Philip the Disillusioned

A COLOURLESS face may have very strong features. There are faces in the New Testament Gallery whose colourlessness repels us. We wonder how they have found their way into such an august company. To drop the metaphor, their lives seem devoid of incident. Their names occur but once or twice on the Sacred Page, and in a connection apparently so trivial as to leave nothing worth transmitting. But as we look longer and closer, we change our mind. We feel as if suddenly a microscope had been put into our hand. The seeming trifle assumes magnitude, the passing reference becomes big with suggestion, the commonplace statement is found to be full of significance; and the man who at first appeared a mere

cipher takes his place among the leading men of 153 the Gallery and the representative men of the world.

One of the best instances of this is, I think, to be found in Philip of Bethsaida. The common impression is that we know nothing about him. For a long time I studied his countenance in vain. It seemed expressionless, characterless. No ray flashed from the eye to awaken human interest. The man appeared a lay figure placed in the group merely to fill up a gap. Was there any personality about him — anything worth converting, worth transmitting, worth transforming.-* At first one was disposed to answer. No. Yet I felt that my impression must be wrong. This man was sought out by Jesus Himself. He was the first who ever heard the Christian command, ‘Follow me! ‘Jesus sought those who were sick — physically, morally, or mentally. His seeking of Philip implied that there was something to remove. I felt that this * something ’ must be indicated, and that if I searched long enough I ought to find it. I did search, long and patiently, and I think I have found it — have discovered that element in Philip which rendered him a man requiring the Master’s care and representing through all time one section of mankind.

The question then is, What is, in Philip’s case, the stone which had to be rolled from the door of the sepulchre, in other words, what was the original imperfection of his nature? We have seen the moral impediments of others — how the Baptist needed expansion, John self-forgetfulness, Peter courage, Nathanael robustness, Nicodemus instruction, Thomas hope. What did Philip need? Can we put our hand upon his barrier? Can we tell the nature of that moral struggle which raises his life from insignificance to interest, and gives him a permanent place among the great cloud of witnesses?

I think we can. It seems to me that the moral impediment of Philip was an illusion about the nature of the religious life. He thought religion was something above the common plain. It was too serious a matter to be concerned in the ordinary duties of the world, too solemn a thing to be brought down to streets and * openings of the gates.’ By all means the duties of the hour should be attended to, but they ought to have their own agencies. Religion should be made to dwell in a higher and purer atmosphere. It should be kept for ecstatic moments in which the world can be forgotten and time can be no more — moments in which the soul is carried right into the presence of its God, and hears things which cannot be spoken amid the duties of the earthly day. At such times the world must drop from a man like Elijah’s garment, and all his mundane responsibilities must be overshadowed by another and a higher life.

Why do I think that this was the original view of Philip? From two episodes in his history, both recorded in the Fourth Gospel. Nothing can exceed the apparent difference between these two episodes. The one is at the breaking of bread in the wilderness; the other occurs at that solemn hour when Christ in His farewell sermon was raising the thoughts of His disciples to the sources of spiritual peace.

The one is in the sphere of the secular; the other is in the region which men call sacred. The one is concerned with the wants of the body; the other is occupied with the needs of the soul. The one is a scene of philanthropy; the other is a scene of piety. In both of these opposite episodes Philip is a prominent figure. And yet I have no hesitation in saying that in each of them he has one and the same attitude. In each of these varied circumstances we find the man subject to the same illusion — the belief that religion is something too high and holy to be identified with the good works of common day. I think this will become evident if we consider the episodes separately.

I begin with the earlier. Jesus has crossed the Sea of Tiberias and has reached its eastern shore. Great crowds are coming in the same direction — some from the scattered ranks of the Baptist, some consisting of the pilgrims to the Passover at Jerusalem. Both are naturally drawn to Jesus — the disciples of the Baptist by a kindred association, the Passover pilgrims iS8 THE REPRESENTATIVE MEN

by a spirit of devotion. We should have thought Jesus would have grasped the moment as one eminently adapted to the spread of His doctrines. Strange to say, His whole interest is bent upon something else. He thinks entirely of the physical wellbeing of that crowd. They must already be hungry and faint with their journey. If they are to interrupt that journey to listen to Him, they will be more faint and hungry still. Accordingly, Christ’s primal care is for their bodies, their food, their nourishment. He intends that before all things they shall receive provision for their temporal wants. But He is not content to achieve that; He wishes His disciples to go along with Him, to sympathise with Him. And so, He starts a problem of political economy — How shall we procure food for this multitude; is there any neighbouring store from which we can buy.-’ It is Philip that He addresses — probably because He feels that Philip is the most likely to be surprised at such a human interest on His part. Phihp’s answer is certainly not sympathetic — * It is impossible; even if you could get two hundred pennyworth of loaves it would not suffice to give a small amount to each; the scheme must be abandoned. ’

