JOHN'S GOSPEL: 
 
 APOLOGETICAL LECTURES. 
 
 J. J. VAN'OOSTERZEE, D.D., 
 
 PROFESSOR OF THEOLOGY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF UTRECHT. 
 
 TRANSLATED, WITH ADDITIONS, 
 
 J. F. HURST, D. D. 
 
 EDINBURGH: 
 
 T. AND T. CLARK, 38, GEORGE STREET. 
 LONDON: HAMILTON, ADAMS, &CO. DUBLIN: J. ROBERTSON &CO. 
 
 MDCCCLXIX. 
 
THE TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. 
 
 JLhe following work is a translation, from the 
 authorized German edition, of four Apologetical 
 Lectures on John's Gospel, delivered to a large 
 audience in the Odeon at Amsterdam, Holland, at 
 the close of the year 1866, by Dr. J. J. Van 
 Oosterzee, Professor of Theology in the University 
 of Utrecht. They were designed chiefly, though not 
 exclusively, as a reply to the Lectures on the Biblical 
 Account of the Life of Jesus, especially on the 
 Gospel of John, which had been delivered at the 
 same place by professors and preachers of the so- 
 called Modern Tendency. The author, with due 
 regard to the requirements of a popular audience, 
 avoided all abstruse and technical treatment of his 
 subject, preferring to give the results rather than the 
 method of his learned investigations. 
 
iv translator's preface. 
 
 There are few theologians more capable, by ac- 
 quirements, native talents, and piety, for defending 
 Christian truth than Dr. Van Oosterzee. In the 
 present work he furnishes a new proof, that, while 
 he refuses to renounce any cardinal point of evan- 
 gelical theology, and gives abundant grounds there- 
 for, he is ready to make any concessions that 
 candor requires. It may not be out of place here 
 to give a brief account of his life, theological po- 
 sition and literary labors, by a personal friend of 
 his, the Rev. Dr. P. Schaff, of New York, who says : 
 
 "Dr. John James van Oosterzee was born at 
 Rotterdam, Holland, in 1817, and brought up in the 
 faith of the Reformed Church. He studied at the 
 University of Utrecht, and commenced his theological 
 career in 1840 with an able Latin dissertation, Be 
 Jesu e virgine Maria nato, in defence of the gospel 
 history against the mytho-poetical hypothesis of 
 Strauss. He labored as pastor first at Eemnes, and 
 at Alkmaar, and since 1844 in the principal church 
 of Rotterdam, where he continued eighteen years. 
 In 1862 he was called to his alma mater, as Pro- 
 fessor of Theology. He opened his lectures in 
 Utrecht with an apologetic oration, De scepticismo 
 hodiernzs theologis caute vitando, 1863. He is gen- 
 erally considered as the ablest pulpit orator and 
 divine of the evangelical school in Holland now 
 living. He combines genius, learning, piety. He is 
 orthodox and conservative, yet liberal and pro- 
 gressive. He seems to be as fully at home in the 
 
TRANSLATORS PREFACE. V 
 
 modem theology of Germany as in that of his na- 
 tive country. To his attainments in scientific the- 
 ology he adds a general literary culture and fine 
 poetical taste. 
 
 "It is as a pulpit orator that he first acquired a 
 brilliant and solid fame. He has been compared to 
 Adolph Monod, in his more calm and matured days, 
 when he stood at the head of the Evangelical Prot- 
 estant pulpit of Paris and of France. His sermons 
 on Moses, on the Seven Churches of the Apocalypse, 
 and on other portions of Scripture, passed through 
 several editions, and some of them have been trans- 
 lated into the German language. He was selected 
 as the orator of the festival of the Independence of 
 the Netherlands, where he delivered in the Willems 
 Park at the Hague, in the presence of the whole 
 court, an eloquent and stirring discourse under the 
 title Be eerste Steen (The First Stone). 
 
 "In the midst of his labors as preacher and pastor, 
 he prepared a number of learned works, which gave 
 him an equal prominence among his countrymen as 
 a divine. His principal contributions to theological 
 science are a Life of Jesus (3 vols. 1846 — 1851; 
 2nd Ed., 1863 — 1865), which is mainly historical 
 and apologetic ; a Christology, or Manual for Chris- 
 tians ivho desire to hnoiv in whom they believe, which 
 is exegetical and doctrinal, the first part of which 
 discusses the Christology of the Old Testament ; the 
 second, that of the New; the third part states the 
 results, and forms a complete work in itself, de- 
 
VI TRANSLATOR S PREFACE. 
 
 scribing the Son of God before His incarnation, the 
 Son of God in the flesh, and the Son of God in 
 glory (The third part has been translated into the 
 German by F. Meyering under the title: Das Bild 
 Christi nach der Schrift. Hamburg, 1864. It is well 
 worthy of an English translation.); and Commentaries 
 on several books of the New Testament, of which 
 we shall speak presently. These and other works 
 involved him in controversies with Dr. Opzoomer 
 and Professor Scholten of Ley den, which bear a 
 part in the conflict now going on between Super- 
 naturalism and Rationalism. He has already con- 
 tributed several parts to Dr. Lange's Bible-Work, 
 which are undoubtedly among the very best, viz., 
 Commentaries on the Gospel of Luke, the Pastoral 
 Epistles, the Epistle to Philemon, and the Doctrinal 
 and Homiletical Sections to the Commentary on the 
 Epistle of James. He also wrote a reply to Renan's 
 Vie de J4sus, under the title: History or Romance? 
 It was translated from the Dutch into the German, 
 and published at Hamburg, 1864, and republished 
 by the American Tract Society, New York, 1865. 
 He also founded and edited, in connection with 
 Professor Doedes, the Dutch Annals of Scientific 
 Theology from 1843 — 1856. His essays on Schil- 
 ler and Goethe, and similar subjects, prove his 
 varied culture and deep interest in the progress 
 of general literature and art. His merits as an 
 author have secured him a place in several liter- 
 ary societies, and also the decoration of the order 
 
TRANSLATORS PREFACE. Vll 
 
 of the Dutch Lion, and the Swedish order of the 
 Pole-star. 
 
 "Dr. Van Oosterzee may he called the Lange 
 of Holland. He is almost as genial, fresh, and 
 suggestive as his German friend, in hearty sym- 
 pathy with his christologico-theological standpoint, 
 and philosophico-poetic tastes, and equally prepared 
 by previous studies for the task of a commentator. 
 If he is less original, profound, fertile in ideas, 
 he compensates for it by a greater degree of so- 
 briety, which will make him all the more acceptable 
 to the practical, common-sense of the Anglo-Ameri- 
 can mind. His style is clear and natural, and makes 
 the translation an easy and agreeable task, compared 
 with the translation of Lange's poetic flights and 
 transcendent speculations. The Dutch mind stands 
 midway between the German and Anglo-Saxon." 
 
 If Holland and Germany were the only countries 
 in which evangelical truth is contested, the present 
 translation would not have been necessary. But in 
 Great Britain and America many of the sceptical 
 arguments so warmly advanced on the Continent 
 have their champions, and special pains are made 
 to give them both a hearing and footing among 
 those who are not confined to theological circles, 
 and particularly among the moderately educated 
 and the young. Of late, this is particularly true of 
 John's Gospel, though it must be confessed that, 
 in the present, as well as in other instances, those 
 
Vlll TRANSLATOR S PREFACE. 
 
 who combat it in those countries are too often the 
 servile imitators of sympathizers on the Continent, 
 marching* in their rear, and being content to carry 
 on their part of the conflict by using weapons 
 already wrested from their friends in the van. "The 
 authors of the Essays and Reviews" says Hengsten- 
 berg, "have been trained in a German school. It 
 is only the echo of German infidelity which we hear 
 from the midst of the English church. They appear 
 to us as parrots, with only this distinction, common 
 among parrots, that they imitate more or less per- 
 fectly. The treatise of Temple is, in its scientific 
 value, about equal to an essay written by the pu- 
 pils of the middle classes of our colleges 
 
 The essay of Goodwin on the Mosaic cosmogony 
 displays the naive assurance of one who receives 
 the modern critical science from the second or tenth 
 hand." * The equally glaring instances of this ser- 
 vility, which we utterly repudiate as a trait of the 
 Anglo-Saxon mind, is furnished by an article in the 
 Westminster Review, (April, 1865) on St. John's 
 Gospel, in which the writer attempts to extinguish 
 John's whole claim to credibility and authenticity, 
 and even confesses that he uses only the arguments 
 of the Tubingen School. . 
 
 Dr. Van Oosterzee, in the Preface to the Dutch 
 edition of this work, says: "Even the best apolo- 
 gists for Christianity cannot, of themselves, convert 
 
 i Evangelische Kh-chenzeitung, Vorwort, 1862. 
 
TRANSLATORS PREFACE. IX 
 
 the enemies of the truth into friends, yet we achieve 
 great success if we succeed in dissipating the mist 
 which conceals it from many who are striving for 
 it, and if we can strengthen the conviction of hesi- 
 tating minds, that, though great floods have poured 
 over the country, not a foot of land has been car- 
 ried off by them. The purpose of these Lectures 
 will have been accomplished, and I shall be de- 
 votedly thankful, if they should contribute even 
 slightly to the attainment of this great result. 
 Apart from all the fruit which they may bear in 
 other minds, I can say with confidence that these 
 feeble utterances of my own conviction have proved 
 a great blessing to myself. I am more hopeful 
 than ever of Liicke's prophecy: 'As long as the 
 Church possesses a living theology, every doubt on 
 John's Gospel will be solved and every question 
 will be answered.' " 
 
 I sincerely trust that the Apologetical Lectures 
 on John's Gospel may not only not have finished 
 their good work of "dissipating the mist" that ob- 
 scures the truth, but that, so timely in their appear- 
 ance on the Continent, they may be found equally 
 so, and be blest with a bountiful harvest, in the 
 new field on which they enter. 
 
 It would have been impossible to complete 
 the translation by the present time if I had not 
 had the services of Mr. John P. Jackson, of New 
 York, hut temporarily residing in Germany, who, 
 both in stenography and correcting the proofs, has 
 
X TRANSLATOR S PREFACE. 
 
 rendered me valuable assistance. To make the 
 volume more useful to the English reader, I have 
 added Notes whenever advisable, a Table of Apolo- 
 getical Literature on John's Gospel, and an Index. 
 
 Frankfort-on-the-Main, Germany. 
 
 December the 1st, 1868. 
 
PREFATORY LETTER OF THE AUTHOR TO 
 THE TRANSLATOR. 
 
 My dear sir: — 
 
 1 have learned with much pleasure that my Apolo- 
 getical Lectures on the priceless Gospel of John 
 have been thought worthy of the honour of an 
 English translation, and I shall be thankful to God, 
 from the bottom of my heart, if He will grant that 
 this testimony to the truth, though a very weak one, 
 may prove a blessing to those who speak that 
 language. The conflict concerning the verity of the 
 Gospel and the credibility of the Gospel History, 
 and particularly of the Johannean Christ, is con- 
 stantly waged with more energy on the Continent, 
 as well as across the English Channel and beyond 
 the Atlantic Ocean; and hence it is very proper 
 that all of the adherents to, and advocates of the 
 truth in other lands should unite more closely to 
 
Xll AUTHOR S PREFATORY LETTER. 
 
 defend the good cause of revelation, as far as they 
 can, against the fanaticism of negation, which, like 
 every other fanaticism, has its stalwart foes as well 
 as its deluded champions. 
 
 You have already observed that my Lectures 
 were not delivered to a learned, though an educated 
 audience, and comprise the results of scientific 
 study, but yet not the researches themselves. It 
 seemed most appropriate that the public to whom 
 they were addressed should be directed to the in- 
 ternal evidences; and while I could not dwell at 
 length on the external evidences, this deficiency in 
 my work has been recently supplied from another 
 quarter in a way which deserves our thanks and 
 hearty appreciation. I may call attention to two 
 friends of the Gospel of St. John who have de- 
 fended it, in a very superior manner, both pathe- 
 tically and critically. I refer to Die Zeugnisse fiir 
 das Evangelium Johannis, neu untersucht, by Prof. 
 C. J. Riggenbach, D. D., of Basle University, pub- 
 lished in Basle, 1866; and to the small but highly 
 interesting work of my friend in Groningen Univer- 
 sity, Prof. Hofstede de Groot, D. D., on Basilides 
 als Zeuge fur das vierte Evangelium^ translated into 
 German, accompanied with a letter to the celebrated 
 Dr. C. Teschendorf, and published at Leipzig in 
 1867. Both these works prove that the hostility 
 to the authenticity of John, though it is now carried 
 on even as far as to remote Iceland, is never- 
 theless designed to be a defence of modern natu- 
 
AUTHOR S PREFATORY LETTER. Xlii 
 
 ralisru, which assails this rock of the Church with 
 truly titanic fury, and has taken as its motto: 
 
 "Superos si flectere nequeam, Acheronte morebo." 
 
 You inquire of me as to the results which I judge 
 followed these Lectures. I am sorry to say, my 
 dear sir, that I cannot decide on this point very 
 positively. My opponents have replied to me with 
 dignified silence, and have regarded my work as 
 non ave?iu. But as for many who have grown 
 weak in faith and have stumbled, I have learned, 
 with great gratitude, that their faith has become 
 strengthened; while I have heard of but one slander, 
 which soon met with its merited punishment. On 
 every side I see that the study of John's Gospel is 
 now conducted with increased zeal and love. It 
 may interest you to hear that this little book has 
 been translated also into the French by Prof. Sar- 
 dinoux of the Theological Seminary at Montauban, 
 France. You are already acquainted with the Ger- 
 man translation. 
 
 It will be a source of great joy to me if stronger 
 and more eloquent voices than mine shall be heard 
 in this and other lands in defence of John, whose 
 cause is hotly contested but by no means lost. I am 
 firmly convinced that this cause is identical with 
 that of Apologetical Christianity, and, in a good 
 sense, of modern Supernaturalism. For the present, 
 I have nothing further to say than simply, through 
 you, to communicate my salutations of fraternal love 
 
xiv author's prefatory letter. 
 
 and fellowship in the Lord to all my English and 
 American friends, whose acquaintance I have had 
 the good fortune to make by my participation inLange's 
 Commentary on the Bible, which, as I hear from 
 yourself and others, has found an entrance into very 
 wide circles among your fellow - countrymen ; cos 
 ayvoovfAevoc, xal i7Tcycva>ax6fji€voc (2 Corinthians vi. 9). 
 Let us extend to each other the hand at the 
 foot of His cross who comes to us amid all the 
 violent storms of our age, and will live and reign 
 for ever. I can only express the earnest hope that 
 your translation may be followed by the good fruit 
 which you have aimed at in undertaking it. 
 
 Very Fraternally Yours, 
 
 J. J. VAN OOSTERZEE. 
 
 University of Utrecht, Holland. 
 
 July the 6th f 1868. 
 
TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
 
 Page 
 
 The Translator's Preface i— x 
 
 The Author's Prefatory Letter xi— xiv 
 
 I. 
 
 The Authenticity of John's Gospel 1—57 
 
 II. 
 
 John and the Synoptic Gospels 58—115 
 
 III. 
 
 John's Account of Christ's Miracles 116—176 
 
 IV. 
 
 The Johannean Christ . . 177-240 
 
 Table of Apologetical Literature on John's Gospel 241 — 246 
 
 Index 247-256 
 
I. 
 
 THE AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 Ihe unique sublimity of the Fourth Gospel was regarded 
 by the early writers, with some few exceptions, as a special 
 seal of its Apostolical character. It is remarkable that it is 
 this same circumstance which has made this Gospel an object 
 of special suspicion on the part of Rationalistic criticism; 
 or, we should rather say, that this criticism has itself pro- 
 duced these suspicions." 
 
 J. P. Lange. 
 
 In announcing a course of Apologetic Lectures, 
 I do not fear the objection that I have undertaken 
 an entirely superfluous task. You are all aware 
 to what a height the controversy on religion and 
 Christianity has risen in our day, and you may well 
 wonder that in our country the attempt has scarcely 
 heen commenced which has been made elsewhere, 
 especially in Germany and Switzerland, and has for 
 some years been followed with happy results. Yet, 
 
2 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 the people of the Lord are feeling, to an increased 
 degree, the necessity of being directed in such a 
 way "that they may know the certainty of those 
 things wherein they have been instructed." They 
 are constantly confronted by the same questions, 
 which very properly excite their interest, yet cannot 
 be treated at sufficient length from the pulpit. 
 What wonder if the platform has risen into a power 
 side by side with the pulpit, which, — I do not 
 say it without shame and a sense of my own neg- 
 lect, — down to the present time has been used 
 perhaps more in opposing than in defending the 
 good cause. Truly, he who has anything to advise 
 in defence and support of his holy faith may well 
 make use of this means. This has been my con- 
 viction, at least, for some time, and your presence 
 on this occasion proves that it may also have been 
 yours. In fact, though slight and unprofitable ques- 
 tions have often been discussed here, yet enough 
 has happened within the last few months to make 
 us turn from them with a feeling of indifference 
 and even repugnance, in order to investigate a to- 
 tally different department. What is even the fiercest 
 battle in the social and political world compared 
 with the conflict concerning the most important 
 questions of life; what is the most dangerous sick- 
 ness compared with the torture of infidelity, which 
 takes from the sick man his only trust in life and 
 death? 
 
 The more convulsions and transitions we pass 
 through or expect in the change of things about us, 
 
VALUE OF THE WHOLE BIBLE. 6 
 
 the more we feel compelled to inquire after the firm 
 ground of those things which we have heretofore 
 believed and hoped could not be changed. The 
 more dark and threatening have been the times 
 in our century, the less able are we to do without 
 a solution to the enigma, a light in the darkness. 
 And this light and key can only be found, as I am 
 deeply convinced, in the Word of Truth. Whoever, 
 therefore, tears to pieces this Word, leaf for leaf, 
 before my eyes, takes away from me the very thing 
 which I can least do without in troublous times. 
 And he who restores to me even a single fragment 
 of this precious treasure has secured to me a spir- 
 itual capital, the value of which never declines even 
 in the most critical times, but is always sure, and 
 advancing in value. 
 
 In announcing Apologetic Lectures on the Life 
 of Jesus, I believe there is little necessity for either 
 an elaborate or personal explanation. Every one 
 knows that just this is the central point around 
 which the battle in our day is being fought out, with 
 as yet indecisive results. Even the new romance 
 which Kenan has served up for us as history, and 
 which he has entitled The Apostles, cannot alter our 
 conviction on this point. It is certain, that though 
 the history of the Apostolic Age is important, it will 
 never set so many tongues and pens to work as 
 the history of Christ himself, or as even the Jo- 
 hannean question alone. Of course, if the Gospel 
 History stands firm, we have a standing-place where 
 the words, deeds, and experiences of the Apostles 
 
 l* 
 
4 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN S GOSPEL. 
 
 can be explained and portrayed. But if, on the 
 contrary, Christ is nothing more than modern natu- 
 ralism represents him to be, we may be quite un- 
 concerned as to whether the Gospel owed its first 
 triumph over the Jewish and Gentile world to fa- 
 naticism, or to deception, or to a conjunction of fa- 
 vourable circumstances, or to a combination of all 
 these. Though these two questions are intimately 
 connected, they are far from having equal impor- 
 tance. The greatest of the Apostles is, in reality, 
 nothing less than the arm by which the sword of the 
 Spirit was wielded; but Christ is the living Head 
 of the Church. Take from me the Acts of the 
 Apostles, and my picture of the origin of the Church 
 may be clouded, but there yet remain the Apostolic 
 Epistles. These give a general outline of this same 
 picture, which is confirmed and illuminated in all 
 its minuteness by the Acts of the Apostles. But, 
 on the other hand, if you take from me the four 
 Gospels, or even that of John alone, my whole con- 
 fession of Christ will suffer from a defect whose 
 disastrous consequences for the doctrines of faith 
 and morals can scarcely be calculated. In fact, the 
 Christian theologian, especially the author of a Life 
 of Jesus, who passes over everything which has 
 recently been urged against the Christ of the Apostles, 
 incurs the danger of making a very unfavourable 
 impression in consequence of his timid or apparently 
 helpless conduct. And yet there would be no less 
 cause of complaint on his account than on account 
 of the holy cause which he defends. 
 
DANGER OF SUPERFICIAL TREATMENT. 5 
 
 I confess that I have long been indulging the 
 thought of delivering such Apologetic Lectures on 
 the Life of Jesus before a cultivated, though per- 
 haps not strictly learned, audience. Need I fear 
 being misunderstood if I say that I do not take in 
 hand this voluntary task without some degree of 
 hesitation. Let me add, at the same time, that it 
 is by no means a doubt of the merits of the cause 
 which I defend that produces in me a certain de- 
 gree of hesitation, but solely the fear that my man- 
 ner of defending it will be so inferior to the impor- 
 tance which it merits. It is, perhaps, less difficult 
 to speak to learned people on a scientific question 
 in an appropriate manner than to convey the results 
 of learned research in a popular form in such a way 
 as to avoid both the danger of obscurity and super- 
 ficiality. I am afraid that the Babel-like confusion 
 of tongues prevalent in our times has arisen, to a 
 great extent, from discussing before a mixed audience 
 controverted points, which had needed more mature 
 consideration in the council of the learned; and I 
 might almost affirm, that though ignorance in our 
 day slays its thousands, it is half-knowledge which 
 slays its tens and twenties of thousands. Yet the 
 question has been presented before the judicial seat 
 of the Church, and what Bacon has said of philos- 
 ophy may apply with equal force to theology, — 
 that "a little taste may lead away from God (as 
 He has revealed himself in Christ), but that a deeper 
 draught leads back to Him." 
 
 In examining the sources for a Life of Christ, 
 
 X 
 
6 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 there is one side of the question which can be 
 brought only partially and with difficulty within the 
 range of every man's vision; but there is another 
 side of the same question which the simple man 
 can discern just as well, and perhaps even better, 
 than the learned; for the sharpness of the learned 
 man's eye is not always equal to the extent of his 
 studies. 
 
 The external evidences for the authenticity of 
 one or more of the Gospels, — which priceless 
 treasure they possess, — are, and must ever remain, 
 such as it is difficult to pass a fair and independent 
 opinion upon as long as we have no knowledge of 
 the history of the second and third centuries; and, 
 if you will allow the expression, this cannot gener- 
 ally be expected of a layman. The internal proofs, 
 on the contrary, are not borrowed from old and 
 unknown writers, but from the contents of the Gospels 
 themselves, and are so numerous, and at the same 
 time so convincing, that they can be examined and 
 proved, in many cases, by every unlearned yet 
 unprejudiced person just as easily as one can dis- 
 tinguish cold and warm, bitter and sweet. To 
 portray the full value of all the Biblical accounts 
 concerning the life of our Lord is a task whose 
 satisfactory discharge, — at least within the limited 
 space of a few hours, — exceeds my power. But 
 to examine closely at least some sources, — espe- 
 cially those which are on the one hand valued most 
 highly, and, on the other, most violently opposed, 
 — is an undertaking which perhaps does not lie 
 
DESIGN OF THE LECTURES. 7 
 
 beyond my power, and certainly not beyond your 
 interest.. It is both an unfruitful and unrefreshing 
 task to contend against those who argue from to- 
 tally opposite views and principles, too many of 
 which are furnished by the history of the last few 
 years. But where the negative school ring out their 
 notes with increasing clearness, you cannot name 
 a nobler task for the Christian chime of our day than 
 to produce a clear and candid testimony of what 
 we have felt in ourselves to be the Truth and the 
 Life, and to aid in defending anew our well-grounded 
 faith against manifold contradictions. 
 
 I have now reached the point where I can de- 
 clare my design, how I believe that I must accom- 
 plish my task, and what I desire of my hearers. 
 It is my plan, in this and the following Lectures, 
 to direct your attention to the Gospel of John, with 
 the fixed purpose of learning where and how far it 
 is entitled to our confidence and esteem, as a histor- 
 ical source of the Life of our Lord. I wish to lead 
 you as little as possible into a department where 
 you can see with your own eyes only with difficulty, 
 but to point you to the Gospel itself as the best 
 advocate for the Gospel. I do not design to pro- 
 nounce a criticism on, or still less attempt a direct 
 refutation of, what I believe has been untruly and 
 unworthily said concerning the fourth Gospel in re- 
 cent years, as well in Holland as in other countries. 
 If I can only succeed in shedding a clear light, the 
 darkness will disappear of itself. I will go to work 
 positively rather than polemically, sincerity, and not 
 
8 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 animosity, shall be my watchword. The question 
 with which we have to deal is not the seeking of 
 one's own honor, but the authoritative exercise of 
 the honor of the Holy Scriptures; not in tearing 
 down, but in building up, — in establishing a proof 
 of the strong foundation on which faith in the Apos- 
 tolic Christ is grounded. You cannot desire that 
 I should remain immovably cold in discussing a 
 question which is vital in the fullest sense of the 
 word. Yet, in conducting the defence, I wish to 
 preserve all that composure which the conscious- 
 ness of a good cause can afford, and least of all 
 to forget the Apostolic sentiment: "I speak as to 
 wise men; judge ye what I say." In making up 
 your judgment, do not be arbitrary but candid; 
 withhold your final decision until the end is reached, 
 and you shall have weighed everything honestly; 
 and in the full consciousness of the narrowness and 
 defectiveness of all human knowledge, let your heart 
 unite with mine in uttering a response to the silent 
 prayer: " Sanctify them through thy truth; thy word 
 is truth." 
 
 As we now pass on to speak of the authenticity 
 of John's Gospel, nobody will deny, in view of what 
 has been said, that we enter a department of very 
 exciting questions ; neither can it be denied that the 
 credibility of the fourth Gospel deserves to be re- 
 garded as a subject of the highest importance. Of 
 course, the importance of this, as well as of every 
 other question, can be exaggerated; the loss of a 
 .single Scriptural book is by no means the downfall 
 
VALUE OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS. VJ 
 
 of Christianity. We readily grant, to a certain de- 
 gree, that we should not be deprived of Christ even 
 if we had not John's Gospel; the Christian Church 
 existed at least half a century, though under totally 
 different circumstances, without this Gospel having 
 lived and flourished. 1 I am, indeed, of the firm opin- 
 ion that the first three Gospels prove sufficiently 
 that Christ is infinitely more than the theology of 
 the present day would make of him, so long as we 
 are permitted to receive their accounts without mu- 
 tilation, and without being met at each of their ex- 
 pressions that has a superhuman character by the 
 dogmatic utterance: "As for me, I do not believe 
 that Jesus spoke these words." Further, if there be 
 left in our hands only the four Pauline Epistles, 
 whose authenticity even the Tubingen School could 
 not deny, — I mean those to the Romans, Corin- 
 thians, and Galatians, — I can justify my faith in 
 the supernatural origin of Christianity and in the 
 superhuman character of its Founder with them alone. 
 It is simply not true that the so-called "modern 
 tendency" will have triumphed in case John's Gospel 
 shall be proved to be unauthentic; even then there 
 would still remain facts and questions which no im- 
 partial inquirer can examine without at once becom- 
 ing convinced of the untenableness of this tendency. 
 
 1 According to Tholuck, Glaubwiirdigkeit der evang. Gesch., 
 p. 323, the present Greek Church derives its notion of Christ 
 almost exclusively from the first three Gospels, without hav- 
 ing, by this means alone, ceased to exist. Whether it flour- 
 ishes in the absence of the Johannean element, is quite a 
 different question. 
 
10 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 But can we stand indifferently at a distance from 
 the fourth Gospel if we inquire into the history of 
 Him whom we confess to be our Lord and Saviour? 
 We live in a time when the love of many has 
 waxed cold, and when much that was once dear to 
 them has lost its former value in their estimation. 
 Yet the mind of the Church can hardly be so deeply 
 sunken, so cold, and so puffed up, — if you will 
 allow the expression, — that the loss of a Gospel 
 of which the celebrated Herder, the apostle of hu- 
 manity, once said, "an angel has written it," would 
 not deeply affect their hearts. If we would not be 
 led astray by high-sounding terms, we cannot con- 
 ceal from ourselves the fact that we should certainly 
 have lost this Gospel, lost it forever from our faith 
 and life, if it had turned out to be no more than a 
 theological romance, or the historically coloured drama 
 which some men now-a-days declare it to be. There 
 is much said about what a "conscientious man, who 
 has the mournful privilege of thinking," * can or can- 
 not do in our times. But I ask, How long will such 
 a conscientious man regard it worth his trouble to 
 call Christ "The Bread of Life," "The Light of the 
 World," "The Good Shepherd," and "The Life," if it 
 is true that these and other terms mean nothing 
 more than the private opinions of an obscure writer 
 of romances, who lived in the latter half of the sec- 
 ond century, and who led the Church and the world 
 astray by his pious deception? It seems to me that 
 
 i Pierson. 
 
RECENT OPPOSITION TO JOHN'S GOSPEL. 11 
 
 a conscientious man will by no means commit such 
 dishonourable quibbles when sitting in the instructor's 
 chair of truth, supposing such a thing possible, for 
 a really conscientious man would catch him in the 
 very act of his Jesuitical mental reservation, and 
 would despise the impostor. 
 
 If we need any further proof of the importance 
 of our subject, it would be the ardour with which 
 this Gospel has been opposed during the last three 
 years, and which Renan has now carried to the 
 furthest extent. So much learning and acuteness 
 would not be applied to prove the possibility of the 
 unauthentic character of the fourth Gospel if such 
 men were not of the opinion that it is utterly im- 
 possible to secure a complete triumph to their so- 
 called modern view as long as this Gospel remains 
 firm in its place. What the resurrection of Christ 
 is in the historical sphere the authenticity of John's 
 Gospel has now become in the critical department, 
 — it is the all-pervading shibboleth; and we can 
 hardly deny the remark of Strauss, that we must 
 first be clear on John and his relation to the syn- 
 optic Evangelists before we can say a word con- 
 cerning the history of our Lord. He, indeed, is 
 foolish who can make himself easily contented while 
 things are in such a state. If any one who is on 
 the point of taking away our most precious jewels, 
 tells us that their loss would not amount to much 
 after all, and even that we owe him hearty thanks 
 for relieving us of a coloured glass -bead, he can 
 nevertheless hardly expect that we should unhesi- 
 
12 
 
 tatingly take this assurance of love without some 
 inquiry into the matter. 
 
 One more remark before proceeding to our im- 
 mediate subject. The opposition to John's Gospel, 
 — for we still adhere to this term in our prelimi- 
 nary remarks, — is by no means new, and yet it 
 is not so old that it has a long history behind it. 
 It began in England in 1792, by a certain Evanson; 
 and Bretschneider , an author not unknown in our 
 own country, continued it in 1820, though he had 
 been in a slight degree preceded by certain other 
 German writers. The invaded territory, however, 
 was so zealously defended on different sides that 
 the last-named opponent publicly withdrew his ob- 
 jections, and declared that his purpose of becoming 
 more strongly convinced himself was now fully gained. 
 There now came on a period of peace to the fourth 
 Gospel, which lasted fifteen years; but it was dis- 
 turbed in 1835 by Strauss, in the First Edition of 
 his Life of Jesus. Yet so strong is the power of 
 truth itself upon its most obstinate opponents, that 
 Strauss felt himself compelled by the strong refutation 
 he met with, to declare, in his Third Edition (1838), 
 that he was no longer of the opinion that this Gospel 
 was unauthentic, and that he now doubted the cor- 
 rectness of his own previous doubts concerning it. 
 But in the Fourth Edition, on the contrary (that of 
 1840), he withdrew this confession, yet not, as it 
 seems, because of new arguments, but owing to the 
 influence of painful experiences in his personal life. 
 And in his popular treatment of the same work (1864), 
 
ENEMIES AND FRIENDS. 13 
 
 nearly twenty five years later, he unhesitatingly ex- 
 tended a friendly hand to the criticisms of the Tu- 
 bingen School, which had arisen in the meantime, 
 and had hoped to dissect the Gospel of John into 
 an "artistic composition." It was especially this 
 school, which, being supported from several quarters, 
 made such a spirited attack on the authenticity of 
 John's Gospel that there was some ground for 
 speaking of a "modern revolt" against the Johannean 
 Christ. But here again it became apparent how 
 fire, while it burns up the straw, only gives a more 
 splendid polish to the gold. To say nothing of the 
 defence of the Gospel in other lands, it was at- 
 tempted in our own country, especially by two Ley- 
 den Professors, Niermeyer and Scholten, and followed 
 by good results. Strong views were heard from 
 Professors in Utrecht and Groningen ; and in Amster- 
 dam this Gospel found in Da Costa a warm de- 
 fender. Ten years ago, and even later, all the prom- 
 inent theologians in this country harmonized on 
 the great fact of its authenticity and value. Even 
 between the different schools and tendencies there 
 prevailed unanimity in this respect, while in Ger- 
 many, theologians of the first rank, such as Liicke, 
 Ebrard, Ewald, Bleek, Hase, and many others, re- 
 garded it both a pleasure and an honour to conduct 
 the defence of John. 
 
 You may ask, then, whence does it come that 
 the s torm has arisen anew within the last few years 
 and months? Has there been a sudden discovery 
 of difficulties in this Gospel which nobody had antic- 
 
14 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 ipated before, and which are not reconcilable with 
 its Apostolic origin? Or, have new witnesses from 
 antiquity been suddenly heard against it? And, if 
 all this has not occurred, have the earlier witnesses 
 for it become antiquated, refuted, and brought to 
 silence? 
 
 Neither the one nor the other has taken place. 
 The subject itself, with its pros and cons, stands 
 pretty much as it did before; it is only the eye by 
 which it is observed that has become gradually 
 changed, or, rather, there are eyes which now see 
 through a certain kind of spectacles that render it 
 impossible to regard this Gospel as anything else 
 than an unhistorical , and therefore unauthentic, 
 writing. You have no doubt sometimes heard in 
 by-gone years of "orthodox-phobia-," but, indeed, the 
 "miracle-phobia" of later date is scarcely a less 
 prevalent and obstinate evil. Sceptical criticism is 
 controlled by philosophical attacks and views which 
 assume at the outset that this or that should, and 
 could, by no means have happened. In regard to 
 every work of so high antiquity as this Gospel, 
 questions and phenomena very easily arise, which, 
 as soon as one once begins to doubt, awaken only 
 mistrust, and perhaps justify it to a certain degree. 
 Perfectly new weapons against the fourth Gospel 
 have not, so far as we know, been devised in the 
 most recent time; but we must say, for the honour 
 of those who are engaged in the attack, that the 
 old ones, which have been many times wrested from 
 the hand by our predecessors, have been sharpened 
 
MODERN SCEPTICAL DEVICES. 15 
 
 anew, and are wielded with so much skill against 
 certain points that the latter may seem really to he 
 threatened. In the critical method there is an art 
 which can hardly he better described than by the 
 expression of "the art of grouping figures," which 
 we must be careful to distinguish from "the art of 
 verifying dates." But there is not any special dex- 
 terity in so presenting the proofs for a good cause 
 in the shade, and the grounds against it so in the 
 light, that the well-meaning, but not properly in- 
 structed, observer derives an unfavourable and per- 
 haps deeply painful impression. It is not so diffi- 
 cult to describe what is clear in an obscure way, 
 the simple in an intricate style, and that which is 
 universally recognized as having but little foun- 
 dation in such a light that the uninitiated man scarce- 
 ly knows how the matter stands. And certainly 
 the acuteness of the critically analytical mind has 
 never greater hope of victory than when it enters 
 into the service of systematic scepticism, under the 
 influence of fashion and the spirit of the age. 
 
 You will be able to decide hereafter how far 
 these general remarks apply to this subject. It is 
 very certain that such a materialistic age as ours 
 can exhibit little sympathy for such a spiritual Gospel 
 as that of John. Modern naturalism knows per- 
 fectly well that it may as well make its will if 
 this Apostle has really spoken the truth. And it is 
 quite natural that naturalism would sooner pronounce 
 sentence of death on the Christ which John describes 
 than subscribe to its own death-warrant. It is urged, 
 
16 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 that we must impartially inquire as to whether the 
 grounds for the authenticity of the fourth Gospel 
 are satisfactory; but the people who do this quite 
 involuntarily increase the number of the conditions 
 on which this authenticity is to be determined; and, 
 indeed, they find it necessary to increase these con- 
 ditions, because the recognition of authenticity would 
 necessarily lead to the renunciation of the modern 
 idea of God and the general view connected with 
 it, — a result which is very naturally avoided by 
 these men. 
 
 Is it our opinion that the method adopted in 
 opposing the fourth Gospel in our day deserves the 
 name of "partizanship?" We must confess, that, at 
 least now and then, we cannot banish this word 
 from our lips without an effort, when we perceive 
 how easily sometimes the most cogent reasons in 
 favour of this object of accusation are pushed aside, 
 or declared to be devoid of the slightest force. It 
 seems at least undeniable, that the perception of the 
 necessary failure of Kenan's well-known romance, 
 — because he firmly adheres to John, — has in- 
 creased the opposition of his sympathizers to this 
 Gospel to a degree not known before. It was an 
 opposition which was prepared with care, announced 
 with boldness, and begun, continued, and maintained 
 with skill and talent, but at the same time has been 
 popularized with so much adroitness, and made use 
 of by minds of such small dimensions, that we are 
 involuntarily reminded of the well-known expression 
 of the poet: " Though kings build, hod-carriers have 
 
John's self -testimony. 17 
 
 to do the work." Will not John, who has fallen so 
 low with some, again rise in value, since it is plain 
 that Renan, in his Apostles, adheres incorrigibly to 
 the authenticity of John's Gospel, — thus proving 
 that even the most audacious revolutionist may show 
 himself conservative on this important point? Such 
 a thing is not impossible. Many learned men of 
 the present day have accustomed us to a change of 
 face with every new edition of their works; and 
 who knows what we may experience within a few 
 months to come? We will quietly await the future; 
 meanwhile, let us take John's Gospel itself into 
 our hands, and ask the author the same question 
 which he reports the Jews to have asked his con 
 temporary of the same name: "What sayest thou 
 of thyself?" 
 
 "What sayest thou of thyself?" — John has as 
 little to say of himself, as the author of his Gospel, 
 as Matthew, Mark and Luke have had to say on 
 their authorship. Even the usual title, "The Gospel 
 according (xaxa) to John," which may be attributed 
 to later origin, and variously construed, does not 
 here warrant any absolute certainty. We must 
 therefore set out upon a voyage of discovery, in 
 order to trace out previously the still anonymous 
 author, — a task all the more difficult, but at the 
 same time the more fascinating, because he pur- 
 posely keeps more in the background, instead of 
 coming to the light. In the last chapter, which we 
 have good grounds for believing was written by the 
 same hand which had written the twenty preceding 
 
 2 
 
18 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 ones, the author characterizes himself (chapter xxi. 
 20 — 24) as "the disciple whom Jesus loved, who 
 testifieth of these things, and wrote these things." 1 
 But it is very prohable that he only reveals the 
 secret of his name in this way for the very reason 
 that it was not unknown to his first hearers. Even 
 this silence leads us to suppose that the author must 
 not have been an obscure person, but one who was 
 pretty well known; and it therefore decidedly in- 
 dicates the Apostolic origin of the Gospel. Or, why 
 should Falsarius, who would make the impression 
 that he was no less than the Apostle John himself, 
 not have been ready to ornament his writing with 
 this highly revered name ; as, for example, the writer 
 of the Second Epistle of Peter, — granted, for the 
 sake of argument, though we do not accept it, that 
 this Epistle is not authentic, — immediately begins 
 by designating himself as "Simon Peter, a servant 
 and apostle of Jesus Christ." It seems to me, that 
 if, in this latter case, the mention of the Apostle's 
 name gives us ground for supposing the Epistle to 
 be authentic, then the absence of the name in this 
 Gospel justifies us in assuming its authenticity. Yet, 
 we only say this in passing. We desire perfect 
 certainty far more than bare possibility, and we 
 shall not find it difficult to perceive this certainty 
 as soon as we look at the great unnamed one, who 
 here stands before us, plainly in the face. 
 
 1 Compare, on the authenticity of the 21st chapter of 
 John, J. J. van Oosterzee, Life of Jesus, last (Dutch) Edi- 
 tion (1865), Part III; also the literature given in the same place. 
 
THE AUTHOR AN EYE-WITNESS. 19 
 
 It certainly stands upon the very face of the 
 Gospel that its writer must have been a Jew, — a 
 Jew living in Palestine at the time of our Lord. 
 Although he nowhere indicates his purpose to write 
 for Jews, he, not less than Matthew, continually 
 cites the Old Testament, and shows unmistakably 
 that he was not merely intimately acquainted with 
 the Alexandrine translation but also with the 
 original Hebrew text. On the smallest points he shows 
 an extensive acquaintance with Jewish manners and 
 customs. Writing after the destruction of Jerusalem, 
 he paints the Holy City, with its inhabitants and 
 localities, in such living colours thait tappears to us 
 sometimes as if the city and temple stood before us. 
 One of the most prominent Oriental scholars of Ger- 
 many, Henry Ewald, says: "We discover throughout, 
 in the author, a man who possessed an accurate 
 knowledge of the state of Galilee and Judea at the 
 time of our Lord, — a man who possessed such 
 knowledge as could only be found in an eye-witness 
 of that time." » 
 
 It has been unjustly maintained that he speaks 
 of the Jews in a spirit of animosity. We grant 
 that we do not find that warm sympathy for Israel 
 which Paul exhibits; but it is owing to the influence 
 of totally different experiences and circumstances of 
 
 1 Likewise Weizsacker, Ueber die Evangelische Geschichte, 
 1864, p. 263: "We find ourselves so completely transported 
 to the Jewish circle of ideas and to Jewish life, that, in this 
 respect, we must recognize not only the design of portraying 
 these matters thoroughly, but also the peculiar memory which 
 furnishes the material for such portraj'al." 
 
 2* 
 
20 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 life that the feeling of nationality is more outspoken 
 in Paul than in John. At the time of Paul, Jeru- 
 salem was still standing; but when John wrote, — 
 we are here dealing with him in particular, — the 
 city, the temple, and the visible partition-wall 
 between the Jews and Gentiles, had fallen; the 
 chosen people were no more God's people, but were 
 suffering the penalty of their rejection of the Messiah ; 
 and so completely did a glowing love for Christ 
 pervade the writer that it outweighed his feeling 
 of nationality. Moreover, it is well known that, 
 where the Jews are spoken of in the fourth Gospel, 
 we must have in mind chiefly the Jews of hostile 
 feeling, the party of the Sanhedrists (for example, 
 chapter v. 15, 16, 18), who are also described in 
 the other Gospels in a very unfavourable light; and 
 what bosom-friend of Jesus could represent this 
 party mildly and forbearingly? Yet sorrow, mingled 
 with the deepest indignation, is perceptible enough 
 in the lamentation: "He came unto his own, and 
 his own received him not" (chapter i. 11). No 
 wonder, since he shows plainly that the old Israel- 
 itish expectation of the Messiah is also perfectly 
 his own. Even his incarnate Logos is the same 
 Christ of whom Moses and the Prophets bare witness ; 
 who says of himself, "salvation is of the Jews;" and 
 who places himself in the same line with the people 
 of Israel when he makes use of the profound ex- 
 pression, "we know what we worship." So with our 
 writer himself; his whole language proves him to 
 be a son of Abraham, but an Israelite who has 
 
THE AUTHOR A FRIEND OF JESUS. 21 
 
 found his Messiah, and in him the Light and Life 
 of the world. The fundamental Jewish type of his 
 individuality, which is controlled by a new, Christian, 
 and philosophical element, nowhere disappears, but 
 ever and anon presents itself anew to the attentive 
 eye in a surprising manner. 
 
 It is just as plain that this Israelite must have 
 belonged to the most intimate circle of the friends 
 and contemporaries of our Lord. The reflection of 
 the Light of the world strikes upon us as from the 
 very face of the man who exclaims in holy ecstacy, 
 "And we beheld his glory" (chapter i. 14). It is, 
 in fact, perfectly gratuitous to associate this decla- 
 ration with a merely intellectual intuition, that has 
 as good as nothing to do with sensuous contem- 
 plation. It rather sounds like a note of the per- 
 manent remembrance of personal, living experience, 
 — as a voice from the heart of the Apostolic circle. 
 He who utters it speaks at the same time in the 
 name of others with whom he felt himself to be 
 one, yet not by virtue of the gift of intuition, but 
 because he was in possession of a matchless privi- 
 lege. Yet he subsequently looks away from them; 
 he appears before us standing alone, and says: 
 "And he that saw it bare record, and his record is 
 true: and he knoweth that he saith true" (chapter 
 xix. 35). He thus speaks as an eye-witness of 
 such a material fact as the piercing of our Lord's 
 side, with its well-known consequences. We contin- 
 ually recognize him as such because of his use 
 of the present tense, in which he generally records 
 
22 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 his accounts, but still more in the manner in which 
 he invariably transports us to the scene of the 
 circumstances themselves. What can be more visible 
 than his. description, in the seventh chapter, of the 
 state and struggle of parties in Jerusalem; what 
 more plastic, fresh, and outspoken than his account 
 in the ninth chapter of the man who was born blind, 
 of his parents, of his conduct before the Sanhedrim, 
 and of his meeting with our Lord? In fact, such 
 accounts may be compared to a freshly-plucked 
 cluster of grapes, on which the morning dew still 
 glistens; and I deeply pity him who, on carefully 
 reading them, does not receive the slightest degree 
 of this impression, but can think only of the artistic 
 creation of an anonymous compositor, who, — oh, 
 unheard of connection, — combines such incompa- 
 rable talents with such unskillful simplicity. 
 
 It is undeniable that our author moves as a fa- 
 miliar acquaintance among the friends of our Lord, 
 and in every case appears to know something more 
 than his predecessors relate. With the exception of 
 Peter, these chief characters are described only in 
 general outline by the other Evangelists; but here 
 they appear before us animated and active. We 
 here become acquainted with Bartholomew, not men- 
 tioned by him elsewhere, by his precise name of 
 Nathanael; Thomas, elsewhere mentioned only by 
 name, here appears before us three times, twice in- 
 cidentally, and once as a principal character when 
 the risen Christ makes his appearance. 1 At each 
 
 i John XI. 16; XIV. 5; XX. 24—29. 
 
the author's minuteness. 23 
 
 of these times, however, he is presented so strikingly 
 and naturally in the same character that the writer, 
 like a skillful artist, paints for us a likeness in 
 but three strokes of his brush that is distinctly dif- 
 ferent from all the other portraits of him, and can 
 only be explained on the ground of its having been 
 the fruit of personal recollection. There is here 
 presented to us a treasury of details which may be 
 apparently of but little consequence, but they are 
 explicable only on the ground that they arise from 
 the natural necessity of the witness to write down, 
 even to the smallest particulars, those recollections 
 which were so invaluable to his own heart. 
 
 Notice the number and size of the stone water- 
 pots of Cana, whose contents were changed into 
 wine; the value of the pounds of myrrh and aloes 
 which Nicodemus used at the burial; and the cor- 
 rect number of the fish caught in the Lake of Ti- 
 berias. In fact, if we would not incur the folly of 
 an allegorical interpretation of John's mention of 
 numbers, — which, strangely enough, is favoured 
 by our modern Rationalists, — we must recognize 
 the truth of this conclusion : just because there seems 
 to be no reasonable ground for presenting such ap- 
 parently small details, they must have had their 
 natural ground in the personal interest of the author. 
 In addition to this, comes the fact that he knew 
 very well not only what, and how, but also when 
 the events transpired. His Gospel deals in such 
 chronological indications as have an importance 
 more from a psychological than from a historical 
 
24 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 point of view. They furnish proof of his unmistak- 
 able effort, when writing, to place again before the 
 eye the facts themselves as exactly as possible, in 
 their natural relation, and to enable his readers to 
 live in the midst of them as if they had been them- 
 selves eye-witnesses with him. Even in the first 
 chapter our attention is directed to the regular suc- 
 cession of days, and even to the tenth hour; then 
 (chapter iv. 6) to the sixth hour, when our Lord 
 sat at the well; and then to the seventh hour 
 (verse 52), when the fever left the nobleman's son. 
 All these dates appear to be without any conceivable 
 purpose, — but for this very reason they possess 
 great importance, for they, involuntarily remind us 
 of an eye-witness. 
 
 And it is remarkable that we meet with these 
 chronological intimations chiefly at the beginning 
 and the end of the history. Are we not also ac- 
 customed, when we call to mind our early ex- 
 periences, to notice with pleasure the individual 
 parts at the beginning and end, while those of the 
 intermediate time become proportionately indistinct, 
 even in the best memory? 
 
 I believe we can scarcely err when we seek this 
 Apostle in the Apostolical circle. The most of the 
 Apostles are distinctly mentioned in this Gospel. 
 Thaddeus is mentioned once; Philip twice; Andrew 
 four times; Thomas five times; the betrayer eight 
 times; and Peter thirty-three times. We have not 
 the slightest ground for regarding one of these as 
 
HIS LANGUAGE BETRAYS HIM. 25 
 
 the eye-witness who here furnishes the account. * 
 We only miss two principal names: James, the son 
 of Zebedee, — who had been earlier beheaded by 
 Herod (Acts xn. 2), and who therefore cannot at 
 all come into consideration as the author of this 
 last Gospel; — and John, who, with Peter and 
 James, was the most intimate disciple of Jesus and 
 one of the so-called "pillar -Apostles." 2 That his 
 name is totally ignored in the fourth Gospel is 
 utterly inexplicable unless he wrote it himself. From 
 all that has been said, it can scarcely admit of a 
 doubt that he, and no one else, was the "other 
 disciple," whom we find so frequently mentioned 
 with Peter; who stood by the cross with the women; 
 and first believed at the empty sepulchre in the re- 
 surrection of the Master. This follows indirectly, 
 but yet without a doubt, from the mention of the 
 memorable tenth hour (chapter i. 40), in which the 
 friend of Andrew and Peter was brought for the 
 first time to Jesus, — a statement which is either 
 totally without occasion or purpose, or it is the 
 writer's ineffaceable recollection of the happiest hour 
 of his life. 
 
