Delphi Complete Works of George Eliot (Illustrated) (809 page)

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Authors: George Eliot

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ot the synoptical entrance,) many Jews went from Jerusalem to Bc-tl’any because they had heard of the arrival of Jesus, and now wished to see him and Lazarus whom he had restored to life (v. 9, comp. 12.). But how could they learn on the day of the synoptical entrance, that Jesus was at Bethany? On that day Jesus did indeed pass either by or through Bethany, but he proceeded directly to Jeo.i ,* 1>a1ulu8’ e*eB- Haudbuch, 3, a. S. 92 ff. 98 ff.; ScMeiermacher, uber den Lukas, S.THE LIFE OP JESUS.
rusalem, whence, according to all the narratives, he could have returned to Bethany only at so late an hour in the evening, that Jews who now first went from Jerusalem, could no longer hope to be able to see him.* But why should they take the trouble to seek Jesus in Bethany, when they had on that very day seen him in Jerusalem itself?
 
Surely in this case it must have been said-not merely, that they came not for Jesus’ salce ONLY, but that they mir/ht see IM-zctrus also, ov 6ia rev ‘Iqaovv fiovov a/lA” Iva not TOV Ad^dpov Mwfft,- but rather that they had indeed seen Jesus himself in Jerusalem, but as they wished to sec Lazarus also, they came therefore to Bethany: whereas the evangelist represents these people as coming from Jerusalem partly to see Jesus ; he cannot therefore have supposed that Jesus might have been seen in Jerusalem on that very day. Further, when it is said in John, that on the following day it was heard in Jerusalem that Jesus was coming, (v. 12.) this does not at all seem to imply that Jesus had already been there the day before, but rather that the news had come from Bethany, of his intention to enter on this clay.
 
So also the reception which is immediately prepared for him, alone has its proper significance when it is regarded as the glorification of his first entrance into the metropolis; it could only have been appropriate on his second entrance, if Jesus had the day before entered unobserved and unhonourcd, and it had been wished to repair this omission on the following day-not if the first entrance hail already been so brilliant. Moreover, on the second entrance every feature of the first must have been repeated, which, whether we refer it to a preconceived arrangement on the part of Jesus, or to an accidental coincidence of circumstances, still remains improbable.With respect to Jesus, it is not easy to understand how he could arrange the repetition, of a spectacle which, in the first instance significant, if acted a second time would be flat and unmcanino- ;t on O”
 
