Приложение. О евангелиях и философии евангельской истории 205

The last result of the study of gospel history is given in some ideological content, which represents the theoretical basis of the faith that gives eternal life that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God (John 20:31). This is the idea of ​​​​divine spiritual life, independent in its eternity from suffering and death, unlimited in its universality by the limits of individual and national benefits, realized in a divinely filial mood and in active spiritual love. The bearer of this divine life was Christ, who revealed it to us in His teaching and in His self-denial even to death out of love for man. This result of the philosophy of gospel history constitutes a valuable contribution to the treasury of the human mind. What is especially important is that this meaning of the Gospel story is independent not only of the factual situation and chronological sequence of events of the Gospel history, which is the subject of attacks of negative criticism, but even of the protocol reliability of those particular events of the Gospel history - miracles that form the subject of rationalistic temptation, since the Gospel meaning of these events is not that they served as an external confirmation of the divine life of Christ, but that they raised the gaze of believers from the visible to the invisible. There is no doubt that miracles occupy an extremely important place in gospel history - without miracles there would be no gospel history. In this case, the gospel story is like the opening pages of every religion, since the cradle of every religion is surrounded by the radiance of miracles. But it is also undeniable that only gospel miracles form history proper, actually enter into the course of human life - that only gospel history makes miracles symbols, raises man’s gaze from them to the invisible spiritual life, places him above miracles. This is the main idea of ​​the gospel story. The Gospels present to us the miracle worker as a crucified sufferer and a formidable judge of humanity, and the savior is preached in the Son of God, laying down His soul for people and calling them to become sons of the resurrection. Therefore, just as true spiritual faith is independent of the vision of signs and wonders (John 4:48; 20:29), so the ideological content of the gospel story is outside the area with which negative rationalistic criticism deals. Of course, the miraculous benefits of Christ and the pneumatic inspiration of the early Christians are the basic fact of gospel and church history, the denial of which is tantamount to the denial of meaning in the original history of Christianity. But this fact, according to the meaning of history, fully fits within the boundaries within which the power of faith is placed: not subject to doubt in the experience of Christ’s contemporaries and the original Christians, this fact does not suffer in its completeness if the exceptional manifestations of the personal glory of Christ (for example, § 37) also did not leave the sphere of subjective faith. We consider this result of the philosophy of gospel history not only to have important apologetic significance for our time, but also to correspond to the character of our (canonical) gospels. One of the main assumptions of our research is the ideological and practical nature of our gospels. (See introduction). We feel duty-bound to justify this view in more or less detail. In this case, we first of all have the opportunity to take advantage of the conclusions regarding the gospels of Matthew and John in the article “The Four Gospels” (God. Herald. February 1899), written by an author who can unquestioningly be called an authority in this area. The author of this article explains that the gospels of Matthew and John, who were eyewitnesses and ministers of the Word, have more unity in content, more ideological plan and more consistency in revealing one main thought, while the gospels of Mark and Luke are more historical in nature. Matthew sees in the Gospel the book of Genesis of Jesus Christ, that is, the Savior-Messiah, as the true son of David, the son of Abraham, who realized in himself that moral messianic ideal, the prototypes and plans of which were given in Abraham and David, as well as in the entire Old Testament. The public ministry of Christ in the first gospel is the ministry of prophet, king and high priest, to which the three parts of the gospel correspond - the conversation on the mount, the ministry of miraculous healings and the story of the suffering and death of the Lord. John contemplates in Christ the ideal of the God-man-Logos and reveals in his gospel the glory of the only begotten Son of God, who was incarnated in Jesus Christ and in His God-manhood, mysteriously and internally uniting humanity with divinity and man with God - and the gradual development, on the one hand, of faith in Him in His true disciples, and on the other, of unbelief in His enemies the Jews. In general, in the gospels of the eyewitness apostles, the idea of ​​the Savior-Messiah in Matthew and the God-Man in John is in the foreground, while the historical story itself occupies a kind of auxiliary position, serving as a revelation of the idea. Non-eyewitness evangelists try to report everything that they could know for sure about the life and teaching of the Lord; eyewitness evangelists, knowing everything about the life and teaching of Christ, report, however, only that which served to reveal the idea of ​​the moral, messianic and divine-human dignity of the Savior. For non-eyewitness evangelists, the gospel story follows and reveals the idea of ​​the messianic-divine-human dignity of the Savior, and for eyewitness evangelists, the gospel story itself follows and is illuminated from the idea of ​​the moral-messianic dignity of the Savior. Then the author, on pages that