BS 2393 .L5 1893 Lightfoot, Joseph Barber,
1828-1889. Biblical essays
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BY THE LATE
J. B. “LIGHTFOOT, D.D., D.C.L, LLD., LORD BISHOP OF DURHAM.
PUBLISHED BY THE TRUSTEES OF THE LIGHTFOOT FUND.
London:
MACMILLAN AND CO. AND NEW YORK. 1893
[All Rights reserved.]
Cambridge : PRINTED BY C. J. CLAY, M.A, AND SONS,
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.
INTRODUCTORY NOTE.
BOUT one-third of the present volume has already seen the light. The opening essay ‘On the Internal Evidence
for the Authenticity and Genuineness of St John’s Gospel’ was published in the ‘ Expositor’ in the early months of 1890, and has been reprinted since; the essay ‘On the Mission of Titus to the Corinthians’ appeared in the ‘Journal of Sacred and Classical Philology’ nearly thirty years ago, while the ninth essay ‘On the Structure and Destination of the Epistle to the Romans’ consists of three famous articles contributed within the years 1869 and 1871 to the ‘Journal of Philology,’ two by Dr Lightfoot and one by Dr Hort. Beginning with a criticism of M. Renan’s theory that our present Epistle to the Romans represents no less than four letters addressed to different Churches, Dr Lightfoot proceeded to formulate a counter- theory of an original letter (our complete Epistle) addressed to the Church of Rome, and a shorter recension of a more general character reissued by the Apostle at a later period and intended for a wider circle of readers. This theory did not commend itself to Dr Hort, and his criticism of Dr Lightfoot’s arguments and Dr Lightfoot’s reply, which form the second and third of the articles in question, are published herewith, while for a restatement of Dr Hort’s view the reader is referred to the ‘Notes on Selected Readings’ which form an appendix to the Introduction to the edition of the New Testament edited by
vi INTRODUCTORY NOTE.
Drs Westcott and Hort. A singular pathos attaches to the republication of these articles in the thought that he who so recently gave his consent to their insertion in this volume, and whose counsel was so reverently listened to by his co-trustees, has been called to his rest, before the volume has passed into circulation.
And the pathos of the situation is only increased as we turn to the main part of the volume, to that which appears in print for the first time. When in 1879 Dr Lightfoot was called away from Cambridge to undertake the Bishopric of Durham, apprehension was felt and expressed in many quarters that the continual claims of diocesan engagements would seriously impair his literary productiveness. How heroically he struggled to belie this anticipation is well known. But the marvellous steadfastness of purpose with which he devoted to literary work every available moment which could be snatched from official duties can be fully appreciated by those only who had the privilege of watching the great bishop’s life from day to day. By sheer strength of will he completed the five massive volumes on the Apostolic Fathers. But the issue of commentaries on St Paul's Epistles was checked absolutely. From time to time rumours were circulated that some par- ticular commentary was in progress, nay more, in type and within a measurable distance of publication; but alas! these surmises were entirely devoid of foundation. The Bishop was heard more than once to declare that, his edition of the Apostolic Fathers finished, he hoped with what leisure he could secure in two years to be able to bring out a commentary upon any one of the Pauline Epistles on which he had lectured when at Cambridge. But the necessary relief from pressure never came, and after his death it was found, as had been anticipated
1 The New Testament in the original Greek (1881), vol. 2, Appendix, pp. 100 sq.
INTRODUCTORY NOTE. Vil
by those who knew his methods, that the notes on the New Testament had remained untouched since the day when he left Cambridge for Auckland Castle. There were moreover sad gaps in the commentaries and in the introductory matter, sketches of work which had never been filled in, and jottings which needed the master-mind of the writer to interpret them adequately. In accordance therefore with a report furnished to the Trustees by Dr Hort, it was decided to abandon all attempts to bring out a complete edition of any epistle on the lines of the published commentaries, and instead to gather into one volume such of the prolegomena as it was possible to pub- lish, reserving for another volume selections from commentaries on the text which appeared to be fullest and most valuable. The present volume of ‘ Biblical Essays’ represents the first of these undertakings. The contents can easily be assigned to the places which they would have occupied had the Bishop been able to complete his projected series of commentaries on all the Pauline Epistles. The second and third essays on St John’s Gospel form part of a subject which, as he tells us himself, he considered to have ‘passed into other and better hands, and they would probably never have been published by Dr Lightfoot himself. The next four essays were intended to appear as excursuses in the Commentary on the Thessalonians ; the three which follow would have supplied material for introductions to the Epistles to the Corinthians, Romans and Ephesians respectively, while the last two would have found a place in an edition of the Pastoral Epistles.
To edit the writings of one who is no longer at hand to explain and to correct must always present grave difficulties ; but when the material to be edited is to appear as the work of a scholar of the widest reputation for learning and accuracy, to venture upon the task is little short of presumption. In the present instance the difficulty is enhanced by Dr Lightfoot’s
vill INTRODUCTORY NOTE.
method of work, to which the present Bishop of Durham draws attention in his prefatory note to the posthumous edition of St Clement of Rome. Possessed of a remarkably retentive memory, he preferred to trust to outlines, rather than write out in full what he intended to deliver in the lecture-room. Accordingly, in those essays which are described as printed from lecture-notes, it has been found necessary to frame into sentences page after page which, in the original notes, exists only in the briefest summary. It is inevitable therefore, that in places the Bishop’s meaning will have been obscurely ex- pressed, if not entirely missed. That this inadequacy of treatment is not more glaring is due to the kindness of those who, in response to the appeal of the Trustees, have placed their notes of Dr Lightfoot’s professorial lectures at the dis- posal of the editor. The cordial thanks of the Trustees are tendered to the Rev. G. F. Browne, Canon of St Paul’s, to W. P. Turnbull, Esq., formerly Fellow of Trinity College and now one of Her Majesty’s Inspectors of Schools, to the Rey. H. F. Gore-Booth, Rector of Sacred Trinity, Salford, for the loan of their valuable notes; and to the Rev. W. E. Barnes, Fellow and Lecturer of St Peter’s College, for kind assistance in looking over the proof-sheets of the third essay.
As some of the lectures were delivered at Cambridge on more than one occasion, it may be well to state that the date placed at the end of each essay represents the year of delivery, after which apparently no fresh material was added in the notes in writing.
In conclusion, the Trustees desire to thank the officers and workmen of the University Press for intelligent criticism and for unfailing courtesy during the time that these sheets have
been passing through the press. J. R.
Corpus Cunisi1 CoLLeGr, CAMBRIDGE. July 15, 1893.
EXTRACT FROM THE LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT OF THE LATE JOSEPH BARBER LIGHTFOOT, LoRD BisHoP oF DURHAM.
“TJ bequeath all my personal Estate not hereinbefore other- “wise disposed of unto [my Executors] upon trust to pay and “transfer the same unto the Trustees appointed by me under “and by virtue of a certain Indenture of Settlement creating a “Trust to be known by the name of ‘The Lightfoot Fund for ‘the Diocese of Durham’ and bearing even date herewith but “executed by me immediately before this my Will to be ad- “ministered and dealt with by them upon the trusts for the “purposes and in the manner prescribed by such Indenture of
“ Settlement.”
EXTRACT FROM THE INDENTURE OF SETTLEMENT OF ‘THE LIGHTFOOT FUND FOR THE DIOCESE OF DURHAM.’
“WHEREAS the Bishop is the Author of and is absolutely “entitled to the Copyright in the several Works mentioned in “the Schedule hereto, and for the purposes of these presents he “has assigned or intends forthwith to assign the Copyright in “all the said Works to the Trustees. Now the Bishop doth “hereby declare and it is hereby agreed as follows :—
“The Trustees (which term shall hereinafter be taken to
“include the Trustees for the time being of these presents)
x EXTRACT FROM BISHOP LIGHTFOOT’S WILL.
“shall stand possessed of the said Works and of the Copyright “ therein respectively upon the trusts following (that is to say) “upon trust to receive all moneys to arise from sales or other- “wise from the said Works, and at their discretion from time “to time to bring out new editions of the same Works or any “ of them, or to sell the copyright in the same or any of them, “or otherwise to deal with the same respectively, it being the “intention of these presents that the Trustees shall have and “may exercise all such rights and powers in respect of the said “Works and the copyright therein respectively, as they could “or might have or exercise in relation thereto if they were the “absolute beneficial owners thereof...
“The Trustees shall from time to time, at such discretion as “aforesaid, pay and apply the income of the Trust funds for or “towards the erecting, rebuilding, repairing, purchasing, en- “dowing, supporting, or providing for any Churches, Chapels, “Schools, Parsonages, and Stipends for Clergy, and other Spiri- “tual Agents in connection with the Church of England and “ within the Diocese of Durham, and also for or towards such “other purposes in connection with the said Church of England, “and within the said Diocese, as the Trustees may in their ab- “solute discretion think fit, provided always that any payment “for erecting any building, or in relation to any other works in “connection with real estate, shall be exercised with due regard “to the Law of Mortmain; it being declared that nothing here- “in shall be construed as intended to authorise any act contrary “to any Statute or other Law....
“Tn case the Bishop shall at any time assign to the Trustees “any Works hereafter to be written or published by him, or “any Copyrights, or any other property, such transfer shall be
“held to be made for the purposes of this Trust, and all the
EXTRACT FROM BISHOP LIGHTFOOTS WILL. x1
“provisions of this Deed shall apply to such property, subject “nevertheless to any direction concerning the same which the “ Bishop may make in writing at the time of such transfer, and “an case the Bishop shall at any time pay any money, or trans- “fer any security, stock, or other like property to the Trustees, “the same shall in hike manner be held for the purposes of this “Trust, subject to any such contemporaneous direction as afore- “said, and any security, stock or property so transferred, being “of a nature which can lawfully be held by the Trustees for the “purposes of these presents, may be retained by the Trustees, “although the same may not be one of the securities herein- “after authorised.
“The Bishop of Durham and the Archdeacons of Durham “and Auckland for the time being shall be ex-officio Trustees, “and accordingly the Bishop and Archdeacons, parties hereto, “and the succeeding Bishops and Archdeacons, shall cease to be “Trustees on ceasing to hold their respective offices, and the “number of the other Trustees may be increased, and the power “of appointing Trustees in the place of Trustees other than “ Official Trustees, and of appointing extra Trustees, shall be “exercised by Deed by the Trustees for the time being, pro- “vided always that the number shall not at any time be less “than five.
“The Trust premises shall be known by the name of ‘The “ Lightfoot Fund for the Diocese of Durham.’ ”
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TABLE OF CONTENTS.
INTERNAL EVIDENCE FOR THE AUTHENTICITY GENUINENESS OF St JoHN’s GOSPEL
Reprinted from the ‘Expositor’ of January, February, March, 1890.
EXTERNAL EVIDENCE FOR THE AUTHENTICITY GENUINENESS OF St JOHN’s GOSPEL
Printed from Lecture-notes,
INTERNAL EVIDENCE FOR THE AUTHENTICITY GENUINENESS OF St JOHN’S GOSPEL. . ADDITIONAL NOTES
Printed from Lecture-notes.
St Paut’s PREPARATION FOR THE MINISTRY
Printed from Lecture-notes.
AND
AND
AND
THE CHRONOLOGY oF St Paut’s LIFE AND EPISTLES.
Printed from Lecture-notes.
Tar CHURCHES OF MAcEDONIA . :
Printed from Lecture-notes.
THe CHURCH OF THESSALONICA . 4
Printed from Lecture-notes.
PAGE 1—44 45—122 123—193 194—198 199—211 213—233 235—250 251—269
X1V TABLE OF CONTENTS.
VIII. Tue Mission or Titus T0 THE CORINTHIANS Reprinted from the ‘Journal of Sacred and Classical Philology,’ Vol. 11. p. 194 sq. (1855).
TX. THe SrrucruRE AND DESTINATION OF THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS . : . ; : : : M. Renan’s THEORY OF THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS Reprinted from the ‘Journal of Philology,’ Vol. m. p. 264 sq. (1869).
On tHE END oF THE EPISTLE To THE Romans. By Dr Horr
Reprinted from the ‘Journal of Philology,’ Vol. 111. p. 51 sq. (1871). THE EPiIstLE TO THE ROMANS
Reprinted from the ‘Journal of Philology,’ Vol. ru. p. 193 sq. (1871).
X. THE DESTINATION OF THE EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS
Printed from Lecture-notes.
XI. Tue Date or THE PastoRAL EPISTLES ADDITIONAL Nove.
Printed from Lecture-notes.
XII. Sr Pavr’s Hisrory AFTER THE CLOSE OF THE ACTS
Printed from Lecture-notes.
INDICES .
271—284
285—374 287—320
321—351
352—374
375—396
397—410 411—418
419—437
439—459
I.
INTERNAL EVIDENCE FOR THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS OF ST JOHN’S GOSPEL.
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Baprinted from the « Rpositos? of January, February,
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INTERNAL EVIDENCE FOR THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS OF ST JOHN’S GOSPEL.
ees lecture originally formed one of a series connected
with Christian evidences, and delivered in St George’s Hall in 1871. The other lectures were published shortly afterwards; but, not having been informed beforehand that publication was expected, I withheld my own from the volume. It seemed to me that in the course of a single lecture I could only touch the fringes of a great subject, and that injustice would be done by such imperfect treatment as alone time and opportunity allowed. Moreover I was then, and for some terms afterwards, engaged in lecturing on this Gospel at Cambridge, and I entertained the hope that I might be able to deal with the subject less inadequately if I gave myself more time. Happily it passed into other and better hands, and I was relieved from this care.
A rumour got abroad at the time, and has (I am informed) been since repeated, that I did not allow the lecture to be published, because I was dissatisfied with it. I was only dissatisfied in the sense which I have already explained. It could not be otherwise than unsatisfactory to bring forward mere fragmentary evidence of an important conclusion, when there was abundant proof in the background. The present publication of the lecture is my answer to this rumour. I give it after eighteen years exactly in the same form in which it was originally written, with the exception of a few verbal
1—2
4 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
alterations. Looking over it again after this long lapse of time, I have nothing to withdraw. Additional study has only strengthened my conviction that this narrative of St John could not have been written by any one but an eye-witness.
As I have not dealt with the external evidence except for the sake of supplying a statement of the position of antagonists, the treatment suffers less than it would otherwise have done from not being brought down to date. I have mentioned by way of illustration two respects in which later discoveries had falsified Baur’s contentions. The last eighteen years would supply several others. I will single out three: (1) The antago- nists of the Ignatian Epistles are again put on their defence. The arguments which were adduced against the genuineness of these epistles will hold no longer. Ignatius has the testimony of his friend and contemporary Polycarp, and Polycarp has the testimony of his own personal disciple Ireneus. The testimony of Irenzeus is denied by no one; the testimony of Polycarp is only denied because it certifies to the Ignatian letters. Before we are prepared to snap this chain of evidence rudely, and to break with an uninterrupted tradition, we require far stronger reasons than have been hitherto adduced. (2) Justin Martyr wrote before or about the middle of the second century. His use of the Fourth Gospel was at one time systematically denied by the impugners of its apostolic authorship. Now it is acknowledged almost universally, even by those who do not allow that this evangelical narrative was written by St John himself. (3) The Diatessaron of Tatian was written about A.D. 170, and consisted of a ‘Harmony of Four Gospels.’ Baur and others contended that at all events St John was not one of the four. Indeed how could it be? For it had not been written, or only recently written, at this time. The Diatessaron itself has been discovered, and a commentary of Ephraem Syrus upon it in Armenian has likewise been unearthed within the last few years, both showing that it began with the opening words of St John.
[1889.]
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. )
The fourth of our canonical gospels has been ascribed by the tradition of the Church to St John the son of Zebedee, the personal disciple of our Lord, and one of the twelve apostles. Till within a century (I might almost say, till within a genera- tion) of the present time, this has been the universal belief— with one single and unimportant exception—of all ages, of all churches, of all sects, of all individuals alike.
This unanimity is the more remarkable in the earlier ages of the Church, because the language of this gospel has a very intimate bearing on numberless theological controversies which started up in the second, third, and fourth centuries of the Christian era; and it was therefore the direct interest of one party or other to deny the apostolic authority, if they had any ground for doing so. This happened not once or twice only, but many times. It would be difficult to point to a single heresy promulgated before the close of the fourth century, which might not find some imaginary points of coincidence or some real points of conflict—some relations whether of antago- nism or of sympathy—with this gospel. This was equally true of Montanism in the second century, and of Arianism in the fourth. The Fourth Gospel would necessarily be among the most important authorities—we might fairly say the most important authority—in the settlement of the controversy, both from the claims which it made as a product of the beloved apostle himself, and from the striking representations which it gives of our Lord’s teaching. The defender or the impugner of this or that theological opinion would have had a direct interest in disproving its genuineness and denying its authority. Can we question that this would have been done again and again, if there had been any haze of doubt hanging over its origin, if the antagonist could have found even a prima facie ground for an attack ?
And this brings me to speak of that one exception to the universal tradition to which I have already alluded. Once, and once only, did the disputants in a theological controversy yield to the temptation, strong though it must have been. A small,
6 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
unimportant, nameless sect—if indeed they were compact enough to form a sect—in the latter half of the second century, denied that the Gospel and the Apocalypse were written by St John. These are the two canonical writings which especially attribute the title of the Word of God, the Logos, to our Lord: the one, in the opening verses, ‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God’; the other, in the vision of Him who rides on the white horse, whose garments are stained with blood, and whose name is given as the ‘ Word of God.’ To dispose of the doctrine they discredited the writings. Epiphanius calls them Alogi, ‘the opponents of the Word,’ or (as it might be translated, for it is capable of a double meaning) ‘the irrational ones.’ The name is avowedly his own invention. Indeed they would scarcely have acknowledged a title which had this double sense, and could have been so easily turned against themselves. They appear only to disappear. Beyond one or two casual allusions, they are not mentioned ; they have no place in history.
This is just one of those exceptions which strengthen the rule. What these Alogi did, numberless other sectaries and heretics would doubtless have done, if there had been any sufficient ground for the course. But even these Alogi lend no countenance to the views of modern objectors. Modern critics play off the Apocalypse against the Gospel, allowing the genuineness of the former, and using it to impugn the genuine- ness of the latter. Moreover there is the greatest difference between the two. The modern antagonist places the composi- tion of the Fourth Gospel in the middle or the latter half of the second century; these ancient heretics ascribed it to the early heresiarch Cerinthus, who lived at the close of the first century, and was a contemporary of St John. Living themselves in the latter half of the second century, they knew (as their opponents would have reminded them, if they had found it convenient to forget the fact) that the Gospel was not a work of yesterday, that it had already a long history, and that it went back at all events to the latest years of the apostolic age; and in their
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS— 1. 7
theory they were obliged to recognise this fact. I need hardly say that the doctrine of the Person of Christ put forward in the Gospel and the Apocalypse is diametrically opposed to the teaching of Cerinthus, as every modern critic would allow. I only allude to this fact, to show that these very persons, who form the single exception to the unanimous tradition of all the churches and all the sects alike, are our witnesses for the antiquity of the Gospel (though not for its authenticity), and therefore are witnesses against the modern impugners of its genuineness.
With this exception, the early testimony to the authen- ticity and genuineness of the Gospel is singularly varied. It is a remarkable and an important fact, that the most decisive and earliest testimony comes, not from Fathers of the orthodox Church, but from heretical writers. I cannot enter upon this question at length, for I did not undertake this afternoon to speak of the external evidence; and I ask you to bear in mind, that any inadequate and cursory treatment necessarily does a great injustice to a subject like this; for the ultimate effect of testimony must depend on its fulness and variety. I only call attention to the fact that within the last few years most valuable additions have been made to this external testimony, and these from the opposite extremes of the heretical scale. At the one extreme we have Hbionism, which was the offspring of Judaizing ten- dencies; at the other, Gnosticism, which took its rise in Gentile license of speculation and practice. Ebionism is represented by a remarkable extant work belonging to the second century, possibly to the first half of the second century, the Clementine Homilies. The greater part of this work has long been known, but until within the last few years the printed text was taken from a MS. mutilated at the end; so that of the twenty Homilies the last half of the nineteenth and the whole of the twentieth are wanting. These earlier Homilies contained more than one reference to gospel history which could not well be referred to any of the three first evangelists, and seemed certainly to have
8 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
been taken from the fourth. Still the reference was not abso- lutely certain, and the impugners of St John’s Gospel availed themselves of this doubt to deny the reference to this gospel. At length, in the year 1853, Dressel published for the first time, from a Vatican MS., the missing conclusion of these Homilies; and this was found to contain a reference to the incidents attending the healing of the man born blind, related only by St John, and related in a way distinctly characteristic of St John—a reference so distinct, that no one from that time has attempted to deny or to dispute it.
So much for the testimony of Ebionism—of the Judaic sects of early Christianity. But equally definite, and even more full, is the testimony which recent discovery has brought to light on the side of Gnosticism. Many of my hearers will remember the interest which was excited a few years ago by the publication of a lost treatise on heresies, which Bunsen and others ascribed (and, as is now generally allowed, correctly ascribed) to Hippolytus, in the earlier part of the third century. This treatise contains large and frequent extracts from previous Gnostic writers of diverse schools—Ophites, Basilideans, Valen- tinians ; among them, from a work which Hippolytus quotes as the production of Basilides himself, who flourished about A.D. 130-140. And in these extracts are abundant quotations from the Gospel of St John.
I have put these two recent accessions to the external testimony in favour of the Fourth Gospel side by side, because, emanating from the most diverse quarters, they have a peculiar value, as showing the extensive circulation and wide reception of this gospel at a very early date; and because also, having been brought to light soon after its genuineness was for the first time seriously impugned, they seem providentially destined to furnish an answer to the objections of recent criticism.
If we ask ourselves why we attribute this or that ancient writing to the author whose name it bears—why, for instance, we accept this tragedy as a play of Sophocles, or that speech as an oration of Demosthenes,—our answer will be, that it bears
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. 9
the name of the author, and (so far as we know) has always been ascribed to him. In very many cases we know nothing, or next to nothing, about the history of the writing in question. In a few instances we are fortunate enough to find a reference to it, or a quotation from it, in some author who lived a century or two later. The cases are exceptionally rare when there is an indisputable allusion in a contemporary, or nearly contemporary, writer. For the most part, we accept the fact of the authorship, because it comes to us on the authority of a MS. or MSS. written several centuries after the presumed author lived, supported in some cases by quotations in a late lexicographer, or grammarian, or collection of extracts.
The external testimony in favour of St John’s Gospel reaches back much nearer to the writer’s own time and is far more extensive than can be produced in the case of most classical writings of the same antiquity. From the character of the work also, this testimony gains additional value ; for where the contents of a book intimately affect the cherished beliefs and the practical conduct of all who receive it, the universality of its reception, amidst jarring creeds and conflicting tendencies, is far more significant than if its contents are indifferent, making no appeal to the religious convictions, and claiming no influence over the life. We may be disposed to complain that the ex- ternal testimony is not so absolutely and finally conclusive in itself that no door is open for hesitation, that all must, despite themselves, accept it, and that any investigation into the in- ternal evidence is superfluous and vain. But this we have no right to demand. If it is as great, and more than as great, as would satisfy us in any other case, this should suffice us. In all the most important matters which affect our interests in this world and our hopes hereafter, God has left some place for diversity of opinion, because He would not remove all oppor- tunity of self-discipline.
If then the genuineness of this gospel is supported by greater evidence than in ordinary cases we consider conclusive, we approach the investigation of its internal character with a
10 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
very strong presumption in its favour. The onus probandi rests with those who would impugn its genuineness, and nothing short of the fullest and most decisive marks of spuriousness can fairly be considered sufficient to counterbalance this evidence.
As I proceed, I hope to make it clear that, allowing their full weight to all the difficulties (and it would be foolish to deny the existence of difficulties) in this gospel, still the internal marks of authenticity and genuineness are so minute, so varied, so circumstantial, and so unsuspicious, as to create an over- whelming body of evidence in its favour.
But before entering upon this investigation, it may be worth while to inquire whether the hypotheses suggested by those who deny the genuineness of this gospel are themselves free from all difficulties. For if it be a fact (as I believe it is) that any alternative which has been proposed introduces greater perplexities than those which it is intended to remove, we are bound (irrespective of any positive arguments in its favour) to fall back upon the account which is exposed to fewest objections, and which at the same time is supported by a continuous and universal tradition.
We may take our start from Baur’s theory, for he was the first to develop and systematize the attack on the genuineness of the Fourth Gospel. According to Baur it was written about the year 170. The external testimony however is alone fatal to this very late epoch; for, after all wresting of evidence and post-dating of documents, it is impossible to deny that at this time the gospel was, not only in existence, but also received far and wide as a genuine document; that it was not only quoted occasionally, but had even been commented upon as the actual work of St John. Consequently the tendency of later impugners has been to push the date farther back, and to recede from the extreme position of this, its most determined and ablest anta- gonist. Hilgenfeld, who may be regarded as the successor of Baur, and the present representative of the Tiibingen school (though it has no longer its headquarters at Tiibingen), would place its composition about the year 150; and Tayler, who a
—
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. ti
few years ago (1867) reproduced the argument of Baur and others in England, is disposed to assign it to about the same date. With a strange inconsistency he suggests, towards the close of his book, that its true author may have been John the presbyter, though John the presbyter is stated by Papias (who had conversed with this John, and from whom all the informa- tion we possess respecting him is derived) to have been a personal disciple of our Lord, and therefore could hardly have been older than John the apostle, and certainly could not have been living towards the middle of the second century.
This tendency to recede nearer and nearer to the evangelist’s own age shows that the che pressure. of facts has be egun to tell on the theories of antagonistic criticism, and we may look forward to the time when it will be held discreditable to the reputation of any critic for sobriety and judgment to assign to this gospel any later date than the end of the first century, or the very
beginning of the second.
But meanwhile, let us take the earliest of these dates (A.D, 150) as less encumbered with difficulties, and therefore more favourable to the opponents of its genuineness, and ask whether a gospel written at such a time would probably have presented the phenomena which we actually find in the fourth canonical gospel. We may interrogate alike its omissions and its contents. On this hypothesis, how are we to account for what it has left unsaid, and for what it has said ?
Certainly it must be regarded as a remarkable phenomenon, that on many ecclesiastical questions which then agitated the minds of Christians it is wholly silent, while to others it gives no distinct and authoritative answer. Our Lord’s teaching has indeed its bearing on the controversies of the second century, as on those of the fourth, or of the twelfth, or of the sixteenth, or of the nineteenth: but, as in these latter instances, its lessons are inferential rather than direct, they are elicited by painful investigation, they are contained implicitly in our Lord’s life and person, they do not lie on the surface, nor do they offer definite solutions of definite difficulties.
12 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
Take, for instance, the dispute concerning the episcopate. Contrast the absolute silence of this gospel respecting this institution with the declarations in the Epistles of Ignatius. A modern defender of the episcopate will appeal to the commission given to the apostles (John xx. 22, 23). I need not stop here to inquire to what extent it favours his views. But obviously it is quite insufficient by itself. It would serve almost equally well for an apostolically ordained ministry of any kind, for a presbyteral as for an episcopal succession. Is it possible that a writer, composing a gospel at the very time when the authority of this office had been called in question, if a supporter of the power of the episcopate, would have resisted the temptation of inserting something which would convey a sanction, if an opponent, something which would convey a disparagement, of this office, in our Lord’s own name ?
Or, again: take the Gnostic theories of emanations. Any one who has studied the history of the second century will know how large a place they occupy in the theological disputes of the day; what grotesque and varied forms they assume in the speculations of different heretical teachers; what diverse arguments, some valid, some fanciful, are urged against them by orthodox writers. Would a forger have hesitated for a moment to slay this many-headed hydra by one well-aimed blow? What can we suppose to have been the object of such a forger, except to advance certain theological views? And why should he have let slip the very opportunity, which (we must suppose) he was making for himself, of condemning the worst forms of heresy from our Lord’s own lips? It is true that you and I think we see (and doubtless think rightly), that the doctrine of God the Word taught in St John’s Gospel is the real answer to the theological questionings which gave rise to all these theories about ons or emanations, and involves implicitly and indirectly the refutation of all such theories. But it is only by more or less abstruse reasoning that we arrive at this conclusion. The early Gnostics did not see it so; they used St John’s Gospel, and retained their theories notwithstanding. A forger would
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. 13
have taken care to provide a direct refutation which it was impossible to misunderstand.
Or, again: about the middle of the second century the great controversy respecting the time of celebrating Easter was beginning to lift up its head. For the latter half of this century the feud raged, bursting out ever afresh and disturbing the peace of the Church again and again, until it was finally set at rest in the fourth century at the Council of Nica. Was the festival of the Lord’s resurrection to be celebrated always on the same day of the week, the Sunday? Or was it to be guided by the time of the Jewish Passover, and thus to take place on the same day of the month, irrespective of the day of the week? Each community, each individual, took a side in this controversy. Unimportant in itself, it seriously endangered the existence of the Church. The daring adventurer who did not hesitate to forge a whole gospel would certainly not be deterred by any scruple from setting the matter at rest by a few strokes of the pen. His narrative furnished more than one favourable opportunity for interposing half a dozen decisive words in our Lord’s name: and yet he abstained.
Thus we might take in succession the distinctive eccle- siastical controversies of the second century, and show how the writer of the Fourth Gospel holds aloof from them all : certainly a strange and almost incredible fact, if this writer lived about the middle, or even in the latter half, of the century, and, as a romancer, was not restrained by those obligations of fact which fetter the truthful historian who is himself a contemporary of the events recorded !
But if the omissions of the writer are strange and unac- countable on the assumption of the later date of the Gospel, the actual contents present still greater difficulties on the same hypothesis. In the interval between the age when the events are recorded to have taken place and the age in which the writer is supposed to have lived, a vast change had come over the civilized world. In no period had the dislocation of Jewish history been so complete. Two successive hurricanes had swept
14 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
over the land and nation. The devastation of Titus had been succeeded by the devastation of Hadrian. What the locust of the first siege had left the cankerworm of the second had devoured. National polity, religious worship, social institutions, all were gone. The city had been razed, the land laid desolate, the law and the ordinances proscribed, the people swept into captivity or scattered over the face of the earth. ‘Old things had passed away ; all things had become new.’
Now let us place ourselves in the position of one who wrote about the middle of the second century, after the later Roman invasion had swept off the scanty gleanings of the past which had been spared from the earlier. Let us ask how a romancer so situated is to make himself acquainted with the incidents, the localities, the buildings, the institutions, the modes of thought and feeling, which belonged to this past age and (as we may almost say) this bygone people. Let it be granted that here and there he might stumble upon a historical fact, that in one or two particulars he might reproduce a national characteristic. More than this would be beyond his reach. For, it will be borne in mind, he would be placed at a great disadvantage, compared with a modern writer; he would have to reconstruct history without those various appliances, maps and plates, chronological tables, books of travel, by which the author of a historical novel is so largely assisted in the present day.
And even if he had been furnished with all these aids, would he have known how to use them? The uncritical character of the apostolic age is a favourite commonplace with those who impugn the genuineness of the canonical Scriptures, or the trustworthiness of the evangelical narratives. I do not deny that the age (compared with our own) was uncritical, though very exaggerated language is often used on the subject. But obviously this argument has a double edge. And the keener of these two edges lies across the very throat of recent negative criticism. For it requires a much higher flight of critical genius to invent an extremely delicate fiction than to
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. 15
detect it when invented. The age which could not expose a coarse forgery was incapable of constructing a subtle historical romance. This one thing I hope to make clear in the short time that is allowed me this afternoon. The Fourth Gospel, if a forgery, shows the most consummate skill on the part of the forger ; it is (as we should say in modern phrase) thoroughly in keeping. It is replete with historical and geographical details ; it is interpenetrated with the Judaic spirit of the times; its delineations of character are remarkably subtle; it is perfectly natural in the progress of the events; the allusions to incidents or localities or modes of thought are introduced in an artless and unconscious way, being closely interwoven with the texture of the narrative ; while throughout, the author has exercised a silence and a self-restraint about his assumed personality which is without a parallel in ancient forgeries, and which deprives his work of the only motive that, on the supposition of its spuriousness, would account for his undertaking it at all.
In all these respects it forms a direct contrast to the known forgeries of the apostolic or succeeding ages. I will only ask my hearers who are acquainted with early apocryphal literature to compare St John’s Gospel with two very different and yet equally characteristic products of the first and second centuries of the Christian era—with the Protevangeliwm, or Gospel of the Infancy of Jesus, on the one hand, and with the Clementine Homilies, on the other: the former, a vulgar daub dashed in by a coarse hand in bright and startling colours; the other, a subtle philosophical romance, elaborately drawn by an able and skilful artist. But both the one and the other are obviously artificial in all their traits, and utterly alien to the tone of genuine history.
Such productions as these show what we might expect to find in a gospel written at the middle or after the middle of the second century.
If then my description of the Fourth Gospel is not over- charged (and I will endeavour to substantiate it immediately), the supposition that this gospel was written at this late epoch
16 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
by a resident at Alexandria or at Ephesus will appear in the highest degree incredible; and, whatever difficulties the tra- ditional belief may involve, they are small indeed compared with the improbabilities created by the only alternative hypo- thesis.
I have already proved that the absence of certain topics in this gospel seems fatal to its late authorship. I shall now proceed to investigate those phenomena of its actual contents which force us to the conclusion that it was written by a Jew contemporary with and cognisant of the facts which he relates, and more especially those indications which fix the authorship on the Apostle St John. It is necessary however to premise by way of caution, that exhaustive treatment is impossible in a single lecture, and that I can only hope to indicate a line of investigation which any one may follow out for himself,
First_of all then, the writer was a Jew. This might be inferred with a very high degree of probability from his Greek style alone. It is not ungrammatical Greek, but it is distinctly Greek of one long accustomed to think and speak through the medium of another language. The Greek language is singularly rich in its capabilities of syntactic construction, and it is also well furnished with various connecting particles. The two languages with which a Jew of Palestine would be most familiar—the Hebrew, which was the language of the sacred Scriptures, and the Aramaic, which was the medium of com- munication in daily life—being closely allied to each other, stand in direct contrast to the Greek in this respect. There is comparative poverty of inflexions, and there is an extreme
paucity of connecting and relative particles. Hence in Hebrew and Aramaic there is little or no syntax, properly so called. Tested by his style then, the writer was a Jew. Of all the New Testament writings the Fourth Gospel is the most distinctly Hebraic in this respect. The Hebrew simplicity of diction will at once strike the reader. There is an entire absence of periods, for which the Greek language affords such facility. The sentences are co-ordinated, not subordinated.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—l, 7
The clauses are strung together, like beads on a string. The very monotony of arrangement, though singularly impressive, is wholly unlike the Greek style of the age.
More especially does the influence of the Hebrew appear in the connecting particles. In this language the single connecting particle } is used equally, whether co-ordination or opposition is implied; in other words, it represents ‘but’ as well as ‘and.’ The Authorized Version does not adequately represent this fact, for our translators have exercised considerable license in varying the renderings: ‘then, ‘moreover,’ ‘and,’ ‘but,’ ete. Now it is a noticeable fact, that im St John’s Gospel the capabilities of the Greek language in this respect are most commonly neglected ; the writer falls back on the simple ‘and’ of Hebrew diction, using it even where we should expect to find an adversative particle. Thus v. 39, 40, ‘Ye search the Scriptures, for in them ye think that ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of Me: and ye will not come to Me’; vii. 19, ‘Did not Moses give you the law, and none of you keepeth the law ?’ where our English version has inserted an adversative particle to assist the sense, ‘and yet’; vil. 30, ‘Then they sought to take Him: and no man laid hands on Him, where the English version substitutes ‘but no man’; vii. 33, ‘Then said Jesus unto them, Yet a little while am I with you, and I go to Him that sent Me, where again our translators attempt to improve the sense by reading ‘and then.’ And instances might be multiplied.
The Hebrew character of the diction moreover shows itself in other ways: by the parallelism of the sentences, by the repetition of the same words in different clauses, by the order of the words, by the syntactical constructions, and by individual expressions. Indeed so completely is this character maintained throughout, that there is hardly a sentence which might not be translated literally into Hebrew or Aramaic, without any violence to the language or to the sense.
I might point also to the interpretation of Aramaic words, as Cephas, Gabbatha, Golgotha, Messias, Rabboni, Siloam,
EO 2
18 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
Thomas, as indicating knowledge of this language. On such isolated phenomena however no great stress can fairly be laid, because such interpretations do not necessarily require an extensive acquaintance with the language; and when the whole cast and colouring of the diction can be put in evidence, an individual word here and there is valueless in comparison.
There are however two examples of proper names in this Gospel on which it may be worth while to remark; because the original is obscured in our English Bibles by a false reading in the Greek text used by our translators, and because they afford incidentally somewhat strong testimony to the writer's knowledge both of the language and of contemporary facts.
The first of these is Jscariot. In the other three gospels this name is attributed to the traitor apostle Judas alone. In St John’s Gospel also, as represented in the received text and in our English version, this is the case. But if the more correct readings be substituted, on the authority of the ancient copies, we find it sometimes applied to Judas himself (xii. 4, xiii. 2, xiv. 22), and sometimes to Judas’ father Simon (e.g. vi. 71, ‘He spake of Judas the son of Simon Iscariot’; xiii. 26, ‘He giveth it to Judas the son of Simon Iscariot’). Now this shows that the evangelist knew this not to be a proper name strictly so called, but to describe the native place of the person, ‘the man of Kerioth,’ and hence to be applicable to the father and the son alike.
The other instance which I shall give, at first sight presents a difficulty; but when further investigated it only adds fresh testimony to the exact knowledge of the Fourth Evangelist. In St Matthew, Simon Peter is called Bar-Jona (Matt. xvi. 17); ze. son of Jona (or Jonan or Jonas). Accordingly in the received text of St John also he appears in not less than four passages (i. 42, xxi. 15-17) as Simon son of Jona (or Jonan or Jonas). But there can be no reasonable doubt that the correct reading in all these four passages is ‘Simon son of Joannes’— the Hebrew and Aramaic Johanan, the English John—and
J
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. LS)
that later transcribers have altered it to make it accord with the form adopted by St Matthew. Here there is an apparent discrepancy, which however disappears on examination; for we find that Jona or Jonan or Jonas is more than once used in the LXX version of the Old Testament as a contracted form of the name Johanan, Johannes, or John. Thus the statements of the two evangelists are reconciled; and we owe it to the special knowledge derived from the Fourth Gospel that the full and correct form is preserved. For, when we have once got this key to the fact, we can no longer question that John was the real name of’ Peter’s father, since it throws great light on our Lord’s words in St Matthew. The ordinary name Jonah, which was borne by the prophet, and which is generally supposed to be the name of Simon’s father, signifies ‘a dove’; but the name Johanan or John is ‘the grace of God.’ Hence the Baptist is called not Zechariah, as his relatives thought natural, but John, in accordance with the heavenly message (Luke i. 18), because he was specially given to his parents by God’s grace. So too the call of St Peter (John i. 42) becomes full of meaning: ‘Thou art Simon the son of the grace of God; thou shalt be called Cephas’; and the final commission given to the same apostle is doubly significant, when we interpret the thrice repeated appeal as ‘Simon son of God’s grace, lovest thou Me 2’ for without this interpretation the studied repetition of his patronymic seems somewhat meaningless. Bearing this fact in mind, we turn to the passage of St Matthew (xvi. 17, 18): ‘Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jona (son of the grace of God): for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but My Father which is in heaven, And I say unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church.’ His name and his surname alike are symbols and foreshadowings of God’s special favour to him in his call and commission. This is only one of many instances in which the authenticity of the statements of the Fourth Gospel is confirmed by the fact that they incidentally explain what is otherwise un- explained in the narrative of the synoptic evangelists. 2—2
20 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN,
Another evidence that the writer was acquainted with the Hebrew language is furnished by the quotations from the Old Testament. This evangelist, like St Paul, sometimes cites from the current Greek version of the Seventy, and sometimes translates directly from the Hebrew. When a writer, as is the case in the Epistle to the Hebrews, quotes largely and quotes uniformly from the LXX version, this is at least an indication that he was not acquainted with the original; and hence we infer that the epistle just mentioned was not written by St Paul, a Hebrew of the Hebrews, but by some disciple, a Hellenistic Jew, thoroughly interpenetrated with the apostle’s mind and teaching, but ignorant of the language of his fore- fathers. If on any occasion the quotations of a writer accord with the original Hebrew against the LXX version, we have a right to infer that he was acquainted with the sacred language, was, in fact, a Hebrew or Aramaic-speaking Jew. Several decisive examples might be produced, but one must suffice. In xix. 37 is a quotation from Zechariah xi. 10, which in the original is, ‘They shall look upon Me whom they pierced.’ Accordingly it is given in St John, ‘They shall look on Him whom they pierced’ (éyovrau els dv éEexévtncav). But the LXX rendering is, ‘They shall gaze upon Me, because they insulted’ (éruBréyrovtar mpos pe, av dv KatwpxyyncavTo), where the LXX translators had a different reading, MPI for 27, and where their Greek rendering has not a single word in common with St John’s text.
In xu. 40 again, the evangelist quotes Isaiah vi. 10, ‘Because that Esaias said again, He hath blinded their eyes, and hardened their heart; that they should not see with their eyes, etc. Now this quotation is far from being verbally exact; for in the Hebrew the sentence is imperative, ‘Make fat the heart of this people, and make heavy their ears, and close their eyes, that they should not see with their eyes,’ ete. Yet, on the other hand, it does not contain any of the characteristic renderings of the LXX; and this is one distinct proof that, however loosely quoted, it was derived, not from the
Kk KKK
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. 21
LXX, but from the original. For the LXX translators, taking offence, as it would seem, at ascribing the hardening of the heart to God’s own agency, have thrown the sentence into a passive form: ‘The heart of this people was made fat, and with their ears they heard heavily, and their eyes they closed,’ etc., so as to remove the difficulty. If therefore the evangelist had derived the passage from the LXX, it is inconceivable that he would have reintroduced the active form, thus wantonly reviving a difficulty, unless he had the original before him.
I will only add one other example. In xiii. 18 occurs a quotation from Psalm xli. 9 (xl. 10). Here the expression which in the original signifies literally ‘made great’ or ‘made high’ his heel is correctly translated ‘lifted up his heel’ (éwfpev Thv wTépvay avTov), as in the A.V. of the Psalms. The LXX version however gives éweydAuvey mrepvicpuov, ‘he multiplied (or increased) tripping up with the heel,’ or ‘treachery, which has given rise to the paraphrastic rendering in our Prayer- Book version, ‘laid great wait for me. Here again it is obvious that the evangelist’s quotation could not have been derived from the LXX, but must have been rendered either directly from the Hebrew, or (what for my purpose is equally decisive) indirectly through some Chaldee Targum.
If therefore we had no other evidence than the language, “eau with y confidence affirm that this _gospel eased
Paces seractdiedl to cars the language of his fathers. This fact alone negatives more than one hypothesis which has been broached of late years respecting its authorship, for it 1s wholly inconsistent with the strictly Gentile origin which most recent theories assign to it. But, though irreconcilable with Gentile authorship, it is not wholly inconsistent with the later date ; for we cannot pronounce it quite impossible that there should be living in Asia Minor or in Egypt, in the middle or after the middle of the second century, a Judaic Christian familiar with the Hebrew or Aramaic language, however rare such instances may have been.
22 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
Having thus established the fact that the writer was neither a Gentile nor a Hellenist, but a Hebrew of the Hebrews, we will proceed to inquire further whether he evinces an acquaintance with the manners and feelings, and also with the geography and history (more especially the contemporary history) of Palestine, which so far as our know- ledge goes (and in dealing with such questions we must not advance one step beyond our knowledge) would be morally impossible with even a Hebrew Christian at the supposed date, long after the political existence of the nation had been obliterated, and when the disorganization of Jewish society was complete.
As I am obliged to compress my remarks within the space of a single lecture, I cannot place the evidence fully before you; but my hope is, that I may indicate the lines of investi- gation which will enable you to answer it more completely for yourselves. I will only say, that we obtain from the Fourth Gospel details at once fuller and more minute on all these points than from the other three. Whether we turn to the Messianic hopes of the chosen people, with all the attendant circumstances with which imagination had invested this ex- pected event, or to the mutual relations of Samaritans, Jews, Galilezans, Romans, and the respective feelings, prejudices, beliefs, customs of each, or to the topography as well of the city and the temple as of the rural districts—the Lake of Gennesaret, and the cornfields and mountain ridges of Shechem —or to the contemporary history of the Jewish hierarchy and the Herodian sovereignty, we are alike struck at every turn with subtle and unsuspicious traces, betokening the familiarity with which the writer moves amidst the ever-shifting scenes of his wonderful narrative.
This minuteness of detail in the Fourth Evangelist is very commonly overlooked, because our gaze is arrested by still more important and unique features in this Gospel. The striking character of our Lord’s discourses as recorded in St John—their length and sequence, their simplicity of language,
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. 23
their fulness and depth of meaning—dazzles the eye of the critic and blinds him to the historical aspects of the narrative. Only by concentrating our view on these latter shall we realize the truth that the evangelist is not floating in the clouds of airy theological speculations, that though with his eye he peers into the mysteries of the unseen, his foot is planted on the solid ground of external fact; that, in short, the incidents are not invented as a framework for the doctrine, but that the doctrine arises naturally out of, and derives its meaning from, the inci- dents.
One example will serve at once to illustrate the double characteristic of this Gospel, the accurate historical narrative of facts which forms the basis of the Gospel, and the theological teaching which is built as a superstructure upon this founda- tion, and which the evangelist keeps distinctly and persistently in view in his selection and arrangement of the facts, and also to introduce the investigation which I purpose instituting.
The narrative and the discourses alike are thoroughly saturated with the Messianic ideas of the time. The Christ, as expected by the Jews, is the one central figure round which all the facts are grouped, the one main topic on which all the conversations hinge. This is the more remarkable, because the leading conception in the writer's own mind is not the Messiah, but the Word, the Logos,—not the deliverance of Israel, but the manifestation of God in the flesh. This main purpose is flung out at the opening of the Gospel, and it is kept steadily in view in the selection of materials throughout the work. But it does not once enter into the mind of the Jews, who are wholly absorbed in the Messianic idea. Nay, the word Logos does not once occur even on our Lord’s own lips, though the obvious motive of His teaching is to enforce this higher aspect of His person, to which they were strangers. And I cannot but think that this distinct separation is a remarkable testi- mony to the credibility of the writer, who, however strongly impressed with his mission as the teacher of a great theological conception, nevertheless keeps it free from his narrative of
24 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
facts; though obviously there would be a very strong tempta- tion to introduce it, a temptation which to a mere forger would be irresistible.
The Messianic idea, for instance, is turned about on all sides, and presented in every aspect. On this point we learn very much more of contemporary Jewish opinion from the Fourth Gospel than from the other three. At the commence- ment and at the close of the narrative—in the preaching of the Baptist and in the incidents of the Passion—it is equally prominent. In Galilee (i. 41, 46, 49; vi. 15, 28, 30 sq.), in Samaria (iv. 25, 29, 42), in Judea (v. 39, 45 sq.; vii. 26 sq., 40-43; vii. 30 sq.; x. 24), it is the one standard theme of conversation. Among friends, among foes, among neutrals alike it is mooted and discussed. The person and character of Jesus are tried by this standard. He is accepted or He is rejected, as He fulfils or contradicts the received ideal of the Messiah.
The accessories also of the Messiah’s coming, as conceived by the Jews, are brought out with a completeness beyond the other gospels. I will only ask you, as an illustration of this, to consider the discourse on the manna in the sixth chapter. The key to the meaning of the conversation is the fact that the Jews expected a miracle similar to the gift of manna in the wilderness, as an accompaniment of the appearance of the great deliverer. This expectation throws a flood of light on the whole discourse. But the fact is not communicated in the passage itself. There is only a bald, isolated statement, which apparently is suggested by nothing, and itself fails to suggest anything: ‘Our fathers did eat manna in the wilderness.’ Then comes an aposiopesis. The inference is unexpressed. The expectation, which explains all, is left to be inferred, because it would be mentally supplied by men brought up among the ideas of the time. We ourselves have to get it by the aid of criticism and research from rabbinical authorities. But, when we have grasped it, we can unlock the meaning of the whole chapter.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. 25
Connected with Messiah’s coming are other conceptions on which it may be worth while to dwell for a moment. One of these is the appearance of a mysterious person called ‘the prophet.’ This expectation arose out of the announcement in Deuteronomy xviii. 15, ‘The Lord thy God will raise up unto thee a prophet from the midst of thee, ike unto me.’ To this anticipation we have allusions in not less than four places in St John (i. 21, 25; vi. 14; vii. 40), in all of which ‘the prophet’ is mentioned, though in the three first the distinctness of the expectation is blurred in the English version by the rendering ‘that prophet.’ In all these passages the mention of ‘the prophet’ without any explanation is most natural on the lips of contemporary Jews, whose minds were filled with the Messianic conceptions of the times; while such language is extremely unlikely to have been invented for them more than a century after the date of the supposed occurrences. But the point especially to be observed is, that the form which the conception takes is strictly Jewish, and not Christian. Christian teachers identified the prophet foretold by Moses with our Lord Himself, and therefore with the Christ. This application of the prophecy is made directly in St Peter’s speech (Acts 11. 22), and infer- entially in St Stephen’s (Acts vil. 37); and later Christian teachers followed in their steps. But these Jews in St John’s Gospel conceive ‘the Christ’ and ‘the prophet’ as two different persons. If He is not ‘the Christ, they adopt the alternative that He may be ‘the prophet’ (i. 21, 25); if not ‘the prophet, then ‘the Christ’ (vii. 40). It is hardly conceivable to my mind that a Christian writer, living in or after the middle of the second century, calling on his imagination for facts, should have divested himself so absolutely of the Christian idea and fallen back on the Jewish.
But before I have done with ‘the prophet,’ there is yet one more point worthy of notice. After the miracle of feeding the five thousand, we are told that ‘those men who had seen the miracle that Jesus did said, This is of a truth the prophet that should come into the world’ (vi. 14). The connexion is not
26 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
obvious, and the writer has not explained himself. Here again the missing link is supplied by the Messianic conception of the age. The prophet foretold was to be like Moses himself. Hence it was inferred that there must be a parallel in the works of the two. Hence a repetition of the gift of the manna—the bread from heaven—might be expected. Was not this miracle then the very fulfilment of their expectation ? Hence we read that on the day following (after several incidents have inter- vened, but with the miracle still fresh on their minds), they
seek Him out, and still try to elicit a definite answer from Him: ~
‘What sign showest thou then? Our fathers did eat manna in the desert. Thus a casual and indistinct reference in one part of the chapter is explained by an equally casual and indistinct reference in another, and light emerges from darkness.
From the Messianic ideas I turn to the Jewish sects and the Levitical hierarchy.
The Sadducees, with whom we are familiar in other gospels, are not once mentioned by the Fourth Evangelist. How are we to account for this fact? Have we here a discrepancy, or (if not a discrepancy) at least an incongruity? Is there in St John’s picture an entire omission of that group which occupies a prominent place on the canvas of the other evangelists, especially of St Matthew ?
The common connexion, when describing the adversaries of our Lord, is ‘the Pharisees and Sadducees’ in the synoptic evangelists, ‘the chief priests and the Pharisees’ in St John. In the comparison of these phrases lies the solution. The high priests at this time belonged to the sect of the Sadducees. How this happened we do not know. It may be that their Roman rulers favoured this party, as being more lukewarm than the Pharisees in religious matters, and therefore less likely to give trouble to the civil powers. At all events, the fact appears dis- tinctly from more than one notice in the narrative of the Acts (iv. 1, v. 17); and the same is stated in a passage of Josephus (Ant. xx. 9.1). Thus a real coincidence arises from an apparent incongruity,
a
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. av
But Josephus elsewhere (Ant. xvi. 1. 4) makes another statement respecting the Pharisees, which throws great light on the narrative of the Fourth Evangelist. He tells us that the Sadducees were few in number, though of the highest rank ; and that when they were in office, they were forced, even against their will, to listen to the Pharisees, because otherwise they would not be tolerated by the people. Now this is precisely the order of events in St John. The Pharisees (with one single exception) always take the initiative; they are the active opponents of our Lord, and the chief priests step in to execute their will.
The single exception is remarkable. Once only we find chief priests acting alone and acting promptly (xi. 10). They form a plot for putting Lazarus to death. This was essentially a Sadducees’ question. It was necessary that a living witness to the great truth, which the high-priestly party denied, should be got rid of at all hazards. Hence they bestir themselves and throw off their usual apathy ; just as, turning from the Gospels to the Acts of the Apostles, they have taken the place of the Pharisees as the foremost persecutors of the new faith, because the resurrection from the dead was the cardinal topic of the preaching of the apostles.
But there is one other notice of the Jewish historian with which the narrative of the Fourth Evangelist presents a striking but unsuspicious coincidence. We are somewhat startled with the outburst of rudeness which marks the chief of the party on one occasion (xi. 49, 50). ‘One of them, Caiaphas, being high priest that year, said unto them, Ye know nothing at all, and ye do not reflect that it is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation should not perish. As a comment on this, take the words of Josephus: ‘The behaviour of the Sadducees to one another is not a little rude, and their intercourse with their peers is brusque, as if addressing strangers’ (B. J. ii. 8. 14).
These coincidences need little comment. I will only add that the Fourth Evangelist does not himself give us the key to
28 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
the incidents, that the references have been gathered from three different parts of Josephus, that the statements in the evangelist are not embroideries on his narrative, but are woven into its very texture; and that nevertheless all these several notices dovetail together and create one harmonious whole, which bears the very impress of strict historical truth.
After reviewing these coincidences, it will appear strange that from the passage last quoted Baur derived what he obviously considered to be one of his strongest arguments against the authenticity of the Gospel. Because the evangelist three times speaks of Caiaphas as ‘high priest that year’ (xi. 49,51; xvi. 13), he argues that the writer supposed the high priesthood to be an annual office, and therefore could not have been the Apostle John.
Now unless I have entirely misled you and myself, this is incredible. You cannot imagine that one who shows an ac- quaintance, not only with the language, but also with the customs, feelings, history, topography of the race, even in their minute details, should yet be ignorant of this most elementary fact of Jewish institutions. Whether the Gospel is authentic or whether it is not, such a supposition is equally incredible. If the writing is a forgery, the forger was certainly highly informed and extremely subtle; he must have ransacked divers histories for his facts; and yet here he is credited with a degree of ignorance which a casual glance at a few pages of his Old Testament or his Josephus would at once have served to dissipate. Suppose a parallel case. Imagine one, who writing (we will say) a historical work, shows a subtle appreciation of political feeling in England, and a minute acquaintance with English social institutions, and yet falls into the error of supposing that the premier is elected annually by vote of the people, or that the lord-mayoralty is a hereditary office tenable for life,
If therefore this supposition is simply impossible, we must explain the expression, ‘high priest that year, in some other way. And the explanation seems to be this, The most im-
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. 29
portant duty of the high priest was an annual function, the sacrifice and intercession for the people on the great day of atonement. ‘Once every year,’ says the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews (ix. 7), ‘the high priest alone entereth into the second tabernacle (the inner sanctuary), not without blood, which he offereth for himself and for the errors of the people.’ The year of which the evangelist speaks was the year of all years; ‘the acceptable year of the Lord, as it is elsewhere called; the year in which the great sacrifice, the one atonement, was made, the atonement which annulled once and for ever the annual repetitions. It so happened that it was the duty of Caiaphas, as high priest, to enter the holy of holies, and offer the atonement for that year. The evangelist sees, if we may use the phrase without irreverence, a dramatic propriety in the fact that he of all men should make this declaration. By a Divine irony he is made unconsciously to declare the truth, proclaiming Jesus to be the great atoning sacrifice, and himself to be instrumental in offering the victim. This irony of circum- stances is illustrated in the case of Pilate, as in the case of Caiaphas. The latter, the representative of the Jewish hierarchy, pronounces Jesus the great atoning sacrifice; the former, the representative of the civil power, pronounces Him as the sovereign of the race, ‘Behold your King!’ The malignity of Caiaphas and the sneer of Pilate alike bear witness to a higher truth than they themselves consciously apprehend.
From the sects and the hierarchy we may turn to the city and the temple. Here too we should do well to bear in mind how largely we owe the distinctive features of the topography and architecture with which we are familiar to the Fourth Gospel. Within the sacred precincts themselves the Porch of Solomon, within the Holy City the pools of Bethsaida’ and Siloam, are brought before our eyes by this evangelist alone. And when we pass outside of the walls, he is still our guide. From him we trace the steps of the Lord and His disciples on
1 ‘Bethsaida’ or ‘Bethzatha’ should probably be read in S. John y. 2 rather than ‘ Bethesda.’
30 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
that fatal night crossing the brook Kedron into the garden; it is he who, relating the last triumphal entry into Jerusalem, specifies ‘the branches of the palm trees’ (the other evangelists use general expressions, ‘boughs of the trees,’ or the like)— ‘the palm trees’ on which he had so often gazed, of which the sight was still so fresh in his memory, which clothed the eastern slopes of Olivet, and gave its name to the village of Bethany, ‘the house of dates.’ How simple and natural the definite articles are on the lips of an eye-witness I need not say. How awkward they sound to later ears, and how little likely to have been used by a later writer, unfamiliar with the scene itself, we may infer from the fact that in our own version they are suppressed, and the evangelist is made to say, ‘they took branches of palm trees.’
Moreover the familiarity of the Fourth Evangelist, not only with the site and the buildings of the temple, but also with the history, appears in a striking way from a casual allusion. After the description of the cleansing of the temple by our Lord, —a description which though brief is given with singular vivid- ness of detail—the Jews ask for some sign, as the credential which might justify this assumption of authority and right of chastisement. His answer is, ‘Pull down this temple, and in three days I will build it up.” Their astonishment is expressed in their reply, ‘This temple has been forty-six years in building, and wilt Thou raise it again in three days ?’ (11. 19, 20).
Now I think it will be allowed that this mention of time is quite undesigned. It has no appearance of artifice, it occurs naturally in the course of conversation, and it is altogether free from suspicion, as having been introduced to give a historical colouring to a work of fiction. If so, let us examine its historical bearing.
For this purpose it is necessary to follow two distinct lines of chronological research. We have to investigate the history of the building of the Herodian temple, and we have to ascertain the dates of our Lord’s life.
Now by comparison of several passages in Josephus, and
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. ou
by the exercise of historical criticism upon them, we arrive at the conclusion that Herod commenced his temple about A.v.c. 735, ue. B.C. 18. It took many years in building, and was not finally completed until A.U.c. 817, 2.e. A.D. 64. Thus the works were going on during the whole of the period comprised in the New Testament history. If we add forty-six years to the date of its commencement (A.U.C. 735) we are brought down to A.U.C. 781 or 782, 2.e. A.D. 28 or 29.
The chronology of Herod’s temple involves one considerable effort of historical criticism. The chronology of our Lord’s life requires another. Into this question however I need not enter in detail. It is sufficient to remind you that the common date of the Christian era is now generally allowed to be a little wide of the mark, and that our Lord’s birth actually took place three or four years before this era. The point to be observed here is, that St Luke places the baptism of our Lord in or about the fifteenth year of Tiberius, which comprised the interval between the autumn of 781 and the autumn of 782. Now the occurrence related by St John took place, as we may infer from his narra- tive, in the first passover after the baptism; that is, according to St Luke’s chronology probably at the passover of 782.
Thus we are brought to the same date by following two lines of chronology; and we arrive at the fact that forty-six years there or thereabouts had actually elapsed since the com- mencement of Herod’s building to this point in our Lord’s ministry. I am anxious not to speak with too great precision, because the facts do not allow it. The exact number might have been forty-five or forty-seven years, for fragments of years may be reckoned in or not in our calculation, and the data are not sufficiently exact to determine the date to a nicety. But, after all allowance made for this margin of uncertainty, the coincidence is sufficiently striking.
And now let us suppose the Gospel to have been written in the middle of the second century, and ask ourselves what strong improbabilities this hypothesis involves.
The writer must first have made himself acquainted with
32 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
a number of facts connected with the temple of Herod. He must not only have known that the temple was commenced in a particular year, but also that it was still incomplete at the time of our Lord’s ministry. So far as we know, he could only have got these facts from Josephus. Even Josephus however does not state the actual date of the commencement of the temple. It requires some patient research to arrive at this date by a comparison of several passages. We have therefore to suppose, first, that the forger of the Fourth Gospel went through an claborate critical investigation for the sake of ascertaining the date. But, secondly, he must have made himself acquainted with the chronology of the gospel history. At all events, he must have ascertained the date of the commencement of our Lord’s ministry. The most favourable supposition is, that he had before him the Gospel of St Luke, though he nowhere else betrays the slightest acquaintance with this gospel. Here he would find the date which he wanted, reckoned by the years of the Roman emperors. Thirdly, after arriving at these two results by separate processes, he must combine them; thus connecting the chronology of the Jewish kings with the chronology of the Roman emperors, the chronology of the temple erection with the chronology of our Lord’s life.
When he has taken all these pains, and worked up the subject so elaborately, he drops in the notice which has given him so much trouble in an incidental and unobtrusive way. It has no direct bearing on his history; it does not subserve the purpose of his theology. It leads to nothing, proves nothing. Certainly the art of concealing art was never exer- cised in a more masterly way than here. And yet this was an age which perpetrated the most crude and bungling forgeries, and is denounced by modern criticism for its utter incapacity of criticism.
Nor, when we travel beyond the city and its suburbs, does the writer’s knowledge desert him. One instance must suffice ; but it is, if I mistake not, so convincing, that it may well serve in place of many.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. 33
The country of the Samaritans lay between Judea and Galilee, so that a person journeying from the one region to the other, unless he were prepared to make a detour, must necessarily pass through it. This was the case with our Lord and His Apostles, as related in the fourth chapter. The high- road from Jerusalem passes through some very remarkable scenery. The mountain ridges of Ebal and Gerizim run parallel to each other from east to west, not many hundred feet apart, thus inclosing a narrow valley between them. Eastward this valley opens out into a plain, a rare phenomenon in this country—‘ one mass of corn unbroken by a boundary or hedge,’ as it is described by one who has seen it. Up the valley westward, shut in between these mountain barriers, lies the modern town of Nabltis, the ancient Shechem. The road does not enter the valley, but traverses the plain, running at right angles to the gorge, and thus touching the eastern bases of the mountain ridges as they fall down into the level ground. Here at the mouth of the valley is a deep well, even now descending ‘to a depth of seventy feet or more, and formerly, before it had been partially filled with accumulated rubbish, we may well believe deeper still. In the words of Dean Stanley:
“Of all the special localities of our Lord’s life in Palestine, this is almost the only one absolutely undisputed. By the edge of this well, in the touching language of the ancient hymn, ‘quaerens me sedisti lassus.’ Here on the great road through which ‘He must needs go’ when ‘ He left Judea, and departed into Galilee,’ He halted, as travellers still halt, in the noon or evening of the spring day by the side of the well. Up that passage through the valley His disciples ‘went away into the city,’ which He did not enter. Down the same gorge came the woman to draw water, according to the unchanged custom of the East. . . . Above them, as they talked, rose ‘this mountain’ of Gerizim, crowned by the temple, of which vestiges still remain, where the fathers of the Samaritan sect ‘said men ought to worship. . . . And round about them, as He and she thus sate or stood by the well, spread far and wide the noble plain of waving corn. It was still winter, or early spring, ‘four months yet to the harvest,’ and the bright golden ears of those fields had not yet ‘ whitened’ their unbroken expanse of verdure. But as He gazed upon them, they served to suggest the glorious vision of the distant harvest of the Gentile world, which with each successive turn of the conversation unfolded itself
L. E. 3
34 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
more and more distinctly before Him, as He sate (so we gather from the narrative) absorbed in the opening prospect, silent amidst His silent and astonished disciples.”
The scrupulous accuracy of the geographical and archeo- logical details in St John’s account of the conversation with the Samaritan woman will have appeared already from this quo- tation. I will only ask you to consider for a moment how naturally they occur in the course of the narrative, so naturally and so incidentally that without the researches of modern travellers the allusions would be entirely lost to us. I think that this consideration will leave but one alternative. Either you have here written, as we are constantly reminded, in an uncritical age and among an uncritical people, the most masterly piece of romance-writing which the genius and learning of man ever penned in any age; or you have (what universal tradition represents it to be) a genuine work of an eye-witness and companion of our Lord. Which of these two suppositions does less violence to historical probability I will leave to yourselves to determine.
Follow then the narrative in detail. An unknown Traveller is sitting at the well. His garb, or His features, or His desti- nation, show Him to be a Jew. A woman of the country comes to draw water from the well, and He asks her to give Him to drink. She is surprised that He, a Jew, is willing to talk so freely to her, a Samaritan. And here I would remark that the explanation which follows, ‘For the Jews have no dealings with’ (or rather, ‘do not associate with’) ‘the Samaritans,’ is the evangelist’s own, a fact obscured by the ordinary mode of printing in our English Bibles. Hitherto, though the scene is very natural and very real, there is nothing which a fairly clever artist might not have invented. But from this point onwards follow in rapid succession various historical and geo- graphical allusions, various hints of individual character in the woman, various aspects of Divine teaching on our Lord’s part, all closely interwoven together, each suggesting and suggested by another, in such a manner as to preclude any hypothesis of
:
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. 35
romance or forgery. ‘Thou wouldest have asked, and I would have given thee living water.’ ‘Sir, Thou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. , . , Art Thou greater than our father Jacob?’ And so the conversation proceeds, one point suggesting the next in the most natural way. Take, for instance, the reference to Gerizim. ‘Sir, I perceive that Thou art a prophet. Our fathers worshipped in this mountain.’ Observe that there is no mention in the context of any mountain in the neighbourhood ; that even here, where it is mentioned, its name is not given: but suddenly the woman, partly to divert the inconvenient tenour of the conversation, partly to satisfy herself on one important point of difference between the Samaritans and the Jews, avails herself of the newly found prophet’s presence, and, pointing to the over-hanging heights of Gerizim, puts the question to Him. The mention of the sacred mountain, like the mention of the depths of the well, draws forth a new spiritual lesson. ‘Not in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem. . . . God isa spirit. The woman saith, ‘When Messias cometh, He will tell us all things.’ Jesus saith, ‘T that speak unto thee am He.’
At this point the disciples approach from the valley, with the provisions which they had purchased in the city, and rejoin their Master. They are surprised to find Him so engaged. Here again an error in the English version obscures the sense. Their marvel was, not that He talked with the woman, but that He talked with @ woman. It was a rabbinical maxim, ‘ Let no man talk with a woman in the street (in public), no, not with his own wife.’ The narrowness of His disciples was shocked that He, their own rabbi, should be so wanting to Himself as to disregard this recognised precept of morality. The narrator assumes the knowledge with which he himself was so familiar.
So the conversation with the woman closes. With natural eagerness she leaves her pitcher, and hurries back to the city with her news. With natural exaggeration she reports there that the stranger has told her all things that ever she did.
A conversation with the disciples follows, which is hardly
3—2
36 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
less remarkable, but from which I must be content to select one illustration only. I think that it must be allowed, that the reference to the harvest. is wholly free from suspicion, as regards the manner of its introduction. It is unpremeditated, for it cannot be severed from the previous part of the conversation, out of which it arises. It is unobtrusive, for the passage itself makes no attempt to explain the local allusion (which, without the experience of modern travellers would escape notice): ‘There are yet four months, and then cometh the harvest. Behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields ; for they are white already to harvest. And yet, when we once realize the scene, when in imagination our eye ranges over that vast expanse of growing corn—so unusual in Palestine, however familiar in corn-growing England—we are at once struck with the truthfulness and the significance of this allusive parable.
I have thus endeavoured to show, by taking a few instances, the accuracy of the writer’s knowledge in all that relates to the history, the geography, the institutions, the thoughts and feelings of the Jews. If however we had found accuracy, and nothing more, we might indeed have reasonably inferred that the narrative was written by a Jew of the mother-country, who lived in a very early age, before time and circumstance had obliterated the traces of Palestine, as it existed in the first century ; but we could not safely have gone beyond this. But unless I have entirely deceived myself, the manner in which this accurate knowledge betrays itself justifies the further conclusion that we have before us the genuine narrative of an eye-witness, who records the events just as they occurred in natural sequence.
I have discussed the accuracy of the external allusions. Let me now apply another test. The representation of character is perhaps the most satisfactory criterion of a true narrative, as applied to an age before romance-writing had been studied as an art,
We are all familiar with the principal characters in the
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. 37
Gospel history: Peter, John, Philip, Thomas, Pilate, the sisters Mary and Martha, and several others which I might mention ; each standing before us with an individuality, which seems to place him or her within the range of our own personal know- ledge. Have we ever asked ourselves to which evangelist above the rest we owe this personal acquaintance with the actors in this great drama ?
When the question is once asked, the answer cannot be doubtful. It is true indeed that we should have known St Peter without the narrative of the Fourth Evangelist, though he adds several minute points, which give additional life to the portrait. It is true that Pilate is introduced to us in the other Gospels, though without St John we should not have been able to read his heart and character, his proud Roman indifference and his cynical scorn. But, on the other hand, take the case of Thomas. Of this Apostle nothing is recorded in the other Evangelists, and yet he stands out before us, not as a mere lay figure, on whose stiff, mechanical form the artist may hang a moral precept or a doctrinal lesson by way of drapery, but as a real, living, speaking man, at once doubtful and eager, at once hesitating and devoted—sceptical, not because his nature is cold and unsympathetic, but because his intellect moves more cautiously than his heart, because the momentous issues which belief involves bid him pause before he closes with it; at one moment endeavouring to divert his Master’s purpose of going up to Jerusalem, where certain destruction awaits him: at the next, ready to share the perils with Him, ‘ Let us also go with Him’; at one moment resisting the testimony of direct eye-witnesses and faithful friends to his Master’s resurrection: at the next, overwhelmed by the evidence of his senses, and expressing the depth of his conviction in the earnest confession ‘My Lord and my God.’
I must satisfy myself with one other example. The character of the sisters Martha and Mary presents a striking contrast. They are mentioned once only in the other Gospels, in the familiar passage of St Luke, where they appear respectively as
.
38 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
the practical, bustling housewife, who is busied about many things, and the devout, contemplative, absorbed disciple, who chooses the one thing needful. In St John also this contrast reappears ; but the characteristics of the two sisters are brought out in a very subtle way. In St Luke the contrast is summed up, as it were, in one definite incident; in St John it is de- veloped gradually in the course of a continuous narrative. And there is also another difference. In St Luke the contrast is direct and trenchant, a contrast (one might almost say) of light and darkness. But in St John the characters are shaded off, as it were, into each other. Both alike are beloved by our Lord, both alike send to Him for help, both alike express their faith in His power, both alike show deep sorrow for their lost brother. And yet, notwithstanding this, the difference of character is perceptible throughout the narrative. It is Martha who, with her restless activity, goes out to meet Jesus, while Mary remains in the house weeping. It is Martha who holds a conversation with Jesus, argues with Him, remonstrates with Him, and in the very crisis of their grief shows her practical common sense in deprecating the removal of the stone. It is Mary who goes forth silently to meet Him, silently and tearfully, so that the bystanders suppose her to be going to weep at her brother's tomb; who, when she sees Jesus, falls down at His feet; who, uttering the same words of faith in His power as Martha, does not qualify them with the same reservation; who infects all the bystanders with the intensity of her sorrow, and crushes the human spirit of our Lord Himself with sympathetic grief.
And when we turn to the second occasion in which the two sisters are introduced by St John, the contrast is still the same, Martha is busied in the homely duties of hospitality towards Jesus and her other guests; but Mary brings her choicest and most precious gift to bestow upon Him, at the same time showing the depth of her humility and the abandonment of her devotion by wiping His feet with her hair.
In all this narrative the Evangelist does not once direct attention to the contrast between the two sisters. He simply
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—l. 39
relates the events of which he was an eye-witness without a comment. But the two were real, living persons, and therefore the difference of character between them develops itself in action.
I have shown hitherto that, whatever touchstone we apply, the Fourth Gospel vindicates itself as a trustworthy narrative, which could only have proceeded from a contemporary and an eye-witness. But nothing has hitherto been adduced which leads to the identification of the author as the Apostle St John, Though sufficient has been said to vindicate the authenticity, the genwineness is yet untouched.
It is said by those who deny its apostolic origin, that the unknown author, living in the middle of the second century, and wishing to gain a hearing for a modified gospel suited to the wants of his age, dropped his own personality and shielded himself under the name of St John the son of Zebedee.
Is this a true representation of the fact? Is it not an entire though unconscious misrepresentation? John is not once mentioned by name throughout the twenty-one chapters of this Gospel. James and John, the sons of Zebedee, occupy a prominent place in all the other Evangelists. In this Fourth Gospel alone neither brother’s name occurs. The writer does once, it is true, speak of the ‘sons of Zebedee’; but in this passage, which occurs in the last chapter (xxi. 2), there is not even the faintest hint of any connexion between the writer himself and this pair of brothers. He mentions them in the third person, as he might mention any character whom he had occasion to introduce.
Now is not this wholly unlike the proceeding of a forger who was simulating a false personality? Would it not be utterly irrational under these circumstances to make no provision for the identification of the author, but to leave everything to the chapter of accidents? No discredit, indeed, is thrown on the genuineness of a document by the fact that
40 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
the author’s name appears on the forefront. This is the case with the histories of Herodotus and Thucydides ; it is the case also with the Epistles of Paul and Peter and James, and with the Apocalypse of John. But, on the supposition of forgery, it was a matter of vital moment that the work should be accepted as the genuine production of its pretended author. The two instances of early Christian forgeries which I brought forward in an earlier part of this lecture will suffice as illustrations, The Gospel of the Infancy closes with a distinct declaration that it was written by James. The Clementine Homilies affirm the pretended authorship in the opening words, ‘I Clement, being a Roman citizen.’ Even if our supposed forger could have exercised this unusual self-restraint in suppressing the simulated author’s name, would he not have made it clear by some allusion to his brother James, or to his father Zebedee, or to his mother Salome? The policy which he has adopted is as suicidal as it is unexpected.
How then do we ascertain that it was written by John the son of Zebedee? I answer, first of all, that it is traditionally ascribed to him, as the Phedo is ascribed to Plato, or the Antigone to Sophocles; and, secondly, that from a careful examination of indirect allusions and casual notices, from a comparison of things said and things unsaid, we arrive at the same result by a process independent of external tradition. But a forger could not have been satisfied with trusting to either of these methods. External tradition was quite beyond the reach of his control. In this particular case, as we shall see, the critical investigation requisite is so subtle, and its subject- matter lies so far below the surface, that a forger, even supposing him capable of constructing the narrative, would have defeated his own purpose by making such demands on his readers.
For let us follow out this investigation. In the opening chapter of the Gospel there is mention of a certain disciple whose name is not given (i. 35, 37, 40). This anonymous person (for it is a natural, though not a certain inference, that
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. Al
the same is meant throughout) reappears again in the closing scene before and after the passion, where he is distinguished as ‘the disciple whom Jesus loved.’ At length, but not till the concluding verses of the Gospel, we are told that this anony- mous disciple is himself the writer: ‘This is the disciple which testifieth of these things, and wrote these things.’
In accordance with this statement we find that those particular scenes in which this anonymous disciple is recorded as taking a part are related with peculiar minuteness and vividness of detail. Such is the case, for instance, with the notices of the Baptist and of the call of the earliest disciples. Such again is the case with the conversation at the last supper, with the scene over the fire in the hall of Caiaphas’s house, with certain other incidents connected with the crucifixion, and with the scene on the Lake of Galilee after the resurrection.
Who then is this anonymous disciple? On this point the Gospel furnishes no information. We arrive at the identifica- tion, partly by a process of exhaustion, partly by attention to some casual incidents and expressions.
Comparing the accounts in the other Gospels, it seems safe to assume that he was one of the inner circle of disciples. This inner circle comprised the two pairs of brothers, Peter and Andrew, James and John—if indeed Andrew deserves a place here. Now he cannot have been Andrew, because Andrew appears in company with him in the opening chapter ; nor can he have been Peter, because we find him repeatedly associated with Peter in the closing scenes. Again, James seems to be excluded; for James fell an early martyr, and external and internal evidence alike point to a later date for this Gospel. Thus by a process of exhaustion we are brought to identify him with John the son of Zebedee.
With this identification all the particulars agree.
First. He is called among the earliest disciples; and from his connexion with Andrew (i. 40, 44) it may be inferred that he was a native of Bethsaida in the neighbourhood.
Secondly. At the close of his Master’s life, and after his
42 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
Master’s resurrection, we find him especially associated with Simon Peter. This position exactly suits John, who in the earliest days of the Church takes his place by the side of Peter in the championship of faith.
Thirdly. Unless the beloved disciple be John the son of Zebedee, this person who occupies so prominent a place in the account of the other Evangelists, and who stood in the fore- most rank in the estimation of the early Church as a pillar Apostle, does not once appear in the Fourth Gospel, except in the one passage where ‘the sons of Zebedee’ are mentioned and summarily dismissed in a mere enumeration of names. Such a result is hardly credible.
Lastly. Whereas in the other Evangelists John the Baptist is very frequently distinguished by the addition of this surname, and always so distinguished where there is any possibility of confusing him with the son of Zebedee, in this Gospel alone the forerunner is never once called John the Baptist. To others some distinguishing epithet seemed needed. To the son of Zebedee there was only one famous John; and therefore when he had occasion to mention him, he naturally spoke of him as John simply, without any addition. Is it conceivable, I would ask, that any forger would have lost sight of himself so com- pletely, and used natural language of John the son of Zebedee with such success, as to observe this very minute and unob- trusive indication of personality ?
I have addressed myself more directly to the theory of the Tiibingen school, either as propounded by Baur, or as modified by later critics, which denies at once the historical character of this Gospel and its apostolic authorship, and places it in the middle or latter half of the second century. But there is an intermediate position between rejecting its worth as a historic record and accepting St John as its author, and this position has been taken up by some. They suppose it to have been composed by some disciple or disciples of St John from remi- niscences of their master’s teaching, and thus they are prepared
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—1. 43
to allow that it contains some historical matter which is valu- able. You will have seen however that most of the arguments adduced, though not all, are equally fatal to this hypothesis as the other. The process by which, after establishing its authen- ticity, we succeeded in identifying its author is, if I mistake not, alone sufficient to overthrow this solution. Indeed this theory is exposed to a double set of objections, and it has nothing to recommend it.
I have already taken up more time than I had intended, and yet I feel that very much has been left unsaid. But I venture to hope that certain lines of investigation have been indicated, which, if carefully and soberly followed out, can only lead to one result. Whatever consequences may follow from it, we are com- pelled on critical grounds to accept this Fourth Gospel as the genuine work of John the son of Zebedee.
Some among my hearers perhaps may be disappointed that I have not touched on some well-known difficulties, though these have been grossly exaggerated. Some have to be satis- factorily explained; of others probable, or at least possible, solutions have been given; while others still remain on which we are obliged to suspend judgment until some new light of history is vouchsafed. It is not from too much light, but from too little light, that the historical credibility of this Gospel has suffered. Each new discovery made, each old fact elucidated, sets at rest some disputed question. If the main fact of the genuineness be established, the special difficulties can well afford to wait.
One word more, and I conclude. I have treated this as a purely critical question, carefully eschewing any appeal to Christian instincts. As a critical question I wish to take a verdict upon it. But as I could not have you think that I am blind to the theological issues directly or indirectly connected with it, I will close with this brief confession of faith. I believe from my heart that the truth which this Gospel more especially enshrines—the truth that Jesus Christ is the very Word Incar-
44 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
nate, the manifestation of the Father to mankind—is the one lesson which, duly apprehended, will do more than all our feeble efforts to purify and elevate human life here by imparting to it hope and light and strength, the one study which alone can fitly prepare us for a joyful immortality hereafter.
[1871.]
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EXTERNAL EVIDENCE FOR THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS OF ST JOHN’S GOSPEL.
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EXTERNAL EVIDENCE FOR THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS OF ST JOHN’S GOSPEL.
HE genuineness of St John’s Gospel is the centre of the
position of those who uphold the historical truth of the record of our Lord Jesus Christ given us in the New Testament. Hence the attacks of the opponents of revealed religion are con- centrated upon it. So long however as it holds its ground, these assaults must inevitably prove ineffective. The assailants are of two kinds: (1) those who deny the miraculous element in Christianity—Rationalists, (2) those who deny the distinctive character of Christian doctrine—Unitarians. The Gospel con- fronts both. It relates the most stupendous miracle in the history of our Lord (short of the Incarnation and the Resurrec- tion), the raising of Lazarus. Again, it enunciates in the most express terms the Divinity, the Deity, of our Lord. And yet at the same time it professes to have been written by the one man, of all others, who had the greatest opportunities of knowing the truth. The testimony of St Paul might conceivably be set aside, as of one who was not an eye-witness. But here we have, not an étpwpua', not a personal disciple merely, not one of the twelve only, but the one of the twelve—the Apostle who leaned on his Master’s bosom, who stood by his Master’s cross, who entered his Master’s empty grave. If therefore the claim of this Gospel to be the work of John the son of Zebedee be true, if in other words the Fourth Gospel be genuine, the most
1 1 Cor. xv. 8.
48 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
formidable, not to say an insuperable, obstacle stands in the way of both classes of antagonists. Hence the persistence and the ingenuity of the attacks; and hence also the necessity of a thoroughness in the defence. No apology therefore is needed, if the subject should seem dry and uninviting.
And details too are necessary. For the nature of the proof is cumulative. Some points which I shall have to urge may seem weak. The allusions to the Gospel in many cases are uncertain or anonymous. But they must be taken pro tanto. To borrow a mechanical simile, evidence for the authenticity of a document is not like a chain, where the strength of the whole is the strength of its weakest link. It is like the supports of a building, where the strength is in the aggregate. One pillar may be weak, or may fall; but the superstructure will still remain, for each instance is independent of the others.
Consequently, considerable mental effort is necessary in order to keep in view all the elements of a cumulative proof. We are apt to concentrate our attention on that which is last, or that which is exceptional. If then the last argument stated is weak, or if anywhere there is one argument exceptionally weak, we may leap to the conclusion that the whole is weak. This is manifestly a false mode of arguing, and we must con- stantly be on our guard against its subtle influence.
Hence the necessity of keeping the whole in view. We shall be occupied during the present term with the external evidence. But the external evidence is not all. And in sum- ming up in our own minds the results which we shall obtain, we must not forget what lies beyond—what will occupy us probably next term—the reinforcement of the internal evidence. For the present however we. shall confine ourselves to the former. And we cannot help being struck at the outset by the inadequacy of treatment which the question has met with in the prolegomena of the majority of commentators. An allusion to Theophilus, to Irenzus, to Eusebius, an apology, somewhat lame, for the silence of Papias, and the whole subject is briefly and summarily dismissed. Now the injury
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 49
done to the cause of revealed truth by this method of treat- ment is very serious, and has resulted in an undue disparage- ment of the external evidence for the Fourth Gospel. On this point I cannot do better than quote so temperate and judicious a writer as Mr Sanday, who, in his introduction to his work on the Authorship and Historical Character of the Fourth Gospel, when stating his reasons for confining himself to the internal evidence, writes as follows:
‘ ‘Several reasons seem to make this limitation of treatment desir- able, The subject of the external evidence has been pretty well fought out. The opposing parties are probably as near to an agreement as they ever will be. It will hardly be an unfair statement of the case for those who reject the Johannean authorship of the Gospel to say that the external evidence is compatible with that supposition. And on the other hand, we may equally say for those who accept the Johan- nean authorship, that the external evidence would not be sufficient alone to prove it. As it at present stands, the controversy may be regarded as drawn; and it is not likely that the position of parties will be materially altered’ (p. 3).
Now I hope to show that there is no deficiency of testimony (considering the nature of the subject), that on the contrary there is a vast body of evidence of various kinds, which cannot be set aside; that the result is a very powerful argument in favour of the genuineness; and that therefore, when we enter upon the question of internal evidence, we shall enter upon it with a very strong weight of evidence in support of St John’s authorship, which can only be counterbalanced by powerful con- siderations on the other side.
But, before commencing the investigation, let us first see what is the nature of the antagonism with which we have to deal. The history of the controversy may be seen in Bleek’. Briefly stated, the position of affairs is this. The universal reception of the Gospel as the work of St John (with the exception of an obscure sect?) up to the close of the last century has been assailed in the early years of the present
1 Bleek Beitriige zur Evangelien- 2 The Alogi, on whom see below, Kritik (1846). pp. 115 sq. L. E. 4
50 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
century by a series of writers, who unite in denying the Johannine authorship, and place the date somewhere in the middle or latter half of the second century.
I give the names of the principal exponents of the new view, with the dates which they respectively assign for the author- ship :—
BRETSCHNEIDER Probabilia de Evangelit et Epistolarum Joannis Apos- toli indole et origine Leipzig 1820. He expressed himself vaguely as to the date, but apparently placed it at the beginning or middle of the second century. After two years, in the preface to his Handbuch der Dogmatik 1822, he withdrew his conclusions, and declared his conviction that the Johannine authorship was finally established.
LUTZELBERGER Die kirchliche Tradition iiber den Apostel Johannes und seine Schriften in threr Grundlosigkeit nachgewiesen Leipzig 1840. He con- siders that the Gospel was written near Edessa, about 135-140.
Baur first expressed his views on the Johannine question in the Theologische Jahrbiicher Tiibingen 1844. He fixes the date somewhere about 160-170, and this is the view of the older Tiibingen School.
HinGenretD Das Evangelium und die Briefe Johannis nach threm Lehrbegrif (1849). He considers that the Fourth Gospel took its rise in the middle of the second century owing to the prevalence of the Valentinian Gnosis.
ScHOLTEN, professor at Leyden, and head of the modern Dutch negative school, in his work entitled Het Hvangelie naar Johannes (1864-6) places the writing of the Fourth Gospel in 150, but considers that it was interpolated subsequently. In a later work De oudste getui- gentssen (1867) he throws the date back later still to 170.
TayLER, J. J. An attempt to ascertain the character of the Fourth Gospel, especially in its relation to the Three First London 1867. In reading this work we cannot fail to be struck with its evident sincerity ; at the same time it exhibits singular deficiency in the enumeration of facts, and looseness in the treatment of them. ‘Tayler’s conclusion is that the Fourth Gospel was written after 135 and before 163 (p. 151). And yet (p. 155) he suggests that ‘John the Presbyter’ is the author of the book— John the Presbyter, of whom we only know that he was a personal disciple of our Lord.
Keim Geschichte Jesu von Nazara (1867) ascribes the Fourth Gospel to the reign of Trajan, A.D, 98-117.
RenNAN in the first edition of his Vie de Jésus (1863) considers that our Fourth Gospel is based upon the genuine work of St John, but edited by his disciples at the end of the first century. M. Renan’s view has fluctuated in subsequent editions of his book.
In reviewing this list of writers, we cannot fail to be struck
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2., Gl
with two facts: (1) the variety of their opinions; (2) their gradual retrogression from the extreme position taken up at first. ‘The pressure of facts has compelled them to abandon one position after another, and to approximate more and more closely to the traditional view.
I, THe CHurcHES oF ASIA MINOR.
Unless we are prepared to reject without a hearing all the ‘traditions of Christianity, we cannot refuse to believe that the latest years of the Apostle St John were spent in the Roman province of Asia and chiefly in Ephesus its capital. This tradition is singularly full, consistent and well-authenticated’. Here he gathered disciples about him, organized churches, appointed bishops and presbyters. A whole chorus of voices unite in bearing testimony to its truth. One who passed his earlier life in these parts and had heard his aged master, a disciple of St John himself, recount his personal reminiscences of the great Apostle’; another, who held this very see of Ephesus and writing less than a century after the Apostle’s death was linked with the past by a chain of relatives all bishops in the Christian Church*; a third who also flourished about the close of the century and numbered among his teachers an old man from this very district’—are the principal, because the most distinct, witnesses to a fact which is implied in several other notices of earlier or contemporary writers.
As to the time at which St John left his original home and settled in this new abode no direct account is preserved ; but a very probable conjecture may be hazarded. The impending
1 Papias in Hus. H. £. iii. 39; Tren. ii. 22. 5, Fragm. 2 (p. 822 Stieren) ete.; Polycrates in Eus. H. FH. v. 24; Apollonius in Eus. H. HE. v. 18; Clem. Alex. Quis div. salv. 42 (p. 958); cf. Can. Mur. (p.17 ed. Tregelles), Tertull. adv. Marc. iv. 5, Praescr. Haer. 32, Ancient Syriac Documents pp. 32, 34 (ed. Cureton). The variety of the
sources of these quotations—Gaul, Asia Minor, Alexandria, Rome, Car- thage, Syria—is worth noticing.
2 Treneus.
3 Polycrates.
4 Clement of Alexandria. One of his teachers was an Ionian Greek (Strom. 1. 1. § 11 p. 322); see below, p. 92.
4—2
52 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
fall of the Holy City was the signal for the dispersion of the followers of Christ. About this same time the three other great Apostles, St Peter, St Paul and St James, died a martyr’s death ; and on St John, the last surviving of the four great pillars of the Church, devolved the work of developing the theology of the Gospel and completing the organization of the Church. It was not unnatural that at such a crisis he should fix his residence in the centre of a large and growing Christian community, which had been planted by the Apostle of the Gentiles, and watered by the Apostle of the Circumcision’. The missionary labours of St Paul and St Peter in Asia Minor were confirmed and extended by the prolonged residence of their younger contemporary. At all events such evidence as we possess is favourable to this view of the date of St John’s settlement at Ephesus. Assuming that the Apocalypse is the work of the beloved Apostle?, and accepting the view which assigns it to the close of Nero’s reign or thereabouts, we find him now for the first time in the immediate neighbourhood of Asia Minor and in direct communication with Ephesus and the neighbouring Churches.
St John however was not alone. Whether drawn thither by the attraction of his presence or acting in pursuance of some common agreement, the few surviving personal disciples of the Lord would seem to have chosen Asia Minor as their permanent abode, or at all events as their recognised headquarters. Here at least we meet with the friend of St John’s youth and perhaps his fellow-townsman, Andrew of Bethsaida*®, who with him had first listened to John the Baptist and with him also had been the earliest to recognise Jesus as the Christ*. Here too we
1 On the relation of the Apostles to the Ephesian Church see Theod. Mops. praef. in epist. ad Ephesos.
2 If the Apocalypse be conceded, the testimony is decisive. And as oppo- nents with very fewexceptions (Scholten is one) allow the genuineness, and
indeed use it against the Gospel, it may be urged.
%’ See the account in Anc, Syr. Documents, p. 25.
4 Can. Mur. (revelatum Andreae ex apostolis), p. 17, ed. Tregelles, Ane. Syr. Doc. pp. 32, 34.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 53
encounter Philip the Evangelist! with his daughters, and perhaps also Philip of Bethsaida, the Apostle? Here also was settled the Avpostle’s namesake, John the Presbyter, also a personal disciple of Jesus, and one Aristion, not otherwise known to us’, who likewise had heard the Lord. And possibly also other Apostles whose traditions Papias recorded, Matthew and Thomas and James, may have had some connexion, tem- porary or permanent, with this district.
Thus surrounded by the surviving disciples of the Lord, by bishops and presbyters of his own appointment, and by the pupils who gathered about him and looked to him for instruc- tion, St John was the focus of a large and active society of believers’. In this respect he holds a unique position among the great teachers of the new faith. St Peter and St Paul converted disciples and organized congregations; St John alone was the centre of a school. His life prolonged till the close of the century, when the Church was firmly rooted and widely extended, combined with his fixed abode in the centre of an established community to give a certain definiteness to his personal influence which would be wanting to the wider labours of these strictly missionary preachers. Hence the notices of St John have a more solid basis and claim greater attention than stories relating to the other Apostles.
This fact is significant for the preservation of a tradition, especially one so important as that of the authorship of the Gospel. But there is another point, which increases the value of the tradition itself, viz., the longevity of the principal witnesses. Of St John himself we are told that he ‘lived to the times of Trajan®, His pupil Polycarp, who suffered martyr-
1 Papias in Eus. H. #. iii. 39; Polyerates in Eus. H. E. iii. 31, v. 24; Caius in Eus. H. E. iii. 31; cf. Clem. Alex, in Eus, H. £. iii. 30.
2 See my Colossians, p. 45 sq.
3 Papias, l. c.
4 Tren. ii. 22. 5; Clem. Alex. Quis div. salv. 42 (p. 958), Can. Mur. l. e.
(condiscipulis et episcopis suis); Epiph. li. 6 (pp. 427, 8).
5 Tren. ii, 22.5. The date of Tra- jan’s accession is a.D. 98. According to the Chronicon Paschale St John survived till a.p. 104; see Clinton Fast. Rom. 1. p. 87.
54 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
dom A.D. 155 or 1561, speaks of himself at the time of his death as having ‘served Christ fourscore and six years®” The expression in the original may leave some doubt whether these eighty-six years should be reckoned from his birth or from his conversion, though the former would be the more natural interpretation. But in any case he must have been born not later than A.D. 70. And as Polycarp was the disciple of St John, so Irenzeus was the disciple of Polycarp. Again, of Pothinus bishop of Lyons we are told* that he was more than ninety years old when he suffered in the persecution of the Churches of Vienne and Lyons (A.D. 177). The date of his birth therefore cannot be later than A.D. 87. A later tradition* makes him a native of Asia Minor; and this would be a highly probable supposition, even if unsupported by direct evidence. But whether an Asiatic Greek or not, he must have been a lad when St John died. And Irenzeus was the successor of Pothinus in the see of Lyons. Thus one link only, and that a double one, connects the life of the traditional author of the Fourth Gospel with Irenzeus who preserves the tradition in writing; and two long lives, St John and Polycarp, link the personal ministry of our Lord with the latter half of the second century’®.
Of the traditions of this school, Irenzeus, who had been
1 [On the question of the date of Polycarp’s martyrdom see Apostolic Fathers, Part II. vol. 1. pp. 646 sq (ed. 2).]
2 Mart. Polyc. 9 dydojKovra Kat é& érn éxw dovetwv aire [see the note on the passage in Apostolic Fathers, Part II. vol. m1. p. 379 (ed. 2)]; ef. Iren. iii, 3. 4 émurohd yap mapéuewe kal mavu ynparéos...uwaptupjoas €&jOe Tov Blov.
3 Kus. H. EZ. v. 1.
4 See the references in Tillemont Mémoires 11. p. 343.
5 There was doubtless a tendency to exaggeration in this matter, e.g. in Christian Essene sources, where the age of Symeon, bishop of Jerusalem, is given as 120 years. But the in-
stances in the text are thoroughly substantiated, and can easily be paral- leled. Thus three Lord Chancellors since the Reform Bill (Brougham, Lyndhurst and St Leonards) have lived tobe 90. The longevity of the most dis- tinguished German professors has been remarkable. Boeckh died at eighty-one, Humboldt at eighty-nine, Ranke [and Déllinger] at[ninety]. For the great age of the Jewish rabbi Hillel see Etheridge Jerus. and Tiber. p. 33. The simple life of the early Christians had probably a great deal to do with this; see Southey Life of Wesley 11. pp. 273 sq., 284, (1858) and compare Josephus B. J. ii. 8. 10, who states that the Essenes often lived irép éxardv érn.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 55
educated in Asia Minor, though his later life was spent in Gaul, is the principal witness. He was a pupil of St John’s personal disciple Polycarp, whom he mentions more than once. He set great store on these traditions as representing most truly the primitive teaching of the Church, and appeals to them again and again with confidence. On one occasion, writing to Florinus, whom he had known in youth as a fellow-pupil of Polycarp, but who in after years had taken up heretical views, he urges that these are not the doctrines delivered to him, by the elders, who were before them, who also associated with the Apostles, and he appeals to his reminiscences of their common master in this language:
‘TI distinctly remember (S:ayzynuovedw) the incidents of that time better than events of recent occurrence; for the lessons received in childhood, growing with the growth of the soul, become identified with it; so that 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 (rév yapaxrfjpa tov Biov) and his personal appearance, and the discourses which he held before the people ; and how he would describe his intercourse with John and with the rest who had seen the Lord, and how he would relate their words. And what were the accounts he had heard from them about the Lord, and about His miracles, and about His teaching, how Polycarp, as having received them from eyewitnesses of the life of the Word (ra@v avromray ths (wns rod Adyov) used to give an account har- monizing on all points with the Scriptures (ravra ovpdova tais ypagais). To these (discourses) I used to listen at the time with attention by God’s mercy which was bestowed upon me, noting them down, not on paper, but in my heart; and by the grace of God, I constantly ruminate upon them faithfully (yunoiws)!’
As regards this whole extract it will suffice to notice (1) the opportunities of the witness, (2) the thoroughness of the evidence (rdvta ctudwva tais ypadais). In more than one passage also of his great work he refers to the ‘Church of Ephesus”’, or to the elders who associated with John in Asia.
It was not the object of Irenzeus to defend the authorship of the Fourth Gospel, for his Valentinian antagonists not only
1 Kus. H, E. v. 20. 2 Tren. v. 33. 4.
56 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. JOHN.
accepted it as genuine, but even set an exclusive value on it; and therefore any testimony to its authorship from the earlier school of Asia Minor which may be gathered from his writings is incidental. But any such testimony must have the highest value.
1. It can hardly be doubted that THE ELDERS whom Irenzeus quotes, and quotes for the most part anonymously, belonged to this school. Of Polycarp and Papias, of whom the former is mentioned several times by him and the latter once casually, this is certain. I shall endeavour immediately to discriminate the several persons whom he thus quotes by the topics on which they write or speak; but, before doing so, one reference to such anonymous authority deserves attention, where Ireneus refers not to individual opinion, but to the collective testimony of all the Elders who associated with St John’. It relates to a question of chronology. His Valentinian adversaries laid great stress on the number ‘thirty.’ Their celestial hier- archy comprised thirty sons, and they appealed to the thirty years’ duration of our Lord’s life. This computation of the Gospel chronology they derived from the notices in St Luke, interpreted by themselves. At the commencement of His ministry, they contended, He was entering upon His thirtieth year, and His ministry itself lasted a twelvemonth, the ‘acceptable year of the Lord’ foretold by the Prophet. Ireneus in reply expresses his ‘great astonishment’ that persons professing to understand the deep things of God should have overlooked the commonest facts of the Gospel narrative, and points to the three passovers recorded~ in St John’s Gospel ising the term of our Lord’s life (§ 3). Independently of the chronology of the Fourth Gospel, Irenzeus has an a@ priori reason why the Saviour must have lived more than thirty years. He came to sanctify every time of life, infancy, childhood, youth, declining age. It was therefore
1 Tren. ii. 22. tinians, whom Irenwus here opposes, 2 On the chronology of the Valen- see Epiph. Haer. li. 20 (p. 450).
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 57
necessary that He should have passed the turn of middle life. ‘From thirty to forty, he argues, ‘a man is reckoned young, but from his fortieth and fiftieth year he is already declining into older age, which was the case with our Lord when He taught, as the Gospel and all the Elders who associated with John the disciple of the Lord testify that John delivered his account. For he remained with them (weptéuervev avrois) till the times of Trajan. Some of them saw not only John but other disciples also, and heard these very things from their own life (ab ipsis), and bear testimony to such an account (de huiusmodi relatione)’ (§ 4). Irenzeus goes on to argue that the same may be inferred from the language of our Lord’s Jewish opponents, who asked, ‘Thou_art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham ?’ (John viii. 57). This he contends, is properly said to one who had already lived
more than forty years, but had not yet reached his fiftieth year, though not far off his fiftieth year (§ 6).
On this passage two points are to be remarked. (1) The Valentinian chronology was derived from an obvious, though not a necessary, interpretation of the synoptic narrative, more especially of St Luke}, while, on the other hand, the Asiatic reckoning, which Irenzeus maintains, was, or might have been, founded on the Fourth Gospel, whereas it could not possibly have been suggested or elicited from the first three indepen- dently of the fourth, whether reconcilable with them or not’. (2) Ireneeus does not commit the elders of the Asiatic School to his own interpretation of the passage quoted from St John’s Gospel, nor to his own view that our Lord was close upon fifty years old. He only asserts that the Gospel and the testimony of all the elders together support the view that our Lord was
But
1 St Luke iii. 1, 23; iv. 19.
2 St John is our authority for the chronology of our Lord’s ministry. In the Synoptic Gospels it is highly probable that the sequence of events is not strictly chronological, but that in places incidents are grouped accord-
ing to subject and treatment. still, though the Synoptic Gospels are consistent with a more lengthened ministry, they do not suggest it, and thus the argument given above, that a knowledge by the Elders of the Fourth Gospel may be assumed, is justified.
58 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
past middle life; and the vagueness of his language at this point may suggest the inference that he had their testimony distinctly on his side as against the Valentinian chronology, but that it did not go beyond this!. (3) So far as the chronology of the Asiatic School is known from other sources, the statement of Irenzus is confirmed; for the Asiatic reckoning was dis- tinctly based on the narrative of the Fourth Gospel. This is the case with the duration of our Lord’s ministry? as given by Melito, and the time of the Crucifixion as given by Claudius Apollinaris, to both which writers I shall have to refer hereafter’,
From this general notice of the Asiatic Elders I turn to the opinions of individuals belonging to this school, as reported by Treneus. As these opinions are given anonymously and scat- tered throughout his work, we can only separate one authority from another by considering the subject-matter and treatment.
1 The argument from John viii. 57 is clearly Ireneus’ own, and is not justified by the passage itself. And this suggests the probability that much besides is his. We cannot safely as- sume that the a priori argument is taken from the Elders, or that the term of years was extended by them beyond forty. Irenzus classes together evan- gelium et omnes seniores. It is a legi- timate assumption that the testimony of the Elders went as far as the evan- gelium and no further.
2 It may be interesting to consider what was the term of our Lord’s life. The chief data are as follows: (a) Matt. ii. 16, 22—the death of Herod which occurred March s.c, 4, see Clin- ton Fast. Hell. sub anno. Thus the Nativity might have taken place in the year B.c. 5 or Bc. 6, (b) Luke iii. 1, 23—our Lord’s Baptism, and the commencement of His ministry, stated to have been ‘in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Cesar’ when our Lord was ‘about thirty years old As Sept. a.p.
(aoel érGv rpidkovra).’
28 was the beginning of the fifteenth year of Tiberius, our Lord would be 32 or 33 years old, which does not conflict with St Luke’s statement. (c) Matt. xxvii. 2—the Passion under Pontius Pilate. We learn from Jo- sephus Ant. xvii. 4. 3 that Pilate was sent to Rome by Vitellius to answer charges made against him, and that before he arrived Tiberius had died, and Caius (Caligula) had succeeded. Now Tiberius died March a.p. 37. Therefore the passover of the Passion might have been as late as Haster a.p. 36, but could not be later. Thus it is possible that our Lord did live to be over forty years of age; for we have no right to assume that St John gives all the passovers which occurred during the ministry. On the whole, however, & ministry of not more than three or four years seems the more probable view.
3 See below, p. 72sq. For the refer- ences to Melito and Claudius Apolli- naris see Routh Relig. Sacr.1. pp. 121, 124, 160.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 59
This criterion of course may be fallacious; and allowance must be made for the possibility of separating one authority into two or more, or again of counting two or more authorities as one. But the argument will not be materially affected by allowance made for errors which may occur on either side. Judging then by the subject-matter, I find that the following authorities are referred to :—
(1) A person quoted with great respect as ‘one better than us’ [o Kpelocwy juor (1. pref. 2 sq., 1. 13. 3) superior nobis (iii. 17. 4)], mm another as ‘the divine old man and herald of the truth, the old man beloved of God (1. 15. 6)... Any one who will compare these references together cannot hesitate, I think, to see that they allude to one and the same person. He is a writer, as may be inferred both from the manner and from the subject of the references. His style is epigrammatic and tell- ing, full of quaint metaphors and poimted sayings, and on one occasion he runs off into iambic verse which is more vigorous than rhythmical. The work which Irenzus quotes is directed against heresies of the magico-gnostic school, and more especi- ally against Marcus.
(2) An ‘Elder of a bygone generation’ (de antiquis presbyter) a ‘primitive character’ (iv. 31. 1) an ‘elder and disciple of the Apostles’ (iv. 32. 1), or, as he is elsewhere more precisely de- scribed, ‘an elder who had heard from those who had seen the Apostles and from those who had learnt’ [ab his qui didicerunt i.e. from personal disciples of the Lord (iv. 27. 1)]. Irenzeus quotes at some length the opinion of this presbyter. From the form of quotation it appears that he is relating oral discourses (perhaps from his own lecture-notes), and not any written treatise of this elder (audivt a quodam presbytero. Huiusmodi quoque disputabat). The subject of these discourses is the re- lation of the two covenants, and the Elder defends the Old Testament Saints, describing the office of the patriarchs as witnesses of Christ.
60 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
(3) <A single saying is quoted as from ‘one of the ancients’ (quidam ex veteribus ait), apparently from a written treatise, that God cursed not Adam but the earth in (or through) his works (iii. 23. 3).
(4) Irenzus, in explaining the expression ‘sons of God, ‘sons of the devil, refers to a distinction made by one of these Elders. ‘A son, as also one before us said (diait, or ‘has said, épn or elpnxev), is understood in two senses: one is a son according to nature, because he is born a son, another is reputed a son according to what he has been made, though there is a differ- ence between the one who is born such, and the one who is made such (iv. 41. 2),’
(5) Irenzus twice refers to some writing or writings, in which the opinions of ‘the Elders, the disciples of the Apostles,’ on eschatological subjects are given. In one passage it is declared that the Old Testament Saints have been transferred to Paradise and there await the coming of the Lord (v. 5. 1). The second, which is of considerable importance, runs as follows :—
As the Elders say, then also shall they which have been deemed worthy of the abode in heaven go thither, while others shall enjoy ‘ the delight of paradise,’ and others again shall possess the brightness of the city (i.e. the New Jerusalem); for in every place the Saviour shall be seen, according as they shall be worthy who see him. (They say) moreover that this is the meaning of the distinction between the habitation of them that bring forth a hundred-fold, and them that bring forth sixty-fold, and them that bring forth thirty-fold ; of whom the first shall be taken up into the heavens, and the second shall dwell in paradise, and the third shall inherit the city; and that there- fore our Lord has said, ‘In My Father’s abode are many mansions’
St John xiv. 2); for all things are of God, Who giveth to all their appropriate dwelling, according as His Word saith that allotment is made unto all by the Father, according as each man is, or shall be, worthy. And this is the banqueting-table, at which those are seated who are called to the marriage and take part in the feast. The Elders, the disciples of the Apostles, say that this is the arrangement and disposal of them that are saved, and that they advance by such stages, and ascend through the Spirit to the Son, and through the Son to the
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 61
Father, the Son at length yielding His work to the Father, as it is said also by the Apostle, ‘For He must reign until He putteth all enemies under His feet, etc.’ (v. 36. 1, 2).
Of these five Elders (assuming them to be distinct persons) no coincidence with St John’s Gospel can be traced in notices of the first and third. Of the first, indeed, though he is appealed to four times, only epigrammatic sentences against his heretical antagonists are adduced, and these naturally do not give room for any quotations either from the Old Testament or the New. The third is represented by a single short sentence relating to Adam’s transgression, which from its brevity admits of no such reference. The remaining three, the second, fourth and fifth, all present more or less distinct coincidences with St John’s Gospel. Of the second Ireneus reports that he was wont to say that the patriarchs and prophets gave thanks and gloried in our salvation, where there is an obscure parallel to our Lord’s words in the Fourth Gospel, ‘ Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day, and he saw it and was glad (John viii. 56).’ The fourth is adduced to explain an expression especially character- istic of St John ‘sons of the devil?’ It is not certain indeed from the language of Irenzeus that this Elder actually used this expression ; but it is at least more probable than not that the distinction, which Irenzeus quotes, was quoted by this father Le. to explain the words ‘sons of the devil.’ I shall presently sug- gest a probable source from which this reference is taken’. And, lastly, the fifth Elder distinctly quotes and explains a saying of our Lord peculiar to the Fourth Gospel (xiv. 2). I shall have something to say shortly about the name of this Elder
also4,
1 The references in Irenzus to the five elders are as follows: (1) Iren. i. BLacCl eo dala, laelos Osp dite 17.) 4 (written: elpyra, épn, eirwv, dizit); (2) iv. 27. 1 sq., iv. 30. 1sq., iv. 31. 1, iv. 32. 1, v. 17. 4 (oral: audivi, dice- bat, reficiebat nos et dicebat, dispu- tabat, pn); (3) iil, 23. 3 (written: ait); (4) iv. 41, 2 (doubtful: dizit,
At present it is sufficient to remark two things: first,
which may represent either é¢y or elpnxev); (5) v. 5. 1, v. 36. 1, 2 (written: Aéyoucw, Néyoucw).
