CHAPTER V. THE FIRST VISIT TO THE TEMPLE, AND THE EDUCATION OF JESUS. § 40. JESUS, WHEN TWELVE YEAES OLD, IN THE TEMPLE. THE Gospel of Matthew passes in silence over the entire period from the return of the parents of Jesus out of Egypt, to the baptism of Jesus by John; and even Luke has nothing to tell us of tlie long interval between tlie early childhood of Jesus and his maturity, beyond a single incident-his demeanour on a visit to tlie temple in his twelfth year (ii. 41-52). This anecdote, out of the early youth of Jesus is, as Hess has truly remarked,? distinguished from the narratives hitherto considered, belonging to his childhood, by the circumstance that Jesus no longer, a,s in the latter, holds a merely passive position, but presents an active proof of his high destination; a proof which has always been especially valued, as indicating the moment in which the consciousness of that destination was kindled in Jesus. || In liis twelfth year, the period at which, according to Jewish * Ueher den Lukas, S. 49. There is a similar hesitation in Theile, Biographic Jesu, §• 13. •)• Ueber den Ursprung u. s. w., S. 68 f. u. S. 158. f Comp. Animon, Fortbil- dung, 1, S. 194 ft'.; Ue Wette, exeget. Handli., 1, 2, S. 24 f.; George, S. 84 ff. Thai different narrators may give different explanations of the same fact, and that these dif- ferent explanations may afterwards be united in one book, is proved by many examples in the 0. T. Thus in Genesis, three derivations are given of tlie name of Isaac; two o( that of Jacob,(xxv. 26. xxvii. 16), and so of Edom and Beershcba (xxvi. 33). Coinp. De Wrtte, Kritik der mos. Geseh.. !->. 1 10- I 18 ft' im.l mi. u.t^^,-i,,;e^^ 1 i c ca «• 192 THE LIFE OF JESUS. usage, the boy became capable of an independent participation in the sacred rites, the parents of Jesus, as this narrative informs us, took him for tlie first time to the Passover. At tlie expiration of the feast, the parents bent tlieir -vvay homewards ; that their son •was missing gave them no immediate anxiety, because they sup- posed him to be amon"' their travelling companions, and it was not until after they liad accomplished a day's journey, and in vain sought tlieir son among their kinsfolk and acquaintance, that they turned back to Jerusalem to look for him there. Tins conduct on the part of tlie parents of Jesus may witli reason excite surprise. It seems inconsistent witli the carefulness which it has been thought incumb- ent on us to attribute to them, that they should have allowed tlie divine child entrusted to their keeping, to remain so long out of their siglit; and hence they have on many sides been accused of neglect and a dereliction of duty, in the instance before us.* It has been urged, as a general consideration in vindication of Joseph and Mary, tliat the greater freedom permitted to tlie boy is easily con- ceivable as part of a liberal method of education ;f but even accord- ing to our modern ideas, it would seem more than liberal for parents to let a boy of twelve years remain out of their sight during so long an interval as our narrative supposes ; how far less rcconcileable must it then be with tlie more rigid views of education lield by the ancients, not excepting the Jews ? It is remarked however, that viewing the case as an extraordinary one, the parents of Jesus knew their child, and they could therefore very well confide in his under- standing and character, so far as to be in no fear that any danger •would accrue to him from his unusual freedom ;f but we can per- ceive from tlieir subsequent anxiety, that they were not so entirely at ease on tliat liead. Thus tlieir conduct must be admitted to be such as we sliould not have anticipated: but it is not consequently incredible, nor docs it suffice to render the entire narrative improb- able, for the parents of Jesus are no saints to us, that we should not impute to them any fault. Returned to Jerusalem, they find their son on tlie third day in the temple, doubtless in one of the outer halls, in tlie midst of an assembly of doctors, engaged in a conversation with them, and ex- citing universal astonishment (v. 45 f.) From some indications it would seem tliat Jesus lield a higher position in tlie presence of the doctors, than could belong to a boy of twelve years. Tlie word ica6ei;6fzevov (sitting) lias excited scruples, for according to Jewisli records, it was not until after the death of the Rabbi Gamaliel, an event long subsequent to tlie one described in our narrative, that the pupils of the rabbins sat, they having previously been required to stand§ when in the school; but this J cwisli tradition is of doubtful authority. || It has also been thought a difficulty, tliat Jesus does * Olshausen, ut sup. 1. 150. + Hase, Leben Jeau, § 37. f Heydenreicli, uber die TT-.-__-I'-__. _.i .-^ .. _ a i o A€\O e n.r.,,.-:n..l. f m »^.,A T;™1,*<-^A* tn !«,* II Vi;1. Knin/il. FIRST VISIT TO THE TEMPLE. 