03.19. "Not . . . But."

"Not . . . But."

There is a very large number of passages of Scripture in which truths are enforced or duties enjoined by placing them in contrast with something else: not that is true, or good, or required; but this. With many or most of these passages there is no difficulty and no ambiguity; the contrast is made absolutely. In other cases the thought is rather of the great superiority of one alternative to another, of the preference for one of the antithetical statements to the other. Occasionally, error of a serious kind has been fostered by a too literal reading, or by the assumption that the "not" phrase is intended to be wholly excluded. In some cases the meaning of "not . . . but" approaches nearly to "not only . . . but also," or it may be "not so much this as that." Or the thought introduced by the "but" is so important and so far above that of the contrasted phrase that to emphasise its superiority the other is as it were put aside from our consideration

It is our purpose now to note a few of the texts which are capable of being read in different ways. There is no difficulty about the translation; but by reading the negative phrase or clause in too absolute a way some interpreters have distorted the meaning of the Scriptures. A few passages of a more general type may first be noted.

Amongst these antithetical passages are some of the most cherished texts and several of the most beautiful sayings of our Lord. "I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance" (Luke 5:32). "God sent not the Son into the world to judge the world; but that the world should be saved through him" (John 3:17). "The Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many" (Mark 10:45). "I am come down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me" (John 6:38). This last text is one of the class in which the "not" phrase must not be pressed to an extreme. In a sense Jesus did his own will, for there is no evidence of the slightest difference between the Father’s will and that of the Son. Martin Luther once boldly wrote: "I do not ask, Thy will be done, but my will be done. For thy will is now my will, and I best get my own will by unquestioning acceptance of thine." We may hesitate about accepting that statement as wholly appropriate from the lips of a sinful man; but the Father’s will and the Son’s will were not in conflict. Even so, the text, "not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me," is one which it is important to notice. The Lord Jesus put God the Father first. Acknowledging, as we must, the deity of our Lord, we have also to accept the scriptural doctrine of the subordination of the Son to the Father who is "greater than all." There is a great example for us in the submission of the Son’s will to the will of the Father. If he could pray, "Not my will but thine be done," well may we re-echo the petition. We might with profit accept as our life’s motto the great quotation which fittingly describes the life’s purpose of the Lord Jesus Christ: "Lo I am come to do thy will, O God."

Faith in the Father and the Son. At the feast at Jerusalem, "Jesus cried and said, He that believeth on me, believeth not on me, but on him that sent me" (John 12:44). Here, obviously, it would be ridiculous to read the "not" absolutely; in that sense, it would be an absurd contradiction to say, "He that believeth on me believeth not on me." But manifestly the passage, in harmony with many other statements of the fourth Gospel, expresses the conception of the Son’s entire oneness with the Father.

It is impossible for a person to have a true faith in Jesus the Son who has not a similar faith in God the Father. On another occasion Jesus said, "No one knoweth the Son, save the Father; neither doth any know the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son willeth to reveal him" (Matthew 11:27). The Lord Jesus came to reveal the Father to men and to show them the way to God. To believe in him was to accept him as God’s ambassador and representative. Dr. Plummer well comments: "Jesus came as his Father’s ambassador, and an ambassador has no meaning apart from the sovereign who sends him. Not only is it impossible to accept the one without the other, but to accept the representative is to accept not him in his own personality but the prince whom he personates." To acknowledge merely the beautiful life and example of Jesus, or to laud the greatness of his ethical teaching is not to have faith in him. He who truly believes in Jesus Christ believes in him as Son of God and revealer of the Father.

Jesus baptised not, but his disciples.

Giving reasons for our Lord’s journey northward to Galilee, the Apostle John writes: "When therefore the Lord knew how that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptising more disciples than John (although Jesus himself baptised not, but his disciples), he left Judea, and departed again unto Galilee" (John 4:1-3).

There have been some interpreters who have read the statement that "Jesus was making and baptising more disciples than John" as implying that the Lord Jesus personally baptised, and who therefore have been compelled to read the parenthetical words as meaning that Jesus did not do the baptising alone, but had the assistance of his disciples. This view is perhaps not impossible, but it is extremely improbable. A few regard the parentheses as a qualification or verbal correction of what John had previously written. This is a quite legitimate view. If we adopt it, then it had better be with the understanding that the correction is not of John’s own statement but of the form of the Pharisaic rumour referred to in the previous verse. On the other hand, the words need not be read as a correction of the rumour, for it is a sound maxim that what one does by another he does himself. With the vast majority of interpreters, we accept the view that the verse teaches that Jesus did not personally baptise. Why, it may be asked, did he refrain from doing so? It is frequently said that the reason was that "baptising is the work of a minister, not of the Lord." Again, it has been noted that Jesus had been announced as the one who should baptise in the Holy Spirit; and it has also been suggested that to baptise in water would be a very subordinate act and perhaps even appear a renunciation of the claim to be the greater One who should baptise in the Spirit? Possibly, though it is doubtful. One of the best reasons seems to us to be that had Jesus baptised any with his own hands, there would have been danger of too great an importance being attached to that circumstance, and of spiritual pride being engendered. In the Corinthian epistles there are references to some who in a special way claimed connection with Jesus, somehow vaunting themselves above others on that account. It can easily be imagined how, if some could have said they received their baptism at the hands of the Lord himself, they would have been tempted to undue exaltation on that account.