2 See John viii. 44, 1 Joh. iii. 8, 10; cf. Acts xiii. 10. The expression is peculiar to St John among the Evangelists.
3 See below, p. 68.
4 See below, p. 67 sq.
62 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
the form of the sentence shows that the quotation is given as part of the Elder’s own saying, and not of an after-comment of Irenzeus ; and, secondly, as Irenzeus uses the present tense ‘the elders say, and yet the persons referred to belonged to a past generation and were no longer living when he wrote, he must be quoting from some written record, and therefore we cannot suppose that he has unconsciously fused his own after-thought with the original saying.
These references are anonymous. But Ireneus likewise mentions by name two of these Asiatic Elders who had conversed with Apostles or personal disciples of the Lord, and of whom something is also known from other sources, Polycarp and Papias.
2. Of Potycarp and his reminiscences of St John, as recounted by his own pupil Irenzeus, I have already spoken’. It is worth while to observe in passing that in the single sentence in which he describes the conversation of Polycarp, he represents him as retailing lessons which he professed to have learnt ‘from eyewitnesses of the life of the Word (mapa Tov avtoTTay THS Cwhs Tov Aoyou’), an expression characteristic of the writings of St John and suggesting that Irenzeus’ recollec- tions of Polycarp were intimately connected with those writings. Of the many letters which Polycarp himself wrote, as Irenzeus (in Eus. H. £. v. 20) tells us, ‘either to the neighbouring Churches to confirm them, or to individual brethren, to ad- monish or encourage them,’ only one remains. The extant Epistle to the Philippians was written after the death of
1 See above, p. 54 sq. fwis. Possibly there is an accidental
2 See above, p. 55. We might be tempted to translate the passage ‘from the eyewitnesses of the Word of Life (cf. 1 Joh. i. 1)’, but the Greek order makes this impossible. Moreover the expression a’rémrns Tod Adyou occurs in Luke i, 2. On the other hand the rendering ‘from the eyewitnesses of the life (the earthly career) of the Word’ would require rod Blov for rijs
transposition in the text of Ireneus and we should read rod Adyou rijs fwijs, cf. Ign. Polyc. 5 els riphy ris capKds rod kuplov (v. l. rod Kuplou ris capKés). But it matters little for our immediate purpose. The personal use of 6 Adyos is Johannine in either case. The Syriac translator has ‘those who saw with their eyes the living Word.’
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 63
Ignatius, but so soon after that Polycarp had not yet heard the particulars. It may therefore be placed about the year A.D. 110. The Epistle is not long and contains very few direct references to the New Testament writings; but numerous For the most part they are taken from the Epistles, as more suited to the hortatory and didactic character of the letter, and the references to the Gospels are very few. With the Fourth Gospel no distinct coincidence is found; but Polycarp was evidently well acquainted with the First Epistle of St John, for he writes (§ 7); ‘Every one that confesseth not that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh, is Antichrist’; and whosoever confesseth not the testimony of the Cross, is of the devil’ (1 Joh. iv. 3 compare 2 Joh. 7, and shortly after (§ 8)), ‘but He endured all for our sakes, that we might live through Him’ (1 Joh. iv. 9). Itswall be shown_hereafter that this First Epistle was in all likelihood written at the same time with and attached to the Gospel. the same author.
passages, more or less exactly quoted, are embedded in it.
At present I will assume that it proceeds from There is a presumption therefore that the At all events, the quotations show that the writer of the Gospel flourished before
Gospel also was known to this writer.
Polycarp wrote. And he is cited by this father, in the same way in which our canonical writings, more especially the Epistles of St Paul and St Peter, are cited.
3. Papras of Hierapolis was a contemporary and a friend of Polycarp. Whether he was a personal disciple of the Apostle St John, as asserted by Irenzus, or only of a namesake of the Apostle, the presbyter John, as Eusebius supposes, I will not stop to enquire. It is certain that he lived on the confines of
1 ras yap ds dv pn oporoyn Incoty 33. 4). On the other hand Eusebius,
Xpuiorov év capkl édXndrvOévar avrixpiords éort (§ 7). [On the genuineness of Polycarp’s Epistle see Apostolic Fathers (Part 11), 1. p. 578 sq. (ed. 2).]
2 Treneus speaks of Papias as ‘a hearer of John’ (Iwavvov dkovoris V.
who mentions this statement of Iren- zeus, remarks; ‘Yet Papias himself, in the preface to his discourses cer- tainly does not declare that he himself was a hearer and an eyewitness of the holy Apostles, but he shows, by
64 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
the apostolic age, that he was acquainted with the daughters of Philip, and that he conversed with two personal disciples of the Lord, Aristion and John. He wrote an ‘ Exposition of our Lord’s Oracles’ in five books, which he illustrated by oral traditions. Its date is somewhat uncertain, but on the whole it would appear to have been written in his old age, towards the middle of the second century, not before 130 to 140. Of this work only the most meagre fragments remain; but it is distinctly stated by Eusebius, that he ‘made use of testimonies from the First (wpotépas) Epistle of John’ (H. Z£. iii. 39). We cannot indeed assume from this notice that he mentioned the Apostle by name as the author, or that the quotations were given as quotations (for Eusebius uses this same expression of the quotations from St Peter in Polycarp, where St Peter is not so mentioned and the passages are indirectly quoted); but it is a fair inference from the procedure of Eusebius elsewhere that the passages were obvious quotations (otherwise he would not have noticed them), and that the coincidence was not so slight as to be accidental, but clearer than the quotation from St John in Polycarp’s epistle, which Eusebius does not mention. In carrying over the evidence from the Epistle to the Gospel, the same remark will apply, as in Polycarp’s case.
But great stress has been laid on the silence of Eusebius, as though it were inconsistent with the supposition that Papias was acquainted with the Gospel. The historian quotes a few lmes from Papias, preserving some traditions respecting the Gospels of St Matthew and St Mark which he related on the authority of John the presbyter, but says nothing about the Fourth Gospel. And the negative argument appears stronger,
the language which he uses, that he received the matters of the faith from those who were his friends (H. £. iii. 39).’ It is, however, not stated by Trenzeus that he derived his knowledge from this preface, and from his fre- quent intercourse with Polycarp Iren- wus doubtless had sources of infor-
mation which were closed to Eusebius. Still Eusebius may have been right. [See Essays on Supernatural Reli- gion p. 142 sq.]
1 xéxpnrac 5° abrds wapruplas dd THs "Iwdvvov mporépas émiorodjs, H. L. iii. 39.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 65
when it is remembered that Eusebius elsewhere’ declares his intention of extracting from early writers such notices as bear on the formation of the Canon.
Before accepting this hasty conclusion however, we must answer two preliminary questions, the one following from the other: (1) What is the practice of Eusebius elsewhere? Does he, or does he not, fulfil to the letter the intention thus expressed relative to the Canon? (2) If he does not, what principle of selection, if any, does he follow here or elsewhere in omitting or recording such notices ?
To the first of these questions the answer is decisive. The Epistle of Clement besides many embedded quotations from St Peter, St James, and St Paul, and a few from the Gospels and Acts, refers by name to St Paul’s First Epistle to the Corinthians. Yet Eusebius says nothing of all this. He mentions only its coincidences with the Epistle to the Hebrews (H. E. iii. 38). The Epistle of Polycarp again, besides the references to the Gospels mentioned above, is replete with the most obvious quotations from St Paul, and in two passages refers to his Epistles by name (§§ 3, 11). But Eusebius omits all mention of these and simply says ‘he employs some testimonies from the first Epistle of Peter, not mentioning even the coinci- dences with St John’s first Epistle (H. #. iv. 14). His account of Irenzeus is equally defective. Excepting one or two of the Catholic Epistles, Irenzeus, as is well known, quotes by name all the canonical books of the New Testament, and most of them repeatedly; yet Eusebius, after giving one passage con- taining an account of the origin of the four Gospels, and another referring to the Apocalypse, adds ‘he makes mention also of the First Epistle of John, adducing very many testimonies from it, and in like manner of the First Epistle of Peter’ (H. £. v. 8). If Irenzeus had been known to us only from the account of Eusebius, it would doubtless have been inferred of him (as even cautious writers have drawn this inference respecting
1 Hus. H. E. iii. 3.
66 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
Papias), that he ignored or repudiated the Acts of the Apostles and all St Paul’s Epistles.
It will then be seen that the mere silence of Eusebius justifies no such inference. And, when we come to enquire the grounds on which he has omitted or recorded notices, I think it is impossible altogether to acquit him of a certain carelessness or caprice. Yet, so far as he is guided by any principle, it appears to be this. The four Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, the thirteen Epistles of St Paul were universally allowed as canonical. He therefore records no references to, or quotations from, these, except such as contain some interest- ing tradition respecting their origin or history, as e.g. in Papias the account of the Hebrew original of St Matthew or the Petrine authority of St Mark. On the other hand the authority of the Apocalypse and of the Epistle to the Hebrews was doubted ; and the limits of the Catholic Epistles also (e.g. how many Epistles of St John or St Peter should be received) were an open question. On these points therefore he is more full; and, though the First Epistle of St John and the First Epistle of St Peter were not themselves questioned, yet their relation to the others leads him to note where they are quoted as authori- tative. There is no reason therefore to suppose that, though Papias might have quoted the Gospel of St John a score of times, Eusebius would have cared to note the fact, unless the notices contained some interesting particulars respecting its origin and history.
And in his account of Papias there is less completeness than usual in repeating the traditions of his author. The five books of the Hapositions were largely interspersed with such traditions, which it would have been tedious to reproduce in full. The millennarian views of Papias were repulsive to Eusebius; and the historian’s impatience is very evident when he is dealing with this author. He mentions the fact that
1 But even this rule he fails to yet in his account of Papias Eusebius
observe strictly, e.g. we know that does not mention the Apocalypse at Papias commented on the Apocalypse, all.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2., 67
Papias records ‘ other narratives of the aforesaid Aristion of our Lord’s discourses, and also traditions of the Elder John’ which he does not repeat, and he contents himself with ‘referring (avarréuryar) the studious readers (tovs idopuabeis)’ to the book itself, professing to give what the exigencies of the case demand and nothing more (avayxaiws) on this head (H. E. iii. 39)’,
But there is also positive evidence very strong, though not absolutely conclusive, that Papias did quote from this Gospel. I have already mentioned the reference in the Asiatic Elder cited by Irenzus to our Lord saying ‘In My father’s house are many mansions’. If anyone will take the pains to read with care from the thirty-third to the thirty-sixth chapter of the fifth book of Irenzeus continuously, he can hardly fail (I think) to arrive at the conclusion that the Elder in question is none other than Papias. In the thirty-third chapter he gives a passage from Papias, and in the thirty-fifth comes this passage from ‘the Elders, with which we are immediately concerned. That they are taken from the same book, appears in the highest degree probable from the following considerations, (1) Both passages treat of the future kingdom of Christ, and both regard it from the same point of view, as a visible and external king- dom, in which the enjoyments are enjoyments of the senses. (2) The subject is continuous, the matter which intervenes between the two quotations extending over some pages but all having reference to the same topic. (3) The authority in the first quotation is ‘the Elders who saw John the disciple of the Lord’ (33 § 3); in the second ‘the Elders’ (36 § 1) simply, and
1 But why should he mention St it. Harly references to a Gospel which
Matthew and St Mark, without St John? The answer is probably as follows. Papias related curious facts of the two former. These are retailed. If Papias simply quoted the Gospel of St John (whether he mentioned John’s name or not), or if he only related what was known to everyone, there is no reason why Eusebius should state
was universally acknowledged had no interest for anyone, unless they con- tained some curious or important fact. If we are at a loss to say why Eusebius singled out 1 Peter and 1 John in the case of Papias, we are equally at a loss to say why he should single out 1 Peter in the case of Polycarp, except on the theory given above.
5—2
68 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
at the end ‘the Elders, the disciples of the Apostles’ (36 § 2). At the close of the first quotation Irenzus adds, ‘But these things Papias also... testifies in writing in the fourth of his books, for there are five books composed by him.’ Papias therefore reports the statements of these Elders as we know from Eusebius that he did on several occasions, and there is no difficulty about the authority in the first passage. But in the second passage Irenzeus fails to explain whom he meant by ‘the Elders, unless they are the same who have been mentioned shortly before. Only on this supposition is the reference plain. (4) I have poited out before’ that the manner of quotation obliges us to suppose that Irenzeus refers to a written document, and not a mere oral tradition. This limits the possibilities of the case: for (so far as we know) Polycarp and Papias are the only writers who could satisfy the description. (5) The tenour of the passage accords entirely with the known subject of Papias’ work, as described by its title ‘ Expositions of Oracles of the Lord.’ We have here one of these explanations’.
It seems fairly probable too, that not only our fifth Elder, but the fourth also, must be identified with Papias. His ex- planation of ‘sonship’ would be framed to explain our Lord’s words addressed to the Jews: ‘ye are of your father the devil.’ Gnostic dualists would interpret these words to mean that the old covenant was directly opposed to the new, and was the work of the evil principle. To meet this argument the Elder makes the distinction between sons by nature and sons by habit. In the latter sense only the Jews were sons of the devil. The explanation at all events is a close parallel to an extant fragment of Papias, where he explains that ‘those who practised a godly innocence were called children’ by the early Christians’.
1 See above, p. 61 sq. title of Papias’ work.
2 It is curious that Eusebius (H. E. 3 rods xara Oedy dxaxlay doxodyras vy. 8), describing the work of the Elder aidas éxddouwv, ws Kal Ilamlas dyno? whom Ireneus quotes, calls it uncon- [i BrAlw mpwTrw Tov Kuptaxdy éEnyhoewr.
sciously éfnyjoes Oelwv ypadavy, an The extract is preserved in Maximus expression almost identical with the Confessor’s scholia to the work of
—
— ee
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 69
Lastly; in the few lines which Eusebius quotes from the preface of Papias, it is worth observing, first, that the names which he places at the head of the list of authorities are those of the Apostles known to us from the Fourth Gospel and from this alone, Andrew, Philip, Thomas’: and secondly, that he speaks of ‘the truth itself?” meaning our Lord, in accordance with the characteristic phraseology of this Gospel*.
But indeed, though the evidence is late and confused, we are not without direct testimony that Papias was acquainted with this Gospel. ‘The Gospel of John was revealed (manifes- tatwm) and given to the Churches,’ says an old Latin argument to this Gospel*, ‘by John while he still remained in the body, as one named Papias, of Hierapolis, a beloved disciple of John, related in his five books (or in his fifth book) of Expositions®’.
Dionysius Areopagiticus de eccl. hier- arch. ce. 2, and is given in Routh Relig. Sac. 1. p. 8, Fragm. 2.
1 Ti ’Avdpéas 7 7i Ilérpos elrev 7 ri Pitirmos 7 Ti Owuas (Papias in Hus, H. #. iii, 29). Andrew, Peter and Philip are mentioned together in St John’s Gospel as belonging to the same place (John i. 44). Of Philip nothing is recorded except in the Fourth Gospel. The last remark ap- plies also to Thomas.
2 am aris ris adnOelas Hus. l. c¢.; ef. John vy. 33, viii. 32, xiv. 6.
° The story of the woman taken in adultery (John vii. 53-viii, 11) may also be an extract from Papias’ work. It is certain that it is an interpolation where it stands. It is wanting in all Greek mss. before the sixth century; it was originally absent from all the oldest versions—Latin, Syriac, Egyp- tian, Gothic: it is not referred to, as part of St John’s Gospel, before the latter half of the fourth century. It is expressed in language quite foreign to St John’s style, and it interrupts the tenour of his narrative. Eusebius
tells us that Papias ‘relates also an other story concerning a woman ac- cused of many sins before the Lord’ and adds that it is ‘contained in the Gospel according to the Hebrews.’ It may very well be an illustration given by Papias of our Lord’s saying in John vill. 15 ‘I judge no man.’ [See Essays on Supernatural Religion, p. 203.]
4 The argument is contained in a Vatican ms. of the ninth century first published by Cardinal Thomasius (Op. 1, p. 344),
5 The ms. has in exotericis, id est, in extremis quinque libris. Overbeck in Hilgenfeld’s Zeitschr. f. Wissensch. Theol. x. p. 68 sq. (1867), contends that some one had forged five ad- ditional works in the name of Papias, and had entitled them Hzoterica, at- taching them to the genuine books. Hilgenfeld adopts this view. But it is simpler to suppose that ewxegeticis should be read for ezotericis, and externis (a gloss on exotericis) for extremis. The passage then presents no difficulties. [See Essays on Super- natural Religion, p. 210 sq.]
70 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
If the corruption of the context and the uncertainty of the source of the statement forbid us to lay much stress upon it, we are nevertheless not justified in setting it aside as wholly valueless.
4. About the year 165 Polycarp suffered martyrdom at a very advanced age. An account of the death of Polycarp is extant in a LETTER OF THE CHRISTIANS AT SMYRNA addressed to a neighbouring Church at the time. In this document the brethren draw a parallel between the sufferings of their martyred friend and the Passion of the Lord, which is suggested to them by some remarkable coincidences. ‘Nearly all the incidents which happened before his death,’ it is said at the outset, ‘came to pass, that the Lord from heaven might exhibit to us a martyrdom after the pattern of the Gospel; for Polycarp remained that he might be betrayed, just as the Lord did’ (§ 1). This account is the earliest instance of the type of hagiology which sees the suffermgs of Christ visibly reflected and imaged in detail in the servants of Christ, of which in the middle ages the lives of the great monastic founders St Francis and St Dominic, of Anselm and of Becket, are an example, and which has been unconsciously reproduced in more or less distinct lineaments in the biographies of the Wesleyan heroes in very recent times. This idea of literal conformity to the suffer- ings of Christ runs through the letter. Some of the coincidences are really striking, but in other cases the parallelism is more or less artificial The name of the convicting magistrate is Herod (§ 6); the time of the martyrdom is the passover, ‘the great sabbath’ (§ 21); Polycarp’s conviction is obtained by a confession elicited by torture from a youth in his employ, and thus he is ‘betrayed by them of his own household’ (§ 6); he is put wpon an ass and so carried before the magistrate, and of course this is a parallel to the triumphal entry at Jerusalem (§ 8); his pursuers come on horseback and in arms as ‘against a robber’ (§ 7); when he is apprehended, he prays ‘The will of God be done’ (§ 7), and so forth.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 71
Most of these incidents have their parallels in the circum- stances of the Passion as recorded in the Synoptic Gospels, or recorded by these in common with St John. This is natural ; for they refer mainly to external incidents, in which the Synoptic account is rich. But there are one or two exceptions. Thus we are told, at the crisis of Polycarp’s trial, that a voice came from heaven, ‘ Be strong and play the man, Polycarp’. And the speaker no one saw, but the voice those of our company that were present heard’ (§9). This corresponds to the voice which St John records as speaking from heaven to our Lord, and as imperfectly apprehended by the bystanders (John xii. 28, 29),
In §§ 5, 12 a change of circumstances brings with it the fulfilment of his prophecy as to the manner of his death (cf. John xii. 83, xvii. 32), Again we are told, when the fire would not consume the body of the Saint, his persecutors ‘ordered an executioner (confector) to go up to him and thrust a dagger into him. And when he had done this, there came forth a dove and’ a quantity of blood, so that it extinguished the fire; and all the multitude marvelled that there was so great a difference between the unbelievers and the elect’ (§ 16). The parallel to the incident recorded in St John’s account (xix. 34) of the crucifixion alone is obvious; and just as the Evangelist lays stress on his own presence as an eyewitness of the scenes (xix. 35) so also have these hagiologers done; ‘ we saw a great marvel,’ they say, ‘we to whom it was given to see; and we were preserved that we might relate it to the rest’ (§ 15). And, lastly, as St John emphasizes the fact that everything was fulfilled in the death of Jesus (xix. 28, 30), so also they declare of Polycarp that ‘every word which he uttered out of his mouth hath been, and shall be, accomplished’ (§ 16). To these facts it should be added that the dying prayer of Polycarp contains one or two coincidences with the characteristic phraseology of the Fourth Gospel, such
1 The expression itself is probably question whether the words mepiorepa from Deut, xxxi. 7, 23, Josh. i. 6, 7,9. «al are genuine or not. * The parallel is not affected by the
72 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
as ‘the resurrection of life, ‘the true God’ §14; cf. John v. 29, xvii. 3)’.
5. Of all the Asiatic school, exclusive of its great Gallic representative, MELITO of Sardis appears to have been the ablest. He possessed some slight knowledge at least of Oriental tongues; he had travelled to the East to obtain certain informa- tion about the Old Testament Canon; he was at once learned, He moreover won deep respect by His writings were very various,
thoughtful and eloquent. his ascetic earnestness. embracing alike questions of speculative theology, of scriptural exegesis, of practical duty, of ecclesiastical order.
Those works, of whose date any record is preserved, appear to have been written between the years 165-175. When Polycrates of Ephesus wrote in the last decade of the century he was no longer living; and it may perhaps be inferred, from the language there used of him’, that his death was not very recent’. These facts will fix his epoch approximately. Though he is not likely to have conversed with St John or other personal disciples of the Lord, he belonged to the generation immediately following, and must have had large opportunities of intercourse with men like Polycarp and Papias; for he was a flourishing and apparently an influential and prolific writer about the time of their death.
Of his numerous works only a few fragments remain; but these are quite sufficient to attest the influence of the Fourth Gospel on his teaching and language. It has been already mentioned‘, that the chronology of the Saviour’s life, adopted
1 Perhaps too the closing words of § 16 érerXerbOn Kal TeXcwOHjoceTaL are a reminiscence of the reréXeora of St John xix. 30.
2 See Polycratesin Eus. H. E. v. 24.
3 His treatise ‘On the Paschal Fes- tival,’ he himself tells us, was written while Sergius Paulus was proconsul of Asia (A.D. 164-166; see Waddington Fastes des Provinces Asiatiques, p. 731
in Le Bas and Waddington’s Voyage Archéologique etc.). Again we are in- formed that he addressed his Apo- logy to M. Antoninus (a.p, 161-180). From an extant fragment we learn that L. Verus, the colleague of M. Antoninus, was no longer living: this places the date after the spring of a.p. 169. 4 See above, p. 56 sq.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 73
in the Asiatic School, was derived from this Gospel. Of this fact Melito is an illustration. Of our Lord he thus writes: ‘Being at the same time both perfect God and perfect Man, He convinced us of His two natures, of His Godhead through His miracles in the three years after His baptism, and of His manhood in the thirty years which passed before His baptism’. If the thirty years before the baptism are taken from St Luke, the three years after the baptism cannot be derived from any other canonical Gospel but St John.
The largest extant fragment is taken from his Apology to M. Antoninus. In a treatise of this kind direct quotation is not usual ; and accordingly we find no passage of either the Old or the New Testament cited in Melito’s work. But the language and ideas are throughout coloured by the influence of the Fourth Gospel. ‘Neither can any sight see Him, nor any thought comprehend Him, nor any word express Him’ (p. xxxix.)’. ‘Behold a light is given to us all, that in it we may see. They dare to make an image of God, Whom they have not seen’ (p. xl.). ‘What is God? He that is Truth, and His Word is Truth’ (p. lxv.; cf. John xvii. 17). ‘What then is Truth?’ (cf. John xviii. 38). ‘If then a man adoreth that which is made by hands, he adoreth not the Truth nor the Word of Truth. But I have many things to say concerning this matter’ (p. xlv.; cf. John vii. 26, xvi. 12). ‘Wherefore I give thee counsel, that thou know thyself and know God’ (p. xlvi.; ef, John xvii. 3). ‘Worship Him with thy whole heart; then will He grant thee to know His will’ (p. xlvil; cf. John vii. 17). ‘To know God is Truth’ (p. xlix.). ‘To know the true God’ (2b.; ef. John xvii. 3). ‘The word of Truth reproacheth thee’ (p. 1.). ‘If thou canst not know God, at least think that He is’ (p. li.). ‘It is impossible for a mutable creature to see the immutable’ (p. li; cf John i. 18, 1 John iv, 12). ‘Then shall they who know not God, vanish away’ (p. lit), ‘According as thou shalt have known God here, so
1 Quoted by Anastatius of Sinai 2 The references are to Pitra’s Spici- _ (Migne P. G. xxxix. p, 228 sq.). leg. Solesm. 1.
74 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
will He know thee there’ (p. liii.). ‘We worship the only God, Who is before all and above all; and we worship also His Christ, being God the Word from eternity’ (p. lvi.).
In like manner in one of the homiletic fragments which remain’, he speaks of our Lord as the ‘Word of God and begotten before the light, the Creator with the Father the fashioner of man; all things im all, the Son in the Father, God in God, King unto all eternity’ (p. lix.); and in another, using the images of St John he says: ‘He appeared as a lamb, but He abode as a shepherd. He wanted food, in so far as He was man, yet He ceaseth not, in so far as He is God, to give food wherewith He feedeth the world®’ (p. lviii.).
6. CLAUDIUS APOLLINARIS was a contemporary of Melito; the two being coupled together by Eusebius, Jerome and others. He was a successor, if not the immediate successor, of Papias, as bishop of Hierapolis. The ascertainable dates of his life are: (1) He presented an apology to M. Antoninus, who died in A.D. 180. (2) He mentioned the incident of the thundering legion, which occurred A.D. 174, (3) Eusebius in his Chronicle seems to place his accession to the episcopate A.D. 171*. (4) He is no longer living in the last decade of the century, when Serapion® alludes to him (Eus. H. £. v. 19).
1 The fragment is extant in a Syriac version; it is given in Pitra’s Spicileg. Solesm. u. p. lix. sq., in Cureton’s Spicileg. Syr. p. 53 sq., and in Otto Corp. Apol. Christ. p. 420.
2 There is an Armenian extract (Spicileg. Solesm. 1. p. 4), which gives this passage with some alterations and a different commencement, assigning it to Ireneus. There is also a Syriac abridgment of the Armenian. It is probable that Irenewus introduced this passage from Melito either anony- mously or otherwise, into one of his writings. Another Armenian fragment (Spicileg. Solesm. 1. p. 1) gives as Irenzus what is really an extract from Papias quoted by Ireneus. [See Ls-
says on Supernatural Religion, pp. 232 sq., 236 sq.]
3 Cf. John i. 36, x. 1 sq. The so- called Clavis of Melito may contain a residuum of genuine matter, but as the amount of this is not ascertainable with any degree of certainty, its evi- dence must be left out of the question.
4 See Clinton Fast. Rom. 1. p. 167.
5 Eusebius Chron. and Jerome place the accession of Serapion to the epis- copate in the eleventh year of Com- modus, i.e. A.D. 190 or 191 (Clinton, I. p. 187), and he died apparently about A.D. 203 (Clem. Alex. in Eus. H. HE. vi. 11), though Eusebius himself says A.D, 212, See Clinton, 1. p, 211.
<= UL UL hl el Ul
EE
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS— 2. 795
Of several works known to have been written by this father, the scanty fragments which remain occupy something less than half an octavo page. They contain however two or three unde- niable references to the narrative of the Fourth Gospel. Thus Claudius speaks of our Lord as ‘pierced in His holy side,’ and ‘pouring forth from His side the two purifying elements, water and blood, word and spirit’ (Routh Relig. Sac. 1. p. 160, cf. John xix. 34). Thus too, he says, that the 14th was the true Pass- over of the Lord, the day on which He suffered, finding fault with those who maintain He ate the Paschal lamb with His dis- ciples on the 14th and was crucified on the 15th, on the ground that ‘according to their view the Gospels appear to be at variance. Thus he himself takes the Fourth Gospel as the chronologicai standard, and interprets the others by it; and here again, as in the case of Melito, we have a confirmation of the statement of Irenzeus, that the reckoning of the Asiatic School was founded thereupon or accorded therewith. It is only neces- sary to add that his allusions to the Gospels seem to imply that they had long been received as authoritative, but that the discussions on the Paschal question had at length awakened criticism, and started difficulties in harmonizing them which hitherto had not been perceived.
7. Potycrates of Ephesus closes the list of authorities belonging to the Asiatic School. In the last decade of the second century he writes to Victor, Bishop of Rome (A.D. 190- 202), on the Paschal question; and having occasion to mention the practice of St John describes him in the language of the Fourth Gospel, as the disciple that ‘reclined on the bosom of the Lord'’ Nothing like this occurs in the other Gospels. It must be borne in mind also that Polycrates states that seven of
1 6 émi TO oTHO0s TOO Kupiov dvarecwvy 6 kal émi TO or7Oos a’rod avarecwr, (Polycrates in Eus. H. E. v. 24), the where this resemblance is important, very expression which occurs in John when coupled with the fact that Iren- xili, 25 dvameodv éxelvos éml rd ctHH0s wus and Polycrates were allied on the
Tod Inood (the correct reading); comp. question of the Paschal controversy. Tren. iii. 1 Iwdvyns 6 wadnrhs Tod Kupiou
76 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
his relatives before him had been bishops; that he carefully observes their traditions; and that he has ‘gone diligently through every holy scripture’ (Polycrates in Eus. H. EH. v. 24).
8. But to complete the evidence, before passing away from the Asiatic Church to her Gallic colony, let me direct attention to one fact. MONTANISM, which took its rise about or soon after the middle of the second century, was strictly an offspring of the Christianity of Asia Minor. As might have been ex- pected, the two main props on which it relied for support were the two great writings ascribed to the Apostle St John. As its picture of the earthly metropolis of Christ’s kingdom, the New Jerusalem, was drawn from the Apocalypse, so also the prophetic mission of its founder was held to be the realisation of the promise recorded in the Fourth Gospel of the Paraclete, Who should lead the faithful into all truth.
On this subject I shall have more to say when I come to discuss the extreme view, into which the more extravagant opponents of Montanism were driven, of rejecting the writings of St John wholly’.
II. THe CHURCHES OF GAUL.
Intimately connected with the Churches of Asia Minor were the Christian brotherhoods established in the south of Gaul. The close alliance existing between these communities as early as the middle of the second century of the Christian era is a striking testimony to the power of the new faith in cementing the bonds of union between far-distant peoples. As, centuries before, the districts of Gaul lying on the seashore and along the banks of the Rhine had been civilised by colonists from the Greek peoples of Asia Minor, so now it would appear that these regions were indebted to the same country for the higher know- ledge of the Gospel. However this may be, the intercourse between the two Churches during the second century was close
1 See below, pp. 115 sqq.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. iva
and uninterrupted. More than one instance is recorded in which they corresponded with each other on matters of common or individual interest. On one occasion the Christians of Vienne and Lyons write to their brethren in Phrygia and Asia, giving them an account of the last hours of the martyrs who had suffered under M. Aurelius, and among these are mentioned at least two who were Asiatics by birth, Alexander, a physician from Phrygia (§ 13), and Attalus of Pergamum (§17). On another, the Gallican brotherhoods write to the same com- munities to express their opinion on the recent heresies of Montanus, Alcibiades, Theodotus, and others, an opinion which Eusebius describes as ‘circumspect and most orthodox’ (Eus. H. E. v. 3). This opinion was appended, he tells us, to a collection of letters written severally by the martyrs from their prisons, and addressed to the brethren in Phrygia and Asia (Eus. 1. c.).
Though all these documents were known to Eusebius, he has only preserved fragments (though very considerable fragments) of the first mentioned (H. £. v. 1). Its date is fixed as A.D. 177. In this letter the Gospel of St John is once distinctly quoted (§ 4), ‘So was fulfilled the saying of our Lord, “The time shall come, in which every one that killeth you shall think to do service to God” (John xvi. 2)’: while elsewhere its language is indirectly borrowed. Thus one of the martyrs is described as ‘having the Comforter in himself, the Spirit, which he showed in the fulness (7Anp@patos) of love, having been well-pleased to lay down even his own life in defence of the brethren (§ 3; cf. John xiv. 26, xv. 13): for he was and is indeed a genuine disciple of Christ, following the Lamb whithersoever He goeth’ (7b.; Rev. xiv. 4); and another as being ‘sprinkled and strengthened from the heavenly fountain of the water of life, that goeth forth from the body (vndvos) of Christ’ S 22 ; ef. John iv. 14, vu. 38).
The persecution which was fatal to these martyrs placed IRENZUS in the vacant see of Lyons. His testimony is im- portant, not only because a close connexion existed between the
78 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
Churches of Gaul and Asia generally, but because he was himself by birth and education an Asiatic. It is important also for another reason. He was directly connected with the Apostolic age by two remarkable instances of longevity’. Poly- carp, his early instructor in his Asiatic home, declared himself to have been ‘ eighty-six years in the Lord’ at the time of his martyrdom. Pothinus, his immediate predecessor in the see of Lyons, his late abode, was close upon ninety when he too died under the hands of the persecutor, Polycarp was a disciple of St John, and is said to have been placed by him in the see of Smyrna. Pothinus was a growing boy when the Apostle died, and it seems probable (though of this there is no direct evidence) that he, like his successor at Lyons, was of Asiatic birth and parentage. Irenzeus, as we have seen, lays great stress on the teaching of the former, which he professes to follow implicitly ; and we may suppose with much probability that among the anonymous presbyters whuse authority he quotes as having associated with the Apostles and their immediate successors the latter held a prominent place. We are therefore greatly interested in enquiring what language Irenzeus holds with re- spect to the Fourth Gospel.
The answer is decisive. He not only mentions or quotes it many times, as the work of the beloved disciple, but gives many particulars respecting it. He states in one place that it was written at Ephesus (iii. 1. 1), in another that its object was to counteract the heresies of the Nicolaitans and Cerinthians (iii, 11. 1). He uses it freely*, not only to establish his own position, but also to confute his Gnostic opponents. To them and to him alike, as to the universal Church, it is a recognised authority. In short, a Fourth Gospel is to Ireneeus not only a historical fact, but a foreordained necessity. He ransacks heaven and earth for reasons why the evangelical record should thus be foursquared. In analogies from the physical world, in types from Old Testament prophecy, in the successive developments of
1 See above, p. 53 sq. eighty times. 2 He quotes it between seventy and
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 79
God’s revelation to men, he finds evidence that this number alone is consonant with the Divine order of things (iii. 11. 8).
The extant work of Irenzus on heresies, from which these references are taken, was written during the episcopate of Eleutherus’, who held the see of Rome from about a.p. 175 to A.D. 190. The exact date is of little or no importance. The point to be kept in view is this; that in youth he had lived in familiar intercourse with Polycarp, and had heard his aged master speak again and again of the Apostle St John, that he professed to have a very vivid remembrance of those early days’, and that on every occasion he appealed to the traditions of the Asiatic School as authoritative in matters of Christian faith and history.
Of his honesty and good faith I think no reasonable doubt can be entertained. Eager partisanship may occasionally have blinded his judgment as to the value of the evidence before him. Close and searching criticism was not the characteristic either of his age or of his class. there have been confused or exaggerated in the course of
A tradition may here and
transmission ; a metaphor translated into a fact; a categorical statement substituted for an individual opinion ; an early date replaced by a later or conversely. Let all reasonable allowance be made for these possibilities. The fact still remains, that he firmly believed himself, and received as the tradition of St John’s personal disciples, that the Fourth Gospel was written by none other than the beloved Apostle himself. On this point he does not betray a shadow of a misgiving.
On reviewing the evidence of the Asiatic school, which thus culminates in Irenzus, we cannot fail to be struck with the solidarity of the body through which it is transmitted. Polycarp
1 Kleutherus is mentioned as still living (Iren. iii. 3, 3). On the other hand, a reference occurs to Theo- dotion’s version of the uxx (iii. 21, 1), and Theodotion’s version is stated not to have been published until the reign of Commodus (A.p. 182-190). But
Epiphanius, our authority for Theo- dotion’s date, is guilty of such start- ling confusions in the passage (de pond. et mens. 16, 17) that his trustworthiness is much discredited. [See Essays on Supernatural Religion, p. 260.]
2 See above, p. 55.
80 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
and Papias, Melito and Claudius Apollinaris, Polycrates and Ireneus, the martyrs of Asia and the martyrs of Gaul, are not isolated individuals, nor is church-membership their only bond of union; but within the Church itself they belong to a more or less compact community, of which the members are in constant mutual intercourse, and consult and advise each other on very diverse matters of interest.
This fact is a strong safeguard for the continuity of trans- mission where a tradition so important is concerned: but in the case before us the disputes of the age and country afford an additional security. As soon as we bring the original theory of the Tiibingen school, which dated the Fourth Gospel about A.D. 170, or even the modified hypothesis of some recent antagonists, which places it close upon the middle of the second century, face to face with these controversies, we at once see what enormous improbabilities are involved in either supposition. The forgery (for professing, as it evidently does, to emanate from the beloved disciple, the Fourth Gospel must be called by this hard name, unless it be genuine), the forgery is almost contemporary with, or even subsequent to, the rise of Montanism and the first outburst of the Quartodeciman con- troversy. It has a very direct bearing on Montanism, for it supplies a basis for the prophetic theory of this sect; and yet it is received by Catholics and Montanists alike. It raises questions connected with the celebration of Easter (though it does not touch the main subject of dispute); and yet it is accepted without misgiving equally by the Quartodecimans and their opponents. Yet, if the hypothesis were true, that it first saw the light during the lifetime of the very generation which was most actively engaged in both these controversies, must we not believe that its authenticity would have been most fiercely contested, and that the clearest traces of this contest would have been stamped on the extant literature of the period ?
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 81
Ill. THe CuHurcHes oF ANTIOCH.
1. From the Churches of Asia Minor and their Gallic colonies it is natural to turn to the neighbouring and allied Church of Antioch; and here the apostolical father Ianatrus first claims attention. His testimony is the more important, because he is historically connected with the two principal Churches in which the influence of St John prevailed, Ephesus and Smyrna. The genuine Epistles of Ignatius were written A.D. 110, very few years after the probable date of St John’s Gospel. They are brief, abrupt and epigrammatic, being chiefly occupied with personal explanations and instructions. An aged disciple on his way to martyrdom writes a few hurried lines to the Christian congregations with whom he has been brought into contact on his journey. Though they reflect the teaching, and in many places echo the language, of the New Testament—especially of St Paul—the letters contain only two direct quotations, as such, from Holy Scripture’.
Under these circumstances it is sufficient if we are able to trace the influence of the Fourth Gospel in individual thoughts and phrases. Nor are such traces wanting. When in his Epistle to the Philadelphians Ignatius writes (§ 7), ‘The Spirit is not deceived, being from God; for it knoweth whence
it cometh and whither it goeth (otdev yap rodev Epyetar Kal
1 Magn. 12, Eph. 5. In Eph. 5, yéeypamrat yap" brepnpdvors 6 Oeds avytt- rdocero, the quotation may have been taken direct from Prov. iii. 34, but the substitution of 6 eds for 6 Kupios in- clines me to suppose that Ignatius got it through 1 Pet. v. 5 or James iv. 6. The same substitution is found in Clem. Rom. 30. The following are the most striking coincidences in the Ignatian Epistles (1) with the Gospel narrative: Eph. 14 gdavepov 7d dévdpov amd Tod Kaprod avrod (cf. Matt. xii. 33), Smyrn. 1 va wANnpwOG waca dixaoctvy
L. E.
(of our Lord’s baptism; cf. Matt. iii. 15), Smyrn. 6 6 xwpev xwpelrw (cf. Matt. xix. 12), Polyc. 2 ppdvimos ylvou ws 6 dus é€v macw Kal axépatos eicael ws h mepiorepa (cf. Matt. x. 16); (2) with the Pauline Epistles: Eph. 10 édpatu 77 miorec (cf. Col. i. 23), ib. 16 oi oixo- PObpot Bacirelav Oeot od kAnpovoujoovow (ef. 1 Cor. vi. 9); and ib. 18 roo codds; mod cugnryTns ; (cf. 1 Cor. i. 20), Rom. 5 aXN ov mapa ToOTO Sedikalwuat (ef. 1 Cor. iv. 4), Polyc. 5 dyaray ras cupBlous, ws 6 Kupios thy éxkdyotav (cf. Eph. vy. 29).
6
82 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
mov wrayer), and it searcheth out the hidden things,’ we recognise at once our Lord’s description of the Spirit in His _ conversation with Nicodemus as related in John iii. 8. Other reminiscences, not so obvious but equally real, of Johannine language are traceable elsewhere. Thus the sentence, ‘The prince of this world is abolished’ (Tall. 4) is an echo, almost a repetition, of our Lord’s language (John xii. 31,xvi.11). Again, the contrast of the ‘corruptible food’ with the ‘bread of God, which is the flesh of Christ and the draught of His blood,’ (Rom. 7) is an adaptation of the characteristic discourse related in the sixth chapter of the same Gospel. So too in other passages he echoes the same expressions, ‘the flesh of the Lord,’ ‘the blood of Jesus Christ’ (Z'rall. 8; cf. Philad. 4), ‘the bread of God’ (Eph. 5). And elsewhere the coincidences with St John are equally patent; ‘we ought so to receive him (the bishop), as Him that sent him’ (Zph. 6; cf. John xiii. 20); ‘where the shepherd is, there follow ye, as sheep, for many fair-seeming wolves make captive those that run the race of God’ (Philad. 2; cf. John x. 4, 12); ‘to Him alone (Christ) are committed the hidden things of God, He Himself being the door of the Father’ (Philad. 9; cf. John x. 7); ‘Jesus Christ, His Son, Who is His Word, coming forth from silence, Who in all things pleased Him that sent Him’ (Magn. 8; cf. John vi. 38)’.
2. Following the succession of the Antiochene bishops we
1 The silence of Ignatius respecting St John has been urged on the other side, especially in Rom, 4 (ox as Ilérpos xal Ilafdos diatdoooua dir), where, it is contended, the introduc- tion of the names of St Peter and St Paul makes the omission of St John’s name more remarkable. But there is a good reason for this omis- sion. Ignatius is addressing the Ro- man Church, and therefore appeals to the two Apostles to whose precepts that Church had listened. Again in Eph. 12, where St Paul is again men- tioned, reference has been already
made in the previous section to other Apostles with whom the Ephesian Church was in harmony. Moreover, Ignatius singles out St Paul on ac- count of the parallel to himself. The Ephesian converts had sheltered St Paul as he passed through; and now Ignatius is passing through Ephesus on his way to martyrdom. Besides these two passages no Apostle is men- tioned by name in the Ignatian Epi- stles, except St Peter in Smyrn. 3, where there is a reference to an inci- dent in our Lord’s life.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS-—2. 83
arrive at THEOPHILUS —the sixth bishop according to Eusebius CHEV iv. 20), t the seventh according to Jerome (Ep. ad Algas. quaest. 6), who commences his list of Antiochene bishops with St Peter. In his extant Apologia ad Autolycwm, an un- doubtedly genuine work, Theophilus quotes the beginning of the Fourth Gospel and mentions St John as its author. The passage runs as follows: ‘whence the Holy Scriptures and all the inspired men (srvevpatodopor) teach us, one of whom, John, says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God,” showing that at the first God was alone, and the Word in Him. Then he says, “And the Word was God. All things were made through Him, and without Him was not anything made”’ (ad Autol. 1. 22). This direct and precise reference is the more conspicuous, because it is the solitary instance in which Theophilus quotes directly and by name any book of the New Testament. ‘To this undoubted quotation should be added the following coincidences. ‘How can one fail to notice the pangs which women suffer in child-bearing, and after that they forget their trouble?’ (ad Autol. 11. 23; cf. John xvi. 21); ‘A corn of wheat, or of the other seeds, ae it is cast into the earth, first dieth and is dissolved, then it riseth and becometh an ear (ctayvus)’ (ad Autol. i. 13). Here the language of Theophilus combines expressions in John xu. 24 and 1 Cor. xv. 36, 37. Lastly, in ad Autol. i. 14 occurs the following expression, ‘Do not therefore disbelieve, but believe, a reminiscence of John xx. 27, ‘Be not faithless, but believing.’
The date of these notices may be fixed with tolerable accuracy. Eusebius in his Chronicon gives A.D. 177 as the year of Theophilus’s death. But it is almost certain that he has antedated the event by six or more years at the lowest compu- tation. For in his Apology Theophilus mentions the death of M. Aurelius, and he carries his chronological calculations down to this epoch (11. 28). These calculations indeed are confessedly taken from Chryseros ‘the nomenclator’ (ii. 27), a freedman of Aurelius, who stopped at this point; but as the object of Theophilus is to calculate the age of the world at the time
6—2
84 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
when he writes, it is a tolerably safe conclusion that the third book, in which these calculations occur, must date not long after the death of the Stoic emperor, ie. not long after A.D. 180. The three books were written and despatched separately, so that the first and second, in which the quota- tions are found, may be placed a little earlier than the third book.
Besides the direct evidence which the Apologia ad Autoly- cum supplies to the authorship of the Fourth Gospel, Theophilus is in another way an indirect witness to the wide acceptance of four Gospels in the Canon of the New Testament. Jerome speaks in more than one passage of a work of Theophilus, now lost, which he calls his ‘commentaries.’ In one reference indeed he appears to throw doubt upon the authenticity of this work. Speaking of Theophilus in Vir. Illustr. 25 he says, ‘I have read commentaries written in his name on the Gospel and on the Proverbs of Solomon, which in my opinion do not appear to agree with the elegance and style of the volumes mentioned above’ (i.e. the ad Autolycwm and other works). But elsewhere he quotes the work without the slightest misgiving. In the preface to his own commentary on St Matthew’s Gospel (in Matth. praef. Op. vil. p. 7) he confesses ‘to have read many years before the commentaries on Matthew...of Theophilus, bishop of the city of Antioch.’ In his epistle to Algasia (Ep. exxi. Op. I. p. 866), written in A.D. 407, he throws further light upon the character of this lost writing. He speaks of it as a harmony of the four Gospels and as a lasting monument of the writer’s genius (Theophilus...qui quattuor Evangelistarum in
1 The four books of commentarii, extant in Latin and ascribed to Theo- philus, cannot represent the genuine work alluded to by Jerome. The theo- logy is evidently post-Nicene; passages are found nearly word for word in 8. Ambrose (i. § 120, p. 295, ed. Otto ; ef. Ambrose Comm. in Luc. iii. § 2), in Cyprian (i. § 153, p. 301; ef. Cyprian
Epist. lviii. § 5), and in Jerome (i. § 4, p. 280; ef. Jerome Comm. in Matt. i, Op. vu. p. 12); and the work is evidently not a translation from the Greek, but originally written in Latin, see ¢.g. i.p. 283 apex (=xepala) autem quatuor literas habens per evangelium quadruplex testamentum indicat no- yum.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 85
unum opus dicta compingens ingenii sui nobis monumenta dimisit). It is needless to point out the importance and significance of a harmony of the four Gospels constructed in the second century, in its relation to the genuineness of St John’s Gospel, and to the Diatessaron of Tatian.
IV. THE CHURCHES OF PALESTINE.
Contemporaneously with the Ignatian Epistles and the treatise of Theophilus, we have the evidence of writers in the neighbouring region of Palestine.
1. The date of the writings of Justin Martyr is of some importance. The two Apologies were written in the reign of Antoninus Pius, i.e. between July, 138, and March, 161. If we can trust the present text, the first (the longer) Apology was composed before M. Aurelius became Ceesar, i.e. before A.D. 140. Against this early date, however, it is urged (1) that L. Verus, who is there styled épactis madetas, was only ten years old at this time; (2) that Justin (Apol. i. 46) speaks of our Lord as born 150 years before, (8) that Marcion is mentioned as already influential (Apol. i. 26). I do not think that much stress can be laid on these arguments. The expression épac77s mTa.oelas was a very fit one to apply to an imperial boy, who was, or was presumed to be, studious and intelligent, and to whom owing to his youth no other compliment could be paid. As regards the question of the chronology of our Lord’s life, if Justin followed the ordinary computation (which is probably the case), he would place the Crucifixion in A.D. 29; and, allowing about thirty-three years for the interval between the Nativity and the Crucifixion, Justin’s 150 years would bring the date of the work to a.p. 146. The third objection, the allusion to Marcion, is more difficult to meet, but the dates of his life are very uncertain. Happily, however, we can escape these difficulties altogether. By a very plausible emendation (see Hort im the Journal of Philology, Ul. pp. 1638, 165, 1857), which reads cau kavoape for karcaps Kat in the opening words
s
86 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
of the Apology}, M. Aurelius has already become Cesar before the date of the work. If we accept this conjecture, the passage itself affords no posterior limit except the martyrdom of Justin, and the death of Antoninus Pius in A.D. 161. The second Apology is a sort of appendix or postscript to the first, written at the same time or soon after.
The Dialogue with Trypho was written after the longer Apology, to which it contains a clear allusion®, and therefore probably after both Apologies. It is represented as held at Ephesus, where Justin had stayed (Kus. H. #. iv. 18). Justin’s testimony therefore becomes in some sense the testimony of the Asiatic school. The time of the dialogue is stated to be during the war of Barcochba? A.D. 132-135, ie. when Polycarp and Papias were scarcely advanced beyond middle age, and while Melito and Apollinaris were yet young men. From the allusion to the first Apology given above, it is evident that if we accept the later date for the Apology, the dialogue cannot have been published until several years after it actually took place.
Eusebius and others after him place Justin’s martyrdom in the reign of M. Aurelius, and the Paschal Chronicle fixes it at A.D. 1654, On the other hand, Epiphanius’ apparently and others
1 The Apology opens as follows: Avroxpdropt Tirw AiNlw ’ Adprar@ ’AvTw- vig EvoeBet DeBarge Kaloape cal Ov7- pircium vig pirocdpy Kal Aoualy tido- sbpovt Kalcapos pice vig kai EdceBois elomoinrg@, épacry madelas, k.T.A. Over and above the question of date in- volyed, it is unnatural to describe Antoninus’ titles in a descending scale from Imperator to Cesar.
2 ode yap did Tod yévous Tov euod... Twos @povrlia ovotuevos, eyypddws Kalocape mporousAGv elrov mdavacbat avrovs x.7.r. Dial. § 120.
3 duydv rov viv yevduevov mb\enov Dial. § 1.
4 Bus. H. E. iv. 15; Chron. Pasch. p-. 481 sq. (ed. Bonn).
5 Epiphanius (391 a; 1. p. 411 ed.
Dindorf) makes Justin thirty years at the time of his martyrdom, which he places émi ‘Pworkod nyeudvos Kal ’Adpi- avod Baci\éws. The name Rusticus is too common at this period to give us much assistance, and the text of Epi- phanius is so corrupt that we may without hesitation read ’Avrwvivou for *Adpiavod in this passage, especially as a few lines lower down Epiphanius speaks of Tatian as setting up his heretical school about the twelfth year of Antoninus (7epi 7d dwiéxarov Eros ’Avrwrlvov Tod eboeBods Kaloapos). He had already described Tatian as a contemporary of Justin (cuvaxudfec *Ioverivw) who lapsed into heresy after Justin’s death.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 87
place it in the reign of Antoninus Pius, and, as far as we can judge, before a.p. 150. If we adopt with Hort A.p. 149 as the date (/.c. p. 180), and leave time for the Dialogue, we may place the extant works of our author between A.D. 145-149.
We now turn to the evidence which Justin affords as to the Fourth Gospel. He does not quote it by name, but he shows more than one striking coincidence with its language. Thus speaking of the sacrament of baptism he says (Apol. 1. 61), ‘ For Christ also said, “Unless ye be born again (avayevynOjTe), ye cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven”, for that it is quite impossible for those that are once born to enter into their mother’s womb is manifest to all’ (cf. John in. 3-5). If any doubt could be entertained whence this saying was derived, it will appear from a passage in the chapter immediately pre- ceding (§ 60) that the Fourth Gospel was present to his mind. Applying the incident of the brazen serpent as an image of the Crucifixion, he reports Moses as erecting the serpent and saying, ‘If ye look on this image (76 tUm@ To’Tw), and believe, ye shall be saved in Him. This is a very wide departure from the account in Numbers (xxi. 7-9), where there is nothing about a type or about the necessity of belief; but the writer obviously had in his mind John i. 14, 15, ‘as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in Him...should have eternal life’, Again, in the sixth chapter of the same Apology, Justin says: ‘The prophetic spirit we reverence and worship, honouring (it) in reason and in truth, where we are reminded of John iv. 24. Speaking of the holy eucharist, ‘We have been (or were) taught (éd:dayOnper), he writes (§ 66), ‘that the bread and wine are both the flesh and the blood of that Jesus Who became flesh, an expression founded upon John vi. 54. ‘For,’ he adds, ‘the Apostles, in the memoirs left by them, which are called Gospels, have recorded that it was so enjoined on them’ ete. This passage alone however would be far from conclusive. It can only be taken to strengthen a position already established.
1 Compare the treatment of this incident in Dial. § 94.
88 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
One other coincidence from the same work will suffice. Speak- ing of the prophecy in Isaiah of the miraculous conception of the Messiah, Justin remarks that God by the Spirit of prophecy foretold what was incredible, ‘so that, when it came to pass, it might not be disbelieved, but might be believed from its having been foretold’ (Apol. 1. 33), where we are at once reminded of John xiv. 29.
Turning now to the Dialogue with Trypho we find numerous expressions, which cannot well be explained except on the supposition that John had the Fourth Gospel before him. Our Lord is described as ‘the only spotless and righteous light, that was sent from God to men’ (Dial. 17; cf. John 1. 9); He is the ‘only-begotten of the Father of the universe, His Word and Power sprung in a special way (¢d¢ws) from Him, as we have learnt from the memoirs (és aro Tov amouynmovev- patov éuabouev)’ (Dial. 105; ef. John i. 14). An allusion to the imagery of Genesis xlix. 11 is explained of Christ because ‘His blood sprung not of man’s seed, but of the will of God’ (Dial. 63; cf. John i. 13). We are informed (Dial. 69) that the Jews ‘dared to call Him a magician and a deceiver of the people (AaorAadvor), where the last word seems to have been suggested by John vii. 12 ‘Nay, but he deceiveth the people (wrava Tov dyrov). Speaking of himself and of his brother Christians, Justin says, ‘We are called, and are, the true children of God, who keep His commandments (Dial. 1238; ef. John i. 12, 1 Joh. iii. 1, 2)’; ‘to us it is given both to hear, and to be with, and to be saved through this Christ, and to know all the things of the Father’ (Dial. 121; ef. John xiv. 7); ‘who are instructed in all the truth’ (Dial. 39; ef. John xvi, 13). ‘He that knoweth not Him (i.e. Christ), knoweth not the counsel of God, and he that insulteth and hateth Him, manifestly hateth and insulteth Him that sent Him; and if any man believeth not on Him, he believeth not the preaching of the prophets, who announced the glad tidings of Him, and preached them unto all’ (Dial. 136, a reminiscence of John vy, 23, 45, 46). Again, in the description of John the Baptist
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2Z., 89
given in Dial. 88, an account which is chiefly taken from the Synoptic Gospels, unmistakeable proofs are given of Justin’s acquaintance with the Fourth Gospel also. Thus the repudia- tion of the Baptist’s own claim to the Messiahship is closely associated with the announcement of the presence of the ‘one stronger, whose shoes John proclaims himself unworthy to bear, in a way which presupposes Justin’s knowledge of John 1. 19-27. Lastly, in Dial. 57 occurs an expression which reminds us very forcibly of John vi. 31, ‘Of the manna, on which your fathers were nourished in the wilderness, the scrip- ture saith, that they ate angels’ food,’
A work of Justin earlier than any extant is his treatise against Marcion. A few lines of this lost work are preserved in Treneus (iv. 6. 2). The passage is very short, not more than half a dozen lines, and does not give much scope for quotations from the New Testament, but in it occurs an expression suggested by St John, ‘The only-begotten Son came to us, gathering up His own creation in Himself.’ The latter part of the clause is based on Ephes. i. 10, the former on John i. 18.
2. We now turn from the master to the scholar, from Justin Martyr to TaTian, The facts of Tatian’s life are soon told. An Assyrian by birth, as he himself distinctly says, and a heathen, he exercised the profession of a sophist, in which capacity he travelled far and wide. His mind was first turned towards Christianity by reading the Scriptures, which impressed him greatly. He was converted, and became a disciple of Justin Martyr, doubtless at Rome, and after the death of his master appears to have remained some time in the metropolis teaching. Subsequently he left Rome, and seems to have spent the remainder of his life in the East, more especially in Syria and the neighbouring countries. After Justin’s death—how soon after we do not know—his opinions underwent a change. He separated himself from the Church, and espoused views closely allied to those of the Encratites. When Irenzus wrote his first book, Tatian was no longer living, as may be inferred from the language of this father (Iren. i. 28, 1); and this book must
90 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
have been written before A.D. 190, and may have been written as early as A.D. 178. On the whole, we shall perhaps not be far wrong if we place the period of his literary activity at about A.D. 155-1707.
Of several writings of Tatian mentioned by the ancients, | only one has come down to us*, his Address to the Greeks, a work composed before Tatian’s separation from the Church, apparently not long after the death of Justin.
This Oratio ad Graecos is an Apology, addressed to Gentiles. We do not therefore expect to find in it quotations from the sacred books, with which Gentile readers would as a matter of course have no acquaintance, and to which they would attribute no authority. But the following passages place beyond the reach of any reasonable doubt what was at least an a priori presumption, that the pupil of Justin knew and accepted the Fourth Gospel, to which his master’s extant writings have been shown to give testimony.
$4. ‘God is a Spirit (cf. John iv. 24),
§13. ‘And this then is the saying (rd eipnyévov), “The darkness comprehendeth not (od xataXapBaver) the light” (ef. John 1. 5).’
$19. ‘Follow ye the only God. All things have been made by Him, and apart from Him hath been made no thing (ef. John i. 3).
These passages are conclusive, for they are characteristic passages of the Fourth Gospel. There are other coincidences with Johannine language, such as § 5 ‘God was in the begin- ning,’ which, taken by themselves, cannot be pressed, but in the
1 See above, p.79. Clement of Alex- andria Strom. i, 1. 11 (p. 322) men- tions an ‘ Assyrian’ as one of his earlier teachers, and the identification of this Assyrian with Tatian is highly proba- ble; see below, p. 92.
* (On the whole subject of Tatian see Essays on Supernatural Religion, p- 272 sq.]
% [The discovery and publication in
1888 by Ciasca of Tatian’s Diatessaron in an Arabic version has set at rest for ever the question whether or no Tatian knew the Fourth Gospel. The Dia- tessaron is, as its name implies, a Harmony of the Four Gospels; and as Dr Lightfoot had surmised, consists of our four canonical Gospels, and commences with the opening words of St John’s Gospel.]
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2Z. 91
light of the extracts given above are probably derived from the same source.
V. Tue CuaurcH OF ALEXANDRIA.
1. In all probability, the Epistle of Barnabas is to be con- sidered the earliest piece of extant Christian literature, outside the Canon, which emanates from Alexandria. Whoever is its author—and it is noticeable that he nowhere claims to be the Apostle Barnabas—in his general style and his interpretation of the Old Testament, he represents Alexandrian thought. He gives us moreover a picture of feuds between Jews and Chris- tians, which is in keeping with what we know from other sources of the character of the population of that great city. For reasons which cannot be entered into here, but which bear upon the interpretation of a passage in § 4, I am inclined to
that emperor’s association with himself of his sons Titus and Domitian in the supreme power (A.D. 70-79). In this case, it
was written before the Fourth Gospel; we must therefore look elsewhere for the evidence of which we are in search. We shall find, if I mistake not, that the earliest quotations from the Fourth Gospel (and these very important) which proceed from Alexandria, are contained in the works of Gnostic writers, as Basilides, Valentinus ete.; and these will be considered later
on’.
At present we will confine ourselves to orthodox writings. With one possible exception there is no orthodox literature extant which comes from the Alexandrian Church between the Epistle of Barnabas and the writings of Clement of Alexandria. That exception is the latter part (§§ 11, 12) of the HpistLE to _ Diocnetus. In our solitary authority for this Epistle, the Strassburg MS., now no longer extant, the beginning of one treatise and the conclusion of another have been accidentally attached together so as to form in appearance one work. The writer of the latter part is clearly an Alexandrian, and indulges
1 See below, p. 104 sq.
92 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
in the allegorical interpretations of the Old Testament which are characteristic of that school. He calls himself ‘a disciple of the Apostles and a teacher of the Gentiles. The whole tone of thought of the fragment is second-century. These indications appear to point to Pantznus, the master of Clement, and the Apostle of the Indies (c. A.D. 180-210), as the author of the treatise. The account given of him in Eusebius (H. £. v. 10) would seem to imply that his journey to India’ preceded his appointment as head of the Catechetical school of Alexandria ; and Anastatius of Sinai speaks of him as one of those early exegetes, who understood all the narrative of the Hexaemeron as referring to Christ and the Church, a view which harmonizes in a remarkable degree with the allegorical interpretation of the garden of Eden preserved in this fragment.
The influence of St John is very manifest in this treatise, though there is no direct quotation from his Gospel. The Word who is called ‘the Life’ (7) Sw §12; cf. John i. 4), ‘who was from the beginning’ (0 am’ dpyjs § 11; cf. John i. 2), ‘through whom the Father is glorified’ (80 06 Ilatip d0€akerar § 12; cf. John xiii. 31, xiv. 13), ‘has revealed Himself’ to His disciples (ofs éfavépwoev 0 Adyos haveis § 11; cf. John ii. 11). These and other coincidences with the Fourth Gospel, occurring in a fragment which occupies less than two octavo pages, are sufficient to indicate that the writer’s mind was imbued with Johannine teaching and phraseology.
2. CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA in his Stromateis? (i. 1. 11) describes one of his instructors in Greece as ‘the Ionian’ (6 pep
1 Jerome Vir. Ill. 36, Ep. 70 (p. 428) states that he was sent to India by Demetrius (bishop of Alexandria 4.p. 189-231). ButHusebius (/.c.) represents him as head of the catechetical school ten years before the accession of Deme- trius. We must conclude that Jerome places the visit to India too late.
2 The Stromateis was written A.p. 194 or 195 under Severus. Clement’s other extant works are earlier, He
enumerates his teachers as follows, giving the country in which he was their pupil, (1) in Greece, ‘the Ionian,’ (2) in Magna Grecia, (a) one from Colo-Syria, (b) another from Egypt, (3) in the East, (a) one from Assyria, (b) another, in Palestine, a Hebrew, (4) in Alexandria, the last and greatest i.e. Pantenus. I am inclined to iden- tify ‘the Ionian’ with Melito.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 93
émt THs ‘EAXGdSos o Iwvexds), and places him first on the list of his teachers, as though he were the earliest.
Thus he is connected with Asia Minor, and probably with the school of St John. Consequently his testimony is of great importance for our purpose. traditions of St John. He speaks? of a certain statement as ‘not occurring in the four Gospels handed down to us (év Tos
To Clement we owe several
Tapacedopévois auiv TétTTapow evaryyeriows) but only in the Gospel according to the Egyptians,’ thus showing that in his time the number of the Gospels was definitely fixed at four. In another passage’ he appeals to the tradition of the presbyters of a former generation (zrapddocus Tdv avéxabev TpecBuTépwv) as to the order in which the Gospels were written, saying that after the other Gospels had been written, ‘John, last of all, observing that the external (bodily) facts: (ra cwpatixa) had been set forth in the existing Gospels, at the urgent request of his friends and by the divine guidance of the Spirit, composed a spiritual Gospel (avevpatixov moimoas evayyéduov). The value of this tradition may be great or it may be small; but his whole language bears testimony to the fact that the Gospel of St John had long been recognised as authoritative, and that traditions had grown up about it*.
3. ORIGEN was born in A.D. 185, and began to teach at eighteen. mentary on St John’s Gospel, and that he betrays no knowledge that the authenticity of the Gospel had ever been called in
Of him it is sufficient to say that he wrote a com-
question’.
1 e.g. the story of St John and the young robber (Quis div. salv. 42, p. 958), quoted in Eus. H. #. ili, 23.
2 Strom. lii. 13, p. 553.
3 Cited in Kus. H. E, vi. 14.
4 In his book on the Paschal Fes- tival Clement makes the 14th the day of the Crucifixion (Fragm. p. 1017 ed. Potter), thus following out the tra- dition of the Asiatic School. Of this
work only two short fragments survive, but Eusebius informs us (H. EF. vi. 13) that in it he mentioned ‘the traditions which he had heard from the elders.’ This is another indirect link with the School of St John.
5 See Liicke, p. 78. His commen- tary on St John was written about the year 222. In it he controverts Hera- cleon.
94 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
VI. THe CHURCHES OF GREECE AND MACEDONIA.
‘1, The extant remains belonging to this branch of the Church in the second century are very slight indeed. In the few lines of Dionysius of Corinth that survive, no quotation could have been introduced naturally. Perhaps however the EPISTLE TO Dioenetus §§ 1-10 may belong to this Church. It certainly shows evidence of Hellenic culture both in diction and matter. This however is a very slight presumption in favour of its ascription to Greece proper; and I only include it here because some place must be found for a document which is undoubtedly very early, and cannot well be assigned to a later date than the middle of the second century’.
The Epistle is full of indications of the influence of St John’s writings. ‘Christians dwell in the world, but are not of the world (§ 6; cf. John xvii. 11, 14, 16). The doctrine of the Word is drawn out fully in § 7. He is described as ‘the artificer and creator of the universe, by Whom God made the heavens, by Whom He enclosed the sea in its proper bounds (cf. John 1. 3, Heb. 1. 2)’: ‘God sent Him as saving...He sent Him as loving and not as judging (cf. John i. 17).’ In a later passage (§ 10), in language which is an echo of John iii. 16, we are told, ‘For God loved men...to whom He sent His only- begotten Son, to whom He promised the kingdom in heaven and will give it to those that love Him (cf. 1 John iv. 9).’ ‘How then,’ the writer goes on, ‘shalt thou (worthily) love Him that before loved thee so (cf. 1 John iv. 10, 11)?’
2. ‘That ATHENAGORAS should be considered a representa- tive of the Church of Greece is evident from the heading of his
1 Westcott (Canon of the N. T. p. 88, ed. 4) places it c. A.p. 117, Bunsen (Hippolytus 1, p. 170) a.p.135. Iam in- clined to date it somewhat later. The Diognetus addressed is not improbably the tutor of Marcus Aurelius, and the reference to ‘a King sending his son as a King’ (ws Baoiieds réurwv
vidv Baoiw\éa § 7), as illustrating the Incarnation, may very well have been suggested by the adoption of M. Aure- lius by Antoninus Pius in a.p. 147. On the other hand the simplicity of the theological teaching will not allow us to bring the date down much later.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 95
extant Apology, in which he describes himself as an ‘ Athenian.’ Thus the account of him given by Philippus Sidetes and pre- served by Nicephorus Callistus’, which makes him the first leader of the Catechetical school at Alexandria, must be But Philip of Side, who lived in the fifth century
and was ordained deacon by Chrysostom, was a notoriously
inaccurate. pretentious and careless writer. For instance, in his short account of Athenagoras he makes Pantzenus the pupil of Clement, and asserts that Athenagoras’ Apology was addressed to Hadrian and Antoninus, whereas its title shows it to have been dedicated to the emperors Aurelius and Commodus, and therefore written after Commodus was associated in the govern- ment (autumn of A.D. 176). From other indications it seems possible to fix the date more precisely between the end of A.D. 176 and the end of a.p. 177%.
The absence of all appeal to Holy Scripture, which is characteristic of apologies addressed to the heathen, is noticeable in Athenagoras also. But this does not prevent him from exhibiting correspondences with the thought and teaching of the Fourth Gospel. Thus God the Father ‘hath made all things by the Word that proceedeth from Him (da tod ap’ avtod Aoyou § 4; cf. John i. 3). Again, ‘the Son of God is (the) Word of the Father in form and in energy; for of Him and by Him were all things made, the Father and the Son being one, the Son being in the Father, and the Father in the Son (§ 10; cf. John 1. 3, xvii. 21 sq.).’ ‘To know God and the Word that proceedeth from Him, what is the union of the Son with the Father, what the communion (xowvwvia) of the Father with the Son’ is the Christian’s life (§ 12; cf. John xvii. 3).
1 See Dodwell Dissert. in Iren.
2 The Baéeia elpyyn (§ 2) is only applicable to the years 176—178 in the reign of M. Aurelius. This peace intervened between the close of the insurrection of Avidius Crassus and the outbreak of the Marcomannic War. On the other hand to place the Apology after the outbreak of the persecution
of the Christians of Vienne and Lyons (A.D. 177) raises a difficulty. Athen- agoras declares (§ 35) that no slaves had ever accused their Christian mas- ters of the infamous crimes attributed to them. This statement ceased to be true after the commencement of the persecution in question.
96 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN,
The later Church of Greece proper is almost a blank as regards any literary activity.
VII. THe CuHurcH or Rome.
The genuine Epistle of Clement has been assigned with great probability to A.D. 95 or 96, during the reign of Domitian, when St John was still in banishment in the island of Patmos. It was almost certainly composed before St John wrote his Gospel. Accordingly, in this, the first contribution to Christian extra-canonical literature which emanated from Rome, no quotation from the Fourth Gospel is possible.
1. We therefore pass on to the SHEPHERD OF HERMAS, the author of which is described in the Muratorian Canon, in a well-known passage, to have composed his work during the episcopate of his brother Pius (c. A.D. 141-156) in Rome’. It is the earliest Christian allegory, written probably by a slave’, and is noticeable for its absence of quotations from Holy Scripture. This applies not merely to the New Testament but to the Old Testament likewise. There are numerous passages which recall the language of the psalms and prophetical books in the one case, and of the Synoptic Gospels and Epistles—especially the Epistle of St James—in the other, but the coincidences are embedded in the narrative itself, and have to be carefully disentangled from it. The only quotation which is avowedly such, is taken from an apocryphal work, the book of Eldad and Modad*. In spite however of this characteristic feature, the treatise contains indications that the author was influenced by the writings of St John. The very title The Shepherd recalls the parable of the Good Shepherd in John x., and the sixth Similitude is an elaboration of the metaphor employed in that
1 Sedente cathedra urbis Romae ec- clesiae Pio episcopo fratre eius, Can. Murator. p. 58 sq. (ed. Tregelles).
2 Vis. i. 1, unless indeed he is as- guming a fictitious character. His
mention of Arcadia (Sim. ix.) makes it
probable that he came originally from Southern Greece.
3 ’Byybs Kupus rots émurrpepopévots, ws yéyparra év TO ’ENSAS cal Mwddr Vis. ii. 3.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2Z. of
parable. The same chapter in the Fourth Gospel affords a more remarkable coincidence. In the ninth Similitude the Son of God is called ‘the Gate) and it is added that ‘no man can enter into the kingdom of God otherwise than through the name of His Son Who is beloved by Him (Sim. ix. 12; ef. John x. 9, xiv. 6). In the same section the Son of God is said to be ‘begotten prior (rpoyevéorepos) to all His Creation, so that He became His Father’s adviser in His creation,’ These correspondences occurring together seem to indicate the influence of the Fourth Gospel. Elsewhere St John’s teaching on ‘the Truth’ underlies Hermas’ words as in Mand. 111., ‘ Love the truth, and let nothing but truth proceed out of your mouth ...and thus shall the Lord, Who dwelleth in thee, be glorified, for the Lord is true in every word, and with Him is no lie,’ a clear allusion to 1 John 11. 27. Lastly, another passage recalls expressions in John x. 18, the Son ‘having Himself cleansed the sins of His people, showed them the paths of life, giving them the law which He received from His Father (Sum. v. 6).
2. The reasons for assigning the MURATORIAN CANON to
Rome are briefly as follows: (1) the mention of ‘urbs’, implying that the writer was familiar with Rome and probably wrote at Rome, (2) the translation of the work into Latin and its preservation in the Western Church, (8) the fact that the Canon which it presents is substantially the Canon of the Western Church’, (4) the knowledge which the writer displays of the Roman authorship of the Pastor of Hermas, (5) the prominent position assigned to the Epistle to the Romans, which he explains more fully than usual, promising an
exposition of the Epistle itself. I will not discuss the
1 The word is @¥pa in St John, wiry in Hermas; but the passage in St John is loosely quoted at least three times by the early heretics given in Hippolytus with 7v)\7 instead of Opa ; and so also in the Clementine Homi- lies ; see below, p. 114.
2 There is however an obscure allu- sion to some (quidam ex nostris) who
L. E.
refuse to allow the public reading of the Apocalypse of Peter, as though imply- ing that the majority accepted this work as canonical.
3 Romanis autem ordine (? ordinem) scripturarum sed et principium earum esse Christum intimans prolixius scrip- sit, de quibus singulis necesse est a nobis disputari.
7
98 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
question of the authorship of this interesting fragment. It has been assigned to Gaius, the Roman presbyter, to He- gesippus, to Hippolytus. It was obviously written in Greek originally, and Greek was for the first two centuries the language of the Roman Church. The data for ascertaining the age of the writing are two, (1) the notice of an event occurring in the episcopate of Pius (A.D, 141-156) as having taken place nuperrime temporibus nostris, (2) the mention in a passage manifestly corrupt of Arsinous, Valentinus, Miltiades!, Basilides and the founder of the Montanists. We have thus the inferior and the superior limits within which the work is to be assigned ; and, though the problem presents considerable difficulties, we may provisionally place the date at A.D. 170 or thereabouts. The fragment opens with an account of the Four Gospels. It is mutilated at the beginning, and the description of St Matthew’s Gospel is wanting. This is the case too with the notice of St Mark’s Gospel, which is lost all but the conclusion of the last sentence—‘at which however he was present and so he set them down’*’ But the account given of St Luke throws light upon the writer’s meaning. St Luke, he tells us, was a physician who after the Ascension became a follower of St Paul and compiled his Gospel in his own name. ‘But neither did he (nec tpse i.e. any more than St Mark) see the Lord in the flesh, that is to say, he was not an eyewitness. ‘He wrote from hearsay (ex opinione €€ axoys). The writer then continues, ‘The Fourth Gospel is (the work) of John one of the (personal) disciples (of Christ) (ea discipulis é« tév pabntov). This expression is significant. St John’s position is here contrasted with that of St Mark and St Luke, who were not eyewitnesses. The word pa@yti)s implies a personal dis- ciple of the Lord, and it is so used in Papias and Irenzus*. Moreover in this place it is peculiarly appropriate, inasmuch as St John uses this expression of himself (John xviii. 15, 16, 1 For speculations as to Arsinous 2 Quibus tamen interfuit et ita posuit.
and Miltiades see Bunsen Anal. Anten. 3 Treneus always calls John 6 rod 1. p. 134 sq., and Credner Canon, p.82. Kuplov uaénrijs ; e.g. above, p. 57,
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 99
xix. 26, 27, xxi. 20, 23, 24); and his example doubtless fixed the usage of the Asiatic School. A little lower down, after quoting 1 John i. 1, he draws attention to the fact that St John ‘not only claimed to have seen and heard’ the Lord (read non solum visorem se esse et auditorem), ‘but to have written all the marvels of the Lord in order (sed et scriptorem omnium mirabilium Domini per ordinem profitetur)” This statement is emphatic. As distinct from the arrangement of events in the second and third (perhaps also in the first) Gospel, the eyewitness is declared to preserve the true chronology.
The references to the writings of St John in the Muratorian Canon are full and explicit. (1) The circum- stances under which the Gospel was written are first described ; (2) incidentally the opening words in the first Epistle are quoted, ‘What wonder then if John so boldly puts forward each statement in his Epistle (in epistolis suis rats éructoXais?) also saying of himself, “ What we have seen with our eyes and heard with our ears and our hands have handled, these things we have written unto you”’; (3) The mention of the number of St Paul’s Epistles introduces an allusion to the Apocalypse, ‘for John likewise in the Apocalypse, although he writes to seven Churches, yet speaks to all.’ (4) Next the Catholic Epistles are discussed’, and we are told that ‘two Epistles of the before- mentioned John are considered canonical‘, (5) lastly, the Apocalypse is mentioned again in conjunction with the Apoca- lypse of St Peter, and an unqualified testimony is given to its acceptance in the Church. Thus there is a continuous chain of
1 See Westcott Canon of the N. T. p. 211 (ed. 4).
2 The plural is here probably used to describe one epistle. This is not uncommon, cf. the Epistle of Poly- carp (§3); Huseb. H. HE, vi. 1; vi. 43; Joseph. Ant. xii. 4.10; and in classical writers Thuc, i. 132; iv. 50; viii. 51; Polyb. v. 43. 5 ete. It is common in the uxx; cf. Esth. iii. 14; 1 Mace. v. 14, etc. See my Philippians, p. 140 sq.
3 There is evidently a lacuna in the os. hereabouts, for the First Epistle of St Peter is not mentioned.
4 Superscripti Iohannis duas (l. duae) in catholica (J. catholicis) ha- bentur. The two Epistles meant are probably the Second and Third Epistles, the first being considered as a kind of prologue to the Gospel, detached from the shorter pair, and treated with the Gospel.
7—2
100 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
notices, and the absence of the faintest hint to the contrary renders it unquestionable that the same John is meant from beginning to end as the author of the Gospel, of the First Epistle, of the two shorter Epistles, and of the Apocalypse.
But is not the account of the Gospels in this fragment founded upon Papias? And if so, what account did Papias give? We have found that the Muratorian writer lays stress on the secondary character of St Mark’s account, with apparent reference to his chronology. Papias also* informs us concerning St Mark, that, though strictly accurate, he ‘ did not write in order (ov pévtoe Ta&ex), for he was not himself a hearer or follower of the Lord (ovrTe yap xovce Tod Kupiouv ovte tapnkodovOnoev avT@). Again, we notice that the Muratorian writer quotes from the First Epistle of St John in evidence. Papias likewise does the same. We are not told with what object Papias adduced this testimony from the Epistles; but it is at least a plausible hypothesis that he had the same end in view as the Muratorian writer. May it not then be inferred with some degree of probability that the writer of the Muratorian Canon borrowed in some degree from Papias? The use of the term ex discipulis seems to point to such a source of information,
3. It might have been unnecessary to carry the history of the Canon in the Roman Church further; but doubts have been thrown? of the view of HippoLyrus upon this question. It has been maintained that he shows no know ledge of the Gospel as the work of St John. It would indeed have been marvellous if Hippolytus, the pupil of Irenzeus, and the friend of Origen, both of whom bear such unmistakeable testimony to the recep- tion of the Fourth Gospel, had entertained any doubts on this subject. But the answer to the objection is evident. (1) When Hippolytus expounds his own views, he is addressing heathens. He therefore does not appeal to any scripture, because it would not carry authority with his hearers. (2) It is perfectly evident
1 Papias in Eus. H. F. iii. 39. character of the Fourth Gospel, pp. 57, 2 Tayler An attempt to ascertain the 177, 87.
—_—
THE AUTHENTICITY. AND GENUINENESS—2. 101
when he refers to the quotations from St John in Gnostic writings’, that he and they alike received as authoritative the documents which are quoted. (3) He does not mention by name St Matthew or St Luke. He mentions St Peter and St James indeed, but without any connexion with their writings in the New Testament. The only Pauline Epistles which he con- nects with the name of St Paul are Romans, 2 Corinthians, 1 Timothy and perhaps Galatians’, though he quotes these and most of the other Epistles of St Paul repeatedly. (4) In the work against Noetus (§§ 12, 14, 15 etc.) and in a fragment preserved by Lagarde (p. 52) he distinctly quotes the Fourth Gospel and attributes it to ‘John, the beloved disciple*’ (5) Among the list of works ascribed to him on his statue is a ‘Defence of the Gospel and Apocalypse of St John.’ The work is lost, but there is reason to suppose that it was known to, and used by, Epiphanius*: These reasons seem to me amply to justify our claim to reckon Hippolytus among the witnesses for the Johannine authorship.
Hippolytus is the last and most famous representative of the Greek Church of Rome. Henceforward Rome becomes the focus of Latin Christendom.
VIII THE CHURCHES OF AFRICA.
Meanwhile Latin Christianity has had its headquarters in Africa and especially at Carthage. And it is here that we must seek the opinion of the early Latin Church on the question of the Canon. The Roman Church, Greek in nation and Latin in soil, was the natural link between Greek and Latin Christendom. Carthage and Africa were converted from Rome. The Canon
1 See below, p. 105 sq. 30, ii. 19, iii. 6, 13 (twice and by name), 2 Romans, 2 Corinthians, Galatians 31, iv. 34, v. 25 (twice), 36, vi. 27, 35, once only, 1 Timothy twice. 45, viii. 12, x. 18, 30, xi. 35, 52, xiv. 6,
3 The quotations are as follows: 8 sq. 19 avis eo, Six. 140537, exe, John i. 1 (by name), 1-3 (by name), 17. 10, 14, 18, 20, 29 (twice, once by name), 4 On this work see below, p. 118.
102 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
of the African Church therefore may be supposed, in all the more important points, to reproduce the Canon of the Church of Rome.
1. TERTULLIAN is the first known writer of the African Church; as to his own individual opinion on the authority of the Fourth Gospel no doubt can be entertained. He quotes it some two hundred times or more without the slightest mis- giving. It is more important to trace the evidence, which his language affords, to the traditional testimony to its use. Thus in his treatise against Marcion (iv. 2, 5), after mentioning the four Evangelists together by name, he appeals to the Churches founded by St John and the succession of bishops derived from St John, as evidence for the reception of the Gospels by the Catholic Church. Making all allowance for his rhetoric, such an appeal cannot be considered unmeaning. Of the Gospel of St John especially he speaks (adv. Pras. § 5) as though it had long worked itself into the phraseology and the teaching of Christianity.
2. Another document, contemporary with, or rather earlier than, Tertullian, THE ACTS OF MARTYRDOM OF SS. PERPETUA AND FELiciTas (Ruinart, p. 80 sq.) shows what deep hold the writings of St John had taken on the African Church at this time. At the outset, we meet in the preface with two obvious coincidences with Johannine phraseology. The courage of the martyrs is instanced as a proof of the power of God, ‘Who worketh always the works which He hath promised, for a testimony to them that believe not, for a support to them that believe’ (quae repromisit non credentibus in testimonium, ere- dentibus in beneficitwum—a reference to John x. 38). The passage then proceeds, ‘accordingly in our case too, that which we have heard and handled declare we unto you also, brothers and sons, that ye also may...recount the glory of God (et nos itaque quod audivimus et contrectavimus annuntiamus et vobis, fratres et filioli, ut et vos...rememoremini gloriae Domini)’, an ex-
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 103
pression based upon the opening words of St John’s First Epistle’. Less stress can be laid on the fact that in her vision Perpetua sees (§ 4) sitting in the midst of a garden hominem canum in habitu Pastoris, for this favourite idea of Christ as the Good Shepherd may have been derived from the Pastor of Hermas. though its original source was doubtless John x. But towards the close of the document occurs an allusion to the Fourth Gospel, which is interesting because it is not apparent on the surface. The only direct quotation from the New Testament found in this martyrology runs as follows: ‘But He who had said, “Ask and ye shall receive” (qui dixerat Petite et accipietis), gave (to the martyrs) at their prayer that form of death which each had desired (§ 19). Now, though the passage quoted occurs in three of the four Gospels (Matt. vu. 7, Luke xi. 9, John xvi. 24), yet the exact form in which it is couched? shows that it was derived, not from the Synoptic narrative, but from the Fourth Gospel. In short, with the exception of the Apoca- lypse (e.g. especially § 12), there are no such coincidences with any other part of the New Testament as are afforded to the language of the Fourth Evangelist.
The Montanist, or rather Montanizing’, tendencies of this Martyrology bear testimony to its early date. Indeed, there is every reason to believe that it was contemporary with the events which it records. ‘Tertullian refers to the document in his de anima § 55, and the date usually assigned to this treatise is c. A.D. 208. The date of the martyrdom of 8. Perpetua and her companions is fixed by a reference in the Martyrology itself to the birthday of Geta Cesar‘, thus placing it between A.D. 198, when Geta became Cesar, and A.D. 209, when he was created Augustus. It is highly probable that the actual year was A.D. 202, during the persecution of Severus.
1 The passage quoted is probably alone alreioe kai Ajupeode.
verse 3. Notice however the variation 3 The allusion to ‘cheese’ in § 4 quod audivimus et contrectavimus for can, I think, hardly be taken to show quod vidimus et audivimus. that the writer or the martyrs were
2 St Matthew and St Luke have Artotyrites. airetobe xal doOjcerac buiv, St John 4 Natale tunc Getae Caesaris § 7.
104 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
IX. THE CHURCHES OF SYRIA.
There is no early Syrian writer of importance until Barde- sanes, He flourished at the close of the second century, or at the beginning of the third century, according as we consider the emperor Antoninus mentioned in connexion with him (Epiph. i. 477 A, Eus. H. H. iv. 20, Jerome Vir. Jil. etc.) to have been M. Aurelius or Caracalla. Bardesanes was a voluminous writer, but of the various works assigned to him only one has survived, The Book of the Laws of Countries, which was discovered by Cureton among the Nitrian MSS., and published by him in his Spicilegium Syriacum in 1855, When examined, however, this treatise appears to have emanated from the disciples of Barde- sanes rather than from Bardesanes himself, and its date is too late to be of assistance in determining the tradition of the Syrian Church on the question of the Fourth Gospel. Among the Ancient Syriac Documents discovered by Cureton in 1848 and published in 1864, is one entitled The Doctrine of the Apostles, in which Simon Peter is represented (Cureton J. ¢. p. 25) as quoting the promise of the Comforter in the language of John xiv. 26; and in another document, The Doctrine of Simon Cephas, the same quotation in a shorter form is again put into St Peter’s mouth (Cureton J. ¢. p. 36). But here again, the value of this evidence is lessened by the uncertainty of the date which is to be assigned to these ancient documents,
X. THE TESTIMONY OF HERETICAL WRITERS.
We now pass from the evidence of orthodox writers to the testimony of heretics, and when we begin to look into it we are surprised at its extent and at its early date. The numerous controversies which the early fathers held with the multiform systems to which Christianity gave rise, has resulted in our possessing, embedded in the works of the defenders of the faith, large extracts from the writers who assailed it. This mine of unorthodox literature has been largely increased by the acqui-
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 105
sition in recent years of Hippolytus’ great work the Refutation of all Heresies. From this newly-discovered work I shall draw the greater part of the evidence which I hope to bring before you. ‘The evidence itself I shall state as briefly as I can. We will begin with the Gnostics,
A. THE GNOSTICS.
1. Srmon MAacus is credited with a work called The Great Revelation (7 weyadn aropacis), of which Hippolytus has pre- served considerable extracts (Ref. vi. 9-18). There is however reason to believe that the treatise was mainly written by his disciples. In a quotation from this book given by Hippolytus (J.c. vi. 9), where man is described as ‘born of blood’ (rov é& aiatwv yeyevynuévov), some have found an allusion to John 1, 13 (0? ov« é& aiwatav...éyevynOncay). This seems to me very doubtful. Indeed the book was probably composed somewhere about the close of the first century, perhaps before the Gospel of St John was written, or at least circulated.
2. The OPHITES or NAASSENES. This was a very early sect, almost pre-Christian in its origin, which broke up into several distinct branches, as it adopted diverse extraneous elements. But its assimilative character makes it next to impossible. for us to separate the more ancient features of its teaching from the more recent developments. Thus we have no means of ascertaining the exact date of the writings quoted by Hippolytus. But Hippolytus himself composed his Refutation some time early in the third century’, and he intimates that when he wrote the Ophite system was already on the wane. There is good reason therefore for assigning an early period in the second century for the document which he had before him. It abounds with quotations from the Fourth Gospel. I will not weary you
1 The limits of date for the compo- own death, which took place some- sition are the death of Callistus a.p. where between a.p. 235 and 238 (Liber 220, of whom an account is given Pontificalis 1. pp. 64, 145, Duchesne). (Haer. ix. 11 sq.), and Hippolytus’
106 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
by detailing them at length, but will content myself with giving the references to the Gospel and to the pages in Duncker and Schneidewin’s edition (1859) of the Refutatio, merely premising that the quotations are clear and explicit.
Johni.3. Refutatio v. 8 (p. 150), v. 9 (166).
1, 9. v. 9 (p. 172). i. 5. v. 8 (p. 162). ii. 6. v. 7 (p. 148). iv. 10, 14. v. 9 (p. 172). iv. 21. v. 9 (p. 166). v. 37. v. 8 (p. 154). vi. 44. v. 8 (p. 158). vi. 53. v. 8 (p. 152). vi. 21. v. 8 (p. 154). xD; v. 8 (p. 156). xiii. 33. v. 8 (p. 152).
There are also undoubted allusions to the marriage of Cana in Galilee (John i. 1-11; ef. Ref. v. 8 p. 152) and to the man born blind (John ix. 1; cf. Ref v. 9 p. 172), which are evidently taken from the same source. And this list might be enlarged without difficulty.
3. The distinction between the PERATH and the Naassenes is not very clearly defined, and the two bodies seem to have held many tenets in common; but Hippolytus treats them as separate sects, and it is evident therefore that he considered the Peraté, as a body, to have a real and independent existence. I tabulate as before the obvious quotations from the Fourth Gospel, which occur in the account of them taken by Hippolytus from one of their own documents.
John i. 1-4. Refutatio v. 16 (p. 194).
il, 14, v. 16 (p. 192). 11,17, v. 12 (p. 178). Vill. 44. v. 17 (p. 196).
, aie & v. 17 (p. 198).
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 107
4. We pass on to another Ophite sect, which is treated next in order in the Refutatio—the SETHIANI. As far as we can judge from the extracts which Hippolytus gives us, the formularies of this sect do not indulge in scriptural phraseology to any great extent. But here again we meet with traces of the use of St John’s language, e.g. Ref. v. 19 (p. 206), where the Logos is said to have ‘drunk the cup of the living water which springeth up, an expression which recalls John iv. 10, 14; and Ref. v. 21 (p. 212), where true believers are spoken of as those ‘who are born again of the Spirit, not of the flesh, words which remind us of John ii. 6.
5. JuSTINUS, whom Hippolytus quotes as another Ophite heresiarch, elaborated a system which combined heathen mythology and the book of Genesis into a fantastic theory of the universe. The Book of Baruch, from which Hippolytus quotes, presents few correspondences with the New Testament, but the same coincidence is found with John iv. 10, 14, which we have noticed already; and Jesus, as he leaves his body on the cross, says to his mother Eden, ‘Woman, thou hast to the full thy son’ (T'vvat, amréyets cou Tov vidv), words which, though with a wholly different application, betray an acquaintance with John xix. 26.
6. The evidence which the Ophite system affords can be supplemented from the PisTis SopHia, one of the few remains of the old Gnostic literature which have come down to us. This work is preserved in a Coptic version. It is in four books, the fourth probably by a different author, and containing a simpler form of teaching than the other three. The date usually assigned to the composition is the middle of the third century. I give from Petermann’s edition the correspondences which it presents with the Fourth Gospel.
John i. 20. Pistis Sophia p. 9. vu. 33. pik xii. 35. p. 11. Xiv. 3. p. 145.
108 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
John xv. 15. Pistis Sophia p. 145. xv. 19. pp. 8, 145. xvii. 14, 16. pp. 8, 145. Xvil. 23. p. 145. xvii, 25, pp. 120, 175.
The Johannine expression ‘Verily, verily’ (Apiv apy) occurs very frequently (pp. 23, 55, 117, 197) in this treatise.
7. BAsILIDES, Gnostic teacher of Alexandria, flourished in the reign of Hadrian (A.D. 117-138). He professed to have been instructed by Glaucias, a follower of St Peter. Clement of Alexandria, to whom we owe this information (Strom. vii. 17 p. 898), classes him in a loose way with those heretics ‘who arose about the times of Hadrian, and who reached until the period of the elder Antoninus’. Though Clement was interested in placing his date as low as possible*, there is no serious difference of opinion in this respect. Within a few years the limit must le. Now Hippolytus gives an abstract of a work, or portion of a work, by Basilides ; and in it one or two passages of St John are quoted and gnostically explained: ‘And this,’ says he, ‘is what is called in the Gospels, “That was the true light that lghteth every man who cometh (or coming) into the world”’ (Hv 76 das ro dAnOivor,d dworifer tavta avOpwrov epxomevov eis Tov Koopov Ref. vii. 22 p. 360; cf. John i. 9), And again: ‘But that every thing,’ says he, ‘has its own proper times (xazpovs), the Saviour states explicitly, saying, “My time is not yet come” (ovaw tee 7 pa pou Ref: vii. 27 p. 376; cf. John ii. 4). It is said, however, that these quotations are taken not from Basilides himself, but from some other Basilidean writer. But what are the facts? The general form in which the quotations are introduced—the word dyciv— cannot be urged as an argument one way or the other; for the expression is often used impersonally, and may mean ‘he says’
1 Our chief authorities for the life xxiv. 1. (p. 68¢), Theodoret H. F. i, 2. of Basilides are Clem. l.c., Iren. i. 24, 2 He is contending that the Catholic 3 sq., Eus. H. E. iv, 7, Epiph. Haer. Church is older than the sects,
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 109
or ‘they say.’ The question must be decided by an examination of the passages themselves. Hippolytus begins by stating (p. 356 1. 64), that Basilides and Isidore his son and disciple declare that Matthew delivered to them certain secret truths which he had heard from the Saviour. Then follows a series of quotations, extending over many pages and ushered in (p. 356 1.69) by ¢yoiv. This connecting particle is repeated again and again, but it links together a continuous argument from which it is patent that Hippolytus is quoting some one book and some one representative of the school. When he comments on the statements made, he occasionally speaks of his opponents in the plural’, but the narrative quoted exhibits more than once the writer's personality, e.g. ‘“I do not admit”, says he’ (ov déyouaz, gynoiv p. 356 1. 79); ‘“ By willed, I mean,” says he’ (7d 6é nOédynce Eyo, Hyoi p. 358 |. 97), clearly showing that the writer was a single individual who delivered his opinions with authority. Who then was this writer? The answer is obvious. None other than Basilides himself. No other name is mentioned? by Hippolytus. After the first introduction Isidore is tacitly dropped, and Basilides is treated as the solitary antagonist. But it may be contended that this was a later work written by a disciplein the name of Basilides. To this contention we may reply, (1) that no such work was ever heard of, (2) that Basilides differed herein from other heresiarchs, as Simon Magus for example, in that his followers had no interest in forging documents in his name. For unlike the Ophites and the Valentinians, the Basilideans were not a large and spreading sect. They soon dwindled away, leaving by a natural selection the Ophites and Valentinians masters of the Gnostic field. On the other hand, the abstract which Hippolytus gives shows the influence of a master mind. Now it is known that Basilides wrote twenty-four books upon the Gospel*’—a work which is
leg. p. 356 ll. 84, 86, p. 36011. 45, rocoto B.), p. 364 1. 8 (dinpyrar yap 49, p. 366 1. 36, p. 368 1. 69, p. 376 = dd B.), p. 366 1. 46 (B....d:acage), cf. ]. 7, p. 378.1. 12, p. 366 1. 47, p. 368 1. 50 etc.
2he.2; p. 306) 1.985, p. 360) 1. 27 3 See Agrippa Castor in Eus. H. EL. (pevyer yap 6 B.), p. 362 1. 67 Kade? 7d iv. 7.
110 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
quoted by Clement of Alexandria’, and which therefore was very likely to be in the hands of Hippolytus. And part of the abstract in Hippolytus is taken up with explaining what is meant by the term ‘the Gospel’?; while the whole is closed with the significant sentence, ‘These then are the fables which Basilides utters, who taught throughout Egypt, and such were the fruits which he produced who was instructed in so great wisdom (p. 378 ll. 40 sq.)” And then Basilides is dismissed, and Hippolytus goes on to combat his contemporary Saturninus®, The extreme probability therefore that we have in the Refuta- tion the very words of Basilides himself falls little short of demonstration; and thus we have a passage from St John quoted, as contained ‘in the Gospels’, by one outside the Church who ranks in antiquity between Clement of Rome and Polycarp*.
8. VALENTINUS came to Rome, we are told, in the episco- pate of Hyginus (A.D, 138-141) and was in his full vigour in the episcopate of Pius (c. A.D. 141-156). He professed to have received his instruction from Theodas, a disciple of St Paul®. Tertullian informs us’ that he adopted the Canon of the New Testament complete, and the fact that the whole phraseology of the Valentinian system is built upon the opening verses of St John’s Gospel® is conclusive evidence that he recognised our Fourth Evangelist. Indeed, we have Irenzus’ authority (11. 11,7) for saying that the Valentinians especially affected the Gospel of St John. But the matter is set at rest once for all by a distinct quotation from St John (x. 8) which Hippolytus records of him (8a Todt, not, Neyer 6 Lornp* Tlavres of
1 Clem. Alex. Strom. iv. 12, 83 sq. 5 Treneeus iii. 4, 3. (p. 599 sq.) 6 Clem. Alex. Strom. vii. 17, p. 898. 2 e.g. p. 370 1. 97 sq., p. 372 ll, 12 7 Tert. de praescr, 38, si Valentinus sq., 32, 37, 40, p. 378 1. 10 sq., and integro instrumento uti videtur, non especially p. 376 1. 6 sq. callidiore ingenio quam Marcion manus 3 radra pev otv éorw 4 kal B, pvdevdec intulit veritati; ef. de carne Chr. 19, ...Laropvetdos 5é Tis cuvaxudoas T@ B. Tren. iii. 14, 4. x7.’ Ref. vii. 27, p. 378 1. 40 sq. 8 rdijpwua, povoyerhs, POs, oxdbros, * See Westcott Canon of the N. T. Xbyos, fw}, ddfPaa are Valentinian p. 290, ed, 4. terms, so also is mapdxA\nrTos.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 111
mpo é€wov eAnAvOoTes KAeTTAL Kai AnoTal eit Ref. vi. 35 p. 284 Ea? sq:).
9. The Valentinians were divided into two schools (1) Western and (2) Eastern (Hipp. Ref. vi. 35 p. 286). Of the Western Valentinians the most noticeable names are Heracleon, Ptolemzeus and Marcus. Now HERACLEON! wrote a commentary on St John, which is quoted frequently by Origen®. Origen informs us that Heracleon was reported to have been a familiar friend of Valentinus (Comm. in Joan. Tom. 11. § 8). The rise of commentaries shows an advanced stage in the history of the text of the Fourth Gospel. PToLEMus, like Heracleon, was a direct disciple of Valentinus. His letter to his sister Flora is preserved in Epiphanius (Haer. xxxiii. 3 p. 216 sq.); and in it John i. 3 is quoted (§ 3) as the statement of 6 awécrodos. Again, in Iren. i. 8, 2 a Valentinian writer quotes John xii. 27 (ti eizrw ove otda), and a little later on (§ 5) follows a direct quotation from the same or another writer, commencing, ‘John the disciple of the Lord’, and explaining from a Valentinian stand- point the prologue of the Fourth Gospel. From the clause added at the end of the section in the Latin version (et Ptolemaeus quidem etc.) it appears that the anonymous writer was Ptolemeus. Marcus himself must have been of early date, inasmuch as ‘the Elder who lived before’ Irenzeus wrote against him (Iren. i. 15, 6). From the account which Ireneus preserves of him, he appears to have used our Four Gospels, and the extracts from his teaching which survive in the works of this father contain an illustration of the mystical number ten, founded on a reference to the appearance of our Lord after His resurrection ‘when Thomas was not present’ (Iren. 1. 18, 3; cf. John xx. 24),
It is doubtful whether Marcus should be included among the Western, and not rather among the Eastern Valentinians. Our information as regards these last is very scanty, but a ray
1 For his date see Hilgenfeld Zeit- 2 He is also quoted by Clem, Alex. schr. x. p. 75, and Westcott Canon Strom. iv. 73, p. 595. p. 299 sq. ed. 4.
112 | THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
of light is thrown upon them by a collection of extracts ap- pended to the works of Clement of Alexandria and according to Bunsen (Analect. Antenic. p. 203) taken from the first book of the Hypotyposeis. The collection is entitled é« tdév Oeoddrov Kat THS avaToNLKNs Kadoupevys OidacKanrias Kata To’s Ovanev- tivov ypovovs émitowat. It abounds in quotations from the Fourth Gospel, explained in a Valentinian sense. I tabulate the most striking, giving the pages from Potter’s edition of
Clement :—
John i. 1. Clem. Alex. §§ 6, 18 pp. 968, 973. i. 3. § 45 p. 979. i. 4. & 6, 18 pp. 968, 973. i. 9. § 41 p. 979. i. 14, 18. § 6 p. 968. it. 16. § 9 p. 969. iii. 8. § 17 p. 972. iv. 24, § 17 p. 972. vill. 12. § 35 p. 978. viii, 56. § 18 p. 973. x. 7, § 26 p. 975. xi. 25, § 6 p. 968. xiv. 6. § 6 p. 968.
10. Marcron elaborated his system about 4.D. 150. At first he accepted all the Four Gospels (Tert. de carne Chr. § 2, 3), but afterwards he became ‘ultra-Pauline, rejecting all but mutilations of the writings of St Luke and St Paul. The ground on which he would reject the authority of the three ‘pillar-Apostles*’ is evident from Tertullian (adv. Marcion. v. 3), who tells us that he appealed to St Paul’s references in the Epistle to the Galatians to certain false apostles who had perverted the Gospel of Christ, and especially to St Peter, as not walking uprightly after the truth of the Gospel. Thus he would consider them plunged in the blackness of intellectual darkness and incapable of imparting any teaching to a Gnostic like himself, while his
1 Galat. ii. 9 of Soxodyres ortdox elvac.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2Z. 1138
condemnation of the Fourth Gospel would be pointed by the consideration that St John was an Apostle of the circumcision. His silence therefore with respect to the Fourth Gospel becomes an argument in favour of its genuineness; had Marcion quoted it with approval, the fact would have been, so far as it went, evidence against the Johannine authorship. Apelles, his disciple, was certainly aware of its existence, for he tells us’ that after His resurrection our Lord showed His disciples ‘the marks of the nails and in (of) His side,’ an inci- dent which is mentioned by St John alone (xx. 25).
11. The Docer# doubted the reality of the Incarnation, saying that our Lord’s humanity was an appearance and nothing more. Their language was founded upon St John’s phraseology—aAocyos, wovoyevns, TANpwwa occurring constantly in their formularies (Hipp. Ref. vi. 9, 10, pp. 416, 418, 420). John ii. 5, 6 is adduced in support of their opinions in a Docetic document given us by Hippolytus (Ref. viii. 10 p. 422).
12. The JUDAIZING CHRISTIANS in the primitive Church separated off into two main divisions, according to the view that they adopted of the obligation of the Mosaic Law. The Nazarenes, while recognising the binding nature of the law upon themselves, were in the main orthodox. On the other hand the Ebionites considered the old dispensation permanent and for everyone, and repudiated the authority and Apostleship of St Paul. In considering the testimony which these two early Judaizing sects afford to the Fourth Gospel, we are fortunate in being able to appeal at first hand to extant works emanating from representatives of both schools of thought.
The CLEMENTINE HoMILIES represent the views of Gnostic Ebionism’. The exact date of the work is uncertain, but it may be placed with confidence between A.D. 100—180. I am myself inclined to fix it at c. A.D. 150. Formerly our know- ledge of the treatise was derived from a manuscript mutilated
1 In Hipp. Ref. vii. 88, p. 410. my Galatians, pp. 327 sq., 340 sq. 2 On the Clementine literature see [Dissertations, pp. 83 sq., 98 sq.] L. E. 8
114 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
at the end, and some alleged correspondences with the Fourth Gospel, which it contained, were hotly disputed by the Tiibingen school, who made this document the keystone of their elaborate theory of the alleged antagonism between St Paul and St Peter in the early Church. In 1853, however, Dressel published the mis- sing conclusion from a Vatican MS., and it was found to contain an obvious allusion to the story of the man born blind’. From that time the acquaintance of the Clementine writer with the Fourth Gospel has not been denied. Though this passage in the 19th homily is decisive, it may be of interest to give other coincidences from the earlier portions of this work; e.g. Clem. Hom. iii. 25 ‘He was a murderer and a liar’ (doveds yap Ww kat wedorns, cf. John vi. 44); Clem. Hom. iii. 52 ‘I am the gate () wvAm)’ of life, he that entereth through me entereth into life’ (cf. John x. 27); 7b. ‘My sheep hear my voice’ (cf. John x. 9); Clem. Hom. xi. 26 ‘Verily I say unto you, except ye be born again of living water in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven’ (cf. John iii. 5).
The book entitled THE TESTAMENTS OF THE TWELVE PATRIARCHS is a product of Nazarene, as the Clementine Homilies of Ebionite, Judaism. It was written after the capture of Jerusalem by Titus, and probably before the rebellion of Barcochba (A.D. 132—135)*. It professes to be a prophecy of the Messiah, and it could not therefore without loss of dramatic propriety quote from the Evangelical record,
1 §0ev cal GiddoKados judy wept Tod ex yeveriis mnpod Kal dvaBdéYavros map’ a’rod é&erd[fwv épwrjcacw] el otros nuaprev 7% ol yovets attod va rupdds yevynO, dmexpivaro, Ore obrés Te Huap- rev ol're ol yoveis ai'tod, GAN iva &’ abrod pavepwhh 4 Sivaus rod Oeod Clem. Hom. xix. § 22; ef. John ix. 2, 3.
2 For rin see above, p. 97.
3 For the various dates assigned to this work see on Galatians, p. 320, [Dissertations, p. 76]. It is directly
named by Origen (Hom. in Jos. xv. 6), and probably was known to Tertullian (ce. Mare. vy. 1, Scorpiace 13), and (as I believe) even earlier to Irenreus (Fragm. 17, p. 836 sq. Stieren). Had it been written after the suppression of Bar- cochba’s rebellion, it is next to im- possible that no mention should have been made of an event so important to the Judaizing Christians as the second destruction of Jerusalem by Hadrian.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 115
but it contains many expressions which are characteristic of the Fourth Gospel, as povoyevns (Test. Benj. 9), 6 duvos tod Ocod (Test. Jos. 19, Benj. 3), 0 cwtnp tod Kxdcpov' (Test. Levi 14, Benj. 3), » wy eis Sonv twacns capxos (Test. Jud. 24). Other longer sentences are apparently due to the same source; thus Lest. Levi 14 ro pas tod Kdcpwov 76 Sober ev ipiv eis dwtvcpoy mavtos avOpw7ov (cf. John i. 9, viii. 12), ib. § 18 adres rroujoes Kptow adrnGeias emi THs yAs (cf. John v. 27); ib. tore ayar- Macetat “ABpaaw (cf. John viii. 56); Test. Jud. 20 76 rvedpa THS adnGelas paptupel TavtTa Kal KaTynyopel wavtwy (cf. John xv. 26); Test. Benj. 9 émi Evrov twOnoerar...cal...gcTa avaBaivwv amo yns eis ovpavoy (cf. John iii. 13, 14, vi. 62).
Hitherto the voice of antiquity, whether uttered by the early fathers of the Church or by those who stood outside her pale, has been unanimous, as far as we can follow it, in testifying to the genuineness and authenticity of the Fourth Gospel. To this universal tradition, however, there is one exception, and one only, and we will conclude our examination of the external evidence by a consideration of this solitary exception to the chorus of universal attestation.
After speaking of Marcion’s mutilation of the Canon, Treneus (iu. 11, 9) goes on to mention ‘others also, who, in order that they may frustrate the gift of the Spirit, do not admit that type of Church teaching (illam spectem), which is in accordance with St John’s Gospel, in which the Lord promised that He would send the Paraclete; but at one and the same time reject both the Gospel and the spirit of prophecy. Unhappy men in very truth, who desire false prophets to exist (pseudo-prophetae—read pseudo-prophetas—quidem esse volunt), but yet banish from the Church the grace of prophecy... Accordingly they ought not to acknowledge the Apostle Paul either...because he testifies to men and women prophesying in
the Church?’