193 not merely hear the doctors, but also asks them questions, thus ap- pearing to assume the position of their teacher. Such is indeed the representation of the apocryphal Gospels, for in them Jesus, before lie is twelve years old, perplexes all tlie doctors by his questions,* and reveals to his instructor in tlie alphabet the mystical signiiiancc of the characters ;f wliilc at the above visit to the temple lie proposes controversial questions,:): such as that toucliing tlie Messiah's being at once David's Son and Lord, (Mattli. xxii. 41) and proceeds to throw light on all departments of knowledge.§ If the expressions epUTav and cnroKpiveaOal implied that Jesus played tlie part of a tcaclier in this scene, so unnatural a feature in tlie evangelical nar- rative would render tlie whole suspicious. || But tliere is nothing to render this interpretation of tlie words necessary, for according to Jewish custom, rabbinical teaching was of such a kind that not only did tlie masters interrogate the pupils, but the pupils interrogated the masters, when they wished for explanations on any point.*!' We may witli the more probability suppose that the writer intended to attribute to Jesus sucli questions as suited a boy, because he, appa- rently not without design, refers the astonishment of the doctors, not to his questions, but to that in which lie could best show himself in the liglit of an intelligent pupil-namely, to his answers. A more formidable difficulty is the statement, that the boy Jesus sat m the midst of the doctors, iv ^liw TWV 6iSaaK.d'/.uv. For we leam from Paul (Acts xxii. 3.) the position that became a pupil, when he says that he was brought up at the feet (TTapa'-ov? To6a^ of Gamaliel: it being the custom for tlie rabbins to be placed on chairs, while their pupils sat on the ground,** and did not take their places among their masters. It has indeed been thought that iv y,iaw might be so ex- plained as to signify, either that Jesus sat between the doctors, who are supposed to have been elevated on chairs, wliile Jesus and tlie other pupils are pictured as sitting on tlie ground between them,1-t or merely that lie was in the company of doctors, that is, in the synagogue \\\ but according to the strict sense of the words, the expression icaOi^eaOal, sv f.iia(f> nvGiv appears to signify, if not as Schottgen believes, §§ in mujorem Jesu gloriam, a place of pre- eminent honour, at least a position of equal dignity with tliat oc- cupied by tlie rest. It need only be asked, would it harmonize witli the spirit of our narrative to substitute iiaO^oi-ievov Trapa rovf •n66a<; wv StSaaitdXuv for naO. KV ^EOG) T. 6. ? the answer will cer- tainly be in the negative, and it will then be inevitable to ad- mit, that our narrative places Jesus in another relation to tlie doc- tors than tliat of a learner, though the latter is the only natural one for a boy of twelve, however highly gifted. For Olshausen's * Evang. Thomae, c. vi. ff. Ap. Thilo, p. 288 fi'i and Evang. infant, arab. c. xlviii. P. 123, Thilo, •)• Ibid. t Evang. intant.-arab. c, 1. § Ibid. c. 1, and li; comp, ev. Tho- "la', c. xix, ]| Olshausen confesses this, S. lol, ^ For proofs (e, g, Hieros, Taanith, lxv"' 4) see Western and LiKhtfbut, in loc, ** Lightfoot, Horgi, p, ^Vi, f-i- Pnulus, 194 THE LIFE OF JESUS. position,*-that in Jesus nothing was formed from without, by the instrumentality of another's wisdom, because this would be incon- sistent with the character of the Messiah, as absolutely self-determin- ed,-contradicts a dogma of the church which he himself advances, namely, tliat Jesus in his manifestation as man, followed tlic regular course of human development. For not only is it in the nature of this development to be gradual, but also, and still more essentially, to be dependent, whether it be mental or physical, on tlie inter- change of reception and influence. To deny this in relation to tlie physical life of Jesus-to say, for example, tliat tlie food which lie took did not serve for tlie nourishment and growth of his body by real assimilation, but merely furnished occasion for him to reproduce himself from witliin, would strike every one as Docetism; and ig the analogous proposition in relation to his spiritual development, namely, tliat lie appropriated nothing from without, and used wliat lie heard from others merely as a voice to evoke one truth after an- other from tlie recesses of his own mind-is tills anything else than a more refined Docetism ? Truly, if we attempt to form a conception of tlie conversation of Jesus with the doctors in tlic temple according to this theory, we make anything but a natural scene of it. It is not to be supposed tliat he taught, nor properly speaking tliat lie was taught, but that tlie discourse of tlie doctors merely gave an im- petus to Ins power of teaching himself, and was tlie occasion for an ever-brightening light to rise upon him, especially on tlie subject of his own destination. But in that case lie would certainly have given utterance to his newly acquired knowledge; so tliat tlie posi- tion of a teacher on tlie part of tlie boy would return upon us, a po- sition which Olshausen himself pronounces to be preposterous. At least such an indirect mode of teaching is involved as Ness sub- scribes to, when he supposes that Jesus, even thus early, made tlie first attempt to combat the prejudices which swayed in "the synagogue, exposing to the doctors, by means of good-humoured questions and requests for explanation, sucli as are willingly permitted to a boy, the weakness of many of their dogmas.