




                     College Voluntary Study Courses

                            Fourth Year--Part 1

                      The Social Principles Of Jesus

                                    By

                           Walter Rauschenbusch

       Professor of Church History, Rochester Theological Seminary

 Written under the Direction of Sub-Committee on College Courses, Sunday
 School Council of Evangelical Denominations, and Committee on Voluntary
            Study, Council of North American Student Movements

                            The Woman's Press

                           600 Lexington Avenue

                              New York City

                                   1917

                           Copyright, 1916, by

    The International Committee of Young Men's Christian Associations

                Entered at Stationers' Hall, London, 1916

                           All Rights Reserved





CONTENTS


Introduction
Part I. The Axiomatic Social Convictions Of Jesus
   Chapter I. The Value Of Life
   Chapter II. The Solidarity Of The Human Family
   Chapter III. Standing With The People
Part II. The Social Ideal Of Jesus
   Chapter IV. The Kingdom Of God: Its Values
   Chapter V. The Kingdom Of God: Its Tasks
   Chapter VI. A New Age And New Standards
Part III. The Recalcitrant Social Forces
   Chapter VII. Leadership For Service
   Chapter VIII. Private Property And The Common Good
   Chapter IX. The Social Test Of Religion
Part IV. Conquest By Conflict
   Chapter X. The Conflict With Evil
   Chapter XI. The Cross As A Social Principle
   Chapter XII. A Review And A Challenge
Footnotes






COLLEGE VOLUNTARY STUDY COURSES


"The Social Principles of Jesus" takes seventh place in a series of
text-books known as College Voluntary Study Courses. The general outline
for this curriculum has been prepared by the Committee on Voluntary Study
of the Council of North American Student Movements, representing the
Student Young Men's and Young Women's Christian Associations and the
Student Volunteer Movement, and the Sub-Committee on College Courses of
the Sunday School Council of Evangelical Denominations, representing
twenty-nine communions. Therefore the text-books are planned for the use
of student classes in the Sunday School, as well as for the supplementary
groups on the campus. The present text-book has been written under the
direction of these Committees.

The text-books are not suitable for use in the academic curriculum, as
they have been definitely planned for voluntary study groups.

This series, covering four years, is designed to form a minimum curriculum
for the voluntary study of the Bible, foreign missions, and North American
problems. Daily Bible Readings are printed with each text-book. The
student viewpoint is given first emphasis--what are the student interests?
what are the student problems?


    The Bible text printed in short measure (indented both sides) is
    taken from the American Standard Edition of the Revised Bible,
    copyright, 1901, by Thomas Nelson & Sons, and is used by
    permission.





INTRODUCTION


This book is not a life of Christ, nor an exposition of his religious
teachings, nor a doctrinal statement about his person and work. It is an
attempt to formulate in simple propositions the fundamental convictions of
Jesus about the social and ethical relations and duties of men.

Our generation is profoundly troubled by the problems of organized
society. The most active interest of serious men and women in the colleges
is concentrated on them. We know that we are in deep need of moral light
and spiritual inspiration in our gropings. There is an increasing
realization, too, that the salvation of society lies in the direction
toward which Jesus led. And yet there is no clear understanding of what he
stood for. Those who have grown up under Christian teaching can sum up the
doctrines of the Church readily, but the principles which we must
understand if we are to follow Jesus in the way of life, seem enveloped in
a haze. The ordinary man sees clearly only Christ's law of love and the
golden rule. This book seeks to bring to a point what we all vaguely know.

It does not undertake to furnish predigested material, or to impose
conclusions. It spreads out the most important source passages for
personal study, points out the connection between the principles of Jesus
and modern social problems, and raises questions for discussion. It was
written primarily for voluntary study groups of college seniors, and their
intellectual and spiritual needs are not like those of an average church
audience. It challenges college men and women to face the social
convictions of Jesus and to make their own adjustments.





PART I. THE AXIOMATIC SOCIAL CONVICTIONS OF JESUS




Chapter I. The Value Of Life


Whatever our present conceptions of Jesus Christ may be, we ought to
approach our study of his teachings with a sense of reverence. With the
slenderest human means at his disposal, within a brief span of time, he
raised our understanding of God and of human life to new levels forever,
and set forces in motion which revolutionized history.