1 This expression occurs only in 2 A reference to 1 Cor. xi. 4, 5. John iv. 42 and 1 John iv. 14.
8—2
116 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
Now from Ivenzeus’ argument, of which I have given only a part, it is clear (1) that these objectors repudiate the Gospel of St John, because it contains a special promise of spiritual gifts, (2) that they confess the existence of false prophets, and yet deny the existence of a true prophecy, (3) hence, Irenzeus argues, they are as unreasonable as those who refuse to associate with the brethren for fear there should be hypocrites among them, (4) on this ground they ought not only to reject the Gospel of St John, but also the Epistles of St Paul, for St Paul has spoken very emphatically about spiritual gifts, and recognises both men and women as prophesying in the Church’. Irenzeus goes on in the next chapter to show at great length that there is a Spirit.
It is evident therefore that the persons spoken of are strong anti-Montanists; they took offence at the claims of the Monta- nists to spiritual gifts, more especially at the prophesyings of women. We must therefore read pseudo-prophetas in the passage given above, For Montanism was spiritualism con- sidered as a reaction against formalism and intellectualism. The Montanists laid great stress upon the writings of St John, especially the Apocalypse, hence these opponents of Montanism cut the knot by denying the authority of the Fourth Gospel*. And they did more than this. Irenzeus speaks only of their rejection of the Gospel of St John. He is dwelling only on the Gospels; and therefore he would naturally not say anything
1 See a similar argument used a- gainst these same persons by Epipha- nius (li. 32 p. 106 ed. Oehler).
2 The alternative correction of Liicke (p. 65) nolunt for volunt seems to inter- fere with the sense.
3 Considerable light is thrown on Iveneus’ attitude upon this matter by the letter of the Gallican Churches to the Asiatic Churches quoted in Eus. H. E. v. 3 on this very subject of Montanism. ‘The letter is an attempt at mediation ; it was written avowedly elotwns vexev, and it was penned by
the martyrs ‘while yet in bonds’ to the brethren in Asia and Phrygia. At the same time the martyrs sent Irenzus, then a presbyter, as their delegate with letters of recommendation to Eleutherus, bishop of Rome (Eus. H. E. vy. 4) for the sake of conferring with him on this same question. Ireneus therefore is not a strong anti-Montanist. He mentions the pseudo-prophetae in another passage (Haer. iv. 33, 6) with, again, a prob- able reference to Montanism.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 117
about their position with respect to other canonical books. It appears however from other sources that they rejected also the Apocalypse. For Epiphanius (who wrote after A.D. 350) describes a sect of heretics, whom he dubs ”AXoyoz, or irrationalists. It is a play on the word, for they rejected the testimony of John, who taught the doctrine of the Logos. He says, ‘I put upon them this nickname; from henceforth they shall be so called, and therefore, my beloved, let us give them this name’ (Epiph. Haer. li. 3). He seems to have succeeded in affixing this opprobrious title upon them, for Augustine so calls them afterwards (Haer. 30, Oehler 1. p. 202). Of these Alogi Epi- phanius relates that they sprang up after the Cataphrygians, and he evidently considers that they originated in the same neighbourhood (J. c. esp. § 33). He begins by describing them (§ 1) as ézreryetou ‘material, ‘sensual, in their views, and as gainsaying the Holy Spirit and the wonderful sequence of the Gospels (§16). He closes a full account of them with a passage commencing (§ 35) ‘And these not receiving the Holy Spirit are convicted by the Spirit etc.’ Thus his account begins and ends with an allusion to their attitude towards the doctrine o the Holy Spirit, and his expressions are meaningless unless he is describmg an anti-Spiritualist, anti-Montanist movement. We may therefore take it for granted that Irenzeus and Epiphanius are referring to one and the same body of people, Epiphanius goes on to say that they rejected the Gospel and the Apocalypse, and attributed these writings to Cerinthus. He supposes that they also rejected the Epistles of St John likewise, ‘for these, he says, ‘agree in character with the Gospel and the Apocalypse’ (§ 34), but he evidently knows nothing definite about this last poit.
In every other respect the Alogi seem to have been orthodox (Epiph. li. § 4 d0xodcu yap Kal adtol ta ica npiv mioTtevewv'). It does not appear that they rejected the doctrine of St John’s Gospel. The silence of Epiphanius on this point is speaking.
1 Compare Preedestinatus Haer, 1. 30 omnia nobiscum sapiunt (Oehler 1. p. 243).
118 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
Certainly this energetic champion of orthodoxy does not detect any mark of Ebionism in them. They may, however, have repudiated the Johannine form under which the Divinity of our Lord was taught, though even this is doubtful.
Very similar is the brief notice of the Alogi in Philastrius (Oehler 1. p. 61). He mentions those who reject both the Gospel and the Apocalypse; but he seems to restrict to the Apocalypse their attribution of the authorship to Cerinthus. And this was perhaps really the case. For Dionysius of Alexandria (Eus. H. #. vii. 25, comp. iii. 28) speaks of some before him who attributed this book to Cerinthus and the Cerinthians, because they thought that they saw in it a gross and material picture of an earthly kingdom of Christ. This ascription would suit very well the fragment of Gaius written against the Montanists and preserved in Eusebius (H. £. iii. 28), and it is possible that Dionysius alludes to Gaius; but it is strange that, if this was the view of Gaius, Eusebius should not have told us so distinctly. Certainly Theodoret interpreted it differently (Haer. Fab. 1. 3; see Routh R. 8. ii. 139).
But whence did Epiphanius draw his information? We can make a shrewd guess. Hippolytus of Portus wrote a book uvzrép Tov kata lwavyny evayyediov Kal atoxadvwews'. This fact is recorded on his statue (Fabricius Hippol. pp. 36 sq., Bunsen Hippol. 1. p. 460). That this book was known in the East appears from the Catalogue of Ebed-Jesu (Assemani Bibl. Or. il. p. 15), where it occurs in the list of Hippolytus’ works as Apologia pro Apocalypsi et Evangelio Ioannis Apostoli et Evangelistae. It is probable also that this is the same work of which the title is given by other writers, e.g. de Apocalypsi (Jerome Vir. Ill. 61), wept adrroxadvews (Andreas of Cesarea in Apocal. Synops., Syncellus Chron. p. 674 ed. Bonn). At all events, Epiphanius is borrowing largely from some earlier writer*. Here then and elsewhere Epiphanius may have consulted Hip-
1 See above, p. 101. and the pseudo-Tertullian on heresies
* The common source underlying is an interesting problem, which can- the works of Epiphanius, Philastrius not be entered upon here.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 119
polytus. Now twice in the immediate context (li. §§ 6, 7) is an allusion to a Merinthus who is mentioned side by side with Cerinthus; and from another passage’ it is clear that Epiphanius was uncertain whether they were not after all one and the ‘Whether the same
Cerinthus was afterwards called Merinthus, or there was a sepa-
same person. The passage is interesting. rate person by name Merinthus, a fellow-worker of his, is known to God (alone). Now Mnypivfos means a ‘noose, and was doubtless, as Fabricius shrewdly suggested (Cod. Apoc. N. T. 344), nothing more nor less than an opprobrious nickname given by an earlier writer, whose work was in Epiphanius’ hands, and who may have written thus ‘Cerithus, or had we not better say Merinthus’ (0 6é KypevOos obtos, cite MypivOov Set réyeur), Such pleasantries were by no means uncommon as applied to antagonists. Thus Demo- critus is called by Epicurus Lenocritus (Zeller Stoics ii. 1 p. 429), Photinus of Pirmium in the Macrostich Skotinus?, Manes (Marys) by Eusebius*® and others Maneis (Maveis). This habit of playing upon names is quite characteristic of Hippolytus. Thus in his treatise against Noetus, he turns his antagonist’s
and in this way misled his copyist.
name to ridicule, Nontds un vowv thv adrnOeav (c. Noet. 8), and in his Refutation, when dealing with the Docetz, he plays upon the words doxeiy ‘to seem’ and doxos ‘a beam,’ contending that they are so named*, not because they ‘seemed to be of importance’ (Gal. 11. 6), but because of ‘the beam in their eye’ (Matt. vii. 3). For these reasons we are tempted to infer that, though Epiphanius claims for himself the invention of the term Alogi, he may have borrowed the name and the account which he gives from his more fanciful predecessor’.
1 Epiph. Haer, xxviii. 8, p. 1150.
2 See Bright’s Church History (1860), p. 52, who gives instances from Eu- sebius H. HE, v. 23, vi. 41, vii. 10, 31.
3 See Bright l.c. and Cotelier Patr. Apost. I. p. 543.
4 Aoxnras éavrods mpoonybpevoay, wy ov TO Ooxety elyac Tivds KaTavooUmeV parattovras, a\Na Thy Ex TooadTns Uys
doxdv év 6pOau@ Pepomervnv Srehéyxouev, Hipp. Ref. viii. 11.
5 Two additional sources of testi- mony have been omitted in the above account, viz. that (1) of heathen writers, (2) of Apocryphal documents. In the former class, Celsus (¢. A.D. 150) treats the Gospel of St John as a record considered authoritative by the
120 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
In looking back over the subject which has been occupying us, we cannot fail to be struck with the variety and the fulness of the evidence which has been adduced. Within the Catholic Church that evidence springs in the first instance direct from the fountain-head, the band of disciples which in Asia Minor gathered round the person of the aged Apostle of Love. From Polycarp and Papias it is handed down to the next link in the chain in Irenzus, the great scholar and traveller, whose life is associated with three distinct and important Churches— Churches in constant intercommunication—Asia Minor, Rome,
Gaul. pendent extant documents, the Apology of Theophilus, the
These three great centres we are able to test by inde-
Christians (Origen c. Celswm i. 67, ii. 18, x. 24). He speaks of Christians calling our Lord atrédoyor (c. Cels. ii. 31), he refers to our Lord sitting thirsty by Jacob’s well (c. Cels. i. 70; cf. John iv. 6), and to the piercing of His side and the result (c. Cels. ii. 36; cf. John xix. 34). Therefore we con- clude that by the middle of the second century this Gospel was so well known amongst Christians that Celsus could appeal to it as an accredited witness, Again Lucian (¢. A.D. 165—170), in his account of Peregrinus Proteus (§ 11), gives indications of acquaintanceship with the Fourth Evangelist (see Zahn Ignatius p. 593), and so does Amelius in Eusebius Praep. Euang. xi. 19. The last-named was a disciple of Plotinus, and flourished ¢. a.p. 250, Preminent in the—latter—class are the Acta Pilati (given in Tischendorf Evangelia Apocrypha), which form the first sixteen chapters of the Hvange- lium Nicodemi, and appear not only in Greek but in Coptic and in Latin. This is a very early work, and in its Latin form exists in a Vienna palim- psest of the 5th or 6th century, There is little doubt that it is the compo- sition referred to by Justin Martyr (Apol. i, 35, 48) and Tertullian (A polo-
geticus 21), for it answers in all par- ticulars to the books described by these writers. Apocryphal Gospels are notoriously liable to interpolations; we cannot therefore lay much stress upon the evidence in this case, but as the document stands, with whatever uncertainty hanging over it, the inci- dents are again and again taken from St John’s Gospel. Lastly the Sibyllist lends her voice to the general attesta- tion. The eighth book of the Oracula Sibyllina is the work of a Christian who wrote during the reign of Anto- ninus Pius (a.p, 1388—161). Speaking of the resurrection, the poet declares that those shall rise with the risen Lord ‘who have washed away their former sins in the waters of the eternal fount (rnyis), having been born again from above (dvayevynbév- res avw0ev),..For the Lord will exhibit Himself first to His own, in bodily shape as He was before, and will show them His hands and His feet and the marks printed upon His limbs, four in number, east and west, south and north (xepolv re rocly +’ émdelter Téc- capa Tots (dls tyvn mnxOévra pédNecow "AvroNlnv Siow re, weonuBplavy re xal apxrov (Orac. Sib, viii, 316 sq.; ef. John iii. 3, xx. 20).
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—2. 121
Muratorian Canon, the Letter of the Gallican Churches, and we find an unhesitating response to our enquiry. We pass over to other Churches of the East, to Palestine and Alexandria, to Greece and Macedonia, with equally satisfactory results. We cross the Mediterranean southwards to Carthage, and the earliest extant writings of the Latin Church of Africa show unmistake- able acquaintance with St John. And now we take a new departure. We leave the apologists and fathers of the orthodox Church, and we turn to the representatives of those multifarious heresies whose rank growth seemed likely to stifle the infant Church of the second century. And here we are startled at once by the variety and the unanimity of the evidence presented. Differing in almost every other particular, heterodoxy unites in bearing testimony to St John’s Gospel. Gnosticism, the out- come of Gentile license of speculation and practice, Ebionism, the offspring of Judaizing tendencies, Montanism, the expres- sion of spiritual excitement—they all presuppose, and to some extent build upon, the Fourth Gospel. Fresh discoveries, which have added considerably to our stock of heretical treatises, have only served to give new weight and force to this testimony. Making every allowance for the possibility that in some cases zealous disciples may have interpolated documents already existing, or have perpetrated forgeries in their masters’ names, yet more than enough of unorthodox literature can be tested to throw back the date of the general acceptance outside the Church of St John’s Gospel as genuine to a very early period in the second century. The solitary exception to this chorus of attestation is found to proceed from an insignificant sect, which, having a special doctrine to inculcate, seeks to effect its end by impugning the documents which strike at the root of its theory. When we pass to the consideration of heathen writers in the opponents of Christianity, or of Apocryphal literature, the supplementary evidence which we are able to collect, though necessarily scanty, still bears out the results to which our previous investigations have already pointed us.
Lastly, so far from considering that the general subject is in
FS? THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
any way exhausted, we rise from our review with the conscious- ness that it has been most inadequately treated, and with the confident persuasion, that a little more patient investigation bestowed on the literature of the first two centuries of the Christian era, as it has come down to us, would enable us to add very materially indeed to the weight of external evidence which with fresh force from year to year tends to the conviction that this most divine of all divine books was indeed the work of ‘the disciple whom Jesus loved.’
[1867 —1872.]
III.
INTERNAL EVIDENCE FOR THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS OF ST JOHN’S GOSPEL.
ie
INTERNAL EVIDENCE FOR THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS OF ST JOHN’S GOSPEL.
i la considering this question three points will be taken in succession. I shall endeavour to show :—
I. That the writer was intimately acquainted with the language, customs, ideas, geography and history of Palestine at the time which he describes.
Inference. He was not only a Jew, but a Palestinian Jew; not a Hellenist, but a Hebrew. And most probably too he was a_ contemporary. For the double destruction of Jerusalem— by Titus and by Hadrian—had caused a dislocation, a discon- tinuity, in the history of the Jews, which it would be difficult to bridge over by one writing after the occurrence of the second of these events.
II. That the narrative bears on its face the credentials of its authenticity. It is precise, circumstantial, natural in the
——
highest degree. Inference. It is the work of an eyewitness.
III. That it contains indications—the more convincing be-
cause they are unobtrusive—(a) that the author was the Apostle St John; (8) that_the book was written at the time and under
the circumstances, under which tradition reports it to have
been written, i.e. at Ephesus, towards the close of th century after Christ.
126 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
These, then, are the three stages in the argument :—
(1) The writer was a Hebrew, probably a contemporary.
(2) The writer was an eyewitness.
(3) The writer was St John (and as a subsidiary matter, St John writing under peculiar circumstances).
he
THE WRITER WAS A HEBREW, PROBABLY A CONTEMPORARY.
The main heads of this division of the argument are as follows :—
1. His knowledge of the Jewish language.
2. His knowledge of Jewish ideas, traditions, expectations, modes of thought, etc.
3. His knowledge of external facts, the history, geography, names and customs of the Jewish people.
1. THE WRITER'S KNOWLEDGE OF THE JEWISH LANGUAGE,
This is shown (i) indirectly, by his own Greek style; (ii) directly, by his interpretation of Hebrew words and his quota- tions from Hebrew Scriptures.
(1) The writer’s indirect knowledge of Hebrew shown by his Greek style.
I spoke of the Jewish language ; but what is meant by this? There are two languages with which a Palestinian Jew might be familiar :—
(1) The Hebrew—the sacred language, the language of the Old Testament.
(2) The Aramaic—the colloquial language, the language of common life.
He would necessarily know the second, not necessarily know the first.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 127
The Hebrew of the New Testament is Aramaic. This is the meaning of ’E@paiori in such passages as John v. 2; xix. 13,17; xx. 16. The forms quoted as Hebrew (Talitha cwmi, Maran atha) are Aramaic. This is no doubt the language of the inscription on the cross (John xix. 20), and of St Paul’s speech on the temple- stairs (Acts xxi. 40).
it is a common error to suppose that Aramaic is a corrupt form of Hebrew. This is quite wrong. The Shemitic family of languages has three main languages, one of which—Arabic— may be neglected for our purpose, leaving Hebrew and Aramaic. Of these, Aramaic, the language of Aram (Syria) [the high- land ?], has, as its dialects, Syriac, Chaldee, Assyrian (the cuneiform inscriptions). On the other hand, Hebrew, the lan- guage of Canaan [the low-lands ?], was originally the language of Pheenicians and Canaanites, the people on the coast.
Which then was the language of the Jewish nation at the beginning of the Christian era ?
Abraham comes from Ur of the Chaldees, and therefore would naturally speak an Aramaic language. But he settles in Palestine among the Canaanites, adopts a Canaanite language, and speaks what we call Hebrew. Hence the incident in Gen. xxxl. 47, 48. The ‘heap of witness’ is called by Laban ‘ Jegar- Sahadutha,’ by Jacob ‘Galeed.’ Thus the descendants of Terah in the third generation speak two languages. The grandson of Nahor retains his Aramaic, while the grandson of Abraham has adopted Hebrew. This is what we should expect, and is an incidental testimony to the credibility of the Mosaic narrative. After the return from the Babylonian captivity the Jews gradually merged their own Hebrew language in Aramaic, but the name ‘Hebrew’ was transferred to the adopted language. Thus the Jews returned apparently to what was the language of their ancestors. How they came by this Aramaic—whether it was the dialect of their Chaldean masters, or the dialect of the people who overran their land during their absence, or a mixture of both—we need not stop to enquire.
At the time of our Lord the natives of Palestine were
128 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
bilingual; they spoke Greek and Aramaic. At least this was the case in a great part of the country, more especially in the towns and populous districts, the centres of commerce?, such as the lake of Galilee and Jerusalem. In this respect the Pales- tinian Jew resembled a Welshman on the border-land, a Fleming in the neighbourhood of the half-French towns of Flanders, a Bohemian in Prague.
Now apply this to the case of the Apostle St John. John was not a man of the lowest class socially. He was a native of Bethsaida, and had connexions or friends in high quarters at Jerusalem (xviii. 16). He would be able to understand and speak Greek from his boyhood, possibly even to write it. But he would think in Aramaic. Aramaic would mould the form of his thoughts”.
Take the case of a person writing in a language which was not the common language of his daily life, not his mother-tongue. What would be the phenomena, which his style would present ? The two parts of a language, in which a person writing in a foreign tongue is apt to be at fault, are the vocabulary and the syntax, As regards vocabulary, we should not expect great luxuriance of words, a copious command of synonyms for instance. In the matter of syntax, we should not look for a mastery of complex and involved syntax, or of sustained and elaborate periods.
Now apply this to the Fourth Gospel.
1. The Vocabulary. The words in this Gospel are very few; probably-much fewer than in any other portion of the New Testament of the same length.
(a) We meet with constant repetition of the same words: e.g. yuvdonerv (57 times), Koopos (79 times), riores, muotevew (99 times), fon, &jv, Sworrorety (55 times), waptupia,
1 See Roberts, Dissertations on the fellow townsmen Andrew and Philip, Gospels, whose view however is per- is strictly in accordance with proba- haps somewhat exaggerated. bilities. It is a significant fact that
* The incident given in John xii. they both bear Greek names. 20—22, relating to his friends and
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 129
paptupey (47 times); mpo8arov occurs in the tenth chapter alone 15 times; xoopos occurs in the seventeenth chapter alone 18 times’.
(6) We find not only the same words, but the same phrases: e.g. épyerOas, 0 Téuryas pe, aTrooTéAXNeL, KaTaBaiveww ex (470) Tov ovpavod—all used of Christ’s Incarnation, etc.’
2. The Syntax. On the extreme simplicity of the Fourth Gospel in this respect, I shall have to speak later. This charac- teristic of the writer is well expressed by Heinsius, who describes him thus, In sermone adéreva: in sensibus est trros*®. The absence of periods is particularly noticeable, and is without a parallel in the New Testament.
Thus much, generally, of one writing in another language than his mother tongue. Now to come to the special case of one accustomed to speak in a Shemitic tongue, and obliged to write in an Aryan; of one familiar with (say) Aramaic, the conversational, spoken language, and Hebrew, the sacred lan- guage; but writing in Greek. Both these languages present striking contrasts with Greek. In these Shemitic tongues there is little or no syntax. This is due partly to
(1) The absence of moods, inflexions, ete. (2) The paucity of connecting particles.
On this last pomt, which is of special importance, one example will suftice.
(1) Paucity of connecting particles.
The } is used equally for opposition and for simple connexion; in Hebrew and Aramaic it stands for ‘but’ as well as ‘and The extent of this use is best shown by the variety of particles which are employed under it in the Authorised Version of the Old Testament.
Thus in Deut. i. (taken at hap-hazard) } is translated ‘so’
1 These calculations are based upon 2 See Luthardt 1. p. 31 sq. Luthardt Das Johanneische Evangelium 3 Quoted by Luthardt 1. p. 28. 1. p. 27 (1852).
bak 9
130 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
vv. 15, 43, 46; ‘then’ v. 29; ‘yet’ v. 32; ‘but’ v. 40; and with 5, ‘notwithstanding’ v. 26.
Again in 1 Kings xii. (again taken at hap-hazard) it is rendered ‘but’ vv. 8, 17, 22; ‘so’ vv. 12, 33; ‘so when’ v. 16; ‘wherefore’ vv. 15, 19; ‘then’ vv. 18, 25; ‘whereupon’ v. 28; ‘that’ v. 3. There are thirty-three verses in this chapter, and all the verses but vv. 4, 23, 27 (i.e. thirty verses out of thirty- three), begin with }. Of the remaining three, two are be- ginnings of speeches, and therefore necessarily are asyndeta.
Indeed in the later Aramaic, Greek particles (a\Xd, 5é, and afterwards pév) were deliberately introduced to supply the deficiency’.
Consequently, in these languages sentences are not subordi- nated, but coordinated ; ‘hence,’ as Winer describes it?, ‘the very limited use of conjunctions (in which classical Greek is so rich), the uniformity in the use of the tenses, the want of the periodic compactness which results from the fusion of several sentences into one principal sentence, and along with this the sparing use of participial constructions, so numerous and diversified in classical Greek.’ The result is an entire absence of periods, producing a monotony of expression, which however is most impressive.
The character of the Greek language was quite different. Greek writers distinguished two styles:
(1) The periodic (katertpappévn) ;
(2) The disjointed (Suypnuévn), or ‘jointed’ (edpopuévn). See Aristot. Rhet. iii. 9, rnv NéEw avadyxn elvat 7) eipowévny Kat TO ouvdéopm piav...7) KaTecTpaypevny....réyo Sé elpomévny }) ovdev exer TEXOS KAO avTV, av un) TO TPAypa Neyomevov TEeNELW- 07...kaTertpaupevn dé n év repiodats’ Néyw Sé trepiodov réEw éyovcay apynv Kal TedXevT)Y avtTinv Kad’ avTnvy Kal péyeBos EVOUVOTTOV.
1 This strange lack of particles, trated likewise by Coptic. which seem to us indispensable to 2? Winer Grammar of N. T. Greek express our simplest thoughts, is illus- _p. 33 (Moulton’s translation).
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 131
In the infancy of the language the earlier prose writers Hecateeus and Herodotus exhibit the e¢popévn; the later, when a mastery over the language had been attained, the catectpap- pévn. Now, Hebrew and Aramaic do not lend themselves to the xateotpappévn, the genius of the languages necessitating the eipouévn. Hence, as a rule, the general simplicity of the New Testament writers, who either spoke Aramaic, or derived their materials from Aramaic sources. The exceptions are the cases of those who commonly spoke Greek, and did not speak Aramaic at all, as St Luke in the prologue to his Gospel (for where he is using documents, the case is different), and the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews.
This simple, jointed style, is seen in its extreme form in St John. In fact, no greater contrast can be exhibited in this respect than the prologue of St John when compared with the prologue of St Luke. The sentences are strung together, where they are not altogether asyndeta. There is no attempt at periodicity. The «ai takes the place of the §, and has almost as wide a range, connecting together not only independent, but dependent, and even opposite and contrasted clauses’. I give a few examples of this:
John 1. 1, 4, 5, 10, 14, 19, 20, 21, 24, 25, 345; 11. 1, 3, 4, 8, PNG air Lis 12, 13514: iv. 11, 40, 41; wi. 17 3 vin. 26,285 33: 34; ix. 18, 19; x. 3, 9, 12, 14-16, 22, 27, 28, 39-41; xiv. 23, 24; xv. 6; xvi. 22, 32; xvii. 1, 8, 10, 11 (six times in three lines); MIX, 4) 3D.
For instances where xai introduces an opposition, with the meaning of ‘and yet,’ ‘nevertheless,’ see John i. 5, 10; iii. 10, if 19,32: 1.20: v.40; vi. 70; vi..4, 19, 26,30); vii. 49755: ix. 30, 34 ete.
A single instance would occur here and there in classical Greek as in any other language; but it is the frequency of occurrence in the Fourth Gospel which betrays the Hebreeo- Aramaic mould in which the diction is cast.
1 See the references in Wilkii Clavis N. T. (ed. Grimm, 1868, s. v. kat p. 215). 9—2
132 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
(2) Hebraic parallelism of sentences.
Instances of this characteristic can be found in almost every part of the Fourth Gospel. The prologue especially presents a succession of parallel clauses. I content myself with drawing attention to some special phenomena of this parallelism.
(a) Repetition of words and phrases in parallel and op- posed clauses, e.g. Ul. 6 (TO yeyevynuévov ex THs capKos cape €oti Kal TO yeyevynuévov €k TOU TvEevpaTos TrEdUa eaTLY): ili. 81 (0 ay ek Tis yis Ex THS yns eoTiv...0 ek TOD ovpavod Epxouevos eTavw Tavtwv éotiv); cf. vil. 6, 7, 8, vill. 14, 23, x. 18, xi. 9, 10 ete. ete.
(b) Repetition of words and phrases in parallel, but not opposed clauses, e.g. ix. 21, 22 (ads 5é viv Brérer ovK oldaperv, 7) Tis HvorEev avTOU Tors ObOarpovds nels OVK oldauer); Xvil. 16 (逫 Tod Koopou ovK eloly KaOws éy@ ovK Eipl ex TOD Koopovu); cf. xviii. 18, xix. 10 ete. ete.
(c) Strengthening of a statement by the negation of its opposite, e.g. 1. 3 (wavta 8’ avtod éyéveTo Kal xwpis avTod éyéveto ovde &v); 1. 20 (@poroynoev Kai ovK npvyncato); cf. ili. 18; x28, xi. 26,’ 26, xx. '27' etc: ete.
(3) Oriental definiteness of expression by the repetition of the same word or phrase.
(a) Repetition of the name, instead of using a personal pronoun, e.g. 1, 43 sq. (evpioxes Pidumrov...jv dé 6 Pidummos ...euploxes Didirrros Tov NaOavannr...Kai elev ait@ Nadavanr .. Aeyes avT@ 0 Didsr7os); cf. ili. 23 sq., xii. 21 sq. ete. ete.
(b) Repetition of the nominative pronoun, where the Greek does not require it, e.g. i. 42 (od ef Liuwy o vids ‘lwavou, av KAnOnon Kndas); ef. 1. 25, 31, iv. 10, 19 ete. ete.
(c) Repetition of the noun, e.g. vil. 6 (6 Kaupos 6 emos ow TrapecTy, 6 OE Kalpds 6 LpméTEpos TavToTé Eat ETOLMOS) ; cf. vil. 8, 19, xil. 43, 47 ete. ete.
(d) Repetition of the verb, eg. v. 17 (0 matnp pou éws dipte épyaterar, kayo épyafouac); ef. vi. 63, vil. 24, 28, vill. 53, x. 10, xill. 43 ete. ete.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 133
(e) Repetition of the same phrase in successive clauses, eg. il. 31 (0 ov é« THs ys eK THS yhs eotly Kal ex THs ys Nanre?); cf. vill. 14, 23, 24, x. 18, x1. 9 sq. ete. ete.
(f) Taking up a word or expression from the preced- ing sentence; e.g. x. 11 (éy@ eipe 0 Troupny 0 KadOS* 6 TOMY O Kanos THY Wuxnv avTov TiOnow K.T.r.); cf. 1. 1, ii. 32, 33, xvii. 2, 3 etc. etc.
(4) Preference of the direct over the oblique narrative in relating the words of another.
In some instances these will be the precise words them- selves; in others only an approximation, and in this latter case the direct narrative is only a different way of expressing what we express by the oblique. Thus we find the narrator himself relating the words or surmises of a crowd, where from the nature of the case the exact words cannot be reproduced; or we find persons referring back to their own words or the words of another, and not always reproducing the exact expressions. Examples of all these varieties are very common, see the narrative of the Samaritan woman in ch. iv. (esp. vy. 17, 27, 33); of the sick man healed in ch. v. (esp. vv. 11, 12); the conversation in ch. vi. (esp. vv. 41, 42); ef. vil. 11 sq., 35, 36, 40 sq., vill. 22, ix. 8 sq., 23 sq., 40 sq., x. 20, 36, 41, xi. 31, 36, 37, xii. 19 sq. ete. ete.
(5) The arrangement of words in the sentence, especially the precedence of the verb, e.g. 1. 40—47 (jv ’Avdpéas...cbpionret OUTOS...AYyayEV aUTOV...€uPBrAEWas avTO...rAéyet aVTS 0 “Inaods
s \ c f- e / f- \ 3 > A mV 5& 0 Dinrsrros...evpioxes Pirdimros...cal elev avT@ Na@avannr...réyer avtT@ 0 Pidurmros...eldev "Incods). This is noticeably the case with the expression Aéyes avT@, eg. iv. 7-—26, xi. 34, 35, 39 sq. ete. ete.
(6) Other grammatical and lexical peculiarities.
(a) The superfluous pronoun (1) after a relative, repre- senting the Heb. "WS which is indeclinable, e.g. 1. 12 (dco dé
a a ’ if tal éraBov avtov, Gwxev avtois); v. 38 (Ov améoTteirev Exetvos
134 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
TOUTW Upels ov TuoTeveTe); Cf. 1. 33, vil. 38, xvii. 2, xviii. 9, 11 etc. etc. (2) after nouns or participles, e.g. 1. 18 (uovoyevrns Beds 0 av eis TOV KOATTOY TOU TaTpOS éexelvos éEnynaaToO); v.11 (6 Tomoas pe vyih éxetvos moe elev “Apov tov kpaBarrov cov) ; cf. vi. 46, vii. 18, 38, x. 1, xiv. 21, 26, xv. 5, ete. ete. This con- struction, it is true, occurs in classical Greek, but the point to be noticed is the extreme frequency of the usage in the Fourth Gospel.
(b) The characteristic Hebraism mds...ov (u)) occurs three times in this gospel; iii. 16, vi. 39, x11. 46.
(c) The frequent use of ta in St John, especially as the complement of a demonstrative pronoun, is probably to be explained by the flexibility of the Aramaic 3. Instances are i 27, iv. 34, vi. 29, 40, vill. 56, xi. 50, xiii. 34, xv. 8, 12, 13, 17, xvi. 7, 33, xvii. 3, 24 (see Winer § xliv. p. 425 ed. Moulton). In every one of these passages a Greek would probably have expressed himself differently.
(d) The use of dv@pwros for tis, eg. v. 7. Kupse, avOpwrov ovx éxyw), Vil. 22, 23 (€v caBBatw mrepitéuvete avOpwrov’ ei Trepitouny KapBdver avOpwros x.T.d.); ef. viii. 40, ix. 16 etc. This represents a thoroughly characteristic use of wes see Gesenius s. v.
(e) The transition from the dependent to the inde- pendent clause, e.g. i. 32 (reOéayar 70 1vebpa KataBaivov...Kat éuewev er’ avtov); cf. xi. 44 (Winer § lxiil. p. 717 ed. Moulton). This transition however appears in other New Testament writers also, and cannot be pressed into an argument.
(f) The frequent recurrence of the expressions e/g Tov aidva, especially with a negative, e.g, iv. 14, vi. 51, 58, viii. 35, 51, 52, x. 26, xi. 28, xii. 34, xili. 8, xiv. 16; and the use of €x Tov ai@vos ix. 32.
(g) Other Hebraisms are: i. 13 (aiuarwr), 15, 30 (padres pov, cf. xv. 18), iii. 29 (yapa yaiper), vii. 33, xii. 35, xiv. 19 (éru puuxpor, cf. xvi. 16, 17, 19), iv. 23 (Epyerar dpa Kal vov éotlv), xi. 4 (ovK éotw mpos Oavaror, cf. xvi. 20), iv. 26, viii.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 135
24, 28, xi. 19, xvill. 5, 6 (eyo ets), x. 24 (€ws ore), xvill. 37 (ov Aé€yers). (7) Imagery, secondary senses of words etc.
This displays a thoroughly Hebrew, or at least Oriental, colouring. The simple facts in life are used to convey deep spiritual truths. Nature and history become signs (oneta) of the heavenly and the eternal. Instances of this figurative treatment are to be found in the Evangelist’s use of the following words and phrases; adnOeva i. 14, 17, i. 21; d0£a i. 14, ii. 11, x1. 41; ddwp Sav iv. 10, 13; Kodia vil. 38; Con Vv. 24; To wavva vi. 31; adptos vi. 82; TO motnpov xviil. 11; vywbo, EXkvow xii. 32.
If the special Hebraisms, or Aramaisms, are few, this is unimportant : for the whole casting of the sentences, the whole colouring of the language, is Hebrew.
In short, it is the most Hebraic book in the New Testament, except perhaps the Apocalypse. The Greek is not ungramma- tical Greek, but it is cast in a Hebrew mould. It is what no native Greek would have written. As Grotius puts it, Sermo Graecus quidem, sed plane adumbratus ex Syriaco ilius saeculi (quoted in Liicke' 1, p. 172). On the general accord of recent writers on this point, see Sanday Authorship of the Fourth Gospel, p. 28°.
On the other hand, there are no classicisms; not a single sentence, I believe, from first to last which suggests in the smallest degree acquaintance with classical literature.
In this respect the writer presents a great contrast to St Luke, and even to St Paul, e.g. Luke 1.1 sq.; 2 Cor. vi. 14 sq.
(ii) The writer’s direct knowledge of Hebrew. 1. The quotations from the Old Testament.
The quotations are a valuable criterion of the position of a writer.
1 Commentar iiber das Evangelium is purer than that of the Synoptists.’ des Johannes (1840). If purer in one sense, yet it is more 2 Mr Sanday (I. c.) says ‘The Greek Hebraic.
136 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
The quotations in St Paul show a knowledge of the Old Testament in Hebrew. He frequently quotes the LXX, but in other passages he is as plainly indebted to the original. On the other hand, the quotations in the Epistle to the Hebrews are all derived from the LXX. There are no distinct traces of a knowledge of the original.
What are the facts in St John’s case?! The quotations in St John are not very numerous. Moreover they are often free quotations; so free that we cannot say whether they were taken from the Hebrew or the Greek. But there is a residuum of passages, which are decisive, and certainly cannot have been borrowed from the Greek.
(a) Passages certainly taken from the Hebrew.
(1) Zech. ix. 9 quoted in John xii. 14, 15 (see Turpie, p. 222).
The quotation is loose. Two points are noticeable. St John has 6 Baoidevs cov épyetar. The LXX 6 Bacirevs épxetai co. (but some edd. insert cov). The Heb. repre- sents 6 Baoike’s cov Epyetat cot, as in Matth. xxi. 5.
The other point is more important. St John has z@Aov évov, which comes from the Hebrew, the LXX having w@ndov véov, while St Matthew quotes the Hebrew still more literally, évl moXov viov vTrotuyiov.
(2) Zech. xii. 10 quoted in John xix. 37, dyovtas eis dv é€exévtnaav (Turpie, p. 131).
This agrees with the Heb. ‘They shall look upon me whom they have pierced,’ But the LXX is quite different, «al éaru- Brefovtar mpos pe av® dv Katwpxyncavto, i.e. they shall look on me, because they have derided. The LXX evidently read \7" for P7, and this reading is actually found in some MSS. of Kennicott and de Rossi. The LXX has not a single word in common with St John,
1 My investigation was made before 244 sq). I have derived much help
I saw Bleek’s Beitriige, and agrees from Turpie The Old Testament in the almost entirely with his results (p. New (1868).
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS-—3. 137
On the reading soy ‘unto me’ and }Y9X ‘unto him,’ which is read by many MSS., see de Rossi 11. p. 217. Aquila, at least, of the other versions, seems to point to this reading. He
renders avy @. The Evangelist however, if he had by, would not unnaturally change the person from the first to the third to suit the connexion. Comp. Apoc. i. 7.
(3) Ps. xl. 10 quoted in John xiii. 18 (Turpie, p. 55).
St John has 0 tpwyeav pou tov dptov émipev em ewe TH awTépvav avtov. The LXX 6 éc@iwv dprous pov éweyaduvey én €ue TTEPVLT LOD.
Here again there is hardly a word the same in the two translations. St John’s is evidently a loose quotation taken from the Hebrew. The LXX translation has lost the meaning
in endeavouring to render bean. St John gives the more correct, though free, rendering. So Gesenius takes it (p. 266, ed. 1829); but Perowne ad loc. seems to think either interpre- tation admissible.
(4) Is. vi. 10 quoted in John xu. 40 (Turpie, p. 233).
It is a very free quotation. The LXX is quite different.
The point to be observed is the use of the active in St John teTUpAWKEY a’TaY TOS OPOarpods Kal éopwoeEV avTaV THY capdiav. God Himself is represented as blinding, as hardening. This points to the Hebrew, which has also the active. But there it is imperative; and the change to the indicative is intelligible. As Symmachus translates T1377, JDWM ¢Bapuve, éuuoe, it is quite possible that St John translated the same words TeTUpAWKEV, ETMpwcev, perhaps from a mixture of Aramaic with Hebrew forms. In the Syriac the imperative and 3rd pers. pret. are the same.
On the other hand, the LXX has adopted a precise form of the sentence, éraytvOn 7 xapdia x.7.r., evidently to get rid of a doctrine which was a stumbling-block. Symmachus seems like- wise to have surmounted the difficulty, though in another way.
138 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
He takes AIM DYNA as the nominative, o Aads ovTOs Ta Ota eBdapuvev Kai Tovs ofOarpovs avTod Euvoe K.T.X.
Now it is quite inconceivable that the writer of the Fourth Gospel, having only the LXX before him, should accidentally have reconverted it, and thus reintroduced the perplexity. The chances are a thousand-fold against it; and he would surely have shrunk from it.
It is noticeable too, that the other New Testament writers who quote the sentence (Matt. xiii. 14, 15; Acts xxviii. 26, 27), quote it from the LXX. In Mark iv. 12, Luke viii. 10, this part of the quotation is omitted.
(5) Is. lv. 13 quoted in John vi. 45 (Turpie, p. 198).
This is a doubtful case. The Hebrew has ‘And all thy sons (are) disciples of God,’ St John xai Ecovta wavtes bidaxroi ©cov. The LXX however attaches the sentence to what goes before, cal mavtas tovs viovs cou didaxtovs Beod. St John treats it as independent—so do the Targum, Ewald, Gesenius, in interpreting the Hebrew.
These passages then, except perhaps the last (5), are decisive. In no case could they be derived from the LXX.
But, it may be said, they came perhaps not from the original Hebrew, but from a Targum.
This admission is sufficient for my purpose, which is to show the direct acquaintance of the Evangelist with Hebrew writings.
(8) Passages which may have come from either the Hebrew or the Septuagint.
In many cases it is doubtful whether a quotation was taken from the LXX or the Hebrew. These instances divide themselves into three classes :— (1) Where the Greek and Hebrew differ, but the quotation is too loose to allow of any inference. Examples of this are: (a) Deut. xix. 15 quoted in John viii. 17 (Turpie, p. 49). Here the LXX inserts 7a@v; but St John paraphrases the
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 139
whole sentence dvo dvOpérwv 7 paptupia. Thus the crucial point of difference is evaded.
(8) Exod. xii. 46 (Numb. ix. 12) quoted in John xix. 36 (Turpie, p. 31).
Here St John follows neither the Hebrew nor the LXX. But the passage intended to be quoted may be Ps. xxxiii. 21; in which case the Hebrew and LXX agree, and no inference can be drawn. Or St John may have had all three passages in his mind, and combined them in a loose way.
(2) Where the Greek and Hebrew agree, but the Greek is the obvious, or an obvious, rendering of the Hebrew; and no conclusion can be drawn. Examples:
(a) Ps, xxxiv. (xxxv.) 19, Ixviii. (Ixix.) 5 of pucodytés pe Swpeav. Comp. Ps. eviii. (cix.) 3, m John xv. 25 (Turpie, p- 30).
(8) Ps. Ixix. (Ixvii.) 10 quoted in John i. 17 (Turpie, p. 29), where the Evangelist substitutes xatagpayetas for Katé- gdayev.
(y) Ps. Ixxxu. (Ixxxi.) 6 quoted in John x. 34 (Turpie, p. 4).
Or again, (3) The Greek and Hebrew agree, but the Greek is not an obvious rendering. Yet the Evangelist’s quotation is not exact enough to warrant an inference. Examples :—
(a) Ps. Ixxviii. (Ixxvii.) 24 quoted in John vi. 31 (Turpie, p- 60).
The use of dproy however here in St John seems to show that he had the LXX rendering in mind, for this is apparently the only passage in the Old Testament where }7 is rendered by aprtos.
(8) Is. xl. 3 quoted in John i. 23 (Turpie, p. 219).
Yet ev@vvate (St John) for edOeias movette (LXX) looks like a direct derivation from the Hebrew, which has one word }79", not two, in the original, All the other Evangelists have evOelas zrovette (Matt. iii. 3; Mark i. 3; Luke iii. 4); and this makes the probability stronger.
140 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
(y) Passages almost certainly, or most probably, taken from the LXX,
(1) Ps. xxi. 19 quoted in John xix. 24 (Turpie, p. 4). The LXX is a literal translation of the Hebrew; but the probabilities are greatly against the Evangelist stumbling upon the same rendering word for word, more especially the opposi- tion of (uatia and (waticpos. (2) Is. lui. 1 quoted in John xii. 38 (Turpie, p. 106). Again the LXX is a literal rendering of the Hebrew, for tive as a rendering of by can hardly be regarded as an exception. But the probabilities are against the whole com- bination of words being the same.
These are all the quotations from the Old Testament in St John, and the result at which we arrive is as follows :— The writer certainly derived several of his quotations from the Hebrew, or from an Aramaic Targum, not from the LXX.
On the other hand, he most probably took one or two from the LXX, though the evidence for the LXX is not so decisive as for the Hebrew. The majority of the passages prove nothing either way.
2. The writer's interpretation of Hebrew words.
(a) Rabbi, Rabbouni, 1. 38 (“PaBBet, Oo Néyerae peOepun- vevopevov AvdacKanre), xx. 16 (‘PaBBouvei, 6 Néyerat ArSacKanre), The longer form is the more impressive, the higher title ; hence it is peculiarly adapted to the solemnity of the circumstances of Mary’s recognition of the risen Lord. In this respect compare Mark x. 51, where again the circumstances are exceptional, These are the only two passages in the New Testament in which the form occurs; see Keim iii. p. 560, Buxtorf p. 2177 sq., Levy p. 401. The omission by St John of the interpretation of the pronoun ‘my master’ is to be explained by the fact that it
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 141
had got attached to the word, as in Rabbi, and had ceased to have any distinct force: just as, by the reverse principle, o xvpwos is rendered in Syriac ‘our Lord.’
(b) Messias, 1. 41 (evdpyxayev tov Meociar, 6 éotw peOepunvevopevov Xptotos), iv. 25. The word does not occur in the New Testament save in these two places.
(c) Cephas, 1. 42 (Kydas, 6 épunvevterar Tlérpos). This title is only used by John and St Paul. Elsewhere, when the appellation is employed, the Greek form is preferred.
(d) Thomas, xx. 24, xxi. 2 (Owpds, 6 Neyomevos Aidupos). Thus St John takes care to let us know that the familiar name of this Apostle was merely a surname, ‘twin.’ There was an early tradition in the Syrian Church that Thomas’ real name was Judas, eg. Kus. H.#. 1. 13 “Iovéas 0 nai Owpuds, Acta Thomae 1. “lovéa Owpd 7O Kai Acdipo (ed. Tisch. p. 190), see Assemani bibl. Orient. 1. pp. 100, 318, Cureton’s Syriac Gospels p. 1, Ane. Syr. Documents p. 32. In the Curetonian Syriac of John xiv. 22 ‘Judas Thomas’ is substituted for ‘Judas, not Iscariot. As there were two other Apostles of this same name, some distinction would be necessary; and this we find was the case, one being called Lebbzeus, another Thomas, the third Iscariot.
(e) Siipaml ix. 7 (els THY KodkvuBHOpay Tod YrAwap, 0 épunvevetar Amrectarpévos). The word occurs in Isaiah vii. 6 a w (A. V. Shiloah), and signifies a ‘conduit, ‘emissary, ‘aqueduct, from the root nbyi ‘send,’ which is used of water in Ps. civ. 10, Ezek. xxxi. 4 (Gesenius p. 1415). pnbyr-n's occurs in the Talmud, meaning either ‘a conduit for irrigation’ or field needing artificial irrigation’ (Buxtorf p. 2412 sq). Another
form nov (A. V. Siloah) is found as a proper name in Neh. 111.
15, if indeed the Masoretic pointing may be trusted. That two forms should exist side by side is very conceivable, for the word is not strictly speaking a proper name. In Greek the forms vary: {wA@aw (LXX Luke xii. 4, Josephus frequently), YaAwas (Josephus elsewhere), LvA@a (Aquila, Symmachus,
142 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
Theodotion). The geographical and symbolical bearing of the notice will be considered hereafter’. At present I am only concerned with the etymology. This the Evangelist has explained rightly. Two further points deserve attention. He has given the correct meaning, notwithstanding that it is somewhat obscured by the Greek form. Again he has added the definite article ‘the Siloam. This is in accordance with Jewish usage. In the Old Testament, and generally in the Targums and the Rabbinic passages, as well as in St Luke l. ¢., the definite article occurs. With this compare Acts ix. 35 ‘the Sharon’ (tov Lapava).
(f) Golgotha, xix. 17 (ets Tov Aeyouevov Kpaviov Toor, 0 Aéyerat "EBpaiortl TorxyoGa); cf. Matt. xxvii. 33, Mark xv. 22 (Luke xxiii. 33). As the interpretation occurs in the Synoptic narrative also, no argument can be drawn from it.
(g) Gabbatha, xix. 13 (es Torov Neyopevoy ArOoatpwrTov> ’EBpaioti 5 TaBBaa). Pliny (H. N. xxxvi. 28) tells us that the pavements called lithostrota were first introduced by Sulla, and that in the temple of Fortune at Przeneste one could be seen in his day which Sulla had placed there. Again, Suetonius (Jul. 46) states that Julius Caesar was accustomed to carry tesselated pavements about with him for his own use in his expeditions (in eapeditionibus tesselata et sectilia pavimenta ctrcwmtulisse). This last notice however does not help us much, for evidently St John’s account speaks of some fixed locality. It shows, however, that such a flooring would seem necessary for a Roman magistrate’s tribunal. <A fixed place at Amathus was so called, Boeckh C. J. G. 2643 amo tod ‘Hpaiou €ws tod AvOootpwrou.
But what is the meaning of the Hebrew Gabbatha? It is commonly connected with 3) from 73) or YA3 ‘to be high,’ meaning a ‘prominence’ or ‘hill,’ compare gibbus. The word would then represent NNYII; see Levy, I. p. 123, Liicke, Heng- stenberg ad. loc., Keim 111. p. 365. This theory receives further
1 See below, p. 171.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 143
support from the fact that Josephus (Ant. v. 1. 29, vi. 4, 2 and elsewhere) uses 'a8aéa for Gibeah, ‘a hill’ And it is a very pos- sible solution, for the Evangelist does not say that the Hebrew represents the meaning of the Greek equivalent. But this interpretation labours under the disadvantage that it does not account for the doubling of the 8B. Accordingly Ewald (Johan. Schr. 1. p. 408) suggests as the derivation 33, Yap ‘to collect together, and thus the word would imply ‘a mosaic’ This appears to me highly probable, for I find this word yap used of studding or inlaying with jewels or precious stones, e.g. Ex. xxv. 7, of the jewels of the high-priest’s ephod, and Deut. xxxili. 21, where the Targum Ben Uzziel has ‘a place inlaid (YAP!) with precious stones and jewels’; see Levy s.v. ul. p. 342. Thus here again St John shows his intimate knowledge of the derivation of an obscure Hebrew term.
(h) Iscariot. The phenomena which St John’s Gospel presents in the use of this name are somewhat remarkable. As soon as the false readings are swept away which obscure the true text, we find (1) that the designation is attached to the father’s name (vi. 71, xiii. 26) as well as to the son’s (xii. 4, xiii. 2, xiv. 22), (2) that in more than one place (xi. 4, xiv. 22) the definite article should precede the name. We gather there- fore that the word is not strictly speaking a proper name at all, but merely describes the native-place of the traitor. This solution is suggested by St John’s Gospel, but there is no hint of it given by the Synoptists. Yet it 1s rendered highly probable by other considerations also. The word “Ioxapimtns is WN AWD ‘the man of Kerioth. Now in 2 Sam. x. 6, 8 among the mercenaries hired by the children of Ammon to attack David are mentioned ‘of Ishtob twelve thousand men,’ or, as it almost certainly should be rendered, ‘of the men of Tob twelve thousand men, Tob being a district mentioned in Judges x1. 3-5. This word becomes in Josephus Ant. vii. 6, 1 a proper name, ”"Ioro8os. The interpretation of Josephus may be right or wrong; but we are only concerned with the representation of the Hebrew form in Greek; and, so far as it goes, it is an
144 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
adequate illustration of the way in which np LN would appear in a Greek dress. Again, the tradition of Judas’ birth- place is preserved in some MSS. of the New Testament. Thus in Matt. x. 4, xxvi. 14 some old Latin MSS. have Carioth, while other authorities have intermediate readings, Scarioth, Xxapiwrns; in Mark iii. 19 the correct reading (% BC L) is Ioxapiw@, the termination not having been interfered with, e has Cartotha, and there are other variations. In Mark xiv. 10 & B L C* have Icxapiw8, while Ioxapiwrns is found in A and the majority of authorities. Here again Scarioth is read by some Latin MSS. On the whole it seems probable that ‘Ioxapio@ is consistently St Mark’s form of the appellation. In Luke vi. 16 Ioxapiw is the right reading (& B L); on the other hand in xxi. 3 Iexapiwrny seems to be correct, though here again the alternative form has supporters. St Luke therefore appears to vary, and this we might expect from the manner in which his Gospel was composed. Turning now to St John’s Gospel we find that D has azro Kapvwrov in four out of the five verses in which the name occurs, and (followed by three Latin MSS.) Sap. in the fifth passage (vi. 71), where, on the other hand, azro Kapvarov receives the support of &1 69, 124, and of the margin of the Harclean Syriac. Thus the trace of the original meaning of the word seems to linger in the Western text of the Fourth Gospel.
Kapiw@ is the LXX rendering of HYP. The word signi- fies ‘cities,’ ie. a conjunction of small towns. Hence it is of frequent occurrence. Thus a place of the name was situated in Moab (Jer. xlviii. 24, 41, Amos ii. 2, see Merx Arch. f. Wissensch. Erf. der Alt. Test. p. 320), another in Judah (Joshua xv. 25). This latter is perhaps the birth-place of Judas who, like Perugino, Correggio, Veronese and others, has merged his per- sonal name in that of his native town.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 145
2. THE WRITER’S KNOWLEDGE OF JEWISH IDEAS, TRADITIONS, EXPECTATIONS, MODES OF THOUGHT.
(i) Lhe Messiah. Occasion has been taken elsewhere to point out that, in the Fourth Gospel, ‘the narrative and the dis- courses alike are thoroughly saturated with the Messianic ideas of the time’ In discussing this subject attention was drawn to two facts as especially worthy of notice: (1) that though the writer's point _of view is twofold, the Word as the theological, the subjective, centre, no less than the \Messiah as the his- torical, the objective, centre, yet, with a true insight which is the best evidence for his veracity, he keeps these two points of view separate. The topic of our Lord’s discourses with the Jews is not the doctrine of the Logos, for which His auditors would feel neither predilection nor interest, but the Messianic expectation, in which they were thoroughly absorbed. (2) It was shown that the Messianic conceptions are not the ideas as corrected by the facts, but the ideas in their original form, not yet spiritualised, but coarse and materialistic still, reflecting the sentiments not of the second century but of the early years of the first; in a word, Jewish, not Christian. This Messianic idea is turned about on all sides. We learn very much more about it from the Fourth Gospel than from all the other three Gospels together. This is a fact which we do not sufficiently realise, and it is a characteristic, though an accidental, token to this fact that the Hebrew equivalent for Xpsords—the word Meooias—is found only in this Gospel. The prevalence, nay, the ubiquity, of the Messianic idea is the key to the motive of the narrative. Does Jesus work a miracle? It is a sign of His Messianic office. Does He suffer an indignity? It is fatal to His claims as the triumphant King and Avenger of His people. Does He utter an unpalatable truth, or a seemingly unpatriotic sentiment? Such language is inconsistent with the office of the long-expected Saviour of the Jewish nation. Does He exhibit in His person the common associations and relationships
1 [See above, p. 23 sq., where this part of the argument is treated fully.] L. E. 10
146 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
of life? This again is not compatible with His Messianic character.
Moreover, He is only one in a long line of claimants who have arrogated to themselves this high office. Before Him many thieves and robbers have entered into the fold by stealth and violence (x. 8). This last passage has been attacked as fatal to the authority of the Gospel, and this on two grounds. First, we are told’ that it is a thoroughly Gnostic sentiment, directed against the lawgiver and the prophets. They are the thieves and the robbers. Thus it is inconsistent not only with our Lord’s own position, but also with the position of St John as a ‘pillar-apostle’ of the Circumcision. Secondly, we are informed* that the statement is historically incorrect; for as a matter of fact we do not hear of false Messiahs before Christ. I give this as a sample of the attacks which are made in certain quarters upon the genuineness of the Fourth Gospel. In reply it is sufficient to state (1) that the interpretation, which sees in the thieves and robbers a reference to Moses and the prophets, is quite untenable. It contradicts the whole teaching of the Gospel. Our Lord constantly refers to the Old Testament Scriptures as authoritative, and as foretelling Himself. Thus Abraham rejoiced to see Christ’s day, and he saw it and was glad. The Jews are Abraham’s seed, yet they seek to kill Him (vill. 837, 56). Moses will accuse them to the Father; for had they believed Moses, they would have believed Christ, for Moses wrote of Him (v. 45 sq.). And the Evangelist sees in the persistent unbelief of the Jewish race a fulfilment of a prophecy of Isaiah uttered when he saw Christ’s glory and spake of Him (xii. 37 sq.). The interpretation therefore may safely be dis- missed. Curiously enough it is a view borrowed from Valentinus, who states that ‘all the prophets and the law spake from the Demiurge, a foolish God, and were foolish themselves and ignorant’ (Hippol. Haer. vi. 35 p. 194), and then proceeds to quote this passage: and it is echoed by the Manicheans
1 By Hilgenfeld. * By Baur and Scholten.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 147
(August. c. Faust. xvi. 12, vit. p. 288 F., 289 A.) and probably by other dualistic sects. Such at least would appear from Clem. Alex. Strom. i. 17 pp. 366 sq. (ed. Potter). Further, the consciousness of the misuse that was made of the text would account for the omission of the words mpd éucd by some authorities’. (2) The expression need not necessarily be confined to false Messiahs. ‘Shepherds’ are teachers (Jer. xxi. 1, Ezek. xxxiv. 2, 3), and thus the Scribes and Pharisees, the leaders of religious thought, would naturally be included in the category. In other passages our Lord refers to them as robbers, as wolves in sheep’s clothing (Matt. vii. 15), as devouring widows’ houses (Matt. xxii. 14, Mark xii. 40, Luke xx. 47). And the beginning of this corrupt state of teaching did not synchronize with the time of our Lord’s life upon earth. For some generations past the whole tendency of religious education had been thoroughly vicious”.
But after all there is no sufficient reason for denying the appearance of false Messiahs before the Christian era. On the contrary, everything points to the fact of such appearances. And if these earlier false Messiahs do not come forward so prominently in Josephus as those who flourished afterwards, this is only what was to be expected; for they did not fall within his own lifetime. Gamaliel, at all events, in his speech as recorded by St Luke (Acts v. 35sq.), mentions two of these impostors, Theudas and Judas the Galilean, the latter of whom is described as having revolted ‘in the days of the taxing. In the case of the former, there is a well-known chronological difficulty, Josephus (Ant. xx. 5. 1) speaking of a Theudas who headed a rebellion in the procuratorship of Cuspius Fadus after A.D. 44; but the occasion of the revolt of Judas the Gaulanite is given by him in detail (Ant. xviii. 1. 1 sq.), and his language shows evidently that the rising took a theocratic
1 The words are omitted in N*, in Chrysostom and Augustine. most Latin mss., in the Syriac, Sahidic 2 See Ewald, Jahrb. der Bibl. Wissen- and Gothic versions, and by Cyril, schaft ix. 43.
10—2
148 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
character’. In another place Josephus, referring to the time of the death of Herod the Great (Ant. xvii. 10. 8), tells us that ‘Judeea was infested with robbers (Anotnpiwv 7 “lovdaia mréws nv), and as the bands of the seditious found anyone to head them, he was created a king at once, in order to do damage to the community.’ He mentions several of these adventurers by name, beginning (Ant. xvii. 10. 5) with Judas the son of a certain Hezekiah, whom he calls the ‘brigand-chief’ (0 apye- AnoTHs). Now it is quite impossible to separate all these uprisings from Messianic anticipations, even if the contrary was not directly stated in some cases by the historian. For the air was full of rumours, and echoes of the Messianic expectations had penetrated as far as Rome, and found expres- sion in the pages of Suetonius (Vesp. 4), and in the Fourth Eclogue of Virgil. By some the Herod-family was looked to as the embodiment of the national hope, Antipas (Vict. Ant. ap. Cramer Cat. in Mare. p. 400), Agrippa (Philastrius Haer. xxvii.), and Herod the Great (Epiphanius Haer. xx. p. 45) being at different times regarded as the Messiah by their partisans’,
But it is not only the prevalence of the Messianic idea exhibited in this Gospel, it is the minuteness and variety of detail displayed which arrests our attention, and is so power- ful a testimony to the authenticity of the narrative. This phenomenon can be conveniently illustrated by the designations which the Evangelist applies to the Messiah. I give some of the most striking.
(a) The Lamb of God (i. 29,36). The reference is to Isaiah liii. 4, a passage which was commonly interpreted of the Messiah, apparently before the Christian era (see Bishop Harold Browne, Sermons? p. 92 sq.,and ef. Sanday, Authorship of the Fourth Gospel p. 39 sq), and is interpreted of our Lord directly by Philip the Evangelist (Acts vill. 32), and indirectly
1 Joseph. Ant. xviii. 1. 6 dvovlknros Dictionary of the Bible; and compare 5é rod édevOepov Epws éariv adbrots udvov Keim t. p, 244 sq. nyeuova kai deomrbrnv tov Oedv bren- 8 Messiah as foretold and expected
pbow. Cambridge (1862). 2 See the article Herodiansin Smith’s
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—83. 149
by St Peter (1 Pet.i.19), This idea of the lamb as typifying the Messiah is not found in the other three Evangelists. It is introduced however by St John naturally and without comment: the meaning is only explained by recalling the Messianic expectations of the time, and in fact is lost sight of by many commentators. With the substitution of another Greek word (apvsov for duvos) the same metaphor occurs in the Apocalypse nearly thirty times.
(b) The Son of God, the King of Israel (i. 49). The naturalness of this outburst on the part of Nathanael is deserving of notice. The titles with which he hails the Messiah are introduced in a way which is absolutely free from artifici- ality. The first designation, the ‘Son of God, is derived from Ps. 1. 7. It occurs again in the Fourth Gospel, 1. 34, 111. 18, ix. 35 and especially xi. 27, in the last passage coupled expressly with the title ‘the Christ,’ a combination which we find elsewhere (Matt. xxvi. 63 in the mouth of the High Priest, and Matt. xvi. 16 in the confession of St Peter). Even when it stands alone, as in Luke iv. 41, xxii. 70, it is at once recognised as applying to the Christ. The second title, ‘the King of Israel, is a favourite appellation in the Fourth Gospel (xu. 13, ef. xviii. 36, 37, xix. 3, 5, 12,14, 19). As Mr Sanday appositely remarks (Authorship of the Fourth Gospel p. 35),‘ the phrase is especially important, because it breathes those politico-theocratic hopes, which, since the taking of Jerusalem, Christians, at least, if not Jews, must have entirely laid aside. It belongs to the lowest stratification of Christian ideas, before Christianity was separated from Judaism; and there is but one generation of Christians, to whom it would have any meaning.’
Other Messianic titles which are found in our Evangelist are (c) He that is coming (0 épxomevos) vi. 14, xi. 27, cf. Matt. xi. 3, Luke vii. 19, 20, derived from the well-known Messianic psalm (Ps. exviii.), which is quoted in this sense by all the four Evan- gelists (Matt. xxiii. 39, Mark xi. 9, Luke xiii. 35, John xu. 18); (d) The Holy One of God (6 Gywos Tod @eod) vi. 69, cf. Mark 1. 24 and other passages; (e) the Son of Man, i. 51 etc., the most
150 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
familiar of all designations of the Christ, especially in St Luke’s Gospel ; (f) the Light, i. 7, 8, viii. 12, xii. 46, cf. Luke i. 32; an idea found in Messianic passages like Is. ix. 2, xlii. 6, 7, Mal. iv. 2, 3, and expressly interpreted of Christ by the Talmud—‘ Light is the name of Messiah’ (see Lightfoot Hor. Heb. p. 564 quoted by Sanday, p. 152); (g) He that hath been sent (0 arectadpévos), ix. 7, where the interpretation of the name Siloam connects the pool with Christ (see x. 36, xvii. 3, 8, 18, 21, 23, 25 ete., ef. Is. 1x1. 1) rather than with the man (see Wetstein ad loc.), but where the allusion to the title, so far from appearing on the surface, is inserted in the most unobtrusive manner possible. These instances show the perfect ease and familiarity with which the writer of the Fourth Gospel moves among the Messianic expec- tations and the national feelings of the period which he depicts.
(ii) The companions of the Messiah. Attention has been drawn elsewhere’ to the significant references to ‘ the prophet’ which occur in four places in St John (i. 21, 25, vi. 14, vii. 40). It has been pointed out that the form which the conception takes is strictly Jewish, not Christian. While Christian teachers identified the prophet foretold by Moses (Deut. xvii. 15) with our Lord Himself (Acts ii. 22, vii. 37, cf. John i. 46)’, the Jews in St John’s Gospel conceive of ‘the Christ’ and ‘ the prophet’ as two different persons. If He is not the Christ, they adopt the alternative that He may be ‘the prophet’ (i. 21, 25); if not ‘the prophet,’ then ‘the Christ’ (vii. 40). But this brings us to another point, which is worthy of consideration. Spring- ing out of the phrase employed by Moses in the passage quoted above (‘a prophet like unto me’) came the Jewish idea of the parallelism of the lawgiver and the Messiah. In part this idea was justified by the prophecy, and finds its proper place in the language of the New Testament. Thus, as the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews shows, Moses and Christ are the two
1 See above, p. 25. 20, Clem. Recogn. i. 48, Origen in
2 This identification is a common- Johan. vi. 4, Eusebius Demonstr. place in patristic writers, see Tertull. Evang. i. 7, p. 26 sq. (ed. Paris 1628). adv. Marcion. iv. 22, Apost. Const. v.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 151
mediators of the two covenants (Heb. viii. 5, 6). Thus again, in a well-known passage (1 Cor. x. 1—11), St Paul works out the parallel in his record of the wanderings of the children of Israel. The crossing of the Red Sea is a baptism by Moses. The rock smitten in the wilderness is Christ. Thus again, St John in the Apocalypse (xv. 3) sets in the mouth of the redeemed a twofold song, ‘the song of Moses the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb.’ And lastly, our Lord Himself instances the action of Moses in lifting up the serpent in the wilderness as emblematic of Himself (John iu, 14). But the Rabbis carried out the parallelism into the most minute details, so that the career of the Messiah became in effect a reproduction of the career of Moses. Of this belief adventurers, who wished to pose as the Messiah, were not slow to take advantage. For instance Theudas, to whom allusion has already been made’, undertakes to divide the Jordan (Jos. Ant. xx. 5. 1), im imitation probably as much of Moses as of Joshua and Elijah. Again, other nameless adventurers, to whom Josephus makes reference a little later on (Ant. xx. 8. 6), ‘urged the multitude to follow them into the wilderness, and pretended that they would exhibit manifest wonders and signs that should be performed by the providence of God (xara THY tov @eod mpovoay).’ Gfrorer, who has worked out this subject in his Jahrhundert des Heils (11. p. 318 sq), tells us that Micah vii. 15 was quoted to prove that the passover was the time in which this mani- festation of Messianic power should be exhibited. In fulfilment of the prophecy of Zechariah (ix. 9), the King should appear riding an ass (Gfrorer p. 339). The miracles which he was expected to perform were to include the two mighty works of his prototype, the smiting of the waters as suggested by Zechariah (x. 11), and the giving of the manna. We have seen how the first of these symbolical acts was promised by Theudas. To the general expectation of the second miracle rabbinic literature furnishes full and explicit testimony. Thus in Coheleth Rabba, 9 fol. 86. 4, we read Diait P. Berachia nomine
1 See above, p. 147.
152 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
R. Isaaci; qualis fut redemptor primus, talis ert redemptor ultimus....Sicut redemptor primus fecit descendere manna, ita redemptor posterior faciet descendere manna. Again, in Shir Rabba, fol. 16, Redemptor posterior revelabitur ws...et quonam illos ducet? Sunt qui dicunt in desertum Judae, sunt qui dicunt in desertum Sichoris et Ogi et descendere faciet pro ws manna (see Lightfoot Hor. Heb. 11. pp. 552, 557; ef. Shemoth Rabba xxv.). In the light of these notices we can imagine the ferment which would be occasioned by the feeding of the five thousand, and we can now understand the full significance of the challenge thrown out to Him on the part of the unbelieving crowd, ‘ What dost thou work ? Our fathers did eat manna in the wilderness (vi. 30, 31), which in St John’s narrative occurs in so abrupt and unexplained a manner’. The key to the understanding of the whole situation is an acquaintance with the national expectation of the greater Moses. But this know- ledge is not obtruded upon us by the Evangelist. It is tacitly assumed, In fact, the meaning is unintelligible, except to one who is brought up among the ideas of the time, or to one who, hke a modern critic, has made them his special study.
And so we might pass in review the various details of the Messianic conception, and show how marvellously they correspond with the account given so naturally and incidentally by the Evangelist. The birth and generation of the Christ who, in accordance with Micah v. 2, should be a descendant of David, born in Bethlehem (vii. 42), and yet at the same time the mystery and uncertainty of that birth (vii. 27) based upon the wellknown passage in Isaiah ‘ who shall declare His generation?’ (Is. li. 8)’, the apparent discrepancies of the two accounts being explained by the rabbis on the analogy of Moses who was born and then hidden’; His manifestation ‘to Israel’
! See this matter treated more fully fol. 5. 1) alleged that the Messiah had above, p. 24. been born at Bethlehem a good while 2 See Sanday p. 146, Gfrérer, pp. before their own times but had been 203, 307, Wetstein and Lightfoot on snatched away. The same idea is John vi. 27. found in Midrash Sair fol, 1, 16, 4 (on 3 The Gemarists (Hieros. Berachoth Canticles ii, 9) Caprea apparet et oc-
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 153
(i. 31 a passage with which Sanday, p. 33, compares Luke 1. 80 spoken of John the Baptist; cf. xiv. 22, xvii. 6 sq), an event which Jewish tradition decided would take place at the Passover (Shemoth Rabb. xv. 150, Jerusalem Targum on Ex. xi. 42, Mechilta on Ex. xu. 42, R. Bechai in Kad Hakkemach 49) —doubtless another element in the excitement of the crowds after the Feeding of the Five Thousand which took place at Passover-tide (John vi, 2); lastly, His eternal continuance (xii. 34), a point much discussed among the rabbis’.
One of the accompaniments of the Messiah in Jewish antici- pations was the return of the Shechinah, the symbol of that visible divine presence, the loss of which after the captivity had been so universally deplored. This confident hope was based on such prophecies as Ezekiel xxxvii. 27, xli. 7, Zechariah u. 10 sq, vu. 3, Isaiah viii. 8, and on the language of Ecclesiasticus xxiv. 8 sq ‘He that created me caused my tabernacle to rest (xatétavce THY oxnvyy pov), and said, Let thy dwelling be in Jacob (év “laxo8 Kxatacknvwcor)...in the holy tabernacle I served before him (é€v cxnvn ayia évotrioy avtod éXecTovpynoa). It finds expression in more than one passage in the Apocalypse (vu. 15, xiii. 6, xv. 5, xxi. 3). It remains however for St John in his Gospel, in words which are replete with local colouring, to point with a quiet triumph to the fulfilment of this expectation in the person of Jesus Christ, ‘The Word became flesh, and tabernacled (€oxyjvwoev) among us, and we beheld His glory
cultatur, apparet et occultatur., Sic redemptor primus (Moses) apparuit et fuit occultatus, et tandem apparuit iterum...Sic redemptor posterior (Mes- sias) revelabitur iis atque iterum abs- condetur ab iis...In fine quadraginta quinque dierum revelabitur iterum lis et descendere faciet pro iis manna.
1 And at midnight; Traditio Judae- orum est Christum media nocte ven- turum in similitudinem Aegyptii tem- poris, quando Pascha celebratum est et exterminator venit et Dominus super tabernacula translit et sanguine agni
postes nostrarum frontium consecrati sunt. Hieron. Comm. in Matth. tv. 25. 6, Op. vir. 203 (ed. Vallarsi). For the Christian counterpart of this Jewish expectation see Justin Dial. c. Tryph. § 8, p. 34, § 110, p. 368 (ed. Otto).
* Seethese various speculations given in Gfrorer pp. 252 sq, 296, 315—317. The passages referred to by the multi- tude (jets nKovcamev Ex TOU vduov) Were probably Is. ix. 6, Dan. vii. 13, 14, and the Targums on these texts will repay study.
154 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
(rnv S0£av avdtod), the glory as of the only-begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth (i. 14),’
(iii) The Messianic expectation among the Samaritans.
It has been denied! that the Samaritans had any Messianic anticipations at all. But, firstly, they had the prophecy referred to above (Deut. xviii. 15), which, as forming part of the Penta- teuch, they would accept as authoritative. This was sufficient in itself to suggest such expectations, and the fact that they were under the same stimulating influences as the Jews, influences arising from the political troubles of the times, would encourage presentiments of a Deliverer. Secondly, as a matter of fact, there is sufficient evidence to show that Messianic hopes were as rife among them at the time of our Lord, as they are now at the present day. Thus Josephus informs us (Ant. xviii. 4. 1) that in the procuratorship of Pilate a disturbance arose among the Samaritans in consequence of an impostor who ‘bade them assemble on Mount Gerizim’ under promise that he ‘would show them the sacred vessels (de/feuy ta iepa oxevn) which were buried there, because Moses had put them there.’ All this is distinctly Messianic in character, and has an obvious reference to the narrative of 2 Maccabees (ii. 1—8), where Jeremiah is related to have buried the tabernacle, the ark and the altar of incense on the mountain ‘where Moses climbed up and saw the heritage of God, and to have declared that the secret of the hiding place should not be revealed ‘until the time that God should gather His people again together, and receive them unto mercy.’ And this view finds confirmation from a passage in the Joma Babl. (fol. 526, quoted by Gfrorer p. 350), and explains the reference in Apoc. 11. 17 to the ‘hidden manna, which was one of the treasures contained in the ark (Ex. xvi. 33, 34, Heb. ix. 4). These disturbances among the Samaritans took place A.D. 34, 35, and are connected by Keim (I. p. 518) with the preaching of John the Baptist. Further light is thrown on these Samaritan aspirations in the Clementine
1 e.g. by the author of The Jesus of History (1869).
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 155
Recogmtions. Here Simon Magus and Dositheus are both mentioned as Samaritans who professed themselves to be Messiahs’, and the Samaritans are described as ‘ rightly looking forward to one true Prophet in accordance with the foretelling of Moses, but prevented by the perverse teaching of Dositheus from believing that Jesus was He whom they expected (Recogn. 1. 54; cf. vu. 33). For the later communications with the Samaritans held by Scaliger, Ludolf, and de Sacy see Westcott, Introduction to the Study of the Gospels p. 148. Petermann likewise, who resided two months at Nablous, gives the results of his visit and investigations in Herzog’s Real-Encyklop. xii. p. 372 sq. All these authorities agree that the Samaritans found their hopes upon the appearance of the prophet like unto Moses. All agree too that they expect the discovery of the furniture of the Sanctuary, eg. the ark, the manna and the tables of the commandments, a fact which leaves the interpre- tation of the passage in Josephus beyond a doubt. With them the Messiah is represented under two aspects, first as the Hashab or Hathab (AMM) the Converter, Restorer, Buyer-back (Westcott and Petermann l.c.), secondly as the Hl Muhdi the Guide (Robinson, Bablical Researches 11. 278°). Thus we see how the confident aspirations placed by St John in the mouth of the Samaritan woman, ‘1 know that Messias cometh, which is called Christ; when he is come, he will tell us all things’ (iv. 25, cf. vv. 29, 42), are not the invention of a later generation, but reflect the contemporary national feelings of this interesting
people.
(iv) Jewish beliefs, and sentiments on other points.
(a) The relation of the Jews to Abraham exemplified in John viii. 33 sq. is worthy of notice, as illustrating the writer’s acquaintance with the Jewish ideas of his time. The boast,
1 Recogn. ii. 7, Simon hic...gente Recogn. i. 54 magistrum suum (i.e. Samaraeus...gloriae ac jactantiae supra Dositheum) velut Christum praedi- omne genus hominum cupidus ita ut carunt; cf. Origen c. Cels. i. 57 (i. excelsam virtutem...credi se velit et 372).
Christum putari (cf. Hom. ii. 22); 2 ed. 1867.
156 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
‘We are Abraham’s seed,’ is an evidence of a justifiable pride of birth (cf. v. 53), but the latter part of the sentence ‘and we have never been in bondage to any man’ has given much difticulty to the commentators. Certainly it is not what a stranger would have said of the Jewish people. The opinion felt by the Romans for the Jews is well expressed by Cicero, who contemptuously classes together the Jews and the Syrians as nations born to slavery (Judaeis et Syris nationibus natis servituti, Cic. Prov. Cons. 5). And Apion casts in the teeth of Josephus the fact that, so far from ruling the Gentiles, the chosen people were as a fact subject to them (Td a) apyew dovreverw S€ pwarrov EOvecu Jos. c. Apion. ii. 11). Yet this proud assertion of liberty is exactly what the Jews would make on their own behalf, whatever wresting of facts might be necessary to maintain it. The answer of Josephus to Apion at the end of the section is quite characteristic. ‘At a time when even the Egyptians,’ he contends, ‘were servants to the Persians and the Macedonians, we (the Jews) enjoyed liberty, and moreover had the dominion of the cities round about us for about a hundred and twenty years, until Pompey the Great. And when all nations were conquered by the Romans, who are kings everywhere, our ancestors were the only people who continued to be esteemed their allies and friends because of their fidelity. And in a certain sense the claim was true. The national spirit of the Jews had never been thoroughly enslaved. But externally it would appear to be the reverse of the truth, and it is difficult to conceive how words such as the Evangelist records could have found a place in a narrative written in the middle of the second century, after the twofold destruction of Jerusalem by Titus and by Hadrian had stamped out the last spark of national liberty.
(b) The authority assigned to Moses is another graphic touch which shows a minute acquaintance with Jewish thought. The assertion ‘We are Moses’ disciples’ (ix. 28) is illustrated by Lightfoot (Hor, Heb. 11. p.572) from Joma fol. 4. 1., where the same expression occurs, and the favourite title of Moses in
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. ay
vogue among the Jews was ‘Moses, our master’ (quoted by Scholtz on this verse). Associated with this idea is the prestige which attached to the rabbinical schools. The surprise expressed that our Lord should set up for a teacher (vii. 15), the contemptuous disregard for the opinion of the people (vii. 49), the very form of address (Xv eZ 0 d:dacKaros tov “IopayrX; ili. 10), which was apparently a formula of remonstrance among the Jews'—all these features can be readily illustrated from rabbinical literature.
(c) The jealousy and contempt with which the Palestinian Jews viewed the Greek dispersion is strikingly evidenced by the sarcastic comment of the Jews—‘ Will he go unto the dispersed among the Gentiles (M7 e’s tv dcvacmopav tev ‘EAAHV@Y wéAXEL Tropevec Oat), and teach the Gentiles 2’ (vii. 35.) Contemporary Jewish opinion drew a hard and fast line between their brethren of the Babylonian dispersion, i.e. those who preferred to remain in the land of their captivity, and the Greek dispersion in Asia Minor, the result of the wholesale de- portations of Seleucus Nicator and Antiochus Epiphanes. The former were held in high honour. The land of Babylon was considered to be as holy as that of Palestine (Rabbi Solomon in Gittin fol. 2. 1), and the descendants of the Jews there even purer than those in Judea itself (Aiddush fol. 69. 2). Even Gamaliel deigned to hold correspondence with the ‘sons of the Dispersion of Babylonia’ (Frankel Monatsschrift, p. 413, 1853). Hence, as Lightfoot remarks (Hor. Heb. ad loc.), ‘ for a Palestine Jew to go to the Babylonish dispersion was to go to a people and country equal, if not superior, to his own: but to go to the dispersion among the Greeks was to go into unclean regions, to an inferior race of Jews, and into nations most heathenized.’
(d) Lastly (to confine ourselves to one further instance), the question put to our Lord concerning the man born blind, ‘Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was
1 See the story told in Lightfoot, from Echah Rabbathi, fol. 66. 2. Hor. Heb. u. p. 534, of Rabbi Joshua
158 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
born blind’?’ reflects with a faithful accuracy the popular teaching of the day as regards the consequences of sin. It was a received doctrine in the Jewish schools that physical defect in children was the punishment of sin committed by their parents; and though the Jewish doctrine of metempsy- chosis was confined to the souls of the righteous (Jos. B. J. ii. 12), and thus a man brought no taint of sins with him from his previous existence, yet it is clear from many curious Rabbinic passages which Lightfoot quotes (ad loc.) that even in the womb the infant, from the moment of his first quickening, was considered capable of incurring stain of sin.
3. THE WRITER'S KNOWLEDGE OF EXTERNAL FACTS, THE HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY, NAMES AND CUSTOMS OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE.
(3) The relations of the Jews with those around them.
(a) The Galileans. Owing to the fact that St John lays special stress on the Judean ministry, the references to the Galileans in his Gospel are less numerous than in the Synoptic narrative. But the notices, though few, are highly significant, and the touches with which St John depicts them, singularly vivid. Thus we cannot fail to observe the contempt which the Jews of the metropolis display for them. ‘Shall Christ come out of Galilee?’ ‘Out of Galilee ariseth no prophet’ (vii. 41, 52). ‘Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth? (i, 46). Such is the objection, which rises unpremeditatedly to the lips of speakers, when the northern province is indicated as the home of the Messiah. This disparagement of the Galileans is reflected more than once in the rabbinic literature of the period. ‘ Foolish Galilean’ seems to have been the inevitable form of address when a Galilean appears as a character in a dialogue*, This contempt arose in great measure from the admixture of foreign blood in the Galilean people. The Sea of
1 John ix. 2. 2 e.g. see Lightfoot, Hor. Heb. 11. pp. 78, 543.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 159
Galilee was an important commercial centre, and as a natural consequence strangers—Phcenicians, Syrians, Greeks and Romans —settled in the district, and intermarried with the Jewish inhabi- tants, to the prejudice of the race in the eyes of a strict Jew of the capital (see Keim 1. p. 309). The distinction thus in- augurated by the taint of foreign blood was further emphasized by a difference of pronunciation. The rough dialect of the northerners, which was a subject of comment in the case of St Peter (Mark xiv. 70), is a favourite theme likewise in rabbinical writers?. Thus in one story? a Judean professes himself unable to distinguish between “WAN ‘a lamb, Wy ‘wool, “VOM ‘wine’ and 7M ‘an ass,’ as pronounced by a Galilean when the latter wants to make a purchase, an illus- tration which shows that the divergence consisted largely in a careless confusion of gutturals on the part of the Galileans. The bad name, from which the Galileans suffered generally, seems to have attached itself more particularly to their city Nazareth (John i. 46). Certainly the account which we have of them from other passages in the Gospels (Luke iv. 16—29, Matth. xiii. 54—58) conveys the impression that the Nazarenes were a violent, unscrupulous, irreligious people. They may therefore have fully justified their invidious reputation. That this reputation was widespread appears from the irony in the superscription on the cross, ‘Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews, (John xix. 19). We pass on to notice the Evangelist’s accurate knowledge of other traits in the Galilean character. In John iv. 45 occurs a brief and incidental mention of the welcome accorded to our Lord by the Galileans in consequence of His doings at Jerusaiem at the feast, ‘for they also went to the feast.’ Now it is worthy of record that Josephus (Ant. xx. 6. 1) relates that serious troubles arose owing to collisions between the Samaritans and the Galileans while the latter were on their way to keep the feasts at Jerusalem*. The
1 See the instances given by Light- 2 See my Galatians, p. 197 (ed. 6). foot, 1. p. 78 sq, and ef. Fiirst Aram. 3 This notice illustrates John iv, 4 Idiom. § 15. compared with Luke ix. 51 sq.
160 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN. natural turbulence of the Galileans, to which Josephus calls attention, was on these occasions aggravated by their intense religious enthusiasm’ It is therefore quite what we should expect when we find a reference in St Luke (xiii. 1) to certain Galileans ‘whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices, and the portrait which St John gives us of St Peter is, as Keim truly observes (I. p. 315), of ‘a genuine Galilean type.’
(b) The Romans. St John’s consummate skill does not fail him as he sketches the relations of the Jews with their Roman masters. We notice on the one hand the cringing political defer- ence exhibited in the words of the chief priests, ‘The Romans shall come and take away both our place and nation (xi. 48),’ ‘We have no king but Ceesar (xix. 15), ‘If thou let this man go, thou art not Cesar’s friend (xix. 12);’ on the other, the religious horror of the pollution attaching to contact with the Romans, which even at the height of their frenzied hatred of their prisoner kept the Jews outside the judgment hall, ‘lest they should be defiled (xvii. 28)... He then proceeds to give us details which reveal an accurate acquaintance with the Roman customs and military arrangements of the time. Twice over is reference made to ‘the band’ (» ozetpa xviil. 3, 12), once to ‘the captain’ (0 y:Aiapyos xviii. 12). Now, we learn from Polybius? and Suidas‘ that ozezpa and yiAlapyos were technical terms, the recognised Greek renderings of cohors and
1 apds macay del mrodéuou meipay av- técxov* pdxiuol re yap €x vynlwy K.T.d. Jos. B. J. iii. 3. 2; ef. Vit. 17 vewrépwv émOupobdvres del mpayudrwr.
2 Many of the false Messiahs were Galileans, e.g. Iovdas 6 I'adAatos (Acts v. 37).
3 rpels omelpas’ Todro dé Kkadetrar 7d ctvraypa Tov metdv mapa ‘Pwpalos xobptis Polybius xi. 23. Schweig- hauser in his note (ad loc.) contends that oeipa here means manipulus, and that the term cohors is applied to the complement of three maniples; but Livy in the parallel passage (xxviii. 14) has ternis peditum cohortibus, and the
expression xadeirac shows that he is merely giving the Latin equivalent (xodpris) for the Greek expression (ometpa). A little later on (xi. 33. 1) Polybius has again él rérrapas xodp- Tis* todto 6° éort omeipa, where Ca- saubon has struck out the last four words, though they occur in all the manuscripts.
4 Suidas (s. v.) states that x.Alapxor came into office at Rome three hun- dred and fifteen years after the foun- dation of the city. This coincides with the institution of military tri- bunes with consular power at the close of the Decemvirate,
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 161
iribunus respectively. Accordingly the use of the definite article by St John in both cases, ‘the cohort’ ‘the tribune!) shows that he was aware of a fact, which we learn from Josephus also (B. J. ii, 12. 1), that a Roman cohort was quartered in the Turris Antonia at Jerusalem to prevent disturbances at the great festivals’. A few years later we find soldiers from this Roman garrison employed in rescuing St Paul from the hands of the Jewish mob during the feast of the Passover’®.
Again, the scene of the Crucifixion furnishes St John with another opportunity of showing his intimate knowledge of Roman military customs. A quaternion (retpadcov Acts xii. 4) of soldiers, as we learn from Vegetius and others‘, was usually employed as a watch on night duty, or for purpose of escort. Now, it is noticeable that, when the other Evangelists speak of the guard which attended at the Crucifixion, no number is given. It is simply stated (Matt. xxvu. 35, Mark xv. 26, Luke xxiii. 34), that the soldiers divided the Saviour’s garments among them. St John however gives the actual number. But observe how incidentally the fact comes out. He makes no mention of a quaternion: he merely says, ‘Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took His garments, and made four parts, to every soldier a part.’ The information is not
paraded in any way; it is involved in the narrative. One more
1 On the other hand, though ‘the band’ is mentioned by the Synoptists » (Matt. xxvii. 27, Mark xv. 16) at a later stage in the proceedings, the
the chief priests (Matt. xxvi. 5) as evi- dence to these disturbances,
3 Acts xxi. 31 sq, where again the same technical terms are used with
definite article, as used in the Fourth Evangelist, is more decisive.
2 When Cumanus was procurator, the insolent conduct of a Roman soldier at the Passover resulted in a mot (B. J. U-c., ct. Ant. xx.-5. 3) in which ten thousand (B. J. l.c., twenty thousand Ant. l.c.) Jews perished, For the disturbances at the great festivals see B. J. i. 4. 3. Whiston instances the cautious procedure of
L. E.
the definite article avéBn pdovs TH yirt- dpxw Tis orelpys x.7.A. This account, like that in the Fourth Gospel, is pro- bably the narrative of an eye-witness. 4 De singulis centuriis quaterni equi- tes et quaterni pedites excubitum noctibus faciunt, Vegetius de re mili- tari iii. 8; ef. Philo in Flacc. 13, 11. p. 533 orpatibtyy Twa T&y ev Tots TeTpadlots gurdxwy kab’ dddv etpdv, Polyb. vi. 33 TO pudrdKerdy eat ek TETTAPWY GVOpHr.
11
162 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
instance, and I leave this part of the subject. ‘The Jews,’ we read, ‘besought Pilate that their legs might be broken....Then came the soldiers, and brake the legs of the first, and of the other which was crucified with Him (xix. 31, 32).’ This again is a detail added by St John, which a forger would not have cared to risk. For crurifragiwm formed no part of a cruci- fixion. It was a separate punishment’, to which slaves could be subjected at the caprice of their masters, and it was abolished together with crucifixion at the command of Constantine (Lipsius de Cruce 11. 14). But there is some reason to suppose that it was used to hasten death in the case of Jewish criminals (Lactant. Znst. iv. 26), in order that the ends of justice might not be defeated by the Mosaic enactment which required the bodies to be taken down on the day of execution (Deut. xxi. 23 quoted by Tertull. adv. Judaeos 10).
(ii) The writer's acquaintance with Jewish Institutions.
1. The High-Priesthood.
The relative positions of Annas and Caiaphas at the time of the Crucifixion have been a source of some perplexity. Annas the high-priest had been deposed by Gratus the predecessor of Pilate, and after intermediate appointments Gratus had nomi- nated Caiaphas to the office. The date of Caiaphas’ succession is probably A.D. 25, one year before Pilate became procurator, and he was deposed apparently about the passover of A.D. 37; whereupon there followed a series of changes, as many as seven high-priests holding office in the next ten years. These facts we learn from a comparison of certain passages in Josephus (esp. Ant. xviii. 2. 2 compared with xviii. 4. 3). Thus at the time of our Lord’s Passion Caiaphas was the actual high-priest, while Annas had been high-priest a few years before. Turning now to the New Testament, we find a certain vagueness in the description of the two by the Synoptists, a vagueness due partly
1 See Plaut. Asinar. ii. 4.68, Paen. Aug. 67, Tib. 44, passages quoted with iv. 2, 64, Sen. de Ira iii, 32; Suet. others by Lipsius de Cruce u. 14.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 163
to the wide use of the word dpytepeds, but not altogether explaimed thereby. Thus, in his Gospel St Luke dates the first year of our Lord’s ministry émi apyvepéws “Avva nai Katada (Luke iii. 2), but in the Acts he mentions as present at the meeting of the Sanhedrin shortly after the day of Pentecost “Avvas 6 apxepeds Kat Karadas (Acts iv. 6). He would seem therefore either to have consulted documents which did not recognise the validity of Caiaphas’ appointment, or to have had himself no very clear conception of the relative positions of the two. The account in the Fourth Gospel is much more precise. St John is aware that Caiaphas is the high-priest (xi. 49, xviii. 13, 24), but he assigns an important position to Annas also, whom in some sense he recognises likewise as apyvepevs (xviil. 15, 16, 19, 22)". On these facts we may remark, first that this unguarded, and to us unintelligible, way of speaking betokens a genuine author, who does not feel the necessity of explain- ing what to himself is a familiar fact. As was natural with one who was ‘known unto the high-priest’ (yyworos TO apyvepet xviii. 15, 16), he evidently has a very clear conception of the relation of the two persons, though he has not definitely put it on paper. Secondly, so far as we are able to test the accuracy of his facts, they satisfy the test, i.e. Caiaphas is the actual high- priest. Thirdly, his account serves as a connecting link between scattered and apparently divergent notices in the New Testa- ment? Yet this episode about Annas in the history of the Passion is peculiar to St John’.
The use of 6 dpyvepevs as applied to two different persons in St John is admirably illustrated by a passage in Josephus (Ant. xx. 9.2). The high-priest Ananias (the Ananias of the Acts) has been deposed, and Ishmael the son of Phabi has succeeded (Ant. xx. 8.8). Ishmael again has been set aside, and his place given to Joseph, surnamed Kabi (xx. 8. 11).
1 The A. V. has taken unwarrantable 2 e.g. Matt. xxvi. 3, 57 compared liberties with dméore:Nev in xviii. 24. with Acts iv. 6. It should be ‘sent him’ not ‘had sent 3 Keim’s attempt (111. p. 322) to set him.’ The events are related in strict this episode of Annas aside is quite chronological order. futile,
11—2
164 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
Shortly after, Joseph is deposed, and the office conferred upon the younger Annas or Ananus, son of the Annas of the Gospels (xx. 9. 1). A period of three months however witnesses the fall of Ananus, and Jesus (Joshua) the son of Damneus is appointed (7b.). In spite of this, however, after these four changes in the high-priestly office, when Ananias reappears upon the scene, he is still called ‘the high-priest’ (6 dpyvepevs xx. 9. 2), and this title is applied to him, even as late as the breaking out of the Judaic war (B. J. ii. 17. 6. 9), though in the meantime there has been a fifth change? in the actual holder of the high-priesthood. And this is not all. Ananias is desig- nated ‘the high-priest’ in describing his dealings with the actual high-priest even in the same sentence (Ant. xx. 9. 2 6 8& apyepeds ’Avavias Ka@ Exdorny K.7.r. Hv yap ypn“aTov moptatixds: Ka? repay yodv Tov "AdPivov Kal Tov apxvEepéa Sépois éOepamevev). This is at least as great an intermingling of the use as in John xviii.; and is exactly of the same kind*, Again, the passage in Josephus gives an example of the employ- ment of the plural (of te dpysepets duora x.7.r.), a sufficiently striking phenomenon. All this is perfectly natural in Josephus, a contemporary and eye-witness, perfectly natural also in the Fourth Evangelist, supposing him to be a contemporary and eye-witness; but incredible in a forger, who could not have failed to betray himself by some slip when treading upon such delicate ground. Lastly, the prominence assigned by Josephus to Ananias is a parallel to the case of Annas in the Gospel and the Acts. If we had only a chapter or two of Josephus detached from the sequence of the narrative, and read of ‘Ananias the high-priest,’ we should certainly suppose him to have been the actual holder of the office at the time. It is conceivable that some such mistaken inference has resulted in
1 Jesus the son of Gamaliel ap- may be considered doubtful. On the pointed in place of Jesus the son of other hand Mr Sanday (p. 245) con- Damneus (Ant. xx. 9. 4). siders the title to apply to Caiaphas
2 It is evident that the references in throughout, a view which compels him
vv, 13, 24 are to Caiaphas, those in to regard the aorist dméoret\e in v. vv. 19, 22 to Annas, while vv. 15,16 24 as a pluperfect.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 165
the expression ‘Annas the high-priest and Caiaphas’ in Acts iv. 6. Indeed it is quite possible that St Luke himself did not know the precise facts, but had copied an authentic document, in which an especially leading part had been assigned to Annas}.
2. The Jewish Festivals.
We cannot fail to notice the large place which religious festivals occupy in this Gospel. They are much more promi- nent than in the Synoptic narrative. The main incidents are connected with them, and this applies not merely to the
Passover, but to the other feasts likewise.
(a) The Feast of Tabernacles is described in John vii. It is introduced by a remarkable expression (jy 6€ éyyvs 7 éopT? ‘The feast of the Jews’ was not in itself an unnatural way of designating the Feast of For it was called by the rabbis fF ‘the festival par excellence’, and Josephus (Ané. vil. 4. 1) speaks of it as ‘a feast of the utmost sanctity and importance among the
tov “lovdaiwy 7 cxnvoTnyia v. 2).
Tabernacles.
Hebrews’ (éopt7s chddpa rapa trois ‘EBpaios aywwtatns Kat
1 For the popular idea that the high- priest had a sort of inspiration (John xi. 51 ‘And this spake he not of him- self, but being high-priest that year he prophesied’) comp. Josephus B. J. iii. 8. 3 epi xploes dvelpwy ikavods...adTos wy iepeds, and Philo de Creat. Prine. § 8 (11. p. 367) 6 pods ddjOevav iepeds evOds €or. mpopirns, the gift however being in both passages extended to the priesthood generally. Other minor references which show St John’s ac- quaintance with Jewish rites and cus- toms are (1) viii. 17, the necessity for two witnesses (cf. Deut. xvii. 6, xix. 15, Matt. xviii. 16, 2 Cor. xiii. 1, Heb. x. 28, 1 John v. 7 sq); (2) viii. 44, the allusion to Cain (ef. 1 John iii. 12): the argument appealed to certain ideas prominent at the time which would not have occurred to any writer of a later date; (3) iv. 27, talking with a
woman, on which see above, p. 35; (4) ii. 6, the purificatory rites on which see Lightfoot, ad loc.; (5) marriage customs, especially ‘the friend of the bridegroom’ (ili, 29), a metaphor in- stinct with meaning, but it is only when we enter into the Jewish practice that this meaning comes out; (6) funeral ceremonies, especially the form of the grave (xi. 38, 41), and the mode of burial (xii. 7, xix. 39, 40, xx. 1, 5, 7, 11), on which last point compare Tacitus Ann. xvi. 6, where we read of Poppea, a Jewish proselyte, ‘corpus non igni abolitum, ut Romanus mos; sed regum externorum consuetudine differtum odoribus conditur.’ Most of these passages are well illustrated from rabbinical sources in Lightfoot’s Horae Hebraicae.
2 See Smith’s Dictionary of the Bible, s. v.
166 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
peylerns). It was sufficiently prominent to attract the notice of the heathen, as Plutarch (Symp. iv. 6, Op. Mor. p. 671 sq.), who regards it as a sort of Dionysiac festival. Still, if the words 2} éop77) tév lovdaiwy alone had been used, the Passover would probably have been meant. Hence the words 7 cxnvo- mnyia_are added. A little later on (v. 37) St John speaks of the ‘last, the peat day of the feast’ (év 77 éoyatn nuépg TH weyadn THs éopThs), language which may mean either the last of the seven days, ie. strictly speaking the last of the feast, or the eighth day, the holy convocation, which followed upon the seven, There seems however to have been no special sanctity about the seventh day’. The first was apparently much more important than the seventh. On the other hand it is urged that the eighth day did not properly belong to the feast, which lasted only seven days. But though the feast is sometimes spoken of as a seven days’ feast, and the eighth day is not regarded (Deut. xvi. 13sq., Ezek. xlv. 25), yet elsewhere the eighth day is reckoned as part of the feast, and a special prominence attached to it. This is the case in Numb. xxix. 35, in Neh. viii. 18, in 2 Mace. x. 6%, in Philo and Josephus® and in Jewish writers generally‘: I need not dwell upon the fact, to which attention has been frequently drawn, that on this occasion our Lord bases His discourse (vil. 37 sq., vill. 12 sq.) upon the two most prominent features in the ceremonial of the day, the pouring out of the water of Siloam upon the altar, and the illumination of the city by flaming torches lighted in the
Temple area’. It will be sufficient to notice, first, that as in
1 Buxtorf, Syn. Jud. xvi. p. 327, gives a certain prominence to it in his description of the modern Jewish ce- lebrations of the tabernacles: see too Groddeke in Ugol. xvii. p. 534.
2 per’ ebppoctyns Tyov Huépas oKTw oxnvwpdrwy tpbrov, 2 Mace, x. 6.
3 érra b& hudpas dydbnv émioppayl- tera, xadéoas éfbd5.0v abriy, od éxelyns ws foue pdvov Ths éopras dd mace trav érnolwy boas KarnpiOujoaper, Philo Septen. §24, p. 298 M.; 颒 nuépas
éxTo éoprhv dyovras, Jos. Ant, iii. 10, 4, and so a little lower down dvlevrac 5é amd mavrds Epyou kara ri dyddnv huépav.
4 Succah iv. 4 (hymnus et gaudium octo dies), iv. 9 (omnes octo dies), v. 6 (octavo die redibant ad sortes); cf. Gem. Hieros. in Ugol. xvu11. p. 492.
5 On the ceremonies of the eighth day see esp. Ewald Alterth. p. 404. The people broke up their tents and re- paired to the Temple. As the dwelling
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 167
our Lord’s discourse, so in the ceremonial itself, the lighting of the lamps followed the pouring out of the water, and was intimately connected therewith; secondly, that it took place in the court of the women where the treasury (yafopuAaxuov) stood’, and where our Lord was speaking at the time (vill. 20). Thus He would be able to point to the candelabra. Thirdly, it is worthy of remark that Philo also incidentally connects the same two images with the Feast of Tabernacles*.
(b) The Feast of Dedication. This festival (ta éyxaivia) is mentioned by St John alone, and it is remarkable how thorough and confident a knowledge of it is implied in his narrative. Here, again, the mode in which it is introduced deserves notice, ‘At that time the feast of dedication was held at Jerusalem’ (x. 22 éyévero ToTe Ta éyKaivnia év Tots ‘lepocodvpors). There is no mention made, as in the case of other feasts (e.g. 11. 13, iv. 45, v. 1, vil. 8), of going up to Jerusalem. For the eyxaima, unlike the Passover, Tabernacles and Pentecost, might be celebrated anywhere (see Lightfoot ad loc.). ‘It was winter, we are told. Now the festival was held to commemorate the purification and dedication of the altar and temple after pol- lution by Antiochus Epiphanes B.c. 167. This event and the institution of the annual festival are described in 1 Mace. iv. 36 sq., where Judas Maccabzeus directs that the commemoration should take place ‘from year to year by the space of eight days, from the five and twentieth day of the month Chisleu (v. 59), Now the month Chisleu falls in November and December, coinciding more nearly with December, and the Jewish winter is reckoned to commence on the fifteenth of Chisleu. Hence the notice of the season of the year in St John is strictly accurate. Yet it is introduced quite incidentally, apparently to
in tents symbolized the wilderness life, 2 mev yap Sixacoovyns éotiv 7H dé itself a deliverance from bondage, so ddixlas apxn Te kal wyyn, Kal 7H pmev the eighth day would be taken to doxlov dwréds, ) 5é cKorods cuyyerns, signify the end of their wanderings Philo Septen. § 24, not as read in the when they settled in the land of ordinary texts, but as given in Tisch. promise. Philonea.
1 See below, p. 169.
168 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
explain the fact that Jesus was not teaching in the open air but under cover. ‘It was winter, and Jesus was walking in the Temple in Solomon’s porch,’
(c) The Feast of the Passover. Graphic touches which illustrate St John’s acquaintance with the details of this feast are his references to the paschal victim (xix. 36), to the danger of ceremonial pollution (xviii. 28), and to the Preparation (mapacKevn xix. 14, 31, 42), a term which he employs in common with the Synoptists (Matt. xxvii. 62, Mark xv. 42, Luke xxiii. 54), but, unlike St Matthew, uses twice without the article, and in one case defines more accurately by the addition of the words rod tracya (xix. 14), implying that the term was not restricted to the Passover. Lastly, the parenthetical remark on xix. 31, ‘For the day of that sabbath was a high day’ (jv yap peyarn 4 npépa éxeivov Tod caBBarov) points to the special sanctity of the day as a double sabbath, the sabbath alike of the week and of the festival, hebdomadal as well as Paschal.
(iii) The Topography of Jerusalem.
From this review of the festivals we pass on to consider the localities mentioned in the Fourth Gospel, merely premising that the complete destruction of Jerusalem by Titus and Hadrian would have gone far to obliterate traces of the actual sites, and would thus have rendered the work of a subsequent forger more than usually exposed to danger of errors.
(a) The Temple. We start with the Temple. Observe the familiarity with which the Evangelist moves about among the sacred precincts. He mentions the Porch of Solomon, ‘the east portico,’ as Josephus describes it to us (Ant. xx. § 9. 7), ‘on the outer part of the Temple, lying in a deep valley with walls four hundred cubits (long), built of square and very white stones’ of enormous size. It was the work of Solomon, and was left
1 This was apparently the case (Lightfoot, Hor. Heb. on Mark xv. 42).
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 169
untouched in Herod’s restoration’. A covered portico of so vast an extent was doubtless a favourite place of resort and shelter in winter time, to which its eastern aspect, catching the warmth of the morning sun, would not be a disadvantage, and thus it was a natural scene for our Lord’s teaching. Another spot where our Lord is stated to have taught is the treasury, the yafodurAaxuy (vii. 20). This word St John employs in common with the Synoptists (Mark xii. 41 sq., Luke xxi. 1), but with characteristic exactness, he gives us additional information. The other Evangelists merely speak of casting money ‘into the treasury, confining the term apparently to the corban-chests, and this is probably the use in Josephus also, when he says (Ant. xix. 6. 1) that Herod Agrippa hung up a certain golden chain which Caligula had given him ‘within the temple-pre- cincts over the treasury (i7ép Tod yafodpuaAakiov). St John however shows that the expression was extended to embrace the chamber in which the chests were placed. This chamber was situated in the outer front of the Temple in the court of the women. Thus it would be a frequented spot, since women could penetrate no further, and St Luke (J. c.) calls special attention to the crowd of people which passed to and fro (é@ewper TOs 0 GyNOS BadrEL yarkov eis TO yalopvrakiov). How natural to take advantage of this concourse, and how significant the addition ‘and no man laid hands on him (viii. 20),’ when we recollect that the Sanhedrin held its meetings” hard by between the court of the women and the inner court, within a stone’s
throw of the speaker.
(6b) The Watercourses of Jerusalem.
(1) Bethesda, Bethsaida, or Bethzatha (v. 2). The Evan- gelist describes this as ‘a pool near the sheep (gate)*®’ (éml 77 mpoBatixh KoiupBnOpa). The ‘sheep gate’ is mentioned more
1 Herod’s restoration of the Temple included in it. was so complete, that it is unlikely 2 In a hall called Gazzith (Light- that in the second century a distinc- foot, 1. p. 2005). tion would have been preserved be- 3 A.V. ‘sheep market.’ tween what was, and what was not,
170 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
than once by Nehemiah (iii. 1, 32, xii. 39 4 wud 7) Aeyouevyn mpoBarixn), but it is difficult to fix its exact position. It was this uncertainty of locality, doubtless, which led to the omis- sion of the words ért +4 mpoBatixm7 in the Curetonian and Peschito Syriac, and to the reading of the Codex Vaticanus éy tois ‘Iepocodvpos tpoBatixn KodvpBOpa, which understands the two descriptions as defining one and the same spot. How- ever it is clear that others also, besides the scribe of §&, explained mpofatixy as an adjective describing «cokuvuPnOpa. Thus Eusebius in his Onomasticon makes the following state- ment: Byfa0a coduuBnOpa év ‘lepoveadnp, itis éotly 7 mpo- Barixn', and goes on to derive the name from the animal sacrifices which used to take place there (aap’ 8 «al mpoBarix?) Kanreltras dia Tad Ovpara). And this interpretation may have produced the reading which we find in &. It is possible, how- ever, that Eusebius may have got hold of the rabbinical word MINDIAMD or NYA} (Buxtorf p. 1796), which seems to mean ‘a bath,’ unless indeed this word has come from zpo8artixy, the bath as well as the gate bearing the name. But it does not fol- low that Eusebius and the Bordeaux Pilgrims were right in their locality. Where then must we place the pool? The question would be answered if we could fix the position of the ‘sheep gate. This however is only roughly possible. From the notices in Nehemiah we draw the conclusion that the gate was situated somewhere near the Temple, on the east side of the city. The traditional site identifies it with St Stephen’s gate, north of the Temple area, but there is no sufficient ground for
1 He proceeds 7d madatdy révre crods éxovoa* kal viv delxvura év rais avré0c Ayvas Sidvpos, Sv éxarépa ek Tv Kar’ tros ver@v mdnpodrat, Oarépa dé mapa- O6Ews medhowrypévov delxvuct Td Vdwp, tyvos, ws act, pépovra trav mada Kabatponévuw év airy lepelwy. Jerome, knowing the locality better, says quae vocabatur mpoBarixy, Hier. de situ et nom, (op. ut. p. 182 ed. Vallarsi). The curious red colour of the waters
to which Eusebius draws attention is mentioned by the Bordeaux Pilgrims in their description: Interius vero civitatis sunt piscinae gemellares, quin- que porticus habentes, quae appellan- tur Betsaida. Ibi aegri multorum annorum sanabantur: aquam autem habent eae piscinae in modum coccini turbatam, quoted by Wesseling, Itine- raria (1735), p. 589.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 171
this; and Robinson’s conjecture (1. p. 342) that Bethesda is the intermittent spring in the Upper Pool known as the ‘ Fountain of the Virgin” at all events accords with the uninterpolated? account of St John, which implies nothing miraculous in the water itself, but describes what was evidently an intermittent and medicinal, perhaps (from the allusions quoted above to the redness of the water) a chalybeate spring. However we need not pursue the enquiry further. Enough has been said to show that from early times much uncertainty was felt as to the actual site. What forger then would have ventured to intro- duce, or if he introduced, to localise, so obscure and contested a spot? Who but one thoroughly familiar with the scene would have been content to describe the position by so elliptical and ambiguous a phrase as él 77 wpoPatixy, employing an adjec- tive without a qualifying noun, a phrase which, as we have seen, has been interpreted to mean ‘sheep market, ‘sheep gate,’ ‘sheep pool’? The naturalness of this vague allusion is the best guarantee for the authenticity of the narrative.
