The life and work of St. Paul

458 THE LIFE AND WORK OF ST. PAUL.
near (xiii.). He then points out the necessity for mutual forbearance and
mutual charity between the strong and the weak that is, between those who
considered themselves bound by legal prescriptions, and those who realised
that from such elements they were emancipated by the glorious liberty of
the children of God; mingling with these exhortations some reference to
the views which he had already expressed about the mutual relation of
Jews and Christians (xiv. xv. 13). The remainder of the Epistle is chiefly
personal. He first oilers an earnest and graceful apology for having thus
ventured to address a strange Church an apology based on his apostolic
mission (xv. 14 21) and then sketches the outline of his future plans,
specially entreating their prayers for the good success of his approaching
visit to Jerusalem. In the last chapter, which I have given reasons
for believing to have been addressed, at any rate in part, not to Romans,
but to Ephesians, he recommends Phoebe to the kindly care of the Church
(1, 2); sends affectionate salutations to six-and-twenty of the brethren
(3 16); gives a severe warning against those who fostered divisions,
which concludes with a promise and a benediction (17 20); repeats the
benediction after a few salutations from, the friends who were with him
(21 24) ; and ends with an elaborate and comprehensive doxology, in which
Borne have seen "a liturgical antiphouy in conformity with the funda-
mental thought of the Epistle." 1
n.
GENERAL THESIS OF THE EPISTLE.
*fl fov ISic&rov rb QavfM & rov a-ypcy^arov fj ffofyia.. Ps. Chrys. Orat. Encom.
(Opp. viii. 10).
"Such we are in the sight of God the Father, as is the very Son of God
Himself. Let it be counted folly, or frenzy, or fury, or whatsoever. It is our
wisdom and our comfort we care for no ;
knowledge in the world but this, that man
hath sinned, and God hath suffered that ; God hath made Himself the Son of men,
Serm. ii. 6.
and men are made the righteousness of God." Hooker,
"It breaketh the window that it may let in the light ;
we may eat the kernel ; it putteth. aside the curtain that we may
most Holy Place : it removeth the cover of the well that we may come by the
water." Pref. to Authorised Version.
it breaketh. the shell that
enter into the
WE must now look more closely at this great outline of one of the most
essential factors of Christian theology ; and I must ask my readers, Bible in
hand, to follow step by step its solemn truths as they gradually expand them-
selves before our view.
The Salutation, which occupies the first seven verses, is remarkable as
1 v. Lange, ad loc.