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Bible Dictionaries
Son of Man (2)
Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament
or SON OF MAN
1. Occurrences of the expression in the NT
(a) In the Gospels it is found in the following passages—eighty-one in all: Matthew 8:20; Matthew 9:6; Matthew 10:23; Matthew 11:19; Matthew 12:8; Matthew 12:32; Matthew 12:40; Matthew 13:37; Matthew 13:41; Matthew 16:13; Matthew 16:27-28; Matthew 17:9; Matthew 17:12; Matthew 17:22; Matthew 19:28; Matthew 20:18; Matthew 20:28; Matthew 24:27; Matthew 24:30, bis Matthew 24:37; Mat_24:39; Mat_24:44; Mat_25:31; Mat_26:2; Mat_26:24, bis. Matthew 24:45; ,Matthew 26:64—[30 times]; Mark 2:10; Mark 2:28; Mark 8:31; Mark 8:38; Mark 9:9; Mark 9:12; Mark 9:31; Mark 10:33; Mark 10:45; Mark 13:26; Mark 14:21, bis. Mark 14:41; Mar_14:62—[14 times]; Luke 5:24; Luke 6:5; Luke 6:22; Luke 7:34; Luke 9:22; Luke 9:26; Luke 9:44; Luke 9:58; Luke 11:30; Luke 12:8; Luke 12:10; Luke 12:40; Luke 17:22; Luke 17:24; Luke 17:26; Luke 17:30; Luke 18:8; Luke 18:31; Luke 19:10; Luke 21:27; Luke 21:36; Luke 22:22; Luke 22:48; Luke 22:69; Luke 24:7—[25 times]; John 1:51; John 3:13-14; John 6:27; John 6:53; John 6:62; John 8:28; John 9:35 (Revised Version margin) 12:23, 34 bis 13:31—[12 times]. It is obvious to remark that these eighty-one passages do not by any means represent as many different occasions on which the phrase is reported to have been used. Thus of the thirty passages cited from Mt. it will be found on examination that nine have direct parallels in both Mk. and Lk.; that four have parallels in Mk. only, and eight in Luke only; while the remaining nine are peculiar to Matthew (see the tables provided by Driver in Hasting's Dictionary of the Bible iv. 579, Schmidt, EBi [Note: Bi Encyclopaedia Biblica.] iv. 4713, and by J. A. Robinson in The Study of the Gospels, p. 58 f.). To the parallel passages in the Synoptics, which exhibit diversity in regard to this particular expression, attention will be directed later.
(b) Apart from the Gospels ‘the Son of Man’ is found only in Acts 7:56 (cf. Luke 22:69). in Revelation 1:13; Revelation 14:14 the expression used, though akin, is not the same: it is ‘one [sitting] like unto a son of man,’ which is a precise reproduction of the phrase in Daniel 7:13.
With but one exception the name as found in the Gospels is used only by our Lord Himself. The exception is John 12:34, and even there it is presupposed that Jesus had spoken of Himself as ‘the Son of Man.’ ‘The multitude therefore answered him, We have heard out of the law that the Christ abideth for ever; and how sayest thou, The Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man?’ The multitude are familiar with the title ‘the Son of Man’; to them it is a designation of the Messiah; their difficulty is to reconcile Messiahship with exaltation through death. The impression derived from this passage, that the title under discussion was by no means new upon the lips of our Lord,—however great the access of content it received from His employment of it,—is confirmed by the significant fact that throughout the Gospel narratives there is not a trace that disciples, or the wider public, were in any wise perplexed by the designation. This fact, it may be remarked in passing, has not been allowed its due weight by those who, like Westcott (Gospel of St. John, p. 33 ff., ‘It was essentially a new title’), regard the designation as originating with our Lord; or who, like B. Weiss (NT Theol. i. 73), explain the employment of it by Jesus on the supposition that, if not new, it was not one of the current Messianic titles. If new, or unfamiliar, the frequent use of such a self-designation must have occasioned remark, and called for explanation, which would surely have found record in one or other of the Evangelic narratives. If then the Gospels, both by what they say and by what they leave unsaid, favour the view that ‘Son of Man’ was already known, prior to the ministry of Jesus, as a Messianic title, it becomes needful to trace, in so far as we may, its history. Next, we must try to ascertain at what period in His ministry this title was assumed by our Lord, and why He used it with such marked preference; and, finally, we must seek an explanation of the absence of the name in NT writings other than the Gospels.
