The frequent figure of the lamb in Scripture conveys two main impressions to the reader. First, in those passages recording the sacrificial rites of primitive monotheistic worship, it presents the touching defenselessness of the lamb. Secondly, the figure illustrates the innocence and purity of the Christ, the divine nature of God, the Father, which all men in their true being express.
In Genesis we read of Abel's destruction by Cain, his brother. Abel's sacrifice to God of a lamb indicated his reflection to some extent of the Christly qualities of innocence and purity. Yet these qualities appeared to make him defenseless against Cain's animality, opposition to spirituality, envy, and earthliness.
Many centuries later Isaiah used the figure of a slain lamb when depicting a coming Saviour to the exiled Hebrews in Babylon. He wrote, "He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth."Isa. 53:7; The murder of Abel foreshadowed the crucifixion of Jesus, who was the human appearing of the divine idea, or Son of God. And indeed John the Baptist twice used the term "Lamb of God" for Jesus (see John 1:29, 36).
Yet earlier in Moses' day occurred a victory over enslavement and suffering which forecast the victory of the qualities of the Lamb of Love over the deadly intent of Jesus' persecutors and over the bodily injury he suffered in the crucifixion. The children of Israel, who were monotheists enslaved in heathen Egypt, sought freedom from Pharaoh. The final plague suffered by the Egyptians for the refusal of Pharaoh to let the Israelites go was the destruction of every firstborn son. Under God's instruction to Moses, which involved the killing and eating of an unblemished lamb and the partaking of unleavened bread, the Israelites marked the doors of their houses with the lamb's blood. Thus the plague passed over them, and Pharaoh hastily released them.
This deliverance shows the saving power of a monotheistic faith, innocent of idolatry, coupled with some understanding of man's spiritual origin. God revealed Himself to Moses as I am (see Ex. 3:14), the source of all true identity. This revelation of spiritual being prefigured the virgin birth of Christ Jesus and his doctrine of spiritual sonship.
The Hebrews, in commemoration of their deliverance, instituted the annual feast of the Passover, which included the elements of the original meal. Jesus observed this Passover, and on the night before his crucifixion he used its symbolism in final instruction to his disciples.
The Master took bread, broke it, and gave it to his disciples, saying, "Take, eat; this is my body." The account continues, "And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it; for this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins."Matt. 26:26–28;
Christian Science does not commemorate Christ Jesus' atonement as a vicarious act. Though this religion pays endless homage to the Master for his sacrifice, its teachings throw upon the crucifixion the light of the resurrection and reveal the spiritual significance of the symbolism of the lamb. Jesus' experience was no victimization. In his marvelous reappearing was victory— the victory of the Christ, of the Lamb of God, of the purity and innocence of the divine nature. In Science and Health Mrs. Eddy defines "Lamb of God" as, "The spiritual idea of Love; self-immolation; innocence and purity; sacrifice."Science and Health, p. 590;
One may well ask, "What then was the primary element not found in Abel's expression of the lamb qualities but which allowed the Master's innocence and purity to triumph over mortal sense?" Christian Science reveals that the answer lies in Jesus' pure knowledge of the real man's divine origin. Mrs. Eddy writes: "Jesus was the offspring of Mary's self-conscious communion with God. Hence he could give a more spiritual idea of life than other men, and could demonstrate the Science of Love —his Father or divine Principle."Science and Health, pp. 29, 30;
Though Abel stands for a more enlightened sense of manhood than Cain, both are typical of mortal offspring, of the material-mindedness that conceives of life as mortal, bestowed by mortal parentage. Neither discerned the real man's incorporeality as divine Love's expression or idea.
