SON O F MAN SON O F MAN

SON OF MIIN
CONTENTS
Synon m of ' man ' (0 I). ExpFession of peculiar Messianic con- Schmiedel's criticism (8 34).
Specialuse in Ezekiel ($3 2). sciousness? (8 20). Value of hilological argument (5 35).
Doubtful meanine in Ta'riniZh., 6 5 a 3). Emphasis on lowliness and human sym- (s
Force of greek translation 36).
Aramaic usage (8-4). pathy? (8 21). Need of literary criticism (8 37).
Analogies in Assyrian, Ethiopic, Arabic Modified Messianic title? (8 22). Genuine sayings during Galilean period
($5). Mystifying title? ($ 23). (0 3%
Dan. 7 13 Enoch 37-71, Ezra 83&($$6-8). Composite idea? 24). (a Phrase not used at Caesarea Philippi (8 39).
Rev., E&tles, Acts 756 (00 9-11). Prophetic title? (8 25). Basis of predictions concerning death and
Occurrence in Gospels ($ 12). Designation of Jesus' own ideal future resurrection ($ 40).
Renderings in Ancient Verstons (8 13). b+iahship, or indwellinggeniu;? (8 26). Synoptic Apocalypse (8 41).
Patristic and Medizval interpretation Designationof 'kingdomof heaven?' (8 27). Gospel according to Hebrews (5 42).
(0 '4). Creation of Evangelists? ($ 28). Marcion's Gospel ($43).
Resort to the Hebrew (8 15). Fresh recourse to Aramaic (8 29). Use of term by Gnostics (8 44).
Substitute for personal pronoun? (S 16). Basis in generic use and later transform- Use in Fourth Gospel ($ 45).
Ideal man? ( 17) tion (B 30). Effect on question of Jesus' Messiahship
Coming man! (5 is). Defence of this theory ($ 31). (B 46).
Current Messianic title? (8 19). Partial agreement ($ 32). Value of different theories (5 47).
Objections by different scholars ($ 33). Bibliography (8 48).
T h e expression 'Son of Man' (be# dddm) is in emphatically low and an emphatically hi.-h estimate, a synthetic
Hebrew literature a synonym of 'man.' Apart from and an analytic judgment, an assumptgn that it is a title of
office and an appeal to philology and literary criticism ;and there
Ezekiel and Daniel it seems to be used exclusively in is an element of truth in each contention. There can be no
poetic style. question as to the general identity of 'son of man and 'man.'
t is also quite evident that ' son of man ' cannot have been used
den-adam ( 0 ; ~);1 in Nu. 53 19 Is. 51 12 56 2 Jer. 49 18 33 50 40 by man as a title of a prophet. He might be referred to as
61 43 Ps. 8 5 BO 18 146 3 Job 16 21 25 6 85 8 robably also in the kn-&zek (nrn7) 'the seer,' han-nZbZ' ("-~j$ 'the speaker,'
originalofEcclus. 1730 Jddyth E 16 Test. 12 Patr. ham-tnbreh (2,in;l) 'the oracle giver,' iF h d - Z / t i m (W-N
1. Spnonyy Joseph 2 ; ben Z n G ( v i j j~l ) in Ps. 144 3. The ~ ? > N ; I ) , 'the man of God,' but not simply as 'the man.' The
of 'man. meaning is rendered perfectly clear by G(v*N), ordinary designations, however, would not be so suitable in the
ZniG (w)j~), or giber (721) occurring in the mouth of God and angels. By them the prophet would be either
parallel stichoi. Such poetic expressions may he either sur- called by name (Am. 3 z Dan. 9 22 10 I I J ) , or addressed as a
vivals of forms once in common use or later creations. When representative of the human race. I n the latter case, the fact
cognate languages offer no analogy, the latter is more probable. that celestial beings hold coiiverse only with their chosen ones
In this case, the strongly entrenched Aramaic usage (see B 4) is would naturally make the expression suggestive, not merely of
in favour of the former explanation. Collectives like U?$, WbK, inferiority of race, hut also of special privilege. Its use would
lz;, jNk are very old; and the designation of the individual of
consequently express the prophet's self-consciousness as well as
his humility. Dan. S17 shows that insome circlesit was thought
the species as Q']? or ~ l l l 3 ; , a man, lt?'i?,an ox, iNS-i?, proper for the angelus interlocufor to address the prophets as
a sheep or a goat, is likely to belong to the same early period. 'human being' (Diu I>), when the name was not used.
A still simpler phrase for ' a man,' nhad hd-dddm T h e employment of this phrase by Ezekiel seems,
(Q? iy),occurs only in Judg. 1 6 7 , where it seems to then, to have arisen from the double feeling of humility
and elation expressed in Ps. 8. Much of the repetition
have been preserved from an earlier form of the story in may be due solely to literary habit, and some instances
which Samson was not ' one of mankind ' but a solar to later imitation (see S C YT HI AN S . 5 5).
divinity. While if ( W N , originally also a collective, c p T h e only apparent exception in Hebrew seems to be
'miw w w , W * N m) and iEdh ( W N ) apparently tended to Talmud, Pal. Tn'dnith 6 j b.
displace den-dddm and bath-dddm (or dnth hnn-ndEm, The passage contains the following comment on Nu. 23 19 by
Dan. 11 17) and were supplemented by dddm and Z n S in Abbzhii (about 280 A . D .): If a man says " I am a god," he
the sense of 'man ' ' t h e human being,' der bfensch 3. Doubtful !ies ; (if he says) " I am a son of man he will"

(frequently found in Ecclus.), the plurals bnE dddm and
h i is' maintained themselves more strongly against the
collectives both in the sense of ' people ' ' Leute ' a n d
in that of mankind.'
The plurals occur thus: 025 'I? in Gen. 115 Dt. 828 I S.
26 19 z S. 7 IZ I K. 8 39 Ezek. 31 14 Mic. 5 6 Joel 1 12 Ps. 11 4
1329 1 4 2 21 I I 51 20 33x3 308 453 493 533 57 5 532 62 IO 6 6 s
89 48 903 107 8 15 21 31 115 16 145 12 Prov. 8 4 31 13 2 2 Eccl. 2 8
3 1 0 2 1 8x1 9 3 12 ; LS"? *?.?in Ps. 4 3 49362 10 Lam. 333 Ecclus.
1615 3623 3 5 7 4 0 1 ; nw? nij?, 'the women of the human
race ' in Gen. 0 2.
I n Ezekiel the expression ' son of man ' occurs some
ninetv times. alwavs as the title bv which the DrODhet is
I .
a. Special use addressed by Yahwb. T h e question
in Ezekiel. naturally arises, why Ezekiel re-
oresented Yahwb as constantlv emulov-
I .~
ing this term ; or, if its use was not due to conscious
reflection, but to inspiration in a certain pathological
condition, why this particular form of sptsch suggested
itself with such frequency.
Jerome regarded the term as expressive of the frailty of him
who was honoured with divine visions and commissions, and
most modern scholars have found in it an intimation of weakness
and insignificance (Smend Bertholet Kraetzschmar, Toy).
Appel, however, d e e k this ekplanation inadequate,
examines the title in the light of the various passages in which
it occurs, and comes to the conclusion that it was given to the
prophet by way of distinction to set him off from his fellowmen.
According to the theory of Maurice Vernes (Hisf. des
idies nressianiques, 187 [r874]) ' son of man ' is synonymous
with 'prophet.' Fiehig thinks that it may have been more
natural to use the longer form in the vocative. Already in the
interpretation of the phrase in Ezekiel we meet with an
4705
in the end regret it ; (if he says) " I kcend to
meaning in heaven,: he may say it, but he cannot accom-
T d h I t h cab, plish i!. If the text is sound, the interpretation
of Laihle, Bacher aud Dalman is no doubt
essentially correct. AbbBhfi, who'was often in conflict with
Christians, unquestionably refers to Jesus. He is not likely to
have had in mind either Moses (Schwab) or the tower-builders
(Rabbinic commentators, followed by Cohen in Lietzmann).
Christians like Sason, who in their disputations with him seem
to have used to some extent the Hebrew language, probably
translated i, v;bs TOO QvBpBnav by den hE-dri&m as in modern
times, Delitzsch. It is supposed that the, indrfihite' hen Aa'am
was suggested by Nu. 23 19,and that the context was depended
on to indicate the reference. The real difficulty, however, is to
understand why Ahbahfi should have regarded it as an assump-
tion on the part of Jesus to call himself 'son of man,' such as
any man must in the end regret. It is not a question of
Messianic titles and prerogatives. The Messiah is not a god
in Jewish theology, and does not ascend to heaven, nor is i;
improper for him, or any other man, to call himself a son of
man, den cid&iz. The original may have read ' I am a man and
I ascend to heaven,' pyi niiy , j ~q~ i ~ 1 11,
s the words
13 nr,ni i ~ beinq
i a~ misplaced gloss. Ahbahlj would then
wittily allude to the self-designation of Jesus as a conkessio;
that he was not a god hut a man while emphasisinp thereby
the enormity of his claim, inferred kom Jn. 1424 and Acts 19.
In Aramaic 'son of man' is used with great frequency
as a synonym of ' man.
I . Early imcriptions. -For the Assyrian and Persian periods
we are wholly dependent upon inscriptions. These are often
dated and represent a widespread territory :
4. h m a i C but they are for the most art very brief, and the
usage. vocabulary is limited. f t is of comparatively
small significance that the term 'son of man '
does not occur in them, since it is very seldom that any designa-
tion of man is found. But it is important that among the few
instances v j occurs ~ three times as a plural or collective-viz.
~ 9 0,pi p n i nip
3 ~ ~ 'hefore gods and man' (Zenjirli, Panamu
474
 SON OF MAN
iastq ‘gods and men’
2. zo), VII. WIN ‘seven men’
2. Syriac. -Among the East Aramaic dialects (Syriac
Mandaic, Babylonian Talmudic) the expression is most comrno,’, human race,‘ Heb. W115 n ! p ; 3316, ‘ears of men,’ Heb.
in Syriac. Eveu if the Pesh. of OT is essentially a Jewish
work, it cannot, in view of text and canon, be earlier than the
first century A.D., and probably does not antedate the oldest
Fhristian productions by more than fifty years. The fact that
man ’ is rendered b a r &d in the OT rather less frequently
than the original Syraic literature would cause one to expect is
therefore likely to be due to the translators clinging as closely as
possible to the Hebrew text, and not to any change. in the
common speech of Edessa. That n&-d originally was a collective
and virtually a plural is abundantly evident from the preponder-
ating usage. The fact that in a translation from one dialect into
another the Bibl. Aram. ZhE of Dan. 7 ‘3 was rendered
1 . w ~112 ~ [p] in Syriac 1 shows that even the indefinite w j ~ being.
gave the impression of being a collective. There are many in-
stances, however, where the Syriac NWJR is used as a singular.
That 6ar-mGd originally denoted the individual of the species
man is perfectly clear from the collective meaning of ~ 1 3 8 and
the prevalent usage. I t is the ordinary, though not the only,
&signation of man, the individual, and the emphatic ending N
does not prevent it from meaning ‘ a man ’ as well as ‘ the men.’
V‘.N and W I N 12 are both used for ‘one,’ ‘some one ’ ‘any one,’
Jemand,’ ‘each.’ In the version made by Paul ofi’ella in 618
6eli dddm is rendered by 6’reh dZ-n&*ii in Nu. 23 19 Ezek.
passim, Jer. 49 18 50 4 0 etc. ; and by b’reh de-6ar-ndiEin Jer.
5143, while bar.n&-ii is reserved for d d m or tn8.F. This does
not show that 6’reh de%&%, which never occurs in Pesh., was a
natural Syriac translation of ben iddm, hut only that Paul of
Tella, when he had already used 6ar-nGd for dddnz, availed
himself of the form created a fermilpus technicusof Christian
theology (see 8 13) for a synonym. That he should do SO is
neither more nor less strange than that he should employ the
similar phrase 6’reh dt-bar-ndfii. The same influence of the
phrase constructed as a rendering of b u;bs 705 bvOpJlrou is seen
in the N T where Pesh. uses d’reh d&n&”d even in Jn. 527 Heh.
2 6 Rev. 173 14 14, though the Greek has only u& bvOpJirrou.
iii. BibZicaZ use.-In Pesh. the Heb. 6en iidiim is rendered
6ar-niiSii everywhere except in Job 358. dar-n&”d is the trans-
lation of iidEm in Ex. 13 13 33 20 I s. 15 29 Is. 44 13 Jer. 2 6 10 14
Ezek.1310~61081428z9I \ l a l . 3 8 x C h . 2 9 1 , o f & 8 ~ i n P s . 5 5 1 4 and Jonathan, are written in the same Judrean dialect. As
6611903103- 10415 Job1514 254 328. But more frequently
-nother word b chosen, such as ‘nriSiior d’nd ‘n&d or ga6rE for
Zn85; dddm or 6’ni n&”d or ‘ n Z d for ddiim. I t is interesting
to observe that, in Ecclus. the Heb. G is rendered gahrd, 14 2 3
31 16 36 20 26 : n&i, 27 5 : 6’nd ’nii;a, 15 19. ddam is rendered
6ar-n&&i,11 2 13 15 41 I I : d’ni n&i, 15 17 ; and koln&d, 16 17 ;
/*’e iidiim is rendered 6’nP ’n&“d, 16 15 40 I . Similarly in
the Aramaic portions of OT., t n d G is rendered bar-n&? in
Dan. 7 8 : elsewhere in#? by ’n&(Dan. 2 ro), * v j(constr. ~ p1ur-f
Ezra 4 II), koZ-nii;(Dan. 3 IO), ‘niiJii (Dan. 5 5 etc.); and iiniisa
with 6’ni n&-ii, Dan.2 38 521, or ’ndtii, Dan. 429 [251.
In the N T the Evangeliarinm Nier. uses the indeterminate
bar-niis’ exclusively as a rendering of BvOporros in hlt. 8 9 196
Mk.S36f: L k . 7 8 1 8 2 Jn.337 5 3 4 7 2 ~ 2 3 a 1 0 3 3 1 1 5 0 1 6 ~ 1 ( J n . Hebraisms than the paraphrases would suggest.
7 z3a is not an exception as the construction demands the em-
phatic); 2 6ar- ndM only for Q dveporrop in Mt. 4 4 12 35a, 6
26 24n, 6 74 Mk. 2 27a, 6 Jn. 18 17 29 19 5 ; gabma in the sense of
‘husband,’ Mt. 19 5 IO (cp Mt. 116 Lk. 2 36 Jn. 4 ~ 6 f l ) ,but also
in hlt.2672 as a synonym of 6ar-nii?ii in 2674; and ’nMwith
themeaning ‘any one’ in Mt. 193 IO end. Theexact use of the
emphatic is all the more remarkable as ga6rE so rarely occurs,
and this rare occurrence is itself peculiar in view of the fact that
d’reh aZga6rii is the ordinary rendering of 6 &F 705 bv-
Op+rO”. In the Curetonian Fragments, 6ar-’niis’d is used
indiscriminately for dvepwroc and b dvflporrop in hlt. 4 4 12 1243
15 I r a , 6 18 2 0 196 Lk. 9 25 Jn. 3 27 534 7 22 23a. 6 . abrd for o
dv8porroc in Mt.89 1235a,b 1935.10 Lk.23447.”%ZB in Mt.
1520 for ‘one.’ In the Sinaitic M S c5a+w&Z is likewi%e doubt
used without discrimination for dvOpwros and b BvBporros in Mt.
414 1212(?)41 1511u,61820 196 Mk.836f: IO9 Lk.1Sz Jn.
2 23 3 27 5 34 7 22 236 10 33 ;ga67-d for b a v O p o m s , Mt. 8 9 12 35
19103j Mk.107 Lk.44 645 7 8 Jn.1150 1817; 6ar-ndf, Jn.
7 23, and ’ad;, Mt. 15 20, for ‘one, 329nand. In the Pesh.
substantially the same condition prevails, as 6ar-ndZ is used
for dvflporror in Mt. 12 12 196 Mk. 8 36 f: Lk. 9 25 Jn. 3 27 6 34
7 23a 10 33 16 21, even more frequently than for Q dv8pwaoe as in
Mt. 4 4 12 43 15 TI^, 6 18 20, and ga6rd for dvOpoaor in Mt. 8 9
Lk. 7 8 Jn. 11 50 as well as for Q dvOpwiro~,Mt. 12 35 19 5 IO Lk.
4 4 645 J n . 18 17 29 19 5, and ’n&“ has the sense of ‘some one’ in
Mt. 19 3 Jn. 2 25a. In Mt. 16 ’3 0; dh’porror is rendered ‘n&”d
by Pesh Cur and Sin., while the k.v. Hier. has 6’nP ‘ndfd.
To show’that’’nii&i may be sing. and d’rek dF-nii&i a gram-
Fatical po-sibility, Drive: quotes Job 7 2 0 14 ‘9 33 16, Pesh., as
precise formal parallels. Such passages as Ex. 31 14 Dt. S 3
Is. 51 12 Job 256 Eccles. 728f: are better examples of ’nd&i as
1 Here and occasionally elsewhere in this article the Syriac
lias been transliterated into Hebrew for the sake of simplicity.
a Lietzmann’s statement (p. 83) that dvOpwa6q TLF is rendered
in ~1112 in Lk. 5 20 is not correct. The Greek is dvOporre, and
the Ev. has N V > ~ as I , the vocative is regularly indicated by the
emphatic. “AvOpoir6s T L Fis rendered in ~9312,Lk. 5 11.
4707
SON OF MAN
sing., since in the three cases quoted it seems to be a collective
(Job720, Syr. ‘maker of the human race,’ Heb. 025; 191,
‘watcher of mankind,’ @ TGV bvOp6nov; 1419, ‘hope of the
D‘VJU, B buOp6rrow). The construction of collective nouns with
sg. suffixesis very common. In appearance the forms ‘d68deh
d’aniizd (maker of man), sa6reh d’aniiCii (hope of man) and
edneh d’amifii(the ear of the man) look very much like ’d’ri./a
d’aniisd (son of man) ; in reality there is a marked difference
between them. While the former are perfectly clear and
idiomatic expressions, the latter is artificial, vague and am-
biguous. It may be translated either ‘son of the huhan race,’
or ‘ son of the human being.’ But it is no more apparent what
it means to be ‘a son of the human race,’ in distinction from
being a mere member of the human family(6ar-niiSii), than why
a man:, father should be emphatically described as ‘the human
The form can he explained by the exigencies of theo-
logical thought (cp $3 13), not by the laws of Aramaic speech.
iv. Mundaic.-In Mandaic N@N]N 11 occurs, Genza i. 207 22,
in the sense of <man.’ Two plurals are found, N ~ N I K-32 and
KININ (formed as n i x , 8nN;INx). The late form
N ’ I N I ~ N ~plur.
, Asfar MaZwaJe, 298, shows how completely the
first part of the word was lost to consciousness. wqy, ‘ a man,’
‘any oiie,’occursonly in sfafusabsolutus. But themost common
expression for ‘man’ is ~122. Cp NO. Mand. Gram. 127, 148.
v. Babylonian a d Talmudic.-In Babylonian Talmudic
pw~q-~,was likewise used, though not so frequently as N ~ J K ,for
man.
vi. jud@andiaZect.-Amongthe W. Aramaic dialects(Jud9an
Samaritan, Galilaean, Nabatzan) this idiomatic expression seem;
to have been less common in the S. than in the N. I t does
indeed occur as early as 165 B.C. in Dan. 7 13. For here kb6ar-
in&- (WIN Y-J~) means ‘like a human being.’ Dalman thinks
that this chapter has been translated from a Hebrew original
which had 0;s is. Even if that were so, the translator would
not have chosen dar-rritin preference t o 6ar Z d d m , exclusively
used by Onkelos, if, in the circles where he moved, b a r - n Z and
6ar-niSii were not more commonly used. For the plural be uses
bnZ in&%, Dan. 2 38 5 21, or iinEiii, 2 43 4 16f: 2 5 32 7 8 ; cp
Ezra 411. Pn& occurs only in the sense of ‘ a man,’ 5 5 6 7 12
7 4 14 2 1 0 3 10. The oldest Targums, ascribed to Onkelos
72 does not occur a t all in OnkelosAen iidiita being
rendered bar-iidiim-and only in Is. 51 12 56 2 Jer. 49 1833 50 40
51 43 Mic. 5 e for 6en ridiim in Jonathan, it is possible that the
disti,’,ctive word for man, the individual, bar-yZ&?, was not i?
vogue, gabrii, ‘man, the male,’ and iinE&i, man, the race,
being employed also to denote the member of the human family.
The fact that N O ~ * N 9 1 2 occurs with greater frequency both in
Onkelos and Jonathan may then show that the plural survived
longer than the singular for the same reasons as in Hebrew.
But the influence of a more extensive cultivation of the ancient
Hebrew tongue in Judaea, especially among those capable of
acting as interpreters, should not he overlooked ; and it is quite
likely that the common speech of the people was less affected by
vii. Samaritan.-In the Samaritan version of the Pentateuch
~ ~ ] is 1 found
2 only in some manuscripts in Gen. 9 6 and Nu. 23 19.
Since it occurs quite frequently in Markah (cp Fiebig, 17 .), I t
is safe to infer that here also the influence of the originaffupon
the learned translators renders the version less trustworthy in
this respect as a witness to Samaritan usage.
viii. GaZilcPan diaZecf.--In regard to the Galilrean dialect we
possess the simplest information. In the freedom of spontaneous
utterance and repartee in the Palestinian Talmud the pecnli-
arities of popular speech have a better chance of revealing tbem-
selves than in the translations, and the later Targums follow less
closely the Hebrew than the earlier. But even when due weight
is given to this fact, the extraordinaryfrequency of the idiom no
indicates a more extensive use on the part of the people
of Galilee. Dalman is inclined to regard it as a comparatively
late development under the influence of the Syriac, and thinks
that a person in the first century A.D. using so strange an ex-
pression as bar-niisd then would not have been understood as
speaking of ‘man.’ But Fiebig has shown that, not only did
HoSa‘ya about z w A.D.. u5e R W ] for
~ ‘a great man’
(Sht&& 56), but Sime‘on b. Yochai, ahout 130.160 A.D., used
wj72 for ‘man,’ ‘der Mensch’ (Berach. 15), and possibly also
Sime‘on b. Gamaliel hiscontemporary, ifacertainsaying hasbeen
preserved more acckrately in Talm. ?ab., NZdcriii~z546, Me?&
206. The indifference to the emphatic state p i n t s to long usage
even in the first partof thesecondcentury. I t is extremely
difficult to believe that only three generations earlier an expression
that had taken such dee roots, and is found in the literary re-
mains of all Aramaic diakcts, should not have been widely used
in Galilee as an equivalent of W I N or NWJN in the sing., and it is
quite incredible that so natural and idiomatic a designation of
the individual of the human race should not have been under-
stood as ‘man,’ but taken to be an esoteric expression. Meso-
otamia and N. Syria were old centres of Aramaic speech, and
t! is therefore natural that the old term to denote a member of
the human family should have maintained itself most strongly
there. Of NVINT a i 2 there is apparently no trace in the
4708
 SON OF MAN
Galilzean dialect. It does not even occur in Christian testimony
which may represent this dialect.
ix. The Niwwod icgend in BZrtGith rabba.-It is quite un-
necessary to resort to Babylonian mythology, as Fiebig is inclined
todo, foranexplanationof nil $ q o ~~ w ] > i ( B e m66a3Sp.
r. 47);
Abraham no doubt intended to lead Nimrod on from the worship
of man to that of God, as he had from the worship of the elements
to that of man ; every man is a bearer of the breath of life, and
no mysterious pregnant sense is demanded.
X. Naba&-an.-Of the Nabataean nothing is known except
through inscriptions. In these only W ) ~ Nin the sense of 'one,'
'some one,' 'any one' occurs. No inference can be drawn con-
cerning the existence of ~ 3 - 3or ~ 0 3 7 3 . The use of this term in
Aramaic has been treated with most comprehensiveness by
Fiebig, with most Talmudic learning by Dalman, and with most
insight by Wellhausen. An essentially correct understanding
of it lies at the basis of the theory developed by Eerdmans,
Schmidt, Meyer, and Lietzmann (see 5 30).
I n the Babylonian myth concerning Adapa and the
S. wind lRecueiZ de trav. 204) the hero is addressed as
Z i r amiZuti'(31z). Hommel ( E z p . T,
6. Analogous
1900, p. 341) translates this ex-
forms in May ' spring of mankind,' explains
Assyrian, itpression,
as ' he from whose seed the whole of
Ethiopic, and mankind is sprung,' and compares it
Arabic. with 6 uibs 703 Oiv8pwrrou. If this trans-
lation were possible, the phrase would have nothing in
common with the Greek term or its Aramaic original.
But it clearly means ' seed of men' ; and as zeru in
z R. 3648 is distinctly said t o be a synonym of m a n ,
' s o n , ' zir amiZuuti is an exact equivalent of XWIN 13.
Whatever his relation t o Ea, Adapa is a mortal man,
not a god, and is to be punished for his presumption.
T h e idea that he is the first man is precluded by 1 6 I I
rz 16. [Cp P A R A D I S E , 12.1
Adapa's designation as marlridu-' son[Le., citizen] of Iridu'
- ( c p mar Bafili, lrrar Bavsip, mar/ Ni%ri, m a d mal d55ur)
shows that, like I 3 and 12, mzru was used to designate the
member of a larger body. Delitzsch aptly compares mar
ummani (pl.), 'an artist' ; mar ikkari, ' a peasant' ; may
iSgari, 'a weaver,' with Heb. ~ * ~ * 39 33 33; mart nun< also
means simply ' fishes,' and inar i+n; < abird.
The Ethiopic Bible renders 'son of man' hy wdldri S ~ Z ,
wiildri be"&?, '&urilii 'imiihiyZu and wiildei 'igurila'Z?nZ&iyriu.
Of these terms wrildii srib'i is probably the most original. As
siib'iis a collective and virtual plural, wrildri s a ' P exactly corre-
sponds to N W I K ~ ~IVZldii bi'Esi=jilius vim' is the equivalent
of ~ i 3 ) ? 3 ,hut,.hke ~ 1 3 1 bB'%
, is also used for 'man,' 'der
Mensc/r. Our ignorance of the native mythology renders it
impossible to decide whether in '<guiiTE 'imri&yZz =proles
Itrat?+>uiui, the reference to Eve is original, and the expression
consequently of Jewish or Christian origin, or some other mother,
human or divine, is intended. It is often used collectively for
o l dvOporor, oi u i d TGV ivOp&ov, N W I X 7 j 3 . WiildE ' t p E Z E
'Zm~i/riyiu, 'son of the offspring of the mother of the living,' is
apparently a Christian term made substantially on the same
pattern and for the same reason as ~ ~ 3 1 1913. 7 It was ex-
clusively used for b ulbr TOG bvOp&rou in the NT, and by
reminiscence or interpretation found its way into passages having
only vios QvOpSlrou such as Jn. 5 27 Heb. 2 6 Rev. 113 14 14 and
also Ps. 80 18 Dan. 7 73 Ezek. 2 I and throughout the book, and
Enoch 37-71passim (see 5 7).
In the Arabic version ' son of man is most frequently rendered
i6nu'l insdni both in OT and NT. Sometimes ibnu insrini
occurs, Is. 51 12, and in Ps. 146 3 078 12 is rendered buni ba5am'.
In the NT ibnu'l ba5ari occurs frequently (see 5 13). Bu-am
is a collective and plural, but used for man,' the individual, as
well as for 'man,' the race.