2. Source of the title.—Baldensperger, writing in 1900 (Theol. Rundschau, p. 201 ff.), regards it as one of the ‘fixed points’ gained in the course of recent discussion, that the origin of the NT phrase, and in large part its explanation, are to be sought in the OT, and especially in Daniel 7:13. Previous discussion had been limited too exclusively to the Gr. expression ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου; and, owing to such limitation, results were obtained (such as that our Lord reiterated ‘His mere humanity,’ or that He was ‘the ideal man,’ or that ‘nothing human was alien to Him’) which stood in no obvious relation to passages in which the title is predominantly used—passages bearing on our Lord’s Passion and Parousia. The appropriateness of the use of the title in sayings of the latter class was at once apparent when it was viewed in the light of Daniel 7:13. Not that the title itself is to be found there. The writer of Daniel describes a vision in which four great beasts come up from the sea—a lion, a bear, a leopard, a beast with ten horns. They are judged by the ‘Ancient of Days,’ and their dominion is taken from them. Thereupon the prophet proceeds:
‘I saw in the night visions, and, behold, there came with the clouds of heaven one like unto a son of man, and he came even to the ancient of days, and they brought him near before him. And there was given to him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations, and languages should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.’
It will be noted that in this more accurate rendering (that of the Revised Version NT 1881, OT 1885 ) the phrase which is of most moment in the subject now under discussion is quite indefinite: ‘one like unto a son of man,’—i.e. one with human attributes in contrast to the ferocity of ‘the beasts.’ The question at once arises, Whom are we to understand by the ‘one like unto a son of man’? The answer most commonly given has been—the Messiah; and there is much to be said for that answer yet, in spite of the dissent of a large number of more recent exegetes. They point to the fact that when Daniel receives the interpretation of his vision (Daniel 7:17-27), not a word is said about the ‘one like unto a son of man,’ but with threefold iteration (Daniel 7:18; Daniel 7:22; Daniel 7:27) it is asserted that after judgment upon the beasts, dominion will be given to ‘the saints of the Most High.’ Hence it is said that on the testimony of the text of Daniel itself, the ‘one like unto a son of man’ does not denote a person, but ‘the glorified and ideal people of Israel’ (see, e.g., Driver, Com. on Daniel, p. 102; Drummond, Jewish Messiah, p. 229). So strongly indeed has this view impressed itself upon the minds of some, that they apply the impersonal interpretation of the phrase in Daniel 7:13 as a test to the passages in which our Lord is represented by the Evangelists as using the words ‘the Son of Man.’ Thus J. Estlin Carpenter (The Synoptic Gospels, pp. 372, 388), regarding the phrase in Daniel as ‘emblematic and collective,’ and maintaining that Jesus used it in its original meaning, arrives at the conclusion that ‘wherever … the term is individualized and used Messianically, we have evidence of the later influence of the Church. Jesus never used it to designate Himself.’ It is obvious that the application of such a canon would have far-reaching results. But is the interpretation upon which it is based quite sure? The writer of Daniel does not regard ‘the saints of the Most High’ as coming down from heaven. They are already upon the earth, suffering the oppression of the tyrant symbolized by the ‘little horn,’ and awaiting deliverance and reversal of condition, which come when the Most High sits for judgment. It would surely be somewhat incongruous to symbolize the saints passing from the depths of misery to exaltation by one who descends from heaven to earth. On the other hand, it accords entirely with the conception which dominates Daniel 7 of a complete change of conditions, if by ‘one like a son of man’ we understand a Divinely empowered Ruler sent from on high to reign where the ‘four kings,’ the ‘great beasts,’ whose origin had been of the earth (Daniel 5:17), had borne sway.
If it be urged that had the writer of Daniel 7 intended the Messiah in Daniel 5:13, he could not have omitted mention of Him when he goes on to interpret the vision, and could not have spoken so unreservedly of the bestowal of ‘kingdom and dominion’ upon the saints of the Most High, it may be replied that it is quite in harmony with what may be discerned in other prophetic writings, if the thought of the author of Daniel is found to dwell more on the glories of the Kingdom of the latter days and the felicity of those who have part in it, than upon the Messianic King. Large sections of prophecy, so far as they seek to portray the better future, omit all direct reference to the Messiah. There is no warrant, therefore, as Driver (who, however, holds that ‘the title … does not in Daniel directly denote the Messiah,’ op. cit. p. 104) points out, for saying that ‘the Kingdom is not to be thought of without its King.’ And there is also no sufficient warrant to assume that if in the recital of a vision there is mention of the Messianic King, He, rather than His subjects, must have mention when the vision is interpreted. It is through failure to make allowance for this that N. Schmidt (EBi [Note: Bi Encyclopaedia Biblica.] iv. 4710) complains that the Messianic interpretation of Daniel 7:13 ‘fails to explain how the Messiah, once introduced, can have dropped so completely out of the author’s thought, not only in the explanation of the vision, where He is unceremoniously ignored, but also in the future deliverance, with which Michael has much to do but the Messiah nothing.’ Hence Schmidt suggests that the ‘one like unto a son of man’ is no other than Michael himself, the guardian angel of Israel (‘Michael your prince,’ Daniel 10:21)—a belated expedient, affording no real assistance. The absence of any mention of the guardian angel in the interpretation of the vision is not more easy of explanation than the absence therefrom of the mention of the Messiah. Indeed, of the two conceptions, that of the gift of everlasting dominion over all peoples to the guardian angel Michael, being the more unfamiliar, would urgently demand some explicit word of explanation.