 But John's authorship of the fourth Gospel ap- 
 pears, above all, from one feature, which is so per- 
 fectly artless that the perception of it almost com- 
 pels us to say of our author: "His language betrays 
 him." And what is this? While the other Evan- 
 
 i Lutzelberger's notion that it was Andrew, has been 
 refuted by Bleek. 
 2 Galatians II. 9. 
 
26 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 gelists speak of the precursor as John the Baptist, 
 — and very naturally so, in order to distinguish 
 him from his companion of the same name in the 
 circle of Apostles, — this writer nowhere regards 
 it necessary to add this surname to the forerunner 
 of our Lord. In all other cases he is exact and 
 complete enough in giving names. He speaks of 
 Thomas, "called Didymus," of Judas "not Iscariot," 
 and of Peter as "Simon Peter;" and why does he 
 never speak of John the Baptist as John the Baptist, 
 who was universally known and honoured by this 
 name? There is only one conceivable reason: Be- 
 cause he himself was John, and was known as such 
 to his hearers, he did not regard the distinction as 
 at all necessary; indeed, it may never have occurred 
 to him to draw the distinction, because, unlike the 
 remaining Evangelists, he did not know two Johns, 
 apart from himself, of whom it was necessary to 
 speak to his readers. 
 
 Now tell me, can you suppose that an impostor 
 who appeared under the name of John, and men- 
 tioned the precursor of Jesus about twenty times, 
 should ever have thought to himself: "I will take 
 care always to speak of the Baptist without this 
 surname, since I can take cognizance of only one 
 John, as I myself have undertaken to play the part 
 of the other?" In this case, we should indeed have 
 to do with one of the most cunning deceivers, who 
 would be less in place before the judicial bench of 
 criticism than before the police-court. Even our most 
 hot-headed opponents must confess that the writer 
 
INTERNAL PROOFS OF AUTHORSHIP. 27 
 
 of the fourth Gospel wished to be regarded as no 
 one else than John; yet, if "the style is still the 
 man," it is incumbent upon us of the present day to 
 explain psychologically how he could have so imi- 
 tated this one without himself having been, and lived 
 the original, and how so much subtleness of char- 
 acter could be united with so much frankness of ex- 
 pression. You may rest assured, that, if the negative 
 critics did not possess their special reasons why a 
 certain somebody could never have written this 
 Gospel, the most critical acuteness could scarcely 
 find an end to the multitude of internal reasons 
 which prove that the author could have been none 
 other than the son of Zebedee. The question is still 
 propounded: "Why, then, did he not mention his 
 own name?" The answer is easy. Why should 
 the Apostle have done what was not customary in 
 his day, and what was utterly superfluous for read- 
 ers who were acquainted with him? He certainly 
 never reckoned on severe critics without special gifts 
 for their occupation, and still less on readers who 
 only recently knew which one of the Apostles was 
 the disciple "whom Jesus loved." This honourable 
 epithet was infinitely dearer to his heart than any 
 other; he therefore made use of it with special 
 pleasure when it was necessary to speak of himself; 
 and that man cannot be a very acute psychologist 
 if he regards as immodest boasting the choice of a 
 term that expresses the deepest sense of gratitude 
 for the highest manifestation of favour. 
 
 When we look at these features it is simply 
 
28 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 impossible to be mistaken about the person. We 
 may therefore confidently group in this first con- 
 clusion the result thus far gained: The light which 
 the Gospel itself sheds upon its author warrants us 
 in adopting no other opinion than that it was written 
 by John, the son of Zebedee. T 
 
 "But," it may be said, "You can possibly be de- 
 ceived. Perhaps, what we learn elsewhere con- 
 cerning John is of such a character that we must 
 come to the conclusion that it was not possible for 
 such a person as this one to have written this 
 Gospel." Let us see. 
 
 We become acquainted with the Apostle John 
 more on less from the first three Gospels, from the 
 Epistles of Paul, from his own Epistles, and espe- 
 cially from the first one ; at least, until within a few 
 years ago, no prominent theologian had ever doubted 
 that this first Epistle was written by the same per- 
 son who wrote the Gospel. We become acquainted 
 with him from the Book of Revelation, whose authen- 
 ticity is acknowledged by almost every opponent of 
 the fourth Gospel; we know him, finally, from the 
 accounts of the Church Fathers, who tell us con- 
 cerning this Apostle such things as cannot be doubted. 
 From a combination of all these scattered colours 
 there stands before our eyes a perfectly clear life- 
 
 i Compare K. L. Weitzel, Das Selbstzeugniss des vierten 
 Evangelisten iiber seine Person, in the Stud. u. Krit., 1849, III. 
 p. 578 fif. — An example of how even very freethinking 
 critics have perceived the unmistakably Johannean character 
 of the fourth Gospel, may be found in Credner, Einl. N. T., 
 1836, I. Sec. 93, p. 208. 
 
the writer's characteristics. 29 
 
 picture. Quite apart, therefore, from the fourth 
 Gospel, there appears before us the person of John. 
 Well, let us ask , whether we find John in the fourth 
 Gospel exactly as he is known to us from the other 
 sources mentioned? Our answer is, judging from so 
 many varied characteristics, if we only knew that 
 this John had simply written a Gospel, we should 
 he driven to the conclusion that it is a Gospel which 
 possesses just the character that we meet with in 
 the fourth. 
 
 Now for the proof. It may be said, "The author 
 of this Gospel could only have been a friend of 
 Jesus." But it is exactly as such a friend that we 
 become acquainted with John through the synoptic 
 Evangelists. 
 
 "The writer manifests a culture and intellectual 
 development quite above the other Evangelists." 
 But, according to the synoptic Evangelists, the 
 son of Zebedee belonged to the moderately opulent 
 class of fishermen. 1 His mother was none other 
 than the judicious and vivacious Salome; and he 
 tarried for years in the cultivated city of Ephesus, 
 where he must necessarily have come in contact 
 with the philosophical tendency of his times. There- 
 fore, it could not have been difficult for him to rise 
 to more than an ordinary degree of culture. 
 
 Again, "The author exhibits in almost every line 
 a spirit and holy zeal for the Lord's cause, united 
 with a glow of the most intense love for the person 
 
 i Mark I. 20; Luke V. 10; Mat. XX. 20; Mark XVI. 1. 
 
30 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 of the Master." But just this is the energetic 
 Boanerges-character as represented by the synoptic 
 Evangelists, according to whom John also wished 
 that fire from heaven should descend upon the in- 
 hospitable village of the Samaritans, and who would 
 not tarry under the same roof with that arch -heretic, 
 Cerinthus; but he is also the patriarch who grouped 
 his last will and testament in the commandment 
 of love. 
 
 Still more. "In the first three Gospels, the Acts 
 of the Apostles, and the Epistles of Paul, John is 
 everywhere the man who says much less than the 
 impetuous Peter; he repeatedly appears with Peter, 
 but always allows the latter to conduct the con- 
 versation; * he is the witness whose receptivity 
 surpasses the spontaneousness of his mind; he is 
 the quiet observer, — I was almost going to say, 
 the silent man." But this is exactly such a person 
 as our writer proves and declares himself to be. 
 Call to mind the silent John at the Last Supper of 
 our Lord, in contrast with the inquisitive Peter, 
 Thomas, and Judas (not Iscariot) ; and think of the 
 many remarks introduced in relating facts connected 
 with himself, which are sometimes enlarged by the 
 self-confession of earlier error or defective perception. 2 
 We might mention, in this connection, the strange 
 confession of Falsarius, who hoped to awaken un- 
 limited confidence in his account by writing in the 
 person of the most distinguished Apostle. 
 
 i Acts III. and IV.; G-alatians II. 
 2 John II. 21, 22: XII. 16. 
 
PROOFS OF IDENTITY. 31 
 
 If the First Epistle of John, not to mention the 
 Second and Third, was really written by this 
 Apostle, (and this has been acknowledged by every- 
 body, with the exception of the latest advocates of 
 a single school), then the beginning, key-note, spirit, 
 and whole tendency of the Epistle presents such 
 surpassing elements of harmony with the fourth 
 Gospel that the identity of authorship is clearly 
 perceptible on every page. So mcuh is this the fact 
 that we can hardly silence the question, whether 
 one of these writings did not serve as an accom- 
 paniment to the other? 
 
 And now what idea must we form of John ac- 
 cording to the Apocalypse, a writing whose Jo- 
 hannean origin has been left untouched by even 
 the negative criticism of our times? Certainly, that 
 he is a man who confesses with loud voice the di- 
 vine nature and majesty of Jesus, — for which 
 reason the writer received at an early period the 
 name of "The Theologian ; " — who finds specifically 
 in the work of redemption and reconciliation the 
 very center of the whole of Christ's labors ; and by 
 whom the love for Christ and the desire for his 
 Second Coming are spoken louder than by any other 
 voice. Observe, that the same fundamental features 
 appear here as on almost every page of this Gospel, 
 notwithstanding the infinite diversity that must 
 necessarily arise from a difference between history 
 and prophecy. No one of impartial judgment denies 
 that the divine nature and dignity of the Messiah 
 can scarcely be declared more clearly than is done 
 
32 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 in the Apocalypse. Then, we find here the same 
 key-note which echoes more majestically than any- 
 where else, except from the prologue to the fourth 
 Gospel; and most assuredly no one can call it 
 accidental that the only place in the New Testament, 
 with the exception of this prologue, where the name 
 of Logos is attributed to Christ, is in the Book of 
 Revelation (chapter xix. 13). 
 
 Still more. From tradition we become acquainted 
 with John as the most long-lived of the Apostles, 
 who evidently, therefore, — if we believe in the 
 continuous guidance of the first witnesses of our Lord 
 by the Spirit of truth, — must have stood higher 
 than all others, have looked deeper than all others, 
 and have been further removed than all others from 
 the contracted Jewish views which, in the earlier 
 period, had undoubtedly been as distinct in him as 
 in his fellow-apostles. I ask you, does not this 
 very fourth Gospel make on you the impression 
 that it was written by a man whose youth was 
 long behind him, who had seen Jerusalem lying in 
 ruins below him, and who had almost completely 
 ascended in the person of Him on whose heart he 
 once lay, as if to listen to the throbbings of that 
 heart, and at last to explain, after years of silence, 
 what he had seen, and heard, and lost in his in- 
 describably blissful contemplation of the One so un- 
 speakably beloved. 
 
 But I desist. Such harmonies, only a few of 
 which I here touch upon, can be seen in abun- 
 dance by any one who takes pleasure in the study 
 
ONE PROOF SUPPORTING ANOTHER. 33 
 
 of them. I think they prove so much, — according: 
 to some, so little, — that inward harmony is per- 
 fectly demonstrable if we inquire after truth and 
 life. You will hardly be able to deny that, in this, 
 case, the harmony is as unintentional as it is incon- 
 trovertible. We, at least, maintain that one of the 
 most excellent theologians of our day does not say- 
 too much when he writes thus: " There has never 
 been between a book and a writer a harmony more 
 striking than between the fourth Gospel and the 
 person of John, such as the histoiy of the first cent- 
 ury has made him known to us." * And holding 
 myself fully responsible to answer any denial that 
 may here arise, I may add, on the ground of what 
 has been said, this second formal conclusion: What 
 the Gospel itself gives us ground for deciding upon 
 its author, is established in a multiform and sur- 
 prising manner by what we learn elsewhere of John ; 
 and the one proof, therefore, naturally and necessa- 
 rily supports the other. 
 
 Here, however, the opponent of the authenticity 
 of this Gospel finds it impossible to look on in 
 silence. Thus he exclaims to us: "What is the use 
 of all these and other grounds; what is the use of 
 the witnesses of an author with reference to his 
 own work, if this work shows that the author is 
 constantly in antagonism with the work itself? And 
 just see how this Gospel bears upon its very face 
 the most direct proofs that it could not have been 
 
 i Edm. de Pressense, Jesus Christ, etc. Paris, 1866. p. 223. 
 
 3 
 
34 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 written by John." This is the exclamation of a con- 
 tinually increasing number of voices at our left ; and 
 yet at the right we hear constantly repeated, in all 
 manner of forms, the sentiment of Ebrard: "There 
 is no book in all pagan and Christian antiquity 
 which can produce more positive and numerous proofs 
 for its authenticity than just this fourth Gospel." 
 The controversy here gives promise of great ardor, 
 but, on this account, it is all the more interesting. 
 Let us try to arrive at certainty on this point, and then 
 we shall see on which side lie the truth and the right. 
 We at once hear from the camp of our oppo- 
 nents the cry: "This Gospel is unauthentic, for it 
 contains a number of historical, geographical, and 
 statistical mistakes which it is impossible to expect 
 from a contemporary of our Lord, and least of all 
 from John." Granting that this is so, then we ask 
 every impartial man this question: Must not the 
 mistakes be very gross, and the errors quite distinct, 
 in order to be able to outweigh the proofs which we 
 have already presented, and which pronounce more 
 distinctly for the authenticity of the Gospel the lon- 
 ger we reflect upon them? Let me concede your 
 point for a moment, just for the sake of an exam- 
 ple. A very aged inhabitant of our metropolis, who 
 passed through the scenes connected with the inde- 
 pendence of the Netherlands, in the year 1813, 
 subsequently went either east or west, and there 
 published a book descriptive of the events of his 
 youth, on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary, in 
 18G3. In numerous instances he proves plainly that 
 
DOUBTFUL PASSAGES EXPLICABLE. 35 
 
 he was an eye - witness, but he once makes a mis- 
 take by mentioning the Nobleman's Canal, for ex- 
 ample, where he should have said the Emperor's 
 Canal ; or, in giving- an historical account of an event, 
 he places it on the 15th of November, while others 
 show that it occurred on the 16th. Now I ask, would 
 not this aged man have good ground for complain- 
 ing at the criticism which would push aside all his 
 authenticated claims to belief and reliance, because 
 of such a small matter, and say that he could not 
 have lived at all amid the events of the year 1813? 
 Very well; in the most unfavourable case, the mat- 
 ter would stand just so with the fourth Gospel, — 
 yet, even then, it need not give us a single sleep- 
 less night. 
 
 In the most unfavourable case, I say. Yet do 
 we really find this to be the fact? Of nearly all 
 the doubtful passages an explanation can be given 
 which is at least just as acceptable as that which 
 the negative criticism presents ; and in every instance 
 there is only a show of disadvantage to John. 
 Against a hundred internal evidences of authentic- 
 ity, we can scarcely gather together ten suspicious 
 grounds of the kind mentioned, and one after an- 
 other of these falls away on coming to the light. 
 It is inferred, for example, from the expression 
 (chapter xi. 49): Caiaphas "being the high-priest that 
 same year," that the author had in mind an annual 
 change of the high -priest's office, — which would be 
 in conflict with history. But what prevents us from 
 maintaining that he here speaks emphatically of "the 
 
 3* 
 
36 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 [remarkable] year," the year of the death of our 
 Lord? Or, if this be objected to, who can say that 
 there was not a sort of secret and base exchange 
 between Annas and Caiaphas, which, at that time, 
 might have been tolerably well known, although 
 not mentioned in history, just as many private machi- 
 nations in the ecclesiastical and political spheres of 
 later date have not been chronicled? 
 
 One more example. " 'John also was baptizing 
 (chapter m. 23) in Enon, near to Salim ; ' but there 
 existed no such city as Enon. Jesus visited Bethesda 
 (chapter v. 2), but Josephus is silent on this place 
 of baptism." Very well; uncertainty is no proof of 
 falsehood, and silence gives us no right for nega- 
 tion. Enon is not once mentioned here as a city; 
 and if it was so little known that it had to be more 
 definitely denoted by the addition of the local speci- 
 fication, "near to Salim," then it should cause us no 
 wonder that it is not mentioned by any other topog- 
 rapher. Or, does our knowledge of the Holy Land 
 present no other chasms besides this; and, among^ 
 other places of baptism in Jerusalem, may there not 
 have been one by the name of Bethesda, though Jo- 
 sephus may have had no occasion to make mention 
 of it? Must we infer that the "sheep-gate" which 
 Nehemiah mentions, did not exist (Nehemiah in. 32; 
 xii. 39), because the Jewish historian is silent con- 
 cerning it? 
 
 A third example. "John, according to most MSS., 
 relates, at the beginning of his history of the passion 
 of Christ, that He went over the brook of The Ce- 
 
John's alleged incorrectness. 37 
 
 dars (toot xedgoov), which, however, did not exist 
 anywhere in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem, and 
 which, accordingly, could have been invented by an 
 ignorant writer, who confounded the well-known and 
 dark Brook Cedron with an imaginary brook of 
 "The Cedars." The reading (chapter xvra. 1) on which 
 this objection is made, is not firmly established, but 
 is probably to be regarded simply as an error of later 
 copyists, who did not understand the subject, and 
 who, being naturally unacquainted, — from the ab- 
 sence of their own inspection, — with the Brook 
 Cedron in the neighbourhood of the destroyed city 
 of Jerusalem, regarded that word as the plural (*l- 
 Sqov) of the Greek word cedar, and easily placed 
 the article in the plural instead of the singular num- 
 ber. The article in the singular stands, however, in 
 the celebrated Alexandrine MS.; we find it likewise 
 in the recently discovered, but invaluable, Codex Si- 
 naiticns. Therefore, having this twofold and ex- 
 tremely important testimony, we have simply to 
 place the article in the singular instead of the plu- 
 ral, and the whole invented cedar-forest, from which 
 our opponents discharge their poisoned arrows , sud- 
 denly sinks into the dark brook, — The Cedron. 
 
 We take no pleasure in adducing many more 
 proofs of this kind. Even if the microscope could 
 discover a single worm-eaten spot in the coronated 
 pine-apple tree, that queen of fruits would never- 
 theless still remain. "One must have the soul of a 
 jegistrar," as Tholuck somewhere says, "to suspi- 
 cously allow the cloud of witnesses for the truth, 
 
 
38 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 — of whom we have mentioned only a small num- 
 ber, — to be outweighed by such small matters. 
 We give only a single proof of how doubts of this 
 kind, closely considered, become demonstrations of 
 authenticity and credibility. It excites suspicion that 
 the well-known Samaritan city is called Sychar in 
 the fourth chapter of John, while everywhere else it 
 is called Shechem. "If John were the real writer," 
 we are asked, "should he not have known the 
 true name?" We answer, that in the Talmud this 
 city is called Sychar; and in more than one way, 
 
 — with an account of which I will not now burden 
 you, — this change of name can be explained. The 
 city bore also two other names; what wonder if our 
 author does not quote the old Hebrew, but a later 
 Hebrew word, by which the city was called either 
 by the inhabitants themselves or by the Jews, — thus 
 proving that John was perfectly at home in his own 
 department ? 
 
 It is objected that there is a suspicious sound 
 in the words attributed in chapter vn. 52. to the 
 Sanhedrim: "Search and look: for out of Galilee 
 ariseth no prophet," while both Hosea and Nahum 
 were of Galilean origin. But who does not see that 
 the fathers of Israel, in their zeal, forgot history for 
 a moment; and who can help finding in this very 
 circumstance a psychological proof of the truth of 
 the whole question, instead of charging the narrator, 
 on such doubtful ground, with no acquaintance with 
 the sacred history of Israel? If, as negative criti- 
 cism will have it, the author has alwavs so care- 
 
PETTY OBJECTIONS TO JOHN'S GOSPEL. 39 
 
 fully placed his words upon the gold-balance, that, 
 as we have seen, he never calls the precursor John 
 the Baptist j but, with acute consideration, simply 
 John, then it is utterly inconceivable that he could 
 have invented an expression of the Sanhedrists in 
 which there is such a gross historical blunder. It is 
 also unreasonable to find fault with him for express- 
 ing himself unfavourably on Nazareth (chapter i. 47), 
 though we elsewhere hear of nothing unfavourable 
 of this little city. Certainly, what we read in an- 
 other passage (Luke iv. 29) concerning the murder- 
 ous design of the Nazarenes against Jesus, does not 
 speak very favourably for the prevailing spirit of the 
 inhabitants ; and even if this were not the case, what 
 becomes of all historical certainty if the smallest 
 specialty becomes an object of suspicion if not 
 testified by more than one witness? 
 
 If all the remaining objections of this character 
 were mentioned, be assured they are not more im- 
 portant than the ones we have presented. If you 
 look at the subject in the most unfavourable light, 
 
 — in which light, however, it does not really stand, 
 
 — we would have just as much right to conclude 
 from a few such phenomena that this Gospel is un- 
 authentic, as to infer from the supposed obscurity 
 connected with some false or rare coins in a bag 
 full of precious metals, that the whole bag had been 
 sent out of a counterfeiter's workshop. 
 
 Yet we must be perfectly candid. There have 
 been still more important objections than these ad- 
 duced against the authenticity of John. "This Gospel 
 
40 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 is unauthentic," we hear from an objector, "for its 
 philosophic colour, its historical material, and its 
 doctrinal character are of such a kind that it could 
 not possibly have come from John. How could the 
 fisherman of Bethsaida have written such a philosoph- 
 ical introduction; how could the Apostle of Christ 
 have wrapped himself up in the robe of the Alexan- 
 drine philosophy; and how could a Jew of that pe- 
 riod have expressed himself in such pure Greek?" 
 As far as this last objection is concerned, we have 
 this to say: Supposing John to have written this 
 Gospel, he certainly did it after spending a number 
 of years in Ephesus, Asia Minor. It was, therefore, 
 not impossible for him to perfect there his knowledge 
 of the Grecian language, the foundation of which he 
 had certainly laid very early in his native country; 
 indeed, the Greek was much more spoken in Jeru- 
 salem in the apostolic age than Hebrew, which grad- 
 ually became the exception instead of the rule 
 (Acts xxii. 2). 
 
 As for the author's ideas, profundity of intellect 
 and sentiment are not always the heritage of the 
 higher classes. The history of philosophic thought 
 proves that the sanctuary of theology and theosophy 
 frequently comprises within its walls men of hum- 
 ble origin. We need recall only the names of Spi- 
 noza, Jacob Boehme, and Moses Mendelssohn; and 
 yet we can say, that we have no warrant for 
 calling John a poor fisherman. The more fervent 
 was his love of Christ, the more intensely it must 
 have excited him to profound reflection on what had 
 
John's use of philosophical terms. 41 
 
 been revealed to him. It is just this love that ani- 
 mates and excites a thirst for knowledge, as it also 
 best enables one to comprehend the endeared sub- 
 ject by the force of sympathy. Augustus Conti, an 
 Italian thinker of our day, has said: "Che ben ama 
 ben sa, — He who loves well knows well!' A residence 
 of a number of years in Ephesus could certainly 
 have been of great influence on the development of 
 such a receptive and contemplative nature as that 
 of John. He there first came into contact with that 
 false Gnosis which was soon to spread so much de- 
 vastation: and just there he must have felt himself 
 all the more impelled to oppose this glittering error 
 by presenting the truth in its full splendour, yet in 
 all its depth. Who can blame him for doing this 
 in forms derived from the philosophy of his day, 
 just as Paul in Athens appeals to the sentiment of 
 a heathen poet (Acts xvn. 28)? He would by no 
 means have done this if he had not found in this 
 use of language a trace of higher truth, and re- 
 garded this form as by far the best adapted to his 
 first readers. Indeed, we also meet with a doctrine 
 of the Logos in Philo, the Jew, as well as in John, 
 yet, in this case, the harmony is confined almost ex- 
 clusively to the term. Between the Logos of John 
 and that of Philo there is such a deep abyss, — 
 to prove which would lead us too far from our ap- 
 propriate theme, — that it is impossible to doubt 
 the independence of the Apostle even when he 
 makes use of this form of expression. Closely re- 
 garded, he never once thought it necessary to bor- 
 
42 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 row this method of clothing his thoughts from the 
 Alexandrine philosophy. Even in the Psalms and 
 Proverbs of the Old Testament he met with the rep- 
 resentation of the Word of the Lord as an anima- 
 ted and active being, and of the Wisdom of God, 
 boldly personified, as sharing in the work of Crea- 
 tion and as an object of God's indescribable good 
 pleasure. What wonder if John, illuminated by the 
 Holy Spirit, should use this representation, — which 
 he had been familiar with from his youth, — where 
 it seemed especially adapted to his purpose of por- 
 traying the glory of Christ conformably to the cus- 
 tomary use of language and the necessities of his 
 times? He has here in mind not a speculative, but 
 a practical design; he purposes to show that the 
 person of Christ affords what the philosophy of the 
 times was still seeking; and he develops no ab- 
 stract conception of God, but encloses the histor- 
 ical picture of Christ in the philosophical frame of 
 his age. 
 
 But if we lay this form aside for awhile, we 
 shall find that the import of what John says of the 
 Logos, both before and after the incarnation, is not 
 at all different from that presented in the preaching 
 of Christ by the other Apostles, and especially by 
 Paul in his Epistles. From this point of view, 
 scarcely a serious objection can be raised against its 
 special use in the fourth Gospel; but if objection is 
 made, we must by no means make concessions on 
 this point. If it is perfectly safe to suppose, at the 
 outset, that Jesus was a mere man, and that, accord- 
 
ILLOGICAL CRITICISM. 43 
 
 ingly, an Evangelist who was really his apostle 
 and bosom-friend could not possibly have perceived 
 and admired in him anything more than a man., 
 then even John himself could not have believed, as 
 somebody has expressed it, "that he had sat at the 
 same table with the world's Architect." But it seems 
 to us that to this criticism there is just this impor- 
 tant objection: It assumes what must first be proved; 
 namely, that Jesus was not the Son of God, the 
 Logos, the Architect of the world, and that there- 
 fore John could not subsequently have recognized in 
 him this character, or have described him as pos- 
 sessing it. 
 
 Can you call such criticism logical and purely 
 historical? With all due respect for its acuteness 
 and learning, I must denominate it extremely par- 
 tisan and dogmatical. To him who is really impar- 
 tial, John's profound expression, "The Word was made 
 flesh," is really nothing less and nothing more than 
 what Paul says in a more popular manner: "When 
 the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth 
 his Son. . . in the likeness of sinful flesh." We be- 
 lieve that no one has yet shown that John could 
 not, and should not, have said the same thing in 
 his own way. 
 
 Indeed, if we further investigate the historical 
 matter and doctrinal character of the fourth Gospel 
 in their minuteness, we shall see anew, by every 
 comparison, that the Christ of the fourth Gospel is 
 fundamentally the same as the Christ of Peter, of 
 Paul, and of all the Apostles. It is true that not 
 
44 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 all of them have looked with the same profound 
 gaze upon the glory of His person and the object 
 of His appearance. But no irreconcilable contra- 
 diction exists here; and we may confidently ask any 
 one to show that John, in his confession of the super- 
 natural character and majesty of our Lord, stood 
 alone among the Apostles. He who is called "The 
 Word" by John, is called by Paul "The Son," and 
 "The image of the invisible God," and in both cases 
 in the metaphysical sense. And, according to the 
 son of Zebedee, He who "was with God," and "was 
 God/' and "dwelt among us," was, according to the 
 son of Jonas, "manifested in these last times for 
 you," — an expression which, taken in connection 
 with every declaration of Peter, refers clearly to the 
 mystery of preexistence. 1 Is it not remarkable that 
 the same elevated christological representation which 
 we meet with in John is already met with, in sub- 
 stance, not only in the Epistle to the Hebrews and 
 in the Epistles to the Colossians and Philippians, — 
 which were written, without doubt, by Paul long be- 
 fore the fourth Gospel, and even before the writing 
 of the synoptical Gospels, — but also in the Epistles 
 of the same Apostle, whose authenticity nobody 
 doubts? 2 It is clear that Peter, Paul, and John, 
 in their harmonious description of Christ, stand upon 
 the same ladder, but on different rounds; so much 
 
 i 1 Peter I. 20. Compare ver. 11. 
 
 2 See, for example, Romans VIII. 3, 4; IX 5; 1 Corin- 
 thians XV. 47; 2 Corinthians VIII. 9; Galatians IV. 4. Com- 
 pare Philippians II. 5—8; Colossians I. 15—20; II. 9. 
 
JOHN'S GOSPEL AND APOCALYPSE. 45 
 
 is this the case, that the one who stands relatively 
 lowest sees more in Christ than mere humanity, 
 while he who proclaims his divine majesty the loud- 
 est, does not cease to know him as truly man. It 
 is evident that we can not yet go into particulars; 
 we hope to do that hereafter, when we shall also 
 look closely at the real stones of offence, — the mi- 
 raculous deeds and experiences of our Lord. We 
 shall be contented if you grant that the objections 
 which are raised against the miraculous and super- 
 natural contents of this Gospel can be raised in 
 greater or less measure against the most, if not all, 
 the books of the Xew Testament. But if the matter 
 stands so, then you may decide for yourselves 
 whether there is any cause for calling to mind the 
 well-known proverb: "That which proves too much, 
 proves nothing." 
 
 Yet there seems to be one book of the Bible 
 which is used as a special weapon for opposing the 
 authenticity of John. And we can all the less leave 
 it unnoticed, because it is held up in opposition to 
 his Gospel under the name, and, as it were, by the 
 hand of John himself. "This Gospel is unauthentic," 
 we hear, "for if the Apocalypse is by the Apostle 
 John, it is then self-evident that the Gospel could 
 not possibly have come from the same hand. The 
 Gospel and the Apocalypse! What a contrast! Here 
 is the most spiritual Gospel, there the most sensuous 
 expectation ; here the Good Shepherd who lays down 
 his life for his sheep, there the Mighty Ruler who 
 breaks the nations like a potter's vessel; here, — 
 
46 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 yet, where all is contrast, the mention of particulars 
 becomes wearisome and to no purpose." No won- 
 der, indeed, that a few years ago this critical oracle 
 found a re-echo: "No result of science is more cer- 
 tain than that the Gospel and the Apocalypse could 
 not have come from the same hand." Is it impos- 
 sible? We are properly warned from time to time 
 to be a little careful in using this word. Shortly 
 after the above sentiment was heralded, and, natu- 
 rally enough, had to be subscribed to on penalty of 
 the loss of all scientific reputation, the Hague So- 
 ciety for the Defence of the Christian Religion 
 awarded a prize to the work of an acute scholar 
 who, unfortunately, has already died. The conclu- 
 sion, in this work, after a thorough investigation of 
 all the particulars, may be compressed in these 
 words: "The differences in the Johannean writings, 
 — the Gospel and the Apocalypse, — are perfectly 
 natural, intelligible, and necessary; but the coinci- 
 dences, on the other hand, can only be explained by 
 ascribing these writings to the same author." * People 
 who are acquainted with this subject know at once 
 that I am speaking of Niermeyer's sterling Prize 
 Essay, which appeared as long ago as 1852, but, 
 in our humble opinion, has become so little anti- 
 quated that it still supplies a treasure of serviceable 
 
 i Comp. A. Nienneyer, in the Verhand. v. h Haagsch. 
 Gen. Part XIII. p. 390; and especially J. P. Lange, Uber 
 ,den unaufloslichen Zusammerihang zwischen der Individuality des 
 Ap. Johannes und der Individualitat der Apokalypse. Vermischte 
 Schriften. Vol. II. p. 173 ff. 
 
Christ's divinity ix the apocalyi\sl. 47 
 
 weapons for even apologists who do not harmonize 
 with this accomplished scholar on the date of the 
 Apocalypse. We refer all who are interested in the 
 subject to the work itself, in order to pass a judi- 
 cious opinion on this much-discussed difference. 
 
 Let us look hack at what has been said on this 
 point very recently. We purposely desire, in the 
 present instance, to make use of no smooth expres- 
 sion when we say that it is simply not true that 
 no supernatural character and dignity are ascribed 
 to Christ in the Book of Revelation. The former 
 leader of the Tubingen School, who maintained this, 
 and had to do it in order to sustain his system, 
 here finds himself in an obvious difficulty, and does 
 not know how to get out of it. It is also very clear 
 that twenty places to one prove plainly the contrary. 
 The names here given to Christ, the attributes 
 ascribed to him, the works performed by him, and the 
 honor paid him equally with the Father by all crea- 
 tures in heaven and on earth, — all this, when 
 looked at in clear light, deserves no other name 
 than that of blasphemy if he of whom the author 
 says it, was, in his opinion, nothing more than an 
 ordinary man. "Whoever will maintain this," we 
 may say with a German theologian, against Strauss, 
 "as a critical opinion, must be either perfectly 
 blinded, or does not wish to see. There is no third 
 condition." x He who will look at the matter clearly 
 must perceive that, as far as Christ's nature and 
 
 1 Dr. Otto Thenius, Das Evangelium der Evangelien. Leip- 
 zig, 1865. p. 54. 
 
48 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 majesty are concerned, he is set forth in the Apoc- 
 alypse not a finger's breadth more subordinately than 
 in the fourth Gospel, while the unmistakable and 
 grand deviation of the two writings can be ex- 
 plained, to a great extent, by the difference in design, 
 contents and purpose. May we not add, that Fal- 
 sarius, who would publish the fourth Gospel under 
 the name of John, and who was acquainted with 
 the (undoubtedly authentic) Apocalypse, would have 
 been very careful to see that an obvious harmony 
 existed between the two writings? Truly, he who 
 would oppose the fourth Gospel must get his arms 
 from some other arsenal than the Apocalypse if he 
 has any hope of victory. 
 
 We believe ourselves now fully justified in draw- 
 ing our third conclusion: Apart from the miracu- 
 lous and supernatural contents, as well as from the 
 difference between John's and the first three Gospels, 
 the fourth Gospel, considered in and of itself, con- 
 tains nothing which would have been impossible for 
 John, — as we become acquainted with him else- 
 where, — to write, and which compels us to deny the 
 authenticity of this writing. v 
 
 One step more, and our design will be accom- 
 plished for the present occasion. As you observe, 
 we have thus far appealed almost exclusively to the 
 internal evidences lying within the scope not only 
 of learned, but also of unlearned men. Yet, it is 
 especially in this department, as friend and foe re- 
 member from experience, that the conflict must be 
 decided. We frankly avow, that the inward proofs 
 
HISTORICAL EVIDENCE FOR JOHN'S GOSPEL, 49 
 
 are so manifold and striking that a doubt on the 
 authenticity of John's Gospel would seem to us al- 
 most inconceivable if we did not know that there 
 are other and concealed grounds, apart from those 
 which are usually exposed to the light. Yet we are 
 far from supporting our conviction of the authentic- 
 ity of John's Gospel exclusively on these internal 
 evidences. We urge, that what has good reasons 
 for being deduced by internal evidences is impres- 
 sively corroborated by external ones. As we said 
 at the beginning, the value of the external and his- 
 torical evidence can only be appreciated in its whole 
 scope by him who possesses more than a superficial 
 knowledge of the history and critical aids of the sec- 
 cond and third centuries. Yet we would not be al- 
 together silent concerning them, especially in view 
 of the fact, that, since the publication of Teschen- 
 dorf's work, — which has been more derided than 
 refuted, — the investigation of the subject has di- 
 rected the eyes of many anew to this field. * The 
 contempt with which some opponents of the authen- 
 ticity of this Gospel mention these witnesses of an- 
 tiquity, gives us special grounds for supposing that 
 these witnesses must be no small thorn in the side 
 of the negative school. Here, however, — as you 
 will appreciate and readily consent to, — we shall 
 
 1 0. Teschendorf, Wann wurden unsre Evangelien verfasst? 
 Compare Allg. Kirchenzeitung, 1865. No. 70. [The English 
 translation of this work: When were our Gospels Written f 9 
 was issued in London (Relig. Tract Society), 1866, and in the 
 United States in 1867. The American Edition, translated by 
 the Rev. W. L. Gage, has reappeared also in London. — J. F. H.] 
 
 4 
 
50 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 not make use of an extended inquiry, but only pre- 
 sent you with a brief indication of our view, the 
 defence of which would be very easy if any one 
 should oppose it. 
 
 I would ask whoever desires what is almost tan- 
 gible, to take into account the following facts: 
 
 1. It is a fact, that there is connected with the 
 Gospel itself an external witness, whose great value 
 has been many times recognized by the most prom- 
 inent men. Even if one adhere, with us, to the 
 Johannean origin of the postscript (chapter xxi.), he 
 will hardly be able to overlook the fact that the last 
 two verses have been written, or at least enlarged, 
 by another hand. We have specially in mind here 
 the words in verse 24: "This is the disciple which 
 testifieth of these things, and wrote these things: 
 and we know that his testimony is true." Those 
 who here speak, and in this declaration present the 
 completed writing to its first readers, are, indeed, 
 not mentioned by name ; but they would hardly have 
 thus written if they had not known that sucli an 
 assurance on their side would have been of unques- 
 tionable value and importance. This assurance 
 must, therefore, have come from the most intimate 
 circle of the first disciples of John, perhaps from 
 the elders of the Ephesian Church, who pledged 
 themselves (as also the writer himself ) anonymously, 
 hut yet collectively, for the authenticity of the Gospel 
 as a work of this Apostle, as they possibly gave 
 it into the hands of the Church after his death, and 
 provided it with this seal of its authenticity. The 
 
51 
 
 weight of such an attestation is as clear as noon- 
 day, and it does not speak much for the imparti- 
 ality of a certain criticism if, in the examination of 
 internal evidence, it simply passes over in silence 
 this first and most ancient one. 1 
 
 2. It is a fact, that the first Epistle ascribed to 
 John was written by the same hand as the fourth 
 Gospel. The most remarkable coincidences in con- 
 tents and form declare the identity of the author. 2 
 If, now, the Johannean origin of this Epistle stands 
 above all reasonable doubt, in consequence of the 
 testimony of the witnesses of the early Church, — 
 among whom are Papias and Polycarp, — and has 
 scarcely been doubted by any one, with the excep- 
 tion of the Tubingen School, then is also the Johan- 
 nean origin of the fourth Gospel established in the 
 same way. Both writings stand and fall together, 
 — that is, they stand together. 
 
 3. It is a fact, that the authenticity of this Gospel 
 was neither denied nor doubted by any one in the 
 second century, except the sect of the Alogi, who 
 did not do it on historical, but doctrinal, grounds, and 
 regarded this Gospel as the work of Cerinthus, a 
 
 i Compare Tholuck, Glaubioiirdigkeit der evangelischen Oe- 
 schichte, 1837, p. 293; and also Beyschlag's remark in his 
 Die Auferstehung Christi, p. 37. 
 
 2 Compare Grimm, Ueber das Evangelium und den ersten 
 Brief des Johannes als Werk eines und desselben Verf assets, in 
 the Stud. u. Krit., 1847. I. — Diisterdieck, Die drei Johannes- 
 briefe. Gottingen, 1852. I. p. xxxv. ff. — Da Costa, De 
 Apost. Joh. en zyne Schr. Amsterdam, 1854. p. 169 ff. — 
 Compare also especially Ebrard's article : Johannes der Apostel, 
 in Herzog's Real-Encyclop. VI. p. 732 ff. 
 
 4* 
 
52 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 heretical contemporary of John; hence, they considered 
 it a product of the first century. Although this al- 
 most total absence of combating it does not alto- 
 gether prove its authenticity, the presumption of its 
 unauthentic character is by no means favoured by 
 this phenomenon. 
 
 4, It is a fact, that the oldest Gnostics living 
 in the first half of the second century prove that they 
 were acquainted with this Gospel, as they made use 
 of its terminology, quoted it, commented upon it, 
 and made use of it in a way which would be ut- 
 terly inconceivable if they had not recognized it as 
 a work of the highest value, — that is, as of Apos- 
 tolic origin. We find traces of this use of it even 
 in the first quarter of the second century by Basil- 
 ides, the Gnostic, who was in part a contemporary 
 of John, the Apostle who lived longer than the 
 others. Basilides even quotes two passages from 
 John's Gospel. 
 
 5. It is a fact, that Ignatius, who wrote at the 
 beginning of the second century, made use of such 
 expressions as prove acquaintance with those words 
 of our Lord which are contained in this Gospel 
 alone; that Justin Martyr, who died A.D. 140, was 
 not only acquainted with the fourth Gospel, together 
 with its doctrine of the Logos, but appealed to the 
 ActaPilati, whose anonymous author was acquaint- 
 ed with the contents of this Gospel; and that the 
 most distinguished Church Fathers of the second cent- 
 ury, — Theophilus, Athenagoras, Apollinaris, Tatian, 
 and others, — made use of this testimony in the most 
 
ENDORSEMENT BY THE CHURCH FATHERS. 53 
 
 positive manner. The silence of two of them, Pa- 
 pias and Polycarp, can excite no serious suspicion 
 when we consider that there has come down to us 
 only a fragment of the former writer, and but a 
 single Epistle of the latter; yet both of these writ- 
 ings show familiarity with the First Epistle of John, 
 to whose intimate connection with the fourth Gospel 
 we have already referred. 
 
 6. It is a fact, that Irenseus, the Church Father, 
 a disciple of Polycarp, cites this Gospel in the sec- 
 ond half of the second century more than sixty 
 times ; that the oldest Syriac translation of the New 
 Testament received it during this period without ob- 
 jection, together with the other canonical Gospels; 
 that about the same time the oldest canon of the 
 New Testament, of which a fragment (that of Mu- 
 ratori) has come down to us, mentions the Gospel 
 of Luke as the third, and makes that of John follow 
 as the fourth. Irenseus compares the four Gospels 
 to the four winds and the four cherubim, but this 
 detracts nothing from the value of his testimony. 
 Convinced by historical reasons of the existence of 
 a quatenary number of the Gospels, he indulges in 
 this spirited comparison, but shows, at the same time, 
 that he by no means accepted a quatenary number 
 of the Gospels on a iwim*i grounds. 
 
 7. It is a fact, that this Gospel was first quoted 
 about the year 180 as the work of the Apostle John, 
 under his na?ne, but that for a considerable time pre- 
 viously it had been considered of like character to 
 the first three Gospels, — which would have been 
 
54 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 utterly impossible if its Apostolic origin had been 
 seriously doubted. There were other writings of the 
 New Testament, — and, among them, those whose 
 authenticity is far above all doubt, — which, at the 
 beginning, were but little, or even not at all, quoted 
 under the name of their authors. For what was al- 
 most never contradicted, did not always need to be 
 expressly mentioned; and as in the beginning the 
 stream of oral tradition ran still purely and quietly, 
 the Church was less directed to the written than the 
 spoken word of the first witnesses of our Lord. 
 
 8. It is a fact, on the one hand, that the Pa- 
 tristic literature of the second century was control- 
 led in such a manner by the idea of the Logos that 
 everything compels us to suppose a common origi- 
 nal fountain of this idea in the doctrine of an Apostle 
 of our Lord; and, on the other hand, that the ap- 
 pearance in the Apostolic period of so prominent a 
 fictitious writing as that of the fourth Gospel, without 
 the name of the author being once mentioned, must 
 have been a highly improbable, if not inconceivable, 
 exception. It cannot be denied, that the Johannean 
 conception of Christ remained tolerably foreign to a 
 large portion of the Christians of the third century, 
 but, for this very reason, we can the less imagine 
 that an anonymous writer of a romance in the middle 
 of the second century appeared unexpectedly one 
 beautiful morning from his concealment with such a 
 writing as this, which was even in advance of a later 
 period. The Christian Church gradually worked itself 
 up to the high standpoint of John, and relied upon 
 
TESTIMONY OF CHRISTIAN ANTIQUITY. 55 
 
 it for a succession of centuries, until the year 1792 
 (as we have already seen), when a sceptical English- 
 man gave the signal for a controversy, which has 
 recently been transplanted from the theological schools 
 to the bosom of the Church itself. 
 
 We might say still more, yet enough has been 
 advanced for our purpose. It does not, indeed, ex- 
 cite our wonder that even a learned opponent of the 
 fourth Gospel can regard its external proofs, consid- 
 ered in themselves, so satisfactory that the least 
 doubt cannot be raised on this score. We do not 
 believe that Liicke has expressed himself too strongly 
 when he called this Gospel a "rock on which the 
 hammer of criticism will sooner be broken to pieces 
 itself than break the rock." And now I can conscien- 
 tiously place before you this fourth and last con- 
 clusion, as the result of my investigation: 
 
 That which the Gospel itself leads us to suppose 
 concerning its author; that which is established by 
 what we elsewhere learn concerning John; and that 
 which, on no essential point, contradicts the contents 
 of the Gospel, when we consider it in and of itself, 
 apart from the question of miracles, are established 
 by the testimony of Christian antiquity in such a 
 way as justifies faith in the authenticity of the Gospel 
 to a high degree, and will continue still more to jus- 
 tify it, on further and impartial examination. 
 
 Here we remain for the present. But shall we 
 consider the case decided for ever, and the adher- 
 ents of the opposite view stricken to the ground by 
 one blow? We will willingly leave to others the 
 
56 AUTHENTICITY OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 passion for scientific murder and destruction. We 
 hope to discuss hereafter many difficulties which 
 we have not yet touched. But we can now confi- 
 dently assert this much : We would heartily congrat- 
 ulate all those who are engaged in the study of 
 the writings of classical antiquity if they always 
 enjoy such strong proofs of the authenticity of its 
 master -productions as, through the wise providence 
 of the God of Truth, prove the authenticity of this 
 much-mistaken Gospel. As a matter of course, if 
 one is disposed to do so, he can always find subter- 
 fuges, and start exceptions, and allow the great 
 force of evident probabilities to be overbalanced by 
 merely abstract probabilities. Yet, as far as we are 
 concerned, we doubt whether stronger proofs can be 
 justly demanded in favour of an historical state- 
 ment (which is to be distinguished from a mathe- 
 matical one) than those to which we have now 
 called your attention. In our opinion, the good 
 cause of John's Gospel is more threatened by bitter 
 enemies than ever before; yet by no means do we 
 regard its cause as lost. And since we may now 
 see, in advance, on which side will incline the 
 scales of truly impartial judgment, we reverently 
 acknowledge the deeper truth which lies concealed 
 in that false supposition, that "John expected to 
 live until the second coming of our Lord," and 
 we can say with a profound feeling of admiration, 
 love, and gratitude: "This Disciple shall not die." 1 
 
 i On the External Evidences, read the valuable treatise 
 of Hofstede de Groot, Professor in Groningen, entitled, 
 
LITERATURE ON JOHN'S GOSPEL. 57 
 
 A Witness of the Longest - Lived Apostle as the first Witness of 
 the Antiquity and Authority of the Books of the New Testament, 
 together with other Witnesses thereon before the Year 138, in 
 the Dutch Theological Review, Waarheid in Liefde, 1866, 
 p. 449 ff.; also its continuation under the title of The An- 
 tiquity and Authenticity of John's Gospel according to External 
 Witnesses before the Middle of the Second Century, p. 593 ff., 
 in the same periodical. 
 
 The following German literature should also be com- 
 pared: H. Ewald, Ueber die neuesten Zweifel an der volligen 
 Aechtheit des Ev. Joh. in the Jahrbiicher der bibl. Wissenschaft, 
 1865, p. 212 ff. As a popular work, we may recommend 
 Vom Evangelio des Johannes. Eine Rede an die Gemeinde, by 
 €. A. Hase. Leipzig, 1866. 
 
II. 
 
 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 Ihe altogether peculiar majesty and glory of Christ which 
 are portrayed in the Gospel of John were certainly not con- 
 cealed from the other Disciples; but John alone was capa- 
 ble of reproducing them as a picture. Every man can see 
 the delicate haze of an Alpine mountain glowing in the twi- 
 light, but not every man is able to paint it. John had the 
 nature of a living mirror, which did not merely receive the 
 full glory of our Lord, but knew how to reflect it upon 
 others." 
 
 A. Ebrard. 
 
 "This Disciple shall not die." With these words 
 of faith and hope I recently closed my first Lecture, 
 which was designed to prove the authenticity of the 
 Gospel of John, as far as the limited time would 
 allow. 
 
 After further reflection upon the highly impor- 
 tant subject which at that time engaged our attention, 
 I do not recall that sentiment. Yet, it does not by 
 
CONTRADICTOKY OPINIONS ON JOHN'S GOSPEL. 59 
 
 any means declare that John should attain to immor- 
 tality without having to die. On the contrary, as 
 the history of our Lord is one of triumph, so is also 
 the history of his true witnesses the same, though it 
 must be after a conflict which is constantly renewed. 
 It is a victory of rising again from an often -pre- 
 pared grave. At the beginning of the present cent- 
 ury there appeared in Germany a frivolous work 
 under the title of John the Evangelist and his Ex- 
 positors before the Final Judgment. x But if we take 
 the title in a serious sense, and imagine the Apostle 
 as standing with his interpreters before the great 
 judgment-bar, we can well suppose that he would 
 have ample grounds for complaining at not a few 
 among the number. It is certain that but few writ- 
 ings of the New Testament have been regarded and 
 decided upon in such a divergent and often contra- 
 dictory way as that to which we now direct your 
 attention anew. Call to your remembrance once more 
 the enthusiastic panegyrics which have been pro- 
 nounced upon the "Spiritual Gospel" all the way 
 from Origen down to Matthias Claudius, and con- 
 trast them with the severe charges which have been 
 heaped within the last few years upon the "fourth," 
 — for so this Apostle is frequently called, with un- 
 mistakable contempt, — and you can scarcely con- 
 ceive how so much honor and derision can be ap- 
 plied to one and the same person. We can scarce- 
 ly suppress this exclamation: Through what un- 
 
 i Vogel, Superintendent in Wunsiedel. 
 
