These words should be an end of controversy. They are a sort of signpost, warning the traveler not to proceed on a dangerous path. The subject is foreclosed for us. The inscrutability of the Person of the Son must ever baffle the ingenuity of man, even of pious and erudite men. Nor is its solution to be gained by some rare spiritual attainment. On the contrary, the most spiritual will be the first to bow before the ineffable mystery, and to say, as did one of old, after stating the scriptural doctrine of the Christ, “So much we know; the seraphim veil the rest with their wings.”
Yet the subject has a singular fascination, and has had in all ages. The annals of Christendom are strewn with the wrecks of venturesome and ingenious theories, the heresies of Arius, of Apollinaris, of Nestorius, and others. Hence the origin of at least two of the well-known creeds, the Athanasian and the Nicene, which most undoubtedly declare the facts as to our Lord's Person with admirable point and emphasis, as they were composed with that object. But nothing can equal the precision of Scripture. Here alone we get the truth in its fullness. No doubt in this verse it is given somewhat negatively, though immediately after the admonitory words as to the Son, we have the positive statement that they know the. Father to whom the Son reveals Him. The knowledge of the Father therefore is moral; the want of knowledge as to the Son is in a wholly different category. Even when we most heed His word, and learn of Him, as He bids us, we can make no progress towards comprehending the mystery of His Person. We are not meant to do so. But the Gospels are full of the revelation of the Father. All that our Lord said and did perfectly expressed Him. So He gently rebuked Philip for having failed to realize during his privileged intercourse with Himself (strikingly characterized by Him as “so long time"), that He had been manifesting the Father.
But what disaster has been wrought, not in ancient times merely, to which allusion has already been made, but in modern, by inquisitive prying into, and often confused and confusing analysis of, the sacred mystery! Some try to buttress their theories by appealing to the undoubtedly Scriptural doctrine of the κένωσις. Yet surely that “self-emptying” points to restraint of power, not to limitation of knowledge. Better to heed the warning of Scripture. No doubt these adventurists flatter themselves that they mean well. They wish to elucidate the obscure; and metaphysics, theological or other, have a singular attraction for some minds. But no; it is a perilous quest. The divine and the human, like gold and silver threads in some precious work of art, wrought by deft fingers, are indissolubly blended and defy dissection. “God and Man are one Christ.”
But let us hear what follows. He who has just uttered words of awe-inspiring majesty, goes on to speak in gentlest accents of love. “Come unto me; learn of me” (on which we have already touched), encouraging us to realize that, though we may never grasp the mystery of His Person, we can and should grow in knowledge of His love, of His goodness, His power, and His works. We learn of Him in all His perfect ways, how “He does,” as one has truly said, “what is most human, but lives absolutely in the divine, ever the Son of man which is in heaven.” Never was there such a marvelous blending of majesty and humility, severity and tenderness, burning zeal and supreme calm, so that, in the words of another again, “There is the meekness of the Lion of Judah and the wrath of the slain Lamb.” So believers gladly testify, but we may quote one who, alas! apostatized from the faith, a brilliant writer of the last century in a neighboring land. This man described the words of our Lord in the Gospels as “characterized by a flashing brightness, at once sweet and terrible.” This witness is true, but the terribleness is only for the rejector.
“No man knoweth the Son but the Father.” Such is the doctrine of the first Gospel, and we have the same impressive words in Luke. For vain is the contention that only in Johannine scripture do we get the superhuman claims of Christ. Nothing can be farther from the fact. Take, for instance, the words in Matthew 16:1818And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. (Matthew 16:18), “I will build my church.” Insufferably arrogant, had He been only man; most comforting as well as sublime when we bear in mind who He was and is that uttered them. And, again and again, the blessed Lord held similar language, yet coupled with the most complete self-abnegation and approachableness. No wonder some (unbelieving I fear, but thoughtful) mediaeval writer said that Jesus Christ was the enigma of the ages. Yes, surely, if we deny His divine glory. But if we bow to Him, if, while fully conscious of our inability to fathom the awful mystery of His Person (which will ever remain unfathomable), we own Him to be God manifest in the flesh, then He ceases to be an enigma. He commands our adoration. No doubt along with this will ever go the work of the Holy Spirit in the heart and conscience, and all that this involves, when the soul learns that not even that precious-life can save from sins, apart from the “precious death.”
“No man knoweth the Son but the Father.” These words are in the Synoptists, not in the Gospel of John. Doubtless the fourth Gospel differs widely from the others, but the harmony of all is perfect. And here in this eleventh of Matthew we have a statement as absolute and profound as any in John, in whose writings, however, we have longer and more elaborate unfoldings of the truth. It is not fanciful to consider how the beloved disciple must have mused on what he had “seen and heard” of his Master. He says indeed, “we contemplated his glory” —conviction sinking deeper and deeper into his heart through the mellowing years. He begins his Gospel with a peal of spiritual, thunder, as Augustine finely said. Anyhow, he was no weakling, nor ever had been. As more than one has observed, nothing can be more mistaken than the supposition that John was a mild-eyed, perhaps somewhat effeminate visionary. Nay, he was a son of thunder, naturally a robust soul, as always are those who strongly love. For very sufficient reasons, we may be sure, the Lord called James and John “sons of thunder,” and Peter “a stone.” None of the rest were so honored. We may not forget the exceeding greatness of Peter—I mean, of course, greatness when compared with other men, even with other apostles. It is needless to say that in one sense, the highest sense, none are great, but the Master alone. Yet, as disciples, as apostles, Peter, James and John, and subsequently Paul, are great, we know, beyond the measure of any others. And administratively, at any rate, Simon Peter was greatest of all. Was he not given the keys of the kingdom of heaven?
But to return to our main point. We may be sure that Peter and John and Paul would have loved to enforce these words, spoken as they were by the Lord Himself, and written “for our learning” by the erstwhile tax-gatherer. For negatively they define the divine glory of the Son of God as absolutely as the terse declarations of Paul, or as did the apostle John with his contemplative calm.
R. B.