hy of interests subordinated to,
and unified by, the sovereignty of the good in the person of God.[18]

1. By reason of its comprehensiveness the doctrine of the kingdom has
been regarded by many as the most general conception of the ideal of
Jesus. 'In its unique and unapproachable grandeur it dwarfs all the
lesser heights to which the prophetic hopes had risen, and remains to
this day the transcendent and commanding ideal of the possible exaltation
of our humanity.'[19] The principles implicitly contained in the
teaching of Jesus concerning the kingdom have become the common
possessions of mankind, and are moulding the thoughts and institutions of
the civilised world. Kant's theory of a kingdom of ends, Comte's idea of
Humanity, and the modern conceptions of scientific and {133} historical
evolution are corroborative of the teaching of the New Testament. Within
its conception men have found room for the modern ideas of social and
economic order, and under its inspiration are striving for a fuller
realisation of the aspirations and hopes of humanity.[20]

Though frequently upon His lips the phrase did not originate with Jesus.
Already the Baptist had employed it as the note of his preaching, and
even before the Baptist it had a long history in the annals of the Jewish
people. Indeed the entire story of the Hebrews is coloured by this
conception, and in the days of their decline it is the idea of the
restoration of their nation as the true kingdom of God that dominates
their hopes. When earthly institutions did not fulfil their promise, and
nothing could be expected by natural means, hope became concentrated upon
supernatural power. Thus before Jesus appeared there had grown up a mass
of apocalyptic literature, the object of which was to encourage the
national expectation of a sudden and supernatural coming of the kingdom
of heaven. Men of themselves could do nothing to hasten its advent.
They could only wait patiently till the set time was accomplished, and
God stretched forth His mighty hand.[21]

A new school of German interpretation has recently arisen, the aim of
which is to prove that Jesus was largely, if not wholly, influenced by
the current apocalyptic notions of His time. Jesus believed, it is said,
in common with the popular sentiment of the day, that the end of the
world was at hand, and that at the close of the present dispensation
there would come suddenly and miraculously a new order into which