The Books of the New Testament Part 7

Lawfulness of healing on the sabbath, humility, inviting the poor, the King's supper, counting the cost (xiv.). Parables to {78} ill.u.s.trate Christ's care for the lost (xv.). The use and abuse of money (xvi.).

Occasions of stumbling, the increase of faith, the truth that we cannot purchase G.o.d's favour by doing more than He commands, the ten lepers, the coming of the Son of man (xvii.). Answer to prayer, the Pharisee and publican, little children, the rich young man, Christ's third prediction of His death, the blind beggar at Jericho (xviii.).

Zacchaeus, the parable of the pounds (xix. 1-28).

E.

Pa.s.sover A.D. 29.

Last days at Jerusalem, and afterwards: xix. 29-xxiv. 53.--Entry into Jerusalem, Christ's second lament over Jerusalem, cleansing of the temple (xix. 29-xx.). Christ challenged, parable of the vineyard, two questions to entrap Christ, His question (xx.). The widow's mites, predictions of the destruction of the temple, siege of Jerusalem, the second coming (xxi.). Judas' bargain, the Pa.s.sover, agony on the mount of Olives, the betrayal, Peter's denial, Jesus tried before the elders (xxii.). Jesus before Pilate, Herod, Pilate again, Simon of Cyrene, the daughters of Jerusalem, the crucifixion, burial by Joseph of Arimathaea (xxiii.).

The women at the sepulchre, and Peter, the walk to Emmaus, Jesus appears to the disciples and eats, His commission, the Ascension (xxiv.).

The Date of our Lord's Birth.--It is fairly well known that the dates of our Lord's Birth and of His Death are both, in all probability, misrepresented in popular chronology. The best ancient chronology fixes the date of the Crucifixion in A.D. 29. The Birth was probably about six years before the commencement of our present era. Various reasons make this date probable, including the fact that there was at that time a conjunction of Jupiter, Saturn, and Mars, which must have presented a most brilliant appearance in the sky, and would {79} certainly have attracted the star-loving sages of the East. The great astronomer Kepler was of opinion that this conjunction was followed by the brief appearance of a new star, which is the star mentioned in Matt. ii. 2. This is of importance in considering the statements of St. Luke. Several objections have been made to his account of the census held under Quirinius. (1) It is said that Quirinius was not governor of Syria when Jesus was born; his administration was from A.D.

6 to A.D. 9, and Quinctilius Varus was governor in A.D. 1. But St.

Luke cannot be proved to say that Quirinius was governor; he describes his office by a participle which may mean "acting as leader," and there is proof that Quirinius was engaged in a military command in the time of Herod, and also proof that some high official twice governed Syria in the time of Augustus. St. Luke's expression might fit either of these two facts. (2) It is said that Herod was reigning as king in Palestine, and that his subjects would not be included in a Roman census. But in the year 8-7 B.C. Augustus wrote to Herod, saying that he would henceforth treat him as a subject. His dominions must henceforth have been treated like the rest of the dominions of Augustus. (3) It is said that no census took place at that time, and that if there had been a census, it would have been carried out by households, according to Roman custom, and not by families. But there seems to have been a census in Egypt and Syria in B.C. 8, and after Augustus determined to put Herod under his authority, the census would naturally be extended to Judaea. Herod would probably be allowed to carry out the census on his own lines, so long as it was really carried out. And he would plainly prefer to do it in the Jewish fashion, so as to irritate the Jews as little as might be.

The question is still involved in some obscurity, but St. Luke's accuracy has not been in the least disproved by the controversy. He is the only evangelist who connects his narrative with the history of Syria and of the Roman empire, and we have every reason to believe that he did his work with care as well as sympathy.

[1] _Adv. Har._ iii. 1.

[2] Matt. v. 3 has "poor in spirit." The same Aramaic word might be used for both "poor" and "poor in spirit."

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CHAPTER VI

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. JOHN

[Sidenote: The Author.]

We learn from the Gospels that St. John was the son of Zebedee, a Galilean fisherman, and was a follower of the Baptist before he joined our Lord. The Synoptists show that he was one of the most prominent and intimate of our Lord's followers. With St. Peter and St. James he was permitted to witness the raising of Jairus' daughter, and to be present at the Transfiguration, and with them was nearest to Christ at the agony in Gethsemane. With St. Peter he was sent to prepare the last Pa.s.sover. Like his brother St. James, he shared in the fervour of his mother, Salome, who begged for them a special place of dignity in the kingdom of Christ. They both wished to call down fire on a Samaritan village, and St. John asked Jesus what was to be done with the man whom they found casting out devils in His name. Their fiery temperament caused our Lord to give them the surname of Boanerges ("sons of thunder"). In the fourth Gospel the name of John the son of Zebedee is never mentioned, but there are several references to an apostle whose name is not recorded, but can be intended for no other than St. John. At the crucifixion this apostle was bidden by our Lord to regard Mary as henceforth his mother, and the writer claims to have been an eye-witness of the crucifixion. In the last chapter very similar words are used to a.s.sert that the writer is he whom Jesus loved.