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the other hand, circumstances must have coincided in an unprecedented manner, if on both occasions there happened the same demonstrations of homage on the part of the people, with the same expressions of envy on the part of his opponents: if, on both occasions, too, there stood at the command of Jesus an ass, by riding which he brought to mind the prophecy of Zachariah. We might therefore call to our aid Sieffcrt’s hypothesis of assimilation, and suppose that the two entrances, originally more different, became thus similar by traditional intermixture: were not the supposition that two distinct events lie at the foundation of the evangelical narratives, rendered improbable by another circumstance.
On the first glance, indeed, the supposition of two entrances seems to find support in the fact, that John makes his entrance take place the day after the meal in Bethany, at which Jesus was anointed under memorable circumstances ; whereas the two first synoptists (for Luke knows nothing of a meal at Bethany in this period of the life of Jesus’) make their entrance precede this meal: and thus, quite LAST JOURNEY OP JESUS TO JERUSALEM.in accordance with the above supposition, the synoptical entrance would appear the earlier, that of John the later. This would be very well, if John had not placed his entrance so early, and the synoptists their meal at Bethany so late, that the former cannot possibly have been subsequent to the latter. According to John, Jesus comes six days before the passover to Bethany, and on the following day enters Jerusalem (xiii. 1, 12); on the other hand, the meal at Bethany mentioned by the synoptists (Matt. xxvi. 6 ff. parall.), can have been at the most but two days before the passover (v. 2); so that if we are to suppose the synoptical entrance prior to the meal and the entrance in John, there must then have been after all this, according to the synoptists, a second meal in Bethany. But between the two meals thus presupposed, as between the two entrances, there would have been the most striking resemblance even to the minutest points ; and against the interweaving of two such double incidents, there is so strong a presumption, that it will scarcely be said there were two entrances and two meals, which were originally far more dissimilar, but, from the transference of features out of the one incident into the other by tradition, they have become as similar to each other as Ave now see them: on the contrary, here if anywhere, it is easier, when once the authenticity of the accounts is given up, to imagine that tradition has varied one incident, than that it has assimilated two.*
§ 110.MOKE PARTICULAR CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE ENTRANCE. ITS OBJECT AND HISTORICAL REALITY.
WHILE the fourth gospel first makes the multitude that streamed forth to meet Jesus render him their homage, and then briefly states that Jesus mounted a young ass which he had obtained; the synoptists commence their description of the entrance with a minute account of the manner in which Jesus came by the ass. When, namely, he had arrived in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem, towards Bethphage and Bethany, at the Mount of Olives, he sent two of his disciples into the village lying before them, telling them that when they came there they would find-Matthew says, mi ass tied, and a colt with her; the two others, a colt whereon never man sat- which they were to loose and bring to him, silencing any objections of the owner by the observation, the Lord hath need of Aim (or theiri). This having been done, the disciples spread their clothes, and placed Jesus-on both the animals, according to Matthew; according to the two other synoptists, on the single animal.
The most striking part of this account is obviously the statement oi Matthew, that Jesus not only required two asses, though he alone intended to ride, but that he also actually sat on them both. It is true, that, as is natural, there are not wanting attempts to explain theTHE LIFE OP JESUS.
former particular, and to do away with the latter. Jesus, it is said, caused the mother animal to be brought with the colt, on which alone he intended to ride, in order that the young and still sucking animal might by this means be made to go more easily;* or else the mother, accustomed to her young one, followed of her own accord :f but a young animal yet unweancd, would scarcely be given up by its owner to be ridden. A sufficient motive on the part of Jesus in sending for the two animals, could only be that he intended to ride both, which Matthew appears plainly enough to say; for his words imply, not only that the clothes were spread, but also that Jesus was placed on the two animals (eirdvu airoJv).But how are we to represent this to ourselves ? As an alternate mounting of the one and the other, Fritzsche thinks :f but this, for so short a distance would have been a .superfluous inconvenience. Hence commentators have sought to rid themselves of the singular Statement. Some, after very weak authorities, and in opposition to all critical principles, read in the words relative to the spreading of the clothes, err’ ainov (TOV ruX,ovj, upon it (the colt), instead of e-rrdvu avr&v, upon them ; and then in the mentioning that Jesus placed himself thereon, refer the ETOVW avruiv to the clothes which were spread on one of the animals.§ Others, thinking to escape the difficulty without an alteration of the reading, characterize Matthew’s statement as an enallage numeri,\ by which, according to Winer’s explanation, it is
 
meant that the evangelist, using an inaccurate mode of expression, certainly speaks of both the animals, but only in the sense in which we say of him who springs from one of two horses harnessed together, that he springs from the horses. 1
 