Dan. 7 13 is the earliest passage in Aramaic literature
where the term 'son of m a n ' occurs. One ' like a
6. Dan., 13, humanbeing' (K2bar2nnd;, WJN 733)appears
before the Ancient of Days and receives
the empire of the world. T h e Messianic interpretation of
this passage meets us as early as in the first century A. D.
in Enoch 37-71 (see 7)and 4 Ezra (see 8). T h e
evangelists apparently understood it a s referring to the
Messiah (cp especially Mt. 2661 Mk.146z), and the
natural impression of. the Greek gospels is that Jesus
himself shared this view. It consequently prevailed in
the church. Through the influence of 'Akiba, Joshua b.
Levi, and Shemuel b. Nahman, it also gained the ascend-
ancy in the synagogue. On critical grounds it has been
accepted by a number of modern scholars.' Its strength
1 Lengerke, Ewald, Knobel, Hilgenfeld, Bleek, S. Davidson,
Riehm, Orelli, Dillmann, Behrmann, Jul. Boehmer.
4709
SON OF MAN
lies in the fact that it recognises the presence in this
passage of a well-known concrete personality. But it
utterly fails to explain how the Messiah, once introduced,
can have dropped so completely ont of the author's
thought, not only in the explanation of the vision where
he is unceremoniously ignored, but also in the future
deliverance with which Michael has much to do but
the Messiah nothing. A non-Messianic interpretation
appears already in Enoch 71 (see 8 ) , where Enoch is
evidentlyunderstood as being the 'son of man' of Daniel's
vision. Ibn Ezra interpreted bar-Znndi as referring to
the people of Israel. I n modern times this view has
been maintained by many scholars.' Yet a symbolic
representation of e a more humane regime,' ' ein A4eensch-
heitsideal' savours more of modern humanitarian ideas
than of the concrete conceptions of Semitic antiquity.
T h e present writer (IBL19, 1900)was led by these
difficulties to regard the manlike being as an angel, and
more particularly Michael, the guardian-angel of Israel.
H e pointed out that angels are constantly introduced as
having the appearance of men ; that the only angelic
representative of Israel is Michael ( ' your prince,' c J l @ ,
Dan. 1021 131); and that his coming with the clouds
after the destruction of the beasts, in view of 4 Ezra 13 I
Apoc. Elijah 1420 151, may show that the battle with
chaos-monsters had already been transferred from Yahwk
to Michael. This view has been accepted by Porter
(Hastings, D B 4 =Eo),who also suggests the demonic
character of the beasts. T h e objectioii that one would
expect the heathen nations to be likewise represented by
their angel princes is met partly by the traditional form
of the appropriated Marduk myth, partly by a lingering
respect for these angelic dignitaries who are the former
gods of the nations. Chaos-monsters may be consumed
by fire, but angels are not slain. That the one like a
man is neither the Messiah nor a mere symbol of Israel
has independently been argued by Grill ( Untersuch. ijber
die Entst. des Vierten E-dang. 50 $ , [1902]),who also
thinks of Michael. but is inclined to look for a still higher
being whose name is significantly withheld, like that of
the nuinen of PENIJEL (4.v.).a t the same time a 'most
exalted personal intermediary between God and the
world and a transcendant prototype of the God-pleasing
humanity ultimately to be iealised in the people of the
Most High.' T h e first part of this definition suits
Michael; whether he or any other angel was ever
thought of as the ideal Israelite, is more donbtfnl.
Volter ( Z N T W , 1902, p. 173J) has also abandoned
the hitherto prevailing views and suggested that the
celestial being is none else than the Mazdayasnian
gfathra vairiya, one of the AmeSa spefitas who is a
personification of the kingdom of heaven. But apart
from the uncertainty as to the date of the Avestan docu-
ments, Daniel's man-like being is a representative not
of the heavenly kingdom, but of Israel.
Another originally Aramaic book (so rightly Schiirer,
LBvi, We.) in which the term 'son of m a n ' occurs
7. Enoch37-71.i~ Enoch37-71. It is known to us
only through an Ethiopic translation.
That a Greek version even of this part of the Enoch
literature once existed may be inferred from Tertullian
(de c u h ferninarum, 1 3 ) ; but whether the Ethiopic
translation was made from it, is uncertain. According
to Bruce (in Laurence, Libri Bnoch Proph. Vers.
Z t h i o p . 11 [1838]) ' t h e Jews in ,4byssinia admit
it into their C a n o n ; it is not, however, the Book of
Enoch received amongst the Rabbins.' The first
Ethiopic version may therefore have been made by a
Jew from the Aramaic. This would account for a
1 Hofmann, Hitzig, Wittichen, Colani, Kiienen, Straton,
Keim Vernes Smend Toy Marti Meinhold Bevan, R&ille,
Dalmk, Schbrer, GAnkel,' Wellhksen, Lieizmann, Charles,
Prince, Driver, Curtis, Hahn.
111 nrim, Dan. 8 15 : o m '13 mn, Dan. 10 16: n ~ i m
niu Dan. 10 18 ; .?ii,, Dan. 3 25 ; ! N ? ~ I w w n , Dan. 9 z , cp
10 5'12 61: ; i ; p o r o ~ u r b vavOpwrrou, Rev. 14 14[see 8 91, ' like white
men,' Enoch S i 2 .
4710
 SON OF MAN
nnmber of Aramaisms not so likely to pass through the
mediuni of a tireek translation. See APOCALYPTIC, 5 30.
That the text has suffered numerous interpolations is uni-
versallyadmitted. A series of these were apparently taken from
a lost Apocalypse of Noah. Already Laurence perceived solile
of them : Kiistlin (Th.Juhr6. 1856, p. 2 4 0 8 ) recognised those
that most certainly have this origin, 54 1-552 60 65 I-ti925.
Tideinann (72.T , 1875, p. 2613:) conjectured that 41 3-943 44
59 were drawn from the same source, and Charles has adopted
this view. Bruno Baner (KritiR d. Gesclr. 1402 [1841])
first called attention to the now generally recognised secondary
charaoter of 70, 71, and suggested that the ‘Son of Man
passages were interpolated. Hilgenfeld ( f u d A$oku&5tih
1 6 2 8 [18571) presented the only natural interpretation d nection shows that there can be no question of ‘ man ’
674.13 by which the Noachic interpolations are found to he
later than 79 A.D., and the most probable explanation of 56 13
which apparently makes the original work later than Nero.
His view that the book was essentially the work of a Gnostic
Christian was accepted by many scholars. The objection that
one would expect more distinctive Christian teaching was met
in part by a reference to the Enochian masque, in part by
emphasis upon the important Christian ideas found in the
book. Drummond, however, showed in a convincing manner
that the Messianic passages were out of harmony both witi
the title and with the contents in each figurative address, and
that their removal rendered the discourses far more intelligible
(The jmuisk Messiah, p. 48 $ [18771). This argument
wa5 further elaborated by Pfleiderer (Urchrist., 3 1 2 3 [r887]).
A similar view wa5 independently presented by Bousset ( / m u
Predigf, 106 [1892]). But Drummond’s theory failed to explain
how any man could have written chap. 71 either before or after
these interpolations were made, and also why a Christian in-
ferpolator should not have used the title wrildii ’2~guriZri
e77riihZyyda exclusively as it is in the NT. 71 7-16 can be
accounted for only on the assumption that the text preceding it
somewhere made an allusion to a man who has righteousness,
yet in such a manner as to render it possible to regard Enoch
as the man intended. This precludes the possibility of any
passage containing the peculiar Christian phrase ‘son of the
offspring of the mother of the living‘(62 7 9 74 G3 II 6Y z6J 70 I)
having been a part of the text to which 71 1-16was added. It
is among the passages in which ‘son of man’ is rendered wrildri
sii6’i(46 2 3 48 2 GO IO) or w. 6 Z X i (G2 5 6929 a, 6) that such an
allusion must he soueht. In 6010the author of the Noachian frae-
menta u,ed bar.mii;i or 6ru.,id,i>n preciwly as it is used in E&.
It i- ditficult tu ititilk rhrough chap. 4,;in the Aramaic without
ol,raiiii~irthe imprea3iun t1i:it tlie Erhiupic is a direct tianslation
of the original. ‘ I saw one like a man ; ‘ I asked in regard to
that man ;’ ‘he answered : this is the man who has righteous;
ness ; ‘this man whom thou hast seen will arouse the kings.
The use of the demonstrative (in ~t~173) is evidently in g o d
order. On the theory of a translation from the Greek, the
present writer and subsequently Charles pointed out the use of
the demonstrative for the missing article in the Ethiopic, per-
mitting the assumption that the Greek had everywhere simply
6 vlbs 705 butlp6rrov. But Flemming (in Lietzmann P H M )
has rightly called attention to the fact that in the N k wiildri
’ Z p r i L i ’hnii&ya3 is never preceded by a demonstrative.
mil& sii6’i is as admirable a reading of bar-niiSd in 46 2 8 as
in 60 IO. Even in 48 2 ‘in that hour that man was named (i.e.,
‘called ’) before (Aramah for ‘by ’) the Lord of Spirits,’ the use
is natural. The scene in 415 is reminiscent of Dan. 7. As
Daniel’s manlike being was not mentioned by name, he might
be an angel like Michael, a translated hero like Enoch, a true
descendant of David snatched up to heaven and preserved for
the day of his appearance or a Christianised pre-existent
Messiah. The present desckption no doubt suggests to ns the
Messiah; but it is quite powble that in an earlier form of it
the man who walked with God, revealed hidden secrets and
achieved victories, pointed as clearly to Enoch, the vision being
(rightly or wrongly) ascribed, like others in the hook, to Noah.
That wuiiZdi be?Zsi, if original, could be useJ in the same sense
as wdldri sri6’i is evident from 71 14 which refer$ back to 46 2.
In G25,all MSS except the oldest read w. li‘&sith, ‘son of
woman ; in 6929 the oldest manuscript has the same form.
This shows that Christian copyists tampered with the text from
theological motives, the dogmatic interest being here the same
as that which crowded 8reh d&gdki (~7217a y ) out of,use.
These MSS themselves are probably Christian interpolations,
as is, undoubtedly 71 11 (cp Schmidt art. ‘Enoch’ in fewish
Ency. ;Son ofM& ch. 7 ; Af Th. ’ i i
In the original discourses the term consequently
never seenis to have occurred. I t is found in one of
the Noachic interpolations in the sense of ‘ man ’ as a
rendering of bar-nEE. In 46 zf., and 48 2 which may
have belonged to the same early stratum of insertions,
it has no other meaning. At these points Christian
interpolations appear to have attached themselves.
Where in the rest of the hook these are most manifest,
the distinctive N T title is employed.
In the Apocalypse of E z r a 1 3 3 5 the seer beholds
one like a man (quasi similitudinem horninis) coming
4711
SON OF MAN
out of the sea (de corde maris) with the clouds of
E ~ ~ 1 heaven, 3 3 ~refers to him again as that
8. man (iLh homo) and simply ‘ the man ’
(homo),and receives the interpretation that this is the
man through whom the Most High will redeem creation.
W e do not possess the original ; but the extant versions
(Lat., Syr., Eth., Arm.) all seem to come from the
lost Greek translation. As the author evidently has
Dan. 7 13 in niind, the original probably had ben-Znd
and bar-n&i which may have been rendered correctly
duOpwrros and d a”v0pwros in the Greek. T h e con-
or ‘ t h e m a n ’ being a title. Though the terni
‘ Messiah ’ is not mentioned, there can be little doubt
that the Messiah is intended. Retouching by Christian
hands may be observed in all the versions. But the
book, written in the reign of Domitian, probably
shows the niost transcendental conception of the
Messiah found in Jewish thought. All the more
significant is it that the final judgment is not one of
his functions. I n 61 the true text is preserved by Lat.,
Arm., ‘ through a m a n ’ being a Christian addition in
Syr. Eth. Ar., as Hilgenfeld has shown (Messins Iud.
54 n. 1.
T h e Christian parts of the Apocalypse of John contain
two passages, 1 1 3 and 1 4 14, where the phrase 6porov
9. Revelation. u l b huOp&rou ‘ like a son of m a n ’
occurs. It is the exact eouivalent of
Mbar-Pn&i and the author no doubt had in mind Dan.
713. In the first place it is unquestionably the celestial
glory of Jesus that is described with colours largely
borrowed by Ezekiel. As 1415 introduces another
angel,’ the impression is that the manlike being of
1414 is also an angel. T h a t this angel has a crown
upon his head does not show that he is the Messiah.
T h e angel of Sardis ( 3 II), the celestial presbyters (44 ro),
the angel represented as a white horse (Sz), and the
horse-like locusts (9 7), also wear crowns, and the angels
are the harvesters in Mt. 1341. I t is of utmost
importance that this work, written substantially at the
close of the first century (A POCALYPSE , 5 35, col. 207),
though with later additions, knows nothing about the
title d uibs TO; 8 v O p h o u .
T h e term d ulbs TOO dwOpdrou is not found in any of
the fourteen epistles ascribed to Paul ; in I or 2 Pet.,
NT Epistles. I , 2 or 3 J n . , James or Jude. Its
absence in this entire literature re-
presenting different lands, periods, and tendencies of
thought can scarcely be accidental. I t may not prove
that all the authors were unacquainted with the term.
As it is used in the Fourth Gospel, the reason for its
non-occurrence in I , 2 , 3 Jn. may be that there was no
occasion for using it. On the other hand, if Jude had
found it everywhere in his copy of Enoch as a Messianic
title, and known of it as the self-designation of Jesus, he
is quite likely to have referred to it. In Heb. 2 6 ,
I’s.85-7 is quoted as referring to Jesus. T h e author
sets forth the inferiority of a rerelation indicated through
angels, and argues from the Psalm that the world to
come was to be subject not to angels but to one
who had been made for a little while lower than the
angels (a). T h e same reference of the passage
to Jesus is seen in I Cor. 1527. Heb. 2 9 clearly
indicates the underlying question : Of whom does the
prophet speak, of nian in general, or of some particular
man? T h e answer was found in v. 6. H e spoke of
one who had been made for a little while (@pax; T L )
lower than the angels to be afterwards made ru!er of all
things. This could only apply to Jesus. T h e author
of I Cor. 1 5 4 5 8 designates the, Christ as 6 CUXUTOS
’A8apL, 6 b E 6 7 E p O F B w e p w ~ o 6~ , dvOpwnos cE O ~ ~ ~ U U O D .
Thus he evidently strives to express the ideal, supernal
humanity of Jesus. Yet it never seems to have occurred
to him to use for this purpose the common synoptic
title, nor the mere term 6 civOporos, or a n equivalent,
without a modifying adjective or adverbial expression.
4712
 SON O F MAN
T h e most natural explanation is certainly that it was
not known to him.
As an alternative the possibility was suggested in J B L 1536
that be may have regarded it as an inadequate characterisation
of that heavenly man who was no longer to he known according
i o the flesh; but such disregard was deemed incompatible with
a knowledge on his part of this as the one Messianic title used
by Jesus. Schmiedel ( P r o f . Monatxdt. 1898, pp. 2 6 0 f l . ,
~ g o r ,pp. 3 4 2 8 ) thinks that he may have hesitated to present
to Greek readers a term which, unlike the Jews, they would not
have understood,as a synonym of ‘ m a n ’ b u t literally as ‘the
son of the man. Such considerations do not seem to have
influenced the earliest translators (cp 5 36); if they were
seriously entertained by himself, it is difficult to see how he
could have allowed the objectionable phrase to run it.< course
wherever the evangelical tradition went without a n explanation.
Apart from the gospels, A c t s i 56 is the only passage
in N T where 6 uibs TOO duOp3rou occurs. Whether
it comes from the Author to Theophilus
56’ or represents a real utterance of Stephen
[see S TEPHEN, 71, it shows that there were some
Christians who did not reverently shrink from the use
of what in the gospels is the exclusive self-designation
of Jesus, nor hesitate to employ it lest it be misunder-
stood by Greek-speaking people. The author manifestly
takes for granted that the excited populace must recog-
nise in the phrase a designation of Jesus and not
merely a Messianic title. W h a t is deemed blasphemy
is not that he claims to see the Messiah on the right
hand of God, for that is his place, but that he claims to
behold the murdered Jesus in the 1Messiah’s place.
If the statement is historical, Stephen may have said
in Aramaic : ‘ I see bar-ndfd,’ L e . , ‘ a man,’ or the
m a n , ’ intending to continue his sentence, o r referring
to the righteous man with whose death he had just
charged the people. But it may be a free imitation of
Lk. 2269.
T h e term d ulbs TOO dvBpdrou occurs in the gospels - .preferred b’reh d i - n d i i were influenced by it. It is
12. O;currences eighty-one times-viz., thirty times in
in the Gospels. Mt., fourteen in Mk., twenty-five in
Lk., and twelve in Tn.
The references are as follows :-Mt. 8 20 9 6 10 23 11 19 12 8 32 40
13374‘ 161327f: 1791222 1928 2 0 1 8 ~ 824273oa6373944
,2531 26224a64564; Mk.21028 83138 9 g r z 3 r 103345 1326
14z1a64162; Lk.524 6 5 2 2 7 3 4 922264458 1130 1 2 8 ~ 0 4 0 that Jesus was not the son of a man.
1722242630 18831 1910212736 22224869 247; Jn.151 313f:
(5 27) 6 27 53 62 8 28 935 1223 34a6 1331.
Mt.1811 ( = L k . l 9 1 o ) , 2 5 1 3 and Lk.956B (=Lk.
19 I O ) T R are rightly obelised by critical editors. T h e
sixty-nine Synoptic passages clearly do not represent s
many distinct utterances. By removing the most
obvious parallels, Holsten and Oort leave forty-two,
Mangold and Driver forty. In any such arrangement
there is much exercise of subjective judgment, since
passages in the different gospels that are not absolutely
alike are regarded a s identical, while exact parallels in
the same gospel may or may not he considered as
duplicates. As it is of some importance to know which
of these occur in all three, in two, or only in one of the
gospels, the following arrangement may be made for
conveuience’ sake, involving no judgment as to the
number of times, or separate occasions, when the
evangelists considered Jesus as having used the ex-
pression. Eight in Mt.. Mk., and Lk. :
I . Mt. 9 6
,,la8 ..
Mk. 210
,, 228
..
Lk. 5z+
,, 65.
2.
3. ,, 1627
4. ,, 1 7 2 Z a
.. ,, 838
931
.
,, 926.
..
,, 944.
5. ,, 2018 .. 9,
,, 1033 ,, 1831.
...
6. ,, 24306 ,, 1326 ,, 2127.
7. ,, 2624a
8. ,, 2664
.. ,, 1421 ,, 2222.
,, 1462 ,, 2369.
Five in Mt. and Mk. :
9. Mt.179 Mk.14216.
SON OF MAN
23. R.It.1023 28. Mt. 19 28.
24. , I 1337 29. ,, 243oa.
25. 13 1341 30. ,, 2531.
26. ,, 1613 3x. ,, 2Gz.
27. ,, 1628
32. Lk. F z z 36. Lk. 19 IO.
33. 3, 128 37. ,, 21 56.
34. ,, 1722 38. ,, 2248.
35. 11 188 39. $ 3 247.
The earliest Aramaic translation of the Gospels, the Sinaitic
Syriac, renders b vibp TOG dvOpJmou by b’reh dZ-gdrZ (871
1 )Mk. 8 38 Lk. 7 34 and Jn. 13 31 ; in
~ 1 1 ~ in
13. ande-6 Lk.1130 and Jn.1223 only b’reh(;nz) is left;
in the Ancient in all other extant passages b’reh dZ-n-nriSii
Versions. 1 ) to have been used.1
( ~ p i ~ l ; nseems
The Curetonian fragments have ~ i ~713 i i
in Lk. 7 34 9 26 22 48, elsewhere N V ] N ,~711: In the Euange-
Ziarium Hierosoiymitanunz the phrase IS rendered ~ i z 811
n
in Mt.96 1232 1613 1791222 1928 24273oa373g Lk.524
6 5 2 2 9 5 8 1 1 3 0 1 2 4 8 ~ o a 1 ~ 1 0 2 4Jn.3,3f:62753626is,828
7
13 31 : ~ w i i i 813
i (b’rch dZ-6ar-n&i) in Mt. 24 30~54425 31
26 2 24a6 45 64 Mk. 2 IO 8 31 38 9 31 10 33 Lk. 21 27 36 22 22 Jn.
1 5 1 12 23 34 bis.
Only in the Pesh. is b uibs TOO dvOp3aou uniformly
rendered b’reh d$-nd;d. Driver’s statement (Hastings,
DB4582)that in the Sin., Curet., and Pesh. the term is
always represented by b’reh d2-ndG is incorrect. T h e
occurence of b’reh dZ-gu6rd in Lk. 7 34 (Sin., Cur. ), Mk.
8 3 8 (Sin., E v . ) and the identical Lk. 926 (Cur.), Lk.
2 2 4 8 (Cur.) and Jn.1331 (Sin., E v . ) is not without its
importance. It suggests that in the case of some say-
ings b’reh d2-gabrd had so established itself in common
usage that even translators who, for dogmatic reasons,
evident that b’reh dZ-bar-ndZ is a creation of Christian
theology designed to avoid misconstruction of b’reh
d?-gubrd. Originally the latter was no doiibt intended
to mean simplyfilius horninis; but the root idea (/Eliz~s
h i ) could not fail to be embarrassing to the dogma
Its use by Paul
of Tella (see 5 4 ) shows that the substitute was not un-
known among the Christians of Mesopotamia. Cureton
explained that his translator ‘was not accurately ac-
quainted with the Greek language, and therefore trans-
lated . . . JElius viri not horninis‘ ( R ~ n z a i n s ,p. hi).
But the Greek phrase, which is everywhere the same,
could not have troubled him, and he knew his own
language. If, in some places, he used what he must
have regarded as a synonym, the reason is probably t o
he looked for in tradition.
It is significant that b’reh dZ-ndJd never occurs in the
Palestinian lectionary, and that in Mt. and Lk. b’reh dE-
g d r d maintained itself everywhere except in Mt. 24-26
and Lk. 21- 22. S o completely has the consciousness of
the element ‘ son ’ in Son of Man disappeared that ‘son
of the son of man ‘ meant only ‘ son of man.’ Possibly
the introduction of the new phrase in the synoptic
apocalypse (see 5 41) and in certain typical sayings is
reminiscent of an earlier Aramaic version having only
bar-ndii. T h e Edessene translators could not render
the Greek phrase by 6ar-724& since this would have taken
no account of the articles. As the idea was new, no ex-
tant expression could be used, and any term would be
open to misapprehension. T h e form apparently first
chosen, b’reh dC-gmbrd, might be understood as the son
of some particular man, but gabrd had the advantage of
being a singular. I n the end the objection that it might
be taken to imply that Jesus had a human father proved

I
Mk.99 12. Mt.26246
IO. ,, 1712 ,, 912 13. ,, 2645 ,, 1441. more serious, and the phrase seems graduallyto have been
11. ,, 2028 ,, 1045. crowded out of use until the officially recognised version
Eight in Mt. and Lk. : had no other form than B’reh dP-ndfd. ‘Son of the
14. Mt. 820 Lk. 958 18. Mt.2427 Lk.1724. huinan being,’ might be interpreted ‘ son of Mary.’
15. ,,
,, 1119 9, 734 19. ,, 2437 1726.
16. 1232 ,, 121oa x). ,, 2439 ,, 1730. vim m h Lk. 2248, is either a scribal error or pi^, is a
17. ,, 1240 ,, 1130 21. ,, 2444 ,, 1240. later addition ; Nwim, Jn. 6 27, was no doubt preceded by 813.
4713 4714
 SON O F MAN
The earliest Arabic version was probably made from some
Aramaic translation. It is not likely, however that this was
the Peshita, as it would then undoubtedly rende: b'reh d;-n&i
everywhere with the same phrase. But in Mt. 9 6 16 13 Lk. 9 58
17 24 26 19 10 Jn. 1 5 3~13f: 6 27 53 62 8 28 it uses the term i6nu ' I
b d a r i , while elsewhere the rendering is i6nu ' I insdni. BaJaarrr
is a collective, but is frequently used as a sg., and i6nu ' I 6a:an'
is not improbably a rendering of d'reh dt-gabmd.
The Ethiopic everywhere translates the Greek term wrildri
'eguallri 'ewrli~eydu,never expressing the article by a demon-
strative Zpekd or zextzi. With the same uniformity the
Latin versions render itfilizw Lominis.
On the relation of Marcion and other Gnostics
to the Synoptic
- . title see 6 ._ f: It cannot safely be
- 43 ~
14. patristic maintained that it was unknown to all
and mediaVal of the ' apostolic fathers.'
The most natural interpretation of Barn.
2 IO is that the author alludes to it when,
having found in an interpolated text of Ex. 17 14 a reference to
the son of God, he declares that,Jesus is prefigured in it 'not as
son of man, but as son of God. The inference may be drawn
that about 130 A.D. the title was known in some-circles and
understood as designating the human nature assumed by the
Son of God. In a later addition to the Ignatiau epistle to the
Ephesians202 the title is found (dvi+ bvOphlrov), apparently
interpreted as referring to Jesus' descent from David. Justin
(DiaL 100) explained the title as referring to Jesus' descent
through Mary from David, Jacob, Isaac, and Abraham.
Irenieus (Kaer. 3 19)understood it to denote that Jesus was the
son of Mary 'quie et ipsa erat homo,' and Tertullian strongly
argued the impossibility of any other interpretation ( d v . Marc.
4 IO). Origen, on the contrary, regarded it as unnecessary to
seek for a particular human being, since the expression simply
meant ' man ' and w a s chosen hy Jesus from pedagogic motives,
as when God is re resented as a man (Migne, 13 r5 37).
Even in Greek tie memher of a body was sometimes indicated
by vi&, as i n vi. T ~ S spovuias, vi..+ lr6Asws, vi. TO$ Srjpov,
VL. 'A+po8rur&v (cp Jeissmann, Bzbelsfzuiien, 1 I&), and v;bs
Qv6'phlrov was frequently found in parallelism with &@puros in
the LXX. So profound a student of these versions as Origen
may therefore have rightly understood the idiom.
Theodoret introduces the Hebrew and Aramaic usage
t o account for certain phrases compounded with vi6s o r
Bvydr7)p in 6 3 ; he may have applied the same principle
to this case. Chrysostom certainly regards the term
as simply designating ' m a n ' in Jn. 527 (Migne, 59223).
That seems also substantially to have been the view of
Augustine (Contra Arian. 18). It is possible that
Cyprian's comparison of Mt. 1232 with I S. 225, a n d
inference that the church cannot forgive sins against
God, indicates that h e understood $&s hominis t o
designate ' man ' in a generic sense in some passages,
as Lietzmann has suggested (p. 80). Jerome was not
prevented by his knowledge of Hebrew from identifying
a the human being ' as the virgin Mary (Com. in Ps.
85) ; and this continued to be a common interpretation.
Euthymius Zigabenus (about 1100A . D . ) explains that
& O ~ W H O Smay mean yuv+ a s well as dv$p (Migne, 129 2g3),
and Alexander of JumCge (d. 1209) only regrets the
difficulty of rendering in French a title which is identical
so far as the meaning is concerned, but not gram-
matically, with lfZius vi?-g'nis. In the first German
translation it was indeed translated sdn der maid (Codex
Teplensis and three earliest editions), and the Romance
version of the Waldenses had$Zh de la vergene. Nicolaus
d e Lyra understood Mt. 128 to affirm that blasphemy
against Christ's humanity is not as unpardonable as
that against his divinity, and Mt. 1613 to be a con-
fession on his part of the humble fact of his humanity
while his disciples understand it of his divinity (SibZia
Sacrn, 1588, vol. ii. ). A curious comment on ' men '
in Mt. I613 is ' homines sunt qui de filio hominis
loquuntur, Dii enim qui deitatem intelligunt.'
