Thoughts on Life and Religion

PREFACE

This book has been prepared in accordance with a wish expressed by many known and unknown admirers of my husband's writings, who desire to possess in a portable form the passages that have specially appealed to them in his different works, and in the Life and Letters.

I have taken this opportunity of adding extracts from private letters, and from the writings he left unfinished, which would not otherwise have become known to any but his own family or a few intimate friends.

Those who have read the Life and Letters, do not need to be told that Max Müller lived from his earliest years in the firm conviction that all is wisely ordered in this life, and 'all for our real good, though we do not always see it, and though we cannot venture to fathom the wisdom guiding our steps through life.'

To others his unswerving trust and faith as shown in these extracts may be a revelation, for he seldom talked on such subjects. This trust and faith gave him strength through the bitter struggles of his early life, taught him resignation during the years when the dearest wish of his heart seemed unattainable, supported him later when those he tenderly loved were snatched from him by death, and upheld him in his last long and depressing illness.

My earnest desire is that this little book may prove a help and comfort to many exposed to like trials, and strengthen those whose path now stretches before them as a sunny avenue, to meet the sorrows that almost surely await them as life advances.

June 11, 1905.

THE ART OF LIFE

To learn to understand one another is the great art of life, and to 'agree to differ' is the best lesson of the comparative science of religion.

There is a higher kind of music which we all have to learn, if our life is to be harmonious, beautiful, and useful. There are certain intervals between the young and the old which must be there, which are meant to be there, without which life would be monotonous; but out of these intervals and varieties the true art of life knows how to build up perfect harmonies.... Even great sorrow may be a blessing, by drawing some of our affections away from this life to a better life … of which, it is true, we know nothing, but from which, when we see the wisdom and love that underlie this life, we may hope everything. We are meant to hope and to trust, and that is often much harder than to see and to know.... The greatest of all arts is the art of life, and the best of all music the harmony of spirits. There are many little rules to be learnt for giving harmony and melody to our life, but the thorough bass must be—love.

One thing is necessary above all things in order to live peaceably with people, that is, in Latin, Humanitas, German, Menschlichkeit. It is difficult to describe, but it is to claim as little as possible from others, neither an obliging temper nor gratitude, and yet to do all one can to please others, yet without expecting them always to find it out. As men are made up of contradictions they are the more grateful and friendly the less they see that we expect gratitude and friendliness. Even the least cultivated people have their good points, and it is not only far better but far more interesting if one takes trouble to find out the best side and motives of people, rather than the worst and most selfish.... Life is an art, and more difficult than Sanscrit or anything else.

We become chiefly what we are more through others than through ourselves, and happy is the man whose path in life leads him only by good men and brings him together with good men. How often we forget in judging others the influences under which they have grown up. How can one expect a child to be truthful when he sees how servants, yes often parents, practise deceit. How many children hear from those to whom they look up, expressions, principles, and prudent rules of life, which consciously or unconsciously exercise an influence on the young life of the child. Yet with how little of loving introspection we pass our judgments.

If you want to be at peace with yourself, do not mind being at war with the world.

THE BEAUTIFUL

Is the Beautiful without us, or is it not rather within us? What we call sweet and bitter is our own sweetness, our own bitterness, for nothing can be sweet or bitter without us. Is it not the same with the Beautiful? The world is like a rich mine, full of precious ore, but each man has to assay the ore for himself, before he knows what is gold and what is not. What, then, is the touchstone by which we assay the Beautiful? We have a touchstone for discovering the good. Whatever is unselfish is good. But—though nothing can be beautiful, except what is in some sense or other good, not everything that is good is also beautiful. What, then, is that something which, added to the good, makes it beautiful? It is a great mystery. It is so to us as it was to Plato. We must have gazed on the Beautiful in the dreams of childhood, or, it may be, in a former life, and now we look for it everywhere, but we can never find it,—never at least in all its brightness and fulness again, never as we remember it once as the vision of a half-forgotten dream. Nor do we all remember the same ideal—some poor creatures remember none at all.... The ideal, therefore, of what is beautiful is within us, that is all we know; how it came there we shall never know. It is certainly not of this life, else we could define it; but it underlies this life, else we could not feel it. Sometimes it meets us like a smile of Nature, sometimes like a glance of God; and if anything proves that there is a great past, and a great future, a Beyond, a higher world, a hidden life, it is our faith in the Beautiful.

THE BIBLE

The fault is ours, not theirs, if we wilfully misinterpret the language of ancient prophets, if we persist in understanding their words in their outward and material aspect only, and forget that before language had sanctioned a distinction between the concrete and the abstract, between the purely spiritual as opposed to the coarsely material, the intention of the speakers comprehended both the concrete and the abstract, both the material and the spiritual, in a manner which has become quite strange to us, though it lives on in the language of every true poet.

