The manliness of Christ #992513

IN order to approach our subject with any chance of making the central figure clear to ourselves, and getting out of the atmosphere of unreality in which our ordinary religious training is too apt to leave us, we must make an effort to understand the condition and the surroundings of life in Palestine when our Lord appeared in it as a leader and teacher.
Take first the southern portion, the scene of the opening and closing days of His ministry, and of periodical visits during those three years. While He was still a boy under ten years of age, the Romans had deposed Herod Archelaus, and had annexed Judæa, which was from thenceforth ruled as a province of the empire by a Roman procurator. The rebellion of Judas of Gamala, which followed shortly afterwards, was a fierce protest of the Jews against the imperial taxation and the yoke of Rome. It was suppressed in the stern Roman fashion, and from that time till the commencement of Christ’s public ministry, Jerusalem and the surrounding country were on the verge of revolt, a constant source of anxiety to the Roman procurators, and held down with difficulty by the heavy hand of the legions which garrisoned them.