deserve the deepest attention, reveals that the ideological and theological character of the first and fourth gospels does not deprive these gospels of authenticity, since Matthew and John do not impose arbitrary and alien ideas on the gospel history, but comprehend its true idea and purpose. The theological and ideological character gives these gospels the stamp of higher ideological and legal reliability and truthfulness than a simple external chronicle-historical presentation of events according to the time and place of their occurrence. Finally, the author entirely reduces the difference between the ideological and theological character of the first and fourth gospels and the chronicle-historical character of the second and third gospels to the psychological difference between eyewitnesses and non-eyewitness narrators 206 . We readily accept everything that has been said about the gospels of Matthew and John, in general and in particular, in its entirety and without exceptions. But is it possible to believe such a sharp difference between the writings of eyewitness evangelists and non-eyewitness evangelists? I think not. All four gospels have an ideological and theological character. Thus, the chronicle-historical nature of Luke's gospel can be affirmed only in relation to the depiction of individual events and to the general sequence of the gospel history, but cannot be affirmed in relation to the historical sequence and connection of all individual events of the gospel history. But in the general sequence of gospel history, the third gospel agrees at least with the first gospel and in a significant part with the second; therefore, within the indicated boundaries, its chronicle-historical character does not have exceptional value. On the contrary, in relation to those individual events of the gospel history, which, unlike the events of Chapters I and II. of the third gospel, can be placed in a variety of chronological relationships, and Luke's gospel cannot serve as an infallible guide. He sometimes places the events with which he supplements the first two gospels according to a chronological connection, more often by association: similarity or topographical contiguity, and sometimes obviously under the influence of the main idea of ​​his gospel. So the accuracy of the study of everything from the beginning and the presentation in order only to some extent characterize the third gospel - precisely to the extent that does not give the right to rely on it in controversial cases. Likewise, the completeness of the third gospel is relative and conditional. It is more complete than the first and second Gospels, but the well-known limitation of the Evangelist John (XXI, 25) also applies to the Gospel of Luke. If it is said about the eyewitness evangelists that they, knowing everything about the life and teaching of Christ, however, report only what served to reveal known ideas, then nothing prevents one from saying the same about the Gospel of Luke: he had plenty to choose from and he undoubtedly chose. Briefly, Luke's gospel, like the first and fourth gospels, has its own basic idea, which influenced to a greater or lesser extent the choice of material and its arrangement. What idea underlies Luke's presentation of the gospel story? The idea of ​​the universality of the Christian spirit, the salvation of the Gentiles in Christ, is the main idea of ​​the gospel of Paul, the apostle of the tongues. Since this characteristic of the third gospel and its closest relationship to the preaching of St. Paul are well known and generally accepted; we consider it unnecessary to provide evidence. Let us dwell only on two particular examples. According to the Gospel of Matthew, of the last two temptations of Christ, the temptation on the wing of the church was preceded and the last was the temptation on the mountain; in the Gospel of Luke, these two temptations follow in the reverse order, despite the fact that thus the answer of Christ: “Get behind me, Satan” according to the Gospel of Luke falls on the second temptation. The difference between the evangelists is most easily explained by the fact that Luke, in the course of the gospel stories, depicts the work of saving man by Christ in accordance with the order in which the pagans are first saved, and then the Jews, Matthew is the opposite, and the feat of victory over temptation on the mountain is the feat of saving the pagans, while the feat of victory on the wing of the temple is the feat of saving the Jews. Therefore, it is completely impossible in this case to “assimilate the third Gospel to a guiding meaning” when constructing the Gospel history chronologically. Then the social activity of Christ, immediately following the temptation according to the Gospel of Luke, is revealed by His coming to Nazareth, when it turned out that “no prophet is accepted in his own country.” Christ told the Nazarenes: “There were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heavens were shut up for three years and six months, so that there was a great famine throughout the whole earth; and Elijah was not sent to any of them, but only to a widow in Zarephath of Sidon,” etc. The Nazarenes, hearing about their rejection, were filled with rage, drove the Lord out of the city and decided to overthrow Him from the mountain. It is easy to see why Luke begins the history of Christ's social activity with this event: the characteristic nature of this event from the point of view of the main idea of ​​the third gospel is obvious; therefore, of course, and not for historical reasons, this event is described in detail by Luke and placed by him at the head of the Lord’s public ministry. In saying all this, we are not correcting the above reasoning of the author of the article “The Four Gospels”, but only adding to it. His last conclusion regarding the third gospel is that “it differs