Old
Testament as written by Moses. Jesus did repeatedly go back of Moses to
more primitive origins (Mark x. 5, 6; John vii. 22); yet there is no
likelihood that the literary question was ever present in his thinking.
This phase of his intellectual life, like that which concerned his
knowledge of the natural universe, was in all probability one of the
points in which he was made like unto his brethren, sharing, as matter of
course, their views on questions that were indifferent for the spiritual
mission he came to fulfil. If this was the case, his argument from the one
hundred and tenth Psalm (Mark xii. 35-37) would simply give evidence that
he accepted the views of his time concerning the Psalm, and proceeded to
use it to correct other views of his time concerning what was of most
importance in the doctrine of the Messiah. The last of these was of vital
importance for his teaching; the first was for this teaching quite as
indifferent a matter as the relations of the earth and the sun in the
solar system.

249. A more perplexing difficulty arises from his handling of the cases of
so-called demoniac possession. He certainly treated these invalids as if
they were actually under the control of demons: he rebuked, banished, gave
commands to the demons, and in this way wrought his cures upon the
possessed. It has already been remarked that the symptoms shown in the
cases cured by Jesus can be duplicated from cases of hysteria, epilepsy,
or insanity, which have come under modern medical examination. Three
questions then arise concerning his treatment of the possessed. 1. Did he
unquestioningly share the interpretation which his contemporaries put upon
the symptoms, and simply bring relief by his miraculous power? 2. Did he
know that those whom he healed were not afflicted by evil spirits, and
accommodate himself in his cures to their notions? 3. Does he prove by his
treatment that the unfortunates actually were being tormented by
diabolical agencies, which he banished by his word? The last of these
possibilities should not be held to be impossible until much more is known
than we now know about the mysterious phenomena of abnormal psychical
states. If this is the explanation of the maladies for Jesus' day,
however, it should be accepted also as the explanation of similar abnormal
symptoms when they appear in our modern life, for the old hypothesis of a
special activity of evil spirits at the time of the incarnation is
inadequa