love thee. He saith unto him, Feed my lambs. He saith to him again the second time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me? He saith unto him, Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, Feed my sheep. He saith unto him the third time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me? Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time, Lovest thou me? And he said unto him, Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee. Jesus saith unto him, Feed my sheep. Verily, verily I say unto thee, when thou wast young, thou girdedst thyself, and walkedst whither thou wouldest; but when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee, and carry thee whither thou wouldest not." Every reader of the Gospels has noted the unerring instinct of Jesus in dealing with all classes,-rich and poor, wise and ignorant, young and old,-reaching their hearts, solving their problems. He speaks, therefore, a universal language which we can all understand. His use of the parable was unsurpassed, and when he tells of the sower, the prodigal son, or the good Samaritan, everything is in keeping, nothing is superfluous. "I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants. And he arose, and came to his father. But when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him." The characteristic message of Jesus is one of love and sympathy. As he understood the heart of man, so he reached more certainly than any other man who ever lived the heart of the Infinite God. To the man of today one of the most interesting things about Jesus is that he was essentially and radically democratic. His soul blazed with indignation at the sight of oppression and wrong. He was the true successor of the Old Testament prophets and must have noted with deep inward satisfaction such passages as "He shall judge the poor of the people, he shall save the children of the needy, and shall break in pieces the oppressor"; "With righteousness shall [God] judge the world, and the people with equity"; "Woe unto them that . . . turn aside the needy from judgment, and take away the right from the poor of my people." To Jesus all men were equal in the sight of God. "I call you not servants," he said to his disciples, "for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth; but I have called you friends." Not only did the common people of Jesus' day hear him gladly but, in their turn, the early martyrs, the crofters of the Scottish Highlands, the Huguenots of France, the peasants of Germany, the Pilgrims of New England, took comfort and courage in his words. The striving people of all ages have received inspiration from the sayings of this greatest of democratic leaders.1 1In the foregoing chapter no mention has been made of the extra-Biblical literature of the Hebrews. Of this there is a considerable amount, and some portions reach a high level. We have deemed it advisable, however, to confine our study to the Bible. Reference List Read the Bible itself (Authorized Version preferably). GENUNG. Guidebook to the Biblical Literature. Ginn and Company. DRIVER. Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament. Charles Scribner's Sons. KENT. Various books on Biblical study. Send to Charles Scribner's Sons for list. MOULTON. Literary Study of the Bible. The Macmillan Company. RHYS (Ed.). Lyrical Poetry from the Bible (2 vols.). E. P. Dutton & Suggested Topics The relation of Palestine to other lands in Bible times. Old Testament history. New Testament history. Old Testament poetry compared with English or American poetry. Narratives of the Old Testament. Great passages from Isaiah. Ruth: a Biblical idyl. The book of Job. Jesus' use of the parable. Ideas of Jesus on brotherhood and democracy. Quotations from the Bible in current speech and literature. CHAPTER IV GREEK LITERATURE It is but a commonplace to say that our debt to the Greeks is incalculable. Whether the Greek genius applied itself to architecture, sculpture, music, literature, government, logic, or speculative thought, the products excelled those of any other people of antiquity. We are separated from the Greeks by many centuries, but every intelligent person of today has a certain familiarity with Homer, Pericles, Phidias, Sophocles, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle -to mention no others of those who have contributed to the luster of this richly gifted race. Our own culture is based largely on the Greek, or on the Greek through the Latin. In the field of literature we have but to name Milton, Dryden, Shelley, Keats, Tennyson, and Swinburne to recall the copious use that our English poets have made of Greek conceptions and themes; and, indeed, what writer or thinker of the modern world does not hark back, consciously or unconsciously, to the Greek? At many points the Greek literature seems extremely modern. This is not surprising, for the Greeks were a highly civilized race, and in the long history of humanity they lived-to use Professor Robinson's picturesque phrase-but "day before yesterday." We feel our age closely akin to theirs in artistic impulse, keen power of analysis, thirst for knowledge, splendid originality, vigorous imagination, and fondness for beauty. Early history. The earliest memorable event which is recorded in Greek literature was the capture (twelfth century B.C.) of Troy, a famous city on the northern coast of Asia Minor. A number of centuries before this (roughly, 2000 B.C.) a branch1 of the IndoEuropean race-known to us as the Greeks, to themselves as the Hellenes-had migrated from the region of the Black Sea, had settled in the Greek peninsula, and had by degrees taken over 1The vanguard were the Achæans; other groups followed later. the relatively advanced Ægean civilization which they had found. Their predecessors were a white race of a higher stage of culture than their own, and the contact of the Greeks with them was important. The subsequent mastery of the neighboring island of Crete gave the Greeks still further artistic impressions and impulses. One additional step is to be recorded: the capture of Ægean settlements in the islands of the Ægean Sea and on the coast of Asia Minor. By 1000 B.C. the Greek peoples had subdued the entire Ægean world. We feel strangely drawn to these earliest Europeans (using the word in the modern sense). They had definitely passed their nomad period, though still retaining many barbaric traits. They had looked upon the wonders of Mycenæ and Cnossus and had made them their own. They had mastered the Ægean Sea with their "swift ships." They had become acquainted with the civilization of Egypt to the south. They had bartered with those earliest of commercial travelers, the Phoenicians, and from them had secured the most valuable of their products, the alphabet. By the close of the period of migration this instrument of thought was recording the earliest Greek literature. Part of the Greek inheritance consisted of hero tales or sagas, folk stories, songs, legends-going back to the old pre-Dorian Achæans and to the Ægean peoples. The Greeks were a mixed race and spoke many dialects. They stood at the end of an age. Mount Olympus was still the home of their gods. They had a peculiar fondness for such heroic stories as the exploits of Perseus, the labors of Hercules, the feats of Theseus, the quarrels of the royal house of Thebes, the Argonautic expedition, the capture of Troy, the return of the heroes. And in their later and more sophisticated days they turned to such tales as to a great storehouse for literary material. THE HOMERIC EPICS The earliest Greek literature is epic in form. Epic poems were recited by bards and were transmitted from one generation to the next. Probably this type of poetry was very common by 900 B.C. The greatest of all epic poems, the Iliad and the Odyssey, drew |