The Bible is the great epic of the human race. It is the record of the unfoldment of the spiritual idea and of the translation of mortal consciousness out of itself,—the appearance of the true sense of being, together with a corresponding decrease of the false sense and the prophecy of its final disappearance. In the earlier Scriptures, the lamb is the type of helplessness, of sacrifice for the appeasing of divine wrath and for the cleansing from sin. The lamb further presents the idea of purity and confiding trust in the shepherd; but it must be confessed there is also the implication that the lamb is incapable of fending for itself—a helpless victim before its enemies. The old writers do not fail to indicate, however, the protecting care of the shepherd, the lamb being a subject for the tenderest poetic expression.
John the Baptist, of whom Jesus himself said that a greater prophet had not arisen, saw the spiritual idea of the lamb in clearer vision, expressing the qualities of the Christ. "Behold," he exclaimed, "the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world." Here the larger thought begins to take form. John sees the Lamb as doing something, —taking away the sins of the world. This is an attribute of the lamb not before noted, a quality which, while as yet seen dimly, grows ever brighter. John the Revelator, from his supreme height of spiritual vision, discerned in the lamb the type of knowledge and of power; and this he saw to be based on the spiritual qualities of innocence and purity,— qualities which are not negative, but positive, active, dynamic. John further saw, when the sixth seal was opened, guilt hiding itself and fleeing from "the wrath of the Lamb." Again, he saw the forces of evil making war on the Lamb, "and the Lamb shall overcome them."
Just as throughout the Scriptures the lamb is the type of innocence with its qualities of good, so the wolf is the type of guilt with its qualities of evil. Evil has therein but two ways of presenting itself,—one as the wolf and the other as the wolf disguised as the lamb. Evil often asserts itself openly as evil, and boasts itself above good; or else it comes as a wolf in sheep's clothing,—evil representing itself to be good. In the Christian Science textbook, "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (p. 567), Mrs. Eddy declares: "The beast and the false prophets are lust and hypocrisy. These wolves in sheep's clothing are detected and killed by innocence, the Lamb of Love." Lust in its original meaning included all desire and human will, but modern usage confines it to wrong desire. Mrs. Eddy has shown that human will is always wrong desire; its self-surrender to divine Mind brings human will into subjection to God, and so renders it harmless—a type of evil overcome, the triumph of the Lamb over the wolf. Lust, then, includes all wrong desires,—envy, covetousness, hate, revenge, malice, sensuousness —the whole gamut of evil and sin. Hypocrisy aligns with lust in cloaking all this evil in the garb of good. But the Lamb detects and slays the wolf, —innocence overcomes guilt.
