I l l The Person and Work of Jesus Christ reason thus: I f the liberal theologians admit that their pic- ture of Christ is different from that which was believed by the Church during all the centuries of her existence—dif- ferent from that of St. Paul, of St. John, of the Synoptic Gospels, of the sources of the Synoptic Gospels; if, as Pro- fessor Pfleiderer says, “Jewish phophecy, rabbinical teachings, Oriental gnosis, and Greek philosophy had already put the colors on the palette from which the picture of Christ was painted in the New Testament writings;” if, as is admitted, the Church was built from the very beginning, not upon the Galilean peasant Jesus, but upon the Christ, the Son of God; and if this Christ is nothing but the creation of speculative theologians, as Paul and John—t hen there is no need at all of a historic Christ. It is not necessary at all that a man Jesus of Nazareth should ever have lived in order to explain the fact of Christianity. Even from the point of view of present religious needs of human nature this Jesus of liberal theology is unnecessary. Orthodox theology is Christ-centric; liberal theology is God- centric. “Back to Christ,” exclaims Professor Wemle, “but only as a means to return to God the Father. God the Father is to regain that supremacy ovei" our lives which Jesus had intended to give Him, but of which theological dogma has deprived Him.” The modern thinkers mentioned above can not see the need of any human mediator between God and man. They want a living, present God, and a constant present communion with Him, if they want a God at all. Neither Catholic saint nor a dead Jew is to stand between their own lives and God. Says Professor Drews: •“The belief in the personal grandeur and the beauty of character of the man Jesus has nothing to do with religion.” W. von Schnehen writes still more explicitly: “Even if God should have re- vealed Himself in the personality of the man Jesus of Naza- reth, it is utterly useless to me, unless God reveals Himself to me likewise. If He does reveal Himself to me, then His
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