In Acts St. John appears with St. Peter as healing the lame {81} man at the Beautiful Gate of the temple, and with St. Peter he goes to Samaria to bestow the Holy Ghost on those whom Philip had baptized. He was revered as one of the pillars of the Church when St. Paul visited Jerusalem in A.D. 49 (Gal. ii. 9). It is remarkable that the Synoptic Gospels, the fourth Gospel, Acts, and Galatians, all show St. John in close connection with St. Peter. St. John's name occurs in the Revelation, which has been attributed to him since the beginning of the 2nd century.

Numerous fragments of tradition concerning St. John are preserved by early Christian writers. Tertullian, about A.D. 200, says that St.

John came to Rome, and was miraculously preserved from death when an attempt was made to kill him in a cauldron of boiling oil. Tertullian and Eusebius both say that he was banished to an island, and Eusebius tells us that the island was Patmos, and that the banishment took place in the time of Domitian. On the accession of Nerva, St. John removed from Patmos to Ephesus, where he survived until the time of Trajan, who became emperor in A.D. 98. Polycrates, Bishop of Ephesus, writing about A.D. 190, speaks of St. John's tomb in that city, and says that he wore the _petalon_, the high priest's mitre used in the Jewish Church. We are told by other writers how he reclaimed a robber, how he played with a tame partridge, how when too old to preach he was carried into church and would repeat again and again, "Little children, love one another." On one occasion a spark of his youthful fire was seen.

It was when the old man indignantly refused to stay under the roof of the same public baths as Cerinthus, the heretic who denied that Mary was a virgin when she bore our Lord, and a.s.serted that the Divinity of Jesus was only a power which came upon Him and went from Him.

The residence of St. John at Ephesus is attested by the Revelation.

Even if that book were a forgery, no forger at the close of the 1st century would have ventured to place the hero of his book in a neighbourhood where he had not lived. {82} Many threads of evidence lead us back to the statement made by Polycrates about the apostle's tomb. It was not until long after that date that the Christians began to carry the relics of saints from place to place, and churches rivalled one another in producing shrines for the severed members of one body. There is therefore no reason whatever to doubt that the tomb at Ephesus marked the resting-place of the apostle. It was known two hundred years later in the time of Jerome, and visited in 431 by the members of the great Church Council which met at Ephesus. The Emperor Justinian built a sumptuous church on the site, and near a modern Turkish mosque may still be seen the remnants of the church of St. John.

Until the end of the 18th century the authorship of this Gospel was not seriously challenged. The only party which ever denied that it was written by the Apostle St. John was an ignorant and insignificant body of people mentioned by Irenaeus and Epiphanius. They were known as the _Alogi_, or "unbelievers in the Word." Their views in no wise undermine the tradition of the Catholic Church. For the Alogi a.s.serted that this Gospel was written by Cerinthus, who lived at Ephesus where St. John lived, and was himself a contemporary of St. John. We have sufficient knowledge of the teaching of Cerinthus to be perfectly certain that he could not have written a Gospel which so completely contradicts his own theories. Therefore the opinion of the Alogi is absolutely worthless where it negatives the tradition of the Church, and on the other hand it agrees with that tradition in a.s.serting that the book was written in the apostolic age.

During the last hundred years the men who deny that Jesus Christ was truly "G.o.d of G.o.d, Light of Light," have strained every nerve to prove that the fourth Gospel was not written by St. John. It is, of course, almost impossible that they should admit that the writer was an apostle and an honest man and continue to deny that the Christ whom he depicts claimed to be the Lord and Maker of all things. During the controversy {83} which has been waged during the last three generations with regard to St. John's Gospel, it has been evident throughout that the Gospel has been rejected for this very reason. The book has driven a wedge into the whole band of New Testament students. The critics who deny that Jesus was G.o.d, but are willing to grant that He was the most holy and the most divine of men, have been forced to side with those who are openly Atheists or Agnostics. The clue to their theories was unguardedly exposed by Weizsacker, who said, with regard to St. John's Gospel, "It is impossible to imagine any power of faith and philosophy so great as thus to obliterate the recollection of the real life, and to subst.i.tute for it this marvellous picture of a Divine Being." [1]

This remark shows us that the critic approached the Gospel with a prejudice against the doctrine of our Lord's Divinity, and rejected the Gospel mainly because it would not agree with his own prejudice. But the determination to fight to the uttermost against the converging lines of Christian evidence has now driven such critics into a corner.

Many have already abandoned the position that the book is a semi-Gnostic forgery written in the middle of the 2nd century, and they are now endeavouring to maintain that it was written about A.D. 100 by a certain John the Presbyter, whom they a.s.sert to have been afterwards confounded with the Apostle John.