60 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 happy change of fate, the eagle, whose bold flight 
 has been watched by so many millions of eyes with 
 admiration and interest, seems all at once to have 
 have been nothing but a raven, which was dressed off 
 for centuries with feathers not its own, until a sharp 
 eye at last discovered the deception ! Truly, the 
 Apostle John, in view of his reception within the 
 last few years, may repeat the sad lamentation 
 placed in the mouth of faded fame by one of our 
 tragedians: — 
 
 "How sudden is my fall! How far am I cast 
 down ! " 
 
 If not "down to yesterday," at least down to only 
 a few years ago, scarcely any one hesitated to 
 give the crown of honor to the "only tender chief- 
 Gospel," as Luther called it. And though no prom- 
 inent theologian has failed to observe the great 
 diversity between the synoptic accounts and that of 
 John, yet the value of the latter has always been 
 recognized; indeed, it has not been unfrequently the 
 case, that, owing to Schleiermacher's influence, the 
 preference has been given either consciously or un- 
 consciously to John. But, at present, it seems to 
 have become settled in some quarters that there has 
 been a general deception, — that the New Testa- 
 ment really contains a double picture of Christ: the 
 synoptic on the one hand, and the Johannean on 
 the other. The diversity between the two, which 
 has been studiously widened as far as possible, is 
 held to be a permanent and irreconcilable conflict, 
 which invariably results in favor of Matthew, 
 
THE SYNOPTIC AND JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 61 
 
 Mark, and Luke. The Gospel of John, on the con- 
 trary, when compared with its predecessors, is get- 
 ting to be thought rather an obscure and mystical 
 writing, having no purely historical, but only a 
 dogmatical and philosophical, character, and present- 
 ing to us the conception of Christ as entertained 
 by the anonymous author and kindred spirits rather 
 than a visible picture of Christ in the framework of 
 his age. It follows from this, that, where we have 
 to do with a knowledge of the life of Jesus, the 
 first three Gospels (very naturally, on condition of 
 a necessary critical sifting) must he sought for 
 counsel, while, on the contrary, we can at most 
 conclude from the fourth what Jesus was thought to 
 be in the second century, but not at all who Jesus 
 really was. 
 
 What shall we answer, in reply to these and 
 other assertions, that, by the confident tone in which 
 they are presented in manifold ways, are very well 
 adapted to make some impression on him who hears 
 them for the first time? We might call to mind the 
 fact, that the believing Church of all centuries does 
 not appear to have specially observed this irrecon- 
 cilable conflict between the synoptic and the Johan- 
 nean Christ, since it has been built up alternately 
 by reading and reflecting on the words and deeds 
 of the one as well as the other, and has drawn 
 from both together an image of Christ before which 
 it still bows in reverent admiration. 
 
 The perception of this fact proves at least that 
 the diversity mentioned above does not endanger the 
 
62 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 profound sanctity of the Christian consciousness of 
 faith, and it awakens the supposition that the con- 
 flict here is more apparent than real. 1 Yet the 
 correctness of this supposition must first become ap- 
 parent by thorough examination, and you may now 
 imagine what the subject is which we present at 
 this time for your consideration. 
 
 In the previous Lecture we saw that the fourth 
 Gospel, considered in itself alone, contains nothing 
 directly contradicting its own testimony concerning 
 its author. But we have already made it clear that 
 the difference first comes to light when we place 
 this fourth Gospel beside the others, or even pre- 
 sent it in contrast with them. It cannot be denied 
 that, here and there, we receive a different impres- 
 sion. Many a time the expression seems to come 
 to our lips: "If this is true, then I can hardly ac- 
 cept the other; for Christ seems to represent himself 
 in John differently from what he does in the synoptic 
 
 i Roger Hollard very properly writes thus on the char- 
 acter of Jesus Christ, in the Revue Chretienne, by Edni. de 
 Pressense: "Christian piety is fed by our four canonical 
 Gospels, and yet it knows but one Christ. The significance 
 of this fact is important. In the people, as well as in a 
 child, there is an instinct which surpasses any acuteness of 
 the best criticism. We can say of the people what Jesus 
 said of his sheep, — 'and a stranger will they not follow.' 
 If, now, the view mentioned is established, and the Jesus of 
 John is totally different from the one of the first three 
 Gospels, we must confess that Christendom has saluted a 
 stranger by the name of Master for more than fifteen cent- 
 uries without the slightest doubt; and has regarded both 
 the stranger and the Master worthy of the same adoration. 
 Such a misconception would not only be without a parallel 
 in history, but would even have history against itself!" 
 
DOCTRINAL IDEA AND HISTORICAL PICTURE. 63 
 
 Gospels." Now, is it possible that he is another, I 
 or really a different Christ? I need not say a word 
 on the importance of this question. Two conceptions 
 inexorably excluding each other cannot be equally 
 true. However much it would cost us to give up 
 John, we should have to adapt ourselves to this loss ; 
 for it is not one witness for the truth, but the truth 
 itself, that can make us free; and, as thinking Chris- 
 tians, we must certainly act with reference to free- 
 dom from sin, but yet not less with reference to 
 freedom from error. You will now follow me with 
 increased interest as I compare, at the present time, 
 the doctrinal idea and then the historical represen- 
 tation of the fourth Gospel with those of the first 
 three, with special reference to the question, whether 
 the two sides stand in such strong contrast with 
 each other that we shall be compelled to say: "We 
 must accept either one or the other, but not both?" 
 After we have reduced the diversity stated to its 
 true limits, it will not be difficult to draw the proper 
 conclusion, both in reference to the authenticity and 
 credibility of this writing in general, and the rank 
 which it is to take permanently among the sources 
 for the history of the life of our Lord. 
 
 I. The doubt arising from the very peculiar 
 doctrinal system of the fourth Gospel has furnished 
 its latest opponents with a strong, and, as they think, 
 apparently insuperable weapon. It was strikingly 
 said not long ago : "We do not doubt the authentic- 
 ity of John's Gospel because of weak and unsatis- 
 factory evidence, nor because doubts have been raised 
 
64 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 against the historical character of its accounts, but 
 because we believe that we have found in it a sys- 
 tem which is totally at variance with that which it 
 must be presumed that the disciple whom Jesus 
 loved could and must have believed." 
 
 We are constantly hearing at our left such ex- 
 pressions as these: "See for yourself, that the form 
 in which you hear Christ speak in the first three 
 Gospels is infinitely different from the garb in which 
 he clothes his teachings in the fourth. And what 
 a broad abyss there is between the two in the 
 matter, spirit, and tendency of Christ's words! Here, 
 the truth is presented through the transparent me- 
 dium of a parable, while your ears are there greeted 
 by the sharp tone of excited controversial language, 
 carried out by our Lord in endless repetition, and 
 answered by his enemies with inconceivable mis- 
 understanding and obstinate contradictions. It ap- 
 pears as if the Johannean Christ not only must be 
 misunderstood, but that he purposely wished to be 
 misunderstood; his teaching is doctrinally coloured, and 
 the substance and centre about which everything turns, 
 is not the Gospel of the kingdom of God, as in the 
 synoptic Gospels, but his own person. Everything 
 depends on whether you hear in this Gospel the 
 preacher of repentance, or Jesus himself, or the 
 Apostle, speak; or, whether they all speak the same 
 thing in almost the same form. Is it supposable 
 that the elaborate discourses of Jesus, which we 
 constantly meet with here, were really delivered by 
 him in this form, and, — supposing that John is 
 
THE JOHANNEAN AND SYNOPTIC CHRIST. 66 
 
 the writer, — have been thus recorded with satis- 
 factory fidelity? Indeed, not merely the form of 
 the words of Jesus, as they are here presented to 
 us, but also their import is of that kind that there 
 is good ground for the mistrust which gives rise to 
 our question. Still more. In the first three Gospels r 
 you hear the voice of a simple Rabbi of Nazareth, 
 whom we understand, become fond of, and can 
 follow; but the Johannean Christ appears before 
 our eyes in superterrestrial splendour, continually 
 bearing witness to the supernatural relation in which 
 he, and he alone, stands to the Father. He never 
 appears as a person from the midst of Israel, but 
 always as one who stands in opposition to Israel, 
 and speaking of his own importance both for the 
 believing and the unbelieving world. There, he be- 
 gins to speak first at a definite time of his suffer- 
 ing and death; here, we hear him make mention of 
 his tragical departure at the very beginning of his 
 public ministry. There, the resurrection and the 
 final judgment are portrayed in poetic colours, just 
 as we know them to have been anticipated by the 
 Jews, and as Jesus, — a phenomenon which we 
 can readily understand, — conceived the same thing; 
 but here, we hear him speak of an eternal life this 
 side the grave; the question is not at all concerning 
 hell, the visible Second Coming, nor the general 
 judgment; everything is conceived in a perfectly 
 spiritual way, but is heard, at the same time, in an 
 altogether different circle of ideas from that in which 
 we have elsewhere moved. In reading Matthew, 
 
 5 
 
66 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 Mark, and Luke, the wanderer seems to be travel- 
 ling over a pleasant and fruitful plain, but in read- 
 ing John he ascends a mountain whose peak is lost 
 in the clouds. Or rather, the first three Gospels 
 remind us of a cheerful brook, whose bottom we 
 can clearly see as it hastens onward; but John is 
 a majestic lake, whose surface mirrors the firma- 
 ment with its stars, and whose depth is altogether 
 concealed from our vision." 
 
 If we have now declared fully and plainly what 
 has seemed obscure to many an one on attentively 
 reading the fourth Gospel, it. cannot excite our 
 wonder if the opponents of its authenticity advise 
 us, on the ground of these and other animadver- 
 sions, to speak in future no more of a Johannean 
 Christ, but rather of a Christian John. But shall we 
 all the less avoid a full explanation of these charges, 
 or withdraw from the consideration of this question: 
 How far do the ideas of diversity and antagonism 
 here coincide? We promise to present to you less 
 what is new than what is complete; and we would 
 at the same time suggest to our opponents to avoid 
 the continual repetition of what has been said and 
 as often refuted. Yet we frankly place before you 
 for examination the following remarks, as a sub- 
 ject for your thorough and impartial reflection. 
 
 First: Every distinguished personage, — and 
 certainly all apply this term to the Saviour, — pre- 
 sents to the observer different, and more or less 
 heterogeneous, sides and points of view, which, on 
 superficial examination, preclude each other, but 
 
Christ's multiform character. 67 
 
 when seen closely, complement one another to a 
 certain degree. One of Goethe's biographers says 
 of him, that there was hidden in him ten different 
 persons; we discover in Luther, Augustine, and 
 Paul, such a multiplicity and fullness of intellectual 
 and spiritual life that it sometimes costs us an effort 
 to discover in the very divergent exhibition of this 
 life the same fundamental characteristics of one and 
 the same person. How very different the Paul of 
 the Epistle to the Romans, for example, appears 
 from the one of the Pastoral Epistles, or the Paul 
 of the Acts of the Apostles from the one of the 
 Epistles in general! So much is this the case, that, 
 if one does not look deeper and further, he will 
 sometimes be involuntarily led to call one or the 
 other picture unhistorical, merely through being gov- 
 erned by the first impression. We hear the great 
 Apostle to the Gentiles saying on one occasion: 
 "I desire to be present with you now, and to change 
 my voice" (Galatians iv. 20); and we know how 
 remarkably he succeeded in this more than once. 
 But, on the scale of such an instrument, an infinite 
 variety of notes can take place without any disturb- 
 ance of harmony. Yet, if this is the fact in Paul, 
 much less can it surprise us to find the same thing 
 in Him who was more than Paul, and in whom it 
 is much easier for us to suppose an infinite wealth 
 of forms and expressions of life than the contrary. 
 In the polished and thousand -faced diamond there 
 shines one and the same light in a multiform blend- 
 ing of colours; and should we expect the case to be 
 
 5* 
 
68 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 different in an infinitely higher sphere, — the spirit- 
 ual and the Divine ? Even in the Christ of the 
 synoptic Gospels there slumbers such a depth of 
 self - consciousness, together with an exhibition of 
 such glory and with such an abundance of form, 
 that it can excite nobody's wonder to perceive in 
 him both thoughts and forms which those of his 
 biographers w r hom we have heretofore consulted 
 either did not make us acquainted with, or, at least, 
 did not do it in such a manner. 
 
 Second: It is proper to observe, that the first 
 three Gospels exhibit a great difference in the matter 
 and form of our Lord's teaching. In the Sermon on 
 the Mount we find here and there a striking appli- 
 cation of metaphor, just as we find it continually in 
 John; but we look in vain there for parables in the 
 strict sense. But later, on the other hand, we see 
 our Lord opening his lips on the shore of the Sea 
 of Galilee in order to speak in a succession of par- 
 ables, of which different ones, apparently on the 
 same day, w T ere spoken to the same audience. And 
 as the period of his public instruction approaches 
 its termination, we hear from the top of the Mount 
 of Olives a prophetical and eschatological discourse 
 (Matthew xxiv. and xxv.j, which varies in import 
 and tone as much from the popular parable as the 
 parable does from the Sermon on the Mount. Our 
 Lord speaks at one time as the Lawgiver of the 
 New Testament, at another as the friendly, popular 
 teacher, and at still another, as the herald of his 
 own Second Coming. Leaving Matthew and Mark 
 
Christ's infinite resources. 69 
 
 out of the question for a moment, we find just in 
 that part of Luke whose great value has been 
 acknowledged by later criticism (the account of the 
 Last Journey to Jerusalem, chapter ix. 51 — xvni. 14) 
 a treasure of thoughts and doctrinal expressions 
 whose existence we are scarcely permitted to antic- 
 ipate by the first two Evangelists. The parables 
 in Luke, — I may mention merely those of the 
 Unjust Steward, the Rich Man and Lazarus, and 
 the Unjust Judge and the Widow, — when placed 
 beside those of Matthew, have such a peculiar ap- 
 pearance that one could almost prophesy the ap- 
 pearance of some critic who would venture to doubt 
 the one or the other series. From these particulars 
 I come to the conclusion, that Christ, who could 
 draw out so many relatively new things from this 
 single rich store-house, could certainly not have been 
 so poor as not to be able to resort, if necessity re- 
 quired, to many another store-house more adapted 
 to circumstances and better suited to his purpose. 
 
 lldrd: Another point which we would now ask 
 you to observe. The evident difference in matter 
 and form between the words of the Johannean and 
 the synoptic Christ can be explained in great part 
 by a difference of circumstances and purpose. I con- 
 fess that if I should read, for example, that the 
 farewell words in John were spoken before a mixed 
 Galilean multitude, it would sound to me as incred- 
 ible as if I heard that the Sermon on the Mount 
 had been delivered in Solomon's Porch at Jerusalem 
 before the unbelieving Jews. But it is well knonw 
 
70 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 that John transports us, by his description of our 
 Lord, principally to Judea, while the remaining Evan- 
 gelists refer us almost exclusively to Galilee. Should 
 it be a proof of Christ's wisdom in teaching if he 
 had spoken to the people in the same tone as to 
 the most prominent Jews, or vice versa? Could not, 
 and must not, the tone in which he here announ- 
 ced his joyous message to the poor and ignorant, 
 and that in which he there opposed the oppressors 
 and seducers of the people, have been different in 
 each case? A proof of the correctness of this ob- 
 servation may be found in the fact that where we 
 see in Matthew, for example, our Lord coming in 
 contact with the Jews of Jerusalem (as in chapter xv., 
 in his conversation on tradition and the laws of pu- 
 rification with the Pharisees and Scribes who had 
 been sent to him, or in chapter xxiii., in his contro- 
 versial discourses at the end of his labors), the lan- 
 guage is altogether different from that before the 
 people who hungered after salvation, and it breathes 
 the same holy indignation which we find in the 
 castigatory words in John's Gospel. On the other 
 hand, we hear him in John speaking so clearly and 
 comprehensively, according to the necessity and cir- 
 cumstances of the moment, — we need only refer 
 to the well - known conversation w T ith the Samaritan 
 woman, — that it could hardly excite our wonder 
 if we found a leaf of this kind in the first three 
 Gospels. 
 
 Fourth: From what has been said, if we tarry 
 at' the form of Christ's words as related by John, 
 
JOHANNEAN AND SYNOPTIC ANALOGIES. 71 
 
 we must confess that we find here no parables in 
 the strict sense of the word. But we can little 
 doubt that this form was much more adapted to 
 public instruction than to dialectical controversy 
 with the representatives of Rabbinical learning ; and 
 still less can we doubt that in the fourth Gospel 
 the metaphor, — as those of the Good Shepherd 
 and the True Vine, — is carried so far, and is so 
 strikingly elaborated, that it sometimes approaches 
 the dramatical and historical character of the real 
 parable. Almost everything which criticism has ob- 
 jected to in the form of our Lord's words in John 
 has its analogies and parallels in the synoptic Evan- 
 gelists, — which analogies and parallels are sometimes 
 remarkable, especially if we bear in mind the differ- 
 ence of circumstances and purpose. Complaint is 
 made, for example, at the length of the Johannean 
 discourses. But, from the Sermon 0:1 the Mount, as 
 presented to us by Luke (chapter vi. 17 — 49), it is 
 plain that Christ sometimes delivered also in Gal- 
 ilee even more extended discourses. It is held that 
 Christ's words sometimes repeat themselves. But 
 without reminding you at length that, notwithstand- 
 ing a partial repetition, our Lord's speaking in John 
 moves on uninterruptedly, and in its flow continually 
 carries with it new grains of gold, we may ob- 
 serve, that also in Matthew, Mark, and Luke we 
 sometimes find two or more parables employed in 
 the elaboration of almost the same fundamental 
 thought. He who, like Strauss, can call the Holy 
 of Holies of Christ's High-Priestly Prayer "tedious," 
 
72 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 is as little competent to pronounce a correct opinion 
 in this department as he who places the music of 
 Mozart or Beethoven on a level with the intolerable 
 din which seems to be the pleasure of our house- 
 keepers when cleaning the house at certain times 
 of the year, but which is the very terror of about 
 as many quiet-loving masters of families. 
 
 Much has been said against the mysterious, para- 
 doxical, and profoundly mystical character of some 
 of the statements of John. I might, perhaps, apply 
 here the sentiment of a celebrated man: "He who 
 scorns paradoxes does not love the truth;" but I 
 will rather ask, whether we have to seek altogether 
 in vain for this kind of expression in Matthew and 
 the two other synoptic Evangelists? Such a state- 
 ment, for example, as "He that loveth his life shall 
 lose it, and he that hateth his life in this world 
 shall keep it unto life eternal," may also be read 
 substantially in the first Gospel (Matthew xvi. 25) ; • 
 and what can sound more paradoxical then the say- 
 ing which has not been preserved for us by John: 
 "For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he 
 shall have more abundance: but whosoever hath 
 not, from him shall be taken away even that he 
 hath" (Matthew xin. 12)? It excites suspicion that 
 the words of our Lord in the fourth Gospel are 
 generally misunderstood, and that where they are 
 spiritually intended, they are perverted to absurdity 
 by literal interpretation. But also in Matthew 
 (chapter xvi.) and Mark (chapter vm. ) we hear that 
 even the Disciples regarded our Lord's warning 
 
HARMONY OF ALL THE GOSPELS OX CHRIST. 73 
 
 against the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees 
 as a proof that they had taken no bread with them; 
 and in Matthew (chapter xxi. 45) it is communicated 
 as something remarkable that the chief- priests and 
 Pharisees understood our Lord on that occasion, 
 which, according to this Evangelist, must by no 
 means have been the case usually. I might say 
 more; but this is sufficient. To the eye that does 
 not look for contradiction and opposition, this is per- 
 fectly clear: In the synoptic Evangelists our Lord 
 sometimes speaks in such a Johannean way, and in 
 John so synoptically, that, if one absolutely adheres 
 to their opposition, he has scarcely any other choice 
 left him than to pronounce a large part of both ac- 
 counts utterly unauthentic and incredible. u 
 
 This will become very plain to us if we take 
 into more thorough consideration the contents of 
 Christ's declarations according to both accounts. 
 Without doubt, the statements of Jesus with refer- 
 ence to his superhuman origin and dignity are far 
 more numerous and forcible in the fourth Gospel 
 than in those we meet with in the other three. We 
 know full well that they are a thorn in many a 
 side, but we ask at the same time this question: 
 Where does our Lord say anything according to 
 one which he denies according to the other, or 
 where does he deny according to this account what 
 he asserts according to that one? Does the sceptic 
 suppose that by adhering to the synoptic Evange- 
 lists he is really exempted from accepting the super- 
 natural character of Christ? Yet it is not in John 
 
 
74 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 that we read that great utterance: "Where two 
 or three are gathered together in my name, there 
 am I in the midst of them" (Matthew xvni. 20): 
 nor: "I am with you alway, even unto the end of 
 the world" (Matthew xxvm. 20); nor: "If David 
 then call him Lord, how is he his son" (Matthew 
 xxii. 45) ; nor, — but why should I burden you with 
 a long succession of such declarations? That mys- 
 terious and majestic one: "All things are delivered 
 unto me of my Father; and no man knoweth the 
 Son but the Father; neither knoweth any man the 
 Father save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son 
 will reveal him," * proves sufficiently that the as- 
 sumption that the Christ of the first three Gospels 
 was a merely human Christ, bears the stamp of 
 evident falsehood. The sceptics know no other 
 way of getting out of their difficulty here than by 
 applying to the scientific department the "rounding- 
 off" system that has been applied in our day with 
 good results to the political sphere; and thus main- 
 taining with Strauss, for example, that one half of 
 the grand utterance, "no man knoweth the Father 
 but the Son," is well enough in place, but that the 
 other half, "no man knoweth the Son but the Father," 
 was never spoken by Jesus. 2 
 
 This, by the way, is a critical operation which 
 may be applied with extraordinary results to a 
 
 i Matthew XI. 27. Compare Luke X. 22. See, also, 
 Matthew XXI. 37; XXII 2; XXIV. 35, and other parallel 
 passages. 
 
 2 Leben Jesu, fiir das deutsche Yolk bearbeitet, p. 209. 1864. 
 
DIFFERENCE IN CHRIST'S CIRCUMSTANCES. 75 
 
 number of other objectionable passages, but, without 
 doubt, would finally prove to even stone-blind eyes 
 where dogmatism and where true science can be 
 found. We say, further, that men utter an evident 
 untruth when they assure us that the Christ of the first 
 three Gospels places himself on a level with all men 
 in order to pray with them, "Our Father;" and 
 perhaps also, "Forgive us our debts." 1 Formerly, 
 the opinion was held that Christ did not say, "Let 
 us pray," but, "After this manner therefore pray 
 Ye: Our Father," and that from his twelfth year 
 he made an evident difference between "Our Father" 
 and u My Father," — which cannot be denied accord- 
 ing even to the synoptic Evangelists, and there- 
 fore expresses plainly enough the consciousness of 
 an altogether special relation to the Infinite. If our 
 Lord places his purpose and majesty more strongly 
 in the foreground in the fourth Gospel than is the 
 case in the first three Gospels, it is because he 
 speaks in the two cases under totally different ne- 
 cessities and circumstances. His discourses in Gal- 
 ilee, which are directed to the people, exhibit a 
 more introductory and pedagogical character, while 
 his disputations with the Jews of Jerusalem are 
 more polemical and apologetical. Yet there, as well 
 as here, he declares himself to be the Son of man, 
 — though with supernatural origin and dignity, — 
 and the Son of God, but at the same time conscious 
 of his dependence on the Father. The claims which 
 
 i Keim, Der (jesclricldliche Christus. 3rd Ed. p. 39. 
 
76 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 he makes with reference to himself are the same in 
 both cases. If objection is made to the fact that 
 he prophesies in John the death of his enemies in 
 their sins, it can be said that the eight woes in 
 Matthew, or the sentence pronounced upon the im- 
 penitent cities of Galilee (Matthew xi. 20 — 24), do 
 not have a less fearful sound. A declaration, on 
 the other hand, like that in the synoptic Gospels: 
 "He that loveth father or mother more than me is 
 not worthy of me" (Matthew x. 37), is just as im- 
 moderate as the direct pardon of sin is blasphemous, 
 if he who speaks them both has no higher rank, 
 either in his own consciousness or in the eyes of 
 the Evangelists, than merely that of one of our fellow- 
 men. No doubt there is a difference, but it is no 
 other than that between the half-blown bud and the 
 perfectly -developed flower. It has been very cor- 
 rectly remarked, that the synoptic christology does 
 not merely assume the Johannean statements, but that 
 it requires them, in order to complete it, and vice versa. 
 Nor is the case at all different with the manner 
 in which our Lord, according to both accounts, pro- 
 ceeds to announce his Messianic character, his suf- 
 fering, and his death. There has been great injus- 
 tice in concluding from the account of the incident 
 at Csesarea Philippi (Matthew xvi. 13 — 17) that 
 Jesus had neither expressly professed before this 
 time to be the Messiah, nor had spoken of his 
 suffering and death. An impartial reading and com- 
 parison of even the synoptic accounts alone, show 
 us that he had earlier indicated one as well as the 
 
Christ's regard to circumstances. 77 
 
 other, though in a more figurative manner; * and thus 
 it cannot seem strange to us to hear our Lord speak 
 in John, at the very beginning of his public labors, 
 of the "destruction of this temple," and of "being 
 raised as a brazen serpent," and soon afterwards 
 declaring himself to the Samaritan woman as the 
 promised Messiah. From the first three, as well as 
 from the fourth Gospel, there is sufficient evidence 
 that, in his frank disclosures, as well as in the fig- 
 urative garb of what it was necessary to say with 
 carefulness, he constantly kept in view the condi- 
 tion and necessity of the circumstances of the oc- 
 casion. According to both accounts, we hear him 
 intimate his approaching end, at first more guard- 
 edly and figuratively, but subsequently, openly and 
 precisely. According to all four Gospels, he re- 
 peatedly prophesied his resurrection from the dead, 
 and thereby exhibited in the most positive manner 
 his Divine foreknowledge. Those who will not 
 accept this fact in John, must deny it in all the 
 Gospels alike, and ascribe only to those the right 
 of speaking who hold such prophecies to be a priori 
 impossible, and, accordingly, allow their historical 
 criticism to be controlled by dogmatical prejudice. 
 In the synoptic Gospels, as in John's, Christ's pas- 
 sion and death are produced by the same cause, and 
 are indispensable for the same purpose; there, as 
 here, that passion and death contribute to the glori- 
 fication of the Sufferer himself, and an interest in 
 
 i Matthew V. 11, 12; VII. 21—23; IX. 15; XII. 39 ff. ; 
 Luke IV. 18-22. ff. 
 
78 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 the fruit of his life and death is made dependent 
 upon the same conditions. 
 
 If we were to supplement all that we say by a 
 number of Scriptural proofs, there would be almost 
 no end of quotation. You can compare the Script- 
 ures with the Scriptures for yourselves. Permit me 
 to direct your attention to the doctrine of escbatol- 
 ogy, because it is here, in particular, that great 
 weight has been laid on the difficulty in question. 
 "In John," we hear it said, "there is not a word of 
 the lower regions, of the resurrection of the dead, 
 and of the subsequent judgment, as is the fact in 
 the first three Evangelists." This is certainly the 
 case, we answer, if this Gospel must first be sub- 
 jected to a sort of military execution, and the critic 
 lays down his rule that this or that could not have 
 been said by the Johannean Christ because it does 
 not fit the scheme (prepared by the critic himself) 
 of his ideas, or if the expositor determines to cast 
 out the obnoxious element from the Sacred Text by 
 a dexterous stroke of his art. But if such opera- 
 tions as these be not welcome to you, I would then 
 ask you this question: "What must we understand 
 by the Johannean Christ speaking of 'an hour' in 
 which all who are in their graves shall hear his 
 voice; of a resurrection 'in the last day;' of a judg- 
 ment appointed for this 'last day;' of a waiting 
 'till he comes,' and of a second coming 'to take his 
 children to himself?'" 1 It would be indeed difti- 
 
 i JolmV. 28: VI. 39,40,54; XII. 48; XIV. 3; XXI. 24. 
 
Christ's doctrinal system. 70 
 
 cult for us to imagine that all this means a merely 
 spiritual coming*. I readily grant that the Resur- 
 rection, the Judgment, and the Second Coming of 
 our Lord at the end of the world, stand altogether 
 in the background in the fourth Gospel, but yet they 
 are by no means absent from it. On the contrary, 
 the idea of eternal life refers here repeatedly to a 
 future life; * while, on the other hand, there are 
 traces in the first three Gospels that Christ speaks 
 in them of life and resurrection in a more spiritual 
 sense. 2 And thus we come to this conclusion: The 
 opposition must be regarded as purely relative, but 
 by no means as a real contradiction. On the con- 
 trary, the apparent contradiction lies merely upon 
 the surface, while the coincidence lies in the depths 
 below. 
 
 In the same way the difference in our Lord's 
 doctrinal system, — so far as we can speak here 
 of a doctrinal system, — gives our opponents no 
 ground for denying the authenticity of this Gospel. 
 We can not, without great impropriety, doubt the 
 credibility of John in communicating such, and so 
 many, highly important statements. Must it be re- 
 garded as altogether inconceivable to meet here 
 with the very words of the Incarnate Word? Must 
 we, forsooth, suppose that John allows our Lord 
 to speak just as, according to his view, he could 
 have spoken, and possibly should have spoken? I 
 know that this is maintained, but we have already 
 
 i See, for example, John IV. 14, 36. 
 
 2 See, for example, Luke IX. 58; XV. 24: 
 
80 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 had occasion to see that assumption and proof are 
 ideas not always found together. It cannot he de- 
 nied that a very great coincidence exists between 
 John's own use of language and that of Jesus in 
 John's Gospel. This is a natural result of that in- 
 ward relation in which he stood for years with our 
 Lord, whose manner of life, thought, and speaking 
 he had gradually appropriated. Nevertheless, we 
 perceive a very essential difference between the use 
 of language by the Evangelist himself and the prin- 
 cipal persons of his history. John, for example, 
 calls Jesus the Logos, yet Jesus never calls him- 
 self this in John's Gospel, but, as in the other 
 Evangelists, the Son. Jesus -here calls the Holy 
 Spirit "the Comforter," as his representative with the 
 Disciples; but John, on the contrary, calls Jesus 
 "the Advocate" (1 John ir. 1), literally, the Para- 
 clete, as the representative of his children before 
 the Father. Jesus speaks of his kingdom and the 
 kingdom of God; but John does not use this ex- 
 pression in his Gospel or in his Epistles when he 
 speaks himself. Whence such a difference, if the 
 words of our Lord in this Gospel are to be re- 
 garded as nothing more than the Evangelist's own 
 simple mixture? 
 
 As far as the Baptist is concerned, John's rec- 
 ord has a more majestic sound than we find the 
 case in the first three Gospels, but yet it contains 
 nothing which it was impossible for the last and 
 greatest of the Prophets to explain; and at least a 
 measure of this difficulty disappears on observing 
 
John's fidelity in reporting jesus. 81 
 
 that the fourth Gospel gives an account of this rec- 
 ord principally after the appearance at baptism, 
 when there undoubtedly appeared to him a new 
 and higher light, while the synoptic Evangelists, on 
 the contrary, mention his record in an earlier pe- 
 riod. It is not necessary for us, therefore, to deny 
 that the Evangelist, in reporting our Saviour's words, 
 used a certain degree of freedom. In ancient times 
 there was not a continual effort for diplomatic and. 
 stenographic exactness on such points. The Spirit 
 which led John to record the words of the Word 
 was not only a Spirit of truth, but also of freedom; 
 but it is beyond all doubt that we can regard him 
 as a true and faithful reporter of the words of 
 Jesus. 
 
 In order to prove this conviction to be well- 
 grounded, we do not now appeal first and directly 
 to the promise of the Holy Spirit, which was made 
 by Christ and was fulfilled through him (although 
 we could make this appeal without thereby incurring 
 the charge of arguing in a circle), as this promise 
 and its fulfillment are not only communicated to us 
 by John himself, but also by the synoptic Gospels, 
 the Acts of the Apostles, and the Epistles. * We 
 would lay just as little stress upon the supposition, 
 — which, indeed, is very reasonable, — that the 
 Evangelist, many years previously, even before his 
 Gospel had seen the light, had gathered together 
 his own records of what was of such incalculable 
 
 i Matthew X. 19, 20; Luke XII. 11, 12; XXIV. 49; 
 Aets L 8. Compare John XVI. 13. 
 
 6 
 
82 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 value to bis own heart. We prefer to direct your 
 attention to the power of his love, by virtue of 
 which such lasting recollections as those, instead of 
 becoming dissipated by time, constantly became more 
 deep and living, and stood out in magnified prom- 
 inence and clearness at the end of his life. We 
 may ask, whether, with this profound reverence, 
 — many call it an idolatrous one, — which the 
 Evangelist entertained for the Master, it is not psy- 
 chologically inconceivable that he should have placed 
 in his mouth such promises and threats, exhorta- 
 tions and prayers, as he could and must have known 
 had never been really uttered? We present this 
 thought for reflection: Whether a collector, who de- 
 sired to let our Lord speak in human love as God, 
 ever came to the thought of proving his Divine na- 
 ture and origin from the fact that in the 82nd Psalm 
 there is once exceptionally given to men the name 
 of "gods" (Johnx. 34 — 36)? We lay special stress 
 upon the many parenthetical observations and di- 
 gressions of this Evangelist, which are scattered 
 throughout his account, now for the purpose of ex- 
 planation and now for the establishing of some ex- 
 pression of our Lord, and we ask: Why would he 
 have regarded it necessary, at any time or place, to 
 make this distinction between his own view and the 
 words of our Lord if he had not been conscious 
 that he was giving a true and faithful report of 
 Christ's words? 
 
 To be brief, let me direct your attention to the 
 many apparently unimportant parentheses which, 
 
being incontrovertible traces of personal observation, 
 acquire a proportionately great importance, but which 
 are utterly without purpose, and totally incompre- 
 hensible if we regard the whole account as an 
 artificial composition. Take, as an example, the 
 narrative of Christ's last evening. There the com- 
 munication of the words of Jesus is interrupted by 
 the remark, "and it was night" (chapter xm. 30); 
 then by the psychologically clear questions of Thomas, 
 Philip, and Judas not Iscariot (chapter xiv. 5; 
 xviii. 22); further, by a declaration of the Master, 
 "Arise, let us go hence," — which, as is plain 
 from what directly follows, was not immediately 
 succeeded by the outbreak, but, as is thought, by 
 the conversation of the disciples, which explains 
 that mysterious expression, "a little while" (chapter 
 xvi. 16); — and finally, when they think that now 
 everything is suddenly plain to them, by the ex- 
 pression of their surprise: "Lo, now speakest thou 
 plainly, and speakest no proverb." I would like to 
 ask an impartial judge, who had never heard of 
 this controversy, this question: Can you not grasp 
 with your own hands, can you not taste and feel, 
 that here is truth and life, — such life as must 
 be experienced, and never imitated? In fact, we 
 can confidently maintain, as Hase does, who was a 
 theological genius in everybody's opinion until the 
 fatal day that he lost his scientific fame in the 
 estimation of a certain class by his defence of 
 John: "The strongest proofs against the fourth 
 
 6* 
 

 84 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 Gospel turn before niy eyes into proofs of its Apos- 
 tolic origin." x 
 
 In view of all that is now said, can we affirm 
 that the words of our Lord, as communicated by 
 the synoptic Evangelists, are essentially different in 
 form and contents from those in John? We cer- 
 tainly cannot see the clear sun if we maintain this 
 seriously for a moment. But we do not forget that 
 the synoptic and Johannean Christ by no means 
 appears just the same, down to the smallest par- 
 ticular. There is a diversity, but it is like that 
 between the two views of a metropolis seen from 
 the sea and from the land; the difference is ap- 
 parent to the eye, but the high towers prove that we 
 see the same city before u&, though new points of 
 view, — all of which harmonize, — present them- 
 selves constantly to the acute vision. There is such 
 a difference as exists between a landscape which is 
 seen at one time from a favourable point on the plain, 
 and at another from an elevation; or such a differ- 
 ence as exists between the starry heavens as seen 
 from the northern and southern hemispheres, when 
 there are other constellations, but the magnificence 
 is all of the same general character. There is really 
 a difference here, but it is the natural result of 
 what an Apostle of our Lord calls "the exceeding 
 riches of Christ." And the same riches to which 
 we are indebted for being able to place the Pau- 
 
 1 See Apologelisches gegen Strauss, in Krause's Vrotestant- 
 ische Kirchenzeitung, 1865; 3. Compare, further, his Letter to 
 Baur: Die Tiibinger Schule. Leipzig, 1855. 
 
john's gospel as an historical record. 85 
 
 line picture of Christ beside the synoptic and Jo- 
 hannean one, and which cause our Lord still to re- 
 Teal himself frequently "in another form," as he did 
 to those two disciples who went into the country 
 (Mark xvi. 12), are revealed in the great diver- 
 sity of words and discourses as repeated by the 
 different Evangelists. These riches make it very 
 easy to understand how the writers could paint the 
 same picture on different sides without coming at 
 all into conflict with the truth; but it is utterly in- 
 conceivable how such a Christ as the one of the 
 Gospels, and particularly the one of John, could have 
 been a fiction of men standing so far below the 
 object of their adoration. Yet, we will hereafter 
 speak of the Johannean portrait of Christ considered 
 as a whole. 
 
 II. We will still tarry a while at particular 
 points, and proceed to answer this question : Whether 
 the historical representation of the fourth Gospel, 
 any more than its doctrinal system, drives us to 
 the conclusion that it is unauthentic and incredible? 
 You have heard much said of the conflict in our 
 times between the synoptic and Johannean accounts 
 of the life, deeds, and fate of our Lord. And we 
 may ask here, whether this conflict is really so 
 great that we can never think of a compromise, 
 much less of a permanent peace? 
 
 The first point where opinions diverge is this: 
 "The beginning of the life of Jesus," we are told, 
 "was purely human; he was the child of an earthly 
 mother; according to two accounts he was con- 
 
86 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 ceived in a miraculous manner; but it does not 
 follow from anything that is further said that he 
 had an existence on earth before his incarnation. 
 The Johannean Christ, on the contrary, was possibly 
 not born, or perhaps had no human mother and no 
 physical brethren." But just the contrary is plain 
 from John's Gospel; for the difference lies simply 
 in the fact that Matthew and Luke begin with the 
 earthly origin of Christ, while John begins with the 
 heavenly, so that in John's case we see the golden 
 thread stretching from heaven downwards, but in the 
 case of the other Evangelists we see it stretching 
 from earth heavenwards. This difference can only 
 appear to be a contradiction in the eyes of him 
 who assumes at the very beginning that our Lord 
 had no other than merely an earthly origin, or, 
 in other words, who silently accepts as a fact what 
 must first be proved. But he, on the contrary, who 
 institutes an impartial comparison, will discover 
 that the one description is a postulate of the other, 
 and so far is this the case that each complements the 
 other in a satisfactory manner. The miraculous con- 
 ception and birth of our Saviour, -- I must here 
 take for granted that this is credited by the de- 
 fenders of the synoptic account, — permit us to be- 
 lieve, a priori, that he who commenced his life in 
 such an extraordinary manner, belonged to a higher 
 order of things than one simply earthly ; and this 
 supposition becomes clearer and more certain by the 
 Johannean account. This account, on the other hand, 
 makes it highly probable that if God's Son appear 
 
JOHN ESTABLISHES THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 87 
 
 at all in the flesh, it will take place in an extraor- 
 dinary manner; and we learn from Matthew and 
 Luke that this actually so occurred. If John is si- 
 lent on this miracle, it simply arises from the fact 
 that he is pursuing quite another train of thought. 
 Their method did not suit his object; yet an acute 
 ear does not fail to catch an indirect, yet almost 
 unmistakable, reference to it in the peculiar manner 
 in which he describes the spiritual birth of God's 
 children, with the exclusion of all carnal extraction. 1 
 It is no proof of John's own view, that, in John's 
 Gospel, Philip calls our Lord, "Jesus of Nazareth, 
 the son of Joseph" (John i. 45). He shows plainly 
 enough that he is not of the opinion that Jesus 
 was of Galilean descent, as we see by the noteworthy 
 passage: "Jesus went into Galilee, for he himself 
 testified that a prophet hath no honour in his own 
 country" (therefore, not in Galilee, but in Judea, — 
 John iv. 43, 44). 2 He, therefore, indirectly estab- 
 lishes the synoptic accounts, which, indeed, he con- 
 tradicts in not a single point. 
 
 No greater difficulty is produced by a second 
 point of difference, — the one concerning the du- 
 ration and scene of the public labors of Jesus. The 
 duration is not defined in the least degree by the 
 synoptic Evangelists; and though it is plain from 
 John that it extended over the space of about three 
 successive years, he nevertheless tells us nothing 
 
 i John I. 13: "Which were born, not of blood, nor of the 
 will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." 
 
 2 Compare Van Oosterzee, Life of Jesus, Part. II. p. 102 ff. 
 
88 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 which the rest deny, but merely something on which 
 all the others are silent. We, therefore, see clearly 
 that the impression that these public labors lasted 
 but a year and some months, — as urged by our 
 opponents, — is not correct, just as is frequently 
 the case with other impressions. As far as the 
 scene of the labors of Jesus is coucerned, it is true 
 that the first three Evangelists mention Galilee al- 
 most exclusively, while John leads us chiefly to 
 Judea; yet he also relates how our Lord appeared 
 during his public ministry at Capernaum, at the 
 time of the second Feast of the Passover, while, 
 on the other hand, we must infer from the synoptic 
 Evangelists that he was present a number of times 
 in Judea and Jerusalem before he went thither to 
 celebrate the last Feast of the Passover. That lam- 
 entation in Matthew (chapter xxm. 37), "0 Jeru- 
 salem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets and 
 stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often 
 would I have gathered thy children together, even 
 as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, 
 and ye would not," is sufficiently convincing on this 
 point, unless we hold, with Baur, that no personal 
 ministration of Jesus among the inhabitants of the 
 metropolis is meant, or, with Strauss, that these 
 were not the real words of Jesus. But if our Lord 
 was in Jerusalem only at the last Feast of the 
 Passover, who will explain to me the fact that 
 many inhabitants of Judea and Jerusalem gathered 
 about him in the beginning (Matthew iv. 25); that 
 he entered the house of Mary and Martha, as an 
 
THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS CONFIRMING JOHN'S. 89 
 
 acquainted guest (Luke x. 38—42); that he found 
 in Joseph of Arimathea a disciple who had his own 
 sepulchre in Jerusalem, and most probably dwelt 
 there (^uke xxm. 50 — 53) ; and that he had friends 
 there, and in the neighbourhood, for whom one word 
 was sufficient to place fully at his disposal an ass 
 for his entrance, and a room for the celebration of 
 the Passover (Matthew xxi. 3; xxvi. 18)? All these 
 facts, gathered merely from the first three Gospels, 
 prove that our Lord did not go to Jerusalem for 
 the first time shortly before his death, and thus they 
 confirm indirectly, yet for this reason the more 
 strongly, the Johannean account. He who reflects 
 very carefully upon this point will clearly see, that 
 if our Lord regarded himself at the beginning of 
 his labors as the Messiah of Israel, his entrance 
 into Jerusalem must not be the end but the very 
 beginning of his ministry, just as John narrates. 
 And he who has the least conception of the ex- 
 alted symbolism of Christ's deeds, will certainly see, 
 with us, the great propriety of his beginning and 
 ending his public ministry by the purification of the 
 desecrated temple. And thus the contradiction in 
 the present instance is merely an imaginary one. 
 
 In the third place, there is no positive contra- 
 diction in reference to Christ's conduct toward his 
 friends and enemies. The calling of the first 
 Apostles, we are told, is described by the synoptic 
 Evangelists in a totally different manner from that 
 of John. But what prevents us from supposing 
 that the latter, who, in his Gospel (in a certain sense 
 
90 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 the Genesis of the New Testament), goes as far back 
 as possible to the very beginning of things, describes 
 in his first chapter the first meeting of our Lord 
 with the five, who follow him in a preliminary way 
 at first, but whose subsequent call to real apostle - 
 ship is described by all the synoptic Evangelists? 
 The characters of the principal persons, at least, 
 are the same in both accounts. If you take, for 
 example, Peter and Mary, according to the account 
 of John and that of the synoptic Evangelists, you 
 will receive from both the same impression, though 
 at one time favourable and at another less so. The 
 family at Bethany, as we become acquainted with 
 it in John (chapter xi.), corresponds perfectly, — 
 at least, so far as the character of the two sisters 
 is concerned, — to the small but masterly picture 
 drawn by Luke at the close of his 10th chapter, 
 yet without the mention of anything more than the 
 name of the place where they lived. We sometimes 
 see in John, indeed, new persons appear in action 
 before us, — Nathanael and Nicodemus, for example, 
 — but should we therefore look upon them with 
 suspicion, and maintain with immoderate dogmatism 
 that these are not historical figures that we are 
 dealing with, but invented types of some tendency 
 of thought? If this is the case, I propose that every 
 one who writes history be implored never to men- 
 tion a single new name in his account, lest he should 
 lose his credit for consideration. Nicodemus, for ex- 
 ample, certainly does not appear to be a mythical 
 phantom; in all three cases where we meet with 
 
DESIGN OF THE JEWS TO MURDER CHRIST. 91 
 
 him, he speaks and acts in such a way that no 
 psychologist, but only a critic of a certain stamp, 
 will deny his actual existence. We see him not 
 merely come, but exist, grow, ripen into a disciple 
 of our Lord, and be characterized, withal, by a 
 psychological truth which can only be the real 
 expression of historical reality. Is he a type, then 
 he is a type of many people of that and of a later 
 period. But it is said that, for this reason, he is 
 not a historical person, just as if one character ex- 
 cludes the other, and as if the John who is de- 
 scribed as a historical person might not at the same 
 time have been a type also. This is the same ar- 
 bitrary array al of idea in opposition to reality, and 
 of religious truth in opposition to historical fact, 
 which, from Lessing's day down to ours, has be- 
 come a source of many misconstructions and mis- 
 fortunes in our Dutch theology. 
 
 Nor can any objection be raised against the fact 
 that, according to John, the Jews were quite early 
 full of murderous thoughts against Jesus, while, ac- 
 cording to the first three Evangelists, these plans 
 came to light at a later period. These latter say 
 nothing of the earlier stay of our Lord at Jerusalem, 
 for they had no cause to describe the increasing 
 intensity of the conflict of parties. What they tell 
 us concerning the previous conduct of the prominent 
 Jews toward Jesus gives us really no ground for 
 supposing that John has painted them too darkly. 
 On the contrary, the eight "woes" which Matthew 
 describes as breaking forth over these whited sepul- 
 
92 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 chres are doubly intelligible if all that is true which 
 John relates of their increasing enmity toward the 
 Master. Such an eye as his looks keenly at hatred 
 in the germ; and the fearful enmity at the end, 
 such as the synoptic Evangelists describe it, could 
 have been, from the very nature of the case, the 
 kindling of a fire which had long been smouldering 
 under the ashes, and gradually burst into a flame. 
 Great injustice is done to John by maintaining 
 that he idealizes the Samaritans and Gentiles, and 
 elevates them at the expense of the Jews. But also 
 in the synoptic Gospels the better side of the Samari- 
 tans appears in contrast with the bitter enmity of 
 the Jews (Luke x. 33; xvn. 16). According to all 
 four Evangelists, Pilate is weak and destitute of 
 character. Though Jesus says (only in John) that 
 the Jews had "the greater sin" than Pilate (John 
 xix. 11), yet this excuse is at the same time a 
 warning and an indirect charge. And if John had 
 really designed the elevation of the Gentiles above 
 the Jews, how could he have been so silent con- 
 cerning the centurion at the cross? 
 
 It has been regarded objectionable, in the, fourth 
 place, that John says nothing of many particulars 
 > in the life and works of our Lord which appear in 
 the foreground in the first three Gospels. We will 
 hereafter speak of the causes of this phenomenon, 
 when we come to discuss the composition and pur- 
 pose of his writing. Meanwhile, we will here sug- 
 gest, that we cannot be too careful in drawing con- 
 clusions from one's silence instead of from his words. 
 
CONCLUSIONS FROM JOHN'S SILENCE. 93 
 
 John nowhere speaks, for example, of the healing 
 of persons possessed with devils, nor of the healing 
 of the leprous and the lunatic. But have we, there- 
 fore, a right to assert that he is silent for doctrinal 
 reasons? Can we not just as well imagine that 
 such diseases were of more common occurrence in 
 Galilee than in Jerusalem, and was it the appointed 
 duty of an Evangelist who relates but six miracles 
 to give an account of at least one of each variety? 
 John is also silent on the institution of Baptism and 
 the Lord's Supper. But we find in his Gospel the 
 idea that constitutes the real essence of both these 
 symbolical solemnities; namely, the being born of 
 water and of the Spirit, and the living fellowship 
 with our Lord, as symbolically represented in the 
 eating of the bread and the drinking of the wine 
 (John in. 5; vi. 51). One must certainly have read 
 this Gospel with very peculiar eyes if he can draw 
 from its silence the conclusion that the author, in 
 contradiction of the whole Christian Church of his 
 period, denied or opposed either the existence of 
 these two sacraments or their right to exist. It is 
 very plain that it was not his peculiar office to 
 portray the glory of the Incarnate Word in special 
 prominent parts, — as, for example, miracles, bap- 
 tism, or the transfiguration on Mount Tabor, — but 
 rather to describe it in its progressive spiritual reve- 
 lation, in opposition to the darkness of the world. 
 It seems to me that his silence on more than one 
 miracle, which has caused so much offence to scep- 
 tical criticism, must much rather serve as an im- 
 
94 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 portant recommendation of him than as an objection 
 to him. How little such silence gives us the right 
 to infer his ignorance, and then the non-existence 
 of a fact, is easily shown by observing that John, 
 who is silent on the struggle of Christ's soul in 
 Gethsemane, has nevertheless immortalized that ex- 
 pression of our Lord, "Now is my soul troubled" 
 (John xii. 27), as well as that other one, "The cup 
 which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?" 
 (John xviii. 11). By this double declaration John 
 shows that his Christ, as well as that of the first 
 three Gospels, can also grieve and pray. In the 
 whole history of the suffering and death of our 
 Lord, the words and characteristics that are men- 
 tioned in both accounts so naturally unite that one 
 harmonious picture stands before our eyes. It is 
 impossible for any one to doubt that John describes 
 Christ's physical resurrection who has impartially 
 read his account of the visit of the two disciples 
 to Christ's sepulchre, and of his subsequent appear- 
 ance, which Thomas witnessed. Though John de- 
 clares that our Lord suddenly stood in their midst 
 while the doors were closed, this only proves that 
 the Risen One appeared in a glorified body, but by 
 no means that the narrator denies the corporealness 
 of his renewed body or of his appearance itself. 
 And though, in conclusion, John does not speak of 
 the miracle of the ascension, he only shares this 
 silence with Matthew. He shows none the less 
 plainly on this account that he, too, regarded the 
 exaltation of our Lord as a visible occurrence. 
 