With the renaissance of learning, the first attempts a t
a philological explanation appeared. GCnCbrord, a
15. Resort noted Hebraist, commenting on Mt. 1232,
declared that ' son of m a n ' meant simply
to the ' m a n ' and, returning to Cyprian's sug-
gestion, saw in Eli's words (I S. 225) an
expression of the same sentiment. Sins against men
may be pardoned, but not sins against God ( D e
S. Tn'nitate, 1569). Flacius Illyricus defined jiZius
1 Ginbhrord, Flaccus, Beza, Grotius.
4715
SON OF MAN
hominis as u n m yuijpiain homo (Clavis, sub voce
' filius '). Beza regarded the expression as a Hebrew
phrase for man, and suggested the Hebrews' custom of
speaking of themselves in the third person, but also called
attention to the fact that in the gospels no one except
Jesus does so. I t is the merit of Grotius to have first
recognised that in Mt. 1 2 8 the conclusion must be,
I Therefore man is lord also of the sabbath.'
Pointing to Mk. 2 28 as exhibiting the more original connection
he conclusively showed that the argument would have no
cogency if the Son of man were interpreted as the Messiah, and
could not have been understood since at the time Jesus had
neither declared himself to he the' Messiah nor been willing to
have his disciples proclaim him as such. In regard to Mt. 12 32
he came to the same conclusion as G611kbrord; hut he refrained
from attempting an explanation of any other passages on the
same principle (Cvit. Sac. 6 445J).
T h e discovery that upon two occasions Jesus spoke,
not of himself, but of man in general, when employing
this Dhrase. naturallv seemed less i m w r t a n t than the
conjecture that h e constantly used a the
16.
for personal man,' in the sense of this man,' for
pronoun the personal pronoun. T h e latter was
maintained hv Cocceius ~Schol.in Mt.
< \
Szo), a n d found its way into the first life of Jesus by
Hess (1 160 161 269). Bolten's criticism was important
because through it a third passage (Mt. 96) was added to
the two of Grotius, and the Aramaic term b a r - n i j i was
brought into thediscussion (Der Be7-ichtd. J4atth. 1792).
He called attention to the Syriac use of b'reh de-n&-d with no
more force than that of an indefinite pronoun, found it strange
that the Greek translator should have failed to take note of this
+ a r m i s m and boldly maintained that in Mt. 24 27 jesus said.
So will h i the appearance of some one,' meaning by some one '
himself. In regard to all passages except Mt. 9 6 12 8 Paulus
returned to the opinion of Coccejus ('hic homo pro ego'), pointed
out the importance of Jn. 12 34, and suggested a later misap-
prehension under the influence of Dan. 7 13 (Exez. Hd6rrch,
1465 5 w 2 ZI~). Kninoel accepted the interpretation given by
Grotins of Mt. 128 and, in spite of the well-founded warning of
Eichhorn (A&. Bi6L 524 [17g4]), followed Beza and Bolton in
Mt. 10 23 (Corn. Z ~ X 337, [1823]). The impossibilityof the latter
explanation led ritzsche, who in general agreed with Paulus,
to the view that Mt. 10 23 and other passages were later additions
(Corn. in ea Matth. 320). The theory which assumed that Jesug
habitually used an indefinitepronoun or a phrase like 'the man
accompanied by agesture indicating himself, was too artificial to
command respect, and in the general reaction against the
rationalisticschool, the real achievementsof these earlier scholars
were conipletely forgotten.
When Herder (Chr. Schyiften, ii. [1796]54) explained
the term as designating the ideal humanity of Jesus, h e
gave a new form to the idea that it was
Idea' man? intended to teach the human nature of
the Christ. But in this modernisation the contrast
with the divine nature of the Christ was lost, a n d an
emphatically high conception was the result. Through
Schleiermacher (EinZ. 4 7 9 8 ) and Neander (Leben Jesu,
1.98) this view gained a wide recognition.
I t was adopted anrong others by Hiihme, Olshausen, I.uti,
Krusc, and Luthardt, hns more recently been defended Ly \Vest-
cott and Statiton, and influenced Weisse, Holtzmann, Iieyschlag,
. -
Hase, Keim, Mangold, Usteri, and Briickner.
Hofmann (Schrz~tbmeis, ii. 253) could find in the
phrase no allusion to a n ideal of humanity, hut regarded
18.coming man? it as substantially synonymous with
' h e that cometh,' d ~ ~ X ~ ~ E Pcon- O S ,
taining no indication of character. Cremer ( Worter-
d u ~ h ( 8~4) 6, 8 ) similarly saw in it a reference to the
man promised in the protevangel, Gen. 315.
Already Scholten (Specimen, 1809) interpreted the
term as a title of the Messiah, the heavenly king
destined to reign as man over men.
19' cum!nt Strauss (Leben J e w , 463 [1835])expressed
M ~ the opinion
~ ~ the sone of man ~ was one
that
of the current Messianic titles. V. Colln
(BibL Th. 216 [1836])agreed with him. Ewald (Gesch.
Christus',~0~[1855])pointedtoDan. and En. 37-71,which
he regarded as the oldest part of the book, as evidence.
Renan ( Vie de /&us, 1 3 1 8 [1863]) maintained that in
1 Coccejus, Hess, Bolten, Paulus, Fritzsche.
4716
 SON O F MAN
certain schools it was a title of the Messiah a s judge of
the world and king of the age to come. Beyschlag
(ChvistoZqze, gf. [1866]) held that it was a Messianic
title in Dan. 7 13 En. 462 fl and all passages in the
gospels, and that Jesus chose this particular title both
to express his consciousness of being a man and his
knswledge of the fact that he was the ideal, absolute,
and heavenly man. Baldensperger ( ~ e ~ b s t b e z e ~ u s s t ~ c i nMessianic from its source in Dan., and maintained
/esd2J, 1 6 9 F [1892]) likewise affirmed that the phrase
was used before the time of Jesus as a Messianic title
and was adopted by him as such, not, however, before
the episode at Caesarea Philippi, the earlier .passages
having been displaced.
T h a t Jesus employed the term to express his own
peculiar Messianic consciousness has been the conviction
of many scholars. But there has been
20. Expression much difference of opinion as t o his
of a peculiar reason for selecting it, and in regard to
Messianic its origin. While some investigators
consciousness? endeavoured to discover its meaning by
a n analysis of all passages, and by connecting the varrous
predicates with the idea of man, others discerned in it
only a designation of office without immediate connection
with the root idea, and in the predicates saw synthetic
judgments. T h e majority of critics found its origin in
Dan. 7 13. Others, however, thought of Ezek., Ps. 8 or
En. 46, while a few regarded it as an absolutely new
creation of Jesus. One source was deemed sufficient by
some students ; by others the conception was looked upon
a s the result of various combinations. As to the motive
for its employment, there were those who thought that
it was chosen openly to proclaim a different Messianic
title from that suggested by such titles as ‘ S o n of
David ’ and ‘ SON OF GOD ’ ( q.v. ). But many scholars
urged that such a public announcement was improb-
able at least in the earlier part of Jesus’ ministry, and
that he is more likely to have used it as a riddle to
be guessed at, half revealing, half concealing his notion
of the Messiah and his own claims. T h e various
thpories were largely dependent upon different interpre-
tations of passages in OT and the Pseudepigrapha, the
priority ascribed to Mt. o r Mk., and the tone of Mt.
8 20 compared with Mk. 2 IO.
In commenting on Mt. 820, De Wette observed that
to those who did not think of Dan. 7 1 ; the expression
21. Emphasis could only suggest ‘ this man,’ whilst
onlowliness to those who had the Daniel passage the determining influence of the first occurrence in Mt.
mind it would mean ‘ this insignifi-
and human in
sympathy? cant man who, in spite of his humble
condition, is destined to become that
which the prophet has indicated.’ In this pregnant
utterance the thought of Paulus still shows its vitality ;
but it contains the germs of new theories.
Wilke (ilrrvuweiis;, 633 118381) inferred from Mt.1613 that
‘ s ~ n o f m m ’ ~ a n nheideiiucalwithrlir
ot 5lesainh. Baur (2WTh.
1860, pp. 2 7 7 3 ) made an important contribution by show-
ing that the passage where the term occurs in the fourth gospel
cannot throw any light on its original meaning. His examination
of the synoptics convinced him that the context never favoured
the idea of an ideal humanityand that there was no reference to
Dan. 7 ‘3 ; and he therefore concluded that Jesus invented the
term, at the same time to claim for himselfa Messiahship without
which he could not attain t3 a more universal recognition and a
genuinely national work and to keep aloof from the vulgar
Messianic idea associateh with the title ‘son of God.’ He
would be, not a king coming in power and glory, but a man
deeming nothing foreign to him that belongs to the lot of a
human being, identifying himself with all human conditions,
needs, and interests, in genuine human sympathy, and accepting
all sufferings and sacrifices connected with his work in life.
This has been called an ‘ emphatically low ’ estimate in distinc-
tion from that of Herder. It should he observed, however, that
it comes much nearer to the old dogmatic position with its
s’larp contrast between the title of Christ’s humiliation and that
characteristic of his glory, as seen c.g. in Meyer (Coni. 1832 to
hft. S zo), and that it really sets firth the human worth of Je;us’
personality more clearly than any mere abstraction like ‘the
ideal.’ Colani (/Psus Christ et Zes croyancrs Messianiqucs
7 4 f i [1864l)held that the expression was unknown before Jes&
because it was he who created it, that by it he designated him-
self as the poor child of Adam, and also as the object of a peculiar
divine love, that no one called him by this name because it would
* Weisse, Ritschl, H o l b a n n , Kkim, HLse, Hoisten, Wendt,
4717
SON O F MAN
have been little short of an insult, and that it disappeared
because in the church the divinity became more important than
the humanity of Jesus. Strauss was also won for the opinion
of Baur and Colani ; and Schenkel (BibeZ-Zexikon, 1872) pre-
seiited a somewhat similar conception based on ps. 8.
Hilgenfeld, like Baur, regarded the term as indicating
lowly external conditions and a humble disposition, but
22. loued entered a protest against separating it
LIL._
-
ninie .!
.., its Messianic significance in all places,
though reflecting the peculiar conception
of Jesus ( Z W T k . 1863, p. 3 2 7 8 ) . Baur was led by
this presentation to assume a later Danielic significance
for the eschatological discourses ( N T T k . 1864,p. 82).
Bernhard Weiss (Bi61. Th. NT 5 9 3 [1868]) saw in the ex-
pression neither a current Messianic title nor a description of
character, but a term having no intrinsic significance in Dan.,
chosen by Jesus to avoid misapprehension of his aims and yet
to announce himself as the Messiah promised in Dan. The
statements made concerning the Son of Man were consequently
regarded by him as synthetic judgments, in the Kantian
vhraseolow introduced in this connection bv Biedermann
( D o g m a t z , 226x).
Mangold (Th.A d . d. rhein. PV 1877, pp. r&) regarded
the term as a Messianic title, chosen to emphasise the possi-
bility of sufferingand death as a man, and the coming exaltation
as the true, ideal man. Usteri (Th. 2.a. d. Schweie, 1886
pp. 18) strongly urged that the verbal meaning of the phras;
was of no importance, as it was solely a title of office selected
by Jesus in order to allude to the coming of the promised
redemption to mankind. Essentially this view was held by
Bruce (Kingdom of God, 172 [18 o]),and Stevens (Teaching of
/es.s, g ~ f [19?1]) emphasised txe new content which Jesus IS
likely to ave given to this Messianic designation.
Rejecting Ewald’s theory as t o Enoch 4 6 8 , Weisse
looked upon the term as an original creation of Jesus
23. MystifJring to express his peculiar consciousness ot
being a human Sou of God, and there-
title ? a fore having no familiar connotation t o
his hearers but presenting to them a riddle (Ev. Gesch.
1325 [1838] ; Ev.-fYage, 2 2 8 [1856]).
Weisse’s philological explanation (‘human son’; like q~
opnLs.il, supposed Hebrew original of 6 ra+p d oirpdvror, ‘heavenly
father’) naturally met with no approval and his confusion of the
Synoptic with the Johannine use was wisely avoided by Ritschl.
Sharing, however, with Weisse, the view that Mk. is earlier
than &It. and resents in a more trustworthy manner the
course of Jesus’ efe, Kitsch1 was led to the conclusion that Jesus
used the term to conceal rather than to reveal his Messianic
claims, as Mk. records two instances of its use before the im-
portant episode at Caesarea Philippi (Th. jahr6. 1851, p. 514).
Holtzmann ( Z W T h . 1865. pp. 2 1 2 8 ) pointed out
(820) upon those who maintained the priority of this
gospel, held that in reality the passage suggests Messianic
dignity rather than humility, and inferred from Mk. 210
the Messianic significance of the term tothe mind of Jesus,
but considered this to have been a secret until the visit
to Caesarea. Keim thought that Jesus gradually went
beyond this mystifying title to such designations as
‘ the coming one,’ ‘ the hridegroom,’ in suggesting his
Messianic claims (Gesck. Jesu, 2 376). Hase was of the
opinion that Jesus chose this term first to conceal, and
then at the proper time t o manifest his Messiahship a s
the perfection of human nature (Gesch. /em, 412).
According to Wendt (Lehre /em, 441 fl [1890]). the
use of this expression was not so much a riddle, as a
problem provoking to thought and private judgment ;
for whilst the hearers by their transcendental conception
of the Messiah were preventsd from seeing in the Daniel
phrase ‘Son of m a n ’ a fit designation of so august a
being, Jesus found it most suitable to express his convic-
tion that in spite of human weakness and low-ly con-
ditions he was the Messiah. In Mt. 82096 1119 128 32
and parallels, Holsten ( Z W T h . 1891, pp. IJ?) saw the
evidence that Jesus used this term concerning himself
before the scene at Czsarea Philippi. and in Mt. 16 13 the
proof that he employed it to designate himself as the
Messiah.
1 Hilgenfeld, B. Weiss Mangold Usteri Bruce Stevens.
Paul, Dalman, Gunkel, Fiebig.
4718
 S O N OF M A N
It seemed to Holsten probable that Jesus’ Messianicconscious-
ness grew out of his experience, suggesting to him that the
chosen one on whom the unction of spirit rested was to pass
through two forms of existence, one of humiliation, another of
glory, even as the ‘Son of man’ in Dan. was brought from
earth to heaven to be clothed with power. So profound a
view, however, must have been a mystery to the disciples until
it was revealed to them.
According to Paul ( VorsieZlungen urn Messias, 4 2
[1895]), the mystery existed for Jesus himself as well as
for his hearers, inasmuch as there was a time in the
Galilrean period when he still doubtfully asked whether
in reality he was the Son of man promised in Dan.
Dalman ( W o r f e /em, 191 8 [1898]) clearly recognised
that ‘ the Son of man ’ was not a Messianic title in the
time of Jesus, and that 6ar-nZ&i was the phrase used
by him that has been translated 6 ulbs 700 d v O p h o u .
This. however, he regarded as unknown in Galilzan
Aramaic at that period in the sense of ‘ man.’
It would therefore naturally point to Dan. 7 13, a passage
especially attractive to Jesus, because it ascribed the estahlish-
ment of the kingdom of heaven to God alone. Dalman con-
sidered it improbable that Jesus employed the phrase before the
episode at Caesarea, some pericopes having been placed out of
their chronological order. After that event his disciples regarded
it as a declaration that he was the Son of man of Daniel’s vision ’
to the peo le it was a riddle, the solution of which Jesus did no;
give until \is appearance before the Sanhedrin, and then a t the
cost ofphis life; to himself it was a means of realising and
teaching that the child of human parents by nature weak
destined by God to be the ruler of the wohd, may before hL
investiture with Messianic power be obliged to suffer and die.
Accepting the view that bar-n&i was used and
meant simply ‘ m a n , ’ ‘ tke man,’ Gunkel (ZWTh.
1899, .pp. 5 8 1 8 ~ Vie& Buch Ezra, 347 [1900])
maintained that ‘ the m a n ’ was a secret title of the
Messiah used in Apocalyptic circles, and originating in
Babylonian mythology.
Like Gunkel, Fiebig (Der Menschmohn, 6 1 8 [1901]) re-
garded ‘the man’ as a familiar designation of the Messiah ; but as
his philological examination had led to the conclusion that ~ w j - ,
was understood in Galilee a t the time of Jesus as meaning also
‘man,’ he ingeniously argued that the phrase was intentionally
used in an ambiguous manner so that the hearers might believe
that he (Jesus) was speaking Af man in general, or of ‘the man’
--i.~., the Messiah as a third person-whilst in reality he was
speaking of himself.
T h e conception of the phrase as a mystifying title
into which Jesus poured the contents of his peculiar
24. Composite Messianic consciousness was naturally
favourable to the introduction of various
idea ? combinations ; whilesome scholars were
contented with a single O T passage as the basis for
further development, others thought of several different
ideas blending into a new conception.
Thus Weizsacker conceived of a gradual revelation of Jesus’
Messianic self-consciousness, first on the prophetic side sug.
gested by Ezekiel, and then on the royal side intimated by
Dan. (JDTh. 1859, p. 7 3 6 8 , E%. G ~ s c h .4 2 6 8 118641).
Hausrath found in the term a combination of the heavenly
man in Dan., the man that is a little lower than the angels in
Pr 8 and the prophet in Ez. (NT Zeitgesch.M 1879 14b).
Wittichen introduced, in addition, the Son of maLin Enoch and
the Servant of Yahwi: in 2 Is. (Die Idee des Menschen, 1 3 7 3
[18r8]; Niisgen (Gesch. /em, 155@ [1891]) saw in the expres-
sion a combination of esoteric Messiahship suggested by Daniel
and a phase of existence through which the Messiah must pas;
with its predetermined humiliation and suffering. Bartlet
(EXpm. 1892, p. 4278) also united the idea of the suffering
servant with that of an ideal representative of humanity and
the kingdom of God. Schnedermann (/em Verkundigung,
2, 1895, 2 0 6 8 ) combined Danielic Messiah, Ezekielic prophet,
ideal man, and humansuffering. Charles (GooRofEnoch rzf.
[1893]) held that the true interpretation would be found:f the
conception in Enoch were taken for a starting-point, its
enlargement and essential transformation in the usage of Jesus
were noted, its subsequent reconciliation to the conception of
the Servant of Yahwe were ohserved, and the occasional re-
miniscences of Dan. 7 were perceived. Stapfer (Jisus Christ
pendanf son ministe‘rc, 3 0 5 8 [18971) combines in the expres-
sion Ezekielic prophet and Danielic Messiah. In the judgment
of Sanday (Hastings D B 2 622A)the ideas of a representative
of the human race, ‘an ideal man and a suffering servant of
Yahwi: are fused into the central’idea of Messiahship. This
position is also endorsed by Driver (i6.4j8z).
1 Weizsacker, Hausrath, Wittichen, NBsgen, Schnedermann,
Bartlet, Charles, Stapfer, Sanday, Driver.
4719
SON OF MAN
Whilst Weizsacker found in the customary designa-
tion of Ezekiel a means employed
-
~ __ --
by Tesus for suggesting
25. Prophetic the prophetic character of his Messiah-
I
ship, Vernes held that ‘Son of m a n ’
title? actually was a current prophetic title
assumed by Jesus to iniicate that, like John ;he Baptist,
he was a herald of the coming kingdom, and sub-
sequently merged into the Danielic ‘Son of m a n ‘ by
the Church ( L d h mess. 178). This view has been
carried out most consistently by Cary (The Synoptic
GospeZs, 360 8 [I~oo])who maintains that by this
term Jesus intended to announce himself as a prophet
sent to warn his people of the danger which threatened
them if they did not turn from their evil ways.
It was not unnatural that the thought should arise
that the ’ S o n of man.’ of whom Tesus is reuresented a s
26. Designation having habitually spoken in the third
person, was an ideal or spirit not
of Jesus, own identical with, though closely related
ideal, future to, his own immediate self.
Messiahship, ~~
Bruckner (IPTh. 1886,p. q2)suggested
indwelling that Jesus who, in his judgment, never
genius? used the term before the episode at
Caemrea, when predicting the return of
the Son of man thought not of his own personality of
the man Jesus, h t t rather of the ideals with which he ’had
identified himself. A. Rkville (Jdsus de Naeareth, 2 1 ~ s
[1897]) concluded from Mk.21028 and Mt.25 that in the
thought of Jesus the phrase designated something more than
an individual son, though this individual he Jesus himself,
that it was a personification of a principle transcendent above.
and immanent in all the persons making up the sum total
of humanity, add only applied to Jesus in so far as he
identified himself with this principle. According to Joh.
Weiss (Predfgt / e m , 5 2 3 [1892!; yachfo?ge Christi, ,33x
[18751), Jesus used the term to indicate his future position.
When he should return upon the clouds, he woiild he the Son of
man referred to by Daniel. In the sayings concerning the
death of the Son of man, he taught objectively that the coming
Messiah must suffer and die ; in Mt. 11 19 16 13 Lk. 7 34 the
~ title has been substituted for original ‘ I ’; in Mk. 2 1028 the
philological explanation resumed by Lagarde Rahlfs, and Well-
hausen (see $ 29) should he applied (cp ako Pred&t / e m @ )
1900, pp.. 1608, ZOI $, where the interpretation of somi
passages IS slightly modified). In harmony with his exegebis
of Dan.713, Grill (Lc., 5 7 8 : ) comes to the conclusion that
Jesus more or less distinctly conceived of himself as being
dynamically identified with the highest principle of revelation,
the angelic hypostasis introduced by Daniel, and that the
original text read Zyw in Mk. 2 I O and b lvOpoaoc in Mk. 2 28.
When the interpretation of Daniel’s ‘ S o n of m a n ’
as a symbol of a coming ideal society had u o n its way
to wide recognition, the suggestion
27. Designation lay near at hand that Jesus may have
of ‘kiwdom used it himself in the same sense.
O f heaven’ ? Hoekstra maintained that Tesus indi-
cated not himself by this te;m, but the
new religious community to which the kingdom was to be
given (De hewarning de zoon des Menschen, 1866). Carpenter
!First Three GosgeLs 1% p 3 8 3 8 ) held that Jesus employed
it as an emblem of’the hingdom of righteousness, and that
his followers, impressed with the conviction that he was the
Messiah, understood it in a personal sense, and gave such a
zolouring to his reported utterances as accorded with this
usumption. Drummond (]Th.Sf. ‘901)thinks that Jesus may
have regarded it as an expression for the ideal people of God,
md for himself as head of this class, giving to it the same
erimarily collective, subsequently individual, sense that the
Servant of Yahwi: has.
Whilst many scholars failed to make any distinction
=tween the words actually uttered by Jesus, and the
sayings ascribed to h:lm by the evan-
28. Creation gelists, and some were content with
by the
indicating passages of doubtful authen-
evangelists ? I ticity, others felt the necessity for a
more searching c r i t i & n . As a more correct estimate
7f the Fourth Gospel spread, the tendency developed
in many circles to lean all the more heavily on the
jynoptics. I t is largely the merit of Bruno Bauer and
Volkmar to have applied the same measure to all the
Zospels, explaining each as a didactic work written for
% definite purpose, and naturally reflecting the religious
1 Bruno Bauer Volkmar, Jacohsen, Pfleiderer, Martineau,
Zone, Oort, Van Manen, Baljon, Bxandt, Wrede.
4720
 SON O F MAN
thought of the author and the men among whom he
lived. From this point of view B. Bauer reached tlic
conclusion that Jesus never called himself ‘ Son of man ‘
(Kritid d. ew. Cesch. 3 [I 8421 I 8 ), and Volkmar was
led to the view that it was an original creation of Mk.
But was redly hlk. the originator of i t ? Colani ( f P s s s
Christ, 140 [1864]) had seen that Mk. 136.32 (hft.244-38 Lk.
218-36) was ‘ a veritable Apocalypse lacking nothing essential to
this species of composition.’ According to Jacobsen this was
the door through which the expression entered into the gospels,
whilst it was still absent in the original form of Mk. (Untersuch-
ungpn aber die syn. E-m. 64, [1883]; Pvot. Kirchenzeitung,
1886, p. 5635). Pfleidrrer (Urchrfst. 366, 387 [1887l) also in-
clined to look upon the word as of foreign Apocalyptic origin,
not used by Jesus himcelf. Convinced that Jesus did not put
forth any Messianic claims, Martineau explained the occasional
use of the term by Jesus as F. C. Baur (5 21) had done, but
ascribed to the Evangelists the conception of it as a Messianic
title (Seat of Azrtharity, 3 3 5 3 [1890]). Orello Cone (New
W a d d , 4 9 2 8 [1893])also looked upon the Apocalyptic assages
as the channel through which ‘Son of Man’ a s a hFesessianic
title found its way into the gospel, though he still thought of
Jesus as having used it to denote that +e was ‘the man who
was pre-eminently endowed from on high.
I n H. L. Oort’s dissertation (De uitdrarkking d vi. T . d.
i n het N T , 1893)the Messianic significance of the term
in the Greek NT was strongly maintained; its origin
was sought in Dan. and the later Apocalypses, whence
it was taken by the evangelists, and no effort was made
to trace any of the sayings back to Jesus. Van Manen
(2%.T. 1893,p. 544 ; 1894,p. 1 7 7 8 )discountenanced
in principle any attempt to go behind the written
records, and ascribed to the influence of Dan. and
Enoch the introduction of the term as a Messianic title
in the gospels ; a view also adopted by Baljon (Griekisch-
TheoZogisch Woordenboek, 2960). Brandt’s position was
fundamentally the same as Volkmar’s ; but he added the
important suggestion that the identification of Jesus
with Daniel’s ‘Son of m a n ’ would be most natural,
if this Apocalyptic figure had been recently introduced
(Euangedische Geschichte, 5 6 2 3 [1893]). I t was prob-
ably the Messianic interpretation, however, not Dan. 7
itself, as (following Lagarde) Brandt was inclined to
think, that was of recent origin. Thus a deep chasm
was found between the gospels and the actual words of
Jesus, over which no man could pass with any degree of
assurance. How completely this exclusive regard for
the Greek gospels tended to crowd into the background
the whole question concerning the Son of man, may be
seen in the important discussion of the Messianic secret
by Wrede (Das Messiasfeheimnis [1901]),in which it is
scarcely touched upon, except that he expresses a doubt
whether a play upon words can have been intended in
Lk. 944, on the ground that the solemn title Son of
Man ’ and not ‘ man ‘ is contrasted with ‘ men.’
If this in itself perfectly legitimate literary criticism
had the tendencv of leadinn to a whollv negative result.
Y ~Y
or at best a non Z i p e t , as regards the
as. keshto use
recourse of the title by Jesus, there was at
the Aramaic. least a possibility that this resnlt was
due to a serious defect in the method
pursued--viz., the failure to examine the reported
sayings in what must have been approximately their
form in the vernacular of Jesus, if spoken by him.
With the multiplicity of new and complicated problems
claiming the attention of students of early Christian
literature and the apparent necessity for a division of
labour, it is not strange that even eminent N T scholars
should have devoted indefatigable labours to what at
best could be only translations of the words of Jesus
without ever inquiring what the Aramaic sentences were
that he actually uttered, whilst O T scholars to whom
such a question woiild naturally occur hesitated to enter
a field no longer familiar to them. T h e chief signifi-
cance of Lagarde’s and Wellhausen’s contributions to
the problem lies in the fact that it was again approached
from the standpoint of Semitic philology. Positively,
the gain was not great at first.
