Note 38 — Chapter I · RELATION OF JESUS TO THE IDEA OF A SUFFERING AND DYING MESSIAH; HIS DISCOURSES ON HIS DEATH, RESURRECTION, AND SECOND ADVENT.

In relation also to the declarations of Jesus concerning the object and effects of his death, we can, as above in relation to the announcement of the death itself, distinguish a more natural, from a more supranatural point of view. When Jesus in the fourth gospel likens himself to the true shepherd, who lays down his life for the sheep (x. 11, 15): this may have the perfectly natural sense, that he is determined not to swerve from his office of shepherd and teacher, even though, in the prosecution of it, death should threaten him (the moral necessity of his death);38 the foreboding expression in the same gospel (xii. 24), that except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone, but if it die it bringeth forth much fruit, admits of an equally rational explanation, as a figurative representation of the victorious power which martyrdom gives to an idea and conviction (the moral efficacy of his death);39 lastly, that which is so often repeated in the Gospel of John,—namely, that it is good for the disciples that Jesus should go away, for without his departure the comforter, παράκλητος will not come to them, who will glorify him in them,—may be supposed to express the perfectly natural consideration of Jesus, that without the removal of his sensible presence, the hitherto so material ideas of his disciples would not be spiritualized (the psychological efficacy of his death).40 The words of Jesus at the institution of the sacramental supper, belong more to the supranaturalistic mode of view. For if that which the intermediate Evangelists make him say on this occasion—that the cup presented is the blood of the new testament, τὸ αἷμα τῆς καινῆς διαθήκης (Mark xiv. 24), and the new testament in his blood, ἡ καινὴ διαθήκη ἐν τῷ αἵματι αὐτοῦ (Luke xxii. 20),—might appear to signify no more than that, as by the bloody sacrifice at Sinai was sealed the covenant of this ancient people with God, so by his (the Messiah’s) blood would be sealed in a higher sense the community of the new covenant, gathering round him: in the account of Matthew, on the contrary, when he makes Jesus add, that his blood will be shed for many for the remission of sins, εἰς ἄφεσιν ἁμαρτιῶν, the idea of the covenant sacrifice is blended with that of expiatory sacrifice: and also in the two other Evangelists by the addition: which is shed for many, or for you, τὸ περὶ πολλῶν, ὑπὲρ ὑμῶν ἐκχυνόμενον, the transition is made from the covenant sacrifice to the expiatory sacrifice. Further, when in the first gospel (xx. 28) Jesus says, he must give his life a ransom for many, δοῦναι τὴν ψυχὴν αὑτοῦ λύτρον ἀντὶ πολλῶν, this is doubtless to be referred to Isa. liii., where, according to a notion current among the Hebrews (Isa. xliii. 3; Prov. xxi. 18), the death of the servant of God is supposed to have a propitiatory relation to the rest of mankind.