"Christ sent me not to baptise." In an oft quoted, and much misused, passage the Apostle Paul writes: "Christ sent me not to baptise, but to preach the Gospel" (1 Corinthians 1:17). The most casual reader of the passage ought to note that Paul cannot mean the "not" to be absolute, as if he had received no commission from Christ to baptise converts. The great commission of our Lord (Matthew 28:19-20) was acted upon by all the apostles. The Apostle Paul definitely says he did baptise some of the Corinthians--Crispus, Gaius, the household of Stephanas--with his own hands. There is no suggestion that in other places he had not sometimes personally baptised. If "Christ sent me not to baptise" be read too absolutely, then it could be thought that Paul in baptising broke the terms of his commission, which is absurd. At Corinth some were calling themselves by the names of favorite teachers, and Paul rejoiced that he had baptised so few of them, in case some should say they were baptised into his name, or lest some semblance of reason could be given for wearing his name.

Paul, we know, was accompanied on his missionary tours by a number of companions and helpers. To them doubtless was relegated the duty of baptising. They could do that as well as the apostle, leaving him free for the higher duties of his office which were beyond their powers. As Robertson and Plummer in their commentary say, "Baptising required no special, personal gifts, as preaching did. Baptism is not disparaged by this; but baptism presupposes that the great charge, to preach the Gospel, has been fulfilled." There is point in the statement of Meyer’s Commentary, that "The absoluteness of the negative is not at all to be set down to the account of the strong rhetorical colouring. . . . To baptise was really not the purpose for which Christ sent Paul, but to preach (Acts 9:15, Acts 9:20, etc.); in saying which it is not implied that he was not authorised to administer baptism, but sent ’in order to baptise’ he was not." Of those who would from this passage belittle the ordinance of our Lord’s appointment, one has said that it would be well if persons thus offending were to remember the words of Bishop Butler: "As it is one of the peculiar weaknesses of human nature where, upon a comparison of two things, one is found to be of greater importance than the other; to consider this other as of scarce any importance at all: it is highly necessary that we remind ourselves how great presumption it is to make light of any institution of Divine appointment; that our obligations to obey all God’s commands whatever are absolute and indispensable; and that commands merely positive, admitted to be from him, lay us under a moral obligation to obey them--an obligation moral in the strictest and most moral sense."

If anything more need be adduced to show how wrong it would be to discount the importance of Christian baptism because of this text, that can be found in the Apostle Paul’s own experience and in the teaching of his epistles. To him had been spoken these words by the man sent by the Lord himself: "Why tarriest thou? arise and be baptised and wash away thy sins, calling on his name" (Acts 22:16). He has written as follows regarding the ordinance: "Are ye ignorant that all we who were baptised into Christ Jesus were baptised into his death? We were buried therefore with him through baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in newness of life" (Romans 6:3-4). And again: "Ye are all sons of God, through faith, in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as were baptised into Christ did put on Christ" (Galatians 3:26-27). It is incredible that the man who penned these words wished to belittle the ordinance of our Lord’s appointment.

Mercy, and not sacrifice. At two different times (Matthew 9:13 and Matthew 12:7) the Lord Jesus quoted with approval the words of Hosea 6:6, and on each occasion effectively answered those who cavilled at his practice or that of his disciples. The Pharisees were punctilious in their regard for external righteousness, but were harsh and censorious in their treatment of others whom they regarded as beneath them. They forgot the need of the inward qualities, a spirit of humility, love, mercy and judgment.

Curiously, there have been some readers who have inferred from the words quoted by our Lord ("I desire mercy, and not sacrifice"), and from similar passages elsewhere in the Old Testament, that sacrifice was repudiated altogether by the prophets. This is quite unwarranted. Sacrifice was of God’s appointment. But without a heart of compassion, and offered without a spirit of obedience, the external rite was unavailing and unacceptable. As Samuel told Saul, "To obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams" (1 Samuel 15:22). It is the spirit of loving obedience which gives its value to sacrifice. The statement is put strongly to indicate the supremacy of the inward, mercy, to the external, sacrifice.

"The Hebrew form of speech here used denotes inferior importance, not the negation of importance." "Sacrifices in themselves, and when offered at the proper time and place, and as the expressions of penitent hearts and pure hands, were acceptable, and could not be otherwise, for God himself had appointed them. But soulless sacrifices offered by men steeped in sin were an abomination to the Lord; it was of such that he said, ’I cannot away with’ them." Dr. Plummer well writes: "Of course the saying does not mean that sacrifice is worthless, but that mercy is worth a great deal more. Compare Luke 10:20, Luke 14:12,, Luke 23:28; in all such forms of speech, what seems to be forbidden is not really prohibited, but shown to be very inferior to something else." The lesson taught by our Lord is of perpetual value. We are all prone to forget the true values of life. Some would get rid of too much of the outward observances, and the rites which are of divine appointment. They need to be reminded of Jesus’ words, "If ye love me, ye will keep my commandments." But others are in danger of attaching too much importance to externals, and of neglecting the disposition of the heart. The prophets of the Old Testament have a lesson for them. Idolatrous systems only required the regular observance of a prescribed ritual; Jehovah was satisfied with nothing less than the devotion of loving hearts. Hosea, as the other prophets, showed that "God cared more for goodness and piety--the knowledge and doing of his will--than for formal offerings and sacrifice, and nothing at all for religious observances that were insincere and corrupt"; and that "ritual without love is an abomination:" As the observances of religion become the habits of our daily lives, let us beware of the sin of formalism, remembering that "everything depends on the right disposition," which is what God supremely desires.

We close with a quotation from Alexander Maclaren: "Hosea had said long ago that God delighted more in ’mercy’ than in ’sacrifice.’ Kindly helpfulness to men is better worship than exact performance of any ritual. Sacrifice propitiates God, but mercy imitates him, and imitation is the perfection of divine service. Jesus here speaks as all the prophets had spoken, and smites with a deadly stroke the mechanical formalism which in every age stiffens religion into ceremonies and neglects love towards God, expressed in mercy to men."