In order to discover how Jewish readers of the Book of Daniel in the time shortly preceding and shortly following our Lord’s ministry interpreted that figure, which was presented so suddenly, to be so speedily withdrawn, we turn to the evidence of the Similitudes of the Book of Enoch and of 2 Esdras. Both books are quite certainly of Jewish origin, and both afford unmistakable testimony as to the deep impression made by the apocalyptic teaching of Daniel, which would carry with it familiarity with the concept of ‘one like a son of man.’ The date of the Book of Esdras is undisputed; it belongs to the closing decades of the first century of our era, approximately to a.d. 81. The date of the Similitudes—a later portion of the Book of Enoch—is more open to doubt. R. H. Charles (Book of Enoch, p. 29) holds them to have been written between b.c. 94–79, or b.c. 70–64. Schürer (HJP [Note: JP History of the Jewish People.] II. iii. 68) places them somewhat later: ‘at the very soonest, in the time of Herod,’ i.e. between b.c. 37–4. Thus, according to both these authorities, the Similitudes are pre-Christian. Whether they have been subjected to interpolations at Christian hands has been much debated. The plea that such interpolations, had they taken place, must have gone further, appears conclusive. Schürer (l.c.) claims, with reason, that ‘this much at least ought to be admitted, that the view of the Messiah presented in the part of the book at present under consideration [the Similitudes] is perfectly explicable on Jewish grounds, and that to account for such view it is not necessary to assume that it was due to Christian influences. Nothing of a specifically Christian character is to be met with in any of this section.’ We are concerned here with the Messianic teaching of the Similitudes only so far as they adopt and develop the concept derived from Daniel of a heavenly ‘Son of Man.’ The following extracts (cited from Charles’ translation ) may suffice:
In ch. 46, Enoch is represented as saying, when relating his vision of the Judgment: ‘And there I saw One who had a Head of Days, and His head was white like wool, and with Him was another being whose countenance had the appearance … like one of the holy angels. And I asked the angel who went with me and showed me all the hidden things, concerning that Son of Man, who he was, and whence he was, and why he went with the Head of Days? And he answered and said unto me, This is the Son of Man who hath righteousness, with whom dwelleth righteousness, and who reveals all the treasures of that which is hidden, because the Lord of Spirits hath chosen him, and his lot before the Lord of Spirits hath surpassed everything in uprightness for ever. And this Son of Man whom thou hast seen will arouse the kings and the mighty ones from their couches, and the strong from their thrones, and will loosen the reins of the strong and grind to powder the teeth of the sinners. And he will put down the kings from their thrones and kingdoms, because they do not extol and praise him, nor thankfully acknowledge whence the kingdom was bestowed upon them.’ In ch. 62 we read: ‘And thus the Lord commanded the kings and the mighty and the exalted, and those who dwell on the earth, and said, Open your eyes and lift up your horns if ye are able to recognize the Elect One. And the Lord of Spirits seated him (i.e. the Messiah) on the throne of His glory, and the spirit of righteousness was poured out upon him, and the word of his mouth slew all the sinners, and all the unrighteous were destroyed before his face. And there will stand up in that day all the kings, and the exalted, and those who hold the earth, and they will see and recognize him how he sits on the throne of his glory, and righteousness is judged before him, and no lying word is spoken before him.… And one portion of them will look on the other, and they will be terrified and their countenance will fall, and pain will seize them when they see that Son of Man sitting on the throne of his glory. And the kings … will glorify and bless and extol him who rules over all, who was hidden. For the Son of Man was hidden before Him, and the Most High preserved him in the presence of His might, and revealed him to the elect.’ See also 69:27 ‘And he sat on the throne of his glory, and the sum of judgment was committed unto him, the Son of Man, and he caused the sinners and those who have led the world astray to pass away and be destroyed from off the face of the earth.’ These passages leave no room to question how the author of the Similitudes interpreted Daniel’s ‘one like unto a son of man.’ To him the phrase characterized no symbolic figure, but a celestial person, Divinely endowed with world-wide dominion, and appointed to be the judge of all men. The descriptive expression is in process of becoming a title; passing through demonstrative stages—‘this Son of Man,’ ‘that Son of Man,’—it emerges as ‘the Son of Man.’
In 2 Esdras 13 there is no such development of the phrase, ‘one like unto a son of man,’ as we find in the Similitudes, but the dependence upon Daniel and the Messianic interpretation of Daniel 7:13 is not less clear. Esdras is represented as recounting a dream, in which he saw coming ‘up from the midst of the sea as it were the likeness of a man; and I beheld [he proceeds], and, lo, that man flew with the clouds of heaven: and when he turned his countenance to look, all things trembled that were seen under him.… And after this, I beheld, and, lo, there was gathered together a multitude of men, out of number, from the four winds of heaven, to make war against the man that had come out of the sea.’ This multitude he destroys by the mere breath of his mouth, and then he is seen to ‘call unto him another multitude which was peaceable.’ When Esdras seeks the interpretation of the dream, he is told: ‘Whereas thou sawest a man coming up from the midst of the sea, the same is he whom the Most High hath kept a great season, which by his own self shall deliver his creatures: and he shall order them that are left behind.… Behold, the days come when the Most High will begin to deliver them that are upon the earth.… and it shall be when these things shall come to pass, and the signs shall happen that I showed thee before, then shall my Son be revealed, whom thou sawest as a man ascending.… And this my Son shall rebuke the nations which are come for their wickedness.… And he shall destroy them without labour by the law, which is likened unto fire.’ The ‘peaceable multitude is further explained to be Israel, of whom this ‘son’ of the Most High is not the symbol, but the Saviour.
