The Gospels in the Second Century Part 11

Matt. v. 37. [Greek: kai] is inserted, as in Justin, by a, b, g, h, Syr. Crt. and Pst.

Luke x. 16. Justin has the reading [Greek: ho emou akouon akouei ton aposteilantos me]: so D, i, l (of the Old Latin) in place of [Greek: ho eme atheton k.t.l.]; in addition to it, E, a, b, Syr.

Crt. and Hel. &c.

Matt. vii. 22. [Greek: ou to so anomati ephagomen kai epiomen]

Justin; similarly Origen, four times, and Syr. Crt.

Luke xiii. 27. [Greek: anomias] for [Greek: adikias], D and Justin.

Matt. xiii. 43. [Greek: lampsosin] for [Greek: eklampsosin] with Justin, D, and Origen (twice).

Matt. xxv. 41. Of Justin's readings in this verse [Greek: hupagete] for [Greek: poreuesthe] is found also in [Hebrew: ?] and Hippolytus, [Greek: exoteron] for [Greek: aionion] in the cursive ma.n.u.script numbered 40 (Credner; I am unable to verify this), [Greek: ho haetoimasen ho pater mou] for [Greek: to haetoimasmenon]

D. 1, most Codd. of the Old Latin, Iren. Tert. Cypr. Hil. Hipp.

and Origen in the Latin translation.

Luke xii. 48. D, like Justin, has here [Greek: pleon] for [Greek: perissoteron] and also the compound form [Greek: apaitaesousin].

Luke xx. 24. Though in the main following (but loosely) the text of Luke, Justin has here [Greek: to nomisma], as Matt., instead of [Greek: daenarion]; so D.

Though it will be seen that Justin has thus much in common with D and the Old Latin version, it should be noticed that he has the verse, Luke xxii. 19, and especially the clause [Greek: touto poieite eis taen emaen anamnaesin] which is wanting in these authorities. On the other hand, he appears to have with them and other authorities, including Syr. Crt., the Agony in the Garden as given in Luke xxii, 43,44, which verses are omitted in MSS. of the best Alexandrine type. Luke xxiii. 34, Justin also has, with the divided support of the majority of Greek MSS. Vulgate, c, e, f, ff of the Old Latin, Syr. Crt. and Pst. &c. against B, D (prima manu), a, b, Memph. (MSS.) Theb.

These readings represent in the main a text which was undoubtedly current and widely diffused in the second century. 'Though no surviving ma.n.u.script of the Old Latin version dates before the fourth century and most of them belong to a still later age, yet the general correspondence of their text with that of the first Latin Fathers is a sufficient voucher for its high antiquity. The connexion subsisting between this Latin, version, the Curetonian Syriac and Codex Bezae, proves that the text of these doc.u.ments is considerably older than the vellum on which they are written.'

Such is Dr. Scrivener's verdict upon the cla.s.s of authorities with which Justin shows the strongest affinity, and he goes on to add; 'Now it may be said without extravagance that no set of Scriptural records affords a text less probable in itself, less sustained by any rational principles of external evidence, than that of Cod. D, of the Latin codices, and (so far as it accords with them) of Cureton's Syriac. Interpolations as insipid in themselves as unsupported by other evidence abound in them all.... It is no less true to fact than paradoxical in sound, that the worst corruptions to which the New Testament has ever been subjected originated within a hundred years after it was composed' [Endnote 135:1].

This is a point on which text critics of all schools are substantially agreed. However much they may differ in other respects, no one of them has ever thought of taking the text of the Old Syriac and Old Latin translations as the basis of an edition. There can be no question that this text belongs to an advanced, though early, stage of corruption.

At the same stage of corruption, then, Justin's quotations from the Gospels are found, and this very fact is a proof of the antiquity of originals so corrupted. The coincidences are too many and too great all to be the result of accident or to be accounted for by the parallel influence of the lost Gospels. The presence, for instance, of the reading [Greek: o haetoimasen ho pataer] for [Greek: to haetoimasmenon] in Irenaeus and Tertullian (who has both 'quem praeparavit deus' and 'praeparatum') is a proof that it was found in the canonical text at a date little later than Justin's. And facts such as this, taken together with the arguments which make it little less than certain that Justin had either mediately or immediately access to our Gospels, render it highly probable that he had a form of the canonical text before him.