And now we come, finally, to that special diffi- 
 culty which, as has been recently supposed, has a 
 far more unfavourable bearing than all others on 
 the authenticity of John's Gospel. We refer to the 
 difference between him and the synoptic Evangelists 
 concerning the day of Christ's death. "According 
 to the first three Gospels," we are told, "our Lord 
 ate the Passover at the usual time, on the evening 
 of the 14thNisan, and that he therefore suffered death 
 on the cross on the 15th. According to John, on 
 the contrary, the Jews must eat the Passover on 
 the evening of the day of his death, and therefore 
 the first real day of the feast was not until the 
 following day. Now this is a point in which the 
 evidence of John is diametrically opposite to that 
 of the other Evangelists; from all external and 
 internal grounds, the synoptic Evangelists are right, 
 and the writer of the fourth Gospel, having a special 
 purpose to serve, has unmistakably represented the 
 affair differently from what was originally the fact." 
 
 We will speak hereafter of this special purpose; 
 for the present, we will say only a few words as 
 clearly as possible on the phenomenon itself. It 
 belongs to those questions in the department of 
 historical criticism on which science has not yet 
 spoken its last word. I will only give you my 
 view here, but you may find it more elaborately 
 developed elsewhere. I firmly believe that this 
 difficulty, too, can and must be perfectly removed. 
 We should regard such a discrepancy simply im- 
 possible even if we were obliged to take a much 
 
96 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 lower view than we are justified in doing concern- 
 ing the historical reliability of the Evangelists, or 
 their accurate acquaintance with the history of our 
 Lord. According to all four Gospels, as we think, 
 our Lord died on the 15th Nisan, after he had 
 eaten the Passover lamb with his disciples on the 
 previous evening, which was the legal time. Though, 
 John seems to contradict this when he relates 
 (chapter xvm. 28), that "the Jews went not into 
 the judgment - hall lest they should be defiled, but 
 that they might eat the Passover," yet this last ex- 
 pression need not necessarily mean the Passover 
 lamb, but the meal of the Passover sacrifice, which 
 began at noon of the same day; and when John 
 says that our Lord was crucified on the "prepara- 
 tion-day of the passover" (chapter xix. 14), we 
 should have in mind the preparation -day before 
 the Passover Sabbath, which preparation -day was 
 also the first day of the Passover itself. We are 
 aware that there are some exegetical difficulties 
 connected with this construction, but they are far 
 less than those into which we should be led by 
 adopting any other construction. If, as is asserted, 
 our effort to discover harmony in the present in- 
 stance is nothing less than unscientific bungling, 
 we can certainly receive this charge with com- 
 posure when we remember that we are in the com- 
 pany of such men as Wieseler, Tholuck, and 
 Hengstenberg. x 
 
 i Compare my Life of Jesus, Part III., in loco, and the 
 literature there cited; also an Article, Pascha, christliche und 
 
REVILLE AND COLANI ENDORSING JOHN. 97 
 
 But granted just for a moment, though we only- 
 do it for the sake of argument, that an irreconcil- 
 able contradiction exists here, we must hold that 
 the synoptic Evangelists have in this respect fol- 
 lowed a less reliable account than the one used by 
 John. Jesus was not, therefore, crucified on the first 
 day of the Passover but on the preparation- day of 
 the Passover, therefore, on a week-day, just as 
 would seem to be the case from some evidences in 
 the synoptic account. We need only call to mind 
 Simon, who returned from the field, and the pur- 
 chase and preparation of spices by the women, to- 
 gether with other particulars. Until within a few 
 years ago, such men as Reville and Colani really 
 acknowledged the superiority of John, in consequence 
 of this and other grounds, since the wind which 
 was blowing from Tubingen had not yet fully 
 swelled the sails of their ship; and as trustworthy 
 a scholar as Bleek has acknowledged the correctness 
 of this view. But just this very objection to the 
 fourth Gospel is thus turned into an argument in its 
 favour, yea, into a guarantee of its authenticity, whose 
 great importance is self-evident to every impartial 
 person. It is clear that this statement could have 
 been made by no obscure person, and by no diplo- 
 matical partisan; and in view of all we have said, 
 we may frankly declare that only an Apostle, and 
 none other than the Apostle John, could have made it. 
 
 Pascha-Streitigkeiten, by G. E. Steitz, in Herzog's Real-Ency- 
 clop., Vol. XI. p. 149 ff. ; and a treatise by L. Paul in the 
 Theol. Studien und Kritiken, 1866, Vol. II. p. 362 ff. 
 
 7 
 
98 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 Nor has any one the slightest ground for forging 
 a weapon against the authenticity of the fourth 
 Gospel from the controversy which was carried on 
 in the Christian Church of the second century con- 
 cerning the proper time of the celebration of the 
 Passover. The brief time allotted us affords as 
 little opportunity for relating the history of this con- 
 troversy as for following modern skeptical criticism 
 in all the serpentine windings which it has made, in 
 order, by its learning and unmistakable acuteness, 
 to convert this difficulty on the Passover into a 
 fearful engine of war against the fourth Gospel. It 
 is asserted that this Gospel was written for the 
 sake of opposing the so-called Quartodecimani, a 
 narrow Judaistic party of Christians of Asia Minor, 
 who, like the Jews, still celebrated the Passover on 
 the 14th Nisan, and defended this custom by an 
 appeal to John and his fellow - Apostles. Let us 
 leave out of consideration for a moment the question 
 whether a whole Gospel like this would have been 
 proper and necessary for their secret purpose, since 
 a simple description of the most prominent events 
 which occurred on the last evening and day of 
 Christ's life would have been perfectly sufficient to 
 answer the demands of their controversy. But who 
 does not clearly see how even the ground for such 
 a supposition is removed if it be true that our Lord 
 was crucified, — just as we find to be the case in the 
 fourth Gospel, — not on the 14th, but on the 15th 
 Nisan? If John did celebrate the Feast of the Pass- 
 over on the 14th Nisan with the Christians of Asia 
 
John's conduct in harmony with his gospel. 99 
 
 Minor, he did it, most likely, not in memory of the 
 real moment of the death of Jesus, but in memory 
 of the Jewish Passover, which, as now the true 
 Passover Lamb was slain, must have gained all the 
 greater importance in his affection, as it was now 
 connected with his own remembrance of the memora- 
 ble institution of the Lord's Supper and the Great 
 Example symbolized in it. This coincides perfectly 
 with the character of an apostle of the circumcision, 
 — which character he had in common with Cephas 
 and James, — and it also harmonizes exactly with 
 the relatively great respect for Jewish customs 
 which the Christian Council at Jerusalem con- 
 nected with the day. Thus John's conduct harmo- 
 nizes perfectly with his own Gospel, and this, in 
 turn, with the other three. How could it ever have 
 occurred that the Evangelists openly contradicted 
 each other on such a point as the real day of the 
 death of our Lord, which was necessarily known 
 very early and universally? 
 
 We have felt it proper to say this much on a 
 point concerning which whole volumes have been 
 written, with the most varied conclusions, none of 
 which claim to present an interpretation perfectly 
 free from difficulty, but the one which is attended 
 with the least. We must add one remark, however, 
 in reference to this whole difference in the state- 
 ment of the day of our Lord's death and of the 
 controversy on the Passover prevailing in the early 
 Church. But granted, for the sake of argument, 
 though we by no means make any concession here* 
 
100 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 that it is not possible to gain any perfect evidence 
 on this matter, and that the difficulty continues to 
 exist in full strength. Then the very serious ques- 
 tion arises, whether this one objection can outweigh 
 the many decisive grounds which declare the au- 
 thenticity of this Apostolic writing? On this ques- 
 tion, it seems to me, no truly impartial person can 
 vacillate one moment in uncertainty. Well now, 
 let us once suppose that the authenticity of John 
 amounts to a hypothesis, which we will allow for 
 a moment to stand in opposition to the hypothesis 
 of a later composition; we then have this as our 
 result: There is everything in favour of the first hy- 
 pothesis, while against it there is but a single phe- 
 nomenon to which we would have to place a mark 
 of interrogation. Tell me, can this one interro- 
 gation-mark destroy the force of all arguments ? 
 Should not one strong light on one dark point be 
 perfectly sufficient, in this mysterious affair, to con- 
 vert this apparent or real conflict into the most 
 beautiful harmony? If nothing else we have said be 
 satisfactory, may not our answer here, as in many 
 similar cases, he this: "I know of no solution that 
 really satisfies me perfectly, but I confidently be- 
 lieve that there is one which will be reached here- 
 after?" For my part, I doubt very decidedly whether 
 one is in the right way to this solution by contem- 
 plating this Gospel in the light of modern criticism. 
 However, as the matter now stands, we can by no 
 means derive from this mysterious phenomenon any 
 proof against the Johannean origin of the fourth 
 
John's gospel not polemical. 101 
 
 Gospel, from the simple fact that this writing was 
 never referred to in the second century, or later, by 
 a single adherent of this narrow -hearted and limited, 
 tendency, fm* the direct combating of which this Gospel 
 is alleged to have been uvitten. How can this be 
 explained if there is not ground for being convinced 
 of its Apostolic origin, whether we will or not? Why- 
 did no one in the second century take the slightest 
 notice of this strongly polemic tendency of John's 
 Gospel, — a tendency which has occupied so 
 splendid a place of honour among the new dis- 
 coveries of the nineteenth century? As such was 
 not the case, should not this whole polemical tend- 
 ency be placed where it belongs, — in the de- 
 partment of the imagination and of hypercriticism ? 
 
 Grouping together all that we have said, we 
 can affirm without a blush that we enjoy the en- 
 viable privilege of seeing extremely little of this 
 "screaming contradiction." We have seen that, with 
 the exception of one mysterious point, the difference 
 between the historical accounts of the fourth Gospel 
 and those of the three others is as easily harmo- 
 nized as the difference in the manner of Christ's 
 teaching as presented to us in the two cases. Thus 
 the greater part of the accumulated difficulties dis- 
 solve into merely apparent differences, and an ex- 
 cellent theologian has very properly said that ap- 
 parent differences are only "motes on Christ's regal 
 robe." We can by no means regard those which 
 we have observed as spots in the crown of the 
 fourth Evangelist; and if we are asked, what can 
 
<-. 
 
 102 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 be inferred from the diversity in John's Gospel?, we 
 would reduce our answer to this brief form: That 
 diversity proves nothing against its authenticity, 
 but, if well examined, pronounces directly in its 
 favour. & 
 
 The diversity proves nothing against the authen- 
 ticity of the fourth Gospel for the very reason that 
 it can be explained by its plan and purpose. The 
 writer has plainly declared the object which he had 
 in view (chapter xx. 31): "But 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." According to his own 
 testimony, therefore, he was not impelled to write 
 by any petty party-interest; his ideal was an in- 
 finitely higher one. He would set forth the truth 
 in all its full splendour, in order to strengthen the 
 faith of Christians; he would do this didactically 
 and not polemically; yet we may confidently say, 
 that his design was indirectly apologetic against 
 the error whose invasion from different sides he had 
 himself witnessed. Yet was it actually requisite 
 that he should describe the whole history of our 
 Lord's life without a single omission? He wrote for 
 Christians who had already long been acquainted 
 with the principal substance of Apostolical infor- 
 mation as recorded in the synoptic Gospels, and he 
 must therefore have been also acquainted with their 
 contents. He would by no means refute these con- 
 tents, but add much that they do not furnish. He 
 would not displace the ideas possessed until his 
 
John's object in his gospel. 103 
 
 time, nor (as has been maintained very unjusti- 
 fiably) supply their place by others, — he would 
 gain his object by completing the true representation 
 of his predecessors through the aid of a new writing. 
 The great importance of this point requires that 
 we should look at it somewhat more closely. It 
 must appear very improbable to every one, a priori, 
 that an Apostle who composed a Gospel twenty- 
 five or thirty years after the other Evangelists, 
 should ignore or attempt to refute the work of his 
 predecessors ; in that case, our Lord's first witnesses 
 would have to be looked at with real Tubingen 
 eyes, and pronounced fanatical partisans. But the 
 matter of the fourth Gospel is utterly unintelligible 
 if the writer was not himself acquainted with the 
 contents of the first three, and did not suppose them 
 also known by others. He speaks of the Baptist, 
 without describing his appearance; of the complete 
 circle of the twelve Apostles, without describing 
 their call; and of Bethany as the dwelling-place of 
 Mary and Martha (chapter xi. 2), without having 
 scarcely mentioned the two sisters previously. While 
 Matthew makes the public labours of Christ com- 
 mence about the same time with the captivity of 
 John the Baptist, the fourth Evangelist, on the con- 
 trary, merely makes this remarkable statement 
 (chapter m. 24), as a mere passing suggestion: 
 "For John was not yet cast into prison;" and he 
 also communicates some particulars of the history 
 of the preceding days and weeks, which the rest of 
 the Evangelists pass over in silence. Matthew and 
 
104 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 Mark give an account of the anointing at Bethany, 
 but John first mentions the name of Mary, and in 
 this way causes the fulfillment of the prophecy of 
 our Lord, — just as it is stated by the other Evan- 
 gelists, — "that what this woman had done should 
 be told in the whole world for a memorial of her." 
 He first makes us acquainted with the name of 
 Malchus, with the event connected with Annas, and 
 with a number of particulars in the history of the 
 death and resurrection of our Lord. 
 
 By one word John calls back to life recollec- 
 tions that would have been in danger of being lost 
 for ever had it not been for his written bequest. 
 It is plain that the fourth Gospel is nothing more 
 nor less than a rich legacy bequeathed to the 
 world after the collected accounts of the first three 
 Evangelists had already been domesticated in the 
 Church. Do I say too much when I affirm that this 
 Gospel also furnishes a real report of the oldest 
 tradition of the Church? And we have not a single 
 reason for distrusting it on this important point. 
 The fragment of the canon in Muratori, that price- 
 less document of the second century, declares that 
 John wrote in answer to the express application of 
 his fellow-disciples and bishops. Hieronymus, the 
 Church Father, relates about the same thing; and 
 Clement of Alexandria communicates expressly as a 
 "tradition of the oldest presbyters, that John, having 
 seen that the external, and, as it were, corporeal 
 part of the events in our Lord's life was already 
 written by the synoptic Evangelists, felt himself 
 
John's gospel the fruit of deep impression. 105 
 
 compelled to write a spiritual Gospel." l In fact, 
 it must excite our astonishment, if not suspicion, 
 to read at the present time very acute explanations 
 of the origin, design, plan, and groundwork of the 
 fourth Gospel, in which such explanations as are 
 given on the orthodox side are simply passed over 
 in silence as if they had never been made. It is 
 certainly natural to suppose that what is held to 
 be only a tradition derived from the second century 
 is just as able to present us with the truth as can 
 the critical conjectures of the nineteenth century, 
 which cannot appeal to a single authority. Nothing 
 prevents us from concluding that John, with a full 
 appreciation of everything communicated by others, 
 felt himself inspired to add from his own treasury 
 that which had made the deepest impression upon 
 his own mind and heart. And as he did this, why 
 should we subject his testimony to suspicion, as it 
 bears upon its very face the character of its peculiar 
 adaptation? 
 
 But do not suppose that we ascribe to the fourth 
 •Gospel no higher character than that of a supple- 
 ment to the other three. Such a harmonious unity 
 as this could never have arisen from a mere con- 
 glomeration of all kinds of additions, John's Gospel 
 
 i Compare Van Oosterzee, Life of Jesus, New Ed., 
 Vol. V. p. 144; and Augustine, the beginning of his Tract 
 XXXVI, on the Gospel of John: "It is not without reason 
 that he relates in his own Gospel that he had leaned on his 
 Lord's breast at supper. He therefore drank from that 
 breast in secret, but he gave forth to the world what he had 
 drunk in private." 
 
106 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 is, in our opinion, a masterpiece in the most sub- 
 lime sense of the word. As a stone thrown into 
 the water produces widening circles, and as the 
 theme of a piece of music constantly returns in 
 richer variations, so it is with the fundamental truth 
 declared in John's Gospel. We believe that we can 
 hear in an expression of the first chapter this fun- 
 damental truth, — the text of the whole sermon of 
 this Gospel: "And the light shineth in darkness; 
 and the darkness comprehended it not." Some one 
 has not unjustly called this Gospel a "painting of 
 a sunrise;" the higher the sun rises the more 
 violently does the fog boil up ; and the more directly 
 the fog strikes us in the face, the more glorious 
 does the splendour of the king of day appear before 
 us. An elaborate survey of the groundwork and 
 plan of this writing is not necessary for the pur- 
 pose which we here have in mind; it is enough to 
 say, that the Evangelist's object could have been 
 none else than to portray Christ as the Light and 
 Life in its increasing conflict with, and in its grand 
 victory over, the unbelieving world. This definite 
 purpose, we readily confess, exerted an unmistakable 
 influence upon his selection, arrangement, and group- 
 ing of facts. To the portrait of Christ made by his 
 predecessors, John adds with great predilection such 
 features as can best contribute to place that portrait 
 in the most sublime light before the eyes of his 
 readers. To mention one example, it is certainly 
 not accidental that he should begin with the divinity 
 of the Word and close with that confession of 
 
DIVERSITY A PROOF OF AUTHENTICITY. 107 
 
 Thomas which sounds like the echo of that begin- 
 ning. We lay special stress upon the point that the 
 intentional representation of persons and facts in a 
 special light proves nothing whatever against their 
 strictly historical character. What is arranged sym- 
 metrically and antithetically, to a certain degree, 
 can also be truly historical. Strauss somewhere calls 
 the fourth Evangelist the "Corregio of Sacred History," 
 and as we look at the exquisite blending of light 
 and shade in his unapproachable picture, we wil- 
 lingly endorse the term. But the historical painter 
 who knows how to place his principal figures in a 
 full light, but paints others in the dark background, 
 has not necessarily given in these figures the cre- 
 ations of his own glowing imagination. 
 
 We return to the point where we began. The 
 peculiarity of the fourth Gospel, which is perfectly 
 explicable when we look at its groundwork and 
 purpose, does not prove anything against its Apos- 
 tolic origin. We must express ourselves more 
 strongly: If the diversity between John and his 
 predecessors be well considered, it becomes a strong 
 proof of the authenticity of his account. Do you 
 not feel its power yourself? Any one who in writ- 
 ing would smuggle in his own wares under the Jo- 
 hannean flag, would certainly have to be very care- 
 ful never to come into even apparent contradiction 
 to the first three Gospels. He who by crafty 
 premeditation would invest himself with the appear- 
 ance and manner of an Apostle, must take the 
 greatest pains to utter an echo of the Apostolic 
 
108 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 witnesses, but never a note that is not in perfect 
 harmony with them. If, therefore, the diversity of 
 doctrinal idea and historical representation between 
 the first three Gospels and the fourth still seems 
 strange, then I may say that this diversity is per- 
 fectly inexplicable if we are here dealing with an 
 anonymous author. But all the difficulty will dis- 
 appear if we accept the fact that this is the work 
 of an Apostle, who occupies a perfectly independent 
 position beside the three other Evangelists, yet 
 whose testimony he continues, enlarges, and com- 
 pletes. 
 
 We might conclude here, but having advanced 
 so far in the defence of this Gospel, we cannot 
 postpone making a little sally in order to answer 
 this question: "What is the use of adhering to this 
 'odd' Gospel, as Renan calls it, after it is proved 
 that it never could have been written by John?" 
 You know the answer of modern criticism, that we 
 have here a writing produced by a certain tendency; 
 that is, a writing prepared with the fixed purpose 
 of disseminating in broader circles the ideas of a 
 narrow church-party, and of accomplishing this end 
 as well as possible by making use of an historical rep- 
 resentation with a romantic colouring. It is further 
 said that the author was not an eye-witness, but a 
 cunning partisan of a later period; that he did not 
 ask, whether that really happened which he related, 
 but whether it could subserve the interests of his 
 own party? Further, his special aim is said to 
 have been to oppose the celebration of the Passover 
 
John's gospel no defence of gnosticism. 10& 
 
 practiced by a certain Judaistical party of the sec- 
 ond century, and, by a gentle method, to effect an 
 introduction into the Church of the views of a cer- 
 tain Gnostic school, — according to some the Mar- 
 cionitic, and according to others the Valentinian. 
 
 I will only notice these general charges without 
 going into particulars ; I shall not attack persons, but 
 opinions and principles. But I openly ask every 
 one who has the capacity of distinguishing truth 
 from mere fiction, whether the author of the fourth 
 Gospel has ever made on him the impression of 
 having been a sly Jesuit, with whom the end 
 sanctifies the means? Does not that fresh, frank, 
 and subjective element which pervades the entire 
 account of John give us reason for thinking exactly 
 the opposite to diplomatic and sectarian delibera- 
 tion? Yea, does not this Gospel contain much 
 which stands in direct contradiction to this alleged 
 origin and tendency? It is said to be a ripened 
 fruit on the soil of an improved Gnostic tendency, 
 but it is directly the opposite of the fundamental 
 views of the Gnosticism of the second century. 
 Gnosticism was anti- Jewish, and was distinguished 
 by its profound contempt of the Old Testament. 
 But here I hear our Lord expressly declare that 
 "salvation cometh of the Jews;" I see that he faith- 
 fully attended the Jewish festivals at Jerusalem, 
 and even those which the people were not obliged 
 to attend. I notice that he continually alludes to 
 the Old Testament, which John quotes almost as 
 frequently as Matthew. Gnosticism prejudices the 
 
110 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 true humanity of our Lord; but, as we shall sub- 
 sequently be convinced, the fourth Gospel acknowl- 
 edges his true humanity, and maintains it with 
 emphasis. Gnosticism attached great value to the 
 baptism of our Lord; but in the fourth Gospel this 
 baptism is mentioned much less elaborately than 
 even in the first three Gospels. One .anight almost 
 say, in fact, that such an author has just as little 
 spiritual affinity with the Gnostics as a flower of 
 Paradise with a thistle. x It is asserted that it was 
 a part of the writer's scheme to prove the superi- 
 ority of John to Peter; that it was a plan so 
 shrewdly devised that it could remain in conceal- 
 ment for eighteen centuries, but that now it is so 
 evident that even many of the smaller peculiarities 
 can be seen. "See, for example [oh, what wise 
 forethought!], that the author takes good care that 
 the people should know how John ran more quickly 
 than Peter to the empty sepulchre" (chapter xx. 4) ! 
 What a pity that even in the following chapter 
 (xxi. 7) he permits Peter to be present with the 
 risen Jesus sooner than John! And how does it 
 square with this plan, that he who would place 
 Peter in the background has preserved for us that 
 glorious confession, at the end of the 6th chapter, 
 which Peter expresses in the name of the twelve 
 
 i Ebrard does not state the case too strongly when 
 he says, p. 736: "That, in order to triumphantly oppose the 
 authenticity of John's Gospel, the whole history of the 
 Church, and literature of the first two Christian centuries, 
 must he piled up and then turned bottom upwards." 
 
John's gospel no imposture. Ill 
 
 Apostles? In fact, this anonymous author knows 
 very well how to choose means for reaching ex- 
 actly the contrary to what he designs. And the 
 Church is said to be indebted for this grand Gospel 
 to such miserable and petty rivalries! One might 
 just as well assert, on a beautiful day, that the 
 earth owes the splendour of its sunlight to a fortu- 
 nate concurrence with the borrowed light of the 
 moon. But enough; we must say with De Pres- 
 sense, that "we will not reply to such arguments, 
 for they are devoid of the very elements of common 
 appreciation; we will leave such insinuations for 
 conscience to take care of." 1 
 
 Or if it be still held that John's Gospel is an 
 imposture, let us ask: How is it possible that such 
 an imposture as it is here assumed to be, was not 
 discovered and punished? This partisan writing is 
 said to have opposed another party, which was 
 quite shrewd in the discovery of mystification. Has 
 the party been asleep, or allowed itself to be out- 
 witted even down to its very last man? It really 
 will not do to convert all the Church Fathers of 
 the second century, who continued the work of the 
 Apostles and who weathered the violent gale of 
 Gnosticism, either into fellow-criminals or into dupes. 
 There is much said about counterfeit writings that 
 are alleged to have been circulated during the first 
 centuries of the Christian era under the name of 
 illustrious men and even of the Apostles, but the 
 
 1 Jesus Christ, etc. p. 224. 
 
112 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 whole literature of the early Christian Church can 
 furnish no parallel to such a writing, circulated 
 under such a name, and with such great success. 
 The imitation of truth in the present instance would 
 have been so masterly that the most skillful coun- 
 terfeiter of manuscripts or bank-notes might well 
 take lessons of this great "unknown author." 
 
 But supposing the abuse of the Apostle's name 
 to have been discovered, could the offence have re- 
 mained unpunished? There are examples before us 
 that clearly and definitely lead us to expect exactly 
 the contrary. Tertullian, the Church Father, reports 
 that a presbyter of Asia Minor prepared and circu- 
 lated a work under the name of the Apostle Paul. * 
 When summoned to answer for his conduct, he pro- 
 tested that he had done so through admiration and 
 love of Paul. But nothing could help him, — he 
 was removed from his office. Such was the way in 
 which the spirit of truth decided in this instance, 
 and would not the same spirit have been able or 
 willing to draw a sharp line of demarcation between 
 truth and imposture if John had not written his 
 Gospel? 
 
 The fourth Gospel unauthentic and forged! The 
 application of these terms to it in accounting for its 
 origin may seem to you to be new, but I must 
 destroy this illusion, for this is an old method of 
 attacking it. I will not now revert to the forgotten 
 
 i Compare Tertull. deBapt. v. 18; and H. W. J. Thiersch, 
 Versuch einer Herstellung des histor. Standpunkts. Erlangen, 
 1845. p. 338. 
 
LUTZELBERGER AND FAUSTUS. 113 
 
 Littzelberger, who attacked the authenticity of John, 
 in 1840, and after allowing his imagination to be 
 his spokesman, surprised us by the information that 
 John's Gospel was written by a Samaritan, who 
 went to Edessa with his parents on the outbreak of 
 the Jewish war, when a boy of between eight and 
 twelve years of age, and who then became a Chris- 
 tian, a bishop under the instruction of the Apostle 
 Andrew, and, finally, the author of the fourth 
 Gospel! Our first reading and acquaintance with 
 this book, which used to be mentioned in the same 
 breath with Strauss, still amuses us, as if it had 
 only happened yesterday. Yet we will leave the 
 dead to bury their dead. 
 
 Let me remind you of Faustus the Manichaean, 
 who, as long ago as the fifth century, forged a 
 weapon against the credibility of the Gospels on the 
 score of their mutual discrepancies. We may judge 
 this writing from the following extract: "We may 
 properly listen to, and rationally examine, writings 
 which have such little harmony as these, but after 
 we have carefully examined everything, and made 
 deliberate comparisons, we question whether Christ 
 could have said much that is contained here. Ever 
 so many words were slipped in among the decla- 
 rations of our Lord at an early period, which, not- 
 withstanding they bear his name, do not at all ac- 
 cord with his faith. As we have repeatedly shown, 
 they were neither said hy Christ nor recorded by 
 his Apostles, but were gathered up from conflicting 
 
 8 
 
114 JOHN AND THE SYNOPTIC GOSPELS. 
 
 reports and opinions by some nondescript half- Jews 
 long after these men were dead." 1 
 
 Does it not really seem that many a critic of 
 this character in the nineteenth century had really 
 gone to school to the Manichsean of the fifth cent- 
 ury? And as we look at such hypotheses on the 
 origin of the fourth Gospel, is extensive learning, 
 or even a long argument, necessary to elicit from 
 us the exclamation of indignity and pain: "Such 
 hypotheses are impossible?" It is almost incon- 
 ceivable that those who would draw us into such 
 adventurous methods do not observe that they would 
 lead us from the sphere of the remarkable to that 
 of the preposterous. Some critics call our faith 
 mere imagination, and assert that we poor apologists 
 swallow camels. Continuing the figure, we might 
 almost ask whether our opponents do not even 
 swallow whole caravans of such animals without 
 suffering the least indigestion? 
 
 But this matter is too serious for pleasantry, and 
 we do not wish to run the danger of meriting the 
 rebuke of "paying the devil too many sorry com- 
 pliments for his scientific seriousness." 
 
 This much we firmly hold: That such desperate 
 measures as we have considered would not be re- 
 sorted to in order to overthrow the power of evi- 
 dences that decide in favour of John if there was 
 not a disposition to avoid, at any price, the really 
 great stone of offence, — Miracles. Our next Lecture 
 
 i Augustine, Contra Faustum, Lib. XXXIII. Cap. 2 and 3. 
 
SCEPTICAL BLINDNESS TO ARGUMENT. 115 
 
 will be devoted to a discussion of this subject. No 
 statement of special evidences, and no solution of 
 particular difficulties, will be sufficient for any one 
 so long as he shares, either secretly or avowedly, 
 Rousseau's request: u Take away from me these 
 miracles of your Gospel!" The subject of the third 
 Lecture being John's account of the miracles of 
 Christ, we here leave the lowly mountain-valley, 
 and will there ascend the lofty Alpine peak of the 
 Gospel History. 
 
 8* 
 
III. 
 
 JOHN'S ACCOUNT OF CHEIST'S MIEACLES. 
 
 I have all respect for the connection of things, but I cannot 
 help thinking of Samson, who did not injure the connection 
 (bar) of the gate, and, as is well known, carried the whole 
 gate to the top of the hill." — matthias Claudius. 
 
 Behold this eagle, proud of flight, 
 Piercing the clouds to . clearer light, 
 Above all witnesses of God. 
 No one e'er saw with such keen eye, 
 What's promised and what's now passed by, 
 And what is yet to be disclosed, i 
 
 In view of all that we have hitherto said on 
 the fourth Gospel, we do not hesitate a moment 
 longer to repeat with increased emphasis this hymn 
 of praise, composed in the Middle Ages in honour 
 of John. The strongest and most convincing ex- 
 ternal and internal proofs of the authenticity of his 
 account being now established, the unmistakable dif- 
 
 i Volat avis sine meta, etc. 
 
UNITY OF ALL THE GOSPELS. 117 
 
 ference between him and the first three Evangelists 
 does not preclude their higher unity, and the be- 
 ginnings and endings of all the lines which John 
 has further extended are clearly perceptible in his 
 predecessors. Indeed, Da Costa, an apologist of 
 our own country, could ask with perfect right: "If 
 any one doubt whether the fourth Gospel, because 
 of its special and peculiar composition, belongs to 
 the authentic Gospels, is it not just as if one 
 doubted whether the head belongs to the body, just 
 because it has a different shape from the remaining 
 members and portions of the body?" Thus, we 
 can now remain no longer uncertain as to the special 
 rank we should attribute to John among the wit- 
 nesses of our Lord, whose written records have 
 been preserved to us by God's goodness. But this 
 is not saying, that, in following the synoptic Evan- 
 gelists, we are misled to follow those who, with 
 partiality and ingratitude, arbitrarily elevate one 
 witness of the truth above another. Not to leave 
 the figure mentioned above, we would just as little 
 dispense with the head, a foot, or a hand, all of 
 which belong to the body; for we believe that the 
 true salvation of faith and of science is not acquired 
 by arbitrary mutilation, but by the careful keeping 
 together of what belongs together. Yet we candidly 
 assert, that, though the first three Evangelists com- 
 municate many important matters concerning the life 
 of our Lord, it is impossible to obtain a complete, 
 connected, and practical biography of Jesus if we 
 do not invoke the aid of John. Numberless special 
 
118 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 points treated by them need the very light which 
 he communicates. He traces a multitude of new 
 lines in the picture of Christ sketched by the other 
 Evangelists. He shows us from the standpoint of 
 his individual tuition just that which he has in 
 common with them; and this detracts no more 
 from historical truth than the sunbeam changes the 
 water, or even the direction of the brook itself, 
 when it falls in manifold reflection of colours on the 
 surface of the stream, and even lets us see its bot- 
 tom. However, not to mention other things, how 
 could we come to chronological certainty on certain 
 special matters in the life of Jesus if we did not 
 have the light which John gives? No wonder that 
 the indispensableness of his testimony for our 
 knowledge of Christ has been recognized, even in 
 our day, by the very ones whom nobody would 
 venture to reckon in the so-called narrow tendency. 
 A few years ago, even some of the "modern theo- 
 logians" declared John to be the principal source 
 for the biography of our Saviour. l Leaving other 
 writers of this class out of the question, Ernest 
 Renan, who has less of John's spirit than all the 
 new critics, and whose opinion of this Gospel is so 
 unfair in other respects, has given such a witness 
 
 l Compare C. C. J. Bunsen, Bibehoerk, Vorioort, Vol. I. — 
 "If John's Gospel is not the historical account of an eye- 
 witness, but only a myth, then there is no historical Christ; 
 and without a historical Christ, all the faith of the Christian 
 Church is a delusion; all Christian confession, hypocrisy or 
 deception; the Christian reverence for God an imposition; 
 and the Reformation, finally, a crime or a madness." 
 
MIRACLES THE REAL GROUND OF OFFENCE. 119 
 
 in favour of its relative indispensableness as may 
 well furnish many of our opponents with food for 
 reflection. * 
 
 In view of all this, we may now ask with in- 
 creased interest: What is the reason that the Gospel 
 of John is still a stumbling-stone to so many, even 
 though a satisfactory answer may be given to most 
 of the objections urged against the particulars of its 
 contents? I do not know how to state this reason 
 better than in the words of the celebrated head of 
 the most recent critical school: "The principal argu- 
 ment for the later origin of the Gospels will ever 
 continue to be this: all of them together, and each 
 one of itself, represents so much of the life of 
 Christ in a way in which it was impossible really 
 to occur." 2 This expression , with praiseworthy 
 frankness, names just the most delicate point of 
 critical inquiry, and it is scarcely uttered before we 
 hear on all sides the cry: "If we look at the matter 
 closely, it is far more probable that all the Gospels 
 are unauthentic than that a miracle ever occurred!" 
 Perhaps you are aware of the witty mockery with 
 which Goethe, in the past century, exposed to the 
 gaze of his contemporaries the well-known opponent 
 of Christianity, Dr. Carl Frederick Bahrdt, the author 
 of the Most Recent Revelations of God. Bahrdt is 
 sitting at his desk, when the four Evangelists ap- 
 
 i Vie de Jesus, Introduction, p. xxxiii. (1st Ed.). Les 
 Apotres, Introduction, pp. ix, x. 
 
 2 Baur, Kritische Untersuchungen ilber die drei ersten Evan- 
 gelien, p. 530. 
 
120 john's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 pear before hirn, who have been persecuted on every 
 hand, and have come to him for refuge. They meet 
 with a friendly reception, and are even invited into 
 the society of other guests; but they must first lay 
 off their old costume, and clothe themselves accord- 
 ing to the most recent fashion. Luckily enough, 
 there are suits at hand; but, very strangely, not 
 one of them wishes to submit to this metamorphosis. 
 One after the other steals away, and John the first 
 of all; they would rather be persecuted than be un- 
 distinguishable, and the disappointed host does not 
 know what better to do than avenge himself on 
 their writings. And no wonder, for he had just 
 placed on paper a declaration of what he would 
 have done: "Thus 'I would have spoken if I had 
 been Christ!" 
 
 Though the manner of contesting the highest and 
 dearest truths of Christianity afterwards became 
 much more refined and genteel, the principle here 
 indelicately expressed, — that of substituting a 
 purely individual opinion for revealed truth, — is 
 still essentially the same. When the actual expla- 
 nation of the Gospel history was carried to the 
 grave, as it was said, amid the derisive shouts of 
 science, the mythical explanation tried its utmost; 
 and when it became plain that the "innocently in- 
 vented legend" existed only in the fancy of Strauss 
 and kindred spirits, the force of consistency required 
 the party to speak of an intentional fiction in the 
 interest of the parties, into which, as it is asserted, 
 the Church of the first and second centuries was 
 
PLAN OF THE PRESENT LECTURE. 121 
 
 wretchedly rent. We are allowed to say, that the 
 Evangelists, especially the fourth, who were regarded 
 only as pious fanatics twenty or thirty years ago, 
 are now promoted to the rank of tolerably cunning 
 impostors; and, continuing further with John alone, 
 the miracles which he recounts are sufficient to cast 
 doubt on every serious claim that he may present 
 to the name of an historical writer. Even a short 
 time ago his Gospel was regarded as authentic, but 
 the sceptics privately sought either to explain the 
 offensive passages in a Rationalistic sense, or to 
 banish them from the sacred text as interpolations. 
 Xow such men no longer scruple to make the Lord 
 say and do "incredible things," but, for this very 
 reason, they deny persistently that it was written 
 by the Apostle John, the favourite disciple of our 
 Lord. Thus the opposing party point out for us 
 the very course which we must now further take. 
 The Johannean account of the miracles of our Lord 
 will employ our entire attention during the present 
 Lecture. We will first consider this account in and 
 of itself, and see whether, granting for a moment 
 the possibility of miracles, it bears traces of forgery 
 or of inward credibility. We shall then find oc- 
 casion, very naturally, to discuss more generally 
 the question of miracles in connection with the Gospel 
 history. 
 
 I. When we speak of the Johannean account 
 of miracles we mean specially the doings of our 
 Lord, which, according to the statement of this 
 Evangelist, took place through his extraordinary 
 
122 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 power; and we will lay aside for a moment both 
 the proofs of his higher knowledge furnished by 
 this Gospel and the miraculous events that were 
 interwoven with his entire career on earth, as, for 
 example, the voice from heaven shortly before his 
 death, or the resurrection of his body. We there- 
 fore have in mind the following : The Water changed 
 into Wine (chapter n. 1 — 11); The Healing of the 
 Nobleman's Son at Capernaum (chapter iv. 45 — 54) 
 (granted, though it might seem somewhat unsafe, 
 that this miracle was not only proclaimed by our 
 Lord but was directly performed by him); The 
 Healing of the Impotent Man at the Pool of Beth- 
 esda (chapter v. 1 — 15); The Miraculous Feeding 
 of Five Thousand, which is followed by Christ's 
 Walking on the Sea (chapter vi. 1 — 15); The Open- 
 ing of the Eyes of One Born Blind (chapter ix.); 
 and The Raising of Lazarus (chapter xi.). We thus 
 have six or seven miracles, of which only one, The 
 Miraculous Feeding of Five Thousand, is also de- 
 scribed by the other Evangelists, while the remain- 
 ing ones are communicated to us exclusively by the 
 fourth Gospel. 
 
 If we now look attentively at these Johannean 
 narratives of Christ's miracles, we see, first of all, 
 that they belong, without exception, to the same 
 department in which, according to the first three 
 Gospels, we find our Lord miraculously operating. 
 In John's Gospel, too, inanimate Nature hears His 
 mighty voice; Sickness also flees here at His look; 
 and Death is compelled to surrender its prey to His 
 
DIFFERENCE OF DEGREE IN JOHN'S GOSPEL. 123 
 
 possession. Yet, with a similarity in manner, we 
 also perceive a difference of degree. The miracu- 
 lous power of the Saviour is glorified not only in 
 restoring a sick man, but one who has been sick 
 for thirty-eight years; not only in one who was 
 blind, but in one who was born blind; and not only 
 in one who was dead, but one who had lain in the 
 grave four days. The negative school have found 
 in this higher degree of the miraculous in the 
 fourth Gospel an unquestionable trace of embellish- 
 ment and invention; and, of course, if the impossi- 
 bility of miracles and the unauthenticity of John's 
 Gospel be once proved, there is good ground for 
 regarding the account of such grand miracles with 
 distrust. But if, on the other hand, we regard 
 miracles abstractly as possible, and the accounts of 
 miracles in the synoptic Gospels be once conceded, 
 we can admit, with at least the same ground, that 
 he who in the one department could perform the 
 relatively lower class would not find it impossible 
 to perform the greater class. Then we can also 
 admit that John, who, as we have seen, knew and 
 enlarged the synoptic accounts, describes with special 
 fondness those works of our Lord which had no* 
 been recorded by his predecessors, yet seemed to 
 him especially adapted for reaching the end which 
 he had in view in the composition of his own 
 Gospel. Hence, to use the mildest form of expres- 
 sion, there is one possibility against another. We 
 must look more closely in order to see where the 
 truth lies. For the present, I merely remark that 
 
124 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 a narrator who communicates far less miracles than 
 one of his predecessors, and repeatedly enables us 
 to see that our Lord performed many more miracles 
 than he has specifically recorded, l does not awaken 
 any particular suspicion of exaggeration or of a 
 mania for miracles. John, on the contrary, here 
 displays a relative sobriety which, I repeat, ought 
 in a certain measure to gain him favour in the eyes 
 of those in our day who deny miracles. But, as a 
 matter of course, however few they are in quantity, 
 their quality is, and ever will be, of such a char- 
 acter that his account, at least on this point, must 
 be utterly incredible to many. We unite unhesi- 
 tatingly with our opponents in saying that, when 
 possible, the Johannean narratives of miracles far 
 excel in grandeur those narrated by the synoptic 
 Evangelists, and manifest a character of incompa- 
 rable majesty, which, if they be once sufficiently 
 attested, warrants us in speaking here of nothing 
 less than a divine miraculous power. 
 
 Our second general remark is, that the point of 
 view from which John looks at the miracles of 
 Christ corresponds perfectly with his declared pur- 
 pose in writing his Gospel. 
 
 When he writes (chapter xx. 31), "That ye 
 might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of 
 God," he regards an account of certain miracles as 
 <one of the requisites for him to reach this end. 
 They are to him "signs," that is, facts which, 
 
 i John II. 23; IV. 35; VII. 31, and elsewhere. 
 
John's purpose in his account of miracles. 125 
 
 however much they are comprised within the realm 
 of sense, are yet peculiarly designed to bring home 
 to the mind the anticipation of a higher truth, and 
 to give it a clear view of this truth. As such, they 
 are also revelations of the glory of the incarnate 
 Word, and are especially adapted to strengthen the 
 faith of him who regards them with a proper state 
 of mind (chapter n. 11). According to the decla- 
 ration of Jesus himself in John (chapter v. 36), 
 they constitute a portion of God's works, which He 
 performs on earth, and which must bear witness 
 that the Father hath sent him. We can scarcely 
 believe our ears when we hear it said that, "Jesus, 
 according to the synoptic Evangelists, does not per- 
 form such works to prove his divine mission," and 
 that, therefore, we here meet with an evident con- 
 tradiction between them and John. l If this be true, 
 then it is, perhaps, not miracles in the strict sense 
 to which our Lord appeals in them when he says: 
 "Go and show John those things which ye do hear 
 and see : the blind receive their sight, and the lame 
 walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, 
 the dead are raised up, and the poor have the 
 Gospel preached to them" (Matthew xi. 2 — 5). 
 Or has Christ's declaration suddenly become un- 
 authentic: "If the mighty works which were done 
 in you, had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they 
 would have repented long ago in sackcloth and 
 ashes" (Matthewxi. 21 ; compare also Matthew xh. 28) ? 
 
 i See Scholten, Evangelium Johannis, pp. 232, 233. 
 
126 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 This much is certain: He who candidly asserts that 
 the Christ of the synoptic Gospels attaches no spe- 
 cial weight to his miracles, and nowhere appeals 
 to these attestations of his Divine mission, will have 
 to tear out the 11th chapter from Matthew's Gospel. 
 Yet, this is not one of those sections whose authen- 
 ticity has been questioned by the most recent neg- 
 ative criticism. 
 
 The following rejoinder is equally unfortunate: 
 "'Miracles occur in tbe first three Gospels to show 
 kindness to afflicted people, but in John, on the 
 contrary, they are written to reveal the glory of 
 Jesus." Now any one who does not look at the 
 matter superficially can see at a glance that one of 
 these elements does not preclude the other. On the 
 one hand, should not the kind deeds of our Lord 
 serve to reveal him as the one who should come; 
 and, on the other, does he not reveal his glory by 
 these very good deeds, which he performs with a 
 loving heart? In both instances, it is perfectly 
 plain that what Jesus does, serves to declare what 
 he is: in both cases compassionate sympathy is the 
 fundamental cause of miracles, and their purpose is 
 to prove his heavenly mission, and, at the same 
 time, the revelation of his heavenly glory. 
 
 We have been likewise very unsuccessful in 
 finding an irreconcilable contradiction in the fact 
 that miracles are brought by the synoptic Evange- 
 lists into the most intimate relation to the faith of 
 the diseased person, while, in the fourth Evangelist, 
 the only factor of the miracle is the omnipotence 
 
THE GOSPELS HARMONIOUS ON MIRACLES. 127 
 
 of the Son of God. Do not the synoptic Evange- 
 lists also prove that omnipotence is the real factor 
 of all miraculous signs, which connect with faith 
 and reveal it? And do we not hear our Lord 
 asking also in John, before the performance of his 
 grandest miracle: "Said I not unto thee, that, if 
 thou wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory 
 of God" (chapter xi. 40)? In neither case is the 
 miracle caused by faith in and of itself, bat only 
 by the power proceeding from Jesus; in all the 
 Gospels, faith is now silently supposed, and now 
 the expressly required, condition on which the mir- 
 acle is performed, — the requisite without which 
 the recipient would be insusceptible of experiencing 
 the beneficent power of the Worker of miracles. 
 According to both John and the synoptic Evangelists, 
 our Lord generally performs his miracles where 
 there is a pressing necessity for his help, and 
 where it is earnestly desired and confidently waited 
 for. 1 According to both, he appeals to these facts 
 in proof that faith in him is very reasonable (cor- 
 responding to the requirements of the highest reason), 
 and that unbelief, on the other hand, is utterly in- 
 excusable. 2 According to both, finally, he plainly 
 shows that the faith which is merely established on 
 his miracles is decided by him to be a lower order 
 of faith; and, on this account, he repels a desire 
 for miracles far more than he satisfies or fosters it. 
 
 i John II. 3, 4; V. 6; XL 21—27. 
 2 Matthew XI. 2—6; compare John V. 36. Matthew XI. 
 20—24; compare John X. 32; XV. 24. 
 
128 JOHN'S ACCOUNT OF CHRIST'S MIRACLES. 
 
 In a word, the difference between the two accounts 
 is merely superficial here, too, while the harmony 
 lies concealed in the depths below, and the sphere 
 of miracles, rightly considered, is the same in both 
 cases. 
 
 Our third preliminary remark is, that if, in all 
 respects, there be no essential difference between 
 John and the remaining writers, we must employ 
 the same method of exposition in explaining them 
 all, and, where this Evangelist does not show that 
 he wishes to be understood otherwise, we are in 
 duty bound to regard his accounts of miracles as 
 accounts of facts, which he would have us under- 
 stand as having really occurred. The question as 
 to the reality of their occurrence does not here come 
 into consideration; but we must know, before any- 
 thing else, what the narrator himself intends us to 
 understand by them. No impartial one can doubt 
 that John intends to tell us of real facts, the deeds 
 of our Lord himself; and these, therefore, must be 
 explained grammatically and historically, just as his 
 words. There was a time when it could be said 
 that the truth of these miracles was self-evident; 
 but certain critics have arisen in the most recent 
 times who entertain quite a different view. In order 
 to get rid of believing miracles at all hazards, it 
 has been thought necessary to apply the so-called 
 allegorical explanation of the Scriptures to these 
 accounts. Certain sceptical writers, proceeding from 
 the very correct remark that the Evangelist John 
 represents these miracles as signs of the glory of 
 
SYMBOLIZATION OF CHRIST'S MIRACLES. 129 
 
 Jesus, have asserted that the signs here recounted 
 were originally the unhistorical dress of religious 
 ideas, and that the Evangelist merely recorded them 
 to make an ideal truth intelligible in a concrete 
 form. Thus the narrative of the miracle at the 
 Marriage at Cana is made to symbolize the thought 
 that Jesus transforms life according to the law into 
 life according to the spirit, in which the former is 
 declared to be represented by the symbol of water, 
 and the latter by that of wine. In the same way 
 the miracle at the Pool of Bethesda is made to 
 represent Jesus as the Renewer of the enervated 
 moral life of sinful humanity, or, according to 
 another notion, the one who had been infirm thirty- 
 eight years is a type of the morally infirm Israel, 
 and, — who would have thought it, — the five 
 porches full of impotent folk are a symbol of the 
 insufficiency of Judaism for the spiritual restoration 
 of the sick. In the same way, the walking of Jesus 
 on the Sea of Galilee symbolizes the thought of Jesus 
 calmly proceeding over the great sea of the world, 
 while believers never have any rest on these tem- 
 pestuous waves of the sea if Jesus is not with them. 
 But this is enough to show us the real drift of this 
 method. If we allow ourselves to be influenced by 
 those who represent it, we must hold, that when 
 the Evangelist speaks of these and similar mir- 
 acles, he would not have us understand them liter- 
 ally but figuratively. To get at his meaning, we 
 are told that we must call to our aid such allegor- 
 ical interpretation as Paul once made use of, in 
 
 9 
 
130 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 the 4th chapter of Galatians, when he proves, by a 
 method in vogue in his day, that the name Agar 
 indicates Mount Sinai, in Arabia. Thus, it is 
 said, there also lies in these accounts a deeper 
 sense, with which the narrator had to deal ex- 
 clusively, and whose discovery involves us in all 
 manner of exegetical and critical difficulties, which 
 would be utterly insurmountable if the writer had 
 designed to give an historical account of real occur- 
 rences. 
 