from all other gospels in the greatest historical completeness, accuracy and consistency of presentation of the life and teachings of the Lord.” Since we are talking about the degree of historical objectivity, this is certain. The Gospel of Luke is characterized by certain historical features. This evangelist alone describes “in order from the beginning” the gospel of the birth of the Forerunner and the birth of the Savior and the history of both births; only he conveys to us the features of the human development of Christ (Luke 2:40,52) and tells us something from the time of His adolescence (Luke 2:41–51); only he puts the gospel history in connection with the history of Syria and the Roman Empire (Luke 2:1; 3:1); The words “year” and “month” appear more often in him than in all other gospels. And yet this evangelist was not guided solely by historical interests; the choice of material and its arrangement were also influenced by the idea of ​​labor. It is impossible to accept the third gospel as a purely historical work and give it decisive preference over the other gospels in controversial cases. Finally, the same must be said about the Gospel of Mark. Let's read this gospel and focus on Mark 1:1-2, 8, 10, 12, 13, 21-27, 32-34, 39, 45; Mark 2:8; Mark 3:11‒12, 14‒15, 21‒22, 29‒30; Mark 4:15; Mark 2:1‒17; Mark 6:7, 13; Mark 7:24. 36; Mark 8:30,33, 38; Mark 9:9. 20‒25.30. Thus, when describing the public ministry of the Lord Christ, Evangelist Mark pays primary attention to the discovery of spiritual strength in Christ in its struggle with evil spirits. Wed. also those passages in the gospel that speak of the outward manifestation of the spiritual power of Christ: I, 31: The Lord heals Peter’s mother-in-law by touching his hand, – Mark 1:41: touched the leper; Mark 3:10: those who had plagues rushed to Him to touch Him; Mark 5: 25‒34: healing of a woman through a secret touch, so that Jesus felt within Himself that power had gone out of Him; Mark 6:56: the sick asked that they might touch at least the hem of His garment; Mark 7:33: The Lord heals the tongue-tied by touching the tongue; Mark 8:22 ff. – also blind through the laying on of hands; Mark 9:27: took the hand of the demoniac; Mark 10:13: They brought children to Him so that He could touch them. The spirituality of the Lord Jesus was especially disgusted by the petty ritualism of the Pharisees - and none of the evangelists portrays it as clearly as in the second gospel (chap. Mark 2; Mark 3; Mark 7; Mark 8). The victorious spirituality of Christ had two enemies: the demon-possessed, who confessed Him to be the Son of God, 207 and the ritual-loving Pharisees, who saw in His spirituality the action of an unclean spirit. The Pharisees were just as much an instrument of Beelzebub as the demoniacs. In these cursory strokes the main idea of ​​the second gospel appears to us quite clearly. At least we have the right to say that in the gospel of Mark, just like in the other gospels, the influence of the main idea is felt. And of course, in the fact that a number of miracles performed by Christ in this gospel begin with the expulsion of an unclean spirit from a demoniac, it is necessary to see the influence of the main idea of ​​the gospel. So, the ideological and theological character must be recognized in all four canonical gospels. At the same time, the explanation of this nature of the gospels by the personal biographical circumstances of the first and fourth evangelists should be expanded to the limits of the universal spirit of the gospels. The gospels must have this character essentially. Here there could only be a difference between believing and unbelieving evangelists, if the latter were not an obvious absurdity. Believing evangelists, precisely because they are believers, inevitably give the gospel records the subjective character of personal faith. There is little difference here, which is created by the purely psychological basis of the evangelists’ acquaintance or unfamiliarity with the Founder of Christianity, carnal knowledge or ignorance of Him; What is more important here is the religious-psychological basis of faith in Him, common to all evangelists and all believers. The whole strength lies in the fact that the attitude of believers to the gospel of Christ and their presentation of His gospel can only be ideological and subjective. The invisible, inaudible and not rationally perceived basis of Christ’s teaching is the life He gives, which is experienced experientially by believers. This forms the inevitability of the subjective attitude of believers to the gospel and the ideological and pragmatic nature of the gospels. Complete objectivity and a purely rational attitude to the Gospel story is possible only on the part of an unbeliever. Only an unbelieving scientist can write objective gospel history. Examples of such learned history in Western theological literature - by conviction and in Russian - by misunderstanding and imitation are numerous. Evangelical subjectivity is quite similar to the aesthetic attitude towards a work of art on the part of a person to whom art gives pleasure, for whom it serves as a source of unique feelings. An objective attitude to art is possible on the part of a scientist in whom art does not evoke peculiar feelings, who judges a work of art not from the point of view of these feelings, but wholly reduces aesthetic sensation to physiology. An objective attitude towards life in general would also be that attitude which does not proceed from a subjective sensation of life, but consists in explaining life by mechanical forces. Recently, such an objective scientific attitude to questions of life in general and mental and moral life in particular was considered fashionable, but now this fashion has outlived its time. It is time to banish it from the field of Christian scientific theology. It’s time to admit