And yet large as is the approximation to Justin's text that may be made without stirring beyond the bounds of attested readings within the Canon, I still retain the opinion previously expressed that he did also make use of some extra-canonical book or books, though what the precise doc.u.ment was the data are far too insufficient to enable us to determine. So far as the history of our present Gospels is concerned, I have only to insist upon the alternative that Justin either used those Gospels themselves or else a later work, of the nature of a harmony based upon them [Endnote 136:1]. The theory (if it is really held) that he was ignorant of our Gospels in any shape, seems to me, in view of the facts, wholly untenable.

CHAPTER V.

HEGESIPPUS--PAPIAS.

Dr. Lightfoot has rendered a great service to criticism by his masterly exposure of the fallacies in the argument which has been drawn from the silence of Eusebius in respect to the use of the Canonical Gospels by the early writers [Endnote 138:1]. The author of 'Supernatural Religion' is not to be blamed for using this argument. In doing so he has only followed in the wake of the Germans who have handed it on from one to the other without putting it to a test so thorough and conclusive as that which has now been applied [Endnote 138:2]. For the future, I imagine, the question has been set at rest and will not need to be reopened [Endnote 138:3].

Dr. Lightfoot has shown, with admirable fulness and precision, that the object of Eusebius was only to note quotations in the case of books the admission of which into the Canon had been or was disputed. In the case of works, such as the four Gospels, that were universally acknowledged, he only records what seem to him interesting anecdotes or traditions respecting their authors or the circ.u.mstances under which they were composed. This distinction Dr. Lightfoot has established, not only by a careful examination of the language of Eusebius, but also by comparing his statements with the actual facts in regard to writings that are still extant, and where we are able to verify his procedure. After thus testing the references in Eusebius to Clement of Rome, the Ignatian Epistles, Polycarp, Justin, Theophilus of Antioch, and Irenaeus, Dr. Lightfoot arrives, by a strict and ample induction, at the conclusion that the silence of Eusebius in respect to quotations from any canonical book is so far an argument _in its favour_ that it shows the book in question to have been generally acknowledged by the early Church. Instead of being a proof that the writer did not know the work in reference to which Eusebius is silent, the presumption is rather that he did, like the rest of the Church, receive it. Eusebius only records what seems to him specially memorable, except where the place of the work in or out of the Canon has itself to be vindicated.

But if this holds good, then most of what is said against the use of the Gospels by Hegesippus falls to the ground. Eusebius expressly says [Endnote 140:1] that Hegesippus made occasional use of the Gospel according to the Hebrews ([Greek: ek te tou kath'

Hebraious euangeliou ... tina t.i.thaesin]). But apart from the conclusion referred to above, the very language of Eusebius ([Greek: t.i.thaesin tina ek]) is enough to suggest that the use of the Gospel according to the Hebrews was subordinate and subsidiary. Eusebius can hardly have spoken in this way of '_the_ Gospel of which Hegesippus made use' in all the five books of his 'Memoirs.' The expression tallies exactly with what we should expect of a work used _in addition to_ but not _to the exclusion_ of our Gospels. The fact that Eusebius says nothing about these shows that his readers would take it for granted that Hegesippus, as an orthodox Christian, received them.

With this conclusion the fragments of the work of Hegesippus that have come down to us agree. The quotations made in them are explained most simply and naturally, on the a.s.sumption that our Gospels have been used. The first to which we come is merely an allusion to the narrative of Matt. ii; 'For Domitian feared the coming of the Christ as much as Herod.' Those therefore who take the statement of Eusebius to mean that Hegesippus used only the Gospel according to the Hebrews are compelled to seek for the account of the Ma.s.sacre of the Innocents in that Gospel. It appears however from Epiphanius that precisely this very portion of the first Gospel was wanting in the Gospel according to the Hebrews as used both by the Ebionites and by the Nazarenes. 'But if it be doubtful whether some forms of that Gospel contained the two opening chapters of Matthew, it is certain that Jerome found them in the version which he translated' [Endnote 141:1]. I am afraid that here, as in so many other cases, the words 'doubtful'

and 'certain' are used with very little regard to their meanings.