The writings of Enoch and Esdras are, it is reasonable to assume, only the survivors of other Apocalypses of the same period, which in like manner founded themselves on the vision of Daniel, and sought to supply in their own way what the prophet had left untold concerning ‘one like unto a son of man.’ If so, that phrase would also inevitably turn in the popular mind into a definite Messianic title, calling for no question when it was heard from the lips of Jesus, unless it were as to His right to appropriate it. It is suggestive to find that later on a more subordinate expression in Daniel 7:13 was adopted in similar fashion, and that בר נפלי = ‘son of cloud,’ or ‘cloud-man,’ became a Rabbinic title for the Messiah (see Levy, NHWB [Note: HWB Neuhebräisehes Wörterbuch.] , s. v. נפלי).
At this point it is needful to pause to consider how our Lord’s use of the expression ‘the Son of Man’ is affected by the fact that He spoke Aramaic. If ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου is turned into Aramaic, does it give an expression which could be employed as a title? Or, to put it otherwise, is perhaps ὁ υἱὸς τ. ἀνθρώπου a mistranslation of the words actually uttered by Jesus, or an expression of later growth imported into His sayings by Greek-speaking Christians? Within the last decade, more especially, these questions have been keenly discussed. Wellhausen gave stimulus to the debate by a footnote in his IJG [Note: JG Israelitische und Jüdische Geschichte.] 2 [Note: designates the particular edition of the work referred] (1895, p. 346), in which he said: ‘Since Jesus spoke Aramaic He did not call Himself ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου, but barnascha; that, however, means ‘the Man,’ and nothing else, the Aramaeans having no other expression for the notion. The earliest Christians did not understand that Jesus called Himself simply the Man. They held Him to be the Messiah, made accordingly a designation of the Messiah out of barnascha, and translated it not by ὁ ἄνθρωπος, as they should, but quite erroneously by ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου.’ Wellhausen further lays stress on the fact that St. Paul makes no use of the expression ‘Son of Man,’ and refuses to admit any evidence which might be cited from Enoch, on the arbitrary plea that ‘the Son of man in the Book of Enoch must be left out of account, so long as it is not established that the relative portion of the book was known, or could be known, to Jesus.’
In 1896, H. Lietzmann published a brochure—Der Menschensohn—in which, after a review of previous opinions, he enters into a discussion of ‘Son of Man’ in Aramaic, with the result that he declares the expression to have been in Galilaean Aramaic, ‘the most colourless and indeterminate designation of a human individual’—one that might be used as an indefinite pronoun (p. 38). The use of בר in the compound phrase is described as a ‘genuine Semitic pleonasm,’ and it is maintained that no intelligible distinction existed between אנש and נש בר. To say with Wellhausen that where the Gospels have ὁ υἱος τ. ἀνθ. the translation should have been ὁ ἄνθρωπος will not do, according to Lietzmann, since that could be no distinctive designation, and the Evangelists do most certainly intend the phrase they use as a definite title; but ‘Jesus has never used the title “Son of Man” of Himself, since in Aramaic it does not exist, and for linguistic reasons cannot exist’ (op. cit. p. 85). The formula is to be regarded as a terminus technicus of Hellenistic theology, which, originating in Christian Apocalypses, was applied first to passages relating to our Lord’s Return, then to His Passion, and finally to other sections of the narratives.
In 1899, Wellhausen returned to this subject (Skizzen und Vorarbeiten, Sechstes Heft), and in the main declared his adoption of Lietzmann’s conclusion that Jesus, speaking Aramaic, could not make the difference which is made in Greek between ὁ ἄνθρωπος and ὁ υἱὸς τ. ἀνθ.:—that so far as this difference is made in the Gospels it is not authentic, but is derived from interpreters and editors. Wellhausen withdraws from the position he had formerly advocated, that Jesus did adopt ‘the Man’ as a title, meaning thereby that He fulfilled the ideal of humanity. He now declares that to impute such a meaning to our Lord is not warrantable, and that in the absence of that meaning the supposed title would be wholly meaningless, and therefore it was not employed. The use of ὁ υἱὸς τ. ἀνθ. in the Gospels is explained as due to the fact that the expressions of Daniel 7:13 are put into the mouth of Jesus in Mark 13:26, that there after it became the custom in all passages which refer to the Return of Jesus to avoid the pronoun, and to place instead ‘the Son of Man.’ Then followed the same usage in other than eschatological passages (op. cit. p. 210). Wellhausen again adduces in confirmation of the position that this self-designation of Jesus is not authentic, the argumentum ex silentio—the entire absence of the expression in other NT writings than the Gospels.