Admitting this expedient to be sufficient, it again becomes incomprehensible why Jesus, who according to thia only meant to use one animal, should have sent for two.The whole statement becomes the more suspicious, when we consider that it is given by the first evangelist alone; for in order to reconsile the others with him it will not suffice to say, as we ordinarily read, that they name only the foal, as being that on which Jesus rode, and that while omitting the ass as an accessary fact, they do not exclude it.
But how was Matthew led into this singular statement? Its true source has been pointed out, though in a curious manner, by those who conjecture, that Jesus in his instructions to the two disciples, and Matthew in his original writing, following the passage, of Zachariah (ix. 9.), made use of several expressions for the one idea of the ass, which expressions were by the Greek translator of the first Gospel misconstrued to mean more than one animal.** Undoubtedly it was the accumulated designations of the ass in the above passage: W3r,s;-]5 -iisi *vrart, vrrotyyiov KCU Trw/lov viov, LXX. which occasioned * Paulus, 3, a. S, 113 ; Kuinol, in Matth. p. 541, f Olshauscn, 1, S. 776. J Comm, in Matth, p, 6130. His expedient is approved by De Wette, exeg. Ilnndlmch, 1,1,8. 173, § Panlus, ut sup. S, H3 f. || Glassius, pliil, sacr, p. 172. Thus also Kuim’ll and Gratz, in loo, « XT T n,n-----« 11(,. *» Kirl.honi. &\]wm. ISibliothek, 5, S. 8’JO f.; comp. Bolten, LAST JOURNEY OP JESUS TO JERUSALEM.the duplication of it in the first gospel; for the and which in the Hebrew was intended in an explanatory sense, was erroneously understood to denote an addition, and hence instead of: an ass, that is, an ass’s foal, was substituted: an ass together with an ass’s foal.* Bui this mistake cannot have originated with the Greek translator, who, if he had found throughout Matthew’s narrative but one ass, would scarcely have doubled it purely on the strength of the prophetic passage, and as often as his original spoke of one ass, have added a second, or, introduced the plural number instead of the singular; it must rather have been made by one whose only written source was the prophetic passage, out of which, with the aid of oral tradition, he spun his entire narrative, i. e. the author of the first gospel; who hereby, as recent criticism correctly maintains, irrecoverably forfeits the reputation of an eye-witness ?f If the first gospel stands alone in this mistake, so, on the other hand, the two intermediate evangelists have a feature peculiar to themselves, which it is to the advantage of the first to have avoided. We shall merely point out in passing the prolixity with which Mark and Luke, (though they, as well as Matthew, make Jesus describe to the two disciples, how they would find the ass, and wherewith they were to satisfy the owner,) yet do not spare themselves or the reader the trouble of almost verbally repeating every particular as having occurred (Mark v. 4 if.; Luke v. 32 if.); whereas Matthew, with more judgment, contents himself with the observation, and the disciples went and did as Jesus commanded them. This, as affecting merely the form of the narrative, we shall not dwell on farther. But it concerns the substance, that, according to Mark and Luke, Jesus desired an animal ivhereon yet never man sat, s
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by the unruliness with which he may have disturbed the peaceful progress of the triumphal train.* If we arc thus unable to comprehend how Jesus could seek an honour for himself in mounting an animal which had never yet been ridden ; we shall, on the contrary, find it easy to comprehend how the primitive Christian community might early believe it due to his honour that he should ride only on such an animal, as subsequently that he should lie only in an unused grave. The authors of the intermediate gospels did not hesitate to receive this trait into their memoirs, because they indeed, in writing, would not experience the same inconvenience from the undisciplined animal, which it must have caused to Jesus in riding.
The two difficulties already considered belong respectively to the first evangelist, and the two intermediate ones : another is common to them all, namely, that which lies in the circumstance that Jesus so confidently sends two disciples for an ass which they would find in the next village, in such and such a situation, and that the issue corresponds so closely to his prediction. It might here appear the most natural, to suppose that he had previously bespoken the ass, and that consequently it stood ready for him at the hour and place appointed ;f but how could he have thus bespoken an ass in Beth-pliage, seeing that he was just come from Jericho ? Hence even Paulus in this instance finds something else more probable: namely, that about the time of the feasts, in the villages lying on the high road to Jerusalem, many beasts of burden stood ready to be hired by travellers ; but in opposition to this it is to be observed, that Jesus does not at all seem to speak of the first animal that may happen to present itself, but of a particular animal. Hence we cannot but be surprised that Olshausen describes it as only the probable idea of the narrator, that to the Messiah making his entrance into Jerusalem, the providence of God presented everything just as he needed it; as also that the same expositor, in order to explain the ready compliance of the owners of the animal, finds it necessary to suppose that they were friends of Jesus; since this trait rather serves to exhibit the as it were magical power which resided in the name of the JLord, at the mention of which the owner of the ass unresistingly placed it at his disposal, as subsequently the inhabitant of the room gave it up at a word from the Master (Matt. xxvi. 18 parall.). To this divine providence in favour of the Messiah, and the irresistible power of his name, is united the superior knowledge by means of * That the above motive will not suffice to explain the conduct of Jesus, Paulus has also felt; for only the despair on his part of finding a more real and special motive, can account for his becoming in this solitary instance mystical, and embracing the explanation •of Justin Martyr, \vhom he elsewhere invariably attacks, as the author of the pe?-vcrted ecclesiastical interpretations of the Bible. According to Justin, the ass designated irxo^vyiov (that is under the yoke}, is a svmbol of the Jews; the ass never yet ridden, of the Gentiles (Dial. c. Try-ph. 53); and 1’aulus, adopting this idea, endeavours to make it probable that Jesus, by mounting an animal which had never before been ridden, intended to announce himself as the founder and ruler of a new religious community. Exeg. Haudb. 3, a. S. 11B ft:

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