Uloth had only renewed the old explanation of the ration-
alistic school (Codgeleenie bgdrugrn, 1862,p. 4 6 7 8 ) . Lagarde,
4721
SON OF MAN
like Uloth, saw that Jesus must have used &zar-nE&i and
thought his purpose was to indicate that he was not a Jew, nor
the member of any nation, but a man (Deutsclte Schrzytcn,
226 [1878] Ges. Abh. 26). Wellhausen held that b u ~ - m - i Z
should ha:e been translated b a‘uepwmc, but found it exceedingly
strange that Jesus should have said ‘the man ’ instead of I ’
though he rightly felt that it was not more peculiar thau thk
currently accepted view that he said ‘ the Messiah’ instead, of
‘ I ’ (Ismelifischc u. jiid. Geschichte,P) 312 [18941). J. Weiss,
following Rahlfi, wisely returned to Grotius’s exegesis of
M k . 2 IO 28 ’ bot the improbability of his eschatological ex-
planation (&e $ 26) left the prublem still unsolved.
What was needed was n search for the Aramaic
original that should at the same time take’account of
the results of literary criticism secured
30. Basis in
generic use and by such scholars as Bruno Bauer,
Volkmar, and Van Manen, as well a s
later trans- by a Raw, a Ritschl, and a Holsten, a
formation. keener analysis of the apocalyptic
sources, and a thorough investigation of thk Gnostic
attitude to this title. It is to be regretted that Bruins,
sed Oort’s failure to consider the
Aramaic usage (Th.T,1894, p. 6 4 6 3 ) . did not follow
up his own suggestions. ’The scope of De Christus
nanr de Ev. (1896)possibly prevented a discussion.
Eerdrnans first combined the general position of Van
Manen and Oort with the assertion that in Mt. 12832
16 13 Jesus used b n r - n d E in the sense of ‘man.’ H e
could not find in bnr-n&i a Messianic title, nor think
that Jesus regarded himself as the Messiah. Yet he
considered it probable that on some occasions Jesus
used the term concerning himself in emphatically
declaring to those who would see in him something
more than a man, that he was only a man as well a s
they. As to the origin of the Greek phrase as a
Messianic title, he thought it possible that it arose
through the peculiar form of the Greek translation ; and
the absence of this title everywhere in early Christian
literature except where there was evidence of acquaint-
ance with the gospels, he accounted for by assuming
that it was everywhere a translation of a n Aramaic
original (2% T. 1894,p. 1 5 3 8 , 1895,p. 498).
T h e view that Jesus never called himself ‘ the Son of
man,‘ indicates that he was either the Messiah, the
ideal man, or a mere m a n ; that, nevertheless, the
development of this term into a Messianic title was in
part due to his having spoken upon some occasions
concerning the rights and privileges of ‘ man,’ using the
word bar n&i in such a startling manner as to create,
contrary to his intention, the impression among later
interpreters that he had referred to himself, and that
through the Greek translation of the Synoptic Apocalypse
it found its way into the gospels, was first expressed by
the present writer in a paper read before the Society for
Biblical Literature and Exegesis in 1895,and published
inJBL163fl On independent grounds it was con-
sidered that only four sayings containing the phrase
placed before the incident at Czsarea can be judgec!
genuine-viz.. Mt. 8 2 0 96 12832. A statement of
universal validity to the effect that ‘ m a n must pass
away, but he will rise again,’ was supposed to have
received later colouring in what were misunderstood as
predictions of Jesus’ death and resurrection after three
days; and it was thought possible that in Mt. 2664
Jesus spoke of the kingdom of heaven referring to
Daniel’s symbol.
Arnold hIeyer (fesu Mutferspruchr, 918, 1 4 0 8 [r8961)
briefly indicated his belief that in Mk. 2 10 28 htt. 1232 an
sriginal bur-n&&i meaning ‘ man’ was used, that in Mt. 8 20 it
;too$ for ‘ 1,’and that in hlt. 1119 it should be translated ‘some
me. He deferred the discussion of the eschatological passages
to a second part of his work which has not yet appeared. But
from later utterances (Die modemr Ebrschung d b e r die Grsch.
z‘es Chvistenfums, 75.[1898] and 7X.Lft.Z. 1898 col. 272) it
may he inferred that in some places he thinks it’possihle that
rhe ‘coming of the Son of man * actually spoken of by ,Jesus
was identical with the ‘coming of the kingdom of heaGen. He
1150 brought to light the forgotten labours of Genehrord and
Bolten, and called fresh attention to the exegesis of Grotius.
Lietzmann (Der Menschensohn [1896]) first observed
b a t there are no traces of the title outside of the
4722
 SON OF MAN
Gospels a n d Acts before Marcion, a n d surmised that
it originated in Asia Minor between the death of Paul
and the year 9 0 A.D. (On the latter point see 8 43.)
I n regard t o the use of 6nr-nisi by Jesus, Lietzmann
reached independent conclusions that approximated
most closely to those of the present writer, from
whom he differed chiefly in not being able to assume a
basis in the language of Jesus for the subsequently
modified sayings concerning his death and resurrection
(see 40). while he rejected Eerdmans' view that Jesus
occasionally used it to denote himself. H e was also
disinclined to accept Illeyer's contention that the
occurrence of the phrase in some of the eschatological
passages shculd be traced back to Jesus, without
desiring, howcver, to pass a judgment in this matter
beyond the general conclusion that Jesus did not call
hiniself ' the Son of Man ' (Th.Ar6eiten a m d. Rhein.
Pred. Ver. [1899]).
T h e theory stated above was accepted and defended
by Wellhausen ( G e s ~ h . 381 ( ~ ) rr8971 ; Skizzen, 6187 fl
Defence of '[1899]). - He- thought it probable that
+& theory.l Jesus once (Mk. 10 32-34) expressed
apprehensions as to the outcome of his
visit t o Jerusalem &but,as the exact wording cannot be
ascertained, he deemed it impossible to determine
whether the term bar-nifi was used. As the source
was Dan. 713, he regarded it as possible that already the
Aramaic term 6ar-niZ had come to be understood in
some circles as a designation of the Messiah.
Ptleiderer (New World, 4 4 4 x [18gq]) also adopted the yiew,
which was not far from his own earlier position. (On his in-
genious theory concerning Lk. 2236-38 see 0 40.) Marti (Dns
Buch Daniel, 53 [ I ~ o I ] )indicated his acceptance. On the
linguistic side, Bevan came to the defence against Dalman
(Critical Rev. 1899, pp. 1 4 8 8 ) , and NBldeke added the weight
of his approval (in Drummond, k).
Adopting Wrede's position, Staerk (Prot. Monatsh.,
1902, p. 2 9 7 8 ) sees in the mysterious name 'Son of
Man ' a creation of early Christian anti-Jewish polemics,
having one root in some misunderstood M y r a such as
Mk. 210 etc., and intended to veil the Messiahship of
Jesus during his lifetime. Such a conscious intention
he finds in the fact that men to whom bar-nisi in the
sense of ' man ' must have been familiar slavishly trans-
lated it with 6 uibr TOG dv0pL;xou.
Holtzmann ( N T T h . , 1897, pp. 246 8 )finds it im-
aa.
-
Dossible. in view of the accumulatine material and
philological difficulties, to pronounce
agreement. peremptorily against this theory, and is
inclined t o acceDt it so far as the ure-
Czz!sarean passages are concerned, while presenting as
a still available alternative the view of Holsten. Fries
(Dei fiurde evangdiet, 8 7 8 [1898]) reaches the con-
clusion that the term was used by Jesus only on rare
occasions to avoid the personal pronoun, and not in a
purely Messianic sense, while through En., where it
only means 'man,' it was introduced as a Messianic
title in the Synoptics (cp § 28).
It is scarcely probable that a new investigation of $?lCn2
(-1755) or '8fhci hi-is' ( v , ~ ?
m r ~ )as a substitute for Jesus in
certain Talmudic writings would throw any light on our
question, as Fries thinks ; Eliezer no donht said 19 in Y8mB
666. The extensive reading of Fiebig (Der Menschensohn,
~gor),including large parts of the Talmud not before examined
in regard to this phrase, corroborated the opinions on which the
theory rested. Fiebig recognised the essential accuracy of the
observations made by the present writer @. 59). and his criticism
of Wellhausen was scarcely judicious. When the latter scholar
affirmed that the Aramaeans had no other word for the individual
of the human species than bar-nrisi, he evidently did not mean
to deny that words originally having another meaning, such as
g d r i and 'n&Z, in course of time came to he used also with
that significance, as is clear from SKitzcn,G 196 n. (1899). The
only word relevant to this discussion, however, is one that could
have been translated B vlbr 70; bv8p&jrrov, and the only such
word in Aramaic is Jar-nifi, since expressions like 6'reh di-
gubri (~11121 ?ix), b'reh d?-'n&i.( K W J N ~ 7.13,and b'reh &-bar-
n&"Z (~03137a,,), manifestly originated as Christian transla-
tions of the Greek term ; but b a r - n i f i is the only Aramaic word
that denotes the individual of the genus man and nothing
1 Wellhausen, Pfleiderer, Marti, Bevan, Noldeke, Staerk.
4723
SON OF MAN
else. As the material considered by Fiehig clearly indicates
and as this scholar himself unhesitatingly concludes, that J e s d
employed the term bar-nZSi ( ~ ~ 1 1 3 a nthat d this was naturally
understood by his hearers to mean ' man ' in general, his further
assumption that Jesus meant hy it himself as the Messiah
appears somewhat hazardous. If Jesus was willing to have his
hearers infer that he cherished such hold and original ideas as
that man for whose sake the sabbath was made was also lord of
the sabbath aud that any man, not merely a riest by virtue of
his office,has a right to pardon sin, why ascrixe to himself asan
am&~$ensie the narrower and less logical conception that he
alone as the Messiah was lord of the sabbath and had the right
to pardon sin? If he at all entertained such a thought, it
cannot have appeared to him unimportant, and it is difficult to
see how he could have been willing to spread what in that
case would have been a dangerously false impression by an
ambiguous use of language. Oscar Holtzmann (Leden Jesu,
1 z a y . [ I ~ o I ] )accepts the proposed exegesis of Mt. 8 2 0 Mk.
2 IO 28 and Lk. 9 58, hut thinks it probable that Jesus used the
expression on many occasions to indicate his acquiescence in
man's general lot, and to teach objectively concerning the
Messiah which he believes himself to be.
Because of its far-reaching implications (see 5 46). it
was natural that the exdanation stated above should
33. Objections meet with much opposition. Van
Manen (L.c. ) rightly protested against
different the tendency t o assume a genuine utter-
scholars. ance behind every saying attributed to
Jesus in the synoptics, and to forget the peculiar
character and manifestly late origin of these writings.
But since even within the synoptics it is often possible
to trace a growth from a simpler form to one unques-
tionably coloured by later thought, the investigator
certainly has the right to assume that this develop-
ment did not begin in our present gospels. By testing
a certain word in an approximation to the Aramaic
form it must have had if uttered by Jesus, a n entirely
different sense is not seldom suggested that may
readily have been obscured by a natural mistake in
translation, or a n equally natural doctrinal bias. As
t o Mt. 1613 8 , van Manen is probably in the
main right (see § 3 9 ) , as well a s in upholding the
Messianic significance of the Greek term everywhere,
and in rejecting the survival of Baur's position in
Eerdmans. On Hilgenfeld's argument based upon
the Gospel according to the Hebrews, see 42. T h e
fact that Dalman (L.C.) could find no other Aramaic
term likely to have been used by Jesus than Cur-nisi,
a n d recognised the improbability of this having been a
Messianic title, is more significant than his contention
that bar-ni& in the sense of a m a n ' was a Syriac
innovation and not likely to have been thus understood
in Galilee in the time of Jesus.
Dalman ma iudeed have indicated a real tendency of
Aramaic speecpin Syria); but the remains of its various dialects
are too scanty and late to determine whether the development
was from an earlier bar-nZSi to a less accurate use of gabri or
'n&i for ' man,'. 'der Mensch,' a view favoured by the general
spread of Aramaic from Mesopotamia and N. Syria southwards,
or from an earlier gebar or 'nriP to a later bar-'nif. But
Bevan's point that the various uses of 'niS and dar-'nns"which
appear concurrently in Syriac are all found in one or another of
the Palestinian dialects and that no Palestinian dialect employs
any of these forms in a sense unknown in Syriac, is certainly
well taken; and Wellhausen rightly feels that Dan. 7 13 is itself
decisive (cp also Fiebig, and usage in Ev. H e r . , above 5 4, in.).
T h e authority of so accomplished a student of
Palestinian Aramaic as Dalman naturally influenced
other scholars. Baldensperger ( Th. Runbchau, 1900,
p. 201 3 )expressed his satisfaction with the final
defeat of the philological explanation, and hinted at
undue philosophical prepossessions. Rush Rhees (JBL
1796) also thought that the present writer was hampered
by the prejudgment that Jesus cannot have made for
himself a t the outset any supernatural claims. This,
however, was not the case, as the conviction that Jesus
did not cherish a desire to become even a righteous
king, a divinely appointed ruler of Israel and the
nations, was not the starting-point but the rather un-
expected result of a long series of investigations.
Klopper (ZWTh. 1899, p. 161$) accepts the validity
of Schmiedel's arguments (see $ 3 4 ) . and thinks that
4724
 SON OF MAN
Jesus, already in the Galilzean period, claimed for him-
self a peculiar kind of Messiahship by the Danielic title.
H e deems it probable that Jesus looked upon his
victory over Satan in Mt. 4 1 3 as a realisation of the
slaying of the beast in Dan. 7 I I 26. It is difficult to see
what ethical content could have been given to a figure
which everybody understood to mean the establishment of
the empire of the Jews that could not also have been
given to the current 14essianic ideal. Clemen
( T L Z , 1899, col. 489) asks why bar-ndfd cannot
have been a Messianic title at the time of Jesus as well
as later. The answer is that there is no evidence
whatever that bar-ndfd was ever used as a Messianic
title. There is reason to believe that Jesus on some
occasions used it in the sense it commonly and ex-
clusively has in extant Aramaic literature. In these
instances it has been wrongly translated in the Gk.
Gospels by a title not yet drawn from Dan. when Rev.,
4 Ezra, and the interpolations in En. 37-71 were written
in the reign of Domitian.
'Ihe most serious objection of Krop ( L n pens& de
7t!sus, 1897) is derived from the presence of the title in
predictions of Jesus' death and resurrection. How was
the title brought from the eschatological series into so
different a setting? It may be answered that when
once utterances concerning the Son of man had been
placed upon the lips of Jesus, and the expression conse-
quently understood as a self-designation. it may,readily
have been substituted for ' I , ' as the vacillating tradition
in many places indicates, and adopted in the creation of
new oracles. I t is probable, however, that a genuine
utterance of Jesus was misunderstood and made the
foundation of these logia (see 5 40).
Gankel's opposition (Z.C.) comes from his strong con-
viction that * the man ' is a mythological figure.
As to the personality to whom Dan., Enoch, and 4 Ezra
refer, he is no doubt right in assuming an ultimate Bzhylonian
ongin. The conflict between Marduk and Tismat became
in Judaism one between Yahwh and the great chaos-monster.
What was first ascribed to Yahwe himself was subsequently
assigned to an angel. After the destruction of the beast
this celestial representative of I w x 1 comes in Dan. 7 witi
the clouds to receive the world-empire. The development
of the Messianic idea (cp Schmidt, Son of Man, chap. 6 )
led to a transfer of these functions to the Messiah. But
that the heavenly king, described like other angels as having
the appearance of a nian was known as 'the man,' lacks all
plausibility. Designatio& suggesting character or function-
such as 'the chosen one,' 'the just one,' ' the restorer,' 'the
bridegroom,' ' the lamb '-are intelligible : ' the man on the
clouds' would point to Dan. 7 13, and titles signifying this, like
* ~ ] y(Trg. to I Ch. 324) and -59313 (SanA. 966), were indeed
formed, as Eerdmans has shown; hut, neither in Babylonian
mythology, nor in Jewish speculation, is it likely that an im-
portant personage was referred to merely as 'the man,' 'the
human being.'
A;] objection is raised by Rose (Rev. b d L , 1900,pp.
1 6 9 8 ): the close connection between the kingdom and
the Son of man render it probable that Jesus, to whom
the former idea was of such importance, also occupied
himself with the latter. Two facts, however, are not
sufficiently considered in this view. Intense specula-
tions concerning the kingdom and the world to come
are frequently found without any allusion to a
Messiah, and this is readily accounted for by the hope
centring on God himself as the sole deliverer of his
people and judge of the world. When Drummond
(Z.C.) appeals to the independent tradition of Jn. and to
the fact that ' t h e apostles must have known whether
their Master spoke of himself in the way recorded in the
gospels or not,' it is to be said that acquaintance with
the synoptics on the part of the Fourth Evangelist can
scarcely be doubted. that the peculiar use of the term in
his gospel (see 45) does not point to an independent
tradition, and that the synoptic gospels were written too
late to reflect. even on points more important than
1 On the argument for an earlier existence of the title drawn
by Charles from Enoch 37-71 (Hist. of Doctr. of Future Ljfp,
z r 4 f : [188g]), see 5 7.
151 4725
SON OF MAN
this, what the apostles must have known, as Drummond
himself would no doubt admit. His weightiest objec-
tion is that the Church would have preferred to invent
some higher title. But the impression left upon a n
ancient reader of Dan. 7 13 was not that of a frail mortal,
but rather that of a resplendent celestial being; and
the title was not invented, it grew. Driver (Z.C.) recog-
nises that all such considerations would have to yield,
' if it were philologically certain that the son of man
" "
could not have been an expression used by our Lord.'
T h a t bar-ndfd should not have been understood as
' man ' in Galilee in the first century, although it was so
used in the second, does not seem to him quite prob-
able. H e therefore goes to the opposite conclusion that
bnr-nrisii= ' nian ' may have been so exceedingly common
that for emphasis Jesus was obliged to use the term
b'reh dJ-miSd, meaning ' t h e Son of man.' But this
Christian translation of d ulbs TOG du8pdrrou, intelligible
only as a product of dogmatic necessity, would not
have been understood as ' the Son of m a n ' but as ' the
son of the Man.' Realising the precariousness even of
this assumption, he finally quotes with approval
Sanday's opinion that *Jesus may have introduced the
term upon some occasion when he was addressing hi
Aramaic-speaking fellow-men in-Greek ! It is not easy
to believe that this Son of man who went forth to seek
and to save that which was lost presented to his
Galilzean fishermen riddles concerning himself in a
foreign tongue.
Even the suggestion of Jansen quoted by Weiss (Predigt
/esu,P) 155) that Jesus used the Hebrew term 6 e n - d i n 2 , though
less violent, lacks all probability. I t is not apparent why he
should have translated dar-n&S&into den-&im, which was not
a Messianic title and could not possibly suggest Dan. 7 13.
T h e keenest criticism of the new interpretation has
been niade by Schmiedel (Prot. Monatsh., 1898, pp.
34. Schmieders 252E z91f18 Igol, PP' , 3 3 3 E ) .
H e is unquestionably right in laying
criticism. down the principle that 'absolute
credibility should be accorded to that which cannot
have been invented by a tradition replete aith venera-
tion for Jesus because contradicting it, and most clearly
in instances where, among the evangelists themselves,
one or another has actually effected a transformation
out of reverence for Jesus.' Strangely enough, this
acute critic has failed to perceive that, if the interpreta-
tion based on the Aramaic is admitted, the passages in
question furnish most valuable illustrations of his
principle. Has a man the right to assnre his fellow-
nian that his sins are pardoned ? T h e Pharisees assert
that God alone can pardon sin. Jesus affirms that man
has the right to do so. This thought was too hold for
the Church to grasp. She asked, ' W h o is the man
that can pardon sins?' and her answer was, ' t h e
Christ.' It was no doubt because the translator,
following the custom of the Alexandrian version.
rendered the phrase literally d uibs TOO dv8pJrrou rather
than in good idiomatic Greek d dvepwrros that the say-
ing was preserved at all.
I t is not necessary to assume that the question debated was
originally connected with a case of healing and quite irrelevant
to ask whether Jesus thought that all men :odd exercise healing
power, nor is it at all certain that Jesus would have answered
such a question in the negative. Jesus declares that the sabbath
was made for man's sake, therefore man is also lord of the
sabbath, and the added remarks show that he regarded the
whole cult as of less importance than the principle of love
violated in the charge made against his disciples. But a view
of the sabbath that put it whollyinto the hands of man, was too
radical for the Church. By the misleading, though probably
unintentional, turn given to the expression in Greek, she gained
the comforting assurance that the Christ was lord of the sabbath,
and would, no doubt, lend his authority to any change made in
his honour. The more in harmony with the growing veueration
for Jesus this thought is, the more value must be attached to
the earlier and so markedly different form revealed b y a transla-
tion of the saying back into the original Aramaic.
In Mt. 820 Jesus used what sounds like a current epigram to
indicate the vicissitudes of human life. He thought of man's
lot, the Church instantly thought of his ; and the greater the
distance hetween her meditation upon the humiliation of her
heavenly lord from the general outlook upon human life sug-
4726
 SON OF MAN
gested by the Aramaic saying, the stronger is the presumption
in favour of the latter. There is pardon Tesns declares, for
anything that is said against a man, but &en the Holy Spirit
that works his mighty deeds through a man is declared to be an
evil spirit, how can there be forgiveness? While the Aramaic
saying suggests as the thought of Jesus, that men should he
willing to forgive whatever may be said against them, but that
it is an infinitely more serious matter to call a manifestly good
spirit possessing a man, Beelzebub ; the Church found it .far
easier to think that Jesus has given the gracious assurauce that
he would pardon even blasphemy against himself, though he
was the Messiah, possibly because his Messianic glory was
veiled, but that hlasphemy against the Holy Spirit could not be
forgiven. When the prophet's death began to appear to him as
the inevitable result of his career he may have comforted his
disciples with another word of &versa1 application : 'man
must pass away, but he will rise again.' Convinced by the
testimony of those who had seen him in heavenly visions that he
had risen from the dead, the Church was better prepared for the
thought that he had predicted his own death and resurrection
than that he had in simple confidence bound up his own destiny
with that of humanity. In proportion as the Aramaic sayings
t h u disclosed differ from the Greek logia, presenting concep-
tions that do not like the latter ally themselves naturally with
the developing e&lesiastical ap 'reciation of Jesus, they become
precious evidences, both of the Eistorical character of Jesus aud
of the peculiar type of his teaching.
Schmiedel also argues the probability of an original
Messianic reference in Mk. 228 from Jesus' attitude to
the law. I l e thinks that Jesus may have been led to
regard himself as the Messiah by the practical question
that he as a reformer was forced to meet, whether the
validity of the law niight be set aside. ' T h e law was
intended to remain forever. If it must h e changed, a n
explicit authorisation by God was of course necessary.
No prophet had possessed this. I t was on the whole
conceivable only in connection with the new order of
the world, the coming of the Messianic age. Conse-
quently, only one could be the divine messenger who
would dare to announce it. the Messiah.' ?his in-
genious line of reasoning rests o n presuppositions that
a r e scarcely tenable.
Jesus probably believed that Moses wrote the Pentateuch.
Yet he found in the prophetic rolls the most pointed criticism of
the cult. Prophets had in the name of God spoken against
sacrifices, temples, sabbaths, and other ordinances of the law.
He w u manifestly much more influenced by the prophets than
by the law. Whilst the question of the validity of the codes
might seem one of life and death to a lawyer, it is altogether
pr'obable that other things seemed far more important to the
carpenter of Nazareth. The Essenes did not regard it as
necessary to wait for the Messiah to authorise a remarkably free
attitude toward the tem le service. Galilee was notorious for
what were regarded in Jerusalem as laxer conceptions. The
man of Nazareth who went forth from his carpenter's bench, as
Amos of old from his sycamore trees, is not likely to have
scrupled to follow the example of the prophets until he could
persuade himself that he was, or was destiued to become, the
Messiah for whom some of his countrymen longed.
I n distinction from Eerdmans, Schmidt, a n d Lietz-
mann, who had looked upon the Greek translators as
the agents through whom the designation of ' m a n '
became a Messianic title, Wellhausen thought it possible
that already the Aramaic b a r - n d f i was a t one time
used with this significance. I t would indeed be interest-
ing to know whether ' Son of man ' was employed by
the Aramaic-speaking Christians in the first century,
a n d if so, what the form was. Unfortunately, there is
no evidence on this point.
We do not know what term in the Hebrew 'gospel
renderedxlim horninis, nor the age of the pericope in w k ~ ~ cisely ? ~ the most appropriate meaning in the passages
found it. The Ev. Hier. may well be somewhat earlier. But
its I W O terms b'reh aZgm5rri and b'reh d&bar-nriSri are mani-
festly translations of i, vibr mQb&'p&jrrov, and ouly the absence of doubt. I t is quite possible that in one or another of
d'reh &.-ncrSri is of importance as it may show that this Edessene
theolngical term was not used by the Palestinian Christians.
The latest interpolationsin Enoch 37-7r are of dortbtfnl age and
provenience (see F, 7). As to the fragments of a lost apocalypse
preserved in the Synoptic gospels, there are too many signs of
editorial activity in the first of the evangelists, or variants in
different copies of the Greek text used, to permit a safe j u d p
ment particularly on the important point whether in the Aramaic
original Mt. 24 joand parallels contained the first mention of the
coming Son of man. It is altogether possible that the usage in
this Apocaly se wa5 analogous to that in Enoch 46 and 4 Ezra
13, the man geing first introduced and then referred to with a
demonstrative pronoun that would naturally fall a*ay in the
Greek when the phrase was understood as a title.
4727
SON OF MAN
If dur-nifi had ever developed into a Messianic title
among the Christians of Palestine, there did not seem
to be any reason why they should have substituted for the
term which they must then have supposed Jesus to use,
such a phrase as dreh dJ-gadri. Schmiedel's point that,
if 6 u r - n i f i could convey t o some minds the idea that
the Messiah was meant, there are n o grounds, a t least
so far as the language is concerned, for disputing that
i t may have been so intended by Jesus a n d understood
by his immediate disciples, appears to the present
writer to he well taken. But it touches only a n ad-
mission by Wellhansen, not necessitated b y any un-
mistakable fact. If such a transformation had been
effected in Jewish-Christian circles before the end of the
first century, we should expect to find it in Rev. T h e
absence of the title in this Christian apocalypse, where
there were many natural occasions for using it, is far
more significant than its non-occurrence in the epistolary
literature where some such motive as Schmiedel has
imagined may have been operative.
Until new evidence, or arguments not long ago
refuted, shall be adduced in favour of the assumption
that Jesus spoke Greek, it must b e taken
36' Of for granted that he addressed his hearers
the
=k%tt. in the Galilzan dialect of the Aramaic.
W h e n this is acknowledged, it follows of
necessity that it is the duty of every
scholar before pronouncing upon the authenticity of
any saying attributed to Jesus to consider whether it may
have been wrongly translated. I n the performance of
this duty two difficulties are met with : it is possible only
to approximate to the original, a n d the literary material
by which the Galilaean dialect is known apparently
does not go back farther than to t h e second century
A. D . On the other hand, the translation in this case is
simplified hy the fact that d uibs 706 dvOp&rou can only
b e the rendering of a form compounded with bur (ix),
a n d further facilitated by the circumstance that of terms
that may be considered, b'reh d&'naD. d'veh d&&adrZ
and b'reh dt-b-bar-nufdmust be eliminated. While all
these are manifestly Christian renderings of the Greek
term, &'re,%dt-nifh was apparently not used in Palestine,
b'reh dJ-gubvd cannot have been formed RS an allusion
to Dan. 7 13 and a s an original Aramaic expression
would put the emphasis o n Joseph, and d'reh dt-bar-
nifri is ruled out by the same considerations. The
only available term, then, is dur-nifd.
