The title "son of God" is
frequent in the Old Testament. The word "son" was employed among the
Semites to signify not only filiation, but other close connexion or intimate
relationship. Thus, "a son of strength" was a hero, a warrior,
"son of wickedness" a wicked man, "sons of pride" wild
beasts, "son of possession" a possessor, "son of pledging"
a hostage, "son of lightning" a swift bird, "son of death"
one doomed to death, "son of a bow" an arrow, "son of
Belial" a wicked man, "sons of prophets" disciples of prophets
etc. The title "son of God" was applied in the Old Testament to
persons having any special relationship with God. Angels, just and pious men,
the descendants of Seth, were called "sons of God" (Job 1:6; 2:1;
Psalm 89:7; Wisdom 2:13; etc.). In a similar manner it was given to Israelites
(Deuteronomy 14:50); and of Israel, as a nation, we read: "And thou shalt
say to him: Thus saith the Lord: Israel is my son, my firstborn. I have said to
thee: Let my son go, that he may serve me" (Exodus 4:22 sq.).
The leaders of the people, kings, princes,
judges, as holding authority from God, were called sons of God. The theocratic
king as lieutenant of God, and especially when he was providentially selected
to be a type of the Messias, was honoured with the title "Son of
God". But the Messias, the Chosen One, the Elect of God, was par
excellence called the Son of God (Ps. ii, 7). Even Wellhausen admits that Psalm
2 is Messianic (see Hast., Dict. the Bible", IV, 571). The prophecies
regarding the Messias became clearer as time went on, and the result is ably
summed up by Sanday (ibid.): "The Scriptures of which we have been
speaking mark so many different contributions to the total result, but the
result, when it is attained, has the completeness of an organic whole. A Figure
was created — projected as it were upon the clouds--which was invested with all
the attributes of a person. And the minds of men were turned toward it in an
attitude of expectation. It makes no matter that the lines of the Figure are
drawn from different originals. They meet at last in a single portraiture. And
we should never have known how perfectly they meet if we had not the Old
Testament picture to compare with that of the New Testament. The most literal
fulfilment of prediction could not be more conclusive proof that all the course
of the world and all the threads of history are in one guiding Hand." The
Messias besides being the Son of God was to be called Emmanuel (God with us)
Wonderful, Counsellor, God the Mighty, the Father of the world to come, Prince
of Peace (Isaiah 8:8-9) (see MESSIAS).
The title "the Son of God" is
frequently applied to Jesus Christ in the Gospels and Epistles. In the latter
it is everywhere employed as a short formula for expressing His Divinity
(Sanday); and this usage throws light on the meaning to be attached to it in
many passages of the Gospels. The angel announced: "He shall be great, and
shall be called the Son of the most High... the Holy which shall be born of
thee shall be called the Son of God" (Luke 1:32, 35). Nathaniel, at his
first meeting, called Him the Son of God (John 1:49). The devils called Him by
the same name, the Jews ironically, and the Apostles after He quelled the
storm. In all these cases its meaning was equivalent to the Messias, at least.
But much more is implied in the confession of St. Peter, the testimony of the
Father, and the words of Jesus Christ.
We read in Matthew 16:15-16: "Simon
Peter answered and said: Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus
answering, said to him: Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jona: because flesh and
blood hath not revealed it to thee, but my Father who is in heaven." The
parallel passages have: "Thou art the Christ" (Mark 8:29), "The
Christ of God" (Luke 9:20). There can be no doubt that St. Matthew gives
the original form of the expression, and that St. Mark and St. Luke in giving
"the Christ" (the Messias), instead, used it in the sense in which
they understood it when they wrote, viz. as equivalent to "the incarnate
Son of God" (see Rose, VI). Sanday, writing of St. Peter's confession,
says: "the context clearly proves that Matthew had before him some further
tradition, possibly that of the Logia, but in any case a tradition that has the
look of being original" (Hastings, "Dict. of the Bible"). As
Rose well points out, in the minds of the Evangelists Jesus Christ was the
Messias because He was the Son of God, and not the Son of God because He was
the Messias.
(1) At the Baptism. "And Jesus being
baptized, forthwith came out of the water: and lo, the heavens were opened to
him: and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove, and coming upon him.
And behold a voice from heaven, saying, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I
am well pleased" (Matthew 3:16, 17). "And there came a voice from
heaven: Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased" (Mark 1:11;
Luke 3:22).
(2) At the Transfiguration. "And lo,
a voice out of the cloud saying: This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well
pleased: hear ye him" (Matthew 17:5; Mark 9:6; Luke 9:35). Though Rose
admits that the words spoken at the Baptism need not necessarily mean more than
what was suggested by the Old Testament, viz. Son of God is equal to the
Messias, still, as the same words were used on both occasions, It is likely
they had the same meaning in both cases. The Transfiguration took place within
a week after St. Peter's Confession. And the words were used in the meaning in
which the three disciples would then understand them; and at the Baptism it is
probable that only Christ, and perhaps the Baptist, heard them, so that it is
not necessary to interpret them according to the current opinions of the crowd.