For this answer Philip has reaped much obloquy. The obloquy is just; but I think it is bestowed on wrong grounds. Philip is blamed for losing faith in the Messianic power of Jesus — a power in which originally he strongly believed. But I do not think this was really his position. This man was no sceptic about the claims of Christ. He had not lost one jot of his faith in the Messianic mission of Jesus. Where he erred was in denying to that Messianic mission a right to be interested in what he called trifles. It is another form of the objection to the blessing pronounced on the little children. The love for children was all right, and the nurture and admonition of children were desirable; but to single them out as a section of Christ’s army, to ordain them publicly to a great Messianic work — this was something which seemed incongruous with the Christ. So did the proposal in the wilderness. Benevolence was good and the wants of the poor a legitimate subject of solicitude; but it was deemed a subject for the economist, for the capitalist, for the citizen. It was surely no part of the province of Messiah Himself! Was it not a thing for His agents, His subordinates! Was not the Messiah’s work cosmopolitan — concerned with momentous issues and big with solemn interests! It could never be expected that He should interrupt that work to give personal attention to a trifle of the hour!

I feel sure that this, and not want of faith, was the motive of Philip’s answer to Jesus. It was his opinion that Jesus would not think it worth while to manifest His power in a scene so humble. And I believe that in His subsequent act of political economy the design of Jesus was to counteract this impression. The narrative as given by St. John clearly implies that Jesus intended here to make Himself the subject of a special revelation. But what about Himself did He wish to reveal.’’ Was it the fact that He had power to expand a meagre repast into a great banquet? No; it was the fact that He had the will to do so, that He did not deem it beneath His dignity to do so. That was what He wanted the multitude to learn; that was what He wanted Philip to learn; that was wjiat He desired the world of all times to learn. We have still our Philips among us — men of devout faith who yet by their very devotion divide God too much from man. To all such the old narrative carries the eternal moral that the God of the telescope must be the God of the microscope too, and that the Power which guides the Pleiades must be able to direct a sparrow’s wing. The later Isaiah says of God, * He calleth the stars all by name; because He is great in power not one faileth. ‘The Philips of the world would have inverted the statement, would have said, ‘Because He is great in power He cannot be expected to take care of individuals.’ But the words of the prophet are held true also by the evolutionist, and religion has here found an ally in science. The claim of seeming trifles to be subjects of Universal Law is one of the greatest lessons this world has ever received.

I come now to the second episode which indicates the limitation in the character of Philip. It occurs in a totally different direction, but it reveals the same tendency. The scene is that hour between the Passover and Gethsemane when Jesus delivers His parting message. It is distinctively a message to the troubled heart. Other messages had been addressed to different sides of human nature. Some had been spoken to the troubled body; they had brought the words of healing. Some had been spoken to the troubled conscience; they had breathed the words of pardon. Some had been spoken to the troubled spirit — troubled as to where lay its road to duty; they had pointed, like the Sermon on the Mount, to a life of sacrifice. But this last message of our Lord was spoken to the troubled heart. It was a season of bereavement. The disciples were losing the object of their dearest love. For the first time perhaps in their lives, their souls were intent on the problem of immortality. Therefore it is of immortality that Christ speaks. He tells them of a life beyond, of a place which He is about to prepare for them in the mansions of heaven. He tells them that He is going to no foreign scene, but to the house of His Father. He tells them that neither will they find it foreign — that they will be where He is, and so have a sense of home. But Christ’s deep teaching had taught these men to be critical. They begin to question — they ask how they are to get there, and where the region lies. Then Philip makes a bold proposal. He suggests a method by which all doubts will be lulled to rest. Let Christ give them a vision of the Father — of the Father Himself — of the primal source of all being, without any intermediate veil. You will observe the thoroughness of the demand. He wants no manifestation from the stage — Jesus had given many such. He wants to get behind the scenes, to get into the greenroom, to know the private counsels which guide the drama of life. He is determined to go to the root of the matter, and the root of the matter is to him the beginning of creation, ‘Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth. ’

