140 QUAKER ASPECTS OF TRUTH 



Nothing could better exemplify the weakness of the 

 position occupied by professing Christians who seek to 

 defend war than the arguments which they bring forward 

 in its support* Such arguments are, for the most part, 

 arguments of expediency, but four passages are constantly 

 referred to from the New Testament* Let us therefore 

 consider them : 



(i) On one occasion our Lord made a scourge of 

 small cords and drove the traders from the temple* 

 Was not this, I have often been asked, the use of 

 physical force ? Well ! was it ? I know of no reason 

 for supposing that physically our Lord was any stronger 

 than you or L At the time when this happened, the outer 

 court of the temple had become a vast market-place, 

 and the buyers and sellers had all the force of law and 

 custom on their side* If you or I were to make a scourge 

 of small cords and were to seek to clear a vast market- 

 place, would the consequences be to any degree com- 

 parable ? Of course they would not, and surely it 

 follows that the force used was not physical, but moral 

 force* Scholars tell us that in the original it is quite 

 clear that the scourge of small cords was intended to 

 drive out the cattle* It was not intended for the 

 buyers and sellers* It is in the Fourth Gospel alone 

 that either the cattle or the scourge of small cords are 

 mentioned* 



(2) Our Lord once said : '* There shall be wars and 

 rumours of wars, and the end is not yet**' Here our 

 Lord makes a simple prediction ; a prediction all too amply 

 verified by subsequent history* It would have been 

 equally true had He said there shall be lies and rumours 

 of lies, and the end is not yet ; but we should not on that 

 account have condoned lying* Or He might have said, 

 with equal truth, there shall be murders and rumours 

 of murders, and the end is not yet ; but we should not 

 on that account have exonerated the murderer* 



