"Which  of  you,"  He  said,  "  convicteth  Me  of
sin  ? "  And  no  man  was  able,  nor  is  any  man
now  able,  to  answer  Him  a  word. But  the  all-
important  fact  is  not  so  much  that  they  could
not  convict  Him  of  sin  ;  He  could  not  convict
Himself. Yet  it  could  not  be  that  He  was  self-
deceived. "  He  knew  what  was  in  man  ; "  He
read  the  hearts  of  others  till,  like  the  Samaritan
woman,  they  felt  as  though  He  knew  all  things
that  ever  they  had  done. Was  it  possible,  then,
that  He  did  not  know  Himself?  Not  only  so,
but  the  law  by  which  He  judged  Himself  was  not
theirs,  but  His. And  what  that  was,  how  high,
how  searching,  how  different  from  the  low,  con-
ventional standards  which  satisfied  them,  we  who
have  read  His  words  and  His  judgments  know
full  well. Nevertheless,  He  knew  nothing  against
Himself;  as  no  man  could  condemn  Him  neither
could  He  condemn  Himself. Looking  up  to
heaven,  He  could  say,  "  I  do  always  the  things
that  are  pleasing  to  Him." ]  This  is  not  the
language  of  sinful  men  ;  it  is  not  the  language
of  even  the  best  and  holiest  of  men. Christ  is  as
separate  from  "  saints  "  as  He  is  from  "  sinners."

1  Cp. Denney's  note  on  St. Paul's  description  of  Christ,  "  Him
who  knew  no  sin,"  in  2  Cor. v. 21  :  "The  Greek  negative  (M),
as  Schmiedel  remarks,  implies  that  this  is  regarded  as  the  verdict
of  some  one  else  than  the  writer. It  was  Christ's  own  verdict  upon
Himself."


44  The  Teaching  of  Jesus

The  greatest  of  Hebrew  prophets  cries,  "  Woe  is
me  !  for  I  am  undone  ;  because  I  am  a  man  of
unclean  lips,  and  I  dwell  in  the  midst  of  a  people  of
unclean  lips."  The  greatest  of  Christian  apostles
laments,  "  O  wretched  man  that  I  am  !  who  shall
deliver  me  out  of  the  body  of  this  death  ?  "  Even
the  holy  John  confesses,  "  If  we  say  that  we  have
no  sin,  we  deceive  ourselves,  and  the  truth  is  not
in  us."  It  is  one  of  the  commonplaces  of  Chris-
tian experience  that  the  holier  men  become  the
more  intense  and  poignant  becomes  the  sense  of
personal  shortcoming. 