On the other hand, Dalman (Die Worte Jesu, 1898 [English translation 1902]) and Schmiedel (Protestant. Monatshefte, 1898, Hefte 7 and 8) called in question the linguistic premises of Lietzmann and Wellhausen, and contested their conclusions. They both maintain that Jesus did certainly call Himself ‘the Son of Man,’ using the title in a Messianic sense, and with direct reference to Daniel 7:13, though both hold the primary sense of ‘a son of man,’ in that verse, to be collective, and not personal. Dalman adduces evidence to show that ‘the Jewish Palestinian Aramaic of the earlier period possessed the term אנש for a human being, while to indicate a number of human beings it employed occasionally בני אנשא. The singular number בר אנש was not in use; its appearance being due to imitation of the Hebrew text, where [apart from Ezekiel] בן ארם is confined to poetry, and, moreover, uncommon in it. The case in Daniel 7:13, where the person coming from heaven is described as כבר אנש, ‘one like unto a son of man,’ is just as uncongenial to the style of prose as the designation of God in the same verse as עתיק יומיא ‘the advanced in days’ (op. cit. p. 237). Moreover, just as in Hebrew בן ארם is never made definite, so is the definite expression בר אנשא ‘quite unheard of in the older Jewish Aramaic literature.’ The common use of בר אנש = ‘man’ in Jewish Galilaean and Christian Palestinian literature is to be regarded as a later innovation. That this later usage was not already In vogue in the dialect spoken by our Lord (of which no written specimen from His time is in evidence) is demonstrated by His words as reported in the Gospels. ‘ “Man,” both in the singular and in the plural, is frequently enough the subject of remark. How is it that υἱὸς ἀνθρώπου never occurs for ‘man,’ and οἱ υἱοὶ τῶν ἀνθρώκων only in Mark 3:28? Can the Hellenistic reporters—apart from the self-appellation of Jesus—have designedly avoided it, although Jesus had on all occasions said nothing but “son of man” for “man”? That cannot be considered likely.’ Hence, against Lietzmann and Wellhausen, Dalman holds both that ‘Son of man’ was a possible expression in the Aramaic of our Lord’s day, and that by its singularity it was adapted for use as a title. ‘To the Jews it would be purely a Biblical word.’ To the same effect Schmiedel, who sums up his view of the linguistic part of the controversy thus: the Aramaic Lexicon ‘must not say barnascha means “man,” and nothing more, but it must run thus: barnascha, (1) man, (2) abbreviated designation of the form “like a son of man” (i.e. “like a man”) in Daniel 7:13, which, although, according to Daniel 7:18; Daniel 7:22; Daniel 7:27, signifying the saints of the Most High, was held to be the Messiah. We, on our part, declare that second meaning to be extant, and to have been so already before the time of Jesus’ (l.c. 264). Reference is made below (§ 5) to the replies of Dalman and Schmiedel to the argument ex silentio, by which, as already stated, it has been sought to lend support to the theory that ‘the Son of Man’ in the Gospels is no genuine utterance of Jesus.
In 1901, P. Fiebig published the result of a fresh and very thorough examination of the linguistic evidence on the matter at issue. The main contribution in his dissertation (Der Menschensohn) is a demonstration that אנש and אנשא were, in spite of their formal indefiniteness and definiteness, completely interchangeable; and that similarly the compound expressions בר נש and בר נשא were alike employed to express either of the three meanings—(1) the man, (2) a man, (3) some one. Hence, either expression might be rendered by ὁ υἱὸς τ. ἀνθ., or by υἱὸς ἀνθ., or—since, according to Fiebig, the use of the compound expression as the precise equivalent of אנש without בד was no relatively late introduction from the Syriac—by ἄνθρωτος (p. 56). That in the Gospels a distinction is maintained by using ὁ υἱὸς τ. ἀνθ., and not ὁ ἄνθρωτος alone, is due to the desire to bring out that the fuller phrase is used with direct reference to בר אנש in Daniel 7:13. But whether in all cases the distinction has been accurately made by the translators is matter for investigation, having regard to the ambiguity of the Aramaic expression. Further, Fiebig holds, on the evidence of Enoch and Esdras, and of the Synoptics themselves, that ‘the Son of Man,’ or rather ‘the Man,’ was in our Lord’s day a current title for the Messiah.
The above linguistic discussion has demonstrated considerable diversity of opinion, as could hardly fail to be the case in the absence of any contemporary example of the dialect spoken in Galilee at the time of our Lord’s earthly ministry. In their estimate of probabilities afforded by cognate dialects, or by later usage, scholars are sure to differ somewhat. Nevertheless, the whole investigation has been fruitful in suggestion to the NT critic. But the attempt made in connexion with it to account for the presence in the Gospels of ‘the Son of Man’ on some other grounds than that it represents a self-designation employed by our Lord, can only be characterized as an elaborate failure. Wellhausen’s invocation of hypothetical Apocalypses to explain the presence in the records of Jesus, and in those records not in the apocalyptic passages alone, of a title which (ex hypoth.) He did not use, removes no difficulty, but only calls aloud itself for explanation how such a thing could be. The belief that the title is the genuine utterance of Jesus is left unshaken.