(2) Siloam (ix. 7). Attention has been drawn already* to the derivation of this word, and the symbolical use which St John makes of this derivation. The topographical question however requires a separate treatment. Fortunately the situa- tion, unlike that of Bethesda, can hardly be considered doubtful. Siloam is frequently mentioned and described by Josephus, and the tradition of its position is tolerably continuous. It bears the same name now, Silwdn, as in our Lord’s time. It lies at the mouth of the Tyropceon valley, close to its junction with the valley of Hinnom, and is fed by a stream issuing somewhere from the heart of the rocks of Jerusalem. Its proximity to Jerusalem is evidenced by the well-attested tradition that water was brought from it for the libations customary at the Feast of Tabernacles, and by the name which it gave to one of the gates
1 Tt was connected by an under- omit the words éxdeyoudrvwr...voonuare ground passage with the pool of Si- (vv. 3, 4), which are found in the loam, Textus Receptus.
2 Textual criticism compels us to 3 See above, pp. 141, 150.
172 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
of Jerusalem, ‘the water gate.’ It was both a fountain and a pool. The fountain (any) is mentioned by Josephus (B. J. v. 12. 2), the pool or tank by Nehemiah (iii. 15, 3553) and St John (xokvpByOpa). The derivation of the name, which means an
‘aqueduct’ or ‘conduit’ (from nby to send) seems to imply that the Siloah properly so-called was not the pool, but the stream which feeds it or which flows from it. The points on which the Evangelist incidentally displays his exact knowledge are two: first, he apparently places the pool near the Temple, for it is improbable that a blind man would be sent on a long journey ; secondly, he is aware of, and draws a lesson from, the Hebrew meaning of the name, in which he sees a spiritual significance. Long ago these very waters had been invested by Isaiah (viii. 6) with a symbolical interpretation. The contrast between the ‘waters of Shiloah that go softly’ and the ‘ waters of the River (i.e. the Euphrates), strong and many’ typified the contrast between Judah and Assyria, between the quiet dwelling in Jerusalem under Jehovah and the overwhelming of a foreign conquest. This idea of an indigenous stream, the possession of the favoured people, ‘the river, the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God’ (Ps. xlvi. 4; cf. Isaiah xxxiu. 21), bespoke the Messianic hope. It foretold the stream of running, life-giving waters, which should issue from the temple-rock, and revive the nations. It recalled and renewed the type of the waters flowing from the rock smitten by Moses, which rock was understood by St Paul to be the Christ (1 Cor. x. 4). Thus St John seizes upon the current thought, and extends its application. The Healer who sends the blind man is Himself ‘the sent?’
(3) Cedron (xviii. 1). This is undoubtedly the Kidron of
1 Isaiah (viii. 6) has simply Nown "1D (LXX 76 tdwp rod DAwdp).
2 Epiphanius rightly connects the two passages. After quoting Isaiah viii. 6, he continues tdwp yap Liwau éore didacxaNla To0 drecradudvov: tis 5 dv etn ovTos GXN’ H 6 Kupros judv “Inoods, 6
amd Tod Oeod marpds abrod drecradpuévos ; Haer, xxxv. 3. So the ps.-Basil on Isaiah viii. 6, rls ody 6 dmweorad\udos kal dwodpnrl péwy 7 mept ob elpynra 6 Kipios dméore\éy we; Basil, op. 1. p. 536 A,
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 173
the Old Testament (2 Sam. xv. 23 etc.), and is mentioned by St John alone of the Evangelists. The common text runs 7répav Tov Yeappov TaV Kédpwr (‘the torrent of the Cedars’), and the passage has a peculiar interest because it has furnished the text for an elaborate attack upon the personality of the Evangelist. Baur and Hilgenfeld after him (see Ewald Jahrbuch, vi. p. 118) have pointed triumphantly to the undoubted fact that Kédpwy is the Hebrew word pyryp ‘dark,’ so called probably from its turbid
stream’, and have proceeded to argue that the Evangelist in his ignorance has imagined it to be the genitive plural of «édpos ‘a cedar. The writer therefore, they conclude, cannot have been the Apostle St John, who, as a Jew, must have been aware of the true derivation of the name.
Before admitting this conclusion, let us look the facts fairly in the face. In Josephus the form Kédpar occurs frequently MB IbCVe. ove. 0h, Verdi. 25 dntowie In Oe va i iaaee ix. 7. 3) used as a declinable noun. This is quite after Jose- phus’ manner in dealing with Hebrew substantives. In the LXX the expression 0 yeudppovs Kédpwyv is employed with- out an article, eg. 2 Sam. xv. 23 (its second occurrence in this verse); 2 Kings xxiii. 6, 12; 2 Chron. xv. 16, xxix. 16, xxx. 14; Jer. xxxi. 40. But in two passages it is found with the plural article—2 Sam. xv. 23 (on the first occurrence), and 1 Kings xv. 13 év 7d yeuappm tov Kédpwv. This is the reading of AB in both passages. Now it is quite clear that the LXX translators did not mistake the meaning of the word. Otherwise they could not have written, as they generally do, o Xelwdppovs Kédpwv, a solecism on this supposition; but we should have had in every case 0 yeywappous tov Kédpov. Therefore either there is a corruption in the best manuscripts of the LXX, or 6 yewpdppovs tév Kédpwv was considered a legitimate Greek rendering of the Hebrew phrase ‘the brook Kidron.’ Turning now to the passage in St John, we find that there is great uncertainty as to the actual reading, authorities varying between tdév Kédpwv, tod Kédpou and rod
1 Compare Ps. exx. 5 ‘the tents of Kedar’ i.e, the dark-skinned folk.
174 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
Kéépev?, and that the preponderance of evidence is either for trav Kédpwv or rod Kédpov. But the necessity for making a selection suggests another view. What then is the probability ? I believe the true account to be that the original reading was tov Késpwv; and this for two reasons. First, it is the interme- diate reading, the reading which explains the other two, whereas neither of the other two will explain either this or each other’. Secondly, it is much more probable that tod Kédpwv would be changed into tév Kédpwv and tod Keéédpou, than conversely, Indeed the converse change in either case is hardly conceivable, the tendency being to assimilate terminations. And unless tov Kédpor be a legitimate rendering of ‘the brook Kidron,’ the corruption has taken place, and has still more completely obliterated the original reading, in the LXX. This solution was adopted by Griesbach and Lachmann, even before the dis- covery of &, and recommends itself to Renan, Meyer and Sanday. Tregelles gives it as an alternative. On the other hand Tischendorf reads tod Kéépou.
But suppose tév Kéépor is after all, as Westcott considers,
the right reading, what then? The Septuagint shows that it was held to be an adequate rendering of the Hebrew })77) bro.
We must suppose therefore that it was the equivalent familiar to Greek ears, and that St John writing to Greeks would not hesitate to employ it. In confirmation of this view we may notice the general tendency to assimilate Hebrew termina- tions to Greek forms, which has coined the Greek plural caB- Bara out of the Hebrew noun }\NIY as though caBBaror. As KéSpwv was only used with yeswappous, the change to the
genitive would be natural’. Again, the temptation to extract
! BCL, with the bulk of the Greek manuscripts and the Gothic Version, have twyv xedpwv; AAS, the Vulgate and certain manuscripts (c, (e) f, g) of the Old Latin, the Peschito and the Philoxenian Syriac and the Armenian have rou kedpwv.
2 A good instance of the application
of this test is the celebrated passage 1 Tim. iii. 16, where ds is to be pre- ferred as accounting for both the vari- ants @eds and 6.
3 In Ps. lxxxii. 10 NAB read ev rw Xeupappw Kewv (kiowv A) anar- throus, but some inferior manuscripts have rwy Kicowr.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 175
a Greek sense out of Hebrew names is exemplified in the deri- vations given to Jerusalem and Essene’. If by an accident there were any cedars in the valley, the adoption of this
Grecised form would be facilitated.
(c) Scenes illustrating our Lerd’s Passion.
Bethany is mentioned by the Synoptists in connexion with the triumphal entry into Jerusalem (Mark xi. 1, Luke xix. 29), with our Lord’s retirement during Holy Week (Matt. xxi. 17, Mark xi. 11, 12), especially the feast at the house of Simon the leper (Matt. xxvi. 6, Mark xiv. 3; cf. John xii. 1), and with the Ascension (Luke xxiv. 50). It occurs in St John’s narrative likewise as the scene of the raising of Lazarus (John x1. 1, 18), and he exhibits his acquaintance with the place in a charac- teristic way by mentioning that it was distant fifteen furlongs from Jerusalem (xi. 18, "Hv 5€ BnOavia éyyis tov ‘lepocodkvpowv os aro otadiwv Sexarévte”). This statement exactly accords with the account which a modern writer gives of its situation. ‘We reached it in three-quarters of an hour from the Damascus gate. This gives a distance of a little less than two Roman miles from the eastern part of the city’ (Robinson I. p. 431).
Gethsemane is not named in the Fourth Gospel, but this does not prevent St John from adding to our stock of know- ledge regarding the scene of the Agony, which he describes more precisely than the Synoptists, calling it ‘a garden’ («j7ros
1 Jos. B. J. vi. 10. 1, dia todro iepdoaro TH Oem mp&ros Kal 7d lepdv mp@ros deréduevos ‘lepood\uua Ti modw mpoonyopevoe, DdAujLa Kadoumevnv mpoTe- pov, Philo quod omn. prob, 12, 11. p. 457 "Eooato...duadéxrov éddAnvikys mapwrd- for dotdrnTos; cf. § 13, p. 459, and fragm, 11. p. 632 (ed. Mangey). The same tendency is to be seen in English in the forms Charterhouse, Barmouth ete.
2 No inference can be drawn as to the date of the composition of the Gospel from the use of the imperfect
tense. The Evangelist sometimes uses the imperfect (xviii. 1, xix. 41, 42), sometimes the present (v. 2), occasion- ally both tenses together (iv. 6. 9). Similarly St Luke uses the imperfect (Luke iv. 29), and we may compare Kinglake’s Crimea 111. pp. 38, 117, 118, 122, 286, which is unquestionably the narrative of one who was an eye- witness of the events he relates, and who writes not half a century later, but within a very few years of the occurrences,
176 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
xviii. 1) instead of simply ‘an enclosure’ (ywplov Matt, xxvi. 36, Mark xiv. 32), and defining its position as ‘over the brook Cedron.’ Can we wonder if the events of that evening were burnt into the memory of the beloved disciple in letters of fire?
Again, he alone of the Evangelists informs us that the Crucifixion took place outside the city-walls (xix. 20). This statement is thrown out quite naturally, and no point is made of it, but it is borne out by the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews (xiii. 11 sq.), who sees in it a deep moral lesson, And no one denies that this Epistle was written at some time or other in the first century after Christ.
(iv) Vhe Topography of Palestine generally.
As far therefore as knowledge of the locality of the Holy City is concerned, our author has ably stood the test applied to him. Let us now take a wider sweep and investigate his acquaintance with the geography of Palestine at large,
(a) Galilee. As is well known, the Fourth Evangelist directs his attention chiefly to our Lord’s ministry in Jeru- salem. We do not therefore expect him to give us many fresh details about the topography of Galilee. However he mentions
Jana in Galilee’ (ii, 1, 11, iv. 46, xxi. 2), and he gives a new designation to the Lake of Gennesareth, which he calls ‘the sea of Tiberias®’ (vi. 1, xxi. 1). Again, in describing the events which clustered round the Feeding of the Five Thousand, his varying use of 7épav ‘on the other side,’ now for the west, now again for the east shore of the lake, bespeaks the eye-
is more closely allied to the represen- tative in the Curetonian and Peschito
1 Cana is named several times by Josephus (Vit. 16, B. J. i, 17, 5, Ant.
xiii, 15. 1), but the references do not throw much light on its position. The traditional site is Kefr Kenna, about four miles north-east of Naza- reth, and this identification is as old as 8. Willibald in the eighth cen- tury. Robinson however prefers a village, Kana el-Jelil, some five miles further north, and the spelling of the name (with a Koph instead of a Caph)
Katna, though the t is not represented.
* The city of Tiberias also occurs (vi. 28). As it was built by Herod Antipas (Jos, Ant. xviii. 2. 8, B. J. ii, 9. 1), it could hardly have given its name to the lake as early as the date of our Lord's ministry, The designa- tion however ‘ sea of Tiberias’ is found in Josephus (LB. J. ili. 8. 5), before St John wrote his Gospel.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—38. 177
witness, who, as he records the miracle, fancies himself enacting the scene once more, and speaks as if he were himself first here, then there.
(b) Judea.
(1) Ephraim. 54 St John describes our Lord’s retirement ‘into the country near the desert, into a city called
In xi
Ephraim’ (éyyvs ths épypov, els “Edpaiu reyouévny modu). This ‘desert of Judah’ seems to mean the broad mountain pasture lands near Jerusalem, which were sparsely inhabited, for in the Gospel narrative ‘the desert’ (7 épnuos) is generally associated with ‘the mountain district’ (7d opos). This city Ephraim (or Ephrem) is noticed here only in the New Testa- But it is mentioned by Josephus (B. J. iv. 9. 9) in connexion with the mountain district (77 dpe) north of Judea, as a small fort (zroXdyviov) captured and garrisoned by Vespasian when on his way westward to fight against Vitellius. Josephus couples it with Bethel, and it is a coicidence that, where it occurs in 2 Chron. x11. 19, Bethel is named with it. The two places were probably not far apart. Mr Robinson (1. p. 447) identifies it with H/-Tayibeh, some eight miles north of Jerusalem. In the passage in the Chronicles referred to, the Kthib has Ephron by, but the Qri Ephraim py, perhaps a dual form like Mizraim, the Upper and Lower Egypt. It is mentioned also in the Talmud (Neubauer p. 155). The Ephraim of St John must not be confused with the wood of Ephraim of 2 Sam. xvii. 6, or the Ephraim of 2 Sam. xii. 23, both of which are spelt with an Aleph like the patriarch Ephraim; or with the district called Apherema in 1 Mace. x1. 34. Mr Robinson (/. c.) identifies it with Ophrah AMDSy of Benjamin (1 Sam. xui. 17, Josh. xvi. 23). This may or may The Qri of 2 Chron. /. c. and the passage in
ment.
not be the case}.
1 Tt is noticeable that in the Codex Alexandrinus E¢paipu is the LXX ren- dering of the other Ophrah, the birth- place of Gideon, in Judges viii. 27, ix. 5. Eus. Onom. s. v. says kat éore kai viv koun "Edpalu péyiorn mepl Ta dpa
L. E.
Aidias ws amd onpmetwy x’; cf. Hier. Op. ut. p. 203, who repeats the same statement. But if Mr Robinson’s identification is correct, the Ephraim of St John is the Aphra of Eus. Onom. is Oe
12
178 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
Josephus are sufficient for my purpose. Whether the Qri be the right reading or not, it shows that such a place existed just in the region where, from St John’s account, we should expect it to be.
(2) Bethany (i. 28). This is certainly the correct reading in this passage, and accordingly St John has been charged’ with gross ignorance as not being aware that Bethany was near Jerusalem. In the light of the accurate and minute acquaint- ance with topography elsewhere displayed by the Apostle, such an accusation is hardly worth the trouble of refutation.
We may however briefly reply, first, that the writer carefully distinguished the two places, speaking of one as ‘ Bethany beyond Jordan’ (i. 28), of the other as ‘Bethany the town of Mary and her sister Martha’ (xi. 1); secondly, that he accu- rately described the Bethany of chapter xi. as ‘nigh unto Jerusalem about fifteen furlongs off?’; thirdly, that if we assume with most commentators the identification of Bethany beyond Jordan with ‘the place where John was at first baptizing’ (x. 40), our Lord is represented at the time as out of Judea (xi. 7, dyopev eis tHv “lovdatay mandy), as journeying from the one Bethany to the other, a journey which occupies three days (xi. 89, tetaptatos yap éort), which takes Him into Judxa once more (xi. 7, @ywpev eis THY “lovdaiay waxduv), and into danger from a position of security (xi. 8). Personally I prefer to keep these scenes of St John’s baptism distinct, and to place the Bethany of chapter 1. somewhere in the Upper Jordan*. It was probably an obscure place. ‘In any case,’ as Mr Sanday truly says (p. 45), ‘the distinction between two places having the same name is a mark of local knowledge
which is unlike fiction‘
(3) Anon near to Salim (iii. 23). Here again we are
1 By Paulus and Bolten; see Liicke 4 In Mark viii. 22 there is a well- I. p. 394. supported variant Byéavay for Bné- 2 See above, p. 175. caidav, which may contain some under-
% This is the view of Dr Caspari, lying foundation of fact, pointing to a quoted by Sanday, p. 45. Bethany in the north-east of Galilee.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 179
introduced by the Evangelist to fresh names. It is true that in Joshua xv. 32 mention is made in the tribe of Judah of py) pombe (Cod. A, Sereeiy, A.V. ‘Shilhim and Ain’); but neither name corresponds exactly to the notice in St John. Moreover the places mentioned in the Old Testament lie in the arid country south of Judza (see Grove in Smith’s Dictionary of the Bible, s. v. Salim). The most probable site of the Salim of the Fourth Gospel is that assigned to it by Eusebius and Jerome near the Jordan, eight Roman miles south of Scythopolis. In Jerome’s time it was called Salimias. A Salim has been discovered by Van de Velde (Memoir p. 345 sq.) exactly in this position, six English miles south of Beisan (Bethshan), and two miles west of Jordan. The name A‘non fully bears out St John’s description of the place, ‘there was much water (zroAXa véata) there, the plural noun indi- cating ‘many fountains’ or ‘springs. Evidently therefore Enon was not situated on the Jordan itself.
These last two notices are especially interesting as showing how carefully the successive stages of John the Baptist’s preaching are brought out in the Fourth Gospel. We find him first at the lower fords of Jericho ‘beyond Jordan,’ ézrov nv lwavyns TO Tp@Ttov Bartifwy (x. 40; cf. Matt. i1.1). We meet with him next at Bethany (a. 28, A.V. ‘ Bethabara’) ‘beyond Jordan, probably at the upper fords. Lastly, his headquarters are at Ainon, near Salim (ii. 23). Thus we seem able to trace his course northward, and the successive changes of scene bear out what we gather from the more general account with which St Luke supplies us. Though John’s native town is in the hill country of Judea (Luke i. 39), yet he is apprehended and put to death by Herod, the tetrarch of Galilee (Luke iii. 19, 20), and therefore must, before his arrest, have passed within Herod’s jurisdiction. The minuteness of detail which in the Fourth Gospel characterizes the episodes in which John the Baptist takes part, becomes doubly significant when we consider the great probability that John the Apostle had been in his early days a disciple of the Baptist.
12—2
180 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
IL. THE WRITER WAS AN EYE-WITNESS OF THE EVENTS RECORDED.
In a striking passage in one of his works! Auguste Sabatier draws attention to two characteristics of this Gospel which run side by side: that though in its teaching it is the most dogmatic, yet at the same time in its narrative it is the most vivid of the Four Gospels. We are apt to forget this latter point in the absorbing eagerness with which we fix our attention upon the sublimity of the doctrines inculeated. Yet this vivid- ness of description is the best guarantee for the conclusion that the writer was not merely a Palestinian Jew, but an actual eye-witness of the events which he records. We shall be compelled to treat this part of our subject in a very cursory and incomplete manner.
(i) The minuteness and exactness of detail which he exhibits.
Sometimes these minute notices stand more or less closely in connexion with the progress of the story; sometimes they are detached personal reminiscences which apparently struck the writer at the time, and have dwelt in his memory since, Such a reminiscence, introduced apropos of nothing, is the incident recorded by St Mark (xiv. 51 sq.) of the young man clad with the linen cloth, which has been generally interpreted as an allusion to the history of the Evangelist himself. I shall divide what I have to say on this subject under the following heads: (1) Time, (2) Place, (8) Persons, (4) Incidents.
(1) Time. The chronology of our Lord’s life can be gathered from St John’s Gospel alone. In the other Evange- lists the incidents are often grouped together with little or no reference to their chronology. This is especially the case with St Luke, who, having neither been present himself at the events, nor, like St Mark, especially attached to one who was himself
1 A. Sabatier, Essai sur les sources de la vie de Jésus (1866), p. 34.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 181
present, is of the four the farthest removed from the position of an eye-witness. ‘The minute exactness of St John’s chronology shows itself most particularly in his record of the first (i. 29, 35, 43, 11.1) and of the last week (xii. 1, 12 etc.) of the narrative, but it is present throughout (iv. 40, 43, vi. 22, vil. 14, 37, x. 22, xi. 6,17). It arises in great measure from the part which he himself has in the drama. It extends even to the hour of the day (i. 39, iv. 6, 52, xix. 14), or, if not the hour, the time approximately (111. 2, vi. 16, xiii. 30, xvill. 28, xx. 19, xxi. 3, 4).
(2) Place. We have had occasion already to allude to the increased definiteness to be observed in the Fourth Gospel in this respect’. All the incidents are referred to their locality. Compare this feature with the other Gospels, eg. St Luke’s account of Martha and Mary, Luke x. 38, e’s cépny Tova, with John xi. 1, ard ByOavias éx ths nbéuns Mapias cai Map@as THS adeAPHs avTHs. It runs through the whole narrative, e.g. vi. 59, ev cvvaywyn Sibdacxwv év Kadhapvaovp, vill. 20, ev TH yalopuAakiw, x. 22, év TA lep@ ev TH Tod TOV LoNomavos. Notice the precision with which on two occasions the distance of the boat from the shore is recorded, measured by the practised eye of the fisherman, vi. 19, os oradious elxoce TrévTE 1) TpLaxovTa, XXi. 8, ws ato THY@V Siakociwr, and for his greater chronological accuracy contrast the Fourth Evangelist with St Luke in the scenes of St Peter's denial (xvi. 15 sq.), remembering that the narrator is ‘the other disciple who was known unto the high-priest, himself a spectator throughout the terrible tragedy.
In all these details we recognise the hand of the personal disciple, and it would be strange indeed if an author with such opportunities did not produce more exact and precise results than one who, like St Luke, was the disciple of one who was not even himself a personal disciple.
(3) Persons. Sayings, instead of being left vaguely general, are attributed to the speakers by name, e.g. 1. 41, 45, 46
1 See above, p. 168 sq.
182 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
(bis), 48, 49 of Andrew, Philip and Nathanael, vi. 7, 8 Andrew and Philip, 68 Peter, xi. 16 Thomas, xu. 4 Judas Iscariot, 21 Andrew and Philip again, xiii. 8, 9 Peter, 24, 25 Peter and John, 36, 37 Peter again, xiv. 8 Philip, 22 Judas not Iscariot, xx. 25 sq. Thomas, xxi. 3 Peter, 7 Peter and John, 15 sq., 20 sq. Peter. This exactness is more noticeable when we have an opportunity of comparing the incidents with the Synoptic records, as in the miracle of the feeding of the Five Thousand, where the objection on the part of the disciples is left general (Mark vi. 37 Aéyoucv) instead of being placed in the mouth of Philip (John vi. 7), or the feast at Bethany, where the loving ministrations of Mary (John xii. 3) are vaguely assigned to ‘a woman’ (Matt. xxvi. 7, Mark xiv. 3 ydvn), and where the expressed discontent of Judas (John xii. 4) is robbed of half its force by being generalised (Matt. xxvi. 8 of wa@nrai, Mark xiv. 4 rwes). Or again take the scene of the betrayal, where a flood of light is thrown upon that part of the drama when we learn from St John that it was St Peter (John xviii. 10) who with characteristic impulsiveness drew his sword in his Master's defence’.
(4) Incidents. The Fourth Evangelist acquaints us with a number of details, which, though in some cases unimportant in themselves, add greatly to the life-like character of his portraiture of events. The six waterpots of water containing two or three firkins apiece (i1. 6), the thirty and eight years during which the man lying at the pool of Bethesda had been afflicted (v. 5), the bag in which our Lord and His disciples kept their common fund (xii. 6), the sop given to Judas (xiii. 26), the three languages of the title on the cross (xix. 20)°, the four parts into which the tunic (yi7@v) and the cloak (iudtia) were divided (xix. 23), the water and the blood which issued from the Saviour’s side (xix. 34), the weight of the
1 The Synoptists are perhaps de- airdv). The name of the servant signedly vague (Matt. xxvi. 51, es Malchus is also given by St John. trav wera "Inood, Mark xiv. 47, els rav 2 The corresponding notice in St mapeornxorwv, Luke xxii. 50, els rus €€ | Luke xxiii, 38 is an interpolation,
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myrrh and aloes used for the embalming (xix. 39), the orderly folding of the napkin which had been about His head (xx. 7), and, in the last chapter, the side of the ship on which the net was to be thrown (xxi. 6) and the number of the fish which were drawn up (xxi. 11)—all these are instances of the miniature painting which is noticeable in this Gospel. What is the inference from all this? Muinuteness is not in itself an evidence of authenticity. But taken in conjunction with the other arguments which have been adduced, this fact is important, pointing as it does to an author who, as he wrote, had all the scenes clearly and vividly before his eyes.
(1) The naturalness of the record.
This is exhibited in two ways, (1) by the development of the characters depicted, and (2) by the progress of the incidents related.
(1) The characters. Some of these appear also in the Synop- tic Gospels; others are new. Of the former class are Martha and Mary, Mary Magdalene, Peter, Judas, Pontius Pilate, Caiaphas ; of the latter, Andrew, Philip, Thomas, Nathanael, the woman of Samaria, Nicodemus?. In the first group of instances we have an opportunity of testing the Fourth Gospel by other independent accounts. The Evangelist therefore must be found true to his fellow-Evangelists. In the second group we have no such external criterion to guide us; but the Evangelist must be found true to himself. We will select an example or two from each of the two classes.
(a) St Peter. His character is sketched for us in clear outlines in the Synoptic narrative. We cannot fail to notice his eager, forward, impetuous nature. He is the self-constituted spokesman of the disciples. His eagerness to learn, his curiosity, his love of definiteness shows itself in the type of question which from time to time he puts before his Master. He will
1 [The characters of Martha and in the first Essay (p. 37sq.); they are Mary and of Thomas are given above __ therefore omitted here. ]
184 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
know the precise point at which forgiveness ceases to be a duty (‘ Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him?’ Matt. xviii. 21); the exact reward which those who follow Jesus should obtain (‘ Behold, we have forsaken all, and followed thee; what shall we have therefore?’ Matt. xix. 27). He will have one mysterious parable explained (‘ Declare unto us this parable’ Matt. xv. 15), and he will know the exact range of the application of another (‘ Lord, speakest thou this parable unto us, or even to all?’ Luke xii. 41). Notice his eagerness to remark upon what is going on around him, whether it be the evidence of Christ’s power (‘ Master, behold, the figtree which thou cursedst is withered away’ Mark xi. 21), or the current of popular opinion (‘All men seek for thee’ Mark i. 37). His impetuosity leads him on two occasions to administer rebuke to the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, either alone (‘Then Peter took Him, and began to rebuke Him, saying, Be it far from thee, Lord: this shall not be unto thee’ Matt. xvi. 22), or with others (‘Peter and they that were with Him said, Master, the multitude throng thee and press thee, and sayest thou, Who touched me?’ Luke viii. 45). His eagerness of faith and assurance is discernible throughout the whole course of the Gospel narrative. It prompts his confession at Ceesarea Philippi (‘Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God’ Matt. xvi. 16), his proposal on the Mount of Transfigura- tion (‘ Lord, it is good for us to be here: if thou wilt, let us make three tabernacles’ Matt. xvii. 4), his confidence on the Sea of Galilee (‘ Lord, if it be thou, bid me come unto thee on the water’ Matt. xiv. 28), his protestation on the night of the betrayal (‘Though all men shall be offended because of thee, yet will I never be offended’ Matt. xxvi. 33). After the arrest, with a characteristic mixture of courage and of curiosity, he follows Jesus into the high priest’s palace ‘to see the end’ (Matt. xxvi. 58). On the other side, we notice sudden revul- sions of feeling, resulting, now in lack of faith (‘ Lord, save me’ Matt. xiv. 30), now in lack of courage (the three denials Matt. xxvi. 69 sq.), now again in unexpected self-abasement
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(‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord’ Luke v. 8). Accordingly we find our Lord in the Garden rebuking Peter specially and by name (Matt. xxvi. 40, Mark xiv. 37), as though implying that his actions had in the most signal way belied his professions.
Such is St Peter’s character as delineated in the Synoptic Gospels. Before proceeding to test the record of the Fourth Gospel, we must turn aside to notice a charge brought against St John by M. Renan (Vie de Jésus p. xxviii. and p. 159) and reiterated by other critics (e.g. Lampe ur. p. 510). It is to the effect that St John was jealous of St Peter’s reputation and endeavoured to undermine it in his Gospel. The charge is false In every way. Compare St John’s account of the third denial (xviii. 27) with that of St Matthew (xxvi. 74) or of St Mark (xiv. 71), the one Synoptist writing for the Jewish Christians among whom St Peter was especially honoured, the other ‘the interpreter’ of St Peter. Or again, remember that the rebuke ‘Get thee behind me, Satan, is confined to St Matthew (xvi. 23) and St Mark (viii. 33), and is not recorded by St John. These facts will show how gratuitous this offensive insinuation is. On the other hand, another antagonistic critic (Késtlin in Theol. Jahrb. for 1850-2, p. 293) has supposed that the object of the twenty-first chapter is to glorify St Peter and St Peter’s see. Thus one criticism serves to neutralise the other.
We return to St Peter’s character, as portrayed by St John. It is in thorough accord with what we have already gathered from the other Evangelists. His curiosity comes out in the eager question with which he interrupts his Master's discourse in the upper room ‘Lord, whither goest thou?’ (xiii. 36), in the expedient by which he endeavours to obtain through the medium of the beloved disciple the traitor’s name
1 M. Renan accepts the latter criti- proves chap. xxi. (though probably cism, but supposes this last chapter to a postscript) to haye been written by be a later addition by some other hand, the author of chaps. i-xx. (see the
in which amends are made to St Peter. additional note at the end of this But the internal evidence of style Essay).
186 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
(xiii. 24 sq.), in the anxiety which he shows to learn his brother apostle’s destiny (‘ Lord, what shall this man do?’ xxi. 21). He will not rest content with dark forebodings and mysterious intimations; he will know the facts, and know them definitely. Again, his ready profession of faith, which makes him now the mouthpiece of the apostolic band (‘ Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life’ vi. 68), now the revealer of his own deepest heart-utterances (‘ Lord, thou knowest all things ; thou knowest that I love thee’ xxi. 17), is in perfect keeping with what the Synoptic narrative has led us to expect. His impetuosity shines out in every action which is recorded of him. In Gethsemane, without a thought for the consequences, he draws his sword and smites the high-priest’s servant (xviii. 10 sq.); at the tomb, while the younger disciple stands awestruck and uncertain, he enters in without a moment’s hesitation (xx. 6); at the sea of Galilee, he plunges into the lake (xxi. 7), he drags the net to land (xxi. 11). And the sudden revulsion of sentiment, of which such striking examples are recorded in the first three Gospels, has its complete parallel in an incident peculiar to the Fourth Evangelist— the washing of the disciples’ feet (‘Thou shalt never wash my feet. ‘Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head’ xill, 8, 9).
(b) Pontius Pilate. In the portraiture of the Roman pro- curator there is much in common between the Synoptists and St John. Thus in all we see the abstract love of justice, inherent in a Roman magistrate, overborne by the desire of securing popularity, natural to a provincial governor. But his personal characteristics appear especially in the Fourth Gospel, and it is not too much to say that we should not have appre- hended his character as a whole without the light thrown upon it from this fresh source of evidence. Here at last we get to understand the man thoroughly in all the variety of his complex nature—his desire to purchase public favour at the expense of justice and yet his unwillingness to condemn Jesus, his cynical contempt of the subject-people, his sarcasm, his scepticism and
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yet his fear. It is only when, fresh from studying him in the Fourth Gospel, we turn once more to the pages of the Synop- tists, that his scorn for the Jews as a nation is clearly discerned. However, when once we have found the clue, that scorn is evident enough. It appears in the form of his questions ‘ Art thou the King of the Jews?’ (Matt. xxvii. 11), ‘ What will ye that I should do unto him whom ye call the King of the Jews ?’ (Mark xv. 12)1; and especially in the title placed over the cross. Ap- parently he could not lose the opportunity of insulting the Jewish rulers, whom he was obliged to gratify nevertheless. But when we read St John’s account, we see these lurid features of Pilate’s character emphasized and lighted up under the glow which issues from the narrator’s master-pen. With what persistency does Pilate evince his desire to shirk the responsibility of condemnation! ‘Take ye him, and judge him according to your law’ (xvii. 31). Baffled here by the logic of facts, the inability of the Jews to condemn to death, he tries another loophole to escape from his dilemma. ‘Ye have a custom, that I should release unto you one at the passover; will ye therefore that I release unto you the King of the Jews?’ (xvii. 39). Foiled again by the malignant hostility of the crowd, he seeks to appeal to their pity by exhibiting his prisoner scourged and mocked. In vain. He is met by the cry, ‘Crucify him.’ Once more he would shift the responsibility on the shoulders of the chief-priests, ‘Take ye him and crucify him, for I find no fault in him.’ From the furious, raging mob he turns to meet the calm, impassive countenance of Jesus Christ. The sight only increases his perplexity. ‘From henceforth Pilate sought to release him.’ The struggle is ended by the twice-repeated name of Cesar (xix. 12), and the dread image thus called up before his mind of the suspicious, vindictive emperor prevails at last over his sense of justice and of awe. He tries one last
1 The scorn is lost in the form in contempt is found in St John’s version, which the question appears in St ‘Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Matthew (xxvii. 22). Jews’; see above, p. 159,
2 Though here again the climax of
188 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
appeal, ‘Behold, your King, and then delivers Him unto them to be crucified. And if the wavering, vacillating temper of the governor is drawn in clearer outline by St John than by the Synoptists, no less is his cynicism, his sarcasm and unbelief painted in deeper colours. ‘Am I a Jew?’ (the English fails to convey the withering scorn of the Greek original pyre éyo "Tovdaios etue;), ‘Art thou a King then?’ (od«odv Bacireds ef ov ;—we can imagine the intonation of the voice upon the final word ov, as Pilate amuses himself with what he considered the fanaticism of his prisoner), ‘What is truth?’ And so the conversation ends, Pilate no doubt thinking that he had had the best of it, had secured the last word. Notice too how he repeats the expression ‘the King of the Jews, harping on the title which he knows to be offensive to his Jewish audience (xvili. 39, xix. 14, 15, 19, 22). And the Roman soldiers catch up the spirit of the Roman governor, who sets the fashion, and ery, ‘ Hail, King of the Jews’ (xix. 3).
(c) Philip. Of the characters known only from St John’s Gospel the first in importance undoubtedly is Thomas; but there are others, which the Evangelist, with a few masterly touches, depicts for us, and which deserve more than a passing notice.
There is in Philip a certain cautious, business-like way of looking at things which bespeaks much circumspectness of disposition. We remark this at once when we are introduced to him in the first chapter (i. 43 sq.). Unlike Andrew and the name- less disciple, he does not make the first advances himself; but he is found andsummoned by the Saviour. Yet when found, he accepts the call without hesitation, and finds a new adherent in his turn. But the mode in which he announces his discovery to Nathanael is characteristic. He keeps back the name as long as possible, and the place to the last word in the sentence, for Nazareth would prejudice any cause. When Nathanael demurs, he does not argue; he simply bids him try, ‘Come and see.’ Philip appears again upon the scene in the sixth chapter on the occasion of the feeding of the five thousand. Again it is
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Jesus who opens the conversation: ‘Whence shall we buy bread, that these may eat (v. 5)?’ The business question is put to the business man. It is answered in a business spirit. He makes the necessary calculation. ‘Two hundred pennyworth of bread is not sufficient for them that every one of them may take a little.’ But he does not reply to the question. It is left for Andrew to suggest a remedy. We meet with him a third time in the twelfth chapter, when certain Greeks come to him with the request, ‘Sir, we would see Jesus.’ Here again he does not take the initiative. He will not act without consulta- tion. ‘Philip cometh and telleth Andrew, and again Andrew and Philip tell Jesus’’ It has been suggested that Philip was the steward, the purveyor of the little company, that he managed the commissariat; just as Judas was the treasurer, the purser. Such a position at all events would suit his business-like character. And it would account for strangers (xii. 21) applying to him first, as they may have been brought in contact with him in this capacity?. |
(d) Andrew. In two places Andrew is associated with Philip, and on both occasions he appears not merely in contact with, but in contrast to, his brother-Apostle. He is as eager and prompt as the other is slow and cautious. While Philip is calculating the amount of bread required to feed the multi- tude, Andrew has hit upon an expedient (vi. 8, 9). While Philip cannot act alone in bringing the Greek strangers to Christ, Andrew, as soon as he is consulted, goes with him to tell Jesus. Thus he is quick alike to act and to speak. It is this decision of character which made him the first to join the Saviour himself, and the first to bring another to the Saviour (i. 37, 40, 41). In short, he has much of his brother Peter’s eagerness, without that brother’s tendency to grievous falls. It is quite in accordance with this characteristic that
1 John xii. 20—22, (Clem. Alex. Strom. ili. 4. 25, p. 522). 2 An early tradition identified him This would be in keeping with Philip’s with the disciple who reqnested that hesitating faith. he might first go and bury his father
190 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
we read in the Muratorian Canon that Andrew was the Apostle to whom it was revealed that John should write his Gospel, and that the revelation took place on the first night of the three days’ fast’.
(ii) The progress of events.
We cannot rise from the perusal of the characters as they appear in the Fourth Gospel without the assurance that we have been introduced to real, living persons, described by some one who knew them well. Individuality is seen to be stamped on every face. Exactly in the same way, as we mark the progress of events gradually unfolded before us in the narrative, our conviction becomes more and more settled that the guide who conducts us has been an eyewitness of the incidents which he records. In order to get the full effect of the extreme naturalness of the description, we have only to read the his- torical portions successively, and to remark how vivid is the sequence of the narrative as it opens out from point to point. Or we may take a conversation like that held in the fourth chapter between our Lord and the woman of Samaria. We notice, first_of all, the development of the conviction in the woman’s mind. Starting with a contemptuous irony (v. 9), she passes by gradual stages into a growing respect mingled with curiosity (v. 11), then into wonder ripening into faith (v. 15). The conversation now takes another turn. There is a direct home-thrust at the vicious part of her character (v. 16). This she disingenuously parries. Convinced by this time of her questioner’s spiritual insight, she attempts to divert into a general theological channel the conversation which was taking so inconvenient a turn (v.19). Our Lord’s answer contains a tacit reproach (v. 24), but she still shows her unwillingness to appropriate the lesson (v. 25), and quietly ignores all particular
! Cohortantibus condiscipulis et epi- latum Andreae ex apostolis ut recog- scopis suis dixit [Iohannes] Conieiu- nescentibus cunctis Iohannes suo no- nate mihi hodie triduum, et quid mine cuncta describeret. Canon Mura- cuique fuerit revelatum alterutrum tor. p. 33 (ed. Tregelles). nobis enarremus. Eadem nocte reve-
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allusions (v. 25). Observe secondly, that the spiritual teaching
of our Lord, which is so prominent throughout, arises-naturally
out of the external incidents. The presence of the woman with the pitcher at the well (v. 7) leads to the subject of the living water; the arrival of the disciples with provisions (vv. 8, 27, 31)
to the reference to the spiritual food. In these two cases the point of connexion is distinctly stated; in others it is mentally supplied by the recollection of the eye-witness. Thus the mountain of Gerizim towering above them, and the expanse of corn-fields stretched out at their feet, are each in turn taken advantage of as opportunities for inculcating spiritual truths. And the whole is woven together with a naturalness which defies all separation of its component parts; for the teaching and the incident are the woof and the web of the fabric. in the incident is both considerable and varied. As we glance through the chapter, we notice that it demands a particular
Thirdly, the amount of local and special knowledge contained
acquaintance with the well of Jacob (v. 5), the relations of Jews and Samaritans (v. 9), the depth of the well (v. 11), its history (v. 12), the mountain and the worship on its summit (v. 20), the social position of women (v. 27), the corn-fields and the harvest-time (v. 35). And all this intimacy with places and customs is not an excrescence merely, but an integral and essential part of the narrative. You cannot remove it without the whole structure falling to the ground?
Or take the scene enacted in the Judgment Hall (xvi. 28 —xix. 16). Observe at the outset the unartificial, the unsyste- matic, character of the narrative. The incidents are not grouped according to subject, but related in sequence as they actually occurred. Hence the history of St Peter’s denials is interrupted by other matters. The third denial interposes between the mention of the transfer from Annas to Caiaphas, and the transfer from Caiaphas to Pilate. On the other hand St Luke (xxil. 54-62) adds force to the episode by placing all three denials together. With St John however dramatic propriety
1 [This whole incident has been already treated above, p. 33 sq. ]
192 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
is sacrificed to chronological accuracy. Notice, in the second place, the gaps in the narrative. Jesus is first examined before Annas, then He is transferred to Caiaphas; but nothing is recorded of what happened at this second examination. We may perhaps infer from the silence of the Evangelist that he was not an eye-witness of this part of the scene. Again, we cannot fail to be struck by the introduction of certain incidents which have no direct bearing on the history, but yet are not on this account excluded. A moment’s consideration will explain their presence in the narrative. The fire of coals kindled in the hall (xviii. 18), the goings in and goings out of Pilate (xviii. 29, 33, 38, xix. 4, 9, 13), notes of place and of time (xviii. 28, xix. 14)—such would be just the kind of circumstances which would impress themselves indelibly upon the memory of an eye-witness, and would inevitably rise up again before him as, years after, he recalled the memorable scene. Or consider the respective attitudes of the chief-priests and of the Roman governor. How natural the representation. On the one side, the Jews, with their fear of ceremonial pollution (xvii. 28), their appeals to the law (xviii. 30, xix. 7), their inability to punish (xviii. 31), their affected loyalty (xix. 12,15). On the other, Pilate—that masterpiece of portrait-painting to which attention has been drawn already. Surely, whether we examine the details, or regard the picture as a whole, we are constrained to admit that all this is something more than ‘ben trovato’: nay, we may say with confidence ‘e vero. And so we might pass in review other incidents; the calling of the disciples, the marriage at Cana, the man at the pool of Bethesda, the scene at Bethany and at the tomb of Lazarus, the washing of the disciples’ feet, the declaration of the betrayal—all these bear stamped upon their face the impress of trustworthy and con- temporaneous testimony. I will conclude this part of my argument by an appeal presented from a somewhat different quarter. The writer of the Fourth Gospel often distinguishes the facts which he records from his commentary upon those facts, made when an interval of time had thrown fresh light upon
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their spiritual import. Is it Christ’s prophetic language, ‘Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up’? We are told that ‘when He was risen from the dead, His disciples remembered that He had said this unto them; and they be- lieved the scripture, and the word which Jesus had said’ (ii. 22). Is it the mysterious utterance, ‘He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water’? The Evangelist’s comment, made subsequent to the Pentecostal gift, explains it of ‘the Spirit which they that believe on Him should receive ; for the Holy Ghost was not yet given, because that Jesus was not yet glorified’ (vu. 39). Is it Christ’s announcement of results to issue from His coming exaltation, ‘I, if I be lifted up, shall draw all men unto me’? It is explained as ‘signifying what death He should die’ (xu. 33). The prophecy of Caiaphas (xi. 51), the triumphal entry into Jerusalem (xu. 16), Christ’s appeal on behalf of His dis- ciples in the moment of the betrayal (xvii. 9)—all form texts for the conveyance of spiritual truths viewed from the stand- point of the Evangelist’s maturer experience. Some have maintained that the commentary is wrong. I do not assert this, nor do I allow it. But one thing at least is clear. If the fact or the saying had been invented for the sake of the com- ment, the fact or saying would in most instances have taken a different form and the correspondence would have been made more obvious. But the fact does not lead up to the comment, for the simple reason that the fact was already there, in absolute possession; and as, in the light of a fuller and clearer know- ledge, the Evangelist draws out its hidden meaning, he will not venture to subserve the purpose of the application by diverging one hair’s-breadth from the exact letter of the record’.
1 [For the third section of thisEssay, ZrBEpre, the reader is referred to the THE WRITER WAS JOHN THE SON oF first Essay in this volume, p. 39 sq.]
194 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
ADDITIONAL NOTES.
A. On the twenty-first Chapter.
The Gospel was originally intended to end with the twentieth chapter. The conclusion of the narrative is significant, ‘ Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed’ (xx. 29, Pakaptot ot py idovtes kal rutTevcavtes), and the writer’s own addition (vy. 30, 31) is evidently the original close to the whole. The twenty-first chapter therefore is an after-thought. This distinction is no refinement of modern theorists; it is as old as the time of Tertullian’. But did it emanate from the same author or not? Clearly yes. The style is essentially Johannine. There is the same historic ody, so characteristic of St John’s narrative, and of his alone (vv. 5, 6, 7 (bis), 9, 11, 15, 21, 23); the same comparative absence in the narrative part of 6 (which is wrongly inserted by the scribes in v. 12); the same tendency to place the verb first (vv. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 10, 11, 12, 13, 23, 25), especially with eye (v. 15 sq.); the same abruptness of diction, the result of the avoidance of connecting particles (vv. 3, 12, 13, 16, 17). Again such sentences as Urdyw advevew...€pxopneba Kal nueis ovv cot (v. 3), devre apioryoate...cv tis €t; (Vv. 12), axodovber por (v. 19), Kupre, outros d€ ti; (v. 21), ri mpos o€; ov pou axodovbe (v. 22) ete. are features which are familiar to us from previous chapters, and should be compared with e.g. the narrative of i. 35 sq. or xx. 1l sq. We find the same fondness for éxeivos (vv. 3, 7, 23), the same love of definiteness, e.g. ta deEta pépyn (Vv. 6), aro mnxav diaxociwy (vy. 8), éxatov Tevtykovta tpudv (v. 11), rovro ndy Tpitov (vy. 14), to which we have already drawn attention; the same vivid painting (e.g. vv. 7, 9 etc.), the same use of a parenthetic explanation (vv. 7, 8, with which compare vi. 23). Favourite Johannine expressions are found, as the doubled ayy (vy. 18), which is peculiar to this Gospel, todro drev onpaivoy roiw Pavatw x.7.d. (v. 19; ef. xii. 33, xviii. 32), Kai TO oWdpov 6 Lows (v. 13 ; ef. vi. 11 Opmolws Kal €k TOV ovapiwv, which last is a word only used by the Fourth Evangelist). We notice the
1 Ipsa quoque clausula evangelii He refers however in three places to propter quid consignat haec scripta, the twenty-first chapter (see Rénsch, nisi Ut credatis, inquit, lesum Chris- _ p. 290). tum filium Dei? Tert. adv. Prax. 25.
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 195
characteristic mode of designating places, ris OaXacons THs TiBeptados (v. 1; ef. vi. 1), and of describing disciples, ‘Thomas called Didymus’ (v. 2; cf. xi, 16), ‘Nathanael from Cana of Galilee’ (b., his abode specified as in the case of Philip xii, 21), ‘Simon, son of John’ (v. 15 sq. ; cf. i. 42), ‘the disciple whom Jesus loved’ (vv. 7, 20; cf. xili, 23, xix. 26, xx. 2)'. Again there is the suppression of the author’s own name, which would most certainly have been mentioned by a continuator of the narrative. Lastly, the delineation of the character of St Peter, and of his relation to St John, has all the refinement of our Evangelist. This is the case in the two scenes in which they appear in contact. The spiritual insight of St John (v. 7) is matched by the impetuosity (vv. 3, 7, 11) and the curiosity (v. 21) of St Peter’.
Thus, though an after-thought, this chapter was certainly written by the author of the Gospel. How soon after, it is impossible to, say ; but there is nothing in the style which requires us to postulate more than a few weeks or a few days. As all the manuscripts without exception contain the chapter, and there is no trace of its ever having been wanting from any copies, the probable conclusion is that it was added before the Gospel was actually published. After the Gospel was written and submitted to his friends, the Apostle may have heard that some misapprehension was abroad respecting himself, or that some disappointment had been expressed because no mention had been made of an incident which they had heard him relate, and which would naturally be interesting to his admirers. He may have then consented to add it as a postscript. Apart from the identity of style, it is hardly likely that the chapter was written after the Apostle’s death, for in that case an event which
1 The Evangelist is fond of marking and éferdoa (v. 12). Any writing or
his characters by some striking circum- stance which serves as a label. Ex- amples are the designation of Nico- demus (xix. 39, vii. 50 from iii. 2), and of Caiaphas (xviii. 14 from xi. 49). From a different spirit and with a different aim Carlyle exhibits the same tendency.
2 Against such indications of iden- tity of authorship, the objections com- monly alleged (e.g. by Liicke) are powerless, e.g. the use of new ex- pressions, as égavépwoev dé otrws (v. 1)
portion of a writing might be set aside on the same grounds. Thus, to take ch. xx. 30, ev ody is a daraé Neydpevov in St John, so is Bi8dov, so is évwmuor, Indeed the first and third phrases are rather characteristic of St Luke; but the endeavour to press such arguments would justly be scouted as fatal to all fair criticism. The chronological diffi- culty of roiro #6n tpirov (v. 14) re- mains unaffected by the question of authorship.
13—2
196 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
threw so much light upon our Lord’s mysterious utterance respect- ing the beloved disciple would scarcely have been passed over in silence.
The question of the integrity of the last two verses of the chapter is an issue which has to be treated separately. The twenty- fourth verse is a confirmation or attestation of the truth of the narrative on the part of his friends and disciples, and it bears out the traditional account, given in the Muratorian Canon, of the origin of the Fourth Gospel’. The last verse is evidently a scholium. ‘Tischendorf declares that in the Sinaitic manuscript (&) it is written in a different hand from the rest of the Gospel, by the Suopbwrns of the whole, and it is perhaps omitted in a valuable cursive (63)*, However, as it occurs in all the other copies, and
1 See above, p. 190.
2 (Dr Gwynn kindly supplies (Oct. 4, 1892) the following information re- specting this manuscript. ‘I think there is no room for doubt that Cod. 63 has lost a leaf (or more) at the end, and that it when complete contained John xxi. 25. At first sight, one might be led to form an opposite opinion. For the last page of the ms., as it now is, is the last of a complete quaternion, and in it the text ends cai oldapyev bre GAnOns eorw 7 pap | Tupla (the last ten letters being arranged in the middle of a new line). The final stop looks like a colon, but may be a period; and one might suppose that the scribe’s reason for placing rvpla airod thus, was because his text was at anend. But on looking through the s., one would find this supposition to be unfounded. It frequently happens that he ends a page with an incomplete line, longer or shorter, not ranging with the pre- vious lines, either at its beginning or its end. Comparing the place with the ends of the three preceding Gospels, one finds a small bit of negative evidence. Each of them has, after its last word, the marks :— These do not appear after rupla atrod. None
avrov*
of them has any subscription, or even teAoc subjoined.
So much for the text; but when we look at the surrounding scholia all doubt is removed. The ms. has in every page a body of continuous scholia, some half-dozen lines in the top margin, a pretty long column (in continuation) all down the outer mar- gin, and six or eight more lines at the foot. As the scholia proceed, the scribe denotes change of subject com- mented on, by a numeral letter (some- times), and always by beginning the new matter with a capital letter, in red. The last two lines of these scholia run as follows: éferatew ra vyeypaupéva* A*TrrepBodcxGs rodro pynaly* éx puplwy yap | Oavyarwv' Ta wdva mpos mlorhy (sic) kal dperhy. Here you will observe (1) that the scholium breaks off in the middle of a sentence, shewing that there ought to be another leaf: (2) that this broken scholium referred to verse 25, as is proved by the word UrepBorixGs, the pip Oatuara being the d\\a mrod\d of St John. These facts seem to settle the question’. Compare Scrivener, Collatio Cod. Si- nait. p. lix., C. R. Gregory’s prolego- mena to Tischendorf, N. 7. (ed. 8) p. 479.]
THE AUTHENTICITY AND GENUINENESS—3. 197
these come from very various sources, we may safely infer that, if an addition, it was written by St John himself, or by one of his immediate disciples.
B. On the conversational character of the Gospel.
The Fourth Gospel was addressed to an immediate circle of hearers. In this respect it differs from the other three, St Luke’s Gospel approaching most nearly to it in this respect. But Theophilus, if a real person, and not a nom de guerre, the type of a God-loving or God-beloved Christian, soon disappears out of sight. On the other hand, the Fourth Evangelist keeps his disciples before his mind. He has to correct misapprehensions, to answer questions, to guide and instruct a definite class of persons, and those persons his immediate circle of acquaintance. Hence he assumes a know- ledge of himself in the case of those for whom he writes. He does not give his own name, because his hearers already know his personal history.
For the most part however the reference to these disciples is indirect. They are before the Evangelist, but he does not address them in the second person. Instances of allusions to misapprehen- sions or to questionings rife in those about him are i. 41 ‘ He was the first to find’ etc, 1. 11 ‘Zhis was the beginning of his miracles,’ ill. 24 ‘John was not yet cast into prison,’ iv. 54 ‘This again was the second miracle which Jesus did,’ xviii. 13 ‘He (Annas) was father- in-law to Caiaphas, who was high-priest of that year,’ xix. 34 sq. ‘There came out water and blood.’ Great stress is laid upon this last point, doubtless in allusion to some symbolism which is not explained, because they would understand it. So xxi. 14 ‘This was now the third time that Jesus manifested Himself,’ xxi. 23 ‘The saying therefore went abroad among the brethren that that disciple should not die. Yet Jesus said not unto him, He shall not die’ ete. Thus we find the Evangelist clearing up matters which the current tradition had left doubtful, or on which the popular mind wished to be further informed. Through the main part of the narrative we see these parenthetical additions, these conversational comments. At length (xix. 35, xx. 31) there is a direct appeal to these disciples, for whom the whole has been written. ‘He knoweth that he saith true, that ye might believe.’ ‘These things are written that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through His name,’
198 THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST JOHN.
The Gospel however does not stand alone. Its connexion with the First Epistle is both intimate and important. Its authenticity and genuineness are still further confirmed by this consideration, which brings out in clearer colours the circumstances under which the Gospel was written, and sets more vividly before us the relation of the Evangelist to his band of hearers. The Muratorian Canon points to this connexion’. The close association of the two Johannine writings warrants the inference that the author of the Canon treated the First Epistle as an epilogue to the Gospel. And this in fact is its true character. The Epistle was intended to be circulated with the Gospel. This accounts for its abrupt commence- ment, which is to be explained as a reference to the Gospel which in one sense preceded it. This accounts likewise for the allusion to the water and the blood (1 John v. 6 sq.) as the witnesses to the reality of Christ’s human nature, the counterpart of the statement in the Gospel narrative (xix. 35).
The evidential value of all this cannot be over-estimated. It presents us with a combination of circumstances which a forger would not have had the ingenuity to invent; nor, if he had invented it, would he have commanded all the circumstances necessary to carry out to a successful issue so stupendous an under- taking.
[1867, 1868].
1 See above, p. 99.
VE
ST PAUL'S PREPARATION FOR THE MINISTRY.
LN:
ST PAUL'S PREPARATION FOR THE MINISTRY.
T Paul dates the commencement of his preparation for the
ministry as far back as the day of his birth. He describes himself as set apart for the Gospel of God, set apart from his mother’s womb (Rom. i. 1, Gal. i. 15). In his social position, in his intellectual training, in his religious creed—in all the influences which wrought upon his childhood and youth— there was a schooling which eminently adapted him to fill the part for which he was designed—to gather the Gentiles into the fold of Christ, to preach the universality of the new dispensation. This was especially his work—his Gospel.
And, when we come to piece together the notices preserved of his early life, we find that this training was in itself very remarkable, that it did in a way forecast his future destination, furnishing him with a large store of varied experiences, idle and unfruitful in Saul the Persecutor, but quickened suddenly into life in Paul the Apostle of Jesus Christ, the Preacher to the Gentiles, by the lightning flash which struck him on the way to Damascus.
We are accustomed to look to three countries especially as the great teachers of the modern world—Rome, Greece, Judea. Rome, the foremost of all nations in the science of government, has handed down to us the principles of law and order. Greece, setting before us her rich treasures of thought and imagina- tion, has been a schoolmistress in art and literature. Above all, from Palestine we have learnt our true relation to God, which gives higher significance to art and literature and an eternal
202 ST PAUL'S PREPARATION
value to the principles of law and order. If Rome supplied the bone and sinew to our colossal man, while Greece clothed him with flesh and gave him grace and beauty, it was Judea that breathed the breath of life into him. Now all these three influences were combined in the great Apostle of the Gentiles. He was a citizen of Rome. His native place, Tarsus, was the great university of Greece. He was brought up in the Jew’s religion in its most rigorous and most typical form.
We are accustomed to dwell solely on the Jewish education of St Paul when considering his preparation for the ministry, not only as the most important, but also as the most prominent in the notices preserved of his early history. But the other elements in his training must not be neglected. It is not probable that one whose maxim it was to ‘become all things to all men,’ whose nature was eminently sensitive and impressible, could have failed to be moved by these powerful influences, and the traces of their working are sufficiently distinct in his life and writings. On the other hand, exaggeration must be avoided. It would be a grave mistake to picture to ourselves the Apostle as an active politician, or an erudite philosopher and man of letters. The sphere of his thought was far different. His life was far otherwise spent. But he must have received from his political status as a Roman citizen and from his residence in the heart of a great Greek University impressions which enlarged his sympathies and his views, and thus, enabling him to enter more deeply into the thoughts and strivings of others, and to contem- plate the Gospel from different points of view, rendered him a fitter instrument in the hands of God for the special work for which he was destined.
1. Let us consider St Paul as a citizen of Rome. The extension of the franchise was the keystone of the Roman system’. By this means a connexion and sympathy was kept up in the remotest parts of the Empire. The blood of the political body thus circulated freely by veins and arteries through the great heart of the republic to its extreme
Cic. pro Balb, 13; Becker Handbuch der riimischen Alterthiimer 1. (1), p. 91.
FOR THE MINISTRY. 203
members, and any injury done to one limb was an injury done to the whole. The metaphor which I have employed is not my own: I am only expanding the image used by Cicero! to express these relations. To the Roman his citizenship was his passport in distant lands, his talisman in seasons of difficulty and danger. It shielded him alike from the caprice of muni- cipal law and the injustice of local magistrates. In Syria, in Asia, in Greece—wherever he went—he bore about with him this safeguard of his liberties. How valuable such a protection must have been to St Paul, how often he must have invoked its aid in a life spent in travel and in the midst of enemies, we can well imagine. He had never known what it was to be without this citizenship, for he had been born a citizen of Rome*®. It procured him an honourable discharge from the prison at Philippi®; it loosed his fetters in the tower of Antonia‘; it rescued him from the lawlessness of a zealot mob, and sped him on his way under escort to Czsarea’; it transferred him from the hearing of a provincial governor to the court of Czsar himself*, As he lived, so he died—a citizen of Rome. — It is recorded that, while his brother-Apostle St Peter suffered the punishment of a common malefactor on the cross, St Paul was allowed to die by the sword, as the last recognition of his civic rights conceded by the law, when everything besides had been forfeited’.
In this way St Paul’s position as a citizen must have been of essential service in the spread of the Gospel. But this is not exactly the point on which I wish to dwell. I am anxious rather to point out that, having been so constantly in requisi- tion, it must have impressed itself upon his mind with a corresponding force. And thus he must have been led to appreciate, as far as it was necessary for him to appreciate, the position which Rome occupied as a teacher of the world. I
1 Cie. Verr, v. 67; Becker, 1. (1), 5 Acts xxiii, 27.
p. 98. 6 Acts xxv. 12. 2 Acts xxii. 28. 7 Tertull. Scorpiace §15, de Praescr. 3 Acts xvi. 37 sq. Heret. 36, ete. See Wieseler Chron.
4 Acts xxii. 25 sq. p. 542.
204 ST PAUL’S PREPARATION
think there are very clear indications of this. It was no vulgar pride or idle self-assertion, but a true political instinct, which led St Paul to demand a practical apology from the magistrates at Philippi. It is clear from his language on this occasion, as on others, that he valued his position as a citizen of Rome. It was something to be connected with that gigantic Empire, whose presence he had felt everywhere, and which, in the restraints it placed on the lawless opposition of his adversaries, presented itself to him as a type and manifestation of that letting power which keeps Antichrist in check till the last day (2 Thess. i. 7).
Nay, so strong is the impression left in his mind, that he chooses the Roman franchise as the fittest image of the position of the believer in his heavenly kingdom. I have already referred to the language of Cicero in which he compares the connexion of the different parts of the Roman empire by this political tie to the circulation of the blood, language which reminds us of the Apostle’s own image of the Church as the body knit together by its joints and ligatures (Col. ii. 19). Another passage of the same writer suggests still more striking points of comparison. ‘I maintain it as a universal principle,’ says Cicero (pro Balbo c. 13), ‘that there is no nation any- where so hostile or disaffected to the Roman people, none so united by ties of faith and friendship, that we are debarred from admitting them to the right of citizens'’ What wonder then if the Apostle saw a peculiar fitness in this image? In the guarantee it offered to individual freedom, in its independence of circumstances of time and place, in its superiority over inferior obligations, in the sympathy which it established between all the members of the community, in the universality of its application, lying as it did within the reach of all, far or
near, friend or foe—in all these points it expressed, as no other earthly institution could do, the eternal relations of the king- dom of Christ. Hence the language of St Paul, ‘ Our citizen- ship is in heaven’ (Phil. iii. 20). ‘Only perform your duties as
1 Becker u. (1), p. 93, note (18).
FOR THE MINISTRY. 205
citizens in a manner worthy of the Gospel of Christ’ (Phil. i. 27). And in a third passage, where the image reappears, his language seems to be coloured by the legal distinction of cives and peregrint. ‘Ye are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens of the saints, od«ére éoré Eévou (the recognised Greek equivalent of peregrini’) cai maporkor, dXXNA GUpTONITAL tov ayiwv (Ephes. i. 19). They were once peregrini, they have been enrolled in the ciwtas coelitum.
All this shows the deep impression which the Roman institutions had made on St Paul. And this being so, we cannot be wrong in recognising here a special training for the Apostleship of the Gentiles, opening out this wider view of social life, and suggesting to him the true relation between the ordinances of men and the Gospel of Christ.
2. But secondly, he was a native of Tarsus, the capital of Cilicia, ‘no mean city,’ as he himself styles it?) We have it on the authority of Strabo*, a contemporary of St Paul, that Tarsus surpassed all other universities, such as Alexandria and Athens, in the study of philosophy and educational literature in general. ‘Its great pre-eminence, he adds, ‘consists in this that the men of learning here are all natives.’ Accordingly he and others‘ have made up a long catalogue of distinguished men who flourished at Tarsus in the late autumn of Greek learning: philosophers—of the Academy, of the Epicurean and Stoic schools—poets, grammarians, physicians. At Tarsus, one might say, you breathed the atmosphere of learning. How far St Paul may have availed himself of these opportunities of cultivating a knowledge of Greek literature, how much of his boyhood and youth was spent here and how much at Jeru- salem, we cannot say. His Jewish teacher Gamaliel, who was distinguished for his liberality in this respect, would at least have encouraged him not to neglect this culture. It has been the tendency of recent writers to underrate St Paul’s attain-
1 Plaut. Rudens, Prol. v. 2. 3 Strabo xiv. p. 673. 2 Acts xxi. 39, ovK donuov méodews 4 Pauly Real-Encycl. der class. Al- TONTNS. terthiimer s.v. Tarsus.
206 ST PAUL'S PREPARATION
ments. The extravagant language of older writers has produced a natural reaction. A treatise was even published ‘On the stupendous erudition of St Paul’. Such exaggerations would be ludicrous if they were not painful. The majesty of the Gospel is not glorified by such means. St Paul’s strength lay in a widely-different direction. It was ‘not with enticing words of wisdom or philosophy (ov« év mrevBots copias Xoryors), but in the demonstration of the Spirit and of power’ (1 Cor. ii. 4), that he won his way. There is no ground for saying that St Paul was a very erudite or highly-cultivated man. An obvious maxim of practical life from Menander (1 Cor. xv. 33), a religious sentiment of Cleanthes repeated by Aratus, himself a native of Tarsus (Acts xvi. 28), a pungent satire of Epimenides (Tit. i. 12), with possibly a passage here and there which dimly reflects some classical writer, these are very slender grounds on which to build the supposition of vast learning. His style certainly does not conform to classical models: his logic savours little of the dialectics of the schools. But on the other hand he did get directly or indirectly from contact with Greek thought and learning lessons far wider and far more useful for his work than a perfect style or a familiar acquaintance with the classical writers of antiquity. Whoever will study carefully the picture of the gradual degra- dation of the heathen world in the opening chapters to the Romans, or, still better, the address to the philosophical Athenians from the Areopagus, will see how thoroughly St Paul entered into the moral and religious position of the heathen world, and with what deep insight he traced its relations, whether of contact or of contrast, with the great message of which he was the bearer. These are only samples’. If we recognise in such passages the voice of inspiration, in union with that instinctive quickness of moral apprehension which a tender love always inspires, we have still to look to external influences to supply the material on which inspiration
1 Schramm De Stupenda Eruditione 2 See Jowett The Epistles of St Paul Pauli (1710). I. p. 352 sq. (1859).
——
FOR THE MINISTRY. 207
might work. And foremost among these must be reckoned the lessons derived from his residence in early life in the centre of a great school—the greatest of its day—of Greek thought and learning.
We are disposed indeed to think lightly of the literary efforts of the Greeks at this late date: but though Greek literature had now lost the freshness and beauty of the spring and early summer of its existence, it had in the decline of its autumn still a glory of its own. We must not forget that the later schools of Greek philosophy exhibited a much greater earnestness of moral purpose, whether for good or evil, and achieved in consequence a much wider influence than the earlier. And if later Greek literature was rather critical and reproductive than original and imaginative, as the earlier had been, this only rendered it a fitter handmaid for the diffusion of the Gospel. It was required that the great Apostle of the Gentiles should be able to understand the bearings of the moral and religious life of Greece as expressed in her literature, and this lesson he could learn more impartially and more fully at Tarsus in the days of her decline, than at Athens in the freshness of her glory. Greece in her old age was now summing up, aS 1t were, the experiences of her past life.
3. Ihave dwelt hitherto on the Gentile side of St Paul’s training. The most important feature in his education has — still to be considered. He was a Jew in the strictest sense of the term. Let us take his account of himself. epitou7 oKTanpepos, ex yévous Icpanr, dvdns Beviapeiv, “EBpaios && ‘EBpatov (Phil. ii. 5). ‘I was not admitted to the privileges of the covenant late in life, as a proselyte. I was circumcised on the earliest day sanctioned by the law. I was not even the son of proselyte parents, but of the race of Israel—Israel the chosen of God. I was not descended from the rebellious Ephraim, who had played fast and loose with the covenant, as many Jews are, but from the select tribe of Benjamin, always faithful to Jehovah. I had no admixture of alien blood in my veins, for my ancestors from first to last were Hebrews. Thus
208 ST PAUL’S PREPARATION
in respect of these four points, (1) the covenant, (2) race, (3) tribe, (4) lineage, he was identified most closely and narrowly with the chosen people of God. He includes himself in the inmost circle of Judaism.
And not only this, but in sect, education and conduct nothing was wanting to identify him fully with Jewish feeling and Jewish life in its most rigid and trenchant form’. He was a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee. He had been instructed at Jerusalem in the strictest principles of the law by Gamaliel, one of the seven great doctors, ‘the Beauty of the Law,’ whom all the Jews revered. He had carried out these principles with the utmost zeal and devotion. He was surpassed by none.
And the lessons which he learnt in this way, and which he could not have learnt so well in any other way, were two- fold.
First of all, there was the negative lesson of what the law could not effect. He had borne in his own person the burden. He had felt its galling pressure, striving earnestly, with all the intensity of his nature, to meet its exactions. In propor- tion as he increased his efforts, he had to confess his weakness and inability. Who can read his pathetic description in the Epistle to the Romans of the helplessness and despair of one struggling under the weight of this load, without feeling that the Apostle is drawing from his own personal experiences, that these are the words not of a vague theorizer, but of a painful sufferer. And here too it is important to observe the influence of the sect to which he belonged. Of the three great parties who shared the empire of Jewish thought—the Essenes, the Sadducees, the Pharisees—the last alone could teach him the lesson in its completeness. On the Sadducee the law sat loosely ; he could not entirely divest himself of it, for it was the national badge, but he would wear it as lightly as he could. The Essene indeed was a most strict observer of ordinances, but the law was to him the starting-point of his mystical reveries, the
1 The chief passages relating to St 13, 14; Phil. iii. 5, 6; Acts xxii, 3, Paul’s Jewish experiences are Gal. i, xxiii. 6, xxvi. 4, 5; 2 Cor, xi, 22.
FOR THE MINISTRY. 209
foundation of an ascetic practice by which he hoped to extricate the soul from the defilement of matter. Thus the Essenes could abandon the law where it seemed to interfere with their aspiration after purity, e.g. in sacrifice. To the Pharisee, on the other hand, the law presented itself in a different light. He regarded it as an end, as an absolute rule of conduct. He respected it in and for itself. ‘Fulfil the law and you shall live,’ was his motto. His vision did not extend beyond the law— the law as laid down by Moses, and as enlarged and interpreted by tradition. It was to him a compact strictly binding on the contracting parties in its minutest details. And thus it became to him, what it could scarcely have been to the Essene, the means of righteousness (dveatocvvn é« vouov). This is just the point which St Paul seizes upon as the important feature of the law regarded as an instrument of training. It is in contrast to, and in consequence of, it that he develops the doctrine of grace, essentially the cardinal point in the Gospel of the Apostle of the Gentiles.
But secondly, the positive influence which St Paul’s Jewish education exercised upon him was equally great and important. Notwithstanding the opposition he met from his countrymen, in spite of all the liberal and the awakened sympathies which he derived from his work, despite the necessity of contending daily and hourly for the freedom of the Gospel among the Gentiles, he never ceased to be a Jew. From his repeated denunciations against the Judaizers we are apt to forget this feature in the Apostle’s character until we are startled to find by some passing allusion how deep-seated is this feeling in his heart. The Apostle’s whole nature was made up of contrasts, and this was one. ‘The strength of sin is the law, and ‘the law is holy and righteous and good, these two maxims? he could hold together and repeat in one breath. The most ardent patriot could not enlarge with greater pride on the glories of the chosen race than he does in the Epistle to the Romans. His care for the poor in Judea is a touching proof
1 1 Cor. xv. 56; Rom. vii. 12.
egos 14
210 ST PAUL'S PREPARATION
of the strength of this national feeling. His attendance at the great annual festivals in Jerusalem is still more significant. ‘I must spend the coming feast at Jerusalem!’ (Ae? we ravtws THv éoptny Thy épxowévnv trovjoat eis “lepooodvpa). This language becomes the more striking when we remember that he was then intending to open out a new field of missionary labour in the far West, and was bidding perhaps his last farewell to the Holy City, the joy of the whole earth.
And here again it is important to remark on his connexion with the Pharisees. Whatever may have been their faults, they, and they alone, entered into the religious feeling of the nation. Hence their influence with the people. They were the true historical link with the past, they represented the growing consciousness of the chosen people, in the two all-essential points in which it prepared the way for the Gospel—in their belief in the immortality of the soul and in the cherished expectation of the Messiah. In more senses than one they sat in Moses’ seat. The pure negativism of the Sadducee lent no aid here. Even if he did entertain some faint Messianic hopes, which is more than questionable, he deprived them of all religious value by denying a future state. And so again with the Essenes. Whatever importance we may attach to the reveries of the mystic Essene recluse, as testifying to the reality of a spiritual world, when all around was frozen and stiffened into formalism, still in his isolation from the national life of the Jews he lost that true historical instinct which was the life-blood of the people, and with it the vivid anticipations of the coming of Messiah.
It is not the spirit of the Sadducee, or of the Essene, but of the Pharisee, the son of Pharisees, which breathes in these glorious words, ‘ And now for the hope of the promise made by God to our fathers I stand at the bar as a criminal, unto which promise our twelve tribes, instantly ministering day and night,
1 Acts xviii. 21, cf. xx. 16. If St not affect the fact of his visit to Jeru- Paul’s words quoted above are to be _ salem at this crisis (Acts xviii. 22), rejected as an interpolation, this does
FOR THE MINISTRY. 201
hope to attain: for this hope I am accused, king Agrippa, by Jews’ (Acts xxvi. 6,7). And whatever shadow of worldly policy may for a moment be supposed to have overclouded the Apostle’s conscience, as by his timely appeal he divided the two rival sects on the question of the resurrection of the dead’, still the appeal in itself was perfectly justifiable, because perfectly true. His cause was the cause of the Pharisees, while between them and the Sadducees a great gulf was fixed.
I have thus traced the three threads which were in- woven into the texture of the Apostle’s mind, to strengthen its fabric and so to prepare him for his great work. It may be said indeed that when he is first brought before our notice, he bears no traces of any other than Jewish influences. He is a bigoted zealot, a narrow-minded persecutor. There is even a strong contrast between the cautious liberality of Gamaliel the master, and the persecuting rage of Saul the pupil. But is it not a matter of common experience, that the lessons of youth often lie for a time dormant and unnoticed, till they are suddenly kindled into flame by some electric stroke from without? The miraculous appearance on the way to Damascus produced in St Paul a change far greater indeed but analogous to that which the more striking incidents of life have produced on many another. It flashed a new light on vast stores of experience laid up unconsciously in the past. It quickened into energy influences long forgotten and seemingly dead. The atoms of his nature assumed a fresh combination. The lightning fused the Apostle’s character and moulded it in a new shape, and the knife of the torturer was forged into the sword of the Spirit.
1 Acts xxiii. 6.
[1863.]
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THE CHRONOLOGY OF ST PAUL'S LIFE AND EPISTLES.
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THE CHRONOLOGY OF ST PAUL'S LIFE AND EPISTLES.
N the subject of the chronology of St Paul’s life originality is out of the question. Unless new documents are dis- covered to throw fresh light upon the period, little or nothing can be added to our present stock of knowledge. Recent writers have treated the matter with a fulness which may be considered exhaustive, and it only remains for those who are later in the field to repeat and to sift the results at which their predecessors have already arrived.
It may be as well to premise at the outset that as regards the exact dates in St Paul’s life absolute certainty is unattain- able. An approximation to the truth is the most that we can expect, but this approximation is all that is necessary for my main object, which is to place his Epistles in connexion with his life. This impossibility of arriving at definite chronological results arises from the fact that there are very few points of contact between the Acts of the Apostles and contemporary history, and such points of contact as exist are of a vague kind chronologically. Indeed there are only two events in secular history which help us primarily im our search, though there are other allusions of a more uncertain character which can be appealed to as secondary and corroborative evidence. The two events to which I refer are, (1) the death of Herod Agrippa, (2) the procuratorship of Felix. We will proceed to investigate them in turn,
1. The death of Herod Agrippa, which is recorded in Acts xii. 23, is known to have fallen in 44 4.D. For Josephus
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says that at the time of his death he had already completed the third year of his reign over the whole of Judea (Ant. xix. 8. 2). Now this dignity was conferred upon him by Claudius soon after the commencement of that Emperor’s reign, which took place on January 24th, a.p. 41. He died after the Passover, for it was during that festival that St Peter was imprisoned by him, and soon after Herod left Jerusalem for the last time. Now Herod’s persecution of the Church and his subsequent death are related by St Luke in connexion with St Paul’s second visit to Jerusalem. The account is inserted between the notices of St Paul’s journey thither and his return to Antioch. It must not be assumed however that they exactly synchronized with that visit. St Luke’s language is indefinite, ‘about that time,’and as his object in digressing is to describe the state of the Church at Jerusalem when St Paul arrived, the incidents which are then interpolated in the narrative may be supposed to have happened previously to that visit. In this case St Paul’s second visit to Jerusalem may be placed at the end of 44, or in 45.
St Paul’s object in visiting Jerusalem on this occasion was to carry relief to the Jews suffering from a dearth which extended ‘over the whole land,’ or, as others would translate, ‘ the whole world’ (颒 6Anv THY oixovpévny), and happened in the reign of Claudius. Unfortunately contemporaneous history does not furnish us with the exact date of this dearth: but so far as we can draw any conclusion, it is quite in accordance with the result already obtained. We read of several famines occurring at different times in different parts of the Roman Empire during this reign, but of no general dearth. Among these, one (and one only) is recorded as having happened in Judea. Whatever interpretation therefore is to be put upon the words ef 6Anv THY oixovpévyy, this must be the occasion in question, as history supplies no other.
Now Josephus states? that this famine in Judzea fell in the procuratorships of Cuspius Fadus and Tiberius Alexander. Cuspius Fadus was appointed soon after the death of Herod
1 Acts xi, 28. 2 Jos. Ant. xx. 5. 2.
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Agrippa, Le. probably in 44, and Tiberius Alexander ceased to be procurator about 48. During this period then (44-48) the famine must have raged. Cuspius Fadus was still procurator at the end of June 45, but the close of his office is uncertain. If we suppose him to have been succeeded by Alexander in 46, the famine may have broken out in 45, and spread over the following year at least.
This date is further confirmed by another incident recorded by Josephus'. Helena, Queen of Adiabene, having recently embraced the Jewish religion, paid a visit to Jerusalem and, finding the famine raging, purchased food for the sufferers. This incident is inserted among events of 45, and the historian immediately adds that about this time (cata todtov tov Katpov) Fadus appeared in his province. It seems highly probable then that the famine broke out in 45, and as the Christians of Antioch had been prepared beforehand by the prophecy of Agabus, and were ready with the means of relief, it may be presumed that Paul and Barnabas would be sent to Jerusalem as soon as the pressure began to be felt, i.e. in the year 45.
2. The date of the recall of Felix and the succession of Festus to the procuratorship is not directly known, but may be ascertained with a tolerable degree of accuracy.
Pentecost had already passed when St Paul was imprisoned at Jerusalem?, and he remained in captivity two years before Festus reached his province. Festus therefore did not arrive before Pentecost. Again, at the great fast of the same year, which fell in October, St Paul was as far as Crete on his way to Rome. Festus therefore must have entered upon his pro- curatorship between Pentecost and October, i.e. some time in the summer or autumn of the year. We have now to deter- mine this year.
The following considerations show that it could not well have been earlier than A.D. 60 :—
(a) St Paul pleading before Felix (Acts xxiv. 10) says: ‘I know that thou hast been of many years (€« 7roAN@y é€TOYV) a
1 Jos. Ant. xx. 2, 6, xx. 5. 2. 2 Acts xx. 16, xxi. 27.
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judge unto this nation.’ Now Felix entered upon his procura- torship at the close of 52, and, if we allow between five and six years for the period designated wodAa érn, this will give 58 as the date of St Paul’s imprisonment, and 60 as that of Felix’ recall. We can scarcely allow less, and on the other hand, con- sidering the rapid succession of the procurators at this time, a period of five or six years might fairly be considered a long term of office.
(b) Nero came to the Imperial throne in October 54. Now Josephus! mentions several incidents which happened during the procuratorship of Felix subsequent to Nero’s accession, and these together must have occupied a considerable time. These events include the death of Azizus, king of Emesa, the succession of Aristobulus to the kingdom of Chalcis, and the readjustment of the dominions of the younger Agrippa. They cover the period of the ‘great quarrel’ between the Jewish and Syrian inhabitants of Czsarea, which was closed by the armed intervention of the Roman procurator. Describing the jealousy which arose at this time between Felix and the high priest Jonathan, and which led to the assassination of Jonathan in the streets of Jerusalem by the governor’s order, Josephus speaks of the reign of terror which, as the result of this dark deed, prevailed at festival times from the bands of assassins, who infested the capital, murdering their private enemies with impunity, even inside the sacred precincts. He devotes two long chapters to an account of the various robbers and impostors who flourished during this period of Felix’s procuratorship, beginning with Eleazar, son of Dinzeus, who was treacherously slain by Felix, and culminating in the formidable insurrection of the Egyptian.
(c) This last-mentioned incident, the rebellion headed by the Egyptian, is alluded to by Claudius Lysias (Acts xxi. 38), on the occasion of St Paul’s imprisonment, as having happened some time before (zrpd tovTwy Tav repo). We may fairly allow five or six years for the events which happened previously (as enumerated in the last paragraph), for the duration of this
1 Jos, Ant. xx. 8. 1—8, B. J. ii. 138.
ST PAUL'S LIFE AND EPISTLES. 219
rebellion itself, and for the period which elapsed; and this again will bring the date of St Paul’s imprisonment to A.D. 58.
If this consideration leads to the year 60 as the earliest probable date of the recall of Felix, there are other circumstances which show that it cannot well have been later.
(1) Felix was the brother of Pallas, the notorious favourite of the Emperor Claudius, and after he had been removed from the procuratorship to make room for Festus, was only saved from the clamours of the Jews by the intercession of his brother. As Pallas was poisoned A.D. 62 (Tac. Ann. xiv. 65), Felix must have been recalled before this. It might have been supposed that this incident occurred before the removal of Pallas from power, A.D. 55, related by Tacitus (Amn. xiii. 14), but the considerations already adduced preclude this supposition.
(2) Again St Paul, after his arrival in Rome, preaches two whole years unmolested (Acts xxvii. 30, 31). The great fire at Rome broke out in July 64, and the persecution of the Christians commenced immediately after. Thus the Apostle cannot have arrived in Rome later than 62, and Felix must have been re- called in the summer of 61 at the latest.
(3) But there are other considerations which lead to the previous year 60 as the probable date of St Paul’s arrival at Rome, for in Acts xxvii. 16 his fellow-prisoners are given up to the prefect of the preetorium (76 otpatotredapyn). Now Burrus held the office of prefect alone, but after his death it was shared by two, as had been the case also before his appoint- ment. As the plural is generally used in similar cases, the singular here would seem to imply that there was but one prefect at this time, i.e. that Burrus was still hving. But Burrus died early in the year 62 (in February at the latest)1, and St Paul can scarcely have arrived in Rome before the end of March. The great fast, which fell on the 10th of Tishri (corresponding roughly to October), had already passed when the ship left Lasea in Crete. The voyage thence to Malta occupied four- teen days, and there they stayed three months, leaving for
1 Tac. Ann. xiv, 52.
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Puteoli by an Alexandrian vessel, that had wintered at Malta (Acts xxvill. 11). The season at which the seas became navig- able is stated by Vegetius’ to be the sixth before the Ides of March. For long voyages Pliny’ places it at the vernal equinox. Taking the earlier date we have to allow three days for the stay at Syracuse, one for the delay at Rhegium, two for the voyage thence to Puteoli, and seven for the stay at Puteoli (Acts xxvii. 12—14). Besides this we have to account for the voyages from Malta to Syracuse and from Syracuse to Rhegium, with the journey from Puteoli to Rome, St Luke not having stated the time occupied by these. If therefore Burrus was still living when St Paul reached the metropolis, he must have arrived in the preceding year 61, and Felix must have been recalled in the summer of 60.
(4) This date is further borne out by another considera- tion. Felix was succeeded by Festus, Festus by Albinus. Now Albinus was already procurator at the Feast of Tabernacles A.D. 62. For the Jewish war broke out in 66, and Albinus was at Jerusalem at the season of this festival four years before. How long he had held office at that time we are ignorant. At most however this would allow only a year and a quarter for the procuratorship of Festus, supposing him to have entered on his office in the summer of 61. But the number of incidents which Josephus records as having taken place during his pro- curatorship can scarcely be crowded into this short space of time; and we are thus led to the year 60 as the more probable date of his appointment.
We have thus ascertained two fixed dates in the chronology of St Paul’s life—a.p. 45 for his second journey to Jerusalem and A.D. 60 for his voyage to Rome. The former of these being an isolated event in St Luke’s narrative is of little value com- paratively for our purpose; but from the latter the whole of the known chronology of St Paul’s life is determined, by means of the notices in the Acts of the sequence of events and the
1 Vegetius de re militari iv. 39. 2 Pliny N. H. ii. 47.
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time occupied by them, together with occasional allusions in the Epistles.
These notices in St Luke’s narrative are much more exact in the latter part of the history, commencing with the third missionary journey, than in the former: and it will be seen from the following table how the dates of the Apostle’s life are ascertained by a backward reckoning from the date of the procuratorship of Festus.
A.D.
34. St Paul’s conversion.
Cf. Gal. i. 15 sq. Three years after his conversion he went up to Jerusalem, for (1) the point of time is obviously his conversion, for the argument depends on that, and (2) pera rpia ern must mean three whole years, or substantially so, for the preposition pera, to say nothing of the argument, excludes the supposition of a Judaical reckoning, by which a term of a little more than a year might be so designated 1.
He visits Arabia, and returns to Damascus (Gal. i. 17, Acts ix. 20-25, 2 Cor, xi. 32, 33).
37. First visit to Jerusalem (Acts ix. 26, Gal. i. 18).
Cf. Gal. ii. 1. Between the first and third visit to Jerusalem a period of 14 years elapsed, for (1) the visit recorded in this passage of the Galatians must be identified with the third of the Acts, (2) da dexatecoapwy érav must be reckoned from the first visit, not from the date of the Apostle’s conversion, because St Paul’s object is to show how long a period elapsed without his holding communication with the Apostles of the Circumcision, (3) maw avéBnv refers back to the previous visit. ;
37-44. To Caesarea and Tarsus, visit to Syria (Acts ix. 30, Gal. i. 21).
44. St Paul brought by Barnabas to Antioch. He stays there a year (Acts xi. 26).
45. Second visit to Jerusalem with alms (Acts xi. 29, 30). 46,47. At Antioch.
48. First Missionary JouRNEY (Acts xiii. 1—-xiv. 26) with Barnabas. He visits Cyprus, Antioch in Pisidia, Iconium, Lystra, Derbe, and returns to Antioch.
1 [In his commentary on the Gala- version in A.p. 36, and the first visit to tians, however, Dr Lightfoot adopts the Jerusalem in a.p. 38; see note on Gal. Jewish reckoning, and places the con- ii. 1, 2.]
222
A.D. 51.
52.
53.
54,
55.
56.
57.
58.
59. 60. 61,
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Third visit to Jerusalem with Barnabas (Gal. ii. 1 sq., Acts xv. 1 sq.). The Council of Jerusalem. Returns to Antioch. The interview with Peter (Gal. ii. 11 sq.).
Sreconp Missionary JOURNEY (Acts xv. 36-xviii. 22) with Silas. First visit to Galatia.
Crosses into Europe. First visit to Philippi, Thessalonica, and
Corinth. {1 Thessalonians. ]
At Corinth. [2 Thessalonians. ]
(Spring) Leaves Corinth for Ephesus.
(Summer) Fourth visit to Jerusalem at Pentecost (Acts xviii. 21, 22). Returns to Antioch.
(Autumn) Turrp Misstonary JOURNEY (Acts xvili. 23-xxi. 15). Second visit to Galatia (Acts xviii. 23, Gal. iv. 13-16).
To Ephesus again.
At Ephesus. Second visit to Corinth (2 Cor. xii. 14, xiii. 1, 2).
At Ephesus. Sends a letter (now lost) to the Corinthians (1 Cor. v. 9). Reply from the Corinthians (1 Cor. vii. 1).
(Spring) At Ephesus. Mission of Timotheus to Corinth (1 Cor. xvi.
10-12, Acts xix. 22). {i Corinthians. }
First Mission of Titus to Corinth (2 Cor. xii. 18). St Paul leaves Ephesus, overtaking Timotheus (?). Visits Troas and Macedonia. Second visit to Philippi and Thessalonica. (Autumn) Titus rejoins St Paul in Macedonia (2 Cor. vii. 6). {2 Corinthians. ] Second Mission of Titus to Corinth. (Winter) Third visit to Corinth (Acts xx. 2), [Galatians 1] (Spring) At Corinth. [ Romans. ] Third visit to Philippi ; meets the elders of Ephesus at Miletus. (Summer) Fourth visit to Jerusalem : arrested and sent to Caesarea.
At Ceesarea. (Autumn) Voyage to Rome, and shipwreck at Malta.
(Spring) Arrival at Rome.
1 The Epistle to the Galatians may of A.p, 58. have been written in the early spring
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A.D. 62. (Spring) At Rome. [ Philippians. ] (Autumn) [Colossians, Ephesians, Philemon.]
63. (Spring) Release of St Paul. St Luke’s narrative mentions ‘two whole years’ (Acts xxviii. 30) as the period of St Paul’s sojourn at Rome. The notice implies a change at the end of this period, hence we fix the release in the spring of 63.
63-66. First journey Eastward. (?) He revisits Macedonia. Fourth visit to Philippi (rayéws eAevoouat, Phil. ii. 24). (2?) Revisits Asia and Phrygia. Visit to Colossz (Philemon 22). Journey Westward. (2) Founds the Church of Crete. Visits Spain, Gaul (?) (2 Tim. iv. 10), and Dalmatia (?) (2 Tim. iv. 10). Second journey Eastward. Revisits Asia and Phrygia (2 Tim. i. 15 sq.). Visits Ephesus (1 Tim. i. 3); here probably he encounters Alexander the coppersmith (1 Tim. i. 20, 2 Tim. iv. 14). Leaves Timothy in charge of the Ephesian Church.
67. Revisits Macedonia (1 Tim. i. 3). Fifth visit to Philippi. (?) Revisits Achaia (Athens and Corinth).
[1 Timothy. ] Visits (perhaps revisits) Crete, and leaves Titus in charge of the Church there (Titus i. 5). Returns to Asia. [Titus. ] Visits Miletus (2 Tim. iv. 20), sails to Troas (2 Tim. iv. 13), is at Corinth (2 Tim. iv. 20) on his way to Nicopolis to winter (Tit. iti. 12). (Autumn) Arrested (probably at Corinth), and carried to Rome. Titus joins him there. [2 Timothy. ]
Timothy shares his imprisonment (Heb. xiii. 23).
68(?). (Spring) Martyrdom of St Paul (Jerome de wir, illustr. 5 ‘in the fourteenth year of Nero’),
June. Death of Nero.
The table of the events of St Paul’s life given above has been drawn up with the special object of presenting a record of the Apostle’s association with the Churches to which he wrote
1 Nero was in Greece from a.p. 66 to 2 EHusebius (Chronicon) places it ‘in
August a.p. 67 (Suet. Nero 19 sq.; Jos. _ the thirteenth year of Nero’ i.e. before B. J. ii. 20. 1). Oct. 67.
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letters, and of the periods of his epistolary activity. It remains for us now to consider in their mutual relations the letters which have come down to us.
The Epistles of St Paul may be divided into four chrono- logical groups, each group being separated from the next by an interval of about five years, each group again corresponding to a marked epoch in the Apostle’s life, and representing a distinct phase in his teaching. To make my meaning clear, I give the scheme in a tabulated form :—
PERIOD | EPIsTLEes Dates CHARACTERISTICS 1. Second Missionary | 1 and 2 A.D. 52,53 | Christ the Judge Journey Thessalonians or The Tribunal 2, Third Missionary 1 and 2 57,58 | Christ the Redeemer Journey Corinthians or Galatians The Cross Romans 3. First Roman *Philippians 62,63 | Christ the Word Captivity Ephesians or Colossians The Throne Philemon 4, After the Release, 1 Timothy 67,68 | Church Organisation including the Second Titus or Roman Captivity. | 2 Timothy The Congregation
These dates are in some cases approximate only. Thus there is a possibility that 1 Thessalonians was written in A.D. 51, and 2 Thessalonians in A.D. 52; a possibility also that the Epistles of the First Roman Captivity should be antedated a year throughout; but upon the whole the above is the result which falls in best with the chronology of St Paul’s life as given above ; and the phenomenon which this result presents throws much light upon the way in which we should approach the study of Holy Scripture as the vehicle of Divine revelation.
In every inspired writing there are two elements, the human and the Divine, or, as it is sometimes expressed, the letter and the spirit; and the different views held of the doctrine of inspiration depend upon the prominence given to one or the other of these elements, and the judgment formed of their
ST PAUL'S LIFE AND EPISTLES. 225
mutual relations. Hence it will be seen that no conceivable shade of opinion is excluded, and every attempt at classifying these views must be more or less fallacious. But it will be sufficiently exact for our present purpose roughly to assume a threefold division in the attitude taken by writers on this question—in the first of these the Divine element being too exclusively considered, in the second this undue prominence being assigned to the human agency, and in the third, and only adequate view of inspiration, each of these elements being recognised in its proper sphere and the two harmoniously combined. The first of these views is irrational, the second is rationalistic, the third alone is in accordance alike with the highest reason and the fullest faith.
The irrational view—that which loses sight of the human agency—is prior in time (I am speaking now of modern criti- cism) to the rationalistic. It refuses to recognise any peculiar- ities in the individual writer who is under the guidance of the Spirit; it is insensible to any varieties in style, any differ- ence in the method of treatment in different books of Holy Scripture. It reduces the whole Bible to one uniform colour. It is needless to say that such a view must fall at once before the assaults of criticism. If this were all, it might be borne patiently, but unhappily it has dragged down the tottering faith of not a few in its fall. It may also be said that it is derogatory to the majesty of God, that it has no support from analogy in His workings elsewhere, and no authority from Holy Scripture itself.
This theory of inspiration provokes a reaction. The rational- istic view is the natural consequence of its exaggerated form. In this the human element is put so prominently forward that the Divine is obscured. The Divine agencyis perhaps not actually denied, but it is so virtually. By indefinitely extending the action of inspiration, it is in fact rendered meaningless. It is allowed that Moses and David, that St Paul and St John, were inspired, but then the same privilege is claimed for Homer and 4Eschylus, for Pythagoras and Plato. Now I should be the last
L, E. 15
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to deny that whatever is good, whatever is beautiful, whatever is true in the heathen writers is derived from the primal source of all beauty, truth and goodness. I have been taught—and I fully believe it—that every good gift and every perfect gift cometh from above. But practically there is such a vast diffe- rence between the illumination of the apostle and prophet, and the illumination of the philosopher and poet, that to call both by the same term ‘inspiration,’ instead of tending to clear our conceptions, does in fact leave a very erroneous impression on our minds. Inspiration is thus emptied of its significance.
The true view is a mean between these extremes, or rather it 1s a combination of the two. It recognises the element of truth which each contains, adopting and uniting the elements, And it recognises them too in all their fulness. It does not assign less power to the Divine agency, nor does it ignore any of the characteristics of the human instrument. The truth is one, but it has many sides. One man is more fitted than another by natural endowments to appreciate it from some particular point of view. No man is capable of seeing it from every side, else he becomes more than a man. The Holy Spirit has chosen His instruments, as Christ chose His Apostles, for their natural gifts, whether intellectual or spiritual, and has inspired them for our instruction and guidance. But He has not destroyed their individuality. Each with his special mes- sage to deliver, they become fit instruments under Divine guid- ance to develop a particular aspect of the truth, and we may suppose, without presumption, that they had each their part assigned them, according to their natural capabilities and acquire- ments, in penning the volume of Holy Scripture, as we know that they had in rearing the fabric of the Church.
To sum up and to apply what has been said. Inspiration is not a mechanical power or a magical agency. It does not use men merely as its instruments. It is a moral and spiritual power. It does not transmute its agents: it moulds them, Hence, as a natural result arising from the varied circumstances and training of the inspired writers, it is not uniform. And, for
ST PAUL'S LIFE AND EPISTLES. 227
a right appreciation of the lessons of Holy Scripture, three stages in this absence of uniformity must be recognised. First, there is a growth from age to age. From the Law we advance to the prophets; from the prophets to the Gospels. Thus in- spiration is developed. Secondly, there is a diversity of inspira- tion in different persons in the same age. One sacred writer, St Paul, views the Gospel as the abrogation of the Law; another, St James, as its fulfilment. They are not contradictory, but complementary the one to the other, for the Gospel is at once the abrogation and the fulfilment of the Law. One Evangelist, St John, dwells chiefly on the Eternal Sonship of the Saviour; another, St Luke, on His human tenderness and His sympathy with our infirmities. They are both true, for He is very God and very Man. Thus they have different functions to perform ; their office is to set forth the Gospel message from different points of view, which are determined by their respective positions and characters. Thirdly, there is a diversity in the same writer in different stages in his career. When we apply this principle to St Paul, we discover on examination that he exhibits a historical development in his teaching. By the word ‘development’ is meant, not that St Paul added to his doctrines, but that he altered the lights in which he placed them, making one point more prominent at one time than at another. The whole doctrine is there from the first implicitly involved in the funda- mental conception of the person of Christ, but the particular aspects are brought into special prominence, as they are called out at different times by the exigencies of external circumstances.
These external circumstances are twofold; first, the varying requirements of the Church at large, secondly, the altered con- ditions of the Apostle’s own life. These are the two forces through which inspiration acts upon the development of St Paul’s teaching; and the progress in his case I have endeavoured to express in the watchwords which I have attached above to the four groups of Epistles—‘ The Tribunal,’ ‘The Cross,’ ‘The Throne, ‘The Congregation.’
For the sake of convenience we will set aside the chrono-
15—2
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logical order, and consider, at the outset, the first and the fourth group of his Epistles. The doctrine of the Epistles to the Thessalonians throughout is the Second Advent, ‘Christ the Judge.’ This is the one prominent idea which runs through this pair of letters from end to end. Similarly, the purpose of the Pastoral Epistles is ecclesiastical organization. In the light of the external circumstances of the Church at the two periods involved, the reasons for this striking difference between the two groups are hardly less obvious than the fact of its existence.
It is only natural that the doctrine of the Second Advent should occur early in the Pauline Epistles. And this for several reasons. The Resurrection was the central point in the teach- ing of the Twelve after the Day of Pentecost, and the Resur- rection naturally suggested its necessary correlative, the Second Coming of Christ. Again, the doctrine of the Second Advent involved the doctrine of rewards for faithful service in the infancy of the Church. When persecution was rife, the disciples would need the necessary incentive to steadfastness under trial which such a promise brought with it. Thirdly, the expectation of the Second Advent implied the call to repentance, and therefore found its natural place in the forefront of St Paul’s early teach- ing, just as the Baptist’s cry ‘Repent’ preceded our Lord’s ministry. Thus, in his discourse on the Areopagus, St Paul, after drawing attention to God’s presence in nature, goes on to point the moral of the special doctrine of revelation as repent- ance resulting upon Christ’s coming to judgment. Lastly, Messianic hopes had to be satisfied. Hitherto, externally every- thing had ended in disappointment. The King had suffered a malefactor’s death; and the Ascension, which followed upon the triumph of the Resurrection, was, to Jewish Christians, if not a negation, at least a deferring, of the promised kingdom of God. Thus the Second Advent became the answer to Messianic expectations.
And if the Second Advent furnished the natural theme for St Paul’s earliest Epistles, not less obvious is it why his latest
1 Acts xvii, 30, 31.
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utterances should have been devoted to the question of the organization of the Church. <A study of the history of the Church at this period shows a growing restlessness both in thought and action, synchronizing with the withdrawal of the teachers most competent to check these disorders. Schisms and heresies were starting into life within the fold, and meanwhile the apostolate was dying out. Therefore a double necessity was laid upon ‘Paul the aged’ to meet this danger by strengthen- ing and developing the Church’s system of government. If we look at the Pastoral Epistles, we find no new doctrine inculcated. The two notes which are struck again and again are (1) ‘ Hold fast the tradition’ (tv tapaOnKnv dvrAa€ov 1 Tim. vi. 20, 2 Tim. 1. 14), and (2) ‘ Preserve order in the Church.’ In short, this group of Epistles constitutes St Paul’s last will and testament, in which he gives his final instructions for the maintenance and continuity of the faith.
Thus the two letters to the Thessalonians and the Pastoral Epistles may be entitled the preface and the postscript re- spectively to the Pauline literature, its prologue and _ its epilogue. We have now cleared the ground, and may pass on to consider the second and third of the groups of Epistles, which contain the main substance of the Apostle’s doctrine. And here a somewhat fuller explanation will be necessary. The ancient Greek Fathers divided what we call by the general name of ‘Theology’ into two distinct provinces, o/xovouia and Georoyia. The first of these two terms points, as its deriva- tion implies, to a Divine dispensation. The Church is, in effect, the household (6 otkos) of God, and 7 otcovouia is the plan by which God rules His household. It is the means whereby God ransoms: from sin. It includes the dispensation of the gifts and graces of the Spirit which form part of the Divine ‘household-stuff’ On the other hand, as understood by the Fathers, 7) Qeoroy/a directed itself to the contemplation of Christ’s Eternal Being—His relation to the Father and the Holy Spirit before the worlds were made. It was in this technical sense of the word that Gregory of Nazianzus and St John
230 THE CHRONOLOGY OF
alike procured the title of 6 @eodoyos. Thus the spheres in which the two sciences move are different. The one centres round the Incarnation and embraces all that flows therefrom ; the other, taking for its theme the Divine attributes of Christ, pierces behind the Incarnation to the Eternal, Pre-existent Word. This twofold division in the province of Theology has its counter- part in the two groups of St Paul’s Epistles with which we are now concerned. The distinctive feature of the Epistles of the Third Missionary Journey is the stress laid upon oixovouia; on the other hand, the Epistles of the First Roman Captivity deal mainly with Oeoroyia. I have therefore given as its leading characteristic to the one group, ‘the Cross,’ to the other, ‘ the Throne.’
Justification, Atonement, Sacrifice—the vast majority of passages which bear upon these doctrines are to be found in the Epistles of the second group. And if we turn to the cireum- stances of the Church at the period at which they were written, the reason becomes obvious. This was the time of St Paul’s great conflict with Judaism on the one hand and Hellenism on the other. The Cross of Christ contains the complete answer to the error of both, to the formalism of the one and the anti- nomianism of the other. ‘Christ died for us’—here is the reply to the legalism of the Jew, setting forth that the true ground of Christian hope is faith, not works; ‘we must die with Christ ’—here is the reply to the license of the Greek, exhibiting as it does the true motive of life. In short, there is a work done for us, and a work done in us. The two must not be separated. Christ’s righteousness, so St Paul tells us, cannot become our righteousness, unless we become one with Christ, unless we live in Christ. It is this repose in Christ which makes sin impossible. This is St Paul’s doctrine. He never sacrifices the one proposition to the other. When he dwells on the truth ‘Christ died for us,’ he is ever mindful of its correlative ‘We must die with Christ, i.e. die to self and to sin. He never separates the religious belief from the moral change. Nay, he cannot conceive of the two as separated. For
ST PAUL'S LIFE AND EPISTLES. 231
faith in Christ is a moral as well as an intellectual state, and with St Paul its moral aspect is in fact the more prominent of the two. So that not ‘justification by faith’ so much as ‘dying and living with Christ’ ‘oneness with Christ’ may be regarded as the central point of his Gospel. This is the meaning of his constantly repeated phrase ‘in the Lord, ‘in Christ’ (év Kupio, év Xpiot@)’, and this fact it is which, when once realised, makes it impossible even to suspect an opposition between St Paul and St James in their fundamental views, though the verbal statement of them is at first sight different’. The two proposi- tions of the antithesis contain the answer to the two fundamental errors of the Jew and the Gentile. The Jewish error, which was dogmatic, rested upon a false ground of hope. The Hellenic error, which was practical, sprang from a false theory of life. The Jewish convert said, ‘We are saved by the works of the law.’ St Paul’s answer is, ‘No: Christ died for us. A work has been done for us by God; and we are saved by faith in Christ’ (meaning thereby, faith in Christ, with all that the idea conveys with it). The Gentile convert said, ‘We are no longer under the works of the law. We are free to do as we like; let us sin that grace may abound.’ ‘No, replies the Apostle, ‘we must die with Christ; Christ’s work must be done in us.’ Thus the danger of the one was bondage; the danger of the other license. These respective errors he meets separately in writing to the Galatians and to the Corimthians. The watchword of
1 Ey Kuptw Rom. xiv. 14, xvi. 2, 8, 11, 12, 13, 22; 1 Cor. iv. 17, vil. 22, 39, Thee UL P+, oats ill Sq Gish ooh ale PC Ororn
Hence Luther’s saying ‘Sin, and sin boldly,’ though Luther himself was anything but antinomian. Mr M.
ii. 12 ete.; év Xporqg Rom. iii. 24, vi. OBE Nantia Mee Bb rhe I aig ad Lie Rvleo wi LOS COMIn 2.4, 50) in) L, TylOWLay Ui xv. LS, LO ol 21 Cor, i. 17, v. 17, xii. 2, 19 ete.
2 Some modern teachers however, alleging his name, have forgotten the one proposition or the other. Taking justification by faith and by faith alone as their watchword, they have produced, as an extreme result, antinomianism.
Arnold justly protests against this perversion, this one-sided view, of St Paul’s doctrine, and all its dangerous consequences, dangerous to practice and dangerous to belief, for it has done more than almost anything else to repel the moral sense. On the other hand, Mr M. Arnold himself, it seems to me, has thrown the other proposition ‘Christ died for us’ a little too much into the background.
232 THE CHRONOLOGY OF
the one Epistle is ‘Liberty, not license’; of the other ‘Not license, but liberty, though in neither is the antithetical pro- position suppressed’. Finally in the Epistle to the Romans the composite character of the Church which he addressed compelled him to combine the two aspects, and to treat them in a full exposition.
And side by side with the special questions which were agitating the Church at large at this crisis of her history, must be set the particular circumstances of the Apostle’s life. This was its most tumultuous period, a time of constant travel, of bitter personal opposition, of ceaseless activities of every kind. All this combined to fit him at this time to be the exponent of this particular side of Gospel truth.
We turn to the third group of Epistles, and at once we notice a change of subject-matter. The metaphysical, mystical, contemplative aspects of the Gospel are brought out into special prominence. In place of the lessons of soteriology and re- demption which we meet with in the Epistles of the Third Missionary Journey, Christ is exhibited as the Eternal Word, as God manifest in the flesh*, and, as the corollary upon this teaching, is set forth the union of the individual and the Church with God through Christ*. Christ’s reign in heaven, His pre- existence, His omnipotence, form the Apostle’s theme rather than His life on earth, His humiliation, the example of His perfect character. The Church militant is for the time lost in the Church triumphant. As before, the secret of this change of thought is to be found in the altered conditions of the Apostle’s life and the Church’s needs. <A lengthened term of imprisonment, first at Czesarea, then at Rome, had succeeded
In God’s good
upon a period of bustling, strained activity.
1 Contrast generally Gal. ii. 15 sq (vv. 19, 20 supply the corrective), iii. 2, 10 sq, v. 3—6, 11 (vv. 13 8q, 16 sq corrective), vi. 14, with 1 Cor. v. 6, 7 (v. 7 Kal yap 7d macxa corrective), vi. 9 sq (v. 11 corrective), 15 sq (v. 20 corrective), vii. 19, 23, viii. 8, 9 (v. 11
corrective), ix. 19, 21, x. 14, 16, 23, 32, xi. 8, xii, 12, 27, 2 Cor. i. 5, iv. 10—13, v. 17—20 (v. 21 corrective).
2 Cf. Eph. i. 10, 20-28, iii. 15, iv. 15, vi; 9; Phil, i) -6 8q+ ‘Col) ie ioren, ii. 9 sq, iii. 1, 4, ete.
8 Cf. Phil. iii. 20; Eph; ii. 19, ete.
ST PAUL'S LIFE AND EPISTLES. 233
providence St Paul was enjoying a season of uninterrupted rest, which gave the opportunity for a contemplation of the highest mysteries of the faith. The most tranquil period of his life supervened upon the most tumultuous. The Epistle to the Ephesians is the expression of the one period, the Second Epistle to the Corinthians is the reflection of the other. But the consideration that the Apostle’s frame of mind at this time would naturally lead him to the study of metaphysical specu- lation must not blind us to the propriety of this study in relation to the altered conditions of the Church. The foe from which she had most to fear now was no longer Judaism or Hellenism, but Orientalism, that mystic, theosophic speculation with regard to angelic, intermediate beings between God and man which was afterwards known as Gnosticism and reached its climax in the fantastic systems of Basilides and Valentinus, That this was the case is evident when we consider the character of the heresy in the Colossian Church, against which St Paul argues in his Epistle to that Church. In order therefore to confront these false doctrines, it was necessary for the Apostle to show that there was only one link between God and man, Christ manifest in the flesh, and that there was no room for the successive emanations, in the creation of which his opponents delighted to indulge their elaborate fancy.
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THE CHURCHES OF MACEDONIA.