* But even such a position on the part of a boy of'twelve, is inconsistent with tlie true process of human development, through which it behoved tlie God-Man him- self to pass. Discourse of this kind from a boy must, wo grant, have excited the astonishment of all tlie hearers; nevertheless tlio expression E^iaravro TrdvTe^ ol duovovree; avrov (v. 47.), looks too much like a panegyrical formula. § Tlie narrative proceeds to tell us how the mother of Jesus re- proached lier son when she liad found him thus, asking him wliy lie had not spared his parents the anguisli of their sorrowful search? * Bilil. Comm. p. 151. t Geschichte Jesu, S. 112. f. In the similar account also which Josephus gives us of himself when fourteen, it is easy to discern the exaggeration of a self-complacent man. Lite, 2 : Moreover, when I was a child, and about fourteen years of age, 1 was commended by all for the love I had to learning, on which account the high priests and principal men of the city came there frequently in me together, in order to FIEST VISIT TO THE TEMPLE. 195 To this Jesus returns an answer which forms the point of the entire narrative; he asks whether they might not have known that he was to be sought nowhere else than in the house of his Father, in the temple ? (v. 48 f.) One might be inclined to understand this de- signation of God as ~ov -n-arpb^ generally, as implying that God was the. Father of all men, and only in this sense the Fatlier of Jesus. But flits interpretation is forbidden, not only by tlie addition of the pronoun ^ov, the above sense requiring i\\iGiv (as in Matt. vi. 9.), but still more absolutely by the circumstance tliat tlie parents of Jesus did not understand these words (v. 50), a decided indication that they must have a special meaning, which can liere be no other than the mystery of the Messiahship of Jesus, wlio as Messiah, was vibf Oeov in a peculiar sense. But that Jesus in his twelfth year had already the consciousness of his Messiahship is a position which, although it may be consistently adopted from the orthodox point of view, and although it is not opposed to tlie regular human form of the development of Jesus, which even orthodoxy maintains, we are not here bound to examine. So also the natural explanation, which retains the above narrative as a liistory, though void of the miracu- lous, and which accordingly supposes tlie parents of Jesus, owing to a particular combination of circumstances, to have come even before his birtli to a conviction of his Messiahship, and to have instilled this conviction into their son from his earliest childhood,-this too may make it plain how Jesus could be so clear as to Ills messianic relation to God; but it can only do so by the hypothesis of an un- precedented coincidence of extraordinary accidents. We, on the contrary, who have renounced the previous incidents as historical, either in the supernatural or the natural sense, are unable to com- prehend how the consciousness of his messianic destination could t>e so early developed in Jesus. For though tlie consciousness of a more subjective vocation, as that of a poet or an artist, which is dependent solely on the internal gifts of the individual, (gifts which cannot long remain latent,) may possibly be awakened very early; an objective vocation, in wliicli tlie conditions of external reality are a chief co-operator, as tlie vocation of the statesman, the general, the reformer of religion, can hardly be so early evident to the most highly endowed individual, because for this a knowledge of con- temporary circumstances would be requisite, which only long obser- vation and mature experience can confer. Of the latter kind is the vocation of tlie Messiah, and if this is implied in the words by which Jesus in his twelfth year justified his lingering in tlie temple, he cannot have uttered the words at that period. In anotlier point of view also, it is worthy of notice that the parents of Jesus are said (v. 50) not to have understood tlie words which lie addressed to them. What did these words signify? That God was Ills Father, in whose house it behoved him to be. But that her snn ivrmir] ;r> o o,,n^;^» „„,.„„ i.» -n~J - ".!>.