3. When did our Lord adopt the title ‘Son of Man’?—There can be but one answer, if we are justified in assuming that ‘the Son of Man’ was already a Messianic title before our Lord employed it. He can have adopted it only subsequently to St. Peter’s confession of His Messiahship at Caesarea Philippi. But do the Gospels lend colour to any such limitation? Turning to the earliest of the Synoptics,—and we may confine our attention just now to the Synoptics,—we are met by the significant fact that St. Mark has the phrase only twice (Mark 2:10; Mark 2:28) prior to the Caesarean incident; St. Luke has it four times (Luke 5:24; Luke 6:5; Luke 6:22; Luke 7:34), and St. Matthew nine times (Matthew 8:20; Matthew 9:6; Matthew 10:23; Matthew 11:19; Matthew 12:8; Matthew 12:32; Matthew 12:40; Matthew 13:37; Matthew 13:41). Thus, in by far the greatest number of cases the title occurs subsequent to Peter’s confession. What, then, is to be said as to its occurrence in such cases as are prior to that confession? No one answer will suffice. Certainly it will not do to resort to the expedient of saying that the title was but little known, and that its Messianic application might be missed until our Lord Himself, late in His ministry, brought it into direct relation to Daniel’s prophecy; or to adopt the alternative offered by Holtzmann (NT Theol. vol. i. p. 264) of saying that ‘the son of man’ or ‘man’ was used by Jesus at first in its ordinary significance, and then, by reason of the stress He laid on it, came to be to the disciples an enigmatic word, which brought them to see that their Master was a man not as others, but with a unique calling, and at length to find in Him the Messiah. Either supposition would leave unexplained how the adoption of the title, whether unfamiliar or familiar, could have passed unchallenged, and not have called forth questions as to the sense in which Jesus was using the words. As little is help to be found in Fiebig’s suggestion that one reason why our Lord chose this title (‘the Man,’ according to Fiebig), was that men would find in it a meaning, though they might fail to apprehend the meaning with which Jesus employed it (op. cit. p. 120). Here, again, allowance is not made for the extreme difficulty of supposing that a speaker could apply a title to himself unless it were with an obvious purpose, which his hearers would certainly discern. There is not the least ground for supposing that it was a more usual thing in Aramaic than it is in our own language for any one to speak of himself in the third person. Such a form of speech might lend itself to more definite self-revelation, but clearly it was in no wise calculated to secure self-concealment. Wrede, in a note in ZNTW [Note: NTW Zeitschrift für die Neutest. Wissen. schaft.] (1904, Heft 4), urges that in recent discussions about the ‘Son of Man’ too little attention has been given to the really astonishing fact that Jesus is represented in the Gospels as quite habitually speaking of Himself as of a third person, and yet, so far as the Gospels show, no one thought it strange. Wrede is justified in saying that only our early familiarity with the language of the Gospels makes us insensible to the difficulty created by the frequency of the recurrence of the title; but he surely greatly exaggerates the difficulty when he finds in it a most convincing argument to deny that Jesus used this self-designation at all. Certainly it was an unusual and striking form of speech to adopt. But that constitutes no sufficient reason for assuming that our Lord did not adopt it, even because it was more calculated to arrest attention when He desired to lay stress on His Messianic claims, and on special aspects of them. The real difficulty lies in the supposition that an unwonted form of speech, most calculated to provoke inquiry concerning the speaker, was adopted by Jesus at a time when, according to the testimony of the Synoptics, He studiously avoided making His identity known, when He had not even affirmed His Messiahship to the inner circle of the Twelve. It is needful, therefore, to look in detail at the passages cited above, in which the title is found prior to the declaration of our Lord’s Messiahship. For that declaration, see Matthew 16:16, Mark 8:29, Luke 9:20.
Taking first the passages in St. Mark, with their parallels in the other Synoptics, and turning to Mark 2:10 (cf. Luke 5:24, Matthew 9:6), we are confronted at once with the representation that quite early in His ministry, when in the presence of hostile scribes, Jesus definitely identifies Himself with the ‘Son of Man.’ ‘… that ye may know that the Son of Man hath power on earth to forgive sins … I say unto thee, Arise.’ It is, of course, possible that the incident is not here in its due chronological position—that it properly belongs to a much later time in the Evangelical narrative. But there is no reason, unless it be the presence of the phrase now in question, to think so. More likely is it that in this case the ambiguity of the Aramaic is accountable for the presence of the title in the Greek rendering. The scribes were charging Jesus with blasphemy because He assumed to pronounce the forgiveness of sins, that being, as they held, in the power of God only, and not in that of any man. Jesus responds by undertaking to afford a convincing sign that even ‘a man [meaning Himself] hath authority,’ etc. Such a reconstruction of the passage finds support in Matthew 9:8, where we read that the multitudes who stood by ‘glorified God, which had given such authority unto men’—the multitudes understanding our Lord to have employed no title, and taking the expression He used in its collective sense.