Of his teachings we have only fragments, but they have an inexhaustible
vitality. In this course we are to examine these as our source material in
order to discover, if possible, what fundamental ethical principles were
in the mind of Jesus. This part of his thought has been less understood
and appropriated than other parts, and it is more needed today than ever.
Let us go at this study with the sense of handling something great, which
may have guiding force for our own lives. Let us work out for ourselves
the social meaning of the personality and thought of Jesus Christ, and be
prepared to face his challenge to the present social and economic order of
which we are part.

How did Jesus view the life and personality of the men about him? How did
he see the social relation which binds people together? What was the
reaction of his mind in face of the inequalities and sufferings of actual
society? If we can get hold of the convictions which were axiomatic and
immediate with him on these three questions, we shall have the key to his
social principles. We shall take them up in the first three chapters.

DAILY READINGS



First Day: The Worth of a Child


    And they were bringing unto him little children, that he should
    touch them: and the disciples rebuked them. But when Jesus saw it,
    he was moved with indignation, and said unto them, Suffer the
    little children to come unto me; forbid them not: for to such
    belongeth the kingdom of God. Verily I say unto you, Whosoever
    shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he shall
    in no wise enter therein. And he took them in his arms, and
    blessed them, laying his hands upon them.--Mark 10:13-16.


The child is humanity reduced to its simplest terms. Affectionate joy in
children is perhaps the purest expression of social feeling. Jesus was
indignant when the disciples thought children were not of sufficient
importance to occupy his attention. Compared with the selfish ambition of
grown-ups he felt something heavenly in children, a breath of the Kingdom
of God. They are nearer the Kingdom than those whom the world has smudged.
To inflict any spiritual injury on one of these little ones seemed to him
an inexpressible guilt. See Matthew 18:1-6.

_Can the moral standing of a community be fairly judged by the statistics
of child labor and infant mortality?_

_What prompts some young men to tyrannize over their younger brothers?_

_How does this passage and the principle of the sacredness of life bear on
the problem of eugenics?_



Second Day: The Humanity of a Leper


    And when he was come down from the mountain, great multitudes
    followed him. And behold, there came to him a leper, and
    worshipped him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me
    clean. And he stretched forth his hand, and touched him, saying, I
    will; be thou made clean. And straightway his leprosy was
    cleansed. And Jesus saith unto him, See thou tell no man; but go,
    show thyself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses
    commanded, for a testimony unto them.--Matt. 8:1-4.


Whenever Jesus healed he rendered a social service to his fellows. The
spontaneous tenderness which he put into his contact with the sick was an
expression of his sense of the sacredness of life. A leper with fingerless
hands and decaying joints was repulsive to the aesthetic feelings and a
menace to selfish fear of infection. The community quarantined the lepers
in waste places by stoning them when they crossed bounds. (Remember Ben
Hur's mother and sister.) Jesus not only healed this man, but his sense of
humanity so went out to him that "he stretched forth his hand and touched
him." Even the most wretched specimen of humanity still had value to him.

_What is the social and moral importance of those professions which cure
or prevent sickness?_

_How would a strong religious sense of the sacredness of life affect
members of these professions?_



Third Day: The Moral Quality of Contempt


    Ye have heard that it was said to them of old time, Thou shalt not
    kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment:
    but I say unto you, that every one who is angry with his brother
    shall be in danger of the judgment; and whosoever shall say to his
    brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council; and whosoever
    shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of the hell of
    fire.--Matt. 5:21, 22.


In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus demanded that the standards of social
morality be raised to a new level. He proposed that the feeling of anger
and hate be treated as seriously as murder had been treated under the old
code, and if anyone went so far as to use hateful and contemptuous
expressions toward a fellow-man, it ought to be a case for the supreme
court. Of course this was simply a vivid form of putting it. The important
point is that Jesus ranged hate and contempt under the category of murder.
To abuse a man with words of contempt denies his worth, breaks down his
self-respect, and robs him of the regard of others. It is an attempt to
murder his soul. The horror which Jesus feels for such action is an
expression of his own respect for the worth of personality.

