Editorial April 1, 1916 Issue

"The stone which the builders rejected"

Annie M. Knott

Christian Scientists have become quite familiar with the argument that healing by spiritual means is not a vital element of religion ; indeed some people insist that it is wrong to attempt it, although it was practised by Christ Jesus and his apostles. It is curiously interesting to note that the Master himself was assailed by the same objections to his healing work, the critics holding to the ritualism which at best only typified the operation of spiritual law in human consciousness. The Jewish people jealously guarded the word as given in the law and the prophets, but with strange inconsistency rejected its application to the needs of suffering humanity, even as so many do today.

When Jesus read in the synagogue at Nazareth the healing words from Isaiah, and announced their present availability, his listeners were "filled with wrath" and sought to kill him. We read that in spite of this, on several occasions he healed the sick at the time of a religious service, one instance being the cure of a man whose hand was withered. On another occasion it was a man tormented with "an unclean devil" who was healed, and again it was a woman who had been "bowed together" for eighteen years. We read that she at once "glorified God;" but alas for mortal blindness, the ruler of the synagogue voiced only indignation, and this called forth from Jesus a scathing rebuke. The most deeply interesting account of such cases, however, is Matthew's record of the healing work done in the temple at Jerusalem, when the Master cast out the money-changers, and those who sold doves for the sacrifices. The little children sang his praises (perhaps some of them had been healed), but the rulers demanded his authority, and this he refused to give them.

Following this experience, Christ Jesus asked this most pertinent question : "Did ye never read in the scriptures, The stone which the builders rejected, the same is become the head of the corner?" Now in the 118th psalm, which contains the record of a wonderful case of healing, and is a most beautiful example of Hebrew poetry, is to be found this passage: "I called upon the Lord in distress : the Lord answered me . . . It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man." Then the one who had been healed goes on, "I shall not die, but live, and declare the works of the Lord." There are many today who are doing this in Christian Science, for the same reason that this man had. We then come to the passage quoted by the Master, the reference to the stone which the builders rejected; and while this doubtless referred to an actual occurrence in the building of the temple, the psalmist, and also Christ Jesus, employ it metaphorically to illustrate the rejection of spiritual healing by the builders of religious systems throughout the centuries.

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