that here the immanent use of reason is possible only in an ideological-subjective relation to the gospel, to the invisible in the field of theological issues proper. Recently, the conviction has been growing stronger that here the use of rational proofs, apologetic techniques, but at least fruitless, to say the least; Attempts are being made to apply these conclusions to missionary work. We would like to strengthen this truth in relation to the gospel story. For the non-believer scientist, the gospels represent a series of chronological, topographical and biographical narratives; the gospel story poses questions of chronology, topography, ethnography, etc. For the believer, the gospel story is a story about the historical beginning of the spiritual life that he lives together with all Christians. The most important thing here is that spiritual life cannot be expressed in chronological-topographical-ethnographic-biographical terms and is not perceptible to them. Of course, the dispute between believing and non-believing historians could remain unresolved in the sense that both are right from their point of view. But the fact that all the gospels have an ideological and theological character finally resolves this dispute. We can say to unbelieving historians; you will be right when you find objective sources for the gospel history. As long as this is not the case, there cannot be a truly scientific “gospel history,” but there can only be a “philosophy of evangelical history.” In any case, to admit that among the evangelists (not only eyewitnesses, but also non-eyewitnesses) “the gospel story itself follows and is illuminated from the idea of the moral-messianic dignity of the Savior,” this means recognizing the possibility and legitimacy of the philosophy of the gospel story. That this philosophy should not be an introduction of worldly wisdom into the gospel history, should not be a fruitless attempt to illuminate it from the point of view of worldly ideas alien to it philosophy, but must be an expression of ideas peculiar to it, must be an illumination and revelation of the divine wisdom revealed in it, must be an expression of its own mind - this is easy to understand, but this cannot in any way be an objection to the possibility and legitimacy of the philosophy of gospel history. To object in this case would mean to deny that the crucified Christ is God’s wisdom, that He became wisdom from God for us (1 Cor. 1:24.30), that the gospel story contains God’s wisdom, secret, hidden, destined by God from the beginning for our glory (1 Cor. 6-7; Eph. 1:8–9). Or, recognizing the wisdom of the Gospel, we will deny the legitimacy of love for it (φιλια), although we are commanded to ask God for wisdom (James 1:5), although the word of wisdom (λόγος σοφίας) is the gift of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 12:8), the Father of glory Himself gives us the spirit of wisdom (πνεῖμα σοφίας Eph. 1:17), although we should be mature in mind (1 Cor. 15:20), love the Lord with all our mind (Mark 12:30)? Can philosophy (Col. 2:8) really not be Christian?... When modern theologians talk about the scholastic direction of theology, they are often unaware of the full scope of scholasticism - the true boundaries within which scholasticism retains its character. It must be recognized that the only reasonable goal of theology is the disclosure of Christian ideas; it is necessary to recognize the only intrinsic value of theological writings - the value of Christian truths. This purpose should not be neglected by any theological work worthy of this name. The author of any theological study who does not consciously guide it to this goal deprives it of all right to exist, just as every brick that is not included in the architectural plan of a building is thrown into the trash. The only difference is that in spiritual and theological construction there is no division between architects and laborers; here every worker must be a conscious creator, everyone must be presented with the idea of ​​Christianity. Of course, here too there is menial work, which is extremely tedious at times, painstaking, and takes many years; but it must be carried out invisibly for the reader, before whom only architecturally meaningful buildings should appear. In the theological field, there should certainly be no place for unprincipled “scientific” works, the authors of which deal with books, and not with the subject, not with the ideas of Christianity. Truly pathetic are those theological works that are limited to the study of factual issues that do not have the slightest ideological interest, or to the presentation and analysis of opinions without positive conclusions. Not only in contrast to the “secular” sciences, but even in contrast to the church-historical sciences, theology, like philosophy and especially practical philosophy, knows only one value - the value of ideas. This value is great - the value of the Christian idea... Just don’t think that the Christian idea can be easily gleaned from any theological textbook and that the task of ideological theological works is to smear hackneyed phrases from these textbooks. No, the Christian idea is ponderous, highly sophisticated, but covered with a thick layer of superstition and scholastic darkness. We need to break through this darkness to get to it, we need to cleanse it from all impurities - and then it will shine before us in all its splendor... Maybe this is a matter of the distant future for us, since Christian philosophy is still in persecution and has not yet begun to officially exist, but this future will come only under this indispensable condition if we get used to valuing only one thing in theological works - the value of Christian ideas. The application of the ego arose for reasons of a purely subjective nature... God. West. 1899, I, pp. 155‒190. You might be interested in: