possible those pictures which now hang in many ladies' chambers,
in which Jesus is represented exactly as he is represented in the
Lourdes cinematograph, by a handsome actor. The only touch of
realism which Luke does not instinctively suppress for the sake
of producing this kind of amenity is the reproach addressed to
Jesus for sitting down to table without washing his hands; and
that is retained because an interesting discourse hangs on it.


WAITING FOR THE MESSIAH.

Another new feature in Luke's story is that it begins in a world
in which everyone is expecting the advent of the Christ. In
Matthew and Mark, Jesus comes into a normal Philistine world like
our own of today. Not until the Baptist foretells that one
greater than himself shall come after him does the old Jewish
hope of a Messiah begin to stir again; and as Jesus begins as a
disciple of John, and is baptized by him, nobody connects him
with that hope until Peter has the sudden inspiration which
produces so startling an effect on Jesus. But in Luke's gospel
men's minds, and especially women's minds, are full of eager
expectation of a Christ not only before the birth of Jesus, but
before the birth of John the Baptist, the event with which Luke
begins his story. Whilst Jesus and John are still in their
mothers' wombs, John leaps at the approach of Jesus when the two
mothers visit one another. At the circumcision of Jesus pious men
and women hail the infant as the Christ.

The Baptist himself is not convinced; for at quite a late period
in his former disciple's career he sends two young men to ask