VI. THE CHURCHES OF MACEDONIA.
T PAUL’ first visit to Macedonia was the dawn of a new era in the development of the Christian Church. The incidents, which ushered it in, spoke significantly to himself and his fellow-labourers ; and, in St Luke’s record, they stand out in bold relief. The entrance into Macedonia and the visit to Rome are the two most important stages in the Apostle’s missionary life, as they are also the two most emphatic passages in the historian’s narrative—the one the opening campaign of the Gospel in the West, the other its crowning triumph. It is no surprise therefore that St Paul years after- wards should speak of his labours in Macedonia, as ‘the beginning of the Gospel?, though his missionary course was now half run. The faith of Christ had, as it were, made a fresh start. This portion of St Luke’s narrative? is emphasized not by any artifice of the writer, but by the progress of the incidents themselves which all converge to one point. St Paul having
1 Phil. iv. 15 év dpxy Tod eay- yenlou.
2 Acts xvi. 6-10 AceXOdvres 5é riv Ppvyiavy xal Tadarixyy xwWpav, KwQdv- bévres bd TOD aylov mvedparos Nadjoau Tov Noyov év TH’ Acta, EXObvTEs KaTa THY Muotay émelpafov eis thv BrOuvlav mopev- O7jvac Kal ovK elacev avrovds TO Trvetua "Inood: mapehOdvres 5é rhv Muciay xaré- Bnoav eis Tpwadak.7.. If the reading
dMOov...€AMdvTes Se... be correct, the complexion of the incident will be slightly, but not materially, altered. But, though the preponderance of authority is considerably in its favour, it is open to suspicion as an attempt to simplify the grammar of a sentence rendered awkward by the accumula- tion of participles.
238 THE CHURCHES OF MACEDONIA.
passed through the country of Phrygia and Galatia is driven forward under the divine guidance and in spite of his own impulses towards the shores of the Hellespont. Attempting to diverge on either side, he is checked and kept in the direct path. He first looks wistfully towards the country lying on his left, wishing to preach the Gospel in the populous district of Proconsular Asia. ‘The Holy Spirit forbids him’ to do so. He next turns his steps towards Bithynia situated on his right, doubtless with the same purpose. This attempt is as futile as the former. ‘The Spirit of Jesus’ will not permit it. Thus hemmed in on either side, he has no choice but to go forward, and so he arrives on the coast of the Augean. Here at length the meaning of those strange hindrances, which had thwarted his energetic purpose, becomes apparent. God’s providence has destined him for a nobler mission-field. While at Troas gazing on the sight of the opposite shores of Europe, he receives an intimation which decides him. He sees a vision in the night. A man of Macedonia stands before him and entreats him: ‘Come over and help us.’ He considers this as an indication of the will of God, and in obedience thereto he crosses the narrow sea which separates Asia from Europe.
In this way St Luke forces upon our notice the importance of this visit to Macedonia. When he comes to narrate the visit itself, he does so with a greater minuteness of detail than is usually found in his narrative. The incidents of St Paul’s preaching at Philippi especially, the first European town which hears the truths of the Gospel from the lips of the Apostle, are dwelt upon with singular fulness. Of these incidents the his- torian was himself an eyewitness. He had but lately joined St Paul’s company for the first time, and the scenes, in which he now moved, would naturally dwell in his memory with all the force of fresh and unwonted experiences. But beyond this personal reason we can scarcely doubt that the fulness of detail in this part of his narrative is due also to the conviction in his mind that this visit heralded a new and important era in the history of the Christian Church,
THE CHURCHES OF MACEDONIA. 239
It was not only that the Apostle had surmounted the sea- barrier which separates two tracts of country bearing different names, and conventionally regarded as distinct continents’. The real significance of his journey lay in this, that it brought him in contact with new interests, new associations and ideas, He now occupied the ground which from its geographical position was the natural high road between the East and the West, and was mixing with that people whose mission it had been to fuse the whole civilised world, to bring the arts and intelligence of Greece and the political capacities of Rome into alliance with
or at least into closer contact with them than hitherto.
the nobler spiritual instincts and sublimer theological conceptions of Asia—above all, with the one specially revealed religion of Palestine—and thus to pioneer the way for the Gospel. The great Macedonian conqueror had appreciated the task which its natural position imposed upon his country. He can have been no mere selfish tyrant or vain profligate, who when advised by the wisest philosopher of the day to treat the Greeks as free subjects, the Orientals as slaves, repudiated the narrow counsels of his teacher, declaring that he had been ‘sent by God to unite, pacify, and reconcile the whole world’’ This generous sentiment of Alexander was an anticipation, however feeble, of the work of that great Reconciler, who broke down the partition walls between castes and nations’, and may well recal the loftier utterance of St Paul, who proclaimed that there was now ‘neither Greek nor Jew, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free,’
but all were ‘one in Christ*’ And when again we read of the
1 It is interesting to observe that ‘Europe’ is never once mentioned in the New Testament, and that ‘Asia’ denotes not the continent, but the Roman province. The words of the man in St Paul’s vision are not ‘Come over into Europe,’ but ‘Come over into Macedonia,’ Acts xvi. 9.
2 Plut. de Alex. Fort. 1, § 6. Op. Mor. p. 329 B Ov yap, ws ’Apiororédns cuveBov\evey alT@, Tois pev “EAAnow
Hyewovikas, Tots dé BapBapos dSeorort- KWS XpwWmevov...d\AG Kowds HKew BedOev Gpuoorys Kat diaddakris Twv srw vouigwy x.7.A. The whole passage is worth reading.
° See Ephes. ii. 14, 15; and com- pare the expressions dmoxara\\ata Ta mavra Col. i. 20, and xaradd\ayi kéo- pov Rom. xi. 15.
4 Col. iii. 11, Gal. iii. 28,
240 THE CHURCHES OF MACEDONIA.
taunts levelled at the Macedonian king by narrower-minded Greeks, because he strove to conciliate the Oriental peoples whom he had vanquished, by conforming to their dress and habits as matters of indifference!, we seem to trace the shadow of that large-hearted policy of the Apostle of the Gentiles, who in a like spirit, but with a nobler aim, braved the fierce hatred of his countrymen, consenting to be reviled as a subverter of the laws and institutions of his fathers, and, himself a Jew, became as a Greek to the Greeks that he might win them to Christ’.
Alexander had not entertained this grand purpose in vain. Though he died young, he had accomplished a vast task, the importance of which to the future history of the world it is searcely possible to overrate. If he had not realised his project, he had prepared the way for its realisation in a far higher sense than he himself could have imagined. He had diffused the literature and life, the habits and institutions, of Europe through the East. He had made the language of Greece a common instrument of communication throughout the civilised world. Now, at length, the completion of his great design, though very different, no doubt, from that which he himself had contemplated, was drawing near. And as his country had borne the chief part in preparing the way for this universal pacification of the world, so now in turn she was herself to receive the earliest and most striking earnest of its fulfilment. The tide, which had once flowed eastward through Macedonia bearing with it the civilisation of the West, was now rolled back through the same channel, laden with a nobler treasure, by which Asia more than discharged her debt of obligation to Europe.
Each successive station at which he halted might have reminded the Apostle of the great services rendered by Mace- donia as the pioneer of the Gospel. The very names of the
1 See Plutarch 1, c. p. 329 C and = ws pev girdcodos rots ddiaddpas xpu- p- 330 A ‘Ex rod Maxedovixod cal pevos x.7.d. Ilepotxod rpdmov peurypévnv rid orodhy 2 1 Cor. ix. 19 sq, Gal. ii. 14 sq. épbper kabarep "Eparoabévns iordpnxev *
THE CHURCHES OF MACEDONIA. 24]
places bore testimony to the part she had played in history. The seaport whence he embarked on leaving the Asiatic shore was surnamed, after the great conqueror of the East, Alexandria Troas. In Philippi, the first European city which he visited, was perpetuated the memory of the monarch, who, by organizing the armies of Macedonia and establishing the supremacy of his country over Greece, prepared the way for the vast projects of Oriental conquest carried out by his greater son. The name of the next town in which he planted the standard of the cross spoke of a later stage in the progress of events. It recalled the partition of Alexander’s empire, having been founded by one of his successors Cassander, in honour of his wife Thessalonica, the half-sister of the conqueror himself. Whether St Paul, while visiting these scenes, recalled the past glories of Macedonia, whether he traced in this marvellous page of her history the hand of God moulding the selfish counsels of men to His own great purpose, it is vain to speculate; but we may at least be assured that he did in a measure forecast the future, and that he felt, when he entered Macedonia, that the Gospel was on the eve of some new and striking development. The divine voice, which had first driven him coastward and then beckoned him across the seas, was a significant token. The rapid and pro- sperous voyage to the European shores seemed the presage of a coming triumph?. The strange scenes, the new and varied types of character which he encountered there, the contact with purer forms of Western civilisation, the more direct influence of Greek and Roman institutions—all these fresh experiences crowding upon him spoke to him of more brilliant victories yet to be achieved, of wider and fairer provinces to be annexed to his Master’s kingdom. All the incidents of this epoch seem to assume vaster proportions, to be cast on a grander scale. A success unparalleled in his previous career
1 Acts xvi. 11, ed@vipoujoaperv. The sion (Acts xx. 6). See Conybeare and distance which on this occasion seems Howson Life and Epistles of St Paul to have been accomplished in two p. 219 (ed. 1870). days’ voyage, took five on a later occa-
L. E. 16
242 THE CHURCHES OF MACEDONIA.
both in extent and durability crowns his preaching in the first European city. A marvellous deliverance, a more signal interposition in his behalf than any elsewhere recorded, assures him of the protecting hand of God. The first visit to Macedonia stands out in the Apostle’s history as an eventful epoch in a career singularly crowded with incidents and fertile in results.
I propose to call attention to a few points bearing on the history and character of the Macedonian Churches collectively. They are so closely linked together in the circumstances of their foundation, and present so many features in common, that it is especially instructive to consider them together.
1. The three stations in Macedonia, which St Paul selected for his missionary labours, are Philippi, Thessalonica and Berea. A glance at any good map of this country will show at once the reasons which may have influenced this choice. The whole region of Macedonia Proper exclusive of the Chalcidice peninsula is divided by its natural barriers into three portions corresponding respectively to the water-courses of the Strymon, the Axius and the Haliacmon, Philippi stands on a tributary of the Strymon; Thessalonica, though planted on the banks of another less considerable river, occupies the most important position in the valley of the Axius; while Bercea, lying more inland, represents the third district watered by the Haliacmon near to which it is situated. In the first Roman partition of Macedonia—now long abandoned—these three towns had belonged to distinct provinces called respectively Prima, Secunda, and Tertia. Thus standing sufficiently wide apart from each other and commanding three separate districts, they recommended themselves to the Apostle by their geographical position, as good missionary centres.
2. But he was guided also by another consideration. It was necessary that there should be a sufficient Jewish population in those towns which were marked out as the mother Churches of their respective districts. Around the few believers of the
THE CHURCHES OF MACEDONIA. 243
house of Israel, as a nucleus, the Gentile majority of the Church All three places satisfied this condition. At Philippi indeed there was no synagogue, but every Sabbath-day the faithful Jews met together for prayer by the riverside’. Their numbers appear to have been scanty, yet there was a sufficient body of them to render it necessary for the Apostle to warn his converts against ‘the concision’, though in the ad- monition he may have been thinking more of Rome than of Philippi%. At Thessalonica, at all events, a synagogue existed‘, and the Jews play a prominent part in the narrative of the Acts’. This city appears to have been a favourite resort for Jews in the middle ages, and a recent writer, who gives the whole population as seventy thousand, sets down the Jewish element at fifty thousand souls®, At Bercea also was a synagogue’, and the conduct of the Jews there is highly commended by the
must gather.
historian of the Acts®.
1 Acts xvi. 13,16. The use of the word mpocevyy here does not necessarily imply a building.
2 Phil. iii. May.
3 [See Philippians, p. 52.]
4 Acts xvii. 1, érou ny cuvaywy) THY Tovdaiwy. Textual criticism requires the suppression of the article before the word cuvaywy7.
5 See esp. Acts xvil. 5 sq., 13 sq.
6 W. G. C. in Macmillan’s Maga- zine for Feb. 1863 (vu. p. 313). This is the highest estimate I have seen, and I suspect some mistake in the numbers. Other estimates are given by Conybeare and Howson, p. 250.
7 Acts xvii. 10 sq.
8 If we are tempted to ask why St Paul chose Philippi and Bercea rather than Amphipolis or Pella for the scene of his preaching, the true answer may be somewhat of this kind. Philippi was the first town which he reached. He would naturally be anxious to
2 Brérere Tv KaTaTo-
commence his missionary work at once. An opportunity offered, and he availed himself of it. Though there was no regular synagogue here, there was, as we have seen, a nucleus of Jews, and in this respect Amphipolis would offer no greater facilities, for there certainly was no synagogue there. Besides, even if Philippi was not the chief town of the district, it was a place of great importance, and would command the EKastern districts better than Amphipolis.
Bercea was probably chosen in pre- ference to Pella on account of the synagogue there. It is improbable that there should have been syna- gogues at both places. Besides this, Pella was on the decline; see Dion Chrysost. Or, xxxiii. (p. 460 ed. Emper. ), vov el Tis Gtépxorto IléANav, ode onmetov bWerar wodews ovdev diya Tov moddv képayov elva ouvTeTpimpevov ev TH Thr.
It seems a mistake to suppose that St Paul went to Bercea as an out-of- the-way town, a sort of hiding place,
16--2
244 THE CHURCHES OF MACEDONIA.
Alexander himself had shown great favour to the Jews, and his successors in the Macedonian dynasties abroad seem to have inherited his policy in this respect. The Syrian kings admitted them to equal privileges with the Macedonians and Greeks’. And the liberality of the Alexandrian princes? in this respect is witnessed by the LXX. translation of the Scriptures, by the building of the Temple at Leontopolis and by the large Jewish population at Alexandria. There were occasional exceptions indeed to this wise liberality, but on the whole it seems to have remained the traditional policy of the successors of Alexander. Both in Egypt and Syria the Romans left the Jews in posses- sion of the privileges which they enjoyed. We may well suppose, though we have no direct evidence, that the like spirit prevailed at home, and that the Jews were at least protected, if they were not encouraged, by the rulers of Macedonia. At all events, we may gather from the New Testament history that at the time of
the Christian era they had settled there in considerable numbers,
as Alford seems toimply. Cicero says of Piso, escaping from Thessalonica, where he was pestered with com- plaints, that he ‘took refuge’ in Berea, ‘in oppidum devium Beroeam profu- gisti’ (in Pison. c. 36). Piso’s course would naturally have been along the Eg- natian road, and therefore to him it was ‘devium.’ But Bercea was a most im- portant city (see Lucian Asin. § 34 épxé- pea els médw THs Maxedovlas Bépoav peyadnv kal ro\vdvOpwrov), and would have been very ill-chosen as a lurking place, since there was a Jewish syna- gogue there, which doubtless kept up constant communication with that of Thessalonica, as the result seems to show. It also lay near the road that he must ultimately take for Achaia.
It is not probable that St Paul on any subsequent occasion preached in other Macedonian towns. In Romans xv. 19 it is true he speaks of having preached ‘as far as Illyricum,’ but if his visit to Berea may not be con-
sidered to justify the expression, the Gospel may well have been spread southward through the labours of his companions Silas, Timotheus and Luke between his first and second visits to Macedonia. In the scanty fragments of his Apology which survive, Melito, addressing M. Antoninus, appeals to the fact that his father wrote letters to the people of Larissa, Thessalonica and Athens forbidding them to molest the Christians (6 6¢ marnp cov...rais modeot mept To pndev vewreplvew epi nuwv eypavev: év ols xal mpos Aapo- calous xal mpds Oecoadovixe’s cal ’AOn- vatous Kal mpos mdvras "EXAnvas Melito in Eus. H. EL. iv. 26, 10, see Routh R. S. 1.p.112). The establishment of Chris- tianity at Larissa is an interesting fact; see below, p. 267.
1 See the curious illustration which Josephus gives (Ant. xii. 3, 1).
2 See Winer’s article on the Jewish Dispersion in his Bibl. Realworter- buch, 1. p. 727 sq. (1847).
THE CHURCHES OF MACEDONIA. DAD
and that the synagogue organisation was established in full force. The historical connexion of Macedonia with Syria and Palestine was of some centuries standing, and the Syrian cities of Edessa and Berrheea, which had far outstripped their older namesakes, not to mention the Palestinian town of Pella, testify to the intimate relationship between the countries.
3. St Paul’s communications with the Macedonian Churches were very close and frequent. This was partly due to their position on the high road between Asia on the one hand and Greece and Rome on the other, partly to other causes. These communications are of various-kinds. Firstly, there are personal visits made by the Apostle. During his second missionary journey in the year 52 he founds the Macedonian Churches’. Five years or so later, on his third missionary journey he visits them twice, as he goes and again as he returns, Another interval of five years elapses, and again he seems to have paid them another visit, immediately after his return from captivity, in fulfilment of his declared intention*. Lastly, once, probably more than once, we find him there again at the very close of his life*. Secondly, we read of constant communications made with the Macedonians through his disciples. When he departs after his first visit, he leaves Silas and Timotheus behind’, and possibly after joining him at Athens they were despatched thither again®. But these are not the only companions dele- gated to watch over the infant Churches of Macedonia. It would appear that St Luke also remained at Philippi for a period of five or six years’. On his third missionary journey again the Apostle sends Timotheus and Erastus into Mace- donia’. During the imprisonment at Rome, this intercourse is of the most intimate character. The narrative of the Epistle to the Philippians implies four journeys between Philippi and
1 Acts xvi. 9-xvii. 15. 7 This is inferred from the fact that 2 ING sabes PAIL) peg ML Be the first person in the narrative is Sebi a2. dropped after Acts xvi. 17 and resumed ATi leo sche. imbenivanl on oO: at ch. xx. 5.
5 Acts xvii. 14, 15, xviii. 5. 8 Acts xix. 22.
6 1 Thess. iii. 1, 2, 6.
246 THE CHURCHES OF MACEDONIA.
the place of St Paul’s captivity, before the writing of the letter’, and mention is made of the Apostle’s intention of despatching Timotheus thither shortly*. And to this constant association, sustained, as far as we can trace it, throughout St Paul’s life, must be added the frequent interchange of messages consequent upon the contributions made by the Macedonian Churches both towards the relief of the brethren in Judzea*, and towards the Thirdly, we find several Macedonian Christians in more or less constant attendance upon St Paul. These men are representative, and are taken from the three Churches of Macedonia. Thessalonica sends Aris- tarchus', a Jewish convert, to endanger his life with the Apostle at Ephesus and to share the captivity at Rome. Another Thessa- lonian, Secundus’, is mentioned with Aristarchus as accompany- ing the Apostle during his voyage to the Capital. On the same occasion Bercea is represented by Sopater ‘the son of Pyrrhus’,’ the patronymic being added perhaps to distinguish him from the Sosipater who sends his salutation to the Church of Rome’. From Philippi comes Epaphroditus, whose sickness at Rome aroused such a tender interest in the Church of which he formed a member®. Another Macedonian, Gaius, is mentioned as St Paul’s companion in the tumult at Ephesus”, unless indeed (as
is possible, though hardly probable) he is to be identified with
Apostle’s personal maintenance’.
1 [Aristarchus however may have parted from the Apostle at Myra. See Philippians p. 37.]
2° Phil. ii. 19:
3 2 Cor. viii. 1 sq., ix. 2 sq.
4 Phil. iv. 15 sq.; 2 Cor. xi. 9.
5 Acts xix. 29, xx. 4, xxvii. 2; Col. iv. 10; Philemon 24. His nationality appears from Col. iv. 11 where he is coupled with Mark and Jesus called Justus, as being ‘of the circumcision,’ He was a constant companion of St Paul who calls him 6 cuvacyuddwrés pov (Col. iy. 10). The name occurs in the Bollandist Acta Sanctorum for Aug. 4.
® Acts xx, 4. Of Secundus we only
hear in this passage, but the name is found in Macedonian inscriptions; thus in Boeckh C. I. G. 1. no. 1957 (Pydna) Kdovov Sexodviov. So in Thes- salonian inscriptions L. Pontius Secun- dus is the name of one of the politarchs (Boeckh no, 1967), ef. no. 1969 Odddys kat Lexodvdos (where compare the name ‘Valens’ in Polyearp’s Epistle to the Philippians $11), no. 1988 [Lex]odvdos, no. 1988 b, ’Iovla Lexovv[5a]...[Z]exouv- dlwv.
7 Acts xx. 4 Sumrarpos Ilvppou Be- po.aios.
8 Romans xvi. 21.
9 Phil. ii. 25 sq.
1 Acts xix. 29.
THE CHURCHES OF MACEDONIA. 247
Epaphroditus'. Lastly, there is some reason for the supposition that Demas*, whose desertion of the Apostle in his second imprisonment contrasts so painfully with his faithful companion- ship at an earlier period, hailed from Thessalonica’.
But the most permanent result of St Paul’s intercourse with the Macedonian Churches is embodied in the three letters which have come down to us addressed by the Apostle to his converts there. His two earliest Epistles—the two Epistles to the Thes- salonians—were written to one Macedonian Church, a later Epistle—the Epistle to the Philippians—to another. we to suppose that these three extant letters exhaust the Apostle’s literary activity in the case of congregations in which he took so special and so affectionate an interest.
Nor are
Even admit- ting that there is not sufficient evidence to warrant us in postulating a lost letter to the Philippians*, yet his language in the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians becomes meaningless unless it presupposes more than one previous communication with the Church of Thessalonica’.
The outward condition of the Macedonian Churches stands fully revealed in the Pauline Epistles which survive to us. They were baptized with the baptism of suffering, and this suffering was the result both of poverty and of persecution®.
1 The two names are borne together in an inscription of Thessalonica (Boeckh C.I.G. no. 1987 Tatw Kr\wdin "Eradpodelrw [K]Awdla Pidnudtioy te [7a|rpwri7d pyjua). Origenin Rom. xvi. 23 states a tradition that the Gaius there mentioned was a bishop of Thes- salonica. The Gaius however in ques- tion was aCorinthian. There may how- ever have been some confusion with the Gaius of Acts xix. 29. [On Epaphro- ditus see Philippians pp. 61, 62. ]
2 On the name Demas see the refer- ences in Meyer on Col. iv. 14, Lobeck Pathol. 505; ¢f. Boeckh C. TI, G. 111. no. 3817 (Anuds cal T'dios). Demas is men- tioned next to Aristarchus the Thes- salonian in Philemon 24, and when he
deserted St Paul he went to Thessalo- nica (2 Tim. iv. 10), probably home. The name Demetrius, of which Demas is a contract form, occurs twice among the list of politarchs of that city (Boeckh no. 1967).
3 To complete the list of Mace- donian Christians we must add Jason (Acts xvii. 6 sq.).
4 [On the question of lost letters of St Paul see Philippians p. 138 sq.]
5 2 Thess, iii. 17 6 éoriv onpetov ev maon émtcto\n: cf. also 2 Thess. ii. 15.
6 2 Cor. viil. 2 é€y modd\q Soxwun OrlWews...7) Kata Bddouvs rwyxela of the Macedonian Churches. And yet there must have been sufficient wealth both at Philippi and at Thessalonica. Were
248 THE CHURCHES OF MACEDONIA.
There is no warning against the temptations of wealth, no en- forcement of the duties of the rich, in the Epistles to the Thessalonians or Philippians’. The former especiallyare addressed as those who have to work for their hving*. On the other hand, the allusions to persecution undergone are prominent in all three Epistles’. And side by side with the external dangers which beset these infant communities we can discern the pre- sence of a more subtle peril to which they were exposed from the tendencies of their national character. The old Macedonian spirit of independence showed itself in a factious self-as- sertion, a contempt for authority, to which the Apostle is constrained to draw attention with a significant and emphatic
iteration‘.
But the better side also of the Macedonian character® made
the gold and silver mines at Philippi [see Philippians p. 47] still worked?
1 The case is different in Polycarp’s Epistle to the Philippians. Probably Christianity had by that time extended to the wealthier classes; see esp. §§ 4, 5, 6.
21 Thess. iv. 11; 2 Thess, iii. 7- 12.
8 Thessalonica (1 Thess. i. 6, ii. 14, iii. 2, 3, 4; 2 Thess. i. 4-7); Philippi (Phil. i. 28-30).
4 Cf. 1 Thess. v. 12-14; 2 Thess. iii. Gi dil, AA.
5 The Macedonians were to Greece what the Piedmontese are to Italy, the rude highlanders speaking a mongrel dialect, regarded with a proud but impotent scorn by the pure bred Greeks, but in the highest moral qualities far their superiors, with a more genuine love of freedom and a stubborn per- severance, They were the one people which made the power of Greece felt throughout the world. On the Mace- donian spirit of independence seeespeci- ally Flatte Gesch, Mac. 1. 45. Flatte’s summary of the Macedonian character
is very striking and accurate. They appear to have had that peculiarly English virtue of not knowing when they were beaten. An excellent illus- tration of this sturdy perseverance and indomitable buoyancy of character which the Apostle commends (1 Thess. i.6)is the passage of Mommsen (History of Rome Bk. ur. ch. 8, Vol. il. p. 229 Dickson’s transl. 1868). ‘In steadfast resistance to the public enemy under whatever name, in unshaken fidelity towards their native country and their hereditary government, and in per- severing courage amidst the severest trials, no nation in ancient history bears so close a resemblance to the Roman people as the Macedonians; and the almost miraculous regenera- tion of the state after the Gallic inva- sion redounds to the imperishable honour of its leaders and of the people whom they led.’
A curious parallel to St Paul’s lan- guage occurs in Dion Chrysost. Or. xxv, ’AdeEdvdpos [robs Maxeddvas] els thy "Aclav ékayaywv dua pev movow- Tdrous drdvrwy dvOpbrwv drédetev dua
THE CHURCHES OF MACEDONIA. 249
itself felt in the converts gained for Christianity from that region. The Macedonian Churches are honorably distinguished above all others by their fidelity to the Gospel and their affec- tionate regard for St Paul himself. While the Church of Corinth disgraced herself by gross moral delinquencies, while the Galatians bartered the liberty of the Gospel for a narrow formalism, while the believers of Ephesus drifted into the wild- est speculative errors, no such stain attaches to the brethren of Philippi and Thessalonica. It is to the Macedonian congrega- tions that the Apostle ever turns for solace in the midst of his severest trials and sufferings. Time seems not to have chilled these feelings of mutual affection. The Epistle to the Philip- plans was written about ten years after the Thessalonian letters. It is the more surprising therefore that they should resemble each other so strongly in tone. In both alike St Paul drops his official title at the outset, not wishing to assert his Apostolic authority where he could appeal to the higher motive of love. In both he opens his letter with a heartfelt thanksgiving ex- pressed in terms of highest commendation. In both Epistles he speaks of his converts as his ‘crown and joy’’: im both he appeals freely to his personal example: and in both he adopts throughout the same tone of confidence and affection. In this interval of ten years we meet with one notice of the Macedonian Churches. It is conceived in terms of unmeasured praise. The Macedonians had been called upon to contribute to the wants of their poorer brethren in Judea, who were suffering from famine. They had responded nobly to the call. Deep-sunk in poverty and sorely tried by persecution, they came forward with eager joy and poured out the riches of their liberality, straining their means to the utmost im order to relieve the sufferers. ‘They exceeded our expectations, says the Apostle ; ‘they gave themselves to the Lord, and to us by the will of
dé mevixpordrous, Kal dua ev isxupois and the beginning of the second cen- diya 6é dobeve’s, puyddas Te kal Baor- tury A.D.
Aéas Tovs a’rovs, comp. 2 Cor. vi. 10. i 1 Lhess, i: 19; Phill iv, 1
Dion flourished at the close of the first
250 THE CHURCHES OF MACEDONIA.
God’ We may imagine that the people still retained some- thing of those simpler habits and that sturdier character, which triumphed over Greeks and Orientals in the days of Philip and Alexander, and thus in the early warfare of the Christian Church the Macedonian phalanx offered a successful resistance to the assaults of an enemy, before which the lax and enervated ranks of Asia and Achaia had yielded ignominiously.
1 2 Cor. viii. 1-5.
[1863.]
NL.
THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA.
Than eer. } Py yh iW ' ieee Cans ri
VIL.
THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA.
HE ancient name of Thessalonica! was Therme or Therma?
‘the hot-spring, and there are still warm springs in the neighbourhood, though not at Thessalonica itself*. At the time of the Persian invasion it was apparently only a small town‘, but it gradually grew in importance and appears occasionally in history. It was at all events sufficiently influential to give its name to the bay on which it stood”.
On the site of Therma, the city of Thessalonica® was
founded by Cassander.
1 On the geography and antiquities of Thessalonica, see Cousinéry Voyage dans la Macédoine 1. p. 23 sq. (1831); Leake Northern Greece 11. p. 235 sq. (1835); Koch Comm. iib. den ersten Brief an die Thessalonicher (1855) Einleit. § 1, 2; Tafel Historia Thessa- lonicae (Tiibing. 1835) and de Thessa- lonica dissertatio geographica (Berl. 1839); Pococke Description of the East 11. (2) p. 148 sq. (1743); Belley Obser- vations sur UVhistoire et sur les monu- ments de la ville Thessalonique ; Texier Description de VAsie Mineure (1839- 49) ; and for its ecclesiastical history Texier Byzantine Church p. 111 sq. (1864). I have not been able to in- vestigate the work by Burgerhoudt de coetus Christ. Thessalonicensis ortu (1825), referred to by Koch, p. 8.
It was probably at the same time that he rebuilt the city of Potideea’.
If so, the date of the
2 Aischines (de Fals, Legat. §§ 31, 36) calls it O€pua, Herodotus (vii. 121, 123 etc.), Thucydides (i. 61, ii. 29) and Scylax (Geog. Min. p. 26 ed. Hudson) Oépuy.
3 See Tafel H. Th., p. 3, and Pococke, p. 149, quoted by Koch, p. 2. For the name compare Crenides, ‘Wells,’ the ancient name of Philippi.
4 So Tafel (p. 13), but Herodotus (vii. 127) speaks of it as a wos.
> Herod. vii. 121.
6 The Greek form is Oeccadovixn (Steph. Byzant. s.v.), or -xela (Strabo vii. § 10).
The name Thessalonica first occurs in Polybius (xxiii. 4. 4, 11. 2, xxix. 3. ti):
7 Diod. Sic. xix. 52.
254 THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA.
foundation of the new city was apparently about the year B.c. 315*. Therma was named Thessalonica after Cassander’s wife, the daughter of Philip and half-sister of Alexander: Potidea Of the twin cities Thessalonica was destined far to outstrip her rival *.
he called Cassandreia? after his own name.
Its natural advantages were indeed great, both as regards the sea and as regards the land. It was situated, as Pliny describes it*, in the middle of the bend of the Thermaic gulf. It had a good natural harbour, so excellent indeed that Xerxes, when on his march against Greece, had chosen it as his naval station °, Nor did its excellence as a military and commercial centre fall short of the
Its dockyards are mentioned by Livy * prominence which its situation as a seaport gave to it. It was the key to the whole of Macedonia. It commanded by a good land route the two levels—the level of the plain of the Strymon on the one hand, and on the other the level of the con- verging plains of the Axius, Haliacmon and Echedorus’. It was likewise conveniently situated with respect to that excrescence of Macedonia, the Chalcidic peninsula. For the purpose of inter-communication with more distant centres its situation
was all that could be desired.
1 See Niebuhr Ethnol. 1. 293.
* Cassandreia was probably his capi- tal. Tafel(p. 8) quotes a coin Kacan- Apoy OeccadonikHc. Both however attained great prominence; thus Livy xlv.30 says ‘ Secunda pars celeberrimas urbes Thessalonicam et Cassandream habet.’
3 Another account of the city is that it was founded by Philip to commemo- rate a victory over the Thessalians. This does not deserve any credit. It appears first in Julian Orat. iii. about seven centuries after the event, and it is there given as a conjecture. In later writers it takes its place with the other account, e.g. Steph. Byzant. s.v. A third story combines the two former. It represents the city as founded by Philip in honour of his daughter Thes-
The Via Egnatia'’, that great
salonica. All three are given in a pas- sage of Tzetzes quoted by Tafel (p. 5).
4 Pliny N. H. iv. 10. 17 ‘medio litoris flexus [sinus Thermaici].’
5 Herod. vii. 121.
6 Livy xliv. 10. In a moment of despair Perseus had ordered them to be burnt. Five centuries later Con- stantine the Great, on the eve of his conflict with Licinius (4.p. 322), had the harbour enlarged for the reception of his fleet (Zosimus Hist. ti. 22).
7 On the fertility of the Macedonian plain see Cousinéry 1. p. 5, Perrot in the Revue Archéologique (1860) 11. p. 49, and compare Appian Bell. Civ. iv. p. 105, Athen. xv. p. 682 B.
8 On this great military road see a treatise of Tafel De via militarit Roma- norum Egnatia (Tiibing. 1837).
THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA. 255 highroad between Italy and the East which spanned the peninsula, passed through its walls—an advantage the full force of which is appreciated only when we recollect that, owing to the imperfect knowledge of navigation of the ancients, communication by sea was at all times precarious, and at some seasons of the year entirely closed. Such advantages fully justified Cicero’s description of its inhabitants as ‘lying in the lap’ of the Roman Empiret.
The city grew and flourished. In Strabo’s time, a genera- tion or two before St Paul, it was the most populous of the Macedonian cities. A century later than the Apostle, Lucian speaks to the same effect®. And in spite of invasion, misrule and disaster, it has enjoyed from that time to this a continuous, if comparative, prosperity ; fully bearing out Meletius’ dictum upon it ‘So long as nature does not change, Thessalonica will remain wealthy and fortunate*’ It narrowly escaped being made the capital of the world®. At one time its population seems to have risen above two hundred thousand. At present it has fallen to about a third of that number. It still retains its ancient name, corrupted in Turkish into Selanik, in vulgar Greek into Sarovixn, but the educated continue to call it, as of old, Weccanrovirn °.
In illustration of the history of St Paul’s labours in these parts, two poimts deserve to be considered (1) its political
status, (2) its moral and religious condition.
1. The political importance of Thessalonica commences
with the decline of Greece.
1 Cic. de prov. consul. 2 ‘Thes- salonicenses positi in gremio imperii nostri.’ Cicero resided at the place when in exile (pro Planc. 41).
2 Strabo vii. 6. 4 7 viv pddtora Tov &\XAwy evavdpe.
3 Lucian Asinus § 46 ii. p. 618 (ed. Hemsterhus.) médews r&v ev Makedovia THS meyloTns Becoadovikys.
4 Cousinéry 1. p. 24,
5 Gibbon ch. xvii. (11. p. 183, ed. Bohn) ‘Before the foundation of
It was the capital of the second of
Constantinople, Thessalonica is men- tioned by Cedrenus (p. 283), and Sar- dica by Zonaras, as the intended capital.’
6 Leake mt. p. 238. In the West it was called by the early German poets Salneck, Salonicia occurs in a twelfth century Italian chronicle (Muratori Script. rer. Ital. v1. 875), but Sa- lonichi is the name by which it is now known in Western Europe: see Koch Hinl. p. 3.
256
THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA.
the four districts in the first quadripartite division of Mace-
donia?.
At a later re-arrangement of the province it would
seem to have been made the capital of Macedonia. Its native poet Antipater about the time of the Christian
era? says of it
Xoi pe, Opnixins cxvrj pope, Oecoarovixn, LnTHp » Taons Téurre Maxndovins.
On coins (though of a much later date) it is styled the
metropolis.
In the civil wars it had the good fortune to take
the winning side, espousing the cause of Octavius and Antony®.
It would appear that it owed its privileges as a free city to the
services thus rendered to the future master of the world 4.
Pliny speaks of it as liberae conditionis®, and there are coins
with the inscription Qeccadonikewn edeyepiac (or -pia)® In the enjoyment of this constitution we find it at the time of the
Acts.
Its chief magistrates are wodutapyav’, a word not known
elsewhere in classical literature, but the account of St Luke is
remarkably confirmed by an inscription still to be seen at
Thessalonica on an arch at the western end of the town’. Politarchs appear to have been seven in number’.
1 Livy xlv. 18.
2 Jacobs Anthol. Gr. ii. p. 98, no. xiv.
3 Appian Bell. Civ. iv. p. 118, Plutarch Brutus 46. Brutus before Philippi appears to have held out to his soldiers the sacking of the city as an incentive to their valour in action.
4 Tafel, p. 20.
SUB Ling Nera tv. hose ite
6 See Cousinéry 1. p, 28 and the reff. in Tafel, p. 20.
7 Acts xvii. 6,
8 The inscription is given in Boeckh C. I. G. um. p. 53, no. 1967; Leake ur. p. 236; Cousinéry 1. p. 27; Cony- beare and Howson (p. 258), and else- where. Quite recently a paper was read on it by Mr Vaux before the Royal
The There is
Geographical Society, July 4, 1866, and a photograph of it produced.
» Not six, as stated by Tafel, p. 21, followed by Dean Howson in Smith’s Dictionary of Geography. The latter is correctin hisarticle ‘ Thessalonica’ in Smith’s Dictionary of the Bible and in his life of St Paul (p. 259). At least there must have been seven, if Boeckh’s copy of the inscription is correct, but no two copies that I have seen agree,
This inscription illustrates St Paul and St Luke in other respects; first, in the prominence given to women, a fact noted elsewhere [see Philippians, p. 54sq.]; secondly, in the names, Se- cundus, Gaius, Sosipater, see above, p. 246.
THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA. 257
mention also in this inscription of a steward (rayias) of the city, and a gymnasiarch (yupvacvapyns)?. There was likewise a popular assembly (dfuos)*. The whole city then is essentially Greek, not Roman as Philippi was. As a free city it was spared the ignominy of a permanent Roman garrison within its
walls?,
2. The moral and religious condition of Thessalonica was probably not worse than that of any ordinary Greek town, perhaps better, for there was a more sterling moral basis in the Macedonian character than in the Greek‘. Still it would be open to all the ordinary temptations of a Greek city and
especially of a Greek seaport.
Against such St Paul had to warn his converts both orally and by letter’.
But no inference
of especial immorality in Thessalonica can be drawn from the
expressions which he employs.
Scarcely a single Epistle of
St Paul is without similar warnings.
There was however one element of immorality in Thessa-
lonica which must not be passed over—of immorality which
shielded itself under the protection of religion—the worship of
the Cabiri, the mystic deities of Samothrace *.
1 The date of the inscription is un- certain. As read by Boeckh, it has the name P, Flavius Sabinus, which, as he truly remarks, points to a date not earlier than Vespasian. As read by others, only the Sabinus remains, Cousinéry (1. p. 28) on very insuffi- cient grounds assigns the arch to the age of Augustus, supposing that it was erected to commemorate the battle of Philippi. Leake (111. p. 236) considers it to be later. The writer of the article in Macmillan’s Magazine alluded to already (see above, p. 243) informs me that it was his impression that the inscription need not be part of the original arch.
2 The word dju0s likewise occurs in St Luke’s narrative in reference to Thessalonica (Acts xvii. 5 é¢jrow av- Tovs mpoaryaryely els Tov Ojuov). He uses
L. E.
This worship
it also twice in the analogous case of Ephesus (Acts xix. 30, 33).
3 See Dirksen Versuche zur Kritik Iv. p. 140 sq. (Lips. 1823).
4 The story in Lucian (dAsinus § 49 -56) has been put in evidence, as showing a very low state of morals in Thessalonica. This is unfair, as Tafel justly remarks (p. 25).
5 1 Thess. iv, 3—6.
6 On the Cabiri see especially Lobeck Aglaoph. 11. ¢ 5, p. 1202 sq. (and esp. p. 1256 sq., where he treats of their worship in Macedonia), Creuzer’s Symbolik und Mythologie ut. p. 17- 36, p. 159 sq. (3rd ed.). The article in Pauly Real-Encycl. der class, Alter- thiim. 11. p. 2, by K. W. Miiller, con- tains an abstract of the opinions of the principal writers on this subject.
1g
258 THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA.
had been patronised by Philip, and by Alexander’. It is especially identified with the Macedonians*, and more particu- larly still with the Thessalonians‘. About the time of St Paul a political sanction was given to the worship—or rather, a religious sanction to the political system as derived from the worship—by deifying the Emperor as a KaBecpos’.
To these Cabiric rites, in which gross immorality was promoted under the name of religion, we may suppose that St Paul alluded, when he deprecated any connexion between his gospel and uncleanness*, a disclaimer which happily would sound strange from the lips of a minister of any religious denomination now, but which is quite intelligible in St Paul’s day, when read in the light of the foul orgies of the Cabiric
worship or of similar rites’.
1 Plut. Vit. Alex. c. 2.
2 Philostr, ii. 43. 94.
> Lactant. Div. Inst. 1. 15, Summa veneratione coluerunt...Macedones Ca- birum.
4 Firmicus de Err. Prof. Rel. c. 11, Hunc eundem Macedonum colit stulta persuasio. Hic est Cabirus, cui Thes- salonicenses quondam cruento [ore] cruentis manibus supplicabant. Ca- birie coins of Thessalonica are not in- frequent (see Cousinéry1. p. 28, Pl. i.). On the Cabiric games see Tafel, p. 24.
Cousinéry supposes that this wor- ship was not introduced into Thes- salonica before the reign of Claudius, on the very insufficient ground that no Cabiric coins are found at an earlier date (1. p. 35sq.). It is in the highest degree improbable that a worship which is especially connected with the Greek kings of Macedonia should not have found its way into the principal city of Macedonia earlier.
On less slender grounds still he finds a temple of the Cabiri in an ancient building still existing (J. c.).
® See the coins and esp. Cousinéry I. p. 38.
$ 1 Thess. ii. 3.
7 On the Jewish population of Thes- salonica something has been said al- ready; see above, p. 243. In the pre- sent day the Jews are probably the most numerous section of the inhabi- tants. They have a quarter of their own. Various estimates of their num- bers are given (see Conybeare and Howson, p. 383), the largest being that of W. G. C. in Macmillan’s Magazine Feb. 1863, see above, p. 243. The writer of the article informs me that he heard it on the spot, on authority that he cannot question. He adds moreover that the Jews have an in- terest in representing themselves as fewer than they are, owing to the poll- tax. Many of the Jews of modern Thessalonica settled there in the fif- teenth century, having been driven out of Spain by the persecution in that country, but they must have been in- duced to settle there by the fact that there was already a large Jewish popu- lation. On the Rabbinical school at Thessalonica see Milman History of the Jews 1. p. 419 (ed. 1866), and on the whole question see Cousinéry 1. pp. 19, 49; Leake rrr. p. 249 sq.
THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA. 259
Fresh from the insults and sufferings he had undergone at Philippi, but nothing daunted, he arrives at Thessalonica?. With the Jews he commences his labours*. On the Sabbath day he enters the synagogue. The details may be supplied from the similar scene recorded as having taken place at an earlier period in Antioch of Pisidia*. The law and the prophets read, he is invited, we may suppose, by the rulers of the synagogue to offer a word of exhortation. He avails himself of the opportunity, and preaches, arguing from the Scriptures. He sets himself to prove two things: (i) That it was ordained that Messias should suffer; (ii) that Jesus whom he preaches is the Messias. For three successive Sabbath-days (éai tpia adBBata*) he preaches’.
Of his missionary labours in the course of the week St Luke says nothing. We may supply the omission from his conduct at Athens (Acts xvii. 17). He would appear in the market place, engaging in conversation and trying to interest persons in his message. The account of St Luke however is silent as to his labours beyond the first three weeks of his stay. Had we merely the historian’s narrative we might have supposed that he only stayed so iong. It is plain however from the Epistles that the At the close of these three weeks we may suppose that he devoted himself more exclusively to the heathen’.
length of his sojourn was much greater ®.
1 1 Thess, ii. 2:
2 Acts xvii. 1 sq.
3 Acts xiii. 15; and cf. Luke iv. 16 sq.
4 It matters little whether we trans- late caBBara ‘ weeks’ or ‘sabbath-days.’ The meaning is the same, viz. that for three weeks he repeated his preaching in the synagogue on the sabbath.
5 We may imagine him doing so, as at the Pisidian Antioch, at the request of some of the congregation who, inte- rested in his teaching, thronged about him as he left the synagogue (Acts xiii. 42), and requested him to resume his preaching; or he may even have
found favour with the ruler of the synagogue, as at Corinth, From what- ever cause, however, he was allowed to repeat his message.
6 We gather this (1) from the success of his labours among the Gentiles; (2) from the mention of the way in which he was engaged, especially his working ‘day and night’; (3) from the notices given in Phil. iv. 16 of contributions sent to him more than once (arat cai dis).
7 The incidents at the Pisidian An- tioch are here again-a parallel (Acts xiii. 45, 46).
17—2
260 THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA.
But meanwhile it was necessary that he should find means of support. He did not wish to hinder the Thessalonians. He did not wish to clog his message with the suspicion that would attach to it, if he sought any return for his labours. He would not appear to preach under ‘a cloke of covetousness’.’ His wants were supplied in two ways, by the labours of his own hands*, and by contributions received from Philippi ®*.
Meanwhile he preached zealously. He alludes more than once to the subject of his preaching in the Epistles: and thus we are enabled to supplement the notice in the Acts, already alluded to, which refers mainly to his labours in the synagogue.
His preaching seems to have turned mainly upon one point —the approaching judgment, the coming of Christ. They had been invited at their conversion to await the Son of God from heaven’, They were warned that He would come, as a thief in the night’. At the same time they were told that many things must happen first, that Antichrist must gather strength, that ‘the Restrainer’ must be removed®. Around this one doctrine the Apostle’s practical warnings and exhortations had clustered. He warned them that they must suffer tribu- lation’, the tribulation which was to usher in the end of all things, the persecution from the power of Antichrist. He bade them abstain from impurity lest they should find vengeance in the day of the Lord’s coming®. He had charged them to walk worthily of God who was calling them to His kingdom and glory®.
But the flood of new experiences, poured in upon them, threatened to unsettle the foundations on which the social structure was built. In the immediate presence of the great
1 1 Thess. ii. 5, mpopdcoer weovetlas. preceding note); ef. 7d berépnua 2 Cor. 21 Thess. ii. 5, 6, 9; 2 Thess. mi. xi. 9.
8. The notice in Acts xviii. 3 refers 4 1 Thess. i. 10. indeed to another town and to a few 51 Thess. v. 2, adrol yap axpiBds months later, but will show what the ofdare. nature of these labours was. 6 2 Thess, ii. 5 sq. 8 Phil. iv. 15-18. This however 7 1 Thess. iii, 4. was not the main means of support, 8 1 Thess. iv. 6, 7. and is not inconsistent with the Apo- 9 1 Thess, ii. 12.
stle’s language given above (see the
THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA. 261
crisis which was to change all things, why should they attend to the petty details, the common avocations, of daily life? In the flush of fresh and glorious hopes, was it right, was it possible, to care for the things of this world? There were some, doubt- less, who honestly drew this inference from the Apostle’s teaching. There were many who, without examining their own motives, would greedily seize hold of so lofty a pretext for shirking the manifold responsibilities of their social position. This restless and feverish spirit had appeared while the Apostle was still at Thessalonica; and he had set himself to counteract it. He told them that their true ambition should be to keep quiet, to attend to their business, to labour with their own hands'. The bread of the Church was not for those who refused to work’. Laborare est orare is the true maxim of the Christian, be the Advent far or near.
In such spirit the Apostle preached. Of the results of his preaching we have ample evidence. ‘His entrance in to them was not in vain®’ ‘They received the word in much affliction with joy of the Holy Ghost‘. The fame of their conversion spread throughout Macedonia and Achaia, and ‘in every place®.’ Among the Jews indeed his success appears not to have been great®, yet among these two are mentioned by name, whose faithful adherence to the Apostle is placed on record. Jason, whose correct name was Jesus’, but who had assumed the heathen name which most nearly resembled it, calls down the wrath of his countrymen upon himself by entertaining the Apostle while at Thessalonica. Aristarchus, another convert from the Circumcision’, is his constant companion, suffering for him at Ephesus, and apparently sharing his imprisonment at
1 1 Thess. iv. 12. *Tovéatwy, érelaOnoar.
2 2 Thess, iii. 10. 7 Cf. Joseph. Ant. xii. 5. 1,6 ue obv 3 1 Thess. ii. 1. "Inoots Idowva éaurov perwvouacerv; cf. 4 1 Thess. i. 6. also Aristo of Pella in Routh R. S.1. 5 1 Thess. i. 8. This is an indirect pp. 97, 107; and see the article by
testimony to the central position of B.F. W. in Smith’s Dict. of the Bible Thessalonica noticed above (p. 254). s. v. Jason. 6 Acts xvil. 4, rwes é& a’rav, i.e. Tov 8 Col. iv. 10, 11; see above, p. 246.
262 THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA.
Rome. With the proselytes and with the heathen his success was greater’, It was from the last-mentioned however that the They turned
Among his
vast majority of the new disciples were drawn’. from idols to serve the living and true God’. converts were many ladies of the first rank‘. These successes provoke the hatred of the Jews. They enlist on their side the profligate idlers of the city, of which in a seaport town there would be many, the lazzaroni of Thessa- lonica’. They besiege the house of Jason, where Paul and his companions were lodged, wanting to drag them before the people, probably in the theatre®. Not finding them there, they carry Jason and certain converts before the Politarchs. They accuse them of high treason. They are setting up a rival to the Roman Emperor, a king Jesus’. The main topic of the Apostle’s preaching had given the handle to their accusation. He had, as we saw, laid great stress on the coming judgment, on the kingdom of Christ. Ignoring or misapprehending his true meaning, they represented him as setting up a temporal
kingdom®.
1 Acts xvii. 4, rév Te ceBouévwy [Kal] EAAjvwv mdj00s modt. The received text is réy Te ceBouévwy ‘EXAjvwy ‘of devout Greeks’ ie. of Greek prose- lytes (so also N&). For this réy re ceBouévwy cal ‘EXXjvwr is read by AD vulg. copt., but not by B, as Koch states. This brings the account into more direct agreement with the lan- guage of the Epistles; and in its favour may be urged (Koch Hinl. p. 8) that ceBduevr elsewhere stands by itself (Acts xvii. 17) for proselytes. Koch refers to Burgerhoudt (p. 93); see also Paley Hore Paul. p. 281.
2 This appears from the evidence of the Epistles. For (i) he addresses his readers distinctly as having been con- verted from idol-worship, 1 Thess. i. 9, quoted below, ef. ii. 14, 16; (ii) he refrains from any direct allusion to the O. T., which would certainly have
occurred had he been addressing Jews chiefly or proselytes.
3 1 Thess. i. 9.
4 Acts xvii. 4.
5 Acts xvii. 5 ‘certain lewd fellows of the baser sort’ (A.V.). This archaic use of the word ‘lewd,’ as equivalent to ‘ignorant,’ is not uncommon in early English literature: ‘the leude man, the grete clerke Shall stonde upon his owne werke’ Gower Conf. Am. 1. 274; ‘the lered and the lewed’ Piers Ploughman’s Vis. 2100, and other in- stances given by W. A. Wright Bible Word-book, 8.v.
6 As in the riot at Ephesus, Acts xix. 29, 30, 31.
7 The exact parallel to John xix. 12, 15 is worth noticing.
8 This is rightly regarded as an undesigned coincidence of a striking kind. The history supplies the ac-
THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA. 263
The magistrates no less than the populace are alarmed at these representations. They take securities from Jason and the rest, as persons who had disturbed, or were suspected of disturbing, the public peace. The Apostle had hitherto lain concealed. Seeing that events had taken a turn so unfavour- able to the continuance of his labours, he left Thessalonica in company with Silas under cover of night.
These events occurred on St Paul’s second missionary journey —probably in the year 52. From Thessalonica he went to Bercea. Thence he was driven out at the instigation of some Jews from Thessalonica, who, hearing of his successes there, followed him. From Bercea he went to Athens, and from Athens to Corinth. As he does not seem to have remained long at either of these intermediate places, it was not many months—probably not many weeks—after he left Thessalonica that he entered Corinth.
But meanwhile his anxiety for his Thessalonian disciples was increasing daily’. He had made more than one unsuccessful attempt to revisit them*% The storm of persecution was gathering while he was yet at Thessalonica. He knew that he had left to his new converts a heritage of suffermg. He had warned them of what awaited them. Would they yield to persecution and renounce their allegiance*? At length the suspense became too terrible. He could no longer contain himself‘. He denied himself the services of Timothy, and des- patched him—whether from Bercea or from Athens is uncertain —to visit Thessalonica and report to him of the condition of his new converts.
The Apostle is now at Corinth; Timothy returns. The report of the Thessalonian Church is most favourable. Their personal affection for the Apostle is as strong as ever; and undaunted by persecution they had remained steadfast in the
count of the charges brought against 1 1 Thess. ii. 17. him. The Epistles supply the matter 2 1 Thess. ii. 18 dag Kal dbs. of his preaching (see esp. 1 Thess. ii. SIMhess Osi. 14. Seite.
12; 2 Thess. i. 5). The two coincide 41 Thess. in. 1, 2, 5. in a very remarkable way.
264 THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA.
faith and in deeds of love’. It was as new life to the Apostle to hear these glad tidings*» In the first flush of joy and gratitude he wrote to the Thessalonians to encourage them to persevere and to advise them on certain matters, where they seemed to need his advice. This is the First Epistle to the Thes- salonians.
For notwithstanding that Timothy’s report was so cheering, there were some points on which they required correction or instruction.
These points were as follows :—
(1) The error, of which he had discerned the beginnings while he was still in Thessalonica, and which he had striven to check, had gained ground meanwhile. The very intensity of their Christian faith, dwelling too exclusively on the day of the Lord’s coming, had been attended with evil consequences. A practical inconvenience of some moment had arisen. In their feverish expectation of this great crisis, some had been led to neglect their ordinary business®. There was a spirit of restless- ness manifest in the Thessalonian Church. The Apostle re- bukes this.
(2) In connexion with the doctrine of the Lord’s advent another difficulty had arisen—not a practical one, but a theo- retical one—which had troubled the minds of many. Certain members of the Church had died, and there was great anxiety lest they should be excluded from any share in the glories of the Lord’s advent‘. The Apostle sets himself to quiet this anxiety.
(3) An unhealthy state of feeling with regard to spiritual gifts was manifesting itself. Like the Corinthians at a later day’, they needed to be reminded of the superior value of ‘prophesying, compared with other gifts of the Spirit which they exalted at its expense’.
1 1 Thess. iii. 6; of. i. 5 sq.; iv. 10, 41 Thess. iv. 13-18. 2 1 Thess. iii. 8 viv fGuev dav pels 5 1 Cor. xiv. 3, 4, 5, 22, 24. OTIKETE. 6 1 Thess. v. 19, 20,
3 1 Thess. iv. 11.
THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA. 265
(4) There were symptoms of a tendency to despise law- fully constituted authorities, and generally a spirit of unruliness was showing itself—not unconnected, as I have already hinted, with that independence of temper which was characteristic of the Macedonians’. .
(5) There was the danger, which they shared in common with most Gentile Churches, of relapsing into their old heathen profligacy*. Against this the Apostle offers a word in season. We need not suppose, however, that Thessalonica was worse in this respect than other Greek cities.
The letter was written partly to correct these errors, but still more to express his satisfaction with his converts, and to cheer them under persecution®.
Between the First and the Second Epistles no long interval seems to have elapsed. Some information as to the state of the Thessalonian Church has reached the Apostle meanwhile, by what source it is not known. Some of the vicious tendencies, which he had endeavoured to check, were still further developed. And some misunderstanding as to his teaching had arisen.
To meet these he wrote the Second Epistle. The two prominent points in the Epistle are as follows :—
(i) Misapprehension had spread as to the nearness of the Advent. It was maintained that the Apostle had declared it to be imminent*.
(ii) The restless and unruly spirit, which he had before rebuked, was gaining ground’.
At the same time, and not unconnected with these errors, St Paul’s personal relations with the Thessalonians had become less satisfactory. His authority had been tampered with, and an unauthorised use was made of his name. It is difficult to ascertain the exact circumstances of the case from casual and indirect allusions, and indeed we may perhaps infer from the
1 1 Thess. v. 12-14; see above, p. 3 1 Thess, ii. 14; ili. 2, 4.
(248. 4 2 Thess. ii. 1 sq. 2 1 Thess. iv. 3-8. 5 2 Thess. iii. 6-12.
266 THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA.
vagueness of the Apostle’s own language that he himself was not in possession of definite information; but at all events his suspicions were aroused. Designing men might misrepresent his teaching in two ways, either by suppressing what he actually had written or said, or by forging letters and in other ways representing him as teaching what he had not taught. St Paul’s language hints in different places at both of these modes of false dealing. He seems to have entertained suspicions of this dishonesty even when he wrote the First Epistle. At the close of that Epistle he binds the Thessalonians by a solemn oath, ‘in the name of the Lord, to see that the Epistle is read ‘to all the holy brethren’*—a charge unintelligible in itself, and only to be explained by supposing some misgivings in the Apostle’s mind. Before the Second Epistle is written, his suspicions seem to have been confirmed, for there are two passages which allude to these misrepresentations of his teach- ing. (1) In the first of these he tells them in vague language, which may refer equally well to a false interpretation put upon his own words in the First Epistle, or to a supplemental letter forged in his name, ‘not to be troubled either by spirit or by word or by letter, as coming from us, as if the day of the Lord were at hand.’ They are not to be deceived, he adds, by any one, whatever means he employs (cata undéva Tporor, i. 2, 3). (2) In the second passage at the close of the Epistle he says, ‘The salutation of Paul with mine own hand, which is a token in every Epistle: so I write’ (iii. 17), evidently a precaution against forgery’. And not only so. If there were unscrupulous persons, who tampered with his authority, there were also unruly ones who denied it, or were disposed to deny it. St Paul asserts his office
1 1 Thess. v. 27.
2 That such precautions were not unnecessary is proved by the complaint of Dionysius of Corinth (in Eus. H. BL. iv. 23, see Routh R. S.1. p. 181), émio- adenpGv kal ravras ol Tov dia-
Todas yap dkiwodvTwy Me
ypavar eypaya,
Bdrov dmdarora fitavlwy yeyéuxav’ a bev €Lacpodvres, a 6¢ mpooridevres* ols rd oval Keira, ot Oavuacrdy dpa el Kal T&y Kuptax@y padioupyjoal rwes émiBéBrnvrat ypapGv, drére kal rats od ro.avrats ém-
BeBovdNev’xact.
THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA. 267
much more strongly in this Epistle than in the former’. Yet still these were but slight blemishes on a Church with which generally the Apostle was thoroughly satisfied. The errors were confined to a few, and had not assumed a virulent form. The Apostle is bound to thank God for the exceeding growth of their faith and the abundance of their love?
The Thessalonian Church is now but a very few months old —a little more than a year at most. From this time forward it disappears from the Apostolic history. As regards the Churches of Macedonia generally we have the Apostle’s testimony to their satisfactory condition, and we can well believe that the Thessa- lonians were included in his commendation. But of Thessalonica especially we know absolutely nothing. Even the name occurs but twice in the New Testament at a later date’, One of these passages refers to incidents within the period of its infancy which I have already considered: in the other it occurs quite incidently. Neither throws any light on its condition.
And this is true of its subsequent ecclesiastical history. The Church of Thessalonica passes through a period of thick darkness, from which it emerges at length in the fourth century. So far as I know, there are but two notices of it during two centuries and a half or more, and these are of the briefest and most meagre character*, From Melito’s Apology it appears that the Emperor Antoninus Pius had written to the people of Thessa- lonica, among other places, telling them to take no new steps against the Christians’, This would seem to show an important and a struggling Church at Thessalonica in the middle of the second century. At the beginning of the next century, Tertullian® couples it with Philippi as a Church where the
1 2 Thess, iii, 14, 15; ef. ii. 15, iii. 4. 5 Melito Apology, undév vewrepifew 2 2 Thess. i. 3. mepl judy (i.e. Tav XpioriavGv). The 3 Phil. iv. 16, 2 Tim. iv. 10. passage is given above, p. 244, from 4 On the other hand Conybeare and Eus. H. EH. iv. 26: it has escaped the
Howson (p. 250) speak of Thessalonica _ diligence of Tafel, pp. 9, 30.
‘boasting of a series of Christian annals 6 Tertull. de praescr. 36, ‘apud quas unbroken since the day of St Paul’s ipsae authenticae literae eorum reci- arrival.’ tantur.’
268 THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA,
letters of the Apostles are read in the original. Of its early bishops two are mentioned, Aristarchus in Bede’s martyrology’, and Gaius by Origen’, if this latter be not a confusion with Gaius of Macedonia®. It could boast of a martyr in the Dio- cletian persecution‘, and the church raised in his honour, the church of St Demetrius, now a mosque, is the most splendid in Thessalonica®’. Nor does Demetrius appear to stand alone, if an epithet (@iiowaprupes) applied to the congregation at large be something more than a complimentary title’. More than once the names of its bishops appear on the records of eccles- iastical councils, and at the Council of Sardica (A.D. 343) its bishop Aetius claimed for the metropolis of the people of Thessa- lonica the consideration due to its importance and its population’. While the glories of Antioch and Alexandria gradually pale, Thessalonica rises into splendour. In the fourth century Theo- doret in a striking passage® points to the city as the greatest
and most populous in the district.
Its resistance to the suc-
cessive attacks of the barbarian hordes—whether Goths or
1 On Aug. 4; see Le Quien Or. Chr. 11. p. 27.
2 Origen on Rom. xvi. 23; see above, p. 247.
3 Acts xix. 29.
4 The year of the martyrdom of Demetrius must be fixed at a.p. 303 or 306, according as the Maximianus mentioned in the acts of his martyr- dom (Anastatius Bibliothecarius p. 88 ; Photius Biblioth. 255) is considered to be Herculius or Galerius. Simeon the Metaphrast (for Oct. 8, pp. 90, 96) and an anonymous biographer of the sixth century call him Maximianus Herculius, but on the other hand he is represented as having conquered the Sarmatians, which was done, not by Herculius, but by Galerius (Oros. Hist. vii, 25; see Cornelius Byeus Acta Sanctorum Octobris iv. Brussels 1780). Demetrius’ festival is kept by the Western Church on Oct. 8 (Martyrol.
Roman. Vet.), by the Eastern Chureh on Oct. 26. His cult sprang rapidly into prominence in the fifth century. He received the title of supoSdvrns from the streams of holy oil, which were said to issue from his relics and to cure diseases.
5 Cousinéry 1. p. 41, Leake mr. p, 242.
6 It occurs in an anonymous writer quoted by John of Thessalonica (Act. Sanct. tv. 48, p. 121). A little lower down, one saint, a virgin called Ma- trona, is mentioned by name.
7 Canon. xvi. ’Aérios érloxomos elev" OvK dyvoetre drrola Kal mnXlxn TvyxXdver h tv Oecoadovixéwy pntpbrods K.T-A. (Mansi Concil. mr. p. 17; ef. Hefele Conciliengesch. 1. p. 577).
8 Theodoret H. E. v. 17, OQeccado- vixn mods éort weylorn Kal modudvOpw- mos. The whole passage is impor- tant.
THE CHURCH OF THESSALONICA. 269
Sclavonians—and the noble share which it took in the con- version to Christianity of each successive tribe of invaders won for it the proud title of ‘the orthodox city*’
At present its population represents more fully the creed of the adversaries of St Paul than the creed of St Paul himself— the Jewish than the Christian faith. Only a minority of the inhabitants are Christians’, But the memory of the great Apostle lives and is honoured by those who deny the truths which he first taught within its walls. Two pretended relics of St Paul the city possesses in two rival pulpits which stand in two of the principal mosques, and contend for the honour of having been the place from which the Gospel was first preached
by the Great Apostle of the Gentiles®.
1 This title was given to it by Cameniata in the tenth century (rd OpOddoéov avrny Kal elya kal dvouagec- dat § 3). Tafel, who has studied the medieval history of the city with great care, couples it with Constantinople as the twin bulwark of Eastern Chris- tendom. Though frequently besieged, the city was only captured three times, by the Saracens (a.p. 904), the Nor- mans (4.D. 1185), and finally the Turks
(a.D. 1430).
2 For a most interesting account of Jewish life in those parts, and on the general relation of Judaism and Chris- tianity, see Renan Les Apétres p. 284 sq. (ed. 1866). On the present ecclesiasti- cal organization of the district see Leake 111. p. 250.
3 Macmillan’s Magazine Feb. 1863 pp. 314, 5.
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THE MISSION OF TITUS TO THE CORINTHIANS.
7 Pa Reprinted from the ‘Journal of Classical and Sacred Philology, Vol. 11 p. 194 sq. (1855). i a _ == me ‘7
Va:
THE MISSION
OF TITUS
TO THE CORINTHIANS.
HE mission of Titus, which occupies so prominent a place in the Second Epistle to the Corinthians, has been the
subject of much discussion with regard to its object and relation to other communications of St Paul with the same Church, especially the similar and almost contemporaneous mission of Timotheus. The explanation here offered has not, as far as I have seen, been anticipated: it is certainly not the view main- tained by the most recent critics, English or German. At the same time it seems so far to recommend itself by its simplicity, and to offer so adequate a solution of all the difficulties which the problem presents, that it can scarcely have failed to suggest itself to the minds of others besides myself?.
But perhaps it may not be superfluous to say a few words on the previous communications of St Paul with the Church of Corinth, not only by way of introduction to my immediate subject, but also because they offer considerable difficulties in
themselves.
1 This paper had been partly writ- ten and the substance of the whole collected, before Mr Stanley’s book ap- peared. It was no slight satisfaction to me to find that with regard to one main point, the identification of the mission of Titus with that of the bre- thren mentioned in the First Epistle, the distinguished editor supports the view here maintained. Though so far anticipated, I have ventured to send this paper to the press, because the
L. E.
results were obtained independently, and, where they agree with those of Mr Stanley, are worked out more fully than his plan admitted.
I have alluded several times to Mr Stanley’s book in my notes, chiefly where I have had occasion to differ from him; but I would not be thought to dis- parage so valuable a contribution to the history of the apostolic times, I would wish the same remark to apply to my mention of other distinguished names.
18
274 THE MISSION OF TITUS
It must have been some time during St Paul’s three years’ residence at Ephesus (from A.D. 54 to 57), that he received information of the critical state of the Corinthian Church, which he had himself founded a few years earlier. Huis presence seemed to be required, and he accordingly crossed the Aigzean, and paid a short visit to the capital of Achaia, returning to Ephesus to complete his missionary work there. This seems to be the most probable account of St Paul’s second visit to Corinth, of which little more than the fact is recorded. For though the circumstance is not noticed by St Luke, yet his silence is easily accounted for, supposing it intentional, when we reflect that his object was not to write a complete biography of St Paul, but a history of the Christian Church, and that he has accordingly selected out of his materials such facts only as throw light upon Christianity in all ages—representative facts, as we might call them; while on the other hand, if it be supposed that he was unacquainted with the circumstance, this supposition again is easily explained from the short duration of St Paul’s stay at Corinth, and the facility of intercourse between the two coasts of the Hgean. At all events, there are passages in the epistles (e.g. 2 Cor. xii. 14; xiii. 1, 2) which seem inexplicable under any other hypothesis, except that of a second visit—the difficulty consisting not so much in the words themselves, as in their
relation to their context’. It appears necessary therefore to
1] cannot think, for instance, that Mr Stanley’s explanation of the context of 2 Cor. xii. 14, rplrov rotro éroluws éxw éOeiv pds buds, on the ground of the designed visit, is at all satisfactory. And yet he calls attention to the oppo- sition between the tenses xarevdpxynoa and xaravapxjow, which leads to the true solution, ‘I have not been bur- densome to you...I am on the eve of paying you a third visit, and I will not be burdensome,’ i.e. I will observe the same practice as on the two former occasions. But the appeal to his pro- jected visit as a proof of his affection (for this is Mr Stanley’s explanation) is
quite out of place in this connexion, to say nothing of the ambiguity of ex- pression. His interpretation of 2 Cor. xiii, 1 in relation to its context is scarcely less objectionable,
At all events, admitting Mr Stanley’s explanations as possible, it must seem strange that the Apostle should twice have veiled his mention of his designed visit under language which applies at least as well (in 2 Cor. xiii. 1 rplroy Touro épyoua, far better) to an actual visit, and in both cases have intro- duced it in a manner which so rudely interrupts the obvious train of thought.
On the other hand, 1 Cor. xvi. 7
TO THE CORINTHIANS. 975
abandon the opposite view, chiefly known to the English student through the advocacy of Paley, who seeks to explain these pas- sages on the ground of a visit designed, but never actually paid.
The Apostle’s visit seems not to have been effectual in checking the evils which called for his interference. It would appear that the shameless profligacy, for which the city was proverbial, had already found its way into the Christian com- munity. He therefore wrote to the Corinthians, warning them to shun the company of offenders in this kind. This letter, which was probably brief and of no permanent interest to the Christian Church, has not been preserved, and we only know that it was written, from a passing allusion to it in a subsequent epistle'—the First to the Corinthians in our Canon. It was probably in this lost letter that he informed them of the design,
has been unjustifiably pressed into the service. The words ot #é\w yap buds dipre év mapddw idetv have been inter- preted ‘I will not now pay you a pass- ing visit;’ implying that he had done so before, and, as St Paul on his first visit to Achaia stayed eighteen months (Acts xviii. 11), necessarily alluding to a second and shorter visit. Against this Meyer alleges the order of the words, and de Wette repeats this argument. So far as I can see, the order would admit this interpretation well enough, and Wieseler (Chron. p. 240) has a right to make use of the passage in spite of this protest. The real objection seems to be that the natural, if not the necessary, antithe- sis to dp7u ‘just now’ (when used of present time) is the future, and not the past. On this ground I should object to Mr Stanley’s explanation, ‘now according to my present, as dis- tinguished from my late intention.’ 11 Cor. v. 9 “Eypaya tyiv ev TH ETLTTOAN fe owavaplyvucbar mopvots: but as undue weight has been assigned to these words, as showing that a pre- vious letter had been written, it will be
as well to see how far they favour such a view. (1) No such conclusion can be drawn from the aorist éypaya. That this word is frequently used in refer- ence to the letter in which it occurs, any concordance will show; I must also confess myself unable to discern the latent ‘philosophical’ objections to its being so employed, eyen at the commencement of a letter (Davidson, Introd, 11. p. 140, ed. 1); the grammar, at all events, seems unexceptionable. Cf. Martyr. Polyc. c. 1: éypapapev buiv, ddedpol, TA KaTa TOvs MapTUpHcar- ras, where the words occur immedi- ately after the salutation. (2) It is unnecessary to accumulate instances to show that 4 émicro\7 may refer to the letter itself. (3) It has been found difficult to explain the allusion by anything which has preceded. This difficulty must be allowed: verses 2, 6, 8, do not supply what is wanted: but is it necessary to seek any refer- ence beyond the passage itself? Would it not be quite in accordance with this epistolary usage of the aorist to look for the explanation in the same sen- tence, so that the corresponding English
18—2
276 THE MISSION OF TITUS
which he at this time entertained but was afterwards obliged to abandon, of paying them a double visit, on his way to and return from Macedonia (1 Cor. xvi. 5; 2 Cor. i. 15).
How long an interval elapsed before St Paul again com- municated with the Corinthian Christians, we cannot ascertain ; but it was towards the close of his stay at Ephesus, that he despatched Timotheus through Macedonia on his way to Corinth, though apparently with some apprehensions that he might not reach that city, and not long after addressed a second letter to them—the First Epistle of our Canon. This he placed in the hands of certain brethren, whom he expected to arrive at Corinth a little before or at any rate not later than Timotheus (1 Cor. xvi. 10-12), so that they might return together, and rejoin the Apostle in company. Have we any means of discovering who these brethren were ?
It seems more than probable in the first place, that Timotheus never reached Corinth, but was detained in Macedonia so long, that he had not advanced beyond this point, when he was over- taken by St Paul on his way from Ephesus to Achaia. At all events he must have been in St Paul’s company when the Second Epistle was written, as his name appears in the salutation, and there are sufficient grounds for concluding that this Epistle
was sent from Macedonia. But there are numerous reasons for
to the words éypawa buty ph cvvavaply- vucba would be, ‘I write to you not to keep company’?
The only substantial argument in favour of a previous letter seems to be contained in the words év rp érwroXp, which are quite superfluous in refer- ence to the First Epistle itself, and the comparison with 2 Cor. vii. 8 makes the allusion to a previous letter even more evident. This argument appears to be insuperable.
I suppose that the Chey. Bunsen’s ‘Restoration’ of the ‘Former Epistle of Peter’ will carry conviction to few German and still fewer English minds (Hippol.i. p. 24, ed. 2,in Anal. Anten. I.
p. 35 sq.), but it is perhaps worth while observing how completely his argument founded on 1 Pet. v. 12 & é\lywv éypaya, which he finds it neces- sary to refer to a former and shorter letter, is met by such passages as Hebr. xiii. 22 dia Bpayéwy éréoreda tutv, Ignatius ad Polyc. ¢c. vii. (shorter Greek) 60’ dAlywv buas ypauudrwr mape- kd\eoa. For not only is the aorist used in both these passages in a way which M. Bunsen seems to think inad- missible, but the writers have also ventured to characterize their epistles as brief, though they considerably ex- ceed in length that to which he con- siders such a term inappropriate.
TO THE CORINTHIANS. QUE
supposing that this was the limit of Timotheus’ journey. In the first place: St Paul himself in announcing this projected visit of Timotheus to Corinth, has evidently some misgivings as to its fulfilment, and consequently speaks of it as uncertain, éav dé €XOn Tipoeos (1 Cor. xvi. 10). Probably he foresaw circumstances which would detain his missionary on the way. Secondly, Timotheus is represented in the Acts (xix. 22) as being sent with Erastus into Macedonia, as if the sacred historian were not aware of his journey being continued to Corinth. Thirdly: if Timotheus had actually visited Corinth, he must have brought back some information as to the state of the Church there ; and, if he arrived, as was expected, subsequently to the receipt of the First Epistle, he must also have been able to report on a subject which lay nearest to the Apostle’s heart—the manner in which his letter was received by the Corinthian Christians. But we do not find this to have been the case. For while in the Second Epistle to the Corinthians St Paul dwells at great length on information derived from another source—the epistle in fact arising entirely out of this—there is not the slightest inkling of any knowledge obtained through Timotheus on any subject whatever. And fourthly, in one passage where St Paul is enumerating visits recently paid to the Corinthians by the Apostle himself or by his accredited messengers, the name of Timotheus does not occur, though it could scarcely have been passed over in such a connexion (2 Cor. xu. 17, 18).
For these reasons we may infer with extreme probability, that Timotheus, finding it advisable to prolong his stay in Macedonia, was prevented from carrying out his original mten- tion of visiting Achaia, before he joined St Paul. For, though each of these arguments separately is far from conclusive, they seem when combined to form such a body of circumstantial evidence, as fully to justify this verdict. Again, if this con- clusion be admitted, it simplifies the problem, and the subsequent communications of the Apostle with the Church of Corinth become easily explicable. This consideration is of course not without weight.
278 THE MISSION OF TITUS
On the other hand attempts have been made to impugn some of these arguments. It will be as well to dispose of these before proceeding.
In answer to the second argument, it has been maintained that the journey of Timotheus to Macedonia (Acts xix. 22) was different from, and subsequent to, his mission to Corinth. If such a method of reconciling the accounts can in any way be avoided, it should not be resorted to. The philosopher’s rule with entities should be the historian’s with facts. They should not be unnecessarily multiplied. Here so far is there from being any necessity, that it is not easy to account for these repeated journeys, which moreover in some degree perplex the chro- nology, there being a difficulty in compressing all the events within the given time.
In the statement on which my third argument is based, I am at issue with Wieseler (Chron. p. 58) in a matter of fact. I can therefore only state the case and leave it for the judgment of others. He argues thus. The language with which the Epistle opens (i, 12—ii. 11) was evidently prompted by St Paul’s distress at the opposition which his former letter had occasioned. Now this language describes his state of mind before the arrival of Titus. Therefore some other messenger must have reached him meanwhile from Corinth. Who can this messenger have been but Timotheus? With Wieseler’s hypothesis as to the composition of the Second Epistle, built upon the argument here given, I have no concern. The argument itself too is unexceptionable, if the premise be once allowed. But does not his statement arise from an entire misconception? I believe ordinary readers will discern no such traces of tidings received before the arrival of Titus. They will read in the opening of the Second Epistle nothing more than the vague apprehensions and misgivings, which would naturally arise in the Apostle’s mind as to the manner in which a condemnatory letter, expressed in such fearless and uncompromising language—written moreover in much affliction and anguish of spirit (2 Cor. ii. 4)—would be received in a community where the most flagrant irregularities
TO THE CORINTHIANS. 279
prevailed, and where his own apostolic authority was denied by a considerable number, and perverted to factious purposes by others. Surely the language would have been far different; his fears would have been far more clearly defined, if he had actually received tidings; especially if these tidings had been brought by a messenger as trustworthy as Timotheus.
The fourth argument has been answered on the supposition that St Paul in 2 Cor. xii. 17, 18 is only speaking of those who took part in the collection of alms, and that, as the mission of Timotheus was quite independent of any such object, his name is properly omitted. But where does it appear that the list of names is so restricted? The word éXeovéxtnoev, judging from the context, seems to refer rather to the abuse of the Corinthians’ hospitality, than to the gathering of the contributions. Meyer again accounts for the omission of Timotheus’ name on the ground that only the most recent visits to Corinth are here alluded to. Yet granting that his view is true, as probably it is, still the visit of Timotheus must have preceded that of Titus by a few weeks at most, and could not have been omitted on this account. The same able critic even considers that any mention at all of Timotheus in the third person would be quite out of place, when his name is found in the superscription of the letter (on 2 Cor. xii. 18, cf. Hinl. § 1); and Mr Alford urges the same argument, though less strongly (Vol. u. Prol. p. 56). It is a sufficient reply to Meyer to observe that, whether out of place or not, it is what St Paul has done elsewhere (eg. 1 Thess. iii. 3, 6), and what therefore he might be supposed to do here.
On the other hand, the direct arguments which have been employed by those who consider it improbable that Timotheus should have abandoned his design, do not seem to have much force. Mr Alford for instance considers the purpose of his mission as stated in 1 Cor. iv. 17, to be ‘too plain and precise to be lightly given up. That the mission should have been entirely abandoned is certainly unlikely. That it should have been transferred to other hands, when it was found incompatible
280 THE MISSION OF TITUS
with the discharge of Timotheus’ duties in Macedonia, so far from being an improbable supposition, seems to commend itself by its very probability. Again it is suggested by Meyer, and here too Mr Alford endorses the suggestion, that the abandon- ment of the intended journey of Timotheus would have furnished another handle for the charge of fickleness against St Paul, and that we should have found the charge rebutted in the Second Epistle. This reason will probably not be considered of suffi- cient weight to counterbalance the amount of evidence on the other side. For if we take into account that the charge would le primarily at the door of Timotheus, and not of the Apostle himself—that St Paul in announcing the design had expressed some doubts as to the possibility of its fulfilment—that the objects of the mission were not abandoned when it was found impossible for Timotheus to carry them out—and lastly, that the messengers sent by St Paul in his stead had a satis- factory explanation to offer to the Corinthians of this change of purpose—we can hardly suppose that the most captious of St Paul’s enemies would have thought it worth their while to employ such a lame expedient to injure his credit. In short, this case is no parallel at all to the circumstance of which his opponents did avail themselves to bring him into disrepute (2, -Cor.-i,,17).
On the whole then, so far from finding anything conflicting in the evidence with regard to this mission of Timotheus, it seems that, combining the hint of the possible abandonment of the design in the First Epistle, the account of the journey to Macedonia in the Acts, and the silence maintained with regard to any visit to Corinth or any definite information received thence through Timotheus in the Second Epistle, we discover an ‘undesigned coincidence’ of a striking kind; and that it is therefore a fair and reasonable conclusion that the visit was never paid.
By whom then was this mission fulfilled? At the close of the First Epistle (xvi. 11, 12) certain ‘brethren’ are mentioned, who appear to have been the bearers of the letter, and whom St Paul
TO THE CORINTHIANS. 281
expected to rejoin him in company with Timotheus. The Apostle had urged Apollos to accompany this mission to Corinth (v. 12), but he for reasons easily intelligible had declined, considering that his visit would be unseasonable. Now there is no mention of the names of these brethren in the First Epistle, but we find St Paul subsequently after his departure from Ephesus at Troas awaiting the return of Titus from Corinth with tidings of the reception of his letter there (2 Cor. 1. 12), and falling in with him at length in Macedonia (2 Cor. vil.6). From this we might have supposed that Titus was alone. But from another allusion to this mission in the Second Epistle we find he was accompanied by a ‘ brother,’ whose name is not given (2 Cor, xi. 18)". What more probable than that Titus and ‘the brother’ accompanying him of the Second Epistle, are ‘the brethren’ of the First ? But why is Titus not mentioned by name? Might we not rather ask, why he should be so mentioned? His name never occurs in the Acts. His influence on the interests of the Church at large was probably not so great as that of Tychicus or Trophimus, certainly not as that of Apollos or Timotheus. He is brought into prominent notice in reference to the Churches of Corinth and Crete in particular; but we should doubtless be wrong in judging of his position in the Christian Church by the special importance with which he is invested in regard to indi- vidual communities. The fact that an Epistle of St Paul bears his name leads us almost unconsciously to assign a rank to him which he probably did not hold in the estimation of his con- temporaries. Titus then does not appear to have had a church- wide reputation at this time, and there is no reason to suppose that he was known specially to the Christians at Corinth. If so, the emission of his name presents no difficulty, and it is in
1 T am at a loss to discover why Mr__— rity, though I have not found any Stanley says, ‘This mission wascom- confirmation), but this has evidently posed of Titus and two other brethren’ arisen from a confusion with the sub- (on 1 Cor. xvi. 12). The Syriac ver- sequent mission, mentioned 2 Cor. viii. sion indeed in 2 Cor. xii, 18 reads the 16. Mr Stanley does not give his plural ‘the brethren’ (I assume this reasons elsewhere (2 Cor. viii. 16; xii. to be the case on Mr Stanley’s autho- 18).
282 THE MISSION OF TITUS
accordance with St Paul’s manner to speak thus of his fellow- labourers (2 Cor. viii. 18, 22). No doubt Titus’ strength of character was well known to the Apostle when he despatched him upon this difficult mission, but it only approved itself to the Corinthians during his stay among them; and his earnestness and devotion, while there, raised him so far above his colleague, that St Paul in writing to the Corinthians subsequently speaks in such a manner as to show that ‘the brother’ who accompanied him had sunk by his side into comparative insignificance.
Titus then, we may suppose, had been selected by St Paul as one of the bearers of the letter, that in the event of Timotheus being unable to prosecute his mission to Corinth, it might be fulfilled by one who would act in the same loving and devoted spirit. But there is one link yet to be supplied. How did Titus communicate with Timotheus? How was it known that Timo- theus would be detained in Macedonia? Here we are left to mere conjecture; but it seems not improbable that Titus and his companion took the less direct route to Achaia by way of Macedonia. They certainly returned that way, and there was, as far as we can see, no more reason for haste in the one case than in the other. And if it was the apprehension of danger which deterred them from crossing the open sea at that early season of the year, they would have much more cause to enter- tain such fears on their journey thither than on their return, when. the season was farther advanced. Probably the greater security of the indirect route was thought to compensate for the ad- vantage, in point of time, gained by sailing straight across the Agean'; while the opportunity of communicating with Timo- theus would be an additional motive in influencing their choice.
If the view here taken be correct, it will overthrow all Wieseler’s chronological results with regard to the interval
1 The movements of St Paulin the and he went by way of Macedonia, following spring throw some light on apparently on account of the early this point. He had intended to sail season of the year. He left Philippi direct from Corinth to Syria. His de- era ras nudpas rv afiuwv (Acts xx.
parture however was hastened by the 6). Cf. Conybeare and Howson, 11. discovery of a conspiracy against him, _p. 206.
TO THE CORINTHIANS. 283
between the writing of the First and Second Epistles. The facts are few and lead to no satisfactory conclusion ; but as far as they go, they do not conflict with anything I have advanced. The data for determining the relative chronology of this period are these; (1) St Paul stayed at Ephesus ‘for a season’ after sending Timotheus into Macedonia (éréoyev ypovov, Acts xix. 22). (2) Timotheus had left before the First Epistle was written (1 Cor. iv. 17; xvi. 10). (8) There is an allusion which makes it not improbable that the First Epistle was written shortly before Easter (1 Cor. v. 7, 8). (4) St Paul here declares his intention of setting out to visit Corinth quickly (iv. 19). (5) We also learn from the same source that he expected to stay at Ephesus till Pentecost (xvi. 8): and lastly (6) there is reason to suppose that he was subsequently led to hasten his departure. It is not evident indeed that his life was endangered by the tumult at Ephesus’, but such an outbreak must have interfered with his preaching, and rendered his further stay there useless. At all events the language of St Luke places his departure in immediate connexion with this disturbance, in such a manner as scarcely to leave a doubt that it was determined by this circumstance (Acts xix. 41; xx. 1). It is probable, therefore, that he left before he had intended; and this explains another We find St Paul, after his hurried departure from Ephesus, expecting to meet Titus at Troas, and when he was
incident.
disappointed of this hope, advancing into Macedonia, where he was ultimately jomed by him. Wieseler (Chron. p. 59) uses
1 Wieseler considers it necessary to bring Timotheus back from Macedonia to Ephesus, because the plural in 2 Cor. i. 8 seems to show that he shared the danger with St Paul on the occasion of the outbreak. The question of the use of the plural is beset with difficul- ties; but, waiving this, the language of St Paul (A@AiWews, EBapnOnuev, éé- amopnOfjva) must refer to something more than the mere momentary danger arising from the uproar. St Paul seems to have been subjected to a continuous
persecution at Ephesus, which must have begun before the departure of Timotheus, and may have been shared by him. St Paul speaks in the First Epistle of his many adversaries (xvi. 9), and compares his struggles at Ephesus to a contest with wild beasts in the arena (xv. 32). It is strange that €Onpioudxyynoa should ever have been understood literally, when the same image is used 1 Cor. iv. 9 ws ema- vatlous, 67. Béarpov éeyevnOnuev.
284 THE MISSION OF TITUS TO THE CORINTHIANS.
this as an argument, that St Paul’s departure cannot have taken place much earlier than he had originally intended; for otherwise he could not have expected to find Titus so soon at the place of meeting determined upon. This seems to be a mistake. There is no reason for supposing that they had agreed to meet at Troas. The true state of the case appears to be this. St Paul had intended to await the return of Titus and his colleague at Ephesus. Subsequently being obliged to hasten his departure, he calculated they would have advanced as far as Troas before they met. In this calculation he proved to be wrong.
If this view be correct, the hurried departure from Ephesus will obviously not affect the chronological question, which thus assumes a very simple form. We have the period from the writing of the First Epistle, shortly before Easter (if we may lay so much stress on a doubtful allusion), till after the feast of Pentecost, when St Paul expected to leave Ephesus, for the double journey of Titus, to Corinthand back. I have supposed that he went and returned by way of Macedonia. Even assuming that he travelled from Macedonia to Achaia by land, the interval is sufficiently great. Hug (Introd. Ul. p. 381) calculates the single journey from Corinth to Ephesus at thirty-one days, but then he allows a wide margin which is quite superfluous. But, if it be thought that in this case more time would be required, we may suppose that Titus took ship at some port of Macedonia (Thessalonica for instance), as St Paul seems to have done on one occasion on leaving Bercea (Acts xvii. 14; Wieseler’s Chron. pp. 42, 43), and returned the same way. This would be a considerable saving of time, and the perils of the open sea
would in great measure be avoided. [1855.
eX:
THE STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION OF THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
A. M. RENAN’S THEORY OF THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
Reprinted from the ‘Journal of Philology,’ Vol. 11. p. 264 sq. (1869).
B
ON THE END OF THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS. By Dr HORT.
Reprinted from the ‘Journal of Philology,’ Vol. 111. p. 51 sq. (1871).
C. THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
Reprinted from the ‘Journal of Philology, Vol. 111. p. 193 sq. (1871).
IX.
THE STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION OF THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
A.
N the introduction to his recent volume on St Paul, M. Renan has offered a novel theory to account for certain phenomena connected with the Epistle to the Romans. If, for reasons which I shall give hereafter, this theory seems to me to be unsatis- factory, it is yet sufficiently ingenious and striking to claim a fair discussion ; and, as the subject itself possesses great critical interest independently of M. Renan’s views, I gladly avail myself of the opportunity to investigate it in detail.
The documentary facts which demand explanation, and which have served as the foundation for several theories more or less allied to that of M. Renan, are the following:
(1) In Rom. i. 7 one MS. (G) for tots ovow év ‘Pon aya- mnrtois cod reads trols ovcow év ayarn Ocovd; while in 1. 15 it omits the words rots év ‘Poeun. Again the cursive 47 contains the following marginal note on 1. 7, To év “Pay, ovTe ev TH éEnynoes oUTE Ev TO PNTO povynwovever, where however it is not clear to what authority the scribe refers, though apparently he is speaking of some commentator. Moreover I seem to see other traces of the omission (at least in 1. 7), which hitherto have not been recognised. Though Origen elsewhere quotes the common reading (I. p. 301, Iv. p. 287), and though it is given as the text in Rufinus’ translation of his commentary on this very passage, yet the comment itself, even as disguised by its Latin dress, still appears to me to indicate that Origen here had before him a text in which the words év “Pon were omit- ted; ‘Benedictio haec pacis et gratiae quam dat dilectis Dei ad
288 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
quos scribit apostolus Paulus’ (Iv. p. 467). The same inference also, if I mistake not, is suggested by the language of the Am- brosian Hilary ; ‘Quamvis Romanis scribat, illis tamen scribere se significat qui in caritate Dei sunt’; though here again the text has ‘qui sunt Romae dilectis Dei, but with the important various reading (in one MS.) of ‘in caritate Dei’ for ‘dilectis Dei. These, it will be remembered, are the two oldest extant commentaries on the Epistle to the Romans. Still further; I am disposed to think that the reading év aydmrn Oecod (for ayarnrtois @eov), which is found in several other authorities, has arisen out of a combination of the two readings Tots otow év “Podun ayarntois Oeod and Tots otcow év aydrn Oecod, and thus bears indirect testimony to a still wider diffusion of a recension omitting the words év “Pwyy. This reading occurs in the Latin of D (the Greek is wanting), and in the two oldest MSS. of the Vulgate.
(2) The ascription of praise, with which according to the received text (xvi. 25-27) the epistle closes, occupies different places in different copies. InN, B, C, D, f, Vulg., Pesh., Memph., /Eth., and in the commentaries of Origen, Hilary, and Pelagius, it occurs at the end of the xvith chapter, as in the received text; in L, 37, 47, and by far the greater number of cursives, in the Harclean Syriac, in the commentaries of Chrysostom, Theodoret, and others, and in Cyril of Alexandria, its place is at the close of the xivth chapter: in A, P, 17, Arm. (MSS. and Zohr.), it is found in both places; while in F, G, it is omitted in both (a blank space however being left in G between the xivth and xvth chapters). This variation of position moreover is at least as early as Origen, who commenting on xvi. 25-27 writes ; ‘Caput hoe Marcion, a quo scripturae evangelicae atque apostolicae interpolatae sunt, de hac epistola penitus abstulit ; et non solum hoc, sed et ab eo loco ubi scriptum est, Omne autem quod non est ex fide, peccatum est (xiv. 23), usque ad finem cuncta dissecuit. In aliis vero exemplaribus, id est in his quae non sunt a Marcione temerata, hoc ipsum caput (i.e. xvi. 25-27) diverse positum invenimus. In nonnullis etenim codicibus post
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 289
eum locum quem supra diximus, hoc est Omne autem quod non est ex fide peccatum est, statim cohaerens habetur Hi autem qui potens est vos confirmare. Alii vero codices in fine id, ut nunc positum est, continent.’ From this language we may perhaps assume that the authorities for either position seemed to Origen to be nearly evenly balanced. Whether in ‘ut nunc positum est’ he refers to the position which he himself adopts in this commentary, or to the position which was most common in his day, does not distinctly appear. He makes no mention of any MSS. as having it in both places, or (except Marcion’s copies) of any as omitting it in both. St Jerome however (on Ephes. ii. 5) speaks of this passage as occurring ‘in plerisque codicibus, thus implying that it is omitted in some; but he may have been deceived by not finding it in the place where he expected to find it.
(3) As appears from the statement of Origen just quoted, Marcion’s recension of the epistle closed with the end of the xivth chapter. Moreover Tertullian (adv. Mare. v. 14) refers to tribunal Christi (xiv. 10) as occurring in clausula of the epistle; but, as he is refuting Marcion, we might reasonably suppose that he here takes Marcion’s own copy and argues from it. On the other hand, it does not appear that he himself elsewhere quotes from the xvth or xvith chapters of the epistle, though the omission may be accidental. Neither is there, so far as I know, any reference to these last two chapters in Trenzeus, but here also no stress can be laid on the omission, as there was no special reason for his quoting them. Again, Wetstein says, ‘Codex Latinus habet capitula epistolae ad Roma- nos 51, desinit autem in cap. xiv.’, but later critics have not been able to identify the MS. and thus to verify the statement.
To explain these documentary facts, as also to account for certain phenomena in the closing chapters of the epistle itself, various theories have from time to time been suggested, which I shall here attempt to classify.
(i) Baur, with characteristic boldness, denied the genuineness of the last two chapters, or, in other words, accepted the recen-
Bek 19
290 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
sion of Marcion as preserving the original proportions of the epistle (Paulus p. 398 sq.). This solution does not take into account all the facts stated. Thus, for instance, it passes over in silence the omission of the words év ‘Pwun in one or more copies. For this reason it must be rejected on the ground of external criticism alone. But again, when we come to examine the xvth and xvith chapters themselves, whatever may be our conclusion as regards their destination, we are forced to recog- nise their genuineness. M. Renan expresses his surprise ‘ qu’un critique aussi habile que Baur se soit contenté d’une solution aussi grossiére. Pourquoi un faussaire aurait-il inventé de si insignifiants détails? Pourquoi aurait-il ajouté a l’ouvrage sacré un liste de noms propres ?’ (p. lxxi. sq.) If the argument is just, the surprise is hardly reasonable ; for in spite of his ac- knowledged ability, Baur’s prompt method elsewhere is entirely consistent with the rejection of these chapters. But indeed we need not rely on this negative argument derived from the in- adequacy of the motive for such a forgery. The style and the substance of the chapters afford conclusive testimony, that we have here not only the thoughts, but the words, of the Apostle himself. To this it must be added that the incidental notices, of which Paley has made use to establish the time and place of writing, hang together in a manner which would suppose not only the most consummate skill, but also the most minute knowledge, on the part of a forger.
From this solution which maintains the spuriousness of the last two chapters, we pass to others which, accepting them as genuine, assume their displacement to a greater or less degree. And here we may subdivide, according as_ these chapters are supposed to have been addressed wholly to the Romans or partly (at least) to some other Church,
(ii) Among those who accept the Roman destination of the whole, but assume some displacement, is HEUMANN*. He
1 The views of Heumann, Paulus, des Briefes an die Rimer 1833, as I Griesbach, and Semler, are here given have had no opportunity of verifying at second hand from Reiche Erkliirung the references.
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 291
supposes that the original epistle comprised the first eleven chapters, to which were added two postscripts, xvi. 1-24, and xvi. 25-27. The intermediate matter (cc. xii-xv.) formed a separate letter to the Romans written on account of some intelligence received meanwhile from Rome. The two letters were afterwards combined (but not by the Apostle himself), in such a manner as to throw the postscript to the end.
In like manner Pauuus (de Orig. Ep. ad Rom., Jena 1801) offered another solution on the same basis. The xvth chapter was a sort of supplementary letter, addressed to the enlightened. The xvith chapter, written on a separate parchment, contained recommendations of Phoebe the bearer of the letter to the principal members of the Church, and instructions to her to salute certaim persons. Finding that there was space remaining on this leaf, the Apostle availed himself of it to add some directions to the presbyters. The doxology at the end belonged originally to the general letter, but was afterwards displaced when the several documents were put together.
Another hypothesis, which like the two last mentioned supposes the epistle to consist of a number of Sibylline leaves stitched together almost at random, is that of GRIESBACH (Cure in Hist. Test. Gr. Epp. Paul. p. 45). He believes that the original letter ended with xiv. 23, the parchment being exhausted. The final doxology, xvi. 25-27, was attached on a separate leaf. Another parchment contained the salutations from certain friends of St Paul, with a benediction, xvi. 21-24. St Paul then found leisure to continue the subject, where he had broken off, in a postscript (xv.), to which he added another benediction. A fourth parchment contained the names of the Roman Christians who were saluted, together with a warning against intriguers; and here again a benediction was appended. At a later date, when these various leaves were attached together, different places were assigned to the doxo- logy, and in some copies it was entirely omitted.
The three solutions last mentioned, while disintegrating the epistle, assume that all the component parts were addressed to
19—2
292 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
the Roman Church. This is not the case with those which follow.
(iii) SEMLER (Paraphr. 1769) supposes that the letter to the Romans closed with the xivth chapter; that the bearers of the letter were charged to distribute copies to the leading members of certain churches which they would visit on the route; and that an authoritative list of these persons (xvi.) was given to them at the same time. To these persons, not to the Roman Church, the xvth chapter was addressed. The bearers would visit Cenchrez, the residence of Phoebe, and Ephesus, where Aquila was staying. The places where the others dwelt are not mentioned by name, because they were well known to the bearers.
Not very different is E1CHHORN’S hypothesis (Zinl. Th. iii.). The parchment destined for the original letter, he supposes, ended with the xivth chapter. A separate leaf contained on one side the final doxology, on the other the salutations and benediction. This formed the whole of the letter as originally conceived. But some time intervening before it was sent, the Apostle added on a separate leaf (which was interposed) certain warnings and personal explanations (xv.). The remainder of the present epistle (xvi. 1-20) was not addressed to the Romans, but was a letter of introduction for Phabe, perhaps intended for Corinth. Phebe forgot to deliver it, and took it with her to Rome.
From these complex theories, which hardly deserve credit for ingenuity, it is a relief to turn to simpler solutions. Allow- ing the xvth chapter to stand as part of the Epistle to the Romans, several critics have separated the xvith chapter from the rest, and assigned it to some other letter. Thus SCHULZ (Stud. u. Krit. 1829, p. 609) supposed it to be a portion of an epistle written from Rome to Ephesus: and this view has been recently adopted by EwaLp (Sendschr. des Apostels Paulus p. 428 sq.), who however restricts the intrusive fragment to xvi. 3-20. On the other hand Scuorr (Jsagoge p. 250 sq.) regards the xvith chapter as a congeries of fragments written by the
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 293
Apostle from Corinth to some Christian community in Asia Minor.
It will be seen at once that in this last class of solutions the documentary facts are entirely neglected, the theories being built on certain phenomena in the chapter itself. But indeed the same charge lies, though in a less degree, against all the solutions enumerated under the heads (ii) and (iii). No regard at all is paid to the remarkable omission of the mention of Rome in the opening verses; and, as attempts to explain the textual phenomena of the last two chapters, they are in most cases at once superfluous and defective. At the same time they are condemned by their highly artificial character.
I hope to show that M. Renan’s theory also must be rejected, both as involving strong improbabilities in itself, and as being more complex than the phenomena demand. But, in so far as it grapples fairly with the documentary facts, it has a higher claim to attention than the others.
M. Renan then supposes that the so-called Epistle to the Romans was a circular letter, of which several copies with distinct and appropriate endings were sent to different churches, the body of the letter being the same for all. One of these was despatched to Rome, a second to Ephesus, a third to Thessa- lonica, and a fourth to some unknown Church. Our epistle is the work of a later editor, who had these four copies in his hands, and combined all the endings so that nothing might be lost. The following table will show what parts of our epistle (according to M. Renan’s view) belonged to each of these :
Romans. Ephesians, Thessalonians. | Unknown Church. i-xi. i-xi. i-xi. | i-xi. SH a MU SAVE! || XA, KT, XAv, Xli, Xlii, xiv. Xv. xvi. 1-20. | | xvi. 21-24, xvi. 25-27,
In the last three some modification would be made also in the
294 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
first chapter. The mention of Rome (vv. 7, 15) at all events must have been expunged.
M. Renan founds this theory of a quadripartite epistle on the assumed fact that in the existing recension we meet with four successive endings, xv. 33, xvi. 20, xvi. 24, xvi. 25-27. His reasons for assigning the several portions to letters addressed to the several churches above mentioned will appear in the sequel.
The most convenient method of dealing with M. Renan’s opinions will be first to consider the difficulties which he feels in the received view that the whole epistle was written to the Romans and which oblige him to substitute another hypothesis, and then to state the objections which lie against his own theory.
The difficulties then, which M. Renan proposes to remove by his theory, are the following:
1. Certain phenomena in the body of the letter are per- plexing, if it was written to the Romans. He selects as in- stances, the passages 11. 16, xi. 13, xvi. 25. Of these he says that they are ‘only moderately adapted to the faithful of Rome, and would amount to indiscretion if addressed to these last alone’ (p. Ixxiv.). This objection rests on the assumption that the Roman Church consisted wholly of Jewish Christians; an assumption which I shall consider hereafter. At present I would only remark that, inasmuch as the letter (on M. Renan’s hypothesis) was specialized by attaching an appropriate ending and thus became to all intents and purposes an Epistle to the Romans, it is difficult to see how the ‘indiscretion’ would be affected by the fact that other copies with other endings were despatched to other churches.
Again, M. Renan, building on the assumption already men- tioned that the Roman Church must have been Judeo-Christian, claims for his theory the merit of explaining ‘the hesitation of the best critics on the question whether the letter was addressed to converted heathens or to Jewish Christians’; for on his hypo- thesis ‘the principal parts of the epistle would have been com-
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 295
posed to serve for several churches at once’ (p. lxxiv.). The answer to this argument is the same as to the former; and to the same extent I must reserve what I have to say in reply.
2. Moreover M. Renan thinks it surprising that St Paul should have composed ‘un morceau si capital,’ ‘having regard solely to a church which he did not know and over which he had not incontestable rights’ (p. Ixxiv.). Considering the general and comprehensive character of the epistle, it seems to me that the church of the metropolis would naturally be chosen for such a purpose, and that the Apostle saw a distinct advant- age in addressing such a letter to a community with which he had no special relations, so that he would run no risk of being diverted from his aim by any personal interests. But to this subject again I shall have occasion to return hereafter.
3. When he reaches the xuith, xiith, and xivth chapters, M. Renan sees many difficulties in supposing that St Paul can have addressed such language to the Romans. He regards it as a departure from the Apostle’s principle ‘Each on his own ground’ (p. lxiii.). He cannot understand that one who is so unsparing towards those who ‘build on other men’s foundations’ should himself give such bold counsel to a church which he had not founded. He discovers a difference in tone between these chapters and the xvth, which he supposes to be really addressed to the Romans, and which seems to him to hold gentler language. I am not sure that others would find out this difference; but if any such exists, the Apostle’s own words supply the explanation. In xv. 15 he himself apologizes for speaking to the Romans ‘with over-boldness’ (todunpo- tepov). But indeed, if this interference with the Roman Christians be truly a violation of the Apostle’s rule not to build on another man’s foundation, he has already violated it in addressing to them a letter of instruction of which the doctrinal portion is at least as peremptory as these special pre- cepts, and he has expressed his intention of still further violating
296 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
it by paying them a visit and by communicating to them some spiritual gift (i. 11). This argument proves nothing, because it proves too much.
4. The opening verses of the xvth chapter also occasion some surprise to M. Renan on the common supposition as to the integrity and destination of the letter. They seem to him merely to repeat and to enfeeble what has gone before. ‘It is hardly supposable,’ he says, ‘that they occurred in the same letter’ with the foregoing chapters (pp. Ixiv., 461). Moreover ‘the verses 1-13 appear to be addressed to Judzxo-Christians. St Paul there makes concessions to Jewish ideas’ (pp. lxiv., 462). These remarks seem to me to show a strange misapprehension of the Apostle’s drift. At the close of the preceding chapter he has taught that in the matter of meats there must be mutual concession and forbearance; that the man who can conscien- tiously eat may do so, but that in so doing he must take care not to scandalize his weaker brother. At the opening of the xvth chapter he turns round and addresses, not Jewish Christ- ians who were too scrupulous about such matters, but ultra- Pauline Christians who were only too ready to go their own way and to ignore the effects of their conduct on others; ‘ But it is the duty of us—the strong—to support the infirmities of the weak and not to please ourselves. A comparison with 1 Cor. viii. 1, Gal. vi. 1, Phil. iii. 15, where there is the same touch of irony in St Paul’s language, will show the force of ogetAopev dé jwets of Suvarot, as addressed to the extravagant disciples of liberty. I am somewhat confident therefore that most persons who will read the xivth and xvth chapters con- tinuously, bearing this in mind, will not only not agree with M. Renan, but will find it difficult to believe that the two did not occur in the same letter’.
Another argument, of which M. Renan makes use against the Roman destination of these chapters, admits a still more direct refutation: ‘Il s’y sert du verbe tapaxana, verbe d'une nuance trés-mitigée sans doute, mais qui est toujours le mot
1 ‘Es ist unleugbar,’ says de Wette, ‘dass Cap. xv, 1-13 zu Cap. xiv. gehdort,’
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 297
qu'il emploie quand 1] parle a ses disciples.’ If this argument is to have any force, it must mean that trapaxade is never used by St Paul except to his disciples. If so, he has forgotten that it occurs in xv. 30, wapaxare Se twas x.T.r., a passage which on M. Renan’s own showing was addressed to the Roman Church.
It should be added that throughout his remarks on this xvth chapter M. Renan is hampered by the hypothesis that the Roman Church was Judeo-Christian. In one passage indeed he seems ready to make a concession, for he speaks of the majority as Judeo-Christian (p. lxiv.); but this has no practical influence on his argument. Yet surely the expression tpoc- NapBaverbe aXXrjXovs (xv. 7), not less than the whole tenour of the epistle, pots to a mixed community of Jews and Gentiles, in which it was the Apostle’s aim to conciliate the discordant elements. If the expression Christ a minister of the Circumcision (xv. 8) points (as M. Renan justly infers) to Jewish prepossessions among St Paul’s readers, yet on the other hand the Apostle’s language a few verses below, xv. 15, 16, ‘Remind- ing you by the grace which was given to me by God that I might be a minister of Christ Jesus unto the Gentiles,’ shows still more clearly that he looked upon the Roman Church as in some sense Gentile, and therefore under his own jurisdiction.
5. The objections which M. Renan brings against the Roman destination of the xvith chapter are partly his own and partly adopted from others.
The Apostle, he urges, concludes the xvth chapter with a benediction and a final Amen. This therefore must be the end of a letter, since St Paul never adds salutations after such a close (p. lxv.). As he mentions the final Amen twice, it must be supposed that he lays great stress on the occurrence of the word here. We are therefore the more surprised that he has not consulted the critical editions of the text. In this case he would have found that ayy is omitted by Griesbach, and placed in brackets by Lachmann and Tregelles. As the bias of scribes is always in favour of inserting rather than omitting an
298 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
Amen in such cases, and as in this place it is wanting in some good copies (though present in the majority), these editors have justly regarded it with suspicion. Deprived of the Amen, the passage has a very close parallel in Phil. iv. 9, cat 6 @eos THs elpnuns éotar ped Hor (comp. 2 Cor. xiii. 11, Gal. vi. 16), which occurs in the body of the letter. But indeed doxologies and benedictions, with or without the accompanying Amen, are very frequent in St Paul, in other places than at the close of an epistle, as eg. Rom. xi. 36, Gal. i. 5, Ephes. i. 20, 21, Phil. iv. 19, 20, 1 Thess. iii. 11-13, v. 23, 2 Thess. ii. 16, 17, iii, 5, 1 Tim. i. 17, vi. 16, 2 Tim. iv. 18; comp. Heb. xiii. 20, 21. In some cases these occur immediately before the saluta- tions, as in the present passage.