-1"-'" 1---1 T 196 THE LIFE OF JESUS. 35), and that he would have a peculiar relation to the temple she miglit infer, both from the above title, and from tlie striking recep- tion which he had met with at his first presentation in the temple, when yet an infant. The parents of Jesus, or at least Mary, of whom it is repeatedly noticed that she carefully kept in her heart tlie extraordinary communications concerning her son, ought not to liave been in the dark a single moment as to the meaning of his language on this occasion. But even at the presentation in the temple, we are told that the parents of Jesus marvelled at tlie dis- course of Simeon (v. 33.), which is merely saying in other words that they did not understand him. And their wonder is not referred to the declaration of Simeon that their boy would be a cause not only of the rising again, but of the fall of many in Israel, and that a sword would pierce through the heart of his mother (an aspect of Ins vocation and destiny on which nothing had previously been com- municated to the parents of Jesus, and at which therefore they might naturally wonder); for these disclosures are not made by Simeon until after the wonder of the parents, which is caused only by Si- meon's expressions of joy at the sight of tlie Saviour, who would be the glory of Israel, and a liglit even to the Gentiles. And liere again there is no intimation that the wonder was excited by tlie idea that Jesus would bear this relation to tlie heathens, which indeed it could not well be, since this more extended destination of the Mes- siah had been predicted in the Old Testament. There remains there- fore as a reason for tlie wonder in question, merely tlie fact of tlie child's Messiahship, declared by Simeon; a fact which had been long ago announced to them by angels, and which was acknowledged by Mary in her song of praise. We have just a parallel difficulty in the present case, it being as inconceivable that the parents of Jesus sliould not understand his allusion to his messianic character, as that they should wonder at tlie declaration of it by Simeon. We must therefore draw this conclusion : if the parents of Jesus did not understand these expressions of their son when twelve years old, those earlier communications cannot have happened; or, if the earlier communications really occurred, tlie subsequent expressions of Jesus cannot have remained incomprehensible to them. Having done away with those earlier incidents as liistorical, we might con- tent ourselves with this later want of comprehension, were it not fair to mistrust tlie whole of a narrative whose later portions agree so ill with the preceding. For it is the character not of an historical record, but of a marvellous legend, to represent its personages as so permanently in a state of wonder, that they not only at tlie first appearance of the extraordinary, but even at tlie second, third, tenth repetition, when one would expect them to be familiarized with it, continually are astonished and do not understand-obviously with the view of exalting tlie more highly the divine impartation 1-iv tins laa+incr incnmiTrp.hensibleness. So. to draw an example from FIKST VISIT TO THE TEMPLE. 197 death is set forth in all its loftiness in the evangelical narratives by tlie circumstance, that even tlie repeated, explicit disclosures of Je- sus on this subject, remain throughout incomprehensible to tlie dis- ciples ; as here tlie mystery of tlie Messiahship of Jesus is exalted by the circumstance, tliat his parents, often as it has been an- nounced to them, at every fresh word on the subject are astonished anew and do not understand. Tlie twofold form of conclusion, that tlie mother of Jesus kept all tlicsc sayings in her heart (v. 51), and that the boy grew in wis- dom and stature, and so forth, we have already recognised as a favourite form of conclusion and transition in tlie heroic legend of the Hebrews; in particular, tliat which relates to the growth of the boy is almost verbally parallel with a passage relating to Samuel, as in two former instances similar expressions appeared to have been borrowed from tlie history of Samson.* §. 41. THIS NAKEATIVE ALSO MYTHICAL. THUS here again we must acknowledge the influence of the le- gend ; but as tlie main part of the incident is thoroughly natural, we might in this instance prefer tlie middle course, and after diser- gaging tlie mythical, seek to preserve a residue of history. We might suppose tliat tlie parents of Jesus really took their son to Je- rusalem in liis early youth, and tliat after having lost siglit of him, (probably before their departure,) they found him in the temple where, eager for instruction, lie sat at tlie feet of tlie rabbins. When cal- led to account, lie declared tliat liis favourite abode was in tlie liouse of God ;f a sentiment which rejoiced liis parents, and won tlie ap- probation of tlie bystanders. The