Canonical books give the reflected image only of the real doctrines of the founder of a new religion; an image always blurred and distorted by the medium through which it had to pass.

The Old Testament stands on a higher ethical stage than other sacred books,—it certainly does not lose by a comparison with them. I always said so, but people would not believe it. Still, anything to show the truly historical and human character of the Old Testament would be extremely useful in any sense, and would in nowise injure the high character which it possesses.

If we have once learnt to be charitable and reasonable in the interpretation of the sacred books of other religions, we shall more easily learn to be charitable and reasonable in the interpretation of our own. We shall no longer try to force a literal sense on words which, if interpreted literally, must lose their true and original purport; we shall no longer interpret the Law and the Prophets as if they had been written in the English of our own century, but read them in a truly historical spirit, prepared for many difficulties, undiscouraged by many contradictions, which, so far from disproving the authenticity, become to the historian of ancient language and ancient thought the strongest confirmatory evidence of the age, the genuineness, and the real truth of ancient sacred books. Let us but treat our own sacred books with neither more nor less mercy than the sacred books of any other nations, and they will soon regain that position and influence which they once possessed, but which the artificial and unhistorical theories of the last three centuries have wellnigh destroyed.

By the students of the science of religion the Old Testament can only be looked upon as a strictly historical book by the side of other historical books. It can claim no privilege before the tribunal of history, nay, to claim such a privilege would be to really deprive it of the high position which it justly holds among the most valuable monuments of the distant past. But the authorship of the single books which form the Old Testament, and more particularly the dates at which they were reduced to writing, form the subject of keen controversy, not among critics hostile to religion, but among theologians who treat these questions in the most independent, but at the same time the most candid and judicial, spirit. By this treatment many difficulties, which in former times disturbed the minds of thoughtful theologians, have been removed, and the Old Testament has resumed its rightful place among the most valuable monuments of antiquity.... But this was possible on one condition only, namely, that the Old Testament should be treated simply as an historical book, willing to submit to all the tests of historical criticism to which other historical books have submitted.

What the student of the history of the continuous growth of religion looks for in vain in the books of the Old Testament, are the successive stages in the development of religious concepts. He does not know which books he may consider as more ancient or more modern than other books. He asks in vain how much of the religious ideas reflected in certain of these books may be due to ancient tradition, how much to the mind of the latest writer. In Exodus iii. God is revealed to Moses, not only as the supreme, but as the only God. But we are now told by competent scholars that Exodus could not have been written down till probably a thousand years after Moses. How then can we rely on it as an accurate picture of the thoughts of Moses and his contemporaries? It has been said with great truth that 'it is almost impossible to believe that a people who had been emancipated from superstition at the time of the Exodus, and who had been all along taught to conceive God as the one universal Spirit, existing only in truth and righteousness, should be found at the time of Josiah, nearly nine hundred years later, steeped in every superstition.' Still, if the writings of the Old Testament1 were contemporaneous with the events they relate, this retrogressive movement would have to be admitted. Most of these difficulties are removed, or considerably lessened, if we accept the results of modern Hebrew scholarship, and remember that though the Old Testament may contain very ancient traditions, they probably were not reduced to writing till the middle of the fifth century B.C., and may have been modified by and mixed up with ideas belonging to the time of Ezra.

May we, or may we not, interpret, as students of language, and particularly as students of Oriental languages, the language of the Old Testament as a primitive and as an Oriental language? May we, or may we not, as true believers, see through the veil which human language always throws over the most sacred mysteries of the soul, and instead of dragging the sublimity of Abraham's trial and Abraham's faith down to the level of a merely preternatural event, recognise in it the real trial of a human soul, the real faith of the friend of God, a faith without stormwinds, without earthquakes and fires, a faith in the still small voice of God?

Is it really necessary to say again and again what the Buddhists have said so often and well, that the act of creation is perfectly inconceivable to any human understanding, and that, if we speak of it at all, we can only do so anthropomorphically or mythologically?

CHILDREN

All seems so bright and perfect, and quite a new life seems to open before me, in that beloved little child. She helps me to look forward to such a far distance, and opens quite a new view of one's own purpose and duties on earth. It is something new to live for, to train a human soul entrusted to us, and to fit her for her true home beyond this life.

I doubt whether it is possible to take too high a view of life where the education of children is concerned. It is the one great work entrusted to us, it forms the true religion of life. Nothing is small or unimportant in forming the next generation, which is to carry on the work where we have to leave it unfinished. No single soul can be spared—every one is important, every one may be the cause of infinite good, or of infinite mischief, for ever hereafter.

