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STUDY VII
THE MEDIATOR OF THE ATONEMENT
"THE SON OF MAN"
What this Title Does not Mean--What It Does Mean--Its Honors Indisputable,
Can be Claimed by None Other--The Son of Man as Seen by
the World--Pilate's View, Rousseau's View, Napoleon's View--Significance
of Statements, "No Beauty in Him that we Should Desire Him";
and "His Visage Was So Marred"--"The Chiefest Among Ten
Thousand"
--"Yea, He is Altogether Lovely."
AMONG many titles applied to our Lord, and one of those
most frequently used by himself, is "The Son of Man."
Some have been inclined to consider this a concession on
our Lord's part that he was a son of Joseph; but this is
wholly wrong: he never acknowledged Joseph as his father.
On the contrary, it will be noticed that this title which he
applies to himself is used, not merely respecting his earthly
life, but also as respects his present condition and glory.
And from this fact some have swung to the other extreme,
and claim that it indicates that our Lord is now a man in
heaven--that he still retains human nature. This, as we
shall endeavor to show, is a thought wholly without warrant,
a misapprehension of the title, "The Son of Man."
But meantime let us notice that such a thought is wholly at
variance with the entire drift of the Scripture teaching. The
Scripture statement is most emphatic, that our Lord's humiliation
to the human nature was not perpetual, but
merely for the purpose of effecting man's redemption, paying
man's penalty, and thereby incidentally proving his
own fidelity to the Father, on account of which he was immediately
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afterward highly exalted, not only to the glory
which he had with the Father before the world was, but to a
more excellent glory, far above angels, principalities and
powers--to the divine nature, and the right hand, place of
favor, with the Majesty on high.
Notice carefully a few of the uses of this title by our Lord,
as follows:
"The Son of Man shall send forth his angels," in the harvest
of this Gospel age. Matt. 13:41
"So shall it be in the presence of the Son of Man," in the
harvest, the end of this age. Matt. 24:27,37
"When the Son of Man shall come in his glory, and all
the holy angels with him." Matt. 25:31
"Of him shall the Son of Man be ashamed, when he
cometh in the glory of the Father." Mark 8:38
"What and if ye shall see the Son of Man ascend up
where he was before?" John 6:62
"He that came down from heaven, even the Son of
Man." John 3:13*
*"Which is in heaven" omitted by oldest MSS.
These scriptures identify "The Son of Man" with the
Lord of glory, and with the man Christ Jesus, who gave
himself, and with the prehuman Logos, which came down
from heaven and was made flesh. And evidently the Jews
did not have the thought that the title "The Son of Man"
signified the son of Joseph, or, in the ordinary sense, the son
of a man, to receive life from a human father: this is shown
by the fact that they inquired, saying, "We have heard out
of the law that Christ abideth forever: and how sayest thou,
The Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of
Man?" (John 12:34) The Jews evidently identified the
expression,
"The Son of Man," with their hoped-for Messiah,
no doubt basing their hopes in large measure upon the
statement of Daniel (7:13), "I saw in the night visions, and
behold one like unto the Son of Man came with the clouds
of heaven, and came to the Ancient of Days, and they
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brought him near before him, and there was given him dominion,
and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations
and languages should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting
dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom
shall not be destroyed." Our Lord identified himself
with this description in his Revelation (14:14), where he
represents himself as one "like unto the Son of Man, and
having on his head a golden crown, and in his hand a sharp
sickle"--the Reaper of the harvest of the Gospel age.
Nevertheless, even though assured that this title in no
sense refers to Joseph's son, and though the evidence is conclusive
that the human nature, taken for the purpose, was
sacrificed forever, and that now he is a quickening spirit being
of the highest order (Heb. 2:9,16; 1 Pet. 3:18;
John 6:51;
Phil. 2:9), the question still arises, Why did our Lord choose
such a name, such a title? Have we not reason to suspect
that there must be some particular reason for it, else this
particular title would not be used, since each of our Lord's
titles has a peculiar significance, when understood?
There is a most important reason for the use of this title.
It is a title of high honor, because a perpetual reminder of
his great Victory--of his faithful, humble obedience to all
the Heavenly Father's arrangements, even unto death, even
the death of the cross, by which he secured the title to all his
present and prospective honor and glory, dignity and
power, and the divine nature. By this title, "The Son of
Man," both angels and men are referred directly to the
great exhibition of humility on the part of the Only Begotten
of the Father, and to the underlying principle of the divine
government--he that exalteth himself shall be abased,
and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted. Thus every
time this name is used it speaks a volume of valuable instruction
to all who shall be taught of God, and who are
desirous of honoring him, and doing those things which are
well pleasing in his sight.