6. In the salutations themselves M. Renan finds the same difficulties which have been a stumbling-block in the way of others before him. He and they are surprised that St Paul should salute so many persons in a church which he had not visited, when he is so sparing of individual salutations in writing to churches with which his relations are most close and intimate. Let us ask in reply, What is the common experience in such matters? Will not a man studiously refrain from mentioning individual names where he is addressing a large circle of friends, feeling that it is invidious to single out some for special mention, where an exhaustive list is impossible? On the other hand, where only a limited number are known to him, he can name all, and no offence is given. This in fact is exactly what we find in St Paul. So far as the data are sufficient to establish any rule, it may be said that the number of names mentioned is in the inverse proportion to his familiarity with the church to which he is writing. In the Epistles to the Corinthians and Thessalonians no individuals are saluted. In the Epistle to the Philippians again there are no salutations properly so called, though a special warning is addressed to two persons by name and a commission given to another. On the other hand, in the Epistle to the Colossians, whom the Apostle had never visited, certain persons are saluted by name.
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 299
This preliminary difficulty therefore is no difficulty at all. But—M. Renan proceeds—there is great improbability in sup- posing that St Paul knew so many members of a church which he had never visited, that he should have had such intimate relations with several of them, and that he should be so well acquainted with their circumstances. In the case of almost any other church such a supposition would indeed be improbable. But Rome with its vast and ever-growing population of im- migrants from the East, and especially from Syria and Palestine, could not but contain a large number of residents known directly or indirectly to one who had travelled so long and so wide as St Paul. On this point let M. Renan himself be witness; ‘By the side of the Apostles who attained celebrity, he writes, ‘there was also another obscure apostolate, whose agents were not dogmatists by profession, but which was only the more efficacious on that account. The Jews of that time were extremely nomadic. Tradesmen, domestic servants, small craftsmen, they overran all the great towns on the coast (p. 96). Rome was the rendezvous of all the Oriental religions, the port of the Mediterranean with which the Syrians had the closest relations. They arrived there in enormous bands... With them disembarked troops of Greeks, of Asiatics, of Egyptians’ (p. 97).
But again, when he examines the names in detail, M. Renan is more than ever convinced that these salutations were not addressed to the Church of Rome. On the one hand he cannot find in the list any names known to have belonged to the Church of Rome at this time, and to substantiate this assertion he refers to 2 Tim. iv. 24, which, with some little ingenuity, he describes as a ‘passage which has its historical value, though the letter 1s apocryphal. I too allow the historical value of the passage (though, if I thought the letter apocryphal, I should hardly venture to build an argument on it); but I cannot see that the mention of four other names and only four in an epistle written from Rome after an interval of several years throws any discredit on this earlier list, as a catalogue of Roman Christians. On the other hand M. Renan finds in the list
300 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
‘several persons who assuredly never formed part’ of the Roman Church. Of these he singles out Aquila and Priscilla, remark- ing that as ‘every one knows, ‘only some months’ (quelques mois) elapsed between the writing of the First Epistle to the Corinthians and the Epistle to the Romans, and that, when the former was written, they were still at Ephesus (1 Cor. xvi. 19). Now it is just in a case like this that words should be carefully chosen. Yet on M. Renan’s own showing (and the fact can hardly be disputed) the Epistle to the Romans was not des- patched till the early part of the year 58 (see pp. 459, 498); whereas the First Epistle to the Corinthians was written about the same time or a little later in the preceding year (‘ probable- ment a l’époque méme de Paques,’ are M. Renan’s own words, p. 383); so that by the ‘some months’ we must understand ‘at least ten months.’ Elsewhere indeed (p. 6) he places even the Second Epistle to the Corinthians in the year 56, thus making a longer interval; but I presume that this is a slip of the pen. Is there then any real difticulty in supposing that they returned to Rome in this interval of a year more or less, and that St Paul should have been made acquainted with their return, seeing that his own travels meanwhile had lain mainly on the route between Ephesus and Rome? Aquila and Pris- cilla appear first at Rome, then at Corinth, then at Ephesus {Acts xviii. 2, 18, 19, 26, 1 Cor. xvi. 19). All this M. Renan admits. But he will not allow their return to Rome. This would be ‘leur préter une vie par trop nomade.’ Why, does not M. Renan himself afterwards in a passage already quoted (p. 275) describe the life of these itinerant Jewish artisans and traders exactly in this way? Does not the narrative of the Acts dis- tinctly assign to this couple a ‘nomadic’ life, which indeed was the direct consequence of the peculiar trade which they plied ? But ‘to bring them back to Rome, without their sentence of banishment being rescinded, on the very morrow of the day (juste le lendemain du jour) when Paul had bidden them fare- well at Ephesus, this in M. Renan’s opinion is to ‘accumulate mprobabilities,’ But how does he know that a special sentence
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 301
of banishment was pronounced against them individually or that, if pronounced, it was not revoked? On this point however I will appeal to a witness, whose testimony ought to be con- clusive, so far as M. Renan is concerned, and who (I confess) seems to me to put the matter in the right light; ‘These ex- pulsions’ (the writer is speaking of the edict of Claudius) ‘ were never more than temporary and conditional. The flood, arrested for a moment, always returned. The measure of Claudius had in any case very little result; for Josephus does not mention it, and in the year 58 Rome had already a new Christian Church’ (Saint Paul p. 111). But again, M. Renan, though he holds the 2nd Epistle to Timothy to be spurious, yet cannot refrain from using it to increase the supposed difficulty, because in that epistle Aquila and Priscilla appear again at Ephesus (2 Tim. iv. 19). Is it at all improbable that after an interval of nearly ten years they should again revisit this important city? They were wanderers not only by the exigencies of their trade, but also by the obligations of their missionary work. Why should we deny them a rapidity of movement, which we are obliged to concede to Timotheus, to Tychicus, to St Luke, to St Paul himself ?
But ‘this is not all. Inver. 5 St Paul salutes Epznetus, the first-born of Asia in Christ.’ ‘What!’ exclaims M. Renan, ‘had all the Church of Ephesus assembled at Rome?’ Let us dis- sect this sentence. This ‘all’ in plain language consists of three persons. Of one, Epznetus, we do not know that he belonged to Ephesus, but only that he was a native of the province. The other two belonged no more to Ephesus than to Pontus, to Corinth, to Rome, though about a year before this they happened to be residing in Ephesus. But once again, is there any improbability in imagining two or three Asiatic Christians resident or sojourning in Rome? Does not M. Renan himself speak of the ‘troops of Asiatics’ that flocked thither ? And history teaches that this language is not an exaggeration.
‘But,’ M. Renan continues, ‘ the list of names which follows is in like manner better suited to Ephesus than to Rome. He
302 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
allows indeed that ‘the earliest Church of Rome for the most part spoke Greek’: but he argues that in examining the Jewish inscriptions in Rome ‘Garrucci has found that the number of Latin proper names was double the number of Greek names,’ whereas in this list ‘of twenty-four names, sixteen are Greek, seven Latin, one Hebrew, so that the number of the Greek names is more than double that of the Latin” ‘To this objec- tion it would be a sufficient answer that St Paul’s acquaintances must necessarily have lain, not among the native Latin popula- tion, but among the Greek and Oriental immigrants whom he had crossed in his travels. But a little examination will show that the argument is fallacious, even as applied to the Church of Rome generally. A better test of its composition, than these Jewish inscriptions, is the list of the Roman bishops in the first two centuries. Analysing this list, we find that in a catalogue of fifteen names (from Linus A.D. 67? to Callistus a.p. 219), twelve are Greek, while three only (Clemens, Pius, Victor) are Latin. After Callistus the proportions are about reversed; the Roman Church was becoming gradually Latinized and there is a corresponding preponderance of Latin names. This fact illus- trates the fallacy of M. Renan’s comparison. Garrucci’s Jewish inscriptions (I am repeating M. Renan’s own statement else- where, p. 106, note 3) for the most part belong to a much later date than St Paul’s age. We should therefore expect to find in these, as we find in the Christian lists at the same time, an increase of the Latin names at the expense of the Greek.
But among these numerous Greek names, which thus create a difficulty to M. Renan, he especially remarks on the fact that ‘the names of the masters of houses, Aristobulus and Narcissus, are Greek also. This remark seems to me peculiarly unfortunate. It so happens that we know of two great ‘chefs de maison’ at Rome about this time, bearing these very names. The former was a Jew, a member of the Herodian family, and therefore among his slaves and depend- ents the Apostle was most likely to have formed friendships ; nor is it an unimportant coincidence, as I have remarked else-
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 303
where!, that after the mention of the household of Aristobulus the next person specified is one Herodion, whom St Paul calls his kinsman and who therefore was a Jew by birth, while at the same time his name seems to indicate a dependent position in the family of this Jewish prince. Again in a foot-note M. Renan for some reason or other (probably thinking of his name- sake, the writer on prodigies, who was a native of Tralles) singles out Phlegon, as a name more suited to Ephesus than to Rome. Even the Trallian Phlegon however, who was a freed man of Hadrian, resided at Rome: and in fact the inscriptions show that this name was by no means of rare occurrence in the metropolis’. On this point therefore I cannot but think that M. Renan is entirely wrong, though he can quote the authority of some important critics on his side. How far I have succeeded, I am not competent to say; but I seem to myself to have shown elsewhere*® that the names in this list are quite appropriate on the hypothesis that the salutations were addressed to the Romans, and that on this supposition alone they present several coincidences which go far to establish its truth. I am glad also to be able to quote on my side the opinion of a writer whose bias would certainly have led him to take a different view, if he had shared M. Renan’s difficulty. Baur, who goes so far as to deny the genuineness of the last two chapters of the epistle, explains the salutations by supposing that the forger inserted ‘a catalogue of those who were known at the time as the notabilities of the oldest Roman Church’ (Paulus p, 414). ‘So, M. Renan concludes decisively, ‘the verses Rom. xvi. 3-16 (containing the salutations) were not addressed to the Church of Rome ; they were addressed to the Church of Ephe- sus. ‘No more, he continues, ‘can the verses 17-20 have been addressed to the Romans.’ The strength of his affirm- ations seems at this point to be in the inverse proportion to the
1 See Philippians p. 173, where I three inscriptions, where this name have interpreted the expressions oi ék occurs, DcLxx1. 6, DccLIx. 12, pcccLvi11. tav ’ApioroBovdou, of €x Tov Napkicoov 3, and all three are Roman. to mean dristobuliani, Narcissiant. 3 Philippians, p. 169 sq.
2 The index to Gruter gives only
304 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
strength of his evidence. He appeals here again to the use of the word rapaxa\ao (ver. 17)—an argument demonstrably erro- neous, even on his own showing, as I have already pointed out (p. 296). He quotes the expression 颒 tuiv yaipw, which he explains as ‘the language of a master to his scholars, not remembering that St Paul uses a similar expression in writing to the Colossians (ii. 5) whom he had never visited, and appar- ently not entertaining any objection to the allied phrase edya- ploT® Tepl tavtwy vuov (i. 8) as addressed to the Romans. He remarks that St Paul knows the condition of the church he addresses, and glories (se fait gloire) in its good reputation; but why should he not do all this in the case of Rome? And thus he infers ‘il est la en famille.” Then by a rough and ready method he argues that the verses could only be addressed to the Corinthians or to the Ephesians; and, as the epistle at the close of which they occur was written at Corinth, they must have been addressed to Ephesus. I seem to myself to have shown that the reasons for questioning their Roman destination are wholly insufficient to counteract the weight of external evidence. But, I would ask, are there no difficulties in the counter hypothesis that they were written to the Ephesians ? Why in this case have the personal allusions no points of coin- cidence either with the narrative of St Paul’s long residence at Ephesus which terminated not a year before, or with his address to the Ephesian elders which was held only a few months afterwards? Why again is there no mention of Tychicus or of Trophimus, who were with St Paul at this time? Of the benediction, which closes the 20th verse and which M. Renan takes to be the conclusion of the Ephesian letter, I shall have something to say presently.
7. The next few verses also (vi. 21-24), containing saluta- tions from divers persons in St Paul’s company, ‘cannot any more than the preceding have formed part of an Epistle to the Romans.’ ‘Why,’ he exclaims, ‘should all these people who had never been at Rome, who were not known to the faithful at Rome, salute these last ? What meaning could these names
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 305
of unknown persons have to the Church of Rome?’ As much meaning, I would reply, as the names of the persons saluting the Colossians could have to the Church of Colossz (Col. iv. 10 sq.). They might or they might not be known to the Roman Church by name; personalacquaintance was not necessary to create Christian sympathy; and, being about the Apostle at the time, they might well pour out their hearts in this expression of good wishes. What more natural for instance than that Gaius in whose house St Paul was staying, and Tertius who acted as the Apostle’s amanuensis, should join in the salutation ?
But M. Renan goes on to remark, as an important fact, that the names mentioned in these verses ‘are all names of Mace- donians or of persons who might have known the Churches of Macedonia.’ Will this statement bear examination? Light names are mentioned in all. Of Yertius the amanuensis and Quartus ‘the brother’ we know nothing. Of Lucius also we are equally ignorant, unless he be the Lucius of Cyrene men- tioned Acts xiii. 1, in which case he is as likely to have had relations with Rome as with Thessalonica. Timotheus, it is true, was well known in Macedonia; but as the constant com- panion of the Apostle, his fame must have reached Rome also. Erastus too, himself a Corinthian, had accompanied the Apostle on a missionary visit to Macedonia (Acts xix. 22); but the des- criptive addition, ‘the steward of the city, is much more appro- priate, if addressed to those to whom his name was unknown or scarcely known, than to those with whom he was personally acquainted, Gazus of Corinth (1 Cor. i. 14) again (for he must not be confused with Gaius of Macedonia, Acts xix. 29) had—so far as we are aware—no personal relations with Macedonia. Thus as regards six out of the eight persons sending salutations, M. Renan’s remark has no force. The remaining two, Jason and Sosipater, were seemingly Macedonians. The former may be identified with St Paul’s host at Thessalonica, Acts xvii. 5 sq. (though the name, as a Grecized form of Jesus or Joshua, is common among Hellenist Jews at this date); and the latter is most probably ‘Sopater the son of Pyrrhus the Bercean,’ who
L. BE, 20
306 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
accompanied St Paul when he left Corinth on this occasion? and was probably with him now. Both these however, as faithful friends and constant attendants of the Apostle, might very well append their salutations to his letter. On the other hand there is no mention of Aristarchus and Secundus the Thessalonians, who were with St Paul at this time (Acts xx. 4)?, as might have been expected in a letter written to Thessalonica.
At this point again M. Renan calls attention to the benedic- tion in xvi. 24 and adds, ‘verse 24 is the conclusion of a letter. The verses xvi. 21-24 may therefore be an end of a letter ad- dressed to the Thessalonians.’ He has failed to observe that this benediction is wanting in the best critical editions, but to this matter I shall have to revert presently.
8. Thus we have arrived at the close of M. Renan’s third epistle. Huis fourth is suggested by the documentary evidence. As the final doxology, xvi. 25-27, is found in many copies at the close of the xivth chapter, he concludes that it must have occurred in this place in one of the four copies of the circular letters which were welded together to form our recension. His fourth epistle in fact coincides in limits with Baur’s Epistle to the Romans, though M. Renan himself supposes it to have been addressed to some unknown church. How much nearer to probability this part of his theory approaches than the rest, I hope to show hereafter.
I have thus examined in detail M. Renan’s objections to the integrity of the letter, considered as addressed to the Romans ; and, if I mistake not, have reduced them to very small dimensions. Every complex historical fact involves some im- probabilities, prior to evidence; and in this case such impro- babilities as remain are not greater than we might reasonably expect. On the other hand the direct documentary evidence is
1 Acts xx. 4, Luarpos Ilvppov Be- that he was not the only person of the po.aios, the correct reading, The very name about St Paul at this time. fact however that St Luke takes such 2M. Renan himself makes them pains to identify him, seems to show accompany him to Corinth (p. 458).
' ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 307
exceptionally strong here, as this epistle seems to have been more widely known from the very earliest ages than any of St Paul’s letters, and therefore the probability of such a manipulation as he supposes having occurred without leaving any traces in the MSS. is correspondingly diminished.
This examination has also brought out incidentally the pos- itive grounds on which M. Renan constructs his own theory, and they have been severally considered. One point however has been reserved. The,-quadripartite character of the closing chapters of this epistle is a remarkable fact, if true, and indeed may be regarded as the foundation of his theory. If it fails, the theory must crumble and fall. I propose therefore to ask whether the epistle has or has not these four distinct endings.
Inasmuch as the establishment of this fact is all important to his theory, it is strange that M. Renan should not have glanced beyond the received text, except to suggest (with what bearing, it does not appear) a possible fifth ending; ‘Nous arrivons donc & ce singulier resultat que l’épitre finit quatre fois, et dans le Codex Alewandrinus cinq fois’ (p. lxxi.; comp.
p- 461).
These four endings then (in the received text) are:
(1) xv. 33 0 8& @eds Tis elpnyns peTa TavTav Lpmorv. apy.
(2) xvi. 20 1 yapis tod Kupiov nuav “Inoot Xpictod pe? UMOV.
(3) xvi 241) yapis Tod Kupiov nuav “Inood Xpictod peta TAVTOV ULOV. apny.
(4) xvi. 25-27 7 8é Suvapévo...pove cof@ Oe Sia Inood Xpictov, © 7) Soka eis TOvs ai@vas. anv.
Now the first of these has not the character of St Paul's final benedictions at all. The dun (this is a matter of little moment) is, as I have pointed out already, open to grave sus- picion (see p. 297). The form of the prayer has many parallels in the body of the Apostle’s letters, as I have also shown. But
20—2
308 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
the final benedictions in every other instance are framed on the type of (2) or (3) 7 yapis «.7.X., consisting of more or fewer words, but preserving this characteristic feature. Any one who reads in succession the concluding benedictions of all St Paul’s epistles will, I think, feel the force of this argument.
The second and third do exhibit the character of final bene- dictions. But here M. Renan has made an important oversight’. The two editors, to whom we are indebted for the best texts, Lachmann and Tregelles, omit the third. In fact a comparison of the oldest uncials will show, that these two benedictions are in reality the same, which occupies one or other place in the better authorities, but which in later copies is sometimes in- serted in both. Thus we have to make a choice between xvi. 20 and xvi. 24, but we cannot retain both. In this respect the phenomena of this benediction present an exact parallel to those which attend the position of the long doxology (xvi. 25-27), as given above, p. 288.
The following is a conspectus of the facts relating to this benediction.
xvi. 20 9 xapis Tod Kupiov nuadv “Inood [Xpictod] pe?
UmOv. ins. &, A, B, C, rel., Orig. om. D,F,G. xvi. 24 1) yapis tod Kupiov nav “Incod Xpiorod peta
TAVTOV UMOV. pNP. om. &, A, B, C, Am., Fuld., Harl., Memph., Aith., Orig. D, F, G, (17), 37, 47, L, (P), Demid., Tol igen Pesh.), Syr. Harel., (Arm.), [om. jyov, 37; om. “Inood Xpiorod, F, GI.
ins.
1 Perhaps ‘oversight’ is hardly the correct term, for he adds in a note, ‘Sur Vincertitude des manuscrits a propos de la place du verset 24, voir Griesbach, Nov. Test. u. p. 222.’ But here his curiosity ends, As his theory
mainly depends on the position of these benedictions, it is only the more strange that he should have accepted the received text without examination, knowing that it was open to question.
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 309
As F, G, 37, L, Goth., omit xvi. 25-27, it becomes the end
of the epistle in these.
In 17, P, Syr. Pesh., Arm., it occurs after xvi. 25-27 [om.
nuav P}.
It will thus be seen that Lachmann and Tregelles are right in placing this benediction at xvi. 20; and that it has been transplanted thence into the later positions, whether at xvi. 24 or after xvi. 27, by editorial revision, with a view to restoring it to what seemed to be its proper place. To this subject also I shall have to revert again.
M. Renan’s fourth ending is different in character from the others, being a doxology and not a benediction, I shall reserve my explanation of it.
Thus then it will appear that the basis of M. Renan’s theory, the quadripartite character of the epistle, has fallen away. But before dismissing this theory, I must point out some objections to which, even if it rested on more solid ground, it would be exposed, and which might in themselves prove fatal to it.
(1) In our existing Epistle to the Romans the topics in the last two chapters occur in the following order. (a) xv. Special injunctions and explanations concerning the Apostle’s movements. (b) xvi. 1-20. A recommendation of the bearer of the letter and several salutations to divers persons, with a warning against divisions appended. (c) xvi. 21-24. Salu- tations from divers persons in St Paul’s company. (d) A doxology (xvi. 25-27). This sequence is natural. In fact the topics follow each other in the same order in the Epistle to the Colossians, which, as regards the concluding matter, is the most complete of all the Apostle’s letters. On the other hand all M. Renan’s four epistles are incomplete, and incomplete in a remarkable way. The first—to the Romans—contains personal explanations without salutations to or from any one. The second —to the Ephesians—contains no personal explanations but only salutations to several brethren. The third—to the Thessalonians —has neither the one nor the other, but only salutations from several friends of the Apostle. Lastly, the fourth—to some
310 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
unknown Church—has none of the three but only a bare doxology. We are required therefore to suppose that these four copies were defective in such a way that, when they were combined at some distance of time by a chance editor, they fitted together exactly, each supplying what was lacking in the rest, and all together forming a complete whole.
(2) But again; M. Renan’s theory, though contrasting in this respect favourably with many of its predecessors, neverthe- less fails to account for all the phenomena of the MSS. Thus, whereas the reading preserved in G rots ovow év ayatn Qeov obliterates the mention of any individual church, M. Renan’s theory supposes that in the several copies appropriate modifi- cations were introduced to adapt them to particular churches. In this case we should rather have expected traces of such a reading as Tots otow év Edéow (or év Ocacanovirn) ayarnrtots @eod, or at all events (as in the somewhat parallel case of the canonical Epistle to the Ephesians) tots odow ayarrntois Mecod, the space which was originally left for the name having disap- peared in the course of transcription and the words closed in upon the blank. On the other hand the substitution of év ayamn for dyamntois seems to have been made with a view to obviating the necessity of mentioning any name. This suggests a solution somewhat different from M. Renan’s.
Again ; as regards the concluding chapters of the epistle, it will be seen that the documentary facts point only to the fourth of M. Renan’s four copies, and give no indication whatever of the other three. This fourth copy, as I hope to show, does represent a truth, though the destination was not what M. Renan supposes.
(3) M. Renan speaks with some vagueness about the body of the letter. In one passage in his introduction (p. xxiii.) he seems to imply that the copy sent to the Romans consisted of chapters i-xi., xv., exactly as we have them; for he mentions ‘modifications in the first half of the first chapter,’ as intro- duced into the three remaining copies. This I suppose to be his meaning. But, if so, what becomes of half his objections to the
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 311
received view? These are based on the assumption that the Roman Church was Judeo-Christian. Of the truth or false- hood of this assumption I shall have something to say presently. I would simply ask now, how it is reconcilable with the Epistle to the Romans, as he leaves it. This is M. Renan’s own state- ment of the case; ‘Les passages de l’Epitre aux Romains qui supposeraient (why not ‘supposent ’?) l’Kglise de Rome com- posée pour la plus grande partie de paiens et de prosélytes, Rom. L621, 13; wala, Ui etesuavs vil 12657. 1325/1 28; 80) xiv. 1 et suiv., xv. 7 et suiv., viennent de ce que les Romains n’étaient pas les uniques destinataires de l’Epitre en question. Ces formules sont, du reste, si vagues que de bons critiques en ont pu conclure, les uns que I’Epitre aux Romains a été écrite & des paiens convertis les autres qu'elle a été écrite & des Judéo- Chrétiens’ (p. 483). Yet M. Renan lets all these passages remain in the copy sent to the Roman Church. It may be inferred however from his language here that these passages made a deeper impression upon him when he came to analyse the epistle towards the close of his volume, than when he wrote the introduction. For though he argues in the introduction on the hypothesis of a strictly Judzeo-Christian Church, and even in this later passage speaks of it as ‘en général composée d’Ebionites et de Judéo-Chrétiens, he yet adds here ‘Elle renfermait aussi cependant des prosélytes et des paiens con- vertis’; and altogether his language seems to betray a vague misgiving that his theory is not very consistent with the hypothesis on which it is built.
It was not my intention, when I commenced this paper, to take up a merely negative position, As M. Renan has en- deavoured fairly to grapple with the documentary facts, it is only due to him, while rejecting his theory, to attempt to suggest some other solution which shall account for them as well or better, and shall not be open to the same objections.
The view that the Epistle to the Romans was early circu- lated in a longer and a shorter form, Le. both with and without
312 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
the xivth and xvth chapters, is in some shape or other not new. Bertholdt and others, for instance, explained the phenomena of the different positions of the doxology by supposing that these two chapters were omitted in the public lessons’. More recently Mr Westcott (Vaughan’s Romans, p. xvi.) says, ‘ Whether it may be possible that the epistle proceeded in two forms from the Apostle’s hands, the one closing with chap. xiv. and the doxology, the other extended by the addition of the two last chapters after the omission of the doxology, or whether any other more satis- factory explanation can be offered of the phenomena of omission, repetition, transposition, authenticity, must be left for further investigation.’ In an article on the epistle in Smith’s Dictionary of the Bible I myself adopted the theory of a twofold edition, and further examination has confirmed me in this view. But the subject has never, so far as I am aware, received that ‘further investigation’ which Mr Westcott desires, and in the hope that I may be able to throw a little light on it, I venture now to examine the question more closely.
But by way of preface it is necessary to say something about the composition of the Church of Rome at this time, for (as we have seen already) much depends on the view adopted in this re- spect. M. Renan, in the passage quoted above (p. 311), offered his own explanation of the fact that the ablest critics were divided on the question whether the epistle was addressed to Jewish or to Gentile Christians. Would not the more natural explanation be that St Paul is here addressing a mixed church, composed of both in equal or nearly equal parts, and that he turns now to one, now to the other, as the tenour of his argument demands? Certainly the Gentile element is very strong; and I think few will agree with M. Renan, that such passages as 1. 5, 6 év waow Tois EOvecu...év ols éote Kal byeis, or i. 13 ev viv Kabas Kal év Tos NouTrots EOvecw, or Xi. 13 bpiv A€yw Tois EOverw (with its whole context), or xv. 16 érravapipyynckor buas Sia Thy xapw tiv S00cicav pot b7d TOD Oeod els TO elvai we Nevroupydv
1 This however is shown not to have been the case. See Reiche, Comm. Crit. p. 118.
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. ohe
Xpictod “Incod eis Ta Evy, are explained on the assumption that the Roman Church was strictly Judzeo-Christian, together with (what M. Renan very reluctantly concedes) a sprinkling of Gentile Christians among them. St Paul, if I mistake not, starts from the fact that the Roman Church stood on Gentile ground, and that very large and perhaps preponderating num- bers of its members were Gentiles. This is his justification for writing to them, as the Apostle of the Gentiles. It never once occurs to him, that he is intruding on the province of others. Yet at the same time it is equally clear that a considerable part of the argument is directed against Judaizing tendencies, and occasionally he appeals directly to Jewish readers (ii. 17, i. 9, vil. 4 sq.). The inference from these two classes of facts seems to be plain.
Nor is there any prior improbability in such a mixed church. M. Renan insists that the Roman brotherhood must have been founded and built up by emissaries from Palestine. But why should the Christianity of Rome be due to Jerusalem solely, and not also to Antioch and Corinth and Ephesus, with which cities communication must have been even more frequent ? Why at Rome alone should the Judaic element be all powerful, and the Pauline insignificant ?
And, while the hypothesis of such a mixed church is pro- bable in itself, it also harmonizes with the notices elsewhere. St Paul’s language to the Philippians implies that, when he arrived at Rome, he found two parties of Christians there, the one friendly to him, the other hostile, but both alike stimulated to activity by his presence (Phil. i. 14-18). It may be truly said also that this view is quite consistent with all the notices of the Roman Church during the first two centuries of its exist- ence, and that some of these seem to require it.
To this obvious inference from the Apostle’s own language, M. Renan can only oppose the testimony of one or two much later writers. He refers especially to the commentator Hilary (p. 483), whom he commends as ‘fort au courant des traditions de lEglise romaine’ (p. 115). It may be granted that this
314 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
writer has preserved more than one true tradition, but the mere fact that he wrote quite three centuries after St Paul deprives his statements of any value when they conflict with the natural interpretation of the Apostle’s language. And after all, is not M. Renan mistaken in supposing that this writer here professes to give a tradition? His words are, ‘Constat itaque temporibus apostolorum Judaeos, propterea quod sub regno Romano age- rent, Romae habitasse ; ex quibus hi qui crediderant, tradiderunt Romanis ut Christum profitentes legem servarent; Romani autem audita fama virtutum Christi faciles ad credendum fue- runt, utpote prudentes: nec immerito prudentes, qui male in- ducti statim correcti sunt et permanserunt in eo. Hi ergo ex Judaeis, wt datur intelligi, credentes Christum non accipiebant Deum esse de Deo, putantes uni Deo adversum; quamobrem negat illos spiritualem Dei gratiam consecutos ac per hoc confirmationem eis deesse’ (Ambros. Op. IL app. 25). He ap- pears to state as matter of history (‘constat’) only that there was a large Jewish population in Rome. Beyond this his language is apparently based on the interpretation of the epistle itself (‘datur intelligi’; comp. p. 80). He sees that a considerable portion of the epistle is directed against Judaizing views, and he therefore infers that the Judaizers were a very strong party in the Roman Church. M. Renan again appeals to the Clemen- tine Homilies, which he asserts confidently were written at Rome, and which exhibit Ebionite views. The Roman origin of this work seems to me more than doubtful; but even if granted, it does not prove his point, for the cautious disguise, which the writer wears throughout, shows that he must have belonged to a comparatively small minority. That there was such a compact and active Judaizing minority in Rome in the early ages, few probably would deny. On the other hand, M. Renan omits to mention the one genuine document of subapostolic times, which was issued in the name of the Roman Church, and which may therefore reasonably be supposed to represent the views of that church. The Epistle of Clement exhibits no leaning to Judaism.
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. alo
To the Church of Rome then, as a mixed body of Jewish and Gentile converts, the epistle was addressed. The destina- tion of the letter was in harmony with its subject. Indeed it may very reasonably be conjectured, that the subject in the Apostle’s mind was prior to the destination. To the Corin- thians he had written rebuking the errors of Gentile licence. To the Galatians he had denounced the deadening effects of Judaic bondage. The letters to these churches had been called forth by special emergencies, and this fact gave a special direction to them. Thus the Apostle’s mind for a year or more had been led to dwell especially on the relation of these two extremes separately to the doctrine of grace and liberty. It would not unnaturally occur to him to treat them together in a comprehensive manner, and to show where Judaic and Gen- tile feeling might find their true meeting point. This is exactly what he does in the Epistle to the Romans. Its aim from beginning to end is conciliation—conciliation of claims, con- ciliation of doctrine, conciliation of practice. The manner in which the question of forbidden meats is treated in the xivth chapter is only a special example of the motive which pervades the whole work. The Apostle, it is true, had a personal reason for writing to the Romans, as he contemplated visiting them soon and wished to prepare them for his visit: but above all this, there was singular propriety in addressing such an expo- sition to the Church of the metropolis, composed, as we have seen, in almost equal parts of the same two discordant elements which he strove to combine. Thus the epistle, though not a circular epistle itself, yet manifested the general and compre- hensive character which might be expected in such. It is more of a treatise than a letter.
This was our Epistle to the Romans. The shorter recen- sion, in which the two last chapters were omitted, was, I suppose, an after-thought, being an attempt to divest it of all personal matter, and to make it available as a circular letter or general treatise. So far, it was a carrying out of the spirit of the original work. When and how this was done I shall en-
316 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
deavour to make out; but by way of introduction I will set side by side what I consider to have been the contents of these two recensions respectively.
Epistle to the Romans. Abridged Recension. 1-XIv. i-xiv. [Substituting tots odaw ev aya- mn @ecod for rots odow év “Po- kn ayatrntois Mcod in i. 5, and omitting év “Pwyuy in i. 17].
XV. xvi. 1-23 [omitting the benediction (xvi. 24), and the doxology (xvi. 25-27)]. xvl1. 25-27.
Of the abridged recension we have distinct traces in Marcion’s copy (though he omitted the doxology), in FG, and less decidedly in other authorities; and some such hypo- thesis alone will explain the varying positions of the doxology in different MSS.
The MS. F is unfortunately defective in the first chapter, but doubtless preserved here the same phenomena which we find in G. These two MSS. are very closely allied, and must have been copied mediately or immediately from the same prototype. They themselves may probably be referred to the Ixth century, having belonged to two neighbouring Swiss monas- teries, the one to Reichenau, the other to St Gall. Either their common prototype, or a still earlier MS. from which it was copied, must have preserved the abridged recension. The space of about five lines, which is left blank between chapters xiv, and xv. in G, would be about sufficient for the doxology (xvi. 25-27), which however is omitted in both places. These features in the MS. suggest that the copyist of an earlier MS., from which it has descended, transcribed a MS. of the abridged
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. Sle
recension till the end of chapter xiv., and then took up a MS. of the original Epistle to the Romans to supply the lacking matter, omitting however the doxology as inappropriate to what had thus become the middle of the letter, and perhaps intending to give it a place afterwards, but abandoning his purpose. It is an instructive fact that in the allied MS. F no space is left after ch. xiv., but the text is written con- tinuously.
My reasons for supposing that the doxology (xvi. 25-27 of the received text) belonged to the abridged recension and not to the original epistle are the following:
(1) It has nothing in common with the usual endings of St Paul’s Epistles, which close with a benediction of the type mentioned above (p. 307).
(2) On the other hand, such an abridged recension as I have supposed, whether issued by the Apostle or by some later editor, would hardly have been left to terminate abruptly with may 5€ 0 ovK éx TiaTEews, apuapTtia éotiv. The addition of a doxology, or of some equivalent, would seem necessary.
(3) If it had occurred at the end of the xivth chapter in the original epistle, it would have been a violent interruption of the sense, for the xvth chapter continues the thread of the xivth, and there is nothing to call for such a thanksgiving, On the other hand, if its position was at the end of the epistle, the displacement to the close of the xivth is somewhat difficult to explain.
(4) The difference of style between this doxology and the rest of the epistle has often been noticed, and has led some critics to question or deny its genuineness. The real fact is, that though it does differ somewhat in thought and diction from the epistles of this date, it has very strong affinities to the later letters of the Apostle, as the following table will show:
318
a \ , TO S€ Suvapeva...
\ \ > / / KQATQ TO EvayyeALOV MOV...
\ / > fa) a TO Knpuywa Inood Xpictov Ka- 1 Be 4 / / Ta aToKdAuYw puoeTnplov Xpo-
/ VOLS alwviows Tea LynMEvoU paveEe- pwbévtos dé viv dia Te ypapav a o> 48 \ a TpOPNTLKOV, KAT ETLTAYHV TOU > / fal > e \ / aiwviov @eod eis UraKonv Ti- \ oTews els TavTa TA EOVN yvwpt-
obévTos.
Tov aiwviov Peod...uove cop@
a 79 an nr e ¢ Bed ba “Inood Xpiotod @ 7 S6£a eis Tods aidvas [TAév aid-
> / vov|. any.
THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
past ) a To dé duvayéve, Eph. iii. 20. KaTa TO evayyédtov mov (2 Tim. i. 8, but also Rom. ui. 16). KaTa atokdAuypw éyvapicOn fot TO puoTHpLOY...0 ETEpaLs yeveats ovK éyvwpicbn...a@s viv > / a € / > atrexadvpOn Tots aylou atro- , >? a \ / OTOAOLS AVTOU Kal TPOpHTaLs > / s Vere / EV TVEUMATL, Elva TA EOVN K.T.r. Eph. ii. 3, 5, 6. TOU -voTHplov TOD aTToKEKpUp- pévou ato TOV ai@ver...iva yvepiaOy viv, Eph. in. 9, 10. ny érnyyelAaTo...mpo xpovev > / “) / \ Lal aiwviov épavépwoer Sé Katpois 7 \ / z= fa) > idols TOY AOYoV avTOD év KN-
/ a 3 7 bl] \ > puyuare 0 émictevOnv eyo Kat eritayny ToD TwWTHpos nmev @eod (comp. 1 Tim. i. 1), Tit. 1, 2, 3.
\ Lal \ / ’ TH Sobeioay...1pd Kpovevaiw- viov, pavepwetoay dé viv dua THS emupaveias «.7.r., 2 Tim. i. 9, 10.
TO 6€ Bacirel TOY aidvear... Love [coped] Oc@ Tyr) Kai doEa els Tovs aidvas Tév aiwver.
1 Tigi AT,
aun.
These facts seem to show that though written by the Apostle it was not written at the same time with the letter itself’. In order to account for all these data, I suggest the follow-
1 Dean Alford (G. 7’. m1. Prol. p. 80) points out the resemblance of this dox- ology to the Pastoral Epistles, though not to the Epistle to the Ephesians, and suggests that it was appended to
the epistle ‘in later times by the Apostle himself, as a thankful effusion of his fervent mind.’ This view seems not to supply an adequate occasion for the addition.
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 319
ing hypothesis. At some later period of his life, not im- probably during one of his sojourns in Rome, it occurred to the Apostle to give to this letter a wider circulation. To this end he made two changes in it; he obliterated all mention of Rome in the opening paragraphs by slight alterations; and he cut off the two last chapters containing personal matters, adding at the same time a doxology as a termination to the whole. By this ready method it was made available for general circulation, and perhaps was circulated to prepare the way for a personal visit in countries into which he had not yet penetrated (i. 11 sq.). The idea of a circular letter was not new to him; for he had already addressed one to the Churches of Asia. M. Renan pertinently remarks that the First Epistle of St Peter makes use chiefly of the Epistle to the Romans and the Epistle to the Ephesians, ‘c’est-A-dire des deux épitres qui sont des traités généraux, des catécheéses’ (p. ]xxii.).
Thus I believe that the last, and the last alone, of M. Renan’s four epistles represents a historical fact. It was not however a special copy, as he supposes, addressed to some individual church now unknown, but an adaptation of the original epistle for general circulation. A copy of this fell into the hands of Marcion, but (unless Rufinus in his translation has misrepresented Origen’s meaning) he removed the doxology, as he well might have done with a doctrinal aim. Another was the prototype of FG. All the phenomena relating to the doxology arose from the combination of copies of this abridged recension with copies of the original epistle in different ways. The notice of Origen shows that such combinations took place at a very early date.
One point still remains to be settled—relating however not to the abridged recension, but to the original epistle. Where are we to place the benediction which occurs (1) at xvi. 20, (2) after xvi. 23, whether before or after the doxology, or (3) in both places, in different copies, as explained above (p. 308)? To this question the great preponderance of authority allows but one answer. It must stand at xvi. 20, and must be
320 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
omitted from the later place. If so, ver. 20 is the true close of the epistle, and the salutations from the amanuensis and other companions of St Paul were added irregularly as a sort of postscript, as was very likely to have been done, considering the circumstances under which St Paul’s epistles were written. The desire of later transcribers to get a proper close to the letter would lead them to transplant to the end of these saluta- tions the benediction of xvi. 20, with or without modification, or to supply the defect with the doxology from the abridged recension. Either expedient appears in different MSS., and in some both are combined.
B.
By Dr Hort. D* LIGHTFOOT in this Journal (11. 264 ff.) has demolished
M. Renan’s ingenious theory about the composition of the Epistle to the Romans, and along with it some others of inferior merit. He proposes instead a simpler view, which one could wish to believe true, so admirably does it harmonize the most salient phenomena of the text, and so free is it from broad historical improbability. A close examination however reveals difficulties which I am constrained to think fatal.
Dr Lightfoot supposes that the letter originally addressed to | the Romans was our present epistle as it stands in the Received : Text and Authorized Version, wanting only the last four verses, | Le. the second Benediction (xvi. 24) and the Doxology (25-27) :| but that at a later time St Paul himself‘ made it available as, a circular letter or general treatise’ by cutting off the last two chapters, substituting the Doxology, and omitting the name of Rome in i. 7, 15. The direct evidence lies in three chapters, i, xlv. xvi, which I will consider separately and in inverse order.
I. The apparently triple ending of xvi. in the Received Text, when taken as a whole, rests on absurdly small and worthless evidence, three or four obscure cursives and the inferior MSS. of the Latin Vulgate: it is a mere jumble of the Latin and the late Greek traditions, which owes its place in the printed text to Erasmus. If the Doxology be put out of
1 His account of his own proceed- the truth as it could be known at that - ing is intelligible, while his careless- date than it would be now. ‘Hane - ness grossly misrepresentsthe evidence; partem usque ad Debemus autem qui- indeed his statement is further from dam codices omnino non habent, qui-
1 Pe OF 21
322 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
sight, we are met by a still worse confusion of incongruous traditions ; that is, the doubling of the Benediction (20 and 24). The great mass of early authorities of various groups concur in placing the Benediction at 20 only: so NABC 5 137 lat.vg (best MSS.) memph aeth Orig.ruf. The pure ‘ Western’ group D*FG (with Sedulius and perhaps the Gothic version) places it only at 24’, evidently from the feeling that it must be the close of the epistle. Minor shiftings and other like freedoms taken by the same group of authorities occur in almost every chapter of St Paul: two whole verses 1 Cor. xiv. 34 f. are pushed 5 verses forward by DFG 93 and some Latin Fathers: compare 1 Cor. xv. 26. The scribes of the fourth century, bringing together MSS. from different regions, here as in countless other instances heaped up without omission whatever they found, and so the Benediction was set down in both places. The compound reading appears first in the Greek commentators of the fifth century from the Syrian school, then in the Harclean Syriac (A.D. 508-616): im extant MSS. it is found only in L (=J) of the ninth century and the great mass of cursives. There is however a similar combination in a few respectable authorities who retain the Doxology and place the second Benediction after it (P 17, the vulgar Syriac and the Armenian versions, and the Ambrosian Hilary): and this implies the previous existence of MSS. which simply transposed the Benediction to their end of the epistle, as (D*)FG transposed it to theirs’. Thus
dam in fine adjiciunt epistolae. Nos, quoniam id non videbatur ad hunce lo-
readings generally, explains this sin- gular collocation. D is not so purely
cum pertinere, semovimus in finem hujus epistolae’ (note on xiv. 23 in ed. princeps of 1516). ‘Haec est pars quae in plerisque Graecorum codicibus non additur, in nonnullis alio additur loco, sicut indicavimus, in quibusdam adji- citur in fine. Id quod et nos fecimus, praesertim assentientibus Latinis ex- emplaribus’ (note on xvi. 26 ff.).
1 D* and Sedulius add the Doxology after the Benediction. The nature of both authorities, as evinced by their
Western as FG: Sedulius combines the Old with the Hieronymic Latin, In each case the Doxology must be a later accretion. The Gothic has the Benediction at 24 and (in xvi.) no Doxology: the extant fragments fail to shew whether the Benediction was at 20 likewise.
2 If, as is probable, the shifting of the Benediction and the dropping of the Doxology were simultaneous in the common source of D* FG Sed., P 17 etc.
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. oe
the historical relations of the authorities clearly shew that, be the claims of the double Benediction as a ‘ harder reading’ what they may, it is as a matter of fact the last term in a series of changes.
Thus far there is no reason to suppose that Dr Lightfoot would dissent. He places the Benediction at 20 and there alone, and gives what is doubtless the right explanation of the order in saying that ‘v. 20 is the true close of the epistle, and the salutations from the amanuensis and other companions of St Paul were added irregularly as a sort of postscript, as was very likely to have been done, considering the circumstances under which St Paul’s epistles were written’ (p. 319). Whoever will read the chapter through as far as 24 according to this arrangement, will find everything straightforward and in- telligible ; while the nature of the postscript is such as might easily mislead a mechanical transcriber. The difficulty begins Supposing however that we had no evidence about these three verses except as to their presence or
when we go on to 25-27.
absence in this place’, I do not see why we need hesitate to take them as an ending to the postscript, just as 20 is the ending to the epistle proper’. Having once made that fresh start to introduce the salutations sent by present companions, St Paul might gladly seize the opportunity to close the whole by a solemn giving of glory to God, as his first ending had carried grace to men. Compare xi. 36 in connexion with xi. 32 and the adjoming verses; also v. 2; xv. 5, 6. Similar pauses of adoration occur elsewhere in the epistle; 1. 25; (viii. 39;) ix. 5; x1. 36; xv. (13,) 33, where I believe ’Aunv to be genuine:
differ merely in taking one step in- stead of two: the writer of their com- mon original was willing to transpose but not to omit. The two transposi- tions were however apparently inde- pendent of each other.
1 Their total omission will be con- sidered further on.
2 The postscriptis evidently St Paul’s
own, notwithstanding the first person used for the moment in 22 by Tertius the amanuensis in sending his own greeting. Otherwise 6 cuvepyds [pov], ol cvyyevets ov before the mention of Tertius would not be intelligible. The subsequent 6 &évos wou kal Tis ExxAnolas is also the language of an apostle.
21—2
324 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
and it is to be observed that, when St Paul’s own salutations to Christians at Rome were ended, he was not able to refrain (xvi. 17-20) from breaking out afresh into renewed exhortations to mutual peace through willing obedience to the common Lord. As he had gone back to the perils and hopes of the Church after the one set of individual greetings, so we can imagine him joyfully returning to the yet higher sphere of God’s universal purposes after the other set of individual greetings’. Nay the parallelism between 17-20 and 25-27 is one of contrast as well as likeness. The first passage gives vent to somewhat of the anxious dread which lurks behind many a phrase of xv. 14-33, especially 30, 31. If these were St Paul’s last words to the Romans except the two sets of greetings and the Bene- diction of 20 b, the epistle might have appeared to end in a note of discord: at all events its exulting comprehensiveness would have died back into the rebuke and controversy proper for the Galatians. The sudden upward flight of the Doxology seems therefore to be almost demanded, to swallow up not only trivial individualities of salutation but also the temporary strifes of the Church.
But it is said that the Doxology differs too much in style from the rest of the epistle to form part of it. I used to suspect that it might be the ending to one of the forms of the encyclical epistle to the Ephesians, which was preserved from being lost to the Canon by being appended to St Paul’s longest epistle. Dr Lightfoot (after Dean Alford) points out its resem- blance to the Pastoral Epistles as well, and accordingly treats it as marked by the Apostle’s later style generally. Before scrutinizing words and phrases, let us look at the subject. The starting-point is doubly personal; an anxiety about the stability of the converts addressed, such as tinges the hopefulness of the first and last words spoken to and about the Romans (i. 11;
1 Dr Lightfoot says (p. 317) that the tion of the type’ ) xdpis x.7.X. But Doxology ‘has nothing in common none of his other epistles have a post- with the usual endings of St Paul’s _ script, following a benediction in that Epistles, which close with a benedic- form already given.
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 325
xvi. 17-20); and a bold lifting up of what friend and foe knew as the distinctive ‘Gospel’ of St Paul, (and that in its distinc- tive form of ‘preaching, and with its distinctive appeal to ‘faith, ) such as marks the time of the conflict with Judaism within the Church (i. 1, 5, 9,16; xv. 16; x. 8,14,15). Here the pronouns ‘ you’ and ‘my’ face each other with an emphasis which in such a context is hard to explain till we remember the presaging instinct with which St Paul saw in thé meeting of himself and the Roman Christians, if indeed it was to be vouchsafed, the pledge and turning-point of victory (1. 10 ff. ; xv. 29-32; cf. Acts xix. 21; xxviii. 31). Then comes the idea in which the Doxology culminates, the counsel of the far-seeing God, the Ruler of ages or periods, by which the mystery kept secret from ancient times is laid open in the Gospel for the knowledge and faith of all nations. This idea no doubt per- vades the Epistle to the Ephesians, though with considerable enrichments. But is it foreign to St Paul’s earlier thought? The second chapter of 1 Corinthians at once shews that it was not and explains why the fact is not obvious. St Paul is dealing there with converts who were in danger from pride of eloquence and wisdom (from i. 5 onward). For fear of this danger, he says (ii. 1 ff.), he himself kept back all excellency of speech or of wisdom when he came among them, and confined himself to the bare preaching of the Cross as alone fitted to their imperfect state. But for all that he desired them to know that he too had in reserve a wisdom which he spoke among the perfect. Its nature he briefly hints in words that closely resemble our Doxology (( We speak a wisdom of God in a mystery, that hidden wisdom which God fore-ordained before the ages unto the glory of us’ etc. i. 7), and then hastens to explain that, even after being laid open, it demands a spiritual power to discern it. The Churches to which he wrote about this time, at Corinth, in Galatia, at Rome, were not in a state to profit by an extended exposition of a belief which yet was strong in the Apostle’s own mind, and so the traces of it in the early period are few. Later it filled a larger space in his
326 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
thoughts, it acquired new extensions and associations, and he had occasion to write to Churches which by that time were capable of receiving it. But it is not really absent even from the Epistle to the Romans. Kindred thoughts find broken and obscure utterance in vil. 18-30. The belief itself is the hidden foundation of the three chapters (ix—xi.) in which God’s dealings with Jew and Gentile are expounded, and comes perceptibly to light in their conclusion (xi. 33-36). Now it is precisely in these chapters, as F. C. Baur (Paulus 341 ff.) saw long ago, that the main drift of the epistle is most distinctly disclosed: all its various antitheses are so many subordinate aspects of the relation of Jew and Gentile which in this seeming episode is contemplated in its utmost generality as reaching from the one end of history to the other. The whole epistle could hardly have a fitter close than a Doxology embodying the faith from which its central chapters proceed. Here at last that faith might well be articulately expressed, though a wise economy compelled it to be latent as long as the Apostle was simply instructing the Romans. This Doxology is in fact a connecting link between the epistle at large and the earlier concentrated doxology of xi. 36. In both alike human sin and hindrance are triumphantly put out of sight!: but here the eternal operation of Him ‘from Whom, through Whom, and unto Whom are all things’ is translated into the language of history.
An examination of single phrases is attempted in the fol- lowing table, which includes some less obvious coincidences of thought’.
1 They could not be left out in the latter part of the Epistle, when St Paul’s own position and the dangers of the Romans had to be spoken of (xv. 14-33; xvi. 17-20). But for this very reason it was the more necessary that the ground conquered at the
end of xi. should be maintained at the final close of the Epistle. See p- 324.
2 References to the later epistles are in []: the chief passages are set out at length by Dr Lightfoot, p. 318.
ITS
Te 62 dwapery buas ornpléac
kara TO evaryyéudy fou
kal TO Khpuyua In- cov Xpicrod
KaTa amrokdduyw pvornplov xpdvo.s aiwvlos ceovynueé- vou gavepwiévros dé viv
dud, Te ypapav mpo- PnTiKkGv
Kat émiraynv
Tov aiwviov Jeod
eis wmakony i-
OTEWS
STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 327
Rom. xiv. 4...crnkee 7 mirre* orabnoerar Se, Suvaret yap 6 Kbpios orhoa atrév. Ad’vaya, Suvards, dvvaréw with an infinitive are used of God Rom. iv. 21; xi. 23; 2 Cor. ix. 8; (xiii. 3;) Gal. iii. 21; [2 Tim. 1.12: 7@...dvapévy... Eph. iil. 20.] =rnplfw in St Paul is found elsewhere only Rom. i. 11 (érim00S yap idety duds...els TO oTnprxOAvac duds) and 4 times in 1,2 Thess. ‘Standing fast’ is a common phrase in 1, 2 Thess., 1, 2 Cor., Gal., Rom.; though also found later: ‘falling’ is confined to 1 Cor., Rom.
So Rom. ii. 16; [2 Tim. ii. 8.] So also cara ro evayyédov Rom. xi. 28, for here as there the inclusion of the Gentiles must be chiefly meant. (The ‘stablishment’ of the Romans would presuppose the harmony of Jew and Gentile among them.) In this light pov is illustrated by i. 1-6, 9, 16; RVeLOS
Compare Rom, ii. 16; x. 8-12; xv. 5 f.; 1 Cor. i. 21; xii. 12 f.; 2 Cor. i. 19 f.; Gal. iii. 26-29; [2 Tim. iv. 17; Tit. i. 3: also 1 Tim. ii. 7; 2 Tim. i. 11.] The double name appears to have special force in this connexion.
Rom. i. 16 f....¢efs cwrnplay mavtl T@ miorevortr, Lovdaly te [mp@rov] xal”"ENAnver dtxaoctvyn yap Oeod év aire [sc. TO evayyeNtw] dmoxadvm@retar éx micrews els miotiv': here the historical dicacocvvn is a part of the pvorjpeov: and so li, 21 vuvi dé xwpls vdmou dixaoctvn Oeod repavépwrar, map- Tupouvperyn brd TOO vouou Kal THY TpopyTHy, dixacoc’vyn dE Jeod dud trictews [’Incotd] Xpicrod els mdavras tovs muorevovTas: ef. Gal. iii. 22 f. Rom. xi. 25...7d wuornpiov rodro...6T¢ Twpwors amd wépovs TS Lopayr yé-yovev aXpt ov Td TAH pwua THY 1 Cor. ii. 6, 7, 10 copiav 5é Nadoduev ev rots TeNelous...Pe00 copiay ev
€Oviev eicéNOn, Kal otrws mas Iopand cwOnoerat.
puotnplyy Thy dmroKkekpuumérny, Tv mpowpicev 0 Beds mpd TOV aidvuv.... nuiv yap amexddupev 0 Beds ia TOU mvevmaros. [Eph. iii, 83-11. IIpo ypdvwv aiwviwy 2 Tim, i, 9; Tit. i. 2.]
Rom. i. 2...evayyéAtov Oeov 5 mpoernyyeldaro Oa THY Tpo- pyrav avrov év ypapais wyias; iii. 21 (above); and ix-xi. passim.
[1 Tim. i. 1; Tit. i. 3.] But the meaning is given by Rom. i. 1, 5 &’ ov [se. I. X.] €AdBomev...darocroNny els Uraxonv miorews év wacw Tois €Oveow; X. 15; and the mere formula kar émirayiv 1 Cor. vii. 6; 2 Cor. viii. 8.
1 Cor. ii. 7 (above); x. 11; cf. Rom. xi. 33-36. [1 Tim. i. 17 76 Bache? raév aidvwy: also Eph. iii. 9, 11; Col. i. 26; Pe oO ye Dit. Le 20
Verbatim in this connexion Rom. i. 5 (above). This enlarged sense of izakoy, raxovw, is confined to the early epistles (Rom. vi. 17; x. 16; xv. 18 eis bmaxony éOvav; ? xvi. 19; 2 Thess. i. 8; 2 Cor. vii. 15; ? x. 5 f.).
328 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
els mavra Ta EOvn Rom. i. 5 above; xi. passim; xv. passim; xvi. 3f. Tvw- yupicbeTos, pi{w is similarly used Rom, ix. 22 f.; 1 Cor. xv. 1; ? Gal. i. 11; as well as (often) in the later period.
pbvy cop Oe@ Rom. iii. 29, 30 7 "Iovdalwy 6 Oeds wbvwv; obxl Kal vay; val cal €Ovav, elep els 6 Beds bs k.7.A. [Mévy beg 1 Tim. i. 17 a kindred passage, which early caused tw aldvwy to be inserted here after rods alwvas, and in its turn received cop hence in the fourth century: cf. 1 Tim. vi. 15; but also Jud. 4, 25; John v. 44 ete.] Zodia is predicated of God by St Paul with reference to the working out of a distant purpose by unexpected means: so Rom, xi. 33; 1 Cor. i. 21, ? 30; ii. 7; [Eph. i. 8; iii. 10; Col. ii. 3.]
dia "Inood Xpicrod Rom. v.1f.; xv. 6f.; Gal. i. 4f.; [Eph. i. 5 f., 11-14;
[3]! 7ddtaclsrods iii. 21; Col. i, 27; 1 Tim. i. 11, 17.)
Sldvas’ dujy.
A minute examination of the passages briefly indicated in this table will shew that the dominant thoughts of the Epistle, —the thoughts which inspired its beginning (i. 1-17), its primary close (xv. 6-33), and its three characteristic chapters in which the old faith and revelation are invoked on behalf of the new,—are precisely those expressed in the final Doxo- logy ; and that the separate words and phrases of the Doxology are for the most part what have already occurred in the Epistle, while there are hardly any not to be found in epistles of the same or an earlier period*. If this be so, the obvious resemblances to parts of the later epistles lose all force as evidence of date. The Doxology and 1 Cor. ii. 6-10, a passage absolutely inseparable from its context, support each other in shewing that St Paul’s late teaching was his early belief; while in each case there was an adequate motive for his ex- ceptional transgression of the limits imposed on him by the present imperfection of his converts. The condensed and cumulative style, which he used more freely afterwards, arises naturally from the compression of varied thoughts and facts into a single idea in a single sentence under the impulse of
1 4 is probably an intrusion, not- of which is preserved in 1 Cor. ii. 7; withstanding the presumptionin favour x.11. On the other hand braxon (xl- of an irregular construction. orews), both phrase and sense, is pecu-
2 The only clear exception is xpévo _ liar to the early epistles. aléviot (2 Tim, i, 9; Tit. i. 2), the idea
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 329
eager feeling. Rom. 1, 1-7; ii. 21-26; 2 Thess. 1. 3-10 offer a true analogy: what distinguishes them is their articula- tion, which was hardly possible in a doxology. But we may go further. As is the Epistle to the Romans itself in relation to the monuments of St Paul’s early teaching, gathering up, harmonizing, concluding, such is the Doxology in relation to the Epistle. It looks at once backwards and forwards. Spring- ing from the keen sense of a present crisis, it gives old watchwords of action a place in the dawning vision of thought which the epistles from Rome were to expound, and anticipates in its style as in its ideas the habitual mood of the time when the crisis was victoriously ended, and the unity of the Church secured.
II. The course thus far has been smooth, because the chief textual difficulties have been out of sight. The end of the fourteenth chapter is a point at which various phenomena present themselves which nothing in the context would have led us to expect. Some of them (a) on the surface mark only an interruption of the Epistle. The Doxology is inserted either (1) here alone or (2) both here and in xvi. In (3) a single MS. G, one of the twin MSS. which alone omit the Doxology altogether, an empty space is left here, occupying half a line at the bottom of an otherwise full page and 5 lines of the next page. Secondly (8) the whole of the two following chapters are supposed to have been omitted (1) by Marcion (on the authority of Origen), (2) perhaps by Tertullian and even Irenzus, and (3) in the capitulation of an unknown Latin MS. mentioned by Wetstein. The variety of this evidence, if it stands proof, is a strong argument in favour of any theory which will account for all the particulars.
The testimony of Origen requires consideration first. We have it only in the greatly abridged version of Rufinus, a careless and licentious translator. This is not a passage with which he is likely to have consciously tampered; but there is no certainty that the language is Origen’s own. Characteristic
330 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
terms of expression as well as ideas may be recognized through Rufinus’s Latin in almost every page; but none such are con- spicuous here: rather the sentences are short and simple for Origen. The comment on the Doxology (after xvi. 23) begins thus. “Caput hoc Marcion, a quo Scripturae Evangelicae atque Apostolicae interpolatae sunt de hac epistola penitus abstulit: et non solum hoc, sed et ab eo loco ubi scriptum est ‘Omne autem quod non ex fide peccatum est’ [xiv. 23] usque ad finem cuncta dissecuit. In aliis vero exemplaribus, id est in his quae non sunt a Marcione temerata, hoc ipsum caput diverse positum invenimus. In nonnullis etenim codicibus post eum locum quem supra diximus, statim cohaerens habetur ‘ Ei autem qui potens est vos confirmare.’ Alii vero codices in fine id ut hunc’ est positum continent. Sed jam veniamus ad capi- tuli ipsius explanationem.” As the text stands, it asserts plainly that Marcion removed from the Epistle both the Doxology and xv. xvi.; and that of the MSS. unaffected by Marcion’s pro- ceeding some had the Doxology after xiv., some after xvi. So the passage has been universally understood. On the other hand for many years I have had a strong impression that the Benedictine text is wrong in three letters, and that on the removal of this tiny corruption the whole interpretation collapses. De la Rue’s notes on this book often mention the readings of a certain Paris MS. (Reg. 1659). Wherever I have examined them, they have appeared usually to give the truest text against all other known authorities, and very seldom to be evidently wrong. In this place Reg. 1639 has im instead of ab. If the preceding hoc is likewise altered to hic, and so small a variation may easily have escaped notice, we get an entirely new and, I venture to think, more probable statement. Origen begins by saying merely that ‘Marcion, the falsifier* of the Gospels and [St Paul’s] Epistles, removed this paragraph
1 [*hune’ is a misprint for ‘nune,’] __terpolate, but properly to give a spuri- 2 Interpolo in ancient Latin, it will ous look of newness to old things, and be remembered, does not mean to in- so generally to falsify.
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. ool
completely from the Epistle. Then it appears to strike him that some reader might know the Epistle in a copy which had the Doxology at the end of xiv. (if not there alone), and acquit Marcion as having at most only removed a superfluous repetition’. He adds therefore explicitly ‘And not only here but also’ at xiv. 23 ‘he cut away? everything quite to the end.” Then, for fear the remark might not be understood by those who knew the Doxology only in xvi, he explains ‘But in other copies, that is in those which have not been corrupted by Marcion, we have found this very paragraph differently placed’ etc.
Of these three statements the end of the second might be thought a mere repetition of the first, according to the corrected reading. But I think Origen wished to make it perfectly clear that Marcion’s offence, as he understood it, was no mere erasure of an obnoxious phrase but utter excision of the entire para- graph. Nor is it unlikely that the Greek original contained intermediate digressive sentences which gave a resumptive force to the repetition. No one, I presume, would seriously find a difficulty in the words ‘to the end’ as inappropriate to the removal of the Doxology alone, in the case of MSS. in which it had stood at xiv. 23: their correctness in reference to its normal position would make them sufficiently descriptive for
1 Reasons will be given further on for suspecting that the MSS. here no-
Dissecuit would not be an unnatural rendering of repiéxoev or possibly zre-
ticed by Origen had the Doxology in both places. At this point the differ- ence is without importance.
2 This is not, it must be confessed, the natural meaning of the single word dissecuit: but will the context on any view tolerate another? As regards the Doxology, abstulit is decisive. Is it conceivable that Marcion only ‘ separat- ed’ xv. xvi. from the rest of the Epistle, while still acknowledging their autho- rity, whether he joined them to another epistle or not? or that such an opera- tion would be unrecorded? The diffi- culty surely lies in the translation.
puéreuev, either of which would mean simply ‘cut away.’ Compare Epiph. Haer. 309 D od povoy dé Ti apxiv arre- tewev [of St Luke’s Gospel]..., dd\Aa Kal Tov TéXous Kal THY féowY TOAAA TreEpte- koe T&V THs GAnOelas Noywr k.T.A.: and again a\Ad Twa av’rav mepiréuvay, Twa dé d\Nowoas Kepddaca. In the first sen- tence, so closely resembling Rufinus’s in form, droréuwyw and TrepixdmTw must be practically synonymous, for the preceding sentence describes the Gos- pel as mepixekoupévoy amd THs apxns by Marcion.
Saz THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
Origen’s purpose. Hoc ipsum caput is perhaps a slightly stronger phrase than we might have expected: how far it re- presents the Greek, and, if supposed exact, how far a knowledge of the unabridged context would explain it, we need not try to conjecture: even as it stands, it has a certain force in binding together the first and second statements.
On the other hand the internal evidence for the truth of the corrected reading is substantial. The order of the sentences, which Rufinus is not likely to have changed, runs naturally upon this view. By the common reading Origen keeps till last the only fact specially concerning the passage on which he is commenting: his first two sentences might have been written with equal force and appropriateness on any group of verses in the two chapters. He begins with saying that Marcion removed this paragraph, three verses, and then con- demns, as an aggravation of the main offence, his removal of 59 verses, of which these three are nothing more than the end. Why should he choose this particular place for the remark, if Marcion’s operation was really on that extensive scale? Why not mention it at the proper place, xiv. 23? It may be urged that possibly he was forgetful there, as he is certainly silent about the Doxology, but gladly repaired his omission when the Doxology brought to mind by association the earlier critical point in the Epistle. Certainly it might be so. But in that case we should expect him to begin with the transposition of his immediate text, and having so been carried to xiv. 23 to append by way of digression an account of Marcion’s proceeding. The reverse order, which we actually find, has no logical justifi- cation on the common interpretation, unless Origen himself saw in Marcion’s supposed omission of xv. xvi. and in the trans- position of the Doxology two facts connected by community of origin. That however is a step in criticism which there is not the slightest evidence that he took. He regarded Marcion’s omission, whatever its extent, as an original and unprecedented act; and he gives no hint that the transposition or repetition in certain MSS. was a consequence of Marcion’s mutilation: in
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. age
other words the two facts were in his eyes two independent phenomena. How then came the one to suggest the other? If Marcion omitted two chapters, the sole point of contact is xiv. 23; and thus the transposition, which alone forms a bridge from xvi. 24 to xiv. 23, must have preceded the omission in Origen’s account. If on the other hand Marcion cut out only what the scribes transposed, then no bridge is needed. The first and the last sentences refer alike to the same subject, the paragraph on which Origen is avowedly about to comment. The second sentence refers partly to this place, partly to the other; and likewise serves to anticipate an erroneous criticism of the first statement, which might occur to Origen’s readers. The commentary of Jerome on Eph. ui. 5 explains diffusely how St Paul could say that ‘the mystery of Christ in other generations was not made known to the sons of men’ notwith- standing the language of the prophets. At the outset he repudiates the doctrine juata Montanuwm that the prophets spoke in ecstasy, not knowing what they said. Three columns further on he repeats ‘Those who will have it that the prophets understood not what they said, and spoke as it were in ecstasy, bring to confirm their doctrine not only the present text, but also that which is found [in the epistle] to the Romans in most MSS., reading Now to Him, etc.’ The inference is obvious, that the writer had seen or heard of MSS. which did not contain the Doxology. But who is the writer? Jerome in his preface tells us that he had partly followed the three books of Origen on this Epistle. Comparison of the Greek fragments proves how freely he drew on his great predecessor’s ample stores; and any one familiar with Origen’s style will recognize it in many places where the Greek is entirely lost. Throughout this long disquisition Origen’s hand cannot be mistaken, though Jerome may have added or altered this or that sentence. The controversy with Montanistic doctrine belongs moreover to the third, not the fourth century’. The character of the MSS.
1 The dislike of the early Alexan- phecy’ or inspiration is well known. drians to the Montanist theory of ‘ pro-
334 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS,
hinted at as wanting the Doxology is sufficiently indicated in the two sentences which follow the refutation of the Mon- tanists. ‘And in like manner it is to be observed that the mystery of our faith cannot be revealed except through the Let those therefore know who understand not the Prophets, and desire
Prophetic Scriptures and the coming of Christ.
not to know, protesting that they are content with the Gospel alone’ ete. This evident allusion to the Marcionists, the other great sect which threatened the Church in Origen’s days, sug- gests the strong probability that the passages from his two commentaries relate to the same subject. What he calls ‘most MSS.’ here are identical with ‘those copies which have not been corrupted by Marcion.’ Doxology is said to have been omitted?: may we not infer, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, that this and this alone Whatever the argument might be worth taken independently, it appears to me a striking corroboration of the result obtained thus far.
After confuting Mar- cion out of Galatians and 1, 2 Corinthians, he proceeds to Romans (adv. Mare. v. 13). but briefly on what has come before him already, and pass over altogether what has come before him frequently. He is tired of arguing about the Law, and about God as a Judge, and so an Avenger, and so a Creator.
constituted Marcion’s offence ?
Tertullian’s language is ambiguous.
Henceforth, he says, he will touch
Yet he must point out the plain references to justice and judgement which meet him at the beginning of the Epistle (i. 16 ff.; 11. 2). It will be enough for him, he declares, to prove his point from Marcion’s negligences and blindnesses, from the sayings which he left undisturbed’.
In the former case the -
1 The words are ‘Qui volunt Pro- phetas etc., cum praesenti testimonio illud quoque quod ad Romanos in ple- risque codicibus invenitur ad confirma- tionem sui dogmatis trahunt, legentes Ei: autem’ ete. They do not formally negative the omission of the two whole chapters; but other language would surely have been chosen had the Doxo-
logy been the mere conclusion of a large section omitted.
2 He notices but one omission by Marcion in this epistle, that of ¢. ix. The limits are not given, but there is little room for doubt. Hight other (short) omissions are recorded by Epi- phanius, who professes to furnish only a selection (Haer, 317 f.). It is singu-
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 335
He then runs over the Epistle in 5 pages, just half what he had bestowed on the little epistle to the Galatians, passing over in silence some long spaces of text containing appropriate matter, as ill. 1-20 and x. 5-xi. 32. The ethical paragraph xu. 9-xii1. 10 tempts him to give examples of the anticipation of its teaching in the Old Testament, and he concludes with insisting on the harmony of Law and Gospel in inculcating love of neigh- bours. There apparently he intended to stop, the doctrinal part of the Epistle being ended, but his eye was caught by the words ‘judgement-seat of Christ’ at xiv. 10. He therefore adds (14s. f.) rather awkwardly, with evident reference to what he had said on the beginning of the Epistle’, ‘Bene autem quod e¢ im clausula tribunal Christi” comminatur, utique judicis et ultoris, utique creatoris, illum certe constituens promerendum quem intentat timendum, etiamsi alium praedi- And then he proceeds to another epistle. The absence of allusions to anything in xv. xvi. requires no explanation: it is hard to see what could have been cited except xv. 4, 8, 18, which are slight and contain nothing new in relation to Marcion, and the Doxology, which all agree to have been omitted by him. But in clausula certainly means ‘in the close of the
caret.’
Epistle, and it is a natural inference that such a phrase would not have been used if xv. xvi. had stood in Tertullian’s MS., whether that was his own or one of Marcion’s recension.
Natural but not conclusive. The verse quoted is not in the
actual close on any view; thirteen verses follow of xiv.
the force of the word must
lar that Epiphanius should pass over the loss of three consecutive verses: but his silence would be far more astounding if two whole chapters were missing. Nothing could be safely in- ferred in any case from his employ- ment of the word dxpwrnpidfw as ap- plied to St Paul’s epistles (kai avray dé TKpwTnpiacuévav svvjOws TH avTod padi- oupyia 317 D): his wide use of it is ma- nifest when he says (311 p) that the
But be estimated by the context.
Gospel, as 7xpwrnyplacrar pre apxhy éxov unre péoa pyre Tédos, iuarlov Be- Bpwmévov vd modhGy onrav éwéxer Tov Tpomov.
1 So not long before he had said, not it is true of a book but of a passage (1 Cor. ix. 10-x. 11), ‘Denique et in clausula praefationi [apostolus] re- spondet’ (c. 7).
2 The true reading is rod Geod, but confusion with 2 Cor. v. 10 was easy.
336 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
Antithesis to the beginning of the Epistle, not by any means the very beginning but 1. 16 ff, 11. 2, is the motive of the remark, If xiv. 10 is included in a section of the Epistle, however large, which can fairly be called in any sense its close, the point of the remark is saved. Now Tertullian had to all appearance virtually ended his comments at xi. 10. What follows to the end, with the partial exception of xv. 3 f, 8-12, is either hortatory or personal. The business of the Epistle, so to speak, is over: to the eye of a rhetorician, accustomed to study the members of a speech, the remainder would all constitute the close. Tertullian uses the word more loosely still on another occasion, again for the sake of an antithesis. To reinforce his position that Christ’s command to flee from city to city under persecution became obsolete when the apostles went forth to convert the Gentiles, he urges that St Paul, who at an early time had consented to escape in a basket, in the close of his ministry (in clausula officiti) rebuked those who urged bim not to go up to Jerusalem lest he should suffer there (de Fuga i Pers. 6). Yet this incident (Acts xxi. 13) preceded the events at Jerusalem, the two years’ imprisonment at Czsarea, the voyage and shipwreck, and the two years at Rome; to say nothing of later occurrences not told in the Acts.
It remains true that Tertullian does not cite any words out of xy. xvi. in other parts of his writings': nor does Irenzeus or perhaps Cyprian?. Negative facts of this kind are by no means to be contemned, but their value depends on the attendant circumstances. Seventeen verses only of the two chapters (xv. 1-13; xvi. 17-20) were likely to be quoted. Of these Origen once quotes one (setting aside the commentary), Clement three; while of others it so happens that Origen quotes five, Clement three, besides the Doxology.
1 Semler and Oehler indicate 5 re- he means p, 283 (Hp. 65 § 3) ‘nec ferences to xv. 4,14; xvi. 18: but they ante se religioni sed ventri potius et are imaginary. quaestui profana cupiditate servisse’ ;
2 Fell’s index gives only xvi. 18‘ven- a very doubtful reference. tri serviunt: E[pist.] 233.’ Doubtless
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. Bae
Lastly Wetstem has a note at the end of xiv.: ‘Codex Latinus habet capitula epistolae ad Romanos 51, desinit autem in caput xiv.; ex quo conficitur ista capitula ad editionem Marcionis fuisse accommodata.’ ‘Later critics,’ says Dr Light- foot [p. 289], ‘have not been able to identify the MS. and thus to verify the statement. Their failure however matters little. The phenomenon here obscurely described is not peculiar to a single MS.: it belongs to what was probably a widely current Latin capitulation, found e.g. in the earliest (540-550) MSS. of the Vulgate, the Amiatinus and the Fuldensis. The sections or breves of Romans are 51, § 50 beginning at xiv. 15, and § 51 at xv. 4. In the table of contents before the Epistle § 50 is headed ‘De periculo contristante [sic] fratrem suum esca sua, et quod non sit regnum Dei esca et potus sed justitia et pax et gaudium in Spiritu Sancto,’ a fair description of the section ; and § 51 ‘De mysterio Domini ante passionem in silentio habito post passionem vero ipsius revelato, which in strictness applies only to the Doxology’. If the marginal figures were lost, it would be a natural inference that § 50 ended with xiv., that § 51 consisted of the Doxology, and that xv. xvi. were absent from the MS. on which the capitulation was originally formed. But as on this view the table and the marginal figures con- tradict each other, 1t seems hopeless to attempt to clear up the confusion while the origin of the capitulation remains un- known’. There is no Latin authority whatever for associating the Doxology with xiv. 23; so that it would be rash to assume the table of headings to be alone authentic, and the marginal figures to have been inserted at xv. 4 by a misunderstanding, Yet that is certainly a possible solution. Only it must be
1 Hither Wetstein examined only the table of headings, or he overlooked the inconspicuous figures li, at xv. 4, a place where he would scarcely expect them. This is the sole point of differ- ence.
2 Internal evidence proves that the sections cannot, in their present form,
L. E.
answer to ecclesiastical lessons. Other- wise one might have thought that the Doxology was appended to xv. 13 or 33 for public reading, and the rest of xv. xvi, neglected. Some sections are de- seribed only by their end, as others only by their beginning,
22
338 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
remembered that the table of headings, with all its obscurities, would stand as the sole direct piece of evidence for the omission of xv. xvi. by any authority.
One indirect testimony Dr Lightfoot finds in the space left after xiv. 23 in the single MS. G, as noticed above (p. 329). His inference [p. 316] is that ‘the copyist of an earlier MS., from which it has descended, transcribed a MS. of the abridged recen- sion [i.e wanting xv. xvi.] till the end of chapter xiv., and then took up a MS. of the original Epistle to the Romans to supply the lacking matter, omitting however the doxology as inappro- priate to what had thus become the middle of the letter, and perhaps intending to give it a place afterwards, but abandoning his purpose. It is an instructive fact that in the allied MS. F no space is left after ch. xiv., but the text is written continuously.’ ‘Either their common prototype}, or a still earlier MS. from
1 The above was written on the assumption that F and G were in- dependently copied from the arche- type, as all considerable writers on the subject except Wetstein had laid down on apparently sufficient grounds. A query by Dr Westcott has recently in- duced me to examine the matter anew, and so led me to the conclusion that the scribe of G alone used the arche- type, and that F is a copy of G. The few verbal (not orthographical) varia- tions of F that might have seemed to preserve the readings of the archetype crumble away on examination. F often interchanges iets with jets, not sel- dom against all sense, and 6 times alters ié to awé: it omits the article 23 times, and perhaps once inserts it: it omits other words 16 times, and inserts them at most thrice (Rom. vii. 19 peo as in 15; ix. 31, with a special mark, dicacocvvns as in the line above; Gal. fin. aujv; all from the Vulgate): and the remaining changes, I believe fourteen, of which most are favoured by the Vulgate, are all trivial and natural. On the other hand FG agree in count-
less blunders, evidently such and not traditional variants, which cannot all, to say the least, be set down to the archetype. Again the confusion of spellings has its uniformities. To take only the more frequent cases, F inces- santly interchanges e€ 7, 0 w,.v, 6@(7); in almost every line FG together inter- change ¢ e1, € at, very rarely either MS. separately ; and I have failed to detect any permutations approximately pecu- liar to G. Misspellings of the pro- miscuous sort swarm in FG together and in F separately; in G separately they are rare and always so simple as to be within the capacity of the scribe of F to correct. Precisely the same may be said of the divisions of words; F is free from no outrageous portent found in G, but has to answer for many of its own. No one can believe that two scribes independently arrived at é.g. Ulorurovow exat vyeweuvor Tw Noyw (both FG have w over -vov: F further divides dye. exvov) for brort- mwow exe vyvavdvrwy Néywv: and the absence of division of words in the archetype is proved by the numerous
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. Bots)
which it was copied, must have preserved the abridged recen- sion. In other words (1) the scribe of G copied 1—xiv. from one MS. and xv. xvi. from another; and (2) the scribe of F copied in like manner from the same two MSS., though he left no mark of the transition from the one to the other. If the first of these hypothetical facts were true, we ought surely to find some evidence of it in the respective texts; whereas the closest study fails to detect a shadow of difference in the character of the readings before and after the blank space. The partial adherence of D excepted, this character is unique among existing Greek MSS.: that it should prevail equally in two MSS. accessible to the scribe of G is possible certainly, but not likely ; and the hypothesis involves this further anomaly that
self-corrections of the scribe of G, where he has added to the end of one word the first letters of the next, seen his error, and begun the second word afresh with a space between. In these cases he sometimes has forgotten to put in the cancelling dots or line, and then the writer of F confidingly tran- scribes the whole. But usually he is careful to follow only corrected read- ings. In 1 Cor. xi. 31f. dé translated by a happens to be under the end of éauvrovs in G; and the stroke or ac- cent which, as usual in G, caps a looks like a cancelling line to the final s: hence F reads éaurév though the verb is Other instances might be given of the dependence of F on acci- dents in G, The relations of the Latin accompaniments (fg) are complicated, but tend to the same result. The body, so to speak, of g must have at least a double origin, from a pure Old Latin text and from one or more alter- ed texts, either the true Vulgate or one of the intermediate revised texts or both. Where none of his materials represented the Greek literally enough, the scribe evidently devised new ren- derings of words and still oftener
dvexplvopev.
changed their order. This is shown not only negatively by comparison with the mixed and fragmentary yet fre- quently copious evidence of all sorts as to variations in Latin MSS. and Fathers, but also positively by mistakes arising from the wrongly divided Greek words and the like. Sometimes g offers two or more alternative render- ings, either all traditional or part tra- ditional part original. The body of f is tolerably pure Vulgate, unequally but always imperfectly assimilated to the Greek with, I believe, the aid of no document except g, all the elements of which may be recognized. In 1 Cor. x., singled out by Mr Scrivener for its frequent departure from the Vulgate, out of the 46 variants 23 agree with d and 42 with g, while the remaining 4 consist of 2 blunders, one correction of an obvious blunder, and one inter- pretative change of tense. The con- cordance of evidence so various seems decisive against any claim of F to represent the archetype where it differs from G. Nothing however in the text of this article is substantially affected by the result except the sentences in brackets.
22—2
340 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
the two originals, so singularly alike in the main, must have differed on the capital point, the omission of xv. xvi. [When F is taken into account, fresh embarrassments arise. Either the scribe of F copied one MS. throughout or he did not. If he did not, an exact repetition of the circumstances attending the writing of G is demanded, without such evidence as the blank is said to afford. If he did, what becomes of the primary original of G?] The blank may, I believe, be easily explained by a simple process. The Greek text of F and G alike was copied from a single archetype wanting only the Doxology. [The scribe of F wrote down exactly what lay before him.] The scribe of G on arriving at xiv. 23 remembered the Doxology as occurring there in some other MS. that he had read (all extant MSS. but 9 have it there, 4 older, 5 younger), held faithfully to his archetype, but satisfied his conscience by leaving a space which might be filled up hereafter if needful. He did in fact only what the scribe of B had done four centuries before, when he left a blank column for the supple- ment to St Mark’s Gospel (xvi. 9-20). It follows that FG attest the omission of the Doxology alone, while the blank in G vouches merely for the vulgar Greek text as it prevailed from the fourth century onwards.
That reading of the vulgar text however remains to be explained if possible, and remarkable without doubt it is. The intrusion of the Doxology after xiv. 23 appears in two forms: conjointly with its retention at the end in AP 5 171, and some Armenian MSS.: in this place alone in L (= J) and all Greek cursives but 8 (or 10), some MSS. known to Origen (above, p. 330), the Harclean Syriac and the Gothic? (with, it is said,
1 There is a doubt about 2 or 3 presence of the Doxology after xiv.
others, and more will probably be found in due time: see also p. 341, note 1. The introduction at xiv, 23 by the second hand of the Latin text in the trilingual 109 is doubtless due to an imperfect assimilation to the Greek.
2 The fragments of this version do not comprise xiv. 20-xv. 3. But the
would make the gap exactly equal in length to the adjoining leaves of the Codex Carolinus, which alone has pre- served the verses before and after. The 4 existing leaves of this MS, shew that xi. 33-xv. 13 was written on 8 leaves; and all the measures give the same length to a leaf within a line,
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 341
two other late and obscure versions), Chrysostom! and the Greek commentators who follow him, and perhaps Cyril and John of Damascus. Perplexities abound here. The first small group is select? though not trustworthy: by the analogy of other passages it indicates a reading of high antiquity, probably current at Alexandria, but a correction. Origen’s MSS. being waived, the certain portion of the second group is practically rubbish: that is, it contains no authority of the slightest value hereabouts except as a rare adjunct to some primary authority left nearly in solitude. That some MSS. known to Origen should have attested a reading of the first group is exactly what might have been expected: their association with the second is passing strange. It suggests a doubt (more is not permissible) whether Origen after all did not speak of those MSS. which had the Doxology at xiv. 23 as having it also at the end. Rufinus’s clumsy scissors may easily have shorn off the additional fact, especially as the antithesis became clearer in consequence: on this view the words about Marcion’s doings ‘not only here but also in that place etc.’ would have increased force, though it must be allowed they do not require it. But another difficulty remains. We might have supposed the double position of the Doxology to be owing to the combination of texts from two sets of MSS., each of which had it in a different place and there alone; yet the character of the authorities inverts this order. In cases like this it is ultimately found safer to trust to the historical relations of the evidence than to any speculations about probability. But indeed here the only tolerable explanation that offers itself of the introduc- tion of the Doxology at xiv. 23 in either group would point to the first group as exhibiting the earlier form of corruption. Changes in the Greek text of the New Testament, chiefly by
1 One Vatican MS. of Chrysostom that Chrysostom himself used only the according to Mr Field (p. 547) has both vulgar Greek text. text and commentary in both places, 2 Though inferior to 17, 5 is a cur- and so might be added to the first _ sive of the first rank. group. But internal evidence proves
342
THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
interpolation, arising from the modifications required for Church
lessons are common in MSS., though they have rarely found
their way into printed texts.
The salutations in xvi. might
easily be thought to disqualify the bulk of the chapter for public reading, especially at a time when but a few select lessons were taken from the whole Epistle?: and yet some church, for
1 The Greek ‘Euthalian’ capitula- tion found in divers MSS. (printed by Mill N. 7. 418 and elsewhere) has for the heading of its $18 rrepi [77s] mep7- cews THS Xpiorod dvetcaxlas, of $19 mepl ris Necroupylas avrov Tis év dvaro\7 Kal dvce, and nothing after. These must correspond to xv. 1-13, 14-33. It fol- lows that xvi. (but not xv.) is omitted, evidently because not publicly read in some church, The latest sectional num- ber (24) in P stands at xv. 14, doubt- less for a similar reason. By a singular coincidence § 18 of the Vatican capitu- lation begins with xv. 1 as in the ‘Eu- thalian’ capitulation: but they do not coincide in the earlier chapters, and the Vatican sections proceed to the end, commencing § 19 at xv. 25, § 20 at xv. 30, and §21 at xvi.17. Fritzsche (Rom. i. p. xlvii.) pleads that on the same grounds we might argue the ex- clusion of 1 Cor. xvi. from public read- ing, since no trace of its contents appears in the ‘ Euthalian’ capitulation for that epistle. Why not? The last sectional numeral (20) in the margin of P in1 Cor. isat xv.51. Thus again both independent capitulations equally agree with what the nature of the chap- ter renders intrinsically likely. The Capuan Lectionary in the Fulda MS. of the Latin Vulgate takes no lesson from Rom. xv. xvi. except xv. 8-14 (for the Circumcision), and none from 1 Cor. Xli.—XVi.
2 Dr Lightfoot (p.312) refers to Reiche as having shewn that xv. xvi. were not omitted in public reading. Reiche depends on Fritzsche and after him
Meyer, who argue (1) that the profound reverence of the early Christians must have saved every letter of the N. T. from being unheard in the churches; (2) that the lectionaries prove the whole epistle to have been actually read. But this continuous reading noted in the lectionaries belongs only to the Daily Lessons, which E. Ranke (Herzog R. E. xi. 376 ff.) shews to be of late date, perhaps not earlier than the 12th cen- tury. The ancient lessons for Sundays and Saturdays are all more or less selected, continuous only in certain definite cases. The existing Synaxa- ria, valeant quantum, give Rom. xiv. 19-23 plus the Doxology as the lesson (an appropriate one) for Saturday be- fore ‘Tyrophagus’ Sunday (Quinquage- sima): see the tables in Scrivener In- trod. 72; Scholz N.T. ii. 459; Matthei Rom. xxiv. They have but two other lessons from this part of Romans, xv. 1-7 for the 7th S. and xv. 30-33 for the Saturday before the 10th 8S. after Pentecost (Scrivener 69 f.; Scholz 458; Matthei ib.). All these arrangements however are probably Constantinopo- litan, and originally derived from the ‘use’ of Antioch. An Alexandrine Table of Lessons is preserved in a Vatican MS. (46 Paul. of Wetstein), and has been edited by Zacagni Coll. Mon. 712-722; but the first leaf, con- taining from Easter to the 3rd S. after Pentecost, is missing. In the part of the year where Romans is chiefly read, xiii, 1-8, xv. 1-6, 13-19, 30-33 oc- cur consecutively; but no other lesson from this Epistle after xiv. 11 appears
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION.
343
instance that of Alexandria, may have been glad to rescue the
striking Doxology at the end for congregational use by adding
it to some neighbouring lesson}.
It could not well be used by
itself, even if it were longer: it craved to follow some passage
which in like manner craved a close.
Many would find in the
benedictions at xv. 13, 33 a reason against appending the
Doxology in either place*, while it would make an impressive
termination to a lesson formed out of the latter verses of xiv. which when alone have both a harsh? and an unfinished sound.
anywhere. <A few scattered lessons agree with those in the common Syn- axaria, but the coincidences are such as might easily be accidental: the systems are independent throughout, though partly analogous. Saturday lessons are wanting, according to the custom of the early Alexandrine and Roman Churches (Socrat. v. 22), except in Lent. But as it is the long eight- week Lent of late Alexandrine usage, comparison as to ‘Tyrophagus’ Satur- day is out of the question. All the Lenten Saturdays have in place of a definite lesson the single obscure for- mula "Ex Tod drocréXov els aylous: the 4 lessons eis pveias aylwy, Rom. yv. 1-5; viii. 28-34; Heb. x. 32-38; xi. 33—xii. 2, can hardly be meant, as Zacagni seems to suppose; but the reference may be to a Menologium, or Table of Lessons for Holy-Days, not preserved in the MS.: the common Synaxaria have lessons from Hebrews on the Saturdays of their Lent. ‘Tyrophagus’ Sunday is one of the days of coinci- dence, the lesson being Rom. xiii, 11— xiv. 4. In short nothing can be clearly made out, except the prevalence of variety of usage and the utmost free- dom in the selection of lessons; that is, Fritzsche’s and Meyer’s arguments are found to have no support from facts.
1 The late Alexandrine lesson for St Stephen’s Day begins Acts vi. 8 and
ends vii. 60. As the other lessons are all short, this must have been made up of two passages, the speech being omitted. A similar Old Latin lesson for St Stephen’s Day has been printed by Ceriani (Mon. S. et P. i. 1. 127 f.), combining vi. 8—vii. 2 with vii. 51—viii. 4. Ranke in Herzog R. H. x. 81 notices two Mozarabic lessons from Jeremiah, one of which omits 13 verses in the midst, and the other is a cento of 5 fragments.
2 Gabler in Griesbach Opuse. ii. p. XXVi.
3 This is the ground taken by J. A. Bengel (App. Crit. 340 Burk), to whom we owe the first suggestion about Church Lessons. He says ‘Videntur Graeci, ne lectio publica in severam sententiam Quicquid non est ex fide peccatum est desineret, hanc ei clausulam attexuisse. Conf. var. Matth. iii. 11.’ His note on the omission of kai mupt in this last place is worth quoting. ‘Citra haec verba finierunt Graeci, vy. gr. in Aug. 4 [the Lectionary numbered 24], lectio- nem ecclesiasticam, ne tristis esset clausula. Simili euphemismo et Ju- daei post ultimum eumque severum Tesaiae, Malachiae, Threnorum, et Ko- heleth versum rescribere penultimum solent: et Graeci nonnulli post ultimum Malachiae versum ponunt antepenulti- mum, Etiam in Byz. [86] rédos pri- mum post haec verba, deinde his erasis ante, notatum est.”
344 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
Scribes accustomed to hear it in that connexion in the public lessons would half mechanically introduce it into the text of St Paul, just as they seem to have introduced a liturgical doxology after the Lord’s Prayer into the text of St Matthew (vi. 13). Then in the course of time it would be seen that St Paul was not likely to have written the Doxology twice over in the same epistle, and it would be struck out in one place or the other; while familiar use would override any effort of critical judgement’, and so the Doxology would vanish from the end of xvi., nothing in the context seeming to demand its retention. Such I conceive is the history of the position which the Doxology holds in the vulgar Greek text, a position which it would probably retain in the Received Text and in the popular versions of Europe but for the confused impulse which led Erasmus in this instance to adhere to the Latin tradition.
III. In the two places of the first chapter (7, 15), where the name of Rome is mentioned, it disappears in the single MS. G. Some leaves are wanting at the beginning of F; doubtless if extant they would shew the same omission. At the first passage there is a note in the margin of 47 to the effect that ‘he [or ‘it’: no nominative] mentions the phrase The subject may be some unknown commentator, but is more likely to be an ‘ancient copy’ of St Paul’s Epistles which is expressly cited in a similar marginal note on vi. 24°, and which like 47 itself may have been provided with a marginal catena Dr Lightfoot thinks he sees a trace of the
év ‘Pon neither in the commentary nor in the text.’
or ‘commentary’®.
1 Yet ancient criticism, finding the Doxology between xiv. and xy., would probably see nothing to object to; while it would readily stumble at the ap- parent violation of epistolary correct- ness in xvi. 25 ff. The influence of MSS. like FG may also have helped to expel the final Doxology, while it would be powerless to displace the same words where imbedded firmly in the text.
2 The reading there quoted from 7d madadv dvrlypapov is both rare and ex- cellent: the other marginal readings of 47 are of no interest, nor is there I be- lieve any other reference to another authority. Cf. Griesbach Symb. Crit. i. 155 ff.
3 An uncial MS. with a catena, like = of St Luke, might be called ‘the ancient copy’ in the 11th or 12th century.
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 345
same omission in Origen’s criticism as rendered by Rufinus, notwithstanding the presence of Romae in the text. But the context gives another turn to the language used. ‘ Benedictio autem pacis et gratiae, quam dat dilectis Dei ad quos scribit apostolus Paulus, puto quod non sit minor ea quae fuit bene- dictio in Sem et in Japheth, quoniam per Spiritum impleta est erga eos qui fuerant benedicti etc. ‘Ad quos scribit’ is substituted for ‘qui erant Romae’ because the point is that St Paul’s benedictions had not less dignity and effect than the sacred benedictions of the Old Testament; as Origen proceeds ‘Non ego his omnibus inferiorem duco hance Apostoli bene- dictionem, qua benedixit ecclesias Christi,’ while any inference from the generality of ‘ecclesias’ is precluded by the further remark that ‘haec Apostoli consuetudo scribendi non erga omnes ab eo servatur ecclesias,’ and by the classification which follows. Still less can I recognize any sign of the omission in the Ambrosian Hilary’s words ‘Quamvis Romanis scribat, illis tamen scribere se significat, qui im caritate Dei sunt.’ For he goes on ‘Qui sunt hi nisi qui de Dei filio recte sentiunt? Isti sancti sunt et vocati dicuntur: sub lege enim agentes’ male intelligunt Christum’ etc. Every word becomes clear on com- parison with a passage in the Prologue (25 AB) in which he contrasts the ‘Romani’ with the Judaizers who were equally at Rome (év “Pwun): the meaning is that St Paul writes not to all ‘at Rome’ indiscriminately, but to those at Rome who were in caritate Dei’ The true text in full is rdow rofs ovow év “Padun ayarntois Oeod KAXnTOots ayiou. A Western correction (D* lat. [the Greek lost] G, the 2 best MSS. of the Vulgate, apparently the Ambrosian Hilary, and perhaps Hilary of Poitiers) substitutes év ayamn Oeod for ayarnrots Geod, doubt- less on account of the «dyTois following (‘who...through the love of God are called to be saints’). The result is that ENPQMH and ENATATIHOY were left contiguous, each beginning with éy. The loss of one or other out of a pair of such groups of letters
1 Not ‘they agentes’ but ‘they who agunt.’
346
THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
is common in MSS. of any form, and would be peculiarly liable to occur in one written in columns of short lines, such as was
assuredly the archetype of FG’.
These two MSS. have further
a trick of omitting words that do not appear necessary to the sense, as might easily be the case with év “Pwun here when the following words were changed: so eis owrnpiav i. 16; 7 éx
1 Hug pointed out (inl. in N. T. i. 252 ff.) the evidence afforded by the frequent capitals in G that it was copied from a ‘stichometrical’ MS. resembling D, and perhaps older. In F many of the capitals are wanting, and probably even the scribe of G neglected a large proportion. It has not however been noticed, I believe, that the three equal chasms in the Greek text common to F and G measure for us the contents of each leaf of the archetype, about 20 lines of the ‘Oxford Lloyd,’ a con- venient standard for reference. Now in these three places (1 Cor. iii. 8-16; vi. 7-14; Col. ii. 1-8) a leaf of D con- tains on the average 24 lines of Lloyd, Greek alone. If then the archetype of FG had like D a Latin column, we might form a fair impression of the general appearance by cutting off 2 lines from each page of D. If there was no Latin, each leaf of the arche- type must have contained rather less than those of any extant Biblical MS. : the nearest approach would be to the purple and silver N (21 Lloyd lines) and the peculiar Z (23), apparently once a MS. of the same class. E of the Acts has indeed but 12 Greek Lloyd lines; but there is the Latin in addi- tion. One exception might have been found in the lost archetype of a part of C. A fortunate displacement of text in the midst of a page of the Apoca- lypse (x. 9,10; vii. 17-viii. 4; xi. 3-12) proves, on accurate measurement and calculation, notwithstanding the loss of the preceding leaf, that the arche-
type hereabouts was made up of quires of 8 sheets, with 12 Lloyd lines to a leaf, while a leaf of C itself has 100 Lloyd lines, The outer sheet but one of a quire must have been somehow turned inside out before stitching, and so the scribe of C, copying on without thought, interchanged vii. 17-viii. 4 and x. 10-xi. 3. But it is possible, though unlikely, that the archetype of C was bilingual: the Greco-thebaic fragments of T have 21 Greek Lloyd lines to a leaf, nearly double. The great primary Eastern MSS. of the 4th and 5th centuries, NABC (with 160, 148, 131, 100 Lloyd lines to a leaf respectively), owe I believe their state- ly appearance to the new impulse to exhibit together the settled and com- pleted Canon of Scripture. Before Constantine the parchment copies were in all likelihood small and portable. Our two earliest MSS, & and B, seem to represent the older period in the narrowness of their columns, not in the ample structure of their pages, which may or may not have been suggested by a partly opened papyrus roll. During the time when most variations arose, narrow columns were assuredly general, to say the least. The date when ‘stichometry’ proper began is still unknown: the evidence which refers it to the middle of the 5th century is most precarious. And the example of E of the Acts shews on how different scales stichometrical arrangements might be made.
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 347
dicews axpoBvatia ii. 27; (ov mavtas ill. 9;) “Inood iti. 26; povov iv. 16; 6 Odvatos v.12; (Tails érvOupiass avTod vi. 12 ;) 6re ewol TO KaKov TapdKettat Vii. 21; ef 5€ Xpuotos ev vpiv viii. 10; vioeciar viii. 23; &c. The omission ini. 7 might there- fore be neglected without further thought but for the parallel omission of tots év ‘Pon ini. 15, the name of Rome being confined to these two passages in the Epistle. The coincidence would certainly be noteworthy if it were sustained by other documentary evidence, or if there were independent reasons for believing a recension of the Epistle to have existed in which the marks of a special destination were purposely obliterated. There is no such reason apart from the supposed removal of xv. xvi: the hypothesis is suggested by the reading of G at i.7,15. We may therefore be content to suspect that in these two verses like causes produced like results.
All the phenomena of text alleged to prove a double recension have now been examintd. The enigmatical Latin capitulation excepted, they have been found, if I mistake not, to be more naturally explicable by other causes. This result becomes clearer still when the hypothesis is examined as a whole. The second recension, it will be remembered, was said to consist of chapters i. to xiv., with the Doxology, and without the two namings of Rome. How is it then that every autho- rity, which supports, or may be thought to support, some part of this combination, contradicts some other part? For the omission of xv. xvi. the one direct testimony, if such it be, is that of Marcion: and yet the one incontrovertible fact about him is that he omitted the Doxology. If Gis to be added on the strength of the blank space after xiv., yet again it leaves out the Doxology. Once more there is no lack of authorities of a sort for subjoining the Doxology to xiv. We may waive the fact that they all retain xv. xvi. We cannot forget (1) that they all make mention of Rome at 1. 7,15; and (2) that they have no sort of genealogical affinity with the MS. that ignores Rome, or with Marcion. In few words, the authorities, which
348 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
as a matter of fact contain the rude outlines of the first recension, supply the main data for constructing the second. Meanwhile neither recension is represented in the great mass of good authorities, Greek, Latin, Syriac, Egyptian, or other, on which the text of St Paul stands in ordinary cases. Both recensions, as wholes, are purely conjectural. If Rome and the transposed Benediction are set aside, the first recension is vouched for by FG (standing for a single archetype) alone of extant documents and by some traditional evidence. The second recension can be reached only through a hypothetical text which Marcion altered, and a hypothetical duplicate original of G.
Such being the relations of the textual evidence, little re- quires to be said on the intrinsic probability of the hypothesis. There is nothing in it that we need hesitate to accept if only the evidence were stronger. But it surely has not that kind of verisimilitude which would raise the feeling that it cannot but be true. The only analogous instance known to us is the encyclical epistle addressed to the Ephesians and other neigh- bouring churches. But that letter appears (1) to have been sent simultaneously to its different recipients; and (2) to have been general in form in the first instance, not a special appeal trimmed for general use. Analogy apart, it is difficult to imagine St Paul deliberately cutting out in after years the words that spoke of personal bonds to definite churches and believers, and the passionate hopes and fears which they had once called forth. If for any purpose he needed an impersonal treatise on the old subjects, he would surely have written it anew. Indeed the fitness of our Epistle, however altered, may well be doubted. Its catholicity springs from the marvellous balance that it holds between Jew and Gentile, which in its turn rises historically out of the equal or almost equal combi- nation of the two bodies in the metropolitan Church, as Dr Lightfoot has justly insisted (p. 312 ff). Is it probable that the same characteristics would recur in the unlike ‘countries into which he had not yet penetrated’ (p. 319)? Even that single
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 349
point of connexion disappears when we recall the pregnant paradox of his relation to the Romans, that, though he had not seen them, he knew them so well.
The inverse theory of several critics, that the original letter to the Romans ended with xiv. and, some add, with the Doxology, and that St Paul afterwards appended xv. xv1., escapes these difficulties to plunge into worse. Paley proves convincingly that xv. can belong only to the time when the body of the Epistle was written and can have been addressed only to the Romans: and there is cogent evidence which he has overlooked. Dr Lightfoot has shewn how much can fairly be elicited from xvi. to the same effect. The slight break more- over after xiv. is onesided, and on the wrong side. The opening words of xv. furnish a tolerable beginning: the last words of xiv. make a very bad end, even when the Doxology is allowed to follow.
When all is said, two facts have to be explained, the inser- tion of the Doxology after xiv., and its omission. The former has occupied us enough already: the latter now claims a few words. If the view taken in this paper be right, the omitting authorities are FG, Marcion, and certain MSS. twice noticed by Origen, once distinctly and both times implicitly, as having been corrupted by Marcion. The readings of D* and Sedulius, mixed authorities substantially akin to FG, likewise imply omission as antecedent. Origen accuses Marcion of wilful omission: is the charge just? There is analogy favourable to either answer. It is now equally certain that Marcion some- times mutilated the text of his favourite apostle, and that some variations or omissions imputed to his pen were in fact simply the readings which he found already in his MS. The reference to ‘ prophetic Scriptures’ in v. 26 might conceivably annoy him, though, as far as we know, he tolerated much of the same kind that was less likely to please him. But the removal of four words, an operation more in his manner, would have served every purpose. Though copies of his Apostolicon were seemingly current here and there in the Church, no extant document can
350 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
be shewn to have been affected by any of his wilful alterations. Indeed ‘ copies corrupted by Marcion’ need mean to us no more than ‘copies agreeing in a certain reading with Marcion’s copy’: and Marcion’s copy, prior to his own manipulations, appears by various signs to have had much in common with the authorities associated with him in the omission of the Doxology. On the whole it is reasonably certain that the omission is his only as having been transmitted by him, in other words that it is a genuine ancient reading.
Genuine: but right or wrong? The question cannot be answered off-hand. Not right merely because shewn to be as old as the first quarter of the second century: not wrong merely because the outward evidence for omission is small and at the same time virtually responsible for many impossible readings. Experience shews that authorities, rarely or never in the right when they alter or add, are often in the right when they omit. Such is preeminently the case with the Western group of which DFG form an important section. Yet the omissions of DFG without the accession of B, when examined together, are for the most part suspicious. Thus on the whole authority is in favour of the Doxology. Internal evidence is likewise not all on one side. So considerable an omission might be expected to proceed only from a strong and evident motive, such as cannot be decisively recognized here. On the other hand the singular and yet unobtrusive correspondence with those parts of the letter which best reveal its purpose is an argument hardly to be gainsayed without strong documentary testimony. Pure accident is not to be rejected from the imaginable causes of the loss. The last or outer column of a papyrus roll, the outer leaf of a parchment book, would be subject to peculiar risks, as every keeper of MSS. can avouch; and it is probable that an epistle as long as that to the Romans would often form a book to itself in early times’. Nor again dare we assume that the
! On the scale of the archetype of C usually of coarse thick parchment, the
this epistle would occupy 90 leaves. delicate thin vellum of our great MSS. They would necessarily be small, and being a recognized mark of luxury;
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. oon
rash hands which shifted the Benediction would hesitate to let go the Doxology, in their zeal to give the Epistle a correct ending. Having once lost the vantage ground of possession from whatever cause, the Doxology would not easily recover it. Henceforth conservatism and criticism would be on the same side. Presently, when the Doxology had found a home after the fourteenth chapter, every motive for replacing it at the end of the Epistle was gone. We cannot wonder that the evidence for retaining it there, and leaving inviolate the continuity of the fourteenth and fifteenth chapters, is exclusively ancient and
good},
and would thus form a sufficient vo- lume. The variety of order in the Pauline epistles in early times, of which there is good evidence, would be promoted by their separate use. On this view the language used by Con- stantine and Eusebius (V. Const. iv. 36 f.) about the new Imperial Bibles, ‘sumptuously prepared,’ with their quires of 3 or 4 sheets, has more force: Constantine’s word cwyudriov (=cor- pus), the technical term for a combi- nation of single works, doubtless ex- presses the change from books and groups of books to the full Canon.
1 Since this article has been in type, Dr Lightfoot has kindly pointed out to me an oversight in pp. 337 f., 347. In the Codex Fuldensis the table of head- ings to Romans agrees with that in the Codex Amiatinus etc. only in the latter part, as Ranke himself observes, p. xxiii, The first 23 headings belong to a totally different capitulation, and exhaust the Epistle down to xiv. 13. Then follows No. 24 of the other table, describing ix. 1-5; and so on. The previous or peculiar headings have no marks or divisions answering to them in the text itself. The scribe evidently saw that his tale of 51 sections could not be made up without borrowing
F, J, A. HORT.
elsewhere, and he ventured to save appearances at the cost of sense. Whe- ther he had actually reached the end of the first table or only saw it near at hand, is less clear. The headings are not so exactly descriptive as to forbid the inclusion of xiv. 14-23 in §23; and thus it is certainly possible that we have two complete and independent Latin capitulations in which xy. xvi. are omitted. More cannot be said till ancient capitulations generally have been properly investigated, and this demands a wide examination of MSS. Meanwhile it should be observed that (1) the Fulda headings have no trace of the Doxology; and (2) they are loaded with Augustinian or Anti-Pelagian phraseology, and cannot therefore be dated much before 400 at earliest.
The sectional numerals in P, I now likewise see, may possibly once have been continued after Rom. xv. 14; 1 Cor. xv. 51: some numerals have faded out of sight in almost every epistle, and in Rom. i.-x. all have vanished; ef. Tischendorf M.S.I. y. p. xiv. But as the §1 of each epistle (10) except 1 Cor. begins after the salutation, analogy favours the view taken above (p. 342, n. 1).
C.
N the last number of this Journal (10. p. 51 sq.) Mr Hort
criticised and condemned a theory which I had suggested in the preceding number (IL p. 264 sq.) to account for certain facts connected with the text of the Epistle to the Romans. The facts, it will be remembered, were mainly these; (1) One or more ancient writers used a copy of the Epistle containing only the first fourteen chapters, with or without the doxology which in the common text stands at the close of the whole (xvi. 25-27). (2) In the existing copies this doxology appears some- times at the end of the xivth chapter, sometimes at the end of the xvith, sometimes in both places, while in some few in- stances it is omitted altogether. (3) At least one text omits év ‘Pown in 1.7, 15. The theory, by which I sought to com- bine and explain these facts, was this; that St Paul at a later period of his life reissued the Epistle in a shorter form with a view to general circulation, omitting the last two chapters, obliterating the mention of Rome in the first chapter, and adding the doxology, which was no part of the original Epistle. Mr Hort impugns some of these assumed facts and explains away others. Having done this, he attacks the theory itself, and endeavours to show that it is untenable.
No one, who is really anxious to ascertain the truth, would object to such a criticism as Mr Hort’s, even though it should lead to the rejection of a darling theory. I am especially obliged to him for the thoroughness with which he has applied the test of textual criticism to my hypothesis. And, if I ven- ture, notwithstanding his arguments, to maintain that the facts themselves are stubborn and in some respects even stronger than I had supposed, and to uphold my theory as the most
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 858
probable explanation of the facts, until a better is suggested, I trust that 1 am not blinded by partiality. At all events I will give my reasons as briefly as possible, taking the facts first and then proceeding to the theory.
I. The first and most important of the facts is the ex- istence, in early times, of copies containing only fourteen chapters. Of this the indications are various, and (as it seems to me) conclusive.