CHRIST, THE LOGOS

An explanation of Logos in Greek philosophy is much simpler than is commonly supposed. It is only needful not to forget that for the Greeks thought and word were inseparable, and that the same term, namely Logos, expressed both, though they distinguished the inner from the outer Logos. It is one of the most remarkable aberrations of the human mind to imagine that there could be a word without thought, or a thought without word. The two are inseparable; one cannot exist or be even conceived without the other.

In nearly all religions God remains far from man. I say in nearly all religions: for in Brahmanism the unity, not the union, of the human soul with Brahma is recognised as the highest aim. This unity with Deity, together with phenomenal difference, Jesus expressed in part through the Logos, in part through the Son. There is nothing so closely allied as thought and word, Father and Son. They can be distinguished but never separated, for they exist only through each other. In this matter the Greek philosophers considered all creation as the thought or the word of God, and the thought 'man' became naturally the highest Logos, realised in millions of men, and raised to the highest perfection in Jesus. As the thought exists only through the word, and the word only through the thought, so also the Father exists only through the Son, and the Son through the Father, and in this sense Jesus feels and declares himself the Son of God, and all men who believe in Him His brethren. This revelation or inspiration came to mankind through Jesus. No one knew the Father except the Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, and those to whom the Son willeth to reveal Him. This is the Christian Revelation in the true sense of the word.

Small as may be the emphasis that we now lay on the Logos doctrine, in that period (i.e. of the Fourth Gospel) it was the centre, the vital germ, of the whole Christian teaching. If we read any of the writings of Athanasius, or of any of the older church fathers, we shall be surprised to see how all of them begin with the word (Logos) as a fixed point of departure, and then proceed to prove that the Word is the Son of God, and finally that the Son of God is Jesus of Nazareth. Religion and philosophy are here closely related.

What is true Christianity if it be not the belief in the true sonship of man, as the Greek philosophers had rightly surmised, but had never seen realised on earth? Here is the point where the two great intellectual currents of the Aryan and Semitic worlds flow together, in that the long-expected Messiah of the Jews was recognised as the Logos, the true Son of God, and that He opened or revealed to every man the possibility to become what he had always been, but had never before apprehended, the highest thought, the Word, the Logos, the Son of God.

Eternal life consists in knowing that men have their Father and their true being in the only true God, and that as sons of this same Father, they are of like nature with God and Christ.

Why should the belief in the Son give everlasting life? Because Jesus has through His own sonship in God declared to us ours also. This knowledge gives us eternal life through the conviction that we too have something divine and eternal within us, namely, the word of God, the Son whom He hath sent. Jesus Himself, however, is the only begotten Son, the light of the world. He first fulfilled and illumined the divine idea which lies darkly in all men, and made it possible for all men to become actually what they have always been potentially—sons of God.

We make the fullest allowance for those who, from reverence for God and for Christ, and from the purest motives, protest against claiming for man the full brotherhood of Christ. But when they say that the difference between Christ and mankind is one of kind, and not of degree, they know not what they do, they nullify the whole of Christ's teaching, and they deny the Incarnation which they pretend to teach.

The Ammergau play must be very powerful. And I feel sure just now nothing is more wanted than to be powerfully impressed with the truly human character of Christ; it has almost vanished under the extravagant phraseology of hymns and creeds, and yet how much greater is the simple story of His unselfish life than all the superlatives of later Theology. If one knows what it is to lose a human soul whom one has loved—how one forgets all that was human, and only clings to what was eternal in it, one can understand the feelings of Christ's friends and disciples when they saw Him crucified and sacrificed, the innocent for those whom He wished to guide and save.

Jesus destroyed the barrier between man and God, the veil that hid the Holiest was withdrawn. Man was taught to see what the prophets had seen dimly, that he was near to God, that God was near to every one of us, that the old Jewish view of a distant Jehovah had arisen from an excess of reverence, had filled the heart of man with fear, but not with love. Jesus did not teach a new doctrine, but He removed an old error, and that error, that slavish fear of God, once removed, the human heart would recover the old trust in God—man would return like a lost son to his lost father, he would feel that if he was anything, he could only be what his God had made him, and wished him to be. And if a name was wanted for that intimate relation between God and man, what better name was there than Father and Son?