In the same sense that our Lord was made "of the seed of
David," and "of the seed of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob," he
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was also of the seed of Adam, through mother Eve--yet, as
we have seen, "undefiled, separate from sinners." "The
seed
of the woman" is referred to as being the antagonist of the
seed of the serpent, yet there is no intimation that Eve
would have any seed apart from her husband, Adam. And
in the same sense that it is proper to think of and speak of
our Lord as the seed of David, it is equally proper to think
of him as the seed of Adam, through Eve. And this, we believe,
is the thought lying back of this title--"The Son of
Man."
Adam, as the head of the race, and its appointed life-giver,
failed to give his posterity lasting life, because of his
disobedience; nevertheless, the divine promise looked forward
to the time when Messiah, identified with Adam's
race, should redeem Adam and his entire posterity. Adam
was the man pre-eminently, in that he was the head of the
race of men, and in him resided the title to the earth and its
dominion. Note the prophetic reference to Adam, "What is
man that thou art mindful of him, or the son of man that
thou visitest him? Thou hast made him a little lower than
the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honor.
Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy
hands; thou hast put all things under his feet: all sheep and
oxen, yea, and the beasts of the field, the fowl of the air, the
fish of the sea, and whatsoever passeth through the paths of
the sea." Psa. 8:4-8
This earthly right, kingship, dominion, fell into disorder,
was lost, through the fall, but was part and parcel of that
which was redeemed by the great sin-offering. As it is written
of our Lord, prophetically, "Unto thee shall it come, O
thou Tower of the flock, even the first dominion." (Micah 4:8)
Thus we see that the hope of the world, under the divine
arrangement, rested in the coming of a great son and heir of
Adam, a great son of Abraham, a great son of David, a
great son of Mary. Nor does this imply that the life of this
son would come either through Adam or Abraham or David
or Mary. As we have already seen, a son-in-law, under
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the divine arrangement, is counted as a member of the family,
able to redeem and to take up a forfeited possession. In
the case of our Lord, we have clearly seen that his life came
not through earthly parentage, but merely his physical organism
--that the life proceeded forth and came from God,
and that originally he was known as the Logos.
And the more we investigate this subject the more evident
all the foregoing appears for the student of the Greek
may readily inform himself of the fact that in all the instances
in which our Lord makes use of this term, "The Son
of Man," he used it in an emphatic form, which is not distinguishable
in English translation, and which, to be appreciated
in English, would need to be expressed with
emphasis upon the two words "the"--"the Son of the
Man."
And our Lord's right to this title is indisputable. As Adam
alone was perfect, and all others of his race degenerate, except
this one Son who attached himself to Adam's race, to
be the Redeemer of all his lost possessions, so when he was in
the act of redeeming the race, and since he has redeemed it
from the curse or sentence of death, the title to be the son of
the man came legally and indisputably into his possession.
And not only was that title properly his during the period
of his giving the great "ransom for all," but it is properly
his during this Gospel age while the selection of his co-workers
in the grand restitution program is in progress.
And much more will this title properly belong to our Lord
during the term of his Millennial Kingdom, when he will as
the (now highly exalted and changed) Son of the man
(Adam) prosecute the work of restitution, "the redemption
[deliverance] of the purchased possession." Eph. 1:14;
Ruth 4:1-10
"The Man Christ Jesus,"
as Viewed by Unbelievers
Not merely the devoted followers of the Lord Jesus Christ
have recognized his wisdom and grace, and noted that he
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was "filled with all the fulness of God," but even his opponents
recognized him as far beyond the ordinary of our
race, as we read, "And all bare him witness, and wondered
at the gracious words which proceeded out of his mouth."
(Luke 4:22) Others said, "Never man spake like this
man."
(John 7:46) And Pilate, loathe to destroy the life of the noblest
Jew he had ever seen, endeavored, as a last resort, to
placate the malevolence of the multitude, perceiving that it
was instigated by the Scribes and Pharisees, who were envious
and jealous of our Lord's popularity. Pilate finally
caused Jesus to be brought forth to face his accusers, evidently
with the thought that a look upon his noble features
would turn back their hatred and their malice. So presenting
him, Pilate exclaimed--"Behold the Man!" with an emphasis
on the words which is not apparent in our English
translation, unless the word "the" be read with emphasis--
"Behold the Man!" As though he would have said, The man
whom you are asking me to crucify is not only the Jew above
all other Jews, but the Man above all other men. And it was
concerning our Lord's manhood that John declares, "The
Logos was made flesh....and we beheld his glory, the glory
of the only begotten of the Father--full of grace and truth."