_How is the self-respect and sense of personal worth of men built up or
broken down in college communities?_

_How in industrial communities?_



Fourth Day: Bringing Back the Outcast


    Now all the publicans and sinners were drawing near unto him to
    hear him. And both the Pharisees and the scribes murmured, saying,
    This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them.

    And he spake unto them this parable, saying, What man of you,
    having a hundred sheep, and having lost one of them, doth not
    leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that
    which is lost, until he find it? And when he hath found it, he
    layeth it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he cometh home, he
    calleth together his friends and his neighbors, saying unto them,
    Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost. I say
    unto you, that even so there shall be joy in heaven over one
    sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine righteous
    persons, who need no repentance.

    Or what woman having ten pieces of silver, if she lose one piece,
    doth not light a lamp, and sweep the house, and seek diligently
    until she find it? And when she hath found it, she calleth
    together her friends and neighbors, saying, Rejoice with me, for I
    have found the piece which I had lost. Even so, I say unto you,
    there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner
    that repenteth.--Luke 15:1-10.


Every Jewish community had a fringe of unchurched people, who could not
keep up the strict observance of the Law and had given up trying. The
pious people, just because they were pious, felt they must cold-shoulder
such. Jesus walked across the lines established. What seems to have been
the motive that prompted him? Why did the Pharisee withdraw, and why did
Jesus mix with the publicans?

_What groups in our own communities correspond to the __"__publicans and
sinners,__"__ and what is the attitude of religious people toward them?_

_What social groups in college towns are spoken of with contempt by
college men, and why?_

_Is there a Pharisaism of education? Define and locate it._



Fifth Day: The Problem of the Delinquents


    For the Son of man came to seek and to save that which was
    lost.--Luke 19:10.


Here Jesus formulates the inner meaning and mission of his life as he
himself felt it. He was here for social restoration and moral salvage. No
human being should go to pieces if he could help it. He was not only
willing to help people who came to him for help, but he proposed to go
after them. The "lost" man was too valuable and sacred to be lost.

_How does the Christian impulse of salvation connect with the activities
represented in the National Conference of Charities and Correction?_

_How does a college community regard its __"__sinners__"__?_ Suppose a man
has an instinct for low amusements and a yellow sense of honor, how do the
higher forces in college life get at that man to set him right?



Sixth Day: Going Beyond Justice


    For the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that was a
    householder, who went out early in the morning to hire laborers
    into his vineyard. And when he had agreed with the laborers for a
    shilling a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And he went out
    about the third hour, and saw others standing in the marketplace
    idle; and to them he said, Go ye also into the vineyard, and
    whatsoever is right I will give you. And they went their way.
    Again he went out about the sixth and the ninth hour, and did
    likewise. And about the eleventh hour he went out and found others
    standing: and he saith unto them, Why stand ye here all the day
    idle? They say unto him, Because no man hath hired us. He said
    unto them, Go ye also into the vineyard. And when even was come,
    the lord of the vineyard said unto his steward, Call the laborers,
    and pay them their hire, beginning from the last unto the first.
    And when they came that were hired about the eleventh hour, they
    received every man a shilling. And when the first came, they
    supposed that they would receive more; and they likewise received
    every man a shilling. And when they received it, they murmured
    against the householder, saying, These last have spent but one
    hour, and thou hast made them equal unto us, who have borne the
    burden of the day and the scorching heat. But he answered and said
    to one of them, Friend, I do thee no wrong: didst not thou agree
    with me for a shilling? Take up that which is thine, and go thy
    way; it is my will to give unto this last, even as unto thee. Is
    it not lawful for me to do what I will with mine own? or is thine
    eye evil, because I am good? So the last shall be first, and the
    first last.--Matt. 20:1-16.


