English
"Thousands and tens of thousands of sheep, at every Passover, as well as at every Pentecost and every feast of the Tabernacles, were borne into the Temple, and carried or driven into the court of the priests, and there slain, the blood being caught by the priests in bowls and dashed upon the altar. Hour after hour, the whole day long, this spectacle continued. The secret channels down through the rocks towards the king's garden, gurgled zuith blood. It was blood, blood, blood; nor can a modern man imagine how it could be other than intolerably shocking. We cannot conceive how even familiarity would abate the repul- siveness of the altar, incessantly flowing with blood, and of the pavement and walls dripping with gore." (20) Section 3. Jesus' parents went to Jerusalem every (19) A Jew could not pay the Temple tax in foreign coin, hence the money changers. (John, ch. 2, v. 14.) (20) Beecher's Life of Jesus, ch. 10. A QUESTION OF MIRACLES 199 year to the feast of the Passover, and when he was twelve years old he went with them (21) and probably between the ages of twelve and thirty years he saw the slaughter of animals in the Temple many times. He surely did, if he acted in obedience to the law of Exodus (chapter 23), for that required every male to appear there three times each year. Yet we have no record, except one Passover, that he ever set himself so decidedly against the Jewish mode of worship as to drive the sheep and oxen out of the Temple, and overthrow the tables of the money changers. He also branded the traffickers as a den of thieves. (22) To all appearances, the outer courts of the Temple were great noisy bazaars. The altar was a reeking slaughter house. And here I must not omit to men- tion that Jerusalem and the Temple, at the time of the great feasts, and in fact at all times, were probably as filthy and disgusting places as could be found any where on earth. The Jewish mode of worship, both before and after Jesus denounced the traffickers as thieves, was an un- surpassed abomination. No heathen people anywhere had a greater agglomeration of filth and downright absurdity in its religious observances than the Jews of Palestine. John the Baptist must have witnessed the same horrible sight, for he preceded Jesus in preach- (21) Luke 2. (22) Luke, ch. 19, v. 46; Mark 11, v. 15 and 16. 200 A QUESTION OF MIRACLES ing tlie baptism or repentance (23), and it is no wonder that John branded them as "a generation of vipers." (24) Section 4. The episode in the Temple with the hucksters and money changers drew upon Jesus the evil eye of the Sanhedrin. From that hour the Phari- sees took counsel how they might destroy him. (25) They asked him if it was lawful to give tribute to Caesar? Now if he answers no, he can be executed as a traitor. But he perceived their design, and told them to "render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's." (26) Defeated in their scheme, they re- tired in confusion, only to enlist every Pharisee against him, even unto the cross. Then the Sadducees, who say there is no resurrec- tion, came to him and said : "A certain man married and died, leaving the woman and no issue. It is our law that his brother shall take her. Now there were seven brothers, and they each, in turn, took her to wife, and died without issue. In the resurrection, whose wife is she?" Jesus answered them quickly : "The children of the resurrection neither marry nor are given in marriage. They who are accounted worthy to obtain that world (23) Luke 3. (24) Matt. 3:7. (25) Jesus made at least three visits to Jerusalem. (John 2, T. 13 to 16; John 1, v, 5; Matt. 4:5.) After driving out the traflBckers, he went to Bethany, but returned. (Matt. 21, v. 12 to 24.) Luke, ch. 19, v. 47, says he taught daily in the Temple. John, ch. 7, says he went secretly to the feast of the Tabernacles. (26) Matt. 22, v. 15 to 23; Mark 12, v. 18, A QUESTION OF MIRACLES 201 are as the angels in heaven." (27) He had probably- heard of the Hindu doctrine, that the devas (angels) in the highest heaven are opapatika ; that is, they come into existence without the intervention of parents, which is a sufficient reason that "they neither marry nor are given in marriage." In that great surging crowd at the Temple, Jesus and his corporal's guard of Galilean followers must have been as a few sands only on the shores of the ocean. We seem to see him there watching the persistent slaughter of cattle, sheep, goats and pigeons; and as he looked upon the bloody altar it must have impressed him as a senseless, awful burlesque — not only on re- ligion, but on common sense as well. Yet that out- rageous proceeding found its complete authority in the alleged inspired Pentateuch, Now if Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuter- onomy were and are inspired of heaven, then Jesus was not justified in scourging the traffickers out of the Temple. (28) But we answer, those books never were inspired, for it cannot be possible that an all-wise Being, the ruler of millions of worlds, would ask or require such idiotic performances. Does any one believe that God inspired the Rishis of India to bake a cake of rice for (27) Luke 20, v. 27 to 38; Mark 12, 19 to 25, also Vol. 11, S. B. E., p. 213. (28) I must here state that I utterly disbelieve in the inspira- tion of the Pentateuch. Moses commenced life as a murderer. (Exodus 2.) 202 A QUESTION OF MIRACLES him? Yet tlie Indian priests in their holy Bible, the Veda, have preached that doctrine to the Hindus for fifty or sixty centuries. Buddha twenty-four hundred years ag^o told his fol- lowers not to practice the low arts of divination, and not to sacrifice to the gods. (29) Section 5. In Jerusalem, the man of Galilee — that most wonderful combination of heart, brain and con- science this world has witnessed for nineteen hundred years — opened up a new chapter in the history of man- kind. His visit to the Temple impressed him with the truth that the old Mosaic religion was wrong ; that the doctrine of "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth" was the law of vengeance, and that true religion was to love one's enemies, do good unto them that hate you, etc. (30) Such radicalism the Jew could not stand. It would uproot and overturn all his ancient notions. Moreover, it was clearly against the law of Moses, and therefore the Jew said it must be wrong. The Scribes, Pharisees and Sadducees quickly saw that they would be "pushed from their stools," hence their instant and bitter opposition. On the other hand Jesus felt that such sacrifices as he had witnessed were almost, if not quite, impious. The law of bloody sacrifices must be changed, re- (29) Maba Silam, vol. 11, Sacred Books of the East, p. 196; and vol. L'O, S. R. E., p. 152, KuUavagga. (30) Matt., ch. 5. A QUESTION OF MIRACLES 203 pealed, abolished, and in its place must be set the doc- trine of love, and with pure heart they were to pray to the Father — but not standing on the corner of the streets, as the hypocrites (Pharisees) do. (31) India, long before Moses was born, had without a struggle abolished bloody sacrifices, and had fallen back upon rice cakes. But the Jew, being a man of blood, had no regard for animal life, and little, if any, for human life. Hence his determination to destroy the man of Galilee, and thus put an end forever to the new heresy. Jesus' doctrine was to the Jews a terrible heresy, which they determined to punish. Here is the issue. Jesus said the law and prophets were until John (32), and in His sermon on the moun- tain he said he had not come to destroy the law, but to fulfil it. But he soon found that He could not put "new wine into old bottles," (33) for the new wine would burst the old bottles, and the new piece of cloth put upon an old garment would not agree with it. In other words (and he was right about it), his new wine (new doctrines) would rend asunder the old Mosaic faith. We of the twentieth century, standing here and calm.ly looking back, wonder at his temerity. The Jewish mind, always narrow and bigoted, was ready to persecute, even unto strange cities (34), any one who assailed the old Mosaic superstition. That very superstition was the pride of their clan. Nothing good (31) Matt. 5. (32) Luke 16, v. 16. (33) Luke 5, v. 36 and 37; Matt. 9, v. 16 and 17. (34) Acts, ch. 26, v. 11.