The examination in detail of Aramaic usage undertaken dur-
ing the last few years, valuable as it has been, was not necessary
to reach this conclusion. But bar-n&i means simply ' man,'
the individual of the human species, and is the only Aramaic
form that by its origin and usage has solely this connotation.
Whilst the term occurs with greater frequency in the literary
remains of some dialects, there is no reason to believe that it
was lacking in any(though even thi5 would not be strange), and
it has the same sense wherever it is found. In Galilee it appears
to have been used more commonly than in Samaria and Jndza.
Althon h, in the absence of older literature, no actual occur-
rence o f the term before the second century A.D. can be quoted,
there is no known fact that even remotely indicates that it was
not employed and understood to have the skme meaning a few
generations earlier.
T h e phrase translated 0' ulbs 7.00 dvOpdrou, therefore,
naturally conveyed the sense of 'man.' This is pre-
whose authenticity on other grounds is least subject to
these sayings the indeterminate bur 'ndf, ' a man,' was
originally used, or that the emphatic ending had already
lost its force. I t would then imply only a natural mis-
apprehension, a n d no violence, if such a n Utterance as
' A man may pardon sins ' should have been interpreted,
' Even a man-viz., this man,' or ' Though I a m a man,
I have the right to pardon sins' ; and the question as
to the authority involved may (so Wellhausen) have
assisted in giving the impression that Jesus referred t o
himself. Rut from this understanding of the phrase t o
the conception that Jesus designated b y it his Messiah-
47*8
 SON OF MAN
ship the distancc is very gi-eat. A person speaking
.Aramaic might of course refer to a third person as ‘ T h e
m a n , ’ if he had already introduced him. There seems
to be no instance of this among the recorded sayings of
Jesus. There is not the slightest evidence that ’ the man ’
was a current Messianic title, and the natural impression
upon a person to whom Aramaic was the vernacular,
that a speaker employing the term d a y - m i f i referred to
nian in general, any man, renders it exceedingly im-
probable that this phrase, without further qualification,
can ever have been used as a designation of the
Messiah. Since, in spite of this fact, d vi. 7. Ci. is
sometimes put upon the lips of Jesus where the generic
use is out of the question, the recourse to the Aramaic
furnishes a most valuable criterion of genuineness.
But if b n r - n i f ~ imeant simply ‘ n i a n , ’ why was it
36. Force of translated d uIds 700 duOpdaou, and not
the oreek d ffvOpwaos? The answer is to be found
translation. partly in the Greek version of the OT,
and partly in the development of thought
in Greek-speaking Christian circles.
The Hebrew hen-ridrim was by B as a rule rendered ulbr
bvOp6mou (uibs d v O p i m v Job 16 21 w l b s M Y ~ Y O S S many MSS
Jer. 49 33), and so also 6ar-Z& in ’Dan. 7 13 (e and @). The
plural b’ni rid&n is translated uloi bvOpJrrov I S. 18 19 z S. 7 14
Is.52r4 Mic.56 Prov. 8431 Ps.575 1462: and o l uloi 7i)v
QvOpJmov, Joel 1 TZ and frequently in Prov. . b’m- hd-ridEnr is
translated oi uloi dVep6rrov in I K. 8 31). and ol)uloi &wkvBp&ov
in Gen. 11 5 2 Ch. G 30 Ps. 33 13 145 12. Of most import-
ance is the usage in Ecclus., where the Hebrew has uniformly
b’ni hi-ddiirn and this seems originally to have been rendered
ever where ot u b i roS LvBp6mou (113 238 3 1 8 5 2 1 8 r r 93),
o l vi% rSv Q d p r j m w v occurring only sporadically in MSS as a
correction and wloi dvOp6mu as an alternative reading in 3 2 1
( H P 147 149, Ald.). I t is significant that Aquila also
has oi viol roi, dvOpJrrou in 8 I I where his text has been pre-
served. To R Greek this could scarcely have conveyed any
other idea than ‘the sons of the man,’ the man being some
particular person previously mentioned. Aquila as well as
the translator of Ecclus., thought in Aramaic, had i’n2 ’rrriSZ in
Find, and used dVeporos as a collective after the fashion of
nfi-i. In Dan. 521 mi662m- en&i is simply rendered
dmb rSv dvOp6-v (e). Instead of following this example and
rendering 6a,ar-n&% by b duOporrar, the Christian translator
adopted the more common cnstom observed in the Greek version
and particularly what seems to have been its most recent form
seen in Ecclus.
A Hellenistic Jew familiar with Aramaic would,
therefore, be quite likely to divine behind d ulbs TOO
dvr9pdrou an original bur-n&E, whilst a Greek, naturally
inquiring who the ffvtlpwaos was, would be puzzled by
the expression. If this conceivably caused a hesitancy
in some minds to employ it, it certainly was to many
an additional reason for its use. T h e air of mystery
surrounding it made it peculiarly fitting as a secret
intimation of Messiahship. It is manifest that the
phrase is not a fresh translation of a Semitic original in
every place where it occurs. Possibly this is not the
case anywhere. I t may have been employed in oral
teaching and in earlier writings before any of onr
gospels were written, and adopted by the evangelists as
an already current designation. T h e use of d uibs TOO
duOpdxou, not only in passages where the employment
in the Greek Bible of dvOpwxos as if it were a collective
like ’nifireudered it possible to see through it a bur-
ni.G in the ordinary sense of ‘ man,’ but also where this
would have been impossible, inevitably leads to the con-
clusion that it may be necessary to distinguish between
passages having different claims to authenticity.
T h e idea that we possess in the Synoptic gospels
accurate transcripts of the words of Jesus is already
3,. Need of abandoned when the 69 occurrences are
literary reduced to 39, 40, or 42 by eliminating
criticism. what are deemed unmistakable duplicates.
For if the 22 passages (see 12) thus
duplicated are examined, a substantial agreement is
indeed found, but not absolute identity, and the differ-
ences are sometimes such as cannot be accounted for
by a more or less accurate rendering of a n assumed
Aramaic original.
4729
SON OF M A N
I n the case of the 17 passages found only in Mt. or
L k . , some are obviously duplicates of sayings already
recorded within these gospels, others have synoptic
parallels in which the phrase does not occur, and others
still are manifestly later glosses. While u prim-i there
is no reason to question the possibility of a genuine
utterance having been preserved only in one gospel, on
examination the decidedly secondary character of all
these seventeen instances becomes apparent.
Not only is Mt. 10 23 without a parallel in Lk. 12 1 1 3 , but the
whole section Mt. 10 17-25 predicting the sufferings of the
apostles reflects a time when the missionary activity of the
Church was still confined to Israel. The allegorical interpreta-
tion of the parable of the tares, found only in hft. 1337.41, shows
the strong feeling against Antinomianism in the early Church
but also the wisdom with which some of her leaders left the
punishment of heretics for the Messiah when he should appear.
I t is generally recognised that the Evangelist wrote this com-
mentary. On Mt. 1613, see 5 39. In Mt.1628 the ‘Son of
Alan ’ coming in his kingdom has probably taken the place of
‘ the kingdom of heaven,’ as is suggested by Lk. 9 27, where ‘the
kingdom of God’ is used, and hlk. 9 I where it is qxpanded into
‘the kingdom of God already come’with power. When Mt.
19 28f: is compared with Lk. 1829 and Mk. 10 29, it is clearly seen
that each evangelist has modified the utterance or registered a
peculiar tradition. While Lk. seems to be nearer the original,
the omission of ‘lands’ is in harmony with his general attitude,
and ‘kingdom of Gqd’ is his synonym for the more idiomatic
‘kingdom of heaven. Instead of ‘for the sahe of the kingdom
of heaven, Mk. has ‘for my sake and for the gospel’s sake,’
specifies the future blessings, and significantly adds ‘ with perse:
cutions ’ ; hlt. introduces the answer by u. 28 and has ‘for my
name’s sake.’ If ‘the sign of the Son of man ’ in hl t.
24 3oa had formed a part of the original apocalypse, it is likely
to have been preserved hy Mk. and Lk. (see $ 41). The com-
mentators have not yet discovered what the sign is. Was it a
flame of fire (2 Thess. 18) or a cross? In either case, this
additional feature would not he very old. On Mt. 25 31, see
9 47. The statement of a fact (Mk. 14 ~ f Lk. : 22 I/) has been
changed into a prediction in Mt. 26 2. Instead of for the sake
of the Son of nian’ in Lk. 622, Mt. 5 I I has ‘for my sake,’ but
even this is a later addition. When Lk. 12 8 IS compared
with Mt. 1032 it is apparent that ~ d y in i the latter place is
more original than the title, but also that the whole verse is
secondary. Lk. 17 20-22 is not in harmony with what follows.
and Paul, Wernle, and Holtmann have rightly pointed out the
disenchantment of the Church expressed in 1722. Jiilicher
(GCeichnisreden Jesu 2188) recoguises that Lk. 18a is a late
addition similarly e;pressing the painful disa pointment as
regards the parousia. The beautiful comment, ek. 19 13: may
he this evangelist’s tribute to Jesus, or an interpolation in this
place as in Mt.18ir. The exhortation Lk. 2134-36, is un-
doubtedly, as Wernle (Syn. Frare, 17) dhserves, the work of
Lk. himself. Holtzmann thinks that Lk. 22 48 is also a creation
of the evangelist and calls attention to its rhetorical character
( H C , R 1901,p. 414). In Mt. 2650 the text is scarcely sound,
and the account of Judas’ treason is of doubtful historicity (see
J UDAS ISCARIOT, 9s 7, IO). It is possible, however, that Lk.
22 48 goes back to an Aramaic orieinal that conveyed the,sense :
‘Is it with a kiss that thou betrayest a man (6ar-nriSri)l And
Mt. 26 50 may originally have had as,a variant Why dost thou
betray (maper for r r a p a 8 r h F ) a friend 1 Two men in dazzling
raiment, evidently angels, remind the women in Lk. 27 7 that
Jesus had predicted the death and resurrection of the son of
man. Addresses by angels do not belong to history. How
little Lk. cared for mere verbal accuracy is seen in the fact that
the quotation made by the angel does not quite correspond to
any prediction recorded.
A study of these passages shows with what freedom
sayings of Jesus were certainly modified and apparently
created.
If words occurring only in one gospel are naturally
somewhat more open to suspicion than those found in
two or three, it must be remembered, on the other
hand, that the presumption in favour of genuineness
does not necessarily increase by duplication, a s it may
only imply the copying of one evangelist by another or
the use of a common source. T h e reliability of any
saying must then ultimately depend upon the general
trustworthiness of the document where it first appeared
or the current of tradition it registered.
To assume as many scholars do that the evangelical tradition
has heen prderved in its purity ih Mk. is to draw a ’ery rash
conclusion from the doubtful theory of Mk.‘s priority. The
fact that no passage containing the phrase is found in Mk. that
is not also found in Mt., or Lk., or both, only shows that Mk.
remain+ free from some of the later additions to the other
synoptics. It often happens, however, that it is the text of
higher age and greater prestige that because of its wider use is
most enriched in that way. Thus our best Greek MS of Ecclus.
4730
 SON O F MAN
has the greatest number of interpolations while far inferior
?fSS are relatively free from additions to th; text (see Schmidt,
Ecclesiasticus ’ in Teix,bfe Sihie).
T h e evidence of later expansions of M t . , most clearly
presented by Hilgenfeld, is constantly increasing, and
new indications of similar accretions to the original Lk.
already snggested by Marcion’s gospel, are forthcoming.
T h e assumption that I\lk.’s conception of Jesus’ attitude
to the Messiahship was different from that of Mt. and
Lk. and more historical can scarcely maintain itself
after Wrede’s criticism. As the prejudice in favour of
Mk., based on a shorter text and a supposed correcter
view of Jesus’ career, is removed, and the different
versions of each saying are compared and tested in their
presumable Aramaic form, an impartial survey of the
facts will show at once how far all the synoptics are
from reflecting accurately the words of Jesus without
losing touch altogether with the oldest tradition. and in
what sense the earliest testimony as to the succession of
these gospels, representing the order as Mt., Mk., and
Lk., is to he accepted. I t will then be seen that there
are passages in Mt. and Lk., not found in Mk., that
may go back to original sayings of Jesus; that the
only passage found in Mk. and Lk.. but not in Mt.,
cannot be regarded as authentic; that there is no
genuine saying preserved in Lk. that is not also found
in Mt. ; that there are passages in Mk. as well as in
Mt. and Lk. that are cle,arly of very late origin ; and
that there are passages in Mk. as well as in Mt. and
Lk. in which the phrase may go back to an original
dar-nrifii even after the episode at Cresarea Philippi.
Among the eight passages found only in Mt. and Lk., Mt.
820 (Lk. 9 58), 11 19 (734), and 12 3aa (12 ma) probahly go back
to original utterances of Jesus (see $ 38); 1240 (1130) is an
interpolation particularly clumsy in Mt.; 2427 37 39(17 242630)
belong to the synoptic apocalypse (see 5 4r), and 29 44 (12 46) is
recognised by Jiilicher (Z.C. 2 1 4 2 3 ) as a later gloss. Among
the five found in Mt. and Mk., Mt. 17 9 (9 8) refers to the vision
on the mountain. In lesus’ lifetime. not even his most intimate
disciples had had anqthing to relaie csncerning his luniinous
heavenly hody. Did this necesarily exclude the pos3ibility of
a vision of this body before his dcuih? Not to the minds of the
evangelists, since they had accustomed themselves to the
thought that Jesus had forbidden all such disclosures concern-
ing himself before he should rise from the dead. This vision
(Bpapa) is thus an anticipatian of the vision that spread the
belief in his resurrection. The Elijah question, Mt. 17 10-13
(Mk. 9 11-13), consequently had no connection originally with
what precedes: the text in Mk. is late and confused (so also
Wernle, Lc., 139, whilst that in Mt. is in good order and the
conclusion may be a rendering of ‘So must a man (vim) suffer
by them ’ referring to John the Baptist. Mt. 2028 (Mk. 1045)
cornmenis retrospectively on the exemplification in the life and
death of Jesus of the principle he has just laid down. Lk.
22.27-30 is a later and less valuable interpretation that curiously
misunderstands the thought that Jesus wished to convey. Mt.
26 246 (Mk. 14216) occurs in an interpolation which breaks the
connection between 26 m a and 26 (14 18 and 22) with an account
that has been placed by Lk. a t the end (22 21-23) and even there
is probahly unhistorical. The occurrence of the phrase in Mt.
2645 (Mk. 14 4r), not found in Lk. where the connection is
better, 1s no doubt to be explained by the place Judas gained
in Christian legend (so Wellhansen). (On Mk. 8 31 [Lk.0 221,
see 5 40.)
Among the eight passages found in all the Synoptics, Mt. 96
(Mk. 2 10 Lk. 5 24) and Mt. 128 (Mk. 2 28 Lk. 65) probably go
back to original utterances. Mt. 16 27 (Mk. 8 38 Lk. 9 26) is
clexrl a later addition, further transformed by Mk. and Lk.
Mt. 1722 (Mk. 9 31 Lk. 944) and Mt. 20 18 (Mk. 1033 Lk. 18 31)
is a prediction of his death (see 5 40). Mt. 27306 (Mk. 1326
Lk. 21 27) belongs to the Synoptic apocalypse (see $ 41). Mt.
26 24a (Mk. 14 21a Lk. 22 22) belongs to the interpolation con-
sidered above. The absence of disci les witnessing the scene,
the conflict with judicial practice, t t e absurdity of the fa!se
testimony, the failure to produce any statement that a Jewish
court could have construed into blasphemy, and the contra-
dictions and evident Christian colouring render it extremely
difficult to believe in the historical character of the trial hefore
the Sanhedrin. (Cp SVNEDRIUM.) In Mt. 2664 Jesus answers
the question whether he,is the Messiah ‘thou sayest it,’ in Lk.
2269 ‘ye say that I am. The plain import is ‘Yon say that I
am the Messiah, but I have made no such statement.’ It i5
significant that these two evangelists should have hesitated to
put upon the lips of Jesus an affirmative answer even under
oath. So strong was the tradition that Jesus did not in his life-
time claim to be the Messiah, so firm the conviction that he
guarded his secret to the end. They felt justified only in
ascribing to him a co\-ert reference to the Messiah in the third
473I
SON O F MAN
person and with the secret name. Mk. (1462) lacks some of the
expressions in Mt. and Lk., but departs widely from the earlier
tradition by making Jesus acknowledge his Messiahship. Cp
thesearching criticism of Brandt (Ea. Gesch. 5 3 3 ) .
In view of this indispensable literary criticism, it is of no
small importance that it is possible by turning the Greek
38. Genuine Zogia into the vernacular of Jesus to ob-
sayings during tain some sayings at once so different
Galilean from the prevailing conceptions of the
early Church and so bold and original
yvr &VU.
as to raise the strongest presiihption in
favour of their genuineness. Such are, in the first
place, Mt. 9 6 and 12 8 (and parallels), found in all the
synoptics. In the former case the question is debated
whether a man has a right to assnre another man that
his sins are pardoned. T h e Pharisees maintain that
God alone can pardon sin. They probably regarded
absolution in the name of God as a priestly function.
There is no evidence that the Jews expected the Messiah
to forgive sins, and no intimation that Jesus looked
upon this as a privilege to be exercised only by himself.
On the contrary, he enjoins his disciples to use this
power (Mt. 1818). S u c h a simple assurance of forgive-
ness, flowing from a living faith in a heavenly father’s
love, was to Jesus no sacerdotal act. Any man had a
right to extend it.
In Mt. 128 the generic meaning is equally clear. T h e
disciples having eaten corn as they passed through the
field, are accused of breaking the sabbath. Jesus
defends them by quoting the example of David, who ate
of the shewhead, which, according to the law, he had no
right to do, and gave his followers permission to do so.
T h e point is not that David and his ’ greater son ’ may
take liberties with God’s law which would be wrong for
others, but clearly that so godly a man as David
recognised that the sustenance of life was in G o d s eyes
more important than the maintenance of the cult.
Lest this should be misunderstood, he adds another
argument. T h e law permits the priests to work on the
sabbath. thus regarding the commanded cessation of
labour as less important than the maintenance of divine
worship. T h e thought is not that he and his had
priestly rights, for they had none, and Jesus had no
interest in the sacrificial cult, as the next statement
shows. Rut even from the standpoint of the law there
were things more important than the enjoined cessation
of work. Man was not made for the sabbath, but the
sabbath for man ; therefore man is also lord of the
sabbath. This conclusion alone is relevant to the
argument. If it were necessary to prove that the
Messiah might break the law or authorise his disciples
to do so, how could so startling a proposition be
established by the general consideration that the sabbath
was made for man’s sake ? There is indeed no evidence
that the Jews expected the Messiah to violate or abrogate
the divinely given law. T h e very suggestion would
probably have produced a shock. If Jesus really
desired to convince his hearers that the Messiah had a
right to dispense from obedience to the law and that he
was the Messiah, he mnst have understood that uhnt
was needed for that purpose was a reference to a recog-
nised Messianic passage ascribing such powers to the
Messiah or a firmly-rooted tradition to this effect, and a
straightforward presentation and vindication of his
claims, all the more necessary if he did not wish his
Messiahship to be taken in a political sense. Were it
possible that the Aramaic word he used for ‘ S o n of
man ’ could have been interpreted as a Messianic title,
the impression left on the Pharisees would still have
been that he had defended law-breaking on the ground
that the lower, the sabbath, must yield to the higher,
man, and had made such a sweeping application of a
general principle, true enough in certain circumstances,
as would allow any man to set aside any ordinance of
God.
‘ T h e foxes have holes, and the birds of the heavens
4732
 SON O F MAN
have nests, but a man has nowhere to lay his head’
(Mt. 820) may be a proverb quoted by Jesus or an
epigram coined on the spot. In either case the scribe
no doubt saw the hint quickly. Man’s life is full of
danger and uncertainty. Where will he reside to-
morrow? Nature cares for the beasts ; they are not
driven from home and hearth for their convictions.
The thought probably never occurred to the scribe that
this Galilzan teacher had in the same breath announced
himself as the Messiah, and complained that though he
was so great a man he neither owned a house nor had
a lodging-place.
T h e enemies of Jesus charged him with performing
his cures by the aid of Beelzebub. In this he saw a
blasphemy, because he felt that his success in curing the
sick was due to a divine spirit that possessed him. Yet
he was careful to distinguish between an attack upon a
fellow-man and a denunciation of the spirit operating
through him. Therefore he says, ‘ I f any one speaks
against a man, that may be pardoned, but he that
speaks against the Holy Spirit can have no pardon’
(Mt. 1232). No person in the audience could have
understood him to s a y : ’You may blaspheme the
Messiah with impunity, but not the Holy Ghost,‘ T h e
distinction is clearly between the divine spirit and the
human instrumentality.
Wellhausen prefers the reading in Mk. 3 2 8 A and assumes
that a misunderstanding arose through the original reading in
Lk. 12 10 which, on the basis of the absence of h6yov in Marcion!
he translates into Aramaic and renders ‘all that is said by man
(wyi,~$ SJ).
~ ’ D K3 1 This is an ingenious suggestion ; but an
omission on the part of Mk. seems more probable than such a
misapprehension. For, whether the words were uttered by
J,esns or not, they seem to have originated in some such retlec-
tian as we find in I S. 2 25.
In Mt. 1119 Jesus may be rightly represented as
having said ‘ J o h n comes neither eating nor drinking
and they say, H e has a devil ; a man comes who eats
and drinks and they say, Behold a glutton and a wine-
bibber. ’
T h e account in Mt. 16 13-20 of Jesus‘ question to the
disciples giving occasion for Peter’s confession has
39. The phrase manifestly suffered by later expansions.
not used at Such is the pontifical diploma presented
Caesarea- to Peter in m. 17-19, Such also the
-~~,:--:
puupp1.
addition ’ the Son of the living God ’ in
n. 16. In z. 13 a second question has
been preserved in Syr. Sin. Namely, ‘ W h o is this Son
of man ? ’ added to the first, ’ What d o men say con-
cerning m e ? ’ ‘ T h i s ’ may perhaps be put to the
account of the Syriac translator (so Schmiedel). But
it is also possible that ‘ Who is this man (dar-nliJi)?’
is a gloss already in the Aramaic, leading the later
glossator to introduce by contrast the title of Christ’s
divinity. It is evident that the interpolator lived
at a period when the supremacy of the Roman See
was being established. At that time the term ‘ Son of
man ’ would be understood to denote the human nature
as distinct from the divine. Apart from these additions,
Mt. seems to have preserved an earlier text than Mk.
8 2 7 8 and Lk. 9 1 8 8 Desirous to proclaim thecoming
of the kingdom of heaven in Jerusalem also, Jesus
apparently hesitated on the ground that it might be
taken as a political movement. Hence, the question as
to what men thought of him. If the answer was
reassuring so far as the people were concerned, seeing
that they looked upon him as a prophet and not as an
aspirant to Messiahship, he had to reckon also with the
attitude of his own disciples. When Peter, utterly mis-
understanding the question as to their views, took the
occasion to express his own hope, Jesus was obliged to
‘ command the disciples that they should not say to any
man that he was the Messiah,’ as it is emphatically put
in Mt.
According to Mk. 831 (Lk. 922) Jesus announced his
death and resurrection after three days immediately
upon Peter’s confession. Of this Mt. knows nothing.
4733
SON OF M A N
T h e first reference to the sufferings of the Son of
man are found in Mt. 17 12 (Mk. 9 IS),
40. Basis of
But here it is probable that the
predictions original Aramaic conveyed the sense
of ‘so must a man (bar-’ndS) suffer by
death and them.’ For ‘ the disciples understood
resurrection. thathespoketothemconcerning John the
Baptist,’ v. 13. Later,. this would naturallfbe mis-
understood as a reference to himself. T h e original
form of Mt. 2028 (Mk. 10 45) may have been ‘ Man has
not come (sc. into the world) to be served, but to serve.’
When this was applied to Jesus, the dogma of the
‘ ransom ’ seems to have been added.
In CZern. Horn. 1229 (ed. Schwegler) Peter quotes the
following words of Jesus : T& i y d h ih0s;v 6ci, , ~ - m ( i p ~ o66
s +qui,
81‘ 06 E p x w a , ’ 6poior rai T& rarh LvLyxq ; M a w , obdr 62 6 ~ 08 ’
2 XCTCU. The work in which this is found probably dates from
&e reign of Marcus Aurelius (161.180); cp Hilgenfeld, CZpnr.
Recog. and Horn. 1848 p. 3 0 5 8 ZWTh. 1869, p. 3:3, Einl.
p. 42. The same)sapiig is repo;ted by dphfaates: good is
sure to come and it is well with him through whom it comes ;
evil also must come, but woe to him through whom it comes ’
(5 I , ed. Graffin). Aphraates used Tatian’s Diutessaron. The
generic sense of dar-nliSci in each part of this section, naturally
enough applied to Jesus and Judas in RI t. 26 24 Mk.14 41 Lk.
22 22, was consequently still preserved in the middle of the
second century.
Of the two passages found in all the synoptics, Mt.
1 7 2 2 (Mk. 931 Lk.944) and Mt.2018 (Mk. 1033 Lk.
l 8 3 1 ) , the latter furnishes a more natural situation.
T h a t Jesus cannot have predicted in detail his death
and resurrection after three days or on the third day, is
evident to all critical students. But ehe difficulty of
suppressing the political hopes of his followers and the
prejudices and opposition he was sure to encounter in
Jerusaleni may well have filled his mind with forebodings
of evil. H e fell back, however, upon the conviction
that the highest good, the kingdom of heaven, would
come, and that it would be well with any man who
assisted in its coming and suffered for its sake. H e no
doubt believed in a resurrection of the dead, although
his idea seems to have been nearer the Essene than the
Pharisaic conception. As Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
had been raised out of death into an eternal life with
God, so he expected to be raised, Mt. 2 2 2 3 8 (Mk. 12
1 3 8 Lk. 2 0 2 0 f l ) . This hope he may have expressed
by some such word as ‘ m a n must pass away but he
will rise again.’ Even this would be improbable, if-
Pfleiderer were right in assuming that Jesus cherished
no doubts as to the outcome of his mission to Jerusalem.
Considering Lk. 2236 as a genuine saying of Jesus,
Pfleiderer (New WorZd, 1899, p. 431 j ? ) concludes
that, as he ordered his disciples to buy swords, probably
to defend themselves against hired assassins, he cannot
have gone to Jerusalem with the purpose of dying there
as a sacrifice for the sin of the world, but of contending
and conquering.’ I t might be said that, if he advised
his followers to arm themselves, the thought of danger
and death must have been present with him. But it is
exceedingly improbable that he ever gave any such
counsel. If he had actually urged his followers to sell
their very garments in order to purchase swords, without
explaining his purpose, he must have contemplated a
coup d’dtut and there would have been plenty of swords
at his disposal, but there would have been a certain
disingenuousness in his rebuke, Mt. 2652. so thoroughly
in harmony with the doctrine of non-resistance he had
preached, since he w w himself responsible for the
presence of the sword and the notion that it would be
a n urgent necessity. T h e earlier tradition in
Mt. and Mk. knows nothing of such a command given
by Jesus ; but it preserved the fact that one of the
disciples had drawn a sword and cut off a man’s ear.
How was this sword to be accounted for ? Jesus had
ordered it. For what purpose? Lk. 2227 gives the
answer, ‘ T h i s which is written must be accomplished
in me, “ A n d he was reckoned with the lawless.” ’
Jesus, of course, did not go to Jerusalem in order t o
4734
 SON OF MAN
die, but to proclaim the good news of the kingdom.