In support of the inference from Jerome, the author refers to De Wette, Schwegler, and an article in a periodical publication by Ewald. De Wette expressly says that the inference does _not_ follow ('Aus Comm. ad Matt. ii. 6 ... la.s.st sich _nicht_ schliessen da.s.s er hierbei das Evang. der Hebr. verglichen habe.... Nicht viel besser beweisen die St. ad Jes. xi. 1; ad Abac. iii. 3') [Endnote 141:2]. He thinks that the presence of these chapters in Jerome's copy cannot be satisfactorily proved, but is probable just from this allusion in Hegesippus--in regard to which De Wette simply follows the traditional, but, as we have seen, erroneous a.s.sumption that Hegesippus used only the Gospel according to the Hebrews. Schwegler [Endnote 141:3] gives no reasons, but refers to the pa.s.sages quoted from Jerome in Credner.

Credner, after examining these pa.s.sages, comes to the conclusion that 'the Gospel of the Nazarenes did _not_ contain the chapters' [Endnote 141:4]. Ewald's periodical I cannot refer to, but Hilgenfeld, after an elaborate review of the question, decides that the chapters were omitted [Endnote 141:5]. This is the only authority I can find for the 'certainty that Jerome found them' in his version.

On the whole, then, it seems decidedly more probable (certainties we cannot deal in) that the incident referred to by Hegesippus was missing from the Gospel according to the Hebrews. That Gospel therefore was not quoted by him, but, on the contrary, there is a presumption that he is quoting from the Canonical Gospel. The narrative of the parallel Gospel of St. Luke seems, if not to exclude the Ma.s.sacre of the Innocents, yet to imply an ignorance of it.

The next pa.s.sage that appears to be quotation occurs in the account of the death of James the Just; 'Why do ye ask me concerning Jesus the Son of Man? He too sits in heaven on the right hand of the great Power and will come on the clouds of heaven' ([Greek: Ti me eperotate peri Iaesou tou huiou tou anthropou? kai autos kathaetai en to ourano ek dexion taes megalaes dunameos, kai mellei erchesthai epi ton nephelon tou ouranou]). It seems natural to suppose that this is an allusion to Matt. xxvi. 64, [Greek: ap' arti opsesthe ton huion tou anthropou kathaemenon ek dexion taes dunameos, kai erchomenon epi ton vephelon tou ouranou]. The pa.s.sage is one that belongs to the triple synopsis, and the form in which it appears in Hegesippus shows a preponderating resemblance to the version of St. Matthew.

Mark inserts [Greek: kathaemenon] between [Greek: ek dexion] and [Greek: taes dunameos], while Luke thinks it necessary to add [Greek: tou theou]. The third Evangelist omits the phrase [Greek: epi ton nephelon tou ouranou], altogether, and the second subst.i.tutes [Greek: meta] for [Greek: epi]. In fact the phrase [Greek: epi ton vephelon] occurs in the New Testament only in St.

Matthew; the Apocalypse, like St. Mark, has [Greek: meta] and [Greek: epi] only with the singular.

In like manner, when we find Hegesippus using the phrase [Greek: prosopon ou lambaneis], this seems to be a reminiscence of Luke xx. 21, where the synoptic parallels have [Greek: blepeis].

A more decided reference to the third Gospel occurs in the dying prayer of St. James; [Greek: parakalo, kurie thee pater, aphes autois; ou gar oidasiti poiousin], which corresponds to Luke xxiii. 34, [Greek: pater, aphes autois; ou gar oidasin ti poiousin]. There is the more reason to believe that Hegesippus'

quotation is derived from this source that it reproduces the peculiar use of [Greek: aphienai] in the sense of 'forgive'

without an expressed object. Though the word is of very frequent occurrence, I find no other instance of this in the New Testament [Endnote 143:1], and the Clementine Homilies, in making the same quotation, insert [Greek: tas hamartias auton]. The saying is well known to be peculiar to St. Luke. There is perhaps a balance of evidence against its genuineness, but this is of little importance, as it undoubtedly formed part of the Gospel as early as Irenaeus, who wrote much about the same time as Hegesippus.