 What shall we say of this view, which is just 
 now defended by the very ones who, a few years 
 ago, could hardly find words to express their pro- 
 found contempt for such a "pious game"? We can 
 only suppress the question with difficulty: Whether 
 the highly -praised progress of science in our day 
 does not consist simply in relapsing into the peculi- 
 arities of Cocceian typology, and whether the sys- 
 tematic opponents of all authority really imagine 
 that people are going to take their own word when 
 they proclaim such views? To mention again the 
 name of the most celebrated poetic herald of the 
 modern view of the world, if Goethe should arise 
 from the dead he would find ample material and 
 occasion for repeating his ironical rule to a certain 
 class of Scriptural expositors: 
 
 "Be fresh and sprightly in your exposition; 
 And what you can't explain, prop something under!" 
 
 It is, indeed, humiliating to see how easily unbelief 
 can degenerate into superstition, and Rationalism 
 into Mysticism. Does it not seem that the human 
 
CAPRICE IX SCIENTIFIC GARB. 131 
 
 rnind is eternally condemned to fall from one ex- 
 treme to the other? For years the facts remained 
 untouched, yet there was neither eye nor ear for 
 the idea contained in them. But at present, there 
 can hardly words enough be found for extolling the 
 glory of the idea; but do not imagine for a moment 
 that the narrative containing the idea is the report 
 of a real fact ! It is insipid materialism on the one 
 side, even in the department of exegetics and criti- 
 cism, while, on the other, we have a spiritualism 
 which decomposes and volatilizes everything. Who 
 will decide which of the two has inflicted the 
 greater injury on the cause of truth? Indeed, it is 
 hard to keep clear of being satirical when we find 
 so much caprice clothed in the garb of science. 
 The case would be different if the Evangelist would 
 only give us the slightest intimation, as Paul does 
 in Galatians iv. 24, that he intends what he says 
 to be understood in the way already mentioned; but 
 since he does not do this, what right has any one 
 to attribute to the author purposes of which we have 
 no proof that he ever thought for a moment? Was 
 the Christian Church stricken for whole centuries 
 with an inexplicable blindness, in being as little 
 able to trace out this "profoundness" as to imagine 
 the existence of such secret thoughts? Is not the 
 door here thrown wide open to all kinds of inge- 
 nious and insipid notions, and does not this view 
 substitute one ipse dixit for another? To mention 
 only a few points, where do we find in the New 
 Testament that water is used in opposition to wine 
 
 9 ;: 
 
132 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 as the symbol of the lower life under the law? Do 
 we not find that the highest life, which is salvation 
 in Christ, is constantly represented by the symbol 
 of living water? Where on earth can you get any 
 right for regarding the five husbands which John 
 says the Samaritan woman had had, as the symbol 
 of the five false gods of the Samaritans, while 
 Israel's God, which they at that time worshipped, 
 was not strictly theirs also? What ground have 
 we for regarding the one who had been impotent 
 for thirty-eight years as an unhistorical type of 
 morally helpless Israel, and, perhaps, his body as 
 a symbol of the rest which he sought in vain? 
 You may well exclaim, with a smile, half in pity 
 and half in vexation: "In this way you can make 
 what you please out of anything," — and you have 
 a perfect right to say so. 
 
 In reply to all this, do we really deny that 
 John's accounts of miracles contain higher ideas? 
 If we were to say this, we should be just as partial 
 as those whom we contradict in the utmost sincer- 
 ity; indeed, we would be doing worse, for we 
 would be placing ourselves in opposition to John 
 himself. There is no doubt, for example, that he 
 communicates the account of the Miraculous Feeding 
 of the Multitude as a sign that Jesus, according to 
 his own words, is really the Bread of Life; the 
 Healing of the One Born Blind, that he is the Light 
 of the World; and the Raising of Lazarus, that he 
 is the Resurrection and the Life. Evidently, John 
 deals more fully than the other Evangelists with 
 
John's account not fictitious, but truthful. 133 
 
 the words of our Lord, by which lie throws light 
 on his miracles, and gives us as clear a view of a 
 particular side of his character as of the miracle 
 alone. But we may lay down this proposition with 
 a good scientific conscience: He does not present 
 the truth of the words which he reports in the mirror 
 of fictitious history, but in that of real fact. Fact 
 and idea are related to each other just as the body 
 and the soul, which can no more be identified than 
 they can be arbitrarily sundered. The fact is the 
 corporeal idea, and the idea is the soul of the fact. 
 If I should explain this truth by one example, I 
 would say, that if the truth of the miracle at Cana 
 is proved, and the purpose of its performance made 
 clear, then we are at liberty to find also in it 
 a posteriwi the expression of the thought, which is 
 true in and of itself, that Jesus creates the higher 
 from the lower, and transforms life under the law 
 to life according to the spirit of the Gospel. Other 
 thoughts of similar beauty may, perhaps, be drawn 
 from the historical narrative for our edifying appli- 
 cation. Much depends on the perception and taste, 
 which are more influenced by a certain spiritual 
 discernment than by definite hermeneutical rules. 
 But to assert unhesitatingly, that, because we find 
 certain things here and there, therefore "the Evan- 
 gelists designed to say strictly this and nothing but 
 this," and to adhere to this opinion, even though 
 he does not give us any intimation of such a pur- 
 pose, and, which is much worse, to conclude that 
 the truth thus discovered is not contained in the 
 
134 john's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 narrative of a real fact, but is concealed in the 
 finely- spun web of romantic poetry, — surely, the ab- 
 horrence of miracles must indeed be a very obstinate 
 and severe evil when it compels its victims to per- 
 form such perilous operations! The case is simply 
 this : — That we are only allowed by our opponents 
 to choose fact or symbol, while we, clearly con- 
 vinced of the injustice of the alternative, insist upon 
 answering: Fact and symbol, symbol and fact, at 
 the same time. 
 
 Unquestionably, the accounts of miracles con- 
 tained in the fourth Gospel, however grand the 
 thoughts also symbolized in them, lay claim to being 
 regarded and treated as miraculous facts which 
 really occurred. But now the great question arises : 
 If we leave miracles out of the question for a mo- 
 ment, do these narratives, as such, bear traces in 
 their details of improbability and invention, or, do 
 they not bear the impress of credibility and fidelity 
 even in their finest shades? u 
 
 We shall be able to answer this question if we 
 subject every account of a miracle to a close, though 
 brief, treatment. — The Miracle at the Marriage at 
 Cana (chapter n. 1 — 11). — "We need not yet 
 fancy, with Renan, that our Lord took pleasure in 
 attending such wedding - feasts , — as this was 
 a favourite place of refreshment to him from time to 
 time, — in order to find it somewhat strange that 
 he should perform his "first sign" just at a wed- 
 ding. I assure you that no one would have ex- 
 pected this as the first sign of the Son of man. 
 
THE MIRACLE AT THE MARRIAGE AT CAN A. 135 
 
 May we not add here, that just this surprise is far 
 more calculated to weaken the supposition of in- 
 vention than to strengthen it; and that a Gnostic- 
 Christian romance, — as Bruno Bauer called this 
 Gospel twenty-five years ago, and as it is held 
 to-day by many negative theologians in Holland, 
 — would have been more plausibly introduced in 
 another and apparently less exceptional manner. This 
 exceptional character disappears, however, at least 
 partially, when we remark that the miracle occurred 
 at the transitional period from the private to the 
 public life of our Lord, in those first days after his 
 return from the wilderness where he was tempted, 
 whose history the first three Evangelists pass over 
 in total silence. 1 Of the personal recollections 
 
 i [Trench says : " 'This beginning of miracles' is as truly 
 an introduction to all other miracles which Christ did, as 
 the Parable of the Sower is an introduction to all other 
 parables which he spoke (Mark iv. 31). No other miracle 
 would have had so much in it of prophecy, would have 
 served as so fit an inauguration to the whole future work 
 of the Son of God. For that work might be characterized 
 throughout as an ennobling of the common and a trans- 
 muting of the mean — a turning of the water of earth into 
 
 the wine of heaven We need not wonder to find 
 
 the Lord of life at that festival; for he came to sanctify 
 all life, its times of joy, as its times of sorrow; and all ex- 
 perience tells us, that it is times of gladness, such as this 
 was now, which especially need such a sanctifying power, 
 such a presence of the Lord. In times of sorrow, the sense 
 of God's presence comes more naturally out; in these it is 
 in danger to be forgotten. He was th^ere, and by his pres- 
 ence there struck the key-note to the whole future tenor 
 of his ministry. He should not be as another Baptist, to 
 withdraw himself from the common paths of men, a preacher 
 in the wilderness; but his should be at once a harder and 
 a higher task, to mingle with and purify the common life* 
 
136 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 which John had of his earlier intercourse with the 
 Master, he communicates one particular, which was 
 so indelibly impressed upon his heart because it had 
 been to him, and also to the small circle who had 
 similar feelings, the first strengthening of their faith. 
 It is a scene from the boundary - line between his 
 domestic and public life, somewhat the same fact 
 among the miracles of Christ as Luke's account of 
 the declarations of Jesus when twelve years old is 
 among the words of Christ. It is the public appear- 
 ance of what had hitherto been concealed; and as 
 in Luke there is the transition from boyhood to 
 youth, so here is there a transition from the period 
 of preparation to the period of the fulfillment, 
 which had long been patiently awaited. How 
 psychologically clear is it that Mary, in her long- 
 years of silence and patient waiting, expects and 
 would even occasion something grand, though she 
 herself docs not know what ! x But how natural 
 and appropriate that our Lord should suggest 
 
 of men, to witness for and bring out the glory which was 
 hidden in its every relation. And it is not perhaps without 
 its significance, that this should have been specially a mar- 
 riage, which he adorned and beautified with his presence 
 and first miracle that he ever wrought?'" Notes on the Mir- 
 acles of Our Lord (Am. Ed.), pp. 83, 85. — J. F. H.] 
 
 i [Dr. Whedon, an American commentator, says: "Whoever 
 doubted about the miraculous birth of Jesus, his mother cer- 
 tainly could not. No eyes like hers would, in his growth, 
 have understood his miraculous development. Nor is it nat- 
 ural to suppose, that at this moment she did not under- 
 stand that he had left home to pass through the preparation 
 for his full Messianic office. She must therefore have known 
 that the time for his divine manifestation had arrived. In 
 the perplexity of the present moment she turns to him , as 
 
THE MIRACLE AT THE MARRIAGE AT CANA. 137 
 
 to her, with friendly seriousness, to occupy the place 
 which was now more becoming than ever to the 
 mother of the Messiah! Only he who goes no 
 further than the mere sound of the words can see 
 in them anything harsh and disrespectful; he who 
 listens more carefully will here perceive the same 
 respect, but also the same independence, which, ac- 
 cording to the other Gospels, l our Lord ever ob- 
 served toward his mother, and will much rather see 
 in this undesigned coincidence a proof of the truth 
 of the Johannean account. 
 
 When Jesus speaks of his "hour," which had 
 not yet come, it is plain from the connection that 
 he can hardly refer to anything else than time. 
 Neither does the hour come (how much like God!) 
 until Mary has testified her faith and subjection by 
 the words: "Whatsoever he saith unto you, do it." 
 Finally, the hour comes, and, as though our Lord 
 would acknowledge the reception of the six new 
 guests, he changes into good wine the water con- 
 to a divine aid, hopeful that he could afford relief, even if 
 
 it required a supernatural power The Protestant 
 
 Church rightly interprets the language as informing the 
 mother, that over the exercise of his official functions neither 
 the authority of his human parent, nor the influence of his 
 blood relations or private friends, has any right of control 
 or interference. As in the temptation, Jesus had established 
 the principle that miracles must not be performed for his 
 own low self-interest, so now, he declares that no fleshly 
 relationship must expect to derive profit of a worldly nature 
 from its connection with him." Commentary on Luke and John, 
 p. 242. - J. F. H.] 
 
 i John II. 4; XIX. 26; compare Matthew XII. 46—50; 
 
138 joiin's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 tained in the six stone water-pots standing outside. 
 Now I will not ask you, whether so much mildness, 
 united with such tenderness, does not rather merit 
 the name of a miracle of love rather than a "mir- 
 acle of luxury," but will simply direct your atten- 
 tion to another point. Granted for a moment that 
 this account, leaving its purpose out of the question, 
 is fictitious, do you not think that the inventor 
 would have been at least careful to place in a 
 clearer and stronger light the time, the manner, 
 and the impression of the miracle? But, as you 
 must have already observed, the miracle is here 
 rather silently presupposed than narrated; it takes 
 place outside and not inside of the hall; it is not 
 established by the bridegroom, but by the governor 
 of the feast, in language which indicates his sur- 
 prise and at the same time his ignorance. The mir- 
 acle appears as though covered by a transparent 
 veil, so that one must even conjecture whether all 
 the water has been changed into wine. There is 
 not a word said of the impression produced by it 
 on the guests, nor even on Mary ; neither is a word 
 said about the Performer of the miracle, which would 
 have directed attention to the peculiar higher pur- 
 pose of the act itself. Judge for yourselves whether 
 the maxim, that "people do not invent after this 
 fashion," may not be applied here with perfect pro- 
 priety ! 
 
 The Healing of the Nobleman's Son at Caper- 
 naum was a second miracle at Cana, after the first 
 Passover, during the public ministry of our Lord. 
 
THE HEALING OF THE NOBLEMAN'S SON. 139 
 
 It was performed by Jesus at a distance, whether 
 we may regard it as at that moment performed, or 
 only announced as indubitably certain, and really 
 occurring after this announcement (chapter iv. 45 — 54). 
 It is asserted that this narrative is designed by the 
 fourth Gospel to characterize a faith which, not 
 being established on mere words, but on the vision 
 of a sensuous sign, is disapproved as such by Jesus. 
 Certainly, no one denies that such a faith as this 
 contrasts very unfavourably with that of the Samari- 
 tans already mentioned. But it is just as certain 
 that no one can understand why this description 
 could not have been drawn from reality whose con- 
 fession of faith on this point is comprised in the 
 couplet : 
 
 "Hans does not ask: 'Be the miracle great or small?' 
 But: 'Can there be such things as miracles at all?'" 
 
 According to the first three Evangelists, there 
 were Jews enough who sought miracles, and it is 
 just as natural that our Lord should oppose this 
 perversity as he should finally not refuse the sup- 
 plicated aid of sufferers. Who does not observe 
 the paternal heart in that tone of anxiety of soul 
 with which the nobleman replies to Christ's well- 
 merited reproach: "Sir, come down ere my child 
 die?" Who does not feel the Saviour's compas- 
 sionate heart pulsating in the declaration immediately 
 following: "Go thy way; thy son liveth?" Who 
 cannot understand that the blissful sight immediately 
 moves the surprised father and all his family to 
 believe? The man believed the word that Jesus 
 
140 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 had spoken unto him; but if the narrator had de- 
 signed to expose ingeniously the worthlessness of 
 faith in miracles, he should at least have left out 
 the conclusion of this striking narrative, or given 
 it quite a different direction. He could then have 
 represented Jesus as being compelled to put the 
 Jews' love of miracles to the blush by inexorably 
 refusing the desired sign; but, in the present in- 
 stance, he performs a still greater one. The "Go 
 thy way" of our Lord, the hasty meeting of the 
 excited servants, and inquiry after the hour of re- 
 covery, — indeed, everything mentioned in this narra- 
 tive, would be so utterly aimless and even inappro- 
 priate unless we here had before us the reality 
 drawn from life and personal experience. 
 
 Do we find the case different in the Healing of 
 the Impotent Man "which had an infirmity thirty 
 and eight years," — a miracle which, according 
 to John, was performed at Jerusalem on the Sab- 
 bath day (John v. 1 — 16)? As a miracle performed 
 on the Sabbath, it takes its place in a series of a 
 number of similar ones mentioned by the first three 
 Evangelists, though Luke is the only one who com- 
 municates the scarcely less surprising healing of a 
 disease of eighteen years standing. 1 There is no 
 discoverable trace of an allegorical meaning of the 
 Impotency, of the Five Porches, and of the Pool, 
 except merely in the imagination of the negative 
 critics, who will rather surrender themselves to the 
 
 i Mark III. 1-6; Luke XIII. 10-17; XIV. 1-6. 
 
THE HEALING OF THE IMPOTENT MAN. 141 
 
 mercy of a worn-out exegetical method than of an 
 irrational faith in miracles, thus comforming to the 
 rule, that, "of two evils, choose the less." What 
 John relates of the disposition and conduct of the 
 impotent man is, psychologically, just as probable 
 as what he immediately afterwards relates concern- 
 ing the deportment and feelings of the Jews. Verily, 
 John's account represents the true state of the case, 
 and if it had a design to perpetuate the knowledge 
 of something else than a miraculous deed, the ob- 
 ject of all these individual features and ornaments 
 in the background of his picture is utterly inex- 
 plicable. All that we here read about our Lord, the 
 question of his solicitous love, the majestic manner 
 in which he performs his miracle, his considerateness 
 in withdrawing from the multitude, and the earnest 
 warning, which takes special necessities into account, 
 with which he finally crowns his demonstrated benefi- 
 cence, stand here so perfectly according to his 
 spirit, as we discover it also in the other Gospels, 
 that what is related is worthy of him in every respect. 
 We might even wonder at finding such a reve- 
 lation of his glory merely mentioned in John if we 
 had not been reminded, in due time, that it belongs 
 specially to the circle of miracles performed in the 
 neighbourhood of Jerusalem, and that, with such an 
 abundance of the signs and miracles of our Lord, 
 of which all the Evangelists make mention, no one 
 ever thought of giving an elaborate account of them. 1 
 
 i Matthew IV. 24; VIII. 16; IX. 35; John XXI. 25, and 
 many other passages. 
 
142 john's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 John, who has merely indicated by a single word 
 the miracles by which Jesus first excited attention 
 (chapter n. 23), describes the one before us more 
 elaborately, because it was on this occasion that the 
 Jews first conceived their plans of murder (chapter v. 
 16, 18); and so far, therefore, it constituted the 
 initial point of the growing conflict between light 
 and darkness, which he now had to portray more 
 in detail. Yet, however great was the enmity called 
 forth by this miracle performed on the Sabbath day, 
 we can perceive that our Lord, on the following 
 Feast of the Tabernacles, very positively refers to 
 this as the first stone of offence (chapter vn. 21 — 24). 
 John felt all the more influenced to relate this event, 
 because it gave him a welcome opportunity to com- 
 municate that vigorous discourse in which our Lord 
 defends his labours on the Sabbath, and he men- 
 tions far greater works performed by him as the 
 Renewer of spiritual life. However, to assert that 
 therefore the account of the miracle is only pre- 
 mised, without any historical ground, in order to 
 illustrate this idea, is a hypothesis that is applicable 
 anywhere else sooner than in the department of 
 serious, thorough, and impartial science. In fact, it 
 makes a painful impression to see the leaders of 
 science, so-called, who have been able to stand their 
 ground with splendour on dizzy hieghts, descend to 
 such a hopeless abyss. 
 
 Neither can we pronounce a more favourable judg- 
 ment when we perceive at how low a price the 
 negative school gets rid of the miracle of Christ's 
 
THE MIRACULOUS FEEDING OF THE MULTITUDE. 143 
 
 Miraculous Feeding of the Multitude , which is fol- 
 lowed by his Walking on the Sea. This is the only 
 one which John has in common with the synoptic 
 Evangelists, and this occurs very probably because 
 it transpired at the time of the second Passover, 
 during the public ministry of Jesus, though not at 
 Jerusalem, and, in connection with the discourse 
 succeeding it, produced the beginning of a dissen- 
 sion among the disciples, by which the final decision 
 was immediately prepared and accelerated. In 
 speaking of the miraculous feeding of the multitude, 
 we would neither repeat all the difficulties which 
 this account presents to the apologist from an 
 orthodox point of view, nor all the subterfuges 
 which men on natural and naturalistic standpoints 
 have employed to avoid the only correct explana- 
 tion. We would only state, that this miracle is one 
 of the best authenticated in the whole of sacred 
 history. It is communicated by all the four Evan- 
 gelists with an elaborateness and transparency which 
 admit of no doubt as to its real meaning, and, not- 
 withstanding the difference in accessory circum- 
 stances, confirm the same principal fact. Further, 
 we should, above all, not forget that the miracle 
 itself is of a character which it is impossible to 
 attribute to invention; it is not merely performed, 
 but it is also afterwards spoken of by our Lord 
 and his Disciples; 1 and there must have occurred 
 at this time some sign which excited just the aston- 
 
 i Matthew XVI. 5—12; Mark VIII. 14-21. 
 
144 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 ishment described by John, because we can only 
 explain by such an extraordinary circumstance the 
 unbounded enthusiasm of the people, which was soon 
 afterwards succeeded by a very perceptible cool- 
 ness, when it became evident that Jesus would not 
 be the Messiah in the sense of the worldly-minded 
 Jews. * 
 
 We do not express ourselves too strongly when 
 we say, that, once admitting the possibility of mir- 
 acles, there is not one, with the exception of the 
 resurrection of our Lord, which is attested and con- 
 firmed in so many ways as just this miracle of 
 feeding the multitude. Under such circumstances, 
 you would think that at least the historical reality 
 of the event would be acknowledged. But no, in 
 spite of all the warrant we have for this narrative, 
 it is utterly incredible ! And why? Because "Jesus him- 
 self, in the 30th and following verses, censured the desire 
 for a visible miracle, as that of manna, and, therefore, 
 could hardly have performed the miracle of feeding 
 a multitude." 2 Indeed ! Then how did the multi- 
 tude ever conceive the thought of desiring such an 
 astounding sign as that of getting manna from 
 heaven, if nothing at all had occurred to suggest 
 this idea to them ? According to my view, the wish 
 for a repetition of the miracle performed by Moses 
 is perfectly clear if a miraculous feeding of the 
 multitude on the preceding day had been really 
 witnessed, and which could very easily excite the 
 
 i John VI. 15, 16 5 compare vers. 66 ff. 
 2 Scholten, Evany elium Johannis, p. 230. 
 
THE MIRACULOUS FEEDING OF THE MULTITUDE. 145 
 
 insatiable thirst for miracles to still higher demands? 
 But, on the contrary, no one can understand what 
 could suddenly call forth the strange desire for 
 heavenly bread if ordinary bread had been merely 
 distributed in the usual manner. Just because our 
 Lord had performed such an astonishing miracle on 
 the previous day, he now had the best right for 
 censuring an inordinate desire for miracles. 
 
 According to the accounts of all the Evangelists, 
 Christ, in his all-powerful love, performed the mir- 
 acle of feeding the multitude with five loaves, not 
 that the wishes of the people might be satisfied, 
 but that their temporary want might be supplied. 
 While John says of Jesus, that, "He himself knew 
 what he would do" (verse 6), this clear knowledge 
 does not preclude that compassion which Matthew 
 and Mark so prominently extol. In the mention of 
 the great concourse of people, and of much grass 
 being in the place, you again perceive without dif- 
 ficulty the eye-witness, and had it been the writer's 
 purpose to portray a Christ who performs miracles 
 solely "to reveal his own glory" (just as if this: 
 were in conflict with his performing miracles "through 
 love"), I doubt whether he would have told us at 
 the conclusion how the Saviour withdrew from the 
 enraptured multitude to sacred solitude. At least, 
 no thaumaturgist, who performs miracles for exhibi- 
 tion, acts in this way in order to rear a memorial 
 monument to his own greatness. Indeed, this mir- 
 acle proclaims in a striking manner the great truth 
 that Christ is the Bread of Life ; yet, for this very 
 
 10 
 
146 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 reason, the declaration has such an elevated sound 
 because it is, so to speak, the account of an in- 
 comparable matter of fact. We, too, learn with ad- 
 miration that Jesus satisfies the wants of the world 
 with apparently small means, yet without exhaust- 
 ing the supply, yea, even having a surplus. But, 
 on the other hand, this thought has not called forth 
 the narrative, but the miraculous deed shows us this 
 truth, as in a clear mirror, which is further con- 
 firmed by the experience of all ages. 
 
 We next come to the Healing of the One Born 
 Blind, which is narrated in the 9th chapter. We 
 are now assured by the negative school that it was 
 invented to show that Jesus is the Light of the 
 world. Invented! It is known that Renan declared 
 himself ready to believe a miracle in case it be ex- 
 amined and established by a committee especially 
 nominated and authorized beforehand for that pur- 
 pose. Should we not be almost tempted to speak 
 of a holy irony of history, which has already ful- 
 filled this arbitrary demand many centuries before 
 it was uttered? For, in truth, an examination is 
 here conducted by the most acute and hostile eyes ; 
 the witnesses are called; opinions are heard; and 
 ihe various possibilities are weighed against each 
 other as though on gold-scales, — and what is the 
 result? It is this: While the miraculous deed re- 
 mains incomprehensible, the invention of the account 
 of the miracle must be regarded as utterly incon- 
 ceivable. Yes, inconceivable; for, by assuming the 
 .opposite, what is the use of that whole supply of 
 
THE HEALING OF THE ONE BORN BLIND. 147 
 
 details, which did not stand in the slightest relation 
 to the principal thought: "Jesus, the Light of the 
 world?" I know what your answer will be when 
 I ask you, whether you regard these particulars as 
 invented: The astonishment of the neighbours; the 
 diversity of opinions; the dissension of the Phari- 
 sees; the cunning and forbearance of the parents; 
 the immovable calmness, the increasing frankness, 
 and, I was almost going to say, the knavish con- 
 fidence, of the one born blind in presenting the 
 knowledge of his experience as of equal weight 
 with the knowledge of the Pharisees; and that 
 humble confession of his faith in the attentive and 
 condescending love of our Lord? As a matter of 
 course, the healing of the one born blind is regarded 
 by the Evangelist as the visible representation of 
 the truth that Jesus is the Light of the world; but 
 this truth has so much weight in his eyes just be- 
 cause it was not merely uttered, but preached, by 
 a grand event. We are no more surprised that the 
 restored blind man was cast out by the Jews than 
 when we hear him confessing, after this event, that 
 Christ is the Son of God. To speak frankly, it 
 would excite our wonder more if one or the other 
 of these circumstances had not been mentioned. We 
 cannot discover the slightest trace of a fixed pur- 
 pose of inventing and reporting such particulars, 
 without regard to the reality of their occurrence. 
 However, if we have symbolism and allegory here, 
 why do we not also have them in the clay and 
 spittle, and in the neighbours and parents? The 
 
 10* 
 
148 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 conclusion is manifestly in favour of the truth of the 
 account; and let it be remembered that we are not 
 here discussing the question of good taste and sound 
 understanding. In fact, as we look at the critical 
 objections that are presented with the most impor- 
 tant air imaginable, we can sometimes hardly re- 
 frain from repeating the well-known question: "Are 
 these men serious, or jesting?" 
 
 Finally, we should now pay attention to the 
 crown of all the Johannean accounts of miracles, 
 — The Raising of Lazarus, the striking revelation 
 of the truth that Jesus is, in the most exalted sense, 
 the Resurrection and the Life. There is no need 
 of proving that we read this truth here in sacred 
 hieroglyphics; but it is absurd to suppose that the 
 whole narrative was merely invented to bring out 
 this truth clearly; indeed, it is almost inconceivable 
 that a period, which, like ours, entertains and cher- 
 ishes a desire for the tangible, has neither eye 
 nor heart enough for the heavenly reality that can 
 be tasted and felt, so to speak, in almost every 
 line of this inimitable statement. Do you not dis- 
 cover history in that mention of the anointing by 
 Mary (chapter xi. 2), even before it is afterwards 
 described; in that description of the family at Be- 
 thany, and of the different states of mind of the 
 sisters, which is so unintentionally confirmed by the 
 account at the end of the 10th chapter of Luke; and 
 in the delineation of Christ's emotion, of the feelings 
 of his enemies, and of the sickness, death, and re- 
 surrection of Lazarus himself? 
 
THE RAISING OF LAZARUS. 149 
 
 But Lazarus himself, we are told, is a mere 
 fiction, and owes his name accidentally to the well- 
 known Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus ! As, 
 namely, Abraham declares in Luke that the Rich 
 Man's brethren would not repent even though La- 
 zarus rose from the dead, the fourth Evangelist is 
 declared to have made Lazarus really rise from the 
 dead, without the Jews being converted, in order 
 thus to impress upon the parable the stamp of a 
 higher truth! Truly, it has been justly said: "If 
 this is the way in which criticism is conducted, 
 then I no longer know by what means we can be 
 taught to distinguish truth from fiction." * What 
 can now be said, in conclusion, in favour of the 
 monstrous conjecture of an accidental coincidence 
 of names? I present another conjecture in oppo- 
 sition to it: In the well-known parable, our Lord, 
 with an involuntary allusion, and one which he alone 
 understood, gave the name of Lazarus to one of the 
 principal characters. This is the more natural as 
 it can be proved chronologically that he had uttered 
 that parable just on one of the two days which he 
 
 i See Cramer, Bydragen, etc., Vol. I. p. 276. Uhlhorn, 
 in his four Vortriige ilber die rnoderne Darstellung des Lebens 
 Jesu, p. 94 (Hanover, 18(36), expresses himself still more 
 strongly when he says: "Then this is speculation! I really 
 do not know which to admire most, the productiveness of 
 the pseudo-John, who created such a history out of merely 
 isolated hints, or the acuteness of the critics who know 
 how to trace out the origin of this account after the world 
 had been in ignorance of it for eighteen hundred years, or, 
 finally, the credulousness of those who regard such a dis^ 
 covery as possible." 
 
150 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 spent at some distance from Bethany, filled as he 
 was with the thought of the sickness and death of 
 the brother of Mary and Martha. 1 Placing one 
 conjecture against the other, I believe that the latter 
 admits of a stronger defence than the former. But, 
 leaving both out of the question, I beg that the 
 Gospel history be not stretched upon the Procrustean 
 bed of such an unwarranted supposition as the one 
 advanced by the negative critics! One would have 
 the same right to-morrow to assert that the account 
 of the stay, and of the hospitable reception, of our 
 Lord in a Samaritan city (John iv. 40 — 42) arose 
 from the parable in Luke (Luke x. 30 — 37), that a 
 merciful Samaritan poured oil and wine into the 
 wounds of a badly-treated Israelite. Now just as 
 much can be said for this conjecture as for the 
 other one that we have mentioned, — which is 
 simply nothing. 
 
 But if miracles are possible, why superscribe 
 over this chapter in particular the words: "An ar- 
 tistically-devised Fable?" As Jesus, by the word 
 of his power, raised to life two other dead persons, 
 who are mentioned by the synoptic Gospels, — and 
 no one has ever proved the contrary, — it could 
 not be too great or surprising a task for the same 
 power to raise from the dead Lazarus, who had 
 lain in the grave. The manner in which Christ 
 first puts faith to the test and afterwards rewards 
 it, harmonizes perfectly with the conduct which we 
 
 Comp. my Life of Jesus (Dutch Ed.), Vol. II. p. 728. 
 
THE RAISING OF LAZARUS. 151 
 
 see him observing both previously and subsequently. 
 We find even the figure of death as a sleep (verse 11) 
 in the other Evangelists also (for example, Matthew 
 rx. 24; Mark v. 39). It has yet to be proved by 
 our opponents that the Evangelist allows two days 
 to elapse after Christ had received news of the 
 sickness, just to show that the miracle should be a 
 greater one! Our Lord could have had unknown 
 reasons which did not permit him to go immediate- 
 ly, and he would undoubtedly employ this neces- 
 sary postponement for the discipline of his weeping 
 friends, the sisters, in patient and believing trust. 
 The conversation of our Lord with Martha before 
 the performance of the miracle (verses 23 — 27), is 
 attended with just as little insurmountable difficulty. 
 Certainly, if that great utterance: "I am the resur- 
 rection and the life," was designed to mean only 
 that Jesus is the source of all spiritual life, then 
 the logical connection between this utterance and 
 the previous one: "Thy brother shall [bodily] rise 
 again," can hardly be proved. Yet the difficulty 
 disappears when we suppose that our Lord, in order 
 to throw more light upon, and strengthen, this pro- 
 phecy, calls himself the Resurrection and the Life 
 in the widest sense of the terms, so that, while the 
 spiritual resurrection is not excluded, the bodily one 
 is chiefly meant. Our Lord by no means intends 
 them to expect a spiritual resurrection instead of 
 the bodily raising which they hoped, but would 
 awaken in her the thought, that whosoever liveth 
 and believeth in him, though he were dead, shall 
 
152 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 yet really live, and therefore can be called back by 
 him to this life at any moment. 
 
 The greatest historical objection ever raised 
 against this miracle is the silence of the synoptic 
 Gospels on an event which, like this one, is so 
 majestic in itself and so decisive in its conse- 
 quences. And, indeed, we do not disguise the fact 
 that this phenomenon is somewhat surprising. 1 
 More than one supposition, with different degrees 
 of probability, can be adduced in explanation of this 
 circumstance. But, granted that not one of the con- 
 jectures can be satisfactorily demonstrated, and that 
 we could not give to the question: "Why are the 
 synoptic Gospels silent here?", any other answer 
 than: "We do not know, What is your opinion?", 
 would this of itself warrant us in regarding a nar- 
 rative with distrust which bears upon its very face 
 so many unmistakable evidences of truth and re- 
 ality? Verily, if the narrative stood altogether 
 alone in the Johannean account, and in that of the 
 other Evangelists; if no informer mentioned any- 
 thing of similar character about Jesus; and if at least 
 
 i ["To the popular view, and to the eye of modern 
 science, the raising of the dead appears the greatest of 
 miracles; but to a true spiritual view the casting out and 
 •controlling demons may be far greater. The former is a 
 mastery of passive or willing human nature; the latter is a 
 mastery of hostile powers. But the reality of the present 
 miracle" is unconsciously attested by all the Evangelists; 
 since they all describe a sudden popular excitement in fa- 
 vour of Jesus which can be solved only by some such fact; 
 an excitement which soon reacted, and resulted in his cru- 
 cifixion." Whedon, Commentary on Luke and John, p. 332. 
 — J. F. H.] 
 
SILENCE OF THE SYNOPTICS ON LAZARUS. 153 
 
 the rise of such a forgery might be explained in 
 an acceptable manner, there would then be some 
 excuse for a certain degree of doubt. But the fact 
 really is, that, though the silence of the other 
 Evangelists be surprising, invention by this one is 
 utterly inconceivable. For if Lazarus was really 
 not raised, what are we to suppose? One of two 
 things: The narrative must have either some or no 
 historical ground. If it have some historical ground, 
 then what is it? Is it, as Renan has supposed, a 
 feigned death, a dramatic deception, in which Jesus 
 was at once both spectator and actor? You cer- 
 tainly turn away with horror and disgust at such 
 shameless frivolousness in casting that which is holy 
 to the dogs. Or, has it no historical ground? Then, 
 as Keville holds, is the whole narrative a sort of 
 allegory or legend, intended to teach us how Jesus 
 awakened from their spiritual sleep of death the 
 outcasts of Jewish society, as then constituted, 
 whom he loved, and whose lot he ^'deplored. Truly, 
 he who endorses such a view without any shadow 
 of proof expects too much of the credulity of his 
 readers. x The miracle is incomprehensible, but this 
 fiction is as incomprehensible as the mystification 
 designed to supply it. But what is the use of 
 speaking more on this point? I can now under- 
 stand why Spinoza declared that he was ready to 
 believe in Jesus if he could only concede this mir- 
 acle. But he could not do this, for it was not the 
 
 i "He calculates strangely on the stupidity of his hearers 
 who feeds them with such nonsense." Godet. 
 
154 JOHN'S ACCOUNT OF CHRIST'S MIRACLES. 
 
 narrative itself, but Lis philosophical system, which 
 impeded his faith. y 
 
 II. His philosophical system, we say, and not 
 the historical accounts, was an impediment to his 
 faith. This assertion naturally leads us from this 
 narrow sphere to a wider one. There is no doubt 
 that the great majority of the purely historical ob- 
 jections raised to every particular account of mir- 
 acles can be met by quite a satisfactory answer^ 
 But it becomes clearer every day that these ob- 
 jections constitute only the curtain behind which an 
 infinitely greater doubt lies concealed. Strauss has 
 somewhere said, that, however venerable and har- 
 monious the witnesses for the apostolic origin of the 
 Gospels might be, he would even then not believe 
 their contents. Do you ask: "Why would he not?" 
 He gives us his own answer: "Everything that would 
 make Jesus a supernatural being is well-meant, 
 and, to a certain degree, is perhaps beneficent; but 
 if it continue permanent, it becomes an injurious 
 delusion, which is now more corrupting than ever 
 before." In other words, we should reject a mir- 
 acle itself, even though attested by a still greater 
 number of harmonizing witnesses. There is no need 
 of proving that he here only sincerely expresses 
 just what we hear openly proclaimed and accepted 
 with gladness. l We bear the cry from different 
 
 i Zeller, the most vigorous champion of the Tubingen School 
 since the death of Baur, says, in his Vortrage und Abhand- 
 lungen geschichtlichen Inhalts, 1865, p. 491, that, with his con- 
 genial friend, he could not admit the reality of such an 
 
OBJECTIONS EXAMINED. 155 
 
 sides: "Miracles are inconceivable!" Another says: 
 "They are undemonstrable ! " A third exclaims: 
 "They are at least destitute of importance!" You 
 cannot expect me to discuss these questions at length. 
 The 2 jros an d cons have been repeatedly weighed 
 and met, so that it will probably suffice merely to 
 present you a brief summary of the arguments ; for 
 it is better to say something additional than, by in- 
 judicious silence, to leave what we have said in- 
 complete and unsatisfactory. We will conclude the 
 present Lecture by a brief examination of the three 
 objections already mentioned, which are offered not 
 merely against the Johannean account of Christ's 
 miracles, but against the accounts of all the Evan- 
 gelists. * 
 
 "Miracles are inconceivable." This is the first 
 expression which many now use in casting aside 
 the accounts informing us that water was changed 
 into wine, that bread and fish were miraculously 
 increased, that a man who was born blind was 
 healed, and that a dead man was raised to life. 
 
 event as the resurrection of Christ, "no matter how strongly 
 it might be attested." 
 
 i In view of the utter impossibility of here treating 
 properly the question of miracles, I refer the reader to the 
 literature furnished in my Life of Jesus (Dutch Ed.), Pt. I. 
 pp. 257, 311; Pt. II. p. 32 ff.; also especially to the excel- 
 lent treatise by Professor Zockler, of Greifswald University, 
 On the Jmportance of Miracles in Nature and History, published 
 in the apologetical periodical, Der Beweis des Glaubens, 1866, 
 pp. 65 — 85; and to the monograph of F. L. Steinmeyer, 
 Die Wunderthaten des Herrn in Bezug auf die neueste Kritik 
 (Berlin, 1866), which imparts much important matter, par- 
 ticularly on the liaising of Lazarus, on pp. 197 — 210. 
 
156 john's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 The modern negative spirit has placed itself within 
 a few years — or, I might say, months, — on a 
 height where it sees the question of miracles so far 
 beneath that it does not any longer regard it worthy 
 of its notice. It seems like a razed fortification, 
 by which the victorious general leads his troops, 
 and behind whose fragments only a few solitary 
 soldiers lie concealed. What a pity it is that the 
 general is compelled to take the road leading by 
 this ruin, and that the supposed invalids are so 
 bold and incorrigible as now and then to fire a 
 gun, and not always in the air! We are not the 
 only ones who imagine that the magnanimity prac- 
 tised by this and that one in passing out of the 
 way of this question does not indicate strength, but 
 weakness, and is rather a proof of the tactics than 
 of the conscientiousness of our opponents. This 
 much is certain: That at least the empirical philos- 
 opher has no right to assert dogmatically that mir- 
 acles are impossible. For this assertion in the de- 
 partment of empirical philosophy is nothing less 
 than a purely dogmatical declaration. Empirical 
 philosophy pays attention to what occurs every- 
 where in nature; but when it undertakes to decide 
 on what can or cannot happen, it treads upon the 
 department of speculative philosophy, which the 
 devotees of empirical philosophy are in the habit 
 of avoiding as a territory full of vapour and fog. 
 The poet's castigation applies very well in their 
 case : 
 
THE ALLEGED IMPOSSIBILITY OF MIRACLES. 157 
 
 "Of what do such rough brooms 
 Leave behind them a trace? 
 Men now haste to deny 
 What only just took place!" 
 
 I need hardly remind you of the utter destitu- 
 tion of support , at least on the empirical stand- 
 point, for the declaration that what does not take 
 place to - day could not have taken place yesterday. 
 It is no wonder that the term, "Miracles are im- 
 possible," is here gradually pronounced with an ever 
 descending voice, however loud it may still reecho 
 in many hearts. Only he can say that miracles are 
 impossible who is ignorant of the existence of an- 
 other and higher order of things than those to which 
 the usual course of affairs refers us. The denial 
 of miracles is, really, the denial of the supernatural. 
 There is a conception of miracles which does not 
 permit him who enjoys it to hesitate for a moment 
 at the word "impossible." If we look at miracles 
 as a purely arbitrary interference of God with the 
 existing order of things, as an infraction of that 
 order of nature whose definiteness and regularity 
 very justly excite our greatest admiration, and, in 
 a word, regard them as absolutely contrary to na- 
 ture, and therefore assuredly contrary to God, it is 
 not then so difficult to banish faith and miracles to 
 the realm of old wives' fables by a single stroke 
 of the pen. But if we carefully consider the matter, 
 it is pure compassion to combat such an opinion of 
 miracles, because it is no longer defended by any 
 thoughtful mind. 
 
158 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 The case is altogether different when miracles 
 are regarded as not in conflict with all nature, hut 
 only with that which we are acquainted with; as a 
 momentary deviation from the usual order of things 
 at the sign of an almighty , wise and holy Will; 
 and as a special revelation of Him who reaches, hy 
 hoth ordinary and extraordinary ways, the end that 
 compels our respect. Now is such a miracle as this 
 possible? This question must he answered in dif- 
 ferent ways, according to our different ideas of God. 
 If I occupy a deistic point of view, and regard God 
 not merely as distinct from, but also sundered from, 
 the world, — as One who lets the universe keep in 
 motion according to its own laws, just like the 
 works of a watch, then I cannot conceive a mir- 
 acle to be possible unless there is a total change 
 in God's relation to the world. If I be a pantheist 
 or naturalist, and therefore deny the existence of a 
 personal God, who is elevated as Spirit above the 
 cosmos, it is self-evident that I must, at all hazards, 
 explain everything as the purely natural product of 
 finite causes, and that when I see something which 
 I cannot comprehend, the most that I should do is 
 to stand still in astonishment, but never make the 
 confession that this was really a miracle. 
 
 But if, on the other hand, I take the Christian 
 theistic view of God, and therefore acknowledge 
 Him to be a living and personal God, who, though 
 infinitely exalted above the world, is nevertheless in 
 continual and direct relation to it; who is not only 
 the Eternal Power by which all things are supported, 
 
NATURAL LAWS AND GOD'S WILL. 159 
 
 but the Holy Will by which everything is governed, 
 and is by no means confined to the laws which he 
 has ordained for the creature that is dependent 
 upon Him, — if this be my point of view, I can- 
 not seriously question at least the possibility of the 
 occurrence of miracles. This possibility of a mir- 
 acle occurring in a particular case must be settled 
 by historical and critical inquiry; but the word "in- 
 conceivable" can only be repeated in case our God, 
 to speak with Henry Heine, is a God who is "pan- 
 theistically laced-up" and who does not reveal him- 
 self in the universe, — he has no self, because he 
 is nobody, only a something, — but is gradually 
 revealed in the thinking mind. But if our God 
 really has self-consciousness and freedom (and how 
 could he be the Absolute Spirit without these), then 
 we must necessarily distinguish between the laws 
 of nature and the will of God, as the former are 
 determined by the latter. In our opinion, the so- 
 called monistic theism, which acknowledges the per- 
 sonality of God on the one hand, and, on the other, 
 denies miracles, is only a happy inconsistency, 
 which does more honor to the heart than the under- 
 standing of those who hold it, and must necessarily 
 lead either backward to a worn-out system of Deism, 
 or forward to hopeless pantheism. A miracle is 
 really nothing else than the revelation of the almighty 
 freedom of Almighty Love, which, by its special 
 interference with natural laws, restores the moral 
 order which was disturbed by man in consequence 
 of the sinful abuse of the freedom which God had 
 
160 john's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 given him. Neither God's unchangeableness nor 
 wisdom is in this way injured in the slightest de- 
 gree; the occurrence of miracles is not an injury 
 hut an advantage to the eternal order of the 
 world, which was at first moral hut was afterwards 
 destroyed hy sin. Thus, the question of the con- 
 ceivahleness of miracles is, in other words, this 
 question : "Is it conceivable that God should interfere 
 for the redemption and restoration of a race cor- 
 rupted and made miserable by sin?" 
 
 Do you suppose miracles to be impossible? Very 
 well; then, in that case, there is also no special 
 saving revelation of God, and no real revealing 
 act of God, but only a merely subjective process 
 of God towards revelation. Then there is also no 
 more answer to prayer than the excitement and 
 elevation which the one who prays communicates 
 to himself by "spiritual gymnastics," as it has been 
 properly called, and in which, intercession for others 
 may be called the climax of all folly. Then we 
 cannot conceive of conversion, at least as the intro- 
 duction of an inward principle of life, and as the 
 beginning of a new life in truth, but at most only 
 as the purely natural development of our inherent 
 goodness. Then there is also no independent gov- 
 ernment of the world, but only an eternally im- 
 movable order of the world; and there is also no 
 creation of all things from nothing, at the beginning 
 of time, by an Almighty Will. The denial of mir- 
 acles must of itself lead to the absurdity of a so- 
 called eternal creation, and this again to a theory 
 
RESULTS FROM THE DENIAL OF MIRACLES. 161 
 
 of the merely natural development of one thing 
 from another, of man from the monkey, of organic 
 from inorganic matter, and this, perhaps, from the 
 atom, and the atom — from what? Here we stand 
 precisely at the same point where philosophy, in its 
 tender childhood, and the systematic opponent of 
 miracles are struck blind when they come to dis- 
 cuss the first of all questions. Truly, the theory of 
 an unbending connection of causes in the natural 
 and moral world, where there is not left a finger- 
 breadth for the freedom of the eternally living ana 
 operating God, avenges itself with fearful severity. 
 The end of this denial will be, that the bells will 
 toll simultaneously the burial hour for religion and 
 philosophy, for they did exist, hut are no more. 
 Even morality itself is not safe, and I can perfectly 
 understand how not only such a learned man as 
 Richard Rothe sees no difficulty in such proofs of 
 divine omnipotence, 1 but that there are so many 
 besides him, who, now regarding religion as the 
 prime necessity for man, and Christianity as the 
 special saving revelation for the sinner, will not 
 allow themselves to be robbed of their faith in mir- 
 acles at any lower price than they would require 
 to part with their faith in a living God, without 
 
 i The profound and acute Professor Rothe , of Heidel- 
 berg University, in his excellent work entitled Zur Doymatik t 
 p. 66ff., has presented a deduction and vindication of faith 
 in miracles on a Christian and theistic standpoint, which 
 cannot be recommended too heartily, especially to those who 
 continually assert that no "thinking" and "conscientious" 
 man adheres any longer to miracles. 
 
 11 
 
162 john's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 whose personal participation they could not live, 
 and without whose grace they could not die in 
 peace. 
 
 But some one, perhaps, sighs: "I would accept 
 miracles if they could only be proved." Allow me 
 to ask this question in reply: "What do you under- 
 stand by proof?" Do you desire a mathematical 
 proof in the department of history and religion? 
 Or do you desire that the one who performs mir- 
 acles be duly attested before a committee nominated 
 by, or composed of, such men as Strauss and 
 Renan? But a juggler, who was compelled to 
 maintain himself in this way, would certainly be 
 anything else than an ambassador of God, a mes- 
 senger of truth and of life. Would not many a 
 member of this court constantly increase its require- 
 ments, and would a conviction arrived at on such 
 wise have anything in common with religious faith? 
 Belief in miracles, as you will readily grant, is not 
 merely to acknowledge that, for example, a dead 
 man rose on a certain day at a certain place, but 
 that God, either immediately or by the instrumen- 
 tality of his servants, there and at that time raised 
 this dead person. In other words, true faith in 
 miracles is also a religious faith. But such a faith 
 can be awakened, strengthened, and justified on 
 rational and moral grounds, though it can never be 
 demonstrated in such a way as will leave no avenue 
 of escape for him who does not grant the premisses, 
 and evades the consequences at all hazards. It is 
 sufficient that miracles, like the sun, are revealed 
 
FAITH IN MIRACLES A WONDERFUL FAITH. 163 
 
 in a certain peculiar splendour to the single eye and 
 the receptive heart. 
 
 But perhaps some one asserts that we are not 
 acquainted with all the laws of nature, and that, 
 therefore, while we are ahle to prove that some- 
 thing was unusual, we cannot prove that it was a 
 miraculous deed of God. But we know enough of 
 the laws of nature to he able to say, that, for ex- 
 ample, it is impossible to explain by the usual 
 course of nature the miracles which John relates. 
 The accounts of miracles contained in the Gospels 
 are of such a character that we cannot hesitate to 
 say: "How strange, how wonderful!" They are, 
 moreover, usually connected with language which 
 compels us to see in the miracle also the sign of a 
 higher operation ; and they are the revelation of One 
 who, in a moral respect, awakens and merits our 
 confidence. According to the words of Jesus him- 
 self, there is no doubt that false miracles could and 
 did occur (Matthew xxiv. 24), and nowhere has 
 more gigantic deception been practised, or been 
 more successful, than in this mysterious realm. 
 Therefore, faith in miracles is always a wonderful 
 faith; hence the necessity of increased care in see- 
 ing what, and on what ground, we should accept 
 anything as miraculous ; and hence we cannot evade 
 the question, as to whether or not there are signs 
 by which we can distinguish true miracles from false 
 ones. But as the existence of counterfeit money is 
 rather a proof for than against the original existence 
 of real money, so does just the pretended miracle 
 
 11* 
 
164 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 all the more induce and justify the presumption 
 that also real miracles must have occasionally oc- 
 curred. Whether this was really the case in the 
 sphere where we are guided by the hand of the 
 Evangelists, is a question that can only be properly 
 answered by impartial historical criticism, which 
 must be distinguished from dogmatical and phil- 
 osophical criticism. You do not require us to 
 guarantee in a pefectly satisfactory manner, and in 
 a few moments, the credibility of even only a 
 portion of the Gospel accounts of miracles. But if 
 you desire that we should mark out in general 
 outline the way in which, according to our notion, 
 this proof can be always attempted with good re- 
 sults, according to the necessities of the present 
 time, your suggestion is just as welcome to me as 
 it can be of interest to you. 
 