Judaism rested on legality. So much obedience to the law earned so much
reward, according to the contract between God and Israel. Theoretically
this was just; practically it gave the inside track to the respectable and
well to do, for it took leisure and money to obey the minutiae of the Law.
In this parable the employer rises from the level of justice to the higher
plane of human fellow-feeling. These eleventh-hour men had been ready to
work; they had to eat and live; he proposed to give them a living wage
because he felt an inner prompting to do so. In the parable of the
Prodigal Son the father does more for his son than justice required,
because he was a father. Here the employer does more because he is a man.
Each acted from a sense of the worth of the human life with which he was
dealing. It was the same sense of worth and sacredness in Jesus which
prompted him to invent these parables.

_Do we find ourselves valuing people according to their utility to us, or
do we have an active feeling of their human interest and worth?_ Let us
run over in our minds our family and relatives, our professors and
friends, and the people in town who serve us, and see with whom we are on
a human footing.



Seventh Day: The Courtesy of Jesus


    And early in the morning he came again into the temple, and all
    the people came unto him; and he sat down, and taught them. And
    the scribes and the Pharisees bring a woman taken in adultery; and
    having set her in the midst, they say unto him, Teacher, this
    woman hath been taken in adultery, in the very act. Now in the law
    Moses commanded us to stone such: what then sayest thou of her?
    And this they said, trying him that they might have whereof to
    accuse him. But Jesus stooped down, and with his finger wrote on
    the ground. But when they continued asking him, he lifted up
    himself, and said unto them, He that is without sin among you, let
    him first cast a stone at her. And again he stooped down and with
    his finger wrote on the ground. And they, when they heard it, went
    out one by one, beginning from the eldest, even unto the last: and
    Jesus was left alone, and the woman, where she was, in the midst.
    And Jesus lifted up himself, and said unto her, Woman, where are
    they? did no man condemn thee? And she said, No man, Lord. And
    Jesus said, Neither do I condemn thee: go thy way; from henceforth
    sin no more.--John 8:2-11.


Was there ever a more gentlemanly handling of a raw situation? This woman
was going through one of the most harrowing experiences conceivable,
exposed to the gaze of a leering and scornful crowd, her good name torn
away, her self-respect crushed. Jesus shielded her from stoning by the
power of his personality and his consummate skill in handling men. He got
inside their guard, aroused their own sense of past guilt, and so awakened
some human fellow-feeling for the woman. When he was alone with her, what
a mingling of kindness and severity! Surely she would carry away the
memory of a wonderful friend who came to her in her dire need. Why did
Jesus twice turn his eyes away to the ground? Was he ashamed to look at
her shame?

Such a sudden, tragic happening is a severe test of a man's qualities. It
brought out the courtesy of Jesus, his respect for human personality even
in its shame. _How can we train ourselves so that we may be equal to such
emergencies?_ Would continued spiritual contact with Jesus be likely to
make a difference?



Study for the Week


The passages we have studied are inductive material. Can there be any
doubt that Jesus had a spontaneous love for his fellow-men and a deep
sense of the sacredness of human personality? Physical deformity and moral
guilt could not obscure the divine worth of human life to him. To cause
any soul to stumble and go down, or to express contempt for any human
being, was to him a horrible guilt.


I


This regard for human life was based on the same social instinct which
every normal man possesses. But with Jesus it was so strong that it
determined all his viewpoints and activities. He affirmed the humane
instinct consciously and intelligently, and raised it to the dignity of a
social principle. This alone would be enough to mark him out as a new
type, prophetic and creative of a new development of the race.

Whence did Jesus derive the strength and purity of his social feeling? Was
it simply the endowment of a finely attuned nature? Other fine minds of
the ancient world valued men according to their wealth, their rank, their
power, their education, their beauty. Jesus valued men as such, apart from
any attractive equipment. Why? "The deeper our insight into human destiny
becomes, the more sacred does every individual human being seem to us"
(Lotze). The respect of Jesus for every concrete person whom he met was
due to his religious insight into human life and destiny. But how did he
get his insight?