Now, there is one respect in which Philip was right. He was right in thinking that our best evidence of immortahty comes from the vision of the Father. I cannot understand how any man who has a firm conviction of the fatherhood of God can be sceptical about the immortality of the soul. Remember, I speak of the fatherhood of God. I do not think the mere belief in an author of the universe is sufficient to bring the conviction of human immortality. We have seen men iike Francis Newman accepting the existence of a Supreme Power and yet refusing their assent to the other doctrine. No man would be entitled to say, * Show us that there is an unknown power in the uni, verse, and it sufficeth. ‘But every man is entitled to say, * Show us the Father, and it suflficeth. ‘It was not there that the fault of Philip lay; Christ’s answer virtually admits that he was right. The highest evidence of immortality is the vision of a God who has a relation to the human soul. The very incompleteness of that soul then becomes an argument in its favour. For, in the light of Divine fatherhood, we say, ‘God will not leave His structure unfinished; He must have determined to finish it elsewhere.’ Tennyson cries, ‘Thou art just; Thou wilt not leave me in the dust.’ It may seem a bold thing in a matter of this kind to appeal to the justice rather than to the mercy of God. It is worse than bold if God be not our Father. But if God be our Father, His mercy and His justice are one. The yearning of a human soul becomes itself a claim. The aspiration of a human heart becomes itself a right. The cry of a human spirit becomes itself a call for the fulfilment of a promise.

Philip, then, was justified in his view that the shortest road to the hope of immortality is a vision of the Father. But he neutralised his doctrine by taking a long road to that vision. Where Philip erred was in the belief that a vision of the Father was best reached by getting away from human contact or, to repeat the old metaphor, by quitting the stage for the greenroom. To him the Divine was something apart from the human; to behold it he must withdraw himself. He must retire from the footlights, from the drapery, from the actors in the scenes of time. He must get behind the scenes. He must seek a moment of ecstasy in which he will be raised above the things of the day and of the dust and ushered into that august Presence which transcends the works of man.

And this is the view of Philip which our Lord combats here. He tells him that the knowledge of the Father is not reached in the way he supposes. He tells him that the love of the Father is learned on the stage of time — not behind it, * He that has seen Me hath seen the Father, and how sayest thou then, Show us the Father! ‘He tells him that it is not where human work is transcended that we get our deepest glimpse of the Divine; it is precisely where human work is richest — * The Father that dwelleth in Me doeth the works.’ Would Philip believe in Divine fatherhood, let him study human brotherhood. Let him consider the spirit of Christ as it exists in the world. Let him ponder how through that spirit man has sacrificed for man, how love has dared many a cross, how sympathy has shared many a sorrow, how pity has dried many a tear, how compassion has healed many a pain, how benevolence has assuaged many a hunger. Let him ponder these things, and he will reach a clearer vision of the fatherhood of God than if he stood in the forest primeval in the solitary presence of the Divine.

Such is the burden of Christ’s message to Philip. I have been struck with the fact that before it became a formal message it was made a practical training. We read that — some three years earlier — immediately after Jesus had called him to join the league of pity, he brought another man to the league — ‘Philip findeth Nathanael. ‘Why does he rush at once to secure a companion in his own calling.-’ We do not wonder when we are told that Andrew, after his own call, finds his brother Simon. These were brothers, and it was inevitable that either adversely or favourably the act of the one should influence the other. But Philip and Nathanael were not brothers; to find the latter required a seeking on the part of the former. Why does Philip hasten to implant m the heart of another a conviction at which he himself had only arrived yesterday? I believe the answer to be that he was told to do so. I think that the moment he gave his allegiance to Jesus, Jesus said to him, ‘Find Me an additional man.’ And I believe the reason of this request was not the helping of Jesus but the helping of Philip. Jesus might have called Nathanael by a telepathic message; but Philip would thereby have lost an element in his education. If Philip was the man we have found him to be — with a tendency to underrate the practical, there could be no better introduction to his Christian training than to give him practical work. He ought not to be allowed to go home and dream of twelve legions of angels. Let him look to the help of his brother-man, nay, let him make an effort to initiate that help. Let him use his human judgment. Let him find a man himself — one whom he believes to be fitted for the great work of inaugurating the future kingdom. All education should be directed to the weak point of a nature. If you see one like Paul whose life has been entirely occupied with the practical, send him into Arabia — seclude him for a time that he may meditate. If, on the other hand, you see one like Philip disposed to look for God in things behind the scenes, send him into the practical world — let him find an additional man.