 In order to reach the end in question, I regard 
 it necessary to begin with Christianity as a phenom- 
 enon related to the whole history of the world 
 and reformatory of the world. No one can deny 
 that with this Christianity there came into the world 
 a new moral and religious power, which has totally 
 changed its previous aspect. He who thoroughly 
 and impartially studies history will see, with con- 
 tinually increasing clearness, that it is impossible 
 to regard this Christianity as the merely natural 
 result of the Jewish or heathen religion of the day, 
 or as the result of the philosophical thought of 
 previous centuries; and no one has ever yet suc- 
 ceeded in giving a merely natural interpretation of 
 
MIRACLES THE FRUIT OF A SPECIAL REVELATION. 165 
 
 the monotheistic peculiarity of the Children of Israel, 
 from whom Christianity sprang. Thus, we are justi- 
 fied in arriving at the presumption that we are 
 dealing with the fruit of a special revelation, and 
 this presumption is strengthened if, in the first two 
 centuries after Christ (not to speak of later mir- 
 acles), we meet also with various phenomena, even 
 in the natural sphere of life, which perceptibly vary 
 from what we are taught by our ordinary daily ex- 
 perience. * The miracles of the post-Apostolic age 
 are as the waning twilight of a sun which has set, 
 but is not quenched and is far from being forgotten. 
 The most credible witnesses of this period refer to 
 an earlier 'One, as an age of more numerous and 
 dazzling miraculous deeds. Thus Quadratus, for ex- 
 ample, a Christian apologetical writer at the be- 
 ginning of the second century, a fragment of whose 
 work has been preserved by Eusebius, the Church 
 Father, relates, that even at his day there were 
 many of the sick still alive who had been healed 
 by Jesus, and that there were then living those who 
 had been raised by him from the dead. 2 
 
 As we go steadily backwards from this company 
 into the vestibule of the Apostolic Age, the few 
 Epistles which the most negative criticism has found 
 itself compelled to leave in our possession will suf- 
 fice to show that the earliest Christian period was 
 
 i Compare Tholuck's essay on The Miracles of the Cath- 
 olic-Church, etc., Vermischte Schriften, Vol. I., especially 
 pp. 28 — 49. 
 
 2 See my Life of Jesus, Vol. II. p. 309. 
 
166 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 a scene of miracles. u He therefore that niinistereth 
 to you the Spirit, and worketh miracles among you," 
 were words which the Apostle regarded amply suf- 
 ficient to put the Galatians to extreme shame ; * and 
 he himself, the great Apostle of reasonable service 
 and of sound understanding, could declare to his ad- 
 versaries in Corinth, that "the signs of an Apostle 
 were wrought among you in all patience, in signs, 
 and wonders, and mighty deeds" (2 Corinthians 
 xii. 12), so that, in this respect also, he was not 
 a whit less than one of the chief Apostles. The 
 various extraordinary gifts that were manifested in 
 this same Corinth are universally known. Miracles 
 were not only the signature of the Church but the 
 seal of fellowship of the most distinguished Apostles, 
 and particularly of Paul. This same Paul has per- 
 formed and experienced miracles. He appeals to 
 visions and revelations, by which he had received 
 communications which he positively and consciously 
 distinguishes from his own perception and opinion. 2 
 He is himself a moral miracle, when we compare 
 his life as a Christian with his previous life; he is 
 a miracle whose solution he gives us himself when 
 he tells us that he has seen the Christ who had 
 died, and who had been persecuted by him. On 
 historical and psychological grounds, it is as pre- 
 posterous to regard self-deception in his case as 
 
 i Galatians III. 5; compare 1 Corinthians XII. 9; He- 
 brews II. 4. 
 
 2 1 Corinthians VII. 10, 12, 40; 1 Thessalonians IV. 15, 
 and other passages. 
 
EARLY CHRISTIAN FAITH BASED ON FACTS. 167 
 
 imposture by others. 1 Only a few years after this 
 same Paul's conversion, he proclaimed in Corinth 
 what he repeats somewhat later in an Epistle to 
 the same Church, that Christ died, was buried, 
 "rose again the third day," and appeared to a 
 number of his friends. The manner in whicli he 
 makes this declaration renders it impossible for any 
 impartial expositor to look at the fact in any other 
 light than as a bodily resurrection and coming forth 
 from the grave. 
 
 As a witness of this miraculous event, Paul 
 stands with all the other Apostles. Every one of 
 them was a personal security for the fact, and, so 
 far as we are able to see, from the very first day 
 when Christianity appeared in the world. Their 
 faith, and the faith of the entire early Church, is 
 utterly inexplicable if it is not established on facts. 
 It is impossible that witnesses so numerous and 
 of such a character could have taken a vision- 
 ary view of what they neither believed nor ex- 
 pected; hunger can desire bread, but it cannot 
 create it. Even scepticism has been compelled to 
 make the following confession: "It is only the Mir- 
 acle of the Resurrection that can dissipate the doubts 
 which threaten unavoidably to banish faith itself to 
 
 i In view of all that has been recently asserted and 
 misconceived by our opponents, we refer the reader to the 
 excellent essay by Professor Schultz, of Konigsberg Uni- 
 versity, published in DerBeiceis des GZaw&ens (1866, pp. 33— 49), 
 entitled: Das Zeugniss des Apostels Paulus von der Auferste- 
 hung des Herrn, gegeniiber den Ansichten von Schenkel und 
 Strauss. 
 
168 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 the eternal night of death." * Jesus must therefore 
 really have risen, as is declared by Paul, together 
 with all the Apostles, and as is also particularly 
 declared by John, whom, from all that has been 
 said, we must admit to be a credible witness on 
 the life of Jesus. 
 
 There is no doubt that John gives an account 
 of a bodily resurrection of the deceased Saviour. 
 Let him who thinks that he can destroy this irref- 
 utable testimony, do it; but do not compel the 
 Apostle to relate what he really does not. We 
 have already observed, that everything which he 
 communicates about the empty grave, the linen 
 clothes found there, the visit to the grave by him- 
 self, Peter, Mary Magdalene and others, would 
 have been as devoid of purpose and as superfluous 
 as you can conceive, if he had not perfectly agreed 
 with the remaining Apostles on the fact of Christ's 
 bodily resurrection. How would an author who 
 believed that Jesus did not bodily rise from the 
 grave, ever have conceived the notion of attribut- 
 ing to him the words addressed to Thomas: "Reach 
 hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach 
 hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side; and 
 be not faithless, but believing?" Still more. Would 
 the same author ever have mentioned the different 
 
 1 Baur, Das Christenthum der drei ersten Jahrhunderte, 
 p. 39. — On the ground and importance of faith in the re- 
 surrection of our Lord, compare the Fourth Lecture, entitled, 
 The Son of Man, in F. Coulin's excellent work, Conferences 
 sur VhumanitC du Christ, p. 141 ff. 1866. 
 
Christ's resurrection proving omnipotence. 169 
 
 appearances of the Risen One among the signs 
 performed by him (chapter xx. 30) if they had not 
 possessed in his view a miraculous character, that 
 is, had not borne the mark of an actual bodily re- 
 surrection? A Christ who, like all other men, con- 
 tinues dead in body, but lives immortally in spirit, 
 and plays the ghost after his death (to use an ex- 
 pression of Strauss against Schenkel), is certainly 
 not the Christ portrayed in the fourth Gospel. 1 
 
 As we have thus ascended to the highest peak 
 in the mountain - range of miracles , — the bodily 
 resurrection of our Lord, — we have gained a solid 
 point of support whence the hotly contested terri- 
 tory can again be gradually possessed. Yet we 
 now have the actual revelation of a higher order 
 of things, a supernatural power, whose presence 
 and operation we are not justified a priori in regard- 
 ing as inconceivable. But now Christ himself stands 
 before our eyes in a light where it is possible, and 
 even probable, that he could thus have conquered 
 death, and was able to control the power of the 
 material world. The miracle which takes place in 
 him makes it very easy to suppose that he could 
 perform deeds which infinitely surpass the universal 
 power of man. The account of his life furnished 
 us by reliable witnesses declares plainly that this 
 really was the case. 
 
 i Compare his quizzical treatment of Schenkel's notion 
 (which has been shrewdly ignored by a certain school), in 
 his controversial work , Die Halben und die Ganzen, p. 57 ff. 
 Berlin, 1865. 
 
170 john's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 As for the credibility of the single accounts, it 
 is not difficult to start questions of greater or less 
 importance concerning some of them as soon as 
 they are isolated. But how speedily does everything 
 assume quite a different light when we look at the 
 miraculous deeds of our Lord by the aid of his 
 own declarations concerning himself, and when we 
 look from this centre to all the points of the sacred 
 circle! 
 
 Then it usually follows, that what may justly 
 awaken distrust when considered alone bears the 
 impress of beauty, truth, and significance when taken 
 in this connection and associated with this Person. 
 And then when we come to particulars, and see 
 how many delicate psychological characteristics of 
 the truth are furnished by these accounts of Christ's 
 miracles; how inseparable is the bond between the 
 words and deeds of our Lord in the fourth Gospel, 
 as well as in all the rest; how great a difference 
 can be proved between the canonical and the apoc- 
 ryphal accounts of the miracles of Jesus; and what 
 a difference there is between his signs and those 
 of others, whether real or pretended performers of 
 miracles, — I shall mention merely Apollonius of 
 Tyana, Mohammed, and others, ■ — need I tell you 
 in advance the result of such a candid and con- 
 scientious inquiry? I believe that I have already 
 anticipated it, and have no more thought of reviving 
 the trivial objection, that we must in that case ac- 
 cept also all the later accounts of miracles, for ex- 
 ample, those of the Romish Church. As for the 
 
Christ's miracles the work of god. 171 
 
 latter , you will have observed that we do not be- 
 long to the class who hold that the miraculous gift- 
 was unconditionally withdrawn at the death of the 
 last Apostle. We will subject the accounts of sub- 
 sequent miraculous deeds to as impartial investiga- 
 tion as those furnished by sacred history; and if we 
 can find that the external and internal grounds in 
 the former are just as satisfactory, we shall be just 
 as willing to acknowledge it. But if it follow that 
 later accounts of miracles were only simulated in 
 many instances, we will never admit that such a 
 castle in the air be dignified to the rank of an 
 arsenal, from which there can be taken spurious 
 weapons for battering down the impregnable fortress 
 of the Gospel history of miracles. 
 
 What further objection can be raised to our 
 claiming the name of disciples of orthodox science 
 on the ground of our firm belief in miracles? As 
 a matter of course, our knowledge of nature has 
 been immeasurably extended within eighteen hundred 
 years, but it has not yet led us to believe that 
 Christ and Christianity can be satisfactorily ex- 
 plained without appeal to a higher interposition. 
 Though we are now better acquainted with nature 
 than men of an earlier day were, and though we 
 must confess that these things have happened, yet 
 this is another ground for seeing in the accounts 
 of Christ's miracles nothing less than the finger of 
 God. The Evangelists were, it is true, simple- 
 hearted men, and not suspicious critics; but they 
 had a better knowledge than a certain class of the 
 
172 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 critics of our day, — they had a sacred sense of 
 truth. It were impossible for him who places Jesus 
 as high as they, and bows as reverently before 
 him as they, to imagine such foolish things about 
 him as a deviser of miracles, and to tell such un- 
 blushing falsehoods, as those who oppose them 
 would falsely attribute to them. We take their 
 testimony in deciding as historical proof that which 
 we cannot deny without becoming involved in in- 
 finitely greater difficulties than follow from a firm 
 belief in miracles. Criticism — of course, we ac- 
 knowledge its right; but the criticism that we are 
 contending with is not truly free, but absolutely 
 bound; for it is not ruled by philosophical prin- 
 ciples, but by philosophical prejudices. And as 
 long as God gives me a voice to speak, I will 
 raise it in protesting against this illicit mixture of 
 true history and false philosophy. 
 
 Let us now group together what we have said 
 in detail. By opposing the miracles narrated in the 
 Gospel history, we would have to accept much 
 greater miracles, and even absurdities. Neverthe- 
 less, we will make a reply, though the objection of 
 our enemies is hardly worth the trouble. "The 
 whole question of miracles," it is said, "is, after 
 all, of but little importance. Why contend longer 
 about things which, having happened so many cent- 
 uries ago, cannot contribute anything to the general 
 satisfaction of men? Jesus is the same to me that 
 he was before, whether I believe that he arose 
 bodily from the dead, or not; and my salvation is 
 
GREAT IMPORTANCE OF MIRACLES. 173 
 
 not endangered even though I doubt that water 
 was once changed into wine, or that the eyes of 
 a man born blind were opened." What reply shall 
 we make to such reasoning as this, in which, as I 
 often think, truth and error are perhaps uncon- 
 sciously united, and are therefore doubly dangerous? 
 Miracles without importance! It does seem to me 
 that the very ones who make this assertion do not 
 believe what they say. Almost every page of John's 
 Gospel proves, with perfect clearness, that they were 
 of great importance in his estimation. * We learn 
 from Christ's own declarations, recorded by John 
 as well as by the synoptic Evangelists, that He 
 also attributed great importance to them. 
 
 It is remarkable with w r hat unsuspecting frank- 
 ness those who deny miracles attempt to persuade 
 themselves and us, that, when they thus despise 
 our Lord's miracles, they have him on their side, 
 holding that he never regarded such deeds of any 
 special value. Because our Lord had said that 
 signs would be done in his name by false prophets, 
 did he not also positively say: "The same works 
 that I do [among which are his miracles also], bear 
 witness of me, that the Father hath sent me;" and 
 again: "Go and show John again those things which 
 ye do hear and see;" and again: "But if I do, 
 though ye believe not me, believe the works; that 
 ye may know, and believe, that the Father is in 
 
 i John I. 50; II. 11; III. 2; IV. 29; V. 36; X. 25; 
 XX. 30, 31. 
 
174 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 me, and I in him?" l If Jesus more than once 
 reproached the people for their lusting after mir- 
 acles, can we conclude that it is a matter of small 
 importance for God to bear witness to the Gospel 
 of his Son, by signs, and wonders, and deeds? 
 I grant that the impression of miracles cannot be 
 so powerful upon us as upon the contemporaries of 
 our Lord, but their importance has not diminished 
 in the slightest. How can it be possible that these 
 things should really happen, and occur with direct 
 reference to our salvation, and be authenticated in 
 such an incontestable way, and yet should perma- 
 nently be remarkable only as enigmatical antiquities? 
 The correctness of this view is at least improbable, 
 and it is not substantiated by the experience of 
 many persons of early and later times who have 
 been led to Christ by these miracles in the fullest 
 sense. 
 
 As a matter of course, historical faith in mir- 
 acles cannot of itself save any one. Who has ever 
 asserted such an absurdity? But without humble 
 faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God, who was 
 given for our offences and was raised for our justi- 
 fication, and as the One who was able to do just 
 such miracles as the Gospel relates, we can not 
 and shall not be saved. The expression: "I believe 
 in Christ, whether he perform miracles or not," is 
 very superficial, and indicates rather a certain good- 
 natured and optimistic state of mind than thorough 
 
 i Matthew XXIV. 24; compare XL 2-6,20—24; John V. 
 36; X. 37, 38. 
 
Christ's omnipotence and man's faith. 175 
 
 reflection. One may believe in Jesus, as some 
 imagine him, and continue in this faith, even though 
 he let go miracles; but, without miracles, would 
 one direct his attention to Him, be led to Him, and 
 fall at His feet? The expression: "Jesus remains 
 the same to me whether I believe in miracles or 
 not," amounts to about as much as, — speaking 
 plainly, — he is only the Socrates of Israel, the 
 Ideal of humanity, the religious Genius. No doubt, 
 with such a Jesus as this it would be a matter of 
 no importance whether or not if, together with the 
 many strange and grand things that he did, he 
 occasionally healed the sick, or took a few steps 
 4)n the surface of the sea. 
 
 But is it necessary to adduce any further proof 
 that this Jesus is that of the whole Christian 
 Church, or of the Reformers and Martyrs, or of the 
 Evangelists and Apostles? The acknowledgment 
 of his divine miraculous power, which was glorified 
 in numerous deeds, is naturally and inwardly con- 
 nected with this last-named, and only saving faith. 
 It is not quite correct to say: "We do not believe 
 in Jesus because of his miracles, but for Jesus' 
 sake we also believe in his miracles." The first 
 part of this declaration is as true as the second, 
 and one does not preclude the other. If we look 
 at Jesus in the light of his own statements, it is 
 not difficult for us to accept his miracles also. 
 But, on the other hand, an appeal to these mir- 
 acles, united with other proofs, justifies our most 
 holy faith, and the Christian's contemplation of them 
 
176 John's account of Christ's miracles. 
 
 constantly strengthens this faith. Thus, on the one 
 hand, they remain the unsuspected attestation of his 
 great mission; and, on the other, they are the suf- 
 ficient revelations of the glory of his exalted Person, 
 the beams of the Sun of the spiritual world, which 
 dazzle our eyes, but are more natural to the Sun 
 himself than would be the absence of such signs 
 from such a phenomenon. But here, as you ob- 
 serve, our consideration of the question of miracles 
 reaches a point where it passes over into another 
 inquiry : "What do you mean by the Apostolic, and 
 especially the Johannean, Christ?" We shall devote 
 the following Lecture, which is the last and by no 
 means least important of our series, to the investi- 
 gation of this question. For the present, we cannot 
 comprise all that we have said in a better way than 
 in the poetical language of a genial theological 
 friend : 
 
 "Goodness is such a foreland; godly deeds are hills; 
 And faith's efforts in God's strength the lower mountain height; 
 But in Christ's miracles the Alpine world begins, 
 O'er which his resurrection-peak sheds dazzling light." i 
 
 i Dr. John P. Lange. 
 
IV. 
 
 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 JLven the attacks of recent negative criticism, with its 
 astounding exegetical operations and divinations, — in which 
 it bears the seeds of its own ruin, — will pass away without 
 effect ; and though they are dealt against John's Gospel with 
 extraordinary energy, and with a great show of learning and 
 acuteness, as we might naturally expect, they will never- 
 theless not be able to pluck a single feather from the mighty 
 wing of this Eagle." 
 
 H. A. W. Meyer. 
 
 A memorable hour arrived in the history of a 
 youth belonging to an honourable family in France, 
 during the second half of the sixteenth century. 
 Though scarcely fifteen years of age, he had been 
 led by blind guides to unbelief and the denial of 
 God's existence; and the serpent's teeth, sown on 
 the unguarded field, had already begun to produce 
 their destructive harvest. His godly father, who 
 was deeply concerned for the salvation of his son's 
 
 12 
 
178 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 soul, placed a New Testament in his room, 
 and offered the silent prayer that he might "take 
 and read it." It really came to pass that the son 
 did take it up at a leisure moment. His eye rested 
 accidentally upon a passage which, according to his 
 own words, so affected him that he "suddenly felt 
 the divinity of the subject, and, together with the 
 majesty, also the power of the words that so infin- 
 itely surpassed the flow of all human eloquence." 
 "My whole body was convulsed," he continues, "my 
 soul was confounded, and I have been so affected 
 this whole day that I have scarcely been conscious 
 of my own identity." 
 
 In later years he looked back upon this hour 
 as the decisive turning-point of his life; and he 
 walked until death in the way which was at that 
 time opened before him. It was not quite twenty- 
 five years after this remarkable event, that he was 
 preaching the Gospel of the Reformation at Antwerp, 
 while the light from the blaze of the funeral pile 
 which was consuming his companions in faith shone 
 against the windows of the hall where he preached. 
 And when the pestilence that raged in Leyden, in 
 the year 1602, numbered him among its victims, 
 it was universally acknowledged and lamented that 
 a shining light in the ecclesiastical and scholastic 
 heavens had set. This youug man was our cele- 
 brated countryman, Professor Francis Junius; that 
 Bible-leaf bore the inscription of "The Gospel Ac- 
 cording to St. John;" and the passage which he 
 read was the beginning of the familiar First Chapter: 
 
A PREVAILING SCEPTICAL TENDENCY. 179 
 
 "In the beginning* was the Word, and the Word 
 was with God, and the Word was God." 1 
 
 "In the beginning was the Word." Francis Ju- 
 nius was certainly not the only one who, at that 
 time and afterwards, has felt the majestic force of 
 this declaration; perhaps there is one here and there 
 in this audience who can speak of a similar im- 
 pression, though in a less degree. But do you not 
 also believe that these individuals are confronted by 
 a far greater number who, instead of reechoing this 
 witness of John, regard it as a contradiction? I 
 believe that the prevailing tendency of the times on 
 this point is not expressed in the above confession 
 of Francis Junius, but, rather, in the well-known 
 scene from Goethe's Faust, a moment before Faust 
 hears the voice of Mephistopheles. As Faust stands 
 upon the boundary - line between Heaven and Hell, 
 he once more takes up the original text of the New 
 Testament, to translate it anew; but at the very 
 first sentence: "In the beginning was the Word," 
 he stands motionless, in painful perplexity. He ex- 
 claims: "I cannot value the Word so highly; I must 
 translate it by something else." So he now writes: 
 "In the beginning was the lliought-" but yet this 
 does not sound quite right. He then writes: "In 
 the beginning was the Pmvev" but even that does 
 
 i See an account of this interesting occurrence given 
 by Francis Junius himself in his Autobiography, lately intro- 
 duced at the beginning of his Opera, Geneva, 1813, and also 
 published by J. A. Fabricius, Delectus Argumentorum, etc., 
 pp. 352-354. Hamburg, 1725. 
 
 12* 
 
180 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 not satisfy his mind. Finally, he takes advice, and 
 writes: "In the beginning was the Act" 
 
 His desire for what was tangible concealed from 
 his vision the highest idea; Scripture had to accom- 
 modate itself to him, or he would not bow before 
 -it; and you know the end of a way which began 
 on this wise. that, in this respect, Faust had 
 never been anything else than simply the product 
 of a creative imagination! 
 
 What has given occasion to the dissension between 
 negative criticism and the Johannean Christ, and in 
 what way has it gained such dimensions in the most 
 recent time? I am not surprised that, as you cast 
 a retrospective glance upon the course of our in- 
 quiry, you should repeat this question with the 
 sense of painful surprise. Nevertheless, you can 
 hardly conceive of a more complete harmony of 
 external and internal proofs than those which can 
 be adduced in favour of the fourth Gospel. However 
 relatively great the difference may be between this 
 and the first three Gospels, the idea of an irrecon- 
 cilable contradiction on cardinal points is not to be 
 mentioned for a moment. Even the miracles related 
 here present no more serious difficulty than that 
 which can be offered against the entire department 
 of Scriptural miracles by those who deny the super- 
 natural altogether. 
 
 If, under all these circumstances, we direct 
 attention to the numberless subterfuges which our 
 opponents employ to escape the power of demon- 
 stration, we need hardly hesitate to jepeat the 
 
COLANl'S DECLARATION ON CHRIST. 181 
 
 prophecy of one of the most excellent Scriptural 
 expositors of our times: that "negative criticism, in 
 spite of all its array of learning and acuteness, 
 will not be able to pluck a single feather from the 
 mighty wing of this Eagle." * And yet the attack 
 is constantly commenced anew, and those who 
 make it obstinately refuse to give their opponents 
 a better name than "warriors for the lost cause." 
 In this case, the cause of opposition must lie deeper, 
 and in quite a different department from the one in 
 which we have hitherto moved. Behind this contro- 
 versy there must lie concealed other antipathies than 
 those which we have already become acquainted 
 with. 
 
 What can they be? Let us look to one of the 
 most talented champions of the modern sceptical 
 tendency for an answer. "We need," declares Co- 
 lani, "a living, true, and human Christ. This ge- 
 neration, which the Spirit from on high animates 
 more than it did the subjects of Constantine or the 
 people living at the time of the Thirty Years' War; 
 this generation, which, it must not be forgotten, is 
 the child of eighteen hundred years of Christian 
 development, wishes as its Master a truly historical 
 person, and not one who belongs to the misty de- 
 partment of theological abstraction. It wishes as 
 its Saviour a hero who did not gain victories 
 without a conflict. It will not believe in him until, 
 like Thomas, it has placed its finger in the marks 
 
 i H..A. W. Meyer. 
 
182 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 of the nails, and its hand in the wounds of his 
 heart; that is, until it shall have felt the scars 
 which the daily conflict of spiritual life has left 
 behind in the soul of the Son of man." x 
 
 "The synoptical Christ," we hear asserted, "may 
 answer to this inquiry, but it is utterly impossible 
 for the Johannean Christ to do it; whatever he 
 is, he is not flesh of our flesh, and bone of our 
 bone." "The denial of the authenticity of the fourth 
 Gospel," the objector continues, "may be subject to 
 great difficulties, but they cannot at all come into 
 consideration when we compare them with the diffi- 
 culties which, well-meaning but helpless apologist, 
 you have hitherto been unable to solve. For, see, 
 it is not this or that particular of his history, but 
 it is the principal character himself, with whom I 
 cannot harmonize; I would have to forget every- 
 thing which I have learned, through so much labour 
 and conflict, by the light of modern sceptical views.. 
 The frame may be never so splendid, and the mirror 
 as clear as possible, after so many centuries, but 
 the form which I behold in this glass is obscured 
 by a mist which my eyes cannot penetrate. I can 
 have respect for an excellent religious man, but as 
 to bowing before an incarnate God, who dies and 
 rises again, — pardon me if I say that I am a 
 little too old, and have thought, and heard, and 
 read a little too much, to do such a thing!" Do 
 you not recognize this tone? Indeed, I might almost 
 
 1 F. Colani, Jesus-Christ et les Croyances Messianiques de 
 son Temps, p. 169. Strasburg, 1864. 
 
CHRIST IN THE LIGHT OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 183 
 
 ask, have you not heard it reechoing now and then 
 even from some hidden corner of your own heart, 
 where you scarcely dared to look? If so, you can- 
 not regard as improper the topic to which I request 
 your attention at this time, and which I design to 
 he the climax of all that I have said. 
 
 As I have previously observed, the Johannean 
 miracles become perfectly clear, to a certain degree, 
 when we regard them as the natural -beams of more 
 than an earthly sun which, in Christ, shed its lustre 
 upon the world. Yet the transition from the beams 
 to the sun itself is not merely easy, but it is also 
 natural, and even unavoidable. In my opinion, and 
 certainly in yours also, the present course of lectures 
 would be destitute of a very essential element if I 
 neglected to direct your attention more specially to 
 the Johannean Christ, who, regarded minutely in 
 the light, is both the object and the centre of this 
 conflict. For everything which we have previously 
 said concentrates here, and it is only from this 
 centre that the whole truth in this department can 
 he arrived at. I will no more attempt to portray 
 the glory of John's picture than I would rashly 
 attempt to draw aside the veil which conceals some 
 of its colours from us. Yet I will present to you 
 the idea of Christ which we meet with in this Gospel, 
 and try to place it in its true light, in opposition 
 to the incorrect sceptical view. Yet you will not 
 think it amiss that, in this last Lecture, I should 
 enter a somewhat wider field, in order that we may 
 treat some of the vital questions which the con- 
 
184 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 sideration of this picture of Christ naturally calls 
 up in our minds. If I can thus succeed in holding 
 up before you this picture in the form in which the 
 Apostle has painted it and beheld it, I may regard 
 my object as accomplished, and can pray that the 
 blessing of Heaven may rest on what has been said. 
 
 "Who art thou?" According to the sacred ac- 
 count (John viii. 25), this question was asked our 
 Lord by the Jews of Jerusalem. We would repeat 
 the question, though in a totally different sense; and 
 would direct our view with increased attention to 
 the person of Him whose works lead us, in view 
 of what we have already considered, to expect so 
 much that is glorious and transcendent. But, we 
 have scarcely asked the question before we begin 
 to listen to a stream of complaints, which we just 
 now begin to understand. 
 
 "The J ohannean. Christ," we are told, "is merely 
 a supernatural being, whom we do not see gradually 
 appearing like every other historical character, but 
 standing suddenly before our eyes as a heavenly 
 phenomenon. Like the Minerva of heathen myth- 
 ology, who came into existence full-grown and 
 heavily -armed from the head of the father of gods 
 and of men, so does this Christ appear at once on 
 the scene of history in all his full grandeur as the 
 Son of God, who designs to communicate to the 
 world what he had long before seen and heard in 
 heaven. By virtue of his immeasurable knowledge, 
 he exhausts at once the mysteries of the heart, the 
 future, Deity, and humanity. Even at the outset, 
 
OBJECTIONS TO THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 185 
 
 he sees the end of his career; and he is sure of 
 his victory before he begins his struggle. He has 
 no temptation, no conflict, and no human develop- 
 ment; he does not grow, but is perfect from the 
 beginning to the end. In body, he is a man; but 
 what is he in spirit and heart? We discover in 
 John's Gospel but little or nothing of all the truly 
 human thoughts and sensations which make the 
 synoptical image of Christ so attractive to our view. 
 The Johannean Christ is exalted above all human 
 emotion. Though he walks among the Jews, he 
 speaks to them of 'their' and 'your' law, just as if 
 he were not bound to it in the slightest measure. 
 He lives on earth, but it is as one who spends but 
 a short time here, that he may return again to his 
 Father. He places himself on a level with this 
 Father, and lays claim to an honour which can only 
 be ascribed to the Father. In a word, the Ego, 
 which here continually stands in the foreground, is 
 not human, but merely apparently human, who 
 utters unheard-of things concerning himself. Even 
 when he prays we hear him say 'we' and 'us', as 
 had never before been said by human lips; this 
 Christ strictly prays and returns thanks, not ex- 
 pressly for his own sake, but (he once said it him- 
 self) 'because of the people who stand by.' Finally, 
 he -is himself the object of religious adoration, and 
 allows himself to be saluted by Thomas with: 'My 
 Lord and my God!' But why say anything more 
 of this Johannean Christ? He who stands before 
 us in such a light certainly deserves any name 
 
186 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 sooner than that of a truly historical person. And 
 for this very reason he cannot be our Christ; we 
 cannot comprehend him, love him, nor follow him; 
 indeed, we cannot truly admire him, for the picture 
 stands too high in the air." 
 
 Now what shall we reply to these numerous 
 objections without repeating something that we have 
 already said, or transgressing too far the limits 
 which we have laid down for ourselves? Forsooth, 
 if these words contained nothing but the pure truth, 
 we, too, would hesitate to follow John as our guide 
 to a correct understanding of Christ. Permit me to 
 give you my view of this way of treating a question. 
 It does not seem to be utterly without foundation; 
 if it were, we would not find it necessary to take 
 it seriously into consideration at all, for error is 
 only permanently dangerous because of the small 
 quantity of truth that may underlie it; but these 
 objections are in the highest degree unfair, ex- 
 aggerated, and partial. Truth and error are here 
 mingled in such fine proportions that, in the present 
 case, a proper distinction is absolutely requisite for 
 a proper understanding. Let us, in making our 
 reply, see what we frankly must and can admit 
 with perfect readiness. That which will be after- 
 wards left us will then be of double value. 
 
 First of all, we hold it indubitably sure that the 
 Christ whom John enables us to hear and behold, 
 must be more than human both in origin and char- 
 acter. We are glad to see this fact acknowledged 
 by those who previously opposed it boldly; and, 
 
OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 187 
 
 while some learned critics still hold that the decla- 
 rations in John must be referred to the ordinary 
 capacity of a purely human knowledge, we must 
 regard such a procedure as a result of either the 
 complete or partial rationalistic desires of the 
 heart. l In reply to this, we unhesitatingly exclaim, 
 whether such critics are willing to hear us or not: 
 u No, — This Christ shines before us in more than 
 human splendour! He appears before our eyes not 
 as a merely human ambassador of God, but as a 
 being of higher rank. He asserts not merely a 
 moral, but a supernatural, union with the Father. 
 It is a unity of power and of will which can only 
 be explained by the unity of nature. According to 
 his own declaration, it was not simply in the 
 counsel and foreknowledge of God, but personally, 
 
 — that is, with self-consciousness and self- volition, 
 
 — he existed with the Father before Abraham, and 
 even before the world was." 
 
 His knowledge leaves far behind it all the gen- 
 eral human perception of God's nature and of in- 
 dividual men, however fully developed this perception 
 may be; and his purity does not bear the slightest 
 trace of the unequal conflict which we must con- 
 stantly carry on. We are perfectly justified in re- 
 peating the assertion, that no man ever spoke like 
 
 i We have in mind especially here, in addition to the 
 previously mentioned work of Weizsacker, Professor W. Bey- 
 schlag's Christologie des Neuen Testamentes. Berlin, 1866. 
 The reader may also compare an article by 0. Pfleiderer, 
 on The Johannean Theology, in the Zeitschriftfiir wisaenschaft- 
 liche Theologie, by Hilgenfeld, 1866, No. III. 
 
188 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 this One; and an acute apologist did not miss the 
 mark when he made the following declaration: 
 "The deepest foundation for the almost fanatical 
 obstinacy with which the pioneers of this critical 
 tendency refuse to recognize the authenticity of this 
 Gospel, is, in reality, nothing less than the fact that 
 this Gospel testifies more decidedly and abundantly 
 of the true divinity of Christ than the remaining 
 ones." ! But just these two terms, "decidedly" and 
 "abundantly," lead us at once to a second remark, 
 — that John by no means stands alone in his 
 description of our Lord's person. If the fourth 
 Gospel had never existed, a glance at the other 
 writings of the New Testament would show us that 
 even the most diverse writers perfectly harmonize 
 in recognizing the supernatural character and dignity 
 of our Lord. We have already made reference to 
 the testimony which Jesus gives of himself in Mat- 
 thew, Mark, and Luke, but the material is so abun- 
 dant that we do not run any risk of repeating 
 ourselves if we return to this important point. We 
 may say to our opponents: "You object to the Jo- 
 hannean Christ. Very well, let us leave John's 
 portrait of Christ out of the question for awhile, 
 that we may see what kind of a Christ the remain- 
 ing parts of the Holy Scriptures bear witness to; 
 but, above all, what is the picture drawn by his 
 own language." May I ask you what you think of 
 
 i 0. Zockler, Die Evangelien-Kritik, etc., p. 33. Darm- 
 stadt, 1865. 
 
Christ's portraiture of himself. 189 
 
 a Christ who exalts himself above all previous la- 
 borers, as the son of the householder having a vine- 
 yard (Matthew xxi. 33); who, in the authority of 
 his sojourn on earth, compares himself with a 
 nobleman who travels for awhile in a foreign land, 
 that he may receive for himself a kingdom, and 
 then return (Luke xix. 12); who speaks of his 
 angels, and is aware of having authority over le- 
 gions of them, as their Lord and Master (Matthew 
 xiii. 41 ; xxvi. 53) ; and who, after his resurrection, 
 permits himself to be worshipped on a mountain in 
 Galilee, and immediately afterwards declares that 
 all power is given to him, not only on earth, but 
 also in heaven, and that baptism in the name of 
 the Son must be administered at the same time in 
 the name of the Father and the Holy Ghost (Mat- 
 thew xxvin. 17 — 19)? Do his words have a human 
 sound when he calls himself the temple (Matthew 
 xii. 6); when he describes the sin against the Son 
 of man, in distinction from that against the Holy 
 Ghost, as the climax of pardonable sins (Matthew 
 xii. 32); and when he makes eternal salvation or 
 misery directly dependent upon the confession or 
 denial of his person (Matthew x. 32, 33)? Or, are 
 all these passages unauthentic, interpolated by some 
 later writers, and to be referred to the category of 
 the sins of some pretended revisor of the oldest 
 Gospel accounts? A person would have to be stone- 
 blind if he could not see the real tendency of such 
 a would-be criticism; and the expression of the 
 learned Llicke is of special application here: "Where 
 
190 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 purely subjective caprice begins, all criticism conies 
 to an end." 1 
 
 But we hear our enemies, whom we would much 
 rather salute as brethren, shouting out from their 
 camp: "My Christ is that of the Sermon on the 
 Mount." Indeed! After all, does it not satisfy such 
 critics to see that the same Christ who places his 
 lowly Apostles on the same level with the persecuted 
 Prophets, therefore places himself higher than any 
 of them; who adjudges to himself the right of being- 
 saluted with "Lord, Lord;" who does not himself 
 appear before Gods judgment bar at the head of 
 all humanity, but decides the destiny of all as their 
 only Judge, and by whom each one who would 
 inherit eternal life must be acknowledged as his 
 servant; and who soon afterwards promises the 
 most abundant reward to every one who will give 
 to the thirsty a drop of cold water, not merely in 
 His name, but in the name of one of His least 
 disciples? 2 
 
 Need we add more? How many expressions 
 of our Lord, which a Christian- heart did not doubt 
 until two or three years ago, must be subjected to 
 suspicion, before everything is discarded which, ac- 
 cording to the changing opinions of these negative 
 theologians of the nineteenth century, it was impos- 
 sible that this amiable Rabbi of the first century 
 could think or say? I go further. I refer to Paul, 
 who, as is demonstrable, presented essentially the 
 
 i Comment. Evang. Johannis, Vol. I. p. 104. 
 2 Matthew V. 12; VII. 21—23; X. 42. 
 
OLD TESTAMENT DESCRIPTION OF CHRIST. 191 
 
 same testimony as John concerning our Lord, though 
 he did it twenty-five or thirty years before John; to 
 the Epistle to the Hebrews, where, years before the 
 destruction of Jerusalem, the truly divine nature of 
 the High Priest of our profession is so expressly 
 attested with his truly human nature that this 
 Epistle sometimes appears to be an unintentional 
 commentary on the words of our Lord himself in 
 John; and to the whole cloud of witnesses for the 
 truth during the Apostolic Age down to the unknown 
 Ananias of Damascus, who, in speaking of Christ's 
 believers, describes their peculiar character with this 
 single touch : "that call on His name" (Acts ix. 14). 
 Now what conception of Christ's person, I ask you, 
 must be presupposed by this calling on the name 
 of One crucified by Israelites, as all of them had 
 originally been, and by godly Israelites, as this 
 Ananias was? 
 
 I have hitherto confined myself merely to the 
 New Testament, not having taken a step in the Old 
 Testament, whither this same Ananias invites me. 
 And yet I find in the Old Testament that the picture 
 of the Messiah is already painted in such stroDg 
 colours, that Israel's minstrels and prophets must be 
 called the most extravagant men if the same picture 
 did not stand before their eyes in all its supernat- 
 ural splendour. Judge for yourselves whether these 
 titles of dignity do not sound much too high for 
 one who was merely anointed by man: "Wonderful, 
 Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, 
 The Prince of Peace" (Isaiah ix. 6). Can you have 
 
192 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 in mind merely the most religious of all religious 
 men when you read of a Princely Scion "whose 
 goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting" 
 (Micah v. 2)-, when, in the last of the Prophets, 
 you see the expectation of the Messiah joined with 
 the idea of the "messenger of the covenant" (Mal- 
 achi in. 1); and when, in the visions of Daniel 
 (Daniel vn. 13), you see one coming with the 
 clouds of heaven "like the Son of man," — an ex- 
 pression which was taken from this passage and 
 used by our Lord and which, to the acute ear, 
 contains a significant presupposition of something 
 supernatural? 1 
 
 But enough. I understand as clearly as I sin- 
 cerely lament, the inability of those occupying a 
 negative standpoint to reconcile themselves to the 
 idea of a supernatural Christ. But I declare it 
 very unfair to make John alone, or chiefly, respon- 
 sible for an obligation in which, at all events, he 
 is united with so many Apostles and Prophets. You 
 can hardly hesitate to say that the question here 
 does not depend upon "everything or nothing," but 
 is one of degree; and he who would wage a further 
 warfare against John because he has presented us 
 with a supernatural picture of Christ, should be at 
 least consistent in his action, and, if I may so ex- 
 press myself, boldly tear half of the leaves out of 
 
 i In the expression Son of man, there is a reference to 
 an antithesis, and we see the force of it when we remember 
 that he so frequently called himself the Son of God. See 
 C. F. Schmid, Bibl. Theol. des Neuen Testamentes, Vol. I. p. 159. 
 
JOHN CHARGED WITH DOCETICISM. 193 
 
 the Bible. But if he employ this energetic measure, 
 he will find that the remaining half will be only 
 the more incomprehensible and incredible. 
 
 However, suppose we take for granted, for a 
 moment, that the Johannean Christ exhibits a merely 
 superhuman character. Now the greatest charge we 
 have to bring against those whom we must contra- 
 dict in our very heart, is their continual arraying 
 in antithesis those parts of John's Gospel which are 
 most intimately united. We hear them say, that "in 
 the first three Gospels we have a Christ who is 
 truly human, but nothing more than human; but 
 in the fourth Gospel, on the contrary, we have 
 a Christ who is truly divine, and human only in 
 appearance." Now this contrast, we observe, in the 
 third place, is to the highest degree unfair. If our 
 words did not have too strong a sound, we might 
 say that the Christ of John's Gospel is not less 
 human, but just as much so, and, if possible, more 
 so, than of either of the other Gospels, u 
 
 We know that it is objected, that John merely 
 represents Christ as the Logos in a human body, 
 and that this Evangelist is therefore by no means 
 free from the leaven of the Docetse, a sect of the 
 first century which denied the proper humanity of 
 our Lord. We are hardly able to express our great 
 surprise that such a view can be laid to the charge 
 of an Apostle who regarded the spirit of Antichrist 
 as the denial of the very truth that Jesus Christ 
 really became flesh (1 John iv. 2 f.). We emphatic- 
 ally ask: Where does Christ, as he speaks and 
 
 13 
 
194 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 acts in John's Gospel, give occasion for such a 
 severe charge? It certainly cannot be where, in 
 humble simplicity, he calls himself "a man that hath 
 told them the truth" (John vnr. 40); or where he 
 expresses on the cross the most tender and devoted 
 care for his mother; or where he is heard to com- 
 plain: "Now is my soul troubled" (John xn. 27). 
 Even admitting that the last-named passage indi- 
 cates the lower life of his soul, it is nevertheless 
 certain that John, who has preserved the expression, 
 elsewhere informs us that our Lord was "troubled 
 in spirit" (John xin. 21). This certainly indicates 
 a really human circumstance, which occurs this 
 time in the very highest department of his inward 
 life. 
 
 But we hear it also asserted, that "the Johanuean 
 Christ is highly exalted above all human emotion." 
 In reply to this, I must ask: What ground have 
 you for drawing this conclusion? Is it because he 
 takes part, at a wedding, in the joy of a young 
 married couple ; or, burning with holy zeal, because 
 he scourges the defilers of the temple; or, weary 
 and thirsty, because he sits down beside a well of 
 water; or because he does not touch the food which 
 his Disciples brought soon afterwards, since his soul 
 was satiated with the higher enjoyments of life; 
 ^r because he looks with hearty sympathy at a 
 man who had been diseased for thirty-eight years; 
 or because, having scarcely escaped the impend- 
 ing stoning of the exasperated Jews, his heart 
 sympathized with the sufferings of one who had 
 
Christ's human emotions. 195 
 
 been born blind; or because he rejoiced on account 
 of the Disciples, that he did not go to Bethany; or 
 because he wept tears, the evidence of the purest 
 humanity, at the grave of a friend whom he de- 
 signed soon to raise from the dead? Now it is 
 true that we read in John xi. 33. that our Lord, 
 as he looked at the weeping Mary and the Jews 
 accompanying her, "groaned in the spirit, and was 
 troubled;" and this emotion, we are told, is here 
 described in a way that does not indicate sympathy, 
 but passion, — such a wrath as this Gospel attrib- 
 utes to even God himself. 
 
 But even allowing this to be true, what becomes 
 of the verse which soon follows: "Jesus wept?" In 
 such a heart as his was, was there not at the same 
 time room for wrath on the one hand, and for com- 
 passion on the other? And was not that a truly 
 human sensation of our Lord when, as we read in 
 Mark (chapter hi. 5), "he had looked around about 
 on them [his enemies] with anger, being grieved 
 for the hardness of their hearts?" Remarkable 
 indeed ! It used to be the case that when people 
 read in the Scriptures about God's wrath, even a 
 little child could say that this is a so-called "hu- 
 manizing" expression. But now-a-days, when we 
 see in Jesus traces of wrath and indignation, it is 
 said that they are more a proof against than for 
 his proper humanity, as people also speak of a 
 wrath of God; and thus the theopathic Christ is made 
 a substitute for an anthropopathic God. However, 
 this is not the first time that the opponents of mir- 
 
 13* 
 
196 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 acles would compel us to believe very miraculous 
 things at their mere ipse dixit. Yet absurdity 
 reaches its climax, perhaps, in the strange assertion 
 that "the Logos was angry because any one should 
 dare to weep over a dead person in the presence 
 of Him, the Prince of Life. It was not therefore 
 a human emotion, but a divine displeasure at a 
 human feeling, which expressed itself in such an 
 inappropriate manner!" What a good fancy, how- 
 ever. But there is only one little measure that 
 must be employed in order to remove every impedi- 
 ment out of the way. Is not the 35th verse: 
 "Jesus wept," the shortest in the entire Bible? It 
 has been declared unauthentic, and that the author 
 consequently represented his Logos as standing with 
 dry eyes, without a human heart, at the grave of 
 Lazarus! Now one or the other of these things 
 must be admitted. Either such an artist as this in- 
 ventor could not have committed such an egregious 
 error as to make the Logos weep, or, allowing this 
 touching narrative to be really historical, he must have 
 believed nothing less than the true humanity of our 
 Lord, — and thus the proposition opposed by us 
 falls to the ground. 1 
 
 No indeed; the Christ of the fourth Gospel was 
 not ashamed to call his Disciples, brethren; 2 and 
 although taking his origin from above, he regarded 
 
 i Compare Bonifas, Sur Vhumanite de Jesus-Christ, selon 
 VEvang. de St. Jean, in the Bulletin Thiol, of the Revue 
 Chretienne. December, 1864. 
 
 2 John XX. 17; compare Hebrews II. 11. 
 
Christ's divinity revealed in his humanity. 197 
 
 nothing truly human as foreign to himself. We 
 even see the divinity revealed in him unfolding 
 itself in a truly human way; he reveals himself as 
 the Son of God, but as the one who took upon 
 himself our nature, in body, soul, and spirit. Do 
 you desire any further proof? Not only according 
 to John, but according to the first three Evangelists, 
 his knowledge of what is concealed is wonderful; 
 but we meet occasionally with a single remark, 
 which the writer seems to make almost involunta- 
 rily, that this knowledge, notwithstanding all its maj- 
 esty, does not cease to possess a human character. 
 In Mark, for example, he inquires, on the road near 
 Jerusalem, whether there is any fruit on the fig- 
 tree; and in John we hear him asking about La- 
 zarus: "Where have ye laid him?"; and that he 
 has the grave shown to him, — all of which could 
 never have been sheer dissimulation. 1 
 
 i Mark XI. 13; John XI. 34. 
 
 [Dr. Van Oosterzee, it will be seen, unites with the 
 most prominent living evangelical theologians of the Conti- 
 nent in holding that Christ voluntarily subjected his Divine 
 nature to a partial renunciation ( Verzicht ) , in conse- 
 quence of its union with humanity. This view, when care- 
 fully examined, will be found to be at variance with the 
 Decree of the Council of Chalcedon, of the fifth century, 
 which holds, that in Christ there is one person; in the unity 
 of person, two natures, the divine and the human; and that 
 there is no change^ or mixture, or confusion of these two na- 
 tures, but that each retains its own distinguishing properties. 
 The Athanasian Creed says, "perfect God and perfect man." 
 It is only by accepting the completeness of each nature in 
 Christ, the non-divinity of his humanity, and the non-hu- 
 manity of his divinity, and the perfect union of both in 
 one person, that, as it seems to us, we stand upon really 
 firm ground. As for Christ's divinity, his possession of it 
 
198 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 His holiness is spotless, but even this is devel- 
 oped in a human way, in the midst of disappoint- 
 ment, conflict, and temptation. Is it urged that, for 
 the Christ of the fourth Gospel, there was no de- 
 velopment, no baptism, no conflict, no temptation, 
 
 was not limited in the slightest degree, and the few pas- 
 sages that indicate his limited knowledge must be referred 
 solely to his human nature. The only direct Scriptural dec- 
 laration that Christ did not know the future is Mark XIII. 
 32: "But of that day and that hour knoweth no man, no, 
 not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but 
 the Father." But even this passage admits of explanations 
 perfectly consistent with Christ's omniscience. The reading, 
 "neither the Son," is not regarded genuine by some of the 
 most orthodox and learned Biblical scholars; further, the 
 word "knoweth" has a sense of the Hebrew hiphil, which, 
 denotes in verbs of action, when the act passes over to an- 
 other: / make another to Jcnotv, I declare. This is its mean- 
 ing in 1 Corinthians II. 2: "For I determined not to know 
 any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified." 
 It is unnecessary to repeat all the passages in proof of 
 Christ's perfect omniscience, but we may take as specimens t 
 "For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed 
 not, and who should betray him" (John VI. 64) ; and : "For 
 he [Jesus] knew, who should betray him" (John XIII. 11). The 
 term God-man has its objections, though supported by the 
 strong authority of Origen. Unless it be used carefully, it 
 is liable to lead to the adoption of such a confusion of na- 
 tures in Christ as really makes of them a third, which com- 
 bines the essential qualities of both, and yet is neither 
 humanity nor divinity in their distinct completeness. "If 
 the divine nature in Christ had been imperfect," says 
 Kichard Watson, "it would have lost its essential character, 
 for it is essential to Deity to be perfect and complete; if 
 any of the essential properties of human nature had been 
 wanting, he would have been man; if . . . the divine and 
 human had been mixed and confounded in him, he would 
 have been a compounded being, neither God nor man. No- 
 thing was deficient in his humanity, nothing in his divinity, 
 and yet he is one Christ. This is clearly the doctrine of 
 Scripture." See Theological Institutes, Part 2nd. Chh. XIII., 
 XVI. - J. F. H.] 
 