John 1:14; 19:5
And in this connection let us remember the oft-quoted
and well-known eulogy of "The Son of the Man," and
his teachings, by Rousseau, the celebrated Frenchman, as
follows:
"How petty are the books of the philosophers, with all
their pomp, compared with the Gospels! Can it be that writings
at once so sublime and so simple are the work of men?
Can he whose life they tell be himself no more than a man?
Is there anything in his character of the enthusiast or the
ambitious sectary? What sweetness, what purity in his
ways, what touching grace in his teachings! What a loftiness
in his maxims! What profound wisdom in his words!
What presence of mind, what delicacy and aptness in his
replies! What an empire over his passions! Where is the
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man, where is the sage, who knows how to act, to suffer, and
to die, without weakness, without display? My friends, men
do not invent like this; and the facts respecting Socrates,
which no one doubts, are not so well attested as about Jesus.
Those Jews could never have struck this tone or thought of
this morality. And the Gospel has characteristics of truthfulness,
so grand, so striking, so perfectly inimitable, that
their inventors would be even more wonderful than he
whom they portray."
The following eulogy on the Son of the Man is credited to
the renowned Napoleon Bonaparte:
"From first to last Jesus is the same; always the same--
majestic and simple, infinitely severe and infinitely gentle.
Throughout a life passed under the public eye, he never
gives occasion to find fault. The prudence of his conduct
compels our admiration by its union of force and gentleness.
Alike in speech and action, he is enlightened, consistent
and calm. Sublimity is said to be an attribute of
divinity: what name, then, shall we give him in whose character
was united every element of the sublime?
"I know men, and I tell you Jesus was not a man. Everything
in him amazes me. Comparison is impossible between
him and any other being in the world. He is truly a being
by himself. His ideas and his sentiments, the truth that he
announces, his manner of conference, are all beyond human
and the natural order of things. His birth, and the
story of his life; the profoundness of his doctrine, which
overturns all difficulties, and is their most complete solution;
his Gospel; the singularity of that mysterious being,
and his appearance; his empire, his progress through all
centuries and kingdoms; all this is to me a prodigy, an unfathomable
mystery. I see nothing here of man. Near as I
may approach, closely as I may examine, all remains above
comparison--great with greatness that crushes me. It is in
vain that I reflect--all remains unaccountable! I defy you to
cite another life like that of Christ."
Aye, truth is stranger than fiction, and the perfect man
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Christ Jesus, anointed with the spirit of the Highest, was so
different from the imperfect race of which he took hold, for
its redemption, that the world is certainly excusable for
questioning whether he was not more than a man. Assuredly
he was more, much more than a mere man--much more
than a sinful man: he was separate from sinners, and, as a
perfect man, was the very image and likeness of the invisible
God.
"No Beauty in Him that We Should Desire Him"
"Yea, he grew up like a small shoot before him, and as a root out of dry
ground: he hath no form nor honor, and when we observe him there is
not the appearance that we should desire in him. He is despised and rejected
of men; a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief: and we hid
our faces from him, as it were." Isa. 53:2,3--Compare
Young's and
Leeser's translations.
Some have suggested that these scriptures indicate that
our Lord's personal appearance was inferior to that of other
men, and hence have regarded this as a proof that he was
not separate from sinners, but a partaker of sin and of its
penalty of degeneration. We dissent from this, however, as
being contrary to the entire trend of the Scriptural testimony,
and incline on the contrary to bend this statement
into harmony with the general testimony of Scripture on
the subject, if it can be done without violence to the proper
principles of interpretation, and we think this can be done
and shown.
There are various types of honorableness, beauty, comeliness
--strikingly different are the ideals of various peoples,
and of the same people under various circumstances. The
ideal of beauty satisfactory to barbarians is repulsive to the
more civilized. The Indian warrior, painted in red and
yellow, and bedecked with shells and dyed feathers, and
with a girdle of gory scalps, would be the desirable ideal before
the mind of certain savages. The pugilist in the prize
ring, stripped for battle, is the ideal of manly form in what
is known as "the manly art"--to some. To others, the richly
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dressed matador, or bullfighter, is the grand ideal of manly
development, which captures the admiration and applause
of the multitude. And so ideals vary, according to times, circumstances
and conditions. Since this scripture deals with
our Lord Jesus at his first advent, it should be understood as
signifying that he did not come up to the Jewish ideal. This
is very evident, since the very one of whom Pilate exclaimed,
"Behold the Man!" was the very one of whom the
Jews cried out the more lustily, "Crucify him! Crucify him!
We have no king but Caesar!"