Mrs. Eddy exposes the part Cain's deceived view played in his conduct. She writes: "Cain very naturally concluded that if life was in the body, and man gave it, man had the right to take it away. This incident shows that the belief of life in matter was 'a murderer from the beginning'"Science and Health, p. 89;
Little wonder then that the Saviour presented in the most stringent terms to opponents enraged by his pure consciousness the falsity of the apparently indisputable testimony of man's creation by man. He said: "Ye seek to kill me, because my word hath no place in you. I speak that which I have seen with my Father: and ye do that which ye have seen with your father." He added: "Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him."John 8: 37–44;
Jesus' appearance among men through his virgin birth challenged directly, and necessarily, mortality's deceptive beginning in human birth, from which men's life prospects are in belief calculated. And his glorious resurrection proved for all men the victory of the pure concept of identity over those who would, on an assumption of mortality, slay a brother to remove the rebuke of his spiritual example.
Not only did Jesus master the world's collective malpractice or hatred of Spirit and its representative, but, knowing the real man's eternal innocency and lovableness, he also expressed an unchanging love in the face of intense individualized hostility. In a continued calm association with Judas, he handled direct malpractice with the strength of love; though assailed in Gethsemane, he healed with Christly ability the ear of the high priest's servant. The malice of so-called persons neither distressed him nor brought retaliatory response. He beheld men as in reality the sons of God.
Likewise the Master's purity could not respond to the seeming mesmerism or magnetism of flesh, or animality. Aggressive fleshly testimony of sickness or suffering never ensnared him into considering men as physical. Here surely is the explanation of his own victory over the shock of the crucifixion and over the medical, surgical, and hygienic so-called laws defied during his resurrection. The Son of God could be drawn only to Spirit. The spiritual characteristics, relationships, and holy joys of Spirit's realm, the kingdom of heaven, alone satisfied Jesus, preoccupied him, and attracted him.
Christian Science, in refuting the interpretation of the atonement as vicarious, understands Christ Jesus' mission to be that of the Way-shower. His victories over death or oblivion, over the hatred of persons, and over animal magnetism's supposed pull show the way of salvation through individual application to human experience of his basic premise—man's divine origin.
Christ Jesus' human appearing manifested the fatherhood of God. The Apocalypse depicts a further manifestation of the Christ-idea of selfhood, a wholly spiritual idea brought forth by a woman clothed in the light of Spirit. And so roused is materiality's hostility to this entirely spiritual concept that its earlier symbol in Genesis of a serpent has here swollen to the proportions of a great red dragon.
John describes the ensuing battle wherein the supreme power of the Christ is demonstrated. The dragon is cast out of heaven, overcome by the blood of the Lamb, Love's spiritual idea. Here is indicated a total victory by purity and innocence over all animality, lust, hypocrisy, and hate. John writes, "Neither was their place found any more in heaven."Rev. 12:8;
Mrs. Eddy's tender thought of true womanhood has made this imagery of Revelation understandable in a chapter in Science and Health named "The Apocalypse." She discerned that the woman in the Apocalypse is typical of the motherhood of God, an office of God which completed the Scriptural revelation of divine parenthood; indeed, an office known to Christ Jesus, though not directly announced by him (see Luke 13:34).
Thus the wholly spiritual concept of man as the offspring of this one parental, divine Principle, Love, is present today in human thought through the advent of Christian Science. And in the turbulence of these times can be discerned the final warfare forecast by the Revelator, in which the spiritual concept of identity is confronting the mortal concept's aggressive resistance to its own sure demise.
John attributes this remarkable apocalyptic statement to the Son of man: "I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen."1:18. Through Christian Science, the Christ—"dead" or not understood in its redemptive power when symbolized by scholastic theology as a slain lamb—is now alive. It is now understood as an impersonal Saviour, as the revelation of spiritual identity active today in the dissolution of humanity's mortal misconception of being.
The Master had forecast the coming of a Comforter, which would fully explain his doctrine and divinity at the appropriate time. Christian Science is this Comforter. The student of this religion, pondering the apparent simplicity, even the foolishness to worldly sense, of the Christly method of warfare through the power of the Lamb of Love, is undaunted as he surveys today's aggravated materiality. The Lamb's long redemptive mission will eventually draw to a close in final victory over all the earth.