Nevertheless he no doubt realised the dangers of the
situation arid only put his life into jeopardy because he
deemed it necessary for the accomplishment of his work,
sustained the while by the hope that the kingdom of
heaven would come in the world and to himself a share
in the resurrection from the dead.
I n Mt.244-36 ' the Son of m a n ' occurs five times ;
in Mk. 135-32 only once, and in Lk. 21 8-36 twice.
Mt. 24 306 (Mk. 1326 Lk. 21 27) which is alike
41- The in all the synoptics has no doubt been drawn
Synoptic from the last apocal;pse. Before it Mt. intro-
~ ~duces the term~twice-viz. in ~ ~
24 27 which is also
found in Lk. 1724 and ik 243oa which has no
parallel. The second Occurrence in Lk. (21 36) is also without a
duplicate ; while Mt. 2437 39 correspond to Lk. 1726 30.
If the passage which the three gospels have in common
was the first in the original apocalypse that referred to
the Son of man, it may well be that it conveyed the
meaning, ' they shall see a man coining on the clouds
of heaven,' and he will, etc. If Mt. 2427 actually pre-
ceded it, this sense would not be possible ; but there is
no certainty that the original has been reproduced
Cxactly or in order. Until further discoveries shall have
been made, it will remain most probable that ' t h e
man ' was first introduced as ' a man,' as in En. 48 and
4 Ezra 13. This apocalypse may not originally have
been put upon the lips of Jesus. When its fragments
once secured a place in the synoptic gospels, the in-
fluence upon the conception of the term , Son of man '
must have bee9 profound. If even d uibs TOG dvOp3rrou
to persons familiar with Aramaic might still have con-
veyed the sense of bar-nrisii (see § 3 6 ) , the man coming
with the clouds or appearing as a lightning flash was too
plainly the celestial being described in Dan. 7 13 to be
considered as referring to man in general. A new
mode of thought was naturally given to familiar utter-
ances. I t was this heavenly man who had been without
a home on earth, who had authority over the sabbath
and the right to pardon sins, who had suffered at the
hands of men and predicted his advent in glory and
power. The title was substituted for the personal
pronoun ; old sayings were modified, new ones formed.
Where Jesus had spoken of the kingdom of heaven
whose coming he expected, the Church spoke of the Sou
of man for whose coming she eagerly looked. Among
the new creations none is grander than the judgment
scene in Mt. 25. Its chief significance lies not so much
in the fact that the judge identifies himself with his
brethren, or that the nations are judged by their treat-
ment of the Christians, as in the fact that they are
judged exclusively by moral tests : men's eternal welfare
is determined by their unconscious goodness in dealing
with their humblest fellow-men.
An indication of the date of the synoptic apocalypse in its
Christian form may be found in the circumstance that it follows
in Mt. immediately upon a passage that in all probability
belonged to the Bo$ia 7017 h i , as Strauss has shown (ZWTh.,
1863, p. 84 3).This 'Wisdom of God ' cannot have been
written long before the end of the first century, as it contains an
allusion to the murder of Zechariah h. Barachia during the siege
of Jerusalem (cp Jos. BJ ir. 5 4 [fs 335, 3431).
Jerome ( Vir. IlZ. z ) affirms that in the Gospel accord-
-
ing to the Hebrews, which he had translated into
Greek and Latin, the statement was
42, Gospel
itccording to made that Jesus after his resurrec-
tion, ' took bread, blessed, brake, and
IIebrews. gave it to Tames the lust, saying,
"my brother, eat thy breacl, for the S o n of -man
( j l i u s hominis) has risen from those that sleep."'
Hilgenfeld ( Z W T h . , 1899) thinks that the Aramaic
phrase translated by Jerome was b'reh dt-*nrifri.
It would he interesting in all these circumstances, to know
what Aramaic term JeroAe found in his gospel, and of utmost
importance if it could be proved that the copy he saw in the
library at Caesarea was a faithful transcript of the Gospel
written by Matthew. In its original form, the Gospel according
t o the Hebrews may indeed have been of very high age, and
4735
SON OF MAN
have served as a hasis for the first Greek gospel. That it was
nameless, as Handmann thinks (Hel. hu., 1888 p. II~), is not
probable. The most natural supposition is that ',t was ascribed
to Matthew. Whether such a tradition was correct, may be
doubted. But, like all other gospels it undoubtedly underwent
many changes ; and this particular pkcope, at least in the form
represented by Jerome, can scarcely have had a place in the
first draft.
As 6'reh d&'-'niZ apparently was not used by
Palestinian Christians, 6'reh dZ-gizdrri is more probable.
But it may even be questioned whether Jerome wrote
$&us hominis, as Gregory of Tours quotes the words :
' Surge, Jacobe, comede, quia jam a mortuis resurrexi '
l
(Hist. Pram. 121).
~ ~ ~ ~ .
I t is the merit of Lietzmann to have called attention
to the fact that outside of the N T the Dhrase occurs for
43. Marcion's the first time in Marcion, and was
used by different Gnostic schools.
Marcion's eosoel seems to have had
this term in the same places as the canonical Lk..
except that 729 35 1130-32 188 31-34 were not found in
his gospel.
From Marcion's acquaintance with it, Lietzmann draws the
cdnclusion that it originated in Asia Minor before the year
go A.D. I t is not apparent why this year should have been
chosen. Harnack's conjecture (Chon. 2983) is based on an
obscure and manifestly corrupt passage in Clement of .41ex-
andria. Lipsius placed Marcion's birth at least twenty years
later, and his arrival in Rome in 14314 (ZWTh., 1867, p., 753).
Tertullian's statement that Marcion was the son of a bishop is
scarcely more reliahle than that of Megethius, that he was him-
self a bishop (cp Meyboom Marcion en (fe Marcionietcn
348). , But, apart from this,'there is no evidence that Marcioi
as a child was familiar with the gospel he quoted in Rome in
the time of Pius (cp also Hilgenfeld, Keizerzesch. pgJ).
According to Irenaeus ( A h . her. i. 301-31 z ) the
Gnostics called the primeval light, the father of all
44. Use of things, IIp&os 6vOpwros (primus homo),
and the first thought (Evvora) emanating
term b~ from him A E ~ T E PdvRpwaos
OS (secundus
Gnostics. homo), or uibs dvOpdrou ( j l i u s horninis).
This ufbs dv8pdrou was not, however, identical with
the Christ who, in their opinion, was the offspring of
a the first man ' and ' the second man ' with ' the holy
spirit,' while the man Jesus, son of Yaldabaoth and the
Virgin Mary, was conceived of as the earthly tabernacle
in which the Christ took up his abode. Hippolytus
(PhiZosophumena. 56-11 109) reports that the Naasenes
(dnl =serpent), or Phrygian Ophites, also worshipped
the ' man ' (dvOpwrror), and the ' Son of man ' (ufbs
dvOpdrou) as a unity of father and son, the father
probably being designated as Adamas (OX).
In the Euangeiiunz Man'& a Gnostic work earlier than
Irenaeus, the highest being :i called IIporavOporros (cp K.
Schmidt, SBAW,, 1896, p. 843J), and in a somewhat later
form of this Gnosis the ' Man of light,' Adamas, occurs (id.in
TU 8 297 3 0 9 3 658) ; and the perfect and true man (Lominerre
#erfectum et werum) called Adamas, helongs to the circle of
divine beings manifesting Barhelo, the father and the son, in
the thought of the BarheloGnostics (Iren. 129). When th:
' Heavenly Dialogue,' quoted by Celsus in his 'True Word
(ahout 177 A.D.), declared that the Son of Man ( b uibs TOG bv-
Ol+rou) was mightier than a god (Origen, Corrtr. Ceis. 8 15)
t is god was no doubt Yaldabaoth whom his mother, Sophia:
had to rebuke by a reminder that'gbove him were 'the father of
all, the first man, and the man, the son of man '" according
to Irenzus. Valentinus also gave the first place i; the pleroma
to the rrpotv dveporros (Clement, Sirom. ii. 836), and Monoimos
represented the divinity a3 man, and in so far as it is revealed,
as ' Son of man ' (see Grill, i.c., 355).
T h e evident kinship between the Ophite system and
the thought ascribed to Simon of Gitta, renders it not
improbable that the founder of the movement already
was familiar with these designations for the highest
beings. His saying in regard to the divine nianifesta-
tion as son in Judaea, as father in Samaria, and as holy
spirit in the other nations (PhiZoos. G I ~ is
) most readily
understood in harmony with whatever else is known of
his views, if it is assumed that he asserted the divinity
of man on the basis of the acknowledged humanity of
God, finding in Judaism, Samaritanism, and paganism,
4736
 SON OF MAN
in Jesus, himself, and Helena, manifestations of that
divinely huninn life symbolised by the already extant
figures of ‘ the man,’ the * Son of man,’ and the feminine
spirit in the pleroma.
T h a t the Ophites existed before Christianity, their
doctrine being a mixture of Egyptian and Jewish ideas,
has been suggested by Baur (Christliche Gnosir. 1 9 4 3
[1835]),by Lipsius, who preferred to think of Syrian
rather than Egyptian influences as preponderating
( Z C V T h . , 1863, p. 718J), and by Lietzmann, who
quotes Philaster, 1T, as showing that they ‘ argued their
heresies before the coming of Christ.’ Lietzmann,
however, is of the opinion that ‘ man ’ as a divine name
call only have originated as a designation of the heavenly
prototype of the Messiah appearing on earth, called
even in early times ‘ the seeond man,’ though the term
is actually found only in late Rabbinic writings, a n d
that the Christian Ophites continued to use these
titles, naturally adopting d uibr so6 d v 8 p d ~ o u for d
~ E ~ P OdvOpwaor.
S But Grill is probably right in
pointing out an Indian origin for this conception
fZ.c., 348fl).
The Vedic Purusha-Le., ‘man’-;.i%a designation of the
universe, the macrocosm being conceived after the analogy of
the microcosm. A distinction is made, however, in Rig Veda
10 qa between Purunha as the ahnolute being, and Purusha as
the firstborn, and for this derived ,primeval existence the term
NLrSyana, ‘the one like a man ‘the son of man’ is used
(Ma/mna riyana- Ujanishad, ;I). Gnostic speculation is
altogether likely to have been affected by this idea.
I t is possible, too, that there was a basis in the
mythical lore of Syria. Adam is not improbably the
name of a Semitic divinity [cp OBED-EDOM]. The
familiar motive of a father, a Eon. and a mother-goddess
having issue by the son (cp Stucken, MVAG, 1902,
4 4 6 8 ) , reflecting a s it does a very primitive form of
domestic life, is certainly of mythical origin, and not
the result of late philosophical speculation. T h e con-
ception of the macrocosmic man and the celestial
protoplast is earlier and more widespread than the
significant names expressing it in Sanscrit sources, and
rendered the introduction of similar terms easier.
There seems to be no trace in Gnostic thought of the
Jewish idea of the Messiah, and the Christ-idea has the
appearance of being a later addition to a system already
completed. T h e Gnostic ‘Son of m a n ’ cannot be
accounted for a8 growing out of the conception
presented in the synoptics; rather is it possible that
the Greek phrase, used in rendering the generic bar-
n E E , lent itself to an interpretation akin to the Gnostic
thought, seeing in Jesus a n incarnation of a celestial
‘ Son of man. ‘
Recent criticism of the Fourth Gospel has had a
tendency to emphasise again its relations to Gnosticism.
While the unhistorical character of the
46’ Gospel, its impregnation with Alex-
andrian, and particularly Philonic,
thought, and its date toward the middle
of the second century, have been rendered practically
certain by the labours of many scholars, from Bret-
schneider to Holtzniann and the RCvilles (see J OHN ,
S O N OF ZEBKIJEE), questions concerning earlier and
later strata within the gospel, and the attitude of author
or redactor to Gnostic thought, have assumed fresh
importance during the last few years. How profoundly
investigation o n these points may affect the interpretation
of the ’ Son of man ’ in Jn. is seen in the works of
Fries. Kreyenbiihl, and Grill. Following the expansion-
theory of Schweizer, t o some extent adopted by Bousset
and Harnack, in the more radical form given to it by
Delff, rather than the source-theory of Weisse. Freytag.
arid Wendt, Fries (Det fiai‘.de evangeziet, 1898;
En koptirke euangdium, 1900)has independently elaho-
rated a view according to which a n earlier gospel by
the presbyter John has been expanded by Cerinthus
with interpolations, partly taken from the Gospel
4737
SON OF MAN
according to the Hebrews, partly consisting of his own
philosophical speculations on the basis of the Philonian
logos-doctrine. This theory leads him to consider 1 5 1
313f: 5275362 828 and 1331 as interpolations. Only
1223 34 he thinks it necessary t o assign to the original
gospel, but regards these as evidence that Jesus himself
occasionally used the term. Soderblom has indicated
his general agreement with this position ( J e w Belgs-
predikan, 40 [1899]).
So much is sacrificed to Cerinthus that 12 23 34 might as well
have been added. For 12 a3 is praitically identical with 1331
and the statement offending the people in 12 34 that ‘the son of
man must he lifted up ’ is found not in 12 32 ;here Jesus says
‘ If I ani lifted up,’ h;t in 3 74 which is regarded as an inter:
polation. So far as the ‘ Son of man ’ passages are concerned
they must therefore, even on this view, he put to the account o?
a Gnostic philosopher familiar with Philo’s speculation since
the similarity of 6 27 tb the Gospel according to the HLbrews
does not extend to this phrase. The siguificant thing is that
the parts which must be considered as most characteristic of the
gospel are thus given by Fries to a Gnostic. Fries may be right
in pointing out a probable use of a Greek translation of the
Gospel according to the Hebrews. That the author to whom
we owe the gospel in substantially its present form, barring
some transpositions indicated b Spitta and Bacon, and the
appendix, used other sources tian the synoptics is not im-
probable. But the freedom with which Mt.2664 has been
modified in 151, and the passion-sayings have been transformed
into predictions of glorification in 314 828 1223 and 1334
suggests the extreme difficulty of ascertaining the exac;
language and historical worth of any such sources through the
chiaroscuro of his thought.
If Fries fell back upon the opinion of the ancient
Alogi that Cerinthus had had something to do with this
gospel, Kreyenbiihl ( D a s EvangeZium der Wahrheit,
1900) has maintained that the present gospel is the
work of Menander of Kapparetaea, the disciple of Simon,
and contemporary of Ignatius, in a work equally marked
by learning, critical acumen, and sympathetic insight.
In accordance with this view he holds that ‘Son of
m a n ’ in Jn. is intended t o be understood not as an
exclusive self-designation of Jesus, hut rather as a term
applying to ‘ man,’ ‘ any man,‘ jeder Christenmensch,
Menander speaking out of his Christian consciousness
of being a saviour sent by the aeons into the world (Z.C.
4 3 7 3 , cp Irenaeus, Adu. her. i. 235). It is
difficult for the present writer t o believe that the slender
foundation in Justin and Irenaeus will bear the weight
3f so heavy a structure.
Menander may indeed have conceived of himself as having
zome into the world to redeem men from ignorance and it is
barely possible that he regarded himself as a manifistation of
the celestial man. But the natural impression is certainly that
in Jn. Jesus is represented as speaking solely of himself when
he uses the term ‘Sou of man ; and no recourse to the ver-
nacular of Jesus does here, as in the case of the synoptics,
suggest a different and universal significance. Particularly
important is 653, where it seems just as impossible that
Menander could hare spoken of the appro riation of his own
flesh and blood, or of the flesh and blood o?mm in general, as
that Jesus should have used such words. Here the reference is
:vidently to the Eucharist, and the Son of man is Jesus whose
3ody and blood the Church regarded itself as appmpriatins in
:he sacrament, and whose life-giving words the author deemed
if supreme value.
T h e interpretation of Jn. 6 35 from the view-point of
:he author’s symbolical idealism by J. RCville ( L e
patn’dme /wangiZee,1 7 8 8 [1901]) is more satisfactory
than the present writer’s assumption of a strong opposi-
:ion to sacramentalism (JBL, 1892,p. 20). It may be
ustifiable to infer that in some circles, ‘ to eat the flesh
tnd to drink the blood of the Son of M a n ’ had
feveloped into a liturgical formula, and this would
;how how little Christians hesitated to use this supposed
ielf-designation of Jesus. I t is the merit of Kreyenbiihl
o have greatly strengthened the impression that this
Cospel contains a certain type of Gnostic thought. i n
iiew of the fact that practically all the O T , tl
ipocrypha, and the Pseudepigrapha are either anony-
nous or pseudonymous writings. it is time that the
:ager desire to fasten the authority of the Fourth Gospel
ipon some person mentioned in Early Christian
Literature should be put a t rest. Grill (Z.C.) rightly
4738
 SON OF MAN
contents himself with tracing the gospel idea of the
incarnation (that does not go back to Philo) through
Gnosticism to its source in Indian speculation, and he
interprets the phrase as designating the celestial ' Son
of man ' who has become a ' man. '
Wendt is probably right in regarding bv0 &ou after ulbr in
627 as a later addition (Das]ohannesarangP~kum,121s [IQOO]).
In 3 13 the words b &v hv 76 oitpavG should not be removed from
the text on the ground of'their absence in BSL, hut emended
into b 6 v ;( oitpavoi, a5 Sin. Syr. has men Simaya; and in 9 35:
not only BDS but ilso Sin. Syr. and Eth. have 'Son of man.
In 1234 the 'Son of m a n ' is not merely an equivalent of the
Messiah ( s o / B L , 15 39). The assumption is that esus claims
to be the Messiah ; hut the reference to a remova/from earth
renders it possihle to doubt whether the mysterious title ' Son of
man ' does not have a differentmeaning.
When it is recognised that d uibs TOG hvOpdaou is the
translation of an Aramaic dar-nliSli. that this term
46. EfPecton cannot, on philological grounds, have
used as a self-designation since it
question been naturally conveyed only the idea of
ofJesus, ' man ' in general, and that this generic
Messiahship* use is most suitable in all instances
where there is reason to suppose that a genuine utter-
ance is found, the opinion that Jesus regarded himself
as the Messiah loses its strongest support. There are
indeed passages in which the underlying assumption
seems to be that Jesus claimed for himself the Messiah-
ship without using the name. Keim (/em von N u z a r a ,
2376) enumerates as suchMt. 915 1 1 3 13 1 2 3 41f: 1 3 1 7 ;
Beer regards Mt. 9 15 as decisive ( ' Enoch ' in Kautzsch,
Pseudepigrapha, 232) ; Wendt (Z.C., 1 7 8 8 ) instances
Mt. 1 1 2 5 8 Mk. 1 1 2 7 8 1235.fi But in Mt. 9 1 4 8
the justification of fasting by the departure of the bride-
groom, and of the non-fasting in Jesus' lifetime (cp Mt.
11 IS), by the presence of the bridegroom, is as clearly a
vaticinium e z eventu (Volkmar) as the words concern-
ing the garments and the wineskins are unmistakably
genuine (see Holtzmann, Synoptiker,(3)55). In
Mt. 113 Jesus is asked by John the Baptist, throngh his
disciples, whether he is the coming one. Jesus iiot
only does not answer the question, but deliberately
turns the attention away from himself to his work,
described in language borrowed from Is. 29 IS$ 3556,
and culminating in the proclamation of good tidings to
the poor. I t is the view men have of the kingdom of
heaven that concerns h i m ; on this point Jesus con-
sidered John's conceptions to be as defective as those of
Moses and the prophets (Mt. l l x z J ) . ' T h e 'sign of
Jonah ' is the preaching of repentance to the Ninevites ;
but Jesus felt that his proclamation of the kingdom of
heaven was of more importance than the announcement
of judgment by the unwilling prophet (Mt. l 2 4 1 J ) . If
Mt. 1317 is genuine, it expresses Jesus' conviction that
the kingdom of heaven, prophesied of old, is coming,
and his congratulation of his disciples for discerning its
advent. But this does not harmonise writh the lack of
perception on their part, of which he elsewhere has to
complain. T h e parable of the vineyard (Mk.12 I 8 )
has been so thoroughly changed, under the hands of
the evangelists (see Jiilicher, Lc., ii. 2386405f:). that it
is quite impossible to ascertain what the original utter-
ance was in 1 2 3 5 8
If Mt. 2 2 4 1 8 (Mk. 1 2 3 5 8 )is genuine, it is either
an academic question concerning the Scriptural basis
for the current assumption that the coming Messiah is
to be a descendant of David, or a serious Scriptural
vindication by Jesus of his claims to be the Messiah
although he is not of Davidic descent. His general
method of teaching renders it exceedingly improbable
that he should have engaged in such a discussion simply
L , confute Pharisaic exegesis without anything of prac-
tical importance depending on the decision ; but if he
really attached value to their accepting him as the
1 On Mt. 12 3 see I 38.
2 On Mt. 11 2 5 5 , see ON OF GOD, 8 13,
4739
SON OF MAN
Messiah without the demanded legitiniisation, his reti-
cence on the essential point whether he was the Messiah
becomes wholly incomprehensible. It seems evident
that this pericope is a defence of Jesus' Messiahship,
made by his disciples against Jewish attacks upon it on
the ground that he was not a son of David-a defence
made at a time when no one had yet thought of
constructing the pedigrees now found in Mt. and Lk.,
both of which are very late. T h e critical estimate of
these passages has not been influenced hy the discussion
of the term ' Son of man,' and in almost all instances
has been reached by scholars who believe on the basis
of this title that Jesus regarded himself as the Messiah.
Although at first sight the result of recent investiga-
tions may seem to be wholly negative and .to render
valueless the long labours that have been
47. Value of expended upon the term, a closer ex-
the different amination will show that each new theory
theories. has tended to bring to view some aspect
of the truth, and that the hypothesis that appear; to
explain satisfactorily most of the facts yields the richest
returns for our knowledge of the life and teaching of
Jesus. When Jesus declared that man is lord of the
sabbath and has the authority to pardon sin, he no
doubt thought of man as he ought to be as a child of
the heavenly father ; and thus there was in his mind a n
element of that ideal humanity which Herder emphasised.
That he did not look upon himself as the absolutely
perfect man only enhances his moral greatness. Other
genuine utterances suggest that humble sense of fellow-
ship with man and acceptance of man's lot which Baur
rightly felt. Those who explained the term as a
Messianic title were right in so far as the Greek gospels
are concerned. But a correct feeling also led many
scholars to the opinion that Jesus cannot have through
this term accepted as his own the current Messianic
ideal. T h a t it served to hide the secret of his Messiali-
ship was also true ; only it was not Jesus himself, but
his disciples, who thus used it. Similarly, the term is
likely to have suggested to early Christians a conception
in which many heterogeneous elements were blended.
T h e gradual elimination of the Fourth Gospel, the
synoptic apocalypse, the manifestly secondary passages
containing the phrase, as the literary character of the
gospels became more truly appreciated, was of utmost
importance. Only on the basis of such careful criticism
could the resort to the vernacular be of any value.
While no process of criticism can restore the ipsissima
verba of Jesus, an approximation may be possible. For
the work of retranslation knowledge of the linguistic
material is necessary, and also philological insight.
T h e attempts to explain the use of the term in passages
that are rejected have been of much value, since they
are utterances of early Christians whose thought, intrinsi-
cally important, has exercised a paramount influence in
the world. In their interpretation it is both legitimate
and necessary to seek for light in the mythical and
legendary lore of the epoch. T h e more marked the
difference between the thoughts revealed in the Aramaic
translations of the Greek sayings, the more difficult is it
to explain them by the conceptions known to prevail
among the Greek gospel-writers ; the more original and
valuable the obtained utterances, the stronger is also
the presumption that they come from a great personality
whose historical existence thereby becomes assured and
whose tremendous influence can be appreciated. If h e
ceases to be what he so earnestly enjoined upon his
disciples not to say that he was, a king to be ministered
unto, he becomes more truly than ever what he would
be, a son of man ministering to the sons of men.
The most important literature hefore the nineteenth century
is indicated in the works of Scholten Appel and A. Meyer.
The term is diskussed in every Life of
48. Bibliography. Jesus New Testament Theology and
Bible' Dictionary. All imwrtant &mi-
hutions in recent times have been referred to in the course of
this article. N. S .
4740
 SONS O F THE PROPHETS
SONS OF THE PROPHETS. See P ROPHET .
SOOTHSAYER (apz, ~aiuq,
etc., MANTEYOMENH).
See D IVINATION , 2 [I$ 41, etc., and cp M AGIC , 5 3.
SOP ( ~ W M I O N ) ,Jn. 1 3 2 6 8 , a fragment or morsel ;
cp ~ W M O C ,6 ,In Judg. 195 (eAL KAACMA Ruth 214
[for ng]). See M EALS , 5 IO.
SOPATER ( C W I - I ~ T ~ O C ) ,a man of BERCEA,who
accompanied Paul (for part of the way at least) on his
last recorded journey to Jerusalem, Acts 204. T h e
addition IIhppou (son of Pyrrhus RV, KABD) is omitted
by TR. T h e mention of the father's name is
unusual, although it may possibly have been inserted
to distinguish him from Sosipater (Rom. 1621)~ with
whom, however, he should probably be identified. See
SOSIPATER.
SOPHERETH (&C€c$HpA0 [BIs [AI,
AC~~$OP . ACW-
c$sp& [L]), Ezra 255 AV. RV HASSOPHERETH
[q.~.].
SORCERY, SORCERER,SORCERESS. SeeMAGIC,
5 3.
SOREK, THE VALLEY OF (?lib$n>[with b],
L e . , 'wZdy of the 56rek vine' [see VINE]). the place
where Samson fell in love with the Philistine woman
Delilah ( J u d g . 1 6 4 : CN ~ A C W P H X CBI, ETTI TOY
XEIMAPPOY C'WPHX [A], ...- H K [L]). It is called
by Jer. (0.5 1536, cp 29776) cafursorec; he places it in
the region of Elelitheropolis near S a r a - L e . , ZORAH
Lq.v.1. This points to the mod. Stirik, 2 hr. W. from
Zorah, on the N. side of the large and fertile Wa'dy
Sura'r. Cp, however, Z ORAH.
SORES (CWPHC [A], -pale [L], EWBHC [B], Josh.
Esg, a). See S EIR, 2.
SORREL (pii),Zech. 1 8 RV, AV ' speckled.' See
5 12.
COLOLIRS,
SOSIPATER ( c ~ c l n a ~ p o c )I.. A general under
Judas the Maccabee, who fought against Timotheus a t
Carnion, 2 Macc. 1219-24.
2 . One of the 'kinsmen' of Paul who unites with
him in saluting the Christians of Rome, Rom.1621.
H e seems, therefore, to have been well known to them.
I n the Pseudo-Dorotheus he is a bishop of Iconium.
H e is probably to be identified with SOPATER [ f . v . ]
of Beroea.
SOSTHENES ( C W C ~ B N H C ) . I. 'Ruler of the
synagogue' (dpxiuuvdywyos, see S YNAGOGUE , 5 9) at
Corinth when Paul was in that city on his second
journey, the first into Greece (Acts1817). After the
failure of the Jews' concerted action against Paul before
Gallio (see GALLIO,5 a)--in which, perhaps, Sosthenes
had taken a leading part-we are told that ' all ' ( I ~ ~ V T E S ,
so BXA and others), or ' a l l the Greeks' (?riLvres ol
"EXATYES : so DdEHLPM, etc. ), certainly not ' all the
Jews ' (IrdvTes 'Iou8aioc or ~ r d v r ~ols ' I o d a h , as some
authorities have ; see Ti., Blass, Hilgenfeld) laid hold
on Sosthenes and beat him before the judgment-seat.
