CHAPTER II

WHERE JESUS GOT HIS IDEALS OF LIVING

WHENEVER we hear or see a great and noble life, we are curious at once to know the secret of its greatness. It was exactly so with the people who met Jesus. "No one ever spoke like him," they said. "He was full of grace and truth," said another. "They wondered at his gracious words," reported Luke. It is interesting to search for the secret of his beautiful life and the noble ideals that made his life beautiful. To say that he was divine does not really answer our question. Though he was the Son of God, he entered this world as a helpless infant, and had to grow, learn, suffer, and develop with experience, like every one who ever lived. Let us study this human experience of Jesus, especially in his growing years of boyhood and youth, to see if we can discover where he got his ideals.

Nazareth, the home of his youth.-Though his home was never in the city, his youth was not spent in an obscure corner. Galilee was more thickly settled than mountainous Judæa. Nazareth was at the heart of the throbbing life of Palestine. Most of the great caravan trade routes ran near it or through it, and the boy Jesus must have learned much of the world just by staying at home and seeing the world go by. Almost daily he saw merchants from Damascus and Egypt, Tyre, Midian, and Arabia; pilgrims thronging to or from Jerusalem, and Roman soldiers from nearby garrisons. There were tradesmen, farmers, princes, beggars, politicians, priests, and lawyers; and the alert boy of Nazareth must have gleaned from many of them the knowledge of the world

outside which his eager mind craved. Then, in solitude on the hilltop back of the town, he would think it all through for himself-this marvelous drama of God's ways in the world of men.

What an observation post his hilltop was! Beyond the Jordan valley eastward he could see the sun rise out of the Syrian desert many miles away, and set at evening in the Mediterranean, whose glistening sandy shore line was less than twenty miles to the west. How his imagination must have traveled as he caught sight of an occasional sail, headed perhaps for Corinth, or far-away Rome! While there at his feet lay the beautiful valley of Jezreel and the plain of Esdraelon, and far to the south, beyond the hills of Samaria, the mountains round about Jerusalem. It was a living map of his country's history. Before him lay the sites of twenty battles. He knew them all. How vividly he could recall the exploits of Gideon, Barak, David, Saul, Jonathan, Elijah, and the more recent heroism of the dauntless Maccabees! Could you have found a better place for a patriotic Jewish boy to live? Surely, Jesus dwelt among the highways of the life of the first century. We are not surprised that he knew human life so well. He had studied life in all its phases, since early boyhood.

The religious ideals of his home. Every intimation we get shows us that Jesus' early home was one with the highest ideals. The home life was simple but comfortable, self-respecting and deeply religious. Mary his mother was a beautiful motherly character, in disposition much like Jesus himself. She deserves to be honored above all other women. Joseph must have been a kind and noble father, or Jesus would not have used the title "Father" as his dearest name for God. He had four brothers and at least two sisters (Mark 6:3; Matthew

13:56). This loving family group of nine or ten was Jesus' first school, in which he learned his first lessons about God and the life of genuine goodness. Early he was taught to pray, and the naturalness of his religious life must have been due to the simple, sincere piety of his mother and her early teachings. Directly descended from King David, this family was loyal to the finest traditions of a noble past. In spite of comparative poverty, they strictly observed the religious customs connected with Temple and synagogue, even including the expensive pilgrimages to the Holy City. Though his brothers were not always in sympathy with his public ministry, his mother Mary was faithful to him to the very last, and two of the brothers, James and Jude, became leaders in the early church after his death. Certainly, Jesus would say that he owed a great deal to his early home, the only home he ever really knew.

His early training in school and synagogue.The neighborhood school, which the boy Jesus began to attend at the age of six or seven, was probably held in the synagogue, with the rabbi as schoolmaster. The language used was Hebrew, the ancient original of the popular dialect, Aramaic, which they spoke at home and on the street. Jesus doubtless also knew Greek, and very likely something of Latin, as a Roman garrison was only five miles from Nazareth.

If he had not already learned it at home, Jesus was taught at school to read and write the Shema (Hebrew for "Hear"), the beautiful confession of faith of the Hebrews, which they loyally repeat every morning and night. Find it in Deuteronomy 6:4, 5; 7:7.

Hear, O Israel, Jehovah your God, Jehovah is One. You must love your God Jehovah with all your heart

and with all your soul and with all your might.

Jehovah did not set his love upon you nor choose you because you were more numerous than other peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples; but because Jehovah loves you.

Could Jesus have learned this beautiful creed at the age of six and not have it arouse his love for God and his assurance of God's love for him? At sunrise and at sunset he was taught to give thanks to God, as well as at every meal. Little was taught in the synagogue school except reading, writing, and the books of religion, the precious rolls containing the law, the prophets, and the writings of the wise. The school was rightly called the "School of the Book." Copies of the Scriptures were costly and rare. Few homes possessed them. The rolls were read at the synagogue services on the Sabbath and feast days, and explained and memorized in school on week days. Jesus had a chance to read them in the synagogue after school hours, and his frequent quotations from memory show how thoroughly he treasured them.

His first visit to the Temple.-Jewish boys ceased to be called children after they were twelve. At that age, in strictly religious families, they began to attend the great festivals three times a year. Jesus' first pilgrimage to the Temple was such an epoch in his life, it stands out in the Gospels as the one great event between infancy and manhood. Remember, in that warm Oriental land, Jesus was as manly at twelve as you were at fifteen, just on the threshold of young manhood. How proud he must have felt that day, when he caught his first glimpse of the domes and towers of Jerusalem, as his caravan climbed the steep trail from Jericho! It was a far greater experience than a country boy's first sight of the city. It