Of John the Presbyter very little indeed is known. Papias, about A.D.

130, says that he was, like Aristion, "a disciple" of the Lord, and that he had himself made oral inquiries as to his teaching. He seems to have been an elder contemporary of Papias. Dionysius of Alexandria, about A.D. 250, mentions that there were two monuments in Ephesus bearing the name of John, and we may reasonably suppose that one of these was in memory of the presbyter mentioned by Papias. But a little reflection will soon convince us that nothing has been gained by the conjecture that this John wrote the Gospel. If John {84} the Presbyter was personally acquainted with our Lord, as some writers understand Papias to mean, then the sceptics are forced to admit that one who personally knew Jesus, describes Jesus as a more than human Being--as, in fact, the Divine Creator. This is the precise fact which keeps these writers from admitting that an apostle wrote the Gospel. If, on the other hand, they suppose, as some do, that John the Presbyter was very much younger than the apostles, the sceptics are confronted with the following difficulties:--

(a) There is the important external evidence which shows how widely the Gospel was regarded in the early Church as the work of St. John.

(b) There is the minute knowledge displayed of the topography, customs, and opinions of Jerusalem and the Holy Land as they existed in the time of Christ.

(c) There is the impossibility of supposing that Irenaeus, who was probably not born a year later than A.D. 130, would not have known that the Gospel was written by John the Presbyter.

(d) There is the fact that the evidence for St. John having lived in Ephesus is better than the evidence for a renowned presbyter of the same name having lived in Ephesus. This has been wisely pointed out by Julicher, even though he himself denies that the apostle wrote St.

John's Gospel. And the justice of this argument proves that it is sheer paradox to maintain, as some now maintain, that the _only_ John who lived in Ephesus was the Presbyter.

It is constantly urged by the opponents of the authenticity of this Gospel that, as it was published at Ephesus at a late period, it cannot be the work of the apostle, because he never went to Ephesus, and "died early as a martyr." [2] This is a most unscrupulous use of an inexact quotation made by some later Greek writers from a lost book of Papias.

It can be {85} traced to Philip of Side (5th century), and it is to the effect that "John the Divine and James his brother were killed by the Jews." Papias does not say that they died together, and his statement is compatible with the belief that St. John survived his brother very many years. We know from Gal. ii. 9 that he was alive some time after his brother's death, which was about A.D. 44. And George Hamartolus, one of the Greek writers who quote the above pa.s.sage in Papias, expressly says that the Emperor Nerva (A.D. 96) recalled John from Patmos, and "dismissed him to live in Ephesus."

[Sidenote: The External Evidence.]

The external evidence for the authenticity of this Gospel is in some respects stronger than that which is to be found in the case of the other Gospels. Thus the Christian may recognize with grat.i.tude that his Divine Master has especially added the witness of the Church to the work of His beloved disciple. All through the 2nd century we have the links of a chain of evidence, and after A.D. 200 the canon of the Gospels is known to have been so fixed that no defender of the faith is called upon to show what that canon was. The earliest traces of the phraseology of St. John are to be discovered in the _Didache_, which was probably written in Eastern Palestine or Syria about A.D. 100. The prayers which are provided in this book for use at the Eucharist are plainly of a Johannine type, and are probably derived from oral teaching given by the apostle himself before he lived at Ephesus. In any case, the _Didache_ seems sufficient to disprove the sceptical a.s.sertion that theological language of a Johannine character was unknown in the Christian Church about A.D. 100. The letters attributed to St. Ignatius, the martyr bishop of Antioch, are now universally admitted to be genuine by competent scholars. They may most reasonably be dated about A.D. 110, and they are deeply imbued with thought of a Johannine type. It has been lately suggested that this tendency of thought does not prove an actual acquaintance with the Gospel of St.

John. But when we find Christ {86} called "the Word," and the devil called "the prince of this world," and read such a phrase as "the bread of G.o.d which is the flesh of Christ," it is almost impossible to deny that the letters of Ignatius contain actual reminiscences of St. John's language. Nor is there the least reason why Ignatius should not have been acquainted with this Gospel. His younger contemporary St.

Polycarp, whose letter to the Philippians was also written about A.D.

110, quotes from the First Epistle of St. John. And Papias, who probably wrote about A.D. 130, and collected his materials many years earlier, also quoted that Epistle, as we learn from Eusebius. Now, the connection between the Gospel and the Epistle is, as has been cleverly remarked, like the connection between a star and its satellite. They are obviously the work of the same author. If Polycarp, who had himself seen St. John, knew that the Epistle was genuine, he must have known that the Gospel was genuine.

The evidence which can definitely be dated between A.D. 120 and A.D.