It is not necessary to suppose, as many do, that
Sosthenes was the successor of Crispus, the 'ruler of
the synagogne,' baptized by Paul at Corinth (Acts 1 8 8 ;
see C RISPUS ), nor yet to assume, with others, that Lk.
is confusing the two persons. Both may concurrently
have borne the title of ' ruler of the synagogue ' (dpxc-
uuvdywyos), and have held the office denoted by it, just
as cases in which there were more than one chief priest
( h p x i q x h r ) can be cited (cp ANNASand C AIAPHAS ).
This Sosthenes has been identified by many since Theo-
doret, but without reason, with ' the brother' mentioned
in I Cor. 1I (see no. 2 ) .
2 . Sosthenes the brother' appears in I Cor. 1I as
having a share in the preparation of I Cor. T o prove
that the part he took was that of amanuensis merely,
appeal is usually made to I Cor. 1621 ; but those who
argue thus overlook the fact that Tertius, who is sup-
posed to have written the Epistle to the Romans, is not
mentioned until the end of that epistle, and then ex-
4741
SPAIN
pressly as the apostle's secretary (Tiprior 6 ypd$as rfiv
6Iriuroh4v. Rom. l 6 ~ 2 ) . Moreover, no one has ever
thought of taking ' Timothy the brother ' in 2 Cor. 1I
Col. 1I (cp Phil. 1I), ' a l l the brethren which are with
me [Paul]' in Gal. 12, ' Silvanus and Timotheus' in
I Thess. 1 1 zThess. 1I as having been the apostle's
secretaries in attendance. T h e simple fact is that the
names belong to the form usually adopted for the
Pauline epistle; one or more persons are mentioned
besides the apostle as writing it, their function being
that of attesting the truth set forth and defended by the
apostle ( 2Cor. 13, cp Dt. 19 IS). From time to time
we are reminded of their presence by the use of the
plural (first person), but quite as often the apostle uses
the singular. ' T h e brother ' Sosthenes is otherwise
unknown. H e is enumerated among the seventy in
Eusebius (HEi. 121) and elsewhere (see Lips. ApoR.
Ap.-gesch. 1 2 0 1 203, 34x3, E. 3. W. C. v. M.
SOSTRATUS ( C U C T ~ ~ T O C [A], coc.,[VI; the
name is also borne by a priest of Aphrodite in Paphos ;
cp Schiirer, G V Z l 514 VV .), governor of the citadel in
Jerusalem (srrapxoc TH C A K ~ O T T O A W C ) temp.
Antiochus Epiphanes ( 2 Macc. 4 27 [z8] 29). T h e post
would, doubtless, be important (cp Benz. HA 47 ;
J ERUSALEM , 5 27).
Zrapapxos, used in @ for ?!CB (see G OVERNOR , I), conesponds to
the Roman ficzfecius. From it is borrowed the Nab. ~3ian.
the precise nuance of which is not quite certain (CIS2, nos.
'73, 207, 214).
SOTAI (V$b, meaning? CWTAI [L]). The B n e
Sotai, a group or family(see S o ~ o n r o ~SERVANTS)
's in the great
post-exilic list(see EZRAii., $ 9); Ezra255 (ohTcL [B], OWTU [AI)
=Neb. 7 5 7 (UOVZCL [BA], - T L [N*vid.],
5 33 (owcab [L], EVom. after @EA).
~ -na [Kc.avid.])=I Esd.
SOUL (E$?, ~ Y X H ;common to all the Sem.
languages ; but Ass. napircu generally means ' life,'
more rarely ' soul '). Properly ' breath ' ; but this sense
seems to have gone out in Hebrew. T h e usual sense is
the soul or individual life (so very often, see, e.g., Ps.
66 g Is. 53 12)as distinguished from the ' flesh ' or ' body '
(Dt. 1223 Ps. 31 I O). By a natural transition nLpheialso
means ' a living l i n g , ' especially in the phrase nPplteJ
&ayya'h(vn &), lit. ' a living soul,' used of man in J
(Gen.27) and of animals in P (Gen. 1 ~ 0 2 4 3 091z15f:
all P ; 219, redactional iusertion in J ) ; cp I Cor. 1545.
For further developments, see ESCHATOLOGY, 55 12-19,
and for the connection of ' soul' and ' heart ' c p H EART .
None of the three passages cited in Ges.-Buhl for the sense
'breath ' will stand examination, as has been shown by Briggs,
I The use of @g; in the O T ' [a critical and exhaustive classifica-
tion of passages], / B L 16 118971 17-30, These passages are :-
(a)Prov. 27 9. Here Briggs gives r z i j h d the sense of 22666,
'heart' : but it is better to read E$!;$ N3lp n$p pnp?, ' s o the
sweetness of counsel is healing to the soul ' (Toy also nry, pnci).
(6) Job 41 13 where vg;, 'breath ' (?), is ascribed to Leviathan.
But Job is a late book; a reversion to an archaic sense is not
probable here. So Briggs, who renders 'his passion, or fury,
kindleth coals.' The parallel expressions, however, point to the
reading inp??, 'his breath.' ( c ) Is.320, e'%? yt?, RV 'per-
fume-boxes ' (see PERFUME). Briggs proposes ' boxes of desire,'
or 'smelling boxes. Paul Haupt (.'?BOT ':sa.' [Heb.] 82) ha:
suspected a connection with Ass. $ & d d , t o anoint oneself.
This suggests n$$?! 'e?, 'boxes of ointment ' (Ass. nujJu.%u,
'ointment '). But still better would perhaps be {$e
'!?? (D and
D confounded). T. K. C.
SOUTH, SOUTH WIND. See E ARTH, FOUR
Q UARTERS OF THE, and WINDS. For Chambers of
the South, see STARS, 5 3 e ; and for The South as a
geographical expression ( I S. 3014 I Macc. 565). see
JUDBA, N EGEB , P ALESTINE .
SOW (yc), 2 Pet. 222 ; see S WINE .
SOWER,SOWING. See A GRICULTURE , 5 6. Cn
the Parable of the Sower, see G OSPELS, 5 19.
SPAIN (CI-I~NIA [AKV Ti.WH], I Macc. 8 3 Rom.
152428). Carthaginian Spain became Roman at the
close of the Second Punic W a r (201 B.c.) ; but the
4742
 SPAN
Roman power was not fully consolidated over the entire
Iberian peninsula until nearly two centuries later (by
Marcus Agrippa the friend and minister of Augustus).
There is no reason to suppose that the apostle Paul
ever carried out the intention of visiting Spain ex-
pressed in Rom. 1524 28, and the evidence that the
country was evangelised by the apostle James the Less
(see J AMES , 5 I ) is too late and legendary to be of any
value. Cp G EOGRAPHY , 9 255 ; TARSHISH, § 2.
SPAN (n?!; CTTleaMH). See WEIGHTS A N D
MEASURES. In Lam. 220, AV gives the pathetic phrase
' children of a span long ' for pms! *)si; RV, however,
has the children that are dandled in the hands ' (cp v.
22). Budde, ' Hatschel-kinder.'
SPARROW. T h e word :ippFr, lib?, of frequent
occurrence in O T , is, with only twoexceptions (Ps. 84&]
1028[7], CTpoy9IoN)rendered 'bird,' 'fowl' in EV. Nor
does the exceptional translation ' sparrow ' imply that
any particular species was intended. T h e word probably
meant any small Passerine bird, a group which is un-
usually abundaut in Palestine. I t is interesting to note
that the common house-sparrow, Passer domesticur, is
common in Palestine, but in a smaller and brighter
variety; three other species of Passer are also enumerated.
Canon Tristram identifies the sparrow of Ps. 1027 as the
Montz'coZi C ~ O Z U J or Blue Thrush, from its habit of sitting
solitarily, or sometimes in pairs, on projecting ledges or
some other conspicuous perch, uttering from time to
time a plaintive and monotonous song. T h e ' sparrow '
is not included in the list of unclean birds ; and it seems
probable that at any rate in N T times (Mt. 1029 31 Lk.
126,urpou8iov) they were eaten, a5 is commonly the case
in Mediterranean countries to this day. See B IRD,
FOWL, § I. A. E.S.
BPARTA ( C I T A ~ T H [KV], - T I A [A], I Macc. 1416:
SPARTANS, c ~ ~ ~ p - r i ~ ~ ~ il ,2~2 M t l4mJ
a c c . 15qI
A A K ~ A A I M O N I O I , AV Lacedemonians, RV '-d;em.,
2 Macc. 5 9).
T h e greatness of Sparta was long past when she
came into connection with the Jewish people. The
final suppression of the liberties of Greece by the
Romans was in part due to her obstinate refusal to
enter the A c h z a n League (149B.C.). On the destruc-
tion of Corinth and dissolution of that league, Sparta
gained a favourable position so far as retaining her
autonomy went, but a number of the Laconian towns
dependent upon 'her were granted autonomy by the
Romans (Strabo, 366 ; Livy, 3429). S p a r t a a t this period
held the rank of a civitas federate et Zibera (Str. 365),
being self-governing and not liable to tribute or to the
jurisdiction of a Roman governor. Sparta and the
Spartans are mentioned together in connection with a
correspondence which passed between them and the
Jews in the Maccabean period ( I Macc. 126). About
134 B.C. Jonathan, then leader of the Jews, wishing to
make alliances to strengthen his position, sent Numenius
and Antipater with letters to Rome, Sparta, and else-
where ( I Macc. 121 &, cp D ISPERSION, § 13). In his
letter to the Spartans he lays great stress on a former
letter from their king Areus to the Jewish high priest
Onias, and on the desirability of renewing the brother-
hood which had then existed. T h e letter of Areus is
quoted to the effect that it had been found in writing
that the Spartans a.nd Jews were of the same stock, that
i s to say, of Abraham, and that therefore their interests
were identical (1220-23). Shortly afterwards Jonathan
died, and the tidings of his death caused great grief in
Sparta (1416), but on Simon's assuming the priesthood,
the rulers ( i . e . ,the Ephors) of the Spartans wrote to him
wishing to renew the friendship which they had con-
firmed with Judas and Jonathan his brethren (1417f).
T h e name of the Spartan king is given as ARIUS.
1 Possibly a more correct form of the name would be dpcur as
in Gk. writers, cp also CIA 2 I, no. 332.
4743
SPEAR
So RV, but AV AREUS(J Macc. 12 20, aprlc); which should
also be read in V . 7 (with Vg. and Jos. [&xcoc]) for AV DARIUS;
and again in v. 19, for AV O N ~ A R E(ovra[alpqr
S [NV], -vacap.
[Avid.]), which has arisen from the combination of o m m ('to
Onias '), the last word in V . 19, with dpqs (Arius), the first in;. 20.
Although there were two Spartan kings named Arius,
there is little doubt that Arius I. (309-265B . c . ) , the
successor of Cleomenes, is the one here referred to,
and that the high priest is Onias I.' It has been sug-
gested with great probability that this letter was written
in 302 B.C. when the Spartans may have wished to
hinder Demetrius Poliorcetes, who was then warring
with Cassander. T h a t treaties may have existed be-
tween Semitic and other peoples at that time is shown
by the league between the Athenians and the Sidonians
before the time of Alexander the Great, to which refer-
ence is made in CZG, no. 87 (Schurer in Riehm's H W B
21536U).
T h e authenticity of the letters in I Macc. has been
much disputed. T h e letter from Jonathan to the
Spartans ( I Macc. 126 8 )scarcely reads like a diplo-
matic document, and betrays the religious spirit of a
later a g e ; though it must be admitted that it is im-
possible to build too much upon the wording since the
letters are translations of translations.
There is no reason, however, to doubt the fact of diplomatic
relations with Sparta having been set on foot by Jonathan. For
Sparta was too obscure at the time to have suggested itself to
a forger eager to magnify his hero by inventions of the kind.
Again the incident leads to no result in the sequel ; the reverse
would have tended to throw doubt upon the entire episode.
As given both by Joscphus and the author of I Macc. the
two letters of the Spartans seem fragmentary and wanting in
definite suggestion. They have the air of diplomatic forgeries.
Especially is it noticeable that whereas Jonathan describes the
Spartan overtures as a declaration of ' coufederacy and friend-
ship' (I Maw. 128) there is no such declaration in pro er
diplomatic terms in the appended document. Yet the ah&
to point to actual alliance in the past would have been the
natural and most powerful recommendation of his proposals.
A point upon which too much stress has been laid is
the relationship between the Spartans and Jews. -4reus
mentions that it was written down that they were
' brethren and of the stock of Abraham.' T h e unlucky
J A S O N ( p . v . , 2) Aed to the Lacedemonians (haKe6acphor)
for shelter because they were his ' near of kin ' (6th rjlu
cvyyeufav. 2 Macc. 59), and Herod made a favourite of
a certain Spartan ' on account of his country ' (JOE.. Bf
i. 261). There seems to be no good ground for re-
garding the ' Sparta' of these letters as a corruption of
the Asiatic name Saparda (see S EPHARAD ) ; and it is
equally hazardous with Hitzig (Gesch. 347) to identify it
with the Lycian towii P a t a r a I t is conceivable that
the old historians connected the Pelasg%ms with the
Spartans, and derived the former from Peleg the son of
Eber ; but the relationship insisted on finds a parallel
in the case of the people of Pergamos. who, in making
a n alliance with the Jews, pointed back to similar rela-
tions between their ancestors and Abraham (Jos. Ant.
xiv. 1022). T h e old historians and genealogists were
ever ready to account for existing confederacies and
alliances as resting on some ancient bond of kinship,
and numerous analogies may be found amongst classical
writers ; cp G E N E A L ~ G Ii., E S 3 [3], col. 1660.
See H. J. E. Palmer, de ejisfulamm p a s Sparfani afque
furlaei invicem si&' misisse dicuntur veritate, Darmst. 1828 ;
Schiirer, 1 x 8 6 ; Ew. Gesch. 4317. s. A. c.-w. J. w.
SPEAR. T h e words are :-
I.n??, &kith. See below (8 2) and cp JAVELIN, 2.
a. &, r&4. See below (g 3).
3. 1'1'9, ki&. See J AVELIN , I.
1 Cp ONIAS,# 3. Not Onias 11. and Areus 11. (Ew. Gesck.
4317), for they can hardly have been contemporaneous and
moreover Areus 11. died young, about 257 B.C. (Paus. iii: 66):
still less can it be On& 111. (Jor. Ant. xii.410). A certain
Areus is mentioned ahout 284 B.C. as a prominent Spartan (Pol.
22 T 23 4).
2 Cp a note in Steph.,Byz., s.v., Loudaia, 'derived b i ior8acov
ZlraprGv i u b <K Cihjf3qc ;see Schiirer, Z.C.
4744
 SPEAR
S. 21 16t). The text, however, isdoubtful. See
(Job4031t; ‘fishspear’). See F I S H , 8 3 , I .
On the e spearmen ’ of Ps. 6830 see C ROCODILE . For
the Gc,$~oX&por of Acts 23 23 we ought probably to read
r Jos. BJ ii. 175,
with X &&op6Xor ; cp the d ~ ? ~ p 6 X oof
o+ev8ovirai and X d o p b X o r of iii. 7 18, and u+evBov+rai
of iv. 13. Cp W A R .
T h e spear was a favourite weapon of offence amongst
ancient nations, as it has always been amongst other
1. Construe- peoples at a n early stage of development ;
it was easy to make and could be used
tion. with great effect. I t varied chiefly in its
size, weight, and length; this will be seen from the
illustrations in Erman (Lzye i n Anc. Eg.), Wilkinson
(Anc. Eg.),and Maspero (StmggLe of the Nations),
though too much reliance must not be placed on the
representations of spears in ‘works of art’ (cp the remarks
of Cecil ‘Torr, Ancient Ships, 8). It consisted, as a rule,
of a wooden staff with a sharp head of flint or .metal.
It may be that the early Israelites, as a writer in Kitto
(BiAZ. CycZop.) suggests, like other primitive peoples,
made use of the horn of some animal, ‘ straightened in
water, and sheathed upon a thorn-wood staff.’ W e
know with what effect animals themselves use these
horns (Darwin, The Descent of M a n , 501 fl[,1890]).
‘ When sharpened this instrument would penetrate the
hide of a bull, and, according to Strabo, even of a n
elephant; it was light, very difficult to break,‘ and
‘resisted the blow of a battle-axe’ (Kitto). Later,
brass (see C OPPER ) or I RON (p.v. ) was used. Layard
(Nineveh a n d BndyZon, 301 [1853]) found at Nimrfid
the heads of spears, ‘which being chiefly of iron fell
to pieces almost as soon as exposed to the air.’ I n
Gen. Louis Palma Di Cesnola’s Cyprus (1877),plates
xxxvi. and XI. (after p. 392),are given gems from Curium
in the Phenician (xxxvi. ) and the Greek (xl. ) style, on
which warriors are represented armed with round shields
(see S HIELD), and spears which look like sharp-pointed
stakes; c p the long spears on the Sarcophagus from
Golgoi (pl. x., opposite p. 110). On the other hand,
on the silver patera found at Aniathus (pl. xix., opposite
p. 276) a regular spear-head seems to be represented.
Layard (Nineveh and its Remains, 2343) says, ‘ t h e
spear of the Assyrian footman was short, scarcely exceed-
2, The binit,,. ing the height of a m a n : that of the
horseman appears to have been con-
siderably longer. ... T h e shaft was probably of some
strong wood, and did not consist of a reed, like that of
the modern Arab lance.’ I t would seem to have been
a stout weapon, since warriors used it to force stones out
of the wall of a besieged city (seep. 372). T h e Egyptian
soldiers of the eighteenth Theban dynasty carried ’ pikes
about 5 ft. long, with broad bronze or copper points’
(Maspero, StruggZe, 213): the spear was not so common.
’The Assyrian pikemen of a later date were armed with
equally heavy weapons (ibid., 627f:). T h e Hebrew
@zith ( n m ) seems to have been a large weapon. It
was used by great warriors (2S. 2 23, etc. ) ; and it is the
weapon put into the hands of ‘giants’ (2S. 2321, etc. ).
Goliath is said to have carried a spear ‘ like a weaver’s
beam ( I S . 17 7), its head weighing 600 shekels ’ (for the
idea of ‘giants’ see A NAKIM ). Saul is said to have
hurled his hlinith at David ( I S . 1 9 g J ) . From such
indications in the O T we may suppose that the bznith
had some resemblance to the Egyptian and the Assyrian
pike.
A lighter, and no doubt much older, weapon of the
kind was also in use among the Egyptians and the
Assyrians, and is still found among the
3. The Bedouins and other primitive peoples.
This is called in Arabic rum&, and we can hardly be
wrong in identifying it with the Hebrew r$ma@ (nni, see
Nu. 25 7, etc. ; c p Doughty, Ar. Des. 1221 228 ; Merrill,
East of the Iordan, 482),which, however, was no doubt
often shorter. ‘ T h e beam, made of a light reed of the
4745
SPICE
rivers of Mesopotamia, is nearly two of their short
horse-lengths ; they charge them above their heads’
(Doughty, I 334). T h e Arab keeps this spear continu-
ally at his side. When he prepares to encamp the
sheikh strikes his spear in the ground. When the camp
is broken up ’ the spear is the last thing taken from the
ground’ (Warburton, The Crescent a n d fhe Cross,
chap. 2 5 ) . For other spear-like weapons (‘ dart,’ etc. )
see W EAPONS , 2 . Cp S IEGE , W A R . M. A. c.
SPECKLED. For ( I ) n@gd (lb!), Gen. 3032 3 ,
and (2)pd&id.(p39, Jer.129, see COLOURS, 5 12; and for (3)
S&Y@ ( pie), Zech. 1 8 , see ib., fi IO.
SPELT is the RV rendering of RussPmeth, nnb?
(Ex. 9 3 2 Is. 2825 Ezek. 491.), forwhichAVhastwice ‘rie’
and once ‘ fitches.’ See FITCHES.
[It is possible that ncp?, Lspelt,’occu~s
also in I S. 2 36, where
it is said that destitute priests will sue to be put into a priest’s
office on) 12?; 70: n?ilx>, i.e., according to tradition, ‘for a
piece of silver and a loaf of bread.’ But the rendering ‘ piece ‘
presupposes a connection of ‘aR and 324,g&ih (see W EIGHTS),
which is purely arbitrary. Following Del. Prol. 149, BDB and
Ges.-Ru. take ‘ 3 to ~ be an abstract noun, meaning ‘payment,’ cp
Ass. a bru ‘to hire.’ But this root does not appear to he known
in He%rew: nor is an abstract noun probable in this passage.
Probably the text is corrupt, and we should read F o p py?,
‘for an omer of spelt.’ is without the following words
on5 ~ 3 1 1 ;possibly these were added after the corruption of
mi?,on account of the concluding mention of ‘ a morsel
of bread.’ For a bolder expedient see Crit. &’ib.-~. K . c.]
SPICE (it.,Lat. species, OFrench tspice, hencekpice;
cp 11, 2 Ch. 16 14. all species [of spices] : Vg. unguentis
mereiriciis [W]). though now specifically employed to
denote ‘ a class of aromatic vegetable condiments used
for the seasoning of food, commonly in a pulverised
state,’ was, in the seventeenth century, applicable to a
much wider variety of ‘ species ’ ; in AV it happens to
be applied (unless, perhaps in Cant. 82, where ‘ spiced’
wine is alluded t o ) g never to condiments but only to
aromatic odours. I t represents :-
I. bPieem, ~$e (Ex. 3023?), or b&em, OF> (often),
plur. o’@c+, z C h . 1614, etc. That this word must
sometimes at least have a general sense is shown by the
expressions ~ p p - p (Ex.
p 302;; see C I N N A M O N ) , op3-mp
.. .
( i b . , see C ALAMUS ) and nVa-5; WR? (Ezek. 2722). On
the specific sense, see BALSAM.
2 . sammim, omp (Ex. 3 0 3 4 : E V SWEET SPICES ;
Ex.266 307 3 1 r r 3 5 8 1 5 2 8 3938 4027[onlyAV]Lev.47 1012
Nu. 4 16 2 Ch. 2 4 [3] [only AV] 13 TI: EV S WEET I NCENSE) or
&i&.th sammim, o’pp nlbp (Ex. 37zgt ; EV IKENSE OF
S WEET S PICES and RV in 4027 z Ch.24[31).
T h e word samrnim is a general expression for fragrant
material in the form of powder, akin to Ar. S m m ~ z a ,
’ to smell,’ as well as samm, simm, or su7nm, ‘ poison,’
and to Aram. sammd, ‘ a medicament.’ The exact
history of this group of words is obscure, but probably
the oldest form of root is represented by Ar. famma=
Arani. sum; and Ar. snmm and Heb. n’tx may both
be loan words from Aramaic (cp Frankel, 262). On
the other hand, the oldest meaning is perhaps that of the
Hebrew word and of Ar. Samm, viz., ‘ fragrance’ : the
notions of poison (in Syr. snmmi dhthzaurtd) and of
medical efficacy may well be derived from this. In post-
biblical Hebrew, and sometimes in Syr., the word vas
used with a further extension of meaning-viz., for
colouring matter.
T h e use of the word in O T is, as a general term, for
the sacred incense compounded of stacte. onycha, gal-
banum (galbanum of sammim), and frankincense (see
I NCENSE ).
3. 7&’Kd’th, nNj? (Gen. 3 7 2 5 ; EV Spicery; RVmg.
1 Compare, however, @AL ; the latter text has the curious ex-
pression l p r o v K V ~ ~ O(see
U C r i f . Bib.).
2 In Ezek. 24 IO the verb results frpm a mistranslation, ‘spice
it well ’ : RV ‘ make thick the broth.
4746
 SPICE-MERCHANTS
gun1 tragacanth or storax ; 8uprQara ; aromatu; Gen.
4311; AV spices, RV spicery ; Buplafiu, storax). See
STORAX.
4. r&a& n,n, Cant. 8 2 (apparently not specific).
See PERFUME, P ERFUMERS .
~ , 161, etc. See PERFUME.
5. & p p ( s p ~ Mk.
6. dpwpov, Rev. 18 13 RV. See A MOMUM. N.M.
SPICE-MERCHANTS (D$$l,?I,with art. ; TUN
e ~ n o p w ~but) , RV ‘merchants,’ are mentioned in
connection with Solomon’s commercial profits ( I K. 1015),
if we should not rather read ‘ Jerahmeelites.‘ See
SOLOMON, 5 7, and cp PERFUMERS. T. K. C.
SPIDER. I. ~km&nith, ll’n@’ ; Prov. 3028.).; KV
L IZARD [q. v . , 71.
2. ‘akkcibiT, w q y (dpdxvv, aranea). Under this
name the spider is mentioned in M T only twice-viz.,
in Is. 5 9 5 , where the devices of the wicked are likened
to a spider’s web, and in Job 814, where the confid-
ence of the godless is compared to a ‘ spider’s house.’
There are several other passages, however, in which,
through a n easy textual error, the spider has been
supplanted by the moth. Thus in Job 4 rg, ‘ which are
crushed before the moth’ (wje ,&) should rather be
‘which are crushed even as the spider’ (.iq?y -?!) ;
Mohammed, too, compares idolaters to spiders (Koran,
Sur. 2940). In Hos. 86 the ‘ calf of Sarnaria’ is also
probably compared to a spider’s web,a and in Ps.
3912[11] 9 0 9 (6LIS d p d x v ~ [ v in
] both passages) the
same figure seems to be employed to symbolise the
frailty of human life, according to probable emenda-
tions of these two corrupt passage^.^ Textual criticism
also reinstates the spider in a fine description of the fate
of the wicked (see M OTH ), where ‘ moth ’ should prob-
ably be ‘spider ’ (Job 2718 / j 8 1 4 ; but in d of 27 18
Bp6xvv seems to stand for mD). Not improbably, too,
‘ the poison of asps ’ in Ps. 1 4 0 3 should rather be ‘ the
poisonofspiders ’ (so Gratz, Merx, after Tg. ). I n Is. 595
‘ spiders ’ and ‘ vipers ’ are parallel, with an allusion to
a belief in their poisonousness. See A SP. 6 , according
to Grabe, followed by H and P read ‘ spider ‘ ( d p d ~ v v ,
but the text [BAQ] has T U P U X ~ )in Hos. 5 12, where M T
has ‘ moth.’ T. K. C.
SPIES (W!$?g, 45.12rrigal,
, ‘ t o busy oneself
with walking about ’ : cp $31, ‘merchant,’ but M H n h l ,
‘calumny,’ and $337, Ps. 15 3 ‘backbite ; K a T a U K O T T O L , Gen. 429,
etc., Josh.21623 I S.264zS.151o~;andvirtuallyD’?? Nu.146
raraure$a+bov, but Aq. Sym. K a m U K b T o V ; nm? Nu. 21 I
AV RVmg.,Aq. Sym. &v K a T a U K . , hut see ad$%.).
For the Way Of the Spies (D’lnn? p),Nu. 21 I AV, see
below, B 2, end, and cp ATHARIM, KADESH, 5 3. Cp Tin, ‘spy
o u t , ’ N u . l 3 ~ 1 6 f : e t c . , a n d l w , ‘range [of spying‘?]’ Job398.
The equation $ii=$33i ( I above) finds an analogy in the use of
0 ’ 2 as ‘ merchants,’ I K. 10 15 (but see MERCHANT, S OLOMON,
5 7).
T h e practice of obtaining information by means of
spies as a preliminary to warlike movements was well-
1. Traditions. known to the Hebrews. Two notable
cases are the mission of twelve (?)
spies by Moses to explore the region which the Israel-
ites were about to invade, and the mission of two spies
by Joshua ‘ t o view the land, namely, Jericho’ (see
J ERICHO , 5 3). It is the former episode which concerns
us here. Our chief traditional authority for it is in Nu.