The remaining pa.s.sage occurs in a fragment preserved from Stepha.n.u.s Gobarus, a writer of the sixth century, by Photius, writing in the ninth. Referring to the saying 'Eye hath not seen,'

&c., Gobarus says 'that Hegesippus, an ancient and apostolical man, a.s.serts--he knows not why--that these words are vainly spoken, and that those who use them give the lie to the sacred writings and to our Lord Himself who said, "Blessed are your eyes that see and your ears that hear,"' &c. 'Those who use these words' are, we can hardly doubt, as Dr. Lightfoot after Routh has shown [Endnote 144:1], the Gnostics, though Hegesippus would seem to have forgotten I Cor. ii. 9. The anti-Pauline position a.s.signed to Hegesippus on the strength of this is, we must say, untenable.

But for the present we are concerned rather with the second quotation, which agrees closely with Matt. xiii. 26 ([Greek: humon de makarioi hoi ophthalmoi hoti blepousin, kai ta ota humon hoti akouousin]). The form of the quotation has a slightly nearer resemblance to Luke x. 23 ([Greek: makarioi hoi ophthalmoi hoi blepontes ha blepete k.t.l.]), but the marked difference in the remainder of the Lucan pa.s.sage increases the presumption that Hegesippus is quoting from the first Gospel [Endnote 144:2].

The use of the phrase [Greek: ton theion graphon] is important and remarkable. There is not, so far as I am aware, any instance of so definite an expression being applied to an apocryphal Gospel. It would tend to prepare us for the strong a.s.sertion of the Canon of the Gospels in Irenaeus; it would in fact mark the gradually culminating process which went on in the interval which separated Irenaeus from Justin. To this interval the evidence of Hegesippus must be taken to apply, because though writing like Irenaeus under Eleutherus (from 177 A.D.) he was his elder contemporary, and had been received with high respect in Rome as early as the episcopate of Anicetus (157-168 A.D.).

The relations in which Hegesippus describes himself as standing to the Churches and bishops of Corinth and Rome seem to be decisive as to his substantial orthodoxy. This would give reason to think that he made use of our present Gospels, and the few quotations that have come down to us confirm that view not inconsiderably, though by themselves they might not be quite sufficient to prove it.

There is one pa.s.sage that may be thought to point to an apocryphal Gospel, 'From these arose false Christs, false prophets, false apostles;' which recalls a sentence in the Clementines, 'For there shall be, as the Lord said, false apostles, false prophets, heresies, ambitions.' It is not, however, nearer to this than to the canonical parallel, Matt. xxiv. 24 ('There shall arise false Christs and false prophets').

2.

In turning from Hegesippus to Papias we come at last to what seems to be a definite and satisfactory statement as to the origin of two at least of the Synoptic Gospels, and to what is really the most enigmatic and tantalizing of all the patristic utterances.

Like Hegesippus, Papias may be described as 'an ancient and apostolic man,' and appears to have better deserved the t.i.tle. He is said to have suffered martyrdom under M. Aurelius about the same time as Polycarp, 165-167 A.D. [Endnote 145:1] He wrote a commentary on the Discourses or more properly Oracles of the Lord, from which Eusebius extracted what seemed to him 'memorable'

statements respecting the origin of the first and second Gospels.

'Matthew,' Papias said [Endnote 146:1], 'wrote the oracles ([Greek: ta logia]) in the Hebrew tongue, and every one interpreted them as he was able.' 'Mark, as the interpreter of Peter, wrote down accurately, though not in order, all that he remembered that was said or done by Christ. For he neither heard the Lord nor attended upon Him, but later, as I said, upon Peter, who taught according to the occasion and not as composing a connected narrative of the Lord's discourses; so that Mark made no mistake in writing down some things as he remembered them. For he took care of one thing, not to omit any of the particulars that he heard or to falsify any part of them.'