We are to remember that at the time of the first advent
the Jewish nation was in subjection, under the Roman
yoke: and that it had been "trodden down of the Gentiles"
for over six hundred years. We should remember also the
hopes of Israel, begotten of the divine promises to Abraham,
Isaac and Jacob, and reiterated through all the
prophets, to the effect that in God's due time he would send
them his Anointed One, a greater law-giver than Moses, a
greater general than Joshua, and a greater king than David
or Solomon. We should remember that at this very time Israel
was looking for Messiah according to their ideals: as it
is recorded, all men were in expectation of the Messiah. But
when Jesus was announced to be the Messiah, his presentation
was so different from all they had expected that their
proud hearts were ashamed of him; and as it were they hid
their faces from him--turned their backs upon him--especially
the leaders and prominent ones of that nation, whose
guidance the common people followed. Luke 3:15
They were expecting a great general, great king, and
great lawgiver combined, full of dignity, full of hauteur,
full of ambition, full of pride, full of self-will--haughty and
domineering in word and in act. This was their ideal of what
would constitute the necessary qualifications of the King
who would conquer the world, and make Israel the leading
nation. They saw the pride, insolence, arrogance, of Herod,
appointed by the Roman Emperor to be their king; they
saw something of the Roman generals and governors, centurions,
etc.; they imagined the Roman Emperor to be still
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more strongly marked in all these various characteristics,
leading him up to predominance in the empire: and taking
their cue from these, they expected the Messiah to possess
many of these qualities still more markedly, as representing
the still greater dignity, honor and glory of the Heavenly
Court and its authority transferred to earth.
No wonder, then, that with such expectations they were
unprepared to accept the meek and lowly Nazarene, who
welcomed to his company publicans and sinners, and
whose only weapon for conquering the world was "the
sword of his mouth." No wonder that when he was announced
to be the hope of Israel, the King of the Jews, the
Messiah, they turned their backs upon him. No wonder
that, with their false expectations long cherished, they were
sorely disappointed. No wonder they were ashamed to acknowledge
"Jesus, the King of the Jews," and said, He is
not the kind of beauty, honor and dignity which we desired:
he is not our ideal of the soldier, statesman and king
befitting our nation's needs or likely to fulfil its long-cherished
hopes. Ah yes! like a similar class today looking
for the Messiah's second advent, they took for granted that
their expectations built upon "traditions of the elders" were
correct, and correspondingly neglected to honestly and earnestly
search the Scriptures, which would have made them
"wise unto salvation."
That it was to such undesirableness of appearance, and to
such lack of the "honor" (beauty) they looked for, that the
prophet referred, seems evident. It would be inconsistent to
translate and interpret the prophecy out of harmony with the
historic facts admitted to be their fulfilment: and also out of
logical harmony with the repeated declarations of his purity,
as the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the
world--holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners.
"His Visage Was so Marred"
--Isa. 52:14,15--
Here again a faulty translation has given rise to erroneous
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thoughts respecting our Lord's appearance: and
yet even the most careless readers who have seen faces of
human creatures seriously marred by debauchery, by disease,
or misshapen by accident, have found it impossible to
realize that our Lord's visage or countenance "was more
marred than that of any man, and his form more than the
sons of men." Evidently something is amiss in such a statement,
for not such an one would Pilate present before the
people, saying, "Behold the man!" Not such an one would
the common people hail as the Son of David, and think to
take by force to make him a king. Besides, have we not the
assurance that not a bone of him was broken? But how
changed is this prophetic statement for the better--how
much more consistent with the facts of Scripture history
and the logical deductions of his holiness and purity--when
rendered thus:
"As astonished at thee have been many (so marred by
man was his appearance, and his form by the sons of men)
so shall he astonish many peoples." As the people of his day
were surprised that he would submit to the abuses of those
who crowned him with thorns and smote him and spat
upon him and crucified and pierced him, so others of all nations,
now and in the future, hearing of the endurance of
"such contradiction of sinners against himself" (Heb. 12:3)
have wondered and will wonder at such patience and such
meekness.
"Before him shall kings shut their mouths; for what was
not recorded [of others] they will see [exemplified in Him];
what they had never before heard of they shall understand."
The great ones of earth never heard of any king voluntarily
submitting to such indignities at the hands of his
subjects, and in order that he might do them good. Verily,
"His is love beyond a brother's." No wonder if all are astonished
"in due time."
Undoubtedly also our dear Redeemer's face bore marks
of sorrow, for as we have seen, his deeply sympathetic heart
was "touched" with a feeling of our infirmities: and no doubt
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those marks increased, until the close of his ministry at Calvary.