13f: ( J E P ) , but it is also related in an allusive way in
Dt. 12 2 8 , where the writer is presumably dependent
throughout on the narrative of J E ; there is at any rate
n o evidence that he made use of P. It may be con-
venient to lay before the reader the variations between
1 ’D and 3 1 5 are elsewhere, too, confounded.
2 n,>lw 9 3 should be wq,y qip (Ruben, Cn‘ficaZ Remarks,
on Hos Z.C.). cp Vg. in aranearum tclas.
3 SedChe.’Psalms,(a) and cp LOCUST, O WL.
4747
SPIES
the accounts which the redactor has welded together, as
well as he could, in Nu. 13f: ; it will not only show
the reader the state of the traditional evidence for the
mission of the spies but will illustrate the section on
Nu. 13f: in N UMBERS [BOOK], § 3 ; cp also Driver,
63.
P JE
13 3, start from wilderness of 1326, start from Kadesh (re-
Paran (P). dactional, hut from JE).
21, they ex lore the landfrom z z f : they go as far as Hebron
the wiPderness of Zin to or the valley of
Rehob, to the district of $?hcol (E).
Hamath (P).
32, they describe the landas 2 7 f : ‘ the land is very fruitful,
one that ‘devours its but the inhabitants can
inhabitants’ (P). well defend themselves ’
UZ
14 6, Joshua and Caleb oppose 30, Calehstillsthemurmurers
the mutinous Israelites u).
(PI.
38, Joshua and Caleb (v. 30, 1424, Caleb
Caleb and Joshua) are ex-
cepted from the general
land u).may enter the
doom (P).
I t is usual to give the preference to the statements of
J and E (an analysis of J E cannot remain unattempted,
even though [cp N UMBERS , 5 31 the result may be
incomplete). It was from Kadesh. then, that Moses
sent spies into Canaan (cp 328 R D ; cp N UMBERS ,
5 8), one from each tribe, and the region to be explored
was the Negeb and the mountain-district (Le., as most
understand, that of Judah). T h e spies did in fact
reach Hebron (in the a hill-country’ of Judah, Josh.
207 2111)~ where they found Ahiman. Sheshai, and
Talmai. On their return, they gave a very favourable
report of the land, and supported this by a huge cluster
of grapes from Eshcol; but a further statement respect-
ing the Nephilim, the sons of Anak, who dwelt a t
Hebron, made the people despond, and even venture to
express a wish to choose another leader and go back to
~ * i m .Caleb alone is excepted from the doom which
Yahw& fails not to pronounce on the rebellious people.
T h e punishment of the guilty is thus expressed in Nu.
1433 (assigned to J by Dillm.).I ‘Your little ones,
which ye said should be a prey, will I bring in ...
But as for you, your carcases shall fall in this wilder-
ness. And your children shall be shepherds i m n 3
~ I ~ D ~ Y J and
I ~ N shall
, bear (the consequences of) your
infidelity, until your carcases be consumed in the
wilderness. ’
Looking at the differences tabulated above we shall
see that the first is quite unimportant, since the mrilder-
ness of Paran in the wider sense may
a. have contained Kadesh-barnea (see
PARAN). T h e third is of some interest, became
(Wellh. PYoZ.(~) 370) Nu. 1332 (P)may reflect the
melancholy feelings of post-exilic Jews, who could only
by faith describe their country as a delectable land
(mnn yis, Ps. 10624). T h e fourth and fifth are im-
portant because they show that one at least of the early
narratives did not include Joshua among the spies.
According to E. Meyer (who allows very little of the
material in chap. 133 to J ) , the earliest narrative
stated that Caleb (possibly with other spies) was sent
into the Negeb-to Hebron, and said on his return that
the people was strong and the cities fortified, Amalek
dwelling in the Negeb, etc., and that giants too were
to be seen there. T h e despondency of the Israelites
disappears, and with it the divine sentence of forty
years’ wanderings. According to Meyer the object
of the story of the spies was simply to account for the
settling of Caleb in Hebron. ‘ Caleb of course receives
Hebron because he acted as spy, not because he
remained stedfast.’ E, however, looks at things with
a ‘ theological ’ interest, and alters the story for edifica-
tion, while P calculates from Josh.2429 that Joshua too
1 Both Dillm. and We. deny that v. 33 belongs to P, and
hold that the ‘forty years’ ( 3 3 ~n*ylis) are a fixed point in
tradition. We., however, assigns 1430.34 to a special source,
distinct irom JE.
4748
 SPIKENARD
must have been born in Egypt, and therefore includes
him among the spies, and makes him, like Caleb, faith-
ful among the faithless ( ’ Kritik der Berichte.’ etc.,
Z-dTi’t”1 1 3 9 8 [1881]).
One of the most doubtful points in Meyer’s theory
is the definition of the object of the story. Was Caleb
really the only spy, and the only clan-leader who had
land assigned to him in the Negeb? I t is also by no
means certain that the threat of the forty years’ wander-
ing formed part of the original tradition. It is suggested
elsewhere (M OS E S , 11, end) that in Nu.1433 (as well as
in other passages) niw n ‘ y x i ~i z t i m is most probably
due partly to corruption, partly to editorial manipula-
tion, and that the original text had simply o’xiy min3
‘ in the desert of the Arabians. ’
Possibly, too, in Nu. 1325 (P) the statement that the spies
returned 019 ~ ’ y x yi p~ arose through a misreading of vim
0*37y(‘from the Arablan Cush’);1 and it L in the highest
degree probable that pysn in Nu. 13 22 14 2-4 should be read
Misrim ?.e. the N. Arabian Musri (see MIZKAIM, 8 2 6).
Nor :re these the only name‘swhich have to be scrutinised.
Important as it is to put a rational sense on the traditional
stories in their kter form, it can hardly be less urgent to find out
how the stories originally ran, and what they originally meant.
It has been pointed out elsewhere (NEGEB, 5 7) that it is the
Negeb and the Negeb alone that is referred to as the region ex-
plored by the spies. p y m (Hebron) has arisen out of nixnia
(Rehohoth), and the mountain-district in 13 17 is ‘mount Jerah-
meel.’3 Inv. 28 73 should probably he p5ny, and we thus see
that v. 29 4 is pa$ a gloss on iy5Dy *31 (so read) in v. 28 (see
NEPHILIM,8 3, i.).
T h e second apparent difference in the above table
still remains. Did the spies, according to P, or at least
P’s authority, really survey ‘ the whole land throughout
its entire length from the wilderness of Zin (cp Nu. 21 I
3 3 3 6 ) to Rehob’ (either the place of that name in the
territory of Asher, Josh. 1928, or Beth-rehob, near the
town of Dan, Judg. 1 8 ~ 8 ~ ) )This no doubt is the
general view. Another theory, however, is much more
probable. If not P himself, yet almost certainly P’s
authority, meant, not any northern Rehob, but Rehob
or Rehoboth in the Negeb, while nllrn (Hamath) is in
many O T passages most probably a southern Hamath,
or more strictly a southern Maacath (see M AACAH ,
end). This accords with the view (see above) that in
Nu. 1 3 2 5 the original text had, ‘And they returned
from spying out the land, from Cush of Arabia.’
Thus the difference between J E and P in the story
of the spies is much less serious than has been supposed.
T h e only important variation is the combination of Caleb
with Joshua-himself perhaps originally a Jerahmeelite
hero (cp J OSHUA ).
We have no space here to consider the names of the spies ac-
cording to P(Nu. 134-15). It is quitepossible that all or nearly
all, the names are characteristically Negeb names. $ut this is
unimportant compared with the right comprehension of the rest
of the composite narrative. Let it he added, however, that
o--,nnHnily (Nu. 21 5 ) is not (as even Knobel supposed) for iii
D’?:? (AV ‘by the way of the spies’) hut is probably a corrup-
tion of o‘nni:,iTi (cp Ramathaim-zophim), unless we prefer to
trace it to n*lnnil~y (KADESH,I, s 3). In either case, the
name appears to be an early PO ular corruption of SRnny.
Wiuckler’s theory (GI 2 4 0 R is ingenious, but cannot here
be discussed. T. K. C.
SPIgENARD (?la: NAPAOC, Cant. 112 4 1 4 ; and
U’??;, NAPAOI, Cant. 4 1 3 ; also N A ~ A O CITICTIKH,
1 Notice the name Sheshai (on which see note 2) in Num.
1322. If we emend as above, the pi, of MT will have grown
out of a dittographed 09. For yl:, from 03 cp Crit. Bi6. on
Ezek. 76.
a Note that Ahiman represents Jerahmeel : Sheshai comes
from Cushi (cp note I ) ; for Talmai compare Telem and Talmo;
(which can he shown to be Negeb names). ‘Zoan in Egypt
should he ‘ Zoan (or Zoar?) i; Misrim.
3 As Dillm. points out, go up into the Negeh’ probably
comes from J, and ’go up into the mountains ’ frenb 3. Rut
if so, is it not natural to take 3 3 3 and i n n as practically
synonymous?
4 The other ethnics are probably ’ny,i (Rehoborhite), ’ $ ~ y ~ v *of withered stalks and ribs of leaves, cohering in a bundle of
Ishmaelite), 3 1 (Amorite),
~ ~ y3p (Kennizzite).
5 Wade, Otd Tesiamenf History (xgor), 120.
4749
SPIKEN’ARD
Mk. 1 4 3 Jn. 123t).I i. T h e Hebrew word, nZrd, which
is derived from Sanskrit, has passed into Greek and
other European languages : see the references to nard
in classical writers collected by Naber (Mnemosyne,
1902, pp. 1-1j) ; according to Lagarde (Mitt. 2 2 5 )
Pers. n a l is an equivalent form.2 A connection with
Ar. rand, is very doubtful (see Mordtmann and Muller,
Sub. DenR. 82). T h e Aramaic and Arabic names
Sebelthd and sunbul (more fully sunbuZ hindi, Indian
spike ’), like our own ’ spikenard,’ have reference to the
’ spike’-like appearance of the plant from which the
perfume is derived. Accounts of the true or Indian
nard, as well as of inferior sorts, are given by Theo-
phrastus (De Odor. 4 2 8 ) ,Dioscorides ( 1 7 5 ) , and Pliny
( H N 12 26 f. 13 2). Its botanical source in India
was investigated by S i r W. Jones (As. RES. ‘2405-417),’
and was ascertained independently by Wallich and
Royle to be the plant called Nardostachys Jatamonsi
DC, of the order Yulen’anacee. T h e drug consists of
the rhizome surmounted by the fibrous remains of the
leaves. I t occurs throughout the alpine Himalaya from
Kumaon to Sikkim.
The meaning of the adjective T ~ U T C K . / ~(Mk. 1 4 3 Jn.
B3t is very uncertain. Five explanations have been
offered : ( I ) that it means ‘liquid,’ from d v w ; ( 2 )
that it means ‘genuine,’ from r i m i s ; ( 3 ) that it means
‘powdered,’ from m I m w ; (4)that it is a local name;
(5) that i t = m m d m p ; (6)that i t = L a t . spicttu. There
is difficulty in accepting any of these explanations ; and
it is possible that the word may have quite another
origin, as Dymock (Phamzacogr. Znd.2 233) gives P i s i f d
a s a Sanskrit name for the spikenard plant (cp W.
Houghton, PSBA, 1888, 3144-6. N. M.-w. T. T.-D.
ii. I. In Bschyl. Prom. 481 (Lob. 67 131)rrrrrr6~means ‘drink-
able’ (so K. F. A. Fritzsche on M a r k following Casauhon), but
the word is only so used for the sake of a gun ; otherwise mor&
and adorpos, but never nru~rrds. I t is true that &mpa ( - 0 ” )
mvnj are found from the same stem m-, and that accordin;
to Atfenaeus (68gc) and others, oil of nard, mixed with wine
was, as a matter of fact, taken as a beverage; but in Mk. and
Jn. the nard is used as ointment, so that, if ~ L U T C K is ~ S only
added with the meaning ‘liquid,’ the explanation would be
superfluous.
Naber (as above) points out, on the other hand, that
Clem.Alex. (Ped.28, 5 64, p. 207 ed. Potter) distin-
guishes between ptpa bypd and phpa .!&xi, and Basil
(Hom. in Ps. 4 4 9 , ed. Garnier, 1166 I , also in Stephanus,
sub uTaKT6sI 7650f.) between two preparations of oint-
ment, the one fiuid ( P u T ~ Y )called U T U K T ~( ~= ‘ dropped,’
stillata, stillatitia), and the other thicker or more
viscous ( ~ u x t h p o v )called
, uptpva. The expression in
AthenEus also ( 2 2 5 , p. 46 A : QKKXIVELV 6ri ~h mix7
T& p t p w v ) , he thinks, has reference to this. Naber
therefore conjectures that there stood originally in Mk.
and Jn. a word (of which no traces can be met else-
where) U T ~ L U T L K(~=S ‘capable of being poured,’ ‘liquid,‘
from U T ~ V ~ W ) . By itacism it could also have been
written U P I U T L K ~ S in
, which form its strangeness made
it unintelligible, and thus it finally became corrupted
into T L U T L K ~ S .
1 Vg. has nardisjicati in Mk. and nardi#istici(so usually
Ital.) in Jn.
2 Meissner has pointed out a Babylonian plant-name Zavder.
Thjs, according to Hommel (PSBA 21 136 [1899]) the Baby.
lonians borrowed from an Iranian form nard (ned-Pers. Zd) ;
the Indians have for nard the later form nata and naZa(da).
3 ‘A Brdhman of eminent learning gave me a parcel of the
same sort, and told me that it was used in their sacrifices ; that
when fresh, it was exquisitely sweet, and added much to th;
scent of rich essences, in which it was a principal ingredient ;
that the merchants brought it from the mountainous country to
the N 9 . of Bengal ; that it was the entire plant, not a part of
it, and received its Sanscrit names from its resemblance to locks
of hair: as it is called Spikenard, I suppose, from its resem-
blance to a spike, when it is dried, and not from the conligura-
tion of its flowers, which the Greeks, probably, never examined.
The Persian author describes the whole plant as resembling the
tail of an ermine. and the jatdmrinsi which is manifestly the
Spikenard of ou; druggists, has preciiely that form, consisting
yellowish brown capillary fibres, and constituting a spike about
the size of a small finger ’ (0). cif., 409f).
4750
 SPINNING
2. The adjective T ~ U T L K ~occurs
S with the meaning ‘convinc-
ing’ and also ‘having the power of persuading’ (Plato, Gorf.
455 A ; Diog. Laert. 4 37 ; Dion. Hal., ed. Keiske, 5 631 ; Thqo-
phrast. in Arisfot. opera metaph., ed. Sylhurg 253, ed. Brandis,
309), though in almost every instance of its occurrence the
variant werrrrrr6s is preferred (Bekker and Stallbaum on Plato ;
Lob. on Soph. Ai:, 121) ; in Fter times it means, when used of
persons, ‘ faithful, reliable (Liicke on Jn. 12 3, Index t:
Cedrenus). If, therefore, we adopt the translation ‘genuine
(Meyer on Mk.)-and such a meaning is conceivable-we must
suppose that the word is used rather freely,j u s t as in commercial
language, for instance, attributes which more often apply only
to persons are not infrequently used of goods. Pliny ( H N xi].
26 s 4;) mentions that in commerce nard was apt to he adulter-
ated by admixture of pseudonardus a plant resembling it.
3. Loh. par. 37 supports Scalig&’sderivation from wrluurrv,
‘ to pound’’ (K. F. k. Fritzsche on Mk. jqj), r a f t e r T being some-
times dropped out for the sake of euphony (cp e.g., r(T)ipvct, and
Lat. #i(n)so = T T ~ U U W , perna = r d p v q ) . Rut how, it may be
asked, could powdered nard he suitable for anointing?
4. If it is a local name it has been sug ested that it stands
either for ’ O T T L U T L K ~ P Opis not far i o m Babylon) or for
(from
i r r ~ w r i 6 c(from Psittake on t h e Tigris). Still more likely
would he n h a , an abbreviation-according to the Scholion on
Eschyl. Pers. z-of a Persian town niurarpa; hut we cannot
he sure that this notice (which according to Stephanus refers
to a Thracian town) is trustworthy.
5. E. N. Bennett(CZass. Rev., 1890, p. 319) seesin the word an
allusion to the Pisfacia Tere6inUus the resin of which, together
with other sweet scents (e.g. ,4Bh&~ov cp RALM I NCENSE),
was mixed with the oil of na;d. Dioscdrides says iMat. Med.
191) of the rnrrr6.q ;yavv&ar 62 ~ d i vr ’Iov8alq. ~ d %pip r ai i v
K h p o , its resin is fv&61)s, ~ p o d p62~ I r a u j v &v jnlriui~v(he
describes nard in I SA). Bennett, therefore, thinks that udp6os
~ F L U T ~ K ~isS intended. According to Hdn. ii. 488 24, and
Stephanus, T& + ~ r r d ~ cwould
a he another form of &. TCUrdKLa,
the fruit of the n r r r d q , which Hdn. (i. 315 16) derives from the
town l i r r & q .
6. Nestle (ZNTW, 1902, pp. 169-171)explains srmirrk from
the Latin name nardus spicatu :the participle spicatuscould be-
come in vulgar Latin s/)icitus,just as prohatus became jrobitus
and vocatvs vocifus (Ronsch, ZfaZa u. Vuigafa, p. 296, cp 283
[1869, (21 187j], and, mwe fully, Collecfaneap~hiZoologica, 221-223
[r8gr]=ZWT, 1877, pp. 409.472); next sgicifus was transformed
into T W T L K ~ S . The supposition however is not easy ; for as late
as the second half of t h e second Christian centurywe find Galen
taking the word over into Greek in the form uaLara.
The ‘nardus spicata’ of (Ital. and) Vg. is intelligible when we
remember that the nard-plant-which indeed is called vapS6-
c r a p s , spica nardi-resembled in shape an Far of corn.
N.M.-w.T.T.-D.,I.; P.w.s.,~~.
SPINNING. See L INE N, WEAVING.
SPIRIT (ply, nix+, fem. about seventy-three, masc.
about thirty-two times: in d n ~ ~ y ANEMOC,~ a ,
TTNOH, CTOMA, horoc, +esrMa,
YYXH, KAPAIA, BYMOCs NOYC.
OPI’H, OAYNH, q P O N H C I C , BOHBSIA, QUCP M E P O C ) ,
originally ‘wind, and so the point of the compass
from which the wind blows. I n poetry, which no doubt
represents ancient usage, the storm wind is the breath of
Yahwe’smoutb or nostrils (e.g..Ex. 158 IO Ps. 1816,[15]),
and since the commotion of nature is a sign of his dls-
pleasure, the red4 of Yahwk becomes synonymous with
his wrath (Is. 44 5919 Zech. 68 J o b 4 9 1530). T h e rzZh
or spirit of a man is his disposition, his mental state ;
he may be ‘ depressed in spirit,’ ‘ of a proud spirit,’ ‘ of
a patient spirit’ (Prov. 1618f. Eccles. 7 8 ) . I t is natural
to compare the wind, invisible itself but visible in its
effects, with the mental disposition displaying itself in
mien and action. Just in the same way Aeschylus,
describing the changed mind of Agamemnon says that
ne ‘ blew an impious veering gale of mind’ (qjppevbs
rvbwv Gwu~/3pijrporalav, Ag. 217).
In a veryearlypassage, Gen. 63, rmdhdenotes the divine
substance or nature, not necessarily immaterial, but far
removed from the weakness of mortal flesh. By inter-
marriage of the ‘ sons of God ’ or angels with women, a
portion of this divine spirit has passed t o their descend-
ants, and therefore Yahwe declares, ‘ My spirit shall
not continue (?) for ever in man, since he is only flesh,’
a n d shortens the span of human life t o 120 years1 But
though the spirit or invisible power of God was not
proper to man, it descended upon the heroes of Israel
a n d endowed them with superhuman energy. It fell on
Othniel (Judg. 3 IO) ; on Jephthah (1129) ; o n Samson
1 On this passage cp NBPHILIM, # I.
4751
SPIRIT
(14619 1514). T h e phenomenon has n o ethical im-
port. Samson shows that the spirit of Yahwe has
Iescended on him by rending a lion as if it were a kid.
Similarly the divine spirit produces prophetic frenzy
( I S. 106 I O 1920 23), such, e.g., that Saul strips off his
Aothes and lies a day and a night naked. T h e spirit
might transport a prophet miraculously ( 2 K. 2 16).
Sometimes Yahwe sent a lying spirit on his prophets
{ I K. 2222) or the spirit of strife into a city (Judg.
923), or a spirit of melancholy madness ( I S. 1614,
etc. ).
Far higher is the use of rzidd in the literary prophets.
To Isaiah, Yahwe (Is. 31 3) is ‘ spirit ’ because he is the
spiritual principle in the history of the world and as
such invisible. Moreover, the spirit of prophecy is a n
abiding gift. To ignore the prophet‘s counsel. is to set
at nought God’s spirit which speaks through him
(Is. 301). In the same sense Hosea hac! spoken ( 9 7 )
of the prophet as ‘ a man of the spirit. But before
Ezekiel references to the spirit’ a s in the prophets
only occur in Is. 301 Hos. 97 a n d perhaps Mic. 38.
A prophet so deeply spiritual as Jeremiah avoids the
term ‘spirit’ altogether; it had been associated too
Long with frenzy and marvel.
T h e following are the chief points in the exilic a n d
post-exilic conception of spirit. I t is an official
2. Later charisma, speaking, e.g., habitually in David
(2s. 232) a n d fitting the Messiah for the
nuances’ discharge of his duties (Is. 11z ) , conferring
wisdom on judges and martial vigour on warriors (Is.
286). I t is characteristic of P that he attributes it only
to Joshua, who receives it in increased measure by the
imposition of Moses’ hands (Nu.2718f. Dt. 319). It
is to dw-ell in the midst of the people as a ‘ new spirit ’
( E z e k . 3 6 ~ 6S$), and to be poured out from on high on
land and people (Is. 32 15). Thefulfilment of this promise
is assumed in Ps. 51 11 [q]143 1 0 : cp Neh. 920. Twice’
it is called the holy spirit, Ps. 5111 [13] and Is. 6310,
in which latter passage it is personified (cp Eph. 430),
and twice ‘ t h e good spirit’ (Neh.920 Ps. 11310). I t
is a cosmic power, producing order (Gem 1 2 ) and
fertility (Is. 3215). I t is the principle of all-pervading
energy (Is. 3416)and omnipresence (Ps.1397). It i s
the voOr or intelligence of Yahwk (Is. 4013), not a s in
earlier writers his essence. Finally, in a very l a t e
passage, it is the breath of life which God imparts, and
which a t death returns to him (Eccles. 127 ; cp Job 273
33434 14f. Ps. 1 0 4 q f : ) . c p FLESH. W. E. A.
I n discussing the N T use of r v e f i p a , the question‘
is complicated by the employment of other words,
3. Contrasted especially of psyche, J.ux-;l, soul, t o de-
note the interior part of man, whereas
with od&, flesh, is the single word to denote
the material part. As a general thing both words a r e
used with reference to the contrast between the spiritual
and the material part, and both words are ennobled by
this contrast. When Jesus speaks of the value of the soul
(I&.? : Mt. 1626), and contrasts it with the comparative
unimportance of the body (Mt. 1028). and Paul advises
the delivering over of the flesh t o destruction, in order
that the spirit (7rueOpa)may be saved (I Cor. 55),they a r e
both evidently using different words for the same thing.
And apart from the Pauline epistles and two passages
in the epistles of James and Jude respectively (Ja. 3 15
Juderg), these words are used in the same way t o
express the contrast between the spiritual part of man
a n d material things, but are not contrasted with each
other. But Paul found it necessary to express this
contrast not only in terms of the spiritual a n d t h e
material, hut also of the spiritual and the natural
( I Cor. 214),a n d for this purpose he uses the elsewhere
synonymous words, pneuma and psyche.
Thepsyche is the vital or spiritual part of the natural
1 [Not counting Wisd.917 cp 7-22 where wisdom (ir the
enlarged sense natural to an ’orthodo; but Hellenised Jew) is
traced to ‘thy holy spirit.’]
4752
nian, and the piiezrmn is the new part brought into
*. activity when the supernatural man begins
his career with the entrance of the divine
usage' pneuma. Pauldoes notstate this expressly;
sin in the natural man is the mind. I t is very much
as if the apostle had said that when he sinned even in
the natural man, he knew better, and his intelligence
rebelled against it, but ineffectually, because t h e very
organs of action were the seat of sin. But the inner
ejrlier Jewish literature, it is an- emanation from the
One God through which he performs various offices-
e . g . , creation-but especially that of inspiring in man
the knowledge and skill needed for his work. In
general we may say, that whenever God is represented
as a diffused presence, he is represented a s working
through the spirit. And in no pre-Pauline writings is
there any indication that the impersonal use is departed
from. But in Paul, and Jn. especially, there is the
beginning of the later doctrine of the Spirit as a distinct
entity, quasi-personal, in God. H e is to God what the
spirit is in man ( I Cor. 21of:) : but in God this is objecti-
fied, represented as a distinct personality (Rom. 8 a7
Gal. 35 Jn. 1426 1613).
There is a distinct difference, however, between the
Pauline and the Johannine theology in the doctrine of
I n both, he is the principle
6. Pauline and the Spirit.
of immanence in God, the one through
Johannine whom God dwells in men, conveying
to them the truth, not in the external
"~~meA_",""-
YIa,UYOU.
way by which men communicate with
each other, and which has no power of enforcement or
persuasion sufficient to beget in men the spirit of holi-
ness, but internally and with regenerative power. And
in both especially he conveys to men the grace of which
4753
Christ is the author. But in Paul, he is the principle
not only of inunanence, but of incarnation. In Jn. it
is the Logos, the Word of God, who is incarnate in
Christ. T h e thought is borrowed from the Alexandrian
distinctly a principle of incarnation. But the Pneuma
is the Spirit in which the lhought is generated, and this
is as obviously a principle of immanence., All this is
distinctly different from Paul's thought. H e has no
Logos doctrine, which is a thought derived from
finally it is distinctly said that the Lord is the Spirit
(2Cor. 3t7f:).
Now, it is not as if this was unexpected. If Jesus
was in any way pre-existent, and that pre-existence
antedated creation, and he had a share in creation,
then he is in some way a n incarnation of the Divine.
And in the Jewish theology the only Divine principle
remaining, after eliminating God himself as expressly
excluded, and the Alexandrian Logos as ruled out by
Paul's opposition to Alexandrianism, is the Spirit of
God. I n Paul, therefore, the incarnation is of the
Holy SDirit. E. P. G.
T6c OT Theologies of Schultz and Smend, and the NT
Theologies of B. Weiw and Holtsmann ; Kani Ofledarrmgs-
6cgri a h A T 187.210; Eiesebrecht, Be-
7 . Literature. mf.&ahny deer A Tlickn Pmpketem,
'2319:. H. Wendt Die Be e Fieisrh u.
Geist i n r a i a l i ~ ~ (E&$) ~ s;A. ~ r z~p hy a l~, Chair
~ ~
et esjrit (Toulouse ~88.5); Liidemann, Die A n l h r o p d o g i des
A$. P a u k (1872): !fleide:er, Pawlinism (ET z ~ 0 1 s . ) -
.
Crcmer, FRE,P) art. Geist Gunkel, Die Wivkrmgen de;
keil. Geisies (1888), 5-62 ; J. doeberle, Natuv u. Gcirl, nach
&Y Anifassnngdes A T (zp.0) ' F. C. Porter 'The Y e er Hara,
a Study in the ewish Doctrine of Sin ' Sidlical ardi Semitic
Slxdics (New Eork, I ~ X ) ,where note 'criticism of Pfleiderer's
interpretation of Paul's conception of soirit and flesh. See also
4754