Love and religion have the power of idealistic interpretation. To a mother
her child is a wonderful being. To a true lover the girl he loves has
sacredness. With Jesus the consciousness of a God of love revealed the
beauty of men. The old gods were despotic supermen, mythical duplicates of
the human kings and conquerors. The God of Jesus was the great Father who
lets his light shine on the just and the unjust, and offers forgiveness
and love to all. Jesus lived in the spiritual atmosphere of that faith.
Consequently he saw men from that point of view. They were to him children
of that God. Even the lowliest was high. The light that shone on him from
the face of God shed a splendor on the prosaic ranks of men. In this way
religion enriches and illuminates social feeling.

Jesus succeeded in transmitting something of his own sense of the
sacredness of life to his followers. As Wundt says: "Humanity in this
highest sense was brought into the world by Christianity." The love of men
became a social dogma of the Church. Some other convictions of Jesus left
few traces on the common thought of Christendom, but the Church has always
stood for a high estimate of the potential worth of the soul of man. It
has always taught that man was made in God's image and that he is destined
to share in the holiness and eternal life of God.


II


What effects has this registered on social conduct? Has the Church
intelligently resisted social forces or conditions which brutalized or
shamed men?

It is most difficult to estimate accurately the historic influence of
religious ideas. They are subtle and hard to trace. But we can justly
reason from our own observations in evangelism and foreign mission work.
Those of us who have gone through a clearly marked conversion to
Christianity will probably remember that we realized our fellow-men with a
new warmth and closeness, and under higher points of view. We were then
entering into the Christian valuation of human life. In foreign missions
the influence of Christianity can be contrasted with non-Christian social
life, and there is often a striking rise in the respect for life and
personality as compared with the hardness and callousness of heathen
society. This is one of the distinctive marks of the modern and Western
world compared with the ancient and the Oriental. Those individuals among
us who have really duplicated something of the spirit of Jesus are always
marked by their loving regard for human life, even its wreckage. That
sense of sacredness is the basis for the whole missionary and
philanthropic activity of Christian men and women.

It is also an important force in the social movements. Have there been any
widespread, continuous, and successful movements for social justice
outside of the territory influenced by Christianity? Was there any causal
connection between the historic reformation and purification of
Christianity since the sixteenth century and the rise of civil and social
democracy? Does the spread of Christian ideas and feelings predispose the
powerful classes to make concessions? What contribution did the Wesleyan
revival among the working people of England make toward the rise of the
trade union movement, the education of stable leaders, and the faith in
democracy? It takes idealistic convictions a long time to permeate large
social classes, but they often spring into effectiveness suddenly.
Certainly a belief in the worth and capacity of the common man is a
spiritual support of democratic institutions, and where the Church really
spread the Christian sense of the worth and sacredness of human life, it
has been a great stabilizer of civil liberty.

Jesus asserted with religious power what all men feel. Sometimes it
requires the solemn presence of death to brush aside the artificial
distinctions of society and to make us realize that a life is a life, and
precious as such. But when we are at our best, we do feel the sacredness
of human life.


III


Does our present social order develop or neutralize that feeling in us?

Presumably it works both ways. For those who want to spread the spirit of
Christ, it becomes important to inquire at what points our social
institutions cheapen life and take the value out of personality.

The class differences inherited from the past are designed to hedge the
upper classes about with honor, but they necessarily depreciate the lower
classes by contrast and neutralize the tie of the common blood. In some
countries the self-respect of the lower classes is affronted by degrading
forms of legal punishment reserved for them. Forms of servility are
exacted from servants and peasants. The practical working of class
differences is most clearly seen in the relation of the sexes. Love is a
great equalizer; hence it clashes with class pride. The plot of
innumerable dramas and novels turns on the efforts of love to overcome the
laws of social caste. Where class spirit is traditional and fully
developed, men have a double code for the women of their own class, and
those of the lower classes. It is a far greater offense for a gentleman to
marry a girl of the lower class than to ruin her.

It is the glory of America that our laws do not intend to recognize class
differences. The conditions of life on a raw continent and the principles
embodied in religious and political idealism fortunately cooperated. Will
this last, or are the great differences in wealth once more resulting in
definite class lines and in class pride and contempt? What does the phrase
"of good family" imply by contrast?