Christ's human development. 199 
 
 and no sorrowful Gethseinane? This objection has 
 some show of correctness as long as it is forgotten 
 that John is not the first, or the only Evangelist, 
 but simply the last one, who presupposes acquaintance 
 with the Gospel of his predecessors on the part of 
 the believing Church for which he writes; and he 
 therefore did not need to repeat constantly what 
 all knew, and which no one seriously doubted. But 
 apart from this consideration, the objection in ques- 
 tion is a word which has far more polish than edge. 
 The human development of our Lord is merely 
 mentioned by Luke, and only briefly, at the end of 
 his second chapter (Luke 11. 40—42); not merely 
 Matthew, but even Mark, that Evangelist who just 
 now stands so high in the favour of most of our 
 modern negative critics, is perfectly silent on the 
 point. It is, therefore, not fair to throw this stone 
 at John's head alone. Though he does not ex- 
 pressly give an account of the baptism of our Lord, 
 he nevertheless immortalizes a testimony of the 
 Baptist, in which he plainly enough refers to that 
 event, and proves his perfect knowledge of it 
 (John i. 32, 33). 
 
 We hear it complained, that in John's Gospel 
 there is no struggle, no temptation, no agony of soul 
 in Gethsemane. Indeed! Then that life in which 
 every step brought on some new encounter with the 
 powers of darkness, is declared not to have been 
 a life full of conflict! It is true that John does 
 not speak of a temptation lasting forty days, at 
 the beginning of the labours of Jesus. Though he 
 
200 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 begins his account at the time when our Lord had 
 already been in the wilderness of temptation, I was 
 not aware that our negative critics ascribed such a 
 strictly historical character to that account as to 
 warrant them in regarding its absence from the 
 fourth Gospel as a proof of its unhistorical char- 
 acter. Is it not well to call to mind that tempta- 
 tion in the later part of the life of our Lord 
 which justified Luke in writing that Satan had 
 "departed from him for a season" (Luke iv. 13)? 
 But I ask, did not the Johannean Christ hear the 
 voice of temptation in the words of his brethren: 
 "Show thyself to the world" (John vn. 4); or in 
 the pressing forward of the multitude to make him 
 their king by force (John vi. 15); or in the calm- 
 ness of his own soul as he thinks of his approach- 
 ing hour (John xii. 16)? With all these expressions, 
 is there not connected the appearance of a proof 
 that this outward temptation might also have been 
 an inward one? 
 
 John, indeed, is silent on the conflict of Christ's 
 soul in Gethsemane; but he was at the same time 
 perfectly well acquainted with our Lord's prayer 
 uttered at that time; 1 but he reveals to us, as 
 from the distance, what first shook off this pain, 
 when he repeats Christ's feeling words: "Now is 
 my soul troubled," — which is a reecho of an 
 earlier lamentation recorded only by Luke (chapter 
 xii. 50): "But I have a baptism to be baptized 
 
 i See, besides the synoptic Gospels, Hebrews V. 7—9. 
 
CONTRASTS REVEALING HARMONIES. 201 
 
 with; and how am I straightened till it be accom- 
 plished!" 
 
 It is remarkable, that every new contrast which 
 our enemies present to us only leads to the dis- 
 covery of new harmonies. When we look at the 
 picture of Christ praying, which is the most sub- 
 lime scene drawn by John, we can receive no other 
 impression than that his account is in perfect har- 
 mony with the other Evangelists. It is true that 
 he mentions fewer individual parts of this life of 
 prayer than are narrated by his predecessors, and 
 particularly by Luke. Yet, when we look clearly 
 at his Christ, we need not be uncertain as to the 
 kind of pulsation and breathing of his spiritual life. 
 In the words spoken at the grave of Lazarus: 
 "Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me" 
 (chapter xi. 41), we hear our Lord disclose, as it 
 were, the most profound mystery of his sacred life; 
 he had already prayed silently before, and the mir- 
 acle which he performs bears the strong impress of 
 a manifest answer to prayer. Though he imme- 
 diately adds: "I knew that thou nearest me always; 
 but because of the people which stand by I said 
 it," there can be no doubt of his purpose. It is not 
 his returning thanks, but his doing it — where 
 he had previously prayed in silence, — aloud, for 
 the sake of the people, in order that now, after 
 this sign, they at least might believe in his divine 
 mission. 
 
 Truly, it requires an effort to keep one's com- 
 posure when he hears this most exalted interview 
 
202 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 between the Son and the Father, at such a time, 
 called by no other name than u a prayer for dis- 
 play." Or, must we call it also a prayer for dis- 
 play when we behold him soon afterwards per- 
 plexed as to what he should say, supplicating in a 
 moment of profound trouble: "Father, glorify thy 
 name!" It is unquestionably "because of the people," 
 as he declares himself, that immediately afterwards 
 a loud heavenly voice is heard, as though in answer 
 to his prayer. But what do you think of such 
 logic as concludes that he himself stood in need of 
 neither the prayer nor the answer, and that every- 
 thing was merely necessary because of the people? 
 But do not understand me as ignoring in our 
 Lord's prayer in John, especially that unapproach- 
 able, peculiar, and superterrestrial element which, 
 naturally, can no where be more strongly expressed 
 than just where we hear God's Incarnate Son speak- 
 ing directly to the Father. We see it beaming out 
 in unapproachable glory from the High Priestly 
 prayer that rises from his heart in the hour of his 
 departure. It is plain, even in his majestic "Father, 
 I will," and in that, perhaps, still more elevated 
 "We," that the Son, however closely united with 
 the Father, is in every respect unlimited, and in- 
 dependent of him. Prayer is here so much an ap- 
 parent necessity of the life of our Lord that, even 
 in that hour, he does not pray for his present and 
 future disciples until he has besought for himself 
 that glory which was to crown his sufferings and 
 his conflicts. His praying in particular, not less 
 
203 
 
 than his foreknowledge and his holiness, may be 
 called divine, but nevertheless truly human; indeed,, 
 without longer evading the peculiarly striking term, 
 it may be called Divine-human, in the fullest sense 
 of the expression. 
 
 If I were to use a single term to give expres- 
 sion to the impression constantly produced in me 
 by John's whole picture of Christ, I do not know 
 a better one for the Johannean Christ than that 
 which the Church owes to the celebrated Origen, — 
 "God-man." The "I," which is here expressed, is 
 not merely the man Jesus, the One sent by God, 
 but the manifested Messiah of Israel. It is just as 
 little the Logos, which was supposed to appear in 
 human flesh without having become real and perfect 
 man. But it is God's own, only begotten, and 
 eternal Son, like his brethren in every respect but 
 sin*, who, notwithstanding his assumption of the 
 lowly form of a servant, is continually conscious of 
 his previous existence and heavenly origin. He is 
 divine even when he appears most human in our 
 view, and he is human even when the beams of 
 his divine glory, as on Tabor, shine out from every 
 part of his tenement of clay. It is plain from his 
 own expression : "We know what we worship," 
 that he was a true Israelite; and it is evident that 
 he was truly man from his first words addressed 
 to John and Andrew: "What seek ye?", to his last 
 invitation to Thomas: "Reach hither thy finger." 
 But he is at the same time divine, indeed, God 
 himself manifested in the flesh; he is the true, the 
 
204 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 highest, the only and eternal ideal man, because 
 the fullness of the godhead dwelleth in him bodily. 
 He presents himself here to our vision as the angel 
 of the Apocalypse, who stands with one foot on 
 the sea and the other on the land. Originally a 
 stranger on the earth, but yet having become 
 an adopted child in the household, he reaches his 
 hand at once to eternity and time, to the Creator 
 and the creature. 
 
 And yet this picture must not convey the idea 
 of a double consciousness. His was not a mere 
 juxtaposition of two heterogeneous natures; but 
 what was originally two-fold is here blended into 
 a real and incomparable unity. Christ is not in 
 John a child of the human family, made perfect by 
 merely moral unity with God, but a personality in 
 which divinity and humanity, originally separated 
 from each other, have come so closely together and 
 become united, that none had ever appeared like it 
 before, and none will ever approach it in the future. 
 This is the Christ of John; this is, in fact, the 
 Christ of all the Gospels, of the Scriptures, of the 
 Church of all centuries, of all ages, of the Church 
 militant here and of the Church triumphant in heaven. 
 Bow your heads then, as I bow mine, as you behold 
 his glory in the mirror of this Gospel! 
 
 Let me now ask you to stand silently awhile 
 before this image of Christ, and consider some 
 questions that it involuntarily propounds to us. The 
 first inquiry which we frankly make is this: Could 
 John's portrait of Christ have been invented? In 
 
ALLEGED INVENTION OF JOHN'S GOSPEL. 205 
 
 other words: Is this invention a settled matter, or 
 at least probable; or may it even be regarded as 
 possible? 
 
 Let us see. Is it a settled matter, then, that 
 in the fourth Gospel we possess nothing more than 
 an artistically invented fable? You are naturally 
 surprised at such a question, when you think of 
 the many proofs of its truth which we have already 
 discovered. Yet we are justified in asking it, when 
 we hear some of the extreme members of the neg- 
 ative school declare the unauthenticity of the fourth 
 Gospel to be a settled matter, that science has 
 established this result, and that it is from this point 
 of view that the Church of the future has good 
 right for adopting its unauthenticity as an article 
 of its faith. Even now we read occasionally in 
 popular writings, as though incidentally, that the 
 fourth Gospel is "improperly ascribed to John," and, 
 only two years ago, the people were told from the 
 pulpit that this Gospel is nothing else than a poetic 
 Messiad of the converted heathen world of the 
 second century. 1 
 
 I shall not speak of the more absurd epithets 
 that have been applied to John's Gospel, but I have 
 a perfect right to say, that I can only with diffi- 
 culty keep from despairing of the real sincerity of 
 those who obstinately deny the authenticity and 
 credibility of the fourth Gospel in the face of such 
 positive and strong proofs. We might almost sup- 
 
 i Dr. J. C. Zaalberg, De Godsd. van Jezus, p. 141 ff. The 
 Hague, 1864. 
 
206 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 pose that many who regard everything that can be 
 said in favour of John as positively refuted, are 
 either still ignorant of the subject, or have never 
 investigated it earnestly and impartially, or have 
 been influenced by special motives to deprive it of 
 its just rights. Perhaps it is too much to expect 
 of the present generation of opponents of John's 
 Gospel that they will make the frank confession of 
 Bretschneider, that "people have been in error on 
 this point," or of Strauss, in his earlier life, that 
 "men are in doubt on their own doubts." Such 
 a candid confession .can hardly be expected now; 
 but the disciples of the Lord, having no interest in 
 denying the truth, and being taught to maintain it, 
 will know in future the faith which they hold, and 
 in years to come will certainly be surprised, even 
 if they are not now, that the people of our times 
 were able to combine so much acuteness with so 
 much prejudice and frivolity. No one can regard 
 the fourth Gospel unauthentic who does not mix 
 special motives with his so-called reasons. The 
 very prince of the Evangelists, to whom the nega- 
 tive critics obstinately say: "We will not have this 
 man reign over us," compels no one to heed his 
 words, and conceals his majestic character from 
 the eyes of all who scorn him as an impostor. x 
 
 i "We are here in a territory where the will weighs the 
 proofs, and definitely determines their force. We ought to 
 be satisfied with placing the fourth Gospel in a condition 
 where no one would hesitate to receive as authentic any 
 book of heathen antiquity. This result being obtained, the 
 last step to take is simply to open the door for it. If we 
 
CHARGE OF FORGERY ANSWERED. 207 
 
 It is by no means a settled affair that we have 
 before us a forgery; for such a result is not proved. 
 But, on looking at John's Gospel more closely, can 
 we consider its forgery even probable? "That de- 
 pends," I am told, "on how things usually appear 
 to us, and what is the state of the eye, and of the 
 light by which, and in which, we look at the matter." 
 You are right, and yet I repeat my question: Is 
 forgery probable here, just because improbability, 
 according to my view, reaches such a high degree 
 that it almost borders on the inconceivable? Now 
 let me assume that this peculiar history of miracles 
 was invented. Then, who invented it? Was it John 
 himself? The thought is too absurd to delay, a 
 moment to consider it. Was the forger some un- 
 known Christian, philosopher, or author of the 
 second century? No; it is not such a character, but 
 John himself, that the numberless particulars of this 
 Gospel reveal as its author. Even supposing, with 
 certain critics, that the present revision of this Gospel 
 was the work of a friendly hand, perhaps one of 
 his earliest disciples or sympathizers, even then we 
 have reports of the words, deeds, and sufferings of 
 our Lord which come directly from his most con- 
 fidential Disciple. 
 
 I must repeat, that he who has bestowed special 
 attention on the literature of the second century, 
 and impartially compared this Gospel with it, must 
 
 would perform this decisive act, it is not sufficient for us 
 simply to know, — we must also have the will." Godet, 
 Examen des princip. Quest. Crit. } etc., p. 54. 
 
208 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 conclude, that it is just as inconceivable that it 
 could have taken its rise at that time as that an 
 Alpine rose can grow in stiff clay, or that a 
 nightingale can unexpectedly sing a sweet song on 
 a stormy December evening. No second example 
 can be adduced of such anonymousness and fiction 
 as we would have to deal with in this instance. l But 
 what could have been the purpose of this inven- 
 tion, for there must certainly have been some ob- 
 ject in view? Was it to popularize the author's 
 own ideas, in the interest of a certain party, and 
 to make Christ appear in imaginary splendour be- 
 fore the eyes of a younger generation? This could 
 not be the case, for we have already seen the in- 
 surmountable difficulties that would attend such a 
 preposterous hypothesis. For the present, we would 
 refer you to something altogether different. 
 
 John's Gospel is the Gospel of the appearance 
 of the Son of God in truly human flesh. But the 
 idea of such a personal incarnation of God in the 
 Son of his love cannot be traced before this period, 
 either in Jewish or in Pagan religion; therefore, it 
 must, and can be, the fruit of reality alone. 2 Very 
 
 i "If you suppose that the Johannean Christ is an in- 
 vention and deception, you must at least see that the for- 
 gery would necessarily belong to a different and grander 
 epoch of spiritual history than to the second century, which 
 witnessed the prolix and miserable scribbling of the Gnostics 
 and anti-Gnostics." Thiersch, Versuch einer Herstellung des 
 hist. Standpunkts, p. 287. 
 
 2 Compare, on this important point, the entire Intro- 
 duction to Dorner, Entwicklungsgeschichte der Lehre von der 
 Person Christi, Vol. I., and especially p. 65. 
 
DIFFICULTY OF BELIEVING CHRIST'S INCARNATION. 209 
 
 much is said of a disposition prevailing in the 
 second century of Christianity to glorify the Founder 
 of Christianity; which disposition is alleged to have 
 almost irresistibly driven his followers to adorn his 
 head with a nimbus of supernatural character, just 
 as if there was not prevalent the very opposite 
 effort to deprive the highest and most majestic One 
 of his original splendour. 1 It would not have been 
 such an easy matter to believe, and make others 
 believe, that some one who was known to be origi- 
 nally a mere man, — a despised, though amiable 
 man, — was nothing less than God revealed in the 
 flesh. In my opinion, it would have been very 
 difficult for any one to bring himself or any one 
 else to believe such a thing, unless he were com- 
 pelled to submit to the irresistible force of facts 
 that permitted a view of no less magnitude. 2 
 Something so exalted, that we who live at this day, 
 
 i We are reminded of the well-known couplet: 
 
 "The world loves to blacken the dazzling, 
 And to drag down the high to the dust." 
 
 2 "Do you commence by supposing that humanity be- 
 lieved in the divinity of Christ, and formed for itself the 
 legend of the divine Christ? Do you speak seriously? I 
 cannot believe it; for the question really is, to know how 
 men came to believe in a divine Christ? Pray, take care; 
 for it is not such an easy thing for the human mind to 
 believe that a man is God. The striking thing here is, not 
 the easiness of admitting such a doctrine, but its difficulty. 
 Eeason does not incline me at first to acknowledge that 
 divinity can be personified in a being who presents himself 
 to me in a human form. Reason, I say, anterior to all proof 
 of the fact, does not incline me to this belief, but, on the 
 contrary, resists it." I. Felix. 
 
 14 
 
210 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 after the lapse of so many centuries, can trans- 
 port ourselves to it only with difficulty, could not 
 be invented by a philosophical dramatist, who had 
 no historical groundwork whatever to begin with. 
 We therefore have here the case of an invention 
 being far more incomprehensible than historical 
 reality. You can decide for yourselves the proper 
 inference to be drawn from this fact. For myself, 
 I do not hesitate a moment to apply Lavater's ex- 
 pression to John's portrait of Christ: "The impos- 
 sibility of inventing Christ overcomes all doubt." 
 
 Do I go too far? Then I will leave it to you 
 to judge whether an invention, which is by no 
 means certain, but very improbable, could have been 
 really possible in the present instance. As a matter 
 of course, we speak of the possibility of it in the 
 moral sense of the word; and we may now await 
 with some composure the decision of all who are 
 authorized to render one, that is, of those, and only 
 those, who possess the organ of perceiving, and, so 
 to speak, of feeling not only the beautiful, but also 
 the true, the good and the holy wherever they are 
 revealed. 
 
 Standing at the end of the long and occasionally 
 rugged way over which we have passed together, 
 I would once more lead this class before this picture 
 of John, and ask them whether he makes upon 
 them the impression of a writer of romances , who 
 writes down what he would have his readers see; 
 or of an eye-witness, who reports what he himself 
 had seen and experienced? I would remind them 
 
INTENTIONAL DECEPTION INCONCEIVABLE. 211 
 
 once more of what they know about John from 
 history, apart from his Gospel, and again ask: 
 Whether it is possible to imagine (a thing which 
 every opponent of John's Gospel must do) that we 
 here find an intentional deception, practised by a 
 witness of our Lord, by a truthful and devoted 
 witness, by a hand which once wrote over the very 
 entrance to the Heavenly City: "And there shall in 
 no wise enter into it anything that defileth, neither 
 whatsoever worketh abominations, or maketh a lie?" 
 I insist upon hearing how far the thought is ab- 
 surd, that the Apostle who had read most deeply 
 the mysteries of the Master's soul, and was sub- 
 sequently illuminated by the Holy Spirit, as he looked 
 back upon this dazzling phenomenon should see in 
 him the revelation of the Word, the wisdom and 
 image of the Father, and should bear witness of it 
 in just the way that we have? Could we expect 
 any other than a purely historical Christ to be de- 
 scribed by an Apostle, who, I might say, comprised 
 in these words the plan of a testimony which 
 covered years: "That which was from the beginning, 
 which we have heard, which we have seen with 
 our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our 
 hands have handled, of the Word of Life; for the 
 life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear 
 witness, and show unto you that eternal life, which 
 was with the Father, and was manifested unto us; 
 that which we have seen and heard declare we 
 unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with 
 
 14* 
 
212 THE JOHANXEAN CHRIST. 
 
 us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and 
 with his Son Jesus Christ" (1 John i. 1 — 3). 
 
 There exists nowhere a more thorough perva- 
 sion of ideas and facts than just on the Johannean 
 standpoint; and it is exactly here that they are 
 alleged to stand in deadly and irreconcilable oppo- 
 sition to each other. Yet what is the use of speak- 
 ing longer of a possibility which, as far as John's 
 Gospel is concerned, disappears the more rapidly 
 the longer we look at it? I will lead you once 
 more to the Juhannean Christ, that he may testify 
 of and for himself; and I repeat with increasing 
 emphasis the question: Whether the invention of 
 such a picture seems to you morally possible? Who 
 does not see that a chiefly fictitious miraculous 
 account of Deity manifested in a human body would 
 have appeared totally different, and would not have 
 presented a holy and supernatural character, but a 
 character utterly contrary to nature? But supposing 
 for a moment that the Evangelist, as somebody has 
 expressed it, designed to give a human physiog- 
 nomy "to the gold-mine of the Divine Logos." 1 
 But admitting that the inventor would have his hero 
 appear in heavenly glory, would he have com- 
 menced by presenting him to us as a guest at a 
 wedding? He would have him perform a miracle 
 at the Pool of Bethesda, but would he have him 
 cure merely one sick man, and then allow him to 
 withdraw quite unobservedly? He would have him 
 
 i C. H. Hase, p. 40. 
 
John's picture of Christ complete. 213 
 
 open the eyes of one born blind, but would he at 
 the same time have made him use the instrumen- 
 tality of clay made of spittle and earth? Would he 
 have made him raise his friend from the dead, but 
 also have made him weep tears of human emotion? 
 Would he have allowed him to be worshipped by 
 some Greeks, as the time approached when the Son 
 of man should be glorified, but almost in the very 
 next moment have presented him before us as 
 praying that the Father might "save him from this 
 hour?" I might adduce more examples; yet these 
 are enough to explain to you my purpose, and to 
 let you feel the force of the argument. 
 
 The Johannean picture of Christ presents many 
 individual features which, if each be considered 
 alone, come in such direct opposition to other feat- 
 ures that they appear necessarily to preclude each 
 other. And yet these characteristics, which stand 
 out in such contrast, blend so harmoniously that 
 this conviction forces itself upon us with almost 
 irresistible power: Only Omnipotence itself could 
 have produced such an incomparable reality, no 
 human artist could have brought forth such a cre- 
 ation without making some mistake, or at least once 
 forgetting and betraying himself. 
 
 We here meet with the Saviour in the most 
 dissimilar situations, circumstances, and states of 
 mind; but he is never so divine as to be no longer 
 human, nor ever so human as to be no longer di- 
 vine. He is never under the necessity of improving 
 anything, of performing it a second time, or of re- 
 
214 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 calling it. He has never deviated from the right 
 course. We always find him just at the proper 
 moment; he is always the master of the situation, 
 even when he appears to be overcome; and he 
 always reigns even when he serves, — and when 
 did he not serve? I would say to every doubter 
 who loves the truth : Forget all that you have heard 
 from others, and read for yourself once more the 
 account of Christ's washing the disciples' feet, with 
 the incomparable introduction to it (chapter xin.): 
 "Now before the feast of the passover, when Jesus 
 knew that his hour was come that he should depart 
 out of this world unto the Father, having loved his 
 own which were in the world, he loved them unto 
 the end. And supper being ended, the devil having 
 now put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's 
 son, to betray him; Jesus knowing that the Father 
 had given all things into his hands, and that he 
 was come from God, and went to God; he riseth 
 from supper, and laid aside his garments ; and took 
 a towel, and girded himself. After that he poureth 
 water into a basin, and began" — to do what? — 
 "to wash the disciples' feet." 
 
 Invent, if you can, such a climax as this! As 
 for me, I seem to feel in such a narrative the 
 pulsations of the thankful heart of the silent eye- 
 witness, and as if in this one touch I saw the whole 
 picture of Christ, which is at once so historical and 
 profoundly symbolical. As we look at such features 
 as these, — and there are many of them, — we are 
 reminded of the language of Matthew Claudius: 
 
IS THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST COMPREHENSIBLE? 215 
 
 u Andrew, did you ever hear of anything like this? 
 One could well allow himself to be stigmatized and 
 broken on the wheel for the mere idea of such a 
 God-man; and he must be crazy who could ever 
 think of deriding and scorning him. He whose 
 heart is in the right place, lies in the dust, and 
 praises and adores." Amen, to such words, thou 
 true Christian in John's spirit, thou true Wandsbeck 
 Messenger! It seems to me as if I beheld on thy 
 honourable face the reflection of the calm spiritual 
 glory of the Apostle John. But what else is John 
 than a light of the Church, which borrows all its 
 lustre from the Sun of the spiritual world, — from 
 the historical Christ, whom he could claim as spe- 
 cially his own? And yet we are told that this light 
 is, after all, nothing more than an empty fancy, 
 conjured up in the cloudy heavens by a glowing 
 imagination! Away with you, ye apostles of un- 
 belief; I would not barter away the mystery of 
 godliness for such absurdities! 1/ 
 
 I am sure that there is a certain influence which 
 almost compels you to adopt at least a part of 
 what we have said. But just this feeling awakens 
 your distrust; for soon after you have listened to 
 arguments, the understanding again asserts its pre- 
 rogative, and you propound a second question, which 
 is altogether different from the first. You ask: Is 
 the Johannean Christ comprehensible? This ques- 
 tion, for you may as well confess it, is the ex- 
 pression of a pretty decided denial. What should 
 we say in reply to an objection which, according 
 
216 THE JOHANNE AN ' CHRIST. 
 
 to the view of a certain class, seems already to 
 decide the case permanently? Unfortunately, it is 
 not necessary in our times to preach the Apostolical, 
 and particularly the Johannean Christ to a heathen 
 Festus or to a Jewish Agrippa, to hear from all 
 sides the reproach: "Paul, thou art beside thyself." 
 We constantly hear the following complaint from 
 people living in Christian lands, and often from 
 most respectable persons: "Your Gospel is contrary 
 to reason just in proportion to the supernatural 
 character which it possesses; and it is in vain that 
 you demand confidence in what stands in outright 
 opposition to the first and simplest laws of human 
 thought. Why do you continue to repeat the witness 
 with which John in particular proclaimed the In- 
 carnate Word? I scarcely commence to read it be- 
 fore I meet with one absurdity after another. You 
 certainly would not have us believe that God, who 
 is a Spirit, can have a son; that this son, full of 
 grace and truth, lived and walked on this tarnished 
 spot of the unbounded universe; and that such a 
 supernatural being, notwithstanding his real character, 
 became truly man, and died as such, in order to 
 rise immediately afterwards from the dead, and to 
 return to the glory of the Father from whom he 
 came. All this is a mere empty sound, and nothing 
 more. As I read these Gospels, and especially the 
 fourth, I sometimes feel strangely attracted, en- 
 chained, and more than half won by this Christ; 
 but I immediately afterwards meet with so much 
 that is surprising, offensive, and repulsive that I lay 
 
DOUBT RELIEVED BY LIGHT. 217 
 
 this Gospel aside without satisfaction and encour- 
 agement. I cannot hate this Son of man, but I can 
 just as little trust in him and follow him." 
 
 How delighted I should be if all the doubters 
 of our times were only conscious of this dissension 
 from John's Gospel. I could then hope that Ruckert's 
 beautiful language might be fulfilled in them: 
 
 "What the heart cannot hate, 
 And yet can not let go, 
 Must be loved with full soul, — 
 Pray what else can it do?" 
 
 I can hope of at least those who have gone thus 
 far that they will have the courage to stand in 
 silence a moment, and — alas, how many avoid 
 it to their own injury — call out their doubt from 
 its dark hiding-place, where it stands like a giant, 
 to the clear light. Who knows whether or not it 
 will dwindle into a dwarf when it once appears in 
 clear day-light? Of course, you cannot expect me 
 to answer in a short time even the most prominent 
 objections that are urged against the acceptance of 
 a special saving revelation, only one of whose most 
 important documents we are now defending. Let 
 us confine ourselves to the fourth Gospel, — the 
 Gospel of the Incarnate Logos. I assume that you 
 believe, with me, in a living and personal God, who 
 has revealed himself in nature, and still reveals 
 himself as the highest power, wisdom, and love. 
 But, tell me frankly, what do you then have against 
 a Gospel whose quintessence may be comprised in 
 
218 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 this single expression: "God sent his only begotten 
 Son into the world, that we might believe through 
 him?" Is u only begotten Son" a term offensive to 
 you, at least in the sense understood and implied 
 by the Christian Church? 
 
 But tell me, where do you get the right to re- 
 gard your idea of God as the most proper expression 
 of the highest touch-stone of truth, and instantly 
 reject as absurd what you cannot comprehend? 
 You believe that God is love, but can you think of 
 love without an object; and if you cannot, can you 
 imagine the creation to be the highest and only ob- 
 ject of this love, without being lost in the abyss of 
 Pantheism? But the highest and eternal object of 
 this love, the Son "sent into the world," sounds to 
 you absurd, as the world is so small, and God is 
 so incredibly great. But do you not hold that love 
 to be the highest which bows lowest to the humble, 
 the wandering, and the lost? But as the smallness 
 of this earth seems to be your greatest objection, 
 tell me how many square miles must a planet com- 
 prise in order to be large enough to be a proper 
 scene for the manifestation of God ? s love? 
 
 It is impossible for me, as you easily see, to 
 defend, on the present occasion, the principal con- 
 tents of this Gospel, as well as its authenticity and 
 credibility, against every contradiction. I would 
 only prove, to the extent of my power, that the 
 questions that press themselves upon us in contem- 
 plating John's portrait of Christ, are not of such a 
 character as to compel you to part with your faith 
 
SCEPTICAL OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 219 
 
 in his name; and I would direct your special atten- 
 tion to the fact, that, as soon as you allow your- 
 selves to be scared away from this faith by the 
 incomprehensible character of this picture of Christ, 
 your difficulties will not disappear, but increase. 
 
 Let me present you a proof of this assertion. 
 Take, instead of this Johannean portrait of Christ, 
 some other one which you can much better under- 
 stand, and see for yourselves whether the enigma 
 can be satisfactorily solved. Granted that the prin- 
 cipal person in the fourth Gospel was not the in- 
 carnate Son of God, but a mere man, — sinless, 
 holy, and perfect man. What, a perfect man, — a 
 man utterly devoid of sin! It is contrary to all 
 analogy, to all observation, to all the results of ex- 
 perience, and to our knowledge of human nature, 
 that such a man has ever lived; a completely sin- 
 less man is inconceivable unless we admit a direct 
 operation of God, that is, a miracle, — which the 
 science of our day inexorably rejects. 
 
 I am, therefore, under the necessity of going one 
 step further. The objector says: "I grant that 
 Christ was not absolutely sinless, but that he was 
 excellent, amiable, and religious, or even a religious 
 Genius." I must say that this is exposed to very 
 serious doubts; for this "excellent man" has said 
 such things of himself as would be blasphemous if 
 he were nothing more than man. The nature of 
 true religion is to make men humble, and yet this 
 man is personified pride, which is all the more in- 
 tolerable because he declares that he does not derive 
 
220 THE JOHANXEAX CHRIST. 
 
 his honour from man. This "excellent man" dwindles 
 more and more into a mere phantom, and, if we 
 are to accept the supposition of our opponent, the 
 best that we have in his place is a fanatic, or even 
 an impostor. 
 
 This Jesus, who is regarded by so many as 
 anything else than really God's Son; this Jesus, a 
 few years after his crucifixion and rejection by his 
 own people, produced upon those of his nation who 
 feared God the impression of such an exalted and 
 noble character that they could "call on" his name 
 without exposing themselves to the charge of idol- 
 atry. This Christ was scarcely proclaimed to the 
 heathen world, — a fact which is proved by the 
 rise of Doceticism, the eldest of all the christological 
 heresies, — before he made upon his adherents the 
 impression that he was superhuman. This view of 
 his person as a supernatural, divine revelation not 
 only obtained in the Church, but actually kept it 
 clear of every other; for centuries it afforded a new 
 starting-point for Christian and philosophical thought 
 on the highest and holiest questions of life; and in 
 every step of its course it was victorious, until, — 
 oh, happy discovery of the second half of the nine- 
 teenth century! — negative criticism came up, and 
 declared that all this was the upshot of the literary 
 mystification of a sect! 1 It has been objected that 
 it is difficult to understand the Johannean Christ 
 well; but we who defend this description of Christ 
 
 i "John's Gospel, more than any other, has passed irto 
 the flesh and blood of Christianity." Keim. 
 
SOLIDITY OF CHRISTIAN FAITH. 221 
 
 do not assert that it can be perfectly comprehended. 
 I see that faith has to contend with much obscu- 
 rity, but it is clear to me that unbelief loses itself in 
 a midnight of absurdities, while it becomes entangled 
 in a net of its own ungrounded hypotheses. Do 
 not think that we attach no importance to the prob- 
 lems and questions that continually present them- 
 selves to us when we examine this picture of Christ. 
 To name but one example, as soon as we under- 
 take to fathom the full depth of this one expression : 
 "The Word became flesh," the measuring-line falls 
 from our hands. 
 
 But the advantage which we have over those 
 who fall into the abyss of doubt is, that we have 
 learned to bow our heads, our hearts, and our knees 
 before the revealed mysteries of God, and to repeat 
 the grand sentiment of the great Monod: "I do not 
 understand, but I understand that I do not under- 
 stand." 1 "Our thinking in this department only 
 becomes rational when we cease to think rational- 
 istically."- 2 And when we see by continued study 
 that our faith rests upon a solid foundation, we 
 apprehend, with the obedience of faith, the sub- 
 stance of what the Gospel declares to us. And 
 having thus commenced to found our belief on testi- 
 mony well supported, we do not simply adhere 
 obstinately to a blind faith in authority, — God 
 
 i A. Monod, Sermons, Vol. II. p. 312: The whole of the 
 excellent sermon, The Credulity of Unbelief, is well worthy of 
 being read. 
 
 2 Auberlen. 
 
222 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 forbid! — hut to press forward as far as possible 
 from faith to understanding. It is only in this way 
 that we are gradually permitted to understand at 
 least something of the mystery of God's Son, though 
 we cannot expect to fathom it completely; and, in 
 spite of all the mysteries which we here find, we 
 can always say with a good conscience, that this 
 concealment is infinitely more reasonable, more ac- 
 ceptable, more admissible, and more worthy of God, 
 than everything which men have attempted to put 
 in its place. Of course, no one will ever succeed 
 in making perfectly clear and intelligible the manner 
 in which Deity and humanity are united in this 
 God-man; but is not the relation between our own 
 body and soul also a mystery in many respects? 
 The certainty of the fact of this union is not ab- 
 solutely dependent upon the clearness and correct- 
 ness with which we perceive its manner; and the 
 revelation of "The Life" was none the less majestic 
 and exalted because it has not yet been brought 
 within the magic circle of some fine-spun idea. 
 
 After all, what do w T e perfectly understand? 
 Not to mention the visible world, what is it that we 
 can comprehend as soon as we enter the realm of 
 the supersensuous and the eternal? Did not the 
 Gospel declare, many centuries ago, that "Eye 
 hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered 
 into the heart of man the things which God hath 
 prepared for them that love him;" and should it 
 excite our wonder when our eyes are dazzled by 
 the sun, which, after a long night, comes out in 
 
NO SUBJECT FREE FROM DIFFICULTY. 223 
 
 all its full splendour from behind the clouds? l 
 Must every question of the sick man on the origin 
 and combination of his medicine be answered before 
 he can use it with confidence? And would you 
 regard it worthy of your trouble to say "Lord and 
 Master" to a Christ whom you cannot perfectly 
 comprehend with your small understanding? Not- 
 withstanding all that is mysterious here, do we 
 nevertheless not have so much clearness and glory 
 that the Christ whom we cannot understand is in- 
 finitely above one whom our minds could grasp? 
 Though it is sometimes difficult to believe under 
 such circumstances, I ask if it is possible not to 
 believe at all? 
 
 But we forget too often that it is necessary to 
 stand in the centre in order to gain a clear view 
 of the circumference; we must have an eye for the 
 great and harmonious whole, in order gradually to 
 receive light on each of the particular parts. The 
 mistake of the defective criticism of our times is, 
 that it can separate, but not unite; that it can ob- 
 serve apparent contradictions, but no grand harmo- 
 nies; in a word, that it cannot see the forest for 
 the trees! Thus the atomistic intellectualism, which 
 
 i Dr. Rothe: "To uie, personally, the thought of a mir- 
 acle, in the literal and strict sense of the word, is not an 
 absurdity; and instead of regarding it as a contradiction of 
 the regular order of nature, I would not know how to ex- 
 plain the natural course of the history of our race without 
 it, nor to establish fully that pragmatism of history which I 
 require." See Die Aufgaben des Christenthwns in der Gegen- 
 wart, p. 73. Elberfeld, 1866. 
 
224 THE JOHANNEAX CHRIST. 
 
 cannot ascend the mountain because it is unable to 
 step over the little stones lying in the path, has its 
 deeper cause. "What would my readers think," 
 asks Tholuck, "if somebody had opposed Paul's 
 preaching his 'Christ crucified' by presenting ex- 
 amples of the difference in vinegar, of the crowing 
 of a cock, and of the braying of an ass; and if 
 the Apostle would have thought it proper to enter 
 into an explanation of the relation of affinity between 
 sour wine and vinegar, and the relation of affection 
 between an ass and its mother, and the like ; or if 
 he had looked around to find one of those available 
 spirits who know how to fill up a gap? We think 
 he would have said to the contentious individual: 
 'Man, your hour is not yet come!' " * Oh, thou who 
 hast a hundred times asked: "Is this Christ com- 
 prehensible?", listen for once to this other question: 
 "Can the world dispense with Him, — dispense with 
 Him for ever; can I dispense with Him?" 
 
 Can he be dispensed with? I lay before you 
 and myself, for our serious consideration, this ques- 
 tion concerning the Johannean Christ. In my judg- 
 ment, every truth which we defend in this depart- 
 ment is only of permanent value when it is proved 
 to possess vital power, or at least vitality. In order 
 to answer this question, it will be necessary once 
 more to call up before our intellectual vision this 
 Christ whose picture we have contemplated together; 
 yet not to regard him in contrast with the Christ 
 
 i Glaubwiirdigkeit der ev. Geschichte, p. 461. 
 
THE CHRIST OF MODERN CRITICISM. 225 
 
 of Matthew, of Peter, and of Paul, — for we have 
 already seen that there is an unmistakable unity 
 between their Christ and that of John, — but with 
 that Christ which the negative critics of our day 
 would foist upon us as their Messiah, so far as 
 they regard a Messiah at all necessary. It is of 
 the greatest importance here to distinguish very 
 carefully between the two, so that no one can any 
 longer be of the opinion that the difference is merely 
 of form or representation. 
 
 We must frankly make this statement: The 
 Christ of modern criticism has almost nothing in 
 common, save the mere name, with Him whom the 
 Christian Church has confessed and adored through 
 so many centuries. 1 According to it, he is nothing 
 else than an amiable man, the only one of his 
 class, but neither infallible nor sinless; a friend of 
 women and children, and a preacher of what his 
 heart inspired him with more powerfully than others 
 had been inspired by their hearts ; a worker of mir- 
 acles in part in the imagination of his contempo- 
 raries, and partly by virtue of an extraordinary 
 coincidence of circumstances and by the happy ap- 
 plication of merely natural forces. Though a gift 
 and revelation of God, he was these in no other 
 sense than the lily of the field is in another depart- 
 ment. He was condemned in consequence of a 
 mysterious and almost incomprehensible miscon- 
 ception; he rose only in the eyes and imagination 
 
 i Compare Kollner, Das moderne Christuslild, ein Zeichen 
 unsrer Zeit. 
 
 15 
 
226 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 of his disciples; he was immortal, if, and so far 
 as all men, and especially pious men, are im- 
 mortal; and he is the ruler of the world only so 
 far as he once gave to it an impulse, which is yet 
 perceptible in its vibrations. He is destitute of all 
 personal and immediate relation to his Church on 
 earth; and he does not answer the sinner who 
 cries to him by saying: "Heal thyself," for the very 
 simple reason that he does not hear the sinner 
 at all. 
 
 In contrast with this Christ, whose history the 
 critics of our day have gathered from unreliable 
 sources, I place before you, — as Pilate once con- 
 trasted the Man of Sorrows with Barabbas, — the 
 King, about whom the cloak of derision is placed 
 a second time, and ask you frankly: "Can we dis- 
 pense with Him?" I direct this question to every 
 one of you in particular. I ask the thinking mind, 
 which seeks the key to the grandest phenomenon 
 and also the greatest enigma of modern history, — 
 the Christianity in the world. Can such a Christ in 
 miniature (if you will allow the expression) furnish 
 the slightest explanation, and have we in him a 
 sufficient cause for such a phenomenon? I address 
 this question with increased emphasis to the active 
 conscience. Do you desire anything higher than 
 a divine revelation that declares only the same 
 thing which every well-developed human conscious- 
 ness can tell you? Do you need merely an ideal, 
 — and, perhaps, chiefly an unhistorical one, — in 
 which to reflect, to develope, and to elevate your- 
 
THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST NECESSARY. 227 
 
 self? As the modern Christ is exclusively a moral 
 teacher and a pattern, is he not more unmerciful 
 and severe than Moses, for he places before our 
 eyes an inaccessible height, without enabling us to 
 attain the peak aimed at? Indeed, how can he be 
 simply a moral teacher, as the much- lauded religion 
 of Jesus was inseparably connected with a colossal 
 error, — faith in the supernatural? 
 
 But, above all, I address the same question to 
 your hearts, that are longing for rest. Has not the 
 heart such necessities as can be supplied only by 
 the Christ of the Gospel; and can you dare to 
 trust in him, and to follow and love him as this 
 Gospel enjoins upon us, if he is nothing more than 
 man ? Can you dispense with him who alone 
 brought the Gospel to us, — the Gospel not only 
 of God's superintending care (for that would not 
 have been necessary if our negative critics » are 
 right), but the Gospel of God's pardoning and re- 
 deeming love, which our unresting souls need, but 
 would never have dared to expect if it had not 
 been revealed to us by the Father himself in his 
 Son? I here touch the point which, at the present 
 day, is mostly overlooked, probably just because it 
 stands so plainly before us. If the world had 
 needed a founder of a new religion, such as Moses, 
 Zoroaster, and so many others, it could, at all 
 events, have been satisfied with the Christ of Renan, 
 Strauss, Schenkel, and others. In this event, Jesus 
 of Nazareth would be entitled to only one place in 
 the pantheon of distinguished men; at most in the 
 
 15* 
 
228 THE JOHANXEAN CHRIST. 
 
 lararium of household gods, in which a heathen 
 emperor of the third century, Alexander Severus, 
 placed him with others. But a voice in our hearts 
 declares that we do not need merely a founder of 
 a religion, but a Redeemer and Saviour; a Mediator, 
 who reconciled in himself both matter and spirit, 
 friend and enemy, and earth and heaven; and, in 
 one word, a Light and Life of the world, by which 
 the true life is not merely declared, but revealed, 
 acquired, and restored. 
 
 Take away this Christ of John, indeed, of the 
 whole Gospel of the Old and New Testaments, and 
 what have you left of the entire Scriptures? Nothing 
 more than a collection of the literary products of a 
 mysterious people of antiquity; a disconnected suc- 
 cession of poetical legends, insatiable demands and 
 groundless expectations; and a doctrine of God, a 
 doctrine of virtue and, at the very most, a doctrine 
 of immortality, all of which deserve any other name 
 sooner than that of the Gospel. 
 
 Take Christ away, and what is there left to the 
 Christian Church? If history is worth anything, it 
 proclaims that the Church owes its origin, its ex- 
 tension, its reformation, and its incipient triumph to 
 the Apostolical Christ; that no branch could per- 
 manently bear fruit which was not connected with 
 this Vine, and that faith in a supernatural revelation 
 of salvation was the foundation which supported 
 the divine edifice, the bond which still unites the 
 Christians of all confessions. AYhat becomes of the 
 Church if this foundation be shaken, and this bond 
 
SAD RESULTS OF NEGATIVE CRITICISM. 229 
 
 be broken? Not to mention any other examples, 
 the sect of Theophilanthropists, which arose at the 
 end of the last century, may prove to you that 
 which follows from the very necessity of the case, 
 — that intellectualism and humanitarianism are 
 utterly unable to establish a permanent ecclesias- 
 tical fellowship; for this can rest alone on a com- 
 mon faith in the saving* facts revealed to us. The 
 evidences of decline and death which are fresh in 
 our memory, prove to what sort of excess this mod- 
 ern negative criticism would bring the Church of 
 our Lord; but this truth will only be manifested 
 with perfect clearness when the generation which 
 now lives on the memories and traditions of a faith 
 which it has privately or publicly denied, has dis- 
 appeared from the stage of history, and its place 
 occupied by those who are now trained into a cer- 
 tain kind of greatness by the milk of this new 
 wisdom. It is in this way, by a natural develop- 
 ment of the evil, that not only is all Christian faith 
 in revelation lost, but also all religion of the heart, 
 all vitality of prayer, and all hope of eternal life; 
 and the final result of a Rationalism which, without 
 the slightest warrant, raises the flag of the Christian 
 name above its cargo, can be nothing else than a 
 materialism more or less gross, with its theoretical 
 and practical disasters to the individual, the family, 
 society, the state, and the world. 
 
 Enlarging our circle of observation, take away 
 this historical, Apostolical Christ, and what view is 
 presented to us by modern society and the world? 
 
230 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 I do not conceal my affliction of mind when I pro- 
 pound to you this question, at the end of the year 
 1866, which has inflicted such severe wounds upon 
 us, hut, at the same time, has disclosed unfathom- 
 able abysses to our vision. I do not venture to look 
 into the future; nor do I speak of the special judg- 
 ments with which God has visited, or may visit, 
 Christian nations that ungratefully scorn his high 
 gift; but I merely refer you to something which no 
 one can deny, because it stands plainly before every 
 eye, — to the shaking of the foundation of society, 
 the dissolution of the holiest bonds, the stupor of 
 all moral principles of life, the supremacy of might 
 over right, the politics of mere facts, with its de- 
 moralizing influence in all departments, and the dis- 
 union, excitement and disquiet which men have 
 without knowing the ground for it. In a word, I 
 point to everything which makes our modern society 
 in so many respects a picture of splendid misery- 
 it is burning with fever and is weak; it is diseased 
 and delirious. I lament with you that Christianity 
 has thus far done very little, and is now doing 
 but little, to discharge the high calling of the Good 
 Samaritan by pouring oil and wine into the wounds 
 of this almost hopeless invalid. Yet I ask, at the 
 same time, do you know any other and better rem- 
 edy than this Gospel; and can our age dispense 
 with the Apostolical Christ? Take Him from it if 
 you will, but what will you give it as a substitute 
 for the future? Let a child of these times, the 
 fallen and unhappy Alfred de Musset, answer the 
 
POEM OF ALFRED DE MUSSET. 231 
 
 question by the following poetical record of his cyn- 
 ical scepticism, in which he thus addresses the 
 Saviour : • 
 
 "No more is Thy word my law. A new age 
 Has come, and with it a thirst for new things; 
 Hope's bright picture of the future is gone, 
 And fear, now dethroned, has lost its power. 
 
 Time, the all- devouring worm, hath eaten 
 Thy holy image, hanging on the Cross; 
 The nails are rusty — utterly destroyed — 
 And nothing gives it any more support. 
 
 And yet who can refuse both gratitude 
 
 And wonder when he calmly thinks on Thee? 
 
 I am in a strait, — a stranger to faith, 
 
 And yet unable its charm to resist; 
 
 I would even kiss the earth that bore Thee, 
 
 And which Thy mortal agony hath cured. 
 
 Thy thawing power has touched the frosty earth, 
 And wakened it to joy it never knew; 
 But now it shuts its proud heart against Thee! 
 How can new blood the old heart penetrate? 
 Who can restore the innocence of youth?" i 
 
 Yes, how can young blood flow into the aged 
 heart? I know of only one way, and you also 
 know it well. Do you remember that exquisite 
 poem, "The Golden Legend/' by Longfellow, the 
 American poet? The principal character in it is a 
 
 i The Dutch translation of this poem is by Professor B. 
 ter Haar, of Utrecht, and is in the recent (3rd) collection of 
 his Poems, p. 289. On Alfred de Musset, compare Julius 
 Schmidt, Geschichte der franzos. Litteratur, 2nd Part, p. 282. 
 
232 THE JOHANNEAX CHRIST. 
 
 young prince, who is endowed with everything 
 which usually makes princes the objects of the 
 world's envy. But at heart he is diseased^ languid, 
 and devoid of spirit and hope. Yet it is no wonder, 
 for he is tormented by an obstinate affliction, which 
 is deeply inrooted in his nature, and for which no 
 medicine can be found. He is irretrievably lost, — 
 and yet he may be saved. But it can only be done 
 in one way, which can be revealed to him by a 
 dark oracle. If any maiden can be found who will 
 love him enough to pour out her blood voluntarily 
 for the rescue of his life , and if the blood of this 
 offering be drunk, the unselfish and innocent life 
 will bestow upon him new strength, and he will be 
 perfectly restored. The poet says: — 
 
 "Not to be cured, yet not incurable! 
 The only remedy that remains, 
 Is the blood that flows from a maiden's veins, 
 Who of her own free will shall die, 
 And give her life as the price of yours ! " 
 
 You may read for yourselves in Longfellow how 
 this apparent impossibility was accomplished, how 
 this offering was prepared and presented in the 
 highest sense, and the consequence of it. I now 
 affirm, that this is a striking symbol of the disease 
 of our age, and of its only hope. Our age is 
 diseased, and its spiritual vitality is dying out; there 
 is only one means of bringing new life to its heart 
 now weak and decaying, and of arresting the 
 fatal gnawing of the cancer at its heart. Oh, that 
 
OPPOSITION TO THE HISTORICAL CHRIST. 233 
 
 faith might he communicated to it again, — faith 
 in a love which has voluntarily presented the most 
 precious offering for those who were sick unto 
 death ; that they might find the One, who, influenced 
 hy nothing but mercy, died for their salvation, and 
 yet lives; and that, in this sense, they may again 
 be brought to "eat the flesh of the Son of man 
 and drink his blood." If faith in the most exalted 
 love cannot save this generation, tell me, what can 
 do it? Oh, that we could communicate this faith 
 to all, or to many, or even a single lacerated soul! 
 Yet, this can be done by no other means than 
 faith; and the need of it in our day is on the in- 
 crease. 
 