Those who deprived Jesus of His real humanity in order to exalt Him above all humanity were really undoing His work. Christ came to teach us, not what He was, but what we are. He had seen that man, unless he learnt himself to be the child of God, was lost. All his aspirations were vain unless they all sprang from one deep aspiration, love of God. And how can we love what is totally different from ourselves? If there is in us a likeness, however small, of God, then we can love our God, feel ourselves drawn towards Him, have our true being in Him. That is the essence of Christianity, that is what distinguishes the Christian from all other religions. And yet that very kernel and seed of Christianity is constantly disregarded, is even looked upon with distrust. Was not Christ, who died for us, more than we ourselves? it is said. Or again, Are we to make ourselves gods? Christ never says that He is different from ourselves; He never taught as a God might teach. His constant teaching is, that we are His brethren, and that we ought to follow His example, to become like Him, because we were meant to be like Him. In that He has come near to God, as near as a son can be to His father; He is what He was meant to be. We are not, and hence the deep difference between Him and us.

Then it is said, Is not Christ God? Yes, He is, but in His own sense, not in the Jewish nor in the Greek sense, nor in the sense which so many Christians attach to that article of their faith. Christ's teaching is that we are of God, that there is in us something divine, that we are nothing if we are not that. He also teaches that through our own fault we are now widely separated from God, as a son may be entirely separated and alienated from his father. But God is a perfect and loving Father—He knows that we can be weak, and yet be good, and when His lost sons return to Him He receives them and forgives them as only a father can forgive. Let us bestow all praise and glory on Christ as the best son of God. Let us feel how unworthy we are to be called His brothers, and the children of God, but let us not lose Christ, and lose our Father whom He came to show us, by exalting Jesus beyond the place which He claimed Himself. Christ never calls Himself the Father, He speaks of His Father with love, but always with humility and reverence. All attempts to find in human language a better expression than that of son have failed. Theologians and philosophers have tried in vain to define more accurately the relation of Christ to the Father, of man to God. They have called Christ another person of the Godhead. Is that better than Christ's own simple human language, I go to my Father?

Christ has been made so unreal to us, He has been spoken of in such unmeasured terms that it is very difficult to gain Him back, such as He was, without a fear of showing less reverence and love of Him than others. And yet, unreal expressions are always false expressions—nothing is so bad as if we do not fully mean what we say. Of course we know Christ through His friends only, they tell us what He told them—they represent Him as He appeared to them. What fallible judges they often were they do not disguise, and that, no doubt, raises the value of their testimony, but we can only see Him as they saw Him; the fact remains we know very little of Him. Still, enough remains to show that Christ was full of love, that He loved not only His friends, but His enemies. Christ's whole life seems to have been one of love, not of coldness. He perceived our common brotherhood, and what it was based on, our common Father beyond this world, in heaven, as He said.

CHRISTIANITY

Christianity is Christianity by this one fundamental truth, that as God is the father of man, so truly, and not poetically, or metaphorically only, man is the son of God, participating in God's very essence and nature, though separated from God by self and sin. This oneness of nature between the Divine and the human does not lower the concept of God by bringing it nearer to the level of humanity; on the contrary, it raises the old concept of man and brings it nearer to its true ideal. The true relation between God and man had been dimly foreseen by many prophets and poets, but Christ was the first to proclaim that relation in clear and simple language. He called Himself the Son of God, and He was the firstborn son of God in the fullest sense of that word. But He never made Himself equal with the Father in whom He lived and moved and had His being. He was man in the new and true sense of the word, and in the new and true sense of the word He was God. To my mind man is nothing if He does not participate in the Divine.

True Christianity lives, not in our belief, but in our love, in our love of God, and in our love of man founded on our love of God.

True Christianity, I mean the religion of Christ, seems to me to become more and more exalted the more we know and the more we appreciate the treasures of truth hidden in the despised religions of the world. But no one can honestly arrive at that conviction unless he uses honestly the same measure for all religions.

The position which Christianity from the very beginning took up with regard to Judaism served as the first lesson in comparative theology, and directed the attention even of the unlearned to a comparison of two religions, differing in their conception of the Deity, in their estimate of humanity, in their motives of morality, and in their hope of immortality, yet sharing so much in common that there are but few of the psalms and prayers in the Old Testament in which a Christian cannot heartily join even now, and but few rules of morality which he ought not even now to obey.

It was exactly because the doctrine of Christ, more than that of the founders of any other religion, offered in the beginning an expression of the highest truths in which Jewish carpenters, Roman publicans, and Greek philosophers could join without dishonesty, that it has conquered the best part of the world. It was because attempts were made from very early times to narrow and stiffen the outward expression of our faith, to put narrow dogma in the place of trust and love, that the Christian Church often lost those who might have been its best defenders, and that the religion of Christ has almost ceased to be what, before all things, it was meant to be, a religion of world-wide love and charity.