In Mark 2:28 (cf Luke 6:5, Matthew 12:8) our Lord’s argument in regard to the observance of the Sabbath seems to demand that ‘man’ should be substituted where we now read ‘the Son of Man.’ He is vindicating’ the action of His disciples, and asserting for all others the same freedom in regard to the use of the Sabbath as they had exercised. Jesus is not concerned to assert His own personal rights, but those of His followers, and of all who suffered from restrictions which threatened to turn that which was given for man’s benefit into a bondage. ‘The Sabbath was made for man … so that man is lord [or rather “owner”—κύριος answering here to a familiar sense of the Hebrew בעל—Swete, Com. on St. Mark] even of the Sabbath.’
Taking next the two remaining pre-Caesarean occurrences of ‘the Son of Man’ in St. Luke, the earlier of the two, Luke 6:22, presents little difficulty. It is an obvious case of an editorial insertion of the title. Where St. Luke has ‘for the Son of Man’s sake,’ Matthew 5:11 has, ‘for my sake’—the latter being clearly the earlier form of the saying. Luke 7:34 (cf. Matthew 11:19) is quite conceivably another case of the reverent substitution by tradition of the title in place of a pronoun. Our Lord is contrasting His action with that of the Baptist. What more likely than that He should say, ‘John the Baptist is come … I am come’? The title can be deemed here in no wise essential.
It remains to glance at six passages in the First Gospel besides those already mentioned, in which ‘the Son of Man’ is found prior to Peter’s confession. Taking these cases in order of their occurrence in the Gospel, it is sufficient as to the first, Matthew 8:20, to note that its parallel is Luke 9:58—i.e. according to St. Luke the incident of the scribe who volunteered to follow Jesus was subsequent to Peter’s confession. There is no reason to suspect here any misconception of our Lord’s words on the part of His translators. He cannot have said that in contrast to beasts and birds ‘man’ hath not where to lay his head. The contrast drawn is between such creatures and Himself, the Messianic ‘Son of Man.’ If even He had no resting-place, His followers might know thereby what hardship they must be prepared to undergo. Matthew 10:23 is quite clearly not in its true chronological order; it belongs to a later time than the first mission of the Twelve, and to a connexion in which a larger work was contemplated than that with which they were then entrusted. But the Evangelist, following his preference for topical arrangement, has linked these later words to the instructions given to the Twelve when they were about to set out on their earliest missionary expedition.
Matthew 12:32, when compared with Luke 12:10 and with Mark 3:28, is found to be a combination of two different reports of our Lord’s saying as to blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. Mark 3:28 has no mention of ‘the Son of Man,’ but it has the expression, quite unique in the Gospels, ‘the sons of men.’ It runs thus: ‘All their sins shall be forgiven unto the sons of men, and their blasphemies … but whosoever shall blaspheme against the Holy Spirit.…’ In the parallel in St. Luke, the unwonted phrase ‘the sons of men’ disappears, and its place is taken by the familiar expression ‘the Son of Man,’ and the entire saying is modified in accordance therewith. That St. Mark has the utterance in its genuine form is unquestionable. Whether it properly belongs to the period before the incident at Caesarea, or, as St. Luke suggests, was later than it, it did not contain the title ‘the Son of Man.’
Matthew 12:40 (cf. Luke 11:30). It is sufficient to point out that St. Luke places this saying in order of time considerably later than does St. Matthew, and as before, preference must be given to St. Luke in a matter of chronological order.
Finally, the parable of the Tares, in the explanation of which the title appears twice (Matthew 13:37; Matthew 13:41), may, with good reason, be said to belong to a late period in our Lord’s ministry. It owes its present position to St. Matthew’s desire to bring it into the collection of parables comprised in his 13th chapter.
Thus, of the instances in which our Lord’s self-designation appears in the Synoptic Gospels prior to their recital of Peter’s confession at Caesarea Philippi, there is not one which can, on examination, be held to afford proof that this Messianic title was used by Him before His follower had declared Him to be the Messiah, or to invalidate the assumption that the use of the title by our Lord began at the time of that declaration, not earlier.
In St. Matthew’s account of the incident at Caesarea there are remarkable additions, both to our Lord’s question and to Peter’s answer. In Matthew 16:13 we read: ‘Who do men say that the Son of Man is?’ The answer is given: “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.’ In Mark 8:27 the question is: ‘Who do men say that I am?’ The answer is simply: ‘Thou art the Christ.’ St. Luke (Mark 9:18; Mark 9:20) agrees, with but slight variations, with St. Mark. He has: ‘Who do the multitudes say that I am?… The Christ of God.’ We have here another case—the most notable of all such cases—in which the title has been substituted for the pronoun which our Lord employed. It is possible that in this case the additional clause was first appended to Peter’s answer, and that the substitution in our Lord’s question was occasioned by it—a substitution which represents the desired answer as already provided in the statement of the question. Holtzmann may be right in suggesting that doctrinal interests are answerable for such a result. He says (op. cit. vol. i. p. 258) that ‘the First Evangelist appears as the theologian, who sees in the “Son of Man” the obverse of the “Son of God,” and so prepares the way for the doctrine of the two natures.’ Whether the clauses in question are to be ascribed to St. Matthew himself, or whether they may be due to the theological tendency of a later hand, may be regarded as an open question.