Let us take the second of these statements first. According to it the Gospel of St. Mark consisted of notes taken down, or rather recollected, from the teaching of Peter. It was not written 'in order,' but it was an original work in the sense that it was first put in writing by Mark himself, having previously existed only in an oral form.

Does this agree with the facts of the Gospel as it appears to us now? There is a certain ambiguity as to the phrase 'in order.' We cannot be quite sure what Papias meant by it, but the most natural conclusion seems to be that it meant chronological order. If so, the statement of Papias seems to be so far borne out that none of the Synoptic Gospels is really in exact chronological order; but, strange to say, if there is any in which an approach to such an order is made, it is precisely this of St. Mark. This appears from a comparison of the three Synoptics. From the point at which the second Gospel begins, or, in other words, from the Baptism to the Crucifixion, it seems to give the outline that the other two Gospels follow [Endnote 147:1]. If either of them diverges from it for a time it is only to return. The early part of St. Matthew is broken up by the intrusion of the so-called Sermon on the Mount, but all this time St. Mark is in approximate agreement with St.

Luke. For a short s.p.a.ce the three Gospels go together. Then comes a second break, where Luke introduces his version of the Sermon on the Mount. Then the three rejoin and proceed together, Matthew being thrown out by the way in which he has collected the parables into a single chapter, and Luke later by the place which he has a.s.signed to the incident at Nazareth. After this Matthew and Mark proceed side by side, Luke dropping out of the ranks. At the confession of Peter he takes his place again, and there is a close agreement in the order of the three narratives. The incident of the miracle-worker is omitted by Matthew, and then comes the insertion of a ma.s.s of extraneous matter by Luke. When he resumes the thread of the common narrative again all three are together.

The insertion of a single parable on the part of Matthew, and omissions on the part of Luke, are the only interruptions. There is an approximate agreement of all three, we may say, for the rest of the narrative. We observe throughout that, in by far the preponderating number of instances, where Matthew differs from the order of Mark, Luke and Mark agree, and where Luke differs from the order of Mark, Matthew and Mark agree. Thus, for instance, in the account of the healings in Peter's house and of the paralytic, in the relation of the parables of Mark iv. 1-34 to the storm at sea which follows, of the healing of Jairus' daughter to that of the Gadarene demoniac and to the mission of the Twelve in the place of Herod's reflections (Mark vi. 14-16), in the warning against the Scribes and the widow's mite (Mark xii. 38-44), the second and third Synoptics are allied against the first. On the other hand, in the call of the four chief Apostles, the death of the Baptist, the walking on the sea, the miracles in the land of Gennesareth, the washing of hands, the Canaanitish woman, the feeding of the four thousand and the discourses which follow, the ambition of the sons of Zebedee, the anointing at Bethany, and several insertions of the third Evangelist in regard to the last events, the first two are allied against him. While Mark thus receives such alternating support from one or other of his fellow Evangelists, I am not aware of any clear case in which, as to the order of the narratives, they are, united and he is alone, unless we are to reckon as such his insertion of the incident of the fugitive between Matt. xxvi. 56, 57, Luke xxii. 53, 54.

It appears then that, so far as there is an order in the Synoptic Gospels, the normal type of that order is to be found precisely in St. Mark, whom Papias alleges to have written not in order.

But again there seems to be evidence that the Gospel, in the form in which it has come down to us, is not original but based upon another doc.u.ment previously existing. When we come to examine closely its verbal relations to the other two Synoptics, its normal character is in the main borne out, but still not quite completely. The number of particulars in which Matthew and Mark agree together against Luke, or Mark and Luke agree together against Matthew, is far in excess of that in which Matthew and Luke are agreed against Mark. Mark is in most cases the middle term which unites the other two. But still there remains a not inconsiderable residuum of cases in which Matthew and Luke are in combination and Mark at variance. The figures obtained by a not quite exact and yet somewhat elaborate computation [Endnote 149:1]