170 is of extreme interest. It proves conclusively that a belief in the authenticity of this Gospel was so firmly engrained in the Christian mind that men holding the most opposite opinions appealed to its authority. It is true that the "irrational" Alogi rejected it, and that Marcion repudiated it, not because it was not by an apostle, but because St. Paul was the only apostle whom he admired. But it was used by the Catholics, the Gnostics, and the Montanists. St. Justin Martyr was acquainted with it, and before he wrote, Basilides, the great Gnostic of Alexandria, borrowed from it some materials for his doctrine. The equally celebrated Gnostic Valentinus used it, and his followers also revered it. About A.D. 170 Heracleon, an eminent Valentinian, wrote a commentary upon this Gospel, of which commentary some fragments still remain. The Montanists arose in Phrygia about A.D. 157. Monta.n.u.s, their founder, endeavoured to revive the power of prophecy, and his followers maintained that "the Paraclete said more things in Monta.n.u.s than Christ {87} uttered in the Gospel." It can easily be proved that their teaching was an attempt to realize some of the promises of our Lord contained in St. John's Gospel. And the fact that the Montanists were strongly opposed to the Gnostics makes it all the more remarkable that both sects regarded this Gospel as so important. Somewhat before A.D. 170 St. John's Gospel was inserted by the great Syrian apologist, Tatian, in his _Diatessaron_, or harmony of the Gospels, and the apocryphal Acts of John composed near the same date contain unmistakable allusions to this Gospel.

The evidence of Irenaeus is the culminating proof of the genuineness of the Gospel according to St. John. He became Bishop of Lyons in A.D.

177, and remembered Polycarp, who suffered martyrdom at Smyrna in A.D.

156, at the age of eighty-six. Irenaeus, in writing to his friend Florinus, says, "I can describe the very place in which the blessed Polycarp used to sit when he discoursed, and his goings-out and his comings-in, and his manner of life, and his personal appearance, and the discourses which he held before the people, and how he would describe his intercourse with John and the rest who had seen the Lord, and how he would relate their words. And whatsoever things he had heard from them about the Lord and about His miracles, Polycarp, as having received them from eye-witnesses of the life of the Word, would relate, altogether in accordance with the Scriptures." [3]

Now, it is perfectly certain that Irenaeus, like his contemporaries Heracleon and Tatian, accepted the fourth Gospel as the work of the Apostle John. And can we believe that he would have thus accepted it, if it had not been acknowledged by his teacher Polycarp, who knew St.

John, and was nearly thirty years old at the time of St. John's death?

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[Sidenote: The Internal Evidence.]

The Gospel itself contains manifest tokens that it was written by a Jew of Palestine, by one who held no Gnostic heresy, and by a contemporary of our Lord.

I. _The author was a Jew and not a Gentile._

He makes frequent quotations from the Old Testament, and some of these quotations imply an acquaintance with the Hebrew. This is especially the case in the verse from the 41st Psalm (xiii. 18), and in that (xix.

37) from Zech. xii. 10, "They shall look on Him whom they pierced."

The Septuagint of Zech. xii. 10, translating from a different form of the Hebrew, has, instead of the words "whom they pierced," "because they mocked." It is, therefore, plain that John xiii. 18 is not derived from the Septuagint. The Gospel is also Hebraic in style. The sentences are broken up in a manner which is at variance with Greek idiom. Whereas in St. Luke's two writings the style becomes more Greek or more Hebraic in proportion to his writing independently or employing the writings of Jewish Christians, the style of this Gospel is the same throughout. We may particularly notice the Hebraic use of the word "and" to signify both "and" and "but" (_e.g._ in v. 39, 40, where "and ye will not come" means "but ye will not come"). We may also notice the correct use of certain Hebrew proper names: _e.g._ Judas is called "the son of Iscariot," showing that the writer did not regard the word Iscariot as the fixed name of Judas only, but knew that it might be applied to any man of Kerioth. In fact, the Greek of St. John is exactly like the English of a Scottish Highlander who has only spoken Gaelic in his earlier days, and, when he has acquired English, shows his origin by the continued use of a few Gaelic idioms and his knowledge of Highland proper names.

He shows a minute acquaintance with Jewish social and ceremonial customs. We may notice iii. 25; iv. 9, 27; vii. 2, 23, 37; x. 22; xi.

44; xix. 7, 31; and especially the waterpots (ii. 6), the purification previous to the Pa.s.sover (xi. 55), the fear {89} of our Lord's accusers to defile themselves by entering the praetorium (xviii. 28), and the Jewish method of embalming (xix. 40). Jewish opinions are faithfully reflected, _e.g._ as to the importance attached to the religious schools (vii. 15); the disparagement of the Jews of the "dispersion"

(vii. 35); the scorn felt by many Jews for the provincials of Galilee (i. 46; vii. 41, 52), and the idea of the soul's pre-existence (ix. 2).