 If you can unite with me in this sentiment, you 
 cannot long hesitate to answer the last question 
 which I will lay before you. How can our age be 
 brought anew to the Johannean, the Apostolical 
 Christ? I need not here state my reasons for the 
 presupposition which gives rise to this question. 
 I fear that the rent between so-called modern 
 knowledge and Apostolical Christianity was never 
 so general and so deep as at the present day. The 
 voices against the historical Christ that were heard 
 resounding from the philosophical schools during 
 the latter half of the eighteenth century, now reecho 
 from Christian pulpits and in the lecture-rooms of 
 theological professors. There is now preached to 
 hundreds of congregations something that is called 
 by the name of Gospel, by believing which we are 
 firmly convinced that it is impossible to be saved; 
 
234 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 and the doctrines of the Apostles are opposed with 
 increasing defiance under the uplifted banner of the 
 Reformation. There is scarcely a single fundamental 
 fact of sacred history which has not been already 
 referred to the department of fiction; and he who 
 dares to utter a lament at this state of things is 
 told, for the calmness of his soul, that nothing 
 essential has been taken from him, and that he 
 cannot be thankful enough for the inestimable kind- 
 ness. We even see those who formerly enjoyed a 
 very different conviction now hurrying with alarm- 
 ing rapidity down the steep path of negation, as 
 though they would prove the truth of the words: 
 "Whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away 
 even that he hath." 
 
 In a word, the negative critics swear allegiance 
 to a Christianity, and preach it up to others, for 
 which it is utterly inconceivable why they desire 
 special pleas, with and above other religions, as 
 even the intelligent Jew cannot deny that this Rabbi, 
 Joshua Ben Joseph of Nazareth, was an excellent 
 moralist, and should be honored and listened to as 
 a religious genius. Meanwhile, the awful truth of 
 these other words stands out before us: "Whosoever 
 denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father" 
 (1 John h. 23); and many a one who believes no 
 longer in a living God, and regards religion merely 
 as the poetry of conscience, is afraid of ghosts. 
 I often feel very sad when I look in silent soli- 
 tude at the world so sadly unchristianized, and 
 
HOPEFUL VIEW OF THE FUTURE. 235 
 
 my lips sometimes involuntarily utter the touching 
 lament in the hymn of Novalis: 
 
 "Prompted by love, 
 How much Thou hast done! 
 Now past away, 
 And thought of by none!"i 
 
 We ask with a shudder: "Shall this century 
 hasten to its close before a new heathenism, which 
 in many respects is inferior to the ancient, establish 
 its home in Europe, and is the man already born 
 whose pen shall describe the downfall of Christianity 
 and of the Reformed Church of the Netherlands? 
 No, indeed; the evil is not gone thus far, and God 
 forbid that we should ever live to see such a calam- 
 ity! In view of the many gloomy pictures before 
 us, we would not close our eyes to the numerous 
 hopeful indications of our excited age; and it is 
 necessary for us to maintain that hope in which 
 Novalis, just quoted, sang, that, 
 
 "The day will come when my brethren 
 Will again look heavenwards." 
 
 The bold and unblushing appearance of the 
 spirit of denial in our day has its advantages. As, 
 according to Shakespeare's well-known expression, 
 "Yes and No are no good theology," so is this 
 theology evidently declining, and it has in many 
 respects become easier to choose between Yes and 
 
 i See the excellent hymn: "Though all be unfaithful," 
 in the Evang. Liederschatz, by A. Knapp. No. 2067. 
 
236 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 No. Many are beginning to feel more earnestly 
 the value of the Scriptural treasure the more they 
 see it in danger; and, in opposition to the violent 
 assailants, the number of those workmen are con- 
 stantly increasing who, like the Jews on the walls 
 of Jerusalem, are building with one hand and 
 holding the sword with the other. We believe in 
 the Holy Spirit, and are therefore sure that the 
 attempt "to drive the pale phantom of the God-man 
 of John's speculation from the faith of the Church" 
 will surely fail. As long as the spirit of truth 
 does not totally disappear from the Church, it will 
 not suffer itself to be persuaded to renounce gladly 
 the greatest and most important part of the Gospels 
 in order to come to Jesus himself. 
 
 Under such circumstances, what grounds have 
 we for losing the hope that many a one who is 
 now our opponent will shortly become our friend; 
 that there is here and there one who will forsake 
 the Sisyphean labor of opposing such a demon- 
 strative power; and that here and there the future 
 defender is slumbering in the enemy? John's Gospel 
 has, for many, a repulsive and, at the same time, 
 an attractive power; and the Johannean Christ still 
 walks uninjured and unimpeded, as he once did 
 through his opponents who threatened to stone him ; 
 and he is still protected by a better guard than 
 his weak friends. It is impossible for us to sup- 
 pose that he has already spoken his last words to 
 this generation. 
 
 You may ask: How is that abyss to be filled 
 
SELF-KNOWLEDGE AND BIBLICAL STUDY. 237 
 
 up, which, in our day, separates so many from 
 him and his Gospel? I cannot do better than to 
 give you an answer in three expressions. First, 
 we must increase our self-knowledge, which can bring 
 us, and many with us, to a deeper knowledge of 
 our sins, and, at the same time, show us that it is 
 impossible for us to obtain eternal peace through 
 such a miserable Gospel as the negative critics 
 would inflict upon us, instead of the one that is 
 well-known and well-established. Second, our study 
 of the Holy Scriptures, and 'particularly of the Gospels, 
 must be more thorough. Which one of you, possess- 
 ing a priceless gem, would allow himself to be told 
 that he has for years been ornamenting himself 
 with a false stone, without using every means at 
 his command to test its purity and brilliancy? But 
 this spiritual Gospel sheds on you a more dazzling 
 light than the most brilliant diamond. Bring your 
 treasure calmly to the test! We do not fear to try 
 the sacred cause which we defend; our only fear 
 is, that it be not sufficiently tested, or tested in the 
 wrong way. Many a one who does not believe 
 anything, takes the authority of others for rejecting 
 everything, and will not any longer listen to or read 
 anything that may be advanced in favour of the 
 Gospel. I implore you not to follow the example 
 of such lamentable prejudice, but search for your- 
 selves the Scriptures, which contain more traces of 
 inward truth than the most experienced person can 
 prove to you. Your faith must be your personal 
 and independent possession, and, if it be necessary, 
 
238 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 you must have it even at the expense of severe 
 conflict. 
 
 If you have this faith, the chief way for gaining 
 the prize set before you is, third, by a more faith- 
 ful and unflinching confession. We would, indeed, 
 be unmitigated fools if we believed that the prop- 
 ositions of false science can be refuted by this 
 means alone. We cannot overlook the fact, that 
 the conceited contempt with which many, — who 
 swear by their science, and probably the last edition 
 of their own compendium of it, — look down upon 
 a bold and sincere confession of faith , betrays as 
 great a measure of intolerable pride as of secret 
 fear. It is not the critical searching for hypotheses, 
 but the well-grounded testimony of faith, that shall 
 and will conquer the world. People of the Lord, 
 persevere in this testimony, every one according to 
 his own capacity, and especially you whom God 
 has endowed above others with the gift and calling 
 to do it! Will not every evidence of decrease and 
 coldness and weakness in your testimony be regarded 
 as an indubitable sign that those in the Church who 
 were faithful to their confession have lost courage 
 and faith in their doctrines? Woe to us if weari- 
 ness, or obscurity in our words and deeds, should 
 give occasion to our opponents to forge such weapons 
 out of our lamentable course! Happy will we be, 
 ye learned and unlearned, if, in these days of 
 apostasy and conflict, we merit the praise which 
 the same John whom we have considered, has re- 
 corded: "Thou holdest fast my name, and hast not 
 
THE CONFLICT DECIDED BY CHRIST. 239 
 
 denied my faith." There is no more beautiful epi- 
 taph for a confessor of Christ than that which was 
 inscribed on the tombstone of another John, — John 
 Knox: — "Here lies a man who never feared the 
 face of man." 
 
 It is such a testimony as this that I have at- 
 tempted to deliver to you, as we have looked at 
 the signs and necessities of the present day. May 
 He graciously forgive all that is weak and defective 
 who knows that we do not seek our own, but His 
 honor! May the true and the good that are in it 
 be blest for the strengthening of your faith, and, 
 above all, for the glory of His name! I am grate- 
 ful to you for the cheerful interest with which you 
 have followed me to the close. Sometimes I was 
 compelled to tax your attention and indulgence, but 
 you have agreed with me that the cause required 
 it as but few causes can. 
 
 And now let me ask: Who shall speak the last 
 word in this conflict? You well know who speaks 
 the last word of all in every conflict for His truth. 
 May He maintain it in your hearts when my voice 
 speaks no longer; and may He preserve it when 
 we have ceased to meet together! I commenced 
 this lecture with the beginning of John's Gospel. 
 I close with the last words of the Apocalypse, 
 which I now apply specially to the fourth Gospel. 
 They are words of testimony, of the Gospel, and 
 of the Advent in this period of Advent, — in this 
 great Advent of the ages: "I Jesus have sent mine 
 angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. 
 
240 THE JOHANNEAN CHRIST. 
 
 I am the root and offspring of David, and the bright 
 and morning star. And the Spirit and the bride 
 say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. 
 And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever 
 will, let him take the water of life freely ... He 
 which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come 
 quickly: Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus. The 
 grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. 
 Amen." 
 
APOLOGETICAL LITERATURE 
 
 ON 
 
 JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 Schlecker, F. W,— Versuch einer Widerlegung der Einwen- 
 dungen gegen die Aechtheit d. Evang. Johannis. 
 
 Rostock, 1802. 
 
 Van Griethuysen, W. H.— Pro evangelii Joannei authentia 
 dissertatio crit.-theol. Haderwyk, 1806. 
 
 Borger, E. A.— De constanti et sequabili Jesu Chr. indole, 
 doctrina ac docendi ratione s. commentationes de evan- 
 gelii Joh. c. Matth., Marc, et Luc. evangeliis comparato. 
 
 Hague, 1816. 
 
 Stein. K. W.— Authentia Evangelii Johannis contra Bret- 
 schneideri dubia vindicata. Brandenburg, 1822. 
 
 A vindication of the genuineness of the writings of John against 
 Bretsehneider's objections. 
 
 Weber, M.— Authentia capitis ultimi evangelii Joh. hujus- 
 que evangelii totius et primse Joh. epistolse argumentor. 
 internor. usu vindicata. Halle, 1823. 
 
 Crome, F. G.— Probalia haud probabilia. Oder Widerlegung 
 der von Dr. Bretschneider gegen d. Aechtheit und Glaub- 
 wiirdigkeit des Evang. und der Briefe des Joh. erho- 
 benen Zweifel. Leyden, 1824. 
 
 Tholuck, A. F. T.— Die Glaubwiirdigkeit der evangelischen 
 Geschichte, zugleich eine Kritik von Strauss' Leben Jesu; 
 fur theologische und nicht-theologische Leser dargestellt. 
 2nd Ed. Hamb. and Gotha, 1838. 
 
 16 
 
242 APOLOGETICAL LITERATURE ON JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 Frommann, G. C. L. T.— Der Johanneische Lehrbegriff in 
 seinem Verhaltnisse zur gesanimten biblisch-christlicben 
 Lehre dargestellt. Leipzig, 1839. 
 
 Lange, J. P.— On the Indissoluble Connection between the 
 Individuality of the Apostle John and the Apocalypse. 
 Yermisclite Schriften, Vol. II. p. 173 ff. 
 
 Leipzig, 1840-41. 
 
 Thenius, 0.— Das Evangeliuin ohne die Evangelien. Ein 
 offnes Sendschreiben an Herrn Bruno Bauer. 
 
 Leipzig, 1843. 
 
 Ebrard, J. H. A.— Das Evangelium Johannis und die neueste 
 
 Hypothese iiber seine Entstehung. Zurich, 1845. 
 
 Bleek, F. v.— Beitrage zur Einleitung und Auslegung der 
 
 heiligen Schrift: Beitrage zur Evangelien- Kritik; p. 107 ff. 
 
 Berlin, 1846. 
 Luthardt, G. E.— Das johanneische Evangelium nach seiner 
 Eigenthumlichkeit geschildert und erklart. 2 Parts. 
 
 Nuremberg, 1852. 
 
 Niermeyer, A.— On the Writings of the Apostle John. 
 
 Verhand. van het Haagisch Genootschap tot Verdediging der 
 
 christ. Godsdienst, Vol. XIII. 1852. 
 
 Costa, Isaac da,— De Apost. Joh. en zyne Schr. 
 
 Amsterdam, 1854. 
 Mayer, G. K. — Die Aechtheit des Evangeliums nach Jo- 
 hannes. Schaffhauseu, 1854. 
 Ebrard, J. H. A. — Johannes der Apostel: Art. in Herzog's 
 Real-Encyclopcedie, Vol. VI. pp. 722—737. 
 
 Stutt. and Hamb., 1856. 
 
 Steitz, G. E.— Pascha, christliche und Pascha-Streitigkeiten: 
 
 Art. in Herzog's Real-Encyclopmdie , Vol. XI. pp. 149 
 
 _169. Stutt. and Hamb., 1858. 
 
 Van Oosterzee, J. J.— Het Leven van Jesus. 2nd Ed. 
 
 Vol. I. pp. 127—156. Utrecht, 1863. 
 
 Astie, J. F.— Explication de l'Evangile selon Saint Jean. 
 
 Paris, 1864. 
 The Preface presents the special reasons for selecting John's 
 Gospel to meet the religious wants of the day ; and the Introduction 
 argues in favour of the authenticity of this Gospel against recent ob- 
 jections. 
 
 Weizsacker, C. H.— Untersuchungen iiber die evangelische Ge- 
 schichte, ihre Quellen und den Gang ihrer Entwickelung. 
 
 Gotha, 1864. 
 
APOLOGETICAL LITERATURE ON JOHN'S GOSPEL. 243 
 
 Godet, F.— Commentaire sur l'Evangile de St. Jean. 2 vols. 
 
 Paris, 1865. 
 An excellent apologetical work. 
 
 Thekius, Otto.— Das Evangeliuin der Evangelien. A Letter 
 to Dr. Strauss. Leipzig, 1865. 
 
 Teschendorf, C. — Wann wurden unsere Evangelien verfasst? 
 
 Leipzig, 1865. 
 
 English Translation: When were our Gospels Written? 
 
 London 1866, and New York, 1867. 
 
 Zockler, 0.— Die Evangelien-Kritik, etc., p. 33. 
 
 Darmstadt, 1865. 
 
 Fisher, G. P. — Essays on the Supernatural Origin of Chris- 
 tianity. Ch. II. : The Genuineness of the Fourth Gospel, 
 pp. 33—152. New York, 1866. 
 
 Hase, C. A.— Vom Evangelium des Johannes. Eine Rede an 
 die Gemeinde. Leipzig, 1866. 
 
 Riggekbach, C. J.— Die Zeugnisse fur das Evangelium Jo- 
 hannis neu untersucht. Basle, 1866. 
 
 Steinmeyer, F. L.— Die Wunderthaten des Herrn in Bezug 
 auf die neueste Kritik. Vol. I. Berlin, 1866. 
 
 The Raising of Lazarus, pp. 197—210. 
 
 Uhlhorn, G. — Vortrage tiber die modernen Darstellungen 
 des Lebens Jesu. Lecture III. pp. 69—103. 3rd Ed. 
 
 Hanover, 1866. 
 English Translation. Boston, 1868. 
 
 Jonker, H.— Het Evangelie van Johannes. Bedenkingen 
 tegen Scholten's Hist. krit. onderzoek. Amsterdam, 1867. 
 
 Luthardt, C. E.— Apologetische Vortrage iiber die Grund- 
 wahrheiten des Christenthums: Die Evangelien, etc., 
 pp. 210-225. 5th Ed. Leipzig, 1867. 
 
 Schulze, L. T.— Vom Menschensohn und vom Logos; ein 
 Beitrag zur biblischen Christologie. Gotha, 1867. 
 
 Diehl, J. C— 15 Nisan ook volgens Johannes de Sterfdag 
 van Jesus. Thiel, 1868. 
 
 Grau, R. F.— Zur Einfiihrung in das Schriftthum neuen 
 Testamentes: On the Peculiar Nature of John's Gospel, 
 and its Importance for the Church of the Present Day, 
 pp. 183-234. Stuttgart, 1868. 
 
 Groot, Hofstede de,— Basilides als erster Zeuge fur Alter 
 und Autoritat neutestamentlicher Schriften, insbesondere 
 des Johannesevangeliums. German Ed. Leipzig, 1868. 
 
 16* 
 
244 APOLOGETICAL LITERATURE ON JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 Guericke, H. E. F.— Gesammtgeschichte des neuen Testa- 
 ments ; oder neutestamentliche Isagogik. Der historisch- 
 kritischen Einleitung ins N. T.: Aechtheit des Evange- 
 liums Johannis, pp. 170—205. 2nd Ed. 1854; 3rd Ed. 
 
 Leipzig, 1868. 
 
 Compare also the Introductions to the Commentaries on 
 
 John's Gospel by Olshausen, Ebrard, Tholnck, Liicke, 
 
 Meyer, and especially by Lange (Bibelwerk) : Das Evan- 
 
 gelium nach Johannes. 3rd Ed. Bielefeld, 1868. 
 
 Robinson, E.— The Alleged Discrepancy between John and 
 the other Evangelists respecting our Lord's Last Pass- 
 over. Biblioiheca Sacra, Vol. II. pp. 405—435. 
 
 Andover, 1845. 
 
 Grimm, C. L. W.— On the Gospel and First Epistle of John 
 as the Work of One and the Same Person. Studien und 
 Kritiken, Part I. Gotha, 1847. 
 
 Weitzel, K. L.— The Fourth Evangelist's Testimony of 
 Himself. Studien und Kritiken, Part III. p. 578ff. 
 
 Gotha, 1849. 
 
 Stuart, M.— Exegetical and Theological Examination of 
 John I. 1—18. Bibliotheca Sacra, Vol. VII. pp. 13—53 ; 
 281—327. Andover, 1850. 
 
 The Logos of St. John. Journal of Sacred Literature and 
 Biblical Recorder, Oct.No. London, 1856. 
 
 Stowe, C. E.— The Four Gospels as we now have them in 
 the New Testament, and the Hegelian Assaults upon 
 them. Bibliotheca Sacra, Vols. VIII. pp. 503—524; IX. 
 77-108. Andover, 1851—52. 
 
 Abbot, E.— On the Reading "Holy Begotten God" in 
 John I. 18, with Particular Reference to the Statements 
 of Dr. Tregelles. Bibliotheca Sacra, Vol. XVIII. pp. 840 
 —872. Andover, 1861. 
 
 Groot, Hofstede de,— The Antiquity and Authenticity of 
 John's Gospel according to External Witnesses before 
 the Middle of the Second Century. Waarheid in Liefde, 
 p. 593 if. 1863. 
 
APOLOGETICAL LITERATURE ON JOHN'S GOSPEL. 245 
 
 The Most Ancient Traditions on our Four Gospels. Revue 
 Chritienne, Dec. 15. Paris, 1863. 
 
 Bonifas, J.— Sur l'humanite de Jesus-Cbrist selon l'Evang. 
 de St. Jean. Bulletin Thiol, of the llevue Chretienne, 
 Dec. No. Paris, 1864. 
 
 Lewis, T.— The Regula Fidei; or, the Gospel of John. 
 American Presb. and Theol. Revietv, Vol. II. pp. 46—63. 
 
 New York, 1864. 
 
 Recent Literature on the Gospels. British and Foreign Evan- 
 gelical Review, Jan. No. 1864. 
 
 The Genuineness of the Fourth Gospel. British and Foreign 
 Evangelical Review, April No. 1864. 
 
 Modern Criticism on St. John's Gospel. London Quarterly 
 Review (Wesleyan). July No. London, 1865. 
 
 Graf, E.— The Authentic Features and especially the Por- 
 traitures of Character of the Fourth Gospel. Der Be- 
 iceis des Glaubens, Vol. I. pp. 435—502. 
 
 Giitersloh, 1866. 
 
 Graf, E.— Ueber die Aechtheit von Joh. Cap. vn, 53— vm, 11. 
 Vierteljahrsschriftfur deutsche und englische Theologie,Yo\. III. 
 pp. 152—179. Published by Dr. M. Heidenheim. 
 
 Zurich, 1866. 
 
 Groot, Hofstede de,— A Witness of the Longest-Lived 
 Apostle as the First Witness of the Antiquity and 
 Authority of the Books of the New Testament, together 
 with other Witnesses thereon before the year 138. 
 Waarheid in Liefde, p. 449 ff. 1866. 
 
 Mombert, J. I. — The Origin of the Gospels. Bibliotheca 
 Sacra, Vols. XXII. pp. 353—384; XXIII. 529—564. 
 
 Andover, 1866. 
 Paul, L.— The Time of the Lord's Supper according to 
 John. Studien und Kritiken, Vol. II. p. 362 ff. 
 
 Gotha, 1866. 
 
 Zockler, 0.— On the Importance of Miracles in Nature and 
 
 History. Der Beweis des Glaubens, Vol. II. pp. 65—85. 
 
 Giitersloh, 1866. 
 
 Cramer, J.— Is the Fourth Evangelist an Historical Drama? 
 
 Bydragen op het gebied van godgeleerdh. en wijsbegeerte, 
 
 p. 204 ff. Rotterdam, 1867. 
 
 Groos, F.-On the Idea of Judgment {y.Qiais) John. Studien 
 
 und Kritiken, Part. II. Gotha, 1868. 
 
246 APOLOGETICAL LITERATURE ON JOHN'S GOSPEL. 
 
 Antiquity of the Gospels.— North British Review, Vol. IV. 
 p. 347. 
 
 Historical Criticism on the Gospels.— British and Foreign 
 
 Evangelical Review, Vol. XII. p. 515. 
 John the Evangelist.— American Biblical Repository, Vols. III. 
 
 299 ff.; VII. 440 ff. 
 The Gospel of John.— Princeton Review, Vol. III. p. 569. 
 The Gospel of John.— Kitto's Journal of Sacred Literature, 
 
 Vol. II. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 ABSURDITY, of the idea of a 
 perfect man, 219. 
 
 Acta Pilati, appealed to by Justin 
 Martyr, 52. 
 
 Acts of the Apostles, effects of 
 loss of, 4. 
 
 Age, the present, materialistic, and 
 has no sympathy for John, 15. 
 
 Alexandrine MS., proof, from, 
 that the brook of The Cedars 
 is identical with the Brook 
 Cedron, 37. 
 
 Alexandrine Philosophy, not bor- 
 rowed by John, 41, 42. 
 
 Alogi, the, denying the authen- 
 ticity of John's Gospel, yet not 
 on historical ground, 51, 52. 
 
 Apocalypse, the, of Johannean 
 origin, and unchallenged by 
 negative criticism, 31. The 
 name of "The Theologian" 
 early given to the writer, 31. 
 The fundamental features cor- 
 respond to John's Gospel, 31, 
 32. Used as a special weapon 
 against the authenticity of 
 John's Gospel, 45, 46. Nier- 
 meyer's prize-essay on it and the 
 Gospel of John, 46, 47. 
 
 Christ's divinity as set forth 
 in it, 47, 48. A Tubingen 
 leader's denial of its super- 
 natural character, 47. Thenius, 
 cited on it, 47. Opponents of 
 the authenticity of John's 
 Gospel cannot procure then- 
 weapons from it, 48. Closing 
 verses of it, cited, 239, 240. 
 
 Apologetical Lectures, not super- 
 fluous, 1. The thought of 
 delivering them long indulged, 
 5. Difficulties, 5. Dangers 
 of superficial treatment, 5. 
 Design, 7. More positive than 
 polemic, 7. 
 
 Apologetical Literature on John's 
 Gospel, 241 — 246. 
 
 Apostolic Epistles, worth of, 4. 
 
 BAHRDT, an opponent of Chris- 
 tianity, the subject of Goethe's 
 wit, 119, 120. 
 
 Basilides, the Gnostic, regarding 
 and quoting John's Gospel as 
 authentic, 52. 
 
 Bleek, a defender of the authenti- 
 city of John's Gospel in Ger- 
 many, 13. 
 
248 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Boehme, Jacob, 40. 
 Bretschneider , continuing the 
 
 opposition to John's Gospel in 
 
 Germany, 12. 
 Bunsen, quoted, 118. 
 
 CAIAPHAS, the high-priest in the 
 year of Christ's death, 35, 36. 
 
 Cerinthus, regarded by the Alogi 
 as the author of the fourth 
 Gospel, 51, 52. 
 
 Character, often presenting differ- 
 ent sides and points of view, 
 66. Multiplicity of it in Goethe, 
 Luther, Augustine and Paul, 6 7. 
 
 Christ, life of, the central point 
 of modern conflict; its great 
 importance, 3. His divinity 
 set forth in the Apocalypse, 
 47, 48. His teaching, different 
 at different times, but never 
 contradictory, 68, 69, Decla- 
 rations on his sufferings and 
 death, 76 — 78. His last evening 
 83. Character of diversity be- 
 tween the Johannean and the 
 synoptic Christ, 84,85. John's 
 account of the beginning of 
 Christ's incarnate life estab- 
 lishes the synoptic accounts, 
 85 — 87. Objection to duration 
 and scene of his public labors, 
 on the ground of difference be- 
 tween the Johannean and syn- 
 optic accounts, stated and 
 answered, 87 — 89. No con- 
 tradiction between the Johan- 
 nean and synoptic Gospels on 
 conduct of Christ toward friends 
 and enemies 89 — 91. Design 
 of Jews to murder him, 91, 
 92. No difference between 
 John and the synoptic evan- 
 gelists concerning the day of 
 his death, 95. His miracles 
 
 in John's Gospel, 121 — 130. 
 Disposition in 2nd century to 
 depreciate his divine character, 
 209. Union of his divinity 
 and humanity as presented in 
 John's Gospel, 213, 214. 
 
 Christianity, its supernatural ori- 
 gin proved by Pauline Epistles, 
 9. A phenomenon related to 
 the whole history of the world 
 and reformatory of it, 164, 165. 
 
 Church, the, relying on John's 
 Gospel till A. D. 1792, 54, 55. 
 The view of Christ's divine 
 character prevalent in the early 
 church, 220. Its history and 
 existence dependent on Chi*ist. 
 228, 229. 
 
 Church Fathers, accounts of the, 
 of John, 28. Acquainted with 
 John's Gospel, 52, 53. 
 
 Claudius, Matthew, cited, 116; 
 on Christ's character, 214,215. 
 
 Codex Sinaiticus, testimony from, 
 on 'John xviii. 1, 37. Proof 
 from it, that the Brook of 
 the Cedars is identical with 
 the Brook Cedron, 37. Its 
 Value, 37. 
 
 Coincidence, remarkable, between 
 John's language and that of Je- 
 sus in John's Gospel; a result 
 of their intimate relations, 80. 
 
 Colani, formerly endorsing John's 
 Gospel, 97. On the kind of 
 Christ now needed, 181, 182. 
 
 Confession, orthodox, must be 
 more faithful and unflinching, 
 238, 239. 
 
 Conti, Augustus, cited, 41. 
 
 DA COSTA, a Christian apolo- 
 gist, defends the authenticity 
 of John, 13, 117. 
 
 Doceticism, 220. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 249 
 
 Doctrinal system, difference of 
 Christ's, in John's Gospel no 
 argument against its authen- 
 ticity, 79. 
 
 EBRARD, 13, 34, 58, 110. 
 Enon, John's baptizing in, 36. 
 
 Josephus' silence on it, 36. 
 Eschatology, absence of, in John's 
 
 Gospel used as a sceptical 
 
 objection. 78. 
 Evangelists, accounts of the first 
 
 three, on the life of Jesus 
 
 completed by John, 117, 118. 
 Evanson, founder of opposition 
 
 to John's Gospel, 12. 
 Ewald, defends authenticity of 
 
 John's Gospel, 13. 
 
 FAITH, the Christian, founded 
 on testimony, 221, 222. 
 
 Falsarius, imposture of, 18, 30. 
 
 Faust, Goethe's, 179, 180. 
 
 Faustus, the Manichzean, an 
 opponent of the credibility of 
 the Gospels on the ground of 
 supposed discrepancies, 113, 
 114. 
 
 Feeding of the Multitude, mira- 
 culous, 142, 146. 
 
 First Epistle of John, authenti- 
 city of, acknowledged, 31. 
 Its harmony with the fourth 
 Gospel, 31. Doubted by the 
 Tubingen school, 51. Identity 
 of authorship with the fourth 
 Gospel, 51. Its authenticity 
 attested by Papias and Poly- 
 carp, 51. 
 
 GNOSTICS, the, of first half of 
 2nd century acquainted with 
 John's Gospel, and using it ; 
 as of Apostolic origin, 52. 
 
 God, revelation of, in nature, 217. 
 
 God-man, Origen the author of 
 the term, 203. The difficulty 
 of understanding the union of 
 Deity and humanity in the, 222. 
 Can we dispense with the God- 
 man, 226, 227. 
 
 Goethe, a many-sided character, 
 66. His raillery against Bahrdt, 
 119, 120. Faust cited on the 
 1st verse in John's Gospel, 
 179, 180. 
 
 Gospel History, importance of 
 the credibility of, 3, 4. Apos- 
 tolic origin indicated by John 
 himself, 18. 
 
 Gospels, effects of loss of, 4. 
 Their internal proofs, 7. 
 
 Greek Church, 9. 
 
 Greek Language, more spoken 
 than Hebrew in Jerusalem in 
 the Apostolic Age, 40. 
 
 Groot, Hofstede de, on external 
 evidences, 56, 57. 
 
 HAGUE Society for the Defence 
 of the Christian Religion, prize- 
 essay of, 46. 
 
 Hase, a German defender of the 
 authenticity of John, 13, 83, 
 212. 
 
 Healing of the Nobleman's Son, 
 miracle of, 138 — 140. 
 
 Hengstenberg, on value of Essays 
 and RevieivSf viii. 
 
 Herder, 10. 
 
 Historical Representation, differ- 
 ence of, in John's Gospel and 
 the synoptics, no proof against 
 the authenticity or credibility 
 of the former, 85. Objections 
 stated and answered, 85 — 99. 
 
 Holland and Germany, contest 
 on John's Gospel not confined 
 to, vii. 
 
250 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 IGNATIUS, of 2nd century, ac- 
 quainted with John's Gospel, 
 52. 
 
 Impotent Man, miraculous heal- 
 ing of the, 140—142. 
 
 Intellectuality, not always con- 
 fined to higher classes, 40. 
 
 Invention of Christ's divine char- 
 acter more incomprehensible 
 than historical reality, 210. 
 
 Irenagus, citing John's Gospel 
 over sixty times, 53. 
 
 JOHANNEAN Christ, the church 
 never recognizing conflict be- 
 tween the synoptic and, 61. 
 Difference between him and 
 the synoptic Christ owing to 
 different circumstances and 
 purpose, 67 — 70; 84, 85. 
 Treated at length, 177 — 240. 
 Objections on the ground of 
 sudden and complete appear- 
 ance as a heavenly pheno- 
 menon, 184, 185; answered, 
 186—190. Both his origin 
 and character more than hu- 
 man, 186—190. Sceptical 
 objection that he is only the 
 Logos in a human body, 193, 
 194; that he is exalted above 
 all human emotion, 194 — 196. 
 Did not possess double con- 
 sciousness, 204. His human 
 emotions, 195. His divinity 
 revealed in his humanity, 196, 
 197. His human development, 
 198—200. TheGod-man,203. 
 The invention of him morally 
 impossible, 212. Internal evi- 
 dences of the truth of John's 
 account, 212, 213. Compre- 
 hensibility of him, 215 — 217. 
 Difficulties increased by re- 
 jecting him, 218, 219. The 
 
 alleged difficulty of understand- 
 ing him, 220, 221. How can 
 our age be brought anew to 
 him?, 233—239. 
 
 John the Baptist, record of, 
 more majestic in John's Gos- 
 pel than in the synoptics, 80 ; 
 explanation, 81. 
 
 John the Evangelist, self-testi- 
 mony of, 17. His purpose in 
 his Gospel, to keep in the 
 background, 17. His char- 
 acteristics, 18. Culture and 
 intellectual development, 29. 
 Energetic Boanerges char- 
 acter, 30. Harmony in all his 
 writings, 30 — 32. Acquaint- 
 ance with him from tradition, 
 32. Impression received on 
 reading his Gospel, 32. Per- 
 sonality, 40. His love for 
 Christ, 40. Compatibility of 
 the ideas found in his Gospel 
 with his origin, 40. Residence 
 in Ephesus, 41. His knowl- 
 edge of Greek, 41. His a- 
 doption of the philosophy -of 
 his day, 41. Illumination, 42. 
 His design in his Gospel, 42. 
 His Picture of Christ funda- 
 mentally the same as that of 
 Peter, Paul, and all the Apos- 
 tles, 42 — 44. His perception of 
 Christ's supernatural character, 
 44. He calls Christ The Word 
 as Paul calls him The Son, 
 44. His elevated christological 
 representation met with in 
 Paul's writings, 44. His har- 
 mony with Peter and Paul, 
 44, 45. Essay of Niermeyer 
 on the difference in his writ- 
 ings, 46, 47. Coincidences de- 
 clare the same author, 46. 
 Recent works upon his writ- 
 
INDEX. 
 
 251 
 
 ings, 47. His expressions not 
 borrowed from the Alexan- 
 drine philosophy, 42. His love 
 for the Master alone sufficient 
 to prevent him from misrepre- 
 senting him, 82. His acquaint- 
 ance with the first three Gos- 
 pels, 102. Assumption of their 
 acquaintance by others, 103 — 
 105. Does not make the im- 
 pression of a writer of ro- 
 mances, but of an eye-witness, 
 210. 
 John's Gospel, J. P. Lange cited 
 on, 1. History of the growth 
 of opposition to it, 12, 13. 
 Opposition commenced by 
 Evanson, an Englishman, 12. 
 Authenticity defended by Ger- 
 man theologians, 13. Cause 
 of mistrust, 14. Old weapons 
 only used in opposition to it, 
 14,15. The opposition partisan, 
 16. The author a Jew living 
 in Palestine at the time of our 
 Lord, 19 ; acquainted with and 
 cites from the Old Testament, 
 19; acquainted with the 
 Alexandrine Translation and 
 original Hebrew text, 19 ; with 
 Galilee, Judea and our Lord, 
 19; speaks as an eye-witness, 
 19; his alleged animosity to 
 the Jews, 1 9 ; friendship for 
 Jesus, 2 1 ; vividness and mi- 
 nuteness of his description, 22, 
 23 ; importance of his chron- 
 ological indications, 23, 24; 
 must be sought in the Apos- 
 tolic circle, 24; proofs dis- 
 covered in the language, 25, 
 26; he is John, the son of 
 Zebedee, 27, 28. Internal 
 proofs in the 4th Gospel, of 
 John's authorship of it, 28, 
 
 from the synoptic accounts 
 and Paul's epistles, 28. Silence 
 of John a proof of his au- 
 thorship, 30. Harmony with 
 the First Epistle of John ; the 
 authenticity of the latter not 
 being denied, 31. Agreement 
 of the Prologue of 4th Gospel 
 with the Apocalypse, whose 
 Johannean authorship is un- 
 challenged, 31, 32. Objections 
 based on historical, geograph- 
 ical and statistical mistakes, 
 refuted, 34; cannot outweigh 
 the proofs, 34 ; found in doubt- 
 ful passages, 35 — 39; their 
 unimportance, 39 ; important 
 ones adduced, 39, 40 ; the phi- 
 losophical introduction of the 
 Gospel, 40; its philosophical 
 color, historical material, and 
 doctrinal character, 40 ; John's 
 use of the Logos, 42; its il- 
 logicalness, 42. Design of John 
 in it, 42. His picture of Christ, 
 the same as that of the other 
 Apostles, 43 — 45. The super- 
 natural character of Christ, 43. 
 Objections on account of the 
 miraculous deeds and expe- 
 riences of our Lord, 45. Un- 
 authenticity alleged from dis- 
 similarity between the Gospel 
 and the Apocalypse, 45 — 47. 
 Importance of the last two 
 verses of John's Gospel, 50. 
 Authenticity not doubted in 
 the 2nd century, except by the 
 Alogi, 51,52. Cited by Irenoeus, 
 53. First quoted under his 
 name about A. D. 180, 53. 
 More threatened at the pres- 
 ent time than ever before, 
 56. Comparison of John's 
 Gospel with the others, 62. 
 
252 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Its doctrinal idea and histor- 
 ical representation compared 
 with those of the first three. 
 63. Objections on the ground 
 of its mystical character, 72. 
 Parentheses very important, 
 82,83. Omissions no argument 
 against authenticity or credi- 
 bility^ — 94. Conclusions from 
 silence, 93, 94. Account of 
 clay of Christ's death, in har- 
 mony with the synoptics, 95, 96. 
 Formerly endorsed by Reville 
 and Colani, 97. Authenticity 
 not vitiated by the controversy 
 in the church of the 2nd cent- 
 ury concerning proper time 
 of celebrating the Passover, 
 98. Not polemical, 101. Plan 
 and purpose explain the rea- 
 son of difference between it 
 and the synoptic Gospels, 102, 
 103. Supplementing the syn- 
 optics, 104—108. The fruit 
 of deep impression, 105. Not 
 of a Gnostic tendency, 109. 
 If an imposture, why not dis- 
 
 ^ covered and punished?, Ill, 
 112. Authenticity opposed by 
 Lutzelberger in 1840, 113. 
 Accounts of Christ's miracles 
 in, 122. Point of view in look- 
 ing at the miracles of Christ 
 corresponds with its purpose, 
 122 — 125. Called a Gnostic- 
 Christian romance by Bruno 
 Bauer, 135. Not a forgery, 
 207. It is the gospel of the 
 appearance of the Son of God 
 in truly human flesh, 208. 
 Alleged unreasonableness, 216. 
 Apologetical literature on it, 
 241—245. 
 
 Josephus, silence of, on Edon, 
 
 Junius, Experience of Prof. Fran- 
 cis, 177 — 179. 
 
 LANGE, J. P., cited, on the 
 sublimity of John's Gospel, 1. 
 On Christ's miracles, 176. 
 
 Lavater, on John's portrait of 
 Christ, 210. 
 
 Lazarus, the raising of, 148 — 
 154. 
 
 Logos, of John, the Christ of 
 Moses and the Prophets, 20. 
 Difference between Philo the 
 Jew's and John's idea of the 
 Logos, 41. The same in John's 
 Gospel as in the other Gospels 
 and Paul's Epistles, 42. The 
 Christ of John and of the 
 other Apostles, especially of 
 Paul, alike in import, 42, 43. 
 John's purpose in his Gospel, 
 42. Objections against John's 
 use of the Logos, 42. Idea 
 of the Logos influencing Pa- 
 tristic literature of 2nd cent- 
 ury, 54, 55. 
 
 Longfellow, Golden Legend, 231 
 — 233. 
 
 Lord's Prayer, objections to, 
 cited and answered, 75. 
 
 Liicke, a defender of the au- 
 thenticity of John, 13, 190. 
 
 Lutzelberger, notion of, on the 
 author of John's Gospel, 25. 
 His theory against the authen- 
 ticity of John's Gospel, 113. 
 
 MARRIAGE at Cana, the mir- 
 acle at the, 134 — 138. 
 
 Martyr, Justin, acquainted with 
 John's Gospel and the doctrine 
 of the Logos, 52. 
 
 Mendelssohn, Moses, 40. 
 
 Messianic Character, Christ's de- 
 claration of his, 76, 7 7. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 253 
 
 Metaphor, use of, in John's Gos- 
 pel, 71. 
 
 Meyer, on John's Gospel, 17 7. 
 
 Miracle-phobia, 14. 
 
 Miracles, the real stone of scep- 
 tical offence, 45. Christ's, 
 enumerated in John's Gospel, 
 122: the marriage at Cana, 
 134 — 138; healing of the 
 nobleman's son at Capernaum, 
 138 — 140; healing of the im- 
 potent man, 140 — 142; mir- 
 aculous feeding of the multi- 
 tude, 142—146; healing of 
 the one born blind, 146 — 148 ; 
 the raising of Lazarus, 148 
 — 154. Not in conflict with 
 all nature, but only with that 
 
 . with which we are acquainted, 
 158. Definitions, 159, 160. 
 Possibility, 157, 160 — 162. 
 Resurrection of Christ, 167 
 — 170. Delicate psychological 
 characteristics of their truth, 
 170. By opposing Christ's 
 miracles we should have to 
 accept greater, and even ab- 
 surdities, 172, 173. Historical 
 faith in them not of itself 
 saving, 174, 175. The Jo- 
 hannean, become clear when 
 regarded as Christ's natural 
 beams upon the world, 183, 
 184. 
 
 Monod, 221. 
 
 Muratorus , mentioning Luke's 
 Gospel as the third, and John's 
 as the fourth, 53. 
 
 Musset, poem of Alfred de, 231. 
 
 NATURALISM, modern, cause 
 of opposition to John, 15. 
 
 Negative Criticism, the great 
 mistake of, 222, 223. Its 
 Christ has nothing in common 
 
 with Him of the Christian 
 church, 225, 226. 
 
 Niermeyer, defends authenticity 
 of John, 13. His Prize Essay 
 on the difference in the Jo- 
 hannean writings ; his conclu- 
 sions, 46, 47. 
 
 Nobleman's Son, miraculous heal- 
 ing of the, 138 — 140. 
 
 Novalis, 235. 
 
 OLD Testament, picture of Christ 
 in, as supernatural, 191,192. 
 
 One Born Blind, miraculous heal- 
 ing of the, 146—148. 
 
 Origen, author of the term God- 
 man, cited, 203. 
 
 Orthodox-phobia, a past evil, 14. 
 
 PANEGYRICS, on John's Gos- 
 pel, 59. 
 
 Pantheism, cannot be avoided if 
 we do not accept the object 
 of divine revelation, 218. 
 
 Papia3, bearing witness to the 
 authenticity of the 1st Epistle 
 of John, 51. 
 
 Parables, none strictly in John's 
 Gospel, 70; purposely avoided 
 by John, 71. 
 
 Passover,controversy in the church 
 of the 2nd century concerning 
 the time of the celebration of, 
 no argument against the au- 
 thenticity of John's Gospel, 
 98, 99. 
 
 Patristic Literature of the 2nd 
 century, influenced by the idea 
 of the Logos, 54. 
 
 Paul, Epistles of, proving John's 
 characteristics, 28. Reiterat- 
 ing one of John's expressions, 
 43. His harmony with John's 
 picture of Christ, 43, 44. 
 Their similarity with John in 
 his elevated christological rep- 
 
254 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 resentations, 44. Different in 
 his different Epistles, 67. A 
 witness with the other Apos- 
 tles to Christ's resurrection, 1 67. 
 
 Peter, authenticity of 2nd Epistle 
 of, 18. His harmony with John 
 on Christ, 44, 45. 
 
 Philo, Logos of, below that of 
 John, 41. 
 
 Pierson, 10. 
 
 Polycarp, bearing witness to the 
 authenticity of the 1st Epistle 
 of John, 51. 
 
 Postscript to John xxi, Johan- 
 nean origin of, 50. 
 
 Pressense, 33, 111. 
 
 QUADRATUS, testimony of, to 
 Christ's miracles, 165. 
 
 Quartodecimani, the, appealing 
 to John and his fellow-Apostles, 
 98. 
 
 RATIONALISTS, allegorical in- 
 terpretation of John's mention 
 of numbers, 23. 
 
 Renan, influence of his Apostles, 
 3. Adherence to John, 16, 
 17. Failure of his Life of 
 Jesus increases John's sym- 
 pathizers, 16. 
 
 Revelation, supernatural char- 
 acter and dignity of the Book 
 of, 47. Opposed by a Tu- 
 bingen leader, 47. Remark 
 of Thenius on it, 47. 
 
 Resurrection of Christ, miracle 
 of the, 167 — 170. 
 
 Reville, formerly endorsing John's 
 Gospel, 97. 
 
 Rothe, on miracles, 161, 223. 
 
 Ruckert, 217. 
 
 SALOME, the mother of John, 
 29. 
 
 Samaritan, a, alleged to be the 
 author of John's Gospel, 113. 
 
 Sanhedrists, the party of. 20. 
 
 Sceptical Criticism, will not tri- 
 umph in case John's Gospel 
 is proved unauthentic, 9. Con- 
 trolled by unsound philosophy, 
 1 4. Grouping figures and veri- 
 fying dates, 1 5. Hopelessness 
 of its victory, 15. 
 
 Sceptical Objections to doubtful 
 passages in John's Gospel, ex- 
 plained, 35 — 46. The expres- 
 sion Caiaphas "being the high- 
 priest that year" (John xi. 49), 
 35, 36 ; "John was baptizing 
 inEnon, near to Salim" (iii. 23), 
 36: Jesus' visit to Bethesda 
 (v. 2), 36; the Brook of the 
 Cedars (xviii. 1), 37. Ex- 
 amples of doubts becoming 
 proofs of authenticity, 38. Sus- 
 picion excited by Sychar being 
 called Shechem by John, 38; 
 by the words attributed to the 
 Sanhedrim (vii. 52), 38, 39. 
 The expression "The Word 
 was made flesh," 43; alleged 
 impossibility of John being the 
 author of both the Apocalypse 
 and the Gospel, 45 — 48; that 
 the New Testament contains 
 two pictures of Christ: the 
 synoptic and the Johannean, 
 60,61; that there is direct oppo- 
 sition between the fourth and 
 the other three Gospels on 
 Christ, 64 — 66; alleged mys- 
 tical character of John's Gos- 
 pel, answered, 72 — 73. Ob- 
 jection to John's Gospel on 
 the ground of eschatology, re- 
 futed, 78, 79: to the duration 
 and scene of public labors of 
 Jesus on the ground of differ- 
 
INDEX. 
 
 255 
 
 ence between the Johannean 
 and synoptic accounts, 87 — 89; 
 that the object of miracles as 
 stated in first three Gospels is 
 different from John's object, 
 126; that John recordedChrist's 
 miracles in a concrete form to 
 make an ideal truth intelligible, 
 128, 129? to Christ's miracles 
 as narrated by John, 134—176; 
 that miracles are inconceivable, 
 155.156; impossibility of mir- 
 acles, 157, 160 — 162; that 
 miracles are incapable of proof, 
 162, 163; that the Johan- 
 nean Christ is a supernatural 
 being appearing suddenly as a 
 heavenly phenomenon, 186 — 
 190; Christ is merely the Logos 
 in a human body, 193 — 194; 
 that the Johannean Christ is 
 exalted above all human emo- 
 tion, 194 — 196; that John's 
 Gospel is unreasonable in pro- 
 portion to its supernatural 
 character, 216; that Christ 
 was only a perfect man, 219; 
 that Christ was only a re- 
 ligious genius, 219, 220; that 
 the Johannean Christ is diffi- 
 cult to understand, 220, 221. 
 
 Schleiermacher, causing the pref- 
 erence of John to the other 
 Evangelists, 60. 
 
 Scholten, 13. 
 
 Scriptures, the integrity of the, 
 dependent on Christ as des- 
 cribed in them, 228. Study 
 of them must be more tho- 
 rough, 237. 
 
 Self-knowledge, must be increased, 
 237. 
 
 Second Epistle of Peter, authen- 
 ticity of, 18. 
 
 Spinoza, 40. 
 
 Strauss, on relation of John to 
 the Synoptic evangelists, 11. 
 Two Lives of Jesus by, 12, 
 13, 206. 
 
 Subjects, common, difficulty of 
 understanding, 222, 223. 
 
 Sychar and Shechem, identity 
 of, 38. 
 
 Synoptic Gospels, introduce John 
 as a friend of Jesus, 29. 
 
 Synoptic Evangelists, silence of, 
 on Lazarus, 153. 
 
 Syriac Translation, oldest of the 
 New Testament, included John's 
 with the other canonical Gos- 
 pels, 53. 
 
 THE Cedars, brook of, proved to 
 be the Brook Cedron, 36. 
 
 Thenius, Otto, 47. 
 
 Theophilanthropists, a sect of the 
 18th century, 229. 
 
 Tholuck, on notion of Christ in 
 the Greek church, 9. On 
 John's critics, 37, 38. On 
 Paul's preaching, 224. 
 
 Tischendorf, on John, 49. His 
 work: When were our Gos- 
 pels Written?, more derided 
 than refuted, 49. 
 
 Translator's Preface, the, i — x. 
 
 Trench, observations of, on the 
 miracle at the Marriage at 
 Cana, 135, 136. 
 
 Tubingen School, on the Pauline 
 Epistles, 9. Its criticism on 
 John, 13. Attack on the au- 
 thenticity of John's Gospel by, 
 13. A member of, opposes 
 the Revelation, 51. 
 
 UHLHORN, Lectures on the 
 Modern representations of the 
 Life of Jesus, 149. 
 
256 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 VALENTINIAN, Gnostic school, 
 
 109. 
 Van Oosterzee, sketch of life, 
 
 theological opinions and works 
 if, i— vii. His Preface to the 
 
 Dutch Edition, quoted, viii, ix. 
 
 His prefatory letter to the 
 
 Translator, xi — xiv. Life of 
 
 Jesus cited, 18, 87, 96, 105. 
 
 150, 155. 
 Vogel, sceptical objections of, to 
 
 John the Evangelist, 57. 
 
 WAARHEID in Liefde, Dutch 
 Theological Review, 57. 
 
 Walking on the Sea, miracle of, 
 143. 
 
 Weitzel, on John's self-testimony, 
 28. 
 
 Weizsacker, on authenticity of 
 John's Gospel, 19. 
 
 Whedon, an American commen- 
 tator, on the mother of Jesus, 
 136, 137. On the raising of 
 Lazarus, 152. 
 
 ZAALBERG, on John's Gospel, 
 
 205. 
 Zebedee, sons of, 25, 28, 29. 
 Zockler, on sceptical objections 
 
 to John's Gospel 188. 
 
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 John's Gospel: apologetical lectures. 
 
 Princeton Theological Seminary-Speer Library 
 
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