(i) The statement of Origen respecting Marcion has been ‘universally understood, as Mr Hort himself allows (p. 330), to mean that this heretic struck out not only the paragraph con- taining the doxology, but the two last chapters also; ‘Caput hoc [ue. the paragraph containing the doxology] Marcion, a quo Scripturae evangelicae atque apostolicae interpolatae sunt, de hac epistola penitus abstulit; et non solum hoc, sed et ab eo loco ubi scriptum est Omne autem quod non ex fide peccatum est (xiv. 23) ad finem cuncta dissecuit. In aliis vero exemplaribus, id est, in his quae non sunt a Marcione temerata, hoc ipsum caput diverse positum invenimus, An universal understanding may be wrong, but most frequently it is correct; and I cannot doubt that this is the case here. Mr Hort however adopts a reading of a Paris MS. (Reg. 1639) which has ‘zn eo loco’ for ‘ab eo loco, and himself alters ‘hoe’ into ‘hic. Thus he makes Origen say that Marcion cut out the doxology, not only at the end of the xivth chapter, but also at the end of the Epistle. Now my reply to this is three- fold; (1) Though we may allow the general value of the read- ings in this MS., whose date however is not earlier than about the 12th century, yet its text is far from faultless, so that only a slight presumption is raised in favour of a reading from the fact of its being found there. In the present instance however the reading ‘in eo loco’ has no meaning, unless with Mr Hort we likewise change hoc into hic—an alteration for which there is no MS. authority. (2) Mr Hort’s reading and interpretation destroy the force of individual expressions in the context.
i. Bi 23
354 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
‘Usque ad finem cuncta dissecuit’ is natural enough when applied to two whole chapters, but not to the doxology alone; and again in ‘hoc ipsum caput’ the aswm becomes meaningless, unless it is contrasted with some other portion. If the words be taken as they stand and interpreted in the ordinary way, the sequence commends itself; ‘Caput hoc...non solum hoc sed...usque ad finem cuncta...hoc ipsum caput’; but it is entirely broken up if they are read and explained as Mr Hort wishes. (8) One who reads continuously not only the passage quoted above, but the whole paragraph of Origen as given by Mr Hort (see p. 330) or by myself (p. 288), will hardly fail, I think, to see how Mr Hort’s interpretation involves and confuses the natural order of the topics.
When again Mr Hort supposes the statement of Jerome (on Ephes. iii. 5), that the doxology was found in plerisque codi- cibus, to have been derived from Origen’s commentary on the same Epistle, I allow that this supposition is probable. But I do not see that Mr Hort’s view gains strength thereby. Com- menting on Ephes. 11. 5, Origen would be concerned only with the doxology in which ‘the mystery’ is mentioned, and he would be going out of his way, if he said anything about the omission of the xvth and xvith chapters, with which he was not in any way concerned. Moreover it must be observed that, when there is a question of a various reading, Jerome sometimes ‘manipulates Origen’s statements in such a manner as entirely to disfigure their meaning. Such is the case for instance with the opening verse of this very Epistle to the Ephesians, where Origen, having before him a text which omitted év "Edéog, interprets tots ovow in an entirely lucid though highly artificial way, but Jerome, repeating his great predecessor's comment, holds language which can hardly be called intel- ligible.
As regards the statement of Tertullian, when arguing against Marcion (v. 14), that the threat of the tribunal Christi (Rom. xiv. 10) occurs in clausula of the Epistle, I agree with Mr Hort that the inference which supposes Tertullian to refer
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 3)
to a copy of the Epistle wanting the xvth and xvith chapters, though ‘natural,’ is not ‘conclusive. Let the fact that the inference is natural have no more than its proper weight. I should not have laid much stress on the expression, if it had stood alone; but in connexion with Origen’s account of Mar- cion it cannot be overlooked.
(ii) For the negative argument that the last two chapters are nowhere quoted by certain early writers I claim a supple- mental value. More than this it does not deserve. The fact however remains that neither Irenzeus nor Tertullian nor Cyprian (except in a very doubtful allusion) refers to them. I will only add that this omission occurs in Western writers, whereas they are more than. once quoted by Clement and Origen. The importance of this fact will appear hereafter.
(i) I owe it to Mr Hort’s candour that my attention was directed to the capitulations of the Latin Bibles, and the evi- dence derived thence seems to me to strengthen my case enor- mously. In my former article I had referred to Wetstein’s note: ‘Codex Latinus habet capitula Epistolae ad Romanos 51, desinit autem in caput xiv.; ex quo conficitur ista capitula ad editionem Marcionis fuisse accommodata’; and, misled with others by his careless expression desinit (where desinunt would have been clearer), I had naturally supposed that the MS. itself, to which he refers, ended with the xivth chapter, and accord- ingly remarked that ‘later critics had not been able to identify the MS. and thus verify the statement.’ I have no doubt how- ever that Mr Hort is right, and that Wetstein refers to such a phenomenon as the Codex Amiatinus exhibits, where (though the Epistle itself is complete) the capitulations end with the end of the xivth chapter, there or thereabouts. I have since
1 The first distinct quotation by any may be trusted) cites nothing from Western writer, so far as I can dis- these two chapters but the doxology. cover, occurs in Victorinus c. Arium The ‘very doubtful reference’ in Cy- iii. p. 280 c, a treatise written about prian is given by Mr Hort, p. 336, A.D. 365—where xvi. 20 is quoted. note 2.
Even Hilary of Poitiers (if the index
23—2
356 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS,
been investigating the subject'; and the results of this investi- gation seem to be sufficiently important to justify my taking up a few pages in recording them.
In fact, there is evidence of two distinct capitulations—both ending with the xivth chapter—the first very widely spread, the second only preserved in a single though very early MS.
Of the first of these, the Codex Amiatinus affords the oldest and best example. In this MS. the table of contents prefixed to the Epistle gives 51 sections, the 50th section being described ‘De periculo contristante fratrem suum esca sua, et quod non sit regnum Dei esca et potus sed justitia et pax et gaudium in | Spiritu Sancto, and the 51st and last ‘De mysterio domini ante passionem in silentio habito, post passionem vero ipsius revelato.’ Corresponding to these, the sections are marked in | the text, and agree with the descriptions in the table of con- tents as far as the 50th. The 50th is marked as beginning at xiv. 15, and here again the description is accurate; but the 51st commences with xv. 4, and has no connexion with the description. The description of the 51st in fact corresponds to the doxology (xvi. 25-27), and to nothing else in the re- mainder of the Epistle. The natural inference therefore is, that the capitulation was made for a copy of the Epistle, containing only fourteen chapters and the doxology; and that the scribe who first adapted it to a full copy with the sixteen chapters, not finding anything corresponding to the 51st section in the immediate context, extended the 50th section as far as the subject allowed him and made the 51st section include all the remainder of the Epistle. This solution, which Mr Hort allows to be certainly possible, seems to me to commend itself as in the highest degree probable.
This capitulation appears to have prevailed very widely. It is found in not less than seven MSS, enumerated by Card.
1 After I saw Mr Hort’'s article in non of the capitulations in the Codex type, I began to look into the matter; Fuldensis. To this conversation he and, before it was finally struck off,I _ refers in a note appended to his article mentioned the remarkable phenome- (p, 351).
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 357
Tommasi (Thomasii Op. I. p. 388 sq. ed. Vezzosi), and dating from the age of Charles the Great downwards. It occurs again in the British Museum MS. Add. 10,546, an Alcuinian copy, generally called ‘Charlemagne’s Bible,’ but really written in one of the succeeding reigns; in the important MS. Harl. 1772 belonging to the 8th century; in the Oxford Bodleian MS. Laud. Lat. 108 (E. 67) of the 9th century (in which however the number is expanded from 51 to 67 by a subdivision of one or more of the earlier sections); in the MS. B. 5. 2 of Trin. Coll., Cambridge, belonging to the 11th or 12th century’; and in the Cambridge University MS. Ee. 1. 9 written apparently late in the 13th century’. in number and position with those of the Amiatinus, but the
In Add. 10,546 the sections correspond
words are occasionally varied, e.g. de non contristando fratre for de periculo contristante fratrem suum. In Harl. 1772 the number of sections in the table of contents is reduced to 49 by combining §§ 43, 44, 45 in one section, while (except unim- portant various readings) the words of the Amiatinus are strictly followed. In the text however the whole 51 sections are marked; of these the first 49 correspond to those of the Amiatinus, but the 50th commences not with the beginning of xiv. 15 Si enim propter, but with the middle Noli cibo (while on the margin in a later hand stands xlviij. opposite Sti enim propter), and the 5lst not with xv. 4 Quaecuwmque enim, but with the middle of xiv. 22 Beatus qui (the Q of Quaecumque being however illuminated). And again in Cambr. Univ. Ee. 1. 9, where the number of sections is similarly re- duced to 50, the beginning of the 50th and last section ‘de mysterio ete.’ stands at xv. 1 Debemus autem nos, i.e. at the precise point where it would have stood, if the MS. had con-
1 In the older Trin. Coll. MS. of St Paul’s Epistles B. 10. 5, of the 9th
2 In the Cambr. Univ. MS. Ff. 4. 40, which came from the Library of Christ
century, the Epistle to the Romans and part of the First to the Corinthians are wanting. The Amiatinian capitu- lations are given for the other Epi- stles.
Church, Canterbury, and was written probably early in the 13th century, though the Amiatinian capitulations are not given, I find this note ‘Haec epistola capitula li. dicitur habuisse.’
358 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
tained only the doxology after the xivth chapter. These variations show the difficulty which was felt in adapting the end of the imperfect capitulation to the complete Epistle: and they answer any objection founded on the fact that in the Amiatinus itself the last section does not commence at the exact place in the text which the hypothesis seems to require.
In more than one MS. however, which I have examined, this capitulation is completed. The British Museum MS. Add. 28,107 formerly belonged to the monastery of 8. Remacle at Stavelot, and was written in the year 1097, ‘ipso eodem anno quo versus hierusalem facta fuerat gentium plurimarum profectio, as is stated at the end. The capitulation to the Epistle to the Romans gives 63 sections. Of these § 1-41 correspond with those of the Amiatinus; §§ 42, 43, 44, 45, are formed out of § 42 of the latter subdivided; and §§ 46-53 correspond to §§ 43-50 of the latter. Thus the heading of § 53 is ‘Periculum contristantis fratrem suum esca sua etc.’ There is nothing corresponding to § 51 of Amiatinus, which comprises the doxology, but § 54 (xiv. 19) is ‘Quae pacis sunt sectanda et fratres propter escam minime judicandi, and § 55 (xv. 4) ‘De doctrina et consolatione scripturarum et quod una- nimiter sit honorificandus deus et pater domini nostri jesu christi’?; while the last section of all (§ 63), beginning at xvi. 21, runs ‘Salutatio timothei et caeterorum etiam et ipsius pauli qui epistolam in domino se scripsisse dicit.. The com- piler was vigilant enough to see that the section ‘de mysterio ete.’ of the capitulation before him did not correspond to any- thing which followed, and therefore ejected it, and supplied (though not very intelligently) the remaining sections which were required to complete the Epistle.
Another complete capitulation, founded on the Amiatinian, occurs in the British Museum MS., Reg. 1. E. viii., which be- longed to Christ Church, Canterbury, and may have been written about the middle of the tenth century. This capitu- lation, which is very brief and very slovenly, comprises 29 sections. The last of these are as follows:
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 359
de redditione unicuique omnium debitore (s?c).
de periculo contristante fratrem esca sua.
de mysterio domini ante passionem in silentio habitat (sic). post passionem domini ipsius mysterio revelatus.
obsecratio pauli ad dominum ut liberetur ab infidelibus. salutatio pauli ad fratres.
XXiili.
XXV.
XXVI.
XXVil.
XXVill.
EKLX. The retention and subdivision of the section comprising the doxology, where it has no meaning, is a curious pheno- menon.
A third instance of completed capitulation is found in the MS. B. 5. 1 of Trin. Coll, Cambridge, belonging to the 12th century. Here the scribe has retained all the Amiatinian sec- tions, including the doxology; but by combining two in the _ earlier part, he reduces them to 50 in number. Thus the 49th
is ‘de non contristando fratrem, etc.’, and the 50th ‘de mysterio domini, etc. To these he adds two new sections, which are the same as those described in the last MS.:
li. obsecratio pauli ad dominum, etc. li. salutatio pauli ad fratres.
In the text the 49th section begins at xiv. 50, the 50th at xv. 4, the 51st at xv. 30, and the 52nd at xvi. 1. The inequality of scale in these superadded sections shows that they did not pro- ceed from the same hand as the rest}.
These facts have been elicited by an examination of such MSS. as came conveniently within my reach?. Doubtless a wider investigation would produce more striking results. But I have seen enough to convince me that the Amiatinian capitu-
1 The relation between the two MSS. last described is curious. For, while other indications would suggest that the capitulations of Brit. Mus. Reg. 1. E. viii. were derived from those of Trin. B. 5.1, the former presents the older form of the Amiatinian 50th sec- tion ‘de periculo contristante fratrem,’ while the latter substitutes the amend- ed form ‘de non contristando fratrem,’
which perhaps appears first in the Al- cuinian copies.
2 My examination has not extended beyond the British Museum MSS. to the 11th century (inclusive), and the MSS. in the Cambridge University and Trinity College Libraries. The infor- mation respecting Bodl. Laud. Lat. 108 I owe to Mr Coxe, the Librarian.
360 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
lation, though originally framed, as will be seen hereafter, for a short copy of the Old Latin, yet maintained its ground as a common mode of dividing the Epistle, until it was at length superseded by the present division into 16 chapters in the latter half of the 13th century.
The second capitulation, of which I spoke, is found in the Codex Fuldensis which, like the Amiatinus, was written about the middle of the 6th century. The sections in the text cor- respond exactly with the Amiatinian. Not so in the table of contents. Of the latter Ranke remarks (Codex Fuldensis, p. xxiii, 1868): ‘Quae epistolae ad Romanos praemissa sunt capitula duabus in partibus constant, quarum altera (i—xxiil.), totius fere epistolae argumentwm in se continens, per se ipsa stare videtur, altera (xxiii—li.) iis respondet quae iisdem sub numeris in cod. Amiatino proferuntur. The words which I have itali- cised are not very exact. These 23 sections, which belong to a different capitulation from the remainder, reach to about the end of the fourteenth chapter, the last (§ xxiii.) being ‘Quod fideles dei non debeant invicem judicare cum unusquisq. secun- dum regulas mandatorum ipse se debeat divino judicio praepa- rare ut ante tribunal dei sine confusione possit operum suorum praestare rationem,’ The 24th Amiatinian section, which fol- lows next, begins with ix. 1, so that six chapters (ix.—xiv.) are included twice. The natural inference is that the scribe, re- membering that the text contained 51 sections and seeing that the table of contents gave less than half that number, applied himself to another source, and completed the headings of the remaining sections from the Amiatinian capitulation. Whether the capitulation from which § i—xxiii. are taken contained the doxology or not, must remain doubtful, The analogy of the Amiatinian sections would suggest that it did. The 23 sum- maries peculiar to the Fuldensis are very broad and general ; thus § xxii. ‘de mundanis potestatibus honorandis quia oportet oboediri his quib. ad mundanum regumen dominus tribuit potestate,’ though including the whole of our 13th chapter, omits to take account of the last half, vv. 8-14; and in like manner
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 361
in § xxi. the doxology may not have been thought worthy of any special attention in this heading’.
Mr Hort indeed impugns the value of this Fuldensian capi- tulation on the ground that the headings ‘are loaded with Augustinian or Anti-Pelagian phraseology, and cannot therefore be dated much before 400 at earliest’ (p. 351, note). I have no wish to deny that there is force in this argument; which never- theless does not seem to me conclusive. The strongest expres- sions in this direction are ‘pro fide romanorum...deo apostolus gratias agit ut probetur fidem in deum munerts est divint, and ‘in Christo Jesu qui solus sic humana [humanam] naturam The African fathers were more or less Augustinian before Augus- tine’s time, and (so far as I can see) might have held such language’.
recepit ut eum contagia veteris originis non tenerent.’
On any showing however the Latin Bibles bear strong testi- mony to the existence of the shorter form of this Epistle at an early date. The alternative hypothesis, that these sections were determined by the lessons read in Churches, is devoid alike of evidence and of probability. With this single exception, the Amiatinian capitulation in the New Testament includes, I It does not bear the Nor indeed is there any reason why the 15th chapter should be
believe, the entire book in every case. slightest trace of being intended for lectionary purposes.
excluded from the lessons; for it is much more fit for public
1 Besides the capitulations mention- ed in the text, I have noticed one other which is unconnected with either. It contains 18 sections and includes _ the whole epistle. This capitulation is found in:
(1) Brit. Mus. Add. 11,852, a MS. which belonged to the monastery of St Gall, and was written in the 9th century.
(2) Brit. Mus, Add, 24,142 ‘Monas- terii S. Huberti in Ardvenna,’ sup- posed to have been written about a.p. 900.
In this last MS., though the table of contents gives 18 chapters, the Epistle itself is divided by marginal numbers into smaller sections, 125 in number.
2 e.g. Cyprian Ep. 64, says ‘Secun- dum Adam carnaliter natus, contagium mortis antiquae prima nativitate con- traxit.’ Compare also Tertull. de Anim, 40, 41; and see Neander Hist. of Christian Dogmas, 1. p. 185 sq. (Eng. Trans.). Augustine’s own dogmatic views on these points were enunciated before Pelagius took up the subject: ib. p. 347 sq.
362 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
reading than many sections elsewhere, which are retained. Even the 16th chapter would be treated with exceptional rigour on this showing, for in other epistles the paragraphs containing the salutations are religiously recorded in the capitulation. Moreover, the oldest evidence which we possess on the subject exhibits lessons for Sundays and Festivals taken from the 15th chapter; and if so, a fortiort it would not be neglected in the daily lessons, supposing (which seems improbable) that daily lessons had been instituted at the time when this capitulation was made,
When my attention was first directed to the Amiatinian capitulation, I naturally inferred that it had belonged originally to the Old Latin and was later adapted to the Vulgate. A fur- ther examination has shown this inference to be correct. The capitulation preserves at least one crucial reading of the Old Latin. In § xlu. the words ‘de tempore serviendo’ show that its author for 76 xupim Sovrevovtes read 76 xarpe SovdrevovTes in xl. 11, a reading which Jerome especially quotes as con- demning the Old Latin and justifying his own revision (Xpist. 28, Op. I. 133, ed. Vallarsi).
Thus, taking into account all the evidence, the statement of Origen respecting Marcion (confirmed by the incidental expres- sion of Tertullian), the absence of quotations in several early fathers, and the capitulation (or capitulations) of the Latin Bibles, we have testimony various, cumulative, and (as it seems to me) irresistible, to the existence of shorter copies of the Epistle containing only fourteen chapters with or without the doxology in early times. Even though it be granted that Mr Hort has given a possible explanation (1 cannot allow that his explanations are probable) of each of these facts singly on a different hypothesis, still the convergence of so many inde- pendent testimonies direct or indirect towards this one point must be regarded, if I mistake not, as conclusive.
II. However the evidence does not end here. The fact that in existing MSS. the doxology occurs in different places (see p. 352) is very intimately connected with the fact or class
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. aoe
of facts considered under the first head. And here again I can- not help remarking that my position has this great advantage over Mr Hort’s, that whereas I postulate only one unknown fact to explain all or most of the phenomena, he is obliged to postulate a distinct one to account for each several pheno- menon in turn.
As regards the varying position of this doxology, Mr Hort’s explanation supposes the following stages. (1) The original place was at the end of the Epistle. (2) It was afterwards attached to xiv. 23 for reading in Church. (8) ‘Scribes accus- tomed to hear it in that connection in the public lessons would half mechanically introduce it into the text of St Paul’ at this place. (4) It would then be struck off from the end of the Epistle, that the same doxology might not occur twice. Thus we arrive at the vulgar Greek text, which has it at the end of the xivth chapter only.
Now, waiving for the present the consideration of its origi- nal position, I wish to point out two great improbabilities First. There is no such obvious connexion between the paragraph at
involved in the other assumptions in this sequence.
the end of chapter xiv. and the doxology, as should lead to their being connected together’, if separated in their original position by two whole chapters, while on the other hand these intervening chapters present material for more than one excel- lent lesson. Bengel indeed suggests, as Mr Hort points out, that the severa sententia dpaptia éotiv, with which chapter xiv. closes, would be deemed unfit for the end of a lesson and that this inauspicious termination was got rid of by tacking on the doxology. But how much more easily would the difficulty
have been overcome by continuing the lesson a little further
1 In a note (p. 342) Mr Hort remarks that ‘the Synaxaria, valeant quantum, give Rom. xiv. 19-23, plus the doxo- logy as the lesson’ for the Saturday before Quinquagesima. But since the doxology occurs here in the vulgar Greek text which prevailed at Antioch
and Constantinople and from which the Synaxaria are taken, they would naturally read it here. I would add that the Synaxaria (see Scrivener’s Introduction, p. 68 sq.) present no parallel to the omission of two whole chapters.
364 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS,
and closing with the 2nd or 4th or 6th verse of the next chapter. The instance which Mr Hort quotes (p. 343, note 1), Acts vi. 8-vii. 2 combined with vii. 51-viil. 4, as a lesson for St Stephen’s day, will hardly bear out his hypothesis, for there the combination is naturally suggested by the subject. Secondly. This solution requires us to believe that all the three steps numbered (2), (3), (4), had taken place before Origen’s time, so that he can speak of some MSS. as having the doxology in the one place and some in the other, without sus- pecting how the variation had come to pass. This supposes such an early development of the lectionary as (I believe) there is no ground for assuming.
III. Lastly there are the phenomena in the first chapter to be considered. Here the important fact is, that in one extant MS. (G) certainly, and in another (F) probably, the mention of Rome has been obliterated in two distinct passages. In 1 7 Mr Hort explains the omission by the fact that ‘a Western cor- rection substitutes év aydmn Oeod for dyarnrots @cod,’ so that the words would run enpamuenarantn, where the repetition of év might occasion the omission of one of the two clauses, especially as the archetype of this MS. appears to have been written stichometrically and each év might commence a new line. Thus the omission would be accidental. But apparently dissatisfied with this solution he offers a second suggestion, that the omis- sion was intentional ; for he adds, ‘These two MSS. (F and G) have further a trick of omitting words that do not appear neces- sary to the sense,’ and gives instances. The accidental omission I could understand, but the intentional (thus explained) seems hardly credible, for the words év ‘Pon are essential to an Epistle to the Romans. Of the omission in i. 15 he gives no direct explanation, except so far as it may be involved in the words ‘we may be content to suspect that in these two verses like causes produced like results’ (p. 347). I do not understand this, unless by like causes is meant the desire in both cases to obliterate a superfluous clause. I too maintain that ‘like causes produced like results, but I cannot allow that the historical fact
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION, 365
involved in the mention of Rome could be regarded as a super- fluity in an Epistle to the Romans; and, if the omission was intentional in both cases, it must have been (so far as I can see) from the desire of obliterating the proper name, because the proper name was no longer applicable. The hypothesis, that a coincidence so remarkable as the omission of the same name in two distinct passages could have been purely accidental, seems to me to be the most improbable of all.
That the twin MSS. F, G, did not stand alone in this omis- sion, appears from the marginal note in 47, on which Mr Hort has some remarks, p. 344, Whether to these authorities we should add the commentaries of Origen and the Ambrosian Hilary, must remain uncertain. I certainly should not have discovered the omission in them, if it had not occurred inde- pendently, and I am not prepared to say that Mr Hort’s explanation (p. 345) of their language is not right. At the same time to my own mind the ‘ Benedictio quam dat dilectis Dei ad quos scribit’ of Origen, and the ‘Quamvis Romanis scribat, illis tamen scribere se significat qui in caritate Dei sunt’ of Hilary, still leave the same impression; but probably they will strike others differently.
It will thus be seen that Mr Hort denies some of my facts, and impugns the significance of others. As the facts give him no trouble, it follows that the hypothesis, which has no other raison d’étre but to explain them, should not find favour with him. But, if (as I think I have shown) the facts are even more cogent than they appeared at first, being reinforced by the Latin capitulations, an explanation is still demanded. I cannot indeed say that my hypothesis is free from objections. But a priori improbabilities could be detected by the keen eye of criticism in the most certain events of history ; and a theory, which is based on circumstantial evidence, cannot hope to escape objection on this ground. But, if no other hypothesis has been offered which does not involve more or greater im- probabilities, and if some hypothesis is needed to account for the facts, I must still venture to claim a hearing for my own.
366 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
In Mr Hort’s criticism of the theory itself, as distinct from the facts which evoked it, there are three points especially which call for a reply.
(i) I had assigned the doxology (xvi. 25-27) to the shorter recension of the Epistle, which I supposed to have been issued by St Paul himself at a later date, and had produced parallels to show that its style very closely resembles that of the Apostle’s later Epistles. Mr Hort himself considers it to have been the termination of the original Epistle. His argument is threefold: (a) that it is appropriate; (b) that St Paul at the time entertained the ideas contained in it; (c) that it presents numberless close parallels of expression to the earlier Epistles.
(a) As regards its appropriateness, I entirely agree with him. I cannot indeed assent to Baur’s opinion which he adopts, that the main drift of the Epistle is revealed in chapters ix.—xi, The central idea, as I conceive it, is the comprehensive offer of righteousness to Jews and Gentiles impartially, following on the comprehensive failure of both alike before Christ’s coming. After this idea has been developed, the objection arises that, however comprehensive may be the offer, the acceptance at all events is partial and one-sided; that while the Gentiles seem gladly to accept it, the Jews stand aloof; and that thus the promises of the Old Testament appear to be nullified, and in- deed reversed. It is to meet the objection which thus starts up, that St Paul pierces the veil of the future and discerns the gathering of the Jews into the same fold whither the Gentiles have preceded them. Thus the result will be comprehensive, as the offer has been comprehensive. But however fit a consum- mation of the <Apostle’s teaching this prophetic announce- ment may be, it does not in itself contain the nucleus of that teaching.
To the whole body of the Epistle however, in which the comprehensive failure, the comprehensive grace, the compre- hensive acceptance, have been set forth in succession, the dox- ology forms an eminently appropriate close. An outburst of thanksgiving for the revelation of this ‘mystery’ of the im-
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 367
partial Fatherhood of God in Christ is the proper sequel to the contents of the Epistle. This adaptation would not indeed be easily reconcileable with any other authorship than St Paul’s; but if written by him, whether written early or late, we should expect it to be appropriate.
(b) And again I grant that its main idea—the impar- tiality and universality of God’s grace as a truth revealed in Christ—was not foreign to St Paul’s thoughts at this time, though it assumed a much greater prominence afterwards. In- deed it may be said that this idea necessarily flowed from his commission as the Apostle of the Gentiles.
(c) But, as regards the expression of the idea, I join issue with him. The general style seems to me to be cast essentially in the mould of the later Epistles. The diffusive syntax of the paragraph is exactly what we find, for instance, in the Epistle to the Ephesians. And, when we come to individual phrases, there is (if I mistake not) a very wide difference in point of closeness between Mr Hort’s parallels with the earlier Epistles and mine with the later. Compare for example his parallel of Rom. xiv. 4 with mine of Eph. i. 20 for r@ duva- péve, or of Rom. iii. 29, 30 with mine of 1 Tim. i. 17 for pove cob Med. The only exceptions in favour of the earlier Epi- stles occur exactly where on my hypothesis we should expect to find them. The expression t7raxon trictews is repeated in this final doxology from the opening paragraph of the Epistle (i. 5), and the reference to the prophetic Scriptures also has a parallel in the same paragraph (i. 2). On my hypothesis the opening portion was read over and altered, when some years later the Epistle was issued by the Apostle in this second and shorter form ; and it was therefore natural that the thanksgiving which was then appended, should embody not only thoughts but also expressions taken from the commencement, thus binding toge- ther the beginning and the end of the Epistle.
(ii) The character and condition of the text of the twin MSS., F and G, is one of the points on which Mr Hort lays most stress; and certainly, if his account of my theory were
368 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
correct, I should find it difficult to answer him. Expressing my hypothesis in his own words, he represents me as holding (1) that ‘the scribe of G copied i—xiv. from one MS. and xv. xvi., from another, and (2) that ‘the scribe of F copied in like manner from the same two MSS., though he left no mark of the transition from the one to the other’ (p. 339). He then remarks that ‘If the first of these hypotheses were true we ought surely to find some evidence of it in the respective texts; whereas the closest study fails to detect a shadow of difference in the character of the readings before and after the blank space’; and that ‘when F is taken into account, fresh embarrassments arise. But I did not for a moment contemplate the scribes of F and G each of them copying directly from these two MSS., containing respectively the shorter and the longer recension of the Epistle. I was well aware that the phenomena of these MSS. would not admit of such a supposition. And I venture also to think that my language, which Mr Hort himself quotes just before (p. 338), cannot be taken in this sense: ‘The copyist of an earlier MS., from which it [G] has descended, transcribed a MS. of the abridged recension till the end of chapter xiv., and then took up a MS. of the original Epistle to the Romans’; ‘ Either their common prototype [i. e. of F and G] or a still earlier MS. from which it was copied, must have pre- served the abridged recension, This language was expressly intended by me to leave open the question, as to the length of the pedigree which connected F and G with the scribe who first combined the two recensions; and the idea of direct parentage, which Mr Hort has imposed upon me, never once entered my mind. Thus I left ample room for the development of the peculiarities of F and G. Only I assumed that the retention of the vacant space at the end of chapter xiv., which I took to indicate the end of the Epistle in one of the two original MSS., had survived this development. But though I still think that (taking it in connexion with all the other textual phenomena on which I dwelt) my account of this blank space is the most probable, yet this is only a subsidiary support to my view, and
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 369
I could abandon it without any material injury to the main hypothesis.
But let us enquire what Mr Hort’s statement, that ‘the closest study fails to detect a shadow of difference in the cha- racter of the readings before and after the blank’ (p. 339), really amounts to, when considered in its bearing on my hypothesis.
The characteristics of F and G, which differentiate them from what we may call the standard text of St Paul’s Epistles, as based on the coincidence of the best authorities, are twofold : (1) Those which they exhibit in common with the Western authorities, and more especially that type of Western authori- ties which appears in the Old Latin Version; and (2) Those which are peculiar to these two MSS.
To the first class, comprising those readings which must be referred to the Western type, belong the most important, as well as the most numerous, variations from the standard text, whether in the first fourteen or in the last two chapters of the Epistle. If the two MSS. (contaiming respectively the long and the short form), from which on my hypothesis the text of FG was ultimately derived, were both of them Western, as on all accounts we might probably conclude that they were, then we should expect to find these readings pervading the xvth and xvith chapters, as well as the earlier part of the Epistle. It is difficult to explain the origin and prevalence of the Western type of text at all; but this difficulty was not introduced by my hypothesis, nor do I see that it is increased thereby.
Speaking of the peculiar features of F and G, Mr Hort says, ‘The partial adherence of D excepted, this character is unique among existing Greek MSS.’ On this statement I should wish to make two remarks. (1) The expression partial seems to me inadequately to express the degree of coincidence between D on the one hand, and FG on the other. Certainly in the two last chapters of this Epistle, with which we are mainly concerned, by far the greater number of the important deviations from the standard text are shared by D in common with FG. (2) These
ie OF 24
370 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
three are the only! three Greek uncial MSS. which, whether on external or internal grounds, can be assigned to the Western family. Whatever distinctive features therefore they possess in common, it is reasonable to set down to the Western type of MSS. generally. The Old Latin Version (with the exception of a few fragments) is only known to us through these same MSS., which are bilingual; for other independent copies, which con- tain a more or less pure Old Latin text, have not been collated: and its phenomena entirely accord with this supposition. The remaining source of evidence—the early patristic quotations— does not offer any obstacle to this conclusion ; and indeed in the last two chapters of the Epistle, this evidence, as has been mentioned, is entirely wanting. On the whole then, I think it may be said that the coincidence of D with F and G repre- sents very fairly the Western text.
The second class of readings, those peculiar to F and G, are in the xvth and xvith chapters comparatively unimportant. The divergences of these twin MSS. from D may be taken as approaimately representing their peculiarities, though in the course of the analysis it will be seen that in many cases these divergences are supported by other, and especially by Western, authorities’.
These are as follows:
xv. 1 apeokov [apeoxev] ; 3 ove [ovy] ; 7 vas [D* jyas, but D** duas with most authorities, including Western]; 11 emaweoare [D emaweca- rwcay, but the Latin of D has Magnificate with many other authorities,
and the variation is easily explained in a quotation from the LXX.]; 13 mAnpodopnoa...raon xapa xa expnyn [D mAnpwcat...raons xapas Kat
1 IT pass over E, which is now ac- knowledged (at least so far as regards the Greek) to be a direct copy of D, and therefore to have no independent value,
* J have not recorded either the ac- cidental errors of G when these have been corrected at the time when the MS. was written, or the divergences of F from G. Mr Hort’s view, that F
was copied directly from G, deserves consideration, and may prove true, though his arguments do not seem quite conclusive, So far as it has any bearing on my hypothesis, it is rather favourable than otherwise. The con- verse proposition, that G is copied from F, could not be maintained for a mo- ment.
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. oie
eipnyns, but B agrees with FG, inserting however ey before raon. The Old Latin has repleat...omni gaudio et pace]. 16 Incov Xpiorov [D Xpicrov Incov, but the Latin of D has Jesu Christi which also has the vast preponderance of authority in its favour]. 18 6 Xpucros [om. o]. 21 avayyedn [avnyyedn]. 24 eAmg¢w [D adds yap with the preponderance of authorities, but the Latin of D omits it, and so do the Latin fathers]. 25 vuy [vu]. 26 Maxadoves [Maxedoves], 27 oeiderar yap [om. yap, but the Latin of D and Ambrosiaster have it]; avrev evow [ew avrwyv]. 28 ovy apa [om. apa. The Latin of G is Hoe ergo igitur ergo]. vpas [vpor). 29 ywookw yap [D oda de, but the Latin of D has seo enim, and other authorities, especially Latin Fathers, have the same conjunction]. 30 mpoa- evxats [add tmep exov, but several Latin authorities, including the Latin of D, omit the words]. 31 mpoodexros [evrpoocdexros. The Latin of D is acceptalis (sic)]. 32 avapvyo [avapv&]. 33 vue [add. auny, but A and others omit it].
xvi. 1 vuev [juor, but the Latin of D has vestram, and AP also have dpov]. 2 mapactarets [mpocraris]. 3 acnacba [aoracacée. This blunder recurs]. 8 AyumAcatov [Aym\cav, but the longer form occurs in the Latin of D]. 10 ApioroBorov [ApioroBovdov, but the Latin of D has Aristoboli and this form is found in B and elsewhere], 11 ovyyevn [D ovyyerny, but corrected by-a later hand]. 14 agmacac6e...ev kup om. with A. 15 Iovmav [D Iovdcay, which is correct, but C* has Iovmav]. Odvperda [D Odvpmuar, but Latin authorities, including the Latin of D itself, have Olympiada or Olympiadem]. 17 mapaxado [D* eparw, but corrected. The rest have mapaxado]. mapa [D* wep, but corrected]. 18 kvpio [tw xupio], Sovdev- covow [Sovrevovow]. 23 odat ai exxAnavae [oAns tTys exkAnovas. The Latin of DFG alike is universe ecclesie, which would cover both readings. Another reading is 6An 7 exkAnova. The Aith. is said to have oda ai exkAnowa with FG]. 24 om. Inoov Xpuorov.
This analysis of the readings in the last two chapters shows two things: (1) That in almost every point even of minor im- portance, in which the text of FG diverges from the correct standard, it agrees with the Western text as exhibited by D or by some other authority; and (2) that the exceptions, which thus form the peculiarities of FG, are in almost every instance trivial and are easily explained by carelessness or caprice in copying. Hence it follows: first, that the scribe, who (on my hypothesis) wrote the archetype of F and G, taking up an average copy of the Western text to supply the xvth and xvith chapters, would find a text substantially such as we actually have here; and secondly, that no long pedigree need have been
24—2
372 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
interposed between this archetype and FG, in order to develope the phenomena which they exhibit in these chapters; but that the intervention of a single scribe, or two at most, would ex- plain everything. If so, the argument from the character of the text cannot be considered a substantial objection to my view. (iii) Mr Hort advances another argument against my hy- pothesis based on the assumption that the textual phenomena on which my theory is built are gathered together from incon- gruous sources ; and he even goes so far as to ask, ‘ How is it that every authority, which supports, or may be thought to support, some part of this combination [i.e. the Short Recen- sion, involving (a) the omission of the word Rome in the first chapter, (b) the omission of the xvth and xvith chapters, (c) the presence of the doxology], contradicts some other part ?’ (p. 347). To this statement I demur. I allow indeed that all these phenomena do not coexist in any extant authority. If this had been the case, I should not have had to frame a hypothesis, for the existence of this Shorter Recension would have been an absolute fact. But that there is any contradiction in my authorities, which prejudices the hypothesis, I cannot allow. This attack has led me to marshal my troops to better effect. I wish especially to call attention to the fact, that the authorities, on which I chiefly rely, have for the most part a close affinity to one another and that they belong to the Western type. The Latin capitulations derived, as I have shown, from the Old Version are essentially such. The copy or copies, to which they refer, presented two (b, c) out of the three phenomena, and (for anything we know) may have pre- sented the third (a) also. The remarkable absence of quota- tions from the last two chapters in the earlier Latin Fathers points in the same direction. The MSS. FG, which are the only indisputable vouchers for (a), are essentially Western. Their relation to (b), (c), is a matter of dispute between Mr Hort and myself; but the fact that there is a great break in G at the end of the xivth chapter (however explained) cannot but be held to favour my hypothesis to a greater or less
ITS STRUCTURE AND DESTINATION. 373
degree. The exception to the Western origin of the evidence is Marcion, who, being an Eastern, used a copy of this Epistle in which the two last chapters including the doxology were wanting. But even Marcion is known to have resided for many years in Rome; and if, during his sojourn in the West, he fell in with a copy of the Short Recension, he might have welcomed it gladly, as sparing him the superfluous use of his scissors, which would be required to eliminate such passages as RVG, 2d
Hitherto there is no incongruity in the sources from which my data are taken. But the position of the doxology in the several authorities still remains to be considered; and it is evidently here that Mr Hort considers the main ‘contradiction’ to lic. Though ‘there is no lack of authorities of a sort for subjoming the doxology to xiv., he writes, yet ‘they have no sort of genealogical affinity with the MS. that ignores Rome, or with Marcion.’ Now to this I would reply that the capi- tulations of the Latin Bibles certainly have this affinity, and that (for all we know) the MSS. mentioned by Origen as placing the doxology in this position may have had it also. On the other hand his statement, so far as regards the extant MSS. and the patristic authorities generally, which exhibit it at the end of the xivth chapter, is indisputably true. They belong to the great Antiochene or Constantinopolitan family, which though by far the most numerous, is of inferior authority. On the con- trary the place of the doxology in the extant Western authorities is at the end of the xvith chapter. But, allowing the fact, I cannot accept the inference. For suppose that a scribe had before him copies of the two recensions (according to my hy- pothesis), the one comprising the 14 chapters together with the doxology, the other including all the 16 chapters but omitting the doxology and ending with xvi. 23 Kovapros 6 aderdos. If he set himself to combine the two so as to omit nothing, is it not at least as likely that, when he arrived at the end of the xivth chapter, he would reserve the doxology for the end of the whole Epistle where it seemed to be required to finish
374 THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.
off an abrupt conclusion, as that he would leave it at the end of the xivth chapter? The same motive which led others to transpose the benediction (7 ydpis «.7.d.), which properly stands at xvi. 20, to xvi. 24, might even more easily induce him to treat the doxology in a similar way, inasmuch as he would still leave it at the end of the Epistle as he found it, though the Epistle had been lengthened out by the two ad- ditional chapters. Thus the fact that the Western authorities place the doxology after ch. xvi. seems to me to prove nothing as to the want of affinity between the several authorities for my hypothesis.
But this investigation fear me to observe (and I think the observation is pertinent) how entirely this Western cha- racter of the authorities coincides with my hypothesis. I sug- gested that ‘at some later period of his life, not improbably during one of his sojourns in Rome, it occurred to the Apostle to give to this letter a wider circulation’; and that for this pur- pose he made the alterations which resulted in the shorter edition, so that it was rendered ‘available for general circulation, and perhaps was circulated to prepare the way for a personal visit in countries into which he had not yet penetrated ’ (p. 319). This hypothetical change is made in the West and for the West; and it cannot be considered a matter of indifference that to this same region we owe the authorities which sug- gested the hypothesis, though at the time when I propounded it I did not see the full significance of this fact.
With these remarks I will leave the theory. For a reply so thorough and so suggestive as Mr Hort’s I can only feel grateful. It has led me to consolidate the different elements of my hypothesis, and, unless I am mistaken, to present a stronger front to attack. From criticisms of inferior merit I might have found less to dissent, but I certainly should have found less to learn.
[1871,]
DS
THE DESTINATION OF THE EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS.
eka wl us ae a ay or j ; a, > eae eee. wh eer. ht ' y, Lie 46 | 72 , - Pas a af ss aa te Tr So aaNan Pe neve ahs, 3 * ws 4 )
. Printed from Lecture-notes.
THE DESTINATION OF THE EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS.
| hi the common designation of this Epistle correct or not ? We are accustomed to style it an ‘ Epistle to the Ephesians.’ But was it really addressed to the Christians of Ephesus, either solely or primarily? This is not merely a curious question of criticisin, devoid of any ulterior interest. It has a very direct bearing on the genuineness of the letter, and it is intimately connected also with the scope and purpose of the writer.
Many facts converge from various quarters, which suggest an answer unfavourable to the commonly received title of this Kpistle.
1. In the first place it is quite clear that in the early ages of the Church a very large number of copies were in circulation, in which the words ‘in Ephesus’ were omitted from the opening verse.
(i) ORIGEN [+ A.D. 253], whose commentary on this Epistle must have been written during the second quarter of the third century, speaks in such a way as to show not only that they were absent from the text which he himself used, but that he was unaware of their existence in any copies of the Epistle within his reach. His words are as follows:
“In the case of the Ephesians alone have I found the expression ‘to the saints that are, and I am led to ask,
378 THE DESTINATION OF THE
unless the clause ‘that are’ is superfluous, what can be meant by it? May it not be then, that as m Exodus He who speaks to Moses declares His name to be ‘ He that is’ (or ‘the Absolute Being’), so also they who partake of the Absolute Being, themselves become existent, when they are called as it were from not being into being: for, says the same Paul, ‘God chose out the things that are not, that they might bring to nought the things that are, etc.”
In the first place, the interpretation itself tells its own tale. No one, seeing the words év ’E¢éow immediately following, would have thought of separating them from the preceding To?s odaw, thus abandon- ing the obvious construction of the passage and having recourse to a highly strained and unnatural explanation. In the second place, Origen could not possibly have said that this statement is made of the Ephesians alone, if he had read the words as they stand in the common texts. In this case he would have found several parallels in the Epistles of St Paul. He would have found the Apostle, for instance, addressing ‘all that are in Rome, ‘the Church of God that is in Corinth,’ ‘all the saints that are in the whole of Achaia,’ ‘all the saints in Christ Jesus that are in Philippi?’ But indeed the fact that the words ‘in Ephesus’
The inference from this passage is inevitable.
1 Origen, ’Eml udvwv Edeciwy eipopev Kelwevov 7d Tots arytots Tots ovo’ Kal (nrovpev, el un mapédKer mpookeluevoy TO
comp. Clem. Alex. Strom. vi. 16, p. 807 Potter, 671 pév iepa 7 Sexds, mapéd- Ket Aéyew Ta vov. There is an allusion
Tots ayLots Tots ovaL, TL OUvarat onualvery. ” * ‘ “ : a? ”
opa obv el wh Worep ev TH HEbbw dvoya onolv éavte 6 xpnuatifwv Muwce? 7d wv, olirws of ueréxovres Tod Gvros ylvovTa ovTes, KaNovmevor oiovel ex Tod wh elvat els 70 elvan’ éedéEaro yap 6 Oeds Ta MH ” 5 . , ~ o » ovra, pnoly 6 abros IlaiXos, va ra bvTa Should the position of 7d be altered, mpookeluevov rots ay.ots 7d trois ovo.? At all events Origen’s meaning seems to be ‘unless roils oboe attached to rots dyots is redundant or superfluous.’ For this sense of wapé)- «et, Which is common in late writers,
Karapyion K.T.Xd.
to these words of Origen in the scholia of Matthwi, ‘Qovyévns as él "Edeciov xelwevov mapéXxov olerar, Where the writer perhaps misunderstands and certainly obscures Origen’s meaning. The refer- ence is given in Resche Comm. Crit. p. 104 note.
2 Rom. i. 7 waow ros obow év ‘Pap, 1 Cor, i. 2 7H éxxAnola rod Oeod rH oton év Koplv@w, 2 Cor. i. 1 rots dylous macw Trois ovow év 6\n TH ’Axala, Phil. i. 1 wacw rois aylos év Xpor@e "Inood rots obow év Pidlrrots.
EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS. 379
are wanting in some very early copies leaves no doubt upon this point.
The importance of this notice will be felt when it is re- membered that Origen was the most learned and enquiring of the fathers in all matters relating to the text of the Scriptures. To him it was a subject of special study.
(ii) From the third century we pass to the fourth, from Origen to Basit [+ A.D. 3879]. The testimony of this father runs thus:
“Moreover, when writing to the Ephesians, as men truly united with the Absolute Being through perfect knowledge, he uses a peculiar expression and styles them ‘being, saying ‘to the saints that are and faithful in Christ Jesus. For so we learn from the statements of previous writers; and we ourselves have found (this reading) in
1”
those copies which are ancient?.
Here it will be observed that Basil repeats the interpre- tation of Origen, of whom he was a diligent student and to whom doubtless he was indebted in this instance. When there- fore he appeals to ‘the statements of previous writers, he cannot be considered to add anything to the testimony of the Alexandrian father. But the information, which he adds re- specting the copies extant in his own day, is highly important. He does not say that the words were wanting in some old copies, or in many old copies; but his statement is absolute. He is not even content with saying ‘in the old copies’ (€v Tots Tadatots avtiypabous); but he expresses himself still more strongly ‘in those copies which are old’ (év tots mandatois Tév avtvypadov). Thus it appears that, while in the first half of the third century Origen (if we may draw the inference from his silence) was not acquainted with any manuscript which
1 Basil contr. Eun. ii. 19 (ed. Garn. pacer, eimdv* rots aylos Tots oto Kal I. p. 254) adda kal Trois "Eqeciows ém- morois ev Xpior@ Inood. obrw yap cal ot aTé\wy ws ynolws hywpévos THB dvTt dv? = pd Nuov mapadedwKact, Kal pues ev Tots érvyvwcews, GvTas avrovs dcafdvrws wvs- madaols Tov avTiypagdwy ebpyKkamer.
380 THE DESTINATION OF THE
contained the words, Basil, writing more than a century later, found them in some copies, but these were all recent.
(iii) The statements of these two fathers are in strict accordance with the phenomena exhibited by extant documents. Two Greek MSS. and two only, which contain this Epistle, have any claim to be dated as far back as the fourth century (they may not improbably be assigned to the earlier decades, at least to the first half of this century); and in both these the In the Codex Sinarticus (&) they were absent originally, but are supplied by the third hand. In the Codex Vaticanus (B) they have no place in the text, The
testimony of these—the two most ancient uncials—is further
words ‘in Ephesus’ are wanting.
but are supplied in the margin by a later corrector.
supported by another authority of weight. The second corrector of the cursive 67 has marked the words év "Edéo@ as spurious. The corrections by this hand have the highest value, having been evidently made from some very early text. It may be safely said that a reading in St Paul’s Epistles which is sup- ported by such a combination as & B 67** can never be neglected, and almost always represents the original text. (iv) To these facts it must be added that Marcion in his The obvious inference is, that at all events he did not read ‘in Whether he found other words sub- The Canon of Marcion, it will be remembered, must have been drawn up before
Canon called this letter an Epistle to the Laodiceans’,
Ephesus’ in his text. stituted for these, I shall enquire hereafter’.
the middle of the second century*. With these facts before us, it seems plain, that in the Greek MSS. which were in circulation during the second and third
be attached to the evidence of one who lived in a neighbouring province of
1 This fact about Marcion is derived from the passages in Tertullian given
below (see p. 381 sq.).
2 See below, p. 392.
3 As the question is purely critical and has no bearing on the doctrinal views of Marcion, his testimony is free from suspicion; and due weight must
Asia Minor in the first half of the secondcentury. Tertullian’s assertion, that he falsified the title (see below, p. 382), is unworthy of credit, though no doubt uttered in good faith.
EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS. 3881
centuries, the omission of the words év "E¢éom was not the exception, but the rule. The silence of Origen is confirmed by the direct statement of Basil; and their joint testimony, suffi- ciently strong in itself, is further strengthened by the phenomena of the extant MSS. and by the belief of Marcion. On the other hand, we have no direct evidence that a single Greek manu- script during this period contained the words in question. The recent manuscripts, to which Basil refers in the latter half of the fourth century, are the earliest of which this can be distinctly affirmed. On the other hand, the fact, to which I shall advert presently, that the letter was commonly and per- sistently styled the ‘Epistle to the Ephesians’ from the latter half of the second century at least, suggests that the words occurred in some manuscripts from a very early date, perhaps from the Apostle’s own age. But this is a critical inference, of which there is no positive proof.
From the Greek manuscripts I turn to the Latin. The original form of the Old Latin Version in the Pauline Epistles can only be ascertained very imperfectly from the existing copies. The three chief extant manuscripts of this Version of St Paul’s Epistles are bilingual. The Latin stands in close proximity to the Greek, being written either in a parallel column as in DE, or over the words as in G. Under such circumstances the Latin text would almost inevitably be made to conform to the Greek in a case like the present, where the omission would appear obvious. Moreover of these three manu- scripts only one was written as early as the sixth century, and the remaining two are as late as the ninth. For the original form of the text therefore we must have recourse to the notices and commentaries of the Latin Fathers.
(i) Of these the testimony of Tertullian, as the oldest, is the most important. He refers twice to the title which this Epistle bore in the Marcionite Canon. In the first passage he writes:
“TY say nothing here about another Epistle which we (Catholics) have with the heading ‘to the Ephesians, but
>
the heretics ‘ to the Laodiceans.’’
382 THE DESTINATION OF THE
In the second passage he is more explicit:
‘According to the true belief of the Church,’ he writes, ‘we hold this Epistle to have been despatched to the Ephesians, not to the Laodiceans; but Marcion had to falsify its title, wishing to make himself out a very diligent investigator. The question of titles however is of no consequence; seeing that the Apostle wrote to all, when he wrote to some?.’
It seems probable from the expressions here used, that the words ‘in Ephesus’ were wanting in the copies used by the Latin father. He speaks of Marcion’s falsifying’ the title ; he appeals to the received heading of the letter. He neither directly states, nor indirectly hints, that anything in the letter itself contradicts this hypothesis. His argument in fact seems to be this: “It must be confessed that the letter itself does not say to whom it was written; but the Catholic Church has always regarded it as addressed ‘7’ the Ephesians. It was therefore a wanton and arbitrary proceeding of Marcion to give it another title ‘ To the Laodiceans, for the sake of gaining credit, as an enquiring critic.”
Thus strictly interpreted, the language of Tertullian refers only to the title. This interpretation however is rendered un- certain by the fact that Tertullian elsewhere uses the expres- sions titulus and praescribere, not of the actual title or heading, but of the opening words of an Epistle*. Still, as he appeals
1 Tertullian adv. Marc. v. 11,‘ Prae- 2 «Interpolare’ is used loosely by
tereo hic et de alia epistula, quam nos ad Ephesios praescriptam habemus, haeretici vero (i.e. the Marcionites) ad Laodicenos;’ ib. v.17, ‘Ecclesiae quidem veritate epistulam istam ad Ephesios habemus emissam, non ad Laodicenos, sed Marcion ei titulum aliquando inter- polare gestiit, quasi et in isto diligen- tissimus explorator. Nihil autem de titulis interest, cum ad omnes aposto- lus seripserit, dum ad quosdam,’ This treatise was written A.p. 207.
Tertullian in the sense ‘to corrupt or falsify’ whether by omission, insertion, or alteration, e.g. adv. Mare. vy. 21, ‘Affectavit, opinor, etiam numerum epistularum interpolare.’ Marcion only accepted ten epistles of St Paul as genuine. See also adv. Mare, iv. 1, ‘evangelium...quod interpolando suum fecit.’ Cf. Anger Ueber den Laodicener- brief (Leipzig 1843), p. 41,
3 e.g. adv. Mare, vy. 5, ‘ Praestructio superioris epistulae ita duxit, ut de
EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS.
383
not to the ancient copies, but to the authority of the Church, the inference is that he couid not refute Marcion out of the manuscripts of the Epistle which were in his hands!.
titulo ejus non retractaverim, certus et alibi retractari eum posse, communem scilicet et eundem in epistulis omnibus, quod non utique salutem praescribit eis quibusscribit, sed gratiam et pacem.’ Generally however ‘titulus’ is the head- ing, the title, e.g. adv. Marc. iv. 2, 3, de Pudic. 20; see Anger Laodic. p. 97.
1 Tertullian’s testimony to the iden- tity of the Laodicean Epistle of Marcion with the Ephesian Epistle of the Catho- lic Church is positive and explicit; and, if it had stood alone, would have excited no suspicion. Two other wit- nesses however appear, whose testi- mony is scarcely reconcileable with his statement. (1) About a generation before Tertullian’s time, an anony- mous writer of the Muratorian Canon of Scripture, after enumerating the Epistles of St Paul adds, ‘Fertur etiam ad Laudicenses alia ad Alexan- drinos Pauli nominefinctae ad haeresem Marcionis et alia plura quae in catho- licam ecclesiam recipi non potest’ (Fragm. Murator. Credner Gesch. des N.T. Kanons, p. 148). If ‘finctae’ refers to the Laodicean and Alexan- drian Epistles mentioned just before, we must suppose the writer to be in error. He knew of an Epistle to the Laodiceans in the Marcionite Canon, but not being aware of its identity with this Epistle to the Ephesians assumed that it was an apocryphal writing. But in this case no account can be given of ‘alia ad Alexandrinos,’ for no such Epistle is elsewhere men- tioned as belonging to the Marcionite Canon. Not without reason therefore, considering that the fragment is a blundering translation from a Greek original, much mutilated in the course of transcription, Credner (p. 160) sepa-
rates ‘finctae’ from the preceding words. The words will then mean: ‘Besides the Canonical Epistles, there is an Epistle to the Laodiceans in circula- tion, another to the Alexandrians, both bearing the name of Paul; others again adapted to the heresy of Marcion, etc.’ The phrase ‘finctae ad haeresem Marcionis’ well describes the process of mutilation and alteration, by which Marcion shaped St Paul’s Epistles to his own views. In this case the Epistle to the Laodiceans was probably some apocryphal writing which has not sur- vived. The allusion in Ool. iv. 16 must have tempted more than one heretical writer to forge an Epistle in St Paul’s name, as a means of gaining Apostolic sanction for his own opinions. (2) At the close of the fourth century, Epiphanius (Haeres, xlii.) speaks of the Marcionite Canon in a way which is very perplexing. He says that Mar- cion recognised ten Epistles of St Paul (the Pastoral Epistles being of course excluded), and mentions the Epistle to the Ephesians in his enumeration of these, p. 310, ed. Petav. He then adds that he recognises also ‘portions of the so-called Mpistle to the Laodiceans’ (yet déxal Tis mpds Aaodixéas Neyouévns uépn, p. 310; cf. p. 321, p. 374). Later on, he gives several extracts from the Epistle to the Ephesians (p. 371) identical with our text, except that in one instance Marcion omitted a few words (mpéds Thy yuvaika a’rod Ephes. v. 31), and one passage as from the Epistle to the Laodiceans (p. 374), which also is found in our Epistle to the Ephesians (Ephes, iv. 5). Epiphanius is aware of this, for, speaking of this last passage, he says that Marcion did not adduce this testimony from the Epistle to the
384 THE DESTINATION OF THE
(ii) And this inference is supported by the interpretations of the earlier Latin commentators, whose language seems to show that the word Hphesi was wanting, or that its position fluctuated in some Latin copies and thus betrayed its later introduction. Thus Victorinus Afer [c. A.D. 360] writes: ‘But when he says these words “To the saints who are the faithful of Ephesus,” what does he add? “In Christ Jesus.”’’? The im- portance of this fact is not seriously diminished by the cir- cumstance that immediately below he quotes the words as they stand in the existing manuscripts’: because we meet with numberless examples in which the commentator explains one reading and the scribe gives another. The natural tendency of the transcriber was to conform to the commonly received text. In all such cases therefore a deviation has far higher value, as evidence, than a coincidence.
(iii) I believe also that traces of a variation from the common reading may be discerned in the next Latin commen- tator in point of time, the Ambrosian Hilary. Here too the text conforms to the common type; but the commentary ignores the word Hphesi altogether. It runs as follows: ‘He writes not only to the faithful, but also to the saints, to prove that men are then truly faithful, if they are saints in Christ Jesus*’
Ephesians, but from that to the Lao- diceans, which is not contained in the Apostle’s writings (o} yap édoke re édeewordtw Mapklwve ard ris mpos 'Ede- clous ravrny Thy wapruplay Néyew, aA ris mpds Aaodikéas, Tis wh ovaons ev TH drocrbdy, p. 375). The explanation of Epiphanius’ language seems to be this. Some of the later Marcionites aban- doned the title of the Epistle adopted by their founder, and designated it according to Catholic usage the Epistle to the Ephesians. In the copy of the Marcionite dmogro\kixdy used by Epi- phanius it was so designated (Anger Laodic. p. 41 sq.). At the same time he found in some writings of Marcion, or of his followers, quotations from
St Paul’s ‘Epistle to the Laodiceans’; and in ignorance assumed that the Epistle thus quoted was another, not contained in the Catholic Canon.
1 Victorinus quoted in Mai Script. Vet. Nov. Coll. mm. p. 87 (1828), ‘Sed haec cum dicit Sanctis qui sunt fidelibus Ephesi, quid adjungitur? In Christo Jesu.’ [On this commentator see Gala- tians p. 231.]
2 Victor. op. c. p. 88, ‘ Sanctis qui sunt Ephesi et fidelibus in Christo Jesu.’
® Ambrosiaster Com. in Eph. i. 1 (Migne P. L. xv. p. 373), ‘Non solum fidelibus scribit, sed et sanctis: ut tune vere fideles sint, si fuerint sancti in Christo Jesu.’
—
EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS. 385
It would almost seem as though this commentator (or some earlier writer whose note he adopts) had in his mind the reading Tols aylors Tots ovaLW Kal TLoTots, and that, like several modern interpreters, he translated them ‘the saints who are also faith- ful” If so, he can hardly have read sanctis qui sunt E’phesi et fidelibus in his Latin copy; since this would have saved him from the misinterpretation. His language however is not so clear as to leave this inference free from doubt.
(iv) The only later Latin father whose language tends in the same direction is Sedulius Scotus, who in the eighth or ninth century compiled a commentary on St Paul’s Epistles. He writes:
‘To the saints. Not to all the Ephesians, but to those who believe in Christ. And faithful. All the saints are faithful, but not all the faithful are saints etc. Who are in Christ Jesus. There are many faithful who are not faithful in Christ, etc?’
No stress can be laid on the omission of Ephesi here, because the inserted fragments of the text are more often dis- continuous than not in this writer; and indeed he omits the corresponding names of places in other Epistles. But the position of gut sunt is striking. It would seem as though some transcriber, finding the reading sanctis qui sunt et fidelibus in Christo Jesu in his copy and stumbling at the order, had trans- posed the words so as to read sanctis et fidelibus qui sunt in Christo Jesu. This altered reading may have been before Sedulius, or some earlier writer whom he copies.
(v) On the other hand the note of St Jerome on the passage suggests that some centuries before Sedulius Hphesi was commonly read in the Latin copies. He writes:
‘Some persons, with more ingenuity than is needed, think that, according as it is said to Moses These things
1 Sedul. Scot. Com. in Eph. i. 1 fideles sunt, non omnes fideles sancti (Migne P. L. cut. p. 195), ‘Sanctis. Non ete. Qui sunt in Christo Jesu. Plures omnibus Ephesiis, sed his quicredunt _fideles sunt, sed non in Christo, ete.’ in Christo. Et fidelibus. Omnes sancti
ies 25
386 THE DESTINATION OF THE
shalt thou say to the children of Israel, He that is hath sent me, so also those who are at Ephesus saints and faith- ful ave addressed under the title of (absolute) existence ; that is to say, just as (they are called) holy after the Holy One, righteous after the Righteous One, and wise after the Wise One, so also they are designated Those that are after Him that is. Others however take it simply, and think that it is written not to those that are, but to those that at Ephesus are saints and faithful’
This father has expressed himself in a hasty and obscure manner. When he speaks of ‘some persons, he doubtless alludes to Origen, to whose work he was largely indebted in his own commentary on this Epistle. But it does not appear clearly what view he took of Origen’s explanation. In the former part of this note he speaks only of a difference of inter- pretation, not of reading; and hence we might infer not only that he had the words ‘in Ephesus’ in his own text, but that he was unaware of their omission in any copies, and therefore did not see the difficulty with which Origen had to contend. On the other hand the word scriptum in the closing sentence seems to point to a difference of reading also. But he may have used the word loosely and without any such intention. On the whole it seems probable that he overlooked the omission. Yet even then his language suggests that his Latin copy may have had the words qui sunt Ephesi in some other than the ordinary position.
(vi) The extant copies of all the other Versions, early as well as late, contain the words in the text. The unanimity however does not carry any great weight in the present instance. Our existing manuscripts of these Versions are all far too late
1 Hieron. Com. in Eph.i. 1 (vir. p. patos: ut quomodo a Sancto sancti, a 545, ed. Vallarsi), ‘Quidam curiosius Justo justi, a Sapiente sapientes, ita ab quam necesse est putant ex eo quod Lo qui est hi qui sunt appellentur... Moysi dictum sit Haec dices filiis Alii vero simpliciter, non ad eos qui Israel, Qui est, misit me (Exod. iii. sint (al. sunt), sed qui Ephesi sancti 14), etiam eos qui Ephesi sunt sancti et fideles sint scriptum arbitrantur.’ et fideles essentiae vocabulo nuncu-
EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS. 387
to assure us of their original reading in a case where the insertion would be irresistible to scribes. The contest between the testimony of the earlier and that of the later Greek MSS., as already stated, shows how little dependence can be placed on any but the most ancient authorities under such circumstances. The earliest extant manuscript of any of these Versions con- taining this opening verse of the Ephesian letter, is at least two centuries later than & B, to say nothing of the manu- scripts consulted by Origen and Basil.
2. But if the diplomatic evidence throws considerable doubt on the common designation of this Epistle, our sus- picions are deepened when we examine the general character and tone of the Epistle itself.
St Paul had spent a great part of three years at Bpleae: He had ‘gone about among them preaching the kingdom of God*’ He had testified ‘both to Jews and to Greeks®’ ‘He had ceased not to warn every one day and night with tears*’ On his last journey to Jerusalem he summoned the elders of the city to meet him at Miletus. He poured forth his whole heart to them in affectionate remembrances and earnest warn- ings. Parting from him at length, ‘they fell on his neck and kissed him, sorrowing most of all for the words which he spake, that they should see his face no more *’
The interview at Miletus is a striking picture of St Paul’s intimate relations with the brethren of Ephesus. There was no Church on which he spent more time and labour, none in which he felt a warmer personal interest, none with which fonder or more sacred memories were bound up. Might it not be expected then that a letter written to the Church of Ephesus would be full of personal reminiscences, that there would be a marked individuality of character in it, that the Apostle would pour out his heart to his converts, as a friend speaking to friends ?
1 Acts xx. 25. 3 Acts xx. 31. 2 Acts xx. 21. 4 Acts xx. 37, 38.
25—2
388 THE DESTINATION OF THE
The Epistle to the Ephesians does not answer these con- ditions. Much stress indeed has been laid on the absence of salutations to individual members of a Church so familiar to him. To this argument there is a ready answer. In writing to brotherhoods with whom he was most intimate, to the Corinthians and Philippians, for instance, he sends no special salutations: in writing to the Roman Church, which he had never visited, he greets by name a large number of individual members. The reason for this is obvious. In a community of strangers it is easy to single out and enumerate friends. Where all alike are known to us, it becomes irksome, if not invidious, to select any for special salutations.
The absence of such salutations therefore is natural enough in an Epistle to Ephesus. But the general character of the Epistle admits of no explanation on this hypothesis. Of all St Paul’s letters it is the most general, the least personal. In this respect it more nearly resembles the Epistle to the Romans than any other’. Both alike partake of the character rather of a formal treatise than of a familiar letter. Yet even the Epistle to the Romans betrays deeper personal feeling, and exhibits more distinct traces of individual relations and local colouring. In writing to the Ephesians of their faith and progress in the Gospel, he might be expected at all events to allude to his own labours among them, their attachment to him, the memories and experiences which they shared in common? Far different is his language. ‘Having heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love towards all the saints, I cease not to give thanks for you*’ ‘For this cause I Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for you Gentiles, if indeed
1 Theodore of Mopsuestia, with his usual penetration, discerns the likeness of these two Epistles ‘ Scribit Ephesiis hanc epistolam beatus Paulus, eo modo quo et Romanis dudum seripserat quos necdum ante viderat’ (Argum. ad Ephes. 1. p. 112 ed. Swete).
2 Theod, Mops. 1. ¢. is driven to assert that the letter was written
before St Paul visited Ephesus, and so does Severianus (see Cramer’s Catena);
~ but not Theodoret, as De Wette asserts.
Recent writers adduce it as an argu- ment against the genuineness of the Epistle. Mr Burgon does not attempt an explanation of the facts.
3 Eph, i. 15,
EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS. 389
ye were instructed in the dispensation of the grace of God which was given me to you-ward’’ ‘But ye did not so learn Christ, if so be ye heard of him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus*’ All this is general and comprehensive, not necessarily excluding personal intercourse with those he ad- dresses, but still scarcely natural if addressed to his own converts solely. It is strangely at variance with the language in which he generally writes to his own children in the faith, the Corinthians and Philippians, for instance. It even presents a very striking contrast to the contemporaneous letter to the Colossians, for whom he shows an intense personal interest, and to whose special dangers and temptations he is fully alive, though they had not seen his face in the flesh *.
3. Yet, though this Epistle so little fulfils our expectations of what St Paul would have written to his converts, it is beyond a question that the Early Church universally regarded it as an Epistle to the Ephesians. It is distinctly referred to as such by the writer of the Muratorian Canon, by Irenzus, by Ter- tullian, by Clement of Alexandria, even by Origen himself, in whose text, as we have seen, there was no direct mention of Ephesus*. Thus the tradition is carried back to the earlier decades of the last half of the second century, and at the close of that century, at least, the title seems to have been received without question by the Catholic Church, so much so that, as we have seen, Tertullian accused Marcion of forgery because he denied it. Earlier than this we cannot trace the opinion, unless the existing text of the Old Latin and the Syriac Versions, which have the words ‘in Ephesus’, may be put in
evidence °, 1 Eph. iii. 2. de praescr. 36, de monogam. 5; Clem. 2 Eph. iv. 20, 21. Alex. Strom. iv. 65, p. 592, Paed. i. 18, 3 Col, ii. 1. p. 108 ed. Potter; Origen contr. Cels. 4 The references are as follows: iii. 20 (xviii. p. 273 ed, Lomm.). Murat. Canon, p.148 ed. Credner; Iren. 5 Ignatius, writing in the first de-
Haer. i. 3. 1,4, pp. 14, 16, 1.8.4, p.40, cade of the second century to the y. 2. 36, p. 294 ed. Stieren; Tert. members of the Ephesian Church, adv. Marc. v. 17 (see above, p. 382), alludes to St Paul as ‘making mention
390 THE DESTINATION OF THE
4. Only one exception to this general belief durmg the earliest ages is on record. But this exception is most important. I have mentioned before that Marcion con- sidered it to be addressed to the Laodiceans. Now (1) Mar- cion lived nearer to the times of the Apostles than any of the Catholic writers above mentioned. (2) He was moreover a native of Pontus, a neighbouring province of Asia Minor, and therefore not unfavourably situated for forming an opinion. And, (3), as the question has no theo- logical bearing whatever, his opinion is free from all suspicion of bias, and must be received with the respect due to so ancient a writer. Did Marcion then maintain this opinion, as a tra- dition received from others, or as a result arrived at by his own independent criticism? We have not sufficient information to form any judgment on this point. If the former idea be correct, this tradition is of the highest value: if the latter, as Tertullian assumes, he may be supposed to have built an inference on the mention of a Laodicean letter in Col. iv. 16. Anyhow it is still clear that the destination of the Epistle was open to question, for it is most unlikely that Marcion would have changed the received title merely because he found an allusion elsewhere to a Laodicean letter, if this title were hitherto undisputed, and if the Epistle itself stated that it was addressed to the Church of Ephesus. The former view is more probable in the infancy of criticism. Criticism would only step in where history was silent or confused.
5. But whether Marcion’s opinion was founded independently of the mention of a Laodicean Epistle in the letter to the Colossians or not, this mention has undoubtedly a very impor- tant bearing on the question. The Ephesian and Colossian letters
of them in every epistle’ (ph. § 12 sonal disciple of the Apostles as a bs dv racy émiro\n pvnuovedear judv). further witness to this tradition; but Attempts have been made to translate grammar forbids the interpretation, év maoy émiorohj as though it were [See the note on the passage in Aposto- &y mdoy TH émicrodg ‘throughout his lic Fathers Pt. u. Vol. 1. p, 65 ed. 2.] epistle,’ and thus to claim this per-
EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS. 391
were written and despatched about the same time. Tychicus seems to have been the bearer of both letters’, At all events he is expected to visit the persons to whom they were addressed about the time when they were delivered. Simultaneously with these also a private letter was sent to Philemon, an individual member of the Church of Laodicea or of Colossz. Thus three letters were despatched at the same time. But in the Epistle to the Colossians they are directed to exchange letters with the Laodiceans. Are we then to add to the three letters already mentioned a fourth letter no longer extant? Or is the Laodicean Epistle to be identified with one of these? If the latter alternative be adopted, it can only be our Epistle to the Ephesians, for the letter to Philemon is addressed to an individual Christian on a matter of strictly private interest, and does not therefore answer to the designation.
Let us now combine the evidence gathered from these various sources, and what is the result? We must frame some hypothesis which recognises our Epistle both as an Epistle to the Laodiceans and an Epistle to the Ephesians, and yet neither the one nor the other. It must moreover be sufficiently elastic to adapt itself to the general tone in which the letter is couched.
The required hypothesis is not far to seek. It was an _ encyclical letter addressed to the Churches lying within a certain area, which we may perhaps venture to define roughly as coextensive with Proconsular Asia. On this supposition all the varying forms of the opening salutation are fully explained. The facts before us are these :—
(1) The words év ’Edéow were omitted in the old MSS. (see above, p. 377 sq.).
(2) The general character of the Epistle is quite in- capable of explanation, if it were written solely or specially to the Ephesians (see above, p. 387 sq.).
1 Eph. vi. 21; Col. iv. 7.
392 THE DESTINATION OF THE
(3) At the same time the Epistle was regarded from very ancient times as an ‘Epistle to the Ephe- sians,’ and so it was entitled (see above, p. 389).
(4) Marcion, however, the earliest writer whose opinion is known (except doubtfully and inferentially), believed that it was written to the Laodiceans (see above, p. 390).
(5) It is certain that St Paul despatched an Epistle to Laodicea, at or about the same time that the Epistle (so called) to the Ephesians reached its destination (see above, p. 390 sq.).
We have to seek a theory which will account for and combine all these facts, and that of Archbishop Ussher alone satisfies these requirements.
(i) In the original letter a vacant space would be left after the words ‘To the saints that are.” In the copies made for distribution the blank would be filled in with the names of the individual Churches for which they were intended, ‘in Ephesus, ‘in Smyrna,’ ‘in Laodicea,’ ‘in Thyatira’ and so forth. In the Church at large some copies would be circulated with the vacant space. When these were again transcribed, the blank would be disregarded, and the text closing in upon it would run ‘To the saints that are and faithful brethren.’ This explains the reading of the texts of Origen and Basil, and of our two best extant MSS. Not a few again would be circulated from the metropolitan Church of Ephesus. Hence the received text and the recognised title. Lastly a MS. would here and there be found transcribed from the copy sent to some other Church. A transcription from the Laodicean copy fell into Marcion’s hands and led to his designation. (ii) And in this way a satisfactory account may be given of the notice in the Colossian Epistle. The letter would be sent only to the mother Church in each district, with the injunction to circulate it among the lesser communities scattered throughout that district. Laodicea would be selected, as she is selected in the Apocalypse, as of
EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS. 393
superior importance to either Hierapolis or Coloss, which lay in her immediate neighbourhood 1.
Moreover the hypothesis adopted fits in with the exact terms of that notice. Two points are to be observed: (1) The Epistle in question is called not the ‘Epistle to the Laodiceans’, but the ‘Epistle from Laodicea’ The former designation would not be very well suited to our Epistle: the latter exactly describes it, for the Colossians got it from Laodicea. (2) If St Paul had written directly and solely to the Laodiceans, he would naturally have given his salutations to the Church of Laodicea and to individual members of it in the letter addressed to them. On the contrary we find him sending his saluta- tions through the Colossians, not only to the Church of Laodicea generally, but to Nymphas, who was certainly, and Archippus, who was perhaps, a member of that Church (Col. iv. 15, 17). (111) Again, the entire absence of special allusions, with the sole exception of the mention of Tychicus, has created much _per- plexity and suspicion. On the supposition adopted, both the rule and the exception are satisfactorily explained. On the one hand the encyclical character of the letter required that all personal matters should be excluded. But at the same time, with some of the Churches thus addressed St Paul was on terms of affectionate intimacy. ‘To such he must needs address some words of special import. These were entrusted to the bearer of the letter: ‘But that ye also may know my affairs, how I do, Tychicus, the beloved brother and faithful minister in the Lord, shall make known to you all things: whom I have sent unto you for this very purpose, that ye may know our affairs, and that he may comfort your hearts”. The very expression ‘ye also’ points to the encyclical character of the letter. Private imstructions, salutations to individuals, strictly personal matters of all kinds would be reserved for him to deliver.
I have suggested Proconsular Asia as the probable limit of the district through which the Epistle was intended to be
1 See Colossians, pp. 7, 8. 2 Eph. vi. 21, 22,
394 THE DESTINATION OF THE
circulated. The seven Churches of the Apocalypse at once occur to us, and St Paul’s letter was probably destined for a circle of readers not much wider nor much narrower than St John’s Revelation. The Apocalypse was written probably not many years later, and by that time these Churches had passed through many vicissitudes, had been proved by many trials, had grown old and in some instances lukewarm in the faith. It is most probable therefore that they were in existence when St Paul wrote. During his residence of three years in Ephesus, the knowledge of the Gospel through his influence, direct or indirect, had spread throughout the neighbourhood. It had certainly reached Laodicea, with her attendant satellites Hier- apolis and Colosse, lying at the extreme verge of this Pleiad of the Christian heavens, and the more central points of the con- stellation would not have been passed over. There was little, if any, exaggeration in the language of Demetrius when he said ‘not only at Ephesus, but almost throughout all Asia, this Paul hath persuaded and turned away much people?’ During great part of the second century the Asiatic Churches are without question the most energetic and lively members of Christ, whether we regard their missionary zeal or their literary activity.
What motive then may be supposed to have prompted St Paul to write this letter? A beloved disciple, Epaphras, had brought tidings of the errors which threatened the safety of the Christian brotherhood in his own native place, Colossz, in itself a comparatively small and unimportant Church. At Colosse the symptoms were so clear, that there was no mistaking the form which the disease might assume. For these strongly marked errors the Apostle prescribed, The true medicine was found in the doctrine of the Person of Christ. In writing to the Colossians therefore he applied this as a special remedy, with a view to a special complaint*. But in the course of writing, it would occur to him to set forth these grand truths in a broader form and in their more general relations. This he
1 Acts xix, 26; of. v. 10. 2 See Colossians, p. 41 sq.
EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS. 395
could do, if, while writing, he were free from any of the disturb- ing forces which special local interests must exert upon him. The Churches of Asia would offer themselves as fit recipients He was known personally to some of A trusty messenger
for such an exposition. these ; his influence had been felt by all. was at hand in Tychicus, a member of the Church of Ephesus, the most important in the district, and himself a tried com- panion and fellow-labourer of the Apostle. To these therefore St Paul wrote a circular letter, for while speaking to all collect- ively, he was not obliged to speak to any individually. He thus felt himself free and unfettered. At the same time, the area chosen was not too large to prevent his adapting his teaching to the wants of his hearers. A certain tone of feeling pervaded all the Churches of Asia, a certain class of errors would find a welcome among them. [If false opinion did not take exactly the same form at Ephesus or Thyatira or Smyrna, for instance, as at Coloss, it would take a similar form. Thus St Paul still dwells in this Epistle on the same class of truths as in the Epistle to the Colossians. Only whereas in the Colossians he combats error directly’, he here combats it indirectly : whereas there he is special, distinct, personal, here he speaks broadly and generally ”.
Thus the Epistle to the Ephesians stands to the Epistle to the Colossians in very much the same relation as the Romans to the Galatians. The one is the general and systematic exposition of the same truths which appear in a special bearing
1 On the character of the heresy which assailed the Colossian Church, see Colossians, p. 72 sq.
2 Besides this, St Paul has given to his teaching a new centre. In this Epistle it revolves about the doctrine of the Church. The same truths which in the Epistle to the Colossians are advanced to combat a peculiar phase of false doctrine have here a place as leading up to the doctrine of the Church, e.g. compare the treatment
of the subject of Christ the Logos in Col. i. 15, ii. 9 with Eph, i. 22, or of the law of ordinances in Col. ii. 14 with Eph. ii. 14, 15, or again the practical lessons of the relations of husbands and wives in Col. iii. 18, 19 with Eph. v. 25 sq., 32. The propriety of this new centre of teaching is obvious when we remember that it is addressed, not in a special letter to an individual Church, but in an encyclical to several Churches.
396 THE DESTINATION OF THE EPISTLE.
in the other. For though the Roman is not strictly a circular letter’, yet, being addressed to a very large and varied com- munity, it was enabled to maintain this general character.
Thus the resemblances between the language of the Epistles to the Ephesians and Colossians are explained. Analogous re- semblances between expressions used to the Galatians and Romans are not quite so close, but there the interval between the two letters is longer *.
1 See above, p. 315. 1 Pet. i. 3. Eph. i. 3.
* This hypothesis best explains the M1. Oy ii. 21, 22. relation between this letter and 1 Peter, ii. 18 sq. Vi. 5. which, like it, is addressed to the lii. 1 sq. v. 22. Churches of Asia Minor and obviously iii. 7sq. v. 25. makes use of the Epistle to the Ephe- ili, 22. i. 20, 21. sians. Compare the following pairs of iv. 3. ii, 2, iv. 17. passages : etc. ete.
[1873,]
oA
THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES.
: ; eee, :
XI.
THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES.
ie date of the Pastoral Epistles has been more canvassed
than perhaps any other point in the chronology of St Paul’. While it has been generally acknowledged that the Second Epistle to Timothy was the Apostle’s dying strain, though even this opinion has not been allowed to pass unchallenged?, the First Epistle to Timothy, and the Epistle to Titus have occupied almost every conceivable position in the systems of different critics. This circumstance is in itself a sufficient proof of the difficulties which beset the question, and might perhaps lead us to despair of a solution. A little more careful examination, however, tends to a more hopeful view. Taking into account all the conditions of the problem—the internal character of the Epistles themselves as regards style and teaching, no less than the historical notices which they contain, whether relating to the Church at large, or to personal matters—we arrive at this simple result, that they cannot be placed within the compass of the history contained in the Acts, and that they must have been written after the other letters of the Apostle, towards the close of his life. The later criticism, based on a deeper appreciation of the style of the Pastoral Epistles, is obviously tending to
1 Various opinions respecting this rant of all recent English Theological question will be found collected and works. classified in C. W. Otto Die Geschicht- 2 For a list of these exceptions see lichen Verhdltnisse der Pastoralbriefe Davidson Intr. iii. p. 52 ed. 1, and Otto, ete. Leipz. 1860. The writer however, p. 16. like most of his countrymen, is igno-
400 THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES.
this result, though there are still some important exceptions’, and it may be safely predicted that the alternative of placing them at the close of the Apostle’s life, or of abandoning the Pauline authorship, will be accepted by both impugners and defenders alike, as common ground.
The two points, which we have to consider, are (1) The style and intrinsic character of the Epistles themselves; (2) The historical matter which they contain.
I THE STYLE AND INTRINSIC CHARACTER OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES.
Those who have examined St Paul’s Epistles with reference to their time of writing, will have observed a strong resem- blance in style and character between the letters belonging to the same chronological group, while at the same time a letter of one group, placed by the side of a letter of another, though betraying the strongest indications of the same mind, shows marked and unmistakable differences. So strong does this impression become on closer study, that the evidence of date derived from style takes the first place in our minds, and when, as in the case of the Galatian Epistle, the historical notices are few and vague, we still feel an absolute certainty in a result derived solely or chiefly from this source. This phenomenon of a difference in a resemblance is much more clearly exhibited in the Pastoral Epistles than in any other of St Paul’s letters*. With the resemblance I have no concern here. At present I shall dwell simply on the differences, as a proof, first, that they belong to the same period one with another, and secondly, that they cannot have been contemporaneous with the other Epistles of St Paul.
These differences may be gathered up under the following
1 Such as Wieseler, Davidson and criticism as retrograde, Schaff. The most recent writer, Otto, 2 Coleridge calls them Ilav\oedeis is also an exception. I regard his (Table talk p. 253).
THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES. 401
heads, (1) vocabulary, (2) syntax, (3) modes of thought and teaching.
1. The Vocabulary. Words used in these Epistles alone, or with far greater frequency in them. The following classification is more or less artificial, but will assist in apprehending the character of these differences. For convenience of reference the First and Second Epistles to Timothy and the Epistle to Titus are designated by the letters a, b, c, respectively, the number of occurrences, where more than one, being placed immediately above each letter.
(a) A new set of terms to describe moral and religious states.
BeBndos ‘profane’ a®b. Not used elsewhere by St Paul, occurs in Heb. xii. 16.
evoéBera ‘godliness’ a’be evoeBas be evdoeBeiv a, thirteen times in all, and not once elsewhere in St Paul’s Epistles.
ka@apés ‘pure’ a*b?c? (in four out of the six cases used of the conscience); only once elsewhere (Rom. xiv. 20) in St Paul.
kados ‘good’ ‘beautiful’ alb%c*, twenty-four times in the Pastoral Epistles, and only sixteen times elsewhere in St Paul.
cepvorns ‘gravity’ a’c oeuvds arc. ceuvds occurs Phil. iv. 8, and nowhere else in the New Testament.
(6) A new set of terms relating to doctrine, many of them bringing
out the contrast between true and false doctrine.
didackadia ‘teaching’ a®b%ct, used most frequently objectively ‘doctrine.’ The word only occurs elsewhere in St Paul four times, and then with its ordinary sense of the ‘art of teaching.’
ex(ntncecs, (ytTnoes ‘questionings’ a*bec, not elsewhere in St Paul.
Aoyouaxia, -etv of ‘combats of words’ ab, not elsewhere in the New Testament.
mapa@nkn ‘the deposit of the faith’ ab?, not elsewhere in the New Testament.
vyujs, Vytaivey ‘sound’ ‘healthy’ as applied to doctrine a2b’c5, not elsewhere in St Paul, or in this sense in the New Testament. Also the opposite voceiv a, here only in the New Testament.
(ec) Certain formule and maxims. Stapaprvper bat evedrov ab. The word diayapriper ba only occurs once elsewhere at all in St Paul. xapts, eos, eipnvn ab and perhaps c, contrasted with the earlier salutation yapus cal eipyyn. muatos 6 Aoyos a*be. Peculiar to this group.
(d) Modes of speaking of God the Father, and Christ. praxapios Oeds a. aetnp applied to God arc’,
Tie 26
402 THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES.
emupaveca in the sense of rapovaia ab*c. None of these are found elsewhere in St Paul. In 2 Thess. ii. 8 however there is 7 émiavera ths mapovaias.
(e) Other expressions not falling under any of these classes. apveia Oa absc*. d:aBodos, ‘ false-accuser’ abe. deomdrns ‘master’ a*bec, elsewhere in St Paul xupsos. dcaBeBatovo Oat trepi Tivos ac. mapareio Oa abe. All these are peculiar to this group of Pauline Epistles,
2, The Syntax.
(a) Itis stiffer and more regular than in the earlier Epistles, more jointed and less flowing. The clauses are marshalled together, and there is a tendency to parallelism.
eg. 1 Tim. i. 9, ii, 1, 2, iii. 16, iv. 12, 13, 15, v. 10, vi. 9, 11, 12) 13, 15, 18; 2 Tim. ii. 11, 12, iii. 1-8, 10-13, 16, iv. 2, 4, 5, 7: Tite 7, 69.7, Ae, a
(6) There is a greater sententiousness, an abruptness and positive- ness of form. Imperative clauses are frequent. e.g. 1 Tim. iv. 11, 15, 16, v. 7, 8, 22-25, vi. 2, 6, 11, 20; 2 Tim. i. 13, 14, ii. 1, 3, 7, 8, 14, 19, 22, 23; iii. 1, 5, 12, 16.
3. The tone of thought manifest in these Epistles has a character of its own.
(a) There is an increased tendency to the directly moral side of duty. The Apostle’s former preaching of faith and grace is not lost sight of, but it occupies a much smaller space and a less prominent position. Stress is laid upon good works (1 Tim. ii. 10, v.10, 25, vi. 18; 2 Tim. ii. 21; ‘Trt i) Gee 14). In describing the Christian state the principles of evoéBeca and gadpooivyn stand forward. Long and frequent lists of virtues are given, often descending into minute details of practical life. (b) On the other hand, apparently in contradiction to the characteristic just mentioned but not really so, the Apostle dwells more on orthodoxy of belief in comparison with his previous Epistles. There is more of the doctrine of Christianity as a creed, and less as a life. Alto- gether we may say that the teaching of the Pastoral Epistles is more definite and positive, than that of the earlier letters. There is more of detail in it, and less of principles.
These distinguishing features, it must be observed, are found in all these three Epistles alike. It is an obvious and
THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES. 403
almost irresistible conclusion (i) that they must all three have been written at or near the same time, (ii) that some consider- able period must be interposed between them and the remain- ing Epistles of St Paul. Now, no hypothesis framed on the supposition that St Paul was not released, and that therefore the Pastoral Epistles fall within the limits of time comprised in the Acts, satisfies these conditions. Indeed it is impossible that such an hypothesis could satisfy them; for the Second Epistle to Timothy is generally allowed to have been written from Rome at the very close of his life, while the First Epistle to Timothy and the Epistle to Titus were written when he was at liberty, and supposing his first captivity to have terminated fatally, this consideration alone interposes a period of four years at least between them?
Thus judging from the style and character of these Epistles alone we are led to this very definite conclusion.
II. THE HISTORICAL NOTICES.
These are of two kinds: those relating to (1) actual inci- dents, affecting himself and his friends; (2) the general condi- tion of the Church.
1. Historical incidents.
From the opening verses of the First Epistle to Timothy
1 Wieseler’s hypothesis (Chron. p. 286), the most plausible of those con- structed on this supposition, arranges the Epistles in the order—Galatians, 1 Timothy, 1 Corinthians, Titus, 2 Corin- thians. Thus we get a series of Epistles in which St Paul’s styles alternate—for Galatians, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinth- ians are closely allied to each other, and widely different from 1 Timothy and Titus. According to this hypo- thesis, 2 Timothy follows Titus after an interval of five or six years, and with six Epistles of an entirely dif- ferent style intervening. The difficulty is not at all met by saying that as
private letters written to intimate friends, the Pastoral Epistles might be supposed to have a character of their own. The peculiarities of style are for the most part not of a kind to be accounted for in this way, though some of them might be so explained. And we have an instance of St Paul’s familiar style at this earlier date in the Epistle to Philemon, which has none of the characteristic features of the Pastoral Epistles. Otto (p. 9) has quite failed to grasp the conditions of the problem when he dismisses these considerations so summarily.
26—2
404 THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES.
we learn that St Paul, when departing for Macedonia, had charged Timothy to remain at Ephesus to superintend the Church there. There are only two visits to Ephesus recorded in the Acts. On the first of these, which was very brief, St Paul scarcely did more than prepare the way for the foundation of a Church, and it is excluded by the fact that he was then travelling not to Macedonia but in a direction the very opposite, viz. to Jerusalem*. On the second, he remained at Ephesus for three years, and on departing did go into Macedonia‘: but the following reasons are decisive against this being the visit in question. (i) He did not leave Timothy in Ephesus, but sent him on to Macedonia’, intending that he should also go to Corinth’. That Timothy did actually reach Corinth is improbable, but that he did not return to Ephesus before St Paul left is clear: for St Paul joins him in Mace- donia’ and is accompanied by him to Corinth*®. (ii) St Paul had no such intention of revisiting Ephesus soon, as he declares in this letter®.. On the contrary, he was bound for Greece, intending to sail thence direct to Jerusalem to pay his farewell to the Holy city before visiting Rome and the West”.
This difficulty may indeed be got over by supposing that St Paul may have paid a visit from Ephesus to Macedonia during his three years’ stay there—a visit unrecorded in the Acts, as he is known from 2 Corinthians to have paid a visit to Corinth likewise unrecorded". But this is an arbitrary assumption, and two unsurmountable difficulties still remain: (i) to account for the growth of the heresies in so short a time during St Paul’s actual presence at Ephesus; and (ii) to reconcile the appearance of these heretics at Ephesus, as stated in this Epistle, with the prediction to the Elders at Miletus™
1 1 Tim. i. 3. 8 Rom. xvi. 21,
2 Acts xviii. 19, and xix. 1. 9 1 Tim. iii. 14.
% Acts xviii. 21. 10 Acts xix. 21.
* Acts xix. 21, 1 This hypothesis is put in the best 5 Acts xix. 22, form by Wieseler, J. ¢.
6 1 Cor. iv. 17, xvi. 10, 11. 2 Acts xx. 29 werd ri aduiély pov.
792 Cor. i. 1.
THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES. 405
that they would appear hereafter, the fact being on this hypo- thesis earlier than the prediction’.
The notices in the Epistle to Titus enhance the difficulty on any such hypothesis. St Paul leaves Titus in Crete to organize the Churches there. There is no record in the Acts of any such visit to Crete. We have also mention of a winter to be spent in Nicopolis*—which Nicopolis is meant, I need not stay to enquire at present. This also is passed over in silence in the Acts. But not only are these incidents unrecorded ; there is no place in the narrative of St Luke where we can inter- polate them‘. It has been suggested indeed that they must be taken out of the long residence at Ephesus, extending over from two to three years. That St Paul paid a brief visit to Corinth during this period, unrecorded by St Luke, we are forced to conclude by some incidental allusions in the Epistles to the Corinthians. But if we add to this a visit to Macedonia, as required by the First Epistle to Timothy, and then a residence more or less prolonged in Crete, and a winter passed at Nicopolis, as inferred from the Epistle to Titus, and make allowance for the journeys to and fro, we have to assume a prolonged absence from Ephesus which could not have been unknown to St Luke, or, if known, passed over in silence, and which would render St Paul’s language to the Ephesian Elders at Miletus® quite incorrect and inappropriate. It may be added also that the projected mission of Artemas or Tychicus to Crete®, or the expected visit of Zenas and Apollos and of Titus himself’, have no points of correspondence with the inci- dents of St Luke’s narrative—a remarkable circumstance if they fell within the same range of time.
The notices in the Second Epistle to Timothy are still more unaccountable. This Epistle, as is generally supposed, was
1 Futile attempts are made to meet 1. p. 79sq., Wieseler, p. 286 sq., Otto, this difficulty in Hemsen, Paulus, and __p. 357 sq.
Davidson 111. p, 25. 5 Acts xx. 31 rperiay vixra Kal Nuépav 2 Tit. 1. 5. ovK émavoduny vovbeTov. . 3. Cit. ii. 12. 6 Tit. iii, 12.
4 For various shifts see Davidson To Nitetiielcs
406 THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES.
~ written while St Paul was a prisoner at Rome, and when his captivity was soon to terminate in death. According to the hypothesis which I am now considering, this was the same captivity with which the history of the Acts closes. Thus he had been a prisoner for more than four years, first at Ceesarea, then at Rome. The incidents therefore which occurred when St Paul was in the East—the sojourn of Erastus at Corinth’, and his leaving Trophimus ill at Miletus—must have happened previously to this. Even if we suppose with some that it was written at the beginning of his stay at Rome, there is still a period of two or three years, yet he feels it necessary to inform him by letter of these occurrences after so long a lapse of time. Nay more, Timothy had been staying with the Apostle mean- while at Rome*; he was in fact with him during this very tour in Greece and Asia Minor when, on the supposed hypothesis, these incidents must have occurred. Why then should the Apostle offer this information so superfluous and uncalled for ? But indeed the incidents themselves militate against the hypo- thesis. Erastus indeed might have remained at Corinth on that occasion, for about him St Luke is silent. But Trophimus was certainly not left at Miletus sick, for we find him with the Apostle immediately afterwards at Jerusalem*. It is unneces- sary to dwell on minor difficulties, such as his leaving the cloak and books at Troas‘ so many years’.
This accumulation of historical contradictions is quite unsur- mountable on the supposition of the earlier date of these Epis- tles. De Wette’s phrase of the ‘ historical unaccountableness’ of the Pastoral Epistles then becomes most appropriate. And if no alternative remained, there would be an overwhelming difficulty in accepting these writings as genuine. This historical difficulty disappears, if we prolong St Paul’s life beyond the period com-— prised in the Acts, and place the Pastorals at a later date.
1 2 Tim. iv. 20. 5 To escape this difficulty Hug and 9 Phil. i. 1; Col. i, 1; Philem. i. 1. Hemsen take dé\eurov to mean ‘they 8 Acts xxi, 29, left’ (see Davidson m. p. 53), Who
4 2 Tim. iv. 13. ‘they’ are, is not clear.
THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES. 407
ii. The condition of the Church.
Very exaggerated and unwarrantable views have been taken of the notices in the Pastoral Epistles relating to the condition of the Church, as indicating a later date, and this circumstance may perhaps prejudice the consideration of them. But on the other hand these Epistles leave on the mind the impression of a definite and various organization, which must have taken some time in forming, and of a progress and development of opinion and action for good or evil, inconsistent with a very early stage of the Church. This consideration becomes of importance when we apply it to the particular case of the Church of Ephesus. According to the hypothesis we have been combating, the First Epistle to Timothy was written not later than A.D. 57, before the close of St Paul’s protracted stay in that city. Now that stay was practically the foundation of the Church there, for on his previous brief visit St Paul did but break ground. Thus on this theory in the course of two or three years the Church has attained this advanced development, and what is more improbable still, false and heretical opinions have grown up and spread before the Apostle’s own eyes.
The three points which deserve considering in the condition of the Church are (a) the ministry and in general the offices connected with Church government, (b) the heresies, (c) the traces of a Church literature.
(a) I do not lay any stress on the existence of the two orders of presbyters and deacons, as a recognised institution. Evidence is not wanting to show that these existed in some Churches at least at a very early date’; but the directions given (1 Tim. ii. 1 sq., v. 17-21; Tit. 1. 7) imply that these offices had assumed a very definite form, that serious irregu- larities had crept into the ministry of the Church and that alto- gether there had been long experience of the working of the system. I would point particularly to the direction that the presbyter must not be ‘a novice, lest he be lifted up with pride?,
1 Acts xi, 30, xiv. 23; Phil. i. 1. 2 1 Tim. iii. 6.
408 THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES.
as savouring of a later date. Again the term rpecSurépiov implies that the office was consolidated. Provision is also made for the maintenance of church officers. Altogether the tone of these injunctions is inconsistent with the very first stage of the Church before carelessness and insincerity had grown with the growth of its numbers,
Again, the systematic employment of women in offices connected with the ministry is another proof of a later date. We read of a deaconess of the Church of Cenchrez?, about the time when on the hypothesis of the earlier date the First Epistle to Timothy was written, but with this single exception there is no distinct trace in the other Epistles of St Paul of a special ministry of women. Here on the contrary the deaconesses are a recognised class of officials‘. The diaconate of women however would not create any serious difficulty. It is more important to observe that ‘the widows” also are spoken of as a separate class, specially appointed («ataXeyéc Ow) with functions of their own, and spoken of in such a way as to show that the institution had been working for some time.
(b) The picture drawn by St Paul of the state of opinion in theological matters tends to the same result—‘the endless fables and genealogies,’ ‘the questionings and battles of words, ‘the pro- fane and vain babblings®.’ The ‘oppositions of science so called?’ must have come to the surface after a long seething of specula- tion, and betoken the conflict of various elements of philosophical opinion with the Gospel, so that a considerable time is required for their development. Again, if we compare these notices in the Pastoral Epistles with those elsewhere, we arrive at the same conclusion. In the Apostle’s farewell address to the Ephesian Elders at Miletus, these irregularities in the Church
1 1 Tim. iv. 14. a cfepi UB ibe aR, bg iat 21 Tim. v.17. On the other hand 5 1 Tim, v. 38q. promotion from one office to another 61 Tim. i. 4, iv. 1, vi 203 20pm
is not implied in 1 Tim, iii, 13, as ii. 16; ef. also 2 Tim, ii, 23, iii, 18; some have supposed (e.g. Blunt, Tit. i. 10, iii. 9 sq. Wordsworth). 7 1 Tim. vi. 20.
* Rom. xvi. 1.
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of Ephesus are an anticipation, a prophecy; here they are a painful fact. Thirdly, comparing them with the phase of heresy prevalent in these. same regions of Asia Minor, as presented in the Epistles to the Colossians and Ephesians, we find that though they have much in common, the latter are an advance upon the former. Whereas in the former no charge of immor- ality is brought against the false teachers, but on the other hand they are reproved for their strict asceticism, in the Pastorals the heretical spirit is one of profligate, reckless self-seeking. Without pressing the prophetical passages”, this tendency is apparent enough*. Now this sequence is natural. Loose and idle speculation, freedom from restraint in matters of opinion, ultimately begets immorality of conduct, for it throws off the sanctions of authority which kept it in check. But all this requires time. Lastly, it should be observed that the heretics of the Pastoral Epistles made a traffic of their false doctrines. They found advantage in vending their wares to foolish purchasers who in turn were interested in being deceived‘. Now all this militates against a very early date. There is little chance of deceiving and nothing to be gained by it, where all are poor and all honest alike. It is only later that the theological adventurer has any chance and _ that, having first deceived himself, he finds 1t worth his while to deceive others®.
(c) We find here and there in the Pastoral Epistles traces of a liturgical form, snatches of hymns, and fragments of creeds or formularies. It will be sufficient to point out one or two of these. They are to be distinguished by their balanced, rhythmical form, as if framed to assist the memory and perhaps to be sung. They are besides introduced in many cases by
1 On the relation of thesetwo heresies 41 Tim. vi. 5 vomifsvTwr mopiopov see the additional note at the end of — elvax rhv evoéBecav: 2 Tim. iii. 6 ailx- this Essay (p. 411 sq.). padrwrifovres yuvaikdpia ceowpevpéva
21 Tim. iv. lsq.; 2 Tim. iii. 1sq., dyaprias, dydueva émOvulars moxtras. iv. 3sq. 5 2 Tim. iii. 13.
3 See below, p. 415.
410 THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES.
the formula ‘faithful is the saying. Such are especially 2 Tim. ii. 11 ef yap cuvareOavopev, kai ovvEjoowey «.7.r. and 1 Tim. iii. 16 d5 éfavepdOn év capxt x.7.4. Now we should perhaps expect to trace the origin of a devotional and ecclesi- astical literature back to the close of the Apostolic age, but not much earlier. At first the oral teaching, the communion of soul with soul, ‘the spirit and not the letter, was the para- mount, as it always will be the most effectual, mode of instruction; but as the Apostles foresaw their speedy removal from the scene of their labours, it is not unnatural that they should have countenanced efforts of this kind, for the guidance and instruction of the Churches after their death. It is worth observing here, that outside the Pastoral Epistles there is no distinct trace of a liturgical or devotional form of words in | St Paul’s writings but one. Both the rule and the exception are instructive. The rule shows the practice of the earlier Apostolic age. The exception occurs in the Epistle to the Ephesians’, probably the latest of St Paul’s Epistles antecedent to the Pastorals. It is therefore the first trace of the transition to the fixed form and prepares the way naturally for the phenomena of his latest group of letters.
[1862.]
1 Ephes. v. 14, 51d Aéyer* “Eyeipe expression 6d \éyer compare the later 6 kadevdwy ||kal dvdora éx T&v vexpdv|| formula miords 6 Adyos. kal émipatoe: cor 6 Xpiorés. With the
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ADDITIONAL NOTE ON THE HERESY COMBATED IN THE PASTORAL EPISTLES.
The form of heresy presented to us in the Pastoral Epistles has been much canvassed. Some have recognised in it a Judaism of the extreme Pharisaic type. To others, it has appeared in the directly opposed form of strictly Gentile Gnosis. Some again have traced one form of error in this group of Epistles, while others have discovered as many as four distinct heresies.
It will be necessary to start from a careful examination of the passages in which the false doctrine is alluded to. From the results thus obtained, with the light thrown by the false teaching com- bated in the Epistle to the Colossians and by the form of heresy known to have prevailed in the age which followed upon the Apostles, we are enabled to draw a tolerably vivid and consistent portrait of this branch of false doctrine.
From the Pastoral Epistles themselves these five characteristics of the heresy are elicited :—
(1) It was Jewish in its origin, promulgated chiefly by converts from Judaism and maintaining the observance of the law as a fundamental tenet.
Cf. 1 Tim. i. 7, 8 OéAovres etvar vopodidacKxador x.7.A., Tit. i. 10 eiciv ydp roAXoi avuToraKror, patavoddyor Kal Ppevarrarat, padirra ot €k THs mepitouns, 14 py mpocéyxovtes “Iovdaixots pvdors Kal évtoAais avOparuv, iii. 9 pwpds dé Lytyoces Kal yeveadoyias Kai épw Kal paxas VOMLKaS TepiiaTaco.
(2) It vaunted a superior knowledge (yvdécrs) and busied itself in idle speculations. Under this head the three points, on which we may fix attention, are (a) its foolish and profane disputations and combats of words, (5) fables, (c) genealogies.
Cf. 1 Tim. i. 4 rpocéxew piOous Kal yeveadoyiats arepavrois aries exlyTyces Tapéxovor paAAov 7 olkovopiav Oeod tyv ev miote, 6 é& etparyocay eis paraodoyiay, iv. 7 tods BeByAovs Kat ypawdes piOovs, vi. 4 voowv epi Lytycves Kat Aoyouaxias, 20, 21 exrperopevos tas BeByrovs Kevopwvias kai avtifeoes THS Wevdwvipov yvwcews K.T.r., 2 Tim. ii. 14 p22) Aoyopaxety ex’ ovdev xpnomor, 16 ras BeBrnAovs Kevodwvias, 23 pwpas kal araidevrous Cytnoets, iv. 4 aro pev THS GAnOeias THY aKonV amootpepovow ert dé Tovs pvOovs extparycovra, and Tit. iii. 9 already
412 THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES.
quoted. It would seem that in some cases at least this speculation assumed the form of denying the resurrection of the dead (2 Tim. ii. 18).
(3) Its adherents practised mysterious or magical rites. They are spoken of as wizards.
Cf. 2 Tim. iii. 13 zovypot advOpwrot kat yontes, to which perhaps we may refer 1 Tim. iv. 1 zpocéxovres mvevpacr wAavois Kat didac- KaXlats daipoviwy.
(4) There was a strongly ascetic tendency in their teaching. Marriage was forbidden, and they distinguished between meats clean and unclean.
Cf. 1 Tim. iv. 3 cwAvovtwy yapetv, aréxeo Oar Bpwpatur, 8 7 cwpariKy yopvacia mpds oAiyov éotiv wpéeAysos, Tit. i. 15 wavra Kafapa rots xaOapots x.7.X.
(5) In character they were corrupt, deceitful and selfseeking.
Cf. 1 Tim. iv. 2 kexavornpracpéevov tHv lav cvveidnow, vi. 5 SvaraparpiBal duebbappévov avOpwrwv Tov vodv Kal amectepnuevov THS adnbeias, vopilovrwy ropirpov elvac tThv evoeBecav, 2 Tim. iii. 6, 8 evowvovres eis Tas oikias...avOicravTar TH GAnGeia avOpwror KarepOappévor TOV vodv, GddKiwor TEpl THY TicTLY, iv. 3 KaTa Tas idias érLOupias EavTOtS eritwpevoovow didackddovs KvyOopevor tiv axonv, Tit. i. 16 Oedv Spooyotow «idévat, Tois 5é epyors apvotvta, BdeAvKTol ovTes Kal amet- Geis kat mpos wav epyov ayabov adoxyor,
In this enumeration I have made two assumptions. J irst, that all the passages refer to one and the same heresy. Now there is nothing in the Epistles themselves from which to infer that distinct forms were contemplated. The characteristic elements, which I have elicited, do not refuse to combine, and, strange as the resulting compound may appear to modern habits of thought, it was in one guise or another a common phenomenon when Oriental mysticism and Greek thought came in contact for the first time with the ordinances of the law and the spiritual truths of the Gospel. On the other hand, it would be anticipating history to regard the heresy as having assumed a definite creed or a distinct organisation. Floating speculation, vague theories, coalescing gradually to a greater consistency and tending more or less in one direction—this, and not more than this, we are at liberty to assume at the date of the Pastoral Epistles. Indeed the phenomena do not justify more.
Secondly, I have drawn my deductions not less from the pro- phetical warnings than from the historical statements. Whoever will read these predictions in connexion with their context will see
THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES. 413
that they are but a declaration of the inevitable consequences to which the spiritual insight of the Apostle foresaw the irregularities of the present would lead, that in fact these irregularities were in themselves the beginning of the end.
Now, combining these features together, we obtain a portrait of an early phase of Jewish Gnosticism, very similar in character to, but more advanced and definite than, that which appears in the Epistles to the Colossians and Ephesians. The later date appears in the directions for dealing with the heretics, pointing to them as recognisable enemies to be treated as such (e.g. Tit. iii. 10 aiperuxov avOpwrov...mapaitod).
On a previous occasion’ I devoted some time to the study of the origin and character of Gnosticism ; it will therefore suffice to recapitulate as briefly as possible some of the most important points arrived at, as serving to explain the allusions in the Pastoral Epistles. The three notes of Gnosticism were found to be (1) its intellectual exclusiveness; (2) certain speculative tenets chiefly relating to the creation of the world and the existence of evil, creation being accounted for by the doctrine of emanations, the existence of evil by postulating matter as an antagonistic principle independent of God ; (3) as a practical consequence of these specula- tions, a twofold and divergent result upon the ethical systems of their advocates, either rigid asceticism, or unrestrained licence. I proceeded to point out distinet traces of all these three characteristics of Gnosticism in the heresy portrayed in the Epistle to the Colos- sians. St Paul is there confronting false opinion itself; he argues against it directly, and opposes to it the truths of the Gospel. Consequently from that Epistle we get a fuller conception of its general principles and bearing. Here the case is different. St Paul is writing to a friend, and instructing him to deal practically with the question. No lengthy exposition is necessary, nor would such be in place, It is from a single word here and there—a descriptive epithet or attribute—that we gather the character of the heresy in the Pastoral Epistles. But these notes are significant enough when we get the key to their interpretation ; and with the light of the Colossian Epistle thrown on the previous era and the light of the heresiologists on the succeeding, we are at no loss to elucidate the intermediate stage in the progress of the error. The heresy in both cases has its root on the same ground, in Asia Minor, the fittest meeting-point of Oriental mysticism, of Greek thought, of Judaism,
1 See Colossians, p. 73 sq., esp. pp. 76—80.
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and of Christianity. It is evidently the same in most of its features, though, as was natural, in the earlier Epistle the picture given us is fuller, the canvas broader, but on the other hand, the individual features of the landscape are less clearly marked.