As a further contribution to this training, Philip, in the latest days of Christ’s ministry, is made the instrument of a wondrously practical work quite on the lines of his search for Nathanael. If you or I were suddenly asked the question. Which of the Christian disciples brought the earliest help to the Gentiles? I do not think we should immediately hit the answer. We should probably say ‘Paul ’ or ‘Peter ’ or ‘Stephen.’ But in truth there was one before any of these — it was Philip. After our Lord Himself, the first who spoke a word to the Gentiles was this obscure man of Bethsaida. Before Peter had called Cornelius, before Stephen had lifted his voice, before Paul had raised his banner, Philip had brought a Gentile band into the presence of Jesus. True, they were the descendants of Jews; ’ but they had been born in a foreign land, bred in a foreign culture, trained in foreign ideas. They had become Greeks in nationality, Greeks in education, Greeks in taste, Greeks in manner. But they had heard of the fame of Jesus, and they longed to see Him. Their pride in the old ancestry was not dead. They were glad that where their fathers’ homes had been, there had risen a great light. How were they to gaze upon that light? The Jews would now despise them, count them aliens. Yet they would try. The Passover Feast was coming on; they would go up to Jerusalem; perchance some one might show them the new star. They come; and they are gladdened by a discovery. Among the names of Christ’s inner circle they hear of one which is Greek — Philip. They are attracted by the kindred sound. Is not this the man to lead them to Jesus — a man with an affinity of name to the names of their own countrymen! And

‘I have taken this view instead of the prevalent one which makes these men pure Greeks; I do not think the latter view sufficiently accounts for their interest in Jesus.

so Philip becomes the medium of the first Gentile wave. To him is it granted to open the door. To him is committed the privilege of unveiling the Christ to the eyes of other lands. To him, above all, is assigned the glory of performing the great marriage between the East and the West, and of joining the hand of Europe to the hand of Asia!

Was there any fruit of this union? Did the meeting of Philip with the Greeks produce any effect on history.’’ Let me hazard a suggestion — a suggestion which, so far as I know, has not been made before, but which has long been graven on my own mind. Some years afterwards there appeared in the Christian world a young man of great power and promise. He was a Greek of Jewish descent, and his name was also Philip. Like the elder Philip, he too was commanded to work in a desert — a place where to all appearance no bread could be found. Yet it was found — in rich superabundance. In that desert he met only one man whom he could make a Christian; but that one man was the centre of a whole kingdom — the bread was multiplied indefinitely. Now, I have always believed that this second Philip received his name at baptism in honour of the first. I have always believed that he was one of those Greeks who came to the Christian apostle with the intention of seeing the Lord. I have figured to myself the result of that vision. I have seen this youth baptised into the new faith, and in the strength of gratitude taking the name of his patron. I have seen him go forth fired with the enthusiasm of spreading that faith among his countrymen. I have seen him, after the death of Stephen, emerge as the champion of these countrymen and claim their rights in the Christian community. Then I have seen his sympathies widen — go beyond Greece, pass into Samaria, travel into Ethiopia, move wherever the spirit prompted him. If the life of such a man was the fruit of the visit to the apostle Philip, the ministry of that apostle was abundantly blessed.

T ORD, often, like Philip, I have been under- ■’ — ’ rating my surroundings. I have been complaining of my prosaic sphere; I have been saying, * Whence shall I find bread in this wilderness to feed the multitude of men! ‘I have been looking for aid to an opening in the heavens — to the descent of powers supernal. It never occurred to me that one loaf of bread could be multiplied into a million. It never entered into my mind that one man could be an army, one life a kingdom, one soul a generation. But Thou hast taught me, O my Father. Thou hast shown me the triumph of my trifles, the majesty of my rejected moments. The hour over which I wept is waving with banners. The book over which I slept is surging with songs. The fence over which I leapt is laden with pearls. My fancied weed has become a flower; my imagined prison has become a bower; my supposed weakness has become a tower. Evermore let me reverence the prosaic things! Evermore let me uncover my head to the place that seems a desert! Let me walk with solemnity beside the rill! — it may be a river one day. Let me tread with awe the village street! — it may be a city one day. Let me stand with veneration before the squalid child! — he may be a Shakespeare one day. Once, with proud foot I passed a hovel by; I was in search of great events, and I lingered not. And lo! I had passed the great event of Thy world — the babe whose swaddling bands were to enfold all nations! The gold and the frankincense and the myrrh were there, and the motherhood that taught Thy fatherhood, and the wisdom that had found a new worship, and the star that had lit a new hope! When I am tempted to despise the desert, let me remember, O Lord, the majesty of the manger!