rest of tlie story we miglit sup- pose to have been added by tlie aggrandizing legend, after Jesus was acknowledged as tlie Messiah. Here all tlie difficulties in our nar- rative,-tlie idea of tlie boy sittma- in tlie midst of the doctors, his ' i/o ' claiming God as liis father in a special sense, and tlie departure of tlie parents witliout their sou, would be rejected; but tlie journey of Jesus when twelve years old, tlie eagerness for knowledge then manifested by him, and liis attachement to the temple, are retained. To tlicse particulars there is nothing to object negatively, for they contain nothing improbable in itself; but their liistorical truth must become doubtful if we can slicw, positively, a strong interest of tlie legend, out of which tlie entire narrative, and especially tlicse in- trinsifcally not improbable particulars, miglit have arisen. That in the case of great men wlio in their riper ap'o liave been distinguished by mental superiority, the very first presaging movc- * 1 Sam. ii. 2C (LXX) : Luc. ii. »2: Kat 7-0 •KtU&u.fiiov Sa^ow/A trropevero fieyalvvo- Kat 'Irjvovf TTpocnonre ao^la nai ij7u.n'tf., ndl ficvov, Kai uya-Sov K.O.I {IETU. Kvpiov Kal fieril ;l;a;/)(Tt vapii tfeu Kai ui-Qpuwou;, I'tvSpi'wuv. Coinp:irf a)Bo whnt Josephus says Antiq. ii. ix. 6. of the ^optf vatBwfi of Moses. + Gali- Ipr n»,,,i..t '*1,--1 T----1 n « r. r>.i THE LIFE OF JESUS. 198 menta of their mind are eagerly gleaned, and if they are not to be ascertained historically, are invented under the guidance of proba- bility, is well known. In the Hebrew history and legend especially, we lind manifold proofs of this tendency. Thus of Samuel it is said in the Old Testament itself, that even as a boy he received a divine revelation and the gift of prophecy (1 Sam. iii.), and with respect to Moses, on whose boyish years the Old Testament narrative is silent, a subsequent tradition, followed by Josephus and Philo, had .striking proofs to relate of his early development. As in tlie nar- rative before us Jesus shews himself wise beyond his years; so this tradition attributes a like precocity to Moses;* as Jesus turning away from tlie idle tumult of the city in all the excitement of festival tune, finds his favourite entertainment in tlie temple among tlie doctors ; so the boy Moses was not attracted by childish sports, but by serious occupation, and very early it was necessary to give him tutors, whom, however, like Jesus in his twelfth year, lie quickly surpassed, f According to Jcwisli custom and opinion, tlie twelftli year formed an epoch in development to wliicli especial proofs of awakening gen- ius were the rather attaclicd, because in tlie twelftli year, as with us in tlie fourteenth, tlie boy was regarded as having outgrown tlie period of childhood.:): Accordingly it was believed of Moses, that in Ilia twelfth year lie left tlie liouse of Ills fatlicr, to become an in- dependent organ of tlie divine rcvclatlons.§ The Old Testament leaves it uncertain how early the gift of propliecy was imparted to Samuel, but he was said by a later tradition to have prophesied from liis twelfth year :|| and in like manner tlie wise judgments of Solomon and Daniel (1 Kings iii. 23 ff. Susann. 45 ff.) were sup- posed to have been given wlicn tlicy were only twelve.^ It in tlie case of tlicsc Old Testament heroes, the spirit that impelled them manifested itself according to common opinion so early as in their twelftli year, it was argued that it could not have remained longer concealed in Jesus; and if Samuel and David shewed themselves at * Joseph. Ant. ii. ix. (;. f Philo, flu vita llosis, Opp. ed. Mangey, V. 2. p. 83 f. ovX {M.a KO^iSi/ victor ?/O£TO TuQao^oic KCU •)e'kuai Hal Trai.Sicuc-u^-V alSu nal oeyvorriTa irapa- (jiaivuv. utTttvofUiai nal Hwfiaacv, u rf/v V"W c^e^er u^tViaeiv •npoaely. 6t6u.amf.oi S ai9v<:, W.a.xo9sv u/iAoc, mpf/aav.-uv Iv oil jzaaptJ xpuvy Tac fmiifitif vvspt.iSu.Ai.-v, sv/zoiptf ^i'dmi; icum,\ they were doors, milkves- sels, sieves and coffers, and once Josepli makes a throne for the kin"-; so tliat here lie is represented partly as a cabinet-maker and partly as a cooper. Tlic Protevangeliu.m Jacobi, on tlie other liand, makes him work at buildings, olito6opalc,Sj without doubt as a car- penter. In tlicse labours of tlie father Jesus appears to have sliared, according to an expression of Mark, who makes tlic Nazarencs ask concerning Jesus, not merely as in tlie parallel passage of Matthew: 7s not this the carpenter's son? ova avrog ea-w b TOV TKK.TOVO^ vlog ; but Is not this the carpenter ? OVK av-og KUTIV o TEICTUV ; (vi. 3.) It is true tliat in replying to the taunt of Cclsus that tlie teacher of the Christians was a carpenter by trade, TEIC-W -qv rffv TE^VTJV, Ori- gen says, he must have forgotten that in none of the Gospels re- ceived by the churches is Jesus himself called a carpenter, STI, ov6a- fzov ~w KV rdl(; KK.K.Xr]C!iaig