1. With respect to the esoteric spirit, the intellectualism of Gnosticism.
The phase of heresy in the Pastoral Epistles is an advance on that exhibited in the Colossians. ‘Knowledge’ is in the Colossian Epistle a favourite word with the false teachers, a word constantly - on their lips; but it has not yet become the watchword of the sect. In these later Epistles, we find it as a distinct title, adopted by them and vaunted as peculiarly their own (1 Tim. vi. 20 ris Yevdo- vipov yvuoews). We may compare also the antithesis between knowledge and faith implied in 1 Tim. i. 4 atrues éx€ytyoas mape- xovot parXov 7) oikovoniay Geod rv év wicte. Perhaps the emphatic declaration of the universality of the Gospel (1 Tim. ii 4-6) is a protest against this intellectual aristocracy in religion. From this intellectualism arose those questionings, vain-talkings and combats of words, which the Apostle so frequently and so severely rebukes.
2. Again, in the speculative theories which characterize the Gnostic system—especially as regards the doctrine of emanations— we have an advance upon the yvdors of the Colossian Epistle. There the emanation of angels, the mediation of superior essences, appears in a vague, shadowy form (Col. ii. 18 Opyoxeta tév ayyedwv). Here it has assumed a definite shape. The ‘genealogies’ are mentioned twice over (1 Tim, i. 4, Tit. iii. 9), in the former passage with the epithet ‘endless’ (amépavro.). The term certainly does not explain itself, but by the light of the later Gnostic systems it becomes clear enough. It refers to the successive generations of zons, or emanations from the pleroma, which occupy so important a place in the speculations, for instance, of the Ophites and Valentin- ians. To the Apostle they are but tiresome pedigrees. To the same feature in Gnosticism may be referred the expression ‘fables’ or ‘myths.’ No term would better express the manner in which the Gnostics embodied these speculations, representing them in the concrete form of stories, as nobler teachers, like Plato, had done before them. There may be a reference to these false mediators in the emphatic declaration of the one, only mediator in 1 Tim. ii. 5, and perhaps also to the dualistic tendencies of the heresy in the doxology of 1 Tim. i. 17 (sovw 66).
These theories respecting the invisible world, proceeding from, or
THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES. 415
at least fostered by, a love of the marvellous, found a practical expression in mystic or magical rites, the common refuge of oriental superstition. Hence the Apostle says that these heretics were misled by ‘doctrines of devils’ (1 Tim. iv. 1), and calls them ‘ wizards,’ ‘enchanters’ (2 Tim. iii. 13).
3. We saw that in the case of the Colossian heretics the doctrine that matter was the source of evil led to the nobler of the two extremes, a rigid asceticism. In this earlier stage there is no trace of immorality. In the Pastoral Epistles, however, we find that we are on the confines of a new development of Gnostic ethics. It is true the ascetic theory still prevails. This asceticism, as in the case of the Colossians, is partly based on the Mosaic law, partly indepen- dent of, and contrary to, the spirit of Judaism. Of the former class is the abstaining from meats (1 Tim. iv. 3), though doubtless it went beyond the Mosaic distinction of meats clean and unclean ; of the latter the prohibition of marriage (2b.), a tenet of many of the Gnostic sects. Having debarred themselves from the lawful use of God’s creatures under the idea of keeping themselves clean from the contamination of matter, they fell into vices of another kind. Avarice, selfishness and deceit are their prevailing sins (see esp. 1 Tim. vi. 5).
But there are besides this traces, more or less distinct, of the opposite extreme, deduced from the Gnostic principle—a reckless sensuality, an indulgence in profligate habits themselves and a pandering to the vices of others (Tit. i. 16, 2 Tim. i. 6). The wild and unbridled profligacy of some of the later Gnostic sects is a constant theme of reproach with the writers of the Church. In the Pastoral Epistles we discern only the first beginnings of this tendency, which is spoken of as future rather than present, having hitherto, it seems, manifested itself only in a few.
All the later Gnostic sects were essentially anti-Judaic ; but this is not the case with the earlier forms of Gnosis. Arising as it did from an oriental mysticism, it took up its sojourn first in Judaism and Judaic Christendom, with which it came in contact first. But it was only by violent wresting and distortion that the teaching of the Old Testament could be brought into any sort of fellowship with the Gnosis. The fundamental principle of the Old Testament, the immediate and direct control of the supreme Lord over the material world and over the affairs of men, was diametrically opposed to the fundamental principle of Gnosticism, which was dualism in some form or other. The whole spirit of the Mosaic legislation, the high
416 THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES.
honour in which marriage was held, especially, was a protest equally against the asceticism and the unbridled profligacy of the two extremes of Gnostic practice. Thus Gnosticism soon found that it was unequally yoked with Judaic Christianity, and betook itself to a more congenial, or at least a less impracticable, companionship in Gentile Christendom. Here at all events it was not fettered by any allegiance to the Mosaic dispensation. So it severed its connexion with the Old Covenant, and assumed a position of direct antagonism to Judaism.
But the earlier forms of Gnosticism are all, or nearly all, Judaic. The uses which it made of Judaism were twofold—both of them abuses.
(1) The narrative of the Old Testament, its antiquity and its supernatural element, yielded a rich harvest for mystic application. The real significance of this narrative, as the history of the progres- sive dealings of God with man, was entirely lost sight of.
(2) The ordinances, especially with reference to clean and unclean things, were made a starting-point for asceticism, It is needless to say that in this their spirit was entirely misapprehended. They were intended to serve as a disciplinary training. They were perverted into a condemnation of God’s creatures.
Speaking then of the heresy of the later Epistles with reference to its position in the Gnostic systems, we may call it Judaic Gnosti- cism. Speaking of it with reference to its position as a phase of Jewish thought, we may call it Lssene Judaism.
Having thus drawn the portrait of this heresy, the infancy of which we trace in the Epistles of the First Roman Captivity, and the early childhood in the Pastoral letters, we are led to enquire whether it corresponds to any form of error of which we have a historical record.
The discovery of the treatise of Hippolytus on heresies has thrown great light on this, as on many other points in early Church History. First in the series of his heresies, before Simon Magus, before Cerinthus, he places the Ophites or NVaasenes, so called from the fact that the serpent (dus {/M3) was the symbol of their worship (Hippol. Refut. v. 6, p. 132 ed. Duncker et Schneid. of otv tepeis Kat TpooTarat TOV doypatos yeyevnvrar TpOTor ot erixAnbévres Naagonvot, rH ‘EBpatd: dwv7 ovtws dvopacpévor’ vaas dé 6 odis kaXetrat). His order is generally chronological, interrupted now and then to keep the same knot of heresies together. We may therefore assume that the
THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES, 417
origin of the Ophites was contemporaneous with the Apostles. On the other hand, in the documents of the sect, which he quotes largely, we find citations from the Gospel of St John, and perhaps traces of the influence of Gnostic speculations of the second century. We must not therefore suppose that he presents the original form of the heresy. It is evident that later accretions have gathered about it. |
Now as to this heresy we have the following facts from Hippoly- tus.
(1) It took its rise, or flourished chiefly, in Phrygia. It delighted especially in the Phrygian rites of Cybele (p. 170 zape- dpevovor Tots Aeyouevors Mytpos peyadns pvorypiors), and Phrygian legends are referred to frequently in the books of the sect (e.g. p. 154 rovrov Opaxes KopvBavra kadodor kal Opaéiv of Ppvyes tapatAnoiws, p. 156 rotrov Bpvyes xai Mdrav xadovor, p. 160 obros iro trav Ppvydv Kal akapros KaXeirat, p. 162 A€éyovor dé adrov Ppr-yes Kal yAoEpov oTAyXvV teJepiopevor, etc.).
(2) It was Jewish. The name ‘Naasene’ indicates this. The Ophites professed to derive their Gnosis from James the Lord’s brother (p. 134 ratrta éori...ra Kepadrta a yoi apadedwxévar Mapiapvy tov “laxwBov tod Kvupiov tov adeAdov). Some of their mystical formule were derived from the Hebrew of the Old Testa- ment (p. 150 xavAaxatd cavAacad Cenoap: cf. Is. xxviii. 10).
(3) They called themselves ‘Gnostics.’ Indeed Hippolytus seems to imply that they were the first to assume that name (see esp. p. 132 pera d€ tadta éwexddXecav Eavtovs yvworiKov’s hacKovtes povor ta Baby ywookev: cf. p. 160 ot yvworixot réAeror, p. 176 ra KEKPYLpLEVA THS aylas 000d yvdow Kadéoas).
(4) They dealt largely in mystic rites. The mysteries of Osiris (p. 142 1. 11), of the Assyrians (p. 140 1. 90), of Samothrace (p. 152 1. 80), of Eleusis (p. 146 1. 80, p. 162 1. 58), but especially, as remarked before, of the Phrygian Cybele, all contributed their quota to the Ophite system. We may believe that many of these were incorporated at a later date into their system, to give a comprehen- siveness and universality to it; and that originally it dealt with the Old Testament chiefly or solely, putting a mystical sense upon it. Thus the Apostle might well refer to them the term yonres.
(5) As the whole of Hippolytus’ account shows, they taught by myths (e.g. p. 134 d6ev avtois ovtos 0 pi60s).
(6) They forbad marriage (p. 170 rapayyéAAovow adréxerOau ws GTOKEKOMPLEVOL THS TPOS YuVatKa. O.tALas).
Taek; 27
418 THE DATE OF THE PASTORAL EPISTLES.
(7) They maintained that the resurrection was a spiritual resurrection, i.e. they said in other words that the resurrection was past (p. 158 égadotvrar ek raév pyypeiwy of vexpol TouvTéaTw éx TOV Twudtwv Tov xoiKdv avayevvnbévtes TVEvpaTiKOL ov capxKiKoi, and the whole passage).
(8) Though the genealogies referred to by St Paul are not so distinctly traced in the Ophite system, as painted by Hippolytus, as in later Gnostic sects, still there are evidences of these. Compare especially the hymn, which, as Hippolytus says, contains a summary of all their mysteries (p. 174 vojos qv yevixds Tov mavTos 6 TpwTos voos’ 0 5 Sevrepos Hv x.7.A.). And other accounts of the Ophites are very full on this characteristic of the sect (cf. Neander Ch. Hist. ii. p. 109 Engl. transl. ed. Torrey).
There is therefore sufficient correspondence between the two systems to enable us to conclude that the heresy combated by St Paul in the Pastoral Epistles was identical with the heresy of the Ophites, or at least partook largely of an Ophite character.
11865,
XG:
ST PAUL’ HISTORY AFTER THE CLOSE OF THE ACTS.
27—2
XII.
ST PAUL'S HISTORY AFTER THE CLOSE OF THE ACTS.
HE conclusion, at which we have arrived in the last section,
assumes St Paul’s release from his captivity at Rome. We must suppose that he resumed his active missionary labours, and that these were terminated by a second captivity ending in his martyrdom, of which the Second Epistle to Timothy sounds the knell. In the present section it will be my business, first, to show that there are sufficient grounds independently for assuming this release, and secondly, considering this as established, to sketch out his movements by the help of the record in the Pastoral Epistles.
I. Of this release, with the subsequent events, there is no intimation in the New Testament beyond the notices in the Pastoral Epistles which seem to demand it. In the memoir of St Luke there is not the slightest intimation of the future. The Epistles of the First Roman Captivity hover between hope and fear, between anticipation of release and forebodings of condemnation. They contain nothing which leads directly to the result we are seeking.
One passage indeed has been adduced as conclusive against a subsequent visit of St Paul to Ephesus; and as, by sur- rendering this visit, we should be surrendering all the advantages gained by the assumption of his release, and should be thrown back upon our difficulties with respect to the Pastoral Epistles, it is important to consider what is the value
422 ST PAUL'S HISTORY AFTER
of this argument. St Paul in his farewell address to the Ephesian Elders on the eve of the First Captivity, says’, ‘ And now, behold, I know that ye all, among whom I have gone preaching the kingdom of God, shall see my face no more.’ This is supposed to be inconsistent with a later visit to Ephesus, and pro tanto with his release from captivity. But in no other province of history would it be allowable to convert a presentiment, however strongly expressed, into a fact; and as this is purely a personal matter, inspiration does not enter into the question. A presumption might indeed have been founded on this expression, if no intimation existed of a release; but the notices in the Pastoral Epistles to the contrary are in them- selves more than sufficient to set this presumption aside. Then again, in what infinite difficulties does this supposition involve us! To the Romans he says; ‘I will pass by you into Spain?’ This however, it may be said, was before the conviction (or the revelation) declared to the Ephesian elders had seized him. What are we to say of the expressions scattered through the Epistles of the First Captivity? Why does he waver between hope and fear, if the fatal result was certain? Why does he entreat the prayers of his converts for his release, if he knew that release to be absolutely impossible? Writing to the Philippians he says that he trusts in the Lord, that he himself also will come shortly*. Nay, he even affirms positively that he will be released. ‘Having this confidence,’ he says, ‘I know (rovdro tremov@as oda) that I shall abide and continue with you all*’ Why is the ola to be regarded as decisive in the one case, and disregarded in the other? But it may be urged that the supposed revelation did not negative his release in toto, that it is limited, that it referred only to his revisiting these Churches of Asia Minor. To this too St Paul’s own language furnishes a reply. He bids Philemon ‘prepare him a lodging’ at Colosse, he ‘trusts that through their prayers he ! Acts xx. 25 kal vidv ldod éyw olda 2 Rom. xv. 28.
bre obkért OWere 7d mpdowmrdby pou Upets 3 Phil. ii, 24. WwavTes. 4 Phil. i. 25.
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shall be given unto them?’—language which he could not have held, if he had had a revelation to the contrary. And if here again it be urged that he might have gone to Colosse without revisiting the neighbouring Church of Ephesus, to this we should reply, firstly, that when the inference from oféa is pared down to these dimensions, we have obtained such a concession as will explain the notices in the Pastoral Epistles, for, though a visit to Ephesus is much more probable, a visit to the neighbourhood would suffice ; and secondly, that it will be felt that so limited an inference is meaningless, and of course value- less to those who refuse to allow the release of St Paul.
But though the New Testament, with the single exception of the Pastoral Epistles, is silent about this release, it is most satisfactorily established from external tradition.
CLEMENT OF RoME [7 c. A.D. 96], a contemporary of the Apostles, after mentioning several incidents in St Paul’s life, and saying that he had preached in the East and the West, adds that he was ‘a teacher of righteousness unto the whole world’, and, before his decease ‘reached the furthest bounds of the West and bore testimony before the ruling powers’ (émi To Tépua THs SVcEws EMO@Y Kai papTUpHaas éml TOV ryouMEévor). Considering that Clement was writing from Rome, and bearing in mind the common significance of the expression ‘the extreme West’? at the time, as referring to the Pillars of Hercules*, we
1 Philemon 22.
2 For the expression, referring to the western extremity of Spain, the pillars of Hercules, comp. Strabo ii. 1 (p. 67) wépara dé adrijs (rijs olkoupévys) rlOnor mpos Svoer pév Tas ‘Hpakdelous oThAas, ii. 4 (p. 106) uéxpe TOv &xpwv Ths IBnplas amep Svomixwrepa éort, iil. 1 (p. 187) robré (ro iepdv axpwrnjprov) éoTt TO OuTiKwWTaTor ov TAS Hipwarns wovov GAG Kal THs olkoupévyns amaons onmetor * meparodrat yap Urd T&v dvely jrelpwv 7H olkoupévn mpos Stow, Tots Te THS Hvpw- ans &kpos kal Tots mpwrots THs AcBUns, ili. 5 (p. 169) émedy kara Tov mropOudv éyévovto Tov Kata THY Karn, vouloar-
Tas Tépuovas elvac THs oikoumévys...Ta dixpa, ib. (p. 170) (nreiv ert rv Kuplws de- youévav oTnA@v Tos THs oikounévys Bpous (these references are corrected from Credner’s Kanon, p. 53), and see Stra- bo’s whole account of the western boundaries of the world and of this coast of Spain. Similarly Vell. Paterc. i. 2, ‘In ultimo Hispaniae tractu, in extremo nostri orbis termino.’
3 It is instructive to mention some interpretations by which the force of these words has been evaded: (1) ‘to his extreme limit towards the west, (Baur Paulus der Apost. p. 230, Schen- kel Studien und Kritiken p. 71, Otto
424 ST PAUL'S HISTORY AFTER
can scarcely be wrong in concluding that St Paul was released from captivity and fulfilled his purpose, expressed years before, of visiting Spain’.
It might be urged indeed that Clement has here the passage in the Epistle to the Romans in his. mind, and that he assumes the intention was carried out. But seeing that at least one of the facts mentioned in the context—the Apostle’s seven captivities (értaxis deca popéoas)—is not recorded in the New Testament, he must be deriving his information from inde- pendent sources, as indeed, living at Rome and having perhaps known the Apostle personally, he was very competent to do. And it may be argued further that this fact obliges us to prolong the Apostle’s labours beyond the captivity with which the Acts closes, .
2. Two generations later. (c. A.D. 180), the anonymous writer of the MURATORIAN CANON gives the following account of the Acts of the Apostles. ‘Luke comprises in detail in his treatise addressed to the most excellent Theophilus the incidents in the lives of the Apostles of which he was an eye- witness. As he does not mention either the martyrdom of Peter, or the journey of Paul to Spain, it is clear that these took place in his absence*.’”
Pastoralbr.) taking the word subjec- geration, but not as it stands, [See
tively, (2) ‘the sunset of his labours’ (Reuss Gesch. des N. I. Schrift. p. 124) explaining metaphorically, (3) ‘to the boundary between the East and West’ (Hilgenfeld Ap. Vit. p. 109, Schrader Paulus), (4) ‘to the goal or centre of the west’ (Matthies Pastoralbr.), (5) ‘before (vd for él) the supreme power of the west’ (Wieseler Chron. der ap. Zeitalt, p. 533, followed by Schaff History of Apost. Ch, 1. p. 400), Such attempts are a strong testimony to the plain inference which follows from the pas- sage simply interpreted. Had the expression been éml ra répyara rod kécuov, it might be explained (as Meyer proposes) as a rhetorical exag-
the notes on the passage in Apostolic Fathers, Pt. 1. Vol... p. 30 ed. 2, from which the above are expanded.]
1 Tt has been urged (e.g. by David- son Introd, 1m. p. 101 ed, 1) that Clement cannot have meant this, be- cause in that case Eusebius (H. 2£. iii. 4) would certainly have adduced the passage, which he does not. To this the reply is twofold: (1) that all argu- ments drawn from the silence of a writer are in the highest degree pre- carious; and (2) that we are quite as competent to judge what Clement meant, as Eusebius was.
* ‘Lucas obtime Theofile (l. opti- mo Theophilo) comprindit, quia (l.
THE CLOSE OF THE ACTS. 425
3. EUSEBIUS speaks of St Paul’s release and second visit to Rome, which ended in his martyrdom, as a common report (Adyos éyev)', It is true that he goes on to confirm this report by a false interpretation of 2 Tim. iv. 16, explaining the two apologies there mentioned of the Apostle’s two captivities; but the worthlessness of his own comment does not affect the value of the tradition on which it is founded, and which must be held quite distinct”,
4, In his Epistle to Dracontius, ATHANASIUS holds up for imitation the earnestness of the Apostle of the Gentiles, whose zeal prompted him ‘to preach as far as Illyricum, and not to hesitate to go even to Rome, nor to take ship for Spain, so that the more he laboured the greater reward he might receive for his labour®,’
5. CYRIL OF JERUSALEM, in his second catechetical lecture upon the Holy Spirit, adduces as a witness of the power of the Spirit St Paul’s conversion, and his missionary labours, which
he names in the following Illyricum, Rome, Spain‘.
quae) sub praesentia eius singula gere- bantur sicuti et semote passionem Petri evidenter declarat, sed et pro- fectionem Pauli ab urbe ad Spaniam proficiscentis, Fragm. Murat. (pp. 19, 40 ed. Tregelles Oxon. 1867; Westcott Hist. of Canon pp. 517, 528 ed. 4). The drift of the latter part of the sentence seems to have been generally misunderstood. I take ‘semote’ to be opposed to ‘sub praesentia eius,’ in the sense ‘at a distance,’ ‘in his ab- sence.’ Other solutions, either in the way of interpretation or of correction of the text, may be found in Routh R. S. p. 394, Bunsen Anal. Antenic. 1. p-. 125, Westcott p. 528, Credner Kanon p. 141 (ed. 1860) and Wieseler Chron. p. 536.
1 Kus. H. HE. ii. 22, rore pev obtv amohoynodpevov adOis éxl tiv Tod Knpby- patos dtaxoviay dyos éxe orelAacba Tov dmoaToNoy, SevTepov 5° émiBdvTa TH
significant order, Jerusalem,
adry mode TH Kar avrov TedewOFvaL baptuply.
2 Meyer’s inference (on Romans Hinl. § 1, p. 15) from Origen’s silence that he was ignorant of this release is quite arbitrary. At least it did not strike Eusebius so, who quotes Origen in the following words: Té de? mepl ILavNou Aé-yewv ard ‘Lepovoadim mex pe Tov “IN\upiKod mem\ynpwKoTos TO evary- yéduov Too Xpirrod, kal borepov ev rH ‘Péun ert Népwvos jeuaprupyxdros ; CHE, ils iL):
3 Athanas. Ep. ad Dracont. § 4, 1. p- 265 ed. Bened. 61a roiro Kal orovdy Tov ayiwy (l. Te aylw) wéxpe Tod ’IAAv- pixod knpirrew Kal mi dxvety nde els Thy ‘Paunv amedOeiv, unde eis Tas Dravias dvaBivar, a bcov Komig Tocoirov Kal Tod Kérou Tov pLoOdv welfova aroAdBn.
4 Cyrill. Hier. Catech. xvii. pp. 276, 7, amd ‘lepoco\iuwy mer kal méxpe TOO "TArupixod memAnpwréra 7d evayyédov*
426 ST PAUL'S HISTORY AFTER
6. EpIPHANIUS, in the account which he gives of the succession of the episcopate at Rome, explains his theory of the appointment of Linus, Cletus and Clement as bishops in the lifetime of the Apostles Peter and Paul by the frequent journeys which the Apostles had to take from Rome, and the impos- sibility of leaving the city without a bishop. ‘For Paul, he says, ‘even went as far away as Spain, and Peter was frequently superintending Pontus and Bithynia’,’
7. JEROME appeals to the testimony of older writers in support of his statement of St Paul’s release from his first imprisonment, which was arranged in God’s providence ‘that so he might preach the gospel of Christ in the West also%’
8. THEODORE OF MopPsuESTIA speaks in the plainest way of St Paul’s two visits to Rome in the reign of Nero. After relating how he was sent as prisoner there on his appeal from Festus, he goes on to say that he was ‘set free by the judgment of Nero and ordered to depart in safety. But after stopping two years at Rome, he departed thence and appears to have preached to many the teaching of godliness. However, coming a second time to Rome, while still stopping there, it happened that by the sentence of Nero he was punished with death for his preaching of godliness*’ The passage is somewhat obscure owing to its survival in the Latin version only.
9, When we come down to the time of PELAGIUS, we find the release from the first imprisonment generally main-
KaTnxjoovra dé kal rhy BaoiAlda ‘ Pounv kal péxpt Xravias tiv mpoOvulav rot Knpiyuaros éxrelvavra.
1 Epiphan. Haer, xxv. p. 107 ed. Pet. 6 wév yap IladXos cal él rhv Dra- viav dduixvetrat, Ilérpos dé rodAdxes Ildv- Tov Te Kal Biduvlav éverxéaro.
* Hieron. de Eccles. Script. §5, Vol. i. p. 823 ed. Vallarsi, ‘Sciendum au- tem in prima satisfactione, necdum Neronis imperio roborato, nec in tanta erumpente scelera, quanta de eo nar- rant historiae, Paulum a Nerone di- missum, ut evangelium Christi in
occidentis quoque partibus praedica- ret’; cf. Comm. in Amos v. 8, 9 Vol. v1. p. 291.
3 Theod. Mops. Argum. in Eph. 1. p. 116 ed. Swete, ‘Inde judicio Neronis liberatus, securus abire jussus est. duobus vero annis commoratus Ro- mae, exinde egressus, multis pietatis doctrinam praedicasse visus est. se- cunda vero vice Romam accedens dum illo adhue moraretur, contigit ut sententia Neronis ob praedicatio- nem pietatis capite puniretur.’
THE CLOSE OF THE ACTS. 427 tained. Commenting on the Apostle’s request to Philemon ‘to prepare him a lodging,’ he says: ‘Here it is shown that on the first occasion he was sent away from the city’; though of the journey to Spain he speaks more doubtfully’.
10. THEODORET, commenting on the Apostle’s expression of confidence addressed to his Philippian converts that he would abide and continue with them, remarks: ‘and the prediction was fulfilled; for at first he escaped the wrath of Nero. Then, after quoting the passage in 2 Tim. iv. 16, 17, and appealing to the last verses in the Acts, he continues: ‘Thence (i.e. from Rome) he departed to Spain, and carried the divine gospel to the inhabitants of that part also, and so he returned, and was then beheaded’. Other references to his release and visit to Spain are given below.
On the statements of Eusebius and later writers however no stress should be laid. Even if it were clear that they relied on some independent testimony, and did not found their belief on deductions—in some cases erroneous deductions—from St Paul’s own language, they are too far removed from the time of the events to be of any real value as guides. With Clement and the author of the Muratorian fragment the case is different. The former wrote from Rome, at a place where and at a time when the memory of the Apostle’s labours was fresh, and his testimony is explicit, so far as relates to St Paul’s preaching in the West. The latter, though living at a later period, is a witness of some importance, for he too was probably a Roman‘, and he distinctly attests the journey to Spain. Indeed, so irre-
1 Pelagius Comm. in Philemon v, 22, ‘hic ostenditur quia prima vice sit ex urbe dimissus’; in Rom. xv. 24, ‘utrum in Hispania fuerit incertum habetur.’
2 Theodoret Comm. in Phil. i. 25, Vol. 11. p. 451 ed. Schulze, xai rédos % wpoppnots EhaBe* diépuye yap To wpH- tov Tod Népwvos tov Oupov... éxetbev dé els Tas Zmavias ame\Owv, kal Td Gelov K@kelvois mpoceveyxav evaryyé\ov émray- HrA0e, kal Tore Thy Kehadiv ameruHOn:
in Ps. exvi. Vol. 1. p. 1425, torepov pévro Kal THs IraXlas éréBn, Kal els Tas Zravias apixero, kal rats év Tw Tedayer Otakermevars vngows THY wpédecav Tpoo?- veyxe: in 2 Tim. iv. 17, dmodoyiod- bevos ws a0@os apelOn kal Tas Dravias karéAaBe kal els Erepa Orn Spaywv rhv THs dtdacKkaNlas AKaumada mpoonveyKe.
3 His use of the expression ‘ab urbe,’ referring to Rome, shows this.
428 ST PAUL'S HISTORY AFTER
sistible has this evidence appeared to impartial critics, that the release has been accepted as a fact by many writers who cannot be suspected of any bias towards this result—by Hug, for instance, who places the Pastoral Epistles earlier in St Paul’s hfe, and by Ewald, who denies their genuineness entirely.
But it has been urged that, though there is evidence for the journey to Spain after the Apostle’s release, there is none for another yisit to the East. This is true, if the notices in the Pastorals themselves are not to be put in evidence; but even then, how does the case stand? St Paul, while still a prisoner but anticipating his release, expresses his intention of visiting the Philippians again, and writes to Philemon at Colosse to prepare him a lodging. He does obtain his release. In the absence of evidence either way, is it not more probable that he did fulfil his intention of visiting Macedonia and Asia than the contrary ?
II. Assuming then that St Paul was released from his first captivity at Rome and resumed his missionary labours, we shall have to sketch in the events which took place between this date and his final imprisonment, from the notices in the Pastoral Epistles, aided by such probabilities as circumstances suggest. If an intelligible and reasonable account of St Paul’s doings during this interval can thus be given, we shall have found a possible place for the Pastoral Epistles, and shall have furnished an answer to objections raised from the point of view of historical unaccountability ; and, in the absence of full and direct information, nothing more than this hypothetical solution can be expected.
Before entering into details, however, we must clear the way by settling two main questions; first, what was the probable length of this interval; and, secondly, supposing that St Paul visited both East and West, in what order did he make these journeys.
(1) According to the chronology I have adopted’, St Paul arrived in Rome early in the year 61. The closing verses of
1 See above, pp. 217 sq., 222.
THE CLOSE OF THE ACTS. 429
the Acts speak of his remaining there without any change in the circumstances of his captivity for two whole years'. This brings us to the beginning of the year 63 at least. Here St Luke’s narrative ends abruptly; so that we are without infor- mation as to what occurred afterwards, but the natural inference is that at the end of the two years there was a change in the prisoner's condition—a change either for the better or for the worse, but a change of some sort. Perhaps the most probable supposition is that his trial came on then. If so, we may place his release not later than the summer of 63, at all events it must have taken place between that date and the summer of the following year, for the great fire which broke out in July 64 was a signal for a fierce persecution of the Christians in Rome, and a teacher of the hated religion so zealous and so distin- guished could not have escaped the general fate, had he still remained a prisoner.
The data for determining the close of the period are still more vague. Ecclesiastical tradition fixes the martyrdom of St Paul in Nero’s reign, and this is probable in itself, for, after the tyrant’s death, the Romans were too much occupied with their own political troubles to pay any attention to the Christians, even supposing the succeeding emperors were animated by the same bitter spirit. It cannot therefore have been later than June 68, the date of Nero’s death. Now, when we examine the Pastoral Epistles with a view to obtaining some result, opposing considerations present themselves. On the one hand, their marked difference in style leads us to prolong the interval between them and the earlier Epistles as far as possible, while on the other hand the mention of Timothy’s youth is an ever-increasing difficulty as we postpone the date of the letters addressed to him. On the whole, perhaps, the later consideration must give place to the former. The death of the Apostle will then be placed at the very close of Nero’s reign, and the Pastoral Epistles will have been written in the year 67 or 68.
1 Acts xxviii, 30, 31.
430 ST PAUL'S HISTORY AFTER
(2) Next, as to the order in which St Paul visited the East and West. On the whole, it is probable that he went eastward immediately after his release. It is true that he had intended, when he first thought of visiting Rome, to proceed thence westward to Spain?. But circumstances might have occurred in the intervening period of about five years to alter his purpose and determine him to revisit the troubled Churches of Asia, before he entered on a new mission field in the far West. Such is the impression left by his language to the Philippians and to Philemon’.
But if it is probable that St Paul was in the East im- mediately after his release, it is certain that he was there towards the very close of his life. The notices of his transactions in the East scattered through the Pastoral Epistles reach continuously to the time of his second imprisonment at Rome, which ended in his death. If this be so, the visit to Spain and the West must have intervened between two visits to the East, For these incidents there is ample time in the four or five years which elapsed before his martyrdom.
We obtain then
(i) A visit to the East, probably brief, according with his intention expressed to the Philippians and to Philemon.
(ii) The fulfilment of his long-cherished purpose of preaching in Spain and the West.
(iii) A return to the East.
First of all perhaps he revisited the Macedonian Churches, fulfilling
Eastward then the Apostle hastens after his release.
his promise to the Philippians. We may imagine him next
1 Rom, xv. 24, 28.
2 Phil. i. 24; Philem. v. 22. This conclusion however must not be re- garded as absolutely certain. It may be that we should not press the raxéws of Phil. ii. 24. And the injunction to Philemon to prepare him a lodging may point rather to the certainty than to the nearness of the visit. It is as
if the Apostle had said, ‘You may cer- tainly expect to see me, I shall my- self observe what treatment Onesimus has received from you.’ With delicate tact, the Apostle’s language, suggested by some slight misgiving, assumes the form of an appeal to Philemon’s hos- pitality and kindly feeling towards himself.
THE CLOSE OF THE ACTS. 431
directing his steps towards the Churches of Asia and Phrygia. The unhealthy tone of religious speculation in these districts needed correction. And to Colosse moreover he was drawn by a personal motive. He was anxious to assure himself that Onesimus was fully restored to his master’s favour, and to carry out his undertaking of staying with Philemon. We can scarcely suppose that he left these regions without a brief visit to the Church of Ephesus, which had occupied so much of his time and thoughts; and it is possible that some of the notices in the Pastoral Epistles refer to incidents which occurred on this occasion, though it is on the whole more probable that they took place on a later visit.
We may conjecture also that, before he left the neighbour- hood of the Aigzan, he laid the first foundations of a Church in Crete. There was in this island a large Jewish population'— a circumstance which would press itself on the Apostle’s attention. Possibly also St Paul’s anchorage there? on his voyage to Rome may have been accompanied by incidents which dwelt on his mind, and stimulated his desire to preach the Gospel in Crete. At all events a few years later we find a Christian Church established here, and, if its foundation is to be attributed to St Paul, no occasion is more probable than this of his first visit to the East after his release.
Having thus taken a rapid review of the Churches of the East, the Apostle hastened to fulfil his long-postponed intention of visiting the hitherto unexplored region of Spain. There was a considerable Jewish population settled in many of the towns on the Spanish coast’, and the Apostle would make this his starting-point. This course had many advantages in itself, but a deeper principle of obligation commended it to the mind of the Apostle, who seems to have held sacred the maxim, ‘To the Jew first, and then to the Gentile. Whether St Paul
1 Philo. Leg. ad Caium ii. p. 587 2 Acts xxvii. 7-12; esp. v. 9, ixa- (ed. Mangey), ov pévov ai Hretpor wectal vod dé xpovov diaryevouévov. Tov “lovdaikGy dmoixtav elow adda Kal 3 See Remond Ausbreitung des Ju-
vnowy at doxiumrarat, EvBoua, Kimpos, denthums § 31, Kp7rn.
432 ST PAUL'S HISTORY AFTER
extended his labours in the West beyond the limits of Spain must remain a matter of speculation, At the close of his life we find him sending Crescens on a mission to Gaul—for so we may perhaps understand by ‘Galatia’’—and if this interpretation is correct, it would seem to imply some previous communication with this region. It is highly probable indeed that, either on his way to or from Rome, he should have visited the famous port of Marseilles?, and having once set foot in Gaul, he would naturally avail himself of the opportunity of furthering his Master’s cause. At all events, the Churches of Spain and Gaul were founded at a very early date, so that Irenzeus appeals to them* along with others, as witnesses of the primitive tradition in matters of doctrine. On the other hand, had he remained long either in Spain or Gaul, we should have expected to find in those parts a more direct tradition of his visit*.
Moving eastward, perhaps passing through Rome, the Apostle may possibly have visited Dalmatia, for with this region again we find him in communication at the close of his life’, If so, he may have continued his journey along the Adriatic coast to Epirus, so that, by wintering at Nicopolis on a subsequent occasion’, he purposed renewing an intimacy already formed, thus following out his general practice of confirming the Churches of his founding.
We find the Apostle then in the East once more. The slight fragmentary notices in the Pastoral Epistles may be pieced together variously, so that any particular plan of his journey must be more or less arbitrary. The object of framing such a plan is to show that it is possible to give a consistent and intelligible account of his movements, on the supposition of
1 2 Tim, iv. 10; see Galatians pp. 3, 4 The journey to Britain must be 81. On Crescens see esp. Gerarius abandoned, as highly improbable, Mogunt. Resp. p. 225, and on the early though maintained with a patriotic Church in Gaul, Neander Ch. Hist.1. urgency by many able advocates (Stil- p. 116 (Eng. transl. by Torrey). lingfleet, Burgess, etc.); see the refer-
2 See the interesting speculations of | ences in Soames Anglo-Saxon Church, Blunt The First Three Centuries, p. p. 21 sq. (1844).
184 sq. (1861). 5 2 Tim. iv. 10. 3 Tren. Haer. i. 10, 2. 8 Tit. iii. 12.
THE CLOSE OF THE ACTS. 433
his release; and under the circumstances no more than this can reasonably be demanded. The scheme which I shall give differs from those generally adopted in assuming that the winter which he purposed spending in Nicopolis was in fact spent in Rome’. We may suppose that his abrupt arrest and imprisonment frustrated his previous plans. In this way the events are gathered within narrower limits of time; and, the Pastoral Epistles being thus brought into closer chronological connexion, the striking coincidences of thought and language between them are the more easily explained. This arrangement of the incidents seems to me slightly more probable than any other, but I lay no stress on it.
Once in the East then, he would naturally revisit the Churches of Phrygia and Asia, which had caused him so much anxiety. There he found that his gloomiest anticipations had been realised. Grievous wolves had indeed entered the fold, as he had predicted years before. His personal influence had gone. ‘All in Asia turned away from him?’ Phygellus and Hermogenes are especially named among these timid or recreant Christians. There was one bright exception -however in Onesiphorus, whose attentions—repeated afterwards when the Apostle was a prisoner in Rome—are gratefully recorded’. It was probably at Ephesus too and on this occasion that St Paul encountered the opposition of Alexander the copper- smith*, And this is perhaps the same Alexander whom, together with Hymenzus, the Apostle ‘delivered unto Satan, that they might learn not to blaspheme®. If we are right in assigning all these notices to this one occasion, it would seem that the Apostle’s residence was more or less prolonged. Alto- gether the visit was one of bitter trial. It was evident that the clouds were gathering about the Church, and that a period of storm and tempest was imminent.
From Ephesus the Apostle turned northward into Mace-
1 Thus the winter of Titus iii. 12 3 2 Tim. i. 15-17; cf. iv. 19.
becomes identical with that of 2 Tim. 4 2 Tim. iv. 14. rh CAL 5 1 Tim. i. 20. 2} Wintaay, th, Ass Fefa.
lig 28
434 ST PAUL'S HISTORY AFTER
donia. At the same time he left Timothy behind to preside over the Church there in his absence’. He would gladly seek consolation after these sad experiences in the affection of that Philippian Church, of which he entertained the most tender remembrance, and which more than once had relieved his wants’.
What country St Paul visited next, we cannot say; it is not unnatural to suppose that, following his old route, he would turn towards the Churches of Achaia. Somewhere about this time we may perhaps place the writing of the First Epistle to Timothy. Its exact time and place cannot be ascertained, but the following data should be observed. (1) It cannot have been written very long after St Paul left Ephesus, as the whole tenour of the Epistle shows. It betrays a nervous anxiety such as might be expected from one who had recently delegated a very arduous task to a young and inexperienced successor. Such advice to have any value must be given at once, and indeed the Apostle’s ardent temperament would admit of no delay in a matter so important. (2) It would seem to have been written before the incidents occurred which St Paul relates to Timothy in the Second Epistle*. When the letter was written, St Paul hoped to revisit Ephesus soon, but foresaw that he might possibly meet with some delays‘.
About this time he also visited Crete. A hypothetical account of the origin of this Church I have given already®. Having been recently founded, its organization was still very imperfect ; and, as St Paul himself could not stay to do all that was needful, he left Titus behind him to complete his arrange- ments there®.
From Crete we may suppose that he went to Asia Minor, and somewhere about this time he directed a letter of advice and exhortation to Titus. For ascertaining the time of writing of the Epistle to Titus we have the following data. (1) As in
1 1 Tim, i. 3. 41 Tim. iii. 15. 2 See above, pp. 249, 260. 5 See above, p. 431. 3 e.g, iv. 9-138, 20. 8 Dib. dy Gi
THE CLOSE OF THE ACTS. 435
the case of the First Epistle to Timothy, it cannot have been written long after St Paul left Crete. (2) Tychicus was still with him when he wrote; and therefore it is before the point of time noted in 2 Tim, iv. 12. (3) He has no forebodings of his coming fate, for he purposes wintering at Nicopolis, not expecting to have his movements constrained’. (4) On the supposition that this winter is identical with that mentioned in his Second Epistle, the year cannot have been far advanced now. There is time for him to despatch a messenger to Titus, for Titus to join him (at Corinth or Nicopolis) and to leave him again for Dalmatia, for him to reach Rome himself, for several incidents at Rome, eg. his trial, ete., for him to despatch a messenger from Rome to Timothy, for Timothy to join him im Rome; all this before the winter.
In this letter he tells Titus that he will send Artemas or Tychicus—perhaps to act as his deputy—and bids him hasten to join him at Nicopolis. He asks him to provide Zenas the lawyer and Apollos with the necessaries for their journey’.
From this point onwards we can trace the Apostle’s course westward with some degree of continuity*. We find him at Miletus, where he dropped Trophimus on account of illness‘. Hence perhaps he despatched Tychicus to Ephesus*. Miletus was a convenient point from which to communicate with Ephesus, as he had found it on a former occasion®, and we may conjecture that, having abandoned his purpose of revisiting Ephesus, he sent Tychicus to Timothy to inform him of this’. From Miletus he sails northward to Troas, where he lodges with Carpus*. What were the intermediate stages, we do not know, but we next find him at Corinth, where he leaves Erastus behind*. He was now on his way to Nicopolis—probably the
EU Mithe atures PA phimus were ’Aciavoi; cf. Acts xx. 4, 2 Titaiiialen de ~Odiy PE) 3 The journey is the reverse of that 6 Acts xx. 17. in Acts xx. 13 sq. 7 1 Tim. iii. 14. 4 2 Tim, iv. 20. & 2 Tim. iv. 13. 5 2 Tim.iv.12. Tychicus and Tro- disarm PLOE
28—2
436 ST PAUL'S HISTORY AFTER
city of that name in Epirus, where he purposed passing the
winter. Whether he reached Nicopolis or not must remain uncertain. A probable, though a conjectural, account seems to me this. While he was at Corinth, his old enemies, the Jews,
informed against him, as the leader of the hated sect of male- factors, who had roused the indignation of Rome; and on this information he was seized and imprisoned and ultimately carried to the Metropolis to await his trial’.
Meanwhile, finding his plan of wintering at Nicopolis frustrated, he despatches his messenger—probably Artemas?, since he had left Tychicus behind*—to Titus in Crete to joi him, not in Nicopolis, as he had intended, but either in Corinth or in Rome itself, whither he was soon to be conveyed. At all events Titus did join him at some point in his route’.
Arrived at Rome, the Apostle found himself almost deserted. Onesiphorus, who lived in Ephesus’, and whose kind services the Apostle had experienced during his stay there, coming to Rome sought him out and with some difficulty found him’, But these friendly offices ceased with the departure of Onesi- phorus. Of all his more intimate friends and companions in travel Luke alone remained with him’. Titus had gone to Dalmatia, Crescens to Gaul, probably despatched thither by the Apostle on some missionary errand. Demas had forsaken him, and gone to Thessalonica, probably his native place*. Certain Christians of Rome, Eubulus, Pudens, Linus and Claudia, join in the salutation, but these must have been comparative strangers’. In this forlorn condition he writes his Second Epistle to Timothy. He urges Timothy to join him as soon as
1 We know that Nero was in Greece 4 2 Tim. iv. 10, at this time, and that he was still 2 Tim. iv. 19. there in August 67, though he was PE bbe wig iy (2
recalled to Rome towards the close of the year by Helius (see Clinton Fasti Romani 1. p. 50). Perhaps the Em-
2 Tim. iv. 9 sq. See above, p. 247. ® [On the supposed connexion of
cu Oa
peror himself sent the Apostle to the capital.
2 Tit. iii. 12.
8 2 Tim. iy. 12.
Pudens and Claudia with Britain see Apostolic Fathers Pt. 1. Clement of Rome 1. p. 76 (1890)}.
THE CLOSE OF THE ACTS. 437
possible’, at all events to come before the winter sets in and while the sea is yet navigable. At the same time he charges him to perform a commission at Troas; he had left his cloak with some books and parchments, and he requests Timothy, as he passes, to fetch these’. He evidently contemplates that Timothy will follow the coast to Macedonia, and then take the great Egnatian Road from Philippi to Dyrrachium and cross over the straits thence to Italy. It was perhaps already late in the season, and a voyage on the high seas was hazardous. Timothy is to pick up Mark on the way and to bring him with him*. Timothy appears to be still at Ephesus, for the Apostle in this letter salutes the household of Onesiphorus, doubtless resident there®; he also salutes Aquila and Priscilla’, and they too seem to have had connexion with Ephesus’.
The legal proceedings have already commenced when the Apostle writes. He has had his first hearing, and has a respite for a time®, But he is full of gloomy forebodings, or rather he foresees but one termination to the trial. And here, with the notes of his dying strain ringing in our ears, we take leave of the Great Apostle.
[1862.] Ue 2) AMSA, Oe himself seems to be absent (i. 17). 2 2 Tim. iy, 21. 6 2 Tim. iv. 19. $ 2 Tim. iy. 13. 7 1 Cor. xvi. 19. a2 imsave. Ll. Seino vero 5 2 Tim. iv. 19, i. 16. Onesiphorus
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INDICES.
vm
\ t & , x uv ‘a> = Bary. i a 2 * Ne ix i —) ‘
I. INDEX OF PASSAGES. Ill. INDEX OF SUBJECTS.
Genesis
Exodus
Numbers
INDEX OF PASSAGES.
Deuteronomy i 1 sq
Joshua
Judges 1 Samuel 2 Samuel
1 Kings
2 Chronicles Nehemiah
Psalms
PAGE
xxxi 47, 48 127 pd bo-< IEE 88 xii 46 139 xvi 33, 34 154 xxv 7 143 ix 12 139 XxX1x 35 166 129
xvi 13 sq 166 xviii 15 25, 150, 154 xix 15 138 Xxi 23 162 Soa 7/5 2B au XXxili 21 143 hy Cy 71 xv 25 144 xv 32 179 Xviii 23 177 xi 3 143 xiii 17 U/C x 6, 8 143 xiii 23 177 xv 23 173 Xvili 6 177 xii 1 sq 130 xv 13 173 xiii 19 177 iii 1, 32 170 ili 15 141, 172 vili 18 166 xii 39 170 vit 149 xxi (xxii) 19 140 XXxili (xxxiv) 21 139 XXX1V (xxxv) 19 139 xl (xl) 10 21, 137 xlv (xlvi) 5 172 Ixviii (lxix) 5, 10 139 lxxvii (Ixxviii) 24 139 Ixxxi (Ixxxil) 6 139 Ixxxii (lxxxili) 10 174 ciii (civ) 10 141 evili (cix) 3 139
Proverbs Isaiah
Jeremiah
Ezekiel
Daniel Amos Micah
Zechariah
Malachi Keclus.
1 Maccabees 2 Maccabees
St Matthew
PAGE iii 34 81 vi 10 20, 137 Vili 6 172 viii 8 153 rhe 150 ix 6 153 Xxxlil 21 172 x1 3 139 xlii 6, 7 150 liii 1 140 liii 4 148 liii 8 152 liv 13 138 lxil 150 xxili 1 147 xlviii 24, 41 144 xxxi 4 141 XXxiv 2, 3 147 Xxxvii 27, xliii 7 153 xlv 25 166 vii 13, 14 153 li 2 144 v2 152 vii 15 151 ii 10 sq 153 viii 3 153 ix 9 136, 151 oe dal 151 xii 10 20, 136 veo 150 Xxiv 8 sq 153 iv 59 167 xi 34 177 li 1 sq 154 x6 166 li 16, 22 58 iii 1 179 iii 3 139 ili 15 81 vii 7 103 vii 15 147 x4 144 x 16 81
442
St Matthew
St Mark
St Luke
INDEX OF PASSAGES.
PAGE xii 33 81 xiii 14, 15 138 xili 54 sq 159 xiv 28, 30 184 xv 15 184 xvi 16 149, 184 xvi 17, 18 18, 19 xvi 22 184 xvi 23 185 xvii 4 184 xviii 21 184 xix 12 81 xix 27 184 xxi 5 136 xxiii 14 147 Xxili 39 149 Xxvi 3 163 xxvl 5 161 xxvi 7, 8 182 xxvi 14 144 xxvi 36 176 xxvi 33, 58, 69 184 xxvi 55 70 xxvi 63 149 xxvi 40, 74 185 XXvVii 2 58 xxvii 11, 22 187 Xxvil 27, 35 161 xxvii 33 142 Xxvii 62 168 3! 139 137 184 iii 19 144 iv 12 138 vi 37 182 vili 22 178 viii 33 185 xl 140 xi 9 149 xi 21 184 xii 40 147 xii 41 169 xiv 4 182 xiv 32 176 xiv 37 185 xiv 51 180 xiv 70 159 xiv 71 185 xv 12 187 xv 16 161 xv 22 142 xv 26 161 xv 42 168 il sq 55, 62, 135 i13 19 i 39 179 i 80 153 ii 32 150 iii 1, 23 57, 58 iii 2 163
St Luke
St John
PAGE
iii 4 139 iii 19, 20 179 iv 16 sq 159 iv 19 57 iv 29 175 iv 41 149 v8 185 vi 16, 71 144 viii 10 138 viii 45 184 ix 51 sq 159 x 38 sq 37, 181 xi 9 103 xii 41 184 xiii 1 160 xiii 4 141 xiii 35 149 xx 47 147 oa hall 169 xxii 3 144 xxii 54 sq 191 xxii 70 149 xxili 34 161 xxiii 54 168 i 1 6, 23, 83, 101, 106, 112 fey 92, 106 i 3 83, 90, 94, 95, 96, 106, 111, 112, 132
i4 92, 106, 112 i 5 90, 131 17508 150
i 9 88, 106, 108, 112, 115 i10 101, 131 i12 88, 133 i 1f3 88, 105
il4 88, 101, 112, 154 i 18 73, 89, 101, 112, 134
i119 sq 89 i 20 101, 107, 132 i 21, 25 25, 150 i 23 139 i 28 178, 179 i 29 101, 148, 181 i 31 153 i 32 134 i 34 149 i 36 74, 148, 194 i 37, 40 40, 189 i 38 140 i 39 181 i 40 sq 41, 133, 189
i 41 24, 139, 181, 189, 197 i 42 18, 19, 132, 141, 195
i 43 132, 181, 187 i 44 41, 69 i 46 24, 150, 158, 159, 181 i 49 24, 149, 182 ii 1 sq 106, 176, 181 ii 4 108, 182
ii 6 165, 182
St John
INDEX OF PASSAGES.
PAGE li 11 92, 176, 197 ii 13 167 ii 16 112 ht ly/ 139 ii 19 sq 30, 101 li 22 193 iii 2 195 iii 3 87, 120 lil 5 106, 114 iii6 101, 106, 107, 132 iii 8 82,112 iii 10, 11 131, 157 iii 14,15 87, 106, 115, 151 lii 16 94, 134 iii 17 94, 106 lii 18 149 lii 23 178, 179 lii 24 197 lii 29 165 iii 31 101, 132, 133 iv 1 sq 33 sq, 190 iv 4 159 iv 6 120, 175, 181 iv 9 175 iv 10 106, 107 iv14 177, 106, 107, 134 iv 20 131 iv 21 106 iv 24 87, 90, 112 iv 25 24, 141, 155 iv 27 165 iv 34 101 iv 40, 43 181 iv 42 24, 115 iv 45 159, 167 iv 46 176 iv 52 181 iv 54 197 vil 167 v2 29, 169, 175 v5 182 v7 134 vautil 134 vl17 132 v 23 88 v 25, 36 101 v 27 115 v 29 72 v 33 69 v 37 106 vy 38 133 v 39 17, 24 v 40 131 v 45 24, 88, 146 v 46 vil 176, 195 vi 2 yes vi 5 sq 189 vi 7, 8,9 182, 189
St John
443
PAGE vi 11 194 vi 14 25, 149, 150 vi 15 24 vi 16 181 vi 17 176 vi 19 181 vi 22 176, 181 vi 23 176, 194 vi 27 101 vi 28, 30 sq 24 vi 31 24, 26, 89, 139, 152 vi 35 82, 101 vi 38 82 vi 39 134 vi 44 106 vi 45 101, 138 vi 53 106 vi 54 87 vi 59 181 vi 62 115 vi 68 182, 186 vi 69 149 vi 70 131 vi 71 18, 143 vii 2 sq 165 vii 6, 7 132 vii 8 132, 167 vii 12 88 vii 14 181 vii 15 157 vii 17 73 vii 19 17, 131 vii 22, 23 134 vii 26 sq 24, 152 vii 30, 33 17, 107 vii 35 157 vii 37 166, 181 vii 38 vii 39 193 vii 40 24, 25, 150 vii 41 158 vii 42 152 vii 49 157 vii 50 195 vii 52 158 vii 53 sq
69 viii 12 101, 112, 115, 150, 166
viii 14 132 viii 15 69 viii 17 138, 165 viii 20 167, 169, 181 viii 21 106 viii 26 73 viii 30 sq 24, 69, 155 viii 44 61, 68, 106, 114,
165
viii 56 61, 112, 115, 146 viii 57 57, 58 ix 1 106
444
St John
INDEX OF PASSAGES,
PAGE
x 2 158 bi f 141, 171 ix 21, 22 132 ix 28 156 ix 32 134 ix 35 149 x1lsq 74, 96, 103 oe if 82, 106, 112 x8 110, 146 x9 97, 106, 114 x Ll ibs: x12 82 x18 97, 101 x 22 167, 181 me 168 x 24 24 ED, 114 x 30 101 x 34 139 x 36 150 x 38 102 x 40 178, 179 xi 1 sq 38, 175, 178, 181 xi 6 181 xi 7 178 xi 16 37, 182, 195 > hed yf 181 xi18 175 xi 25 112 xi 27 149 x1 35 101 xi 38, 41 165 xi 39 178 xi 48 160 x1 49 sq 27, 28, 163, 195 xi 51 165, 193 xi 52 101 xi 54 abrir xii 1 sq 38, 181 xii 3 182 xii 4 18, 143, 182 xii 6 182 xii 7 165 xii 10 27 xi112sq 30, 149,18 xii 14, 15 136 xii 16 193 xli 20 sq 128, 182, 189, 195 xii 24 83 xii 27 111 xii 28, 29 71 xii 31 82 xii 33 71, 193, 194 xii 34 153 xii 35 107 xii 38 140 xii 40 20, 137 xii 41 146 xii 46 | 134, 150
St John
PAGE xiii 2 18, 143 xiii 8, 9 182, 186 xiii 18 21, 137 xili 20 82 xiii 23 195 xiii 24 sq 182, 186 xili 25 5 xiii 26 18, 143, 182 xiii 30 181 xiii 31 92 xiii 33 106 xili 36 182, 185 xiv 2 60, 61, 67 xiv 3 107 xiv6 69, 97, 101, 112 xiv 7 88 xiv 8 sq 101, 182 xiv 12 101 xiv 13 92 xiv 22 18, 143, 182 xiv 26 77, 104 xiv 29 88 xv 13 77 xv 15, 19 108 xv 25 139 xvi 2 U7 xvi 11 82 xvi 12 73 xvi 13 88 xvi 21 83 xvi 24 103 xvi 28 101 xvii 3 72, 73, 95, 150 Xvii 11, 14,16 94, 108, 132 xvii 17 73 xvii 21 95, 150 Xvili 23, 25 108 xviii 1 172, 175, 176 xviii 3 160 xvili 9 193 xviii 10 182, 186 xviii 12 160 xviii 13 28, 163, 197 xviii 14 1
95 Xvili 15 sq 98, 128, 163, 181
Xvili 27 185 xviii 28 160, 168, 181,
191 xviii 31 187 xviii 32 71, 194 xviii 36, 37 149, 188 Xviii 38 73, 188 xviii 39 187, 188 xix 8, 5 149, 188
xix 12 149, 160, 187, 262 xix 13 142 xix 14 29, 101, 149, 168,
181, 188
St John
Acts
INDEX OF PASSAGES.
PAGE
xix 15 160, 188 sabe) 17/ 142 xix 19 149, 159, 187, 188 xix 20 176, 182 sabe 2 188 xix 23 161, 182 xix 24 140 xix 26 99, 107, 195 xix 28 71 xix 30 aT 2 Mixoleroe 162, 168 ximod Mo. 1a07 182. 197
xix 35 71, 197, 198 xix 36 139, 168 xix 37 20, 101, 136 xix 39, 40 165, 183, 195 xix 42 168, 175 9.6 dl 101, 165 2.9.0 Pe 195 08 165 xx 6 186 xx 7 165, 183 xx 11 sq 165, 194 xx 16 140 so 11Y/ 101 xx 19 181 xx 20 120 xx 225 23 12 xx 24 UO eae a xx 25 sq 113, 182 noe WHY 83 xx 28 37 xx 29 sq 194 xx 30 195 xxol 197 xxi 1 sq 176, 194 sq Kxi2 39, 141, 176 xxi 3, 4 181, 182 xxi 6 183 xxi 8 181 xxi ll 183, 186 xxi 14 197 xxi 15 sq 18, 182 sora, 19/ 186 xxi 20sq 99, 182, 186 xxi 23 197 xxi 24 41, 99, 196 iii 22 25, 150 iv 1 26 iv 6 163, 165 aan yf 26 v 35 sq 147 Vv 37 160 vii 37 25, 150 vili 32 148 ix 35 142 xi 28 216 xi 30 407 xii 4 161
Acts
445
PAGE xii 23 215 xili 1 305 xiii 10 61 xiii 15, 42 sq 259 xiv 23 407 Xvi 6 sq 237 Xv1 9 sq 239, 245 xvi 11 241 xvi 13, 16 243 xvi 17 245 xvi 37 203 xvii 1 243, 259 xvii 4 261, 262 xviidsq 2438, 257, 305 xvii 6 247, 256 xvii 14, 15 245, 284 xvii 17 259, 262 xvii 28 206 xvii 30, 31 228 XVili 2 300 xviii 5 245 Xviii 11 275 xviii 19, 21 210, 300, 404 XVlli 26 300 x1x 404
xix21 245, 325, 404 xix 22 245, 277, 278, 283,
305 xix 26 394 xix 29 246, 247, 262, 268 xix 30, 33 257 xix 41 283 08. IB} 245, 283 xx 4 246, 306 xx 6 241, 282 xx 13 sq 435 xx 16 210, 217 xx 21 387 xx 25 387, 422 xx 29 404 26.0 Bill 387, 405 9-01 115} 336 99-01 PH 217 xxi 29 406, 435 xxi 31 sq 161 xxi 38 218, 387 xxi 39 205 xxi 3 208 xxii 25, 28 203 xxiii 6 208, 211 Xxili 27 203 xxiv 10 217 xxv 12 203 xxvi 4, 5 208 xxvi 6, 7 211 Xxvii 2 246 XxXvil 7 sq 431 xxvili 11 sq 220 XXvili 26, 27 138
xxviii 30, 31 219, 325, 429
446
INDEX OF PASSAGES.
PAGE
Romans ilsq 328 sq i 5, 13 312 vey | 287 sq, 310, 316, 344 sq, 364, 378
i111 sq 296, 319, 325 i 15 287, 316, 364, 444 sq i 25 323 ii 16 294 ii 17 313 iii 9 313 iii 21 sq 329 iii 24 231 vii 4 313 vii 12 209 viii 18 sq 326 ix 5 323 xi 13 294, 312 xi 15 239 xi 21s 304 xi 36 298, 323, 326 xii 11 362 xiv 10 354 xiv 14 231 xiv 20 401 xiv 23 287 sq, 319, 329 sq, 340, 349 sq, 363 sq
xv 5, 6 297, 323 xv 15 295, 297, 324, 326 xv 16 297, 312, 324, 326 xv 17 sq 324 sq xv 19 244 xv 24, 28 422, 430 xv 29 sq 325 xv 30 297 xv 33 294, 307, 323 xvi 3 sq 300 sq xvi 17 sq 326 xvi 20 307, 308, 319, 324 xvi 23 319 xvi 21 sq 246, 304, 404 xvi 24 307, 308 xvi 25 sq 288 sq, 317 sq, 317 sq, 326 sq, 366 sq
1 Corinthians i 2 378 i14 305 i 20 81 ii 1 sq 325, 328 ii4 206 iv 4 81 iv 9 283 iv 17 279, 283, 404 iv 19 283 v 6sq 232, 283 v9 275 v 12 281 vi 9 sq 81, 232 vii 19 sq 232 viii 1 296 viii 8 sq 232
ix 10 sq 335
1 Corinthians ix 19 sq
2 Corinthians i 1
Galatians
Ephesians
PAGE
232, 240
x1lsq 151 x4 172 x ih 328 x14 sq 232 xi 3 232 xi 4, 5 115 xii 12 sq 232 xiv 3 sq ” 264 xiv 34 sq 322 xv 25 61 xv 26 322 xv 32 283 xv 33 206 xv 36, 37 83 xv 56 209 xvi 1 sq 342 xvi 5 276 xvi 7 274 xvi 8, 9 283 xvil0sq 276, 277, 280, 281, 283, 404
xvi 19 300, 437 378, 404
15 232 i8 283 112sq 278 i15 276 DL 280 ii 4 278 ii 12 282 iv 10sq 232 v10 335 v17sq 232 vi 14 sq 135 vii 8 276 vililsq 246, 247, 250 viii 16 281 viii 18, 22 282 ix 2sq 246 xi 9 246, 260 xi 22 208 xii 14 274 xii 17,18 277, 279, 281 xiii 1, 2 274 xiil 11 298 i5 298 i113, 14 208 i115sq 221 ii 6 119 ii 9 112 ii 15 sq 232, 240 iii 2 sq 232 iii 28 239 v 3sq 232 vil 296 vi 14 232 vi 16 298 ge | 377 sq i3 396
INDEX OF PASSAGES.
PAGE
Ephesians i10 89, 232 i165 388 1 20 sq 232, 395, 396 ii 14, 15 239, 395 T2122 396 i119 205, 232 iii 2 389 iii 3 sq 318 iii 15 232 iii 20 298, 318, 327, 367 iv 15 232 iv 17 396 iy 20, 21 389 v 14 410 v 22 396 v 25sq 395, 396 v 29 81 vi 5 396 vi 9 232 vi 21 391, 393 Philippians il 378, 406, 407 i114 sq 313 i 24 430 1 25 422 127 205 li 6sq 232 ii 19 246 li 24 245, 422, 430 ii 25 sq 246 iii 2 243 iii 5 207, 208 iii 15 296 iii 20 204, 232 iv 1 249 iv 8 401 iv 9 298 iv 15 237, 246, 260 iv 16 259, 260, 267 iv 19, 20 298 Colossians il 406 i115 sq 232, 395 i 20 239 i 23 81 iil 389 li 9 sq 232, 395 i118 414 ii 19 204 iii 1 sq 232 iii 11 239 iii 18, 19 395 iv 7 391 iv10,11 246, 261, 305 iv 16 383 sq 1 Thessalonians i 6, 8 261, 263 i9 262 i110 260 iil 261 rh 24. 8} 258, 259 ii 5sq 260
ii 12 sq 260, 262, 263, 265
447
PAGE
1 Thessalonians ii 19
ili 1 sq 245, 260, 263,
249 265
iii 4 260 ili 6 sq 264 sq, 279 iii 11 sq 298 iv 3 sq 257, 264, 265 iv 10 264 iv 11 248 iv 12 261 iv 13 sq 264 v2 260 v 12 sq 248, 265 v 19, 20 264 v 23 298 v 27 266 2 Thessalonians i 3 sq 267, 329 i5 263 ii 2, 3 266 ii 7 204 u8 402 ii 15 247, 267 reg UG) 1y/ 298 iii 4 267 iii 5 298 ill 7 sq 248, 260, 265 iii 10 261 ili 14, 15 267 iii 17 247, 266 1 Timothy i3 245, 404 i4sq 328, 408, 411, 414 117 298, 318, 367, 414 i 20 433 li 4sq 414 ii 10 402 iii 1 sq 407 iii 11, 13 408 iii 14 404, 435 iii 15 434 iii 16 174, 410 iv 1sq 408, 409, 412, 415 iv7 411 iv 9sq 434 iv 14 408 v 3sq 408 v 10, 25 402 v 17 sq 407, 408 vi 4 411 vi 5 409, 412, 415 vi 16 298 vi 18 402 vi 20 229, 408, 411, 414 2 Timothy i9, 10 318, 328 i14 229 115sq 433, 436 sq 118 318 ii 11 410 ii 14 411 ii 16 408, 411 ii 21 402 ji 23 408
448
2 Timothy
Titus
Philemon
Hebrews
INDEX OF PASSAGES.
PAGE
lii 1 sq 409 i6,13 409, 412, 415 iv 3 409, 412 iv 4 411 iv 9sq 435 sq iv 10 247, 267, 432 iv 13,20 245, 406, 434,
435 iv 14 433 iv 18 298 iv 19 301, 433 iv 21 433 iv 24 299 12,3 318, 328 iD 405, 434 i6 402 ay 407 i110, 14 408, 411 112 206 115,16 402, 412, 415 lii 7 402 iii 9 408, 411, 414 iii 10 413 ii 12, 13 405, 432, 435 sq iii 14 402 if 406 22 423, 430 24 246 12 94 vili 5, 6 151 ix 4 154
Hebrews
James 1 Peter
1 John
2 John Revelation
xii 16 xiii 11 xiii 20, 21 xiii 22 iv 6
i3
i119
ii 5, 18 lii 1, 7, 22 iv 3
v5 vl12
12
i 27
rib bol bey? iii 8, 10 iv 3
iv 9
iv 10, 11 iv 12
iv 14
v 6sq
a
yf
ii 17
vii 15 xiii 6 xiv 4 xv 3
xv 5 xix 13 xxi 3
276
INDEX OF
‘ Abraham’s seed,’ 156
Acta Pilati; date, 120; shows ac- quaintance with the Fourth Gospel, 120
#inon, 178 sq
Africa, the Church of; characteristics of, 101; testimony to the Fourth Gospel from, 101 sq
Albinus, 220
Alexander the coppersmith, 433
Alexander the Great; his work as a reconciler of the world, 239 sq; points of affinity with St Paul, 241, 254; his policy towards the Jews, 244
Alexander the physician, 77
Alexandria, the Church of; its litera- ture, 91 sq; its evidence for the Fourth Gospel, 92
Alexandria Troas, 241
Alford, 279 sq, 318, 324
Alogi; their motive in rejecting the Fourth Gospel, 5 sq, 49, 115 sq, 121, its authorship according to, 6, 118; rejected the Apocalypse also, 6, 117, 118 ; anti-Montanists, 116; the name, 116 sq
Ambrosian Hilary; see Hilary the Deacon
Amelius shows acquaintance with the Fourth Gospel, 120
Amiatinus, codex, 337, 351, 355 sq
Amphipolis, 243
Ananias the highpriest, 163 sq
Anastatius of Sinai, 92
Andrew (St); not the author of the Fourth Gospel, 41; in Asia Minor, 52; character of, 128, 189; Papias on, 69; the Muratorian Canon on, 190
Annas, the official life of, 162
Antioch, the Church of, testimony to the Fourth Gospel from, 81 sq
L. E,
SUBJECTS.
Antipater, poet of Thessalonica, 256
Antoninus Pius, 86, 94, 244, 267
Apion, on the slavery of the Jews to the Gentiles, 156
‘ Apocalypse of Peter,’ 97, 99
Apocalypse of St John ; why attacked by the Alogi, 6, 117; probable date of, 52; the Muratorian Canon on, 99
Apollinaris; date of, 74; testimony to the Fourth Gospel from, 58, 75
Aquila and Priscilla, movements of, 300, 437
Aramaic, general characteristics of, 16, 127 sq
Archetypes, characteristics of certain lost, 346, 350
Arianism and the Fourth Gospel, 5
Aristarchus of Thessalonica, 246, 261, 306 ; traditional bishop of Thessa- lonica, 268
Aristion, 53, 67
Aristobuliani, 302 sq
Arnold, Matthew, on the Pauline doctrine of justification by faith, 231
Arsinous, 98
Artemas, 405, 435, 436
Asia Minor; the establishment of Christianity in, 394; apostolic letters written to, 393 sq, 396; St John resident in, 51; the metro- polis of Christianity, 51; testimony of its Churches to the Fourth Gospel, 51 sq; their tradition as to the chronology of our Lord’s life, 56 sq, 58, 75, 93; see also Ephesus
Athanasius (St), on St Paul’s visit to Spain, 425
Athenagoras; date and country of, 94 sq; his Apology, 95; coincidences with the Fourth Gospel in, 95
Attalus of Pergamum, 77
29
450
Augiensis, codex ; its relation to codex Boernerianus, 316, 338 sq, 367 sq; characteristics of these MSS, 339 sq, 369 sq ; of their archetype, 346; joint divergences from codex Beze in Rom. xv, xvi, 270 sq
Augustinian phraseology in capitula- tions, evidence of date from, 351, 361
Aurelius, Marcus, 83, 85 sq, 94, 95, 104
Avidius Crassus, 95
dxpwrnpiagew, 335
amecraduévos (0), of the Messiah, 150
apxtepe’s (6), use of the word in Jose- phus and in the N. T., 163
Bardesanes, 104
Bar-Jona, 18 sq
Barnabas, Epistle of, date and country of, 91
Basil (St), on the text of Eph. i. 1, 379 sq
Basilides; his date, 8, 98, 108; his work on the Gospel, 109 ; extracts in Hippolytus from, 8, 108 sq ; quotes from the Fourth Gospel, 108; his followers few, 109
Baur, 4, 10 sq, 28, 42, 50, 146, 173, 289, 303, 326, 366, 423
Bengel, 343, 363
Berea; geographical importance of, 242; a Jewish centre, 243; not chosen by St Paul as a hiding- place, 244, 263; why preferred to Pella, 243
Bertholdt, 312
Bethany, accurate description in the Fourth Gospel of, 30, 175, 181
Bethany beyond Jordan, 178
Bethesda, 29, 169 sq
Bethlehem, as the birthplace of the Messiah, 152
Bethsaida, the pool of, 29
Bethzatha, 29, 169 sq
Beze, codex, its relation to F and G of the Paulines, 339, 369 sq
Bleek, 49, 136
Boeckh, 247, 256
Boernerianus, codex; its relation to codex Augiensis, 316, 338 sq, 367 sq; characteristics of these MSS8, 339 sq, 369 sq; of their archetype, 346; joint divergences from codex Bezme in Rom. xv, xvi, 370 sq
Book of Baruch, 107
Bordeaux Pilgrims, on the pool of Bethesda, 170
Bretschneider, 50
Britain, not visited by St Paul, 432
Bunsen, 8, 94, 98, 112, 276
INDEX OF SUBJECTS.
Burrus, 219
Cabiric worship ; at Thessalonica, 257 sq; royal and imperial patronage of, 258
Caiaphas; tenure of office by, 28 sq, 162; his designation in the Fourth Gospel, 195; passages there ex- plained, 28 sq, 195
Cana, site of, 176
Capitulations; (1) used in certain Vulgate MSS, 289, 337, 342; dis- tinct forms of, 356 sq; one form derived from the Old Latin, 362, 372; their connexion with lection- aries considered, 342, 361 sq; (2)
Greek ‘Euthalian’ capitulations, 342 Carlyle, 195
Cassandreia, 254
Cedron, 172 sq
Celsus, reminiscences of the Fourth Gospel in, 119 sq
Cephas, the name, 17, 19, 141
Ceriani, 343
Cerinthus; authorship of the Fourth Gospel assigned to, 6, 118; his nickname M7puwos, 119
Christian literature, first traces of, 409 sq
Christian ministry, as evidenced by the Pastoral Epistles, 407 sq
Chronology ; of our Lord’s life, 30 sq, 56 sq, 75, 85, 180; of St Paul’s life and epistles, 215 sq, 282 sq; of Herod’s restoration of the temple, 30 sq
Chryseros, 83
Cicero; his language on Roman citi- zenship transferred by St Paul to the Church, 202 sq, 204 sq; other references to, 244, 255
Circular letters of St Paul, 319, 391 sq
Claudius Apollinaris ; see Apollinaris
clausula, as used in Tertullian, 289, 335, 336, 354
Clement of Alexandria; traditions about St John in, 93; Valentinian fragments in, 112; his teachers, 51, 92
Clement of Rome; on the composition of the Roman Church, 314; on the release of St Paul, 423 sq, 427
Clementine Homilies; date, 113; its testimony to the Fourth Gospel, 7, 113 sq; its contrasts to it, 15, 40; on the composition of the Roman Church, 314
Clementine Recognitions, on Samari- tan Messianic expectations, 154
Coleridge, 400
INDEX OF
Colossians, Epistle to the; date and circumstances of writing, 224, 232 sq; compared with that to the Ephesians, 232, 389, 395 sq; salu- tations to the Church of Laodicea sent through the, 393; the heresy attacked in, 233, 394 sq; compared with that combated in the Pastoral Epistles, 408 sq, 411, 413 sq
Constantine the Great, sumptuous bibles ordered by, 346, 351
Conybeare and Howson, 256, 258, 267
Corinth, the Church of; missions of Timotheus and Titus to, 273 sq; an unrecorded visit of St Paul to, 222, 274, 405; the chronology of St Paul’s Epistles to, 222 sq, 275 sq, 282 sq
Cousinéry, 253 sq
Credner, 383
Crescens, 432, 436
Crete ; when Christianized, 431; visit of St Paul to, 434; missions to, 405; Jews at, 431
Crucifixion ; time of the, 58, 73, 93; place of the, 175
crurifragium, 162
Cumanus, 161
Cureton, 104
Cuspius Fadus, 216
Cyprian (St), probably does not quote Rom. xv, xvi, 336, 355
Cyril of Jerusalem, on St Paul’s visit to Spain, 425
Davidson, 275, 400, 405, 424
de Wette, 275, 388, 406
Deaconesses and widows in the early Church, 408
Demas; perhaps from Thessalonica, 247, 436; the name, 247
Demetrius, martyr of Thessalonica ; his cult and day, 268; his title pupoBdUTys, 268
Diatessaron ; see Tatian
Diognetus, Epistle to; date and locality of its two parts, 91 sq, 94; each part presents coincidences with the Fourth Gospel, 92, 94
Dion Chrysostom, 248
Dionysius of Corinth, 266
Dispersion, the Greek; despised by Palestinian Jews, 157; not so the Babylonian Dispersion, 157
Docete, and the Fourth Gospel, 113
Doctrine of St Paul’s Epistles, de- velopment of, 227 sq, 231, 315 sq, 324 sq, 402
Dressel, 8, 114
Oiacrropa (7) Tov “EAAjvev, 157
Ebionism, 7
SUBJECTS. Adi
Egnatian Road, 254, 437
Eichhorn, 292
Elders, quoted by Ireneus; belonged to the Asiatic School, 56; appealed to collectively, 56 sq; and individu- ally, 58 sq; an identification at- tempted, 59 sq
Eleutherus of Rome, 116
Epenetus at Rome, 301
Epaphyras, 394
Epaphroditus, 246
Ephesians, Epistle to the; evidence for the omission of é¢v "Edécw, 377 sq; a formal treatise rather than a familiar letter, 387 sq; yet regarded by the early Church as addressed to the Ephesians, 389; the exception, Marcion, 390; conclusion, a cir- cular letter to proconsular Asia, 390 sq; motive of writing, 394; resem- blances to the Epistle to the Romans, 388, 395 sq; comparisons and con- trasts with the Epistle to the Colos- sians, 232, 389, 395 sq; used in 1 Peter, 396; the first example of Christian hymnology in, 410
Ephesus; St John at, 51; St Paul at, 274 sq, 387 sq, 404 sq, 431, 433; heretics at, 404, 409 sq; as shown by the Pastoral Epistles, 408 sq, 411 sq
Ephraim, site of, 177
Ephrem Syrus, commentary on Ta- tian’s Diatessaron by, 4
Epiphanius; on the name Alogi, 6, 116 sq ; indebted to Hippolytus, 118; on Marcion’s Epistle to the Laodi- ceans, 383; to the Romans, 334; on St Paul’s visit to Spain, 426; on other points, 172
Episcopacy unnoticed in the Fourth Gospel, 12
Erasmus, 321, 344
Erastus of Macedonia, 245, 305, 406
Essenes, longevity of the, 54; view of Jewish law taken by the, 208
Eusebius; his practice in notices of evidence for the Canon, 64 sq; on Papias, 63, 66, 69; on the Letter of the Gallican Churches, 77; on Theophilus, 83; on Pantenus, 92 ; on Bethzatha, 170; on St Paul’s release, 425
Ewald, 292, 428
"Efpaiort, 127
éypawa, use of, 275
év “Edéow, omission of the words in ph. i. 1, 377 sq
év Kupiy, ev Xpiorw, 231
ev ‘Pan, omission of the words in Rom. i. 7, 15, 287 sq, 310, 316, 321, 344 sq, 364
452 INDEX OF SUBJECTS.
émtoro\al, of a single letter, 99 épxomevos (0), a title of the Messiah, 149
Felix, date of the recall of, 217 sq
Festivals, Jewish; disturbances at, 161; minute acquaintance displayed in the Fourth Gospel of, 165 sq
Festus, 217 sq
Field, 341
Flatte, 248
Florinus, the letter to, 55
Fourth Gospel; the traditional view of its authorship, 5, 125 ; when first impugned, 5; significance of this unanimity, 5, 9; the most decisive testimony from heretical writers, 7, 8, 104 sq, 120 sq; importance of the truths which it embodies, 43 sq, 47 sq; two classes of its assailants, 50; biographical sketch of some of them, 50; their hypotheses con- sidered, 10 sq; compelled to throw back the date, 11; Exrernan Evti- DENCE for, 45 sq; cumulative cha- racter of this evidence, 48; (1) the Churches of Asia Minor, 51 sq, (i) Elders quoted by Irenzus, 56 sq; (ii) Polycarp, 62 sq; (iii) Papias, 63 sq; (iv) the Letter of the Smyr- neans, 70 sq, (v) Melito of Sardis, 72 sq ; (vi) Claudius Apollinaris, 74 8q; (vii) Polycrates of Ephesus, 75; (vili) Montanism, 76 ; (2) the Churches of Gaul, 76 sq; (i) the Letter of the Gallican Churches, 77; (ii) Ireneus, 77 sq; (3) the Church of Antioch, 81 sq; (i) Ignatius, 81 sq; (ii) Theo- philus, 83 sq; (4) the Churches of Palestine, 85 sq; (i) Justin Martyr, 85 sq; (ii) Tatian, 89 sq; (5) the Church of Alexandria, 91 sq; (i) the Epistle to Diognetus (pt. 2), 91 sq; (ii) Clement of Alexandria, 92 sq; (iil) Origen, 93; (6) the Churches of Greece and Macedonia, 94 sq; (i) the Epistle to Diognetus (pt. 1), 94; (ii) Athenagoras, 94 sq; (7) the Church of Rome, 96 sq; (i) the Shep- herd of Hermas, 96 sq; (ii) the Muratorian Canon, 97 sq; (ili) Hip- polytus, 100 sq; (8) the Churches of Asia, 101 sq; (i) Tertullian, 102; (li) Acts of Perpetua and Felicitas, 102 sq; (9) the Churches of Syria, 104; (10) Heretical writers, 104 sq; (a) Gnosties, (i) Simon Magus, 105 ; (ii) Ophites, 105; (iii) Peratw, 106 ; (iv) Sethiani, 107; (v) Justinus, 107; (vi) Pistis Sophia, 107; (vii) Basilides, 108 sq; (vili) Valentinians,
110; (ix) Heracleon, Ptolemeus, Marcus, 111 sq; (x) Marcion, 112; (b) Docete, 113; (c) Judaizing Christians, evidence of the Clementine Homilies, the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, 113 sq; counter testimony of the Alogi considered, 5 sq, 49, 115 sq, 121; (11) Heathen Writers, 119 sq; (12) Apocryphal documents, 119 sq; retrospect of the External Evidence, 120 sq; InTER- NAL Evyipence for, 123 sq; plan of treatment of the subject, 125; 1 the writer a Hebrew, probably a con- temporary, 126 sq, (1) his knowledge of the Hebrew language, (i) proved indirectly by his Greek style, 16 sq, 126 sq; (a) paucity of connecting particles, 17, 129 sq; () parallelism of sentences, 17, 132; (c) definite- ness, 132; (d) preference of direct narrative, 133; (e) arrangement, 133; (f) grammatical and lexical peculiarities, 133 ; (g) imagery, 135; (ii) proved directly by his knowledge of Hebrew, (a) quotations from the O.T., 20sq, 135 sq ; ()) interpretations of Hebrew words, 17 sq, 140 sq; (2) his knowledge of Jewish ideas, ete. ; (i) the Messiah, 22, 23 sq, 145 sq; and Messianic titles, 148 sq; (il) companions of the Messiah, 25 sq, 150 sq; (iii) Messianic expectation among the Samaritans, 154 sq; (iv) Jewish beliefs, 155 sq ; (3) his know- ledge of the history, geography ete. of the Jews, (i) of their relations to (a) the Galileans, 158 sq, (b) the Romans, 160 sq; (ii) of Jewish in- stitutions (a) the high-priesthood, 162 sq; an objection of Baur, 28 sq ; (b) Jewish festivals, 165 sq ; (c) posi- tion of the Sadducees, 26 sq; (ili) of the topography of Jerusalem, 28 sq ; (a) the temple, 168 sq; its chrono- logy, 30 sq; (b) the watercourses, 169 sq; (c) scenes illustrating the Passion, 175 sq; (iv) of the topo- graphy of Palestine, 176 sq; the scene of the interview with the Samaritan woman, 33 sq; silence on second-century controversies, 12 sq; contrast with second-century romances, 15; m the writer an eye- witness of the events recorded, 180 sq ; (1) the minuteness of his details, 22 sq; (a) time, 180; (b) place, 181; (c) persons, 181; (d) incidents, 182; (2) the naturalness of his record, (i) the characters, 36 sq, 183 sq; (a) St Peter, 183 sq; (b) Pontius Pilate,
INDEX OF SUBJECTS.
37, 186 sq; (c) St Philip, 188; (d) St Andrew, 189; (e) the Samaritan woman, 34 sq; (f) St Thomas, 37; (g) Martha and Mary, 37 sq; (ii) the progress of events, 190 sq; (a) in the conversation with the Samaritan woman, 190; (b) in the judgment- hall, 191; (c) subsequent commen- tary of the author on the facts which he records, 192 sq; 11 the writer John the son of Zebedee, 39 sq; the last chapter an afterthought, but authentic, 194 sq ; the conversa- tional character of the Gospel, 197
sq
Fritzsche, 342
Fuldensis, codex, 337, 342, 351, 356, 360 sq
Funeral and marriage customs in the Fourth Gospel, 165
Gabbatha, the name, 17, 142
Gaius of Corinth, 247, 305
Gaius of Macedonia, 246; perhaps the same as Epaphroditus, 247; the name in Thessalonian inscriptions, 256; Origen’s confusion as to, 247, 268
Gaius, the Roman Presbyter, 98
Galileans, despised by the Jews of the metropolis, 158
Gamaliel, 205, 208
Garrucci, 302
Gaul, the Churches of; early date of their foundation, 432; founded by the Churches of Asia Minor, 76; correspondence between the two bodies, 77
German professors, longevity of, 54
Gethsemane, 175
Gfrérer, 151 sq
Golgotha, 142
Gnostic writings, testimony to the Fourth Gospel from, 7 sq, 105 sq
Gnosticism ; notes of, 413; form attacked in the Epistle to the Colos- sians, 233, 394 sq; in the Pastoral Epistles, 408, 411 sq; the Fourth Gospel silent as to, 12, 146 sq
Greece as an educator of the world, 201, 205 sq
Greek philosophy, influence of late, 207
Griesbach, 291
Grotius, 135
Gwynn, 196
yavopuddKiov, 169
Heathen writers, testimony to the Fourth Gospel from, 119
Hebrew language, characteristics of the, 16, 126 sq
453
Hegesippus, 98
Helena, Queen of Adiabene, 217
Hemsen, 405, 406
Heracleon; a western Valentinian, 111 ; his commentary on St John’s Gospel, 111
Heretical writers; testimony to the Fourth Gospel from, 7, 104 sq, 121; recent evidence on this subject, 7 sq
Hermas, Shepherd of ; date and cha- racter of, 96; coincidences with the Fourth Gospel in, 97; known to the author of the Acts of Perpetua, 103
Herod Agrippa I.; date of his death, 215 sq ; considered the Messiah, 148
Herod Agrippa II., 218
Herod Antipas, Messianic hopes set on, 148
Herod the Great; the restoration of the temple by, 30 sq, 169 ; considered the Messiah, 148
Herodes in the Acts of Martyrdom of Polyearp, 70
Herodotus, 253, 254
Heumann, 290
High priest; his tenure of office in the Fourth Gospel, 28 sq; relations of Caiaphas and Annas, 162 sq ; Jewish belief in the inspiration of the, 165
Hilary the Deacon; Rom.i. 7, 15 as read by, 288, 345, 365; Eph, i. 1 as read by, 384; on the composition of the Roman Church, 313 sq
Hilgenfeld, 10, 50, 146, 173, 424
Hillel, great age of, 54
Hippolytus; importance of his Refu- tation, 8, 105 sq; its date, 105; his testimony to the Fourth Gospel, 100 sq ; perhaps Epiphanius’ autho- rity on the Alogi, 118; his use of nicknames, 119; other references to, 97, 98
‘Holy One of God,’ a title of the Messiah, 149
Hort; on the date of Justin Martyr, 85,87 ; onthe Kpistle to the Romans, 321 sq
Hug, 284, 346, 406, 428
Ignatian Epistles; date of, 81; coinci- dences with the N.T. in, 81; with the Fourth Gospel, 81; their silence as to St John explained, 82; the Epistle to the Ephesians alluded to in, 389 sq
Inspiration; its twofold character, 224 sq; its progress, 227; illustrated by St Paul’s Epistles, 227 sq
interpolare, in Tertullian, 330, 382
Ireneus; his life, 77 sq; his impor- tance as a depositary of tradition,
29—3
454 INDEX OF
4, 51, 54 sq, 77 sq; date of his work on heresies, 79; his letter to Flori- nus, 55; his testimony to the author- ship of the Fourth Gospel incidental, 56; but full, 78; the elders quoted by, see Elders; on Polycarp, 55, 62 sq; on the Alogi, 115 sq; the passage emended, 116; Eusebius’ treatment of his evidence, 65; no reference to Rom. xv, xvi in, 289, 336, 355
Iscariot, the name, 18, 143
Isidore, 109
“IoroBos, 143
James, the son of Zebedee, not the author of the Fourth Gospel, 41
James, the brother of our Lord, per- haps connected with Asia Minor, 41
Jason of Macedonia, 247, 261 sq; per- haps the Jason of Rom. xvi. 21, 305
Jegar-Sahadutha, 127
Jerome; on Salim, 179; on St Paul’s release, 426; on Eph. i. 1, 385 sq; on Eph. iii. 5, 333 sq; embodies Origen, 333 sq, 354, 386; on Pan- tenus, 92
Jerusalem; effect of its destruction by Titus on the Christian Church, 52; bearing of its twofold destruction on the authorship of the Fourth Gospel, 13 sq, 125, 156
Jewish; law and national feeling from the standpoint of Pharisees, Sad- ducees and Essenes, 208 sq; Messi- anic hopes etc., 22 sq, 145 sq; institutions, 162 sq
Jews; in Macedonia, 242 sq, 258, 269; their treatment under the Macedo- nian Kmpire, 244; at Crete, 431; in Spain, 431; in the early Koman Church, 294 sq; oppose St Paul, 262; effect of Claudius’ edict on, 301
John the Baptist; his designation in the Fourth Gospel, 42; scenes of his preaching, 179
John, the father of St Peter, 18 sq
John (St); his social status and edu- cation, 128; settles in Asia Minor, 51; his companions there, 52 sq; his longevity, 53; first founder of a Christian School, 53
John (St), the First Epistle of, a pro- logue to the Fourth Gospel, 63, 99, 198
Jobn (St), the Second and Third Epistles of, mentioned in the Mura- torian Canon, 99
John the presbyter; date of, 11; the Fourth Gospel assigned to, 11; in Asia Minor, 53; Papias’ connexion with, 63
SUBJECTS.
John of Thessalonica, 268
Jona, the name, 19
Josephus; on the Sadducees, 27; on Herod’s restoration of the Temple, 30, 32; on the Essenes, 54; on the recall of Pilate, 58 ; on pre-Christian Messiahs, 147, 148, 151, 154; on the famine in Judea, 216; on the visit of Helena, 217; on the pro- curatorship of Felix, 218; his use of the word apx.epeds, 163; of the name “IoroBos, 143; defends the Jews against Apion, 156; mentions Cana, 176; and Ephraim, 177
Judaizing Christians, 113
Judas, son of Hezekiah, 148
Judas the Gaulonite, a false Messiah, 147
Justification by Faith, not the central point in St Paul’s Gospel, 231
Justin Martyr; date of his writings, 85 sq; of his martyrdom, 86; his treatise against Marcion, 89; uses the Fourth Gospel, 4, 87 sq
Kedron, 30
Keim, 50, 163
Kerioth, 144
‘King of Israel,’ a title of the Messiah, 149
Koch, 253 sq
Kostlin, 185
Kédpwv, 172 sq
‘Lamb of God,’ a title of the Messiah, 148
Laodicea, importance of, 393, 394
Laodiceans, Epistle to the; in Mar- cion’s canon, on the evidence of Tertullian, 380, 382 sq, 392; of Epiphanius, 383; identical with the HKpistle to the Ephesians, 391 sq; the notice in the Muratorian Canon, 383; the reference in Col. iv. 16 considered, 390 sq, 393; forged Epistles, 383
Larissa, Christianity established at, 244, 267
Lazarus, 27
Leake, 253 sq
Lectionaries; their relation to capitu- lations, 342, 361 sq; date of, 364
Letter of the Smyrneans presents coin- cidences with the Fourth Gospel, 70 sq
‘Lewd,’ the word, 262
‘Light, the,’ as a title of the Messiah, 150
Lightfoot, John, 152, 156, 158, 159, 165
lithostrata, 142
INDEX OF
Logos-doctrine; the central idea in the Fourth Gospel, 23; yet never obtruded into the narrative, 23 sq
Longevity of early witnesses to the Fourth Gospel, considered and paral- leled, 54
Lord Chancellors, longevity of certain, 54
Lucian; acquainted with the Fourth Gospel, 120; other references to, 244, 255, 257
Liicke, 116, 135, 195
Luke (St); the Muratorian Canon on, 98; his Greek style, 131, 135; his vagueness as compared with the Fourth Gospel, 163, 179, 181, 191; his portraiture of Martha and Mary, 38, 181; his chronology of our Lord’s life, 31, 32, 180; adopted by the Valentinians, 56; his narrative of the first missionary visit to Hurope, 238; his residence at Philippi, 245
Luthardt, 129
Luther, 231
Liitzelberger, 50
Macedonia; its work for civilisation, 239 sq; its connexion with Syria and Palestine, 245; character of the inhabitants, 248 sq, 257; Jews in, 242 sq, 258
Macedonia, the Churches of; their foundation, 237; their importance, 238 sq; St Paul’s choice of stations, 240 sq; his communications with, 245 sq; companions of the Apostle from, 246, 305; outward condition and dangers of, 247 sq; their affec- tionate relations with St Paul, 249 sq; his last visits to, 430, 433 sq; subsequent history of, 267
Manna, the giving of, associated with the coming of the Messiah, 24, 26, 152, 155
Manuscripts; see Archetypes, Augien- sis codex, Capitulations, Lectiona- ries, Menologia, Synaxaria, Vulgate etc.
Marcion; his recension of the Hpistle to the Romans, 288 sq, 316, 319, 329 sq, 347 sq, 353 sq; perhaps misrepresented by Tertullian, Origen and Jerome, 331, 334sq; the Hpistle to the Laodiceans in, 380, 381 sq, 392; importance and credibility of his statement, 380, 382 sq, 390 sq; his silence as to the ourth Gospel explained, 112 :
Marcus the Valentinian, coincidence with the Fourth Gospel in, 111
SUBJECTS. 455
Marriage and funeral customs in the Fourth Gospel, 165
Martha and Mary, their characters as drawn in the Fourth Gospel, 37 sq
Matrona, saint of Thessalonica, 268
Matthew (St), possible connexion with Asia Minor of, 53
Matthies, 424
Maximus Confessor, 68
Melito; his travels and learning, 72; date of his writings, 72; coinci- dences with the Fourth Gospel in, 73 sq; chronology of our Lord’s life used by, 58, 73; tutor to Clement of Alexandria, 92; Ireneus indebted to, 74; on Christianity at Larissa, 244, 267
Menologia, 343, 361 sq
Merinthus, a nickname given by Hip- polytus to Cerinthus, 119
Messiahs, false, antecedent as well as subsequent to the birth of Christ, 146 sq
Messianic hopes and ideas; described in the Fourth Gospel, 22 sq, 145 sq; the keynote of that Gospel, 23 sq, 145 sq; Messianic titles applied to Christ, 148 sq
Messias, the name, 17, 141
Meyer, 275, 279 sq, 342, 424, 425
Miltiades, 98
Mommsen, 248
Montanism; date of, 98; traceable in the Acts of Perpetua, 103; dislike of the Alexandrian fathers to, 333; no allusion in the Fourth Gospel to, 5, 76, 80, 115 sq
Moses; as a type of Christ, 26, 150; detailed parallelism in rabbinic teaching, 151 sq; our Lord’s atti- tude towards, 146; Jewish reverence for, 156
Muratorian Canon; place of writing, 97; authorship, 98; language, 98; date, 98; its testimony to the synop- tists, 98; to the Fourth Gospel, 99 sq, 121; on the circumstances of thecomposition of the Fourth Gospel, 99, 196, 198; perhaps based on Papias, 100; the notice of the Epistle to the Laodiceans in, 383; the pas- sage explained, 383; on St Paul’s release, 424, 427
padnrns, 57, 98
Meocias, peculiar to the Fourth Gos- pel, 145
Naassenes; see Ophites
Nabltis, 33
Narcissiani, 302 sq
Navigation, ancient, when possible, 220
456
Nicknames, 119
Nicodemus, designation in the Fourth Gospel of, 195
Nicophorus Callistus, 95
Nicopolis, 405, 432, 433, 435 sq
Oehler, 336
Onesiphorus, 433, 436, 437
Ophites; date of, 105; a large sect, 109; quote the Fourth Gospel, 106; their system compared with the heresy attacked in the Pastoral Epistles, 416 sq
Origen; used the Fourth Gospel, 93; used MSS omitting év "Edéow in Eph. i. 1, 377 sq; the passage emended, 378; his testimony compared with Basil’s, 379 sq; his reading of Rom. i, 7, 15, 287; on Gaius, 247, 268; on Marcion’s recension of the Ro- mans, 288 sq, 318, 329 sq; Rufinus as a translator of, 329,345; a passage emended, 330, 341, 353 sq; Jerome incorporates his commentary, 333 sq, 354, 386; and disfigures it, 386
Otto, 399, 423
olxovoula and Beodoyla, 229 sq
Palestine, the Churches of, testimony to the Fourth Gospel from, 85 sq
Paley, 275, 290, 349
Pallas, 219
Pantenus; date of his visit to India, 92,-95; probable author of the end of the Epistle to Diognetus, 92
Papias; his history and writings, 63 sq; probably one of Irenzeus’ elders, 67 sq; Eusebius’ evidence considered, 64sq, 68; Eusebius’ antipathy to, 66; his evidence to the Fourth Gospel, 67; obligations of the Muratorian Canon to, 100; other references to, 11, 51, 53
Pastoral Epistles; the problem of their authorship, 399 sq; date and charac- teristics of, 224, 228 sq, 429; occa- sion and purpose, 434 sq, (1) style and intrinsic character, 400 sq, (i) vocabulary, 401; (ii) syntax, 402; (iii) tone of thought, 402; (2) his- torical notices, 403 sq, (i) actual incidents, 403 sq; (ii) condition of the Church, 407 sq, (a) ministry, 407; (b) heresies, 408, (c) church literature, 409 sq; the heresy com- bated in, 411 sq
Paul (St); his preparation for the ministry, 201 sq; as (1) a citizen of Rome, 202 sq; (2) a native of a Greek university-town, 205 sq; (3) a Hebrew, 207 sq; twofold results of his Hebrew training, 208 sq; of his
INDEX OF SUBJECTS.
position as a Pharisee, 210 sq; his intellectual power gauged, 206; his love for the Jews continuous, 209; chronology of his life and Epistles, 215 sq, 428 sq; groups and leading characteristics of his Epistles, 224 sq ; justification by faith not the central point in his Gospel, 231; impor- tance of his first visit to Macedonia, 237 sq; his choice of missionary stations there, 240 sq; area of his preaching in Macedonia, 244; fre- quent communications with the Macedonian Churches, 245 sq; his extant letters to them, 247; his Macedonian companions, 246, 305; affectionate relations with Mace- donia, 249; at Thessalonica, 259 sq ; topic of his preaching there, 260; of his Epistles to the Thessalonians, 263 sq; at Ephesus, 274 sq, 387 sq, 404 sq; pays an unrecorded visit to Corinth, 222, 274, 405; joins Titus in Macedonia, 283; circumstances and object of writing his Epistle to the Romans, 285 sq, 321 sq, 352 sq; evidence for his release from cap- tivity, 399, 403 sq; a counter argu- ment disposed of, 421sq; his release supported by tradition, 423 sq; its date, 429; his subsequent move- ments, 428 sq; date of his martyr- dom, 221, 429; see also Pauline Epistles
Pauline Epistles; groups and charac- teristics of, 224 sq; Wieseler’s order of, 403; circular, 319, 391 sq; lost, 275; forged, 383
Paulus, 178, 291, 405
Pelagius on St Paul’s release, 426
Pella in the time of St Paul, 243
Perate quote the Fourth Gospel, 106
Pericope adulterae, 69
Perpetua and Felicitas, Acts of ; date of, 103; bear testimony to Johannine writings, 102 sq
Peter (St); his character in the Fourth Gospel, 182, 183 sq; called son of John, 18 sq; the order of his denials, 191
Peter, First Epistle of; as restored by Bunsen, 276; indebted to the Epistle to the Ephesians, 396
Pharisees; contrasted with the Sad- ducees in their attitude towards the Jewish law, 208 sq; in their patriot- ism, 210 sq; effect of their system on St Paul, 208 sq
Philip the Apostle; in Asia Minor, 53; mentioned by Papias, 69; his character, 128, 188
INDEX OF
Philip the Evangelist, in Asia Minor, 53
Philippi; its name, 241, 253; its geo- graphical importance, 242; Jews at, 248; St Luke at, 245 ; gold-mines of, 248; social status of the Church of, 248; see also Macedonia, the Churches of
Philippus Sidetes, errors of, 95
Philo, 165, 167
Phlegon, 303
Pheebe in the theories as to the struc- ture of the Epistle to the Romans, 291, 292
Pilate ; his character as drawn in the Fourth Gospel, 37 sq, 186 sq; irony of circumstances illustrated in his case, 29; date of his recall, 58
Pistis Sophia, correspondences in the Fourth Gospel with, 107 sq
Plutarch, 166
Pococke, 253 sq
Polycarp; a pupil of St John, 53; his great age, 54; his martyrdom, 79; his testimony to the Ignatian Epis- tles, 4; to the Johannine writings, 62 sq; notice in Ireneus of, 55, 62 sq; the Church of Philippi in the time of, 248
Polycarp, Martyrdom of ; see Letter of the Smyrneans
Polycrates, his testimony to the Fourth Gospel, 51, 75
Poppa, funeral of, 165
Pothinus, great age of, 54
Procurators of Judea, 58, 162, 216 sq
‘Prophet, the’; in Messianic expecta- tion, 25; by Jews distinguished from, by Christians identified with the Messiah, 25, 150
Protevangelium, 15, 40
Ptolemeus quotes the Fourth Gospel, 111
Public lections, 312, 342 sq
moditapxat, 256
mpoBarcKy (7), 169 sq
mvdAn and Odpa, 97, 114
Quartodeciman controversy unnoticed in the Fourth Gospel, 13, 80
Quotations from the O. T.; in the Fourth Gospel, 20 sq, 136 sq; in St Paul’s Kpistles, 20; in the Epistle to the Hebrews, 20
Rabbinic teaching on the Messiah, ete. 151 sq
Rabbouni, 17, 140
Ranke, E., 342, 343, 360
Rationalists, importance of the Fourth Gospel against, 47
Reiche, 312, 342
SUBJECTS. 457
Renan ; his theory as to the Epistle to the Romans, 287 sq; other references to, 50, 174, 185, 269
Reuss, 423
Roberts, 128
Robinson, 171, 175, 176, 177
Roman; citizenship, 202 sq; military terms and customs, 160 sq
Romances of the second century, 15
Romans, Epistle to the; phenomena of the text, 288 sq; theories as to its structure, 289 sq, 349; Renan’s theory of a quadripartite epistle, 293 sq; his arguments stated and considered, 294 sq; the four endings tested by textual criticism, 307 sq, 321 sq, 329 sq; other objections urged to Renan’s view, 309 sq; counter theory of a longer and a shorter form, 311 sq, 321 ; supported by the mixed character of the Roman Church, 312 sq; the Apostle’s object in writing the Epistle, 315 sq, 324 sq, 366 sq ; theabridged recension to form a circular letter, 315 sq, 319 ; textual evidence for the abridged recension, 316; Dr Hort’s criticism of this evidence, 329 sq ; recapitulation, the evidence chiefly western, 272 sq; the final doxology belongs to it, 317, 366 sq; style of the final doxology, 317 sq, 324 sq, 347 sq, 367; its purpose, according to Dr Hort, 324, 328 sq; the salutations, 298; the whole theory criticised by Dr Hort, 348 sq; negative evidence against the last two chapters, 289, 336, 355, 362; the evidence of capitulations, 337, 342, 355 sq; resemblance of the epistle to the Epistle to the Ephesians, 388, 395 sq; the epistle a revelation of St Paul’s personal experiences, 208, 209
Rome, as an educator of the world, 201
Rome, Church of ; its composition in the time of St Paul, 294, 296 sq, 311, 312 sq; its literature, 96 sq; evidence for the Fourth Gospel sup- plied by, 96 sq
Rufinus; as a translator of Origen, 288, 329, 345, 365 ; a passage emend- ed by Dr Hort, 330, 341, 353 sq
Sabatier, A., 180
Sadducees; composed the chief priests’ party in the time of our Lord, 26 sq; their contrasts with the Pharisees, 208 sq
Salutations ; in Pauline Epistles gene- rally, 298, 388; in the Epistle to
458 INDEX OF
the Romans, 299 sq; these last not applicable to the Church at Ephesus, 300 sq ; no salutations in the Epistle to the Ephesians, 388
Samaritan Messianic expectations, 154
Samaritan woman, incident of the; as a delineation of character, 190; as an evidence of topographical accu- racy, 33 sq, 191
Sanday, 49, 135, 148, 149, 164, 174, 178
Schaff, 400, 424
Schenkel, 423
Scholten, 50, 52, 146
Schott, 292
Schrader, 424
Schulz, 292
Secundus of Berea, 246, 306; the name, 256
Sedulius Scotus, on Eph. i. 1, 385
Semler, 292, 336
Serapion, 74
Sethiani, coincidences with the Fourth Gospel in the writings of the, 107
Severianus, 388
Shechem, 33
Shechinah, its return expected with the Messiah, 153
Sibylline Oracles show acquaintance with the Fourth Gospel, 120
Silas in Macedonia, 245
Siloam; the name, 17, 141; situation of, 171 sq; associated with the Feast of Tabernacles, 166, 171; with Mes- sianic expectations, 172
Simon Magus, the Great Revelation ascribed: to, 105
Sin, Jewish doctrine of transmitted, 157 sq
Solomon’s Porch, 29, 168, 181
‘Son of God,’ ‘Son of Man,’ Messianic titles, 149
Sopater of Thessalonica, 246, 305; perhaps not the Sosipater of Rom. xvi. 21, 246, 305; the name, 256
Spain, St Paul’s visit to, 423 sq
Stanley (Dean); his description of Nablis, 33; his edition of the Epis- tles to the Corinthians, 273 sq
Stichometry in manuscripts, 346
Strabo; on Tarsus, 205; on Thessa- lonica, 255
Sufferings of Christ reflected in His saints, 70
Symeon, bishop of Jerusalem, great age of, 54
Synaxaria, 342 sq, 363
Syria, the Church of, early literature of, LO4
omeipa, 160
cwpdriov, 351
SUBJECTS.
Tafel, 253 sq
Tarsus, intellectual prominence of, 202, 205 sq
Tatian; his history, 89; his Diates- saron, 4, 90; his other works, 90; accepted the Fourth Gospel, 90
Tayler, 10, 50, 100
Temple; its restoration by Herod, date, 30 sq; and character, 169; detailed knowledge in the Fourth Gospel of, 169
Tertius, 305, 323
Tertullian; quotes the Fourth Gospel, 102; on the ending of the Fourth Gospel, 194; on Marcion’s Epistle to the Laodiceans, 380, 381 sq; did he know Rom. xv, xvi? 289, 334 sq, 354; his use of clausula, 289, 335, 336, 354; of interpolare, 330, 382; of titulus, 382; other references to, 267
Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs ; date and character of the work, 114; its coincidences with the Fourth Gospel, 114
Texier, 253 sq
Theodore of Mopsuestia, 388, 426
Theodoret, 427
Theodotion’s version of the LXX, date of, 79
Theophilus; his date, 83; quotes the Fourth Gospel by name, 83, 120; his lost commentaries, 84; appa- rently a harmony, 85
Therma ; see T'hessalonica
Thessalonians, Epistles to the, ceca- sion and contents of the, 224 sq, 263 sq
Thessalonica; the name, 241, 253; situation and history of, 254 sq; geo- graphical importance of, 242, 254; nearly made the capital of the world, 255; a large Jewish centre, 243, 258, 269; present condition of, 255, 269; medieval and modern names of, 255; inscriptions at, 256 sq; St Paul at, 259 sq; his teaching there, 260; its effect, 261; subsequent history of the Church, 267 sq; of the city, 268
Theudas; date of his rebellion, 147; its Messianic character, 151
Thomas (St); the name, 18, 141; his character as drawn in the Fourth Gospel, 37; his connexion with Asia Minor, 53; significance of his mention by Papias, 69
Tiberias, 176
Timotheus ; his communications with Macedonia, 245, 263, 276, 278; sent to Corinth from Ephesus, 222, 273
INDEX OF
sq, 404; but failed to reach Corinth, 276 sq, 404; events in the subse- quent history of, 404 sq
titulus, 382
Titus; sent to Corinth from Ephesus, 222, 273 sq; fulfils the abortive mission of Timotheus, 280 sq ; his mission identical with that of the ‘brethren’ in 1 Cor., 280; why not mentioned by name, 281 ; his status, 281; his route, 282; events in the subsequent history of, 405 sq
Tradition, as evidence to authorship, 8, 40
Trophimus; his position in the apos- tolic age, 281; his movements, 406, 435
Tiibingen School, 10, 42, 80; see also Baur, Hilgenfeld
Turpie, 136 sq
Tychicus, 281, 391, 393, 395, 405, 435
Oeoroyia and ofkovouta, 229 sq
Onptomaxetv, 283
Ovpa and 7vAn, 97, 114
répna TAS SUoews (7d), 423
TeTpadvov, 161
Uncritical character of the apostolic age; alleged, 14 sq; the argument double-edged, 14, 32, 34
SUBJECTS. 459
Unitarians and the Fourth Gospel, 47 Ussher, 392
Valentinians; prominence of, 109; schools of, 111 sq; opposed by Trenseus, 55 ; used St Luke’s chrono- logy of our Lord’s life, 56 sq; quote the Fourth Gospel, 110
Van de Velde, 179
Vegetius, 161, 220
Victorinus Afer, 355, 384
Vienne and Lyons; persecution at, 54, 77, 95 ; coincidences with the Fourth Gospel in the record, 77, 121
Vulgate manuscripts; capitulations used in certain, 289, 337, 342, 351; distinct forms of, 356 sq; one form derived from the Old Latin, 362, 372; connexion of these forms with lectionaries considered, 342, 361 sq
Westcott, 94, 99, 155, 174, 312
Wetstein, a manuscript referred to by, 289, 337, 355
Wieseler, 275, 278, 282 sq, 400, 403 sq, 424
Winer, 130, 134, 244
Witnesses required by Jewish law, 165
Zacagni, 342 sq
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