are these; Matthew and Mark agree together against Luke in 1684 particulars, Luke and Mark against Matthew in 944, but Matthew and Luke against Mark in only 334. These 334 instances are distributed pretty evenly over the whole of the narrative. Thus (to take a case at random) in the parallel narratives Matt. xii. 1-8, Mark ii. 23-28, Luke vi. 1-5 (the plucking of the ears on the Sabbath day), there are fifty-one points (words or parts of words) common to all three Evangelists, twenty-three are common only to Mark and Luke, ten to Mark and Matthew, and eight to Matthew and Luke. In the next section, the healing of the withered hand, twenty points are found alike in all three Gospels, twenty-seven in Mark and Luke, twenty-one in Mark and Matthew, and five in Matthew and Luke. Many of these coincidences between the first and third Synoptics are insignificant in the extreme. Thus, in the last section referred to (Mark iii. 1-6=Matt. xii. 9-14=Luke vi. 6-11), one is the insertion of the article [Greek: taen] ([Greek: sunagogaen]), one the insertion of [Greek: sou] ([Greek: taen cheira sou]), two the use of [Greek: de] for [Greek: kai], and one that of [Greek: eipen] for [Greek: legei]. In the paragraph before, the eight points of coincidence between Matthew and Luke are made up thus, two [Greek: kai aesthion] (=[Greek kai esthiein]), [Greek: eipon] (=[Greek: eipan]), [Greek: poiein, eipen, met' autou] (=[Greek: sun auto]), [Greek: monous] (=[Greek: monois]). But though such points as these, if they had been few in number, might have been pa.s.sed without notice, still, on the whole, they reach a considerable aggregate and all are not equally unimportant. Thus, in the account of the healing of the paralytic, such phrases is [Greek epi klinaes, apaelthen eis ton oikon autou], can hardly have come into the first and third Gospels and be absent from the second by accident; so again the clause [Greek: alla ballousin (blaeteon) oinon neon eis askous kainous]. In the account of the healing of the b.l.o.o.d.y flux the important word [Greek: tou kraspedou] is inserted in Matthew and Luke but not in Mark; in that of the mission of the twelve Apostles, the two Evangelists have, and the single one has not, the phrase [Greek: kai therapeuein noson (nosous]), and the still more important clause [Greek: lego humin anektoteron estai (gae) Sodomon ... en haemera ... ae tae polei ekeinae]: in Luke ix. 7 (= Matt. xiv. 1) Herod's t.i.tle is [Greek: tetrarchaes], in Mark vi. 14 [Greek: basileus]; in the succeeding paragraph [Greek: hoi ochloi aekolouthaesan] and the important [Greek: to perisseuon (-san)]

are wanting in the intermediate Gospel; in the first prophecy of the Pa.s.sion it has [Greek: apo] where the other two have [Greek: hupo], and [Greek: meta treis haemeras] where they have [Greek: tae tritae haemera]: in the healing of the lunatic boy it omits the noticeable [Greek: kai diestrammenae]: in the second prophecy of the Pa.s.sion it omits [Greek: mellei], in the paragraph about offences, [Greek: elthein ta skandala ...ouai...di hou erchetai].

These points might be easily multiplied as we go on; suffice it to say that in the aggregate they seem to prove that the second Gospel, in spite of its superior originality and adhesion to the normal type, still does not entirely adhere to it or maintain its primary character throughout. The theory that we have in the second Gospel one of the primitive Synoptic doc.u.ments is not tenable.

No doubt this is an embarra.s.sing result. The question is easy to ask and difficult to answer--If our St. Mark does not represent the original form of the doc.u.ment, what does represent it? The original doc.u.ment, if not quite like our Mark, must have been very nearly like it; but how did any writer come to reproduce a previous work with so little variation? If he had simply copied or reproduced it without change, that would have been intelligible; if he had added freely to it, that also would have been intelligible: but, as it is, he seems to have put in a touch here and made an erasure there on principles that it is difficult for us now to follow. We are indeed here at the very _crux_ of Synoptic criticism.