was P Why was Paul regarded by
them with such deadly hatred ? Because St. Paul recognised more fully than St.
James the future universal destiny of a Christianity separated from Judaic in-
stitutions. The Crucifixion had, in fact, been the protest of the Jew against
"
an isopolity of faith. From that moment the fate of the nation was decided.
Her religion was to kill her. But when the Temple burst into flames, that religion
had already spread its wings and gone out to conquer an entire s world."
Now, as might have been expected, and as was evidently designed by their
Divine Master, the last point on which the Galilsean Apostles attained to
clearness of view and consistency of action was the fact that the Mosaic Law
was to be superseded, even for the Jew, by a wider revelation. It is probable
that this truth, in all its fulness, was never finally apprehended by all the
Apostles. It is doubtful whether, humanly speaking, it would ever have been
grasped by any of them if their powers of insight had not been quickened, in
God's appointed method, by the fresh lessons which came to them through the
intellect and faith of men who had been brought up in larger views. The
obliteration of natural distinctions is no part of the divine method. The
inspiration of God never destroys the individuality of those holy souls which
it has made into sons of God and prophets. There are, as St. Paul so
earnestly tried to impress npon the infant Churches, diversities of gifts,
diversities of ministrations, diversities of operations, though it is the same
Spirit, the same Lord, the same God, who worketh all things in all.* The
Hellenistic training of a Stephen and a Saul prepared them for the acceptance
1 2 Cor. iv. 6, 7. 1 Cor. xtti. 9.
*
Kuonen, Rel. tflsr. Ill, 281,
1 Cor. xlL f-,