Even so cautious a critic a the Anglican Professor Sanday writes on thee
passage: "And if, on the occasions in question, the Spirit of God did
intimate prophetically to chosen witnesses, more or fewer, a revelation couched
partly in the language of the ancient Scriptures, it would by no means follow
that the meaning of the revelation was limited to the meaning of the older
Scriptures. On the contrary, it would be likely enough that the old words would
be charged with new meaning--that, indeed the revelation...would yet be in
substance a new revelation.... And we may assume that to His (Christ's) mind
the announcement 'Thou art my Son?' meant not only all that it ever meant to
the most enlightened seers of the past, but, yet more, all that the response of
His own heart told Him that it meant in the present.... But it is possible, and
we should be justified in supposing--not by way of dogmatic assertion but by
way of pious belief--in view of the later history and the progress of
subsequent revelation, that the words were intended to suggest a new truth, not
hitherto made known, viz. that the Son was Son not only in the sense of the Messianic
King, or of an Ideal People, but that the idea of sonship was fulfilled in Him
in a way yet more mysterious and yet more essential; in other words, that He
was Son, not merely in prophetic revelation, but in actual transcendent fact
before the foundation of the world" (Hastings, "Dict. of the
Bible").
(1) The Synoptics. The key to this is
contained in His words, after the Resurrection: "I ascend to my Father and
to your Father" (John 20:17). He always spoke of MY Father, never of OUR
Father. He said to the disciples: "Thus then shall YOU pray: Our
Father", etc. He everywhere draws the clearest possible distinction
between the way in which God was His Father and in which He was the Father of
all creatures. His expressions clearly prove that He claimed to be of the same
nature with God; and His claims to Divine Sonship are contained very clearly in
the Synoptic Gospels, though not as frequently as in St. John.
"Did you not know, that I must be
about my father's business" (Luke 2:49); "Not every one that saith to
me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven: but he that doth the
will of my Father who is in heaven, he shall enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Many will say to me in that day: Lord, Lord, have not we prophesied in thy
name, and cast out devils in thy name, and done many miracles in thy name? And
then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me you, that work
iniquity" (Matthew 7:21-23). "Everyone therefore that shall confess
me before men, I will also confess him before my Father who is in heaven"
(Matthew 10:32). "At that time Jesus answered and said: I confess to thee,
O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the
wise and prudent, and hast revealed them to little ones. Yea, Father; for so
hath it seemed good in thy sight. All things are delivered to me by my Father.
And no one knoweth the Son, but the Father: neither doth any one know the
Father, but the Son, and he to whom it shall please the Son to reveal HIM. Come
to me, all you that labour, and are burdened, and I will refresh you"
(Matthew 11:25-30; Luke 10:21, 22). In the parable of the wicked husbandmen the
son is distinguished from all other messengers: "Therefore having yet one
son, most dear to him; he also sent him unto them last of all, saying: They
will reverence my son. But the husbandmen said one to another: This is the
heir; come let us kill him" (Mark 12:6). Compare Matthew 22:2, "The
kingdom of heaven is likened to a king, who made a marriage for his son."
In Matthew 17:25, He states that as Son of God He is free from the temple tax.
"David therefore himself calleth him Lord, and whence is he then his
son?" (Mark 12:37). He is Lord of the angels. He shall come "in the
clouds of heaven with much power and majesty. And he shall send his
angels" (Matthew 24:30, 31). He confessed before Caiphas that he was the
Son of the blessed God (Mark 14:61-2). "Going therefore, teach ye all
nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the
Holy Ghost... and behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of
the world" (Matthew 28:19, 20).
The claims of Jesus Christ, as set forth
in the Synoptic Gospels, are so great that Salmon is justified in writing
(Introd. to New Test., p. 197): "We deny that they [Christ's utterances in
the Fourth Gospel] are at all inconsistent with what is attributed to Him in
the Synoptic Gospels. On the contrary, the dignity of our Saviour's person, and
the duty of adhering to Him, are as strongly stated in the discourses which St.
Matthew puts into His mouth as in any later Gospel.... The Synoptic Evangelists
all agree in representing Jesus as persisting in this claim [of Supreme Judge]
to the end, and finally incurring condemnation for blasphemy from the
high-priest and the Jewish Council.... It follows that the claims which the
Synoptic Gospels represent our Lord a making for Himself are so high...that, if
we accept the Synoptic Gospels as truly representing the character of our
Lord's language about Himself, we certainly have no right to reject St. John's
account, on the score that he puts too exalted language about Himself into the
mouth of our Lord."
(2) St. John's Gospel. It will not be
necessary to give more than a few passages from St. John's Gospel. "My
Father worketh until now; and I work.... For the Father loveth the Son, and
sheweth him all things which he himself doth: and greater works than these will
he shew him, that you may wonder. For as the Father raiseth up the dead, and
giveth life: so the Son also giveth life to whom he will. For neither doth the
Father judge any man, but hath given all judgment to the Son. That all may
honour the Son, as they honour the Father" (v, 17, 20-23). "And this
is the will of my Father that sent me: that everyone who seeth the Son, and believeth
in him, may have life everlasting, and I will raise him up in the last
day" (vi, 40). "Father, the hour is come, glorify thy Son, that thy
Son may glorify thee.... And now glorify thou me, O Father, with thyself, with
the glory which I had, before the world was, with thee" (xvi, 1, 5).
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