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The writing and correspondence of Hastings Rashdall: 1905 - 1915

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Sermon on "The Suffering Servant" preached at Hereford Cathedral, March 16, 1913.

Previously unpublished, these extracts are from a manuscript in Box 3 of the Pusey House Rashdall archives. Their significance is in the way they illustrate Rashdall's treatment of Isaiah 53 in his explanation of the Atonement.

The greatest of all the problems which early Christians had to grapple with when its Founder was taken away was to explain the sufferings of the Messiah. All the ideas which were commonly entertained about the Messiah were associated with triumph, victory over enemies, and deliverance for the people of God by means of that victory. During our Lord’s earthly life the disciples had looked forward to the time when He would lay aside the mask of humiliation and inaugurate the Messianic Kingdom by some sudden and marvellous display of divine power. All these hopes were dashed to the ground by his death upon the Cross. Those who had seen the vision of the risen Lord found it a partial answer to the problem; but even for them - still more for those who were not convinced by the visions which others had seen - the idea of a suffering Messiah remained something strange and inexplicable.

Fuller extracts may be downloaded here - in .pdf format

And yet it is more than doubtful whether this passage - as the prophet himself understood it - really is Messianic. It is certain that it was not commonly so understood by the Jews of before our Lord’s coming.

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the writings of Rashdall
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This 53rd chapter of Isaiah does so exactly express what Christians feel that in a spiritual sense Christ has done for them that it was, we may say, inevitable that the early Christians should attribute this meaning to the prophet who uttered them. We may say indeed that they received their highest fulfilment in Christ. There is not merely a chance coincidence between what happened to the righteous Jew in the Exile and what happened to Christ. The words express an eternal principle. We must not, indeed, take them so literally as actually to speak or think of Christ’s sufferings as being a bearing of punishment by the innocent for the guilty. Vicarious punishment or expiation is an immoral notion. Vicarious suffering is the law of the Universe. The atoning, redeeming effect of suffering upon others as well as upon the sufferer himself - the moral efficacy of self-sacrificing love - that is the eternal principle which emerges from the prophet’s words, and of that principle the self-sacrifice of Christ in his life and his death is the supreme, the crowning example.

The writing and correspondence of Hastings Rashdall: 1905 - 1915			HastingsRashdall.org.uk
Sermon on "The Suffering Servant" preached at Hereford Cathedral, March 16, 1913. Previously unpublished, these extracts are from a manuscript in Box 3 of the Pusey House Rashdall archives. Their significance is in the way they illustrate Rashdall's treatment of Isaiah 53 in his explanation of the Atonement.
The greatest of all the problems which early Christians had to grapple with when its Founder was taken away was to explain the sufferings of the Messiah. All the ideas which were commonly entertained about the Messiah were associated with triumph, victory over enemies, and deliverance for the people of God by means of that victory. During our Lord’s earthly life the disciples had looked forward to the time when He would lay aside the mask of humiliation and inaugurate the Messianic Kingdom by some sudden and marvellous display of divine power. All these hopes were dashed to the ground by his death upon the Cross. Those who had seen the vision of the risen Lord found it a partial answer to the problem; but even for them - still more for those who were not convinced by the visions which others had seen - the idea of a suffering Messiah remained something strange and inexplicable.			Fuller extracts may be downloaded here - in .pdf format
		And yet it is more than doubtful whether this passage - as the prophet himself understood it - really is Messianic. It is certain that it was not commonly so understood by the Jews of before our Lord’s coming.
	Back to "Explore the writings of Rashdall - 1905 to 1915"	This 53rd chapter of Isaiah does so exactly express what Christians feel that in a spiritual sense Christ has done for them that it was, we may say, inevitable that the early Christians should attribute this meaning to the prophet who uttered them. We may say indeed that they received their highest fulfilment in Christ. There is not merely a chance coincidence between what happened to the righteous Jew in the Exile and what happened to Christ. The words express an eternal principle. We must not, indeed, take them so literally as actually to speak or think of Christ’s sufferings as being a bearing of punishment by the innocent for the guilty. Vicarious punishment or expiation is an immoral notion. Vicarious suffering is the law of the Universe. The atoning, redeeming effect of suffering upon others as well as upon the sufferer himself - the moral efficacy of self-sacrificing love - that is the eternal principle which emerges from the prophet’s words, and of that principle the self-sacrifice of Christ in his life and his death is the supreme, the crowning example.