We must remember that the finer the organism and
the more delicate its sensibilities, the more it is susceptible
to pain. We can readily discern that scenes of trouble, sickness,
pain and depravity, to which we become more or less
inured through our own share in the fall, and through continual
contact with human woe, would be many-fold more
serious matters to the perfect one--holy, harmless, undefiled
and separate from sinners.
We find the same thing illustrated to some extent in our
own experiences. Those of comparatively fine sensibilities
who have been accustomed to luxury, refinement, beauty,
and favorable surroundings, if they visit the slums of a
great city, and note the degradation, the unfavorable conditions,
the bad odors, the incongruous sounds, the
wretched sights of squalor, are sure to become sick at heart:
involuntarily the countenance becomes drawn, and the
thought arises, How terrible life would be under such circumstances;
what a boon death would be. Yet, perhaps,
while thus soliloquizing, the eye catches sight of children
playing merrily, and perhaps the washerwoman, from her
task, catches up a snatch of a song, or a man is seen contentedly
reading a newspaper, or a boy is heard attempting
music with an old instrument. These things indicate that
those who have become accustomed to such sights and
sounds and smells and general conditions are far less influenced
by them than are those who have been accustomed
from infancy to refinement.
And this lesson illustrates in a very small measure the disparity
between our Lord's view of the earth's sinful and
woeful condition and ours. As a perfect being, who had left
the courts of heavenly glory, and had humbled himself to
become a partaker of man's woe, his sympathizer and his
Redeemer, he surely felt much more than we the miseries of
"the groaning creation." What wonder, then, if the weight
of our sorrows cast a shade over the glorious beauties of his
perfect face! What wonder if contact with earth's troubles,
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and his voluntary sharing of the human weakness and diseases
(at the close of his own life, his own vitality, as we have
seen), marked deeply the face and form of the Son of the
Man! And yet we cannot for a moment question that his
communion with the Father, his fellowship of the holy
Spirit and the approval of his own conscience, that he did
always those things which were pleasing in the Father's
sight, must have given to our Redeemer's face a peaceful
expression, which would make it a combination of joy and
of sorrow, of trouble and of peace. And his knowledge of the
Heavenly Father's plan must have enabled him to rejoice in
the things which he suffered, realizing how they would
shortly work out, not only a blessing to himself, but also
"salvation unto the ends of the earth." If, therefore, the sorrows
of men shadowed his countenance, we may be sure
that his faith and hope were also marked in facial expression,
and that the peace of God which passeth all understanding
kept his heart, and enabled him to be always
rejoicing, in the midst of the greatest contradictions of sinners
against himself.
"The Chiefest Among Ten Thousand"
To the sinful, envious, hateful heart of the fallen nature,
everything akin to beauty, goodness, truth and love is distasteful,
there is no beauty in it, nothing desired--it is a reproof.
Our Lord expressed this matter forcefully, when he
said, "The darkness hateth the light, and they that are of
the darkness come not to the light, because the light makes
manifest their darkness." (John 3:19,20) We see a further
illustration of this fact, that an evil heart may at times hate
and despise a glorious countenance, a lovelit countenance,
not only in the fact that our dear Redeemer was thus despised
by those who cried, "Crucify him," but also in the
cases of the others. Note the various records of martyrdom
for the Truth's sake, and note how little was the melting influence
of the countenances of those who could look up
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from their personal sufferings, and pray for blessings upon
their persecutors. The testimony respecting the first Christian
martyr--Stephen--is to the effect that his face was
radiant and beautiful, so as to be even comparable to the
face of an angel. "All that sat in the council looking steadfastly
on him, saw his face as it had been the face of an angel."
(Acts 6:15) And yet, because of the hardness of their
hearts, so far from loving his angelic face, which must have
been much less angelic than that of the Master, and instead
of heeding his wonderful words, which were much less wonderful
than those of the Great Teacher, "they ran upon him
with one accord...and they stoned Stephen," even as they
cried out to Pilate to have the Lord of glory crucified.
"Yea, he is altogether lovely."
* * *
"The heav'ns declare thy glory, Lord;
Through all the realms of boundless space.
The soaring mind may roam abroad,
And there thy power and wisdom trace.
"Author of nature's wondrous laws,
Preserver of its glorious grace,
We hail thee as the great First Cause,
And here delight thy ways to trace.
"By faith we see thy glory now,
We read thy wisdom, love and grace;
In praise and adoration bow,
And long to see thy glorious face.
"In Christ, when all things are complete--
The things in earth and things in heav'n--
The heav'ns and earth shall be replete
With thy high praises, ever given."
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