For other instances than those already cited of this variation—the title appearing in one Gospel, but not in the parallel passage in another, or in the other two—see Luke 12:8 as compared with Matthew 10:32; Matthew 16:28, cf. Mark 9:1, and Luke 9:27; Mark 10:45, and Matthew 20:28, cf. Luke 22:27; Mark 8:31, and Luke 9:22, cf. Matthew 16:21.
As to the occurrence of ‘the Son of Man’ in the earlier chapters of the Fourth Gospel, it need here only be pointed out that such occurrence is in entire accord with the representation of St. John, that from their earliest association with Him our Lord’s followers knew that He was the Divine Christ. The declaration of Messiahship and the use of the title are concurrent in the Fourth Gospel as in the Synoptics. This agreement is to be emphasized here: the reconciliation of the view, which represents our Lord’s Messiahship as declared from the outset of His ministry, with the threefold testimony that such declaration followed only when disciples had received prolonged training in the course of that ministry, does not come within the scope of our present purpose. The first occurrence of the self-designation in St. John’s Gospel affords a striking parallel to our Lord’s use of it in response to Peter’s confession (Mark 8:29; Mark 8:31). Nathanael declares Jesus to be ‘the Son of God … king of Israel,’ and to that confession Jesus responds With the promise: ‘Ye shall see the heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man’ (John 1:51). Similarly in John 3:13, it is when Jesus has declared to Nicodemus that He has Himself descended from heaven and can therefore tell of heavenly things, that He goes on to designate Himself ‘the Son of Man,’ and to foretell His suffering on behalf of man. Here it may be noted that in the Fourth Gospel, precisely as in the Synoptics, not a hint is given that the title was unfamiliar and one that called for explanation. Nicodemus was not indisposed to ask questions; but St. John leaves us to infer that as to this designation he found no difficulty. Three times in ch. 6 (John 6:27; John 6:53; John 6:62), in connexion with the discourse in which Jesus speaks of Himself as ‘the bread which came down out of heaven,’ the title occurs, accompanying and used to emphasize an open declaration of our Lord’s claims as to His Person and Work.
The later occurrences of the title in the Fourth Gospel all, with the exception of John 9:35 (if ἀνθρώπου be the right reading there), are found—as is the case with most of its later occurrences in the Synoptics—in passages relating to our Lord’s Passion, or to the glory which would follow thereon. This fact suggests, at least in part, the answer to a further inquiry which must now be made.
4. Why did our Lord adopt this in preference to any other Messianic title?—Nowhere does He tell us in precise terms; but His usage leaves no room to doubt that its attraction lay in its freedom from the limitations which beset other Messianic names.
(a) First and foremost, it permitted the blending of the conception of the Suffering Servant with that of the Messianic King. That was the great enlargement which Jesus gave, in His use of it, to the title He adopted. True, there was nothing in Daniel’s delineation of ‘one like unto a son of man’ to suggest such a blending, but there was also nothing to preclude it. Whether the coming of the heavenly Son of Man in glory, and for universal dominion, was to be preceded by a coming in humiliation and a reascension through suffering, the writer of Daniel did not tell. But what the prophet failed to disclose, Jesus revealed. He was indeed the son of man, whom Daniel beheld, but passing through a phase of existence anterior to that of which the seer had a glimpse, and a phase which none were anticipating. Jesus was indeed the Messiah; but the expectations which gathered about that name made no allowance for that which was foremost in the purpose for which He came to earth. Hence, no sooner did His disciple exclaim ‘Thou art the Christ,’ than ‘he began to teach them [the disciples] that the Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.’ Put even so,—as a fresh disclosure concerning the Son of Man,—the teaching was not easy of reception, as Peter’s remonstrance showed; but to have said at that juncture that the ‘Son of David,’ or ‘the Christ,’ must suffer and be killed, had been to make the teaching yet harder of reception.
As Dalman says (op. cit. p. 265): ‘The name Messiah denoted the Lord of the Messianic age in His capacity as Ruler; in reality it was applicable only when His enthronement had taken place, not before it. Suffering and death for the actual possessor of the Messianic dignity are, in fact, unimaginable according to the testimony of the prophets. When Jesus attached to the Messianic confession of Peter the first intimation of His violent death He did so in order to make it clear that the entrance upon His sovereignty was still far distant.… But the “one like unto a son of man” of Daniel 7:13 has still to receive the sovereignty. It was possible that he should also be one who had undergone suffering and death.&#
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Hastings, James. Entry for 'Son of Man (2)'. Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/hdn/s/son-of-man-2.html. 1906-1918.
